suitably_heroic | Outside a Metal Bar and Beyond, Baltimore, Thursday Evening

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Outside a Metal Bar and Beyond, Baltimore, Thursday Evening

"Okay," Atton said, staring back at the door he'd just been thrown out through. "Okay, that could have gone better."

One of these days he was going to charm his way back into Linda's good graces. Damn it all. She'd yelled at him some more about being a jackass when he and Sparkle'd tried to come in acting like nothing had ever happened (what? It worked with Sia), but that clearly hadn't worked out for him all that well.

And okay, he did have some more aces up his sleeves if he wanted to use them, but he was... kind of trying not to do that.

"But hey, the night's still young, right?" Right.

The night was young! And cold. Very, very cold.

[[ for sparkle and misadventure. ]]

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"Yes," Sparkle replied, to all of the above, as he gave his wrists a somewhat uncoordinated rub. "Feels like he hit me in the brain with a brick."

Or a baseball bat. One of those.

"Who're they? What'd we... you know? S'not poker."

The poker thing was going to be the sticking point today.

"It's not poker," Atton agreed. "And you probably have a concussion, so I'm hauling your ass out of here. Our friend splashed all over the floor down here can go save himself."

They might have to find somewhere to crash for the night. Atton wasn't sure either of them wanted to be caught hauling in injured on the island.

Sparkle made a bit of a whining sound at that. Because, in terms of summing up the whole situation, that was about the best he could manage.

"Gotta get my bag..."

See, Atton? That change of clothes would totally come in handy.

"Yeah, yeah, we'll get the bag," Atton promised. "Think I saw a door that opens out on the alley back there in the next room."

And with that, he was going to try to haul your ass upright, Sparkle. With a lot more care than he was going to admit to later.

And Sparkle wasn't going to admit that he was more or less hanging off of Atton as he was hauled to his feet, either. They could live in that merry state of denial together forever!

"N'if it doesn't lead out to the alley?"

What if they were trapped in the back room of the Random Heavy Metal Baltimore Mafia forever?

"I'll shoot someone in the kneecap. I already covered that, didn't I?" Atton said. "Pure pazaak."

Now just to get Sparkle out through the door and past that merry trio of passed-out gentlemen on the floor...

"Oh. Okay." Sparkle seemed to accept that as an adequate answer. Until a moment later, when he gave Atton a kind of bleary look. "Where'd you get a gun?"

This was all so new and novel to him, dammit.

This was so ridiculously normal for Atton - or used to be, anyway - that he'd already mentally plotted out his course to a just-in-case place he knew, and going by the looks of it, Sparkle was going to be fine by the morning, so--

"One of the idiots back here had one," Atton said casually. "I thought he'd be better off without it. I'll ditch it later."

He already had his blaster on the island. He didn't need more.

"Oh." Well, that answered that, didn't it? Sparkle returned his attention toward the floor, and the bodies that were strewn across it. "Ditch it far from here or the cops'll be all over it trying to place your prints."

If there was one thing Sparks could do, it was dodge the police.

"... Might call 'em anyhow." He nodded down to the blood that he was tracking across the floor. "Like anon... annun... anomin... without giving my name. 'Cause."

Nothing against the club, but he was feeling a bit of solidarity for the mystery guy with the blood smears everywhere.

"Not like they'll listen to me, but."

Atton tried the back door. It opened easily enough-- well, once he jimmied the lock a little, but that was child's play.

"How about we get a painkiller in you first and maybe some rest," he said, "Then when you stop stuttering, you can call the police."

Though the joy of being Atton was that nobody had his prints.

Sparkle fell quiet for a minute as he chewed on that statement, letting Atton drag him... wherever Atton was headed. He trusted him, by this point, to get him out of here in more or less one piece. He'd sent Sparkle in first, but he was also the one to come and get him again.

"... Think buddy'll last that long?"

Sparkle wasn't a big fan of getting himself killed for other people, and he wasn't a big fan of the cops, either. But just letting someone die when it was a matter of making an anonymous tip or something seemed...

... Seemed like...

Well, he didn't like it.

"Are you honestly worrying about this?"

Because this was the kind of shit that got a lot of Jedi killed.

Alleyway. Thank hell. He left Sparkle propped up against the dumpster for a couple so he could root around in it and drag out their backpack.

"Dunno," Sparkle grumbled, clinging to the side of the dumpster, amusing himself with the way the blood on his fingers froze to the cold metal of the bin. "Covered in blood an' some of it's mine and they were gonna kill me in there and my whiskey's still in the bar and some guy's gonna croak and like one of these things I can maybe to something about probably."

He wasn't going back for his whiskey, Atton.

"You're not dead," Atton pointed out. "You'll be fine in the morning. Maybe be rattled for a couple more days, but hey, who hasn't been?"

He rooted through Sparkle's backpack until he found his jacket and threw it on. "I got some vodka in here somewhere. How about we strike a deal, and you can have it when your brains aren't leaking out through your eyes?"

Sparkle put forth a valiant effort to not look too pathetic as he looked back Atton's way from where he was propped against the dumpster.

"What kinda deal?"

Because the vodka was sounding pretty good, too.

"You come with me, you settle down, you deal with me waking you up every fifteen minutes, and you get the vodka whenever your head's pieced back together," Atton said easily, slinging the backpack over his shoulder and walking back towards Sparkle.

He didn't think 'and don't tell anyone about the details of this debacle' was something he really needed to say, here.

Yeah, Sparkle wasn't planning on running off and talking about this one. Given his penchant for tall tales, it wasn't like anyone would believe him anyhow.

"... Good enough."

That wasn't going to stop him from sulking against the dumpster, though. God, he wanted to puke his brains out. Maybe if he managed that, his head would stop hurting so damn much.

Pretty bad idea, if you asked Atton, which nobody was. Instead he'd try and peel Sparkle away from the dumpster again. "I know a place, just a few streets from here," he said. "Girl'll let me crash there. You can ride this out and avoid some questions and clinic bills."

"... You do this kind of thing a lot?"

Oh, hey. Atton was all warm and not dumpster-like. Sparkle was going to hang off of him like a limpet again. That was cool, right?

~~Let's pretend that was the right icon, shall we?~~

"You spend five minutes on Nar Shaddaa, you'll find yourself getting used to a lot of things," Atton said. Not that was where he'd picked up all of this stuff, but hey.

He dragged Sparkle out of the alley. "What, have you never done this before?"

~~I saw nothing!~~

"This is a new one for me," Sparkle mumbled, shuffling along with Atton miserably. "Well. The being tied up part, anyhow."

Generally, when he got caught places he wasn't supposed to be, he was faster than the guy trying to beat him down for it. Bad luck, tonight.

"I'll teach you how to get out of that later," Atton said. Then pulled a face at himself. Ugh, he was going soft.

"What's the worst trouble you've had?"

Sparkle was quiet for a long while before he finally just gave his shoulders a shrug.

"Stupid family shit," he replied, too sore and tired and shaken to even bother trying to come up with a story. "Cops had to get involved and drag us out 'cause it was getting... I dunno. Doesn't matter. Been in trouble with the cops a lot since, but at least when they slap you in handcuffs you know you're just gonna get dumped off on your social worker again anyhow."

Atton didn't actually care if he told the truth - he was just trying to keep Sparkle talking. Anything else was a bonus.

"Did that leave any scars?"

It usually did.

"Ever get that feeling like somebody's reached into your chest and grabbed your breath right out of your lungs, and then that feeling never actually goes away?"

There was his answer.

Of course it did.

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