Home again, home again, jiggety-jig

[cats_scratched]

He hasn't liked travelling by plane, not for some time. It's too confined, being pent up in a metal tube with wings, 30,000 feet above the ground. Thomas used to be the sort of man who could handle that kind of thing

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[kathy_duquesne]

Kathy walks away from the gate; with that last Yakuza member leaving, that is the final divorce between the family business she's inherited and any criminal ties. She had to see him off... personally

As she passes baggage claim, she pauses. There... strong, broad shoulders. A perfectly delightful bit of scruff. Well-dressed, and comfortable.

She knows she's seen that face before. But where? From one of Daddy's... social dinners? Part of the criminal element in Gotham? If so, he hasn't been around for a long time.

Kathy considers. If he's a returning part of the criminal element, it's best if she gets to know him quickly. If not... it's best she gets to know those delicious shoulders quickly.

She steps up to him, getting out her compact from her purse and applying lipstick while checking herself in the small mirror as she stands beside him.

"Don't you hate checking luggage?" she asks him, mid-application.

[cats_scratched]

Thomas is standing there, confused. He hasn't had much of a history of fetching his own baggage after an international flight, of course, and is turning his ticket over in his hands, looking for the correct gate number, to match it with the LED numbers over the baggage claim treadmills.

Tedious.

When she steps close enough for him to smell her, he smiles in spite of himself. No overdose of perfume, just a touch, enough to make his sensitive nostrils flare. Most of what he smells is simply woman, and that, he can appreciate. Thomas glances in her direction.

"I haven't flown in a long time. Last time I did, I had someone to handle all of this for me, actually. Which one is for flight 816 from Kenya?" He flashed her his best smile, and it didn't feel forced; she was rather pretty.

[kathy_duquesne]

Kathy smiles at him. "This way," she directs him, and begins to show the way, letting her hips swing as she walks.

"Coming from Africa, huh? Have you been swinging around the jungles in a loincloth or something?"

[cats_scratched]

"Actually," he said, keeping his voice carefully neutral, "I used to lead over-stuffed rich people on safari trips. I hunted. Still do on occasion, but not for sport. The sport's gone out of killing. Long time now." He couldn't keep a tonal shift from his voice there, one of barely supressed anger, recalling the bodies of his pride, slack and lifeless on the floor of the veldt, one lion's mane shaved off and tacked to a nearby tree. He'd been clenching one hand hard enough to cut off circulation to his knuckles, which had gone the waxy white of a candle. He flexed his hand, an old scar clearly visible along the back of it, remnants of a fight, but he couldn't recall if the opponent had been man, beast or Bat.

"I was reasonably good with my money, so I took some time off to...well, I suppose most people these days say to "find themselves", but with me it was more of a getting back to basics approach. And now, I'm back. And I did wear a loincloth, for a while. But there was no swinging."