milliways_bar | (no subject)

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When Doc enters the bar tonight, it's from a hotel room in Montgomery. He's carrying a bag over his shoulder, and isn't surprised to see that Milliways has decided to show up. After a quick trip to his apartment in the staff wing to change his clothes and shower, he makes a trip out to the stables to check on things.

Once he's satisfied with the state of the stock (and taken note of some new arrivals), he ends up at a table near the bar with a drink and a dinner 'menu'.

Contemplating the specials, he sips at the bourbon (straight, tonight) and looks around the bar for familiar faces while he decides what to order.

[No new threads please - busy workweek means slowtimes. He'll be back!]

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She eyes him.

Quite a lot, really.

That sounds vaguely mad, and this is coming from someone who lived, for decades, in close proximity to someone who was regularly a bear, and she considered that normal.

"... and?"

Lifting his glass:

"I see it this way," he says. "If you wanted t'ride around in my head like I was some puppet in a travelin' show, there wouldn't be a thing in all the hells on earth that I could do t'keep you from it, right? So I gotta accept that fact, and trust in the fact that I know how t'make smart decisions, and do my best not t'git myself into situations where I'm gonna be in trouble. I can't do anythin' more than that...and so's I gotta just watch my back and keep my head on straight."

"........"

With a strangled sound that sounds something like despairing disbelief she thumps her forehead on the table.

And people think she is the crazy one.

"...would you rather I not buy y'dinner and drinks and just cut off all contact?"

Because he's a little confused right now.

She is going to write a manual. For all the humans she actually cares about, and she's going to stand over every single one of them until they read it, and understand it.

There may possibly be quizzes.

With an inarticulate growl she stands and stalks over to the bar. She returns shortly, a small medallion of some saint-or-other (she asked Bar for something appropriate, and took what was given) on a sturdy chain dangling between her fingers.

Cautiously - and curiously - he glances at the medallion.

"I'm guessin' that'll help."

"It will, if you let me charge it." She replies tersely, retaking her seat. "Olya would be better, but also, scarier."

Hey, honest Other is honest - none of them are particularly reassuring to humans when being Other, and Olya is Other on a much grander scale than Katya will ever be able to manage.

"What do you need to do to charge it?"

"Something of you." The medallion flashes as it catches the lights, twirling on its chain between her fingers. "It is your choice, of course."

He considers this for a moment.

"Are you talkin' like, a bit of hair or a little bit of blood, or are we talkin' you goin' in and snippin' off a piece'a my soul or somethin'."

"I cannot touch your soul." She assures him, smothering the grin that threatens to take over her face. "That is beyond us all, unless you were to become Other."

Hers, on the other hand, has been in peril since she was seven.

"Well, that's somewhat comfortin'," he admits. "So we're talkin' blood, I'm guessin'."

It was a common theme he'd noticed in some of the stranger rituals that Chavez had taken part in.

"It would be strongest. It is... a key piece, of you. The less essential, the weaker the protection. The same is true for any harm I wished to cause." It is part of the reason Gesar had needed a tiger in his battle mage - she was often disturbingly easily able to get an enemy's blood, and from there wreak devastation.

"If that's what is strongest, then that's what we'll use," he says. "How do y'need to take it? And..."

He glances around the bar, eyes quickly scanning all of the nearby faces, ensuring that nobody is listening in too closely to their conversation.

"If y'wouldn't mind, I'd rather not do such a procedure here in the bar proper."

The idea of being that exposed makes his skin crawl.

"We can use my apartment if need be."

"No, not here. There are two vampyre close by, and the door may open to my world." And that could lead to so much badness she can't even say.

"And it is time for dinner." She doesn't often make protection amulets except for herself - it's draining, when it's someone else, especially someone less familiar than a constant partner. She plans on eating well.

"After dinner," he suggests.

The rats have wisely returned with their dinners - two massive steaks with plenty of their requested side dishes as well. Doc passes over hers, and then a rolled up napkin containing a set of silverware. He then orders a glass of water.

(If she's going to be taking blood, he should start hydrating now, just to be on the safe side.)

This giggle and grin she cannot smother, as she begins mashing all of the things she's managed to end up with together.

"I am not going to drain you dry. You may even enjoy it."

"I would hope you wouldn't drain me dry," he says. "And I would think, as it would probably really piss off Bones, and then you'd have t'deal with Olga because of it."

If he ends up in the infirmary because of a blood magic ceremony gone wrong, he will never hear the end of it from McCoy.

"Light Others do not generally drink blood, in such noticeable amounts, unless hunting." Hunting vampires, specifically, and she's not allowed to hunt here.

And generally, even then, it's beef blood, or pork blood, or some other unfortunate critter.

And it is foul.

"Then we shouldn't have a problem," he says. "I do try t'keep out of trouble, y'know."

Despite his track record for acquiring scars.

"It is a good habit to have." She has never been accused of such a thing, but she's heard it is an admirable thing.

She's also making quick work of her meal. She has been busy recently, after all.

While there is nothing in the world like his mother's home-cooked meals to fill him up right, there is also a lack of grass-fed beef for making into steaks in his where and when. After a long day (and evening) of travel by foot and wagon to Montgomery, he's also pretty damn hungry.

"I even manage most of the time, now'days," he adds, before digging into his mashed potatoes with vigor.

She snickers in appreciation, wolfing down her food like she's afraid it might run away from her.

"I'm sure that is a distinction Olya and her doctor will approve of." Since they're on the topic of that couple's appreciation of their actions.

"I agree," he says with a nod, before turning his attention to the food - he won't eat as fast as she is, but the companionable silence that comes with sharing a meal between two people that don't have to talk every second they're together is nice in its own way.

Once he's cleared his plate, and finished his glass of water, he looks around the room once more.

(You can't be too careful.)

"Two vampires - one over in the corner by the fishtank, the other is in the rafters. Two gods, or creatures who would call themselves such. Five magic users, none of which pose a significant threat." She rattles off without looking up from where she's mopping up the last of everything on her plate.