(no subject)

[everyone_takes]

Time doesn't heal all wounds.

Kate's pretty much determined that old cliché to be total bullshit, because here she is, months after Marshall disappeared and she still feels like crap almost every day. Some days are better than others and sometimes she can pretend she's happy long enough to fool some people, but it never sticks. At the end of the day she still goes home and thinks about all her family members who aren't there with her and feels like she's been left behind.

She doesn't tell anyone, but all she wants lately is just to go home.

But she does all the stuff people expect of her, even though she doesn't want to. She trains with Danny and pays attention to what he's saying. She spends time with her friends, with her boyfriend, she acts like herself, but she never feels like herself. No matter what she does, she feels like some kind of imposter who's just floating through her life.

The worst part is that there's nothing she can do that makes it go away. For the past few days, she's been thinking about going off on her own, doing something that's probably sort of stupid, but nothing seems to appeal to her. The dinosaurs still don't hold that much interest for her and she doesn't care about camping or looking for weird animals or bugs. That sort of leaves her with Rapture, even though she isn't sure about going down there. They probably wouldn't let her go down alone, anyway, but she can hardly ask Danny to go along with her.

Standing in front of the caves, she frowns and stares down into the dark. She has a flashlight, but no idea where to do or what she'll do when she gets there.

Comments

[everyone_takes]

With a laugh, Kate nodded, figuring that was fair. It would also probably be a good chunk of time before she actually managed to land a punch. She and Marshall had never been the sort of siblings who fought physically. Even their verbal arguments were usually pretty tame, especially given how abusive Kate knew she could get with other people.

"So what's the secret to like, the perfect punch?" she asked as they descended.

[girlsolo]

"The satisfying crunch of bone in some asshole dickbag's face because he deserved the hell out of it," Kate answers without hesitation.

The bathysphere stops and Kate gets out gratefully. It takes her a minute to readjust her eyes to the ambient light. There's not a lot, but enough they don't need the flashlights. She tucks hers back in her pocket and looks around.

Between the stairs and the gold walls that led to the bathysphere, Kate's sort of expecting Hollow Earth. She's not completely disappointed. That sends a little shiver up her spine and she can't help thinking about her future-fiance.

[everyone_takes]

Kate just about laughed, but then they were coming to a stop and she stepped out as well, her lips parting in surprise. This wasn't what she was expecting at all -- although if she stopped to think about it, she wasn't sure what she was expecting -- and she turned around slowly, staring at everything there was to see.

"Jesus," she said softly, her gaze drifting from the walls to the floor to the lights. There really was an entire city down here. They'd told her as much, but it was sort of hard to believe unless you saw it yourself and here she was, finally looking at it.

[girlsolo]

"First underground city, huh?" Kate teases, but she's pretty impressed too. It makes her feel a lot of things. A lot of things. So instead of admitting it, natch, she says, "Seen one, seen 'em all."

Kate had been there to see the bracelet and the talk with Will at least, so, she adds, "My future maybe fiance with the bracelet? He's from an underground city like this," mostly because she's not trying to be a douchebag. It's awesome and Kate should enjoy it.

Psillobars. Herusans. Death. They have a way of fucking with a girl.

[everyone_takes]

"Only underground city," Kate answered with a small grin, reaching out to run her hands over one of the walls. She'd known it was here and all the things she said to Hermione still stood. It freaked her out and she wasn't sure what the purpose of it was, which made it all just a bit more weird, but she was fascinated at the same time.

"So you've been in something like this before?" she asked. "Or did... this is a fucking weird question to be asking, but did that not happen to you before you came here? I mean... you know what I mean, right?"

[girlsolo]

"Both." It is a fucking weird question, but Kate's used to it. Here on the island and off. She shrugs and starts forward into Rapture. She's not sure what she's looking for today. Maybe some wine, maybe some ammo, maybe another weapon, maybe herself.

"It's kind of a long story. You remember what I told you about the Abnormals and what the Sanctuary does?"

[everyone_takes]

"Yeah, I remember," she answered, following Kate, making sure to stick close to her. Already, she was pretty sure that Danny wouldn't like this and the only thing that would save her ass was Kates presence. As long as she stuck close, she figured everything would be fine, even if this whole underground city was as weird as things could fucking get.

"So you saw something like this doing that work?" she asked.

[girlsolo]

"Yeah. See, we found out that..." Kate glances around, reflexively. It's still secret, at least, in her time. "Listen, no one knows this up on the surface. I don't know if it's true in your world, but you can't tell anyone. Okay?"

It's not just because of Hollow Earth. She can't help thinking about Garris, the mystery fiance and his people. Who knows what happens when they leave here or if the people out there are watching them on TV like they see people on the reels. She doesn't want anything to happen to them because of her.

[everyone_takes]

"Not a word," Kate promised, holding her hand up to show that she was serious. Secrets weren't exactly her thing, given how insane stuff had been back home, but she was good at it anyway. When she had to be.

She ran her hand over the walls of the hall they were in, then leaned against the window to take in the rest of the city. It was bigger than she thought, which was a little terrifying, but also amazing. There was so much out there, so much for her to see.

[girlsolo]

"Thanks. I doubt it matters. But--" She shrugs and looks through the window, leaning against it to look out over the city. "It matters to me."

The thing that strikes her is the blue cast to the lighting. Hollow Earth had been full of blues, too. She's heard Will say blue soothes, that's why doctors wear blue, why open skies can be calming. It feels pure and cool. She remembers Hollow Earth had felt that way, too, logical and beautiful and ordered. Not like Old City, all chaotic and dark and dirty. Maybe that was part of why she'd wanted to help Garris, when Hollow Earth got destroyed, because the Herusans lived in the shadow of that.

"We found out last year that...well, the Earth is hollow. There was a whole civilization under the surface. A big beautiful city called Praxis and a lot of Abnormal tribespeople living out in the plains. There was a guy we needed to find before he hurt a lot of people and we chased him down there. I guess coming into the city without permission was against the law, and all of us got executed." She glances at Kate. "Death by electrocution, in case you're curious? Sucks."

[everyone_takes]

"You were executed?" Kate repeated, suddenly turning against the window. The city itself was fascinating, but this was a little more important than whatever she was looking for down here. It shouldn't have been that surprising; she knew that all sorts of really shitty things happened to the people who were on the island now, but she didn't like to think about it all that much.

She especially didn't want to think about someone she liked being killed.

"How's that possible? I mean, what happened?"

[girlsolo]

"Yep. Whole team." Kate's glib now, but it had been ugly and messy and terrifying then. They'd all pretended not to be terrified, but they all thought Will or Magnus would talk their way out of it too.

Beautiful but deadly. Just like this place. Just like Declan used to say about her. No wonder she's confused.

"Next thing I knew, I was waking up with a bitch of a headache and drinking some kind of ion-reversing shake. Turns out, they had the ability to resurrect us. Once we were dead, the law was satisfied, and their leader had us resurrected to help out with a problem."

[everyone_takes]

"Jesus Christ," Kate said, frowning deeply. That was seriously fucked up and for all the shitty things she'd seen in her life, all the things she'd had to deal with, this was definitely near the top of the list. There was something seriously different from dealing with her mother than hearing about something like this.

"That's... really fucking stupid," she decided. "Just, oh, we'll just kill you, because you're breaking some law and now we need your help, so we'll bring you back and put you through all this horrible bullshit." People were pretty much assholes wherever they were from.

[girlsolo]

"In their defense, they were fighting off a coup and environmental collapse at the time," Kate says, but she's not sure why she's defending Ranna. Bitch wouldn't even give them the help they needed to save Will when he started turning into a Psillobar. "We were people they could trust not to have an agenda and Magnus's name goes a long way in our world."

She makes a face, then shoves her hair back, twisting it back into a knot. "But it sucked. The protein shake tasted like shit and I had a headache for days. That's the before part. The after part... I guess the surface world found out about Hollow Earth and Praxis and the Abnormals and it got destroyed. I met a dude, like some kind of leader there, and when Magnus needed a liaison, she sent me down there and I got engaged. Get engaged. Will get engaged. Won't ever get engaged?" She's still making faces because how the fuck do you talk about something you never did, but some other you did and you might but might not ever do? Even in her head it's complicated.

[everyone_takes]

"All of the above?" Kate guessed, because none of that shit really made sense in her brain. It all happened and yet none of it happened and she wasn't sure how that worked. For the most part, she tried not to think about it too much, especially in relation to her own life.

"So did you meeting him happen before you got here?" she asked, wandering down the hall a little further, looking for another door or another room. "The guy you got or didn't get or will get engaged to, I mean. Do you remember that much at least?"

[girlsolo]

"Welcome lounge is at the end of this hall, keep walking all the way through, the hall bends right, keep going through the room there and we'll take the elevators down," Kate says offhandedly, making it obvious the reason Thrace waved her through isn't because she's generally competent. More like a frequent flyer.

She lets Kate go ahead of her, because the ITF keeps this level in good repair and pretty well lit. A lot of people end their tours here. They won't, and Kate will take a lead then, but for now, letting other-Kate have her head is safe and it'll take the edge off the urge to wander later.

"Never met him, unless he was just one of the thousands of guys I met in passing. Kinda think he was part of some resistance though. More my type than a government honcho, you know?"

[everyone_takes]

"Yeah, I get that," she answered as she walked in the direction Kate had indicated, grinning to herself. Although she was totally convinced that her parents would have approved of Harry, there was still the fact that he wasn't much of one for rules, which was something Kate had always liked. Harry was a lot more balanced than the guys she'd dated in the past, though, which made everything a little easier.

"Apparently I date some total right wing douchebag for a little while back home," she said. "Lionel told me while he was here. I don't know why. I bet he was rich."

[girlsolo]

"Or he was hot and great in bed. Good sex covers a multitude of sins." Kate grins at her back and keeps walking. She's kind of curious about Harry, because, you know, Harry Potter and all. Either he's like a champion fuck or he's got a stick so far up his ass it stabs when they're kissing.

"So." Because it's about time they get to the point and neither of them's really the talk to me type, but if she's taking Kate somewhere dangerous, she needs to know what's on her mind. "You just decide you needed some excitement or looking for something specific down here?"

[everyone_takes]

It was totally possible he was awesome in bed, but it still bugged Kate that she'd actually date some asshole who was a jerk to her brother. She didn't have a lot of lines, but that was one of them. As far as she was concerned, she was the only person allowed to be a jerk to Marshall. Not that she even had the opportunity anymore.

She shrugged at Kate's question, lifting her hand to trail her fingers over the wall. "Nothing really specific. I just... I needed to do something. Effy and I went over to the other island, but that was before everything pretty much exploded for the both of us."

[girlsolo]

Effy. Kate knows the name and face but not the girl. Lost a bunch of people, went a little or a lot crazed, Finnick and Kate and some others have been looking out for her since. Stuff exploding, that's probably mostly Marshall but a lot of people went missing around the same time as Declan.

"Yeah, I know that feeling." Rapture's a good place to 'do something'. It's just what sort of 'something' Kate has in mind. "Sightseeing, window-shopping, treasure-hunting or adventure climbing? Rapture's got a little bit of everything, even if it's mostly defanged." Kinda like Tesla, really. More a memory of danger than actual danger, but sometimes it jumped up and bit you anyway.

[everyone_takes]

"Treasure hunting," Kate answered almost immediately. The other things appealed to her, too, but she had never been very good at window shopping, always wanting to take something home, keep it and have it for her own. Treasure hunting could give her that and maybe she'd find something cool to take back to Effy.

Maybe get her talking a little bit again.

"Is there actually treasure down here or will we just run around forever and find nothing?" she asked, smiling.

[girlsolo]

"Fort Frolic it is," Kate decides. A little bit of everything there and farther down so it's a little less trafficked. It means more time in the bathyspheres, but she can deal for a little bit of fun.

"There's still some stuff. Food, wine, weapons, crap from the shops. They don't mind if you bring the little stuff back but if it's bigger than a breadbox or fires projectiles, you've gotta talk to someone about it."

[everyone_takes]

"Fort Frolic," she repeated, amused by the name. There was a lot she didn't know about this place, but that was part of the fun, part of the distraction. It meant she wouldn't have to be thinking of other things, which was pretty much exactly what she was looking for.

"Who named it that?" she asked. "Any idea? Because it sounds like something straight out of a seventies porno or something."

[girlsolo]

Kate shrugs and leads them to the bathysphere station again. "Not sure. Probably the big kahuna, Ryan, or maybe Cohen." Their names are all over the place. Kate hasn't bothered to learn the history. That's usually Will's department. Maybe she'll come down here with Daniel sometime. He'll probably be able to figure out all that geeky crap just by twitching an eyebrow.

"This place was supposed to be for artists and scientists to have freedom of expression all the time, before it went bad." That much she knows. "All the names are kind of...you know. Thematic."

[everyone_takes]

"Not to be a total downer on the original idea, but isn't total freedom in science kind of... I don't know, really fucking bad?" Kate asked, thinking about that as she stepped back into the weird elevator thing. "I mean, scientific advancement is great and all, but there has to be some kind of rules. Guidelines so that everyone doesn't go completely insane and create something really dangerous?"

Maybe that was what had happened down here. She'd said everything had gone bad, so maybe someone had done exactly what she was thinking. Created something that had turned on everyone and caused a whole lot of bad shit to happen.