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Who: Natasha Romanoff & You
Broadcast: Fleetwide
Action: Marsiva
When: 6/24

Video

[Transmission starts at the same moment the woman laying in fram shifts from unconsciousness to tense stillness—her eyes open, darting, and she goes tense, but otherwise there's no movement from her for the first four or five seconds. That seems to be how long it takes her to process that she's in an unfamiliar space with no memory of how she came to be lying there. Then one hand balls consciously into a fist. Her eyes flutter. Jaw tightens.

Natasha takes a deep breath and forces her body to relax muscle by muscle.

Seems like spies don't make for great entertainment when they first wake up. Not unless you find tension and veiled suspicious looks riveting. The first minute or two isn't much more than that. She wakes up. She sits up. She swings her legs over the edge of her cot and stretches her back, trying to flex the adrenaline out of her muscles.

She looks directly into the camera at one point, her expression flat, lips tightening in a frown. She taps the edge of the lens experimentally.]

You know, if you're gonna kidnap a girl you could at least buy her dinner first.

[Her voice is just a touch to defiant to be neutral as she speaks.

Then she hauls herself to her feet. The last thing caught on camera before the broadcast ends is a shot of her catsuited figure walking away.]

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[Well. Looks like sassing the camera might have come back to bite her. This is what she gets for not considering who might be on the other side of the video feed.]

You mean between dinner and getting abducted?

Yeah. I tried to find the connection, but I didn't manage to understand.

[He's not quite self-deprecating — there's no use in being ashamed of a lack of information. But he's less brazen than he often is, trading in his usual confidence for something softer and more open to being taught.]

[Clearing her throat:]

It's a reference, an old joke. And you know what they say about explaining a joke...?

[Bright-faced, and like he's still eager to learn— ] I don't know what they say.

[So eager. She's not entirely sure what to do with that. But, hey, she can fill him in on this.]

If you have to explain a joke, it's probably not funny.

Because it loses its novelty? I guess that makes sense. But how else is one to learn?

[He's a weirdo, and he knows that he's a weirdo, but he acts like it doesn't bother him. Well, all that aside, there are more pressing matters at hand...]

Are you all right, though? Despite the lack of dinner.

Humor's a tricky thing to learn. If you don't get it, you're probably not going to find it funny. Someone can explain it to you, but you lose the timing.

[Explaining the rules of comedy from the deck of a spaceship. There's a moment where she has to pause and let a wave of dissonance pass.]

Yeah, I'm fine. Not even hungry.

I appreciate your candor... What you've said makes sense. Well, I do know a little bit about some funny things. So, you're fine and you're not hungry, but are you settled and comfortable yet? Well... [Here he looks sympathetic, though still earnestly friendly. His eyebrows angle upward in an expression of caution, but he's smiling.] It's probably not easy to get comfortable. But do you need any explanation of your situation?

I have a hard time picturing getting much more comfortable than this any time soon.

[Which isn't exactly an answer, though it does admit she's not especially comfortable now.]

A few people have tried explaining what's going on here. It's a work in progress.

I think it always will be a work in progress. We're learning new things all the time. But you'll be able to learn with us, and that will be nice.

[He's tepid, relaxed, which is customary for him, but he hopes for it to be a contagious atmosphere. This is one zen teenager. Oh, but something occurs to him: ]

For example, I've learned that food can nurture one's emotional state. If you eat something, it could help bring you closer to comfort. Some people on these ships don't care for the food provided, but there are a lot of interesting flavors... [Abruptly, another thought piles atop his first one. He purses his lips for a second, then amends,] Oh, but it won't help if you feel nauseated from stress. I think that would actually make it worse.

[Hope Natasha enjoys... a questionably accurate primer on her own species' relationship with food...]

[Natasha listens for a long moment, increasingly bemused by his explanation. His observations are certainly—well, they're something.]

You haven't spent a lot of time around people, have you?

[Well, he's outed himself as odd. He's used to that—Kaworu isn't one for subtlety when it comes to his inhumanity—but it validates, in a sad way, his belief that he is too apart from others to belong. That's not Natasha's fault; it's his own disparaging way of thinking. He smiles, again sympathetic.]

More with the Fleet than I had previously, [he admits.]

[He tried. It's not as though this is Natasha's first time running into someone poorly socialized, either.]

Seems like you're learning a lot then.

[Is that a joke? Looks like maybe sort of.]

Should I ask what you were doing before?

I really am. [He seems quite pleased by this, too; he loves learning, is particularly fond of human beings, and believes in seizing opportunities. This person is very kind to him anyway (even if he doesn't really catch the joking air here).] And you can ask me anything you'd like to. Anyway, I was a pilot. But there weren't many people nearby.

[She's kind enough not to comment that he looks a little young to be a pilot, at least.]

A pilot, huh? What did you fly? Not one of these ships, from the sound of it.

Evangelion. When I first came to the Fleet, I would have expected you to recognize that name, but after spending time among these people, I understand that almost no one knows what it is. [But he doesn't appear to be bothered by this discrepancy between his world and others.] Rather than a ship, it's a tall, imposing figure. Many hoped that it would aid humanity.

Sorry. Doesn't mean anything to me.

[She actually does sound regretful.]

When you say a figure, you mean... like a human figure? A suit?

It might be for the best if Eva doesn't exist in your world. Though depending on the year from which you come, she may still come to pass. [Strange as that may sound, he's met people from well before the year 2000 — in cases like that, it's no wonder they haven't heard of Evas or Angels. Still, he can hope for their sake.

Before explaining Eva, though, he has to pause. He's choosing his words very carefully when he says,] Evangelion is a sort of artificial human. But the scale of the body is much larger. Roughly seventy meters. A pilot enters Eva's body and utilizes it for combat. In that way, it's a bit like a suit... That is, Eva wears armor and restraints to better be maintained.

I've heard a little bit about different worlds. [How much she believes in them, or how she feels about the fact that it's looking more and more like they're real whether or not she believes in them, she keeps to herself.] That doesn't sound like anything I've seen back home.

Who knows, though? Things we never heard of show up every few months.

There's always something new to find out about. There's always another world to look forward to. [Or, that's what he likes to think, at least. Admittedly, Atroma's intervention in Kaworu's life cycle is changing what he thought he knew about how the worlds can work. He can understand the reluctance, the mistrust.]

Nice that you can take this so philosophically. [She can respect that, though she's a long way from being able to look at it the same way.]

It's just an approach I learned over time. [He dismisses most positive comments in this way, never taking credit for any trait a person might perceive to be "good," despite the crazy amount of effort he's put into becoming who he is today. Anyway,] You seem like a person who will be able to acclimate, too. And if you have trouble, someone will surely lend a hand.

[She doesn't doubt it. Especially knowing some of the people around here. Still, she'd rather not depend on it.]

I'll keep that in mind.

So one last question. How long before we get off of this ship and onto something with more people on it?

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