2021-10-30 - They Only Tried To Murder Alexander Once Here

Name three great things about the dive bar on Spruce Street known as the Pourhouse?

It's got alcohol, it's a dive bar, and it's right across the street from the HOPE centre where Ravn Abildgaard spends a substantial amount of his time these days. Certainly doesn't hurt that Leon Gyre has given up on teaching the Dane to drink the moonshine engine fuel that most lumberjack flannel wearing patrons favour, and stashes a bottle of proper, aged whiskey in his honour. He charges for it too, but this is apparently one of the indulgences that Ravn allows himself, while otherwise living a quite simple life.

The tall copper blond wanders in, the collar of his leather jacket up around his ears because the weather outside is a thunderstorm in the making and he hates getting rained on. He's carrying a couple envelopes -- mail, looks like -- and claims his usual bar stool; man's been in town for a year, he can start laying claims, right? Davis the bartender just reaches for the bottle; he knows his patrons.

It's not long after Ravn arrives that Alexander sidles in from the rain. His hair is plastered untidily to his scalp and cheeks - it's longer than it was before he disappeared, as if whatever happened in the twelve weeks did not, for some reason, include a haircut. He steps to one side as soon as he's through the door, keeping his back to the wall as his twitchy gaze acclimates to the gloom and he pushes wet hair out of his eyes. He's dressed like Alexanders usually dress, for the most part: an Iron Maiden t-shirt that looks as if the seams are about to give way, under an oversized flannel shirt that has to be rolled several times at the cuff to keep his hands free, old black jeans, and...sneakers. Junk shop sneakers, instead of his big, stompy workboots. They squish a little as he makes his way towards the bar, a small notebook in one hand.

There's a pause as he recognizes Ravn. "Hey," he says, after a moment. He takes the stool next to him, and starts staring at poor Davis. It's not exactly hostile, but it is a bit reptilian, and more than a bit creepy.

It's a good day, Vittoria decides as she ambles into the bar, an easy smile curling her lips upward as she looks around. Her usual, comfortable black leather jacket wraps snugly around her muscled, imposing frame, which she's squeezed into tight black jeans with artful rips and a white band shirt that seems to be in Italian.

That easy smile broadens to a grin as she spots Ravn at the bar. "Hey! Ravn, right?" she calls, her measured, accented voice bright. She's moving forward when suddenly there's a random, unkempt man taking the seat next to the Dane. Eh. She shrugs and moves over to the other stool to Ravn's side.

Suddenly the juicy centre of a people panini. Ravn blinks and raises his glass to salute both. "Long time no see," he tells Alexander -- and indeed, it has been, almost five months. "Vittoria, still in town? No one ever does take that advice and get out -- I mean, I didn't either. How's Gray Harbor treating you so far?"

He looks from one to the other and realises neither of them are likely to know the other. "Alexander, meet Vittoria -- she's a bouncer out at the Platinum. Vittoria, Alexander's our local Dick Tracy."

"Yes," Alexander tells Ravn, regarding the long time no see. Not 'nice to see you' or anything, just an acknowledgement that it has, indeed, been a long time. He frowns at Davis some more, but eventually orders a...water. Which is given to him. He takes a sip of it, suspiciously, before transferring that unblinking stare to Vittoria as she settles in. "Vittoria. I don't know you." It sounds more like an accusation than an observation, and he gives her a quick up and down, eyes lingering on the foreign language on the shirt, before going back up to her face. "Alexander Clayton. I'm not Dick Tracy." Then, carefully, like he has to feel around in his brain for each word, he adds, in Italian, "<<Nice to meet you. This is a terrible place, and you should listen to Ravn's advice. But you won't.>>"

Vittoria's cheeks flush pink as Ravn calls the unfamiliar man - Alexander? - 'Dick Tracy.' She doesn't know anything about that second word, but is definitely familiar with the first one. "Uh. I don't know," she says nervously, glancing around Ravn to peer at Alexander with wide eyes. "He seems nice. Not -- a dick." Geez. She flushes further as Alexander stares at her chest before looking her in the face and suddenly speaking in Italian. << Oh my god. You know Italian? You are already my favorite American, >> she responds, a delighted smile growing on her face. << Apart from when you stared at my boobs. I know they're nice but please save that for later. >> She wags a finger at him in mock anger before turning to Davis and ordering a shot of whiskey.

Not allowed to smoke in here as per Washington State law, but the law says nothing about toying with a battered old zippo, and so Ravn does; it keeps his hands busy (which is also more or less the point of cigarettes as far as he is concerned). "A lot of people in this town know all the languages. Pick the words right out of someone else's mind -- it can be disconcerting. My girlfriend visited me in Denmark and she had the most cheerful conversations with everyone in Danish. She doesn't speak Danish. Just does that -- language borrowing thing, too."

He chuckles at the memory and adds, "I'm not one of them. Already shown you pretty much all I can do, that day in the parking lot."

The envelopes seem to be whatever the mailman dropped off at HOPE, across the street. Some bills, a couple of newspaper clippings, and a hotel brochure.

Whatever his other social faults, Alexander seems quick to catch onto the confusion. "Dick Tracy is a fictional detective. And 'dick' is slang for a detective, as well. So I am a dick. In multiple senses of the word." Now, there's the briefest of smiles towards her, before he nods to Ravn, agreeing. "He's right. I don't know Italian. But you do, so I borrowed it." He switches back to Italian, briefly, to say, "<<I was reading your shirt. Not your breasts. I'm sorry if it made you uncomfortable.>>" It's all very solemn.

At least, until he glances back at Ravn, and there's more warmth to his voice as he says, "Was this when she fell in love with your buildings?" And then? Then he starts snooping into the guy's mail, or at least tries, reaching out to try and snag one of the newspaper clippings to read it.

Umbrellas aren't just for tourists Chris reminds himself as he ducks into the warmth and cover of the Pourhouse. He was tired of mind but not of the body. What better than a pint to finish a long shift?

Shaking off a few errant drops, he collapses the black umbrella and sets it by the door, keeping his down-lined blue coat over his regular lumberjack-plaid and jeans.

The firefighter tunnel-visions on one of the empty stools at the bar, making his way to deposit his rear upon the chair before leaning against the countertop with his elbows. He cranes his neck at the taps to identify his drug of choice.

Vittoria's english is pretty good, but she remains a little confused. "Wait. You are speaking Italian to me but you do not speak it?" she asks, her accent even more pronounced now. "Is this," she looks at Ravn suspiciously, "the weird thing we talked about?" Her voice is low and hushed as the lumberjack dude enters. You never know.

The clipping that Alexander snagged -- and which Ravn made no move to prevent him from snagging -- discusses a fire on Gray Harbor's old, largely abandoned industrial harbour. It's dated about three months ago and a photograph depicts what looks like a smallish coaster or cargo freighter, burning. Missing Bodies Still Not Recovered is the headline, and the text goes on to discuss that while a number of casualties have been identified as Serbian sailors, the Mercantic's cargo hold was determined by forensics to have been home to a number of unregistered passengers -- who have yet to be discovered. The clipping is a photocopy, and yesterday's date has been scribbled on it, along with a stamp from the Gazette's archivist.

The Dane's not familiar with the newest face to join the little group at the bar but shine speaks its own tongue. He nods a polite greeting because of it. (Then he ignores Alexander's rootling through anything else, really, Alexander, you want a brochure from the Baccarat Hotel in New York?) Then he nods. "When Hyacinth fell in love with a house and came to the conclusion that if she wants it, she's going to have to take me as part of the bargain, yes. Just took us a while to get to that part of the real estate negotiations."

He can't resist a lopsided grin at Vittoria's inquiry. "Yeah. It's exactly that thing. Take a good quiet look at Alexander, he shines like a lighthouse." And so does Chris, but the Dane's not quite rude enough to point it out about a man he doesn't know -- yet. Compared to either, he himself is just a teeny blip.

Alexander does, in fact, want a brochure from the Baccarat Hotel. Honestly, if Ravn doesn't stop him, then he efficiently and with no shame goes through all of the Dane's mail, reading it silently. The first newspaper clipping seems to gather the most attention from the investigator; when he puts things back in order, the clipping is on top, and he taps it, once, before murmuring to Ravn, "This is the thing you and Seth were talking about?"

His head comes up as Chris approaches. He frowns at the man, more like someone who habitually frowns at most thing than specifically hostile. "Mr. Baxter," he says, after a moment. After a much longer moment, he adds, "Hello. You're alive. That's good." He takes another sip of his water, just giving a brief bob of his head to Ravn's explanation.

Chris flags down Davis and orders an IPA on draught that he hasn't tried, or even heard of for that matter. Odin's Fury? Why not. After settling urgent business, Chris expands his situational awareness, spying a couple of familiar faces among his neighboring patrons.

Seated closer to Vittoria than Alexander, Ravn is the first of such familiar faces that he spots. "Oh, hey Ravn," he offers with a friendly-enough smile. "Long time." He's midway through that when Alexander greets him, and Chris's eyes widen with recognition.

"Alexander! I took your advice." His blue eyes fidget before drooping toward the bar. His hands stuff into the front pockets of his coat. "At least," his voice drops, "I tried to. Is... is it groundhog dag?"

Shine is what Ravn says. Vittoria is still so unfamiliar to this concept, though she did feel some flicker of recognition when looking at Chris and Alexander. It then hits her that she's the only woman in a room full of men. Eh. She shrugs mentally. She's used to it at this point. "Hello. I'm Vittoria," she says presumptively to Chris, extending a hand in greeting.

Ravn blinks. It dawns on him he has in fact met the brown-haired bloke before. It dawns on him he's blanked doing so. Social anxiety says hi! He swallows, and spends a moment just toying with the zippo lighter, looking at it as if it is in fact a very important thing -- grounding himself, reminding himself that really, it's not a capital offence to space one face out of the eighteen thousand in Gray Harbor. It just feels like it.

Then what Chris said catches up with him and he murmurs, "Someone actually did take the pack up and go advice? We need to build you a statue, Baxter."

He sips his whiskey to wash down the remainder of the anxiety he will fervently deny having and glances at Alexander. "And, yeah. The fire on the harbour. It's not as mysterious as the official story goes. They had a couple of trafficked girls on board. The girls high-tailed it out of here, and good on 'em for doing so."

Alexander jumps at Chris saying his name, and he studies the young man again. "No," he says, at last. "Don't think so. Missing time, not repeated days." Something like a smile comes to him, and he adds, voice dry, "Gray Harbor always has a new way to fuck with you."

His eyes flick back to Vittoria, and he watches the introduction impassively for a moment, before turning back to Ravn. "Fuckers," is his bland pronouncement on the traffickers. "Hope the women made it to somewhere that could help them. One of the problems with being a small, often overlooked port on the coast, about equidistant from multiple major cities, with a police force that wavers mostly between corrupt and incompetent, is that we're pretty popular for smuggling and trafficking." He grimaces. "Most of it isn't even interesting crime."

When Vittoria extends a hand in introduction, Chris's jaw opens with a sudden flash of embarrassment. He'd been talking right over her-- how rude! With a pinker complexion than usual, he extends a hand to shake hers, and he gives her the kind of glance a man would when noticing a pretty girl. "Good to meet you, miss. Chris Baxter, GHFD."

A statue in the center of town commemorating the guy that left town is an amusing mental image. He shares an appreciative look to Ravn. "A lot of good it did me. I don't even know how I got back here. I just woke up in my old place with a phone call from my old job, wondering if I was planning on showing up for the shift I was late for." He shakes his head, eager to drown his bewilderment in the foul-tasting amber bottle delivered into his fidgeting hands.

"Huh. The ship fire? A couple of guys were talking about it at the station." He spares a glance at the article, but it's far too distant to read beyond the glimpse at the picture.

"GHFD?" Vittoria asks, pronouncing each letter slowly as she shakes Chris's hand firmly. Her grip is strong, though she does her best not to squeeze too hard. His glance doesn't go unnoticed and she grins. "Nice to meet you," she says, sipping from her whiskey. "Wait. Fire on the harbor? Trafficked girls?" Vittoria's voice is low and surprised, this seeming to catch her attention.

Ravn nods, far more comfortable talking about burning ships and trafficked girls than he is talking about his own forgetting a face. "Three, four months ago? As Alexander says, Gray Harbor's perfect for sending things through, for Portland or Seattle, without anyone paying a lot of attention. Old, run-down harbour, police either indifferent or busy sorting out all the crap the Veil gets up to. A lot of things that happen here are -- from the Other Side. But humans don't really need supernatural help to be assholes."

He sips his whiskey and toys with his lighter (really, the police chief telling him he's not allowed to smoke indoors anywhere that serves food was a serious blow). "Same kind of time skip happened to most of us," he tells Chris and Vittoria (since Alexander is already aware). "People realised that they'd lost three months somewhere. Me, I apparently bought a house and got on with my life. No one really knows why -- all we know is that the hurricane three months back seemed to set it off."

"Pitcher plant," Alexander tells Chris, with something like sympathy. "This town is a pitcher plant. Once it has you, it doesn't let go easily." He quiets to let Ravn explain most of the rest, but he does murmur, "Fire department," to Vittoria.

When Ravn's finished, he adds, "I don't remember much from March on. And I lost my goddamned boots," he adds, with a sour look down at his feet. "I think I got Lost. But then came back, sometime during the...missing time for everyone." A huff of breath. "I hate it."

Chris is in pretty decent shape himself, like most firefighters, but his usual concern about not crushing a woman's hands seems entirely unfounded. "Good to meet you" he echoes in kind.

His attention soon drifts back toward the talk of time skips and the town. Chris muses darkly over the rim of his bottle. "Maybe us folks at the FD are the real villains of the story, standing in the way of the whole city just burning down." He raises his bottle before taking a swig; his face puckers momentarily from the bitter aftertaste. Everyone assures him he'll acquire the taste any day now.

"So, is the consensus that the time didn't happen, or that people just lost their memory of the events?" Any sort of explanation that could explain his situation, however crazy-sounding, is a small mercy.

"Oh shit. I'll be right back," Vittoria says, scurrying off to the bathroom.

Ravn folds up the brochure for the New York hotel (after glancing to make sure Alexander is done familiarising himself with the ridiculous opulence of the place). "Most people go with memory loss. They seem to just have carried on as usual." He hitches a shoulder a little. "I don't know that I agree that it's all so terrible here, but I get why most people feel that way. Gray Harbor's been kind to me. Couldn't drag me out of here if you tried. Or maybe the Other Side just hasn't found the right cracks in my armour yet."

He glances after Vittoria and then, once she's out of earshot, adds, "She's new in town. Met her a week or two back? Same as the rest of us people blowing in from the rest of the world -- thought she was the only one, now realising she isn't. Seems nice."

"I don't want the town to burn down," Alexander says, with a frown. "That could be arranged, but there are good people here. People who don't deserve to lose everything they have just because they have the misfortune to be in a bad place." He shrugs. "Besides, the Shadows would like it. So much misery." A sidelong look at Ravn. "You're crazy, though. It's not kind. You lost twelve weeks of your life, and you don't know what happened, or if anything that people say you did is something that you actually did, or if something was wearing you like a fucking skin suit to do fuck knows what--" his voice doesn't get louder, despite the fact that he's clearly getting agitated. The words just speed up until they're practically running into each other as he spits out, "and you may never find out what sort of horrible things happened to you because no one remembers shit that they can trust is real."

Deep breath, and he releases his grip on his water glass before he shatters it. Only just before, though - his fingers are red, the knuckles white.

"They'd like it only for a moment, and then hopefully everyone would move away, and we could condemn this place as they do places like Cherynobl or Verdun with its unexploded mustard gas shells," Chris replies, more tongue-in-cheek than not, although watching Alexander's tension on display like a cartoon character with smoke blowing out of their ears make him immediately regret continuing with that subject.

Topic change, stat! "Anyway, it's weird being back. I didn't do anything but scratch the surface before. I'm still getting to know places, people." He sighs faintly. "I need to figure out something fun to do other than beer and TV, though."

"You're not wrong," Ravn cedes with a glance to Alexander. "I know that, intellectually. To me personally, though -- Gray Harbor's a kind of Hell I'm better at coping with than the one I came from. Here, the demons are real. I can punch them in the face, and I'm not alone against them. My Hell? Looks like that." He taps the Baccarat's brochure with a gloved finger.

He grasps at the life saver Chris threw out; it was never the Dane's intention to upset either man (nor the lady who dashed to the bathroom where, hopefully, she will not find the porcelain throne invaded by tentacle monsters but in this town, who ever really knows?). "All I did was apparently grade essays, continue to tutor people online, and buy a house. Looks like we got on with restoring the HOPE building too. And apparently I looked after the hurricane shelter at the high school where there's still a couple of families because their houses were washed into the Chehalis by the flood. It's a little awkward because they clearly know me, and I have no idea what anyone's name is."

Alexander takes another deep breath, lets it out slowly. He glances at the brochure. "Your versions of Hell need recalibration," he mutters, but it's not entirely without humor. He runs his hand over his face, scrubbing at it, scratching the scruff at his cheek and chin, before sighing. "And you don't know that, Ravn," he adds, wearily. "I could make you think you did that. Or that you murdered people. But I couldn't do it to the whole damn town. Not at the same time. Anything that can? I don't know what it is. Maybe The Director, but if so, I don't know why. Or if the evidence left behind is just what we're meant to find."

He pokes at his water glass, scraping it across the surface of the bar. An inch in one direction. An inch back. He drags his attention back to Chris. "...there a casino. Last I checked. And apparently we have a, uh, HOPE building. Now." A wave of his hand to Ravn for explanation. "And I have autopsy files. If you like those."

"Autopsy files? That sounds rather morbid," Chris muses. He's busy picking at the corner of the label on the bar, but it doesn't separate from the glass cleanly, leaving little bits of a sticky mess in its wake to the man's immense disappointment.

"Maybe I'll find a place to rent a boat and a decent fishing spot. Might as well take advantage of the lovely nature in our backyard, no?" In the realm of looking for silver linings of Gray Harbor versus Spokane, it was at least something.

Both men mentioning HOPE reminds him of potential charity work. "It's always good to give back," he comments, "Maybe I can get the department involved. Back in Spokane, we'd sometimes do charity things like help build houses."

"Casino's the kind of place you're supposed to wear a tux," Ravn murmurs and shudders. "I made the mistake of wandering past once, not wearing one, to bring some papers to the manager, and somehow, I ended up in the society pages as the ADA's date. HOPE, well, it's a community centre -- nothing more, nothing less. Pretty interimistic too, we make do with what we have."

He toys with the lighter; a battered old silver affair with a coat-of-arms engraving. "Thing is, Alexander, we all know there are people on the Other Side who can pull something like this. The Revisionist, for one. But the other shoe hasn't dropped. Most people just want to get back to their lives, pick up where they left off, try to sort out what they missed. It doesn't make things right. But you know people -- we bend, we go with the flow. It's how we survive. If you find anything, or think of anything I can help with, you've got my number. Being an arsepain to the Veil is apparently what I do for a living these days."

Chris' comment makes the Dane look up again. "We were able to help the first responders out during the storm -- take care of some of the rest, to free them up. In this town? Won't be the last time helping hands are useful, no matter who's helping who. Got this gut feeling that the amount of strange you folks get called out to is through the roof."

He chuckles. "Fishing is good though. I got my Vagabond down on the marina -- live there most of the year except this year I dry docked her before the storm and apparently didn't get her back in during those three months. Season's over now but I'm moving back on the marina as soon as the first spring wind peeks in."

"I don't wear a tux," Alexander points out, blandly. Does he even have a tux? Unlikely, judging by the rest of his wardrobe. His lips thin at the rest of it. "That's why I said The Director," he says, flatly. "And I don't ignore it when someone fucks with my head." But at least it doesn't set him off into another rant. Instead, he says to Chris, "Very few people like the autopsy files. But I thought I'd offer. Fishing is probably better. Try Gray Pond. It's deep towards the center, and there are fish."

He stands up, then. Scowls down at his shoes, but says, "Don't die," to both men. Then he pulls out a couple of wrinkled bills to pay for the water and a tip, turns, and leaves the bar without another word.

"Thanks, I'll give it a shot." Locals do, in fact, know the best spots. Plans for a relaxing few days off are already forming in Chris's head. The ominous-sounding names being thrown around mean nothing to him, but that they seem to mean things to the others proves disturbing enough.

Chris frets over the warming beer in his hand. "Are there really enough muckity-mucks and tourists around to keep a tuxedo-wearing casino afloat?" He hasn't seen much high society around.

"Good to see you," he offers Alexander's back as he makes his hasty exit.

Regarding the amount of strange he's called out to on the job, Chris takes another long sip from his beverage. "It's easier just to help who needs helping and not try and figure out why they got into that situation to begin with." A few beats later, he lifts his shoulders absently. "In some better, wealthier alternate reality, I'd own a boat."

"Rent one. That's what I do." Ravn chuckles. "Granted, mine's hardly a floating luxury condo, either. Probably the number one reason I ended up buying a house with a friend -- get regular access to a bathroom with a shower."

He sips his whiskey and mulls on the taste a moment, thinking. "From what I've seen -- no on the muckity-mucks. There are a few -- the Addingtons have more money than they know what to do with, and there's a self-made millionaire who's a local boy. Couple of rich Europeans sticking around town for whatever reasons. On the whole, though, no -- most of the patrons of the casino aren't locals. A number of them are connected to all kinds of shady affairs pertaining to Seattle and Spokane, no doubt. Most of them seem to be tourists -- there's a lot of yachters sailing between Seattle and Olympia, whale sighting, good fishing, the works."

He's not a local either, judging by his accent -- the kind of European accent that really wants to be Oxford but isn't English in the first place. But maybe Gray Harbor's one of those places where sticking around for a year makes you an honorary local or something.

Being from the area, if not from the actual city, Chris is more than familiar with his share of Scandinavians. The firefighter looks into a distant corner of the bars where there's nothing remarkable worth the attention. But maybe that's the point. "It's hard to imagine coming all this way and opting to come here, of all places," he eventually ventures, rubbing a hand across his cheek. "But I guess, for a certain type of person, it's a shining jewel, shall we say?"

"Never expected to stay," Ravn murmurs, because on some level, he's still wondering what the hell happened, too. "I was hitch-hiking down from Seattle towards Portland. Thought I'd stay a week or three, replenish my cash reserves and then be on my way. As you can see, I never got around to it. I did go home for a few days over Christmas just to see what it'd feel like -- and I spent every moment there just waiting to get back on a plane. Alexander Clayton isn't wrong -- this place is a hellmouth. But it's my kind of place. Which means I'm crazier than most, I figure."

Soon, the beer bottle has no more to give. Chris considers the menu with disinterest, opting for just the one, this time. But he's in no hurry to brave the seasonal elements just yet; thankfully, the bar isn't crowded enough to earn him Davis' ire. "There is something about it. It feels like home, strangely. An abusive home, maybe, but a home nevertheless." He considers the man a few stools over, "Maybe it's different for us Baxters, but it doesn't sound like it."

"If anything, it's even more abusive for you folks than most," Ravn murmurs with a small wince. "Someone cue you in on the family feud yet? Your family has a hundred and fifty years' worth of history with the Addingtons, and you generally didn't come out on the winning side. Probably why so many Baxters left town -- and why the Veil keeps trying to pull them back. Clayton's a Baxter too. So's my room mate, Aidan Kinney, though in his case by adoption. I hang out a fair bit with Grant Baxter, too. Kailey Holt's on the family tree too."

He glances around furtively. There isn't a police chief in sight, and Leon's made it clear in the past that he doesn't care about cigarette smoke. Ravn fishes one out and lights it; spine of a jellyfish. "In the past it's been very -- clear drawn lines. It's softening up some now -- Hyacinth Addington wants the feud to end. Not all of the Addingtons are on board, though."

"Yeah," Chris nods with recognition at the mention of the feud and Alexander's ties, although hearing another perspective on the subject is always worthy of a listen. "Alexander filled me in when I was here previously. It's funny how I spent so much time without much luck trying to decipher my heritage, only to have everything just opened to me shortly after arriving." In the sense that so much wasted time in his life is funny, perhaps.

"It seems like my late father was trying to protect me from this place. God help him." He makes a frowning face as he slouches on his stool, settling his elbows against the bartop with a thud. "It's dumb to inherit a blood feud with people I don't even know, over a family that I've largely never even met."

"The current generation of Addingtons are decent people, and there's no damn reason you should fight." Ravn sips his whiskey. "Atli and Erin -- eh, rich white girls, they're what you'd expect. Entitled, a bit air headed. Emotionally crippled by one family tragedy after another. Hyacinth's the smart and independent one, and the one who actively wants to bury the hatchet. I'm partial to her point of view, of course -- I'm dating her, so I think I'm kind of contractually obliged to be. It's the old one -- Margaret -- who's the problem. But as matriarchs go, I think she's pretty much handed the reins over to Hyacinth now. We can hope so."

He glances at the other man. "If you get a chance, talk to Grant Baxter. That kid is... the quintessential Baxter. If there is such a thing as a leader on that side, he's it -- not because he can lead his way out of a paper bag, he's just a skater kid. But the Veil seems to think it's him or Alexander, and Alexander's too smart to take any bait it puts out."

Names and advice Chris seems to take to heart. "I originally came to try and figure out who my mother was. She seemed to make every effort to avoid being involved, or even known. And my late father, he'd always dismissed my inquiries about it 'for my own good.' I only learned about the town at all when I stumbled upon his old yearbooks." He shakes his head, looking down toward his hands. "My current speculation is that she was an Addington, trying to hide the relationship, baby, what-have-you. It's the only thing that makes any sense to me." He shifts uneasily, "But then, it could just be that I'm grasping too hard onto the first decent hypothesis I've been able to come up with."

On the subject of Grant, he nods, recalling Alexander had similar advice, back in the day. "I'll keep an eye out for him."

Ravn taps his lip. "You wouldn't be the first. Lord, I must sound like a crazy stalker. I'm honestly not. I'm a historian, a folklorist. Taking a kind of academic approach here comes naturally to me. There was a girl -- Muriel Vernon. Died in 1933 -- ten years of age or something along those lines. A natural death as far as we're aware -- but anyhow, she was adopted by the Vernons. Her mother was an Addington. We don't know the father's identity, but Muriel's ghost is still around, and she very strongly implies that her father was a Baxter."

Because that's normal. Yes.

He shakes his head. "Truth of the matter, though? You can't fix all the Addington-Baxter history. It's a right bloody mess with a hell of a lot of casualties. But we can stop feeding it, and as far as I'm aware, that's Hyacinth's plan as well as that of any Baxters I've talked to about it. The whole mess has to do with the tear here. Anyone fill you in on that? I apologise for sounding like your college teacher, honestly. It's -- this is what I do."

"Maybe? It's been a while, and to be honest, when I first started hearing things described to me, it sounded more like the rantings of a madman than something to pay much heed." Chris's shoulders slump a moment before he twists around to more face Ravn. His tone indicates that his thoughts on such matters have changed recently. "The shroud of secrecy around my own past has made me something an enthusiast, but snippets of truth are hard come by -- especially online." Or, more likely, finding the morsel of truth among the dungheap of sheer nonsense.

"Doesn't get any easier when most of this is word of mouth that's been passed down on the sly since the middle of the 19th century." Ravn nods his sympathy with the other man; it's genuine enough because while all of this interests him both in an academical capacity and because the people involved are friends, he's not mired in it by default the way someone finding themselves a Baxter is.

Not that he hasn't got a fair bit of family history of his own.

"The -- gist of it is about this tear in the Veil. We don't know -- or at least I don't know -- what really happened, back then. Why the two families got into a fight. Did either of them create the thin spot, or was it already here? But we do have pretty good evidence that something happened. The Addingtons came into power. The Baxters got shafted. And this is the supernatural kicker: When a Baxter dies, the tear mends a bit. When an Addington dies, it opens a little. So ever since, people on both sides have been trying to push their agenda, the very hard way." Ravn glances at Chris to see how he's about to take that. "It's my understanding that a few years back, a lot of Addingtons were murdered with the specific purpose of re-opening the tear. And before that, the souls of Baxters were prevented from passing on, to prevent them from closing it."

And so, if his theory holds true about mixed heritage, does that mean his soul doesn't do fuck-all? Or is he bound to be some kind of haunting ghost, like this Muriel character? Concerns that are felt but not voiced and subsequently displayed on his expressive face. "Hah. It sounds like not dying was better advice than I immediately gave him credit for," Chris manages a nervous smile and hooks his thumb toward the door.

It was enough impetus to have him ordered a second round: this time, a popular hefeweizen from the tap. "I guess the universe doesn't give a fuck if all I want to do is eke out a simple, happy, and peaceful existence."

"Does it ever?" Ravn chuckles a bit. "You do have some agency, though. Veil can toss you into crazy dreams with the rest of us, and some of them will be awful, no doubt about it. But it can't force you to pick up the hatchet to play Hatfields and McCoys. Can't stop you from making friends here, either. Life in Gray Harbor isn't simple or peaceful, but -- I mean, I realise Alexander thinks I'm a first class imbecile for saying it, but it can be happy."

Chris drums his fingers on the table, eyeing Davis as he prepares his order. He greets the fizzy pint with enthusiasm when it arrives shortly thereafter. "Someone told me there are forces at work that try to cause us misery so that they can feed on it," he ventures, nodding a slow agreement to his own thought, "If that's the case, then happiness is the best form of defiance I can think of."

Ravn grins slowly; it's a lopsided affair that starts at the corner of his mouth and slowly appropriates his entire face. "And that, my friend, is the whole point of the HOPE community centre. These entities on the other side that feed on misery and fear? Souring the crop. Making the harvest taste awful for them. Weaponised altruism."

He continues to smile. "Not everything Over There is bad. It's -- picture Grand Central Station. A lot of trains come in. Some of them are full of monsters. Most are just passing through. The Veil is like that -- overlapping realities. A lot of them are extremely dangerous because we don't know the rules -- can't trust even the basics such as what goes up must come down, and so on. Most of them don't care about us at all, and when we stray into them, it's just weird. A lot of them are trying to communicate -- a lot of the Dreams are like that, which is probably why so many of them make no sense. And then there's the dolorphages -- the pain eaters. Those are first class assholes, and they're the ones you're thinking of."

That was a small piece of refreshing news, at least. Descriptions had Chris thinking that the entire was was full of demons with a personal interest in torture. "Revitalizing the town is a pretty big undertaking. It'll take a bunch of people with the right intentions all working together." Or at least, a hell of a lot of money and hard work. He may not have the former but seems keen on devoting some of his time to the latter. "Are there Baxters interested in continuing this feud, or are we just at the mercy of the Addington's wishes vis-a-vis the tear?" Being on the losing end of a feud doesn't sound like his cup of tea, but logic doesn't always enter into a person's thirst for revenge.

Ravn puts his cigarette out before somebody does decide to comment on it. "I don't know any Baxters who want this to go on. Don't know any Addingtons who want it, either. Know a couple people on both sides who would definitely prefer to not have to have a conversation, but that's not quite the same as being ready to toss someone into a wood chipper. Margaret Addington's the one to worry about and as far as I'm aware she's pretty much a hermit in her home now, just waiting to die. Hyacinth has no interest in becoming crazy matriarch who collects Baxter ghosts."

Davis gets flagged down for another glass of entirely too good whiskey for this kind of dive bar. He probably makes Ravn pay through the nose for it. "Whether Gray Harbor has a future? Hard work. Investments. Something to invest in. I mean, that's the entire coast area, not just this town. Maybe that casino will bring in more tourist trade, maybe it won't."

"Usually, they bring in more of the criminal element," Chris frets. At least, dealing with the crime wasn't his job-- something for the boys in blue to handle. Right now, though, he's more focused on his short-term future than the grander city plan. "I can't speak for my family, but I'm always happy to talk. The way I see it, most issues come about from poor communication. With a very few exceptions for the truly malevolent." And this Margaret seems to be one of those, judging from the self-assured nod.

"This is going to sound... very cynical." Ravn sips his whiskey and studies the other man's face a moment. "I don't care about the criminal element. Don't get me wrong -- I'm not advocating crime and disorder. It's just, when there are monsters out there who torture people for shit and giggles, it's hard to get worked up over a bit of embezzlement or someone running a bit of a prostitution racket out the back of some motel or other. Gray Harbor is not bad in this regard. It's got crime -- of course it does. Organised crime too -- like Alexander said, it's a perfect port for shipping stuff in from the Pacific to a number of large cities, and no one looks too closely. I find it difficult to care a whole lot, not the way I do about the Veil. Maybe it's because I used to rough it myself -- did some boardwalk grifting, a bit of picking pockets, nothing too serious but enough that the boys in blue weren't my best friends either."

He shakes his head. "Margaret's pure human malevolence from everything I've heard. Haven't had the pleasure of meeting her, don't particularly want to. Hyacinth, well -- she's a high society socialite, don't think she's going to be hanging around the Pourhouse on a Friday night often. But if she does? It won't be your name or wearing a blue collar that stops her from having a chat. She dates a bloke who lives on a boat with his cat, when he's not wintering with another bloke in a run-down house on Oak Street."

On the subject of crime, he isn't so sure. "It's just like smashing the windows of the house we're trying to clean up. Cause a few thousand dollars of damage to a victim to net a few bucks in cash for somebody else's pocket. It's always been a net loss to society to enrich a sole member of it." Chris nods along as he takes a long draw from his beer, "Not that criminals have any monopoly on that kind of thing. Sometimes, they get called investors or capitalists. All comes down to motive." After a beat, and he adds, "But I understand priority and perspective."

He can't help but smile at the man's description of Hyacinth. But then, a man tends to speak well of the one they're dating. "You paint a pretty hopeful picture, Ravn. I'm going to try and help, in whatever small way I can."

"Hope is what I do." Ravn chuckles. "And, you're not wrong, Chris. I worry a lot more about white collar crime than I do the occasional car theft or escort racket. But as far as I can tell, Gray Harbor doesn't really have anything besides the casino to attract that kind of interest. What's here? The Addington lumber industry but, it's on its knees; the investments they make money from now are elsewhere. There are people in Gray Harbor who have money, but their money isn't here. We might be able to just mind our own business and try to get by. At least that's what I'm opting for. But then, I get told often enough that I'm not very ambitious."

Chris musters a grim smile. "Barring extravagant wealth, an individual can't do a whole lot on their own. It's not like we can just give everyone jobs or encourage everyone to work together instead of just for themselves when they can barely get by as it is." He chuckles lightly. "As far as I'm concerned, being a downright decent person goes a long way."

"It's all most of us can do," Ravn agrees. "Even with extravagant wealth -- I mean, Jeff Bezos could buy the town and turn it into his personal amusement part, sure, but not a lot of people have that kind of money. Real estate is bloody expensive, and I dread to think what it'd cost to kick start some kind of new industry here -- if it was just a matter of investment, I imagine somebody would have, we're close enough to Seattle that you'd think the tech billionaires looked this way if they smelled an easy opportunity."

He hitches a shoulder and raises his glass. "Here's to being a downright decent person. And to towns that are one man's hell and another man's haven."

The glass is emptied and Ravn gets off the barstool at least. "Don't be a stranger, Chris Baxter. That's the one thing you don't want to do in this town -- be a stranger. Make friends everywhere you can, with people like us. We'll be back to back in some absurd otherworld experience soon enough, and then you need to know what kind of man the other guy is. You know where to find me -- here, across the street, or on Oak Street until spring comes and I can get my boat back in the water."

He leaves a generous tip for Davis as he strolls off. Maybe he appreciates the bar bothering to offer a decent whiskey.

"Cheers to that," Chris offers the departing Ravn. He pulls out his card to settle his tab with Davis whenever he has a moment. "I have a place on Oak too. Maybe I'll see you around the 'hood." A few minutes later, Chris makes his own departure into the rain.