Devil's Advocate [CLOSED]

If someone made a list of the things most hated by the staff at the Devil's Brew coffee shop, the Saturday evening shift would certainly be up there. Grace particularly hated it, because she usually worked the early shift, which meant that she was usually ready for bed by ten, and the last thing she wanted to be doing was still being at work.

Of course, it beat the Sunday morning shift, and that was the one she'd traded away for the privilege of being here tonight, so she was trying not to complain about it. The place was pretty much dead anyway, just her and the girl on the register, and Grace was mostly floating around the back trying to get some of the closing tasks finished early, with the understanding that Anna would call for her if someone wanted something more complicated than just coffee at this hour.

It should have been easy enough, but the sudden clatter from the front room alerted her that it was suddenly very much not. The urge to walk out from the kitchen and see what was going on was strong, almost instinctive, but there was another instinct there, too. She'd lived in Millennium City for almost a year now, after all, and either whatever was going on out there was something that Anna could handle alone, or it wasn't - and if it wasn't, then it wasn't really something Grace was going to be able to help her with either, because Millennium City was full of weirdos and practically everyone had some sort of thing these days.

As much as she might not have liked admitting it, that also included Grace.

She went out the back door, well aware that the sensible thing to do would be to keep going, and maybe pull out her phone and call any one of the numerous people she knew who were actually qualified to deal with this sort of crap, a list which very distinctively did not include herself. The thing was, though, this was her coffee shop - not that she was the owner or anything, but she worked there and they'd given her a job when she'd desperately needed one, and if any idiot was going to mess with that, then it was personal.

Which was why, when she emerged from the alleyway and stopped in the open front door, it was with a sword in her hand and armor concealing her body - and a black apron with the shop's' logo on it in red over the ensemble, because apparently it was loose fitting enough that the armor formed under it rather than over it, which was something she really wished she had noticed about ten seconds earlier.

Never anyone to go anywhere but forward, Grace gave the costumed stalker a glare that he wouldn't be able to see on account of the helmet business anyway. Inconvenient. "Hey." Her thumb gestured to the shop rules printed on the sign displayed on the wall, particularly the one about not starting stupid shit in the store. "Take it outside."

Grace stepped back just enough to let the crazy guy through the door. He was dragging the other guy with him, which wasn't great, but at least they were taking it out of the coffee shop. She took a moment to divest herself of the Devil's Brew apron, which was a lot harder one-handed. She supposed she could have just cut the strings, but then she'd have had to replace it.

No time to hang it up, so she just dropped it on the floor in the doorway and followed back out into the street, where the boys were busy having a tussle. It was entirely one-sided, of course, with a lot of pleading on the other side. Jerk. Grace did not like this guy, and she had met a lot of unlikable people. Most of them weren't nearly as bad after their second espresso, but there were an awful lot of people who were just awful before they got their coffee.

Hell, she could probably include herself in that number - not that it particularly applied here. Of course, she could have just walked away, this was Millennium City and someone would be by soon. Not soon enough for the guy's hand, though, and as someone who very much needed both her hands to work, Grace figured it wasn't right to let this guy possibly risk his livelihood over a cup of coffee. And besides, this was her coffee shop and she was not having this. She moved forward, sliding a foot over the prone guy's hand and nudging the knife. Sure, she might end up stepping on him if she had to bring her weight down hard, but broken was better than gone.

"Okay. A, no hurting the customers." By technicality, he wasn't a customer yet, but he'd meant to be, and that meant something to her. He was her people, just one of the many poor bastards in Millennium City who needed a decent brew to keep them going through whatever they were trying to get through.

"Two, Kore Smith is literally in the freakin' phone book and her office is like four miles that way." A gesture emphasized the statement, although Grace had no idea if it was actually correct, because she was not great with directions - but the address was online and Mr. Undercaffeinated could get off his ass and the other guy's stomach and google it like the everyone else.

"And D, no one's heard anything about that Noctua guy in like, a year. He probably died in a car accident or got yeeted off to a multiverse or whatever else happens when superheroes disappear." And, regrettably, there was probably no way this guy was going to catch the Home Alone reference, which was just sad for him. "Hell, I hardly know anything about him. Wasn't he supposed to have some sort of owl getup for a while? You trying to be an impersonator or you just want an autograph?"