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"Yeah, didn't the idiots tell you my name before? It's Jack ******** Charming Hawthorn," he replied, the dryness of his smile warming up some. Then again, he always was a little overfond of himself.

He strode in and met with the hostess first, assuming correctly that not only did Ian and Shiloh reserve it under his name, but a joke of one as well. Yes, he was Jack Sparrow, yes it was a table for two, no, Chance wasn't Will Turner, no it wasn't a shame that they weren't dressed up, yes he was tall as hell but would fit just fine in the booth. He swore the woman rolled her eyes as she turned and directed the pair to their seats, saying someone would be with them shortly.

"Twitter's a cesspool," Jack said as they got comfortable. "I don't bother with it most of the time unless I'm very bored. At best it makes you question who you work with and at worst it just pisses you off."

Their waiter, a tweedy fellow who introduced himself as Kyle, asked for their drinks. It took Jack a lot of restraint to just ask for water and not to kick the guy when he was informed that the rum was all gone.

Jack sat back, considering the man across from him like he would a project request, one of many fledgling groups trying to get funded. "If you're nobody interesting, Bones, then I'll see myself out," he said bluntly. "My leave hours and money are better spent elsewhere, as are yours, if that's you can offer me. I'm not a man that wastes his resources."

Chance was a strange mixture of pleasant but distant, more to him a ghost given physical shape than a new trainee. Shallow connections, vague smiles; maybe just a defense mechanism, or maybe he really was as boring and bland as he said he was. It wasn't that they couldn't make conversation--Jack could force just about anything if he put his mind to it--but he had yet to see the point of meeting another potential dead person just to chit chat for an hour--which was what he felt about almost all of these blind dates.

"Skeletons, I can take. Limpid personalities, not so much." He gestured at Chance to continue before scanning the menu, appearing almost like a royal in his throne: start talking. "The story thus far: a deadbeat dad, a mother with a drinking problem, and an emancipated teen escaping it all."

Ah, there we go. He was more used to animated personalities now thanks to his friends, so a game of questions was appealing; at least it was better than him just pushing for more information.

"Stories," Jack replied, eyes still on the menu. "Facts are perfectly fine of course, but paradoxically they don't always define us. Broken homes aren't especially uncommon at Deus, for instance, or at least having one absent parent, but each person is unique in spite of having the same circumstances. Encounters and experiences, the details, are always interesting to me. Especially," he started to fold the menu up, "given our line of work."

He clasped his hands on the counter and looked at Chance. "A game is fine. Let's start with...How did you deal with your ability to see what others couldn't as you grew up? It must have been difficult without a stable home or family."

Jack remained still and attentive as Chance spoke, though in spite of his posture his eyes were distant as he took in the words. He understood the need to learn; it practically fueled his every action, for better or for worse. Being beaten for it, though, seemed pointless. Violence always needed to have a reason behind it, he thought: control, out of fear, or for entertainment being the most common ones. But he couldn't empathize with the situation and merely filed it away.

"Tomato soup," he told the waiter with a glance, "grilled cheese, and coffee, thank you."

"You mean from the kids' menu?"

"Yeah."

"Uh, alright then."

Jack turned his attention back to Chance as they were left alone. "You can ask questions," he replied with a verbal shrug. "Did you ever see anything outside of moving shadows?"

Shadows alone, unfortunately, weren't enough to interest him, so he stopped that line of questioning.

"Renaissance," Jack answered without missing a beat. He used to date Lina: odd questions at random times had been part of the gig. "Gothic art of The Middle Ages is perfectly lovely--general human ignorance and Big Brother Catholic Church, not so much. I'd much rather be in a time of creative revival, thanks. The idea of rebirth is more appealing to me anyway," he added with a cryptic smile.

"What was it like, working in a book store?"

"A Sun who wants to be decently learned, now there's something. But you'd best rethink that spacey outlook on life, Bones," Jack said, coming off more firm than intended. "It might have been eclectically endearing in your old life, but here it's only a nuisance and obstacle to your training. Suns already shuffle around like a deck of cards; prove yourself too distracted and you're going to be another unmarked grave. Not to mention—and I'm sure you've heard this before but it bears repeating—nothing you read can honestly prepare you for the real thing. You need to be grounded if you expect to survive, understand?"

He realized then why he felt the need to drive this point forward: once again, ******** Lina memories. Not of the same situation, of course, but Chance's vague curiosity about the world was similar to hers. Or it used to be at least; he no longer knew who that girl was.

Drinks arrived with impeccable timing. Jack sniffed his cup, inhaling it like the fumes of wonderful incense.

"As for where I worked," he replied more mildly, "it doesn't really matter now. I was more student than anything else, but I was in a band too. Years of tuition and student loans I'll neither get back nor pay back on the whole."

He made a musing noise over Chance's answer and seemed, at least for now, content with it; only time would tell if the Sun was being serious.

He smelled the coffee before the waiter offered him his cup, and with a nod of thanks he brought it to his face and took a deep breath of its fumes. He barely registered that he also had received his tomato soup and grilled cheese, though he was glad Chance hadn't ordered red meat; the smell might have upset him.

"I still have my guitar, Barbara," Jack replied, turning fond as he always did when referring to his one true girlfriend. "Used to be lead guitar, sometimes vocalist. Know a little bass too, but it's not my focus. We were a cover band who pretended we could make our own singles in between gigs," he said with a snort. "Got a little cash sometimes, and it dulled the painful existence that is college life. Same way I imagine people escape into books, huh?" It didn't sound like a half-bad job, if only because most places tended to have a coffee place in the building: the smell of paper and black coffee was hard to rival.

"My turn. Any interesting stories while you worked there?" Jack asked as he blew on his drink and started to sip.

He snickered. Who'd hide in a bookstore anyway? Someone who was anxious to get away, furtive, noisy maybe not physically but in presence, in disturbing an otherwise calm atmosphere? He personally would have picked the guy out easy too if that were the case.

"What, were you by the ghetto or something?" Jack asked as he savored his coffee. "s**t, that sounds like fun. I bet it must've been a party when the fans came out too. Did you work when there were Twihards? Tell me you have stories about Twihards. Or those 50 Shades freaks." This was very important to his entertainment.

"As for pastimes, well, if I'm not accidentally or deliberately pissing someone off, I like to conduct experiments with the ghosts I've captured." Jack finally gave the soup his attention and set his mug down. "Have you been to the Haunted House yet, Bones?"