Somewhere in Washington DC, a woman is sitting patiently in a café. Well, maybe not patiently. And really, the café is far too fancy to be considered a café. It's one of those high end ones that hipsters like. Most items on the menu seem more like bastardized versions of perfectly reasonable foods, and the woman can't hide her distaste for that. She can hide her repulsion to the people around her just fine, keeping it buried under layer after layer of journalistic fake optimism.
It might not surprise you to know that this woman, Shanna Cochrane, news reporter and scathing editorialist, is not here willingly. She's here to meet with someone, a politician. And an old friend. They'd dated in high school, split up just in time for said friend to fall in with a bunch of media-obsessed lunatics.
Well, Shanna's got more respect for… fans… now, but she swears Katherine's college sci fi club was in a league of it's own, oddness wise. To be fair, she'd never met them. Maybe they were normal people, like Xan and Lia and the others, but.. she hadn't liked them back then and even if she was slowly mellowing out in terms of opinions on those nerds, she'd dedicated so much of her life to making sure no one else fell into them the way her mother had (albeit in very inflammatory and controversial ways), that it felt wrong to take too many steps back, and so soon.
After all, wasn't everything that happened with Hurricane caused by nerds getting in over their heads? Eight people, all dead because some of them had wanted to live in video games. It sounded ridiculous even to her own ears.
She stirred her coffee, it was black- they charged for cream and sugar here, because of course they did- why expect logic from people who thought bean sprouts were foodstuffs worthy of being put on anything, and waited, keeping an eye on it. She watched the water spiral, forming a hurricane of its own.
Some small part of her, barely present, wondered if maybe there was a little coffee Carol in there, and if she was struggling through court and well on her way to jail.
Most of her pushed the thought aside. Carol was probably getting what she deserved. Shanna had known since the first time they met that she would do anything for HR, for Hurricane. She'd said he was a god.
How fitting, she mused to herself, she killed her own god. A part of her, this one less likely to be tamped down, wondered if maybe, had she been the kind of person to go into game design instead of journalism (as if there was any version of herself who wanted to spend time around people who cared that much about their… sky orcs and fish people. She had to admit, even if her recent life had had a lot to do with Kingdoms Of Arkerra, she didn't really know what it was about), if she could've found herself in the same place as Carol.
Fuck, she absolutely could've. She'd killed someone. She'd. She'd done so much shit. Even if most of it could just be excused as investigative journalism, she'd still… walked up to Ferris’s house, basically breaking and entering, she'd gone in costume to see Joel, (god. In costume. She sounded like some kind of… cosplayer. Which she had been. Unfortunately. Even if it was all for… journalism, it was definitely a low point.) She'd thrown herself so far into her work, it was easy to imagine that slightly different her doing the same, even if that work ended up mostly being worshiping her “magical” boss and hiring hitmen and whatnot.
She'd inherited her mother's habit of falling down rabbit holes and then building her entire world around them. Be it journalism, fiction, they were all that mattered to them. Fuck. She was just like her. Like Carol, like her mother, she was going to. She was going to snap one of these days. Maybe she'd kill someone good, maybe she'd start acting like her mother, believing that everything she saw in fantasy was real. She was just like them, wasn't she-
Her phone went off in her pocket. She took it out. It was a flip phone, hopelessly out of style, but Shanna took some pride in that. A message from Katherine. “Bad traffic, be there in five.”
Shanna closed it. Since she'd moved to Washington, traffic had become a fact of life. It took longer to drive a handful of blocks than to drive all the way across Billsberg (though that might've had more to do with the size of Billsberg and less to do with the traffic in Washington.) It was fine. She was going to see Katherine again, she could push aside her traumas and fears.
—
When Katherine finally walked through the door, fifteen minutes had passed, and Shanna's coffee was cold and half drank. Katherine looked almost the same as she had when they'd last met. Hair cut the same length, the same glasses… she looked older - there were more lines around her eyes and was wearing an extremely business casual outfit. So was Shanna, but that was normal for her. She didn't own a pair of sweatpants, a single t-shirt, even her pyjamas reeked of formality. The Katherine she had known had been no stranger to them.
Maybe, assumed Shanna, it's just that this place is so damn fancy.
“Hi!” Exclaimed Shanna, maybe a little uncharacteristically chipper. It was nice to see someone normal. Someone she knew. Someone whose presence in her life wasn't tied to the horrible situation that got her her current place in the journalism world, be they friends who'd been stabbed in the hand by hired guns, or her editors, looking for her next big break (one had been enough. She was happy covering whatever they needed to provided it didn't involve goop (?) dingy basements, or dead bodies hooked up to electrodes, suspended in tubes.)
Katherine walked over to her table. “Do you want anything to drink?” Shanna looked down at her half empty cup of cold black coffee.
“I'm good.” she looked back at Kath. “This place is too expensive, I swear to god, no cup of coffee should cost eight dollars.”
“Well, I like it here.” Responded Katherine. “I guess I can afford it.”
“It's fine.”
An awkward silence fell across their table. The people seated around them rambled on, some loud song Shanna had never heard was playing on the speakers.
“I saw your article.”
Shanna didn't look up.
“It was really- really interesting- to see how such a well known company could fall into the hands of such an… unstable leader.”
“It's not like I would've done any better.” Responded Shanna, forcing a smile onto her face.
Katherine looked back, a more genuine, verging on patronizing smile on her face. “Shanna, that man was a disturbed egomaniac.”
“My mother was ‘disturbed’ too, Kath.”
“Your mother confused bridges for diving boards- she never convinced herself she was a god. What H.R. Daedalus did was horrible, but-
Kath's voice faltered.
“But?” Asked Shanna.
“It was a great piece of reporting.”
“It was a ‘great piece of reporting’, sure, a wonderful example of the written word! Of course, it would've been better if anything more than a few arrests and sci-fi plots had come of it!”
She slumped back in her chair and splayed out her hands dramatically, letting out something verging on a guffaw.
“Well, if you can't take a compliment that mundane, you're probably not cut out for being an egomaniac ceo.”
Shanna smirked. “Good point- I guess I’m just sooo self-conscious! I’m never going anywhere!” She didn’t mean a word of it.
“Shan- can I just talk to you… seriously?”
Shanna bit back a retort and leaned a forwards in her chair until she seemed maybe semi-personable (provided you ignored the rest of her body language). “Of course.” she responded, half-sighing. She’d had a loose grip on her patience as of late. She wanted to have a pleasant casual chat with an old friend but of course she wouldn’t be getting that.
“I’m thinking of running for office.”
There was no good way to respond to that. Next to gamers, politicians were Shanna’s least favourite sort of person. Katherine was a lawyer- she’d already made lying to people a job, but at least she hadn’t had any real power. Katherine was to positions of power what a moth is to a glowing bug zapper.
“What office?” She asked, accidentally letting a little journalistic interrogation seep its way into her voice. “Something local?”
“Senate.” responded Kath, a sickly-sweet smile plastered on her face.
Shanna resisted the urge to smash her stupid expensive coffee on the ground. She succeeded.
“That’s great, Kath!” Shanna did not see this as great and her face showed her thoughts well. “How’s that going for you?”
“Well, nothing’s set in stone yet. I just figured I’d let you know ahead of time, because
Because? Shanna asked herself. She was under the impression she was low on friends- was telling Shanna this important to her because she’d lost contact with her nerd friends?
You’re a pretty well-known journalist nowadays.”
Oh.
“This might be the last time we hang out in person. I don’t know how public my campaign will be, but you’re probably not someone I should be seen with.”
Shanna stood up from the table. “Kath. I’m a video game journalist. Nothing will happen.”
“For now.” Said Katherine. “You’re going places. I’ve seen the press response to your article.-
-I’ve seen bigger fits thrown over things ten times pettier than that. Nothing will change.”
“You exposed one of the biggest scandals of the century!”
“We’re barely a decade into this century. Bigger things will happen. Plus, I was just the one who exposed it.”
“Exposing all that was what made you known!”
“Christ, Kath, it was just journalism!”
“It was investigative journalism- it was, it was incredible investigative journalism! And your persistence…”
A silence fell between them.
“Either way- it’s probably best we don’t-
Shanna picked up her trenchcoat. She pulled on a sleeve.
“What are you?- started Katherine. Shanna kept walking. “You said you didn’t want us to talk, so I’m leaving.”
“I don’t mean now- it’s just- this is going to be one of the last times we can be in the same place without it being seen as political- and- and-
Shanna closed the door behind her and slumped against the cafe’s window. What the hell was she thinking? This was stupid. And petty. Wasn’t she supposed to be beyond this now?
There was always a little moisture in the atmosphere this time of year. She watched as a small, light drizzle of rain fell onto the gray sidewalk. The timing was almost comedic. She sat there for a moment, stewing in her social incompetence- She didn’t know why she’d walked out like that. Part of her worried that her reputation as a “cutthroat investigative journalist” had impacted her, she’d got more desperate and impulsive during the research on Hurricane- it hadn’t left her. None of the feelings she’d built up then had left her, she carried them around like a ball and chain.
She didn’t want them to impact her pre-existing friendships. She wanted people around her who hadn’t dealt with the Hurricane stuff, but at the same time, she wasn’t sure she knew how to navigate that sort of friendship. She and Kath hadn’t been close in decades.
Classic Shanna, always running away from whatever she loves.
Katherine opened the door next to Shanna. She poked her head out, smiling nervously, as a beam of the Cafe’s bright LED light spilling out. Shanna turned to face her. She half-wanted to apologize, but she didn’t know how.
“Shanna- I’m so sorry.” Katherine had gained a certain timidity just then. Shanna stood up. “It’s fine.”
“Look- I’m so sorry- I just thought maybe- maybe we could- do something, before…”
Shanna looked at her inquisitively but said nothing. It looked more suspicious. Shanna’s time as a ‘detective’ had definitely impacted her general air.
“Elections aren’t for a few months. I was- I was thinking maybe I- er- some friends of mine were thinking of having a board game night. I was wondering if maybe you’d want to come? I know you’re not really interested in… In that sort of…. Thing, but it seemed like… a good enough excuse to- Goddamnit, look! I’ve just wanted to meet up with you again and everything’s moving so fast, I just. I thought we should do something.”
Shanna kept looking at her- it didn’t seem like she was considering it, but she was.
“I understand if you don’t want to- just- I thought it would be… something.. That we could…
Shanna cut her off. “I’ll come. It seems fun!” She smiled.
Katherine was taken aback. “Really?”
“I don’t see why not!”
“I just- I didn’t remember you caring for any of that kind of thing. It’s surprising, I guess.” Kath let out a laugh, and walked closer to Shanna. “Is the third good?” She pulled out a much more recent cell phone, and opened it to a calendar app. A bit of rain dusted the screen.
“I don’t know for sure. I’ll let you know when I go home.” Shanna paused. “My car is this way.” She pointed vaguely to her left. “Your taste in cafes is awful. Let’s go someplace reasonable next time.”
“Next time?” asks Katherine, confused.
“Of course! You said there was plenty of time till you had to start campaigning, Why shouldn’t we make the best of that?”
Katherine caught up to Shanna. “I’m parked this way too.”
The two walked along, into the light drizzle, making quiet conversation.
And all was well.