Agonrath versus Marten

The dim lights cascading from the rusty steel poles cast eerie silhouettes of shadow plastered against the grimy pavement as the denizens of the city lumbered about like drunken bums. Actually, a vast majority were just that: drunken losers with no real purpose in life. Smudges on the surface of the city, and they continued to infect the downtown area with a plague of liquor, sex, and murder.

The bar resembled a butchery more than a bar. A few bloodied limbs hanging out of the trash canister in the dark alleyway hooking towards the back of the bar where the bums who couldn't pay for their tab were tossed out like rag dolls. Cheap prostitutes with three inches of makeup slammed upon their visages clicked their two inch long heels upon the sidewalk, waiting for the usual crooked politicians to come make their rounds. The occassional crash was heard inside of the bar, and a blood curdling scream brought about by a rusty knife being driven into an unfortunate victim's kidney. The movements of the patrons' shadows flickered through the dirty and half broken windows, the dark figures dancing merrily along the blood tainted sidewalks. If there was a physical manifestation of Hell, this was surely it.

Agonrath was what the normals of the bar called a "Berserker". When his presence entered the room, everyone was guaranteed that at least one person would leave the bar with a few broken bones, or not leave at all. He was an animal, born like an animal, and raised like one. The man liked his drinks hard, fast, and cheap, similar to how he preferred his women. Agonrath wasn't interested in a four hour long fuck that exhausted him. He wanted the bitch to suck his cock, get her damn crack money, and get the hell out of his face before he ran a length of rusty barbed wire into her ovaries.

This night was just like any other night, but astoundingly Agonrath had been in the bar for two hours and hadn't even drilled the broken end of a bottle into an unlucky occupant's face. He simply sat in his habitat, the bar, taking the occassional chug from his bottle of Jagermeister, his favorite. The bartender, Ricky, was the only one who had managed to form a sort of friendship with the Berserker, and they occassionally spoke of broads, new punks in town that needed their cocks sliced off and fed to them, or liquor.

"Anything new tonight?" Agonrath mumbled almost incoherently, yet a strange fortification was laced within the bass of his tone. His coal black eyes did not even glance up from the bottle of German Whiskey sitting before him. He simply watched the frosty surface of the bottle slowly begin to melt away underneath the overwhelming heat of the bar.

"Nah man, not since last week when that mob son came in here looking for trouble. What'd you do with him anyway?" Ricky inquired, pausing from the task of cleaning a mug with a soiled rag to glance at Agonrath with his hardened grey eyes.

"Shut the fuck up and get me another bottle," Agonrath said dangerously, still not raising his petrified gaze upon the bottle of liquor.

"Sure thing, boss," Ricky said, seeming a bit troubled by the unusual attitude of his usual customer.

Something was going down tonight, that was for sure.

The scent of rain; followed by the familiar sound of the water crashing against the bar's filth-encrusted windows; pervaded the room as the door slid silently inwards. A tall, nearly gaunt form (an oblong object in tow) silhouetted against the argent light of an overcast sky was visible for a few fleeting moments before the door was shut, the room returning to its previously dim state.

Pausing a moment so that his vision would adjust to the poorly-illuminated bar, a soft sigh escaped Marten's lips as rivulets of rain ran down the back of his weathered worker's jacket. Its color was usually that of a faded ecru, nearly white, but the portions that had been caught in the storm's sudden arrival were sullied to a hue far more darker than when the coarse cloth was new.

A minuscule puddle had collected at his feet; or more aptly put, boots. Obviously, his decision of having chosen steel-toed boots as opposed to his "brothel creepers" had been a wise one. Taking a few steps forward, Marten was met with the twanging sonance of some unintelligible folk song that was eventually drowned out by the voices of the more raucous patrons.

"Small towns, got to love them."

Continuing towards the bar, Marten situated himself atop one of the bar's stools while laying the oblong object, revealed to be a guitar case by the lamps that were suspended above the bar, on the floor at his feet. Sitting between a rather hefty individual; in comparison to Marten's elongated build; and a moderately attractive woman who obviously had more to drink this fine afternoon.

"They start early around these parts."

Marten rolled his shoulders backwards, causing his jacket to slide off of him in a rather suave manner. That is, until it formed a damp pile of cloth that pressed against his lower back. Marten's muscular arms flexed of their own accord as he reached behind him and retrieved the jacket before depositing it on to the counter; the tattoos that adorned his arms visible due to the fact that he wore nothing more than a two-tone vest (the portion that covered his chest was suede and dyed red while the back was a black and made of silk).

Gesturing towards the bar-keep, Marten ordered a double of gin while rummaging through the pockets of his frayed jeans, wondering if he had any cigarettes left, only coming across the slip of paper that had brought him through such a desolate shit-hole.

"Now, what'd I do with those smokes?"