Boothill steps out into the dark with an unlit cigarette hanging on his lips as the door of the bar swings shuts behind him. The cold air bites at his cheeks, a sting that feels more real than any drink. He strikes a match and the tiny flame flares gold against his metal hands. Smoke curls up from the burning cigarette, white and thin as a foggy breath on a cold night, and Boothill takes a slow drag, exhaling through the quiet.
The wind carries the smoke sideways and for a brief moment, the shadows seem to move also, leaning this way and that, fluid as the burning flame, as if the shadows were watching, as if it were alive.
Boothill narrows his eyes, confused. He's not drunk or even close to a buzz as the alcohol he sips is barely tasted on his tongue and converted into energy within the mechanical array of his body. It's the habit of drinking he cannot kick, the memories and misery at the bottom of the bottle he chases; so as to why the shadows are playing tricks on him … must be system failure, he thinks.
The shadows, however, don't seem to settle. They crawl along the edges of a wall as if something is approaching and the air hums faintly. Boothill isn't easily spooked by shadows or what bumps in the night as he himself is just as terrifying to run into, but the memokeepers he's encountered have a nasty habit of slipping through walls and into people's minds.
That thought alone is enough to put his nerves on edge and Boothill turns, ready for Black Swan to show her cards, or maybe Reca …
Boothill stumbles back, the cigarette almost flying out from his mouth. A figure stands behind him, head tilted just enough that the pale yellow gleam of his eyes catches the light eerily. A familiar face. Another star of The Hunt. A Galaxy Ranger. One as incognito, and just as weird, as La Mancha themself.
“Flins! You! Damn near gave me a heart attack!" Boothill shakes his head. “Keep pullin’ that stunt, partner, an' one of these days I’ll shoot first an' 'pologize later.”