Log: Kitty and Illyana

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Backdated to early June; Kitty and Illyana relax after finals, the Guthrie suitemate society kerfluffle, and the argument about history.


Ice cream was one of the best things about the modern world; never mind television, or running water - for Illyana's money, it was the food that stood out as the most impressive thing going. She paid the girl behind the counter for the soon-to-be-drippy chocolate fudge and headed back toward the table, slinging her backpack over the side of a chair. "So," she said, glancing over at Kitty. "Finals are over. What do we do now?"

Kitty set her milkshake down before pulling out a chair for herself. "I would say that significant R and R is decidedly called for. I think I may even take the whole three months of summer break and not do anything intelligent. See how long it lasts before I go nuts."

Illyana grinned at that. "Good luck with that," she said drily. "I suspect you'll be longing for the joys of academia way before summer's done. Especially if that constant nonsense on the journals keeps up," she added irritably, looking briefly sympathetic. She'd been following the recent kerfluffles - something about the Guthries, and then about history, of all things - and was not particularly impressed with the tone some of them took toward her friends.

"God, don't get me started," Kitty said, leaning back in her chair with a sigh. "Although, if I were really going to give up on academia for the summer I'd have to give up my computer, computers being one of my fields, and then I wouldn't see the journals. But, well, I'm sure we can guess how long that would last without my mother taking it away from me."

"I think we'd have to count it in milliseconds," Illyana teased, lightly. "Anyway, if you lack for something to do and people are embarrassing themselves again, you can help me with my summer project. If you want." The offer was non-pressing; mostly, she'd decided it was all right to tell someone about it, now that she'd decided to really do it.

Kitty grinned. "Milliseconds might even be a tad generous. And project? I like projects. What is this project you speak of, and how can I be of assistance?"

"Well - it's not a big deal or anything. But I've been doing some research." Illyana reached over to her backpack and pulled out a slightly dog-eared pile of file folders, each labelled in Russian. "My family," she explained, looking at Kitty only slightly apprehensively - she trusted Kitty not to make fun of her by now, but even the slightest hint of her own emotion made her edgy anyway. "My parents, grandparents, cousins, that kind of thing. I just - wanted to know, I guess. So I thought I could - you know, check things out this summer. See where they're buried, if they're buried, I mean, where they lived, that kind of thing." Her hands must have been suddenly very interesting; she was staring at them. Pulling her attention back to Kitty, she smiled. "So I thought maybe you'd be up for some relatively safe, if kind of illegal, not that anyone's going to care about illegal tourists in Siberia, country hopping."

Kitty smiled, looking serious. "I would love to help," she said, "and have proven a couple times that the kind of illegal nobody cares about I'm pretty ok with. How much family did you find? Your idiot brother
was never terrible clear about much of his past..."

"My idiot brother isn't clear about the last ten minutes, let alone his family's history," Illyana said dismissively, with more than a hint of vindictive spite evident in her voice. "I didn't find - much. No one alive, anyway." She looked only a little bit regretful; but the thought of finding family alive and showing up to them randomly did not appeal to her at all. "But there are a bunch of places I wanted to check out. Churches and things. Just - see where I come from." She shrugged, a little uncomfortably.

"True enough, and I understand. At that, the only other remaining branch of my family is in Russia, somewhere. A second or third cousin of my mothers I've never met and his kids. Don't really know where,
though, and most of that family probably haven't even got graves. And Forge wonders why we should be emotionally invested in our history."

"People who forget their history are likely to be crushed by their enemies," Illyana misquoted drily. "I don't think I've got any real family left - maybe some fourth cousins somewhere - but I'd like to see where they . . . where they lived, I guess." She looked slightly wistful - and slightly bemused by herself. "Plus," she added on a more cheerful note, "I want to make sure none of them had genetic diseases that I'm going to manifest soon and die of."

Kitty did not snort her milkshake, but it was a close thing. "You, my friend, are a very strange girl. So you know," she added with a grin.

Illyana grinned down into her ice cream. "Well," she agreed mildly, "probably. But at least I'm in good company." She raised an arch eyebrow at the brunette, leaning back into her chair with a smile that was almost wholly unguarded. "Besides, it makes me interesting."

"Here's to the company, then," Kitty agreed. "We may be weird, we may be strange, but at least we're interesting." She saluted Illyana with her spoon.

IIlyana beamed and raised her cone in reply. "Here's to interesting times," she said, not without a hint of irony. "Curse implied notwithstanding."