Apartment Above Luke's, Sunday Afternoon

[spin_kick_snap]

The quiet was nice.

Kathy looked around the empty apartment, wandering from room to room. If asked, she'd say she was picturing where all their stuff would go when she and Raven left Eliot's place (okay, Eliot's and Parker's and Hardison's, but it had been Eliot's place in her mind for years and it would take some adjusting to) and moved in here, but really, she was just appreciating the quiet. It was nice, being somewhere that no one else was for a little while. She didn't have to worry about whether her smile was convincing or she appeared happy--and grateful! One mustn't forget grateful!--to be alive again. Not that she wanted to be dead again or anything. But sometimes it was hard to be happy about anything. But around people, she felt like she owed it to them to try. Or at least to put up a decent enough facade that they could convince themselves she was.

Alone, though, she didn't have to pretend. She could just do her own thing, try to distance herself from her recent spate of nightmares and just wander for a bit. She would have thought she'd gotten enough walking in as an ex, but maybe her body'd just gotten used to the repetitive motion. Maybe idly poking around the place really would give her some ideas for what to do with the place. Or maybe it was all just bullshit and she should focus on thinking less altogether.

Yeah, it was probably the latter. But until she found a decent substitute for her previous activities that shut her brain down (besides zombieism, ha ha, she was hilarious), walking and appreciating the lack of people would have to do.

[Post open! Link to Anders' thread]

Comments

[spin_kick_snap]

"And I don't think they're scared at all," Kathy countered. "They're selfish. Socialism means they have to pay more for things that don't immediately benefit them. They're not worried the government is going to come in and take their lands away or their businesses or their summer homes. They're worried they'll lose four percent of their profit margin helping some woman they don't know beat cancer or something. It's not ideological. It's greed."

[tigerundercover]

"You know it can be both, right?" Raven pointed out. "I mean, it's not like the fear of communism was ideologically pure or anything."

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy gasped. "May the ghost of blessed St. McCarthy hush your lying mouth," she said. "I mean, you're right. I just--I don't get the fear of communism. I understand fearing the dictators that use Communism to rise to power, sure, but I don't understand why everyone gets so hysterical about it."

Greed, she could understand, sure. It was repugnant, but explicable. The fear of communism, though? What gave?

[tigerundercover]

"It goes against Truth, Justice, and the American Way!" Raven declared, eyes rolling all the while. "Plus, you know. We'd just finished the second giant multi-country war in less than forty years, the British Empire was collapsing, and the US had just unleashed a weapon that we were pretty sure could destroy the entire world if not used carefully. Everyone wanted a scapegoat. Russia was the other great big superpower. Communism was . . . convenient."

[spin_kick_snap]

"But you had, like, literal Nazis," Kathy protested. "Perfect scapegoat right there! Nazis!"

[tigerundercover]

Raven shrugged. "The Nazis were defeated. The ones who weren't dead were being tried for their crimes." Or let into the US to help them build weapons. Yeah. "The Communists were still out there, running countries. More and more of them all the time."

[spin_kick_snap]

"So, basically, we worried about getting nuked off the planet for thirty years because people hadn't figured out this wasn't all just a giant game of Risk?" Kathy asked, appalled. "My god, I just want to go back in time and shake every person I find."

[tigerundercover]

"I've never played Risk," Raven said. "But I think it's more that we worried about getting nuked off the planet for thirty years because the people in charge were playing a giant game of it."

[spin_kick_snap]

"Stuff like that almost makes me want to run for office," Kathy grumbled. "Except I'd probably get frustrated at everyone and start throwing spin kicks around."

Snap! The sound of spines breaking under pressure. "I'll get those three, Mystique, if you wanna get the big guy over there!"

Kathy shivered. Was everything going to bring back memories she didn't want to deal with?

[tigerundercover]

Yes. It probably really would.

"From what I hear, that might actually be an improvement over a lot of US officials."

[spin_kick_snap]

"And I think a lot of US officials could be improved by a couple of spin kicks to the face," Kathy said, determined not to give those lurking memories any more leeway than they already had.

[tigerundercover]

"I'd vote for you on that platform alone."

Also because she was her best friend, let's be real.

[spin_kick_snap]

"The 'I Promise To Assault Idiots' platform?" Kathy asked, smiling a bit. "It's got a pretty decent ring to it, yeah."

[tigerundercover]

"Possibly a little bit long for a slogan," Raven said. "But 'assault idiots' on a tshirt would probably sell out in seconds."

[spin_kick_snap]

"What I'm hearing is you agreeing to be my campaign manager then?" Kathy noted. "Glad to have you aboard, Raven."

[tigerundercover]

"Campaign manager means I get to do nothing at all and just cling to your coattails, right?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"I'm going to say yes for now," Kathy said with a laugh, "just so you'll agree. I'll spring the real responsibilities on you later, when you least expect them!"

[tigerundercover]

"I don't know, that sets a dangerous precedent for how you might behave in office."

[spin_kick_snap]

"Hey, that's why you get aides and assistants and interns," Kathy said. "We can just keep passing the responsibilities down."

[tigerundercover]

"While you get all the glory?" Raven pointed out. "Look at that, you haven't even started running yet and already the power's corrupting you."

[spin_kick_snap]

"While I get all the kicking," Kathy corrected. "That's what I'm bringing to this administration. Kicking."

[tigerundercover]

"Maybe you should shoot for a new cabinet position instead of the presidency. You could be the Secretary of Kicking."

[spin_kick_snap]

"Not under this administration," Kathy said with a curl of her lip. "Has anyone told you about the current political bullshit?"

Kathy had been alive a week and already has SERIOUS political opinions.

[tigerundercover]

"Does it have anything to do with why Hardison starts his mornings by cursing at news websites?"

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy's ferocious scowl was a very eloquent yes.

"I would be very surprised if he wasn't trying to convince Parker and Eliot to pull some kind of giant con on the president right this minute."