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[speakveryclearly]

Apparently Im Too Busy To Even Talk To You Right Now
How Unsurprising
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[redheadcarrier]

What do I care about some random idiot from another planet?

[Read: they weren't important to me, so they didn't count.]

And what the Hell is that supposed to mean? They're gone! They're gone and they're not coming back! They weren't supposed to leave!

[speakveryclearly]

Of course they're not supposed to. That doesn't change anything. [The ones you love ought to have the decency to stay. They just never do. The rope is so easily cut. Kanaya's volume has gotten less low and controlled, because she knows how much less abstract the next question is to her]

What I mean to ask: is there anyone else left who matters to you in this sorry excuse for an army? Or are - were - they the last ones? If they are, you can rest in the knowledge that this is over, and can't happen again. [If they aren't... you get this sort of phone call, apparently, and feel dubious degrees of lucky.]

[redheadcarrier]

What kind of stupid question is that?

[Asuka snaps, voice shrill.]

Why should I bother caring anymore if everyone can just vanish? I knew this was pointless - why bother if everyone just leaves you?

[If she weren't in panicmode, she might actually get what Kanaya's hinting at.]

[speakveryclearly]

It's been absurdly tentative since the beginning. Even if things weren't interdimensional -- we are in some farcical imitation of a war, and a temporary one at that.

Clinging to another person might be a futile aim, and nobody could blame you for giving up on caring after this. Independence is definitely a becoming trait for a soldier. If you give into isolation entirely, though... you never get the benefits of other people, after that. [She wonders if Asuka knew Haruka, had ever seen that hardening of heart firsthand.] So if you ever derived a real value from attaching yourself to someone... I think that still exists, even if the risk remains very high.

[Does that make any sense? It's all bullshit.]

[redheadcarrier]

Maybe I should've given up a long time ago.

[Yeah, still bitter. Her voice drops into an angry murmur.]

I hate everyone.

[speakveryclearly]

[I'm glad you didn't. There's a silence while she doesn't say it.]

That's a little drastic.

[redheadcarrier]

Why? Everybody leaves!

[speakveryclearly]

So why would you expend hatred upon them? I thought it would take a lot of energy.

[redheadcarrier]

Hating is easy.

[Spoken with all the bitterness of experience.]

[speakveryclearly]

I see.

[She doesn't. Asuka is out there somewhere and the feed isn't video. She'd like to see her again... the question of this as their last chance to talk always casts a shadow.]

Does it make you... feel violent?

[redheadcarrier]

It makes me want to forget everything and everyone. That's what it does!

[speakveryclearly]

If you wait long enough, that's what they say happens. When you go "back". It's crueler, really.

[redheadcarrier]

I don't want to go back!

[There's a new note of panic.]

They can't make me!

[speakveryclearly]

... --what do you want?

[redheadcarrier]

I don't want to be alone!

[speakveryclearly]

I--

[Was definitely going to say something else a lot deeper. On the other side of the line, though, something changes drastically and then Kanaya's shuffling her feet, turning around.]

Have to get back to work. Right now! Bye!

[In a clumsy way she deactivates the device.]