Logs:Exciting Clients

Exciting Clients
Dramatis Personae Jean, Marinov, Shane
In Absentia	2021-12-11 "I'll consider less offensive colors and lots of little golden stars, even if you didn't study."
Location <XAV> Great Hall - Xs First Floor
The largest room at Xavier's, the Great Hall is designed to hold all of the mansion's residents and then some. Built for the mansion's bigger functions, it serves as the school's dining halls on ordinary days, and ballroom when needed. On school days, long trestle tables stretch across the hall, high-backed chairs with plush cushions offering seating for the students. The weekend is a less regimented time here at school, the schedule far more relaxed without classes to rush to, and though there's food prepped and ready a lot of the residents are taking their time about trickling through the dining hall to eat it. Shane is, thankfully for many around here, not a resident of the school any longer; perhaps that's his excuse for the off-hours lunch quest. The diminutive blue X-Man is fresh out of the showers, skin still damp and smelling faintly of some minty body wash. Dressed in lavender button-down, grey pinstripe slacks and vest (there's a scaled-down Mutant Mongrels logo embroidered on his left breast pocket), he's just finishing up tying his tie in a precise trinity knot as he drifts -- not toward the cooked feast laid out for the picking but the fridge, to pluck out a tray of raw salmon and settle down at a bench with that, dropping his bag with a soft whumph to the floor beside him. Marinov is similarly getting a tray from the fridge, also raw salmon, shortly after Shane has grabbed his. They wear a forest green jacket open over an off-white turtleneck, along with a tartan kilt in beige, black and white. A few moments are spent evaluating the colour of the fish. "Free salmon's almost worth the trip," they remark idly as they move to join Shane at the bench. They brush their hand behind themselves to swipe their tail of the way from being sat on before settling more comfortably. Their ears twitch and they note, "Feels weird being here and not. You know... studenting." The salad on her tray sits mostly untouched as Marinov and Shane move into the hall with their food. Jean catches the two mutants out of the corner of her eye and shifts to watch them enter. Her head is throbbing with the idle thoughts of the others in the room, and she's come to the rather frustrating realization that the barriers Charles had implanted only 4 weeks ago, were already eroding. The other mutants sit at a table just nearby, and Ms. Grey attempts to flash them a friendly smile. Even if she was starting to feel anxiety creep its way up her throat and the desire to hide was only growing. And only halfway through the day. "I still feel that way sometimes!" Jean chimes in toward Marinov. "But now I get to assign homework rather than having to do it, so in a way it pays off." She gives a little shrug and tries to sound chipper. Xavier tells her not to let on that she'd melted the fixtures in her bedroom because of a particularly bad dream, and just deal with it as long as she can. But how long until one of her nightmares hurts someone else? A student? "What brings you two back?" "It's not such a bad trip if you fly." Shane's grin is quick and sharp; he knows perfectly well his flying motorcycle is two-of-a-kind and not exactly an accessible option for anyone besides him and his twin. He hasn't gotten any flatware to go with his fish but that doesn't seem to bother him; he extends one long sharp claw to spear a piece of salmon and sink serrated-sharp teeth into it hungrily. "Don't worry, you hang out here long enough I'm sure someone'll happily forget you graduated and try and give you work or detention or both --" He is mentally rifling through likely options, though he doesn't get around to saying that his money is on Scott he's thinking it clearly. His head turns when Jean speaks, jet-black eyes riveting on her. There's a slight blink of clear inner eyelids, a slightly wider peeling-back of his lips in what might be a wider grin but just looks very -- very toothy. "They haven't kicked me off the team yet, I'm still scheduled for training." This comes out chipper enough, even if it has a very minorly irritable mental prickle in his mind: of course his old teachers don't remember he's A Real X-Man Now. "I'm actually startled," he adds, earnestly, to Jean, "the Professor doesn't still give you all homework, he seems like the kind to never really let students, uh, go." "Man, I wish I had a bike like that... While it seems sorta dangerous I'm real coordinated, more durable than you'd think, and I always land on my feet," says Marinov, the last statement with a grin in their eyes, though not in their teeth. "Can't wait for my first fake detention that I can ignore. Cast off the yoke of educational authority! Bet it'll be Sc--" As they detect Jean as well, their ears swivel towards Shane and then back towards her. "While I can't make a claim to be a part of the illustrious X-Men-- though you would be lucky to have me-- I'm here to help some of the students with their fashion concerns." They sigh dramatically, "Oversized Xavier's sweatshirts are really no comparison to something that fits properly to one's body and keeps integrity under powers." Their tail flicks back and forth idly as they cut their salmon into cube shaped chunks. There's a slight twinkle in Jean's blue-green gaze as she listens to them talk, and her lips quirk slightly upward. She always loved to hear the students banter, even ones not quite students any more. Shane plucks up a piece of salmon and eats it quickly, but she catches the way his mind pinwheels around to Scott. She hadn't exactly announced their break up to the campus, but let it slide. "Hey, I have enough on my plate just grading papers!" She says, flashing the two of them a grin. "You don't expect it was easy having to put all that red ink over Taylor's work, do you?" There's a good natured jab to her words, and once again Shane's thoughts are loud. That wounded pride would deflate as soon as the teams went through another Liberty tower event...and Jean only believed it was a matter of time. "My homework is making sure you graduate with an appropriate appreciation of history!" She says in a faux smug tone, popping a cherry tomato in her mouth and chewing it. Then, turning to Marinov as they begin speaking, Jean can't help but laugh softly. "We're lucky you're helping us in any capacity. Needle and thread tends to be a little less exciting of course, but there's less bruises." And less deaths. "But those hoodies are comfortable, and they have their place!" Jean says, smiling. It was often in the early mornings that she wore them, wrapped up in the baggy hoodie, her red locks tucked away as she shuffles into the teacher's lounge for coffee. Only a few students had seen her, usually on weekends, and she had sworn them to secrecy. "The uniforms need an update anyway. Maybe something with more color?" "Only less bruises when you choose less exciting clients than Marinov has, as long as they keep dressing Ryan Black I think it's gonna be like, action tailoring." There's amusement in Shane's tone, but a genuine concern in his mind as his thoughts flash back to the many (many) death threats -- and several open assassination attempts -- against the high-profile mutant rockstar who is Marinov's most famous client. "But oh, man, she is onto something. If you did update the uniforms I'd love you for ever. Ba bedazzled his but I don't think that's really my style." He's looking down at his own pinstripes, thoughtful. "Something sleeker? Just because we're vigilantes didn't mean we have to be so gauche about it." There is a moment of gloom in Marinov's mind at the light teasing, just an undertone of self-consciousness about their own intelligence, though it does not show in their countenance. Instead, they reply, "Perhaps if you used a more encouraging colour, I would have done better! Red's a bit aggressive, maybe orange would soften it up a bit. More stickers, too, please." Marinov laughs softly, though their mind turns to a similar place as Shane's at the mention of Ryan Black. "Ryan's definitely what I'd call an exciting client. I'm really glad that I've had the chance to work with him, not just because he is a cool guy and has also brought me a lot of attention. But he is just so... dressable! I bet he could pull anything off!" They take one of the cubes of salmon and snap it in their maw. "I'd love to give those old uniforms an update. They should look iconic, distinctive, personalized! Should have fun with your vigilantism, that's what I think." They also look over Shane's outfit for a moment, as they start to imagine sleek and stylish looks for him suitable for that X-Men life. Hearing about Ryan Black left an almost bitter taste in her mouth. Not only was he the United States hot-new-thing on the music scene, but was the first openly out hot-new-thing on the music scene. Being a mutant hadn't engendered a great response from the pro-registration crowd, and for that they'd tried to blow him up. It was a horrible time to be anything other than what they considered 'normal'. "I think the idea was that the leather would be more protective." Jean shrugged, noting Shane's comments. "Practical rather than fashionable, maybe?" Jean remembered running around in them, stiff until you broke them in in the Danger Room, fitted with a kevlar lining and reinforced threads, fire retardant. Sweaty. She still wasn't sure how it was meant to protect them from powerful mutations, but perhaps it was something they could work on. Jean laughs at Taylor. "Ok, ok. I'll consider less offensive colors and lots of little golden stars, even if you didn't study." Jean purses her lips at the feline featured mutant. Jean let their thoughts and words filter though to her. They were easier, less chaotic than her own. "Talk to Hank about it. If you can dress Ryan Black you can dress the X-Men!" Maybe once Jean would have encouraged them further, and discussed design potential. But those days were over. At leas for her. ~~She hoped.~~ "Right see we could do both!" Shane's enormous eyes have lit, happily. "Be the most stylish terrorists this side of the -- well, I don't actually know, I can't really tell you what other groups are like. But I bet recruitment would go up if we had just a smidge better coordination." He holds his webbed fingers up, thumb and forefinger -- just-so-much apart in demonstration. "I don't know how much it'd help your career dressing people who kinda gotta keep it on the DL, though. Maybe you should stick to those of us who get blown up in public." He spikes a claw through another chunk of fish, tearing into it and gulping it down. Curiosity blossoms in his mind as he adds, to Jean: "-- be honest, was it the uniforms that drove you off the team? I won't judge." << Maybe just common sense, >> is his mental addition, idly thinking over the many reasons someone might not want to be on a team that throws themselves at Ridiculous Danger without even any hazard pay. "I studied, I just didn't do it while awake," says Marinov helpfully. "I heard you can just osmose the books by napping on them, it's a life hack. You can google it." They shrug, "As for the fabric being protective, you just need to be a little more creative. There's all kinds of mutants out there who I'm sure you could condition to get creative textiles." They tilt their head, idly scratching at their cheek wth an extended claw, eyes partially lidded. "Yes, the whole 'secret' part of the gig does make it hard to advertise. Probably couldn't even pay to get my logo printed on the uniforms." They shake their head, "Maybe I will try and angle to get to dress Captain America. Then I could make an iconic action outfit. Plus, the guy dresses up like an american flag. That's camp as hell. I could go crazy with it." "Only too bad you didn't get to him while he was with Ryan, that'd be the power couple to have scored. Still." Shane's enthusiasm is little dimmed by this Missed Opportunity. He's polishing off the last of his fish, licking his claws clean. "Any superheroes who do get the honor of getting dressed by you probably gonna just wow their nemeses to submission. Maybe if you'd had a chance to get fake Dawson into something more stylish than his permanent farmer getup, Latveria would have ended very differently." It is with this dubious logic that he offers cheerfully as he stands: "I can pitch Camp New Uniform to Steve the next time I see him at Pa's. You'll be tailor to this weird new hero class in no time."