Drip's Coffee (Funky City)

The late afternoon sun scarcely penetrated the heavy haze that rested over Funky City's industrial sector, for the countless rows of factories in the sector never rested. The cycle of pollution never ended: it simply continued to drift through the air, sometimes weaving between the towering subsidized housing that served as lodging for those lucky enough to be employed. Those who weren't so lucky spent their evenings shacked up in shanty towns, their 'houses' constructed out of whatever materials they could scrounge.

Various businesses had popped up in the area to relieve the workers of their money. They provided the exhausted with an escape from the monotony of their lives, and nowhere else in Funky City was immediate pleasure so readily available... or so cheap.

Crushed between a brothel and an empty warehouse was Drip's Coffee Shop. It was one hell of a dive, but it boasted the cheapest cup of coffee in a 20 mile radius. Drip's Coffee was built inside a refurbished bomb shelter left behind from the days before the battle of Nepleslia. A flickering Neon sign announced the name of the otherwise uninteresting square building, and with some effort, the rusted metal door would award entry with a groan.

The smoke-filled interior of Drip's Coffee was unflattering: graffiti was scribbled all over the walls and furniture of the place, and the lighting seemed flat, lending to many shadows. Behind the bar stood a black-haired ID-SOL, who absently washed glasses and cups and also answered orders for alcohol. The cluttering of dishes could be heard faintly from the kitchen behind the ID-SOL, and a single Geshrin waitress weaved to and fro, delivering orders to patrons.

At a large circular table in the corner sat a group of regulars who usually shared words over their coffee. The waitress approached them with an angry smirk, having just batted a wandering hand from the backside of her apron.

"What can I get you?"

The gentle sound of music began to float through the cafe as it prepared for the late afternoon rush. The cafe was fairly empty right now, but would soon start filling with people finishing the day's work.

Stephen Bacchus raised two fingers. "I'll take a coffee with a shot of Kahlua, thanks."

The mechanic had been residing in Funky City for about four months now, ever since freeing himself from the hellish Morant system so far away now. Considering the recent devastation to befall the area at the hands of the Yamataians seemed to only add to the blessing that was his escape. Of course, his current living conditions weren't much of a vacation. As a Nepleslian native, he was obviously used to at least some pollution, but considering he had grown up hundreds of miles away, in the far more affluent suburbs, it was something of a rough transition.

Bacchus leaned back in his chair, pulling a napkin with a slight coating of dust from the table to wipe some accumulated grease from his arms he had gained from his shift that had ended barely an hour before.

"So, anyway," Bacchus turned his attention back to the other table occupants, "There was this great ride some gang banger left at our garage, right? He comes back the other day to pick it up. We'd just tuned the engine up and gave it a new paint job, and he was real fuckin' impressed with it." Bacchus's normally calm eyes showed a bit of life as he related the story to the others.

"Anyway, we roll up the garage door after he gets in, and there are two guys standing there with fucking machine guns. They'd just been waiting there, and damn if they didn't light that poor fucker up good. They pull his body right out of the car, throw him into a wheelie cabinet, wave their guns at us and bolt the fuck out of there. It was the most ridiculous sight, two psychos zooming out into the street in a blood-filled, bullet-ridden deathtrap."

The Half-ID-SOL shook his head. "We'll be cleaning blood off that fucking floor for a week now."

“Cola is great for getting rid of bloodstains,” A lit cigarette hung in the corner of her mouth. The smoke rising in a white tendril to join the prevailing haze that obscured the air in the Café. She was a regular patron these past two years, pulled in by some universal need for social contact and drawn in to the corner table and the regulars there.

Old faces left, new faces came. The corner table had probably seen its share of patrons come and go. Some of the current group were newer regulars, but the corner table never really changed. Until the café closed or burned down or blew up, there would always be a group of people sitting in the unofficial little social society that was the corner table.

At least that was how Kallinen looked at things. She was a child of Funky City. In her line of work it was healthy to look at things from a realistic perspective. Nothing lasts, but nothing changes. Friends die, lovers betray but Funky City lives on. No use scrambling to hold onto everything, so take what you got in-front of you. And for now, Kallinen had the corner table and those who sat around it with her.

Her useful tip about the blood removal caught the attention of a few patrons at another table but the eyes quickly found something more interesting to look at when she met their gaze. She had never been too specific about her business, but everyone knew. Most were either too scared about asking details or simply didn’t give a shit. Either way worked for her.

There were no jobs passed her way today, nothing churning in the rumour mill and it was getting too late in the day for anything new. Kallenin waved the waitress over, “Looks like I’ve got the night off, I’ll take two shots in my coffee.”

To Bacchus she said, “If I ever get a car, remind me never to get any work done at your shop.”

Lunar sat with the others, a rifle case between her legs with her arms folded across the top and chin resting on those. She coughed quietly at the smoke, still not used to it all. She'd only come to Funky City recently.

Thus far, this grand adventure and new chapter in her life had been rather lack luster. It'd been filled with a lot of the same stuff: men, pollution, and guns. Ah, life in the grand 'lush' metallic jungle that is Nepleslia, or more specifically Funky City.

"Mmmm, iced coffee if you would Miss," she requested.

She turned back to the conversation, still nothing to add at the moment.

Wii adjusted his moon-shaped glasses for a moment as he looked up to the waitress. He smiled at her and tucked his tie in a little into his vest. "Oh, I'll just have a coffee, cream and sugar, that's it." He said as he turned back to the other tall members of the group.

Unlike most people in the establishment, Wii was overly dressed as usual with slacks, a dress shirt, wingtips, a vest, the works. The short man didn't seem to mind any of the attention he grabbed, his only concern was keeping his dress shirt relatively clean. The patrons may not minded his appearance since he had been coming there since as long as he could remember, and when he still wore jeans.

"Say, you know, the same thing happened four days ago to one the cab drivers who work for my boss at TaxiCo. Phillip Arganza, a good driver, took a load buckshot through the windshield from some bastard running from the Funk." Wii sighed and pulled out a silver pocket watch, then flipped it open, he gained a satisfied look on his face and then put the watch away and turned his face back up to the other guys.

"You want to know the worst part? The Boss was too cheap to let the cab go, so he called me off desk duty just to clean it out so he could give it to another cabby! I swear, Mike is scared shitless that the same thing is going to happen to him since he's driving Phil's cab." Wii shook his head in disappointment and then placed his ankle on his knee. He looked down at one of his wingtips and rubbed some dirt off the heel.

"Cola? Eh, I'll remember to pick some up. And don't worry, we'll probably be bankrupt before your poor ass ever gets a car," Bacchus said with a little smile to Kallenin.

"Philip Arganza? I think I saw his name in obituaries. Damn shame." Bacchus thought for a moment. "Speaking of buck shot, I need to pick up a shotgun later. Boss's all freaked out lately. Won't go four damn minutes without blabbering about 'protection' or some shit, even though the garage is a fucking fortress." Stephen tipped back in his chair, leaning on two legs.

Ah... Migisi Pima. The off looking one. Not many shared her skin colour, at least.

She, however, shook her head lightly as she listened to the conversations, gesturing over to Wii as she looked to the Waitress, "The same. Oh, and theres another hand behind you." She warned.

She was wearing a fairly simple, although dirty, white somewhat baggy t-shirt underneath her usual heavy leather jacket, with pockets dotting all about, this of course in the colour of black as there was no other choice for leather. A unarguable fact! And on her legs were the usual, slightly dirty cargo pants of a dark tan colour. Interestingly, the leather jacket was pretty much spot less.

Boredly, as she had had her head in one of her hands, leaning it on the table gently, she clicked her brown boots together twice before laying them to rest on the floor again, twitching her nose rabbit like. A trait she could do, fun to show off with at parties.

Her appearance at the table wasn't to long ago, although also not that short ago. A month and a half or so, maybe. Mainly because Bacchus had dropped his wallet, and one thing you learn: Always return a wallet, as it might have a tracer device (You never. Fucking. Know.), plus most of the stuff other then the money (If it was even non-electronic.) is a pain in the ass to replace. And, of course, you usually get a thank you present anyway. So, she had to follow him!

Rocking her injured, as it seemly always has been, arm back and forth a little, she plopped her head back down in the same bored spot. "You Nepleslians..." She began; No mystery she wasn't exactly of this culture group, "Always killing each other, left and right. Somewhat of a waste... If not for the individual lives, but there is the time and effort it takes to raise that person, too..." She shook her head gently, and once again let out a sigh. "Sad state of affairs... "

Kallenin looked over her sunglasses at Migisi with her onyx black prosthetic eye, “How many times have I told you now? The Reaper comes for us all sooner or later.” She flashed a quick little malicious smile at Migisi, “Funky City is just too big, so he hires out to ‘independent contractors’ like me.” Kallenin leaned back in her chair, pushed her glasses up and held her arms above her head. Arching her back slightly as she stretched, she garnered her more attention from other patrons. This time the looks that came with quickened heartbeats and heavy breathing.

She was by far the least conservatively dressed person at the corner table. The peaces of her outfit looked as if they were held together seemingly by nothing at all. Skin tight and leaving a great deal of her hips exposed, a very low slung short skirt held in place by a pair of crisscrossing belts, was token modesty and the pale blue skin of her arms, hips and long legs was bare. What kept hands at bay were the prominent straps of her under arm holster which held Kallenin’s HHG. The combined appearance screamed, ‘Look but don’t touch.’

As the Waitress was distracted by the hand trying to cop a feel, one of Kallenin’s Vectors-- one of the two long tentacle like appendages that started at the base of her skull and were often mistaken for long pony tails-- snaked its way unnoticed into one of the Waitress’ pockets and retrieved the archaic remote for the old music player stashed somewhere in the Café. The Vector brought the remote to Kallenin and dropped it into her hand, “Thanks.” Kallenin pressed a few buttons and the music filling the Café changed to that of guitars and drums.

Kallenin closed her eyes and enjoyed the sounds. Behind her head, her Vectors twitched and swayed in time.

Lunar finally chimed in. "Bacchus, if your boss could always hire me for some protection if he wants." She could use the money anyway, since she still hadn't found her calling in Funky City.

The hunter was adorned in a tank top, that exposed her mid-rif from belly button down, a light jacket, and fatigues. All of it pretty much matched since much of her clothes were green and black anyway.

Bacchus nodded to Lunar. "Will do. Not sure how much he'll want it, though. He may be a paranoid fuck, but he knows that garage is practically a fortress. As long as you're inside, you're golden. It's just going out you have to worry about."

Bacchus dropped himself forward, furrowing his eyebrows a bit at Migisi and Kallenin.

As the waitress disappeared into the kitchen to retrieve the table's orders, the last man at the table spoke. He was dressed in jeans and had a large black leather jacket with chains over a white shirt. His shoulder-length curly black hair draped over his ears.

"Yeah, yeah, we all know 'dat shit sucks 'ere in Funky City, but you just gotta know teh angles to take."

He rubbed his hand against his stubble of a beard, his creased skin folding a little as he smirked.

"Ain't nobody who give two shits 'bout what's right or not, and the government's too slow to help anyone in trouble... or stop d'ose who're too fast. It's lawless, sure, but 'dat just means we got ourselves more opportunity. And 'dat ain't so bad."

His cybernetic eyes surveyed the group at the table. That much was certain as his eye color just changed from brown to green.

"Know what I mean?"

Wii grinned widely at the man who had spoke just before. He rubbed his hands and spoke.

"Indeed, opportunities to make money." Wii delighted, he seemed to motion himself to wear his well-dressed figure was most shown.