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[Sören]

“You could tell me, and perhaps I would fall asleep on my table right now just to escape the telling.” The cigarette hanging for a moment between his lips, he smacked his palm down in illustration of stupor, then blew out his draw. He smirked. “Build a foundation from lies and it is bound to crumble. We all know it, yet we all do it anyway.” And he finally stubbed his smoke.

“Ah, and so we find common ground, stranger. Not for the drinking. But for the monsters, yes. Though I know no one-armed boys. Memorable as a missing eye, I’d wager.” Even in his cups he did not physically point out the deficiency in himself, but there was poison in his tone. “I looked death right in the eye at a lake in India, and she claimed one of mine with the spit of her tongue. Now I help a boy hunt for her sister in Moscow’s waters and hope she does not take my other.” He barked laughter, perhaps because it seemed the second creature did not exist at all, at least not where the boy thought. You will never find her, Nimeda had told him. There had been no news for weeks, and now he had other problems.

“Dead things are walking now? That is news. I saw corpses in the tunnels rescuing an ungrateful girl from her own stupidity. Creatures hungry for flesh, and the scientist who tied her down in the dark.” He paused a moment, squinted a little. Thought was slow, but Sören had never liked not knowing, and he suddenly realised the stranger had implied recognition. The bite was one of annoyance, more for the fact it was only the context that offered a brief flicker of dim memory. Though he had a good eye for faces, he had a better one for those useful to his endeavours, and in any case the hunt for oblivion rarely made a bedfellow of clarity.

“Ah,” he said flatly. “I remember you. You were the cop she told her woes. Did you apprehend the devil, or is the debt still unpunished I wonder? If not it surprises me the boy did nothing. His heels burned into the darkness, heedless. Another stupidity. But he seemed intent on a death. A man shouldn’t promise it unless he means it.” But he shrugged, ultimately uncaring of either fate. The girl was somewhere in America now, and caught in yet another net of trouble it seemed, by the brief communications he had received from her: demands like he were her father’s errand boy.

“We all die, though,” he said, but the smile was gone now. “It’s life’s first promise, and her biggest joke at our expense.”

[Dorian]

He was right, and Dorian wasn't sure he'd change even knowing what he could mess up. Though he had changed - maybe not for the better but he had changed. Wise words from a stranger. Wasn't that always the way.

The grim things that they had all seen. Dorian didn't know what man the stranger spoke of, but the scientist in the tunnels - there could be more, but doubtful. "I shot him three times in the head. At least as long as there are not more scientists lurking in the tunnels. He was one of them - bitten by those things that got my friend. He didn't have one arm when you met him."

Dorian laughed, "No he was curled up in a ball on the alleyway pavement with a ring of debris around him as he protected himself from his own brethren." The Atharim had cornered Nox, he'd protected himself. Nearly cooked himself alive.

And he still fights - knowing they'll hunt him till he's dead. And he's not even angry. That pisses Dorian off more than anything else, "The boy gets attacked and still does his job. I asked him to find the body of the man who was not there when my officers went to retrieve the evidence. He waltzed into the tunnels with both arms. Confronted another man sentenced to the same death, and found our scientist walking among the monsters. Three bullet holes in his head, vacant eyes. Dead but walking."

Dorian shuttered at the thought of seeing such a thing. Only in movies, had he ever seen such things, and Nox jumped in the middle and saved Officer Lih's life. Forfeiting his own - and for what? That's what the drink is for. Glad I'm not him. Glad it wasn't me who faced those things. I'll bring whoever I need to to justice, would hid whatever they asked of me. But I'm mortally grateful I do not face those dangers. A drink for the lives lost protecting humanity from the things they don't even know about." Dorian raised his glass in remembrance before downing the last of it.

[Sören]

“Three times,” he repeated. Dead things walking. It clenched his teeth, but it was better not to fall down the rabbit hole of that thought. The alcohol lubricated his tongue, and he did not want to say too much -- not because the man was a police officer, but because Sören did not wish anyone to bear witness to the shadow of his darker thoughts. Nimeda’s guileless voice haunted sometimes, an unwanted voyeur to his dreams. Even that was too much.

“I know the boy you mean, now.” Though not the name. A snake; or had been, presumably up until his own kind turned their savage teeth upon the knowledge of what he was. As Sören recalled, he had intended to kill the boy before consideration of the crater cradling him struck understanding and offered a reprieve instead. The man impaled to the wall had received no such quarter. For all his tallied sins, that one had never kept Sören from peaceful sleep.

He rubbed at his face, took another bitter swallow. “I suppose there’s honour in it,” he said, though he sounded more than a little dubious. He might have in fact more honestly called it foolishness. Sören had seen the same boy at the fundraiser too, at the centre of the strange attack -- and a shield to the bloodied girl after. He grumbled low in his throat as he considered it. It was not that he was adverse to risk, but it did not call to him without discernible gain. What was the point?

“Why does he do it?” The question had some heat behind it, and his jaw clenched like perhaps he would rather have not asked it. Instead he pointed somewhere in the direction of the other man’s glass, though the last drain had had a note of finality. “Do you want another?”

[Dorian]

Dorian glanced down at his empty tumbler with a nod. "Never let a mate drink alone." He waved for another drink. This wasn't a meeting of friends, or even enemies or business partners - strangers of similar minds. Though Dorian knew nothing of the man.

"Why? I don't know. He's a boy who thinks himself a god?" The thought made Dorian laugh out loud. Nox had an ego, but he definitely didn't think himself a god. He thought a great deal of himself but he was not one to be worshiped in that sense anyway. "He knows nothing else. Born into it all. Can you imagine growing up on the road in the middle of the United States. Learning to read and write from online tutors. Playing with weapons and in addition to learning everything we did as children. Learning how to hunt monsters. He's never held a real job in his life. He's never had a roof over his head he didn't pay for in rental fees or none at all. I imagine he and his family spent many a night in their cramped vehicle too far away from civilization to find a room to sleep in, but too cold to pitch a tent." Dorian sighed, "Who raises a kid like that?"

[Sören]

Sören was vaguely surprised when the drink was accepted. His life tread such narrow lines sometimes that he forgot the simple pleasure of camaraderie absent of ulterior motive. Memories of Declan buried deep, and for a moment he regretted the drunken sway of his thoughts to things best left untouched. Better to learn the lesson and find such connections in a stranger; to swap tales and no names, each returning to his own life after. He did not care for this man’s woes any more than he suspected the same was true.

The idea of godliness plucked a grim smile, but its shadow slipped quickly away. His mind reared sluggishly to reflect upon the mercurial nature of his own existence in kind, but it was too terrible to grasp. Sometimes he still heard the clack of those bones. With a short swallow to rid the taint, he instead considered the manner of his own upbringing, which provoked considerably less feeling. Lacking the usual pillars of either parent, Sören had been raised by money.

“Who indeed,” he agreed. Fate’s forked tongue was cruel. It did not really answer the question he had been asking, which was perhaps too slippery a thing anyway -- and far more existential than he was willing to delve into even with the whiskey. Else maybe it really was as simple as do or die. Another drain. “A child should have a childhood.” A resolution that somehow pleased him, the first such instance of satisfaction he found in the conversation, and strangely of peace. One couldn't control the building blocks of their own life. Absence was its own vindication. He didn’t think about it.

[Dorian]

Who indeed? Dorian drank in silence for a moment reflecting on his own transgressions. Fatherhood had never been good to him - his own father was a traditionalist. Liking men had never gone over well. Marrying Ana had saved him that family disgrace - having a son only made it even better. But if not for his own manipulations in the thing he wouldn't have either. He'd still be in the family business though who's to say things would be any different given the choices. He still would have married out of obligation and had a child even if it were 'out of love'. Ana didn't mind. She got what she wanted out of the deal - and now that Cruz of was of age and vice president of Jivana his father's leash was lessened. If not gone.

He'd never been much of a father to Cruz. At least not until Nox showed up to teach his son how to be a god. Cruz took to it like a fish to water - Nox even refrained from teaching his son battle weaves. He focused on other things - things outside of his ball park but still the boy picked up a few things. That had been apparent when his own saved his life.

But he pushed the thoughts away. Drink was here and lighter things should be had while sitting in a bar losing ones inhibitions to the drink. "What tale brings you here? Romance? Death? or just general oblivion?"

[Sören]

He scoffed at the offered suggestions, though which one earned the greatest derision was unclear. The answer was none of them, of course. Sören’s sluggish mind grasped for a moment at an explanation worthy of the telling, but the words all ran into feeling. He contemplated his glass instead. Poetry was preferable to bluntness, and he might have woven something elegant from the pieces of truth. At least if he’d had better control of his faculties than he did currently. He would not stoop to doing something so poorly, though.

“Good old fashioned betrayal,” he said eventually. A grim smirk thinned his lips, since such pains did not exist without the ingredient of trust, and Sören was usually better at the game. In fact he was stung twice over of late. Nimeda’s betrayal was less surprising, though the fact she had managed to rouse herself to the task had been unanticipated. Ephraim’s, in hindsight, should have been obvious. “And a moment of self-indulgence before I decide what is to be done about it.”

[Dorian]

Betrayal. That was always a fun demon. And as one who had betrayed a friend, and been betrayed by his family, he felt a sort of kinship to the man. It was after all why he was really here. Nox had lost an arm because of him. But the boy didn't blame him. He didn't even blame the Atharim. The blame lie in the monsters who took it from him. Nox would always be a better man. Dorian was not a hunter, and he now saw the look in Martin's eyes everytime they would need. Dorian was a friend, but he was beneath Martin. The man had become High Inquisitor. And then on to an Archangel with a new title. Martin had known his betrayal too. Dorian's doubt lingered under the understanding nod he gave the man. "As both betrayer and betrayed, I say give them a chance to explain. It will allow you to possibly understand, but it will make them feel better too. You can still feel the same. but maybe with a greater insight to the person. And yourself." Dorian was sure that his advice would fall on the same dead ear as he said it to himself. Pride was something very difficult to get over. And even in the dulled state of mind, Dorian knew his family had betrayed him because he had betrayed them first. It was an never ending circle. "The circle of betrayals will never end without understanding."

[Sören]

He barked laughter. “I know enough of the why, and I do not wish him to feel better for it,” he said grimly. For the other betrayal he said nothing. By virtue of its enacter it was a less certain thing, doubtless intentional at all, though that didn’t forgive the theft. Nimeda would not be able to explain it, if she even remembered the next time he saw her in the Unseen World. Thalia was likewise unlikely to have any great insight into her new possession. Yet the volcanic depths of Sören’s anger were not soothed by the knowledge of its innocence.

He downed the last of his drink. “The Ouroboros. The Saṃsāra. There’s no escaping the wheel of fate. Ever doomed to repeat the same mistakes.”

[Dorian]

The mention of the Ouroboros made Dorian stiffen slightly. It was another betrayal he was responsible for. One that he did not regret in the slightest, except it made his life slightly easier without it. He could do his job as a detective without having to hide the truth. But it also left him wondering if this was truly what he wanted out of life - but he knew nothing else. He'd been a rich pampered brat before - he knew that and could admit as much.

But his mind wandered back to his schooling before the Atharim found him - before Martin found him. It had been a trying time, the boyfriend turned ex and the monsters fighting in the ring. He'd not been back since he became a cop. Maybe he needed a little adventure, but then Dorian was sure his job was adventure enough. The never ending cycle of life and betrayals sounded like a philosophy paper he once had to write. "Sounds much like a philosophy paper I had to write once upon a time many years before becoming the man I am today."

Dorian stood up with a smile. "And on that note, I should call a taxi and find my way home." Dorian saluted his new acquaintance. "I bid you a fond adieu and happy hunting." Dorian walked in a straight line - at least he thought it was straight, but in his state of mind, a circle could be straight.

[[ figured not much more to add to this so time to move on. ]]