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Hydor glanced down at his phone to see a text from Demeter.

Honestly, he had gotten used to her reaching out by this point. Presumably, she needed help with something powered related--a powers question? a trip to space? figuring out the database?--so he obliged it, asking where she wanted to meet. Faust might be proud of him in some way, trying to herd all these damn newblets into functional sailor senshi.

He'd just.. believe that. Better than feeling like he was wasting his time when he could be dusting youma or going after people going after souls. If talking to someone helped that a bit--

"Demeter," greeted Hydor, who didn't know what a hello was.

He didn't understand how she was always so bright, but he guessed that was just her thing . Her smile by itself could probably power a ******** football stadium--

Her word vomit came at a million miles an hour and it smacked him with ten kinds of whiplash before he could even respond. She had a girlfriend? She was romancing people? Great, he was probably the worst person to ask about that considering he considered romance at best a waste of time, at worst something considerably worse, but then she laid down the fact that she was dating someone in the Dark Mirror of all ******** things.

Well.

At least it wasn't the soul stealers, just the energy stealers. She wasn't as likely to die.

Didn't remove other possibilities. "Dark Mirror?" Hydor's response was laden with disbelief. "So you're dating someone in chaos." Yes. He knew that. She knew that, hopefully. "If she legitimately cares about you, and even if she doesn't," he pinched the bridge of his nose, "in my experience, falling in love with someone in chaos just leads to them corrupting you."

And if he was going to keep collecting newbies, the least they could do was stay put--

Great, she was already wilting--

What if she got her to purify? Considering all the corruptions he had been at least adjacently a witness to, or even just heard about, he doubted it at the onset. A little bug in his mind reminded him of Eurydike--Logan--and how he had convinced his Neptunian boyfriend to abandon the Negaverse and join them on the side of Order. But that was, what, one out of so many more that had been lost?

He opened his mouth and then closed it as she said more, more which complicated matters, more which hinted of new feelings and new experiences he had no idea what he was supposed to do with. Or perhaps he did--he considered himself sex-neutral asexual and arospec, but he also understood attractions being unexpected. He wasn't quite entirely uninterested.

He was greybiromantic, at least.

Even if he thought romance was a goddamn waste of time--

"Well," he noted, wryly, "perhaps being new might get you some brownie points. But you'll have to be careful, alright? Chaos --," he sighed. How to put this, "they're good at making it seem like their way is the only answer. They're good at making it seem like you should just go join them, and having mixed up new feelings probably won't help any of that pressure. If you're going to pursue this, resist any of that s**t. Dark Mirror at least doesn't kill people, but how much better it is..."

Well. That was debatable.

It was ... Good to see that she wasn't getting too distracted by her new emotions, at least so distracted that she wanted to corrupt. He would have to keep an eye on that, because he knew that chaos would be convincing. He knew parts of it were appealing. He knew the concept of losing some of his memories, or losing that connection to himself, was appealing.

Would he ever do it? Hell to the ******** no.

... Especially not for romance, which was fickle at best--

He took the cookie she handed him and sat down, taking a few nibbles from it as she asked for his advice, of all things. Fairly knowledgeable was a compliment, so he would take it for what it was, although he was not sure if asking him romance advice was the best idea. What the ******** was he gonna say?

"Glad to hear you're thinking logically about this. Keep that in mind, keep in mind that they're still allied, and keep in mind they're still taking from humanity without the permission. I suppose being close to one of them does mean you're less likely to get Force corrupted, so long as they know..."

He ran a hand over his hair. Okay. He might be able to answer that question.

"I recommend starting with reddit, honestly. It's a good place for a lot of organic advice coming from people in a similar position. I recommend starting with actuallesbians... And the actual is important." He coughed. "Very. Do you not know how to wipe your internet history? Because I can show you how to do that."

Trackers.

Sadly, he was more than familiar with the concept of those. More than he wanted to be really. The fact that she had to worry about being tracked by her parents definitely sat uncomfortably, but there were ways around that too. It would just take more work. And this tech s**t was his wheelhouse, at least-- "Do they have a tracking app on your phone? A good place to start might be intentionally going into incognito browsers on your phone."

Easy step, but if she was able to dodge notice by using her phone, that would take a bit less work.

"I can get you the names of reddits that are probably a bit less obvious looking if they are doing a deep dive and not just by the websites..." Maybe they could start with some online groups of other things, too, or by burying it in reddit-found school s**t so uninteresting that they wouldn't be inclined to dig any further. "But no, there are definitely some ********," he snorted, "ruffians on that site, but overall they've mostly been chased off and are kept to very specific communities. Forum-linked communication has primarily faded, but I think Reddit has very well taken over that particular style of communication."

It was one of the only online styles that Hydor actually liked. All the video communication that seem to be the primary way people talked these days grated on him. Instant messaging was okay too, he did really like discord, but he did not want to jump on a voice call with a greater majority of people he talked to.

"Reddit is a lot better than it used to be, I think, or better than the impression the assholes have given. They've banned a lot of the shittiest communities." Communities he was familiar with through his classmates in high school being assholes because of the groups his parents preferred him keep--

He sighed at the memory and tried to bury it down.

"You're not stupid, just new. Everyone's ******** new at some s**t right?" Hell, he had been a new senshi at some point, whenever the ******** that was. Why wasn't this s**t over yet? "For what it's worth, I've never been in a relationship myself. Don't really find them worth my time." People were... People. People were generally pieces of s**t that he wanted nothing to do with. People took advantage of him and wanted nothing but the best for their goddamn selves.

"But I've observed people over the years. Got curious about s**t. Never heard much about it when I was younger, so."

... Huh.

He hadn't necessarily expected her to apologize for making him uncomfortable, and it took him off guard enough that his eyes widened minutely. He buried it, turning his attention elsewhere for a moment while he got his face back together, hiding it under taking another bite of his cookie. Hydor swallowed it, and by the time he looked back down at Demeter, it was hard to tell he had even been offset in the first place.

"No problem. Kinda my job, right?" There seemed to be something a bit less pointed about the way he said that than usual, but he opted not to comment on it. Was he supposed to thank her for the compliment? What was he supposed to do with that? Let it hang, breeze over it, give it at legitimate answer with things like the feelings he had trouble articulating? "Thanks."

Well, that was something.

Hydor glanced out in front of him.

"Don't really know two bits about relationships in relation to myself, or really what I should've been taught, but I can point you in the right direction and tell you what I've observed in other people. Plus, uh," Ancha was bi, right? Why was he collecting newbies? "I do know another bi woman. A newbie kinda like you too. Can give you her info."