ᴋᴀᴅʏ ᴏʀʟᴏғғ-ᴅɪᴀᴢ (![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} thehedgewitch) wrote in ![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small} noexits,@ 2021-11-24 09:15:00 |
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KADY & PENNY-40
(BACKDATED) NPC INVASION | DAY 1 Kady's feeling a little more than overwhelmed by the sudden arrival of Penny-40 and decides to go find something to eat as a distraction. She ends up running into him instead.
⚠
None, really.
Sometimes the shit this place decided to throw at them was enough to make Kady want to lock herself in her room and just hide for the week. Did she? No, but did she want to? Absolutely. This week was already proving to be one of those. Just stay in the dark of her bedroom, covers pulled over her head, ignoring the fact that Penny -- her Penny -- was somewhere out on the campus.
A part of her had been hoping for something like this to happen for the last few years, the stupid, illogical part of her. He was property of the Library now. She’d resigned herself to never seeing him again… or at least not until she died, too. Like Q.
Did he get to see Penny when he went to the Underworld?
Not like she could ask. The Q that was here didn’t even know he died.
Despite her wanting to stay hidden away because holy shit this was too much, she quietly moved through the hallways of Butler Hall, moving out onto the green and toward the dining hall. What? A girl needed to eat.
Was she at all ready to run into Penny though? No. Fuck no, even. But somehow it still didn’t feel real that he was here and despite how much of a punch to the gut it was seeing him on the network, if she was given the chance to hug him even one more time, she was going to take it.
Penny was already in the dining hall, having seen the chaos of people by the dorms and deciding he wanted nothing to do with it. Coffee was the priority, quiet secondary.
His suit was nondescript, and being in the Library had given him some ability to be still, rather than the constant bubbling energy he used to display at all times. It wasn’t so much growing more comfortable in his own skin as it was shedding everything that had become unnecessary. He was still Penny, possibly more Penny than he’d ever been.
He sipped at the coffee, idling by the cream and sugar, watching for others coming and going. He wasn’t entirely certain what to do with himself. Catching up with his old friends had seemed the thing, but when he’d seen Kady, any desire to be elsewhere was gone.
Goddamnit, this shit wasn’t fair. Their lives just wouldn’t let them be together. That hurt more than losing her. He hated hurting her.
And… there she was. Penny shut his eyes for a moment, swearing internally, then opened them quickly before she could vanish, unwilling to risk her leaving without him.
The trek across the campus to the dining hall seemed to take less time than usual and honestly, Kady was pretty sure that was just because she was stuck on some endless loop of ‘what the fuck’ in her own head that she wasn’t paying much attention to her surroundings. Sort of on cruise control, in a way.
At least until she neared the coffee maker and stopped dead in her tracks once she realized who was standing there.
Her breath hitched, catching briefly in her throat as she stared. She’d spent so much more time around Penny 23 in the more recent years that actually seeing him -- and she could tell that it was him, if nothing else the hair gave it away -- momentarily knocked the wind out of her in a way.
“Fuck,” she breathed finally, her words hardly audible, though tinged with both surprise and sadness. “Penny.”
Penny met her gaze and nodded slowly. “Yeah. Seems to be the consensus.” He tipped his head, the gesture taking in the whole of the campus at once. “Is this place seriously as fucked up as it seems to be? I’ve been here, like, five minutes, and from what I can tell, this is the most messed up place in the multiverse.”
Given their shared history, that was a hell of a shithole, compared to the fucked up places and situations they’d already been in.
“And this is an easy week so far,” she replied without really missing a beat. She still couldn’t take her eyes off of him. “This place is pretty fucked up though, yeah. Eliot’s paper airplane kind of goes over most of it, but nothing really explains it like experiencing it.”
Kady paused then and glanced at the cup of coffee in Penny’s hand. “You should put that down,” she remarked and without any explanation before crossing over to him. Her arms were thrown around his neck and she hugged herself to him, the emotions of the moment hitting her like a tidal wave.
“Holy shit, I’ve missed you so much.”
The coffee was set aside immediately, and Penny’s arms closed around her with the same willful abandon, one hand sinking into the tangles of her hair, the other pressing her close as his body ached to remember all the ways she fit against him.
The decision to cut his ties to life, to commit to the Library and the Underworld, had probably saved his sanity in the long run, but the price had been high. This, this right here, Kady Orloff-Diaz, and all the passion, pain, fire, and love between them had been the price. Penny had made the decision not only for himself and his sanity, but for her. He couldn’t stand the idea of Kady lingering, waiting, forsaking all at the thread of hope that he could somehow, someday return to the land of the living, escape his billion year contract, or go on the run once again.
So he had been selfish, taking the escape to spare himself the pain. It was in no way rescuing her - she would never see it that way, and he wouldn’t discredit her by trying to justify it like that. But in the small place where he permitted himself to dream, to regret, to desire, this was what he’d needed.
“I missed you too, girl,” he breathed into her hair, taking in the scent of her. “More than you know.”
In the time that had passed since Penny’s decision to sign that contract with the Library and therefore give up any chance of returning to their world as they knew it, Kady had gone through the myriad of emotions that came from processing grief. Anger having been the one that had lasted the longest, though she never allowed herself to focus that anger on him. It was entirely the Library’s fault, right?
But Kady was going to let this moment last as long as the both of them could stand it. She felt like she’d been waiting forever for this and somewhere deep in her, she never wanted it to end. Yes -- she’d allowed herself to move on, but she still loved him. She always would. And the fact that she never got closure had been an impossible thing to grapple with.
When she felt the emotions starting to bubble over, her grip on him tightened and she buried her face against his neck, the tears quietly spilling over onto the collar of his suit jacket. She didn’t know how to deal with what she was feeling just then outside of crying -- so she did.
Penny felt the tears and his grip tightened, gently shifting to lift her off her feet and carry her away. There weren’t a lot of people milling around the dining hall, but there was more than simply them, and the source of fresh coffee would certainly draw others. Penny knew Kady hated showing her vulnerable side, and tears were the ultimate vulnerability. He found a side door, and another, ducking through hallways and rooms until they ended up in a small storage area that seemed remote and empty.
It would be a lie to say his own eyes were dry, so he didn’t bother trying. He held onto her, stroking her hair and murmuring nonsense sounds so that she would hear his voice, and know she was safe.
In that moment she didn’t care who saw her like this, weak and vulnerable and crying her heart out against his grey suit. When he lifted her, her legs instinctively moved to wrap around his waist, arms tightening around his neck so that he could carry her more easily. Not that she was thinking about that, no.
One moment they’d been in the dining hall and the next they were in the quiet of some storage space she’d never been in before, or at least that’s what it had felt like. As the rush of tears started to subside, she let out a quietly embarrassed laugh and pulled away, wiping her face. She looked up at him sadly and then leaned in, pressing her forehead to his. “Why’d you have to show up?” she asked, closing her eyes. “This is gonna fuck us both up so much.”
He shook his head against hers, the same sad chuckle escaping his lips. “I didn’t choose it any more than you did,” he said. “I thought… I thought we were done. Thought I was done.”
He pressed his forehead to hers, then opened his eyes, seeking her gaze. “Kady… whatever this is, we know it’s not gonna last. No point in pretending it will. Maybe we can... finally say goodbye the way we never got to before.”
She’d healed from the loss of him and this was just ripping that wound right back open. He’d died. He was gone. But now he was here and fuck.
Her face crumbled again a little when he mentioned that this wasn’t gonna last. She wanted it to, somehow, but she knew he was right. People came and went from this place all the time and sooner or later, the Library was going to yank him back into their hold. “I fucking hate this place,” she murmured, sniffling as a couple of more tears fell, her eyes opening to meet his. Her arms loosened from around his neck and she brought her hands up to cradle the sides of his face as she looked at him.
It hurt so much more than she wanted it to, more than she’d braced herself for. “I don’t want to say goodbye again,” she finally said, the words cracking under the strain of what she was feeling.
Penny brought up his hands to cup her jaw, brushing the tears away with his thumbs. "I know, girl," he said. "It ain't fair, and it ain't right. But you're strong, Kady. Stronger than I've ever seen you. This ain't gonna break you. Not if you don't let it."
He pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I see two options here. One, we get swept up in each other again, and life keeps dicking us around. Two, we take control of the narrative, and decide how to move on." He brushed a tendril of hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear.
"Both options suck, but at least one of them, we make the choice ourselves."
He was right. It wouldn’t break her if she didn’t let it -- she’d already been broken once by him leaving, even if it wasn’t his choice. She could get through this again if she needed to. She just didn’t want to, that was the thing.
Kady nodded her head a little against his hands and something of a quiet whimper escaped her, eyes closing again. She could at least be vulnerable with him. She’d reached that point of comfort with him ages ago and even if she’d come to terms with the fact that she was never going to see him again, at least she knew some things also never changed no matter what.
Penny was and always would be a constant for her, even if he wasn’t there.
“I know, you’re right.” She sniffled softly. “Sorry I’m such a hot mess right now.” That let a sad, weak laugh escape her. “Do you have any ideas of how we take control of this so it sucks less?”
Penny kissed her, once, lightly on the lips. "Don't," he said. "Don't apologize." He kissed her again, keeping it chaste, but letting his lips linger a moment. "I mean, you are a hot mess, but the emphasis is not the mess." His lips met hers a third time, and now came the heat he'd been holding back, his tongue taking just a little taste of her.
He held her gaze for a moment. "I love you, Kady. But this is a gift. I expect you to live a good, long life before I see you again. And I'll be waiting when you get there."
She was so overwhelmed by everything that was happening that she was sure she was just going to collapse into a useless heap somehow or that maybe her brain was going to short circuit. Who knew?
Instead she pushed up and leaned into his lips each time he brushed them against hers, and then finally let her fingers curl into the front of his suit jacket to pull him closer the third time, almost desperate for that kiss to hold steady. But it didn’t. It was brief, just like all of this was going to be. As much as she wanted to figure out a way to deal with this so that it would be easier to move on, she wasn’t sure if she could.
“I love you,” she breathed through a fresh wave of tears, though she opened her eyes to look at him again. “You’re still going to have your bullshit billion year contract to finish though, even by the time I kick the bucket, Penny.” It wasn’t like she was even going to get to be with him after she was dead, either. Not for a very, very long time, anyway.
Penny gave her a little smirk. “Yeah, well, there’s plenty of branches of the Library. Time moves differently in some of them. I can rack up a few million years while you’re living out your life. Maybe get my sentence reduced for good behavior or something.” Or steal another MetroCard and move on with Kady when the time comes. The point was, they would make it work then. “I’ve got the entire resources of the Library to find a way. So, I’ll work on that. You? Just live. Stay alive, stay happy, and give me as much time to figure it out as you can.”
His fingers traced her jawline. “But I’m not going to be able to leave this room before our clothes come off. I’m about to crawl out of my skin wanting you.”
Before her arrival in Derleth, staying happy was a struggle -- it hadn’t been until a year or so before that she’d found something to actually let her move on, to work toward that happiness, because for the longest time she’d been stuck in a rut of hoping against hope. Then grief took over, which had sucked. But slowly she’d found a way to get back on her feet, to get sober, to find a purpose.
Arriving here? Kind of threw a wrench in that, but with so many people from her own world in the same spot, it sort of felt… on purpose. Even if they were all from different times, if not different timelines.
Still. She’d been trying. What else was there to do?
But now Penny was here and somehow she knew, despite him verbally saying it, that he wasn’t going to be here long. Which made her feel desperate and vulnerable. Penny was undoubtedly the love of her life and she knew that, too. So when he made the less than subtle suggestion, she let out a quiet laugh of nervousness, but wasted no time in using one hand to throw up a set of wards against the door of the space they were in. Something easy, but something that would also keep anyone from accidentally walking in on them. “So much for not getting swept up in each other again, huh?” she asked, before eagerly closing the distance between their bodies to kiss him in a way she’d been dying to kiss him for the last few years.
Penny pulled her back into an embrace, taking a moment to taste her mouth on his before he caught his breath enough to answer. “Girl, there’s no chance of that not happening. I love you. I’m always gonna love you. And I’m gonna miss the shit out of you until I can see you again.”
He could say his goodbye later. For now, he was going to fold himself inside this time, this space, and make enough memories to carry him through the eons without her.
A part of her had been hoping for something like this to happen for the last few years, the stupid, illogical part of her. He was property of the Library now. She’d resigned herself to never seeing him again… or at least not until she died, too. Like Q.
Did he get to see Penny when he went to the Underworld?
Not like she could ask. The Q that was here didn’t even know he died.
Despite her wanting to stay hidden away because holy shit this was too much, she quietly moved through the hallways of Butler Hall, moving out onto the green and toward the dining hall. What? A girl needed to eat.
Was she at all ready to run into Penny though? No. Fuck no, even. But somehow it still didn’t feel real that he was here and despite how much of a punch to the gut it was seeing him on the network, if she was given the chance to hug him even one more time, she was going to take it.
Penny was already in the dining hall, having seen the chaos of people by the dorms and deciding he wanted nothing to do with it. Coffee was the priority, quiet secondary.
His suit was nondescript, and being in the Library had given him some ability to be still, rather than the constant bubbling energy he used to display at all times. It wasn’t so much growing more comfortable in his own skin as it was shedding everything that had become unnecessary. He was still Penny, possibly more Penny than he’d ever been.
He sipped at the coffee, idling by the cream and sugar, watching for others coming and going. He wasn’t entirely certain what to do with himself. Catching up with his old friends had seemed the thing, but when he’d seen Kady, any desire to be elsewhere was gone.
Goddamnit, this shit wasn’t fair. Their lives just wouldn’t let them be together. That hurt more than losing her. He hated hurting her.
And… there she was. Penny shut his eyes for a moment, swearing internally, then opened them quickly before she could vanish, unwilling to risk her leaving without him.
The trek across the campus to the dining hall seemed to take less time than usual and honestly, Kady was pretty sure that was just because she was stuck on some endless loop of ‘what the fuck’ in her own head that she wasn’t paying much attention to her surroundings. Sort of on cruise control, in a way.
At least until she neared the coffee maker and stopped dead in her tracks once she realized who was standing there.
Her breath hitched, catching briefly in her throat as she stared. She’d spent so much more time around Penny 23 in the more recent years that actually seeing him -- and she could tell that it was him, if nothing else the hair gave it away -- momentarily knocked the wind out of her in a way.
“Fuck,” she breathed finally, her words hardly audible, though tinged with both surprise and sadness. “Penny.”
Penny met her gaze and nodded slowly. “Yeah. Seems to be the consensus.” He tipped his head, the gesture taking in the whole of the campus at once. “Is this place seriously as fucked up as it seems to be? I’ve been here, like, five minutes, and from what I can tell, this is the most messed up place in the multiverse.”
Given their shared history, that was a hell of a shithole, compared to the fucked up places and situations they’d already been in.
“And this is an easy week so far,” she replied without really missing a beat. She still couldn’t take her eyes off of him. “This place is pretty fucked up though, yeah. Eliot’s paper airplane kind of goes over most of it, but nothing really explains it like experiencing it.”
Kady paused then and glanced at the cup of coffee in Penny’s hand. “You should put that down,” she remarked and without any explanation before crossing over to him. Her arms were thrown around his neck and she hugged herself to him, the emotions of the moment hitting her like a tidal wave.
“Holy shit, I’ve missed you so much.”
The coffee was set aside immediately, and Penny’s arms closed around her with the same willful abandon, one hand sinking into the tangles of her hair, the other pressing her close as his body ached to remember all the ways she fit against him.
The decision to cut his ties to life, to commit to the Library and the Underworld, had probably saved his sanity in the long run, but the price had been high. This, this right here, Kady Orloff-Diaz, and all the passion, pain, fire, and love between them had been the price. Penny had made the decision not only for himself and his sanity, but for her. He couldn’t stand the idea of Kady lingering, waiting, forsaking all at the thread of hope that he could somehow, someday return to the land of the living, escape his billion year contract, or go on the run once again.
So he had been selfish, taking the escape to spare himself the pain. It was in no way rescuing her - she would never see it that way, and he wouldn’t discredit her by trying to justify it like that. But in the small place where he permitted himself to dream, to regret, to desire, this was what he’d needed.
“I missed you too, girl,” he breathed into her hair, taking in the scent of her. “More than you know.”
In the time that had passed since Penny’s decision to sign that contract with the Library and therefore give up any chance of returning to their world as they knew it, Kady had gone through the myriad of emotions that came from processing grief. Anger having been the one that had lasted the longest, though she never allowed herself to focus that anger on him. It was entirely the Library’s fault, right?
But Kady was going to let this moment last as long as the both of them could stand it. She felt like she’d been waiting forever for this and somewhere deep in her, she never wanted it to end. Yes -- she’d allowed herself to move on, but she still loved him. She always would. And the fact that she never got closure had been an impossible thing to grapple with.
When she felt the emotions starting to bubble over, her grip on him tightened and she buried her face against his neck, the tears quietly spilling over onto the collar of his suit jacket. She didn’t know how to deal with what she was feeling just then outside of crying -- so she did.
Penny felt the tears and his grip tightened, gently shifting to lift her off her feet and carry her away. There weren’t a lot of people milling around the dining hall, but there was more than simply them, and the source of fresh coffee would certainly draw others. Penny knew Kady hated showing her vulnerable side, and tears were the ultimate vulnerability. He found a side door, and another, ducking through hallways and rooms until they ended up in a small storage area that seemed remote and empty.
It would be a lie to say his own eyes were dry, so he didn’t bother trying. He held onto her, stroking her hair and murmuring nonsense sounds so that she would hear his voice, and know she was safe.
In that moment she didn’t care who saw her like this, weak and vulnerable and crying her heart out against his grey suit. When he lifted her, her legs instinctively moved to wrap around his waist, arms tightening around his neck so that he could carry her more easily. Not that she was thinking about that, no.
One moment they’d been in the dining hall and the next they were in the quiet of some storage space she’d never been in before, or at least that’s what it had felt like. As the rush of tears started to subside, she let out a quietly embarrassed laugh and pulled away, wiping her face. She looked up at him sadly and then leaned in, pressing her forehead to his. “Why’d you have to show up?” she asked, closing her eyes. “This is gonna fuck us both up so much.”
He shook his head against hers, the same sad chuckle escaping his lips. “I didn’t choose it any more than you did,” he said. “I thought… I thought we were done. Thought I was done.”
He pressed his forehead to hers, then opened his eyes, seeking her gaze. “Kady… whatever this is, we know it’s not gonna last. No point in pretending it will. Maybe we can... finally say goodbye the way we never got to before.”
She’d healed from the loss of him and this was just ripping that wound right back open. He’d died. He was gone. But now he was here and fuck.
Her face crumbled again a little when he mentioned that this wasn’t gonna last. She wanted it to, somehow, but she knew he was right. People came and went from this place all the time and sooner or later, the Library was going to yank him back into their hold. “I fucking hate this place,” she murmured, sniffling as a couple of more tears fell, her eyes opening to meet his. Her arms loosened from around his neck and she brought her hands up to cradle the sides of his face as she looked at him.
It hurt so much more than she wanted it to, more than she’d braced herself for. “I don’t want to say goodbye again,” she finally said, the words cracking under the strain of what she was feeling.
Penny brought up his hands to cup her jaw, brushing the tears away with his thumbs. "I know, girl," he said. "It ain't fair, and it ain't right. But you're strong, Kady. Stronger than I've ever seen you. This ain't gonna break you. Not if you don't let it."
He pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I see two options here. One, we get swept up in each other again, and life keeps dicking us around. Two, we take control of the narrative, and decide how to move on." He brushed a tendril of hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear.
"Both options suck, but at least one of them, we make the choice ourselves."
He was right. It wouldn’t break her if she didn’t let it -- she’d already been broken once by him leaving, even if it wasn’t his choice. She could get through this again if she needed to. She just didn’t want to, that was the thing.
Kady nodded her head a little against his hands and something of a quiet whimper escaped her, eyes closing again. She could at least be vulnerable with him. She’d reached that point of comfort with him ages ago and even if she’d come to terms with the fact that she was never going to see him again, at least she knew some things also never changed no matter what.
Penny was and always would be a constant for her, even if he wasn’t there.
“I know, you’re right.” She sniffled softly. “Sorry I’m such a hot mess right now.” That let a sad, weak laugh escape her. “Do you have any ideas of how we take control of this so it sucks less?”
Penny kissed her, once, lightly on the lips. "Don't," he said. "Don't apologize." He kissed her again, keeping it chaste, but letting his lips linger a moment. "I mean, you are a hot mess, but the emphasis is not the mess." His lips met hers a third time, and now came the heat he'd been holding back, his tongue taking just a little taste of her.
He held her gaze for a moment. "I love you, Kady. But this is a gift. I expect you to live a good, long life before I see you again. And I'll be waiting when you get there."
She was so overwhelmed by everything that was happening that she was sure she was just going to collapse into a useless heap somehow or that maybe her brain was going to short circuit. Who knew?
Instead she pushed up and leaned into his lips each time he brushed them against hers, and then finally let her fingers curl into the front of his suit jacket to pull him closer the third time, almost desperate for that kiss to hold steady. But it didn’t. It was brief, just like all of this was going to be. As much as she wanted to figure out a way to deal with this so that it would be easier to move on, she wasn’t sure if she could.
“I love you,” she breathed through a fresh wave of tears, though she opened her eyes to look at him again. “You’re still going to have your bullshit billion year contract to finish though, even by the time I kick the bucket, Penny.” It wasn’t like she was even going to get to be with him after she was dead, either. Not for a very, very long time, anyway.
Penny gave her a little smirk. “Yeah, well, there’s plenty of branches of the Library. Time moves differently in some of them. I can rack up a few million years while you’re living out your life. Maybe get my sentence reduced for good behavior or something.” Or steal another MetroCard and move on with Kady when the time comes. The point was, they would make it work then. “I’ve got the entire resources of the Library to find a way. So, I’ll work on that. You? Just live. Stay alive, stay happy, and give me as much time to figure it out as you can.”
His fingers traced her jawline. “But I’m not going to be able to leave this room before our clothes come off. I’m about to crawl out of my skin wanting you.”
Before her arrival in Derleth, staying happy was a struggle -- it hadn’t been until a year or so before that she’d found something to actually let her move on, to work toward that happiness, because for the longest time she’d been stuck in a rut of hoping against hope. Then grief took over, which had sucked. But slowly she’d found a way to get back on her feet, to get sober, to find a purpose.
Arriving here? Kind of threw a wrench in that, but with so many people from her own world in the same spot, it sort of felt… on purpose. Even if they were all from different times, if not different timelines.
Still. She’d been trying. What else was there to do?
But now Penny was here and somehow she knew, despite him verbally saying it, that he wasn’t going to be here long. Which made her feel desperate and vulnerable. Penny was undoubtedly the love of her life and she knew that, too. So when he made the less than subtle suggestion, she let out a quiet laugh of nervousness, but wasted no time in using one hand to throw up a set of wards against the door of the space they were in. Something easy, but something that would also keep anyone from accidentally walking in on them. “So much for not getting swept up in each other again, huh?” she asked, before eagerly closing the distance between their bodies to kiss him in a way she’d been dying to kiss him for the last few years.
Penny pulled her back into an embrace, taking a moment to taste her mouth on his before he caught his breath enough to answer. “Girl, there’s no chance of that not happening. I love you. I’m always gonna love you. And I’m gonna miss the shit out of you until I can see you again.”
He could say his goodbye later. For now, he was going to fold himself inside this time, this space, and make enough memories to carry him through the eons without her.