[quote=@Ruby] She took the seat next to the Chimp, and ignored the index cards on the bar counter before him. "Single Scotch, plain," the barkeep nodded, and thought about warning the pretty redhead about the chimp she had sat next to. Dressed in black high heeled boots, low cut jeans, a navy blue shirt with white horizontal pinstripes, and a black leather jacket that fit her like a glove. It was all designer; the boots and jacket Prada, the jeans and shirt Burberry. Her perfume a hint of rose and lavender, and no more. When the right earbud was snatched out of the chimp's right ear, she half expected him to swat at her. Instead, he seemed to Jean to just try to repress anger at another irritating hew-man. Jean tried not to smile. "Jean Grey, Detective; mutant activist and combatant with Charles Xavier." [i]What else[/i], she thought, [i]would I call us X-Men right now?[/i] "I'm getting the feeling you aren't a mutant, like some of the OCPD think you are...just the same I think you can help me. I know you've got a case, so my offer is I'll help you with that case, and in return you help me with what I'm looking into. I'll pay you five times what your current client is paying for your current case." Her drink arrived, and a bright, radiant smile was unleashed on the barkeep. "Thanks, so much." A quick sip, the departing of the eavesdropping barkeep, and Jean was turning back to her left, to the chimp. "And if you don't do partners, I'll pay you ten times what you're being paid now...and you can just consider me a tag-along. I'm new to the city and I need help. You're my best option right now. You know this city." [/quote] [i]"Once I had a love and it was a gas, soon turned out had a heart of glass..."[/i] Debbie Harry's sultry voice blasted from the earbuds now resting on the bar. DC heard the music, but he wasn't listening. Instead he was looking a bit stunned at this woman sitting next to him. He was outraged that she had rudely snatched his earbuds from his head and acted like nothing had happened. And they called him an animal... But... She was interjecting herself into his mystery. That usually made him very upset. These were his cases, adventures he never really shared with anyone except maybe Effie. The whole damn reason he was in this hellhole of a city was to solve mysteries and now... But the money... And she would help him with his case? Help? Like he was a dumb primate who couldn't do it. He-- But the money... And he was intrigued by this Jean Grey. A mutant? He'd never met one of those before. He knew about them, of course, he'd looked into mutation wondered if chimps were now becoming mutated like humans, but he could find no definitive answers. His own condition was not a genetic mutation, but he had still held out hope that there might one day be a Chimp who might be like him. A mutant with a mystery. The dame walked into the place and gave me all kinds of hell. Isn't that how these things were supposed to go? The tough as nails PI dealing with a beautiful client. It was the stuff that Chandler and Hammett wrote about, but he was a talking chimp and she was apparently a mutant. "One thousand dollars," he said as Blondie faded away in the earbuds and Talking Heads took their place. [i]"Watch out you might get what you're after..."[/i] "That's your down payment for this tag-along and my service fee for whatever it is you feel you need my help on." DC took a long swig of his own drink before turning back to Grey. "Sound good?"