Happy hour

[i_got_vision]

You know who's tanned and well-rested and enjoying life even more than usual--and 'usual' for him is pretty damned good, except when being chased by Pinkertons? This cowboy right here.

Butch Cassidy at the bar, taking a break from escorting the loveliest mechanical lady in all of Galveston. It sure beats working for a living, doesn't it?

Specials
Whiskey

Why mess with the classics? (He'll make other drinks on request, but he can't necessarily spell them, so the sign stays as it is.)

[open all night!]

Comments

[52_dropoff]

Charlie sees a man who looks like Paul Newman. Meaning...well, it could be Paul Newman, but that seems less than likely. Or it could be the myriad real people from other realities who look like Paul Newman when seen in the Bar.

Not that it matters. People are people. Even if you look at them and see a face you once saw in your own mirror for two days many years ago.

"Any water back there?"

[i_got_vision]

"Water?"

That's not a usual request at a bar--well, maybe in the desert, when the weather's hot, but it's winter here. He thinks it's still winter, anyway.

"There's a pitcher with some icewater, and... looks like there's bottles, too. Huh. You see something new every day. Pitcher or bottle?"

[52_dropoff]

"A pitcher will do fine. And I guess you are from the time before bottled water, which is a good thing." Bottled water offends the environmentalist side of Charlie's mind.

[i_got_vision]

Pitchers are easy. Pitchers make sense.

He pours a glass of icewater, and slides it over.

"Seems like a waste to put it in bottles. Either you're somewhere with a well or springs or something, or you've got a canteen. Those bottles look like they'd break easily."

[52_dropoff]

"It's the wonder invention of the 20th century...plastic. Won't break if you drop it. Lasts forever. Keeps things fresh for a long time. And gives everything that 'not just out of the well' flavor." Charlie happily drinks the water not from a bottle.

[i_got_vision]

"Best water I've ever had is from a little spring in Wyoming," he says with a grin. "Maybe it's just that the ride there's so rough, so dry, and by the time I get there I'm just so damn grateful for some fresh cold water. Beats warm canteen water any day."

Those bottles don't look like they'd taste good at all.

[52_dropoff]

"Best water I ever had was in a place called Nanda Parbat, which is about as far from civilization as exists. The water comes from the Himalayas themselves. The sediment of the world's tallest mountains, and not much else." Certainly no pollution.

[i_got_vision]

"No kidding?"

He's vaguely heard of the Himalayas. They exist in a sort of mythical way for him, not as a place people have actually been to.

"What brought you all the way out there? Unless that's where you're from."

[52_dropoff]

"No, I'm from America. Hub City, Illinois by birth. But Nanda Parbat is known as a place of great mystical importance.

"If you actually accept that, at least. My sensei did, so I went there with my protege. It was worth the trip, if nothing else." It was where Renee finally found herself, after all.

[i_got_vision]

"I'm from Utah. Traveled a bit around the states, but I've never even seen an ocean, let alone crossed one. My folks did, but they only came from England, nowhere exotic."

A lot of the people he knows back home are immigrants from one place or another. His parents hadn't had to learn a new language, so it almost doesn't count.

"I bet it took a long time to get there, huh."

[52_dropoff]

"At least by the standards of my time. Which I would guess is your future. You're from...mid 19th century? Late?" His guess is based entirely on the clothes. "But travel is faster in general for us."

[i_got_vision]

"It's 1897 back home," he nods. "We got railroads and ships mostly, for going long distances. There's other things, trolleys and automobiles if you're in the city, or balloons if you just want to go up for a while. And horses and wagons, of course. If you go somewhere, you have to really want to go."

[52_dropoff]

"Give it about 30 years, and it will start to change. Though ease of travel probably isn't in your lifespan." And he'll never have to deal with the airlines, which might be a bad thing.

[i_got_vision]

He'll have enough trouble just leaving the country by ship. And Sundance--bless his heart, he'd never make it through security.

"I hear some people say the journey's as important as the destination. Builds character. Those are things you can say after the fact, when you're indoors and warm and well-fed again. Everything makes for a good story, once you get back home."

[52_dropoff]

"That is true. Though sometimes the journey is all that matters. If you don't have a place to go when you go." That Charlie in his wandering years. Fun times.

[i_got_vision]

"I've done something like that a few times, looking for work--well, there was nothing in this town, maybe the next one. Or maybe there'll be a ranch along the way that could use some help. I didn't used to know that many people, but being around... you know, I got places now that know me, that'll always find some room for me if I need one."

[52_dropoff]

"I eventually just made a new home for myself. And still couldn't really stay there. There were things I needed to do." Like find a protege before his death.

[i_got_vision]

"Oh, I have one of those, but it's so far away from anywhere--it's more of a hideout than a home. Land's not much good for farming, but livestock do all right, if you don't have too many. You want enough to keep you through the winter, though. I've had to go out in snowstorms for medicine a time or two, and I don't begrudge folks--no one chooses to get sick--but if you have a choice between going out and staying in, it's better to stay in."

[52_dropoff]

A hideout? Interesting. And possibly telling.

"I was once stuck in the middle of nowhere during a snowstorm. I'd caught up with two gunrunners who styled themselves after a couple of bandits from around your time. A new friend and I arrested them, and then spent the night waiting for the storm to pass, talking. For criminals, they were fairly interesting." Though the friendship that Charlie made with Oliver Queen that night was the thing that endured.

[i_got_vision]

"You really get to know people, when you're stuck together waiting out storms," he nods. "Stuck in a cabin with nothing to distract you--at least out on the trail, you can ride separate a ways, the scenery changes. But a one-room cabin, you're all the entertainment you've got, and by the time spring comes, either you hate each other or you're family."

He ends up family, usually. Good-natured.

[52_dropoff]

"I think if we spent more than a night in the same place, Ollie and I would have killed each other." Pause. "No, he would have killed me. He was the one with bow and arrows."

[i_got_vision]

"That'll happen," he grins. "There's a point where you get sick of each other, you just keep snapping at each other for nothing at all, but then you get past that. If for no other reason than that it's easier to have someone else's help digging the snow away from the cabin door."

[52_dropoff]

"Sounds like that happened to you at least once?" The story is definitely interesting, if nothing else.

[i_got_vision]

"You get a lot of... rugged individualists, out in Wyoming. Folks need to be tough out there, but some fellas go twice as stubborn as they need to be. You say the sky's blue, they'll tell you it's green just to be different. And you can't always choose who you're out with when the weather changes."

[52_dropoff]

"Sounds rougher than I tend to like it. Though the city wasn't my favorite place either."