[OPEN;] feeling satisfied, but guilty as hell

[sassgardian]

Who: Fandral sassgardian & you!
What: Good, old fashioned learning about the nightlife (with a healthy dose of denial, because drinking is about fun and forgetting)! Get annoyed by Fandral, mingle with each other, it's a revelry free-for-all.
When: Day 383 | [Following this post.]
Where: Barhopping. Starting at Sky's Prize, maybe moving around (aka: feel free).
Rating: PG-13 to start, but may progress. Adults doing dumb adult things, who knows.


[It's startling, how easy it is to fall into a routine in a wholly unfamiliar situation, in line next to strangers with unknown motivations, complacent around an order (even as framed as it is as a desperate request, the gravity remains). And even easier still is the age-old remedy of denial.

Specifically, liquid denial.

For all of his showmanship, leading to seeming recklessness and stupidity under the guise of "bravery," Fandral also has a penchant for pleasure and overindulgence, especially in the forms of vice and "comfort." Celebration (perhaps more accurately described as an unclever ruse designed to fool himself and no one else) has been known to grow a mind of its own.

He hopes for the latter. Because despite the disturbing ease of complacency even in a home that is not "home," there is still enough strangeness to leave him with a deep, lingering sense of unease.

And so, he drinks to forget. Or perhaps, it's more to remember: to remember that there is a life outside of this. That even, as an instrument of salvation (or potential damnation), it changes nothing about him. Or anyone else.

Hell, he'd probably even toast to that.]

Comments

[bossily]

[Since she's already let Rose talk her into drinking recently, and she somewhat considers Fandral to be a friend after their amusing first encounter, Clara sends him a quick message alerting that she'll find him at some point that night. She leaves a note at the house saying where she's going, and heads out to try the drinking thing yet again.

However, fear of making herself sick yet again stops her from actually drinking anything strong, and she frequently downs glasses of water just to be on the safe side of things.]

Is the drinking a thing you do often, then?

[sassgardian]

[For the moment, Fandral is sticking with wine: he likes to ease into inebriation with some modicum of grace, rather than opting for straight hard shots and hitting drunkenness with the force of a brick to the head. It also helps that it's familiar territory, warming, and only slightly bitter.]

An acquired habit, but I've had some time to grow into it. [He shrugs as if the answer isn't "Yes, all the time."] Of course, after a few centuries, it is difficult to remember when that happened.

[bossily]

A few centuries?

[Blinking, she allows herself to take a drink of something that's definitely not water. It makes her shudder.]

Right, of course you're one of those ancient sort of blokes. Can't ever have enough men in my life that are over a thousand.

[sassgardian]

[He manages to give her a sympathetic look, despite not being wholly sure what exactly he's supposed to feel sorry for.]

Indeed. I am Æsir, though certainly not of the local variety. [The latter of which she already knows, having met him upon his arrival, but when it comes to explaining the Asgard-that-was and the Asgard-that-is, there are only so many distinctions to be made.]

Is this common where you come from, or is this a more illustrious distinction?

[Priorities.]

[bossily]

Is what common? The sitting at a bar with a guy that might be a friend and drinking but not really liking the taste of it, or the knowing more than one man that doesn't look a day over thirty when he's really at least a thousand?

[Because there needs to be a distinction here. She smiles a little, shrugging and laughing.]

The first one's probably more common back on Earth, but my life? The second's the common one.

[She raises her glass up in a cheers gesture, before downing the rest of her drink. She tries really hard not to shudder that time. And fails.]

[sassgardian]

[He follows suit in raising his glass (especially to the idea of not "properly" looking his "age", and then continues to nurse his wine slowly, pretentiously savoring it. But Clara's reaction forces him to bite back a laugh.] If you don't like the taste of it, my dear, you're not drinking the right thing.

[Says the Asgardian who can still drink like one. Clearly his tolerance is a good basis of judgement.]

[bossily]

I'll have what you're having, then.

[Nose still wrinkled up, she gives him a look that says she definitely can tell he's trying not to laugh at her.]

And a water.

[Okay, so she sucks at drinking companionship, but she's trying.]

Anyway, what is it that you normally do with company in places like this?

[sassgardian]

[He is, but not out of spite; it's endearing. He will happily pass the bottle over, but doesn't expect much of a difference in her reaction.]

Oh, the usual. Talk, boast, make bets you'll not remember in the morning...a myriad of other distractions. [And sometimes wake up the next morning in a room that isn't yours.]

[bossily]

Sounds like you only exist to get girls like me into trouble.

[Laughing, she waggles her eyebrows in his direction.]

Feel up to a game or two, then? I'm always open for you making bets you won't remember in the morning. 'Specially if it involves me getting your money.

[sassgardian]

Especially those as beautiful as you. [Smooth.] But alas, you already know what you're in for, and thus the trouble, my dear, is all yours.

[He grins and nods; there is honestly very little he wouldn't be up for trying at least once.]

Of course, though I would say money is hardly the most interesting wager.

[Fandral, please, that's beyond transparent.]

[bossily]

[That gets her to drop her jaw in near disbelief, the corner of her mouth twitching up into a grin.]

You're so entirely sure of yourself. Here I am, attempting to start up a game, and you can't stop flirting long enough to pay attention.

[His arm is lightly hit at, and she chuckles, rolling her eyes in mock exasperation.]

Go on then, find us some cards. Or darts. Or something!

[needsnoheadsman]

[Robb doesn't go out drinking often, and when he does head out for a drink, it usually isn't for a social call. Indeed, on the rare occasion he heads out for a drink, it's to forget whatever just recently happened. Still, there are exceptions, and this is one of them. Fandral may be a bit of a flirt, but he is something of a friend, and when Robb sees the network post, well, he figures he might as well.

He finds him in a bar somewhere between Freya and Heimdall, and it's easy enough to slide into the seat beside him.]

You wished for company? [Because this kind, the kind where they share drinks and maybe stories? That, he can grant.]

[sassgardian]

[To be fair, Fandral has spent a good majority of the evening wandering, so he's no longer even properly sure of where he is. It's luck that Robb manages to find the right place, but then, the not-related-to-the-man-of-iron Stark boy has always seemed the rational sort.

Maybe too much so, but in lacking so often, Fandral finds no real reason to complain.]

Aye, that I did. [Though he hadn't been wholly sure Robb, as serious as he is, would make the effort. It isn't the first time he's been wrong in that regard, however, and he's thankful for that.] Drinking is a terribly depressing thing to do on one's own, I find.

[needsnoheadsman]

And you risk drinking in excess as well when you drink alone, as I've found.

[One exception being the man he was named for, but then Robert Baratheon loved his wine and his whores. Far too much, Robb figures.]

If I may ask, though, what changed?

[sassgardian]

[Excess has rarely truly been a problem, but by most standards, he's still a budding alcoholic, and to argue otherwise would be to play a useless game of semantics which fools no one. Instead, he simply nods in agreement, waves a bartender over anyway, and sighs.

What reason does he give, of the myriad? That his friends are uncharacteristically distant, quiet, and that he worries in spite of himself? That the veneer on this unfamiliar, yet supposedly shiny, new situation has begun to wear when he now feels each day's length like a mortal would? That all this talk of war is some of the most unnerving, and he's been fighting them for centuries?]

Many things. This is all much quieter than I expected. [Especially in the middle of a 'war.' There's been plenty of talk, much of it unnerving in its own right, but the wariness of it is almost foreign when a warrior too used to his brothers-in-arms is all but left to the "one for all" half of the speech.]

[needsnoheadsman]

Savor the quiet, then, while it lasts. [Voice of experience, right here.] I know it may not look like it now, but this city's seen more than its fair share of battles, and will see more so long as this war rages on.

[sassgardian]

[Robb sounds so much more weary than a man of his age--or what Fandral can only assume his seeming-youth implies, being unversed in mortal life-spans--rightly seems he should, and while he cannot quite understand what that solemnity must feel like when concentrated into such a short amount of time, he does have a great amount of empathy. What he can understand are the more harrowing moments and lasting effects of war, of duty and responsibilities, and though it's rare for him to react in such a serious manner (rather than brushing it off, focusing on anything-but), the idea of quickly pushing that solemnity aside hits him nearly hard enough to wind him, and feels like a grievous disservice.]

No smart man wishes for war. Battle, perhaps: there is something to be said for a good fight. But fights are easy. Clear. They end.

[Peace is, indeed, a fragile and rare thing. But it's often mistaken as a solution when it's so often only a matter of time before it frays, or gods forbid, wholly shatters.]

[needsnoheadsman]

Then fight for an end to this war to come sooner rather than later.

[That solemnity's a hard-won thing, if you can count it as something to win at all, with everything he's had to lose in the process. He picks up a glass, waves the bartender over once more for some ale, and takes a sip.]

I know the battles are easy, I've fought and won more than enough of those even before coming here. War is--complicated.

[He gets it, is the thing. Snowball fights, playing at knights and monsters in the yard, fights with wooden swords, even fights with live steel--those are easy, and come to an end soon enough, though the last one's end is more lethal for one or even both. A war--well. It ends too, but it's longer and more complicated, and sometimes you start to lose sight of the goals you had when you started out.]

You could win all the battles, but you could still lose the war with one misstep. [Something that he, regrettably, has more than enough experience in.]

[sassgardian]

You could, yes. [He's no shortage of his own losses, by his own judgment or otherwise. But it gets easier. Frighteningly easier.] But I've a feeling you've grown from it?

[investigatetime]

[Sarah Jane wasn't unfamiliar to alcohol and the adult world, even though she often felt like it, but being in such a strange setting had provoked her to try different things here, and try to meet others. She was still relatively new, and finding so many people who knew the Doctor made it easier to 'settle' as one would say.

She glances over to the dashing chap by the bar, and her brows knitted together. Finally, her confidence grew and she stepped over to him.]

How much do you suppose you've had to drink?

[She didn't want to admit she had been watching him, but... Well, she had been watching him.]

[sassgardian]

[It has been a while, and more than one bar already, so he's feeling warm and lightheaded, but content, which had really been the entire aim of the evening.

He chuckles as the question, and does make a show of trying to count back, but eventually he loses track. Fandral gives her a small shrug.] Too many to remember, but far too few to quite regret it.

[investigatetime]

[Sarah Jane couldn't help but to chuckle at that reply and finds a spot next to him, leaning against the bar.]

Bad day, then? I can't say I don't blame you, this place gives me a headache trying to sort it all out.

[sassgardian]

[Too many of them in a row, really. But beyond the occasional good brood, excessive complaint flatters no one, and he keeps most of it to himself, aside from the obvious tell-tale signs of too-much drink and not enough company to pressure him into it by the unspoken "rules" of sociable drinking.

He finds a smile, despite it all.] Something like that. It is still quite a lot to...ah. Take in.

[If that ever really happens at all. For anyone.]

[unsparing]

[ She probably should've left Joel some kind of note of where she'd be but if he were really that hard-pressed to get a hold of her, Tess figured he knew how to contact her easily enough with the bracelet. And knowing her she'd cut her night and fun short just to go to him, if he really needed her that badly.

Sky Prize.

Tess tilts her head back to look at the sign near the door. This looks like the place. She checks around the entrance before letting herself in. Since they'd spoken via video communication it should be easy to spot the guy but apparently not.

Heading over to the counter she orders a drink for herself and turns to face the rest of the bar, scanning the tables for any sign of Fandral. ]

[sassgardian]

[Luckily, he's been present long enough that he's started to acclimate to the environment and crowd, even if it's not his ideal (and now he knows). He notices Tess before she seems to have noticed him, and he makes his way back over to the counter.]

I trust it was not difficult to find?

[unsparing]

[ She spots the movement and looks towards it, watching him as he approaches, sizing him up now that they're meeting in person. She's leaning back casually against the counter, already halfway into her drink when he's speaking to her.

Tess holds up her arm, showing her bracelet. ]

Took me a while to get used to the mappin' system on this thing but I think I got it now.

[sassgardian]

[It is, at the very least, a pleasant surprise to find that a good number of people here actually can hold their alcohol. From what he's heard of realms outside of his own Asgard, that is not always (or even terribly often) the case.]

Truth told, I still often find myself lost. But it is good to know one of us has their head firmly on their shoulders, I'd have hated for this to be too far our of your way.

[unsparing]

Nah. [ She offers him a short smile. ] It wasn't too far out.

Besides, it gives me a chance to explore the other areas around my own. Get a feel for the main streets and what's around.

So. [ Her brow raises at him with the question. ] Where's the next stop after this?

[sassgardian]

It is funny you should ask; I had not thought so far ahead. [The ensuing shrug is paired with a laugh.] I am, however, open to suggestion, and wholly at your service.

[unsparing]

[ The rest of her drink goes down in one swift gulp and she's signaling the bartender for another one, no make that two. ]

I feel like you've been here longer than I have and if that's the case--it's your call. You'll know 'bout it than me.

[ When the drinks arrive she holds one out for him. On her. ]