It's helping me set some dialogue.
End of 'Jet Jaguar in the Steelyard', that's what Jet just remembered.
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--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
Quote:-------
Jet finished the last of her mug of tea, downing the last of it in one. The sun shone in through the apartment windows as it rose like a flare over the horizon.
“How many times do I have to admit I was wrong?”
"Just once," replied Yayoi, "as long as you know what you were wrong about. Jet, I know what it's like to not say what I was really feeling... all right, that was the original me, not the me that's here in this world, but I still know. Not saying what I should have said caused a lot of pain to somebody I care about."
Jet looked down at the floor for a moment. “Shinji was in for pain either way. I tried to do the right thing. I wanted to do the right thing for him, I just didn’t know what it was.” She crossed her legs, settling back into the couch. “And he’s still going to have a hard time of it when this is over.”
Yayoi placed her mug on the saucer on the coffee table. “Even so, he has people who care about him to help him through it.”
“Yeah.” She smiled. “I’m still amazed at the response we got from the rest of Fenspace.”
“That wasn’t exactly what I meant.”
“I know. But still....” She trailed off into her own thoughts.
“What?”
“I was just reminded of something a friend told me a long time ago.” Something that had filled her up with a quiet, illuminating happiness that had come from somewhere deep within. “It’s not important right now.”
“And where is Shinji now?” Yayoi gently changed the subject. “Has he been told we’ve arrived?”
“Not yet,” Jet admitted after a few moments. “He’s with Anika and Nené now, having an ‘AI’s night in’.” A wry grin spread across her lips for a moment before she forced it down. “He seems to be bonding with Anika, and I’m worried about interrupting that too quickly.”
She took a sip from the mug. It was a European tea, a strong one with a sharp bitter edge. It wasn’t bad, but it definitely wasn’t what she was used to. “He might resent not being told.”
Jet answered with a slow nod. “I want to give him a chance to spend some time with them at least, he’s going to need new friendships aswell.”
“He is. But it won’t just be you he’ll resent.”
“I’ll let him know then.” Jet looked away, out the window for a moment, trying to hide how.... incompetent.......she felt. “But. On some level, he’s going to be disappointed, especially if he just runs straight to her.”
“You could tell him they’re tired after the journey.” Yayoi suggested. “And, I’d like to meet to meet him first, by myself.”
“Right, right. “Jet was quiet for a few seconds, her full concentration leaving the room. “I just messaged Anika. She’ll tell him, since she’s with him.” Jet went to take another drink from her cup, before realising that it was empty. “More tea?”
“Is there anything milder?”
“Sorry, we only Breakfast tea, but I can try.” A little less time to brew would do it. The kettle started to warm up, giving Jet enough time to remember where she’d left the teabags. She rummaged for artificial milk for her own cup, then made doubly certain she didn’t mix up the individual mugs.
“There’s one more thing, Jet.” Yayoi broke the quiet. “How do you feel about him?”
Jet closed her eyes for a few seconds turning it over in her mind. The kettle started to hiss as it warmed up.
“I didn’t want to wake him at first,” she answered, quietly. ”But Anika convinced me otherwise and I’m glad to say I was wrong about ot.” A genuine smile crawled across her face. “Less than a week ago, he was just a group of inert parts, and now he's a living person who has a chance at happiness because of us here. There’s something.....” She stopped, taking a few moments to search for the right word. “....I don’t know what it is exactly but it’s exciting.”
The sort of exciting that’d cause any self-respecting Mad to go the full Blue-haired Frankenstein. The sort that sent a giddy existential shudder through her frame just thinking about it. She had made life.
Seven days earlier, Shinji had been a bare shell mounted to a workbench jig for final alignments. Just a complicated kettle, really. Something she woulddn’t have given a second thought about dismantling and just using for spare parts.
And now that shell was a living person. While the kettle was just a kettle, steadily coming to the boil.
Yayoi nodded. “I understand that completely.” She looked up at Jet, then down at her own hands. “And in the next few years, who he is will be shaped and formed by you and those around him until he becomes his own truly unique individual. In fact, it’s already begun.” She covered an alto chuckle with her hand.” I honestly didn’t ever expect Shinji Ikari to be a biker.”
“It doesn’t surprise me at all that he enjoys riding.” Jet shrugged. “If he’s anything, he’s a fourteen year old boy first.”
End of 'Jet Jaguar in the Steelyard', that's what Jet just remembered.
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--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?