Third Floor Common Room, Friday Morning

[lockestheway]

Just a few weeks ago, Peter had been celebrating the end of the war he'd set in motion himself - the one that catapulted Locke into political prominence.

Roughly a week later, his parents had kind of squashed his enthusiasm thoroughly with all that crap about Ender.

After some thinking about it, though, Peter had realised there was only one option - Ender would have to go. And not to some interdimensional school he could easily come back from: he needed to leave.

He'd been working on that for a while now, trying to get some interesting footage released while dealing with the minor world leaders who were now interested in Locke's backing. Which went well, generally speaking, except for minor glitches. Like last night. Like last 'drunken Topher calling him on his 21st century phone' night, which had resulted in at least an hour of apologies to the Congolese prime minister because he really hadn't been telling him to 'have a lie-down'.

Peter hadn't slept much last night.

All of this boiled on down to one thing: Peter Wiggin, lying on the sofa in the common room before classes, a bowl of cereal balancing on his stomach and a giant mug of coffee on the tale.

Topher would pay. Right after he finally managed to grab a nap.

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[withasword.livejournal.com]

Kate was frequently up at a ridiculous time in the morning, and since she had a morning class today, was saving her training session for later. It resulted in some wandering.

There was a split second where she considered turning and taking her wandering elsewhere when she saw who was already in the room. It was the strict reminder to herself that things that happened that weekend should stay in that weekend that made her stay to investigate the possibility of pre-made caffiene.

"There some of that going spare?" she asked, tipping her head towards his giant mug.

[lockestheway]

"There's still half a pot left," Peter said, with a lazy wave of his hand. At least he lacked the accent - or, for that matter, much recognition with regards to Kate. "Morning."

It had been a weekend. He'd chosen to forget about it.

You know. After the week he spent hiding in bed.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"Morning," she offered in return. If he was choosing to forget, then Kate sure as hell was too, and she nodded as she made her way over to fill a mug. "I make it, it tastes like motor oil." Or so other people described it. One of those things that she'd never got the hang of, somehow.

There was probably supposed to be a 'thank you' in there somewhere too.

[lockestheway]

Peter gave it a shrug, and picked his mug up off the table. "I'm no big-time coffee-slinger," he confided, "But as long as it doesn't damage my stomach lining, I think I'm comfortable with that."

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"... That'll do for me." It was entirely possible that Kate's idea of coffee did. You could never be sure what people were putting in food in her days. Rat and dog often ended up getting served as anything but.

She momentarily examined the contents of her mug, then shrugged and found a space on a nearby armchair. "Don't people normally nap in their rooms?" Okay, yes there was the cereal and coffee, but the lying down at least implied nap.

[lockestheway]

"Hey, I'm an unconventional guy," Peter said, taking another sip of his coffee. "And I've got class sometime today, so I thought this might be a nice compromise between sleeping through it, and not getting any rest at all."

He set his mug back down and dumped his spoon back in his cereal.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"Not being evil? Not exactly the most stressful of classes." There were slideshows adout checking how much leather you wore and the guy wasn't even there last week.

"Claim being good is just sapping all your energy," she suggested, smirking as she lifted her mug to her lips.

[lockestheway]

"Like being a recovering evil addict?" Peter asked, raising his eyebrows. "Clever. I'll need to remember that one."

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"Don't abuse it. That's going to be my fall-back," she warned, mostly kidding.

[lockestheway]

"Oh, I solemnly swear only to use it when absolutely necessary," Peter said, just as solemnly.

Don't mind the amused wagging of his eyebrows.

"Kate, right?"

[withasword.livejournal.com]

Yep. That was her. "Peter, right?' she echoed back in place of an actual reply, curving a hint of a smile.

"I'll have to remember this if that teacher wants examples of not being evil again." She could at least vouch for the sharing of coffee as not being evil.

[lockestheway]

Peter grinned a little. "And if you pass me the cereal," he said, eyeing his mostly-milk-filled bowl, "I can scratch your back right... well, back. Not that I think our teacher isn't well capable of turning anything around into being... what is the word for 'not evil' that isn't 'good'? Unevil? That just sounds all poppy."

[withasword.livejournal.com]

Kate glanced over her shoulder and eyed the cereal packet on the side. Why could she not move things with her brain? That would be handy.

"What, you don't think you'll be whatever meta there is for Care Bear material by the end of the semester? Ready for philanthropy and good deeds."

[lockestheway]

"I'm always up for philanthropy and good deeds," Peter protested. "But I'd say those two acts are not necessarily exclusive to not being evil. I mean, consider the status upgrade anyone committing good deeds and philanthropy gets in our society-- you think all those actors and actresses go around kissing hungry babies in Africa just because they're so damned squishy and good inside?"

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"No. It's never that simple." Kate was still staring at that cereal box over her shoulder, like perhaps it would move itself. "Same goes back. Good people sometimes do bad things, it doesn't always make them evil."

"How did you get me into deep discussion, when I haven't even had my coffee yet?" That wasn't right.

[lockestheway]

"It's a family trait," Peter said, and finally gave up and just set his bowl of mostly-milk down on the table. Lazy boy. "Though really, you'd think he'd have gone into some semantic discussion about what we're defining as 'evil' here, exactly... you know, besides mustache-twirling and puppy-kicking."

... not that he wanted to talk about puppy-kicking.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"Don't forget the leather." Very important.

"Maybe he's saving it for later," Kate theorised. "Or possibly just thought that chatting about real evil was a little too dark for high schoolers."

In which case, he clearly didn't know the high schoolers he was dealing with here.

[lockestheway]

The look on Peter's face said that he was thinking the same thing. "At this school?" he asked. "You can't throw a rock without hitting someone who's brooding about their dark, blood-soaked past."

Unlike Peter, who only brooded about how much his parents sucked and about how everybody loved his brother better than him and, okay, how he was trying to save the world and nobody could know about it, which was sort of dark, and as of recently, blood-soaked.

He'd just, you know. Not been anywhere near the blood in question.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"I didn't say that it was right," Kate pointed out mildly, stirring her coffee carefully. Literally blood-soaked past, check. She liked to think she didn't brood too excessively over it, though. Or not obviously, at least.

"But some people are into preserving innocence." Which was all very laudable, but a little impractical in a place where grey monsters came to eat you and people got thrown off a roof on a weekend (even if they did come off unscathed). "Or just pretending that they can. It makes people feel better about how shitty the world is."

[lockestheway]

Peter shrugged. "If you ask me, the world's not that shitty," he said. "Complicated and often unfair, sure. But shitty? It's not all hearts and flowers, but I think either standpoint denies the power of human accomplishment."

These days, sometimes he slipped into Locke-mode out loud. Whoops.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

Kate's eyebrows twitched in a little amusement at the almost propaganda-like statement, and she shrugged. "This one, I'll give you, isn't half bad." She approved of the full time magic and simultaneous tech. "It's... impressive." It was almost exactly what hers would've been about twenty years ago.

"I'm sure it has its crappy bits, but at least it's nicely hidden."

[lockestheway]

"Not really doing the whole 21st century Western World thing back home, huh?" Peter said, managing a credible attempt at sounding sympathetic.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"No, technically we are." Just not in quite the same way. It had regressed a little, technologically, admittedly. "We just do it with magic."

Unfortunately, magic had a massive capacity for sending things screwy.

[lockestheway]

Peter looked nonplussed, though mentally he was now fitting her into his 'befriending people with superpowers' strategy plan. "Really?" he asked. "How does that work?"

[withasword.livejournal.com]

Kate shrugged, "We build skyscrapers, and the magic rolls on in and reduces them to rubble." It was normal to the point that buildings in Atlanta toppled and the populace barely batted an eyelid.

"It flips back and forth a bit magic to tech. But magic, definitely winning." Her world had a science all its own.