Roadhouse Vignette Gaiden: A cold wind in Autumn
The Dobe feels something is amiss, and sure enough, her answer comes through the saloon doors of the Roadhouse.
The evening grew long, and something about it was ill at ease. Even the air didn't feel right. Too cold for a summer's day, too humid for an autumn evening, She took a long swig from her beer, Looking at the hippo barkeep. Ordinarily she'd be teasing him mercilessly to make sure he poured drinks as stiff as his crotch but tonight, every line just melted against the back of her teeth before it could take shape. The Doberman shifted her hypertrophic seat, idly sandwhiching her leather pants between the enormous pucker and the naugahyde of the barstool again and again. It stimulated but did not delight. There was a rumble approaching from outside. her left ear, closest to the door, twitched, as she listened, her agitated thoughts racing quickly "low and throaty, two cruisers? no. the revs were too synced up for it to be multiple riders, it has to be a single bike..." She cast her eye over the bar, doing a quick headcount. "We're all here...well, Jerri-can's back in the pisser still. I hope she didn't forget the keys to her handcuffs at the last gas station like last year.... silly girl." The rumble grew louder, as the crunching sound of tires on gravel rose over the general rabble of a bar full of rowdy tired and increasingly inebriated bikers. The crack of a triangle of billiard balls breaking rose from the table in back, making the Doberman snap her focus towards the sound only to watch as a Languid leather bedecked gazelle draped herself over the felt as she made the shot. Her opponent, A Paso Fino horse, casually sliding a palm up the girl's cheeks, with stifled nickering.
The bootfalls on the wooden veranda outside the roadhouse snatched the Doberman's attention back towards the door. and her hand moved down to her hip, digits curling around the buckhorn handle of her sheathed fixed blade, there was...a slight soothing familiarity to the feel of the inscription on the handle against her fingerpads...
the doors swung open. Her eyes were instantly drawn towards the figure filling the doorway, the splash of green from the bandana grabbed the eye, and the red crosshair emblem situated right in the center broadcast it's wearer's allegiance clearly. The yellowed goggles, framed by long grey hair and beard with a few stray strands of black left in it, sat atop tan flesh, and a broad bovine nose. The doberman's grip on her knife relaxed a little as she took a deep breath to steady herself, and the faintest hint of wisteria crossed her nose. "Sam! You old cuss, is that you?" She shouted.
The bull's expression softened for a moment, a faint flicker of a smile, but his brows quickly furrowed again,
"Good to see you again, [Redacted], Hate to say it, but I know I owe you from the last poker game but right now I couldn't be less interested in working you over..."
The weathered and exhausted tone in his voice caused the doberman to raise on of her eyebrows. "That's probably the last thing I'd ever expect to hear out of someone flying the Horndog's colors...What's eatin' you?" As she spoke, The old bull raised a finger and the barkeep quickly poured him a mug, The bull slammed the entire thing back in a single steady sustained swig. and swung the glass down but stopped himself before it hit the bartop, hand shaking slightly as he exhaled, setting it down gently. looking left at the doberman.
"It's Julius... I got back from Malachite Falls, and there was a note telling me to come to the old beach spot in San Destro. The one where his brother....well.. Look, He's never wanted to go back there...Not in all the years we've been together. This ain't like him, especially to head out alone while I was away on business...he...you know how he is."
The doberman offered the bull a cigarillo from her pouch as she replied. "I definitely know how he is, and last I checked he was one of the most skilled riders you or I had ever met, I don't know why a jaunt over the mountains has got you all worried...."
"The note was signed with his deadname."
The two fell silent, the stillness growing heavy between them, his gaze shifted to one side, as if searching for a path away from the tension in the air. Her ears pinned back against her skull reflexively, lowering her gaze so the brim of her leather cap hid her eyes as she lit her cigarillo.
"So do you think after all this time...."
"Aren't too many people who know that name, and I'm the only one of them I trust, [Redacted]."
"Whatever's in my bags are yours if it'd help, Sam."
"Like that?"
"Like that."
"I'll owe you."
She tilted her head alllll the way back, nose to the ceiling as she exhaled a stream of acrid bitter smoke, before casually replying, "The world owes me, Sam. But You? you deserve a little help once in a while. I can't very well collect if you're dead, now Can I?"