willnotchoose | a man walks into a bar...

In some ways, the world has changed a lot since Geralt first started out as a Witcher. The monsters are better at blending in, in a lot of ways have been far better at changing with the world than he has. People don't need his services as often, like being told they're in need of them even less, and when they do they don't like his fees. Time hasn't given him any particular advantages, no hidden cache of funds. Some years are better than others, and at least the past few have been less lean than most. Far better than the decade he spent in an asylum, too.

He's tracking a shoggoth, a hulking, slithering thing with far too many teeth that prefers sewers, but tracking it has proven to be largely fruitless so far. Which sewer system, or subway tunnels, they sprawl too far across the city, and the cloying stink of rot and aimless agitation that hangs heavy in the air dulls his abilities, even with the elixirs. He hates cities, has learned to hate them more as the world moved on, but the beasts he hunts have found it easier to hide in them.

There's nothing for it but to ask for help, so he heads to the bar, the one he knows might have the information he needs. Stalks through the door, yellow, red-rimmed eyes travelling across the patrons to find the men he needs before cutting across the room to settle at the bar.

"I require information. I'll take a beer too, while I'm here." It's only polite, not that he much cares about that, but it's easier than trying to bribe.

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The Ninth Circle isn't the only supernatural bar in New York, nor even the only peri bar, but it's one where the proprietor, Ishiah, takes even half an interest in the doings of mortals. Ishiah passes him a beer and stares at him a moment, pale blue eyes unreadable. The briefest of mental touches on Geralt's mind, and the peri turns away, enormous gold-barred feathered white wings resettling. "You'll want to speak with the Leandros brothers, and they may split the bounty with you. Table by the door."

Cal is taking a break, and better he takes his break at the table where Niko is drinking tea and reading a giant tome on Persian myths: Cal starts fewer fights under Niko's watchful grey gaze. Cal is slouched in his chair, looking half asleep: both brothers look up immediately as Geralt nears. Aside from their matching iron grey eyes, they are a study in contrasts.

Niko sits ramrod straight, balanced, unlike Cal's careless slouch: his hair is a rich golden blonde in a braid to his waist that contrasts fair against his dusky olive-toned skin, and the expression on his handsome Greco-Roman face is one of Zen neutrality, watching Geralt approach. His is the utter stillness of born warrior, never a motion out of place.

Cal remains slouched, his expression one of bored hostility, his short dark hair barely scraped back into a short ponytail, stark black against his moonlight pale skin. There's a sense of danger despite his careless posture, as there is around a sprawled panther: it only takes a moment for boredom to turn to murder. He scents as Geralt nears, chin lifting as he draws in a deep breath.

"May we help you?" Niko asks, his pleasant baritone perfectly polite, if cool. Neither of them are overtly friendly people, but Niko is very particular about manners.

Cal gets his breath, and coughs a few times before sneezing, just once. "Nik." Quiet warning: the man before them is not human, exactly.

Niko waits for the answer, seemingly without paying attention to Cal or his words.

The study of opposites as he crosses the space doesn't go unnoticed. He takes a sip of his beer as he looks the pair over, the stink of Other from one of them palpable but dismissed quickly. The peri had directed him here, whatever he was wasn't a worry. He doesn't miss the warning either, but it's hardly the first. He's a Witcher, it's always come with veiled threats of violence.

"I was told you know something about the shoggoth that's been eating drifters."

"The what?" Cal demanded, baffled.

The flicker of Niko's expression was very brief, before the faintest ghost of a smile touched his lips, satisfaction in his grey eyes. "Ah," he said, softly, pleased. "So that is what it is."

As was usual their typical job description had not included names, only 'something's eating the homeless and random commuters, find it and stop it from eating people, here's half your fee in advance.' The rapid calculation behind his grey eyes was very clear to Cal, though perhaps not to an outsider: Niko's expressions were subtle things, minute gestures.

"We have been hired to either...move it along, if possible, or exterminate it," Niko told the man, quiet, firm. "Might I ask what your interest in the matter might be?"

Cal snorted, and unscrunched himself in his chair with a lithe, uncannily graceful motion, reaching out to snag his own beer. "Guy's built like a brick shithouse and has a goddamn sword, he's probably been fuckin' hired to kill it too and doesn't want us muscling in on the job," he drawled, bored with the politeness. Really, Niko. "Too bad, fucker, this is our turf. We get first dibs."

Niko swatted him on the back of the head. "Ow shit! Nik!"

Niko's sidelong look might seem mild but the press of his lips and the dip of that eyebrow meant Cal was well on his way to aggravating Niko to death.

Of course they didn't know what it was. He wasn't surprised, only resigned, and sighed heavily as a result. A human and a fae hunting something they didn't even understand fully, but that's what this world was now. People who were wholly unprepared running after the monsters.

"If it has a steady food source it won't move on, it'll only bury itself in deeper. I heard you had one that was causing problems, figured there was a bounty for it. You can have 'dibs', but when it devours you I'll finish the job."

Cal bristled at the insult, the suggestion they would get eaten. “Alright, you-” he began, and his grey eyes went from grey to unnatural scarlet, as he leaned forward.

Niko cleared his throat, imperatively.

Cal checked reluctantly, turned back to Niko, who gave him a very pointed stare. Cal scowled, rubbed his thumb over the two-toned ring Niko had given him, and sullenly slouched back into his chair, lips curled as he glared at the rude freaky dude.

“I think,” Niko said, dryly, grey gaze level and cool as he turned back to the stranger, “We will manage. But if you are concerned about our chances, perhaps you might be willing to volunteer information?”

‘Or your sword,’ suggested the golden eyebrow he raised.

Yeah, like that would happen. Cal sneered at the guy.

An eyebrow arched at the flash of red, but he gave no reaction otherwise. A monster that can more or less fit in, same as him. He watched the kid for a long moment, holding his gaze easily, then flicked his attention back to the blonde one.

"I prefer to work alone. But if you give me half the bounty, I'll consider it."

Cal started to snarl and nearly choked when Niko laid his hand on his arm.

"If you intend to be there in person to assist, a third, on our survival. If you are only offering advice, a fourth, again upon our survival," Niko offered, far too generously in Cal's opinion. This uppity fucking bastard could take himself and fuck right off as far as Cal was concerned. Goddamn what an asshole.

Cal slouched back down and angrily threw back what remained of his beer. Niko didn't even look his way, focused.

The Witcher considered the words. Ages ago he would have brushed him off. Told them to go fuck themselves, half or nothing, and then stepped in to pick up the pieces and kill the monster when it inevitably overwhelmed them.

But time had moved on. That wasn't the way things worked anymore, so he grunted and grumbled but ultimately nodded.

"Fine. A third if you survive."

Niko inclined his head a fraction, a stand-in for a nod. "Very well. I'm Niko, and this is my brother Cal." He nudged Cal, gently, but Cal kept his mouth shut. He was not going to say anything nice if he opened his mouth, so he just wasn't going to say any damn thing at all. He rubbed his thumb over the ring Niko had given him again, trying to be good.

Niko glanced briefly at him, sighed a soft, minute sigh, and continued on, tone perfectly polite. "We have worked out the general area where it seems to have gone to ground. We were going to make an attempt in two night. If you'd like to meet us at," he named a subway stop that was near, but there would still be some slogging through maintenance tunnels to get through, "In two night's time, around seven, that will be sufficient."

An attempt meaning Niko had mostly intended it as a kind of scouting run to actually pinpoint the damn thing and figure out what the hell it really was, but was prepared for them to actually meet it and take it down if they had to. This wasn't the first time they'd gone monster-hunting on vague descriptions and unreliable info. It wouldn't be the last.

It wouldn't even be the first time another monster-hunter had come and offered their sword in the same of killing monsters. Cal just hoped this creepy-eyed ass wouldn't double-cross them, like the last son of a bitch had.

a man walks into a bar...

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