Salem lets out a bitter laugh. "And did Thienal explain to you the part where it's his own damn fault he's trapped in my wake? Self-absorbed **** wouldn't know irony if it tore him away from his home and everything he cared about on a semi-regular basis."
As Rathien speaks, Salem stares at him, blinking, trying to keep his vision from misting over. There's a new emotion now, mingling with the rest. Pity, maybe? Or something not far off. What kind of a creature would let him mean that much to it? The rational corner of his brain notes that the feeling doesn't have any real, logical basis. Even so, the emotion leads to a fresh wave of guilt; a wave of guilt that crescendos when Rathien's pulls his hand to his face, and Salem looks away, words and thoughts catching in his throat and making it surprisingly hard to breathe.
He tenses, for a brief moment, when Rathien moves to kiss him, but he returns the kiss, and after a moment, he relents to the combination of familiarity and passion, melting against Rathien, pulling him close. The sense of danger, the tension, is still there, and as always with Rathien, it only serves to heighten the excitement Salem feels at his touch.
After only a brief moment, Salem places a hand against Rathien's chest and pushes him a few inches back. His lips tingle and his heart pounds-- that kiss, that touch, had felt very nearly electric, and he would very much like to let it continue. He chuckles in spite of himself and gives Rathien's body an appraising once-over before he sighs and leans back a bit with a shake of his head.
"Later, pup," he says, his voice coming out husky and rough. He clears his throat. "We can finish this... talk... later." His face grows deadly serious. "For now, I'm here on business. I need..." he looks around the bar, then back into Rathien's eyes. "I need all the help I can get, and probably more besides. It's time to make my move. They took my..." His voice catches again, and he barks out a bitter laugh before continuing. "They took my family."
Al smiles at William. "One shirt, coming up." There's no outward sign that Al communicates with the ship, but the ramp again cracks open and begins to lower slowly towards the ground nearby. "As far as I can tell, the house," he jerks a thumb towards the bar, "will take anything you consider to be currency. I've seen money from a dozen different worlds and times here. It all seems good. I think it's more about the idea of buying something. Or something. Crazy superdimensional entities do the darndest things."
"As for my buddy," he again jerks a thumb towards the bar, "I believe the appropriate price would be blood." He growls the last word, trying to make it sound extremely sinister, then laughs. "Not... really literally, though. Just permission to image your DNA. It's his schtick. Everybody gets something small in exchange for a genetic sample. I think the idea is to prime the pump, if you will, and make you more willing to make bigger trades. Or something. Crazy universal wanderers do the darndest things."
He turns and jogs up the ship's ramp as it settles to earth, returning a few seconds later with a garment, which he holds out to William. It looks as though it'll be too small, but it's made from spandex or some similarly elastic material. Once donned by William, it'll be a skintight black shirt with rather prominent spiked shoulder pads. "I got this for him as a gift a while back. Ingrate hasn't worn it once. No idea why." He holds up what looks to be a glass rod, maybe six inches in length, inlaid with with a copper wire. "May I?"
Al sighs, looking towards the landing ships. "I'm hoping they're bringing more 'good time' and less 'blood,' honestly," he says to Jeffrey. He squints at the two new craft, trying to get a look at who's arrived, but neither craft seems to have let anyone off just yet. He shakes his head, still staring at the new craft. "Funny thing about kids-- there's no way to make them go the way you want them to. No formula, no definitive guidebook, and no way to know everything about who they are or what's in their world." He smiles. "In the end, all one can do is their best."
"I guess," says Al, ****ing his head and rather abruptly changing the subject, "my first question about this dome would be... what kind of society lets you just go around calling yourself a supervillain? Because that is so badass. And as a follow up, uh... is it a title that's warranted? Anything to do with the whole psychic thing you did a bit ago?"