Closing Time

Suggested music: Ella Fitzgerald - Blues in the Night

Descending Wood 24, R.Y. 770

Traces of smoke lingered in the dusty bar, which had largely emptied. Even for the Grass-Spiders and their associates, it eventually came time to put down the bottle and retire (stumble) to one's quarters. Nevertheless, an unlikely inhabitant remained in the bar.

Midori Rizuka was the bar's lone remaining inhabitant, staring wistfully into a half-empty cup of tea. She idly stirred the small spoon resting in the tea, lost in her thoughts. She didn't visit The Training Grounds often, and had come in this night as most patrons were on their way out.

Nuadha O'Bannon had just finished cleaning out and hanging up a few glasses, and made his way over to the senior Grass-Spider. The bar was dark - most of the torches had been put out. Nuadha noticed that even in the dark, Rizuka's fair skin took on an almost green, pearlescent glow. Technically, it was past the bar's closing hour, but Nuadha wasn't about to throw out the oldest living member of the organization. Stopping in front of Rizuka's seat in the bar, he leaned forward, speaking gently to her.

"Can I get ya' something, ma'am?"

Although not startled by his polite intrusion, it was clear Rizuka was not fully paying attention to her surroundings. She looked up to Nuadha, smiling.

"No, thank you. I must be a bother, keeping you open so late. I'll be on my way shortly."

Nuadha shrugged, smirking sheepishly.

"No trouble, ma'am. My doors are always to the Grass-Spiders. If you need anything, you just whistle for me."

Deciding to leave the elder Dragon-Blood to her thoughts, Nuadha went back to cleaning up other areas of the bar. Fortunately, it was not difficult to stay busy - after the Circle With No Name visited, it was easy to think there were two hundred Grass-Spiders rather than two-dozen. Nuadha was a bit surprised when the door opened gently and an enormous form ducked carefully into the doorway. Iron Shatters Oak nodded to Nuadha on his way in, but appeared more interested in the woman sitting at the bar. He approached with a slight grin, taking a seat next to Rizuka. He stared at her for a few seconds, his grin persisting.

"Midori, this is not where I thought I'd find you."

She looked up from her tea, smiling to Oak and cheerfully inquiring, "Did you come looking for me?"

Oak laughed a little, shaking his head.

"You wish! Me? No, I came for a nightcap. You're the last person I expected to see... Is that tea? Really?"

Oak couldn't help but jeer at Rizuka's timid choice of beverage. She shrugged a little, still smiling.

"I wanted a change of scenery, Oak, not a hangover. I didn't come for the booze."

Oak shook his head in a disapproval that was at least half-serious, replying, "By the gods, Midori. Some criminal queenpin you are."

Rizuka, in good humor, defended herself.

"Oak, I don't come here to scold you about your late-night boozing. What gives?"

Oak, certainly the more crass of the two eldest Grass-Spiders, was ready with a counter-attack.

"And I don't come to a bar to drink tea with old women. But since we're both here anyway, how about you let me buy a girl a real drink?"

Rizuka rolled her eyes ever so slightly, shaking her head. She looked down into her tea for a moment, giving it a final stir before glancing up to Oak, simultaneously pulling out the stool next to her as an invitational gesture. Oak accepted her offer, taking a seat on her left. Rizuka slid her tea to other edge of the bartop and looked to Oak.

"You're going to be death of me, Oak. I didn't get to be this old by obliging every enterprising man who offered me a drink, you know."

Oak waved a hand dismissively to Rizuka as he tapped lightly on the bar with the other one, signaling for Nuadha. He replied to Rizuka, "Yeah, yeah, I know. Rice and tea, early to bed, early to rise, all that crap. Sounds like a blast."

Oak stopped his speech abruptly when the organization's beloved bartender had moved over to their seats. Oak looked up to Nuadha and placed their orders, deciding himself Rizuka probably did want a drink. He held two fingers up to Nuadha.

"Whiskey and a whiskey."

Nuadha nodded silently and went fishing under the counter for a bottle of his best - this was unspoken when dealing with senior members of the Order. Oak turned his attention back to the woman at his right. He shook his head slightly, smirking.

"Healthy or not, I can't see how you take any pleasure in that overblown piety of yours. I'd rather live another five years than die another ten."

Nuadha set two stout, crystalline glasses on the counter, pouring a few inches of a well-aged Realm whiskey almost as ancient as the two old-time gangsters themselves. Figuring he didn't have anything meaningful to contribute to a conversation between two of the organization's two most monolithic members, he set the bottle next to the glasses and resumed his tidying up of other parts of the bar. He wasn't about to charge Iron Shatters Oak for a drink - Oak was good to him anyhow. A few years ago, as a project he described as being "in the best interests of the organization", Oak had taken it upon himself to personally renovate the previously-shoddy bar at no cost. He completely restored all of the wood and metal working in the establishment and transformed it into a pub worthy of Creation's criminal elite.

Rizuka, pursing her lips to avoid letting the smile out, begrudgingly accepted the glass as Oak slid it her way. She stared down at the whiskey - it was so rare that she drank, and even rarer that she drank straight, hard liquor. Shaking her head slightly, she looked up to Oak to find him gazing at her with a smirk. Finally, her smile broke through her feigned disapproval of the situation.

"What?"

Oak let the silence linger for a moment before speaking up. The situation would have been terribly awkward between any two people less familiar with one another, but centuries of working and living in such close proximities had made the two immune to awkward pauses in conversation.

"We've seen a lot, you and me. Three clan wars, two total splits of the organization - three if you really count that business with Carp and the pigeon farmers, shifts in power, whole generations have gone by in this village. Lot of good times, hits we were sure even we'd never pull off."

Again, he paused to allow for a moment of silence. The two chuckled to themselves, both individually recalling the most ridiculous moments of their long careers. Oak's tone grew considerably more somber as he trailed into his next statement, shrugging and nodding slightly.

"Lot of deaths..."

Rizuka nodded, looking back into her whiskey glass, as though paying respects to lost friends and family.

"Lot of deaths."

Oak, still nodding slightly as he spoke, replied, "It's part of the business. We didn't get into this line of work because it was safe. We're relics now, Midori. I've got at least a century on Ruk, and I think he's the next oldest member."

Rizuka looked up from her glass to face Oak, waiting for him to finish. He smirked again, gesturing with an open palm in her direction as he spoke.

"And gods only know how old you are."

Rizuka replied quickly, with a grin.

"Twenty-nine, and not a day older. Younger than Makoto, and younger than Atlas, too. I'll give you that much."

Oak simply smirked, beginning to raise his glass to his lips, but speaking up before taking a drink, as though interrupted by a thought.

"To think, all this time, despite all this change, we've been pursuing the same thing - at least on paper."

Rizuka nodded, replying, "Betterment of the art. Pushing the boundaries, expanding the definition."

"On paper, anyway. We all have our own agenda."

Oak and Rizuka had endured many arguments about her seemingly contradictory drive to demonstrate compassion while being a major figure in an assassin guild, and they cared not for another. Although they both quietly acknowledged it in the silence between their words, Rizuka's motivation wasn't discussed further. Somewhat uncharacteristically, Rizuka quizzed Oak.

"What's yours?"

Oak's eyebrows raised slightly; he wasn't used to such probing questions from Rizuka, at least not those of a personal nature - the run-of-the-mill "what hurts where", "this feels broken", "how could you have possibly misplaced the entire manse" type of questions were common enough, but this was a far cry from impersonal investigation. Nevertheless, Oak obliged her.

"Me? You're gonna be disappointed. I'm just doin' what I love. Simple as that."

Rizuka smiled, setting her glass on the bar and folding her hands on her, replying sincerely.

"I'm not at all disappointed by that, Oak. It's refreshing to talk with someone who knows what they want."

Oak dismissively gestured as he replied, "Eh, don't give me too much credit. I'm not trying to live some spiritually pleasing lifestyle of simplicity, I just didn't put too much thought into it. Speaking of not putting much thought into it," Oak smirked sarcastically, "What do you think of the Circle with No Name? They handled that shitstorm in Icehome pretty well, I gotta admit."

Rizuka nodded in agreement. Although the Circle with No Name had something of a reputation for slapdash planning and poor work ethic as a whole, they were already proving to be among the Organization's most creative - and perhaps boldest members. Rizuka elaborated.

"They're victims of their own talent. They don't prepare because they don't have to - so far, they've gotten by on gusto alone. And that's brilliant, if you ask me. I can't argue that, for better or worse, they're going to change the direction this organization goes in."

Oak shrugged, half-nodding in agreement, saying, "I guess so - I suppose 'or' is the key word there. They're just as likely to be the Business's next renaissance as they are the death of it."

Rizuka leaned back on her stool a bit, grabbing her knee with her folded hands, replying after a moment.

"Sure, I didn't say they didn't have anything to learn - they'd do well to take a cue from us in the discipline department."

Oak smiled nostalgically, leaning forward and swirling his glass a bit as he shot a glance down into it.

"Us old dogs? Yeah, we used to plan for weeks, and we'd train for more than that. We'd setup our crime scenes on the obstacle course and practice maneuvers catered to a specific room. I'd make the same sword a thousand times and I'd do it a thousand more if it wasn't perfect in every last way. But they're different, that's for sure. They're a whole other breed. In a way, they all are."

Rizuka straightened up, smiling confidently to Oak, reaching for her glass.

"We've had a hell of a run, Iron Shatters Oak. Nobody did it quite like us."

Glad Rizuka was finally ready to drink, Oak gave a chuckle of agreement and raised his glass in a toast, referencing Mesa's earlier judgment of Rizuka.

"To the old school."

Even Rizuka could drink to that. She raised her glass, clinking it into Oak's gently.

"To the old school."