Flint was doing his best to hide in the shadows of the booth that Kenni and Lastor had picked out. He had been doing well, no one had seemed to recognize him and he preferred it that way. Being back where it had all started was not doing him any favours in the mental department. He was getting twitchy and that damned fog was taunting him with the thoughts of encasing him.

He rubbed his hand on his jeans and mentally cursed to himself. All of his memories were shoving at him. Every single one stinging him with the memory of being banished from this fucking bar by his best friend. He didn't have a place in this town, among the clans he had grown up with, among the clan he had been born to. He knew his mother would have sadly shaken her head at what had happened, would have slapped him and Brutus upside the head for even thinking about tearing the family apart like it was but she was dead and this was all there was left.

There were no good memories waiting for him outside of the meagre amount of shadows he found himself in. "I should have stayed away." He knew he should have, this was a big fucking mistake.

"No one has noticed you. Stop bellyaching." Kenni practically sneered it at him and Flint flashed her his teeth in warning. He really wasn't in the mood. "Bite me." She flashed her fangs at him in return as she hissed it out.

"All of us know that neither one of you would enjoy that." Lastor picked up his beer bottle and sloshed it around. He hadn't drank any of it but then again it tracked for him. As a Salus vampire he needed more blood than the average vamp like Kenni, and could barely eat other food. He could in a pinch but it wasn't agreeable with him for the most part. Kenni could pack away food like no one's business but Lastor couldn't. It had been explained to him but Flint couldn't quite remember how it went with the medical terminology. Something about the expended energy he used while healing others meant he could only use pure octane fuel rather than regular. AKA, more blood, less food.

"You think Nalah is alright?" Kenni tapped her fingers on the table top as she grabbed her bottle of beer and took the last swig of it.

"I would be more worried about the contact." Flint muttered it out but it was the truth. Nalah could take care of herself. Didn't mean he liked her being out of sight on a mission though and he knew his two other team mates felt the exact same way. They didn't like anyone being way from the group, aside from Kenni but she was usually behind by several hundred feet watching their asses through a scope of a high powered rifle.

"I'm giving her twenty minutes. She's down ten now. After twenty we go and find her." Lastor's leg was bouncing up and down, Flint could hear it pushing down slightly on a squeaky floor board. He rolled his head on his shoulders, trying not to let that hormonal haze creep up on him. Lastor didn't need him snapping on him.

"Agreed." Kenni reached over and snagged Lastor's beer, taking a heavy pull from the bottle.

"Fuck you, Kenni." Lastor yanked it away but Kenni didn't seem to notice as she made a face.

"Corona? You're a fucking basic bitch, Lastoriolli." She grimaced, making another face before she lifted her empty beer bottle and waved it slightly to catch the waitress' attention. Flint glanced towards whatever female Kenni had flagged down and nearly choked when he caught sight of her.

He coughed, trying to recover from the shock and Lastor grabbed his arm. "You alright?" It was a harsh whisper and Flint shook his head as he covered his mouth, turning his face away from his niece as she moved closer. He knew it was Clary, fifteen years older, but she always did look like her mama. He pulled his arm from Lastor's hand and swallowed hard, doing his best to keep the coughing under wraps.

"Hi there! My name is Clary, What can I get for you tonight?" Her tone was light and bubbly and Flint swallowed down more coughs as he stiffened. It hurt, seeing her again hurt. It reminded him that he had been gone for far too long. She had grown up, all of the little ones had grown up, and the thought hurt, looking at her fucking hurt.

His clan had moved on, their lives had changed, the children had grown up, and he had been left behind. Bitterness seeped through him at the thoughts. That was how it worked when you were banished, you were cut off and everyone else was free to move on and forget. He clenched his hands into fists and sunk closer to the wall, hiding more in the shadows. It had to be his luck that she was there, that she had to be working in that bar on the one and only night he had come back since his banishment.

"Give me another one of these." Kenni said it lazily as she set her bottle down at the end of the table, right in front of Clary.

"Anyone else?" Her voice was peppy and happy and Flint closed his eyes and held his breath. His chest hurt, his heart hurt. It was one thing to remember the memories and know you could never again be with those people again, it was another to have your living flesh and blood stand in front of you and not be able to say or do anything.

"I'm good." Lastor said it firmly before nudging Flint's leg underneath the table. Flint shook his head and Lastor shoved at his leg harder, jerking his head towards her.

"I'm fine." Flint opened his eyes and ground it out, dropping his voice as he sent a prayer up to the moon that Clary wouldn't recognize him. The last thing they needed was his brother coming into the bar to make a scene. However Flint had a feeling that was exactly what was going to happen as Clary froze, staring into the shadows, her eyes narrowing as she seemed to be trying to make out his features as she inhaled deeply as if trying to scent him out.

"Beer, dollface. I want a beer." Kenni picked up her empty bottle and thumped it against the table top rather loudly. Clary jumped but grabbed the bottle with a hasty apology before moving away quickly. "Okay, what the fuck?" Kenni hissed it out as she leaned towards Flint and he grimaced.

"That is-was my niece. We might be in shit." He rubbed at his face and bit back a groan. He hoped against all odds that Clary didn't recognize him. He was fifteen years older, yes, but he looked relatively the same, a bit bigger, a bit gruffer, but still the same. He wasn't like her, he didn't have fifteen years to grow into an adult, he had already been one when he left. There wasn't much changing with that.

"That is shit luck right there." Lastor said it low as he grabbed his beer bottle and took a heavy drink with a grimace that spoke of how much he did not like the plain beer or the situation.

"She's actually part of the reason I was kicked from my clan." Flint found himself looking out into the bar for her. "I did my duty as protector of the family and beat the boy that I caught sneaking into her room late at night. She was dating him but he hadn't declared his intentions to me. They were going to get bound and I wasn't to be around." He spotted her and stared at her hands, no ring. His eyes travelled over her arms, no tattoos, and then to her neck and shoulder, no binding mark. "Doesn't look like that happened." A heavy bitterness flooded him at the realization. Just like he had said, Clary and that male hadn't been bound. He had lost his home, his position, and his clan for no fucking reason.

"That's a damn shame." Kenni nearly said it in a tsking manner as she ran her hand through the long hair at the top of her head, grasping the black strands in her hand, showing off her undercut. "Now you're our problem." She tsked lightly before kicking at his foot underneath the table. Flint's mouth twitched upwards slightly at her attempt to deflect away from the subject but the bitterness was just a bit too thick and the hurt a bit too raw to joke about it.

Lastor knocked his boot against Flint's and Flint gave him a nod of acknowledgement. He knew he would need to talk about it later, let them both know what was going on in his head but that would be later. They needed to be aware of any and all distractions that could crop up and Flint wouldn't keep how he felt about it all away from them but right now he didn't want to talk. Lastor seemed to pick up on that and simply nodded his agreement to the unspoken answer of a question he hadn't actually asked.

Silence fell and Flint could feel eyes starting to look towards him and he cursed heavily to himself. The last thing they needed was to cause a scene before they knew what the op was. If their presence was notable then they could be comprised and he cursed Mick for essentially forcing him to go out. Best tracker or not, it wasn't worth it to compromise the entire team.

"I'm sorry about the wait. Here is your beer." Clary sounded nearly breathless as she came back over with a tray. She set a beer bottle in front of Kenni and then smiled wide at Flint. "And a whiskey neat, three fingers." The glass clunked down close to him and Flint blinked as he slowly turned his head to look at his niece. "That is what you usually get, isn't it Uncle Flint?" She practically clutched the tray to her chest, beaming so wide and welcoming that Flint felt like he had been gut punched.

He could feel Lastor and Kenni staring at him, glancing between the drink, Clary, and him. He inhaled deeply, taking in the familiar scent of his clan that he had almost forgotten before he leaned out of the shadows and grasped the glass. He ignored how Clary gasped, how her excitement seemed to waft out of her as she realized that she had been indeed correct in her guess of who he was. "I don't drink." He said it firmly as he set the glass down at the end of the table. The sound had a finality to it, a closure of a part of his life he wasn't allowed back into. He leaned back, once again letting the shadows swallow him up as he tried to put space between him and his clan. It didn't feel like enough, in fact the bar felt too damn small as she stared at him.

Her smile faltered slightly but she bolstered it as she grasped the glass. "It's on the house. It's just like what you used to order. I even texted Tamara and asked her what you used to get. I did it exactly how you used to like it." She slid it back towards him and the moment she let it go Flint reached over and gently pushed it back towards her.

"I don't drink." The pain and bitterness was bubbling together inside of him and a form of anger was building. She had been a foolish female when she had been young, putting a future above her family, a future that hadn't happened. Her actions had helped get him banished and there was no way she believed that one drink would make it all better, would erase the fifteen years that he had been without his clan. He had claimed a new one, yes, but it didn't erase what had been taken from him.

"You can take it. It's fine." She slid the glass back towards him.

Kenni let out a hiss as she grabbed the glass and slammed it back in front of his niece, the whiskey sloshing out of the glass. "He said he doesn't drink." Her voice was damn near deadly and Clary jumped at the sharp sound the glass made as it hit the table.

Flint was feeling like the walls were closing in on him as he watched the scene unfold. He knew Kenni was just protecting him in her own way. He was trying to close that door and Clary wasn't letting him. He appreciated what Kenni was doing but he needed to get out and have a smoke. He needed to get the scents out of his nose before he went crazy.

"Excuse me but this is a family matter." Clary said it low and with warning, her own chest rumbling and Flint finally slid out of the booth and stood up. Clary backed up as he drew to his full height, he didn't know if she did it out of fear or because she was smaller than him. Her mama had done that same half step back as she did when he had stood up around her. "Uncle-"

Flint held up a finger, cutting her off as he looked down at her, doing his best to ignore all the eyes that were on them. He kept his expression even and neutral, not showing anything that was going on inside of his mind about the entire situation. "I'm not your uncle so don't call me that." The words rumbled out of him and he shifted on his feet, dismissing her as he pulled a pack of the herbal cigarettes from his pocket and heading out the exit that was right close to their spot.

No need to get involved at all. There was no family there, not anymore.