[ The expected answer. Whatever Gaelio's own fixation back then (wounded pride, visceral disgust), further fueled by his investment in Ein, he wasn't oblivious to the relative indifference from Mikazuki. It threaded through his lack of humanity, legitimizing space rat.
A frame of mind that no longer fits, strange to remember, unable to recapture most of the feeling in it. Mikazuki as he is now might not have heard his apology, but it had been an apology born of his own mutilation, more than knowledge of Mikazuki and his kind. Tekkadan flared bright in his thoughts only when helping to blaze the trail toward McGillis.
Otherwise, they faded.
The point: his shifted regard of Mikazuki Augus has less to do with an advanced understanding of him (whatever the records he'd scoured, imprinting names and loose histories, unseemly private security companies, all of which places Orga Itsuka easy and firm in his mind, though he'd never come face to face with that man). More to do with lessons from Ein, from the machines in his neck.
Mikazuki, too, faded, a dead man's memories and a dead man's thorn, though he had been the tool wielded by the killing man to cut down Carta and Ein.
A different sort of dissonance in this, as close as he can get to awkward, any stretch of time standing without metal framework and death on a blade's edge. A careful look, the press of those stolid eyes.
Conversation.
It's terribly human. A boy with his own understanding of death rituals, eating dates, speculating on someone else's pain and place.
For a moment, his mind drifts, eyes sagging to his hand, and he considers taking a date, after all. An idle, wholly nonsensical thought of Persephone. His fingrers slacken on the gun, and after a last beat of hesitation, he tucks it into his coat belt. Then raises his freed hand, and as if mimicking Mikazuki's gesture, plucks up one date. Brushes it against a (less and less) white glove. ]
Belonging and peace, huh?
[ Glancing for Mikazuki's eyes, he performs a trick. The date between his fingers becomes a cherry, though only the convincing illusion of it. ]
I hope he's right.
[ Shouldn't he know? No, scratched out of the grave, pieced together. Let Carta know rest. He must let Ein rest. But... ]
It's true I didn't.
[ Popping the cherry into his mouth, but he forgets at first bite to adjust the taste. An eye twitches as he adjusts, delayed juice bursting.
Swallow first. Still just... holding out the rest of those dates... anyway... ]
Do you not remember, or has it not happened? Bael's hangar.
delete it immediately
A frame of mind that no longer fits, strange to remember, unable to recapture most of the feeling in it. Mikazuki as he is now might not have heard his apology, but it had been an apology born of his own mutilation, more than knowledge of Mikazuki and his kind. Tekkadan flared bright in his thoughts only when helping to blaze the trail toward McGillis.
Otherwise, they faded.
The point: his shifted regard of Mikazuki Augus has less to do with an advanced understanding of him (whatever the records he'd scoured, imprinting names and loose histories, unseemly private security companies, all of which places Orga Itsuka easy and firm in his mind, though he'd never come face to face with that man). More to do with lessons from Ein, from the machines in his neck.
Mikazuki, too, faded, a dead man's memories and a dead man's thorn, though he had been the tool wielded by the killing man to cut down Carta and Ein.
A different sort of dissonance in this, as close as he can get to awkward, any stretch of time standing without metal framework and death on a blade's edge. A careful look, the press of those stolid eyes.
Conversation.
It's terribly human. A boy with his own understanding of death rituals, eating dates, speculating on someone else's pain and place.
For a moment, his mind drifts, eyes sagging to his hand, and he considers taking a date, after all. An idle, wholly nonsensical thought of Persephone. His fingrers slacken on the gun, and after a last beat of hesitation, he tucks it into his coat belt. Then raises his freed hand, and as if mimicking Mikazuki's gesture, plucks up one date. Brushes it against a (less and less) white glove. ]
Belonging and peace, huh?
[ Glancing for Mikazuki's eyes, he performs a trick. The date between his fingers becomes a cherry, though only the convincing illusion of it. ]
I hope he's right.
[ Shouldn't he know? No, scratched out of the grave, pieced together. Let Carta know rest. He must let Ein rest. But... ]
It's true I didn't.
[ Popping the cherry into his mouth, but he forgets at first bite to adjust the taste. An eye twitches as he adjusts, delayed juice bursting.
Swallow first. Still just... holding out the rest of those dates... anyway... ]
Do you not remember, or has it not happened? Bael's hangar.