The decision has been made. LILITH Japan orders the Outsiders to mobilize to pursue the Imugi.
Given that they are in a foreign country, they are largely dependent on LILITH Korea’s resources. In response to the decision, the Korean branch provides some assistance: the Outsiders are given just enough vehicles to help transport them, essential supplies, and only a few operatives to help guide them. This is the most the Korean branch is able to give, as they must focus on relocating people and restoring peace following the attack.
LILITH announces that the Imugi is currently resting near Gangneung on the east coast and they must move quickly. The effects of Rift poisoning will grow stronger as they approach the source; a sign that they are close to a kaiju. Upon reaching the mountains just outside the city, LILITH informs them that they are right on top of its location.
However, there is no Imugi to be found. After searching the area, Outsiders will discover the source of the trace and the poisoning: eggs. They will find about twelve eggs. When they report their findings, Seokdang will curse. In their rush, they had followed the wrong trace. They didn’t track down an injured and resting Imugi—they tracked down the Imugi’s nest. So where is the Imugi?
Not long after, Outsiders will receive an update on their implants: the Imugi reappeared in Seoul. After seeing the corpse of its mate, it went berserk and attacked the city again. While many of the citizens were evacuated to nearby Incheon and remaining shelters, just as many perished, with the death toll at 168,000 and rising. LILITH’s Korean base is destroyed.
The Imugi was last seen flying north, but the Korean government prohibits the Outsiders from pursuing it again through their territory. By choosing to pursue the kaiju, the Outsiders have abandoned humanity and thus will receive no further support. They are ordered to leave the country immediately.
LILITH Japan will order them to collect as many eggs as possible and continue to the abandoned city of Gangneung, where they will arrange pick up and return to base in Tokyo.
▶ AFTERWORD.
Thanks everyone for participating in our first major Event Decision! We hope you had fun discussing what to do both ICly and OOCly.
After failing to capture the second Imugi and also failing to save a large portion of Seoul's population, characters will be shipped back to Japan. The events of the TDM will springboard from there. Feel free to use this post to thread out any aftermath threads if you would like.
All tags on this log are worth 2 points and will count towards August AC.
You're talking to the Patron Librarian of the Floor of Language, you know.
[ There's a thin strain to her tone, even as she raises an eyebrow at him. Maybe he's not looking at her. That lift is probably present in her voice too. ]
... "A lot", huh. I can't say you're living your life freely now either, so I hope you're including yourself in that.
I wasn't aware! After you told me that your Librarian isn't the librarian that'd come up in dictionaries, I can't say I even know what that means at this point.
[ maybe he's been a little curious. just not enough to bring it up out of nowhere without some kind of convenient excuse. but, it's his turn to offer her a sidelong glance. ]
Ask me later, then. [ Surprising that Malkuth hasn't told him yet, but then again, Gebura's technically known him longer. What an exhausting thought that is. ]
... You want the short observation or the longer one? [ He really wants to make it a challenge, huh. ]
[ because Elysium doesn't ask what isn't freely offered; it's as simple as that. ]
Whichever one you care to give.
[ … he's been here for too long, hasn't he? he doesn't think he's inscrutable. he actually expects Gebura's observations to be on point. whether he chooses to corroborate with her observations is another story. but unlike with Rhodes Island where he couldn't be found in one place for more than weeks at a time, Neo Tokyo would be the one place he's been anchored to the longest.
what a thought. what a number of thoughts, that have arisen from this encounter alone. ]
[ Can finished, she fishes in her coat pocket for a pack of cigarettes and her lighter, pulling one out and touching the flame to the tip. It glows red-hot for a moment as she inhales, releasing a steady plume of smoke into the air that the breeze swiftly carries away. ]
You're being attentive in a way that doesn't reveal anything about yourself. You're catering all of this, your reactions and whether you talk or not, to me. You're smiling like it's any other day and you just happened to feel like bugging me. If you went looking for me, it means you're not sticking near the base, where the majority of people are right now.
[ Another exhale. ]
You had this kind of attitude in your memory. Like you'd braced yourself for anything and you didn't want to give a bunch of people with a lot to worry about anything else to worry about. Someone who went back to save that many people wouldn't be fine with what happened here. And you and I have seen combat enough to know that risks and sacrifices happen, so maybe you made your peace with it when they made the call.
But I also think you can't do entirely what you want to do with processing it, so you're falling back on this, throwing yourself at a bunch of people probably, and doing it in a way that no one's going to worry about you.
[ Wow. For having nary an idea what Librarians do in her world, she at least proved herself to be the rightful owner of the Floor of Language, for whatever that was worth. Succinct and to the jugular, much like her combat style. He can't help the smile that slips—he even looks amused for it. ]
… Have you ever considered being a profiler, Miss Gebura?
[ Eyes catch the dying embers of her cigarette with interest, almost like a moth to. With how close he is to being unraveled at his seams, he might as well be one. But he continues to persist, because that's all he knows. ]
Just kidding. [ … ] If that's how I look to you, I'm doing fairly well for myself. The last thing I want to do to anyone is add to their worries, it's true. But being deflective only works so long as you aren't around people for a length of time. It doesn't really matter how long you've known someone if the time you spent together's only in small increments. But in larger ones—eventually, people start asking questions. Wanting to know why. That's natural.
[ He clicks his tongue, as if he's debating his own answer against Gebura's. ]
I've never been in one place long enough for that to happen. How interesting. What does it mean for me to live my life freely? I really couldn't tell you.
[ … maybe he could've, once upon a time. but that's a now impossible, far out of reach dream that's been left unexplored, nevermind the larger issue he's yet to speak to anyone about. nowadays, it's just waiting for the other shoe to drop. even if he could travel—even if he could be solitary without repercussions… would he? probably not. ]
This is as free as it gets. For me, anyway.
Edited (the last edit I swear) 2024-08-24 10:23 (UTC)
Part of that's also likely restricted by your illness.
[ She's never really forgotten it. But she speaks of it matter-of-factly, because serious or not, it's one aspect of him. He's living his life despite it, without mention of it, and she's choosing to respect that in return. ]
But I've been in one place long enough. Technically, I've never traveled as far as people like you and Siffrin have, in my entire life. Lives. And that'll probably be the case when I go back, since I won't be able to leave the Library.
This is probably as free as it gets for me, too. [ That she can, more or less, go where she wants to go. Act how she wants to act. Leave to stare at the ocean, instead of gritting her teeth and waiting for the next thing to happen that's more or less the same as the last thing. This current situation is familiar enough to bring back those screams in the back of her mind, but it's still different. She acknowledges that. ]
You keep trying to shove me out of my comfort zone, anyway. So it's probably only fair that you get used to some changes yourself.
… No. That'd be an excuse. Whether or not I'm afflicted with Oripathy wouldn't change anything in the long run.
[ Present tense. Not past. There were too many loose ends for him to let them go, still. The simplest way to put it: Elysium has always been Elysium, even long before he was infected. ]
Besides, it's what enabled me to save people that day. So I really don't regret the actions I took nor would I have done anything else given the chance. If anything… it's actually given me more opportunities than I had to start. Hardly restrictive.
[ It's still not enough—he wonders, if he'll ever be enough. But it's something that's been so long engrained that he's settled, or at least has convinced himself, it's enough to do what he can. He falls into a contemplative silence again, another minute elapsing between them. ]
… And you wouldn't be wrong about that. But believe it or not, this is what I want to do.
[ who is the person under 'Elysium'? a mystery. aka, i hate gacha drip feed lore so please don't look at me i'm crying ]
It's hard to say. She doesn't tend to take anyone at face-value until she knows them well enough to know if they put actual weight behind their words. At the same time, it's second nature to her to look at someone, hear them speak, and have a sense of knowing from that alone that someone was lying through their teeth or not. Yet another survival skill that had carried far past her ability to survive. It's almost funny. ]
Whether I believe it or not doesn't matter, does it? You don't need my acknowledgment to do what you want to do. [ In this case, anyway. ]
I never really thought you regretted your choices, though.
[ He'd still succeeded, where she'd failed. So had Siffrin.
She doesn't begrudge either of them. She'd still fought like hell back then. ]
Not really. I'm just saying. Even I wouldn't know what it'd look like to change.
[ It's a bit of lie, but he doesn't explicitly think of it as one. He could stop caring about everything overnight, for instance. He'd been in that position before, and while impossible in every realistic scenario: it's not a thought he'd want to entertain in any capacity.
It had been nice, though. Liberating. ]
… So, you'll have to forgive me. For being a little unfair.
[ A very faint snort. Almost a scoff. So he still thinks her protective instincts were that strong? That she was that kind? ]
Because the manager got the employees out of my way. Don't get me wrong--at the time, I didn't care anymore. I didn't give a damn about my coworkers or the employees who were afraid to risk their lives, understandably. I just wanted to destroy everything. I wanted it all to end.
[ The time scale is so whack, Geb… The fact of the matter is that she came out of it with them, pulled herself from the bottom however that may have took, and that's what stands out to him. ]
Then you came around and ended up at the Library… or is the order a little different from that?
No, that's more or less it. I decided to see it through, we made it to the end, and just when I thought I could finally die, the AI who helped run the corporation rebelled, tampered with the distribution process and eventually made us a compromise when we'd fought to a standstill. If we worked for her in the Library, there was a chance we could set things right once we'd gathered up that Light again.
[ She heaves a sigh, fingers on one hand twitching lightly. ]
In the end, I just kept getting dragged back for someone else's purposes.
[ It'd really be so much simpler if he'd just asked for her to elaborate, but he takes the moment to contextualise her answer, to try and fit the middle pieces of these puzzles without having even the semblance of a border. Where that leaves her now is his guess, yet what matters now is the moment,
what they can make of the moment,
and as her hand twiches, he allows his gaze to fall on it lightly. ]
… The rug can be pulled from underneath us any day now, but that doesn't diminish the value of the time we have until then. It's technically more of the same situation. I get how you feel.
[ It's easier said than done, as the adage goes over and over again. ]
But in the time we have to ourselves, we can pretend it's ours and ours alone. Let's head back, do something fun? [ He holds out a hand, tips his head. He could just as easily pretend he'd meant to make a gesture with it if she chooses not to acknowledge it. ] And not let this take any more of that away from us.
[ Still trapped, in the end. More victorious than she'd been facing Angela, with less sacrifices this time around, but... still, she wasn't able to leave or die. It is what it is. It wasn't the same kind of situation anymore. And maybe one day Elysium will ask her more about it and maybe he won't. It doesn't matter much to her.
Gebura's eyes lower, resting on his outstretched hand. She doesn't need to take it. She's fine. And she's aware he knows that, has made it extremely easy to ignore it without souring the situation.
... But it still exists, in the back of her mind, Siffrin's little comment. "Do you know what hands are natural at doing?"
It doesn't feel natural, but neither had fighting, of course. She knows what makes a gesture feel normal, even as she inwardly sighs at it.
But with a nonchalance that is definitely her attempting to act like it's nothing, she takes Elysium's hand. ]
[ The weight of someone's hand in yours can't always be measured by mass alone. Not with what he knows of her and the experiences they've shared together, the unspoken "trust" that he grasps as he closes his fingers around hers. It's a fragile and precarious thing, easily lost within the passage of a day or the blink of an eye. But in this moment—Elysium smiles, tugging Gebura forward and away from the ocean.
… It's not natural for him, either—gestures with this level of significance. He wonders if he's doing it right, but that would make him a hypocrite, wouldn't it? To preach the importance of living in the moment without actually doing so himself. Better to not think too deeply of it. ]
You had fun with volleyball, didn't you? [ His grip tightens, mischievously. All the strength he could summon and then some would be nothing compared to hers at rest if she'd wanted to let go, and they both know that. But he does it anyway. ] Please, now you're just giving me a hard time for the sake of it.
[ To stare down at their joined hands would be the biggest damn indicator that she's paying far too much attention to this, to the warmth and closeness of another person when there's a part of her insisting that it's best to keep her hands free, just in case. That letting anyone hold her hand is a sign of weakness and vulnerability and she's just put herself at risk by allowing it and when this inevitably leads to betrayal, when he wants something from her that's more important than her trust, this will be another thorn lodged in her heart that she willingly exposed.
... She doesn't say any of this or let any of it show on her face because she's aware of how dramatic that is and how, by extension, how stupid it is to both dread and vaguely expect it. His hand feels both callused and a lot smoother than her own, with the scars scrawled all over her hand with no rhyme or reason.
She's not ashamed of it, but she has to wonder how that feels for someone else, even as his grip tightens and she lifts an eyebrow as though warning him she could pull back if he teases too much. ]
You wouldn't know what to do if I didn't give you a hard time, would you?
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synflux2024-08-22 04:03 am
no subject
[ There's a thin strain to her tone, even as she raises an eyebrow at him. Maybe he's not looking at her. That lift is probably present in her voice too. ]
... "A lot", huh. I can't say you're living your life freely now either, so I hope you're including yourself in that.
no subject
[ maybe he's been a little curious. just not enough to bring it up out of nowhere without some kind of convenient excuse. but, it's his turn to offer her a sidelong glance. ]
What makes you say that?
[ it almost sounds like a challenge. ]
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... You want the short observation or the longer one? [ He really wants to make it a challenge, huh. ]
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Whichever one you care to give.
[ … he's been here for too long, hasn't he? he doesn't think he's inscrutable. he actually expects Gebura's observations to be on point. whether he chooses to corroborate with her observations is another story. but unlike with Rhodes Island where he couldn't be found in one place for more than weeks at a time, Neo Tokyo would be the one place he's been anchored to the longest.
what a thought. what a number of thoughts, that have arisen from this encounter alone. ]
no subject
You're being attentive in a way that doesn't reveal anything about yourself. You're catering all of this, your reactions and whether you talk or not, to me. You're smiling like it's any other day and you just happened to feel like bugging me. If you went looking for me, it means you're not sticking near the base, where the majority of people are right now.
[ Another exhale. ]
You had this kind of attitude in your memory. Like you'd braced yourself for anything and you didn't want to give a bunch of people with a lot to worry about anything else to worry about. Someone who went back to save that many people wouldn't be fine with what happened here. And you and I have seen combat enough to know that risks and sacrifices happen, so maybe you made your peace with it when they made the call.
But I also think you can't do entirely what you want to do with processing it, so you're falling back on this, throwing yourself at a bunch of people probably, and doing it in a way that no one's going to worry about you.
Just my thoughts, though.
no subject
… Have you ever considered being a profiler, Miss Gebura?
[ Eyes catch the dying embers of her cigarette with interest, almost like a moth to. With how close he is to being unraveled at his seams, he might as well be one. But he continues to persist, because that's all he knows. ]
Just kidding. [ … ] If that's how I look to you, I'm doing fairly well for myself. The last thing I want to do to anyone is add to their worries, it's true. But being deflective only works so long as you aren't around people for a length of time. It doesn't really matter how long you've known someone if the time you spent together's only in small increments. But in larger ones—eventually, people start asking questions. Wanting to know why. That's natural.
[ He clicks his tongue, as if he's debating his own answer against Gebura's. ]
I've never been in one place long enough for that to happen. How interesting. What does it mean for me to live my life freely? I really couldn't tell you.
[ … maybe he could've, once upon a time. but that's a now impossible, far out of reach dream that's been left unexplored, nevermind the larger issue he's yet to speak to anyone about. nowadays, it's just waiting for the other shoe to drop. even if he could travel—even if he could be solitary without repercussions… would he? probably not. ]
This is as free as it gets. For me, anyway.
no subject
[ She's never really forgotten it. But she speaks of it matter-of-factly, because serious or not, it's one aspect of him. He's living his life despite it, without mention of it, and she's choosing to respect that in return. ]
But I've been in one place long enough. Technically, I've never traveled as far as people like you and Siffrin have, in my entire life. Lives. And that'll probably be the case when I go back, since I won't be able to leave the Library.
This is probably as free as it gets for me, too. [ That she can, more or less, go where she wants to go. Act how she wants to act. Leave to stare at the ocean, instead of gritting her teeth and waiting for the next thing to happen that's more or less the same as the last thing. This current situation is familiar enough to bring back those screams in the back of her mind, but it's still different. She acknowledges that. ]
You keep trying to shove me out of my comfort zone, anyway. So it's probably only fair that you get used to some changes yourself.
no subject
[ Present tense. Not past. There were too many loose ends for him to let them go, still. The simplest way to put it: Elysium has always been Elysium, even long before he was infected. ]
Besides, it's what enabled me to save people that day. So I really don't regret the actions I took nor would I have done anything else given the chance. If anything… it's actually given me more opportunities than I had to start. Hardly restrictive.
[ It's still not enough—he wonders, if he'll ever be enough. But it's something that's been so long engrained that he's settled, or at least has convinced himself, it's enough to do what he can. He falls into a contemplative silence again, another minute elapsing between them. ]
… And you wouldn't be wrong about that. But believe it or not, this is what I want to do.
[ who is the person under 'Elysium'? a mystery. aka, i hate gacha drip feed lore so please don't look at me i'm crying ]
no subject
It's hard to say. She doesn't tend to take anyone at face-value until she knows them well enough to know if they put actual weight behind their words. At the same time, it's second nature to her to look at someone, hear them speak, and have a sense of knowing from that alone that someone was lying through their teeth or not. Yet another survival skill that had carried far past her ability to survive. It's almost funny. ]
Whether I believe it or not doesn't matter, does it? You don't need my acknowledgment to do what you want to do. [ In this case, anyway. ]
I never really thought you regretted your choices, though.
[ He'd still succeeded, where she'd failed. So had Siffrin.
She doesn't begrudge either of them. She'd still fought like hell back then. ]
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[ It's a bit of lie, but he doesn't explicitly think of it as one. He could stop caring about everything overnight, for instance. He'd been in that position before, and while impossible in every realistic scenario: it's not a thought he'd want to entertain in any capacity.
It had been nice, though. Liberating. ]
… So, you'll have to forgive me. For being a little unfair.
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A little, huh. [ Dryly. ]
I'll think about it.
no subject
Great. That's the more than I would've ever anticipated.
[ low-key, kind of rude?? ]
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[ Yeah. Wow. ]
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Just like you, it's not that I want you to be anything in particular. But if that's what you want, can anyone truly stop you?
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[ Well, she is nothing if not succinct. ]
So it's probably a good thing I don't want all that much, in general.
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[ not quite self-deprecating. something close to. ]
Considering your nature, I don't believe anything born out of any desire of yours would be all that bad.
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[ It's said so mildly. ]
I'm not as altruistic as you think I am.
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[ From what he knows of Lobotomy Corporation from Netzach and Yesod…… he thinks he kind of gets it, though he won't say it aloud. ]
… But you didn't. Because you had people you wanted to protect more than you wanted to bring everything down, yeah?
no subject
Because the manager got the employees out of my way. Don't get me wrong--at the time, I didn't care anymore. I didn't give a damn about my coworkers or the employees who were afraid to risk their lives, understandably. I just wanted to destroy everything. I wanted it all to end.
So I rampaged.
no subject
[ The time scale is so whack, Geb… The fact of the matter is that she came out of it with them, pulled herself from the bottom however that may have took, and that's what stands out to him. ]
Then you came around and ended up at the Library… or is the order a little different from that?
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[ She heaves a sigh, fingers on one hand twitching lightly. ]
In the end, I just kept getting dragged back for someone else's purposes.
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what they can make of the moment,
and as her hand twiches, he allows his gaze to fall on it lightly. ]
… The rug can be pulled from underneath us any day now, but that doesn't diminish the value of the time we have until then. It's technically more of the same situation. I get how you feel.
[ It's easier said than done, as the adage goes over and over again. ]
But in the time we have to ourselves, we can pretend it's ours and ours alone. Let's head back, do something fun? [ He holds out a hand, tips his head. He could just as easily pretend he'd meant to make a gesture with it if she chooses not to acknowledge it. ] And not let this take any more of that away from us.
no subject
Gebura's eyes lower, resting on his outstretched hand. She doesn't need to take it. She's fine. And she's aware he knows that, has made it extremely easy to ignore it without souring the situation.
... But it still exists, in the back of her mind, Siffrin's little comment. "Do you know what hands are natural at doing?"
It doesn't feel natural, but neither had fighting, of course. She knows what makes a gesture feel normal, even as she inwardly sighs at it.
But with a nonchalance that is definitely her attempting to act like it's nothing, she takes Elysium's hand. ]
I don't think I trust your idea of "fun".
no subject
… It's not natural for him, either—gestures with this level of significance. He wonders if he's doing it right, but that would make him a hypocrite, wouldn't it? To preach the importance of living in the moment without actually doing so himself. Better to not think too deeply of it. ]
You had fun with volleyball, didn't you? [ His grip tightens, mischievously. All the strength he could summon and then some would be nothing compared to hers at rest if she'd wanted to let go, and they both know that. But he does it anyway. ] Please, now you're just giving me a hard time for the sake of it.
no subject
... She doesn't say any of this or let any of it show on her face because she's aware of how dramatic that is and how, by extension, how stupid it is to both dread and vaguely expect it. His hand feels both callused and a lot smoother than her own, with the scars scrawled all over her hand with no rhyme or reason.
She's not ashamed of it, but she has to wonder how that feels for someone else, even as his grip tightens and she lifts an eyebrow as though warning him she could pull back if he teases too much. ]
You wouldn't know what to do if I didn't give you a hard time, would you?
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