[There's a part of him that wants to go straight to Warriorhead over it. He doesn't expect straight answers. He's too angry to watch his mouth. If a year has taught him any caution, it's taught him to know better than to risk it. The filter of text is good for one thing, at least.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org misaki too
[Part of their unit, part of their recon team. She and Hibari didn't do a damn thing different from Hinata. Eren had abstained from the diplomatic attempts, but so did Holland.]
[not only had Misaki not done any different-- he remembered she had held them together. Sasuke, Hibari, him - they were children compared to her poise. Holland had complained. Hibari hadn't spoken as much as he maybe should have. how did they know?]
[the cuff felt heavy as a leaden cuff, and thrice as damning.]
[how did they know - how did they judge?]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org things here aren't fair, fine. they dont owe us reasons, fine.
but it doesnt even make SENSE
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org theyre almost dying for something that they and we don't even understand
how can we learn from that? do they expect us to learn from that?
[It's no small poetic irony, the cuff around the wrist. A physical shackle to go with the metaphorical, the leash around their necks, the sword hanging over their head.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org we're supposed to swallow it
[The CDC is stronger than them, and there's nothing he can do. They're supposed to swallow it, and he's choking on it instead. It sticks in his throat.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org that's what they want us to learn
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org it doesn't change anything. this sort of thing has happened before.
[They can and will take their lives away for nothing. They always could. This is nothing new, which doesn't make it acceptable. Just rekindles his hate from a slow simmer to a rolling boil.
It's not learning, it's a reminder. A display of power. The CDC can kill them on a whim. They didn't. That's their mistake.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org it's a threat. scare people enough and they'll do what you want without even thinking about fighting for themselves.
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org It happened with the red team failures, right?
[but they knew why, and---]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org So what's up with the apology after?? He's never done THAT before, I always thought he was the type to swallow his own ice covered tongue before saying anything like it
[Good question. Eren doesn't know Dagger very well. He'd gone from seeing him as an enemy to an instructor to even, once, finding him strangely sympathetic (he'd joined the CDC to save his species. To wipe out invaders,) if still very, very alien.
Now.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org I don't know
[Hero types, he'd said. What the hell does it mean.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org they never tell us everything
[They're always in the dark about something. And the ignorance is frustrating. Stuck trying to find a foothold in the dark.]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org Yeah yeah we have to read between the lines and put something believable together ourselves
[the anger just made that---]
[that was part of the point. something he understood well on an intellectual level, but pulling in emotions during a stressful moment was an entirely different story. as Eren may, coincidentally, understand. thus, it's only after a pause that:]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org So, what. Did the instructors not even have a choice? Did they have a quota to meet?
[Yeah, yeah, indeed. It's the sort of crap he's gotten used to hearing from Warriorhead, about what Orange is meant to do in the grand scheme of the crew. (Watch and listen and put it together. Find your own answers instead of expecting simple responses to your questions.) In some ways, Eren's gotten better at biting back his kneejerk reactions, trying to see between the lines instead of brute force through them. But progress is...slow. Some things are constant.
So it takes some burning out of his frustrations for him to feel his way around that question. Do they have choices, quotas, appearances or orders? What about this isn't normal.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org they didn't apologize before
[Not usually, not that he can remember. Not the last time this happened. Not when Gliese threw Vriska into a mountain, or when Optimus was killed.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org what do you think he meant by hero types
[Maybe Hinata doesn't know Dagger any better than he does. But Eren's brief personal contact with him doesn't leave him with a lot to work with.]
[never had they apologized. Gliese had for a few of the softer spoken people after the mission-related deaths, he thinks--- but maybe he'd imagined it. he'd have to look back. later, later.]
[right now:]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org People who still care
[had to be. still, because who knew what changed a few people's minds. Kotetsu, Peter Parker, those who had once told him they were heroes: he didn't know if they were planning, but the lack of even a whisper made him think not. it could be another case of him not being bright enough to pick up on it, but-- as always, he hoped not.]
[except he should've hoped so. should've. smart people silenced whispers. selfishness: human, irrational, petty. not the point.]
[frustration bit too deep to drop it. think. hero types. those angered, those frustrated, those who say senseless pain and felt they couldn't do a thing about it...]
[breathe. think.]
Those with morals and those who see this as senseless and think they can change it and maybe get themselves killed by trying to change it. Isn't that what heroes do?
[Had she? He tends not to read too far into the Captain's conversations, because they tend to be the ones that come at the worst times, set him off the hardest until he's whiteknuckling his blackglass and too angry to type. Either way, this is different from a casualty list. By all rights, if it's a punishment they're enacting, they ought to believe it's justified. Why else do it.
(Or else see it as senseless and think they can change it and too often get themselves killed in the process. That's what he'd always admired and respected the Survey Corps for. That's what heroes do.)]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org yeah, they do
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org then why did he apologize
[It's a sticking point. It doesn't make sense. Parker thinks it was insincere. But why bother?]
[that was the problem. they never knew, never could guess, never could put any pieces together.]
[that was the problem, that was their control, and it made him restless and frustrated and so, so tired, especially in the parts where there was nothing at all. so then why had Dagger apologized?]
[why any of it?]
[it couldn't be Macha in general - this may as well have been routine, with how the instructors acted. if it was the orders, if it was the missions, if it was... what? as far as he knew, they all just gathered intel. compared to setting bombs around the villages, it shoul--]
[oh.]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org Maybe it's not about the punishments. Maybe it's something that's coming up.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
misaki too
[Part of their unit, part of their recon team. She and Hibari didn't do a damn thing different from Hinata. Eren had abstained from the diplomatic attempts, but so did Holland.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
it doesn't add up.
no subject
[the cuff felt heavy as a leaden cuff, and thrice as damning.]
[how did they know - how did they judge?]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org
things here aren't fair, fine. they dont owe us reasons, fine.
but it doesnt even make SENSE
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org
theyre almost dying for something that they and we don't even understand
how can we learn from that? do they expect us to learn from that?
no subject
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
we're supposed to swallow it
[The CDC is stronger than them, and there's nothing he can do. They're supposed to swallow it, and he's choking on it instead. It sticks in his throat.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
that's what they want us to learn
[To hell with that.]
no subject
that's not learning
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org
you told me to survive to fight. but they can and will take away our lives for nothing.
[waiting isn't enough.]
no subject
it doesn't change anything. this sort of thing has happened before.
[They can and will take their lives away for nothing. They always could. This is nothing new, which doesn't make it acceptable. Just rekindles his hate from a slow simmer to a rolling boil.
It's not learning, it's a reminder. A display of power. The CDC can kill them on a whim. They didn't. That's their mistake.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
it's a threat. scare people enough and they'll do what you want without even thinking about fighting for themselves.
no subject
It happened with the red team failures, right?
[but they knew why, and---]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org
So what's up with the apology after?? He's never done THAT before, I always thought he was the type to swallow his own ice covered tongue before saying anything like it
not that I think it was really meant
no subject
Now.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
I don't know
[Hero types, he'd said. What the hell does it mean.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
they never tell us everything
[They're always in the dark about something. And the ignorance is frustrating. Stuck trying to find a foothold in the dark.]
no subject
Yeah yeah we have to read between the lines and put something believable together ourselves
[the anger just made that---]
[that was part of the point. something he understood well on an intellectual level, but pulling in emotions during a stressful moment was an entirely different story. as Eren may, coincidentally, understand. thus, it's only after a pause that:]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org
So, what. Did the instructors not even have a choice? Did they have a quota to meet?
no subject
So it takes some burning out of his frustrations for him to feel his way around that question. Do they have choices, quotas, appearances or orders? What about this isn't normal.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
they didn't apologize before
[Not usually, not that he can remember. Not the last time this happened. Not when Gliese threw Vriska into a mountain, or when Optimus was killed.]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
what do you think he meant by hero types
[Maybe Hinata doesn't know Dagger any better than he does. But Eren's brief personal contact with him doesn't leave him with a lot to work with.]
no subject
[right now:]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org
People who still care
[had to be. still, because who knew what changed a few people's minds. Kotetsu, Peter Parker, those who had once told him they were heroes: he didn't know if they were planning, but the lack of even a whisper made him think not. it could be another case of him not being bright enough to pick up on it, but-- as always, he hoped not.]
[except he should've hoped so. should've. smart people silenced whispers. selfishness: human, irrational, petty. not the point.]
[frustration bit too deep to drop it. think. hero types. those angered, those frustrated, those who say senseless pain and felt they couldn't do a thing about it...]
[breathe. think.]
Those with morals and those who see this as senseless and think they can change it and maybe get themselves killed by trying to change it. Isn't that what heroes do?
no subject
(Or else see it as senseless and think they can change it and too often get themselves killed in the process. That's what he'd always admired and respected the Survey Corps for. That's what heroes do.)]
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
yeah, they do
FROM: jaeger.eren@cdc.org
then why did he apologize
[It's a sticking point. It doesn't make sense. Parker thinks it was insincere. But why bother?]
no subject
I don't know
[that was the problem. they never knew, never could guess, never could put any pieces together.]
[that was the problem, that was their control, and it made him restless and frustrated and so, so tired, especially in the parts where there was nothing at all. so then why had Dagger apologized?]
[why any of it?]
[it couldn't be Macha in general - this may as well have been routine, with how the instructors acted. if it was the orders, if it was the missions, if it was... what? as far as he knew, they all just gathered intel. compared to setting bombs around the villages, it shoul--]
[oh.]
FROM: hinata.shouyou@cdc.org
Maybe it's not about the punishments. Maybe it's something that's coming up.