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This time of year, snow is common. What’s uncommon is the single, strange snowfall that glistened like tiny diamonds. Everything about the snow seemed normal—it’s cold, wet, and melts just like any other snow, it just also happens to look like tiny little gems are falling from the sky. Depending on who you’re with, it’s either incredibly strange, or incredibly romantic.
Jason had been surprised and delighted when the senshi he had met up with before and exchanged information with, had wanted to meet up with him again. It had been only a couple of weeks ago since they had met and exchanged their contact information, but Jason hadn’t really expected the senshi to contact him about non-powered stuff. Apparently, she just wanted to hang out! He wasn’t sure where they would go or what they would do, or even, WHAT WOULD HE WEAR?! Tom had chuckled at him and told him that he just needed to wear what was comfortable, he highly doubted they would be going to some fancy restaurant or something.
Jason felt like he should have glared at his older brother, but couldn’t, knowing that his older sibling was right. If Cynthia, as Jason learned, just wanted to hang out, he couldn’t look too much into it. It would just be for the night and perhaps she just wanted someone to talk to who could power up like she could. From the conversation they had last had, he learned that she really didn’t know much about what was going on and had only recently been ‘awakened’ into the senshi that she was. Jason had tried to do his best to encourage her and tell her she didn’t have to do it alone, which had made her smile, and had made him blush a bit too much. And so the two of them had decided to meet tonight to just go to some fast food restaurant or wander around until the found someplace, and Jason put on a pair of jeans, t-shirt, and a jacket/sweater, along with a more snow-appropriate coat, and headed out the door.
On her end Cynthia was excited to meet with the knight, she giggled a bit at the title, that she had met in civilian form. Though it was weird to call them ‘civilian’ and ‘powered’ forms. The latter was okay, but wasn’t the civilian form the ‘normal’ form compared to being powered up? It’s not as though she was now powered up all the time and then used her ‘civilian’ form to go and blend in with the people. Heck, she hadn’t even powered up since her meeting with that knight! She had been too busy with school and family things to even worry about it, which was why she had wanted to contact the knight, well, Jason to go and just hang out. She still really hadn’t met anyone else yet who had been powered before, and if she could at least get to know him while he was just his regular old self, well maybe she would feel like she was part of all of this a bit more. She wondered if she would see a whole new side of him, but unless he could change from the blushing and stuttering guy she had met while they had been powered up, she doubted he would change that much. At least he was cute that way.
She blushed and tried to focus. She did not have a crush on this guy! Yeah, he was very cute, but that didn’t mean anything! She yelled out the door to her parents that she was meeting with a friend and when she opened it, found Jason waiting outside. They had decided to walk from her house, since it was closer to a lot of small cafes and shops that should still be open at this point. She blushed when he caught her yelling like that, and before he could say anything, she grabbed his arm and tugged him forward. “Come on, it’s snowing like crazy out here! We need to find somewhere to go!” She said, while Jason just simply nodded and let her lead the way.
Jason was quiet as they walked around a bit, trudging through the snow. They had gotten to a darker part of the city, near where the park was where they had met. Though it was snowing, the clouds still were spaced apart at points and he could tell that there was a full moon, which was giving them a bit of light as they wandered around. He continued to let Cynthia tug on his arm for a bit, not really wanting her to let go. He wasn’t sure why, but he felt his stomach doing flip-flops when she was with him.
Tom hadn’t really said anything about dating, and he knew that Tom had only dated a few girls so far, and felt like he couldn’t get the right advice from his big brother, out of embarrassment more than assuming that Tom didn’t know anything. But if he had asked, he would have asked why he was so nervous, what to do about it, and perhaps how to be a little more forward when it came to girls. This was just the first time that Jason had experienced it. He felt himself looking around as he tried not to stare at her, and that was when he noticed what the snow looked like. It was… very pretty. Suddenly, he had an idea on where to go. “Cynthia, how about we go to the park that we met in? It might be fun looking at it while it’s all white and before there are too many footprints in it. We might even find some animal tracks!” He hoped he could convince her, and she did love exploring.
Cynthia hesitated for a moment. She knew that in one of these cafes there was hot chocolate or coffee, depending on what Jason wanted, waiting for them, and to take a detour for it? An agonizing decision. She looked at her phone to see what time it was, and saw that they still had a couple of hours to go before any of those places closed that she knew of. She smiled at him. “All right then, we can go to the park for a bit, then hot chocolate.” She said, tugging on his arm again and the two of them started to walk to the park together.
She smiled to herself as Jason let her lead them along. It was kind of funny, she thought that being a ‘knight’ it would be more like a knight-in-shining-armor, but Jason barely had any on as Alphubel. Still though, it was slightly romantic in her mind. She now had a knight, or at least a squire, that would be around to help, and possibly protect, her when she needed it. She had been told that there were other knights matching the more ‘knightly’ description of what she would have expected, but still, Alphubel was fine, even if his identity slightly clashed with hers, what with him being about the cold and her being about plants that didn’t necessarily thrive in the cold, but still, it was cute.
Jason let her lead them over to the park, and he could tell that they were the only ones there. He only hoped that an agent wouldn’t attack them. He tapped on Cynthia’s shoulder. “Cynthia, I noticed something about the snow on our way to one of the cafes which is why I thought this would be the best place to see it. Just look at how it glitters in the moonlight.” She let him lightly grab her shoulders and move her to where he was talking about. It took a few seconds, but Jason smiled widely when she said, “wooooow.” It seemed that she had noticed it too, and he was glad that she did.
Cynthia hadn’t expected the snow to be this beautiful! Jason was right! It did look amazing! Though it looked more like tons of sparkling tiny gems rather than snowflakes! She wasn’t sure if it was just how they were made or if it was the moon shining light on them, but they looked incredible! She knew however that it was just snow, as she had seen some of it melt on her hand just a bit after going out, before she had her gloves on. Which meant she couldn’t keep any of it. But she did have something else to memorialize it! She quickly took her camera out of her bag and began snapping pictures with her high-depth camera, something she was so thankful to have in situations such as these. “Jason this looks amazing! I can’t believe the snow turned out like this! Thank goodness, I have my camera, it’s just too bad we can’t save some of it. Though I’m sure even if we could put it in the freezer it would no longer look this awesome.” She said, continually snapping pictures at all angles and everything she could see that the moon was shining light on. She quickly turned around and snapped a picture of Jason as the moonlight was on the both of them and he did look interesting in the sparkling snow that went up to the top of his boots!
Jason blushed when she suddenly took a picture of him, but he was glad that he was able to let her see this sight, and that she was taking pictures. “Cynthia, how about I take a picture of you? Only fair, right?” He asked, smirking a bit. At least he wasn’t stuttering all the time when he was around her now, but he seemed to be acting a lot more confident than he actually felt. It took a moment for Cynthia to register what Jason had said, but she quickly gave him the camera, and they moved positions, so that the moonlight was now shining on her. Jason snapped a few photos, at least the best ones that he could, and made sure that she was the center of attention in them. She even did a few poses for fun and they laughed together.
After all the pictures were taken, the two of them stood there for a moment just appreciating the scene. Cynthia looked over at Jason, and he seemed to be lost looking at everything. She knew that he loved stargazing, and when they were communicating over texts, had said that it would be cool if they could get together sometime to perhaps go camping or something in a place where one could really see the stars without them being interrupted by all of the city lights. She had agreed, though they both knew that they would have to wait until it got warmer to do so, after all, they didn’t want to freeze overnight! And… looking out there too, she knew that her moon was out there, just waiting to be explored.
Though she didn’t have all of the information she needed to go there yet, since she knew that she was a reincarnation of someone who used to be there, which meant that that civilization might be completely gone now. She didn’t want to go to a dead planet without making sure she knew what she was getting into first. But… she looked over at Jason again. As Alphubel, he had said he had a wonder on the star Polaris. It was just an observatory, but it would be interesting to see the wonders of any knights, even if they were in freezing climates. And perhaps… she could invite Jason to go to her planet with her sometime, so she wouldn’t feel so… alone going there by herself. She looked at her watch again, and realized it had already been 45 minutes. How did the time fly so quickly?! She caught Jason’s attention and said, “We need to get going, it’s already been 45 minutes. We need to find a place to warm up and possibly get something in our stomachs.” Jason agreed.
That was when Cynthia got closer to Jason. He wasn’t sure what she was going to do, but he could feel that his face was on fire. Suddenly, she said, “Thanks Jason.” In a somewhat quiet voice, before grabbing his face lightly and giving him a small kiss on his cheek. Jason stood there stunned. He wasn’t sure how to take that sort of gesture. She was French after all, it could just be the way they thanked people sometimes, however, she was already moving away, back toward the street, and turning back to him, smirking. Jason tried not to melt into a puddle of goo. She knew exactly what she was doing. But perhaps… it meant that she liked him back? He quickly followed her back to the street, and she laced her gloved hand into his. Jason, still feeling himself blushing, smiled a bit as they walked toward the café together.
