birthright_rpg | Drown Your Troubles

Entry tags:

daniel,
whistler

Drown Your Troubles

The sharp end of a dart whizzed through the air until it sunk solidly into cork. The quill vibrated in place. "Bullseye!" proclaimed its drunken thrower as he threw his hands in the air. Victory was his, assuming that darts were meant to hit a 'For Sale or Rent' board posted two feet from the game board. Daniel lumbered over and pulled the point from an ad for a 1976 Chevrolet with 40,000 miles on the odometer.

Hey... not a bad looking car.

Blindly, he moved to stab it into the correct spot. The air alongside his ear whistled. Thud. There was stinging pain in his right hand. "Ah! Son of a bitch!" He pulled the dart from the soft flesh between his knuckles. "You meant ta do that!" he accused an unknown assailant.

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"Shit, I really didn't!"

Whistler was panicked. It wasn't his best day, not by a long shot. He'd doled out the last of his cash-on-hand to get new tires for his Impala (apparently Searchlight's idea of a good time was to slash the tires of the old guy living on the outskirts of town in a ramshackle double-wide). Which meant a run into Vegas to stand in a ridiculously long line to withdraw more. At the end of it, a drink was in order.

Or eight.

And now he'd probably have to pay this guy's medical bills too.

"No?"

Daniel looked at the board again. Before the piercing pain, his hand was at the center of the target.

"In that case, nice throw."

He grabbed a wad of napkins from a dispenser and wiped the blood off his knuckles. Better to wipe it off than suck on the open wound and vamp out in full view. He cleaned the dart and gave it back to the guy.

Whistler smirked. "You'd think." He picked up a half-empty bottle of beer from the bar and took a sip. "Problem is, I was aimin' at the dart board to the left of ya."

His attention went to the stranger's wound. "It wouldn't be the first time this year I'd be payin' for medical expenses. So, say the word. We can hit a clinic and have that looked at."

A clinic? Not a chance, not with his total lack of respiration or pulse.

"Nah!" He smirked and waved it off. "I'm a quick healer. Never had stitches in my life. Barten'er! Can I get a coupla shots for me 'n my friend?"

He pointed at Whistler. "You drink whisky?"

Did Whistler drink whiskey? He was there when it was invented. The Agent tapped the first keg. "Twist my arm," he gladly replied.

"And two pints to chase 'em," he continued to the bartender. "Least I could do." He held out his hand. "Whistler."

"Daniel."

Whistler? Kind of name was that?

He slapped the man's hand in a loose shake. Now that he had a drinking buddy, the night was looking up. He really needed one or he'd probably end up sobbing into a mug like a bankrupt tourist who blew the last of the cash from his mattress.

Now that they were closer, he thought there was a peculiar smell about the guy. Not bad, just unusual.

He picked up the shot glass and lifted it to Whistler. "What are we drinkin' to?

Weird handshake, Whistler thought. Almost as if Daniel was afraid to make contact. He didn't come off as a germophobe...

And his breathing was waaaay off.

But there was whiskey, so the Agent didn't rightly care.

"To fuckin' up," he offered as a toast. "And gettin' back up and tryin' again."

"Hey, man, you're speakin' my language." He put back the shot and wiped his mouth. "Woo!" A slap to the countertop and he grabbed the pint. In order to work up the nice buzz he had going, Daniel had been drinking for over an hour. He wasn't about to let it fade on him.

"So what'd you fuck up?"

Whistler dropped his whiskey and chugged half of his pint. Tonic for what ailed him, and what ailed him (mostly) was Searchlight. Since he arrived, it'd all gone upside down.

"Fer starters, I flew into Nevada to convince someone to stay away from a podunk town called Searchlight, only I didn't. Then I hit a woman with my car. Inten--- Unintentionally. Then I gave 'em every reason to think I was insane. And earlier someone went and slashed my tires."

The demon finished his pint and ordered another round. "Can ya beat that?"

"I b'lieve I can," said Daniel. He leaned both arms on the bar and stared at the glossy surface. "I'm a vampire," he said, turning his face to Whistler. "You pro'bly figured that part out, am I right? And I'm dating this chick who's... well, let's jus' say she's connected to people who are a threat to my continued existence, so I tried to feed 'n not kill this girl at a bar and I wound up giving her apha... anaphyladic... crap." He rubbed his face. "Y' know what I mean, she's allergic to peanuts and I had just eaten a ton of them. I had to drive 'er to the hospital. I can't do jack shit." He took a gulp of his drink.

"Okay, lemme get this straight." Two shots and two beers in, and Whistler's speech started to slur. He was usually a heavyweight when it came to alcohol. The feeling was not a good one.

"You. Vampire." Should've figured that out, time was I could've done it by sight. "And not only did you save a girl from death by peanut, You're feeling bad about it. Because your girlfriend is connected to the Council. Sum it up?"

It was easy to infer 'threat to my continued existence to mean either, A) Slayer, or B) Council. While the Agent knew of at least one Slayer dating a Were, he had a harder time thinking a Slayer would sleep with the 'enemy'. Of which Daniel, by his story, didn't appear to be.

"So I'd say you did somethin' right. Couldn't have known about a nut allergy. Not like you've got a three-page questionnaire you gotta ask before feeding. Puts a positive check mark in my book."

Whistler finished the second beer, and ordered two more rounds.

"You share, I share. I'm a demon. And the woman I nearly ran over? A slayer. So watch your back."

Daniel sneered. “Yeah, heh,” the laugh dissolving into hiccup. “Right.” The vampire didn’t doubt he’d be easy pickings for a slayer. However, he had massive doubts a slayer would waste time or the sharp end of a stake on him. “The Council’s here, too,” he said. “I met one of ‘em. She knows what I am and I’m still here.” He ran a hand across his chest to demonstrate the lack of puncture wounds. “Bigger fish to fry. Maybe you,” he said, sizing up his new friend, who didn’t look dangerous, but was apparently hell behind the wheel.

”Oh!” He slapped the bar top.

Finally! Someone to tell.

“I met a vampire, she says that town about an hour south of here’s trouble. Gonna be trouble. Undisclosed trouble. She had a map.”

What kind of map? Road map? Treasure map? It struck Daniel that he hadn’t bothered to look.

The Agent knocked back his shot and began on his beer when the words 'Council' and, more importantly 'she', reached his brain and nearly made him do a spit take. Marjorie was here? He wouldn't put it past the old cunt, what with her granddaughter in the States. Some extra avoidance was in order. Maybe out of state.

Like that worked so well the last time.

The pounding on the bar brought Whistler back into the conversation.

"Wait. A map?" Maps equaled clues. And given the Agent's radar was on the fritz, he needed all the clues he could get.

Edited 2013-10-09 21:09 (UTC)

For all Daniel knew, it was a map to the closest McDonald's. But he nodded. It felt good to know something for a change, to not be a vampire perpetually caught with his pants around his ankles or his shoes on the wrong feet. Daniel finished his pint. "Her name was Katherine," he said. "Brunette with a painfully hot ass. I tried not to notice. If I wasn't seeing Holly, I probably would've..." He drifted into consideration. "Gotten my balls handed to me on a fork."

'If I wasn't seeing Holly, I probably would've gotten my balls handed to me on a fork.'

You still might, the demon groused internally. If it was the same Holly. Whistler considered her family, especially after Gregory's death. He could be a sumbitch uncle if he needed to be.

"Vampire with a painfully hot ass. Brunette. Got it." Whistler filed the information to be parsed and dissected later. He'd probably have to do some research. He hated doing research. And, he reasoned, back-up wouldn't be the worst idea.

"You don't normally hear of vamps and humans... uh, dating." Shit. "Assuming she's human, I mean."

Edited 2013-10-10 01:09 (UTC)

Daniel shrugged. "Just one of many things I do wrong," he said. Holding up two fingers, he signaled the bartender for another round of shots. He watched golden-brown liquid fill the glass containers. "Nah, y' know what?" Daniel squinted and rounded on Whistler, holding the whiskey aloft. "Maybe I do it right. Maybe I'm the next step in vampire evolution."

Gulp. Slam. Wipe.

"Here's the thing, Whistler." He leaned closer. "I actually felt bad for that girl! I did'n think that was possible. I can't figure out if I felt bad because I disappointed myself or bad 'cause she turned blue."

"Yer definitely different," Whistler confessed. "Not so much with the 'Grrr, Arrgh' like oh... ninety-nine percent of the vamps I've met in my travels."

Gulp. Slam. Wipe.

Idea.

"Can I check somethin'? It means touchin' yer chest, but not in, ya know, weird way."

"You think you can touch my chest and not be weird?"

Daniel sniffed, a mild laugh. "Alright, man. Whatever." With sleepy looking eyes, he faced Whistler, but only after doing a quick 360 to make sure nobody was looking.

It was weird, no matter how you described it. But Whistler wanted to see for himself. He placed a hand on Daniel's chest, where his heart would beat if he was alive.

"Huh."

The Agent retracted his hand after a moment. "Nope, no soul. You, my friend, appear to be an anomaly. Maybe you are a step forward."

Or backward. Daniel thought his sire would have a different perspective on it.

"Maybe souls are overrated," he said, rubbing absently at his face. "I doubt Ed Gein was using his. Nah, I think the demon's got more t' do with it. They can't all be the same. Maybe mine's--"

He wrinkled is nose.

Impotent?

Whistler cut him off. "Maybe yours isn't interested in mass slaughter." He took out his cigarettes, shook one through the ripped corner of the soft pack, and lit it. "Maybe you're supposed to be somethin' else."

"Like what?"

Daniel was glad he hadn't picked up the smoking habit when he was alive. It cost money he didn't have in spades. Which reminded him, he needed a damn job, fast, before he stopped being able to buy drinks. That would be a tragedy.

Whistler sighed into his beer. "There's a time I could've told ya," he grumbled. "I could look right at you and see your possible futures. But fuck," he took a gulp of the beverage, "I'm not so sure right now."

Daniel cringed. "You're a fortune teller?" He didn't look like a gypsy, although if he was brutally honest, the man's wardrobe left a lot to be desired. "With... no fortunes." A slicing motion of his hand.

"Wow."

Daniel put his cheek in his palm.

"Jeez, way to hurt a guy."

Whistler ordered another round of drinks, briefly considering drinking the second shot just to be an asshole. "I'm NOT a fortune teller. I maintain the balance. Ain't m' fault Searchlight's gone and fucked it up. Again."

GULP. SLAM. SMASH.

"Whoa! Relax!" Daniel flung his palms in the air. He eyed the shards of glass from the broken shot glass. If he got impaled a second time in one night, he was going to lose his good humor.

"How th' fuck should I know what you are? Barely know what I am. Sheesus." He shook his head at the bartender, who swept away the sharp remnants with an irritated expression.

The Agent wiped a bit of spittle off his chin. "S'rry, just mad at myself." He signaled for another round as an apology.

"I used ta know this shit like the back o' my hand. Dunno, maybe I got too used to seein' shit before it happened. If someone had questions, I had the answers."

Whistler thumbed the liquid drops on the bar while the bartender mopped up the broken glass. "Mebby that's th' point. Start back at one, 'n work my way forward again." He shrugged.

"Maybe you're supposed to do somethin' else, too," Daniel said, punctuating with a jab to Whistler's arm. "Besides. Who needs to see the future to... maintain the balance?"

What the hell did that mean?

"There's gotta be other ways t' throw your weight around. Oh. Heh heh." He lifted his glass. "Weight, balance. See what I did there?" He sipped at the brew.

"Put it that way... just 'cuz yer a vampire doesn't mean ya gotta be Dracula, amiright?" Whistler puffed on his cancer stick, blowing smoking rings. "If I can change -- and I'm a lot older than you -- what's to say you can't?"

Daniel shrugged.

"Nuthin," he said. Change wasn't the problem. It was determining what came next that baffled him. "If you're old, you ought to be ready for somethin' new anyway. Every job I had, I got bored after a week."

He fished for his wallet and started to dole out cash.

Whistler put a hand out. "I got this, Daniel."

Daniel was surprised. Impressed, even. "A'right, man. No argument here." Especially with his dwindling resources. His buzz was dwindling, too, but he had places to be -- namely, scouting for his next meal -- and he needed his wits about him if he was going to avert a second disaster. "I'm about to head out. You good?"

"I'm good."

At least, for the moment, Whistler was. In the stark light of day, with a blistering hangover that was to come, he might feel different. But he suspected that would be temporary. Like the vampire, the Agent could choose to let his actions define him, not his heritage.

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Drown Your Troubles

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