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Backdated to June 14th

Kratos didn't normally drink - he believed that alcohol dulled the mind and wasn't worth the trouble it got the drinker into. But on a few days of the year he let his stance on alcohol slide, because some days even he couldn't get through without a drink. This just happened to be one of them. Relieved that he had actually gotten the night off, the redhead had left most of his pokémon back at the base and sought out a relatively private bar in Camphoreon.

He had arrived around an hour ago if the clock on the wall was telling the time right, but he hadn't really started drinking yet. Instead, he sat at the bar and quietly nursed a whiskey, delaying the shot until he felt relatively sure of his anonymity and his safety. Though he had no ill intentions here this night, the increased alert in the region meant that caution was of utmost importance. And... he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to drink his memories away just yet, anyway. If he did that, he couldn't peruse them ,searching them over and over for anything he might have missed, anything the police might have missed - anything at all.

Besides, there was a small part of him that was afraid that by drinking away the memories, he might actually begin to forget Anna and Lloyd, and that was something that he didn't want to do no matter how much easier it might make his life. Instead, he stared idly down at the whiskey he held with an expression that, while it wasn't exactly approachable, was neither the sort of intimidating frown that he often sported on other days.

Not that anyone was likely to approach him on a night like this, anyway.

But then again, what did probably have to do with anything when humans got involved?

"Hn..." he murmured, a soft, wordless sound as he idly yet carefully traced a finger around the rim of the glass. Maybe whiskey wasn't really what he needed tonight, after all. Maybe something else... Shrugging the thought off, Kratos tilted his head back and downed the shot before flagging the bartender down for another. He only had a few hours left of the fourteenth - a very limited amount of time to try and drown his sorrows a bit.

If he wanted to achieve that by the time the fifteenth arrived, then he needed to get started.

Kratos noticed the long-haired man come in and sit beside him, but didn't really listen to the conversation between the other man and the bartender apart from catching a name - Yuri. Instead, he took his second shot of whiskey and frowned at it, wondering if he should down the thing now or at least wait another moment to be sure he wasn't going to be addressed by the man next to him.

He didn't really want to be social - he didn't enjoy socializing on good days, let alone anniversaries of unpleasant events like this. Still, he had the feeling that he was going to end up roped into some kind of conversation whether he liked it or not - people visiting bars were usually either there to talk or to drink themselves into oblivion.

Given that ht thought he might have caught a mention of Kodo beer, he felt he was safe in assuming the former. He chanced a glance at the man sitting next to him, but kept his expression as close to neutral as he could manage it on this night. Perhaps there was someone else sitting nearby that he was interested in - Kratos hadn't exactly been paying as close of attention as he usually did to his surroundings.

It was bad form to let his guard slip like that, but nobody was perfect.

It was just as he'd thought - for whatever reason, this 'Yuri' wanted to speak with him. Kratos raised an eyebrow at the address and deliberately turned away to worry at his second shot of whiskey. "Perhaps," he said, which was the most elaborate answer he felt like giving at this moment.

Besides, the other man's question wasn't exactly accurate, anyway - it wasn't a rough night for the redhead - it had been a rough day. Or, if you preferred a wider timescale, a rough three years. Shaking his head a little, Kratos downed his second shot and signaled for a third.

Since he wasn't normally a drinker, he knew it would be a bad idea to go too far past a third shot, but he didn't really care that he was likely going to end up drinking himself into a stupor and having to work tomorrow with a hangover the size of a Wailord. Still, he couldn't help but wonder a little about what was driving the dark-haired man's nosy inquiry.

"How does it involve you one way or the other?"

Even though his question was standoffish in wording, Kratos was simply too tired for it to sound anything other than defeated. It wasn't that he was physically weary, either - he was simply tired of the world and the way people tried to pretend that it was anything other than corrupt and dismal.

"Hn," Kratos murmured in response to the younger man's claim. He supposed it could be the truth, but it didn't seem likely - after all, who bothered to speak to someone if they weren't interested or were unconcerned about what that person was doing?

As for his question... had he been the type of man to shrug much, Kratos would have. Instead, his reply was a verbal one - and, due to the slowly-increasing influence of the whiskey, his tongue was loosened just enough for it to be an honest reply. "Simply because if I stayed I would only have gone over old information enough times to drive me into a frenzy."

Kratos was going to regret this in the morning, but for now his inhibitions were sufficiently quieted to the point where he didn't see as much point to his customary stoicism as he usually did. Because of this whiskey-induced trait, he had absolutely no problem with answering Yuri's question.

"Not revenge," he said simply as he eyed the third shot that had just been placed before him. "Justice." Suddenly, his slight inebriation displaying its influence on him, he jerked his gaze from the whiskey glance to an invisible point in the far distance, his mind partially in the present and partially lost in the past.

"The police were too corrupt to do their job," the redhead said, dropping his gaze to the whiskey again. Oh yes, he was definitely going to regret this in the morning. He should have remembered that whiskey made him chatty.

Kratos wasn't quite drunk enough to come right out and say something like 'my family' or 'my wife and son', but he was just inebriated enough to give a slightly more vague answer to Yuri's question.

"Someone," he admitted, then quickly downed his current shot in order to cover up the rough, emotional tone to his voice.

Perhaps it was Anna's fate to die that day... but it didn't make it any less painful.

Well, that hit the nail on the head. Kratos didn't want to voice an agreement to the other man's statement, but his murmured "Hn," was acknowledgement enough. Wasn't that exactly what it was, after all? He was Anna's husband, Lloy'd father - he should have been able to keep them safe.

Should have could have would have.

None of it made any difference - fate would always win in the end. There was no sense in fighting it.

And with any luck, fate would lead him to Anna's murderer and let him exact his vengeance.

Kratos debated ordering another whiskey for a moment, but refrained from doing so. Instead, he finally turned his attention fully to the other man, dipping his head in what was meant to be a slight nod of acknowledgement - but the motion was likely a bit more than 'slight'.

"The world itself is corrupt," he said softly. "And fate itself stands against us all."

There was no need to say what his own response to that injustice had been - joining a criminal organization that was outwardly corrupt instead of hypocritically so was likely not the kind of response that would go over well, especially not in a public place like this

However, by this point his inebriation was just enough to loosen his restraint about other sensitive topics. "They never tried to find my son. Never considered that the one who killed her might have merely taken him..."

It was time for another shot, definitely.