062 - Advice and Trust
Tohsaka Rin
There are some serious downsides to this farce of a war she's been forced to take seriously. Some are obvious, some less so. She particularly begrudges the constant need of late nights sequestered inside her Workshop, preparing herself for war with an earnestness she's not really devoted to anything in years. Oh, her craft is advancing by leaps and bounds as a consequence and that will never be a truly bad thing, but…
She hasn't felt this harried since her times of nigh-neurotic overachiever back in high-school!
She misses her luxury sleep. She misses her little sister. She misses the rest of the gang. She misses… him. Archer and the maids do their best to make things more tolerable, but they can only do so much.
This sucks, and no amount of faith in the future or assurance in their ultimate victory can actually erase that simple fact.
A small ping on her wards lets her know of an unscheduled but authorized arrival, so she lifts her head from her latest attempt at forcing the anti-army component of Cu Chulainn's [Soaring Spear That Strikes With Death] to fit into a gem without absolutely ruinous costs to glance over her shoulder to check on the visitor. An amber eye and a dash of fluffy white hair are watching her timidly from the other side of the door.
"Ah, Olga." She calls out, turning around fully with a smile on her lips. "What brings you here at this ungodly hour?"
"Ah, I couldn't sleep and was wondering…" It's kind of amusing to watch the girl acting so bashful, considering her preferred method of dealing with reality as a whole is to aggressively assert dominance. "I was hoping Senpai would offer me her guidance again."
"You don't need to be so polite, you know?" She chuckles, finally stepping away from her research to direct her full attention towards the girl. This is fine, more than fine, actually. Rin was kind of hoping for something like this. "I was the one who made the offer in the first place, there's nothing wrong with taking me up on it."
If there's something she'd been missing from her wonderful life even before this entire Crimson Empress debacle, that was a cute apprentice to take under her wing. Her last one was her same age, and an unabashed monster of talent to boot, so they never really had a normal master-apprentice relationship. And he wasn't cute at all.
Her time workshopping with Olga, back in (that nightmarish affront to her every belief and sensibility she refused to call Fuyuki) Singularity F, had been surprisingly pleasant, the sort of thing she wouldn't mind doing on the regular, should the chance arise.
"Yes, please take good care of me!" Olga hurries to step fully into the room and give her a small bow. "Can I ask what you were working on? Just looking at it gives me the shivers."
"I'm not surprised. These are my experiments trying to build upon that little [Curruid Coinchenn] gem from last time." Rin explains, feeling a bit sheepish watching the girl shiver at the mention of the spell that once killed her. That wasn't intentional at all, just poor timing that she happened to be working on it tonight. "Nasty stuff to deal with nasty problems, but probably a bit too advanced for you right now."
"…Right." Olga drawls out slowly, looking visibly relieved when Rin puts a lid on the experiment and places the whole table in stasis. "What's the plan for tonight, then?"
That's the question, isn't it? Rin hasn't had as much time as she would've liked to work on lesson plans, that with her entire life getting hijacked by this stupid role, but she did toy with some possibilities before everything went to shit.
"Last time we focused on jewelcraft as a general art that can be both used in conjunction with one's natural expertise or as a specialized tool to compensate for any specific style's traditional weaknesses." She hums, idly [Projecting] a set of glasses on her face with a flicker of her hand. "I thought we could touch your specialty more directly tonight. The Animusphere family specializes in Astrology, right? I don't get many chances to show off my prowess on that field, so this will be a good chance to shake off the rust."
She's not even lying. The Tohsaka family has never paid any special attention to the firmament, but one of Medea's magic teachers was none other than Hecate herself, goddess of both magic and the night, amongst other vaguely related domains. There's a lot of obscure and nifty bits Rin has learned about the stars through the years.
Olga is a talented young magus and the Animusphere are a particularly preservation-focused family, keeping complete records dating all the way back to King Solomon himself, but there's a limit to everything. In the end, it's been three thousand years and not every Animusphere Head in that time has been capable enough to perfectly preserve the knowledge of their ancestors.
Besides, it was a loaded game from the start. Rin doesn't actually need to know more than Olga. As long as she knows different things, that'll suffice to teach something new to her cute young apprentice.
… Not that she believes Olga knows more than her, of course. That would be wrong, and very silly. But, you know, it wouldn't matter even if she did. Which she doesn't.
Their little impromptu session ends up becoming a pleasant intellectual exercise, somewhat challenging, even. That small rule about only needing to know different things also applies the other way around, and there's plenty the young Animusphere knows that Rin doesn't. Even without Olga going out of her way to reveal family secrets, simply observing the way both their knowledge bases fit together into a neatly coherent whole through their conversation is nothing short of fascinating.
Unfortunately….
"Is there something wrong Olga?" She asks with as much gentleness as she can manage. Olga still stiffens at her question. "Your head is clearly somewhere else."
"It's just…" The girl looks away, shifting uncomfortably for a moment before deflating with a sigh. "It's nothing."
"If it's distracting you so much, it's clearly not nothing. But I won't press it if you don't feel comfortable talking with me about whatever it is." Rin nods, knowing full well that trying to force the issue will only make the girl feel threatened and dig her heels in. "Just make sure to talk about it with someone, okay? I'm somewhat of an expert in bottling things up and trying to bulldoze through the issue out of stubbornness and let me tell you. There hasn't been a single occasion when I didn't end up regretting it."
It takes a couple minutes of silence before Olga speaks up again.
"I can't really involve my subordinates in something like this." She mutters to herself, slowly shaking her head before turning her attention towards Rin. "I suppose… I suppose Senpai is my best bet, after all."
"Geez, I can feel the overwhelming enthusiasm all the way from here brat." Rin rolls her eyes, getting a couple frappe cups from her workshop's coffee machine and offering one to Olga. "Sure, I'll lend you an ear."
"It's just… Actually, half of it is just my position." Olg sighs again, accepting the offered cup with a tired nod. "I have been… hiding behind it, behind propriety and stubborn pride, just to avoid facing reality. But I think I'm reaching my limit. No way I can keep doing it for much longer."
Ah, Yes. Rin knows quite a bit about that. Well, not about hiding behind your position, specifically, but about using any excuse at hand to continue pretending you're okay, no matter what. It took some extreme circumstances to break Rin out of that habit but, then again, Olga has Haku to do all the breaking for her.
"The other half of the problem is… I don't even know what I actually want. How am I supposed to act on feelings I don't understand myself? When I sometimes feel like I hate my best friend, when I sometimes don't know if I want to hit Fujimaru or…" Olga doesn't finish the sentence, a vivid blush surfacing on her cheeks as she busies herself with her frappe straw. "Hell, I can't even make up my mind on who– I, I mean 'what'! When I can't make up my mind on what I actually want to get out of this!"
There's… much left unsaid there, through trailing off into silence, through failing to elaborate, through 'misspeaking'. The signs of someone trying her best to come out clean with her feelings and just… failing. Rin is so intimately familiar with the situation that it hurts. But that also means she's the perfect person to understand what Olga is actually trying to convey.
She's been there before, after all, on that other side of this conversation. She knows what Olga needs, because it's all the same things Rin once needed.
"First of all, your position isn't an excuse for you to isolate yourself from others." Rin states calmly, carefully putting away the frappe she no longer feels like having. "Never was, never will."
Once again, Olga takes her time before answering. "But it's improper to–"
"To hell with that!" Rin snaps with a snarl. "These rules of conduct that you're so worried about only came to be in a society where the actual problems you are struggling with had already been handled!"
It's only after Rin is done ranting that she realizes she startled Olga into spilling her drink with her outburst. Okay, so maybe she's a bit too invested in this topic. Maybe she's getting a bit too emotional. Then again, if there's such a thing as a perfect time to be emotional, it would be for something like this. To properly convey her thoughts on the matter and ensure it leaves an impression through Olga's stubborn self-deprecation.
"Eh?" It's Olga's very eloquent reply, eyes wide open as she looks up toward Rin who…
When did she invade Olga's personal space like that? Maybe she is getting a bit too emotional, after all.
"Sure, there is a reason fraternizing with subordinates is discouraged, but observing that rule doesn't mean shit if you're socially and emotionally starving yourself in the process!" Rin sighs, pitching the bridge of her nose and taking a deep breath to try and calm down a bit. "Everything in this world is a matter of priorities, and your emotional wellbeing is much more important than the shadow of a chance that maybe you might abuse your position in some untoward way."
"I…" Olga looks like she's having a hard time processing Rin's words. Like the very concept that her wellbeing could be even remotely as important as her duties is utterly alien to her. "Eh?"
To hell with calming down. Rin is hugging this girl. Westerners are okay with casual physical contact, right? A startled squeak and the sudden feeling of something soft and warm between Rin's arms are her first indication that her body went ahead with the plan without any input from her mind.
Oh, well… It better be okay, because the harm is already done.
"You matter, Olga. Your feelings matter." Rin whispers softly, hugging the younger girl tighter. "Your first duty is making sure you don't fall into pieces in front of everyone."
"I…" Even now, Olga tries to protest. But it's a weak, feeble thing. Just one more push and it will collapse.
"You matter, Olga." Rin repeats, a bit more strongly now. "Be a good kouhai and take Senpai's lesson to heart, okay?"
"I… Yes." The girl finally concedes, allowing herself to sink into the hug. "I suppose… you have a point."
"Good."
Rin finds herself enjoying the hug more than she probably should. She's no longer as touch-starved as she used to be, but there's a certain feeling of vicarious accomplishment on this. Even if she doesn't truly need the closeness, Olga does, and Rin knows how that feels way too well not to empathize.
So she stretches out the moment until Olga herself starts becoming restless.
"Now, about your other dilemma…" She speaks up again as she breaks the hug, pulling herself away while pretending not to notice Olga's suspiciously shiny and puffy eyes. "An infuriatingly wise idiot once told me something I've always tried to keep in mind."
Olga doesn't comment, making a non-committed throaty noise while refusing to make eye contact with Rin at all.
"Sometimes life forces you to make hard choices. 'You can't eat the cake and have it too' and all that, it's a whole thing. Nobody can have everything." Rin continues undeterred. "But you should damn well try before giving up, make sure it's not just a made-up problem that exists only in your head. There's a question you always need to ask yourself."
"A question?"
"¿Por qué no los dos?" Rin says with her best Mexican accent
… Which is admittedly quite bad, but what can you do?
"That was horrible, Tohsaka-senpai." Olga complains with a groan of dismay. "And you should feel horrible."
"Good advice is not everything I picked up from that idiot, I'm afraid." Rin shrugs, an unrepentant smile on her lips.
Olga groans again and makes some rather convincing denial noises, but Rin can see a hint of contemplation in her eyes. A new door has been opened and it's up to the girl to decide whether she wants to walk down that path or not.
Rin did her part, the rest is out of her hands.
I have no intention of hiding my work behind a pay wall, but I do welcome patrons and donations.
I have a P-treon thing! A Ko-fi account too!
Just add "/Planeshunter" after the dot com and it should take you straight there.
If you have some spare change and feel my work deserves it, please consider throwing it my way.