Interlude: Another Bar

His father hadn't told him much, but one thing had stuck with the Hispanic man: the way to tell if you'd made your mark on life was how much life had made a mark on you.

The man had come to agree with him in the last decade. Forgetting the ropes of scar tissues that wrapped around his arms, chest, legs, and back, age had brought wrinkles to his Hispanic features that looked less like aged skin and more like entropy had decided to leave its mark on the man's face by attacking him with multiple small rakes. He'd always had a hard face, but life had polished its low-key fierceness to a razor's edge, and with his hair still refusing to show a hint of gray (as if perhaps afraid to anger the man), he could pass from any age from his 40's to his 60's, though it was in the latter range that he was actually in. Fortunately, the days when people would mess with him to try and prove something had nearly all vanished; they'd left their marks on him, but he was the one still walking around in most cases. The man suspected that he didn't much mind that fact any more meant he really was getting old. Well that, and of the few dozen friends he'd had when the Change had come, less than half a dozen still had a pulse. But his mom had always told him to not bitch over spilled milk. Though she could hardly talk as she'd spent so much of her paycheck on crack cocaine that the man had been lucky to have any milk at all.

But that was a lifetime ago, several now, humps that the man had gotten over. Still, when he walked into the tavern that called itself the Deranged Unicorn, he was reminded of his age by how much his legs ached. It seemed like not five years ago he could walk all day and still be ready to throw back enough alcohol to render the average man comatose, and perhaps entertain some female company after that. Now he just wanted a few beers and some sleep. Maybe AFTER that he could drink and 'drive' as it were...

Lacking any nearby festivals or trouble, the building's several long tables and twenty smaller, personal ones were mostly empty. The man did a mild double take at the three Ihmensel’jk sitting at one of the tables playing what appeared to be some sort of variant of dominoes. It seemed like yesterday that any 'Ick' who showed up in a human settlement with their distinctly 'inhuman' faces (their skin being various strains of literal, unhealthy white, and their faces tending towards exaggerated, heavy jaws with eyes sunk deep into their skulls and hair that seemed more akin to metal wire than organic filament) would either be there to burn it to the ground or be chased away with literal pitchforks and torches (and the chase only lasted until they got caught; there were no trials for Ihmensel’jk in those days). Then again, the man had once been considered to be little better than an 'Ick'...and most people would say he probably still was. The man lived with it, as he made his way to the bar.

The woman's face behind it looked like it had been forged out of a literal battleaxe, but her expression was neutrally friendly enough as the man approached.

"Have any Warmfang venom?" The man asked.

"Some."

"Fresh?"

"Three days."

"Right. Put a drop in the house brew, whatever it is, I don't care. Got any eggs?"

"Sorry, that gentleman over there got the last of them for the day."

The man glanced over. It took him several seconds to recognize the one-who-had-ordered-the-eggs, but when he did, he felt rooted to the spot. The egg-eater did not notice, as he was cutting into the length of meat he'd ordered with the eggs, putting it into his mouth and slowly chewing. After fifteen seconds of said mastication, he swallowed the meat and took a drink from the flagon of water by his side, which was when he finally noticed the man. After a few seconds, the egg-eater had his own flick of recognition.

"I'll be damned." The man said.

"I think, Rajoh..." The egg-eater said, as he put his drink down and resuming cutting at his meat. "You were damned long before you stepped foot in this place."

"...Can't really argue with that." Rajoh said, putting down a square coin of tightly forged black dirt as the bartender brought him his drink. "Keep them coming, but spare the venom for the rest." With his drink order placed and paid for, Rajoh walked over to the egg-eater at the table, indicating that he wanted to sit down. The egg-eater motion that he could or could not, whatever Rajoh wanted, the egg-eater didn't really care.

"Can I help you, Rajoh?"

"Oh no. Just a very big surprise. You're the last person I ever thought I'd run into again...

"...Caine."

Caine said nothing in regards to Rajoh's comment, at least not at first, waiting to finish another bite of meat first. Unlike Rajoh, who wore traveling clothes (and while his boots were made for walkin', his legs were starting to tell him how much they disagreed with how much he did. Though no one had yet been able to walk over Eutropius Rajoh), Caine seemed to wear a patchwork of old uniforms mixed in with some hunting leathers, and while he had no weapons evident, Rajoh suspected seeing was not believing.

"...If for some reason you're that sore over eggs..."

"No no, I can live without eggs. Like I said. I'm just amazed you're alive."

"Because you haven't seen me for a few decades?"

"Well, that, and that makes you the only one to ever get on his bad side and live to tell the tale." Rajoh said. "You ARE him, right? You're not some blackbird trick?"

"Last I checked."

"...how the hell did you live this long, Caine?"

"My dispute was...settled. That's all that really needs to be said." Caine said, returning to his meal.

"And, what, you've just spent the last 30 years..."

"28." Caine corrected.

"28, just farting around? If your dispute is 'settled', why didn't you go carve out a kingdom for yourself or something?"

"When you knew me, Rajoh, beyond what you knew, I was always a man of simple tastes." Caine said, as he actually started eating the eggs he'd beaten Rajoh too. "I didn't need much then, and I don't need much now. I had enough trouble in my life with one grudge, I didn't need to make more by trying to 'carve out a kingdom' as you put it. You should know. Or did you ever manage to best the golden boy?"

"Heh. Got over that myself, long time ago. Plus I managed to...charm his daughter, if you catch my drift. I'll consider that settlement enough."

"...she WAS of proper age when she did that, I hope."

"Hey, Caine, I'm a bad man. I'm not a BAD MAN, if you catch my drift." Rajoh said, leaning back in his chair and putting one boot up on the table. "No more a real bad man than you, I guess. Who would have thought it? Two old bad men in a bar, instead of in the ground or on a trophy case. Seeing you here makes me realize just how bad the odds were against us. We didn't do too badly when it came to lives, did we?"

"I suppose not." Caine said, putting down his utensils and tapping a rough looking cigarette from a metal case into his palm.

"You know those things will kill you."

"The hell with it, I'm 72." Caine said, and lit up the tobacco stick, taking a long inhale before blowing it off to the side. "And I disagree with your assessment that I was a 'bad man'."

"What would you consider yourself then?"

"A soldier." Caine said, as the bartender came to take his empty plate away and bring Rajoh his second drink.

"Haven't found a war that can kill you yet, then?"

"I've fought my wars, Rajoh. It's not worth it. Look at what it did to the Hemel. Or Rapanga. Or hell, even HIM. It forged him a nice little gilded cage. If I cared, I think I'd enjoy that fact." Caine said, taking another inhale of his cigarette. "Maybe you still like trouble, like the old days, but I never found a taste for it. If you want to get any older, I'd suggest you do the same."

"Eh..." Rajoh said, settling back down in his chair. "I've found that no matter what you do, where you go, whether you're some punk off the street or a Center...if trouble wants to find you, it will."

Rajoh then glanced behind himself, looking at the bar door. Caine took mild notice, following his gaze.

"Expecting someone? Or something?"

"No and...well, not yet I guess." Rajoh said, turning back. "So. Got any kids?"

"Not my preference. You?"

"Well, technically I got eight, but I seemed to have crapped out in that all their mothers don't like me...well I guess Shea's kinda gotten over it, but for the most part it seems it just works better if I give them money and stay out of their lives. At least half of 'em got better dads than I could ever be..."