"I hear you can buy tall glasses of booze here. Let's find us a few of those."

Is Red surprised Abe was asking for alcohol? A little, but he was also not going to question or deny it.

Hellboy rearranged the itinerary in his head to find booze first, then gamble.

Abe had stripped for females not of his own species, and coached an underage boy through buying clothing off a stripper. He deserved a drink.

At least a drink, as he had a feeling getting rotten eggs was out of the question.

"I will follow you, Red. Your uncanny instinct for trouble should find us a table and waitress soon enough" he sighed, then resumed coaching Haru on the English terms needed for blackjack. Like "Hit me, stay, double down..."

Maybe better off Abe doesn't know just how underage.

Hatsuharu is a good learner with the gambling at least, eventually able to repeat the phrases back understandably.

It wasn't too long before Red found them a place.

"Here we go."

It was a nightclub/casino/bar, with a counter, booths and tables around a stage and a few slot machines and a table game or two going on in the back.

Red took a seat at one of the tables and tapped his cigar out in the ashtray ontop of it. "We'll get a drink and then get to the gamblin."

They got a weird look or twelve. Of course they got weird looks; to which Blue smiled charmingly and replied "Stripper party" What else was he suppose to say? 'Yes, I am a fish man?'

He didn't see that one going over well, and the confession of stripping seemed to work just fine. They even got a few sympathetic winces and mutters of "...latex is a bitch." they could certainly live with that.

Live with it better once the beer arrived; carried by a delightful young woman who looked oddly like Liz, but dressed in some strange cross between a harem outfit and a gypsy skirt. "This place is strange" Abe sighed, once the cards were dealt; of course, there was nothing but sarcastic humor in the tone.

"Thanks, pretty." Hatsuharu said to the waitress who brought them their drinks. They were considerably smoother than the rest of his English - leave it to the boy to have priorities.

"/Americans are weird. Are we in America? Is that guy actually wearing a cowboy hat?/" Hatsuharu said by way of running commentary as he looked over his cards. This served two purposes. One, it would let him know if they were in America. Two, disparaging comments would probably reveal if anyone else at the table spoke Japanese.

Red actually did a double take at the waitress and followed her with his eyes as she walked off, even going so far as to turn his head with her movements.

His cards were ignored in favor of watching the Liz lookalike.

Abe followed her as well, mulling over the possibilities. After all, the resemblance was simply uncanny, and, well...uncanny was not something to be ignored in their line of business. "This is another universe, Red." he whispered carefully. "Humans we know may have counterparts..."

Counterparts that Haru had hit on.

Umm.

"Hit me, please." he sighed to the dealer, turning resolutely away from his friends doppleganger. "/And yes, we are. Yes, he is...and said gentleman in the hat seems to dislike your commentary.../"

The man in the hat (it was not yellow) was eying Haru with the bored look of incredible disdain, then answered in flawless Japanese "/I hardly think you have the right to comment on my hat, given your own attire./"

"/I look awesome, cowboy./" Hatsuharu stated blandly. At least he knew that there was at least one other person at the table who spoke Japanese.

"Hit me." he said to the dealer right after that, noticing Hellboy's eyes still following the waitress, and raised an eyebrow. "/Go for it, dude./"

... It was probably good that some things were lost in translation.

Hellboy watched her until she stepped through a door then turned back to the table.

"That better not have been one of the phrases you taught him, Abe." He muttered about Hatsuharu's comment to the waitress.

Looking over his cards he tapped the table with a stone finger. "Hit me."

The Japanese exchange caught his attention and he glanced at Abe, "What's that about?"

"It did not occur to me to teach Haru how to hit on women. I would have taught him finesse..." he pointed out easily to his friend. "Haru also encourages you to 'Go for it' in regards to well, let us call her the waitress instead of Liz yes?" he might have been teasing. Might, judging the small smirk on his lips.

He eyed his cards and signaled a hold at twenty, then turned back to his friend "And the men are generally rubbing each other the wrong way I believe, both being disparaging of each other and hopefully, that will be the end of it."

Of course, that was an optimistic statement given that the man in the cowboy hat continued to eye their underage companion with disdain, then answered "/If by 'awesome' you mean 'cheap'. I applaude you in realizing that gambling is an easier to way to pay the bills./"

Cue a fishman facepalming.