Logs:In Which Some Mongrels Make Plans for Strengthening Their Team Spirit

In Which Some Mongrels Make Plans for Strengthening Their Team Spirit
Dramatis Personae Shane, Taylor	2024-03-21 "What I'm hearing is that we need way more diversity in Mutant Gangland."
Location <NYC> Hellhound Bikes - The Hole
Located not far from Jamaica Bay in a predominantly Latinx sector of East New York, this garage doesn't look like much from the outside. A low-slung squat dingy brick building with a hand-painted sign over front proclaiming it to be HELLHOUND CUSTOM CYCLES, this garage has a small office area with its own pedestrian entrance from the street at the front, containing a minifridge usually full of beer and beaten down old desk with a ledger and an antique cash register that no one ever seems to use. The rest of the space is roughly L-shaped, its walls lined with racks of tools and heavy workbenches with built-in steel drawers full of hardware and spare parts. There's a raised platform in the wider leg of the space for working on one motorcycle, and there's space in the narrower leg for parking at least three more. Meeting has officially concluded, and so the garage and the street in front of it are boisterous now. People are trickling over from neighborhood houses to pick up plates of barbecue or just to chat. Taylor hasn't yet gotten dinner, still inside the garage, off in the office. He's been going over the schedule for the week. one slender arm rubbing slow at his temples as if this might stave off the headache he's nursing. The door to the office opens. Shane has a pair of beers tucked under his arm and a plate in each hand. He sets one of the plates down in front of Taylor, plunking down one of the bottles beside it. He's dropping into a spare chair then, his own plate on his lap, and he cracks his beer on a bottle opener mounted at the side of the desk. The muted stress in his mind is a familiar mix by now, an exhausted worry and anger that are obscured but not hidden by the intricate elegant violin melodies that loop white noise through his thoughts. His chin tips towards the computer screen, the garage's scheduled orders. "Don't tell me you're looking for another job." It's lighthearted, though some part of him is somewhat idly considering the impact on Evolve if Taylor leaves -- less so in training a new barista, easy enough, and moreso in the enormous gap he would leave in the social fabric of the community space. One of Taylor's arms snakes out to pull the plate closer as another drapes in companionable squeeze around Shane's shoulders. A wordless press of gratitude nudges up against the sharkpup's mind. As his arm withdraws from Shane he's also plucking up his beer, popping the cap off. "Please I'mm'a be pulling shots for you till we get bombed out existence," is an oddly bright and cheerful reply. "Only but with J.C. gone alla other greasemonkeys on extra shifts and I'm tryna make sure I plan our next ride when ain't nobody gon' be stuck at work. Bitch and a half juggling that with Freaktown patrol shifts but I'mm'a make it work." Shane's gills ripple quick in silent laughter that brightens the music playing in his mind -- the thought of Yet Another Bomb Scare far less alarming to him than the thought of losing Taylor on staff. He plucks up a mouthful of barbacoa with a pair of chopsticks, and (not for the first time) thinking a quick thanks to HaShem for blessing their communal table by returning Ion in... almost one piece. "Nobody's gonna die if the garage closes for a day or two. Hit the road good and long, weather's looking up and we all could use the air. Get out to the mountains and --" Here he falters with a momentary uncertainty about what the fuck people do with Days Off. There's an unthinking tumble of chained grief as he ponders a night out in the country under the stars -- Isra's wings around him and B as she names stars on a Xavier's roof -- Dusk teaching her to fly off that same rooftop. It's brief, quickly looping back to a warm-bright anticipation of some Quality Time with the Mongrels. "-- Trust falls," he decides, quite solemn in tone despite the much brighter amusement in his mind. "Shit yeah when I think on you muh'fuckers the first thing I always wonder is, can I trust these dogs? These freaks got my back? Be good to check." Taylor takes a swig of beer first and then starts in on the food, words shifting briefly into mental space while his mouth is full. << OK but if Ion got told we need a damn corporate retreat you know he gon take that mad serious. Plan us hella team-building activities. >> "He would be so earnest in a compliment circle. -- Wait, fuck, actually, this sounds great now. Can we make this happen for real. We get far enough away from Ten Million Surveillance Cameras maybe even everyone could join." Shane is talking with a mouthful of beef but he is, at least, covering his mouth with one hand. His other flaps toward the computer screen. "What else do people do at work -- retreats. We can always stand to bond more." "Hell you talmbout," Taylor replies with a shake of his head and fond crook of smile, "like hell we can, I bond any more with you mangy-ass fucks we gon be a damn cult." Even so, he is dutifully opening a new browser tab so that he can google work retreat team building activities. He's squinting critically at the first result: "-- share a meal? Explore a city on bike? Have an adventure? we way ahead of the game --" and moving on to a next link: "What the fuck is Human Bingo, I'm putting it on the list. Oh damn you think we could score some those bigass people-hamster-balls? The woods bout to be popping off." He is making a list, in fact, though he's also adding with a very small frown: "Admit ever since that goddamn nightmare in fall I been in dread any time there ain't no Mongrels in Freaktown." Shane's inner eyelids shutter. His shrug is nonchalant, and the livelier classical strains in his mind don't quite drown out the memory of bright (bright) flare, the unearthly sound of his pa's voice in the middle of the flaying storm. "There were Mongrels in Freaktown on Yom Kippur. We can't protect everyone all the time no matter how much we want to. Safety Squad's bigger, now. Trained better." His mental imagery is shifting to a highly approving imagining of Nick and Ion attempting to aggressively collide inside big squishy inflatable balls. He's rolling his chair nearer so he can peek at the screen, too. "The internet's got everything I'm sure we can get some -- ooh! You think paintball would get too violent?" "How you get too violent in paintball, ain't that what it's for?" Paintball is going on the list, too. Taylor eats his next few bites slow, head wobbling in an uncertain acknowledgment. "I know we can't be everywhere alla time but it feels..." He trails off, one arm flattening and plumping back up in slow squeeze where it's curled around his beer. "Like, fuck. We don't look after them freaks, who the fuck will? Ego-tripping damn Brotherhood? Your band of assimilationist cops? Most them too weak for the Master of Magnetism to give a shit 'bout and too criminal for the X-folks to care 'bout protecting. You a schizophrenic with five robbery convictions who can float a pencil if you try real damn hard who the hell signing up to do trust falls with your sorry ass?" "Mmnh," Shane is considering, and his ridged brows hike. "I'unno, do they ride? Because if not, we sure aren't." Though this flippancy is accompanied with a small flit of faces running through his head -- various Freaktonians who have turned up over the years carrying the traumas of prison or extended homelessness or both and the ways having actual community has helped people feel like part of the world again. "What I'm hearing is that we need way more diversity in Mutant Gangland." Taylor lets out a bark of laughter. He saves the half-finished list of Team Building Activity Ideas, flipping back to the calendars instead to tentatively block out a long stretch of time for CORPORATE RETREAT. "'long as they ain't all tryna run us through like the damn Swords. I'm always down to keep things more interesting."