2010-03-18 - Under A Waterfall

SOMEWHERE IN JAPAN NO, SERIOUSLY, IT'S JAPAN SHUT UP The Katagiri estate is a sprawling one, the legacy of a family once numerous as well as proud and powerful, though now it plays host to a startling few people; it's the private residence of Homer Katagiri, one of the big dogs amongst the multilateral A-LAWS taskforce, but oftentimes Katagiri's student, the man who has come to be known as Mister Bushido, returns to his teacher's estate in order to spend some time in the peaceful contemplation only the Japanese countryside can truly afford his warrior's spirit. The estate is one of the few places Bushido feels comfortable enough to forego his mask, but that might have to do with the rarity of encountering anyone present; Homer Katagiri himself is usually busy with the business of command, and the few family servants who remain are mostly tottering oldsters, unlikely to truly see the blond man's scarred face even if they looked up at it. At the moment, then, Bushido is in a distant part of the grounds, meditating on recent events, most particularly the spectacular Zoids Fight victory over Team Brimstone, snatched from the jaws of certain, grim defeat. The One Man Army accomplishes this meditation by standing under, yes, a running waterfall. A great sheet of water pours down into a pool from above, and clad in a white kimono, the green-eyed man lets it clear his mind, allows the flowing water to purge him of impurities spiritual and mental. He can barely feel the water, where it runs over the scarred tissue of the right side of his face, but he tries not to think about that. This is as relaxed as Mister Bushido gets, these days.

This - meditating under a waterfall like Mister Bushido - is something that Leo Stenbuck has wanted to try for awhile, but has simply never had the time to do... until now, and his stretch of involuntary medical leave. After several days of sitting in his hotel room grousing to the internet about being bored - and one day full of a Zoid Fight in which Team Samurai Braves was somehow, miraculously, victorious - he has finally endeavored to make it happen.

And so Leo, in garb similar to that of Mister Bushido, also stands under the running waterfall, doing his best to meditate and relax. Unlike the One Man Army, however, the young Captain does not seem terribly relaxed. His shoulders are slightly hunched and his teeth are clenched... in fact, he looks to be in pain.

Perhaps this is why he's managed to, so far, remain silent, and not disrupt the purpose of the entire exercise. But that, like all good things, must eventually come to an end. "Graham?" Leo says suddenly, his voice slightly clipped from his apparent pain. "I'm sorry I can't keep up with you in the Zoids. I promise I'll try harder not to slow you down."

Hands held together in front of him, palms together as if in prayer - one can't even tell, at a glance, which one is biological and which is cybernetic - Mister Bushido's eyes are closed, his head slightly bowed. He might almost look like he was sleeping as he stands like that, his tall, lean form unmoved by the pressure of all that water falling down on top of him. And on top of Leo Stenbuck, of course. He had hoped that this exercise would help the younger pilot, especially in the face of that aforementioned forced medical leave. Finding his center, Bushido thought, would do Leo worlds of good, to help him in the battles to come to ensure the safety and unity of the Earth Sphere and beyond. To help him achieve the strength to grasp his goals. However... "You worry too much," the scarred man says, without opening his eyes, or changing his posture at all. Only his mouth moves. "You did well. They were three talented, experienced pilots and they used the advantage of numbers against you." Of course, Mister Bushido doesn't point out that he proceeded to defeat all three of their opponents; that would be crass.

In the face of Mister Bushido's reassurance, Leo goes silent for several seconds. His stance, like his dress, is the same as his scarred companion's... even if he does keep shifting uncomfortably, in contrast to Mister Bushido's stillness.

"I know," the young man concedes eventually. "But..." He sighs, and shifts his stance slightly. "If it were up to me, I'd fly solo, like you do," he explains. "The team I have now... they're all people I trust, but I still feel like I have to babysit them, you know?"

"I just..." Leo sighs again. "I don't know. I wish I was as strong as you."

"Hrm," murmurs Mister Bushido, in response to Leo's explanation; it borders on directionless complaining, as if there were anything the normally maked ace could do to fix it. But, again, Bushido is not the sort of person to just say that outright; it would not be suitable behaviour from a warrior. Instead, the blond man lifts his head, green eyes opening as he looks towards Leo, the right standing out all the more with the scarred flesh that surrounds it. "True strength comes from within, Leo Stenbuck. Search for it, and you will find it," the One Man Army offers. In truth, the reason he operates by himself is as much because of his peculiarities as his ability; he has little interest in following the orders of others during combat, and even less in giving them, though he will on occasion work with other A-LAWS pilots directly. It just so happens that he's good enough that command decided to indulge his eccentricities. "Besides, it seems that our superiors see in you the material of a commander," Bushido continues. He remembers what that was like, during the days of the OverFlags and before. But he threw that away, along with his name and his pride. He can't be that man, not anymore. "In which case it is, to a degree, your responsibility to 'babysit' your subordinates. We each find our aptitudes in different ways, Leo Stenbuck. Besides, I doubt you would truly want to follow the same path I have chosen to." He looks forward, expression hardening. "The end of that path can only be absolute victory, or death... And everything else along the way will be destroyed."

Absolute victory or death, huh? Leo's expression melts into a thoughtful frown - really more of a grimace, thanks to the way his jaw is clenched. Well, Mister Bushido is right about one thing... he certainly doesn't want to destroy everything in his path. But the choice between victory and death... that's all anyone gets, isn't it? No one ever compromises... not really.

"I know," Leo repeats. And then he goes silent again, this time for a good fifteen seconds... at which point he begins, again, "Graham? Is beating Gundams really the only reason you fight?"

"It's just..." He forges onwards, without giving the One Man Army a chance to answer, "I want to be stronger, too, but... I want to be stronger so I can protect people. Not just the people I care about, but... you know, everyone. People who can't protect themselves. That's why I want to fly alone. That way, as few people as possible have to..." He hesitates, briefly, before admitting, "Die."

"But... why is all this honor and strength stuff suddenly such a big deal to you?" Leo finally asks, having boiled his feelings down to the question at their core.

How does one explain their entire reason for being in a few simple sentences? Even for one as straightforward as Mister Bushido, there are complexities, gradients, shades of grey. He doesn't answer at first, letting Leo get out all of his words while considering his own, but the scarred man's green eyes remain fixed forward, glaring at something that he can't see. The future, perhaps. Or maybe the past. "Surpassing 'Gundam' is only part of it," the One Man Army says finally, after a long, significant silence. "There are many reasons that I fight. I fight to avenge the victims of Celestial Being and their allies' misguided 'war on war'. I fight to honour the memory of, and avenge my fallen comrades: Darryl Dodge, Howard Mason, Professor Eifman, and the others who fought alongside me, each in their own way." His mouth sets into a firm line, and he seems to lean forward, staring all the more intently at that 'nothing'. "So too, I fight to avenge Lamia Loveless, slain by the honourless dogs of the Divine Crusaders. But I also fight to become stronger. To become the /strongest/." The scarred man lets out a slow, steadying breath, trying to regain his calm center. "But 'honour' and 'strength' have always mattered to me, Leo Stenbuck. Ever since I was able to fulfill my dream of flying, through my ability as a combat pilot. Katagiri-sensei simply showed me a better way to achieve them, a more disciplined way. The savage purity of blade to blade combat, the empowering discipline of the warrior's way." So, no murder... Yet.

As increasingly annoying as his questions might be, Leo does at least seem genuinely interested in Mister BUshido's response. Fighting against Celestial Being he can get behind, and he can empathize with the One Man Army's desire to get revenge for his fallen comrades... even if not exactly. He's never lost a particularly close wingman - at least not to their mortality - but...

His mind drifts, briefly, back to Rei, and the knife buried permanently in his heart twists, an ethereal weight on his lungs strangling his breath in his throat. The young man swallows roughly--

-- but any further devolution is, thankfully, halted by Mister BUshido's mention of Lamia Loveless. It's... surprising, let's say, to find her listed seperate from the others. He had heard rumors that they were sort of a thing, sure, but when he asked. Mister Bushido had said...

... but it doesn't really matter now, Leo grimly reminds himself, because she's dead, and she's never coming back. People don't come back from the dead... and even if they did, it wouldn't really be them. It'd just be a copy, a constant reminder of loss.

Just like /her/.

Leo grinds his teeth together through the rest of Mister Bushido's explanation, taking a few slow, shuddery breaths. It sort of sounds like he's about to cry... but no tears come. When his teammate finishes speaking, the young man is silent for yet another long stretch of time before speaking again.

"Graham?" he finally asks, a little hesitantly. "Have you ever been in love?"

Though many things about Mister Bushido are straightforward and simple, despite his previously mentioned gradients and shadings, the matter of Lamia Loveless is a... Complex one. Even he isn't too sure what to make of it, though whatever did exist between the two of them was certainly doomed after the 'incident' in which the GN Flag was thoroughly destroyed by Exia, and the pilot was... Severely burned. In some ways, 'Graham Aker' as most people knew him died there. After that, it was just the road to becoming who he is now. The One Man Army. At Leo's question, Bushido frowns. Again, a more complicated issue than it might appear at first blush. "A long time ago, there was a young woman," the scarred man says. "She was the daughter of my commanding officer, when I was selected to be one of the test pilots for the Flag. She and I were... Close. We were going to be married." Mister Bushido remains silent for a long time, before he says: "And then I killed her father."

Leo spends the silence after Graham's brief explanation contemplating what might have happened. Did she die? Did they have a fight? He has trouble coming up with anything more involved than that; he can't imagine what would ruin things, if they were in love and had been together so long that they were going t-

Oh, yeah, that'd probably do it.

Leo says nothing for a long time. So long, in fact, that it becomes a distinct possibility that he's going to do the wise thing, and just let the topic lie. That, of course, would be too good to be true. "I'm sorry," the young man says eventually. "What... what happened?"

"I mean, you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to," he adds quickly, almost tripping over the words. "I know that it's... hard to talk about stuff like that."

"As I said, it was a long time ago," Bushido replies, shrugging almost imperceptibly. "It was during a live fire exercise, we were testing out the Flag's fire control systems. I chose my shot poorly, and struck his mobile suit in the back... He did not survive." The memory of that day hounded his career for a long time, particularly since he was promoted to Lieutenant not long afterwards. "She was upset, but perhaps she would've been willing to work things out... However, I decided it would be better to break things off." He pauses again, then adds: "I haven't spoken to her since." See, this is what happens when you try to talk to Mister Bushido about /feelings/. All you get are some really depressing anecdotes about his past, because he's apparently incapable of having any sort of functional relationship that isn't based around revenge. "After that, the closest I came to any sort of romantic entanglement was with Lamia Loveless, however that did not go anywhere." Which was probably his fault.

The whole thing is, in fact, pretty depressing. Even more than the simple facts of the story being a downer, exposure to it has made him realize just how alone the man next to him is. After the whole thing he just described, and then his wingmen died like that, and now Lamia... He has the Katagiris, sure, but... more and more, from the outside, it seems like they're just enabling Graham Aker to burrow ever deeper into his new persona.

Leo's frown deepens. No wonder Graham puts on the mask and acts like he does. After what happened to Rei - the name sends another lance of pain through his heart - if he didn't have anyone else, if he didn't have girls like Latooni, and Louise, and the Cyber-Newtypes, if Master Paptimus and Sarah didn't need him... it'd be tempting to do that, too. To be someone else for awhile.

"I'm sorry," Leo manages after awhile, barely loud enough to be heard over the water. He clears his throat, and continues more loudly, "But you should know, that..." Hnn. How does he put this? "... I know we haven't known each other that long, but you're my friend, and... I worry about you. But... I get it now. Do what you have to do, but until you're ready to... to be Graham, again..."

"Just be careful, okay, Mister Bushido?" Leo urges, opening his eyes for the first time since the conversation began and glancing sidelong at the One Man Army.

Indeed, there are few people who are even remotely close to the scarred man, anymore. Born an orphan, most of the friends he's made over his career have died, one way or another; death follows Mister Bushido like a shadow, though perhaps not quite so prominently and dramatically as it follows some. Even the enemies he's counted on for their familiarity have begun falling by the wayside; he felt oddly sad after the death of Rau Le Creuset, even, for all that the ZAFT madman was felled trying to wipe out all human life. It's a funny old world. Bushido doesn't look over at Leo as he speaks, or even visibly seem to react at all. His attention remains fixed forward, on whatever it is that he's been staring at all this time. Maybe his goals for the future, maybe the past he's haunted by. "I appreciate your concern, and your support, Leo Stenbuck," the blond man says, gravely. He's not really sure how to respond to it. "Perhaps that day will come," Bushido allows, closing his eyes again to renew his calm center, to focus himself. "But there is much to be done, before then."

Leo gives a small nod, and then turns to look forwards again, closing his eyes. After a few seconds, he says, "Thank you for talking to me. I'm sorry to drag up bad memories, but..." The young man rolls his shoulders briefly, and then opens his eyes again. Suddenly, they're aglow with yellow light, beams of even bright light lancing out of his pupils in all directions.

"... men like us can't just snap our fingers and understand each other. We have to work at it." Leo hesitates a moment, and then continues, as if uncertain of what he's saying, "I think... that's what makes us strong. That we have to try. Even if it's hard... 'that which does not kill me makes me stronger.'"

Leo closes his eyes again, and asks, still obviously uncertain, "Right?"

"If we could simply 'understand' one another," Mister Bushido says, contemplatively, "then I suppose we would be 'Newtypes'. However, there is value in finding ways to understand others through effort, I believe." Perhaps his is a soul held down by gravity; he certainly has a heart weighted by the past, unable to move forward because of his need for vengeance, his obsession with 'Gundam' and the attendant baggage thereof. The older pilot is silent for a while then, considering what's been said. His head tilts slightly to one side, eyes remaining closed as he focuses, blots out the disquiet within and without. "I believe that you are right, Leo Stenbuck." He says, finally.

Leo doesn't say anything; he just nods again, more deliberately this time. He adjusts his stance one more time, takes a deep breath, and goes back to concentrating on finding his center. It appears he's run out of things to say.

Thank God.