Jade System - Chapter 5：Stars aren't black and white.

“No, that one is no good either,” Jade grumbled. He carried the pants back to the display and eyed the other options glumly.

“You shop just like a girl,” Eric groaned.

“Sorry,” Jade apologized.

“What are you looking for anyway?” Eric asked.

Jade eyed the quest the system had highlighted for him again and mumbled, “stylish clothes.”

“Got a date?” Eric asked with interest.

Jade shook his head quickly.

“I bet you have a cute digital girlfriend,” Eric said teasingly.

Jade pondered the statement seriously before replying, “I don’t think so. Some of my friends are female, but I don’t think any of them count as a girlfriend.”

Eric’s eyes glinted and then slid away from Jade as he tucked his arms casually behind his head. “I guess if I don’t help you out a little we’ll never get done in time for the movie,” he declared.

Jade shrugged helplessly.

Eric dropped his arms, and waved at the display of pants. “None of those plain ones are any good if you want to do something stylish. You need to pick a striking image and run with it,” he explained. He glanced at Jade and asked suddenly, “what’s the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen?”

Jade blinked, and then closed his eyes and let his mind flash through a thousand of the incredible views that he’d already experienced. Shining sunsets and shimmering sunrises, snow capped mountains, tumultuous rivers, wide oceans, colorful crowds of people, and interesting animals flashed up and were dismissed.

Eric had begun to say, “it doesn’t have to,” when Jade’s eyes snapped open.

Jade asked, “does it have to be in the real world?”

Eric gazed at him and then shook his head.

Jade answered, “then I think the most amazing thing I’ve seen so far was when a girl, who knew that dying again would force her to start a new character, insisted on taking the opportunity to ride a celestial dragon clear to the top of the sky. All I could see was the way she disintegrated into a rainbow hued cloud when she reached the top, but afterwards she told me that it felt like she was a mermaid that rose out of the sea and saw the stars for the first time before dissolving into foam.” He shook his head and said, “she gave up everything she’d built up for that one moment.”

Eric froze.

Jade said nervously, “I know most people would say something like the sunrise from a mountain top, or a mother and child, but…”

Eric covered his face and said firmly, “shut up.”

Jade stopped talking.

“Fine,” Eric declared after a long silent moment. He rubbed his face briefly and then dropped his hands. “A celestial dragon ride, we can work with that, but we’ll never find anything that really shows it.”

Eric walked over to a rack that held printed T-shirts and rummaged through them until he pulled out one that had a dark galaxy printed at the bottom that lightened through a soft rainbow of colors until it reached the shoulders where everything was hazy white and blue.

Despite having declared that the plain pants Jade had been looking at before were no good, he pulled a pair of simple dark jeans off the pile and tossed them at Jade with the shirt. Then he strode toward the girls side of the shop, and without hesitation pulled down a half jacket in white suede that was covered in silver sparkles.

Eric shoved the jacket into Jade’s arms and said roughly, “try those on together.”

—

Jade gazed at his reflection in the mirror. The outfit wasn’t anything he’d ever have chosen, but it looked good on him, and somehow it really did faintly reflect the memory of her ending and beginning.

Eric asked impatiently from where he still leaned against the wall outside the booth, “so? Are you going to stay in there all day? The movie starts in an hour and you said you need underwear and socks too.”

Jade checked his quest list almost out of habit, as he completed the purchases. He didn’t need to, as the quest completed tone had chimed softly as soon as he’d laid the last packet of socks on the counter. ‘Ask if Eric wants more food,’ glowed softly.

“Want to get more food?” Jade asked.

“Sure, if you’re hungry now,” Eric agreed easily.

—

When the VR movie started everything was in grey, and the sets were small. Jade waited awhile for the effect to disappear when time passed or something, but when the scene changed again and everything remained grey he asked quietly, “why is it all in grayscale?”

“Black and white,” Eric corrected.

“It’s not just black and white, there are all kinds of shades of grey,” Jade objected.

Eric chuckled. “No, that’s what they called it. This movie is reconstructed from a 2d movie made in the 1900s. That’s why all the sets are so small too, they didn’t have much data about what was outside of the scenes shown in the flat pictures.”

Jade asked curiously, “you like historical film making?” He was pretty sure that was the correct name for it.

Eric shrugged and replied, “no idea. I just like this story.”

Jade watched in silence, but he was busy asking the system about the history of the movie. The very pretty and slightly plump main female character turned out to be played by Monroe, and the name was actually slightly familiar to him. Apparently her fame had been long lasting, although he’d never heard the name of this movie that he could recall.

When the movie ended, Eric asked hopefully, “what did you think?”

Jade shrugged, and Eric looked a little disappointed. “It was ok. Definitely a different style,” Jade said, “and I think I liked that line from the end best.”

Eric’s face brightened a little as he asked, “nobody’s perfect?”

“Yeah,” Jade agreed.

Eric grinned at him, and agreed, “yeah, that’s the best part.”