Dante put his cigarette out and tossed it in the trash as he walked inside and took a breath of familiar air. His home turf, if one would venture to say.

He chuckled as his circumstantial drinking buddy ordered something with a little kick to it this time. That a boy; you've earned it. And then, Ezra was speaking to him, and he curled his fingers around his bottle and took a hearty swig before looking at him. "Yeah, the smoke back there kinda surprised me too," his voice dropped to a mumble as he added, "Never had it knocked outta me before..." A pink blush rose to his cheeks as he turned back to his beer.

"I can manipulate smoke, but I actually have to have breathed some in to be able to use it, hence the cigarette," he explained. "So what about you? What's your story?"

"I suppose that there is a first for everything," Ezra said warmly, elbowing his companion. He didn't mean anything by the remark. People were always learning things about their mutations... for example, when Ezra learned that he could reattach parts of him that had been severed, and still use them... and that'd only taken a good hundred-and-twenty years to discover. There was always a first for everything.

Ezra's drink finally arrived, and the homunculus murmured thanks to the bartender, taking an eager sip of the concoction. The alcohol was strident in the mixture, and with one sip it felt like it was rising straight into his head (or to his nexus, perhaps). He nodded as Dante explained his mutaiont-- he was a smoke-breather.

>> "So, what about you? What's your story?"

That was... to be expected, honestly. Ezra had no nose, after all. His mutant status was written write across his slender face. Ezra set his glass down, casually crossing one leg over the other as he spoke.

"I was dead, once," Ezra proclaimed, "But I came back."

Which was not untrue. He spared the gritty details of being Frankenstein's monster, kept alive by a Philosopher's Stone, or bodily functions optional... Dante was just a man that Ezra met in the bar, he wasn't going to give his entire life story. Maybe... with a little more alcohol.

Ezra took another, perfunctory sip of his drink, sighing when he finally came up for air.

"N-not that I have anything to show for it, though," he remarked, smiling sheepishly, "I came back just as... spindly and timid as before."

That was a fabrication. Ezra had no conscious recollection of his previous life. Or, since he had parts from a few different donors-- previous "lives" if you wanted to be specific.

Dante quirked a brow as the larger gentleman spoke; it really didn't explain too much to be honest, but it was an interesting bit of knowledge. Then again, the two men had just met, even if the smaller man believed that getting the smoke punched out of him warranted a little bit more. But he said nothing of it, just raised his bottle to his lips with a nod. It was then that he felt this...odd, sensation in his face. It was a surge of pain in his cheek that almost felt like it had a pulse.

Pausing, he put the glass bottle to his cheek, letting the cool glass come in contact with the wound for a little bit. "That's not gonna feel too pleasant in the morning," he mused, shaking his head slightly. "Well, timid ain't necessarily a bad thing. Keeps you out of trouble," he said, taking another healthy swig of his drink as he looked over at the larger mutant.

Ezra chased any further explanations away with another generous sip of the Tom Collins. The glass was then lightly placed upon the table. There was a note of concern in his gaze as Dante drew his bottle to is cheek.

"M-maybe you could ask the bartender for a bag of ice?" Ezra proposed, smiling. He traced the edge of his cylindrical glass with a fingertip, dropping his gaze towards his drink. There was a sort of pregnant silence that followed Dante's remark, and that elicited another glance from the homunculus.

"Well, it keeps me from causing trouble, perhaps," Ezra remarked, "Humans have always had a proclivity for seeking me out for trouble, however, even when I was yet young in this world. I would attribute this to my stature."

Most nimrods who desired a fight looked for the biggest man in the vicinity and looked to incite conflict with them. That was simply how things were.

Ezra took another sip of his drink, a pregnant silence settling on him once again. It had been days since he had eaten, which meant that the alcohol went directly to his head. This, of course, made focusing on the conversation in front of him very difficult to follow.

"Though one would hope that the fact that my nose is typically buried deep within a book would be indication enough of my... talents... and how inaccurate their assumptions are... you know?" Maybe Dante didn't know. Maybe Ezra wasn't making an ounce of sense.

"I suppose... what I'm trying to say is that I appreciate your assistance, sincerely."

Another swig of the Tom Collins followed the remark. Maybe, if he got far enough along in his drink, he could trigger a more eloquent rendition of Ezra Pahlke. n Ezra Pahlke that didn't just... ramble about the tribulations of being a tall, bookish type.

Dante chuckled at the other mutant's suggestion. "That isn't a bad idea, actually," he said before waving the bartender over and asking for a bag of ice. The bartender gave a smile and a nod, then quickly came back with a bag.

"Rough night, kid?"
"Heh, yeah. Let's just say I learned not every bar is as mutant friendly as you guys are," he replied, holding the ice to his face with one hand as the other brought his drink to his lips.
"Yeah, I understand that, but that's what you get for going somewhere else," the stout bartender joked before giving a grin and walking away to tend to other patrons.

Turning back to Ezra, he listened intently, then gave a nod. "Yeah, some people just like to provoke others. Hell, this isn't the first bruise I've sported for defending a mutant. Growing up, my baby sister was always a prime target for bullies who liked to pull her tail, or just mess with her. I got in so much trouble at school," he gave a slight, nostalgic chuckle. "But...given the chance, I'd gladly do it all over again. People can't help how they look, how they were born."

He paused, looking Ezra over. "Like I said, anytime." He gave a smile as he finished off his drink and set the empty bottle on the counter.

If Ezra had more wherewithal, he would have noticed the correlation to the diminishing amount of his Tom Collins and his increasingly foggy thoughts. Someone who might not necessarily know the homunculus well might say, “Well, he's a big fellow, certainly he could hold his liquor!”

They would be wrong, on two accounts-- Ezra’s lankiness put him at a distinct disadvantage, and he also scarcely ate. There was nothing in his stomach to absorb the alcohol. As such, the typically close-lipped homunculus was hastily wandering into “open book" territory. Particularly for the fellow who seemed to fit the “swashbuckling hero" stereotype to a T.

“What a good brother,” Ezra commended his friend, smiling a tad sloppily, “I wish I had a brother like that. I don't even have family… as far as I know.”

He laughed at how he thought that might sound. “No family.”

“That's not entirely accurate,” he corrected himself, pointing an index finger skyward as if preparing to make a proclamation, “I have no biological family. I've found plenty of surrogate families over the years. Birds of a feather, and all that.”

He peered at Dante, wondering if the smaller man caught his drift.