Outside the tavern, the growing roar of an approaching engine heralded the coming of the surliest and least friendly recent arrival to World of War, one Random Resolution. Most grew accustomed to the world and their presence in it after their arrival, but Resolution had yet to make his peace with this place, as the core of his being, everything he had ever come to understand about how he had come to be had obliterated by his very existence here.

His connection to the Ninth Gate had been severed; he could no longer feel the constant stream of wicked souls passing beyond the threshold and into the waiting arms of the reaper, could no longer sense the presence of the demons and the damned; could no longer bask in the warmth of the Inferno's embrace, which meant that he [i]should no longer be alive.[/i] The moment he was created Resolution had been told that he owed his life to the computer program that connected him to the Gate that existed within him, and that should that connection ever be severed or disrupted, he would die, and yet here he stood, slamming open the doors to Chen's Tavern as he stomped towards the bar. As ever he was unsure of what he was doing here, or what he was going to do here. 

There were newcomers at the bar yet, but if there was one constant in this new, tumultuous existence it was that none of them would be of any help; he'd yet to encounter another computer, robot, cyborg, anyone or anything that would be of any use to him on his quest to reconnect to the Gateway inside him. Truth be told, Resolution would have had no problem with Xiomara on any other day, at any other point in his own existence... Reso found something about the overwhelmingly powerful darkness within the warrior... comforting; a tiny, soothingly evil oasis within this new and chaotic place, but until Reso figured out what was going on in his own life, he had no time to indulge in his usual curiosity for the world around him.  Reso had retained his memories, but he had lost much of the knowledge the Gateway had granted him... he could no longer remember his Sin-crafted spells, could no longer access the Hard Drive 2.0 or its interstellar flight mode. Would he continue to shutdown, losing bits and pieces of his programming until he finally deactivated? Or would he -- [b][i]she has a phone.[/i][/b]

He froze for a moment in the middle of his violent stomping towards the bar, his eyes wide behind his crimson shades as he stared at Jen and the phone was playing with, having pulled it from her coat and unlocked the screen to access some silly mobile game to kill the time between not-so-stealthily stealing drinks from the panda-man bartender and the cursed, crimson-haired warrior.  Reso was lost, alone and unsure of his place, his purpose in this world, but that girl and her phone would fix that. 

Stomping his way over to her, he quickly snatched the phone from Jen's grip.

"Hey! That's my PHONE!" 

He ignored her sudden and immediate protest as he turned away from her, marching away from the bar as his thumbs flew over the tiny digital screen. Wi-Fi -- the phone had Wi-Fi! Of course there was no signal here, but he didn't need one. He needed the phone to call himself, the only question was whether or not it was powerful enough. Blue lightning wreathed his fist, surging into the phone as the screen immediately washed over with static, the same static had begun pouring from his eyes as lightning bloomed from beneath his collar, igniting his skin. 

In but an instant, Reso had awoken the Engine, his flesh burning away to expose the blazing skull beneath. Empty sockets stared down at the phone, searching for answers in the digital snow. He gnashed his teeth, shaking his head as he paced rapidly back and forth between the tables. "[b]No, no, no, no, N-- hn? Yes... Yes, [i]YES![/i][/b]" He pumped a clenched fist in the air as the phone screen cracked, flashed to black, and then exploded, spitting a final flash of electricity as the phone breathed its last. Throwing the ruined phone to the ground, he turned back to the others, his chest swelling as he somehow drew a deep breath. 

"[b]Whew. I feel a lot better now... Who's up for drinks on me?![/b]"