The Grafton

[Patrick Llewelyn] He'd consulted the open mic listings for the evening, and low and behold there was an Irish Pub with one for a Monday evening in the city.

4530 N. Lincoln Avenue turned out to be The Grafton Pub & Grill, and old fashioned establishment with an L shaped design. Wooden tables ran the length of one side upon entry, and a row of chairs set up against a counter along the other. The bar had quite the array of drafts on hand up toward the corner most juncture, and branched off into a back seating area with soft lounges set around low coffee tables and complete with an open fire. For all that the place bore an Irish flavor, it was not filled with brogue-speaking servers behind the bar.

It was, in actual point, quite like most other venues of its caliber in the area.

There was no stage set up at the Grafton, rather musicians lending their talent to the place sat in a corner with a microphone and chair; playing to the patrons seated and standing, milling and talking. It was, the Galliard supposed, intended to promote a more intimate experience. Here, you were not on a stage above the crowd, but part of them. It did, however, make focusing slightly more of a challenge.

Those performing were seated at tables around the long front bar area, a scattering of guitar cases and singers.

There had been two women on stage before Patrick exchanged places with one, briefly congratulating her in an undertone. For his own performance however, the Galliard was paced. Patient. That he had some skill with the guitar in his grip was evident in the manner he coaxed its rhythm along with the slower, bluesy song he chose to sing. It was not a known composition, and many listening must have supposed it to be his own.

It spoke of home, and of what lands a person might fight to see again, at what cost. Nothing deeply original to its context, but those who knew what he was, or perhaps who he was, could see the deeper significance to the choice. When he finishes, there is polite applause; and some whistling from the over-eager drinkers at the back. The Fiann murmurs something like a thank you into the mic, and rises; plucking up a glass of beer set beside him on a small table.

[Patrick Llewelyn] [I'm always afraid to roll this. Did he do alright?]

[Imogen Slaughter] Her pure breeding infiltrates the pub like a miasma. It seeps between the humans, unremarked by them, but indelible to him.

The kinswoman is sitting in a corner booth, alone, with a pint of beer on her table. The pub is an intimate affair, the kind of place one goes as a serious musician (where you can see the whites of the eyes of your listeners), and as a serious music aficionado. The beers are best on draft, and the food is a cut above most pub food. The fake Irish style is not quite so forced, here. The employees and owners and musicians tend to truly love Celtic tradition, rather than put it on as a costume for a gimmick.

The kinswoman is dressed in jeans, a light blouse beneath a heavier sweater. She has no instrument with her, but her fingers tap in time with the music, keeping perfect time as the next singer strikes up a song - a traditional ballad.

Her eyes had been on the new singer, but as Patrick moves among the crowd, the once-Fianna kinfolk's gaze shifts, moving toward him. Should their eyes meet, she will nod, however slightly, in acknowledgement.

[Patrick Llewelyn] Most often of late when someone meets Patrick Llewelyn, he's dressed in a navy blue work-suit best seen on repairmen and smells, rather potently, of motor-oil and car grease. It was not all that common to meet of his ilk that enjoyed working days at a very human occupation but it was something that the Galliard did for reasons two-fold. For one, it helped steady his anger, burned down his energy to levels he could readily control and two, he found it a genuinely stimulating occupation.

Fixing cars, re-building them from scratch.

There was a lot that was to be said, after all, for honest work done with your bare hands. Tonight though, as he moves through the crowd, his guitar case solid in one hand, his other taken up by a glass of beer he's dressed to match those whom he was performing for. His leather jacket was not new, but scuffed and worn enough that it could have been designed that way to begin with. Paired with it was a long sleeved button down dress shirt almost the shade of his eyes and jeans.

His hair needed very little altering; it was kept too short to matter much what he did to it.

When his eyes meet the red-head Kinswoman, it is not for the first time he's seen her; it can't have been with her breeding. She must know that, perhaps its why her eyes seek him out as he's moving nearer to her and he alters his direction to pass toward where she sits, pressed into a corner booth.

"Didn't know I'd be playing for a familiar face," he says by way of greeting, and cants his head toward the empty half of the booth. "Mind?"

[Patrick Llewelyn] [This is where we are, newcomers! http://www.thegrafton.com/media/ ]

[Imogen Slaughter] Imogen leans back as he approaches, an accommodation she makes for his height, tipping her head back to look at him.

"S'not tha' familiar," she points out, a little wryly. He cants his head toward the empty half of the booth, and she moves her hand in a brief gesture toward it. "Be my guest." Her hand lowers but not to the table, instead to the pint glass which she picks up and from which she drinks deeply.

"You're not bad," she observes, mildly.

[Patrick Llewelyn] His mouth twists a little and he slides the guitar case in first, and sets it against the wall before slipping in after it.

"At least I could pick you out of the crowd when you heckled," he counters evenly, and frames big hands around his own pint of beer, rolling it slightly from side to side so the froth drapes over and over in circular waves against the sides of the glass. He doesn't bother to remove his jacket, which could read either he doesn't intend to stay long or he's not comfortable sitting there overly long with her.

If anyone was hyper aware of how stifling their own company could be, it was this man.

Being near him, while nothing remotely close to the impact of a full moon, was an experience, none the less. She comments that he isn't bad, and he lifts both shoulders in a slight shrug as if to say what can you do, apparently so while studying at once the bar's occupants, and her face, or the suggestion of her expression out of the corner of his eye. "You play, too, don't you? That or you enjoy haunting open mic nights."

[Drew Roscoe] The day had been a busy one, and nothing said 'come in and relax' like a pub that boasted Irish roots. The interview had gone precisely as swimmingly as Drew had expected-- she had a good word put in for her, and her charm and bright, warm smile had only sealed the deal. They handed her paperwork on the spot and she'd spent a good two or three hours that afternoon working on human resources and benefits paperwork.

Immediately following that had been a considerably lengthy phone conference in regards to real estate, which she'd made while taking up space in a quiet, warm area with a bottle of water and a notebook open in front of her. The sun had set by the time she was back out on the sidewalk, and while she felt like she'd accomplished much she also felt like the day had taken a lot from her, and she needed to win it back with a big tall frothy glass of something full of hops and on tap.

The door to The Grafton opened and closed, and this time that brought in a petite young woman dressed up like she was a part of the business world. Drew had her thick dark hair twisted up into a braided loop at the back of her head, a pair of charcoal slacks and black heels, and a soft white scarf around her neck hanging over the front of her dark blue winter coat. She made a beeline right for the bar, without taking the moment to look around and soak up the environment just yet. Her jacket was shrugged off, revealing underneath a royal purple silk blouse and a cropped jacket in a similar gray to the slacks. With the coat hung over the back of a stool at the bar, Drew settled in two seats down from a couple of friends having a good conversation that mixed in with the rest of the background noise at the pub.

She'd wait for the bartender to come to her rather than flag him down, and smile to him, compliment the tattoo on his arm, and order a tall glass of whatever was on tap that he liked the best. He'd smile back, start the girl up a tab under the name 'Roscoe', and fetch her drink while she waited.

[Imogen Slaughter] "Hm," she says, her wit almost a reflex, unbacked by humour, "that's me. The heckler in th'crowd."

Patrick may fear his company is stifling. He may be aware of the wafts of rage that come from him, the way the waitress shrinks away when he stands there, the way the audience enjoys the music, just a little bit less because they find his stage aura a little too far on the dangerous side.

Then there's the other possibility. The men and women that thrive on the danger. That watch him with hungry eyes, or eyes, wanting to start a fight.

Imogen is a stark contrast to the norm. She is calm and composed in his presence, either a brilliant actress, or possessing nerves of steel. She watches him steadily, her gaze more direct than most, her voice even when she speaks.

"I don't play much anymore," she says. "But I still like to listen." She lifts her chin indicating the musician's area, "The bloke after this one is apparently someone t'watch."

[Patrick Llewelyn] "I picked that," he throws back with a sort of careless grace, the lack of inflection in his voice a match for the lack of outright humor in her own. "You had the heckler look that first night in the bar." There's the return of his attention, then, or that his eyes snap back to her face and it gives leave to the notion his interest had been elsewhere; which was untrue.

Drew Roscoe enters; though the Garou across from Imogen does not instinctively know her by name, he can smell her, much as he can Imogen seated across from him. It was, sometimes with the truely bred Kin women and men around him like being lost in a garden of scented flowers. Each held their own distinctive aroma, yet placed together in a bouquet; it took a moment to separate each.

This one that reaches him simply says Fenrir. For a Garou, it was stronger again, typically, backed up by the wash of their Rage. Patrick's expression does not so much alter as his head turns, briefly, as he detects it. "Maybe the bloke after this guy will change your mind and inspire you." He says bloke like an American, it is not as musical, or natural as it sounds coming from her; but then, his voice possessed its own brand of it.

[Imogen Slaughter] Imogen's gaze flicks in the direction that Patrick's head turns. She has no sense of the breeding, but she has a sense of the change in the Garou's attention. And she knows Drew by sight.

She finds her, after several moments, the Fenrir kin's back turned toward them as she faces the bar.

"Perhaps," she says, mildly, her voice offering no emotion, one way or the other on her opinion of this likelihood.

She tilts her head back toward the bar, and Drew, sitting at it. "Her name is Drew," she says. "A half-blood Fenrir."

[Hunter] The next person through the bar doors has no breeding, none to mark him at least. But Rage, oh he has plenty of that, plenty enough that the he has to literally wave the barman over before he can get served. He gets a pint of some dark beer, sips at it and turns around on the spot, eyes scanning the room. Of course, Patrick doesn't have to guess about this one, or play games with the kinfolk. He knows him, and Hunter ambles on over. He slides up a chair backwards against the end of their table and straddles it, places his beer in front of him.

"Evenin' Pattykins."

He has been hanging out with Howard far too much.

[Tabitha Reese] The Fury strides in, pausing just inside the door to take in the room and it's occupants. Patrick seems vaguely familiar, but not enough to capture her attention for very long. In search of alcohol ultimately, she makes her way to the bar and waits for the bartender's attention.

[Patrick Llewelyn] It must be difficult in a sense to be a woman of Imogen Slaughter's age, and standing, to know certainly you've watched enough versions of every other tribe's Garou come and go and die to recognize the sorts they are, and how they intend on treating you in respect to how they view themselves -- it must be difficult, one would imagine, sometimes, to sit across from someone younger than yourself and recall that in the Nation's eyes, they were considered your better.

Of course, to wager that it was, was to credit the monsters with a great deal of influence over the Fianna Kinswoman.

Perhaps she did not believe anything of the sort to be a challenge. Patrick's focus has since swung back to Imogen, and he has been dwelling on some degree of similar sort himself to read what little of it lay exposed in his gaze, or expression. She notes the girl is called Drew, and there's a brief flex of a muscle at the corner of the Cliath's lip.

Clearly, the name rang some bell.

The torrent of Rage precedes Hunter, then, and before Patrick can do more than raise his eyebrows at the Ahroun, he's straddling a chair and greeting him, he nods his head at him, eyes on Imogen. "You remember this guy from the other night, I don't doubt." He pointedly ignores the nickname.

There's a Fury joining the bouquet of scents, but it is lost to the others occupying Patrick's attention just now.

[Imogen Slaughter] The flicker of Patrick's expression does not go unnoticed. Imogen's eyebrow arches, then only arches further as Hunter approaches with his particularly unique greeting.

There's a brief pause, then her memory clicks. "Yes," she says, "Hunter, isn't it?"

[Drew Roscoe] The tender sets a glass down in front of Drew and smiles his most charming smile, and tells her: "Carlsberg. Real full of hops and still nice and crisp. If you need me to recommend you anything else you just say so." She smiles right back and turns back to face him, having been preoccupied with tucking her scarf into a pocket of her coat so it wouldn't get lost or fall on the floor. "No one else," she assures him, and lifts the glass in something of a salute before taking a drink. He grins, winks, and moves on to Tabitha-- but there's a brief pause, hesitation striking him in the joints and eyes before he pushes himself forward. Rage set him on edge, had caused him to stop for a second, but he swallowed that back long enough to get her something she wanted-- quickly, so he could get be done with her all the sooner.

Drew's attention turned to the door when more people came in-- Hunter, she recognized him from that cafe, as the guy that had ground Linus and Kora's nerves in all the wrong ways. Tabitha caught her eye at the bar also, and Drew pressed her mouth into a line before taking another drink of her beer and deciding not to invite conversation. Rather, she drew her phone from her pocket and pressed a few buttons to browse through the photos, pruning ones she didn't want taking up memory anymore.

There's a brief glance back over her shoulder, there was too much background noise for her to catch her own name or hear that she's apparently 'half-blooded', but she did spot that bright red hair and familiar face beneath it. Patrick's face swam into memory as well. They were looking to each other now, and Drew contemplated for another moment before deciding that she didn't need to go join.

Rather, she looked at pictures on her phone and drank her beer. She wanted to be warm and fuzzy before she went back to the motel.

[Tabitha Reese] Alcohol secured, she leans back against the bar and looks around the room. The guy she recognized is with Hunter now, and she does a quick inventory to see if Howard is also in attendance tonight.

[Drew Roscoe] A minute or so ticks by, and Drew's cleared out and explored most corners of her phone-- changed the background picture on her screen and a few ringtones before deciding to go into the phonebook, find a name, stare at it for a second, then dial out. The phone-- a simple thing, newer but the sort that you got for free when you started a plan with a provider-- was held up to her ear, and Drew took another drink and tapped her nail on the glass while waiting for the other end to pick up.

"Hey, it's Drew. Yeah, the girl." She'd grin and jump right to the point rather than try to chit-chat over the sound of a pub in the evening. "I got a job and somehow I'm celebrating this alone. You wanna join me for a drink?"

[Hunter] Hunter she says, and Hunter it is.

"Ya, that's me. Nice ta' see ya' again." He winks at her, takes a few gulps of his beer. Drew recognises him as a guy who grinds her tribes gears, and if he's honest they grind his gears too. Except JoJo, she's aight. Yeah she can stay.

"Damn vikings." He says, after looking towards the bar, then grins at Imogen and Patrick.

Yep, good work Hunter.

[Patrick Llewelyn] The performer playing on in the background of their conversation finishes to applause and is soon replaced by the man Imogen had noted was worth paying attention to. He says his introductions into the microphone before he begins to play, another guitarist with a deeper voice than both Patrick and his predecessor to the performer's corner of the bar.

Like every other establishment of its kind, there was no smoking permitted inside so those few brave souls that deemed their addiction strong enough clustered around heaters out the front; green umbrellas strapped tight against the elements around outside tables. Inside, though, it was cozy.

A fire crackled in the lounge section of the Grafton, with small tables set around four a piece plush chairs; the comfortable seating alternative to the more standard bar section where most everyone seemed to be mingling to watch the musicians perform. Hunter responds, one imagines, in his own manner to Imogen's query regarding his identity and Patrick watches their brief interlude with no small amount of amusement -- most of it seems directed at Hunter, truth be told.

Leaning back, he braces an elbow against the back of the booth, his jacket falling open to reveal the black lining; the suggestion of his build where the shirt pulls taunt. "You're right," he notes to Imogen, fingers tapping idly to the song playing.

"He is good."

[Remy] Whatever answer Drew got must have been affirmative. Twenty or so minutes later -- it's not that far from the BroHo to the Mile, even on foot and by El -- the door swings open on one rugged young buck, turning sideways to let some other pub patrons scurry on out before heading in.

He doesn't see Drew first. He actually sees Patrick first, which puts an automatic and immediate frown on his face even while he's tugging his scarf off, stuffing his wool cap in his pocket. A gloved hand quickly scuffs through his shortish dark hair, mowing it up into a sort of deliberate disorder. He passes the Fianna's table without comment, but without shying his gaze away, until Patrick's well out of his frontal field of vision.

Then he's at the bar. And the frown relaxes into a smirk as he passes Tabitha, hooking his foot into the leg of her barstool and giving a good yank -- not quite hard enough to topple her, but damn close.

"B.D.," he says, affectionate-like, hiking his thumb at Drew. "Why don'tcha join the girl and I for a drink. She landed a job."

Then, pulling out a barstool next to Drew, he levers his solid, sturdy frame up and looks her over. "You clean up good," he comments, and unsnaps his ski jacket to strip out of it.

[Tabitha Reese] She's busy scanning the room, not noticing Remy until he all but yanks her seat out from under her. Somebody is going to get hit when she turns around, until she sees who it is. "Well, if it isn't my favorite prick with ears. Who got a job?" Her eyes follow the thumb, and she nods, following him to the table.

[Imogen Slaughter] The wink has no visible effect on the pale skinned kinfolk. "A pleasure," she says, much as she did in their first meeting.

He comments on vikings, and Imogen's eyebrow lifts. "I encourage you to say that to a Fenrir's face. I'm sure they're bound t'find it charming."

Remy enters, and Imogen's gaze shifts as he passes the table, a line forming between her eyebrows. It clears a moment later, as she turns back, first to Patrick, then to the musician playing on the same level as his audience, his body and guitar angled to give him a comfortable space from a nearby table.

"I ha' good sources," she says, her eyes remaining on the performer.

[Drew Roscoe] Remy rolls through the door and sets a determined half-glare half-stare upon Patrick while he passes the booth he and Imogen and Hunter sat at, but passed rather than stopped and moved to the bar. He'd spied Tabitha, antagonized her with the kind of affection that one jostles a frat brother or older sister with, and invited her to come join he and Drew for a drink to help celebrate the job she landed (though she never did mention what it was that she'd be doing to make money now).

When he plops onto the stool next to her, half of Drew's tall glass of beer is gone and she's grinning to greet him. "Thanks," she offered when he complimented her state of dress. She did, as a matter of fact, clean up nicely, she knew how to dress to lengthen her legs and make herself seem taller than she was (up until she was right next to you anyways). He unbuttoned his ski coat to peel it off, and Drew leaned forward to look at Tabitha as she stepped up to join them. She nipped the inside corner of her lip, staring at the Fury contemplatively for a second, then nodded her head to her in greeting and gestured to the bartender to call him over again, flashing the same smile she'd used on the man earlier even while she spoke to Remy.

"You want anything? It's on me. I hear they have great steak sandwiches."

[Kora] Places like this have a back door as well as a front. There's an old pay phone down that narrow hallway, flanked by the restroom doors. The wood paneling in the hallway is covered by graffiti as old as the pub, but the lighting is too uncertain to read anything more than the lewd intentions. The scent of smoke and garbage drifts in when the door opens or closes. There's the alley back there, a stoop where the staff might lounge on a warm summer day, smoking a cigarette, coping a break on the concrete slab with the door propped open, music filtering down the hall and out to the alley.

Kora enters from the alley, down the hallway. Red-faced from the cold, a hood pulled up to cover her hair and ears, a multicolored Fair Isle-patterned scarf wound around her neck, half-knotted at her throat, hanging down the front of her wool coat. Her hands are in the front pockets of that coat, made into fists, jammed in there, and her eyes are bright. Just in the mouth of the hallway leading to the backdoor she stops, frowning - the details of her features hard to read in the shadows of the pub, half-hidden beneath the hood - until she shakes it back off the grown of her head a fractional inch or two. She stands there for a minute or two, a liminal promise of energy about her, as if she meant to keep sailing through the place and was arrested only by some irresistible and oppositional force.

The hood falls back, a impression of a crown of pale blond hair, strong features, wide curving mouth set in a thoughtful frown, eyes narrowed as she scans the crowd, sharp-eyed, seeking. The impression lasts twenty seconds, maybe thirty, and then she's cutting through the crowd, nodding forward so that the hood is a shadow against her cheek, her body language narrowed, contained, close-in.

[Tabitha Reese] "Girl." She nods, obviously trying to be friendly but not really knowing the kin's name. She settles next to Remy, hands on her lap and out of sight.

[Patrick Llewelyn] Unlike Remy, when Patrick notices the Fenrir entering the bar he doesn't do much of anything but raise his eyebrows mildly as so much focus is put on him as he passes by; his blue eyes shift to Imogen and he notes, without much need to divulge what he does nor with a large amount of pride, which may in and of itself be surprising, "We sparred and I called him a dirty name," a beat, he adds with a sip of beer.

"Who knew calling a Fenrir a Silver Fang was bad manners."

He pauses, whether or not he has more to say on that subject or on another is lost to the addition of the Fenrir Jarl to the mix in the bar. Patrick's eyes track her, more out of interest than some fear that she may have overheard what he had said; of this it seemed abundantly clear once you'd spent any small amount of time around him --

Prayers to Broken Stone had a death wish.
He might as well have installed a flashing neon sign above his head, to ask Buried Hatchet.

[Hunter] "Shit you call anybody a fuckin' silver fang and you probs lookin' for trouble. Least where I'm from anywho."

And it's true, where Hunter is from it would be hard to find a Silver Fang that wasn't simply cruising by on his way to a better world. But there ain't no fangs here, least far as he can tell, and alls the better. If he needs his meal paid for he'll call up Joey, not that Hunter ever asks for shit from anyone else.

His head turns and he spots the burly Fenrir walking towards the bar after passing them on by and it makes Hunter grin. "He's a fuckin' staunch one ain't he?" And then there's Kora, oh lovely Kora. The place literally swimming with Vikings and Hunters face sinks, he stares at his beer.

"I totally know how them fuckin' brits felt back in the day."

[Imogen Slaughter] Imogen smirks, "What a shock," her voice is mild as she picks up her beer glass and drains it.

Kora arrives as the musician moves from one song to the next. It's one he's written himself, and he talks a little about where it came from. Not quite long enough for the crowd to become restless, but just rambling enough to mark him as still an amateur, though a talented amateur at that.

Kora approaches, tense and sharp-eyed and - though only to Imogen - late. The British kinswoman ignores Hunter's comment, instead watching the Fenrir Jarl's approach, her eyebrows arching upward in silent query.

[Tala Whitedeer] She comes out of the women's bathroom, looking around, fairly at ease despite the environment.

[Tala Whitedeer] Shee stops, glancing around, and heads for Tabitha abruptly.

[Tabitha Reese] She waves to Tala when the woman gets closer, kicking out the fourth chair for her. "Have a seat. Girlie got a job of some sort, so everybody is drinking. Seems like as good an excuse as any, right?"

[Tala Whitedeer] She sits, primly. "What?"

[Kora] The Fenrir woman does not detour by the bar. Her path is incised through the crowd, arrow-straight and arrow-sure she shoulders through the sparse crowd, past the table where Drew celebrates with Remy, a brief, direct look of acknowledgment for the latter with a flicker of dark eyes between kin and Garou and stranger - the third at the table. Kora looks as she walks, her head canted, watching, the drift of her fine blond hair like a corona in the hood's shadow.

"Doc," says Kora to Imogen when she reaches the booth where Imogen sits with Patrick and Hunter. Her gaze touches Imogen first, then the other pair of Garou, lifting her chin upward by way of acknowledgment. The low voice carries, quiet, underneath the movement of the melody as the singer finishes his patter and launches into the original song.

There's something distinctive enough about the melody, some pattern of words in the air, that Kora's dark eyes swing up from Hunter, then, over the heads of the crowd toward the stranger on the small stage. She watches him for a measure, then two, for the entirety of a phrase. There's a certain awareness, wreathed around the Skald like a skein of smoke, this cut-glass sharpness that enters the edge of her voice. "Sorry I'm late. This guy's not half-bad though." For the first time, the sharp edge of her expression breaks into a brief half smile. "And you weren't without entertainment otherwise, yeah?"

Her hands remain in her pockets, and she does not sit down. Once, she glances at Imogen's glass.

[Remy] Remy doesn't seem inclined to correct the name. 'Girl' was a perfectly good moniker, though every time it comes out of his mouth it sounds more like slang and less like a noun. He finishes climbing out of his jacket, stuffs it under his barstool, then leverages himself back up on the stool. The low lights of the bar glance off the sharp slant of his cheekbone. Darken the shadows under his solid jaw. Some girl's staring at him from across the room, answering her friend in monosyllabic non-words.

"Yeah, I'll take a sandwich. I'll split the tab with you though. You can take me out to dinner after you get your first paycheck." On that note, he reaches over and hauls Tabitha's hands out of her lap. "Don't hide your hands. Makes me think you're going to pull a knife. Or that you're diddling yourself at the very sight of me."

And he grins to show he's playing, a flash of white teeth. He's a tall fellow, but all that muscle piled on those solid bones gives him a stocky, compact look. He sits with heels hooked onto the rungs of the barstool, knees apart -- grabs the edge of the stool between his legs and jumps himself over closer to the bar in little hops between thumping his fist for some attention.

"Can I get the hefeweizen on tap here?" Given past experience, Remy'll probably repeat this at ever-louder intervals until someone responds.

[Tabitha Reese] She gets very still when Remy grabs her hands without warning, eyes widening and breathing becoming instantly shallow and rapid. When words come out, they're low and in more of a half growl than her usual voice. "Let me the fuck go."

[Tala Whitedeer] "Oh. You shouldn't touch her hands."

[Drew Roscoe] Tala joins the mix, sitting beside Tabitha at the bar, so now the line-up went Tala, Tabitha, Remy, Drew. The latter leans forward to look down the bar at the group, and the bartender starts over, but hesitates at the sight of the insanely attractive man, the two women lining the bar joining the cute young girl as a group, and how all three of them made dread sink deep into his bones. He looks uncertain, conflicted, almost as though he's asking the Kin with his eyes not to make him come over. She sets her mouth into something apologetic and nods him on over.

"You'll be having?", he asked, much less playful now than he had been before. Drew smiled politely, with as much warmth and confidence in the expression as she could muster to share with the man behind the bar, trying to share it with him. "The steak sandwich and fries, please. Do you have a hefeweizen on tap?" He'd nod his head in answer, ask if he could get her anything else, and she shook her head. "That's all for my tab, whatever the ladies get is on their own."

Tabitha's half-snarling at Remy, Tala's advising that he shouldn't do whatever he just did, and Drew stares up the bar at them blandly before turning back to the bartender and patting his inked up forearm bracingly. "They'll take something domestic and strong, both of them." So that way he wouldn't have to talk to them. He nods and hurries to send off the order for a sandwich to the kitchen and get the hell away.

Drew tucks a bobby pin in her hair back where it ought to be, securing a stray bit of hair in doing so, then took another deep drink of her beer, killing off the glass by tipping it up and her head back.

[Imogen Slaughter] Imogen's glass is empty, and she has not ordered another one. "No, he's rather good, I think." In his little area, the musician is wrapping up, getting out of the way for the next artist.

There's a shift in tensions in the bar, subtle enough that it does not much impact on the flow of conversation around them, at least not yet. The Garou's reaction is critical. The weight of his rage, or the strength of his control.

Imogen's eyes pass over the group, whom she must all assume are of the blood, now, by mere association, before turning back, her eyebrow arching in Kora's direction.

"Everything alright?"

[Remy] Naturally, ordering a Fenrir about doesn't get Tabitha the results she wants. The humor washes off Remy's face like blood off a stone. He shifts in his seat to face the Fury more directly. He doesn't let go.

"What's the magic word?"

[Tabitha Reese] She's all but vibrating with anger now, and the seats around them are starting to clear out. "Fucking let me the fuck go."

[Howard] Nobody came in here with him, or really invited him. He isn't sitting with anyone and hadn't made an obnoxious scene when he came through whatever door he came through. Without heavy Rage or a strong spiritual acuity, Howard can move through a crowded whatever the fuck establishment this is without being noticed. His clothing is colorful, but he doesn't make himself known until Remy asks:

What's the magic word?

"OOGA BOOGA BOO!" comes from right behind the Fenrir, as Howard grabs his shoulders.

[Remy] Suddenly interrupted -- instantly and instinctively -- Remy responds. His free fist shoots out from under Drew's restraining hand and goes straight for Howard's nose.

[Tabitha Reese] She takes the distraction as an opportunity to try to twist her hands out of Remy's grasp.

[Patrick Llewelyn] "Hey, Kora," the Galliard says, amicably enough. He's sitting with a guitar case leaning against the booth beneath his reclined arm; bent at the elbow. Were the object a woman the position might appear somewhat possessive and in truth there is ownership to it, his body is slanted toward it ever so slightly. He scrubbed up well, Patrick, when he was wasn't fresh from the road, or covered in grease.

Or blood.

He looks past Kora momentarily; brows knitting as he picks up on the distress [read: rage] in the Black Fury's voice. He's not the only one; the humans in the bar are feeling the waves of anger rolling off the Garou and even amongst those still applauding the last performer, there's a shift; a rippling of tension.

"That guy is such a dick." He says blandly, and makes no motion to rise until Howard -- Patrick's fingers find the bridge of his nose and delicately pinch with a loud exhale -- "Oh, wonderful." Imogen gets a brief look; it's full of the grimace his face is transformed to. It ages him.

"Now might be the time for a stealthy exit."

[Howard] On a good night, when he hasn't been swallowing or smoking whatever has come his way, Howard's reflexes leave something to be desired, which is a more loquacious manner of saying: they suck. Hard. He has his sunglasses off because the light in here is dim enough to grant him some semblance of vision, but his depth perception is terrible anyway.

Tonight isn't necessarily a bad night, but neither is he exactly sober. When Remy twirls towards him, Howard lets go and makes the attempt to duck, but he starts laughing first. It slows him down.

[Tala Whitedeer] She scowls, immediately stepping closer to Remy and Tabitha. It's hardly intimidating, given that she's 100 pounds soaking wet, but bless her, she tries.

[Hunter] Hunter hasn't been paying attention at all really, has been trying to avoid Kora like the plague for some reason or another. He isn't entirely sure why, maybe he just doesn't want to deal with anything too serious right now, maybe he just wants a night off. But all of a sudden, he's up on his feet staring at Howard and rushing over to watch the ordeal.

"LIKE I SHOWED YA HOWIE, RIGHT RIGHT LEFT BODY HEAD BODY HEAD! LETS GO!"

[Kora] "Yeah," says Kora, with a wreathing hint of humor in her mouth that never quite touches her dark, sure eyes. "now." No longer watching those at the tables, Kora's eyes fix on the quartet - quintet - at the bar. She makes a single noise under her breath, a low chuff of displeasure, then looks back to Imogen. "Could use your help out back, though," she continues, tipping her head toward the hallway leading to the bathrooms, payphone, the back door out into the alley.

"In case that," a brief, lilting look toward the incipient brawl. " - turns into something worthy of a bit more notice." Before some panicked bystander calls 911. Kora glances up then, meets the Fianna's gaze briefly, directly, her own dark eyes level and sure as she searches his features to call up his name. It comes to her after a moment, recognition clicking like a lock tumbling home. "Patrick. Sorry to steal your guest away. Doc?"

[Drew Roscoe] The arm that her hand had settled on in a silent show of 'easy there' (because telling these guys to simmer down resulted in her being a liar and getting slapped in the back of the head) launched out from under it when the cry of 'ooga booga!' exploded behind the both of them. Drew jumped, smacked her knee into the bottom of the bar's ledge, and cursed. Remy's fist rockets toward Howard's face, the Black Fury tries to twist her hand out of the Godi's grasp, and the Uktena steps closer to be a quiet supportive presence of her not-girlfriend.

Drew's leaning to the side so she doesn't get caught with an elbow when Remy draws his arm back again, frowning at her empty beer glass (just finished, just slapped back down on its napkin) wishing that it was full again.

Her hand scrubs at her face, running the risk of smudging up carefully applied make-up that was a small help in securing that interview today, and she inhales deep, exhales slow. Ride it out, like last time, the madness would calm one way or another. Right?

[Howard] [Here, I got an amendment for you...]

[Remy] [WROK! +7]

[Howard] [WROK! +7]

[Remy] [1. punch face!]

[Howard] [1: Punch... whatever gets in the way of his fist!]

[Imogen Slaughter] Imogen's gaze is fixed on the beginning of what looks like a good old fashioned fistfight - and might be worse, given the combatants. Patrick suggests a retreat and Imogen's gaze flicks toward him, a misplaced blink registering a reaction of sorts, before Kora begins to speak. A line forms itself in her brow as she gets to her feet, her awareness of the altercation still in her peripheral as she takes her billfold out of her handbag and retrieves the money for her drink.

She does not bother to offer her agreement; her actions are enough.

"Shall we?" to Kora, as if they were embarking on something socially acceptable and not something bloody and cold.

"Good night," this, polite, to the Fianna Garou before she turns to follow the Fenrir Jarl out the door, leaving the brawling and the music behind.

[Howard] [Brawl+Dexterity: THUNK! Let's call it -1 from being inebriated.]

[Howard] [+0, wooo!]

[Remy] [soak!]