Owner	Pose
Jacob Walker	Sister Margaret's really doesn't look like the wretched hive of scum and villainy that it is. It could be any other blue collar dive, really, save that instead of today's specials, the chalkboard has various contracts on offer for mercenaries of all stripes. Not fancy, but clean enough. Some of which is due to the man behind the bar at the moment. Jake's in his usual white dress shirt and jeans, hair pulled back. He's still for the moment, hands busy with the drying of pint glasses, keeping his eyes on the few drinkers there at that hour on a weekday evening. Over the speakers, the Pogues are lamenting the death of the poet Lorca.
Frank Castle	*Mother of all our joys, mother of all our sorrows* *Intercede with him tonight* *For all of our tomorrows* --Who should be coming through the door but Frank Castle, walking with that calm, unruffled predator's pace, a lion silently parting dry grass. His trenchcoat on, the hem sweeps just above the soles of his boots. He could be carrying anything under there. Anything at all. Coming up to the bar, Frank scans for Weasel, past the few fellow clients. His cold gaze takes in Jake, ticks past him--then back. Weasel isn't in. It's this guy. This...weirdly familiar guy. Frank leans on the wooden bartop richly stained in booze and other things. "Yo. Gimme a beer." He's got his eye on Jake, watching him; the beer is less for drinking than for watching him.
Jacob Walker	There's a similar reaction from Jake himself. A first cursory glance as Frank enters, already moving that way to ask what he'll be having. With the abrupt double-take, he doesn't drop the glass he's holding, only setting it down with a certain exaggerated care. He doesn't ask what *kind* of beer, only picking one of the ones on draft. "On me," Jake says, as he sets it down before Frank. Lingering, ostensibly to make sure it's to Frank's liking...but then there's a smile trying to creep in by the corner of his mouth. It hasn't quite made it by the time he murmurs just loud enough for Frank to hear under the music, "Speak, Memory," and turns back to cleaning and racking the glasses.
Frank Castle	On him? Frank upnods in thanks, but his eyes are flat. Who is this guy? He can almost place him. Almost. On the one hand, the guy isn't trying to run or beg for mercy, so Frank probably doesn't want to kill him. Yet. Sniffing, he takes a swig of bland beer. When Jake murmurs to him, he jerks his head up. He knows those words and he knows the voice and the cadence speaking them. "Walker?" he tries. He feels stupid just trying, but... you never know, right? Weird shit happens in this world. Like young Latino queers whose face burns off.
Jacob Walker	Frank's reply is rewarded with a brilliant grin. That's the same, at least, even if the bartender looks like he's considerably the worse for wear inflicted by the intervening years. Hollow-eyed and pale, skin taut over the stark bones of his face. "You do remember," Jake says, clearly pleased. "Good to see you. How you been keepin'?" No name offered in return, or specifics of past encounters. Sister Margaret's being what it is, God only knows what alias Frank might be under now. Discretion is also one of the services offered here, at least up to a point.
Frank Castle	Frank Castle doesn't answer. He's changed, though. The superb Marine has broken, somehow, his soul chewed into rags. Many a Marine seeks out soldier-of-fortune work after his tour, but this...this is different. He says, wry in the way that he used to have, "You look like shit."
Jacob Walker	"Well, I have felt better," Jake concedes, after glances to either side to make sure he's not neglecting the other drinkers. "Had to get outta the business after I got up close and personal with a IED." The grin's returned to the barest curl of a smirk. Then he's openly looking Frank up and down, and says, "Now that I look again, man, you had a hard road this last while." It isn't a question. "But you're alive and speaking coherent English, which is more'n I can expect of most of your tribesmen at this age."
Frank Castle	Frank shrugs one muscular shoulder, bending the elbow for more tasteless beer. "Could be worse, right? Could be under a nice cross in Arlington. I tell myself that one a lot. You're still into the epic poetry." That's not a question either. His gaze has become slightly more lively, recognizing Jake. Perhaps it's those two words that have breathed a touch of life into him.
Jacob Walker	Walker's thoughtfully silent a moment, looking at Frank. "I have to agree with you there," he says, though apparently it took some real consideration. A nod at that, and the answering smile is an echo of what he was when last Frank knew him. "Still am." He glances down at the surface of the bar, which is as clean and glossy as his efforts can make it, and looks up again. "I still maintain that while material goods and money can be taken from a man, what he knows can't be. Most valuable thing that can't be stolen."
Frank Castle	"I remember arguing with you about that, them late nights on sentry. Drove the guys nuts." Frank huffs, just a breath of a chuckle. He looks down at the bartop, too. "Disagreed then. Ain't nothin' convinced me different since." That coldness blooms in him again. He shakes his head, takes another drink. "Everything can be taken from a man. Everything."
Jacob Walker	"Sure did," Clear satisfaction at the memory, if no real nostalgia. But then, Jake was once a lawyer, long long ago. Arguing's still fun, even if it's no longer before a jury. "Is that why you've been wading in blood since I last saw you?" Startled into a betraying bluntness, as that little furrow knits itself between his brows, though the blonde's voice is soft. Because he can guess what that 'everything' consists of, after a glance at hands bare of any jewelry. He doesn't hesitate, but lays a long hand over Frank's, squeezes it once before withdrawing it. There's no ring on the bartender, though by the glint of a fine chain at the collar of his shirt, he's still wearing it on him.
Frank Castle	Frank always wore that thing, didn't he? Religiously he wore it. On the rare occasions he had to take it off for safety reasons, the white line on his finger was just as good at showing just how devoted he was. A family. A wife. Two kids. Gone now. So long that the white line on his finger is gone, too. In its place: blood. A sea of blood. He bares his teeth at Jake, which is answer enough, rage rising. His hand becomes a fist when Jake squeezes it, but Frank doesn't attack him. Just sits there trying to sort out when and where he is.
Jacob Walker	The older man's stare turns cool, hooded, watching that change. Jake doesn't flinch back from it. "I know you know I lost my wife when we were both real young," he says, and it's not exactly sympathy in his tone. He doesn't seem to be sorry for Frank, not precisely. "I don't believe I told you anything more about it. She was murdered, and I sold my soul to get her killers. So I won't give you any bullshit platitudes about time or comfort or any of that. Sometimes blood is the only answer and there's never enough of it. I'm sorry, nonetheless."
Frank Castle	Frank Castle takes that statement as prosy. Not literal. Not fact. They only say you can sell your soul to the Devil. But then again, thinking about that mechanic the other day... Frank stands up, abruptly, knocking his bar stool back. Jake says things he does not want to hear. He grabs him by the shirt front, eyes blank--until he hears that Jake's wife had suffered the same fate as his own. Then, a clearing of his mind, some long-buried ounce of empathy attempting to flare. He lets him go, the whole thing having happened in a few seconds, before anyone else can interfere. Frank still has his knife's-edge reflexes, it seems. Not to mention that massive strength and always, even then, always that willingness to turn off being human and become a thing that kills. The Marines had done good work with him. Still do, you might say. He stares at Jake. "Sorry," comes in a mumble as Frank steps back. "Tell Weasel I was here lookin' for him."
Jacob Walker	Jake's got sense enough to go with that grab, hauled half-way over the bar without any resistance at all. There's none of the usual settling of feathers when he's released, no indignation meant to transmute fear into something more acceptable to the ego. He just slides back until his feet drop to the floor again. The apology's dismissed with something not quite a shrug. "I'll let him know. What was the name again?" he wonders, prompting. "And I got your tab here, you come back soon." It is an order.
Frank Castle	Frank Castle glances back over his broad shoulder, those black eyebrows like thunder. "Frank Castle. The dead man." Then, out, back into the balmy New York spring, where his black coat does not fit in at all.