<> (I think the plan was Thren making an evening call to the ladies' room. Haha. Ahem.) <> (...thank you, Captain Exposition.) (he's all worn out after today's session.) * Katherine is lounging, but today this actually involves still having her clothes on. She's laing frontways on the bed. "Oh, who is it?" She pauses, and then says, "Fuck, no autoresponse." * Threnody calls, muffled from outside but probably still audible, "It's just me." (And how does Roch start this game of Tennis?) * Rochelle looks up from rubbing some aloe or whatever it is all over herself. She's in shorts and a tank top, and has some really *nasty* burn lines. "Yeah. Oh, it's Thren." (Doubles on single? Not fair.) (...god, this mini is pornful.) (Bow-chicka-wow-wow.) (*snort*) (You started it!) (I know I did, shut up!) * Katherine pads over to the door, sockless, looks through the 'eyehole', and then opens the door. "So it is Thren." She backs up. "Were you looking to come in?" * Rochelle goes back to what she was doing. Ow, burns, ow. * Threnody looks confused, per normal. He is also wearing black silk pajamas that are too big. A pillow and teddy bear would not be out of place but are thankfully absent. He nods as he comes in and shuts the door behind him. "Yes. It's important." Ah. * Katherine backs up to sit on her bed, and then glances at Roch briefly. "Uh, okay, shoot?" * Threnody desperately looks for a chair; he's blushing, but just a little. Finding one, as most hotel rooms have one, he has a seat... and looks at Roch. "...Miss Rochelle..." * Rochelle doesn't bother looking up, rubbing the lotion over one arm. "What?" * Katherine smirks faintly, and then scoops up Eck from wherever she is. * Threnody takes a breath in, slowly, then lets it out and pauses a moment, closing his eyes before he speaks. "...you can see into the future, too. Can't you?" (*spits all over the screen*) (Well, that's gonna make a mess.) (It wasn't a questioning 'can't you?'. It was a statement.) * Katherine 's eyes widen, and she gapes. (Yup.) (You are your mother's child, dear Thren.) (Almost 100%, which perhaps she saw and he never did.) * Rochelle freezes, the hand holding the tube going completely lax and dropping it. She sits there, unblinking, for a time before she says, "I'm gonna kill you." * Threnody looks away. "You can, if you want. I won't stop you. I wasn't trying to listen..." He finds the courage to look at Roch, trying hard not to blink. "But when you suddenly mentally say a man's going to die tomorrow, I can't help but notice. It's like hearing your name called across a crowded room." * Katherine is stll a little in shock. She drops Eck on the bed, and swivels to look at Roch and Thren carefully. Hawkishly, even. <> * Rochelle snaps her head up and glares at him. "It's not your fucking name! People die all the time!" She spins to turn the glare to Kat, and this has to be the closest to angry anyone's ever seen. "You told me I could trust him!" * Katherine winces. "You can! I mean, I thought you could! But you can!" She pales slightly, as she realizes what that means. "Aw, fuck." * Threnody looks down at the floor. "I want to know the answer to one thing. Then if you want you can pick up your gun and put a bullet in my head." God *damn* it! How the hell am I... could you... * Katherine shakes her head, as if to clear it, and moves closer to the Thren/Roch edge of the bed. She also curls her feet up underneath her, slowly. * Threnody continues to look at the floor. "You didn't say anything. You knew! You saw what was going to happen and you didn't say anything." He looks up and isn't... crying, but he's upset. "I don't understand why. I knew you'd be angry, but I came here anyway to ask you because... how could you not? How could you see something and not try to save him?" Because I can't fucking save him! He's been dead a long time ago, okay? Everyone is. * Rochelle is glaring at Threnody, and she isn't crying, either. But her hands are clenched and she looks about ready to punch him, whether he's trained or not. * Threnody bites his lip. "Maybe you can't alone, but... the future can't be preordained! If it were, you and Anders would see the same things. People can change the future!" Maybe not, but guess what? He's back in TC and there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. People can change the future, yay. But he doesn't fucking *want* it to be changed. * Rochelle keeps up the glare. "And neither does Anders." She gets to her feet, tube in hand, and storms over to her bag, where she dumps it in. * Katherine quirks an eyebrow, but doesn't seem to have anything to contribute other than, "Jesus..." * Threnody just... stares, openmouthed for a few moments. Then he blinks, and closes his eyes, sitting up and shutting his mouth again. "...alright. You answered my question." He leans his head forward, bangs falling over his eyes. "I'm sorry you felt betrayed. You can do what you want." * Rochelle stares at him for a second, then walks purposefully over and punches him in the face, hard. * Threnody takes it without moving a muscle. Well, not voluntarily; he slumps sideways over the chair in recoil, but doesn't move after that. * Katherine can't help but grin faintly, briefly. * Rochelle rubs at her hand, keeping up that steady glare. "Killin' you won't get anywhere." * Threnody says nothing, but after a moment he stands up; his lip is bleeding a little bit, but not much. "I'll... take everyone's leave tonight, before they wake up the morning. My welcome's overstayed." * Rochelle looks down at her hand. * Katherine stands slowly, and says in a weak voice, "Wait, Thren, Roch." * Threnody gets a pained look. "It's not like something I can turn on and off like a switch. It's like sight, or hearing, or taste or touch. It's a part of me. I know... that's small consolation. But it's the truth." Can't either. What? * Rochelle looks up to Kat. * Threnody turns slightly to look at Kat. * Katherine shakes her head. "I... christ. I'm sorry, Roch. But... like he said," she gestures over at Thren, "he can't control it all..." she pauses, and then adds a tentative, "...either?" Either. * Rochelle looks back down at her hand. "Anders is gonna be wrong. Don't know exactly when, don't know exactly where. But he will be." And everything's gonna fall, like... Crumble into nothing. He's too sure. * Threnody looks at the ceiling. "She felt it very strongly at the restaurant. I couldn't help it. It was a loud, disturbing image." He looks down. "I wasn't looking into your mind, Miss Rochelle. Past what I sort of 'hear', people's minds are inviolate." Yeah. * Threnody looks up. "I don't like Samuel very much, but if what you saw is true... it's not just him, but all of us are in danger." He pauses. "I won't say anything. What I know won't leave this room." It won't matter. If he knows or not, I mean. * Katherine nods, slightly. "It'll be hard, but..." she trails off at that, with a very soft, "Fucking christ." * Threnody knits his brow. "Maybe not. I more meant... keeping your secret. Everyone has good reasons for them." He looks at Kat. "But it resonates. I can hear Her in here..." He points at his head. "Saying that this isn't right. That Anders is too confident, that the situation's not what we were told. She's been saying it for days." She's right. (Beore Cham leaps on melike Mecha did: He's being metaphoric.) * Katherine nods. "Yeah. We talked about it at the Coffee, remember?" She shakes her head. "Shit." * Rochelle sits on the bed, still looking at her hand. She sounds more distant, now, less emotional. "Anders thinks he can see everything. He thinks he can do everything. Nobody can do that. He's gonna figure that out, soon, and it won't be pretty." (I will ask a favor as a GM, that you trust me as players and all continue through with this thing. I promise I have my plans.) (Ehe.) * Threnody sighs. "And his careful house of cards will collapse under him when he does. But what can we do?" He looks at Roch, then at Kat. "We don't have a choice. We have to see it through." (Hasn't she been? Roch's got reasons. ^^) (She's a sadist.) (I suddenly feel like I did a bad thing, here. ._.) (I know, but I just wanted to ask. I don't want another GCI.) (She LAUGHS at your misery. Present and future!) (It's not a bad thing, but the initial reaction is "don't do this" and I'd really rather avoid a convoluted excuse to drag you all back in again.) (Naw.) * Rochelle stays silent. She doesn't look up. (At worst it'd color his reactions. But... see also: What I was saying to Mecha about how hard it is to separate my mind from his on occasion.) * Katherine shakes her head. "Shit. There's gotta be something..." Kat's face is set. "Well, there is something. It's not fair..." she pauses, and adds, "... for us to know yours, but..." she trails off, and doesn't come back. * Threnody smiles faintly. "You don't have to say anything..." He tilts his head at Rochelle. "I know your secret. But Kat has a point. Do you want to know mine?" * Rochelle says, quietly, "We'll live. We all will." And then she blinks and looks up to Thren. Only if you wanna tell it. (This... seems familiar.) * Threnody lowers his eyelids a little. "It always seems to come down to that sentence." * Katherine smirks faintly. "It does.' * Rochelle shrugs. It's like we want to have an option, but... we never do. (*hums the World is not Enough*) * Threnody shakes his head. "I won't tell anyone, Miss Rochelle, I swear upon my very soul. I have secrets, too... bloody ones. If it would make you feel safer to know them, I'll tell you whatever you want as a sign of good faith." Doesn't matter. Knew a lot of people who kill. But you wanna tell, so go ahead. * Katherine smirks faintly, "That ya do." She starts to reach her hand towards Roch, but stops. Probably a good thing. (*snicker* Now I get to stun kat into total silence too. And after this we'll find a peach tree and swear to die on the same hour of the same day...) (Only Rochelle wouldn't bother, 'cause she knows it won't be true! Aaaagh!) (Means you two need to take up the spear, but...) (Guns are like spears.) (They have range!) (Exactly.) * Threnody looks down at his hands. "My full name is Threnody Ouka Tsukitomi-Renard." He pauses. "When... when I was 17, I argued with my brother over something terrible, and he did... something, I don't know what... with his powers. It drove me... mad. I killed my father and 17 other people that night before my mother knocked me out of it." * Katherine turns to Thren, to give him the gaping look. "Fucking christ!" * Threnody continues on, looking sort of dazed, trance-like. "All of those deaths are still considered unsolved homocides. My mother covered it up, and my brother disappeared. A few months later I left Kyoto and was never to come back again. Not until I'd destroyed the monster living here..." He points at his head again. "Inside my head." * Rochelle stares at him for a long moment, then gives a hesitant nod. "Why you left Earth." * Threnody nods slowly. "That's right. I studied meditation techniques in the mountains of Tibet for a while, but it got to be too much. I had to leave... so I visited my aunt on Mars." And then? (Fuck this. I want ice cream.) * Threnody lets out a breath. "My brother is an underworld figure, now. He's hiding somewhere on Mars, with a substantial bounty on both my head and my mother's. I travelled around to keep from putting friends and family in danger. I eventually came to Red New York and met Dorian Parker..." Would've happened anyway. * Threnody smiles faintly. "Maybe it would have. I told Dorian I don't believe in destiny, and that's the truth. The belief that I can change the future is the only reason I can keep going every day." Yeah, but. * Threnody shakes his head. "Don't worry about it. I might be wrong. You might be wrong." He looks up. "The difference between you and Anders is that you can admit that, and he can't." * Threnody smiles again, tiredly. "That's why I can tell you something that could cause a 400 year old clan of swordsmen to die out forever." * Rochelle looks over to Kat for a moment, then back to Threnody. "We're blue. There's something that'll make us run into each other. Maybe fate is bullshit. The one Anders is making is what he's making." * Katherine looks confused. "... blue?" And maybe you can change stuff, but it's really fucking hard to go against it. * Rochelle turns her attention to Katherine. "Blue." * Threnody tilts his head, but Kat's already voiced the question, so he says nothing. Anders, Samuel, Luanne, Dorian... they're all purple. * Rochelle looks to the ceiling. "And the Concordat is red." (The good guys get the blue lasers!) (Darn tootin'.) Like... like a halo. * Threnody closes his eyes a moment, then opens them again. He furrows his brow. "...auras?" (...and again, Center of the Sun followed by Hubris.) (I haven't got Hubris, Mission, or Center of the Sun on random this whole blasted time.) * Rochelle nods at Threnody. "Kinda, yeah." (See why Center of the Sun fits now?) * Threnody looks at the windows distractedly. "There was..." (DO I have to roll to remember something that might be very obscure by 2086?) (Um.... what kind of event? /msg?) * Threnody knits his brow. "It was called Kirlian photography. They used it to take pictures of 'auras'. They'd freshly cut a leaf and take a shot... in the picture, the outline of the part that was cut off would still be visible as colored light." * Rochelle blinks. "You wanna take pictures?" * Katherine looks down at Roch with a faint smile, and touches her on one of her unburnt shoulders with the balls of her fingers. "I think Thren's just tryin' to think of things to relate, Roch." * Threnody laughs a little. "No... what you said just reminded me of it, is all. They said you could tell a living thing's 'lifeforce' by that aura... the color, the shape, the brightness." * Rochelle jerks a little at the touch, but doesn't move otherwise. "Oh." * Threnody suddenly looks awkward, and sighs. "Having done as much damage as humanly possible to morale... maybe it's better if I go back to my room for now." * Rochelle says, perfectly seriously, "You didn't hurt mine. Never had any to begin with." And I don't hate you. * Threnody ehes embarrassedly, rubbing the back of his neck. "Well, it's a start." He sighs. "We... all we can do is prepare ourselves and do our best. I guess the new me would say, 'Fate can go screw itself.'" * Katherine can't help but smirk at that, and say, "I'd drink to that, but it's all at home." Yeah. And, uh, Thren. * Threnody is about to open the door, but turns around at that. "Yes?" Even if you don't usually look into people's heads, never look into mine. Lotsa times, it's ugly. I'm just used to it. * Threnody smiles, his 'old' smile. "Everyone's is, really. The cobwebby, dark parts of our mind... it's everyone's last refuge. I don't go there unless someone asks me to." He pauses. "Just remember that... sometimes I can 'hear' things without even trying. Don't hold it against me." * Rochelle looks back down at her hands. "Sure." * Threnody turns the knob, then comes back in again as he's about to shut the door. "One last thing." * Katherine looks at Thren without turning her body. * Rochelle doesn't look up, but she's probably listening. * Threnody gets a guilelessly pleased look. "You throw a really forceful punch. You should consider the martial arts someday." * Rochelle blinks, then looks up at Threnody. She blinks again. * Threnody smiles. "See you tomorrow." He then shuts the door and is gone. * Katherine laughs. It's weak, but it's there. ... He's so weird. (And now I go to get 4 and a half hours of pre-work sleep.) (Night, Todd. ^^;) (Worth it, though. Thanks for indulging me.) (Hope it's enjoyable. ^^;) (Hee. No sweat.) * Katherine looks down at Roch. "Yeah. Yeah, he is." She pauses for a second, and says, "Listen, Roch... I have something I have to say too. I'm not sure it'll mean much to ya, though. But... it's the least I can do." (Aw, see, now I wanna see this, and I can't!) (Haw.) (I expect loggage. ._.) * Rochelle goes back to looking at her hands. Specifically, rubbing at her nails. "Okay." (Hehe.) (I'm going to go crawl under THE SLEEP and hide.) (Safety under THE SLEEP.) (... "It's just a Snorlax?" ^_~) * Katherine shakes her head, and lets go of Roch's arm. "Like Thren said... more to me than just a Kat. My..." she sits down on the bed. "You know I said I had nightmares, right?" * Rochelle looks up at her. "Yeah." Hard to ignore. * Katherine smirks faintly. "Yeah. I'm sure you heard 'em, even back when I was with Zak." * Rochelle rolls her eyes. Yup. * Katherine smirks. "Well, either that, or the sex. Wonder if you could tell the difference." It was hard to tell, but kinda, sure. * Katherine shakes her head. "I... beh. It's so blasted hard to say." She looks at Roch. "I feel bad, now. I don't know how Thren does it.' By being stupidly honest and not caring who's around when he says it. Or how he says it. Sounds about right. * Rochelle nods. She tucks some hair behind one ear. * Katherine shakes her head. "It's just..." she sighs, and says, "I want you to know I'll stick with ya." She smiles weakly. "Maybe you already know that. But..." her ears twitch. "It's important to me ya know that. It's like being in a pack. You gotta look out for everyone." * Rochelle blinks, then sighs. She crawls across the bed and sits near the head, picking up a pillow and setting it on her lap, then looks down at it. "Okay. But..." (Her bed or mine? Or are they single queens?) I don't do that. Never have. (Heck if I know. It's the one she was sitting on, so I assume it's hers.) (Heh.) * Rochelle looks almost confused for a moment, then turns her gaze up to Kat. "Mostly, anyway." * Katherine smiles faintly. "Mostly?" Mostly. * Rochelle looks past her. "I kept myself alive, yeah. And Zak. I saved him, too. And... I tried..." She pauses, then tries again. "Dad's gonna die tomorrow." I don't feel that bad, but I kinda do. I didn't think I loved him. Maybe I don't, but I still feel bad. * Katherine winces. "Oh, god. That's what you..." she looks down. "I'm sorry. I never liked my... dad, but...I can understand." * Rochelle hugs the pillow. "It's really weird. I knew it was gonna happen for years." (You two know how to end this. I've got to Z.) * Katherine mms. "Don't make it any easier, though." Not really a question. (Haw.) (Good night, Wombat One.) Probably does. No shock. Got over it real quick. * Katherine shakes her head. "I dunno how you deal with it. Then again, I barely know how I deal with my shit, so I suppose that's no damn surprise." Always had to deal with it. Don't know how not to. * Rochelle turns her attention to Katherine. "It helps if you don't care." * Katherine looks back at Roch, nods slightly with a slight frown. "I spent half my life preparing myself to not care. Then I tried to spend the rest trying to deal with having to. It's... not easy." It is for me. Maybe it'd be different if I grew up here. It's so quiet. No people dying, or kids being raped, or... * Rochelle takes a breath. It doesn't even shake, and she continues as steadily as ever, "If I cared about all of that, I think I would've gone crazy." * Katherine says softly. "You're probably right." She rubs her neck. "Don't change the fact that you're with me now, and that means I look out for ya." * Rochelle gives a small smile. "Okay. Thanks." * Katherine nods slightly, "Sure," and then chuckles, flumping back on her bed, causing the shirt to go up, exposing her midriff as per normal. "Good to sleep on a bed that's not full of cat, eh?" * Rochelle puts her pillow back and wriggles under the covers. She gets face full of pillow, and after a moment, says, "Yeah. It's different." * Katherine shakes her head, and sighs. "Damn, tomorrow..." He'll die. We'll do what Anders says. And we'll live. * Rochelle turns so she's looking at the ceiling. "We're gonna live." * Katherine sighs. "I hope so, Roch. That's my job." Anders might be wrong, but we'll live. And so will Luanne and the rest. Just do what you gotta. * Katherine smiles a little sadly. "The hard part's knowing what that means." * Rochelle turns on her side and says, a little sleepily, "You'll know." * Katherine nods slightly, but hasn't made any moves to go under the covers. She's just... flumped. (Gonna say anything else? Because I think Rochelle's dozing off. ;P) (That's cool. Good to be rested before the end of the world.) (Fantastic.) (You wanna do the crazy endy brackets?) <>