"Ha! Like I give a damn. I wouldn't wear these pants if I cared about people looking."

He pulls up his crotch demonstratively.

"How about you, what interesting quirks has the wider multiverse failed to work out about your world?"

"Hmm. Uh, asari aren't women but don't generally care very much if you get it wrong? The blanket ban on extreme genetic engineering doesn't mean we aren't all engineered to the absolute limit of the law? The fact that we don't have magic doesn't mean we don't understand pretty well how it works once it's been explained?"

"Asari, those're the blue ones with the tentacle hair? Huh. What are they if they aren't women?"

"Not women," Tintin shrugs. "They just don't have a thing where gender goes. They're all asari."

"Learn something new every day. What say we get a drink, uh..."

"Valentin Saint-Martin," he says, sketching a little bow. "Tintin, if you please."

"Chilchuck. Chilchuck Tims. You... are adorable. And I do not say that often."

Tintin heads for the bar. "Thanks!"

When they reach the bar, Chilchuck is able to climb onto a barstool, but it's a pretty near thing. "Accessibility," he grumbles. "An underrated virtue."

"I'm guessing you wouldn't have taken kindly to being helped up."

"Would've bitten you, yeah."

"Noted."

They get drinks: Tintin something fruity that doesn't taste like booze, Chilchuck a bitter ale.

"I've never understood the draw of beer," Tintin comments. "If you want to get drunk there are easier and more straightforward ways."

"It's a cultural thing. And I like the taste."

"It tastes like rotten grain!"

"Maybe to your sensitive tallman tongue. Drink your fruitwater."

Tintin drinks his tallman fruitwater.

"So - what brings you to the Bowers?" he asks. "I did some work for the OTC, on, uh, sort of an unofficial basis."

"Same, pretty much. My world was threatened by demons that feed on desire, and I provided some important information that the OTC needed in order to keep them contained. Plus I used to run a workers' union, so I made an obvious candidate for an ambassador... apparently."

"A union! Nice. I'm just kind of a general adventurer."

"Well I did that too, but honestly, I usually prefer not to put my own ass on the line unless I really have to."

"Ah, there's the difference between us. I'm constitutionally incapable of self-preservation."

"I've known the type."

Chilchuck takes a long pull of his ale.

"But neither of us came here to talk about work. So I guess the real answer to 'what brings me to the Bowers' is 'I'm an inveterate hedonist and it seemed like the kind of place I could have a good time.'"

"And is it, so far?"

"Oh, I just got here. Literally, walked through the door an hour ago. Not much time to form an impression. The complimentary chocolates were nice, I guess."

"Ah. No time yet to sample the other pleasures on offer, then."

Chilchuck looks him over. "Are you offering?"