2nd floor common room, Friday evening

[crimson_sister]

Lucille was pleased to find the common room empty when she stopped by to make a pot of tea. Especially the lack of that noisy thing called a TV made it inviting enough to stay for a while, settling down on the couch with a cup and a book. By now she had almost finished the most recent book in the Shieldmaiden series provided there actually is such a thing as most recent, and she looked forward to see how it ended this time.

[Open common room. Welcome to disturb Lucille's peaceful reading.]

Comments

[tigerundercover]

Raven had been in a bit of a mood all day after her history class, and Kathy wasn't around for her to hash it out with. So she found herself wandering through the dorms restlessly as evening set in. Unfortunately for Lucille, she was the first other person Raven found.

She came in, huffed, and managed to stay quiet for a few moments -- she was close with enough nerds to know that interrupting reading time was a terrible thing to do -- before she finally couldn't help herself.

"Why are people terrible?"

[crimson_sister]

Lucille ignored Raven when she first appeared, but then there was a question. For once, a very reasonable question. "Because that is the way of the world," Lucille replied. "Or the way of many of them, I assume. Would you like a cup of tea?"

She might have preferred solitude, but at least Raven wasn't being annoyingly cheerful.

[What does Raven look like right now?]

[tigerundercover]

[pretty much as it looks in the icons: long straight blonde haired Jennifer Lawrence. In a simple, casual outfit, t-shirt and midi skirt, sans hat.]

Raven smiled faintly. "That's probably exactly what my brother would say. About the tea, anyway." And Charles hadn't even grown up in England. "And 'that's just how it is' isn't a very satisfying answer. People are just -- nasty. For no reason."

If Raven ever eventually grew up into the assassin she'd be without Fandom, she'd at least have reasons for being nasty.

[crimson_sister]

"Isn't it?" Lucille asked. "Why would reason or purpose improve it? I prefer a universe that offers no explanations to the cruel nature of others." She sipped her tea, considering whether she should interpret Raven's lack of response as a 'yes' or a 'no'.

[tigerundercover]

Honestly, Raven would roll with either interpretation Lucille went with. And probably leave at least half a cup of cold tea behind if Lucille actually made her one.

"But it's stupid. Animals don't kill each other for the hell of it. They do it for food, or self-defense. People just hurt each other because they can."

[crimson_sister]

"The price of sentience." Lucille decided Raven would have to make her wish clear if she wanted tea. That would be the price of interrupting.

"Although some animals do enjoy the necessary killing. Haven't you seen a cat play with a mouse it is about to kill?"

[tigerundercover]

Raven huffed. "If you have to do something, you might as well be able to enjoy it," she said. She'd found any number of ways to rationalize not minding when she had to kill someone the few times she'd had to do it so far. "Especially if you need to get good at it."

[crimson_sister]

"I have been told I had to do many things that I found little enjoyment in," Lucille replied. "Perhaps that is true of the things you decide yourself that you have to do." She smiled a little. "But what if you find you have to be terrible?"

[tigerundercover]

Raven thought about that for a little while. "How terrible is terrible?" she asked finally. Being raised by a pacifist brother and influenced by the intensely moral Kathy was warring with her own fairly terrible inner nature.

[crimson_sister]

Lucille might be able to compensate for them both.

"I believe we all have to find how terrible we have to be." She looked down into her teacup, almost smiling. "Do you think you have to be terrible?"

[tigerundercover]

Raven frowned thoughtfully. "Not on an average day," she said. "But I've had to do nasty things before. But I could definitely be much worse than I am."

She could impersonate anyone. And she hardly ever used it to mess with people!

[crimson_sister]

Lucille looked at her. "And why aren't you?" She took another sip from her cup.

To be honest, Lucille could also be a lot worse than she was, but she knew why and she wasn't the one answering questions.

[tigerundercover]

"Because there's no reason to." Raven shrugged. "Are you as terrible as you can be?"

[crimson_sister]

"No," Lucille replied. Because there were reasons not to be. "It serves no purpose. But perhaps those people you were complaining about earlier had reasons, or perhaps they didn't care about having them.

Lucille preferred not to talk about herself, here.

[tigerundercover]

"Whatever. Even if they did, everyone else had plenty of reason to be as terrible as they'd possibly want right back at them."

There was a reason why in another timeline she'd been lover and partner to a vengeful holocaust survivor.

[crimson_sister]

"So why weren't you?"

That seemed like an obvious question.

[tigerundercover]

"I was busy," Raven said. "And, uh. Probably about six. Maybe seven."

This was the trouble with getting righteously angry at historical events.

[crimson_sister]

"I see. Well, that does make it understandable."

It had taken Lucille a while too.

"I was under the impression that it was someone here who had been terrible."

[tigerundercover]

"Nope," Raven said, a little resigned. "I mean, yeah, probably. But not that I know of."

[crimson_sister]

"At least today we are both spared the terrible things of this time and place," Lucille said, finishing her tea. "Or does that mean we just lose an opportunity to fulfill our truest nature, in opposing it with its equal."

[tigerundercover]

"You're like an evil version of my brother," Raven said admiringly. "He figures you should take the 'high road' no matter what the other person's done, but you both like waxing philosophical about it."

[crimson_sister]

"I assume that is a compliment." Lucille looked almost amused. "My brother also has a gentler spirit than I have. It is a responsibility for us, isn't it?"

[tigerundercover]

"One of those things that we might as well enjoy, since we have to do it."

[crimson_sister]

"Yes." Raven was more intriguing than Lucille had first thought. "A perfect example."

[tigerundercover]

What, the ability to turn blue wasn't intriguing enough?

"What's that you're reading?" Raven asked, sensing they'd pretty well exhausted the previous topic.

[crimson_sister]

The ability to turn blue was strange, but Lucille found their conversation more interesting.

"Oh, a romantic novel." Unlike Cassandra she wasn't particularly embarrassed about it. The novel in question had a warrior woman on the cover, with a shirtless young man hovering in the background.

[tigerundercover]

"Ooo, looks like a real bodice ripper," Raven said. "I haven't read one of those in ages. Is it any good?"

[crimson_sister]

"I'm not familiar with that expression, but it seems that in these books the gentleman gets to remove his clothing more often than the lady. Perhaps that is a modern thing?" One of the improvements, Lucille had to admit.