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Sturm:
Sturm's just come back from Hedge patrol, and she's feeling a bit out-of-sorts. She waved off the rest of her party, and set off for a stroll through the cool night still clad in her armored overcoat -- and the ancient, bloodied handwraps she once wore in Arcadia stuffed into the pockets of her once-signature jacket.
She stopped off at a bar on the way back to her car -- a seedy little hole-in-the-wall that she used to frequent back in her K&A days. Much had changed about Sturm since she'd last been here -- notably, the sale of her Life of Crime to a Goblin Market -- so what little remained of the memory was hazy, muddled, and without the hard, painful edges it once had.
She steps inside, ducking her head underneath the frame to avoid banging her horns, and swings by the bar for a coke and some bar-food. That's the cure for all ails, right?
The Serpentine Man:
One of the lights is on the blink. It shuts on and off, electrically sizzling and trying its little heart out, flickering along the wall. Someone holds their phone up to catch a signal, grumbles at the bartender who chatters back.
The Serpentine Man is coiled in a seat in the far corner of the bar; a high-collared duster clouds his shape and the brim of a hat is pulled down low. An untouched drink sits in front of him, the perspiration long having since dribbled down the sides of the glass to pool on the top of the circular two-top he's seated at; this place doesn't use coasters. Aside from his choice to wear sunglasses and a hat inside, at night, nothing about him stands out at all; he practically melts into the surroundings, as he's meant to.
Sturm:
Sturm might not be in the game anymore, but if there's one thing she knows how to do... it's spot trouble. Smooth as can be, she rolls her shoulders -- catching a solid look at the Serpentine Man out of the corner of her eye.
She hooks a finger, gesturing for the bartender to come closer.
"Guy in the corner. He a regular?" Her voice is barely above a whisper, and it practically blends into the backdrop of the white noise.
The Serpentine Man:
The bartender leans closer when Sturm asks for them, and glances over at the Serpentine Man. She raises her shoulders. "I've seen him a couple times this week. Comes in, gets one drink, hardly touches it, plays with his phone, doesn't talk to anyone. Bad tipper."
More than the light flickering, than the man complaining about his cell phone, there seem to be other faint electrical glitches around the man, and that's probably what draws the careful eye at first. Maybe. But just for a fraction of a second, invisible to anyone else besides Sturm, what looks like no less than a tail, scaled and reptilian, slithers out from underneath the hem of that duster, and then it's gone.
Sturm:
"Seems like a fuckin' weirdo," Sturm offers a little half-smile to the bartender. Her brow furrows ever-so-slightly at the sight of the swishing tail. "Who wears a hat and sunglasses indoors at night?" A beat. "... and tips poorly? In 2021?"
She slides a hefty tip across to the tip jar -- worth far more than twenty percent of the snack she ordered -- and gives the bartender a wink. Sturm can be charming when she wants, it seems.
She shifts on her barstool, moving to another section of the bar to continue her conversation with the bartender -- and more importantly to keep the Serpentine Man in her direct line of sight...
The Serpentine Man:
The Serpentine Man leans forward at his seat, touches the otherwise ignored glass and pushes it back by a few inches. The skin of his hand is rough and dry, but his fingers are slender, bird-boned. The combination of glasses, hat, and high-collar obscure most of his facial features, but what's visible is slim, almost delicate.
Sturm:
Sturm rolls her jaw as she settles into place, looking nearly as comfortable as if she lived here on this barstool. Hell, for all she knew, she once had. The memory was so faded.
She continues to chat amicably, occasionally flirting with the Bartender to test the waters there, but always keeping an eye on that unusual guy in the corner. The Jotunn is good at playing barfly, and her gaze never lingers for longer than a few moments.
Does snake man do anything odd? Is the Bartender gay enough to respond to Sturm's flirting? Inquiring minds want to know!
The Serpentine Man:
Bartender: super gay. Serpentine Man: super sus.
At some point, his eyes follow a goon who rises, drunk, from his collected mates and staggers out one of the back entrances to stagger into the alley and take a piss. The Man stands, his drink untouched as predicted by Cara behind the bar, and discreetly follows the goon out the same entrance, hands shoved into the pockets of his duster. He moves with slow, long steps and a preternatural dexterity, practically but not literally moving across the floor like a ghost.
Sturm:
Sturm definitely scrawls her number on a scrap of paper at some point, and leaves it on the bar when she's finished with her mozzarella sticks. Which Sturm's player is currently very badly craving. Hrrrrng.
"Have a good night, Cara. Thanks for the chat," Sturm offers a little wave as she slides off the stool. She follows the snake man off towards the back entrance of the bar, practically mirroring him with her hands shoved into her pockets. She, too, seems to move with a preternatural dexterity -- blending into the background like a ghost.
The Serpentine Man:
Whatever happens, happens quickly, but when Sturm rounds the door into the back alley, just a short ways down, behind a dumpster, there's a horrible croaking noise and faint bits of the Serpentine Man's duster and hat are visible from the other side of it, like he's crouched over something -- or someone.
Sturm:
Sturm moves like a professional. Quick. Quiet. Low to the ground. Like any good operator, she weaves in and out of cover on her approach. Eyes darting about for the perfect angle to strike from.
... but unlike a good operator, she isn't quite paying attention to the ground beneath her feet. The black, oil-slick-like substance that coated the ground around her target catches the sole of her steel-toed boot.
Somehow he hasn't noticed her yet, but she's stuck fast, and as much as she struggles to avoid getting snared, it's swiftly creeping up her legs...
The Serpentine Man:
The Serpentine Man is utterly unaware that he's being watched, or even that his Snare is grappling with Sturm just a few yards behind his back; he's engrossed. And he is indeed bowed over his victim, the duster obscuring most of what might be visible as the strange man crowds the goon.
The goon gurgles thickly, and a body that was electrified with tension goes slack and limp. There's a sick, wet crack as the body is dropped a couple of feet to the ground, slumped in a puddle and on bits of soggy cardboard.
Sturm:
Fuck this shit. Sometimes it's easy for Sturm to forget that she's a changeling. More often than not, she pretends that part of her life is a distant, traumatic memory she hasn't unpacked yet.
... but sometimes the old fashioned way just doesn't do the trick. She's seen this movie before, and with a dexterous little twist (and a bit of glamour) she's free of the snare. Free to launch her ambush. It's probably too late for this monster's victim, but it sure won't kill again by the time she's done with it...
"Hey asshole, pick on someone your own fuckin' size."
It's the kind of thing that only an action star in a cheesy 80's movie would say before taking a swing, but it's enough of a "challenge" for the Wyrd.
Sturm's fist is like a fucking meteor screaming to earth. The bloody stone that covers her fist collides with the side of the creature's head, and she follows through with enough force to dent the dumpster.
The Serpentine Man:
As the man's body lies on the ground, he makes another gurgling sound; he may not be dead just yet, but he is notably worse for the wear, eyes rolled back in his skull.
The Serpentine Man is just starting to move away, ignorant of the changeling glamouring out of the trap that had invisibly ensnared her. By some miracle, he isn't moving in her direction, and turns in her direction as he hears the taunt. He practically snaps around, movements sinuous and slick.
And he takes the fist right on his rough, delicate-looking chin, shattering the sunglasses he had worn on impact, snapping his head back with enough force that it throws the wide-brimmed hat as well.
Underneath, a bald head with smooth, pale skin, and thin features that come to a point. Eyes like thin strips, the sclera and irises reptilian. Of course, Sturm only sees that bit for a moment before her knuckles drive the Serpentine Man's face halfway across the alley, lunging the rest of him with it, and he makes, predictably, a hissing noise and snaps back again to face her, spitting thick blood into the dirty puddles of the alley, blacker than it is red.
He takes a step closer. "You could have walked away," he murmurs at her in a high-pitched voice that's addled by an unfamiliar sort of vocal fry.
Sturm:
Sturm rolls her jaw, and an almost-feral grin springs to her features. It's been a long time since she's had an opponent that could stay up for more than a single punch.
The scarred brawler brings up both fists, striding forward past the snare as she makes her next move...
This time, Sturm has some measure of the slippery bastard and when her blood-stained fists scream through the air, she lands a solid blow. The kind of hit that would probably kill a mortal man.
Thwack!
The Serpentine Man:
The Serpentine Man takes another sock to the jaw, and this one nearly puts him the ground. He bangs into the dumpster and growls, spitting blood and jagged, sharp teeth all over the top of the dumpster, crumpling on top of it.
While he staggers back up, pushing itself up on scaly hands, he seems to rattle with a strange frequency of energy, and the wave of sickness hits Sturm like a shockwave, like her stomach has been snatched and yanked, poisoned, turned upside down, and shoved back in with the rest of her organs at an awkward, new, uncomfortable angle.
The Serpentine Man wheels towards her, opening its maw to bear that black-bloodied rows of teeth, and starts to rear back, cobra-like, as if to strike again.
Sturm:
A wave of nausea washes over Sturm, and the sickening situation settles somewhere just behind her eyeballs. She staggers backwards, nearly falling back into the snare, and wretches.
The painful feeling of a dry heave wracks her entire torso, but it isn't enough to knock her on her ass... and the Snek Boi doesn't know that. She doubles over in feigned pain, attempting to lure her opponent in close enough that she can deliver a final, powerful blow.
... just as the Serpentine Man opens his gaping jaws to strike, she makes her move. Summer might be ferocious, but Winter's a dangerous bitch, too. Especially when you fall for her tricks. Sturm springs out of her exaggerated sickness with a fierce uppercut, followed by every ounce of her strength. The bloodied cap of her knuckles connects with her opponent's jaw with a sickening crunch.
The Serpentine Man:
The Serpentine Man explodes into rivers of snakes; they snap at Sturm and try to sink their teeth into her, but it's aimless effort as they pelt the ground atop the pile of clothes that had once adorned the strange, spindly body of the alley agitator.
One of the snakes gets a lucky shot, and latches exactly one fang into the meat of Sturm's thigh, shaking like a pool noodle until it's forced to let go and fall back into the swarm.
Sturm:
"FUCK."
The word leaves her mouth just a touch louder than she intended, and it's being chased by a very painful dry heave. The disgusting swarm snaps and bites at her, but the armored duster, and her natural toughness seem to repell most of their efforts. Y'know, save for one.
Poison and sickness coursing through her, and surrounded by snakes, Sturm does the only sensible thing...
She turns to go back for that stupid, probably piss-soaked drunk. He's clearly very hurt, and though she doesn't know what's wrong with him, she's not going to leave him here with this fucking swarm of snakes.
... stupid character development.
The Serpentine Man:
The snakes are more focused on escaping themselves than they are in pursuing Sturm, disappearing into a sewer hole and hitting dirty down below with a series of splashes and slaps, dripping like dark, scaled ribbons through the grate.
The goon that Sturm grabs, his eyes open at the jostling, but they're distant and glassy, like an empty husk of a body around nothing inside. He breathes, his blood courses, but he doesn't blink, and his lips are dry and cracked but he doesn't wet them. He just stares.
Sturm:
"Fuckin' A," Sturm mutters under her breath. With the snakes escaping, and fucking off to elsewhere, she's got more pressing concerns.
She rifles through the drunk's pockets for some kind of ID, and -- assuming it's on him -- snaps a pic of the info on her phone so she can track him down later if need be.
... after that, she's going to notify then bartender that buddy passed out in the alley, and then get the fuck up out of dodge. Fuckin' snakes.
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