(to fight the weekend wars)

[burnwithus]

Life gets better.

Well, not really. Maybe it's more appropriate to say that life gets normal, even if Katniss isn't the type of girl to even remotely know what normal means. Buttercup's arrival was the last snag in the fabric. After that, she did what she does best; picked everything up and trudged along at the same slow, steady pace that she had

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[two_natures]

He's stepped outside for a change of scenery; the lab isn't solely his, and at times, it can be a bit stifling. Perhaps it's because he'd gotten somewhat spoiled, having his own space at Professor Xavier's mansion, even if the time he'd spent there was comparatively short.

Hank looks up from his spot on the compound steps, the beginnings of a schematic in his lap, when she addresses him. He remembers her from the weekend when residents of the island were victims of spontaneous mutations. Needless to say, their previous encounter had been more than a bit unusual.

"Uh, yeah. Thanks. I guess," he says, "It certainly makes getting around on land a lot easier. Glad to be rid of the wings?"

[burnwithus]

This is what is called banter, she knows. Small talk, idle conversation. Katniss has done it often enough in her lifetime - mostly mundane things about the weather, or the price of certain staples. Things she learned in school (which amounted to not much of anything). That sort of thing. The events of one year ago had almost completely robbed her of her ability to talk to people, but as the days passed she was slowly beginning to get it back.

And besides, she started this conversation, for reasons she can't fathom right now. Katniss doesn't mind the quiet. Actually, she prefers it. So her random, first few words were an invitation that she doesn't know why she extended. "They were...I liked them well enough," she shrugs, and normally she would just leave it at that. But there was a process to this that she used to know. "But yes. They were hard to sleep in."

[two_natures]

"Really?" he asks. In the brief time that they'd interacted that day, Hank had gotten the impression that she was less than impressed with her spontaneously appearing wings and ability to breathe fire. Perhaps he might have preferred that over his own random mutation, but there's no doubt in his mind that he would have been nearly as annoyed by that deformity.

"How- you didn't get any stares?"

[burnwithus]

Fire terrifies Katniss. Even now, a year later, this effect is still very visible to the point where her nickname of the Girl on Fire seems utterly laughable now. So the ability to breathe it had not gone over well with her, although she doesn't mention this right now in front of Hank. Her pride won't really let her.

She shrugs. "I don't care if they stare at me," it's non-chalant but there's an edge to it. The burns on her skin already gather a lot of strange looks, all of which she responds to with a hefty glare that could probably wilt plants at close range. "Why should I?"