Like Father, Like Son || June & Harry
Harryâs politeness was so polished that anyone who didnât know him in a professional capacity would assume it was genuine. It was impossible for even him to keep the mask up when he was working â one of the marks of a sociopath was their inability to keep from flying into fits of rage, and Harry was no exception. Whenever one of his street workers was shot, or when a meeting didnât go as planned, or if he didnât earn as much money as he aimed to in a week, Harry would grind his teeth and change from the well-mannered businessman into what he actually was â a spoilt rich brat. On some occasions he would be able to refrain from yelling, but that was rare. Whoever delivered bad news was bound to be subjected to him ranting about stupid kids getting themselves killed or selfish bastards or whatever else had caused the source of his anger, with a lot of expletives and spit.
It wasnât just on a national scale either â if a customer complained to him directly, if they dared to directly bring an issue to him that couldâve easily been dealt with by one of the bar staff, then he would lose his composure the moment theyâd spoken. Their drink didnât have enough vodka in it? The bar was out of fucking peanuts? Though a lot of his patrons knew that the bar was just a front, and they left him to his work, a few didnât. They thought he was honestly a bar owner, that the Zone was a real bar, and therefore they expected to get a good service.
Sometimes they discovered the truth if they complained â Harry would fly off the handle and shout that of course their drink wasnât fucking correct, this isnât even a real bar! On such occasions where he admitted that the Zone was a front for a money laundering business, that would snap him out of it and he would immediately ask for the personâs name (which they would usually give, either out of surprise or fear). From there, he would have someone check their background while they waited in his office. If they were deemed safe, they would sign their name on the dotted line, swearing to keep the Zoneâs true purpose a secret, and be on their way. If they werenât safe â if they were too âmoralisticâ or too âclose to heroesâ or a civilian â then they would be taken out the back and shot. That was rare, because Harry vetted everyone who came to the Zone carefully to make sure they were of a dark moral standing. Also, he didnât like killing paying customers.
âThe day off? Nice for some,â Harry joked with a smile. His business could run itself more or less without his help, but not for long. After about four days of Harry not working, the various heads of his national branches would run out of instructions and orders, and chaos would ensue. As it turned out, being a criminal was a very taxing career. But whenever he turned on the news and saw a report on a murder on the other side of the country which heâd plotted, or read in the paper about a candlelight vigil for a missing person who he had ordered to be kidnapped, he knew that it was worth the backbreaking effort which he put into it. His work wasnât just a job, a means of making money â it was a vocation.
When June asked for a drink, Harry nodded and pulled out a cocktail shaker from underneath the counter. He turned to the shelves behind him for the whiskey, where it sat beside other bottles in an alphabetised line. The lemon juice was kept under the counter, so he pulled it out and placed it beside the whiskey, scooping a few ice cubes out of the icebox under the shelves and dropping them into the cocktail shaker. The whiskey and lemon juice was added, and a teaspoon of sugar from the pot on the back counter. As he shook the ingredients, he kept his back to June so that she wouldnât see his irritated expression. Heâd asked if she wanted anything out of necessity, not because heâd expected her to actually ask for something.
Once everything was shaken, he strained the liquid into a rocks glass and spun on his heel to present it to June with a smile. Her compliment was well meaning but pointless â Harry cared as much for the Zone as he did for his employees. It was a means to an end, a meeting place, a way to clean his money, and nothing more. But as he placed the glass down in front of her, he kept his act going.
âThanks. Iâm sorta proud of this place myself. I just didnât want to follow my dad into the family business, you know? Oscorp wasnât for me. Thatâs why I stepped down.â He didnât deviate from the official media cover-up story â the stress of the job had gotten to him, and heâd stepped down to let someone else take his place. He had no idea how much June knew about what had really happened to him, how much she knew about Ravencroft, and he didnât want to take a risk. âIâm much happier here, though I donât know what my father would have to say about his only son and heir running a bar.â
Thanks. Iâm sorta proud of this place myself. I just didnât want to follow my dad into the family business, you know? Oscorp wasnât for me. Thatâs why I stepped down. Norman would have been disappointed, and June was aware of that, but Harry didnât need to hear a confirmation from her. If anything, heâd believe her opinion about it more than anything else. The least she could do was throw the kid a bone. âEveryoneâs gotta make their own path through life. If this is what you do to make yourself happy, itâs the right thing to do.â It just so happened that changing people from the inside out without their knowledge made June happy. Her methods may not have been âethicalâ, but pioneers of scientific thought often had to do a few things arbitrarily declared inhumane in order to understand the world around them better. And it was fun as hell.
Iâm much happier here, though I donât know what my father would have to say about his only son and heir running a bar. June accepted the drink Harry made her and took a sip, wincing at the burn, but shaking her head at the comment. The boy had severe daddy issues it seemed. But who didnât? June wasnât sure if it was better for Harry that his father was gone and he only had to live up to a memory, or if that made it worse. âWhat matters now is your happiness. Itâs so hard to find, you need to reach out and hold onto it when you finally do.â Using people as her own personal playthings made her happy. Improving her own genetic makeup and mapping otherâs did as well. Norman had, when he was still alive. He had been just the right mix of sinister, high class and intelligent to debate scientific discoveries and the lengths that should be taken to achieve them. They agreed on most points, but generally June tried to keep what she actually did private. Sheâd already gone down the tell-your-boyfriend-what-you-really-do road and it was the one that got her kicked out of school, so she wasnât eager to repeat it.
After a long sip of her drink, June decided to be bold with her questions. Had to be asked sometime so it might as well be now. âWere you surprised when Norman passed? He never spoke with me at length about personal matters.â June knew he liked to pretend that he was exactly who he wanted to be with her, and she was fine with that, but the fact that heâd kept his disease, something in all likelihood she could have cured if she knew what it was, was frustrating and made her wish that their secrets hadnât been so numerous.
