tampered | i'm in a hurry (and i don't know why).

When; September 8th, mid-afternoon
Rating; PG?
Characters; Kathryn Janeway (

deuterium) & OPEN
Summary; Still cursed, hiding out in Xandu.
Log;

Katie doesn't roll out of bed until mid-afternoon, having not succumbed to the pull of sleep until dawn's light started to creep over the horizon. She'd been determined to stay up as late as possible, afraid that if she went to sleep, she'd wake up as a completely different person. Her dreams were plagued with such thoughts and scenarios, waking up in a body that had a good decade or so to age, being called Captain and asked for directions she didn't have — like her body had returned to what Commander Chakotay had insisted was normal only to have her mind still stuck in the state it was in now.

To the nearest mirror she went, inspecting her image to make sure her features were as they should be, that she was still the woman she thought she was. Curse paranoia was going to drive her mad. (Good thing she wouldn't be Katie for very long, that when she did wake up tomorrow morning, she'd find herself Captain Janeway and not the Ensign that served on the Al-Batani under Tom's father.)

Wanting to avoid another run-in with someone who knew that Katie was short for Kathryn and fought the urge to address her as someone with a much higher authority than she possessed, she ducked out of the apartment and made her way to Xanadu.

She thought about taking her older counterpart's tricorder with her, and while the scientist in her screamed yes, the young woman who wanted nothing to do with a future she hadn't carved out for herself said no. And against her better judgement, she left her phone and combadge behind as well — no pockets to hide the latter, no desire to carry around the former.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Neil wasn't cursed for a change, but he looked a little bit different from his usual self. He didn't recognize the woman who practically walked into him and who knew if she'd recognize him? They could have talked over the network, maybe. He didn't think so, though.

"Hey, it's okay," he said with a smile. "I'm fine, you fine?"

Nope. No recognition -- even if the woman she was supposed to be was good with faces and knew more about people she'd never interacted with, much less spoken to, than she let on (thank you, open network feeds), Katie didn't have access to any of those memories. It was as if she'd been re-ripped from her world from an earlier point in time. She knew nothing of that life and the people in it outside what Commander Chakotay had told her, and she took those things with a grain of salt.

"Yes, fine. I avoided falling on my face, so I'd call that a win."

Wow. What a curse this is.

"Nobody fell at all, so yeah, win-win."

Neil stuck his hands in the pockets of his trousers - not his jeans, because he was trying to wear his new clothes, for Lucy's sake - and wondered what to say next. Awkward nineteen-year-old? Yep.

"Nice day, huh?"

And how fuckin' lame was that, McCormick?

She's going to hate it come tomorrow morning when she's as she should be, especially once she recalls spending the majority of her Saturday flirting shamelessly with Captain Kirk. Her younger self didn't always make the best choices, and there were many things Kathryn wished she could take back -- like all those summers spent glued to her textbooks instead of enjoying family time when her father wasn't off world on assignment in deep space.

"I don't know; does this constitute as a nice day for this place? It's only my second day, so I wouldn't really know. It seems nice, but it's very possible I'm just overlooking the bad parts."

That's Captain Jerk to Neil. The guy wasn't very patient with him and became a bit patronizing during the one network conversation they've had. As for regrets? Doesn't everyone have some of those?

"I think it does, 'cause nobody's died." He paused. "As far as I know..."

That was the thing about the City. It was unpredictable and who knew what the Hell was going on, really, from one moment to the next? Neil didn't glue himself to the network, so sometimes he missed things.

"Second day? Wow. You're like... new new."

Her eyebrows shoot up in sudden alarm. "Dying's common here?"

New and unused to the crazy that's considered to be the City norm. (As new as someone who was cursed out of her mind and believed herself to be new could be, anyway.)

Oooops.

"Well, no, not really all that common, it just, you know..."

She doesn't know, McCormick. Get your shit together.

"It's a saying, like... Ha-ha, nobody died, so it's a good day..."

You are the lamest dickhead ever...

"Still, that means that people do die here. I know there's curses and what-not, but I didn't think any of those involved death."

That's one thing she has in common with the person she'll grow to be: A vehement disdain of death.

"They do, yeah, but then they come back to life or... something like that. They strike a bargain with the gods who... aren't in charge anymore, so maybe the whole thing is kinda fucked up now."

Wow. That was informative, Neil.

"Really fucked up is more like it." Captain Janeway would never swear like that in public. Ensign Janeway doesn't much care. "Even if the person does come back, they still have that experience to carry with them. Does this place even have trauma counselors to help people deal with the post-traumatic stress of some these curses?"

As she can tell, he doesn't mind her swearing. Swearing is almost a second language for him, though he's tried not to swear around his boss, Lucy, or Penny, because it makes her face a bit red...

His expression turns to surprise.

"Trauma counselors? This isn't a resort, you know. It's some kinda prison experiment or a trap or something. I don't think they care if it makes us feel like shit..."

i'm in a hurry (and i don't know why).

hurrah! ♥

:)

:D

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