melodiesoflife | Jade, explain...

Who: Jade Curtiss and Sheena Fujibayashi
What: Sheena needs some advice
Where: The Library
When: March 9/10
Summary: Sheena's going to Jade for dating advice... How bad could this be?
Warnings: Snark probably. :)

The "day" was almost here, and Sheena was absolutely clueless about what to do. One would think working in the Library would have helped, since there had to be at least one book on the subject, but nope. Not a single, solitary word.

Seriously. Just how hard was it to find advice on dating?

She hadn't wanted to ask anyone for fear of looking foolish for not knowing, but she was running out of time; she was going to have to ask someone about it. She just didn't know who. There were a couple, but they had a few problems of their own to contend with. And her asking might be seen as salt in the wound.

She was still pondering the question when the answer literally walked in the Library.

Jade seemed like a smart man, surely he could answer her questions? Waiting until she felt the time was right--or until she had book to be put away in that section--she approached the man. Clearing her throat softly to announce her presence, she opened her mouth to ask her question, but another one came out first instead.

"Are you finding everything all right?"

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Oh, good timing. Jade had been scanning the shelves and just come to the conclusion that he was going to need directions from the staff when Sheena made her presence known.

"Ah, Sheena. You work here?" Jade smiled as he usually did -- a smile that could be either benign or forbidding depending on his mood. Thankfully, today it was the former. "I was actually looking for more texts on the Heroes of Light, but I'm afraid I've read most of the ones here."

He nodded towards the shelves he had been looking at. During his first few months in Crystallis, Jade had become quite familiar with this particular area of the library, having prioritized information gathering before anything else. There could very well be someplace he had missed, however -- it was a large library, after all.

That was a first. Her timing wasn't always that good. Just ask her friends back home about a certain service tunnel switch. Smiling, she nodded to him.

"Yep! Started shortly after I got here, so about...seven or eight months." Luckily for him, she took the smile as being benign and reacted accordingly. Otherwise, he'd have a terse-speaking ninja on his hands. "More texts? Hmmm. Let's see. Excuse me."

Standing beside him, she slowly scanned the shelves, heaving an exasperated sigh when she was done. Her next statement proving that she was smarter than she gave herself credit for. Either that, or a very good memory. "There are a few books missing. They're probably in another section. For some reason, people tend not to put them back when they're done."

Like the Moogles. She caught Corrine doing that a few times when he came to work with her. And this was on top of her and Vincent trying to clean the mess the Library the was in at the time. Her brows narrowing, she looked up at him. It's possible that he might not have read all of the books as a result.

"Unfortunately, there's no pattern where they're left off, so I don't know where to look right now. Although, I can put them aside for you when I do find them." She paused a moment.

"Have you tried the history section? Some of the book there mention the Heroes."

"Please do. I don't have as much time to look for things as I'd like these days." He was no stranger to spending days just reading books, but right now, he'd rather spend the time more efficiently. They'd already lost a lot of working hours in the aftermath of the mess with the other Heroes.

Well, admittedly Jade had recovered from it faster than might have been appropriate. Keeping his mind occupied with work was preferable to dealing with the bitter taste left by his brief reunion with Guy, Luke and Natalia. Even knowing it was too good to last long, the way they had been lost... Well, it wasn't something he wanted to dwell on. If he got discouraged by every shock Crystallis threw at them, he'd never get anything done.

Or so he told himself, anyway.

"I have... Though, I suppose reviewing some of them wouldn't hurt. I'm less concerned about finding new information than I am about having parallel texts to compare for my research at the lab."

Because really, what were the odds of finding anything in the library that hadn't already been found by someone else?

"No problem; I'm happy to do it." Despite her outward appearance, Sheena hadn't quite recovered from her reunion with Zelos. He wasn't the one she knew, and what he told her bothered her more than she let anyone know because his was a future that shouldn't have been.

A belief she still held about that vision, and why she immersed herself in work and training and other things in order to try to ensure that future never is.

"Ah, so you're interested in corroborating ideas and stories--is that it?" Which might be better than new information. Sometimes. "To prove theories that you might have?" She said it fondly as she recalled Raine being the same way about information. And speaking of Raine (and the fact he mentioned the lab)...

"Jade... You're pretty smart, aren't you?"

"Precisely. It's never a good idea to limit yourself to one point of view." That went for research as well as just about everything else. Settling for the easy answer always carried the risk of growing complacent and letting your growth stagnate.

Sheena's last question served as a good excuse to push last month's incident out of his mind. Jade gave a modest little grin.

"Well, I don't like to brag," a bald-faced lie, "but I'd say my intelligence is well above the average."

"I know people who have done that; things didn't turn out well for some of them." One in particular, who couldn't see any path but the one he had chosen and designed for himself.

Sad, really.

"Maybe you could try looking in the Fiction section if you haven't? Sometimes fables and tales have information the more 'factual' accounts don't." Again, speaking from experience.

His answer to her question got one eyebrow raised in amusement.

"For someone who doesn't like to brag, that sure was easy for you to do," she said with a chuckle, calling him out a little. "But...okay." It's clear she's working up to another question. "What do you know about dating?"

Jade tilted his head at her comment. It sounded like there was a story behind it, though he didn't make a habit of prying without a reason. Since she moved on anyway, he merely made a mental note of it. Perhaps he'd ask later.

"True enough. As much as I'd like to stick to proven facts, we don't really have that luxury." There was so little left of the previous cycles, cold hard facts were hard to come by. And she was right. Fables could often carry a smidgen of truth.

The question that followed was very much unexpected. Any seriousness that might have been sneaking into his voice immediately vanished.

"Ohh? Don't tell me... Are you asking me for romantic advice, Sheena?"

This could only go well.

Seeing his head tilt, she offered a partial explanation. "He couldn't believe that people could accept him in a world he didn't create, so...he chose not to remain in that world." Not detailed, no, but it says enough?

"No, you don't. And sometimes what's fact a lot of people think is fiction, so it slips through." And more than just a smidgen--when looked at correctly.

Don't laugh at her, Jade. This was serious. To Sheena, at least.

Her cheeks turning red, she nodded. "Yeah. I really haven't been on too many dates before." Read: one. "And I'm not sure what and what not to do."

Jade, explain...

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