electrocynic | The Fortress, Sarah's London, Saturday

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The Fortress, Sarah's London, Saturday

It had been decided Sarah wasn't going to the picnic. By Sarah. Because she felt she got the best quality decisions when she made them all by herself. New kids could just as well meet her during office hours next week. She wasn't portaling back and forth for that. Or the free food, even.

So, she'd already been here for a while. They'd gotten back from the retreat – finally, thank Christ – late last night, and she'd slept in, done some shopping, then retreated to the only place in London that really mattered: the Fortress.

And now she was standing outside in the street, smoking as she waited.

[ooc: NFB, and for the boys!]

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"The welcome picnic," Atton said, casting a glance in Sparkle's direction. "Same old, same old."

"If it's a 'same old' welcome picnic, there must be like eight new Skywalkers," Sparkle mused, smirking a little and giving them both a bro-nod. "Nah, not missing out on anything, there."

"Exactly my thinking," Sarah agreed with a nod. Notice for unfazed by Sparkle's appearance she was. "Seen far too many of them as it is."

She dropped what was left of her cigarette, and snuffed it out with the heel of her boot.

"Right. Should I cover some ground rules with you before I take you in?"

"Nah, Anakin was looking relieved, so I'm thinking no new Skywalkers," Atton said. He shrugged, but then Sarah came out with the ground rules thing, so he went, "Let me guess. Don't piss off anyone bigger than me?"

"I'm pretty sure that's just good life advice," Sparkle pointed out. "I mean, like, in general, even."

And not just when dealing with superheroes on their home turf.

"Actually, I don't give a shit who you piss off," Sarah replied, shrugging. "Just as long as you don't do it by using any powers, 'cause those are forbidden. Same with costumes and heroics, but I don't see how either of those is going to be a problem for you two."

Atton looked down at the Metallica t-shirt he was wearing, then shrugged. "Yeah, I'll be fine," he said. "I'm not going to need superpowers to deal with this bunch."

"And I'll leave the heroics to, you know... heroic people," Sparkle agreed. Because he'd sooner get a root canal than throw himself in front of a bus for a stranger or something.

Funnily enough, so would most of the heroes he was likely to run into here soon. The difference was that they earned their living by doing the bus thing.

"That's confirmation enough for me that you're not going to get me banned from my regular watering hole," Sarah decided, then indicated behind herself with a nod. "Come on, then."

And she turned to lead them around the building to where the entrance was, complete with a neon sign in the shape of a key and the text THE FORTRESS by the door, which itself read NO MASKS, NO POWERS, NO HEROICS. The aforementioned house rules.

"Did a bunch of superheroes really get together and decide to name their cantina 'the fortress'?" Atton asked... mostly Sparkle, but Sarah was probably within earshot, considering he was following along and everything. "That's just asking for something to go wrong."

"Especially with the no masks and no powers rule," Sparkle mused. "Like, I mean, somebody has got to have gotten the bright idea to try to take advantage of that, right?"

"Hate to disappoint you, boys, but that's not really how it works here," Sarah told them over her shoulder. "And the supervillains called their place the fucking Stronghold, so I wouldn't throw any stones if I were them."

So yeah, they had off-duty pubs for both heroes and villains in this city.

But they were at the door, now. The doorman looked grumpy, and somehow managed to look even grumpier after Sarah exchanged a few words with him. Still, she managed to convince him Atton and Sparkle were visiting colleagues from Canada and didn't have proper identification because of that, and also that he could shove it if he gave her any more grief about it because look, wanker, she'd been at a retreat all week and had a lot of anger bottled up and waiting for a target.

... So, anyway. The guy sighed and nodded, and Sarah held the door open and nodded them through.

"Go on, then. In you pop."

Atton scowled, but he at least withheld commentary until he was actually inside. "Okay, one? Dueling cantina's for the bad guys and the good guys? How sad is this place? And two, Canada? Do I look Canadian?"

... You looked Space-Canadian, dude.

Yeah, Atton, you were just getting an amused side-eye for that one, right there.

"What do you even think Canadians look like?"

Multiculturalism, hey!

But he was making his way inside all the same. Because, hey, it wasn't like he figured he looked like a colleague, so much, himself. Between the two of them, it averaged out or something.

"Hey, I'm not going tell them where you're actually from," sarah drawled. "Mostly because I don't even know, beyond space, but anyway."

It wasn't very important to her. They could both deal with being Canadian for the evening. The main thing was thet they were in now. This was the Fortress. "Well, here we are. Feast your eyes, or what have you." It was... a pub. Dark wood paneling, signs of wear all over the place, beer ad poster for brands such as Shazamstell and Green Lamp Ale on the walls. And a lot of people in suits, because that was the casualwear of superheroes, apparently.

"S'pose I can get the first round in."

"Just get me a whiskey," Atton said. Because whiskey was his signature drink in here, what with the tasting terrible but getting him drunk fast. "What's with the suits, anyway?"

"Seriously," Sparkle chimed in. "This is the best-dressed bar I've ever seen. I feel like I'm under-dressed for the occasion."

And Sparkle didn't often feel that way.

"Calls for a whiskey here, too."

Sarah shrugged. "Dunno. Reaction to wearing fucking spandex to work, I suppose." Lord knows she liked to cover herself up with full-length pants and a nice blazer when she wasn't working. "So that's two whiskeys then, is it? I can handle that."

She nodded towards one of the booths. "There's the regular spot." Already occupied by a dark-haired guy in all-black and a smiley, if a little frumpy young woman with huge glasses. "You can go on over there while I go deal with Norsey at the bar."

"Have fun," Atton said.

He looked towards the table and heaved a sigh. He had just come here for the drinks, damn it.

"Well, no time like the present," he said dryly, and wandered towards the booth.

"Oh hey, being social," Sparkle mused, looking toward the booth, and then shrugging his shoulders and ambling along behind. "If you need to bail from, like, human interaction," he said along the way, "I can always come up with some kind of shitty teenager excuse. I, like, come with those all built-in, really."

If he was here to play buffer to both sides, at least he was going to do his best to oblige along the way.

"'Sorry, it's vitally important I go outside and set the dumpster on fire'?" Atton suggested.

Stop putting the word 'fire' in Sparkle's head, Rand.

"I do come with my own pyrotechnics," Sparkle pointed out, grinning.

He was talking about the sparklers in his pocket, of course, but still.

"This is them, yes?" the man at the table asked the woman as they got close enough. There was a rosary hanging around his neck, and his voice was deep with a slight Spanish accent.

The woman immediately looked over and bounced up with a biiig smile. "Hi! You must be Sarah's American friends! Come, sit down, sit down! So nice to meet you, we don't get to see a lot of the people from Fandom."

And this was Sarah's BFF, boys.

"Yeah, you're lucky that way," Atton agreed, casting Sparkle a quick look. "This one's Sparkle, I'm Atton, and you're--"

He snapped his fingers. "Jenny. Sarah's best friend."

"Hey," Sparkle added with a little wave. "And actually, I'm Canadian, not American."

Look, this was a big deal and that mistake needed to be rectified, here.

... Not just because it was their cover, apparently.

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