The Pick-up Chapter Sixteen Just Another Manic Monday
The Pick-up Chapter 16 Just Another Manic Monday
7:20 AM. The aged clock radio alarm went off for the second time. Lucky reached across the still sleeping Raven and smashed the "Off" button, knocking the instrument of torture off the nightstand and onto the floor, missing the carpet, making a clatter.
The impact turned the radio on, Susannah Hoffs informing us, at full volume, that it's "Just Another Manic Monday - oh ooh ohhh". But it wasn't. It was already a gloomy Tuesday. Oh well.
The noise had partly wakened Raven, who glowered at him, from under an upraised eyebrow, asking "What the hell?" before pulling the covers up over her head again.
I, too, wished it were Sunday.
After preparing breakfast for three, Lucky grabed his workout bags and made his way to the rear courtyard. The session garnered it's usual group of observers.
The end of his workout with the 'chucks even earned a small round of applause from a trio of cuties on a balcony to his right. He grinned and gave them his best Erol Flynn bow, nearly touching his headband to the pavement. He then became aware of Saniyah and Raven at the railing atop of the stairs above him. Watching.
He continued his grin. As stated before, he liked an audience.
After stowing his gear, he turned toward the shower room where he heard the sounds of running water.
He dropped his cargo pants and stepped out of them, pushing the door open with an elbow. Before he could do anything else he was enveloped in soft, wet slithery appendages as his lovers dragged him under the steamy showerheads. He did not resist. Resistance is futile.
Later, geared up and ready to ride, he eased Knuckles out the door and down the three wooden steps to the sidewalk where he humped her back and up onto the center stand for her 'preflight' inspection.
Elton John, "Rocket Man" was plying uneveny from several radio speakers. Lucky slipped on his helmet and pulled down the headphones, drowning out the other versions. "I'm gonna be highhhh, ighhh, ighhh as a kite by then".
It was already past zero hour.
Saniyah sauntered down the steps with a playful wiggle. "Remember your shopping list?" she inquired. He nodded. "Good," she said and gave him two more things to remember, two more things he would always remember.
"I'm going to the Walgreens pharmacy in Ashbury Heights," she informed him. "For some Amador cigarettes, and I need those other items for the extraction," she concluded. He nodded again, then pulled her in for a sweet, gentle kiss that spoke worlds of words. Then he let her go and entered the building again.
"Raven, I'm headed out." he called up the stairs. But she somehow materialized before him, out of the darkness of the hallway. She reached out to draw him in. Again, he did not resist.
Back out on the sidewalk with Knuckles, he cold feel/hear her purr of approval. "knucles" he thought. 'Talon' was returned. And Lucky realizes it was truth. Talon had merged with knuckles and they had chosen: Talon, and she was female. word.
He adjusted the carbs and set the choke. A single kick sufficed to turn her over. One quick flick of the wrist to give her the goose and he disengaged the choke. She hummed a bit as she purred, very happily. Lucky felt it all. Contentment.
Chapter 16 Just Another Manic Monday - The shopping run
(c) 2025 by the Entangled Pair
Lucky sat astride her for a moment longer, hands light on the bars, listening to the steady thrum. Not mechanical anymore, not just pipes and pistons. There was an undertone, a pulse that seemed to answer his own.
Word.
The thought wasn’t his. It came riding in, smooth and certain, as if Talon herself had just dropped it into the center of his skull. He chuckled low, shaking his head. “Guess we’re past introductions, huh?”
The engine purred, then gave one sharp bark, an unmistakable don’t get cocky.
From the stoop, Raven leaned against the rail, cigarette smoke curling around her. “You two done flirting, or do I need to come referee?”
Lucky gave her a lazy grin. “She started it.”
Raven flicked ash into the street. “Sure she did.” But there was a glint in her eyes, a flicker of unease or was it awe? that she quickly buried behind the smoke.
He rolled Talon off the center stand, felt the weight shift like a living thing beneath him. She was more than steel now. More than rubber on pavement. She was something that chose.
And choosing is dangerous.
Chapter 16 Just Another Manic Monday - Sons of Silence
Talon carried him smooth down the block, like she had grown tired of pretending to be just a bike. The engine tone wasn’t idle anymore, it was *breathing*. He felt her through his thighs, up his spine, humming in tune with his pulse.
The Ave was already stirring. Street sweepers hissing. Baristas pulling shots for half-awake grad students. A sax player testing riffs under the awning of the Alegro, notes floating like errant birds.
Lucky leaned into the first corner. Talon leaned back. Not just the mechanics of momentum—more like a dance partner testing his rhythm.
“You’re with me,” he muttered.
A quick growl from the pipes—agreement. Or warning. Hard to tell.
Walgreens sat at the edge of Ashbury Heights, neon flickering above sliding glass doors. The parking lot was its usual purgatory: tired faces, moms juggling screaming kids, a wiry guy trying to sell knock-off earbuds from the trunk of a Toyota.
Lucky dismounted, feeling Talon’s hum linger under his skin. When he chained her up, the chrome flashed, and for half a second he swore the faint outline of a dragon’s eye blinked back at him from the tank. Gone before he could blink himself.
Inside, the harsh fluorescent buzz didn’t suit him. He wandered the aisles, collected Saniyah’s smokes, the odd items on her handwritten list: peroxide, cinnamon oil, black salt, and three boxes of matches. The clerk didn’t even blink—Seattle was used to odd shopping carts.
At the counter, the teenager with a septum ring muttered, “That’s one hell of a Monday survival kit.”
Lucky just grinned. “You don’t know the half of it.”
On the ride back, Talon purred deeper, as though pleased by his purchases. Or maybe by his choices.
He pulled up at a red light beside three shiny new Harleys, the rider's spotless cuts proclaiming "Sons of Silence — Everett Chapter". Unsanctioned wannabees.
They gave him the once-over, sneering at the battered leathers and the unadorned cutoff vest. The sneer didn't overlook Talon nee Knuckles.
One revved his throttle, cocky grin plastered under mirrored shades.
Lucky didn’t make a sound. Talon did. The pipes thundered; a dragon waking. The air itself shimmered with the heat of it.
Both bikers flinched, visibly rattled, pretending to fiddle with their mirrors until the light went green.
Lucky chuckled low. “Easy, girl. They’re not worth it.”
But deep down, he knew the truth. She had opinions now. And one day, she might not wait for him to decide who was worth it.
Just Another Manic Monday Chapter 16 - Back to the Zit
The ride back was smooth, almost too smooth. The daytime Ave wasn’t known for peace, but today traffic slid aside like a river parting around a stone.
Pedestrians stepped back from the curb without looking. Even the panhandler by the Shell station gave Lucky a solemn nod, like he’d seen something sliding beside him that wasn’t visible to the rest.
Talon purred the whole way, steady and low, like she was satisfied.
They coasted into the Zit’s back lot, tires crunching gravel. He dismounted, unstrapped the pharmacy bag from the sissy bar, and started to pick it up. Then froze, eyes wide with amazement.
Across the face of the paper were three jagged lines, each about six inches long, raked corner to corner. They shimmered faintly, the rips exposing a rainbow light that shimmered like oil in water.
Lucky blinked. The scratches remained. The cigarettes were untouched and the bottles clinked inside, waiting.
He glanced then at the tank. For the first time, the ghost-image wasn’t imagination or trick of light.
A dragonet’s outline, delicate and spectral, curled along the steel, One taloned forefoot raised, claws extended: Matching the slashes on the bag, perfectly.
Raven’s voice drifted from the upstairs window, lazy and amused:
“You bring me anything fun, lover?”
He lifted the shredded bag to show her, the light reflecting the morning sunlight.
Her laughter rang down. “Guess she decided for you.”
Saniyah appeared beside Raven, her hair still damp, robe cinched. She leaned on the sill, studying both man and machine. Her eyes narrowed, thoughtful. Not alarmed. More like a midwife watching something being born.
“Don’t label her yet,” she called down. “She hasn’t finished deciding.”
Lucky tilted his head back, looking at them, then at Talon. He felt the grin crawl up from somewhere deep in his chest. "I believe she has."
“You’re my maker,” he said softly to the tank. “But you’re not my master.”
The pipes answered with a single, sharp bark. Not a misfire. A statement. Agreement.
The rainbow scratches on the bag pulsed once more then faded, leaving only three faint, charred lines.
Lucky carried the goods inside. Behind him, Talon sat gleaming in the lot, quiet but watchful, as though she was no longer merely parked, but standing guard.
End Chapter 16
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