A Stiff Drink and an Egg Sandwich

The jukebox was skipping on the same lyric over and over again. "-be a stranger-" a snippet of a duet on a bossa-nova beat, burrowing itself into the memory of anyone who was still listening. Mr. Baker set down his glass, still half-full with a golden something that smelled of cleaning solution onto the bar top, deliberately picking a spot that didn't have any spilled liquids on it. He could see most of the room in the shattered mirror hung opposite his seat at the bar. He might as well be alone. The prospect of the drink had lost its luster by the time he had been forced to leave his seat, and returning to it hadn't improved the situation any. The door to the bar opened just enough for someone to stick their head inside the shop floor. Their eyes met through the mirror, and they hand to push someone away from the door to open it any further step past the stoop. Once inside, they locked the door behind them, then cleared their throat: "You needed clean-up again?"

"They started it." Mr. Baker grumbled. That wasn't entirely true. He certainly did his part in provoking what had turned into a full-fledged bar-fight. He didn't know the newcomer, only the badge they wore on their lapel, and the nonchalant manner they stepped over sprawled arms and legs on their way behind the bar.

"I'd surely hope so. You're off the clock." they pulled the person that had landed face-down on the bar sideways and let them drop onto the floor, cusioned by someone else.

"So technically it's not company business that you need clean-up."

"You can't afford not to." Mr. Baker glanced behind them. Considering how it could have gone, the venue wasn't in terrible shape. A few spots, a few indents, barely any blood, only from a nose or two. He had been careful, even if it didn't look like it. The newcomer pulled the power cord out of the jukebox, finally ushering in a much welcomed silence into the bar "You'll have to mention the details of how 'they started it' in a report somewhere, I'll have you know."

Mr. Baker pulled a face. He was aware. The agency wanted detailed reports on just about everything to do with its business, and while he claimed that this happened off the clock, having the agency do cleanup afterward made their involvement final and impossible to overlook.

"That can be something I deal with tomorrow." he grumbled.

"Or you tell me now and we can massage events to be done with it, once you're out the door."

Not a terrible suggestion, as far as he was concerned.

"I followed a lead here." he said, pointing toward someone sprawled over a table "It probably was a trap."

"Probably?"

"Like I said: They started it. About as soon as I was through the door." Mr. Baker stood, and moved back onto the center of the shop floor. Years of recalling high-stress situations make this process an automatic one. The man from the agency stepped aside to give him space. He's likely to have seen field agents do this countless times before.

"I'm about here when I notice that people are standing up, like they're getting ready. No backing out now, I figure, and continue to about here." he stopped about an arm's length away from the bar "The man behind the bar has his hands under the bar, where I can't see them. Looks like he might be reaching for a weapon or something. I'm not sure where the contact I'm supposed to meet is, because I don't want to take a close look at anyone yet, so I say my passphrase, because maybe it'll diffuse the situation. I order 'a stiff drink and an egg sandwich', loud enough to be audible to people paying attention, which might as well be everyone in here." Mr. Baker points toward one side "That one moves out of the way, and someone throws a bottle. I do my thing, try to stop people from leaving." Mr. Baker rounds the bar "The barkeep has a baseball bat, so I make sure to put some distance between us. I use a chair to disarm him. I don't really have the space to do it properly, so I throw it out that window."

Mr. Baker moved toward the window, until he stops against one of the tables "I end up here when things quiet down. I'm pretty sure I missed one or two of them in the process. Couldn't tell though, I was busy. I continue checking for my contact. I find him over there. Identified him through the name on his credit card."

He makes his way back to the bar and sits "I'm off the clock and haven't had dinner, so I get myself something to drink. They don't have real food, so I make do with peanuts." then he glanced at the agency man "Can you work with that?"

"I can make it work." he said with that empty smile that Mr. Baker had learned to ignore, even though he always thought it made the pencil-pushers at the agency seem more sinister than they needed to "Take a break tomorrow. It'll save both of us a lot of back and forth while I make this go away."

"Hmpf" Mr. Baker grunted and tapped the side of his glass with the edge of his fingernail "And the case?"

"You'll be able to continue working it when you come back. It's not time-sensitive, is it?"

"It's not."

"Well then," the agency man opened the door just far enough to slip through it "have a nice evening."