Kate Gregson

The bookshelf keeps giving her books on drawing. It's sort of annoying, because the very last thing in the world Kate is interested in is drawing. Well, that's sort of an exaggeration. There are probably a few things she's less interested in, like walking on hot coals and shit like that, but if she's going to do anything artistic, it's going to be dancing.

Or makeup. Which she supposes is just drawing on her own face, but it's totally different.

So she's collected the books -- six in all, though the bookshelf tries to give her more -- and she's walking to Harley's place carrying all of them in a pink bag. Which, now that she's almost entirely there, she's realizing probably wasn't the best idea. They're fucking heavy and Chang isn't much of a help, trotting along beside her, occasionally sniffing himself. When she reaches Harley's hut, she's sweaty and she all but throws the bag on the ground.

"Oh, my god, I hope you're home," she groans, loud enough to be heard if he's inside. "I'm just gonna leave this shit here even if you're not."

The snow was gone and with it all the crazy, puffy dresses in Kate's closet had disappeared as well, which wasn't something she was particularly sad about. The apartment that she and Marshall had been living in was pretty sweet, but if living in a hut was what she had to deal with to be able to wear a pair of shorts and a t-shirt, then Kate was totally okay with that. The hut wasn't so bad, after all, and she'd actually gotten used to the heat after all this time. (Although she'd been told about some German dude who made air conditioners and she was definitely going to track him down as soon as possible.)

Plus, with January came presents. Some people had already gotten theirs -- Kate had seen Jeff's puppy plenty of times now -- and she woke up nearly every morning and checked the hut for something that might be new and all hers. So far there had been nothing, not even that morning when she'd woken up, so, as usual, she'd walked to the Compound for a shower and breakfast.

What she hadn't expected at all was to find a brightly wrapped box waiting for her when she returned home. Just sitting there on their front step, a big bow on top and her name written on a tag. With a grin, Kate dropped down onto the step and began to rip into the box. There was a book, which she barely glanced at before dropping it on the step beside her, a weird leather looking thing and then a sleek, black box. A box with a gun inside.

"Uh..." Kate looked up and glanced around, half expecting someone to pop out of the jungle and tell her it was all just a joke. She didn't get guns as gifts. No one in their right mind would give Kate a firearm.

But there it was, lying in its box. The weird leather thing was a holster, she realized, and there was a box of ammunition. The book looked like it was mostly safety guidelines, but Kate couldn't quite get her brain to make sense of that yet. She was still too stunned by the fact that she was holding a gun in her lap. A real gun.

A real gun.