2010-04-02 - Relapse

Leo Stenbuck has just returned from his second stint of medical leave; a mere two days, compared to his (initial and involuntary) two weeks. Much to his relief, his return was not interrupted by the arrival of an Angel, this time, and his summoning to NERV HQ in Tokyo-03.

What this means is that it is about midnight Zulu time, and Leo is in his quarters aboard the Shirogane, unpacking his teal A-LAWS duffel bag, which lies open on his bed. His Haro sits in his desk chair, merely watching after being scolded for its initial attempts to help.

Leo has not actually explicitly contacted his teammates to let them know he's back. Not yet, at least; after all, he's only been back about an hour, and has had Things To Do. But the Shirogane isn't exactly the Exelion, and news travels fast.

There is a sharp knock at Leo's door about an hour and five minutes after he gets in. He has about three seconds to answer before it becomes five sharper knocks. Someone is impatient, and also not in the mood to announce who they are.

"One second!" Leo calls over his shoulder at the first knock, as he is busy placing his uniform pants back in his dresser; possibly even his space dresser.

This, apparently, is not good enough; when the knocking redoubles - or, more accurately, requintuples - Leo huffs in exasperation, aborts storing his pants mid-fold, and stomps irately over to his door to open it.

What's behind door number one?

Louise Halevy.

Louise does not look happy, either; more to the point, she looks furious. "Hello, Leo," she says, practically blowing past him and seating herself on the nearest available chair. "How was your 'medical leave'?" The words 'medical leave' get spit out like rancid food; she did a little poking into that, and knows that, at the very least, he didn't go alone.

This is going to get awkward really, /really/ fast.

Leo's expression shifts rapidly from irritated to pleased, and then just as rapidly from pleased to a mixture of worried and confused. He /was/ glad to see Louise, and still kind of is, but it's been totally overwhelmed by what an obviously foul mood she's in.

Even the Haro picks up on it; he gets the hell out of dodge before Louise makes it to the desk chair it's perched upon, and rolls across the room to hide under the bed, flapping with fear.

"It was... fine," Leo says uncertainly, after a few moments of shocked silence. "I missed you, but..." He shakes his head to clear his thoughts, and then finally thinks to close the door. "Louise, what's wrong?"

Haro's terror is very rational. Louise is in the process of gearing up to flip her shit. "I'm sure you missed me a whole lot when you went to Jupiter with some other girl. I'm sure you missed me a whole lot when you were telling Ralla she /needed/ to try some cake -- was there anything else you told her she needed to do?"

She narrows her eyes at Leo, absently fingering her new necklace. "I don't know if I can trust you anymore, Leo. I mean -- god, even when you came and apologized you tried to get fresh with me," she continues, tone full of barely-restrained anger.

For another few seconds, Leo just stares, his face screwed up with confusion. That's... a lot of accusations all in a row, rapid fire, and he's still trying to work out what exactly she's mad about, let alone how to respond to it.

He seettles, after a bit, for the most recent one. "I thought it would make you feel better," he explains helplessly, leaning backwards against the closed door to his room. He spreads his arms, and continues, "Louise, why are you so upset? Did something happen?"

It must be that, he guesses. Some bad news from somewhere else, and she's taking it out on him. /He/ certainly couldn't have done anything wrong, after all, he wasn't even here!

"Revive came and checked up on me after what happened," Louise says. "And /didn't/ try to get fresh with me and /didn't/ accuse anyone of anything." Oooh yeah, this is going to go /fantastically/. "And the more I think about it, the more I'm not happy with the answers you gave me the other night."

Louise crosses her legs and arms at almost exactly the same time, body language becoming about as closed-off as it can be. "You thought it'd make me feel better for you to try to have sex with me so soon after you hit me across the mouth?" she asks of him -- her tone on this particular question is a little less accusatory, which might be worrisome in and of itself. "Funny -- it seems like all the other girls you touched weren't the type who would've enjoyed it." Which, of course, only makes his skittishness make more sense.

Revive. Fucking... /Revive./ Revive God damn Revival. That little factoid goes a great length towards making Leo just as angry as Louise is... but he forces himself to control it, briefly grinding his teeth together. He can't afford to lose his temper with Louise, especially not after what happened last time he did, even if she /is/ being so... so...

"What 'other girls'?" he demands, forcing exasperation rather than anger into his voice. "There aren't any-- I told you, I never touched Ralla! She's a Cyber-Newtype! That's just... it's disgusting! It's like /rape!/"

When he says it aloud, it seems to reinforce what exactly he's being accused of, and he deflates a little. When he continues, he sounds more hurt than offended. "What the hell did I do to make you think I'd do something like that?"

Louise doesn't seem convinced by Leo's forced exasperation. She can sense it for what it really is -- there are advantages to being a strong receiver rather than a broadcaster. The anger in his heart -- that's what she senses, and that's something that feels, from her perspective, like guilt.

"Hit me in the face. Dated that passive little Japanese tart before me, who I hear has all the emotional range or self-assertion of a brick. Went to Jupiter with some other girl." She sticks to her guns, keeping herself straight on her original talking points -- Louise is very much the sort to hold a grudge.

She just went exactly where it sounds like she went. This is going to go -fantastically.-

Little Japanese tart? /LITTLE JAPANESE TART?/

"Louise, what the /fuck/ has gotten into you?!" Leo snaps, unable to restrain his anger when faced with /that/ little barb. "She wasn't a 'little japanese tart', she was my /girlfriend!/ And she fucking /DIED!/" His voice cracks at that proclamation, and he takes a step towards Louise; he forces himself not to take a second.

The topic of Rei's fate dims his anger a little, replacing it with sadness... which isn't unexpected, really. Leo is an emotional rollercoaster, even on a good day. "Are you /seriously/ jealous of..." Leo trails off, reaching up to rub at his eyes with his left hand in frustration.

"If she died then why is she our NERV liaison?! Don't lie to me, Leo Stenbuck!" Louise half-shouts back, not knowing the complex story of that particular bit of madness. "And -- I'm not jealous of her, I just -- don't feel like I can trust you! You seem to want all the girls around you to just -- be passive, just -- lie there and do nothing --"

She isn't even sure what she's saying anymore. As such, she finds herself hitting a wall and just -- running out of energy to be angry. "I just feel like you aren't really interested in me, just in... girls like Ralla or --" what was her name again? "-- our NERV liaison."

Well, Leo has to admit that Louise poses a good question. If she died, why /is/ she our NERV liaison? Leo's shoulders sag, but he doesn't say anything; she wouldn't believe him even if he told her. She probably wouldn't even if her faith in him wasn't already shaken.

Leo steps backwards, to lean against the door to his room again, and rather than staying there he slides down it, settling into a sitting position and covering his face with his hands. This is all so hard, and he's still not even sure what he did to set it off... besides the obvious.

"Louise," he says tiredly, without lifting his head out of his hands. "I swear to God, I am trying as hard as I can to make things right, about... everything. Would I do that if I didn't care about you?"

"I'm telling you the truth," he insists, still without looking up. "I never touched Ralla. And I was just doing a favor for a friend's sister at Jupiter."

Louise still doesn't trust Leo... but then, does she have to? Whether she wants to admit it or not, whether she's happy with Leo or not -- she needs him. He's the positive end of their pair -- part of the same steps toward Innovation. Ribbons gave them paired machines for a reason... and she's taken to leaning on him so strongly for a reason.

Getting out of her chair, she slowly walks toward Leo, leaning on the wall next to the door. "... All right. I believe you," she says. If he can deny it in the face of even the extent of her accusations, without tweaking her instincts about his guilt... then at the very least, she can believe he didn't touch Ralla. She's still hesitant about Jupiter... but right now, she's not going to get any better answers.

Even that admission of belief doesn't do a whole lot to relieve Leo; he remains slumped against the door, his head clutched in his hands. This has officially moved into yet another one of the many, many times since Rei's death that he's wished he could cry, and found himself totally unable to.

Louise's accusations have left him a veritable maelstrom of emotions; he's confused, he's scared, he's exhausted, he's upset, and underneath it all he's still a little angry. And it's all there in his voice, when, after a few seconds of silence, he weakly says, "I thought you believed me last time."

He may not be able to cry, but he sure as hell sounds like he might start at any time.

"I thought I did at first, but... the more I thought about it..." Louise starts, thinking to herself. "... I don't know. I guess I just felt like something felt off about you trying to... you know..." She shakes her head, saying, "... nevermind."

Sliding down to sit next to him, she says, "I'm sorry I doubted you, it's just... it felt weird how right after that you took off with some girl to Jupiter, even if it ended up not being about that." She sighs, saying, "... sorry."

The apology /does/ make Leo feel a little better. He deserves it, after all; he didn't do anything wrong, and Louise is being such an irrational, jealous bitch. But...

... but that's probably his fault. It's always his fault, at the end of the day, no matter how hard he tries. He should be the one apologizing, not her. He's the one who fucked up. Maybe he should start taking those stupid fucking pills again, after all.

"I'm sorry I'm such a fuckup," Leo eventually mutters, pulling his face out of his hands. "I wasn't trying to upset you... I just... I don't... I don't know." He reaches out to touch Louise's hand, but apparently thinks better of it halfway through the motion, and just drops his hand limply to his side after a moment of hesitation.

For now, Louise isn't sure she can find the words to actually affirm or deny Leo much of anything. She glances toward him, feeling both her guilt and his; she lets her own hand drift down, next to his -- not quite touching. Close enough, however -- enough that her presence is known.

"... hey, um..." she says, absently fingering that necklace again. It reminds her that she's part of a family... and for the moment, at least -- so is Leo. "Maybe some time in the next week or two, once we have a little time to cool off... would you take me to dinner?" she asks, finally finding /something/ to say. "Or a concert, or -- something. Just the two of us."

A week or two? Leo's shoulders sag again; to him, right now especially, that is basically forever. A large number of his spare thought cycles on his initial, two-week leave were spent thinking about getting back on duty and being able to see Louise, so of course as soon as he was able to do that, he fucked everything up and now she doesn't even want to be around him.

Maybe it's karma for what he told Latooni. Or maybe that's just him driving away Latooni, too, like he drives away everyone, like he's driving away Louise, like he drove away Sarah, like he drove away his mother. And that list doesn't even include the people he /really/ let down.

"Yeah," Leo says weakly, finally turning his head to look at Louise. He looks as miserable as he sounds. "Okay." He pauses, and then desperate for some lighter note to the conversation, grasps at straws. "You've never worn that before," he observes, eyes dropping to her new necklace. "It's... pretty."

Offering Leo a little smile, Louise says, "Thanks... the acting captain gave it to me, when he came to ask if I was all right." She isn't sure she should have said that, the second after she does -- accepting gifts from a man who just took over Leo's position... but then again -- he was so sisterly about it, and it's not like they hadn't been friends for quite a time before that.

"I think he wanted to cheer me up a little... I was still very unhappy when he showed up." There isn't a whole lot else that she can say, truthfully, on that front. "I'm glad you like it -- I thought the stone was very pretty, as well."

It takes Leo a second to put two and two together, and then... well, to use a technical term, 'blaow!' Somewhere, Revive Revival probably has the closest thing he is achieving to an orgasm, as Leo's eyes widen in shock and he's overtaken by a wave of jealousy and anger.

Now it is Leo Stenbuck's turn to be the irrational, jealous bitch!

"Oh," Leo says a little too quickly, the curtness of his voice betraying that the necklace's origins bother him. He looks away from Louise again, drawing his knees up to his chest and fixing his eyes firmly on them. "That was... nice of him." Everything but his words suggests that he doesn't actually think so.

"You can go, if you want to," Leo continues after only a little hesitation. She'd probably rather be with Revive, anyways. After all, he gets her /necklaces./

"... all right -- I'll go," Louise says, knowing full well when she's not wanted; she knows enough to know that Leo is unhappy with her right now, and knows enough to know why besides. It's his turn to be jealous -- and why shouldn't he be, part of her realizes.

After all, /both/ of them spent Leo's leave with lavender-haired strumpets.

She slips out without saying another word.