"Pay, huh?" The blade of the Hasegawa asks, swirling the liquid in his glass. He drinks the rest down in one gulp, savoring the sweet taste on the way down. He drinks like a man that doesn't know the value of anything. Placing the glass down, he grabs another.[break][break]
"Hahaha, I didn't even know we got paid. Whatcha spend yer money on? Got any cool hobbies?" It's in a small dog's nature to be friendly. His swaying shoulders and excited tone serve as fine stand-ins for a wagging tail.[break][break]
Only the sight of one man, alone at a poker table, can excite him more.[break][break]
"Oi! Rookie! You've got money! Let's go have some fun!" They're still on duty, both of them. He places his faith in the Kartana. Whatever his new friend, for he has decided this young man is his friend, decides, he has been thoroughly kidnapped. He trots up to BARNABY FINCH, one of the many dangerous individuals in the room, without a care in the world.[break][break]
"Oi, Admin-san! My buddy and I wanna play poker with you! Can ya like, pull rank a little to let him have a break? I bet he's really good at poker!" The dog has never spoken to this man before, but he speaks with warmth. His face he knows. His name, the dog wouldn't remember at gunpoint.[break][break]
Dog, human, or blade, his money will spend all the same if the smiling admin can swindle him out of it.

A number of people come and go - which is simply par for the course, when one is hanging near someone offering drinks.

There are brief glimpses of Troy MacQueen and jayden cross, who simply take a drink and move on - and parker jones as well, approaching for drinks. Though Makoto pays brief glances to them, they don't linger - not wanting to stare.

Then there is Hitoshi Inoue, who strikes up a conversation with Steven Campbell - and Makoto does idly listen, a bit curious to hear what Steven's thoughts may be... Though, it doesn't prove to be anything too insightful, at least as far as Makoto's own ponderings go. And they don't exactly have the opportunity to pose their own questions before Steven is kidnapped off to another person's table - someone playing poker, it looked like.

But then there are the familiar faces who are still here, howard slayte and Amor Rose. Seeing them, Makoto can't help the slightest smile, as they join the duo in sitting down. "Enjoying it where I can," They respond to Amor's question, sipping their drink - though they weren't quite used to these big social gatherings, actually having a couple of friends certainly helped in settling into the rhythm. "It's amazing, just how much gets put into these parties."

They weren't all that big on the music choice either, honestly, but they could at least tolerate it.

Tsukiko, meanwhile, seemed sympathetic to Howard's plight - as she would sit at his side and rest her head on his lap, looking up at him with big round eyes. Surely, petting her will make all the woes go away, right? She's even happy to lend a Wish for Howard's sake!

The question of gifts, though, would have Makoto blink a bit. "I... feel like it'd defeat the purpose of the white elephant exchange, if we talked about what our gifts are, wouldn't it?" Weren't they meant to be a surprise?

Eyes flickered back onto the wolfish man, who was barking for attention. If this had been anywhere else, preferably somewhere without rankings and threats of death looming over their heads, Steven's response might've been colder. More 'what the fuck are you saying' than the current pleasantries he was forced to regurgitate.

"School, mostly," he answered again, forcing a warm smile. If someone didn't know any better, they'd see two happy dogs yapping to each other, not a tired man being held against his will. "But I'm also in a band, so I guess I put some money into that, too."

When his gaze traveled to the poker table, so did Steven's, and what he saw could only be described as one shitty coincidence. Of course BARNABY FINCH was here. And of course this random guy, who was hellbent on dragging him away, was taking him straight to the admin.

"Hello, sir. Hope luck has been on your side," he nodded toward the poker table, "It's okay, I'm happy serving the rest of my shift here. I mean, who else will keep everyone from growing parch."

If nothing else, these months under Rocket's thumb taught him one thing: how to play his role effectively.

Oscar chuckled at Mint's Genesect dreams. "Yes please, we can do a playdate! Prime hasn't met another Genesect yet, I bet they'd get along." Or you know, rip each other apart. There was not enough data of Genesect interacting with each other to be worried about it. As far as Oscar knew, it would be adorable.

Oscar flinched as Mint's vaporeon came up to him. He was not paying enough attention, silly dog got the drop on him. Oscar chuckled nervously, "I dunno if I'm allowed to feed you anything." Mint confirmed that the poor thing was getting tubby, but Oscar could not let it wander away empty handed. He poured a single boba pearl from out of his straw and covertly offered it to the water dog. A fun secret between him and Oscar.

Oscar moved up to observe Mint's playlist, and he liked a lot of what he saw. Fucker was a gifted vibe master. "Yeah for sure! It'll keep me company as I bury myself in paperwork." Oscar looked away when Mint started texting, it would be impolite to eavesdrop. His eyes would scan the party floor, resting upon a familiar face he had yet to reunite with. Oscar's eyes beamed.

"Hold up I gotta say hi to someone. I'll grab drinks, do you want anything?" After taking Mint's order Oscar would excuse himself and power walk out to greet his oldest friend. "Priam! Priam over here! PRIAM! PRIAAAAM!"

tl;dr
--Open to interactions.
--Oscar secretly fed mint frost's vaporeon a boba pearl.
--Oscar excused himself from the dj booth to reunite with priam conrad