February & March Catch-All

[spiritwalks]

Who: Vyng spiritwalks and various others
What: Catch-All for February. Closed Prompts (in comments) for now, but am open to adding more!
When: Various
Where: Various

Content Warnings: Listed in subject lines when applicable

Notes:

- Style veers wildly between prose and brackets. Just choose whatever style feels good when responding, and I'll match it ♥

- Feel free to hit me up at jackets or Jansen#8997 for plotting and general chatter...or if you want a starter of your own!

Comments

[bardbarous]

This would be a perfect moment to clap back at Anakin, call him a nerd and a loser for not knowing how to have fun, but it never comes. Instead he flags the bartender over with a loud bellow.

"Hey! Two herbal teas and—! What do you get again?" Tuck turns his attention to Vyng to get his answer.

"And an oxblood! Wait! But make the teas look cool like they're alcoholic so it feels like we're having fun, too!"

[spiritwalks]

"Also..." Vyng raises a hand. "One of those tiny little umbrellas in the oxblood, if you please."

The bartender flashes them a thumbs up, does a dramatic spin across the floor, and effortlessly swipes two hefty mugs from the shelf behind him. Before long, he's pouring some loose leaf blend into a couple basket-shaped infusers with the same flair as making a Sleepy-Town Iced Tea.

Vyng, meanwhile, nods and leans back in his seat. "Nice."

[facultative]

They're drinking tea? Anakin is sure bars were more for alcoholic beverages. Most of his experience comes from watching Obi-Wan who does go for hard liquor when the option comes up so he finds this all very unusual, but he only has one example to compare to.

"Is this... normal for a bar?"

He doesn't mind tea, but he certainly doesn't have the patience to wait for it to steep properly. He dunks his infuser in and out of the mug to try get it to go faster.

[bardbarous]

Neither does Tuck. He is dunking his aggressively, too, perhaps a bit faster than Anakin because fuck you.

"Uh, what part?" Tuck asks. Nothing is ever normal when they go about anything, so it's a fair question. He needs specifics. "You mean the drinks? Did you want alcohol? I can't exactly get drunk all that easily and you made it sound like you're a lightweight... But we can get some!"

[spiritwalks]

Vyng's eyes drift between the two mugs. It's pretty funny watching both men independently decide they need to slam back tea as soon as possible, which means dunking their diffusers with the same vigor as shoving some poor nerd's face into a bucket of water. Some of Vyng's own tea blends can take up to 20 minutes to steep properly, so he can't quite relate.

"Did you want, like...dirt in your tea?" He nods toward his bottomless green suede bag of jars (and other garbage) he brought from the Dream. "I've got some. Or a flask of a little somethin'-somethin' for a tiny pick-me-up pinch, if you know what I'm saying."

(Yes, there are places back in their old world where dirt-tea is a thing. And yes, normal tends to lose any real meaning in their family.)

"Anyway..." Vyng daintily stirs his cocktail of pomegranate wine, vodka and spices. "You can drink whatever you want, pal. And if you wanna stick with something soft? That's fine too. More alcohol for me."

He punctuates that thought with a sly sip and smile.

[facultative]

"Uh. No thanks." Anakin may be perfectly comfortable eating off the floor, but he didn't go out of his way to add dirt to his food.

He looks down at his mug with the pale liquid that hasn't steeped properly yet and then back up at Tuck. That was suspiciously like a challenge. "And I'm not a lightweight! I can handle it."

He absolutely cannot, but he's still standing up to flag the bartender. "I want the strongest thing you've got."

[bardbarous]

Tuck's eyes flit over to Vyng to catch his reaction, but the half-elf doesn't look concerned. Neither does the bartender. He finger guns with a straight-face and pulls out a dark bottle, topping off a short glass with the stuff.

"Here, kid. And good luck." He sets it down on their table, and Tucks begins slapping the table in rhythm.

"Ana-kin! Ana-kin! ANA-KIN!" Tuck begins chanting with excited cheer.

[spiritwalks]

O-kay. They're doing this? They're doing this, apparently. The sensible thing would be to try talking Anakin down, but...hell, they're here to have a fun time. If Anakin wants to get plastered, they're happy to egg him on.

"A-na-kin!" Vyng joins in — albeit with a different cadence that clashes with Tuck's own rhythmic shouting. "Ana-kin! A-NA-KIN!"

[facultative]

Anakin picks up the glass downs it in one gulp.

And then immediately spits it back out into the glass.

Wait, that wasn't supposed to happen. He holds up his other hand in a universal gesture of wait. "I can do it! I was... I just didn't expect it to taste like that."

He thought he could tolerate anything, but this was something completely different. He'd need to be fast, bypassing his tongue entirely if possible. He eyes his gross drink with a careful eye and the moment he musters enough courage slams it back for a second time.

This time he's trying to hold back wheezing and coughs.

[bardbarous]

As soon as the drink goes down and stays down, there is a loud chorus of cheering from Tuck and Vyng. It's so loud it drowns out the poor bastard singing tunelessly to his song of choice, drawing ire from a few tables around them. And one thankful for the brief respite.

"Okay, now are we gonna fucking sing?" Tuck asks with childish impatience. If he doesn't get his emotions out through song soon the bar and its patrons will be the ones suffering for it.

1/3

[spiritwalks]

Vyng is lightly patting Anakin on the back when Tuck pushes the conversation back toward their original quest.

"Heck yeahhh," he says with a grin. "And you know what we're gonna sing? Let's say it together, Tuck. On three, two, one—"

"Sabotage!"

"Take Me Home, Country Roads!"

[spiritwalks]

(Wait—)

3/3 lolll fucked up my formatting, here we go

[spiritwalks]

"Or we can sing 'Sabotage'," he brightly adds. "That's fine too. Always a classic."

Vyng turns to Anakin. "Which sounds more fun to you? Screaming-shouting stuff? Chanting? Or, actually..." He rubs his chin, studying the other man. "How good are your Bat impressions, Anakin?"

[facultative]

Anakin blinks at them in a way that suggests that while he's not feeling it right now, it's going to hit him soon. The back patting helps with keeping it down though.

"Bat?" They were a bit different in the Star Wars universe. "I can't do the screeching noises."

He wants screaming-shouting over chanting, but he doesn't know either song to say anything.

[bardbarous]

"Just do the shouting parts then," Tuck offers, looking to get this sorted as soon as possible. He's sure this jerk can scream just fine.

"We'll point, like this—" He thrusts two fingers in Anakin's direction, eyes bulging with unnecessary intensity. "—and then you scream. Vyng can do the bat noises. You got your harp, right?" Already Tuck is grabbing his two-necked bass, you know, past the giant axe on his back.

"Everyone know their part? Okay, break!" Tuck vaults over the table and heads for the unlucky patron holding the karaoke mic.

"HEY! GIVE ME THE MIC! GIVE—GIVE IT TO ME RIGHT NOW!"

[spiritwalks]

Vyng has already retrieved the instrument from his bag. "Harpin' to go, bud."

Aaand then he watches Tuck yell at the poor bastard standing between him and Sabotage. Vyng's expression is mild — no facepalming, no eye-rolling. This is 100% normal in his particular slice of Trench...because Tuck takes his rake back from the neighbor the same way he takes down water demons: With brute force, and all the grace of a bull in a china shop.

"I'd do what he says if I were you, pal," Vyng pipes up when the patron makes eye contact with him. There's an undercurrent of sympathy in his voice. But also, it's just karaoke. The stakes couldn't be lower

Unsurprisingly, the Trenchie hands the mic over.

"Just watch for the cue." Vyng looks over at Anakin. "You can't fuck it up."

(His tone of voice is more reassuring than forceful, at least, regardless of the wording.)