Handyman -- Traverse Town [OPEN]

[landofcanaan]

Aerith stared right up at the gaping hole in their nice, sturdy roof with a frown. A nice, pile of snow had gathered right in the middle of the hallway by now, and the flower girl was a little miffed that no one had bothered to temporarily patch it up until Dante and Zack actually got around to repairing it

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[grumpy_lion]

Leon's trip to the café turned out to be far more eventful than he liked, but he had to admit that in the end it was exactly what he needed. Dealing with Dante was a frustrating affair, but he could at least sympathize with the bastard a little, and it was a pleasant surprise to find that Sephiroth was someone he could actually talk to. The awe he first felt for the former general had toned down to respect and no little admiration, a professional sort of camaraderie that Leon now realized he'd missed out on since his days as a SeeD.

Needless to say, he was in better spirits when he returned to the hotel. He was even ready to tackle that damn hole in the roof if necessary, as it had begun to snow by the time he reached the Second District. He doubted Aerith would be pleased to find snow melting on the rug, and the poor flower girl was put upon enough with the sea of corruption that currently occupied his bedroom.

Stepping inside, Leon was not prepared to be greeted by the sight of Aerith struggling to cover what he presumed to be the hole itself with a curtain and clothespins while standing on the counter. That looked -- awkward. And dangerous. He stared for several moments before shutting the door behind him as he stepped inside, brows raised as he peered up at the flower girl.

"Do you need help?" he asked, still nonplussed by what he was witnessing.

[landofcanaan]

Aerith almost lost her footing when the door opened, startling her. Almost. She wavered a bit but ultimately, and probably miraculously, managed to keep her balance and not plummet to the ground. She probably should've expected Leon to show up at some point... It was a little curious that he didn't seem as irritated about the hole in the roof as she'd expected him to be. Maybe someone had warned him about it already, and he'd had time to prepare himself?

"I think I've almost..." Aerith's voice trailed off as she secured one of the first clothespins. Thank goodness they were large enough to fasten the curtain to one of those jagged edges. "I think I can handle it... but it would be nice if you'd stick around for a second in case my cat-like reflexes decided to fail me at any point in time." The flower girl managed to toss a grin over her shoulder at Leon as she spoke.

"I assume someone told you already?"

[grumpy_lion]

Leon appeared somewhat apologetic for having startled the flower girl and had even prepared himself to catch her if need be. When Aerith managed to regain her footing, he relaxed again, stepping close to watch her intently. He snorted softly in response, lips thinning with either disapproval or displeasure as the girl turned to grin at him. Cat-like reflexes indeed.

"Sephiroth," he explained, his gaze darting to the hole briefly. His mouth parted in a slight grimace. It was large, and the hall was freezing. "Incidentally, I ran into the culprit before I met Sephiroth at the café. Are you sure you don't want me to do that instead?" Seeing her like that was making him a little anxious.

[landofcanaan]

"Oh, good! It seems like everyone's getting to know each other already," Aerith replied happily. It was nice that they were all acquainted and whatnot, since a good portion of them would be working together soon enough.

And there. Another one secured. The brunette leaned forward a bit further, stretching to secure a clip on one of the farther edges. All while attempting to have a conversation. No one could say she didn't live on the edge.

"Zack told me about it. He said the man isn't hurt, and that he promised to help fix it. So, I guess everything'll turn out alright. It could always be worse," she continued optimistically. "And I'm fine. Only a few more to go!"

[grumpy_lion]

Leon folded his arms across his chest and sighed, though he refused to take his eyes off Aerith. This was far too precarious for his comfort, but if the flower girl insisted, he had no choice but to remain to make sure she didn't fall and break something.

He frowned when she mentioned Zack, uncomfortable aware of the issues the hadn't been settled between them. "I have the feeling he might try to skip off on us," Leon sighed. "I don't like him. Try not to end up alone with him." Apparently Leon didn't trust him, either.

"Did you speak to Zack recently, then?" he asked. "Where is he?"

[landofcanaan]

Clip. And only two more to go.

Aerith frowned at Leon's assessment of this character. Zack seemed to trust him, and, though the other man was generally a little optimistic, he wasn't known to be too trusting. Well, unless the incident with Axel could be counted... It would be a strange day that Aerith could even fancy herself being more cynical than Zack.

"I'll be careful," she assured Leon with a wink. "But I'm pretty sure I could handle myself." The girl did adopt a more serious tone as she considered her friend's next comment. He still hadn't spoken with Zack, then...

"I was just in Merlin's old place, talking with him and Cloud. They're having a little man-to-man chat now, but they'll be coming back soon." A nice, careful way of saying 'you'll get your chance to apologize soon.'

Thoughts briefly drifted to the talk she and the boys had had about her 'girl-time' with Leon, and Aerith had to indulge in a brief giggle. Not that she intended on mentioning that to Leon if he was miffed. No, it was probably best to wait until this mess with Axel and the lesser issue of the roof had been dealt.

[grumpy_lion]

Leon did not doubt for a moment that Aerith was capable of taking care of herself, but he still felt obligated to warn her. Dante didn't come across as the gentlemanly sort, after all. He raised a brow at her but said nothing as he finally leaned pressed his back against the opposite wall. He continued to keep an eye on her for any sign of her losing her balance.

He didn not miss the implication in her words, shifting uncomfortably. To be perfectly honest, he felt less inclined to apologize to Zack after what Sephiroth had told him regarding Axel. Zack had always gotten on his nerves without exercising much effort, but this was beyond ridiculous. He should have given Sephiroth the chance to annihilate Axel from the start, or at least injure him to severely so that the bastard would think twice about abducting people for his experiments. How the fuck could Zack allow someone so dangerous to roam free, let alone defend them?

He sighed, pressing his fingers against his brow, an old habit of his that easily betrayed his agitation. "Cloud? I should probably have a word with him, too. It's been a while," he remarked, folding his arms again.

"Do you have a journal?" he asked suddenly. "We should trade usernames."

[landofcanaan]

"We're all supposed to get together to share what we know about the Heartless situation some time soon," Aerith offered, fastening to second to last clip without too much trouble. "You should come too. It'll be me, Sephiroth, Cloud, and Zack." After all Leon knew quite a bit about their current situation... Maybe even more than she did.

Oh, journals! She hadn't even thought of that. She had Cloud's and Sephiroth's, but not Leon's, which was kind of weird. With the last bit of curtain to be pinned up in hand, the flower girl turned around, a touch too quickly to reply. She swiftly lost her footing and fell from her perch, grasping the curtain reflexively as she fell and subsequently tearing down all her hard work and a few, more pieces of roof along with it.

[grumpy_lion]

The severe look on Leon's face cleared slightly as Aerith mentioned the meeting. So, things were finally going to start getting serious around here? It was about damn time. He could finally do something about the cargo he had yet to collect from that junk heap of a gummi ship he'd left in Cid's shop, too.

The old lion wasn't able to give it much more thought, however. He reacted almost immediately, pushing himself off the wall and darting forward to catch Aerith before she could come to any harm. His hands found her waist and guided her towards him, but the momentum of her fall was far too great and Leon lost his footing as well.

He stumbled back and fell with a grunt, wincing when Aerith fell on top of him. He's managed to cushion her fall, at least. "Fuck." Grimacing, he glanced up at the ceiling. The hole was larger now. "You all right?" he asked Aerith after several moments.

[landofcanaan]

It all happened so quickly, that Aerith simply didn't have time to react. She'd braced herself for the hard landing and was sort of surprised when it didn't come. With the relatively soft landing, she noticed that she'd squeezed her eyes shut and decided now might be a good time to open them.

She honestly should've expected Leon to catch her and felt a little guilty that she hadn't when he'd been there so many times in the past. To be fair, though, it was kind of hard to think such things through when you were falling from a high enough distance to at twist and ankle and be sore of several days.

As awkward as their position probably was at the moment, Aerith's face was quickly clouded with concern and such realizations were not immediately entertained.

"Leon! Are you alright?" she asked worriedly, ignoring his own inquiry. "You didn't break anything, did you? Geez, I'm so sorry!"

[grumpy_lion]

Leon stared at Aerith in disbelief. Well, that answered his question. If the flower girl still had it in her head to worry about his well-being, then she had to be all right, at the very least.

He realized somewhat belatedly that his hands were still clasped around Aerith's waist and quickly let go. he felt an unexpected rush of heat spread across his cheeks, and he shifted uncomfortably. Leon suspected that he would be sporting some pretty interesting bruises in a few uncomfortable places before the night was over, but otherwise...

"I'm fine," he said a little stiffly, looking away. "Could you get off?"

[landofcanaan]

Finally realizing their position herself, Aerith hurriedly scrambled to her feet and offered her hand to Leon to help him up. Not that it would be much help, but the flustered, young woman assured herself that it was the gesture that counted.

"I'm really sorry," she apologized again, feeling just terrible that she'd ended up making a big mess of everything after she'd come so close to actually proving her status as a bonified handyman. Aerith sighed, looking a little annoyed with herself now that all the embarrassment and awkwardness had had time to pass. "Wow, I ended up making an even bigger mess, didn't I?"

[grumpy_lion]

Leon didn't say anything as he got to his feet. He rolled his shoulders back as he took a quick assessment of the acehs and found everything to be fine, just as he had assured Aerith. Once he saw that he was still intact, he focused his attention back to the hole, now made wider thanks to Aerith's skills as a handyman.

He brushed her apology aside with an impatient wave of his hand. "Just means more work for that idiot," he remarked, but he didn't sound very pleased about that particular notion at all. More work for Dante meant that Dante had to stick around longer, if the man even owned up to the damage he caused. Leon did not want to have to see that swaggering idiot anymore than he had to.

Whatever.

"It'll be better if I cover the hole from the outside instead." After a pause he nudged a piece of the ceiling Aerith had brought down with her with his toe. "We should clean up."

[landofcanaan]

Aerith sighed and shook her head. There was no one to blame for the mess but herself. Well, maybe whoever had caused the mess too. At least Leon wasn't as irritated as he could've been, considering...

"You're probably right. I should just leave the handyman stuff to you boys from now on." Aerith laughed and smiled up at him. "I'll handle things in here then and keep an eye out for you in case I need to return the heroic rescue."

[grumpy_lion]

Leon simply could not fathom how Aerith could smile or even laugh at a time like this. The old lion had just about reached the end of his rope, far beyond the point of even getting angry anymore. It was almost comical how many disasters -- all of varying degrees -- he had run into since his return to Traverse, and he had yet to get an adequate amount of sleep, a meal or even a shower.

Then again, she wasn't the one who had landed on the hardwood floor. Leon suppressed the urge to sigh.

With the way things have been, he thought as he bent down to pick up the curtain, I wouldn't be surprised if I did fall off the fucking roof.

[landofcanaan]

As Leon retrieved the curtain, Aerith picked up the broom she'd used to sweep up the powdery, white snow moments earlier. She didn't immediately begin to sweep up the debris, however, as she wanted to spot Leon and be certain that he wasn't about to fall.

"I don't think I'll be able to give a boost..." she admitted with a frown. Sometimes not being one of the stronger members of the bunch was a pain. "Do you want me to look for a ladder or something?"