Hallway to MCA #5, Monday Afternoon

[electrocynic]

Ugh.

Sarah had been away for a while, back in London. For reasons. Nothing very good, though nothing very horrible, either. She'd ducked out this morning, though. It would've been otherwise fine to spend her birthday in dear old London, except her parents had threatened to pay her a visit, and she just wasn't feeling up to her old favourite game of disappointing her dad extra hard by pretending to be even worse than he thought. So, she'd come back.

And once she'd come back, she'd realized she'd missed graduation. Sparkle's graduation, to be exact. So now she felt like shit. And she had no plans for her birthday, and she was spending it alone, and she found herself missing Guy and April and who the fuck ever she'd ever managed to care about only to lose touch.

Yeah.

This all probably explained why she was making her way towards her apartment with a great big bag of groceries, where bottles of Green Lamp Ale clinked together, packets of crisps made crisp-packet noises, and there was enough ice cream to probably get a class of first-graders into a sugar coma.

[ooc: Oooopen post! Of birthday frowning.]

Comments

[suitably_heroic]

Atton gave that the look it deserved.

"Okay, now I feel appeased," he said. "You do good cleavage."

[electrocynic]

That deserved getting the beer back in her hand. "I may be getting older, but I do still have great tits."

And she had no trouble acknowledging that, no matter how many times she'd told Devlin to stop leering at them.

[suitably_heroic]

Atton snagged a chip and popped it in his mouth, returning his attention to the holo. "See, now you're starting to see the light side of things," he said. ... Pun not intended, his brain-voice muttered. "We're not getting older, we're just acquiring more skills while still looking pretty."

[electrocynic]

"This is the first I've ever heard of good cleavage as a skill." Not that she objected. In fact, giving it a thought, she was pretty sure some of the women in the holo had benefited from the skill in question to get their parts. "Suppose there's value in that."

[suitably_heroic]

"It also helps to know how to deploy it properly," Atton pointed out.

Helpfully.

[electrocynic]

"True," Sarah replied, nodding sagely. "I should know, I've used to bloody marvelous effect in upsetting my parents."

The level of maturity, it was astounding.

"But it's almost as fun to use it as a lure."

[suitably_heroic]

"I have a friend who does that," Atton said, right as one of the idiots in the holo tried to pull it on an opposing idiot in the holo. The two were clearly slated to be the starcrossed romance of the piece. "She wears this thing that's practically just a bikini, and when people are distracted by the breasts, she swings them in the face." Beat. "Or hits them with a rocket, or... well, she's pretty inventive."

When you were a guy, you had to go slightly more subtle than that.

[electrocynic]

"Admirable." That sounded sarcastic out of habit, but was relatively sincere. "Tried to get my friend to do that back when we were a team. She wouldn't go for it, though."

Maybe LadyTrouble would've taken off more if you hadn't been so nice, Jenny. Just a thought.

[suitably_heroic]

"See, this is why people teaming up need to share the same core values," Atton said, taking another small sip of his beer.

It wasn't completely impossible that he and Mira had wound up the go-to Jedi for field assignments purely because out of the entire group, they were the bags of attitude with slightly shaky moral compasses.

[electrocynic]

"Right. Otherwise there's no point." Kind of like this holo, but she was enjoying it all the same. "I'm never working in a team again. Too much bickering, not enough cleavage."

[suitably_heroic]

"It has its upsides from time to time," Atton said. "Usually when the rest of the team is at home making sure you can go where you need to go."

He grabbed some more chips.

... Damn it, he actually kind of agreed with what he'd just said.

[electrocynic]

Sarah shook her head as she glanced over at him again. "Doesn't work like that for capes," she said. "Everyone wants to be where the action is."

That was how you got in the papers and on the news, and got sponsorship deals.

[suitably_heroic]

Atton shrugged. "I'm a Jedi," he said, and that got easier to say every time he did it. "We're allegedly all about the collective and blah blah. In the end, I think it's just that the others prefer me and Mira risking our necks while they poke their noses in ancient holocrons, but hey."

[electrocynic]

"I still don't know what the fuck a Jedi is supposed to be." Although having been on this island for three years, she hadn't exactly managed to avoid hearing the term before. "And does that have something to do with why Skywalker was screaming at your door a few weeks back?"

[suitably_heroic]

Atton let out a groan. "Sorry about that," he said, "But no, he's just a drama queen."

... And a Jedi.

[electrocynic]

"Also the main Jedi I've heard about," Sarah pointed out, helpfully. Also amused. "Should I be nice and assume the insufferable drama queening is particular to him?"

[suitably_heroic]

"Yes," Atton said, "It is."

... He had his own brand of drama queening. It was just slightly more ridiculous than Skywalker's.

"Anyway, the general gist is, we're warrior monk diplomats." Beat. "Don't ask me. I'm mostly there for the warrior part."

[electrocynic]

"Would've surprised me more if it'd been the monk part." Yeah, okay, maybe the diplomacy too. "Although that does explain the robes."

Unless that was another one of Skywalker's personal quirks.

[suitably_heroic]

Atton let out a snort. "The robes are terrible," he said, "I prefer to go no further than the tunics, but Skywalker definitely tries to sell the part."

[electrocynic]

"Well, you look better than he does." That was more fact that compliment, if you asked her. It was, as always, better the less people asked her things. "I suppose as a member of a largely spandex-clad professional field I shouldn't judge, but I'm going to."

[suitably_heroic]

"I do look better than he does," Atton agreed. "Thanks."

He'd get flustered about it, except no. "Anyway, spandex, huh? That sounds uncomfortable."

[electrocynic]

"By all accounts, it is," Sarah replied. "Which is why I have go-go boots and a dress, and no spandex."

Still amazingly impractical, but the business was image-driven.

[suitably_heroic]

"Hey, at least you can move in a dress," Atton said, with approval. "Maybe more of a risk of flashing your opponent, but hey, that can work for you, too."

He was taking another look at her cleavage because he could, okay?

[electrocynic]

Well, it was there, and it wasn't as if she objected. "Considering the quality of villains I tend to face? That'd work like a charm." They weren't very smart, was what she was saying. "I prefer to save all that for people I plan to let near my knickers without a fight, though."

[suitably_heroic]

"You know, I'm not going to respond to that," Atton mused, "Because I'm halfway afraid the knickers will come off, and that'd ruin this nice holo we're watching."