As soon as Taika had entered the bar, she was greeted with the familiar scent of alcohol and murmur of conversation that was muffled slightly by loud music. It was pretty crowded tonight but that was not uncommon as things were typically busy at this hour. Humans and dragons alike gathered to have a good time. It was not her first choice to meet up with Stryke seeing as she didn’t really like these kinds of environments. She was more for quiet places. This had been his choice, and he had won that argument, but only because he had caught her in one of her apathetic moods. Those seemed to be pretty common these days as much as she hated to admit it. During these times, quiet was favored above anything, she was less likely to even want to come in here. Taika was pretty much forcing herself to tolerate this atmosphere.<br/><br/>While she searched for her comrade, she strode past everyone, including a few people she recognized, eager to get this conversation rolling. She knew she was late and would probably have to make it up to him somehow. That was usually how it was whenever they got together to discuss business. Today, however, she was not in the mood at all and just wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. That meeting had her pretty worked up. She worked to remove her irritation from her expression before heading over to where Stryke was seated.<br/><br/>Taika pushed her platinum blond hair out of her face as she sat down. When the bartender came her way and asked if she’d like anything, she settled for a tequila sunrise and then turned her attention to Stryke.<br/><br/>“So,” she began, her tone filled with an odd sense of calm. The was sure that every bit of the way she was carrying herself said she was having a rough day but did not care to discuss it much. She couldn’t hide from Stryke, however she did not care to speak about losing her temper because of that asshole, Alan, bringing up her mate’s death. “How has your day been? Better than mine was, I presume?” Not even apologizing for being late, she decided to be casual. From what she remembered, Stryke’s line of work was not as frustrating as hers was. Oh how she hated working in an office, let alone being the head of her division. It really made her want to pull her hair out some days. But she knew better than to complain, their leader was not too keen on complainers and would eliminate her in a heartbeat if he was displeased.<br/><br/>Before she could continue, she was briefly distracted by the bartender bringing her drink to her. She gave it a stir with her straw and took a sip of it. “At least this bar has good drinks,” she commented, a smile appearing on her expression for the first time. Whenever she smiled it usually caused those around her to cower slightly. Taika smiling for any reason other than finding something amusing or satisfying, in a horrid sort of way, was not common. She meant it. She has always enjoyed the drinks here; something about them really seemed to hit the spot. Perhaps due to the fact that the bartender was a dragon and not a human like in most of the bars around the city. But the smile soon faded as she was not here to discuss drinks with a good friend; there were much more important matters to attend to.<br/><br/>For now she would wait it out a little. She was more interested in hearing about Stryke’s day before she vented to him about hers.