<< Angle brackets are cool, got to wear them before you go into MiniFile 8.6. >> (Since the outfit he came in is covered in, you know. Blood.) * Katherine is in her room! Which is where she's been for the past 40 minutes or so. She's lying back on the bed with a bottle of vodka in her hand, in a black t-shirt and shorts, and some blood-caked boots which she forgot to take off. Her hair is unbraided and sorta splayed out all over the bed. * Threnody is wandering the halls, having changed his clothes after talking with Taluun; he is, in fact, wandering around in stocking feet, black kenpo pants and an overlarge dark blue Mandarin shirt that looks more like pajamas given his stature/frame. (And she's on her back. It's sorta a 'fell backwards' thing.) * Katherine suddenly giggles to nobody in particular and says softly, "I ran into Taluun today. He didn't crush me. I think that's a good job." She nods to herself. * Threnody continues his little walk, which for the sake of expediency takes him nearish to Kat's room. * Katherine pulls up her shirt to poke herself gently in a bullet-hole scar, and chuckles to herself. "Oh, so drunk. Vodka was the right choice for me!" * Threnody stops about five feet from Kat's door, then sighs and holds his temples with his hands, leaning against the wall and then looking up at the ceiling. "Just... wonderful." * Katherine sits up briefly and looks around. "Roch did leave. Huh. Well, she's quiet, you can't be sure." She looks around again, slowly, and then falls back over. "No Roch." (It's hard to play Kat _alone_ and drunk. @_@) * Threnody stays leaning against the wall for long moments, then closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and stands up and knocks. He has the sort of expression one normally finds on the condemned. * Katherine blinks, and says, a little less loopily, "If it's someone without alcohol... tell me who you are while I try to get to the door." She sits up again. * Threnody closes his eyes and, invisibly, starts to say something mentally, then thinks better of it and says, as clearly as he can manage, "It's Threnody." * Katherine blinks, "Oh, Thren! I'll be right there." She stands a little wobbly, and walks over to the door button. She leans against it, causing the door to open. "Door's open!" (The light's not on in the room. I have no idea what the light conditions are outside. I should point that out.) * Threnody blinks at Kat, but doesn't seem too shocked. He folds his hands in front of him and after a moment of indecision, simply says "...yes. Yes, it is open." * Katherine nods, and gestures with her bottle. "Well, come in, then! Want some vodka? It's good stuff, for ATC crap." The bottle is maybe 1/3 full, and her eyes are a bit watery. * Threnody stays right where is. "I think I'll pass." He looks around, then frowns a little. "In fact, maybe I should do this some other time..." (1/3 full. Cham the expert alcoholist says so.) * Katherine shakes her head, and wanders away from the door, back into the possibly semi-dark interior of the room. "Nah, come in! I told Roch to go get you, so she must have got you. Or you're just bored. I can't tell, I've got a pyramid." * Threnody frowns, and after a moment or two takes a step inside. "Maybe I'll stay, then." He looks for somewhere to sit, well away from the bed. (Okay. That sounded worse than I intended.) (Yes it did.) (There's a chair, and a desk.) (Well away from Kat is what I was going for, but she was sitting on the bed.) * Katherine is, in fact, in the bathroom, door open, water running. She's splashing her face with water. "Burble!" She coughs, then says "I meant good. Could you close the door?" * Threnody sits down, saying in an even tone, "I sort of prefer it open." * Katherine shakes her head, and walks back out into the main room, taking a brush out of her bag. "Why? Doors are supposed to be closed." She actually puts the vodka down on the floor, and starts brushing her hair. * Threnody knits his brow, looking briefly confused, before looking down at the table and then up at the ceiling, twitchily. "A door is a door. Its nature is not to be open or clo..." He pauses and rubs the bridge of his nose. "I'd just prefer it to be open." * Katherine winces slightly as she brushes, but says, "Ah. Well, then, I guess it's open. So, if you're not going to drink, why'd you show up? Worried about the leg?" * Threnody blinks, genuinely confused this time. "...leg?" * Katherine nods. "Yep. Roch was by to see it earlier. Vera shot me in the leg good." She brings up her leg, blood-caked boot and all, and stops brushing to points at a part just below her knee. "Right here. Hurt like a fuskc... fucks... Chako. Hurt like a Chako." She nods with satisfaction. * Threnody blinks, frowning further. "*Vera* shot you?" (God, find some DunnoSobR pills. I'm getting hung over just watching.) ("You sobered up yet?" "...Dunno.") * Katherine nods, and leaves her leg up, although she stops pointing at it and goes back to brushing her hair. "Yep. The guy with the Monocle made her, I think. And then she shot me and Leo. And then my gun jammed. And then Taluun showed up. Ian shot the monocle guy somewhere in there too." * Threnody mms faintly and looks down at the desk, though he looks less... miffed and more simply unhappy now, compared to when he came in. "I... see. I didn't hear much about what went on." * Katherine nods, and a frown starts to come over her face. "Well, that's why you get to ask me, right?" Brush, brush. * Threnody sighs, then shakes his head. "I'll wait to hear the story with everyone else. I came for... a different reason." * Katherine blinks once, and swallows. "Oh." She puts the brush down. "Should I close the door? Wouldn't want people to hear nothing. People shouldn't ever hear." * Threnody blinks back, looking confused, and then after a long pause gets up. "Maybe I'd better wait for a different time. You're obviously, uh..." He fishes for a word, and lamely settles on "...drunk." * Katherine stands too, and says. "Hey, I do some of my best talking when I'm drunk!" She turns and starts walking for the button to close the door. "Why, just today I told Roch about mom." * Katherine frowns, murmuring to herself. "And I do my best killing when I'm not drunk. Another good reason to be drunk." She slaps the button, and the door slides shut. * Threnody pauses, and stops where he is, looking conflicted. At Kat's last comment, however, he frowns and looks at her with... it can't be called 'rage' because that expression doesn't actually FIT his face. But it is certainly something approaching anger. "...you're a horrible person, Katherine." * Katherine turns around, and nods emphatically. "You're damn right I am!" (Meanwhile, the rest of the ATC2 crew walks by and listens in through the door.) (c.c;) * Threnody grips his right hand into a tight fist, tracking her with his eyes, his voice squeaking just a little bit as he simply rants onward. "It must be terribly nice to be the big mystery! And then whenever it comes too close to home, you bury yourself and alcohol and forget it... or you just grab whatever body's handy and sate yourself that way! What kind of person ARE you?" * Threnody continues, a little frenzied and sounding terribly, terribly bizarre. "Tell me, when we were together, did the emotional attachment last five seconds, or maybe ten since I'm almost family?" (This is what happens when you pet the fluffy bunny a little too hard.) (... pat the bunny. With A STICK) (Pat the bunny with a jackhammer?) * Katherine looks at Thren carefully, like he's lost track of something. "I'm a horrible kind of per--" she stops, and takes a step towards him and reaches out her hand. "Hey, hey, wait a damn minute! That was good, and I was fine, and then you're the one who went and left and didn't want to talk about it anymore!" * Threnody takes a step back. "You used me because I was convenient! I didn't bring it up because I didn't want to embarrass you and because at the time maybe I thought you needed it," he hisses. "I was just a fool for thinking too much of it." (As the Mars Turns. Jesus fuck.) * Katherine takes another step forward. "But I do like you, Thren." She smirks faintly. "I don't even know what you thought of it, though. You left." * Threnody looks like he can't decide if he should cry or reach out and punch Kat. Instead he just sort of... vibrates every now and then. "Can you blame me?" * Katherine looks down, and says softly, "Nope. That's why I said wouldn't do it again, because you didn't want to." She looks back up. "At least, I thought you didn't want to. And now you really don't want to, because I'm horrible." The outstretched hand falls to her side. <> * Threnody closes his eyes for a moment, then turns away and wraps his arms around himself. "I... don't think I've ever done you wrong, Katherine. I've been honest and true with you from minute one, when I'd only just met you. But..." He closes his eyes tight. "A week, maybe two, isn't enough time for someone to be 'important' in your life. But... you couldn't even tell me your real name?" * Katherine says, with fire in her voice, suddenly, "My name is Kat! Not Katrina, not Katherine, not Kat the Wolf, and not Bloody Hunter! Kat Kat Kat!" ( Sure it is Katrina. ^_^) (SHUT UP LUNCH MEAT.) * Threnody turns around, saying sharply, "I don't care what your name is!" He takes a deep breath, then says, quietly, "...can't you see that? The name's not what's important." (...lunch meat?) (TaluunLoaf?) (Is it Taluun? Or processed? "Dunno.") * Katherine responds in an only slightly less angry tone, "Then what is? What do you want to know, Thren? My kill count? Former fucks? I don't understand!" * Threnody looks at Kat angrily for a moment, then relents and looks at the floor, gripping his right elbow with his left hand tight enough to make marks. "That... it was never important. That it took a mistake for you to be able to tell me." * Katherine frowns, but says in a less angry, although slightly snarky, tone, "Well, I'm so sorry I don't have a list of things to tell people in case Isis' Son comes by!" She pauses, and adds, "I changed it for a reason, and then I tried to forget." * Threnody says quietly, without looking up, "How much of your life are you going to go on trying to forget?" * Katherine replies a little harshly, "All of the parts that aren't mine, and some of the part that is. The parts that don't suck, at least." * Threnody doesn't look up. He finally gave in to the tears, at least, though it seems less out of sadness than frustration. "Then forever long it lasts... I hope your memories of me are good ones. Until... until I'm just something else to drink off." * Katherine steps forward again, and says, "Hey, why the fuck would I do that? Like I don't have enough work already without forgetting about the good stuff?" * Threnody takes a step back. "Don't. Don't... say you're sorry, or anything like that." * Katherine smirks. "I'm not sorry. I just don't want the damn BITCH in my head." She points over at one of her suitcases. "That's why THAT is there, to keep the bitch out." * Threnody follows Kat's gaze, then does the rest of the work the 'easy' way. "...that's why you went along with this, isn't it?" He looks at the suitcase. "Anders promised you'd find something that would shut Chako out." * Katherine shakes her head. "Nope! He didn't promise me a damn thing. Fucker. He should have, if he knew it was coming." * Threnody pauses a moment, then wipes his eyes and tries to continue in a normal tone of voice. "Taluun-dono said his orders weren't to collect the Concordat artifacts. It was simply to save us from the Concordat. He said he wasn't told about you or I, but he was told not to 'intimidate' us. It's... it's possible your mother was looking out for you, you know." * Katherine snorts, and looks angry again. "Did he? She could have been looking out for me before she pointed me at Gruber and said, 'Maim!'" She grits her teeth. "Besides, the fucking message to Krissy wasn't for another few days. I sure fucking hope it wasn't her fault." * Threnody blinks, confused. "Krissy?" He pauses, then blinks again. "...the woman you told me to forget about." * Katherine frowns deeply. "Good fucking guess." * Threnody looks away. "It doesn't take much to put two and two together." * Katherine sways in place, and sighs. "Guess not, nope." She turns around, and starts walking back towards the bed. "Krissy..." Fuck, Krissy. Always brings me back to the fact that I just can't fucking shake this shit. * Threnody goes and has a seat in the chair again, saying nothing, but putting his face in his hands a good long while. * Katherine thuds down on the bed herself, and picks up the bottle, staring at it for a little bit. * Threnody says, after a long pause, "You want to forget your past so badly... I can relate in my own way. And what you do with your own life is your own business. But... what does all this rage get you, in the end? What's worth being so angry all the time?" * Katherine says dryly with a hint of humor, "A nearly empty bottle of vodka, apparently." She puts it back down, and says angrily, "I don't want it. I want it all to go away. What the fuck do you do when you want things to go away, except be angry? Or drink? It NEVER goes away, Thren. Never." * Threnody says, quietly, "You don't need to tell me that." * Katherine says, with a larger hint of desperation, "Then what the fuck do I do, Thren? You think the anger doesn't do anything, but at least it's something! Something that says, 'I'm not fucking giving up!'" * Threnody can't help but smile a little, as he suggests, "Perhaps you could live in Tibet for a few years learning T'ai Chi." * Threnody looks away, letting the smile fade. "It just hurts to see you throw yourself on the rocks because you don't know where else to go. Doesn't it hurt you inside to do all this... destructive stuff, just to sate your anger and confusion?" * Katherine frowns. "If I had a few years to blow in Tibet, that'd work." She suddenly says, "Hurts you? Hell, drinking is fun, usually." She rubs her stomach. * Threnody doesn't look up. "And... killing? And..." A leaden pause. "...other things." * Katherine suddenly looks sorta blank. "Killing... killing isn't fun. Killing isn't fun. But you have to. You or them. Always you or them." * Katherine continues saying, "You can try to shoot their knees, or their arms, or their spines... but then they can kill you, or someone around you. And when she's in my head..." * Katherine seems to shake her head clear of whatever she was talking about, and leans forward, supporting her face on her hands, elbows on knees. * Threnody leans back in the chair, staring at the ceiling and letting his neck dangle a little bit. "I never wanted to study the sword," he says, quite out of the blue. "Kataki loved it. And he's much better than I am." * Katherine says dryly, "Good for you, I guess. Means you're smarter than I was." * Threnody continues to look at the ceiling dazedly. "Am I? Kataki's gone. Disowned, too. I couldn't escape being the school's successor. 400 years. 400 *years* of history. I never wanted to be the next master, but I accepted anyway." He sits up and looks at Kat. "I made a place for it in my life." * Katherine nods slightly, but doesn't seem to know what to say. * Threnody keeps up the gaze, and he looks a little... deserpate? "Can't you... in some small way, can't you make a place for her in your life?" * Katherine smirks, but it's not an amused smirk. "Which her, Thren? There's two of them, and one of them taught me how to be a horrible mass murderer." She frowns and stares right at him. "Think real hard on that." * Threnody sets his jaw, and thinks for a moment. After a while, he says, slowly, "If killing people alone makes you a mass murderer... aren't I from 'cursed blood' too? Are you saying I should shut my mother out of my life because she made a career of cutting people in half? Some of whom by her own admission probably didn't deserve it?" * Katherine looks down. "Maybe you are. Maybe we all are." She looks back up, angry, "It'd be easier if I didn't have to fucking SEE it, Thren! Every day! Every night!" * Threnody shakes his head. "Wouldn't it?" He smiles, tiredly. "It's be nice... I'd stop having the nightmares. The really vivid ones, where chunks of things people I've never met drift through my head and stick in my subconscious, and I map them onto my own in REM sleep, and I see myself standing in the shoes of a balding Martian man licking my father's blood off his sword. It'd be nice to have those stop." * Katherine looks almost physically struck. * Threnody looks down. "I don't deny that the things you see in your mind, memories she had... they must be awful. You probably think I'm belittling you by asking you to forget about them... I'm not." * Katherine says, softly, "How can I make a place for her? She's already there." She grabs her stomach again. * Threnody smiles. "Knowing that is sort of the first step, isn't it?" * Threnody pauses, then pulls his knees up on the chair with him, hugging them. "I'm... a preachy fool, Katherine. I don't have any right to call you a horrible person." * Katherine smirks. "Well, you're right, but if you're trying to say you're sorry, I'll buy it. It's been a long fucking day." She chuckles weakly. "Although I didn't get to answer your last question." * Threnody peeks out from behind his kneecaps. "'Last question'?" (z. night) * Katherine nods. "The other things." (Night, Cham.) (You were asleep anyway. ;P) ('night Cham.) (Hee. So cute when he drools!) (Cam's not up, Todd. Sorry. ^_~) * Threnody tilts his head a little. "I don't... really get it." He rubs his eyes, and looks exactly like a little kid in the process. "I'm a bit out of it." * Katherine nods and says, with a smirk, "You wanted to know why I destroyed myself with sex, if I picked it up right." * Threnody blushes darkly. "You don't have to answer that. I was just... angry." * Katherine shakes her head. "No, no, it's... important. I tried to tell you earlier, but it didn't work. Now, though..." * Threnody lays his head on his knees and closes his eyes. "Maybe for now it's better if you don't say." He pauses. "We had... have... different expectations and desires and beliefs. That's all." (Well, I'm not doing anything this session. This went into not-my-area really fast, and my head hurt, and I was playing MC2, and I got distracted by F-Zero, so, um... Yeah. ^^;) (Eh. Sorry. ^_^;) (I probably could have t... you're gone.) (Heh. Good job me! ^^;;) * Katherine shakes her head again. "No, listen. Sex is..." she frowns, and says softly, "...like the opposite of killing. It's not destructive. It has meaning. It..." she trails off, and chuckles to herself. "It sounds stupid." * Threnody doesn't look up. In fact, he looks half asleep. "It doesn't..." He stops. "Let me try to put it this way. Did Rochelle tell you... about Momo's?" * Katherine nods. Then after a second, she says, "Yes." * Threnody giggles despite himself. "It's... the same principle, only less farcical. Does that make any sense?" Not really. Do you mean sex or looking for it? (I restrained from saying, "You'll have to define 'It' for me.") * Threnody opens his eyes and looks at the wall just to have somewhere to put his gaze, with the way his head's facing. "I'd known him for 9 hours. It wouldn't have felt right. Not because we were both men..." He pauses, then cracks a tired smile. "And not because he was a total sleaze, either. Maybe I'm old fashioned. I just wanted... I wanted it to come at the end of something different." * Katherine nods. "Yeah. I'd sorta guessed that. Another reason I thought you didn't want me to do anything again." * Threnody closes his eyes again. "I'm not... sorry. I just need time to adjust." * Threnody pauses briefly. "A word of advice that has nothing to do with you, personally." * Katherine stands, and chuckles to herself. "Everyone needs time to adjust--mmm?" * Threnody rests his chin on his knees again. "Get... get your thoughts about other things in order, soon. When everyone can get together again..." He pauses. "I had a long talk with Taluun-dono. We have a lot to discuss." * Katherine frowns. "You're not thinking I have to tell them, are you?" * Threnody looks up at Kat's face. "What you do is up to you. But... it's clear, to me anyway, that the top echelons of ATC are involved in this situation, somehow... so high that even Taluun`tzo doesn't know anything." * Katherine frowns deeper. "How top are we talk--" her face pales slightly. "Oh, fuck no." You can't be serious. * Threnody shrugs his shoulders. "Taluun-dono is maybe third or fourth in command? Second to your mother, Palatine, Rohaus... yet he says he wasn't ordered to get any of the artifacts laying in Roswell, and we *saw* them underground... so many crates it'd take days to sort it all, and a huge vehicle to move them out." Oh, Jesus. They LEFT them there? * Threnody nods slowly. "That's the impression. But still... you said ATC knows about the artifacts, right? So why wouldn't they collect them? They were simple, unmarked wooden crates. Only we would know." Yeah. Someone at ATC's keeping track. What the hell... shit. * Katherine sits right back down. "I was going to eat, but now I've just got a fucking headache." (I am hoping I am not overstepping my bounds here. Cham can read it and smack me around if I am.) * Threnody nods. "I'm telling you first because we know things the others don't. Things like... SIG-ASP." (Yeah, we can say they went off to eat peacefully la la la if not. ^_^;) * Katherine nods, then frowns "Yeah. You're not planning to blow all ATC's secrets to this bunch, are you? Hell, we barely know these people!" * Threnody shakes his head. "No. I don't think that's right. We should keep it to ourselves. But..." But what? What can you tell them? * Threnody frowns. "I don't know. But would you want to head into this situation not knowing?" He drums his fingers on his kneecap. "There's so much to think about. Was Rochelle right, and Anders didn't see what was going to happen? Were Taluun-dono's orders not to intimidate us because ATC wants to *recruit* us to do exactly the same thing?" * Threnody pauses a moment. "Anders told me the Concordat's power comes from their connections, ancient money, things like that... there's too many angles to consider. I can't get a handle on what's real and what's not." He smiles weakly. "Isn't it funny? I bet... I bet many years ago our parents were having this same discussion." * Katherine frowns. "If it... you're probably right, and I can't either." She grins faintly. "But I'm not doing it on an empty stomach." * Katherine blinks. "Though, about Anders. Man fucking lost it on the base. You missed it." * Threnody shakes his head and finally uncurls out of the chair, standing up and stretching. "There'll be time enough t... what do you mean, 'lost it'?" * Katherine says, "He was being creepy, and then all of a sudden, he yelled, "It wasn't supposed to happen like this," or something like that..." she looks embarased very briefly, "... and then up and vanished." Guess Rochelle was right, but I didn't see anyone die either... (Well, that's not true. Dorian cut someone in half.) (Well, yes. Monocle and Nietzche died, but Kat didn't count them.) * Threnody tilts his head. "Didn't you say Ian shot someone?" He suddenly winces. "Ian? Ian Savolino?" * Katherine squints slightly, then nods. "Shot the leader... Hobbes, I think, right through the eye. Good shot." * Threnody suddenly looks very green, and holds his head a little. "I... see." * Katherine smirks faintly, although whether she's amused or sad... "I still racked up the most kills, though. Horrible little me." She gestures towards the door. "C'mon, let's go see what they're selling." * Threnody shakes his head. "I'm not... very hungry. I'll catch up with you later, I think." * Katherine nods, and picks up her purse off the floor. "Yeah, sure. I'll try to think about that ATC angle. Maybe I'll ask the bitch in my head." She sorta stands there for a few seconds, looking at Thren. * Threnody smiles reassuringly. "If she has something useful to say in response, then so much the better." * Katherine shakes her head. "Somehow... I don't think I'll get anything useful. It's not like a conversation, and thank god for that." * Threnody mms faintly. "It never hurts to try." He walks out the door and turns around outside, waving. "Have a good hangover." And with that, he's gone. * Katherine smirks, and then once Thren's gone, sighs, patting down one of her sides only to find no gun. "I never do." (One more reason not to get drunk, then!) << MiniFile 8.6 way over >>