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As anyone walks into the cafeteria, they might notice a figure resting his head against his arms with an untouched tray of hut dugs and ~~french~~ belgian frees. A trail of smoke rises up from his hand. Occasionally, the cigarette will move to his mouth or be tapped off into an ashtray.

Victor came in, got the usual, and looked for a seat. He saw Pip sitting by himself, and though Pip was smoking,he looked like he could use a friend.

"Hey, Pip. Long time no see. You mind if I sit here?"

[ooc: May be a little slow because LJ is being a pootiehead right now.]

Normally, Pippi just sits down.

Today however, she just comes up behind Victor with her tray and waits.

Pip looked up at Victor. "Sure. Take a seat, my friend."

"Are you alright?" he asked, sitting down and motioning for Pippi to join. "You look like you're having a bad day."

Pippi takes a seat and opens up her bottle of water.

Pip sighed. "Today has been mostly uneventful. Last night was a little more interesting, however. Interesting in a mostly bad way."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

Pip took another drag on his cigarette.

"Had Tactics of War last night with the new teacher. She's really cool actually. She also paid for us to have dinner at Cafe Fina. Food there is great, if you've never been."

"Strangely enough, I have," Walter said, doing a minor butler-fu appearance trick and sitting down next to Victor.

Pip nodded. "Steak's great."

He paused for a moment in silence before letting his head his arms again. "Does it bother any of you that I'm, ya know, a mercenary?"

"Don't be ridiculous! Why should it bother us?"

Victor smiled at Walter and squeezed his leg before turning back to listen to Pip's question.

"I don't think so. I mean...I really don't know much about them except that they do jobs for money."

Walter shrugged. "No. At least you know a person's motivations when they're fighting for money."

"Really? Because everywhere else I went to school? It did. Used to throw rocks at me when I was eight. Called me the "son of a killer". Broke my nose. Because of what my father did. What my grandfather did. I thought I had actually found someplace where you all wouldn't hate me for it."

He shook his head, still staring into the darkspace between his arms. "That frakking bitch."

"That's not right," Victor replied with a scowl. "No one should have to deal with that shit. Who's giving you trouble about it?"

"Pip," she said, "We don't hate you. I don't think we could hate you if we tried. It's nothing to do with you what other people do." She put her hand on his shoulder. (Except that she touched him with the back of her hand, rather then plam down.)

"What happend?"

Pip grunted. "At Tactics of War. Aeryn and I got into an arguement about mercenaries and it ended with her basically saying that the world would be better off if I, my father, my grandfather, everyone all the way up that line, and the entire mercenary company, these are the people that raised me, didn't exist."

He shook his head as he stubbed out his cigarette. "I gotta tell ya, I've heard some bad ones about my family's chosen profession, but that one made the hall of fame."

_{[[Now I disappear to class! Back in about an hour!]]}

Victor pinched his lip as he thought about what Pip had just said. "So lemmie get this right..did the new teacher insult your entire family, or just mercenaries?"

[ooc: Right-o!]

"Aeryn isn't a teacher." Pippi said leaning over to Victor. "She's a student. And I think it's both."

"Sounds like both if you consider that the mercenary company is family."

Walter was going to have to agree that she sounded like a frakking bitch.

"Oops. Well, that makes it better, I guess, but still...what a bitch! I wonder if she and Whorey are roommates."

"No idea," Pip said, stubbing out his cigarette and finally going for a hut dug. "I know that she just came back from going off somewhere like outer space or something."

He took a bite of the hut dug. "I know that we're not the most honorable people in the world... but what the fuck gives her the fucking right to say that."

"She's just being ignorant, Pip. She probably just had a bad run-in with a mercenary and now she assumes that all mercs are like that one. If she just got to know you, maybe she'd realize just how stupid she was to say that."

"She'd definitely realize she was wrong." nodded Pippi. "They're just words Pip. They don't make a difference when it comes to who you really are, whether she bothers to learn that or not."

She took a sip of her water.

"Grandfather Fabe used to always say the best revenge is living well. Just ignore her, it's not worth beating yourself up over."

"Yeah! I mean, just because she says it doesn't mean it's true! You know how many people from my world think that all mutants are born in Hell?"

He picked up a free and pointed it at Pip for effect. "If she can't see just how cool you are, Pip, then she's not worth worrying about."

"She'd be sneering out of the other side of her mouth if she ever really needed the sort of help you can get from mercenaries."

Walter nodded in agreement with Victor. "She's not worth this."

Pip smiled and laughed a little. "Thanks," he said. He picked up a free. "Fun fact. These things? Not actually from France."

"They're from Belgum!" Pippi offered.

"Which reminds me Pip. I don't think any of us were able to catch you yesterday and tell you about the camping trip you're going on tomorrow night."

How Belgian Pommes Frites remind Pippi of camping is anybody's guess.

"What camping trip I'm going on tomorrow night?"

"We're camping out." said Pippi. "Over-night. Tomorrow. You know. Big ol' tent. Ghost stories. Roasting marshmallows. Beans on toast for brakefast. Just for fun. Not because we're hiding out from fish-monsters."

"Because fish monsters suck, but camping does not." Walter nodded and munched on a Belgian free.