2008-05-17: Fist To Future (Pt.1)

Starring:

Chase_icon.gif Jordan2_icon.gif Portia_icon.gif Randall_icon.gif

Summary: Jordan gets decked and Randall talks about a not-so-bright future. Part 1 of 2

Date It Happened: May 17, 2008

Fist to Future


Midtown, NYC - Club DnA's

Finals are finally over. Like many collegiates, Jordan is at a bar, trying to score some free drinks as she "forgot her I.D." Her cleavage is thus slightly more pronounced than usual.

Sitting at the end of the bar is a simple looking young woman. She doesn't have the beauty, let alone the cleavage, of the her nearest neighbor, but she also doesn't seem all that interested in having much to drink. Chase, for the time being, just sits on her stool watching the very large crowd sway with the music. A glass of water sits in front of her as she methodically cracks peanut shells open.

An average-looking, lanky, brunette male passes by Jordan. She smiles and grabs him by the arm. "Hey, my name's Jordan. What's yours and would you like to buy me a drink?"

Chase watches silently for a few minutes as the blonde down the way pulls a young man aside. He is clearly intoxicated and just when it looks like she'll be getting that drink, a redhead steps in between them. And she's looking none too pleased.

Jordan glares drunkenly at the interloper. She pouts a bit and gives a broken-hearted, "Hey! What the heck is /your/ deal?"

"My /deal/ is that this is /my/ boyfriend. He only buys /my/ drinks," the chic retorts with a roll of her eyes. "Why don't you go find someone else to mooch off of?"

At the end of the bar, Chase tilts her head curiously. She stands and carefully slips past a small crowd ordering another round and into a seat closer to the possibly brewings of a girl-on-girl drunken bar fight.

Jordan's eyes briefly roll back into her head before she turns to look down to other side of the bar. "Whatever… bitch," she mutters under her breath, but most certainly within earshort of the redhead.

Randall makes his way through the crowd, coming from the other direction, and squinting as he spots the familiar body language of angry drunken women up ahead. Quickly claiming an open stool at the bar, he waves to catch the server's attention, then glances back toward the entrance. He's waiting for someone to show up, or rather he's waiting to show up when the someone arrives.

The lanky drunk gives a soft uh-oh and starts grasping for the woman's arms. Of course, in his stupor, only about half of the hand-flaps come in contact with her. "Hey… Hey… Laura… Laura, less juss go. It's not li'e I was gonna by her a drink anyway," he slirs. "Oh /no/ she didn'!" Laura, clearly, is pissed.

Slouching over her diet cola with no ice up at the bar, Jordan mutters, again somewhat audibly, "Oh, yes. She did, indeed," she remarks, oozing with intellectual elitism.

Chase is shaking her head at this point and calls, rather loudly, to Jordan who has turned her back on the woman. "I don't think you should have done that…" She eyes the redhead and shakes her head again, "I /really/ don't think you should have done that…"

Portia hasn't always been in amongst the crowd. Well, that is, you can't tell how long she's been there, simply because all of a sudden she's just /there/. Funny how that works. Shifting through the crowd, she moves to lean against a wall, glancing to find someone in particular.

"How's about you turn around and say that to my face, slut?" Laura, unlike her boyfriend, is quite sober and aparently iching for some action.

Randall can't help but be distracted by the catfight that just insists on playing itself out. While he doesn't go seeking out violence as a matter of course, he has run across it before; just in case, he glances around to see what sorts of objects are handy. Some empty glasses there, and another empty bar stool next to him. It's better than nothing…

Jordan raises an eyebrow and slowly rotates in her seat until she faces the irate redhead. "You know what your problem is?" she asserts with perhaps a bit too much attitude, "Deep-seated insecurity. I would bet good money that, at some point in your childhood, you were rejected. By your peers? By your parents? I don't know. But I do know that you ought to seek therapy if you want to be sane on your thirtieth birthday." Wow, from zero to sixty, Jordan went from bitch to clinical psychologist.

Portia doesn't catch a glimpse of who she's looking for, it seems, but she notes that there's something interesting going on. Arguments always draw attention, so she takes a moment to watch, not really daring to get closer or really involved. She just watches, most likely unnoticed as she stays where she's at.

Chase is now interested in analyzing Jordan. As far as she can tell, nothing Jordan says seems forced. Though very few would know what she meant by that if she were to say it out loud. But she glances quickly back to the redhead. "I would duck if I were you!" The warning is directed at the blonde, but it's hard to tell if she can hear her over the music and the noise of the crowd.

Clearly not impressed by the psycho-babble, Laura pulls her fist back and then swings. It's a hard, fast, deliberate punch and it's headed directly for Jordan's face. Her boyfriend is swinging his arms around nervously, urging her to got. Apparently this isn't the first time that he's been in this sort of situation.

While Randall is also nice and sober - so far, at least - his attention is split, as he sees Portia and hears a familiar voice at the same time. He can't make out what exactly the voice is saying; after a second, he turns back to Portia, gesturing with one hand. "Bad timing, I think!" he calls out, equally uncertain whether he can be heard at that distance.

"Oh… oh… oh…" Chase cringes as the fist goes flying. "Drunk people and angry people," she murmurs, "they are so easy to read. Always so easy."

"Not the face!" Jordan screams as she put her arms in front of her face, forearms crossed in an 'X' shape.

FWLAP!

That is the noise a fist makes when it meets forearm skin. Instinctively, Jordan cries out, "Assault! Assault! My brother's a lawyer, you idiot!"

Portia catches a little of what Randall's saying and offers a wave from the distance she's at, but she stops really when she notices there's a fist being thrown. Yeah, not the best thing all right. Bad timing indeed. Still, she backs up, making sure she's nowhere in close enough to have any sort of danger, even accidental, cross her path.

Laura clearly doesn't seem to care. "And my daddy's a judge. What's your fucking point?" She's shouting loudly now, "You think I give a damn? I don't give a damn. You need to learn your place. And it most certainly isn't clinging on my boyfriend.

Any nearby members of the crowd who hadn't noticed the fight, clearly do now and are making all sorts of noise to the point. The bartender quickly snaps his fingers and waves a pair of very muscled men over. "Okay, ladies. This is a club, not a boxing ring. Take the fight outside! Or we'll take it outside for you!"

Randall nods to Portia, turns— and promptly discovers that, while Jordan and Laura argue, one of the other guys at the bar has decided to just pile straight on with the violence. He gets a forearm up to catch the blow, but is still knocked a couple steps backward before the bouncers can close in on him as well.

Jordan dabs at her nose gingerly, noting the blood on her fingertips. She staggers to her feet, eyeing the muscle. "Did you see that? She fucking crazy? You saw her hit me and I never laid a FINGER on her!"

Chase is on her feet as chaos starts to break lose. It almost looks like, despite the bouncers, anyone with a grudge against anyone else is deciding they might as well take it out on them now. "Oh, the things alcohol will do to peoples brains…" She inches closer to the door and dodges as another drunk man begins swinging wildly. "Randall?" She can't tell through the tangle of bodies, but she starts towards him anyway as he staggers backwards.

Though her boyfriend is long gone, Laura pops her collar, "Yeah, because you know you couldn't take me, bitch." She rolls her eyes at the bartender as he orders them outside and turns, ready to disappear into the crowd.

Portia is managing to stay back out of the way, though she does look over with concern as she sees Randall knocked back a bit. Still, she's going to wait until she's fairly certain she won't get caught in anything before she even approaches, but she keeps a careful eye on the situation.

Jordan stumbles back onto her stool and motions the bartender over. "Hey, buddy, mind adding a little Jack to this Diet Coke? I need something for the pain." She hi-jacks someone's cocktail napkin and donates it to the cause of her bloody nose.

"Right," the bartender smirks as one of the bouncers reaches for Jordan's arm. "Come on, Miss. I think it's about time you called it a night."

There's that voice again. Randall looks around, squinting, until— oh, there she is, over there. "Yeah," he calls out to Chase. "Hey, do you have a few minutes? —And make that two," he adds, motioning to the bartender just before he wanders off to take care of Jordan's one-for-the-road.

Chase slips up beside him. "Um. Yeah." She reaches out, offering him her arm in case he needs it after being knocked about a little. "Though I don't know that this is the best place to talk. With a brawl this size, someone's bound to call the cops." She gives him a half smile.

Jordan's eyes widen. "Hey, wait a minute! I'm an American citizen, which means I have rights. You're not going to throw me back out there with that… that… woman waiting to kill me, are you?"

The bartender does, however, nod to Randall and quickly mixes him a drink. Then he heads over to the phone on the wall and starts dialing a very short number.

Portia glances back over to Randall and the woman he's talking to, slowly wandering her way over. Yeah, she's not going to try and make it too obvious, either. Still, she is keeping an eye out on the last bits of the squabble, concern on her features. She does care about what's happening, even if it is a little crazy.

"Who, Laura?" The bouncer rolls his eyes. "She ain't killed nobody yet and I doubt she'd waste that honor on you. Now why don't you just get your things and I'll /escort you/ to your car for your /protection/," he doesn't seem to care what rights she may or may not have. He's just following orders.

"Bullshit, you'll escort me," retorts Jordan. "I'll take anyone who saw it over you to get me back home. At least they would believe me."

While Jordan's right of free assembly is unceremoniously violated, Randall takes the opportunity to pick up his drink and head off in a different direction. "I think you're right," he replies to Chase, nodding to the offered hand but declining to take it. Actually, behind his back, his left hand waves to Portia: yes, I know you're hiding back there.

"You think I'm right?" Chase smirks at him, a look that says he probably knows better. "But right or wrong aside," she slips into the door frame, doing her best to clear the door from him and, though she doesn't know it yet, Portia as well, "we're leaving, right?"

Jordan holds her hand up to the bouncer. "You know what? Forget about it. I'm going to walk myself out."

Once the little group is safely away from the crowd, Randall turns to Chase, gesturing with his hands as he walks. "Okay, so you can tell when people are lying, I mean really tell, right?" Part educated guess, part delusion, though it happens to be on the right track in this case. "There are other people out there with special abilities like that. Some of them could use your help." He leaves it at that for now, waiting to see how she reacts.

Jordan stumbles a bit out of the bar, glaring back at the bouncer over her shoulder, muttering something incoherent.

Portia slowly and quietly heads out after Randall and Chase. While she's not invisible, per se, she's still following at a respectful distance. She doesn't need to hide completely, after all. She glances over at Jordan as she stumbles out, but doesn't say anything.

Chase tilts her head. Clearly, she is reading him. After a moment, she nods, "Well. You're legit." It's a statement, obviously. "I was pretty sure I wasn't the only one walking around with more than above average … skills …" She hestitates, uncertain of whether or that is the right word for it. "It would have been pretty arrogant of me to think otherwise." A glance is tossed back over her shoulder at Portia and Jordan. "Is she?" the inquiry is of Portia, whom she is certain knows Randall.

Randall nods to Chase, then turns and follows her gaze back toward Portia. "Portia, this is Chase, she's going to— Brighton, was it?" Not directly answering Chase's question, but leaving Portia an obvious opening to do so herself if she wants. He hasn't noticed that Jordan is tagging along as well, or at least not that she's close enough and alert enough to overhear any of it.

Jordan's head slowly turns towards the more private conversation taking place nearby. She quickly - and uncharacteristically - shuts her mouth and opens her ears, listening intently.

"That's right," Chase nods. "Nice to meet you, Portia." She offers a hand casually and glances between the two of them several times. She is aware of Jordan's presense, but she's even more aware of the woman's sudden silence. She chooses, however, not to say anything.

Portia moves in to follow Chase and Randall a little more closely, offering a smile. "Nice to meet you, Chase." She does nod as a simple answer to the question as she keeps up with them. She accepts the hand for a shake.

At this point, Randall stops walking, clasping his hands behind his back so he won't be tempted to fidget with them. "There are some others, too— probably some that I don't know about yet. But here's the important thing… we got an inside tip that there was a drug company trying to create an ability-in-a-pill. That it was going to mess things up, big-time." Also true, albeit incomplete - he doesn't figure that Chase is secretly on their payroll, he just doesn't want to dump too much on her at once. Even if she would know he wasn't making it up.

Stops walking herself and stares at him. "Are you serious…" A retorical statement, given that she can clearly tell that he's tell the truth. For whatever reason, he is a lot like the uninhibited people at the bar. She can read him with relative ease. "So… This tip. Did it come with any suggestions about /stopping/ total chaos from taking over the world?" Dramatic, much?

Jordan raises an eyebrow at the intriguing conversation before moving silently to lean against the nightclub's wall. Reaching into her pocket, she pulls out a pack of cigarettes and a box of matches. She procures a cigarette and lights it in a smooth motion with a match. She takes a drag and continues to act nonchalant.

Portia is listening quite closely as well. Sure, she's got some information, but it's not all of it. She puts her hands in her pockets as she sticks in close, glancing between Chase and Randall.

Randall sticks his hands in his pockets. "Sort of," he answers. "We know the name of the company, and that we need to derail the project before they take it public." He doesn't question that dumping something like this on millions or billions of people at once would indeed lead to total chaos. "Beyond that… not a lot of detail, so we're basically going with who we trust. And— well, you're all about getting to the truth, and you're not afraid to show it. I trust you."

Chase seems geniunely grateful for his vote of confidence. "That means a lot, actually… Not many people really trust other people any more. Especially not people like me."

Tsshhhhh!

That is the sound of a cigarette falling out of Jordan's mouth as Randall drops the proverbial bomb. Is she hearing what she thinks she's hearing?

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