Scene #8840:

Owner	Pose
Petra Soroka	PHONE: Timespace Riders \| Woz says, "I appreciate it. I will do my best to elucidate her without letting my emotions get the better of me." PHONE: Phoning Timespace Riders, Petra Soroka says, "No, like-- I don't think you should have to. I mean, I'm glad you... care, to, but..." PHONE: Phoning Timespace Riders, Petra Soroka says, "I mean. For a lot of reasons, I'd rather that fall to... me? I don't even think you could, honestly. Not in a way that wouldn't freak her out." PHONE: Timespace Riders \| Woz says, "In this time period, there is a pattern that I notice, when it comes to people like us. But it matters not. Thank you, Petra, for your friendship with us." PHONE: Phoning Timespace Riders, Petra Soroka says, "... I don't really know what you mean by 'like us'. But... I mean... yeah." PHONE: Phoning Timespace Riders, Petra Soroka says, "I've got a lot to, you know, make up for." PHONE: Phoning Timespace Riders, Petra Soroka says, "Yeah. I'll, um... I'll talk to Meika sometime. And see if I can't figure something out." PHONE: Meika Kirenai says, "Nothing to- to fuss over or- yeah. I can be wherever, is all I mean. Nobody's going to care." PHONE: Phoning Meika Kirenai, Petra Soroka says, "Oh, yeah. I think... well, yeah, the point is just that, yeah." PHONE: Phoning Meika Kirenai, Petra Soroka says, "Er-- I don't want to jumpscare you, so, like... I talked to Woz. But I'm not-- like, I'm not your fucking dad, I'm not going to be scolding you or anything." PHONE: Meika Kirenai says, "Talked to-" PHONE: Meika Kirenai says, "Oh. Okay." PHONE: Meika Kirenai says, shakier, "... Of course he'd- R-right." PHONE: Phoning Meika Kirenai, Petra Soroka says, "He didn't. I asked. I-- I kind of feel like everyone's been super weird at you about the whole, Woz, thing. And the... broader... thing. It's always fucking something with the people here." PHONE: Phoning Meika Kirenai, Petra Soroka says, "So, uh, yeah. Didn't want to... like, hide, what I was going to talk about, because it seems like that'd be bad? Sort of telling you that you should be on edge every time, since I could be hiding something at any time? I don't really know." PHONE: Meika Kirenai says, "Oh. That's-" A long, uncomfortable pause. "Y-yeah. I- I appreciate you saying what it's-" PHONE: Meika Kirenai parrots, delayed and quiet, "Broader..?" PHONE: Meika Kirenai says, "Ah- um, don't worry about... Nevermind." PHONE: Phoning Meika Kirenai, Petra Soroka says, "Well, like-- yeah. I mean, you get it." PHONE: Meika Kirenai says, "I- I guess, maybe. I-" A shaky exhale. "... Talk more when it's face to face, then..?" PHONE: Phoning Meika Kirenai, Petra Soroka says, "... Yup, yeah. See you later." And so, somehow, Petra Soroka, known homophobe, unchosen of space, who shouted slurs in the broadband a mere year ago, who spent years, and even up through the present and future, self-flagellating over her inability to accept, understand, and empathize with queerness, is now in the position of sitting down and talking with a younger Elite about homophobia. Even doing it while being one of the very few people that Meika knows is gay-- for her continual, embarrassing failures to hide it, rather than the defiant stance that Woz and Sougo took. And certainly being the only person that Meika can both know that fact about, and still call a friend. Petra has no idea how to deal with it herself, frankly. She's more shocked than anyone, at being in the position of a 'queer elder', to literally anyone at all. But tomorrow comes whether you expect it to or not, and everyone's got to grow up sometime, right?
Petra Soroka	Petra's mental model on how to treat this interaction can only be interpreted from her own forays into bigotry, even though she knows they don't map quite right onto Meika. For one, she knows Meika genuinely doesn't understand-- while Petra was always terrible by choice; the presence of a proper backstory widens the gap even further. Still, there's a few tactical choices she knows she can make here: First off, privacy, but not imprisonment. The castle of Quicknest has positive associative feelings, and is near the warpgate for an easy way 'out', but none of the indoors areas feel quite right. Outdoors, then, on one of the upper levels of the semicircular terraced gardens, but not on the very top layer so that there's still a curved retaining wall to not have to see the whole cityscape stretching out to every side. Second off, activity. Having something to provide direction for vision and gestures, providing filler in an uncomfortably pressured conversation, whether it's karaoke, a meal, a zoo--, helps. When Meika comes up the stone and wrought-iron stairs to the upper gardens, Petra has abandoned the picnic table she'd been sitting at before, to fuss over the small swarm of ratbots carrying supplies up to the terrace. Some carry dishes in their fancy covered platters (since that's what's available in the castle), still warm from the kitchen given that they were lifted straight up and out the window, and the castle is right besides the gardens. Others carry far more inscrutable objects-- metal platforms, conveyor belts, seemingly random pipes and colorful rails, even things like disassembled wrecking balls, all stuck haphazardly to the bottom of her little tiny robots. "Oh! Hey, Meika. You don't-- need to mind all this. Except for the sandwiches, I mean, if you want, I had the bots make a bunch since I didn't know what you'd want. Or, I mean, what I'd want, either. But yeah, um--" Petra winces a bit, suddenly uncertain if she's coming across as too careful. She fidgets, starting to reach for a cigarette by habit and then second, third, fourth-guessing herself, and awkwardly doing nothing at all for a few seconds instead. "Yeah. We're cool. I mean. Not like that was in question. Fuck."
Meika Kirenai	It's starting to sink in, bit by bit, with every trip out past her city's familiar warpgate, that it hardly matters at all for anyone whether Meika Kirenai is around at all. In the wake of a Temptation fight, and the window it provides that no further danger will come, for just a little while, the purposelessness of her presence around the familiar streets hangs heavy in the humid early spring air. Days still slip their way out past her fingers, and whatever line she's crossed to get her youngest sister, her father, her mother, to barely even look at her isn't something she knows how to double back across. There's room to breathe in it all- but it's scary, too, when ice is so thin you can feel it bend and buckle beneath you. Paralyzing, option-stealing, like on that beach, in front of everyone, enough to choose to spill a friend's blood in the hopes it'll freeze the layers thicker, enough to worry someone else's bouncing will crack her last foothold, too. By the time Meika's hung up on the call, her feet are already moving one after another towards-- anywhere but here --the warpgate, and Quicknest's castle, once through it. She doesn't register the pain of her fingernails, in balled-up hands, digging deep enough into the skin of her palms to risk bruising and torn skin. With how heavy the eyes and ire of strangers feel weighing down on her, it's a shock how little of it releases stepping foot into a city freed from its own inhabitants, empty streets and pathways save for unthinking robots. She still feels like absolute shit- And, at the grounds and gardens, awkwardly waving to her friend, it's clear she looks how she feels- that ever-present jacket is wrapped around her, still, but her usual uniform has been replaced by worn-out black jeans, awkwardly loose, and a grey athletic tee tee with a drying bloodstain still on her side from the night before. She said there'd been a fight, a bad one. With that and the bags under her eyes, it's clear she hasn't been home between then and now. "Mind? I- okay. I won't." It's easy to respond on autopilot, with the sinking bit of dread in her stomach- but even easier, when it's just empty words as she stares out at the ant-like columns and formations of busy little ratbots, something less than excited but more than curious. Her own steps up the pathways to convene are uncomfortably muffled and silent, a mismatch to her words, and her having put no other effort into evading detection. "What are they making..?" Stepping just to the side of the pathway, nearer the picnic table, Meika does an odd little move, with her hands clasped around her bag's shoulderstrap- a three-sixty degree turn, looking out at her surroundings. The senses she'd prefer to rely on don't work as well on their own, when there's open vistas and overlooks like this- and she lets out a silent little gasp, as if she hadn't even noticed the view, even if it's only part of what'd be visible from a higher level of the terraces. "Sandwiches," Meika finally parrots, drawing attention away and back to the robots, as she opens up the cloche one is carrying. "What types are-" She cuts herself off, and grabs one she recognizes, already biting into it. Egg salad is easy, good, and familiar- if also in theme for this new annexation of the Eggman Empire. After a second, and a guilty expression flashing over her face, Meika wipe her lips on her sleeve, and braces.
Meika Kirenai	"... 'We're cool'. That's the- you're supposed to say it after, everything." She winces, worried- ambiently, mostly, but more and more so. She rocks on her heels, slow. "... I know you said you weren't going to- to scold, or something. but..." "What's there even to say? I'm- I guess you already know all of what happened, and stuff, so it's just-" Another bite. "I don't know." Try as Petra might, it's hard for her not to be on the recieving end of a tone built more for use against school counselors. Somewhere in her small, worried motions, Meika's found herself seated at the picnic table, finally. "I guess what I- what I mean to say is, I'm listenening, or whatever."
Petra Soroka	Meika looking like shit is expected; Meika being bloodstained is a bit worse than Petra expected. Giving her a little wave back as Meika comes up the steps, Petra hesitates for a second, gripped immediately by the problem-solving impulse: offer her new clothes, or laundering, or some rest at the castle. She suppresses that urge by recalling her own attitude when showing up to places in this state-- the jacket really completes the image, even if it's a totally different kind-- and decides to hold the offer until after the talk. In some ways, every meeting starts from scratch, by Petra's interpretation. There's always the gut assumption that someone's going to point out how visibly miserable you are, since it's not like you're not aware of it, when you're this deep in the hole, and that preemptively sets up a defensive posture. Petra told Meika what she was here to do, so she'll stick to doing that, rather than trapping her into some other offer of 'fixing' her attitude in some way. "Nah, I mean, like... 'we're cool' as in..." Seeing Meika wince spikes Petra's anxiety about this conversation-- she's not good at this kind of thing at all, and Lilian will be really upset at her if she fucks up. That compounds with the worry that, of course, visibly being worried about the conversation to Meika, and acting more tentatively because of that, dramatically increases the likelihood that Meika will react negatively, feeding back into the cycle. "I mean, like-- there's not wrong answers, I mean. You're not going to say something bad and I'll, like, freak out and say something pretentious and swish my scarf around before disappearing." She didn't actually hear about Woz doing that, she just knows him well enough to imagine. Then, repeating something she said while fighting the Hermit-- not intentionally calling back to the line, but maintaining the sentiment, "I'll still be your friend after. So say whatever you want.)]")] Nerves jittery, Petra giggles a bit when a thought jumps to her mind, saying it out loud before she can reconsider it. "No one's going to judge! I mean, like, you know how I stop anyone from mind reading around me? That means God can't judge you for anything you say here, either! So it's totally private." The idea that Petra's aura severs her from heaven in a more literal sense than she already considered it to do is funny enough that she can't get it out of her head, and the smile on her face back-justifies itself into making her more confident. Then, gesturing down at the colorful assembly of metal and machines that the robots are swarming around, "So, like-- you know how hard it is to think of stuff to actually do with all this space? And all this money, and everything. It's not like I want to sit around and get lazy or anything, and even if there was any government running to do, I wouldn't want to do it. So-- so, have you ever imagined..." Petra, with the absolute most earnest expression on her face, turns to Meika and leans her hand on the picnic table intently. "Making a cool obstacle course to run through? I feel like, everyone thinks about it, at some point. But it's like, you never get a chance to really do it. One of those, like-- there's those game shows in Japan, right? Some over the top, kind of dangerous thing to run around in. I got to do it in Lilian's world, recently, so I just-- it's fun, right?"
Meika Kirenai	Surrounded by the sprintime castle garden and the swarms of ratbots, idyllic and kind of ridiculous, is not the kind of situation the Meika of a year ago could even picture. As flowers and motion catch her attention, or the overlook view itself, it sours, a little, to think backward or think forward at all. Trying not to just makes it unavoidable. The magical girl shifts how she's seated, one elbow resting on the tabletop itself, facing in-line with the attached bench so she can hug one knee close to her chest. A closed off, nervous posture- but when hasn't that been normal for her? The sandwich and its opened-up cloche don't take much notice, for now, even after that first bite. "... We're cool." She parrots, once more. "I'm- w-well, I'm here to talk. Like you said. And I get it, that you're not just going to..." A shrug, and a halfhearted miming of the scarf flip. The motion stops, dead and still, awkwardly and achingly, as her following words echo over the memory of their parallel. "Yeah. You said that before, right..? That I'd still be able to call you that." Another little admittance that she does, unfortunately, regardless of however much or little as she'd like to, remember everything from the Hermit incident. The pained look that flashes across her eyes, as her fingers squeeze tightly together, and drive bloodflow out of their tips, says as much as she hushes up. In the quiet moment after Petra's somewhat-joking claim, the wave of worry- furrowed eyebrows, shifting gaze, and uncomfortable posture -that comes over the magical girl as she mulls over the idea is quickly followed up by its opposite- an uncomfortable ease. Quietly, she unlaces her fingers from hugging a knee up to her chest, and sits back a bit. She's breathing deeper, but it's silent, as is her lowered foot tapping against the ground. {"Oh. Okay. I guess He wouldn't be able to, huh? It's totally private."} The slip into her whispering is yet another little odd relaxation, as one-sided as it is, her speech still sounds just a bit calmer and steadier. There's no logical reason to believe Petra. It's not like she even properly does- she's just choosing to take that at face value, anyway, as desperate as it is to feel the need to stick by a silly joke. {"There's still answers you don't like, right? Or else we wouldn't be talking. I don't know what you're going to say, even if you won't hate me."} Probing, more than challenging, her own uncertainty still easy to see. She raises a wrist to cover cough- it's the first time she makes a real, proper noise at all in over a minute, and after it, she's back to not using her whispered words. "... It seems like a lot to care for. I don't even- I don't even know what I'd do with a house, and you've got to..." She gestures outwards with the half-eaten sandwich. A bit of the ease still sits in her demeanor, now, as guilty as it's sure to make her feel later, being happy to feel shielded from God's oversight. Not yet, though. "Obstacle courses?" "We used to make little mountains and towers out of gymnastics mats, for- for running through like that, in gym and some of the less serious off season practice meets. I know the stuff on TV is a lot wilder, but..." Lensing it with the sort of past experience and topics Meika sees as painfully out-of reach makes it hard for her to match the earnest interest Petra is exuding. She finally manages a little growing giggle, at best. "Are you going to make one? Really? I- you really could, right..?"
Petra Soroka	"Yeah. You said that before, right..? That I'd still be able to call you that." Petra pauses for a second at that, but it's not clear whether she's surprised, and if she is, it's not clear whether it's because she's worried for or about Meika remembering. After unsticking from that thought, she just nods and says, "Yeah." Whether there's answers Petra dislikes... the expression she makes is oddly guilty, similarly to Meika's. She keeps her hand on the table and straightens up a bit, pacing around in a quarter circle at the corner of the table while running her fingers along it. While she's figuring out how to answer, it actually seems like she's the one worried about being graded by a counselor instead. "... I, uh... yeah, to get serious about it..." Petra slowly eases herself into the seat opposite Meika, then plucks a sandwich away from a ratbot to draw the silence out for a bit longer. She takes a bite, then finally breaches the subject matter by explicit name and focus, wobbling her head back and forth. "People used to get on my case about doing that, a lot. Feeling that way about... Sougo and Woz, and... well, some others." Rather than dancing around it, Petra takes a breath and bracingly exhales. "It was a whole thing. Me being kind of..." The words don't come easily to her. "Shitty about gay people. And everyone here is sort of..." This one is even more difficult, especially with the cultural context. "... woke? So it became thing thing of, it being totally acceptable for people to dunk on me for it, and then for anything else, too." "And, I mean that all sucked, but the worse part was that I totally did hurt people and totally did deserve it." Petra leans back and raises her arms up and behind her head, and the intense itching radiating off of her constantly softens somewhat. "So I've got some responsibility to stick up for my friends, right? As someone who's hurt them before, in the same way. But I've got some to you, too, I think." Petra gets through that segment like she's finishing a marathon, then scarfs down the rest of her sandwich all at once. Shifting around on the bench to work out some of her nervous energy, she turns sideways to look out at the robots setting up the obstacle course nearby the castle. "Honestly, like, I live in a little studio apartment. I don't know why I'd want anything bigger. This all is-- I wouldn't know what to do with a house. I'm just me; I kind of spend almost all the time out of the house, anyways? So... yeah! Obstacle course." The bots, working collectively and without needing typical human organization to their building, haven't put together a coherent outline of the obstacle course yet. Segments of it, completed to varying degrees (ranging from 'a single bouncy platform set down in the middle of nowhere' to 'three-quarters done with metal skeletons of structure being filled in'), are scattered all around, but it's possible to imagine what it might look like eventually. Petra looks down at it for a bit, watching a series of ratbots carry what is definitely a bunch of buzzsaws over to the construction site. "It's hard to know what to do with the freedom to do anything, all for myself. I don't really like it."
Petra Soroka	Petra sighs, then stays turned to the side, propping her foot up on the bench to slouch. "God, I fucking suck at this. I'm not good with my words. But everyone else has been kind of shitty and avoidant and just hoping that they're not going to have to be the one to say anything to you, because they want someone else to do it, or they want the problem to just magically go away, or they want it to blow up badly enough that they don't have to worry about being careful towards you and can just be freely mean without having anyone judge them. So I'm really just, actually, going to cut all the bullshit because I don't know any other way to do it." She slides her feet down forwards, angling directly towards Meika, and then-- doesn't know what to do with the position of her hands, or the angle of her posture, and fidgets a bit. "So we both know that it's normal to be like that, to-- or, I mean, that it's not normal, to be gay. And-- I don't know jack shit about theology, so I don't mean like that, but like... there's sort of a way that 'normal' exists collectively in everyone, and you know what it is. And it's not that." "And for a lot of people, that's enough to just know it's bad, too. There's not even... any reason for them to think about it; it's animal instinct to them. But sometimes it's like upholding one side of a contract? Like, uh... bargaining with the idea of 'normal', so that people can see that you're acting a little closer to it." Petra finally pulls back, having settled past her fidgeting into a leaned-forwards rant. Distracted and a little dazed by slipping into that level of philosophy, she falls quiet while pulling out a cigarette and lighting it, offering one to Meika. Softer, more casually, she adds one last bit. "So I just want to know your thoughts about why, I guess. What it means, to you, that you said what you did to Woz and Sougo."
Meika Kirenai	Each paced part-circle around the table's end, as Petra thinks, is tracked in small motions by Meika's all-too-harsh stare. Even when her eyes don't point right at the other girl, her stillness betrays that she's focused, with vision or otherwise. Meika tenses up, and doesn't relax, once Petra seats herself again, but at least it's an excuse to face another way. As Petra's explanations start, the magical girl she's sitting across from mouths some of the more unfamiliar words, topics, and ideas soundlessly. It's close to just repeating and asking- but in a way she isn't interrupting for, and just doing a half-close job at shaping out ideas further from context. Occasionally she isn't so quiet about it. "Acceptable to... be mad at people for-" That in particular feels alien to Meika, that there'd be such a departure in motive from what she'd expect and be used to, a reversal of consequence for actions. It's probably not the best way to internalize it, first, as niceness being a way to avoid flak, but it's good at rattling her loose enough right now to not know what defenses to field. "... I thought... maybe people hated you like they do because you- you were one of..." That admittance is followed by a guilty wince, like she just stepped on an unseen bug. She doesn't apologize with more than a glance and a shrunk-back expression, though. Awkwardly, Meika keeps scratching at her arms through the sleeves of her jacket, a familiar motion even without the other girl's aura of skin-itching irritation. Once Meika notices she's even doing it, she sticks her hand into her jacket's pocket, to keep it busy. "You deserved it..?" It's only a bit later, distracted by thoughts, distracted by the busy robots, that the hand winds up back out, clutching tight to a mango-shaped keychain- it makes the itching worse for Meika to think about it, and there's utterly no chance for her to overhear anything from it, but it's a comfortable object to hold and feel a fraction less alone. It's a transmuted habit from doing the same with a crucifix, or quietly running through her rosary, with that EGO gift. Meika's shoulders rise, and fall, as she takes another silent breath. "People are being... careful?" There's genuine confusion in her voice. With a few notable examples of knowing for sure, one way or another, it lends even more growing discomfort to thinking back on past interactions with just about everyone- at least out here, everywhere that isn't what she's used to. "Why?"
Meika Kirenai	Meika's fingers dig their nails into palms, around the clutched keychain. If they want anything to magically go away, they'll just have to sit tight and wait. They don't have to do anything, and they'll be happy. Eyes fix on the cracks and grain lines of the picnic table, tracing them to fix on anything else, as her shoulders tremble. She only relaxes, just barely, to hook the keychain's loop around her index finger and reach out to take the offered cigarette. 'So I just want to know your thoughts about why, I guess.' That's the moment that words stop coming without being whispered. Clarity still comes from sound that looks, at least, like it's originating from mumbled words around a cigarette, without the coarseness of smoke and tension. {"I told Woz. He and Sougo were just saying all of that, right there, in front of Drop, in front of Spot, in front of Kayoko and everyone. It's..."} {"They're my friends, sort of. I was hoping they'd be able to take a way out, to not make anyone be..."} Her boot squeaks against wood, resting up on the bench in front of her. Actual sound. She jolts, like she's surprised. {"... If it was just a joke, people wouldn't be more mad. If it was a joke, people wouldn't hold it against them, or say anything worse about them, or anyone who was... around them."} She looks ashamed. {"I get it. I messed up. I don't-"} It's harsh and weird for her whispering to hit the same cutoff her speech does, and it mirrors her expression, again driving fingernails into her own palms, with balled-up hands. {"They're saying things anyway, right? Whatever... contract, or bargain, it's just making it worse for-"} Sharp. Again. {"I didn't know what else to do. I don't know what to. It feels impossible, and everything's already falling apart."}
Petra Soroka	Being told, to her face, that Meika thought everyone hated Petra because she was gay should hurt-- and it does, flinching, in the beat after the implication lands. But after a brief wince-- the impact of being seen, judged, and marked Other-- it mostly drains away, and before Petra can quite put a name on the feeling that replaces it, it shows on her face as a snort and a small smirk. "Well. You know, that's true too. But that's kind of a more complicated thing, and it's not super important right now." Petra, needing a moment to collect and analyze her thoughts (for her own purposes, entirely irrelevant to Meika), takes a few drinks from her water bottle with her eyes closed. This isn't really somewhere she can feel comfortable, since it's a foreign furry kingdom in which she's a hostile occupant, but with the outdoor air and the sound of construction, she can at least feel in control. And that's probably more important, given the topic of conversation. "Yeah. I deserved it. I was way shittier than you, to people I cared about-- I mean, Sougo and Woz specifically, even. As fucking rabid as people got to dunk on me, it's hard to really, like, argue that they shouldn't have been doing it; they should've been worse." Petra drums her fingers on the side of her water bottle, unfocused for a moment. Does it make sense to use herself as a cautionary tale while also being the one giving Meika advice? Is Petra even really in a position to make these kinds of judgements about the severity of familiar failings? It doesn't really matter for the moment, but she's going to stress about it. "You're not that fucked yet. You're figuring weird shit out. I'd kind of prefer that you don't ever actually deserve that kind of hostility, since like, like I said, I've sort of got a responsibility to them too." Letting Meika whisper out her feelings, Petra falls silent and mostly thoughtful. Her eyes wander away from Meika's shortly into the explanation, and she repositions herself to be lounging semi-sideways on the bench with her knee kicked up, smoke trailing away from her lips as she opens them idly and tilts her head back to stare at the sky. Meika's answer is, basically, perfect. In terms of reducing her own responsibility, she scores every point she could get, from trying to protect the pair of boys from harmful external forces that she herself feels threatened by, to feeling guilty and alienated and horrifically stressed. It's so proper of a reason that I barely feel like I can understand it at all. "... So your sister, and..." Petra isn't entirely clear on the nature of the cherubs, but understands the nature of an omnipresent oppressive panopticon well enough, "The church, and stuff, they were right there watching. And they've got some power over you, so you've got to perform a bit to their standards or get hurt or-- like, you know, judged as an outsider and a failure. And because you're really familiar with them having power over you, you instinctively felt like they had the power to hurt Sougo and Woz too, and tried to give them a way out." Petra sighs, and flicks her spent cigarette away as hard as she can, sending it sailing off the terrace. A laser-equipped ratbot spins around in the air along an axis that isn't quite level with the planet's surface, then charges up and blasts it into powder in midair. "And, you know, right now, no one's got the power to. Not listening in, not knowing anything you're feeling, not hurting you for anything you say. And when there's nobody and nothing else, when Earth is just a little glimmer of light in the distance, you just start feeling guilty for it all, right?"
Petra Soroka	Petra lets that sit for a long stretch of silence, unless Meika starts looking distressed (more than default, at least). Her thoughts are somewhere else, thinking about the near-soothing escape from the world that jail was for her, as if a million mental muscles relaxed at once. It was never as simple as 'Earth' for her issues, but Meika's are far more one-sided; a clean cut example of a girl who's merely suffering for the situation she's in, and would be fine if not stuck in it for so long, rather than burdened with ontological evil. Petra's a little jealous in a way, after hearing her explanation. Vaguely, Petra hopes that the empty kingdom and prickling security of her aura has a similar effect on Meika. As the thought crosses her mind, she opens her mouth without considering her words too hard. "Do you want to just apologize? To them? Like, call them up while you're here, around no one, and not being watched in any way. It won't be awkward, I promise, they're actually pretty sweet. I could cover my ears or whatever if you want." Petra sighs, already regretting the words a bit. "Only if you want to, obviously. And it's okay if you don't, or can't want to, or just want to want to. I just mean, it's a little building block you could put back together right now, so that everything's not falling apart so much. Not everything."
Meika Kirenai	"Oh. It's not important right-" A pause, in her reflex-parroted comment. "... It's not? Even if that's part of..." Half-looking glances don't elucidate why Petra seemed to find it funny, at first. Meika's sure to look away, to be clearly occupied focusing on something else, be it the table's wood-grains, the grass, the sway of the trees as they catch the breeze, or just empty points in space her eyes can point towards. "Oh. Should've been..." Meika's never caught wind in a way she understood, beyond the rambles of other Paladins Chevaliers, in the flared-up worries that happened each and every time she'd brought up Petra's name on the radios, of why Petra deserved that treatment. She didn't see it herself. It's hard to imagine-- not because she can't try, can't picture it, but because it feels damning-by-proximity --that one of the only people in this or any other world she's been to Meika would call a friend, is worthy of that endless ire. The 'yet' in Petra's assurance stands out, like the one red object in a greyscale-stylized film. "I don't want to be. I- I don't want to, either." Meika says, hurried and quiet, like it's something obligatory to confirm, like it's not the baseline assumption. Figuring out..? The magical girl isn't really sure whether to take the slighty-relaxed posture Petra takes up, mulling over her whispered words, as a good sign. She can't tell, and she doesn't ask. While Petra stares up at the sky, Meika stares at her, watching quietly for indication- as if it's a seperate thought-processing level to continuing to talk. As still as a gargoyle in the moments after that's done, after her words have been said, she's painfully slow to uptake motion again, to indicate acknowledgement to the other girl's response, and to blink unfocused eyes back from feeling dry. 'Power to hurt' is a phrase Meika nearly flinches at, hearing Petra utter. Every further little word, of the other girl's view of her reasoning, makes her stomach drop. No, that's not what I said. Maybe they'd get hurt, or... The magical girl stays silent for a good long while. Eyes trace the path of the flicked cigarette, and fix in place towards the spot midair that the ratbot evaporates it. Meika absentmindedly pulls off a piece of her sandwich, and tosses it towards that same spot, curious if the robot will turn it to dust too. {"Why are you saying it like that? Like they're bad, or dangerous. I didn't want things to go bad for Sougo, for Woz, but that's not..."} Quietly, examining the nail marks in the palm of her hand, Meika turns her palm side to side, catching it in the overhead sunlight. Her expression is tense, like a water balloon filled up to bursting with noxious acid. {"It's just how it's supposed to be, Petra. They'd be doing what's-"} She goes still, and closes up her posture on the bench. Her knees are in towards her chest again, like she's trying to be smaller and smaller. {"It's not like I'm not a failure. They'd be right to say that. They'd have been right to be mad at me, at them, or..."} She squeezes herself even smaller.
Meika Kirenai	{"I don't like that. But that's something that's wrong with me, right?"} Meika busies a hand by tapping out the ash of her own cigarette. It doesn't register to her where any of it falls, even as the tobacco haze permeates her. {"Yeah. Here's different."} Despite the resigned agreement that's laced like poison into her whisper, it takes a little while for there to be any shift in Meika's expressions and demeanor. Petra's silence helps. A small glance, moments later, softer, conveys a light bit of the thanks she feels for the pause. {"... Guilty for it all."} She repeats, scratching at the skin of her forearm. {"... I guess. But that's not really different, sort of. It's hard to think."} The background haze is even more tangible in her voice, when she stops whispering. "... Isn't that nice to think about? Being seen or heard or anything, all of that so- so out of mind, and distant..." No matter what she thinks while saying it, the slight glaze of indirect dismissiveness keeps the sentiment at arms reach. It's not like she can avoid that forever, right? "Do I want to-" A slow blink. A bit of ash from the cigarette she's holding falls on her finger, and burns, ever so slightly. "I don't want to. But- but I should. It'd be easier if they... were mad, or- or angry. But Woz already even said, I'm- I'd still be welcome, around them, and..." "It's not fair, that they're kind, that they're... sweet, and I-" She's slightly choked up. Smoke and knot-tight guilt alike make her throat feel like it's twisting. "S-still have to rub it in, bring it up again, b-by saying anything else. They even want to help me. I don't get why."
Petra Soroka	"Why are you saying it like that?" "Mmm?" Petra seems confused by what Meika even objects to about her phrasing, wincing preemptively at the expectation that she's misspoken something. Turning halfway back to Meika to tilt her head inquisitively as she elaborates, Petra doesn't quite get it by listening to the magical girl's vague, unfinished sentences, and instead watches her body language. "Oh. Well. I mean, maybe 'hurt' is a harsh way to put it," Petra isn't sure that it is. Meika looks pretty hurt. "But that's kind of just what 'punishment' is, right? Hurt can mean, like, reprimanding you, or taking your... phone away, or... is caning legal over there? Anything like that. That's how 'right' and 'wrong' are enforced; that's all." "It's not like I'm not a failure. They'd be right to say that." "Well, sure." Petra is not the super supportive feel-good mentor that might be preferrable right now, but in her opinion, feeling good rarely helps with anything, so she's still doing her best. "But the punishment still sucks, right? It's two different things, whether you think the punishment is correct, and whether you actually want to have it happen to you. Or someone else." Belatedly, Petra wonders if Meika's comment about comparing herself as being similar to Sougo and Woz and saying something is wrong with her is her way of confessing that she's gay. Of all people, though, Petra understands that having those words pointed back at her would only cause Meika to throw her walls up and very possibly run away, so she doesn't. Her gaydar is shrouded behind multiple layers of metaphor and narrative symbolism, anyways, so it's unreliable. "If Sougo and Woz had that to worry about, from the same people you do, then it's, like, a normal thing to do for a friend. To give them a way to back down, or play it off as a joke, and keep playing by the rules the right way instead of getting punished for breaking them. Like, being stealthy, you know." Petra taps on the table with her knuckles in an irregular beat, trying to think of the best way to blunt Meika's impulse to scold other people back into the closet without condemning her home too badly. Even though Petra would fucking love to condemn them at this point, out of sheer irritation if nothing else. "But, like, Sougo and Woz can't really be, they don't have that kind of oversight from the Holy Refulgence like that. So whether it's 'supposed' to be one way or another for them, there's not actually anything to protect them from. And like I said, it's not something to worry about with how Elites can see or judge you, either, since, well... I mean, you see the issue with trying to stop Elites from living however they want to when half of them can blow up cities, right?" Internally, Petra thinks about how that's not exactly true, and that she's the best living proof of it. But there's a certain amount of finesse necessary to wield the forces of oppression against Elites that Meika neither has nor wants, and Petra isn't exactly inclined to advise her on it since if Meika could do that, then Petra would be forced to kill her. Mentor her with the second half of the arc, not the first.
Petra Soroka	Briefly, Petra wonders if Meika might accidentally express any kind of yearning for the idea that Sougo and Woz live above the majority of consequences for being gay. Would that be enough of a justification to press her harder on it? Petra isn't sure she could tolerate watching Meika forget all about herself to live a normal life after hearing her say that. "... You know, you're kind of, like... the only teenager I've ever met that doesn't even explore the idea of fighting back against their parents and stuff." Petra hesitates, correcting herself. "Well-- that's not true. I knew plenty back on Earth. But that's barely fair, since neither of us are exactly, like, normal kids." "Like... all this time you've been here. Almost a year, right? It has to be; I met you right after getting out of jail. And you haven't... changed that much, even though you're right at the age where you should be changing the most, as a person. I know it doesn't feel good to stagnate, like that. And I know it's not how you want to be, either. Testing boundaries is, like... natural, you know?" "I don't want to." "Don't, if you don't want to." Petra backs down easily from the suggestion, though she's a little bit disappointed at how much inertia there is to fight against to get Meika to do anything at all. "Doing something you don't want to do is only right if you really believe in doing it. No one will feel better about you dragging your feet and making a fake apology like you got yelled at by the principal or whatever." "It's actually fine not to. I know what you mean about it being easier if they were angry. But you'd have to do a lot worse for that. They've put up with worse." "Sougo and Woz..." Even though this whole conversation started because of Petra's impulse to stand up and care for the two of them, she's surprised by the amount of affection she feels when reflecting on the Riders. With how much resentment she'd had for them at the start, Sougo's arc over the past year of gaining Lilian's respect and refining his ideals is one that Petra can't help but feel strongly positive towards too. "They're the type of Kamen Rider who understands that fighting for the things you believe in doesn't always mean fighting for the people who believe in you. One little fight isn't so bad, when you think about how they want a better world for everybody, and they're willing to actually commit to it. So that's why."
Meika Kirenai	"... It's not legal, I hear them say so sometimes." Her voice is soft and quiet, soured and flat. Fingers press into the wood of the picnic bench. Silently,, splinters spall out from the bottom of it, falling to the ground without notice. "... Right. Enforced. If it's not something you do already-" She blinks, distracted, and cuts off her thoughtline. She bites at the inside of her cheek, hard, nearly enough to draw blood. "... Yeah." Happy enough to leave 'how things should be' and 'harm inflicted to enforce what is and isn't right' conflated in the same rough idea, and call it understanding, she brushes her jacket cuff across her face, and grimaces. She's stopped whispering, now. Whether she's noticed she has, or not, doesn't read easy off Meika's face. '... Whether you actually want to have it happen to you. Or someone else.' "... Right. Still sucks. S-sorry. I know people don't want that. I know that's the point. Teaching when you don't listen to other things. I guess it would've been right of them, but it felt- I didn't want- yeah." The rest of her sandwich, half-picked at, gets ever so slightly pushed by its plate towards the edge of the table. "... Sorry. I'm repeating myself. Ahah. I should just..." She goes quiet for a surprisingly long moment, eyes fixed on the now-precarious plate. It's a chance to keep listening, yes, but inside, she's also trying very hard not to hit the edge of it just to see how far it'll launch anything, or whether something would shatter. 'If Sougo and Woz had that to worry about-' If. It's that same slight jealous line, the 'wouldn't it be nice,', that makes her breath hitch. Maybe she's not doing Petra's suspicions any good. "R-right. Nothing to protect them from. Doesn't need protection. So that's- yeah." "... Not easy to imagine. Guess I just- just wasn't, doing that. Do... can they destroy cities? Would they?" She tries not to think how she herself could, and with her free hand pressed against table wood, Meika absentmindedly makes splinters fall free and away without the crack that ought to ring out. It's like ripping cardboard to try. But what then? "... They seem happy." She couldn't put into words how she feels about that. Positive-yet-soured jealous emotion-leaking, it's lost on her that anything could be gleaned from her words. "... Everywhere always feels so different than I think it will. Does that ever change? Not that there's much time, but-" She flinches. "Ignore me. Don't answer that. Won't- probably won't do any good. I should just shut up, or-" A posture shift, and she accidentally knocks the already-precarious plate off. She goes silent, watchit it clatter- ... Good riddance.
Meika Kirenai	'Testing boundaries is, like... natural, you know?' "Almost a year," Meika repeats, the words painful to shape out. Harsh-staring eyes fix focused on the tip of the cigarette she's holding, as if glaring hard enough will flare up its embers. It doesn't. "Feels like longer. That makes it worse, right?" That thought slips out faster than she accounts for, faster than her processing can even quite match. Why is it bad? It'd only be so if it was normal to change or push back, or at least if she wanted to, and hadn't. It's almost backing herself into a corner to have already blurted out a proxy-agreement, and the skin-needling tinnitus itch of reflexively reaching out to pull her words back, near Petra, flares up before quickly fading back into a sharp wince. Breathing in to stabilize just catches smoke. "... Is it? Normal, or something..? You're not supposed to. Everyone thinks it, even if they don't- don't say it, or whatever." Mulling over the words, like an object you can only tell the shape of by touch and not sight, she's slow to continue, and half-scowling in unconscious focus. "Does that mean-" Who's actually going to do anything? "... 'Supposed' to. You think of- of something different, with that term, right? Sorry- um, that just... keeps coming up. It's always like that. Different ideas, for what's the right thing to... yeah." "Funny. I don't measure up either way." She winces, after saying so. "Stupid. Stupid. It doesn't feel good to stagnate, or-" Meika's posture shifts, and her hand, from stress or worry or embarrassment, or all three, reaches up to grab at the side of her own head, spooling strands of shock-white hair around clutched fingers. "It doesn't matter. Maybe it doesn't matter. It's too late for anything bad to, right? Too late." It's hard to tell by any tone or posture, whether that's something she feels good or bad about. 'No one will feel better about you dragging your feet and making a fake apology like you got yelled at by the principal or whatever.' Meika shuts her eyes tight, and blinks them back open. "N-no. No, I should. Sorry. Different kind of 'don't want to', or something. I know I should. It'd be better if I said something, even-" She shrugs, and puts the cigarette back to her lips, even as it's getting shorter. "... I guess that's a different kind of wanting to. Maybe. Even if it feels- yeah." Another little shrug, and she rolls her head around her shoulders, still gripping at the side uncomfortably, like she has a headache, or a bleeding wound that needs pressure. Listening quiet, and parroting Petra's last term without even looking at her, she follows up the other girl's, and her own, comment-lines. "... So that's why." "... They sound like good people-" If not for- She bites at the tip of her tongue, silent. "... I hope they can. Make it better. Mister Sougo's said some things that- he seems like he really cares. Really can. Willing to actually..." Again, "So that's why. Right."