Stryder BC
Ezekiel
Apollosarcher
JFK
Deadline
Boston Bridge
Kaithe Dame
xVampire3go
D3AD ST4R
Location: Hush
The man spent the better part of an hour telling him up, down, and back around about the operation. It was simple money laundering gone complex in crypto-subtleties. He was tall and bald and thick, pale skin and small dark brown eyes hidden behind thick rimmed glasses. If Hollywood were to cast a "weird but brilliant and socially incapable money laundering guy", Philip K. Exeter would have been the result. That thought alone proved to him that he was so far past the point of fully understanding this shit with narcotics (that would've been prescribed had it not be just part of the off the books doctor thing) and the appalling strangeness that was this new slice of the world he found himself in.
His little sister was hopeless. Every bird that hovered the great family tree sang songs to him of other siblings with ideas about him one or the other. He'd rather just leave--but for the awful timing and the sad desire to stay long enough to see if family was anything he had remaining to him, or if he was the only one who bought the talks about everything for their bloodline, for their family. That's what he'd always been told by father. That's what he told the men (and women) that followed him into the danger and the glory and the darkness that dwelled between the two.
A long, drawn out, sigh and focus had graced him once more through the haze of both understanding the laundering, and dealing with family, and...the world. "Fuck it. We'll talk some time in the next week about it. Just make sure the system purrs, please, Philip." His immediate impulse was that of the lonely figure that had been waiting around for him since he sat down: his drink. Scotch, old, incredibly intoxicating. A double, no less. One sip and the bitter bite was enough to cut right through that haze as he turned his body away from Philip and the door, and out onto the floor.
Floors.
There were three dance floors. One in the bottom that was especially dark, with wild lighting, and a funky mood. The 2nd Floor was hardcore, wasted and horny, house party vibe--if you knew how to have a house party, at least. The main floor was the only one he could view from windows. Of eight windows, the four central windows were real. The two that flanked the center screens were simply incredibly hi-def video: two the bottom floor, the other two the second floor. It wasn't just lights and a big space with bars and doors on the edges. It wasn't just the crowds.
From his view he could see the dealers, the players, the pimps. He could see the pick pockets, usually, there were tells if the same pickpocket kept coming back to the same honeyhole once too many times. Most good pickpockets would never be so desperate, at least, he wouldn't be and he was an excellent pickpocket, a thought he took another drink to.
"Anything interesting?" Serg asked.
Alek shrugged. "Not really. Just kind of trying to get used to new crowds, new places. This was so much easier in Europe."
It was his eleventh club. They were useful in the criminal underworld, and in the legitimate business world. Especially if they were good ones. Hush was good enough; it's interiors coming across closer to a favorite high-class hotel, just with darker tones and more playful lighting. None of the construction was cheap, no shortcut taken. The walls were really that nice. Standing room tables near the dancefloors, one main bar for each floor with at least one supporting bar, three on the main floor. The sound system was all, he was shocked to learn, American made.
So far he liked the results. Fiber optics, maybe? A detail he'd have to circle back to later.
At the moment his eyes were back to the game, as Serg distracted himself with a blonde that kept looking Alek's way when Serg wasn't looking, a better use of his time finding the players to this old game in a new location. It was after switching on night vision for the lower level cameras that he spotted the switch, and the face of one of the two "boys" taking part--he knew no better way to describe such idiots. "Serg--" Alek stopped, and suddenly smiled at Serg, and the idea of leaving his companion here alone with the blonde. "You got the office. I'll be fine. My luck isn't bad enough to get shot a day after getting grazed with a bullet."
Right?
