JGOB- Tuesday late afternoon

[solo_sword]

When Jaina got the message from John telling her to stay in Fandom, she'd been a tiny bit disappointed and more worried. She told herself that he probably just had a long mission, and tomorrow she'd get the message telling her he was back in time for her to visit. She assumed that's what the "c u soon" meant in his text, and really, he hadn't started spelling words out yet?

Anyway, it meant she was in Fandom when she finally got some intel on her own first postwar mission. She'd been able to talk to her version of Luke when she was on Ossus over Christmas and tell him what she wanted to do, put things together, and get feelers out there to start tracking the guy down. And sure, the information was sent to her datapad while she was waiting on her order at JGOB, which now meant she was ignoring her food in favor of looking things over. And sure, there wasn't much information because the true downside to her time back home normalizing (for the most part) was that she didn't get the info nearly as fast as she was used to anymore.

So if anyone needed her, she'd be poring over her datapad and letting her coffee get cold. Poor coffee.

[Open like an open thing. Sometimes she just needs to get out.]

Comments

[survivesplague.livejournal.com]

It was cold and Kyle was thirsty. Therefore, coffee.

And when Kyle got said coffee, he noticed Jaina over at her table. "Reading anything interesting?" he asked, walking over to her table.

[solo_sword]

"Mission intel," she said, looking up as she finished reading this last sentence. "Which I can tell you because there's not much of it. Hi."

[survivesplague.livejournal.com]

"Mind if I sit down?" Kyle asked. Asking was just a formality, though. He sat down. "Is that not much intel in a good sense or a bad sense? And I promise that's as specific as my questions are going to get."

[solo_sword]

"In an annoying sense," she said, gesturing to the other chair to let him sit. "I put out some feelers on something, but the problem with time slowing down back home is that it just doesn't move fast enough."

[survivesplague.livejournal.com]

"It sounds like there's some kind of time craziness I don't know about yet," Kyle said. "Do I want to know, or should I just smile and nod?"

[solo_sword]

"Smile and nod," she said, but explained, "It used to move at twice the rate of the time here, but now it slowed down to Fandom time, except apparently when I'm there. See, smile and nod."

[survivesplague.livejournal.com]

Kyle smiled, nodded, and took a sip of his coffee. "I should probably check what day it is out there next time I talk to Jan just to make sure I don't have to worry about that kind of thing."

[solo_sword]

"You're probably fine. I think the weirdness sticks to me, for the most part," she said, and frowned. "I don't know why I never pictured you drinking coffee."

Because God didn't need caffeine, duh.

[survivesplague.livejournal.com]

"Well, it was either get something to drink here or something to drink at the bar, and I didn't feel like risking a bar fight tonight," Kyle said.

[solo_sword]

"Most everyone's gone this week. You might have had a shot at a peaceful evening," Jaina pointed out.

[survivesplague.livejournal.com]

"Fifty-fifty shot at best," Kyle said. "I attract bar fights like you attract weird time things."

[solo_sword]

"That would explain how you got so good," she said dryly.

[survivesplague.livejournal.com]

"Well, it definitely hasn't hurt," Kyle said. "You didn't hear it from me, but you'll never get better survival training than having a snitch turn on you in a bar on Nar Shaddaa. Or, really, doing anything on Nar Shaddaa."

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

And there was John, attempting to steal her coffee and give it a better home than she seemed to be offering.

Maybe he should've been more clear in his text.

[solo_sword]

Jaina was definitely involved in her reading, because while she could tell someone was there, who it was didn't really register until she saw someone reach for her coffee and looked up to yell at them.

And then her datapad was dropped onto the table as she jumped up to try and hug him. "Put that down what are you doing here?"

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

As glad as he was to see her, there was no suppressing the flicker of embarrassment at why he was in town. "You didn't seem to be drinking it," John replied, releasing the mug to hug her instead.

[solo_sword]

"I was prioritizing," she said, taking it from him. And while she caught that little flicker, she didn't know what that was about and... he was here. One thing at a time. "Now I'm prioritizing more."

Awww, he came before work.

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

"Your coffee will thank you," he said, letting her go and moving to take a seat at her table, glancing around at the shop. Weird, how nothing seemed to ever change there.

[solo_sword]

Sitting, she took a sip of her coffee while she remembered to do so- that'd probably be the last time in this conversation- and said, "I thought you were probably on a mission or something."

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

She just jumped right on in, leaving him to puff air in his lips and nod a little. "Well, there was that. Yeah." He needed to just spit out the reason he was there, but it wasn't as easy as you might think to admit you screwed up and earned a transfer to the ice.

[solo_sword]

She hadn't realized that would turn things serious already. Uh oh. The last of her smile vanished and she asked, "What happened?"

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

The middle of JGOB was not really the place to be talking about what had actually gone down, so John simplified it somewhat. "I messed up. Got myself a nice, cushy transfer to McMurdo." She probably didn't have to be empathic to see past the fake smile he presented with this news.

[solo_sword]

Even if she didn't have details, she knew what it was like to screw up on a mission, and he didn't look happy about the action it resulted in. She reached for his hand, wishing she knew so much more about everything military out here. "What does that mean?"

[missed-the-gate.livejournal.com]

It probably wasn't fair to take her hand while saying this, but there he was. "It means I'm going to Antarctica."

[solo_sword]

"You like Antarctica." She wasn't sure what that meant for everything else, but at least she found a bright side right away?