Gigabyte 025

[electronichound]

Cultural traditions and holidays are often standalone complexes, copies without an actual original. Halloween is one that springs immediately to mind. Modern holidays seem less focused on spirituality and community than on consumerism, which a late twentieth-century writer dubbed "the bastard child of capitalism and fascism

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[electroniccrane]

[The sound of Batou's progress through the forest comes to her both through the communicator and her own hearing. Kusanagi flips through and discards several evasion scenarios. His woodcraft is better than hers, and they're tied in a flat-out sprint...and it's a sign of the turmoil she's been in the past few days that she's even considering something that undignified.

It's her own fault, really--spending so much time on Deck 03 lately. Patterns favor the pursuer. Leaning her head back against the bole of the enormous tree in whose roots she's sitting, she waits for Batou to find her. She hasn't a clue what she's going to say when he does.]

[electronichound]

[It's really not difficult to find her. For starters, she weighs over a ton so her tracks are ridiculously easy to spot. The Major also leaves a clear trail of broken grasses, twigs and crushed leaves and lastly, his electromagnetic vision picks up one large figure made out of metals sitting against a tree.

Either they've erected an unorthodox version of The Thinker on Deck 03, or the Major is playing hide and seek.

Batou doesn't feel like playing. He walks up and stops about three meters from her, hands in his pockets.]

// You've been scarce. //

[electroniccrane]

[Not wanting Batou around is an odd feeling for her. Her eyes flick up to his.]

// Yes. //

[electronichound]

// Not so scarce that I couldn't find you, though. //

[Implying she wants to be caught.]

[electroniccrane]

// Why would I hide from you? //

[This tangle of emotions must be what biological humans feel all the time. She doesn't know where to begin killing the processes.]

[electronichound]

// Don't play coy with me, Motoko. //

[There's a tangle of emotions, but what was it that Sun Tzu said?

"When there is no right or wrong, it's time to attack."]

[electroniccrane]

[She doesn't like it at all when he says her name like that, and her eyes narrow a little. This isn't how their script goes. For the moment, she doesn't care that she's the one who went off it first.]

// Well. You obviously have something you want to say. //

[electronichound]

// You deserted me. //

[The military jargon is deliberate, as is the offensive nature of what he just said.

"When there's no right or wrong, it's time to attack."

It might not be the right rule for relationships, but it's the only set of rules Batou understands.]

[electroniccrane]

[How dare he.

Being angry is something she knows how to deal with. There's a split second of open radio as she's about to give a blistering retort, when her treacherous organic brain produces the memory Batou shared with her of the last few moments on the Locus Solus factory ship before the other Major returned to the net:

"I'll be by your side."

She'd echoed it then, and she can all but feel his arm under her hand again....

The anger dies. She says nothing, and her gaze flicks away from his eyes to the leaf litter on the forest floor.]

[electronichound]

// You deserted me when it wasn't convenient for you. //

[Batou is an atheist. He's a skeptic. He's a cynic. He's a man who has seen promises, hopes, oaths, reassurances all shattered and ground under the heel of cold, hard reality.

But he's always had faith in the Major.

He gazes at her. It wasn't misplaced, was it?

Part of him feels like the child in his dream, looking up at his own face. It's cold and blank, and the digital version of fury burns barren ground over his consciousness.]

[electroniccrane]

// It wasn't about convenience. //

[The reproach in his voice stings like a blow never could.

Why hasn't he backed down? He should have backed down by now. More changed than his hairstyle in that stretch of time that never happened for her.]

// I've...never regarded you as a convenience. //

[electronichound]

[Ouch. Direct hit. Batou can't phsyically flinch but his 'voice' over the radio crackles, indicating a mental upset.

That hurt.

They're sparring again.]

// You left. //

[He tries to keep his voice neutral, but fails. She left him before, in the locus solus ship, after sex, every fucking time she leaves him.]

[electroniccrane]

// You went into defrag. //

[The old sparring match resumes. This is firmer ground, though she can still feel it shifting beneath her feet and threatening to dump her right back into that roiling pit of emotions.]

Japanese

[electronichound]

You couldn't have contacted me after?

[He automatically retorts in spoken language, hands coming out of his pockets to gesture in a frustrated gesture. If Batou wanted to kill this emotional process and return to complete impassivity, he could. He's a little too agitated at the moment, though, as upset as he was when Togusa had been shot, or when the Major had vanished.

He thinks suddenly of his dog, Gabriel, and how she reacted when he was late coming home. At first she'd ignore thim, then woof a bit, then finally paw at him, demanding attention.]

Japanese

[electroniccrane]

No.

[It's the simple truth, spoken to something in the vicinity of his feet. She's running in full retreat from the very emotions she was trying to stir up.

Basic controls theory: remove the constraints and watch a system spin wildly out of control.]

I--no.

Japanese

[electronichound]

[Batou turns his head to the side and waits. He's not taking pity on her, he's laying off deliberately because he thinks he can feel justa bit of what she's going through. Their lives haven't been identical, but they have been similar enough that he can understand why she chose the solutions she did to problems they both share.

So Batou looks down, ponytail slipping over his shoulder as he gives her space, time.

Minutes pass.

Finally he looks up.]

// Do you regret it. //