Lu and Shen - Backdated

[ax_swift]

A lunch chat turns into plans for a new mutant rally in NYC.


Full tray in hand, Shen surveyed the available seats in the cafeteria, then made a beeline for someone she still hadn't really talked very much with, despite being in a couple of classes together. Time to change that! Shen was in a green Emmeline Pankhurst tank top and black leggings, her feet bare and wings out, as usual, as she walked over to the table Lu was eating at. "Hey! Can I sit with you?"

"Of course!" Lu smiled and gestured for the other girl to take a seat. "Shen, right? Or do you prefer Li-Men?" She was guessing not, considering that she'd never heard any of the teachers call her that, but she didn't want to assume.

Shen nodded appreciatively at Lu, even as she took a seat. "You're the first kid here to even know to ask, way to go. I'm pretty used to Shen. Nobody but my uncle calls me Li-Men." She picked up her fork. "Is it rude to ask if it's just you right now? Or all of you?"

Lu laughed and shook her head. "It's not rude," she assured Shen. "Not unless you get up and leave when I admit that all three of me are here."

Shen grinned at her. "Not a chance. I was just curious. But sometimes there's a thin line between curious and invasive, and I'd rather not cross it."

"Oh, I know what you mean - I'm always dying to ask people about their mutations, and then I think I should probably wait to see if they offer." She grinned back and shrugged as she dipped a fry in her ketchup. "I have to admit, sometimes curiosity wins out."

Shen chuckled. "Well, you can ask anything you want about mine. I don't mind." It wasn't one of the most complicated or challenging mutations out there, though, so Shen didn't generally get a lot of questions, but that was cool, too.

"Well, I have to admit, I'm curious as to where you put them when they're not obviously there, but I'd rather ask you about whether or not you've got any plans for more pro-mutant rallies?" Lu smiled crookedly. "It's possible I've been reading your blog ever since you held the one that was written up in the Bugle."

Shen held up one finger, "They dissolve into some disgusting goo," and a second, "and I've pretty much let other people run with the rallies. I was pretty close to a burn-out by the time the first one is over." And now everyone who used to help her with the activist club was either gone or way too busy, so just preparing their weekly meetings was a lot of work. She dropped her hand and winced a little. "I guess we're due for another one in New York, though, huh?"

"I'd think so? I mean, I don't think anyone's held one since." Lu smiled, and tentatively added, "I don't want to step on your toes or anything, don't get me wrong. But I'd be happy to help organize one, if you don't think you'd have time. I mean, it would have to be overwhelming to do it on your own."

"And we could ask Kurt, too," Shen said with a small smile, as she warmed up to the idea. "See if he's in again."

"I haven't met him yet, but I'd like to. You guys were really brave, doing it the first time. Did you have any problems that the news didn't report?" Lu's smile tilted. "I wanted to go, badly, but we had a lot going on just then, and Dad asked that I hold off until things settled down." Or until he'd put the final pieces in place establishing Reep's identity, so that it would stand up to tougher scrutiny. Just in case.

Shen frowned a little at the fact that Lu's father had pretty much told her not to come out. She'd never known anything but support from Yang Tian, and she was so thankful for that. Coming out was such a personal decision. Deciding not to do it for someone else's sake was different from that person asking you not to. Still, not her business. All that mattered, regarding their conversation, was whether Lu was ready to come out now. "What kind of things?" Because that was super vague.

"Oh, mostly just family stuff." Lu shrugged nonchalantly. "My brother Reese had shown up not too long before that - long story involving a ton of misunderstandings - and he was still setting in. And, well, there'd been a few vague threats from my father's old business partner. So Dad wasn't keen on me being out in a park without security, and I didn't want security there drawing attention away from the rally. So." She offered a crooked smile. "All in all, it was better to hold off a while."

"Hey, we had security," Shen protested. There had been event security, from volunteers, and they'd done a very good job of handling haters who stepped across the line. Not to mention the Xavier's kids around - both in and out of the rally. Still, she winced in acknowledgment. "But yeah, probably not corporate level security. Is that a real thing? Business people could really come after you?" That sounded like something out of a TV show or something; Shen hadn't realized it was for real.

Lu grimaced and poked at her salad with her fork. "Unfortunately. It's happened - not then, Dad ignored it when Doyle threatened him but when he started talking about going after me and Reese he took it to the police. But since?" She shrugged. "One of me got kidnapped just before I started at the school, by assholes who were trying to blackmail my father into providing power supplies for some anti-mutant project they had in the works. Shinobi found me and got me out. It's part of the reason I ended up here; Dad wanted me somewhere safe until the police were sure they'd caught everyone involved." She shook her head and made a face. "I'm glad he did; it would've killed Dad to give them what they wanted, but I'm not sure he wouldn't have done it."

Shen stared at her for a couple of seconds, and then simply said, very eloquently, "Wow." She snapped out of it, sympathy painting her features. "I'm sorry that happened to you." But also, Shinobi had played hero? Shinobi?

"Well, nothing much happened, really," Lu confessed with an awkward smile. "I mean, it was scary? But all they did was lock me up, and I wasn't there all that long before the rest of me called Shinobi for help. And I ended up here," she added, her smile brightening, "so something good came out of it."

"Scary is bad enough," Shen said sympathetically. But she wasn't going to go on about that if Lu was over it, or didn't want to talk about it, so she followed that up with a friendly smile. "But it's definitely cool that you're here."

"Thanks. What about you?" Lu asked, genuinely curious. "That is, if you don't mind me asking? Did the Professor just get in contact, or...?"

"Pretty much," Shen confirmed with a nod. "And a good thing, too. These babies," with a jerk of her thumb at the wings draped behind her back, "were taking their sweet time growing but we weren't sure how to handle it with the school. Turns out we didn't have to."

"Do you mean your old school, or something here?" Lu asked.

"Yeah, no, my old school," Shen confirmed with a nod. "Begging out of PE because of menstrual cramps? Sure. Begging out of class because of aviary growing pains? Kind of different. There was like next to no mutant awareness back then."

"Do you think that's changed at all? I know there are lawsuits pending, but I haven't heard of any that have actually resulted in legislation that adds mutantcy to any kind of protected status list." Lu made a face. "Which should be obvious, really, but then, a lot of things should have been obvious that haven't been."

"And still aren't," Shen confirmed with a grimace. "No new legislation, no, but awareness has definitely been raised. But it's definitely time for another rally here. We can't let people think everything's settled when we still don't have any kind of protection, and some legislators are actively campaigning against our rights."

"I agree." Lu grimaced, then offered a tentative smile and leaned forward a little. "So tell me - what can I do to help?"

Shen grinned. "Plenty. We can bring up the idea of a new rally at the next club meeting, and I'll reach out to my contacts. If we have enough interest, we'll need to start thinking of a date, and a specific message. And if we don't have enough interest, we'll need a strategy to get people interested again."

"When's the next club meeting?" Lu asked, and grinned. "And as for interest - the girl with the dragon wings who has that blog on YouTube used to be a student here, didn't she? If we let out that she and maybe Warren were going to be there, we'd probably get people who'd come just to get autographs - and who'd stay for the message?" She shrugged. "I mean, I don't know her, but I've heard she does appearances. And I'm sure I could talk Warren into it."

"That's good for mainstream interest, not for the interest we need to get things rolling," Shen stated. Never mind that they had to be careful how they got Warren involved if they didn't want the coverage to be all about him. It was the rich white cis guy syndrome. That was a problem for later. "We want to make sure there's proper interest first, for the real reasons. From actual mutants - and from proper allies."

"I don't agree," Lu protested. "I mean, yes, we want people who will be involved for the right reasons. But sometimes if you draw people's interest, people get interested who don't think they will be. And really, we need mainstream interest, too, if we want public opinion on our side. And we need that."

"Yeah, and we can have that conversation once we get the ball rolling," Shen replied. "First, we need a reason to do this at all." She paused. "Or I do, anyway. I'm never gonna be doing this for the mainstream audience, no matter how nice it would be to have them on our side."

"No, I understand that. I'm just saying - if we want to change laws, we're going to need the mainstream audience, not just the people who are invested." She smiled. "But like you said, that's a conversation for later. Sorry, I'm used to listening to my dad talk about environmental issues. Some of what he says relates."

"I'm used to grassroots activism and social justice movements," Shen answered with a small smile. "Pretty different perspectives."

"Which isn't a bad thing," Lu pointed out. "Looking at things from multiple points of view can only help in the long run."

"For sure," Shen agreed. "Anyway, I should talk to Kurt first. It was kind of his baby, to start with."

"Of course!" Lu agreed. "I wasn't trying to cut him out of things. I just haven't met him yet."

"I didn't think you were," Shen reassured her with a small smile.

"Ok, good." Lu smiled. "Anyway, you were saying you're used to grassroots activism? What kinds of things have you been looking at?"

"I've been involved with a bunch of things," Shen replied, grabbing her bowl of fruit salad. "LGBTIQ stuff, mainly, but also anti-racism movements, feminist marches. I did a few house-building projects, and I was looking into literacy stuff when the wings started growing, and I came here."

"Habitat for Humanity?" Lu perked up and she grinned. "I did that a couple of times. It was fun - I mean, that wasn't why I did it, but I had fun with it anyway. But wow, you've done a lot."

"My parents were activists in China," Shen answered with a small smile. "My uncle always supported me following in their footsteps. I did a lot of that stuff with him, especially at first."

"It sounds like he's pretty special," Lu offered warmly. "Your parents, too. Is it okay to ask what happened to them?"

"Riots in Tibet, when I was six," Shen answered simply. It had been long enough ago that she was definitely cool with answering questions, even if she thought she would miss her parents forever. "They never made it back, so Yang Tian decided to leave the country."

"And took you with him," Lu finished. "Definitely a special guy."

"Yeah, I definitely lucked out," Shen confirmed with a smile. She loved her uncle, no doubt.

Lu smiled back. "I know the feeling."

Shen's smile widened slightly. "So your dad's as cool as he seems?"

"My dad is as cool as he seems," Lu assured her. Her smile softened, fondly, and she shrugged. "I mean, everything else aside, how many eccentric business owners would not only take on the administration of a hospital on the word of a twelve year old, but then adopt her?"

"Probably more than would actually stick to it afterwards," Shen stated with an amused half-smile, wondering what the story there was. "What's that about a hospital?"

Lu's smile faded somewhat and she shrugged. "Doctors have diagnoses for people with three distinct personalities, and they're generally not 'mutants'," she explained. "And then I manifested, and they somehow got even more interested and wanted to call in a 'specialist'. Fortunately, RJ Brande happened to be touring the place when I tried to make a run for it."

Shen wrinkled her nose at Lu's explanation; dealing with sanism must have been such a pain. "Well, he sounds even better now," Shen admitted.

"He's kinda the best," Lu agreed.

"Here's to awesome adoptive parents," Shen stated with a smile.

Lu held up her glass for a toast and smiled back. "I'll drink to that."