Not Everything Is Ones And Zeroes

"Well that's reassuring~", snickered the blonde, not really doubting the girl had it in her to kill her friends, but at the same time, trusting she wasn't the kind of person to do that for no real reason whatsoever, "Still, that sounds like a pretty damn good deal to me, so... Guess we're in business~"

But in the end, nothing quite sunk in as easily as her fellow stoner's following words on her pet's sexual orientation, her blazed eyes shooting wide as she gawked at the cute cat sleeping in his corner, hand raising up to her head:

"That... Actually makes perfect sense. Shit how could I have never thought of that...? No wonder he's such a prissy little princess.", mumbled the blonde, she too stoned out of her mind by the looks of it.

In the end thought, nothing quite grabbed her attention as the way she talked about her new girlfriend. Hell, she couldn't imagine the kind of person who not only accepted everything Kasey did the but still stuck around. Well, Kanna did but... They were friends, not intimately connected that way. And to think that person was not only a pro hero but an employee at her very school:

"Oooof, you're hooking up with somebody on faculty? Shit, do I know who? Do I wanna know?", for once, even Kanna showed a smidge of hesitation. What if it was one of her teachers? Would it make it weird to look at her at school knowing she'd been out getting stoned with her girlfriend? Far be it from normal Kanna to even spare a hint of second to think about such conundrums, but then again, she was also very stoned, "I mean when you put it like that... I kinda hope she's one of my teachers... If she's okay with all the shit you do, she probably won't care too much about a couple bad kids~"

She actually felt curious now... Really, who could it be? She could think of a couple teachers who might be okay with that, but odds were, she'd probably never guess who the person in question really was. Whoever it was, this level of acceptance must be something they kept under a tight lid:

"Yeah, i feel ya...", she nodded, looking into the girl's eyes, every last one of her words making perfect sense, and for once, she didn't even need to be high for that, "It's like... You got somebody waiting for ya back home? Ain't nothing like it really..."

Kanna sighed... Though she normally shunned any and all long term options for romance, as she leaned back lazily into the couch, sinking her weight on it, heavy and sluggish as she took the bond back into her hands, she knew this was perhaps the one regret she had in her arromantic lifestyle:

"Who knows... Maybe that's exactly whatcha needed yknow~?"

Kasey's struggle with remembering the name kept the blonde from actually taking it in. The name in question, and the tall teacher whom it belonged to. Instead, she merely laughted, slapping her hand down atop her knee catching her breath, then coughing before finally being able to speak once more:

"Hahaha... Holy shit Kas... She's the one and you can't even remember her name~?", teased the blonde, raising an eyebrow, shooting her that shit eating grin, not missing the rare chance to mess with her before well and truly imagining the statuesque stunner the girl had fallen for. And, well, she couldn't really feel surprised at Kasey for having it that bad, "Still though... Ooof... Not gonna lie, she's pretty hot huh?"

Who would have thought huh? That the cool beauty who taught linguistics, one of the newer teachers in UA, would have it in her to stick around someone with a lifestyle as wild as the girl sitting next to her, taking hits from the bong. Really she didn't know her teacher had it in her to begin with. She'd have thought about how she probably didn't want the teacher hearing about what the two were doing now, but considering all Kasey must have told her, Alisa Vollan would probably not care about Kasey smoking pot with her students:

"Holy shit can you imagine that...? Your secret being out while pretty much everybody in UA has been hanging out at your place? Hot damn that would be a PR disaster for the school... And they thought Semper fi was bad~", Kanna all but snickered, scoffed even, understandably holding no pleasant memories for that particular military event that had her trapped inside a steel coffin as it sunk down towards the bottom of the ocean. Even thinking back on it now was enough for her to feel that anger growing between her teeth, or, it would had she not been stoned out of her fucking mind, "If ya ask me, you don't really need literally all your friends for that. Only a handful or so, really. Shit can you imagine how crowded your house would get with everybody in it?"

Hell, even Kanna couldn't help but groan as she pictured the scene before her, clearly not something she was wholly comfortable with, and understandably so. A bit of a shut in for the most part, she avoided leaving the house unless absolutely necessary, and just as well, didn't like having more people than strictly necessary either:

"I mean, who knows... I got no clue what the fuck he gets up to while I'm gone, but I can tell ya he ain't keen on leaving the house~", shrugged the blonde, looking towards her cat, and despite her dismissive words she couldn't help but stare harder, brow furrowing as she leaned in, her elbows coming to rest on her knees, "...But since we established he's probably gay, I wouldn't be surprised if he did... Maybe he still in the closet?"

"Yeeeeeah I feel ya there... This is some pretty good fuckin weed ya got there...", added the blonde, for once taking a moment to assess her own condition and how impossibly hard it felt to will even the a single muscle into motion. In the end though, the girl's choice of words brought a smile even to the aloof blonde's face. She hated chick flicks and rom com's but... She'd couldn't lie that the sight of a friend of hers in love still warmed her heart, handing the girl the bong back as she spoke, "Not gonna like Kas... That's the most romantic shit I heard all year~... Sounds like you're head over heels in love there~"

Yup, nothing quite drove that point home as seeing Kasey smile at the sound of her name alone, enough that even Kanna couldn't help but snicker at the sight. She couldn't imagine what on earth was Ms Vollan thinking, after all, she was still a Pro Hero and Kasey was balls deep in villanous endeavours, even if she herself was a far more agreeable person than her self professed villainy might suggest. Maybe her teacher saw her in much of the same way as Kanna herself did, enough to comfortably look past it?

"I mean honestly? Semper Fi was a disaster to begin with...", sighed the hacker, rubbing her hand behind her neck as she all but groaned at the thought. She hated people trying to flex on her, and the fact that she had the entirety of the armed forces trying to do so only infuriated further, "I mean, sure, of course I known that but god damnit how many friends do you even have? I'd imagine you'd have a load of them really..."

After all, if Kasey had managed to befriend someone like Kanna at that time, back when she tried keeping just about everyobody at arms length... Then surely she'd have had an easier time with everybody else? She all but rose an eyebrow at the thought, ultimately nodding:

"Yeeeeah, eating people usually tends to do that. People get kinda uppity about that sorta shit for some reason~", she quipped, winking at the girl with a hint of sarcasm, only to shrug as she added, "But hey, might as well off as many of those fucktards as you can until that happens. But don't worry... I'll keep ya safe as long as I can~... Do you, uuuh... Wanna have a look at my setup...?"

Since the two would be working together, Kanna didn't really mind giving her a little peek at what she did behind close doors, nodding to the glowing red tower of her computer before pointing her thumb there.

"Yeah, I getcha~...", Kanna could tease her all she wanted, but honestly, if the roles were reversed she herself probably wouldn't fare much better, "After everything ya told her, I'm sure she gets it too~"

Still, Kanna could hardly imagine just what manner of pro would be so accepting of everything Kasey had done. Sure, she would... She'd believe that pros had bigger fish to fry than somebody who only seemed to focus on killing other villains. To prioritize her over the many villains she killed seemed like an exercise of idiocy the likes of which a pragmatist like herself could scarcely comprehend. Who knows, maybe there were actually some honest to god pros who did?

"Sure, but if you hadn't kept those kids alive, shit woulda been way worse if you ask me. Perhaps you might not have gotten so royally screwed but.", Kanna shrugged, ruffling her hair, all but groaning at the thought, "I'm sure a lot of shit would have been way worse now for everybody involved."

When Kasey nodded, the blonde stood up, walking over to her big comfy chair and pulling up to her computer. She rarely showed anybody but now just happened to be one of those times as she unlocked her screen, finally letting Kasey have a look at what had been running in the background as they got blazed out of their minds. Much of it boiled down to lines of code and terminal outputs unintelligible to all but the savviest of techies, but at least one of the screens shows a clean, user friendly interface:

"Well damn... One way or another seems like you already got a bunch of pro's on your corner, whether they know it or not. If you go down, a lot of people will go down with ya.", something reassuring no doubt, and it helped that her motivations seemed a lot more benign than most heroes, meaning many of those who support her would continue doing so and keep her covered, "Yeeeeah... Most people ain't too keen on eating people yknow? Folks generally shy away from eating shit and apparently villains ain't no exception to that."

In the end though, she finally pulled up the myriad windows that actually showed what she wanted Kasey to see: The face of the hacker she and Maya had taken down, a summary of his Cayman island accounts, and last but not least, the slow and steady progress with which Kanna had been laundering it all. Courtesy of her many investments in both crypto currencies and stock market in turn, she could easily report earnings over the course of a hundreds, if not thousands of transactions:

"This is the fucker. He's in jail now, probably a vegetable considering how it went down. His digital presence is still very much alive though, at least, until I finish draining his funds.", explained the blonde, knowing that even if her means were quite slow, her money laundering operation was effectively iron clad, especially with all the protection she had. In the end though, she couldn't help but shoot her a knowing little grin, "...How well does it measure up to your villain operation~...? Not gonna lie, wouldn't mind seeing it with my own eyes."

"Kids don't turn into problems unless anybody makes them so.", frowned the blonde, no doubt speaking from experience, "Would you have grown into the chick you are now without anybody fucking with your childhood?"

She didn't really mind the whole eating thugs, but kids was clearly a whole other matter. She proabably couldn't talk Kasey out of it, and didn't really deem it worth to stop her over it, even assuming she could. Even if somebody brought her down, who would take her place? Somebody arguably worse, no doubt about it:

"Well, I suppose all ya gotta do is not go down then, don'tcha?", chortled the blazed blonde, winking at her deadpan friend, knowing all too well that she for one would be fucked if people found out she knew about the girl going around butching criminals and really didn't do anything to stop her. Reaching out and grabbing a couple unopened Blu Ox cans nearby, she tossed Kasey one and cracked open the other, taking a good long swing as she focused on the four screens in front of her.

Sure, she'd be fucked if Kasey got found out but Kanna never had that kind of self preservation when it came to her motives though. In the end her desire to help Kasey resulted from much of the same pragmatism her teacher no doubt posessed as well. Whoever took her place if that happen would undoubtedly be worse. So long as they let the girl do her think, she'd kill all the crooks Pro heroes were not openly allowed to kill:

"Yknow what they say, it's easier to make money when you have money~", snickered the blonde, ruffling her head a little awkwardly at the sound of shell corporations, anything seemingly legitimate that could turn a big enough profit without drawing attention, "I mean I can easily find out all the shit he's been spending on. I don't currently have enough clean funds to set up a company that could justify profit of this scale. Gotta admit though, that's pretty fuckin brilliant."

Kanna really didn't have that kind of resources, and wouldn't have em for a long time, but Kasey most certainly did... And in all fairness, as a professional villain and the CEO of a multinational conglomerate, she probably knew a heck of a lot more about money laundering. She, on the other hand, knew a lot more about servers and what do with em, grinning proudly as the woman praised her work:

"That's where all the money's going, if you're wondering... Once I process enough I can get my own servers and the speed will increase exponentially. In the end I'm just crunching numbers here... I guess ya can call it the brute force method? Ain't pretty or efficient, but works if you know how to pull it off.", she'd explain, but in the end, nothing quite compared to the way her lips widened into a grin as Kasey mentioned 'the right tools'. She may not really have them at hand, but she obviously had a plan, something to do with them in the off chance she got her hands on them, "If you give me some company to invest in, I can dump all the clean dosh I have into it. Then you process what remains through that company and pass it off as honest earnings. My shares go up in value, so I can sell 'em back to you for whatever price... Well, that's what I'd do with the right tools~"

It always seemed as thought if one were to remove the negative influences from a child's life, they could at least come out half decent. Humans were neither innately good nor evil, but unless hardened from a young age, all but the most psychotics showed some measure of concern for their fellows, out of principle if nothing else. Governments were different but they too obeyed a calling higher than themselves... That of the people who put them there. Those who lost that support wouldn't last long. As a hacktivist, Kanna knew all too well how the best way to bring down a government was simply eroding their base of support and letting it crumble under its own weight:

"Yeah the government funds a lot of shit, some of it more half assed than others... But the govenrment changes with the public opinion really, that's what you gotta worry about.", spoke the blonde, narrowing her eyes at the notion. As they thankfully yet lived in a democracy, few policies would survive without the backing of a significant majority. Without that backing, they'd likely have a new government when the next elections came around, "Focus on the villains first. I mean the way you focus on the actual villains is how you managed to get so many people in your corner."

She couldn't imagine who on earth would Kasey be referring to, sure, she could think of a bunch of people, really, but even Red Horn wasn't nearly as big a problem as Ishtar, Thundershock, and all the would be top villains. But granted, Kanna was a selfish woman in the end. She had very few people she cared about, who she'd care enough to protect, and at that point she cared very little at whose expense that came. That said, that list currently included Kasey herself:

"When you put it like that, maybe I can still find some use for this dude's identity.", she noted, pointing her thumb at the bank extracts whose owner she was currently so preoccupied with bleeding dry, "...I can make you a list, sure, and come up with some way to keep the shadier shit under this dude's name."

That said, if she was about to play the investment game, on a real tech company, Kanna wasn't overly concerned with some of it tracing back to her. That said, light cannot exist without shadow. Just as she needed technology and resources for legitimate needs, some of her less than legitimate work would just as easily benefit from less conspicuous:

"Oh, now that's an idea I could get behind~", like a child just offered the keys to a candy shop, Kanna couldn't help but grin. So she already had a tech company lying around huh? Honestly, considering Ketsujo's outrageous size, she didn't really feel surprised at the idea of them having swallowed a smaller tech company and just kinda neglected it until the right opportunity came along. Kanna didn't really mind being that opportunity, after all, there was much for her to gain from this trade, perhaps even more than Kasey would, relatively speaking. Which shouldn't be too surprising, after all, the woman already had pretty much everything she wanted, "Sounds like a good way to launder all this cash, and who knows what I can come up with if I got that kinda resources huh?"