Make a Choice

Jude was slightly caught off guard, mostly because he'd misunderstood what they were confused about. He definitely sounded confused, but went ahead and explained anyway.

"Oh," Jude said, "I didn't want them getting the presidency and not having as much oversight. Someone in a position like secretary has a lot less opportunity to do whatever bad thing they might have been planning on doing, and it'd be less disruptive if they were arrested or something. Originally I was going to keep to a lower level myself, but I didn't think there were enough people to make sure they weren't going to end up the president."

"Well, I did," Jude admitted. "At the time, I took their response as being... dismissive, like they didn't think there was a real issue. Knowing what I do now, that was probably their way of dissuading me from sticking my nose in further, but I've never been one to take those kinds of hints."

You didn't get into the job of being a teenage superhero if you weren't willing to firmly ignore plenty of dissuading by well meanning adults.

"I don't think I did anything that went over the line, but... yeah, pushing someone towards them who knows about this stuff might be nice."

There was a pause, at which point Jude gave Chloe that look. The look that meant both of them were obviously thinking the same thing. Jude reached back, scratching at the back of his neck, and then gave Chloe a small grin.

"So, uh. Do I ask you to? Do you just... uh, do it? Or should I check in with the school and see if they have any resources they can subtley slide at Elisa?"

"I did," Jude said. "Point her to counselling services, I mean. I told her she should be talking to someone who was a professional. Someone who actually knew what they were doing with this sort of thing. I don't know if she actually followed through, though. Maybe she's... I don't know. Maybe she's already in therapy and this whole conversation is pointless."

Jude sighed, sagging head head into his right hand.

He couldn't get tired, but somehow he was tired anyway.

"I guess I'm going to... to leave it. To avoid making it worse. I don't know how they feel about me right now, and it's possible that they won't take any advice just because it's from me. I'm hoping we'll be able to talk, and..."

Jude let out another sigh, his brain running a mile a minute ahead of his mouth.

"I'll apologize for having stuck my nose in. Hopefully that'll make it easier to work together, at least. If you want to talk to her, that would be nice, but you don't have to. Even just this talk was helpful in terms of... figuring out courses of action." An outsiders perspective was rarely not a useful thing, after all.

Jude had food to eat, but he wasn't exactly hungry. The whole thing was a bit of a mood killer, and instead he sort of packed it up, glancing to Chloe.

"Thanks for talking with me," Jude said. "I think I'm going to head back to class a bit early. I totally understand if you don't want to talk to them, but either way... just, thanks for talking it out with me."

He felt a lot more balanced, and he'd say his goodbyes before heading out.