2010-03-24 - Everything Here Dies Alone

She was brought in, perhaps, under false pretenses. She has no idea what Amuro and Beltorchika told the Karaba cruiser's medics, no idea what's become of her Ahead Prototype, and no idea what's become of her duties as Leo Stenbuck's personal aide on board the Shirogane. So much has happened in the last few weeks that it's made the one relatively stable Cyber-Newtype in joint-EFA/A-LAWS possession a little unsteady, mentally.

The last thing that she remembered was looking up through the hole in the lower side of the cockpit and finding herself face to face with none other than Amuro Ray. After her brief lapse of consciousness, she slipped back into the darkness in Beltorchika's arms, both physically and mentally exhausted.

When she arrived on the cruiser, she was rushed off to the infirmary. No band-aids or aniseptic sprays were going to fix up her problems; hours of surgery and careful bandaging started things off, time spent to stabilize her condition before they could even think about attempting to heal her by any other methods.

When her right eye opens, a hoarse noise passes through her throat, the world blurry and dull. It could just be the bag of IV painkillers strung up next to her bed along with the antibiotics; it could still be the powerful pain in the back of her skull.

Her right leg is elevated by traction, her left arm left to a sling. Instead of her eyepatch, thick layers of gauze pad over her eye. Few parts of her dusky-colored skin are left without being wrapped in bandage, and she hurts absolutely everywhere.

Breathing slowly, Second Lieutenant Ralla Triald lets her gaze drift left, then right.

Her voice is small, hoarse. "Where...?"

Cagalli has been sore as Hell since her surgeries to have a bullet extracted; she'd originally come to this cruiser to assess the mobile suits, but now she finds herself in the infirmary, seeking a little pain medication. Healed up by this point though it may be, Cagalli's wound still hurts like a bitch. What she finds there is decidedly not pain medication.

When she sees -- well, hears; her first clue is the beeping of a heart monitor, the next that tiny whisper of Ralla's voice -- that there's a patient in critical care, at first she's motivated by sympathy; she wants to at least say 'hello,' and make certain that whoever it is is feeling OK, that they're going to be all right, or at least that if they aren't they can be comfortable. She peeks behind a curtain...

... and is a little shocked at what she sees. At first, she's at a complete loss for words; this is the woman who beat her bloody and vomit-soaked. This is the woman who's sworn to kill her. This is the woman who murdered three hundred of her comrades.

"Wh -- what the Hell are you doing here?!" she half-cries, almost too shocked to really scream the way she wants to. "Why are /you/ in a Karaba cruiser getting medical attention?!"

Swathed in whites and bandages, covered in blankets, and so sore that she can't even sit up when someone else enters the infirmary, the young pilot tilts her head slowly despite the cramps in her neck toward the soon-to-arrive visitor. As she does, a little of her bangs drift in close to her vision. Either it's the light or the drugs in her system are working a lot better than she thought, but... is there streaks of white in her hair?

Colorations aside, her eye comes into focus on the Princess of Orb. The woman whom she's fought with time and time again both in the Ahead Prototype and on foot. The woman whom she'd sworn to rip limb from limb, and whom she'd either failed to capture or been ordered to stand aside and let her escape.

"... y-you--"

Her eye wide, the Second Lieutenant's answer does not come to the high-ranking Katharon pilot. Her head moves slowly, still, her arm stiff and bandaged fingers groping around the side of the bed. Not for a weapon, but for the small wand plugged into the wall to call for the doctor.

While her fingers continue to search for the stick, her head turns away, left side of her face defiantly presented to Cagalli. The English girl is hoarse, but she does manage to find her voice. "I have no obligation to answer you."

The small wand can be adjusted and moved for patients of varying sizes and arm lengths, allowing for easy access for even the most awkwardly-shaped individuals. Unfortunately for Ralla, this also means that Cagalli can quietly slide it away along its rail with a 'click-click-click-click-click' when she sees her reaching for it.

"Murderer," she hisses, reaching under her skirt for a moment and pulling out a handgun. She didn't think she'd need to touch it today, but here she is. "Don't play dumb with me! Why the Hell are you here?!" Her eyes begin to water in spite of themselves, and she positions herself partially on the bed, one of her legs in a kneeling position on the bed, the other still stable on the floor. The side of her shin just barely touches Ralla's side; she looks down at the wounded woman, teeth gritted.

"I should just shoot you," she says. This isn't like Corner -- she hasn't had time to remind herself not to fight for vengeance, to talk to her friends, to try to steel her will. And there's something else -- a sort of newfound additional assertiveness, aggression, maybe, that she can't quite place.

She rests the barrel of the gun gently against the far back of Ralla's jaw, near where the curvature of the bone shifts upward; her hands tremble. For an instant, she really, /really/ wants to do this.

[OOC] Cagalli Yula Athha turns the bitch up to 11

[OOC] Ralla Traln Triald says, "yessssssssssssssssssss"

Her fingers shift, reaching to the rail. The tip of her index finger brushes it, but the wand is pulled away before she can get her hand on and around it. There, her hand drops back down to her side, the mere thought of sitting upright to grab at it right now enough to make her wretch as violently as the time she caused the Princess of Orb to do the same.

She wants to reach out and punch the young woman in the face.

She wants to make good on her vow.

She wants to go home.

"Y-You're going to... kill me, then?" As Cagalli's leg comes up onto the bed, Ralla grunts uncomfortably, though the bandaged left side of her face is still turned towards the leader and her mouth is drawn into a tight line. As the barrel of the gun touches her jaw, there's even the slightest fear reaching up in the back of her mind.

She can hear him laughing.

Before the GN-Tau Drive went critical, before her world became nothing but heat, light, flames, and pain, she could hear him laughing. Despite her programming, despite everything that the EFA has done to her over the years, she felt the cold knife in her chest-- fear. Even after the cockpit bloc hit the ground and rolled off into the woods, even after her extensive and violent bath in GN particles, even after all the power was gone from the Ahead Prototype, she could hear him laugh.

Slowly, her head turns against the pressure of the gun to look up and lock eyes with Cagalli. For the second time in her sixteen-year life, the Cyber-Newtype realizes, she may be feeling fear. ... Why...?

"Yazan Gable..." she starts, taking a moment to swallow. It's like swallowing dust; she hasn't had a proper drink in so long and her throat is dry. "... p-pinned my machine down and c-caused the reactor to go... critical. I ... I woke up here."

Ralla's words draw the world into sharp contrast. The stammering, the fear -- part of it feels good. Better than it should. Three hundred people gave their lives fighting this woman. They were a green crew -- the elites were training in the crew of another Izumo-class. They had hopes and dreams -- and now they're all dead, to the last. Why /shouldn't/ she enjoy hearing the murderer stammer, grunt, murmur?

A quiet click emits from some six inches from Ralla's ear. It's the hammer of Cagalli's pistol, as if that wasn't obvious. Cagalli's eyes look down on Ralla's; there's anger in them, mixed with something else, something harder to identify. "That doesn't explain why you're /here/," she says, once Ralla finishes her explanation, not answreing her first question with words; instead, she digs the barrel into Ralla's neck a little, twisting. The gun is well-cared for and well-polished; the smoothness and coolness of the metal drifting across her skin might be soothing to Ralla were there not the threat of death so imminently behind it.

She thinks about the aftermath of killing Ralla. No doubt someone in the faction has taken an interest in her; no doubt /someone/ would be bothered. Someone -- maybe not even someone on this ship, but someone -- has an interest in this woman for some purpose. Intelligence, perhaps.

But she could get away with it, she realizes; this woman murdered three hundred people. She injured a handful more who were resourceful enough to find ways to barely survive the ship's downfall. The world would move on. Some of her more zealous allies might even congratulate her.

Her finger drifts up and down the trigger, slowly, gently.

"But I guess you don't know that," she finally says, admitting that she can't get an answer on this one out of Ralla. She leans forward a little, face only a few inches from Ms. Triald's. "So instead, I want you to tell me why -- why you --" she stammers for a moment, trying to find the words for her hatred.

The wound she received from Soma not two weeks ago burns in her gut still, a radiating, dull ache. The thought of medicating it, however, is well out of her mind.

Why is she here? What even IS 'here'? Clearly she's in Katharon's hands, but what was the young man that saved her life thinking? Was it a search for military intelligence? Or was he acting purely out of benevolence? She can't remember... she can't remember anything other than looking up and seeing his face when she came out into the light by way of a makeshift harness, and it's driving her crazy.

The gun twisting into her throat is what brings her back to reality. The hardness, the cold that seems to radiate outward and steal her body's warmth reminds her that she's alive. Oddly enough, the cold is somewhat soothing against some of those bandages on her throat, though the pressure does little to help her ability to breathe.

The proximity between them narrows, greatly. Here, one eye looks up to two, Cagalli Yula Athha demanding an answer of her. The finger on the trigger, the thumb that pulled back the hammer. She knows-- she knows for a fact that the only thing she needs to do is give the blonde a reason.

Why?

Why is she reacting like this? Why does she feel emotions where there shouldn't be any, against people like Cagalli Yula Athha? The wounded soldier's head turns slightly again, this time to the left while looking down-- or as far down as she can for someone who is nearly horizontal.

"I was made... t-to be a perfect soldier... a weapon..."

'I... suppose I was... not... m-much of a weapon...'

'Better to be a failed weapon... at least they won't use you anymore.'

Ralla's face slips to one of confusion, her lips parted while she stares at Cagalli's face for a long time without blinking. There's a glassy look in her eye, and it isn't from the drugs. A few tears roll from the side of her face, her gaze lowering as though she were trying to look down at her own face.

"... W-Why does my head hurt so much...?"

It's that crying, those tears dribbling down the side of Ralla's face, and her comment that she was made to be a weapon, that tell Cagalli what she needs to say. Her mind snaps back to the report she read from Ledonir. The report that planted the now-blooming seed of hatred in her heart.

Her free hand coming up to her face, she mumbles quietly. Ralla probably can't hear her at first; her mumbling includes something about weapons, but quickly shifts into what sounds, if indistinctly, like a list. After about a minute, the mumbling builds to something loud enough to be intelligible.

"... Ensign Palin, Jessica. Helsman; presumed killed instantly. Private Weis, Ajit M. Died two days later from blunt trauma incurred from falling debris. Ledonir said he must have stayed in the hangar to close up the padded shipping crate that some of the mechanics used as an escape pod."

The names come faster and faster; Cagalli's tone is desperate. At one point, she momentarily breaks to say, "Do you get it?! Do you get what a weapon is for?!" before returning to the list. "Second Lieutenant Rutherford, Bright! Speared through the right eye and stomach by a piece of a Shrike Astray's flight pack despite sealing himself in a Sol Tekkaman drop pod! Gunnery Sergeant Mead, Michael! Presumed dead in a chain-reaction ammunition explosion!"

She gets through, easily, sixty names of injured and dead, practically shouting over Ralla if she attempts to get a word in edgewise. After that, however, something seems to stick in her mind -- and all at once, she stops, hard. Her entire body tenses up; subconsciously, she presses in just a little further with her pistol.

What is she...?

Why is she mumbling? What is she talking about?

Why are there tears coming out?

Watching Cagalli's mumbling as they remain so close, the Second Lieutenant's hand starts to shift upward a little bit, a slight jerking motion that brings her hand over to rest on her own stomach. As Cagalli's murmuring becomes louder, more distinctive, Ralla's eye blinks a few times to clear out the tears that she doesn't quite understand.

"I--"

More names.

"I--"

More names.

A tension builds up in her chest, a thick knot that she can't understand. She hasn't felt anything like this sense of loss or weight in any memory she's ever had, and yet... only now does she stop to realize this. Only now that she has a gun pressed up to her throat, only now that Cagalli Yula Athha is drilling cold reality into her head.

Only now, only when she isn't the calm and composed soldier that she was designed to be.

Her hand shifts upward, moving to brace Cagalli's hand against her own throat. Swallowing hard, the wounded Cyber-Newtype's jaw tightens up. "I'm-- I'm-- I can't... I-- w-why is it like this-- I don't want to feel this way-- I'm s-supposed to be a perfect weapon, a-and I--"

The cracks began to form the moment she stepped inside the Psyco Gundam. Cracks that stretched when she used it in battle after battle, until the day Paptimus Scriocco assigned her the Ahead Prototype. Cracks that spread when she fought other Newtypes. Cracks that broke open wider and wider every time she met Cagalli Yula Athha.

"Why didn't you let me DIE?! WHY DO I HAVE TO FEEL THIS WAY?!"

As Ralla declares her need to be a perfect weapon, as she pleads with... /someone/, not to feel this way -- all at once, Cagalli finds herself unable to answer Ralla with more words. She jerks her hand away from Ralla as Ralla's meets hers; trained reflexes tweak the safety on and drop the gun. It clatters to a stop next to Ralla's heart monitor, still beeping steadily.

She thinks back to the last conversation she had with her father before Alejandro Corner murdered him in cold blood, before she had to watch him bleed out in her hands, before he gave her the blood-soaked picture that would prompt her to make the choices that have brought her where she is today. The choices that have alienated Leo Stenbuck and Sarah Zabiarov, both of whom she wishes she could still consider friends; the choices that have made her a hero to the people of Orb; the choices that made her hide herself behind a mask.

'Does the war end when you fight?' he had asked. 'If you should kill someone's husband in battle, then his wife will despise you for that. And if you were to kill someone's son, then his mother will hate you for that as well... and if someone were to take your life -- I would hate them with all of my heart.'

She stares down at Ralla -- stares down past Ralla -- momentarily uncomprehending, barely even realizing Ralla exists. Barely even realizing she exists. Her mind becomes a jumble, flashing forward to another time. Ralla begs for death, but Cagalli's mind has already snapped to elsewhere; the words register on some level, but she still fails to respond.

Gun camera review. Her own against Absalom Yadin, compared to a drone against Alejandro Corner when the man had taken an interest in learning to pilot. Absalom's were more refined, certainly -- but every pilot has tells, and when you kill a man and know exactly why you did, you learn them. The way he aims. The first direction he thinks to dodge. They're all the same.

Even killing Alejandro didn't put an end to his hatred. Whether or not Absalom was somehow that same man, he'd inherited that man's hatred of the Athhas, that man's desire to see her defeated and broken, that man's hateful maneuvers.

Something slides into place in Cagalli's head -- even death, even the most justified death, doesn't resolve that hatred. Hateful desires pierce all barriers, even the one between life and death. Hatred can't defeat hatred -- but dispassionate, retributive "justice" can't either. It's better than revenge, perhaps -- but it doesn't break the cycle, the three-beat cycle of attack, defeat, and retaliation that extends into forever. It only slows it.

Cagalli slumps forward, burying her head next to Ralla's. She does not answer the Cyber-Newtype's question. She can only sob into the pillow, thinking about the five pound trigger pull-weight gap that, ten seconds ago, was the only thing between herself and a senseless mistake.

If Ralla listens closely to the sounds in her pillow, she can make out -- with difficulty -- a choked, "I'm -- I'm sorry, Father, I'm so sorry," between sobs.

Her bandaged hand comes down onto Cagalli's own. While ordinarily she would be a formidable opponent that can hold her own, while on your average day she would've been able to grip Cagalli's hand and pull the trigger herself, she can't. She just doesn't have the strength.

"I can't... I've never felt... I..."

The gun clatters on the floor next to the heart monitor, well out of either of their reach. Her empty hand falls back slowly, elbow thumping down on the bed. Eye closing slowly, her chest shifts while her fingers twitch numbly. Slowly, it does dawn on her that she has no control over her situation. If Cagalli had truly wanted to, she could have shot the Lieutenant right there in the bed.

Did she ever have control?

Cagalli does something that she never ever expected to see in the Princess of Orb. While she'd always had that fury, that rage, she never in her lifetime ever expected to be privvy to the sight of the Gundam pilot crying, weeping openly as she leans forward over the wounded Cyber-Newtype and release choked, pained words and sounds.

With tears in her own eyes, with that dull ache in her chest and the pressure that begins to ripple through her own mind, Ralla brings her hand slowly up to her own face, covering her only eye with the heel of her hand.

The first time that they had met was an awkward one. He kept getting distracted, but she was always attentive, on the ball. They met on the Archangel in the hangar as she was disembarking from the shuttle from the Earth Federation's supply lines, and it didn't take long for A-LAWS Captain Leo Stenbuck to ask her a question.

'Do you like being a Cyber-Newtype?'

Now, as her mouth draws open a bit more, as her jaw and neck tighten up, it isn't just Cagalli Yula Athha that begins to cry. It's the first time she's ever done it in her life, it feels like. It's like trying to shuck a great weight from off of her shoulders, as though a veil begins to part in her own mind. Could it have been touched off by the GN Drive exploding? By her contact with Amuro Ray? Or is it being so close to one of the few people who can evoke an emotional response from her?

With her hand remaining on her face, Ralla Traln Triald as well begins to cry, hard. Even while everything hurts, it -feels- like the right thing to do.

Now, after all this time, Ralla could probably give him an honest answer.

'No.'

"... what am I supposed to do now...?" she whispers, mostly to herself.

Ralla's tears redouble Cagalli's, for a moment, shortly before they begin to subside; Cagalli can only cry so much. Crying doesn't heal the world. Crying doesn't do anything but get stuff wet. As Ralla finds her answer, Cagalli pulls her face off the tear-stained pillow, trying her best to take even breaths.

They end up ragged anyway.

Cagalli hears Ralla -- asking for guidance, asking for something in the world to make sense. God, she thinks -- if someone could answer that question for all of us we'd be in a better place. Still, she feels the need to answer -- to say something. If 'justice' doesn't stop the cycle... maybe reaching out, maybe treating Ralla not as the 'weapon' that she's every bit as guilty of treating her like as the enemy is, but as a human being, might be a start.

"... I don't know," she forces out, voice a whisper. "O... only you -- that's up to you." She pushes herself up a little, meeting Ralla's eye with her own eyes again, but still resting her arms on the bed. "But... I don't -- I don't want to fight you, anymore. I don't know if I -- I don't know if I can."

Now it's Cagalli's turn to feel a little foggy. Her awkward positioning coupled with all that sobbing has made that wound act up a lot worse; her eyes are clouded with tears still. It's nothing compared to Ralla's severe, fresh wounds, of course... but it's sympathetic, somehow. She doesn't mind it, the way she might if she were just having coffee.

Thinking back to the beginning of the conversation, she says, voice still a whisper, "... I'm scared -- of Gable. I thought he... killed my brother. He's terrifying, and the, the, th, things he does... i- it's not just him that's the monster -- he wants to make everyone else the same." For a little while, she reflects, I could've become that monster. It wasn't far off.

She wipes at her eyes, saying nothing further; she looks at Ralla, expecting her to respond -- hoping she responds.

The crying continues for a short period of time, enough so that she keeps going even as Cagalli lifts herself up a little bit. Next to her head, the pillow seems warmer than it used to be. Before, she would pass it off as just a shift in the temprature due to the heat from Cagalli's face, the tears themselves. Now, it feels different. It feels like there's something there-- raw emotion, a feeling that cuts a sharp line into her brain with her artificially-enhanced Newtype abilities.

Bringing her hand down, rubbing frantically at her eye to clear the tears away, the young pilot slowly allows her hand to lower back down to her side, gaze meeting with Cagalli's own. At first, she's hesitant. Her head tilts to the side again, turned slightly toward the place the Princess of Orb just had her head.

She's lost. She's so very lost.

The image of Yazan Gable is likewise burned into her mind. His face, his voice, the way he laughs-- all of it, seared into her memories as though it were a brand. Voice caught in her throat, Ralla's breathing becomes jagged for a few breaths.

"I thought I was going to die... I was..."

Ralla's eyebrows knit, pale white hairs and blonde hairs mixing together as her hands-- both hands, even the one in the sling-- draw into small fists. "I don't want to be scared. I -- I don't ... want to feel like this. I was made to be a perfect soldier, but..."

Her eye closes, tight. "I don't care if I kill him. I just... I don't want to feel like this. There was a Dom there, it... it kept hitting me from behind. If I was a little faster, I could've... I-- I could've just--"

"How do you cope with feelings like this...? Why do I want to smash him down...?"

It doesn't take a Newtype to feel the change in the atmosphere -- the closing gaps between human hearts. Even Cagalli, a Natural, can feel it here -- and while she isn't sure she can give Ralla the direction she needs, she's at least willing to talk with Ralla, willing to bounce ideas, emotions, fears back and forth.

"I don't know if we'll ever stop feeling scared," Cagalli says, finally backing away from Ralla a little; after a second, she notices a stool a few feet behind her, which she drags over with her foot and sits down in. This is a little more comfortable, she thinks.

Going into the classic 'Thinker' pose -- hand on her chin, elbow on her knee -- Cagalli thinks about what Ralla's saying. "Maybe you want to smash him because he hurt you -- maybe because he hurt your friends, too... I know he did awful things to Leo, who knows who else he's hurt." She's careful not to say anything for sure -- Ralla needs to think about this stuff on her own. She needs to figure herself out.

"I /still/ want to smash him. Even though I know my brother's not dead, even though he isn't in command of the Archangel anymore. It's just... I try to focus on that other stuff. I mean -- I feel like... if I get too focused on /him/ I might end up turning into the same kinda thing. I dunno how to deal with it, either."

She thinks about the things Ralla has said -- about how time and time again she keeps coming back to how she was made to be a perfect soldier. She mulls this one over in her head for a while -- are we what we are because we were made that way, because we were put in those circumstances? Is there something better we can be? Heavy questions... but ones Cagalli is willing to at least work with.

"... it doesn't matter what something was made to be, y'know," she thinks aloud, after a little awkward silence. "I mean -- mobile suits started out as weapons, but now we use them for parades, construction -- even just, like, hobby stuff. You don't have to be what you were made to be."

She comes up blank on anything else to say, so instead, she just says, "... sorry I can't help more. I'm still kinda figuring out this stuff too... I guess I'm not so smart, huh?"

Listening to Cagalli's side of the story, for once, there's something in the "broken" Cyber-Newtype that causes her to actually listen. There's a common thread between them, even if hours-- minutes-- ago, they would have just as soon given each other numerous gutshots and tried to outlast the other. Of course, the common link is perhaps one of the most notorious and violent men of the modern era.

Her brother...

Gaze turning toward the cruiser ceiling, Ralla seems to get control of her breathing. She doesn't feel like crying anymore, and the majority of the pain that courses through her body is dulled by the IV that runs down into her arm. More in fact, it feels almost like there's a weight lifted from her chest. The pain in her head isn't gone, but it's certainly lessened up. There's so much she has to think about, still...

Yazan Gable... her brother... the Archangel.

Then, of course, Cagalli points out the obvious.

"I don't... have to be...?"

This goes, fundimentally, against everything that she's ever known-- presumably for the entirety of her life. Her memories, her actions, the way she walked, talked, and related to others, it seemed to be so natural, to streamline so well. Like riding in a Mobile Suit, it felt like something better than second nature.

But she doesn't... have to be that way?

Ralla can't find it in herself to smile as it becomes clear Cagalli may just be trying to cheer her up in the midst of her suggestions, but she isn't frowning, either. Hand reaching out for the bed's elevation switch, she clicks it until she can sit upright just a little bit more, as much as it feels like the entirety of her internal organs are shifting their positions.

"No, ... Miss Athha," she says with an awkward pause, keeping herself from uttering the Gundam pilot's given name in any kind of anger. Maybe it's legitimate manners. Maybe it's just parts of her programming holding on for dear life in what's become the rock tumbler that is Ralla Traln Triald's mind. In either event, her head shakes, just a little bit. "I believe I ... have a lot of things to think about. I cannot explain why, but... I do not want to give up fighting. But... if not for the orders of my superiors, then what is it that I should be fighting for?"

Cagalli is a little scared of pushing Ralla to a conclusion that she won't be happy with -- she just wants to make sure she can make a choice /she's/ happy with. She had to do the same thing with Pascal, and even with Kazuma -- she'd rather fight against someone who knows why they're fighting than fight alongside someone who's made what, to them, is a hollow choice. As such, she's a little scared of doing more than suggesting in the vaguest sense.

"Again -- that's kinda up to you, isn't it?" Cagalli asks of Ralla, when Ralla asks what she should be fighting for. She knows that this is a big step for Ralla, whose primary interactions with her have included, mostly, 'shrieking' and 'mutual attempted murder.' "I mean -- I'm glad to talk this stuff out with you, but... if you want to be something other than someone's big gun, you have to figure it out on your own."

The Princess feels a vague responsibility for Ralla for a moment, one that makes her nervous and a little frightened. She knows what she wants to say -- she wants to tell her to fight alongside her, to fight for her own dignity, for the moral dignity of all human beings. But if she tells her that, if she just -- orders it, then she's just turning Ralla into /her/ perfect weapon. The Princess has to let Ralla choose... and that's scary.

She smiles at Ralla, despite her tear-soaked face. "... Sorry I moved your wand," she finally says, sliding it back into place with a slower, quieter motion than she moved it away, what seems like forever ago. "Is -- is there anything you wanna ask me? Tell me?" Fidgeting a little awkwardly, she says, "If not, I... guess I should let you start thinking."

Five pounds of pressure away from a senseless, deadly mistake, she reflects. Somehow, Ralla's life feels a whole lot weightier than five pounds now.

Amuro Ray walks in the door, surreptitiously re-holstering his Char-killin' gun under his ARMY jacket. He looks vaguely relieved, but still troubled, as if by some phantom emotion haunting his soul.

"Ralla," he greets, nodding at the reclining cyber-newtype. "Cagalli," he says, nodding to the young Princess. "Guess you uncovered my little secret." It's not stated as a joke, or as an accusation. Just a flat fact, neutral, lying there like a turd in the punch bowl.

The Newtype walks over to lean against the wall next to Ralla's hospital bed, and re-adjusts his jacket once again, sure to conceal the slight bulge of the pistol under his arm. "You in any shape to be discussing philosophy right now?"

Looking down at the wand as it's moved back up the rails by Cagalli's hand, Ralla doesn't seem like she's ready to snatch it up and hit the 'call for halp nowz' button such as she was when she first woke up. No, instead, her brow knits and her gaze shifts down to her feet-- where one leg remains hefted up and the other laid flat on the bed.

Figure out a reason to fight...

... on her own?

Still, as Cagalli offers to talk it out with her, Ralla inhales. Her breathing is a little ragged, trying to keep the welling-up emotions under control. How DO people do it...? "I'm sorry. I just... I've always been ordered to do things. I have never had the chance to truly... figure things out for myself, like this..."

The Cyber-Newtype's expression becomes pensive, her good right arm shifting as the blanket over the lower half of her body is held in a clenched hand. She does want to say something, she really does... but then another person appears in the infirmary, and she looks up to address him with a bit of surprise. "Amuro Ray..."

The events of her discovery are still a jumble, memories that she can't quite remember but the things he said hanging there in the back of her mind regardless. Glancing at the Newtype as he shifts, she tries her best to alter her expression into something a bit more neutral. It wasn't so when the pilot of the original Gundam had found her in the cockpit of the Ahead Prototype, but there seems to be a few streaks of solid white in her blonde hair.

"I... I'm fine, I think."

After an uncomfortable pause, her eye closes. "Beyond the obvious, I suppose," she says, bringing a hand up to her face to wipe away the last of the tears that filled it minutes ago. "I ... did not have a chance to thank you for saving my life. I can't remember everything, but... I do remember this much. So... thank you."

"I understand," Cagalli whispers to Ralla, in that last moment before Amuro Ray enters; so this was his 'little project,' she realizes, as he begins to speak. This was what he was less than eager to discuss with her on the command frequency.

She glances over to the gun dropped next to Ralla's heart monitor. Yeah, she thinks in hindsight, not telling her 'I have a woman who murdered 300 of your comrades lying vulnerable in a bed' was probably a good plan, as far as plans go. Who knows what she would've done if she'd just been told as much.

When she finally opens her mouth to speak to Amuro, she says, with a bluntness that matches his, "... yeah, it was probably better you didn't tell me at first." She gives him a bit of a smile; she notices the slight bulge, but figures it's flak padding. Most of her jackets are padded, too. "Iiii... almost did something I couldn't have taken back." She gestures, a little surreptitiously, to her own dropped weapon.

"Yeah, I was right outside," Amuro Ray replies, voice harbouring a slightly harder edge, which vanishes as soon as the words are out of his mouth. "But... I understand a thing or two about vengeance." He shrugs.

"You're welcome. Any time I can save a life instead of ending one..." Amuro's eyes grow distant for a moment, perhaps perusing the List he keeps in his head. All the blood on his hands. All the blood to come. He grunts. "Well, let's just say it's a nice change of pace."

The Newtype listens intently to the pre-amble as well, and takes a moment to digest it. Then, miracle of miracles, he smiles. "I told you already, months ago... you don't have to be a weapon, Ralla." He reaches down, placing a hand on her good shoulder. "Maybe now... maybe now you can realise that yourself. Maybe now we can help you make a new start."

Please, god, let her be ready.

As Cagalli indicates to the gun again, the last few moments play over and over again in her own mind. The feelings she had, the emotions that came out, even the question why Katharon hadn't just let her die in the middle of the forest. Even now, she struggles with an answer. Are people actually that benevolent and kind...?

Nodding briefly as she sits there, Ralla's gaze shifts back down to her lap. The weight of Amuro's hand on her shoulder, the suggestion of a new start. Is he suggesting that she runs away? Or should she keep fighting? Even Cagalli told her to figure things out for herself, but... what should she do?

What orders would Leo give her?

... Would he even do that? Or would he say the same?

Mouth falling into a flat line again, her brow creases. "I can't..." she starts, letting out a slow sigh. "I can't go back right now. I don't want to leave Lieutenant Peries or Captain Stenbuck, Warrant Officer Halevy... I... I don't want to abandon them, but I cannot go back. Not like this. I can't even be sure I won't be imprisoned even if I did return."

Ralla closes her eye. "I do not wish to make a promise to you all I cannot keep. I ... may decide to return one day. I still have so much to think about, so... until I am able to make up for the things I have done to you all," she says, blue eye shifting especially toward Cagalli before drifting downward, "I can't go back."

Ralla isn't the only one who, in the face of this situation, needs to figure some things out.

Wincing a little at Amuro's mention that he was right outside, she wonders for a moment just how much he might have heard or seen. The gun gently shoved underneath Ralla's mouth. The desperate shouting. The sobbing breakdown. She doesn't know -- she doesn't /want/ to know.

Her previous thoughts are still true; she'd rather have Ralla return and know why she fights than stay with her and just be a weapon. Slowly, shakily standing up, she says, "... All right. If you can't go back -- we'll keep you safe. I know you said you still want to fight... but you don't have to if you find out you don't want to after all. We'll still keep you safe."

The Princess stands up, looking Amuro squarely in the eye. "For a little while, I was scared of you -- I didn't... get a lot of the stuff you did. But -- I see where you're coming from, now, a little." She takes a few shaky steps back, eventually adding, "... I'm sorry I doubted you. I should... I should get going."

Giving one long last look to Ralla, Cagalli says, "I think... we should talk more, when we've had a little time to cool down. We might have a lot to learn from each other," she says, before starting toward the door.

The White Devil returns Cagalli's look evenly, without hostility. "Hell, Princess. /I'm/ scared of me." He nods as she leaves.

"Hey, I know how you feel," Amuro Ray replies, glancing down at Ralla. And he's not just saying it, like most people would. He actually does know. "I know Stenbuck's hurting right now, but you can't help him yet." He shakes his head, recalling the abyssal emptiness he felt in the young pilot. "Right now, all you need to promise is to get yourself in shape, mind and body."

Amuro leans his head back on the wall, closing his eyes."There's, uh, there's a war on, Ralla. What's at stake is more than just, you know, than lands and lines on a map. I can't tell you where you stand in it." His eyes open again, but he's not seeing the ceiling. He's seeing something else entirely. "Stay or go, that's on you. But I'll tell you this now: if you go back to being a weapon, if you go back and blindly follow what they tell you, if you let /anyone/ tell you that you're anything less than human..."

Amuro Ray closes his eyes again. "I /will/ hunt you down." His voice is quiet, now. "It is my duty to destroy weapons."

There's a bit of security in Cagalli's words, as much as it seems strange to trust someone who has been the sole object of a destructive obsession. For a moment, Ralla wonders if this entire incident has made her gone crazy; feeling fear and pain, having the entirety of her existance berated and insulted by a man that very nearly killed her, those uncontrolled emotions that should've been suppressed.

The feelings she had when Amuro and Beltorichika pulled her out of what was left of the cockpit.

The gun, and the plea from her own lips to die.

"O-Okay, Miss Athha," she says, suddenly overcome with the urge to rub her eye with the heel of her hand before she begins to cry again. With that, Cagalli is gone, leaving both Ralla and Amuro alone.

Painkillers are all that allow her to sit up at this point, the Cyber-Newtype somehow able to remain upright despite the pain in her body. It's true, Leo has had so many of his own problems right now. Soma... Soma wanted to talk to her, she remembers that much clearly. There was a lot she's leaving behind with the A-LAWS, both professionally and personally.

Now, she seems less like a weapon. Now, she seems more like the sixteen-year old girl, one that should've lived a normal life with her mother in London. Swallowing back the knot in her throat, Ralla gives a short nod, the thought of being hunted down by none other than Amuro Ray a little numbing and jarring at the same time. "I understand, Mister Ray."

Slowly, Ralla lays back onto the elevated-backed bed, closing her eye. "I am sorry I have caused trouble for you."

Amuro stands there, leaning on the wall, and grunts in reply. It's a non-committal sort of sound, the grunt; even so, coming from this man, at this time, in this environment, it's almost a comforting noise.

The Newtype continues to lean on the wall, even as Ralla falls asleep from the painkillers, the exertion and the agony of self-examination. He stays there, calm and waiting, a steady presence. Almost like a father, waiting at his wounded daughter's bedside.

Humans are social creatures, after all. They need each other as much as they need air, food and water. Right now, this girl needs a person like Amuro Ray.

And it may just be that Amuro Ray needs a girl like this just as much.

Humans sure are funny.