trans_9 | Only in as much hot water as a lobster feast... [closed]

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Only in as much hot water as a lobster feast... [closed]

It's kinda hard to navigate the City level without flight, Kon finds out, and it really sucks, but there's not much he can do about it. He's dangerously low on power, and not soaking up enough from the ambient light so his powers have to be used very, very sparingly.

But eventually Kon finds Cassie, sitting on the steps of the Parthenon, looking cranky, and immediately is hit with a complicated barrages of teen emotions, mainly conflicting contriteness, annoyance that she's annoyed, and also thinking she's hot when she's annoyed. (Stupid hormones).

There are tons of logical, calm, things he could say to keep this from being an argument, that might come close to convincing her that he's not being a total idiot, but Kon is Kon and he's a teenage boy, and as such, he is not really calm or logical. (Also, he really doesn't like it when Cassie is mad at him).

So he throws up his hands dramatically, and says, perhaps a little too loudly and emphatically:

"WHY ARE YOU MAD AT ME?!"

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She looks up and her chin slips off her hand. Cassie's just not in a good mood, and he comes at her with an outburst like that? Seriously? It ticks her off just a bit more, and she sits up straighter, an obvious frown appearing on her face.

"Mad? Who said anything about being mad? I'm not mad."

That passive aggressive tone slips very, very quickly into more obvious aggression.

"Yes you are! You do the thing where you pretend you're not, but you are and you're doing it right now, and don't even pretend you're not!"

She stands up.

"I said I'm not mad. I'm just frustrated, okay, there's a big difference."

More flailing.

"Then why are you frustrated?!"

"Because... because!" She folds her arms, defensively. "Because we're trapped in some... big floating, living prison that sends us on twisted little missions and keeps control over us, and pulls us from different places and points in time, and you're going on some dumb manly camping trip with the BOYS."

She doesn't like that it bothers her.

"There's gonna be tons of coed stuff, 'cause that's, like, the norm! Why is it so bad to want a manly camping trip? We just want a place to be dumb without the girls calling us dumb! Like, just once! I mean, me and Rob always did that stuff that included you, but also just did stuff that was just me and Rob, didn't we?" he points out. "And you do stuff that's just you and Cissie or whatever, don't you?"

"I know," she says, pointedly, "I GET that. That's NOT the POINT."

"Then what's the point? 'Cause so far I don't think you have one."

Edited 2009-06-24 08:04 (UTC)

She scowls and looks away for a second. She's always been honest with Kon. He's the first person she goes to with a problem. She can tell him anything. So why not this?

"My point is you're... you're just so FLIPPANT about these things, like none of it is serious, or for real, and I just..."

She takes a breath before she starts getting incoherent.

"One minute you're talking so casually about all the things you want to do before you DIE and then the next it's just camping trips and hanging out with the boys, and Kon, you have no idea how it is to listen to that."

The anger fades, and while his expression is still guarded, the annoyance is visibly gone.

Kon turns to look away from her and that gesture turns into a shrug.

"What am I supposed to do? Mope about it? Go 'woe is me'?"

Edited 2009-06-24 08:26 (UTC)

This isn't a conversation she wants to have, because it's dangerous and accusatory and she refuses to put her own feelings on his death before his, but it still hurts. She takes a breath.

"No, that's not what I want at all! I'm happy you're okay. I want you to be happy, Kon, I really, really don't want to argue that! But I saw you die! I held you as I watched you die and I'm still not over it, and... and seeing you act like you're just READY to die after you get all these things done really hurts because I love you and I'm not ready for a world without Superboy, and I never will be! And..."

Cassie fumbles for words for a second, words that aren't incendiary or angry or something. She turns away because her eyes are watering, and she has to grit her teeth for a moment to keep herself under control.

"God, I must be the most insensitive person on the planet, I'm sorry."

Edited 2009-06-24 14:44 (UTC)

"You're not insensitive."

Pushing his hand through his hair, he wonders how the hell to handle this.

He hates situations like this, because he is so not good at them, generally. Give him a man-shark and he is on that like white on rice because all it consists of is punching and being his brand of awesome, but time travel-provided "I'm gonna be evil in the future" angst, existential "I'm a Luthor" clone angst, and now "I'm gonna die" angst, all that stuff, well...

"Look, Cass. The freaking and the moping, and all--I did that the entire time I found out I was half-Luthor. In secret. Only Rob knew. I moped, I sulked, I sat awake in the dark reading stuff about genetics and trying to figure out when exactly I was going to flip out, start wearing green and purple, and terrorizing the public or something."

He shakes his head.

"I don't wanna do that anymore, Cassie. It's miserable."

Looking back at her and tilting his head, he says, "I'm not just...gonna walk into it, and go 'whoops, I'm doomed to die, that's that.' I'm gonna fight. If there's something about it we can change so I can make it that doesn't screw up anything, if there's a way everyone can get saved, but I can, too..."

There's a deep breath and he's honest. Completely honest.

"But if not--if not, I don't even know how to deal with that thought. So yeah, I'm going camping. 'Camping and guy time' is on my little list. Just like 'hanging with my friends,' and 'spending time with my girlfriend who I love more than anything' is. My 'just in case' list, because--because I don't know what's going to happen, but if the clock is tickin' and my number's gonna get punched, I'd really rather spend the time we're all twiddling our thumbs waiting to get off this giant meatball having fun with people than thinking about it. I know being an idiot and being all social and stuff is a really dumb alternative to thinking about it, but I really, really don't wanna think about it."

Because he is and has always been Captain Avoidance, for all his chastising Robin for being the same. Of course, Robin just suppresses and hurts in silence--Kon, on the other hand, likes to pretend he's okay. He's good at self-denial.

Sometimes, though, you have to be brave enough to look things in the face, and be honest with yourself and the people you love.

"But I can see why you'd be thinking about it, because if it was you I'd seen die, I wouldn't be able to stop, even if you were right there in front of me and okay. That's why you're not insensitive." Honesty: "I just--I have no idea how to deal other than how I've been doing."

She doesn’t do anything other than watch him and listen, arms still folded, though now more out of discomfort than defensiveness. And she lets it go, because he really does have a point, and hearing that from him sounds a lot better than what she’s just seeing. She knows he struggles with things, Cassie’s known that Kon’s best coping method is flat out denial, but not wanting to grow up and being flippant about death are two very different things.

And the anger goes. Reassurance was what she wanted, and that was what she got.

“It’s not that I want you to think about it. And it’s not dumb to be social or anything, and I want you to have fun and do things and whatever, girls allowed or not, and everything,” Cassie says, wiping away a stray tear. “I just... freaked out that maybe I’m the only one thinking about it. You just bounced back so fast.”

"Cass, my life...you know, for all the great, great things in it--like you--hasn't exactly always been a bed of roses. You know that. I've just kinda rolled from one thing to the next--and I liked where I was before all this. The Titans, Ma and Pa...and you. But I'm always ready in case something goes wrong, ready for a curveball. When life throws you out the back of the train, you hit the ground running."

He shrugs.

"S'all I'm trying to do."

That's where he takes her by the shoulders, and his voice is soft, in that way that cuts through the machismo and the jokes and the 'tude, that's really...him. Soft, gentle, with his heart on his sleeve like he always pretends it isn't.

All for her.

A hand drifts up to wipe the tears from her cheeks and to tuck a stray lock of blond hair behind her ear.

"It doesn't mean I won't fight for the chance to not leave you."

Edited 2009-06-25 05:11 (UTC)

She nods, relieved, and hugs him, because she just needs that right now, even if she's all sniffles.

"Good. Because we're going to save you," she says. She knows it. When she said she wasn't ready for a world without Superboy, she wasn't kidding, and Cassie knows she'll fight to keep him, regardless of what it costs. "I know we can find a way."

Kon doesn't say anything to that, because he doesn't...know what's going to happen, and all he can promise is that he'll try. He can't promise more than that, not with the world on the line. Not even to her.

"No more tears, okay?" he says gently, leaning back to look at her again, and as a stray tear rolls down her face, he kisses where it falls on her cheek.

For a moment, he leans back to look at her again, and then the next thing he knows, he's kissing her all over, peppering her cheeks with little soft kisses.

Cassie doesn't like the lack of confirmation, but he's kissing her and affection never hurts. She tilts her face up to him, one hand drifting to touch his cheek.

"Okay."

She can't really guarantee that, but she says it anyway and seals it with a kiss.

Kon's kisses drift down to the line of her chin and then even further down to her neck, growing more and more intent. His arms wrap more tightly around her, and he presses his body in close.

"Mm," she mumbles, one hand on his chest, pinned between them, and the other around his neck. It feels good to be this close.

Cassie worms out her hand to grab him by the wrist and try to pull him in one direction, where they'll be more out of sight, without having to break off the kissing in the process.

He's smiling. "Mmph. Where--mmph--we going?" he asks, voice low and husky and kinda muffled by her mouth.

He should probably just, like, try to stop talking, honestly.

Edited 2009-06-25 07:43 (UTC)

"Just out of the way," she replies. There's a cheeky hint to it.

"How out of the way?"

"Far––" a pause to kiss him "–– enough."

"You are so good to me." A waggle of his eyebrows. "And I'm gonna be real good to you."

A pause.

"Uh, let's just try to find a building that's not a church though..."

"Looking forward to it," she says. "And yeah, respecting the gods at the same time is probably smart. Come on."

She takes him by the hand.

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