Summary:Ambrose and Severin run into one another in a seedy bar, and hilarity and violence ensue. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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It's been one of those days for the Jackal. Even after his semi-weekly ride on the subway to let the Bane nibble until it was sated and even after he was absolutely certain the tip would pan out as to the vases from 3000 B.C. — it did not. It wasn't a trap, but the items were fakes and he had to scarper because the shift change of rent-a-cops nearly swept him up into it. The one dropping the hint has been moved from the column of trust to the column of 'a visit'. Insert ominous music here.
That being said, Ambrose is currently slouched in a chair at a table tucked into the corner of a seedy bar over on the docks of Brooklyn. It reminds him of his old watering hole…or what was the place in Shanghai all those decades ago, in the mid-Twenties. He's on his second pint of stout and by his expression he's got aimed at the sidewalk through the grungy window, he's enjoying its numbing effects on his mind. The wane light falls in across his deep-red button-down shirt beneath the black leather motorcycle jacket and equally-dark jeans. By the jackboots and helmet slung over the back of his chair, he must own the cafe racer motorcycle parked next to the curb.
Taking a deep set of gulps from his glass, the master-thief licks his lips and scans the bar idly. Hmm. Who looks like they want a fight today…
*
Severin has a lot of friends in low places, folks who know where to find things, mostly illegal things, contacts all over the city that he can tap into to get a line on a deal. Tonight, he is heading down to the docks to meet one of those contacts, gathering some information for a little job he wants to get his little group in on. And so he comes strolling on into the bar and makes his way over to it, ordering himself a pint and then taking a look around the room to see just who he might see.
He doesn't notice Ambrose at first, but he does notice the guy toward the back matching the description that he was given — large, blue mohawk, tattoo of a spider on the side of his head. There may be a few of those in New York, but he suspected this one was his. He makes his way over and slides into the booth across from the man, taking his pint with him.
*
Ambrose, however, notices him. With impulse control, he keeps himself from sitting up further in his seat and, in a sense, giving away the recognition. His oceanic-blue eyes linger on Severin and mark his passage through the bar's spread of tables and questionable folk of all shapes and sizes. Pool balls crack in the corner and someone shouts something ribald; the other player cusses back, and bawdy laughter ensues.
The Jackal scratches at the line of his jaw idly before rising to his feet. He meanders up to the front, orders two more of whatever Severin bought up to be delivered, and then passes by his table to take up his drink and helmet. He approaches obliquely on Severin's half of the booth and, ignoring propriety entirely, takes up an easy lean on the booth's vertical dividing architecture.
"It is indeed a very small world," he comments quietly, hiding most of his pleased smile behind a slug of his stout. His eyes fall to Severin and linger. "Are you aware of whom you're getting into business with, pullet?" Whether or not Mohawk recognizes the Jackal is moot; he gets a toothy and blatantly unkind grin.
*
Mohawk looks up when Ambrose encroaches on the conversation that he and Severin were having and his expression darkens. Oh, he recognizes the Jackal — that much is certain, and it doesn't seem to be with fondness either. His words don't seem to help the situation. "Fuck off," Mohawk says to Ambrose before looking back at Severin. "You tell your brother I'll get you what you asked for." He then begins to lumber to his feet, rising up to tower over Ambrose.
Severin glances up when Mohawk does, and a grin spreads across his lips, both at recognizing the man, and at Mohawk's reaction, seeming more entertained than anything else. "Mhmn," Severin says. "We've done business before. Couldn't stay away, though, could you? Sorry I'm a bit over-dressed this time around." He watches as Mohawk stands and looms, but just sprawls comfortably on his side of the booth, lifting his pint for another drink.
"Mmm. Quaint." Ambrose drags his eyes up and down Mohawk and dismisses him with the way he turns to look back at Severin. "I prefer you over-dressed than as to the opposite state. As to staying away, I'd rather say it's you who couldn't." He argues this with the same moue of enjoyment a cat might toying with a mouse. "After all, I was here first, and my claim is a true one."
Then, he throws back the rest of his stout and puts the glass aside on Severin's table. Still holding his motorcycle helmet loosely by two fingers tucked within the foam padding, he takes a deep breatha and turns his attention back to Mohawk.
"Now then, you homely volucrine ink-spattered bastard — at least buy me a drink before you offer up a good shag." And the eat-shit grin on his face follows.
*
"That's the first time I've heard that," Severin tells Ambrose with an amused little smile, eyes sparkling. "I had business," he says, nodding toward Mohawk. "Didn't even notice you were here til you decided to come over and flirt." He takes up his pint and takes another swallow.
Mohawk takes one look at that grin, and he just hauls off and throws a punch at Ambrose, not even bothering to comment back. He's at least sober, and he's got a bit of power behind that punch.
Severin quickly finishes off his beer, holding up one finger in a wait-a-minute gesture, because he's not about to get caught in the middle of this brawl without finishing his beer first.
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 10
*
Two pints are not in Ambrose's favor right off the bat. It's luck that keeps him from being hit much more full on to the face. He's able to at least jink to one side so the knuckles of Mohawk's fist glance from his cheekbone and not his nose. Still, it stings and rattles him enough to make him stumble backwards. His free hand goes out and plants itself on another table nearby, more than enough to count as interrupting the conversation being held there.
"Pardon me, so sorry," he slurs airily towards the occupants, all three of whom are glowering something fierce now, one with a fist clenched on the table. "In my defense, he swung FIRST."
Around comes the motorcycle helmet, aimed for Mohawk's head in a quick arcing blur of matte black thermoplastic.
*
|ROLL| Severin +rolls 1d20 for: 11
Severin manages to finish off his pint quickly once the swinging starts. Mohawk glowers as Ambrose doesn't quite go down with the punch as he'd intended, and keeps coming. He tries to take another swing, and there's Severin popping out of the booth to try and grab hold of his arm, "Alright, big guy, why don't y'jus' sit back down here, have another drink." Unfortunately, that arm is already on its way toward Ambrose for another swing, and he just ends up getting sort of elbowed for his efforts.
One of the group at the table Ambrose stumbled into stands up just as that thermoplastic comes into contact with Mohawk's head, stending him stumbling a bit, and instead of hitting Ambrose, ends up decking the guy who just stood up from the booth, instead.
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 20
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 17
*
"Oh-ho-ho, you poor bastards, that sounded like it might have hurt," the Jackal crows as he stumbles back into Severin's table. Mohawk's drink is a goner; there it goes in a wash across the surface and down into the booth seat itself, thankfully not on Severin's side.
"Now, now, pullet, stay out of this. I wouldn't want you to end up — " Another of the group at the table slips around the fracas that now includes Mohawk and one of his buddies (we'll call this one Kerchief, the one involved with Mohawk) and throws a wild haymaker at Ambrose for…drunken reasons. This one, Goldtooth, hits nothing but air and receives a strong uppercut into his gut for his efforts. He wheezes and slumps to the bar's flooring. Ambrose lifts up his hands and laughs wildly, still holding the helmet.
"Try me again, you fucking luna — " Seeing a glass flying at him, he ducks it and it shatters on the wall behind his head. "Fucking lunatics!" he finishes far more quietly, wide-eyed despite himself.
*
|ROLL| Severin +rolls 1d20 for: 9
The sudden rush of others from the neighboring table into the fray causes Severin to take a step back. Unfortunately, he does so just as a server is coming around with a tray of drinks, which causes a collision and though he narrowly escaped being soaked by Mohawk's drink, he is now covered in the beer that just poured off the edge of the tray as four glasses tip sideways. Like a cat that just got hit with a squirt bottle, his face squinches up a bit for a moment and he mutters something under his breath.
"Be careful, bitch," says the third member of the Goldtooth, Kerchief, and Unfortunate Tattoos trio. We'll call him Unf for short, ends up catching some of the spray from the falling beers, which do nothing to accentuate his greasy hair or unfortunate ink choices. He goes to give the server a shove, and Severin puts a hand on his shoulder, "Now, that ain't a way to treat a lady."
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 2
*
"Make him eat his words, Rabbit!" Ambrose yells overtop the growing scrum of Mohawk, Kerchief and Goldtooth — the most latter who's managed to clamber to his feet only to get shoved by the Jackal into an open space between tables. "Pissant little shit," he hisses and makes to spit on the man's back.
However, Mohawk, having put Kerchief down with a well-aimed punch, whirls and slams a hand around Ambrose's throat. He rolls a shoulder up and the choking Jackal only succeeds in nailing him in the bicep with the motorcycle helmet this time. Mohawk rips it from his intoxicated grip and throws it to one side; it rolls away, lost for now.
Then, the choking Brit is bodily lifted from the ground and SLAMMED into a glass-paned display of knicknacks. Glass shatters behind and onto him as he wheezes, gone half-limp even as the Bane begins nipping at Mohawk's hand.
*
|ROLL| Severin +rolls 1d20 for: 6
"I don't need you to be my fucking knight in shining armor, you dumb shit," the server says and promptly bashes Severin over the head with one of the empty beer steins that had been on the tray. She then smacks Unf in the face with the tray itself, sending him reeling backward. When she sees Ambrose go flying into the display she says, "That's /it/! All you testosterone-poisoned asshats get /out/ of this bar before the cops get here." The bartender, of course, already started dialing by the time he saw Mohawk going for Ambrose the first time.
Severin grips his head with one hand, and ducks, trying to get out of the way of the nearly unhinged server who is clearly having a /bad/ day. He scoots backward a bit more, and almost crashes into Mohawk.
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 14
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 18
Mohawk gets nice and close to Ambrose's face to hiss something rather rude. It's enough to make the Jackal's gritted teeth turn into an honest snarl despite his inability to land a punch on the sturdy man's body anywhere. Mohawk pulls back his hand to deliver what is going to be a nose-breaking punch, heedless of the server screeching in the background, when the brush of Severin stumbling nearby distracts him.
That's when Ambrose nails Mohawk in the leg with the heel of his jackboot; the joint makes a disgusting crackling sound of ligaments and cartilage displaced sideways and Mohawk yowls. He drops Ambrose to grip at the limb as weight bearing suffers to one side and the Jackal then nails him with a mighty downwards arcing of both fists clutched together to the side of the head.
"And stay down, you bloody git!" he snarls, voice sounding a little forced. Stepping overtop Mohawk, he wobbles over towards Severin and stops, almost faceplanting when his ankle is suddenly gripped. A firm STOMP on the fingers reaching for him and then he's beside the drink-doused young man.
"Alright, Rabbit. Anyone else you need put down?" he asks, grinning despite the cut on his cheek and glass in his hair. His eyes are wild and the bar light flashes through his pupils in carmine. "I've nothing else to do with my free time as of now!"
*
|ROLL| Severin +rolls 1d20 for: 6
|ROLL| Severin +rolls 1d20 for: 11
|ROLL| Severin +rolls 1d20 for: 13
|ROLL| Severin +rolls 1d20 for: 6
Severin stares at Ambrose, dripping, and smelling of cheap beer, with a bit of glass in his hair and blood running down the side of his head. He just silently points at Unf, who is coming back for another round. A gesture which earns him another whack from the server's tray to the back of his head, which he isn't quite quick enough to push away.
"I said get /out/," she says firmly, eyes flashing and ready to use that try again if need be.
Severin lets out another growling sound, and then he simply turns and walks out. This was definitely not how he'd planned this entire situation to go down.
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 17
|ROLL| Ambrose +rolls 1d20 for: 4
*
Ambrose turns to see Unf on the way over and he claps his hands together as if it were Christmas Day and he'd found the presents. "Wonderful. I shall be but a tic." He throws himself bodily into Unf like an old-school football lineman and they both crash into another table, this time with the unfortunate Unf on the bottom. This table is not as sturdy. Alas, poor table. Unf doesn't get up, not after Ambrose is done with him, and he rises to his feet, dusting off his hands in marked dramaticism. "Righto, I believe we'll call this — "
And the server nails him in the side of the face with another pint glass.
"GET THE FUCK OUT!!!" she rails at the man stumbling to one side, his hand on his face.
"I am vacating the premises, you harridan!" the Jackal shouts back, apparently content to leave his motorcycle helmet where it lies. Spotting Severin nowhere within the bar, he then leaves the place but not without a final salute. "Thank you for hosting, it was a pl — " And he ducks another thrown glass. "Fine, and a merry fuck-you too!"
With that, he's outside and stumble-jogging onto the dusky sidewalk. "Oy! Rabbit, where did you scarper off to?" The Jackal lets out another reel of drunken laughter, semi-oblivious to the cut on his eyebrow bleeding down his face. It'll match the black eye on the 'morrow. "Heeeeere, little cottontail, come out, come out," he singsongs as he wobbles further down the sidewalk, hands in the pockets of his coat.
*
Outside the bar, Severin has surrendered the night, calling it a wash, and seems to be on his way homeward, hands in his pockets and strolling at a not particularly hurried pace. No one is following him. There's still sounds of crashing and bashing about inside, and there are plenty of people still irritated and/or getting smacked by serving trays for the cops to deal with when they arrive. The sound of the sirens are still a ways away, however, and Severin seems unconcerned. Hearing Ambrose's voice behind him, he rolls muddy green eyes and takes in a deep breath, letting it out again. "You owe me a beer," he calls over his shoulder. "One that I can drink, not wear."
There are the sounds of loose jogging footsteps approaching behind Severin and then there's the Jackal…passing by him a short distance in order to turn around and block his path. He spreads his arms and hands wide, jovially.
"Oh, come now, Rabbit. You've never had a drink poured on you before?" Ambrose is grinning crookedly, unaware that the cut has bled a line down to his jaw now. He takes a moment as something tickles on his scalp to ruffle his hands through his dark hair. Pieces of gleaming glass go flying like snowflakes and he sighs as if far more comfortable now. "But where is this claim of debt in beer stemming from? I saw you finish your entire pint — and you know that ham-handed trollop is bad business entirely." He means Mohawk, of course, and tsks in a disapproving manner.
*
Severin doesn't seem to be slowing down any, despite the jogging steps that approach from behind. As for having never had a drink poured on him before, he smirks just slightly. "Usually because I earned it." Then he points out "And yet, our business was done, and I was about to settle in to get a comfortable drunk on before you showed up and started shit," which was, in fact, the case. "So, beer. You owe me one." It makes sense to him, anyway, and he doesn't seem too concerned whether it makes sense to the Jackal. THough the man stopping and holding his arms out to the sides, blocking his path, does bring him to a halt. "You need a hug?" he asks.
*
Ambrose blinks at the question and brings in his arms as quickly as a startled clam might disappear into the sand. "No," he scoffs, his grin replaced with a wrinkle of his nose. "No, I don't need a hug. What — is that sort of gesture not used for halting someone anymore? It works bloody well enough on horses, after all." The Jackal makes another soft sound in the back of his throat and eyes Severin. A contemplative handful of seconds pass before he puffs a hard sigh.
"So be it. It will be no hardship on my part, buying you a pint. I might even consider two if I can convince you to showcase your talents. A drunken kangaroo sounds so very charming." He smirks. "Though might I add, your talents do not lie in ducking — and before you point a finger, I am far more inebriated than you are, so my blame lies in drink and not in inability," the Jackal points out with a little weaving in place.
*
The blink at the question and the sudden closing up like e clam actually makes Severin laugh, and not just a little laugh, but a shoulder shaking laugh, one hand coming to rest on his stomach, "Oh god the look on your face…" He does not, in fact, explain that yes, that gesture also works on people, because that would take the fun out of it.
"Fine, you buy me a pint, and I will show you some of my talents, which could be a real quick way to clear out a bar," he chuckles. Then smirks and says, "Yeah well, I was definitely off my game, tonight." He can admit that much. His bar fighting skills have been getting rusty since living it up comfortably as a shop cat lately. "Clearly I need to get into more bar fights."
*
The cheeky grin appears on Ambrose's face again and he lifts his chin, proudly declaring, "Then you've got the man to aid you in your efforts. I have been enlivening bars since…" He pauses, looking off to one side. He frowns a little more and then clears his throat. A little wriggle runs through him as if someone dragged a finger down his back.
"Since the early 1900s, really. I've all the time in the world, apparently, to indulge myself in these things." He laughs again, the sound warm and thick. "Would you like the drink in the future or now? We'll no doubt have to vacate the general neighborhood in order to avoid being swept up in the fracas and the buttons if you've a preference for the current time." Buttons being the police, whose sirens are still on the approach.
*