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Melvin had done the best he could. Without portals, he had to go search through the pantries and find what would already be cooked in the cafeteria. With that in hand and set to feed all he hoped to bring, he found a closed kitchen that he could claim as his own with some help by asking Ofelia. Then he got all the cooks who then also talked to other hunter cooks and showed them what he had. It was sad. Boxed stuffing, a massive can of turkey, canned cranberry sauce, canned yams, and bags of potatoes among many other things.

"I'll leave it to you guys. I hope you can transform it to something better than what they will serve us without any real care in the regular cafeteria." He would have helpers come in to talk to the cooks and fetch anything from the pantries they might need to make the already lame food at least edible and hopefully, thanksgiving miracles being possible, even good. He left them in the kitchen to work.

In the next room he called out to everyone who could move tables, chairs, donate, and bring whatever they could to make this party less of a disaster. This whole no portal thing had really ruined his plans, but he always had an alternative. He glanced at the booze he spent a good portion of his money (no portals meant inflation) and sighed. If the food sucked, hopefully the booze could help swallow it down.

"How is everything?" He asked those helping.





Please quote those you are speaking to as it might get lost. Bolding names also helps.

Jerry had been on a mission for his fifteenth cup of coffee that day when he noticed the hubbub. People certainly seemed... busy. He spotted Melvin directing several other trainees, and made his way over once he noted the man had a moment.

At the sight of the booze bottles, his lips pursed.

"Hey uh... what are you up to here?" Days blurred when you were busy. He barely had registered it was November at all. "Need any help?" He offered with a weak smile. It might have still been the cafeteria, but the smell of cooking was enough to awaken even the skinny Sun Hunter's appetite. Helping meant maybe a helping in return.

Harrison shoved a couple of the tables together, matching up the edges. The quartermaster had a lot of folding chairs, which had been stacked up along the wall. Somebody else could worry about decorating.

It looked good enough.

It would fit, at least.

He leaned their longest table away from the wall.

"...Help me with the other end of this," he grunted. Rep hadn't been signed up, but Harrison had dragged him along anyway, determined not to be the only one moving a bunch of chairs back and forth.

Jerry's eyes lit up in sudden realization. "It's THANKSGIVING already??" At least the man looked more well groomed than the last time Melvin had seen him. He was (mostly) freshly shaved, his hair somewhat trimmed, and he had traded his janitor jumper for his orange hawaiian shirt. See? He was a functioning member of society again. "I can do that! OH And I know how to fold napkin turkeys!" He beamed proudly. "Should I get my guitar too?"

Melvin watched Harrison and Rep set the tables, smiling at each other in a way that made the Lifer wonder if he'd have to make sure they wouldn't just throw one or the other on the table and make no one want to eat on it. For now, they seemed to have it under control.

Looking back at Jerry, he smiled despite wanting to cringe. "No. No. You don't need to bring the guitar. With this many people, it's bound to get loud, and we don't want to have to talk over your guitar. Conversation is part of the holiday after all. Wouldn't want to spoil it." That and he guitars hardly were mood music for Thanksgiving.

"How about you work on decorating and making those turkey napkins? We don't have much to make it feel festive after all." He said, patting Jerry on the shoulder.

"Not all of us can lift a truck one-handed, smartass," Harrison flipped the table horizontally, hauling it towards the room's center. "And I'm maximizing the space, here."

He dropped it unceremoniously on one side, next to the other tables, then pried one of the legs free free.

"Chairs are-" He started to tell Jerry, but stopped at the bright smile and the volunteered napkin turkeys. "...yeah. Maybe you better just do that." Melvin shot down the sing-alongs, at least.

"Aye okay, granted." he nodded sagely, eyeing his nails in a little preening show of self satisfaction. The moment his attention wasn't needed directly to help move the furniture he decided to play supervisor, crossing his arms and not helping in the least. Instead rambling the entire time.

"I had to build a table from Ikea once man, do you know their instructions have like no words in them? Like well, nearly no words. And I built most of it and then realised I'd put the table top on upside down and couldn't get it back off and it was a ******** disaster. Do you think they get the tables here from ikea or if there's like a table shop somewhere that supplies specially?"

He interrupted himself as a thought hit him, raised a brow. "Why are you taking the legs off anyway?"

Jerry's enthusiastic smile flickered slightly as he realized Wash had joined them without so much as a 'hello'. Well... a lot of people had heard about what had happened, and the man had made it pretty clear the last time they spoke he was Sasha's friend over his. It hurt a bit. But things got tricky in breakups.

Deep breaths, be the bigger man. "Stuff from home?" He chimed in as friendly as he could as he moved to find the store of paper napkins.

He glanced back toward where Rep and Harrison were still setting up. He would probably fare better at one of those tables away from the kitchen. "I'm amazed you scrounged up anything, Melvin! I hope we aren't supposed to be rationing or something."

He would defend that guitar could make some very pretty background music, but he could take a hint, much to his dismay.