Mythical Saturday

[Moira Morley]

Saturday evening was always a busy time at Morley's. No matter how hectic it was, people always seemed to have a good time there. It was as if Dionysus himself watched over the festivities. If not the god of revelry, then Moira had her business in order.

The child of Ares and Aphrodite used to think getting away from her old life was of the utmost importance to starting her career as a superhero. As time marched on though, she found out that having one foot stuck in reality wan't a bad thing. Her old friends, no, her family was here. And her new friends had a place to hang around.

Tonight was nothing special. A local jazz band was booked to play later on. At the pool tables, Moira and a few friends were earning some cash from some new guys. It was a good night.

[Heritage]

Lynn Epstein stepped into Morley's for the first time, and decided right then and there she liked it; her sharp ears appreciated the slightly muffled acoustics that did nothing to mar the sound of the jukebox, and the scent of inexpensive perfume and cologne mingled pleasantly with the whiff of leather jackets and Utz potato chips. The old-fashioned lighting fixtures were neither too dim nor too bright, and the place felt real and lived-in; a lot of the bars on the West Coast felt like movie sets or hyper-twee tourist traps.

Tonight Lynn was wearing an old army jacket, faded Bob Marley t-shirt and a pair of Levis with knees worn thin; her boots were calf-high and fashionable a year ago, and seemed to have lived a lot in that year. Over her shoulder, the slender dark-haired girl carried a duffel bag on a canvas strap which bumped against the back of her legs as she walked. Running a hand through her spiky hair, she approached the bar, dropped her bag to the floor and smiled at the barkeep.

"Hi, could I have a Bacardi and Coke, please?" She pulled out a Washington State driver's license for examination, then had a look 'round the place. There, the redhead playing pool; that had to be her. Despite herself, Lynn took in a sharp breath and blew it out as she muttered softly.

"Boy, they weren't kidding, were they?"

[Moira Morley]

The bartender took a look at the driver's license. The picture on the card did not do the girl justice. Then again, no driver's license picture ever helped anyone. "A long way from home," she said with a smile, sliding the fake ID back to her. "So, what brings you all the way out here," she asks as she set up to make the drink.

---

Moira smiled as she counted the winnings as her three other companions waved goodbye to their newly beaten opponents. "Man," she sarcastically cleared her throat, "anybody thirsty?"

"Think we got time for one more game," Jeremy asked.

"Always ready for another," David replied, "but some drinks would be good about right now."

"You guys rack em up," Moira said slipping her part of the money in the top of her shirt and handed the rest, separated three ways, to Linda, "I'll be back in a few with drinks."

[Heritage]

The bartender took a look at the driver's license. The picture on the card did not do the girl justice. Then again, no driver's license picture ever helped anyone. "A long way from home," she said with a smile, sliding the fake ID back to her. "So, what brings you all the way out here," she asks as she set up to make the drink

Oh crud, she's friendly and talkative; better mix a bit of truth in with the lies.

Lynn shrugged and waved in an offhand manner. "I used to live out here; I was actually born out here, in Atlantic City, but I moved out West for awhile, with a guy, of course, but that.."

And now she didn't have to fake it, because the pain was fresh, even now.

"That, that ended...badly, and now he's gone."

She grabbed a bar napkin to dab at her eyes, which had gone a little moist.

"Damn it, there I go. Oh, thanks."

She took the finished drink and had a sip.

"Mm, that's good! You make 'em strong, like I like 'em. So yeah!"

Lynn laughed awkwardly and waved her damp napkin.

"Come back to familiar ground, maybe reconnect with some old friends. I dunno."

The petite brunette sighed and drummed her hands on the bar.

"It's good to be back, actually."

She held her drink up.

"To new beginnings and burying the past; what's done is done, so screw it."

Lynn smiled, nodded to herself and took a big swig.

"Gah! Oh man, that's good!"

"You guys rack em up," Moira said slipping her part of the money in the top of her shirt and handed the rest, separated three ways, to Linda, "I'll be back in a few with drinks."

Lynn heard the redhead approaching, emerging from the scattered amorphous din of the Saturday night crowd; it was hard to pick out individual conversations here, and she hadn't expected to hit her own nerve chatting with the bartender, so this so-called goddess was right on top of her before she had a chance to prepare herself. Up close, she was striking; her hair and skin seemed to have this sort of...soft glow. And she smelled different than most people, somehow purer, with a hint of...olive trees?

Dear God, I hope she has a brother...or a cousin! Hell, even a creepy uncle would do!

Finally, Lynn felt she had to say something, since she felt a bit guilty about coming all the way to Morley's to, what, gawk? Laugh?

"Uh, hi! You probably hear this all the time, from guys and girls and everybody, but you're...you're a very beautiful person."

Yep, they make the drinks strong here. :oops:

[Moira Morley]

The bartender listened to Lynn, watching the girl as she mixed the drink. Finishing her work as the girl started tearing up, she comforted the girl with a softly laid her hand on her hand. When the girl cheered up a bit, she smiled and let go. "Don't worry about the drink," she winked, "It's on the house."

"Hey, Summer," Moira said hopping on a barstool next to Lynn, "We need a full round over at the table." She handed the cash over to the bartender with her pointer and index finger.

"Sure thing, boss," she said taking the cash, "You gonna take it over there like usual?"

No sooner than Summer asked her question, Lynn spoke her piece to Moira. Moira blushed with a smile towards Summer, "No, you take it over there." Looking to Lynn a little bit more composed, she reached her hand out in greeting, "Well, you know me, but I do not have the honor of knowing you."

[Heritage]

Lynn feels a little bit guilty about the free drink, but not enough to turn it down; at least most of what she said was true.

No sooner than Summer asked her question, Lynn spoke her piece to Moira. Moira blushed with a smile towards Summer, "No, you take it over there." Looking to Lynn a little bit more composed, she reached her hand out in greeting, "Well, you know me, but I do not have the honor of knowing you."

The slender brunette smiles and bobs her head. "Yeah, kinda unfair when you're a celebrity, even just a local one; bit of a one-way street, right?" She sets down her glass and extends a hand. "Lynn Esptein, back in FC after what feels like forever. You're Moira, right?"

Her handshake is casual yet firm. Lynn vaguely waves her hand about, indicating the bar in general.

"Very nice place you got here; classy without being snotty, a nice neighborhood place that folks can go to, have a few, then wander on home after. I like it."

[Moira Morley]

"Yes, I am Moira. Glad to meet you Lynn," she said greeting the girl.

"Thank you," Moira said with a bit of an impish smile, "Morley's has been around for a few generations. We have patrons that go way back." She sighs dreamily, "I grew up with a lot of these people." Coming back from the past, Moira blinked, "Excuse me, you probably know all this," she chuckled.

[Heritage]

"Yes, I am Moira. Glad to meet you Lynn," she said greeting the girl.

"Nice to meet you, too."

"Thank you," Moira said with a bit of an impish smile, "Morley's has been around for a few generations. We have patrons that go way back." She sighs dreamily, "I grew up with a lot of these people." Coming back from the past, Moira blinked, "Excuse me, you probably know all this," she chuckled.

Lynn grins and shakes her head. "No, no, it's fine! I spent a lot of my summers as a kid here in West End, when me and my folks would drive up from Atlantic City to visit my grandparents, but it's not like I'm an expert or anything."

She looks kind of bashful as she continues. "So maybe I did read the little blurb thing in the Nightlife section of The Daily Word, I'm not gonna lie; figured I was back in town, I should check the place out, see if you were as cool as they said in the paper. And now, I fell like I'm a freakin' tourist."

She laughs and rubs her face. "Gah, whatever! I hope the band's good tonight, I could use a good show." Lynn stops herself, and looks at Moira out of the corner of her eye, a little sly. "Okay, sorry for bein' such a pain and all, but was it true what it said, and you bein' like a cape or whatever? Saving folks and whatnot?"

[Moira Morley]

"A cape," Moira questioned with a modest laugh, "My dear, I am not the cape and costume type." Staring off for a split-second, she ponders what she would look like in Captain Thunder's geddup. She blinks confusedly at the thought. "But yes," Moira said returning to her smile, "I have done my fair share of good deeds. I guess word travels fast."

Looking around, she saw she was without drink, "Summer, keep em coming, for me and my friend here." Looking to Lynn, she nods, "Don't worry about the drinks. Their on me."

[Heritage]

Lynn accepts the drink with a nod.

"Thanks. That's good, the 'doing the right thing' bit; I try to live by that rule myself, but it doesn't always turn out so well sometimes."

She takes a sip of her drink and shrugs.

"I dunno, I guess it comes easier to some people; I don't know how it is for you, but me, I kinda, well...I kinda attract trouble."

The shorter girl laughs and winks.

"And I'm kinda attracted to it, too, I guess."

She sighs, takes a deeper sip, then indicates the pool table Moira was playing at earlier with a jerk of her head.

"I'm not keeping you from your game, am I? I'd hate to cramp your style if you're ahead."

[Moira Morley]

Moira smiled at Lynn's explanation for her heroics. Standing and picking up her drink, she smiles when the other woman mentions the pool game, "Don't be silly! Please join us. We'll get you better aquainted with the Morley's family yet!"

The two women made their way over to the game. "Lynn, this is Jeremy, David and Linda," Moira announces the players. "Guys, this is Lynn. She's here to join us for a few games, hopefully."

[Heritage]

"Lynn, this is Jeremy, David and Linda," Moira announces the players. "Guys, this is Lynn. She's here to join us for a few games, hopefully."

Not surprisingly, Moira's friends were lookers in their own right, though of course they paled in comparison with their supernatural host; Linda could have been a model (who knows, maybe she is?), and Jeremy and David were downright dreamy, hovering somewhere around the 'older brother on a Disney Channel show' area of hotness. And to make things even more enticing, they seemed like normal, everyday folks who just happened to be this attractive.

But all these thoughts rushed through Lynn's head in but a moment, and it only took her a few seconds to flash a smile and regain her cool.

"Oh yeah, I love pool!"

She sets down her Bacardi and Coke and snags a stick, twirling it effortlessly like a baton first one way, then the next. Setting the stick aside, she peers over the top of her drink as she takes a sip.

"So are we playing kiddie league or are we playing pool? Nickel a shot is fine with me, as long as I'm playin' for something."

[Moira Morley]

Moira laughed with a wink to Lynn, "I guess we can take it easy on you. Once you start whoopin on us then we can start playing for real." She smiled and shrugged to the three others, "What can I say, don't hit her in the pocket too hard. If she's good she can come back." Nodding warmly to Lynn, she pointed to the rack with a pool stick, "Consider this a tryout, rack em up."

Linda leaned over to Lynn and whispered, "Don't get too intimidated, dear, she does this to all of her first timers. Be glad you didn't jump in head over heels." Leaning back, she smiled to the other three, "New girl is my partner."

[Heritage]

Linda leaned over to Lynn and whispered, "Don't get too intimidated, dear, she does this to all of her first timers. Be glad you didn't jump in head over heels." Leaning back, she smiled to the other three, "New girl is my partner."

Lynn grins and raises her drink in salute.

"To partners in crime!"

She tosses a faux worried glance over her shoulder at Moira.

"Without, y'know, the actual crime part. Is she packin' heat?"

Linda laughs and waves her hand dismissively. "Pretty much all the time; don't worry, she's off the clock."

The diminutive brunette nods her head sagely.

"Ah, then my grievous sins of the past are a non-issue; excellent!"

She picks up the rack and flips it up in the air, letting it spin a few times before she snatches it back. Lynn takes another sip off her drink before she starts racking them up.

"So, who is Morley's originally named for, some grizzled rumrunner from back in the day? These older places have the coolest stories."

[Avenger Assembled]

At this juncture, the table exploded. A blast of light cut down through the ceiling and tore through felt and slate and wood, sending a huge shower of debris everywhere and sending patrons running in terror. Inside the cylinder of light, two figures rapidly formed into being as the light faded into darkness. Moira recognized Sidetrack and Targette very well, the two mercenaries looking ready for one heck of a fight. Brandishing an enormous rifle in both hands, Sidetrack looked around for a moment before her eyes settled on Divine. "You! It's payback time, #($(#!" She noticed Grim a few moments later as Targette tugged on her sleeve, and swore again. "Both of you? !*$#$" Sidetrack evidently knew a lot of swears.

[Avenger Assembled]

The two heroines were suddenly surrounded by a groaning, bleeding crowd; some of them unconscious, some of them blinded, all of them in pain. Divine's friends, her bar, her pool table; were hurt, and hurt bad! Unfortunately for the cause of good and right, the carnage was enough to delay the two heroines long enough for the two supervillans to spring into action!

Targette pointed at Divine first, the Earth-bound goddess' beauty unfortunately making her a natural target for the mute mercenary. As she did so, Divine felt a hammering batter into her skull as if a dozen of her uncle Hephaestus had just showed up to pound on her head with his Hammer of a Thousand Blows. Nearly simultaneously with her lover's strike, Sidetrack leaped into the air, executing a neat pirouette that caught Grim's attention long enough that she failed to notice Sidetrack's glowing gloved fist slammed into her midsection with a sickening crunch! "I'm going to beat you like your mama beat you last night!"

[Moira Morley]

Moira's head screamed out in pain as she gripped it in. It didn't make the pain go away, but it maybe it centered her from being woozy. Whatever it was she found the pain was only temporary.

Grabbing a poolstick from the wreckage, she went after the first one she saw. "You two again? Where's your guard buddies? And when are you gonna pay me for this table?" Moira punctuated each question with a vicious jab at Targette with the makeshift javelin.

[Heritage]

"I'm going to beat you like your mama beat you last night!"

That little bitcah!

Lynn clutches her gut as she sneers back at agile villainess.

"Gotta find me first, loser."

She promptly disappears from sight, slips as quietly as she can past the girl, then turns to dig in her claws.

[Avenger Assembled]

Targette dropped to one knee as the pool cue shattered into kindling at the first blow, her eyes rolling back in her head as blood ran down her face.She looked up at Divine as consciousness left her body and smiled, mouthing a Honduran obscenity that spoke unspeakable things about Moira's mother. Back in ancient days, you could get hit by lightning for talking like that. But as Targette slipped into unconsciousness, Divine felt a sudden blast of agony right between her eyes!

Meanwhile, Sidetrack screamed in rage and frustration as Grim's claws sunk into her flesh, the sneaky hero having managed to catch her off-guard while she was looking away. If she was hurt now, she was absolutely infuriated at the sight of Divine knocking her lover to the ground. "You #$))! SUCK ON THIS!" She suddenly leaped high in the air again, turning a wild pirouette, and landed a glowing fist right at Divine's feet. There was an enormous flash of light that briefly blinded the lovely godling before suddenly her vision cleared and she found herself over a hundred feet in the air over her bar! She needed to get someone to fix the roof, she noted, as she began to fall towards it.

[Avenger Assembled]

Sidetrack turned, eyes casting about the room for Grim, even as she looked over her unconscious lover's condition. "Baby, it's okay," she murmured out loud, "I'm going to get you out of here so the bad lady can't hurt you anymore. Just as soon as I find that #)$)#)$) ofay and $)()# her right in the #$$D!" she added, her tone spitting venom. Reaching down to adjust her power gauntlets, she called out loud, "You'd better get ready to run, girl! Because when I catch you, I'm going to staple Betty Friedan to your butt and mail you to Iran!" And with that, she picked up her discarded power rifle and fired a shot wildly into the air, the blast rising high and suddenly exploding out into a cloud of pure inky darkness.

[Heritage]

"Baby, it's okay," she murmured out loud, "I'm going to get you out of here so the bad lady can't hurt you anymore. Just as soon as I find that #)$)#)$) ofay and $)()# her right in the #$$D!"

Wow, the mouth on this girl! And did she say-

Oh. Oh! Well, how...nice for them.

"You'd better get ready to run, girl! Because when I catch you, I'm going to staple Betty Friedan to your butt and mail you to Iran!"

Grim rolled to one side, easily dodging the weird blast effect and completely missing the Betty Friedan reference (was she on Golden Girls?), but staples in her butt sounded very uncool.

I think I got lucky on that last hit; time to try something new.

She steps silently behind her prey, raises her hands towards Sidetrack's head, and then with a flick of her wrist creates a black bag over the villain's head! The fit is fairly tight around the neck, but not so tight as to cut off circulation or limit her ability to breathe.

Right before she drops low and back, she whispers. "Careful, you might hit your little friend with that thing."

[Avenger Assembled]

Grimalkin's cleverly-placed bag missed, her mercenary opponent ripping off the bag and whipping her gun around to point right at the pixie. "I've got you now," she yelled triumphantly, a moment before Divine crashed through the ceiling and landed on her. There was a huge crash as both women hit the stone floor with an enormous crunch, and dead silence from Sidetrack before she looked up, swore, and disappeared in a flash of light, reappearing right next to the still-unconscious Targette.

[Moira Morley]

Moira quickly picked herself up from the floor. She made a quick assessment of her surrounding. The female villainesses were coupled together. She couldn't find Lynn though. A devious smile shot across Moira's face as she looked at the standing villainess. A whistle of admiration escaped her lips. "So, your girlfriend's out," she said with a sarcastic tone, "That mean you're single?"

[Avenger Assembled]

Divine's words fell across the battlefield like bombs, her teasing a taunt striking right at Sidetrack's soul rather than a flirt that struck at her body. She might as well as driven a dagger through her heart. "You-you-you-" Divine's sheer affrontery completely took Sidetrack off-guard, the Labyrinth thug staring at her in open-mouthed shock and awe. "You just-but she-..." Her voice broke off into stutters, then came back a moment later. "How could you-My God, it! WHY YOU GOTTA BE THAT WAY, HUH?" She screamed, clutching the side of her head.

[Heritage]

So maybe the bag wasn't such a great idea after all; Grim chalked it up to experience, though she thought maybe in the future she could perfect some kind of variation on the same theme-

"I've got you now!"

Assuming she had a future, because it looked like she was about to die-

RUNCH!

Or, possibly not; man, that looked painful.

"So, your girlfriend's out"

"That mean you're single?"

Wow. Just...wow. :shock:

The invisible heroine remembered reading Greek myths as a kid, loving all the intrigue and backstabbing between the gods of Olympus, but as she grew older, she came to realize that the gods were kinda horrible; petty, jealous and cruel, an Olympian might turn a hunter into a deer so his own dogs would eat him, or turn a former lover into a tree. Clearly a little bit of that wicked pantheon was alive and well today.

"How could you-My God, it! WHY YOU GOTTA BE THAT WAY, HUH?" She screamed, clutching the side of her head.

That all being said, Grim wasn't about to waste a perfectly good opportunity like this; the lithe vigilante steps deftly over to the shaken villainess, then let's her have it.