::Prue walks into the library and breathes in that stale book smell. Mmmm. She smiles and nods to the librarian; thankfully it's somebody she doesn't recognise.::

(It's been years innyway. And like they'd even know I died.)

::She walks over to the computer base and gets herself a computer with a newspaper database beside it. Sitting down, she logs on to the internet. She could've done this at home, but she likes having a proper place to do proper research. She starts looking up pages on her area and learns about what's happened recently. She gets up and heads over to the ancient studies section of the library, selecting a few books she's read before. She has a lot of brushing up to do. Returning to the desk, she leaves the computer for a while as she leans back in her seat and goes through the well-thumbed pages, enjoying the knowledge returning to her in a smooth rush.::

::After a good few hours, Prue's had enough for now. She feels good, though, and smiles as she puts every book back where it came from. She could just leave it to the librarian, but this way she's more likely to remember exactly where the useful ones are to be found. Finishing tidying up after herself, Prue smiles at the staff on duty and gives a small wave while she leaves and heads home.::

::Nico enters the library, having paused outside to check the opening hours. It's only open until 20:00! What nonsense! Back home libraries are open until 22:00 and at universities, frequently twenty-four hour. Still, beggers and all that. The dark-haired journaliste follows the path Prue Halliwell had taken exactly one year earlier, to the very day, and sits in the same chair at the same computer. She accesses the city's newspaper database and opens her spiral-bound notebook. It takes a long time to find anything of interest, but once she gets used to research mode, she's soon scribbling down notes and dates.::

"Bien sûr..."

::Nico is staring intensely at articles pertaining to the earthquakes last year. It's incredible, what they say, and how it's been covered up.::

(Of course this is the story they took. What are they so afraid of, with all of this paranormal stuff around every corner you look?)

::Some corners more specifically than others. Nico is back in San Francisco for a reason. She's going to change the world. Just you wait and see! Since a lot of time has passed and she's dying for a coffee, the brunette gathers her things and closes down the workstation. She has a lot to think about. She leaves the library and goes to the diner.::

::Melinda orbs in with Paige, into some discreet corner of the main library. She's learned that they have to make sure nobody ever sees them do stuff like this. She looks up at her mum for approval.::

"Good girl."

::Paige puts her hand on the back of Melinda's hand and guides her through the aisles to the computers. They walk over to one, Paige wondering what kind of loser library is open at this time of day, and take a seat.::

"All right. This is a computer."

::Melinda rolls her eyes.::

"I know."

::Paige shoots a look at the girl.::

"You do?"

::The young witch responds by logging into the terminal in front of her and signing into ACWMSN. On her friends list it shows that Andrea is (Away).::

::Paige's mouth drops open.::

"What?"

"When did you learn this?"

::Melinda shrugs.::

"Dad and Aunt Andrea and Aunt Jasmine showed me."

::Paige looks bewildered.::

"When!?"

::Melinda shrugs.::

::Paige touches her fingers to her forehead. It must've just been some time that Leo was looking after Melinda. Weird.::

"Do you know how to use that?"

::She gestures at the keyboard.::

::Melinda shakes her head.::

"Only to do that."

::She points at the ACWMSN window. Her email address is shown as being melindarocks@acw.com.::

::Paige looks hapless for a moment, then laughs and shakes her head.::

"You are so smart."

::She gives Melinda a sideways hug and kisses her on the forehead.::

"You are such an amazing kid. My amazing kid."

::Melinda gets all whiny and tries to pull away.::

"Mooooom."

::She loves it.::

::Paige kisses her temple.::

"Two more."

::She kisses her forehead again.::

"Last one."

::And her cheek.::

(I love you so much I could-)

::Crush you. Paige is trying not to squeeze the life out of the poor girl, but it's a hard task. Eventually she manages to chill out and let go, returning to a sense of self-control and the task at hand.::

"Okay. This is something I've always meant to get installed at the magic school but have been too busy to do it."

::Busy? You mean lazy.::

(Shut up.)

::Paige opens up the newspaper database.::

"It's a collection of newspapers dating back to... a long time ago. They get kept and scanned into the computers so people can look at them years after they were printed."

"Uh huh."

::Melinda doesn't know what a newspaper is.::

(News on a paper?)

::She takes that as its meaning for now.::

"Now. The best thing about all this is that every article - that's, the little individual parts of writing - are logged and have their content noted. Soooo..."

::She clicks on a button and a box pops up. Into it, she types a name.::

"If we were to search for Guinevere Pound..."

::She clicks search and the screen goes white for a moment. Then a list of articles crops up.::

"It'll show us all the articles that her name appears in!"

"Okay."

::Melinda pauses for a second.::

"... why?"

::Paige is speechless for a second, then clears her throat.::

"Okay. Say you wanted to find a person but you didn't know their name or anything about them. Do you think it'd be easy or hard to find them?"

::Melinda frowns.::

"Hard."

"That's right. Now say you knew their name. Do you think that would make it easier or harder?"

::The young witch looks away for a moment. She's scared she'll get it wrong, even though the answer feels glaringly obvious.::

"Easier."

::Paige smiles.::

"That's right! But why?"

::Mel thinks for a moment, then shrugs.::

"Because then you can do this. You... know about them, so it helps you learn more, and then you can find them because they stick out from everybody else."

"Exactly."

(Genius.)

"Just by knowing Guinevere's name, we've found out-"

::She scans the screen.::

"When she died. Why she died. Who her husband was, and what he did. Essentially, Mel, we've found out enough information about her to be able to find her great, great, however many great-grandchildren, all because we started looking."

"And if we didn't know her name..."

"We'd be lost."

::Melinda nods. She gets it now.::

"So you should try to remember that it's important to act on things you promise people you'll do to help them... but you have to make it as easy as possible first by finding out all you can. Otherwise you'll get nowhere and just end up disappointing that person."

::The young girl doesn't need the explanation and has grabbed the mouse. She clicks on the obituary and looks at Paige expectantly.::

::Paige scans the article.::

"She died during childbirth. Aged seventeen."

(Wow...)

"What's that?"

::Paige looks at Melinda uneasily. How is she supposed to explain that? On second thought, what're Melinda's concepts of death? She saw what happened to Dar, and seems to realise that Guinevere is on another level of existence to them, but does she really understand what death us?::

(How can she? She's so young.)

::The whitelighter reaches out and gently strokes Melinda's hair. Died during childbirth. Paige could've done that herself, the way she'd started bleeding and losing consciousness. Even when Melly was premature and so tiny in her arms. The redhead has to bow her head to stop from crying. The love she feels for her daughter is overwhelming, but she feels cheated out of that little baby, that tiny human being she could've cradled in her arms and rocked and sang to until she fell asleep. Melinda doesn't seem to want to be that baby. She wants to walk and talk and understand the big bad world faster than the planet revolves. And who's Paige to stop her?

The whitelighter sighs and strokes her thumb over Melinda's cheek.::

::Melinda looks upset. Really upset. The look on Paige's face is disheartening.::

"Now you're sad."

::Paige raises her eyes to meet Melinda's and she gives her a grim smile.::

"Nah, I'm okay. Well, I am sad, because something sad happened to this woman and it makes me feel bad. But I'm also happy because we're gonna do what we can to make her feel better."