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[h2]Phantasm[/h2]
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[u][url=https://goo.gl/maps/FpH6B4XGad6hC8ic6]Love Street[/url][/u]
[i]Lincoln Park, Tenebrae[/i]
[@Estylwen]

Gloria watched the man take a long, slow sip of his drink. He was in the driver's seat of this conversation and he evidently knew it, was savouring it even. Clearly satisfied that he'd made her wait long enough to make a point of who was in charge, the man set his drink down and turned to look at her; no, not look, stare. He scanned her up and down, taking in every inch. She didn't like the look in his eyes, he was sizing her up, looking for a way to bring her down.

“I’ll be honest, the gift is bait. I just wanted to see you with my own eyes.”

His voice was deep but it had a bite to it. Like someone used to cracking the whip on those below him. He wasn't sizing her up like an opponent, he was sizing her up like a mouse to be batted around. Gloria didn't like being played with.

“The boss has taken an interest in you and asked me to invite you." he continued "But I have high standards for him, and I have to know what’s worth his time, and what isn’t.”

He slid the briefcase he had resting on the bar a foot over so that it rested in front of her. "If you pass, you get to keep what’s in this," he said, patting the case's sleek leather, "as well as handsome pay for a few contract jobs, easily three times more than what [i]they’re[/i] paying you." He gestured toward Gloria's squad behind them.

Gloria's eyes flicked sideways, first to the briefcase and then to the Valkyries. Jinny, Sonia, and Siobhán were talking and laughing loudly over their first round of drinks but Quinn sat slightly apart from them in the wraparound booth, staring at the strange man Gloria was conversing with.

Gloria's eyes only lost focus on the man for a second. The more he spoke, the more like a threat he sounded and Gloria wasn't going to let a him blindside her.

"And if you don’t pass, well... I guess we’ll see when we get there." He said, lounging back on the elevated bar chair.

The offer wasn't entirely unwelcome, Gloria was certainly interested in the money, but there was something she valued just a little bit more, her freedom. She had an understanding with Lady Hel about the kinds of things that she would and wouldn't do. Admittedly it wasn't an exhaustive list but Hel knew that Gloria didn't do hits, she didn't hurt kids, and she didn't hurt parents in front of their kids. Not that she hadn't killed people. There had definitely been jobs she did where people ended up dead because of her actions, sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. But Gloria didn't take jobs were someone being dead was the end goal.

Of course she wasn't stupid. She knew that just because she refused to do a job, that didn't mean the job wasn't getting done, but her hands were clean of it. This stance had probably cost her chances at promotion and at a larger cut but Gloria valued the ability to say "No" more than she did riches. The proposition that this crescent wearing stranger was spouting was sounding more and more like a "get in line or disappear" kind of operation.

"And does what you've seen so far make you think I'm worth [i]his[/i] time?" she asked. The question was nonchalant but there was a bite in her voice, indicating that she considered this spectacle to be a waste of [i]her[/i] own time.

The man reached his hand up and pulled his hood off his head. Underneath his hair was black and wiry, pointed in a dozen different directions. It gave off an unkempt look that was purposeful in how accidental it was trying to be. Without the hood casting shadows over his face Gloria could see a silver diamond shape dominating the iris of each of his eyes and a tattoo of a blazing sun on the side of his neck. His face was obscured with a domino mask from within which his diamond eyes glinted. In one swift motion he stood, swept the bar stool around him, and slid it neatly under the bar; giving himself room to maneuver. Gloria recognized it before he said anything, it was a battle stance.

His next words only confirmed what she could already tell was coming. "Phantasm, your first job is to duel me. If you can lay me out flat, you get the reward of it. And if you need motivation, I can provide it if you simply deny me. Any questions?"

Gloria gave a one eighth turn toward the bar. It was enough that it looked like she was disregarding him as a threat but still allowed her to watch him closely in her peripheral vision.

"You know, it's not really a gift if it comes with strings attached, it's a bribe. And in this case, it seems more like a gambling pot."

Gloria put her hand on the briefcase, she felt her skin tingle with a kind of soft vibration and as she touched her fingers to the leather, they sunk through its surface as if it wasn't there, like it was made of water. It may not have compared to the euphoria that she'd experienced when on Cypher but there was something comforting about that feeling of moving through solid matter. It was like slipping into a warm bath. Her hand hadn't even sunk an inch into the case however when she felt a sharp jolt and she yanked her hand back instinctively. She wasn't a stranger to the feeling of an electric shock. High voltage currents were one of the few things that stopped her abilities in their tracks and she wasn't keen to experience what would happen if she kept pushing, not again.

Gloria turned her chair to fully face the stranger. She leaned back against the edge of the bar in a posture that suggested she didn't really care about what was going on. "You really have done your research Mr...?" she let the question hang in the air for a fraction of a second.

"The name's Arc," he supplied "Right Hand of the Shadow Knights.”

She continued as though she hadn't heard him. "What are the win conditions? I assume your [i]'boss'[/i]" she said the word like it was a laughable title "doesn't want your head on a pike as proof that I'm [i]'worth his time'[/i]. So at what point have I won? First blood? When I knock you to the floor? Or should I make you scream for your daddy?"