9372/Heavy Metal Thunder: Shadow to Light

Heavy Metal Thunder: Shadow to Light
Date of Scene:	29 September 2019
Location:	Garage - Xavier's School
Synopsis:	Shannon and Sam-Bean talk shop over a classic Shadow
Cast of Characters:	Samuel Morgan, Nightingale

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Samuel Morgan has posed:
    There's a din in the garage. On the whole, this isn't that unusual, considering that there's more than a few motorbikes around that either have been worked on by students, or being actively worked on by students. This din, however, is coming from a berth that until recently had been empty, but now seems to be a hive of activity. Inside, Bean appears to be pouring his heart and soul into the restoration of what once a Honda Shadow VT1100 classic. It's hard to tell at the moment, stripped down to the bare frame. Even the wheels have come off, and then the wheels have come off the rims, both stacked in a corner. The engine hangs almost entirely stripped from an engine hoist, and bits and pieces of the bike are strewn around in organised chaos, everything in its place.

    Sparks fly while Bean, in coveralls and wearing eye protection, removes the excess material from a new weld in the oil pan with an angle grinder. That partially explains the din... the rest is down to the radio tuned to a local hard rock station, blaring out music at an unwise volume.

Nightingale has posed:
     It was difficult--no, impossible--for Shannon to miss the levels of noise in the garage, on her way through to the stables. The loud music and the whirring, metallic grinding sounds were nothing new. Someone always seemed to be working on a project in here. Mechanical things had never been her forte, but sometimes it was fun just to witness a maestro at their craft. It didn't matter whether or no that maestro was in training or not. So she tiptoes up to the bay where Techno is working on the Honda cycle that seems to have become his pet project, staying out of the range of stray sparks as she simply looks on. A bit of a smile curls the corners of her mouth upwards. It was good to see someone enjoying themselves with something constructive like this.

Samuel Morgan has posed:
    It's odd. Dressed in coveralls, Bean somehow seems... complete. He's got oil all over himself, rust stains on his hands and face, and despite all that... he's actually smiling. The weld gets a few more passes, until the technopath eyeballs the material, then cautiously runs a finger across the only shiny bit of the otherwise rusty oil pan. With a nod, he puts away the grinder and writes the date and the time on the shiny spot of the oil pan with a sharpie, adding it to a growing pile of parts on one end of the work bench. On the other side, a much smaller pile of nuts and bolts, all of which have a very distinct, very new looking reflective metal shine to them.

Nightingale has posed:
Shannon cracks a little bit of a smile as she sees Bean actually at peace, for once. It did her heart good. None of what he was working on made a single ounce of sense to her, but to see him doing something he clearly loved was a good thing. She inches a bit closer, to see if she can get a better view of the bike, looking between the frame, piles of parts, and back again. She looks more than a little confused, as she tries to picture the bike whole once more.

"Wow... you've got a real knack for this. How do you manage to keep all those itty bitty little parts straight?"

Samuel Morgan has posed:
    Despite the music, Bean hears the voice and turns around, pulling his goggles up to his forehead. Yup, there's a very clear goggle-shaped outline on his face, he looks like he walked right out of some kind of magazine. The music turns itself down, and so conversation becomes possible. "I just kind of know where they go, and I keep them together in the same tub. Basically the way you keep spices straight, I suppose. Welcome to my kitchen." And that gets another bright smile. "Bit of a mess at the moment, but that's pretty normal."

Nightingale has posed:
Shannon chuckles lightly, and is that a bit of a twinkle in her eyes? A change from her more somber expression of the past several days, for sure! "At least there's no oil dripping from the ceiling. Yet." she teases, and indeed it looks as if she's on the brink of... laughter? She tiptoes into the bay, peering from one pile of parts to the next. "Some pretty strange spices there. Which one's which?"

Samuel Morgan has posed:
Samuel looks up for a moment, hand on chin, studying the ceiling. "Thirty feet plus... I'll have to work on that, challenge accepted." Of course he gives Shannon a wink to make it very clear he's joking, and motions for her to come on in. There's plenty of room... the bay was designed to hold a car and all the equipment needed to maintain it. A bike hardly takes up any space, even mostly disassembled. "The bike was basically a tetanus trap, so I've taken everything off the frame to grind off the rust and re-finish the metal. Right now I'm doing the same for the larger parts and the nuts and bolts while I'm at it. Then it's on to the engine, basically the same thing, except I'll have to replace the cylinder rings, these ones are shot to hell, and then get all the congealed oil out of the crankshaft bearings." He's indicating parts as he goes. Unsurprisingly, it's all following a clockwise progression, as if the entire project has been meticulously planned out. "Some parts I'm going to have to have made, unless I can find a few good second hand bits in the junk pile. Gearbox is still solid, but the pressure plate and the flywheel are beyond hope."

Nightingale has posed:
Shannon just looks very, very confused as Bean points out each part, laughing and holding up her hands. "Is this how you feel when I'm doing my thing in the kitchen? I've got a better chance of learning Latin than this." She studies each part again, going around the project in close to the same order that he pointed out. "That one's... the flywheel? Or is that the crankshaft?" Yep. There is finally something she is completely inept at.

Samuel Morgan has posed:
    "That would be a cylinder." Bean smiles, hands behind his back. In a way it's unfair. He's been doing this for a while, enjoys it and... ooooh... Yup. It clicks. "It's exactly like watching you cook, I think. And if you can teach me how to make cookies, I bet I can teach you a few things about mechanics and engines." His eyes almost seem to glow when he looks over the pile of junk that only a mechanic would recognise as most of a bike. "One day, all this... all this is going to fit together and be something."

Nightingale has posed:
     "Just add water and stir?" Now Nightingale's actually laughing, able to forget about recent events for just a little while. While there are still some shadows in her eyes that cannot quite be chased away, in addition to some dark circles beginning to appear beneath them, she's actually smiling and laughing. "You know, that might not be a bad idea. I try to help you with cooking, and you keep me from completely wrecking a bike or anything with a motor."

Samuel Morgan has posed:
Samuel drums his fingers on the workbench as he leans against it, smiling. "We should talk to Miss Pryde." Relaxed or not, teachers and counselors are still referred to by surname. Some habits die hard. "See if there's another bike you can have for restoration, and if they can put me in some kind of cooking class. You help me not burn down the kitchen, I help you not burn down the garage. Deal?"

Nightingale has posed:
Shannon laughs, and shakes her head a little bit. "I'm not quite sure I'm ready for that one yet. But if you need an assistant on this one, it could be something for me to work towards." She raises her eyebrows, and cants her head slightly to one side. "I don't know if there's any cooking classes, per se. Something to talk to Kitty about. Or maybe Jean or miss Munroe." It seemed her use of surnames depended on how relaxed or how familiar she was around each particular staff member. There's that long pause and she closes her eyes, thinking out what to say. "Wie klingt das?"

Samuel Morgan has posed:
    "I'd say we have a deal." Bean smiles, holding out a greasy hand, looking at it for a moment, then finding a rag to clean it off a bit before offering it again. "I mean, we've just double the risk of accidental fires in the school, but that's a small price to pay, right?"

Nightingale has posed:
"Either accidental fires, or some other sort of injury. But those, I can handle, long as they're not too bad. Mostly." As Shannon takes his hand, her voice has lost some of its jovial tone, and become decidedly more pensive. There was a lot she'd thought she couldn't handle, but found out otherwise in very short order. And a new week had just begun. What else could be in store?

Samuel Morgan has posed:
    There was, at least, one more thing that was in store. Without ceremony, Bean holds up a square of sanding paper, and hands it over to Shannon, then points at the very, very rusty frame. "Lesson one. You're gonna get dirty..." Yup. And with every appearance of enjoyment, Bean picks up his own sanding paper and starts to attack the rusted tubes of the frame. Ah. Engineering...

Nightingale has posed:
     Yes, it seemed class was in session. Shannon digs right in, picking one of the most rusted-over parts of the frame and sanding away. It felt good to just be working with her hands, even if she really had no clue as to what she was doing. The hands that could heal, the touch that had set off a veritable firestorm of events in the school, could perhaps begin to set things to rights, for once.