Drinks, Deals, and Discourse [Satine]

"That was rhetorical. It's always rhetorical." Sora mumbled to her unseen conversation partner before continuing on in spite of the fact that Christopher had already walked away to get the new customer a drink. "So The fightin' pit sounds like its out then... I s'pose if you wanna keep things more low key, you're after something that compliments the atmosphere." She swirled around the ice in her glass and thought about it for a second. It's not like she actually wanted this place to turn into some sort of arena, even if the idea was an interesting one... You know what? scratch that; part of her did want that, but the rest of her knew it wasn't a good fit. "Live music maybe? People do tend to like a bit o' sombre ambiance with their drink. You've got enough space for a piano back there, but you'd have to pay the musicians." Sora gestured to the far end of the room opposite the bar that was occupied by a set of tables that never seemed to actually get used.

"You see, that's actually not terrible. Maybe a bit old fashioned though." The barkeep effortlessly eased back into the conversation as he mixed the drink, his movements accompanied by the precision that came from nearly a decade of practice. "I'll ask the boss about it later, maybe we can set something up." Sora nodded and took another sip of her drink, a slightly confused expression forming when she found the glass was nearly empty. "You mind topping me off when you're done with that, Chris?" She slid the glass down the bar and the man nodded in response. Guy did always have good service... but still, what time was it? If she'd already gone through a drink then it must have been getting later than she thought. Where the hell was her client? They should have been there by now... Actually, were they? She did a quick sweep of the interior to look for any familiar faces. The two in the back were chatting about something involving sports, the guy by the door was looking at his phone.. no, not nearly shady enough. The one that had just come in and sat at the bar was looking at her though... huh, something about her did seem familiar for some reason. The fact that Sora couldn't place it wasn't exactly a new experience; to say that her memory wasn't the strongest thing in the world might have been one of the largest understatements in history. Why else would someone be staring at her though?

With a shrug, Sora turned toward the woman and brushed her hair to the side so that she could meet her gaze. She was fairly pretty in all honesty, but the cold stare from those gold eyes probably would have been enough to scare off most normal people. Unfortunately, Sora tended to a bit oblivious to that sort of thing, and simply smiled as she addressed the stranger with an honest question. "'Evening, love. You wouldn't happen to have business with me, would you?"

Sora tilted her head slightly when the woman didn't answer immediately, apparently more interested in the drink that had just be delivered to her than a stranger at the bar. That was fair, this place did have some damn good drinks, and after a few second of staring blankly Sora abruptly turned back toward the barkeep. "On second thought Chris, How 'bout I try one a' those?" If the woman's focus on the strawberry daiquiri was anything to go by, it had to be pretty decent. Besides, it probably was a better idea to have something with a little less alcohol content than hard scotch when she had a meeting coming up. With a shrug, Christopher put back the bottle he'd pulled down and reached for the one he'd just put away. "Sure thing, Ari."

Having turned her attention away, Sora almost seemed confused when the woman finally decided to address her, presenting a wanted poster. So she was after a bounty then? Well, that answered the question of whether or not she was the client... actually, maybe not. What was this meeting about again? The name didn't ring any bells, but the face on the poster did look familiar... Sora scratched her head as the memory paths failed to connect again and she passed the paper back with a shrug. "I think I can give that one a solid 'maybe'."

When the woman finally introduced herself, the red head raised an eyebrow for a moment. Masamune... Now that was a name Sora definitely knew, but just like everything else that had tickled her memory tonight, she couldn't figure out where it was from. It stood to reason that if she recognized the name and the face, that this was someone she knew, or at least knew of, and yet... Something nagged at her, telling her that it was an important piece of information, but the feeling was far too familiar at this point to warrant any sort of frustration. After a moment she took the hand that was offered, planting a kiss on the back before giving the woman a smile. She did actually occasionally remember her manners, even with how messed up the inside of her head was. "Pleasure to meet ya, miss Masamune. They call me..."

Sora trailed off as she noticed the door to the bar open and a man in a black hooded coat walked in. His face was... right. Her eyes suddenly sharpened as the proper fragment snapped into place and her brain finally kicked into gear. "Sorry love, we'll have to pick this up in a bit. Business calls." She got to her feet as picked up the duffel bag that had been resting by stool and turned to greet the newcomer. "'Evening sir, right this way if ya please." She gestured to a small room past the end of the bar that was shielded from view of most of the bar, letting the man pass before following him in and closing the door.

"So let's get this out of the way, just in case, eh? You're here to see me, right?"

Sora slid into a booth seat across from the hooded man after doing a quick check to make sure no other customers were hiding out in the room, dropping the duffel bag on the seat beside her as she settled into place. The man seemed a bit confused at the question, almost as if to say 'why else would I be here?' Though his manner of dress covered most of his features, she could still make out the green eyes that peered out from beneath the hood. Couldn't even tell how old the guy was, but the eyes were all she needed, locking on to them with a sharp gaze of her own.

"...Yeah, that's right, I'm-" She cut him off. "Ah ah ah, don't need your name or your life story, lad, just makin' sure a customer's a customer. Now, got your order right here..." She unzipped the bag and produced a number of items, which she carefully spread out on the table in front of the client. The first was unmistakably a handgun, more specifically a reproduction of a browning hi-power military spec pistol. "As requested, I got you something reliable, but we're using heavier rounds to give it a bit of a bite." She added a stack of .40 caliber magazines and slotted one into the gun before handing it over. "You're good up to about 50 meters, though you're probably gonna wanna get in a bit closer to actually hit anything, eh? Safety's right here, magazine release is there."

While the man took a moment to inspect the gun, Sora continued on, setting a piece of cloth down to the side of the magazines and unrolling it to reveal a lockpick gun with a set of spare rods. "This ought to be enough to get ya into any place without an electronic lock, assumin' you know how to use it at least." Given the fact that the guy had asked for it in the first place, she had to assume that he did actually know how to use one... if not, that wasn't exactly her problem was it? The man glanced over the device for a second and then gave a simple nod. "...And what about the other stuff?"

"Don't you worry, we've got these little beauties right here..." Out of the bag came a decently sized satchel, which Sora opened to reveal a number of what looked to be canisters, each held in place by a bit of extra packing material so that they didn't jostle about when the bag moved. "Nasty little things, these. You're gonna wanna make sure they don't get knocked 'round to much, 'lest they go off on accident. The red ones are incendiary, got six of those, and the three blue ones are thermite. Save those for when ya need to deal with somethin' hard like metal. Each one's got a timer you can set here." She pointed to a small dial affixed to the top of one of the canisters. "Just pull it out and up to arm, 'an' make sure you're not too close when they go off."

The client seemed particularly interested in that last parcel, pulling the bag close to get a better look as Sora explained how the grenades worked. That made a degree of sense, they were the main order after all, the other pieces were just extras that were thrown on later. Why did someone need so much firepower? That wasn't her business, and she made it a point to keep the whole operation professional and detached. That was probably one of the main reasons why she'd kept this up for so long without losing even more of her mind.

"I do hope it's all to your satisfaction, lad. All the equipment was made by yours truly, an' I can guarantee the effectiveness. Assumin' everything's to you're liking, the only thing left to discuss is payment." Sora propped up her head on her hands and once again returned her gaze to the man. For several long seconds he continued to stare at the satchel of grenades as if contemplating something, and then he finally closed it back up and nudged it to the side with the gun, which was still in his hand. "...about that."

The familiar sound of a hammer being cocked was followed by a rather exasperated sigh and a roll of the eyes. "Seriously?" First time clients were always so much fun, you could never tell what sort of shit they were gonna pull. Sure, Sora's appearance wasn't exactly intimidating, hell, tonight she looked downright harmless, but why did people so often forget that they were talking to an arms dealer when they were in the middle of a deal? Did they really think that she wasn't used to bullshit like this by now? With an annoyed expression covering her face, she continued to stare at the man past the muzzle of gun and slowly raised her hands in a gesture of surrender.

"Look, nobody can kno-"

"Lemme stop you right there, 'cause I don't care. Do you have any idea who you're dealing with?" There was a pause and the man raised an eyebrow as if expecting her to continue with some sort of threat that never came. "No, seriously, do you know? 'cause I tend to lose track every now an' then."

***

The telltale sound of gunfire cracked through the bar, and an instant later the door to the room splintered and came down. The man in black lie in a heap against the wall opposite of the door, and Sora soon reappeared in the doorway, a smoking barrel sticking out from the backside of her hand. "Sorry 'bout the mess Chris. Next repair's on me." With a flick of her wrist, a spent concussion shell ejected and fell to the floor. "What a bloody moron." She muttered as she approached the man, who was now attempting to scramble to his feet.

Sora rolled her shoulder a bit as she stepped forward, trying to shrug off the recoil from the shell she fired. Those concussion shockwaves had one hell of a kick when you didn't brace properly. Naturally, with all the ruckus she was causing, every set of eyes in the bar were on her... well, every set but one. Her new acquaintance at the bar sure was one cool customer... either that or the drink really was just that good. In any case, she was used to this sort of thing by now, as trouble had a tendency to follow in her wake. She stares didn't ever concern her, especially not now since her business hadn't been concluded quite yet.

By the time Sora crossed the room, the man had managed to rise to a crouch and was bringing his hand about, something shiny in his grasp. Was that her gun? She'd knocked it out of his hand just a second ago, before she sent him flying, what was it doing there? "Oi, how'd you get that back, ya sneaky bastard?" She braced as the muzzle leveled on her, but as the guy pulled the trigger a knife came flying from the direction of the bar and dug into his ankle. With a grunt of pain he collapsed forward slightly, throwing off his aim and causing the bullet to graze Sora's cheek. Seizing the opportunity, Sora darted forward and caught the man's gun as he attempted to line up another shot. With one clean movement she twisted the gun out of his hand and tossed it across the floor, bringing the barrel in her hand to bare on him again to stop him from trying to get up again.

The man seemed to be contemplating his next move as a whistle drew both his and Sora's attention. The sight of Masamune standing over them caused the man to swallow hard, hesitating for a moment as Sora gave the woman a smile. "Thanks for the assist, love. After this one coughs up what he owes, the next round is-" A sudden movement made Sora cut herself off as she brought her sharp gaze back down on her client, but it wasn't him that was moving. It was his shadow. A tendril of darkness shot out across the floor and connected to one of the bottles on the counter, causing it to vanish and reappear in the man's hand. A shove with his empty hand pushed Sora's arm clear to rob her of a shot, and was followed up almost instantly with a number of wild swings with the wine bottle.

Well, that explained how he got the gun at least. The arms dealer ducked the first swing and backed off to get out of range. She heard the bottle smash against something but didn't look to see what, more concerned with the fact that his shadow was going nuts, tendrils shooting out and connecting to whatever they could find as he started throwing stuff at her and Masamune. He was panicking, which wasn't an entirely unreasonable reaction, but it was inevitably just digging his grave deeper. She weaved around the flying debris until she noticed one of the shadows reaching for the gun again, at which point she dashed forward to close the distance. As a metal tray came flying at her head, Sora blasted it away with another round from her wrist and then darted around a beer bottle, letting her get in close just as the pistol appeared again. This time, as the gun came up to point toward Masamune, Sora's hand shot out and took hold, squeezing the release mechanism and pulling the slide out to render the firearm useless.

It took a few pulls of the trigger before the man realized what had happened, at which point his eyes went wide and his shadow shot again, this time toward the stash of weapons in back room. "Oh no ya don't." Sora brought up her other hand and a copy of the gun she just disabled materialized in her grasp. With two pulls of the trigger, the man's hand exploded into a red mist, leaving the incendiary grenade that appeared a moment later to drop harmlessly to the ground. When the shock finally hit him, the man cried out in agony and collapsed onto the floor, clutching his bleeding limb.

Satisfied that he wouldn't be pulling anything else in his current state, Sora dismissed her projections, snatched up the grenade, and took a moment to assess the damages. The area around them was a mess of splintered wood, broken furniture, shattered glass, and spilled booze. More chaos than she'd been expecting when she first shot him. With a shake of her head, Sora glanced back toward the counter to see Christopher climbing back out from behind the bar, where he'd apparently been taking cover. "Good news Chris, my friend here says he's covering the damages, an' to make up for the trouble, he's got everyone's tab for tonight. Isn't that right?" She kicked the guy's ribs, earning her a whimper that she decided was a yes. With that sorted, she once again turned her attention to her new acquaintance, checking her over for injuries since she'd been right in the firing line as well. "That was a bit more excitement than I was expecting. You alright, love?"

Sora smirked as Masamune gave the former client just a little bit extra to remember this evening by. Because of the sort of neighborhood they were in, it was pretty unlikely that anyone would be calling the cops, so it was up to the locals to make sure the right lessons were taught whenever something like this happened. After the woman retrieved her knife, Sora took the opportunity to relieve the man of his wallet before one the staff got around to throwing him out. Opening it, however, the faintest of scowls spread across her face. It was pretty obvious that he hadn't intended to pay her from the start... but at the very least there were a handful of 10000 yen notes to cover the damage and the drinks for the night. She tossed the wallet over to Christopher with a shrug. She'd be able to enjoy herself a bit tonight, but without that deal she was starting to run pretty low on funds.

Still, it seemed that Sora's new friend had managed to come out of the little scuffle unscathed, which was always a good thing. For her own part, the bullet had left a red streak across her cheek when it grazed her and had taken out her braid, leaving her hair free to flow over her shoulders and back. That bit was a little irritating because of how much it tended to get in the way, but not enough for her to actually do anything about it for awhile. She was lazy like that.

Standing back up, Sora found Masamune introducing herself a second time, this time by the name Satine... That's right, she did know who this person was, by reputation at the very least. One of the most prominent bounty hunters around, always gets her mark. Supposedly she was cold as ice and had a pretty bad attitude, but... well, Sora didn't ever put much stock in rumors to begin with. She repeated the same greeting she'd given earlier, with a kiss to the back of the hand and a smile. She hadn't ever finished her own introduction either, had she? "It's a pleasure, miss Satine. Forgive th' interruption earlier, I'm..." There was the briefest of pauses, as she was about to give her business name, another one popped into her head, one that she hadn't actually been able to remember for the longest time...

"Sora. Yeah, that's right... " She nodded to herself as she said it, feeling the familiarity as her head seemed to be working with remarkable clarity for once. "'Course 'round here they call me Arsenal, Ari for short." She gave a bit of a shrug at that. Her own reputation wasn't anywhere near as big as Masamune's, but she had been able to make a decent name for herself over the past few years. A supplier of equipment, someone who could get you whatever you needed to get a job done, a lunatic with a bit of a record for collateral damage, take your pick. "But you can call me whatever you like, love."

Accepting the invitation, Sora took the seat Beside Satine, giving a regretful look to the shattered rum bottle as she settled into place. "A right shame, that..." She mumbled. It was always a shame to waste a good drink, but even more so since never got the chance to actually try the mix before her client arrived. She ordered another glass of scotch instead, since she didn't have to worry about business anymore there wasn't really a reason not to. While she waited on Chris to fetch the drink, she figured she might as well try to get to know her new companion a bit in the mean time.

"So, miss Satine, what brings ya here tonight anyway?"

Sora found herself chuckling softly at her new nickname. Another one she'd have to remember, but this one was simple enough that there likely wouldn't be an issue there. She had to admit that she was actually enjoying herself. Sure, a business deal had just gone south and messed up one of her favorite bars, and she was basically broke because of it, but here she was having a good time. She always liked to talk to people, whether they wanted to hear what she had to say or not, but to come across someone who she actually enjoyed the company of was a pretty rare thing. And you know, for someone who was supposedly so cold, this lady had quite the smile.

Christopher had just retrieved Sora's usual bottle from behind the bar when Satine placed her order, causing the barkeep to immediately put it back, and instead reach for the top shelf. The redhead let out a low whistle when she saw the bottle of 30 year old single malt come down, then turned to her companion with a grin. "Hey now, don't go spoilin' me on the good stuff love, took a long time to get a taste for the swill." She glanced over to Christoper with an apologetic expression. "No offense, Chris." The bartender just shrugged in response as he fetched the rest of the ingredients for Satine's drink. "None taken, there's a reason why the stuff's cheap."

After oh-so-kindly taking advantage of their 'patron' for the night, Satine got around to answering Sora's question. Once again she passed over the bounty poster, and once again Sora looked over the face on the paper. There was still something about it... given that most of her memory seemed to actually be working now, it was probably something incidental, but... Oh well, she'd try probing a few of her contacts on it later for the sake of curiosity, and if anything came out of it she could always pass along the info to her new friend.

Before Sora could voice anything about the matter however, Satine changed the subject. And in a rather pointed way at that. Maybe she wasn't the only one who was enjoying the company after all. The redhead chuckled again and gave the girl a smile, going along with the shift. "Shady's 'bout the only way this business comes, love. 'Course not everyone I deal with is a right useless sod like 'im." She gestured backwards with her head toward the mess on the floor. "Get in my fair share of scraps though, since all they see is a delicate li'l flower they think they can take advantage of, an' they forget who they're dealin' with." She smirked with an exaggerated roll of the eyes and demonstrated her point, flexing her left arm and channeling her quirk. Countless blades sprouted out from the surface of her skin, instantly covering her hand and forearm in a gauntlet of sorts that was made entirely of knives. She left the blades out for a few seconds so that her companion could get a look before retracting them again. "It's not always here either, but I come by often enough, a decent ale after work's never a bad thing... right Chris?"

"Oh yeah, I've had to clean up after you plenty of times, Ari." Christopher turned around and set the first round of drinks down on the bar in front of the two. "Enjoy." Sora gave and amused look and shrugged with feigned innocence, it really wasn't far fetched to call her a bit of a trouble magnet. She casually snatched up her drink and was considering sipping at the well aged whiskey when she stopped herself, once again turning to her new companion. "Well, love, got anything worth toasting to tonight? I might be able to think of a few." She shot the woman a sly smile as she raised her glass.