You drive by an inconspicuous building. There's nothing fancy about it from the outside. It looks like your typical storefront with writing on the windows. The writing says:

BACON - IT'S WHAT'S FOR BREAKFAST!
Open 24/7 

You look up at the sign

 
A Salt & Battery Breakfast Joint

You realize that you are hungry and decide to see what this is about. As you enter, you realize this isn't your typical restaurant. You check out the place. The walls had wallpaper of the streets of Chicago. Pictures of mobsters were on the wall. Padded benches lined both walls. The booths had rectangular Tommy Gun cases for tables and four Tommy Guns for legs. There were 6 center tables. Each center table had to Tommy Gun cases connected (with Tommy Guns for legs and four wooden chairs facing the door. Every seat had a view of the door. There were no surprises here. Maple Syrup, Ketchup, Salt, Pepper, Silverware, and Napkins were on every table.

You see a sign that says   Seat Yourself.   You select your strategic position and sit.

The double swing doors that lead to the kitchen swung open as the waitress appeared. She hands you a menu and pours you coffee without asking if you wanted it. Everyone here wants coffee.

I'll be right back for your order, she says. The waitress walks the room refilling everyone's coffee.

As you wait for her return, you read the menu.

Menu

 

All Breakfast's come with 6 slices of Bacon and Coffee. Black Coffee, nothing fancy here!
All Breakfasts served with Toast. White Toast, nothing fancy here!

 

Build Your Breakfast (all Breakfasts .35)

From The Chickens (Select One)
Scrambled Eggs
Ham and Cheese Omelet
3 Fried Eggs

The Batter (Select One)
2 Blueberry Pancakes
2 Buttermilk Pancakes
10 Silver Dollar Pancakes (5 Blueberry/5 Buttermilk)
2 Waffles

On the Side (Select Up to 2):
Hash Brown
Extra Bacon (3 slices)
Sausage (3 links)

Thirst Quenchers (Select One - All refills are free)
Coke
Orange Juice
Apple Juice
 

The waitress returns, wields her order pad and pen and asks What can I get ya? 

Mercury emerged from her back office and looked the place over. It was exactly as she had pictured it in her mind.

This was a great front for her and Rain. By opening this business and using Rain's Colombian coffee they are now able to have meetings, move product, and launder money through another location. Mercury would begin to branch out as Rain had. She had a feeling this was going to be a lucrative partnership. She nodded at the staff and disappeared out the back door. Michael was waiting for her. It was time to get to the Yacht Club and make sure the damages had been repaired. She also needed to find out what happened here. A prominent man had been taken down and still she had no answers ...

Mercury sighed as she dragged her ass into A Salt & Battery Breakfast Joint. Those flights were killing her! At least they had their own plane now. While she went into town Michael saw to the the deliveries to the Detroit Yacht Club. They were sending shipments along the Great Lakes via a tour boat. The tour boat made various stops along the way. This "tour" went all the way to the Atlantic.

As Mercury entered she saw that it was a slow day. She wasn't concerned. She had stopped to use the phone. She checked on her businesses across the States. All were reporting great business. She looked at the books, reviewed the stock and placed a few orders. While she was in the office, there was a knock at the door. One of the employees let her know that the bread delivery had ran late the last few days. They did not have Bagels this morning when they opened. A few customers left mad.

Mercury made a note of this. She would pay them a visit herself this afternoon. She thanked the guy for the information, gathered her things and left.

Walking in through the doors of A Salt & Battery breakfast joint, she immediately noticed the sign asking customers to seat themselves. She obeyed the rule and sat on a velvet covered seat in the corner hidden away by tall yucca plants. Just as she sat down, a waitress burst through the double doors,  greeted Pencil and poured her a coffee before she had a chance to say anything. On that note the waitress said she will be back to take the order then whisked herself away just as quick as she appeared. During this time, Pencil had time to browse the menu she was given and decide what she wanted while sipping coffee. 

A few moments later the waitress come back with her pen and pad, asking Pencil what she would like to eat or drink? Pencil mulled over it for a few minutes. There was so much choice. She looks up st the waitress and smiles. 

"Hi there, please may I get buttermilk pancakes and an orange juice?" 

"Will that be all?" The waitress asked. Pencil reassured her that was all and picked up a newspaper to read while she waited. 

The waitress brought the Buttermilk Pancakes, bacon (everything comes with bacon) and orange juice out to the table and set it down. The waitress topped off the the coffee and disappeared between the double doors.

When the customer finished eating, she came out, topped off the coffee once more and let the check.

Will that be all, she asked her.

Pencil looked up as the waitress while nodding her head in a gesture to say yes, that is all now.  Pencil thanked the lady and started tucking into the pancakes. She was pleasantly surprised at how lovely they were. They washed down well with the orange juice. The added bacon tipped it off excellently.  Pencil was thrilled with her experience at the salt and battery joint and will definitely be visiting again. She finished the pancakes and sat back in her chair to let them settle in her stomach as she sipped her coffee.  Her horoscopes were interesting in the paper today she thought as she began reading again. 

Finally she was ready to go. She called the waitress over and tipped her largely along with paying for her breakfast. 

"Thank you very much for your hospitality.  Good food and good atmosphere." Pencil stood up, slipped on her coat and wandered out through the door. 

Mercury and Michael grabbed a cup of coffee and sat at the table towards the back. Mercury was waiting on Rain to arrive in Detroit and may as well have breakfast. She motioned the waitress over.

What can I get ya? she asked.

I'll have scrambled eggs, has browns, and orange juice please, Mercury said to her. She looked at Michael who then proceeded to order.

I'll have a ham and cheese omelet, blueberry pancakes, extra bacon and hash browns, he said. Oh, and can you scare up some more coffee? he said as he showed her his empty cup.

Mercury was surprised he drank the coffee so fast. She still had half a cup.

Coming right up! the waitress replied. She turned in the order and came back with coffee. She refilled Michael's and topped off Mercury's

We have a long day ahead of us, Mercury said to Michael. Hopefully Rain will be on time.

The breakfasts arrived and they ate in a tranquil silence. When they finished, Mercury put a $20 on the table and they left. 

Kaiya gazed at the sign "A salt and battery" she giggled and pushed open the doors, the smell of bacon greeted her like an old friend she closed her eyes and took and smelled the bacon filled air.She scanned the restaurant for an empty table and saw one by the window, she jaunted over to the table merrily and took a seat.Picking up the menu she began to read Bacon.eggs.coffee her stomach groaned approvingly as a waitress approached her."May I please have Pancakes and bacon please and a big glass of OJ" she smiled to the waitress as she recited her order and the waitress left.

Minutes late the waitress returned with the order, Kaiya was already waiting knife and fork in hand, after all girls gotta eat! With a polite thank you to the waitress she tucked in ferociously to her breakfast , the fuel to last her up until dinner time.

Enjoying himself in Detroit was something that had Sal comfy with himself, he knew that his father often wrote about this place but what his father didn't know was how much it had changed in the time he had been away. In the time he had passed away, new people rose up and came from what this place once was.

It had risen from the so-called ashes and had become a thriving city once more, though the businesses could have used some remodels, he didn't really see it as a bad thing. He loved the ancient feel, it made him feel apart of history as if it was happening right in front of his eyes. Of course, that led him to this breakfast joint...

A Salt and Battery...there was a pun there, he was sure of it. Shrugging, he decided to enter the place and with a small sigh. He found himself at the counter, sitting down and ordering some buttermilk pancakes along with some coffee...he would have gone for a hot chocolate but he was in the need to stay up for now. 

He had some big-time work coming up, it began soon and he was not going to keep himself awake if he drank some good old coco. Without another sigh, he found himself eating with gusto. 

Only to turn to his right, noticing the same woman from Dale's Burger Joint, you had to be kidding him.....this...she has to be fucking stalking him and not in a good way. 

Sipping his coffee, he gave her a look as she met his eyes with nothing but a soft smile in return. He was not smiling back, he did not like being followed. 

"So, want to tell me why you're following me, Cas? If that's even your name."

She smiled, leaning forward as she ordered the same as he had, seemingly hungry at this time of the night. 

"Well, my name is Cassana and I'm here to discuss the opportunity of the Pavanno family working with Las Vegas' booze runners, The Omertras."

And it was here that he tensed up, his eyes turning cold and for a moment, Cassana thought she was staring at another man entirely. His eyes nearly resembled a frozen land that ice stretched for miles...

"You have five minutes, tell me why I should work with the Omertas once again."

And so she went into the explanation, and she hoped that would have been enough to convince. Since the Pavanno's had retreated back to England, their enterprise in the states had remained afloat due to their various factions. Biker gangs, the Irish, even some local gangs carried the Pavanno's name. Their influence stretched everywhere, her crew needed that, she was willing to sacrifice anything for it.

In a feeble attempt to scout out the other breakfast related businesses of the city, Cepheus found himself at a Salt and Battery Breakfast Joint from the now deceased Mercury who had been known far and wide in his line of work as someone who had been involved with many types of establishments around the cities of the US-- their influence went far in the breakfast line of work, but he was hoping that her passing would give way to a new type of breakfast eatery, the type that only serves pancakes, perhaps?

"So this is the old S&B, eh? Looks good."

Entering the place he takes note of the decor first and then the menu quickly second. It has so many different options, but pancakes seem to take up most of the area. This wasn't good, if someone else was already doing what he was then he'd been called not only a fraudster but someone who can't come up with an original idea! 

Racking his brain for a few moments he came up with at least the idea of a solution and so ordering every pancake on the menu, Cepheus decided to try them all at once and give them scathing reviews. However upon eating them he came to a terrible realization that they were not terrible at all, but honestly comparable to his own... one thing was missing though! He has over 980+ different types of pancake and that type of lunacy was not easily duplicated, it would probably be just fine...

But just in case he ordered one hundred blueberry pancakes and shoved them into a bag. He would take them back to Only Pancakes and attempt to reverse engineer what Mercury had started. Maybe if he started selling such delicious blueberries he would easily overrun this business and see his own thrive even stronger than before! 

Or not. Who cared, honestly. It was just pancakes.

"So...that's it? Profit, no actual loyalty, not that the Omertas had any to begin with, hmm, I find myself...amused that the family which wanted to destroy mine while my grandpop was still kicking comes to his grandson for assistance. One second while I play my violin..."

A smile, a sarcastic one that had bite and Cassana knew that there would be no lashing out at him. He had earned this, most likely reading about them in the journals his family had kept. She had certainly read hers, she knew, her family should have allied with the various families around. Especially one as powerful as the Pavanno's who had a hand in every piece of the pie, it was pretty fucking lovely for each of the crews involved with Charlie. 

"What else? This is the business we live, kid. I have to sate my guys somehow and I doubt they enjoy living off the scraps in vegas for right now, booze and anything else under the sun is how we operate right now. Though, there is a certain way your family has operated. You cannot lie that you have ways into certain markets, the Irish in Detroit, Seattle, Chicago, and some in New York. We want in."

It wasn't his to fucking give, why did everyone think that he had held the cards like some fucking godfather of some kind? He was just Sal, yet the way she was looking at him and pleading with him, she wanted him to know that he had held the power at this moment. He would have to talk to his connects, by that, he fucking meant Keelin. 

"It's not up to me only, gotta talk to my crews but when I have the time and the correct place. You will know and only then, I don't exactly wish to have you stalk me again Cassan. I'll call you to let you know the news regarding this business, it should be a beneficial agreement if all parties can see to that."

With a soft smirk, she left him to his now cold coffee as she walked out. Followed by a few muscle men, commonly known as the thugs or bodyguards, they seemed to be her guard and for that, he was glad that nothing bigger had occurred. Otherwise, he was sure that he would have been on the floor. 

Sighing to himself, he was wondering what he had found himself in. All of this, all just to find himself in a world where he would have thought he belonged.