The Grateful Burger
Silesia
Solaris VII
Lyran Commonwealth
11 January, 3053


     As soon as she heard the sound of the cue ball striking its target, Faith knew she had made the shot. The sound of the final ball dropping into the corner pocket was confirmation.

     "Thank you for your donation." she flashed a wry smile to the large hulk of muscle who had taken her up on a bet at the pool table, and quickly pocketed the 100 c-bill purse. In a place like this, there weren't many guaranteed marks that she knew she could hustle, but the overly brawny, and exceedingly boisterous man that she had just beaten was one.

     She had needed time to breathe and figure out her next move, and she had also needed untraceable cash. After fleeing the Reaches, she knew that Cathay and the Black Hills wouldn't afford her much cover at the moment. She had too many contacts and ties there to blend into the shadows at the moment. She had settled on Silesia, as far as she could get from things, as a spot to hunker down until she got her bearings and figured out just exactly what was going on.

     The Grateful Burger was an eclectic establishment, to say the least. The ownership were some kind of neo-hippies who seemed to relish in their image of going against the grain. Unlike most Solaran bars or restaurants, there were no feeds of the games shown, with most of the vid feeds displaying a mixture of niche games and music of questionable quality from various "underground" sources.

     The clientele was an even more varied mix. In addition to a sizable number of bohemian types, an assortment of bikers, tourists, goths, punks and oddball gamers generally called The Burger home. The back of restaurant was currently dominated by a rather large group of youths playing some form of card game that seemed only slightly less complicated than the inner workings of an HPG to her.

     She made her way to the bar, putting down a few S-bills and attracting the bartender's attention. He was a fairly short, wore his hair obscenely long, wore some kind of odd headband, and small circular glasses that seemed to her to be worn way too far down his nose to actually be helpful in looking at anything. "What can I get for you, sunshine?"

     Ignoring the fact that her mood was anything but sunshine at the moment, she ordered in spite of his overly happy attitude. "Scotch, neat. Whatever you have handy. And make it a double."

     While she might stand out somewhat among the diverse patrons of the Burger, at least everyone here was trying to stand out in some way, making it a slightly safer place to hang out while she waited to hear back from a few contacts she had pinged for information. More importantly, you weren't going to find many mech fans in a place like this, making the likelihood of her being recognized very low.

     "There you are, friend." the bartender said as he finished pouring her drink. She nodded, grabbed her glass, and headed back to the pool table to await either news from her contacts, or her next victim. It was getting late in the evening, and soon the bar would be flooded with an influx of patrons.

     "Up for a game?" she heard a female voice ask from behind her. She turned to see a woman holding a 50 Kroner note. It was a little hard to judge her age under the makeup, but she was young. She was dressed in a kind of fashion that Faith supposed was some kind of blending of steampunk and the kind of cyber-goth-revival that was currently popular among a segment of the youth along the Free Worlds border. Faith didn't notice any obvious weapons, but it was hard to judge among the numerous buckles and straps that would be a security attendant's nightmare at the drop-port.

     "Sure. I trashed the last guy, so you can break," Faith said as she set her own 50 S-bill note on the table. Faith patiently waited while the woman lined up her shot and fired the cue ball into the racked balls.

     "That was easy pickings before, taking on that hulking brute of a biker," the woman said as she repositioned for her first shot. "Don't think I'll make the same mistake he did."

     Faith chuckled. "And what was that?"

     "Underestimating the opposition. He figured it would be easy pickings. Hell, he was probably so busy checking out your ass that he didn't even notice the Sternsnacht." She sunk her first shot and moved on to lining up her next.

     "So packing makes me a shark? That makes most Solarans pretty good players," Faith retorted.

     The woman carefully lined up her next shot. "No, but it should have at least made him ask questions." She sunk the shot and stood back for a moment to scope out the table. "Like what a former top-notch mechwarrior in the games is doing slumming it down here in Silesia. Especially after she just trashed an Enforcer a few nights ago."

     Faith fixed the woman with a glare. Even without the questions, something tripped alarms about this woman. She might be dressed like a mopey angst-ridden Lyran youth, but she carried herself in a much more serious and threatening way. "Maybe I'm just trying to have some fun and avoid the mechbunnies."

     The woman sank her shot. "Donnie, a couple of shots of Party-kill over here when you get a minute. We'll take the bottle." She glanced at Faith briefly. "If you were just running from mechbunnies, there are plenty of places you could do that in the Black Hills. Hell, there's probably plenty of places in Cathay that would suit the bill, even with the rumors that the Cappies hate you at the moment. No, I'm betting that you're down here scoping something out, or laying low for some reason."

     "Yep. You caught me. I'm looking to re-create Woodstock." Faith quipped. The woman missed her next shot. Faith surveyed the table while a waitress brought over a tray with two shots of blue liquid and a nearly full bottle of Party-Kill Heavy vodka, setting it down on the small table nearby as Faith's opponent handed the server an S-bill note. Faith quickly downed the rest of her scotch while she looked at the table.

     "Look, I'm not trying to spook you or anything. Do what you want down here. Just pointing out that I'm smart enough to know that not everybody here is exactly what they appear," the woman said, softening her stance slightly.

     Faith made her first shot, then walked over to the table and picked up a shot glass. She waited for the woman to join her, and the two downed the shots. The blue liquid burned fiercely, more from it's relatively low quality than any particular potency, in spite of being mockingly named after a brand of PPC. They slammed their glasses down, and the woman glanced at Faith for a moment. "My name is Sapphire, by the way."

     Over the next hour or so, the two women alternated shots at the pool table and the cheap vodka bottle. They had just finished a game when a pair of men, boys really, approached them from the direction of the throng of card players in the back.

     "Hey, you ladies want to play a round of doubles?"

     The two women exchanged a predatory glance out of the corner of their eyes. "Rack 'em up, boys"