Participants:
| Scene Title | Small-Time Revenge Tactics |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | When people hurt, they make rash suggestions. They can be for the right reasons as well as … others. |
| Date | January 2, 2019 |
Lance's Apartment, Phoenix Heights
"Okay."
"I appreciate you hearing me and hopefully helping me figure this out. The short of it is that right before Christmas, something really shitty happened. Someone who couldn't mind their own fucking business decided it would be a good idea to forcibly lock someone in a room until they'd gotten their kicks."
Emily was trying to not be vague, for all the good it was doing her. This was at least progress compared to how it was explained to Brynn and Squeaks originally. Still, though, there was a certain context the explanation so far was lacking.
"… I'm still angry about being tricked like that. Short of actually hurting anyone, revenge is due for what I was put through. And this really isn't something I can pull off alone. The guy who locked the door is Richard Ray."
She pauses for a moment, her weight shifting. She's standing on her own, without crutches, and without the slightest bit of unsteadiness to her, which might be more surprising to some of the group than anything else she's said so far. Emily's hands fidget before her, pinching the tip of her ring finger between the thumb and fore of her other hand.
"I know this is out of nowhere, but will you help me get back at him?"
Brynn sits with her back against the wall nearest the door, where she 'painted' for Lance a mural of home — the pond where they always skated, a deer looking on toward the house back away from the trees with Doodlebug. She's uncertain about this whole idea of revenge on Richard Ray — if only because she's seen the boys go on revenge sprees among themselves before and it gets ugly. But she keeps the thought to herself because she was not the injured party in all this. And no matter what her own opinion, she's got Emily's back.
If there's one thing you can say about Lighthouse Kids, it's that they take care of their own. And Emily is Lighthouse Adjacent enough by now to qualify for that level of backup and support, even when in the same breath she tends to tell all of us to mind our own business.
As long as no one gets hurt, she promises. Because she's one of the more squeamish when it comes to hurting other people. Unless, of course, they're trying to hurt one of us — then she can be among the more vicious of the Kids.
Pepe Le Pew is hiding in the bedroom, where Clara left him when she noticed that it was Emily coming in. Minerva and Ron, on the other hand, are in their usual spots — the mink looks (and smells) much better than she did when Weasel first pulled her out of the cage, and Ron is hiding in a pocket as usual.
Clara herself leans against the wall near the hallways, listening quietly to Emily’s story, idly petting the mink on her shoulder. After a moment of thought, she suddenly grins. “You know…my ability is kind of tailor made for harmless revenge.” She raises a brow. “If you can stand being in the same room as him, Pepe Le Pew is great for those things.”
The young Canadian woman reaches up, tapping the side of her nose. “An immediate scenario comes to mind, and doesn’t involve anyone getting hurt.” She glances toward Geneva. “Leave a window open somewhere, and I can send a troupe of Raccoons into his building, and Pepe can spray the shit out of him.” Most people don’t know her magic solution for removing skunk odor, so it could be a nice lasting revenge.
Sure, Richard Ray was nice to her once, and gave her a Benny instead of ratting her out for pickpocketing. But a little bit of revenge for a friend is always fun.
"Chicken shit," Hailey chides Brynn with a wide cat-like grin but then she gives Emily her full attention. She still dressed in her wintery layers, only shedding those that cause her to overheat inside. She still has her woolen hat and scarf on, the heavy coat and mittens are underneath her. "So this dude kidnapped you and held you against your will and no one else wants him hurt? What the heck, guys, just because he's rich doesn't mean he should be above the law. We live in a new world where money isn't supposed to give you those privileges." Apparently, according to the empath, kidnappers are only supposed to be poor and belonging to Pure Earth.
"Pew-lease," she intones to Weasel. "Let's get original. Let's not use animals that can get caught and exterminated. Ok-rrrrr?"
She lifts her hand flicking two fingers forward, volunteering. "Okay… so since physical violence is out of the question, what about glueing all the windows and doors to his company building closed?"
"If you're not up for it, I'm not going to push it." Emily signs as well as says, her head shaking slightly. This was her torch to carry, not anyone else's. Her attention lingers on her for another moment before she looks between Hailey and Weasel both, trying to figure out where her own lines are drawn. Where the risk outweighs the reward.
"Hailey, it could have been a lot worse. It's more the insult of it." is as much as Emily explains before shaking her head, hands dropping by her side. "And honestly, the thing I'm struggling with here is pulling something off that's not going to get any of us arrested in the process. Going through something that extensive sounds like a good way to get caught on camera, or caught in the act." There's an undercurrent of regret in her voice as she rapidly tries to think of something comparable, to provide an alternative suggestion instead of just shooting ideas down. Skunking him honestly sounded great, but Hailey had a point.
Brynn frowns just a bit, and glances toward Hailey. Wasteland Cant is useful for a lot of things, not the least of which is the shorthand that it allows. She wasn't kidnapped, Hailey. One of her friends and Richard Ray went behind her back and locked her and her dad in an office to work out their problems — I gather her dad isn't the nicest sort and her friend should maybe have left things alone. A faint grimace accompanies the explanation to her sister. I sort of feel weird about this revenge thing. It wasn't their business and all, and she's right that it was a crappy thing to do. Total botswarf. I'm down with a prank for revenge, so long as no one gets hurt.
Hailey is just staring at Brynn before her head makes a slow and smooth turn to level a look at Emily. "Wait… they locked you in a room with your dad? And you're pissed?" One liberal eyeroll later, she's back on the train and drinking the juice. "I'm still in but gurrrrl… hashtag first world problems. Some of us don't even have dads to get locked up with."
Apparently the glueing was out and she's not up for animalistic tom foolery.
"I don't want to do anything lame, if we're going to pull this off, I want it to be epic. Like… Lighthouse was here, epic. We're playing a prank on the richest guy in the whole freaking safe zone! We have to make it good. Give us some ideas. What kind of things does Richard hate?”
Clara tilts her head toward Hailey, nodding slowly. Good point on the animal tomfoolery. “We could glue things shut, then unleash a butt blast from Pepe into the ventilation. It’d take them weeks to get the smell out.” She smirks — she doesn’t personally have as much of a problem with Pepe’s stink, but she’s practically grown up with the little skunk.
She leans against the wall, quietly nodding toward Hailey’s sentiments about first world problems. “Some of us don’t even know if they have a dad to get locked up with,” she adds, turning and kissing Minerva Mink on the cheek. She doesn’t sound bitter at all — more matter of fact than anything else. She’s always had the stance that it’s better not knowing what came of her parents to lead her to waking up in a hospital in Calgary.
“Either way, I agree with Hailey. This has to be epic. I’m happy to lend a butt blast from Pepe, though, so long as he doesn’t get hurt.” She glances back toward Lance’s bedroom, where Pepe is hunting down a bunch of crickets that she let loose for him. Sorry, Lance.
Joe is needless to say rather surprised at the crowd gathered in Lance's (The LHK's) apartment. He pauses and looks around the room a little, a brow lifting at the gathering. Joe is… dour. Srs face Joe. Not normal goof Joe. He walks into the kitchen area and puts his backpack on the counter, pulling some canned food out of it and putting it up before he puts the bag down. He is dressed in the army surplus stuff he bought when he first started working for Keira. He shrugs his way out of his jacket and folds it, laying it over his backpack. It shows off a shoulder holster and a gun there that he unhooks and puts on the backpack as well. He's quiet, mostly just listening to the ongoing conversation, trying to figure out what it is they're talking about. What goes on? He signs in Brynn’s direction mostly while trying to listen as well, not interrupting the ongoing conversation.
Emily's a little preoccupied with weighing everyone's reactions, and the short signs Brynn's making look wholly unfamiliar to her … save for certain words. She always feels uncomfortable when she misses out on something Brynn's said, but she shoves the feeling down. Turns out, though, that it wasn't something she had to wonder about for long.
She blinks when Hailey says it, because she's surely hearing things. Then Hailey looks back from Brynn, and Emily's expression blanks the same way it had when she realized she'd forgotten to mention being mugged. She looks uncomfortable, but tries to hold onto the fact that they're still with her. Great. When Joe comes in, she pauses in the middle of forming a response, resisting the urge to frown before she turns back to the girls.
"So, based on what Squeaks said, Richard's afraid of like, living shadows. If it looks black and it's coming from where it's not supposed to be, apparently he panics." Emily's brow lifts like she's not entirely sure that's a real fear — because it's a reaction she herself had when first exposed to the 'ink lady' — but it's clear she'll work with what she's got.
When Joe comes back, her eyes flicker for a moment as she weighs letting herself be spoken for again. Her hands start to lift to be more careful with signing as she speaks. It takes only a second for her to shirk her discomfort and tell him bluntly, "Richard Ray thought it would be a good idea to fuck with me and my dad. He tricked us both to Raytech and then had us locked in a conference room until he was happy we'd screamed at each other a sufficient amount." Her shoulders lift in a passive shrug. "So short of punching him in the teeth or shooting him in the foot," An idea she apparently thought must be poetic or she wouldn't have still been stuck on it, "I think sabotaging that place with smells and colors or whatever gives him that same level of infuriating discomfort is a pretty fair form of payback."
Her hands are shaking with frustration by the time she finishes, and she pauses for a moment still looking at Joe. She's prepared for equal parts judgment and acceptance, given the subject matter, as well as the person. "Bonus points:" Emily adds with a flat nonchalance, "My dad'll be happy about the revenge." Then she's running her hand over the side of her head, threading her hair back behind her ear and resisting the urge to start pacing.
"Skunks are not epic, skunks point a finger right at you." Hailey says to Weasel, shaking her head. "I'm not in if we're pimping animals. If you don't think that there's some sort of weird ass laser beam skynet thing loose in that building ready to kill on sight, you're insane. Have you seen what's inside there? They have drink delivering spider-dog robots right out of aliens. Not everyone is in love with skunks, especially ones that have just butt blasted an entire building. He will die, you will get him killed. No skunk. Period." Tirade over.
Taking a deep breath, Hailey releases it very slowly to clear her temper. "Okay, so we can't glue the building shut… no skunks… What about a mural? I mean… Brynn would be doing all the real work but the rest of us can act as lookouts. We can completely put up a great mural all over the building, war heroes or something like that."
Her face falls into an astonished expression and she jumps up, “OH MY GOD!! LET’S PUT DENISA AND ERIC AND LUCY AND MALA ON HIS BUILDING!!!” She waves both of her hands excitedly, miming bigness and just being generally excited. “The revenge part is.. He didn’t order it, didn’t want it, but he will look like a complete monster if he takes it down!!!” She stops and takes a seat on the arm of the couch and shrugs her shoulders, “Or we could do the shadow thing, it’ll be way harder though.”
That Emily's pissed at her for giving the bare bones of the situation? Brynn shrugs slightly at the other girl and signs, perhaps with a set to her chin that indicates a little bit of stubborn to her, If I'd let Hailey go on thinking you'd been kidnapped, we could have been looking at some significant and real physical injury to Richard Ray. No matter how crappy what he did was, I didn't think you wanted people to actually hurt him. Because oh yes… the boys are already on the warpath about kidnappings and muggings of the girls. Brynn's not taking the chance on a misunderstanding possibly getting someone killed.
As to the rest of the ideas, she's actually just quiet and watching. A brief chin-jerk at Joe, a frown because she can see there's something wrong with him, and then Brynn settles. Even with Cant, there is a time and place for certain conversations, and this is not that time. Hailey's idea makes her look thoughtful though. If you want something like a mural… I'd be willing, but… again with the security at RayTech. I've heard that it's off-the-charts wicked. Where she heard such things is completely up in the air — because you know, the deaf girl hears things??
Quietly, Clara pets the mink around her shoulders, a thoughtful grimace etched into her features as the others talk amongst themselves. Careful to sign as she speaks for Brynn’s sake, she says, “I think trying to do anything to his building would be a really bad idea, if his security is as good as you say.”
She frowns. “Animals are one thing, but totally out of the question, unless we can count on him to be kind enough to hire someone who won’t kill the animals. If we do anything there, he might have us arrested.” He doesn’t have that track record with pickpockets, but she’s not counting on him being okay with people messing with his business.
“We should come at this from a different angle. He leaves his building sometimes, I’ve seen him out and about before. We should try to catch him then. In any case, we’re pranking him, not the people who work for him.” She tilts her head toward Emily. “If we can catch him right around dusk, we could do a shadow person thing, I bet. There’s bound to be a costume shop somewhere with those weird black full-body suits.”
She thoughtfully rubs under Minerva’s chin — she can’t help it, the mink is soft. “What about your friend who was in on this? Want us to fuck with him, too?”
Joe blinks once, then twice at the explanation from Emily. His face brightens when she mentions getting locked in a room with her Dad to work stuff out. But then settles into a frown when she says she wants to get back at him. "So wait… you're angry because…" Joe's head tips sloooowly to the side. "I…" He pauses as the conversation rolls right onwards. He listens to Hailey, talk of skunks and other things and then… the mural. Joe's features fall back from curious but confused and into somber and sad again. He just kind of stares at Hailey for several seconds. Like he's not sure what planet she's from. It's a horrified sort of stare too. He cannot believe she just suggested using their passed friends as part of a revenge prank. Joe's lips part to speak, then close, eyes flickering to Brynn for a few moments, then around the room before he shakes his head. He shoulders his backpack after putting the gun and it's holster into the pocket where all the canned food was, and then he… goes right for the door. Leaving rather than causing conflict. It's quickly becoming a regular thing for him.
"Because tricked and trapped against my will?" Emily fills in the blank for him, trying to keep the edge from her voice. Joe's kind of staring off, though, and it doesn't really hit her at first why. Hailey seems genuinely excited about her latest idea, but it shuts him down entirely. The names don't ring a bell, but it doesn't take much to put together it's not just Richard that could be emotional sabotage for … assuming that was Hailey's point. When he goes to get his things again, she only waits, biting down hard on her lip.
"Something permanent and a jumpscare both sound like good ideas," she voices carefully, looking back to Weasel suddenly as she asks about Devon. "No," Emily's brow furrows. Why was she so sure about that? "He doesn't live in the Safe Zone." she explains dismissively. Distance was a good reason. "I can deal with him on my own if he tries to come back around."
Joe’s reaction is…. Unexpected… and when he leaves Hailey stops and stares after him. To punctuate his sudden absence, she clears her throat. Then looks toward Brynn with a frown. Using their cant, she quickly signs This isn’t right. As much as she tries, she’s not one for many words and this has drained all of them.
Brynn's been watching Joe and she clearly doesn't like what she sees — the fact that her brother, usually the leader of the pack in prank revenges, is absolutely NOT on board is a huge red flag. She catches Hailey's eyes and her sister's signs give voice to the way she herself is feeling. Gray eyes flit to Emily and then briefly to Weasel and Gen. Emily… I can't do this. I get why you're pissed, and you have every right. I'm sorry. Too many of us would give our right arms for parents who actually cared enough about us to fight with us about anything at all. And all of us would have done something like that if we thought that one of us had the chance to at least know where you stood even if it was fucking nowhere with that parent. She almost never curses.
She pushes off the floor where she was sitting. Something is badwrong with Joe, though, that that takes priority. I will have your back on a hell of a lot of things, Em. This one… I can't. And I hope that it doesn't ruin our friendship. If it does… I'm sorry. She looks genuinely regretful but she shoots Hailey a glance and heads for the door, signing Joe's name for Doodlebug.
“Joe wait!” Hailey yells after him and sprints across the small room, almost tripping over Doodlebug. A few hops and a skip later, she’s following him out the door, slamming it behind her and Brynn. Revenge, however misplaced, was an amusing thing to talk about for a bit but there’s actually something wrong now. There is nothing of value she can add.
Emily's shoulders slowly fall as she reads Brynn's signing, only starting to shake her head, but the girls are off chasing after Joe. Which, as frustrating as everyone dropping off is, she can't help but feel a little relieved he's not heading off on his own. When the door shuts, all she can do is look back to Weasel, shrug, and rub the back of her neck. "Stones in the dark, but I'm betting they're people who died in the war. And…"
She didn't think parents were the reason Joe bailed, but there was a lot that went unsaid there. And at any rate, parents were a weighted subject for the rest of them.
"Maybe getting him while on the go is the best way to do it. And if Hailey's bailed, if you want to let … 'Pepe' do his thing, I certainly won't stop you." Emily doesn't sound particularly enthused at first, the wind taken out of her sails with everyone falling off one by one. A thought hits her, though, and she looks back up with the beginnings of a small smile.
"I think we can do one better, though, than any shadowy-looking suits." Her head quirks to one side as the grin grows, and she reaches for her phone. "But we're going to need some cans of black paint."
Outside
If there is one thing that is good news? It's that Doodlebug was trained by Hailey — and one of the things she taught the dog was the command for 'find.' Finding one of the boys. Because if anything did happen to Brynn, they're usually the ones nearest to her. Which translates in this case to the deaf teen instructing Bug on her way out of Lance's apartment, Find Joe. She's alarmed enough by the way he exited to not realize that Hailey is hot on her heels as she jogs after the Labradoodle seeking the boy.
Joe has made his way pretty quickly down the stairs of the building. It's a lot easier to take stairs at speed when you're not really worried about falling down them. There are a lot of things Joe takes for granted in life, like that. He can hop down stairs three or four at a time. Because if he turfs it it's just the inconvenience of having to pick himself up. Not fracturing bones on the edges of stairs. So down the stairs is where the dog would lead. Joe can be found at ground level outside just around the corner of the building. He's leaning back against it with his head tilted back, his jaw clenched and moisture on his cheeks. Because as tough as Joe is on the outside, he's really all mush on the inside when it comes to his family, especially those members of the family that are gone. He pulled his jacket on on the way down, good thing considering the gun under his arm.
Jim's shriek is the only warning Joe gets as a sizeable spread of golden furred limbs attaches themselves to him. The monkey is agitated and scrambling all over the young man, avoiding his grip. Once attached, the shriek turns to cheeps and coos as the monkey searches through Joe's hair. A good grooming always calms Hailey, why wouldn't it do the same for Joe.
For now, Hailey is still in the building. While she was concerned about the stairs, bannisters are a perfect solution to the problem, so she's sliding most of the way down, allowing her to overtake Brynn. At the bottom of the stairs, the empath breaks into a sprint. She doesn't have the dog to track the young man but she does have her own internal radar. She follows Jim.
"What the hell, Joe," Hailey yells as she rounds the corner. "What is going on with you?"
When Jim goes flying past her, Brynn winces. Joe's not gonna be happy about that. And then Hailey herself zips by on the railing and Brynn simply sighs. By the time she hits the bottom of the stairs, whatever calm may have been in place is probably broken by boy and monkey doing a dance-off finale number as Joe scrabbles to grab Jim. At least, that's what she expects to see—
Joe lifts a hand to run fingers through his hair slowly, gripping it a bit, frustration showing on the young man's face. He pushes off from the wall, breathing steadily, and takes a single step before he gets attacked by a monkey. "Jim. I am really really not in the mood." He comments. He doesn't flip out and try to pry the monkey off like he normally would. Just informs the monkey that he is in no mood for his shenanigans. Really Hailey? Really? You don't know what you did wrong in there? Joe's hands move, but his lips don't. They stay pressed into a thin line. His eyes flicker to Brynn when she makes it outside, and he looks over at her. Maybe you can explain to Hailey why I'm pissed off about her suggesting we use the likeness of our dead friends as part of a prank. His hand movements are angry and chopped. He still doesn't try to pry the monkey off his head either.
In her imagination, Hailey always envisions human voices sounding too much like Charlie Brown adults to Jim. Sometimes he responds to words he recognizes. Sometimes he knows what Hailey wants and what makes her feel better. Most times he uses the same behaviors on the other people he's familiar with. Never does he get the same response as he does with the empath. All the time, it doesn't discourage or cause him to stop.
Because Jim is just as belligerent as Hailey.
"No," Hailey doubles down, jamming her fists angrily into her pockets. They visibly clench and unclench through the fabric before she pulls them out and signs instead of yelling at him. No the idea isn't wrong. You know why? She pauses, waiting for either of them to answer. Looking at both of them with the expectant expression of a remedial math teacher waiting for a right answer. When it isn't given, she provides it.
Because no one remembers the kids who died. And so what if this is a prank right now, it's not going to be a prank in a week or a month or a year. She pauses allowing that to sink in. In a week or a month or a year, it's going to be a monument to people the rest of the world never knew or already forgot.
Fights between the siblings aren't unusual, necessarily. Brynn's eyes flicker back and forth between them as they argue and the only indicator of her own upset is the fact that Doodlebug leans against her leg and whines softly. Pulling in a slow breath, she slices her hand sharply downward, the only version of STOP! that she has. If they don't, she has no way to force them, of course. A couple of steps forward places her at least within the circle of communication. Guys… stop, please.
WE REMEMBER THEM!!! Joe's motions are sharp and angry. We remember them. We honor them. If you want to honor them? Look for a way to honor them that doesn't involve using their likeness in a fucking joke. Joe doesn't swear. Like ever. That's how you know when Joe's emotions are beyond his control. Swear words slip out. He turns and glares at Hailey, and raises his hands to keep signing, but stops when Brynn does the equivalent of a shout. Which is just as rare coming from her as a swear word is coming from Joe. The vicious chop from Brynn takes him by surprise and causes his eyes to swing her way. All the angry signing has a few passersby on the street eyeing the trio, but Joe ignores them, instead looking over at Brynn. He looks at her for a few moments, then looks at Hailey. "Get this monkey off of my head Hailey." His voice is stony, hard. Not at all his normal jovial self. He won't hurt Jim. He wouldn't do that, but he does not want the monkey on him any longer.
"Bullshit," Hailey growls at Joe, with a twiddle of her fingers on one hand, Jim leaps from his shoulders to the ground and then scrambles up the empath's body, finally coming to rest on her shoulder. Everyone is too busy to remember them. Hell, most of the time, you guys are too busy to remember people who don't live under your own freaking roof.
Tossing an apologetic look toward Brynn, she shrugs and retreats toward the corner of the building. Sorry I made you so mad, we won’t again. And with that, she takes her turn to storm off.
The more words are thrown, the worse it's getting. The deaf teen watches them do the silent equivalent of shouting at one another, whatever argument she might have tried to make simply overrun. When Hailey storms off, she reaches out to stop her sister but unless she plans on running after both of them, there doesn't seem to her to be anything she can do to even to soothe the churned-up angers. The accusation that they're too 'busy' to remember other people visibly makes Brynn pale still further and brings a sheen of tears at the unjustness of it.
She shoves her hands in her pockets, their trembling hidden deep in the fleece, and then simply leans on the wall of the building. She doesn't like conflict, never has … many of the sibling arguments over the years, all she could do was shut down and stay clear. Apparently living in the city hasn't changed that.
Joe snorts aloud, and makes an equally dismissive gesture at Hailey's words, his hands signing along with his voice. "Please. You chose to exile yourself to the wilds. And I didn't even know you were staying at Gillian's until recently. Because it's not like you bothered to tell me. And it's not like you've bothered to visit. Or reach out. And we do remember. We remember our fallen all the time. You're never around. By your own choice. So you don't see it." He leans back against the wall next to Brynn and if she allows he'll put an arm around his sister and pull her into a hug, because she clearly needs one.
The empath's blonde head peeks around the corner.
"Liar!!" Hailey shouts, whether she feels it at the moment or not, some things are great to get off of her chest. "You guys came to Gillian's place the day I got shot, you guys came with me to feed and clean the stables, and you were there when I was sneaking out to scavenge to get money for Gillian's birthday. You've always known where I was!!"
As if to emphasize her point, Jim screeches at the top of his lungs causing the dog next to Brynn emit a high pitched whine. Hailey's aggravated and both of them are feeling the full brunt of it.
Squeezing her eyes shut, she steps back around the corner and pinches the bridge of her nose. "Look, I'm sorry my idea caused so much grief," the sincerity in the apology is raw and unmistakable. "You're offended, I get that. Sometimes, I just want to punch people in the face because they forget the little people who were stepped on to get where we are now. I guess the mural idea was me trying to punch the most amount of people in the face in the least amount of time." Then she opens her eyes and steps closer to the two younger sibs and forces a hug, whether they want it or not. “I’m really sorry, okay?”
Brynn worries at her bottom lip uneasily, leaning just a little into the arm Joe puts around her without pulling her hands out of her pockets. When Hailey pokes her head back around, she is still watching that direction because the other girl's departure hurt. And then she's heading back this way and although Brynn doesn't catch pretty much any of the words and tone is entirely lost in her, the body language and facial expressions certainly aren't.
Her hands slip out of her pockets, one reaching up to grip Joe's hand of the arm he has wrapped around her and the other arm wrapping itself around Hailey's waist as she buries her forehead in her sister's shoulder. Nonverbal her forgiveness may be, but she loves them both. And retribution for hurt feelings and for sticking her in the middle of a brawl, which they know makes her shaky and anxious, well…. that won't become evident until she's a little calmer and has decided exactly what form punishment will take. Lance had pink sparkly hair for weeks.
"Uhh no. Am not liar. Am thoroughly confused though. You've been staying at Gillian's since you got shot? I assumed you moved back out to your animal kingdom when you got better. I didn't know you were still at Gillian's place. And you sneaking through the fence would make sense if you were coming and going from the Safe Zone don'tcha think Hails? And you stay out of this Jim!" Joe hollers back. At the monkey. While people nearby stare at the group. Sign language and shouting and all of it. And a monkey. They make quite the sight indeed.
"I'm all for a mural in their memory Hailey." Joe's hands move along with his words as always. "We should slap a mural on the side of a huge building somewhere. Absolutely. But not… as part of a prank. Because we mean it. Because we want people to know who…" Joe chokes up a bit. "To know whose lives were lost. Not as part of some prank. But as a message, and as a statement." He pauses, turning to Brynn. How big of an area can you do at once? It's asked with a sly smile starting to form on Joe's lips. But then Hailey is hugging, and Joe is happy to pull her into a group hug, all three of them. He gives them both a tight squeeze because he loves them. Sometimes he's overbearing sure. But he loves them.