((Thanks, as always, to the wonderful Madison-mun!))

It was still early enough in the day for a place like Seaside Sam's to be relatively empty. Good, considering Glenn wasn't overly fond of crowds. He had a stolen away a place for himself in a small two person booth just aside from the bar, close enough that he could order a drink without having to stand but far enough that he didn't have to put too much effort in keeping himself from being overheard. He sat there already with a pack of cigarettes on the table and an ashtray already full of a few ashen remains.

The bartender was paying him little mind and the few patrons gathered were all sitting there watching reruns of a game on the small television. They didn't care to look around and no one thought twice about the gun that he had holstered at his side, plain as day. He had a beer in front of him along with another bottle of rye and two glasses, both empty and waiting to be filled. His eyes were on the door and a cigarette hung limply between his lips. The day was dragging on and it was hotter inside than it was out, even with the wind and sea spray just on the other side of a couple of buildings, the heat clung to him and he grabbed the neck of his shirt and gave it a few shakes to get a semblance of a breeze flowing up over his chest. It didn't do much. The beer was perspiring something fierce and leaving wet rings on the old wooden table that was cut up and scarred from knives, toothpicks, cigarette burns and the like. The whole place smelled like salt and blood and liquor and despite the heat--or perhaps because of it--Glenn felt right at home. All he needed to complete the picture that Sam's was conjuring up from the past was that one person he'd been waiting for all afternoon

The heat of the day and a promise drove the woman out of the bar and right into the thick of it, the swelter of it and by the time she'd reached Sam's, Madison Rye Mamoru wasn't sure what it was that had her sweating more; there was a text in her phone with words she didn't like for the potential they brought to her mind. Every time Glenn Douglas entered her life, windows broke and blood was spilled and some part of her would be forced to rise from the dead. It was a cycle that didn't seem to end. And just when she thought the man was a ghost on the wind, old boots would hit the sore wood and the west and past came to life in an instant. It was a cycle that for a time had driven her out of herself, much like the heat and the promise. It had driven her across the deep plains with him in search of redemption and in search of some sense of ending. Certain things had indeed found their completion, but not he. Not the wind that tugged at her hair and her sleeves and her heart and had her walking inside the bar and towards his very table.

The first thing those prairie eyes notice are the smokes which tell the story that the man had been here a while; that unto itself was a stranger thought, for he was either late or just on time, but never... early. It held her eyes as she drew her eyes slowly to his and took a seat. She was dressed for comfort and simplicity, two things that she had come to find but which Glenn threatened to dissolve, even with the growing semblance of friendship they and Tag had become to find, but it was a thing that held the capacity to be capricious, to turn on any of them. There was old blood between them, and ultimately, a lack of closure, of finality, despite words on rooftops, that said there was more to be known. White t shirt, denim shorts that frayed at the seams and older boots. Madison sat opposite to him and laid her hands on the table, tracing a nail along the face of the scarred wood. "Glenn." His name like a footfall across her heart. She inhaled sharply and leaned in. "Tell me... what's goin' on?"

When she stepped into Seaside Sam?s Glenn uncorked the bottle of rye and filled the two glasses and set one down in front of her seat, just as she came to claim it. The bottle was stoppered up again and he lifted his glass to her in a mock toast but did not drink from it. Instead he took that cigarette and had another drag, then set it to rest in the ashtray along with the others with thin tendrils of smoke curling up into the thick, stifling air. He gave her a look that was forlorn, but held within that spark of life that got him up and running every day and whipping up a storm of destruction wherever he went. He was the shadow of the clouds before the falling rain, and she had called him something to that effect once or twice. The memory made him smirk just a bit, and then he reached aside to the bundle that was his coat crammed on the booth seat between his leg and the wall.

He dug through and tossed onto the bar a small glass container with a cork for a stopper. It was dark green and opaque.

?Foley?s dead.?

There's two words which shatter. To her ears, it seems far-fetched, impossible, unlikely, so she takes a moment before reaching for the bottle as it rolls her way, taking it in hand and removing the stopper. A blue eye stared back at her; as implacable as his stare had been, how dead it had been, had seemed. But Madison doesn't recoil. Pale hands push the cork into place and then she slides the bottle aside. Her eyes meet his as she takes up the glass and smirks. She holds it up. "Finally. Some good goddamn news." And, she drinks. Her eyes closed as she tips her head and the whiskey back and slams the glass to the table. A lick of her lips. "But what else you got to tell me, Glenn?" She straightens her spine and folds her hands before herself. "I hope you're gonna be tellin' me you did that.?

He took the container back and tucked away into the same hidden pocket from whence it came before slamming back his drink as well. Then he poured them two more and sat back and picked his cigarette up again and had a taste. ?Yeah,? he said. ?He was at this fella?s house. Big house on a big hill. Fancy place, you know?? he licked his lips. ?Had security and everythin?. Wasn?t enough though. I killed him there, but he was meetin? this fella. This older guy, by the looks of him. Don?t know who he was.?

"How did you find him there. What took you into that context?" She adjusted in her seat, crossing her legs beneath the table as she lifted the whiskey and took a sip; this time, without haste. A thoughtful muse. "You sayin' you got no idea who this man was? Foley was lookin' for a rise, out of you, out of me. You think he had somethin' bigger cookin'. And where is this place?" It was a ram raid of questions but they needed to be asked, these were not the kind she could ignore like the call of the wind beneath her door at odd hours, nor the ringing of bells for too many years which led them, ultimately, to this point. It was still a time buried in mystery, in misunderstanding. A dark brow sloped as she brought a hand out across the table to take his hand and squeeze it. "Glenn... I'm glad he's dead, but nothin' that your sayin' is somethin' I'm followin' here. You and I both know that Foley wasn't a showy man. You saw where he insisted on havin' that real estate meetin' with those lawyers. That shithole. The thugs he had runnin' around with you. Tell me, and tell me now, what was it he had you doin'? That you set Redemption on fire, and cuttin' out his eye?" Her lips thinned as she looked down to their hands and exhaled. "How big does this all get? There's some idea you are havin'."

Glenn couldn?t bring himself to look Madison in the eye with the latter part of her questioning. He stared into the rye in his glass and wondered, not for the first time, how he?d come to this junction in his long, tired life. It wasn?t that long when he put his age to paper, but it felt like ages had come and gone since he was just a boy in that small town in the valley below, where no one came and went and all the folk who lived and died there had done so for generations. York. He missed it then in that moment more than he had in his whole, miserable life. Even more than he had the day it all burned and his family had disappeared.

?Mostly small, petty shit, Madison,? he said. ?Robbin? some folk. Collectin? protection money, that sorta thing,? he licked his lips again and knocked some ash into the tray from the fiery end of his cigarette. The heat was stifling. He could feel beads of sweat trickling down his back and it made his spin shiver and twist uncomfortably. ?And other things. You remember the Hexx,? it wasn?t a question, of course she did. ?I don?t know what Foley was gettin? at, but toward the end I got the feelin? like I did from the Hexx before I split ways with them.?

?I got a guy who?s gonna help me get to the bottom of things. Why I took his eye. I ain?t sick, Madi. Ain?t into mutilation for the sake of it, you know? The eyes are the window into the soul...considerin? Foley was only half a man I figured I wouldn?t need both.?

Her hand found its way back to the scarred table as she contemplated his responses, looking off a moment when he mentioned the petty crime. Sometimes she felt towards him like his mother didn't have the chance to; that he was beyond all the bullshit that men like Foley would have him do. The break ins, the shake downs; all he had mentioned. She shook her head and fought against another sigh. Her face looked sad, empty, worried. Then she looked down into the whiskey and turned the glass. "As for the eye...I didn't think it was novelty, Douglas. I didn't. Just...if you're thinkin' there's more to this.. if what you're sayin' is this is deep west..." she stopped short and met his eyes. They were the fierce, stubborn blue of bald, country days in mid-summer. Like her voice could get, like it was getting there now; prairies on fire. "You ain't doin' this alone."

A sigh rippled through the air, his breath disturbing those thin lines of smoke emanating from his cigarette. He rubbed the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger and grit his teeth at her. ?You?ve been tryin? to put as much distance between us as you possibly can, Rye,? he reminded her. ?You ain?t gettin? involved in this. If there?s anythin? more to get involved in. Shit, I don?t know if there?s anythin? to that house or that man. Could just be a fella he was workin? with. Might have nothin? to do with us. An? he ain?t likely to know who did Foley in. I promise you this. No one saw me, and I left no trail.?

"You and I both.." she dropped her voice with a look all over and leaned in. The brine in the air tried to oxidise her intent but she was having none of it. "we both know Foley didn't roll on in pickin' on us on chance, Douglas. There are wanted posters still floatin' about all over for us. York, Cossol... we're still wanted." She grit her teeth and took a hit of the drink; it only loaned heat to her words. "You are sittin' here tellin' me that the man who robbed my bar and cut the goddamn, fucking head off one of my patrons is dead and that's his goddamned eye. The same man who, to my face, made it abundantly clear he was tryin' to get to you. And now, he's dead, at your hand. I'm involved. You think I can turn away from this now, Douglas? I'm not sayin' I'm runnin' west, I can't. I have my family. But there are things I can still do." Leaning back an inch. "You stayin' at the Penny still?"

Her mention of York and Cossol brought from him a harsh, barking laugh and he slapped a hand on the table. ?You think we?re wanted ?cause of business in Cossol? That shit hole burned, Madi. Don?t you know? Nothin? left of it.?

He sobered up a second later and sat a little straighter. ?You might be. Still involved, I mean. I can?t say yet. Look...I?ll check into things. The house, the old man. See what I can dig up and I?ll let you know, alright? I owe it to you and Tag to at least make sure you know what?s goin? on.?

?I?m leavin? the Penny in a few days, I think. Not safe to be there at the moment, not until I know things are quiet.?

"You got my number." She smirked again, those dark brows slanting up as she looked from him to the opaque, green bottle. "Gotta say, Douglas... shame you didn't get me a souvenir. Would have liked to put his balls in a mason jar." She swiped up the glass to drain it and slammed it back down as she had her first, watching him the whole time. "I know it's burned down.... that's why I thought you were dead." Her eyes hard. "When you came in the bar that night...." she looked off and mined a deep breath. "I got to get goin'." She rose to her feet, not looking back at him as she did. "Where you gonna stay?"

?I?ll let you keep his eye when all?s said and done,? he smirked right back and watched her stand. ?Not how that works, Rye. Safest if no one knows, remember? I?ll be in touch.?

?Tell Tag I found a knife for Penny.?

"And if no one knows?" She meets his eyes. "I do worry about you, you know. There's... space here, there's got to be space.. here. Don't mean I don't worry and care for you. And especially when you're mutilatin' men like Foley and tellin' me this might go higher." She shook her head as her chest rose and fell with another sigh. She stood a moment just.... there. Thinking over it all and giving him a faint smile.

"I bet you did." To what he expressed about finding a knife. "Come over for dinner. When you bring the knife." And with that, Madison turned and strode for the door; moving like she did, that walk like sorrow, her eyes watchful, her face tense. She stepped into the sun but all she could feel was a chill.

Glenn only nodded to her as she left, taking a moment to finish his glass of rye before picking his coat up and stopping by the bar to pay off his tab and return the bottle they'd shared.