Theodoric of York: Wednesday afternoon

[iknowstuff]

Layla usually wasn't one for a beauty salon, manicures, pedicures, massages or the like but classes were now over for her and coming from her conversation with Karla the other day it seemed like the thing to do after a busy summer quarter

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[findingelena]

"It's wonderful, isn't it?" Elena sighed. "I really need to come here more often."

Her nails looked amazing.

[blondecanary]

Dinah was getting hers shaped and buffed, and she grinned over at Elena. "Hi! I'm Dinah. I don't think I've met you yet, although maybe we had a class together?"

[findingelena]

Elena tilted her head slightly at that. Dinah? Unless there were two of them, she needed to talk to this girl.

"I think we have a friend in common," she said carefully, considering each word. "Zack?"

[blondecanary]

"Yes! You know Zack?" Dinah beamed at her, pleased. "Isn't he awesome? He's my eat-sugar-and-run-around buddy."

[findingelena]

"We've met," Elena said, lightly, eying her cuticles critically. "How did you two meet? Are you from Midgar?"

[blondecanary]

"Unh-uh. We meeeeet... oh, right, Reserves meeting. One of the first ones after it got organized." Dinah had to think back that far to the beginning of summer. "And we had Terrain together, and he's stage-managing the play now, and I'm helping out a bit when I'm not saying my five lines onstage." She grinned, laying back. "Plus ice cream off and on."

[findingelena]

"I see," Elena said, nodding to herself. "Sorry, I must have misunderstood. I know he said you two talk about it a lot -- Midgar, and so on, so I assumed you must be from there, too."

Actually, she hadn't, but she needed to find out this girl's agenda, ASAP.

[blondecanary]

"Oh, no, I know Reno. He's from Midgar, he graduated last May. We talk on the phone off and on. I get him stuff for Midgar, like plants and supplies that are hard to get, now that the big whatever happened." She tilted her fingers so the stylist could put on the base coat more easily. "He asked me about Zack, what class SOLDIER he was and all, and told me a little about Zack. Not much, though. He's a few years ahead of him, I'm not sure how many."

[findingelena]

Oh, wasn't Reno going to be pissed when he found out he was the leak.

"A few," Elena agreed. "I know Reno better than I know Zack. I'm a little surprised he'd tell you anything, though. Isn't that how time-loops get screwed up?"

[blondecanary]

"Time loops?" Dinah looked over at Elena, and blinked. "Wait, what? How can it get screwed up? That disaster thing, I thought nobody could stop that. If it even happens in Zack's world, 'cause it might not..." She frowned. "Right?"

[findingelena]

Elena was trying to decide if she was playing dumb, to cover her ass, or ... well, the alternative.

Which was possibly unfair of her; she had, herself, once been the clueless rookie who spilled her guts at the wrong time. But she usually at least realized it when it happened.

Then again, this girl wasn't a Turk.

"How would anyone know?" she said, narrowing her eyes slightly. "More importantly? What possible good could it do, to tell Zack any of it? I'm trying to understand what possessed you to do this, and I admit, I'm coming up short."

[blondecanary]

Okay, Dinah was beginning to get that somehow, she'd done something to piss Elena off about this. Except she wasn't entirely sure what.

"Reno said to tell him to stay loyal to his friends at Midgar," Dinah said, still worried. "And that someday it saves the world. He wants to be a hero. I thought it could help." She paused, feeling anxious suddenly. "Wait. Did that mess things up for him? Or, no. Is it going to? I didn't want him to blame himself for the disaster thing! Reno said no one could stop it!"

[findingelena]

Elena closed her eyes and counted to ten. Okay, ten. Good. Maybe she'd try ten more.

"You told him Midgar was destroyed," she said dryly. "That couldn't have been because you thought it was going to help anything."

She shook her head. "Look. It doesn't matter. Just ... stop. Stop asking, stop prying, stop telling him whatever you find out. I'm not going to have the timeline of an entire world get fucked up because you feel like being a chatterbox. So either you stop, or I'll stop you. My approach is a little extreme, but it gets the job done."

She wasn't bluffing, either. Turks neutralized threats, and right now, this girl was one.

[blondecanary]

"We talked before I talked to Reno, and we were trying to figure out if he was from Reno's past or future, and he'd never heard of something terrible happening to Midgar, so we figured, past. And Reno said yeah, he was from a few years behind him or something." Dinah's blush was working its way up from her throat to her eyes. She'd said too much. Reno had asked her not to give details, and she thought she hadn't-- but maybe even saying that it was few years in the future was too much. Oh, God, Zack.

Right at the moment, she would've been so okay with Elena punching her out. Or whatever. Her arms went around her stomach, a sick feeling settling in deep. "Okay. I won't."

[findingelena]

"I'm not interested in the details," Elena said calmly. So this girl felt bad; that still paled in comparison to an entire planet. She couldn't even tell Tseng that Zack was here; Tseng, who hated himself more for not saving Zack than all his other sins. Tseng would be tempted to try again, or he'd hate himself for deciding not to. It was a nightmare. And now she had to watch to be sure someone else entirely didn't wiggle information out of different sources and pass it along, just to pass the time of day. "But this isn't a game. I just needed to know that you understood that."

She didn't trust her, and wasn't going to. But maybe a warning would be enough.

[blondecanary]

Dinah opened her mouth to ask a question, then stopped, closing it, looking down at her hands.

She didn't know what to ask, what not to ask, what to say, what not to say. She'd been trying to help; she hadn't believed that Zack knowing a little of the future would mess anything up. Reno had even told her a little to say. And she still didn't want to believe that, but Elena knew Reno, and knew about Zack, and ... she could be a bad guy, trying to trick her, but she didn't sound like it.

So she didn't say anything, miserable, and just nodded.