Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Clips of a movie are played on an old cathode-ray tube television screen. 

“La-La-La-La-La-Leanbois!”

“Leanbois! Suck a dick!”

“If you’re with me, and we’re gonna go all the way, lean with me.”

“We lean together, we die together, boys.”

“The rooster flies over nest with egg in hand.”

“We come back full force. We take over the fucking city. We try again, but this time we do it differently. We’ll never ever do an illegal thing again. We’re legal, we’re straight, we’re clean… Cleanbois.”

“It’s got a nice ring to it. It’s got a nice ring.”

The screen became saturated and distorted, resulting in the television being shut down.

(Friday, February 5, 2021)

“Yo! What’s up, guys? It’s me, Tony Corleone, here. Back at it again with another livestream. Good to see ya! Look at the POGs!” Tony was wearing a simple gray suit with a white dress shirt, black dress shoes, and a gray fedora on his head covering his brown, slicked back hair. He looked towards his bedroom door.

“Buddha! I’ve got like five hundred viewers in here!” Tony laughed, and turned back to his camera.

“Welcome to the stream guys! Check it out.” Tony gestured to his bedroom. There was a king-size bed and a closet to his left, and a display case showing off all his expensive shoes on his ride side. In front of him was his white desk with his camera, monitors, speakers, and PC setup placed on it. A few plants and photographs were arranged around the room. Behind him was a wooden dresser which was displaying his collection of watches. He was wearing his favorite watch on his left wrist.

“Yeah~ This is my brand new room right here! Fully refurbished with the help of Lang Buddha’s bank account. Oh my god! Pdmac779 with the five gifted subs. Thank you so much. Oh my god. Oh my god! BLO0ODSheD with the twenty-five gifted. Thank you, appreciate it!”

Outside of Tony’s bedroom door was a hallway with ten portraits hanging on the walls. At the end of the hallway was a red, wooden hobbit door with an intricate, white and gold rooster design painted on it. 

A Chinese man dressed in a black suit over a red dress shirt with black dress shoes stepped through the excessive bedroom door. He adjusted the silver rings on his tattooed fingers, and fixed the two necklaces around his neck before setting a pair of round sunglasses on his face. One of his necklaces featured a logo with three dog heads revolving to the right in a triangle formation.

“Tony, shut the fuck up!”

“I’m fucking streaming, motherfucker! This is how I pay my bills!”

“You will never make a living doing that.” Lang brushed his fingers through his black bangs, and groaned in annoyance.

“Yo, let’s go! Davelavio with the five gifted! Oh yeah? Well, I just made $25 from dancing, so suck my balls, bitch! Yo, Tobii, thanks for the two months! That’s $10, Buddha. Colonelsanders460 with the three gifted! That’s $15. That’s my order at Rooster’s.”

Lang tried opening Tony’s bedroom door, but it was locked. He slammed his hand repeatedly on the door. “Tony! Shut this shit off!”

“Oh, you guys want an ASMR stream? Let me adjust my mic settings,” he continued chatting, ignoring Lang. 

While he was focused on his monitor, Lang fell from above him, hit his keyboard, and inelegantly tumbled to the floor. Although initially shocked by Lang’s sudden appearance, he became upset when he realized that the fall had turned off his livestream.

“Oh, nice going, Scufflord!”

Lang stood up from the floor, brushing the dust off his clothes. “You’re not gonna make money doing this shit, Tony! Go to your real goddamn job! Fucking pathetic!”

Tony gave a long sigh. “Fine~” he conceded, “I should probably go check on my steak shop anyways.”

“Tch,” Lang clicked his tongue. “I can’t believe you, of all people, own a business.”

They exited the bedroom, and walked down the hallway.

The other half of the second floor opened to a staircase and an indoor balcony, surrounded by wooden railings that overlook the dining room below. They took the staircase down to the dining room—a spacious area with a refectory table in the center—and went to the doorway entrance.

Tony stopped abruptly. “Oh! I’ve been meaning to ask you, would it be alright if I give our sons keys to the manor? We don’t get into any gang shit anymore, so I figured it’d be fine. Also, the renovations are finished.”

“I guess…” Lang pondered for a second. “Sure, they can have keys. Just tell ‘em not do any stupid shit in my castle.”

“You got it!” Tony held the door open for Lang as they exited through the front door. They walked across the concrete patio, and passed by the giant water fountain to arrive at the driveway.

“Have a good day, brother! See ya around,” Tony said while getting into his red Hycade Audi R8.

“You too, Tony! See you.” Lang waved as Tony drove away. 

Lang went to the garage at the other end of the driveway, and opened the door, revealing his black DeLorean. “OUTATIME” was printed on the license plate, a reference to the movie Back to the Future . He got into the car, drove up the driveway, and passed through the front gate. 

Surrounding the front of the property were several Italian Cypress trees and a concrete wall with the words “CLean Manor” cemented on the gateway entrance. The large estate was located in Vinewood Hills, and entirely owned by Lang. Tony was happy to live there for free.

Scene 1: Lang & Tony

Lang drove down to West Eclipse Boulevard, and headed east through Vinewood when he decided to stop at the gas station in Downtown Vinewood to refuel his car.

As he placed the nozzle back in the gasoline pump, a man taking a stroll down the sidewalk called out to him.

“Yo! Sick car, man. Is that a Datsun?”

“It’s a fucking DeLorean.” Lang answered, appalled that anyone would mistake the two car brands.

The man gave him a puzzled expression. “Oh. What year is it?”

Lang smirked at that. “Beats me.”

He got back in his car and drove away, leaving behind the confused man. 

Arriving at the Diamond Casino & Resort, Lang caught the attention of an employee in the reception area.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Lang Buddha. Can I help you?” she asked.

“I’m here to see Dean Watson and Leslie Lingberg.”

“Ah, they just went up to his office a few minutes ago.”

“Thank you.” Lang sauntered across the casino floor, took the stairs up to the executive offices, and knocked on the office door labeled “Dean Watson’s Office.”

A voice replied, “Come in, Lang.”

He entered the dimly lit office. All the walls were painted black with a black desk at the head of the room and black chairs placed in front of it. To his left was a bar area with a vast assortment of liquor displayed on glass shelves. On his right side, there was an elevator, a black drawer against the wall, and a black couch with a real, living, breathing, black panther sleeping on it. 

Behind the desk was a massive window with a view of the casino floor. Dean and Leslie were watching people gamble at the Lucky Wheel to win the $600k black Porsche on the podium. Both businessmen were dressed in black suits with white dress shirts, and wore sunglasses on their faces. They each had a necklace around their collar with the same logo as Lang’s necklace.

“Nobody win the car yet, Dean?” Lang asked.

Dean, who had short black hair and a clean-shaved face, replied with his British accent, “Nope. I just like looking down at the casino floor from this window. Watching the degenerates spending their hard earned cash all day and night…it’s beautiful.”

Leslie had a black goatee and mustache with a black bowler hat over his bald head. He expressed a similar sentiment, “Ah~ I do get a sense of pleasure from watching the poor try to get rich and somehow only end up even more poor.”

“You sound like a fucking sadist, Leslie. I feel like I’m watching you masturbate right now. Jesus.” Lang said it as a joke, but knew that it would still insult the prim and proper man.

“What the hell, Lang? Why would you say that?” Leslie asked in disgust.

“By the way,” Lang carried on, “I got a question for you.”

Leslie indulged him. “Okay.”

“I’m trying to get into investments and shit, and I came across a bunch of info on penny trading, and I figured I get involved in that.”

“Yeah, you can do that.”

“You think it’s lucrative, though?” he asked with false curiosity.

“Oh yeah. It’s definitely lucrative if you do it right. Everything is.” Leslie didn’t notice the mischievous look in Lang’s eyes.

“Wait, really? Do you know how penny trading works?”

“No, I don’t have that much experience in penny trading.”

“Penny trading (Penetrating) this dick in your ass!” he delivered the pun, and released an obnoxiously loud laugh.

Leslie gave him an unamused look, then turned to Dean.

Dean shrugged. “What? You walked right into that one, Leslie.”

Leslie rubbed his temples, wishing to move on from this conversation.

Lang walked around the desk to get a better view out the window when a glint of gold caught the corner of his eye instead.

It was a statue of a gold panther with blue spots, standing on top of a blue sphere. There was a flat, gold stand underneath the sphere, holding the statue in place. 

“When did you get this, Dean?” he asked.

“Oh, I bought it a few weeks ago on, uh, one of the neighboring islands. Forgot which one. As soon as I saw it, I just had to have it. I don’t even remember how much it was worth."

Lang examined the statue placed on the desk's surface. “I like it. It looks good in the office.”

“Yeah, it reminded me of Onyx here. Isn’t she pretty?” Dean kneeled next to the black panther resting on the couch, and petted her head. 

Leslie finished rubbing his temples, and headed to the office door. “You know what? Fuck it. I’m gonna gamble for the car.”

Lang and Dean followed after him as he left the room.

“Leslie, you own a fucking car dealership,” Dean said. “You can have any car you want.”

“It’s about setting a precedent. A poor man eats a meal at an expensive restaurant. A rich man goes to an expensive restaurant, orders everything on the menu, leaves without eating any of it, and then eats from the cheapest fast-food restaurant down the road,” Leslie explained.

Lang nodded. “He makes a good point, Dean.”

Two men were gambling at the Lucky Wheel when they walked up to it. 

“I’m next whenever you’re done,” Leslie informed them.

One of the men dejectedly rubbed his face with his hands after losing $10,000. “Go ahead, man. We’re not in a rush to lose more money.”

“Perfect. Move aside, peasants.”

“What the hell?”

“Excuse you?”

The men made disgruntled noises, but Leslie disregarded them and approached the floor attendant standing by the Lucky Wheel.

He asked, “How much is this?”

“$500 per spin,” she replied.

Leslie hands her the money in cash. “Here’s $2000.”

“Okay, four spins then.” The attendant accepted his cash, and spun the wheel four times.

“Yes…no…yes…oh!” Leslie watched the needle land on his prizes: $50,000, $1000, $50,000, and the Porsche.

“I won it! Dean, look!” Leslie excitedly pointed at the wheel.

“Wait, what the fuck?” Dean laughed. “You actually won it.”

Lang stared at the Lucky Wheel in shock while Leslie unnecessarily slid across the floor on his knees with his hands raised. “I won it!”

“Congratulations, Mr. Leslie Lingberg. I’ll inform the staff, and have your car moved to the parking lot for you.” The attendant left to perform the task.

The two peasant men were outraged.

“Nah, man. This is some ‘and the rich get richer’ bullshit.”

“The casino is fucking rigged!”

Leslie collected his money at the cashier booth, then the three businessmen went outside to pick up his new black Porsche.

“I need to take this to my dealership.”

“Let’s go together,” Dean suggested. “We need to move money into the Cerberus account, too.”

“We’ll follow you in the Cerberus Range Rover to the PDM, and pick you up.” Lang said.

Leslie drove to the Premium Deluxe Motorsport, and left the Porsche in the back parking lot. Then, he joined Lang and Dean in their black Cerberus Range Rover. On the hood of the vehicle was the white Cerberus logo; three dog heads revolving to the right in a triangle formation.

“Okay, so I need each of us to put $500,000 into the Cerberus bank account to make some payments.” Dean explained.

“$500k?!” Leslie yelled.

“What are you talking about, Dean?” Lang asked, but continued to drive to the Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank.

“We’re gonna accumulate debt if we don’t start paying our bills for all the construction and the upcoming projects we’re trying to fund,” Dean elaborated.

“Check the account. I’m sure I’ve already paid more than that,” Lang insisted.

Dean pinched the bridge of his nose and furrowed his brows. “Why are you being stingy? I thought you were a rich businessman?”

“You guys know I make like 60% of my money from selling meth and weed, right?” Lang rhetorically asked.

“No.”

“No.”

“Oh…okay. Well, there you go.” He parked in front of the bank, and they went inside.

Dean checked the Cerberus account at an interactive kiosk, and began scrolling through the previous transactions.

“Y'know how much money I pay my employees?” Lang asked Leslie.

“Do you know how much money I pay my employees?” Leslie asked him. "One of my salesmen made $140k yesterday. One of my salesmen,” he emphasized.

Lang stood up straighter and crossed his arms. “Yeah? I’ve been paying Penny $150-$250k a week.”

“All right, but I do that to eight people every week. What about you?”

Lang opened his mouth to respond when Dean cut him off.

“Okay, so you’ve put exactly nothing into this account, Lang,” Dean said, looking at the transaction history from months ago.

“...I haven’t?”

“No. You put in $96,000, and then you gave it to the winners of the National Paintball Association.”

“You sure?” Lang insisted again, “Just look back a little bit more.”

“I went to the day the account was created.”

The statement made them burst out in laughter. Lang and Leslie each went to a different interactive kiosk to check their accounts. 

Lang noticed a recent transaction. “So, where that $275k come from?”

“Dean.” Leslie wheezed. “That was Dean’s money.”

Lang scratched the back of his head. “Listen, I might look like I have a lot of money, but I’m actually down bad right now.”

“I’m also down bad,” Leslie admitted.

“You want me to be honest? You know what I did? I put myself in a corner where I’ve built all these businesses, and I’m letting all my employees reap all the rewards,” Lang confessed. “Now, I can afford to do $150-$250k, but I’m gonna have to drastically change everything.”

“It’s a half mil one time payment, Lang. It’s not weekly.” Dean tried reasoning with him while watching his money transfer into the Cerberus account. “Okay, I moved it. I moved $500,000 of my own money into Cerberus.”

“When I tell you guys that this is gonna hurt me bad, it’s gonna hurt me bad. But, I’ll do it.” Leslie prepared to transfer the money, but then he hesitated. “Can we go a bit less than $500k?”

Lang whispered, “Wait, wait, wait. Leslie, let’s just take all the fucking mining money, and chuck it in there.”

Leslie looked at the LingCorp Mining account. “Yeah, but then the problem is that it’s just $500k. Somebody else has to do $500k still.”

Lang didn’t respond.

“...You’re doing it right now, aren’t you?”

“I’m thinking,” Lang denied. “I’m looking at my accounts and I’m thinking. I literally have to come up with a game plan here. I’m operating on a major, major loss.”

“It’s okay.” Dean attempted to persuade them again. “It’s just $500,000, and then we don’t have to worry about it for a few weeks.”

“How many weeks is that?” Leslie inquired.

“Six weeks, maybe.”

“It’s $500k. I get that, but I need to recoup that,” Lang stressed.

“But, you’ve got lots of liquid.”

“Can we do $250k?” Leslie pleaded.

“No, you’ve got—Guys! You’ve got $100,000,000 each. What the fuck are you talking about?” Dean was becoming a little frustrated.

“Yeah…but still…” Leslie said feebly.

Lang defended himself, “Yeah, I like being a millionaire, Dean. Is there something wrong with that?”

“I like it, too.” Leslie agreed.

“You’re still gonna have $99,000,000. That makes you a millionaire.”

“That looks so trash!” Lang argued back.

“Yeah, it does look trash.” Leslie continued siding with Lang in the hope that Dean would drop the amount.

Dean grumbled, “Well, do you want the National Paintball Association arena to be fucking shut down?”

Hearing that, Lang gave up the fight. “...You're right. Okay, so we have to announce that we are not a non-profit NPA now.”

Dean gave a tight-lipped smile, then said, “Funny.”

“I’m not joking, Dean. That’s what I’m gonna have to do to start making some fucking money here.”

“The NPA makes no money anyway. No one plays paintball competitively,” Dean said.

“Do we have to do $500k? Just triple checking,” Leslie asked for a third time.

“Just stop being bitches.”

Lang attempted to stifle his laughter as he turned around to leave the bank. “Alright, I just put my $500k in there, guys.”

The door shut behind him, and Dean returned his attention to the interactive kiosk. “I’m gonna open his account, and see what bullshit he’s done—Oh okay, he did it. No, wait, he didn’t do it. Hold on, wait.” He was so surprised that he didn't believe his eyes.

“No, he did it.” Leslie confirmed.

“Okay, he did it.”

“Wait a minute.” Leslie began scrolling through their other accounts.

“No, he did, he did.”

“No, wait, wait, wait…wait…wai—He took it out of the mining business. No, I’m not paying.”

Leslie marched out of the bank and yelled, “Lang! I’m not paying a single dime! I’m not paying anything, you cocksucker!”

“Come on, Leslie. I paid.” Lang leaned against the Cerberus Range Rover with a cigarette in his hand.

“I saw what you did! You took it from the LingCorp Mining account!”

“I’ll recoup it in a few weeks.” Lang brought his cigarette up to his mouth and inhaled.

“I’m not putting in a single dime, not a single goddamn dime!”

Dean exited the bank, and was met with Leslie yelling in his face. “He just put in my money, Dean! So, I’ve already done my payments. I had Lang do it for me. Lang’s the only one who hasn’t paid money now.”

Lang exhaled the smoke. “No, first of all, I own 50% of that fucking company, cocksucker. So, if anything, I owe another $250k, and you owe another $250k.” He inhaled again.

“Okay, but you still owe me $50k from last week that you said you were gonna recoup, and you still haven’t paid it back.”

Lang slowly exhaled out the smoke, trying to come up with a retort but was unable to think of one. “Jesus fucking Christ.”

“Yeah, I remember that,” Leslie said.

Dean sighed. “All right, just put in $250,000 each for now, please.”

Lang stamped out his cigarette, and they walked back inside the bank. Deciding to just get it over with, Lang and Leslie each went up to an interactive kiosk, and transferred the money.

Leslie looked back at the $99,750,000 in his account. “I’m so fucking broke now. Goddamn.”

Dean double checked the Cerberus account. “Okay, it’s all totaled up. Thank you.”

“No, no, Lang still owes me $50k,” Leslie argued, but Lang wasn’t paying attention because he was on a phone call.

“Penny, I have some terrible news. Pay reduction is coming to all our employees. I gotta go back to taking 65% a week from Rooster’s profits for at least four weeks. Things are bad. I’m down over $1.2 million in a week… It’s business, Penny… No, I don’t gamble, I reinvest. And my investments are falling flat right now… Uh, tell him that the accounts are frozen because we’re being audited… Wait, what’s happening at Rooster’s?”

.⋆ ｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡˚⛧˚｡⋆.

Andi Jones Farmers Market was located on the northern end of the island between Paleto Boulevard and Great Ocean Highway in Paleto Bay. Several vendor booths were spread out along the sandy lawn, one of which was owned by Tony and called Corleone Prime Steaks. The booth contained a front register and a refrigerated display case full of various cuts of meat. Behind the display case, Tony was currently having a meeting with an employee. The employee wore a white dress shirt tucked into black dress pants, and a name tag that read “Filipe Roberto.”

“Sir, I need to know when you take money out of the company account.” Filipe said, scrolling through their account’s transaction history on his phone.

“What do ya mean?” Tony asked, feigning ignorance.

Filipe placed his phone in his breast pocket. “Boss, there is $400k missing in the account.”

“$400k? We have that much in the account?” Tony acted surprised.

Filipe narrowed his eyes. “No, that’s already what you’ve taken, sir. That’s what you’ve used to date. We have more than that in the account—”

“I…I don’t need $400k. I have above $400k in my account.”

Filipe raised an eyebrow. “Well, yes, because you took it. From the beginning to now—”

Tony waved his index finger in the air. “No, I—”

“I just ran the numbers the other day. I could actually tell you it’s just slightly above—”

“I did not take $400k from the account.” Tony denied.

“It’s 100%, sir. Without a doubt—”

“I…” Tony struggled to come up with a lie.

“Without a doubt, unequivocally—”

“Somebody hacked the bank account.”

“—undeniably, indubitably—”

“I would never. I would never do that.”

“—and with certainty, I could tell you it’s just above four hundred.”

“That’s fucked up.”

Filipe laughed, and mimicked Tony’s voice. “Ay, Filipe! I want you to run this, and I’m gonna let you do your thing, and I’m never gonna touch the money.”

Tony awkwardly fiddled with his hands. “Um…listen…”

“Boss, come on. Relax. I’m never giving you a hard time and honest—”

“Alright, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine.” Tony sheepishly explained, “L-L-Look, I took money. I…y'know? I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I needed the money.”

Filipe shrugged. “That’s fine, boss. I just need you to tell me.”

“No, no, it won’t happen agai—” Tony cut himself off, hearing a commotion coming from behind the booth. “The fuck is going on?” He walked around to investigate.

On the green lawn behind the row of booths, a group of live action role-players wearing various styles of clothing appeared to be playing Dungeons & Dragons. 

“Oh, it’s The Guild,” Tony realized.

He surveyed the seven LARPers, and spotted his son among them. “Hey, son! Come over here for a minute, will ya?”

“Oooh~ Bjorn’s in trouble~” a man in a white paladin outfit replied in a sassy tone.

“Hello, Tony!”

“Hi! Hi!”

“Good afternoon, meow!”

A bearded man with a blue trench coat, a pink-haired girl in a black and pink spandex suit, and a man wearing a beige suit and a brown cat mask greeted him, and he waved back.

“Dad, I’m in the middle of something right now!” Bjorn yelled.

“Don’t go OOC! Stay in character!”

“Says you, Yeager!” a man in a black-hooded robe yelled back.

“Yeager’s there, too? Both of you boys get your asses over here!” Tony called again.

Tony’s son, Bjorn the Barbarian, was wearing a dark forest green and brown sweater with black pants and black boots. Metal shoulder pads, leather knee pads, and an assortment of belts are strapped to his body including a mohawk helmet of metal spikes strapped to his head. His discounted barbarian look was completed with a pair of eyeglasses resting on his nose for his poor eyesight.

Yeager Demonblood, Lang’s son, was dressed in a black maid dress with black gloves, black pants, and black boots. The outfit had white ruffles, white cuffs, a white collar, and a white apron tied around it. Yeager’s long violet hair was tied in a high ponytail that trailed down to the middle of his back with bangs that framed his purple face. He had elf ears with red dice earrings, and horns with glowing purple tips coming out of the top of head. His face was covered with black goggles and a black samurai mask. Compared to Bjorn, either Yeager’s appearance was extremely well-designed or he was not completely human. 

The two LARPers made their way across the grass to Tony.

“Hey, Uncle T.”

“What’s up, dad?”

Tony revealed two keys in his hand. “These are keys to the manor. One for each of you.”

“Hell yeah!” Yeager tried to grab a key from Tony, but he pulled it out of his reach.

“Wait. There’s gonna be some ground rules, okay? Yeager, no bikes in the house.”

Yeager brought both of his hands behind his dress, and crossed his fingers. “Of course, Uncle T! I understand,” he said innocently.

Tony faced his son. “Bjorn, Warhog has to stay outside, too."

“What?! He can’t go inside?”

“Son, I don’t wanna be that guy, but Warhog is a massive, disgusting warthog. Just look at him.” He pointed at the dark brown boar sleeping in the shade underneath a tree. It was not a warthog, but Bjorn didn’t feel the need to correct him because his point still stood. Warhog was six feet in length with a coat of coarse, dirty hair.

“All right,” Bjorn replied sadly.

Tony emphasized the importance of Lang’s rule. “Don’t do any other stupid shit in the manor. Got it?”

“Okay, dad.”

“Yeah, yeah, we got it.” Yeager brushed off Tony’s concern.

“Good.” Tony handed them each a key. “Okay, that’s all. You can go back to playing your game. I love you, boys.”

“Love you too, dad.”

“Love you, Uncle T.”

The boys ran back to the rest of The Guild to continue role-playing. 

.⋆ ｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆.

“You guys are my family~”

“...You ate two slices of pizza, and now you’re like this?”

“Woah~ What do you mean?”

“You just—Y-You’re bipolar.”

“I’m not bipolar. I’ve just had a rough day, okay?”

“All right, Lang.”

Lang took another bite of pizza. “I insult you and you’re offended. And now I fucking say, ‘You’re my family,’ and you’re offended, Leslie? Really?”

Dean was driving the Cerberus Range Rover with Leslie in the passenger seat and Lang eating a box of pepperoni pizza in the back seat.

Leslie groaned. “Penny and Harry have been waiting for us the past fifteen minutes because you were craving pizza.”

“Sue me, bitch.” Lang finished another slice of pizza.

Dean parked in front of a Chinese style restaurant. In the green lawn on the right side of the property was a massive sign that read, "The Rooster’s Rest Hotel & Tavern." Part of the sign had been vandalized with spray paint, and several employees were working to clean it off. 

A woman with short black hair tied into two half buns wearing a short black turtleneck dress with a red blazer and black heels approached them in the parking lot.

"Hey, Mr. Lang."

“Penny, what the fuck happened?” Lang asked, exiting the vehicle.

“It’s this new gang that just moved in. They’ve been placing their gang tags everywhere and harassing the employees,” Penny said with a hint of irritation in her voice, and Lang got the impression that this had been going on for a while.

Penny and Lang walked up to the sign, watching the employees wash off the paint. He didn’t recognize the gang tag.

“What gang is it?” he asked.

She shrugged. “I have no idea. Apparently, they own The Gentry.”

“Fucking gangbangers. Where’s Harry? I thought he was here with you.”

“He got tired of waiting, so he’s talking to them right now.” She pointed to a building behind the restaurant.

Lang’s eyes grew wide. “Oh my god. Guys, we gotta go get him before he gets shot. Go, go!”

Penny Farthing, the CEO of Rooster’s Rest, waved to them as they left.

Dean drove to The Gentry Manor Hotel located one block behind Rooster’s Rest.

A ginger-haired man with a buzz cut and a long beard wearing a warm brown suit over a dark brown turtleneck was talking to a group of Italian mobsters.

With a British accent he said, “We have to kick you out. This isn't the Southside; this is Vinewood.”

The leader of the mobsters was puffing on a cigar. He exhaled and replied, “That’s exactly why we chose this place, Harry.”

Harry really wanted to roll his eyes, but didn’t. “Well, we don’t want these goddamn tags all over the goddamn buildings. So, I’mma tell you guys this right now, all these tags will be removed from Vinewood. It ain’t personal. This is what we’ve done to everyone before you, and will do to everyone after you guys. No gangs are allowed in Vinewood. We keep these streets clean.”

“Harry, get in the fucking car!” Lang yelled out of the window.

Harry glanced over his shoulder, and saw the Cerberus Range Rover. “Nice talk, guys. I gotta go.”

The mobster nonchalantly shrugged. “We’ll let you off this time for your blatant disrespect. If you come back again, we won’t be as welcoming.”

“Gotcha.” Harry turned around, and with his back facing them, he let himself roll his eyes.

He walked to the Cerberus Range Rover, and slid into the back seat with Lang.

“You’re so stupid, Harry,” Lang chastised.

Harry took a slice of pepperoni pizza from Lang’s pizza box, and started eating it. “I thought I could convince them to leave. What are you guys doing?”

Lang reclined in his seat. “We’re gonna go to city hall, and get them evicted.”

Harry gave him a confused look. “You can do that?”

“People think that they can just buy a house and suddenly they own property, but that’s not true,” Lang said. “They have rights to the land, but the land still belongs to the state government. And with the legislation we’ve recently slipped through city council, we can do whatever we want.”

Harry was surprised by that answer. “You’re willing to do that for the Rooster’s Rest?”

Lang looked out of the window as they passed by the restaurant on the way to city hall. “This is my holy ground. Rooster’s Rest is everything I have. This would be the last empire that comes crumbling down. I’ll sacrifice everything else before I sacrifice this restaurant, and I ain’t gonna let some fucking schmuck cockroach think they can claim it as part of their gang territory. I gotta set a point here. I ain’t gonna set a precedent where somebody can come and use my fucking restaurant for their shit.”

“If that’s the case, then I feel you’re doing the right thing,” Harry said, grabbing another slice of pizza.

An idea popped into Lang’s head. “This is actually perfect because I was thinking of acquiring a new storefront for my wine business anyway,” he contemplated.

A sadistic idea popped into Leslie’s head. “Before we kick them out, we should put up an advertisement on one, or all, of the billboards in front of the property, and it’s just a picture of us three that says, ‘Cerberus: We live rent free but you don’t.’”

Dean laughed. “Okay, that would be brilliant.”

“It’s a pretty good one,” Leslie stated, pleased with himself.

“That might be too close to home, though. Too real,” Dean decided.

They arrived at Rockford Hills City Hall, and entered the Western Wing where the mayor’s office was located. 

Lang barged through the office door.

“Denzel~” he sang.

The mayor’s office had one large desk in the center of the room, and the nameplate on it read “Mayor Denzel Williams.” A man with black, slicked back hair wearing a white suit over a black dress shirt sat in the plush chair behind the desk.

“Hey, Lang. What can I do for ya?” Denzel greeted and shook his hand.

“I want to acquire The Gentry for my wine business, and kick out everybody on the property,” Lang said.

“All right,” Denzel easily agreed. “Let me get the paperwork for that.”

Leslie was in disbelief about what he just heard. “Wait, you guys actually have paperwork for shit like this?”

Lang nodded. “Yeah. I figured something like this might happen. So, this is one of the first things we did when Denzel became mayor.”

Denzel started typing on the computer at his desk, and pulled up the necessary files for transferring the private property to Lang. A process that would normally be illegal, but they had spent weeks slipping the documents through the city council to get it passed.

“Here's our documents.”

Lang leaned over Denzel’s shoulder, looking at the contents on the screen. “Perfect. How fast can we get this done? Do you have to pass it through a judge?”

“No judge necessary. We can get this done in about thirty minutes.”

“Fantastic,” Harry said.

They finished going through the paperwork, and The Gentry was acquired by Cerberus.

Afterwards, the four businessmen drove back to the Diamond Casino & Resort.

Lang received a phone call during the car ride there. “Hey, Eve.”

“Hello, Lang. I heard about the gang issue from Penny,” a feminine voice replied through the phone.

“Yeah, we already took care of it, and now we own The Gentry,” Lang informed her.

“Oh, that’s great. Well, I just wanted to say I officially submitted the business proposals for the four buildings in Vinewood: the strip club, the coffee shop, the dungeon crawler, and the one building across from Tequi-la-la. And they all got approved.”

“Alright. Hell yeah, Eve. So, wait, you own it all?”

“Yeah, it’s all mine now.” Eve said in a slightly sadistic tone.

“That’s what I like to fucking hear.”

“Mm-hmm~ So, Vinewood secured.”

“You’re the fucking best, Eve. You’re the greatest person I’ve ever met,” Lang complimented.

She giggled. “If you ever need anything, call me.”

“Alright. Buh-bye.”

“Bye.”

Lang hung up, and addressed the others, “Hey, guys. Fucking Eve locked up all of Vinewood. Holy shit.”

“What do you mean?” Leslie asked.

Lang elaborated, “She got all her business proposals approved for pretty much all of Vinewood, so no more gangs will be trying to move in. A bunch of other people are probably gonna get evicted because of this, but it is what it is.”

“Hmm~ Eve is cold, and I like that.”

“Yeah, I like it too. Call me ‘evil,’ call me ‘fucked up,’ but I’m glad this happened,” Lang said.

“Oh, this is great. This is great in every way, shape, or form. I mean, Eve is the prodigy of our combined minds. She is everything that we’ve ever wanted. If she was lab created, I could not have made her more perfect,” Leslie continued to praise her.

“...Why don’t you ever compliment me like that?” Lang asked.

Leslie scowled. Lang couldn’t see it from the back seat, but he could tell that Leslie was scowling. 

“Eve doesn’t make dick jokes.”

Dean chimed in, “I’m siding with Leslie here.”

“Same.” Harry agreed.

Lang pouted and looked out the window. “You guys don’t appreciate my sense of humor.”

They arrived at the Diamond Casino’s parking lot, and Lang and Harry said their goodbyes to Dean and Leslie as they walked back to the casino to gamble. 

Harry was about to go to his own car when Lang stopped him. “Hey, check out this new car I bought.”

Lang pulled Harry to the back of the parking lot where a black Stratum was parked next to his DeLorean. “What do you think of my Stratum?”

“Fantastic.” Harry circled around the vehicle. “Not as classy as the DeLorean, but it’s still nice.”

“It’s the four-door that drives like a two-door. The fucking ass of this car is just an ass you wanna fucking put your dick in. Donnie used to call it the Cussy for that reason.”

“I saw a documentary on a guy that married his car, you know?” Harry said, “Used to stick his dick in the exhaust pipe. No kidding.”

“What the fuck?” Lang’s eyes darted to the car’s exhaust pipe, and they both bent down to examine it.

Harry continued, “Not even making that up. And I once saw a documentary on a woman who married a roller coaster, and she used to kiss it.”

Lang furrowed his brow. “You watch some weird shit.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. You can marry like inanimate objects. I was close to marrying my hammer one day. Shit got really bad.”

“Jesus, Harry.”

They stood up and walked to the front of the car.

“Anyway, I got it for keeping a low profile when I’m doing illegal shit. Wanna help me transport some drugs?” Lang asked.

“I’d love to, but I promised Penny I’d meet up with her when we were done,” Harry replied, checking the time on his phone.

“What? Are you really gonna ditch me here?”

“I got plans, Langy.” Harry tried appeasing him.

“Fine. I’ll do it by myself, asshole.” Lang slammed his car door closed and started the engine.

Harry went up to the window. “Are you sure that’s a good idea? Can’t you ask The Guild to go with you?” he asked in concern.

“Fuck you! You’re giving me no choice. I have to do it right now by myself,” Lang said dramatically.

Harry decided to just let Lang do what he wanted, so he wouldn’t be gaslighted. “All right, good luck with that. See ya tomorrow.”

“Yeah, see ya tomorrow. Unless I go to prison, and it’s all your fault!” Lang yelled as he drove away.

˚₊·♡ ͟͟͞͞➳ˋ°•*⁀➷𓅯𓅭𓅰

Tony was wearing a dark gray trench coat over his gray suit. His face was hidden under a gray mask and a dark gray fedora. He strolled around a gas station on the Palomino Freeway with several sports cars lined up next to him.

A blue Nissan GT-R R35 with a neon blue underglow drifted across the parking lot and stopped right next to him; the driver exited the car. He was dressed in a black hoodie with the Disney character, Goofy, printed on it, dark blue denim jeans, white shoes, black gloves, and a black motorcycle helmet that looks like Goofy’s face.

“Ay, my boy! Goofy, what’s up?” Tony said.

“Ay, DuckerZ~” Goofy greeted him by his racing alias.

“We hitting up more fucking races tonight or what?” Tony extended his hand towards him.

“Absolutely. You know it, buddy.” They locked hands and dapped each other up.

A girl with long black hair tied into two braids wearing leopard cat ears on her head, and a short black dress with a black mask across her face came up to them.

Tony turned his attention to her. “Hey, Kitty! You racing today, too?”

“Hell no. I’m riding with Goofy. I’m the professional passenger princess for a reason,” she said, wrapping her arms around Goofy’s waist.

Tony chuckled. “Yeah, that sounds right. Good to see both of you here.”

A white Lamborghini Huracan drove up to them. This driver was dressed similarly to Tony with his own dark gray trench coat except he also wore an ominous black mask with a neon orange face roughly etched into the plastic.

“Big M~ You made it!” Tony exclaimed.

Big M spoke with a robotic sounding voice changer, “Hello, DuckerZ. I was able to make some time to race tonight.”

“Will any of the other Puppets be coming?” he asked.

Big M shook his head. “I invited Earl and Unit, but it sounded like they were busy.”

“Okay, that’s alright,” Tony said, “Glad to see you here, brother. The race is starting very soon.”

Tony checked the racing app on his phone, and saw that everyone had arrived and paid their $500 entry fees.

“Everybody line up! The race is starting in three minutes.” he yelled from the middle of the parking lot.

The street racers ended their conversations amongst each other, and got back into their cars. They connected their phones to their GPS which connected to the windshield of their cars, allowing them to see the map of the race, upcoming checkpoints, racer placements, and lap times.

Tony drove his red Hycade Audi R8 to the starting line, and turned on his racing playlist. As the countdown hit zero, he sped down the freeway.

In the parking lot of Betta Life Pharmaceuticals, Lang wore a brown monkey motorcycle helmet, an oversized black hoodie over a long white shirt, black techwear pants, black gloves, and black and white Nike shoes as he carried several burlap sacks of medications to his car, and placed them in the trunk. The pills weren’t illegal to purchase, but pharmacies weren’t allowed to hand out massive amounts of them to people like Lang who would use them to cook into methamphetamine.

“Kitty, I’mma be honest with you, I need the drugs on this list for making meth.”

“And that’s exactly why it’s illegal for me to sell large amounts of medications to people, Mr. Lang. Especially those who aren’t prescribed, and have no medical documentation.”

“Please~ I’ll pay whatever price you want.”

Kitty sighed. “All right, fine. Just steal it or something, so I have something to report about why all these substances are missing.”

“Thanks, Kitty. I appreciate you. Goofy is better for you than Ray, but if anything happens, just let me know and I’ll take care of him for you.”

She laughed. “Thank you.”

A couple of months ago, Lang made a deal with Kitty Dream, the owner of the company, that allowed him to take as much as he wanted, but it had to look like he stole it. Otherwise, the company could get investigated for making and selling illegal drugs.

Under the cover of night, he worked quickly and stealthily to not get spotted by the police. That was what he’d like to believe, but he didn’t see a police cruiser approaching until it was in the parking lot with its lights and sirens blaring at him.

Lang jumped into his Stratum, and drove away as fast as he could. With the police cruiser following closely behind him and a secondary cruiser joining in the pursuit, he called Tony in a panic.

Tony was speeding and drifting around the streets in Grapeseed while blasting electronic dance music at maximum volume through the speakers. Just as the bass was about to drop, his phone rang which paused the music.

He answered the call. “Hey~ Buddh—”

“Tony! I need help!” Lang shrieked.

When Tony’s ears stopped ringing, he asked, “What?”

“Cops spotted me! I need a pick up ASAP!”

Tony looked down in the bottom right corner of his windshield to see his placement; he was in second place out of twenty racers.

“I’m in a race right now. I can’t—”

“Tony! I don’t give a fuck! Pick me up!” Lang screamed even louder.

Tony jolted at the scream, and accidentally swerved off the course, almost crashing into a streetlight. Three racers passed him by, and he unleashed his own scream that sounded like the cry of an upset duck.

“Alright! Fuck! Where you at?” Tony left the race on his racing app, and drove back onto the street.

“I’m in my Stratum right now, heading up Great Ocean Highway. I got two units on me! Hurry the fuck up!”

Tony mentally visualized where both of them were currently located on the map. “Okay, drive up to Paleto. I’ll meet you there.”

“I’m coming, I’m coming!”

They headed towards each other from highways on opposite ends of the island. Tony saw lights coming from in front of him.

“I hear the sirens. This you in the black car?” Tony asked.

Lang saw Tony’s red Hycade. “Yes, get in!”

Tony hit the brakes. “Wait, I’m driving your car?! You said to pick you up!”

“This car is filled with drugs! I ain’t abandoning it! Get in, get in, get in—”

“Okay, okay, motherfucker! You didn’t say you had shit with you. Let me park this car at my house. Go loop around, and pick me up at the supermarket.”

Lang looped around the neighborhood, and cut through a small alleyway that led to a supermarket behind Tony’s house. The police cruisers were too big to fit through, so they had to drive around the rest of the block.

Tony climbed over the fence behind his house, and got into the driver’s seat as Lang crawled over to the passenger seat.

He drove south from the supermarket, but the police quickly caught up to him.

“Go, go, go! What are you doing?! Drive, Tony!”

Tony was partially distracted, looking at his phone. “Ju-Just give me a fucking minute! You interrupted my music earlier. Let me run this song back, and then I’ll lock in.”

Electronic dance music blared through the speakers, and Tony focused back on the road. The neighborhood in Paleto Bay was small, and there was only so much he could do to lose the police on the wide highway in the countryside. Eventually, he decided to use the darkness and his knowledge of the Paleto Forest to his advantage.

He turned off the headlights as he went off-road and maneuvered around the trees and bushes. Lang’s Stratum was lighter than the police cruisers which made it easier for him to drive up and down the dirt hills.

After a short chase, Tony was able to lose the police.

“Damn~ This car is pretty good. You said this is a Stratum?” Tony asked.

“Yeah, I’m calling it the Cussy.”

Tony recalled hearing that word before. “Wait, who used to say that again?”

“The exhaust pipe looks like a car pussy,” Lang said, not answering the question.

Tony laughed and drove them back to CLean Manor.

˚₊·♡ ͟͟͞͞➳｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡𓅯˚｡⋆.

Upon entering the front door, they saw Bjorn cooking meth in the kitchen, his brown boar running around the dining room, and Yeager riding his motorcycle through the hallway upstairs.

“Who the fu—What the fuck are you dumbfucks doing, you motherfuckers?!” Tony yelled angrily.

Lang waved away the air in front of his nose. “My castle smells like shit! Cook skooma at the fucking Guild Hall!”

Tony headed to the staircase. “I said, ‘No bikes in the fucking house!’ Ay, dickheads!”

Seeing Tony about to go upstairs, Bjorn stopped cooking, and ran to block him.

“Uh, do-don’t come up here!” Bjorn said with his arms and legs extended in front of Tony, but he easily shoved past him, continuing to march upstairs.

“What the fuck are you doing, you crazy motherfuckers?!”

“It’s nothing, dad!” Bjorn called from behind him, trying to catch up.

Yeager drove his bike to the end of the hallway, and crashed into the red, wooden hobbit door which caused a few of the portraits to fall off the wall. He rubbed his head, and searched his dress pockets. “I don’t have my key!”

“Warhog, attack!” Bjorn yelled.

The boar ran into Tony and knocked him to the floor. While he was down, Bjorn ran past him and unlocked the door.

Yeager drove through, and stopped by the glass balcony door. “Open the balcony! Open the balcony!”

Bjorn ran through the room, unlocked the balcony door, and jumped on the back seat of Yeager’s bike.

“Go, go!” Bjorn encouraged, and Yeager launched the bike off the balcony.

Warhog jumped down after them, following behind in the lower driveway.

Tony ran out to the balcony and yelled, “You little shits! You little fucking shits! Jesus fucking Christ. What the fuck?!”

Yeager yelled from below, “Hey, we’re not in the house anymore, Uncle T!”

He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Oh marone. Gabagool.”

Tony went back inside, walked through Lang’s massive Chinese style bedroom, and locked the door behind him. He found Lang rehanging the portraits in the hallway.

When he was done, they looked up at the ten portraits on the wall.

“Clayvon, Sven, Saab, Ellie, Donnie. Uh, Nino still comes around when he can, we see Denzel and Harry sometimes, and then there’s me and you,” Tony said.

Lang chuckled. “Yeah, my castle is fucking empty now. Time really flies, doesn’t it?”

After a few seconds of unexpected silence, he turned to look at Tony. He was already looking at Lang, and giving him a very familiar, sad expression. A silent conversation passed between them, and Lang knew that Tony was about to say something he didn’t want to hear.

“Buddha, I don’t wanna be that guy, but I’m gonna say it.”

“Don’t say it, Tony.”

“I’m gonna say it.”

“...Fine, say it.”

“Take me back…just for a day.”

It was a rhetorical request that Lang could not fulfill no matter how many times he said it. Both of them knew that, but Tony still felt the need to voice it whenever they had these poignant moments.

Lang swallowed the lump in his throat. “...We gotta keep moving forward, Tony. There’s new friends and new adventures out there.”

Tony looked back up at the portraits. “Made a whole lot of good friends. They’re all gone now. That’s what it feels like.”

“Yeah, but that’s kinda just how life goes. Y'know what I mean? People come, people go, people grow up, people die, people have kids. Once you let go of the past, you can move into the future.”

Tony pondered, “What if the greatest days we’ve ever had are already gone, and we’re just hoping to find something that we’ll never find again?”

“Well, there’s only one way to find out, right? And let me tell ya something, I ask myself that question so many fucking times. When I first met Clayvon, when I first met Donnie, when I met fucking Saab, when I fucking met you, Denzel, Ellie, so on and so forth. And the good times just keep coming. But, I always embrace letting go of the past. Think about it. When we were fucking young, dumb motherfuckers running in a shitty gang called the fucking Leanbois, I thought that was the best time of my life. Yet, every once in a while, I found myself living better. But, I was only able to do that because I wasn’t clinging on to the past.” Lang continued looking at Tony, hoping that his words were getting through to him.

“That makes sense,” Tony said, lost in memories that only the two of them know.

Lang placed his hand on Tony’s shoulder, getting his attention again. “Sometimes the past is gonna seem all fucking great, but we can make the future ten times better.”

Tony smiled at him, but his eyes were watering up.

“Don’t do it, Tony. You’re gonna make me cry.”

Tony rubbed his eyes as Lang guided him to the staircase.

“So, how was the race? You finally make some fucking money?” Lang asked, changing the subject.

Tony’s exasperation from earlier returned. “Motherfucker, I swear to—I had to ditch the race to save your ass!”

“That’s not my fucking problem. And that was only thirty minutes of your time.” Lang casually walked downstairs.

“I had to pay an entry fee for the race, so I lost $500 in thirty minutes,” he complained.

“Damn~ You are poor, if you’re complaining about losing $500,” Lang teased him.

Tony stomped down the staircase. “I’m not poor, Buddha! I’m very rich and successful.”

“Tony, I don’t understand how you work as much as me, and you have no money.”

“What are you—I have money.”

Lang was doubtful. “No, you don’t. How much money do you have in your account right now?”

“I have like $100 grand in the steakhouse bank account. What do you mean I don’t have money? I have money. What the fuck are you talking about? How do I not have money? I have money.”

“How much do you have in your personal account right now?”

“$25 grand,” Tony stated proudly.

Lang raised an eyebrow. “...Damn.”

“Oh, don’t give me that! That’s fucking money! What do you want from me? Sorry I don’t shit $30 mil outta my ass three times a day like you do. Bitch—”

Lang’s phone rang and he answered it while Tony continued yelling in the dining room.

“Hey, Penny.”

“Hello, Mr. Lang. I need to have a quick meeting with you about, uh, apparently, we own The Gentry now?” she asked.

“Yeah, I forgot to update you about that. I’ll come over right now.”

“Also, your son is here driving his bike through the restaurant,” Penny added.

“Okay, I’ll yell at him for you. Don’t worry. I’ll be there soon.”

“All right, see you.” She hung up.

Lang looked at Tony. “I gotta go to Rooster’s, and I’ll probably be there all night. Have Alfred clean this place up.”

“Okay, I’ll—Wait, is the butler’s name actually Alfred?”

Lang nodded. “Of course, I’m literally Batman.”

That response was enough of an explanation for him. “Alright, okay, I’ll call him up. And when you see my son, tell him he’s grounded.”

“Oh, you already know I'm grounding both of them,” Lang said, heading to the front door. “See you tomorrow, Tony! I love you.”

“Love you too, Buddha." Tony gave him a soft smile as he exited the manor.

The front door slammed shut. He sighed and sat down in the seat at the head of the refectory table in the dining room. Now, alone in the quiet manor, he gave each of the vacant seats a somber look before dialing Alfred’s phone number.

.⋆ ｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡˚⛧˚｡⋆.

A young man wearing a dark green blazer over a white dress shirt and a navy bulletproof vest with gray pants, black gloves, white shoes with blue light up soles, and a black motorcycle helmet parked his green Sultan Mk III in the customer parking lot in front of the Rooster's Rest.

There was a driveway on the left side that led up to the staff parking lot, and he briefly considered parking there instead when he decided against it.

The helmeted man walked up the staircase to the balcony, and entered through the front door. The main entryway led to a hallway with the lobby for the Rooster’s Inn on the right side, and a large dining atrium on the left side.

He turned to the left—steering clear of the noisy commotion surrounding The Guild in the middle of the atrium—and went up to the bar on the other side of the room.

The kitchen and more dining tables were on his left, and on his right was a stage with a performer singing an advertisement for the Rooster’s Rest despite the fact they were currently in said restaurant.

He approached the front counter for the bar where a bearded staff member, dressed in the Rooster’s Rest uniform consisting of a red vest over a white dress shirt with black pants and a black bow tie, was working the register.

“Glory to the cock! How can I—Oh! Hello, Yuno!”

“Ah, hey, um—” Yuno quickly glanced down at the staff member’s name tag on his shirt. “—Lando. Uh, I was just hired as the janitor here, but they never really trained me yet. Can you train me?”

Lando checked the list of employees working the current shift. “Well, we’re kinda understaffed right now. Can you come back for the next shift? I’ll have time to teach you then.”

“Oh, I actually have another job to go to in a bit, but I’ll come back at a different time,” Yuno promised.

A charismatic, silver-haired man with a Russian accent came up to the bar accompanied by two girls at his side. He was wearing a dark pink blazer over a white dress shirt with black pants, black gloves, and black dress shoes.

“Good evening, gentlemen.”

Yuno immediately recognized his voice. “Oh, what’s your name? I remember seeing you here last time.”

The Russian man recognized him as well. “Yeah, yeah, nice to meet you. My name’s Raymond, but you can call me Ray.”

“I’m Yuno. You, uh, you work here?” Yuno gestured to the whole restaurant.

“Yeah, I’m one of the employees of Rooster’s Rest.”

Lando validated his statement. “Yeah, he is.”

Yuno tilted his head. “You don’t have the outfit on.”

“I’m not working tonight,” he clarified.

“Would you like to?” Lando asked. “We’re understaffed.”

“I have plans later this evening.” Raymond sent a wink to the two girls he arrived with. They had ordered drinks at the bar, and giggled at his obvious intentions.

Lando rolled his eyes, and looked back at Yuno. “Let me give you my pigeon. Just reach out to me at any time, and we can get you your uniform and training.” 

“Great! Let me give you my phone number,” Yuno said, taking out his phone.

“Yuno, is it okay if I get it, too?” Raymond inquired.

“Yeah, you should definitely take it! We’re co-workers now, right?” Yuno asked optimistically despite the fact that he hadn’t worked a shift yet.

Raymond smiled. “Yeah, co-workers. Of course, Yuno. I feel like we’ll have good connection somehow.”

They exchanged phone numbers, and Raymond sent Yuno a text message that read, “Hello brother. This is Raymond Romanov (Ray) from the Rooster’s Rest. Nice meeting you!”

Yuno looked up from his phone. “Yup, great to meet you, Raymond. Why are you here if you’re not working right now?”

“I just like hanging out here, and I’m friends with Lang.”

Yuno had never heard that name before. “Who is—”

“Demon! You're fucking grounded! Park your goddamn bike outside! No bikes in my fucking restaurant!” Lang yelled as he entered the dining atrium.

Yeager grumbled, “Oh, come on, dad! It's my noble steed.”

“I’m not gonna ask again!”

“Fuck you!” Knowing that he couldn’t win this argument, Yeager drove his bike out of the restaurant.

At the same time, Bjorn rode his brown boar into the restaurant.

Lang stepped in front of him. “No, Bjorn! Get your disgusting pig outta here, too.”

Bjorn whined, “But Emperor—”

“Get him out, Bjorn! Your father and I are already very disappointed in you two. You’re both grounded!”

Bjorn lowered his head at bring reprimanded. “Okay,” he said, jumping off his boar.

“Oh, and I have more supplies for skooma in my carriage. Take it to the Guild Hall while you're out,” Lang said. “Do not cook it in my castle!”

“Understood, Emperor,” Bjorn replied as he took Warhog outside.

Lang turned to address the other five members of The Guild who were watching their family drama. “The rest of you nerds get back to work!”

“Yes, Emperor!” they responded, and quickly dispersed.

As Yeager reentered the restaurant, Lang pulled him aside. “One last thing, son.”

“Ugh, what now?”

“Yeager, you’re breaking the one rule that I taught you to stay rich, and that’s giving away money ‘cause you feel bad for people. You don’t do that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your uncle told me that he has $25 grand, and you’re the only person I know who would’ve felt bad enough for him to give him the money to get out of debt,” he explained.

Yeager hesitated, “Well, uh…it-it’s pathetic, dad. It’s fucking pathetic!”

“And?”

Yeager came up with an excuse. “He represents you, and this poor motherfucker is walking around in debt! It sickens me!"

“Okay, let’s get this straight. There’s only one motherfucker that represents my bloodline, and that’s you.” Lang ran his fingers through Yeager’s bangs, messing it up. “Now, I need you to stay rich and successful. Like father, like son."

Yeager swatted his hand away, and fixed his hair. “I’m adopted. I don’t represent anything you do. And I’m just saying Uncle T walks around the Rooster in debt. It sticks up the place! Plus he's Bjorn's adoptive dad.” Yeager started walking away.

“Son, you don’t need to add the ‘adoptive’ part—”

“I’m busy! I have work to do.” Yeager joined the rest of the staff members in the kitchen.

Lang decided to let the issue go for now, and walked upstairs to the office to meet with Penny. “Hey, Penny~ I’ve got good news.”

Lang updated Penny on everything that happened after he left her earlier that day. Then, they worked alongside each other until closing time at 6:00 a.m. 

(The next morning - Saturday, February 6, 2021)

When the restaurant emptied out, Penny prepared to leave. “All right. See you later.”

“Yeah, good work today,” Lang said.

“Thanks, you too. Oh! By the way, Denzel said he wanted to talk to you when you’re done here.”

“Okay. Thanks, Penny.”

“Bye, Mr. Lang,” she said as she left the restaurant.

Lang briefly looked around the restaurant, making sure that it was empty, then he went to the staircase in the backroom area and walked down to the supply room.

He looked around again before opening a hidden door in the wall that led to the secret basement. The main room was a dimly lit version of the dining atrium above with ancient artifacts hanging on the walls. He went through a door on the left that led to a long hallway with several rooms, and began searching for Denzel.

The first room led to a dark, stone room in the shape of a dome. Besides the arch that he passed through when he entered, there were three other arches leading to dark winding tunnels.

He left the tunnels, and traveled further down the hallway to another hallway that led to an open artifact room, two storage rooms, and a room displaying a full body armored suit that resembled the black and red Shredder outfit from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles except there were red feathers decorating the helmet.

“Hello, Shadow. Hope you’re doing well down here,” Lang said to the armor.

He left Shadow’s room and went back down the main hallway.

Lang went through an arcade room, and down a secret hole in the closet to a dark, wooden room that appeared to have been wrecked and burned. There was an ancient black, samurai mask with two horns displayed on an altar at the end of the room. He gave a heavy sigh and left.

He went back to the main hallway, through a library, and down another secret hole that led to a similar dark, wooden, and wrecked room except there was an ancient book displayed on an altar.

Denzel stood in front of it.

Lang breathed a sigh of relief. “Why are you down here, Denzel?”

He turned to Lang. “I was just checking up on this place, and I need to speak with you.”

“What’s up?”

“So, the training for The Guild has been going well, and I was wondering if I have permission to take them out hunting?”

“Uh, by yourself?”

“Yeah, I can keep them in check. You have my word,” Denzel said in seriousness, and Lang knew how serious Denzel’s word can be. 

“Okay, fine. You can take the nerds on a little field trip. They need the experience anyway.”

“Thank you.” Denzel shook his hand, then gazed down at the old book on the altar.

Lang noticed that it had gotten dusty, and wiped some of it off with his hand.

“You know, they remind me of everything that Talon could have been.”

“Yeah,” Lang agreed. “I truly believe that this is destiny.”

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

At CLean Manor, Lang and Tony did some redecorating and looked through a photo album. There were a set of pictures labeled, “Happy Holidays 2020.” 

Tony and Bjorn were featured in a series of photo booth prints wearing matching Christmas sweaters. Tony’s sweater read, “The World’s Greatest Dad” and Bjorn's sweater read, “The World’s Greatest Son.”

Another series of photo booth prints featured Lang and Yeager wearing matching sweaters as well. Lang’s sweater read, “I HATE MY FUCKING SON!” and Yeager’s sweater read, “FUCK YOU, DAD!”

Chapter Text

(Friday, February 12, 2021)

It was 1:00 a.m., and Raymond Romanov was driving to his gang compound in his pink Lamborghini Aventador. He wore his usual attire consisting of a dark pink blazer over a white dress shirt with black pants, and black shoes. A girl wearing a short red dress with red shoes sat in the passenger seat.

He parked at Rogers Salvage & Scrap. “So, you like the Lambo, huh? It was only $400k.”

“Yeah, the seats are so comfortable,” she cooed, relaxing into the luxurious seat.

He leaned over and lowered his voice, “Well, let’s go someplace where we can get even more comfortable~”

She smiled and exited the car with him.

Raymond motioned to the concrete building, covered in corrugated metal. “This is the R.U.S.T. Scrapyard, and I bought the whole property myself. Come with me this way.” He took her hand in his—intertwining their fingers—and guided her to the doorway entrance.

“I’ve been wondering, uh, why is it called R.U.S.T.?” she asked.

“It stands for Raymond’s Unfortunate Scuff Team. We’re sort of a new gang.” He held the door open for her as they entered the building, then he led her up the staircase.

Choosing to leave the lights dimmed, he brought her to a capacious room with coffee tables topped with expensive liquor, lavish couches and lounge chairs lined up against the walls, and a pool table in the back corner. Windows with grilles were lined up along the wall facing the street, allowing the moonlight to be cast onto the couches below. He didn’t feel the need to tell her about the armory closet storing their drugs, weapons, and other contraband.

“This is where we hang out. What you think?”

She looked around, admiring the space. “Wow~ This looks nice.”

“Yes, it is. I paid for all the furniture myself.” Raymond took off his pink blazer and unbuttoned the top of his white dress shirt. “Would you like vodka?”

“No, thank you. I think I drank enough tonight.”

Raymond had already poured himself a glass of the clear liquid, and he quickly swallowed it as if it was water. A stray drop flowed from the side of his mouth and down his neck until it disappeared underneath the open collar of his shirt.

“Anyway, no one else should be here tonight, so~” He seductively laid down on the plush couch. The moonlight illuminated his silver hair and his muscular structure through his shirt.

It was an overt invitation that she eagerly accepted, sitting on his lap and kissing him deeply. His lips moved against hers in a heated fervor, savoring the bitter aftertaste of alcohol and every sweet sound she made. She started kissing his neck along the wet trail that the vodka left behind. Raymond let his hands wander along the curve of her waist, feeling her soft skin peeking out of the openings in her red dress. He reached around her to unzip the back.

“You’re very beautiful lady, Amber.”

The girl stiffened and slowly pulled away to look at him. “Did you just call me ‘Amber’?”

He hesitated. “Uhh…Skylar?”

“It’s Fae. My name is Fae.”

“Oh! You have the same hair color as this other girl. I must’ve saved the wrong number.”

“Are you fucking serious, you whore?!” she yelled and stood up.

Raymond grabbed her wrist. “Hey, we can still—”

“Fuck off!” She yanked her hand out of his grip, and headed towards the exit.

“I’m sorry. It’s so unfortunate that we met this way.”

The Russian accent that she used to adore was now grating on her nerves. Fae slammed the door loudly as she left, but Raymond barely heard it over the sound of his phone ringing.

He answered it. “Hey, Juno! Happy anniversary, baby~ Wanna come over to the Scrapyard to celebrate?”

Scene 2: Raymond & Yuno

At Burger Shot, Yuno Sykk performed his line cook duties during the morning shift. All the employees were dressed in the Burger Shot uniform except him who still wore his dark green blazer over a white dress shirt and a navy bulletproof vest with gray pants, black gloves, white shoes with blue light up soles, and a black motorcycle helmet. As the clock ticked closer to noon, the fast-food restaurant became more crowded, and he got overwhelmed.

A woman with short red hair wearing a burger mask, a bright yellow shirt, and red pants with red suspenders yelled at him, “Yuno Sykk! Stop cutting onions and make some fricking burgers!”

Yuno jolted and dropped the knife on the floor. It was by pure luck that it didn’t cut him. “Shelly, uh, when it’s really busy I just—I can’t, you know? I jump out. I can’t handle the stress of the kitchen.”

“Yuno, do not jump out!”

He picked up the knife and placed it back on the counter. “When it gets busy. When it gets too busy, Shelly. I can’t—”

“That’s when we need you the most, Yuno!”

“I-I’ll grab the, um, frozen patties from the back.” He ran to the storage room.

“Thank you!” Shelly thought for a second and turned to her assistant manager. “He just left, didn’t he?”

Yuno jumped out of the storage room window, leaving behind a disappointed Shelly Smith, the CEO of Burger Shot. He got into his green Sultan Mk III, and drove to the Diamond Casino & Resort.

Running up to a man at a blackjack table dressed in a beige suit with a brown cat mask over his head, Yuno greeted him, “Hello, Mr. Meow!”

“Good afternoon, Yuno. Want to gamble with me, meow?” He patted the empty seat next to him.

“I really shouldn’t,” he declined. “Did you win anything yet?”

“Of course, meow. I just made $100k, meow.”

“Wow! Oh, I have a discount for drinks now, by the way. Are you thirsty?”

“No, thank y—”

“Excuse me, Meowfurryon. I need to talk to Yuno alone for a minute.” A woman with short black hair tied into a half bun wearing a black dress with a gray overcoat cut off their conversation, and pulled Yuno over to the side.

He saluted her. “Hello, best boss, Cassie!”

“You never cleaned the bathrooms, Yuno.”

“Wait, I didn’t?!” Yuno grabbed the sides of his motorcycle helmet with both hands, racking his brain trying to remember.

“Oh god! My short attention span. I’m so sorry, Cassie!”

She sighed. “Maybe I should rehire you as a manager promoter instead since you’re distracted talking to guests anyway. You can at least sell—Where are you going?”

Yuno suddenly started heading towards the lobby. “I forgot to buy a new phone after I was robbed yesterday. My bosses might call—Oh, I don't have enough cash. Do I need cash? Wait, is there an ATM here? Times are tough. I used to sell weed and oxy, and that didn’t even make me money. I’m still in debt. Point is I make no money, I’ve never made money, I still don’t make money, and, uh—”

He pulled a pocketknife out from his pants pocket. “Hey, how much do you think one of these knives is worth?”

“Why did you bring a knife to a casino?!” Cassie yelled, struggling to follow him. While he was talking, he forgot that he was going towards the lobby, and now he was wandering around the casino floor.

“I’m trying to pawn off some goods. Hey, I went to the pawn shop and nobody, nobody, uh, maybe I can buy a phone there? Oh, wait, hey, I got you a gift. S-Some sunglasses!” He handed her a pair of sunglasses that he found in his blazer pocket.

“Woah, one thought at a time, Yuno. I get it. Having ADHD is difficult.” She placed the sunglasses on top of her head.

He shook his head. “I actually don’t. I haven’t been diagnosed. I grew up in an Asian household. They don’t believe in mental health. You got money for a burger? Do you know I work at Burger Shot? Oh, I guess I should’ve gotten one while I was there—Eh!” He crashed into a slot machine, and fell on the floor.

“If you actually worked here, you would make your own money—”

“I need a phone! I need to go make money! I got a job! I gotta go!” He jumped up from the floor, and ran to the lobby to exit the building.

“This is your job, Yuno!” Cassie futilely tried calling him back.

He got back into his green car, and drove away to buy a new phone, leaving behind a disappointed Cassie Cupcake, the CEO of the Diamond Casino & Resort.

It took him a couple of hours because he got distracted talking to everyone he passed by, but eventually he made it to an electronic store and bought himself a phone.

After that, he drove to the UwU Café, a cat maid themed restaurant in Little Seoul. The two cashiers—who were both dressed in a white vest over a light pink dress shirt with black pants and a white tie—groaned when they saw him enter.

The pink-haired cashier with a name tag that read “Lucas” welcomed him at the front register. “Well, if it isn’t Yuno, the King of Rice Balls, here to make some rice balls, heh?”

“Perfect! That’s me!” Yuno ran to the kitchen in the back.

“...And then runs away with the rice balls,” Lucas mumbled under his breath.

The brown-haired cashier with a name tag that read “Craig” leaned towards Lucas and whispered, “He never actually works. Why is he hired here?”

Lucas scratched his head, thinking. “That’s actually a really good question. I have no idea.”

“It’s the same thing with Burger Shot!” Craig whispered harshly.

“Shh!”

They subtly glanced over their shoulders to make sure that Yuno couldn’t hear them. To their surprise, he wasn’t in the kitchen anymore.

“Wait, did he even—Is he gone already?” Lucas asked.

“That’s how fast he is. He just grabs the rice balls and goes.”

“He really is the King of Rice Balls.”

At 7:00 p.m., Rooster’s Rest opened for the evening shift, and it was busier than usual given that it was the Spring Festival, also known as Chinese New Year.

Yuno rushed inside the crowded dining atrium which caused one of the employees with long pink hair and a black mask to crash into him. The dishes in her hands rattled and two ceramic bowls fell, but she was quick enough to catch them before they hit the ground.

“Oh Jesus! I’m sorry,” Yuno apologized.

“No, I should’ve watched where I was going. I’m sorry about that, Yuno.”

“That’s okay, Leyla. That’s the closest thing to a girl hitting on me I’ll ever have.”

Leyla giggled at his response. “See you later.” She fixed her pink hair, which was tied into a side braid that hung over her right shoulder, and continued working.

Looking around, Yuno saw that seven members of The Guild were working tonight’s shift. They were all wearing the red and black Rooster’s Rest uniforms, but generally he had been able to differentiate them as Yeager was the purple-haired one, Leyla was the pink-haired one, Lando was the bearded one, Meowfurryon wore the cat mask, Bjorn wore the spiky mohawk helmet, Stagdancer wore the paladin helmet, and Gloryon wore the black-hooded robe.

Raymond appeared to be working as well since he was wearing the uniform this evening. Having witnessed the collision from across the room, he walked over to Yuno.

“What do you mean? You seem like good looking man, though.”

“No, I’m ugly, Raymond.” Yuno pointed to his covered head. “That’s why I wear the black motorcycle helmet.”

“If it bothers you, there’s good plastic surgeon—”

“No, no, I want someone who likes me for me. You know what I mean? I don’t wanna change my eyebrows or something like that. I want ‘em to like hanging out and stuff.”

“I understand. You want someone to like you for more than just what’s on the physical side.”

“You probably deal with this too, huh? You probably got like fifty wives I bet.”

Raymond chucked and ran his fingers through his silver hair. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never had this issue in my life.”

“You have fifty wives?!”

Raymond immediately recognized the voice behind him. “No, Fiona! It’s not—”

“Oh, that was awkward timing,” Yuno said.

They turned towards a woman with long braided white hair wearing a black, long sleeve, crop top and a white skirt with black thigh high socks and black boots. She had her arms crossed, and an eyebrow raised, daring him to explain. 

Before he could, Gloryon walked over to her.

“Are you dating Ray?” He looked back and forth between them. “I’m not calling him dad.”

“Gloryon, I’m not dating Ray! I’m married to Marlo,” Fiona refuted.

That claim made Raymond raise an eyebrow. “Oh, you’re married to Marlo? Congratulations.”

“Well, we married each other for money, not love.”

“Ah~ In that case, are you free on Valentine’s Day?” He winked at her.

“I’m busy!”

“That wasn’t a ‘no,’ number thirty-eight,” Yuno joked.

“I’m not ‘number thirty-eight’!”

Raymond smirked. “No, she’ll always be wife number one.”

Fiona wore an unimpressed expression. “Ray, don’t encourage my sons.”

“What?”

“Yeah, yeah!” Yuno jumped around. “Fiona adopted me last week. Gloryon is my brother now.”

“I was the first person she adopted a few months ago,” Gloryon said.

“...Why are you…adopting adults, Fiona?” Raymond asked, greatly confused.

“It’s a long story plus this whole adoption tax scam thing, but anyways I have like thirty kids now. Oh, kids! Don’t forget that the Scamily Race is tomorrow.”

Gloryon nodded. “I know. Bjorn said he’d be my teammate.”

“I completely forgot!” Yuno yelled.

She shook her head. “Of course you did.”

“What’s the Scamily Race?” Raymond asked.

“Marlo and I are using some of the money we made from adoptions to throw a Reliant Robin race for our new kids,” Fiona explained. “They each need a teammate to help them compete.”

Yuno turned to Raymond in excitement. “We gotta be on the same team.”

“We should be on the same team,” he easily agreed.

“I’ll send you guys the details of the race later. Just remember to meet up at Bean Manor before the race starts,” she said.

“Woo-hoo! This is gonna be so much fun.” Yuno ran around in a circle, and crashed into Lang, causing them both to fall over.

“Oh! I am so sorry, Mr. Lang!” he apologized.

Lang groaned and rubbed his aching back. “Yuno? You want me to fucking fire you or what? You haven’t worked at all this past week.” He got off the floor, and dusted off his expensive black suit.

“I…just haven’t gone through the training yet,” Yuno lied, terribly.

“No, you’ve already gone through the training,” Gloryon said.

“Motherfucker, we’ve trained you, and given you plenty of opportunities to work a shift. What’s going on here?” Lang asked.

Yuno fidgeted on the floor. “Ah, next shift for sure, uh…”

Raymond offered his hand to Yuno and helped him stand up.

Lang cracked his back, then continued to scrutinize him. “Okay, Yuno, do you actually want to work here?”

“Yup! I’m 100% interested!”

“Yuno, why—Listen, I-I can’t understand. You don’t wanna lose your job here, but you don’t wanna work. Why?”

“Oh wow, Mr. Lang! You completely understand me. This is why we get along so well, right?” Yuno gave him a thumbs-up, but Raymond could tell that it was not helping. He tried to bring Lang’s attention to something else.

“But look at his outfit. He looks really dapper right now.”

“Yeah, I was able to afford this new green jacket, see? Check this out.” Yuno leaned against a table with his hands in his pants pockets to show off his slightly more expensive jacket.

Lang glared at him and slowly said, “You’re not cool enough to lean, Yuno.”

Yuno stopped leaning and fiddled with his fingers. “Oh, oh, okay, I’m sorry.”

Raymond facepalmed. “Oooh.”

“Oh shit.”

“Damn~”

Gloryon and Fiona said, enjoying the drama.

Lang rubbed his temples. “Now, I need to understand. Do you want your job or not?”

“Of course I do.”

“Okay, fine. Work a shift, you keep your job. Understand?”

Yuno saluted him. “Yup, you got it—Well, I got it, for sure!”

Lang stepped closer to him, and gave him a stern expression. “Good luck. The bathrooms haven’t been cleaned since you’ve gotten hired ‘cause we thought you were gonna clean them. So, please, clean them.”

“I got it, Mr. Lang. I promise—” Yuno’s new phone chimed, and he checked the text message he just received.

“I gotta go.” He awkwardly waddled towards the exit.

“Are you walking away?” Gloryon asked.

“Is this motherfucker leaving? You’re supposed to work one shift!” Lang yelled.

Yuno ran to the staff door. “I’ll work the next shift, Mr. Lang!”

“You better be back here in twenty-four hours!” he screamed as Yuno left the restaurant.

He got into his Sultan, and drove to the Legion Square parking lot across the street of a Fleeca bank which had two police cruisers lined up in front of it.

After parking his car and getting out, he ran over to two men sitting on a wooden bench. One of the men had short black hair, red tinted sunglasses, and a mask with the flag of the Philippines across his face. He only wore blue denim jeans and tan steel-toe boots, leaving himself shirtless to display his Filipino tattoos. The other man had a brown-haired mullet, and wore a blue denim jacket with blue denim jeans.

“Benji! Dundee!” He cheerfully circled the bench a few times.

“Ay, Yuno!” Benji greeted him.

“G’day, mate.” Dundee, the man with the mullet, said with a thick Australian accent.

Yuno climbed onto the backrest of the bench. “Is Mr. X already in there? He’s really gonna rob this bank solo?”

“Yeah, this Jean Paul motherfucker, man. He ain’t want any fuckin’ help from nobody. He’s crazy, bro,” Benji said, leaning forward so that Yuno doesn’t accidentally tip the bench backwards.

“He should be done hackin’ by now,” Dundee said.

“Did bro remember to bring hostages?” Benji asked.

“Yeah, he’s got two, but I’m not sure if it’s gonna prevent him from gettin’ shot, breached, or fucked—Agh! Careful, Yuno.”

Yuno had hastily crawled off the bench, and sneaked across the street to get closer to the bank. He was curious about the police negotiations happening at the entrance, and eavesdropped on the radio communications of two officers standing outside.

“Do you have a visual of the suspects or hostages?” An officer spoke into his handheld radio.

The negotiator standing by the doorway responded, “Yes, I can see two hostages in the front, and they both have their hands up. Someone is holding a gun towards them from the back. The suspect appears to be male, wearing a yellow shirt with white pants, and his face is covered by a skull mask. He’s also using a voice changer.”

“You think it’s the criminal using the alias, X? He fits the m.o.,” the officer suggested.

The negotiator tried to get a better look, but it was hard to see behind the hostages. “Maybe. I’ll continue the negotiations. I still don’t know if there are more suspects in the back.”

“10-4.”

The negotiator opened the front door, and an explosion went off behind the bank. The officers covered their ears and closed their eyes as the blast went off.

“Status?!” the officer asked between coughs.

“Ocean King!” The negotiator yelled, running to check on the other officers.

A motorcycle zoomed out from the back of the Fleeca. The skull-masked bank buster with blonde hair—who was more widely known as X—drove away from the bank, went through Legion Square, and disappeared in an alleyway.

One police cruiser pursued after him, and after a few minutes, the sirens grew distant. Yuno sneaked back across the street, careful to not get spotted by the remaining police officers investigating the bank.

“And there he goes.” Benji relaxed back into his seat. “I wonder if he was able to get the hack.”

“We’ll ask him about it later if he manages to escape,” Dundee said.

Yuno jumped back onto the bench. “That was so cool! I wanna hack a bank one day.”

Dundee chuckled. “Champion, you don’t know how to fuckin’ hack.”

“Can you teach me, Dundee?”

“I’m fuckin’ dumb as bricks, mate. Just ask someone from Chang Gang. They’d probably be willin’ to teach you.”

Yuno slumped against the backrest. “I did, but they’re always busy.”

“I think one of ‘em works at the VU. Can’t be too busy while workin’ there,” Dundee said.

“VU?”

“The Vanilla Unicorn. It’s in the Southside,” Benji explained.

“A great place for cleaning your dirty money. I can get you a VIP membership if you want. It’ll also get you free food,” Dundee offered.

Yuno perked up. “Really? That would be great! Thanks, Dundee!”

“It might take a few weeks for you to get approved, though,” he added.

Yuno jumped off the bench. “That’s okay. It sounds better than doing drug runs to clean my dirty money.”

“Bro, that’s just ‘cause you keep gettin’ fuckin’ robbed and shit,” Benji said. “Come on, let’s go clean some money right now. We’ll watch your back, man.”

“Okay, let’s go!” Yuno ran back to his car.

(The next day - Saturday, February 13, 2021)

Yuno had just finished doing something and he was supposed to be going to someplace, but he had gotten distracted. One thing led to another and now he was doing parkour across rooftops in Little Seoul. He was about to make a questionable leap to a distant building when he saw a man wearing a dark pink blazer drive a motorcycle into a bush on the side of the street.

He climbed down from the roof, and jumped to the ground. “Wait! Raymond! Is that you?”

Raymond popped out of the bush. “Yuno? Where’d you come from? How’d you know it was me?”

“Who else is smuggling Akumas like a psychopath?”

Raymond adjusted his blazer and brushed the leaves off. “It’s the best bike in the city. Anyone who does crime should have one. You never know when you might need it.”

He looked around to see how Yuno got there, but the street was vacant. “Did you drive here?”

“Oh, I walked.”

“You’re walking to Bean Manor?”

“Oh Jesus! I forgot. We gotta go.”

Raymond gestured across the street. “My Lambo is parked over there. We can take that.”

They went to his pink Lamborghini Aventador parked in the Korean Plaza by the UwU Café, and Raymond started driving them to Bean Manor for the Scamily Race.

Yuno curled into the seat, enjoying the leather cushions. He sat up and rolled the window down, but then decided that he liked the window rolled up and rolled it back up. He put his hand in the cupholders to feel the size of them, and liked the texture of the hard material. He ran his hands across the dashboard, but the material was different, and he didn’t like the feel of that; it was too rubbery. He tapped a finger on the window and it made a pleasant thumping sound, so he continued to do it.

“Not that I don’t like the Lambo, but what was wrong with the Akuma?” Yuno asked.

“It was just one of the four main backup bikes I set up every morning.”

Yuno quickly turned to face him. “Four main backups?! You have more?”

“Of course. I’m Raymond Romanov.”

He pulled over to the side of the street. “Walk with me, Yuno.”

Yuno exited the car and followed him towards a bush.

“Listen, Yuno, if you’re ever in trouble and wonder, ‘Hmm~ Does Ray have bike in this bush?’ The answer is, ‘Yes, Ray has bike in every bush.’” He jumped into the bush, and drove out on another Akuma.

Yuno laughed. “Oh god. How do you have this many bikes?”

“Most of them are VIN scratches from boosting.”

“VIN scratches from boosting? What’s that?” Yuno asked.

“You’ve never boosted car before? You do crime, right?” Raymond placed his bike back in the bush.

Yuno shrugged. “Yeah, but not that. I’m not much of a driver really.”

They got back into the car, and continued driving to Bean Manor.

“Okay, so for boosting—Well, first off, there’s this racing scene called the Underground, and it’s run by the Puppet Master. He gives out contracts for boosting vehicles and sets up other jobs for street racers. When you accept a boosting contract, you gotta steal the car he wants, disable the tracker, and chop it for parts. Then he’ll pay you in GNE, or if you want to keep the car, you can buy it with GNE.”

“So…boosting a car is basically…grand theft auto?”

Raymond rolled his eyes, and they both laughed.

“Yes, Yuno, yes. If you get caught for boosting, it goes in your criminal record as GTA.”

“We should boost cars together someday. It sounds fun.”

“Yeah, I can teach you. You’ll need Underground chip installed in your phone, though. Oh, also I got notified by Fiona, right? Here’s how the race is gonna work.” Raymond took out his phone and opened his text messages.

He handed it over to Yuno who read it as he began to explain. “One of us is driving, and one of us is going to be the navigator because only one of us is allowed to see the map. So, either me or you will have to navigate every turn.”

Yuno looked up. “Wait, wait, only one person can see the map, and the other person can drive?”

“Yup!”

“I-If it’s okay, I wanna do the driving, but…” Yuno fiddled with the phone in his hands, thinking of what to say.

“Yes, I will do navigation, yeah?” Raymond asked.

“I feel like you’re more organized, man. I guarantee you I’ll mess that up. I have the memory of a goldfish.”

“Really?”

“Apparently, goldfish actually do have a decent memory, and they can remember things for weeks. I think mine is worse than that sometimes.”

“No worries, no worries.”

Yuno’s worries increased and he stammered, “L-Look, uh, with this car I don’t think driving skill is gonna matter as much as—”

“Oh, I know. I don’t care if we crash or flip over fifty times. It doesn’t even matter.” Raymond tried to ease his fears again.

“Y-Yeah, let’s have some fun with it.” Yuno handed the phone back to him.

While Yuno had enjoyed getting to know Raymond over the past week, he still didn’t know him that well. He was a little worried that Raymond would find him useless in the race.

Yuno looked out the window to distract himself with the passing scenery. They were driving through a wealthy neighborhood in Rockford Hills.

“Wow~ There’s a lot of nice houses here. I’m thinking about getting a stash house one day to store my illegal stuff.”

“Having stash house is great. I used to have one with Kitty until we broke up,” Raymond said.

“You lost your house?”

“Yeah, we decided to put the house under her name because she’s clean civilian. If I ever got raided, the police wouldn’t find anything because I don’t own property.”

“Oh, I see.”

Raymond gripped the steering wheel tighter. “But when we broke up, she still kept the house! Even though I paid for half of it.”

“Ooh, that’s rough, buddy,” Yuno replied, unsure of how to respond.

“So, put your stash house under the name of someone you trust. Otherwise, you just lose house.”

“I don’t think I’ll have to worry about that yet. There’s no way I’m getting a house anytime soon.”

“We could go house hunting after this,” Raymond suggested. “At least you can look at what’s available, and see how much it’ll cost.”

“Yeah, sounds fun!”

They arrived at Bean Manor, and parked in the crowded driveway. Raymond handed Yuno a pair of pink gloves that matched his own, then he put on a black motorcycle helmet that matched Yuno's.

The first person that approached them when they got out of the car was a girl with long black hair tied into two braids, and wearing leopard cat ears on her head. She had a light blue denim jacket over a white blouse, a pleated pink skirt, and white shoes with pink light up soles that matched Yuno’s blue ones.

“No way. Kitty?” Raymond said in disbelief.

Kitty waved. “Hi~”

“Oh! Hey, Kitty!” Yuno ran around her once.

“Hello, bro.”

Raymond sighed. “What are the chances?”

“What? I was also adopted by Fiona.”

“Yup! We’re siblings now, technically. This is our family house, Bean Manor.” Yuno pointed to the $1 million mansion.

“Ohh~ Is this house also under your name, Kitty?” Raymond asked sarcastically.

Yuno tilted his head. “Oh, what are you—What exactly are you referencing, Raymond?”

Kitty placed her hands on her hips. “He could be referencing the beach house, the business—”

“That’s right! You took Betta Life Pharmaceuticals from me, too!” Raymond yelled.

“Also, we split the house. He didn’t pay for the house.”

“Yeah, so then why did you take it after?” Yuno asked.

She smiled and flipped one of her braids over her shoulder. “Because it was in my name, and he’s the one who was collecting different wives and didn’t know he had a queen.”

“Ohh!”

Raymond felt the salt being rubbed into his wound. “Okay, that’s not right! Ay! You—”

“Well, they do call him ‘Fifty Wives Ray,’” Yuno joked.

“Yuno!” Raymond yelled, feeling betrayed.

“I’m joking, I’m joking!” Yuno waved his hands placatingly, and Kitty took notice of their matching gloves and helmets.

“Are you guys teammates?” she asked. “You guys are going down!”

“Huh? Listen, listen, I’m with Raymond, and he’s an expert navigator. He’s like the Nami to my Zoro from One Piece.”

“Yeah, well, I’m the professional passenger princess.”

“Ohh, that’s tru—Wait, wait. If I’m with Raymond, are you with Goofy?” Yuno asked.

Kitty nodded, proudly. “Yes.”

Raymond straightened his posture and crossed his arms. “Yes, Yuno, yes. She’s in team with Goofy.”

“Ohh.”

“Stop it, Yuno.”

Yuno patted Raymond’s back. “We’ll win, man, don’t worry. And, you got forty-nine others. What’s one? I mean...they do also say, ‘If you see Goofy in a race, you’re fighting for second place.’ So—”

“No, no, we’ll win. We got this,” Raymond said with determination.

“Welcome to the race, everyone!” Fiona yelled from across the driveway. “The race is starting in five minutes, so start heading to your Robins after you get your keys!”

Fiona and Marlo were helping people prepare for the race, and handing out car keys. Most of the participants had already gone to their cars. Kitty left to find Goofy, and Raymond and Yuno walked over to Fiona.

“Hey, Fiona.”

“Hello, Ray. Thanks for coming to the race. I’m guessing you're driving?” she asked.

“Actually, I’m navigating. Yuno wants to drive.” He pointed behind him, and Yuno jumped into her view behind Raymond. “Yup!”

She smiled, noticing their matching gloves and helmets. “You guys look like twins.”

“We are twins.” Raymond said sternly.

“What?” Fiona asked.

He swung an arm over Yuno’s shoulder and brought him closer. “We’re brothers. We’re helmet brothers.”

Yuno wasn’t sure where this serious attitude was coming from, but it did help ease his nerves from earlier about being useless.

He giggled and asked, “Where’s our car, mom?”

Fiona handed him a car key with a keychain attached to it. “Here you go, son. The license plate is written on the keychain.”

She held out her phone to Raymond. There was a QR code on the screen, and he scanned it with his phone. A map of the race was downloaded into the racing app on his Underground chip.

“This is a map of the race,” she said. “Don’t hook it up to your car’s GPS. You have to give verbal directions only.”

“Got it. Hey, are you still busy on Valentine’s Day?” Raymond asked.

Fiona turned away. “Next! Who hasn’t gotten their keys?”

Seeing the clear rejection, Raymond dropped the subject. “See you later, Fiona.”

“Thanks, mom!”

Yuno and Raymond went to the street behind Bean Manor where several brightly colored Reliant Robins were parked, and Yuno began searching for the license plate that matched the one on his keychain.

“She’s still busy, huh?” he asked.

Raymond gave a deep sigh, and put a hand in his pants pocket. “I guess I’ll just be alone on Valentine’s Day.”

“Wait. How are you gonna be alone? You still have forty-eight wives.”

“No, I don’t, Yuno! Besides, it’s not just girls. The R.U.S.T. boys are all busy, too.”

Yuno paused. “Oh, were you planning a Valentine’s Day party? I thought you were just looking for a date.”

Raymond kicked a pebble with his shoe as they passed by a few Reliant Robins. “February 14th is my birthday. That’s why my favorite colors are red and pink. I’ve tried to throw parties for it, but the plans always fall through because everyone ends up spending the day with their partners.”

“Ooh. That’s—Hey, I found our car!” Yuno ran up to a small, pink, three-wheeled car.

Raymond bent down a little to read the license plate. “‘SCAMILY7’? We’re number seven?!”

“Number seven! Let’s go!” Yuno ran in circles around the car.

“That’s awesome! I like that.”

“Yeah, we’re number seven, and our team color is pink.”

They both got in the car, and Yuno drove them to the starting line of the race. He braked on the left side of Bjorn and Gloryon’s lilac-colored Reliant Robin.

“Raymond, I hope you don’t mind that I’m driving.”

“What? I don’t mind at all.” He was confused about why Yuno continued to bring it up, but he didn’t want to press him for answers when the race was about to start soon.

Gloryon, who was sitting in the driver’s seat of his car, heard their conversation and rolled down his window. “Wait, you’re driving, Yuno?”

Raymond also rolled down his window. “Yeah, he’s driver. He’s gonna kick your ass, Gloryon.”

Yuno looked at them. “Um, uh, I don’t—"

“You’re going down, brother.” Gloryon said.

“Hey, I’m his real brother here. We have family on our side.”

“We’re all family. We were literally all adopted.”

“And it doesn’t matter ‘cause you guys are going down,” Bjorn joined in.

“Everyone get ready! The countdown is starting!” Fiona yelled, walking along the starting line.

They rolled up their windows, and Raymond pulled out his phone to look at his racing app.

“I see the countdown on my phone—Oh my god, Yuno.”

“What’s up, Raymond?”

“This is the longest race I’ve ever seen in my entire life,” he said, looking at the checkpoints for the race.

“Eh, we’ll figure it out, surely.” Yuno checked the gas, oil pressure, and temperature gauges on the dashboard.

“Surely. You ready, Yuno?”

Confirming that everything was good, he nodded. “Yup, ready!”

“Okay. Three, two, one!”

Fiona fired a starter pistol.

“Go, go, go!” Raymond yelled.

“Go!” Yuno stepped on the gas pedal, and they dashed down the street. He wasn’t the fastest driver, but he believed that if he took it slowly, he wouldn't mess up the turns as much.

They were off to a great start, easily weaving through the streets in the Vinewood Hills without tipping over.

“This car is surprisingly stable despite it only having three wheels,” Raymond remarked.

“I mean, they do say three points are stronger than four. I don’t know if that applies to cars, though.”

They continued to make their way up north. When they passed by a ranch, the thunderous sound of a red Hycade Audi R8 running into a cow at roughly fifty-two miles per hour resounded through the air.

“What the heck was that?!”

“That’s just Tony Corleone,” Raymond explained without looking up from his phone.

“What is he—Uh, is that normal?”

“Slow down. We gotta turn left up here.” He pointed further down the street.

Yuno saluted. “Got it!”

He turned the steering wheel with one hand. The car drifted, and then it flipped over fifty times.

˚₊·♡ ͟͟͞͞➳ˋ°•*⁀➷𓅯𓅭𓅰

At the ranch, Tony was using his car to run over cows while having an argument with Lang on the phone.

“I am making money, Buddha! I’m at the ranch right now working my ass off.”

“Tony! Boss! Please stop killing the cows like this! We can’t use the meat!” Filipe was running across the ranch, trying to catch up to him.

“What do you mean ‘we can’t use the meat’? Oh my fucking god.” Tony parked his car, put down his phone, and jogged over to Filipe.

“What do you mean ‘we can’t use the meat,’ Filipe? It’s meat!”

Filipe panted. “Yes, but the quality is ruined when you ram a vehicle into it.”

“What? Why?”

“You can ask the cow.”

Tony looked back at the bloody field of roadkill. “So, what am I supposed to do with all these carcasses then?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

“Argh!” Tony duck cried. “Gimme one second, Filipe.”

Tony got back to his car, and picked up his phone again. “Okay, Buddha. Why did you call?”

“I’m thinking of going full Italian for my wine business, and you’re the only Italian guy I know. How do you say ‘red’ and ‘white’ in Italian?” Lang asked.

Tony was silent for five seconds, and then said, “Um…”

“Oh my god, are you a fake Italian?”

“My dad’s Italian, my…grandfather’s Italian.”

“Tony, are you a fake ass Italian-American?”

“My grandmother lived in Italy.”

“Do you not speak any fucking Italian?”

“I can sing the ‘when the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie’ song. Oh wait! I know how to say ‘red’ in Italian.”

Tony cleared his throat like he was about to speak, but then he played a translator through the phone instead. A robotic voice said, “Rosso.”

“You want me to say it again, but slower?” This time, a slow robotic voice said, “Rrrroooossssoooo.”

“Are you serious?” Lang wished that Tony could see his unimpressed face.

The robotic voice replied, “L'amore fa male agli affari.”

“What the fuck was that?”

“Do you know what that means? You want me to say it again?” Tony asked while imitating a thick Italian accent.

“Say it again, Tony.”

“La-L’amori, uh, L'amore famiglia Ferrari?” he attempted.

“That was a completely different sentence.”

“Yeah, my Italian is not that great,” Tony said, keeping up the Italian accent. “But, ‘love is bad for business.’ That’s what my family always used to say.”

“You don’t need to tell me that,” Lang said. “You have once again proved to me that you are absolutely useless besides driving.”

Tony groaned. “Is that all? Is that why you called? I gotta get back to work.”

“Yeah, that was it. Love you, Tony. Mwah!” Lang made a smooching noise, mimicking the sound of a kiss.

“Mwah! Mwah!” Tony kissed the left and right side of his phone, mimicking Italian cheek kisses. “Love you too! Bye.”

════⊱ ♣ ⊰════

It had been forty minutes since Raymond and Yuno started the race. They followed the racetrack up to Paleto Bay, and now they were heading south through the mountains.

On one of the turns, the Reliant Robin flipped over and slid down into a creek, and Raymond volunteered to push it out of the water. When he finished grunting and heaving the car back to the street, he realized that Yuno was missing. He looked around for a bit, and found Yuno following a stray black cat up a cliffside. He chuckled, and took a selfie of himself and Yuno against the rocks. Then, they got back in the car and continued driving.

After a hundred rough turns, the pink car became more prone to flipping again. It looked worse for wear, but they opened both car doors to give them more balance. This technique allowed them speed ahead of three other racers, and Raymond taunted them as they passed by. It continued to work until Yuno took a turn too quickly, and his left door got ripped off by a streetlight. Raymond closed the other door after that so he wouldn't lose it as well.

Going much slower now that the door was gone and the body was battered, five racers surpassed them. Raymond lowered his head and ducked down, hoping that they wouldn't notice him.

“They call that ‘karma,’ Raymond.”

As they finally neared the finish line back at Bean Manor, they had a head-on collision with a fire hydrant, and the engine died.

“That’s so unfortunate,” Raymond said.

They exited the vehicle, and Raymond pushed it across the finish line. Yuno gave him moral support while sitting on the crumpled roof of the car.

“Woo-hoo!” Yuno cheered.

Raymond gasped for air. “We made it.”

“I kinda like this car. I hope I get to keep it.”

“Honestly, it’s not that bad. It’s good car,” Raymond agreed.

The broken and defeated car made a groaning sound as they joined Fiona and the others at the front of the property.

“Shut up one second! Listen to your mom!” Fiona yelled, and everyone quieted down.

“Okay! Thank you guys for participating in the first ever Scamily Games. I just wanna really quickly congratulate Goofy and Kitty on winning.”

“Boo!” Raymond yelled in disapproval as he observed the two celebrating their victory.

Fiona continued on, “I’ll send you guys the $250k after this. And I wanna give out a last minute consolation prize to the worst drivers, the shittiest racers that didn’t even finish the fucking race in their car…and that is Ray and Yuno.”

“It’s not our fault the car broke!” Raymond protested.

“Your consolation prize will be the Reliant Robin that you raced in to remind you of how shit you were at driving it. And because I’m not paying to repair that.”

“Woo~ Let’s go, Yuno!” Raymond gave him a tight hug, picking him up in the air and spinning around in circles.

Yuno giggled. “Yeah! Let’s go!”

“You got the Reliant Robin! Congratulations!” Raymond said, setting him back on the ground.

“Good job, everyone!” Fiona yelled.

“Can I leave the car here until I can afford to repair it?” Yuno asked.

“Sure, just park it in the garage.”

Yuno shouted words of encouragement as Raymond pushed the car up the driveway, and left it in the corner of the garage.

“Let’s go look at those houses, Raymond.” Yuno ran back towards Raymond’s pink Lamborghini Aventador, and waved at Gloryon as he passed by.

“See you, Gloryon!”

“Wait, are you not staying for the after party, brother?”

“No, I’m gonna go look at houses with Raymond.” Yuno pointed to an exhausted Raymond, slowly trekking across the front lawn.

“All right, you have a good day then. I love you.”

“Oh! Eh—” Yuno ran to Raymond’s car in the driveway and waited for him.

After a moment of awkward silence, Gloryon cleared his throat. “You didn’t say it back.”

Raymond watched their interaction in amusement as he unlocked his car.

“You didn’t say it back, Yuno,” Gloryon repeated.

Yuno quickly got in the car and lowered his head below the window.

Raymond started the engine and whispered, “Yuno, he said he loves you.”

“Huh? Oh, I-I’m in a rush. Step on it. Step on it, Raymond.”

“Oh, a-all right. S-So long, so long.” Gloryon gave a small, hesitant wave.

“He loves you too!” Raymond took his time backing out of the driveway, making it more awkward.

“Oh, y-you still have time. Yea—You’re still in the driveway,” Gloryon teased.

Raymond laughed. “He loves you!”

“Drive, Raymond, drive,” Yuno said while covering his helmet visor with his hands.

Raymond relented, driving out of the property, and Yuno breathed a sigh of relief, more than glad to be free from that situation.

“Where to, Yuno?”

“Mirror Park. I’ll mark it.” Yuno marked a house address on the GPS, and Raymond started driving east towards it. The ride was much smoother with Raymond behind the wheel in his expensive Lamborghini.

Yuno relaxed into the luxurious seat. “This is much better after spending the last hour in the Robin. Maybe the next time we go racing we can take your Lambo instead. We’ll win for sure, right?”

Raymond stiffened. “Um…I…”

“Hm?”

“Uh, I have, um, you see…”

“What’s wrong, Raymond?”

“Listen, Lambo cost $400k, but I couldn’t actually afford all of it. I took out loan of $223k, and I don’t know if I can pay it back. Unfortunately, I think it’s gonna get repossessed, and then everyone will ask me about it,” the Russian man explained.

“Yeah, you did pretty much tell the whole city that you have this thing.”

Raymond pouted, propping his arm up against the window and letting his head rest in his palm. “I don’t suppose you have $200k, do you?”

“Sure, let’s go to the bank.”

Raymond’s head snapped back up in surprise. Yuno had already marked the nearest bank on the map instead of the house.

“Wait, what do you mean ‘sure’?”

“I mean, sure.”

Raymond was skeptical. “You just have $200k to give your friend like that? Not even—Yuno, we just met last week. I thought you were broke.”

“I sold drugs with Benji and Dundee yesterday, and then we cleaned some money together. It’s not like I’m using it for anything right now, so I might as well help you pay your loan.”

“I can’t take $200k from you. What about your house?”

“They’re all gonna be too expensive anyway. Come on, the bank’s just down the road.” Yuno pointed to the mark on the GPS.

“Are you sure? I mean, I don’t mind losing the car,” he lied.

“Yes, you do, Raymond. You love this car. You can’t stop talking about this car. Besides, what about the forty-eight wives? What if they leave you once it’s repo’d. We can’t let that happen.”

Raymond chucked at that. He was Raymond Romanov; the girls would never leave him for such a minor inconvenience.

“I promise I’ll pay you back.”

“I’m not giving you a loan to pay off a loan. Just take it,” Yuno insisted.

“O-Okay. If you’re sure,” Raymond septuple checked.

“I’m sure!” Yuno gave him two thumbs up.

“Well then, thank you.”

Raymond stopped at the City Vault, and Yuno had no second thoughts about giving him the money. 

.⋆ ｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆.

Since Tony couldn’t use his roadkill cows for the steak business, he took the meat to Rooster’s Rest instead. He got dressed in a traditional chef’s uniform, and started his livestream.

“Welcome to Tony Corleone cooks at the Rooster’s Rest, and today I’m gonna show you how to make beef ramen. So, the first thing you wanna do is get your noodles ready. You wanna go ahead and grab that pot and get some water in it. Just fill that bad boy up, then you’re gonna place that down here on the stove.”

Tony grabbed a pot off the kitchen shelf, filled it with tap water from the sink, placed it on the stovetop, and turned the burner on. Some of the water dripped on his apron.

“Whoops, I’m such a messy boy. I’m so wet.” Tony sensually dried it with a hand towel. He had seen videos on TikTok with a lot of views from sexy chefs cooking, and he figured that he would give it a try.

“Now, we’re gonna look at our recipe book.” Tony picked up a random book off the counter, and pretended to read it. “Here it says that we’re gonna require one pack of ramen, so we’re gonna go and grab that from the supply cabinet while this water is boiling up.”

Unwilling to use actual Rooster’s Rest supplies and going through the hassle of chopping his own ingredients, he pulled out a packet of instant ramen that he hid in the cabinet earlier, and purposely dropped it on the floor.

“Oh, I’m so clumsy~” He bent down to pick it up, making sure that the camera got a good view of his ass.

“There you are bad boy—Ack!” He coughed when he stood up and noticed Kitty walking into the kitchen. She was wearing her Rooster’s Rest clothes and a confused expression on her face.

“Tony?”

“Oh, uh…” He leaned over, blocking the camera with his back to keep her out of the frame.

He cleared throat. “Hey, what’s up, Kitty?”

“Hi?”

“Yeah, sorry, I was just…filming a video.”

“Oh, sorry! Sorry to interrupt.”

“Yeah, it’s alright.”

She shuffled out of the kitchen, and Tony turned back to his livestream.

“Sorry about that, guys. That was, uh, Lang Buddha, the owner of the restaurant. And he actually just gave me a raise for sucking him off. Anyway, make sure you drop that ramen in there. Put those noodles and vegetables in.” He opened the ramen packet, and emptied the dried ingredients into the pot of water on the stove.

“And now we’re gonna need to let that boil up, and we’re gonna get our beef outta the fridge.”

Once he was out of frame, Tony walked to the liquor cabinet instead, and grabbed a bottle of beer.

“Need a fucking drink,” he said while taking the cap off. “Fucking job kills me, Jesus fucking Christ.”

He chugged the whole bottle, then took his roadkill wrapped in butcher paper out of the refrigerator.

“Alright, guys. Welcome back! Now, we’re gonna be cooking our beef. I’m really happy you guys could tune in today to the cooking show and I’m really excited, to be honest. So, let’s go in and take a look at this thick meat.”

Tony adjusted his chef hat and fixed his apron. He was about to unwrap the meat when Kitty came up to him again.

“Excuse me, can I have a dish?” she asked.

“What?”

“Can I have a dish?”

“What?”

She pointed to a recipe on the counter. “I need four Mountain Meals.”

“You need four, what?”

“Okay, I’ll cook it.” Kitty nudged him out of the way to start preparing the meals.

Tony gestured to himself. “The fuck do I look like? A chef?”

“What the fuck are you doing in my kitchen?”

Tony jumped and turned around, coming face to face with Lang.

“Doing a cooking stream,” Tony whispered. “Just a new idea for my channel.” He turned back around and addressed the livestream, “Sorry, guys. The kitchen is busy right now, so I’ll continue the show another time. Have a great day everybody! Peace~”

Lang rolled his eyes as Tony turned off the livestream. “You gotta stop it with this fucking streaming hobby, buddy.”

“But Buddha~” Tony whined.

“Get this shit outta here. The dinner rush is about to start,” Lang said, and Tony began to clean up his partially cooked ramen.

There was a loud clang that came from the backroom, and Lang walked over to investigate what was happening now.

He wasn’t surprised to find Yeager, Bjorn, and Stagdancer taking a break to role-play. The noise appeared to have been the sound of Bjorn dropping his spiky mohawk helmet because he was currently wiping the dirt off and examining it for cracks.

Lang suddenly remembered that he had something to show them.

“Yeager, Bjorn, Stagdancer, look at this! Ready? You ready?”

“What? Yeah,” Bjorn responded and put his helmet back on.

“KFC, come here, boy.” Lang brought his fingers up to his mouth and whistled.

After only receiving three blank stares, he pointed down at the wooden floorboards to show them. Standing by his feet was a rooster with orange and red feathers.

“Oh my god!”

“What the fuck?!”

“Woah!”

“It’s KFC,” Lang said.

“Oh my go—He came to me!” Yeager yelled in excitement.

KFC rubbed his beak against Yeager’s legs, and he bent down to pet him on the back.

“Oh my goodness.” Bjorn bent down to pet him, too.

“Oh my god!” Stagdancer repeated, still shocked.

Lang nodded. “Yeah. It’s KFC, guys!”

“Hey, KFC,” Yeager said, running his fingers through the rooster’s feathers.

Leyla entered the backroom, and walked over to see what they were doing.

“What?! You have a pet chicken?”

“It’s a rooster! His name’s KFC!” Lang specified.

“Oh, it’s a rooster not a chick—Uh.” She paused. “Is a rooster and a chicken the same thing?”

“No, roosters are male,” Stagdancer insisted, even though he was partly wrong.

Roosters were male chickens. So, all roosters were chickens, but not all chickens were roosters.

“Aww, he’s so cool,” Bjorn cooed as KFC gently pecked his hand.

“Guys, I met up with a fucking witch doctor who made me sacrifice an innocent man, and infuse him with one of my favorite belongings—”

“Oh my god,” Stagdancer said.

“—and then I gave him KFC, and he taught me how to summon him like a hunter in World of Warcraft. KFC is a fucking magical rooster,” Lang explained dramatically.

“Oh my god, that’s so cool.”

“That’s sick!”

Bjorn and Stagdancer were amazed.

“Isn’t that crazy?” Lang asked.

“That is crazy. What the fuck—Wait.” Yeager thought about Lang’s explanation.

“Come here, boy!” Lang waved KFC over.

“What was… What was your beloved thing?”

Lang ignored Yeager’s question, and continued calling KFC. “Come on, boy. Let’s get outta here.”

KFC followed Lang out of the restaurant and into the parking lot.

When Lang got on his black moped and whistled, the rooster obediently flapped his wings and jumped onto the back seat. He happily clucked after he had completed his task.

“Oh~ KFC, you’re so cute.” Lang pet KFC’s head before starting the engine, and driving out of the parking lot. KFC held on for dear life by gripping the seat with his feet.

₊˚⊹⭒☣˖°༄✧.♣ ࿔*:･

Raymond and Yuno were looking at the houses for sale in Mirror Park.

“Right here! Come with me, come with me! Check this out.”

“This small one?” Raymond asked.

“I know it's a little small, but once you climb on this roof here, you’ll see.” Yuno used the fence to climb onto the house, and Raymond followed him up.

Once they had successfully made it to the roof, Yuno pointed to the edge on the other side of the house. “You can dive into the pool from the roof. Look at that! Jump on in!”

Without hesitation, Raymond sprinted across the roof and jumped.

“Wahh!”

“Yeah!” Yuno jumped after him, and they fell into the pool below.

Both of them laughed and splashed each other before climbing out. It was then that Raymond stared back at the roof, and felt shocked at himself.

He was usually a much more serious man. Not only was that a silly thing to do for a brief moment of fun that had subsequently left him drenched, but it was extremely dangerous. If Yuno had wanted to kill him and there wasn’t a pool there, he would’ve been gravely injured.

“I had no hesitation doing that. I should’ve probably hesitated more.”

“Wait, did you jump too far? Are you okay?” Yuno glanced over his body to see if he was bleeding anywhere.

Raymond shook his head. “No, I just jumped straight in without even thinking about it.”

“But you didn’t get hurt, right?” Yuno asked, continuing to search him for any injuries.

“I didn’t, no… I didn’t even look or aim. I just jumped.”

Deeming Raymond to be unharmed, Yuno chuckled. “You can trust me, right? Come on. There’s another house down this road.”

Yuno ran down to the next block over, and they looked at a few more houses in the neighborhood as the sun began to set.

“$800k?!” Yuno shouted. “These houses are tiny and way too pricey! Some don’t even have a front lawn.”

They were standing on the rooftop of another expensive house.

Raymond turned around and admired the cityscape in the sunset. “I think it’s because Mirror Park has one of the best views of the city. Vinewood is still more expensive than this, though.”

Yuno stood next to Raymond, and was upset to see that the view was indeed breathtaking. “Where are the cheapest houses on the market, you think?”

“Oh, definitely the Southside. They go for like $50k to $100k over there. Let’s go.”

They drove southwest to the Chamberlain Hills.

As soon as they went up to one of the houses, several black cars with tinted windows drove by, and gangsters dressed in purple jumped out, shooting dozens of bullets into a house across the street. A group of gangsters wearing green clothing came out of the surrounding houses to shoot back at them.

Yuno and Raymond ended up caught in the crossfire.

“Are you kidding me?! Raymond! Raymond, we gotta get—Oh Jesus!” Yuno ducked down, and ran back to Raymond’s car to avoid the bullets.

Raymond, who was unfazed, continued examining the house in front of him.

“I’m just looking for a house, man! Christ! I don’t wanna live here anymore! Raymond, get in the car! We gotta go!” Yuno repeatedly pulled on the locked door handle in vain.

“Hold on, let me grab brochure.” Raymond casually walked through the gunfire to the sign in front of the house to pick up a real estate listing brochure. He was looking through it on his way back to his car when he heard Yuno scream.

A gangster in purple clothing had a pistol aimed at Yuno’s head. “The fuck are you? You with them?”

Yuno nervously stammered, “N-No, sir. I, um, I was just—”

A bullet pierced through the gangster's neck, and he collapsed to the ground. Crimson liquid spurted out of the two holes; one in each of his carotid arteries. He struggled to breathe and gurgled on his own blood until he died.

Yuno looked up to see Raymond lower his pistol and tuck it back in his pants.

“God, I love the color of blood.” Raymond gave a sigh of contentment, and unlocked his pink Lamborghini Aventador, which now had a splatter of red on the hood. He continued to read the brochure as he got in the driver’s seat.

Yuno was a little shaken up at the sight of the dead man, but eventually got back in the car.

Raymond hummed. “I don’t think this is the type of home you want. These houses are kinda old, and they need to be renovated.”

“Yeah, you know, I just almost got shot up in a gang war. So, yeah, I don’t wanna be here, I think,” Yuno replied with a slight quaver in his voice.

“Well, it’s the Southside. R.U.S.T. turf is just down the road from here, and it’s kinda like this, too.”

“You might be used to gang wars, but I think I’ll like a place that’s a little calmer.”

Raymond thought for a second. “Let’s get out of the city. I think Sandy Shores might be nice.”

They drove northeast to Sandy Shores, and checked out a few properties next to the Alamo Sea. After a few minutes, they stopped at the cheapest shack they could find.

“...This is not bad.”

“Raymond, there’s a hole in the roof. They covered it with a tarp.”

Raymond chuckled. “Yuno, we’re talking about buying cheap home here. Not buying some luxury house.”

The shack was made of discolored, eroded wood, and screwed back together with corrugated steel panels. The property itself was spacious, but it was all dirt and sand.

A tumbleweed rolled by.

“I mean, this one’s not too bad for $124k. There’s a lot of space,” Yuno reluctantly agreed.

“It’s not bad, man.”

Yuno kicked at the sand. “Are there houses for sale in Grapeseed? I like the green.”

“Um, let’s go explore?” Raymond suggested. “I went there before and…they were expensive.”

“Oh… How about we go more north then? Let’s go check Paleto.”

They drove north past Grapeseed, and went to the end of Paleto Bay where the houses were bigger and closer to the beach.

At this time, the sunset was long gone, and it was very dark in the countryside without the city lights. Raymond took off his black motorcycle helmet to see better. He didn’t know how Yuno could constantly keep his helmet on, especially at night.

With an unobstructed view, he read the real estate sign. “Oh my god! What the hell?! It’s so expensive!”

“There’s no way, man! $536k!” Yuno yelled.

Raymond walked around the house. “But look at this! It’s gorgeous! Two floors and you can see the beach.”

Yuno joined him in the backyard. “Oh! No wonder this is so expensive. You get a garage—Wait, and you get two balconies?! What the heck?”

“This home is gigantic.”

“Oh man. It’s $500k, but this is a huge house. I don’t know if I’ll ever afford it, though.”

Yuno started going back to the car. “Let’s get outta here. I think the prices are by neighborhood.”

“Wait, hold on!” Raymond ran to a house across the street, and then ran back. “I don’t know why, but this one across the street is $300k. It’s nice.”

Yuno looked behind him. “Wait, it is nice. Yeah!”

They crossed the street to examine the smaller house.

“Yuno, look how beautiful this one is! You get carport—And grass!”

“And grass, yeah!” Yuno ran to the back of the house. “You get a backyard and a tree! This tree is probably worth like $20k.”

“This is incredible. And you will be Tony’s neighbor,” Raymond said.

“...You mean the guy who runs over cows?”

“Yeah, I think he said his house is on this road.” Raymond looked up and down the street, unsure of which house it was exactly. “But yeah, this house right here looks great.”

“I mean, it is up in Paleto, but the house itself looks amazing for the price,” he contemplated.

“How’s this one half the price of those ones?” Raymond picked up a brochure in front of the house, and read through it.

“Yeah, the neighbors across the street are rich. Probably because they’re closer to the water.”

Yuno tried to get a view of the beach across the street, but the house was too wide. “Hey, let’s climb on the roof, and check out the view. We can sit on the roof right here, and look at people passing by,” Yuno said, already climbing up.

“Oh, hell yeah.” Raymond climbed up after him.

They sat together on the edge of the rooftop, and took in the scenery.

The moon and stars were shining in the night sky, and a hint of the northern lights were visible since they were in the northernmost part of the island. The house and trees across the street were still blocking part of the view, but they could see some of the beach and the moonlight reflecting off the bay.

“Oh~ Look at how cool this is, Raymond. Look at this place.”

Raymond hummed in agreement. “This is kinda nice, Yuno.”

“Yeah, I like sitting where my glowing shoes dangle a little bit.” He swung his blue light up shoes back and forth off the edge of the rooftop while Raymond laid down on his back and gazed up at the sky.

“Wow! The sky is beautiful. You can really see the stars over here since we’re so far from the city.”

Yuno leaned back slightly to see. “Ah~ This is a pretty nice house. It’s near the beach. Not too big and not too small. It’s all the way in Paleto, so not too many cops roaming around this area. Kinda perfect for storing illegal goods.”

“It’s peaceful. There’s no gang wars or bullet holes in the walls,” Raymond added.

“This might be the one. I might save up for this. This right here, you said it’s $300k?”

“Yeah, dude. You should buy this one.”

Yuno laid down next to Raymond. “It’s gonna take a while to save up the money for it, though.”

“You can take loan.”

“...Like what you did for your car?”

“Good point. Don’t take loan. You want your money back?” Raymond offered.

“No, no, it’s okay. I can wait. Hopefully, no one buys this place soon.”

Raymond took out his phone to check his calendar when he noticed the time. “Fifteen minutes until Valentine’s, Yuno.”

“Doing anything?”

Raymond sighed. “No, I don’t have any plans.”

“Ah, I was just gonna hang out with a friend.”

“Who's your friend?”

Yuno giggled and looked towards him. “It's you.”

“Oh!” Raymond exclaimed, pleasantly surprised.

“I mean, what else am I gonna do in fifteen minutes?”

“Oh, yeah. You're right, you're right.”

They laughed and continued to talk underneath the starry sky.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

(The next morning - Sunday, February 14, 2021)

Raymond celebrated his 27th birthday with Yuno at the R.U.S.T. Scrapyard. They ate junk food and played games together in the capacious room that was filled with both Valentine’s Day and birthday decorations. He even introduced Yuno to his favorite survival video game, Rust.

Chapter Text

(Wednesday, March 10, 2021)

At Burger Shot, Yuno performed his line cook duties during the morning shift.

Yuno was doing his job diligently.

Yuno was a good employee.

The CEO of Burger Shot, Shelly Smith, walked out of her office after finishing some paperwork. She yawned and made her way over to the kitchen before pausing at the unusual sight in front of her.

“Uh…”

“Shelly, it’s me, Yuno. I work really hard.”

“What the frick? Y-You’re not cutting onions today?”

“Already done. I restocked the fridge with ingredients, filled the containers with freshly chopped vegetables, and prepared some burgers to put in the food warmer. Let me put those in right now.”

“Thanks, Yuno.”

He walked past her to go to the food warmer by the front register, and she whispered to herself, “What is happening?”

A few hours later at the Diamond Casino & Resort, Yuno was responding to guest emails and inquiries on the computer in the reception area. The CEO of the casino, Cassie Cupcake, entered from the lobby with Lang and Meowfurryon.

“Yuno! Good afternoon, meow.”

“Hello, Meowfurryon. Welcome to the Diamond Casino & Resort,” Yuno greeted back without looking up from the computer.

Lang furrowed his brow. “Wait, Yuno, you work here?”

“Yes, Mr. Lang Buddha. I have many jobs. I work really hard.” He continued typing, not really paying attention to their conversation.

Meowfurryon nodded. “He works here all the time, meow.”

“...Right.” Lang was still skeptical.

Cassie felt the same, and expressed her concern, “Yuno, are you okay?”

She was glad that he was doing his job for once, but she wanted to know what brought upon this sudden change in behavior.

“Yes, I’m just really focused on answering these emails right now.”

He finished responding to one email, then he opened up another one and began to read it.

“What? You know how to do that?” Lang asked in surprise.

Cassie leaned over to Lang and whispered, “I didn’t even know that he could focus, let alone work while focusing.”

The afternoon passed by and a few more hours later, Yuno clocked into work at the UwU Café. He started his shift by cleaning the dining area.

After ten minutes of dusting and wiping down tables, his co-worker in the kitchen was impressed by his performance.

“Oh. My. God.” Craig couldn't believe his eyes.

Lucas walked over to him, and looked out into the dining area to see what was happening. “Wait, he's really working. I’ve never seen him stay in one place for so long.”

“I know.”

“I just didn’t realize it was possible.”

“I didn’t realize that he could do anything without running around.”

“Shh!” Lucas harshly whispered, “What if it’s not actually Yuno? What if it’s an imposter among us?”

“He’s doing his tasks—” Craig cut himself off, hearing the staff door open.

Yuno walked behind them, and went into the storage room to grab a box of dry cat food. As he walked by again, he said, “Hey, guys. Do you need me to clean anything in the kitchen?”

Lucas shook his head. “N-No, thank you. We’re good over here, Yuno.”

“Yes, I’m Yuno. I work really hard.” He walked out of the kitchen, and went into the lounge area to refill the cat bowls. It wasn’t long until he was ambushed by ten furballs, eagerly meowing and rubbing their heads against him.

Yuno sat down and pet the ones who finished eating, making sure that everyone received an equal amount of food.

Lucas and Craig were not fooled by the cute display.

“You’re right. He’s so sus. It must be an alien,” Craig concluded.

At 6:30 p.m., the Rooster’s Rest employees prepared to open for the evening shift. Yuno entered through the staff entrance, and walked up to The Guild member with the pink-haired side braid.

“Greetings, Leyla.”

“Hey, Yuno. Let me clock in for you. Wink, wink.”

“Thank you.”

Leyla went into the staff room to clock him in, and Yuno made his way into the dining atrium to greet his co-workers.

“Good evening, fellow Rooster’s Rest employees. Can’t wait to start another hard day of work. I work really hard.”

Raymond’s head immediately whipped around, and glared at him. “Who the fuck are you? Where’s Yuno?”

“...Um.”

The probably-not-Yuno ran out of the restaurant, hopped on a motorcycle, and drove down the street while Raymond trailed after him on his black Akuma. They stopped at the Fleeca bank in Legion Square where Yuno—the real Yuno—was paying other men who were dressed up like him.

“Yuno?”

“Raymond!”

“Who the fuck are these people?” He pointed to all the Yuno look-alikes.

“I’m hiring people to dress like me and sound like me to work at my jobs, so I don’t get fired. I’m a genius!”

Yuno had managed to avoid getting fired for the past month because of his genius plan. However, he failed to realize that he wasn’t earning any money. All of the profit acquired from his jobs went straight back to the look-alike who worked his shift.

Raymond looked at the body doubles, then looked back at Yuno. “I mean…but I could tell this guy’s not you.”

“Huh? But everyone else was so fooled. Oh! You need the side by side test. Close your eyes. Everyone switch places!”

Raymond closed his eyes while they switched places and leaned together, facing back-to-back.

“Raymond, guess which one is me!” Yuno yelled. “Point at the one, Raymond! This is the real test!”

Raymond opened his eyes, and circled around the five helmeted men. All of them were mimicking Yuno’s voice when he talked, and they held the same pose as him.

Somehow, Raymond still managed to point at Yuno.

“This one. It has to be.”

“What?! Wait, how did you know?”

Raymond shrugged. “It’s the stance. You always have that stance.”

Yuno pointed to the others. “We held the same pose, we were standing right next to each other, you couldn’t even hear where my voice was coming from.”

“I just—I can tell. I’m your boy, Yuno. I just knew it was you.”

“I can’t believe it. Good job, Raymond!”

Raymond chuckled and checked the time on his phone. “I better get back to work. Just wanted to make sure everything’s okay.”

“Yeah, I’m good. I’m gonna be busy tonight, so please don’t tell anyone that he isn’t me.”

“You got it. I love you, Yuno. I’ll see you around!”

“Yeah, see you soon!”

Raymond and the Yuno look-alike drove back to Rooster’s Rest, and Yuno finished paying everyone else.

Scene 3: DownBad Mickey 

Tony was driving in his red Hycade to a street race that started near the Los Santos International Airport. When he arrived, he noticed that there were more racers than normal, but he couldn’t see them clearly because the sun had begun to set, which casted everyone in shadows. As he exited his car and walked closer, he saw that some of the racers were holding up a giant sign that read “Happy Birthday DuckerZ!”

Kitty ran up to him—emerging from the shadows—and gave him a hug. “Happy birthday!”

Tony hugged her back. “Thanks, Kitty. Was this your idea?”

“Yep! I called everyone down here. Goofy was the one who set up the race, though.”

She released him from the hug, and he looked around.

“Yeah, literally everyone’s here. Oh, even the Puppets came! Hey, Big M!”

He waved at a group of sinister looking individuals who were wearing dark trench coats and masks. Big M and a few others waved back.

Tony turned back to Kitty. “Thanks for gathering everybody. I appreciate it.”

“Of course, it’s your birthday. I want you to have a good time.” She spotted her boyfriend collecting entry fees for the race, and waved him over. “Hey, babe! The birthday boy is here!”

Goofy looked up from his phone and approached them. “Yo, DuckerZ. Happy birthday.”

“Ay~ Thanks, Goofy.”

They locked hands to dap each other up, then Goofy showed him the racing app on his phone. “I set up the race so that the entry fee is $500, but all the winnings will go to you even if you don’t win.”

Tony laughed. “Oh, so you can still beat my ass and not feel bad about it?”

“Well, I’m not gonna throw the race just ‘cause it’s your birthday, buddy.”

“You better not. I want you to go all out.”

“I always do.” Goofy checked the time, and put his phone back in his jacket pocket. “Now let’s get this race started.”

“Alright, let’s go!”

“Good luck~” Kitty said, following Goofy to his blue Nissan GT-R R35.

Tony got back into his car, and turned on his racing playlist. The other racers did the same. They connected their phones to their GPS which connected to the windshield of their cars, allowing them to see the map of the race, upcoming checkpoints, racer placements, and lap times. As the countdown hit zero, Tony sped away from the airport.

.⋆ ｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆.

In a dark cavern with several bats hanging from the ceiling and a waterfall flowing from the side of the wall to the darkness below, Lang stood on a circular, metal platform that was elevated in the middle of the cave. It had the Cerberus logo printed in the center of the platform. A pipe fence surrounded the circumference of the platform which held the computer system, the massive screens, and the display cases in place. The screens showed several diagrams and measurements for a techwear style outfit.

Lang walked over to a cylindrical case with the suit itself propped up on display. It consisted of a scarlet jacket with black pants, black gloves, red and black Nike shoes, and a black futuristic samurai mask. There were several black belts and zippers throughout the suit. “TIMELORD ⴵ” was written in white text on the front of the scarlet jacket.

Picking up a black book in his hands, Lang opened it to a page with a blueprint titled “Cerberus Industries | TimeLord | Project: CHV-88 Outfit and Design Schematics.”

He groaned and rubbed his tired eyes. “I mean, it looks fucking sick, but it doesn’t work. How the fuck I am supposed to get Onyx?”

Lang opened the glass door of one of the display cases, and placed the black book inside a drawer. When he closed the door, he caught his reflection in the glass. He was wearing a black tank top, black dress pants, and black shoes along with three silver rings on his fingers, two necklaces around his neck, and a pair of sunglasses on his face. The outfit revealed his heavily tattooed arms and torso, and he couldn’t help but check himself out.

“Goddamn~ I’m basically the richer, sexier, more powerful version of Iron Man and Batman.”

He ran his fingers through his black bangs, then walked back to his computer system to close all the opened tabs of his diagrams. A message popped up on the screen, notifying him that someone was requesting to enter his cave, and he granted access to them, allowing the secret door in the lower garage to open.

Two women dressed in red and black business suits drove his black moped down the cement road to the metal platform. One of the women had brown hair tied in a low twisted bun. She quickly stood up from the moped, and looked around the cave in amazement.

The other woman had a short blonde pixie cut. She walked over to Lang and crossed her arms. “You never came back with the new wingsuit prototype.”

“Oh right!” he exclaimed. “I should have it here. Gimme a second, Eve.” He unlocked another display case, and started searching through the storage drawers inside it.

The brown-haired woman slowly spoke, “Hey, don’t mean to be weird, but where are we?”

Lang’s head popped up. “Oh wait. Nancy, you haven’t seen this yet?”

“No.”

“Yeah, welcome to my cave.” Lang gestured to the dark cavern, then went back to searching for his wingsuit prototype.

Nancy proceeded to examine the cave which was obviously inspired by Batman’s Batcave. “This is fucking sick. Oh my god.”

“Yeah, I moved everything Cerberus Industries related under my house ‘cause I was too lazy to drive to seventeen different places,” Lang explained.

“Good.”

“If you look up, you can see bats.” Eve pointed above them, and Nancy saw the fuzzy creatures flying around the rock crevices.

“Oh my god, you have bats. Aww~ That’s so cool.”

“Yeah, I love this place. My schematics are over there, too.”

“Come look over here, Nancy.” Eve led her to the computer where Lang had his vehicle schematics and constant video surveillance of Los Santos on display.

“Wow! This is dope!” Nancy scrolled through the different schematics.

“There’s a schematic of a moped~” She giggled. “Oh my god. This is so you, Lang.”

Seeing Nancy admire his cave so much made Lang happy. Since he had confidential artifacts and items in the display cases—like his TimeLord suit—he didn’t get many opportunities to show off his favorite location.

He chuckled. “Yeah, it’s sick, right?”

“This is so cool. Holy shit,” Nancy said in awe.

“The whole city is under our watch,” Eve said in a slightly sadistic tone which was a little concerning, but she spent most of her days with Leslie so Lang supposed that she was being influenced by his idiosyncrasies.

“By the way, Nancy, how many businesses are you running right now?” Lang asked.

“Lots. Well…” She thought for a second. “I say ‘lots,’ but really it’s just focusing on wingsuits. Which is really fun. I like it a lot.”

“Alright. Do you wanna be the CEO of Cerberus Industries?”

“Hell yeah,” she readily accepted.

“The job is yours. Get that grand announcement event done, I’m gonna send my materials guy to you, you’re gonna be working with him from now on, I’m gonna wash my hands clean of that, and I’ll just oversee the sales that you do there."

“Okay, I’ll get started on that right away.”

Lang finally found his wingsuit prototype. He pulled it out of the drawer and handed it over to Eve. It looked like a Toy Story Buzz Lightyear Wing Pack.

“Here it is, Eve. Give it to Dean for further testing.”

The two businesswomen stared at it in silence for five seconds.

“...You can’t be serious.”

Nancy burst out laughing. “This is what you built, Lang?”

“What do you mean? I built it with the things that I had available to me.”

“Can’t you at least change the colors, so we don’t get sued by Disney?” Eve asked.

“I can do that later, but for now...to infinity and beyond,” Lang said solemnly.

“To infinity and beyond,” Nancy said, trying to keep a straight face and failing miserably.

Eve sighed. “Right. Okay, I’ll take this to Dean.”

“Thank you for coming by, and—” Lang cut himself off when the light hanging above them flickered on and off a few times. “What the fuck is that flickering? You see that?”

“Oh, that light?” Eve looked up, but it stopped flickering when she did.

“Did that just flicker?” Lang asked again.

“Yeah, it’s haunted,” Nancy joked.

He brought his hands up to his head. “Oh god. Are my ghosts coming back to get me?”

“Mm-hmm~” she hummed.

Lang dropped his hands and glared at the light, daring it to flicker one more time.

When nothing happened, he groaned. “Alright. Well, I’m gonna get the fuck outta here. Gonna go buy some garlic and some salt.”

Nancy was a little worried that Lang seemed to be taking it more seriously than she originally thought. Then, she recalled a rumor she heard earlier that week.

“Have you heard about the vampires in the city?”

“Uh, yes, but I don’t believe in vampires.”

Nancy raised an eyebrow at that. “Okay, but are you good with ghosts?”

“Yeah. Ghosts, time travelers, aliens, and superhuman beings. They all exist.”

“Just not vampires?”

“No, vampires do not exist. It’s a myth.”

Nancy struggled to follow his sense of logic, or rather the lack of it. “Okay, good shit. We’re gonna get to work.”

“See you, Lang.” Eve sat on the moped with the wingsuit in her lap and turned on the engine.

“Alright. Give me a call if you need anything from me,” he said.

“I appreciate that, thank you.” Nancy got on the back seat, and Eve drove them out of the cave.

She parked the moped in the lower driveway, and they walked around the CLean Manor to the front driveway where Nancy’s black Mercedes with a red and white Cerberus livery was located.

As Eve placed the Buzz Lightyear wingsuit in the back seat, Nancy’s phone rang. She looked at the caller ID, and noticed that it was important. “Sorry, I need to take this.”

“No worries. Take your time,” Eve responded.

“Hello, this is Nancy Drew. How can I help you?” Nancy answered her phone, and walked a little further up the driveway for some privacy.

Eve waited by the car for a minute when she saw movement in the back of the garden. She wasn't sure if it was a person sneaking around or if it was just the sunset and shadows messing with her, but she went to investigate anyway.

When she got to the garden, she was surprised to find Leslie standing underneath a tree with a yellow apple in his hand. He was wearing a beige suit over an iridescent pink dress shirt, accompanied by an iridescent pink bowler hat and a pair of eyeglasses on his face. The bright colors were quite the sight to see because she had only ever seen him wear his usual black business suit.

“Hello, Eve Summers,” he greeted while still gazing into the sunset.

“Leslie Lingberg. What are you doing here?”

“Just taking an evening stroll through the garden.”

“Oh, sorry to disturb you. It looked like someone was trying to break in. I’ll leave you to it.” She started to leave.

“Wait, there’s something that I wanted to ask you,” he said, and faced her.

“Yeah? What is it?” She turned back to him.

Leslie adjusted his eyeglasses and looked her straight in the eyes. “What do you know about Cerberus?”

“Like…the corporation itself or just you three?”

“I’m simply curious about the reputation we’ve gotten. I want to know the public’s perception about us.”

The question was still relatively vague, and it took her a moment to formulate her answer. “Well, everyone knows that the three heads of Cerberus are you, Lang Buddha, and Dean Watson. And Harry Brown is the tail because you couldn’t trust each other split the corporation into 33.33%. Harry needed to be the 1% so that it would be an even split.”

Hearing her tentative response, he relaxed his gaze. “Yes, the negotiations were a hassle.”

Leslie seemed like he wanted to hear more, so she carried on.

“Uh, the three of you came together because you were each very successful businessmen, and you thought that you could achieve more if you combined your wealth and resources. As of now, you own over forty businesses together.” She paused and looked up at him, wondering how much more she should say.

“Correct. Go on.” He urged her to continue, but she wasn’t sure what he wanted to hear.

“Um, you have a lot of CEOs. I’m the CEO of Rooster’s Reef, Penny Farthing is the CEO of Rooster’s Rest, Shelly Smith is the CEO of Burger Shot, Nancy Drew is now the CEO of Cerberus Industries, and Cassie Cupcake is the CEO of Cerberus. She’s also the CEO of Hero Wine and the Diamond Casino.”

“Hm, is she now?”

Eve couldn’t read his expression in the bright sunset. She squinted her eyes, and raised her hand to block out some of the light.

“You didn’t know?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Must’ve slipped my mind. Like you said, there’s a lot of businesses and CEOs now. It’s hard to keep track of them all.”

Leslie checked the time on his watch. “You think she’s at the casino right now?”

“Probably. She spends most of her weekdays there.”

Leslie smiled and held out the apple out to her. “Thanks for the talk, Eve. Have an apple for the inconvenience.”

“Uh, thanks.” She hesitantly took the apple into her hands.

He tipped his hat at her, then walked inside the manor.

Now, standing alone in the sunlit garden, Eve stared at the golden apple and thought about the conversation she just had with her superior.

✦₊˚⊹⋆✿₊⁺⋆❀⋆⁺₊✿⋆⊹˚₊✦

With all of his body doubles paid, Yuno began driving to the Vanilla Unicorn in his green Sultan Mk III. After stopping at a red traffic light, he dialed Raymond’s phone number.

“Yuno! What’s up, my friend?”

“Raymond! You have a membership to the Vanilla Unicorn, right? For cleaning dirty money?”

“Yeah, VU is great for that.”

“Oh, good! Dundee was able to get me a VIP membership, so I can clean my money and meet someone there.”

“Oh, Yuno~” Raymond said in amusement. “I didn’t think the strip club would be for you.”

Yuno froze. He didn’t realize the traffic light had turned green until a car honked behind him, making him move. “...Wait, it’s a strip club? He told me it was cleaning money and free food.”

Raymond chuckled. “Yuno, VU is strip club!”

“That’s how we clean the dirty money?!”

“You watch ladies dance and—” Raymond struggled to speak between his laughter. “We give them the dirty money, and they give us the clean~ money after the dance.”

“H-He didn’t tell me that part. He told me I get free food, and I don’t have to do drug runs to clean my money. That’s all he said.”

Raymond couldn’t help but laugh at how he was misled by Dundee.

“Why are you laughing?” Yuno whined, and it only made him laugh more.

At 7:30 p.m., Yuno arrived at the Vanilla Unicorn, and ended the phone call with Raymond. He flashed his VIP card to the club bouncer at the front entrance and was let inside the venue.

He didn’t know what to expect, but the crowded club was blasting electronic dance music and it was a little overwhelming.

Upon entry, there was a bar to the right, a stage with a catwalk to the left, a giant hot tub in the center of the main floor, and private booths lined up against the left wall. At the end of the left wall was a red upholstered door blocked by another club bouncer. He flashed his VIP card again, and was let through the doorway into the private VIP lounge area. A smaller hot tub sat in the center of the room with black booths surrounding it.

He heard a familiar voice and looked towards a booth on the right side where a girl was recording herself on her phone while sitting next to two men in red suits.

“Hey, vlog~ It’s ya girl, April. Today, I’m hanging out at the Vanilla Unicorn with two of my new sugar daddies. Let’s give them a warm welcome.”

April had blue eyes, long scarlet hair, and two red hearts stamped on her cheeks. She was wearing a pink and red plaid corset top with a black mini skirt, black heels, and a thick golden chain around her neck with the letters “CG” carved into it.

Yuno ran up to her. “April! Hello!”

April turned towards him, and twirled her hair between her fingers. “Hey, Yuno~ It’s ya girl, April. What’s up?”

He leaned in and whispered, “I’m just here to clean some money, but I also heard that there’s a hacker from CG who works here. Is that true?”

She scoffed. “They must be talking about DownBad Mickey.”

“Who is Mickey?”

“That’s what I’m saying~” she said while snapping her fingers. “But he’s in the hot tub outside if you wanna see him or whatever.”

“Thanks!” Yuno ran out of the VIP lounge, and looked towards the center of the main floor. A man with short black hair dressed in a sexy firefighter outfit emerged from the water of the large hot tub. He was shirtless and only wearing the vibrant yellow firefighter pants and helmet while dancing for a livestream.

“Woo~ Enjoying the hot tub stream, squirters? How’s everyone doing on this exquisite evening?” He squatted down and twerked, splashing the water around.

Yuno slowly turned around and looked for a different hot tub, just in case he had the wrong guy. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe April, but she could’ve been misinformed. Surely, she was talking about someone else.

“If you like the stream, consider subscribing to DownBad Mickey on mitch.tv! It helps support the channel ‘cause being Chang Gang’s bitch doesn’t pay me shit.”

Nope, Yuno had definitely found the right guy. There was only one hot tub on the main floor.

“Don’t forget to type your song requests in chat for what I should dance to next.” Mickey winked at the camera, and watched the chat feed on his phone.

Feeling very uncomfortable but determined, Yuno awkwardly waddled to the hot tub, catching Mickey’s attention.

“Hello~ you beautiful, helmeted somebody. The name’s DownBad Mickey. Enjoying the show?”

Yuno fiddled with the edges of his green blazer and stammered, “D-DownBad Mickey, huh? Um, great to meet you. I’m Y-Yuno, and I—”

“You know, what?”

“Oh, Yuno Sykk. T-That’s my name. It’s Japanese. Uh…” He knelt next to the edge of the hot tub, and Mickey swam closer to him.

“Y-You’ve done a bank heist, right?” Yuno whispered.

“Oh!” Mickey’s eyes widened, caught off guard by the bluntness of the question. “That’s really, uh, forward of you. But yeah, I have, allegedly, hypothetically speaking.”

“I'm hoping to do one of those one day. C-Can you teach me how to hack? I heard you’re a hacker in CG.”

“…How much do you know about computers?”

“I was, uh, l-learning how to be a software developer before I dropped out of college.”

Mickey was skeptical about Yuno’s motivations, but he seemed sincere enough. He couldn’t really tell what his expression was underneath the helmet. All he saw was his own confused face reflected back at him in the visor. Either way, he didn’t think that Yuno was one of the creepy men who sometimes stalked him outside of the club after his livestreams. They were usually less direct than this. So even if Yuno was lying about what he wanted from him, he could probably get a free ride home at least.

He made his decision and shrugged. “Hm, sure, I can teach you after my stream. Can I meet you in the dressing room in about, let’s say…twenty minutes?”

“Okay, I’ll wait there. Um, do you know where I can clean some dirty cash?”

“I’ll take care of it.” He held out his hand, and Yuno gave him $10,000.

Mickey blew him a kiss, then continued dancing.

✶₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅ⴵ⋅⁺‧₊𓅭⋆⁺₊✶

Tony had finished his birthday race in first place with the power of his own racing skills and abilities. It had nothing to do with the performance of the other racers, especially Goofy who did not let him win. At least, he never admitted he did during the numerous times Tony demanded him to confess to throwing.

Afterwards, Tony drove back to his house in Paleto Bay where Lang was cooking ramen in the kitchen. He poured the savory broth into a bowl with thick noodles, and topped it with an eight ounce medium rare steak that had been thinly sliced. He added bamboo shoots, bean sprouts, and green onions, then he finished it with a dollop of compound butter on the steak, and sprinkled a pinch of black sesame seeds over the noodles.

“And that’s how you make beef ramen, you dumbfuck.” Lang placed the steaming bowl of soup in front of Tony, who was sitting on a stool on the other side of the kitchen peninsula. “I better not find you pretending to be a fucking chef at my restaurant again.”

“Thank you, Buddha~” Tony picked up his chopsticks and happily slurped his ramen, completely ignoring Lang’s insults.

“Happy birthday, old man.”

“Thirty-six is not that old,” Tony mumbled around a mouthful of steak.

“Yeah, sure, whatever.”

“I love you, Buddha.”

“Bitch.”

Tony swallowed, and cleared his throat pointedly. “I love you, Buddha.”

“...Love you too, bitch.”

Lang whistled and his rooster flew up onto the counter. He poured some seeds in front of KFC to eat, but the bird curiously hopped over to Tony’s bowl of ramen instead.

“Ay! Get away! I’ll boil you alive.” Tony waved his hand, shooing him away.

KFC clucked in fear of the threat, and hopped back to the pile of seeds. Lang pet the rooster on his back as he began to peck at the food, then he helped himself to a beer from Tony’s fridge.

“Anything else you wanna do for your birthday?” Lang opened the bottle of beer, and took a gulp.

“Oh, Ray was telling me that he wants to rob Paleto bank. Wanna join us? I need the money.”

“You always need money, Tony. How are you so broke?” Lang burped, and continued to drink his beer.

“Listen, I’m not having this conversation with one of the richest motherfuckers in the city. I wanna make money, I wanna rob a bank, I wanna drive us out. Can you still hack?”

“Maybe. It’s been a while since we’ve done shit like that, though. I have a lot more to lose now if we get caught, too. Why are you so excited about it?”

Tony paused with his chopsticks halfway to his mouth, and set them back in the bowl. Memories from years ago when they were in a gang popped into his mind, but he was not in the mood to be depressed about that on his birthday. He mentally shook the thoughts from his head, and forced himself to continue eating.

“I just miss it a little bit, y’know? Doing heists with boys. Also, Ray said something about the security systems being upgraded, so every criminal in the city wants to take a crack at it and see what’s good.”

“How does Ray know that?” Lang finished his beer. He rinsed the can and threw it into the recycle bin on the other side of the kitchen.

“He’s got a gang now, so he probably hears things. I invited him here to get more info about it, and he should be here any minute.”

KFC finished eating his seeds. As he flew off the counter, he bumped into the salt shaker and knocked it over. Luckily, the lid was sealed, so none of the salt spilled out, and Lang set it upright again. The accident made Tony realize that there was a large, ten pound bag of garlic sitting next to the salt.

“What’s all the garlic for?”

“It’s to fend off the ghosts at the manor.”

“...Okay.” Tony wasn’t sure what that meant. He picked up his nearly empty bowl and began to drink the broth.

“Oh, did I tell you a few days ago, I met the Timelord again, and we traveled to the future, and I watched myself get assassinated?”

Tony laughed which caused him to choke on the broth. He set the bowl down, and wiped his mouth with a napkin. He didn’t think that Lang getting assassinated was funny, he just found it humorous how he would randomly bring up these insane topics.

“Uh, no, you didn’t.”

“Yeah.”

“How?”

“I watched my future self drive up in my fucking sexy ass looking DeLorean, and get killed by Leslie Lingberg.”

“What the fuck?”

“Yeah, it was crazy.”

“Jesus fucking Christ—Oh, wait. I think you did mention it to me actually. Yeah, you did. I just don’t think to that extent. Goddamn.”

The doorbell rang.

“Oh, Ray’s here. Let him in, let him in,” Tony said, standing up to bring his empty bowl to the sink.

Lang walked down the staircase to the front door, and looked through the peephole. The Russian man was indeed there, and smiling brightly at the hole as if he knew Lang was currently looking through it.

He opened the door for him. “Hey, Ray. Good to see you. Come in.”

“Good to see you too, my friend.” Raymond closed the door behind him, and followed Lang to the kitchen where Tony had just finished washing his bowl and placed it into the drying rack.

“Tony! Happy birthday, man!”

“Ay, thanks, Ray. Good to see ya, brother.” Tony dried off his hands, and gave Raymond a quick hug.

When they separated, Raymond walked into the living room and looked around.

The living room was on the other side of the kitchen peninsula. There was a white couch against the wall with a coffee table in the center of the room. On the left side was a door to the bathroom and a door to an office.

That was the whole house; it was small.

Raymond decided that—despite the lack of space and furniture—it was rather cozy. “Nice place you got here.”

“Wait, have I not invited you here before?” Tony asked.

“No, this is my first time.”

Lang sighed and sat down on the right side of the couch. “This place is ass. It’s nothing like the manor, that’s for sure.”

“Why you gotta say that? No one asked! No one fucking asked you!” Tony waved his hands in exasperation. “And I own the manor, too. What do ya mean? I am a co-owner of the CLean Manor! The fuck ya trying to say?”

“Did you buy the manor? Did you pay for any of the reconstruction? Or was that all me, huh? I’m just saying if you actually made any fucking money, you wouldn’t have bought this shithole. Look at this place, Tony. Your house is the size of my fucking bedroom.”

“Buddha, I swear to fucking—”

“No, Yuno, you’re not interrupting,” Raymond said, talking on his phone. “My, uh, dads are fighting, so I have a few minutes to—”

“Ray, hang up the fucking phone!” Lang yelled.

“We ain’t fighting!”

“No. We’re not.”

“Buddha’s just being an asshole.”

“Tony’s in denial about being fucking broke.”

“Hey, rich bitch. Get off my dick about my fucking financial—”

“Sorry, Yuno, could you repeat that.” Raymond brought his phone closer to his ear so he could hear better. “Ohh, you met Mickey…that’s…great...”

✦₊˚⊹⋆✿₊⁺⋆❀⋆⁺₊✿⋆⊹˚₊✦

In the dressing room at the back of the Vanilla Unicorn, Mickey was drying himself off with a towel while talking on the phone.

“Oh, cut the bullshit, Peach! You don’t get to have half of my money in the divorce because you made me gay! I used to be the type of guy who thought that he could get with anybody until I married you! Oh, flip me? Flip me, bruh?! When we were married, I used to call you ‘my Peach cobbler’ despite the fact that I was down at the Vanilla Unicorn gobbling up every sausage in sight so—Don’t you fucking hang up on me again!”

The line disconnected, and he gave a deep sigh. “We’re never gonna finish filing this divorce.”

Mickey finished drying his hair and dropped the damp cloth on the towel rack when his phone rang. He slipped on a black turtleneck sweater over his head, and answered it.

“Hey, Mr. K!” He put the call on speaker and set his phone down on the table, so he could talk while changing his clothes.

“Mick, I been tryna call ya for the past five fuckin’ minutes,” Mr. K said in a irritated tone. “Who the hell were ya talkin’ to?”

“Yeah, sorry I was having an argument with my ex-wife. What’s up?”

“The boys are tryna get a group together for a job tonight. You in?”

“Well…”

Mickey looked over at the Japanese man who was climbing around the dressing room while talking on the phone.

“Something kinda came up, so I can’t go.”

“Whatcha doin’?”

“This guy named Yuno asked me to teach him how to hack.”

“You talkin’ about Yuno Sykk?”

“Oh, you know him? Who’s he rolling with?”

“He was hangin’ with Dundee and Benji for a bit, but he’s not really part of any group. He kinda rolls with everyone,” Mr. K explained.

“Really? So, I mean, is he like, actually a criminal?”

Mickey watched Yuno cheerfully running in circles, talking to each and every person he bumped into. He looked out of place conversing with the half-naked strippers and gangsters.

“He does small crimes here and there.”

“...Right. Do you trust him?” Mickey finished getting dressed into a black suit over a black turtleneck sweater with black gloves. He sat down to put on a pair of black dress shoes.

“Not really. He wants to be friends with everybody, and a friend to all is a friend to none. But I mean, the guy’s aight. He’s done a few favors for us, so you can help him out if you want.”

Mr. K didn’t sound particularly close to Yuno, but he didn’t outright say that he disliked him. With that in mind, Mickey didn’t see the harm in helping him out.

“Sure, why not. Might as well take him on a job and see what he can do.”

“Aight. See ya 'round, Mick.”

“Later, Mr. K.”

Mickey ended the call and fixed his hair in the mirror before packing his firefighter outfit into a black duffel bag and walking over to Yuno.

“Follow me this way, Yuno.” He led him to a corner of the room away from prying ears, making sure that no one could hear them.

He dropped the duffel bag on the floor. “Okay, job interview time.”

“What?! Oh my god, I didn’t prepare!” Yuno yelled, defeating the purpose of being in the corner of the room.

Mickey carried on, “Question one: What’s your reason for doing crime? You don’t seem like the type.”

“Oh! You ever hear of Mr. X, the greatest criminal of our generation? The joker, the ghost rida, the bank busta, high rolla, gambla?”

“Yeah. Jean Paul and I are friends, but he’ll never admit it.”

“I’m friends with him, too! He’s always getting into crazy stuff, and I wanna be just like him. I saw him solo rob a bank last month, and it was the coolest thing ever. We do house robberies together sometimes, we light stuff on fire, and there was another time we threw grenades out of a helicopter. It was a lot of fun!” Yuno didn't really answer the question, yet it still explained a lot.

Mickey sighed. “Congratulations, you passed the interview.”

“Really? That’s it?”

He nodded. “Your adulation towards Jean Paul tells me everything I need to know. He is an impetuous wild card.”

Yuno wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but he assumed it was a good thing. “What about you? Why do you do crime?”

Mickey carefully thought of an answer, debating what he should and shouldn’t tell him. “It wasn’t my intention to be a criminal, but I had to resign from my previous career. I was a detective.”

That word made Yuno backtrack. “D-Did I say I was a criminal? T-That was a, uh, joke. I don’t—”

“I was a detective back out east, don’t ask where. I used to be known as the DownBad Detective, but that was a while ago.”

“So, is your first name: DownBad, and your last name: Mickey?” Yuno asked.

“First name: Mickey, last name: S.”

“Mickey S… Is the S short for something?”

“No one knows. Just use my sobriquet ‘DownBad Mickey.’ Anyway, you possess a vehicle here?”

“Yeah, I’ve got my Sultan!”

Mickey picked up his duffel bag and gestured to the door. “Lead the way, Yuno Sykk.”

The dressing room was behind a red upholstered door in the back of the private VIP lounge, so they exited both rooms to get back to the main floor, and shuffled through the crowd to exit through the front entrance.

One of the female staff members assumed that Yuno was escorting Mickey out of the strip club for a different reason.

“Oooh~ Have a fun evening, Mickey~” She winked at them as they passed by. 

Mickey rolled his eyes, taking the words lightly. He was used to receiving comments like that.

“Thanks, we will!” Yuno replied, oblivious to the sexual allusion of those words, and Mickey had to force himself not to laugh.

They exited the club, and got blinded by the setting sun. Yuno let his eyes adjust to the light, then he found his car in the parking lot and ran up to it.

“So, you’re friends with Chang Gang?” Mickey asked while getting into the passenger seat.

“Yeah, I hang out with April and Ramee all the time. I don’t get to see Mr. K that much, though. It seems like he has a lot of stuff to take care of, being the leader and all. I didn’t know you were with them.” Yuno started the car engine and buckled his seatbelt.

“There are over thirty of us in the gang. It’s reasonable that you wouldn’t know everyone, but Ramee’s a hacker, too. Why didn’t you ask him to teach you?”

“I did, but lately he’s been busy. Working at the gallery, I think.”

“Oh yeah, he mentioned something about that. Well, worry not, Yuno. Tonight, I’ll make a hacker out of you.”

Mickey marked a location on Yuno’s GPS, and they drove out of the parking lot.

Ramee, another hacker in Chang Gang, owned an establishment in West Vinewood called the Vultur Lé Culturé. It functioned as an art gallery, auction house, and jewelry store. He was known for a tactic that his gang members liked to call “vulturing” since he was constantly pickpocketing, snooping around people’s properties, searching car trunks, etc. He would do anything to score a quick devious lick; stealing something and getting away with it. His gallery was a place where he could sell the items that he had stolen.

Tonight, something much more important was taking place. Ramee—who had brown, slicked back hair and wore a black turtleneck, a black fringe scarf, dark gray dress pants, and black dress shoes—was in a gem and jewelry appraisal room receiving a lesson about gemstones. The man conducting the lesson had short bright green hair, and wore a white and black striped blazer over a pink collared shirt with blue jeans and yellow sneakers. His face was covered in colorful makeup with a purple mustache drawn above his upper lip.

The eccentrically dressed man handed Ramee a black book, and he opened it to a page containing several diagrams of a black gemstone with a gold sheen. As he read the notes on the page, a cold breeze rushed in through the open window, turning the pages and making him lose his place. He looked outside at the night sky and the gathering storm clouds, and decided to close it in case it started raining.

When he shut the window and turned back around, he noticed Yeager in his maid outfit crouched down by the doorway, listening in on their conversation.

Ramee marched over to him, and spoke with an annoyed tone, “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Oh, hey, Ramee! Didn’t see you there.” He quickly stood up and patted down his maid dress.

“Yeager, cut the bullshit! What do you know? Where are you from?!” Ramee pulled out his pistol and aimed it at the violet-haired eavesdropper. However, his green-haired companion gave him a disapproving look, making him put his gun away.

“I’m just curious,” Yeager said. “Who’s your friend here?”

“This is Edwin. He’s a Gem Master, and I met him on the day I opened this gallery. He’s teaching me about gems right now, so if you could kindly get the fuck out—”

“We met here?”

Edwin cut him off, and Ramee gave him a baffled look. “Yeah. You don’t remember?”

“I remember,” Edwin said, appearing to be lost in a distant memory. “I was just surprised because our first meeting played out differently somewhere else. Although, that does explain why you guys don’t acquire enough Onyx Gems in this timeline.”

Ramee and Yeager looked at each other, hoping that one of them knew what Edwin was talking about, but they could only exchange equally lost expressions. It made them wary about the situation at hand.

“What are you talking about?” Yeager asked.

Strong winds rattled the windowpanes as the storm intensified outside.

Edwin stepped over to the window, observing the raging tempest. “I’m worried that we are not in the right place at the right time…”

He looked up at the clock hanging on the wall. “It’s midnight?”

A flash of lightning pierced through the night sky, and thunder roared loudly above them. The power went out, and they were briefly shrouded in darkness before the lights turned back on.

With a barely noticeable puff of black dust dissipating in the room, Yeager started coughing. “Ugh, what’s that smell?”

Ramee sniffed the air. “I don’t smell anything. Where’s Edwin?”

Yeager continued coughing while Ramee searched the room and the hallway, but he couldn't find the green-haired man anywhere. He looked back up at the clock, and saw that it was now 8:00 p.m.

“The time changed?!”

That caught Yeager’s attention as well.

After sharing a quick look, both of them ran outside. The storm was gone, and the sunset casted the sky in orange hues.

✦₊˚⊹⋆❀₊⁺⋆♣⋆⁺₊❀⋆⊹˚₊✦

Over in Paleto Bay, Lang and Tony had eventually stopped arguing. They were seated on opposite ends of the white couch, Raymond sat on the floor across the coffee table, and KFC was perched on top of the refrigerator in the kitchen for a nap. It seemed that even the rooster had gotten tired of hearing them fight.

“Anyway,” Tony began. “You said that there’s news about Paleto bank.”

Raymond nodded. “Yeah, so I already told you about the new upgraded systems, right?”

“Yup. I told Buddha, too.”

“So, apparently, there are gold bars in the vault now, and that’s why the systems have been upgraded.”

“Wait, really?” Tony had robbed Paleto bank with the Leanbois over four years ago, but the city population was smaller back then and there wasn’t a lot of money in the vault. He supposed that things were different now.

“Yeah, CG got their hands on a few earlier this week. Dunno how much the going rate is currently, but it’ll still be cool to have some.”

“Yeah, I’m in, I’m in.”

“Wanna hit this shit tonight?” Raymond asked.

“Well, you can drive, and Tony can drive. We’re good on that, but I don’t know how hard this hack is gonna be.” Lang couldn’t lie, he was intrigued enough to do the robbery, but there was a major part of him that seriously doubted if he could still hack.

Tony could see the anxiety filling Lang, and turned his gaze to Raymond. “Can you hack, Ray?”

“I can, but I’ve never tried hacking this new system,” he partially lied.

Raymond was given a hacking lesson by a very annoying individual a couple of months ago, and he never wanted to relive that experience so he never received additional training. However, he was confident that he could do the hack because he was Raymond Romanov, and Raymond Romanov was not a failure. Still, he didn’t want Lang and Tony to set high expectations for him in the rare case that he did fail the hack.

Other than that, there was another issue.

“We’ll also need money. I think it’s $35k for hacking tools.”

“Ohh…” Tony drawled out.

They both stared at Lang expectantly. The obvious, unspoken question hung in the air.

Lang sighed. “How about, for the next few days, you two do some fucking jobs to earn some money, and I’ll brush up on my hacking skills? We’ll talk about this again once each of you can cover a third of the supplies. I may be rich, but I ain’t buying all this shit by myself.”

Tony gave a loud obnoxious groan. “Fine~”

“It’s unfortunate, but I understand. Are you free tonight, Tony?”

“Ooh~ Sounds like a date,” Tony teased.

“It can be. I like dates,” Raymond replied in a humorless tone that left Tony wondering if he was joking or not. “Let’s go boost cars together. It’s easy way to make money and gather VIN scratches at the same time. We might need it.”

“Alright,” Tony agreed, and the two of them left to make the money needed to cover the hacking expenses.

Meanwhile, Yuno followed the marker on the GPS which led him through the Grand Senora Desert.

“In order to hack, you need to acquire supplies for hacking from the gray market. That’s where we're headed to now,” Mickey explained.

“I think I’ve been there once before. I thought it was called the black market, though.” Yuno’s memory was bad, but he was sure that Dundee took him there at some point.

“It’s similar. A black market sells illegal goods, and a gray market sells legal goods or modified goods without a distributor agreement. It pretty much just sells legal shit to criminals who will use it for illegal activities. This place is exquisite because it only accepts cash, and it keeps all of their transactions anonymous. We need to purchase a burner laptop, a VPN router, and a dongle.”

“A burner laptop, a VPN router, and a dongle,” Yuno repeated. “Oh, I get it. We need these supplies for hacking, but we don’t want to walk into a store where surveillance cameras will see us buy it. We also don’t want to use our own laptops or downloaded software which would connect us to the crime.”

“Exactly~” Mickey said. “Depending on the job, it might require other supplies, but you need to buy these three things for every hack. You use it once and dispose of it afterwards.”

Yuno didn’t know how much the hacking tools would cost, but he knew one thing. “...It sounds expensive.”

“It’s the price you pay if you don’t wanna get caught. Also, I'm gonna use your $10k to help pay for the supplies.”

"Okay."

They parked at a trailer park on the west of the desert. There weren’t a lot of people in the vicinity, and the ones who were there wore masks and disguises. It was clear that shady exchanges were taking place, and everyone moved with a precise intent to buy and sell. They were here for one thing, and immediately vacated after conducting their businesses to keep loitering to a minimum. It was always better to have less eyes around the location.

Mickey placed a bright yellow “Grinning Face With Smiling Eyes” emoji mask over his face, and got out of the car. Yuno—who figured that he didn’t need a disguise because he was already wearing the motorcycle helmet—followed him to an old, rusty trailer with eroded blue and white paint.

Mickey knocked on the door, and a man wearing black clothes and a demon mask opened it.

“Good evening. I’ll have the Los Santos special and with a green dongle on the side, please,” Mickey said, handing him $35,000 in cash.

The man accepted his payment and closed the door. A few seconds later, he returned with a laptop, a VPN router, and a green dongle.

Mickey picked up the items and examined them. Once he made sure that they were in good condition, he addressed the man again. “Thank you. Wow, I love our talks. We should do this again sometime. Bye~”

The masked man shut the door, and they went back to the car. On the GPS, Mickey marked the CG Cubby located in Little Seoul.

“Okay, now drive here.”

“Is the laptop made of gold?! Why is it so expensive?” Yuno started the engine and headed back south towards the city.

Mickey reclined in his seat and began explaining, “The laptop is stripped of everything that can make it trackable, the VPN router connects to their private vpn server called “Shungite” that is constantly deleting data and hiding criminal activity, and the dongle contains several software programs that you’ll need to hack.”

Yuno thought back to the exchange. “Does the color mean anything? Why a green dongle?”

“It refers to the types of programs installed on it. There’s also a blue one and a red one, but the green dongle has what we need to hack a Fleeca.”

“We’re gonna hack a Fleeca bank?! Right now?!” Yuno yelled.

Mickey laughed at his reaction. “I can’t teach you how to hack without hacking into something, and you said you wanted to rob a bank.”

“Wha—I d-don’t even know if I can do it. I-I’m just kinda—you know?” Yuno struggled to wrap his head around the unfolding events and focus on the road.

“No need to be pusillanimous.” Mickey tried to ease his fears. “We’re just gonna do a ‘hack and dip' to test out the waters. I don’t think we’ll need a full plan for something like this.”

“L-Like a getaway plan? Do you normally have one?”

“Yeah, it’s usually a whole process. You buy the supplies, you make a plan, you put on your criminal outfit, you gather a few hostages, and then you do the job. In CG, Mr. K organizes all of it for us, but I’ve been learning how to make plans from him,” Mickey stated proudly.

“What kinda plans do you make?”

“My plans have a low success rate, but are extremely exciting. I’m known for coming up with what we call ‘jail plans’ because we leave from a bank and head straight into jail.” Despite the terrible odds, Mickey was pleased with himself. The odds were usually never in his favor, so the fact that he had some odds was an achievement.

“Straight into jail? You’ve been to jail?”

“I’ve only been there like five…fifteen times? But, I’m always released early for my good behavior.”

“I can’t go to jail, Mickey! I won’t be able to afford the fines.” Yuno’s fears proceeded to grow, especially now that he had to worry about going to jail. He had neither the time nor the money for the fine.

Mickey didn’t see the issue, though. “See, here’s the thing, it only takes a little fuck up for my incredibly epic plans to completely crumble apart. As long as we don’t fuck up, we’re fine. However, for today, I highly doubt we’ll be chased by the cops, so we’ll just do a little bike escape instead.”

“Oh, you like bikes? My friend, Raymond, also likes bikes.”

Mickey raised an eyebrow. “Raymond? As in…Raymond Romanov?”

“Yeah, you know him?”

“Unfortunately.” Mickey smirked as he said it, and there was humor in his tone, but Yuno didn’t understand the joke.

“Hm?”

Mickey was intrigued about Yuno’s relation to Raymond. “What do you know about him?”

Yuno began to freestyle rap. “Hey, they call him bloodthirsty, stone cold killa, Ray. He’s killin’ ‘em on sight, all night, every day for no pay. He loves killing. Anyway, that’s what they say.”

Mickey paused, unsure of what just possessed Yuno rap just then, but he considered his words.

“You forgot about ‘kinda cute if he wasn’t way too serious.’ But, yeah, that sounds about right. He acts urbane, but he is a total sybarite. And let me guess, his idea of a getaway plan involves hiding ten Akumas in bushes around the city,” he said, mimicking Raymond's Russian accent at the end of his sentence.

“Yeah, that’s exactly what he does every morning. How’d you know?”

“Oh god, well, we’re not doing that. Park here on the right.”

Yuno parked on the street next to the CG Cubby.

Mickey picked up the black duffel bag carrying his firefighter outfit and brought it inside the compound. He returned a few minutes later with an empty duffel bag and a black BMX.

Yuno realized that there had been a slight misunderstanding. “Oh, that’s not the type of bike I was thinking of.”

“I know. It’s better, right? I’m gonna pedal on this to get us out.” Mickey placed the bike in the trunk, and sat back in the passenger seat. Then, he marked a new location on the GPS.

“Drive to the Fleeca on Great Ocean Highway. The nearest police department to this bank is over ten miles away. Unless a police cruiser happens to pass by as you’re hacking, we’ll be able to get outta there without a chase.”

Yuno tried stealing his nerves, and started driving to the marker. “Okay. I guess we’re doing this.”

Mickey began to recite his mental checklist. “Do you have a voice changer?”

“Yeah, I have it installed into my mask.”

“Do you have gloves?”

“Wearing them right now.”

“Do you have a parachute?”

“N-No? Do you?”

“Yeah, I always wear one in case something goes wrong.” He unbuttoned the jacket of his black suit, revealing a parachute strapped to his torso over his black turtleneck sweater. There was also a gun hidden in the inside pocket.

“Do you have a gun?” Mickey asked.

“No, no, I-I don’t shoot people, or hurt anyone at all really. I’m more of a pacifist, you could say.”

“A gun is not only used for shooting people. It’s for threatening people, taking hostages, giving demands to the police, and other things like that. Do you know how to fight?”

“Not really, but I can do parkour. I took a class once.”

“Yuno, if you’re not gonna carry a gun, you need to know a little bit of self-defense at the very least. Imagine you’ve just robbed a bank, right? You and your crew are running away, and then a cop jumps on you or your friend. How are you getting out?”

“Uh…I ask the cop to let go?” Yuno said uncertainty.

“Aww~ That’s a nice way to do it, but it sounds a bit too quixotic. Whether you like it or not, there may be some situations where violence is unavoidable when you’re doing crime. You need to be prepared for those moments because you are working in a crew, and a crew only works if you are supporting each other’s backs. Now, you don’t need to kill cops, you just gotta temporarily incapacitate them long enough for you to get away.”

“Oh, I see. I guess that could be helpful,” Yuno admitted that it might be useful to learn how to defend himself and protect his friends.

“If you want, I can train you later so you can learn the basics of hand-to-hand combat.”

“Okay, yeah! That sounds fun,” he said just as the Fleeca came into view, arriving much sooner than he would’ve liked.

Mickey instructed Yuno to drop him off at the bank with his BMX, and then park his Sultan on the beach across the road. He would pedal to the car after they were certain that the police hadn't spotted them.

It was about 8:30 p.m. so the bank was closed, but Mickey investigated the parking lot, rooftop, and interior to make sure that no one was around. With the coast clear, he assembled the supplies he bought earlier, plugging the dongle and VPN router into the laptop, and packed them into his duffel bag.

One minute went by, then two, then three, and then ten minutes passed, and Yuno still hadn’t returned. So Mickey threw the duffel bag over his shoulder, and made his way down to the beach to see why he was taking so long.

Yuno was aimlessly running around the shoreline in the sunset while on a phone call.

“Okay, bye! I miss you~”

“See you later, April. Have fun hanging out with your rich friends.”

“But you’re my rich friend, Yuno.”

Realizing that Yuno had disappeared from the Vanilla Unicorn without a word, April called him and asked where he had gone. She knew that he had a tendency of getting distracted and abducted, so she wanted to make sure that he was safe. After hearing that he was fine, she felt that she deserved to be given some money for all the trouble she went through to check in on him.

“We should hang out sometime~” She spoke in a sultry voice that was reserved for her sugar daddies. It was a guaranteed method to milk as much money as possible out of them and into her bank account.

“No, not anymore. I’m broke now. I’m about to rob a bank to make a little more money.”

“Ohh, well, when you have that money, hit me up. But for now—”

“Wait, you don’t wanna hang out if I don’t have the money?” He shouldn’t have been surprised, but he was.

“No, it’s not that I don’t wanna hang out with you until you have the money, but as long as you’re broke, I’m busy.”

“Oh, you’re just busy till—Oh, she hung up on me.”

Seeing that the conversation was over, Mickey walked up to him. He wasn’t sure who Yuno was talking to, but it sounded like an awfully familiar scarlet-haired member in Chang Gang.

“She hung up on you ‘cause you’re broke?”

“Yea—Well, no, no, she just said she’s only busy when I’m broke, that’s all. Out of coincidence she said. Like she just happened to be busy, and then she said once I’m rich, she won’t be busy.”

Yuno didn’t want Mickey to get the wrong idea. He knew it sounded bad, but he also believed that April wasn’t a bad person. However, Mickey was not convinced.

“Were you talking to April Fooze? She’s the gold digger of CG, man. She’s only friends with you if you’re rich.”

Yuno waved his hands, trying to sway Mickey’s opinion of her. “No, no, Mickey, we’re friends. We’re actually friends. I’ve known her since before she joined CG. She’s nice. A-Anyway, why are we here? On this beach?”

“We’re supposed to be up there. At that bank.” Mickey pointed back towards the Fleeca on the other side of the Great Ocean Highway.

Yuno suddenly remembered that they were there to rob a bank, and he looked down at his clothes. The dark green blazer, navy bulletproof vest, gray pants, black gloves, and white shoes with blue light up soles that he wore every single day for the past month because he was too poor to buy another outfit. He did have spare clothes that he used for committing crime, but that was back at his apartment.

“Wait! I forgot to change my clothes! You’re just gonna go like that?” He gestured to Mickey’s black suit and yellow emoji mask.

Mickey shrugged, he didn’t see the problem. Black was the perfect color for committing crime because it was easier to hide in the shadows, and it was harder to get identified by police.

“I guess so, Yuno.”

“Well, I can’t just go like this! This is clearly me. Everybody knows it’s me if I’m wearing these clothes. There’s no way!”

“The cops won’t know it’s you.”

“Yes, they will! I was wearing these exact clothes today when I brought them sandwiches for lunch.”

“Why?”

“I always bring them sandwiches after I get away from a crime.”

There was a lot to unpack in that sentence, but Mickey figured that they could discuss it later. They had already gotten sidetracked a few times, and he didn’t know how long it would take Yuno to hack the bank. They needed to get started soon.

“Well then, no face, no case. Just because you’re wearing the same clothes, and the same helmet, and the same bright shoes doesn’t mean that they can prove it’s you. If anything, just say that it was an imposter—”

“Oh! I got it!”

Yuno took off his motorcycle helmet, revealing a black mask covering his face and a pair of black cat ears resting on his head. He threw the helmet in the trunk of his car, and faced Mickey.

“I look different, right?”

Mickey stared in surprise. “...You have cat ears underneath the helmet?”

“Yeah, I’m a cat burglar! It’s part of my crime outfit. It’s good enough, right? I look so different.”

Describing the change as “so different” was a bit of a stretch in Mickey’s opinion, but it would have to do.

“All right. You look slick, let’s go!” He headed back to the bank, and Yuno followed behind him.

════⊱ ♣ ⊰════

The BMX rested against the front of the green-painted bank. Two suspicious people climbed onto the roof, cut off the power, picked the lock on the front door, then sneaked into the bank. They went up to a panel at the back of the Fleeca by the vault.

Mickey took the supplies out of the duffel bag, connected the laptop to the panel, and instructed Yuno on how to start the hack. Overall, it was a pretty simple process that went smoother than he expected. Yuno definitely had a better grasp on computer programming than he had initially verbalized. He suspected that Yuno was more than just a college level dropout, but he still needed a little guidance.

“Okay, now you’re gonna type that input into here, and then you should get a prompt.” Mickey gave his directions in an unnaturally deep voice due to his voice changer. “Yeah, that one. Now, just follow—”

“Oh! I get it, Mic—”

“Shh! Codenames, Y.” The power was cut, but Mickey wasn’t sure if there were any wireless, battery powered cameras and audio recorders that remained on. They needed to be careful of what they said.

Yuno corrected himself, “I think I can do this, M.” His voice changer gave him a high-pitched sound.

He quickly typed several lines of code into the laptop, and completed the hack in under a minute. The lock on the vault was disabled, and opened up for them.

“Holy shit. That might’ve been the fastest hacking I’ve ever seen.” Mickey stared at the laptop screen in shock.

“Yeah, that was easier than I expected.” Yuno assumed that Mickey was talking about the difficulty of the hack itself, and not his ability to hack.

“No, I mean, like you cracked that hack like it was nothing. A neophyte couldn’t pull that off. How the hell did you learn that?”

“I just got lucky, I guess. So now what? What do we do now?”

Mickey checked the time on his phone, and calculated that if the police were notified of tampering in the bank, then they had about five minutes until they showed up.

“We could dip before the cops arrive, or we quickly fill this bag with money and risk getting caught. Honestly though, you did that so smoothly, I think it’ll be a while until the cops notice anything.”

“Yeah, let’s take some money,” Yuno agreed, and went into the vault.

Mickey put the dongle, VPN router, and laptop back in the duffel bag to dispose of them later, then he joined Yuno in the back.

Together they filled the rest of the bag with $12,000. Mickey acknowledged that they could've carried more money if they had more bags, but that would've taken too much time. He was all right with leaving at a loss of $23,000.

They left the bank through the front entrance to get to his BMX. The only problem was that a police cruiser happened to pass by right as they exited.

“Ooh.” Yuno raised his hands, only making them look more guilty.

“Hey! Stop right there!” the officer yelled.

“Y, get on the bike!”

Yuno jumped on the back seat, and Mickey pedaled off into the Banham Canyon right behind the bank. They had a good start ahead of the police cruiser who struggled to go around the bank and followed them off-road to the grassy hills.

“Go, go, M!” Yuno cheered. “You have so much distance!”

“I can lose him! I got this! I will persevere!” Mickey yelled between his exhausted panting. He knew that he only had a couple of minutes before the entire police force showed up, so the faster he lost this one officer, the better his chances were to escape.

Mickey weaved around the trees and bushes, and when they broke vision with the police cruiser, he looped around back to the Great Ocean Highway. The inclined surface allowed him to gain speed, and zoom across it to get to the beach on the other side.

He stopped to hide behind one of the several beach houses, and waited to see if the officer noticed.

To his relief, the lights and sirens grew distant, and he peeked out just to confirm.

“All right, we lost him.” Mickey sighed.

“I can’t believe he just happened to drive by right as we exited the bank.”

“Yeah, that was crazy.”

They laughed, and headed further down the beach to Yuno’s Sultan. Mickey put the bike back in the trunk, and they evacuated the area before the police found them again.

Yuno drove them to the CG Cubby to split the money and destroy the laptop, VPN router, and dongle. With those supplies gone, the only thing tying them to the crime was their clothes.

Mickey substituted his black blazer for a dark blue blazer with a gold flower print, and lent Yuno a long, olive green raincoat to wear over his clothes. The moment Yuno put it on, he liked it so much that he begged Mickey to let him keep it, which he did. He even helped Yuno cut two slits into the hood to let his black cat ears pop out.

With Yuno still nervous about being caught, they decided to hide out at the compound for the rest of the night. Mickey used this time to teach Yuno a few fighting techniques until they both grew tired from their eventful evening and fell asleep.

(The next morning - Thursday, March 11, 2021)

After a beautiful sunrise, Mickey and Yuno woke up, and got ready to start the day.

After a small breakfast, they decided to gamble their $12,000 at the Diamond Casino.

After their small streak of good luck, Yuno thought that it only made sense that it would end by him running into the one man that he had been trying to avoid for the past month.

“Oh, hey, Mr. Lang!” Yuno cheerfully greeted him. It wasn’t that he was avoiding Lang because he disliked him. He just felt that the more he saw the grumpy businessman, the higher his chances were of being fired.

Lang glared at him, deciding if he should fire him right then and there.

“Oh, well, well, well, well. You work a shift yet, Yuno?”

“Well, it’s, uh, I—”

“By the way, uh…” Mickey rapidly came up with a lie. “By the way, Yuno, thanks for the—Thanks for serving me the ramen, uh, last night. That was probably some of the best I’ve had.”

It wasn’t a good lie, but it was what he thought Lang wanted to hear. Yuno debated if he should go along with it or not. “Uhh, I—”

“Mickey, don’t give me that bullshit.” Lang called him out.

“Uh, I don’t know what you’re talking about, Lang.”

Mickey unsubtly motioned for Yuno to help him double down.

“Yeah, no problem. I know it was off the, uh, clock. Uh, but, uh, you’re welcome!” he stammered.

Lang glared harder, and went along with the obvious lie. “Oh, so you’re giving free food now?”

Yuno backtracked. “Uh, no, no, he, um—”

“No, no, no. He actually charged double,” Mickey said.

“He gave me double, and, uh, he gave me a tip for—”

“Yeah, it was, uh, it was a delivery service. It was some of the best, uh, in the Rooster’s Rest.”

“Yeah, I could be the only delivery driver, uh—”

“Honestly, you’ve earned a life long customer actually.” Mickey gave Lang a bright, fake smile, but he wasn’t impressed.

“Mm~hmm~ Well, Yuno, I heard that you’ve been hiring body doubles to stand-in for you at work, and you had Leyla clock your attendance for you.”

He fidgeted. “W-What? That sounds, um, crazy. Why would I—”

“You have twenty-four hours to work one shift or you’re fired,” Lang said with finality. He was done with the flimsy excuses and constantly being lied to his face. He was giving Yuno one last chance.

“F-Fired?! Fired?”

Lang stepped closer to him, his face nearly touching his helmet, and gave him a stern expression.

“Twenty. Four. Hours. Yuno. Twenty-four hours.”

Lang backed away and headed inside the casino, leaving Mickey to try and calm down a distraught Yuno.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

As evening rolled around again at the CG Cubby, April performed her new song, “If You’re Broke I’m Busy.” Ramee and a few other Chang Gang members enthusiastically gave her money as she sang. One of the main reasons she loved the gang was because everyone was rich. Well, everyone except for one down bad, gay man.

Mickey couldn’t afford to pay her anything. Even if he could, he wouldn’t. April flipped him off as he walked by her makeshift stage, and he returned the gesture.

He made his way through the crowded compound, laughing and bantering with the others. Eventually, he found an old man with a brown beard who wore a black and brown tracksuit. Despite his misleading appearance, he was the notorious gang leader of Chang Gang.

Mickey kneeled at his feet, and Mr. K smiled down on him.

Chapter Text

(Friday, March 12, 2021)

At Burger Shot, Yuno was listening to a new song demo on his manager’s phone.

“Baby, don’t forget me~

And I promise not to forget you~

Even when things aren’t the best~

I’ll be there~

Even when shit hits the fan~

I’ll be there, ohh oh~”

When the demo ended, Yuno clapped his hands. “That was pretty good, Sheldon! That was incredible!”

Sheldon Jones—a manager at Burger Shot and a rising musical artist—replied, “Ah, thank you. I can’t wait for it to be done.”

He held his hand out, and Yuno gave him his phone back.

“You should play it with a bunch of people one day. That was amazing.”

“I need to one day,” Sheldon agreed.

Yuno was curious about one thing, but he wasn't sure if it was overstepping boundaries with his manager. Still, after a short mental debate, he caved to his curiosity and asked, “So, who was, uh, who was the song for? Was there like a person?”

Sheldon rubbed the back of his neck. “Uh, not really, you know? Well, it is a person, but I don’t know.”

Seeing him become self-conscious, Yuno tried to encourage him.

“Who is it, Sheldon? I’ll hype you up.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that. The two of us agreed that we’re pretty much done. The song’s kinda like I’ve been in love, but I’m also moving on. If she ever needs me, I’ll always be there. But at the same time, I’ve gotta move on and start a new life.”

Yuno could tell that there was more to the story than what he was being told. It sounded like their relationship gradually fell apart despite the both of them really trying to make work. The feelings were there, but they couldn’t force two puzzle pieces together when they didn’t fit. They had to move on, yet they still wished to be a part of each other’s lives, even if it was just staying in the other’s memory.

He patted Sheldon’s back. “Oh, man that…that’s tough, Sheldon. That’s tough. That was a great song, though. Good job.”

“Yuno, is that you?”

Yuno didn’t hear anyone come in, so he jumped in surprise at the voice.

He turned around and saw Lang at the front counter holding paperwork in his hands.

Hanging on the wall next to Lang was a poster that read “LANG BUDDHA BANNED” with a giant X over the face of an Asian man that wasn’t Lang.

Yuno figured that he would have to ask Shelly about it later.

“Morning, Mr. Lang!”

“Your twenty-four hours are almost up, asshole.”

Yuno pointed at the clock on the wall; it was 9:15 a.m. “Uh, it’s not time to clock in yet. It’s still the morning, but I promise I will be there tonight.”

“You tell me this every time I see you.”

“Yeah, I will most definitely be there in twenty-four hours. I got it!”

“Motherfucker, you better be!”

(Saturday, March 13, 2021)

In the reception area at the Diamond Casino & Resort, Yuno was advertising an event for the upcoming weekend.

He saw Meowfurryon enter from the lobby. “Hello, Mr. Meow!”

“Good morning, meow.”

“Going to the blackjack table again—Oh, I gotta tell you about this thing. There’s a special event at the casino this Sunday. Sunday at six—”

“Yuno! You still have yet to come into work!”

Yuno jolted at the scream and dropped all the advertisement flyers on the floor.

Meowfurryon looked up at Lang, and realized that he must have been referring to his Chinese restaurant. “You work at the Rooster’s Rest, meow?”

“Uh, I sort of work at the Rooster’s Rest as an unpaid intern janitor,” he said, picking up the scattered flyers.

“Well, we don’t pay you cause you never work,” Lang explained.

Yuno stood up and saluted. “T-T-Tomorrow. I will be there tomorrow. I promise you.”

Lang rolled his eyes at the obvious lie.

He started walking away and yelled, “Twenty-four hours, Yuno! Twenty-four hours!”

(Sunday, March 14, 2021)

In the Korean Plaza behind the UwU Café, Lang noticed a group of gangsters leaving a shady area. When he walked around the building to investigate, he caught Yuno selling drugs.

“So, this is what you do when you don’t fucking come to work? This what you fucking do?”

“Oh.” Yuno rushed to hide the pills in his pockets, and Lang shook his head at his feeble attempt to conceal the contraband from his eyes.

“I hired a criminal. I hired a fucking criminal. Look at you.”

“Well, listen here, I got you something. Ahh…” He searched his pockets and pulled out a handful of joints. “Fresh weed. The freshest weed actually.”

Lang snatched the joints out of his hand, and began walking back to his DeLorean.

Yuno ran after him. “Mr. Lang, I’m so sorry I didn’t show up after the seventy-two hours that you kept giving me.”

“Yeah, I know, asshole. It was twenty-four hours.”

“Well, it was twenty-four hours, three times, and I didn’t show up any of the times, uh—”

“Oh, you’re good at math. You should be my accountant,” Lang said, his voice filled with sarcasm that Yuno didn’t notice.

“Really? You wanna hire me again after all that? I can’t believe it!”

Lang sighed. “I’m just kidding, Yuno. You fucking asshole.”

“Oh, I see.” Yuno visibly shrunk in on himself, embarrassed about the misunderstanding.

Lang would have pitied the sight more, if he didn’t just go seventy-two hours without a janitor. It was getting to the point where it might be harder to hire a new janitor who was willing to deal with the mess that Yuno never cleaned.

“Okay, seriously. This is the last chance you’re ever gonna get. Show up to work in twenty-four hours or else I’m firing you.”

Scene 4: 4/4

(Monday, March 15, 2021)

At Cerberus Industries’ secret research and development facility located under the Jetsam Terminal, Cassie and the heads of Cerberus were seated around the conference table wearing their usual black business suits. As they finished their meeting, Cassie went to the laboratory on the other side of the room to organize some documents when she saw the wingsuit prototype hanging on the wall next to her.

“What is this?”

Leslie stood up and walked over to her. “It’s the wingsuit.”

“The first ever prototype wingsuit,” Lang called out from the table.

Cassie examined the Toy Story Buzz Lightyear wingsuit. “Ohh, so you guys weren’t joking. It actually is… It actually is…”

“A wingsuit,” Leslie said.

“Future advanced technology, yes,” Lang added on.

Dean, as the one who fixed most of Lang’s mistakes from the initial blueprint, went to correct them. “Well—”

“Yes, it is.” Leslie cut him off.

Cassie shook her head. She wasn’t in disbelief over the fact that they wanted to build a wingsuit; it was more about the Toy Story aspect of it. “Yeah, no, when you said Toy Story, I didn’t, uh…I didn’t think…”

“Pretty cool,” Leslie stated proudly.

Cassie could no longer contain the laughter that she had been trying to hold in, and she let out a little chuckle.

Lang stood up from the table and joined them in the laboratory. “Cassie, don’t insult anything we build down here, you understand me?”

“This stuff is from the future, apparently.” Dean said sarcastically, under his breath.

“I’m not!” Cassie went to justify herself. “Okay, I’ll be honest with you. I was thinking that it was going to be like a small, toy model that you could play with. I didn’t realize you wanted to make a full-size Toy Story wingsuit that actually works.”

Lang scoffed. “Why would I make a prototype that doesn’t work, Cassie?”

“How far were you able to fly in it?”

“...”

“...”

“...It still needs some work.”

“Oh, that’s a shame.”

“Yeah.”

“Welp,” Cassie picked up her stack of papers. “I’m gonna send out these material request forms to our suppliers. Call me if you need anything, okay?”

“All right,” Dean and Lang replied in unison.

Leslie checked the time on his watch. “I should start heading over to another meeting soon. Need a ride, Cassie? I can drop you off on my way.”

“Thanks, that would be great.”

Leslie and Cassie left the facility together, and headed west into the city.

Meanwhile, Lang and Dean headed north to return to the Diamond Casino & Resort. During the drive there in his DeLorean, Lang remembered something.

“Dean, I heard from Cassie that you fired all your security guards for the casino. Why?”

“I can’t trust them. I would rather be in charge of running the security systems myself, and have the C.B.P.D. step in only when needed.”

“What happened to make you think they’re not trustworthy?”

Dean looked out the window, pondering for a moment. “...Have you seen my silver secure case anywhere?”

“No. What secure case? You never carry a secure case.”

“Yeah, exactly. I left it in my desk drawer in my office, and I never took it out. However, it went missing a few days ago. No one should’ve suspected anything about it, but it holds something extremely important. I checked the security footage, but everything from that day was wiped. Then, I asked everyone on the security team, but no one knew anything about it or found anything suspicious from that day either. Whoever stole it had to get access to the executive offices, acquire the key card to my office, and unlock the desk drawer. The reason why it’s strange is because you, me, Leslie, and Cassie hold the only four key cards for it, but none of you even knew about the secure case. Did you give your key card to anyone?”

“I would never do that, Dean. Are you sure it was a thief? What if you just misplaced the case?”

Dean tried to give Lang an astonished look, but the Chinese man was too focused on the road.

“Only you would freak out over a stupid mistake like that.”

“True.” Lang had no comeback. It was simply true.

“I’m perturbed about this because I know something not normal is happening. So, I fired the security team, and I’m redesigning this casino myself to have the most advanced security system possible. It will all be run by computers, not people.”

Lang thought back to the conversation he had with Tony and Raymond. “Hmm~ you’re not the only one for that matter. Recently, it seems like everyone is more concerned about security breaches. You hear about how all the banks have gotten their systems upgraded, too? Maybe you could just hire the same security company to help you out?”

“They already reached out to me, and I declined. I don’t know the name of that company, but they’re suspicious. I don’t want anything to do with them.”

“Why’s that?”

“Have you seen their logo? It’s printed on the side of every bank.”

Lang thought back to the last time he went to a bank, which was an hour ago. He had a habit of stopping by in the morning to check on all of his business accounts, but he couldn’t remember ever bothering to look at a security logo.

“I guess I’ll take a look at it next time.”

They arrived at the casino, and went straight to Dean’s office.

Lang looked down at the desk, noticing that something else was missing.

“Hey, what happened to your panther statue? Did the thief take that, too?”

“No, I just moved it to a safer location until I figure out who has my case. Whoever broke in was only interested in that.”

Lang was beginning to realize that Dean had a good reason for being wary. There were a lot of valuable items in his office: high-quality liquor, expensive furniture, a golden panther statue, classified documents and files on his computer, etc. Yet, the thief only took the silver secure case.

“Oh, I think I get it. Whoever broke in wasn’t after money or any of your personal files. They knew what was in that case, and so they only targeted that case. You think it’s strange because you never told anyone what’s in it…not even me or Leslie.”

“Right. It was given to me in absolute secrecy a little over a week ago. No one should’ve known what’s in it.”

“So…what’s in it?”

“I don’t know if I should tell you.”

“Why the fuck not?”

“If I can tell you, then I’ll tell you later. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to finish coding more security devices. I cannot have this be a recurring incident.”

“Alright, cocksucker. I have business meetings to attend anyway.” Lang huffed, and dramatically stomped out of the office.

✶₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅ⴵ⋅⁺‧₊𓅭⋆⁺₊✶

A few hours later, Tony, Raymond, and Lang met up back at Tony’s house in Paleto Bay.

Tony and Raymond were sitting on the white couch while Lang restlessly paced around the living room. KFC mimicked Lang, strutting behind him pensively.

Several conflicting thoughts were flying through Lang’s head. On the one hand, Tony and Raymond were eager to rob the Blaine County Savings Bank to acquire money and gold bars. Tony also just missed the feeling of doing heists in general and—as it was a request on his birthday—Lang didn’t really have it in him to deny it.

There was also that conversation he had with Dean, informing him about the mysterious security company. He couldn’t lie; if Dean was suspicious about it, then he was interested in it. He had to remember to check the logo on the side of the bank.

However, and it was a big “however,” if they got caught, Lang would lose nearly everything in his empire.

Denzel could do many things as mayor, but breaking him out of jail after robbing a bank wasn’t one of them. Even if he were to pardon Lang of his crimes, there was no way that the Los Santos Senate would let him keep ownership of his businesses. Additionally, Leslie and Dean would probably have to revoke his Cerberus shares to preserve the corporation's public image.

Then there was the main question of whether he could even hack the bank or not. If they couldn’t do the hack, then it was pointless to take the risk. Well, risks with an s because there were many. Many, many, many risks.

The soft carpet had been flattened where Lang was pacing. He had unknowingly started to pace more aggressively, and KFC did his best to keep up with his steps to avoid being trampled on.

Raymond decided to break the silence. “We got the money now. We can hit Paleto bank tonight… Lang?”

Hearing his name, Lang was brought out of his rampant thoughts. “Yeah, well, I thought about it some more, and I want another hacker.”

“Isn’t that what I’m there for?”

“But what if it’s some fucking crazy difficult hack?”

“True. It could be the most difficult hack ever. We could fail, or set off several alarms and get surrounded by cops. But, I have no problem killing anyone if it comes down to—”

“Ray, Ray, Ray, shut the fuck up!” Lang abruptly stopped pacing, causing KFC to crash into his leg and fall over. “You’re just fueling my paranoia about this shit going horribly wrong.”

Seeing Lang only become more anxious, Tony spoke up. “If having another hacker for security makes you feel better, then that’s fine with me.”

KFC shook away the stars circling around his head, and flew up onto the coffee table. A location he deemed to be safer.

Lang let out a deep breath, calming his nerves. “Okay, who’s a really good backup hacker?”

Tony couldn’t answer that. He turned to Raymond.

“I’ll call some of my contacts to see if anyone is available.” Raymond got up from the couch, and went to the kitchen to make his phone calls.

Lang took his seat next to Tony, and they went through their own contacts.

“What about X?” Lang asked, dialing his number.

“X? You mean Jean Paul?”

“That’s the one. He’s a good friend of mine, and I heard that he solo robbed a bank last month.”

“I heard he failed that hack, and I don’t know anything else about his hacking record.”

The line went to voicemail, and Lang hung up. “Well, he’s not picking up anyway. Who else?”

Tony took a moment to think. It had been years since they had done a heist, so their usual contacts were either unavailable or no longer around. Most of the boys had moved on with their lives.

Even so, Lang had always been the main hacker. The hackers they used to bring were just backups. Though he had not hacked in a while, Lang was still an inventor for Cerberus; he was good with technology.

Now it seemed like Lang didn't trust his hacking skills and needed to find someone who was possibly better than him.

He wondered if Lang’s recent troubles with building his TimeLord suit and wingsuit prototype had anything to do with his drop in confidence.

“What about Fiona?” Tony asked.

“Just called her, she said she’s busy!” Raymond yelled from the kitchen.

“What about Ramee?”

“He’s also busy!”

Tony groaned. “Ugh, is anyone free today? Or do we wanna postpone this to tomorrow?”

“We’ll find someone, Tony~” Lang tried to sound optimistic.

Tony sighed, his previous musings returned to his mind.

“If only our boys were still around.”

Lang paused. Then he pulled up an old contact in his phone.

“...Let me call up Nino.”

“Buddha, he’s not—He’s got things to—”

“I’m calling him—Hey, Nino!”

Lang moved to lay down on the couch, swinging his legs up and letting them drop heavily on Tony’s lap.

Tony grunted at the impact and smacked his legs, but let Lang lie there anyway. He continued looking through his phone contacts while Lang conversed with Nino.

“Yo, what’s up, Lang? It’s been a while.”

“Yes, it has. We’re gonna be hitting a bank tonight. You in? Can you still hack?”

“Wait, tonight? Lang, I’ve got meetings scheduled in the morning.”

“Ugh, you boring motherfucker. You used to be down for anything.”

“Yeah, well, now I’ve got a clean job that comes first. Also, you hypocrite, you have your own business meetings happening all day, too. It’s me who can barely get a hold of you most of the time.”

“Nino, I can’t believe you’re gonna gaslight me like this when you’re the one always in a fucking business meeting, you fucking cocksucker. You used to be one of the boys. You, me, Tony, and D—”

Lang abruptly cut off his sentence, and glanced over at Tony to see if he heard. Luckily, Tony was in the middle of his own phone call.

Nino sighed knowingly, filling in the bank of the missing name. “Yeah, those were good times. Have you heard anything from Donnie?”

“No. How long has it been now? Three months?”

“Just about I’d say.” Nino paused for a moment, wondering if he should even ask. “Donnie is…not coming back, is he?”

Lang hated that question. Every fiber of his being dreaded the answer to it, but he shrugged and tried to be as nonchalant as he could. “Nah, he’s probably dead or something. I don’t know.”

“What? Who’s dead?!” Tony had just ended his phone call. Now, he was looking at Lang with wide eyes.

Lang waved his hand. “Don’t worry about it, Tony. Just catching up with Nino.”

Tony was doubtful, but he let it go. He moved down his contact list and dialed another number in his phone.

Lang continued, “Anyway, Tony and I are gonna finish putting together another four-man heist squad. If you ever wanna join in, there’s always a spot saved for you. Just say the word and I’ll throw someone out.”

“I appreciate the sentiment, Lang. Maybe I’ll join you another time. Good luck on your job.”

“Yeah. See you later, asshole.”

“Later.” Nino hung up.

Lang set his phone down and stared up at the ceiling. “Nino’s busy.”

“I told you so, Buddha. Still no luck on my end either.”

“There has to be someone—Oh, fucking Mickey is really good at hacking. He’s insane.”

“You're talking about DownBad Mickey in CG?”

“Yeah, let me see if he’s free.” Lang dialed his number.

“Hello, this is DownBad Mickey speaking~”

“Mickey, it’s me. Lang.”

“Oh! Hey, Lang! What’s up?”

“We’re about to rob a bank, but I heard that the security systems are harder to hack.”

“They are, but it really depends on which bank. You’re a criminal veteran, though, so you probably got it.”

“Can you be my backup hacker just in case?”

“Uh, I’m actually about to do a job soon, so I can’t.”

“Oh, c’mon. You don’t even have to stay long. Just do a quick hack and dip.”

“I can’t go,” Mickey insisted. “It's gang leader’s orders.”

After hearing that, Lang gave up on trying to convince him. He knew better than most in the city to not get involved with a gang leader’s orders. “Fine. You always fuck me over, y’know?”

“Oh, Yuno!”

“...What?”

“You know, Yuno, your janitor. He’s a hacker.”

“No shot he fucking hacks. No shot he’s a fucking hacker.”

“It’s true. I watched him do it myself, and his hacking skills are cracked. Give him a call and—Oh! I gotta go. Give Yuno a call. Bye!”

“Mickey—” He hung up before Lang could retort.

Lang snapped his fingers at Tony to pull his attention away from his phone. “Hey, Mickey is busy, but Yuno, apparently, is also a crazy hacker.”

“I know, what? Wait? What?”

“His name is Yuno. My shitty janitor.”

“The one who never works? You’re gonna trust him to hack?”

“I might be a little desperate. I just don’t want to fail, y’know what I mean?”

“Yeah, I understand.”

Tony was feeling a little parched from all the phone calls he had been making, and knocked Lang’s legs off his lap so he could stand up.

“I’m gonna grab a beer. You want one?”

“No, thank you.”

Tony joined Raymond in the kitchen, and Lang got up from the couch to go to the small room next to the bathroom. It used to be Tony’s bedroom, but since he moved into CLean Manor, he repurposed it into an office.

The walls were lined with bookshelves, and in the center of the room was a table with a three-dimensional map of the State of San Andreas on the surface. The Golden State was an island located in the southwestern United States of America, and it was divided into two counties: the southern and urban Los Santos County, and the northern and rural Blaine County.

Tony’s house was in Blaine County, and Lang let his fingers run across the area, idly searching for his location as he waited for Yuno to pick up the call.

Finally, he heard the cheerful voice answer. “Mr. Lang! How’s it going?”

“Yuno, I need to know how good you are at fucking hacking.” Lang spoke slowly as if it was a threat.

“Uh, I’ve never failed before. Why?” Yuno suddenly felt nervous about the direction of the call.

“When was the last time you hacked Paleto bank?”

“I-I’ve never done that. I’ve only done Fleeca before. Uh, you need a hacker?”

“Well, the thing is I’m a fucking hacker, but word on the street is that it’s much harder than it used to be now.”

Yuno gasped. “What?”

“So, I’m trying to find a great hacker who can be the backup when I inevitably choke the hack. I need to know how good you are, Yuno. I cannot fail this job.”

“I’m definitely in. Listen, I’ve never failed a hack in my life.”

“Alright. Let me talk to my boys. I’ll call you back, motherfuck—”

“I’ve only ever hacked once in my life, but—”

“What?”

“Well, yeah, I mean, I’ve only ever hacked once. I did it, though.”

“Yuno, what are you trying to do to me here, huh? You never come to work, you fuck me over. You lie to my face, and now you’re gonna fuck with me here, huh?” Lang growled out. He was really at his wits’ end trying to deal with him.

“T-Technically, it was all true. I’ve never failed a hack, but I have only hacked once so…”

“Let me talk to my boys. I’ll text you later, asshole. By the way, you’re fired.”

“F-Fired?! Wha—” Lang hung up on him.

Raymond and Tony walked into the office once they heard his conversation end.

“Finally fired your shitty janitor, huh?” Tony asked, overhearing the end of Lang’s phone call.

“It’s not like he was gonna make it to his shift tonight anyways. He says he’s down to be a backup hacker, but he’s only hacked once. But he says that he did it perfectly.”

Those odds sounded good enough for Tony. “Yeah, three hackers, fuck it. If Buddha can’t do it, and you can’t do it, then surely he’s got it, right?”

“Yeah, sounds good,” Raymond agreed. “So, what’s the getaway plan?”

“I want a super quick plan,” Lang said. “Something simple, something clean and easy. Y’know what I mean?”

“I can put bike in bush. Just drop me and Yuno off there, and we’ll split up to divide the cops’ attention from you guys.”

“Oh, and I know the perfect place to do it.” Tony brought their attention to the three-dimensional map in the center of the room, and pointed to the base of a mountain. “Fort Zancudo.”

About fifteen minutes after Tony had explained the details of the getaway plan, they drove to the location. He wanted to show them the plan in person, so that they didn’t run into any mistakes when they did it later that night.

Tony was in the driver’s seat of Lang’s Stratum—the license plates read “CUSSY” on the front and back—and Lang sat in the passenger seat, holding KFC in his arms.

They were headed south on the Great Ocean Highway, and Raymond followed behind them on his black Akuma. It didn’t take long for Tony to find the tunnel that traveled underneath the military base.

“Okay, so I’ll drive us out of the bank in this Stratum, we head down Great Ocean, and then we take the jump into Zancudo. Like this.”

Tony increased his speed, drove up the hill next to the tunnel, and turned sharply as the car flew into the air over the metal fence surrounding Fort Zancudo. The car spun backwards a hundred and eighty degrees, and drifted across the aircraft runway as he landed.

Raymond copied the jump, but his speed was a little too slow. His back wheel hit the top of the fence, and his bike wobbled as he landed roughly on the runway.

After he landed, Tony drove down the runway to the other end of the fort. “Then we go to the ramp over here, and take this jump.”

A metal ramp was placed by the fence at the end of the runway. Tony increased his speed again, but not as much as last time. He drove up the ramp at an angle, allowing the car to slowly spin through the air over the metal fence and into the wetlands of Lago Zancudo. He aimed for the dirt road below, careful not to overshoot the jump and end up in the marsh.

Seeing how high they were in the air and how long the drop was, Lang and KFC braced themselves to die. However, all four wheels hit the dry ground at the same time, and Tony drifted in a couple of circles to stabilize the landing and disperse some of the impact. The fall wasn’t bad at all.

To make up for his previous lack of speed, Raymond overcompensated by copying the jump at a much higher speed than necessary, launching himself into the marsh. His front wheel hit the ground first and got stuck in a mud puddle, causing Raymond to fly off the bike and splat face first into the Zancudo River.

Tony drove over, and rolled down his window. “You alright there, Ray? You okay, buddy?”

“I’m good!” Raymond climbed out of the river, and brushed the mud and grass off of his soaking clothes. Fortunately, he was wearing his black motorcycle helmet which protected his handsome face.

“Tony, you trust this guy to drive?” Lang asked while petting the trembling rooster in his arms.

“Those jumps are hard to nail on your first attempt. I bet most of the cops won’t be able to do it either. You need to know the right speed and angle. Even then, it won’t work in certain vehicles.”

“Well, if I’m riding with you, then I like this plan.”

Raymond dragged his Akuma out of the mud puddle and walked up to their car.

“Now what?”

Tony gestured to the several bushes nearby. “You can just leave that bike in one of the bushes around here, and I’ll drop you guys off after doing those two jumps.”

“Okay.” Raymond drove to the biggest bush near the area where they landed, and concealed the bike in its leaves.

When he walked back to the car, he noticed that the area was pretty deserted. He would have thought that a military base would be heavily guarded.

“Fort Zancudo seems pretty empty, but you sure we won’t have the military come after us if they see us trespassing to do these jumps?”

Tony motioned for Raymond to come closer to the window, and he leaned in.

“Here’s a little secret between us, okay? Fort Zancudo is still a military base, but the Air Force was decommissioned after Denzel became mayor.”

“What the fuck?! He can do that? But why?”

Lang leaned over and whispered, “Don’t tell anyone else, though. We don’t need all these gangbangers to come onto the property now that the Air Force isn’t here. Plus there are still government businesses in operation on the property sometimes.”

“Yeah, yeah, I won’t tell anyone,” he promised.

Tony unlocked the back seat door. “Get in, Ray. Let’s go buy the supplies, and get changed.”

Lang took out his phone. “And I’ll text Yuno.”

Raymond got in the back seat, and Tony drove them to the gray market in the Grand Senora Desert to buy a burner laptop, a VPN router, and a blue dongle. After that, Tony exchanged the “CUSSY” license plates on the Stratum with fake plates to avoid getting ID’d by the police.

Lastly, they got changed into their criminal outfits. Lang wore a brown monkey motorcycle helmet, an oversized black hoodie over a long white shirt, black techwear pants, black gloves, and black and white Nike shoes.

Tony wore a dark gray trench coat over a gray dress shirt and gray pants. He had a gray mask, a dark gray fedora, black shoes, and black gloves.

Raymond wore a black motorcycle helmet, a black leather jacket over a black dress shirt, black jeans, black shoes, and black gloves.

Since it was getting late, they all decided to wear dark-colored clothing to help them blend into their surroundings better when they escaped under the cover of night.

♣₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅⚝⋅⁺‧₊ⴵ⋆⁺₊𓅭

Yuno ran around the rooftop of Rooster’s Rest, hanging out with The Guild as he waited to be picked up. He was wearing his olive green raincoat with his black cat ears popping out of the slits in the hood, a black mask, a black backpack, black gloves, dark gray techwear pants, and white shoes with blue light up soles that could be seen from the International Space Station.

Seeing a black Stratum pull into the front parking lot, he jumped down to greet it.

“Hello!”

“Get in the Cussy, Yuno. Let’s go,” Lang replied from the driver’s seat.

Despite Tony being the main driver, most of the time Lang preferred to be the one driving his own cars. So, Tony sat in the passenger seat with four black duffel bags on his lap while Lang drove them.

Yuno hopped in the back seat with Raymond, and Lang headed north to the Blaine County Savings Bank located in Paleto Bay.

“Wait, Raymond, it’s you!” Yuno didn’t recognize Raymond at first sight due to his dark clothing.

“Yeah, it’s nice to see you. I heard you were good hacker. Is that true?”

“Uh, I’ve never failed a hack yet.”

Tony looked at him over his shoulder. “Yo~ What up, Yuno?”

“H-Hey, uh, Mr. T-Tony, yeah?” Yuno nervously greeted him for the first time. The only things he knew about the man was from what Raymond had told him; he owned a house in Paleto Bay and ran over cows with his car.

“If you fuck us over, Yuno, we will kill you.” Lang threw out the joke to ease the tension, but it accidentally flew over Yuno’s head.

“...I promise you I won’t. D-Don’t worry.”

“Just kidding!” he added to make sure that Yuno knew it was a joke.

Lang and Tony laughed, but Yuno only grew more apprehensive.

“Y-Yeah. Haha. I-I know.” He struggled to sound at ease. His fingertips were drumming on the leather seat, and he couldn't stop bouncing his leg.

Raymond patted Yuno’s shoulder, hoping to calm him down. “It’s good to have you along, man. Don’t worry about the supplies or the getaway plan. We already set up my bike, so just follow my lead.”

“You’re driving?” Yuno asked.

“Yeah. I’m good driver on bike, and Tony’s driving this car for the initial getaway. The plan is pretty easy.”

“I mean, I like the sound of easy.”

Tony laughed. “If you like the sound of easy, go talk to your mom, dumbass.”

Yuno tilted his head. “Hm?”

Lang smacked Tony’s arm. “Tony, don’t be fucking rude to Yuno. We’re about to rob a bank with him, asshole.”

“Yuno is good guy, okay? Don’t be rude to him,” Raymond joined in.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I was trying to be funny. Lighten the mood. Jesus Christ. Sue me. What? I like to be funny. Is that a fucking problem?” Tony sarcastically remarked.

“Yes, when you come off as an asshole, Tony,” Lang chided.

“It’s not an ass—” Tony turned around. “Yuno, was that an asshole thing to say?”

“Uh, I-I don’t think so, um.”

Tony faced forward again and relaxed into his seat. “See? It was a joke. We’re joking, y’know what I’m saying?”

“Uhh, y-yeah, it was just a prank?” Yuno said, but it sounded more like a question to which Raymond answered, “Yeah, it’s just joke. Tony’s funny man.”

Lang glanced in the rearview mirror, watching Yuno fidget with nervousness.

He leaned over and whispered, “You hear how scared he sounds, Tony? This guy probably thinks we’re gonna fucking kill him after this, c’mon.”

Tony whispered back, “Sounds like he’s gonna shit his fucking pants, Buddha. You vouch for this guy?”

“Because you’re fucking scaring him, Tony.”

They weren’t whispering as quietly as they thought because Yuno heard it all and responded, “Uh, well, I-I’ve never failed a bank hack before.”

“That’s why we fucking need him~” Lang singsonged, “He’s never failed a bank hack. So, let’s take this guy—”

“Here!” Tony unzipped one of the black duffel bags. “Here’s a binky. There you are. There’s your, uh, milk bottle, and here’s a little toy you could play with.” He tossed Yuno the blue dongle, VPN router, and burner laptop.

Yuno picked up the items—ignoring Tony’s comparisons of his hacking tools as baby supplies—and started assembling them together the same way that Mickey did for the Fleeca. He plugged in the dongle, and noticed that Mickey was right about the blue one containing different software from the green one.

While he inspected the differences between the dongles, Lang and Tony continued to argue.

“Tony! You’re just being more of an asshole.”

“It’s a joke! I’m joking!”

“We’ve gotta have camaraderie! We’ve gotta come together here, y’know? Get the vibes up. We’re a group, we’re a team, and we’re gonna hit this bank. Let’s go!”

It was 10:00 p.m. when they arrived at the closed Blaine County Savings Bank. Since it was Paleto Bay, it was significantly darker and quieter than the city.

Without the cover of the Los Santos noise, Tony felt that if they weren’t stealthy enough and the police showed up, they would need a way to negotiate their escape.

“Should we get a hostage, B?” he asked.

Lang considered it for a moment.

If they brought a hostage, it could be used as leverage against the police. However, if they brought a hostage, failed the hack, failed the negotiations, and were brought into police custody, then—in addition to attempted robbery—they would also get charged with kidnapping. Getting hit with multiple charges for attempting to rob a bank that they couldn’t even hack, seemed like an unnecessary risk out of the already numerous risks with an s.

With already so much to lose if the heist failed, Lang didn’t even want to think about getting charged with more jail time.

“Let’s just see if we can even hack this thing first, T. You keep watch outside while the three of us check out this hack.”

“Got it.” Tony grabbed the duffel bags and climbed onto the roof of the bank.

Lang turned to Raymond and Yuno. “R and Y, do you both have a gun?”

“Of course.” Raymond pulled out his pistol to show him.

Yuno twiddled his thumbs. “Oh, um, I-I’m a pacifist. I don’t carry…guns.”

“Motherfucker—” Lang stopped in the middle of his shout, and took a deep breath. There was no point to get riled up about it, he needed to stay calm. “Well, it's too late now. Follow me.”

On the rooftop, Tony cut off the power, and Lang picked the lock on the side door to sneak in. Yuno and Raymond followed him through the door while Tony crawled to the edge of the rooftop, staying hidden but able to keep a lookout for anyone approaching the bank.

As they entered, Lang recalled the words Dean told him earlier that day.

“I don’t know the name of that company, but they’re suspicious. I don’t want anything to do with them. Have you seen their logo? It’s printed on the side of every bank.”

Lang walked to the front of the bank, and looked around. It only took him a few seconds to find an image stuck on the lower right corner of the front window. It was vibrant as if it was placed there recently. The logo was a tree branch tied into a trinity knot with a golden apple in the center.

He found it eerily familiar, but couldn’t remember when or where he had seen it before. He also couldn’t pinpoint why he felt a surge of fear when he saw it. There was no text accompanying it either which he also found strange.

Lang quickly pulled out his phone and took a picture of it, deciding to figure it out later. For now, he went to the panel at the back of the bank by the vault, and got prepared.

Yuno had already connected the laptop to the panel, and Lang began to hack.

He was immediately faced with some difficulty with it.

“Oh fuck. I’m so stupid. I can do it,” Lang encouraged himself.

“It’s okay.”

“You got it.”

Raymond and Yuno also motivated him, keeping watch at the front door and side door while he hacked. All of their voices sounded slightly robotic due to their voice changers.

Lang took a breath to calm his nerves, and continued working on the hack. He knew that his skills were washed, but he couldn’t believe that they were this washed. He even spent the last four days practicing, too.

After five minutes, he called out again, “Ay, who’s feeling super confident right now? I keep fucking up.”

Right then, Tony walked in through the side door. “There’s literally no one there. Paleto Bay is dead quiet for some reason. Did you fuck up, B?”

“No, I didn’t fuck up. I’m currently fucking up. I haven’t set off any alarms yet, though.”

“Okay, you got this. Just do it,” Raymond encouraged, and switched places with Tony so he could watch Lang attempt the hack.

Lang continued to hack for another five minutes, but was still unable to succeed. The more he failed, the more nervous Raymond became.

At this point, Raymond was feeling less confident about being able to hack if Lang couldn’t do it, and a part of him regretted saying that he could hack. If he was being completely honest with himself, he had never hacked anything ever, and the one time he did was because he had some assistance.

While standing at the front door, Tony watched Lang hack, and doubted that he was going to be able to complete it. Not because he thought that he couldn’t do it, but he was certain that Lang was psyching himself out.

Lang slammed the laptop down next to him in frustration and turned to Raymond. “Listen, I’m choking, but I can do it. How confident do you feel, R?”

Raymond hesitated before answering, “...Uh, how long do you think we have until the alarm is triggered?”

“I’m not sure. If you don’t feel confident, you shouldn’t do it.”

“I think you should do it, L.”

Lang didn’t think he should do it. He was hoping either Raymond or Yuno would be willing to take up the job.

He turned to Yuno who was still crouched by the side door. “Y, how are you feeling?... Y?... Y?”

The cat-eared man was anxiously tapping his fingers against the floor, lost in thought.

Lang bent down next to him and whispered, “Yuno?”

Yuno’s head popped up. “Hah? Oh! Sorry, I was stressed out. Um, is it, uh, is it my turn?”

“No. How are you feeling right now?”

“Do you think you could do it?” Raymond pointed at Lang. “Do you think you can do better than him?”

“A-Ah, I think I could m-maybe do it,” Yuno stammered unconfidently, but that was good enough for Lang.

“Alright, give it a shot.”

“O-Okay!” He went to the vault and started to hack on the laptop while Lang and Raymond watched over his shoulder.

Yuno’s hands were shaking as he watched the text appear on the screen, but he took a deep breath and focused on the code. He recalled the instructions that Mickey gave him, and managed to complete the hack in a minute.

The lock on the vault was disabled and opened up for them.

“No way! I did it on the first try!” Yuno yelled in surprise.

“Oh fuck yeah!”

“Hell yeah! Hell yeah!”

“Let’s fucking go, baby!”

“Let’s go, let’s go, let’s fucking go!”

“You fucking legend! You’re a fucking legend, Y!”

Tony, Lang, and Raymond screamed their praises. After spending the past fifteen minutes doubting Lang’s hacking skills, they didn’t think that they would be able to get into the vault. The speed at which Yuno was able to crack the hack was the most impressive part of it all.

Raymond gave Yuno a tight hug, picking him up in the air and spinning around in circles before dropping him on the ground. “I fucking love you! Oh my god, you’re amazing! Y, if you ever need anything in your life, you let me know, okay?”

Yuno attempted to stand up, only to feel nauseous and fall back down. “I-I need a bucket ‘cause I’m about to throw up.”

“Okay, I’ll get you fucking bucket! You’re amazing! You’re incredible! You’re the one!” Raymond ran to the front entrance and grabbed a small trash bin for him.

Lang ran to Tony, giving him a bunch of playful punches to his shoulder. “Ay, I told you! I told you we should have fucking brought this guy! I told you!”

Tony chuckled. “Yeah, you fucking did!”

Lang walked back to Yuno—who was sitting on the ground and holding the small trash bin in his lap—and repeated his words from earlier, “Y, you’re a fucking legend, baby. You’re a fucking legend.”

“No, no, you are! I couldn’t have done it without you guys.”

“No, we couldn’t have done this without you,” Lang emphasized, needing Yuno to know just how amazing he was at completing the hack.

Yuno scratched the back of his head, not used to getting praised. “No, I just got lucky.”

“You cracked that shit like it was nothing. You’re like a fucking cheat code,” Lang said.

“I can’t believe I’ve still never failed a hack. I thought today was the day. My hands are tingly I—”

“God, I fucking love this guy, man.” Raymond knelt down in front of Yuno. “You don’t understand how much better this makes you. Like how much more valuable you are. You’re so valuable now!”

“I-I have no clue, but I—Wow! I’m shaking, I’m shaking. I’m freaking out too much. I can’t believe it. I’m gonna go outside and stand guard,” Yuno said, standing up and dusting off his pants.

Lang nodded. “Okay, I’m gonna take a look at the system.”

Yuno packed his hacking tools into his backpack, left the trash bin by the front entrance, and walked outside.

Lang started looking through files in the security system now that Yuno had hacked into it. He knew that the chances were slim, but he wanted to see if he could find any information that related to the logo in front of the bank.

While he was doing that, Raymond and Tony filled up the four black duffel bags with money in the vault.

Raymond found a drawer stocked with gold bars and whispered to himself, “It's true. Mickey wasn’t lying to me for once.” He made space in his bag, and began to fill it with gold bars.

Tony had finished filling three duffel bags with cash, so he turned on his phone’s camera and started recording a video.

“Hey, vlog~ It’s ya guy, T. We’re robbing the bank.”

He pointed the camera at Raymond. “This is my boy, R. He’s got the gold bars.”

Raymond looked up at Tony in disbelief. He was a gangster, and gangsters don’t snitch. But, he did believe in reporting bad behavior. “Hey, L! T, is vlogging right now. He’s recording me taking money out of the bank.”

Tony carried on filming the vault for his vlog. “Oooh~ I’m gonna be able to upgrade my car engine with this. R, come here and take a picture with me.”

Lang walked into the vault after unsuccessfully finding any useful information in the system, and a flash of light blinded him as Tony took a selfie of him and Raymond holding the bag of gold bars.

“T, what the fuck are you doing?” Lang grumbled.

“Vlogging. It’s what April does. She’s the biggest influencer in Los Santos, so I figured I’d try it out to see if I get any new subscribers.”

“I told you to stop doing that. Don’t fucking post this.”

Lang picked up two duffel bags while Tony and Raymond grabbed the other two, then they exited through the front of the bank where Yuno was running around in circles in the parking lot. He realized that Tony was right about Paleto Bay being dead quiet. The only thing he could hear were the calls of a raven in a nearby tree.

“The cops still aren’t here, huh?” Lang was surprised. From what he remembered, the cops showed up pretty quickly to these types of robberies. He wasn’t gonna complain, though. He really needed to keep his record clean.

Raymond looked around just to confirm that they weren’t being watched. “Yeah. Looks like we didn’t even need the getaway plan.”

“It’s better to be prepared,” Tony said, “C’mon, let’s dip while the coast is still clear.”

The four bank robbers got into the black Stratum with their duffel bags, and Tony drove them a couple of miles south on the Great Ocean Highway.

“Yuno, you’re a fucking legend, y’know that?” Lang repeated for a third time.

Raymond joined in, “Yeah, I want you to know, Yuno. We love you, man.”

Lang continued on, “All the respect that I did not have for you, I’ll now have for you. You’re a fucking friend on my phone list now.”

Yuno perked up at that. “Oh, wow, thanks! I have you as ‘Mr. Lang’ in my phone.”

“I had you as ‘Yuno, never comes to work, broke bitch’ in my phone. Now, you will forever have a position in the Rooster’s Rest. I’m fucking proud of you.”

“I do?! Oh my god!”

“Yes, you’re the head janitor for the rest of your fucking life.”

Hearing that made Yuno a little sheepish. “Look, I’m sorry I never showed up even with the ninety-six hours you gave me.”

“It’s okay. You’ve got a permanent position now, motherfucker. You’ll be hired forever.”

“Permanent position?! I can’t believe it!” Yuno was elated. He hoped that he could continue to not do the job, but now he would get paid for it.

Tony parked the Stratum behind a log cabin, hidden in the Paleto Forest.

“Why are we here, Mr. Tony?” Yuno asked.

“Even though the police didn’t show up, the security cameras probably saw our car and marked the license. This is a good spot to switch to another fake plate.”

Tony pulled out a brown paper bag of fake license plates from the car’s glove box, then he passed his duffel bag to the back seat with Raymond and Yuno.

“You guys start splitting up money, alright?”

“I can do it.” Raymond opened up all four bags, and began counting their profits.

Lang looked at Yuno over his shoulder. “Yuno, thank you for hacking, but frankly, you put in nothing. You’re gonna get a little less ‘cause we gotta cover the cost of supplies first.”

Yuno nodded. “Yeah, that’s fair. I understand.”

“Good.”

Lang elbowed Tony, who was still in the car, looking through the fake plates.

“Ow! Motherfucker!”

“Get out, Tony. I’ll drive us home.”

“Alright, alright.” He exited the car with his brown paper bag, and Lang got behind the steering wheel.

Once Tony was able to find two matching plates, he bent down and changed the front plate. Then he walked behind the car to change the back plate, when he crashed into someone. The impact sent all the fake plates falling to the ground.

Around the corner of the cabin, Chang Gang was also changing the fake license plates on their own black Stratum.

Tony smiled behind his mask as he recognized the man he bumped into.

“Oh, Mickey, you’re so fine~

You’re so fine you blow my mind~

Hey, Mickey~

Hey, Mickey!”

Tony sang the chorus of “Hey Mickey” by Toni Basil.

Mickey laughed at the coincidence of it. “Hey, Tony! Good to see you, too.”

“What are you doing here?” Tony regathered his fake plates, but he didn’t realize that he had accidentally picked up Chang Gang’s fake plate. The license was nearly the same except for one number.

He started attaching it to the back of the Stratum as Mickey responded, “Probably the same reason you’re here.”

“Yeah, I didn’t realize this was a popular license changing spot.”

Mickey forgot that he dropped a plate, and he only became more distracted when Yuno popped his head out his window.

“DownBad Mickey! I hacked Paleto bank on my first try!”

“My fucking man. I knew you could do it—”

“Ay, Mick! Helicopter’s heading towards Great Ocean Highway! Dip, dip!” Mr. K yelled at Mickey from the driver’s seat of their car.

“Gotta go! See ya!” Mickey ran back into the car, and they drove off.

“Helicopter?” Tony looked up and saw the aircraft heading towards them from the city. He quickly picked up his paper bag, and got in the passenger seat.

“Buddha, we should get outta here, too.”

“Alright.” Lang drove back on the Great Ocean Highway, and continued heading south.

In the back seat, Raymond had finished counting and dividing the money into the four black duffel bags.

“Okay, I’ve got the split. Yuno, this is yours.” He handed a duffel bag to Yuno who wrapped it over his shoulder.

“Thanks, Raymond.”

Raymond pulled one of the duffel bags onto his lap. “This one’s mine, and those two are Lang and Tony’s.”

“Thanks, Ray,” Tony said.

“No worri—Oh no.” Raymond looked out the back window, and saw the police rapidly approaching them down the highway with their lights and sirens on. “They’re coming after us.”

Tony glanced at the rear view mirror. “Pull over, Buddha. Just say we were shopping or something.”

Lang stopped the car on the side of the highway, and three police cruisers parked behind them.

Tony was expecting one police officer to come up to the driver’s side window, and question them. He wasn’t expecting six police officers to exit their vehicles, and instantly aim their guns at their car.

A bald officer in a black uniform started yelling, “This is the Chief of Police of the LSPD, Sam Baas! Get the fuck out of the car! I need the driver to take the keys and throw them out of the window right now!”

“Wait, why?!” Lang screamed.

“What did we do?!” Raymond questioned.

Lang and Raymond spoke in a Southern accent, so they weren’t easily identified. They didn’t want to use their voice changers because that would make them appear even more suspicious.

“Do it now!” Baas demanded again.

“Can you explain what we did?” Lang asked.

“No, this is not a negotiation!”

“You guys have the wrong people!” Lang yelled, growing more exasperated.

“Exit your vehicle now!”

Tony whispered to Lang, “We can’t get out. If they search us, they’ll find out we just robbed Paleto.”

“Tony, what do I do here?”

“Drive.”

Lang sped off down the highway. With all the cars nearby, the police couldn’t risk shooting their tires out.

It only took a minute for two more police cruisers to show up. Then Raymond noticed a spotlight shining down on them. “That’s so unfortunate.”

Yuno stuck his head out his window and looked up to confirm it. “Air-1 is here, too.”

Lang really wished that he had just let Tony drive. “We’re fucked. We’re fucked. We’re fucked!”

“No, we’re not. Go to Fort Zancudo. I’ll direct you.”

Yuno caught onto Tony’s idea. “Yeah, yeah, we already had a plan set up. Let’s just do it.”

“I don’t know the fucking jumps!” Lang yelled.

“I’ll direct you! Just keep heading down the highway until you see the tunnel. When we get to Ray’s bike, prepare to switch seats. I’ll take over driving from there.”

“I don’t think we’re gonna get that far, Tony. I’m about to fail these jumps.”

Lang drove as fast as he could down Great Ocean Highway while avoiding crashing into the other vehicles.

“Good. You’ve got a lot of distance, Buddha. The cops are driving more carefully than you are.” Tony spotted the tunnel up ahead. “Here it is! Now, go left and up the hill. Build up speed, over a hundred miles per hour… Send it!”

Unlike Tony and Raymond who flew through the air earlier that day, Lang drove up the hill at a hundred and five miles per hour, but the Stratum stayed glued to the ground. However, it did manage to pierce through the metal fence surrounding the fort with minimal scratches to the hood of the car.

“I didn’t make the jump, Tony.”

“T-That’s fine, that’s fine. I don’t know how that’s possible, but it’s fine. Just drive straight down the runway, motherfucker. How are you so scuffed?”

“You know why, Tony.”

“Right. I said right! Do you not see the ramp over there?!”

“It’s fucking dark out now! I can’t see shit!” Lang yelled, driving to the corner at the end of the runway.

Breaking through the fence slowed the car’s speed substantially, and allowed the police cruisers to catch up to them, following through the hole that Lang made.

Tony believed that there was no way that Lang could nail the jump. The most important thing he needed to focus on was giving him instructions so that he wouldn’t pop their tires when he landed. If that happened, then they were really screwed.

“Okay, Buddha, you don’t wanna overshoot this, and land in the swamps. So, you only gotta go eighty here. Don’t go too fast, and try to keep the car level.”

“Alright, here we go!”

₊˚⊹⭒☣˖°༄✧.♣ ࿔*:･

Air-1 hovered above the chase. The pilot drove the helicopter, another officer gave out communications to the officers pursuing on land, and a police cadet directed the spotlight on the suspects.

As the Chief, Baas was directing the five ground units, coordinating their movements and adapting their mode of pursuit as he got updates from Air-1.

The moment the black Stratum reached the end of the runway, they all lost sight of the car.

“Did the vehicle just disappear? Air-1, do you have a visual?” Baas asked on the radio.

The pilot steered the helicopter lower to the ground and surveyed the area. Eventually, he spotted movement on the dirt road in Lago Zancudo.

“Regained visual,” the pilot replied. “Suspects are heading eastbound in Lago Zancudo.”

Baas groaned. “Fuck, we gotta drive around. They probably took the ramp and jumped over the fence. Air-1, take primary.”

“10-4.”

Meanwhile in the Stratum, Raymond and Yuno were shocked at what they just witnessed. They weren’t even sure what they saw.

“What the fuck just happened?”

“How did we get here?”

“Ray, is your bike in the second bush on the left?” Tony pointed at the bush that believed was the same one from before.

“Yeah, that’s it,” Raymond confirmed. He handed his duffel bag to Yuno because he wouldn't be able to carry it while driving.

“Okay. Slow down, Buddha.”

Lang parked by the bush, and jumped out of the driver’s seat, more than eager for Tony to take over.

“Go, go!” Tony yelled, and everyone else exited the car.

Lang and Tony ran around the Stratum to change seats.

Raymond ran to the Akuma and turned on the engine while Yuno carried their duffel bags over his shoulder and hopped on the back seat.

“You got this, Raymond.”

“Hold on tight.”

Yuno grabbed onto the motorcycle handles, and Raymond drove off.

Air-1 caught them splitting off in separate directions with two vehicles, but the ground units were still going around Fort Zancudo. The first three police cruisers to make it back to the chase pursued after Tony while Air-1 stayed on Raymond.

Tony turned off the Stratum’s headlights and headed south towards the Tongva Valley to lose the cops in the darkness.

Raymond tried doing the same thing while heading north to Mount Josiah, but Yuno’s shoes were constantly giving Air-1 updates to their current location.

Within five minutes, the other two police cruisers caught up to them.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. I think we got fucked. I think we actually got fucked.”

“Wearing glowing shoes probably wasn’t the best decision for this circumstance.”

Raymond glimpsed at the ground. It looked as if the motorcycle had a neon blue underglow.

“Yuno, you're so glowy.”

“Sorry, I didn’t realize I’d be this bright in the dark.”

“Can’t you turn them off?”

“I don’t know how. I never wanted to.”

“Oh god.” Raymond didn’t realize that he would have to factor in the brightness of Yuno’s shoes for their escape.

“It’s fine, it’s fine. You can lose ‘em!”

Raymond drove around the base of Mount Josiah for ten minutes, but it was clear that they wouldn't be able to lose the police in the wilderness. So, he turned around and started heading south to the city.

“We’re so fucked, we’re so fucked. Why are they chasing us? There’s no way they know we robbed Paleto, right?”

Yuno thought back to their little meet-up with Chang Gang.

“I think they mistook us for CG somehow. I’m gonna make a call.” He dialed Mickey’s phone number.

“DownBad Mickey speaking~ What’s up, Yuno?”

“We’re being chased by the cops. I think they mistook us for you guys.”

“No way! Are you serious?”

“Yeah, we’re in a lot of trouble. How did this happen?”

“Well, they probably think you guys robbed the City Vault in Vinewood.”

“What?! You hacked the Vault?”

Mickey laughed.

“Good luck, Yuno!” he cheered, then hung up.

Yuno slowly put his phone back into his pocket. “Yeah~ so apparently CG robbed the City Vault.”

“...That’s so unfortunate.”

Raymond made it to the Vinewood Hills, and drove through the winding roads. Being on a bike allowed him to make sharper turns and take routes through smaller alleyways than the police cruisers. He lost them a couple of times, but he struggled to lose Air-1.

Despite their circumstances, Yuno was amazed by Raymond’s driving skills. Though, he couldn’t help but feel a little useless sitting there and unable to do anything.

“Is there any way I can help or do you just need to focus?” Yuno asked.

“Uh, yeah, I’m trying to focus on losing Air-1, but it’s hard to do that and keep track of the cops behind us. Can you just give me comms on their locations?”

“C-Comms? What sort of comms?”

“Like just say how many cruisers you see, and how close they are. If we break visual, I need to know,” Raymond explained.

“Oh okay. There’s two cruisers behind us. One is very close, but the other is pretty far back.”

“Yeah, good. Just like that.”

Yuno continued to give vague comms as Raymond drove more south into the city. The streetlights removed some of the vibrancy of Yuno's shoes, and the tall buildings helped give them some cover.

He drove into a red garage, went up to the second floor, and jumped out through an opening in the staircase. Both police cruisers were too big to fit through the gap.

“Oh! Nice, Raymond! You lost ‘em both.”

Raymond made a quick turn the next block over to make sure that he broke visuals with the ground cruisers. Then he drove to the La Puerta Freeway underpass, and made a slow U-turn to go back the way he came.

Air-1 continued to head forward, expecting him to pop out on the other side of the underpass.

“Air-1’s not following us! You did it!” Yuno cheered.

“We still VCB with the cruisers?”

“What?”

“I mean, Visual Contact Broken. They don’t see us?”

“Yeah, yeah, they’re long gone. Oh, Air-1 is turning around.”

“I still hear the sirens, too.”

Raymond drove into the Southside, and parked his bike in a bush right next to a small apartment complex. He looked around to make sure they were not being followed.

“Come with me,” Raymond said.

Yuno carried the two duffel bags and ran after Raymond who walked up to an outdoor shed on the side of the property. Three cement walls surrounded them with one being covered in mailboxes.

Yuno whispered, “Raymond, isn’t this the Southside? What if it’s gang territory? What if we get robbed?”

“This is still La Puerta, so it’s R.U.S.T. turf. We should be fine.”

The sound of sirens approached their location.

They stopped talking and huddled in the corner of the shed, trying to stay out of sight. It was a tense minute as several cruisers passed by the neighborhood.

Hearing the sirens finally drive away, Yuno dropped the heavy duffel bags on the ground, and Raymond breathed out a sigh of relief.

“Come here.” Raymond hugged Yuno, and all the tension left his body. “I can’t believe I got us out.”

“You did great, Raymond. You’re crazy, man.” Yuno patted his back, letting him slump against him.

The police lights and sirens were still discernible, but they were distant enough to let him know that the police weren’t aware of their little hiding spot. Still, the officers were likely to search the area for a while.

“Let’s just stay here for five minutes or until the sirens go away. Is that okay with you?” Raymond asked, pulling away from the hug.

“Yeah, let’s just wait here for a bit.” Yuno leaned against the cement wall, and Raymond leaned next to him.

“I can’t believe we got framed for the City Vault,” Yuno said.

“I can’t believe I got us out.”

“Yeah, you weren’t joking when you said you were a good driver.”

“You weren't joking to me when you said you were a good hacker. You’re incredible!”

“You’re insane! You’re actually insane on a bike. This is a pretty good team here.” Yuno gestured to the two of them.

Raymond took off his motorcycle helmet, and smiled at him before he noticed that he could barely hold his helmet. “Holy shit, man. If I said I wasn’t shaking right now, I’d be lying.”

Yuno giggled. “I was shaking like thirty minutes ago at the bank. Feels amazing.”

Tony lost the cops twenty-five minutes ago.

At CLean Manor, he carried their duffel bags to the game room featuring an arcade machine, a jukebox, two brown couches, a coffee table, a large TV screen with a shelf underneath it, and a red pool table that read “CLeanbois” on it in white text.

He walked up to the wall next to the arcade machine and opened a hidden door which led to a secret armory stashed in the base of the watchtower. Tony dropped the bags of money on the floor next to a wooden crate, placed a couple of pistols in a safe, and climbed up the ladder to the observation deck.

The night view was beautiful. Tony could see everything from the Vinewood Hills to the buildings in the center of Los Santos to the ocean in the distance. He and Lang would argue that it was the best view in the city, but right now he was making sure that they weren’t followed by the police, checking the streets and hills for lights and sirens.

Confirming that the coast was clear, he climbed back down and went into the game room where Lang was resting on the couch. They had both already changed into their usual clothes. It was the first thing they did when they returned.

Lang sighed. “That was a close one.”

“Maybe for you, but I knew I could lose the cops. And it only took me five minutes.”

Lang took out his phone to check for text messages from Raymond or Yuno. However, the moment he unlocked his phone, he was faced with the picture he took of the security logo at the bank.

“Hey, have you seen this logo anywhere, Tony?” Lang held up his phone, showing it to him.

“Oh! I’ve seen it on a few banks here and there. Don’t know what it means, though.”

Lang brought his phone back to his face, examining the logo but still blanking out on where he had seen it before.

A tree branch tied into a trinity knot with a golden apple in the center. He knew that golden apples were important for some reason.

“I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it on something else, too. I just can’t remember where. I think it might be important.”

“How important?”

“I don’t know. What I do know is that I want to start hacking into all the security systems with this logo to see if we can learn anything.”

“Well, I suppose we’ve got a good squad for it now.”

“Oh right!” Lang exclaimed, remembering why he originally took out his phone. He checked for any text messages from Raymond and Yuno, but he didn’t have any, which worried him.

“Did Ray or Yuno text you? Are they out?”

Tony checked his phone, but didn’t see any text messages from them either.

“Nope, nothing from either of them.”

“Let me call Yuno. I hope they escaped.”

The call rang for a while, but Yuno picked up.

“Mr. Lang!”

“Hey, are you guys okay?”

“Yeah, Raymond got us out. What about you?”

“We’re safe. We’re all good,” Lang reassured him. “Just checking on you two.”

“We’re good! Oh, Mickey said they robbed the City Vault, and that’s why there were a lot of cops. They mistook us for them.”

Lang came to a similar conclusion himself when he wasn’t panicking behind the driver’s wheel. “Yeah, I figured it might’ve been something like that.”

“That was great, though! The getaway plan was a little scuffed, but it worked well. Right, Raymond?”

“Yes, it was good plan.”

“It was! I had so much fun,” Yuno said, full of enthusiasm.

“Well then, I have another job for you guys. You both free next weekend?” Lang asked.

“Wait, really?!” Raymond was in disbelief that they were being offered spots for another job. Lang and Tony weren’t usually down for heists, and had denied his offers in the past.

“You guys down or what?” Tony asked.

“Hell yeah!”

“Yeah!”

Raymond and Yuno were still riding on the adrenaline of their getaway escape, and now they were more than excited for their next heist.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

For the next eighteen days, the four bank busters would go on a heist binge all over the island.

With how much they worked together, and how close they’ve gotten in such a short amount of time, Lang and Tony offered them a room in CLean Manor. A shared room because that was all the space they had, but Raymond and Yuno didn’t mind sharing, and it was easier to get ready for jobs when they all lived under the same roof.

On one of the days, when things were slower, Lang would pull out a photo album and fill it with pictures of the four of them driving around San Andreas in the black Stratum which he now called the family Cussy.

Chapter Text

“Please, don’t fail! C’mon, Yuno! Yeah! Oh my god, I wanna fucking kiss you right now, and make sweet love to you.”

“M-Mr. Lang?”

“You’re a fucking legend, Yuno. Ay, lean on me right now. Hell yeah. You’re a fucking legend, baby. You’re a fucking legend.”

—

“Even if the hacks get harder, we have the Cheat Code, Yuno.”

“The best hacker in the fucking city right here.”

“You’re the boy, Yuno. You got this.”

"No, I'm only here because of you guys."

—

“Mickey! I don’t mean to brag, but I hacked the vault the other day!”

“I heard! I heard you’re a legend. I heard you hacked the vault and you did it in one try.”

“Well, I just got lucky.”

—

“At the end of the day, brother, I believe anything you say over nearly anyone else. I just want you to know that.”

“Hey, it’s the same from me to you, Raymond.”

“You’re awesome, Yuno. I love fucking working with you, man. I can’t wait for tomorrow.”

“You got me here to hack, so you’ve got nothing to worry about.”

“Yuno, you make me feel so much better about this. It’s so good to have you around.”

—

“‘Beans~ What the fuck?!’ C’mon, Yuno. Do it, do it, do it.”

“I-I don’t think I’d be good at doing that one, Mr. Tony.”

“C’mon, just do it, do it, c’mon.”

“Beans~”

“Hahaha! Say it again, say it again!”

“Beans~ I’m not as good as you. It just sounds dumb when I do it.”

“It sounds so cute~” 

—

“So, Yuno, are you now officially a Cleanboi now or what?”

“I-I’m being invited?”

“Yeah.”

“Wait, I am a Cleanboi, right? I actually—I never asked—”

“Yes, Ray!”

—

“Mr. Lang and Mr. Tony said that we’re like actual Cleanbois now.”

“We’re official Cleanbois, Yuno!”

—

“Welcome to the CLean Manor.”

“Welcome home, Yuno. Welcome home, Ray. Good to see you two.”

Scene 5: Scuffbois

(Friday, April 2, 2021)

It was a sunny, spring day. The sky was clear, the weather was warm, and there was a gentle ocean breeze. On days like these, the AirX Flight School gave skydiving lessons at Fort Zancudo.

Inside one of the hangars, Yuno was running up and down a staircase while Lang, Tony, Denzel, Nino, and Harry argued with each other about money below him.

He got an incoming call from Raymond, and sat down at the top of the staircase to answer it.

“Hey, Raymond! What’s up? We’re doing a big jump. You’re gonna miss it,” he said, kicking his blue light up shoes in the air.

“I made it on time!”

Yuno glanced at the time on his phone; it was 3:30 p.m.

“You told me—”

“1:00 p.m., yes! Yuno, I made it!”

“You specifically said you’d wake up at one, Raymond.”

“Yeah, that’s before I ended up hanging out with this girl until like six in the morning, and I killed some people till nine. The R.U.S.T. boys got into another war, apparently. So, I had to deal with that—”

“Is Ray finally awake?!” Tony questioned from the bottom of the staircase.

Yuno gave him a thumbs up. “Yeah, Mr. Tony! He said he woke up at 1:00 p.m., Pacifical time.”

“It’s just ‘Tony.’ And you know how he is. He probably meant 1:00 p.m. RST, Ray Standard Time.”

“Oh!” Yuno moved his phone away from his head as he laughed, but Raymond still heard it.

“What’d he say? What’d he fucking say, Yuno?” he demanded.

“Nothing, nothing. Listen, we’re jumping onto the beach just southwest of Zancudo in a bit, so if you wanna meet us there, we’ll be there. We’ll probably need a ride.”

“Okay, yeah, I’ll see what I can do.”

“I’ll catch ya soon.” Yuno hung up, and jumped down from the top of the staircase.

As it was the middle of the day, everyone was dressed in their usual business attire. Yuno didn’t know Denzel, Nino, and Harry too well, but he knew that they were close friends of Lang and Tony. Denzel wore a white suit, Nino wore a black suit, Harry wore a brown suit, Tony wore a gray suit, and Lang wore a red suit. Then there was himself dressed in his green blazer with gray pants. He was grateful that everyone stuck to their respective color schemes most of the time; it made it easier to tell them apart.

Nino, Denzel, and Tony were talking to each other at the front of the hangar, Harry was talking to a man wearing a pilot’s uniform a few feet away from the others, and Lang was in the middle of a phone call with Dean in the corner of the hangar.

“Dean, you need to push the Hero Wine meeting back by at least an hour.”

“Cassie has another meeting to go to. I can’t just make her wait around that long. Where are you guys?”

“I told you I scheduled a skydiving lesson with the boys. You and Leslie are invited, too.”

“We’re not going, Lang. We have business meetings. Just go skydiving on the weekend.”

“C’mon, Deanie Weenie~ They were booked for the next few weekends, and I need these parachutes.”

“...Why?”

“Well, okay, so here’s the update,” Lang took out his phone and checked a note he made. It read,

“The ten buildings with the sus security company logo:

Blaine County Savings Bank

Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank

Fleeca Great Ocean

Fleeca Lifeinvader

Fleeca Pink Cage

Fleeca Harmony

Fleeca Hawick

Fleeca Legion Square

Bay City Bank

Vangelico”

“We’ve broken into seven buildings with that security company logo on it, and it’s getting harder to escape the cops. There was a really close call this past week, and I really can’t go to prison.”

“Please, don’t get caught. It’ll be bad for business.”

“Yeah, I know. So, I’m trying to get more creative with our getaway plans. You see where I’m going with this?”

“Got it. You think parachuting out of a plane is gonna help you escape the cops, yeah, right, sure. Have you even learned anything about that security company?”

Lang hesitated, thinking about how little he had learned. “Uh, kinda? Oh, I remembered why the logo looked familiar and where I've seen it before.”

Yuno ran past Lang, not wanting to intrude on the conversation. Even if he did, he wasn’t sure what he was talking about anyway. He made his way over to Harry at the front of the hangar.

“Hey, Mr. Harry!”

“What’s up, Yuno?”

“Just coming for the skydiving. How much is this, by the way?”

“$200.”

“Okay! Oh! Mr. Denzel!”

Yuno ran past Harry, making his way to the others.

“Yuno!” Denzel greeted back.

“You coming skydiving, too?”

“Yeah, just coming along for the ride.” Denzel checked the time on his phone. He had been waiting at the hangar for the past fifteen minutes, and he had mayoral duties that he needed to attend to at city hall. He turned to Tony. “Are you flying us?”

“I mean, I could, but we need the fucking parachutes.”

Nino had been watching Harry talk to the man dressed in a pilot’s uniform. The man accepted some cash from Harry, then pointed at their group. Harry shrugged his shoulders and rubbed the back of his head while the man continued to wave his arms around, clearly becoming frustrated. Nino snickered and leaned into their group to whisper, “This guy’s gonna kill us. This fucking airplane pilot is gonna fucking murder us.”

“Wait, why?” Yuno asked.

“Harry’s the only one who’s paid so far.”

“Oh, really?” Yuno ran over to the man he assumed to be the pilot, standing next to Harry.

“Hey, I’m here for a parachuting thing with Mr. Lang.”

“The skydiving lesson?”

Yuno nodded quickly. “Yeah, yeah.”

“All right, sir. My name is Kevin Ram, and I’ll be flying you guys,” he stated professionally and tipped his hat.

“Oh, okay. How much is it for the parachuting?” Yuno asked as if Harry didn't just tell him.

“It’s $200 per person, but there’s a discount for groups over four. So, the six of you guys only have to pay $150 per person, and that’ll bring us to $900 in total.”

“Wow! That’s a big discount!”

Kevin gave him a tight lipped smile. “I need someone to pay me $700 dollars, though. Harry already paid me $200.”

“I didn’t know there was a fucking discount. Fuck, I want my $50 back.”

Yuno ran back to the group while Harry demanded a refund.

“There’s a discount, guys! For big groups, it’s only $150 a person.”

Denzel was shocked. “Oh, we have to pay $150 just to get a parachute?”

“That’s what they told me, yeah.” Yuno pointed back at Kevin and Harry to clarify who “they” were.

“The fuck? Do these guys make any money?”

Yuno wasn’t sure what Denzel was implying. It sounded like a lot of money to him. “Um, probably. I mean, they probably don’t have too many customers, right?”

“Alright! Let’s get this show on the road! Where the fuck is Kevin?” Lang had finished his phone call with Dean, and was walking over to Harry and Kevin.

Yuno ran over to them, too.

“I’m the only one that’s paid!” Harry informed him.

“Kevin, you still haven’t charged anyone, yet?!” Lang couldn't believe that he took a five minute phone call, and they weren't any closer to being ready to skydive.

“No, I’ve been trying to charge everybody, but no one wants to pay, Mr. Lang.”

“Yeah, I’m the only one that’s paid so far,” Harry reiterated.

“Okay. Me, Harry, and Yuno will go. Everyone else will just stay here if they don’t wanna pay.”

Yuno looked back at the others who couldn’t hear them from where they were standing a few feet away. “What about Mr. Denzel, Mr. Tony, and Mr. Nino?”

“Well, if these rich motherfuckers want to be stingy with their cash, it’s not our fault,” Lang scoffed.

“Mr. Tony’s rich?”

“He has $150.”

Kevin typed the new numbers on his phone. “Okay, so Harry I’ll need the $50 back, and it’ll be $400 for just the two of you then.”

“Wait, what happened to the discount?” Yuno asked.

“The discount is only for groups over four. If it’s just gonna be the three of you, then we’re back to $200 per person.”

“Everyone get your asses over here!” Lang, a rich motherfucker who was stingy with his cash, called everyone over so he could get the discount.

“I’ll go get the parachutes while you guys figure out who’s paying.” Kevin could sense that it was going to take them a while to collect their funds, so he headed to a booth in the back of the hangar while Tony, Denzel, and Nino regrouped with Lang, Harry, and Yuno.

“Can we hurry the fuck up?!” Tony screamed.

Lang stepped in front of his face to scream back, “You guys haven’t paid yet! He’s waiting for you guys to fucking pay, Tony!”

“He hasn’t come over and fucking asked me! This dumbfuck!” Tony cupped his hand around his mouth and yelled into the hangar, “Ay! Why don’t you come over and do your job!”

“Relax. Give the guy some respect, Tony.”

“I’ve been waiting here for ten minutes!”

“I’ve been waiting here for twenty minutes,” Denzel added.

Yuno changed the subject. “So, I’ve never used a parachute before… Do you know how to open—”

“No, no, no, here’s the trick,” Lang cut him off.

“Everybody huddle in, huddle in,” Tony whispered, and motioned for everyone to gather closely. They nestled together, shoulder to shoulder.

“Yeah, what’s up?” Yuno asked.

“What’s going on?” Nino also asked.

Lang whispered, “Don’t use the parachute. Just aim for the water, and pray~ you don’t die.”

“Don’t use the parachute?” Yuno repeated.

“Yes,” Tony whispered.

Denzel could tell that Lang and Tony had an ulterior motive. “Wait, are we robbing this place?”

“No, we’re technically paying for it. We’re using it for a test jump later,” Lang explained.

Tony patted Lang’s shoulder. “Buddha needs the practice.”

“As long as we’re not committing a crime here, it should be fine. I don’t wanna lose my mayoralty.” If Lang and Tony weren't concerned, then Denzel was willing to trust them.

“It’s not really a crime. You should be good,” Lang assured.

Tony began to explain the plan, “The plan is—”

“We’ll be fine,” Lang reassured.

“The plan is—”

“Also, can we—”

“Listen, the plan is—”

“—please hurry up and pay?” Harry asked impatiently.

“The plan is—”

“But, if we’re stealing this—”

“The plan—”

“—is that gonna be a problem?” Nino asked.

“The plan is! The plan is!” Tony screeched at the top of his lungs, and everyone stopped talking to listen to him explain the plan.

He took a deep breath to calm himself, then whispered, “To teach Buddha—”

“We’ve got a meeting to go to,” Harry remembered.

“Motherfucker!” Tony took off his gray fedora and slammed it on the ground in frustration.

“Yeah, what happened with that meeting?” Nino asked.

Lang went to explain his phone call with Dean, “Guys, listen, we pushed the meeting back—”

“What meeting? Can I come?” Denzel asked.

“Ahhhhhhh!!!” Lang was losing his mind.

Yuno looked between the frustrated businessmen in confusion. “I can’t even understand what’s happening.”

“Guys, we’re gonna draw attention to ourselves,” Nino said.

“Can we please whisper again?” Harry asked.

Tony dusted the dirt off his fedora and put it back on his head. “The plan is—”

“Shh!!!” Harry emphasized, making Tony whisper, “The plan is—”

“Hey, guys. I’m gonna be honest—”

“The plan—”

“—I still don’t know what the plan is. What’s happening?” Yuno asked.

“The plan—” Tony stopped himself from yelling at Yuno. “Listen, listen, alright? The plan is, okay?”

“Don’t pull the parachute, right?” Denzel reiterated.

“Yes,” Tony answered.

“Oh, we just don’t pull it?” Yuno asked.

Tony nodded and whispered, “To teach Buddha—”

“So, what’s the plan, guys?” Kevin asked, returning to the group with his arms full of parachutes.

“Ay! Ay! Ay!” Tony stomped over to Kevin. “Can you give us a minute?! Can you give us a fucking minute?! Can’t you see us fucking huddling here?!”

“C’mon, Kevin! Give us a second, Kevin! Please!” Lang yelled.

“Yep, yep. Let me know when you guys are ready to pay.” He brought the parachutes over to his helicopter parked in the center of the hangar.

The boys huddled back into their group circle.

Tony whispered, “Listen, the plan is to take the parachutes and practice, so Buddha can learn how to jump from Mount Chiliad all the way to the casino rooftop, go in the casino, and be able to change and come out, and have a vehicle parked at the casino. So that way, when we rob the Bay City Bank tonight—”

“No, the Fleeca tonight. Raymond’s awake,” Lang interrupted.

“Yeah, yeah,” Yuno confirmed.

“Mmrph.” Tony yelled with his mouth closed, barely keeping it together. “Yes. So, we can—”

“But we’re saving this plan for Bay City?” Yuno asked.

“Mmrph!” Tony clenched his hand and raised his fist, shaking it at the sky. “No, we do it for the Fleeca. So, we need these parachutes, so I can teach him, alright? To teach him how to jump from Mount Chiliad and land. At. The. Casino,” Tony punctuated.

Nino didn’t see how this wasn’t a crime. “Okay, that’s a great idea, but—”

“What’s the plan now?” Yuno asked, immediately forgetting the plan of “Don’t use the parachute. Just aim for the water, and pray you don’t die.”

“—we’re robbing the parachutes off this guy,” Nino said a little too loudly.

“We’re not—Arrrggghhhh!!!” Lang lost his mind.

“What do you mean?!” Nino asked.

“We’re not robbing anything!” Lang screamed.

“Shh!!!” Harry looked over at Kevin, but it didn’t seem like he heard.

Denzel tried to explain, “Look, what we’re doing is—”

“Can you guys just pay, please?” Harry let out an exhausted sigh.

“We’re practicing! It’s practice!” Lang continued screaming.

“Please, pay.” Harry begged.

“We’re swiping the property!” Nino yelled.

“Jump out the plane. Aim for the fucking water. Simple,” Lang hissed.

“I’m paying! I’m paying!” Tony screamed, and walked over to Kevin with Lang following behind him.

“...I don’t think that’s gonna end well,” Denzel thought aloud.

“What’s happening?” Yuno asked. He—along with Nino and Harry—were still confused about the plan.

Denzel shouldn’t have been surprised. Back when he was a Leanboi with Lang and Tony, communications between them weren’t always the best. It seemed as if it had only gotten worse as they aged.

He took it upon himself to explain, “Basically, it’s illegal to go skydiving in San Andreas because of the heavy air traffic. The easiest way to acquire parachutes is through the AirX Flight School, but you can only use them in this designated area. It sounds like Lang and Tony want to use the parachutes for a getaway plan, but it would be much harder to steal parachutes from this military base. So, we’re making it appear as if we’re here for the skydiving lesson, but we’re actually gonna try free falling into the water so they can keep the parachutes for later.”

“Oh~ okay! And it’s not a robbery because we are paying for the parachutes. We’re just not using them where we’re supposed to.” Yuno felt like he was finally understanding the plan.

“Precisely.”

The four walked over to Lang, Tony, and Kevin standing by the helicopter.

In all of his weeks of being a pilot—because he was a new pilot who had just gotten his pilot’s license a few weeks ago—this was the most chaotic and exhausting group of customers he had ever dealt with. Kevin punched the new numbers on his phone and turned to Tony. “Okay. Are you paying for everybody or—”

“No, just myself. Fuck, you think I’m gonna pay for all—I’ll pay for Denzel,” Tony decided and took out his wallet.

“Oh, thank you.” Denzel was pleasantly surprised that the poorest person of the group would pay for him.

“No, problem. You paid for a lot of my shit. Thank you.”

Tony paid for himself and Denzel, Lang paid for himself and Yuno, Nino paid for himself, and Harry waited around impatiently since he had already paid.

Once Nino finished paying, he looked over at Denzel who was gazing out into Lago Zancudo in deep contemplation.

Denzel muttered under his breath, “In a helicopter, up there, no parachute, probably thousands… All right.”

Nino walked up to him. “What’s up, Denzel?”

“I’m pretty sure we’re gonna die if we hit the water at that speed, right?”

“Uh, how high are we gonna go?”

“I’m assuming we’ll be thousands of feet in the air.”

“Okay, so, wait, are you suggesting that…t-that we’re not…ahem… I love my life.”

“No, I’m not suggesting it, no. I’m just thinking that—”

“Wait, you’re telling me?!” Nino felt his stomach drop in fear.

“No, no, no. I’m just curious that…aren’t we, though?” Denzel raised his eyebrow pointedly, seeming unbothered by their possible death.

It only made Nino grow more anxious. “We-We’ll, uh, probably…”

Hearing Nino scream, the others had gathered around them while Kevin prepared the helicopter for their flight.

“Nah, we’ll be fine,” Yuno said, equally as unconcerned as Denzel. “Look, as long as you break the surface tension of the water, if it’s choppy enough, it reduces the impact or something like that.”

“Well, that’s not entirely true.” Nino couldn’t verify how true Yuno’s statement was, but he knew that at a certain point of altitude, no amount of broken surface tension would be able to save them.

Denzel shrugged. “Hm~ Guess we’ll find out.”

“Guys, listen, I thought this through.” Lang motioned for everyone to huddle around him. “Originally, I was gonna have us wear wingsuits, but they’re not finished yet. So, I made these instead.” He reached into his pants pocket, and pulled out several small, rectangular, metal objects. “Put these devices on the side of your shoes.”

Nino picked up two of the devices and held them up to his face, observing the mechanical structure. “What are they?”

“They’re kinda like springs, but for the air,” Lang replied. “Leslie wanted me to make him some spring boots, and these are the prototypes for it. They’re voice activated, so just say, ‘activate,’ right before you hit the water. It should be able to propel you a few feet back into the air, and break your fall."

Nino’s eyes widened. “It should propel us into the air?”

“Well, yeah, they’re prototypes. They obviously still need to be tested. They work really well on land, but I’ve never tried using them in water or in the air.”

“We’re so dead,” Nino monotoned.

“It’s better than nothing,” Denzel said, and grabbed two of the devices.

No one could rebuttal Denzel’s conclusion. It was better than nothing. They all followed suit and attached one device to each shoe. After Harry finished clicking a device on his left shoe, he noticed that the helicopter Kevin was fueling only had four seats.

“Kevin! Donkey! Come on, you bellend!” Harry screamed in British.

“Pull out the plane, Kevin!” Tony yelled.

Harry complained, “You fucking knob! This helicopter only fits four people, when we just paid for six people!”

“We don’t have time for this shit! I want a refund!” Nino was tired of waiting.

“Give us our money back!” Denzel demanded.

Lang attempted to appease their pilot, who potentially had the power to kill them while they were in the sky. “You’re doing a fantastic job, Kevin!”

“Thank you!” Kevin appreciated the compliment, and finished fueling the helicopter.

“Don’t fucking lie to him!” Tony disapproved of his remark.

“Guys, be nice to Kevin. He’s a good guy,” Lang said.

Tony grumbled, “No, he’s not. He’s taking twenty years. C’mon, Kevin!”

Nino was still fed up with the waiting time. “You know what? Just give me a refund. I’m outta here.”

“Please, show some respect to Kevin, guys!” Lang urged.

“Terrible customer service!” Tony agreed with Nino.

Lang went over to Nino and whispered, “Nino, c’mon. We need these parachutes.”

Kevin returned to the group, carrying six parachutes in his hands. “Since we only have four seats, it’s gonna be two groups of three. So, one group goes and while they’re landing, the others can go up.”

“What the fuck?” Lang couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“Can’t we get a jet or something?” Yuno asked.

“I think the helicopter’s the way,” Kevin said.

Tony stomped his foot and angrily pointed at the ground. “Now! Parachute now!”

Lang’s courteous manner towards Kevin had vanished, and he joined Tony in venting his frustration. “Now! Now!”

“Now, now, now, now, now, now, now, I want the fucking parachute right fucking now, and jump from the plane right now!”

“Right fucking now! Stop wasting my goddamn time!”

“Now, Kevin! Now, Now!”

“Now, now.” Yuno happily mimicked their actions. Not because he was frustrated, he just liked copying them.

Kevin didn’t know how to respond to the verbal assault and continued his routine. “So, we’re cool with the helicopter, right?”

“Plane!” Tony yelled.

Lang clarified, “We are cool with a six-seater, Kevin.”

Tony continued yelling, “Plane, plane, plane, plane, plane—”

“You’re a billion dollar company. You don’t have a six-seater helicopter?”

“—plane, plane, plane, plane, plane—”

“I’m not cleared to fly any other aircraft besides this one,” Kevin explained.

“—plane, plane, plane—Pull the fucking plane out! I’ll fucking fly it!”

“Plane, plane.” Yuno jumped up and down next to Tony, mimicking him.

Harry examined the space inside the helicopter. Even though there were only four seats, it was rather spacious. “How much room is there? Can we carry each other or something like that?”

“Oh yeah!” Yuno realized what Harry was asking. “If we’re jumping out, we don’t need to be buckled in, right? We can sit on each other’s laps or something.”

Tony carried on, “Plane! Plane! Plane!”

“That’s actually doable.” Kevin confirmed.

“Plane! Plane! Plane!”

“Oh, let’s do that then,” Yuno decided.

“Plane! Plane! Plane!”

Lang nodded. “Hell yeah, we’ll do that.”

“We do stunt work sometimes. You just hold them on your lap, and then let them go mid jump,” Kevin said.

“Yeah, that’s fine.” Lang just wanted to make sure that they all jumped out at the same time. If Kevin realized that the first group didn’t use their parachutes, the remaining three may not be allowed to jump.

“Pull the plane out! It has twelve seats!” Tony yelled.

“It has eight. Not twelve,” Kevin corrected.

“It is twelve,” Tony argued.

“It’s eight,” Kevin argued back.

“It’s supposed to be twelve,” Tony double downed.

“I checked, and it was eight,” Kevin also double downed.

“I mean, eight would be enough, wouldn’t it?” Yuno asked.

Tony counted everyone plus Kevin. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. There are seven of us here!”

“Guys, let’s just get in the fucking air. Please. I’m losing my mind,” Harry begged, running low on patience.

Lang dragged Tony away from Kevin. “Tony, Tony, we’ll just carry each other!”

“We’ll carry each other. It’s fine,” Yuno said.

“It’s fine, let’s get the fucking goddamn parachutes, and fucking do this shit!” Lang yelled.

“I still want my fucking money back. I’m gonna leave a bad review.” Nino didn’t think that the service was worth the money he spent.

“I’m fucking losing it! Let’s go!” Tony got into the helicopter.

“Wait, we need the parachutes,” Yuno remembered.

Tony got out of the helicopter. “Where’s the parachute? Where’s the parachute? Where’s the parachute?”

Harry stepped in front of Kevin. “Pilot, let’s get the parachutes, and let’s go. Come on.”

Kevin quickly tried to separate the parachutes in his arms. “Okay. Um—”

“Get it together, Kevin!” Tony yelled.

“Yeah, here’s one.” Kevin held out one parachute that was hastily swiped by Harry.

“That’s mine. Thank you. Fantastic.”

Kevin handed out the rest of the parachutes, and everyone put them on over their business suits.

Nino struggled to pat down the creases it made in his suit jacket. “Fuck, this is gonna ruin my suit.”

Denzel wasn’t faring any better. “Why didn’t you guys tell us to change first?”

“Langy, I want you to carry me.” Harry waved Lang over to him.

“Of course, Harry.” Lang sat in the passenger seat of the helicopter, and Harry sat on his lap. The position was a little awkward and slightly cramped, but they had already committed to this idea.

Denzel turned to the tired pilot. “Did you tell us any safety protocols, Kevin?”

“Nope, I didn’t tell you anything. You all seemed too impatient.”

Yuno patted Denzel’s shoulder. “We’ll be fine. Don’t worry, we’re experts.”

“Come here, Yuno. I’ll carry you,” Tony called.

“All right. Here I go.”

In the back seats, Yuno sat on Tony’s lap, and Nino sat on Denzel’s lap.

Harry sighed. “Finally, boys!”

“This is the worst fucking service I’ve ever had in my fucking life. How are you still in business?” Nino grumbled.

“All right. Hold on.” Taking out his phone and walking to the front of the plane, Kevin aimed the phone’s camera at the overcrowded seats in the helicopter.

“Is he taking a picture?” Denzel asked.

Yuno tilted his head. “Why is he taking a picture of us?”

Nino continued grumbling, “This is actually shit service.”

Kevin pressed the record button on his phone. “No, no, it’s a video. We didn’t do the liability waiver—”

“Can you hurry the fuck up?!” Tony yelled.

Kevin continued to explain, “So, I need you guys to promise not to sue us for any accidents, okay? Can you do that?”

“We promise not to sue,” Tony said. He didn’t have the money for that anyway.

“We will not sue you for any accident, but we might fucking kill your ass if you don’t hurry up!” Lang’s patience was at an all time low.

“All right, that’ll suffice.” Kevin put his phone back into his coat pocket, and got in the pilot’s seat.

“Fantastic,” Harry said, relieved to finally be taking off into the sky.

Kevin started the engine. “Okay, fellas. Let’s have a good flight.”

“Thank you. Only waited fucking thirty-five minutes,” Tony replied sassily.

The helicopter took off, and Kevin piloted them to the ocean. He hovered the helicopter over the water, and began to gain altitude. The boys started to fill with dread as they realized just how high they were going to be.

“Woo-hoo! Let’s do a countdown! We can all jump at the same time!” All of the boys except for Yuno seemed to be wary of the danger.

They leaned closer to the opened doors, and watched the ground grow further and further away from them.

“Uhh,” Lang said.

“Huh,” Harry added.

“Interesting,” Denzel agreed.

“Try to go like two hundred feet over it,” Nino requested.

“Yeah, not too high, not too high, not too high,” Tony stated frantically.

“Yeah, we ain’t trying to die here. You know what I mean?” Nino tried to sound calm, but failed.

“Yeah, we’re not trying to die,” Tony repeated.

“Our altitude is already at a thousand feet, and we’re supposed to go to ten thousand. Don’t worry, you guys will survive.” Kevin tried calming them down, not knowing that they were going to try making the jump without a parachute, and would be fully reliant on Lang’s prototypes.

“Let’s go, boys! It’s gonna be a great jump!” Yuno cheered excitedly.

When they got to five thousand feet, Nino started panicking. “I’m, uh, scare—Um, I’m… Yuno’s scared of heights! You gotta go lower! Yuno, it’s gonna be okay!”

Yuno caught on and acted scared. “Woah, woah! This is a little high. I’m getting nervous here.”

Kevin tried calming them down again. “Okay, we don’t have to go that high. How about eight thousand feet?”

“Nope, right here looks good. Bye-bye, Harry!” Lang pushed Harry off his lap and out of the helicopter.

Yuno watched Harry disappear from sight. “Oh my god, are we jumping now?!”

Nino screamed, “He’s dead! You just fucking—”

“Goodbye, Nino!” Denzel pushed Nino out of the helicopter.

“Okay! I’ll see you guys later! Woo!” Yuno jumped out.

“Hasta la vista, baby! Yeah!”

“Let’s fucking go!”

“Ahh!”

Tony, Denzel, and Lang yelled as they jumped from the helicopter.

Kevin—who was glad to finally have some silence—immediately turned around to fly back to Fort Zancudo. He didn’t notice that no one pulled their parachute.

Harry screamed as he plummeted thousands of feet through the air. Just before he hit the water, he straightened his legs and yelled, “Spring boots, activate!”

The devices on his shoes made a loud boing, and sent a strong gust of air underneath his shoes which propelled him ten feet into the air. He fell for a second time at a much shorter distance, and splat into the water. Harry swam back up to the surface and gasped for air. Upon realizing that he was not dead, he breathed out a sigh of relief.

“Fantastic.”

Harry had a fantastic view of the raining men doing the same thing before dropping into the water with him. Confirming that no one’s devices failed and they were all alive, they swam to shore of Lago Zancudo.

Raymond was waiting there with a black Granger.

“Raymond! Oh, wait…” Yuno was about to give Raymond a hug, but stopped himself and looked down at the water dripping from his green blazer.

Raymond gave him a hug anyway. “Good to see you, buddy. When I saw you guys falling, I was worried you wouldn’t survive.”

“Yeah, I thought we were dead, for sure. We were lucky that Mr. Lang’s devices worked.”

Denzel, Nino, and Harry were groaning about their soaking wet clothes that clung to their bodies uncomfortably. They removed their suit jackets and unbuttoned their dress suits so that their upper bodies could dry.

Lang and Tony had no such decency and stripped down to their boxers, letting the ocean breeze dry their skin.

Tony walked over to Raymond, carrying his wet clothes in his arms. “You have a Granger, Ray?”

Raymond opened the trunk so that Tony could lay out his clothes to dry. “I'm in the middle of boosting it, but I figured it would have enough space to pick you guys up. I didn’t expect you to be wet, though. What happened to the parachutes?”

“We were gonna use them to practice tonight’s getaway plan, but…” Tony observed his drenched parachute. “We might have to let them dry overnight.”

Harry got into the passenger seat of the Granger, and groaned as his moist pants made a squelching sound against the cushion. “Please, take us back to the manor, Ray. We need to get changed before we go to this meeting.”

“Yeah, everyone get in.” Raymond drove the wet boys back to the manor.

(The next day - Saturday, April 3, 2021)

In the game room at CLean Manor, Tony and Raymond were waiting for Lang and Yuno to arrive so that they could discuss their plans for the day. Raymond yawned and laid down on the couch. He just woke up so he was still a little sleepy.

Tony walked around the red pool table that read “CLeanbois” on it, and pulled out his burner phone to prank call someone.

Lang was confused about why he was receiving a call from an unknown number, but answered anyway. “Hello?... Who is this?”

Tony responded in a feminine voice, “Hello there, sir. My name’s Tiffany. I’m calling about your car’s extended warranty.”

Lang rolled his eyes. “Tony, I can tell it’s you.”

“...Motherfucker,” Tony huffed, abandoning the feminine voice. “Goddammit.”

“Tony, I know you better than anybody.”

“Right, right~ We’re waiting in the game room. Where ya at?”

“Yeah, I’m coming down the driveway right now.”

Tony looked out the window next to him, watching the black DeLorean drive into the garage.

“Okay, see you here.” Tony hung up just as Yuno entered the room.

The hacker awkwardly fiddled with his sleeves as he waddled over to a drowsy Raymond.

“Raymond, I went to our room, and there was some…you know…”

“Oh shit!” Raymond quickly sat up. He was certainly wide awake now.

“Man, you can’t keep bringing your wives over, all right? It’s a shared bed and—”

“No, no, no, no, Tony left his panties on the bed. Sorry about that.”

“Mr. Tony?!” Yuno turned to Tony in shock.

“It’s ‘Tony,’” he corrected him. “And yeah, I left them there. That’s my bad. We were changing after a job.”

Yuno wasn’t sure why Tony would need to change his clothes in his and Raymond’s shared bedroom, or why his panties specifically needed to be changed, or how he could forget them on the bed, or how Raymond knew that they belonged to him. And he didn’t want to know the answers to any of those questions so he didn’t ask.

“Let’s go, guys. C’mon.” Lang entered the game room with KFC in his arms. He dropped the rooster onto the red pool table, and pet him on his head.

“Morning, Lang,” Raymond greeted, and stood up from the couch.

“Hey, Ray. Thank you for waking up early. It's only 5:30 p.m.”

The heavy sarcasm in that statement went unnoticed by Raymond. It was really early for him, and he felt acknowledged in his efforts to wake up on time.

Yuno joined them by the table. “Hey, guys? Why don’t we all lean in front of this table and take a picture?”

“Oh, hell yeah. Alright,” Lang agreed, and fixed his hair for the picture.

“Alright, but why?” Tony asked.

Yuno leaned against the table with his hands in his pants pockets. “It’s gonna look super cool, and it’ll be a great picture to look at for the memories. This is gonna be our first job together as actual Cleanbois.”

“Yeah, Cleanbois! I’ll take the picture,” Raymond said, taking out his phone. He moved his arm around, looking for the right angle to capture everyone and the “Cleanbois” text on the pool table.

Lang and Tony shared a look, and a silent conversation passed between them.

“Okay. Just don’t tell people about it,” Lang said in a serious tone.

Tony joined in, “Remember, the title doesn’t mean anything, alright? It’s just a name. We’re not a gang or anything like that. The name isn’t important; it’s you guys being here that matters. Don’t expect this to be anything other than that.”

Yuno gave him a thumbs up. “Got it, Mr. Tony.”

“How many times do I have to tell you? It’s just ‘Tony.’ You’re making me feel old.”

“Sorry, sorry.” Yuno recoiled.

Lang leaned against the table and pulled Tony next to him. “C’mon, Tony. Just smile for the photo.”

“Everybody stop moving. Three, two, one.”

They posed as Raymond clicked the shutter button. Then he brought his phone up to his face to check the picture.

“Oh, it’s great photo,” Raymond said, and sent the picture to their group chat.

With that done, Yuno eagerly clapped his hands to start their planning session. “Okay, guys. What’s your ideas for the getaway?”

“Oh, I’ve got the greatest idea,” Lang said.

“Greatest idea?” Yuno repeated.

“Here me out, hear me out.” Lang turned on the TV screen on the left side of the game room, and connected his phone to it so he could show them the map on his GPS.

“So, the Fleeca in Legion Square is right here. I’m thinking that Tony drives us east in a four-door through El Burro Heights and through the Palomino Highlands all the way to this cliff in the south. We send it into the water where we have a boat waiting by this island, and then we drive back west to the Jetsam Terminal where we have two seaplanes waiting at the edge of the platform, and then we get in and fly away. The distance from the docks to the planes is a little far, so we should probably have two bikes waiting there for us. Oh, and the parachutes are still damp from yesterday, so we’ll save them for later.”

“We’re going from a car to a boat to a bike to a plane?” Yuno asked.

“Yes.”

“I like it!”

“It’s good plan,” Raymond agreed.

Tony wasn’t as excited as the other two because of one reason. “...Sounds expensive.”

Lang couldn’t refute that. It would be their most expensive plan yet. “We’ve been doing a lot of robberies recently, and the cops have been getting stronger and more aggressive. I don’t think driving skill alone is gonna cut it anymore. No offense. Plus, I believe it’ll be beneficial for us to practice these other routes.”

“Wait, what about the parachutes? Are we parachuting from the planes?” Yuno asked as if Lang didn’t just explain the plan for the parachutes.

“They’re still drying from yesterday, so we’ll save them for later. I just really want to try this new plan I thought of last night.”

Tony sighed after hearing that. He knew that he couldn’t change Lang’s mind about the plan. “Okay. Let’s start setting this up. Everyone get into the family Cussy.”

Yuno ran out of the game room followed by Raymond and Tony. Intrigued by the excitement, KFC strutted after them, but Lang stopped in front of him, blocking his way.

“Nuh-uh. No. You’re staying here today, KFC.”

The rooster gave a few sad clucks, pulling at Lang’s heartstrings, but the Chinese man would not let himself be swayed.

“No. Last time you got so scared, you shit in my car. Now, be a good guard cock and watch the house for us while we’re gone.”

KFC kicked at the floor, but nodded his head in understanding. He followed Lang to the front door and perched himself on the windowsill to watch for danger while they were away.

♣₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅⚝⋅⁺‧₊ⴵ⋆⁺₊𓅭

While Lang drove his black Stratum to the Los Santos International Airport, Tony sat in the passenger seat, and Raymond and Yuno sat in the back seats. They were each fiddling with a handheld radio.

“Hello? Hello?” Yuno asked over the radio.

“Copy,” Tony replied, hearing the message come through.

Raymond didn’t hear it, though. “What channel are you guys on?”

“444.5,” Tony said.

Raymond switched channels and clicked the talk button. “Testing, testing. One, two.”

“Copy,” Tony replied again. “Okay, great. This way we can easily talk to each other. You guys are gonna get the bikes while Buddha and I get the planes. Then you’ll get the four-door while we get the boat.”

“We just need two bikes, right?” Yuno asked. “They don’t even have to be good bikes because we just need them to get to the planes.”

“Yeah, just something that moves,” Lang said. He didn’t want to spend extra time and money to find a fancy bike that they would barely use.

“Any old bikes will probably do.”

“Yep, even a moped would be fine.”

Yuno and Tony shared the same sentiments as Lang. For five seconds, the three of them basked in the peace of mind that they would just steal the first two bikes they found on the side of the road, and set them up at the Jetsam Terminal. For five harmonious seconds, they were at ease.

“Well, might as well grab my Akumas at the Scrapyard.”

“Ray, for fuck’s sake!”

“Oh my fucking god, Ray!”

“Oh Jesus.”

They knew that Raymond was going to respond this way, but a Cleanboi could dream for a bit.

“I’m just saying ‘cause we’re headed that direction anyway,” Raymond reasoned, and it was the truth. They would have to drive by the R.U.S.T. Scrapyard located in La Puerta to get to the airport.

“Yeah, sure, that’s why,” Lang doubted.

“We’re riding the bikes for like a hundred feet,” Yuno tried to argue.

“But listen to this, what if the plane’s disabled? Boom! Akuma escape. I could go anywhere.”

“Uh-huh. I suppose so, yeah,” Yuno conceded. He was not good at arguing, and easily gave into peer pressure.

“Akuma escape, yeah. Literally anywhere. Anywhere except in water.”

Tony rubbed his face. “Ray, just admit it. You love bikes more than women. We get it, okay? Listen, your wives are just a cover up for your bike addiction.”

Yuno had to admit that Tony was right about that. “When a lady named Akuma moves into the city and you break up with all your wives, don’t forget about us, okay?”

“Ray would stick his dick in the exhaust pipe of a fucking Akuma,” Tony said.

“Oh, he definitely fucks the Akuma’s cussy already,” Lang assured him.

“100%. You think he puts it in the left one or the right one. Aren't there two?”

“Yeah. They’re at an easily fuckable height, too.”

“Jesus Christ. Maybe he fucking fingers one while he puts his dick in the other.”

Raymond raised his eyebrow at the fanfiction that Lang and Tony were writing about him and the love of his life. “What the fuck?”

Lang looked at the rearview mirror, watching Yuno fidget uncomfortably at the sexual conversation. “What do you think about that, Yuno?”

“Huh?!”

“What?!” Raymond didn’t want to drag Yuno into this topic.

“I-I don’t know. I mean, Raymond, is this true?”

Lang insisted, “It is true. It is definitely true.”

“Yeah, he definitely fucks his bikes,” Tony agreed.

Raymond was grateful to see the Scrapyard come into view. “We’re here! Please just park, so we can get my bikes.”

Lang dropped off Raymond and Yuno at the R.U.S.T. Scrapyard. There were several of Raymond’s backup Akumas parked in the garage with fake license plates already attached to them. They each grabbed a motorcycle, and drove out of the gang compound.

“Alright. Go set the bikes up by the docks at the Jetsam Terminal. We’re gonna go get the planes.” Tony talked to them on his handheld radio as Lang resumed driving south to Los Santos International Airport.

Raymond’s voice came through the radio, “Sounds good.”

Tony continued to tell them the plan, “Once you set the bikes up, start working on getting a four-door to—”

“We need, uh, two four-doors in case something goes wrong, right?” Yuno asked.

“No, we just need a four-door that’s—”

“We got a Stratum,” Raymond cut in.

“Well, we’re gonna need a four-door that—”

“What’s wrong with it?” Raymond asked.

“Yeahyeauwaghuah! Let me finish, Ray! Get a four-door that’s gonna—”

“Yuno, the turn’s up here.”

“Dawhaa! Motherfucker!”

“Oh, it’s over there?” Yuno asked.

“Yeah, follow me.” Raymond forgot that Tony was going over the plan.

Tony took a deep breath, and said, “We’re gonna need a four-door to send us off the cliff, okay? We’re not gonna send the Cussy into the water, so we need another—”

“Ay! We’re here! Where should I park, Raymond?”

“Stop cutting me off!” Tony angrily screamed in annoyance.

“Sorry!” Yuno didn’t realize Tony was talking.

Lang spoke in a calm voice, trying to placate him, “Come on, Tony. Relax~ Just be like Yuno. He’s always happy.”

Yuno giggled. “It’s ‘cause you guys are always around.”

“Aw~ Hear that?” Despite the rough start of their relationship, Yuno quickly grew on Lang. He never thought that he would come around to love the helmeted hacker.

Tony moved the radio away from his mouth to speak directly to Lang. “I’m trying to talk on the radio. They won't fucking 10-3 and shut up. I’m trying to get out my comms.” He still took Lang’s advice to relax, and removed the irritation in his voice when he spoke over the radio again. “Are you guys already at the Terminal?” he asked as calmly as he could.

“We’re repairing the bikes at Benny’s first, and then we’re going,” Raymond responded.

“Oh okay.” Tony knew that it was way too late to convince Raymond to take his bikes out of the vehicle repair shop.

Raymond’s words were like a trigger that pulled out all of the irritation left in Tony and transferred it over to Lang. “Why is this guy repairing bikes when we’re driving less than two hundred feet?!”

Tony spoke in a calm voice, trying to placate him, “Buddha, he’s a perfectionist. That’s all it is~”

“Motherfucker, you’re repairing bikes when we’re driving less than two hundred feet with it!” Lang screamed over the radio.

“Buddha, take it ease~ That’s just how Ray is.”

“Uh, yeah, just in case. You never know,” Raymond replied.

“Yeah, we might need it,” Yuno chimed in to back him up.

“Dumbass motherfuckers,” Lang dropped the radio into a cupholder on the center console, and focused on the road.

“I’ve just learned to let ‘em do it,” Tony stated like an exhausted parent. “Y’know what I’m saying? Just let ‘em do it.”

The Russian gangster reminded Tony a lot of himself and Lang when they were younger, and his behavior gave him conflicted emotions of love and hate towards him. They despised that lifestyle now, but he hoped that he could guide Raymond so that things wouldn’t turn out the way they did for the Leanbois.

“Listen, I love Ray…” Lang began.

“I know. I love him, too.”

“I hate how he wakes up late, and takes three hours to get ready for any goddamn job.”

“I know. I hate it, too. But, it’s good that he’s extra prepared because neither of us are willing to do that to that extent. It’s helpful…sometimes.”

Lang liked to be prepared. He needed to be prepared to avoid getting caught by the police. However, Raymond’s level of overpreparation was unbearable and unnecessary. He sighed and thought about Tony’s words. “It pisses me off that it’s true.”

At Benny’s Original Motor Works located in Pillbox Hill, Yuno ran around the shop while Raymond spoke to one of the mechanics working there.

“Sir, weren’t you just here yesterday?” the mechanic asked.

“That was different bike. I need the same checkup for these ones.” Raymond pointed at his two black Akumas.

“Sir, I’m pretty sure I looked at those last week.”

“I know, but I want them to be in the best condition possible.”

“Okay, so you want me to do the full checkup? Engine inspection, ignition system inspection, oil changes, tire rotations, brake and clutch adjustments, chain lubrication—”

“Yes, all of it. And I want them waxed and polished afterwards.”

The mechanic took note of Raymond’s requests and checked the time on his phone. “All right, sir. This is gonna take about one to two hours.”

“That’s fine. We have plenty of time.”

˚₊·♡ ͟͟͞͞➳｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡𓅯˚｡⋆.

“Makin’ our way downtown~

Step on the gas~

Let’s do this fast~

Before sundown~” Lang made up his own lyrics to the tune of “A Thousand Miles” by Vanessa Carlton.

“Starin’ blankly ahead~

Just makin’ my way, makin’ a way~

Through LSIA~” Tony joined in.

“Na na na na na na na~”

“We got dongles~”

“Na na na na na na na~”

“We got laptops~”

“Na na na na na na na~”

“Time to rob this bank—Oh, wait. We ain’t~

It’s gonna be scuffed, ‘cause we’re Cleanbois~

Everything is~

So fucking scuffed~

Oh shit, looks like we are gonna get fucked again~”

“Tony, where’s the fucking turn~”

“Go right~”

Tony directed Lang to a hangar at the end of LSIA. The whole airport was located on a small peninsula, and the back of the hangar had a staircase that led to a sandy beach with a dock for boats and seaplanes. Lang parked in the small parking lot next to the staircase.

Wanting to maintain anonymity for buying the seaplanes, Tony put on a black disposable face mask, mirrored sunglasses, and pulled out his wallet filled with cash and a fake ID. Normally, he would do more to protect his identity, but San Andreas was a warm state filled with wealthy islanders. Hundreds of people rented seaplanes every day; a fake ID and covering his eyes would be enough to not connect him to the crime that they were about to commit.

He looked over at Lang who hadn't moved a muscle since he parked the car. “Where’s your disguise and fake ID?”

“I ain’t buying shit. I paid for supplies on the last job, and you still haven’t paid me back.”

“Motherfuck—Fine! How much is this?”

“$10k per rental seaplane.”

“Are you fucking seri—Why?”

“To discourage people from renting planes to commit crimes.”

“Oh, I’m discouraged alright.”

“C’mon, Tony~ We need planes~”

Tony grumbled as he exited the car, went into the hangar, and rented two Seabreeze for $20,000. They each got into a seaplane, and piloted over to the Jetsam Terminal. There was barely any space to land—as it was an industrial storage area for various cargo brought in by ships—but Tony managed to decelerate his speed and park on the corner of the platform, hidden by tall stacks of maritime containers. No one would see it unless they went to that specific location. It was also Saturday, and he knew that the seaport was closed on the weekends.

Just as Tony climbed out of the cockpit, he got a call from Lang.

“Y’ello, I’m here. Just land next to me.”

“...I don’t know how to land.”

“What do you mean? You’ve landed planes before.” Tony walked to the edge of the Terminal, and looked up. A small white speck was hovering in the air above him.

“I’ve landed helicopters before. The controls are different.”

“No, they’re not. First off, hover lower. You won’t be able to see where you’re landing if you nosedive from up there. Then find a good angle and aim for the Terminal. If you miss, just land in the ocean. You’re literally in a flying boat. You’ll be fine.”

Lang circled around, and slowly dived closer to Tony. Seeing an opening, he aimed for the corner next to Tony's Seabreeze, but somehow missed the concrete platform and flipped his seaplane upside-down, crashing into the ocean and leaving him trapped underwater. A second of silence passed, then the aircraft exploded. Blazing flames burned the exterior and rapidly died out.

“Jesus!” Tony exclaimed, still on the phone call with Lang. “How the fuck does a plane blow up underwater?”

“How is this physically possible?” Lang didn’t know he managed to survive the explosion completely unharmed, but he wasn’t going to complain about it.

“You’re the only motherfucker I know…who can literally crash a fucking plane that’s meant for water…in the fucking water. How does a motherfucker crash a seaplane in the water?”

“This is your fault, Tony. Don’t fucking flip this on me!”

“You’re a fucking dumbass, and now our fucking plane is fucked.”

“Tony, I need help!”

“Alright, I’m coming, hold on.”

“I’m upside-down, Tony!”

“Yeah, I can see that. Are you burned at all?”

“Tony, hurry the fuck up!”

“I’m fucking coming!” He hung up so he wouldn’t have to listen to Lang yell in his ear.

“Tony! Help me, you motherfucker!”

He forgot that they were still on the same radio channel, and he turned that off as well.

Tony got back into his seaplane and, unlike Lang, landed right side up on the water’s surface. He steered next to Lang’s drowned plane, and nudged it until it flipped over. The right wing was bent, the propeller was broken, there was a large gash in the fin, and the entire metal outer shell was burned black.

Now right side up, Lang climbed out of the cockpit, and looked around.

“Get over here! Walk on the wing!” Tony opened his cockpit door, and waved him over.

Lang treaded carefully on the wing of Tony’s seaplane so he wouldn’t fall into the water, and then he climbed into the cockpit with him.

Lang’s seaplane had suffered irreparable damage, so Tony flew them back to the hangar at LSIA to buy a new one. He landed by Lang’s Stratum, opened the cockpit door, and pointed at the car.

“Drive back to the Terminal and pick me up. I will fly both planes to the spot.”

“Tony, I only crashed because you gave me shit advice.”

“No, no, no, no, I’m flying the planes! Pick me up!”

“Listen, listen, I can fly!”

“Pick me up! You just drowned and exploded my $10k in the ocean! I’m flying the fucking planes.”

“Fine! Do all the fucking work by yourself! I’ll see you at the Terminal, bitch!” Lang climbed out of the cockpit, and drove his car back to the Jetsam Terminal.

Tony flew his seaplane back to his previous location, and Lang picked him up in the car and drove them back to LSIA. Tony rented another Seabreeze, flew back to the Terminal, and parked next to the other seaplane. A process that should have only taken thirty minutes at most had taken an hour and thirty minutes.

“Okay, we’ve got the planes.” Tony breathed a sigh of relief. “Ray and Yuno should’ve been here with the bikes by now.”

“Ray, Yuno, where you guys at?” Lang asked over the radio.

“We’re at Benny’s, remember? We told you this,” Raymond replied.

“Still?! It’s been over an hour!” Lang screamed to the skies. He knew that voicing it over the radio would not make a difference.

Tony turned his radio back on and responded, “Okay, Ray. We’re gonna go get the four-door, and set up the boat. The planes are ready, so just bring the bikes to the docks when you’re done.”

“Got it.”

Tony turned to Lang. “I have a VIN scratched car parked by Vespucci Beach. Let’s switch the Cussy for that one. I don’t mind sending it into the water.”

“Okay, let’s do that.”

Lang and Tony got back into the Stratum, and Tony drove them to the parking lot next to the Vespucci Beach where his VIN scratched blue Sultan Mk II was parked. They left the Stratum there, and drove the Sultan to the Puerto Del Sol Marina where Lang had his own private dock. For Cerberus reasons, Lang owned several watercraft including a submarine, but he decided that his black Jetmax would work for the plan. He just had to remember to report it as stolen before they started their heist.

Tony followed Lang to the boat at the end of the dock, and watched him extend his arms out in front of him, and dive into his boat.

“You’re the only idiot I know that dives into your boat.” He chuckled as he helped Lang cast off the lines mooring the boat to the dock.

Lang started the engine. “Pick me up at the cliffside, Tony.”

“Yeah, I’ll see you there.”

Tony drove his VIN scratched Sultan to the south of the Palomino Highlands, and found the cliff that Lang mentioned earlier. He walked to the cliff edge, and looked down. There were a couple of small islands below the cliffside. If he was driving at the right speed, he could launch the car off the cliff and land next to them. He was satisfied with the location and thought that Lang had picked out a good spot for the plan.

Movement in the corner of his eye brought his gaze back to the ocean. Lang was speeding towards the islands when his boat hit a perfectly timed wave along with a beautifully angled bump against a boulder, causing it to be launched several feet in the air and land on top of the cliff next to Tony.

“You’re the only motherfucker I know…to fucking somehow…jump a fucking boat up on a fucking cliff…that is thirty feet from the fucking water! How, bro?!”

Lang laughed at the ridiculousness of the situation. “I don’t fucking know. How was that possible?”

“You scuffed motherfucker. Everything you touch turns to scuff. But y’know, it’s probably good we got the scuff out of the way now. Y’know what I mean?”

“Yeah, that’s what we’re doing. Getting the scuff out now, so the real chase goes smoothly.”

“You think we can push it back into the water?”

Lang jumped out of the boat and looked over the cliff edge. “We’re too high up. I think that’ll break it.”

“Well then, what do we do now?”

Lang thought for half a second, but the idea of spending more time setting up the plan sounded awful. “Y’know what? Screw the boat portion of this plan. I don’t know how long it’s gonna take to get this back in the water, and I’m running out of patience. Let’s just call a tow truck to take it back to the marina. I think the planes should be good enough.”

“I agree. So, instead of coming here, I’ll just drive straight out of the Fleeca, head to the Terminal, and then we’ll swap to the seaplanes.”

Lang approved of the new plan, and called a tow service to pick up his boat before driving back to the Jetsam Terminal where Raymond and Yuno had finally arrived with the two Akumas.

“Raymond, the planes are over here!”

“Are we parking by the planes or by the docks?”

“Uhh…I don’t remember.”

Raymond tried to recall the plan. “I think it’s by the docks because we’re launching the car into the water to get to the boat, and then we drive the boat to the Terminal, right? Then we park at the docks, and drive the bikes to these planes.”

“Yeah, yeah, I just wanna look at the planes first.” Yuno drove up to the seaplanes, and Raymond followed him.

“Oh, they’re hidden behind these crates, too. I don’t think anyone will find them.” Yuno jumped off the bike, and ran around in circles to survey the area.

“Yuno, what’s that shiny thing over there? Is that another plane in the water?”

They gazed out into the ocean, and spotted Lang’s crispy seaplane drifting away.

“Yeah, that looks like a plane,” Yuno answered.

“Well, I know what happened while we were gone.”

“Hey, we should park the bikes by the docks, right? We park at the docks, and drive the bikes to these planes.” Yuno recalled as if Raymond didn’t just explain the plan.

“I think so, too. Wait, do you smell that?” Something in the air smelled off to Raymond.

“Huh?”

“It smells like—” He gasped. “Run! Yuno! Run!”

They ran behind the metal maritime containers right as a seaplane exploded, causing the other vehicles to catch on fire and explode as well. The sound of explosions lasted for a full minute, then eventually died out. After nothing had happened for five minutes, they cautiously approached the wreckage to investigate.

“That’s so unfortunate,” Raymond said.

“Wow, we’re so lucky we didn’t die. What the heck even happened?”

Raymond saw that it wasn’t only the seaplanes that exploded; his bikes were destroyed beyond recognition. “No! My bikes! We just got them repaired!”

“We just got them repaired, yeah.”

“You see, Yuno? This is what happens when you don’t give your vehicles daily checkups. They explode for no reason.”

“Oh my god, you’re right.”

Raymond tried looking at the positive side of things to take his mind off the pain of seeing his dead loved ones lying before his eyes. “I’m glad it happened now at least, and it didn't happen during the chase.”

“Yeah, me too, me too.”

“That would’ve been worse, honestly.”

“Raymond, we lost $30k in planes already.” Yuno gestured to the three burned seaplanes.

“I know, Yuno!”

“That means we’re gonna be investing $50k in planes, and we haven’t even done anything yet.”

A blue Sultan Mk II pulled up next to them. Tony exited the driver’s seat, gave a long sigh, and crossed his arms. “Oh my god. What happened?”

“Mr. To—I mean, Tony. The plane!” Yuno pointed to the burned mass of vehicles. “It blew up! We literally just walked by it. We weren’t even in it or anything.”

Lang examined the wreckage, then scrutinized Raymond and Yuno’s postures. They didn’t seem to be lying, and this wouldn’t be the first time one of the seaplanes had suddenly exploded. “Well, welcome to the Cleanbois. We’re glad to have you guys, and all the scuff that comes with it.”

“Welcome to the Scuffbois,” Tony congratulated.

Raymond chuckled at the name. “Scuffbois, baby!”

“Woo! Scuffbois!” Yuno cheered.

Looking around the disaster that had befallen them at the Jetsam Terminal, Lang announced a new course of action. “Okay, I believe this place is cursed by either ghosts or the scuff gods, so let’s just run Zancudo again. We’ll do those same two jumps from when we robbed Paleto bank except this time instead of having a bike in a bush, we’ll have two seaplanes parked under the Great Ocean Highway.”

“Can we still have bike in bush, though?” Raymond asked. “I have another Akuma at the Scrapyard we can use.”

Lang stared at him with a disbelieving look, but held himself together. “You won’t need a fucking bike. We’re gonna be getting in the planes.”

“I know, but just in case, right?”

“Motherfucker! You’re a—”

“Buddha~” Tony singsonged.

“Fine! Just bring it to Zancudo! We’ve already spent over two hours trying to get this shit set up. There’s no time to bring it to the repair shop.”

“Yeah, we just bring bike,” Raymond promised.

Tony assigned roles for the new plan. “Alright. We’ll stop by LSIA again, so Buddha and I can get the seaplanes. Then, Yuno, you will drive the Sultan to drop Ray off at the Scrapyard to get his bike. And then, we’ll all drive our vehicles to Zancudo. Let’s move.”

♣₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅⚝⋅⁺‧₊ⴵ⋆⁺₊𓅭

In the passenger seat of the blue Sultan, Lang watched the sunset. It had almost completely set over the horizon, and if they didn’t haul ass for this set up, they wouldn’t have enough time for the heist. He couldn’t stay up too late due to an early meeting tomorrow morning.

Lang began singing, “When I fall on my face~

You help me back up~

Even when I hate myself~

Baby, you show me love~”

Yuno recognized the melody. “Oh, you like Sheldon’s song?”

“I love that fucking song,” Lang replied. “Don’t Forget Me” by Sheldon Jones was released a week ago, and it was the only song he had listened to on repeat since then.

“Yeah, he’s pretty cool,” Yuno said.

Tony interrupted their conversation. “Buddha, you need to buy these two planes now. I don’t have the money for it.”

Lang had two options presented before him: argue back or continue to be petty. Each choice was too tempting to resist, so he decided to do both. “Okay, but I’m adding this to your loan. Y’know that, right?”

“Wait, what?”

“Yeah, 10% interest every day you’re late, Tony.”

“On what?”

“On the loan I gave you.”

“No, Buddha. Fuck off.”

“What do you mean, ‘No, fuck off’? I’m serious.”

“C’mon, bro. Don’t do that shit to me.”

“Then pay the loan, Tony.”

“Buddha, I just spent $30k on fucking seaplanes for us, and $25k for the laptops two days ago.”

“I gave you a loan, and you gave me your word you’d pay it back.”

“I…listen, I pay you in other ways, okay? I give you GNE.”

“No, no, no, that’s not how that works.”

“No?”

“You say you give me GNE from winning your little street races, but you haven’t placed anything above fucking fifth—”

“I just paid $30k on a fucking plane!”

“Give me my fucking money, Tony!”

“The planes!”

“Give me my fucking money!”

“The planes!”

“That’s true,” Yuno cut in. “Those planes were expensive. They kept blowing up.”

Tony appreciated Yuno taking his side of the argument. “You hear that, motherfucker? What did you just pay for in the set up? What did you pay for?”

“Motherfucker, I paid for ten thermite, and you didn’t pay for a single one! It cost me $70k, bitch!”

“If I’m not mistaken, didn’t Ray buy the thermite?”

“No, I’m talking about the ten thermite we used in the past four heists, bitch!”

“Ohh~ So, you mean when I bought the laptops?”

“Did you spend $70k or did you spend $25k, pussy ass motherfucker!”

“I spent $25k and $30k for the planes!”

“Give me my fucking money, Tony!”

“He spent a lot, including the planes, yeah,” Yuno cut in again.

“Exactly~” Tony felt acknowledged.

Lang grumbled, “This is why I don’t do shit for motherfuckers that think they have the audacity to call me stingy, and then they wonder why I don’t do shit for them.”

“I’m not calling you stingy! I—”

“I gave you a loan, you have to pay it.”

“I paid $30k for the plane!”

“I will take your ass to court, bitch!”

“Oh, you’re gonna sue me?”

“Yeah, I’ll see you in court, motherfucker!”

“You’re gonna sue me?”

“I’m gonna sue your ass!”

“Then fucking sue me!”

“Every 10% late fee is gonna be $110k I’m gonna use to sue your ass! Or you can pay me the $20k you owe me!”

“$20k? Wait, this isn’t about the heists? It’s the $20k you gave me to upgrade my car engine?”

“Yeah, give me my goddamn money.”

“I will. Just had to fucking ask for it.”

“Bitch.” Lang pouted and stared out the window.

Since their fight appeared to be over, Raymond changed the subject. “Hey, guys, for the next job we should—”

“Stop! Stop! Stop! Ray!” Tony yelled. “You’re always fucking talking about job after fucking job!”

“Ray! We’re still working on this job! Fuck!”

“Jesus fucking Christ!”

“I’m just talking about the future. Relax.” Raymond tried calming them down. “I understand you guys are having your argument right now and you’re hyped up, but relax.”

“Tony’s fucking pissing me off,” Lang growled.

“Why you guys pissing each other off? Just relax,” Raymond futilely attempted to stop the fight.

“This cheap ass motherfucker!”

“Shut up, Buddha! Shut up, motherfucker!”

“Motherfuckers, stop arguing!” Raymond looked at Yuno for help, but he just shrugged, unsure of what to do.

To Yuno, it didn’t seem like they were actually angry about money. He got the impression that they just liked arguing together, so he didn’t necessarily want to get involved in their aggressive bonding moment. However, it did sort of feel like he and Raymond were the children in the back seats, watching their parents fight.

“I’ll light your ass up, bitch!”

“I just paid $30k for fucking planes!”

“I’ll send every goon I have on your ass!”

“$30k for planes!”

“I’ll send every goon I have on your ass!”

“$30k for planes!”

“I’ll kidnap your son, and kill his ass!”

Raymond and Yuno gasped at Lang’s threat.

“What?! Why Bjorn?”

“Oh Jesus!”

They looked over at Tony, awaiting his response.

“What did you just say, little bitch? I’ll fucking take your fucking rooster, and cut his fucking head off! Put it on top of the fucking sign at the Rooster’s Rest!”

“No, not KFC! He’s innocent!” Yuno shrieked.

“Why would you do that to KFC?” Raymond asked.

“I’ll fucking burn down your fucking Corleone steakhouse! I’ll shit in your fucking barbeque, bitch!” Lang threatened.

“Do it, pussy! You’ll probably shit out fucking gold, and make it taste like a million bucks. If you did that, then I’d be able to give you your fucking money!”

“You shit out gold, Lang?” Raymond asked seriously.

Tony stopped the car. “Buy the fucking planes, Buddha! And you’re flying one of them this time. I ain’t fucking going back and forth again.”

They had returned to LSIA for the fourth time that day, and Lang rented two Seabreeze for $20,000. They each piloted a seaplane to Lago Zancudo while Yuno drove Tony’s VIN scratched Sultan back to the R.U.S.T. Scrapyard so Raymond could get another Akuma. He was very tempted to bring it to Benny’s to give it a checkup, but he forced himself not to with some heavy coercing from Yuno.

Ten minutes later, Yuno parked the car under the Great Ocean Highway as Raymond drove up next to him on his Akuma. A few seconds later, Tony parked the seaplane behind them. They all exited their vehicles, and stood side by side next to the Zancudo River.

Tony clapped his hands. “Alright! This is it, guys. We’re almost ready.”

“Now, all we need is Lang to park his plane, right?” Raymond asked.

“Yeah, we got the planes here,” Yuno pointed at the underpass. “They’re going under the bridge. The cops probably won’t see it. We’ll put the backup bike in a bush. And for the chase, we’re gonna do those two jumps with the car to get here, and then that’s…”

Yuno went silent as they watched Lang’s seaplane fly through the air at a great speed. It bumped into Tony’s seaplane which crashed into the car which crashed into the bike which caused everything to combust in massive explosions.

After a minute, Lang came running out of the flaming bushes, somehow unscathed from the blaze behind him. Raymond, Tony, and Yuno were still stunned speechless, but Lang hysterically laughed as if he wasn’t nearly killed.

Yuno eventually found his words. “So…good thing you’re rich, right?”

“Yup! I wasn’t paying attention. I think I’m cooked,” Lang rubbed his tired eyes.

Tony groaned. “Yeah, no shit. Everything’s literally cooked.”

The shrubbery spread the fire towards them, and they moved to the other side of the river. The positive side about this incident was that it happened in a wetland, so the fire would put itself out soon.

Yuno decided that after everything that had happened that day, this outcome only made sense. “Wouldn’t be us if it wasn’t scuffed, huh?”

“How the hell did you survive that?” Raymond asked.

“Scuffbois!” Lang yelled in response.

“We’re not redoing this set up again. I’m never going to financially recover from this.” Tony gloomily looked at his empty wallet.

“Yeah, I’m done for today. Let’s run it tomorrow,” Lang declared.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

Without a vehicle, the four unsuccessful bank busters walked along the Great Ocean Highway back to Los Santos. At first, Yuno excitedly ran in circles around the group, enjoying the family hike. However, the running and jumping tired him out, resulting in Raymond carrying the sleeping hacker on his back for the next three miles.

It was about an hour of walking when they heard music coming from the shoreline. The sound woke up Yuno, and he jumped off Raymond’s back to follow the music to a large yacht that was apparently rented by Chang Gang for April’s birthday. They were surprised to learn that despite her name, she was born on April 3rd, not April 1st.

After a brief discussion, April allowed them to hitchhike a ride back to Vespucci Beach where Lang’s Stratum was parked in exchange for $50,000 which Lang reluctantly paid. They ended up having a fun time at the party—getting drunk and dancing—while April debuted her new song, “April’s Fool.”

Chapter Text

(Friday, April 16, 2021)

Lang had just finished his last meeting for the day, and rushed over to visit the Vultur Lé Culturé before it closed. He walked in through the the glass door entryway, and saw the owner of the establishment aiming his pistol at a customer, who was on his knees with both of hands held behind his head.

Ramee made eye contact with Lang, then put his pistol away. “Okay, get off your knees, man. I’m not gonna fucking kill you, bruh. I’ll give you $700 for the gem. That’s it.”

The customer stood up, brushing the dirt off his pants. “Why are you messing with me? I’m like…just like gimme $1000 and I’ll walk away.”

“I’m not giving you $1000 for that dirty jade. I’ll give you $700 like I said.”

“I’ll just wait till you’re not working, and talk to one of your co-workers, man. It’s fine.”

Ramee scoffed, “Good. Yeah, yeah, do that. What’s your name?”

“I don’t know why you’re being so like—”

Lang laughed, cutting off the customer. “Sir, this is Ramee El-Rahman. He owns this gallery.”

“Motherfucker, you realize I own the fucking building, right?” Ramee stopped holding back, and prepared to taunt the man.

“All right. If you need it so bad, then it’s your loss.” He double downed.

Ramee sneered, “Oh~ Really? Motherfucker, how ‘bout you keep the gem, and you can ram it down your fucking throat, huh? How ‘bout that? Trust me, I’ll catch you later, man.”

“Okay. Have a good day.”

“Yeah, good fucking day. Get the fuck outta my face.” Ramee opened the front door, and the customer walked out of the gallery.

Five seconds passed, then Ramee sprinted down the street to catch up to him. “Sir, please! I’m sorry! I’m kidding! Let me get your fucking gem! Ay!”

Lang let out a burst of laughter. “Holy shit. How the fuck does Ramee run a business? I don’t understand.”

Fifteen minutes later, Ramee reluctantly agreed to pay the customer $1000 for the jade, then promptly kicked him out of the gallery again.

“Aight. Whatchu want, Lang?” Ramee looked at the dirty gemstone he had just bought, and headed over to the gem appraisal room. Lang followed behind him.

“You got any Onyx Gems here?”

Ramee stilled. “...No? Why you wanna know?”

“I’m trying to build something, and I thought you’d have some.” Lang was speaking casually as if he didn’t realize the weight of the words he just said which only made Ramee become more wary of him.

“You think I would have a fucking Onyx Gem? If I found one, I would’ve found true power. It’s practically an Infinity Stone from the MCU.”

“Ramee, don’t fuck with me here. I am literally Tony Stark, Batman, Lex Luthor, and Doc Brown all in one. I need to build a suit and change the world. I need to—Fuck, I still gotta build two scuff capacitors to make my fucking car work. Do you understand me?”

“What does that have anything to do with Onyx Gems? All I’m saying is that I don’t have any.”

Lang gestured to the gallery. “You have like a million gems here. I thought you were collecting them?”

“I’m collecting—Wait, do you mean Onyx Dust?”

“Oh! Maybe? What’s the difference?”

Ramee let out a sigh, no longer suspicious of Lang, but rather annoyed by his inability to recall important information. “Onyx Dust exists everywhere, and it literally holds time and space together. It’s very hard to find and collect because they’re tiny black and gold particles. You can really only see it in large amounts where it looks like a dusty black cloud that shimmers gold. An Onyx Gem is a black stone with a gold sheen. I don’t know how to make them yet, but I know that it requires Onyx Dust.”

Lang stared at him uncomprehendingly as he finished his explanation. “...This is why you’re the one studying this.”

“So, you’re looking for Onyx Dust?”

“Sounds like it.” Lang still wasn’t sure, but it did sound like it.

“Well, you’re gonna have to wait till I collect more. I used to have hella Onyx Dust, but Dean’s been buying it all.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. He just said that he needs it for something called Project Eden.”

Lang’s expression grew dark with those words. “What do you know about Eden?”

“I don’t know shit. All I know is Dean needs a fucking shit ton of Onyx Dust.”

“And you didn’t think that’s fucking sus as fuck?”

“I do now! What’s Project Eden?” Ramee was perplexed by Lang’s sudden shift in demeanor.

“I’m not sure if I can trust you, Ramee. You working for the Dark Timelord?”

“I just explained fucking Onyx to you! We’re on the same side here. What do you know?”

Lang was still distrustful of Ramee, and didn’t want to give away too much about what he knew. Though, there was one vital piece of advice that Ramee should know, regardless of if they were on the same side or not.

“All I can say for now is to stay away from golden apples. If someone offers you one, don’t eat it ‘cause it’s probably from the Garden of Eden.”

With that, Lang left the gallery.

Scene 6: Rainbow Road

At CLean Manor—underneath the staircase and next to the dining room—was a dimly lit office with two wooden desks at each end of the room. The left side had a wooden cabinet, a bar table, and a three-dimensional map of the State of San Andreas hanging on the wall. The right side had a python terrarium, a brown couch, and a glass door that led outside to the front driveway.

Lang had just returned from the Vultur Lé Culturé, and entered the office through the main door from the dining room. He went straight to the three-dimensional map and examined each red pin and note marked on it.

There were ten red pins in total, each accompanied by a note with heist details. Blaine County Savings Bank, Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank, Fleeca Great Ocean, Fleeca Lifeinvader, Fleeca Pink Cage, Fleeca Harmony, Fleeca Hawick, Fleeca Legion Square, Bay City Bank, and Vangelico. They were the only ten buildings in the state carrying the golden apple logo of the suspicious security company, and he had checked the files in all of them to no avail. He still knew nothing about this company which he suspected to be somehow related to Eden.

Feeling heavily defeated about their wasted efforts for the past month, he groaned and plopped himself face down on the plush couch cushions.

Tony walked in through the office door shortly after with KFC in arms. He knelt next to the python terrarium, and held up the rooster to the glass. “You see that, KFC? That’s Schneaky Shnaaeyke. He eats birds like you for breakfast, if you ever—”

“Stop scaring my cock, Tony. It’s not his fault you suck at blackjack,” Lang mumbled into the cushion.

“He was cheating and you know it,” Tony insisted. He laid the rooster on Lang’s back, then sat down on the floor next to the couch.

“What’s wrong, Buddha? Why are you face down, ass up, upsetti spaghetti? Bing bong. Fuck your life—”

“Tony, what the fuck are you saying?”

“It’s this thing I seen on TikTok. Anyway, why you looking all depresso’d espresso’d, huh?”

Lang pointed to the map without looking up from the couch. “We’ve been breaking into all these buildings all over the island, and we haven’t found anything useful. We still don’t even know what the suspicious security company is called.”

“You think this is a dead end?”

Lang really hoped that wasn’t the case, but if it was, then he wanted to do one last heist, just to make sure. “I feel like we gotta be missing something, so I wanna go back and double check the buildings we’ve already hit.”

Tony’s eyes widened. “That’s gonna take a long ass time.”

“I know, but I really think we should do it. Also, if we can somehow hit everything in a day, then it wouldn’t take that long at all. You free tonight?”

“I’m gonna be busy running events for Redline every night for the next couple of weeks. The racing scene is popping off right now, and I promised Big M and Goofy that I’d be there. Look at my new jacket! This is the official Redline jacket.”

Lang lifted his head and looked at Tony. He was wearing a bomber jacket with red and black floral designs stitched across the leather. The red Redline logo was printed on the front in the bottom left corner. It was clearly a high-quality jacket and he thought it looked beautiful. Even though he wasn’t even in Redline, he was a little jealous that he didn’t have one of his own. He made a mental note to find the company that made it for Tony later.

“Are you fucking serious, Tony? It looks like shit.”

Tony smirked. “Don’t shit on the jacket because you’re jealous. Anyway, this is what it means to be the leader of a racing crew, and this is really important. A lot of rumors are spreading in the Underground about the Puppets, and they’re saying the Puppet Master might be dead. I gotta be there to make sure everything’s okay.”

Lang groaned. “Fine, go be a cringe ass racer.”

“It’s not cringe. I’ll see you after tonight’s races, alright?” Tony stood up.

“Yeah, okay. I love you.”

“Love you too, Buddha.”

Tony exited the office through the glass side door, and got into his red Hycade in the front driveway. He was about to drive off when Raymond and Yuno arrived on a black Akuma.

“You heading out, Tony?” Raymond asked, parking the motorcycle in the driveway.

“Yeah, I’ve got some races to go to.”

“Okay, good luck. I love you, brother.”

“Love you too, Ray. Oh, Yuno, I put your cut for last night’s job in your room, by the way.”

“Perfect! Thanks, Tony.”

“Good night, Yuno. See you tomorrow. I love you, alright?” Tony started driving forward.

“Yeah! Good luck with the races, Tony! I’ll catch ya later.”

Tony slammed on the brakes, and reversed back down the driveway.

“Say it,” he demanded.

“Good night, Tony!” Yuno yelled as he headed towards the front door.

“Why don’t you say it?!”

“Good night!”

“Why don’t you love me?! Why?” Tony sniffled. “Why don’t you say it? What did I do?”

“See you tomorrow, Tony!” Yuno called out one last time, and entered the manor with Raymond.

(The next day - Saturday, April 17, 2021)

Yuno rode his BMX through Richman Glen, heading south to CLean Manor. He was sweating and panting when he made it to the lower driveway, and left his bike in front of the garage. He checked his phone and saw that he had missed a call from Lang, so he called him back while he trudged up the staircase to the side lawn.

“Hey, Yuno. You finally called me back.”

“Sorry, Mr. Lang, my phone got stolen. I just got another one.”

“How the fuck are you always getting fucked with, huh? What’s going on here?”

“I don’t know. I get robbed like three times a day. They always take my ID and my phone, too. I had to ride my bike back to the manor because I crashed my car and I don’t have enough money to repair it.”

Yuno reached the side lawn, and saw all seven of The Guild members hanging out there. Bjorn, Stagdancer, Leyla, Lando, and Gloryon appeared to be doing some type of fight training in the grass while Yeager was teaching Meowfurryon how to swim in the pool. They were being quite loud and he could barely hear Lang through the phone, so Yuno went into the manor’s living room through the side door.

“Yuno, how the fuck are you poor? You’ve been hacking for everybody.”

“I don’t know, Mr. Lang, I don’t know. I checked my logs, and I’ve done over a hundred jobs with about twenty different crews, right?”

“A hundred jobs, and you’re fucking poor?”

“A hundred jobs, and I’ve got $4k in my account.”

“How is that possible, Yuno? That doesn’t make any sense.”

“I don’t know. I just did a back-to-back bank job yesterday, too. I just—I-I’m broke.”

Ever since last month when Yuno discovered that he had a talent for hacking, he had been advertising his freelance hacking services to other criminals. He didn’t care about status or criminal background history, he offered to hack for everybody. Nearly every criminal knew about him, and he was constantly busy doing jobs for them. He would do about one to two jobs a day, but he never made any money from it and he didn’t know why. Yuno pondered it over as he ran in circles around the living room before sprinting over to the dining room.

“Okay, how much did you make on these last two jobs, then?” Lang asked.

“Well…I couldn’t afford to pay for any of the supplies, and it was a new crew, and I was just the hacker so I didn’t contribute very much—Ugh! Mr. Lang, we need new fruit. I just bit into this banana on the dining table and it tastes weird.”

Yuno set the banana back down on the silver tray where he grabbed it from. He found it weird that there was always a banana and a pineapple sitting on the dining table, but he was really hungry at the moment. He had been biking for two hours and he couldn’t afford to buy lunch in the city. Normally, he would just wait for Rooster’s Rest to open and steal the leftovers from the pantry, but the restaurant wouldn’t open for another hour.

“It’s fake, Yuno. It’s not for eating.”

“Huh? Wait, what about this pineapple?” Yuno poked at the fruit, and realized that they were both made of plastic. Thinking back on it, he couldn’t believe that he just bit into a plastic banana without attempting to peel it first.

“The fruit is just for decoration. They represent Leanbois codewords from back in the day. Banana is the codeword to kill somebody. Pineapple is the codeword to get the fuck outta there.”

“Oh~ I see.” Yuno thought it was cute that Lang and Tony kept a memento of their Leanbois days as decorative fruit on the table. He felt bad about biting into one, but he knew that Lang’s butler, Alfred, would probably buy a new one later today.

“You don’t have to remember the codes, though. We don’t really use them for jobs anymore.”

“Oh yeah! That reminds me, I’ve got a genius plan for our next heist! I thought of this last night,” Yuno exclaimed excitedly and continued running around the manor.

“Okay, talk to me.”

“I call this the Rainbow Road. We rob a Fleeca bank, immediately drive to Paleto and rob it, then we drive over to the City Vault and rob that one, too. We rob every single color bank all at once. Green for Fleeca, blue for Paleto, and red for the City Vault.”

“Well, I think that’s genius, and how do you feel about doing this today?”

“To-Today?”

“It’s funny you mention that because DownBad Mickey, X, and I wanted to do a Team Rocket job.”

“Team Rocket? Like from Pokémon?”

“You see, the three of us met last year at an illegal gambling ring in Las Venturas. We piled our winnings together to commit a few crimes here and there, but we weren’t very successful and ended up returning to the gambling ring several times to win it all back. We called ourselves Team Rocket because of our frequent failures.”

“Oh, wait, yeah! I remember Mr. X telling me about this a little bit. I actually met him in Las Venturas, too.” Yuno had been living in Las Venturas up until last December when he moved to San Andreas. During his time in the desert city, he had run into Jean Paul a few times at the local casino. He was surprised to run into Jean Paul again in Los Santos, nearly a year later.

Lang continued his explanation, “Yeah, so this gambling ring had this color-coded wheel, and we always bet on blue, purple, and red. Additionally, the banks near the ring were color-coded green, blue, and red just like the banks here in San Andreas. So, we actually thought about hitting every bank at the same time like it’s all one big bet. We triple down or we get nothing.”

“Wait, you had the same idea? Ah, man. I thought I was a genius.”

“It’s crazy that you had the same idea. Mickey came up with a plan last night when I told him that I wanted to break into the three largest banks on the island. You down to join us?”

“What about Tony and Raymond?”

“Tony’s busy being a cringe racer, and Ray’s busy being a cringe gangbanger.”

“Ohh, that’s right. Raymond said he was in a gang war or something,” Yuno recalled.

“Being a cringe gangbanger, yeah. Wanna come meet us at the Vinewood Bowl in a few hours? Mickey will explain the plan there.”

“Yeah, yeah. Can we still call it the Rainbow Road? I thought it was a good name from this game I used to play.”

“Yeah, we can definitely call it the Rainbow Road,” Lang agreed.

“All right! See you soon, Mr. Lang!”

“See you, Yuno. I love you. Say you love me.”

“Wh-Wha—Mr. Lang? What?”

“Tell me you love me for letting you join the heist and name it.”

“Whaththat—What do you mea—I-I think I’m losing reception.”

“I need to hear it from you, Yuno.”

“Well, thanks, Mr. Lang. I appreciate it. I really, really think you’re great.”

“‘Thanks, I love you, Lang.’ No problem, Yuno. I love you too.”

“You’re great. I like you a lot. You’re the best boss.”

“I love you.”

“I…whebeuhe—”

“Just say it. It’s very easy.”

“I lahvebeuhe—”

“Just say it back. It’s not hard.”

“Yeah, yeah, Mr. Lang. I lo—”

“Yuno, it’s—”

Yuno hung up. It was then he realized that while he was on the phone, he had somehow gotten stuck on the roof of the manor. He frantically waved his hands at The Guild below him and called out for help.

Meowfurryon was more than willing to leave the pool, and help Yuno. As a cat, he was a climber, not a swimmer, and he effortlessly scaled up the manor to the roof. It was then that he realized he was stuck as well.

The two cats meowed for help until they caught the attention of Gloryon and Yeager. Gloryon carried his adoptive brother down from the rooftop while Yeager threw Meowfurryon back into the pool to resume his swimming lessons.

🃟♡₊⁺🃑♧⁺⋅⚝⋅⁺♢🃎⁺₊♤🂫

It was 10:00 p.m. when Yuno made it to the Vinewood Bowl on his BMX, wearing his usual crime outfit featuring his olive green raincoat with his black cat ears popping out of the slits in the hood. The Vinewood Bowl was an open-air amphitheater located in Vinewood Hills. It consisted of a large band shell, several rows of raked seating, and the concave hillside the theater was carved into.

Yuno found Lang—who was also wearing his black crime outfit—standing inside the band shell. The businessman was in the middle of a heated phone call, and the curious cat jumped up on the stage and made his way over to him to eavesdrop.

“Yeah, we kinda busy right now. Get your own fucking crew, get your own fucking hacker, go through the blood, sweat, and tears that we had to go through, and fucking achieve that shit, motherfucker! Stop calling Yuno only when he’s fucking convenient to you!” Lang screamed and hung up.

“Oh Jesus. What happened?”

“Listen, Yuno, I love you with all my heart, and it pisses me off to see motherfuckers trying to use you instead of doing it themselves.”

“That is true…” Yuno didn’t want to admit it, but while he did enjoy hacking, he was getting worn out by the sheer amount of requests and the lack of payments.

“Yeah, I think you’re too nice for your own good,” Mickey replied, having recently arrived as well and caught the end of their conversation. Since he had just gotten off work at the Vanilla Unicorn, he was wearing his firefighter helmet and pants.

“DownBad Mickey!” Yuno greeted.

“Hey, guys. What are you talking about?”

“Everyone in the city is calling Yuno to hack for them, and they’re not paying him what he’s worth,” Lang said.

“I’m broke. I’ll take what I can get, but it doesn't sound nice to demand money from your friends.” Even though it was technically his money that he would be asking for, Yuno didn’t want to bother them by persistently complaining about it.

“Motherfucker, I do that all the time. I’m the richest man in the city, and I have a lot of friends.”

Mickey nodded. “I agree with Lang here. He is parsimonious, but he has a point.”

Yuno considered their words, and hesitated. “...I-I don’t know. I still don’t think I’d feel comfortable—Mr. X! Mr. X!”

Yuno was glad to escape the conversation, and dashed over to the parking lot to greet Jean Paul who was wearing his clothes for his “X” persona consisting of a yellow shirt with poker chips on it, white pants, white gloves, yellow shoes, and a skull mask. He took off the mask, and ran his fingers through his blonde hair before talking to Yuno.

Lang leaned over to Mickey. “Hey, we gotta help Yuno make some money today, alright? If we don’t help him make money, these crews are gonna fucking spam call his ass and try to fucking manipulate him into hacking for them.”

“Yeah, that’s what we’re doing. Hopefully, if all goes well, we should make over $800k.”

“Mista Lang Mista Lang!” Jean Paul greeted as he and Yuno returned to the band shell.

“Fuck, it’s been a while X.”

“Aww I missed you Mista Lang it’s good to see you again.” The blonde-haired man spoke quickly with a slight French-Canadian accent, and gave Lang a hug.

“I missed you too, motherfucker. I’m glad you’re back.”

“Hey, Jean Paul. It’s good to s—”

Jean Paul groaned, pulling away from the hug and glaring at Mickey. “Motherfucker who invited this dumbass bitch ass bruh?”

“Hey, Jean Paul. It’s good to see you, too. I’m the one who came up with today’s plan,” Mickey continued, unphased by the insults. He was used to being shit on by Jean Paul.

“I thought we were using my plan,” Jean Paul protested.

“Well, I have good news. I just redesigned your original plan which was dope, but honestly, batshit insane.”

“But I mean that’s what made it good no?”

“...No.”

“Wait, what was his plan?” Yuno asked.

Lang pulled out his phone and showed a picture to Yuno. It was a map covered with scribbles that he couldn’t decipher for the life of him.

Sensing his confusion, Lang explained, “When we leave the last bank, he steals a Cargobob and hooks our car onto the bottom of it and flies away.”

“And we shoot Air-1 while flying!” Jean Paul added.

Yuno clapped his hands. “Oh! And he could swing the hook, so we could do it in a backflip in the car.”

“Yeah!”

“I mean, I don’t know how well it’s gonna work, but it would look super cool.” Yuno liked the plan, and he didn’t see the numerous problems with it.

Mickey had to intervene to bring them back to reality. “It would look pretty sick. I’m just worried it’s, uh…it sounds a little excessive.”

“This is Team Rocket I don’t care if there’s no reason or plan I don’t give no shit bruh I’m going in,” Jean Paul said.

Lang’s phone rang. It was a call from Yeager and—worried that it might be important—Lang answered it while walking off the stage. “Gimme a second. Hey, what’s up, son?”

“I put your shit in The Guild Hall,” Yeager informed.

“Thank you very much. I appreciate that.”

“Also, Denzel is training Leyla, Lando, and Meowfurryon right now if you wanna come over.”

Lang forgot that he had scheduled that lesson to happen today, but he couldn’t leave at the moment. “I can’t. I’m at the Vinewood Bowl.”

“Uh, doing what? How—”

“I can’t believe what I’m hearing right now,” Jean Paul said with annoyance.

“Shut up, pussy. Sit down.”

Hearing Jean Paul and Mickey drown out Yeager’s voice, Lang tried to walk further away from the band shell.

Jean Paul complained, “I literally just said we are risking our lives out here in this bank for some cash and this guy takes a phone call.”

“What if it’s important?” Yuno asked.

“More important than robbing banks?!”

“It might be important, okay?” Mickey tried to quell Jean Paul’s growing irritation.

“We’re doing a triple bank heist! We’re bank bustas! That’s more important bruh!”

Lang laughed when he made it to the other end of the Vinewood Bowl, and he could still hear them talking on the stage. “Hey, Yeager. I made all the boys meet up at the Vinewood Bowl for a job, and everybody’s on the stage, and the whole city can hear it.”

“What the fuck?”

“I gotta go. I’ll call you later.”

“All right.”

Lang hung up and ran back to the front of the stage. “Ay! Everyone get off the stage! Your voices are being amplified by the band shell! I can hear you guys a mile away!”

Mickey laughed. “Oh shit!”

Everyone moved from the stage to the parking lot. They looked like a suspicious group gathered underneath a single tree in the dark, empty parking lot.

“Okay, here’s my proposal for our getaway plan,” Mickey cleared his throat and prepared to set the tone for their heist. “Now, gentlemen, I’m presenting an infinitesimal lie when I say this is a foolproof plan because the actuality is that no group has ever tried to commit a transgression of this caliber before. It would be naïve to assume the Unified Police Force would take a laissez-faire approach to the pursuit, and I don’t know what the condign course of action would be. Whether it is immediate escalation of the situation or… Yuno?”

At some point through his monologue, Yuno activated like a Pokémon and began running around the parking lot with purpose.

“Yuno, why are you running around? I… Wha-What? Yuno, why—” Mickey waited until Yuno ran closer to the group, then called out to him again, “Yu-Yuno? Are you okay?”

“Huh? I-I’m having an episode. Give me a minute.”

“You’re having a—Oh! It’s your ADHD.”

“‘Cause you’re taking forever to explain the plan!” Lang yelled.

Jean Paul groaned, “Mickey is a dogshit Mickey is a dogshit Mickey is a—”

Lang witnessed their two most easily distracted members slowly losing their minds. “Just skip the boring part. We hit the first bank, boom! Second bank, boom! Third bank! Boom! We’ll update Yuno later while we’re setting up.”

“Okay, okay!” Mickey conceded. “Anyway I lied. This plan is actually redesigned off of a plan that Lang told me about. So, Tony gave me his VIN scratched Sultan Mk II for the initial getaway. We’ll use it to drive from the Fleeca on Great Ocean Highway to Paleto bank and then to the City Vault. We’ll be travelling in a circle around the whole island. For our final part of the getaway, Lang showed me this cliff in the south of the Palomino Highlands where we can send the car into the water, and have a boat waiting at the nearest island. Next, we drive north to another set of islands where we have two seaplanes waiting for us. Then we just get in and fly away.”

“I like Seasharks we could go boat into four Seasharks to the two seaplanes,” Jean Paul suggested.

Mickey considered it, and concluded that it would be harder to persuade Jean Paul to not use Seasharks. He figured that they could try setting them up, and if it didn’t work out, then they still had the boat. “Sure, we could do that. There’s probably another island in between that we could use.”

“Yeah, yeah, sounds like a good plan.” Yuno had returned to the group. He was hanging above them from a branch in the tree, swinging his blue light up shoes back and forth.

Now that Mickey had everyone’s attention again, he brought back his initial concern. “And circling back to what I was saying before, there are a myriad of potential obstacles, right? Each time we stop at a bank is a chance for the cops to breach us. Also, once we go from the Fleeca to Paleto, what happens if they catch on to our plan and know that we’re heading from Paleto to the City Vault? It’s a long, long drive from Paleto down south into Vinewood, and my biggest concern is they preemptively place officers outside of the City Vault.”

“Oh…yeah, you think? Yuno questioned.

Mickey turned to their criminal veteran. “Lang, you’ve been in the city the longest, how do you feel about this plan?”

“Uh, well, I think that by the time we start going from Paleto to the City Vault, the cops are gonna figure out what we’re doing, and probably disable our car and kill us.”

They thought about that in silence for a minute until Yuno spoke up.

“...Jesus.”

“That’s within the ambit of the law?” Mickey asked.

“Probably,” Lang guessed.

Mickey pointed up to their cat. “Listen, the cops love Yuno. If Yuno just yells at the cops to not shoot us, we’ll be okay.”

“Yeah, I hope so. I did bring sandwiches to the police station today.”

Jean Paul interrupted their hopeful, yet unrealistic expectations. “Listen listen if they’re waiting for us at the vault then we just gotta skip it and continue to the final getaway there’s no way around it.”

“Yeah, so we just gotta plan as if it’s not gonna happen, I think,” Yuno agreed. “There’s no other way to get from Paleto to the City Vault any faster.”

Lang presumed that skipping the final bank would probably be their best course of action if they didn’t want to be killed. “True, true. So, what’s the first step then? We wanna go grab the seaplanes?”

“Okay here’s what we’re gonna do we’re gonna split the early tasks one gets a boat one gets the Seasharks and two gets the seaplanes,” Jean Paul rapidly spoke, tired of standing around.

Mickey nodded. “Sounds good, let’s go.”

“I’m gonna get the Seasharks aight?” Jean Paul tried getting into his black Sultan Mk II, but the door wouldn't unlock. “Something’s wrong with my fucking car man.”

“Oh, that car is Tony’s VIN scratch. Your car is over there.” Mickey pointed behind him.

Jean Paul turned around, and saw another black Sultan Mk II except this one had lights flashing on and off as he pressed the unlock button on his key fob. He walked to the car. “Okay I’mma get the Seasharks pick me up on the left of the city uh there’s a series of islands uh on the right on the right yeah at the bunch a weird crescents a bunch a weird islands I’ll park there I’m gonna go put Seasharks right there you know I’m saying aight see ya man aight love you guys peace out.”

“Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.” Yuno waved as Jean Paul got in his car, and drove away.

Mickey struggled to translate the incoherent announcement. “Wha…What the fuck did I just listen to?”

Lang assumed, “He probably drank too much coffee today.”

“He said he’s going to put the Seasharks at the islands on the right side of the city.”

Yuno said it so confidently that Mickey was inclined to believe him. “You understand Jean Paul diction?”

“More or less. Can you please help me down, Mickey? I’m stuck.”

“You’re stuck in a tree?”

“This always happens when I get distracted climbing. You’re a firefighter, right? You help people in trees, don’t you?”

Mickey looked down at his sexy firefighter outfit, then he looked up at Yuno’s black cat ears.

“Jump down, cat man. I’ll catch you.” Mickey stood below the branch Yuno was sitting on, and raised his arms towards him.

Yuno jumped down, and the world blacked out for a second. When they regained their senses, they were able to stand up from the concrete pavement and brush the dirt off their clothes.

“Okay.” Mickey rubbed the back of his head, easing the throbbing pain. “What’s your predilection for vehicles, Yuno? Wanna help me get the seaplanes?”

Yuno massaged his sore knee, and the pain gradually went away. He realized that he was asked a question, and answered, “I don’t know how to fly a plane.”

Lang rolled his eyes at their antics. “Alright. Mickey and I will get the seaplanes, and Yuno can get the boat.”

“I don’t know how to drive a boat.”

“Are you fucking serious?” Lang asked.

“I can barely drive a car. That’s part of the reason why I rode my bike here.” Yuno grabbed his BMX parked under the tree and rolled it over to them.

“In that case, you can tag along with us while we set up the vehicles,” Mickey unlocked the Sultan and opened the trunk for him.

“I’ll just tag along, yeah.” Yuno lifted his BMX and dropped it in the trunk.

“Lang, just a heads up, it’s gonna drive you crazy to hang out with us,” Mickey warned.

“Why is that?”

“Recently, we’ve been hanging out and doing jobs together so I can teach him how to fight and how to make epic getaway plans. However, sometimes we’re just very dumb, and we don’t value our lives as much as we should. We’re kinda like Evel Knievel in that regard.” Mickey handed the car keys to Lang, so he could drive them to Puerto Del Sol Marina.

🃟♡₊⁺🃑♧⁺⋅⚝⋅⁺♢🃎⁺₊♤🂫

On a beach that Jean Paul didn’t know the name of, he harassed a group of four people riding Seasharks until they gave him the keys to their watercraft. It was a rather easy confrontation once he pulled out his pistol and shot one of them in the leg. They scattered off to seek medical attention for their friend, and Jean Paul realized that he had a new problem that he didn’t think of beforehand which was how he was going to transport all four watercraft.

His simple solution was to strap them all on the roof of his Sultan with a giant chain and hope that they wouldn’t fall off on the drive to the beach across from the islands. It looked comical, and there was no way that any of the Seasharks were safely secured. He would probably get fined if he was pulled over by the police, so he wasn’t going to. He got into his Sultan and headed towards the islands.

At Puerto Del Sol Marina, Lang parked their black Sultan in the parking lot. He believed that it would be safe there until they started their heist.

Lang helped Mickey and Yuno get into his black Jetmax, and then drove the boat to Los Santos International Airport where he stopped by the beach behind the hangars. “I’ll rent my Seabreeze first, fly it to the island, then we’ll drive back with the boat to get the other one.”

“Got it.” Mickey took hold of the steering wheel and Lang jumped onto the beach, heading for the hangar.

Ideally, Mickey and Lang would’ve rented their seaplanes at the same time and they would all head to the islands together, but Yuno didn’t know how to drive the boat. They didn’t mind taking the extra time to set up, though.

Lang rented the Seabreeze, and barely flew out of the airport before the aircraft started losing altitude.

Mickey vocalized his concern into his handheld radio, “Uh…oh, um—”

“I might be dead here, guys.” Lang crashed into the ocean. Unlike last time, the seaplane didn’t explode and it was still in good condition.

“Team Rocket! Let’s go!” Mickey cheered.

Yuno giggled. “I don’t think this is a good start.”

“This is an amazing start! It’s just like I remember,” Mickey happily recalled their days in Las Venturas.

He steered the boat next to the cockpit of the seaplane. “You want me to fly, Lang?”

“No, no, I got this. I was just practicing how to land on water,” he lied.

“Oh, all right. See, Yuno? He was just practicing. Everything’s fine.”

Lang took off into the air again, and they followed him in the boat. As they traveled further north, they realized that there were a lot of islands, and they weren’t certain which island Jean Paul was referring to. It didn’t help that it was 10:30 p.m., and the night made it harder to see.

“Yuno, do you happen to know which island exactly Jean Paul wanted us to land this seaplane on?” Mickey asked.

“Uh, well, I mean, surely we’ll just see him with the Seasharks, right?”

“Oh, that’s true. He’ll probably just be there.”

After searching for ten minutes, they found Jean Paul on a beach right off the Palomino Highlands with four Seasharks parked on the shoreline. Lang must’ve seen him too because he dived the seaplane right into the watercraft and all five vehicles combusted in a series of explosions.

“Oh Jesus!” Yuno exclaimed. “I feel like I’m having déjà vu.”

Jean Paul stood in stunned silence. The explosion had happened dangerously close in front of him. As the flames burned, he called out to the charred mass of vehicles, “Is anybody in there?! Hello?!”

He got no response.

Mickey parked the boat on the shore, and walked over to him. “What is going on, Jean Paul? We are here to pick you up.”

“What just happened?”

“Where’d Mr. Lang go?” Yuno climbed out of the boat and joined them by the warm fire. It didn’t look like Lang was in it.

He looked up. “Oh! there he is. How’d he get over there?” Yuno pointed further down the shoreline where Lang was running back towards the group, completely unscathed from the blaze.

“He must’ve jettisoned from the aircraft,” Mickey theorized.

Lang stopped by the fire and collapsed on the sand, panting and gasping for air.

“Team Rocket! Let’s go!” Mickey cheered again.

Yuno knelt next to Lang. “Mr. Lang! What happened?”

Lang gave an airy laugh as he caught his breath. “I didn’t see the fucking sand.”

“You didn’t see the sand? Are you okay?”

“It looked like fucking water to me.”

Yuno looked back at the crash site. He could see how—if he was a thousand feet in the air—the moonlight reflected on wet sand would make it appear as if it was water.

Jean Paul grumbled, “Aight so fuck me fuck the Seasharks I guess.”

Mickey thought of a solution for their debacle. “Jean Paul, can you pilot a seaplane?”

“Yeah absolutely.”

“That’s perfect. So, you and I will each rent a Seabreeze, and Lang will drive the boat.”

“That works for me,” Lang said.

They all climbed into the boat, and Lang drove them back to LSIA. During the ride, Yuno leaned against the side of the boat and stared at his reflection in the water, getting lost in his thoughts. It seemed like everyone had multiple roles to play except for him, and it made him feel a little useless. The other three each had a part of the plan that they came up with, they knew how to operate several types of vehicles, and they could hack. Yuno only knew how to hack. Even when considering skills outside of criminal activities, Jean Paul was a manager at Burger Shot, Lang was a rich businessman, and Mickey was a firefighter. Yuno assumed he had been fired from his part-time jobs when he started freelance hacking. All he had outside of that was his janitorial job that he still never did. He was pretty sure that Lang ended up hiring someone else to do the job, and his name was just on the employee register out of pity.

Yuno was pulled out of his thoughts when he heard a seaplane fly above him. He was so distracted he didn’t notice that they had arrived at LSIA and Jean Paul had already rented his Seabreeze. Mickey was still in the hangar, and Lang was refueling the boat’s tank with a red gas can.

“Hey, Mr. Lang?”

“Yeah. What is it?”

While it was just the two of them on the boat, Yuno tentatively asked, “Um, since we’re all hackers, am I going to be hacking or will the others be doing it?”

“Of course you’ll be hacking. That’s the reason why you’re here. You’re the fucking Cheat Code.”

“Oh…right.”

“I mean, Mickey and X will probably want to hack Fleeca and Paleto, so you might only have to do the hack at the City Vault. You’ve done it before, and you’re the only one I trust to ace that hack.”

“I just got lucky.”

“It’s more than luck; it’s skill.” Lang checked his phone, and saw that he had two text messages from Jean Paul that read “PICK M EUP” and “gO NOW.”

“I gotta pick up X. You go with Mickey, okay?”

“Okay,” Yuno answered without comprehending what Lang said. He was still trapped in his head.

Confused about why Yuno hadn’t moved after responding, Lang lightly nudged his shoulder.

“Yuno?”

“Hm?”

“Go with Mickey.”

“Oh yeah, I’m going!” Yuno jumped out of the boat and ran across the beach to go to the staircase that led up to the hangar.

Lang was a little puzzled by Yuno’s shift in behavior, but it wasn’t unusual for him to get distracted or forget things that had just happened. He assumed that the hacker was just going through another episode. With that, he left to pick up Jean Paul at the island.

Yuno climbed the staircase and entered the hangar to find Mickey fueling the seaplane. “How good are you at flying, Mickey?”

“I consider myself to be the best pilot in Los Santos,” he responded confidently. “You want me to teach you?”

“Uh, Raymond tried teaching me once, but it didn’t go well.” Yuno thought back to the one and only time he tried to learn how to pilot a plane which resulted in a similar explosion to the one that had happened a few minutes ago.

“That’s just because Ray was teaching you. He is shit at giving directions.”

“Maybe, but, um, still, you’re good at a lot of things, huh? How’d you learn all this?”

“They’re just skills I’ve picked up over time. But, everything I know about heists comes from Mr. K. He taught me how to hack, and how to make plans like this.”

“You can hack, you can plan, you can fight, shoot guns, fly aircraft, drive any vehicle.”

Mickey chuckled, and finished filling the tank with gasoline. “It’s like they say, ‘Jack of all trades, master of none.’”

“...‘Oftentimes better than a master of one,’” Yuno mumbled under his breath.

Mickey looked over at Yuno. He was leaning against the plane, and looking out onto the runway. It was impossible for him to read Yuno’s expression under his black mask.

“Get in the pilot’s seat.” Mickey opened the cockpit and jumped onto the wing of the seaplane.

“What?”

“Come on, let me teach you how to fly.” Mickey held out his hand to him.

Yuno hesitated for a second, but then he made his choice and grabbed Mickey’s hand, allowing himself to be pulled up onto the wing with him. He dropped into the pilot’s seat, leaving the cockpit door open so Mickey could tell him what to do. He was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of controls and he wasn't in a good headspace to focus, but he tried his best to follow Mickey’s instructions.

Meanwhile, Lang found Jean Paul standing on the island next to his Seabreeze and waving his hands at him. Lang picked him up in the boat, and drove him back south to the location where the Seasharks exploded because that was where he left the black Sultan parked and it was where he needed to park his boat.

Lang carefully steered to the nearby island so he wouldn’t end up in the same situation as last time where he launched the boat onto the cliff. It took a few minutes, but he was able to dock the boat by the small island.

He reviewed the plan in his head to confirm that they were on track. They would drive the Sultan to all three banks, send it off the cliff to this island and switch to the boat, drive the boat to the island up north and switch to the seaplanes, and fly away. It sounded perfect to him.

Lang and Jean Paul swam from the island to the Sultan and drove back north to the beach across from the seaplane island to pick up Mickey and Yuno.

When they made it to the beach and the two were still not there, Jean Paul pulled out his phone and called Mickey.

“Shit, shit, shit. Jean Paul’s calling me. We gotta go.” Mickey dropped into the passenger seat, and closed the cockpit door. “I trust you, Yuno. Go for it.”

“Oh my god! Uh…I’ll try it.” Yuno clicked the buttons that Mickey just taught him, and watched the gauges as he drove forward onto the runway.

Mickey answered his phone, “All right. We’re coming, Jean Paul. Yuno’s flying, uh, we’ll be there in a second.”

“I don’t know how to land,” Yuno informed.

“Yes, we’re, uh, the estimated time of arrival is soon. I’m sorry, we’re coming, we’re flying now.”

“I don’t know where to land,” Yuno realized.

Mickey placed a marker on the seaplane’s GPS.

“Do I go to this marker?”

Mickey nodded his head, and motioned for Yuno to begin taking off. “Yes, Jean Paul. We’re flying there. We are literally…in…the…air…”

Mickey drew out his syllables waiting for the exact moment the wheels weren't touching the ground. “Right now. We’re in the air right now. We’re in the air.”

“Ohh! Oh, this is way harder than I thought it’d be.” Yuno struggled to control the seaplane and it flipped over for a moment before he was able to turn it upright again.

“Okay. Do you want me to stay on the phone?~” Mickey teased, and Jean Paul hung up. “Okay, bye.”

“Help! Help! Mayday!” Yuno yelled.

“You’re doing fine!” Mickey reassured him. “You need to retract the landing gear!”

“What?!”

“You gotta put the wheels up!”

“I can’t hear you! The plane is too loud!”

Mickey talked into his handheld radio, “Yuno, you gotta put the wheels up.”

Yuno replied on his radio, “O-Okay, um.”

“On the right side, remember?”

“Oh yeah!” Yuno pushed a button, and it retracted the landing gear. “Did I do it?”

“Yeah, that’s it! Just continue heading to that marker.”

“Can you two shut the fuck up if you ain’t gonna say anything important?!” Jean Paul’s voice suddenly came through their radio.

“I need to direct Yuno,” Mickey insisted.

“Well I need to—Yes yes I surrender to the police.” Jean Paul said, but it no longer sounded like he was talking to them.

“The fuck? Where are you X?” Lang asked through the radio. After Jean Paul’s phone call with Mickey, he walked down the road to stop by an ATM to withdraw some cash, but he hadn't returned yet. Lang was waiting in the Sultan on the beach alone.

“Yeah just double checking yeah yeah I got a warrant uh reckless evading from thirty minutes ago but I think it’s a bug in the MDW,” Jean Paul replied.

“Motherfucker, are you okay?”

“Yeah I’m getting arrested sort of.”

“Wait, you’re getting arrested?” Lang laughed, and left the car.

Jean Paul was currently being held up at the ATM by a police officer who had tried to pull him over for transporting the unsafely secured Seasharks on his car.

Lang made his way over to them, hoping that he could pay off the officer to let Jean Paul go.

“Oh god. Do you have earbuds, Yuno? I can call you instead,” Mickey suggested.

“Yeah, let’s do that.”

“Everyone shut up I can’t hear the officer!” Jean Paul yelled for the last time.

Mickey and Yuno both put in earbuds, and started a phone call together.

“Hello~ Testing, testing. Contacting, Mr. Yuno Sykk.”

“Oh, this is much better. It blocks out all the noise, too.”

Mickey was able to direct Yuno to the small island where Jean Paul had parked his seaplane. It was a rocky island with trees and bushes growing in the center, dividing the island in half. Jean Paul’s Seabreeze was parked on the south end, and Yuno had a rough landing but managed to park on the north end.

“We survived!” Yuno celebrated.

“Yeah, you aced that. All right, you’re gonna be my pilot.”

“Am I? Look, I just barely managed to land. If you weren’t literally in my ear and telling me what to do, we would’ve definitely crashed.”

Mickey shrugged. “If you don’t want to, then it looks like Jean Paul and I will be the getaway pilots.”

“Yeah, that sounds good.” Yuno handed the keys to Mickey, and then they both climbed out of the seaplane.

Mickey looked around for Lang and Jean Paul, but they were nowhere to be found. “Weren’t they supposed to be here?”

“Look, look, the Sultan is on the beach, but it looks empty.”

“Ah, they probably left to go deal with the police.”

Mickey and Yuno swam from the island to the shore, and got into the black Sultan.

Mickey noticed that the car keys were still in the ignition. He didn't know how long it would take Lang and Jean Paul to confront the police, and they still had to pick up supplies.

“I’ll drive us to the gray market to pick up the hacking supplies. We should be able to get back to this spot before they return.”

“Okay, yeah. That'll save us some time.”

Mickey turned on the engine, and just before he drove off, he had a sudden realization. “I feel kinda uneasy about leaving those two seaplanes unattended. Anyone could come to this beach and steal them. They’re not exactly hidden on that island, and it's a very quick swim to reach them.”

“I can ask someone to watch them for us.”

“Can you really find someone who’s willing to…just sit here?”

“Yeah, I’ll ask Raymond. He’ll do anything for me. Besides, he’s always in a gang war, so he’s used to staking out an area for hours and doing nothing.”

“Okay then, you text him.” Mickey started driving west to the gray market in Grand Senora Desert while Yuno sent Raymond a text message, asking him to watch their seaplanes from the beach.

Yuno also sent him an image of a cute black cat begging, just in case he needed a little more incentive.

Yuno sent Raymond two messages in total.

Yuno specifically sent Raymond the messages instead of calling him because he and Mickey were still in a phone call together with their earbuds in. They couldn’t even hear their radios when Jean Paul and Lang returned to the beach five minutes later and started questioning them about what happened to the car.

Lang tried calling both of them several times, but it kept going to voicemail. “Oh my god, are they still on the phone with each other?”

At the gray market, Mickey groaned as he spent more than usual for supplies. He bought a green dongle, blue dongle, red dongle, three burner laptops, and three VPN routers. Technically, they only needed one burner laptop and one VPN router because they could reuse them, but if anything went wrong that led to the destruction of any tools, it would be good to have backups.

He balanced the supplies in his hands as he made his way back to the Sultan. “Yuno, can you drive while I get everything assembled?”

“Yeah, of course.” Yuno switched to the driver’s seat, and Mickey slowly slid into the passenger seat, careful not to drop anything.

Yuno turned on the engine and checked the gauges. “Oh, we’re running low on gas. I should refuel before we head back.”

“Yeah, good idea.”

Yuno drove towards the Sandy Shores gas station as Mickey prepared the supplies. When he took out his phone to make sure the VPN router was working, he saw fifty-four missed calls from Lang.

“Yuno, I’m gonna hang up so I can call Lang.”

“Okay.”

Mickey hung up, and called Lang back. “What’s up, Lang?”

“Motherfucker! You two are the only two who would be on the phone with each other while in the same car. Where you at?”

Mickey laughed. “Remember when I told you it would drive you crazy if you hung out with us?”

“Where are you? Where are you? Where are you?”

“We’re going to the gas station in Sandy.”

“Sandy, yeah,” Yuno repeated.

“Where is that?” Lang asked.

“Where is that, Yuno?”

“I marked it, marked it. Perfectly marked.” Yuno pointed at the GPS, but Mickey couldn’t see it over the stack of laptops on his lap and the VPN routers on the dashboard.

“Oh, no, but like I can’t see the map. So, like where? Lang’s asking.”

“It’s, uh, left. It’s uh…”

“Uh, Yuno says it’s left,” Mickey parroted to Lang.

“Right above the prison.”

“Okay, right above the prison.”

“Concrete road. Smoke Tree Road.”

“Right above the prison…in the mountain?” Lang asked.

“Looks like a big nose,” Yuno helpfully supplied.

“Oh, he says a big nose,” Mickey continued to relay directions.

“Uh, big nose looking up.”

“A big nose looking up.” Mickey laughed, confused about the directions Yuno was giving.

“And there’s like a little bit of snot coming out, and that’s where we’re going.”

“A-And there’s—” Mickey struggled to communicate through his fits of laughter. “And there—”

“Oh! The big nose looking—Alright, I know where that is. Okay, I’ll be there soon.”

Lang hung up, and Yuno continued on, “Almost like an eagle’s beak, eating a worm.”

“Thanks, Yuno. It sounds like he’s gonna meet us at the gas station.” Mickey couldn't believe that Lang apparently understood Yuno’s oddly graphic set of directions.

A few minutes later, just as they finished filling up the car with gas and assembling the hacking supplies, Lang and Jean Paul were dropped off at the gas station via taxi.

“Mickey is a dogshit!” Jean Paul yelled.

“Sorry, sorry!” Mickey apologized. “We didn’t know how long you guys would be gone, and we had to pick up supplies and refuel the car.”

Jean Paul scoffed, “Yeah yeah sure so we’re all good to go then?”

“Yeah. Now, we just need outfits.”

“Wanna do magicians?”

“Yeah, let’s do it,” Lang agreed and got into the driver’s seat.

“Magicians?” Yuno asked as they all entered the Sultan.

“For our matching outfits,” Mickey clarified. “We always used to dress up for our jobs in Las Venturas.”

Lang drove them southwest to the CLean Manor. He owned an extensive array of clothing, most of which he never wore, but it was convenient for their criminal disguises. They all wore top hats, white gloves, and three-piece suits containing the colors: green, blue, red, black, and white. Then they added their own personal touches to their attire.

Jean Paul wore his signature skull mask, and had a joker card peeking out of his breast pocket.

Yuno wore a similar skull mask, his usual white shoes with blue light up soles, and had an ace of clubs card tucked in his top hat band.

Mickey wore a jack mask, a ruff around his neck, and had a jack of spades card tucked in his left sleeve cuff.

Lang wore a king mask, black and white striped boxers, and had a king of diamonds card tucked in his right white crew sock.

“Oh, I like the no pants look there, Lang. That looks cute,” Mickey complimented.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t you think your legs will get tattoo ID’d, though?”

“No one knows what my leg tattoos look like. I always wear business suits.” At least, Lang hoped that no one would recognize his leg tattoos.

Jean Paul admired himself in the mirror. “I like this what do guys think you like this or not?”

“I like it.”

“Hell yeah~”

Mickey and Lang replied.

Jean Paul turned around, double checking his outfit. “Man this is actually sick.”

“Yeah, we look so good,” Yuno agreed.

“The Joker, the Ace, the King, and the Jack. Those are our codenames for today,” Mickey reminded.

Jean Paul looked away from the mirror and observed the crew. “Man I have to be honest though there’s a lot of combined skill here Lang’s a criminal veteran he knows the map he knows how the plan’s gonna go Mickey’s a good hacker Yuno’s an incredible hacker and I’m I’m uh…I’m good at picking up the money really fast.”

“Yes, you are. You’re fast at everything you do. If anything goes wrong, you're our quick-thinker who will get us out of it,” Mickey said.

“Alright. I’ve got duffel bags downstairs, so we’ll just grab those when we leave. We ready to go now?” Lang asked while adjusting his suit lapels.

“I think so. We got gas, we bought the hacking tools, all the vehicles are set up. Raymond said he's waiting by the seaplanes, so we’re good there, too,” Yuno rambled off their checklist of things to do. He couldn't see anything that they were forgetting.

“We should probably have hostages just in case no,” Jean Paul suggested.

Lang nodded. “I agree. We can pick them up on our way to the Fleeca.”

Mickey dramatically waved his hands in the air. “Abracadabra! Alakazam! Let the show begin!”

(Midnight - Sunday, April 18, 2021)

Four magicians appeared at the Fleeca on Great Ocean Highway with three hostages in the trunk of their black Sultan.

Lang climbed up to the roof to cut the power, and the others passed out supplies.

“Mista Ace stay here and let us know if you see cops yeah,” Jean Paul told Yuno.

“Okay, Joker!”

“You got a gun?”

“Of course I don’t.”

Jean Paul groaned. “Oh yeah that’s right I forgot that about you.”

“But he's got hands now. I taught him self-defense,” Mickey attempted to back Yuno up.

“Jack, get to the back and start the hack,” Lang unlocked the door, and held it open for him.

“I’m on it, King~” Mickey and Lang carried the hacking tools and two duffel bags inside, and went to the back to crack open the vault.

Yuno ran in circles around the car, keeping an eye out for police cruisers.

Jean Paul walked around the highway, setting up a surprise for when the police arrived. Then he took out his pistol, opened the trunk, and waved it at the three curled up hostages.

“One of you get out of the car and come with me.”

A man with denim overalls hesitantly got out of the trunk.

“The rest of you stay quiet if you want to live.” Jean Paul slammed the trunk closed, and led the hostage to the front door of the bank.

“Who should I be, huh?” Jean Paul cleared his throat and aimed his pistol at the hostage’s head. “Who should I be for this, sir? Who should I be?~”

Jean Paul spoke while experimenting with different intonations. They were all using voice changers, but he liked to mask his voice even further by finding a character to play for his disguise.

Scared and confused, the hostage tried to come up with a satisfactory answer. “Um, hum, uh, I don’t know. Who do you want to be? You can be whoever you want. You have a gun.”

“Stand still and stop moving~”

The hostage wasn’t moving that much. He was just shaking and blinking. “Can I blink?”

“Don’t blink. It makes me real~ scared, and I don’t wanna shoot ‘cause I’m scared~” Jean Paul found a high-pitched voice of a crazed maniac, and decided to use it.

Mickey had completed the hack, and was filling the two duffel bags with cash. While he was doing that, Lang was searching through files in the security system: financial records, bank records, bank accounts, etc. The most crucial thing he needed to investigate was the bank’s CFO records. He figured that those management and financial reports would tell him everything he needed to know about who the bank was working with and where the bank funds were going. Since this was his second time looking through the system, he was able to do it fairly quickly. He just needed to double check that he didn’t miss anything important, and he was right because there was absolutely 0% of useful information stored there. All the files looked like normal bank files. The one persistent odd thing out of place, like always, was that there was no mention of any security company. If a company was providing services to a bank, there should be financial records of the bank paying them, but there was nothing. Lang sighed in defeat and packed up the hacking supplies.

At the front of the bank, the night was silent, but the winds started to howl.

“Where the cops at? They’re still not here,” Yuno said while sitting on the roof of the car.

“They take a little bit of time~ sometimes,” Jean Paul singsonged, but he hoped that they would be there soon. He spent a lot of money on his little gift for them. “Two minutes~ three minutes~ maybe four minutes~ And if not, we just take everything, we kill the hostage, and we outta~ here~ like a breeze~”

“Woah! Kill the hostage?! How do I not get that ending?”

“Ah~ here they are~”

“Oh thank god.” The hostage breathed a sigh of relief at having seen two police cruisers arrive and park across the street.

Yuno jumped off the car and ran behind the hostage. “Joker! Joker! Cops are here! We gotta go!”

“No~ no~ no~ we gotta let ‘em know~ what’s happening~ Take the gun.”

“Oh, um, all right.”

Jean Paul handed his pistol to Yuno, and walked outside with his hands in the air.

Mickey and Lang had finished filling the duffel bags, and went to the front door, propping it open. The three of them each kept a pistol aimed at the hostage while Jean Paul talked to the four officers.

“Hello, officers of the law~ Hello~ Nice to meet you!”

“Hello, hello, this is the LSPD. Please keep your hands where we can see them. What’s going on here?” an officer yelled through a megaphone. They were keeping their distance from the Fleeca for their own safety.

“Now, me and my pals here are making a little bit of a withdrawal~ from the back vault.”

“O-Okay.”

“When I went here earlier, there was a little bit of a problem with the bank~”

“What’s the problem?”

“It said insufficient funds~ Ain’t that fun?~ And I’ll tell you what, mister officer~ I was on a date the whole time, and it made me look stupid! And I couldn’t get money for the steak dinner~”

“Oh god, I’m sorry to hear that, sir.” The officer wasn't sure if the criminal was lying or not, but he thought it might deescalate the situation if he just went along with it.

“Sure~ sure~ like you care~ Now, instead of asking for a loan, I thought ‘I’m just gonna take the money myself~’ So, that’s what we’re doing right now~ We’re making a little bit of a deposit!”

“Sir, what can we do to ensure the safety of your hostage there?”

“Hm~ What can you do?~ Well, you see, we’re magicians~ We like performing~ Would you like to see our first magic trick of the show tonight?” With a nifty bit of sleight of hand, Jean Paul made a remote control appear in the palm of his right hand.

“First trick?”

“That’s right~ Welcome to the Team Rocket~ Rainbow Road Heist!” Jean Paul clicked a button on his remote and several colored smoke grenades exploded on the highway—each one a different color in the rainbow—and the blustery ocean winds quickly spread the smoke in the air.

While the cops were unable to see the front of the bank through the colored smoke, the four magicians got back into their car and drove north on the Great Ocean Highway, leaving the hostage at the bank. One police cruiser stayed behind to examine the building and get a statement from the hostage, and the other police cruiser followed the black Sultan. The criminals had a huge head start, and they noticed that the weather was getting a little stormy. As the pursuing cruiser crossed over the Great Ocean Highway bridge above Lago Zancudo, a large gust of wind blew their car off the highway and into the concrete guardrail, disorienting the officers. A few other cars were also pushed off the street, and panicked drivers got out of their vehicles to inspect the damage and observe the storm. In all the turmoil, the police lost sight of the Sultan.

“Where did the cops go? We already lost them?” Yuno asked. He and Jean Paul were kneeling on the back seats, looking out the back window. He gave Jean Paul’s pistol back to him.

“Already lost them? Heh, I’m that fucking good,” Mickey patted himself on the back literally. While his hand was off the wheel, a raven flew in front of the windshield, startling him. He roughly swerved the car to avoid it, causing Jean Paul to hit his head on his window.

“This driver is fucking stupid~ Who hired this guy, man?”

“Ay, what the—Shut the fuck up, Joker!”

“To Paleto, you fuck ass~” Jean Paul cleared his throat and dropped the voice impression. “Uh ay yo I don’t have to do this voice anymore uh just drive to Paleto bank! Gun it! Gun it!”

“Team Rocket!” Lang yelled.

The four magicians arrived at the Blaine County Savings Bank, also known as Paleto Bank, with two hostages in the trunk of their black Sultan. As soon as Mickey parked in front of the bank, Lang climbed up to the roof to cut the power, and then he and Jean Paul went inside to open the vault at the back.

Mickey took out his pistol, opened the trunk, and waved it at the two curled up hostages. “You in the black clothes, get out. Keep your hands up.”

A man wearing a black business suit slowly exited the trunk, and followed Mickey to the front door of the bank. Yuno closed the trunk and ran around the empty parking lot, keeping watch for the police or any other suspicious people.

The process repeated the same as before except Jean Paul and Mickey’s roles were switched. Jean Paul completed the hack and began filling two duffel bags with money while Lang searched through the bank files to find the exact same amount of nothing in there. Jean Paul, Lang, and Yuno got back into the car with two duffel bags of cash right as the same two police cruisers from the Fleeca approached the bank. This time, Air-1 was with them, and hovered in the air with a spotlight shining down on their black Sultan. The cruisers parked at the other end of the parking lot, and four officers exited their cars with guns pointed at them. Mickey kept his pistol aimed at their hostage.

“Oh my god, it’s you guys again.” The same police officer spoke through the megaphone.

“Are these the same people from the Fleeca?” the Air-1 pilot asked.

The officer lowered his megaphone and talked into his handheld radio, “Affirm.”

“Okay, I’m gonna inform the PBSO since this is their jurisdiction.”

“10-4,” the officer responded and brought the megaphone back to his mouth. “Hello again! This is still the LSPD!”

“Thank you for joining us on the Rainbow Road! We’ll be performing magic tricks for all of you tonight~” Mickey shouted.

“Yeah, we saw. What’s the next trick for us to get that hostage to safety?”

Yuno exited the car. “I’ve got one! Check this out! Eh!” He did a flawless back handspring. “Presto! What’d you think of that?”

“...Very cool.”

“Thanks!”

Mickey resumed his speech, “Now, we’re going to take the money from this bank, and make it…disappear~”

“That’s a good one!” Yuno giggled, and got back into the car.

“...That was fucking corny.” The officer hated to admit it, but the first trick was much better than wherever this was.

“Watch closely and prepare to be amazed!” Mickey waved his hands and snapped his fingers. Then he quickly got into the back seat with Yuno. “Drive, King! Drive!”

Lang sped away from the bank, and the police pursued after them. He followed the highway to travel south on the east of the island. “Okay. This is the part I’m scared of ‘cause it’s a long drive back to Vinewood. If those cops already suspect us to go to the City Vault, then—”

A bright flash of lightning in the sky blinded everyone for a second. When the pursuing officers' eyes readjusted to the darkness, they had completely lost sight of the Sultan.

“Air-1, do you have a visual?” the primary officer asked over the radio.

The Air-1 pilot looked around, but couldn’t find the criminals. “Negative.”

“How? It’s the highway? Did they turn off at some point or continue straight?”

“I don’t know. They just vanished.”

“We’ll continue straight, but call 77s to search the area.”

“10-4.” The Air-1 pilot relayed a message to police dispatch to inform the PBSO and LSPD that there was an ongoing pursuit featuring a group of four criminals dressed like magicians, committing a series of robberies. They were also warned to proceed with caution because the storm was making it difficult to drive and navigate. It began to rain heavily, and the wind was unpredictably pushing the helicopter around in the sky.

The pursuit continued south to the city while backup officers arrived to check the area where the criminals were last seen. There was a chance that they broke off from the highway to hide in the wilderness, but the primary officer believed that—based on the pattern—the criminals were probably headed to the largest bank in the State of San Andreas.

“Ahh!”

“Oh Jesus!”

“What the fuck Mista King?!”

Mickey, Yuno, and Jean Paul had no idea what just happened. One second they were driving down the highway, and the next they were parked in front of the Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank, also known as the City Vault. They supposed that was one way to cut down the drive between Paleto and Vinewood.

“Get out, get out, get out! We gotta do this before the cops arrive!” Lang urged and exited the car, making the others step into action.

Lang and Yuno went to the alleyway behind the City Vault and began to climb up the fixed ladder behind the building while Mickey and Jean Paul took the final hostage out of the trunk and watched the front entryway.

Unlike the other two banks, the City Vault had tighter security and a more complex layout. The building itself was more than three times the height of the other banks. Just getting to the rooftop proved to be a struggle because the outdoor fire escape and fixed ladders only stopped halfway up the building. They had to climb up on the concrete crevices and beams the rest of the way up, and they were only able to do it because Lang frequently worked out and Yuno knew a little bit of parkour. The rain pouring on their bodies and turning the concrete slippery became an obstacle that nearly ended their lives more than once during their climb. When they made it to the rooftop, Lang disabled the power, and they heard the backup generator kick in.

“Ah, I forgot about that,” Yuno said.

“Yeah, I still don’t know where the backup generator is, but it’s fine. It doesn’t interfere with your ability to hack the vault.”

Yuno unlocked a staff door on the rooftop and they snuck down a staircase that led to the main floor. The door separating the staircase to the main floor was also locked, so Yuno attached a stick of thermite to the door and set it off which burned the lock off the handle. Beyond the door was a hallway that contained several offices and a security room. Yuno unlocked the door to the security room, then used his burner laptop and red dongle to easily hack into the security system. He disabled the security cameras and the first door to the vault. Lang was always impressed by Yuno’s ability to do this hack because of the difficulty of it.

They headed downstairs where the first door to the vault was opened. Slightly inside the vault was another door that he would have to use another stick of thermite on. The downstairs layout consisted of the main vault on the left side and a hallway that was blocked off by red lasers. It was proof that a generator was still partly powering the security system.

Lang looked through the lasers, and saw a door at the end of the hallway. “Come to think of it, maybe that room is the thing that we’re missing.”

Yuno stood next to Lang and contemplated it. “But…when we stole the blueprints for this building, it said that there was only one vault. The one over there.” He pointed behind them. “I think the room on the other side of these lasers is just an office space.”

“But then why is it so heavily guarded?” Lang asked.

“I… I’m not sure.”

“We should definitely try disabling the lasers. How do we do that?”

Thunder roared loudly above them, and the red lasers disappeared.

“Oh my god. Hello?” Lang looked up. “Jesus, is that you?”

“N-No, I don’t think that was—”

“You guys good down there?” Mickey’s concerned voice came through their radios.

“A huge~ lightning bolt just struck the top of the bank~ Wahoo~” Jean Paul informed them in his crazed voice.

“Oh! The power is fully out. The lightning bolt must’ve disabled the backup generator.” Yuno reasoned.

Lang pulled out his phone and cautiously extended it into the path of where the lasers used to be, confirming that they were disabled. “The power is really—Wait! Ace, come with me.”

Yuno followed Lang to the room at the end of the hallway. The door was unlocked, and they entered to find another vault; however, it didn’t contain anything except a huge computer system.

“Can you hack this?” Lang asked.

Yuno examined it, but the computer was completely shut down. “Uh, I think we actually need power from the backup generator to hack into this computer.”

“So, we need to disable the backup generator to get through the lasers, then we need to turn it back on to hack this?”

Yuno nodded. “Yeah, probably.”

“Okay!” Lang spoke into his handheld radio, “Joker, start helping Ace take out money from the vault. I’m gonna check the roof.”

Yuno ran to the entryway to let Jean Paul into the City Vault, then he went back down to the vault and placed a stick of thermite on the second door to burn off the lock. Once the lock melted and the door opened, they began to fill four duffel bags with money.

Lang backtracked through the security room, and up the staircase through the staff door to get back to the rooftop. There were two large chunks of metal that had been fried from the lightning strike. He tampered with one of them before realizing that it was just a ventilation system. The other one was less damaged, but the lock was broken so the side panel connected to it opened without a key. Assuming that it was the backup generator, he studied the machinery, trying to figure out how to turn it on and off. He knew that they would need to come back another time when it was fixed to test their theory to break into the lower vault, but any information about the generator was an advantage to him.

Lang randomly flipped a few switches before his fingers were shocked and he was deafened by a piercing, ringing sound. “Whoops.”

“The power is back on! I think we accidentally tripped an alarm,” Yuno yelled.

Lang didn’t want to tell them that it was he who stupidly tripped the alarm, so he stayed silent.

“Everyone, hurry up! Cops are coming!” Mickey screamed.

Lang took a picture of the generator panel with his phone, and ran back to the staff door that was unexpectedly relocked.

“Shit! Shit! Did turning the generator on relock it?” Lang frantically rattled the door handle, but it wouldn’t open. Suddenly, he got an idea, and placed his hand on the door.

“Phase up!” He intently stared at the door and pressed on it with his hand.

After a few seconds of nothing happening, he impatiently slammed his body into the door. “Ow! Fuck! Why does my Scufflord ability never work when I fucking want it to?!”

Lang quickly yet carefully climbed down the side of the building the same way that Yuno and he scaled it. It took longer than he liked, but he safely made it back to the ground and ran to the front of the bank to find the four of them surrounded by six police cruisers. Mickey and Jean Paul each kept a pistol aimed at the hostage while the officers gathered.

A bald officer took command of the pursuit, and spoke into his radio, “We need all available units to break, and come to the City Vault. We have a vault robbery in progress. Where is Air-1?”

“Arriving in a few seconds. Had to refuel after flying back from Paleto—Oh my god, it’s the same guys!”

“They robbed the—Wait, are these the same people that robbed the Fleeca and Paleto?”

A chorus of five officers replied, “Affirm.”

The bald officer took out his megaphone and raised it to his mouth. “This is the Chief of Police of the LSPD, Sam Baas! Release the hostage, drop your weapons, and put your hands in the air!”

Mickey yelled back, “Greetings, Chief Baas! Glad you could make it to our final act!”

“Welcome to the Team Rocket Rainbow Road Heist! Woo-hoo~” Yuno cheered.

“After an exciting night of magic, get ready to witness our final trick!” Lang entered the car and turned on the engine.

Jean Paul put away his pistol and stepped forward. “When you ride like lightning~ you’re gonna crash like thunder~ Abracadabra!”

He threw three stun grenades in the air, blinding the police with a bright flash of light and startling them with an extremely loud “bang.” The four magicians closed their eyes as it happened, so they were able to leave while the officers were stunned. However, Air-1 was unaffected by the grenades and pursued after them. After a minute, the ground units caught up to them.

Lang drove to the south of the Palomino Highlands. “Uh, where is it again?”

Mickey was astonished by the question. “It’s your cliff. You don’t know where it is?”

“A little further south yeah you should see the boat out in the water,” Jean Paul said.

Lang squinted his eyes, but saw nothing. “I don’t see shit! It’s too foggy!”

It was 3:00 a.m., and it was the peak of the storm. The night was dark and foggy. Rain, lightning, and thunder constantly rumbled throughout the sky.

“Right here! Turn right!” Jean Paul yelled.

“Oh wait, I do see it!” Lang picked up speed as he drove towards the cliffside and sent the black Sultan into the ocean. They exited the car and swam up to the boat parked at the nearby island.

Once they were in the Jetmax, Lang drove them north, and two police boats pursued after them.

“So…which island is it? I forgot.”

Jean Paul groaned. “Ugh it’s right there you dumbas—Oh actually wait wait there’s a lot of islands.”

Mickey looked down at the boat’s GPS. There were a lot of islands. “Um…do you remember, Yuno?”

“I… Oh! Raymond’s there. I’ll ask him.” Yuno called Raymond, who had been waiting on the beach for the past three hours.

“Yuno, what’s up?”

“Raymond, we’re driving to the island right now!”

“Perfect, your seaplanes are still here.”

“Do you know which island it is?”

“Yes, it’s east coast.”

“Island on the east coast, Mr. Lang!”

Lang grumbled, “Tell Ray he’s a dumbfuck. He needs to use his fucking eyes, and be more fucking specific.”

“Be more specific, Raymond!”

“That’s not what I said.”

Raymond looked at his GPS and tried to describe the location to Yuno. “Okay, you see there’s three big islands on the east coast! You see them?”

“Describe the shape! The shape!”

“Uh, it’s the top left one of the three big ones next to the gun store!”

“What does that mean?”

“To the right of the gun store. There’s three huge islands!”

“South? Slightly south or north of it?”

“Southeast! The top left one!”

“The big one? It looks like the chicken nugget that’s a boot?”

“Yeah, the top left one! There’s the big one to the bottom right of it.”

“Chicken nugget that’s a boot, but small. And it has a little sauce dripping off the bottom.”

“Yeah, perfect, yes! Chicken nugget, yes!”

“Chicken nugget! Uh, little sauce!” Mickey repeated to Lang.

Yuno marked the island on the GPS. “I see it! I see it! I marked it! Mickey, I marked it!”

“Okay, okay! Tell him we’re on the way now!” Mickey said.

Yuno relayed the message, “All right, we’ll be there soon! You should probably leave the area, so you don’t get spotted.”

“Yeah, okay. Good luck with the rest of the chase.”

“Yeah! See you, Raymond.” Yuno hung up, and Lang drove to Yuno's mark on the GPS.

It was so foggy that the island appeared before them with little to no time to stop, and Lang crashed his boat into the side of it, damaging the engine. The moment they all got out of the boat and stepped foot on the ground, a bolt of lightning struck the trees in the center of the island, causing it to catch on fire and quickly spread. A small shock wave from the strike sent Yuno and Lang flying to the north of the island and pushed Jean Paul and Mickey to the south.

Air-1 had caught up to them, and began to shoot at the seaplanes. If the officers disabled the vehicles, then they would be trapped on the island.

Lang and Jean Paul took out their pistols, and fired shots back at the aircraft, pushing it away from them. Lang continued to shoot as a distraction while Jean Paul ran to his seaplane to start the engine.

“Mic—Jack, you need to get over here! You have the keys!” Yuno yelled through the blaze.

“I can’t get through!” Mickey tried going around the fire, and even used his wet suit jacket to try and smother the flames, but it didn’t work. The fire divided the island in half.

Yuno heard a bullet pierce through the engine of the seaplane next to him, and he turned around to stare at it in dread.

“Ace!” Mickey brought his attention back to him. He waved the keys for the seaplane in his hand, and threw them through the fire.

Yuno caught them, and stared back at Mickey in more dread.

“I believe in you!” Mickey gave him a salute, then got into the cockpit of Jean Paul’s seaplane.

“We gotta go!” Lang yelled. He was running out of bullets.

Yuno got in the pilot’s seat, turned on the engine, and did his best to prepare for take off.

Jean Paul took off and flew closely around Air-1, diverting their attention to them. It gave Lang enough time to get into the cockpit and for Yuno to take off.

When they were both successfully in the sky, Jean Paul headed east into the ocean. Yuno didn’t know where he was headed because of the fog, and he hadn't quite learned how to read the gauges. Air-1 was able to shoot more bullets into his seaplane because of this. He turned and weaved as much as he could to avoid getting shot, but between the gunshots and the brutal storm, Yuno wasn’t sure they would survive.

“Yuno, you gotta retract the landing gear!” Lang shouted.

“I can’t remember! I’m barely keeping us in the air! Oh Jesus!”

“Oh fuck! The engine is smoking!”

Lang's commentary was not helping Yuno’s nerves.

“Ahh!”

“Holy shit!”

A building appeared in front of them through the fog, and Yuno narrowly managed to avoid it. When he stabilized the seaplane, he realized that the whizzing of bullets were no longer flying by them.

“Oh, they stopped shooting!” At least it was one less thing that Yuno had to worry about.

“Probably because we’re in the city now. They don’t want to accidentally shoot any buildings. Oh my fucking god!”

Several skyscrapers appeared from the fog.

“Wait, this is perfect! We can lose ‘em through the buildings!”

“Yuno!” Lang braced himself for the crash that would kill him upon impact.

Yuno dived closer to the ground and swerved between buildings. His steering was shaky and the seaplane oscillated uncontrollably, but he didn’t hit anything.  Air-1 couldn’t follow his movements because it was against protocol to fly that low in the fog. They were running low on gas again, and doing those maneuvers would only deplete their fuel faster. Luckily, after a couple of minutes, Yuno lost Air-1.

“It fucking worked! You lost them! Hell yeah~”

“I did it!” Yuno cheered.

Red lights that Yuno had never seen before began blinking on the dashboard. “Uh, what does that mean?”

“The engine is failing, we’re leaking oil, the seaplane is overheated, we’re fucked! It’s over. We’re dead. Hold me in your arms when we take our last breaths together in harmony.”

“No, wait! I think we’re by the marina, right? Don’t we have our car parked here?”

“Do we? I thought we just threw it in the ocean.”

“Well, we’re about to see.” Yuno crash landed the seaplane into the water, and they swam out of the marina.

They found a black Sultan Mk II in the parking lot, and Lang surprised himself by having the keys for it. “Wait, is this Tony’s VIN scratch? What car were we driving?”

“I don’t know. Let’s just get outta here before the cops find us.” Yuno got in the passenger seat, and Lang drove them away from the area.

“You guys good?” Lang asked on the radio.

“Yeah we out.”

Mickey elaborated, “Air-1 stayed on you, so it was easy to lose the ground and boat units. You guys good?”

“Yeah, we’re out. Where are you?”

“I fucking dumped the seaplane on the west coast near Chumash we need a ride I’mma ping you our location.”

“Okay, we’re coming.” Lang received Jean Paul’s ping and drove north on Great Ocean Highway.

During the drive, the storm finally calmed down. It was no longer raining, but it was still a little windy.

The ping was at the Fleeca where they started the heist. The cement was still stained in the colors of the rainbow from Jean Paul’s colored smoke bombs.

Jean Paul and Mickey ran out of hiding in the bushes behind the bank, when they saw Lang and Yuno arrive.

Lang parked and exited the car. “Of course you guys would return to the scene of the crime.”

“Team Rocket!” Jean Paul yelled.

Mickey looked over at the colorful highway. “Hey, let’s take a picture here on the—Well, the literal rainbow road.”

“Hell yeah~” Lang approved.

They waited for the traffic to pass by, then they stood in the middle of the Great Ocean Highway to take a group picture.

“Woo! Rainbow Road!”

“Team Rocket strikes again!”

Yuno and Jean Paul cheered.

“Exquisite work, boys. That whole heist was cinematic as fuck.” Mickey raised his phone to take the picture.

Lang chuckled. “Yeah, I'm not gonna lie…it was like a scene in a movie.”

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

When they made it back to CLean Manor, the storm was gone, the sun had started to rise, and Team Rocket got to witness a triple rainbow in the sky.

They spent the morning celebrating their successful heist and splitting their profits. Yuno was glad that he finally had enough money to repair his Sultan Mk III. That reminded Jean Paul that he forgot where he parked his Sultan Mk II before the heist. He opened his GPS on his phone and tracked it. The tracker was telling him that his car was parked in the ocean. He stared at it with a confused look on his face for ten seconds before he had a revelation.

“Ohh we dumped my car in the ocean.”

Chapter Text

(Thursday, May 20, 2021)

Dean smiled as he explored Andi Jones Farmers Market. He strolled around the vendor booths and browsed through different products. Turning his head towards the other end of the market, he caught a glimpse of Lang talking to Tony at his booth for Corleone Prime Steaks. Tony appeared to be excitedly telling Lang about the new cans of pasta he was selling.

Deciding to wait for them to finish their conversation, he paused to look at an assortment of soaps at one of the booths.

The vendor greeted him, “Howdy.”

“Hello.”

“How’s it going?”

“Pretty good. You? What you selling?”

“I sell soaps for Clean Getaway Soap Company.”

“Ahh~ Gotcha, gotcha. I think I might own that.”

The vendor was skeptical. “Really?”

“I have no idea anymore.”

“Uh, our CEO is Nancy Drew.”

“Yeah, I probably own it then.” In the corner of his eye, Dean saw Lang walk away from Tony's booth, and moved to follow him.

“You have a good one.” He waved back at the vendor.

“Okay, you too. See you around.”

Dean strode over to Lang just before he could enter his DeLorean. “Long time no see, Lang.”

Lang turned around, surprised to see Dean at the market. Today, the usually clean-shaven man wore a full beard, a pink dress shirt with his black business suit, and seemed strangely happy.

Lang squinted his eyes. “I just saw you yesterday.”

“And yet it feels like a hundred years ago.”

“What’s going on with you? What’s with the beard?”

Dean ran his hand across his facial hair. “You think it suits me?”

“It looks good. You should keep it,” he answered honestly.

“Thank you. You mind giving me a ride back to my office?”

“No, get in.”

Dean got in the passenger seat, and Lang started driving them to the Diamond Casino.

Lang had been skeptical about the businessman ever since Ramee said that he was buying Onyx Dust. When he questioned Dean about it the following day, he claimed that he didn't even know what Onyx Dust was.

The ride was quiet for ten minutes as Lang debated how to go about this conversation, but then he decided to just be straightforward about his concerns. “Dean, listen, I know you already said that you haven't been buying Onyx Dust, and that you don't even know what Onyx Dust is.”

“Yes, I said that.”

“But I'm still feeling paranoid about it because Ramee is convinced that you’re buying it for something called Project Eden.”

Dean raised an eyebrow when he heard that. “What do you know about Project Eden?”

“What do you know about Project Eden?” Lang fired back.

“I know that it’s a project run by the Dark Timelord.”

“Wait, how do you know that?”

Dean’s cheerful face turned serious. “Let me give you a piece of crucial information.”

“O-Okay?”

“I have a brother. His name is Dave Watson, and he looks similar to me. I think he is who Ramee met. He is a crackhead who’s obsessed with transhumanism, and I believe he’s involved with Project Eden.”

“He’s involved? Can you get me a meeting with him?”

“I don’t know where he is, and it’s been years since I last saw him. You need to be careful with who you tell about Eden.”

“Why? I’m just trying to find answers to all the sus shit that has been happening. Edwin told me to not fall for Eden’s false promises.”

Dean thought for a moment, and Lang wished he knew what was going through his head.

“Do you know what variants are?” Dean eventually asked.

“Yeah, they’re basically time travelers from another timeline, or just anyone who isn't from the current time. What about them?”

“They can be dangerous.”

Lang thought back to his very minimal encounters with variants. “I’ve met a few before, and they’re pretty similar to their counterparts in this timeline. I mean, they are the same people.”

“They wear the same body and have the same mannerisms of the people you know, but they are not the same people. There are versions of them that have lived completely different lives from the ones here. If you meet a variant from the Dark Timeline, they will do everything in their power to manipulate you into working for the Dark Timelord.”

“Okay, admittedly, I did not think of that.” Lang parked in the Diamond Casino parking lot, and they walked to Dean’s office.

Dean continued on, “If you know the people closest to you well enough, then you should be able to spot a variant. But, whatever you do, don’t be fooled into giving information to a variant posing as your friend. That is the reason why I don’t think you should meet my brother. You’ve never met him, and you won’t know who you’re talking to.”

“How do you know all of this?” Their discussion had only made Lang become more suspicious of Dean.

“I don’t think I can tell you more, and I have business to attend to. One last thing before I go. When the time is right, you will find what you’re looking for in the Diamond Casino vault.”

“…What does that mean?”

“You’ll find out one day.” Dean looked down at his watch, checking that he was on time. Then he swiped his key card, unlocking his office door.

“I’ll see you in—” Dean cut himself off, pondering over something. “I’ll see you soon, Lang.” He entered his office and closed the door behind him.

Thinking back on their conversation, the way Dean acted was a little weird. Lang hesitantly swiped his own key card and entered the office; however, Dean was no longer there.

Scene 7: Value of Life

At a car rental marketplace located in the Chiliad Mountain State Wilderness, Mickey and Yuno inspected a row of vehicles. They were each wheeling around a BMX with them, too. Deeming all of the vehicles to be unsuitable, they moved on to the next row.

Mickey pointed at an ATV. “How’s this, Yuno?”

“Hmm, we might wanna get a better off-roading car. Like a big car—Wait, right there! This silver car. This thing’s built like a tank.”

“Perfect.”

Yuno filled out the rental form paper and gave it to an employee who then handed him keys to his rental car. He ran over to a silver Prius, and put his bike in the trunk. “Yeah, this thing’s built like a tank. I promise you.”

“Wait, you wanna go up with that thing?” Mickey asked, realizing that there was a small misunderstanding.

“Trust me. April used to own one of these before she got her fancy LFA. The car never broke no matter how many times she crashed it.”

“Um, I feel like this…”

Yuno tilted his head as Mickey kept glancing away at something to his left. After whatever internal debate Mickey was having ended, he shrugged and placed his BMX in the trunk next to Yuno’s.

“You know what? Yeah, let’s do it.”

Yuno closed the trunk and admired the Prius. “Look at the shape of this thing. It’s built to shrug off impact. The round shape of it. The teardrop shape. You ever hear that, Mickey? You wanna drive or…?”

Mickey hesitated. “Uhh…nope, nope. You’ve got it.”

“I can drive it. I can drive it.” Yuno happily got in the driver’s seat while Mickey sat in the passenger seat.

“This is what I love about you, Yuno. A lot of people would look at that truck over there and be like, ‘Wow, that’s an off-road truck. We should obviously take that.’” He pointed at a massive silver truck parked on the left of their silver Prius.

“Off-road truck?” Yuno questioned judgmentally. “Just because it says four-by-four, and it looks like it’s been through the mud before? Nah, nah, that’s crazy, man. That thing’s terrible.”

“Right~ And that’s exactly the problem with people. They don’t think outside the box. They judge books by their covers.”

Yuno drove out of the marketplace and onto a dirt trail that began to ascend up a steep hill. “This is it, Mickey. This is it. Look at the off-roading capability of this thing. It’s not really fast, but it’s got amazing traction.”

“Oh yeah, this is exquisite.”

“Wait, wait, I know what we gotta do, Mickey.”

“Yeah, what do we gotta do?”

“We’re gonna launch off in this car with the bikes in the trunk. When this thing gets totaled—If it gets totaled, we jump onto our bikes—” Yuno slammed on the brakes. “I think I went the wrong way. I think we go up there. Here, watch this!” He drove off the dirt trail, through a grassy lawn, and onto another dirt trail. “Look at that control. Incredible, incredible.”

“It’s perfect. What could go wrong?”

“See this near vertical angle? No problem. We’re going up just like that.”

The trail became steeper and more rocks covered the ground. Mickey noticed that the car began to struggle. “Y-Yeah, yeah. I’ve always wanted to climb a mountain in a Prius.”

The car stalled, and slid down a little. Yuno whined, “Ah, come on. Oh, no, no. It’s, uh, one of the wheels is stuck in the mud, I think. We’re going backwards.”

“Oh, we’re fine~” Mickey said as he tightly gripped the grab handle by his car window.

“I’m pushing the gas pedal. It’s supposed to go forwards, but it’s going backwards.”

The car picked up speed as it slid back down the trail they came from until it bumped into a rock that threw them off the path, causing the car to crash into a tree. The engine was smoking, but they were unharmed.

“Get the bikes! This is what the bikes are for! Let’s go, Mickey! Let’s go!”

Both Mickey and Yuno took their bikes out of the trunk and pedaled two thousand feet up the incline to the top of Mount Chiliad; the highest point in the State of San Andreas.

Yuno headed towards a metal structure that hung over the mountainside. “Oh, there it is! What is this thing, by the way?”

“It’s an aerial tramway. Cable cars used to travel between the base and the peak of the mountain, but it’s been out of commission for years. I don’t think they’ll ever fix it.”

“Oh~” Yuno jumped off his BMX and ran out to the edge of the tramway that hovered in the air over the mountain.

“Careful, Yuno!”

“No, no, it’s safe! Come here!”

Mickey warily joined him at the edge, and looked down. It was a fifty-foot drop to the ground below, and the ground below was a nearly vertical incline. “Holy shit!”

“This is where we’re jumping off. Off of this thing right here,” Yuno explained excitedly.

“Dude, this is the route we’re taking?!”

“This is the way to go, Mickey. Trust me. We ride straight down here, jump off that ledge, do a flip maybe. That’s the way to go.”

“Wait, I’m fucked. I need to practice.”

“You just gotta drop in at an angle where you don’t hit the ground flat. You need to be in line with the slope, and let the momentum carry you down.”

“How many times have you done this?”

Yuno raised his right hand and swore, “I have never failed this jump in my life.”

“It’s that easy?”

“I’ve only done the jump once in my life, but I did it.” Yuno gave him two reassuring thumbs-up, but Mickey’s eyes widened and he gave him a look of disbelief.

“Okay…so there’s that route, and then there’s two normal routes.”

“What do you mean?”

Mickey gestured to the two dirt trails that descended on each side of the mountain; one headed east while the other headed west back the way they came from. “There’s like normal bike paths…”

Then he pointed at the fifty-foot drop below the tramway. “And then there’s this bike path which is not a bike path.”

“No, we’re taking the fancy route, aren’t we?”

“Oh god, Yuno.” Mickey rubbed his eyes. This wasn’t supposed to be a suicide mission, but it was rapidly turning into one.

“We’ll try it and see what happens. Come on, Mickey. We’re gonna be just like Evel Knievel!”

“We’re really gonna do this?”

“We pulled off the Rainbow Road. We can do this.”

Yuno’s simple words filled Mickey with determination. “You're right. Let’s fucking do it.”

They picked up their bikes and lined up at the tramway entrance to gain maximum speed.

“Let’s go!” Yuno yelled.

They pedaled to the end of the tramway and jumped off, falling down onto the mountain and riding the incline.

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳ˋ°•*⁀➷✧˚⊹⭒☣

Raymond let out a wide yawn. He was tired from the sleep that he didn’t get last night. His eye bags were prominent, his hair smelled of iron and smoke, and his clothes were stained crimson. He rubbed his eyes and heavily dragged his feet over to the bathroom at R.U.S.T. Scrapyard. Similar to a dormitory, there was a row of showers along the wall for washing themselves clean after bathing in the blood of their enemies.

Just as Raymond stripped off his clothes, walked into a stall, and turned on the shower, a bullet whizzed through the wall, nearly hitting him. He groaned as he turned off the shower, wrapped a towel around his waist, and trudged back to the Scrapyard lounge where one of his R.U.S.T. members, La Flare Davis, was standing over a corpse.

“La flare, you better explain yourself right fucking now,” Raymond sleepily grumbled.

La Flare jumped and turned around to address his leader, “Ray, we’re at war with Hydra.”

“Why?”

“Well, I just killed this guy. So, I assume they'll hear about it soon, and it'll lead to a war.”

“Okay. I'm gonna go take shower, then I'll deal with it.”

“Yes, sir.”

Raymond returned to the bathroom, hung up his towel, and got into the shower. Just as he turned it on, he heard an explosion from the lounge. He quickly turned off the shower, wrapped his towel around his waist, and ran back to the lounge which was now engulfed in flames. La Flare was dead, burned to a crisp, and Raymond found his death to be unfortunate due to his name. He gingerly creeped around the flames and found a brick in the corner of the room with a message scratched into the surface that read, “Fuck you Ray! Hail Hydra!”

His second in command, Chem, ran into the room with a fire extinguisher, and put out the blaze. When the fire was completely gone, he saw the damage.

“What the fuck happened?!”

“Chem, look at this.” Raymond handed him the brick.

He glared as he read the message. “What do you wanna do?”

The rage in Raymond’s eyes intensified. “Every single motherfucker there is going to die. Every motherfucker there is dead! You hear me?! They’re all fucking dead!”

They gathered up whoever was available in R.U.S.T. to go out hunting for Hydra members for the next few hours. Raymond wouldn’t let himself sleep until he had shot down at least five people.

It was noon when Raymond returned to the shower with more crimson staining his clothes than before. He took off his garments and finally relished in the feeling of scaling hot water cascading over his skin, relaxing his muscles. Less than a minute into his peaceful shower, he was interrupted by his phone ringing. He released a slightly irritated sigh, but turned off the shower and picked up his phone resting on the shower niche to answer it.

“Yo.”

He recognized Tony’s voice. “Hello?”

“Listen, S+ Boost, BMW M5. I need a hacker stat!”

“Uh, can it wait, Tony?”

“No, we need to go boosting to VIN scratch vehicles for our Lower Vault Heist. All of ours keep blowing up. Do you want to do the job without a car?”

He agreed that Tony had a point. They had been preparing for this heist for the past month, and while they had finally accumulated the supplies for hacking and breaking into the Lower Vault, they didn’t have an escape plan yet because they didn't have backup vehicles.

Raymond had been awake for the past twenty-seven hours, but it looked like he would have to deal with this before he went to sleep. “Okay, I am naked in my shower and I’m coming soon.”

“Wait, are you naked in your shower and you’re coming soon? Or you’re like naked in your shower and then you’re getting over here soon.”

“No, no, no, no, no, no, I’m coming over soon. I just—I’m literally buck naked.”

“Hurry up, man! Hurry up! Hurry up! S+ Boost!”

“I know, listen, I gotta get dressed! I gotta get dressed!”

“Okay, okay, okay, get dressed! Get dressed!”

“I’ll see you soon, Tony! I’m on my way!”

“Okay, okay, I love you! Bye!”

“I love you too.” Raymond “quickly” finished his twenty-minute shower, then rushed out to meet with Tony.

On the side lawn by the gazebo at CLean Manor, Tony was admiring the view of the city while waiting for Raymond. It was a sunny day, and late-spring flowers decorated the gazebo pillars. Despite that, the weather broadcast said it would rain later, so Tony wanted to get the boost done before the water made it difficult to drive. Suddenly, his phone rang. It was a call from Lang.

“Hey, Buddha. Ray and I are gonna go boosting if you wanna—”

“Is this Tony?”

“Uh, yes, it’s me. Obviously. You get a new phone or something?”

“Tell me something Tony would know.”

“What? Everything I know is something I would know.”

“Right…” Lang replied skeptically. “Are you racing right now?”

“Ah, about that. I think I’m gonna quit the racing scene for a bit.”

“The fuck you mean ‘quit’?”

“I’m quitting, brother.”

“Why the fuck would you do that?”

“I just feel like after everything that happened with the Puppets, it’s time for me to take a break. Y’know what I mean?” Tony had recently experienced a rough week in the Underground Racing Scene, and he needed to take his mind off of it for a little while.

“No, Tony would never do that. Tony loves cars. He loves racing more than anything.”

“I don't love racing more than anything. I can promise you that.”

“Oh god. This is what Edwin was talking about. They’re trying to give me false promises. I can’t fall for it.”

Tony tried to make sense of Lang’s words, but couldn’t. “What are you talking about?”

“Tell me something only Tony would know about me.”

“Buddha, I know you better than anyone. I literally know your whole daily routine.”

“No, you don't.”

He took a deep breath and said, “You wake up at 8:00 a.m. The moment you go downstairs, Alfred gives you your black cold brew coffee. You drink it while listening to music and going on a thirty-minute stroll around the neighborhood. You don't like being disturbed on your walk. You won't even talk to me until you come back to the manor and get dressed for the day. At 9:00 a.m., you meet up with Dean, Leslie, and Cassie to have your Cerberus meetings. Sometimes Harry, Nancy, and Eve are there, too. You’re an ‘eight and skate’ businessman, so you always end work at 5:00 p.m. Then you check in with Denzel and The Guild to make sure they’re doing alright. At 7:00 p.m., you check in at Rooster’s Rest to discuss profits and sales with Penny. Sometimes you work the shift with her if she needs the help. If not, then you return to the manor at 8:00 p.m. to have dinner with the boys. After dinner, we do a job with Ray and Yuno, but that’s only if we have the money and supplies for it. Most nights you do an hour-long workout session followed by a quick shower, then you meet me in the game room to watch The Sopranos until we fall asleep.”

“Literally everyone knows that, you fucking fake ass Tony. I’m on to you, motherfucker.”

“Wha—”

Lang hung up, leaving Tony confused about their conversation. He debated calling him back when Raymond arrived.

“Ready to go, Tony?”

“Yeah, let's take the Cussy.”

Tony used the family Stratum to drive them to the black BMW M5 that he wanted to boost. The car was parked in a loosely guarded driveway of a large house located near the Chiliad Mountain State Wilderness. They stealthily hot-wired the car, but it had a tracker which activated the moment the front door was unlocked. The alarms went off, and they got into the car to disable the tracker as the police pursued after them through the Paleto Forest. Tony drove while Raymond hacked into the security system.

Two police cruisers chased after them. The primary officer, Sam Baas, yelled at them through a megaphone, “This is the Chief of Police of the LSPD, Sam Baas! Pull it over!”

Tony smiled and stuck his hand out of the window to flip off the bald officer. He didn’t need to try and lose them yet because the tracker would just tell the police their new location anyway, so he idly drove around instead, messing with them and flaunting his drifting skills. He knew that he could outdrive Chief Baas any day of the week with his eyes closed, so he didn’t need to worry about getting too confident and getting caught. For the boosting crime that they were committing, it was unlikely that the whole police force would show up to apprehend them. The police were probably more busy dealing with the rise of gang activity in the Southside.

Meanwhile, Raymond was struggling with the hack and became frustrated with himself. The sound of police sirens following them only agitated him further.

“That’s it! Pull over, Tony. Let me shoot these cops real quick.”

“What?! No. Why?” Tony was taken off guard by the sudden threat.

“Fucking pull over so I can put bullet in each of their heads!”

“There’s no need for that. I can easily outdrive them as long as the tracker is disabled.”

“Yes, but I can easily kill them, too. What’s the problem—”

“No, no, fucking listen here, you little shit! I know this cop. I like this cop. He’s got a family, and friends, and a whole career ahead of him. We're on opposite sides of the law, but he doesn't deserve to die. No one deserves to die.”

“Yes, I understand that, but why can't I kill him? I mean, I might as well since he’s right there and—”

“There is no need to escalate here! Do you understand that if you shoot a cop, it will only cause them to get more aggressive and make more of them show up?! They only escalate the situation when we escalate the problem.”

“Of course I know that. I'm a gang leader. It’s what I do—”

“Just shut the fuck up and hack! You can do it. I believe in you. You just gotta focus on the hack and ignore everything else.”

Raymond furrowed his brows, but chose to listen to Tony. “If that's what you want, then I'll try my best.”

After fifteen minutes of hacking, he finally managed to disable the tracker. The moment he did, Tony lost the police. He parked behind a tree and they exited the vehicle to relax for a bit. It was usually a smarter idea to wait for the police to leave the area before driving a hot vehicle again, so they decided to hide in the shrubbery for at least ten minutes.

“Good shit, brother,” Tony complimented. “Now we can use this car for the next heist.”

Raymond gave him a lopsided smile. He was fatigued from hacking and the lack of sleep, but happy from the praise that Tony had given him. “Hopefully, it doesn’t explode like the others.”

“Yeah. Let’s VIN scratch the license and switch back to the Cussy. You got time for another boost?”

“Honestly, I’m kinda tired and I think I need another showe—” Raymond heard a noise from a distant bush behind him that sounded suspicious, and he jumped behind the BMW M5 as a gunshot was fired.

“Holy fuck!” Tony ducked behind the car as well.

Raymond—remembering where the bullet came from—pulled out his pistol and shot into the bush, killing his attacker. They got into their car, and Tony drove away as bullets flew around them from two other individuals hiding in the bushes.

Just like the chase with the police, Tony easily lost them. “What the fuck is happening?!”

“R.U.S.T. is in war against Hydra right now.”

“I thought you guys were at war with Mandem?”

“That was last week—Ngh!” Raymond felt a stinging sensation, and realized that one of the bullets grazed his left arm. It was bleeding profusely.

Tony glanced over at Raymond. “Oh my fucking god! Are you okay?”

Raymond ran his fingers across the wound, making sure there wasn’t any leftover debris or dirt caught in it that could lead to an infection.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Seeing that there was nothing stuck in it, Raymond ripped off his white dress shirt and used it as a bandage, tying the clothing tightly around his arm to stop the bleeding. The burning pain made him smile manically. “I’ll patch it up better later.”

Tony looked at his face in concern. “You sure you’re alright?”

Raymond’s smile widened. “It fucking hurts like a bitch, but I’m smiling through the pain. And I can’t wait to kill them.”

“Uh, should I take you to the hospital first?”

“No, it's protocol for nurses to report all gun-related injuries to the police, and we don’t need cops investigating our gang business. I need you to take me back to the Cussy, and I'll tell my R.U.S.T. boys to meet us there. Then we'll get payback on those motherfuckers who shot me.”

Tony was silent for a second before he answered, “Okay.”

They were heading back north on the Great Ocean Highway bridge when a low-flying helicopter came zooming by remarkably close to the road. It looped under and over the highway bridge twice, then headed towards Mount Chiliad.

Raymond blinked in surprise. “Umm…”

“Oh, that's definitely Mickey. No one else flies like that.”

✦₊˚⊹⋆❀₊⁺⋆♣⋆⁺₊❀⋆⊹˚₊✦

“Woo!~ Yeah, Mickey!”

“Hang on tight, Yuno! Watch this!”

The black Volatus doors were open and Yuno leaned slightly out of the aircraft, enjoying the breeze as Mickey performed his aerial tricks. They were heading back to Mount Chiliad for a second time.

“Mickey, I know the first ride was a failure because the BMX bikes broke, but with our new mountain bikes and this helicopter it’ll be much faster to get from the bottom to the top and you'll get more time to practice.”

“I hope so. The mountain bikes look sturdier, too.” Mickey saw a gas station below them and descended towards it. “I'm gonna refuel before we go back to the top!”

“Okay!”

The gas station had plenty of open space to refuel the helicopter. As Mickey refueled, Yuno ran around each gasoline pump to pass the time. He finished his third lap around the gas station when his phone rang.

He answered it. “Hey, Mr. L—”

“Are you a variant?”

“Mr. Lang? Are you all right? What’s been happening today?”

“...I don’t know if I can trust you, Yuno.”

“Wha-What?”

“You’re a vari~ant, aren’t you?”

“I’m very~ concerned. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, y’know I know, fake Yuno.”

“No, no, I’m Yuno. You know I’m Yuno. It’s me!”

“There’s one thing Yuno will always say to me that nobody else does.”

“Right~ What is it?”

“Only Yuno would know.”

“I would?... Um, uh, ‘I’m going to the Rooster to work’?”

Lang sighed. “Yeah, Yuno would say that, too.”

“Mr. Lang, what’s going on?”

“Yuno, I’m in the middle of a war in the multiverse. I got the Burger King coming for my ass. My empires are crumbling.”

“Uh…did you bake any cookies today?”

“No. Why?”

“Bjorn told me that the jars in the pantry are filled with The Guild’s 89% purity skooma. It’s not flour, so don’t—”

“I didn’t eat meth cookies, Yuno.”

“Okay, then I’m thinking of making fruit salad tonight. Is there anything I should put in it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t like fruit salad.”

“I’m going to the store to pick up some fruit . What fruit should I put in the salad?”

“Any fruit is fine, I guess.”

“The word I was looking for was pineapple.”

Lang chuckled. “No, it’s not like that. You get an A+ for remembering the codeword, though. I gotta go now, Yuno.”

“O-Okay. I-I’ll see you later.”

Lang hung up, leaving Yuno confused about their conversation. He debated calling him back when Mickey called out to him, “Yuno! We gotta go!”

He ran back to the helicopter, and Mickey flew them to the peak of Mount Chiliad.

“Yuno, you ever hear of NVL?”

“NVL?”

“It stands for ‘No Value of Life.’”

“Because we do dumb—I mean, cool things like this, and don’t value our lives as much as we should?”

“Exactly. I was thinking that ‘NVL Twins’ could be our stunt name, like Evel Knievel.”

“Oh~ Okay, yeah.”

Mickey landed the helicopter on the roof of the aerial tramway, and came to a realization. “Ooh, we didn't think this through.”

“What didn't we think through?”

“When we jump off the tramway, we'll still have to pedal back up the mountain because the helicopter will still be here.”

“That's okay. I say let's just go and worry about it later.”

“Yeah, you're right. Send it!”

Mickey and Yuno took the same jump off the tramway. This time, their mountain bikes survived the impact of the fall—unlike their BMX trial—but Mickey crashed into a boulder and broke his bike again.

“Yuno, why don't I just ride with you first so I can see how you do it.”

“Yeah, yeah. I'll show you my secret technique. Hop on, Mickey.”

Yuno pedaled back to the top of Chiliad with Mickey sitting on the back seat of his bike. He jumped off the tramway again, smoothly landed on the ground, and weaved between the boulders and mountain ridges down the slope to the bottom. At some point—he didn't know when—Mickey fell off the bike and landed in a bush.

He crawled out of the shrub, and called Yuno on his phone. “Yuno, I don't think these bikes are made for carrying two people while jumping off a cliff. Since you've already mastered this jump, why don't I just follow you in the helicopter and we move on to the next step of the plan?”

“All right. What's the next step?”

Thirty minutes later, Yuno found himself back at the tramway on his mountain bike except now there was a parachute strapped around his body.

Mickey was flying around Mount Chiliad in the helicopter. “Yuno, are you ready?”

“Yup! I’m all set!”

“Okay, so as soon as the bike hits the air, you jump off and pull the parachute. Hopefully, that’s enough time for it to deploy.”

“And when it isn’t—If it isn’t, then I splat into the ground like a tomato and you’ll pick up my dead body off the side of the mountain. I got it, Mickey.”

“No, no, if the parachute doesn't fully deploy, I'll be hovering under you and I'll snipe you from the air before you hit the ground, effectively saving your life like a goddamn superhero.”

“Oh yeah, that's perfect! I see nothing wrong with this plan, Mickey.”

“Exactly. It’s impossible for something to go wrong.” Mickey positioned the helicopter below the tramway. He knew the exact spot where Yuno was most likely to land because they had accumulated a pile of broken bikes below the drop. “Send it, Yuno! Send it!”

“Is this NVL?” Yuno asked himself. “No, this is science.” He pedaled at a great speed and jumped off the tramway. He gained so much momentum that he flew over the helicopter with his bike, then he let go of the handlebars and pulled the parachute. His bike plummeted to the ground with the other broken bikes.

“Oh my god! Where is he?!” Mickey squinted his eyes, looking for him.

It was a nerve-racking five seconds, but the parachute fully deployed before Yuno could splat onto the mountain.

“Ohh! Let’s go! You made it!” Mickey cheered when he saw the parachute.

“It worked! I did it, Mickey!”

“Okay, now just parachute down to the bottom. I'll pick you up there.”

“Mickey, this is gonna go so great when we use it for the Lower Vault Heis—”

He heard a loud cracking sound and the call disconnected. “Yuno?! Yuno, are you okay?”

Yuno’s parachute had gotten snagged on a tree, and his phone fell from his hand, breaking on impact when hitting the ground. “Oh, poop nuggets! Now I have to buy another phone.”

“Yuno, where are you?!” Mickey navigated the helicopter around the last place where he saw Yuno. Searching for him proved to be more difficult than he realized because he was looking for a man wearing a green blazer among the green foliage.

“I’m over here! Help! My shoes! My shoes! Look for my glowy shoes!” Yuno kicked his blue light up shoes in the air, hoping that Mickey could see them. Luckily, the light caught Mickey’s eyes and he flew over to him.

“Help! Over here! I’m in the tree!”

“I’m coming, Yuno!” Mickey hovered close to the tree, being mindful not to blend up Yuno’s body with the helicopter blades.

“Pick me up! Pick me up, Mickey!”

“I’m gonna save you, Yuno!” Mickey left the helicopter hovering on autopilot, ran to the door, and cut Yuno’s parachute off while dragging him into the aircraft.

Once Yuno was safely seated inside, Mickey looked down at the bike graveyard below them. “Looks like we're gonna need to buy more bikes for further testing.”

They had wasted a lot of time and money on this extremely risky not-a-bike path, and Yuno didn't have that much money left to fund it. “So, uh, where’s the normal bike path to get down? Should we check out the normal path?”

“Yeah, let’s do it.”

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳ˋ°•*⁀➷✧˚⊹⭒☣

Tony and Raymond were in the family Stratum, searching the area for the Hydra members that shot at them. Chem and another member of R.U.S.T., Achez Perez, helped them search. Even though Raymond had only caught a glimpse of their two culprits in the bushes, he had a good memory of their general description. It gave Chem and Perez a lot to work with since they had been hunting Hydra all day, and they had a better idea of what the Hydra members looked like.

“We found two guys with pistols on them that kinda match your description,” Chem stated into his handheld radio.

“Okay, we’re coming over,” Raymond responded.

They went to Chem and Perez’s location, and got out of the car to examine the men that they were holding up. One wore a denim jacket and the other wore a red hoodie. At first glance, they looked like the guys that shot at him, but their hair colors were the wrong shades. Tony was impressed that Raymond could remember that much. At the time, he was too busy trying to drive away from the bullets.

“So why were you here carrying around guns if you’re not Hydra?” Raymond questioned the gangster in the denim jacket.

“Hey, we’re just small criminals terrorizing people wherever we can outside of the Southside.”

The red hoodie wearing gangster joined in, “Yeah, our gang’s not big enough to fight with you city folks. We’re just going what we can, man.”

“Ah, I see.” Raymond took out a pen and a piece of paper, and wrote down his number. Then he held it out to the red hooded gangster. “Well, my name’s Raymond. Here’s my number. If you guys need help terrorizing, let me know.”

“Sir, I’m not taking your number. I’m a married man.”

“Oh, you have a wife?”

“Yes.”

“Is your wife single?”

“Ay! Fuck you!”

The fuming gangster left, and the other one ran after him.

Raymond shrugged, putting the slip of paper in his pants pocket. “That was rude of him.”

“Let’s just keep searching,” Chem said and drove away, resuming the hunt.

Raymond turned back to Perez and Tony. “Okay. You guys search for Hydra, and I'll search for that man's wife.”

Perez squinted his eyes. “I can't tell if you’re joking.”

“Why would I be joking? If she's married, there's probably a good reason for it, right?” Raymond’s voice deepened as spoke. Perez wasn’t sure if he was unaware of it or if he did it on purpose.

“Do you try to emphasize your voice to make it deep or is this just how you speak?”

Raymond spoke deeper in response to the claim. “You want me to make it deep?~ I can if you wan—”

“Stop!” Perez punched Raymond’s chest, resulting in him dropping the voice and speaking in his normal Russian cadence.

“Motherfucker, you hit me again and I’ll hit your mother like that at night.”

“Oh my god!” Perez didn’t expect that to be the threat following his misconduct.

“Now where’s the box of ammo cartridges? I swear I left it in this car.” Raymond searched the trunk of Perez’s car.

“Ray!” Perez couldn’t get over his leader’s inappropriate threat.

“What, Perez? What?”

“Jesus Christ.”

“What? What’s wrong?”

“Oh my god.”

“What did I do?”

“You can’t just say—”

“Oh, here they are! Perfect.” Raymond found the cartridge and reloaded his pistol.

Chem spoke over the radio again, “I found them! This is them for sure. I'll ping you guys!”

Raymond and Perez received Chem’s ping to the northernmost part of the Great Ocean Highway near Mount Chiliad.

“Guns out. Let’s go,” Raymond commanded, and Perez immediately headed over to the spot.

Raymond got into the Stratum and marked the location on the GPS for Tony to drive there. The Italian man had been oddly quiet since he started helping him hunt for the guys that attacked them, and Raymond was only now noticing it.

“You okay, Tony?”

“Ray, I don’t have a gun.”

“I have AK and three Desert Eagles in the trunk, and I got C-4 in the glove box. Anyway, listen—”

“You have C-4? And you put it in our glove box?”

“Of course, I’m Raymond Romanov. Uh, anyway, listen—”

Tony mimicked Raymond’s voice, “Of course I have C-4. My name’s Raymond Romanov. Are you fucking stupid? Are you fucking dumb? My wife has big, voluptuous tits.”

“She does. Anyway, listen—”

“Big Fs like pornstar.”

Raymond didn’t know why Tony was changing the subject, but he went along with it. “Fucking giant, yeah.”

“We fuck every night.”

“Every single night.”

“Goofy wish he could be me. I have huge cock, big guns, nice house, tuner car, and C-4.”

“Wait, how do you know all these things about me?”

“I also have Tony Corleone.”

“Oh, he’s in my arms every night, too.”

“I fuck whoever I want, Raymond Romanov. Very sexy.”

“Yeah, you’re right. Anyway, listen, I’m gonna have Chem and Perez cover us while we sneak over to Hydra. We’ll each take one out at the same time.”

Raymond wasn’t sure if he was imagining it, but he thought that Tony looked apprehensive.

Tony sighed and replied, “...Alright.”

As they got closer to the ping that Chem sent them, Tony parked a little bit away from the spot, so that Hydra wouldn’t hear their car. Then they walked the rest of the way there with guns in their hands. Raymond explained the plan to Chem and Perez over the radio, and the two R.U.S.T. members situated themselves a short distance up the mountain so that they could watch their backs.

As Raymond and Tony reached the ping location, they saw a black car parked on the side of Great Ocean Highway, and standing next to it were the two Hydra gangsters that perfectly matched the image in Raymond’s memory. He crouched down and quietly led Tony to a large bush a few feet away from their position.

“They’re definitely the guys who shot at us, Tony.”

Raymond’s phone buzzed, and he was thankful that he had the forethought to silence it earlier. He answered the call from Lang. “Hey, can I call you back? I’m about to kill these two motherfuckers right now.”

“Oh thank god.” Lang sighed in relief. “You’re the only one who hasn’t been replaced by a fucking variant.”

“I… Wh-What?”

“No, no, don’t mind me. You just go kill those gangbangers, buddy.”

“Ah~ Thanks, man. I appreciate that. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Okay, buh-bye.”

Raymond hung up, and aimed his AK through the leaves of the bush. “We go on three, Tony.”

Tony raised the Desert Eagle he borrowed from Raymond, and aimed through the bush.

“One…”

Tony looked up at the two unaware gangsters talking by their car. One wore a denim jacket and the other wore a red hoodie. He blinked and now he saw a teenage version of himself with Lang, laughing without a care in the world. He blinked again and saw a bullet fly through Lang’s head. He blinked a third time and saw the red-hooded gangster holding the other one in his arms as he bled out.

Tony closed his eyes and walked away. He heard the sound of a gunshot ring out behind him, but he couldn’t force himself to look at the aftermath of Raymond’s bullets.

The walk back to the Stratum was silent except for the sound of rustling bushes and footsteps; his own and another pair following behind him. He assumed that Chem and Perez went to deal with the corpses.

“Why didn’t you shoot, Tony?” Raymond asked once they returned to their car.

Tony stared at his reflection in the windshield which also showed Raymond’s curious eyes peeking over his shoulder. “Seeing the two talk outside the car, I just kept picturing me and Buddha. I couldn’t stand there and watch it. I’m so fucking soft…but that’s who I am. I’m the fucking soft one. My heart’s too fucking big. I’m sorry I let you down.”

“You didn’t let me down. I was still able to handle things on my own. It was just unexpected.”

Tony sighed. “When it comes to tying up loose ends, then I can do it. But, you have no idea how much I’ve lost.”

“Yeah, I know you’re not a Leanboi anymore, but I assumed that the guy who sold pasta with human meat as the meatballs was still in there.”

“...You heard about that?”

“Lang mentioned it a little bit.”

“That was a long time ago…” Tony unlocked the Stratum. “Get in the car, Ray. Let me tell you something about myself.”

Tony sat in the driver’s seat, and Raymond sat in the passenger seat. He took a deep breath and recalled the bittersweet memories of his past. “I grew up in Liberty City. Ever since I was a kid, I was fascinated with cars. And when I got my license, I would drive everywhere, exploring the city, following each road as far as they could go. I used to ditch school to go street racing with friends, but my parents were disappointed when they found out about it. I’ve never seen my father so pissed. The last thing he told me before he kicked me out was that I would never amount to anything.”

He sighed, talking about his father always left a bitter taste in his mouth. “After that, I dropped out of high school, and decided to move to San Andreas. I was only sixteen and living on the streets, but I grew to learn these roads better than anyone. I learned how to steal, taught myself how to hot-wire cars, and began making a name for myself as a criminal. I got into some fucked up shit to make money, too. Like what Buddha said, I used to kill people, cut them up, and sell their bodies as meatballs. For fun, I used to get two or three people in a room, kill one of them, and force feed the corpse to the others.”

“Wait, that’s so good. Why didn’t I think of that?” Raymond interrupted.

Tony sighed again. “Can I finish my story, Ray?”

“Right, sorry. Continue.”

“Anyways, when I turned nineteen, I met Buddha along with two others, Avon and Saab, and we founded the Leanbois. We lived that gang lifestyle for over a decade. Made a lot of new friends, made a list of enemies, and grew into a formidable gang. But, as time went by, everything slowly started to crumble around us. People died, people betrayed each other, gang wars waged on and on for months at a time, but you already knew that part. For me, I can’t recall when it happened exactly, but I remember being surrounded by the blood of my brothers. Brothers who were more of a family to me than any of my real family ever was. And I remember thinking, ‘I don’t wanna lose the best thing that has ever happened to me over some petty gang shit.’ When I expressed these feelings to Buddha and Denzel, they agreed and we disbanded the Leanbois a few months later. People went their separate ways, people changed their jobs, people made new families, and one thing led to another, and now I’m here with you. And you remind me so much of everything that I left behind.”

Tony turned to Raymond, who was wearing a confused expression on his face. “What are you trying to say, Tony? I don’t get it.”

“Well…I mean, to put it simply, I’m just saying, I don't mean to be that guy, but sometimes there’s more to life than gang life. The value of life should not be taken lightly. It is defined by how much we treasure ourselves and those around us.”

“Wait, how so? If I kill someone, then it means that their life has no value, right?”

“Uhh, I guess, maybe not to you, but they’re still valued by someone else.”

“Why? How is that possible?” Tony’s words were becoming nonsensical to Raymond, and made him more confused.

Tony looked at Raymond in disbelief. “Motherfucker, have you not been listening to a single word I have said?”

“Of course I’ve been listening, Tony. What else would I be doing right now? I just don’t think I understand what you’re saying. Why would a few dead family members stop you from killing other people? That just sounds like more reason to kill someone.”

Tony sighed and looked up at the sky through the car window, wondering if he should even try to have this conversation with Raymond when he fundamentally just couldn't comprehend the point he was trying to make.

He noticed big, dark clouds rolling in, and remembered seeing the weather broadcast that morning about how it was supposed to rain. So, he decided to drop the subject for the time being.

“Y’know what, Ray? I’m tired. Let’s just go home before it rains.”

“Wait, we need to pick up Yuno first. He just texted me saying that he’s at the bottom of Mount Chiliad, and he needs ride. I think he's just up this road.”

Tony started the engine and drove forward until saw Yuno on the side of the road with a mountain bike. The helmeted man was distracted talking to someone so Tony honked his horn to get his attention.

“Yuno, we’re here! Get in!”

“Okay, one sec!” Yuno turned back to the stranger. “Sir, would you like to buy this bike?”

“Uhh, how much?”

Raymond rolled down his window and yelled, “If you don’t buy that bike, I will end your family line!”

Tony sighed for what felt like the hundredth time that day.

The stranger took the threat seriously. “Well, man, I don’t really want that, so I guess I’ll buy the bike.”

“How’s like, uh, $20 sound?” Yuno asked.

“Yeah, I mean, I don’t want my family line to be ended, so I’ll give you $20.” The man pulled a $20 bill out of his wallet and gave it to Yuno.

“Wow! Thanks! Hope you enjoy the bike, sir!” Yuno left his mountain bike with the stranger, then got into the back seat of the Stratum.

When Tony started driving back to CLean Manor, Raymond looked at Yuno over his shoulder. “So, Yuno, you’ve been spending a lot of time with Mickey lately. What’s going on?”

“Mickey was helping me make a getaway plan for the Lower Vault Heist. We wanna try to get away from the cops while using mountain bikes, so we're studying Mount Chiliad. The plan is for me to bike up to the top of the mountain and parachute down to Mickey’s location.”

Raymond broke eye contact with Yuno and looked out the window. “Vetoed.”

“V-Vetoed? Why?”

“Tony and I went boosting today and VIN scratched a BMW M5. We’ll use that instead. Also, Mickey’s not doing this job with us.”

“He’s not? Why?”

“‘Cause he's CG. There's no way Mr. K would let him work with our gang—”

“We’re not a gang,” Tony interrupted.

“—with our group,” Raymond corrected. “Did you tell Mickey that you’re doing the job with us?”

Yuno thought back to his conversation with Mickey, but couldn’t remember what he said. “Uhh, no? I think I might’ve forgotten to mention that part.”

“Once you tell him, he'll decline working with us. Doing a job with you as Team Rocket is not the same as doing a job with us as Cleanbois.”

“It’s not? Why?” Yuno suddenly felt like he didn’t know anything.

“That's just how it is between gangs—I mean, groups in the city. Be careful when working with CG, Yuno. They’re fucking snakes.”

Yuno didn't think that Chang Gang were snakes, and he wasn’t really sure what Raymond was talking about. However, the Russian man seemed tired and a little upset, and he didn't want to upset him further. “Okay, Raymond. I'll tell Mickey that it’s just a Cleanbois Lower Vault Heist.”

He saw Raymond grin in the car window’s reflection, and felt glad that he was able to say the right thing to make him smile.

“Where’s Mickey now?” Tony asked. “I thought he was with you.”

“He’s still on the mountain. He wanted to practice the bike route some more.”

Underneath the storm clouds, Mickey pedaled up Mount Chiliad for the final time. The rain poured down harshly against his drenched clothes.

“Yuno might be a better hacker than me! He might’ve just done this biking thing on his first try! But I have perseverance!” Mickey screamed out between exhausted pants. “Yeah, Tony might be the best getaway driver, and Mr. K might have the best plans, and Lang might be rich, and Jean Paul might be the best bank buster… But I have perseverance! I will be the greatest criminal in Los Santos! Urgh! Unh!”

Mickey grunted as he made it back to the aerial tramway at the peak of the mountain. Then he pedaled as fast as he could to launch the bike off the metal structure.

“Send it!”

Lightning struck.

.⋆ ｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆.

Thunder roared. Lang was running for his life, trying to get to the Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank. He needed to get there before he was killed by the spies and variants chasing after him. KFC flapped his wings and strutted his feet, trying to keep up with the man. The pouring rain made it difficult for the cold and wet rooster.

“Box him out!”

“I’m trying!”

“Everything’s okay! Everything’s okay!”

“Lang, stop being a drama queen.”

“Oh my god.”

On West Eclipse Boulevard, Lang was being chased through the rain by the businesswoman of Cerberus; Eve, Fiona, Cassie, Nancy, and Kitty. Pursuing him on foot was Cassie and Eve. Every time Lang got a huge lead in front of them, Fiona would drift her white Elegy in front of him to slow his pace.

Nancy followed the chase by driving behind them in her Cerberus Mercedes, and Kitty sat in her passenger seat, trying to contact Dean and Leslie.

“It keeps going straight to voicemail. They're probably in a meeting right now.” She groaned and tried to call Harry, but he also didn’t pick up her call.

Eve was running out of breath and falling behind. Her business shoes were not made for exercise. KFC was just as exhausted as she was. His little feet gave up trying to run after Lang, and he toppled over onto the cold pavement in front of her. Eve picked up the rooster, cradling his shivering body in her arms.

“Yeah. I’m right there with you, KFC,” she said between gasps for air. “I'm tapping out, too.”

Cassie almost managed to catch up to Lang when the heel of her shoe broke, causing her to fall and land in a puddle, lightly scraping her knee in the process.

“Fuck!” It didn’t hurt that much. She was more annoyed about her broken high heel.

As she examined her small wound, Nancy drove up next to her. “Cassie, what the fuck was that?!”

“It’s hard to run in heels, Nancy!”

“Here, get in my car! Let's trade.” She exited her vehicle and let Cassie take over driving. Eve laid down in the back seat with KFC. Both of them needed a moment to catch their breath.

Nancy threw her high heels in her trunk, and proceeded to run barefoot on the wet street. When she sprinted up to Lang, she saw Fiona repeatedly drifting in front of him in her Elegy, cutting off his path. However, he always slid across the hood of the car and kept running. Nancy decided to try and find a good moment to tackle Lang right after Fiona blocked his path as that was the only time he was standing still.

Fiona drove after Lang again and again, trying to box him against the road. She was a well-known street racer, but her driving skills were not suitable for capturing a man running on foot. This continued on for ten minutes with the two of them trying to pin him down, and Lang evading them every time. Cassie, Eve, and Kitty tried to yell out reassurances to Lang, but their words didn't reach him. He was too lost in his own paranoia.

As they approached the City Vault, the constant running began to take its toll on him, and his pace slowed down. Nancy was able to get close enough to Lang to hear him muttering to himself, “Go to the bank, go to the bank, go to the bank—”

“What the fuck are you doing?!”

“I gotta go to the bank right now!”

Penny exited the City Vault and saw the commotion. “Uh, Mr. Lang, is everything okay?”

Lang looked up at her. His eyes were filled with hope and relief. “Penny! Wait right here, Penny.”

“Yeah, yeah. I got you.”

Kitty groaned. “Oh my god. Penny too?”

“Penny, are you good?” Cassie asked.

“Wait, what’s going on?” Penny had no idea what she had just gotten herself into. Everyone exited their vehicles and ran past her as they followed Lang inside the bank, but she held her ground, waiting in place for Lang to return.

The businesswomen found him at a kiosk, withdrawing money from a bank account.

“My fucking money.” Lang panted out like a crazed man. “My fucking empire.” He couldn’t remember how things got to this point. All of his thoughts were loud and conflicted with each other. One moment he was scared about variants, and throughout the day he had only realized that nearly everyone around him was a variant. He no longer knew who was spying on him and who was someone he could trust. He needed to protect his empire. In order to do that, he had been traveling to all of the banks on the island with the logo of the suspicious security company, and withdrawing his money.

“Lang, what the fuck are you doing?” Nancy yelled once she reached him.

“My fucking empire! My empire!”

“It’s our empire and you need to get a hold of yourself!”

“My fucking empire. My fucking empire,” he repeated.

“Your empire’s fine, Mr. Lang.” Kitty tried to pat his shoulder to reassure him, but he shrugged her off.

“Lang, calm down. Everything's fine.” Eve panted heavily, and used a hand to move her wet hair out of her face.

“Shut up, Eve!” Lang had a disturbing realization and gasped. “Wait a fucking minute. Eve…did you come from the Garden of Eden?”

Eve looked down at KFC in her arms, and they both sighed at the ridiculous question. “Obviously not.”

“No, no, no, no, that's what you want me to think! Did you eat a golden apple from Eden?”

“Oh, now that you mention it, a couple of months ago, Leslie did offer me a golden apple in your backyard garden.” She found the coincidence amusing, and didn’t think anything more of it.

“Leslie would never! You're lying to me! You're a fucking variant! Get away from me!”

“Mr. Lang Buddha, I have the money you wished to withdraw,” the bank teller called out, carrying three black briefcases.

Lang snatched them in his hands and ran out of the bank.

Cassie was horrified at the amount of money that Lang just took with him. “Oh my god. Eve, help me check the Cerberus accounts.”

The two stayed at the City Vault to check the accounts while everyone else followed Lang. He only made it a few steps outside before he was tackled by Nancy. They ended up in a small tussle for the briefcases. Kitty and Fiona felt that they would only get in Nancy’s way, so they let her deal with it.

“Lang, stop being dramatic! The empire is fine!” Nancy nearly dislodged a briefcase out of his firm grip, but her business suit made it hard to move freely. A little push from him was enough to make her lose her balance and tumble backwards. She fell on her back and groaned.

“Fuck! It’s hard to fight in these clothes. I didn't expect to throw hands with my boss today.”

“Arghhh! They’re trying to kill me! Penny!” Lang screamed dramatically.

Penny—who hadn’t moved at all—idly stood by and watched, not knowing what to do.

Lang noticed that Nancy’s Mercedes was empty behind her and the engine was still running. He jumped into the passenger seat. “Penny, Penny, let’s go. Penny! Drive the car!”

She obediently got behind the wheel and drove down the street, ignoring the other women’s shouts of protest.

Lang grew a little relieved once he couldn’t see the variants anymore. He knew that Penny would never betray him. “Go, go, go. Pull off to an alleyway.”

She pulled over into a small, one-way alleyway. The moment she parked the car, Lang put his hands on her shoulders and looked her straight in the eye.

“Penny, my empire’s falling apart. You need to take this. You need to take this and hide it for me. Can you promise me you’ll hide it?”

“Yeah, I’ll hide it. I’ll keep it a secret. It’s fine. I’ll keep it safe. What do you got?”

Lang handed her the briefcases. He opened one of them to show her the money inside. “There’s $3,000,000 in here. Take it.”

“What the—How?!”

As one of the richest men in San Andreas, Lang had a history of depositing and withdrawing large sums of money. The bank tellers didn’t question it anymore, and usually let him do as he pleased.

“Go hide it!” he begged. “Go hide my empire! Please, Penny.”

“O-Okay, uh…”

Lang jumped out of the car and continued running. He ran and ran and ran. Hours passed, the rain stopped, but the paranoid thoughts persisted.

˚₊·♡ ͟͟͞͞➳｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡𓅯˚｡⋆.

At 8:00 p.m. in the kitchen at CLean Manor, Tony had just finished building his charcuterie board, covered with lots of gabagool. He picked it up, and carefully brought it over to the refectory table in the dining room. The rest of the table was set with candles, plates filled with potatoes and vegetables, and a massive bowl of spaghetti and meatballs was placed in the center.

It was normal spaghetti and meatballs, not human meatballs. That part of his life happened so long ago that he couldn’t believe he used to do it. He still loved pasta, though. And this recipe was now being sold in cans at his steak shop in Paleto Bay.

He turned to Raymond and Yuno who were playing cards at the poker table in the corner of the room.

“How are you so good at blackjack, Yuno?” Raymond asked.

“You need to play this game with Mr. Meow someday. He’s the best in the city.”

“Mr. Meow? You mean Meowfurryon?”

Tony cleared his throat and got their attention. “Ay, boys! Dinner’s ready!”

“Ooh~ Smells great, Tony.” Raymond stood up and walked over to the table, examining the food.

Yuno looked around the room. He found it strange that Lang wasn’t immediately running over to the table to eat. “Where’s Mr. Lang? He’s not joining us?”

“Oh, he’s probably in his cave,” Tony concluded. He hadn’t talked to him since their weird phone call earlier that day. “I’ll go get him. You guys can start eating without us.”

Tony took the elevator in the kitchen down to the lower garage. He was surprised to find a trail of cash that led from the garage entrance to the cave entrance. Using Lang’s black moped, he followed the money trail into the dark cavern where he found several tall stacks of cash in the center of the cave. There was probably over $100,000,000 in total, and he stared at it in awe. He had never seen that much money before.

Tony parked the moped in the corner of the platform by the computer system and walked around the money. Behind it, he found Lang curled up in a ball on the ground. He looked miserable.

He reached his hand out and rested it on Lang’s shoulder.  “Hey, you alright?”

Lang slapped his hand away and stood up to glare at him. “Get the fuck away from me! Are you from a different universe? You a variant?”

“Huh?”

“Right~ You just gonna pretend like you don’t know what I’m talking about?”

“Uh, Buddha? It’s me, Tony, your boy, man. What are you talking about? I don’t know anything about variants and time and shit like that. I know I’m hungry and it’s time to eat. That’s all I care about.”

“Right~ What do you know about the Dark Timelord? And are you working with him, Tony?”

“I don’t know anything. I have no idea what you’re talking abou—Ngh!”

Lang roughly pushed him away.

“Don’t you fucking lie to me, asshole!” he yelled while breathing heavily and uncontrollably.

Tony saw that underneath Lang’s aggressive attitude, he was filled with anxiety and paranoid out of his mind. He spoke softly, “Hey, calm down, okay? Look at me.”

Lang made eye contact with him, and he could feel himself being analyzed.

“Y’know I’m not lying to you. I don’t even know what you’ve been up to today. I don’t know shit about fucking variant this, fucking timeline that. Just…” Tony emphasized taking a deep breath.

“Just take it ease and breathe. C’mon, in through your nose, out through your mouth, remember?” Tony took deep breaths and got Lang to copy him. It took a few minutes, but his breathing eventually stabilized.

“Come here, buddy. Bring it in.” Tony had his arms spread out and waved Lang over with a beckoning hand gesture. After a brief moment of hesitation, Lang accepted the invite into the hug and let Tony wrap his arms around him.

“It’s all good, Buddha. It’s just you and me. No variants here. Trust me.”

Feeling Tony rub his back and whispering reassurances helped ground him. His head started to clear, and his paranoia gradually drifted away.

Lang sighed. “This shit’s just throwing me off. I’m so tired, Tony.”

“I know, I get it. You wanna get some rest and eat later?”

“No, it’s fine. I should probably eat something.”

“C’mon, let’s go upstairs. I just finished cooking dinner.”

They rode the moped back up to the lower garage, and went to the dining room to have dinner with Raymond and Yuno.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

It turned out that it was not just dinner with Raymond and Yuno. Tony and Lang entered the kitchen through the elevator to find that their manor was fully occupied.

Cassie, Nancy, Eve, Penny, Kitty, and Fiona were drinking wine in the kitchen, and the sink was filled with room temperature water which KFC merrily swam around in to warm himself up. It gave them all some much needed relaxation after what Lang put them through.

All six of The Guild members were gathered around the fireplace in the living room. Lando, Leyla, and Gloryon were eating spaghetti while Yeager, Bjorn, and Stagdancer were playing a card game. And then Goofy, Denzel, Harry, Nino, Raymond, and Yuno were eating in the dining room. Tony knew it was always a better idea to prepare more food than usual because everyone seemed to magically appear whenever he finished cooking.

Worried that the large number of people might be too overwhelming, he turned to Lang and let the silent question pass between them with a slight head tilt. Lang simply waved his hand and walked to the dining room, letting Tony know that he would be fine. Seeing the whole family gathered in his castle, doing their daily manor antics and normal routines actually made him feel calmer. They sat down at the two chairs towards the head of the table, and started to eat.

As everyone finished their meal, Tony observed the lively atmosphere and once again felt content with the choice he made all those years ago. He probably never would’ve gotten to see this scene if they had continued down the path they were on. He turned to Raymond. The gangster had fallen asleep next to Yuno with his pistol still gripped in his hand. Tony couldn’t help but sigh at the sight.

Chapter Text

TW: Suicidal thoughts, alcohol abuse, animal death.

(Monday, May 24, 2021)

Lang frantically ran all over the Diamond Casino floor until he found Dean gambling at a roulette table. The British man was back to his normal clean-shaven face, and Lang supposed that he didn’t like the beard.

“Dean?! Where the hell have you been? You can’t drop a bombshell of information on me like that, and then just fuck off for four days!”

It was early in the morning so there were not many people around to witness Lang yelling at the owner of the casino. Still, the staff members were not subtle about eavesdropping on their conversation.

“Come with me, Lang.” Dean led his business partner to his office to talk in private, locking the door behind him when they entered. “So, what happened four days ago?”

“You got me going fucking crazy about variants, motherfucker. What was that about?”

Dean wore a confused expression on his face, but Lang wasn’t going to let his guard down yet.

“Are…you a variant?”

“I’m not! Are you? What’s going on here, Dean? You’ve been acting real weird lately, and you seem…different.”

Lang scrutinized Dean’s appearance closely, trying to work out if he was talking to a variant of Dean or not. Physically Dean looked prim and proper like he always did, but he seemed mentally fatigued. Between this exhausted version of Dean and the overly cheerful one he met four days ago, this current one seemed more normal.

Dean confirmed Lang’s musings by responding, “I’m just tired. I don’t know what’s going on, and I don’t know who to trust anymore.”

“Motherfucker, it's me who doesn't know if it's okay to trust you. Also, what do you mean by ‘you will find what you’re looking for in the Diamond Casino vault,’ huh? You got some secret hidden in there, Dean?”

“What are you talking about? It’s just a vault for storing money.”

“Oh really? Is that all?” Lang asked sardonically.

“Yes, it is,” Dean insisted. “And I just finished building the new security system for it, too.”

“It’s about fucking time. It only took you, what? Like two months? You’re lucky it hasn’t been robbed.”

“I needed to make sure the security system was in top-notch condition. But, even if someone did break in, it would be covered by insurance. Actually, I should show you this.”

Dean opened his desk drawer, revealing a silver secure case resting inside. An emblem of a panther was engraved on the surface. “This is a new silver secure case and it has the new casino blueprints stored inside. It can only be unlocked when a code is inserted into the opening right here.” He pointed to a slot at the top of the case. “If anything happens to me, and you or Leslie absolutely need the blueprints, you’ll find the code on my personal computer.”

He then took the time to show Lang the file on his computer. Dean never brought the electronic device with him anywhere so it would always be accessible for the other two. If they ever needed it, they would find it sitting right there on his desk in that office.

“Understood?” Dean asked.

“I got it.”

“Don’t tell anyone else about this.”

“Yeah, of course not.”

“I’m being serious, Lang.”

“Dean, I take everything you say seriously.”

“Right, right. That’s why Tony knows about everything.”

“He doesn’t know about everything.”

“Right, right.”

“He doesn’t.”

Dean thought for a moment, staring at the ceiling in deep concentration before he turned his attention back to Lang. “If this code or my silver case disappears again, then prepare for the worst.”

“I’m already paranoid as fuck about everything. You ain’t gotta tell me twice.”

Dean smiled. “Good.”

Scene 8: Black Hack

At the Vinewood Bowl, Raymond stood on the ridge of the hillside which was covered with vehicles. There were seven trucks, two ATVs, five sports cars, and six SUVs. He knew the exact numbers because he spent the past ten minutes counting each and every one. Upon closer inspection, he found two dirt bikes in the bushes and—unable to make sense of the vast array of vehicles—he called Yuno.

“Hey, Raymond, everything’s set up. We just need thermite. You see the plan?”

“Yuno… What is this?”

“What do you mean, ‘What is this’?”

“Why is there twenty cars here?”

“Listen, you don’t need keys for any of the cars.”

“Uh-huh.”

“There’s two Sanchezes hiding in the bushes.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Those are what we’re actually using. Everything else is a distraction.”

“Huh… What’s the getaway plan?”

“T-That is… That’s it.” Yuno thought the plan was rather self-explanatory.

“We’re just getting on Sanchezes and driving away?”

“Into the mountains, yeah. That’s why I picked dirt bikes. And if something goes wrong we have all these backup cars.”

“...Oh.”

“Hold on, I’m coming back with an Akuma, just in case you prefer that.”

“Oh, hell yeah. So, wait, how do we get to the bikes here?”

“We just drive up through the last row where there are no seats, and climb over the wall to the hillside ‘cause they can’t follow us. They would have to go around the bowl to reach us on the other side. They might start shooting tires, but how many tires can they shoot before we get on the bikes?”

Raymond chuckled. “I suppose that’s true, yeah.”

“Raymond, this is a plan I came up with. What do you think?”

“I like this. I mean, yeah, you’re right. They can’t shoot all the tires if there’s this many vehicles.”

“Yup! All we need is thermite. Getaway plan is already set up.”

“Are we waiting for thermite? What’s going on?”

“I don’t know. I was hoping you would know.”

“I think Lang said that he’s saving the thermite for the Lower Vault Heist, so we’re gonna need to get our own if we wanna do this job. Let me try calling some people.”

“Wait, we made a plan to rob a jewelry store today, but we don’t have thermite?”

“No, no, I might be able to get some. I’ll call you back. Buh-bye.”

“All right, see you soon.” Yuno hung up and drove the Akuma he stole back to the Vinewood Bowl.

Ten minutes later, he arrived at the car-covered hillside to see two police officers and two tow truck operators, towing away the vehicles.

He called Raymond back. “Uh—”

“I’m sorry, Yuno. The guy who gave me the thermite was being followed by cops, and I’m trying to drive away from them right now.”

“You don’t have the thermite on you, do you?”

“Oh my god. I still have the thermite on me.”

“What? We can’t lose the thermite, man.”

“...Um…I’m kinda in rough spot.”

“How rough of a spot?”

“Oh, that’s bad.”

“How bad?”

“I’m stuck.”

“You’re stuck?! Where?”

“Ah! Don’t tase me!”

Yuno heard Raymond grunting and panting through the phone as he struggled to get out of his car and run away on foot with police officers chasing after him.

“Hello? Raymond, where are you? I gotta pick you up. Hello?”

“I’m by—I’m sorry. I’m by like this construction yard thing.”

“That doesn’t—”

“Okay, by the Rockford Plaza?”

“Rockford Plaza? Give me some details. I don’t know where…” Yuno drove through Rockford Hills on his stolen Akuma, trying to find the plaza.

“I’m trying to ping you, but it’s hard to maintain this call and run at the same time.”

“That’s okay. Focus on running.”

“I’m sorry, man. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry—”

“It’s okay. Try to give me details.”

“There’s, um, bunch, uh, motel here and everything.”

“Landmarks?”

“It’s huge yellow, uh, hotel thing here. The plaza. You know what I’m talking about?”

Yuno did not. “Uh…”

“The huge plaza. The yellow one. Um, it’s in the middle. It’s huge mall like, uh, huge thing that you drive through.”

“What’s it nearby?”

“It’s, uh, yellow—I don’t know what it is. I don’t know how to describe it. It’s like—Oh god. The shopping mall? It’s like huge shopping mall? This—I’m gonna get caught, man. It’s unfortunate. It is what it is. Should I shoot the cops?”

“Wait, wait, I see you! I’m behind you!” Yuno drove up next to Raymond who was being chased by two police officers.

Raymond jumped on the back seat of the Akuma right as an officer shot a taser at him, but Yuno sped away before they got hit.

“Oh Jesus! That was so close!”

Raymond hugged him. “Thank you, Yuno! Thank you for saving me, man. I wouldn’t want anyone else on a bike with me.”

“Hey, no problem.”

The cops had to return to their cruiser to continue the pursuit, but Yuno had already gained a lot of distance from them by then. He weaved through the small alleyways and parked behind a dumpster where they could hide for a minute.

“Yuno, you did it! You’re good getaway driver.”

“It’s only because you’ve been teaching me these sneaky bike tactics. I can only really get away if I’m in a small vehicle.”

“Hey, at least you’re learning how to drive.”

“Wait, how’s my thermite, though? Is the thermite okay?”

“Oh…I dropped it during the chase.” Raymond sheepishly rubbed the back of his head.

“So, now we really don’t have thermite?”

“I know, I’m sorry. I can’t believe we did this whole planning thing, and we don’t even have thermite.”

Yuno pouted. “Hmph. All this. Woke up early. Drank my coffee. Got ready to hack.”

Raymond smiled and patted Yuno on his helmet. “I know. You’re probably amped up right now, huh?”

“I was, I was. Man, I was so excited to have my first plan.”

“I love your plan. When I was looking at it, I was like, ‘Damn, they’re not gonna be able to shoot all the cars out. There’s no way.’”

“Yeah, it would’ve been so much fun.”

Yuno’s phone rang and he checked the caller ID. Seeing that it was from Lang made him forget about his disappointment, and he answered the call. “Mr. Lang!”

“Yuno~ Yuno~ Yuno~ Big day today~”

“Oh, is it time to rob the Lower Vault?”

“Yes, sir~ Is Raymond awake?”

“Yeah, he’s with me right now.”

“Alright, perfect, you two come on over to the manor so we can get started.”

“Gotcha. We’re on our way.”

“Okay. I love you, Yuno.”

Yuno pretended to not hear those words. “Yup, we’re—”

“You have to say it back because I always buy laptops for you. You can say it back at least once so it’s worth it, y’know?”

“Wha—Yeah, yeah, listen, I-I’ll…I’ll—I’d, you know, I, uh—”

“Say it, Yuno. It’s not hard.”

“I’ll, uh, I’ll see you here, Mr. Lang. I lowbeuevehevhd—”

“You fucking—”

Yuno hung up and ignored Raymond’s stifled laughter.

════⊱ ♣ ⊰════

In the dining room at CLean Manor, Tony and Lang sat across from each other at the refectory table. An assortment of supplies were laid upon the table’s surface.

“Okay, so we’ve got two laptops, two VPN routers, five thermite, four duffel bags, three grappling guns, four night vision goggles, and a C-4,” Lang explained.

“Wait, back it up. Night vision and C-4?”

“For the power. I want you to blow up the power plant a few blocks away from the City Vault. And we’ll need night vision because it was a little hard to see when we were down there last time.”

“And the grapple guns?”

“Yuno and I almost slipped off the City Vault while trying to climb it in the rain. Also, it just takes way too fucking long to get up there, so I made these grapple guns. They’re just prototypes, though.”

“The spring boots worked well before. We can use those instead.”

“Uh, those were commissioned by Leslie, so he’s the only one who has them. Also, they won’t be able to reach the roof of the City Vault; it’s too high.”

“Did you ever finish building your w—”

“The wingsuits are still in working progress, okay?! It takes some time to build all this shit, Tony! Fuck!”

“Alright, alright, I’m just asking! Ay, did you figure out the backup generator shit?”

“Yeah. You’ll be on hostage duty, and I’ll show Ray how to do it on the roof before Yuno and I make our way to the Lower Vault.”

Lang looked down at their supplies, checking to see if he forgot anything. Then he noticed a pile of dongles. One was red while the other six were black. “What are these for?”

“We have a red one for the normal City Vault hack, and then Raymond got these black dongles which should be useful for hacking the computer system in the Lower Vault.”

As if summoned by name, Raymond entered through the front door, followed by Yuno. They were both already dressed in their criminal outfits.

“Hello, boys,” Raymond greeted. “Ready to hit this shit or what?”

“Yeah, we got the supplies right here,” Tony gestured to the table.

“Great. I brought guns for you guys, too.” Raymond placed two pistols on the table and took a seat in the chair next to Tony while Yuno sat across from him next to Lang. They divided the supplies amongst themselves, and double-checked that everyone had what they would need for their roles.

Yuno hummed as he filled his backpack with his hacking tools, then he scratched his cat ears as he tried to recall their getaway plan. “Okay, I think I have everything I need to hack. What’s the getaway plan again?”

“We’re gonna use the Cussy for the initial escape from the bank. Then I will drop off you and Ray in an alleyway located in Pacific Bluffs where I have the black BMW M5 parked at. After that, we’ll split up and drive away,” Tony explained.

“What about my—”

“Yes, and Ray will have one bike hidden in a bush of his choosing, just in case something goes wrong.”

Yuno made a sound of confusion. “That’s it? No aircraft? No watercraft?”

Tony sighed. “The expensive rental vehicles are hurting my wallet so we’re gonna take a break on those for a while.”

Lang checked the time on his watch, and saw that they were running a little behind schedule. “Okay, let’s get in the Cussy, boys! C’mon let’s get moving; it’s getting late.”

It was only 5:30 p.m., but the Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank had already closed. They didn’t know how long it would take Yuno to hack into the Lower Vault, so they planned to use hostages to negotiate for time with the police if they showed up. They chose this time because it was late enough for the bank to be closed, but early enough for people to still be hanging around the area. People who would become good hostages for their heist.

Tony dropped off Lang and Yuno at the alleyway behind the City Vault, then he dropped off Raymond at the front to check the area for bystanders. As they did that, he drove to the Los Santos Department of Water & Power with the C-4, preparing to turn off the power.

Lang taught Yuno how to use the grapple gun, and they made their way to the rooftop. It became clear that they should’ve practiced beforehand when they made it to the roof in almost the same amount of time as it did for them to climb it in the rain. It had been a while since Lang last fired a gun, and Yuno had never fired a gun before, so their aim was way off on every ledge they tried to grapple to. They were lucky that most people in the city didn't look up. If they did, they would see two criminals dangling from the building.

With that obstacle out of the way, Yuno became nervous about the hacks he would have to do.

Raymond casually walked around looking for isolated bystanders when he was surprised by a phone call from Yuno. If he wanted to talk, he could’ve just talked to him on the radio. “What’s up, Y? Is everything okay?”

“Oh, we’re good. I just wanted to see how the hostage collecting is going.”

“I’m trying my best. It’s just going to take some time. You know what I mean?”

“Okay. Y-You wanna stay on the phone or…?”

Raymond picked up that Yuno was feeling uneasy. “Um, yeah, we can stay on the phone. How ya feeling?”

“Nervous.”

“Don’t worry. I’m going to be very aggressive to make sure we don’t get breached.”

“Yeah, that’s on you guys. I’m not too good at being aggressive. I’m good at the hacking, though.”

“You are. You’re the best in the city, and I keep saying that because you haven’t let me down once.”

“Well, I haven’t failed yet. It would be a shame if I failed at the Lower Vault, huh?”

“It would be, but I don’t think you will, man. You’ve got this shit. Your job is to hack, and my job is to defend you every step of the way. I will be your brother who watches your back no matter what. You have my word.”

“I’ve been lucky so far. Some groups have multiple hackers on a squad, but I’m just solo.”

“I can hack. Don’t forget, don’t forget. I’m always here,” Lang interjected, as he finished picking the lock on the side panel of the backup generator.

“Yeah, yeah. Mr. L, can hack too.”

“That's true, but he’s not you. Oh! I found some people. I need to hang up.”

“Okay, good luck.”

“You too. Not that you need it. I'll talk to you on the radio.”

Raymond hung up. A minute later, his voice came through the radio. “I’ve got three hostages at the front.”

“Alright, good,” Tony responded. “I’m blowing up the power.” He threw the C-4 over the cement wall surrounding the property of the water and power company, and detonated it as he drove away. The C-4 was small enough that it didn't destroy the cement wall, but it was powerful enough to damage the electrical substation, casting the city in a blackout.

Tony arrived at the front of the City Vault and took over hostage duty for Raymond so that he could go to the rooftop. Unlike Lang and Yuno, he fired one shot to the highest ledge of the thirteen-story building—which was nearly two hundred feet tall—and flew through the air to gracefully land on the roof. “All right. What do you need me to do?”

Lang led him over to the backup generator and explained what the switches and buttons did, so Raymond would know how to turn it on and off without setting off any alarms.

“Got it, R?”

“Yeah, just let me know when.”

“Okay. Y, let’s go.”

Yuno went through the same routine of lockpicking and thermiting doors to get down to the Lower Vault, and ignored all of the computer systems that he would normally hack to get into the Upper Vault. The only hacking he did was to disable the security cameras. In a couple of short minutes, Lang and Yuno were back at the hallway of lasers.

“Do it now, R,” Lang commanded on the radio.

“Copy.” Raymond turned off the backup generator.

The moment the lasers disappeared, they ran into the room at the end of the hallway.

“Okay, turn it back on.”

Raymond turned the backup generator on, and the room filled with light. Lang and Yuno heard power surging back through the computer system, letting them know it was working and ready to be hacked.

They took a moment to explore the room because it was their first time seeing it in the light, but it really was just an empty room except for the one computer system.

Lang turned to Yuno and held out the black dongle. “Alright. Prepare for anything, do your best, take a deep breath, take your time, relax, turn off your radio if you have to. Full zen mode. Do not rush this. Start whenever you’re ready. The second you plug in the dongle, you fucking heighten your senses.”

“All right, Mr. L.” Yuno took the black dongle into his hand, and they both noticed that he was trembling.

Lang spoke into his handheld radio, “Hey, we’re gonna go off radio so he can focus, alright? We’ll turn it back on when we’re done.”

“Okay.”

“Got it.”

Tony and Raymond responded, then Lang and Yuno turned off their radios.

Yuno took a few deep breaths to calm his nerves, but his breaths were shaky. He had completed over a hundred hacks around the city and he got nervous each time, but he had never been this nervous before. He assumed that every time he succeeded actually created an inverse effect that made him more nervous for the next hack because the pressure to succeed was even greater. He was the hacker who had never failed a hack, and now it was what everyone expected of him.

Lang patted Yuno’s shoulder, trying to relax the spiraling hacker. “Hey, no matter what happens, information is power. You have this. Even if you fail, we are still family, and we’re gonna try again. This is going nowhere.”

“Right.” Yuno didn’t doubt that the hack was going anywhere, but he did doubt that they would bring him back there if he failed. He took a few more deep breaths, then he inserted the black dongle.

Yuno started hacking. Lang assumed that what he was doing was hacking because he couldn't understand anything on the screen.

“Oh my god.”

Yuno stammered, “I-I don’t know what this… I don’t know if it’s even—I don’t even know if this is humanly possible.”

“Okay, let’s chill. We have time.”

“I don’t know. It’s so fast. I legitimately think I could practice this for like a week and I don’t think I’ll be able to do it.”

Yuno continued to hack without making progress. After three minutes, the black dongle became infected by some sort of anti-hack virus which led to a hardware malfunction. It effectively stopped Yuno from hacking.

Lang gasped. “There’s no way.”

“Yeah, I’m still gonna try, but I just want to let you know that I don’t think I’ll succeed.” Yuno’s senses were overwhelmed. The hack was much harder than he expected.

“Alright, fuck it. I believe in ya.”

Yuno ejected the corrupted dongle, and Lang handed him a new one to reattempt the hack. Twenty minutes passed by, and it was obvious that Yuno wouldn't be completing the hack that day. Even if he had an unlimited amount of dongles and stood there hacking all night, he still wouldn't succeed.

Yuno decided to stop hacking after the fourth dongle became infected. He needed to accept the reality that this would be the first hack he had ever failed. “T-That’s it, I can’t. Even if I used these last two, I won’t be able to… I-I’m sorry I—”

“Hey.” Lang put his hands on Yuno’s shoulders, and stared directly into the visor of his helmet. “Listen to me. You aced every hack in the city. You’re the only reason we’ve gotten this far. You are allowed to fail and be a human being, alright? This does not matter. If you fail, nothing changes. We make some money and we try again. We got nothing but love for you. If it was only me, Ray, and Tony, we wouldn’t even get past that fucking first door. You understand me? Listen…we’re okay, alright? Let’s use the red dongle to hack the Upper Vault, get our money back, and get the fuck outta here, okay? We’re running out of time.”

“Yeah, sorry.” Yuno turned around to leave when Lang stopped him.

“Ay, you got nothing to apologize for, man. You’re the only reason we even get to experience this. It’s because of you. Don’t beat yourself up for it.”

Lang turned his radio back on. “Ay, you guys there?”

“Yup.”

“How’d it go?”

“It’s an insanely difficult hack,” Lang informed. “So, we’re gonna rob the Upper Vault, recoup some of our money, and try again some other time.”

Yuno turned on his radio. “I’m sorry about today guys.”

“It’s okay, Y. If you can’t do it, then I know it’s a hard hack. But you got it next time. Don’t even sweat about it. I believe in you,” Tony reassured him.

Raymond joined in, “Yeah, it’s all good, brother. You got it next time.”

“Can you let us out, R?” Lang asked.

“Yeah, I got it.” Raymond flicked the backup generator off and on so that Lang and Yuno could get back to the Upper Vault without setting off the alarm.

Yuno felt awful, but he still needed to hack. “I-I’ll, uh, I’ll j-just do the rest of the…” He sniffled, trying to hold back his tears.

“Hey, man. You’re good, alright?” Lang spoke softly, trying to comfort him. “Just breathe, you’re fine, everything is okay. It’s just a hack. It’s just a bank. What’s more important is the boys you’ve got around you to do it with, and we’ve got a good crew of boys. That’s all that matters.”

“Yeah, but I’m the one that messed up. Even if I practiced, I don’t know if I can… L-Let me focus on this hack, we’re running out of time.”

“...Okay.” Lang had never seen him this distraught, and he honestly didn’t know what to say or do.

Despite Yuno’s words, he was not focused on hacking the Upper Vault, but he still easily broke into the system. Once the lock on the vault had been disabled, he aggressively kicked open the door—breaking the hinges—and proceeded to fill up the duffel bags with money.

He could tell that Lang was still talking to him—trying to speak reassurances over his shoulder—but he couldn’t hear it over the sound of his own racing heartbeat. He couldn’t believe he failed. To be fair, he had been a failure at a lot of things, but back then it was okay because it was what people expected from him. Now he had a crew of people who not only expected him to be great, but they needed him to be great. The whole job depended on his ability to hack.

Even though he knew that this was the inevitable outcome, he couldn’t help but feel disappointed in himself.

Yuno barely remembered hacking the Upper Vault, so it was no surprise for him to not remember how he ended up back at the front of the City Vault with the others. He was carrying two duffel bags of cash, though. So, he assumed that muscle memory was helping him move through the rest of the heist.

“The cops never showed up, T?” Lang asked, noticing that Tony had already released the hostages.

“I think they’re investigating the blown up water and power company. We did kinda go overboard on that, don’t ya think? Now we’re not gonna have fucking electricity for at least the rest of the day.”

“Fine, we can shut the power off the normal way next time. Just don’t complain when cops show up to investigate why it’s only the City Vault that has no power.”

“Great.” It wasn’t really great, but Tony was upset that he wouldn’t be able to livestream until the power came back. So, if they didn’t turn off power to the whole city the next time they attempted the heist, then he could deal with being chased around by a few police cruisers.

“Even though we don’t need the getaway plan, can you still drop us off at the BMW M5?” Raymond asked. “I want to drop off my guns at the Scrapyard before going back home.”

“Alright.” Tony didn’t have an issue with that. He would rather have Raymond keep his guns in his gang compound instead of the manor anyway.

He drove Raymond and Yuno to their unused getaway car in Pacific Bluffs, and then he and Lang headed back to CLean Manor.

Raymond held out the car keys. “You wanna drive, Yuno?”

“Sure. I should do something useful today.” Yuno took the keys and got in the driver’s seat.

“What are you talking about?” Raymond asked while he sat in the passenger seat.

Yuno gathered his scattered thoughts as he drove to the R.U.S.T. Scrapyard. Then he took a deep breath and said, “I failed, Raymond. I couldn’t do the hack.”

“Yeah, but it was your first fail out of over a hundred hacks you’ve done these past few months. Even after you failed, you still hacked the Upper Vault like it was nothing. Other hackers still dream of being able to do that.”

“I still let you all down. I wasn’t—I couldn’t d-do… I’m still useful, Raymond. I-I’m still use—”

“I know you’re useful, Yuno. You’re someone who’s irreplaceable.”

“I…I’m not good anymore, and I just feel worse that everyone still believes in me.”

“We believe in you ‘cause we know you can do it, man. You’re my brother, and we have full confidence in you. Just think about all the jobs we’ve done and all the heists we did.”

“Yeah…and the only problem with the Lower Vault Heist was thinking that I could do it.”

“That’s not true, Yuno. I know you can do it. You just haven’t done it yet.”

“And that’s the problem.”

“It’s not a problem because you will do it. I will never stop believing in you.”

Yuno hummed, not really listening to Raymond’s words. He wouldn’t be able to drive if he was crying, so he took another moment to compose himself. Even in his clouded mind, he was able to make it to the Scrapyard so Raymond could drop off his guns, then he drove them back to the CLean Manor.

Sometime during the drive, he had accidentally drifted into the lane next to him. A motorcyclist honked his horn, causing Yuno to focus on the road again and swerve back into his lane.

“Sorry!” Yuno apologized.

“Stay on the right side of the fucking road next time, please!”

“Wait! What the fuck you just say?!” Raymond opened the car door, and Yuno immediately braked, fearing for Raymond’s safety.

The angry gang leader stomped out of the vehicle, and aimed his pistol at the motorcyclist. “Get the fuck off the bike! Are you being rude to my friend here?!”

“H-Hey, man. I’m sorry.” The motorcyclist raised his hands in the air, and got off his bike.

“Hopefully, you don’t have anything bad to say about him because he’s my brother and he lives with me.”

“Raymond, don’t—”

“N-No, no, no, I-I don’t have anything to say,” the motorcyclist stuttered.

“Don’t be rude to my friend, okay?” Raymond shot the man in the thigh.

Despite the blaring sound of the gunshot, they could all audibly hear the motorcyclist’s femur bone crunch and shatter from the impact of the bullet as it completely passed through the limb, and became embedded in the cement street. He screamed and fell to the ground, clutching his bloody leg in severe pain.

On the positive side, Yuno’s mind was no longer spiraling. “Why’d you do that?!”

“It’s just warning. Did you want me to kill him? ‘Cause I can kill him for you,” Raymond offered.

The wounded man whimpered, “Please, don’t.”

“We gotta take him to the hospital.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s hurt bad. We can’t just leave him here.” Yuno tried to pick up the motorcyclist but he groaned in pain, and Yuno felt bad about inflicting more pain on him.

Raymond let out a sigh, watching Yuno struggle to find a way to carry the man without hurting him. He wanted to make the argument that they could leave the rude man there, but he couldn’t bring himself to go against Yuno’s wishes.

In a few minutes, they arrived at the Pillbox Hill Medical Center, and Raymond carried the injured motorcyclist over his shoulders to the front entrance.

While he did that, Yuno waited in the car. It was then that he got an unexpected call from Mickey.

“Mickey, how’s it going?”

“Not too bad, Yuno. I just woke up.”

“Oh, good morning.”

“How was the vault? Ray was telling me about it yesterday.”

“H-He did?” All of the dark thoughts that had just felt Yuno’s mind came flooding back in.

“Yeah, he was telling me about how excited you were to hack the Lower Vault. How was it?”

Yuno sighed. “Terrible, man. Terrible.”

“Why ‘terrible’?”

“It was the first time I let my boys down.”

“Wait, you failed?!”

Yuno didn’t really want to talk about it, and he saw Raymond coming back to the car. “W-What was that? I-I’m sorry, you-you’re breaking up. I can’t—” He hung up and got out of the driver’s seat.

“Maybe you should drive, Raymond. I don’t think I’m focused enough to drive.”

“I mean, I can drive, but it wasn’t your fault. That biker was crazy.”

“If you say so.”

Raymond took over driving them to the manor, and Yuno let his mind drift again. It was easy to forget about all of the unpleasant memories when he was gazing out the window in silence, taking in all the familiar scenery…until it wasn’t so familiar. Raymond must have realized it too because the car came to an abrupt stop.

Yuno turned to him. “Uhh, this is the wrong street.”

“Sorry, I definitely went to the wrong street, yup.”

“Yeah.” Yuno let out a small chuckle. It was somewhat reassuring to know that he wasn’t the only one who had his head in the clouds.

Hearing Yuno’s slight laughter gave Raymond an idea. “You wanna have some fun?”

“Yeah, off-road?”

“Yup! What’s the worst that can happen?” Raymond steered off-road through the Vinewood Hills, and they came to a massive hill that he proceeded to launch the car off of. “Woo!~”

Yuno giggled. “Oh Jesus!”

The car flew through the air and Yuno relished in the adrenaline rush. After all his time on Mount Chiliad, he grew to love that feeling of falling through the air. It felt like he was flying, and it took all of his worries away.

The car hit the ground hard and flipped upside-down. “Ugh, god! Yuno, it’s so bad!” Normally, Raymond would be upset about ruining a perfectly good car, but at the moment he was trying to cheer Yuno up. He didn’t really see the appeal himself, but he knew that the hacker liked doing this in his spare time.

Yuno giggled again. “We might have to walk at this point—Oh!”

The BMW M5 crashed into a tree at the bottom of the hill, and the engine was smoking.

“Well, walking sounds great.” Raymond kicked the door off and crawled out, then he helped Yuno crawl out after him.

“We can walk the rest of the way. We don’t want a stolen car there anyway.”

“Yeah, let’s just walk. We don’t wanna do that. Walking is good for you. We need some exercise, right? Race you!” Raymond took off sprinting without waiting for Yuno’s response.

“Hey!” Yuno laughed and ran after him. The joyful sound filled Raymond with pride. He never wanted to see Yuno sad again.

(Seven days later - Monday, May 31, 2021)

“C’mon, boys! Let's meet in the gym of genuine positivity!” Tony yelled throughout the manor.

He made his way to the side lawn and took the staircase down to the outdoor gym. Lang was the one who used the space the most for his daily hour-long workout sessions, but the others would occasionally stop by to do a few lifts. Yuno preferred to do yoga, so he had a yoga mat placed in the corner for him. The stressed hacker had been using it a lot the past few days between his hours of hacking practice.

“You ready to rob this shit, Tony?” Lang asked as he made his way down the staircase with KFC in his arms.

“Yup, but I don’t think that’ll be up to me. How’s our hacker doing?”

“Listen, I already know he’s gonna do it. That’s why I don’t even feel stressed about it.” Lang was confident about that. One failure didn’t mean anything to him.

“I mean, I don’t know how to hack, but I know if anybody can do it, I know my boy, Yuno, can do it,” Tony agreed.

“Oh, he’s gonna fucking do it. It's Yuno. Let’s be real here, c’mon.”

“Of course he’s gonna get it. That man’s a fucking god. Y’know what I mean?”

“He’s the only reason we’ve gotten this far, Tony.”

“Exactly.”

KFC nodded along too, equally as confident in Yuno’s ability to hack.

Said hacker was currently crouched behind the staircase railing, eavesdropping on their conversation. He had been practicing the hack all week, but he still wasn’t sure if he could do it. Hearing them speak so highly of him, only made him more anxious.

He stood up and finished running down the staircase.

“Hey, there's the number one hacker in the city!” Lang greeted him.

KFC flapped his wings, flew over to him, and landed on his shoulder. He rubbed his head against his black mask in a comforting motion that didn't ease Yuno’s tension at all.

“Y-Yeah…”

“Where's Ray?” Tony asked.

“Uh, I don't know. I'll call him.” Yuno dialed his number, and waited for Raymond to pick up.

“Yo, Yuno. What’s up, my friend?”

“We’re meeting up at the gym. Where are you?”

“Bro…” Raymond went silent for a few seconds.

“Hm?”

“Yuno, I swear we have… I-I’m pretty sure we used four black dongles last time. We had six, we used four, and I bought two more. Isn’t that four left? So, where are the other two?”

“Absolutely no idea.”

“No, it’s a hundred percent two. We had six, we used four—”

“So, how many dongles do we have right now?”

“Wait, we have, for sure, two! But, th-there’s no way. We have two more.”

“Wait, that's it?” Based on what happened last time, Yuno was pretty sure that he would need more than two black dongles.

“No, we have two more. There’s no way. There’s no fucking way. We’re pretty sure we have two more because two plus two is four, I think.”

“Um, yeah, we should have two, yeah.”

“Okay, hold on, I’m gonna call Lang.”

“Oh, he’s right next to me.”

“Okay, te-tell Lang that two plus two is equal to four.”

“Uh, no, I don’t think that’s—I think we just have to check all of our storages, and see if we—”

“Wait, wait, there’s new calculator app. Hold on.”

“I…I mean, I don’t think that’s the problem. I think the problem is we don’t know where they are, right? If we even have ‘em.”

“Two plus two does equal four, Yuno. I confirm with calculator. Uh, yeah, yeah, so we just gotta find out where they are.”

“Did you check the secret stash in the watchtower?”

“...One second.” Raymond hung up, and Yuno assumed he went to check.

Hearing Raymond’s mental state, filled Yuno with guilt. He couldn't help but feel at fault for his condition. Just last week Raymond could count all the vehicles he hid in the Vinewood Bowl. Now he couldn't count to four.

Lang, Tony, and Raymond didn’t want Yuno to know—but he did—that the failed heist had cost them over $150,000. The money they collected in the Upper Vault was enough to cover half of it, but they still needed the money to cover the cost of supplies that he wasted, and to buy new ones. To make up for their loss, Raymond took it upon himself to make the money back because he knew that Lang and Tony were busy running their businesses. During that time, he trusted Chem to lead his gang while he was away.

After seven days, the result was a severe lack of sleep, and his mind was weak.

“There’s eight?! How?” Raymond walked down the staircase and joined them in the outdoor gym. He was carrying eight black dongles. “We had six, we used four, we bought two more… Let me check with calculator.”

Raymond typed the numbers in his calculator app on his phone. “Six minus four is two. Two plus two is four. So why do we have four more?”

Yuno suddenly remembered, “Oh, that’s right. I forgot that I fixed the four corrupted dongles, so we actually have eight, yeah.”

“Six minus four is two. Two plus two is four. Four plus the original four…is eight?”

“Yeah,” Yuno answered just in case Raymond didn’t know.

“So…do we have enough black dongles?” Lang asked.

Yuno sighed. “I think that if I can’t solve the hack on the first dongle, then no amount of dongles will be enough. I’ve been practicing the hack all week, though.”

Raymond patted Yuno’s head between his cat ears. “But you can do it. I believe in you.”

“Yeah, there's no one else I trust to ace the hack,” Tony encouraged.

Belief, faith, trust, confidence, hope, luck. None of that mattered to Yuno. It wouldn’t help him do the hack. In the end, it would all come down to skill alone. And it was a skill that he simply didn’t have.

To him, it seemed like the whole heist happened within the blink of an eye. Just like before, he barely remembered hacking at all. One moment he was at the manor, and the next he was in the depths of the Lower Vault. All eight of the black dongles were corrupted and unusable, and he knew that he had failed again.

Yuno spoke into his handheld radio, “I’m sorry, guys.”

“Don’t say that! Don’t fucking say that!” Raymond didn’t like how sad Yuno sounded when he apologized.

Tony went for a softer approach. “Hey, don’t be sorry. You tried your best, okay?”

Yuno didn’t respond. He could only stare at the dongles in his hands, wishing that he had just one more chance. Though, even then, it probably wouldn’t matter.

“Hey, you okay?”

Lang’s words startled him, and he dropped the dongles. “S-Sorry. I’m sorry,” he apologized again and picked them up.

“Y, you’ve got nothing to apologize for. The important thing is you’re willing to try, and you’re willing to put the pressure on your back and carry the fucking boys. You understand me? That in itself is what makes you, you. That’s why we need you. We’re lucky to be here, and we’re lucky to have you, alright?”

Yuno put the corrupted dongles in his backpack and turned around. “I-I’ll just go hack the Upper Vau—”

“Hey! Wait!”

Yuno had forgotten about the lasers outside of the room, and walked into the hallway which set off the alarm. They were all deafened by a piercing, ringing sound.

“What happened?!” Raymond asked.

“Cops! Cops! I hear sirens!” Tony’s panicked voice left no room for stalling, but Yuno was still shaken up by his serious blunder.

“Y, we gotta go! No time to hit the Upper Vault! Let’s go!” Lang dragged him back to the family Stratum.

Once everyone was back in the car, Tony drove them away from the City Vault; however, they didn’t leave fast enough and the police saw them. Unlike last time, they opted for turning off the power the normal way on the roof instead of blowing up the Los Santos Department of Water & Power, so the police arrived sooner than they expected.

The street racer focused on the road, trying to lose the police cruisers, but there were a lot of vehicles driving around that evening which made it harder to not get blocked or surrounded. “You got a bike, R? We need to split up and divert their attention.”

“Yeah, go to that same alleyway in Pacific Bluffs. L can come with me.”

“Got it.”

Normally, Yuno would split off with Raymond, but he wasn’t in the best mindset to focus on an escape plan. He stared out of the window, barely able to listen to what was happening.

When Tony arrived at the location, he briefly stopped at the alleyway—pausing just long enough for Lang and Raymond to jump out of the car—then he drove away.

Raymond got on his bike first, then Lang jumped on the back seat. Right as he began driving, an officer shot a taser at them which hit Lang, causing him to fall off the bike.

Raymond turned around and saw Lang being apprehended by the police. “That’s so unfortunate.”

“You guys good?” Tony asked through the radio.

“No, L got tased off my bike.” Raymond growled.

“Okay, I’m going ba—”

“No, no, I got it, T. Just drive away, but don’t lose the cops yet. I need you to clear the area.”

“I’m on it.” Even though Tony wanted to go back for Lang, he continued to drive away and draw the police’s attention with him.

There weren’t any police following Raymond, so he parked in another nearby alleyway and got off his bike. He only had his AK and a grapple gun, but that was all he needed. He aimed for the ledge of the building next to him, and grappled to the rooftop. Then, grappling from building to building, he made his way back to Lang. Raymond was fortunate that the police didn’t look up. If they did, they would see a criminal swing through the air like Spider-Man.

When he looked down from the roof through the scope of his AK, he saw one police officer communicating on a radio transceiver, one cadet scrolling through the MDW on a tablet, and a K9 sniffing Lang who was lying on the ground in handcuffs. The taser probes had been removed, but he was still masked.

The moment the officer put the radio down, Raymond shot all three of them in the head. As the pavement grew stained in his favorite color, he grappled down from the building to the alleyway. “I’m not fucking leaving you!”

Despite being saved, Lang felt sorry for the whimpering dog as it bled out. “Oh my god! You just shot that dog!”

Raymond set down his guns and picked the lock on Lang’s handcuffs. “What dog? I just shot three pigs. Don’t worry about it.”

The handcuffs unlocked with a click. “Let’s go, let’s go! Now, now, with me!” Raymond picked up his guns and gestured for him to follow, but Lang’s muscles were not cooperating with him. They were still recovering from the taser, and Raymond realized that he wouldn’t be able to ride on his bike like that.

He spoke into his radio, “T, lose the cops and pick us up. L is good, but he won’t be able to hold on to my bike. Also, I shot cops, so hurry before the other officers find out.”

“You what?! How many times do I have to tell you—”

“I know! I know! Motherfucker, not now! Cops could be here any second, then we’ll actually be fucked!”

“Okay, okay, I’m coming!” Tony lost the police and returned to the alleyway to pick them up. Raymond threw Lang in the back seat with Yuno, then sat in the passenger seat. They were there for less than a minute, and dashed away.

Raymond’s heart was racing. They had never had a call as close as that. “That was the most scuffed heist so far. You good, L? Do they know it’s you?”

“Nope, they didn’t have time to unmask me before you came. Thanks for saving my ass.”

“I gotchu, brother. I’ll always protect you no matter what.” Raymond was relieved that he was able to get there in time.

Everything had happened so fast, but the bloody scene had seared itself into Yuno’s mind. He was reeling from the shock of it all. It was the first time one of their heists had turned out this way. No one—not even the police or random passerby—had ever been injured or killed because of them until then.

Every regret he had in the past hour started to weigh on him.

If he had only completed the hack, they would've left the bank before the police arrived. If he hadn’t walked out of the room before Raymond turned off the backup generator, he wouldn't have set off the alarm. If he wasn’t so distraught, he could’ve figured out another way to save Lang.

There were so many things he could’ve done to avoid this result. Now two police officers and a dog had lost their lives because of his failures.

They were all dead because of him, and they did nothing to deserve it. If anyone deserved to die it was…

(The next day - Tuesday, June 1, 2021)

“Ray, your math is wrong. Something’s not adding up.”

“It’s not addition, it’s multiplication.”

“Something’s not timing up.” Lang took out his phone, opened the calculator app, and typed in the numbers.

“No. Isn’t $165 times $1000… $520,000?” Raymond asked.

Lang swore that his heart stopped until he saw the equation on his screen, “165×1000=165,000.”

“No, it’s $165k, Ray.”

“Oh, oh, it’s $165k—Okay, that makes sense, okay.”

“Geez, you gave me a fucking heart attack.”

“All right, so that’s the total amount of money we lost on the last heist. I’ll go make that right now. Don’t worry about it, Lang.”

Raymond was tired. Raymond was exhausted. Raymond was every synonym of that word, but he needed to make that money so Yuno could get another chance to hack the Lower Vault. Since they failed the heist, and they didn’t get any money from the Upper Vault, he had to work over twice as hard as last week to make the money back. He was operating on copious amounts of caffeine and a dream. A dream to see his brother succeed, so he was going to make that money one way or another. He confidently strode out of the manor, filled with determination.

Tony walked downstairs and watched Raymond clumsily stumble through the front door. He was worried about the lengths the Russian man was willing to go through to make money for their heist. A part of him wished he could help him out, but making money had never been his strong suit.

He looked over at Lang. “You gonna go make money for the heist, too?”

“Can’t. I have meetings to attend. But, I wish I could help out so that Ray’s not the only one doing it.”

“What about Yuno? Where is he?”

“Uh, I thought he was upstairs with you.”

“Nope, he’s not up there. I assumed he was making money with Ray.”

“Ray didn't want to stress him out more, so he’s been making money by himself.”

“So…” Tony had a feeling he already knew the answer to the question that he was about to ask. “When was the last time you saw him?”

“Yesterday after the heist.”

“...Same.”

The silence that followed as they stared at each other was deafening. The unspoken words were laced with dread, and told them everything they didn’t want to hear.

Lang pulled out his phone again. “I’m gonna give him a call.”

“Okay, let’s not panic. He’s probably just practicing the hack some more.”

“At this point, fuck the hacking shit. I just need him. Gotta make sure he’s okay.” Lang held his breath as the phone rang, trepidation filled his veins.

“Mr. Lang!~ Mr. Lang!~”

Lang released his breath. The cheerful voice eased some of his worries. “Uh, hey, Yuno. How ya feeling?”

“I’ve never been better! I feel great!”

“T-That’s good. What’ve you been up to?”

Yuno hiccuped and giggled. “Raymond said that he was working to recover the money that we lost from the failed heist, and I wanted to help out so I gambled at the casino to make some money. But then I lost everything in my bank account. Then I drank three bottles of vodka, went drunk driving up Mount Chiliad with some friends, and I sent the car off the top of the mountain to see if we survived.”

“Jesus fucking Christ! I’m glad you’re alright. Who are your friends?”

“I don’t remember. I think they asked me to hack for them before, but I’ve been a hacker for so many groups that I lost track. They seemed nice, though. It was fun hanging out with them.”

Tony leaned over and whispered to Lang, “He sounds upset.”

Lang nodded. “Yuno, personally, I don’t think you should hang out with them again. They seem like trouble.”

“No, no, no, they’re nice people,” Yuno insisted. “I was feeling a little hungover from all the vodka, and they gave me a few pills. Said it was a painkiller. At first I was skeptical, and thought they were lying to me, but it turns out it was oxy. So, they didn’t lie, and I feel great now! Also, I stole a car on the side of road, crashed into a tree—”

While Yuno rambled on, Lang shared a look with Tony who simply accepted the quiet request.

“—and then I added the leftover vodka to the fire.”

“Uh, what? What was that, Yuno?”

“The car spilled gasoline everywhere after I crashed into a tree at the bottom of Chiliad. Now, I’m making the biggest forest fire possible. I even added the leftover vodka to the fire. It’s huge! I’m gonna go buy more bottles—Oh, I don’t have any money. Eh, that’s okay. I’ll just steal—”

“Wait, wait, um, listen, Yuno, I have Cerberus meetings to go to, but Tony wants to hang out. Why don’t you come back to the manor and chill with him?”

“All right! I’ll try not to be burned alive until then!”

Lang hated the image that flashed through his mind. “Please, please, be safe. I love you, okay? We all do.”

“Mm-hmm.” Yuno hung up, and looked down at the blaze. He knew this mountain better than anybody, including Mickey. No one could traverse the terrain as easily and effortlessly as he could.

He was balancing unsteadily on top of a large boulder. The raging forest fire spread from tree to tree uncontrollably. The greenery was swallowed by red-orange flames and spit out as black charcoal. Ashes fell like a gray downpour; a rain that wouldn’t quell the inferno.

Roaring flames, agonized screams, and animalistic howls echoed around him, and he laughed as the cries for help tapered off. He didn’t understand why he found it so funny because he was usually a pacifist. For some reason, hearing other people experience the same pain he felt gave him a twisted sense of euphoria. He also thought that it could be the vodka and oxycodone messing with head.

The land was nearly devoid of life, but there was still a black raven staring at him in a black tree. Yuno stepped to the edge of the boulder. The flames had almost died out under him, but they were still there. It was a long drop to the burned mountain incline below; probably between fifteen to twenty feet if he had to guess.

He imagined how great it would be to jump off. He bet that it would feel like flying. The flames were probably warm, too. He didn’t think that height would be enough to kill him. After all, he had jumped off of higher heights with Mickey, and he survived. So, surely he wouldn’t die here, right?

Without thinking too long about it—and craving the adrenaline rush—he jumped down from the boulder. Even though he landed on his feet, the force of the fall sent his body tumbling down the side of the mountain all the way to the street where several firefighters were trying to contain the wild fire.

One of the yellow-clad men ran over to him. “Oh my god! Are you all right?”

Yuno wasn’t sure. He knew that his whole body was sore, his ears were ringing, and his head was pounding. He couldn’t tell if he sprained his ankle or not, but he knew that he was going to have a few bruises tomorrow morning. His clothes were slightly scorched from the flames, but he was able to avoid catching on fire because he was rolling on the ground. So, all things considered, he knew that he should be feeling miserable. However, all of his pain was numbed from the painkiller in his body.

“Never felt better! Thanks for asking!” Yuno stumbled as he tried to stand up, so the firefighter helped him get to his feet.

“That was quite a dangerous fall you just took. Are you sure you’re okay? We can check you for injuries or a concussion.”

“No, thanks. I don’t have money for that. Why is there a fire here? How did this happen?” Yuno played innocent like he wasn’t the cause of it. He swayed, struggling to stay upright.

“Oh, um, we don’t know the cause of it yet, but we’ve got most of it under control now. Honestly, I’m just surprised that you survived. We have reports of five casualties so far.”

Yuno laughed humorlessly. “...I just got lucky.”

He took off running down the street, and once he was out of sight from the firefighters, he hot-wired another car to get to the manor. Tony was waiting for him, and he didn’t want to keep him waiting too long.

An hour and three broken cars later, Yuno crashed his latest stolen vehicle into the gate on Lower Clean.

“Oh god, help! Tony!” Yuno yelled as his body flew through the air—the force of the crash ejecting him out of the driver’s seat of his convertible—and he landed on the road.

“Tony! Help! Tony? Are you upstairs?” He staggered up the lower driveway of CLean Manor, and climbed up the staircase to the side lawn.

Tony was sitting at a table on the concrete patio, and scrolled through a pizza menu on his phone. He heard Yuno drop into the wooden chair next to him.

“Ay, Yuno! I’m gonna order us pizza from Maldini’s. What should I get? I’m thinking one pepperoni and maybe a Margherita or the—”

“I like the kind with ten cheeses ‘cause it smells funny.”

It took Tony’s brain a while to process that statement. “...What in the Italian? I don’t think that’s on the menu.”

Yuno felt his stomach lurch, and he was hit with a wave of nausea. His body was protesting against all of the substances it had been given that day. “Oh god, man. Oh god. I’m gonna go to the bathroom real quick.”

“Yuno, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m doing great, doing great. I just need to go to the bathroom real quick, bathroom real quick, and I’ll be good.” Yuno sprinted inside and went straight to the bathroom. He barely managed to rip his helmet off in time and vomit into the toilet.

Tony knocked on the bathroom door, worried about him. “Yuno? Oh my god, are you drunk? You drink too much? Are you—”

He heard Yuno retching into the toilet again, and he waited by the door as he did so. He didn’t want to intrude, but he also didn’t want to leave him alone.

Yuno dry-heaved for a minute or so, then a loud thud reverberated inside the bathroom followed by the sound of groaning.

“Oh my god. You alright? Yuno, what the fuck is wrong?” Receiving no reply, Tony slowly opened the bathroom door to check on him. Yuno was wearing his helmet again and sprawled on the floor, and he assumed that the hacker had lost his balance and collapsed.

“Oh my god, buddy. Come here, okay?” Tony helped him sit up and gave him a hug, gently rubbing circles on his back. “It’s okay, it’s alright, you’re gonna be fine. I’ll take care of ya, okay? Gonna be alright~”

Yuno couldn’t say anything back. He was busy taking slow, even breaths, focusing on relaxing his upset stomach.

It was tough for Tony to watch him be in such a sorry state. “I’ve never seen ya like this. Oh my god.” He sniffled. “You need some water.”

He ran out of the bathroom, and filled a cup with tap water from the sink. Just as he was about to return to the bathroom, he noticed the poor condition of the kitchen and living room. There were feces and pee on every surface, the wooden cabinets had chew marks on them, the boxes of spaghetti noodles had been knocked over, broken wine bottles left red wine spilled on the floor, and there was a hole in one of the couches surrounding the fireplace in the center of the living room.

“The fuck?” He glanced around the room and found a rat chewing a hole in the wall. “Ay! You little shit!”

The rat squeaked in fear and skittered away from the angry Italian man.

Tony chased the rat in circles around the fireplace. “Ay! You fuck! You just destroyed our fucking—There’s a hole in the couch! Droppings everywhere! What the fuck?!” He panted and screamed until he lost sight of the rat. “Oh my god. Where the fuck is that little bitch?”

“Hey, Tony! What’s up?~” Yuno exited the bathroom, feeling better after his stomach had settled, but he was still greatly affected by the vodka and oxycodone in his system.

Tony grabbed his shoulder and wildly pointed to the mess that the rat had caused. “There’s a rat! There’s a rat here, Yuno! Look, there’s a hole in the couch, the siding is chewed, there’s rat droppings, the fucking kitchen is a fucking mess—”

“Gimme a gun, gimme a gun.”

“You want a gun?” Yuno never wanted a gun, so Tony was taken aback by the request.

“Tony, gimme a gun. I’ll take care of the rat.”

He didn’t see the issue in giving a drunk man a gun if he was only going to use it to kill a rat. “Here. Take it, take care of it. I’m grabbing another gun.”

Tony placed his pistol on the kitchen counter for Yuno, then he went into the game room to grab another gun from the secret armory stashed in the base of the watchtower.

Yuno tried to pick up the gun, but his vision was a little distorted. “Yeah, I got it. I go—Ugh!” He accidentally knocked the gun off the counter. When he tried to bend down and pick it up off the floor, he banged his helmet against the corner of the countertop. He was glad that he constantly wore the protective gear, but the impact still hurt his head.

He massaged the outer shell of the helmet as if it could soothe the pain when he noticed a wine bottle on the floor that hadn't been broken. He removed the cork, opened his helmet visor, and chugged the wine until the pounding in his head went away. He put down the bottle and closed his visor when he heard Tony returning.

“Yeah, yeah, Tony, just a… Surely, I can handle…” Yuno swirled his hand against the floor, looking for the gun.

Tony observed him struggling for ten seconds before he finally picked up the gun and handed it to him. His gaze was then drawn to the open wine bottle sitting upright on the floor next to the other broken bottles. “Did you drink?!”

“No! No, no, no, it’s the rat.” Yuno shook his head, but stopped when it made his head feel worse. “I think it bit me. I-I’m poisoned.”

“You alright, Yuno?”

“It’s the rat, man! It drinks wine! Where is it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Where is it?”

Tony heard muffled squeaking by the couches and whispered, “Wait, I hear it. Shh, shh, shhh~”

Yuno yelled, “Spaghetti noodles! It’s the rat from Ratatouille!”

“No, those are my spaghetti noodles, Yuno. I always have some in the kitchen.”

“Oh my god! Maybe we can cook! Just like in the movie!”

“Shh. I hear it,” Tony whispered again. He attempted to track down where the squeaking was coming from through Yuno’s senseless rambling.

“Anyone can cook! Maybe if I start cooking, it’ll just come out!”

“Yeah, yeah, you do it,” Tony answered, distracted by his task of finding the rat.

A loud thud and a crash came from the kitchen. “Oh my god! Yuno?!”

Tony found Yuno lying on the floor underneath five pots and pans. He had tried to grab a pot from the cabinet above him and accidentally dropped all of them on top of himself.

Tony gave him a quizzical look. “How you doing, man? You okay?”

“Uh. Huh.” Yuno didn’t know how much pain he would be in once the drug and alcohol wore off, but he knew that he needed to stop hurting himself or it would be bad.

As Tony picked the cookware off of him and set them on the counter, Raymond walked in through the front door. He paused when he saw the disarray in the kitchen and living room. “Uh, you guys good?”

“Yeah, we’re doing alright. Just taking care of Yuno. He’s drunk right now.” Tony said, helping Yuno stand up.

“No, no, I’m fine. Let’s shoot the rat, Tony. I’m ready! I’m ready, man! Let me at ‘em!”

“There’s a rat?” Raymond asked.

“Yeah, you see all the wine and shit?” Tony gestured around the room, and Yuno tried to mimic him. The drunk man waved his fists in the air, trying to look menacing to the rat.

Tony dodged one of his arms as he swung around aimlessly. “C’mon, Yuno. Get yourself together. No more drinking.”

“Yeah, I’m just looking for the rat—Ugh!” Yuno tripped over his own feet and fell helmet first into the floor. “Is there a rat on the floor?”

Raymond raised an eyebrow. “Are you drunk, Yuno?”

“No, of course not. I feel fine.” Raymond was not convinced as Yuno struggled to stand up by himself, and he helped him get back on his feet.

“I was checking under the table for the—Ah!” Yuno gasped. “There’s a rat! Shoot it!” He grabbed Tony’s pistol and shot underneath a cabinet. He had somehow managed to hit the rat in the head with a single bullet. “Tony! Tony! The rat! It’s crazy! It went under that cabinet!”

Tony kneeled and looked underneath the cabinet that Yuno shot. “Oh my god! There’s fucking blood all over! What the fuck?!” He picked up a spatula from the counter and poked the rat’s body. “I think you killed it.”

“You think? What if it’s just wounded?” Yuno couldn’t even ace a hack right now. He doubted that he aced the shot as it was his first time firing a pistol.

Tony poked at the rat some more, but he was hesitant to touch it. “It’s probably dead. There’s way too much blood.”

“If you say so, Tony. If you say so.” Yuno swayed on his feet, but Raymond caught him before he could fall again.

“You okay, Yuno? ...Yuno?” Raymond heard soft snores coming from underneath the helmet. “I think he passed out.”

“Lay him down on the couch in the office, will ya? I’m gonna clean this up.”

“Okay, Tony.” Raymond picked up Yuno and carried him to the dimly lit office to lay him down on the plush, brown cushions. If Yuno woke up hungover, then this room wouldn’t be too bright for him.

Tony walked in shortly after with the bloody rat on the spatula, and dropped it into the python terrarium to feed their pet. “Got a fresh rat here for ya. Eat up, Schneaky Shnaaeyke.”

With their cat and snake resting in the office, they quietly walked out to leave them be.

“What ya been up to, Ray? Did you finally sleep?”

“I’ve been up for thirty-seven hours, and this is after I took a two-hour nap. Before that, I was running on forty-five hours of no sleep. And I can’t go to sleep yet ‘cause I still need to recoup $10,000. Actually, it might be $11,000. What’s $20,000 minus $7000? Let me confirm with calculator—Oh, my phone is dead. I guess I haven’t charged it since I woke up. I’ll confirm on my laptop. Be right back.”

“...Alright.”

Raymond went upstairs to his shared room with Yuno. After five minutes, Tony became worried about him when he wasn’t “right back,” so he went up to their room to check on him.

Unsurprisingly, he found Raymond sleeping while hunched over their desk with the equation typed on his laptop’s calculator app. The screen displayed, “20,000-7000=13,000.”

“C’mon, buddy.” Tony softly coaxed. “Let’s get you into bed. Up you go. Don’t wanna wake up with a sore back now.”

Raymond sleepily moaned, but he let himself be led to the bed and tucked into the bedcovers.

✦₊˚⊹⋆❀₊⁺⋆♣⋆⁺₊❀⋆⊹˚₊✦

At the Vanilla Unicorn, Mickey was celebrating the first day of Pride Month by dancing for a hot tub livestream in a new outfit. Instead of his usual firefighter attire, he was wearing light blue overall shorts, a black bowtie, and a rainbow backpack. He had a rainbow flag painted on his left cheek, and blue acrylic nails with rainbow gems on his fingers.

“All right, I think I’m gonna end it here, guys. Thanks for watching the stream! I’m gonna be doing more pride related content this month, so follow my socials to stay updated on that, okay? Happy Pride Month, everybody! Bye~” Mickey ended the livestream, and went to the dressing room to grab a towel. He dried himself off, put on a pair of blue shoes, and—noticing that he had missed a call from Tony—he called him back.

While waiting for Tony to pick up, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. “God, my bulge looks so good in this outfit. Fuck—”

“What the fuck are you saying right now?” Tony did not appreciate answering the phone to hear Mickey whispering in his ear about his bulge.

“O-Oh, Tony! I didn’t hear—”

“I don’t—What did I tell you? What did I tell you?”

“About what?”

“I’m okay if you wanna do your fucking horny arc shit, alright? I don’t wanna fucking know the details of how your fucking bulge looks.”

“You are just as guilty of saying sus shit just like me. Need I remind you of the time you called me a fatass.”

“Okay, that wasn’t—No, no, actually, y’know what? Your ass isn’t fat! And you’ve got fucking small tits!”

“Tony!”

“You’ve got the SpongeBob build of fucking builds. Like if I went to Build-A-Bear and fucking built it, I just picked it out with no fucking stuffing. That’s you, motherfucker. You’re fucking—No, you’re not fucking. You’re not even good at sex, you don’t give any foreplay, you don’t fucking do anything.”

Mickey gasped. “Tony, what the fuck did I do to you?”

“Sorry, I’m sorry. That was too—”

“That was too far, Tony!”

Tony sighed. “Just a little on edge today.”

“Oh yeah~ You’re a little on edge~” Mickey sang.

“Stop, not like that. It’s about the Lower Vault.”

“Ah, that’s right. Ray told me that you guys failed again.”

“Yup. The vibes are down, our money is down, the boys are down. Buddha’s never around, Ray can’t do math, and Yuno’s fucking depressed.”

“Why is Yuno depressed?”

“He keeps failing the hack, and he’s not taking it well. But he’ll get it; I know he will. He just needs his confidence back.”

“Let me talk to him. I bet I can cheer him up.”

“You can try. He’s here at the manor.”

“Okay, I'm on my way.” Mickey hung up and made a quick phone call to Dundee. The Australian man and Benji arrived about five minutes later to pick him up from the Vanilla Unicorn, then they drove him to CLean Manor.

“Do we just wait here?” Dundee asked, parking in the front driveway.

“Yeah, I'll be right back with him.” Mickey exited the vehicle and rang the doorbell at the entryway.

Tony answered the door, looking Mickey up and down. “Ohh my god, Mickey. Why are you still wearing your fucking EDC outfit?”

“First of all, EDC was in May and that one was a different color. Number two, it’s June so it’s not an EDC outfit. It’s a pride outfit, Tony!”

“Oh, that’s cute. You look really hot.”

“Thanks.”

“Is that the bulge you—Wow! That’s a big bulge!”

“I know, right?! It looks so good in this outfit. Now where’s the sad cat?”

“I left him in the office. Don’t know if he’s still passed out.”

“Gotcha. I’ll give him a lap dance and see if that cheers him up.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “Good luck.”

Mickey tiptoed over to the office and peeked inside to see Yuno lying on the couch and typing on his phone. He put a mask over his face and walked into the room with a gun pointed at Yuno.

“Put your fucking hands up! Walk with me outside,” Mickey said with a voice changer disguising himself.

Yuno jumped off the couch in fear. “Oh god, what?!”

“Hands up!”

Yuno obeyed, raising his hands in the air and following the scary, masked man outside to the car in the driveway. He saw two other masked men in the front seats.

Benji noticed that Yuno wasn’t wearing his criminal outfit. “Wait, should he—Should he like change or somethin’?”

“No, he’s going like this!” Mickey had a plan, and he didn’t want to waste time on the theatrics for once.

“G-Going where?” Yuno asked.

“Get into the car and listen to them.” Mickey commanded.

Yuno didn’t want to get in the car of strangers. “Uh, but… W-Who are these guys?”

“Get in the fucking car, Yuno. Get in the car.”

Yuno complied to Mickey’s instructions and got in the back seat of the car.

Mickey sat next to him. “Drive, boys! Drive!”

“Hey there, Champion!” Dundee greeted while driving away from the manor.

Yuno recognized that Australian accent, and only one person called him that nickname. “Wait, Dundee?”

“That’s right. It’s been a while.”

“Ay, Yuno. You’re hackin’ a Fleeca bank right now,” Benji explained.

“Benji?!”

“Yeah, how’s it goin’?”

Yuno was trying to make sense of the situation. Apparently his friends had just kidnapped him to do a hack. “Uh, wait, um, guys, I…I really don’t think I can do it.”

Dundee continued to explain, “This is Mickey’s idea. We’re takin’ you back to your fuckin’ roots, mate.”

Mickey took off his mask and patted Yuno’s shoulder. “Yuno, I watched you hack your first Fleeca like it was nothing. You need to get that confidence back. We’re going to the Legion Square Fleeca, you’re going to easily hack that shit, and you will get back to your normal, happy self.”

Yuno doubted that. “But, Mickey, I’m a failure now.”

“You don’t fail anymore, motherfucker! You’re doin’ it. You fuckin’ got this, bro,” Benji encouraged him.

Dundee nodded. “Yeah, you’re Yuno! The master bank buster! The Cheat Code! The number one best hacker in this city! The fuckin’ legendary—”

Yuno promptly managed to fail the Fleeca in less than ten minutes, and they were both dropped off back at CLean Manor. With just the two of them standing in the front driveway, Mickey tried to spit out some words of wisdom.

“Yuno, it’s okay.”

“Yeah, of course it’ll be okay. I’m quitting. I won’t mess it up again ‘cause I-I’m gonna quit.” He wanted to cry, but he had cried a lot for the past several days. He didn’t think he had any tears left in him.

“Yuno, I’d rather fail a bank with you…than be successful with anyone else.”

“I-I just can’t do it anymore. I can’t let everyone down again.”

“I think the problem was that you never let people down before. The expectation was always too high. People called you the Cheat Code, and you never had to experience this kind of failure. Here’s the reality, you were too successful. You never had to face the idea of being ‘down bad.’ I, constantly, have failed banks, let people down, and I still do. It’s literally my name. It always weighs on me, and almost every other hacker feels that way. You were the exception. You were the one person who never let people down, the only hacker who never failed a hack. Now, that you’ve got a taste for what it feels like, well, now you’re just like the rest of us…and that’s okay.”

“...If you say so. Need a ride, Mickey? Where can I drop you off?”

Realizing that he wasn’t going to be able to get through to Yuno, Mickey told him to bring him back to Little Seoul.

Yuno drove them there in his green Sultan. The whole ride was silent as Mickey thought of some departing words for him to ponder over.

“Mickey, we’re here.”

He was drawn out of his thoughts, and saw that they were parked in front of the CG Cubby. “Yuno, can I ask you something?”

“Yeah, what’s up?”

“What would Jean Paul do? What would the bank buster do?”

“Uh, probably mald a little bit, but then, uh, come back next time.”

“Exactly. And that’s what we do, Yuno. We mald a little bit, but at the end of the day, just like the bank buster, we get back into the bank and we hit it again ‘cause that’s what we do. We’re bank busters.”

Yuno knew what Mickey wanted to hear, but he couldn’t lie to him. So, he didn’t say anything.

Taking the silence as the end of the conversation, Mickey exited the vehicle and closed the door behind him. “See ya around, Yuno!” he called over his shoulder and walked into the gang compound.

Just as Yuno was about to drive away, he heard his passenger side door open and close again. A young man had just entered his vehicle without saying a word and confidently reclined in the passenger seat. He was wearing a red button shirt with a black necktie, black slacks, black shoes, and a black motorcycle helmet.

Yuno was very confused. “Um, hello?”

“Oh hey!” The stranger faked his surprise as if he didn’t see Yuno sitting there.

“Uh, what’s up? You, uh, you need a ride?”

“Yeah, pwease take me to this location, pretty pwease~” His voice was saccharine to the extreme as he made his request, and marked a location on Yuno’s GPS.

“Um, yeah, of course I can.” Yuno started following the directions on his GPS. “So...what’s your name?”

“Marty. What’s your name?”

“Marty? Um, I’m Yuno. Great to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too. What do you do for a living?”

“Well, um, I mean, allegedly, I rob banks on occasion.”

“Allegedly~” Marty said sarcastically and laughed. “But yeah, me too.”

“What do you mean?”

Marty took off his helmet, revealing his blue eyes and short, black hair. He seemed young; younger than Yuno himself. “Allegedly, I’m the best hacker in the entire city.”

“Really? Well, you sound like a pretty cool guy.”

Marty smirked. “Yeah. You too, number two.”

“Number two?” Yuno pulled into the parking lot of the location that Marty marked, and he realized that it was the Fleeca in Legion Square; the exact same bank that he had just failed with Mickey. “Uh, this bank—”

“You know why they call me the best hacker in the city?” Marty asked.

“No. Why do they call you that?”

“Because I’ve never failed a hack in my life. I know of another hacker who used to say that—a hacker who I was always compared to—but I’ve recently heard that there is a hack that he just can’t do no matter how many times he tries. Hm, I wonder why~”

Yuno gritted his teeth and gripped the steering wheel tighter. He had never heard of Marty before, but it was evident that Marty knew a lot about him. That knowledge made him feel even more self-conscious about his failures.

Marty winked and put his motorcycle helmet back on. “Good luck with everything, second best hacker in the city.”

He watched Marty leave his car and run over to the front of the bank where a man wearing a black hoodie appeared to be waiting. The hooded man gave a laptop to Marty and they held a brief conversation before Marty ran inside. The man took off his hood and turned to look directly at Yuno. At that moment, he instantly recognized Jean Paul’s signature skull mask and blonde hair in the sunlight.

“Mr. X?” Yuno whispered.

Jean Paul waved at him, then joined Marty inside the bank.

A familiar ache grew in Yuno’s chest as he drove out of the parking lot. Even though he knew that Jean Paul could work with whoever he pleased, he also knew that Jean Paul only worked with criminals who were the best of the best. He wouldn’t accept anything less than number one.

Yuno knew this because it had happened before. The blonde-haired bank buster hated how he wouldn’t carry a gun or shoot cops, so he found someone else to replace him. Now it seemed like he had been replaced by Marty. This encounter made Yuno wonder how many chances he had left with the Cleanbois before they replaced him.

When he returned to CLean Manor, he was mentally exhausted and tired from his eventful day, but he didn’t feel like he deserved to go inside. Instead, he laid next to a bush by the lawn and fell asleep.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

Lang parked his DeLorean in the lower driveway and let out a wide yawn. It was only 8:00 p.m., but he had finally finished his last meeting for the day and he couldn’t wait to have dinner with the boys. He took the elevator up to the kitchen, which smelled heavenly, but no one was there. There were two pizzas in the oven, and Tony had left it unattended for some reason. Through the kitchen window, he saw a flash of light from the side lawn, and so he walked outside.

It was there that he saw Tony taking a selfie with a bush. Though after taking a few steps closer, he saw Yuno lying face down on the grass underneath the shrub. “Jesus. Yuno, you okay, buddy?”

“I think he’s a little passed out there,” Tony replied while making a peace sign and taking another selfie of him and Yuno.

Lang kneeled in the grass next to the hacker. “You drank too much today?”

“Yuno, you alright?” Tony asked as he put his phone in his pants pocket.

Yuno remained unresponsive even as Tony repeatedly poked his shoulder. “My man is out.”

“Let’s go put him in his bed.” Lang picked Yuno up and carried him in his arms across the lawn. “Can you open this door for me, Tony?”

“Yeah, I got ya. Bring him on in.” Tony held the door open for him as he passed through. The moment he stepped inside himself, the scent of marinara sauce hit his nose. “Oh shit! I forgot about the pizza!”

Lang carried Yuno upstairs while Tony checked on the pizzas in the oven. When he entered Raymond and Yuno’s shared room, he was surprised to see the Russian man already snoring in the bed with his limbs spread out and entangled in the bedcovers.

“Why the fuck is Ray sleeping?”

“Shh! Don’t wake him up! I just got him to sleep, too!” Tony yelled from down the hall.

Lang nudged Raymond to his side of the bed. “Move over, buddy. Make room for your brother.”

When his body was no longer taking up the whole bed, Lang dropped Yuno onto his side and tucked him in underneath the covers. There was a pile of plushies on Yuno’s bedside table, and he grabbed the biggest one. He wrapped Yuno’s arms around the killer whale plushie, and the sleeping hacker instinctively snuggled the soft sea animal in his sleep.

Tony peeked into the room and watched Lang finish tucking in Yuno.

“There ya go. Nice and tucked in.” Lang walked over to the doorway with Tony and they both looked back at the bed one last time, making sure that their boys were peacefully sleeping before turning off the lights and closing their bedroom door.

Chapter Text

(Thursday, June 3, 2021)

The Liquid Library was a bar and library located in Mirror Park. The owners allowed the space to be rented to host events every now and then. Today, the downstairs study area of the library was being used for Rizz Class. The space consisted of several rows of desks with a podium in the front, and each desk was big enough to hold a row of three chairs. Raymond, Yuno, and Fiona sat at a desk together in the very back of the room.

The lecturer walked up to the podium and laid down his briefcase on the surface. “Good morning, class. Before we begin, I have a public service announcement that was brought to my attention—that I feel like shouldn’t need to be brought to my attention—but, don’t rizz up your siblings.”

“Oh, Yuno, do you hear that?” Raymond said, leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed behind his head and his feet resting on the desk.

A few of the other students looked back at them with confused looks, making Yuno self-conscious. “Why are you saying that to me? I don’t do that.”

The lecturer continued on, “I didn’t know I needed to make this public service announcement, but I was approached by multiple people—I think about four to five people—before this class started, and they were like, ‘Can you make a note about not rizzing up your adoptive siblings or your siblings in general?’ So—”

“Why are you changing it?! Ay, this is targeted!” Yuno yelled.

“No, this is not targeted. Don’t try to fuck your cousins, or your siblings, or any family really—”

“Adoptive siblings,” Fiona clarified.

“Or adoptive siblings, yes. Whoever said that. I don’t know why I had to bring that up, but here we are.” The old lecturer never had to give such an announcement before, but he supposed that the kids were wild these days.

Yuno turned to Fiona. “Why are you trying to clarify that? I don’t do that.”

“Yuno, our family tree is starting to look like a family bush. Some of your brothers are dating your sisters, and some have even tried to ask me out on a date. Now I don’t want you getting any weird ideas.”

Yuno visibly cringed and plopped his head down on the desk. “Oh god. Why are we here again?”

Fiona patted his back. “I’m worried about you, son. You’ve been pretty down recently, and I thought that getting you a girlfriend would help cheer you up.”

“I…I’m not sad because I don’t have a girlfriend.”

The lecturer cleared his throat, getting their attention again. “Can I get the young lady in the back with the braided white hair to please come up to the front of the class, and introduce yourself?”

“Oh no, me?” Fiona wasn’t expecting to be called on, but she walked up to the podium anyway. “Um, hey, my name’s Fiona Stewart, but I’m not actually here for the Rizz Class. My side piece—I mean, my friend and I are just here to support my son.”

“Who’s your son?”

“Yuno.” She turned around and pointed at him. “Say ‘hi,’ Yuno.”

Yuno waved his hand. “Hello! You’re doing great up there!”

The lecturer was not expecting a grown man in his twenties—who appeared to be around the same age as Fiona—to speak up. “Wait, how the hell old are you?”

“Thirty-two,” Fiona answered.

“And…how old is he?”

Understanding the lecturer’s bewilderment, Yuno simply responded, “I’m adopted!”

“Oh, okay. Why are you here with your mom?”

“Um, girls aren’t into me, but she said that if I took this class then they might be?”

“O…kay. Do you mind taking your helmet off, Yuno?”

“I can’t. I’m ugly.”

“...All right. Now then, who in this class would like to volunteer to be rizzed by Yuno, the ugly, helmeted man who brought his adoptive mom to class?”

No one raised their hands, and the lecturer turned back to Fiona. “I’m sorry, ma’am. It appears your son has no rizz.”

Yuno whined, “Ahh, I haven’t even done anything yet, and I already failed the class. This is just like college all over again.”

Fiona returned to her seat and whispered to the boys, “The fuck kind of Rizz Class is this?”

Raymond chuckled. “This is great.”

“Mr. Romanov, is that you?” the lecturer asked.

“The one and only~”

“Would you like to come up here and take a crack at rizzing someone up?”

“Of course.” Raymond walked to the front of the room, wrote his phone number on the board, turned around, and loosened his necktie while leaning against the wall.

“My name is Raymond Romanov, but you can call me Ray~” He deepened his voice, and thickened his Russian accent as he spoke, “I just want to say that everyone here looks beautiful, and I would like to get to know all of you better. I’m killer on the streets and in the sheets, and I can promise you good time for both. Feel free to send me text with your name in it if you want someone taken care of or if you're interested in meeting up later~” He winked and confidently sauntered back to his chair.

Every single person, except for Yuno and Fiona, took out their phones to text him.

Hearing Raymond speak in his sultry voice, and make bedroom eyes with the class was the final straw for Yuno. He leaned over and whispered, “Raymond, I would rather make another attempt to hack the Lower Vault than spend another minute here. I can’t handle the cringe.”

Raymond checked his phone. Seeing that he had secured fifteen new phone numbers, he supposed that he was done with the class as well. “All right. Let’s ditch class.”

Scene 9: Cheat Code

Tony waited in front of the Los Santos Department of Water & Power with a C-4, preparing to turn off the power. After their close call last time, they wanted to make sure that the police were distracted with the city wide power outage rather than the City Vault.

He was talking to Yuno on his phone, “Okay, I’m at the water and power company. You guys good, Y?”

“Yep, I’m on the roof, and Mr. L should be here soon. The moment R is ready, you blow up the power.”

“Sounds good. I love you, alright?”

Yuno ignored those dreaded three words again. “See you soon. Thanks a bunch.”

“Say it back.”

“Uhh, I wawahewhe—”

Tony heard the line disconnect. He sat in his car in silence for ten seconds before he adjusted the collar of his shirt and called Yuno back.

“Hey, what’s up, T? You need something?”

“Say it for real.”

“Yeah, ‘f-for real’? ‘It for real’? Um, oh! There’s Mr. L!”

“Why don’t you love me?!” The line disconnected again, and Tony pouted in his car.

Yuno ran across the rooftop to the ledge that he heard Lang grapple up to. He joined him by the corner of the Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank, and took in the view of the nighttime cityscape. “Look at all those lights. We’re about to turn them all off.”

Lang sat down on the ledge, and looked down. “Yeah. I’m fucking starting to get nervous now.”

“You haven’t already been nervous?”

“I don’t normally get nervous until just before we’re about to start, to be honest.”

“Oh, I was nervous when I woke up today,” Yuno admitted.

“Damn~ Don’t worry. If we fail, it’s fine. We’ll just come back again. Y’know what I mean? The reason any of this is possible is because of you.”

“I know you guys won’t be upset, but I’ll feel like it.”

“You shouldn’t, alright? Just think about it this way. Even if you succeed, obviously it’s huge, and it’s amazing, and we’re all gonna be happy, but we still gotta get away as well. You gotta remember that we all have our parts to play on this job, so don’t put all the pressure on yourself.”

Yuno supposed that was true. It was just hard to think that way when the only reason that the previous two heists failed were because of him.

Raymond’s voice came through the radio. “I’ve got two hostages at the front.”

“Alright,” Tony replied. “Blowing up the power now.”

Lang and Yuno watched the lights go out, casting the whole city in darkness, then they began making their descent into the Lower Vault. It wasn’t long until Raymond turned the generator off and on, and they were back at that computer system once again.

Lang held out two black dongles. “You ready, baby? This is your big moment. R, was only able to get you two dongles this time, but—”

Yuno grabbed the dongles from him. “Yeah, that should be enough. Just give me, uh, give me a minute.” He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths.

Yuno had been practicing the hack nonstop, and even though it had only been two days since their last attempt, he was certain that he could do it. He still hadn’t gotten over the nerves, though, and was worried that they would mess him up.

Asking for his hands to stop shaking was an impossible task, but when the shaking abated, he decided that it was enough to start the hack. He inserted the black dongle.

Unlike the previous attempts, the hack passed by in the blink of an eye. It took Lang a longer moment to process that Yuno had actually completed it in that short amount of time.

He let out a high-pitched scream, and started laughing uncontrollably. “Oh my god, oh my god. Y, what the fuck?”

Once Yuno’s ears stopped ringing—and he realized that the piercing sound was Lang and not another alarm being set off—he laughed and said, “Mr. L, I’ve got some bad news.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Lang struggled to say between fits of laughter.

“I wasted a dongle. I only needed the first one.”

They kept laughing in disbelief over the whole situation. They both couldn’t believe that he was able to complete the hack that easily after everything they had been through. It felt more like a dream instead of reality.

Lang spoke into his radio, “Boys, he just one-shotted this thing like it was nothing.”

“No way!” Tony cheered, “Let’s go! Fuck yeah, baby!”

Raymond joined in, “What?! Let’s go, Y!”

“I-I cannot believe what I just saw.” There was only one other moment that Lang had been this proud of the hacker, and he fondly thought back to that first bank in Paleto Bay. Yuno had come a long way since then.

Yuno chuckled and said, “Cheat Code’s back, guys. Sorry I made ya wait so long.”

“Damn~” Lang sang. “Okay, now I’m gonna check the system. R, you can go ahead and turn off the backup generator and leave it turned off. If the police notice and show up, we’ll just leave immediately. Y, you can start working on the Upper Vault.”

“Got it!” Raymond disabled the lasers, then made his way back down to the front of the City Vault to help Tony watch the hostages and keep an eye out for approaching police cruisers.

“I can’t believe I did it. I still can’t believe I did it.” Yuno paced around in circles. “I practiced like a psychopath, and I got it! I’m never letting you down again. It’s the worst feeling in the world.”

While Lang was glad that Yuno was feeling ecstatic, that statement was a little concerning to him. “Y, you’ve never let us down. You’re not a computer, you’re human and you made one mistake.”

“It was two mistakes, and I’m not making a third. I’m never failing anything ever again. That felt awful. I’m gonna go hack the Upper Vault now!” Yuno ran upstairs before Lang could reply.

“Umm, okay.” Lang didn’t think that Yuno learned the right lesson from this whole ordeal, but he could discuss it with him later. He wasn’t about to bring down the hacker’s good mood since this was the first time he had seen him genuinely happy in two weeks.

He went to the computer system and searched through the files. Despite the system’s impressive hardware, the files weren’t that different from the contents in the other banks, and yet again, he found nothing of importance to him.

Lang let out a sigh of defeat, his mind spiraling and trying to think of a new course of action. They had wasted all of that time trying to look for information on Eden, and he still didn’t have much to show for their efforts.

Maybe he was curious, maybe he had an inkling something wasn’t right, maybe he just wanted to see how the Cerberus account looked after he had emptied it. He didn’t know why, but he had the sudden idea to check the Cerberus account while he was there.

Cerberus Account History: Transaction Details

Transaction date: Feb. 3, 2021

Description: $96,000 deposit from Lang Buddha.

Transaction date: Feb. 4, 2021

Description: Lang Buddha withdrew $96,000.

Transaction date: Feb. 5, 2021

Description: $500,000 deposit from Dean Watson.

Transaction date: Feb. 5, 2021

Description: $500,000 deposit from LingCorp Mining.

Transaction date: Feb. 5, 2021

Description: $250,000 deposit from Leslie Lingberg.

Transaction date: Feb. 5, 2021

Description: $250,000 deposit from Lang Buddha.

Lang scrolled through every transaction from February to May. The list of transactions carried on and on like normal until he noticed a series of transactions from an unfamiliar account.

Transaction date: Mar. 12, 2021

Description: Eden Industries withdrew $100,000.

Transaction date: Mar. 26, 2021

Description: Eden Industries withdrew $100,000.

Transaction date: Apr. 9, 2021

Description: Eden Industries withdrew $100,000.

Transaction date: Apr. 14, 2021

Description: Eden Industries withdrew $100,000.

Transaction date: May 20, 2021

Description: Lang Buddha withdrew $3,000,000.

End of transactions. 

(Further information about Cerberus has been transferred to the VAR.)

“What the fuck?! What’s a VAR? How the hell does Eden Industries have access to this account? How did we not fucking notice this? Wait, wait, wait.” Lang pulled out his phone and checked the Cerberus account on his profile. Everything was the same except the transactions from Eden Industries didn’t appear.

“The fuck? Has our account been hacked or—”

“That’s the last of the money. Ready to leave when you guys are,” Yuno said over the radio.

Tony replied, “Great, cops aren’t here yet either. B, you done? We gotta go.”

“Coming.” Lang put his phone in his jacket pocket and exited the Lower Vault. He hoped that this would be his last time down there.

Yuno had completed all of the hacks so well that the bank and the police never even noticed it had been robbed.

(The next day - Friday, June 4, 2021)

Dean was the owner of the Diamond Casino & Resort, and Cassie was the CEO. That was how it had been for the past five months when Dean first purchased the establishment at the end of December. That was how it was until May twenty-fifth.

This afternoon, Harry was on the casino floor, Cassie was in the reception area, Eve and Nancy were in the penthouse, and Lang and Leslie were in Dean’s office.

Lang searched the office for any hidden paper documents while Leslie was looking through the files on Dean’s personal computer. “This is looking bad, Lang.”

“Don’t say that, Leslie. You’ll make me fucking paranoid. Everything is fine.”

“Guys, this is cooked,” Harry’s voice came through on the Cerberus radio channel.

Lang responded, “It’s not cooked, Harry.”

“Lang’s right,” Nancy said, “It’s actually fucking abyssmal.”

“No, it’s not, Nance.” Within the top of the Cerberus hierarchy, things usually played out the other way around. Lang felt weird being the one person trying to think positively, and he didn’t like it.

“Then what is it, Lang?” Cassie’s panicked voice came through, “Because right now, I am a CEO of an establishment without an owner, and it’s been that way for ten days.”

Lang groaned, then got back into character as the optimistic boss. “Dean is probably just on a vacation. He’s been really tired recently.”

“You think he took a vacation without telling anyone?” Cassie asked skeptically.

“He’s your boss. He doesn’t need to tell you when he’s going on vacation,” Lang reasoned.

“You’re Dean’s best friend and business partner. Shouldn’t he at least tell you?” Cassie fired back.

Leslie scoffed, “Cassie, I’m offended that you think Dean’s best friend is Lang instead of me.”

“Suck it up, Leslie. Cassie is spitting big facts right now. Everything is fucked!” Lang’s positive phase was short-lived. He was done trying to be optimistic about the situation.

“Hey, guys?” Eve tentatively began. “I don’t mean to alarm you, but I just found Dean’s work phone and personal phone in the penthouse.”

“...Fantastic,” Harry said sarcastically. “So, we all agree something really bad must’ve happened here that led to Dean’s disappearance, right?”

“Not only that, but this means he can’t contact us and we have no way of contacting him,” Leslie added.

With the false positivity gone, Lang flipped into his dooming phase. “Yep, Dean is dead. The world is gonna end. The fuck do we do here?”

Leslie pondered, “Hm, I don’t really want to own the casino, so you can have it, I guess.”

“All right, it’s decided then. Yo~ What’s up, boss man?~” Cassie tried to joke, but ended up cringing at herself.

Lang cringed more. “Cassie, never say that again.”

“Sorry, sorry, I regretted it as soon as I said it.”

“Have you heard back from the police, Lang?” Nancy asked.

“Nothing yet. And, uh, I’m not gonna lie, I don’t think they’ll learn much because we weren’t able to give them any leads.”

“In that case, I don’t know if it’s insensitive of me to ask, but should I get That’s Life Funeral Homes ready to host Dean’s funeral?”

“The fuck kinda question is that, Nance?” Lang was appalled she would even ask. “Obviously you should. You know Dean would love for us to capitalize on his death. Remember to make it a public ceremony and request for donations.”

“Okay, that’s what I thought. Just wanted to check ‘cause I’m sure that you two were the closest ones to him.”

“Yes, Nancy,” Leslie confirmed. “Start planning it at Tempest Sanctuary Church, and I’ll prepare the eulogy.”

“Start planning it tomorrow, guys,” Lang clarified. “For now, let’s just keep looking through Dean’s documents.”

“All right.” The radio channel went silent as everyone resumed their search through Dean’s possessions.

Leslie leaned back in the desk chair and stretched his arms. “I’ve been going through these files all day, and there’s nothing here that explains Dean’s disappearance. I can’t do this anymore.”

“Can I check the computer if you’re done?” Lang asked.

“Sure.” Leslie stood up and moved over for Lang, but then Tony entered the office.

“Ay~ Buongiorno, my brotha! C’mere~” Tony greeted Lang with a thick Italian accent and kissed both of his cheeks.

Lang chuckled. “I see you’re feeling extra Italian today.”

“I went to Maldini’s for lunch and I was served pizza by a true Italian man.” Tony pinched his fingers together as he spoke, mimicking the gesture of a true Italian man.

“You mean Vinny Pistone made you this way?” Lang asked before he registered his words. “Hey, wait! And you didn’t bring me pizza? What the fuck?”

“They ran out of pepperoni.”

“What kind of fucking pizzeria doesn’t have pepperoni pizza?”

“Ay~ Whatchya gunna do ‘bout it?”

Leslie groaned. “Tony, can you please drop this shitty Italian impersonation?”

“Ay, Leslie! Buongiorno! C’mere~”

He backed away before Tony could reach him. “No, I don’t want a kiss.”

“C’mere, buddy~”

“Spring boots, activate!” Leslie’s shoes made a loud boing, and sent a strong gust of air underneath his feet which propelled his body through the office window and onto the casino floor. The glass shattered and scattered around them.

“Ohh! What the fuck, Leslie?!”

“Oh gabagool! Leslie, you alright?” Tony ran out of the office to check on the dramatic businessman.

Lang used his sleeves to brush the glass shards off of the desk and onto the floor. He would call someone to clean it later.

He sat down in the black desk chair, and logged into Dean’s personal computer to check on the code for his silver secure case. The man seemed worried about it going missing, so he figured that he should check to see if it was still there, which it was. Thankfully.

With Dean gone, Lang couldn’t help the growing urge to open up that mysterious case, so he printed out the casino code from the computer. The code was a QR code that came out on a small slip of paper. Then he opened the desk drawer to see if the silver secure case was still there, which it wasn't. Unfortunately.

“Oh my god! This can’t be fucking happening right now. It’s missing again!” Lang desperately searched the drawer, hoping that the case would magically appear, which it didn't. But, he did find a black slip of paper in the back of the drawer. He pulled it out and saw that same golden apple logo. Specifically, a logo of a tree branch tied into a trinity knot with a golden apple in the center.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck! I fucked up! And they’re fucking with me! I should’ve checked Dean’s office as soon as he disappeared. Now the goddamn Diamond Casino blueprints are missing.”

Tony returned to the office without Leslie, but his thick Italian accent was still intact. “Ay, what’s goin’ on in here? I can hear ya from outside.”

“Tony, I’ve got bad news.”

“What is it?”

“Okay, alright, okay, fuck, right.” Lang took a couple of deep breaths to calm himself so he could explain his thoughts to Tony. “I’m gonna give you the full explanation of everything I’ve learned so far just to make sure that I’m not missing anything, and to go over future steps.”

“Yeah, give it all to me. Lay it down.”

“Okay. So, back in March, we noticed that there were ten buildings on the island that had a golden apple logo which I now know is the logo for Eden Industries. After finding nothing for months, yesterday I found out that Eden Industries has been withdrawing money from the Cerberus account, but it only shows up in the Lower Vault’s computer system. Thank god I went paranoid that one day and withdrew the rest of the money myself. And thinking of that day made me realize that Eden Industries might involve a variant of either Dean, Leslie, or me, and that is how they were able to access the Cerberus account without drawing suspicion at the bank. So, now I’m under the belief that Eden Industries posed as a security company to hack into the Cerberus account and use our money for…something. Probably Project Eden.”

“Eden (Eating) this dick?”

Lang laughed in surprise. “No, it’s not a dick joke.”

Tony chuckled shyly. He really thought it might’ve been some elaborate set up for the joke. “Sorry. To be honest, I’m not sure if I fully understand what you’re talkin’ about.”

“That’s okay. The important thing, which is also the fucking sketchy thing, is that the system in the Lower Vault also mentions Cerberus info being transferred to something called a VAR. And if my suspicions are correct, I think the VAR might also have Dean’s silver secure case.”

“Dean’s what?”

“Dean’s secret case that used to be in this office, and it apparently holds the blueprints to the casino. The weird thing is that it went missing twice now, which makes me believe that there is something more to…all of this. Regardless, we really gotta break into that VAR thing. Whatever the fuck that is.”

“What is VAR? Does it stand for somethin’?”

“No fucking clue. I don’t even fucking know if it’s like, a place or some kinda object. Oh, maybe I can ask Ramee if he knows.” Lang presumed that if anyone would know, it would either be Ramee or The Guild. The bigger question was whether or not he could trust them with this information.

Hearing Ramee’s name made Tony recall something he heard earlier that day. “Oooh. ‘Bout that, uh, Vinny was tellin’ me that there’s some beef happenin’ between you and CG.”

“Wait, that’s right, I forgot.” Lang chuckled as he remembered what the argument was about. “They’re still upset with me?”

“Sounds like it. What's goin’ on?”

“Well, uh, it's a few things actually. Remember how I've been asking Ramee for Onyx Dust?”

“Yeah, and he kept sayin’ he doesn't have any.”

“So, I got kinda mad one day ‘cause he kept insisting that he didn’t have any when I know damn well that motherfucker probably has mounds of it stuffed in his fucking asshole, and so I created a scene at the gallery. And then this girl tried begging me for money so I called her a broke bitch. And it turns out her name is, uh, August? No. Uh, what's the name of that vlogger you like?”

Tony’s eyes widened. “You called April Fooze, the Los Santos sugarbaby, the CG gold digger, the top artist of Wu-Chang Records, and the influencer with the highest follower count on the island…broke?”

“Not only that, but the next day I used my billboard company to create two massive Cerberus ads, and placed one in front of the gallery and the other in front of Wu-Chang Records. Apparently, it was affecting business and people thought that Ramee and April were sucking Cerberus’ dick so they told Mr. K, and he was very angry at me until I got the billboards removed. So, yeah, things are a little tense between us right now.”

Tony’s main takeaway from that was, “You own a billboard company?”

“Yeah, it's called Billboard Erectus, remember? We have it specially for placing giant Cerberus ads around the city to annoy people.”

“Oh~ That's right.”

“Anyway, was Vinny giving you a hard time because of it?”

Tony shook his head. “Nah, he said that we were good ‘cause I was just a customer at his business, so I got the Italian pass for the day. But then he did say that I should stay away from the restaurant for a while. Mr. K, Ramee, and April are still pissed, and has given everyone the order to—” He made air quotes with his fingers, and said, “—stay away from CB.”

Lang raised an eyebrow, understanding Mr. K’s implication and Tony’s discontent. “And what exactly is ‘CB’?”

Tony smirked. “That's what I’d like to know, too.”

“Umm, Lang…” Nancy’s voice slowly came through on the Cerberus radio channel. “Can you meet us in the penthouse, please?”

“On my way, Nance.”

A couple of minutes later, Lang and Tony entered the penthouse of the Diamond Casino & Resort. It used to be owned by Dean, and Cerberus had yet to figure out what they wanted to do with it. Nancy and Eve were tasked with searching it for clues about Dean’s disappearance.

“I’m here! Where ya at?” Lang called out into the massive entryway. The penthouse took up the entire floor, so there were several rooms that the two businesswomen could be in.

“We’re over here!”

Lang followed the sound of Nancy’s voice to a meeting room. She silently stood by the door and pointed inside.

“Hey, what’s—Holy shit.”

In the center of the meeting room was a table with a hissing, black panther peeking its head out from underneath it. Eve was standing close to the mad cat, frozen in place from fear. She had walked into the room to clean it, not noticing the panther until it angrily hissed at her.

Lang cautiously walked over to her. “Is that Dean’s panther?”

“Yes.”

“Why is it here?”

“It’s a girl. Her name is Onyx,” Eve explained.

The name surprised Lang, but he suddenly remembered Dean telling him her name a few months ago. He wondered if there was a deeper meaning behind it. “Um, why is Onyx hissing?”

“I think she misses Dean. Apparently, you were listed as her legal guardian if anything ever were to happen to him, so…”

Lang looked down at the panther, baring her fangs at them. He whispered, “I don’t think she wants to be my pet. You can have her.”

Eve whispered back, “I don’t think she wants to be my pet either.”

“She’s a fucking exotic animal. They’re not supposed to be pets. What do we do?”

“I don’t know. Should we put her down?”

Onyx growled loudly. She swiftly jumped at Eve, and bit her ankle.

“Ahh!” Eve screamed more from shock than pain.

“Oh my god!” Lang instinctively flinched out of the way when Onyx pounced. He felt bad about leaving Eve defenseless, but he wasn’t about to get in the way of a vengeful panther.

“Eve!” Nancy wanted to run into the room to check on her, but she didn't want to upset the panther further. So, she continued to wait by the door with Tony.

Onyx retreated back under the table, and Eve felt a slight sting in her leg. Though, she couldn't bend down to inspect it due to her pencil skirt and heels.

Lang knelt to examine the wound. The bite was very light, but her sharp teeth were enough to break the skin, causing it to bleed a little. “Eve, are you okay?”

Eve whimpered, “Onyx just bit me.”

“I don’t think she likes you.”

Onyx slowly approached Lang, and sniffed his clothes. Confirming that she had smelled his scent before during the several times he had hung out with Dean, she rubbed her head against his knee. She was more comfortable around him now that he was eye level with her.

Lang carefully extended his hand and pet her on the head; Onyx purred in response.

Eve huffed, “Well, now she seems to like you. What did I do?”

“It’s the heels Eve. She doesn’t like women towering over her.”

“How is that my fault—Ow.” Eve shifted her weight, causing the ripped flesh to be stretched and irritated.

Lang assumed that Dean wouldn’t keep an animal with rabies, but he thought that it would be better to be safe. “You need a rabies shot ASAP.”

“I’ll take you to the hospital, Eve,” Nancy offered.

“Okay, thanks.” Eve gingerly walked out of the room, and the two businesswomen left to go to Pillbox Hill Medical Center.

“So, you got a new pet?” Tony asked from the doorway. After what happened to Eve, he didn’t want to be anywhere near Onyx.

“I don’t know where I’m supposed to keep her, though. I mean, I guess she could stay here. Dean probably keeps her care products here, too.”

Lang whistled and KFC came strutting over, but stopped in fear when he saw the cat towering over him. He looked over at Lang with wide eyes, scared that he was being given some type of punishment.

“KFC, you’re in charge. I still have business to take care of, so I need you to watch Onyx while I’m gone, okay? I’ll be back later.”

KFC nodded obediently.

“You’re gonna leave him alone with her.” Tony asked, concerned about the rooster’s safety.

“He’s a magical rooster. He’ll be fine.” Lang turned back to the two animals. “You two better behave. You’re both siblings now, so I want you to get along.”

Before Lang could leave the room, his phone rang and he answered it.

“Hey, Lang! You coming to Yuno’s birthday party?” Raymond asked.

“Uhh, when’s his birthday?”

₊˚⊹⭒☣˖°༄✧.♣ ࿔*:･

“Today’s my birthday, Mickey! I’m throwing a party at 5:00 p.m. on the rooftop of the City Vault. You’ll be there, right?”

Mickey sighed. “Yuno, I wish I could, but Lang and Mr. K are beefing, remember? I can’t be seen with you or else I’ll get in trouble.”

“I already thought of that. So, not only is it on the roof where no one will see us, but it’s also like a masquerade, costume party kinda thing. I’m telling everyone to arrive dressed like me; that way no one knows who anyone is. You’ll be hidden in a crowd of Yunos. Isn’t that perfect? I’m a genius!”

“Wait, that actually is pretty genius. I think it just might work. Which outfit is it? Your black motorcycle helmet with a green blazer or your cat ears with an olive green raincoat?”

“The green blazer one. I didn’t think it'd be a good idea if everyone showed up wearing my criminal cat outfit. The exact clothes are a dark green blazer over a white dress shirt and a navy bulletproof vest with gray pants, black gloves, white shoes with blue light up soles, and a black motorcycle helmet. But, don’t worry about it being perfect.”

“Okay, I’ll try to get the outfit together and sneak over.”

“Oh boy! This is gonna be so much fun! See you soon, Mickey!” Yuno hung up. He was running around the driveway of Bean Manor while Fiona was struggling to gather her children together.

She yelled for her husband, “Marlo, hurry up! We have a time limit! The party is in one hour! Help me get the kids!”

“I’m gonna run down the block. I’m getting impatient,” Yuno announced.

“I know. We’re just waiting on Raia, and Marlo can—”

Yuno took off running down the street, not realizing that Fiona was talking to him.

“Yuno! Yuno!” Fiona got into a white Stratum and drove after him. “Yuno! Get in the car!”

“Wait, this isn’t the Elegy. What is this?”

“It’s a rental car, Yuno. My Elegy only has two seats. Get in.”

“Oh, you wanna go drive around while we wait?” Yuno asked while getting in the passenger seat.

“No, we’re going now. I’m taking the kids in the driveway and we’re going now. Marlo can deal with everyone else.” Fiona drifted into the driveway of Bean Manor. “Kitty! Gloryon! Raia! Get in the goddamn car!”

Sensing the urgency, Kitty and Gloryon rushed over to the car and slid into the back seats. Raia, a teenager with light brown hair, was distractedly texting on her phone.

“Raia!” Fiona yelled. “Raia, your siblings have ADHD! Get in the car!”

“Okay! Okay!” Raia put her phone away and got into the back seat with them.

Fiona started to drive south into the city. “Finally! Now we’re gonna—”

“Quick!” Yuno interrupted. “We’re going house robbing for $2 a pop.”

“Family crime day! Let’s go!” Gloryon cheered.

“Wait, wait, let’s do family house robbing in the Southside. The first one to get shot wins!” Yuno suggested.

That made Gloryon reconsider. “Oh god! How many of us are there?”

“Family Southside robberies! First one to get blasted wins $1000~”

“Now hear me out—”

“We’re going to jail?” Raia anxiously asked. Her older brothers were scaring her.

“No! We’re going to the clothing store! We need to get dressed up for Yuno’s birthday party!” Fiona tried to get the boys under control, but it was hard to focus on driving while listening to everyone’s constant chatter. She couldn’t even tell who was saying what anymore.

“Are we there yet? Are we there yet?”

“Can we go to Burger Shot?”

“I need to go to the bathroom!”

“I’m hungry.”

“Are we there yet? Are we there yet?”

“Wait, where’s Marlo?”

“Marlo’s got another car. Fiona split everyone up.”

“Are we there yet? Are we there yet?”

“Oh! Take a jump on that tow truck! Take a jump on that tow truck!”

“I’m still hungry and thirsty. Does anyone have a water bottle?”

“Does this clothing store have a bathroom inside?”

“Are we there yet? Are we there yet?”

Fiona screamed, “We’re nearly there! We’re almost there! And we’re here! Everyone get out and get changed!”

They all exited the car, and Yuno yelled, “To the clothing store, everybody!”

“Do I wear what you’re wearing right now, Yuno?” Kitty asked.

“Yeah—Wait,” Yuno looked down at his clothes. “I don’t even need to change. I’m already dressed.”

Raia scrutinized his outfit with a disgusted look on her face. “I don’t wanna wear that. I’ll look stupid.”

“What does that mean?!”

Fiona groaned, feeling a headache coming on. “Fuck! This is why I never had kids!”

Twenty minutes went by and they were still getting changed. At some point, Marlo brought the other kids, and they all wreaked havoc on the small clothing store.

Yuno decided to run around outside to take a break from the noise while he waited for them. As he randomly wandered, a familiar pink Lamborghini parked next to him on the side of the street. “Hey, Raymond!”

“Hey, what’s up, Yuno?” Raymond greeted as he exited his car. His outfit perfectly matched Yuno’s current one.

He ran around Raymond in circles, admiring the outfit. “Wow, you look just like me. It looks like the same brand and everything.”

Raymond chuckled. “Probably because it is. I just took your clothes from our bedroom closet.”

“O-Oh! Right,” Yuno rubbed the back of his neck, slightly embarrassed that he didn’t recognize his own clothes.

Raia exited the clothing store dressed like Yuno if he wore a purple blazer instead of a green one. She didn’t like any of the green blazers the store had to offer.

“Hey, nobody,” Raymond greeted her.

Yuno turned around to see who he was talking to. “Oh, this is Raia. Fiona adopted her a month ago.”

“Hello, I’m Yuno’s favorite sister!” Raia said, and hugged Yuno’s arm. Raymond glared at the action from underneath his motorcycle helmet.

“I mean, uh, Kitty’s pretty cool, too,” Yuno said. “I don’t really wanna pick favorites.”

“Hello, Raia. I’m Yuno’s favorite brother, Raymond Romanov.” He offered his hand to her.

She released Yuno’s arm and shook his hand, then Raymond’s words sank in. “Wait, you’re adopted by Fiona?”

“No, I’m dating her, but Yuno is also my brother.”

The unintentional insinuation made Yuno recoil. “U-Uh, let’s not say it like that. It sounds a little—”

Raia continued on with a slight teasing tone in her voice. “Well, if you’re not adopted by Fiona, I don’t think that actually makes you his brother. And my mom is married to Marlo, so it doesn’t sound like you have any relation to Yuno at all.”

Raymond didn’t realize that she was joking with him. “You take that back, you fucking b—”

“So! Um…” Yuno decided to change the subject. “Y-You know, since you’re both my siblings now, I want you to get along. You guys should get to know each other a little better. What’s your, uh, what’s each of your favorite colors?”

“Purple!” Raia exclaimed.

“I genuinely enjoy the color of blood.”

“You know most people just say red, but t-that’s, um, that works, too.” Yuno tried to think of another question to ask when Kitty exited the clothing store.

“Yuno, how does this look?” Kitty twirled around to show off her outfit. She looked like Yuno if he wore a girls’ high school uniform. “I really like the plaid skirt, but I think the gray is not the same shade as your pants.”

“Oh, well, it doesn’t have to be perfect,” he reassured her.

Kitty puffed out her cheeks and spoke in her sweet voice; a high-pitched cadence she used to get what she wanted. “Can you come help me pick out a different skirt, please? I need to see your clothes for reference.”

“Yeah, of course. I’ll be right back, guys.” Yuno ran inside with Kitty, leaving the awkward silence outside.

Raymond and Raia sat down on the public bench together on opposite ends. No one said anything for five minutes.

“This is definitely not awkward at all," Raia tried to strike up a conversation, but Raymond didn’t respond.

“...Damn, the weather is nice.”

“Hm.”

After another minute of silence, she tried again. “D-Do you have anything you want to ask me?”

“Do you have any talents in life?” Raymond snarked.

Raia hummed as she seriously pondered over his question. “...Nope.”

“That makes sense.”

“Yup, I don’t have talent at all.”

Raymond almost let the silence settle in again, but he didn’t want to disappoint Yuno by not at least attempting to get to know Raia. “...Why do you like purple?”

“It’s a pretty color.”

“So, you like purple and you have no talents?”

“Yup! Uh, what are your talents?”

“Everything.”

“Like what?”

“Ask me what I’m good at, and I’ll say I’m good at it. I can drive, shoot, hack—”

“Are you good at singing?”

Raymond paused. “...Not particularly, no.”

“That’s not everything~ I’m just saying~” she sang under her breath.

“The fuck you say?! You trying to insult me right now?!”

“N-No, I’m not. Uh, d-do you know how to draw?”

“...No, I don’t know how to draw.”

She continued to tease him, “Uh-oh~ Well, you can’t just say everything~ Just saying~”

“Everything that matters!”

“Drawing matters, okay?”

“For what reason?!”

“It’s cool!”

Raymond was becoming frustrated with her. He was about to yell at her again, but was interrupted by the sound of his phone chiming. He had received a text message from Yuno that read, “Hey, I’m helping a few of my other siblings choose their outfits. Should be done in about ten minutes.” Yuno also sent him a picture of a cat meme that made him smile.

Raymond pocketed his phone and stood up from the bench. “Yuno says this might take a few minutes, so why don’t I show you what I’m good at while we wait?”

“Okay!” Raia jumped up and followed him to his car.

.⋆ ｡⋆ ♣˚｡⋆｡˚ⴵ˚｡⋆.

Ten minutes later, inside the clothing store, Gloryon had finished getting dressed. He was reluctant about removing his black hooded, cleric robe, so he simply picked an oversized green blazer to wear over it.

Gloryon rested his hands in the pockets of his robe, and remembered that he had yet to give Yuno his birthday present. He walked around until he found him by the store entrance. Yuno looked like he was about to leave.

“Yuno! Wait!”

Yuno stopped and turned around. “Oh, what is it, Gloryon?”

“I heard you flunked out of Rizz Class, so this is my birthday present for you.” Gloryon took his hand out of his pocket, and gave him a glass vial filled with pink liquid. The cylindrical container was small enough to fit within the palm of his hand. “Happy birthday, brother.”

“...Um, thank you?” Yuno said as he examined the liquid.

“It’s a love potion. Whoever drinks it will fall in love with you for a few days. During that time, you can court them, and hopefully make them fall in love with you for real.”

Yuno didn’t believe that, but he assumed it was part of the role-play The Guild did. He didn’t want to appear rude by showing that he was skeptical about how real the fantasy vial was, so he played into it. “Oh, that’s really cool, thanks! I’ll see you at the party!”

“Later, brother. I love y—”

Yuno exited the clothing store, and placed the potion in his jacket pocket. He saw Raymond smoking a cigarette while leaning against his pink Lamborghini, and ran over to him. He had completely forgotten that he had left him alone with his sister. “Hey, you guys been getting along—Wait, where’s Raia?”

“Oh, I ocean dumped her.”

“You what?! W-What does that mean?”

Raymond stamped out his cigarette, and looked at Yuno’s confused head tilt. “Ocean dump? Oh, yeah, I guess you wouldn’t know. It’s common thing in gangs. You just shoot bullets into someone, and then throw their body in the ocean.”

“Wha—So, y-you…uh, why?”

Raymond smiled, and rested his hand on Yuno’s shoulder. “You don’t need any more family but us~ We’re the only family we need~”

Yuno wasn’t quite sure what he was talking about, but there was a protective undertone inflicted in Raymond’s voice. So, he assumed that Raymond was proud of himself for successfully protecting him. From what? He didn’t know, but he felt like he should be grateful for it anyway. “Ohh okay, if you say so, Raymond. Should we start heading over to the City Vault then?”

“Wait, I have your birthday present at the PDM. We can pick it up before we head over to your party.”

“All right, let’s go!”

Raymond drove them to the Premium Deluxe Motorsport. He had already filled out all of the paperwork and gone through all of the procedures of purchasing a vehicle, but Yuno still needed to sign off on a few things. When that was completed, they looked at the sports cars in the showroom while they waited for the attendant to bring out his present.

Yuno ran over to a blue Elegy RH8. “Wow, the Elegy looks pretty good in this color. I see why my mom and Kitty like it.”

“You thinking about buying one, Yuno?”

Yuno stilled, then started to fidget around in place. “Umm, hey, Raymond, do you think, um… Everyone I know who likes the Elegy is a…is a girl.”

“...Uh-huh?”

“You think that means anything? Is it not like a cool car to impress guys with?”

“...You want to impress guys with it?” Raymond didn’t know where Yuno was going with this conversation, and he wanted to choose his next words very carefully.

“Yeah, yeah. I want you to think it’s cool. I want Goofy and Tony to think it’s cool.”

“Uh-huh. I mean, I’d be impressed.”

“Would you?”

“Yeah, of course I would,” he gently reassured him.

Yuno breathed out a sigh of relief. “Oh thank god.”

“That car is sick. It’s RH8, yeah? Absolutely.”

“I just want the guys to think it’s cool, you know?”

“Yeah, of course.” Raymond didn’t think Yuno would be the type to crave male validation, but he supposed that being friends with the top street racers would make you feel self-conscious about your own car.

“Mr. Sykk,” the attendant called out. “Here are the keys for your new vehicle. It’s parked in the front parking lot.”

“Thank you!” Yuno grabbed the keys, and Raymond led him outside to a black Vagrant.

“Happy twenty-fifth birthday, Yuno!”

“Woah~ What is this?” Yuno ran around the car, studying the appearance. He had never seen a car like it before.

“It’s Vagrant. I think you’ll like it ‘cause it fits your driving style. It’s small enough for most bike strats, and it’s perfect for off-roading.”

“Oh, I think I’m gonna call it the Streetle!”

“Streetle?”

“It’s the name of a kart from this game I used to play.”

“Ah, I see. Well, why don’t you drive this to the City Vault to test it out?”

“Okay—” Yuno was cut off by an incoming call from Lang. “Hey, Mr. Lang! What’s up?”

“I’m thinking about buying a new car. Which car should I buy?”

Yuno wasn’t expecting that question, and he certainly wasn’t expecting Lang to go to him for car advice. “Mmm, I’m not sure. I can’t think of anything cooler than the DeLorean.”

“Well, what do you think is cool? What would you recommend?”

“I don’t know… I think the Elegy RH8 is kinda cool.”

“The Elegy? You like that car?”

“Yeah, Fiona has one.”

“...Would you buy that car?”

“I mean…I probably…” The confidence that Raymond gave Yuno melted away because it sounded like Lang was trying not to vomit from just the thought of buying an Elegy. “I don’t know. I haven’t looked into it too much. Are you at the PDM right now?”

“No, I’m just chilling at Rooster’s, thinking of what car to buy. I need your help, Yuno.”

“Oh, this is tough, this is tough. I don’t think you’ll like the cars I like. Maybe I should go inside the PDM and see what else is there.”

“You don’t need to go inside. Just tell me what you like.”

“Mr. Lang?”

Yuno sounded shocked, and Lang wondered if the line disconnected. “Hello?”

“I thought you were at the Rooster?”

Lang turned around and saw Yuno standing behind him with Raymond at his side.

Yuno took in the presence of Lang, Leslie, and Tony dressed like himself, hanging out by the front office. Then he remembered that Leslie owned the Premium Deluxe Motorsport.

Leslie finished typing something on the computer and said, “Oh, there is one Elegy RH8 in stock here, Lang.”

Realizing what had just happened, Tony, Raymond, and Yuno burst out laughing. Not only was Lang caught trying to buy a last minute gift for Yuno, but because they were all dressed like the hacker it looked somewhat like the Spider-Man pointing meme.

Embarrassed, Lang hung up and turned towards the exit. “We have a party to go to, guys! C’mon, don’t wanna be late.”

Lang tried to act casual which only made the others laugh more, but they followed him to the door.

Leslie was the only one who hadn’t caught on because he was still distracted looking at cars in their database. When Lang didn’t reply and started to leave, Leslie became confused. “Do you want the car, Lang? Lang! What? Why’s Lang being such a bitch?”

✦₊˚⊹⋆❀₊⁺⋆♣⋆⁺₊❀⋆⊹˚₊✦

It was sunset and over two hundred people had arrived at the Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank rooftop dressed like Yuno. Most of his friends and family were criminals, so they were able to find creative ways to climb up the building with ease. There was music playing, illegal drugs being passed around, and tables covered with food and drinks.

Mickey watched the festivities through a pair of binoculars on top of a different building that was taller than the City Vault. He was able to throw together a decent Yuno disguise. The only difference was that he wore a white turtleneck sweater instead of a white dress shirt, but he doubted anyone would notice.

Using his binoculars, he was trying to see if there were other Chang Gang members present. He had secretly hoped that maybe things would be resolved between Lang and Mr. K, but it didn’t seem like that was the case. He was sure that Ramee and April would’ve attended Yuno’s birthday party if things had been resolved. The other issue was that he was worried someone would snitch about his attendance at the party to Chang Gang, but he realized that it would be impossible to guess who would do that.

“I think the coast is clear. I should probably try to blend in and keep a low profile.”

Mickey then proceeded to jump off the building and parachute down to the City Vault. Since it was Pride Month, he used a rainbow colored parachute that shone brightly in the sunlight. The words, “Move! I’m GAY!” were printed on it in black ink so that he wouldn’t accidentally crash into anyone. He did a forward roll as he landed on the rooftop and detached the parachute, letting it blow away in the wind.

When he looked up, he was pleasantly surprised to see Yuno standing in front of him. He leaned in and whispered, “Psst, it’s me. Happy birthday, Yuno.”

Yuno looked to his left, then looked to his right. As he expected, everyone had their eyes on them. “Why are you whispering? I’m pretty sure every single person on this rooftop just saw you land here.”

“But they don’t know it’s me.”

“I think you’re the only person who would parachute from a twenty-story building down to a thirteen-story building which are only two blocks away from each other.”

“Hey, I always wear a parachute for a reason. Sorry that I have style~ Now come on, let’s dance!” Mickey grabbed Yuno’s hand, and dragged him over to the makeshift stage that was blasting music.

Yuno laughed as Mickey enthusiastically waved his arms around, and sang at the top of his lungs. If his cover wasn’t blown before, it certainly was now. Mickey never mentioned it, but he had a pretty decent following of supporters from his hot tub livestreams, and all of his time spent dancing was certainly visible now. Yuno didn’t know how to do any of the fancy moves Mickey could do, but he still bounced around and swayed his body to the music.

“Yeah! Dance, Yuno~ Dance!”

Mickey’s encouragement made Yuno comfortable enough to try copying some of the moves he saw Mickey doing. However, he got a little carried away as he was spinning around, which caused the love potion in his jacket pocket to fly out. He was lucky that he caught it with his cat-like reflexes before it could hit the ground.

“Oh, what’s that?” Mickey asked.

Yuno held up the glass vial. “You know how girls aren’t into me? My brother gave me this love potion. He says it should work. I just gotta get someone to drink it and…you know? Maybe one day.”

“Who gave that to you? It looks sketchy as fuck. Can I hold it?”

“It was Gloryon. He’s in The Guild and he’s a cleric, so it’s gotta be real, right?” Yuno responded, and handed the potion to Mickey.

He inspected the pink liquid through the glass. “It just looks like water and food coloring. It doesn’t appear viscous at all.”

Yuno giggled. “That’s probably what it is. I think The Guild just uses it for role-play.”

“Right, then let me just drink this real quick.” Mickey popped off the cork and opened his helmet visor to chug the whole potion in one gulp.

“What are you doing? Wait, you drank it already. What if it was toxic?”

Mickey closed his visor and handed him the empty vial. “Oh my god, Yuno! I love~ you!” he drawled out sarcastically.

Yuno replied with an equal amount of sarcasm, “Wait, you didn’t before? You needed the potion. I thought we were—thought we were friends?”

“Okay~ So you tricked me?” Mickey laughed, but he was hit with a brief bout of dizziness and lost his balance for a second.

Yuno didn’t notice and continued to talk sarcastically, “Ohhh man. Okay, I thought we were already good friends, and we were buddies, and I thought—” He laughed for a moment, then he felt his phone vibrate. Checking his text messages, he saw the most recent one was from Mickey which read, “hey u up rn?”

“Mickey, I’m right in front of you. Why are you texting me?”

“Oh~ho~ho~ Wow~ That’s weird.” Mickey didn’t remember when he took his phone out. His mind felt hazy and his face felt warm. He wanted to take off his helmet, but he didn’t want to blow his cover.

Yuno noticed him fidgeting, and saw a red flush creep down his neck. “Uh, Mickey? You okay? What’s going on?”

Yuno tried to step closer to him, but Mickey nervously backed away.

“Oh, uh, nothing. I’m fine, uh, it’s just—you’re hot. I mean, I’m hot, uh, from dancing! I’m gonna go grab a drink!” Mickey ran through the crowd, and Yuno lost sight of him.

Yuno was concerned about Mickey’s sudden shift in behavior, and was about to try looking for him when the music stopped. He couldn’t tell who anyone was, but they ushered him up to the stage to give a speech. He figured that he should say a few words and thank everyone for coming.

Yuno jumped up on stage and waved at everyone below him. “Hey, everyone! Can you hear me?”

A chorus of “yes” and “happy birthday” responded.

“Thanks for coming to my birthday party! I can’t believe you all dressed up as me! Thanks a bunch!”

Another round of cheers went by, then quieted down again.

“I just wanted to thank everyone for showing up to the party, and making everything fun for me these past few months. I never thought I would live in this city, and I was actually super scared when I first moved here. But, uh, thanks to you guys I feel way more comfortable. I made a lot of friends and stuff, so it’s been great! It’s a little hard to tell who’s all here with the helmets on, but that’s on me, you know? I’ve never really been confident in my appearance, but maybe one day I’ll be able to take it off and look at all of you face to face!”

“Yeah, we love you, Yuno!”

“Hell yeah! Take off the helmet!”

“We’ll love you no matter what!”

“Take it off! Take it off! Take it off!”

A few others joined the chant, and it stressed him out a little. “One day! One day, guys! But not today!” Yuno laughed nervously and jumped down from the stage.

The music resumed, and everyone continued to dance and partake in the festivities.

Raymond didn’t like how people were pressuring Yuno to take his helmet off. He was on the opposite side of the rooftop, so he unfortunately couldn’t tell who started the chant. Still, he knew that it was someone in the front row by the stage. So, he made his way through the crowd, took out his pistol, and sprayed down everyone in the front.

It was so crowded that no one saw Raymond shoot, but they heard the gunshots and saw ten people collapse, creating a pool of blood.

The party quickly turned into a mass panic after that. People ran around looking for a way to climb down, some were pushed off the roof, others were trampled to death, and the police arrived to control the situation.

The officers started arresting people as they climbed down, trying to find the shooter. Since Yuno was a criminal, and the party was mostly composed of criminals, people were carrying contraband that would definitely get them jailed if they were caught by the police. More people began to shoot, and several cars swarmed the area as people called for pick ups, resulting in more police officers arriving on scene.

The Guild were the first to successfully escape. After months of intense training, they had learned how to thrive in the shadows of chaos.

Tony did his best to pick people up, drive them away, and return to pick up more people. Until the police closed off the area, he would drive around helping people who didn’t have rides. Goofy and a few other street racers followed his lead.

Through the commotion, Yuno found Kitty cowering by a ladder, and brought her with him to his Vagrant. Two police cruisers pursued after them, but he was easily able to evade them through the narrow city alleyways. It was then that he decided that he loved Raymond’s birthday present to him, and the Vagrant would absolutely be making an appearance in their future heists.

Raymond narrowly escaped the officers by grappling to another building and dropping down to a hidden alleyway. He was about to go to his car when he heard Lang's voice.

“Fuck you, Baas!”

Raymond peeked out of the alley and observed the crowd of handcuffed Yuno look-alikes. Based on the body build and the direction he heard his voice come from, he made a guess at which one was Lang and kept his eyes on him as he got into his car and drove up to him. He shot down the five closest police officers, grabbed the helmeted man, threw him in his passenger seat, and sped away. When the other surrounding officers realized what happened, they yelled and shot at his car, but since no one was already in a cruiser, Raymond lost them after making two turns.

“Woah! What?!”

“Hello? Who is this?” Raymond asked, hoping his guess was correct.

“It’s me! It’s me! What the fuck just happened?! Oh my god! You saved me?!” Lang’s mind was reeling. He couldn’t believe his eyes. One second he was hopelessly lying on the ground with his hands cuffed behind his back in a crowd of officers and Yunos, now he was safe in Raymond’s Lamborghini.

“I heard your voice and I got you, brother.”

Lang laughed. “Holy shit! Raymond, you’re fucking crazy! What the fuck?! I can’t believe that you pulled that off.”

“There were so many fucking cops around you, too.”

“That was like one of the craziest saves I’ve ever had, to be honest. I don’t know how the fuck you got outta there.”

“I’m never fucking leaving you behind. You can always rely on me to come save your ass. You know I fucking got you!”

“I fucking love you! Holy shit! That’s some fucking Cleanboi shit right there, motherfucker.”

Raymond parked in a neighborhood in Vinewood Hills, and got out of his car. “All right, let’s get you outta these handcuffs.”

He helped Lang stand up, then he picked the lock on his handcuffs until they unlocked with a click. “There you go. Now should we continue celebrating Yuno’s birthday at the manor?”

“Wait, I still haven’t gotten him a present! What the fuck do I buy?”

Raymond chuckled, remembering the incident at the PDM. “Didn’t you want to buy him a car?”

“Yeah, but I don’t know what he fucking wants.”

“Why not just get him a… What would Yuno like?” He gasped when an idea struck him. “He wants a house! I know exactly which house he wants, too.”

“Let’s go there right now.”

“I know exactly which one. We literally talked about it together, and it’s not that expensive. Oh, I wonder if it’s still for sale.”

They drove up to Paleto Bay to look at the house.

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳ˋ°•*⁀➷♣𓅰

At this time, the sunset was long gone, and it was very dark in the countryside without the city lights. Raymond took off his black motorcycle helmet to see better. With an unobstructed view, he gazed at the rooftop of the house, recalling the night he and Yuno laid there underneath the stars.

Raymond shifted his gaze downwards and smiled when he saw the real estate sign was still there. Honestly, he wished he could’ve bought it for Yuno himself, but it was a little out of his price range and he had been spending all of his money on supplies for their Lower Vault Heist.

“Over here, Lang. This is the house that we were talking about months ago, and he loves it. It’s got full driveway, it’s got green grass, and it’s got backyard. And he would be Tony’s neighbor. I can’t believe no one bought it.”

“It’s in fucking Paleto, Ray. No one wants to drive this far from the city.”

“Well, it’s nice house. I can’t afford it, but I thought maybe you can.”

“Oh, you’re right. It’s only like $300k.” According to the real estate brochure Lang was reading, it was affordable, well taken care of, and had the benefit of being near the beach.

“It’s…small. But if he wants this house, I’ll buy it,” Lang reluctantly decided. It was either this house or the Elegy, and Raymond seemed more confident about the house than Yuno did about the Elegy. Lang thought that the house was better than that ugly car anyway.

“He does, yeah,” Raymond affirmed. “We need to get someone that’s clean who can buy it for him, right?”

“That’s the thing. Should we get it under a clean name for him?”

Raymond nodded. “Yes, absolutely. He told me that he wanted to use it as stash house.”

“Fuck. Who do we know? Wait, I know. Let me give her a call.”

Cassie answered in one ring, “Hey, Lang.”

“Hi, Cassie. I have a weird question.”

“Okay, what’s your weird question?”

“Uh, I feel like I can trust you. Are you down to be Yuno’s stash house keeper? Meaning I give you money, and you buy him a house under your name.”

“Sure, yeah. I can do that.” Cassie knew that Lang was actually asking her if she would be willing to risk getting caught with a house full of illegal money, which she was. She was currently doing worse by being the CEO of Hero Wine for Lang.

“Alright. I need you to very quickly go to city hall, have Denzel do the paperwork to acquire the house, grab the keys, and come to Paleto,” Lang explained.

“Okay, I’ll do that.”

As soon as Cassie hung up, he sent $300,000 to her bank account and texted her the house address. When he finished, Gloryon called him.

“Hey, Emperor. Just letting you know that Stag is free tonight if you want to do training with Leyla.”

“Uh, well, it’s Yuno’s birthday, and I f—” Lang stopped himself and pretended to clear his throat. “—I totally didn’t forget.”

“Oh. You totally didn’t forget. All right.” Gloryon went along with the lie, knowing better than to question the Emperor.

“I totally didn’t forget. So, we’ll have to move the training to a different night.”

“Okay, very well.”

“Yeah, we gotta do that. I gotta give Yuno his birthday present, and then I’ll call you back to reschedule.”

“Ooh~ What you get him?”

“I got him a house.”

“...I’m sorry. What?”

“Yeah, I mean, is it weird that I’m petty enough to get him a house, so that I can flex on people that I got my friend a house for his birthday? Is that petty?”

“No, you’re rich.”

“I’m just rich, right? Like this is just rich people shit, right?”

“Yeah.”

“You see? That's exactly why I’m doing it. So, when people ask him, ‘What Lang get you for your fucking birthday?’ He’s like, ‘Oh, he got me a house.’ Y’know what I mean? It sounds fucking sick, right?”

“Yeah. Since you’re doing that instead, can we stop by?”

“Sure, I’ll ping you. You can bring The Guild, but don't tell anyone else.”

“All right, see you soon.” Gloryon hung up.

The moment he did, Lang heard Raymond on the phone with Tony.

“Tony, come to Paleto! We bought Yuno a house!”

“Ray~ I bought Yuno a house, so stop telling everybody. Not you , not we , me!”

“Okay, Lang, the richest person in the city, bought Yuno a house. He’s the rich one. I just helped choose it… Yeah, it’s right next to your house… Alright, buh-bye.”

Raymond ended the call and faced Lang. “Okay, Tony’s coming right now. And can we say ‘we’ ‘cause I helped you choose the house, though?”

“No, it’s my gift that I bought with your support.”

Raymond huffed, “Okay. Perfect. Thank you. I’ll take that.”

A few minutes later, The Guild, Cassie, and Tony arrived.

“This is the house?” Tony asked. He was expecting it to be bigger, but since it was right next to his own house, he guessed that it was part of the same set of cookie-cutter houses.

“Yep, I bought it for $300k,” Lang answered.

“I love it so much! Yay!” Leyla cheered and ran around the lawn. The rest of The Guild ran after her and explored the property.

Lang turned to Cassie. “You own this now, yeah?”

She held up the keys and said, “Yep, the house is mine. It’s really pretty. You chose a really nice one.”

“I just hope it looks good on the inside too.” Normally Lang wouldn’t buy a house without properly examining it first, but if Yuno was sure that he wanted it, then he would get it.

“Okay, I'm gonna tell him to come over now.” Lang gave Yuno a call.

“Hey, Mr. Lang!”

“Yuno, instead of a car I bought myself something else. Head over to Paleto.”

“Paleto? All the way in Paleto?”

“Yeah, I’ll meet you here.”

“Okay.”

It took an hour for Yuno to arrive with Kitty in his Vagrant. Raymond was about to ask why it took him so long to get there; however, when he noticed that the newly bought vehicle was covered in dirt and scratch marks, it was rather self-explanatory. Raymond was glad that Yuno seemed to be enjoying his present, and assumed that Mount Chiliad would be seeing even more of him in the upcoming days.

Yuno ran up to them. “Raymond! Tony! Mr. Lang!”

“Ay, Yuno! I just bought this house. What you think?” Lang gestured to the property.

“You did?” Yuno looked over at the house, recognizing it from months ago. “What a weird coincidence. This is the one me and Raymond went house shopping for.”

“Oh, you like this house too? Well, come inside.” Lang led him to the front door, and Cassie unlocked it. Everyone excitedly entered to see the interior for the first time.

Cassie’s mouth gaped open. “Uhh…”

Lang whispered, “What the fuck? Did we buy the right house?”

“This is what you told me to buy,” she whispered back. “What the fuck is all this on the floor?”

“$300k for this shit. What the—Look at this carpet.”

The layout was the same as Tony’s house, but the condition was considerably worse. Lang and Cassie couldn't fathom how the tiny house with stained carpeting, old-fashioned wallpaper, and cracked windows could possibly be worth $300,000. He now understood why no one had bought it.

“Hey, this looks kinda like Tony’s house on the inside! It’s huge!” Yuno happily ran around the living room.

“This looks so fucking nice!” Raymond agreed.

Lang shared a look of disbelief with Cassie, then looked at Yuno. “Yuno, you…like this?"

“Yeah, it’s perfect! I’ve loved it ever since we first went house shopping for it.”

“It’s so nice, bro,” Raymond said, leaning against the kitchen counter.

“Well, happy birthday! It’s your house. I bought it for you with the help of Ray.”

“You did?!”

The Guild yelled, “Happy birthday!” and cheered for him.

“This is your own stash house,” Lang said and pointed to Cassie. “Cassie here is very trustworthy, but also super fucking clean. The house is under her name, so she’s gonna hold onto it for you.”

“Hi, Yuno! Happy birthday!” She handed him a spare house key.

“Oh, thanks a bunch, boss!”

Cassie chuckled. “I'm not your boss anymore. You were fired from the casino over a month ago.”

“I was? Why?”

“The fact that you didn't know till right now is one of the main reasons why.”

Lang continued on, “So, anyway, she’s gonna watch over the house. You’re never gonna tell anybody about this place—”

Yuno pointedly looked around the crowded living room.

“—except for the people here. Stash all the shit you want here and never get caught.”

“All right, thank you so much, Mr. Lang! I was saving up for one of these.” Yuno gave him a hug.

“Hell yeah~ Happy birthday. I love you. You gotta tell me you love me, though.”

“I, what?” Yuno pulled away from the hug in surprise.

“Just say it. It's your birthday, but I’m still petty.”

“W-What? I, uh, thought this was a f-free thing, Mr. Lang,” Yuno nervously stuttered. “I like you a lot, and I really, really appreciate it.”

Lang sighed, knowing that was the best he was gonna get from him. “Alright, that’s good enough. I won’t be as petty because it’s your birthday.”

“Let’s go, Yuno. Come here, bro.” Raymond gave Yuno a hug and lifted him in the air to shake away his nerves.

Yuno giggled. “Raymond, you remembered! Thanks!”

“Yeah, we got the one you wanted.”

Watching the wholesome moment come to an end, Tony figured it was now his time to shine. He knew how competitive Lang could get when it came to presents, and he had a feeling that the rich man would go out of his way to buy Yuno an expensive gift.

What Lang didn't know was that Tony had come prepared for this day with his own valuable gift.

“Yuno, here. I got you a birthday present, too. Open it.” Tony smugly handed Yuno a green gift-wrapped box.

He unwrapped it and pulled out a soft, blue, shark plushie. It was about half the size of his body, but that wasn't the impressive part. Yuno could tell from the material alone what brand the plushie was from.

Tony grinned. “This is for you.”

“Jesus! Wait, you’re giving me this?! Tony, t-there’s only one of these…ever I think, right?”

“That’s right. One of one. You’re the only person in the world who has this limited edition item.”

“That’s so cool! Thanks, Tony!”

“No problem, brother. Listen, you better take good care of it, alright?”

“Thanks a bunch! I will! This is amazing!” Yuno squeezed the blue shark in his arms, giving it the biggest and warmest hug possible.

Tony felt a pair of eyes glaring at him. So, he smirked and turned around to face Lang, a silent conversation passing between them.

“I gotta take a piss,” Tony announced.

Lang gritted his teeth. “We’ll take a piss. I gotta pee too. Let’s go pee together.”

“Yep, okay. Can you hold my dick for me?”

They entered the tiny bathroom, and closed the door. There was barely enough space for two people which just gave Lang another reason to dislike the house. For the time being, he ignored it and scowled at the irritating Italian man.

Tony, who was still smirking, winked and sang, “Hey~”

“Really, Tony? You’re really gonna try and one up me, asshole? Really?”

“If I didn’t one up you, then you would’ve used this to be like, ‘Hey, Yuno, remember when I brought you a house, but broke Tony couldn’t afford to buy you anything?’ I wasn’t gonna let that happen. You do this every single time.”

“I still got him the better present. It’s a fucking $300k house.”

“Oh marone~ Only you treat gift giving like a fucking competition. A competition that I still fucking won because my present is better.”

“How so?”

“It’s an extremely rare, collectable plushie from a popular brand overseas that Yuno really wanted. It’s a one of one item that you can't buy. You gotta gamble for it, and I just so happened to win it at a gambling event at the casino. Some of the plushies from that brand have a resale value of $700k in online biddings.”

Hearing that made Lang laugh hysterically. “Alright, I’m gonna go buy him a Bentley now.”

Tony chuckled. “Good luck, bitch.”

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

Yuno was sitting on the floor of the living room, snuggling his new plushie while everyone else conversated. He squeezed the shark, then he repositioned it and squeezed it again. He ran his hands across the fabric, enjoying the softness underneath his fingertips. The reason why he loved this plushie brand was because of the style of the adorable animal faces, and the high-quality material that didn't overwhelm his senses. This plushie in particular was his favorite shade of blue, had the cuteness of his favorite sea animal, and it was comforting to hold in his arms.

His phone had been buzzing in his pocket, but he ignored it in favor of snuggling his shark plushie. As the constant vibration continued, it was getting rather annoying, so he checked his text messages.

He found many, many, many, messages from Mickey that read,

“ever since I drank that potion at the vault I just”

“idk I’ve been thinking about us”

“thinking about getting a cottage with you”

“out by the lighthouse”

“we make coffee for each other every morning”

“we walk along the beach”

“collecting shells”

“and we know each other’s favorite shells”

“and we grow old together”

“What is this? Favorite shells? A cottage?” Yuno asked himself. He sent three text messages back that read,

“a cottage?!”

“FREE STASH HOUSE BOIS”

“LETS GO”

At the CG Cubby, Mickey cried when he read Yuno’s messages and chugged a whole can of White Claw, crushing it in his hands when it was empty.

“He only sees me as a friend! Dammit! I was friend zoned.” Mickey opened up another can and drank some more.

Chapter Text

TW: Graphic depictions of violence.

(Sunday, June 6, 2021)

Mickey slowly walked along the shoreline of Del Perro Beach. The smell of salt, the sound of the ocean waves, and the feeling of the breeze against his skin was enough to take his breath away. However, it all paled in comparison to the warm fingers that suddenly interlocked with his own, and the gentle embrace that followed, a pair of strong arms wrapping around him from behind. He turned around and looked into the beautiful helmet visor of Yuno Sykk. A man with a heart of gold.

“Mickey, why are you here?” Yuno asked as he lifted his free hand to caress his cheek.

“Just going on a stroll along the beach. Wanna join me, babe?”

“Mickey?”

“Hm?”

“Mickey, wake up!”

Mickey was startled back into awareness, blinking away the remnants of his daydream. Yet, he might as well had still been dreaming because the love of his life was standing before him, dressed in his criminal cat outfit like the cute cat man that he was.

“Hey, Yuno~”

“Mickey, what are you doing here?! What if CG finds out?”

Mickey took in his surroundings. He was seated at a table in the corner of the dining atrium in Rooster’s Rest with an empty ramen bowl in front of him. The time was probably between 3:00-6:00 a.m. because the restaurant wasn’t as busy as it usually was.

“I’m sure they won’t mind. Especially if it’s because I’ve found my true love~”

Yuno groaned, tired of hearing that phrase for the past two days. “Oh Jesus. Is that potion still working?”

“I have no clue what you're talking about.”

“Mickey, you need to leave or put on a disguise. I thought you were banned from interacting with CB because our boys are fighting or something.”

Mickey whined, “Really? Why can’t I be seen with you?”

“That’s…actually a good question.” Yuno brought a hand to his chin, trying to remember if he was ever told a reason for the fight. “Why don’t we just ask Mr. K what the fight’s about?”

“Okay, I’ll do whatever you say,” Mickey easily agreed.

“Will you?”

“Listen, Yuno. Any idea you have, I support.”

“You’re not gonna stop me?” Sensing that Mickey wasn’t going to get up and leave any time soon, Yuno sat in the chair across from him.

Mickey sighed dreamily and said, “Yeah, especially if your idea is that the two of us leave this war behind, leave CG behind, leave Cleanbois behind. Get a little cottage up by the lighthouse. Make fresh coffee for each other every morning.”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. What I am saying is this, right? You don’t know why they’re fighting. So, why don’t we just ask—”

“And, Yuno, we slowly fall in love over time. It’s not just instant.”

“Oooh~ Don’t tell that to the potion,” Yuno said sarcastically, but Mickey didn’t hear him.

“It’s the little things. It’s the way we laugh at each other’s jokes, the way we smile in each other’s eyes—”

“You can’t see my eyes.”

“We go along the beach and we know each other’s favorite seashells. So we always surprise each other by finding each other’s favorite seashells.” Mickey brushed his hand along Yuno’s arm until he pulled away.

“Uh, I don’t think I have a favorite seashell.”

“Oh, good point! We should get to know each other a little more. Let’s say five things about ourselves. I’ll go first. One, my favorite color is blue. Two, my favorite Pokémon is Blastoise. Three, I love beaches. Four, my guilty pleasure is hanging out with Ray and subtly trying to mess up whatever he’s doing. I secretly like April’s music, but you didn’t hear that from me. And I’m kinda into this whole Romeo and Juliet situation we’ve got going on. It’s like, really hot~”

“That was six things,” Yuno monotoned.

“Ooh~ I forgot my Juliet is really smart and clever.” Mickey booped Yuno on his mask where his nose would be, catching him off-guard for a moment.

“Wait, why am I Juliet in this situation?”

“Oh, sorry. My number seven is I’m a top. Are you cool with that? Or is anal not—”

“I don’t wanna talk about this, man!” Yuno waved his arms in front of him, begging him to stop talking, and hastily glanced around to verify that no one was listening to their conversation. “L-Look, we’re getting off topic here. You need to—”

“You know~ Yuno~” Mickey drawled out as he leaned over the table. “No one knows what the S in my last name stands for. What if it stands for ‘Sykk’?”

“...That would make us related. And that would make this even more weird.”

“You’re right. I worded that poorly, but the offer still stands. What if I become Mickey Sykk?”

Yuno crossed his arms and leaned back in his seat. “Why don’t you try asking me again after the potion wears off?”

“Potions aren’t real, Yuno. I’m in love with you.”

Scene 10: Mickeo & Yuliet

(Two days later - Tuesday, June 8, 2021)

“Oh my god! Yuno, I am so sorry!”

At Maldini’s Pizzeria, Mickey set down a Margherita pizza on the table Yuno was currently seated at, and sat across from him.

“What’s going on, Mickey?” Yuno pretended to be oblivious.

“I woke up this morning, and the love potion had worn off. I’m so sorry for the way I’ve been acting these past four days. I didn’t think that potion would be fucking real.”

“What do you mean? Potions aren’t real,” he said innocently.

“Ha. Ha.” Mickey sent him an unimpressed look, making him giggle. Even though Yuno was wearing a black mask over his face, he still had the habit of covering his mouth whenever he laughed.

Mickey realized that Yuno was still wearing his criminal cat outfit. He thought it was strange to see him wearing it outside of crime. “You’re not wearing your usual motorcycle helmet and green blazer. Are you about to do a job?”

“No, it’s just that the cops are still investigating my birthday party massacre at the vault, so I thought it would be safer to wear this. It’s the only other outfit I have.” Yuno adjusted his black cat ears, then began fiddling with the collar of his olive green raincoat.

“Yeah, that’s probably a good idea.” Mickey grabbed a slice of Margherita pizza and took a bite.

As he ate, Yuno looked around the nearly empty restaurant. The only people there, besides themselves, were the young staff members who looked like they were only working there part-time; they didn’t appear to be in Chang Gang. The owner, Vinny Pistone, wasn’t anywhere in sight either.

“Are you sure it’s okay for me to be here, Mickey? I thought you were banned from seeing me.”

Mickey waved his hand. “It’s fine. No one really comes here during the day, and the boys are busy with their own shit right now.”

“Hmm, did you ever find out what the fight was between Mr. Lang and Mr. K?”

Mickey finished his slice of pizza and grabbed another one. “Yeah, it sounds like the argument was business related. I don’t really keep up with that side of gang operations, though.”

“You don’t see yourself as a businessman?” Yuno questioned while staring at Mickey’s businessman-like attire.

Mickey made a look of disgust. “Ugh. I wouldn’t dream of it. My time is better spent elsewhere.”

“Like livestreaming and dancing?”

“I was referring to my criminal career.”

“Like doing heists and—Oh!” Yuno excitedly slammed his hands on the table and leaned forward. “Speaking of dreams, I finally got the resources for ours.”

“...Our what?”

“Our dream, Mickey! The one we’ve been talking about.”

“Oh, uhh, Yuno, I don’t know how to tell you this, but the dream about the cottage on the beach and the seashells…that was just the potion talking. I don’t really—”

“No, not that dream. The real one…with the bikes.”

Mickey’s eyes widened in understanding. “No way… you didn’t…”

An hour later, Mickey and Yuno were standing at the top of Mount Chiliad, surrounded by mountain bikes.

“Ta-da!” Yuno exclaimed while spreading his arms out. “Twenty-eight mountain bikes! And I’ve got spike strips hidden along the path. If we come up the right way, it’ll blast out the tires of the cop cars, and force them to commandeer a bike to pursue us. It’ll be an awesome cops versus crims bike chase!”

Mickey pumped his fist in the air. “Yes! Finally, our practice is gonna pay off! How did you afford all of this?”

“When I told Mr. Lang about it he seemed very excited to—Oh, yeah! Mr. Lang and Nino wanna join in on this.”

Mickey froze in place and stared at Yuno in shock. “...What?”

“Yeah. Mr. Lang said that he wants to check Bobcat Security for something, and I suggested that we run this bike plan for the getaway ‘cause we’ve always wanted to do it. Tony is busy and Raymond said that it sounds too risky, but Mr. Lang and Nino are down. They said it sounds fun!”

Mickey looked down at the mountain bike in front of him, running his fingers along the handlebar. “Uh, I might get in, uh, I-I might get in trouble for that one, Yuno.”

“What do you mean ‘get in trouble’?”

“Well, ostensibly our gangs are, uh, are still beefing with each other.”

“We’re not a gang, and look, it's just a funny bike job. We’ll be wearing our criminal outfits too, so no one will know it’s you. It’ll be fine.”

Mickey rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah…Mr. K might kill me, though, if, uh, he learns I’m doing a job with Lang.”

“Well, just don’t tell him about it, you know? Wha—” Yuno tried to approach Mickey, but he moved away and went over to a different bike.

“Uh.” Mickey nervously laughed. “Uhh~ you know, the city talks, you know?”

“Mickey, if Mr. K kills you for this, I would be absolutely shocked…maybe.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Probably not actually. I don’t know him that well. He seems pretty nice, though.”

“Oh, he’s actually a psychopath and he will kill anyone.” Mickey was anxiously walking around the mountaintop, weaving through the bikes and keeping his distance from Yuno.

“I mean, if it makes you feel better, April said she might want to hang out with me later ‘cause I’m not broke anymore.”

“Oh, yeah, April hanging out with you, Yuno, versus me, Mickey, doing a job with majority Cleanbois. Yeah, those are totally the same thing,” Mickey said sarcastically.

“Majority friends, Mickey. You can just call ‘em friends, you know?”

“Aww~ That’s a nice way to put it. Surely, Mr. K will understand if we say it like that,” Mickey’s voice continued to drip with sarcasm.

“Well, it’s true isn’t it? Ah, actually, how well do you know, Nino? I only know Nino a little bit. But, he seems like a cool guy.” Yuno climbed over the bikes, trying to catch up to him.

“I don’t know Nino too well. I just know he looks like he always has to pee.”

Yuno chuckled. “Okay, well, we can get to know him better by doing this job together.”

“Well, I mean, I… Look, uhh, Yuno…” Mickey realized he had gotten himself trapped inside a group of bikes.

Yuno circled around him like a shark. If he wasn’t wearing a mask, Mickey would see his wide and mischievous smile. “You know…worse case you just join the Cleanbois, right?”

Mickey gasped at the suggestion, overwhelmed by what that would mean. “Please, no! You’re so—Oh, God…”

The next time Yuno spoke it was from behind him. “Wait, does Mr. Lang not like you? I thought you guys were friends. Team Rocket, remember? We did the Rainbow Road together.”

Mickey sighed at the memory, and lowered his head. “Oh, I do remember, Yuno. It’s just—Listen, uh, listen, Yuno, I…”

Yuno appeared in front of him, and placed both of his hands on his shoulders. “It’s just a fun job, Mickey. No one has to know.”

Mickey looked up at him, so close that he could almost see his eyes through his black mask. He was glad that he couldn’t because he knew that Yuno was giving him the type of pleading eyes that no one could reject.

However, Yuno’s contagious optimism and silver tongue must have had a hold of him because, three hours later, they were back at the top of Mount Chiliad along with Lang and Nino, escaping from the police after the job. They had taken a route that was littered with spike strips—which popped the tires of every car—then they switched to the mountain bikes to finish the getaway, including the officers. They laughed as they sped down the slope, heading towards the city.

Unbeknownst to Mickey at the time, Ramee was also hanging out on the mountainside. He had traversed off the path to an area of bushes. Two items were in his hands: a notebook filled with  symbols that he was trying to decipher, and a clear glass jar that was filled with a dusty black cloud that shimmered gold in the sunlight. The moment he heard the police sirens, he hid in a bush, waiting for them to pass.

Ramee was perceptive. He knew Lang and Nino well enough from years ago to recognize them regardless of what clothes they were wearing, and he knew that Yuno only had one crime outfit. Seeing the three of them, he assumed that this was related to Lang’s search for the VAR, but he didn’t know how. He would probably hear about it sooner or later with another unwelcome visit from Lang at his gallery.

He was about to leave the bush to continue his work when a very familiar criminal outfit passed by him on a bike, following the same route as the other three. There was only one criminal who did jobs wearing the black suit with a black turtleneck, and the stupid, bright yellow “Grinning Face With Smiling Eyes” emoji mask.

Ramee immediately pulled out his phone. “Hey, K. Guess who I just saw disobeying gang leader’s orders?”

(The next day - Wednesday, June 9, 2021)

It was a little after midnight, and Mickey was working at the Vanilla Unicorn. The hot tub was reserved by someone else, so he had planned a different type of livestream for the night. He was still wearing his firefighter attire, but he was sitting in a booth with medical supplies on the table.

“This is for educational purposes only! Insulin pen, pen needle attached, pull the cap off, pull the secondary cap off, expose the needle.” He performed the actions as he explained, doing the movements slower than normal so his viewers could follow along.

“Hopefully, I don’t get in trouble for doing drugs on stream. Prime it, shoot a little bit of the insulin out. Probably was like $10 worth of insulin ‘cause it’s so fucking expensive. Measure the amount that I’m taking. Double check it ‘cause if I take too much, I’ll die. Pull down my pants a little bit, expose my butt, but not on stream. Ow.” He injected the insulin into his butt.

When he was done, he threw away the needle and picked up two other devices off the table. “The other way to do it is with this glucose monitor, and this insulin pump. It’s like stuck to my ass basically, and it’s on all the time. I had it get ripped out during sex once. I inject a fuck ton of insulin into the reservoir and then I stick this on my butt, and then it will like inject that into me. I have this device, dial in a number, and then I can even feel it in my butt—Oof, phrasing, but I can like, feel it inject the insulin. And this all costs me about $10k a year because our fucking government and pharmaceutical companies make way more money of off the fact that I have type 1 diabetes, and don’t actually want to ever invest in anything that would stop me from having a chronic illness. But yeah, that’s the gist of it. Any questions?”

Mickey picked up his phone and scrolled through the chat feed. He read one of the comments, “I recently got diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. Still trying to understand it and trying to get the right diet.”

He looked up from his phone to look at his camera. “Type 2 diabetic? Eat less carbs. There you go.”

“What the fuck you doing with Lang?!”

“Oh god.” Mickey knew exactly what was about to happen. “Thanks for coming to my educational stream, everybody! Gotta go, bye!” He ended the livestream and stood up from the booth to face the rage in Mr. K’s eyes.

Ramee was standing next to him with his arms crossed. “Did you do a job with Lang?”

“Uh…”

Mr. K clicked his tongue. “Take him to the compound.”

“Yeah, you’re dumb. You’re done! You go and do a job with him?!” Ramee and Mr. K each grabbed one of Mickey’s arms and brought him outside to the parking lot.

“Please! It was Yuno’s fault!” Mickey yelled, struggling to break free from their grip to no avail.

“I told you it was gang leader’s orders to not fucking interact with them,” Ramee chided.

“Okay, so I was originally gonna do a job with Yuno, and then he invited Lang and Nino. I didn’t know!”

“You fucking joking with me?” Mr. K asked, not believing any of his words.

Mickey aggressively shook his head. “No, sir! I’m not.”

Mr. K sighed in disappointment. “I don’t know, Mick. I’m about to just give up on ya. You don’t listen.”

“P-Please, sir! I’m—”

“Get in the fucking trunk,” Ramee demanded, and roughly shoved him into the small trunk of their black Stratum.

There wasn’t any room to reposition himself, and Ramee was never the best driver, so his body was tossed around as the car hit every bump in the road. On a particularly violent drift, his head smashed into something hard and he blacked out.

Mickey didn’t remember much after that except for the unbearable pain. His mind dissociated and blanked out several times during his torture session.

His clothes were stripped off, and he was tied down in an uncomfortable position. He was repeatedly hit with a baseball bat until it broke in half, the sharp wooden ends scratching him in the process. A paring knife was used to cover his back with cuts before being stabbed into his left thigh. His blood leaked out from the lacerations. Lighter fluid was poured over his legs and set on fire with a match. He screamed as he flailed around on the floor to put out the flames, leaving behind first and second degree burns. His legs were then held apart as a hammer was violently slammed down onto his scrotum, causing him to vomit and pass out from the pain.

This next time he woke up, he found himself lying on his bed alone in his room. The clock on his bedside table told him that it was almost 7:30 p.m. He didn’t know how long the torture lasted, but he slept most of the day away.

Mickey was still naked, but his legs, genitals, and torso were heavily bandaged which gave him some decency. He was still covered in dirt and dried flakes of blood, though. A deep ache and a stinging pain traveled throughout his whole body. It hurt to move at all. The worst of it came from the stab wound in his thigh and the swelling in his crotch area. He lightly placed his hand on top of the bandages covering his balls, but immediately pulled it away in pain.

Too scared to investigate the damage, he went to his closet to put on his usual outfit. He figured that his clothes would be loose enough that it wouldn’t put too much pressure on his bandages or brush against them unpleasantly. It was a slow process with how careful he had to move his limbs without reopening any of the wounds, but he would feel more comfortable being fully clothed. His room was chilly, and he knew that Mr. K was probably waiting for him to wake up.

Once he was dressed in his black turtleneck and black suit, he grabbed an oxycodone tablet from his bathroom cabinet, and swallowed it using some water from the sink faucet. This wasn’t the first time he had been punished by Mr. K, but this was definitely the most brutal session. Without waiting for the drug to take effect, he limped out of his room and headed outside.

The CG Cubby’s layout consisted of a cemented, U-shaped apartment complex with a metal gate blocking off the top of the U. Every member of Chang Gang had their own room which led outside to the concrete hangout area. There were about seventeen members lounging around that evening, and Mickey slowly wandered around looking for their leader.

A bald man wearing a Maldini’s jersey noticed him. “Well, well, well. Look who’s finally awake.”

“Hello, Vinny,” Mickey mumbled.

His voice was just loud enough for Mr. K to hear it from across the lounge, and he walked over to him. “Have a good rest there, Mick?”

He shrugged. “I guess. Is my punishment over?”

The rest of the gangsters noticed Mr. K talking to his disobedient underling, and gathered around to watch the interaction.

“Hmm, I don’t know. I’m not sure if ya learned your lesson, yet,” Mr. K sneered, which made the others laugh.

“Yeah, how do we know you’re not gonna pull some shit like this again?” Ramee asked.

Mr. K hummed, pretending to think of a solution that he already knew the answer to. “Y’know, I’ve been thinkin’ ‘bout what I could have you do to make it up to me, and I think I’ve finally got it.”

“What do you want me to do?” Mickey stood up straighter, bracing himself for another beating.

Mr. K smirked and announced, “Mick, new gang leader’s order, you gotta kill Yuno.”

Ramee laughed. “Mickey, you heard him. You gotta fucking do it. Gang leader’s order has to be fulfilled.”

“Please, don’t make me! He’s my friend!” Mickey felt his blood freeze, terror filling his veins.

Vinny raised an eyebrow and said, “It’s starting to sound like he’s more than just a friend.”

Ramee scoffed, “Yeah, Mickey, what’s going on here? You fucking this guy or something? His ass must be real good if you keep going back to him.”

“Does he suck you off too, huh?” Mr. K joined in. “You like shoving your penis into his virgin mouth? Is that it?”

Mickey heard a few other jeers from behind him about his relationship with Yuno, but he blocked them out. “It’s not like that! I thought you guys were friends with him, too. That’s the only reason I even met him in the first place.”

“All I said was that he’s a nice guy,” Mr. K said. “That don’t mean he’s more important than the gang, but that’s how you’ve been fuckin’ treatin’ him lately. You deliberately went against a gang leader order to fuck around with this guy, so now I’m tellin’ you to end his life.”

Mickey flinched at the command, then turned to the other gangster. “What about you, Ramee?”

“Yuno’s aight. But, he doesn’t know when to shut the fuck up. He doesn’t have any sense of loyalty and he thinks everyone’s a friend even when they fuck him over. I bet that you could fuck his tight asshole in the middle of the street, and he’ll still kiss your dick afterwards. Is that what you want, Mickey? We can make that happen before you kill him.”

“No! I just—He’s been a good friend to me, and the idea of hurting him has never even crossed my mind before.”

“What the fuck? You gay, bro?” Ramee taunted.

Mickey blinked. “Uh, yeah, actually.”

“Oh…you’ve been gay this whole time?” Mr. K asked, astonished that he never knew in the several months he had known him.

“Yep, marrying a woman made me realize I’m gay,” Mickey confirmed matter-of-factly.

“Oof.”

“Fair enough.”

“Yeah, that’ll do it.”

Mr. K, Vinny, and Ramee shared their similar sentiments.

Mickey continued on, “But, I digress. Anyway, what do you expect me to do here?”

Mr. K pulled out a knife from his pants pocket and handed it over to him. It was in a knife sheath, and the blade was about eight inches long. “Kill Yuno. With that knife.”

“And don’t you dare say, ‘Sorry, Yuno. Gang leader’s orders, I have to do this,’” Ramee added.

“Yeah, don’t you say that shit,” Mr. K agreed. “You gotta play it off like you like it.”

“You shout, ‘CG for life, fuck CB’!” Ramee pounded his chest with his fist.

Vinny copied the action and hollered, “Yeah! Say it with your whole fuckin’ chest!”

“You got the balls to do that, Mick?” Mr. K snarked with a hint of seriousness behind it.

At the mention of his balls, Mickey noticed that the oxycodone had kicked in, and the pain had dulled drastically. “Hopefully, I still do. I didn’t really check.”

“They’re there. They’re just a little fucked up.” Then Mr. K leaned in close to him and whispered in a commanding tone, “You got what it takes, Mick?”

Mickey looked at the knife in his hands and gave a defeated sigh. “...We’ll find out.”

“Okay, okay. Tonight at nine at the La Puerta Freeway by the Alta Street Apartments. We’re gonna watch you to make sure you do it. Don’t you fucking disappoint me again,” Mr. K’s voice left no room for negotiations.

✦₊˚⊹⋆✿₊⁺⋆❀⋆⁺₊✿⋆⊹˚₊✦

Mickey slowly walked along the shoreline of Del Perro Beach. The smell of salt, the sound of the ocean waves, and the feeling of the breeze against his skin was enough to take his breath away. However, it all paled in comparison to the cold dread consuming his heart and mind. He knew what he had to do, but he didn’t know if he had the courage to follow through. He looked up at the water, trying to calm his nerves. He would’ve loved to go for a swim, but it probably wasn’t a smart thing to do, given how injured he was.

As Mickey approached the Del Perro Pier, he began to sing the lyrics to “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler as if he was in a 1980s music video.

“Turn around~

Every now and then, I get a little bit lonely~

And you’re never coming ‘round~

Turn around~

Every now and then, I get a little bit tired~

Of listening to the sound of my tears~” He dramatically turned around, flipping his short black hair in the wind.

“Turn around~

Every now and then, I get a little bit nervous~

That the best of all the years have gone by~

Turn around~

Every now and then, I get a little bit terrified~

And then I see the look in your eyes~” Mickey was feeling himself in tune with the song, and the oxycodone was making him feel high.

“Turn around, bright eyes~

Every now and then I fall apart~” He slid on the sand with his knees, and spread his arms out.

“Turn around, bright eyes~

Every now and then I fall apart~”

“DownBad Mickey, what the fuck are you doing?”

Mickey paused his exaggerated arm movements, and looked towards the voice to see Nino resting in a wooden beach chair. The dark-skinned man had his hair slicked back, his floral shirt unbuttoned, and the cuffs of his white pants rolled up. He was enjoying his break on the beach until Mickey came out of nowhere with his off-key singing.

“...Singing,” Mickey simply responded. He suddenly felt like his high had ended because the knee slide was an extreme lapse of judgement on his part. It felt like sandpaper was grinding against his burned legs. He stood up, brushed the sand off his pants, and walked over to him.

Nino rolled his eyes. Obviously he knew Mickey was singing. He just wanted to know why his peace was disturbed. “Why the fuck are you singing?”

“Well, if I die today, I might as well go down singing. Like in a musical.” Mickey had less than an hour left until he was supposed to meet up with Yuno, so he wanted to enjoy the little time he had left before whatever happened that night.

Nino could tell that there was something weighing heavily on Mickey’s mind. He wasn’t busy at the moment, so he decided to hear him out. “Come sit next to me. You’re blocking my sun.”

“Okay.” Mickey carefully sat in the unoccupied chair to the left of Nino, being mindful of the way his clothes brushed against his bandages.

“Why do you think you’re gonna die? What’s going on?” Nino asked, still looking out at the beach.

Mickey appreciated the casual nature of it. There wasn’t a pressure to speak about his troubles, but the offer was clear. He took a moment to gather his thoughts before replying. “I…I disobeyed a gang leader order. Now I must expiate my disobedience by following a new gang leader order. But…it’s really just about me trying to propitiate Mr. K.”

“What order did you break?”

“The order to stay away from CB. I wasn’t supposed to go on that job with you guys, but I did. And now I’m suffering the consequences.”

“If you knew, then why did you do it?”

Earlier, Mickey had tried to put the blame on Yuno when explaining himself to Mr. K. Now, it didn’t feel right because he could’ve declined the offer. It was still his fault for agreeing to do the job. “Yuno was…he can be very convincing, and it was our dream to run that bike plan. It turned out even better than I imagined it would be. I don’t regret it at all.”

Nino chuckled. “So, you did it because you and Yuno are living like fucking Romeo and Juliet. Got it.”

“Mickeo and Yuliet are actually the names that I’ve been rolling with in my head.”

“Ah~ Hopefully you don’t face the same tragedy then.”

“Yeah, let’s hope not.” Mickey knew that Nino was joking, but given that he had the new order to accomplish, it didn’t feel that far off from the truth.

He still didn’t know much about Nino, but it was fun to work with him on the bike heist yesterday. Additionally, this was the longest conversation he had ever held with him, yet he found him easy to talk to.

“Nino, can I ask you for some advice?”

“Sure, but I don’t think I can tell you what you want to hear.”

“What do you do when the interests and priorities of your gang oppose your own? Should I follow my leader or myself?”

“I think the bigger question you need to ask yourself is why do they differ? ‘Cause that didn’t used to be the case, right? You used to obediently follow orders without hesitation. So, what has changed?”

Mickey admitted that Nino had raised a good point. He never had problems following gang leaders orders before. In fact, he wouldn’t have even considered it before, knowing how brutal the infamous gang leader could be. There was that incident with the love potion, but it eventually wore off and took his infatuation with Yuno away with it. Even so, he found that he liked Yuno just enough to disobey an order for him.

“...I don’t know. I think this is the first time an order has gotten in the way of a friendship that I care about. But, I also really care about my gang. I’ve done jobs with them. I’ve gotten into some crazy shit with them. And yeah, they do stab me sometimes, and light me on fire sometimes, and beat me up with a baseball bat sometimes—”

“What the fuck?” That made Nino tear his eyes away from the ocean to look at Mickey.

“—and they might’ve just smashed my balls with a hammer. But listen—”

“How long has this been happening, Mickey?”

“...A while. Anyway, that’s not the problem. I mean, that’s literally my name. That’s my character, you know? I’m DownBad Mickey. Shit like that happens to me every week. Not just from CG either. But, even then, I still consider them my boys.”

A lot of concerns were raised, but Nino didn’t think that Mickey would be ready to have that discussion at this time. He could ask more questions about the agony that Mickey seemed to be going through, but he believed it wouldn’t go over well. Instead he relaxed back into his chair, and stared at the waves again, returning to his casual posture and thinking of a safer question to ask.

“Mickey, I’ve always wanted to know, out of all people, how the fuck did you get wrapped up in a gang?”

“Well, a little bit about my history is that my marriage fell apart, then my detective career fell apart, so I ended up moving from place to place until I made it here. I was at my lowest with no friends or family to support me, and the only job I could get was at the Vanilla Unicorn. It was there that I met CG. They were nice to me and taught me everything I know about the criminal world. When they asked me to join the gang, I had no reason to decline because they were all I had.”

Mickey subconsciously gave a sad smile at the ocean, reflecting on the bittersweet memories. “You’ve probably had a similar experience with CB.”

“Not at all,” Nino replied without hesitation.

Mickey let out a small chuckle. “Right because your little group of rich criminals is so different from us and our gang lifestyle.”

“I’m gonna tell you this straight up. If you asked Tony what CB is, you asked Lang what CB is, you ask Yuno what CB is, if you asked me what CB is—”

“It’s not a gang. I’ve heard.”

“No, it’s not even that. I think we all have our own take on what that is. We don’t even call ourselves the Cleanbois. Y’all motherfuckers use that term more than we do. I look at it like these are my friends. You know what I mean? That’s it. I don’t look at it any more than that.”

Mickey had never really thought of it before, but he supposed that it was true. He knew that the group of boys got together for jobs sometimes, but he wasn’t aware of their connections outside of that. “Then how did you guys come up with the name, Cleanbois?”

“It was a joke between Lang, Tony, and Denzel when they were expunging their criminal records. Yeah, it says CLean Manor on the side of our fucking property, but it’s not a gang compound like your CG Cubby. It just so happens that we all still partake in crime.”

“So, in that case, how exactly is your group of friends different from a gang?”

“Simple, it’s the difference of loyalty. Leanbois was a gang. CG is a gang. In a gang, you have tests of loyalty. That’s what CG is having you do right now. Gangs are built on these bridges that you have to cross to prove that you are loyal. However, there are other types of loyalty. The loyalty between gangsters, co-workers, and spouses are different, right? But, loyalty is used the same way. It’s for control.”

Mickey squinted his eyes. “Even between spouses?”

“Yes. When you get married, your spouse expects you to make them your priority above all else. They don’t want you getting married to other people. You let them control some aspects of your life because you are loyal to them and their needs. And in a gang, you are also expected to prioritize your gang above all else.”

“Yeah, that has become very clear.”

“For us, it’s the other way around. We’re not a gang, we’re a group of friends. We don’t give each other loyalty tests because we’re friends, and we don’t expect each other to prioritize our group of friends over our other loyalties.”

Mickey could sort of comprehend what Nino was saying. He gave out an example to make sure he understood. “So…what you’re saying is that if Yuno was the one to go on a job with Mr. K, Ramee, and Vinny…Lang wouldn’t have been upset?”

Nino nodded. “Mr. K could’ve killed KFC and Lang would’ve still let Yuno do a job with him if he really wanted to ‘cause that’s what friends do. We don’t control who we’re allowed to hang out with, and we don’t make each other choose where our loyalties lie.”

“Sounds…kinda nice.”

Nino glanced over at Mickey and saw the wistful expression on his face. “But don’t get the wrong idea here, Mickey. That alone comes with its own plethora of headaches. When you’re in a gang it’s easy to make decisions because the gang leader makes the final call. When there is no group structure, and all the members are equal, and loyalty can shift from one thing to another, there are times when we would argue for hours and hours over a situation that ultimately can’t be resolved and nothing gets accomplished.”

Mickey laughed, recalling a conversation he had with Tony. “Yeah, I’ve heard about that. I heard that you’re still trying to teach Ray why what he did at Yuno’s birthday party was unacceptable because the people he killed were Yuno’s friends.”

Nino groaned, “Ugh, don’t even get me started on that. But, the reason I bring this up is ‘cause I don’t want you to get this false impression that we’re this other crew and maybe the grass is greener on this side. ‘Cause it’s not. We’ve got our own fucking issues. Not in the same way that a gang has issues, but there are issues. Sometimes life would be much easier if there was one person calling all the shots, and all you have to do is obey it.”

Nino checked the time on his phone and stood up from his chair, brushing the sand off his pants and buttoning up his shirt. “Hopefully, you were able to find some of this advice helpful. I gotta go now, but I hope things work out for you.”

“It was, Nino. Thank you for the advice. I hope you have an exquisite evening.”

“Bye, Mickey.” Nino waved as he walked back to his car in the beach parking lot.

Mickey remained in his chair for another ten minutes, looking at the waves and thinking back on his conversation with Nino. It had given him a lot of food for thought, but didn’t provide him with any answers. It was obvious that Nino was speaking from years of experience on this topic, but he wanted Mickey to come up with his own conclusion for what he should do. Whether in a gang or not, conflict will always arise within groups. Whether in a gang or not, there will be friction between various groups.

He had already taken the risky path, and it only led him to an even darker and riskier path. Mickey didn’t know how much longer he could handle walking on the rocky road he paved for himself. It was getting harder and harder to resist the idea that things would turn out better for everyone if he just stayed in his lane and walked on the safer path, taking the easier route.

With that in mind, Mickey made the phone call.

“Yuno, I need to talk to you.”

✦₊˚⊹⋆❀₊⁺⋆♣⋆⁺₊❀⋆⊹˚₊✦

At 9:00 p.m., Yuno parked his green Sultan at the back of the Pillbox Hill Public Parking Lot. Mickey was waiting for him in the lawn behind it.

“Hey, Mickey! What’s up?”

“Yuno, come here.” Mickey turned around and walked across the lawn to the La Puerta Freeway.

“Okay—Wait. In the middle of the road?”

“Just come with me to the underpass, Yuno. We need to have this conversation in private,” Mickey said without a trace of emotion.

“Uhh, o-okay. If you say so.” Yuno was confused, but continued to follow him.

The La Puerta Freeway had six lanes. Two lanes headed north, two lanes headed south, and they were separated by a grassy median strip. Then, above the strip was an elevated freeway of another two lanes, one headed north and the other headed south.

Mickey and Yuno ran across the two southbound lanes of traffic to the grassy median strip underneath the elevated freeway. They were surrounded by the La Puerta Freeway.

Mickey abruptly stopped walking, his back facing Yuno. He didn’t say anything for a while which made him uneasy.

Yuno fiddled with the ends of his raincoat before prompting him to say something. “W-What’s happening?”

Mickey took a deep breath, then he unsheathed Mr. K’s knife and turned around.

“Oh god, Mickey! Why do you have a knife out?!”

“...CG for life. Fuck CB.” He sprang forward and swung the knife at Yuno.

“The weight of your body should be evenly distributed over both legs to allow for easy movement in all directions. Staying on the balls of your feet can give you the speed you need to either attack or flee.”

Yuno quickly dodged the attack and positioned himself behind Mickey.

“You want to attack areas of the body that are the most susceptible to damage while protecting your own.”

He kicked Mickey’s back, pushing him away from him, then took a few steps backwards.

“Maintain distance. If your opponent has a weapon, try to disarm them.”

Mickey’s voice echoed through Yuno’s head. All of the training came to the forefront of his mind.

The irony was not lost on Yuno, and he was sure it wasn't lost on Mickey either. To think that Mickey had spent the past few months teaching him about hand-to-hand combat, only to use those skills against him now. It was Yuno’s first physical fight too. Despite Mickey telling him that he would need it someday, that day had yet to come during a job.

Mickey attacked him again and again, strategically switching between well-timed punches and swinging the knife in Yuno’s blind spots. It would've looked like wild and uncontrolled movements if they hadn’t practiced this scenario before. Yuno was aware of Mickey’s techniques and habits, so he was able to predict where the next strike would come from; however, this wasn’t a friendly fight.

Every strike and every impact was more aggressive and powerful than usual. It made Yuno grow tired faster, and while he would’ve liked to stay on the defensive, he wouldn’t be able to escape that way. He needed to fight back.

Yuno threw in his own jabs, followed by a few high kicks. He didn’t have Mickey’s upper body strength or stamina, but he was flexible and had gotten better at parkour. After a good shove brought Mickey’s arms away from his body, he did a back walkover, using one of his feet to kick the knife out of Mickey’s hand and onto the road.

“Be aware of your surroundings. Avoid getting backed up against a wall.”

When Yuno finished his kick, he felt the back of his legs hit the concrete guardrail, and realized his mistake. Mickey tackled him, grabbing his shoulders as he did, and they fell over the guardrail. Their bodies rolled into the two southbound lanes of traffic.

Cars honked and swerved around them, but Mickey continued to fight. Every time Yuno tried to get back to the grassy median strip, Mickey would throw a punch at him or a car would get in his way. It was a lot to process, and the constant dodging made Yuno fall back into his self-defense tactics.

Soon Mickey overpowered him, and landed a solid strike on the juncture between his neck and shoulder, causing him to bend his head forward. It gave Mickey the chance to hit the space between his shoulder blades, and send him falling to the ground on his stomach.

“Don’t panic if you’re knocked down. Your legs have a further reach than your arms, so use them to your advantage by kicking them.”

Yuno swung his leg behind him, kicking Mickey in the shin and forcing him to back away. When he moved to stand up, something touched his hand. He looked down and saw Mickey’s knife on the ground in front of him.

He picked it up and pointed the blade at Mickey.

“The fight isn’t over until your opponent is incapacitated. If you hesitate, it could end your life.”

Even though Yuno knew what he should do, he couldn’t bring himself to swing the knife when Mickey attacked again.

After a brief tussle to maintain possession of the weapon, Mickey was able to wrestle the knife out of his grip with one hand, and grab onto Yuno’s neck with the other. Yuno grunted as he used both of his hands to try prying Mickey’s hand off his throat.

“Stay focused on your opponent, but keep an eye out for other threats. Your opponent may not be working alone.”

A reflection of light caught Yuno’s eyes, drawing his attention to the bushes by the parking lot across the street. He spotted Ramee aiming a sniper rifle at them with Mr. K and Vinny standing next to him.

Confused, he turned his eyes back to his opponent. “M-Mickey, why?”

“...Yuno. I’m supposed to kill you.”

Everything clicked in Yuno’s head. The silent acceptance, the defeated tone in his voice, the watchful eyes of Chang Gang. The moment all of the pieces came together, he dropped his hands, giving up the fight.

Mickey’s eyes widened in surprise. He looked up at Yuno, but couldn’t tell what he was thinking. If he could see the face underneath the mask, he would see Yuno giving him a sad smile.

“Do it.”

The words were whispered so quietly that only Mickey could hear them, yet they resounded loudly through his head. The fact that Yuno was instantly willing to die for him filled Mickey with guilt because he wasn’t able to do the same. He was under the impression that if roles were reversed, Yuno would kill him to save his own life. Now that exact scenario was playing out before him, and Yuno was still his extremely selfless friend. Those two softly spoken words cut deeper than any of the torment he went through at the hands of Mr. K.

Mickey slowly released his grip around Yuno’s neck, and let the knife fall from hand. As soon as the metal clanged against the cement, a sharp pain shot through his right upper arm near his shoulder. He collapsed, his head hitting the pavement, and he blacked out again.

“Mickey!” Yuno yelled, dragging his body off the street and back to the grass. Blood trickled from Mickey’s head and the gunshot wound.

The three gangsters left the bushes and crossed the road.

“What the fuck is going on here?” Vinny asked, confused by Mickey’s reaction.

Ramee sighed. “He don’t follow gang leader’s orders, Vinny.” He threw Mickey’s unconscious body over his shoulders, then he looked down at Yuno. “Ay, Yuno. Can you believe this guy?”

Yuno was staring at the crimson liquid staining his gloves. He was shaken from his thoughts after being addressed by Ramee, and stood back up. “He needs a doctor! He’s gonna—”

“Don’t worry about it, Yuno.” Mr. K patted his shoulder. The act was both reassuring and threatening. “We’re gonna take good care of him. And you didn’t see us here, aight?”

Yuno slowly nodded. “Yeah. But, what’s all this about?”

Ramee snickered and headed back to their car. “Yuno, hope you have a beautiful night, man!”

“You have a good night, brother.”

“Have a good one, Yuno.”

Mr. K and Vinny said their farewells as they followed Ramee.

“Y-Yeah, you too.” Yuno stood in the middle of the highway as they drove around him and left.

♣₊⁺⋆❀₊‧⁺⋅⚝⋅⁺‧₊ⴵ⋆⁺₊𓅭

Mickey regained his consciousness to more excruciating pain. He looked up and saw that he was in an airplane. Several members of Chang Gang were there, but he couldn’t make out who they were in the darkness.

Suddenly, he was grabbed by the collar of his turtleneck and led to an open door, a distant view of the Earth awaited him outside. He was filled with dread and moved his gaze along the arm holding him up to the malicious expression on Mr. K’s face.

“You fucking brought this upon yourself, Mick. And all you had to do was follow gang leader’s orders.”

“Please, don’t do this!” Mickey begged, holding onto the door of the airplane.

Mr. K sneered. “Goodbye.” He kicked Mickey’s chest which dislodged his grip on the door, and sent him falling through the night sky. In less than a second, the laughter of Chang Gang grew distant and disappeared. Then it was just him, his racing thoughts, and the harsh winds.

Mickey could tell that he was about ten thousand feet in the air which meant that he had roughly thirty seconds until he reached the ground. He positioned himself parallel to the Earth to create more drag and slow his descent.

“DownBad Mickey always wears a parachute. DownBad Mickey always wears a parachute. DownBad Mickey always—” He repeated the words as he struggled to remove his suit jacket.

Like always, he was wearing a parachute. He considered himself lucky that Chang Gang didn’t strip off his clothes again after he failed to kill Yuno. He doubted that they even knew because the parachute was small enough to fit underneath his turtleneck sweater.

However, that was also a problem. It was underneath his turtleneck sweater, and the gunshot wound had reignited the pain coursing through his body. He tried to quickly slip his arms out of the sleeves of his suit jacket, but he winced in pain and took it slower.

The task proved to be much harder to do when the wind was blowing his clothes in every direction, and he was falling so fast that it was hard to open his eyes without feeling like his eyelids were about to be ripped off. He kept his eyes squeezed shut, and focused on his task at hand, trying to keep his mind calm as he worked. In a few more seconds, he felt his jacket fly off, but he couldn’t relax yet.

With step one completed, he attempted lifting his sweater up and over his head, but his arms wouldn’t cooperate. The fresh bullet wound in his right upper arm, the bruises blooming across his chest, and the clotted cuts on his back created a hot-searing pain with every movement he made.

The panic set in as he couldn’t tell how much time he had left, and so—sensing the seconds slipping away from him—he gritted his teeth and roughly yanked off his turtleneck, feeling all of the cuts on his body reopen in the process. Some of the bandages on his torso ripped off as well. His brain could barely handle the severe amount of anguish. It was only through the rush of adrenaline that he was able to reach behind him and pull the parachute. He felt his descent slow and his body being lifted as the parachute did its job. The straps were agonizing against his body, but he could deal with it.

Mickey opened his eyes, meeting the gaze of a black raven perched on top of the gazebo in the backyard of CLean Manor. He realized just how close he was to death and, at this point, he was too exhausted to steer the parachute or move his body, so he dropped into the pool.

It wasn’t long until he heard a scream and a voice calling out to him.

“Mickey? Mickey, what happened?!”

Yuno had been restlessly running on the roof of CLean Manor, worried about Mickey when he saw quick movement in the corner of his eye. It was hard to tell what it was since it looked like a fast-moving black dot against the dark sky, but when a colorful parachute deployed and landed in the pool, he knew exactly who it was.

He climbed down from the roof and ran over to the pool, fishing Mickey’s body out of the water and freeing him from the parachute. “What’s going on? Mickey, speak to me!”

Mickey shivered and spoke weakly, “I-I was…t-thrown out of a plane.”

“Thrown? And you survived?”

“Y-Yeah, I guess so—Ngh!” The bloody bandages on his torso were soaked and falling off, leaving his wounds exposed. The dirt and grass brushed into the sensitive cuts on his back, and he turned himself onto his left side to avoid it.

Yuno took in the sight of Mickey’s purple and crimson torso. He didn’t even want to know the condition of the parts of him that were hidden underneath his pants. Even in the dark, it was too much for him to look at.

“Oh Jesus. We gotta get you to the hospital, Mickey.”

“D-Don’t. I’m fine.” Mickey groaned in pain.

“You’re really not. Let me get you in the car—”

“I have a bullet wound. Nurses are required to report all gun-related injuries to the police, and I'm not in the mood to be interrogated.”

“W-Well then, we might have bandages in the bathroom. Let’s go inside.” Yuno cautiously lifted Mickey’s left arm over his shoulder and helped him walk to the front door.

It was hard to unlock the door, hold it open, and slip Mickey inside, but he managed. They only made it a few steps in before KFC spotted them and started making distressed calls.

Tony came over to the entryway to investigate the sound. “Oh…my…god…”

“Tony, I can explain!” Yuno said.

“Snuck into the house? Listen, if you’re gonna do it, don’t do it on my fucking walnut wooden door imported from Italy!”

“Huh?” Yuno looked at the door. It had gotten covered in blood and mud, and it was drenched in pool water. He followed the splatters that dripped from the door, and realized that Mickey had tracked it onto the floor as well.

Lang’s muffled voice resounded from the game room, “Tony, stop screaming and get over here! It’s time to watch The Sopranos !”

“Buddha, it’s the cat! He brought us a dead animal!”

Lang walked over and paused when he saw the mess. “Are you fucking serious, Mickey? All over my Brazilian walnut wood floor!”

“You have blood oozing out of your body!” Tony shouted.

“Fucking blood and mud everywhere!”

“You got it all over the fucking door! It’s ruined! You know what that’s like?! I picked that door my goddamn self, you motherfucker! Arrrghhh!!” Tony gripped his gray fedora in frustration.

“I, uh…I think I’ve been slowly bleeding all day,” Mickey said groggily. The adrenaline rush had ended, leaving him feeling numb to his emotions, yet raw to the pain.

“Come with me, Mickey!” Tony lifted Mickey off of Yuno’s shoulders and carried him to the second floor bathroom. He dropped him in the bathtub, and rolled up his sleeves. “Did CG do this to ya?”

Mickey hummed and swayed, then settled on leaning his left side against the bathtub. “I feel a little light-headed.”

“Do they feed you?” Tony asked.

“Uh, no.”

“Do they wash you?”

“...No?”

“What the hell, Mickey? They didn’t wash you over there? Like what the fuck is this?” Tony removed Mickey’s dirty clothes and bandages, then he turned on the faucet, filling the tub with warm water.

Realizing he was exposed again, Mickey sat up and covered himself. “Wait, what are you—”

“You can barely stand. You think you can wash yourself?” Tony turned towards the door. “Ay, Buddha, wash him! C’mon, gotta help him out!”

Lang entered the bathroom and knelt down next to the bathtub with Tony. “Jesus Christ, Mickey. You’re fucking filthy.”

“Here. Come here, little guy. Let me help ya out.” Tony poured shampoo into Mickey’s hair, and massaged it into his scalp. Then he grabbed the detachable nozzle to rinse it; bits of dirt and dried blood coming out as he did so.

While Lang carefully cleaned his back, Tony began to examine his injuries. The gunshot wound in Mickey’s right upper arm was the most concerning. There was an entry and exit point so he knew the bullet wasn’t lodged inside, but he didn’t know the extent of the damage.

“I’m not going to the hospital,” Mickey said before Tony could voice his opinion.

“You still need to get it checked out for bone and tissue damage. I can call Kitty to come look at it tomorrow morning if you want? She’s a licensed doctor at Pillbox Hill Medical Center and the owner of Betta Life Pharmaceuticals. Plus, she won’t report anything to the cops.”

Mickey thought about it for a minute before he answered, “Sure, that works for me.”

Tony lifted his arm and began to delicately wash the wound. Despite his efforts, it was still tender and sensitive.

“Mmnn! Mmrrgh! Ahh!” Mickey tried to suppress his screams.

“I know, I know. I’ll try to be gentle, but this is gonna hurt a little,” Tony soothed him apologetically.

As Mickey gritted his teeth, KFC strutted into the bathroom, then he flapped his wings to perch up on the rim of the bathtub. A yellow rubber duck was held in his beak. The rooster plopped it onto the soapy bath water and looked at him expectantly, but Mickey didn't know why.

“KFC brought you a friend to play with to take your mind off the pain,” Lang explained.

Mickey picked up the rubber duck with his left hand, and it gave a pitiful squeak as he nearly squeezed the head off his new bath buddy.

Fifteen minutes later, Mickey sat on Lang’s bed, wrapped in new bandages and a fluffy bathrobe. Lang and Tony did a thorough job of washing his body from head to toe, and after the rough day he had, it felt pretty good to be clean.

Yuno entered the room carrying a turkey sandwich on a plate and a glass of apple juice. He set them down on the bedside table next to him.

“I now see why you guys call yourselves the Cleanbois,” Mickey said as he picked up the sandwich and took a bite. He noticed a painkiller tablet on the plate as well, and swallowed it down with a few sips of apple juice. “God, I fucking needed this. Today has absolutely fucked my blood sugar levels.”

As Mickey finished his meal, Yuno sat next to him on the bed, wrapping his arms around his knees and pulling them up to his chest. “What happened, Mickey?”

Mickey paused, then swallowed the last bite of his sandwich. “I was told to kill you. And I couldn’t do it.”

“Yeah, and then they shot you. What was that about?”

“Remember when I told you that doing that job would probably get me in trouble?”

“Mickey, that job was so fun, wasn’t it? Mr. Lang had tons of fun. And did you hear how much Nino was laughing? It was one of the best jobs we’ve ever had.”

Mickey smiled fondly. “I think it was my favorite job actually.”

“Yeah, it’s always fun when we hang out. You know we got a lot in common? We always do silly things, we make risky plans, and it ends up working out anyway. That’s why we’re a good team, Mickey.”

“...I just wished my boys understood that.”

“They’re just worried about ya, that’s all.”

Mickey looked over at Yuno in shock. “They wanted me t-to kill you, Yuno. How could they make me do that?”

“Look, it’s not about me. If it was, they would’ve killed me after you failed. It’s about them knowing they can trust you to do something, right?”

“What about what I want, Yuno? What if I don’t wanna kill my friends.”

“It doesn’t really work that way in a gang. You gotta do it or else you end up like this or even worse.”

“Why are you agreeing with them? Don’t you see that you would’ve died if I went through with it?”

Yuno shook his head. “I’m not agreeing with them. I’m just saying that if you needed to kill me so that you could survive, I would’ve understood.”

“You would?”

“Even if you kill me, I’ll know that you’re the one that’s gonna be more hurt. ‘Cause I know that you didn’t want to do it, and you would’ve had to live with that decision. It would’ve hurt you every day that I wasn’t around to do fun jobs with you anymore.”

“That’s why I didn’t do it. And I never will,” Mickey promised.

“But they threw you out of a plane, Mickey. You can’t live like this.”

“I can’t live with killing you either. Look, I’ve always accepted being DownBad Mickey. I accepted being beat up, and shot, and stabbed, and lit on fire, and thrown out of a plane—”

“Wait, did all that happen today?”

“I can accept all of that pain, but I couldn’t accept them telling me to kill you. And now I’ve landed myself here with nowhere to go.”

“Well, you’re always welcome here, Mickey.” Yuno gestured to the room. “Mr. Lang said it’s for us and all our friends. That includes you, I think.”

“Umm, at the end of the day, it’s probably Mr. Lang’s choice for that one,” Mickey said nervously. Everything had happened so quickly, and the idea of moving into the CLean Manor was overwhelming.

“Well, what are you gonna do now?”

“I’m not sure. All I know, Yuno, is that you’re my friend. And I don’t wanna hurt my friends anymore.”

“Thanks, Mickey. I appreciate that. You’re a good friend of mine, too.”

♣₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅ⴵ⋅⁺‧₊❀⋆⁺₊𓅭

Downstairs in the office, Lang was on the phone explaining the dirty entryway to his butler. “Alfred, I need you to get over here as fast as you can to clean all this shit up… Yes, it’s just as you enter the front door. Fucking blood is everywhere and that shit’s gonna stain… No, it’s not my blood. Mickey was told to kill Yuno, and he got hurt in the process… Okay, great. See you soon.”

“What the fuck did you just say?”

“Hngh!” Lang jumped as he hung up and looked behind him. Raymond had entered through the office’s side door while he was on the phone.

“For fuck’s sake! You motherfuckers always walk up behind me unannounced.”

“Is Yuno okay?” Raymond asked coldly. Upon hearing the end of Lang’s conversation, his expression turned dark.

“Yes, he’s fine. Mickey didn’t kill him. It was just an order he was given from CG.”

“...All right. If he does anything to Yuno, I want you to know that I’m gonna kill every single person involved in hurting him.”

Lang rolled his eyes. “Mickey and Yuno are in my room upstairs right now. You can just ask them.”

“You left Yuno alone with him?”

“Mickey was thrown out of a plane for not killing Yuno. He ain’t gonna do shit.”

Raymond huffed, “If Mickey lays his hand on Yuno, I will cut off all his fingers before he could even move. If he so much as touches him, I will bash his skull in.”

He heard Lang let out a deep sigh as he left the office, but he chose to ignore it. He made his way to Lang’s bedroom and quietly cracked open the door, catching the tail end of another conversation.

“What?!”

“He smashed my balls with a hammer! I’m not even sure if they’re still there,” Mickey cried out.

“I…well…you can get it reattached, right?”

“Do you know what my profession is, Yuno?”

“Oh my god, you’re right! You’re a firefighter.”

“Uh, yeah, um…a Vanilla Unicorn firefighter, I guess.”

“Oh…Mickey.” Yuno gently patted Mickey’s shoulder, not wanting to hurt him.

“It’s gonna ruin my package and all of my tight underwear. What’ll I do, man?”

“Look, look, just—We’ve got toilet paper here. You can just stuff it.”

“It’s not the same!”

“It’s not—Look, no one can tell.”

“Out of all the pain I’ve experienced, this is the worst by far.”

“Hey, it’ll be okay, man.”

“I hope so.” Mickey hugged him, and Yuno carefully returned it, trying not to put too much pressure on his back.

The warm gesture sent a surge of bitter envy through Raymond. “Yuno, I’m jealous. Where’s my hug?”

“Oh!” Yuno backed away from the hug in surprise.

Mickey barked out a loud laugh. “Ha! Did you really ask that?”

“He just ‘where’s my hug’d me—Oof!”

Raymond dashed into the room and wrapped Yuno a tight hug. “Love you, buddy.”

Yuno giggled at his behavior. “Yeah, great to see you too.”

“Ray~ Where’s my hug?” Mickey sang sarcastically.

Raymond pulled away from Yuno and glared at him. “I’ve never hugged you before in my life, and I’m not gonna start now just ‘cause you’re hurt.”

“You wound me, Ray~ Can’t you lick my wounds for me, please?”

Raymond squinted his eyes, trying to see if Mickey was being serious or if it was another English idiom that he didn’t understand. “I can’t tell if you’re fucking with me, Mickey. I really can’t.”

“He always is. He’s just joking, man,” Yuno said.

Raymond continued to glare at Mickey. “Sometimes you’re really supportive as friend, and then sometimes you’re not.”

“No, he’s always supportive.”

“I’m always supportive. True.” Mickey smiled innocently, knowing that Yuno backing him up only made Raymond more jealous.

“But listen, we need a safeword if you’re uncomfortable at any time,” Yuno suggested.

Raymond nodded seriously. “True, yeah, very true.”

“Yeah, pineapple,” Mickey joked.

“Oh, pineapple’s a different one. We use that for…” Yuno stopped himself, wondering if Lang and Tony would be okay with him revealing the meaning of the word to someone who wasn’t a Cleanboi.

Mickey took the pause to imply something else. “Oh, that’s our other safeword. You’re right, Yuno~”

Recognizing the innuendo, Yuno quickly spoke up, “T-The Leanbois used to use it, but I hear Mr. Lang and Tony still say it sometimes. That’s all.”

Yuno figured that description would be enough to clarify things for Mickey which it wasn’t. The visual in Mickey’s mind was completely different from what Yuno had intended.

“Wait. Oh my god,” Raymond said. “Wait, I’ve used that safeword before. How the—That’s fucking weird.”

“What did you use it for?” Yuno asked.

“Uhh…it’s not important.”

“Hm?”

“Oh?” Mickey covered the black cat ears on Yuno’s head. “What kinky position were you in when you said it, Ray?” He was glad that he took the painkiller because Raymond roughly shoved him away from Yuno.

Raymond growled, “Fuck. Off. Attention whore.”

“Street slut.”

“Motherfucker!”

“Beta bitch~”

“You know it’s called Betta Life, not Beta Life! You fucking—”

“Uh, hey, um,” Yuno interrupted, “I just wanna say that I-I’m, um, uncomfortable with this role-play, or whatever is happening right now. If we had a safeword, I would use it.”

“Yeah, Ray. Let’s not do this in front of Yuno. You’re scaring him,” Mickey teased.

“You’re the one saying weird shit!”

Now that he was thinking about it, Yuno realized that this was the first time he had ever seen Mickey and Raymond in the same room together. He knew that there was some hostility between the two—apparently so much so that they avoided each other most of the time—and now he knew why. He wasn’t sure what to think of this interaction.

Raymond headed towards the door. “Come to our bedroom, Yuno. I want to show you the plan I made for tomorrow’s job.”

“Oh, okay.” Yuno climbed off the bed. “I’ll see you later, Mickey. Good night!”

“Good night, Yuno.”

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

Mickey laid down with his back against the soft mattress and looked around Lang’s bedroom, taking in all of the Chinese decor. He thought that it was very cozy for a former Leanboi, and wondered what happened to change his life from being a gangster to a rich businessman.

Just as the thought popped into his head, Lang entered his bedroom and locked the door behind him. “Mickey, what the fuck happened to you?”

“I already told you. I didn’t kill Yuno, and I got thrown out of a plane,” Mickey explained, still laying down and staring at the ceiling.

“H-How the the fuck—I-I just don’t understand like h—” Lang gave a frustrated sigh. “How do you deal with that kinda shit?”

“I…I mean, I’m DownBad Mickey. That’s how I deal with it.”

“I mean, fuck it. If you’re okay with being treated like fucking dogshit, then that’s on you, I guess.”

Mickey sat up and looked at Lang. “The thing is it wasn’t being thrown out of a plane, or lit on fire, or getting shot, or getting stabbed, or getting beat up with a baseball bat, or getting my nuts hammered in. I was actually able to take all that. I can take the pain, but I don’t like hurting my friends. They told me to kill Yuno and I couldn’t do it.”

“Now what if they had told you to kill me, would you have done it?”

“Oh, you? Absolutely. But, Yuno? I couldn't do it.”

Lang chuckled. “You and Ray are both so protective of Yuno. It’s hilarious to me.”

Mickey took a second to ponder over Lang’s question some more. “Honestly…I don’t know if I could’ve killed you either.”

Lang raised an eyebrow, noting the sentiment, but not commenting on it. “So, what’s going on with you and Chang Gang now?”

“I’m assuming that they’re under the impression that I’ve died. Even if they find out I didn’t, I think they want nothing to do with me anymore. That was probably their way of blooding me out of the gang.”

“Alright, well, what do you want to do now?”

“...I’m thinking of joining you guys.”

“Bull-fucking-shit. You just wanted to see my reaction to that.”

Mickey smiled. “Yeah, and that was just about the reaction I was expecting. To answer your question, I legitimately don’t know what I want yet. Everything still feels unreal. In general though, I do kind of want to forge my own path. I kinda wanna do my own thing, and that will never happen if I’m in a gang. If anything, what I’ve learned the most from all of this is that being in a gang is not for me because I don’t think I’ll always be able to put the gang first in every situation.”

Lang shrugged and unlocked his door. “If that’s what you really want to do, then it sounds like a good decision to me. Feel free to sleep on my bed tonight, but you gotta find your own place tomorrow.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Lang opened his door, but he paused before he could take a step out.

“...Lang?” Mickey prompted.

“Listen, I know you’re too busy being ‘down bad’ and getting thrown out of a fucking airplane. But, Cleanbois, Cerberus, The Guild, Team Rocket, everyone is welcome to live in this castle together. We’re a family. We take care of one another and help each other out. If you’re seriously considering it, give me a call.”

Lang exited his bedroom and closed the door.

Chapter Text

(Monday, July 5, 2021)

“Guys, Mirror Park! Mickey is waiting! I’m losing my fucking mind!” Lang screamed while rubbing his temples.

Tony punched the back of the car seat in front of him. “Mirror fucking Park! What do you not understand?!”

“Mirror fucking Park! For the love of fucking god!” Lang screamed again.

Raymond was driving the family Stratum today, and Yuno was sitting in the passenger seat. Tony and Lang had willingly chosen to ride in the back seats; a choice they were now regretting because Raymond took too many detours and made too many stops along the way.

“Mirror Park. This is the opposite way,” Yuno gently instructed. However, his voice was drowned out by Tony’s yelling.

“U-turn! U-turn! U-turn! Mirror Park!”

Raymond spoke slowly, “Lang. Tony. Did you not listen to what we need to do?”

“M! I! R! R! O! R! Space! P! A! R! K! Mirror Park!” Tony continued yelling, gripping his gray fedora in frustration.

“We need to go to the manor anyway to get changed,” Raymond calmly explained.

Lang inhaled deeply, then yelled at the top of his lungs. “Just go to Mirror Park!!!”

“Oh god! Ahh!” Yuno shrieked and dunked his head as something went flying next to him and the car violently jerked forward.

“Aghh!” Tony let out a duck cry and threw his fedora at Raymond, making him swerve to the side of the road.

“Get out, get out, get out! I’ll drive! Move! Get out now!” Tony switched seats with Raymond, and he dashed over to the lake in Mirror Park.

When they got there, they saw children and adults hanging out in the water on this hot, summer day. Tony found that the sweltering afternoon heat was always intense in July.

After looking around for a moment, they were unable to find Mickey anywhere, so Tony took out his phone and called him. “Mickey, where the fuck you at? We’re here at Mirror Park lake.”

“Tony…” He could already hear the irritation in Mickey’s voice. “I’m still here at Del Perro Beach. The same place I’ve been waiting at for the past two fucking hours!”

“Wait, why did you tell us to meet you at Mirror Park if you’re already at the beach?!”

“That was hours ago! Get the hell over here!” Mickey yelled and hung up.

Tony groaned and pocketed his phone. “Oh marone. Fucking gabagool. Guys, I don’t wanna be that guy, but I’m gonna say it.”

“Be that fucking guy, Tony. Fucking say it, Tony,” Lang encouraged, already knowing what he was about to say.

“Our comms are fucking horrendous. Literally the fucking worst.”

Yuno hummed, thinking about the countless times their comms had failed them. “Yeah, Mickey calls CB comms a joke.”

Scene 11: 5/5

At Del Perro Beach, Mickey was spinning a volleyball on the tip of his index finger. He was wearing a loose, light blue tank top with navy denim shorts. His skin was covered in scars from the day he was kicked out of Chang Gang, but the wounds had almost completely healed. The gunshot wound on his arm and the stab wound in his leg needed another month to fully heal, but they didn't hurt anymore.

“Let’s go!” Lang hollered and clapped his hands together. He was only wearing his black dress pants with the cuffs rolled up to his ankles. Sweat glistened on his muscular, tattooed torso and arms.

Mickey served the volleyball over the net to the other side of the court where Raymond and Yuno were standing, both dressed in their own beach attire. Yuno was wearing mint green joggers, white shoes with green light up soles, black gloves, and his black motorcycle helmet. Raymond wore an unbuttoned pink floral shirt with a pair of white athletic shorts. His arms were tattooed with R.U.S.T. imagery.

Raymond bumped the ball to Yuno, who set it back to him, and then he spiked the ball over the net. The four of them volleyed the ball back and forth for a while until the ball landed in the sand next to the white spray-painted court line.

Tony, who was wearing red swim trunks and sitting in the sand underneath the net, whistled and gave a point to Lang and Mickey’s team. The two cheered and gave each other a high five.

KFC also sat in the sand underneath the net across from Tony, watching the court line on the other side. The rooster didn’t know much about sports, but he knew that he liked dust bathing. As the boys continued to play, he rolled around in the warm sand and fluffed his feathers, enjoying the feeling of the coarse grains cleaning his skin. It wasn’t often that Lang took him to the beach, so he was going to enjoy his time there to the fullest.

Suddenly the volleyball landed near the spray-painted line next to him, and the five sweaty boys looked at him expectantly. Not willing to admit that he wasn’t paying attention, he waved his wing towards Lang and Mickey’s team, giving them another point.

“Ay, this is bullshit!” Raymond yelled, gasping for air in between his sentences. “That was clearly out of bounds! Lang is bribing the referee!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Ray.” Lang pet KFC on the head and fed him a blueberry from a small container of berries in his pants pocket.

“Suck it, Ray~ We won fair and square~” Mickey sang, bragging about their victory. He wiped the sweat off his forehead with his hand and flung it at him.

Raymond scrunched his face in disgust when he felt the liquid sprinkle across his skin, and he wiped it off. Exhausted from the game and the heat, he flumped down in the sand next to Tony.

Yuno was juggling the volleyball with his feet, waiting for their conversation to come to an end. Upon no longer hearing their voices, he asked the question that had been on his mind ever since they arrived. “So, Mickey, I’ve been meaning to ask, how is playing volleyball gonna help us on the job?”

Yuno tossed the ball high into the air, did a backflip, and kicked it over to Mickey who juggled the ball with his feet and passed it back to him. “Oh, trust me, Yuno. Playing volleyball with the boys is a crucial part of this whole heist.”

Raymond propped himself up with his elbows in the sand. “Wait, what job? Nobody told me that.”

Tony shared a look with Mickey, then proceeded to speak very slowly and clearly, “Ray…I know what you’re gonna say…everything’s gonna be okay… We’re gonna make sure we get away… You can set up as many bikes as you want, anywhere, any way… But, we’re doing a job with Mickey today.”

Raymond closed his eyes and laid back down in the sand, trying to remain calm. “Uhh…Tony, I don’t know. I don’t really want to work with him.”

“It’s gonna be a fun plan,” Tony insisted, trying to put him at ease.

“Yeah, that’s what I’m worried about. Um, let me think about it and—” From underneath his closed eyelids, he could tell that someone was blocking his sunlight, casting a shadow over his face.

He opened his eyes to see Yuno kneeling in front of him. Sunlight fanned out from behind his head, making him glow like an angel.

“Raymond, I’m your favorite brother, right? You’d do anything for me, won’t you?”

“Yeah, of course. Why you ask?”

Yuno brought his hands up and lightly tapped his index fingers together.

“Could you do the job with us, please?~” He spoke in a sweet voice using a high-pitched cadence; a trick that he picked up from Kitty to get what he wanted. “What’s wrong? Mickey already told me the plan, and it sounds fun! We won’t get caught, I promise. Let’s do the job together~”

Raymond blinked a few times and cleared his throat. “Tony, I’m going to set up my forty-seven bikes, then I’ll meet up with you guys for the job.”

Tony sighed, half from relief and half out of annoyance. “Okay, you have two hours. Please don’t be late.”

“Yeah, I’ll be quick,” Raymond promised, standing up and brushing the sand off his skin.

“I’ll go help him! We’ll be real quick, Tony! Don't you worry!” Yuno brushed the sand off his pants and followed Raymond.

Mickey chuckled, watching them hail a taxi and leave to set up the motorcycles. “So, he still does that bike thing, huh?”

Tony shrugged and laid back in the sand. “He doesn’t do it too much nowadays ‘cause we kinda got him out of it, but he still does it from time to time.”

“I…I’m, uh.” Mickey chuckled sheepishly. “By the way, he might deny this and I hate to say it, but I think I got him on to it.”

“Wait, wait. You got him into the thing of setting up forty fucking bikes around the city?”

“Yes? See, the thing is I can’t outdrive the cops. I can’t. I know that about myself, so I’m not gonna fucking try. A few months ago, whenever I needed a back up plan, I would ditch my car in the Alamo Sea, swim to the other side, and have a bike waiting for me in a bush. I showed that to Ray, and then I swear to god, he just did it over and over again for the next two weeks. I started to hate showing him my little getaway spots because he would immediately use it. I had to tell him to stop. I was like, ‘Cops are gonna know, man. They’ll know what the plan is if you keep using the same spots.’”

That was new information to Tony, and it was enlightening. “Well…that certainly explains why he has so many fucking bushes now.”

“Yeah.” Mickey laid down in the sand next to him, and set a timer for two hours on his phone.

While waiting for the timer to go off, Tony and Mickey sunbathed underneath the warm afternoon sunlight, just shooting the breeze. Lang spent the time feeding berries to KFC, then he gave him a gentle massage, applying a light pressure to his neck and back. Feeling properly pampered, the rooster closed his eyes and cuddled next to Lang.

Two people taking a stroll along the shoreline were surprised by the abnormal sight, and stopped to watch.

Lang huffed, “What? You never seen a man stroking his cock before? Keep walking.”

✧₊⁺⭒☣₊‧⁺⋅♣⋅⁺‧₊❀⋆⁺₊✦

Yuno helped Raymond set up his bikes all over the island. It ended up taking them a little over two hours to finish, but no one had called them to complain yet.

When they returned to the R.U.S.T. Scrapyard, they saw Mickey waiting for them by the entrance.

“Hey, Yuno!”

“Mickey!” Yuno ran over and gave him a hug.

“Woah. Yuno, where my hug at?” Raymond asked. The tug of jealousy that pulled at his heart had become more familiar these past few weeks.

“Huh?” Yuno had already given him a hug earlier that day. He didn't know why he wanted another one now.

“Where my hug at?” He repeated.

Mickey released Yuno from the hug and gave him a look. “Jesus, Ray. That’s a bit—”

Raymond ignored him and hugged Yuno. “I love you, brother.”

“Uh-huh,” Yuno responded uncertainly. “Um, anyway, what are you doing here, Mickey?”

“Just wanted to stop by and make sure Ray wasn’t taking too long setting up his bikes.”

“Motherfucker, the bikes are important!” Raymond defended himself. “It’s better to be prepared rather than not being prepared, you know?”

Raymond noticed that Mickey was wearing gloves and holding a wet sponge. He had a sneaking suspicion that he was up to no good. “Wait, what were you doing before we got here?”

He pushed past Mickey and walked around the brick building behind him. The giant R.U.S.T. gang tag that usually rested on the surface had been mostly removed. There was a bucket of water and a can of paint remover sitting on the ground next to it.

Mickey didn't even try to hide his smirk as he casually leaned against the wall. “Oh~ you guys were taking so long to come back, and I thought, ‘Hm, I might as well do the city a favor by removing these unsightly gang tags.’ I mean, they’re all over these streets, and they’re such an eyesore. Gotta do our part in keeping the city clean, you know? Wait, was this your gang tag? Oh, that’s my bad. I had no clue whatsoever. Do forgive me for my mistake, Ray. That’s so unfortunate~”

Raymond closed his eyes, clenched his fists, and took a deep breath.

“Baby, don’t forget me~

And I promise not to forget you~

Even when things aren’t the best~

I’ll be there~

Even when shit hits the fan~

I’ll be there, ohh oh~”

Lang and Tony were listening to “Don’t Forget Me” by Sheldon Jones in the family Stratum. Tony drove in circles around the neighborhood, not heading anywhere in particular, just killing time while they waited for the other three to arrive at CLean Manor.

“Man, Sheldon’s song is fire. He’s just so talented. That song’s amazing,” Tony complimented.

Lang agreed, “Hell yeah~”

“That shit’s so good, y’know? It’s good when you’re sad, it’s good when you’re not sad, it’s just all around a great song.”

“Yeah~ I love it.”

Lang noticed he had an incoming call from Yuno, and he paused the music to answer it. “Yuno~ What’s up?~”

“Mr. Lang! Can you pick us up, please? Mickey’s tires got shot, and Raymond’s windshield is broken.”

“What the fuck happened?”

“Mickey washed away Raymond’s gang tag, then Raymond punched him and started respraying the thing, but Mickey kept getting in the way and got himself covered in spray paint, then he hugged Raymond which smeared paint on his clothes, so Raymond shot out the tires of Mickey’s car, and Mickey retaliated by shooting the windshield of his Lambo, and now they’re just yelling and punching each other.”

Lang groaned, “Oh…god…”

“Mr. Lang, the kids are fighting. Can you, uh—”

Lang groaned louder, “Oh…god…”

Yuno giggled at his reaction. “Mr. Lang, what’s wrong?”

“Oh god, Yuno. Where you at? We can pick you up, but only you.”

“We’re at the R.U.S.T. thing.”

“Okay, we’re on our way. I love y—”

Yuno hung up and ran over to the arguing boys. “Hey, guys! I just called Mr. Lang!”

Yuno’s cheerful voice and sudden closeness was enough to get the two to separate for a moment; neither wanted to accidentally get Yuno hurt in the middle of their fight. In addition to being sweaty and sandy from the beach, they were now covered in scratches, soon-to-be bruises, and bright red spray paint.

Raymond wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, and it left a crimson smear. He smiled at the sight of his favorite color.

Yuno noticed that he had a cut on his upper lip. “Oh Jesus! Raymond, your lip! Does it hurt?”

He smiled wider. “Yes, but I’m smiling through the pain.”

Hearing that made Mickey grimace. He rubbed his sore cheek from when Raymond punched it, then smiled for a few seconds before dropping it back to a frown. “Shitty recommendation. Still fucking hurts.”

“Anyway, what did you say, Yuno?” Raymond asked.

“I just called Mr. Lang. He said he’s coming to pick us up.”

Mickey scoffed and crossed his arms. “Well, we wouldn’t need a pick up if someone , I’m not saying who, didn’t lose his temper and shoot the tires of my car.”

“That wouldn’t have happened if someone didn’t fucking—”

“Oh boy! I’m so excited for all of us to do a job together for the first time! It’s gonna be so much fun.” Yuno interrupted their argument and changed the subject.

Raymond turned towards Mickey and glared at him. “Yeah, why are you joining our job? The fuck is this?”

“Um, actually, Lang is the one who invited me,” Mickey purposefully spoke in an obnoxious tone. “Since I’m now an independent hacker and strategist, I’ve been doing jobs for a variety of groups all around the city. In fact, just last night I did a job with Dundee and the BBMC, and I worked with Benji and Seaside this morning. Seems to me like there are plenty of people who enjoy my company.”

“I’m pretty sure the phrase you’re looking for is ‘tolerate your company,’” Raymond sassed.

“Why are you so—”

“Motherfucker, I don’t understand how—”

“Ray, stop fucking cutting me off—Pfft!”

Raymond had picked up his red spray paint can and sprayed him again.

“Stop! You already fucked my fuck!”

“Fucking make me!”

“Ay, you two fucks! Stop fighting! We have a job to do! Get in the goddamn Cussy!” Tony yelled and honked the horn of the black Stratum. Lang groaned in the passenger seat and waved them over.

All three piled into the back seats before they could get yelled at again, but the paint dripping off their bodies still made Tony upset.

“Jesus fucking Christ! You’re gonna ruin the seats!”

“Alfred will take care of it,” Lang assured. “Ray and Mickey, I’m very disappointed in you both. Take a fucking shower and change your clothes as soon we get to my castle!”

“Fine~”

“Mickey started it.”

“ Mickey didn’t start shit, you little shit!”

“Oh, you fucking—”

Mickey and Raymond argued all the way back to CLean Manor, giving everyone else a headache in the process.

♣₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅ⴵ⋅⁺‧₊❀⋆⁺₊𓅭

“C’mon, boys! Hurry up! Meet by the pool table of patience and planning,” Tony called out and entered the game room.

Everyone had been feeling dirty and smelly from their hang out at the beach, so they all ended up taking a shower and changing out of their beach clothes into their normal attire. It took Mickey and Raymond longer than the others because they had to scrub the red paint off their skin and hair. By the time they made it to the game room, Lang, Tony, and Yuno had already been waiting at the pool table for nearly thirty minutes.

“All right, sorry for the delay,” Mickey apologized, running his fingers through his slightly damp, black hair. “I will now go over the whole plan to get Raymond filled in on how everything will go down.”

“Okay, let’s hear it,” Tony prompted, resting his hands on the red pool table as he did so.

Mickey nodded, then he took a second to gather his thoughts to explain the plan in a concise manner, knowing that he only had five minutes before Yuno’s ADHD made him grow antsy.

“Today, we will be exploring Gruppe Sechs.”

Raymond’s brows raised at that. “Group sex?”

“It’s a private corporate security company that transports money around the city in armored trucks,” Mickey explained. “I’ve been told that Lang is looking for something called a VAR, and he believes it’s gotta be related to something that regularly has access to the City Vault. We’ve already checked a few security companies like Bobcat Security, and there was nothing there. So, now we’re trying Gruppe Sechs.”

Yuno cringed at the name. “W-We can just call it Group Six, right? I mean, it sounds a little—”

“The thing is,” Mickey went on, “we don’t know what their exact routes are, or if they transport anything other than money. So, the hope is that they go to a place called a VAR or one of the trucks transport something called a VAR. What we need to do is investigate all of their locations, and then we’ll take some money and dip ‘cause we’ll need it to pay off our expenses for the heist.”

“What happens if we don’t find the VAR, or if we do find it, I guess?” Tony asked.

“We’re just gathering information on this job. Our next course of action after we find it will greatly depend on whatever it is exactly. So, if we do find the VAR, we either remember its location for next time, or we take it with us and deal with it back here at the manor.”

Raymond felt like Mickey was hiding something about the plan. “Sounds too simple. Tony made it sound like I wouldn’t like it. What else is there, Mickey?”

“Right, here’s how the whole plan will play out. You and Yuno will sneak into the 707 Vespucci building dressed as Gruppe Sechs employees, get access to the routes, hijack a truck, and drive it to all of the locations listed. Tony will trail after you in the Stratum as back up in case anything goes wrong. After you find the VAR or not, grab the money from the truck and switch to Tony’s car. Given how long this process could take, your truck will most likely be reported missing, and you’ll have the police on your asses by the time you finish. For the getaway, Tony will drive you to the Jetsam Terminal where Lang and I will be waiting with two planes. Each of you will get into one of the planes while Tony stays mobile on the ground. I call this the Top Gun Heist. We actually ran a similar plan for the Rainbow Road, but the main issue was that we couldn’t get into the planes fast enough. This time, Lang and I will be ready to take off as soon as you guys arrive.”

Yuno tapped Raymond’s shoulder, getting his attention. “It sounds great! Right, Raymond?”

“I don’t know… Wait, where did you even get planes? I thought the plane rental place shut down ‘cause too many criminals were using it for heists.”

“Fortunately for us, Ray, we happen to have connections to a very rich businessman.” Mickey gestured towards Lang, giving him the opportunity to speak.

“Yeah, Cerberus Industries manufactures aircraft now. So, I had two fighter jets made and we'll be using those.”

“Wow!”

“What the fuck?!”

Yuno and Tony exclaimed at the same time.

Mickey’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Okay, admittedly, I did not know that. The fuck?! I thought you got us normal planes.”

“Uh, isn’t that too excessive, Lang?” Raymond asked apprehensively. “Anyone who uses fighter jets in crime is bound to get blasted out of the sky, no?”

“It’s fine, it's fine.” Lang waved off their concerns. “They’re only prototypes, and I need them tested. Also, this is classified information, so don’t fucking tell anybody that Cerberus made them.”

“You got it, Mr. Lang. Your secret is safe with us,” Yuno promised on behalf of all of them.

Mickey backtracked a little. “All right, uh, slight modification to the plan then. We will all wear parachutes for when we bail out of the jets right before we get shot down. Tony will pick us up wherever we land.”

“Um, I don’t think I can pick up all of you at the same time.”

“That’s okay. Yuno and I have forty-seven bikes we can parachute to,” Raymond suggested.

“Yeah, yeah,” Yuno said. “You just pick up Mickey and Mr. Lang. We’ll be fine.”

“Okay, that sounds good. Any other questions before we start setting up?” Mickey asked.

“How many guns should I—”

“No, Ray,” Mickey stopped him there. “I know what you’re thinking, but you’re going for stealth and deception here. You’re not allowed to shoot the Gruppe Sechs employees. We gotta make it look like everything is normal for as long as possible. How good are you at lying?”

“I’m really bad at lying,” Raymond lied.

“This guy? He’s an expert.”

Yuno said it so certainly that it was a bit worrying to Mickey. “Oh, what has he done to you?”

“Oh, to me? No, no, no. He only lies to protect me ‘cause he’s my buddy.”

Raymond nodded. “Facts. Actual facts.”

“He would never lie to me, and I would never lie to him. We’re good pals. We’re ‘helmet brothers’ as we say.”

“I would never lie to Yuno,” Raymond swore honestly.

Deciding to accept all of that as fact, Mickey moved on. “All right, well, the other thing I’m worried about with this plan is gonna be the comms.”

“What you mean?” Raymond asked.

“Well, you and Yuno are gonna have to continuously communicate to Tony where you’re located at all times, so that he can follow you.”

“Yeah, sounds easy. I don’t think there will be any problems,” Raymond stated in full confidence. “How you feel, Yuno? You ready, man?”

“Look, between you and me, I think… You ever heard of the phrase ‘CB comms’?”

Tony sighed. “Oh, god.”

Raymond pretended to be oblivious. “I…I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“No…no clue, huh? Exactly. That’s how bad our comms are. You don’t even know what that means, but—”

“Goddammit, Yuno. Come on! Me and you have good communication, right?”

“...Anyway, we got this, Raymond. I think it’ll be fun no matter what.”

“Probably. We probably got this, yeah. Let’s go, Yuno! We’re gonna prove people wrong today. Today’s gonna be the day when people know that CB comms is not a real thing—”

“It is a real thing,” Lang heavily insisted.

“—and that we actually have really good comms.”

Yuno hummed, “Yeah, you’re right. It really is nonexistent.”

“Wait…” Raymond paused and realized what Yuno was getting at. “No, Yuno, no—”

“Yeah, it’s not a real thing, you’re right. There’s no communication whatsoever, but it’s okay. It’s funny, and that’s what matters.”

Raymond chucked. “No, Yuno~”

Mickey checked the time on his phone. It was 5:00 p.m., and they needed to start the heist before 6:30 p.m. when the Gruppe Sechs employees started getting off work. “Anyways, to save on time, we should split into two groups. One group gathers the supplies while the other gets the jets set up.”

“I want to be in the group without you,” Raymond immediately said.

“Why, Ray? You got a problem?” Mickey snarked.

“Several actually.”

“Well, I think you’re a problem, too. But I’m—”

“Don’t you even get me started with—”

Tony rolled his eyes as the two fell into another argument, and looked at Yuno. “Alright. Get in the car, Yuno. I’ll drive you to the gray market to pick up your hacking supplies.”

“Okay!” Yuno ran out of the game room at the speed of lightning, more than happy to be able to move after standing in the same place for so long.

“Buddha, you can take the Cussy to set up the jets,” Tony yelled behind him as he followed Yuno to the front driveway.

“Wait, wait, wait!” Lang ran after them as they quickly got into Tony’s red Hycade. He leaned next to the window and aggressively whispered, “Wait, wait. Tony, why do you get Yuno?”

Tony whispered back, “It’ll be faster if I drive, and I already had to deal with those two last week. It’s your turn.”

“Motherfucker—”

“Bye, Buddha! I love you!” Tony sped away before he could reply.

Lang groaned and turned his attention back to Raymond and Mickey who had exited the manor but were still at each other’s throats. “Ay! Get in the fucking car! Let’s go!”

“Shotgun!” Mickey called out and ran to the passenger seat.

“I’ll show you shotgun, you fucking—”

“Stop fighting! Get in the fucking car!” Lang ordered as he got into the driver’s seat and Raymond slid in the recently cleaned back seat. Alfred had washed them as soon as they arrived at CLean Manor.

“Can we stop by the UwU Café for dinner first?” Mickey asked. “I’m hungry~”

Lang looked at him incredulously. “Seriously, Mickleton?”

“Either that or I pass out from low blood sugar on the job.”

Lang grumbled and started the engine. “Fine, let’s go.”

✧₊⁺⭒☣₊‧⁺.⚝.⁺‧₊❀⋆⁺₊✦

Fifteen minutes later in the UwU Café, Lang carried his colorful tray of cat-themed food to a booth and sat down. He released a long sigh, letting the tension flow out of his body. “Alright. I’m having dinner, I’m fucking chilling out, and I’m gonna pet some pussies.”

As if on cue, an orange cat jumped onto his lap and rubbed its head against his hand. He complied, giving the small animal some attention by petting its back and scratching behind its ears before setting it back down on the floor so he could eat his food.

Raymond sat next to him and viciously stabbed his fork into the cat face drawn in chocolate syrup on his Doki Doki Pancakes. He was still exasperated from dealing with Mickey, but a few bites of his sugary and fluffy treat made him settle down a bit.

Mickey had gotten distracted petting a black cat at the entrance of the café, and Lang called him over, “Ay, Mickey, come take a seat! C’mon, we’re having dinner!”

“I will be there in a second!” Mickey finished scratching the friendly feline’s chin, then made his way over with his tray of food, sitting across from them on the other side of the booth.

Unlike Raymond and Lang who slowly savored their food, he quickly ate his Charismatic Kawaii Curry and chugged his boba milk tea. “Wow, this is delicious.”

“I guess it is nice to eat something other than ramen every once in a while,” Lang said around a mouthful of Om-Nom Omurice.

Mickey drank the rest of his tea, and set the empty cup down on the table, letting out a sigh of satisfaction in the process. “Harry told me he tried boba tea yesterday for the first time ever, and thought of me while sucking up the balls.”

Lang scrunched his face at the innuendo. “Why you?”

“I’ve been trying to convince him to drink it for ages. He still prefers his tea the British way, though. A real ‘cuppa’ as he says.”

“Yeah, that sounds like Harry,” Lang agreed and took another bite of his sweet and savory rice.

Mickey took out his phone, monitoring his blood sugar and making sure the right amount of insulin had been administered into his body, then he checked the time. “Hey, we should change our clothes before we set up the jets.”

Lang nodded. “Yeah, we’ll do that.”

“Alright, let’s go,” Mickey said, already picking up his tray and standing up.

“You wanna go right now? I’m eating my fucking dinner. Why you rushing me?” Lang slurped his avocado smoothie in annoyance.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Mickey apologized, and sat back down. “I didn’t know you weren’t finished! I was thinking we wear—”

“Hey, keep your voice down,” Raymond chided. “We’re in public.”

“Oh, yeah, right.” Mickey looked around, and even though the café wasn’t that crowded, he probably shouldn’t yell about their future criminal activities. He leaned over the table and whispered, “I was thinking that Lang and I should wear the full fighter jet outfit for the aesthetics.”

“Sure, we can do that,” Lang agreed.

As Lang and Raymond both finished their food and drinks, Ash Ketchup, the owner of the cat café, walked by their booth. She was dressed in a light pink vest over a white dress shirt with white shorts and a black bow tie. Her long red hair was tied in a low ponytail and she wore pink cat ears on her head.

“Hey, Ash!” Mickey waved her over. “I don’t know if your employees told you my offer, but I am willing to hunt down anyone who messes with the cats in this café as long as I get to name two of the cats.”

“Oh! Well, you know, we have had several people come in specifically to shoot the cats?” Ash brought her hand up to her chin, considering the proposal.

“That’s what I was told, and that’s why I’m offering this.”

“Hm, interesting,” Raymond stated indifferently as if he wasn’t one of the people shooting felines in his free time.

Lang got an idea and intervened. “Ash, I will give you $150,000 to name a cat. Two cats! So, I’ll give you $300,000. Specifically, the cats that Mickey wants to name. I want to name them.”

“Wh-What?!” She exclaimed, taken aback by the large offer. “What do you—Just out of curiosity, what do you want to name them?”

“Uh, well, I’ll name one, Mickey Is Cringe. And I’ll name the other one, Mickey Can’t Name This Cat.”

Ash chuckled at the suggestions. “Oh, shit. Hell yeah.”

Mickey wasn’t bothered by the gibe and shrugged in response. “Honestly, that sounds great. Anytime that I live in Lang’s head rent free is a good time.”

Lang scoffed, “Of course you gotta live rent free. You can’t afford to live in there, Mickey. You’re broke.”

“Actually not anymore, Lang,” Mickey countered. “Ever since I left CG, I’ve been surprisingly up good.”

Raymond let his forehead drop onto the table with a heavy thump and groaned into the surface. He had had enough of this idle conversation. Every minute spent with Mickey was utter torture, and he just wanted to get this job done and over with. The only thing preventing him from leaving at that very moment was Lang’s earlier reaction to Mickey attempting to rush him out of the café. He didn’t want to upset the Chinese man further.

Raymond mumbled into the table, “God, I hate the new Mickey honestly.”

Mickey raised an eyebrow in amusement and asked, “What do you mean by that, Ray?”

“What do you mean the ‘new Mickey’?” Lang asked. “This has always been Mickey.”

Raymond lifted his head up, still resting his chin on the table. “Nah, he just has money now. He used to be the down bad, stripper, dude.”

“Oh, I have heard tales of his fireman hot tub streams,” Ash recalled.

“Yeah, now look at him.” Raymond gestured to Mickey’s entire being. “What happened?”

“This Mickey is the best version of Mickey. What are you talking about?” Lang asked, confused about what Raymond meant. In his eyes, Mickey hadn’t even changed that much.

Mickey smirked and leaned over the table. “Ray, it kinda sounds like you just don’t want to see me succeed. Why’s that? Does it get under your skin?”

Raymond sat up, lifting his head off the table and slamming his fist down on the surface. “ You do not get under my skin. I will get under your skin.”

“In your dreams, Ray~” Mickey teased.

“Motherfucker, I will rip the flesh off your body and wear it like—”

“Anyways, let’s get the fuck outta here, guys,” Lang cut Raymond off and pushed him out of the booth. “Ash, it was great to see you, and I’m glad your business is thriving. Sorry about my boys. They’re a bunch of fucking children.”

Ash giggled and waved at them as they left. “It’s all good. Thank you very much. I appreciate you guys coming in.”

Lang guided Raymond to the door. “Get outta here, you fucking cocksuckers.”

Mickey disposed of their trash in the garbage can, then followed after them, exiting the café.

Back in the family Stratum once again, in the same seats as before, Lang drove them to the Jetsam Terminal. It was a quiet and peaceful drive for about five minutes.

Then, Mickey felt the need to speak. “Lang, I just want to say that even though I’ve been the one acting as the leader for this heist, I think that overall you are a great leader.”

Lang bristled at the comment, but didn't let it show. Every now and then, people would get the impression that he was the leader of the Cleanbois, and he didn't like it. “Well, I’m not a leader, so it doesn’t matter,” he said nonchalantly.

“Yeah, there are no leaders in our group.”

Mickey heard the bite in Raymond’s voice. Even without looking at him, he could tell that Raymond was glaring at the back of his head, and he couldn't resist the urge to irritate him some more. “Okay. If that’s the case, then I’ll take the role of leader. Thank you so much~”

“Good luck being a leader,” Lang stated sarcastically.

Raymond looked back and forth between them, unable to tell if they were joking or not. Even though Mickey was always joking with him, it was still hard to tell the difference between silly Mickey and serious Mickey. It was even harder to tell with Lang. “If Mickey ever became the leader of Cleanbois, I would immediately leave and become part of another crew.”

Lang rolled his eyes at his response. “Guys, there’s no leader.”

“I know there’s no leader. That’s why I love this group,” Raymond said, unnaturally monotone, almost as if he was trying to convince himself.

“Ray~ I am the leader,” Mickey double downed, knowing it would provoke him.

Realizing Mickey’s true intentions, Lang backtracked and went along with the joke. “I mean, if you think about it, there was no leader and all it took was for somebody to just claim that they were the leader and Mickey was the first person to do that.”

“True. I am the leader. Thank you.” Mickey looked out the window, hiding his smirk and waiting patiently for the Russian man to scream.

“What the hell is this?! Mickey, are you actually the—Uh, I need to clarify this before I do anything more with you!”

Mickey grinned wider from Raymond predictably taking the bait. “Yes, I am the leader of the Cleanbois.”

Raymond recomposed himself and spoke as calmly as he could. “All right. I should probably start looking for different place to go because if Mickey’s my leader, I don’t know if that’s going to work out.”

“That’s fine. I’ll give you three days to think about it, and then you can send in your resignation on paper,” Mickey said, trying to sound serious and keeping his smile out of his voice.

“Alright, there you go,” Lang confirmed. He wasn’t sure where Mickey was going with this discussion, but he wasn’t really paying attention to it, choosing to focus more on the road and the risky job they were about to do. “Getting back on topic. Uh, Mickey, what’s the plan for once we’re in the air?”

“Listen, I was thinking—”

“Jesus Christ. Mickey’s the leader of—What the fuck is happening right now?!” Raymond yelled, throwing away his calm composure.

“What do you mean?” Lang asked, confused by Raymond’s sudden burst of anger. “Mickey is literally a strategist. He always comes up with plans.”

“No, what’s happening now where he’s the leader of the fucking Cleanbois?!”

“It’s happening now. Sorry, Ray,” Mickey said, not sounding apologetic at all.

Raymond couldn't decipher what Mickey’s tone meant, and glanced over at the man he respected the most. “Lang, no disrespect, but I always saw you as one of the people who led the family.”

“I don’t know why we’re still arguing about this.” Mickey intervened before Lang could respond. “We already decided I’m the leader. We’re moving on. Anyways, let’s focus on this job.”

“What do you mean?!”

“Yeah, okay. What are we doing, Mickey?” Lang asked again.

“What I’m thinking is that after Yuno and Ray get into the jets and we take off, we should start dropping sporadically to divert attention. Ray, andasmuchasitpainsmeconsideringyouwanttoleavemyorganization, has all the—”

“What’d you just say? The fuck?!”

Despite Mickey being cut off by Raymond, Lang could tell what he was about to say. “I think Tony should be the one to carry—”

“What the fuck you just say, Mickey?!”

Despite Lang being cut off by Raymond, Mickey could tell what he was about to say. “Stop interrupting, Ray. So, you want Tony to carry the loot? That also works—”

“Repeat that one more time, Mickey!”

“—if Ray and Yuno leave it in his car before they—”

“Mickey!”

“Stop fucking fighting!” Lang yelled, tired of Raymond interrupting.

“I’m gonna fucking kill this guy in literally ten seconds if he doesn’t clarify what he just said,” Raymond warned in full seriousness.

Mickey smiled and turned around to look him directly in the eyes as he repeated his words. “I said, ‘Ray, and as much as it pains me considering you want to leave my organization, has—’”

“Your organiza—I am going to put a bullet in your head and leave you at the bottom of the ocean and never see you fucking again if you continue saying shit like that!”

Lang choked on his breath, and coughed in surprise at Raymond’s extreme threat. “Jesus, Ray. Oh my god.”

Mickey forced himself to drop his smile and face forward again. “It’s my organization. We decided I was the leader. And I smiled through the pain of you leaving it, like you said to do.”

“Stop the car,” Raymond demanded, fuming with anger.

“I-I’m not—”

“Stop the fucking car, Lang! I am going to kill Mickey right fucking now!”

“Wha—Why?” Lang asked, trying not to laugh. He found Raymond’s unreasonable fury towards Mickey hilarious, but he knew that the upset man would take his laughter the wrong way if he heard it. So he did his best to stifle his laughter.

“Lang, as leader of the Cleanbois, I order you to not stop the car.” Mickey laughed and slightly feared for his life as he gave Lang the order. It came out sounding more like a desperate plea. He could tell that he pushed the joke too far with Raymond, and he was torn between fear and amusement. Raymond had never given him a direct threat before, and he wasn’t sure if the gangster would actually do it. At the very least, he felt safe knowing that he most likely wouldn’t follow through with the threat in front of Lang.

“Alright, sounds good,” Lang obeyed, continuing to drive. “I can’t. My leader told me not to.”

Raymond gritted his teeth and spoke slowly, “Mickey, I am going to put a fucking bullet in your head.”

“I take orders from my leader. He told me not to. Like what do you want from me?” Lang asked and glanced in the rearview mirror to check on Raymond.

Realizing that this conversation wasn’t going in his favor—and Lang would be displeased if he actually shot Mickey—Raymond didn’t reply. He simply ignored both of them and looked out the window, trying to cool down his boiling blood. As of lately, this always happened when he interacted with Mickey, and he hated it. He constantly got heated and riled up with the infuriating ex-gangster, and he never had an outlet for his frustrations.

As a gang leader, every single time Raymond wanted someone dead, he would kill them with zero hesitation and no questions asked. Unfortunately, he couldn't do that to Mickey because of his relationships with Lang, Tony, and Yuno. Whenever he got into a fight with him, the dispute would end with Raymond sitting by himself, trying to drain the bloodlust from his veins and swallow back the venom dripping from his mouth. It felt like he was getting blue balled with the uncontrollable desire to kill Mickey.

After a few seconds had passed and the tension dissipated slightly, Mickey continued his explanation to Lang. “All right, so listen, the plan is this: Yuno gets into my fighter jet, Ray gets into your fighter jet, and Tony keeps all the loot in the car. Ray jumps out first and parachutes to his nearest bike, next Yuno jumps out and lands at a different bike, then you jump out and you’ll be picked up by Tony. I will continue to buy time in the sky until everyone is out. It’s just important for you to jump out third ‘cause most cops will probably break off to pursue Ray and Yuno first, and that gives Tony time to lose the cops following him. We should give Ray and Yuno duffel bags filled with paper or something to make it look like they have money on them.”

“That sounds good to me. I can probably find that in my facility.”

They finally arrived at the Jetsam Terminal. Cerberus Industries’ secret research and development facility was located under it, but Cassie and Leslie would be very upset if he revealed the exact location to Mickey and Raymond.

Lang parked at the edge of the platform to take out the fighter jets by himself. Which only left one problem. “Okay, I’m gonna get the fighter jets. I need you both to stay here and watch the car. Do. Not. Kill. Each. Other.”

“Understood. Ray, as leader of the Cleanbois, I order you to listen to Lang.”

Raymond sighed apathetically, feeling numb and empty after forcing his wrath to evaporate. “You know what? I’m actually okay with that ‘cause you’re admitting that Lang is the true leader.”

“I’m no one’s leader!” Lang yelled and slammed the door closed behind him. “Wait in the car!”

Lang stormed away and disappeared from their sight as he zigzagged through the tall stacks of maritime containers until he found his secret elevator hidden in a concrete wall. He entered a code in the key pad to reveal a scanner, and positioned his eyes in front of it to confirm his identity. It enabled the elevator which took him down to the meeting room.

He walked over to the laboratory on the other side of the room to grab the gray fighter jet clothes, helmets, and gear. He also found two duffel bags which he stuffed with crumpled, blank pieces of paper to make it appear as if they were filled with money.

Tossing both straps over his shoulder and turning to leave, he abruptly stopped himself when he saw the completed wingsuit prototype hanging on the wall next to him. It still resembled a Toy Story Buzz Lightyear wingsuit, but the colors had been exchanged with the Cerberus black and red. It worked well during the final stages of testing, but it still needed to be tested during a free fall from ten thousand feet.

Before he could overthink it, he shrugged and grabbed the wingsuit off the wall.

With arms full of supplies, Lang took another elevator down to a bunker which contained the two magnificent fighter jets surrounded by several other aircraft prototypes that Cerberus Industries was currently working on in secret. One fighter jet had a red livery while the other had an orange livery.

Lang climbed into the aircraft with the red livery, dumped the supplies into the passenger seat, and turned it on. He steered it towards the side of the cave. The rocky wall disappeared the second he approached it, and it reappeared after he flew through. It was another form of advanced security that Dean made before he disappeared.

To Lang’s relief, Mickey and Raymond had not killed each other. They weren’t even acknowledging the other’s existence, too stunned by the sight of the fighter jet. They were both standing outside of the Stratum, watching Lang fly down to the Terminal.

“Oh my god.”

“Holy shit.”

Lang parked the aircraft next to the car, then took the secret elevator back down to the bunker to bring out the second fighter jet, parking it next to the other one when he returned.

“This is insane,” Mickey said in awe. “Why is Cerberus privately manufacturing fighter jets?”

“That’s classified information. Why don’t you give it a test drive while we wait? We’ll be here for a while anyway.”

“Oh, fuck yeah.”

Lang tossed Mickey the keys for the fighter jet with orange livery, and he excitedly got in and took off, getting a feel for the controls and learning the mechanics.

Raymond glared at him as he easily flew in circles and swooped through the sky with ease. “I hate Mickey.”

“We’re your boys, Ray. We give each other a hard time; it’s how it goes. But we know that we still got each other's backs at the end of the day.”

“Yeah, you always have my back, Lang. When has Mickey ever done that for me? I barely know this guy other than the fact that he likes to fucking piss me off. He thinks he can mess with me like we’re boys just ‘cause he sees you and Tony do it. And it’s fine when you guys do it ‘cause I know you guys, but he just takes every single opportunity he can to make fun of me. And I’m like, ‘What the hell? What have I done to you?’ It just gets so exhausting to deal with. It fucking sucks.”

Raymond was crossing his arms while leaning against the Stratum, staring up at the fighter jet and silently hoping that Mickey would crash and burn.

Lang observed Raymond’s reserved posture and emotion. He had seen that look plenty of times before, and not just on Raymond. It was a very bad look that usually resulted in a very bad outcome.

“No, I get it. Trust me, I get it,” Lang conceded.

“That’s why I’m saying this now when Mickey’s up there ‘cause I know that if he was down here, he’d be laughing.”

Lang sighed and patted his shoulder. “I-I’ll talk to Mickey, alright? I’ll handle it, Ray. I got you.”

“Thank you, brother.”

Lang handed him the keys to the Stratum. “Take the car to Tony. He and Yuno should be just about done getting the supplies, so meet up with them and start the heist. We’ll be here listening to the radio channel.”

“All right, I’m on it.”

Lang watched Raymond drive away. Even though he knew that Mickey was just joking around with him, he had seen things like this happen in the past. He knew people who had bottled up their feelings and repeatedly brushed off gibes, allowing resentment to fester over time until they eventually exploded. The fact that Raymond was being honest about his emotions right now was a cause for concern. He wouldn’t have mentioned it unless it truly bothered him.

Mickey landed the fighter jet next to Lang and climbed down. “That was fucking awesome! Okay, we should get dressed and—”

“Just a sec, Mickey. Uh, for real though, we gotta chill on Ray’s shit, alright?”

“What? It didn’t seem like a big deal. Just boys fucking with the boys, you know?”

“Yes, Mickey, but me and you are built different. We don’t give a shit what people have to say, but some people will. It’ll get under their skin, and we gotta look out for our fucking boys.”

Mickey sighed in defeat. “Understood.”

“When you see that shit actually starts bothering him, it’s gonna become a problem. There are people who let those negative emotions build up inside of them until they blow up over the tiniest thing. We can’t let that happen with him.”

“Yeah, I understand. Well, I don’t, but I understand you not wanting me to fuck with Ray.”

“‘Talk shit, get hit’ is a real thing, Mickey.”

“It’s only a real thing for people with fragile egos who take everything too seriously. A little banter toughens up your skin, and the words just slide right off. We literally will not give a shit about what people have to say about us. In my experience, most men think they can talk up a tough game, but it always ends in a physical altercation. All they do is beat me up when they can’t shit talk back.”

“Oh, you’re on your way to get beat up by Ray, that’s for sure. You better hope your tough skin can take a bullet from Ray’s AK ‘cause I don’t think he’ll banter with you. Please, just chill for a bit, alright? He’s like a dog. You just gotta let him warm up to you first to get him to stop barking at you.”

Mickey crossed his arms and argued, “I just wanna say that Yuno could make the same jokes that I do, and Ray wouldn’t have this reaction to it. Why does he want to shoot me and not him?”

“Shooting at Yuno is like shooting at a cute ass kitten. Why the fuck would you ever do that? Yuno is like the cutest little kitty in the world. Y’know what I mean?”

“Yeah. It means it must be great to be the favorite child in this family. Figuratively speaking, Yuno is the youngest and the favorite child, Ray is the serious and rebellious teenager, I’m the cool, gay cousin, Tony is the fun uncle, and you’re big daddy Lang. That’s the structure of this family.”

Lang didn’t respond right away, making Mickey feel uneasy. He was just staring at him like he had said something surprising. “Um…what, Lang?”

Lang’s shocked expression shifted into a knowing gaze and he stepped closer to Mickey. “So you do see yourself as a part of this family. I thought you were gonna do your own thing after you left CG?”

“Uh, I…well…I-I mean…” Mickey stepped back, trying to hide how flustered he became. “Don’t overthink it, okay? I've been hanging out with a lot of other groups, too. Let’s just hurry up and get dressed. They could be starting the heist any minute now.”

“Okay, let’s do it.” Lang gave Mickey one fighter jet outfit, and kept one for himself along with the wingsuit.

Mickey laughed at the sight of it. “What the fuck? Buzz Lightyear, is that you?”

“Don’t disrespect the wingsuit, Mickey.”

He eyed it skeptically. “Does it even work?”

“...We’re about to see.”

♣₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅ⴵ⋅⁺‧₊❀⋆⁺₊𓅭

Raymond and Yuno hid in an alleyway near the Pacific Standard Public Deposit Bank, waiting for the two Gruppe Sechs employees to finish loading their armored truck with money. The moment they drove away from the bank and passed by their hiding spot, Raymond shot a dart into one of the front wheels, causing it to lose traction and forcing them to pull over.

The employees stepped out of the vehicle only for each of them to be hit in the neck by a dart of propofol—a fast-acting intravenous anesthetic—making them fall unconscious within seconds. Even though Raymond no longer owned Betta Life Pharmaceuticals publicly, he had retained his position as the owner off the books, and Kitty still gave him medicines whenever he asked for them.

With the employees sedated, Raymond and Yuno stole their IDs and uniforms which consisted of a a green shirt with the Gruppe Sechs logo embroidered onto the right sleeve, a black bulletproof vest, dark green trousers, and a helmet that luckily covered their faces. Then they tied the employees’ limbs together, and drove away in their armored truck. Even while using the truck and IDs to sneak into the 707 Vespucci building—the high-rise office building which contained the Gruppe Sechs offices and garages—it still took a little bit of hacking from Yuno to get into the staff room that they wanted. Through the power of Yuno’s silver tongue and friendly demeanor, it didn’t take them long at all to get a fellow work employee to send them a PDF with all of the Gruppe Sechs routes mapped out for them.

To their disappointment, none of the routes on the map led to anything called a VAR. The employee they questioned didn’t seem to know anything about it either. Regardless, they got back into the armored truck and traveled to each location to search for it anyway. Raymond did the driving while Yuno filled up five duffel bags with the money in the back of the truck.

Tony followed behind them the whole time in the Stratum while wearing his usual dark gray crime outfit. The routes were fairly simple even with Raymond’s mediocre comms and Yuno’s incoherent directions. It didn’t really matter that much because the truck could only go fifty miles per hour, so it was impossible for Tony to lose sight of them.

To the surprise of no one, after two hours of driving to over twenty locations, they finished the last route without finding the VAR and the police had figured out that they had hijacked the truck. They now had Air-1 and five police cruisers pursuing after them.

“Alright, ditch the truck! Get in, boys!” Tony called out.

Once they gained enough distance from the cruisers, Raymond and Yuno ran out of the truck with the duffel bags and got into the Stratum. As soon as they were in, Tony headed south to the Jetsam Terminal at a hundred miles per hour.

Raymond informed Lang and Mickey on his handheld radio. “We’re heading to the Terminal now! We’re almost at the spot!”

Lang replied, “Alright. R, get in the red one. Y, in the orange one.”

“Orange, Y! Orange!” Mickey yelled. He and Lang turned on the engines and opened the cockpits, getting prepared for take off.

“We’re in the orange?” Yuno double checked.

“Orange you glad I’m your pilot?!” Mickey laughed at his own joke, and Yuno laughed along with him, much to the dismay of Raymond.

Tony drifted the car sideways and blocked off a pathway in between two rows of maritime containers, allowing Raymond and Yuno to run out without the cops following them. By the time some of the cruisers had driven around the containers and Tony had moved out of the way, Raymond and Yuno had gotten into the fighter jets with Lang and Mickey, and they took off into the sky.

Both jets headed northwest while Tony headed northeast. He checked the back seats and nodded in approval, seeing that Raymond and Yuno remembered to leave the duffel bags there. Now all he had to do was lose the cops, pick up Lang and Mickey, and get away with the money.

After looking out the window for a couple of minutes, Raymond saw La Puerta below him. “Okay, this is my stop! Good luck, boys!” He grabbed the decoy duffel bag and jumped out of the fighter jet, parachuting down to one of his bikes in a bush. Air-1 must have transmitted the action because two police cruisers arrived as soon as he got on his Akuma and drove away.

Since there was only one airborne police vehicle, Lang turned back south to further divide the police’s attention while Mickey proceeded to fly north. Air-1 relayed the split and prioritized following Mickey instead of Lang.

Mickey flipped a switch and pressed a few buttons until a voice came through the jet’s radio.

“Unidentified aircrafts, this is ATC. Please, identify yourselves or land. Otherwise, we will be forced to scramble the jets.”

“What was that?!” Yuno asked in shock. “Was that a message from Air-1?”

Mickey explained, “No, that was air traffic control. They monitor and direct aircraft to prevent collisions in the airspace. They’re definitely communicating with the police right now, though.”

He put on a headset and pressed a button. “Hello, ATC~ This is DownBad-1! How can I help you on this exquisite evening?”

“DownBad-1, your aircraft is not registered or licensed for flight, and it was just seen being used in a hijacking. Please land immediately or we will scramble the jets and make you land.”

“Hmm,” Mickey pretended to consider his options. “Nah~ I don’t think I will. How ‘bout you scramble those jets and we’ll see who really controls these skies?”

“DownBad-1, this is your final warning. Please land or you will be shot down.”

Mickey was unbothered by the threat and disregarded it, looking down at Fort Zancudo below them instead. “Y, you said there’s a bike here, right?”

“Oh yeah! I’m going, I’m going! Later!” Yuno jumped out, taking a decoy duffel bag with him and parachuting down to a bike. A few police cruisers arrived at his location, pursuing after him as he drove east.

Mickey let the situation play out for a few minutes to let everyone do their thing. At this point in the getaway, they were in the optimal position because all five of them each had their own vehicle and were driving in different directions all over the island, making it difficult for the police to organize their pursuit.

Letting another moment pass by, Mickey took off the headset and switched to his handheld radio. “Guys, how’s it looking?”

“Good. I think I just lost them,” Raymond replied, checking behind him as he drove around the Southside. His motorcycle made it easy for him to weave through the narrow alleyways. “Yeah, it looks like they don’t see me. Does anyone need help?”

“I’m okay, but I still got a cop on me.” Tony drove as fast as he could through Sandy Shores. Since Air-1 wasn’t following him, he decided to go north out of the city where he could push the top speed of the Stratum and show off his street racing skills.

“I’m just chilling.” Lang was enjoying the sunset over the horizon where the ocean met the sky, and the red-orange clouds floated over the city.

Mickey flew higher to see better. The only aircrafts he could see were Air-1, who was still following him, and Lang hovering over Los Santos. The jet threat from ATC didn’t appear to be imminent, but it would be safer to get the next step of the plan done sooner rather than later. “Okay. When T loses the cops, L will jump out of the jet and T will pick him up. Hopefully, the cops don’t see it, and you guys can get out to stash away the money.”

“Alright,” Tony responded. “Let me quickly lose this cop, and then—”

“Oh, god! Dang it! Dang it, man! I got spiked!” Yuno’s panicked voice cut him off. Every time Raymond and Tony lost a police cruiser, it would transfer over to Yuno’s pursuit. In his desperate attempts to flee the four cruisers surrounding him, he didn’t notice the sharp strip of metal shining in front of him until it was too late. The spikes punctured both of his wheels, forcing him to ditch the bike and resume the pursuit on foot.

“Where?! Where at, Y?!”

“Y, you good?”

Raymond and Tony asked.

“I need a pick up! Help! Help!” Yuno jumped over a wooden fence and started running across a massive dirt field that was growing something. There were rows and rows of sprouts that he was stepping on, but the alternative was running in the streets where the officers were. At least this way he was able to keep his distance from them because they weren’t willing to damage the property to arrest him. Though, the cruisers started to drive around to the other side of the field to surround him, and he wasn’t sure how he was going to avoid them over there.

“Where?! Where?!” Raymond asked again.

“I’m in Grapeseed, I think. By the, um, I-I don’t know.” Yuno searched for landmarks, but all he saw was dirt, trees, and police cruisers.

“Ping me. I’m almost there.” Tony was the closest to him—driving north from Sandy Shores—but he needed to know his exact location.

“I’m going, Y!”

“We’ll meet you there!”

“I’m on the way!”

“We’re coming! We’re coming in a fighter jet, a bike, everything!”

“We’re coming with everything!”

Tony, Mickey, and Raymond’s voices blended together as Yuno struggled to take his phone out of his buttoned pants pocket to send them a ping. The pants that weren’t even his; it belonged to the Gruppe Sechs employee. The clothes were uncomfortable and too large for his body. He didn’t like the itchy feeling of the fabric across his skin, or the smell of cologne from the collar of the shirt, or the way the strap of the duffel bag clung to the side of his neck as he ran. All of that was distracting, and he needed to focus on running away from the police and pinging his location to Tony. But he couldn’t because his phone was in his pocket and the clothes were—Yuno stopped that looping train of thought and replied, “I can’t, I can’t. I-I’m carrying the duffel bag and—Ah! I keep tripping over plants, and stepping on my pants, and I can’t—”

“Here! I’m here! Jump on!”

He looked up from the dirt field and saw Raymond to his left, hidden behind a small quonset hut. Yuno changed directions to head towards him, jumping over the fence and getting on the back seat of the bike. Despite just being in the Southside, Raymond rushed over to Grapeseed and was fortunate to find Yuno in the first field he checked.

“Hello? Y, you there?” Tony asked, still looking for him through the streets of Grapeseed.

“Yeah, R picked me up.” Yuno looked over his shoulder, observing the six police cruisers chasing after them. “Um, I don’t know how we’re gonna lose the cops in the open like this.”

“You want me to pick you guys up again?” Tony offered.

“No, I think R’s got it. I think we—Oh Jesus!”

“Holy fuck!” Tony swerved to the right as Raymond swerved to the left. Thankfully they swerved in opposite directions, otherwise they would’ve had a head on collision with each other. The police pursuing behind both vehicles weren’t as lucky. Unable to react in time, two of the cruisers collided.

Tony grumbled, “You fucking—This is why you communicate where you are! Comms, please!”

“Motherfucker, I did!” Raymond insisted. “I said, ‘I’m here!’ What you think that means?!”

“That don’t mean shit! You gotta—”

“No, no, no, no! Ugh, that’s so unfortunate!” Raymond groaned. He was too distracted with yelling at Tony that he didn’t notice the spike strips in front of him until it was too late.

“Guys, there’s a police jet aiming a missile at me. Do I jump now or—”

“Help! Help!” Yuno pleaded. “We just got spiked! This is a very sharp area!”

“Okay, I’m coming!” Tony made a U-turn and drove back to where he last saw them, except they were now running on foot. He drifted in front of the police cruisers, using his vehicle to block them from Raymond and Yuno. The moment they slid into the back seats, he zoomed over to the highway and headed north. It seemed like the police had Grapeseed mostly secured with how they already had spike strips placed on almost every corner.

As Tony drove them to Paleto, he counted eight police cruisers following behind him and Air-1 hovering above them. However, that problem was quickly taken care of as a spiraling fighter jet with orange livery dived into the police aircraft, sending it crashing into the ocean.

“M, what should we do?” Tony asked.

“You guys need to split up to get some cops off of you, so that you can pick up L. Any moment now they could scramble the jets and blast us out of the sky, so we gotta be quick. Also, I might’ve just killed Air-1, so they may get more aggressive. We’re running out of time and options here.”

“Oh! We hid my Vagrant in the forest near the bottom of Mount Chiliad! We can switch to that.” Yuno suddenly remembered that he wanted to have his own backup plan just in case Raymond’s bikes failed him.

“Isn’t that your legal vehicle? Does it have a fake plate?” Tony asked, just to be safe.

“Yeah, I gave him one,” Raymond said. “It’s just up ahead on this road, too.”

Tony followed the highway until the Paleto Forest appeared on their left, then he drove off-road to go through the trees.

“Yeah, this is it,” Yuno confirmed.

Raymond gave Tony directions. “To the left, to the left. Behind in that lumber yard—Uh, that lumber thing.”

Yuno nodded. “Yeah, left a little bit.”

“It’s in that left bush on the left of it—Oh, it’s off to the side of us right now.”

Tony drove up to a big green bush. “Right here?”

“No, no, no, no, no, that big lumber thing behind us.” Raymond pointed behind him.

Yuno did a circling motion with his finger. “We have to circle a bit.”

Tony did a U-turn, but didn’t see anything that looked like a big lumber thing. “Motherfucker, what the fuck are you talking about? Big lumber?”

“Oh, I see the problem.” Yuno realized what they were trying to ask Tony to do, and in spite of their stressful situation, he couldn’t help but giggle into his hand.

Tony drove up to a bush that was next to a woodpile. “Right here?”

Raymond pointed to his right. “It’s to our right now. Directly west. That big lumber thing.”

Tony drove up to a bush that was next to a stack of tree trunks. “Right here?”

Raymond sighed. “Uhh, directly south now. The lumber behind us, T.”

“Motherfucker, we’re in a fucking forest! What do you mean?!” Tony screamed in frustration. “Fucking lumber all over!”

“Now west! Now west!” Raymond directed. “It’s the pile of lumber right there!”

“It’s closer to the left! Left!” Yuno said through fits of laughter. “The left! That bush to the left!”

Tony finally headed towards the bush that they wanted, and Raymond jumped up. “It’s this bush right here! Yeah, yeah!”

“Get out!” Tony parked next to the “left bush” in the forest, and Raymond and Yuno ran over to the Vagrant that was hidden in its leaves. As soon as Yuno turned on the engine, he drove up the side of the mountain. Tony continued driving on the highway to get back to the city to pick up Lang, and Mickey followed after him to help.

In the turmoil of rapid weaving through the forest to find Yuno’s Vagrant, the police became equally as disoriented as they were. Only two cruisers saw Raymond and Yuno get into the Vagrant, and went up the mountain to pursue after them. They were unsuccessful, losing them in five minutes because their cruisers weren’t made for that terrain and because they were going after Yuno who not only knew Mount Chiliad better than anyone else, but he also knew the Vagrant better than anyone else. It wasn’t a fast vehicle, but he knew how to use its traction and tight turning radius to traverse through the mountainside quickly and nimbly.

On the other side of the island, Tony was having a much harder time trying to lose the police. There were nine cruisers pursuing him, bumping and pitting his car whenever they could. Two officers had died in the Air-1 helicopter crash which gave the police the authorization to go rougher on the pursuit, but it was still too dangerous to shoot the car when it was in the middle of the bustling city.

Tony really didn’t want to ditch the Stratum after all they had been through the past few months, but it was getting crushed and he didn’t know how much longer it could last before it was destroyed. “Holy shit! M, they’re getting very aggressive right now! I don’t know if I’m gonna be able to lose them like this, and the car is in terrible condition.”

Another police cruiser went for a pit, and rammed into the right side of the Stratum, pinning Tony to the guardrail. He barely managed to prevent being boxed in by abruptly reversing and drifting around to drive into the oncoming traffic lane. When the cars braked and moved out of the way in fear, Tony drove off-road to a different street and continued the chase on the right side. “Fuck! They’re fucking plowing my ass! I might need a pick up!—Ngh!”

Tony was bumped from the back of the car, nearly giving him whiplash. Seeing that, Mickey dropped down onto the police cruiser, using the fighter jet to crush the vehicle before taking off into the sky again. Now Tony only had eight cruisers pursuing him.

“T, I have an idea! You know the canal jump onto Del Perro Freeway?”

“Of course.”

“Do it. Fucking send it as fast as you can. You’re gonna need insane height and speed.”

“Okay, okay, I’m going!” Tony drove to Mirror Park and went down into the canals. He built up speed until he reached a hundred and fifty miles per hour, and drove up the side of the canal. In the span of a few seconds, he saw the Del Perro Freeway overpass, sent the car flying out of the canal, and noticed Mickey’s fighter jet hovering underneath him.

Once Tony flew over the aircraft, two police cruisers tried to pursue after him, taking the jump as well, but Mickey intercepted them. Lifting the jet up and twisting, one wing hit a cruiser which launched it up into a column supporting the overpass, breaking a chunk of concrete out of the freeway. The other wing hit the second cruiser which sent it crashing down into a tanker truck, exploding on impact. It was enough to deter the other officers from continuing the pursuit via that route, so they drove out of the canals to try and look for a different route to pursue the Stratum.

Tony casually flipped and landed the car onto the freeway, then he saw the flames and debris burst out behind him. “Jesus fucking Christ!”

Mickey laughed as flew away from the smoke before it could damage the jet propellers. He put the headset back on and pushed a button. “Take that, ATC! I rule the fucking skies!”

“The jets are now en route to your location. You have been warned and you will be shot down.”

Mickey lowered his altitude until he was hovering over the Stratum. It was enough for Tony to understand the unspoken request and he slowed down.

“Well, ATC, I’m sorry to disappoint them, but I’ve gotta dip. That’s what they get for showing up late to the party. Also, just so you don’t forget, the name’s DownBad-1. Over and out~” He set the headset down and jumped out of the fighter jet, letting it crash into the ground and explode. Then he parachuted to the Stratum and got into the passenger seat. Under the cover of smoke and ash, Tony sped away, losing sight of every police cruiser in the process.

Mickey pulled out his handheld radio. “All right. Is everyone out?”

“Yup!”

“We’re good.”

Yuno and Raymond replied. Then as an afterthought, Yuno added, “Is Mr. L still in the jet?”

Tony stilled. Over the past fifteen minutes he was struggling to lose the police, he had forgotten about Lang. He couldn't even recall the last time he heard the man’s voice over the radio. “Um, B? You there, buddy?”

“Hello? Hello? You good?” Raymond also asked.

Lang didn’t respond. The ten seconds of silence that followed, filled them with dread.

“Oh fuck!” Mickey yelled. “Where is he?!”

.⋆ ｡⋆ ⴵ˚｡⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆.

Twenty minutes ago, Lang was getting ready to jump out of the fighter jet while waiting for Tony to pick him up. Suddenly a small but quick aircraft approached him, and it took him an embarrassingly long time to identify it as an LSPD fighter jet.

“Guys, there’s a police jet aiming a missile at me. Do I jump now or—” Lang couldn’t even finish his sentence before the missile was fired, aimed right at him. He just barely had enough time to open the cockpit and jump out. Watching his jet explode as he fell through the sky, he took a deep breath and readied himself to press the button on the bottom of the wingsuit, hoping that it would work like he had planned.

He pressed the button. The wings shot out on each side, and a gust of air pushed him higher into the sky.

Unlike jet packs, or rockets, or any other sort of device that relied on jet propulsion, the wingsuit was quiet. It didn’t have an engine or use fuel. It used the same technology as Leslie’s spring boots minus the annoyingly loud boing sound they make when activated. It allowed Lang to quietly fly through the air at eighty-eight miles an hour while using the wind currents and subtle gusts of air to steer.

The police jet tried to follow Lang’s movements, but his fight pattern was too unpredictable and it was too hard to keep track of him. Two more police jets joined the aerial pursuit, but they didn't fare any better than the first jet. They didn't even attempt to fire another missile at Lang, knowing that it was more likely to miss than hit. Compared to a large jet made of metal with the wide turning radius of a boat, Lang flew through the air like a bird. He was small, silent, and changed directions with the wind. His wingsuit couldn’t even be picked up on the police’s scanners. And when he dived down into the city, he couldn’t be seen at all.

Having easily lost the police by himself, he took a moment to fly through the city. Steering around buildings was more difficult than he originally thought it would be because they blocked the wind currents, but he was able to manage. As he soared around, he realized how little people actually looked up. Most people were glued to their phones, paying attention to the busy street roads, or idly walking around while socializing. Watching the normal routines of everyday life play out below him, gave him a sense of pride and power that he couldn’t quite explain.

Not a single person noticed him, and the feeling of pettiness washed over him. He spotted someone reading a book by the lake in Mirror Park, and he flew down low enough to turn a page as he passed by. The action nearly gave the person a heart attack as their head jerked up and watched him fly away.

Lang chuckled to himself, then decided to go to CLean Manor to test out the wingsuit’s landing capability. It was his first time flying to his castle, and it turned out that he wasn’t that familiar with his own rooftop. He ended up at a few different Vinewood mansions before he found his own.

As he dived to the side lawn, he pressed another button which released a parachute, allowing him to slowly glide onto the grass.

“Damn~ I’m fucking James Bond,” Lang said to himself as he detached the parachute and folded it up. He put it away in his bedroom along with his wingsuit and changed out of the fighter jet clothes into his regular black tank top and black dress pants.

He was fixing his hair when he got a phone call from Tony. “Hello?”

“Oh my god! Where are you?! Are you okay?!” Tony asked, fear permeating through his voice.

“Yeah, I’m in my castle.”

Lang’s calm voice shot the anxiety right out of him. “Oh. Wait, how long have you been out?”

“I’ve been out for a while, bitch. I fucking saved myself from being blasted by the cops. No thanks to any of you motherfuckers.”

“We were a little busy, okay?!” Tony defended, then switched to speaking on his radio. “Boys, he’s good. Go get changed, and meet in the gazebo of good vibes.”

The sunset was gone and the stars had come out by the time everyone arrived at the gazebo on the edge of the side lawn. The night view was beautiful. From that vantage point, they could see everything in the center of Los Santos to the ocean in the distance.

“Selfie time~” Mickey sang and took a picture of the five of them in the gazebo with the cityscape behind them. He looked at the picture on his phone and groaned. “Ugh, Tony you blinked. And Yuno, you’re too out of frame. Come closer.”

“Jesus Christ. Chill, Mickey,” Tony complained.

“C’mon, Mickleton. Get the vibes right, buddy,” Lang joined in.

As Mickey deleted the picture and prepared to take another one, Raymond shoved his ego down for a second and cleared his throat. “In the spirit of correcting the vibes…Mickey, as much as it pains me to say this, your Top Gun Heist plan was good.” He wasn’t sure if Lang had talked to Mickey yet, but he thought that Mickey’s attitude towards him might change if he extended an olive branch first.

Mickey kept his expression neutral and tilted his head. “It pains you to say it, huh?”

“Very much so.”

Mickey smirked and rested his arm over Raymond’s shoulders, moving his face close to his. “Well, if you’re gonna say it, might as well say it with a smile~”

The resulting sharp pain in Mickey’s face was entirely expected.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

After working with Mickey all day, Raymond decided to blow off some steam at the Vanilla Unicorn. He couldn’t help but feel ticked off by how often Mickey hung out with them now that he wasn’t tied to Chang Gang. He needed to get drunk out of his mind and get his dick satisfied to forget everything for a moment.

Some time after his fifteenth shot of vodka, Raymond was shirtless, only wearing a pair of pink athletic shorts, and making out with some girl he met on the dance floor, enjoying the taste of her lip gloss and running his hands across her exposed skin wherever he could. There was something soothing about the intoxicated and meaningless actions of lust that always managed to calm him down. When he felt her fingertips dipping below his waistband, he started leading her to a private booth so they could get to the fun part.

He made his way through the crowd, but just as he was about to go into the private VIP lounge area, he was tripped and he fell face first into the doorway. Grunting in pain, he stood up and looked behind him, immediately faced with Mickey dressed in his firefighter outfit and wearing the biggest grin on his face.

To piss him off further, Mickey held the girl’s other hand in his own, bringing her close to him and whispering something in her ear. Raymond assumed that Mickey must have said something along the lines of him being a slut or having a hundred wives because the girl suddenly pulled her hands out of their grips and slapped the Russian man’s face, strutting back into the crowd afterwards.

Raymond was unfazed by the slap and turned to glare at Mickey, the frustration from their car ride earlier returned in full force. He grabbed Mickey’s wrist and threw him into the VIP lounge, locking the door behind both of them.

Private booths were placed along the walls—each equipped with a black curtain—and a small hot tub sat in the center of the room. As the night was still young, the whole lounge area was empty.

“Wow, Ray~ You missed seeing me in this outfit that much, huh?~”

Raymond couldn't wait to punch the smirk off of Mickey’s face. At this point, he was literally asking for it.

Neither man being the type to back down from a fight, they both moved to throw the first punch at the same time, resuming their fist fight for the third time that day except this time none of the boys were around to stop it.

They both felt the impact land on the side of their face. Since Mickey was still sober, he regained his stability faster and threw a punch at Raymond’s shoulder, knocking him off balance and sending him falling into the hot tub. Without waiting for him to recover, he aimed a kick at his chest, but Raymond caught it with his hand and yanked, pulling him into the hot tub with him and causing his firefighter helmet to fall off.

Mickey gripped the edge of the hot tub with his hands to kick Raymond’s stomach, pushing him away and freeing his leg from his grip. With the extra distance, Raymond jumped out of the hot tub then kicked the water at Mickey’s face. While he was temporarily blinded, Raymond ran behind him and wrapped an arm around his neck, putting him in a chokehold.

Mickey grabbed Raymond’s arm with both of his hands, then squatted his legs to submerge himself beneath the water, dragging Raymond back into the hot tub with him. Both of them had to release their hold on each other to swim back up to the surface before they drowned.

They proceeded to punch and kick each other for another ten minutes—both in and out of the hot tub—until Mickey was able to pin Raymond on the ground. His chest and stomach were thrust against the tiled floor with Mickey’s knee pressing against his back, and his arms were restricted behind him within Mickey’s grasp. Raymond blamed the vodka for subjecting him to this pitiful position.

Seeing that he had won, Mickey made a finger gun gesture with his right hand and brought it up to Raymond’s temple, pretending to fire it and mimicking the sound of a gunshot with his mouth. Raymond’s dark glare made him laugh as stood up, releasing his arms from his grip.

Mickey picked up his helmet and put it back on his head as he sauntered back to the doorway. He threw a wink back at Raymond over his shoulder before unlocking the door and exiting the lounge.

As the door closed behind him, he missed the way Raymond’s eyes filled with bloodlust and resolve. It was almost as if his irises glowed red from his fiery passion and thirst for revenge.

Chapter Text

(Saturday, August 7, 2021)

“Do you remember~

The 21st night of September?~

Love was changin’ the minds of pretenders~

While chasin’ the clouds away~

Our hearts were ringin’~

In the key that our souls were singin’~

As we danced in the night, remember~

How the stars stole the night away, oh, yeah~

Hey, hey, hey~

Ba-dee-ya, say, do you remember~

Ba-dee-ya, dancin’ in September~

Ba-dee-ya, golden dreams were shiny days~”

Mickey sang along with the music that was blasting from the speakers, belting out the lyrics to “September” by Earth, Wind & Fire.

Ever since Dean disappeared in May, Lang had become the new owner of the Diamond Casino & Resort. Cassie was still the CEO, and handled most of the management. Today, the roof terrace was being used to host Lang’s birthday party.

Harry was drunkenly dancing next to Mickey until he drank the last drop of his beer. He tossed out the bottle and was about to grab a new one from the bar when he ran into someone he never expected to see in person.

“Sheldon Jones?”

“What’s going on, homie?” The Burger Shot employee and rising musical artist greeted him with a smile.

“Oh my god, Sheldon! I’m your biggest fan, man!”

“Oh, you like my music?”

“I am your biggest fucking fan, Sheldon. I know all the lyrics to ‘Don’t Forget Me.’ You're basically my hero, okay? I hope you know that.”

“Ah, thank you. I’m gonna be performing on stage soon, so I’ll sing that one for you.”

“Hell yeah! See you around, Sheldon. Take care.”

“Have a good day!”

Harry grabbed a beer from the bar and walked back to Mickey who was now sitting in one of the several lounge areas with Lang, Tony, Denzel, Nino, Leslie, and Raymond. They were all drinking excessively, sitting in a curved booth around a table covered in alcoholic beverages.

Tony was also snorting cocaine with Nino and Denzel until he felt light-headed and fell onto the floor.

“Tony, are you alright?” Lang asked.

Tony mumbled incoherently so Nino answered for him. “He’s not.”

After Tony shook away some of the dizziness from his head, he looked up and saw Lang standing over him. “Oh my god. Is that an angel?”

Lang sighed but he couldn’t wipe the smile off his face. “Tony, are you fucking serious?”

“What’s going on—” Tony gagged in the middle of his sentence, then vomited into a potted plant next to him.

“Oh shit!”

“Jesus, fuck!”

Nino and Lang yelled in disgust.

Tony wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and stood up on shaky footing. “Just gotta go to the bathroom. I’ll be back—Uhh, where is it?”

Lang knew that Tony wasn’t going to make it all the way to the bathroom on the other side of the terrace, so he led him over to a bush on the lawn next to them.

“Is this fine?” Tony asked.

“Yeah, just go ahead and pee in here. A-Are you okay, buddy?”

“I took a couple lines of coke, a little LSD, hold my dick I gotta pee.”

“I ain’t holding ya dick!”

Lang gave Tony some privacy as he did his business in the bush, then he helped him stumble back to the lounge area.

As he laid the wasted man down on an empty booth to rest, he heard Raymond make a suggestion.

“Guys, we should’ve done drinking competition.”

Lang scoffed confidently, “Okay, I can out drink anybody here. Are you kidding me?”

Harry doubted it given that Raymond had just drank another shot of vodka while Lang was sipping from a bottle of beer like himself. “...Lang, don’t you drink beer?”

“Yeah, but I can drink anything.”

Raymond poured himself his twentieth shot of vodka and easily downed it. “That sounds like fucking challenge, baby.”

Mickey rolled his eyes and imitated Raymond’s Russian accent. “Lang, I’ll have you know I was challenger in competitive drinking. I can drink anything. Cow’s piss mixed with vodka, my favorite drink.”

“True. Very true.” Raymond nodded seriously.

Mickey huffed, “You see, you don’t even—”

“You guys understand that I’m from the north?” Leslie asked. “If we had a competition, you guys would never live. I would end your life.”

“Well, I’m only drinking White Claw.” Mickey picked up the white can and swirled it in the air. “And I’m a little pussy bitch, so I’m gonna be drunk after three.”

“Oh my god.”

“White Claw?”

“Jesus Christ, Mickey.”

Leslie, Harry, and Lang groaned in complaint.

“Yeah, it’s almost like I have a disorder that makes it so I can’t have carbs,” Mickey sassed, purposefully making them feel guilty for making fun of his drink of choice.

“Oh shit, I forgot about that,” Lang admitted, even though he was reminded of it every time Mickey ate or drank anything.

Mickey smirked and leaned back in his seat. “Yeah, and now I’ve shamed you, and you should feel bad for me for having type 1 diabetes.”

Harry laughed. “Mickey, you knob.”

“I don’t feel bad.” Lang stood up and straightened his suit jacket. “Alright, let me go grab a beer. I’ll be back.”

“Yeah, fuck you guys. I’m getting another White Claw.” Mickey got up and followed Lang to the bar.

“Hey, Lang, how old are you today?”

“Oh, I’m an old man, Mickey.”

“Don’t say that. You don’t look a day over thirty.”

Lang took out his phone and scrolled through his photos until he found the one he wanted.

He showed him the screen. “This is a picture of me and the boys celebrating my birthday last year.”

Mickey examined the picture and immediately identified Tony, Nino, Denzel, and Donnie as they were the familiar faces he recognized. The old man standing front and center was a stranger to him. He had wrinkles, old scars across his face, and long gray hair. His expression was cold and stern like a man who had been through years of hardships. However, underneath it all, he saw a glimpse of Lang.

“How…is this you?” Mickey stared back at Lang, analyzing his facial features.

“I took a sip from the Fountain of Youth and Strength a few months ago, and it gave me back some of my youth.”

“What the fuck? How old are you?”

Lang smirked. “Old.”

He left it at that and continued walking to the bar, leaving behind a shocked Mickey who was trying to estimate his age.

Just as Lang was about to ask the bartender for another beer, he was interrupted.

“Hi, dad!” Yeager greeted him, followed by a chorus of “Hello, Emperor!” from the other five members of The Guild.

“Hello. What’s up, guys?”

“We all chipped in and got you a birthday present. Here it is.” Yeager revealed a card that he was hiding behind his back, and nervously twirled his long violet hair in his fingers. “Uh, it’s a little card. We all signed it.”

“Holy shit!” Lang exclaimed as Yeager handed it to him.

The front of the card was a drawing of a castle with the words, “+1 Birthday Present” written below it. When Lang opened the card, the left page read, “Don’t just stand there! SLAY something! Ain’t no party like a D&D party—unless it’s a birthday party! Real adventurers don’t have birthdays. They level up! Don’t think of it as another birthday. Think of it as additional XP! Happy Birthday Emperor!

Signed,

Lando Stormborn

Gea Stagdancer

Yeager Demonblood

Leyla Nightingale of Embervale

Gloryon

Bjorn

Necrolord”

The right page was a vibrant drawing in crayon. Each member of The Guild drew themselves smiling, and Yeager drew Lang in the middle, scowling at them.

“Yeah! Looks sick, right?” Gloryon asked.

“Oh, wow! This is amazing. Damn~ Thanks, guys,” Lang answered honestly.

“Happy birthday, Emperor!” They cheered and smiled, feeling overjoyed that he liked their gift.

In moments like this when they weren’t being annoying or trying to piss him off, he felt like a proud father. “Damn, we’ve come a long way, huh? I appreciate it. Seriously, I really do.”

Yeager gave him a hug, then The Guild ran off—probably to play D&D.

When Lang finally got his beer from the bar, he saw a man wearing a motorcycle helmet exit the elevator, entering the terrace.

“Yuno?!” Lang asked, rushing over to him.

“Mr. Lang! Happy birthday!” Yuno happily exclaimed.

“Oh my god, it’s actually you, oh my god! I thought you left for a while. What the fuck?”

“I was able to move my flight to tomorrow morning, so I could come to your party.”

“It is crazy how much I actually missed you in less than twenty-four hours.”

Yuno chuckled at the familiar words. “It’s great to see you!”

“I love you, alright? You’re one of my greatest friends. I’m glad you’re around.”

“Hey, you’re a great friend, too.”

“Hello! Can everybody hear me okay?!” Sheldon asked on a microphone, gaining their attention. He was standing on a makeshift stage in front of the pool. The crowd cheered, then quieted down so he could speak.

“I’m here to perform for Mr. Lang Buddha. Happy birthday, man. Thanks for being one of my biggest fans. You know, usually all my music is rap music, but I wanted to change it up and make a love song. So, this right here is a love song. It’s called, ‘Don’t Forget Me.’”

The crowd cheered again, and Sheldon started singing,

“When I fall on my face~

You help me back up~

Even when I hate myself~

Baby, you show me love~

You're always on my side~

Even when I fuck up~

You’re always my ride or die~

Until the sun comes up~”

Scene 12: Brothers

(The next morning - Sunday, August 8, 2021)

The sun was just beginning to rise above the horizon as Lang drove the black Stratum to LSIA. Tony was riding in the passenger seat while Raymond and Yuno were riding in the back. KFC was resting on Yuno’s lap, cuddling against him one last time before he left.

When they neared the terminal, Tony turned around, staring back at Yuno and trying to prevent the tears in his eyes from falling. “I’m gonna miss you, Yuno. You’re coming back, yeah?”

“I’ll be back, Tony. I’ll miss you too much also.”

“It’s all good. Everybody’s gotta go do their things. But, if you don’t come back, just know I love you.”

Lang sighed and patted Tony’s shoulder reassuringly. “He’s only leaving for a few weeks, Tony.”

Yuno nodded. “Mm-hmm, you won’t even notice I’m gone.”

Lang parked in the “Departures” curb front by terminal number four, “Los Santos Air,” and Yuno picked up KFC in his arms as he went to the trunk to grab his luggage. While he did that, everyone else exited the vehicle and waited for him on the curbside.

Tony whispered to Lang, “I hope he comes back. I hate when people leave, man.”

“It’s just a short vacation to visit his family, Tony. He’ll be back.”

“That’s what they all said,” Tony mumbled under his breath, but Lang heard it loud and clear. He opened his mouth to reply, but Tony cut him off. “Don’t say it. I don’t even wanna talk about it.”

Lang didn’t press him. They both knew what he was going to say anyway, so he didn't feel the need to verbalize it. He simply closed his mouth, dropping the subject.

Yuno threw his backpack over his shoulder with one arm so he wouldn’t drop KFC, and Raymond lifted his suitcase onto the sidewalk for him. After triple checking that he had his passport, ticket, and everything else important, Yuno was ready to leave San Andreas.

Tony sighed gloomily. “This is the sad part.”

Yuno thought back to the day he met Tony on their first heist together in Paleto Bay. His life had completely changed after that, and he wouldn’t trade it for anything else in the world. It was crazy to think of everything that had happened since then. “You know, I’m glad I moved to this island all those months ago.”

“I’m glad you did too, brother,” Tony said. “I’m glad you’re part of our family. It’s been a good time. It’s been a wild ride. Really has.”

“The boys here, man. The boys~” Raymond said, wrapping his arms around Yuno and Tony, and the latter wrapped his free arm around Lang, creating a little group hug.

“Cleanbois, right?” Yuno asked while hugging KFC close to his chest.

“That’s right.” Tony sniffled, barely holding himself together. “You better come back.”

Yuno nodded. “I definitely will be. We still have to find the VAR, don’t we?”

“Yes, we do!”

“Hell yeah~”

“That’s right, that’s right.”

Raymond, Lang, and Tony confirmed, still eager to solve the mystery behind Eden Industries and the Diamond Casino. Despite their meager progress—and how overly cliché it sounded—the real journey had been the memories and relationships they made along the way.

“I’ll definitely be back for that,” Yuno assured, then checked the time on his phone. The boarding for his flight was about to start and he didn’t want to be late. “Well, see you guys soon. I think it’s about that time.” He gave the rooster one final pet on the head, then set him down on the ground.

“Take care, Yuno. Hope you have a great vacation.” Lang broke apart their group hug to give Yuno his own personal farewell hug.

The moment he said those words, Tony started to panic. Anxiety surged through him unexpectedly. “Wait, are you leaving? Are you really leaving?”

When Lang pulled away, Raymond moved to give Yuno a hug as well. “Bye, Yuno. I’ll miss you, buddy. You keep me updated, all right?”

“Yeah. I’ll call you every day, and I’ll let you know when I’m coming back home.”

Raymond didn’t even completely let go of Yuno before Tony pounced, clinging on to him like a koala.

“I love you,” Tony said, his voice trembling, filled with affection and fear. It was moments like these where he cursed his heart for being so fucking soft and too fucking big.

“I won’t be gone forever,” Yuno promised, but it didn’t matter. It was a promise that had been broken too many times before with too many other faces. Still, every single time the Italian man heard it, he couldn’t help but hope that this time would be different.

“Please don’t,” Tony begged. “I like hanging out with you too much.”

“You too. I’ll see you guys again soon.”

Lang had to practically pry Tony’s arms off of Yuno—wrapping them around himself instead—so that the hacker wouldn’t miss his flight.

Yuno waved at them for the last time, then went into the terminal. While Raymond and KFC waved back and watched him leave, it was then that Tony started crying uncontrollably into Lang’s shoulder. His arms tightly holding onto him as if he was scared that he would be the next person to abandon him.

“Oh man, goddamn. Not this again. It’s like when Donnie—Oh god… A-And Clayvon, and Saab, and Ellie. F-Fuck, I just got left behind again… Goddammit, man. I hate this feeling.”

Lang rubbed circles on his back, soothing him as much as he could, but he knew that it would take a while for Tony to calm down. “You’re okay, Tony. It’s alright. We’re still here. And he’ll be back before you know it.”

“I-I know. Hah…I know it happens, man. P-People come and go, but…h-he’ll be back, though. I have a strong feeling he’ll be back. I mean, I had that same feeling with the others but…I-I know he’ll be back.”

“People come, people disappear, but you and I will always be here. You don’t have to worry about that. And sometimes, every now and then, people come back. When they do, we’ll be here waiting for them. Isn’t that right?”

“Mm-hmm,” Tony hummed in agreement, but the tears continued to stream down his face. Lang’s shoulder had become drenched in tears and snot, but he didn’t mind it. He would let Tony cry as much as he wanted. That didn’t mean he wouldn’t be petty and complain about it later, though.

While Lang comforted an emotionally distraught Tony, neither man noticed the expression on Raymond’s face. Only KFC saw it, tilting his head in confusion before the Russian man covered it with his black motorcycle helmet; the one that matched Yuno’s. He thought back to the day he bought it for the Scamily Race back in February. It was a day he vowed to never forget. As those fond memories passed through his mind, he looked up at the sky, waiting for Yuno’s flight to appear above him.

The sun was now visible above the horizon, and Yuno stared at it through his window as the airplane took off. While he was admiring the soft morning hues of orange and blue, he saw a helicopter zoom by, looping in circles through the air, then slowing down on his side of the airplane. Looking closely in the pilot’s seat, he could see Mickey waving at him through the window.

Yuno chuckled and muttered to himself, “You’re crazy, Mickey.”

He waved back at his crazy friend as the two aircrafts separated with one flying back towards the island and the other flying away from it.

Just like every single day of the year, the minutes ticked by without fail. Long after the sun had set, Raymond continued to wear his helmet, looking up at the night sky and thinking about Yuno.

He had just finished tagging one of the lower rooftops of his gang compound with his R.U.S.T. gang tag. Now he sat in silence, letting his fingers fiddle with the red spray paint can in his hands until Chem and Perez climbed down from the ladder next to him. He was about to greet them, but then a third person dropped down and waved at him. The young man was wearing a dark green blazer, white shoes with blue light up soles, and a black motorcycle helmet.

“Yuno?!” Raymond asked, a burst of happiness flooding through him.

The man took off his motorcycle helmet, revealing himself to be Marty. “Bang! Martin!”

Chem laughed at Raymond’s reaction. “He said, ‘Yuno!’”

“Goddammit, Marty.” Raymond clicked his tongue in disappointment.

Marty imitated Yuno’s voice, “Oh Jesus! I just got lucky. I’m the best hacker in the city.” He laughed and ran to another ladder to drop down to the ground, sprinting away without answering the unspoken question of why he was dressed as Yuno.

“Why was Marty here?” Raymond asked.

“We had a gun deal with Gulag Gang today,” Perez answered. “He was just here to pay us for the shipment.”

Raymond figured he must have been sulking or making some type of pitiful stance because Chem and Perez seemed worried about him.

“Do you have like PTSD or something from like a past relationship?” Chem had never met Yuno before, but he knew that he and Raymond were close.

“No, I just miss him. He’s not here right now.”

“Oh…wait—” An abrupt burst of laughter escaped from him. “You already miss him? Wasn’t he just here?”

“What?! No, I haven’t seen him in like a day.”

Chem and Perez looked at each other in surprise before both being consumed in a fit of laughter. When Chem was able to collect himself, he said, “Yeah, you’re down bad, buddy.”

Raymond registered how that must’ve sounded like to both of them. “Wait, not, uh, okay, why did—That sounded really bad. Like he’s on vacation—”

“Ray’s having Yuno withdrawals after fucking twenty-four hours, man! Fuck!” Chem joked.

Perez wiped the tears from his face. “This is actually kinda sad, Ray.”

“L-Listen, it is fucked up!” Raymond said, growing flustered from their teasing.

Chem started speaking in a terrible Russian accent that Raymond believed was supposed to sound like him. “I haven’t had Yuno’s attention in twenty-four fucking hours. What will I do? How will I live?”

“Listen, he’s my helmet brother and he’s… Nevermind, I gotta go. See you guys later.” Raymond climbed down to his pink Lamborghini and drove away. The whole time, Chem and Perez continued to laugh and poke fun at him from the rooftop.

❀₊⁺⋆☣₊‧⁺⋅⚝⋅⁺‧₊ⴵ⋆⁺₊𓅭

Lang had been pacing around the Diamond Casino for the past three hours. His mind was spiraling out of control. There were so many things to consider and most of it didn’t make any sense to him.

Even though he didn’t have the Diamond Casino blueprints, he assumed that he would still be able to figure out where the casino vault was located or at least find someone who knew where it was. However, it seemed like no one knew and some even doubted that it existed, assuming that the owner probably pocketed all of the money in his own bank account.

Lang wouldn’t correct any of them or reveal that he was the new owner of the casino, but he did save their assumption about him in the back of his mind, admitting that it was a good idea that he might implement later. For now, he regretfully concluded that he would actually need the blueprints to find the casino vault, and he hoped that he would actually find them in the VAR; whatever and wherever that was.

Cassie walked up to him in concern. “You look like a creep sneaking around the casino like this, and you’re starting to scare the staff. What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to find the casino vault, Cassie. Can’t you let me work?”

“You don’t know where it is either?”

Her question surprised him because he suddenly remembered that she was the CEO, and he almost slapped himself in the face for forgetting something so important.

“Wait a minute, you’re the CEO. Why don’t you know where it is?”

“Dean never told me! You’re the new owner! Why don’t you have access to the vault?!”

“Shh!” Lang shushed her, and they looked around the casino floor to see if anyone heard them. Thankfully, everyone was too busy being addicted to gambling. It would’ve been bad if anyone else knew that the casino higher-ups had no clue where the vault was located.

Lang gestured for her to follow him to Dean’s office, which was his new office.

Once they were locked in the room where no one could eavesdrop on their conversation, he continued on, “I used to have access to the vault, I think. Dean showed me where he kept the Diamond Casino blueprints, but they were stolen. All I know is that this entire place runs on advanced technology, so it doesn’t need staff or security guards going in and out of the vault. So no, I don’t know where the vault is.”

Cassie pondered over the logistics of that. For their casino, people needed to buy a card at the cashier booth with cash to gamble at a table or at a slot machine. When they lost, the card would stop working until they filled it with more cash at the cashier booth. When they won, money was transferred to the card which could be used to gamble more or be exchanged for cash at the cashier booth. It all left her with one question. “How do the employees running the cashier booth deposit and withdraw large sums of cash?”

“There’s a giant machine in the booth. Unlike an ATM that stores money inside, the machine accepts and spits out cash straight from the vault. The vault where only god knows where, apparently.”

“Isn't that a good thing then? It means no one can ever rob the vault. Why are you looking for it?”

“Dean was acting a little sus about it before he disappeared. So, one day I’m gonna find those fucking blueprints and I’m gonna fucking bust that vault open. Mark my words, Cassie.”

“Sure~ Good luck with that.” Cassie exited the office to go back to work, leaving Lang to resume his paranoid antics.

He was about to sit down at the desk to do another search through Dean’s personal computer when he received a text message from Mickey asking him to meet at CLean Manor.

Lang let out a sigh and sat behind his large wooden desk in the manor’s office with Mickey standing in front of him.

“Okay. Why the fuck are we here, Mickey?”

“I have prepared something for you to consider.” He handed Lang a physical copy of his resume. It highlighted his experiences as a criminal, but used “allegedly” and “hypothetically” throughout the paper just to be safe.

“Oh my god.” Lang briefly skimmed through the resume, then looked up at him. “What the fuck is this, Mickey?”

“This is my resume as a hacker, heist planner, and criminal strategist. Ever since I left CG, I’ve done twenty heists with ten different crews. Just last night I did a job with a group that I call the Disney Trio, which featured me as Mickey Mouse, Goofy as Goofy, and Tony as Donald DuckerZ. And then this morning, since it’s SBS Sunday, I did some devious licks as m&m.”

“As a what?”

“Mickey and Marty. We go by m&m.”

“Who the fuck is Marty?”

“His full name is Marty Banks, and he's an insanely talented hacker just like Yuno. Apparently, Jean Paul formed a new gang called Gulag Gang, and Marty is their main hacker. I thought that it was about time I started lending my skills to a crew as well. So, what do you say?”

“We accept,” Lang smoothly responded, much to Mickey's surprise.

“Oh, you don’t have any follow up questions?”

“I’ve been wondering why the fuck you haven’t been hacking for us earlier, you cocksucker.”

“Oh, okay, uh, um, okay then.”

“This is a damn good CV, though.” Lang heard voices coming from outside, and looked out the office window to see Tony and Raymond talking in the driveway. “We should probably talk it over with the rest of the boys, too.”

They exited the office into the dining room just as Tony and Raymond entered through the front door.

“Hey, boys!” Lang got their attention. “We need to discuss something. Let’s sit down at the table.”

Raymond’s dour mood shifted into a sour mood upon seeing Mickey standing next to Lang. “Mickey, why are you here?”

Tony groaned and decided to address the tension between the two that everyone had been ignoring for the past few months. “Right. Ray says he doesn’t like you, apparently. Why, Ray?”

“Yeah, Ray don’t fuck with you, Mickey. What’s going on here?” Lang placed his hands on his waist, looking back and forth between them like a disappointed father.

Mickey shrugged nonchalantly and pretended to clean his fingernails. “I don’t know. Got a problem with me, Ray?”

“You’re the one who has problems with me, Mickey,” he said between gritted teeth.

Lang huffed, already annoyed by their passive aggressive tone. “Y’know what? Let’s save it for later. Right now we need to have this discussion, so sit down.”

The four boys sat at the refectory table in the dining room. Tony and Raymond were seated on the right side while Lang and Mickey were seated on the left side.

Tony found it odd that Raymond was still wearing his motorcycle helmet despite the fact that it was dark outside and he was indoors. He knew Raymond never liked wearing it during this time when it was hard to see, unless they were in the middle of a crime. “You wanna take off the helmet, Ray?”

“No. I’m wearing it in honor of Yuno until he gets back.”

“Yeah, that’s our dilemma, right?” Lang questioned both of them, getting right to the point of their discussion. “Yuno’s on vacation for over a month.”

“Alright. Mickey, looks like you’re getting subbed in,” Tony easily concluded without hesitation.

Raymond bristled and sat up straighter, feeling more on edge than before. “Wait, don’t just—What the fuck, Tony?”

“What we need is—Well, exactly Mickey. We need to bring another guy on board, and I feel like Mickey is kinda our only guy right now. Denzel and Nino are way too busy with other shit, and Harry can’t hack for shit.”

“But, Tony—”

“Let me tell you a story, Ray, okay?” Lang interrupted. “You only moved to this city because you met Donnie in Las Venturas and he invited you here. And then Denzel and Nino trained you to be a hitman, right?”

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“And even though you knew them, Tony, Harry, and I had our concerns about you. We didn’t really know you too well, and we wanted to wait six months or so to decide if you could be a good fit for the boys. But Donnie said, ‘Fuck no. He’s my boy, he’s gonna be one of the boys.’ And we said, ‘Okay.’ And look at you now.”

Tony sighed sadly at the mention of his friend that he hadn’t seen in over eight months. “I miss Donnie, man.”

Lang moved on from that topic to avoid making Tony cry again. “And to be fair, I’ve done a lot of jobs with Mickey. I’ve done something with Mickey that I’ve never done with anybody in this room…and that’s called the Rainbow fucking Road, baby. From the Fleeca to Paleto to the City Vault…Team Rocket.”

Tony wiped away the few stray tears that welled up in his eyes and nodded. “Yeah. And I like Mickey. I think he fits right in with us.”

Raymond disagreed with that, but he could tell that there was no use in arguing about it. “Okay, but Mickey’s only becoming the hacker of the group temporarily, right? He’s not any replacement for Yuno because Yuno’s fucking god.”

“Listen, before we go any further, nobody is replacing anybody, okay?” Tony didn't like thinking that way. No one could replace any of his friends that had disappeared one way or another. “The thing is that Yuno is on vacation right now, and we need another hacker. We all fuck with Mickey, and Mickey is the best option for our group.”

Raymond still disagreed with that—especially because Mickey was currently sitting in Yuno’s chair next to Lang—yet he went on, “But, the biggest issue here is that, and I have to say this directly to Mickey, if you are becoming the hacker in the group, you gotta practice your ass off.”

“Ray, I don’t like how you’re kinda going at him like this,” Tony said.

Lang shrugged, unbothered by Raymond verbalizing his concerns. “I mean, I like it. I like the honesty.”

“What’s wrong with that?” Raymond defended. “What’s wrong about being honest about the hacking?”

“I mean, he knows he has to step it up. You don’t have to tell him to practice,” Tony retorted.

Raymond slammed his fist on the table, losing his temper about losing this argument. “I’m gonna tell him why he has to practice because he’s not Yuno!”

Lang leaned over the table to whisper to Tony who was sitting across from him but everyone still heard it regardless. “Tony, I think he has to. It’s important to air out the feelings. Y’know what I mean? Don’t bottle shit in.”

Mickey quietly observed them talk about him as if he wasn’t even there. He took a silent pleasure in knowing how much the situation riled up Raymond, yet he couldn't do anything to change Lang and Tony’s mind.

He wanted to see how far he could push him. “I agree with Lang. Lay your feelings all over me, Ray.”

“You fucking—”

“Alright, alright,” Tony cut in before Raymond could yell at him. “Well, y’know, I’m gonna say it.”

“Say it, Tony,” Lang encouraged.

“I’m gonna say it. We’re gonna have some crazy times in front of us because you and Mickey have a rocky road. You guys are gonna have to sort out your problems.”

Raymond took a breath to calm himself down before he did something he regretted. “Yeah…I have lots of problems with Mickey, to be honest.”

Lang laughed in amusement at hearing Raymond so rattled by Mickey’s presence. “Wait, what problems do you have with Mickey?”

Tony snarked, “Ray just thinks he’s better than Mickey.”

Raymond crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, “I mean, obviously. I’m R.U.S.T. gang leader, I live in this manor with you guys, I own Lambo, I own successful company—”

Mickey cleared his throat and cut him off with an obnoxious tone that he knew got underneath Raymond’s skin. “Um, actually, I believe Kitty owns your company now, doesn’t she? And what’s it called again? Beta Life Pharmaceuticals?”

“It’s. Betta. Life. Pharmaceuticals,” Raymond spat out with barely controlled fury.

“That’s what I said.”

“You see, guys? He’s never serious, he shits on me, he pits me while boosting—”

“I pitted you once during a boosting job. You have to admit that was funny. There weren’t even cops around.”

“It was not funny. It ruined the car. There was also the time you pitted me during race.”

“You bet $1000 that you could beat me, and you didn’t. I’m still waiting for that money, by the way.”

“You cheated! You’re not allowed to pit in street race. It’s not fucking bumper cars.”

“Oh, come on~ It was fun.”

“It was not fun, and you didn’t pit anyone else in the race.”

“What about the time I took you biking down Mount Chiliad? That was fun.”

“It popped the tire on my Akuma, and I was stranded there for thirty minutes because you took your sweet ass time to pick me up.”

Mickey smirked and rested his chin in the palm of his hand, staring directly into Raymond’s helmet visor. “I bet you wouldn’t have complained about it if I was Yuno.”

“What are you trying to—”

“Well, I’m just saying Mickey likes having fun. He likes fucking around,” Tony interrupted before their fight could escalate like they always did. “Mickey, when we do the serious jobs, you need to be serious. I think that’s what Ray’s trying to say.”

“I understand that, and I agree with Ray…this time.”

“What do you—”

“And getting back to the main topic here,” Mickey pressed on, not giving Raymond the chance to retort. “The only thing I will say is I have a pretty good knowledge and understanding of hackers in this city, and you guys realize there is literally no hacker like Yuno, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Obviously.”

“Of course, you cocksucker. That’s why he’s called the Cheat Code. He’s the glitch in the matrix.”

Raymond, Tony, and Lang responded, affronted that Mickey would imply that they didn’t know how special Yuno’s hacking ability was.

“That’s what I’m saying. Like I will fail sometimes, that’s just the reality.”

“Oh, we know,” Raymond scoffed, much to the displeasure of the Italian man. Tony knew that harsh words and gibes never bothered Mickey, but he couldn’t help but feel offended on his behalf.

“Okay, but don’t fucking—Let’s not knock the fact that he’s still a good hacker. Don’t give him so much shit.”

“Well, to be fair, we did give Yuno a fucking boat load of shit until he proved himself, right?” Lang gently reminded him. “I’ll never forget the day he hacked Paleto for us, and then everything changed. I mean, think about it, Tony. On the drive up there, you were shitting all over Yuno. Remember that day?”

Tony smiled at the memory. “Right. You’re right.”

“So, Mickey’s got something to prove now. And until he proves it…” Lang gave Mickey a look, urging him to speak up.

Mickey hummed. “I appreciate what Ray is saying to me. He’s pushing me to be better. And yeah, maybe I can’t be the Cheat Code that Yuno is, but I can be better than I am now.”

“You got this, Mickey. I believe in you, brother,” Tony praised.

Raymond sighed, slightly upset by the meeting’s conclusion, but hopeful for the future of the group. “Yeah, sure. Let’s see what you can do.”

“Great, that’s it then. Welcome to the family, Mickey,” Lang congratulated.

“Thanks, guys.” Mickey smiled, genuinely excited by the outcome. It had been two months since Lang originally gave him the offer while he was recovering in his bed, and he was a little worried that the door for that opportunity had closed. Hence, the reason why he had made a resume. Now he was glad to officially be part of the Cleanbois.

As everyone stood up from the table—and Tony started talking to Mickey about dinner plans—Raymond walked up to Lang, whispering lowly over his shoulder, “Lang, can we talk?”

“Yeah, let’s go to the office.” Lang held the door open for him, then they both sat down on the brown couch in the dimly lit room.

Raymond instantly felt the tension leaving his body now that he was away from Mickey. “Holy shit. I mean, that was good meeting to have. I think we got some shit ironed out right there.”

“Yeah,” Lang said and let the silence settle over them, knowing that Raymond needed a moment to collect his thoughts. He wanted him to be honest about his feelings, but he didn’t want to push it.

After a minute, Raymond spoke up again, “Mi-Mickey’s, uh… It’s good. I’m happy that he’s joining us. It’s just—It’s tough. It’s always tough to bring someone new in. I just wanted to let you know that I’m okay with this, but it’s gonna take me some time to get accustomed to it.”

“Oh, trust me I get it. I didn’t wanna bring your ass in, and I took a leap of faith. Y’know what I’m saying?”

“Yeah, exactly. You told me that. It’s all about the leap of faith. I just hope that we progress, and we do good shit.”

“Yeah, and I’m really close with Mickey. We’ve always gotten along, and now we can work together more often. You just gotta give it some time, Ray.”

“Right.” Raymond decided that Lang probably knew what he was talking about. The Chinese businessman was the person he respected and trusted the most after Yuno. Lang always had his back even when he had his reservations about him becoming one of the boys, which was why Raymond was willing to die and kill people for him. This whole situation with Mickey further proved that Lang would respect his feelings, and back him up if he needed it. So, to respect Lang’s feelings for Mickey, he would do his best to get along with him for the sake of the family.

Lang got a call from Tony, and answered it. “Hey, what’s up?”

“Ay, Buddha, where are you? You wanna get dinner at Rooster’s?”

“Yeah, Ray was just, uh, giving me a blowjob in the office. I’m coming now.”

“You’re coming now? That was fast,” Tony joked.

“Shut up, dumbfuck.”

(Forty-four days later - Tuesday, September 21, 2021)

Yuno was lying on a couch in his parents’ house, kicking his legs in the air over the armrest while talking to Raymond on his phone. He wasn’t able to call him every day, but he did when could and Raymond answered every call without fail, even if it was late at night or at an inopportune time.

That morning they had been chatting about every topic that entered Yuno’s head for the past twenty-eight minutes.

“Oh! And guess what, Raymond? I went to the zoo yesterday and saw a rooster that looked just like KFC. He had the same color feathers and everything. Can you send me a picture of him, please? I know that I'm flying back to Los Santos tonight, but I miss him. How's he doing?”

“Mm~hngh~ hahh~ ahh~” Raymond let out a breathy moan and lightly panted into the phone that left Yuno worried about him.

“Raymond? You all right?”

“Ohh god~” Raymond moaned again, then cleared his throat, composing himself a little. “Sorry, Yuno. Do you remember my new girlfriend? She was getting dressed in the bedroom when you called and then she got impatient waiting for me. You should see her outfit. She’s wearing this really cute bunny lingerie thing. Want picture?”

Yuno realized what Raymond was doing at that moment and checked the call duration timer. “What?! Raymond, you’re in the middle of—And you just left her—It's almost been half an hour. I can call you back when you're not—You know?”

“No, no, it's fine. She’s just giving me—”

“I don't wanna know, man! Just send me the picture later if you have the time.” Yuno quickly hung up, not wanting to hear what he now knew were Raymond’s lustful moans in his ear.

Only a few seconds passed before his phone chimed, letting him know that Raymond sent him an image, and he wondered how he was able to send him a picture of KFC so soon. However, the moment Yuno opened their messages, he dropped his phone in shock and shielded his helmet visor behind his hands, but the damage had already been done.

Raymond misinterpreted his request for a picture of the rooster as a request to see the bunny lingerie. It looked like he had just taken the picture in whatever position they were currently in because Yuno saw a cottontail, two fluffy ears, and way too much skin.

₊˚⊹⭒☣˖°༄.ೃ✧࿔*:･

Denzel stood at the front register inside of Burger Shot and looked up at the menu board posted above him, deciding what to order.

Leslie grumpily entered the fast-food restaurant wearing the biggest frown on his face.

“What would you like?” Denzel asked, offering to pay for his meal. “What are you thinking today, Les?”

“I think I’m a kindergarten teacher! I think I’m a kindergarten teacher, and I’m dealing with children. You know what? Do they have Happy Meals? Do they have a hundred Happy Meals? A million Happy Meals? ‘Cause that’s how many children I have to deal with in a day! You know what’s business? Man, fuck business. I might as well open up a big kindergarten. Make money while doing it ‘cause right now I’m doing it for free! I don’t know. Get me a Murder Meal or something.” He stomped outside, slamming the door closed behind him.

“Yeah, can we get like, uh, can we get two Murder Meals?” Denzel asked the employee at the register, ignoring Leslie’s aggressive rant.

Five minutes later with two Murder Meals in hand, Denzel sat in the passenger seat of Leslie’s black Rebla GTS with the words, “GOD KING” printed on the license plate.

Leslie rubbed his temples as he drove them out of the parking lot, not really paying attention to the road.

“Morning! Ooogghh!”

“Oh!” Leslie hit the brakes but it was already too late. He had just hit an exceedingly old man with his car, and sent him flying out of his wheelchair. He could only stare at the bloody scene in shock.

“...You want me to go make sure he’s dead?” Denzel offered while munching on his fries.

The old man whimpered in pain, confirming that he was not dead.

“Quick, put him in the trunk! Shit, shit, shit! Wheeling around in the middle of the street! Dammit!” Leslie complained even though the empty wheelchair sat in the middle of a crosswalk, and his car sat in the middle of an intersection in front of a red light.

Another five minutes later, Leslie and Denzel stood in a hidden alleyway in La Puerta. Denzel ate his Murder Meal as Leslie stared into the open trunk of his car, listening to the old man mumbling a bunch of gibberish.

“This is my where’s my own fishes there’s no miles that’s why anywhere I rode me I won’t be I will seven three eight six seven six eleven three thousand—”

“Hey, Denzel,” Leslie whispered.

Denzel finished the last bite of his burger, and looked at him.

Leslie put his index finger and thumb together to make an OK gesture.

Denzel pulled out his pistol and shot the old man in the head.

“Aghh!” the old man screamed and died.

“No, no, no, n—What the fuck?” Leslie asked, his voice filling with panic.

“What? You—I thought you were giving the okay to kill him.”

“No, no. I was doing like, ‘Okay, he’s good. We can let him go.’”

“That was a huge miscommunication there, Les. I just put a fucking bullet in this guy. I thought you said it was okay.”

“Fuck. The mayor just killed a man. This city is fucked. We need to—” Leslie stopped talking as he heard police sirens pass by and realized that they were probably investigating the sound of the gunshot.

They quickly shut the trunk door closed, then ducked more into the alleyway to stay hidden from the police.

“Les, your food is getting cold.”

“I’m not hungry anymore.”

“May I?”

“Go ahead.”

Denzel ate the cold Murder Meal as they waited for the police to clear the area.

Believing that they had successfully evaded being found out for murder, Leslie’s heart nearly jumped out of his chest when a gang leader wearing a black motorcycle helmet jumped down from the rooftop and landed in front of them.

“Hey, Leslie! Denzel! Good to see you guys!” Raymond greeted them. “I thought I heard gunfire around here on my turf. Did you see anyone suspicious?"

Leslie pulled him close to his face and whispered, “Ray. We have a dead body here and the cops are here and I’m panicking.”

Raymond chuckled, “You motherfuckers are crazy.”

“No, it’s Denzel’s fault,” Leslie insisted while pointing at the mayor who had his cheeks puffed up with food like a chipmunk.

Raymond raised an eyebrow and turned towards him. “It’s Denzel’s fault, huh?”

“Yew! ‘fere wa’ a mif'communica'ion (You! There was a miscommunication),” Denzel mumbled around the burger in his mouth.

Raymond nodded in understanding. “Ah, so CB Comms strikes again.”

Those words sounded familiar to Denzel for some reason. He swallowed his burger and said, “Now that you mention it, I think Mickey is always harping on about that, but I've never bothered to listen to what he meant by it.”

“Guys!” Leslie aggressively whispered, still panicking about the situation. “What do we do about the fucking corpse in the trunk of my car?!”

“Well, did anyone see you?” Raymond asked. “If not, we can just leave it here and then clean your car at my Scrapyard. It’s just down the road. The cops will probably assume this unfortunate man stumbled into gang shit.”

“Okay, okay, let’s do that,” Leslie agreed.

Denzel threw the corpse onto the ground in the alleyway, then they washed the trunk in the parking lot of R.U.S.T. Scrapyard. Leslie didn’t let himself relax until his car was completely clean of all traces of blood.

He let out a sigh of relief after checking the trunk for any signs of crimson for the third time. “That was a whole thing, but it looks like we’re good.”

Denzel threw away the empty Murder Meal boxes in the trash, then addressed Raymond. “Look, look, Ray, can I get your opinion?”

Leslie crossed his arms. “Oh, should we reenact the scene just so he can see?”

“Yeah, let’s reenact the scene.”

Raymond watched them position themselves behind Leslie’s car with the trunk open.

Denzel gestured to the trunk. “We’re talking about whether or not we kill the guy in the trunk, okay?”

“Wait, wait, you have to explain it in its whole entirety,” Leslie protested. “So, I accidentally ran the guy over with my car, but he’s very old and I thought he wouldn’t remember it. And now he’s pretty much half passed out in the trunk, and I had a sidebar with Denzel where I said, ‘All right, let’s go talk to him and see if he has dementia. If he does, we let him go and take him to the hospital or something. If he doesn’t, we kill him.’ Right?”

Denzel nodded. “Right.”

“We go back to the car and he starts mumbling a bunch of incoherent stuff. So, I just say, ‘Denzel,’ and I do this.” Leslie made the OK gesture again.

“And so I shot him in the head,” Denzel said proudly.

“Instantly. It was half a second.”

Raymond burst out laughing. “I’m with Denzel here.”

“What am I—What? I’m crazy?!” Leslie asked, appalled that Raymond would agree with Denzel. “You’re telling me I’m the crazy one for thinking that an OK sign doesn’t mean shoot him in the head?!”

Raymond coughed and composed himself. “Leslie, you’re giving the OK sign to Denzel Williams…after you just discussed murdering someone.”

Leslie huffed indignantly. “...Well, I also discussed maybe not doing it. And, Ray, what were you doing in the alley?”

“I was hanging out with my new girlfriend when I heard the gunshot. Then I went to look around for the source of the sound just in case my boys had started another gang war.”

“Oh, that reminds me,” Denzel cut in. “I’ve been meaning to ask, did you break up with Juno or did she break up with you?”

Raymond scratched the back of his head sheepishly. “This is gonna sound fucked up. It’s not that fucked up. Just little bit. She came to me and she’s like, ‘Ray, I believe I value this relationship more than you do.’ And I was like, ‘Why do you say that?’ She’s like, ‘I always want to hang out with you. I always want to spend time with you, but…it never seems like you want to do the same for me.’ And I said, ‘Nah~ What are you talking about?’ She brought up the point that it’s already been seven months of dating and I hadn’t said I loved her. And I said, ‘Because I don’t yet.’ And I was being honest, right? And she said, ‘What? Well, I don’t think this can work out. Do you think you could love me or something along those lines?’ And I was like, ‘No, not yet.’ And then she said, ‘Well, I don’t know how to take this. I don’t think we should keep going.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, probably not…but we could still be friends, right?’ And she said, ‘No, I don’t want to be friends with someone that I love.’ And she walked away.”

Leslie gaped at him, his mouth open and eyes wide, but Raymond didn’t know why.

“Wait, are you telling me that after seven months, you never said, ‘I love you’ to this woman?” Denzel asked.

“Yes.”

“And then when she asked, ‘Why?’ You said, ‘Because I don’t love you.’”

“Yes. And I found out that resulted in the break up.”

“Jesus Christ.”

Raymond shrugged. “Well, it’s the honest truth. Either way, I still have hundred more wives, and I think most of them are actual wives. I haven’t met all their husbands yet, though.”

Leslie finally closed his gaping mouth and asked, “You like to date married women?”

“Just because there’s ring, doesn’t mean you can’t do the thing,” Raymond explained. “Like how just because there’s goalkeeper, doesn’t mean you can’t score.”

“How the fuck are people still willing to date you?”

“All you need is Lamborghini and life is easy.” Raymond checked the time on his phone then and headed to his car. “I’m running late for my meeting with Mickey, so I’ll see you gentlemen later. Take care.”

“Later, Ray.” Denzel waved as he entered his vehicle and drove away.

Leslie turned to Denzel, still in shock over their conversation. “Am I the only one who thinks Ray is crazy?”

“He seems normal to me.”

“Ugh, of course. You’re both fucking psychopaths!”

✦₊˚⊹⋆✿₊⁺⋆❀⋆⁺₊✿⋆⊹˚₊✦

“Are you ready to see this, Mickey?” Tony asked while leading him upstairs to the second floor of CLean Manor.

“I’m sure, Tony. What do you want to show me?”

Tony stopped in the hallway of CLeanbois portraits. Eight months ago, there were only ten portraits hanging on the wall. Today, there were fourteen.

He leaned on the left wall, and gestured above him. “Welcome to the family.”

Previously, only Raymond and Yuno’s portraits were hung on the left wall, but now Mickey and Jean Paul’s portraits hung below them.

Mickey screamed loudly in excitement and wrapped his arms around Tony.

“I’m glad you like it,” Tony said as he hugged him back.

“It means the world, Tony.”

“No prob, brother. You deserve this spot. We got Yuno, we got you, we got Ray, we got JP…we got everybody here.” Tony pulled away from the hug and looked over to the right wall, staring at the portraits of Clayvon, Sven, Saab, Ellie, Donnie, Nino, Denzel, Harry, himself and Lang. It felt a little strange to him that only half of the people in those ten portraits were still living in Los Santos, and now they were almost back to ten again.

“It’s beautiful~” Mickey sang.

“You happy? Are you happy?”

“Yes! I’m very happy, thank you. And it’s right next to my bedroom, too.”

Mickey’s portrait was hanging next to the bathroom door. Tony had offered several times to get Mickey his own bed or have a guest room made for him, but he insisted on making the bathroom his new bedroom. “Y’know, you don’t have to sleep in the bathtub, right?”

“I want to! No one uses it, and it reminds me of my first day here.”

“Right, right.” Tony chuckled, recalling the day that Yuno dragged him into the manor covered in dirt and blood, and how they washed him in the bathtub.

Hearing their voices, Lang exited his bedroom and joined them in the hallway. “Mickey, I got good news for you. You’re approved to be an intern for Cerberus.”

Mickey’s eyes widened along with the already huge grin on his face. “Really?! It’s okay?”

“Yeah, of course it is. I’m glad that you want to get involved in business. Though, I’m not gonna lie, it was a little surprising.”

“Yeah, I’ve never been interested in it before, but I don’t know. I kinda wanna give it a try now.” Only a few months ago Mickey wouldn’t even dream of becoming a businessman; however, after spending a considerable amount of time with Lang, he thought it sounded kind of fun. Additionally, he would be able to spend more time with Lang and Cerberus to learn how to be a businessman.

“Well, you’re lucky you know the richest businessman in the city, and you’re on good terms with the higher-ups of Cerberus,” Lang said.

“Wait, if you and Leslie are the heads of Cerberus, and Harry is the tail, and I’m right below Harry…can I be the asshole of Cerberus?”

Lang didn’t even entertain the suggestion. It would be an insult to Cassie, Nancy, Eve, Penny, Kitty, Fiona, and a whole lot of other CEOs and VPs. “Mickey, you're underneath so many other people besides Harry.”

“Fuck.”

“Anyways, for now you show up early, bring coffee, attend the Hero Wine meetings, spend your whole life not getting paid for learning. Y’know, that kind of shit.”

“Hero Wine?”

“My wine business which is actually a front for our heroin operations, remember? Oh! And we’re currently working on a business deal in South America to get cocaine imported here, in which case, I’ll need a new storefront to run that business.”

“How about…Stratum Knights Investments!”

“...Why?” Lang asked, not seeing how that name related to cocaine.

“One, to honor the family Stratum. Two, the abbreviation would be S.K.I. for skiing down lines of snow,” Mickey explained.

Lang gave it some consideration then shrugged. “Sure, if this deal goes through, and you do well on your internship, then I’ll consider naming it that.”

“Hell yeah! I’m so excited!” Mickey was nearly jumping up and down with joy.

“Mickey, I’m here! Where the fuck are you?!” The Russian man’s voice carried loudly from the front door.

“Fucking finally, Ray! I’ve been waiting for hours!” Mickey ran downstairs to meet with Raymond.

The two still got into way too many arguments, but that only happened because they were making an effort to hang out together every day. All things considered, things were going well for Mickey.

“I’ve never seen DownBad Mickey this ‘up good’ before,” Tony thought aloud.

Lang agreed, “Yeah, it’s a little weird. I mean that in a good way.”

Tony gave him a soft smile, and Lang knew exactly what he was going to say before he even said it. “It kinda reminds me of us. Leaving the gang life behind and starting a new clean slate.”

“I told you so, Tony,” Lang huffed. “When you keep moving forward and stop clinging to the past, you’ll find new friends and new adventures out there. The good times just keep coming.”

✧₊⁺⭒☣₊‧⁺.⚝.⁺‧₊❀⋆⁺₊✦

Nino entered through the front door of CLean Manor carrying a duffel bag filled with hacking supplies for Lang. He had requested them for Mickey as per Raymond’s insistence that their new hacker would need some practice.

Lang didn’t appear to be home at the moment, so Nino set the duffel bag down on the refectory table in the dining room with a note to explain what was inside. Just as he was about to leave, he got distracted by yelling coming from the office.

He was unsurprised to walk through the office door and find that Mickey and Raymond were the cause of the noise.

“Ray, how many times do I have to tell you to send me the money for thermite?!”

“Motherfucker, I already sent it! Check the app!”

“This isn’t enough!”

“You said it’ll be $1000 per thermite, and we only have five. So—”

“Ray, $1000 times five is not $2500! I don’t even know how you got that fucking number! Look!” Mickey showed Raymond the calculator app on his phone which read, “1000×5=5000.”

“Yeah, I know that! I also used calculator app. $2500 is my half for the thermite. You’re paying the other half.”

“I’m already paying for the other supplies. Why the fuck am I also paying for thermite?!”

“Okay, well, you didn’t tell me that. What’s the total cost for the other supplies? I’ll pay for half.”

“No, just pay the full price of the thermite!”

“But then it won’t be exactly even, Mickey!”

“It will be, Ray! I’ve been keeping track of how much money everyone is spending on supplies, so that no one feels like they’re contributing more than others.”

“Really? Since when—”

“You just never listen—”

“—I don’t see how—”

“—I needlessly, repeat myself—”

“—and we still need more thermite—”

“I don’t have more fucking thermite—”

“I mean, why wouldn’t you just ask me?” Nino interrupted, having had enough of their bickering.

Mickey and Raymond turned their heads towards him, unaware that Nino had entered the office and was listening to their argument.

Raymond processed his question first and slowly asked, “You…have access to large quantities of thermite?... Right now?”

“Yeah. I’ve literally told the crew this like a million times,” Nino stated as if it was obvious.

“...What?” Mickey asked.

“I’ve got like fifteen thermite just chilling in my apartment.”

“...What?” Raymond asked.

“I’ve got AKs, I’ve got silencers, I’ve got C-4, I’ve got everything you could possibly need for hacking—”

“What the fuck?” They asked in unison.

“You’re literally looking at the most connected man right here.” Nino gestured to himself. “I’m probably the biggest arms dealer in the city.”

“I don’t think you’ve told me this,” Raymond said, trying to recall a time where he might’ve been informed of this secret.

“Lang knows. Tony knows.”

Mickey groaned and rubbed a hand down his face. “God, something about comms, something about comms! What the fuck is wrong with us?”

“We’re literally family. How do I not know?” Raymond asked in disbelief over the fact that he didn’t know. He could believe that Mickey didn’t know. It was probable that Mickey wasn’t told because he talked too much.

“I’m literally out on the streets sucking dick for thermite, Nino! I have sucked cock for thermite!” Mickey complained.

“You would have done that anyway, Mickey,” Raymond snarked.

“No, I would not! Shut the fuck up, Ray! I’m not a slut like you.”

“Motherfucker, you—”

“By the way,” Nino interrupted their argument again. “This does not leave this fucking room. You never call me for it. You never text me for it.”

“Only in person. Got it,” Mickey confirmed.

“And we would like all fifteen,” Raymond requested.

“Yes…” Mickey tried to stop himself from saying his next sentence. He really did. But, the words accidentally slipped out. “Ray will give you a blowjob as soon as he’s done paying me.”

“I’ll bring them here,” Nino said and bolted out of the office before Raymond could protest, desperately not wanting to get caught in another fight between them.

At some point between arguments, they noticed that Nino had come back and left a duffel bag filled with thermite on the office desk, but neither Raymond nor Mickey could tell the exact time when that happened. They also didn’t know the exact time Harry, Yeager, Bjorn, Lando, and Leyla had joined them in the office. They had just finished getting their money sorted out when they heard Lando snoring on the couch, bringing their attention to the very bored and tired individuals sitting in the corner of the room.

The office was a little cramped for all seven of them, so they moved to the dining room and sat around the refectory table. They instantly smelled a pleasant aroma wafting out from the kitchen where Tony was marinating and seasoning an assortment of different cuts of meat.

He wiped his hands with a towel, and walked over to them. “Hey, guys! I’m making steak for dinner tonight! I got a nice Italian marinade going, I got gabagool, I got it all! You guys sticking around?”

“Oooh~ We’re currently working on a job, but we should be back by then. Assuming this job ever gets started, and we don’t get caught,” Mickey replied while checking the time on his phone. It was already 6:00 p.m., so it would have to be a late dinner.

“We won’t get caught,” Raymond promised. He would make sure of it.

“Sounds great, Uncle T.”

“Yeah, sounds delicious, dad!”

Yeager and Bjorn responded, bubbling with excitement at getting to eat Tony’s cooking. The Italian man owned a steak shop for a good reason.

Tony checked his watch, then said, “The meat has to marinate for two more hours anyway, so that should be perfect timing! Let’s aim for 9:00 p.m., okay?”

“Yeah, we can do that,” Mickey confirmed.

“Alright. I’m gonna go pick up some vegetables now. Good luck with your job!” Tony called over his shoulder as he took off his chef hat and exited the manor.

As soon as the door slammed shut, Mickey clapped his hands together to get their attention. “Okay! We have three hours to get this heist done, so let me quickly explain the plan. As you know, about a month ago, Bjorn saw a painting at the Vultur Lé Culturé and he has been begging for it since then; however, no one wants to buy the overly priced artwork from Chang Gang. And then last week, Yeager managed to steal blueprints of the gallery from Ramee. So, now we’re going to rob it instead. The painting is titled Madge Milk, and it portrays an old, grumpy woman with a glass of milk.”

“It’s beautiful~ I’ve been paying tribute to it every day,” Bjorn said, making Yeager groan and slam his forehead into the table.

The reaction made Mickey question if it was a sincere tribute or a cum tribute, but he was not curious enough to ask for clarification. “Uh, okay. Anyway, the painting is located here.”

Mickey took out the gallery blueprints and continued explaining the plan for how they were going to steal it and escape from the police if they showed up. It was The Guild’s first time doing a heist, so a few days ago, he had come up with a simple plan that was easy to follow but would still be fun and memorable for them.

Harry and Raymond were there to help out, but when Mickey started giving out roles for the job, Raymond became distracted by a phone call.

“And Harry, you’re gonna fly from, um…”

“Are you talking to me, Kitty, or you talking to someone else?”

Mickey barely heard Raymond’s words, too focused on looking at the map. “I’m talking to all of you. Um—”

“Oh, five days ago. Okay.”

Mickey’s brows furrowed in confusion at that statement, making him look up from the map. “...What?”

Leyla clarified, “Oh, he’s on the phone. He said, ‘Kitty,’ not ‘Mickey.’”

“Wha-What?” Mickey asked, confused about why Raymond would choose to start a phone call with Kitty at that moment when they were already pressed for time.

“Yeah, I have vehicle that I can give to you as gift. I wanted to give it to someone that I know instead of selling it. It’s Itali GTO. It’s like Ferrari type car,” Raymond continued talking, completely obvious to the six pairs of eyes staring at him in irritation.

Mickey sighed aggressively as he waited for him to hang up. He was reluctant to yell at Raymond because he knew it would only lead to another long-winded fight that they didn’t have time for. So, he begrudgingly resigned himself to waiting for the Russian man to finish his phone call.

Sensing Mickey’s dwindling patience and feeling the growing urgency to get the job done before dinner, Leyla spoke up, “Hang up the phone right now, Raymond Romanov.”

“We’re in a meeting, Ray!” Lando complained.

“Uh, I don’t know who has it, but I just wanted to give it to you as gift,” Raymond said, not hearing a single word that anyone else said.

Yeager clicked his tongue angrily. “Tch, this fucking motherfucker.”

Harry rolled his eyes and grumbled, “Ray, this job has already been pushed back because you couldn’t stop fighting with Mickey. Please, just hang up and call her back later.”

“All right, you don’t want it?… Okay. I wanted to give it to someone because it’s nice car… Yeah, I’ll call him. That’s good idea, Kitty. Oh, also do you have more of that drug I asked for? I forgot the name of it.”

Raymond’s conversation didn’t sound like it would be ending any time soon.

Leyla checked the time again, and it was already 6:30 p.m. “Should we start preparing the getaway plan without him? It’s getting late and if we wait any longer, we might not have time to finish the job.”

Bjorn sighed dejectedly. “Ahh, will I not get the painting today?”

Mickey looked over at Bjorn’s sad and disappointed face. It was the look of someone who had gotten their hopes up only for them to be crushed and stomped on. It stung Mickey particularly hard because he had given him that hope by arranging this whole heist for him, and now Raymond was about to ruin it.

Unable to wait any longer—and without saying a word—Mickey stood up and punched Raymond in the shoulder as hard as he could, causing the Russian man to tumble out of his chair and fall onto the ground with a loud thud. The force was enough for his helmet visor to crack as it collided with the tiled floor.

Mickey then proceeded to walk to the front door, not paying attention to the man sprawled on the ground. “Lang gave me the keys to his Stratum today so we could use it for the heist. We can drive that to set up the plan.”

“Bjorn and I can get the bikes set up while you guys set up the helicopter,” Yeager suggested.

“Sounds good.” Mickey held the door open for everyone as they all left the property, working out the final details of the plan as they drove away. Bjorn drove Yeager in his green Cheburek while Mickey drove Harry, Leyla, and Lando in the family Stratum.

Mickey had managed to drive two blocks away from the manor before his phone rang. He already knew who the call was coming from so he didn't bother looking at the caller ID as he answered.

“Hey, what’s up, Ray?”

“Mickey…I swear to god, the next time I see you…I’m gonna put bullet in your brain.”

Mickey chuckled, more than familiar with that threat. He only heard it every other day since he moved into CLean Manor.

“Sure, Ray. Whatever,” he replied then ended the call so he could focus on setting up the plan.

Standing alone in the dining room, Raymond ran his fingers along the crack in his helmet visor.

He called Kitty back. “As I was saying, Kitty, before I was rudely interrupted, does Betta Life have more of that drug I asked for?”

₊˚⊹⭒☣˖°༄.ೃ✧࿔*:･

(7:30 p.m. - Tuesday, September 21, 2021)

At the Night Market, Tony was carrying bags of produce back to his car while talking on the phone to Lang.

“C’mon, Buddha~ I know how to cook.”

“Your ramen tasted like shit.”

“Okay, fine. I know how to cook Italian food.”

“Remember when—”

“You won’t get food poisoning! That was one time! And it was eight years ago! Let it go, bro!”

“Well, isn’t Yuno coming back tonight? Don’t you have to pick him up?”

“He said his flight is landing at 8:00 p.m., and he’ll text me when to pick him up. The food will be ready at 9:00 p.m. and everyone will be there, so can you please come home for dinner?”

Tony heard metal clanking, and assumed that Lang was building something. The businessman had told him that he would be working late at Cerberus Industries to finish up a few projects that night.

“Fine,” Lang replied after a moment. “Let me finish building this prototype, then I’ll come home.”

“Yes! See you there.”

“I love you, brother.”

He heard Lang making a kissing sound through the phone, and he replied with his own. “Mwah! Love you too, bye!”

Tony hung up, happily throwing his bags in the trunk of his red Hycade Audi R8, and driving back to CLean Manor.

(8:00 p.m. - Tuesday, September 21, 2021)

Mickey, Harry, and The Guild were finally ready to start the heist, and all that was left was updating Raymond on the plan. Mickey figured that he was probably still fuming about the punch and he didn’t want to make it worse by calling him, so he made Lando do it.

He thoroughly went over the details with Raymond to get him into position for the getaway, unaware that the gang leader was idly driving through the Chiliad Mountain State Wilderness.

“Okay, then we’re pretty much ready. Um, I’m gonna be on a bike, and you’re probably gonna be on a bike. The thing is, do you want to be the person on Chiliad or the person in the hangar at Sandy?”

“So, Lando, how does this work out? If I’m in the middle of pursuit and I see Mickey…I’m stopping the pursuit, getting out, shooting Mickey, and then continuing whatever I need to do. You understand that, right?” Raymond asked nonchalantly without a hint of anger in his voice.

Lando sighed and began speaking sarcastically, “Sure, if you’re in a pursuit and you see Mickey, you gun him down, but y—”

He stopped speaking for a minute, but Raymond could faintly hear voices talking to him.

“Okay, if you’re doing that, you’re off the job,” Lando said with finality.

“I’m off the job?”

“Yeah. This job is for Bjorn and he doesn’t want to risk anything.”

“What if I find him before then, and he dies anyway? It’s the same thing. The job ends.”

“I don’t know, Ray!” Lando yelled, stressed about the whole situation. Several voices were angrily chatting around him, and time was still ticking closer to 9:00 p.m.

“Well, we’re looking into little problem here, aren’t we?” Raymond asked as if he wasn’t the one making it a problem, languidly weaving through the wilderness.

“How about you guys kiss and make up, and do the rest after the job?”

“I warned this motherfucker to not treat me with disrespect, and he punches me when I’m trying to do something nice for my friend. Does that sound like respect?”

“It’s just a little kiss…for about half an hour.”

“I don’t need a little kiss. I need a bullet into his brain.”

“Please! We just want to do this heist and get the painting,” Lando pleaded again. The stress was getting to him, and he couldn’t read Raymond’s emotions through the phone. At first, he thought that Raymond was joking or making an empty threat like he always did, but now he wasn’t sure if he was being serious or not.

“Don’t worry,” Raymond said reassuringly. His voice was soft, trying not to stress him out more. “I will dispose of him, and then I will talk to you guys, okay?”

Lando went silent as more orders were given to him.

“‘You’re off the job. You need to grow up.’ These are not my words, ‘You need to grow up.’”

“Who said that?” Raymond calmly asked.

“...I do not recall.”

“Then I’m assuming it’s Mickey because you’re not telling me.”

“D-Don’t assume!” Lando panicked, scared about what Raymond was about to do.

“All right. Just know that Mickey’s dying. And if you can, tell other people not to get involved. If they get involved, I’m sorry. I don’t want to shoot at friends.”

Raymond hung up, never once losing his composure. He impassively stared at the rocky road in front of him and headed south.

(8:15 p.m. - Tuesday, September 21, 2021)

Tony was grilling steaks on the concrete patio next to the side lawn. The sun had begun to set, casting warm hues throughout the sky above him. He smiled at the view of the cityscape and the way that rays of light reflected off of the tall skyscrapers.

His phone chimed and he checked the text message from Lang that read, “yo im gonna b late. the timelord is showing me a future where mr. k joins the dark timelord to become a dragon and i start a zombie apocalypse. b back when I can.”

Unsure of what that meant, Tony simply replied, “ok stay safe <3”

He then opened Yuno’s contact and saw that he still had no new messages from him. It was a little worrying that Yuno hadn’t texted him to pick him up from the airport yet, but he guessed that his flight was just running late.

Choosing to believe his assumption over the other unnerving possibilities, Tony picked up his plate of cooked meat, and walked back inside the manor.

(8:30 p.m. - Tuesday, September 21, 2021)

Harry was driving Mickey to the gray market in the black Stratum when he got an incoming call from Raymond.

“Oh fuck,” he muttered then answered it. “Hello, Ray.”

“Hey, Harry. I just wanted to give you a warning, my friend. I’m going to kill Mickey. I don’t want to shoot at you or anyone else involved in the job. I don’t shoot at family, but Mickey is exception. Someone who treats family like shit deserves to die. You know what I mean?”

Raymond’s voice was stable and expressionless in a way that Harry had never heard before. He suddenly understood why Lando was acting scared earlier. “Ray, is this…is this like…normal? Does this happen a lot? I’m confused. To be honest, Ray, I feel like…we have bigger enemies than each other. ‘Cause I don’t think we should be shooting each other.”

“I also think we should be treating each other with respect. Also, he says, ‘I think you need to grow up. You’re off the job.’ So, Harry, no matter what, he’s dying.”

“I-It wasn’t—” Harry briefly considered lying but decided against it, knowing how much the Russian man valued honesty. “Ray, it wasn’t Mickey that said, ‘grow up.’ It was me.”

“Okay, that’s disrespectful, Harry. I don’t know why you would say that. But if that’s how you feel, then that’s fine. I—”

“Yeah, but, Ray, you are…” Harry let out a long sigh, not knowing how to read the situation and therefore felt very unequipped in handling it. “You do you, Ray. Okay? Uh, but I don’t want us fucking shooting each other on a job, all right? So, it’s probably better if we just do this job unless you decide not to shoot.”

“I’m going to kill Mickey, Harry. Whether I’m on this job or not.”

Harry had heard threats like that before. Lang and Tony had de-escalated them before, but he couldn’t remember how. “...All right, Ray.”

“Harry, please don’t shoot at me.” Raymond’s voice was so empty that Harry couldn’t tell if he was begging or threatening him with that statement.

Harry sighed again. “Ohh my god. This is… I think—Is this what it feels like for Lang and Tony? This is hard.”

“It’s the only thing I request.”

“Holy shit.”

“You’re family. I don’t shoot at family unless it’s Mickey who’s being disrespectful. Listen, I’ve never even considered shooting another member of our family.” Raymond used the same soft tone from when he spoke to Lando.

“I-I’m not gonna get involved, all right?”

“Don’t get involved. Please, I beg of you not to.”

“...All right,” Harry couldn’t handle speaking to Raymond any more. It was too unsettling. “I’m driving like shit ‘cause I can’t multitask, so I gotta go.”

“Bye, Harry.”

“All right, bye-bye.”

Raymond hung up and inspected the syringe needle in his hand. He was hiding in a bush in the gray market. Not even a minute later, the familiar black Stratum parked next to the old, rusty trailer with eroded blue and white paint, and Mickey exited the car.

From the Stratum, Harry watched in shock as Raymond jumped out of the bush, injected Mickey in the neck with propofol, and carried his unconscious body back to his pink Lamborghini hidden behind the trailer.

Harry was too stunned to speak or move.

All too soon, Raymond drove up next to him and rolled down his window. “Don’t get involved, Harry. I’ll talk to you later.”

He watched Raymond drive away with Mickey, quickly disappearing from his sight.

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ☀︎ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

(9:00 p.m. - Tuesday, September 21, 2021)

Mickey couldn’t do anything.

He had felt helpless before, but he had never experienced helplessness like this. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t move, and he couldn’t see. No matter how much he tried, he couldn’t open his eyes. His blood was hot, but his body was cold. Too cold. Yet somehow, even though he knew he was freezing, he didn’t feel cold.

Mickey couldn’t feel anything.

It was as if everything had disappeared around him. He felt as if he was floating in a place underneath the weight of the world, and he futilely tried to believe that he wasn’t hovering between life and death.

If Mickey could’ve pried his an eyelid open, he would’ve seen his own eyeball staring back at him as it sank to the bottom of the ocean.

˚˖⁺₊✶₊⁺⋆.☀︎.⋆⁺₊✶˖⁺₊˚

“Your call has been forwarded to an automatic voice message system. The number you have called is not available. At the tone, please record your message. When you have finished recording—”

The phone call disconnected. It was midnight, and the refectory table in the dining room was set with candles, a massive spread of meats, and other Italian dishes ready to be served.

However, the food had gone cold hours ago.

Every single chair was empty except for one.

Tony sat at the table alone.