"Oi nah, fuck off mate." Gia said rather rudely to the retired Yellow Ranger who had just revealed her previous status to the current Yellow Ranger.
Noah gasped, "Gia, you should respect your elders. I am so sorry," he said, turning to the retired Red Ranger.
Jayden, breaking his broody face, gave the new Rangers a patient smile. "It's okay." His face then returned to its usual constipated look.
"So this is the new hang out?" Mike asked, casting his eyes around the Juice Shop. "Not bad."
"Woops," Emily laughed. "Paper cut." She held up her finger, showing them the small cut that dribbled blood onto the table.
Kevin paled considerably and turned away from the dripping blood.
"Not again," Mia sighed, rolling her eyes at the ex-Blue Ranger. "He hates the sight of blood."
"I thought he was dedicated to the cause?" Jake said, giving poor Kevin a sceptical look.
"Well, yes but at the same time no. Before he was a Ranger he was a Canadian vampire." Mia explained. "He reverted back to his human status, as you can see," Mia demonstrated the change by pressing a clove of garlic to his face. "But seeing blood reminds him of his vampire days."
"Wow," Emily said, giving Kevin an admiral look. "He's so deep."
The rest of the retired team nodded in agreement. Kevin was the most complex of them all.
"And even though he's now an American citizen, his Canadian roots leave him incapable of actually committing any violence," Mia continued.
"Yeah, he never really fought with us; Ben would pretend to be the Blue Ranger." Jayden said, waving over a slender blonde woman in a red dress.
"Wow," Noah breathed as he committed every word of Kevin's back-story to memory to later add to his shrine.
Although always happy to hear about Kevin's tragic past, Mike was finding it hard to concentrate on the new people without any sustenance and so he waved the waiter over.
"One Tutti-Frutti Deluxe, and ten waters, thanks."
"Coming right up," said a familiar voice.
Moving as one creepy looking unit, the five ex-Rangers plus Ben all turned to look up at Dekker. Dekker looked back wearing a slightly confused expression and a frilly apron.
"Is something wrong?" He asked warily.
The new Rangers very cleverly picked up on the tense atmosphere and began to awkwardly play cards.
"Dekker." Jayden growled, turning up the anger on his face to furious.
Dekker's eyes widened. "Oh. Oh shit! It's you guys!" He took a half step back, wielding his pen at Jayden's face.
"What are you doing here?" Mia asked, scowling as hard as she could.
"I work here," Dekker said, resisting the urge to add 'obviously'. "It's not easy being evil, you know? Have to make ends meet somehow."
Jayden managed to unclench his jaw long enough to share a look with his retired comrades.
"Aww, that's so sad." Emily cried, giving Dekker a pitying look.
Mike had reached the point of sustenance deprivation where he had no idea what was going on and was starting to get upset that his drink was taking so long and began to cry, earning himself some raised eyebrows from the new Rangers and Dekker.
Jayden took an exaggerated deep breath and repeated the mantra 'you're retired' in his head. "Just get us the drinks."
Dekker nodded and scuttled off to the kitchen, glad that he wasn't going to be dragged into some fight that would magically transport him to the middle of some forest and definitely get him fired.
"I'm beginning to think you guys aren't as fair dinkum as advertised," Gia said.
Apart from Noah, who was in reverence of the retired Rangers, the new team was in silent agreement with Gia.
This was the wrong thing for Gia to say. Mia had been going through some stuff and was very sensitive to criticism and having her Ranger authenticity questioned turned her into a sobbing, inconsolable mess.
"Now you've done it," Emily said. Patting Mia's hair—it was very pretty and she not-so-secretly wanted to cut it off and make a wig for herself.
"We're totally hard yakka," Jayden defended, turning his ultimate glare of doom onto the new Yellow Ranger.
"You wanna go, mate?" She asked, standing abruptly.
"No." He turned his head away from them as if that was a socially acceptable way to communicate with people.
"Weak tea." Gia said disapprovingly.
It was then that Dekker returned with their drinks, which was lucky for Mike, who was nearing a comatose state.
"Water?" Mia wailed. "Is that all I'm worth?"
And before anyone could deny or agree with the sentiment, she inhaled the water, gasped and flailed her arms for a few moments then fell, dead, across the table in a dramatic fashion.
Not at all fazed by the sudden turn of events, because they were Rangers (retired or not), and nothing had the ability to surprise them anymore. Mike tucked a ten dollar note into Dekker's apron because he was feeling generous enough to pay for his drink for once; Emily plugged Kevin into the portable maple syrup IV they had on hand for such situations and Jayden and Ben led what was left of their team out the door, hand in hand.
Speechless, the new team of Rangers stated open mouthed at the dead Mia on the table. Noah discreetly snapping a photo—she still looked alive enough for it to later end up on his wall—and then they quickly turned tail and ran, leaving poor Dekker to deal with the police and once again lose his job.