Let's All Get Drunk

River
Consider this bonding time.

Ever since she gave one of the patrons at the Diamond Cabaret a bloody nose, it's been a bit harder to bid on shifts with the other dancers. Nobody wants to be known as the strip club where you need a safe word to interact with the dancers, so River has found herself with decidedly more free time than she had originally anticipated. Which, of course, meant that she was spending time around the hotel room being what can only be described as a sad lump. She's even taken to watching the daytime programming on Telemundo. 
Enséñame a querer, she'd clarified if Ihsan asked what she was watching. Probably between little whimpery noises and pleas in Spanish for Adriana to get her life together and for anyone to straighten up and see exactly what Yadira was up to.

The show has been on the air since 1998. If something doesn't give, River's going to start torrenting episodes of daytime Venezuelan television (which will likely result in her breaking whatever electronic device she used to acquire said television episodes and ending up on a technocratic watch list because River Vasquez knows precisely nothing about computers.)

Today was different, though, and after she indignantly gave the business to some nameless television character, she got in the shower, cleaned upo, and put makeup on. Eyeliner, mascara, some eyeshadow, and a little blush because she needed to look like she had actually eaten something of value as of late. She's got on a denim skirt and a sweater. River even shaved her legs- this is a good sign.

"Do you want to go get a beer with me?" she asks Ihsan, as if she has finally mustered the oomf to go drink in public.

And thus, they go drink in public.

The bar is a relatively decent establishment. It isn't dirty, but its name doesn't really ring too many bells. It would probably only be known as that one place that has a deal with a microbrewery upstate (which could name any number of places in Colorado) but it is five o'clock and well drinks are three dollars and there she is perched on top of a mismatched bar stool holding a tall glass of some IPA the bartender recommended.

"Do you think working with a ballet company gives you a flexible schedule?"


Samir
Eleanor Roosevelt's brilliant advice was to do one thing every day that scares you.

That's brilliant advice for an individual with an anxiety disorder. Means they can justify never leaving the damned house. Trailer. Whatever. The brain has tricks for defeating itself. Samir would like to think he's smarter than his brain.

He had sent Grace a text message only after he loaded himself onto the train. Told her he was headed into the city and going to the dirtiest bar he could find. It was beer o'clock if she wanted to join him. He has only peripheral awareness of what is going on in her life courtesy of Ginger. Maybe his sixth sense concerning her emotional well-being is niggling at him.

And now he is wandering into the first bar he passes that strikes him as being The One. It isn't as dirty as he was hoping for. It isn't dirty at all.

So the tall dark handsome stranger steps out of the way of the door and with a sigh puts his back to the wall and sends Grace a text saying he failed miserably but when she was ready to come out here he was.

Ihsan
One afternoon, after days on end of filling the hotel room with Spanish drama, River asked Ihsan out for a beer.  On that day Ihsan couldn't be happier to oblige with a request.  She wasn't one to turn down a night out very often in the first place, but it was all the better that River was getting out into fresh air.  She didn't want to have to spend goodness-knows-how-long worrying about looking after someone-- she would have gone and started a family by now if that was on her agenda.

So Ihsan was sitting next to River on a bar stool that was a little shorter than the one her companion was seated at herself.  She had her down on her shoulders and wore a floppy-brimmed hat on her head.  Boots, tight black jeans, and a chunky gray sweater.  River had purchased a beer, and Ihsan opted for an Irish coffee instead.  She wasn't accustomed to chilly days, blamed it on the bones of her ancestors and their centuries of desert-dwelling.  So she sat with her legs crossed one knee over the other and held her coffee mug with both hands, cupped up near her face so she was breathing the warm vapors it emitted.

"No," was her answer with a matter-of-fact tone and shake of her head.  "Practice won't change on account of you.  Neither will classes that you'd teach in.  You'd be better off on shift work."

When a door opens in a bar it tends to bring light and sound and sometimes even cold or heat along with it.  Ihsan's eye had moved reflexively to the door when she heard and saw it opening past her left shoulder.  She'd looked back to River right away, mid conversation with her after all, but soon looked distractedly back to the disappointed looking man who hovered by the door instead of entering further.  Her brow heavied a little, thoughtful from shuffling through memory to try and place the familiarity in the stranger's(?) face.

"I never believed in deja vu," she said distractedly and nodded her head with one small chin-bob toward the door, indicating that River should glance as well.  "Even before I knew better, I did not."

River
She takes it in, really pays attention to what it is that Ihsan is saying because she makes a pretty good point- she'd be better off on shift work. Her mind drifts briefly to being a professional card player because heaven knew she had an edge on the blackjack table, but that took her thoughts one step further and River nodded and took a good, solid drink of her beer. Solid enough that it disappeared down the hatch and she had about half a glass left because reasons.

Ihsan points her attention to the door and she turns her head, then shoulders, and pays attention to the door like most people do when someone new walks in the door at a place like this. Her brain, however, fills in a big blank space instead of filling in someone Samir-shaped. It's what the universe does sometimes, paints over places in your consciousness because it knows to fill in a repeating pattern even if that isn't correct.

So, she almost misses him before she leaned a little over to Ihsan and said, "... I have no idea what I'm supposed to be looking for."

Samir
[perc + awareness: WHAT UP MY PEOPLE]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 3, 4, 7, 9) ( success x 2 )

Ihsan
[Oh right, we roll these things:  Perception 2 + Awareness 2]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 5, 9) ( success x 1 )

Grace
[Perc + Awareness: Doing this too!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 6, 8, 8) ( success x 3 )

Samir
For those of you playing along at home: Samir and Ihsan were both in Cairo before the revolution of 2011. They both had powerful mentors in Los Angeles who knew other powerful mentors in Los Angeles. Sam had never been much of a partygoer but Kayf had dragged him plenty of places that Mike had also dragged Ihsan.

They know each other even if they haven't exactly added each other on Facebook. Enough to recognize each others' resonances anyway. He picks up on River's too even though he's never seen her before. The pinging on his internal radar has him looking up from his screen and stuffing the device back in his pocket.

Grace had a little red dot on him during his little Quiet episode recently. If she shows up five seconds after he texts her that isn't going to be the weirdest thing in the world.

For a second he looks as if he doesn't know what to do with himself. It's obvious Ihsan has seen him but she isn't looking at him right now. This wasn't in the manual. Keyboard mash keyboard mash.

He takes a deep breath and counts all the chairs in the place before walking up to the bar.

Grace
Samir is a lifesaver, really. Of course she'd be looking for any excuse to peel herself away from her ongoing efforts to track Mike down via mundane means. And by that, we mean, she's looking for suspicious murders in between here and the east coast. It's such a great way to spend an afternoon, isn't it?

She texts him back, asking for location (because she doesn't red-dot people after the need has passed) and presumably gets a response, because in walks Grace to the establishment that Samir found. Not dirty. Which, hey, that's good, right?

The place is humming already. Grace rolls her eyes at the caprice of the universe for doing this, but she looks around a bit, doesn't notice Samir at all (not a surprise there) but does find Ihsan and River. And so, she approaches. And oh, hey!  Look at him appearing out of the woodwork.

"Hey. I see you found some company," she says.

Ihsan
"A familiar face," Ihsan coached River, and following an after thought she looked her new friend in the face to clarify.  "I mean, perhaps not familiar to you.  But you know what I am saying."

The Irish coffee cup was moved up in front of her face, so she could perch her lips on the rim and take a sip.  Eyes as dark as the coffee was prior to tampering found Samir approaching the bar and followed him as she did.  It was much like unexpectedly bumping into somebody that you'd gone to high school with; in that equation, there is always one party who didn't want to be seen and the other who wanted nothing more than to shout out recognition and catch up on old times.

"Hey, didn't you live in Los Angeles?"

Guess which person Ihsan was.

She inquisitively stared, open and waiting for her answer, and it was at that point that Grace entered the bar, found Samir and the other two Awakened within his proximity, and approached.  Ihsan looked over to Grace and offered an upward nod of her head and a brief smile.

"Grace.  How are you getting along?"

River
[I notice resonance, because it's a thing]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )

Samir
When Deer Met Headlights.

Though he was neither born in Egypt nor could boast any Egyptian blood in his lineage Sam was a citizen of the world. Between his multilingualism and his ambiguous ethnicity he grew used to people mistaking him for someone else or thinking that they shared a heritage or what have you years ago.

In this instance though yes as a matter of fact he did live in Los Angeles and he is drawing a breath and opening his mouth to answer when Grace appears.

His eyes tick between Ihsan and Grace and then he cuts River a lopsided nervous grin. Does not offer his hand to shake. Both of his hands are stuffed hard into the pockets of his leather jacket. Like in L.A. he wears his hair tied into a knot at the nape of his neck. He hasn't shaved his damned face in several days. He only thought he was going to be seeing Grace and no offense Grace but he doesn't feel the need to impress you.

"Hi," he says. "Sam. Nice to meet you."

River
"Ohhhh," she says, like this is supposed to make things make sense. And on her senses she gets this amazing cocktail of piercing keen forceful rippling winged something that River concludes makes her beer taste funky. So, she finishes it and carefully pushes it aside in favor of ordering a water.

She's going to be drinking a lot. She's not a freshman, River Vasquez knows how to drink and minimize the level of damage she's going to do to herself in the morning. She knows what she's doing, and there she is taking in people and Grace gets a legitimate smile (though, despite her radiant nature, isn't necessarily beaming. Don't make references about clouds and rain, Ms. Vasquez, it's tacky)

There was somewhere that she didn't know and there were introductions. She notices the lack of hand being offered, so she doesn't broach the gap with her own. Despite her profession, River has a very well developed sense of personal space.

"I'm River," she says with a smile, "what are you drinking?"

Because Ms. Temporarily Short on Funds is more than willing to buy a cute guy a beer because why the fuck not?

Grace
Grace gives Ihsan this weary look, and just responds by hopping up on the stool next to her and saying: "I need some tequila? Something."

River too. Everybody, really. Let's all get plastered.

Well, okay, River looks like she's doing all right, with her beaming nature and outward smiles. But still.

"Sam's my friend, he's cool," she says, trying to bridge the gap between groups of people who don't know each other yet. So, you know, he's a known entity. And so are they. We're all cool here.

Samir
[manip + subt: lol the name river totally doesn't mean anything to me]

Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (7, 7) ( success x 2 )

Ihsan
Grace's answer got a dark chuckle out of Ihsan, something that sounded like it could have been a rumble in the throat of a lioness.  Grace had moved to the stool beside her, so Ihsan patted it welcomingly before it was mounted.  She soon went back to cradling her drink with both hands.

"Oh!  Sam, that's right.  Sorry, it's been a little while.  I'd kind of forgotten what your name was."  Perhaps that wasn't the kind of polite lying that she should have presented, but you get to know Ihsan for more than five minutes and the realization that beating around the bush wasn't her forte.

"I recommend the coffee.  It's good."

Samir
Ihsan had kind of forgotten what his name was. He looks back over at her and smiles the sort of smile that only serves to broadcast how uncomfortable he is when he isn't holed up in his cave. It would be a nice smile if he meant it.

"That's alright. I get that a lot."

What are you drinking?

"Not tequila," he says. Since this was such a hit the last time he said he tries it again: "Last time I drank tequila I woke up in a pyramid."

Now that he's the only one not sitting he has committed himself to standing up. So he goes to stand by the girl who's offering to booze him up. It has nothing to do with the fact that he kind of knows her most recent damage courtesy of Ginger. Nope. Nothing at all.

I recommend the coffee. It's good.

"I will do the coffee."

River
[Manip+sub: this is me being completely normal and eeeeverything is fine]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 5, 7, 8) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

River
She seems to be doing okay, or as good as one can expect for someone whose best friend died a fairly gruesome death pretty recently. Ihsan knows better, but Ihsan has had to live with her as of late. She's had to suffer through the Spanish soap operas, she's had to coax her out of the bathtub because River decided to make her little fortress of solitude in the only bathroom they had and you can't really be a hermit in a one bathroom situation.

But she's there, and the fact that she's enjoying herself isn't fake. So, there's that. She flags down the bartender with a wave and a smile and a look that says she's pretty accustomed to flagging down bar tenders.

"Can I get an irish coffee and-" she turns briefly to look at Grace and "- do you drink bourbon?"

A quick offer. Two if the answer is yes, one if the answer is no.

Samir
[perc+empathy: you're so full of shit]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]

Grace
"Yeah," she responds to River. "Irish coffee doesn't sound terrible, actually. Better than tequila."

Tequila always reminds her of Thursdays with Elijah. Not bad memories, just there was this one time where she had too much, and yeah that wasn't fun.

Maybe she's still got that bottle stashed behind the robot arm in the Danger Room...

Samir
River is not completely normal and nothing is fine: film at 11.

For a few seconds that the camera and anyone else looking at them picks up Samir looks River dead in the eye. It might look like flirtation. With his resonance flavored as it is having his attention on her might not be the most comfortable thing in the world but he is an attractive young man and once you get past the jabbing sensation there's no malice in him. Something in her speaks to something in him and he takes a deep breath but doesn't say anything else.

He really wants to straighten out the pile of coasters to his left but that's a slippery slope. He keeps his hands in his pockets.

"Tequila is Spanish for 'you fucked up,'" he says.

River
There has been one time in the entirety River's life where she has not been able to keep someone's gaze, and she'd like to keep it at one time. So, Samir looks her dead in the eye and it might look like flirtation but she isn't sure what it is. She smiles at him anyway because there isn't any malice in him no matter how awkwardly uncomfortable his resonance might feel. She doesn't have an approximation for what the feeling is like, save for the fact that it's just, well, piercing. About like getting her ears pierced, she presumes, which was something she hadn't actually done until she was past the age where she could drink normally. The nerves are worse than the brunt of it.

She does get two coffees, one bourbon, and then tosses Grace a look with her eyebrows up and a laugh that comes shortly after her surprise manages to get pushed away.

"What terrible world did you live in that said tequila shots are okay," she said, taking a sip of her water before continuing, "do you have crazy spring break stories nobodies ever heard about?"

Grace
"That must be why Elijah likes it so much," Grace says, in response to Samir's quip.

And also, well, she fucked up. She did. And now it's time to drown the sorrows, right?

"My spring breaks were full of marathons of various turn-based strategy games, okay? No."

She only really started doing anything like this because it's what you do when you're a mage and you can see what you were never meant to as a human.

Samir
He doesn't mean to but he laughs when Grace takes a jab at Elijah. It's a quick Oh shit I shouldn't laugh laugh and then it's over. Spring break doesn't mean anything to him. He never went to college. Or high school. Or.

A tone sounds in Ihsan's pockets and she pulls out her phone to quick-read a text before excusing herself. She and Sam agree to catch up later which means he's going to have to hunt her down which seeing as how he's a Mercurial Elite that isn't the biggest deal in the world. It'll take him all of two minutes.

Then she's gone. Sam clears his throat before sitting on the now-vacant stool between River and Grace.

"So, uh," this to Grace. "Spill it."

She did say she needed something. Italicized. Though he doesn't come out and ask his tone asks What's wrong? Might as well take the heat off River for a minute or two.

River
Ihsan gets a little wave goodbye- they'll catch up. It's not like they aren't inhabiting the same space; River would text if she needed anything. (And briefly wonders if she has Ihsan's number correctly in her phone. Knows she has it written down on an actual paper address book in her obnoxiously large purse, so she doesn't worry too much.)

She's content to sit and listen to people, and Samir is saying spill it and her brows raise and she looks at Grace. Cocks her head to the side a little like a puppy would when encountering a command it hasn't learned yet.The look, you see, is concerned. Concerned for someone she barely knows, yes, but she is a bit concerned and that concern is pointed in Grace's direction.

Grace
"Spill what? I don't have my coffee yet," she says, and it's a dull, dry joke. She gives Sam this look, trying to figure out if he really wants to know.

"Just, you know. Stuff. Mike fell asleep, woke up in New Jersey, and called me to let me know he hadn't... done anything too crazy while he was out. I worry about him, though."

And she worries, every day, about the continued silence of The Artist. How long is that going to last?

Samir
"You worry about him?"

Sam sounds baffled by this statement. It isn't as if he and Grace talk about their feelings when they talk. They talk about news items that have shown up on Twitter or argue the philosophy of mathematics or go back and forth on the most efficient application of a program given the spheres involved.

Shit. They've known each other what five months now and other than his propensity for slipping into Quiet Grace doesn't know that Samir is straight-up mentally ill. She had to find out from Elijah that he's a fucking drug dealer.

"We're talking about the scary white guy who knows the priest, right?"

River
Ah, look, bourbon. You're awful tasty-

Ugh, wait, no, you're just awful. Thanks to her contact at work, River's slowly turning into a bourbon-snob, but whatever the case it gets a hearty drink anyway because it's there and she concludes it'll get the job done. She takes a second, inhales, and reminds herself to be a compassionate person.

It takes about two seconds too long, though.

"Worrying is terrible," she says, "because it lacks the ability to actually be acted upon. It just is- and it's even worse because having people tell you not to worry is even worse than actually worrying."

Grace
Grace gives her own coffee a glare, and goes for it, after Samir wonders aloud why she should ever worry about a guy as scary as Mike. Well, that's because he's both scary and losing contact with himself, Sam.

"Maybe that was a poor choice of words. I'm not so much worried about his physical safety as much as I am worried about everyone else's should he go to sleep and stay there."

There are other things to worry about when it comes to Mike.

"And River? Are you... warded? I have concerns."

Especially after Farrah, but she's not going to bring it up directly.

River
There's this moment where it crosses River's features that she's thinking about how to avoid this topic gracefully, but that... doesn't quite seem to happen. She seems thoughtful, waves a dismissive hand and with the everything is fine for right now that she had managed to project and hold onto (barely, River finally comes up with a response.

"I'm staying in his old hotel room with Ihsan, I doubt security's a problem right now?" she said this almost like a question, "but I plan on moving out once work picks up. Things will work out."

Let it be said that River Vasquez did not ask for help.

River
(close that tag!)

Grace
"You could stay with me?" she suggests, because of course she is going to. "Kalen made that place as a safe spot for people to crash in if they needed it. I took him up on the offer a long time ago."

And, well, now she has an office with a sleeping couch and its own kitchen, because Kalen knows her that well.

"And it's got that kitchen," she adds, as if to wave a lure in front of River's face.

River
"What's the rent on a place like that?" she's trepidation, that much is clear. She's not even making a show to hide that, the way she looks at Grace sidelong and is trying to tell herself to slow down on her drink but she's trying super hard to not drain the thing and call it a day.

"I'd really rather just get a leg up on security in my own place," she said, "if I move in with you, that's too much."

Samir
Just keep your head down, Samir. Drink your coffee. It has whiskey and Bailey's in it. Whiskey and Bailey's are delicious. Just ignore the fact that you're lactose intolerant and you don't know whether the whipped cream came out of a can from a factory or whether the bartenders make the stuff with little cartridges of carbon dioxide. Don't act like you're sandwiched between two women who are having a Serious Conversation. There you go.

Grace
Grace snorts into her coffee. "Nothing. The rent is nothing."

As if they'd charge.

"I can understand. I have my own place too, for all I never go back to it. But you know. It's there, if you ever need it."

She can understand some fear on River's part. The first time Kalen invited her over, she suggested going with a friend, because the dude might be a serial killer in disguise or something. And at that thought, Grace frowns into her cup and drinks some more.

River
There are about seven different things that are going through River's head at that juncture, and one of them being that she's pretty sure that this is all going to go very, very badly and she's going to wake up and she's going to owe Grace something. It's a look that she shares with old people who are afraid of credit cards and people who have very narrowly avoided losing their knee caps to the mafia.

She then squares her attention on Grace, raises her glass, and grins. It's playful, for all of her nerves.

"Let's get drunk together before we decide we're going to be room mates," she said, "I'm surprised Ihsan hasn't packed up yet."

Samir
Oh right. Phone. Phone will save you from the Serious Conversation sandwich. Let's see what's going on on Reddit.

Grace
Grace raises her cup to River in agreement to the getting drunk together part, and upends her glass. It saves her from having to emote too much about that last part. Ihsan should be packing up, because Mike is gone.

River may be hesitant, might worry about owing Grace in the end. But Grace just doesn't think in terms of owing. She'd have to believe in fair trades and there being a concept of worth that made any damn sense.

"Yes. Let's get drunk. Second that."

River
And thus, Grace upends her glass and it becomes socially acceptable for River to finish her second alcoholic beverage in under an hour. She swallowes, closes her eyes tight and is content to try and drink that down about as quickly as she can without having to really notice the fact that if she exhales she can taste rubbing alcohol.

"Sam, I apologize in advance for whatever awkward things I say during the process of getting toasted."

Samir
"What?"

He doesn't even look up from his phone. It's like he comes preprogrammed to not listen when his homegirls are talking across him.

River
"Preemptively apologizing for making a pass at you," she said. Drink down, and back to her water.

Samir
"Oh. Okay. Cool."

Dot dot dot.

River
She clears her throat, looks at the bartender and then back at Grace. She's slowly starting to tend a nice little graveyard of drinks. She wraps both hands around her water glass. Looks back at Grace and-

"So... what do people do in Denver for fun that isn't hiking?"

There we go, smooth transition.

Grace
"You guys are going to third wheel me," Grace says, smiles, slides her empty glass around. "I don't care. I have bourbon."

Ha, ha, ha. Yes. More bourbon is going to be necessary to deal with this shit.

The rational, good-decision-making side of her says that if The Artist does attack, it would be preferable not to be drunk at the time. Then she wonders if she could scrub her blood of oxygen if it came to that, and decides no... Not with that amount of control, unlikely. She'd end up exsanguinating herself or something.

Oh, the things you think about, right?

"Laser tag."

River
"I think you have a secret laser tag addiction, Grace," she said, looked at her like she was completely serious which... she could pull off for all of two seconds, "and I want you to know that there are people who can help with that. They have meetings."

Samir
"Grace sucks at laser tag," Sam says. Still without looking up from his phone. He's gone from Reddit to answering an email.

Grace
"Ohh yeah?" she says, makes like she's going to shove Samir off the barstool, but it's just a feint, a joke. "Fuck you, man. It was just that once," she says, laughing.

Well, well. She can still laugh.

"I know about the meetings. They're at my laser tag arena. I hold them, River. I don't see the problem."

River
"Ohhhh, ladies and gentlemen we have a grudge match- the laser tag battle of the century- Grace versus Sam. Two men enter, one man leaves-" a la that one movie with Thunderdome in it.  "We need to make this happen. Is pay-per-view still a thing?"

Samir
With the feint and the invective Sam decides to pocket his phone and be present. That's what the Internet says the first step to recovery is. Mindfulness and shit. So she laughs. He laughs too. It's a bit uncomfortable but he's trying. Damn it.

So okay. Phone in pocket. Fingers knit between his knees. He looks back over at River for what may be the first time since he sat down. Hard to gauge his eye color with dim ambient lighting. Whatever they are they look dark as the wood making up the bar indoors.

Okay. So River is funny. He's only had about a quarter of his Irish coffee so Sam is in a decent position to judge. He's not drinking to get drunk. He's barely drinking.

"What the fuck is Pay Per View?" he asks.

Grace
"That's what we had before the internet gave us BitTorrent. Nasty bug though, in that you had to actually fucking pay."

Ahh, Mercurial Elites and the yo-ho-ho philosophy, right?

"I will say though, that I am not averse to putting a bunch of spikes on my coat and wearing a skull helmet or whatever is sufficiently Mad Max enough to qualify for this grudge match."

Samir
A wince at the idea of actually paying for entertainment. How bourgeois.

She will say though.

"I was just gonna smoke a bunch of weed and kick your ass again, but if you want to make a cosplay out of it you go right ahead."

River
"So let me get this straight: you two smoke up, go eternal grudgematch in a laser tag arena... and I have somehow written myself out of this scenario why?" dismissive wave. "I call dibs on playing the winner."

Grace
"I will send you both to Valhalla shiny and chrome!"

Hey, even if River or Samir hasn't seen the latest movie yet, they'd have had to have lived under rocks not to get that reference. It's everywhere.

"Well. Okay. Probably not. But a girl's gotta brag."

Samir
"WITNESS ME."

Pounding his cooling Irish coffee is way more badass when he does it after quoting a movie only two other people in the bar have seen. Especially when he puts his fists up about temple-height and says it in a deadpan despite saying it in a loud voice first.

Yes River. This is the one you want to hit on when you're sufficiently anesthetized.

River
She doesn't laugh like a dignified belle. She's not the type of person who laughs like she's some sweet and demure thing. She doesn't laugh like it's the tinkling of bells it's the blaring of trumpets with too much bravado. She's downed two alcoholic beverages in less than an hour and here she is witnessing a moment of utter glory.

So, River laughs, puts her head on the bar and her cheeks are bright ink like she can't tell if she's supposed to be amused or embarrassed and settles on being both. Covers her mouth because she's trying not to encourage them but-

Yeah. River Vasquez can really pick 'em.

Grace
"Ohh, man. This was a good idea. If only to hear him yell 'witness me' in a bar."

Very few people ever witness Samir. It's a part of what makes this so funny. People's eyes have a tendency to slide off of Samir Lakhani. His friends tend to forget he's there, if he's not making sure their attention is grabbed.

It's also what makes him so great at laser tag. Cheater.

But then, they all cheat. It's part of the fun.

"I'm going to have to break into Kalen's shiny silver eyeshadow for this cosplay, I can see. He'll understand. It's for a good cause."

Samir
If only yo hear him yell 'witness me' in a bar.

"No one will ever believe you." A beat. He winces and slides the empty glass away. "Jesus, I've never regretted anything so fast in my life."

River
She is still giggling, cheeks bright red and the word that most accurately describes River's reaction is tittering.

"Did you just Bill Murray us?"

Samir
"You Bill Murray'd yourself."

River
So, she has to sit there for a minute, because sound has left her laughter and, instead, has become a little gasp and a shake of her shoulders. Her face hurts. It's been a little while since she's laughed hard enough that her face hurts.

"Dang it," is all she could get out. She might be pretty verbally useless for a little bit.

Grace
"They will too believe me. I don't lie, about important things. And what could possibly be more important?"

Her eyes scan across the boundary between wall and ceiling as she talks.

There are important things, but she doesn't want to think about them.

"I mean, look. You broke River."

Samir
He does look. River is laughing like that's the funniest fucking thing that's ever happened to her. Given what has happened to her and what has been documented to have happened to her he takes it as either a point of pride that he's able to provoke that response out of her or a point of concern that that is the response she had.

Then he looks back at Grace. Flicks his eyebrows.

"I don't know what to tell you," he says. "I have that effect on women." He drops the act. "No I don't. I don't talk to women."

Oh good. His drink is empty. Sam drags the nearest ashtray over to him and wipes the hand that touched it on the thigh of his jeans and reaches into his jacket to find his cigarettes and lighter.

River
[WP: Seriously, River, get your shit together you're not that drunk (+1 diff: you have no idea how funny she finds Bill Murray)]

Dice: 5 d10 TN7 (4, 4, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )

Grace
"Oh, whatever. You talk to me all the time."

Well, of course, he meant that in a different way, right? Or maybe he just sees Grace as un-woman. It could happen.

River
She finally straightens up after she has managed to catch her breath and her stomach tells her that she needs to stop laughing because this is a lot of abuse that it isn't willing to take. She straightens out her sweater and smooths off her denim skirt and exhales a long and measured breath. Puffs her cheeks out because she needs to stretch and her cheeks are still pink but at least she isn't lightheaded.

River exhales. Long and with a little bit of a high-to-low quiet siren pitch.

"Iiiiii am okay."

Samir
If Grace needs it spelled out that Sam has the same relationship with her that he would have with a sister or a cousin or some other female blood relation he isn't going to draw her a picture but he can't lie worth a damn and the way that he ignores her for as long as it takes to light a cigarette and blow out the first drag ought to tell her as much.

"Yeah, but you don't fucking count."

He looks back over to her to see if this is how ball-busting works. He's been getting lots of practice in with Elijah but Elijah is. You know. Elijah. Also he and Elijah bonded over the fact that Elijah wanted to suck his dick as a self-soothing mechanism and Samir not only turned him down but made him a fucking sofa so he could play Civilization V and shut the fuck up about his emotional turmoil over torching a house full of what they thought were vampires.

River pulls herself together. Sam looks back over at her.

"Uh..." He clears his throat. "Remind me not to quote Bill Murray around you ever again."

Grace
"Geez, I should go hand my extra X chromosome over then. It's been nothing but trouble," she says, rolls her eyes at him, but note -- still smiling.

Everything may be falling apart. But River is okay. She's laughing, so she must still be there. Grace is laughing, so she must still be there.

Yeah. This was a good idea.

River
"It's probably for the best," like it's a sad truth, "when I saw Zombieland I was completely useless for the next hour. I'm not proud of that."

She shakes her head slow and sad, but there's the tiniest bit of a grin on her face. Shoots Grace a look at raises her water glass before taking another drink.

Samir
By the transitive property: Samir has good ideas.

Winning.

He considers what River has to say about his not quoting Bill Murray. Then he takes a drag off his cigarette instead of saying something inappropriate. Blows the smoke out his nose like he's performing an imitation of a dragon and glances back over at Grace.

"Wait, if you have an extra X chromosome, doesn't that mean you have Down's syndrome?"

Grace
"No, no. That's a totally different trisomy," Grace says. "And anyway, I meant... If I'm not a woman, then I have an extra X... The joke isn't the same if I have to explain it, dude."

She gives him a fake-glare and shakes her head.

"Zombieland was great. Cardio!"

Samir
Yep. They have a brother-sister relationship in the works. Sam cuts her a shit-eating grin when she tells him he's ruined her joke and takes a huge drag off his cigarette. That fake-glare is icing for him.

"I never..." He clears his throat. "I never saw Zombieland."

Grace
"Never? What? We are fixing that, Sam."

She might not say the same to Kalen, who experienced a zombie apocalypse for real. But Samir? Chances are he's never actually been forced to witness the collapse of human civilization under a zombie plague. He should be fine.

And it's hilarious.

River
River exclaims the Spanish equivalent of you've got to be shitting me (because the player doesn't know what that is and is being mildly lazy and refuses to use Google Translate to say such an important thing). and she looks between the two of them.

"It's incredibly quotable. And there is Bill Murray, which is a selling point for a very select number of people." she nods.

"Decidedly better than Anchorman."

Samir
He glances over at River like he needs backup in this fight. Unfortunately he speaks Spanish. So her exclamation does not fall on deaf ears. And then she talks shit about Anchorman.

"That is a bold statement," he says. Unblinking like she just insulted his mother or his favorite brand of snack food. It also appears as if he's about half a second away from laughing and ruining the effect. When he looks back to Grace: "How long is this movie? Fallout 4 comes out on Tuesday so we're gonna have to do it, like, now if you expect me to watch it before never."

River
That is a bold statement.
She just gives Samir the most sage of nods, like this was a matter of utmost philosophical importance... and like she cant' think of anythign to say without laughing out loud so she's really trying to keep her stoic face on and it's not quite working.

"Please tell me the warehouse has a theatre, Grace. It has to."


Grace
"It's a movie. A couple hours. You won't miss your Fallout launch, I swear," she says, rolls her eyes at him.

"It's about this guy, who treats the zombie apocalypse like a video game. Woody Harrelson is in it, and obsessed with Twinkies. Fucking owns."

River makes her statement about the warehouse, and Grace raises a brow at her. "Of course."

Does that mean you don't think Grace is about to kidnap you anymore, River? Hah.

Samir
Just smoke your cigarette, Samir. You're not going back to your lonely-ass trailer out in the middle of nowhere tonight.

River
"So... maybe... we can play laser tag and watch a movie and get drunk in a place that isn't going to cost half as much?" bats her eyelashes like if she's charming enough this will sound like a good idea.

Grace
"I like you, River. You have excellent ideas," Grace says, slips off of her barstool.

No, Samir. You are not going back to your lonely-ass trailer tonight. And no, River, you are not sleeping in a hotel bathtub tonight, where you have to share with Ihsan.

And maybe Grace will stay sober long enough to Ward the fuck out of you...

Yes. That would be a good idea too, says the rational part of her brain.