Segue

[Existentially Odd]

Harm was briefly cast adrift in Trick's wake, his eyebrows raised and his pink lips slightly parted in surprise as he watched his boyfriend walk Dana away. He blinked at Phoenix and then he looked at Jesse, the mechanic they'd got distracted away from talking to. A pity, Harm thought, also casting a wistful look in the direction of the unusually-eyed smoker that had been sitting on Dana's other side. And, finally, he looked to the woman behind the bar.  Whether she made eye contact with him or not, she was intimidating so his acknowledgement of her involved a quick dip of his head before he scurried away.

Because Dana wasn't the easiest of passengers, Harm caught up with Trick just in time to be told to get their phones. He rolled his eyes at Trick's back - because he'd intended to do that anyway, Trick's muscular heroism allowed for ogling only, not practical actions like retrieving belongings - but verbally agreed and veered obediently off towards the cloakroom. He supposed it would be wise to get Dana's things as well, though it took him hastily pointing her out and describing her intoxicated condition for them to release another person's belongings to him.

The drunk woman was becoming agitated as he approached so Harm jogged the last few metres towards her, taking a moment to realise why she was fighting Trick. "I have your shit!" he exclaimed triumphantly as he arrived, still holding his and Trick's phones in one hand but pulling the messenger bag strap over his head with the other. He held it aloft to get Dana's attention and then reached past Trick to give it to her, finding comfort in pressing his body against his boyfriend's. "Here it is! Be cool," he soothed. When she took it off him, his hand fell naturally to Trick's waist as they both watched her in concern.

[Ehcorn]

Dana hugged her messenger satchel to her chest and hummed a few short, happy hums as she stroked buttery leather like she would a cat. If she liked cats. Or if cats liked her. Ever since she'd been bitten by a werewolf, they'd tended to do one of two things: freak the fuck out and run away, or freak the fuck out and hiss and claw at her until she ran away.

"I'm cool," she insisted, looking up from her bag and into a pair of big blue eyes fixed on her like he was afraid she might fall over right then and there. She'd show him. Dana straightened and wobbled, but she remained on her feet. The arm still supporting her wouldn't allow for anything else. "Like... a cucumber or a... fuck, I don't know." Dana made thinking faces, then brightened. "Right! Ice. You know. Cold as ice, willing to sacrifice our love." She snorted a laugh when she recalled one of the many times she'd ridden along in a truck with her dad, off on some adventure with classic rock playing on the radio. She'd sing loudly and offkey because she didn't know any other way, and he'd laugh and beg her to stop. She never had.

Fuck.

Different song. She needed a different song. She couldn't stay in the truck.

"Or ice, ice baby. Stop, collaborate and I'm gonna sit down now, okay?"

Tucking her chin into the top of her bag, she slid away from the man that held her up and onto the bench. There were glass panels that ran from ground to roof on either side of the bus stop, and she slumped over in one direction until she could rest her head against it.

"Thanks for saving my shit, by the way. It's... all my shit. My recording shit. My writing shit. My coping with life shit."

The final one prompted her to dig into her bag and retrieve her flask. She took a sip and then held it out towards the pair. "Can have some if y'want."

[Pocky]

Trick kept a good hold on the woman until she tugged away. He rapidly followed her movements but would’ve lost his hold had Harm not been right there with her bag. Trick adjusted his grip to something less invasive but still supportive. He watched and listened as she slurred something and said ‘shit’ a bunch of times.

When she became dead weight, he guided her onto the seat—his purpose all along—and moved out of chucking up distance, standing against the side framework of the bus stop.

He looked toward the club but nobody stepped out of it. It was just the three of them. Frowning, he refocused on Harm and the woman. He addressed his boyfriend next.

“I don’t want to leave her here on her own,” he said, sure that Harm was the same.

[Existentially Odd]

Harm watched Dana in fascination, finding her drunken song references cute as hell. He couldn't help but grin at her as Trick released her under her own steam and she plopped onto the bus bench. His indulgent expression swiftly changed to one of consternation as she (somehow) flawlessly extracted a flask of booze from her bag and took a swig before he could stop her. He relaxed when she offered it to them and he stepped forward and took it before Trick could.

"Hell no, me either," Harm agreed as he screwed the cap back on the pungent flask and instinctively moved closer to Trick. Satisfied that Dana wasn't going to grab any more booze from nowhere, he turned his head to look up at his boyfriend. "I don't mind if we call it a night to get her home, I already had a good time," he offered, smiling reassuringly as the hand not holding the flask gravitated to the small of Trick's back to connect with him.

[Ehcorn]

While they discussed what they’d do with her, Dana began to drag her feet onto the bench, but the spike of one high heel got caught on the edge of the seat. She grumbled and lifted her head enough to frown at the offending footwear. Blister-causing, wobbly-walking, trip-inducing torture devices. They clattered to the concrete one after the other as she nudged them off, exposing her toes to cool air. She wiggled them happily. God, that felt good.

Dana was still smiling as she drew her legs onto the bench so she could scoot, scoot, her way into a position where she could lie down. She stuffed her messenger satchel under her head to act as a pillow — a practiced motion that she performed flawlessly despite the world pitching and swaying around her.

"It’s okay. You don’t hafta," she said, waving them off with a flap of her wrist. "I just… Just need to rest my eyes for a little."

[Pocky]

Trick watched Harm pluck the flask from Dana's hand and cap it without taking a swig. He smiled using the corner of his mouth nearest his boyfriend, a dip of his head soon after. Harm's warm hand brushed against his back and Trick's smile broadened before he was distracted by the sound of something clunking against the bus seat.

Heels clattered onto the ground and one of them tipped over. Trick was fascinated by their positioning, looking like a movie poster about a drunken party-goer.

Trick shook his head at the woman as she made herself comfy on the bus seat. He eyed her figure, assessing her weight. To Harm he said, "I'm pretty sure I'll be able to carry her. Are we taking her to my downstairs couch or your spare room?"

[Seragil]

By the time Phoenix went back around the bar and grabbed a couple of bottles of water and swiped the VIP cards. Trick Dana and Harm had already disappeared. Shit he said under his breath as he scanned the crowded club for them. Not seeing them he blinked to the coat room. After discovering their things already picked up he blinked outside and seeing them down the road at the bus stop he teleported to them. The quick successive teleportation left him feeling dizzy and slightly nauseated.

"Water." He said holding the bottles out. He blinked slightly at the seat drapage that was Dana and smiled a little woozily as he leaned against the bust stop pole to steady himself. "Looks like you need a ride more so then water."

[Existentially Odd]

When the noise of Dana dumping her heels arose, Harm caught the calculating look in Trick's eyes and he snorted. "Here," he said, withdrawing Trick's phone from his pocket and holding it out to him. "You have that 'I need to Instagram this right now' look in your eye," he chuckled, following Trick's gaze and seeing it on the shoes rather than the woman who was - shit, she was going to sleep! He laughed again as Trick spoke of carrying her and getting her to one of their places but the solution was much simpler, in Harm's opinion - they should keep her awake and find out where her place was.

He hurried forward, split-second considerations firing in his brain as he headed for Dana. The fact that Trick offered his downstairs couch meant that he was considering taking them to his house for the night. There was something thrillingly intimate about that that trumped mention of his place. Harm's place was easy, no-one else lived there and they wouldn't be disturbing anyone if they dragged a drunken woman in to sleep off her intoxication.

Trick's was a family house, with his father and little sister living there. For that reason, Harm would certainly suggest they go to his place and not burden the Fallowses with Dana... but it would be laced with disappointment. He loved the idea of seeing Trick's family again and of being invited to stay the night in their home. It made him feel warm and fuzzy and accepted. Also, he knew that Trick had organised with his little sister to teach her to surf in the morning, so going there would make sense. Dana was a complication, though.

In amongst all this rapid thinking, Phoenix suddenly appeared on the other side of Harm, causing him to halt his progress towards Dana in order to perform a loud, arm-flailing, eye-bugging mid-air pirouette of shock. "HOLYFUCKINGSHIT!" he screeched, his heart rate tripling in an instant as he landed boggling at the handsome club owner in wide-eyed disbelief. "What the fuck man!" he panted hoarsely, his free hand clutched to his chest in a fist and the one holding Dana's flask wielded defensively in front of him like he might punch Phoenix if he got any closer. "Where the fuck did you come from? What the fuck even are you?"

If he hadn't been lost in the miasma of an adrenaline dump and fifty spikes of fear, he'd never have been so brash as to ask such a thing but, in the heat of that terrified moment, it felt like a perfectly legitimate question to pose to the creature that had instantly appeared out of thin fucking air right beside him! He edged slightly closer and swiped the bottle of water out of Phoenix's grasp for good measure coming to his senses enough to slip Dana's flask into his pants pocket with some difficulty (his hands were shaking).

[Seragil]

Harm's outburst startled him slightly but once the shock wore off he couldn't help but feel amused at the cute guys tirade of shock. Appearing out of nowhere tended to have that effect on people and he had to admit, he kind of liked it. "Ummm, I'm a gorgon" he replied nonchalantly as Harm snatched the water from his hands. He had thought the snake hair from earlier would have given him away, but apparently not. He watched harm move towards Dana, assuming he was going to try and wake her then turned his attention to Trick

Still feeling a little shaky from the successive teleporting he opened the other bottle and took a swig. "I have a car or can get one." He said after taking a few mouthfuls and recapping the bottle. He had no idea how the trio had gotten to the club, offering them a ride home was the least he could do considering looking after a drunk Dana had apparently ended their night out.

[Ehcorn]

Ten more seconds of silence and Dana would’ve fallen asleep, but the nearby commotion ruined everything. She sighed and cracked an eye open, then tilted her head slowly until three men came into her field of vision. Wait. Three? Dana squinted, but the third person remained. She squinted more.

What the fuck was he doing here?

“Hey,” she said and stared blearily at Phoenix while she levered herself onto an elbow, “you can shove that car up your ass.” Dana sat the rest of the slow way up, grumbling that she’d walk all the way to the caravan park before she accepted anything from him. She might be drunk but she remembered — she fucking remembered — what he’d said at the bar. “Misinformed. Yeah, you can… You can just— Just fuck right off with that,” she said, shooting one last glare at Phoenix before she twisted and swung her bare feet to the ground and stood. The concrete was cold and rough but she didn’t mind — she often went shoeless and had the callouses to prove it.

“Think I don’t know about the death matches,” she muttered darkly, clutching her messenger satchel tightly enough her knuckles whitened as she began weaving and stumbling away from the bus stop. “Fuckin’ using us as entertainment every full moon. Not me. Fuck that noise. I will— Pf, yeah, I’m never coming back here.”

Dana stopped dead in her tracks and looked around her, trying to place where exactly she was. “Soon as I figure out how to leave.”

[Pocky]

He accepted his phone from Harm, shooting a grateful smile his way. Pushing off the side of the bus-stop he crouched to align the perfect angle for the heels. Moving the phone forward then backward, he tapped the screen to shift the focus. At the same moment his thumb moved to press the picture taking button Pheonix popped into existence and Harm yelped his fright.

Trick tossed then juggled the phone once, twice, three times into the air. He fumbled his catch but managed to slap it harmlessly against his inner thigh, holding it in place so it wouldn't smack against the concrete and shatter its screen. While Harm and Phoenix discussed how and what he was to be able to appear magically that way, Trick righted his phone and then himself, propelling himself upward into a standing position, the photo of the shoes forgotten.

Dana's difficult to follow blurting came next and Trick at first giggled at her crass refusal of Phoenix's car before his brows furrowed. "Did she say death matches?" he repeated slowly, looking first at Harm and secondly at Phoenix.

 

[Seragil]

"Yes, misinformed. Maybe actually talk to those involved in the subject matter." He called out to Dana as she stumbled past. Where ever she got her information from she certainly hadn't spoken to the pack or to Saraekiel, nor to anyone who actually participated in the fights.

At Tricks question and the look in his eyes Phoenix sighed heavily. "The club has an underground supe fighting ring. Once a moth there is a championship fight, its called a Death Match. There are a lot of rumours about it and the pack use it as part of their initiation or something, but that's entirely pack business. Fighting weres is generally not allowed, although there are some who like the thrill and danger of it." He thought of Jesse and his insistence to step into the ring and fight any and all who were willing and allowed.

[Existentially Odd]

A gorgon? Seriously? Harm had hypothesised something along those lines when he saw the snake 'hair' earlier but it was still a preposterous and amazing thing to have confirmed. Gorgons were real, just like the rest of it, and they could apparently blink all over the place like living heart attacks looking for a place to happen. He wondered if Phoenix's good looks had a lot of people forgiving him his terrifying habit of appearing out of nowhere (scaring them to death) or whether he got punched regularly. Perhaps that was a question for later.

Dana sitting up and abusing Phoenix had him turning his wide-eyed stare back upon her. She seemed genuinely angry. The mention of death matches and using 'us' didn't go unnoticed and rapid connections fired in Harm's brain as he considered the full moon reference as well. If he had to guess (and he didn't, but he was a nosy fucker when it came to supernaturals), he'd hazard she might be a werewolf. A werewolf that was unsteadily but inexorably escaping his and Trick's protective custody as she stumbled indignantly away.

"Hey!" Harm called out, snatching her shoes up and hurrying after her belatedly because he'd been interested in Phoenix's response to Trick's question about death matches. It sounded very ominous. Unfortunately, he also felt obligated to go scoop Dana up and keep her safe so he was forced to run away from them before he heard it all. As it turned out, despite his panic, he didn't have to travel very far; he came to a stop nearby as Dana became disoriented and tried to figure out how to leave.

"We can take you home, if you want," he offered kindly, linking his arm with Dana's and circling around her so that he turned her back towards the bus shelter and he could walk her back to Trick. "Where do you live?"

[Ehcorn]

An arm wound its way around hers and by the time she determined it was the blond guy that’d rescued her shit from the assholes that’d taken it from her for ‘security reasons’, she’d been aimed at Phoenix again. And naturally, he was defending the club, sprinkling sugar on a pile of garbage and trying to pass it off as palatable. 

"Yeah, I wanna go," she said, dropping and turning her head to look at her nursemaid, "but I got something to say to that asshole first." When Dana straightened, the world spun around her, but she blinked it back and lifted her chin. Alcohol was fuel on a fire she’d usually try to bank, but Phoenix deserved it: she blasted him with pent-up frustration.

"They’re called death matches," Dana snapped, "‘cause you put two people in a cage, and then other people with a lot of money, they pay you to see which one dies. Try to spin it to make yourself look better, but it’s still fucked." She jabbed her tongue at the inside of her mouth, scoffing and shaking her head. "That’s just the way of the world though, right? The little people get shit on while the ones up top expect to be thanked for giving them the fucking privilege?"

She didn’t wait for an answer before she looked at the man that’d dragged her out of the club in the first place. Anger burned in her eyes but the fire was going out fast. It didn’t matter. It never did. She could yell, she could write, but nothing changed. Phoenix would go back inside and dance and hand out VIP passes and pretend he had the right to exploit people. And her? She’d go home, wake up with a hangover, and start drinking again because what else could she do?

"Just— take me home. Please. I need to get out of here before I say anything else."

[Pocky]

Phoenix's response had Trick staring at him, expressionless. His stare drifted down the other man to his shoes and then back up again to his face. He didn't look as impressed as he had the first time his eyes had performed that sweep.

He looked over his shoulder and half-turned when Harm took a few necessary steps after the drunk lady and held her in place as she made another accusation at the gorgon. Trick looked between them, at her seething words and then to see how Phoenix was taking them.

"Car's not far away," Trick said, turning his back on Phoenix and joining the pair. His eyes were filled with relief that Harm had his arm around the woman so he didn't have to get close.

Before the woman was too far gone to talk and while she was riled up, Trick asked her some questions. "What did he mean by a pack using the death matches for initiations? Initiations into what? And... are you a werewolf?" He looked up into the night sky.