Archive of Our Own

Ryan doesn’t make a habit of washing his clothes in a public laundromat often for more reasons that one. However, the washer in his apartment is broken and his landlord-slash-boss has yet to fix it. He could fix it himself, sure, or just get his coworker-slash-building repair man to come and fix it but he’s been putting it off for a while. Now he doesn’t have time to fix it, it’s two am, and he needs to get the blood out of his jacket immediately for- health concerns, sure, that. At least the place will probably be empty.

It’s not but Ryan is far from complaining. The only other person in the half lit laundromat is a young blonde woman perched atop one of the driers. She looks at him partially when he comes in with his basket and then immediately goes back to her DS. Ryan isn’t sure it’s safe for a lady of her size and stature to be in the middle of Los Santos at two am like this. She minds her own business, though, and Ryan minds his. He picks a washer a bit aways from hers and piles his clothes in before popping in a quarter.

She looks at him halfly, perhaps noticing the blood on his clothing, but she doesn’t say anything. Or it could be the face paint. It’s probably the face paint. She pops her gum, almost as if to make Ryan say something to her, but he doesn’t. Instead, he takes his book out and makes himself comfortable against the edge of his washer to pass the time. It’s quite aside from the occasional pop of her gum and the soft hum of the machines; Los Santos dead in the night or at least, pretending to be.

Ryan steals a glance at her every so often and she him. Her oversized purple sweater doesn’t give much away as to what she bares underneath but Ryan is guessing it’s a gun. Who in Los Santos doesn’t have a gun? Aside from that, her pert little nipples stand out under the fabric so he’s also guessing not a shirt or bra. He doesn’t stare long and neither does she. Are they flirting? Ryan thinks they’re flirting. If she’s waiting for him to say something, she’s going to be sorely out of luck.

Her drier goes off and Ryan returns to pretending to read his book. For a moment at least. She hops off the machine and searches her pocket for a moment before seemingly coming up empty handed. Searching for another quarter, probably, these machines never dry things completely through the first time. Ryan pushes off his washer and approaches her with some deliberation. He doesn’t want to freak her out by mistake; he’s quite a bit bigger than her and he knows he can look rather intimidating sometimes. He’s supposed to.

He pulls a quarter from his pocket and she looks at him curiously but holds her hand out all the same. Ryan hands it to her quietly and she nods her appreciation. He nods in return, an assurance that it’s fine, and they don’t say anything to each other. She starts up her drier again and they return to not speaking a word to each other. For a moment, Ryan considers giving her his number. Ultimately, he decides against it when he realises how weird that would be. What is he expecting from meeting a beautiful woman in a laundromat at two in the morning? That they’d go out and have coffee and be normal? Ryan is in a laundromat at two in the morning wearing full face paint and washing the clothes he bloodied while stealing thousands of dollars.

Maybe she’d stab him.

An alert sounds and Ryan peers at her momentarily as she checks her phone. She pops her gum loudly and tucks it back into her pocket before hopping off her drier. Now that he takes a closer look, there’s a stain on the back of her sweater that looks suspiciously like dried blood. She takes her earphones out and wraps them around her little handheld game before tucking it in her pocket and taking up her canvas bag. There’s a moment where she waits a beat, allowing the dryer to run for a few more seconds, before she pops it open; dry or otherwise.

She then proceeds to fill her bag with hundreds of bills. Honestly, Ryan isn’t sure what he expected; that she’d actually be doing laundry? Ridiculous. The strange woman is sure to get all of the bills, mostly twenties and hundreds by Ryan’s eye, into her bag before zipping it closed and throwing it over her shoulder. Ryan is staring at her without waver now, almost disappointed that he hadn’t given her his number, and she stops to look at him curiously. She gives him a wink and then she’s leaving.

Ryan watches as she makes her way out and as she reaches the street, a white zentorno pulls up, she hops in, and then she’s gone. Likely forever. So to recap, Ryan wandered into a laundromat with a gorgeous girl washing her likely stolen money, proceeded not to talk to her for thirty minutes then lent her a quarter. She absolutely would have stabbed him.

A small sound echos from his pocket and Ryan checks his phone. A message from an unknown number otherwise known as Geoff. It reads ‘someone stole our fucking heist money’ in all caps. Ryan idly wonders if- and then nah.

- x -

“Just play it cool,” Geoff murmurs quietly.

“Play it cool?” Michael scoffs back. “Ryan’s in full fucking face paint.” In response to this, Geoff glances over his shoulder at Ryan like he’s somehow forgotten. He might have, realistically, considering Ryan never takes it off. Ryan shrugs.

“Alright, play it at least lukewarm,” Geoff corrects. Ryan doesn’t actually know what that means. Regardless, the people in the bank are already uneasy about them and probably for good reason. That being said, there isn’t much they can do, the alarms have already been cut and the jammer is, hopefully, up to par. Matt promised it would be but he promises a lot of things. Now all they have to do is wait for him to get the safe system down so Ryan can blow it open.

That was the plan anyways. Plans change.

“Uh,” Matt says slowly. “Uhh.”

“I don’t like it when you say ‘uh’, Matt!” Geoff snaps.

“Something kicked me out of the system!” Matt replies. “I don’t know what’s going on!”

“Well fucking fix it,” Michael barks. “Now.”

“I’m working on it!” Matt assures irritably. “Uh, alright, don’t be mad but I’m locked out of the safe security system.”

“You’re what‽” Geoff hisses. He doesn’t have long to be upset about this. Without warning, the front doors of the bank slam open and a particularly large woman with a gun walks in. The bank they’re robbing is getting robbed. Unbelievable. Ryan looks at his gun for a moment before hurriedly covering it up with his jacket. His pistol is much smaller than her assault rifle. They didn’t come armed for a heavy fight.

Behind the woman is a familiar blonde and an unfamiliar one. One of them chains the doors closed and the other walks forward with her also rather big, semi auto weapon. His? Ryan supposes that’s unimportant. He looks to Geoff for further instruction.

“Alright everyone! Get down and we’ll be out of your way in no time!” the woman announces. “No funny business!” Everyone hurriedly gets down and Ryan only waits long enough to see that Geoff is going to go along with this before doing so as well. The only real defense they have at the moment are sticky bombs for blowing open the safe and in this enclosed area, they’d only assure mutual destruction. Honestly, they’ve never had a contingency plan for if someone else tried to rob the same bank they’re trying to rob. How does that even happen?

“V, get the safe,” the woman commands. The unfamiliar blonde gladly rushes off, hopping over a counter and disappearing behind the desk of workers. “Brownii, grab everyone’s wallets.” The familiar one, Brownii, nods agreeably and pulls the bag from over her shoulder and opens it up. With the larger woman watching over, assuring no one moves out of place, the other goes around making everyone empty their pockets. Ryan isn’t sure what he’s going to do when she gets around to him, the only thing he has in his pocket are matches and a hand grenade. For grenade emergencies and all that.

When she gets to Michael, he holds out. He drops his wallet, a fake Ryan’s sure, and his watch in the bag with a mild scoff. If he’s as smart as Ryan gives him credit for, it should be easy to track the watch down later. She continues on without giving Michael a second thought. He almost reaches for his gun but, sure enough, their ringleader still lingers with a close eye on everyone. It’s not worth the risk right now.

Brownii makes her way around to Ryan and when she does, she stops. This could be bad. Ryan looks at her mildly and she gives him a strange look. She’s wearing a ‘mask’ sure, but Ryan recognises her. While that’s fine and dandy, Ryan is a wanted criminal and a notorious member of the FAKE crew. She didn’t recognise him at the laundromat, right?

“Brownii?” their leader asks cautiously. Geoff looks at Ryan urgently, obviously wanting him to do something. Considering they’re robbing a very high priced bank, it’s likely these people would want them dead if they knew they were FAKE. A lot of people want them dead, fairly. Ryan is willing risk whether or not doing anything is necessary.

“I know you,” Brownii says plainly. Not a great start, sure. Ryan just looks at her questioningly, hoping not to do anything to give himself away. They’re not in a good position right now. “Yeah, you leant me a quarter at the laundromat a few weeks ago.” Geoff glares at him across the way. Ryan had mentioned it and Geoff had passed it off like it wasn’t anything for them to worry about. What did he want.

“Thanks for that,” Brownii grins at him. She brushes her fingers through her hair a bit and from out of the curly blonde locks emerges a pen. With some lack of self safety, she puts her bag down momentarily to fish out a bill and proceeds to write on it before tucking the ten into the collar of Ryan’s shirt. They were definitely flirting. She winks at him and then picks up her bag and continues on without making him empty his pockets.

That was interesting.

“I got it!” V announces as they return with whatever it is they were after. Money would be the obvious answer but their bag seems awfully light for that. Nevertheless, their leader nods and gestures them to a side door.

“Let’s go,” she announces. They definitely weren’t here for money. Much as they came, they leave suddenly and in a loud bang of noise.

“Dammit, Vav!” Brownii shouts. “We were almost so cool!” Once they’re gone, everyone gradually rises in confusion and distress. Alright, that was definitely a hitch in their plan and a blow to their wallets.

“That was weird,” Matt says mutely. “I’m back in? And the safe’s open, so- yeah!”

“Everyone back on the ground!” Geoff calls as he pulls out his gun. “Those of you still with wallets, get them out! The rest of you, I don’t know, just chill for a minute, okay? We’re working on the fly here.”

Ryan takes the bill out of his shirt curiously and unwrinkles it. Printed on the face side is her name, or at least what they call her, and a phone number. ‘Txt me’ is scribbled haphazardly at the bottom. Second recap; met a hot girl at a laundromat who was washing her stolen money, lent her a quarter, then two weeks later ended up trying to rob the same bank as her and instead got her phone number. Ryan’s been doing this whole dating thing wrong from the very beginning.

Michael looks at him irritably and Ryan gives him a questioning look.

“Your new fucking girlfriend stole my watch,” he says blandly. Ryan looks at the bill in his hand and then to Michael before pointedly putting it in his pocket. “You’re buying me a new fucking watch.”

He’s not doing that.

“Hey assholes! Money to steal!” Geoff snaps at them. “R, get in the safe. Mikey, grab the tills.”

“Don’t call me fucking Mikey.”

- x -

Ryan grooms his nails with his knife as Matt drops a stack of papers on their heist table. Geoff is still pretty upset about what happened at the bank mostly because they had been shown up hard. They had still brought in a good sum of cash, more than they could carry, but the news is almost exclusively talking about the ladies that had beat them to it. The FAKE crew is only mentioned in passing; still extremely wanted. That never changes.

“This is all that I could find,” Matt announces. Honestly, between them they could probably find a lot more, but they make Matt do it because that kind of stuff is boring. Ryan has better things to do now a days than research. He’s not sure what those things are, really, but they're probably important. Matt pins a picture to their map of the assault rifle wielding woman.

“Jack,” he says. “Jack Pattillo specifically. Not a crime on her record. Which, you know, you’d think maybe she was new at this- nah. Apparently she’s an underground fight champion.” He pins up another photo, similarly of her only with a beard and less makeup. Ryan thought it before and he’ll think it again, that’s a big woman. “She beat a man to death. Like, with her bare hands. She likes gambling, fine liquors, and fast cars.”

“Sounds like Geoff,” Michael jokes somewhat irritably. “Only more competent.”

“Who’s paying you again?” Geoff huffs back. “Oh, right, me. Shut up.” Matt pins up another headshot, this of the so called ‘Vav’.

“This is Free,” he explains. “I couldn’t find his first name, also not sure that’s actually his last name. People just call him ‘Vav’. He’s a black market expert.”

“That’s a dude?” Geoff questions.

“Uh,” Matt says looking at the image. “No. He, she, they- Vav doesn’t seem to care? Honestly, if you get that close to him, he’s probably just stealing your wallet.” He shows off several smaller images of Vav in various states of dressing. At any rate, they are pretty easy to recognise in most of them and therefore, they probably isn’t dressed to disguise.

“Well, she almost broke her neck leaving the bank,” Michael reminds. “How dangerous could she be?”

“Yeeah,” Matt replies like he doesn’t exactly agree. “He’s caused hundred of thousands of dollars in damage in the last three days alone. Mostly with explosions.” Oh, that’s great. Ryan likes deadly explosions as much as the next guy but typically he likes them more when he’s the one responsible. “Likes expensive clothes, money, and crashing fast cars.”

“Is there a point somewhere in all of this?” Geoff asks irritably.

“Hey, you told me to find what I could, this is what I found,” Matt promises as he puts up another image. This one Ryan’s actually interested in. Unlike the other two which were taken either from somewhere else or without the person’s knowledge, this one is obviously a selfie. Brownii is posing with a purse full of very shiny, very expensive looking jewelry. “And this is Ray Narvaez Jr, aka ‘Brownii’. Sniper.”

Ryan is definitely interested. He’s yet to text her, partially because he’s not sure exactly what to say or if she, in fact, does know he’s FAKE, but also partially because he wants to find out more about her first.

“I don’t know if the number she gave Ryan was real or not, but it’s functioning and listed to the name ‘meatspin’, so there you go,” Matt explains. “As far as I can tell, she’s an ex-LSPD officer and a hell of a shot. Likes, and I quote from her Tinder, ‘blazin’ it up, cash money, achievements, and Up n’ Atom’.”

“She’s definitely a keeper,” Michael jokes, elbowing Ryan in the rib. Ex-LSPD? That’s quite impressive. Most people don’t last long enough to become an ‘ex’ LSPD anything. She’s so small, too. Perhaps he’ll text her after all. Matt posts up an image of a cat.

“Matt,” Geoff says flatly.

“They have a hacker, I guess?” Matt murmurs. “I don’t know who she, or he, or they are but they sent me this picture. That’s all I got.”

“They sent you a cat picture?" Geoff confirms. Matt looks at the image a moment before looking back on them.

"Yes," he says flatly. "They're good."

"Maybe we should have hired them instead," Michael scoffs. Matt frowns indignantly but he doesn't really have a defense for himself. Whoever this hacker is, they got into the safe faster than Matt had. Not only that but they had managed to first kick his connection completely. That's impressive, too. Making no mention of their own hacker's competence, Geoff moves on.

"Did you find out what they were there for?" he asks. Matt scratches his head as he looks at his pile of papers.

"No," he admits. "Only thing in there was cash. Vav took some but they could have made off with more, doesn't make sense. Bank numbers, maybe? Or maybe they were leaving something there. I'm still working on that."

"Work on it faster," Geoff bites out. "In the meantime, where can I find this 'Pattillo'?"

"Well, she likes cars and gambling," Matt says. "I'll see if anyone's seen her at the street races."

"Good. Michael, see if Vav's got anything good for sale. Ryan, don't fucking get your dick wet, okay? I want to know what these girls are after first," Geoff instructs. Ryan will decide later if he's actually going to obey. He'd like to know more about her first. Or, at the very least, know she doesn't want him dead.

- x -

Between the info Matt had and what Ryan dug up himself, she should live somewhere around here. Ryan pretends to browse around to his leisure, not making an effort to seem like he's looking for anything but not suspiciously loitering, either. It's difficult to accomplish when he's having a hard time finding what he's looking for. It's mostly stores around here. Maybe he just has some bad intel.

Ryan's phone vibrates and he almost ignores it, being a bit busy to bother with his co-workers at the moment, but ultimately decides he'd better not. It's not Geoff as he had initially thought.

'Warm,' it reads. Though Ryan has saved her number in his phone, he's yet to text her. He's curious as to how she got his number. Ryan looks around, trying to find where she's watching him from, but there's nowhere obvious. He continues the way he was walking.

'Warmer,' the next reads. She's close by, then. Perhaps she'd seen him aimlessly wandering around. 'Warmer,' it says though Ryan has officially wandered away from where he had initially thought she was.

'Cold,' comes the sudden message. Ryan stops. He looks around but there's really no livable places nearby. Perhaps she's intentionally leading him astray. He takes a step forward. 'Fucking ice cold.' Again, Ryan examines his surroundings. It looks like she's trying to lead him down a dark, dirty alley. He wanders towards it, playing along with this little game for now.

'Hot,' it reads. 'Hot hot hot,' as he unwisely strays further down. This is totally a trap. Ryan obviously isn't interested in avoiding it, but surely he gets points for knowing it's a trap.

"Hot damn," a voice says over head and Ryan looks up curiously. Sure enough, there's Brownii sat on a fire escape with a cigarette. If this is where she lives, and he's not sure it is, it makes sense why he couldn't find her; she lives above a shitty game store.

Brownii grins at him and Ryan offers a small wave. She's in a hoodie, same as before, and short shorts that don't leave much to the imagination. Though her face looks like she just woke up, not a wave of her hair is out of place. Ryan remembers why he thought she was so beautiful.

"You stalking me now?" she asks and leans against the railing, her feet dangling down through the bars. It's definitely not the safest place to be. When Ryan doesn't say anything for a moment too long, she arches a brow. "That's not a 'no'."

He sends her a text. Brownii looks at her mobile oddly, then back to him before picking it up to check.

'Stalking is a strong word.'

"Oh what? Now you text me?" she scoffs but it's amused if nothing. She texts back.

'So is first degree murder.'

"So what do you call following me home, then?" Brownii inquires curiously as she flicks the ash off her cigarette. "Romantic?"

'Didn't follow,' Ryan replies simply. Brownii checks her phone halfly, the gears in her head obviously grinding as Ryan continues not to say a word.

"That's creepier," she assures. "So what do you want? I just got in from a gig, not really up for a surprise date.” Ryan smiles partially. He came for curiosity’s sake if nothing else. Right now, they’re not sure if this little ‘crew’ is a problem to them but it’s a safe bet to act like they will be and knowing where she lives is important.

‘LSPD, huh?’ he writes. Brownii scoffs faintly.

“Hey, I know shit about you, too, Mr. Haywood,” she assures. “Let’s not go down this path.” Ryan laughs but he nods agreeably. Here and now isn’t the place for this. Brownii watches him for a moment, a certain amusement in her eye that tells Ryan she doesn’t find him intimidating in the least. Humbling, yet attractive.

“What are you doing, babe?” a voice says. Ryan stops smiling. The man is completely unfamiliar. He places an affectionate hand on Brownii’s head and she smiles at him partially. He looks at Ryan curiously. “Who’s this?”

“Work friend,” Brownii says simply. “I’m coming, babe.” He nods faintly before returning back inside and Brownii stands with an arch of the back. She flicks her cigarette down at Ryan’s feet and gives him a sultry wink before following her ‘babe’ back inside. Of course she has a boyfriend, Ryan shouldn’t be surprised; she’s gorgeous. His phone vibrates.

It's an image, the soft curve of Brownii's stomach exposed from under her sweater. Her skin is speckled with scars and the thick hairs that line her belly trail down into the glimpse of her lacy purple panties. The important part, Ryan supposes, is the revolver tucked into her pants. The attached message reads, 'stay away from my apartment.'

Ryan doesn't reply.

- x -

Geoff enters his apartment with a loud shout and the noise makes both Ryan and Michael pause their game to look at him. He paces angrily by the door as he tries to collect himself before giving up and rapidly approaching them.

"She stole my car!" he yells.

"Uh," Michael replies. "Be more specific."

"Fucking Pattillo stole my luxury, gold tint, leather seat, butt warming, half a mill custom Audi!" Geoff shouts disgruntledly. That's definitely something to be upset over, Ryan will give him that.

"How do you know it was her?" Michael questions curiously. Geoff whips out his phone without hesitation to show them the video already well prepared. It’s Pattillo, clearly, and even clearer, Pattillo’s tits. Ryan raises a brow at Geoff curiously but continues to watch. She’s not alone, Vav sucks at one of her nipples while a familiar head of wavy blond hair is tucked between her heavy thighs; certainly Brownii. They’re very clearly in the back of Geoff’s expensive Audi.

“Ahhh, Geoff,” Pattillo moans out sweetly, a very clear indication that she knows exactly what she’s done. That’s already fairly obvious by the fact that Geoff has this video. Ryan isn’t sure what this is; a taunt or an attempt at flirtation. Geoff snatches his phone away again before the video finishes. It’s not like they were watching that or anything.

“So uh,” Michael murmurs. “You gonna forward us that video or?”

“What? No,” Geoff scoffs. “She sent it to me. She also stole my car if you’ll remember!” Michael looks at Ryan questioningly and Ryan shrugs.

“So?” he asks blandly. “Buy a new one?” Ryan has to nod in agreement. It’s not as if Geoff can’t afford another car. It’s amazing he didn’t steal the first one to begin with.

“It’s not about my perfect Audi!” Geoff shouts. “This is disrespect! First she robs the bank we’re robbing, then she steals our spotlight, and now she’s stolen my Audi!”

“What do you want to do about it?” Michael questions.

“We’re going to steal something of hers,” Geoff assures with some great determination. Ryan already sees an issue with this plan. They know very little about these people right now, let alone how to go about taking anything that belongs to them, if, in fact, they have anything. They cropped up out of nowhere and there’s usually a good reason for that.

“Okay,” comes the slow reply. “What are we stealing?”

“I don’t know,” Geoff says flatly.

“Great,” Michael grumbles back, rolling his eyes excessively. “Flawless plan as always, Geoff.”

“Matt’s still looking into the local street races,” Geoff informs. “If she’s there, I’m going to bet she has a car.” Again, Ryan sees a bit of a problem there.

“Dude, she’s going to have your car,” Michael assures. There’s a moment where Geoff is silent before he looks at his phone halfly and then sourly looks at Ryan then back to Michael.

“I’m going to be in my heist room,” Geoff says sternly. “Don’t bother me.” As he grumpily walk off, Michael turns to Ryan pointedly.

“Yeah, I think better when I’m masturbating, too,” he murmurs being sure to speak loud enough for Geoff to hear. Ryan offers a nonchalant, but agreeable shrug.

“Still your boss!” Geoff shouts back.

“Forward me that video! She has sweet tits!” Michael insists.

“Then let her steal your car!”

- x -

Though Ryan had not initially come to check on Matt, the noises coming from said office make him curious anyways. They’re mostly grunts of frustration and illegible shouts which Ryan supposes isn’t all that unusual. He pokes his head in and sure enough, Matt is at his computer making loud noises at the screen. Ryan wanders over and peers over his shoulder for several seconds before Matt notices him.

“Jesus Christ!” he yelps and quickly covers his face with his hand in fright. “Don’t sneak up on me like that! God, your face paint is creepy enough when I see you coming,” he sighs in exasperation. “I wish Geoff would put a bell on you again.” Ryan really hated that bell. He examines what Matt is doing and from a glance over, it looks ridiculously boring. Matt handles most of the boring work around here, or just stuff the rest of them don’t want to do, with the occasional hand from a local freelancer, Trevor. Ryan isn’t sure why he’s so frustrated over accounting.

“Someone liquidated one of Geoff’s businesses,” Matt murmurs. Though it’s not his strong suit, Ryan’s pretty sure that’s not how that works. “A whole string of emails I can’t trace back convincing our front man that Geoff was selling the place and needed to get rid of everything. I’m trying to get it back but legally, we don’t own it anymore.” Legally, they never owned it. Ryan’s already bored with this conversation, though. Of course Matt is never doing anything fun.

“Guess who bought it,” he says and then quickly backtracks. “Right. Sorry. It’s Pattillo. She’s using a fake name, but, well, ‘Jack Ramsey’ isn’t exactly conspicuous.” Once again, Ryan isn’t sure if she’s really just trying to piss Geoff off or wants to ride his mustache. He pulls up a website for Ryan to see and if it weren’t for the fact that Matt is telling him this, he’d assume this site had been here for years.

“Changed the name and everything,” he murmurs. What was once ‘Los Santos Co. Inc.’, a jargon name to pass illegal business acts under, is now ‘Hell in Heels’ with a somewhat tasteless Venus symbol. Matt scrubs the bridge of his nose with his fingers as he leans back in his chair. “Geoff’s gonna be pissed.”

As he gets up, likely to go relay this information to the big boss, Ryan sits down at his computer. Much like what the business was previously, Ryan assumes that Pattillo has set this up as a ruse to sells things people shouldn’t be selling. What he’s interested in is what their products actually are. At first glance, it looks like knock off shoes. After browsing around a bit, this is clearly not the case. Ryan isn’t sure what the case is. Though the pictures are different, every listing has the exact same information as the last, there’s no order button, no cart button, not even an up front pricing. This entire site is a front.

There’s probably a trick to this somewhere. Without having to search for it very far, a help window pops up. ‘Good afternoon! I’m Rwby, an automated help assistant! Do you need help?’ Oh, how clever. It would be significantly harder to trace back messages through an in-site chat. Pattillo is certainly a very smart woman. Ryan simply types ‘yes’.

‘Excellent! May I ask your gender?’ Rwby replies. It seems like an odd question to ask but Ryan plays along.

‘Male,’ he answers, short and sweet for the probably easily confused machine. If it even is an actual machine.

‘Okay! May I ask the gender of the person you are buying ‘shoes’ for?’ it continues. If the first question is weird, this question is more so, mostly due to the fact that shoes is for some reason in quotations.

‘Male,’ Ryan types again. If there’s some sort of secret password to this, it’s not doing a very good job of being discreet.

‘Okay! Between 1 and 10, 10 being immediate, how soon do you need these ‘shoes’?’ Again, shoes in quotation marks makes Ryan very suspicious. It sounds like they’re probably dealing drugs but what a roundabout and needlessly complicated way to do it.

‘2,’ Ryan enters, mostly out of random. There’s no reason to make himself seem desperate at the moment. Until he knows the key to this, he’ll just play it cool.

‘Okay! Please tell me the colour of the ‘shoes’ you would like; white, yellow, orange, or red,’ it asks. Off the top of his head, Ryan doesn’t know anything sold in code names of these colours. That being said, he also didn’t know what ‘Molly’ was until recently. Ryan just picks one at random.

‘Orange,’ he types.

‘Okay! Are there any other people of which you would like to buy ‘shoes’ for?’ Rwby asks. Maybe he really is buying shoes, Ryan can’t tell.

‘No,’ he assures.

‘Okay! Do you have a phone number of which you can be reached?’ it asks. Give it his phone number? No thanks.

‘No,’ Ryan types simply.

‘Okay! Do you have an address of which we can send you ‘shoes’?’ it asks. Ryan still has no idea what he’s actually buying or who he’s potentially meeting, so that also sounds like a poor idea.

‘No,’ he replies. Three little dots appear as Rwby ‘thinks’. He’s confused it, apparently.

‘Okay! Do you have a place you can meet to pick up your ‘shoes’?’ it offers instead. It’s being very pushy right now and Ryan isn’t sure what it’s intentions are. Instead of offering up any more replies to it, he closes the tab out and sits back. That was interesting, though Ryan isn’t exactly sure what he found out. Pattillo is up to something and she’s exceptionally good at keeping it hidden if Ryan can’t even take a hint at it. This is way too complicated to be drugs but too public to be black market dealings. That aside, what would a crew like this need to sell drugs for so publically? Plus, she has a black market dealer on her side already, and they would do a hell of a lot better job than this cheesy website.

Cheesy, maybe, but it’s clearly more underhanded than Ryan initially thought. Without warning, an alert pops up on Matt’s computer. ‘Anonymous is tracking’ it reads. It really wants to sell him something. Matt’s computer does most of the work on its own, preventing this ‘anonymous’ source from tracking back to Matt’s dork room if just barely. This thing, Rwby, is super aggressive. When it can’t track, it tries again. ‘Anonymous attempting to access local data.’ Ryan hadn’t noticed anything at the time but clearly having been on Pattillo’s website for any amount of time has downloaded something to Matt’s computer. That’s ridiculously clever.

When it can’t access anything automatically, the human feature is introduced; someone takes control of the desktop. Ryan hurriedly unplugs the tower before anything is uncovered. The last thing they need is Pattillo getting into their already pretty unsafe information. Geoff is so used to blantly sharing all of their intel with everyone that they don’t have many secrets but with Pattillo out there now, they need to be careful. She’s far more dangerous to them than the LSPD ever will be.

“Dude, what’d you do to my computer?” Matt asks shortly. Ryan looks to the plug in his hand for a moment before shoving it into Matt’s hands. He’ll figure it out. “Aw man, I was using that.”

- x -

“And you’re sure this is the fastest car you have?” Geoff confirms yet again. Michael rolls his eyes. If Pattillo is using Geoff’s Audi in the races, and from Matt’s sources she has, then they have nothing to worry about. Michael likes cars and more importantly, Michael likes fast cars. He’s not exactly new at street racing, either, and Ryan trusts he at least thinks he knows what he’s doing. Pattillo and her girls, or therefore, have proven themselves to not only be clever and underhanded but downright cheaters at time. Like rigging the football game Geoff had put money on. He’s still mad about that.

Fortunately, their intel seems to be good. The collection of cars huddled together in a construction site includes one rose gold Audi and one Jack Pattillo leaned against said Audi. She’s drawn quite the crowd around her and she’s certainly not alone. To one side is Brownii, far more interested in her handheld game than anything else, and to her other side someone new. Vav is seductively dancing on the hood, entertaining a group of men who seem vaguely confused as to whether or not they should be enjoying this; Vav’s gender is too illegible.

Geoff gets out of the car before Michael even has the chance to completely break. Pattillo sees them, she looks directly at him, but offers no form of greeting or acknowledgement. Needless to say, Geoff is pissed. Ryan climbs out the back seat to, unfortunately, back up his less than wise boss and Michael isn’t far behind.

“What did you do to my Audi!” he shouts over the crowd of people. Admittedly, the new paint job sort of ruins the clean look of the very expensive car even if Ryan can appreciate the completely nude woman’s portrait. Of course, she’s also drenched in blood and surrounded by decapitated heads, what’s there not to appreciate? When Pattillo doesn’t respond to his shouting, Geoff pushes through the crowd.

“Listen here, hot tits,” he demands. This is welcomed about as much as Ryan expected it to be. Instantly, Pattillo’s girls lurch. Brownii whips out a butterfly knife in a heartbeat and in two, she’s at Geoff’s throat with it. Though Geoff isn’t particularly bothered by this, few things actually surprise him anymore, he does stop. Ryan reaches for his own knife but Pattillo calls off first.

“Relax,” she hums softly. Brownii looks at Geoff shortly before rolling her wrist and sheathing her blade again. She drops it down her sleeve before returning to where she leans with her game. Momentarily, if even that, she gives Ryan a glance. Only after she looks away does she smile.

“Good choice,” Geoff scoffs.

“Call me ‘hot tits’ again and I’ll wring your neck myself,” Pattillo grins. Ryan has to admit, he likes their style. Geoff, perhaps not willing to fight her physically, doesn’t make any agreement or dis. “I was in the middle of a conversation, but what can I do for you, Mr. Ramsey?”

“Give me my car back. Now,” Geoff says sharply. Pattillo glances at the car she’s leaned against before looking back at him with a questioning look.

“Finder’s keepers,” she replies.

“You found it in my garage!” Geoff snaps at her. Pattillo shrugs.

“You shouldn’t have had such an easy to break into garage,” she assures. “How do we know you didn’t want it to be stolen in the first place?” Geoff fumes.

“Why would I want you to steal my car‽” he shouts.

“You’re so hysterical,” Pattillo murmurs dismissively. “Men will overreact over anything.” Geoff takes a long breath to try to settle his growing rage. If it comes down to it, they’re prepared for a firefight this time. Ryan doesn’t think it will, though.

“Just give me my car back and I won’t bury you in a shallow grave,” Geoff assures calmly. Pattillo laughs.

“Get out of my face,” she instructs. It’s clear she doesn’t see Geoff as a threat at all. At least, she doesn’t treat him like one. She’s much too smart not to know how dangerous Geoff really can be. Ryan reaches for his knife again, prepared to ‘help’ change her mind. Geoff motions him back, though. He supposes he’ll just have to have a knife fight with Brownii some other time.

“We’ll race for it,” Geoff says simply. “Even if it’s already my car.” Now this gets Pattillo’s attention. She’s a hard gambler and not the only one good with cheating. She glances back at Michael’s car before grinning much more sweetly.

“That I can do,” she agrees. They haven’t seen her drive yet so Ryan really hopes Geoff knows what he’s doing. Honestly, he probably doesn’t. “You win, you can have my car,” Pattillo agrees. “I win, I get yours.”

“Deal,” Geoff replies without hesitation. The chances that Geoff’s luxury Audi can beat Michael’s custom racing vehicle are pretty slim. That being said, this area is curvy and speed is not the only thing important here. It’s really not about being able to afford a new car. “First one to Southside.”

“In that thing?” Pattillo laughs. “Yeah, okay.” Ryan isn’t sure if this is to make them nervous or not. As long as they get into town at a decent pace, Michael’s car should be able to outpace them. “No weapons. You shoot and we bail.”

“Fine,” Geoff scoffs. He gestures Ryan back to the car with a nod of the head and then turns to do the same to Michael. Michael isn’t paying attention even remotely. He seems to be completely enthralled in Vav’s little dance, staring without waver as they move. Ryan can definitely see the allure. Geoff swats him in the chest.

“What?” Michael scoffs back irritably.

“Get in the fucking car and stop staring at tight pants, already,” Geoff snaps at him. Michael shoots him an annoyed glare but manages to stop watching Vav and head back to their car anyways. As they do, Pattillo and her girls hops back into Geoff’s Audi. This should be easy. It won’t be, obviously, but there lies the fun.

“What’re we doing exactly?” Michael asks begrudgingly, proving he hadn’t been listening even remotely.

“Racing!” Geoff snaps at him. “Just go where I tell you.” Maybe it's for everyone's best interest they don't tell Michael they bet his car.

“Whatever,” Michael huffs. Ryan watches Pattillo from the backseat. Everyone moves out of the way to allow them to line up on the street side by side. Though Pattillo drives, the other three pile into the backseat and snicker with each other. The readhead lifts her shirt and presses her breasts against the window before they all laugh animatedly together, a taunt that unfortunately works very well against Geoff.

“Ryan, get your tits out,” he instructs hastily. Ryan looks around curiously as if to find these mentioned tits before patting his chest a bit. He lifts his shirt to press his chest against the glass. It lacks the same effect, honestly. Still, the girls all laugh at him. Ryan isn’t sure why he did this.

“We showed them,” Michael says sarcastically.

“Get better tits, Ryan,” Geoff insists with a minor huff. Ryan pats his chest again protectively. His tits are great, thanks. A street racer provides them with a countdown and a flag. Michael revs his engine and when the flag is thrown, he takes off. It’s immediately obvious that Geoff’s Audi just can’t keep up. Within a few minutes, they’re far out of sight. Geoff laughs happily. It’s been so long since anyone has stepped to Geoff, let alone anyone with the capability of it, that it’s probably nice for him to actually win something he’s had to work at; even something so petty. He's never been a humble winner.

Ryan watches behind them for signs of Pattillo and her crew but there is none. Geoff’s Audi just wasn’t made for racing. Pattillo should have known that. It’s only when they arrive at their ‘finish’ line that Ryan thinks, she probably did. There’s absolutely no one in sight; more so than just ‘falling behind’. Geoff loses his cocky attitude after about seven minutes. It only takes him ten to realise something’s up.

“Maybe they crashed?” Michael suggests. Ryan wouldn’t bet on it.

“Would serve her right,” Geoff murmurs but by the tone in his voice, he doesn’t believe it either. The soft vibrate of Ryan’s phone immediately assures him that’s not what happened. He checks it and sure enough, it’s from Brownii. Ryan looks at Geoff halfly for a moment, then to his phone, then back to Geoff before quietly handing his phone over.

It’s an image, of Brownii yes, and of Matt. They have him tied up and looking vaguely terrified like he doesn’t have any idea what’s going on. He probably doesn’t. Brownii poses with him for a selfie in front of what is clearly the view from Geoff’s apartment. They’re obviously in Geoff’s apartment, otherwise known as not anywhere near here. They must have gone the complete different direction. Pattillo didn’t even need to cheat; she never planned on playing.

Geoff shouts angrily, a noise interrupted by a second text. This one is another image but this time, featuring Pattillo. Matt’s face is nuzzled between her breast and he's flushed bright red as Pattillo gladly examines one of Geoff’s expensive watches. To add further insult, she’s in one of his fancy shirts, drinking his fancy booze. She's made herself quite at homr. Geoff throws Ryan’s phone at the ground with a shout. Ryan frowns.

“You’re buying Ryan a new one of those,” Michael mumbles halfly. Geoff shouts at him, then shouts at Ryan. No words, just an angry noise.

“That’s my Lange & Söhne! That watch costs more than your lives! Combined! And do you know what I had to do to find a bottle of that whiskey‽ I’m gonna kill her!”

Needless to say, she’s not there when they get back. Though Geoff’s apartment isn’t a complete mess, it’s very obvious they’ve been here. Geoff immediately storms away to take inventory of some of his more expensive goods. Matt is lying face down on the couch, still thoroughly tied up and covered in kiss marks but seemingly asleep. Ryan hoists him upward and he awakes a bit, blinking blearily as Michael ungags him.

“Dude, you alright?” Michael asks. Matt blinks.

“I’m in love,” he says, slurring his words in a way that is generally not caused by sleep. Did they drug him or is he just drunk?

“No you’re not!” Geoff shouts, holding one of his precious bottles of liquor. “Just because Pattillo has some sweet tits doesn’t mean you’re in love!”

“Not with her,” Matt murmurs. Ryan cuts the ropes binding him and he slumps back onto the couch. “With a beautiful woman. Mm, her name is Jeremy and I love her.”

“Jeremy?” Michael repeats. “Who the hell is Jeremy?”

“An angel,” Matt sighs.

“Are you fucking drunk?” Geoff shouts. “Did you drink my liquor‽ That’s coming out of your paycheck!”

“That must have been the redhead,” Michael says. Ryan nods in agreement.

“I want my car back! I want my watch back! And I want a new bottle of whiskey!” Geoff yells irritably. “Find me Pattillo now, Matt!”

- x -

Brownii should be here somewhere but Ryan has yet to see her. Granted, it’s hard to see much of anything in the dark, smoky club. Most people leave him alone, though, the facepaint creeping out most of the other patrons and all of the dancers. He isn’t here for a dance, only to potentially kidnap a member of what is seemingly an enemy crew or as Ryan thinks of it ‘get stabbed by a small blonde girl in a strip club’. This is one of Geoff’s clubs and if it turns out Brownii is here to either steal one of their girls or talk their way into owning their business, Ryan’s been tasked with stopping her.

Ryan is pretty sure he’s gotten some bad information. He’s been here nearly an hour and hasn’t seen any of Pattillo’s girls let alone Brownii. He’s considered texting her just to get a feel of where she actually is but he doubts she’d give away much. As much as Ryan likes people staying away from him, not everyone does.

“Well you totally look in place here,” a voice says. Ryan glances at him halfly. Though his face is unfamiliar, his voice is not. It’s hard for Ryan to say if he’s seen this guy before or not, however; he sees a lot of people day in and day out. Instead, Ryan takes to ignoring him. This doesn’t work. The smaller lad just takes a seat beside him, completely ignoring all of the signs assuring him he should not.

“So what are you doing here, exactly?” the lad asks curiously. Ryan can’t say he’s quite in the mood for this. “Ah, cat’s got your tongue. Sure, I understand.” Ignoring Ryan's cold demeanour, he puts a hand on his chest and grins a bit.

"You know, there's a nice alleyway out back," he murmurs before leaning in close to speak in Ryan's ear. "My friend's got ten bucks that I can't talk you into a blowjob." Ryan looks at the lad halfly, then around the room. It doesn't look like Brownii is going to show. What can he say? The lad is certainly his type; small, scarred, with that sharp look to his eye that says 'I'd watch you bleed out for a five'. It certainly has nothing to do with Ryan's pent up frustration over Brownii or that the lad very, very vaguely looks like her.

Ryan stands and takes the lad's wrist to lead him away. He grins smugly, gladly following Ryan's lead without a complaint. The back alley is mostly empty and mostly clean, at least for what they intend to use it for. The lad pushes him behind a dumpster before Ryan gets a good look around but he's not all that concerned about it. It's not the first time he's gotten oral sex in an alley and honestly, it's probably safer back here. People tend to mind their own business in alleys.

The lad honestly doesn't seem to care of Ryan's name and fairly, Ryan doesn't care of his. Instead, he just drops to his knees and quickly busies his hands with Ryan's zipper. He rubs Ryan through his jeans, helping get the blood flowing, before pulling his dick out the front. Initially, the lad is surprised.

"Damn dude," he murmurs, stroking Ryan to firmness. "Didn't think you had a horse dick hiding in those dad jeans." Ryan could do with less of the chatter. He takes the lad's face in one hand and his cock in the other to usher him along. The lad smirks at him, clearly entertained by Ryan's impatience, but opens his mouth all the same. His mouth is warm and Ryan threads his fingers in the lad's hair to steady him.

Out of the blowjobs Ryan has gotten in dirty alleys, this one is easily up there. This lad has a talented mouth and an even more talented throat, taking even Ryan's impressive girth down to the root. Ryan makes no effort to push or pull him, he obviously already knows what he's doing. He only pulls off to catch his breath, spit clinging to his lips and a raspy laugh on his tongue.

"Probably should have grabbed a condom," he comments. "Who knows where you've been." That makes two of them. Likely accepting that it's a little late for that, the lad just swallows his cock down again. Ryan grunts hotly. Maybe he should have gotten the lad's name after all. He comes way quicker than usual and Ryan isn't even embarrassed by it; that was a really good blowjob. Just the right amount of teeth and tongue.

The lad coughs a little as he pulls off and promptly spits what's in his mouth on the asphalt. He runs his thumb across his bottom lip before getting to his feet. Ryan huffs out a pleased noise as he tucks himself back into his pants.

"Next time you can return the favour," the lad assures. Ryan isn't sure how likely it is they'll run into each other again. He doesn't make a habit of occupying strip clubs. "Thanks for helping me with that bet."

Ryan nods somewhat dismissively. It certainly wasn't a strong effort on his part. The lad offers him a wink and then he's showing himself out of the alley, apparently satisfied with their short encounter. Ryan can't say he has much to complain about. At least he's not going home unsated.

His phone vibrates and as he reaches for it he very quickly realises his wallet is gone. Ryan urgently checks the rest of his pockets to make sure before running off after the thief of a lad. Of course, he's already long gone. That's definitely a first. Ryan's glad he doesn't actually keep anything important in his wallet. He'll definitely have something for him if he catches that lad again. Like a knife or two knifes.

Ryan checks his phone. A simple message from Brownii, 'catch ya later'. Well fuck. Obviously she sent someone to distract him while she did who knows what. How long had she been watching him? Ryan would be more annoyed if she wasn't so clever. Or if the blowjob had been bad.

Geoff's going to be so mad.

- x -

"Well thanks to Ryan, Pattillo has stolen a bunch of our girls," Geoff sighs in complete exasperation. So Ryan dropped the ball on that a little, whatever. If Geoff saw what great oral sex he got from that stranger he'd understand.

"I mean, Ryan being there once wasn't going to stop her," Matt assures. Ryan nods in agreement, gesturing to Matt appreciatively for the support. Really, Geoff was setting him up to fight an ex-LSPD alone anyways. The regular LSPD is brutal, he's sort of curious as to what that makes Brownii.

"Oh sure," Geoff scoffs sarcastically. "It's not like I was paying you to do a job or anything." Ryan shrugs. Matt pins up a photo of a familiar building downtown.

"Pattillo's opened her own strip club," Matt says. The bright, new neon sign reads 'no FAKEs' in fancy cursive letters. That's certainly a way to piss them off. Michael huffs loudly.

"I've already sent some men to get our girls back," Geoff explains as Matt pins up some more images. "They didn't do so hot." The images are nothing if not painfully brutal. Many of them still seem to be alive but Ryan isn't sure if they're any better off, honestly. Most of them are also likely still in terrible, terrible pain. At any rate, they won't be working in the crew anymore, now missing some pretty vital pieces like entire arms and brains and pulses.

"This isn't even the worst of it," Matt murmurs. "You should see Reggie." Well, Ryan never cared much for him anyways. Though now he is curious; these pictures are already pretty bad.

"So what, Pattillo is competition now?" Michael asks irritably. "It's one club."

"Not exactly," Matt admits. "Lots of dancers are itching to work at Pattillo's club but it's, well, less than popular with clients. Let's just say Pattillo enforces a very strict 'no touching' rule. Lots of broken hands."

"But newsflash; no dancers, no club," Geoff grumbles. "I don't know what she's doing to make them want to work for her but we're going to put a stop to it."

"Pattillo isn't exactly making herself our enemy, either," Matt explains. "I mean, aside from bullying Geoff. It's not like she's selling drugs or encroaching on our territory. Her crew isn't even all that big. She just takes what she needs."

"Like my Audi, my Lange & Söhne, and my girls," Geoff snaps in annoyment.

"I honestly don't know what she's up to," Matt says. "Or why she's bothering Geoff."

"Seriously?" Michael scoffs. "Pattillo's trying to fucking sit on his dick, genius." Ryan has to agree, he's pretty sure that's exactly what's going on. At least where the 'bullying Geoff' part is relevant. At any rate, Pattillo likely has her own goals in mind that have little, if anything, to do with them. "Look how worked up she's got him."

"I'm not worked up!" Geoff snaps. Ryan gestures to the images questioningly.

"Well," Matt murmurs. "Right now, it'd probably be a really bad idea to try to get any of our dancers back. Pattillo doesn't have the resources to keep this up long, though."

"She's being real careful right now," Geoff assures. "But she's going to slip up and when she does, we'll clean her and her crew up all at once." This certainly isn't the first time they've dealt with rival crews and it probably won't be the last. That being said, none of them have quite been this clever. Ryan isn't sure Geoff is giving them the credit they deserve.

"So what do we do right now?" Michael asks shortly.

"Make rounds," Geoff instructs. "Clearly some people in this town have forgotten who's in charge around here. There's some overdue protection fees that need to be collected." Now that Ryan can get behind. They've gotten a bit too lax lately, anyways.

Matt's phone rings and they all look at him as he quickly checks it before proceeding to turn several shades of red. He tries to put it away and pretend like nothing's happened but it's way too late for that.

"You still texting that girl?" Michael questions almost teasingly. "You act like you've never got nudes before." Matt clears his throat loudly.

"She used to be a gymnast," he says quietly.

"Oh," Michael replies. "Damn." Geoff does not look pleased.

"Well, uh, right, any information you can dig up on Pattillo's gang will come in handy," Matt says as he tries to cool his face. "So keep an ear out."

- x -

A little birdy with his ear to the ground has passed to them the knowledge of Pattillo's temporary location. So far, it's been rather difficult to find out where she is and get there before she's gone. Pattillo moves fast and with little rhyme or reason; hopping across town in a moments notice and sometimes disappearing altogether.

Tonight, fortunately or otherwise, it looks like their 'birdy' forwarded this information in time. When they arrive, Pattillo and her girls are just starting to get out of their van. Ryan isn't sure what they're doing in a place like this, the broken down apartment building offering little in the way of profit let alone anything else. Perhaps someone's hiding out.

Geoff makes no hesitation, approaching Pattillo head on. He hasn't exactly shared his plan on what he was going to do when they caught up with her but Ryan supposes no plan is about as good as most of their plans. Ryan and Michael follow at a safe distance to provide back up that Geoff will surely need if he doesn't play this right.

"Pattillo," he says sharply. Pattillo pauses momentarily, looking at him with a dismissive glance before returning to grabbing her purse out the driver's seat. Vav pulls a bat from the back and Brownii a shovel. The redhead, who they've learned isn't Jeremy, stands with her hand on her gun, clearly not too pleased with their appearance.

"Ramsey," Pattillo states simply. "I'm busy right now. We'll have to talk later."

"You better fucking be two point four million dollars busy," Geoff snaps at her. A woman's scream sounds from the building and they all look toward it immediately. Pattillo gestures her girls to head inside.

"As I said; later, Ramsey," she repeats, slamming the van door closed and turning away from him. Geoff grabs her forearm.

"I don't know who you think you are-" he begins. He doesn't get very far. Pattillo backhands him hard in the side of the face and the impact is audibly painful. The sheer force of the blow makes him not only let go, but nearly sends him to the ground. Getting handsy with an underground fight champ may not be a great idea.

"I think I'm Jack Pattillo and I think I told you I'm busy," Pattillo spits. "Put your hands on me again." A moment of silent passes where Geoff wisely doesn't do that. This, however, could be because he's concussed now. She didn't hold back at all. With an annoyed sound on her mouth, she follows her crew into the building.

Geoff looks back at them pointedly.

"What?" Michael murmurs. "Obviously she was two million dollars busy."

"What kind of backup are you?" Geoff bites.

"Dude, she looked like she was gonna strangle you, didn't think you wanted me to point a gun at her like that," he assures. Ryan shrugs; he just wanted to see what would happen. "Should we go in there?" Hell no. Ryan definitely isn't itching for a concussion today.

"No," Geoff says as he looks over the building. "I want to see how this plays out." It could just be Ryan but maybe they should have started with that. They return to their car but there's no effort in hiding; Pattillo already knows they're here. Still, it's dark and it's possible she thinks they've left. It's also possible she just doesn't give a shit. Ryan would be willing to bet on the later.

Ryan uses his phone to record whatever's happening which, at the moment, isn't much. There's some commotion from inside but nothing they can see. It's a bit dark for this, too, but the street lights offer some vision. It looks like someone really was hiding out here. If people are making enemies of Pattillo, it's probably in their best interest to find out who they are. The enemy of my enemy is my friend and all that. Though in this case, perhaps Pattillo is their enemy’s enemy.

After roughly ten minutes, Pattillo returns to the front entrance. She carries a zip tied man out with her, the fellow hissing and spitting the entire time but certainly not getting free. He's not very impressive looking and Ryan certainly doesn't recognise him as anyone important. Pattillo throws him on the sidewalk and brushes her hands together with vague disgust.

"You fucking bitch! You think you'll get away with this? I'll fucking kill you and her!" he shouts. Pattillo doesn't seem to acknowledge him with a reply, instead turning to her crew to instruct them to handle it. Brownii and Vav nod in agreement and Pattillo makes her way back inside. Ryan catches a glimpse of the other woman behind her, cradling what seems to be a child. Something's definitely going on here.

Vav drags the guy kicking and screaming to a part of the lawn and Brownii begins to dig. Neither of them seem to notice that they're being watched. Many of the lights in the apartments above flicker off, a passive statement that says 'we see nothing'. The other tenants are scared, though that's not unreasonable with what's going on. The smart people of Los Santos know how to stay out of gang business.

"I know guys! I'll find where you live! You can't do this to me and get away with it!" he yells. Ryan's surprised the police haven't been alerted yet, not that they'd come to an area like this he supposes. Vav cracks the guy hard in the mouth with their bat, quickly and instantly shutting him up via broken jaw. The silence doesn't last long but the man is significantly quieter with his jaw in pieces and blood pouring out of his mouth. He still struggles but much less now. That's gotta hurt.

"Shit dude, she's digging a grave," Michael comments under his breath. He's definitely not wrong. "What the fuck did that guy do?" That is a really, really good question.

Vav and Brownii chat to each other aimlessly but they're far enough away and quiet enough that it's impossible to tell what they're saying. If Ryan were to guess, it's probably nothing relevant to what's happening. Neither of them act like this is anything new to them. Vav hits him again with their bat, a complete pull back and release meant to break bones and it silences the guy with ease- if he's even still conscious or alive. Much like Pattillo, they don't hold back.

An older lady wanders out of the building and Ryan almost thinks trouble is starting. She isn’t coming out to try to stop them is she? Instead, she offers Brownii and Vav tea of which the duo stop what they're doing to accept. The tenants aren't scared; they're willfully ignoring what's going on. More and more Ryan's curiosity of these women builds. The lady heads back inside once the tea is gone, Vav and Brownii thanking her sweetly.

Brownii seems to dub the grave deep enough and the two of them roll the guy right up next to it. Vav turns away, very pointedly not watching as Brownii takes her shovel and jabs it into the man's throat. Blood immediately stains both her spade and the grass in large splotches. If he wasn't dead before, he sure as hell is now. It takes some doing with the dull edge but she manages to decapitate him with her shovel before kicking his body into the shallow grave. There is definitely LSPD in that girl.

Vav holds out a bag and Brownii takes it to throw the head in before tying it off and handing it back. As she starts burying the body, Vav brings the head back to the van to toss it in the back. They look around curiously, possibly sensing that they're being watched, but ultimately returns to Brownii without noticing. Once they're done, an obvious dirt grave in the dead, blood stained grass, the two of them head back inside.

“Holy shit, that was fucking brutal,” Michael murmurs. “I want to know what he did just so I don’t do it.”

“Well, it’s easy when it’s three against one,” Geoff assures. Ryan is pretty sure Pattillo has already proved she can handle herself in a one on one. Their discussion is cut short by another car pulling up. From out of the car steps a familiar face.

“What’s she doing here?” Michael questions mildly. Caleb hurries into the apartment building and doesn’t stay long. Within a few minutes, she’s returning with another unfamiliar face. This woman is bruised and bloody something awful, her eye swollen and blood dripping down her chin; Caleb has to walk with her to prevent her clearly broken arm from shifting out of place. She helps the woman back to her car with some urgency. Not far behind is Pattillo and what is certainly a baby. Pattillo rocks the small thing softly in an attempt to stop it from crying while Caleb helps the woman into the backseat of her car.

The redhead hurries around the other side to pop a car seat into the back and then Pattillo settles the baby inside. For a woman who just backhanded some of Geoff’s tattoos off, she’s very gentle. Vav and Brownii throw a few bags into the trunk and then Caleb is leaving just as quick as she had come. With no other business to be had here, Pattillo and her crew climb back into their van and head off.

“So now our medic is working for Pattillo, too?” Geoff scoffs. Ryan honestly has no idea what’s happened here. It seems like an undercover job gone wrong but he can’t imagine Pattillo involving a child in something like that. With every new thing they find out about this little crew, they only raise more questions. They now have two women they know even less about to pin down and their otherwise loyal medic apparently working against them.

“You get a good look at her face, Ryan?” Michael asks. Ryan nods. It’s dark, but he’s certain he got enough recorded for Matt to pull them up a couple of names. Right now he’s not too interested in finding out what Pattillo will do if they dig that guy’s body back up but it probably wouldn’t be a good thing. They buried him for a reason.

“Good, let’s get out of here,” Geoff instructs.

“Yeah, get some ice for Geoff’s face,” Michael snorts. As if on cue, Ryan’s phone goes off; Brownii never misses an opportunity to send a selfie of herself to him. It’s hard to be upset when she has a gorgeous, blood covered face. She poses with her lips puckered and the garbage bag very clearly containing a head in her lap, blood smeared on her face and hands like it’s not big deal. Ryan certainly doesn’t have a boner or anything.

‘lol ruined my make up. you’d probably like it better if it was your blood.’

Ryan’ll just save that for later.

- x -

Geoff’s grumpy mood is only made grumpier by the fact that Pattillo shows no signs of faulting. Instead, she’s flourishing. For now, she’s largely staying out of Geoff’s territory but instead is cleaning up the little gangs around that Geoff had just never bothered with. Unfortunately, Pattillo is much more of a problem than the gang’s she’s wiping out. It would be less of a problem if two of Geoff’s clubs haven’t effectively shut down from all his dancers leaving. There’s no option to retrieve them because as they’ve found out, Pattillo will send back crew members in body bags. Honestly, they don’t want their dancers back enough to loose crew members.

Still, Pattillo’s main base remains to be ‘Hell in Heels’ and ‘no FAKEs’, both very much in Geoff’s territory and both businesses they can’t get anywhere near. Ryan should know, he nearly blew himself up trying to get into the shoe store. While it’s easy to see how Pattillo could be doing this just to antagonize Geoff, it’s actually a good business tactic; she needs to be close to town and right now, most of her territory isn’t.

Needless to say, when Brownii sends Ryan a text simply saying ‘meet me at no fakes’, he’s not quite dumb enough to blindly march in there. He’s been texting her infrequently but what few words they exchange are typically short and intentionally vague. There's really no way for him to tell what this is about or if it's a trap. Ryan shows the text to Michael because skipping to showing it to Geoff would surely be a mistake.

“Uh,” Michael gives him an odd look. Fairly, the last few messages before that read ‘dick pic?’, ‘come on man, i know you a hoe. dick pic me’, and ‘it’s not like you have anything to hide down there’. That is not the important part of this discussion. “Why does Narvaez want you to come to their club?” Probably because it’s a trap. There’s really no way of telling why they would do that as of yet, either. So far they've been pretty passive towards actually assaulting anyone first; defending themselves is another story. Many things seem to be a trap with them that turn out to be perfectly harmless. That works the other way around, too.

“We should show this to Geoff,” Michael admits though clearly he knows this is not going to blow over well, either. It’s no question he hasn’t been approaching this with his head on straight. Ryan still isn’t sure if this is Pattillo’s tactic or if Geoff is just that flabbergasted by a group of women questioning his status. In retrospect, using her body and simply the fact that Geoff finds her attractive is likely Pattillo manipulating Geoff. Much like Brownii is very obviously manipulating him and how Vav is surely doing the same to Michael.

“Show what to me?” Geoff questions, already vaguely annoyed at the timing of which he’s decided to enter this conversation. Ryan gives Michael a half look before handing over his phone. Similarly, Geoff gives him an odd look before getting down to the last message.

“It’s got to be a trap,” Michael murmurs. As much as that makes sense, Ryan isn’t so sure it’s that straightforward. Pattillo has had many opportunities to take a swing at them and she just hasn’t. It’s far more interesting that she hasn’t.

“Have you been talking to that girl?” Geoff asks harshly. Ryan shrugs. Of course he has. Geoff sneers a bit but lets out an annoyed sigh that confirms he’s not going to make a fuss about it right now. “You’re gonna go,” he says, “we need to see what she’s up to in there.”

“It’s a strip club,” Michael scoffs. “What do you think’s happening in there? She’s cutting coke? Alright, bad example.”

“I want to know why all my dancers are scrambling to work there,” Geoff snaps at him before turning back to Ryan. “Have Matt get a camera on you and get down there.”

- x -

Ryan is uncomfortable. The camera wire taped to his chest and trailing down his leg makes his clothes feel bulky and noticeable. Of course they’re going to notice but with how things have been going, that’s probably part of their plan. That’s making a few too many assumptions right now. Despite the club not being ‘so popular’ with the usual clientele, there’s a line outside that leads around the corner. Oddly enough, a fair amount of them are also women. Needless to say, that was rarely the case in most clubs Ryan has been to. Ryan passes up the line all together and sure enough, the bouncer recognizes him.

“You can go in,” she assures plainly. Wow that is a big lady. “Brownii is waiting for you in the back. Just follow the left wall to the door.”

Ryan gives her an acknowledging nod and she lets him in. The inside looks nothing like any of Geoff’s clubs. It’s lit brighter than strip clubs usually are and it’s much, much cleaner. It’s almost like someone actually cares about this business. Most of the dancers are barred off from the partons by a solid wall of glass and those that aren’t seem to be kept out of hand’s reach. Only a few here and there are actually interacted with and Ryan notes immediately, the coloured wristbands that like indicate it’s okay to touch. Pattillo’s ‘no touching’ rule seems to be upheld by the workers that buzz around; harmless looking at first glance but none without some sort of weapon at hand. Clever, disguising bouncers as dancers.

“Are those hands? Christ,” Michael murmurs in his ear. Ryan takes a quick look around and sure enough, there’s a plaque with hands on it. Those looks very real. Ryan might be working for the wrong people, honestly. Geoff never let him put hands on a plaque. Overall, the layout of the building makes it feel very closed in for the patrons while the dancers having all the room they could want to entertain in. Any direct exchange of cash has largely been removed as well, instead machines frequently being set up to accept tips through. It makes sense why their dancers would prefer a gig like this. Their safety and comfort is priority here and the clients get what they get.

“Just get back there,” Geoff instructs. Ryan heads for the back, the only clear door on the left wall being labeled, appropriately, ‘back room’. The woman guarding the door nods at him and gestures him through without a word. What few men work here seem to be mostly cleaning staff. He can see how hiring mainly women would do a lot to help prevent the staff from harassing each other. Geoff’s had quite the problems in the past with male staff abusing their jobs; get rid of one and another just comes along. Judging by the FAKE crew members they have in the hospital, Ryan can say it’s going pretty well for them here.

The hall beyond the door is lined with more rooms, many of them very small. These are simply labeled ‘private shows’. The bigger rooms are only labeled ‘vacant’ or ‘not vacant’. There’s no doubt Pattillo has some full service sex workers in her arsenal. The door at the end of the hall is marked ‘backstage’ and there’s where Ryan assumes he’s headed. The guard here, however, doesn’t let him pass.

“Can’t go back there,” she assures. “They’re in the middle of something.” Ryan pulls out his phone to show her the invite Brownii sent him. She shakes her head. “Nah, I know. I said you can’t go back there right now. Fam’s busy. It’s gonna be a minute. Have a seat.” She gestures him to one of the private rooms and Ryan, with some annoyance, slips inside. There’s a single seat and Ryan settles himself in for the time being. It’s weirdly comfortable for the back room of a strip club; he supposes he can wait. A curtain covers up the other section of the room and the payment interface displays a screen for him.

“How much money did she sink into this place?” Geoff questions idly. It’s certainly modern and way nicer than any other strip clubs in Los Santos. Pattillo knows where to get her money. The screen reads ‘credit: 5 minutes’ and then offers up a page of available dancers. For all the dancers Pattillo’s been stealing, there aren’t a lot of options. Ryan picks one mainly by random and after a few moments, the curtain opens up. Again, there’s a solid sheet of glass dividing them.

“She really doesn’t want you touching her girls, does she?” Michael notes. There’s a pair of hands on a plaque, Ryan’s pretty sure they’ve already figured that out. That alone is more than enough reason for most of the dancers to flock here. It’s a stunning business tactic that’s surely going to let Pattillo literally run out every other strip club. No strippers; no strip club.

The girl that comes out is initially startled, probably by Ryan’s face paint, but relaxes almost immediately, knowing he can’t get near her. Ryan wouldn’t say that but honestly, he’s less than interested in that or her really, even though she dances nice. Admittedly, Ryan feels like even if he did get through the glass, he'd be swarmed by at least a dozen people ready to beat him unalive.

“The only way you’re getting any of your girls back is if you drag them back kicking and screaming,” Michael says. “And something tells me, Pattillo’s gonna push your shit in if you try that.”

“We just have to put our clubs on higher priority,” Geoff insists. “We give them better work settings and they’ll come running back.” Ryan isn’t sure it’s going to be that easy. Pattillo has clearly put a lot of effort into this place and furthermore, oversees it herself. Geoff just doesn’t have that sort of patience or time. He’d have to invest a lot more money than he’ll want to to get any of his clubs on par with this one.

“The only place they’ll be running is away from you,” Michael promises. “You haven’t exactly done them any favours in the past.”

“I hired them!” Geoff snaps. Ryan flinches irritably at the volume.

“You didn’t even do that!” Michael reminds him. “You only hired the people that hired them!”

“Maybe I’ll just rent out the buildings like I planned to, then,” Geoff scoffs. “Get my money back on the shitty property anyways.” Ryan focuses a bit more on the girl. There’s something off about her he can’t quite place his finger on. When he stops looking at her breasts it becomes fairly obvious; she isn’t wearing any make up. Though Ryan doesn’t often find himself in strip clubs, he’s pretty sure he’s never seen a dancer not wearing make up before. That’s interesting. The curtain closes suddenly and the screen alerts him that five minutes is over and he needs to pay now.

The price for even an extra minute is nothing to shake a stick at, either. It looks like the price goes down the longer the show goes, encouraging clients to buy more of their favorite’s time. Ryan isn’t that interested in seeing anymore and fortunately or otherwise, is fetched anyways. The guard gives a warning knock before letting herself in.

“Put your pants back on, the mamas will see you now,” she alerts. Ryan gives her a cold look but she only gestures him to hurry up. He follows her back out of the private room and she motions him through the back door before leaving him on his own. Several girls bustle around back here, prepping to go on stage or to go home or simply having a break among themselves. When any of them notice him, they immediately lurch and avidly try to stay out of his way. It’s easy to spot Brownii and Ryan beelines towards her without bothering any of the other girls.

“Just don’t break your hand while you’re doing it, you should be fine,” Brownii assures the woman she’s talking with. Upon getting too close, the girl Brownii speaks to jumps to a stop, staring at him in horror. Ryan doesn’t recognise her, but it’s likely that she worked for one of Geoff’s clubs and thinks he’s here to take her back. As Ryan likes his hands, he won’t be doing that today. Also because he doesn’t care, he'll probably never be doing that. Brownii looks at him curiously. She doesn’t find him as intimidating as most people should. “Vav’ll get you some gear and Jeremy will show you the ropes from here. Lemme know if you need anything else.”

Urgently, the woman nods and hurries off as quickly as possible to get away from Ryan. It actually makes a lot of sense why Pattillo wouldn’t want any FAKE members in her club. It's not just to spite them, though that's surely part of the reason, but to make her workers feel better about not having to worry about being ‘presuaded’ back. Brownii smiles at him a bit.

“Hey man, glad you could make it,” she says and she gestures with her head to an open door. “Come on. I got something to show you.” Hopefully it’s not the end of a gun. Ryan’s seen quite a few of those. He follows her back with really no other choice and her little office is, well, very her. Several games are hooked up to a nice sized television and there’s little shelves of paraphernalia that Ryan doesn’t take too hard of a look at; he’s focused mostly on the pair of decorative sniper rifles behind her desk. He assumes they’re decorative as one’s solid gold and the other is hot pink.

“Is this the part where she kills you?” Michael asks, perhaps jokingly but it’s a legit concern. He did basically just walk straight into the Devils den.

“Firstly, here,” Brownii says and hands him a photo. Ryan freezes but only for a moment. He shreds the image into little pieces immediately, scattering them across her floor, before looking at her harshly. Oh, he’ll wring her fucking neck. “Well okay. Dramatic much?”

“What was that?” Geoff demands. “What the fuck Ryan, we didn’t get to see it.” Ryan turns his mic and camera off, disguising the movement not very well. He could care less if they find out he's tapped at this point.

“Relax,” Brownii assures. “It’s not like we’re going to do anything to her.” Ryan is well aware of that; he’d kill them first. “It’s just, your boys don’t know, do they?” Ryan signs a short ‘no’. “You do know sign language. Cool, good to know. Listen, this isn’t like some blackmail thing, okay? Jack wouldn’t wind someone like you up like that. She just wanted me to let you know that we know and if something were to happen to you, idk, you like die or end up in prison or something, then she’ll make arrangements for you.”

It’s not a gesture Ryan appreciates.

“Take that how you want to,” Brownii shrugs nonchalantly. He's not planning on going anywhere. “Secondly, Jack has a proposition for you and your crew. There’s some guys in your crew that Jack would like to ‘talk’ to,” she says and by the air quotes she makes, what she means is ‘kill’. “If you hand them over, maybe Jack will have some information for you?” That seems like a bit of an unfair trade. Ryan glances down at the pieces of photo by his feet. They seem to be awfully good at finding things they shouldn’t be sticking their nose in and as irritating as that is to them, it could also be useful.

“We’re going to have a talk one way or another,” Brownii assures. “Jack just thought maybe ol’ mustache would like a say in it first. Give him a chance to get on her good side.” Her good side? Granted for a crew that came out of nowhere, Pattillo has bested Geoff at nearly every turn. “She’ll let Ramsey think about it for a few weeks until we’re ready for them, okay? Don’t sweat it.”

She holds out a paper and Ryan is a bit reluctant to take this one. It’s not another picture but rather a list of only about fifteen to twenty names. These must be the ones Pattillo would like to ‘talk’ to. Their numbers are not lacking, especially in comparison to Pattillo’s, and such a small number of men would do little to damage their crew. Ryan would find it weird if she were doing this just to weaken them; these names aren’t even important enough for him to be familiar with. Ryan looks at Brownii questioningly.

“Don’t worry why,” she says. “It’s none of your business anyways. Let’s just say if you knew what they did, you’d feel better with them off the street. Especially for your daughter.” Ryan digs his fingers into his palm. If they put a hand on her-

“You can go now,” Brownii tells him, motioning to the door with one hand. “As much as I’d love a dance, I got shit to do. Maybe later.” For whatever reason, Ryan doesn’t feel like this conservation needed to have him come all the way down here. No, this was nothing more than to show off; a power play.

Ryan isn’t any more comfortable leaving than he was arriving.

- x -

Without being able to find anything substantial on the man Pattillo’s crew buried or the woman they took away for that matter, Geoff insists they return to the site of the crime to do some more digging. All the information Matt can dig up suggests that they’re both just normal citizens; the woman an office assistant and the man a cab driver. Pattillo is obviously very good at hiding things and the fact that she’s gone so far to make sure no one finds out about this only makes it more important that they find out what it’s about. Whether or not it’s to be more cautious in the future or to have something blackmail her with doesn’t make much difference.

Geoff ‘borrows’ them a cop car for the day. Having done so, he assures that he’ll keep watch while Michael and Ryan ask around the complex. Ryan can’t say he’s ever cared for being dressed like an officer and with the people in the building giving him nervous looks, he is even more uneasy. Michael assures him it's probably the face paint more than it's the outfit. He doubts they’ll do anything and hopefully, they won’t.

“None of these people have anything to say,” Michael grumbles halfly. Out of all the people they’ve gotten to open their doors, none of them will admit to having seen anything. Despite being shown a picture of the dead man in their own yard, none of them will even confess to knowing who he is. As for the woman, ‘she was always so nice, I hope she’s doing okay’. Whatever’s going on here, Ryan doesn’t like it. Why would they act like they don't know him but know her? If she was undercover she did a poor job. If he was undercover he did a fucking terrible job.

“Someone’s gonna have something to say,” Geoff assures from the car. “Keep asking around.”

“Says the guy that doesn’t have to walk up four flights of stairs,” Michael scoffs. Ryan knocks on another door and they have to wait a few moments before anyone opens up. The older woman smiles at them and already Ryan is uneased. Smiling old women never have anything good for anyone. To be old in Los Santos is a statement in and of itself.

“What can I do for you, officers?” she offers kindly, the first kind words of the day. In a way, it makes Ryan glad. The LSPD are awful people anyways and deserve the malicious behavior they get. Ryan just wishes he wasn't dressed like one.

“We’d just like to ask you some questions,” Michael states.

“Oh sure, sure,” the lady agrees. “Please come in.” Oh god, Ryan doesn’t want to go in some old ladies house. She probably has stuffed cats. Unfortunately, he doesn’t get much of a say in it. Michael follows her in and Ryan has to go with him. The woman gestures them to have a seat and Michael does but Ryan remains standing. He doesn’t want to be here long. It smells like bleach.

“Ah fuck,” Geoff whispers. “Fuck, someone’s here.” Ryan makes a half hearted effort to look out the window but tries not to make it too obvious. Michael pulls out one of their photos to show the woman and she nods thoughtfully.

“Do you know this man?” Michael questions.

“I do,” she assures. That’s definitely a first. Michael looks a little surprised. It’s now that Ryan realises this is the same lady that had offered Brownii and Vav tea while they were in the middle of bury someone. “A real asshole, that one. It’s much quieter now that he’s not around, you know. Always yelling and screaming and drinking. Someone should have decapitated him sooner.” And this is why old people weird Ryan out.

“Oh shit, it’s Pattillo,” Geoff says. Ryan moves towards the window a little more obviously to look out, spotting Geoff in their police car and an all black, tinted murder vehicle behind him. This is not good news at all.

“So you know who did this?” Michael presses.

“Of course dear,” the woman hums. “I gave her a call for you.” Fucking old people! Ryan can only watch as Pattillo approaches Geoff in their car and one of her girls wanders around the back. Geoff can protect himself surely. He just really needs to not say anything stupid.

“You what?” Michael replies irritably, not even given the chance to ask ‘why’.

“Cops should really mind their own business, hun,” the woman says. “Where were you when we called the police countless times? Where were you when that poor baby was screaming for someone to help her? Now you show up? What gives you the right?” Outside, Pattillo’s little red headed helper breaks one of the tail lights of their police cruiser with her bat. Geoff hasn’t called for help yet but they clearly aren’t going to get much more here. Hurriedly, Ryan exits the old lady’s apartment and Michael is right behind him.

“Fucking pigs! I know what you’re really after!” the woman shouts after them. That’s one lady they’re going to avoid in the future. They show themselves out of the apartment building as quickly as they can and by the time they get outside, Red is on the trunk, beating the shit out of the cruiser’s back windshield. Pattillo lifts her head from the driver’s side door to look at them before leaning back down to whisper to Geoff.

“Hey! The fuck do you think you’re doing‽” Michael shouts. Red turns to him partially and proceeds to make an obscene gesture between her fingers signifying cunniligus. Michael turns a dark shade of red. As he approaches the car, she isn’t deterred in the slightest. She climbs onto the top and takes a swing at the lights, only pausing to swat Michael’s hands away from her with her bat.

“Don't touch the goods, babe,” she says. “Don’t worry, I’ll let you know when I’m ready for you to suck on my titties.” She winks at him flirtatiously, grabbing one of her breasts and only urging Michael’s face to turn redder.

“I’ll fucking-!” Michael starts.

“Linds,” Pattillo interrupts. “Let’s go.” ‘Linds’ gives the cruiser another firm strike, denting the top, before hopping down and following Pattillo back to their car. Before driving off, Pattillo stops alongside the cruiser and Linds pokes out the passenger window.

“Week’s up, Ramsey,” Linds says and she throws a bag into his window. They drive off obviously having done what they came for. Ryan moves to make sure Geoff is alright while Michael tries to calm himself down. Geoff shouts.

“Jesus Christ! What the fuck‽” he yells as he tosses the bag back out the window. The fingers spilled across the asphalt don’t spell good news for their crew. Ryan picks them back up as Geoff urgently tries to rub his hands clean “Ugh! Remember when people used to send flowers instead‽ What happened to that‽”

- x -

Admittedly, refusing Pattillo’s offer was probably a bad idea. Ryan only says that because heisting the same place twice in a row is no mistake.

“You!” Geoff shouts. “What are you doing here?”

“Keep your voice down,” Pattillo hisses back. She not surprised to see them even remotely which is already not a great sign. She is alone, however, though it’s hard to say for certain how alone she actually is in the dark. It's safe to bet that answer is; not very.

“We were here first,” Geoff assures her irritably. “Scram, Pattillo.”

“Uh, no you weren’t?” Pattillo replies matter-of-factly. She’s certainly not dressed to break into a safe, Ryan can say that. Instead, the one piece leather suit is mostly just distracting. Geoff is trying his hardest to keep his eyes at her face and it’s not working at all.

“Yes we were,” Geoff insists again. “This is our hit.”

“Look Ramsey,” Pattillo says in some form of agreeability. “We can help each other out here. You’re here for the money and we’re not.” Already, Ryan doesn’t like the sound of this. What are they here for then? What else is even here? Michael takes a step forward, far less intimidated by Pattillo when she is alone.

“You’re not here for the money?” Geoff repeats. “What are you here for?”

“It doesn’t matter,” she assures, absently running her hand along the partially open zipper of her suit and in doing so, her cleavage as well. “It’s nothing that interests you.” This doesn’t sound great. She’s up to something and they all know it. Of course, though, Pattillo probably doesn’t care enough to make any serious commitment towards convincing them otherwise.

“Maybe I’ll just take it for myself,” Geoff offers. “Why do I need you?” Pattillo pauses to think about it. Without warning, Vav appears from out of the dark. Surely they’d been there the entire time, waiting for a good moment to act and they certainly picked one. Michael doesn’t react quick enough to defend himself before Vav has their gun pressed right up against his throat making it very quickly a poor idea to reach for his own. Ryan turns to meet the other but she’s quicker than he is. It’s not Brownii, unfortunately, but the the so called ‘Linds’. She grabs him hard and presses her knife firm against his throat. Her weight on his back makes it hard for him to keep his balance and he has no doubt she’d draw blood.

“Good question,” Pattillo murmurs with a smirk. “Why do I need you?” She gestures to Geoff mildly and he manages to look down long enough to spot the red dot on his chest. Considering where they are, that would be a hell of a shot but Ryan has no doubt it's doable. He is, however, starting to doubt that Pattillo would actually hurt them.

“You just can’t go two seconds without playing dirty, can you?” Geoff sighs.

“It’s hardly my fault if you’re too distracted to notice anything around you,” Pattillo says simply, making a point to dip her hand along her cleavage again. “Now that you’ve had some time to think about it, maybe we can help each other out after all.”

“Help you dig a grave maybe,” Linds ‘jokes’. Ryan doesn’t find it very funny.

“You’re too pretty for a grave,” Vav insists, smiling at Michael affectionately. “I was thinking more like a pike.”

“Can one of you get her away from me?” Michael asks shortly.

“Aw, don’t be like that Micoo,” Vav whines. “Can’t you take a compliment?”

“Fine,” Geoff scoffs. “Let’s ‘help each other’. But we get all the cash. You’re not here for it anyways, right?”

“Sure,” Pattillo agrees with a smile. Linds loosens her grip on Ryan and he pushes her knife away from his throat at once. Vav twirls their gun around their hand only to fumble it last second and nearly shoot someone. Ryan honestly can’t tell if they’re playing dumb or if they’re actually dumb or some weird mix of both.

“Let’s get this over with before someone shows up,” Geoff grumbles.

“Vav, Lindsay,” Pattillo says. “Why don’t you take red here down to the labs to grab the stuff. Brownii will keep a watch on the safe.” Vav grins happily at Michael who, in response, doesn’t look happy. Geoff just motions him to go along with it, though.

“Oh woof,” Lindsay murmurs pleasantly. “We get the hot bod.”

“Almost makes up for how dumb he is,” Vav agrees with a laugh.

“You’re one to fucking talk,” Michael snaps back, begrudgingly following them out of the room. Hopefully Michael will be able to hold his own against the two of them. Of course, Vav hardly seems that capable physically which is likely why Pattillo stacked them up against Michael.

“Ryan,” Geoff instructs. “Get up there with brownie bites. Make sure she doesn’t get any funny ideas.” Ryan nods shortly. He doesn’t have much to argue with after all even if Geoff just wants to be left alone with Pattillo. Surely he’s smart enough not to get another black eye from her. What is he saying? Of course he isn’t. Ryan makes his way out of the room and the little red light appears at his feet. It darts away and Ryan follows it.

Like many other things about Pattillo’s crew, Brownii’s skill isn’t something they can accurately guess. The LSPD won’t even admit to her having ever worked there and for good reason. They have a bad enough reputation without having to explain why one of their good agents went so far rouge. Terribleness of the LSPD aside, Ryan has nothing but respect for a woman who had not only survived being in the LSPD but got out of it in one piece and managed to do better. The laser light leads him to another small building in the area and he peers up curiously to see where she’s settled herself. He glances back to where they were; that really would have been a hell of a shot.

“Yo,” Brownii greets, poking her head over the edge of the building precariously. Ryan already sees a pattern of her dangerously settling herself in high places. That’s what snipers do he supposes. “Come on up. I got s’mores going.” S’mores? Ryan peers around the side of the building to find the ladder and climbs up enough to check everything out first. Brownii hasn’t started a fire, it seems, but rather is using a propane torch to burn marshmallows. Somehow, Ryan’s not surprised.

He joins her, somewhat awkwardly sitting himself on the ground in the odd little set up she has going on, and Brownii offers him a burnt marshmallow. Ryan refuses.

“Safe’s inside,” Brownii explains and she pats the roof with her free hand. “Numatic tumblers, constantly changing code, titanium door; easy peasy.” Easy if one knows what they’re doing. Ryan nods in acknowledgement. He had come prepared to just blow it up, that’s the fun way, but he supposes they were here first. “I got a drill going on it right now. Alarm’s gonna go off regardless, though. Jack should be working on that.”

They are very organized if nothing else or at the very least prepared. Geoff makes plans, sure, but rarely are they followed usually because of Geoff. It’s come to the point where it’s easier to wing it than confuse themselves with unnecessary details. That probably contributes to why Pattillo is always finding ways to outsmart them. Brownii makes a curious sign with her fingers and Ryan looks at her oddly.

“Sorry. I literally only know spanish sign language,” she says and shrugs halfly. Ryan laughs. He just watches for a moment as she stuffs another s’more in her mouth like she hasn’t eaten in days. Brownii pauses momentarily to look at him look at her before rubbing her hands off on her jeans. “What are you looking at? Bitch gotta eat.” Ryan shakes his head, assuring that it hardly matters to him and Brownii scoffs.

“Find out what they’re here for,” Geoff snaps into the mic. He’s working on it. Ryan pulls out his mobile to talk with her.

‘Seems like a lot of work for no cash,’ he comments. Brownii takes a moment to check her phone. She finishes chewing, licking her fingers slowly in a manner that is not strictly necessary.

“There are more important things than cash,” Brownii assures. Ryan expresses a look of disbelief. “There’s such thing as love you know.” He’s not taking that bait. “No? Didn’t expect you to be a cynic.”

‘I don’t see you with much faith in love,’ Ryan reminds.

“Hey, I love Terry,” Brownii insists and then slowly continues, “and his wallet.” Terry? Ryan is reminded all that once that she has a fucking boyfriend. He forgot about that. She certainly doesn’t flirt like she has a boyfriend. Ryan’s thoughts are very quickly filled with murder and little else. Terry’s not that big; Ryan could take him.

“Sides,” Brownii says. “I love Gavin and Lindsay. Make sure you watch your little homeboy, alright? He’ll get his ass kicked.” Ryan greatly doubts that. Their conversation is loudly diverted by a static in Ryan’s receiver. He flinches unhappily and simultaneously, Brownii begins to laugh.

“Holy shit!” she manages out between laughs. What was that? “Your boss is a dumbass. How many black eyes does that guy want?” Oh Geoff. Ryan sighs loudly. There is a pretty big difference between Pattillo ‘bullying’ Geoff and Geoff just being an asshole. One day Geoff will learn the difference. Maybe. So much for trying to figure out what they're here for. A small beep sounds and Ryan looks at Brownii curiously as she starts packing up her things.

“Drill’s done,” she says though whether or not it’s to Ryan or Pattillo isn’t clear. “Come on, Ryan. Give me a hand.” That he can do. Brownii hands him her bag as she slides down the ladder and Ryan follows once she’s clear. Once inside, she takes a moment to turn the drill off before motioning Ryan to her side. This thing is seriously heavy duty, he's surprised. Vav must be some dealer if they got their hands on something like this.

“Here, take this down,” she instructs. Ryan hands her bag back to her before moving into place. The drill is fairly heavy and still hot but he can manage. It takes him a moment to realise she’s only watching him, however, and he looks at her pointedly.

“What?” Brownii shrugs. “We don’t both need to be doing it.” Right. Ryan continues without making a complaint. He was offered to help her after all. He sets the oversized drill aside and once it's out of the way, Brownii goes to work on disengaging the rest of the mechanism. It’s interesting to watch her work, far more methodical than Ryan usually is. It’s not that he can’t be, it’s just that it’s far more boring to rearrange wires than it is to explode things. He finds himself less than bored getting to watch her.

“Safe’s ready,” Brownii informs. “Cool. You got the stuff, Lindsay?” Being left out of an important conversation has never been Ryan’s favorite thing. Surrounded by dangerous women, it continues to not be his favorite thing. “Alright, opening it up.” Ryan moves to help her pull the door open and fortunately, no audible alarm sounds. Brownii lets herself in and Ryan uses a little more caution to follow her. Unfortunately, it isn’t nearly as full as they thought it would be. Still, it’s not about the money; it’s about making a point. It’s always about making a point.

“You got it, Ryan?” Geoff asks. Ryan taps twice on his mic. “Good. We’ll meet you there.”

While Brownii looks around for whatever it is they’re here for, Ryan starts filling his bag with the stacks of cash. Maybe if Geoff put as much effort into showing Pattillo who’s boss as he does in robbing people that annoy him they might get somewhere. That being said, Geoff is doing some weird flirting dance with Pattillo and stepping on her feet, well, might bring some unseen consequences. Like death. Lots and lots of death.

“Found it,” Brownii announces, holding a small object in her hands. “Ready? The sequence is thirteen, six, nine, one hundred and twelve, fourteen. Second sequence is g as in Gavin, r as in Ryan, i as in intervene, and f as in fuck.” Sequence? Ryan looks over curiously, unsure of exactly what she’s going on about despite clearly none of it being directed to him. “Got it? Sweet.”

They were after something far more complicated than Geoff was. It’s now that Ryan realises they aren’t robbing the same places Geoff is, Geoff is dumbly wandering across the same places Pattillo is heisting. That sheds a whole new light on things. Pattillo’s crew is working towards something; the FAKE crew is really just throwing the whole thing off. It's no wonder Pattillo is much more prepared for things. Though Ryan has to say, they're taking the unwelcome and likely surprise appearance of the FAKE better than Geoff would.

Ryan hears Michael yell in the distance. Immediately he stops what he’s doing to be alert. Did they set the alarm off?

“Is that fucking pepper spray‽ Did you just fucking mace me‽ You fucking asshole, you maced me!” Michael shouts, his voice breaking up as he tries to trigger his mic. That’s not good. Seconds later, Geoff’s girlish scream follows. Ryan turns to Brownii at once and sure enough, she’s holding pepper spray. Honestly, they were expecting this and yet Geoff still went along with Pattillo. What did he expect to happen? That they really weren’t here for the money?

“So, you gonna be a good boy and give me the money or do I have to mace you?” Brownii inquires. Ryan looks to the bag of cash he’s holding, then back to her. He’s been pepper sprayed before and honestly, he doesn’t want the money bad enough to fight her for it. Slowly, he hands the bag over. His backup is already down for the count, anyways. It's not like he's going to get very far even if he does somehow best Brownii.

“Man, do you guys ever get tired of having your balls in a vice?” Brownii asks. Then she pepper sprays him anyways. Unfortunately, Ryan’s mask doesn’t do much to help him. In fact, it makes things much worse, trapping it near his face. He rips it off with a pained grunt and urgently tries to soothe his burning eyes with little success.

“The bf’s down,” he hears Brownii say as he collapses to his knees. “Help me grab the rest of this cash. Ry took forever bagging it up.

- x -

“It was a compliment!” Geoff insists again.

“‘How did you fit your fat ass in that tiny leather suit’ is not now, nor will it ever be a compliment, Geoff!” Michael barks back. Though Michael is certain that it’s Geoff that made Pattillo go back on her word, Ryan is not so sure about that. It explains Geoff’s black eye, the fact she didn’t just straight up knock him out was no mistake, but Ryan is certain that Pattillo had gone in expecting to walk out with the money.

“What?” Geoff scoffs irritably. “I don’t have a problem with big women!”

“She has a problem with you!” Michael assures.

“How is that my fault‽” Geoff snaps. “She started this!”

“You escalated it!” Michael bites. Ryan shakes his head mildly as he continues to spray his face with water in the sink. He stands by the statement that he hates being pepper sprayed and would like it to happen less than it has. Honestly, he’s pretty sure he’d prefer to be shot. Fortunately he got the least of it compared to Michael and Geoff, though unfortunately that doesn’t stop them from loudly arguing over basically everything. All he wanted was to get stabbed by a pretty girl.

Ryan dries his face on a hand towel before joining his crew in the living room with a heavy, tired sigh. He flops down on the single and rests his head on the back while they think about what they’ve done. Or rather, not done. They had to wander out more or less blind which made it difficult for any of them to spray paint their emblem on the safe let alone much of anything else. It was a miracle they managed to call and get Matt down there to help them out before anyone arrived. Caleb would have been the smarter choice but Geoff insists that they need to keep her cut off until they can find out what she’s doing working for Pattillo.

“I mean,” Michael says. “If she was trying to take Geoff’s place, she’d just kill Geoff right?”

“Yeah, like she could manage,” Geoff grumbles.

“I’m pretty sure she could manage, Geoff,” Michael barks at him. Ryan nods in agreement. Pattillo definitely isn’t looking to kill any of them. Her crew has shown that they’ve had more than enough chances to at least make an attempt on any of their lives. Much in the same way Geoff really isn’t looking to take out Pattillo- yet.

“She probably knows no one in my crew is dumb enough to follow her lead,” Geoff says. That could be true. While Ryan will admit, Pattillo is a scary woman, it’s likely that much of the FAKE crew wouldn’t see her that way simply for being a ‘she’. They wouldn’t respect Pattillo’s crew as an actual crew but rather as a gimmick ‘girl gang’.

“That would explain why she’s hoarding all the shitty property at the edges,” Michael agrees reluctantly. “She could be trying to wipe us out all at once. Still doesn’t make sense why she wouldn’t just get Geoff out of the way.” Ryan presses his index finger into his palm curiously, signalling an example. Geoff scoffs loudly.

“I think she’s already doing that,” Michael says with a huffy laugh. Ryan nods. Still, he supposes if Pattillo really wanted to humiliate Geoff in front of his crew she’d do it more publically. As if on cue, all three of their phones buzz. Ryan shifts enough to pull it out of his pocket, knowing he’ll have to check it inevitably and sooner is typically better than later with Brownii. The selfie she’s sent him is one she’s taken while he was writhing on the ground in pain. She holds his mask over her face and poses with him dramatically. There’s a total of four pictures she sends but he’s sure she took more. That’s definitely where his mask went.

‘lol people are already offering $$$ for this thing. i’ll make u a deal if u do me a favor’

Ryan can make an educated guess that it’s not going to be a good favor for him. He’s not desperate to get his mask back, he has plenty of them, but he’s not exactly desperate to have someone else running around with one of his masks, either. After the whole ‘copycat’ incident, Geoff made him switch to a personally customized mask which, admittedly, sort of defeats the purpose of a mask. It’s hardly Ryan’s fault Geoff talked to some random guy for nearly twenty minutes.

‘i need an override code for a grade b, 4 frequency, sub class aa transmitter device. custom shell, runs on like 12 volts. a car battery i guess?? serial #’s worn off but w/e. this thing’s modified so much i doubt it matters. code’s four digits’

What.

‘top bidder right now is the LSPD ;) wonder what kind of dna they’d find on this thing <3’

What.

“Who the hell is this?” Geoff demands irritably and immediately flashes his phone at them for an answer. Ryan puts his phone down to instead focus on the image Geoff’s been sent. A familiar face takes a selfie with Jack and not only the money they stole but Geoff’s bowtie as well. Ryan makes an annoyed opening and closing motion with his palms.

“That’s the guy that stole Ryan’s wallet,” Michael murmurs. “I guess he works for Pattillo after all.” The wallet that Ryan has since learned had a picture of his daughter in it. He has to watch that girl, honestly, she’s becoming a mean little pick pocket. It’s no wonder Pattillo found out about her.

“And here I thought Pattillo was just a man hater,” Geoff says halfly.

“Just because she hates you doesn’t mean she’s a man hater,” Michael assures him.

“Just have Matt find out who the hell he is,” Geoff snaps at him. “Pattillo’s making way too many friends for my taste.” Well, Pattillo is obviously a friendly person or at least knows how to pretend to be. Ryan exhales loudly, grabbing his coat and heading for the door again.

“Where the hell are you going?” Michael barks after him. Ryan waves him off dismissively.

He’s got to find out what a grade four-something transmitter is.

- x -

“Hey Mr. Juggalo!”

The last thing Ryan expected when rounding the corner of his apartment building is Vav and Lindsay. Actually no, because the last thing would be Geoff’s once rose gold Audi. It’s not rose gold anymore that’s for sure. Most of it’s been spray painted over and what can be seen underneath the images is pitch black. The bloody mural has been replaced with the words ‘Femme Fatale’ and the other side reads ‘save a dildo; Fuck a FAKE’. Ryan looks down at his groceries a moment, trying to decide if he should bother putting them down, before glancing up at the building.

“Mr. Herman won’t open up,” Lindsay says, approaching him just enough to not make Ryan feel the need to strike out at her. “Guess he’s not here. Just tell ‘im Jack felt bad for pepper spraying him. Not for the black eye, just the pepper spray part. She was very clear on that. He can have this back.”

“It’s mostly pity,” Vav promises from where they’re leaned aside the car. “You guys are just so pathetic.” Ryan sets his bag down by the door to instead check the car. His first thought is, of course, that there’s an ignition bomb in it. This is very quickly proved wrong when he pops the hood only to discover there is no engine.

“Hey, she didn’t feel that bad,” Lindsay assures. Yeah, Ryan can see that. “That engine purrs like a dream and the only way he’s getting that back is by prying it out of Jack’s dead hands.” That doesn’t seem like a statement she wants to be making. Ryan closes the hood back up and looks them each over thoroughly. He’s not going inside until they leave; he’s not a complete fool.

“Uh, hey,” Vav says as they raise their shades up to the top of their head. “Michael isn’t here, is he? We wanted to talk to him.” Ryan shakes his head. He doesn’t actually know that or not but he’s going to assume that if Michael isn’t down here, there’s a good reason for that. Vav pouts a little.

“I guess we’ll catch him next time,” Lindsay assures. Vav pushes off the car and the two of them wander off down the street. How did they get here? Ryan examines the Audi a little more now, making sure nothing else is visibly out of place, but the rest of it seems more or less in tact. Geoff will likely scrap it anyways, mostly out of spite, but better safe than sorry. He pops the trunk carefully, making sure he doesn’t trip any detonators, and that’s a dead body. That’s definitely a dead body. Ryan isn’t sure who it is and he’s not sure he’ll ever know who it is; it doesn’t have a face or teeth or fingers. Ryan goes ahead and closes the trunk.

That was interesting.

- x -

‘Come downstairs. I need a hand.’

Ryan isn’t sure what Geoff is up to and he’s not sure he wants to find out. He doesn’t have much of a choice unfortunately. Begrudgingly, Ryan leaves his research to head down to the ground floor. He’s spent the last few days trying to figure out what kind of transmitter Brownii is using despite her assuring that she’s ‘already got it figured out’. Though she also promises that she’s decided to keep his mask and he doesn’t have to worry about it winding up with some high rolling collector.

Ryan would have a better chance at getting it back from a collector.

What he can’t figure out is what Pattillo’s crew needs with such a high powered transmitter. They have to be up to something way more complex than originally thought and Ryan isn’t so sure it has anything to do with the Fake crew. Again, he has the thought that Geoff is really just in the way and Pattillo is dealing with them like little pests; annoying but hardly dangerous. That being said, if Geoff keeps this up, she may decide to be a legitimate problem to them. Pattillo has already proven she can be a real thorn in their side.

Upond arriving downstairs, Ryan wishes he hadn’t metaphorically spoken so soon. The armored truck parked in front of their apartment building very clearly belong to Pattillo and the fact that Geoff has somehow gotten it here is probably a fluke. Michael is working on breaking the back open with a crowbar while Geoff proudly, and smugly, watches on. This is a mistake. This is a giant mistake.

“Look what I found, Ryan,” Geoff says pleasantly. Oh, Ryan can see what he’s found. It’s a trip to the hospital one way or another. Either Pattillo let him get away with this or she didn’t and she’ll be coming to retrieve it very soon. “Turns out all you gotta do to get past them is pretend to be a chick.” Oh no.

“Hell yeah,” Michael alerts as the back doors finally give and he yanks them open. He gives a quick look inside to make sure it’s safe before pulling himself up. Geoff quickly joins him, eager to find out what sort of loot he’s gotten. Surely they recognise what a terrible idea this is. Ryan stands outside the truck, peering around cautiously to make sure it isn’t rigged in some way while Michael tears open a box. Geoff opens up another, rifling through it for anything worth while.

“Drugs?” Geoff murmurs. “What is this shit?” Michael drops the box he’s holding.

“Geoff,” he says quietly. “You gotta give this back.”

“What?” Geoff scoffs irritably. “Fuck no, dude. Do you know what I had to do to get this thing? I almost twisted my ankle.”

“Geoff,” Michael repeats with more urgency. Geoff’s phone rings. Ryan’s going to take a wild guess and assume that’s Pattillo looking for her truck. He’s also going to assumes Geoff made it very clear and very obvious that it’s in his possession because of course he would. Though he checks the caller id first, Ryan isn’t wrong.

“It’s Pattillo,” Geoff informs with a smirk as he wisely answers the phone. “What can I do for you, baby?” The rapidly approaching motorcycle noise is not a good sign. Do they have time to call for backup? “Oh, what’s wrong Jack? Don’t like having your toys taken away?”

“Geoff,” Michael whispers. Geoff waves him off.

“How does it go? Finders keepers,” he says. “Maybe you shouldn’t have made it so easy to steal?” Those are definitely Femme Fatale bikers. Those are a lot of Femme Fatale bikers. Ryan quickly reaches for his phone to call for backup and it’s sniped out of his hand immediately. Aw, that’s the second phone this month.

“No! You listen to me Pattillo! I’m done playing this game with you!” Geoff barks. “You’re going to start with giving me my two million dollar watch back! Then you’re going to close down your little clubs and maybe I’ll think about letting you off easy!” The sniper makes Ryan a little wary about pulling his gun but it’s not something he has to consider for very long. One of the bikers drives past in a flurry and as they do, the one on the back fucking lassos him. Geoff turns to him curiously and Michael quickly hops to action. Ryan’s yanked off his feet hard and dragged several feet across the ground with little to grasp onto. His back, fortunately, takes the brunt of it but before he can properly right himself, he’s ganged up on by several woman. This scenario is better in dreams!

“Hey!” Geoff yells as he hops out of the back of the truck. Michael quickly follows. “Let him go!” Thanks Geoff. They’re surrounded almost instantously by Pattilo’s crew and sure enough, a car pulls up of which Pattillo gets out of. Several woman grab Michael before he can properly do anything to defend himself or Geoff and they drag him to the ground in a heap. Geoff lowers his phone as Pattillo approaches.

“What do you think you’re doing, Pattillo?” he snaps at her. “You’re in over your head. One word and I’ll-”

Pattillo grabs him by the throat- hard. It startles Geoff quiet and she keeps him that way through sheer force. Now Geoff seems to understand the mistake he’s made. She whispers to him privately, his toes barely touching the ground. This little game they’re playing is suddenly not a game. What on earth did Geoff steal? When she drops him, Geoff nearly loses his footing; looking somewhat dazed. It’s entirely possible he hadn’t been breathing through all of that. Ryan can practically see the hearts in his eyes.

“Take the truck,” Pattillo informs her girls as she stars back to her own car. The rest of her girls very quickly swarm on Geoff. Ryan is having enough trouble of his own, though. He makes a startled noise when he’s hit that quickly becomes a disgruntled series of noises when they don’t stop.

“Hey!” Geoff yelps. “Get off me!”

“Not him,” Pattillo says. Unfortunately, Ryan is not the ‘him’ in question. He doesn’t feel like this is a very fair fight when there’s like eight of them all trying to hit him at once and he’s half tied up. “This is your only pass, Michael. Next time I won’t be so forgiving.”

Pattillo leaves and some of her girls escort their truck off. By the time they back off of him, Ryan is thoroughly black and blue- and slightly red thanks to his own blood. Geoff isn’t in much better condition, either. It suddenly makes a lot of sense why their crew members always came back injured. That was brutal. He didn’t even have anything to do with this! Ryan sits up slowly, rubbing his face in his hands to try to disperse some of the discomfort. His face paint is completely ruined.

“Jesus christ, Geoff,” Michael sighs loudly. “Why would you steal a truck of hormones‽ What is wrong with you‽”

“What?” Geoff replies shortly. “Hormones for what?”

“For people, Geoff!” Michael snaps at him. “You’re lucky Pattillo didn’t fucking skin you.”

“How was I supposed to know?” Geoff grumbles, rubbing his now second black eye tiredly. “It wasn’t like there was a sign that said ‘hey, don’t take me’.” Ryan pushes himself to his feet and limps over to where Geoff is sat on the asphalt. Geoff holds his hand out to be helped up and Ryan swats him in the head. “Ah, hey!”

“Maybe next time know what you’re stealing first,” Michael scoffs as Ryan limps himself back inside.

- x -

Ryan scoffs at his phone mutely from the backseat. Brownii, having felt ‘bad’ for what happened to Ryan’s phone, ‘apologised’ by sending several pictures of herself to replace the ‘losts’ ones; several of which feature her in varying shades of undress but never actually nude. Though her breasts are small, nearly nonexistent, Ryan can’t help but be excited. She’s cute and he’s ridiculously attracted to her.

“Just bang her already,” Michael urges bluntly. “She’s into you, isn’t she?”

“Fifty bucks says he catches something,” Geoff murmurs. Ryan’s certainly thought about it but his returning thought continues to be: she has a boyfriend. She’s certainly only flirting with him to make her own means. Which, sure, Ryan can understand, but he’s not going to have sex with her if that’s the case. Hell, he doubts she’d even go through with it as much as she suggests it. Then there’s the whole ‘brother’ thing. Matt is certain that the lad that stole Ryan’s wallet is, in fact, Brownii’s brother. They do look and sound alike, Ryan will admit, and the fact that they’re sharing an identity suggests one or both of them have been in some serious trouble before.

Ryan isn’t sure where on his scale of weird and unacceptable ‘get a blowjob from the brother of your crush’ fits but it’s certainly there somewhere. No wonder he found him attractive.

“No,” Michael replies scandalously. “Then I’d be out fifty bucks.” Ryan pockets his phone with a grumpy huff and gives their view another once over. He didn’t expect them to be helpful to his situation, they rarely are. Besides, it’s not like they’re doing much better. Last Ryan checked, Geoff was also getting unsolicited, but very wanted, photos from Pattillo with Michael getting double that of either of them. Much like Brownii, these efforts seem to be mostly to distract and disarm not to actually suggest sex.

Pattillo should be here tonight, though. Geoff hasn’t decided what he wants to do yet, but he’ll surely think of that when the times come. There’s only two viable options at this point; total war or a pact. Coming to an agreement would be best but that’ll depend on Pattillo’s attitude. She might not want to share Los Santos; Geoff doesn’t.

“That must be her,” Michael alerts. It certainly looks like one of her cars. The hood is painted with Renaissance-esq painting of what appears to be Geoff and a single fig leaf covering his junk. It reads ‘Femmes not FAKES’. Ryan would be thoroughly surprised if it was anyone else. Sure enough, she parks her car along with some of the other racers and Pattillo climbs out with her little gang. Ryan is pleased to see Brownii among them.

“Let’s get down there,” Geoff instructs. Pattillo doesn’t seem to be actively holding a grudge against Geoff and hopefully that remains true. Michael takes them down to join the crowd of street racers and much like they did for Pattillo, people move out of the way. Perhaps having finally learned his lesson from all the previous encounters, Geoff takes an easier approach at her and for the love of god, does not grab her. Pattillo shows her appreciation for this by not smacking off another one of his tattoos.

“Pattillo,” Geoff greets stiffly.

“Geoff,” Pattillo replies with a friendly smile. “How’s your face?” As passive aggressive as ever.

“Better,” Geoff says with a sarcastic smile of his own. “I see you’re wearing clothes today. You look different without your tits out.”

“Thank you,” Pattillo hums. “You look different without your foot in your mouth.” As Geoff preps to say something he’ll sure regret, Ryan clears his throat loudly. They need to do something productive here before Geoff firmly wedges his own head up his own ass again.

“I got an offer for you, Jack,” Geoff says instead.

“If it’s Micoo, we accept,” Vav coos from the hood of their car.

“It’s not me!” Michael snaps back. “And that’s not my name!”

“That’s nice,” Pattillo says nonchalantly. “But I’m not here to talk. I’m here to race.” As painted up as it is, it’s clear that Pattillo’s car is certainly not made just for show. It’ll definitely out pace the Audi she was teasing Geoff with and in all likelihood keep up with Michael’s beast of a car. Ryan doesn’t know the exact details of either of them so he can’t say for sure but Pattillo is well known for her taste in fast cars and winning bets.

“You just don’t know what’s good for you, do you?” Geoff scoffs.

“See this is why you can’t trust men so easily,” Pattillo comments to her girls with a dismissive twist of the hand. “You tell them ‘no’ and suddenly it’s all teeth and fur.”

“Really no better than wild animals,” Lindsay agrees and she smirks sharply, a look directed almost exclusively at Michael. “I could think of a few ways to tame a wild animal.”

“Fine,” Geoff stresses out. “We’ll race. Maybe you’ll actually show up at the finish line this time.” If not, well, Geoff has really cracked down on the security in their apartments since the last time. Pattillo grins, more than pleased with his begrudging admit of defeat.

“We can talk afterwards,” she promises. “If you make it that far.”

“We’ll make it that far,” Michael snaps. “Try not to let your dogs bite you on the way over.” In response, all three of Pattillo’s girls snap their teeth audibly in his direction and Michael hops back instinctively. They should really work on their teamwork if they want to outshow Pattillo’s crew at any point.

“It’s not much of a race without a bet now is it?” Pattillo offers.

“What do you want to bet?” Geoff answers suspiciously. Pattillo glances over him, then Michael, then Ryan. Oh sure, she’s not up to anything.

“I’ll let you make that call,” she assures. It’s immediately obvious what she was up to and Geoff snaps on the bait hard.

“How ‘bout one of your girls?” he suggests. She looks over her girls with an interested smirk before shrugging in mild agreement. “Just for a night,” Geoff assures. “Give us some company, you know?”

“Oh sure,” Pattillo agrees. “Take your pick. It’ll be the only time you can afford one of them.”

“Let’s go with Ryan’s little girlfriend,” Geoff says as he nods his head at Brownii. It makes sense, really. Vav is too absent minded and energetic, Lindsay is far too deadly at close range, and Jeremy unfortunately not here. Ryan is well aware that Brownii probably won’t offer them any useful information, she’s very good at avoiding subjects and weaving ‘half-truths’, but she’s probably their best bet. Vav and Lindsay get Michael too wound up anyways.

“You alright with that, Brownii?” Pattillo confirms.

“I’m down,” Brownii agrees smiling suggestively at Ryan. Not that it’s necessary when she followers it up with miming a blowjob.

“And if we win, hmmm,” Pattillo offers smugly. “We’ll go with your little quiet friend, I think.” Ryan saw that coming from a mile away. The way they look at him is not comforting, either. He really hopes Michael wins this race.

“Aw, not Michael?” Vav pouts.

“It’s only fair to Brownii,” Pattillo assures.

“Deal,” Geoff says. Ryan obviously doesn’t get much of a say in the matter. Geoff offers his hand to shake and Pattillo takes it. Of course, Geoff makes the mistake of trying to outpower her grip when he knows he can’t and quickly tries to play it off like he’s fine and his hand isn’t bruised now.

“Good luck,” Pattillo wishes and she offers a flirty wink.

“Thanks,” Geoff replies shortly as if they won’t need it. According to Trevor, Pattillo has lost very few races and those that she has are usually attributed to something ridiculous. A straightforward race like this? Michael will need to be completely on his A game.

“Hey Michael,” Lindsay calls as they’re heading back to their car. Sure enough, when they turn back both Vav and Lindsay have their shirts completely raised to expose their breasts. Michael’s face turns several shades of red in quick succession though Ryan isn’t sure if it it’s embarrassment or anger. It could be both with him. “Wanna rub for luck?”

Michael doesn’t make a reply, only quickening his steps to get back to the car sooner. Ryan makes a gesture between his fist and finger suggestively, returning the ‘advice’ he had been given earlier.

“Shut up,” Michael snaps at him and Ryan laughs. Not so easy, is it?

“Just pay attention to the road,” Geoff instructs as they climb back into the car. “I don’t need Ryan in any more pieces than he already is.” Oh he’s so glad Geoff is worried about his well being after betting him away. Not doing that would have been a great start.

‘i’ll buy you dinner first, don’t worry ;)))’

- x -

They lost.

Of course they fucking lost. Did Geoff think they were going to win? Pattillo has lost races; she hasn’t lost bets. Judging by the way she took off in the last half of the race, Ryan is sure they only kept up with her to begin with was because her girls were having sex in the back. Geoff has got to stop meeting her in her home field. That’s why they keep losing to her; she knows how to play her cards to what she’s good at and Geoff just keep falling for it. Then again, maybe Geoff should just stop thinking they're so good at everything.

“You lost Ryan in a bet,” Michael says quietly. “Geoff. What the fuck.”

“I thought you could win!” Geoff insists. “It’s only for a night! He’ll be fine. Ryan can handle a few girls.”

“Ryan’s so dead!” Michael assures. Ryan agrees! He is very, very dead! He still has the road rash from getting dragged by Pattillo’s crew! And the bruises! They're going to torture him in the bad way!

“Listen,” Geoff says firmly, grabbing Ryan’s shirt before Ryan can grab his neck. “Find out everything you can, you got it? Find out where they live, find out what they got stocked, fuck, find out their damn shoe size- I don’t care. We’re not passing this opportunity up, Ryan.” ‘Opportunity’? The only ‘opportunity’ here is Ryan ending up in a shallow grave. Geoff’s seen what they did to the others.

“This was such a bad idea,” Michael confirms. Pattillo approaches their car with a smile that can’t be nearly as soft as she makes it appear. She leans over the passenger side and Geoff reluctantly rolls down the window to talk to her. They could have just raced. They could have just bet money. No, that would have been too easy.

“Well done, boys,” Pattillo compliments. “I lose most people on the jump. Consider me impressed.” Too bad it didn’t win them the race. She peers into the backseat where Ryan sits, already dreading the rest of the night. “I believe we had a bet, though.”

“If anything happens to Ryan, it’s coming out of your skin, Pattillo,” Geoff warns.

“I’d pass that through- what’s your name? Ryan? Ryan first,” Pattillo says smugly. “I hear he likes it when it hurts.” Ryan glares at his crew irritably. One of them fucking ratted him out and by the way Michael suddenly finds something more interesting to look at out the window, it was him. Why would he tell them that? Geoff scowls at her sourly.

“Just be careful with my investments,” he insists. “He’ll be expensive to replace.”

“Don’t worry so much,” Pattillo says fondly. “My girls are gentle.” Ryan has bruises that say she is a liar! She pulls the back door open to gesture Ryan to come with her and he slowly climbs out. He’s sure to turn back to give Geoff and Michael a dirty look as he walks with Pattillo back to her car. There will be hell when he gets back. He is going to set so much of their stuff on fire it's not even funny.

“We’ll talk tomorrow, Geoffrey,” Pattillo assures with a wave of her hand. “We have a guest to entertain.” Ryan slows his pace a little when Brownii throws the back door open and the three of them eagerly await him. He is not afraid of things, including this, but hell if he’s not extremely concerned and upset that his boss lost him in a fucking racing bet. Geoff’s not even that drunk!

“I guess he’ll do,” Lindsay says.

“He’s a big wanker, isn’t he?” Vav offers amusedly. “Does he have a cute face like Micoo’s under all that crap makeup he’s wearing?”

“You know, I don’t actually know,” Brownii admits. “Probs a meatloaf face under there.” Pattillo gives him an ‘assisting’ push and Ryan growls unhappily. Once he’s close enough, they grab him. Ryan flails a little as he’s yanked off his feet and literally dragged into the backseat of Pattillo’s car where he’s wedged between Brownii and Vav.

“Take it easy with him,” Pattillo comments though she makes no suggestion that she would take any action if they don’t. They’re rather small and Ryan doesn’t think the three of them can rough him up that bad bare handed. He’s been wrong before. He's been very wrong before. Also he's pretty sure they all have knives. Ryan looks to his crew irritably a last time before Pattillo drives off.

“I didn’t think Ramsey would fall for that,” Lindsay laughs as she kicks her feet up onto the dashboard. She tilts her head back to look at Ryan and he frowns at her unhappily. “Not that we cheated, mind you. Jack’s built engines for years. No offence but Michael has soft, baby hands like Gavin.” Ryan’s not offended; Michael’s speciality is knocking people out with a single punch.

“Ah, his car looked top, though,” Vav assures. Ryan tries to ignore the fact that the three of them are still disheveled from their two hundred mile an hour club sex. It's not very easy when Brownii is reapplying her lipstick now also found on everyone else and there's at least two pairs of panties on the floor. No one else mentions it, obviously.

“Oh yeah,” Pattillo agrees. “It’s a great model. Unmodified it’s a little lacking, though. I’m surprised it made that jump.” This wasn’t exactly what Ryan expected to be perfectly honest. Before he gets the chance to dwell on this, a bag is yanked over his head. That’s more like it.

“Sorry sweetie,” Pattillo says. “We know you won’t be talking but better safe than sorry, right?” It’s not tied to him, not even wrapped, just sort of draped being long enough to shut out his vision completely. Ryan doesn’t understand. They really don’t seem to have any intention of hurting him. Even this weird bag is easy to breathe in.

“You’re good with bombs, right?” Brownii asks. Ryan turns his head towards her a bit before slouching back. Despite both Brownii and Vav not being very big, the backseat of this tiny car is cramped and he doesn’t much care for it.

“He’s not going to help us,” Vav says. “I got it under control, don’t worry.”

“You’re using way too much C4,” Lindsay insists. “I don’t even think C4 is necessary. Like a cherry bomb would probably do it, right? One of those exploding right against the front of your throat- bang.” She laughs.

“I want their heads off,” Pattillo murmurs. Ryan doesn’t like that sound of that. “Completely.”

“Oh woof,” Lindsay hums gladly.

“Besides, Ryan isn’t here for that,” Pattillo assures. It’s not like he was going to help anyways. He doesn’t have an immediate death wish. “He’s our guest tonight and we’ll treat him like one.”

“There’s no way Ramsey is going to side with us,” Vav complains. “I mean, his crew is so dense, this one can’t even talk.” Ryan exhales loudly, an audible growl on his mouth that makes Vav jump.

“Gavin,” Pattillo scolds.

“It’s not like we need his support,” Brownii scoffs. Ryan can’t tell how much of this conversation is scripted but it’s a safe bet to assume most, if not all, of it is. They'd never let him know something he isn’t supposed to.

“Geoff’s not as bad as he seems,” Pattillo assures. How would she know? “Just give him some time to settle down. He’ll tire himself out eventually.” Do they know each other? More importantly, does Geoff know that they know each other? That seems like something that he would have mentioned if that were the case. Unfortunately, the conversation comes to an end before Pattillo can diverge any more. It’s hard to say with Geoff, he’s drunk so often he forgets most things. Surely Pattillo is far too memorable to forget, though. She’s a beautiful, red headed woman that could crush him easily. That doesn’t seem like something he'd forget.

The car comes to a stop and Ryan mentally tries to map out where they are. It couldn’t have been a very long drive and wisely, they kept him distracted enough that he couldn’t hear any audible clues on the drive over. Brownii grabs his arm with both hands to tug him out of the car and then proceeds to lead him somewhere. He could just take the bag off but he isn’t sure he wants to test what would happen if he did that before they wanted him to.

They take a long elevator up and Ryan counts the floors in his head. Much like Geoff, Pattillo seems to have a taste for the excessive and luxurious. A penthouse suit, nothing less for the likes of them. The hallway is long and the single door that he’s lead through suggests there’s more than one on the floor. He's willing to bet they all live here much like he and Michael live within shouting range of Geoff.

“Welcome to Hell in Heels,” Pattillo greets as the bag is yanked off his head. Oh. Well. Ryan knows where that is. He glances around minutely, not very discretely, but not wanting to appearing completely transparent either. Sure enough, Pattillo seems to have refurbished the top floor meeting room into a living space. Ryan guesses the purpose of the bag was not so he didn’t know where they were going but rather how they got here; they didn’t go through the lobby. There must be another way up here; a good thing to keep hidden from Ryan.

“Now take your clothes off,” Lindsay says bluntly. Ryan blinks.

“Please,” Pattillo adds, assuring that she’s serious. The ‘please’ doesn’t help. “You can do so in the bathroom with Brownii if that makes you more comfortable.” Annoyed, Ryan signs an ill tempered ‘why’. He’d actually quite prefer to keep his clothes on.

“You didn’t think we’d just let you wander around armed did you?” Brownii says shortly. Okay, he sees their point. He didn’t know he was going to get bet away by his boss today; he would have come less armed.

“Want to make sure you’re not wearing a wire, too,” Vav furthers. “We got some pretty sensitive stuff around here.” Ryan huffs disgruntledly, looking to Brownii before averting his eyes back to Pattillo. It doesn’t look like they’re going to give him much room to refuse. Of course, he’d take advantage of it if they did. Considering he’s already seen far more of them than he sees of most people, Ryan figures it hardly matters at this point whether he strips down here or somewhere private. He can be as shameless as they are.

As soon as he takes his jacket off, Lindsay is there to take it from him. She passes it on to Brownii who rifles through his pockets immediately and empties out his belongings. He only had one grenade on him, what’s the problem? And some extra ammo, everyone carries that. That’s just a utility knife. Backup utility knife. Duct tape. Rope. Extra backup utility knife. Brownii shakes his jacket and a few other things fall out before she looks at him blandly. He shrugs.

Ryan shimmies out of his shirt and Lindsay tosses it aside with his empty jacket. With a mild scoff, he unbuckles his belt and steps out of them to hand them over as well. Lindsay quickly shuffles through these pockets as well. His phone and wallet, obviously, gun and holster, obviously, emergency plastic explosive, obviously; wire strippers, matches, lighter, extra lighter, cigarettes, emergency grenade. Honestly, he was barely armed in the first place.

“What’s wrong with you?” Vav asks incredulously. Ryan makes a fist at his forehead and subsequent slithering motion down to tail it off. Vav looks at Brownii questioningly before gathering up Ryan’s things to box up for him.

“That was rhetorical,” Pattillo promises. She gestures to his lower half. “Boxers too, please, sir.” Ryan makes a face of disagreement, not as quick to want to agree to being completely bare ass naked in a room of deadly women. “Come on, Haywood. We know how conniving you can be.” Conniving is a hard word. With an irritably grunt, Ryan takes off his boxers as well.

“I told you he was fucking hung,” Brownii murmurs to Vav pointedly. Pattillo gives him a mild look.

“Hand over the knife, Ryan,” she instructs. Ryan scoffs as he pulls the backup of the extra backup utility knife and the tape holding it there off his thigh and hands it to Vav to put in the box with everything else. It wasn’t like he was going to use it or anything. “Thank you.”

“Here, you can wear this for now,” Lindsay instructs as she hands him a pair of plain grey sweat pants and a white t-shirt. He tugs them on with a mute huff and Vav folds up his clothes and tucks them in the box with the rest of his stuff.

“You can have this back when you leave,” they assure. He’d better.

“We appreciate you coming, Ryan,” Pattillo offers kindly. Ryan really isn’t about this fake outer shell she shows off. She’s a mean lady and she isn’t fooling him at all. Last he checked, he hadn’t had much of a choice, either. She gestures him to have a seat on the couch and he sits himself down with some heaft, taking up more room than strictly necessary. Brownii kicks one of his knees aside to make room for herself beside him.

Ryan expects to be asked some hard questions; possibly to be tortured and-or persuaded for answers even. He’s not. Pattillo and Brownii quickly become more interested in the football game on the television. Vav and Lindsay alternate between serious discussion about what sounds like mechanical schematics, giggling like school girls for no apparent reason, and happily kissing. Ryan is significantly more uneased than he was before. Brownii eventually just kicks her shoes off and settles her legs in his lap, absently using him as a footrest. He’s pretty sure they’re not trying to scare him; they’d be doing an awful job and he knows what they're capable of too well. Ryan’s just super uncomfortable.

“Does Ryan want a beer or something?” Vav calls from the kitchen. Ryan shakes his head.

“Nah, he’s good,” Brownii replies though her attention remains very focused on the tv. “Bring me a redbull, though!”

“Same,” Lindsay insists. “I got Rwby duty in the morning.” Their program? The way she says it doesn’t make it sound like a person but Ryan can’t say for sure yet. He’s had to watch over some less than self sufficient programmers in the past. Matt included. Vav hands Pattillo a beer before tossing a can at Brownii and the other at Lindsay. Their taste for finer things obviously doesn’t extend to beer as they’re seemingly content with the shitty Los Santos brand. Ryan’s not even sure that counts as actual beer; it’s more like watered down rubbing alcohol.

“I forgot to ask, how did South’s team do on their first red?” Pattillo questions curiously, popping the cap off her bottle with the palm of her hand. Ouch. Lindsay laughs.

“Oh man, it was brutal,” she says. “She stuck the dude’s hand in the garbage disposal.” Forget about that first ouch. Ryan’ll have to remember that for later. Pattillo makes a pained face and Vav squeaks.

“Awesome,” Brownii laughs quietly.

“No details,” Pattillo instructs shortly. “I just wanted to know if she handled it.”

“Oh she handled it,” Lindsay promises. “He’ll never be putting hands on anyone again.” Another unfortunate client getting too touchy with Pattillo’s girls it sounds like. Ryan thinks he’s learned a lesson here somewhere if that lesson is don’t touch the strippers.

“Good,” Pattillo praises. “It’ll be good to have another team on red rotation.” Ryan would love to find out how many people Pattillo actually has under her belt. They can’t get a solid number on them because many of them are women and the idiots Geoff employees can’t get it through their thick skulls that the strippers will murder them now. Just straight up murder.

“Jeremy’s out now, right?” Vav asks curiously, leaning back on the couch to glance down the hall.

“Nah. Think xe’s bangin’ Ramsey’s little nerd programmer,” Lindsay murmurs. Matt that traitor, sleeping with the enemy already? Kudos. Vav pouts a little.

“Aw. Xe’s been hanging out with that bird so much lately,” they complain. “Lame.” Ryan has been wondering where Matt's been off to lately. That's a lie, he didn't care.

“Oh leave her alone,” Pattillo insists. “She's having fun. I don’t blame her.”

“Yeah, and when he's done playing doctor with that fucking nerd, he'll be back here,” Brownii promises. Still, Vav frowns a bit but they don't let it get them down that much. In fact, they're almost immediately on to the next task.

“So, Ryan,” they says suddenly. Please just let them do something to him so he’s not so anxious about it. “Million dollars but for a year, you can only fire your gun if your dick is completely erect.” He changed his mind; nothing happening was better.

“Jesus,” Pattillo exhales with a tired shake of the head. “You can ignore him.”

“What if firing a gun gets his dick hard?” Lindsay asks curiously.

“Nah, his dick would have to be at full mast otherwise it just, like, jams,” they insists. It’s going to be a long night.

- x -

Ryan carries his box of stuff up to Geoff’s apartment tiredly. What he’s learned is practically nothing. Vav likes to ask a million and a half questions, frequently forgetting Ryan can’t answer them verbally and knowing little to no sign language. Brownii will fall asleep doing basically anything including offering a handjob and then nodding off before he can even get his pants off. For being an amazing computer expert, Lindsay is terrible at math; it took forever for her to figure out the tip for the delivery guy. Jack rambled about football for half the night and spent the other half dozing off.

He did get a nice blowjob from Brownii’s brother again in the middle of the night who then proceeded not to speak a word to him the next morning. Then they cold kicked him out. He had to walk home. Admittedly, Ryan’s not sure why he’s surprised. He really should have assumed that at their core, they’re just a bunch of people hanging out and protecting each other just like Geoff’s crew. Pattillo had to have a point to all of this but Ryan isn’t sure what it was. To make him vaguely uncomfortable all night? To make him see them as human?

Fortunately, Ryan did manage one thing.

“See, I told you he’d be fine,” Geoff assures as Ryan drops his box down on the coffee table. Michael sits up to look at him curiously. They were so worried about him obviously, they couldn't even fathom it in themselves to come pick him up. He hasn’t had time to change out of the clothes he’d been given but that can wait a little longer. He shuffles through his box for a moment to pull out a photo and Geoff suddenly sits up a lot straighter.

“Is that Jack?” he asks. “Where’d you get that?” Oh, Ryan just asked politely. The three of them were more than happy to oblige. He pulls out two more pinup photos, these of Vav and Lindsay, and Michael urgently pops up.

“Whoa, I’ve never seen those before,” he murmurs. Ryan knows. They reach for the pictures and Ryan yanks them out of reach immediately.

“Dude, come on,” Geoff says. “Don’t be a dick. That’s like a straight up sexy nurse outfit.” Ryan pulls out his lighter.

“I didn’t bet you away, Ryan!” Michael assures.

“Michael!” Geoff snaps. “Okay, Ryan wait. I’m sorry for losing you in a bet.” He doesn’t wait. He lights them a flame, fire instantly engulfing the flimsy paper, and holds them out of reach until they’re well burnt away. Ryan hands them the remaining scraps and both Geoff and Michael frown.

“You have copies of those, right?” Michael asks.

“You wouldn’t do us like that, Ryan,” Geoff agrees. Ryan picks his box back up and tucks it under his arm. He’d like a warm shower and a clean pair of clothes and maybe some breakfast. He huffs to himself, satisfied, and heads for his own apartment.

“Ryan, man, come on.”

- x -

The truce with the Femme Fatales is bare minimum at best. Pattillo was more than willing to play fair with Geoff, she didn’t seem to have an issue with that, but it made Geoff nervous anyways. He made the right call in cutting things short. They don’t want to make the mistake of giving Pattillo too much push room and letting her overtake them. They have something of an agreement now; the FAKEs will leave the Femmes alone and the Femmes will leave the FAKEs alone. It’s working out to some degree Ryan supposes. Though, Ryan is sure now, that the Femmes have never really given them a problem before.

In fact, aside from Jack toying with Geoff, her crew mostly kept to themselves and what they needed. Much of the fighting came from FAKE members pressing on the Femmes and them violently lashing back. Everything else they claimed was largely nonviolent. Of course, Geoff was also sure to make the comment that Pattillo should, henceforth, ask before she moves in on his territory. Pattillo assured she’ll consider it.

Perhaps he also should have suggested she inform them whenever she does something in their territory. They only find out about the commotion going down on the main street because of a live news report. True to the story, there is a mess of people gathered around and the LSPD are doing their best to keep everyone at a distance. They’re far too busy to even notice Geoff and his boys, a rare commodity. The crowd is far too thick to see into and it probably wouldn’t be wise to make a point of drawing attention to themselves.

Instead, they take to a nearby roof to try to see what’s going on. From what Ryan can tell, not much. There’s a white ring painted on the street and in it, a group of people almost exclusively made of men. The cops dare not set a food within the ring and the men not a step out. Smack in the middle of the ring is a phone booth and sure enough, what has everyone in a comotion, is probably the large amount of C4 strapped to the top. That’s probably enough to take out the street.

“You recognise anyone down there?” Geoff asks curiously as he peers through his binoculars. Michael shakes his head and Ryan does the same. They’re certainly no one important to them, hell they don’t even look like gang members.

“Maybe?” Michael offers. “I think that’s the guy that owns one of the suit shops?” Definitely no one important. What is Pattillo up to? More importantly, maybe they should be a little further away. The blast radius on that thing is going to be fairly lengthy. The LSPD is definitely going to want to evacuate the citizens a lot further than they have though Los Santos citizens have a habit of not knowing what’s best for themselves anyways. For a while, nothing happens. What’s she waiting for?

“Pattillo’s not answering me,” Geoff admits, having not gotten a reply to his message.

“Vav just says she’s busy,” Michael agrees. “Lindsay’s not answering either.” Ryan isn’t sure he’ll get an answer, either, but it might be worth a shot. This doesn’t seem to have anything to do with them so their participation in it is hardly important. He doubts they’d give them the time.

‘Are you doing this?’ he asks. Sure enough, he doesn’t get a reply. They’ll just have to wait it seems. It’s not a particularly long wait, just under about ten minutes, and then the crowd parts. A guy slowly wanders forward and nervously enters the ring with the others.

“Thank you for joining us,” a speak on the phone booth alerts. It’s Jack’s voice, that’s unmistakable. “I know it was a hard decision.” Ryan glances around, trying to find a safe place where Pattillo and her girls could be. Perhaps they have a video feed; that would explain the need for a powerful transmitter.

“You have been chosen to be examples,” Pattillo goes on. “For those of you watching, please don’t worry. As long as the LSPD officers remain out of the ring, you’ll be safe. LSPD, please take a lesson while we do your job.”

“This is fucking weird,” Michael murmurs. Ryan thinks he’s piecing together what’s going on here. Geoff doesn’t say anything, simply watching on with an odd expression.

“I’m hardly one to judge,” Pattillo promises. “You’ve been chosen by your peers; your loved ones, your ‘significant’ others, your community. Some of you chosen by your records; some of you by polls. Don’t be mistaken, this isn’t justice. Think of it as retribution. This is sheer spite. Let’s begin.” Wow Ryan is just- ridiculously attracted to Jack right now. This is better than a saw trap.

“Pattillo put all this together?” Geoff ponders quietly. It stands to reason that perhaps they should reconsider getting on her bad side.

“Please step into the booth Mr. Wilhelm. Your wife would like to have a word with you,” Pattillo says and as she does, a photo is projected on a nearby building. It’s a woman’s face, another person Ryan’s never seen before or at least never dedicated to memory, and she’s beaten up something terrible. Things are definitely starting to add up. One of the people from the little group nervously approaches the phone booth, holding his throat anxiously as he steps inside. “Close the door behind you, would you? We’re trying to contain the mess.”

Images flip through of the supposed Mrs. Wilhelm and various states of her injuries then the various states of her home and possessions. The crowd is certainly not on his side, though Ryan can’t say he is either. “Beg her for forgiveness.”

He does, terrified for his life, and she doesn’t listen. The pop of the explosive isn’t nearly as gory sounding as the blood splatter that suddenly coats the inside of the phone booth making it nearly impossible to see inside especially at a distance. The entire crowd gasps in horror and begin to buzz loudly with concern and distress. What was that?

“Mr. Hardy, your daughter is ready to speak to you next,” Pattillo assures. “Please enter the phone booth. Don’t mind the blood.”

“Damn dude,” Michael murmurs. “That’s brutal.” That’s a lot more than brutal. Ryan’s going to have to remember to add this to his repertoire. Without warning, a red dot appears on Ryan suddenly and he jumps instinctively. Of course, his startled gesture immediately startles both his teammates; the lot of them too focused on what’s going on to really be bothered with paying attention to anything else. Fortunately, it’s not malicious. His phone buzzes.

‘found you,’ Brownii texts. ‘sorry had my hands busy’ Geoff’s phone goes off shortly after. Ryan glances in the direction the dot seems to come but even with binoculars he can’t find her.

“Pattillo wants us to meet her,” Geoff informs. What a terrible idea that sounds like. However, Ryan’s curiosity is louder than the concern for his well being. He's too interested to find out Jack's reasoning behind these vile acts and more importantly, how she's pulling them off. It's a performance he's sure he'll never forget.

Geoff looks around, likely trying to spot where Pattillo is before his gaze falls on a building. It's close, too close to be safe from their own explosive, which only makes Ryan think they really don't have any desire to do more damage than necessary. That means the transmitter is for the individual explosives and that means if any one of them were to leave the painted circle kaboom.

“Let's go,” Geoff instructs. Perhaps he's making sense of things, too. The building Pattillo instructs them to isn’t even second guessed by the police. It's just a normal building and no one thinks any the wiser. Several women loiter around the lobby, seemingly harmless but the way all of their eyes a fix to the new presence that's far from true. They're guards and they're antsy; Ryan can understand why.

Quietly, Geoff leads them to the front desk and both Ryan and Michael are sure to keep in a safe line behind him. The woman there gives them an unapproachable look and sets a box on the counter top. If they're already on edge, it would be best not to ruffle any feathers around here. Then again, it doesn't look like Geoff is looking for a fight this time. Geoff is a lot of things but Ryan can not imagine him harboring ill intention for someone he cares about or children. He just doesn't have it in his drunk little heart. Hate to those who deserve it.

“Weapons,” the receptionist instructs. It's not like they're going to try anything. As far as Ryan is concerned, the three of them are rather fond of not being dead. All the same, they stick their personal goods in the box for temporary keeping. Pattillo did keep her word last time and returned all his equipment in the same manner he left them, hopefully he's not wrong to assume that will happen again.

“You have to take your mask off,” she instructs Ryan with an increasingly short temper. He does, reluctantly. She stares at him blandly. “Facepaint too.” Ryan has to draw the line somewhere. He shakes his head firmly, assuring he isn’t going to do that. “Then you're not going up there, are you?”

“Hey, give him a break,” Geoff insists. “He's self conscious about his face.”

“Well he's going to freak out the ladies like that,” the receptionist assures sourly. “Here. If you won’t take it off, you have to wear this.” Ryan frowns but he takes the paper bag anyways and begrudgingly pulls it over his head. His paint isn’t even that scary. She pulls the box down and pushes it under her desk before standing and gesturing them to the elevator. With a short hand movement, she motions them in.

“No sudden movements, okay? And keep your voices down. Many of the ladies aren't too ‘fond’ of-” she looks them over with a displeased expression. “Men.” Well wasn't that a pleasant interaction. He's sure it's necessary all the same for everyone's safety; Ryan wouldn't want to make himself look like a threat around here. She leaves them to it and the elevator automatically takes them up. It feels like they're walking into an already agitated beehive. Unfortunately, that's not the case. Ryan honestly would prefer if it were.

The room is somber and quiet. The people gathered, almost exclusively women, huddle together in little groups; some of them with children, some of them with injuries, some of them with both. Many of them are being consoled by obvious Femme members and others console each other. Ryan thinks it goes without saying that the three of them are on their best behavior. They don’t want to rattle anyone here for more reasons than one. Honestly, he didn't know his heart was so easy to break. God knows Geoff is so empathetic to families, families with children especially, he's probably a wreck right now.

“Hey guys,” Lindsay greets them with the same somewhat overbearing smile she always wears. “Jack's in the front room. You should go have a seat. I need to tend to some people right now.” She certainly has her hands full. They make their way through the room carefully and quietly, not bothering anyone as much as they can. As unagitated as everyone is, perhaps it's not a great idea to shake the hive anyways. Actual wasps would be friendlier.

Jack is set up in a room overlooking the show she's put on display but she has several screens to keep track of at her will. The ground is fairly far from here after all and she'd want to make sure nothing goes wrong to the best of her ability. Ryan wouldn't be surprised if she has crew members in the crowd; the LSPD not considering her girls anymore of a threat than the FAKE crew does. Perhaps this will teach everyone a lesson. There are papers scattered around that Ryan realises with just a small glance are the pages to her speech. Pattillo is a very smart person though so this isn’t that surprising.

Vav is helping talk a woman through the phone call to the street below, another man eagerly begging for his life and promising he can change even if they're words said purely under duress. Of course, Vav has no problem with reminding her of this, urging her that she knows he's a liar and will only hurt someone else. Pattillo glances at them with a friendly smile, far too friendly for the capital punishment she's dealing out like Halloween candy.

“Oh, hey Geoff,” she says warmly, tenderly rocking the small child in her arms. “I meant to call you but we've had our hands a little busy around here. I'm glad you could make it.” Is she really? Ryan doesn’t feel like she holds any malice for them; she really has no reason to. They've been playing a game up until this point. Perhaps they should be safe rather than sorry.

“Is this what you've been doing?” Geoff asks with more amazement that scorn. Pattillo gestures him to pull up a chair to sit beside her and Geoff passes the motion on for one of them to grab it for him. Ryan slides it over to him quietly.

“You'll have to be more specific than that,” Pattillo urges. “This specifically? We've been working on it a while, yeah. Gavin found one of these,” she uses a free hand to pick up a clunky piece of metal and hands it towards them. Geoff takes it with some hesitation to look it over before passing it to Michael. He's initially confused but a startled expression causes him to quickly pass it on to Ryan. It's a collar? Ryan quickly makes the same discovery Michael had; it's explosive. No wonder their heads popped off like that.

“And this was a natural progression from there,” Pattillo promises. Ryan sets the collar down, not wanting to handle it too much and potentially injure himself- or everyone else. That is an awful lot of C4. He would love a chance to dissect an unarmed one, however, of which he's not sure this one is. They could definitely have some fun with that. The man in the phone box erupts suddenly and it catches them off guard, all three of them jumping a bit. Pattillo winces like she doesn't quite care for this part. Vav quickly ushers the woman out of their private little corner, quietly cooing little praises to try to calm her down. They eagerly help the woman take her child back from Pattillo and guide her to the door.

“Lindsay will take care of you, okay? It's okay. Nothing is going to hurt you,” they promise and the woman nods agreeably, murmuring soft thank yous. Once Lindsay takes over, Vav beams at them excitedly. The overall nonchalant attitude Pattillo and her girls have for this situation is intimidating- and hot. Ryan is totally into it.

“Well Geoff, since you're here now,” Pattillo says though the way she says it puts everyone a bit on edge. “Why don’t you help me with something.”

“Help?” Geoff repeats. She grins as she reaches for her mic.

“Why don’t you step up to the booth, Mr. Kraid,” Pattillo speaks to the crowd below as she picks up one of her notecards. Ryan distantly wonders if Geoff knows this guy. He's still not sure if Geoff knows Jack and Geoff probably doesn’t know either. “Unfortunately, we don’t have anyone for you to barter your life with. You were chosen by your record. Three girlfriends, one wife, a son; we found them and gave them proper burials for you. My buddy here will decide instead. You've killed people before, haven't you? Not much different.” She smiles at him. Geoff doesn’t smile back.

“Like you haven't,” he scoffs back irritably, not exactly thrilled to be put on the spot so suddenly with her accusations.

“Never said I haven't,” Pattillo assures. “That's why I'm not judging.” The man certainly begs same as the man before him and same as most of the others will likely do. Ryan’s not sure if it actually matters or not. Pattillo seems to be offering up the concept of being spared but really why would she do that? Honestly, they shouldn’t be so surprised. They knew from the beginning that Pattillo and her crew were violent feminist or rather, extremely violent and feminist. Not that Ryan disagrees with either of those things he supposes. The most surprising part of this is how organized it is.

“Can I ask why you’re doing this?” Geoff murmurs. Pattillo looks at him curiously and then grins.

“Same reason you do, I imagine,” she replies. “Bored. We all have our own reasons, I guess; Vav was unsatisfied in England, Brownii retired early, Lindsay just likes to see people suffer, Jeremy- was here a minute ago? Unlike you, we decided to have a goal.”

“What exactly is that goal?” Geoff insists.

“Making Los Santos safer for women,” Pattillo says simply. In retrospect, that makes a lot of sense. In fact, Ryan sort of feels dim witted for not putting that together sooner. Rwby is a help hotline, Hell in Heels is a sanctuary, the man Brownii and Vav decapitated was an abuser, and ‘no FAKES’ a place for them to train predominately women how to protect themselves. It’s remarkable, actually.

“Honestly,” Pattillo murmurs. “For someone who used to be just a massive asshole, I’m surprised how much you’ve calmed down.” Geoff used to be more of an asshole? How? “I thought we were going to have a problem.” There’s a small moment where Geoff seems confused before recognition passes his eyes like a five watt bulb.

“You’re that Jack Pattillo?” he asks with clear amazement.

“Do you know any other Jack Pattillos?” she replies pointedly.

“Well no, I mean,” Geoff says hurriedly. “You just- I- you got hot. Like real hot. Damn. You were just some dorky little fat kid in high school.” Ryan isn’t sure he believes that Geoff used to be worse than this. Surely she’s remembering wrong.

“Neither of those things has changed,” Jack scowls sourly.

“Yeah,” Geoff agrees and he motions to her suggestively. “But, like, wow.”

“You’re gesturing to my breast,” Jack says blandly. “I know where you live, Geoffrey.”

“Okay, let’s relax,” Geoff insists. “It was just a compliment.” Michael physically puts his head in his hands. “I’m down with offing this guy. Let’s do it.”

“Can I hit the button?” Vav asks eagerly. “It’s just so satisfying.” Geoff shrugs without a real opinion.

“Go for it, babe,” he assures but they look to Jack for further confirmation and she nods approvingly. With a happy grin, Vav makes a rather elegant bound to the corner they had been huddled with the previous woman in and hits the button that makes blood explode against the inside of the phone booth. Oh yeah, Ryan can have a lot of fun with these.

“Ready for the next one when you are, Lindsay,” Jack says affectionately.

“Man, I can't believe you went on to be a fight champion,” Geoff mentions off handedly. “And hot. So, so hot.”

“I can’t believe you grew a mustache,” Jack replies. “At least you grew into your massive ears.”

“You know, I don’t remember you being such a bitch in high school,” Geoff insists.

“And I remember you having a stronger back bone,” she assures. “We all change.” It’s actually kind of interesting to see Geoff get his ass handed to him by a pretty lady repeatedly. It’s certainly a trained effort. Geoff pouts. Jack turns in her chair and looks at Ryan for a moment while Ryan tries not to act too intimidated. It’s not that he’s unsettled by her or anything, but he respects what she’s doing and is sort of terrified about being grouped up on and beaten by more deadly ladies. At least, in this situation anyways. A controlled environment would be interesting.

“You’re scaring my ladies, Ryan,” she says simply. He’s wearing the paper bag and everything! “Why don’t you join Brownii on the roof?”

“Last time Ryan joined Brownii on a roof he ended up maced,” Michael points out. That's an excellent point granted from pretty particular circumstances.

“So there’s only a fifty-fifty chance it’ll happen again, right?” Jack promises. At this point, he’d probably be safer on the roof and more comfortable. “Elevator up then take the stairs to the roof,” she explains and waves her hand to send him off. Michael gives him a half look as if unsure as to let him go. Brownii has been, by far, the least malicious towards them. Ryan thinks he’ll be okay. Carefully and quietly, he makes his way back out of the room and softly buzzing hornet’s nest.

Ryan pulls the bag off his head once soundly in the elevator and scoffs to himself mildly. He doesn’t think his face paint is that bad; not as bad as his mask anyways. Still, he supposes it’s the least they could have asked of him as unappealing and uncomfortable as it is. He sorta understands, anyways. It's not like he's the friendliest of looking people in the first place.

The elevator only goes up one more floor and it takes him a bit of looking around to find the stairs. There’s some equipment laying around, none of it very important looking, but Ryan has learned his lesson about messing with stuff he doesn’t know about. Geoff learned that lesson for him, actually. It’s another shallow flight of stairs up to the roof. Though it's a long way from the ground, the soft blue of the sky is rather comforting for Ryan. He’s always had a fondness for heights.

“Hey Ry,” Brownii greets though she doesn’t take her eyes off her scope. Ryan comes to settle down beside her, leaning on the edge where she has her sniper rifle setup, and peers down at the crowd of buzzing people below. She's well hidden up here. The LSPD just call in more and more people but they can’t safely do anything; Ryan doubts Brownii is the only sniper they have posted. Her hot pink rifle is definitely not just for show.

“Sorry I can’t look right now,” she murmurs, shooting him a distracted half grin. “Give an inch and the cops’ll take a mile.” He understands. Brownii acts as Pattillo’s eyes not only here but he imagines in most situations; always at an elevated level and always watching, listening from the sides. It’s a safe bet to say Lindsay is both the brawn and the brain. Vav, certainly, is the charismatic one with their ‘dumb blonde’ act and surprisingly quick witt. Jeremy, apparently, just gets everyone real fucking high. It is very good for morale. Pattillo’s put herself together a well balanced team for being out of ‘boredom’.

“You know what I like about you?” Brownii says off handedly. Ryan isn’t sure he’s supposed to reply to this rhetorical question considering she is currently too occupied to look at him. She goes on. “Aside from your horse dong I mean.” Oh sure, aside from that. He watches as she makes quick work of reloading her sniper rifle. Perhaps she really hadn’t intended on shooting today. It’s a blur if nothing else; she knows exactly what she’s doing like a machine at the ready.

The following shot is loud and fast but accurate. Even from the sky, Ryan can see the body that flops to the ground. Brownii laughs, a laugh that is completely filled with joy for what she’s done. “Damn dude! I popped his helmet clean off! You fucking see that? That was fuckin’ sweet,” she exclaims happily. Ryan gestures to her curiously and she looks at him out the corner of her eye. She blinks momentarily before brushing a curl of blonde hair away from her face and looking back down her scope.

“Oh, right. We were talking about your dick or something?” she comments like Ryan had been the one to bring it up. “Idk I lost my train of thought. Probably wasn’t important.” Yeah. Probably not. “You have no idea how long I was waiting for someone to step over that line. Come on baby, mama needs two more to beat last month’s head shot count.”

Ryan sighs. He loves this girl.

- x -

Ryan straightens out his hair a touch as he heads up to Geoff’s apartment, primping idly just at the idea of being invited anywhere near Brownii for the first time non maliciously. Now that Geoff has recognised Jack and now that they understand what it is she's doing, it's much easier to not worry about it. If they haven't done anything, there's no reason for them to be concerned. At least as far as Pattillo and her gang is concerned.

Granted, Geoff and Jack weren’t the best of friends in high school but Ryan can only be glad that Geoff hadn’t bullied her to either of their knowledge. Geoff always has, and probably always will, have a tendency of going after the bigger, badder fish. It's easy for people to underestimate Geoff’s drunk little tired form but there's no doubt in Ryan’s mind that this thing with the Femmes could have so easily escalated into a full fledged war for Los Santos. He's glad it didn't.

Like usual, Michael can be found in Geoff’s apartment as well. They all can most of the time, really; they practically live with him. This doesn’t mean either of them are ready, however. Jack has invited them to her club, no FAKEs, so she and Geoff can discuss what they're going to do from here. It's another battle on her home field but if they play their cards right, it doesn't have to be a fight.

Ryan waits a moment to see if either of them will notice him but they don't. Geoff is far too caught up in Michael’s blowjob and Michael far too caught up in blowing him. While it's definitely not the first time they've partaken in each other's company, nor will it be the last most likely, it has been a while. With the Femmes providing actual love interests, they've all been a bit too busy to bother.

Okay, ‘love interest’ is absolutely not the word he was looking for.

Knowing neither of them are going to be done any time soon, Ryan pushes a vase off a table. This is a lot more endearing when the Femmes do it. The shattering noise makes Geoff jump and, subsequently, jerk into Michael’s mouth. Michael shoves away quickly, making an ineloquent cough and shooting Geoff a dirty glare. Geoff redirects it at Ryan. Hey, they have places to be. As mentioned, Michael might as well live here; they can finish this later.

Michael pushes to his feet and Geoff hurriedly looks back to him with vague disappointment.

“Aw, come on. I'm sorry, Michael. You're just gonna stop half way like that?” he insists. Michael isn’t having it.

“Fucking finish it yourself,” comes the annoyed grumbles. He heads off down the hall likely to refreshen himself before they leave. Geoff gives Ryan an annoyed stare, obviously displeased that his illy timed oral sex had been interrupted. Ryan swats a picture off the table.

“Stop!” Geoff barks. Ryan knocks the other picture onto the floor, never breaking eye contact with him. “Alright! I'm going! Jeez.” He hurriedly tucks himself back into his pants and tries to straighten out his clothes to the best of his ability. “Your fucking face paint always gives me a softie anyways,” he grumbles. They don’t want to keep Jack waiting and Geoff knows it. She's patient, sure, but making her wait will look like a power play and Geoff definitely doesn't want that.

Fortunately they’re ready sooner than later.

- x -

Sure enough, ‘no FAKEs’ hasn’t changed. Knowing what it is now, however, gives Ryan a different impression of it. Today, it's significantly less busy and that's very attributed to the lengthy line outside of people they won’t let in. Ryan isn’t sure the meaning of it, it's not like Jack cleared the place out just to speak to Geoff. The bouncer gestures them in without a second thought but no one in line audibly complains. They surely know better.

Michael and Geoff take a moment to look around for themselves. It's much different in person, after all. The client side is closed in and the stage draws in the eye. No different than before, a solid wall of glass separates the two sides and assures there's no contact between them. There's less dancers on the client side tonight, less clients, too. The people they are letting in seem familiar. Ryan makes the connection quickly; she’s only letting FAKEs in?

“Those are definitely real hands,” Geoff comments quietly. “Definitely, definitely real hands.” There's more than last time. Ryan is surprised people don’t learn. Lindsay and Vav come to greet them, the two of them smiling no different than usual with that certain eeriness to it. He's come to learn that's just the way they are, intentionally or otherwise. It's charming in it's own way.

“Hey, you guys made it,” Lindsay chirps gladly.

“I didn’t think you'd come after the call box thing,” Vav laughs. Ryan came almost exclusively because of that. He still wants to know how they pulled that off, after all. Explosive collars are right down his alley.

“Oh what, like you scared us or something?” Michael scoffs. The two of them just giggle.

“Well we're here,” Geoff assures. “And Jack is here, right?” They have definitely learned it's better to know where Jack and all of her girls are at most times. This should go without saying but fairly, most gangs don't sneak into Geoff's apartment and steal his things during a race.

“Oh sure,” Lindsay agrees. “Come on.” She gestures them to follow her with a little wave and they do. Michael looks around before glancing at Ryan mildly. Ryan crosses his wrists at his chest and gently slackens them. There's nothing to be worried about, there's no feasible reason Jack would choose now of all times to attack them. Hopefully. Michael huffs.

Lindsay leads them into the back to one of the larger rooms Ryan had passed by the first time he was here. She motions them in then closes the door behind them. It is a decent sized room and in it, a small stage and booth. Ryan doesn’t recognise the dancer who seems more than happy to entertain Jack but that's probably for the best. Lindsay nods her head over for Geoff to join her on the plush looking couch and he only hesitates a moment, glancing back to Michael and Ryan, before heading over.

“Over here, then,” Vav insists, grabbing Michael’s arm to guide him to a different corner of the room. Michael, begrudgingly, allows it. While it's clear Jack wants some privacy with Geoff, she doesn’t want to separate Geoff from his crew and of course, that means she won't be separated from her own. Vav and Lindsay are more than happy to settle themselves in the other booth with Michael squished between them. Though his face is well red, he makes no complaints.

Ryan looks around curiously, trying to find Brownii with no luck. It's actually rather odd that she isn't here; so rare to see her crew without her. He hasn't heard from her in a couple days but that's not unusual. They don’t text a lot, most of their semi-flirtatious conversations short and to the point. This is probably more on Ryan than her, though. It's hard to have much to say and even harder with the looming threat of accidentally revealing information he shouldn't. Ryan thinks he'd be better at this if he could talk; texting isn’t a great way of dictating what he means to communicate.

Perhaps she's finally bored of him.

“Hey, where's the other one?” Michael questions, likely having realised Ryan is sitting so tragically alone. As if just suddenly realising this themselves, Vav and Lindsay look at each other curiously. It takes a moment and several facial expressions for them to silently exchange the information that neither of them actually know the answer to this question.

“I'm not sure?” Lindsay offers. Vav shrugs, assuring they agree with this statement. Ryan isn’t sure how to feel about this.

“You fucking lost your friend?” he asks shortly.

“Well, I mean,” Vav begins but they don't seem to know where to end it. “We didn’t lose her,” they promise quickly. “Brownii’s just like that. Sometimes wanders off and does her own thing for a while.” They say that but by the unsure look Lindsay gives them, neither of them really believe it. Hurriedly, Lindsay pushes away from Michael’s side and scurries over to whisper in Jack’s ear. Geoff looks back at them questioningly, but there's really no reason for him to be too concerned. Ryan hopes she's alright at least. She might be itty bitty but she's a killer all the same.

“Well,” Vav says. “I'd keep you company but uh, you scare the shit outta me.” They wrap their arms around Michael and lean in close as if he'll protect them from Ryan. Not that Ryan had much of an interest in Vav's company tonight or ever. They're a bit too- much for him. Michael shoves Vav off of him irritably, trying to keep the lad at bay half heartedly. Truth be told, if Michael really didn't like them or Lindsay, everyone would know. He has no problem with showing his displeasure for anything or anyone. Lindsay comes bounding back.

“Hopefully she'll show up soon,” she promises. Ryan is pretty sure that's not going to happen. “But I'll keep you company, okay?” she grins at him as she gladly settles herself in his lap. Ryan never actually asked for a substitution. This is weird.

“You'll what‽” Michael snaps suddenly. Alright, now Ryan is a little concerned. Lindsay grabs a hold of his neck to brace herself as she tilts her head back to smile smugly at Michael. Ryan frowns a bit, looking down at her hung off him like he's a fucking tree.

“What's wrong? Jealous?” she asks.

“No!” Michael huffs defensively. “Ryan doesn’t need company!” Rude but true. “Especially from you!”

“You know, sometimes a quiet man is a nice change,” Lindsay says and she grabs Ryan’s face in her fingers. Ryan furrows his brows. “I bet you're at least semi attractive under all that, right?”

“He fucking bites,” Michael assures in a flat tone. Lindsay quickly, and wisely, pulls her hand away.

“Oookay. Good to know.”

- x -

‘No.’

Ryan isn’t sure how to reply to this nor is he sure if he should. A simple reply made to a simple question he had asked nearly two days before; ‘are you okay?’ It’s nice to finally hear from her, he supposes, if it even is her. He’s almost tempted to call her, knowing he can’t speak to her, just to assure it really is Brownii. Such a simple message speaks so much and it warns him not to bother her right now. He wonders why she bothered to reply to him at all. Ryan fiddles with his phone anxiously, not sure what to do. He asked a question and got an answer, she’ll talk to him when she wants to.

Still, Ryan doesn’t know where she’s been. That’s hardly new, Brownii is quite adept at getting around without anyone knowing anything, but what concerns him is that her crew didn’t know where she was either. They didn’t know for several days and who knows how long before it was brought to their attention. ‘She’s just like that’. Yeah, Ryan’s just like that too. He disappears sometimes, gone for days, weeks once. Out of all the times he’s left without warning, it has almost exclusively been for not great reasons. Why else would he disappear without a word?

Perhaps Brownii’s not like that, though. Perhaps Brownii just needs some time on her own sometimes. So why is she not okay?

In the end, Ryan decides it’s really not his place to ask. He’s really nothing to Brownii, certainly no one who she has any obligation to assure or deny her levels of ‘okay-ness’ to and definitely no one she’d bother with telling anything to anyways. She has her friends who she loves very much and her boyfriend who she, at her own words, loves significantly less but still likely more than Ryan. There is simply no reason for him to bother her right now.

Ryan hopes she is fine, though. Jack may have tried to hide it, but when her entire crew was searching for where Brownii might have gone, it’s hard not to notice. There’s no way Jack would prioritize everyone in her crew to search for Brownii unless she thought something was wrong. At least, Ryan would assume. They are in a dangerous business, playing a dangerous game, and much like the FAKE crew, they make dangerous enemies. Ryan knows how easy it is for such a simple mistake to lead to a terrible one. He’s been on both ends.

There is a moment where Ryan catches sight of his own reflection in the dark screen of his phone. It’s an odd sight, even for himself, to see himself without something obscuring his face. The scars that mangle the lower half of his face aren’t exactly pretty and though people complain about his face paint, they almost always choose that over his bare face. Hell, Ryan chooses that over his bare face. He pokes at the lines a bit, examining himself in the dim reflection that does him many more favours than a mirror does. They don’t really heal anymore, permanently engraved on his face, but what can he do?

Ryan sets his phone down again as he idly strokes his face, quietly mulling over his situation. It’s not a great situation, he’ll be honest. He’s not handsome or charming and he isn’t a suave talker. He considers himself fairly smart but it doesn’t seem like Brownii would care about that. Ryan scoffs to himself. Look at him, trying to impress a vaguely homicidal, enticingly promiscuous, wolfishly vicious little she devil. Incredible.

- x -

So the FAKE crew and the Femme Fatales are officially working together. Sort of. As it stands, Jack’s crew would never obey Geoff and Geoff’s crew would get themselves executed immediately by Jack’s. Instead, Geoff and Jack discuss things and then pass on their decisions to their respective crews. It’s not the best system, but as of now, it works very well. It will work better once Geoff can get his crew to stop needlessly agitating the Femmes.

Ryan, admittedly, has never thought very highly of Geoff’s crew but this is just getting ridiculous. Even for a bunch of people paid mainly in blood money and drugs, surely they’re capable of some form of learning. The Femmes more often want to help than hurt anyways. At any rate, any men who prove themselves to be less than respectful to the Femmes, and to women in general, are very quickly getting weeded out. Whether that’s for the better or not is questionable- unfortunately some of Geoff’s best chess pieces aren’t exactly gentle handed feminist. Geoff doesn’t seem to care. There’s a never ending supply of people looking for work in Los Santos and he is, even with Jack around, still the powerhouse around here. At least the Femmes seem to maim before they kill in most cases; there's no second chances but they'll break an arm before slitting a throat.

It’s sort of odd to just casually hang around with Jack’s crew, though. They’re friendly, sure, but Ryan far too often feels like a doberman among them. Of course, that means they’re probably black widows and a false step means a slow, painful death, but many of them like Ryan. Many of them like Michael, too. Geoff could learn with keeping his mouth shut on occasion. Mostly though, Ryan just likes going on Rwby duty. He never thought he’d say it, but hurting people who actually deserve it is a thousand times more satisfying.

Jack is still Jack though and racing is a firm staple in her life. The only difference is that now Geoff is actually invited along and she doesn’t dismiss him like a horny dog trying to hump her leg. That doesn’t mean he’s not, but there’s no changing that either. Ryan has his fingers crossed that Brownii will actually be around today. He feels like she is avoiding him but she continues to send him little texts now and again without being prompted to. Still short and to the point, very unlike her, but there all the same. He hasn’t seen her in almost two and a half weeks now.

Fortunately, Ryan gets what he asks for.

When they arrive at the constantly new location, Jack has already parked herself amongst the other racers and is socializing pleasantly with another. Vav, as per usual, is making a grand show for the attention and distraction of the other participants and Lindsay aids them, the two of them tangled together in a vocal make out session. By the small, hooded figure in the backseat, though, Brownii is definitely here. Jeremy doesn’t come to races like these and Ryan can’t image Jack bringing along anyone else.

“Pattillo,” Geoff greets and Jack smiles at him.

“Geoff,” she replies. “It’s nice to see you here.” Even now it’s hard to tell if her pleasantness is real or not. She seems to put on a friendlier tone in public than she does in private but perhaps this is just coincidence. Michael is immediately distracted by Lindsay and Vav. Ryan takes the time to approach Brownii. When he gets too close, Jack cuts him a suddenly sour glare, another question to the authenticity of her friendliness, but she doesn’t say anything to him. It’s a warning, he knows. What is she expecting him to do?

Ryan taps on the window with his index finger and Brownii turns to him shortly. Oh. He is surprised only for the fact that he had not been expecting it. The large, spiral mark on Brownii’s face is anything but discreet, wrapped around the right side of her face and crossing over her features with little regard to them. It’s still red and sore looking, standing out against her skin in pure relief. The pattern is familiar and Ryan realises almost immediately that someone must have pressed her face against a hot store if only but momentarily. Her makeup doesn’t hide it.

“What?” Brownii snaps at him irritably. “What are you looking at?” Though her face draws his attention, it always has, that’s not the only thing. She’s playing her DS, not exactly unusual, no what’s unusual is the fact that she very clearly only has one arm now. Ryan could be mistaken but the last time he saw her, that was certainly not the case. What happened to her? He looks to Jack again and she gives him a solemn little smile. Brownii scoffs sourly.

It’s no wonder she’s been in a bad mood lately.

Ryan isn’t sure what to say. He’s glad she’s okay, even if only at the barest minimum of the meaning; she is still alive after all. With the sort of injuries she has, he can’t imagine death was far off. He moves around to the other side of the car to climb in alongside her. She doesn’t say anything to him and he doesn’t to her. Instead they just sit quietly. Ryan remembers what it was like after his ‘accident’; it wasn’t pretty. He watches her for a moment as she uses her remaining hand to relearn how to play her games. She notices his look but she pretends not to.

Carefully, Ryan reaches over to pat her arm. Brownii looks at him shortly, the discontent expression on her face seemingly expecting the worse. He just signs at her, one letter at a time to assure she can keep up, ’good to see you again.’

“Come on man,” she replies halfly, turning back to her game. “You know I don’t know sign.” Yeah, of course. Ryan glances out the window where Geoff and Jack are conversing with one another, laughing in between their mutual flirting. At least Geoff has since learned a long list of things not to say to her; things he learned the hard way. Michael seems to have convinced Lindsay and Vav to cease their kissing for the most part, much to the dismay of the crowd, and he chats with them much quieter than he usually does.

“You too, I guess,” Brownii murmurs faintly, an assurance that she really did understand. Ryan chuckles.

- x -

Ryan feels, quite literally, like the most oblivious person on the planet.

Brownii doesn’t have a brother. Brownii is her nonexistent brother.

In retrospect, that seems fairly obvious but even with that said, the only reason Ryan knows this at all is because her supposed ‘brother’ has the exact same brand mark and exact same missing limb. He’s going to go ahead and say they’re not, in fact, twins. All those times he couldn’t find Brownii, the weird interactions with her ‘brother’, the selfies; when did Ryan become so dense?

Brownii looks at him strangely, a look that very quickly digresses into disgust. She rolls her eyes, turning away from him all together and heading off. She does look significantly different without her wig and makeup, he tries not to stare but it’s hard. Of course, he quickly realises she likely thinks he’s staring at her brand which is definitely not the case. The last thing he cares about is her unfortunate injury. He urgently moves to follow her, making a weird chirp of a noise that he really doesn’t mean to make. It does get her attention at least and she glances at him out her good eye irritably.

“Don’t you have a clerk to creep out or something?” she asks shortly. Ryan isn’t sure how to bring up this discovery he’s made. Now that he thinks about it, it doesn’t seem like she was trying to hide this from him, he just didn’t notice and she probably thought he did. That changes a lot of things. Instead of admitting to his ridiculous ignorance, he gestures to the bag she’s holding suggestively. Brownii hands it over with a scoff, allowing him to carry her things in order to free up her hand.

Curiously, Ryan taps his finger against his cheek. Brownii isn’t exactly pleased by the nosy question, though he never thought she would be happy about, but she shrugs mildly anyways.

“Shit happens,” she says. That’s not a very definitive answer. Ryan doesn’t want to pry too much but by the concerned look he gives her, he supposes he does anyways. “What? You want a fucking dramatic retelling? Some dude with a vendetta caught me off guard and I’m like twenty pounds wet on a good day.” He’s not sure what he was expecting, really? She’s ex-LSPD in a gang who makes it their lifestyle to aggravate one of the most volatile groups of people in Los Santos. Perhaps he just wants to know how to help.

Brownii stops and Ryan stops with her. She pulls her phone out and takes a moment to flick through it with her hand. The difficulty she has is minimum at least. Ryan’s phone vibrates and she shoves her own back into her pocket. She takes her bag back from him and gives him a mild look over before disappearing into the little shop. The Femme insignia on the door promises him it’d be better not to follow from here. He’s not sure why every meeting with her has to be so fleeting but that’s probably partially his fault.

Instead, Ryan checks his mobile. The grotesque, mangled image of a body assures him of what he really already knew; Brownii dished out twice as much as she got. She has some very pretty knife work. Ryan wishes he got that kind of comfort. ‘thnx tho’ the message reads. He’s not sure what for. He’s literally done nothing helpful to any capacity. Ryan ruffles the back of his head as he glances up at the building before quickly remembering that he was actually doing something that he probably should not have walked away from.

That car bomb is probably fine, right?

- x -

“Thanks for meeting with me, Geoff,” Jack says with a small smile. Ryan is actually surprised that she came by herself and judging by Geoff’s suspicion, so is he. In fact, the whole reason Geoff didn’t come alone was because he was expecting her not to come alone. Have they ever seen her alone? Like for real alone?

“Where are the rest of your girls?” Geoff asks warily. Jack makes a small nod towards a nearby building, assuring that she isn’t nearly trusting enough to actually meet with Geoff in a dark alley by herself.

“Don’t get any funny ideas,” she promises. “Lindsay has a bit of a twitchy trigger finger.” Ryan doesn’t think that’s true but he also knows Lindsay is quick. That being said, no one here really has any intention of hurting Jack as long as she doesn’t hurt them. Which admittedly is part of the problem usually but they’ll have to see.

“Is there a reason we’re in a dark alley to talk about whatever this is about or what?” Geoff questions irritably. That, however, is a good question.

“Not really,” Jack assures. “Just multitasking.” She checks her watch as if to make a point before smiling at him fondly. Ever since Geoff has remembered that he knows her, they seem to be getting along much better. Fairly, that’s probably because Geoff is significantly less of an asshole to people he knows- and likes. Jack’s no longer an overly seductive rival, just a vaguely intimidating old friend.

“Great,” Geoff scoffs.

“I need a favour from you,” Jack gets to the point fast.

“Do you?” Geoff replies halfly, a smug grin touching his face. Ryan can’t imagine why, they all know Geoff’s going to fuck this up. “What’s this favour worth to you, eh?”

“No, Geoff,” Jack says. “This is a personal favour.” Geoff glances at Michael then to Ryan before leaning towards Jack to whisper to her not nearly quietly enough.

“Personal like-?” he murmurs curiously. Jack looks at him blandly.

“Try again,” she assures.

“Right,” Geoff scoffs, disappointed. “Well, I don’t do favours for free, Pattillo, not even for you.”

“Maybe you’ll change your mind this time,” Jack says like he’s really not going to have a choice in the matter anyways. “You know Ray, right?” Geoff has to consider it a moment, answering her question without any need for words. “I suppose you know him better as Brownii.”

“Right,” Geoff agrees. “Right. Yeah. What about him- her?”

“Him,” Jack assures simply. “He's been a little- off since his ‘accident’,” she explains with a soft sigh. “You see, Brownii is quite vain when it comes to her looks. Ray is- less so. He's been, well, a he much more often since he's been back and even when she's not, she skimps on her makeup which is a complete no-no for Brownii. She even broke up with her sugar daddy. Terry’s real worried.” Ryan’s attention is had completely. A; not her boyfriend. B; broke up.

“Uh huh,” Geoff says but he already seems to have tuned out most of this conversation. “What's that got to do with us? You don't think we did that to her- him?- do you?”

“Her,” Jack assures again. “I know you didn’t. You're not that stupid. I just want you to look after him for a while. Brownii has this complex about her looks and being around,” she pauses to glance at Michael and Ryan for a long few seconds. “Men, I think will make him feel better, you know? He won't feel the need to compare himself to you guys.”

“Is she insulting us?” Michael leans over to whisper to Ryan. “I feel like she's insulting us.” She might be insulting them a little.

“You want us to make him feel like a woman?” Geoff confirms. Jack gives him a dirty look. “Alright, wait. That's not the way I meant it.”

“Whatever way you ‘meant it’,” Jack replies shortly but allows the comment to slide. “No. Ray just needs to let off some steam and relax for a bit while he gets used to his new appearance. Your crew is great at needless violence if nothing else.”

“That was definitely an insult,” Michael insists. Perhaps not a very effective one, but yeah, he’s right. Needless violence is great!

“All our violence is perfectly necessary,” Geoff assures. “So we're babysitting one of your lap dogs so he won't feel inferior to your other lap dogs?”

“If you want to look at it that way, sure,” Jack says but her tone suggests he really shouldn't. “I'd say it's more like I'm letting you borrow the best sniper in this city so he can take it easy while he's recovering. Win-win.”

“What makes you think he'll have an ‘easier’ time with us?” Michael snaps, bristling with offense.

“No offense,” Jack comments in a way that couldn't be bothered less. “But your crew isn't exactly heavy on the tactics. We make a wrong move and someone gets hurt that shouldn’t. Ray doesn’t need that stress right now.” She checks her watch again and Ryan glances around wearily. “Listen. If you want to say no, then say it. Just know that this is a very big, very personal favour from me and it would mean very much to me Geoff.”

“Like, how much?” Geoff asks suggestively. “Because there's this place downtown-”

“Not that much,” Jack replies flatly. “Nice try, champ.”

“Yeah, yeah, fine,” Geoff scoffs a bit. “We'll help the poor kid out, don't worry about it. Ryan's a sucker for ‘im anyways.”

“Great,” Jack grins. “And if anything happens to Ray, I'll kill all three of you with my bare hands.” Alright, so maybe Jack scares Ryan just a little bit. Not very much but enough that if anything did happen to Ray, which it won't, he'd probably high tail it out of town. He still has those road burn scars on his back.

“Nothing’ll happen,” Geoff promises. “Just send him over when he's ready.”

“Thank you,” Jack hums sweetly. A helicopter swings by far lower than it should be. “Now if you'll excuse me. The less time in the pilot seat Vav has, the better. Oh and Geoff, maybe making reservations for two at that nice Italian place wouldn’t be your worst idea.” Geoff grins smugly. Now he can add ‘fancy’ restaurant to the list of places he's going to make an ass of himself at.

“Wait- you let her fly‽” Michael barks.

- x -

Ryan spends a good portion of the night assuring his apartment is clean and, to some extent, not completely awful. He spends most of his time in Geoff’s apartment and thus his own apartment is rarely in the top of shape. Some dust and cigarette butts here and there, maybe a bit of dried blood, nothing Ray hasn’t seen before. He does make the wise decision to hide his cocaine and valuables in his safe, though. While he doesn’t think this will keep Ray out at any rate if he really wants to rob Ryan, it’ll at least give Ryan some time to realise it’s happening. Besides, he really doesn’t have anything that valuable, at least nothing Ray would want to steal.

Aside from that, Ryan makes sure the bed sheets are clean for Ray to sleep in. Geoff’s apartment has a spare guest room but he assures he’s not letting Ray sleep anywhere near him; one armed or two. That’s probably also a wise choice. Fortunately, Ryan has already had a surprise sleepover with Jack’s crew so he’s less than worried about sleeping on the couch while Ray is around. There’s nothing around here that Ray would want that Jack couldn’t have already taken- including them being super dead.

“Yo, dad pants, you here?” Ray calls and a following tap rattles the door. Needless to say, Ryan did just sort of expect him to show up. When he opens the door, Ray looks up at him with a raised brow. “Dude, you wear that shit in your own house?” There are few, if any, times when Ryan isn’t in some form of face paint. He’s not very fond of his own face and the less likely it is to be seen, the better. He gestures Ray in and the lad pads in with his bag on his shoulder to look around.

“Cleaner than I expected,” he murmurs. “I hope you’re getting paid well for babysitting me. Maybe your boss’ll finally get laid. Wow, almost said that with a straight face.” Ray’s face has yet to move from its unperturbed state. Ryan’s not completely sure if this is part of the joke or if Ray just can’t feel his face very well right now. After Ryan’s little ‘accident’ he couldn’t properly feel his face for months. He holds his hand out to take Ray’s bag and he hands it over without argument before Ryan motions him down the hall.

“This your bedroom?” Ray asks as he looks around. Ryan nods. His taps his two front fingers of each hand together and separates them as he nods back towards the living room. “Dude, I’ve sucked your dick at least twice, I think we can sleep in the same bed together.” That’s a fair point but Ryan figured he’d give him his space in case he’d rather not. It was better not to assume. Ryan sleeps on his couch from time to time anyways, and on Geoff’s couch more frequently. Ray isn’t putting him out.

“Thanks, though,” Ray murmurs and he tosses himself onto the clean bed. He stretches himself out and rubs his face with his hand a bit before rolling onto his belly. Ryan sets his bag down on the dresser. He's not sure how long to expect Ray to stay but he feels like Ray wouldn’t want to for very long and Jack wouldn’t let him. “You got a shower or these places only got tubs?”

Again, Ryan gestures him to another part of the house. A little tour of the apartment he’s going to be staying in for a while doesn’t hurt anything. Ray trails after him and Ryan shows him how to work the shower. Needless to say, he has no problem stripping down right there and hopping in. Ryan tries not to stare too much, Ray’s once nearly flawless skin now mangled with scars much too fresh. They seem to be healing well, though, and any stitches he might have had are already out.

Ray looks at him coldly when Ryan stares too long. Quickly, he finds something better to look at. He has to remember Ray thinks he finds his injuries unappealing or disgusting or something which is simply not true but Ryan can't exactly say he likes them and expect that to go over well. Ryan grabs a towel from the shelf to place next to the shower and leaves him to his business. He’s not entirely sure what he’s supposed to be doing besides giving Ray a place to relax and recover. He just hopes he doesn’t inadvertently do anything wrong both because he doesn’t want to hurt Ray and because he doesn’t want to instill Jack’s wrath on himself.

“Hey, if you’re gonna stand there and watch me bathe like a creep anyways, why don’t you give me a hand,” Ray insists. Ryan blinks before nodding agreeably. He was just making sure he didn’t need anymore help. Trying to offer help he doesn’t need sounds like a good way to get on his bad side; Ryan struggled with accepting help for a long time and his injuries weren’t to the amplitude Ray’s are. He also supposes Ray isn’t him, though.

Carefully, Ryan leans into the shower to scrub Ray’s back and particularly the parts he can’t reach anymore. He’s sure not to rub too hard, not wanting to reopen any of his healing wounds, but he’s nowhere near as delicate as he looks. The very fact that he has so many scars and is still alive proves that. Ray splashes some water on his face suddenly, making him jump a little. Ryan shakes his head to get some of it off before giving Ray a flat look.

“Damn, you really got that on there,” he murmurs. What, his face paint? Yeah, that’s pretty on there. He appreciates the check though. Ryan hands Ray the rag back and promptly fucks off before he gets anymore good ideas to soak him. Ray hops out of the shower and wraps the provided towel around his waist before following after him. He returns to Ryan’s room to flop himself back down on the bed and sprawl himself out.

“Usually you’re all over me,” Ray says with a small huff. “What’s wrong? Not pretty enough for you anymore?” That’s not the case at all. Ryan doesn’t want to say so, he can’t in fact, but he finds Ray even more attractive. Not just the scars but everything about him; the way he seems to be made of nothing but pure steel, the way he can be so nonchalant regardless of what’s happen whether it’s an act or not, his vicious and sharp nature like a wolf always ready to bite- the way he survives everything he shouldn’t. There was a reason Ryan was taken to him so much in the first place and it only seems to grow the more he learns.

When he makes no reply for too long, Ray puts his face in his hand and lets out a stressed noise. Ryan heads for the bathroom.

“Your loss, coward!” Ray barks after him. “Sss. Fucking men.” Ryan pulls a few makeup wipes out of the box by the sink before returning to his bedroom. Ray looks at him sourly as he sits on the edge of the bed and carefully cleans his face paint off a bit at a time. With a soft, slightly concerned sigh, Ryan turns to Ray with a small smile. Needless to say, Ray’s a little surprised looking. He sits up, moving closer so he can tentatively touch the tangled mass of scars on Ryan’s face with his fingertips.

“Holy shit,” he murmurs then he laughs. “You do have a meatloaf face, lmao.” Ryan chuckles a little. They sorta match now, don't they? “Damn, you’re kinda hot, Ry.” Carefully, Ryan takes Ray’s face in his hand and kisses him. Ray lets him, all but relaxing completely in his grip. Ryan fondly kisses over his face, placing his lips against the burn mark lovingly with little pecks. Initially, Ray’s more than happy to lean into them and soak up the attention. After a few moments, he seems to realise Ryan isn’t all that interested in stopping and he becomes a little more flustered. Ray reaches to grab his hair but when Ryan tries to move away to give him some space, he’s held there by Ray’s grip.

“Come on, man,” Ray murmurs as Ryan kisses his face more. He lets go of his hair to wrap his arm around Ryan’s neck instead. “You’re supposed to raw me hard with your big ass dick until I don’t remember my own name, not whatever the hell this is.” There will, hopefully, be plenty of time for that later. Right now, Ray won’t let him go far enough to do anything else so Ryan just kisses and nuzzles as if he isn’t more than happy to anyways. Slowly, Ryan guides them down to lay and Ray allows it. The lad, in all honesty, is nothing short of loving the affectionate attention.

“Listen man, if you start talkin’ and sayin’ I love you and shit, I’m out,” Ray assures though it’s a joke if anything. Ryan sticks what remains of his tongue out and Ray snorts a laugh. “Oh gross, where’s the rest of your tongue?” He kisses Ryan on the mouth all the same, a tender meeting that he feels neither of them are really all that used to.

“Just so you know, the only reason I’m doing this is to make you feel better about your meatloaf face,” Ray says softly. “This has nothing to do with me.” Ryan just laughs and nods. “You tell Gavin or Lindsay about this and you’re dead meat.”

Fortunately, he is pretty good at keeping secrets.

- x -

Ryan awakens to the smell of smoke. He’s alert immediately but it only takes a moment to realise it’s cigarette smoke. Ray glances at him a little as he takes another puff from it, already at least semi-awake and sat up with his phone in his hand. Ah, Ryan must have fallen asleep in his clothes. It’s a little uncomfortable but not nearly enough to bother getting out of bed right this moment.

“Oh man I can’t believe she actually did it,” Ray laughs and adjusts his hold on his cigarette so he can show his phone to Ryan. Still in the midst of waking up, Ryan has to squint at it to make out what’s going on. That’s definitely Geoff. Unsurprisingly, Ryan also can’t believe she actually did it. Geoff’s well asleep in Jack’s tits and they’re both just all kinds of covered in hickeys. He’s not sure if that means they slept together but he’s willing to make that safe bet. Ray takes his phone away again and Ryan rubs his eyes tiredly. Good for Geoff.

“I know Michael’s been gettin’ it on with Lindsay and Gavin for weeks now,” Ray murmurs. Ryan didn’t know that. It’s not really all that surprising, either. He pulls his shirt off over his head and uses it to pat his face before tossing it aside and pulling off his belt as well. It's still early and he certainly doesn’t have anything planned for today so sleeping in is always a nice way to pass the time.

“And I know J’s hitting your little nerd geek like he’s never been hit before,” he goes on. Ryan settles himself back down, a bit more comfortable now. Ray fiddles his cigarette between his lips, looking over his phone thoughtfully for a moment. “Guess it’s just you and me left, then. You do want to have sex with me, right?” Ryan nods without hesitation. Of course he does. Is that even a question?

“Like, right now?” Ray offers. Again, Ryan gladly nods. Now is as good of a time as any. He grins. “I’d tell you to repay those favors but I don’t know how well that’s gonna work with your whole mouth fiasco going on.” Not well, that’s for sure. Ryan shakes his head a little. He used to really love giving oral sex, and he still does, but it’s not particularly satisfying for his partners without most of his tongue. That’s really not the first impression Ryan wants to give. Ray sets his phone down and gives another puff of his cigarette before adjusting himself in bed a bit. While Ryan had fallen asleep completely clothed, Ray obviously never found the time or want to get dressed.

“Show me what you go then,” Ray insists. “I need to know if I need to, like, get your fingers insured or something.” That’s all he needed to hear. Ryan sits up a bit, reaching for his side table to find the bottle of lube he has stashed there for exactly these moments. Better to have it and not need it- or something to that effect. With it in hand, he moves back towards Ray, comfortably moving to wrap his arm across the lad’s waist and kiss his side warmly. Ray holds his cigarette between his teeth so he can card his fingers through Ryan’s hair as Ryan kisses and nuzzles his stomach.

“Listen man, I got enough of that cuddling shit last night to last our entire relationship,” Ray scoffs under his breath. “I’mma need you to show me what you can do with that horse cock of yours sometime today.” Ryan laughs against his skin but nods approvingly all the same. If that’s what he wants, Ryan is more than happy to supply. He pops the cap off the lube and drizzles a fair amount over Ray’s half mast. With a few strokes, Ryan urges him full erect and Ray pants little hot, smoke filled breaths.

When Ryan rubs two fingers against Ray’s pucked hole, Ray sucks in a soft breath and moans approvingly. He knocks the ash off his cigarette into a cup he seems to have reassigned into an ashtray before his fingers are right back in Ryan’s hair. Gingerly, Ryan eases a finger in and then two when Ray eagerly grinds his hips against his hand. Ryan exhales heavily, his cock twitching as Ray clenches around his fingers. He presses them in nice and deep until Ray tosses his head back and groans from the very back of his throat. Rolling his finger against Ray’s prostate makes him rasp out such a beautiful noise he has to do it again.

Ryan rubs the pads of his fingers against Ray’s sweet spot until he’s a squirming, panting mess. Ray's dick strains against his belly, already eager for something more. He twists and turns his fingers, spreading them apart and making sure Ray is well stretched before withdrawing. Ray lets out a satisfied huff, reaching down to stroke his cock before turning his attention to Ryan’s crotch suggestively. Ryan unbuttons his jeans quickly but he doesn’t get the chance to get them off before Ray is pulling him over. He pulls Ryan on top him by the only real grip he can get; Ryan’s hair. Of course, Ryan’s not one to complain about this and he’s more than happy to lean into it if nothing else. It is a little daunting to hover over him like this, though; Ray seems so small.

“I hope Michael was telling the truth about you being a good lay,” Ray murmurs, wrapping his arm around the back of Ryan’s neck and watching, enthralled, as Ryan pushes the waistband of his boxers down to free his aching cock. He drools lube onto his hand to slick his dick with and Ray grins so smugly. He lets Ryan move him into a better position for both of them, Ryan pushing Ray’s legs over his thighs and his hand behind his neck. The hand with the cigarette in it, something important to note because only one of them notices; Ryan. The hot ashes that fall off the end make his skin lurch and him gasp.

Ryan decides not to mention it. He slides his dick between Ray’s cheeks with his hand before pressing the head against his twitching hole. Ray bites his lip a touch.

“Fuck you’re a big dude,” he groans. Ryan eases in a bit and Ray digs his nails into his back, more white hot ashes speckling the back of his neck. He gives a testing thrust and Ray tosses his head back, giving Ryan all the enticing show he needs. When Ray grabs the nape of Ryan’s neck with his fingers and pulls him closer, Ryan takes this as a sign that he’s getting impatient. He thrust forward and earns a guttural groan from Ray.

“Ah,” Ray rasps out. “Fuck.” Another short thrust and he arches against the bed so sweetly, skin rubbing against Ryan’s jeans. “Stop fucking around and just fuck me.” Impatient is right. Ryan doesn’t need to be told twice. He angles Ray’s hips up a bit to be able to bury himself hilt deep with one swift move. Ray makes a gasp that melts into a moan right against his ear, nails sunk into the flesh of his neck, and the heavy smell of cigarette smoke mingled with Ray’s natural scent floods his senses.

Ryan grabs one of his pasty thighs in his hand, finding a good purchase to set a pace capable of sating even Ray. He’s not very vocal but Ryan could care less. The little groans and pants in his ears, the nails scraping his skin, the hot ash down his back, Ray clenching down on him so snugly; Ryan could come right here. He withholds though to assure Ray comes first. With his free hand, he reaches between them to stroke Ray’s dripping cock to each deep, grinding thrust.

“Oh fuck,” Ray groans. He moves his hips to meet each of Ryan’s thrust, arching his back against the bed too hotly, and his movements become more erratic the closer to his orgasm he gets. Ryan takes the feel of broken skin on the back of his neck as a good thing, Ray's nailed biting into his flesh just by how hard he grabs. Ray throws his head back when he comes and arches into Ryan until they’re flush together. A few more thrusts and Ryan’s right there with him, stuffing him so deep and so full of hot cum. The little shudder of a gasp Ray lets out is beautiful.

They both take a moment to regain their breath before Ryan gingerly pulls out. He threads his fingers with Ray's to get the nails out of his skin before he rolls off to the side. Ray looks at the crumpled cigarette still in his hand before shrugging, tossing it in the cup, and reaching for a new one. Ryan rubs the little burns between his shoulder blades with his hand. When Ray offers the box to him, Ryan refuses with a polite shake of the hand. Ray pulls one out with his mouth, though, and Ryan leans over to light it for him.

“Thanks,” he murmurs and then sighs contently. Ryan cleans himself off a bit with his shirt from yesterday. A shower is probably in order now. Perhaps he can convince Ray to join him. “Damn. Why can’t I ever find a sugar that bangs like that.” As he goes to offer the shirt to Ray for some haphazard clean, he finds the lad already taking to his usual business. He spreads his thighs and uses his phone to snap a picture of the cum dripping from his stretched hole. Ryan probably should have grabbed a condom; not his best decision. He gestures a little apology and Ray glances at him.

“Huh. Oh, yeah. You shouldn’t have or something, idk,” he replies, obviously not caring in the slightest as he goes back to his picture taking. “Vav definitely isn’t getting cream pied like this, I know that.” He’s so romantic. Ryan rolls his eyes amusedly. He tucks himself back into his boxers and zips his pants back up as he rolls out of bed to go find them something to eat. If he's learned anything, Ray has proved food is the quickest way to his heart. Some breakfast before a shower sounds nice anyways.

“Oh what? Geoff gives good oral? Shit, I picked the wrong dude,” he hears Ray say. “Yo, Ryan, you swing, right?”