She thought she had learned her lesson. Drifting was incredible, of course, it was a human vice to always go galavanting in search of ways to reach new heights and possibilities. Saving the world though? To abandon any sense of self preservation for selflessness, honor, and responsibility? At the end of the day, with the warm wet heavy iron blood on her hands, she learned it took much more than dreams to win a war. In fact, not only would the callous battlefield take what you offered - it would help itself to anything and everything like a fickle, angry ex-girlfriend.
That didn't stop her from returning though, like a starved man who had tasted the finest cuisine, she came back, stark raving mad, beating off fucker after fucker as quickly, as brutally as she pleased. The common folk mistakened her bloodlust for just that, only two souls knew better - and both were more than happy to play a rap-tap-tap at her head. Funny enough, it would be her new match that would quite literally play the fine tune with a bo in her hand.
Sortie, after sortie, skirmish after skirmish, some not-quite-respect had developed. A fine understanding perhaps, of boundaries, but Katarina knew much better, that she had taken to her match so well because both of had the balls to do as they thought best, and while too shy to submit to common courtesy, or apologize, they knew how to make it up in spades. They spoke not in words, but so much more often in barks, pinches, and repeated scoffs. And no, it didn't matter if Cassiopeia thought that her scoffs were 'out-of-tune' in comparison to Ashe's. The two women were born in fire, in anger, in loss, and walked out with a head held high - nothing could replicate this unique mutual understanding, and quiet nod to each other's roaring fire.
In another time, in another world entirely, considering how this one was slated for the death row - and no, no matter what the hell the director thought and said, Katarina knew this to be the truth - Katarina was a woman of class, money and power. Her sister had charms worked to the nines, and Katarina? Well, there wasn't anything really to salvage from the rough, harsh unladylike mannerisms, and so in her brilliance, she simply took a note from the other team - lavishing grandly, expensively, and formidably to exert the same level of charisma, to garner the same level of adoration her sister so easily raked in with pretty words.
She had thought such memories were to be buried with this dying world, and yet now more than ever, they resurface, like a cancer, some parasite that couldn't be found or terminated properly. For what, she could not discern. For nights, she spent restless, sawing at wood to rid herself of this itch - an old burning want, it smelt like anticipation, a breathless hope, and the lie of modest nonchalance.
Naturally, it would be Cassiopeia who would solve the whole mystery, and the answer to it all left her even more irritated than all those sleepless nights combined.
"Catch," she grunted out, passing by the breakfast lounge, where a handful of pilots had gathered casually. In her one hand, she held her mug, and the other flippantly threw a hastily wrapped package at the white haired woman. She did not stay to see how it was received - with a face or with a hand, that is, and made it a point to vacate the area as quickly as she could.
It would be hours later, when she felt it coming, as sudden, as strong, as waves that made it crashing onto the shore. In the privacy of her own quarters, she basked in this torrent of unfiltered … satisfaction. To call it joy was being assumptious, to call it happiness was too naive. It was simply satisfaction, admiration even - not of her consideration or thoughtfulness, but of her mind - to be able to grasp a certain perfection such that two different sets of eyes could perceive it as such.
In the old world, she needn't bother to know whether or not her money and spending truly satisfied their recipients, and so here she is, a witness at last, to the affirmation that everything is perfect. That her efforts, minimal as they are in her opinion, that her attention, however sparingly she sets aside just for her, is considered priceless, enjoyed, treasured.
She sleeps, truly believing, for the first time, that she - they, together - could be something perfect.