<hr/><div class="floatleft">(http://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/0/0c/Doomtown2-Recovered2.jpg)</div><br/><strong>Name:</strong>Walter Sinnett (https://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?topic=200832.msg9812108#msg9812108)<br/><strong>Date:</strong>May 11th, 1876<br/><strong>Time of Day:</strong>Afternoon<br/><strong>Location:</strong>Casino Mor... wait, wait, the bastard place is called<strong>Babel's Tower</strong>now right? Feck it, he's sat in a corner away from the bar.<br/><strong>Tagged:</strong>Open, Corky, mentioning Ginny and Lilah<br/><hr/>Some people chaffed at the thought of serving another.<br/><br/>They were strong people, independent people. They and they alone controlled their own destiny. They did not have a boss, they were not “owned”, they did not belong to anyone. No-one could summon them at will, no-one could control them, no-one could tell them what to do. They would rather die on their feet then keeping living on their knees. They were proud and they were mighty. They fought their own battles, waged their own wars. They were not beholden to anyone and woe betide the fool who suggested they were. Their choices were their own, their acts their own, their future their own.  Or, at least they thought that way, even if the reality was somewhat different.<br/><br/>Walter didn't.<br/><br/>You want the simple truth... Walter had spent his whole life being owned. Not in the way a slave was but still, controlled by someone else. First it had been his mum tellin' him what to do and smackin' his arse if he didn't. Then she'd died and it had been the other whores playin' mum for him. Then he'd been taken off them and put to work in a street gang and the leader of that bunch of rascals had owned 'im. And when Walter had clawed and fought and schemed his way to leadin' the gang then the thug who ran the gang had also run him. And when that bastard had gotten his neck stretched by the noose Walter may have stepped into his shoes but he was still under the thumb of the slumlord who ran everything. Even when Walter had been taken aside, his brutality recognised and turned into the slumlord's “last resort”, his “final option”, his top enforcer and perfect soldier he'd still been owned by the guy. To an extent he still was, even 5,000 bloody miles away. But now he was also owned by Sweetrock. He didn't mind.<br/><br/>Some people dismissively refer to those who are owned by someone else as a “bitch”. No-one did that to Walter's face for the fear of having their teeth removed but in his all too rare moments of reflection, Walter did occasionally think the term was actually pretty appropriate. Not the female part, obviously... Walter had a cock and liked to stick it in what he could... but in the dog part. Because Walter was a dog. Not a house-trained little spaniel who trotted politely beside his owner. No. He was an attack dog. Kept in a house and fed a diet of red meat he was a risk, a danger, the sort of beast that would accidentally rip a hand off, the sort of creature not shown to polite company, best kept in a cage and with a close eye on them. But when you needed someone killed, when you needed the blood to flow... then it was all worth it, for you took off his collar, unhooked the chain, pointed him at a target and waited for Walter to rip the fecker's throat out. That's what Walter was... a dog. And dog's tended to have masters. So it wasn't a surprise that he would be summoned.<br/><br/>He'd just rather it didn't happen when there was free whiskey to be had...<br/><br/>Walter should have hated Corky. Despite her growth she was still a kid and he hated kids. She was a Law Dog and Walter hated anything with “Law” in the name unless immediately followed by “breaker”. She'd interrupted his drinkin' and he hated anyone or anything interupptin' his drinkin'. She asked bloody questions and he hated people askin' questions. She was positive and naïve and optimistic and Walter hated all of that bollocks. But despite that Walter couldn't quite find it in himself to hate her. He didn't like her... feck that... but then Walter didn't like anyone outside of maybe his donkey. He didn't even like himself overmuch. But the steady throbbin' behind his eye and the achin' from the knife still buried in his shoulder that appeared whenever he was forced to talk to someone he didn't like and normally meant someone was about to get thrown through a feckin' window didn't appear as he talked to her... or more accurate she talked at him. Hell, Walter even smiled a bit as Corky tried the whiskey again, his reply about as close to light-hearted as he ever came.<br/><br/><strong>“'Cos no-one takes you seriously if you can't drink your whiskey love. They'll think you're a bloody child and laugh at you. You wanna' be treated seriously... you drink your bloody whiskey.”</strong><br/><br/>Yeah, his answer was crap and Walter realised it. Because truth be told he didn't really know. Why did people want to develop a taste for whiskey or beer or any of the other pissing drinks around here? What was wrong with water... at least when you got the clean stuff? I mean, Walter liked whiskey... well, he thought he liked whiskey... but if he did, how much did he actually like it compared to how much had he taught himself to like it? How much did he actually like the bloody taste rather than havin' learned to like the bloody taste? And even if he did like the taste, why the bloody hell would he drink so much he woke up each mornin' feelin' like his head was about to fall off, his eyes had been put out and someone had stuck a feckin' desert down his throat? Yet still he did it, despite knowin' exactly how bad it would make him feel the next day.<br/><br/>Despite his generally good mood in Corky's presence, Walter did bristle somewhat when she said someone was looking for him, tensing up slightly. Walter didn't like people lookin' for him. People who came lookin' for him were normally lookin' for a fight and as much as he liked a good fight (or a bad fight... or hell, any sort of fight) he wanted to be the one to pick it. Bein' told that someone was lookin' for him generally meant there was some bugger stood hidden in a dark alley waiting to drive a knife into his back. Walter wasn't a fan of that... he'd much rather be the bugger stood hidden in a dark alley waiting to drive a knife into some other bastard's back. Thankfully, the tension eased when Corky mentioned exactly who it was looking for him. Scooter. If the big foreman wanted a fight he'd have walked straight in and punched Walter... Walter liked that in him, although he'd have still cut his cock off... and the man didn't have the cunning or foresight to drag Walter out to some dark corner of Gomorra and do the deed there. If Scooter was asking for him then it wasn't a fight he was lookin' for, it genuinely was Walter. And if Scooter was looking for him it actually meant Sweetrock was lookin' for him... Scooter never had a thought in his huge but empty head that hadn't been put there by his masters.<br/><br/>Just a dog like Walter.<br/><br/>In a perfect world Scooter and thus Sweetrock would have waited till the damn whiskey had stopped bein' free and Walter was forced to dip into his coinpurse to get it before callin' him rather than now where the whiskey was still free and Walter was still feeling uncomfortably sober. That said, draggin' a drunk Walter away from a bar... even a bar he had to pay for drinks at... was not a task many men would have looked forward to and in the small part of his mind that thought sensibly even Walter could agree that goin' to meet someone from Sweetrock when half-cut probably wasn't the best idea. Not when he wanted things. Walter wasn't by nature an ambitious man... whores, whiskey and wanton violence were pretty much his needs and those were needs easily satisfied in Gomorra... but advancement with Sweetrock meant more money and more money meant more whores and more whiskey... as well as the possibility that he'd get to spend his days doin' something  other than scaring the crap out of a bunch of hapless miners. If a dog was good his masters threw him a bigger treat.<br/><br/>And Walter's masters were calling.<br/><br/>Walter stood as Corky asked her final question, finishing what was left of his drink before grasping the other one and downing that as well. For the briefest of moments he wondered quite what a Law Dog... even a junior one like Corky... was doin' runnin' erands for a man like Scooter but it made sense in the end. From what he'd picked up both that JP Coleman bastard and Nathan Hunter bugger were their own men despite the rumours... strong, indepedant, in charge of their own destiny, all that bollocks. Not beholden to Sweetrock. But both those bastards were dead so look where it got them. Bilton... Bilton weren't quite like that. Sure, he may not openly admit that he was bought and paid for and there may be a bit more to him than most expected... Walter still couldn't quite believe he'd shot down that bounty hunter a week ago... but he was seemingly a man easily swayed and when the Sweetrock wind blew a lot of feckers started swayin. Didn't seem that strange to think Sweetrock would already be linin' up the Law Dogs as their personal bitches, even if the Law Dogs didn't realise what they were.<br/><strong><br/>“A Babel?”</strong><br/><br/>Walter's pockmarked face curled up quizzically at the question before his shoulder's slumped and he broke out in something almost considered a grin, a slight chuckle breaking through.<br/><br/><strong>“I 'aint got a bloody clue love. I thought it was one of your yankee-feckin'-doodle words. Listen, how about you go ask that Ginny bird... she seems right smart. Or that Chinese lookin' lady sat with the big farmer... she was starin' at you earlier.”</strong><br/><br/>Walter may not have been smart but he knew about fightin' and he knew the signs when a fight was about to break out. He could recognise hostility and he could keep his damn eyes open. Walter could stare maliciously at anyone he wanted without givin' anything away because he stared at everyone maliciously. In the end most people were smart enough to recognise that and not take it seriously. But when you don't stare maliciously at most people and then harden your eyes on one person in particular? Then you stand out. Walter checked his coat, adjusted his hat and then glanced back at Corky.<br/><strong><br/>“Ta for the whiskey love.”</strong><br/><br/>And then the dog moved through the bar, cutting through the throng with relative ease (and the odd well-placed swearword and stiff stare) before heading for the alley around the back.<br/><br/>For his master had whistled.