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Not Drunk Yet [M]

Started by Lowen Thorn, May 08, 2018, 09:00:02 PM

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Lowen Thorn

"Oh for FUCK'S sake!"

Amaya lunged at the now conscious Red only to be knocked back by a belligerent, swinging arm, sending him back to the cobbled ground and temporarily knocking the wind out of it.

"Bitch!" he seethed through his teeth.

Red, somewhat regaining his senses, stared daggers into the bounty hunter's eyes before bellowing out a cry.

"I'm going to kill you," he snarled. He attacked with a big right overhand punch. Amaya stepped out of range, but before he could bring his hands up to defend, Red drove his shoulder into the bounty hunter's chest, slamming him into a nearby alley wall, where he started landing solid punches into the man's gut.

Fuck! This bastard can throw a fucking punch!

Satisfied, Red removed his hold from Amaya, and the bounty hunter slid down to his ass, wincing from the beating from the equivalent to a wild boar.

"Help! Someone, please!" Red screamed again frantically, his face burning. "These two are trying to kill me!"

And then, people started to gather.

Wonderful.

Remi

"Son of a donkey-fucking whore!" Remi snarled as Amaya jumped into the fray; they had to take this lunk down, before he left them as bloodstained smears on the cobblestones. Though Amaya's beating was something that she could most certainly sympathize with, she didn't have the time to worry about whether or not she'd have to heal them both-- taking the opening that was left in the wake of Amaya's charge was more important at the moment.

Drawing a deep breath, she let loose with her own battle-cry; a viciously-snarled "Fuck everything!"  Exhausted and banged-up as she was, she rushed headlong at the dullard; at the last moment, using her momentum and agility to throw herself into a hand-spring. (Had Red not been crouched fairly low to the ground, whining and shrieking while attempting to catch his breath, her tactic would not have had a chance in hell of working.) Given how close her proximity to him was, she was able to bring her booted feet down with as much force as she could muster, against the bridge of his nose.

The loud crack and subsequent, very satisfying snapping of cartilege filled her ears as Red's nose broke; blood flowing freely down his face. Unfortunately, she didn't have the time to savor that very small victory; nor the subsequent one that came when she righted herself directly in Red's lap; which gave her the opportunity to draw back her arm and deliver a vicious (for her size) elbow in close quarters, directly to his throat.

For it didn't stop the lout from using Remi's precarious perch to his own advantage: cocking his own fist back and driving it into her collarbone, causing Remi to grit her teeth tightly to keep from yelping in agony; she had no idea if he'd managed to break or fracture anything, but she swore she felt something tear; followed by a wave of searing pain that momentarily left the woman stunned..

Which was all the incentive Red needed to lift a hand and bat the woman aside, as though she was little more than a fly. Sending her careening gracelessly across the cobblestones, her ankles tangling and almost sending her to her kneees. Her sides heaving, breathing coming in ragged pants; trembling from a combination of adrenaline, agony and worry as people began to close in around them, she clenched her teeth hard enough to make them ache as she made her way over to where Amaya was and thrust a hand at him.

"Get your ass up!" It wasn't a request, but a demand- and was ground out far more harshly than she intended, but she couldn't help that just yet, "We're getting the fuck out of here before the guards come!" Between Red's howling and the indignant murmurs of the ever-growing crowd, it sounded like they'd just been pinned as accomplices for attempted murder- and as far as she was concerned, they needed to get out of here as quickly as they could.

"I didn't do nothing wrong!" Red continued to bawl pitifully, "I was bein' friendly-like to them, but they're going to kill me! I got a wife and babies, too!" Feigned alligator tears began dripping down the man's bloodied face as he attempted to garner sympathy and pity from the crowd, playing up the harmless and innocent act as much as much as he possibly could. If he could get the crowd to believe he was just a dumb, gentle giant, he was sure that he could make the pair's life a living hell.

Lowen Thorn

Amaya watched in horror as what was suppose to be an easy bounty job slowly but steadily became more fucked. He had every intention of marching back over to the brute of a man, giving him another swift kick in the balls, or two, or until he no longer had the option to father children, and then dragging his ass in for his reward.

Yet the buzzing of the crowd was too strong, his "accomplice" had just gotten her ass handed to her again, and Red was playing up the victim in full display. It was too much. Amaya couldn't think.

"Gods dammit," he seethed, taking the woman's hand and getting back to his feet through an ache and groan. "I'm coming back for that piece of shit!"

He yanked her hand as they rushed and broke through the crowd, attempting to make a temporary escape.

Remi

At that point, it was abundantly clear to Remi that on top of everything else that had happened so far tonight, she had clearly and willfully completely fucked the oath she'd taken as a healer: to never unnecessarily inflict harm on another living creature. And she just couldn't find it within herself to give a fuck about anything like that. Sure, it meant she would no longer be able to openly advertise her services, but conversely, she'd have free reign to use her knives whenever she wanted to. While her small stature left her extremely disadvantaged in a fist-fight, at least she knew how to use those daggers she carried. It wasn't a split-second decision, either: she'd been contemplating severing that oath for a few months and Red was just the catalyst that had helped her reach her conclusion.

Rage colored her countenance as Red's whining and pleading became more theatrical; her hand drifting to stroke one of her daggers' hilts and almost closing around it. It would only take a few moments to make her way through the crowd, shmooze her way back into Red's lap again- and remove his tongue. If the crowd didn't seem to be growing larger by the minute, she would have done just that- and with more people clamoring, shrieking for a cleric and the guards, the longer they remained where they were, the more precarious the whole situation became.

"And you think I'm not?" She scoffed; all notions of teasing and trying to act the "naive, gullible woman" dropped in an instant, "I don't give a shit about getting paid- I want to make that goat fucker suffer!" I just need enough time to patch us up, wait for these stupid fucks to leave and coat my knives. An hour, maybe two.

"After them!" A particularly loud, deep voice boomed from the milling throng of people as they broke through the crowd; she didn't have a destination in mind, nor did she give a damn where they were heading; all that mattered was making it somewhere that might be marginally safer than the streets, for now. "How you holding up?" She inquired, voice pitched low in an attempt to not be overheard by anyone they might have been darting past; hoping that they were somehow managing to keep far enough ahead of whoever the fuck that had been to call for their pursuit- though expecting the shitstorm they were embroiled in to swallow them whole. Gods damn, what a night.

Lowen Thorn

"Never fucking better," he repeated himself from earlier, not even trying to hide in sarcasm this time. "How the fuck do you think I'm holding up?!"

They made their way through the cobbled-stone alleys, turning corner and corner until they reached a dead end. "Fuck!"

Amaya's eyes scanned the area around them, his mind racing with solutions. They had gotten away far enough to buy them a little time, but not much. Heading back out into the open would only expose them, and staying there would only trap them from their pursuers.

And then he spotted it. An open window, leading it to gods knows what, but it would have to do. "Come on," he huffed. "I'm going to hoist you up."

Remi

"Just making sure you're not going to pass out on me, or some other stupid shit like that," She stated with a careless shrug, followed by a wince. While she didn't expect to hear anything of the sort, he had taken one fuck of a beating. Seemed like if he was going to conk the fuck out while they careened through the streets, she wasn't even sure if he'd be the type to even announce "stop" or anything like that. Regardless, she wouldn't have ended up stopping; would have focused on saving her own ass.

However, she needn't have worried about anything of the sort; for instead, it seemed like the gods were having one hell of a good time making their lives more difficult than they needed to be. "Dammit!" Thankfully, the enraged crowd didn't appear to be on their heels just yet, but it was probably only a matter of time now. While she wouldn't have minded remaining where they were if it was just Red and they were luring him into an ambush, she wasn't overly fond of being cornered by a mob that they'd have no chance of facing down.

Peering about, looking for a quick fix for their issues, it was Amaya that had found what was probably their only out, for now. It didn't take any other urging; she closed the narrow gap between them in a few quick strides. "Alright, I'm ready whenever you are."

There was no time to wonder what they'd be getting into by climbing through that window, but that was of no concern right now. The first order of business was effectively vanishing; everything else could be dealt with afterward.

Lowen Thorn

"Alright, off you go."

He didn't waste any time as he grabbed the one from under her legs, carelessly tossing her at the window in hopes that she would grab on. He could only hope that they weren't busting in on some family sitting around a kitchen table, or two lovers tearing away at each other, or anything and everything else that came to his mind.

He followed the woman promptly, jumping up and slamming his hand on the window seal to ensure he didn't fall back to the ground. Somehow, he managed to lift himself up and into the little building, rolling into Remi as he did, and impossibly tangling his legs and arms with her.

"Shit," he grumbled as he tried to remove himself from her. "Get off of me, would ya?"

Remi

She didn't protest as she was grabbed and tossed upward, toward the window; grasping hold of the sill and and propelling herself inside. Despite not being able to decide what hurt the worst, it was still a fairly easy endeavor. Only once she was inside did it cross her mind to consider just what they might be getting themselves into.

Narrowing her eyes and tilting her head, she had been trying to listen for anything that might have been indicitive of yet another problem they'd either have to barrel through or hightail away from, she'd thought she'd moved far enough from the window, but a couple of feet apparently wasn't enough; for as she was trying to get her eyes to adjust to what appeared to be the dimly-lit interior of some kind of shop (she assumed, based only on a perfunctury glance at how neatly-arranged the room they ended up in was,) Amaya ended up not only rolling into her, but somehow snaring their limbs in a spectacular manner.

"Dammit," The word came out somewhere between a disbelieving groan and a half-laugh as she attempted to disentangle herself from him; which involved some contortioning, murmurred profanities and a bit of squirming. When she'd thought she'd proably be able to get up though, she found that she couldn't do a hell of a lot more than redistribute her weight a bit more comfortably, "You need to let go of me so I can."

How easy it would have been to tease him about the rather interesting position they'd landed in and a bit of humor flitted momentarily across her face; maybe she would have given in and spouted off with some smart-ass comment or another, if she'd been certain that the building was indeed empty. It was a tempting thought, nevertheless.

Lowen Thorn

"Oh gods' sake-- Here! Hold still," he grumbled as he finished untangling himself from the woman.

He was back on his feet in no time, casting a cautious glance out of the window to see the mob of pursuers moving in every direction.

"Looks like we lost them," he said quietly before turning back around. "Now, where the hell are we? It looks like some sort of shop, but I think they're closed."

He tiptoed a little further into the opening where the neatly-arranged furniture and displays were most prominent. Definitely a shop, he concluded, as his eyes landed on a table adorned in scarfs.

"Need some new clothes?"

Remi

As soon as they were able to separate, she quickly got back to her feet, nodding as he peered out the window, muttering an extremely rare "sorry about that" before speaking up; "Good... hopefully we can catch a gods-damn break for a little while. Hell knows it'd help," she replied just as softly; save for their voices and rather quiet footsteps, everything seemed to be in the clear-- at least for the time being. "I'll be damned if I know," She admitted as she began creeping about the room they currently occupied, nodding in agreement at his statement about them being in a shop. Judging by the furniture and dim lighting, it was definitely closed for the night.

"Why not?" It was a rhetorical question: not only would it be nice not to go around in dirty, recently-torn clothing, it could help with the whole "laying low," thing. After all, any guards that might have been prowling about might have been given a vague description of what they'd been wearing. Curiosity getting the better of her, she ventured deeper into the building, stopping every now and again to examine some of the displays. If she had to guess, they'd found a rather large general store: along with furniture, scarves and other clothing, her circuit around the room revealed a table full of toys, the odd small basket of dried herbs, shelves lined with linens, crockery and other household goods.

However, a bit further back, something peaked her curiosity even further: a door and two corridors leading from what she assumed was the main shopfront. Lifting a finger in the gesture of "hold on a second," prowling quietly on the balls of her feet, she crept toward the closer of the two doors. If it didn't lead to either a storage area or changing room, she wasn't entirely certain what to expect. Drawing Pain and keeping that dagger close to her side, she used the toe of one foot to push at the door; which swung open slowly, with a soft creak.

Waiting for a few seconds, she pushed the door the rest of the way open and stepped inside. What she came across wasn't the shopkeeper's residence, but as far as she was concerned, even better: it was a work-room, complete with toy-making equipment. But what caught her eye was the table, strewn with a deck of cards and five or so bottles of booze. Definitely a room worth revisiting.

Making her way back toward where she'd last seen Amaya, she called out quietly: "The work-room's damn sure worth looking into, later." With that, she made her way back over to the display of women's' clothing. It took a little searching, but after looking through countless dresses, skirts and bright, ornately-designed shirts, she finally located something that she thought would be comfortable and accommodate ease of movement: a fairly simple sleeveless, rust-red shirt and black pants that were gauzier than what she was used to, but seemed comfortable enough. Not knowing if the shop had a washroom or not, she shrugged, unfastened her waterskin from her whip-belt and with little care or modesty, stripped down and changed; wetting her old shirt so she could scrub most of the dirt and grime from her skin without getting the floor wet, grumbling and cursing under her breath whenever she located one of her injuries; finally dragging an exquisitely-crafted comb through her hair.

All in all though, it didn't take more than maybe fifteen minutes to make herself presentable; her old clothes tucked into a rucksack she'd located on one of the many displays, cautiously continuing her exploration of the shop once again; satisfied that there were no traps she'd end up triggering, no guard-dog sleeping somewhere, just waiting for a hapless intruder.

Lowen Thorn

Amaya was too busy with his own investigation to notice anything the woman was doing, or saying, initially. He poked around for several moments but nothing really impressed him. Of course, he was definitely not a thief either, so the thought that crossed his mind was dismissed rather quickly.

His train of thought was interrupted by her mentioning the work room. The work room? Well, who gives two fucks about the work room? He sighed and shook his head - how did he end up with this woman, and what were they going to do next? He was still pissed at the thought of losing Red, but he would have to remain calm and go after him once things cooled off.

"Man, where's the alcohol in this place?" he finally asked, his tone dry and his eyes bored.

Remi

It was relieving to be left alone with her own thoughts; she didn't really give a shit what the bounty hunter was doing at the moment, as long as another shit-storm didn't end up erupting around them. Though she didn't typically resort to thievery, well, she was beyond giving a fuck about much of anything right now. While trying to formulate a plan would probably have been a great idea, but at the moment, nothing worthwhile was coming to mind. Then, there was Red. She honestly didn't give a fuck about the bounty on his head, but she damn sure wanted to carve him up a little; he deserved it for the shit he'd caused. Exploring the shop had served as a welcome, if too-brief diversion.

"I found cards and liquor; looks like it might be okay shit." That statement was deadpanned. She was only going off the appearance of the rather large bottles; they'd been dusty enough to look relatively well-aged at least and it had damn sure not been just wine. Maybe if lady luck was on her side, there'd be more stashed in that workroom.

With a shrug, she pivoted on her heel and set off again, back in the direction of said workroom; if the bounty hunter wanted a drink, he should have been capable of finding his way there; the shop wasn't exceptionally huge, after all. Making her way through the displays and back to the workroom again didn't take all that long, now that she'd figured out the general layout of the building.

Once she entered that room again, she rifled through the small collection of bottles, settling on a decently large one made of dark brown glass, marked as imported rum. Cracking it open and taking several long swallows, a pleased groan escaped her throat- it was good shit; strong enough to have a pleasant kick and decent burn.  Flopping down in one of the chairs, she let her mind wander aimlessly while she resumed drinking; snorting at the sheer absurdity of the entire situation.

Lowen Thorn

She had him at liquor.

After watching her make her way into the working room, he followed. When he entered the room, he found the woman slouched over into a chair with a brown bottle in her hand and an all-too-content look on her face. "Find the good shit, then?" he asked slyly as he paced over to her like she was his new best friend. "Let's have a look."

He snatched the bottle out of the woman's hand and took a few rather large gulps. Removing the opening from his lips, he blinked slowly and shook his head once in either approval or surprise or something of that sort. "Yeah," he said quietly before taking another swig. "This will do."

Remi

Kicking her feet onto the table, carefully enough to avoid upsetting either the cards or the remaining bottles, it took the woman a few seconds to acknowledge that he'd followed her; mainly because she was savoring her newest acquisition. "Hell yeah, I did!" She replied with an easy smirk as he walked over; gesturing with her free hand at the rest of the selections on the table, "Might even be enough here to last, mmmm, a little while; help yourself."

She had not expected the man to commandeer her rum, though! "Hey, that's not fair!" The entirely feigned indignity of that mock protest was coupled with a shit-eating grin as she lowered her feet back to the floor again, gesturing at the rest of her find, "Relax, make yourself at home; we also got what sounds like some pretty fucking great whiskey, something sort of greenish and something else I've never seen before." The liquor she'd never seen before was in a tall, thin, unlabeled clear glass bottle; the fluid inside a pale, somewhat iridescent blue.

However, rather than reaching for that intriguing bottle, or the whiskey that was basically calling her name, just to be an ass, she reached up to snag the rum again, just long enough to smirk up at Amaya and take another long, greedy swallow before she handed it back, grabbing the whiskey instead and cracking it open; taking a quick gulp: if the rum was good, holy fuck, the whiskey was outstanding: bitter, potent and burning a fiery trail down her throat. "Gods damn, I need to find this bastard's supplier!" Tilting her head back, eyes half-closing in satisfaction, she guzzled that whiskey as though it were water, until she needed to breathe; maybe tonight wasn't complete shit, after all- just mostly.

Alternating between idly shuffling the cards and knocking back more of that quickly-coveted whiskey, she was beginning to relax, at least a little bit. "You much of a gambler?" She inquired. Though she didn't have much left in the way of coin at the moment, she was usually of the mind that drinking and gambling went perfectly together; the higher the stakes, the better.

Lowen Thorn

"Gamble all the time," he replied with a roll of the tongue as he sat into one of the empty chairs. He eyed the other available alcohols, but ultimately just kept swigging the rum. It tasted good, so why take that away just yet?

"So, who the fuck are you again?" he asked almost nonchalantly as he slipped more rum into his mouth. "Remi, right? Stupid name. You're a contract healer or some shit like that?"

He took another swig. "Stupid job, too."

Remi

"Good," She nodded; anything else she might have said cut off by more whiskey; not that it really mattered if she was going to leave at that or start dealing cards. In the end, she did neither; shaking her head and sighing at his question and quick follow-up. "Yeah. Remi's good enough; easy enough for most stupid fucks," It was delivered with an uncaring air and a shrug; "Oh, c'mon, you've got to do better than that, Amaya's no fucking better." An impudent smirk followed that taunt as she poured more whiskey down her throat.

"Something like that; who cares." She paused, shifting to a more comfortable position, as he gave his unasked-for opinion of her job. "If I heard you right, you're a bounty hunter. How pathetic; no better than a trained hunting dog," She sneered, trying to goad him into a fight of some sort, for no reason other  than the sake of doing so. It just sounded like it would be fun."Think I'll call you Puppy from here on, since that's all you are."

The half-assed, lazy little barbs were tossed about with a complete disregard to, well, anything; a peculiar, vaguely amused smirk curving her lips as she once again chugged her whiskey; the only thing really wrong being that she'd be out before too much longer- what a damned shame, it just meant she'd have to try something else soon; which she wasn't exactly opposed to.

Lowen Thorn

Amaya laughed. He couldn't help himself.

"Okay, okay," he said as he put his hands in the air in defense. "I get it. Puppy, at your service then."

He smirked and took another large gulp of the rum, this one living a twisted mark on his face briefly as he caught in his chest. "Damn, that's good," he breathed. He eyed the woman curiously, an almost blank, tipsy-like stare for several moments before speaking again. "Been in Thanatos long? I imagine you're only here to service ol' Red. Doing a good job of that so far, I might add."

Remi

She'd be damned, but Remi was actually having fun, even if their verbal sparring match was cut short again, at least for a moment; seemingly reaching one of their strange little split-second truces. There was just something extremely fun about the way things were ending up. "You're not a bad Puppy," That was delivered with another casual, entirely careless shrug.

That devilish little smile was back in place again as she momentarily went back to guzzling the whiskey; blowing harshly between her teeth as the pleasant warmth ignited even more intensely as it flowed down her throat this time; "Hell yeah, it is," She agreed, leaning forward a bit and dragging a hand through her hair, meeting his blank stare at least somewhat levelly; then shaking her head and laughing. She wasn't quite buzzed yet, but she was well on her way to getting there.

"No, just three days so far and it's my first time here," She admitted with a laugh. "The job I got was supposed to be quick and easy, but shit always changes-- I don't really give a damn, though. Don't have any plans for after I'm done with Red.  You haven't been doing bad, either; I guess it's just gonna be hard to bring the bitch down. What about you, going anywhere interesting when we're done with him?"

Lowen Thorn

"Nope."

Amaya took another slow drink, eyes on Remi. "Not really," he said again. "Probably just back to Jin'ta for a while. See what the next bounty is, see what the next meal is, see what the next fuck is.. Simple life. Not much to it. I haven't been in Thanatos long myself. One thing is for certain is they are a little... strict on their ways, to say the least."

Another whip, and another thought. He cast a look at his company with a furrowed brow. "What's up with your right ear?"

Remi

"That actually sounds kind of fun," She acquiesed with a nod, slugging the whiskey back again, "Not a damn thing wrong with the simple life. I'll prob'ly just be fucking around, only the gods know where that'll be, til some bitch does something stupid and needs to be fixed." It really wasn't a bad job at all, unless the stupid bitch in question ended up being yet another pain in the ass that didn't want to explain where they might have picked up their curse, or why they decided it was a really great idea to slap a sleeping bear in the face. Yes, she had dealt with stupidity of that magnitude once or twice before.

She nodded, that smirk becoming a bit wry at his comment, "Yeah, you got that right; far as I've seen so far, they all seem to be kind of uptight and boring around here, with Red being the exception."

Toying with the whiskey bottle for a few seconds before tossing more back yet again, she arched an eyebrow and smirked at her company, "Now, that's a kind of funny story. A couple years back, I was drinking and playing cards with this ass who was getting pissed because I was winning. He decided he didn't like my ear and tried to cut it off. I knocked the hell out of him, got banned from that pub and spent the night locked up. Turned out the bastard was some stupid noble."

Even now, she thought that night had been extremely amusing; especially the expression on the bastard's face when she'd fought back. It was a shame that she'd been unable to recall the name of his noble house; she would have ended up extorting them at least a couple times over, back when the fiasco had happened.