ArchivedLogs:Too Good

Too Good
Dramatis Personae Iolaus, Melinda, Shane, Toma
In Absentia	2013-12-31 '
Location <NYC> Montagues - SoHo
Montagues harkens back to the day when SoHo was filled to the brim with artists, with its mismatched furniture, all plush and decorated heavily with carved wood, but remains trendy enough to keep its newer patrons by making sure that furniture is clean, in good repair and inviting. The antique tables all have been reinforced to seem less creaky. The real draw of the cafe is the smell: fresh roasted coffee mingles with perfectly steeped teas. Spices from crisp pastries mingle with the tang of clotted cream but don't overwhelm too much the scent of chalk on the menu boards. Despite calendars all over New York City about to expire, this Tuesday has not been very different from weeks before in the behaviour of those all over the Big Apple. Most of the city still has work, though some slip away a bit early for party preparations, and tourists crowd through the paths of Times Square like so many rats skittering around a cheese riddled floor. The weather, at least, is doing its part to keep them somewhat at bay - a chill hangs in the air, causing heavy jackets to come out all over the city, and people to retreat away from the parks and the few outdoor events open still in almost-January. Just after the lunch rush has started to die away, the door to Montagues opens and shuts, letting two figures into the room. Both dressed like so many others, Iolaus in a navy suit and silvery-blue tie, Jane in a white dress shirt and a pair of slacks. An ID badge hangs off of Jane's waist, thumping against her thigh as she walks, scolding Iolaus lightly. "It's not the time to be making rash announcements. You're just going to make yourself even more of a target for them to come down all over you /and/ the clinic. It's bullshit, and you know it. Everyone knows it. Just let it work itself out." Melinda is behind the counter, doing her best to help the short staffed cafe by covering multiple stations at a moment's notice. She looks a little worn around the edges, her posture indicating that her back is killing her and movements are a touch slower than her normal ones, but she's managing and showing off decent energy while doing so. Periodically, her eyes glance toward the kitchen with concern, as if trying to peek around the wall that separates or use a here-to unknown gifting of x-ray vision, but she fails to see what she wants to see and has to keep moving. As the influx of customers starts to dwindle, she pauses, leaning against the counter near the opening, drinking down a huge glass of water, the ice clinking against the sides. Despite everyone else bundling up, she's wearing a short sleeved white top, bulkier than her usual blouses, and a pair of black slacks that looks as if they might be a size too small. Blue eyes look up when she hears Jane's voice, a small smile tugging at one side of her mouth. She waits until they are a little closer before lifting her glass in lieu of a wave. "Hey, Jane, Iolaus. It's really probably wisest if Shane enters from the /back/ today, all things considered, and he generally does, too. But he's a little out of breath when he jogs his way abruptly into the shop, a little early yet for his shift, the door opening in a hard push that draws some notice from the customers already there and his somewhat darker-flushed countenance implying he's been running here. /He/ draws notice, too, all blue skin and sharpteeth, solid-black eyes huge and wide and his gills fluttering rapidly as though this will help him catch his breath. It takes a moment (and a wary glance out the door) before he peels off his coat to continue further in. He's dressed in dishwashing-appropriate clothes rather than his off-time fancier attire, jeans and a plain white t-shirt under a Xavier's hoodie. Somewhere across the room, a pair at a table has started whispering to each other; he tenses up with a faint flinch, ears capable of picking up conversation he otherwise should not be able to. "Hey. Hey. You. Aren't you --" One man is pushing quickly out of his seat to take abrupt-aggressive steps towards Shane. Shane turns and /hisses/, sharp teeth baring in a harsh rasp of snarl. Entering the cafe is one Toma Lupei, minus his sister today. Probably a good choice. Dressed in a long shabby gray coat, his hair streaked red in the long brown, he's already searching the menu, when he spots Iolaus. Toma stops in his tracks, a face of some sort of admiration, as he mumbles to himself in Romanian. < Woah..It's him. >. Toma tries to approach him, but notices Jane, nervously heading towards one of the lines instead. Iolaus smiles and gives a little wave to Melinda as she greets them, taking a step towards the counter just as the door opens behind him. "Hey, Melinda. How are you doing?" He gives her a conspiratorial look, glancing around the room. "Got ditched, huh? You look swamped." He, perhaps, has already had some caffeine, fingers drumming a line on the counter. For her part, Jane is more interested in who has come through the door, instinctively turning around to survey the teenager. She relaxes in a moment, though, eyes flicking over Shane again, her eyebrows raising in a silent question. As the commotion starts, Iolaus turns around and blinks in surprise as he takes in the sight. "Hey, leave him alone." He says, starting forward. He is headed off quickly by a gesture from Jane, holding a hand up. Her voice is, perhaps, more authoritative, anyway, a low cold burn of a sound. "Stop." "Well, it's a time of rebuilding." Melinda makes a vague hand wave to the store as she straightens up a little. "So many jobs are open and so many people are trying their luck on bigger and better things. It's a buyer's market." She lets the catch phrases roll off her tongue with blithe, amusement still pulling at her eyes. "How..." She pauses in her attempt to exchange pleasantries when Shane enters and a raucous follows. She draws in a deep breath and purses her lips before walking up behind Shane and placing a hand on his shoulder. "Come on, you." Her arm drapes protectively around Shane's shoulders as she tries to lead him to the back, if he lets her. "Fuck you," the man snaps to Iolaus, "my kids both /died/ because of that sick /bastard/, I hope they put him down like --" Shane's next snarl is lower, more guttural, claws snapping out as he starts to /lunge/ towards the man, whose words cut off as he backs up /quickly/ away from the toothy shark-boy. It's Melinda's hand on his shoulder that checks him, rocking his weight in abrupt /thump/ down onto his heels. His growl doesn't stop, though, rumbling sharp and warning in his throat. His head turns, eyes cutting over to Jane. "He's not -- he'd /never/ --" His gills are fluttering to rapid-quick for him to form proper words. The man's rage towards Shane also angered Toma, albeit silently, as Toma steps forward to take a stand, though siding with Shane, not the man. "Hey, leave him the hell alone. Innocent until proven guilty, that's how it works, right? You don't have a right to judge him, that's what courts are for.". Toma turns towards Shane, more worried about him than the man he tried to just slaughter. "Are you okay, pal? I'm sorry about what happened.". Toma's voice is reassuring, even though Shane is a strange, he just doesn't like the fighting. "If it makes you feel better, I don't think he did it." "And the only reason you aren't dead too is because of that man's hard work." Iolaus says, lip curling up in disgust. "I should know. I was there when he did it." The doctor's eyes flick up and down the other man and he shakes his head, dismissively. "He saved your sorry ass risking his own life for it, and this is the thanks you give him. At least we see your colors, clearly." Iolaus turns his back on the man, clearly, watching Shane get pulled towards the back. Jane does not turn her back, but rather stares the other man down, hazel eyes flashing dangerously. When he backs down, her eyes shift to Shane, and she gives him a nod, and a brief twitch at the corners of her lips. It's not a smile, quite, but it's halfway to one. "No, he wouldn't." "You have more than enough people who know your pa and know what kind of person he is, hun. Let them defend him." Melinda pulls him a little closer, drawing in a deep breath and putting her other arm around him to hug him. "Iolaus has all the information to handle that customer's ignorance - if he can get through the man's pain." She releases him, but keeps her arm around his shoulders though, in case he needs it. Shane turns in against Melinda, burying his face against her shirt. His gills continue to flutter; intermittently he draws in ragged strained breaths between them, though these are too few and far between to likely be comfortable. When he turns his face away from Melinda to speak, his words come out ragged, too, a little breathless-fluttery themselves. "He didn't. Do it. Not any of it," he says to Toma. "He'd never even -- have killed /Malthus/ let alone -- let alone /all humans/. My /dad's/ human, why. Would he want to kill his own. Husband." His eyes are a little too shiny-bright when he looks to Jane, and then away. "He's a. Good man." "Too good." Jane mutters under her breath, that same faint smile teasing along the edges of her face. She shakes her head, once, and gives Shane a reassuring look. "I'd still put him on shift. That video is the behaviour of a coward, or he would have said it while he was alive." Jane shrugs her shoulders, eyes still warily watching the man from the earlier outburst, flicking around to survey the room and then return. Iolaus has gotten distracted from all of this, watching someone drawing in pencil in a notebook with complete attentment, fingers drumming along the counter. He shakes himself out of it a few moments after Jane finishes speaking, though, looking over to Shane, back to the drawing, then to Melinda, in a quick almost double take. One hand rises to rub at his forehead, and he gives Melinda and Shane a smile. "There wasn't ever any doubt." Mel raises her hands and cups Shane's cheeks gently before moving them down to press against his gills, to help him calm. "If people were paying attention, they'd be asking questions, not making accusations. How can one day he be lauded as a hero and a helper, who put up with being harassed by the police for the greater good, and then the next, accused of everything opposite of that." She shakes her head before glancing up to Jane and Iolaus... Toma given a blinking stare for a moment. She refocuses on the other two, renewing her smile. "SO, what will it be today? Late lunch or mid afternoon caffeine refill?" Shane closes his eyes, drawing in slower deeper breaths as his gills still down flat against his neck. "He threatened me. And B. And /dared/ my Pa to kill him. And Pa /wouldn't/." For a moment his teeth bare in a grimace. "Too good," he agrees with Jane. "That's what -- the last line of the video. Pa had the chance -- to /kill/ him. And now he's getting punished for /not/. He takes a step back away from Melinda, eyes skipping over where Iolaus looks, towards the drawing. He looks away again soon with a deeper flush when Mel asks for the others' orders. "Oh, fuck. I'm --" 'sorry,' he signs, "I'm. Starting shift now, shit." He ducks his head, avoiding the gazes of others in the room as he hurries back towards the kitchen. This bit of information is new to Jane and, for once, the surprise shows on her face even as Shane bustles off into the back. She is silent as Iolaus smiles and talks to Melinda, one hand gesturing in the air as he speaks. "Can't it be both? A late lunch, involving a large amount of caffeine? Triple shot espresso, please. Something's gotta keep me awake for the rest of the meetings I have this morning, that's for sure. I'm not going to be able to do it alone." Jane's smile is sudden, wolfish. Her laughter starts as a dark chuckle, a murmur of sound almost to a growl, but it grows, bubbling up in her chest and out of her before she is bending over, hands on her thighs, laughing at a joke that no one seems to have told. Iolaus gives Jane a strange look, blinking and raising one eyebrow. "What the fuck's going on with you, huh?" "Too good, indeed." "Okay. Coming right up." Melinda shakes her head and gives a little smile. She relays the order to the two people behind the register then follows Shane back to the kitchen to provide a little extra support.