Unexpected Encounter

Nostalgia

Words in BOLD in between "quotation marks" represent thoughts of characters.
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Back at what was left of the bar, Mr. Eric did his best to explain to the police that him and his customers had nothing to do with the fire fight that broke out between the mercenaries and vigilantes which happened to destroy his restaurant.

He was torn down because of it, in fact. There was no way he could pay for the damages done to his business. The cameras in the bar were all shot up, the computer was full of holes, there was nothing he could do to save his business at all!

The others didn't do much talking. They were in shock, apparently, and could not tell the police anything. Dante was taken away by an ambulance along with Dominic who had been shot on the shoulder. As it happened, Jackson was living in an apartment right next to the bar he was working security for.

He was also just arriving home from the Christmas party he had with his family. Naturally, he was alarmed by the chaos going on outside his home and not only asked about what happened, but also invited Mr. Eric and his guests to his home until they decided on a course of action.

Natalie went to check on Mr. Eric as Jeremy, Eva, Karen and the musicians followed Jackson to his place. She was going to ask about Abigail, whom she could not find but noticed that he wasn't looking too good.

"Uhm... Mr. Anmut? Are you okay?"

"Hmm? Oh, it's nothing, dear. I was just... I don't know how I'm coming back from this one... I do not have enough money to rebuild the bar. And please, call me Eric."

"Alright, haha you don't need to worry about money for that! I could just give you the money you need!"

"Nono, nein! I could never accept that!"

"Mr. Eric, I have money to spare. You can pay me back if it'll help ease your mind, but I am helping you get this place up and running again!"

After much convincing, Mr. Eric accepted the help that was being offered to him. Natalie asked again about Abigail and was told by Eric that he was fairly certain that he saw Eva run with Abigail to Jackson's building. They began making their way to join the others.

"How did you two meet? You and James, I mean."

"That was a long time ago haha! I met him through Elena. Elena is Karen's sister. She was an aspiring musician! That girl had a very bright future as a performer. One day she invited James to watch her play when she was just starting performing in public. That's basically it."

"That's it? No grand stories of other dimensions?"

"That's right."

Natalie noticed Susie coming out of the destroyed bar with guitar case that she did not have when she first arrived at the party. Ronnie was the one who had it then. For some reason Natalie felt like asking Susie about it. She waited until they got to Jackson's apartment and then asked the teenage superstar why she had taken the guitar case Fron under the Christmas tree.

"Oh, it's nothing haha! I was gonna give it to James after some of you guys left, but he ended up leaving before I could do that, and then--"

"And then the wall blew up?"

"And then the wall blew up."

Natalie asked about why Susie wanted to give James a guitar in private. By then all the grown ups that were left behind by the "super" people got in on the conversation about James and the guitar he was supposed to have gotten.

"Yeah, so, I talked to Ronnie, Mitch and Karen about it and we thought that James should have it."

"I'm sorry, but why did you ask Karen about whether or not to give James a guitar?"

Karen then jumped in and announced that the guitar that they were giving James used to belong to her sister.

"Susie came to talk to me about it, and we agreed that Elena probably would have wanted James to have it."

It was the second time this Elena person had been mentioned in something James was involved. Three different people mentioned her which meant she was probably someone worth asking about.

"Eric told me a little about Elena-- My husband as well. He uh... mentioned that she passed away... Is it alright if we talk about that, or-- I don't want to intrude or anything!"

Ronnie spoke out for most of them that it was alright. It had been about a year since Elena died, and so, it was still pretty fresh on their minds.

"From what we understand, James is the way he is because of some wolverine type experiment when he was younger. He was always getting into trouble with people in high places either because they made him or because he genuinely managed mess up some bigwig's plans for bad stuff."

Karen took over the story by reminding Natalie that James met Elena back in Puerto Rico, around the first time he went to Asgard.

"After a while of mutual friendship, the two fell in love... But, like, real love! At least, I think it was... Anyway, James changed when he tried to date my sister. He became nicer, tried to be more helpful in general. So, she agreed to going out with him."

"And then what happened?"

Mitchell, being moody the way he was, dropped a massive emotional bomb on everyone who knew Elena when he said,

"And then she was murdered! She had her fucking h-"

Preventing Mitchell from finishing what he was going to say, Eva ran out of one of Jackson's room to ask for some juice or something like that. Jackson got up to tend to her needs, at the same time, putting an end to the conversation about Elena.

"James shouted something in the kitchen when he was talking to those two men. We heard it from upstairs but couldn't make what he was saying. Was it important?"

The question was directed to Karen, the one perso in their group that stayed downstairs after all the fighting was done.

"No... Nothing important..."

It then occurred to Natalie that Abigail had not asked her for anything throughout the entire time that they had been at Jackson's. Abigail was ten and quite spoiled, so it was not like her to keep quiet for too long.

"Guys, has anyone seen Abigail?"