Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Hey, you!

Yeah, I'm talking to you. Come a little closer.

You want to hear a story? It's the story of how Ms. Tarantula became a Bad Guy.

It started with a plan. My plan, of course. It was a really good plan, too.

First, Mr. Shark replaced one of the security guards, somehow convincing them that nothing had changed despite his... exaggerated performance.

Once he was in place, he successfully distracted the guards by claiming to spot an intruder on the other side of the building, allowing me, Snake and Piranha to slip inside.

Of course, not all of the guards inside left their posts, so it was my job to distract the remaining guards while Piranha snuck up on them.

'Hello!' I said to the guards, disguised as an old grandmother -- Snake insisted -- and feigning confusion. 'Can one of you fine gentlemen tell me the way to the--?'

Piranha jumped up between them, bashing their heads together with that crazy grin of his.

'Surprise!' he shouted.

'Quiet!' Snake hissed as he slithered up to the safe. 'This design is new. Looks all fancy and electronical or something.'

'Can you open it?' I asked him.

'Of course,' he replied confidently, as I knew he would. 'I can open anything!'

'Then do,' I told him. I think I smirked, but this was a long time ago, so I'm not sure.

He couldn't. He tried everything he could think of, but this safe was so different and nothing worked.

'Well, what now?' Piranha asked.

'Maybe--' I started, but I was cut off by the safe opening.

'Snake, you did it!' I shouted, probably too loud, really.

'That wasn't me,' Snake admitted.

'Then who--?' I cut myself off when I looked at the safe again. The money had been inside when it opened, but now, it was all gone except for one ring.

'Okay, what--' Snake started.

'Look!' I interrupted when I saw movement in the safe. The thief had come back for the ring, carrying the rest of the loot in a white sack. That thief was a tarantula.

'Get her!' I shouted, and we all scrambled to grab the thief who had stolen what was supposed to be our loot.

She was fast, though, too fast for us. She leapt between us and crawled out of the room through the vents.

'Shark, there's a tarantula crawling through the vents with our loot!' I yelled over the radio.

'There's a what crawling through the what with our what?' he asked, incredulous.

'Tarantula, vents, loot!' I repeated.

'I'm gonna eat her!' Snake hissed as he slithered into the vents.

'Fine, just don't eat the loot!' I warned him. He does eat lots of different things, Snake, and our loot was one thing I didn't want his saliva all over.

'Relax, Wolf!' he told me. 'I'm not that hungry!'

While Snake chased her through the vents, me and Piranha ran outside to trap her at the exits.

Shark's voice came through the radio. 'The guard's radios say a tarantula's been spotted at the North side of the building!'

'Well, it's not this one!' Snake told them. 'I've still got eyes on her!'

'I'd quite like to eat her, myself!' Piranha said, jumping up to the vents, tearing the cover off and scrambling inside.

'Again, don't eat the loot!' I reiterated.

I stood, waiting ready for the tarantula to jump from the vents, when I heard a lot of clanging and shouting echoing through them.

'Guys, what's happening?' I asked over the radio.

'I got her!' Snake returned.

'And the loot?' I asked.

'... Sorry,' he muttered, but I don't think he meant it.

Snake soon crawled out of the vents, with Piranha jumping out behind him. Snake spat out the tarantula, and I grabbed her before she could escape.

'I'm the Big Bad Wolf!' I growled to intimidate her. 'Who are you?'

'Miss Tarantula,' she said defiantly. 'You're the bad guys, right?'

'Indeed we are!' I told her proudly. 'The biggest, baddest gang of thieves, robbers and jaywalkers the world has ever known.'

'Sorry I'm late!' Shark said as he found us. 'What did I miss?'

'We were just working out what to do with this itsy bitsy spider,' Snake said.

'SPIDER!?' Shark screamed.

'Relax!' Tarantula told him. 'I'm just a tarantula.'

'TARANTULA!?' Shark screamed again, somehow louder.

'Quiet!' Tarantula hissed. 'The guards will find us!'

'Unidentified disturbance in sector four,' came a voice from the stolen guard's radio Shark was carrying.

'Uh, negative! Negative!' Shark called into the radio. 'No unidentified disturbances here! These disturbances are very identified!'

'Who is this?' a gruff voice came from the radio. 'What's your ID number?'

'Give me my laptop!' Tarantula hissed.

'Why?' Snake hissed back. 'You gonna use it to run away with OUR loot?'

'No!' Tarantula protested. 'I was going to hack into their security network and distract them while we can escape!'

'Fine!' Snake grumbled. 'But we keep the loot.'

'We split the loot,' Tarantula countered. 'Fifty-fifty.'

'We split it equally, five ways,' Piranha countered. 'There's four of us.'

'I have a better idea,' I interjected. 'Miss Tarantula, how would you like to be a Bad Guy?'

'Really!?' all four of the others asked.

'You might want to decide quickly,' I pointed out.

'But she's--' Snake protested.

'A very talented hacker,' I interrupted. 'She opened that safe, and I'm guessing the other tarantula the guards were chasing was just more of her hacking tricks.'

'Fine!' Snake grumbled. 'Provisionally!'

'You're gonna need a nickname, though,' I told her. 'Tarantula is four syllables, that's too long.'

'Congratulations!' she replied sarcastically. 'The wolf can count!'

'How about Tarantino?' Piranha asked.

'That's literally just as long,' Tarantula pointed out.

'Scary-spider-thing!' Shark offered.

'That's even longer!' she objected.

'Legs?' I suggested. I quite liked that one, actually. I still think it was a good choice.

'Too generic,' she countered. 'We literally all have legs. Except the snake.'

'Guys, I think we should leave first and choose nicknames later,' Snake interjected. 'Also, I think she got some webs stuck in my teeth.'

'Webs!' Tarantula -- Webs -- exclaimed. 'Call me webs. Now can I please get my laptop back?'

Snake begrudgingly obliged, and Webs started typing frantically, muttering about wet, sticky keys. Security were almost at the door, now.

'Just ten more seconds...' Webs muttered.

We could hear them coming.

'Five...'

We could see the beams of their torches coming from around the corner.

'Three...'

Piranha farted.

'Two...'

Shark was shivering.

'One...'

I could feel the sweat on my nose.

'Done!'

Abruptly, the guards ran off.

'Give it up for Webs!' I shouted quietly. 'Welcome to the team!'

'Provisionally!' Snake interjected.

'Provisionally,' I conceded.

'So,' Webs asked while we were getting away. 'What's the next job?'

'I was thinking Cairo,' I said. 'I heard there's this rich guy who has something I thought sounded particularly enticing.'

'What is it?' Snake asked.

'You'll have to wait and see,' I told them. 'But it should be a very exciting job.'

'You mean,' Webs said wryly, 'You'll -- we'll --'

'Provisionally!' Snake interrupted.

'-- Go bad...' Webs continued.

'Or go home!' we all shouted together.

~-~

'That was quite the story!' Diane Foxington said.

'And I tell them so well,' Mister Wolf said smoothly.

'Well, you do have a specific set of skills,' she said wryly. 'Now, would you like to hear a story?'

'If it's the one about the diamond, I could probably recite it by heart, though to be fair, it does get better every time you tell it.'

'Actually,' Diane told him, 'This is one you haven't heard before, about the time I stole the British Crown Jewels, and how I met Kitty Kat.'

Chapter Text

Alright, my turn now. Let's set the scene.

London, seven years ago. Through a mix of gadgets, stealth and -- let's not forget -- incredible skills, I had made my way to the Tower of London unnoticed.

I got past security using a handy device that could replicate ID cards from a quick scan, and managed to take the vents all the way to right above the jewels themselves.

It was when I descended into the room itself that I saw her. A snow leopard with a lollipop in her mouth hanging on the other side of the glass case the jewels were in.

As we were cutting the case open, I broke the silence first.

'Hello, snow leopard,' I said cheekily.

'I have a name, you know,' she interrupted before I could introduce myself. 'Kitty Kat.'

'How nice to meet you,' I said wryly. 'I'm the Crimson Paw.'

'Then I'm the Bad Guys!' she shot back sarcastically. 'Yeah right, the Crimson Paw.'

'Fine, then I'm Dana the Purple Flamingo.' I retorted.

I finished cutting a hole in the glass and reached into the case to grab as much as I could while she did the same, ending with us both holding the crown itself.

'I grabbed it first!' Kitty blatantly lied. 'It's mine!'

'Ha! As if!' I responded as I prepared one of my gadgets with my other hand. 'Kitty Kat, meet my Polariser!'

The crown was wrenched from her grip, but she seemed more impressed than angry.

'I'm impressed,' she said -- I could tell, of course, but sometimes it pays to be underestimated. 'Where'd you find it?'

'That'd be telling,' I told her as I pulled myself back up to the vents.

When I left the vents, however, she was stood there waiting for me.

'Mine, I think,' she said as she tried to snatch my bag of loot.

'Nope!' I said as I kicked at her, but she dodged and went for the bag again. She'd almost latched onto it when I swung it away from her and, seeing her own bag across the room, dashed for it. When I was almost within reach, she caught up to me and grabbed the bottom of my bag, so I turned and kicked her in the jaw, causing her to lose her grip and sending the lollipop flying. I lurched for her bag again and grabbed it, but she was blocking the exit.

I ran up and kicked at her again, but she dodged again and tried to punch me. I punched for her face but she blocked, and she headbutted me, causing me to stumble backwards and drop both bags -- in my defence, I'd never been headbutted before. I shook it off, but she was already leaving with the bags. I dashed for the exit, but I forgot the security system and triggered the alarms.

Within seconds, the two of us were surrounded. We stood back to back, waiting to see who would make the first move.

I think it was me, but I'm not really sure.

I started by kicking, probably. In my experience, kicks always make a good starting move. The guard fought back, of course, but he didn't stand a chance against me. Once he was dealt with, I turned around and went for the loot, but Kitty managed to turn around and push me into another guard, who I grabbed by the arm and flung at her, causing her to drop the bags but also making them both spill open.

'No, no, no!' I cried while disarming several guards in quick succession.

'No!' Kitty wailed while shrugging off the guard I had thrown at her.

We both grabbed a bag and scrambled to put as much of the loot as we could back into it.

'You ruined it!' she screamed at me. 'This was supposed to be a simple operation!'

'I know!' I replied. 'And it was, until you came along!'

'Maybe you should call it quits this time,' she suggested unhelpfully.

'Well, maybe if you dropped my loot,' I countered, before adding 'without spilling it, this time.'

'No can do,' she said. 'This loot's mine, and I'm keeping it!'

We were so busy arguing that we were soon surrounded by guards.

'You might want to give that bag to me,' I advised her. 'Easier to escape without it.'

'And I suppose you'll escape with them both just fine,' she muttered sarcastically.

'Well, I am the greatest bad guy the world has ever seen!' I reminded her.

'Then you shouldn't need this stuff anyway,' she countered.

'But I did earn it,' I said.

'So did I,' she returned, 'and I've got it, so I'm keeping it!'

'Why don't we fight them first and each other later?' I suggested.

'Good idea,' she admitted. 'Just know I wont forget the "later".'

'Neither will I,' I assured her, and we started kicking.

One guard was dropped with a kick, one guard was dropped with a punch, one went down to a shove, one was hit by a flying helmet. One by one, they all fell down, and soon, there were only two of them left.

'You go left, I go right.' Kitty Kat instructed.

'You know, I was only one second away from saying that,' I replied.

'Shut up and fight!' she growled, before rushing at the guard on the right and tackling him while I took on the other remaining guard with more finesse.

'Nice work,' I lied. 'I'll take that loot, now.'

'Not so fast,' she said. 'I'm planning a big heist that could use your skills.'

'You're asking for my help!?' I asked, incredulous.

'I'm offering you a job.' she corrected.

'What do I get out of it?'

'Half of whatever this lot's worth, plus half the price of the Ironite Flamingo.'

'Couldn't I just steal both of those myself and get full price for everything?'

'Well, I've got at least half of these jewels already,' she reminded me as if I'd forgotten, 'and you're welcome to try, but I don't think the Ironite flamingo can be stolen alone, even by one of your talents.'

I could have refused, of course, but there was always the possibility that she was right about the flamingo, and I could always ditch her and steal the other half.

'Deal.' I said, and we shook on it .

~-~

'If you both already knew each other,' Mr. Wolf asked, 'how come neither of you mentioned it during the whole rocket incident?'

'I imagine she finally decided to take my advice and stop making things personal,' Diane Foxington explained, 'and my memory of that heist's still a little fuzzy.'

'Wait, you actually did steal the Ironite Flamingo?' Wolf asked. 'I thought only we did that.'

'You did,' Diane responded wryly, 'in the middle of our heist.'

He gasped. 'That was you!?'

'I'd tell you the story,' she told him, 'but I'd like to hear your side first.'

'Very well,' he said. 'Get over here...'

Chapter Text

... Just a little closer...

Perfect.

Now, I'm sure you remember the Master of Disguise, Mister Shark, the expert safecracker, Mister Snake, the brawler Piranha and, of course, myself, the pickpocket-slash-master-planner-slash-getaway-driver Mister Wolf -- I know, how could you forget? -- Miss Tarantula, though, hadn't joined us by this point, and our resident hacker was instead a grumpy old bird called Mister Vulture.

We had a plan -- painstakingly, lovingly crafted by yours truly -- to steal the Ironite Flamingo -- I'm sure you remember it, world's most expensive tin can -- from the private collection of some rich idiot who was away for the weekend.

Why am I telling you all of this? I guess I just like exposition. That's not a crime! Right?

Anyway, the first step of the plan was to disguise Shark as the rich whoever who owned the thing, allowing him to get inside, order the guards away and let the rest of us in. It wasn't that simple, though, because the statuette was protected by a security system that used a seven-digit code, a retinal scan and a voice print.

We couldn't risk trying the code or voice print, because we didn't know the correct sequence or phrase and the security would increase if we guessed wrong more than once. We also couldn't trick the retina scanner, because it was extra-fancy and only responded to a guy who wasn't home. Our solution was to hack into the security network.

Yep, we really thought it would be that easy.

The retinal scan was bypassed easily enough, but the code and voice print were trickier.

'The useless junk's told me half of the code,' Vulture explained wearily, 'but it can't get the other half!'

'Are you insulting yourself in the third person?' Snake asked sarcastically. I, of course, totally understood the joke at the time, but I didn't want to embarrass the others.

'I don't get it,' I lied.

'I was insulting my laptop,' Vulture explained, 'but Snake thinks--'

'I do not!' Snake protested. 'I was being sarcastic!'

'Quiet, boys, let's focus!' I reminded them. 'What's the half-code you've got?'

'It goes zero, something, zero, something, something, zero, something, five.'

'Man likes his zeroes,' I noted. 'I guess he shouldn't mind too much when we steal his most priceless work of art.'

'"Priceless" isn't relative,' Vulture corrected, 'so it can't be his "most priceless" because that's not how words work. Also, it's actually very pricefull, I checked.'

'On point one, I'm a pickpocket, not a professor of grammar-ology or whatever, and on point two, how pricefull, exactly?'

I can't remember the exact figure, but it was definitely very big. Even Piranha and Shark, who had been distracted by some underwater landscapes, turned at that.

'Okay,' I whistled, 'that's quite some sum. Any guesses as to the rest of the code?'

'zero one zero eight two zero two five.' Shark said.

'What makes you say that?' I asked.

'It's written in the coral in A Painting of the Underside of the Sea by Artie S. Thompson.' he explained.

I tried it. There was tension in the air for a few seconds as the system processed the attempt with sadistic slowness, but eventually, there was a click and the light on the keypad lit up green.

'I have an audio fragment of the correct phrase for the voice print,' Vulture said.

'What does it sound like?' I asked.

'Hard to tell,' Vulture explained. 'Kind of like a snake kissing a raven, I suppose.'

'Vulture,' I told him, 'Please get that image out of my head.'

'Mine, too!' Snake added. 'Why would I kiss a raven?'

'You were pining after a guinea pig the other day,' I reminded him.

'Yeah, to eat!' Snake protested. 'Besides, that's a guinea pig. Birds are weird. They have feathers and beaks and--'

'I can hear you, you know!' Vulture reminded him.

'I'd say "no offence",' Snake said. 'But we both know I'd be lying.'

'Can we hear the fragment, please?' I asked.

I had no idea at the time what a snake kissing a raven would sound like, but I think Vulture was right.

'How does that make words?' I asked.

'I think it's corrupted,' Snake said. 'You probably need to--'

'I tried that first,' Vulture interrupted.

'Did you--' Piranha started to ask.

'Yes!' Vulture interrupted again. 'It didn't work!'

'What about--?' Shark tried suggesting.

'That didn't work either!'

'I suppose you already tried--' I began.

'Wolf,' Vulture grumbled, 'you are a genius!'

'I am?' I asked. I knew I was, of course, but sometimes it pays to be humble.

'Listen to it now!' he said, before playing what now sounded like actual words.

"There's noth...ore use...an a lo...th a voi...int."

'There's nothing like ore for an allocated... I give up!' Piranha said.

'There's nothing more useless than a lot of... Thavoy Int?' Shark suggested.

'There's nothing more useless than a lock with a voice print!' I exclaimed. 'Shark, try that!'

'There's nothing more useless than a lock with a voice print.' Shark told the voice recognition lock in a perfect imitation of the collection's owner.

It didn't work.

We only had one more guess.

'What could it be?' I wondered aloud. 'noth...ore, lo...th, voi...int, use...' I had it! 'Useful! Try Useful!'

'Just "useful"?' Shark asked. 'What about all those other words?'

'There's nothing more useful than a lock with a voice print!'

Shark tried it. We waited. Eventually, it clicked and turned green. We were into the inner sanctum of the collection. Now we just had to grab the flamingo and--

The Ironite Flamingo was gone!

Looking around, we saw a shadowy figure leaving through the roof.

'Why didn't we come in that way?' Vulture asked.

'Because it's boring!' I explained. 'Whoever that is has no sense of style!'

Sorry. No offence.

When none of them moved, I added 'Well, let's get after him!'

Using Snake as a grappling hook, we climbed up after the mysterious thief, who we found was nowhere to be seen. There was another thief, however, who looked much more menacing -- though, knowing them both now, I'd say the true threat was the other way around.

Piranha was the first to charge, but he was quickly tossed aside by our menacing mystery opponent.

Shark went next, but he, too, posed no threat to our enemy.

'Snake attack!' Snake shouted, proving difficult for our opponent, but not impossible, as he, too, looked about to be defeated.

That was when I jumped in, landing a mean left hook -- yes, I know I was out of practice when we met, but I used to be quite handy with that sort of thing -- to knock our opponent off-balance. Next, I slashed with my claws and was rewarded by a glimpse of the statuette we'd come for.

'Everyone, attack!' I shouted quietly.

In the confusion, I managed to slip the statuette into my pockets. Yes, they were very big pockets.

'Snake, I need you to rappel me!' I called.

'Repel you?' he asked.

'Rappel me!' I corrected. 'Get me down!'

'Oh, right,' he said, and he jumped from the mystery thief, wrapping himself around me and clamping his jaw onto the edge of the roof.

I jumped from the building and slid safely down to the ground where our getaway car was waiting. Hopping in, I sped away.

No, I wasn't leaving without them, I was doing something clever. Once I was far enough away, I turned sharply and drove back as fast as the car would go.

You see, the road leading up to the place was very long, completely straight, and inclined at just the right angle that, if I drove fast enough, I could use it as a ramp to jump the car right onto the roof. The only question was whether I would be going fast enough when I reached the end.

Launching from the end of the road, I skimmed the roof's edge with my wheels and landed right beside the rest of the guys, who all quickly scrambled into the car. Except Vulture. As the mysterious enemy tried to reach our car, Vulture stood in the way.

'Go!' he shouted. 'I'll hold this bandit off!'

'We're a team!' I protested. 'We won't leave you!'

'I'll manage!' he insisted. 'Now go!'

I tried to protest again, but he clicked a button he'd been hiding beneath his wing and the car sped off by itself before I could stop it.

'We have to go back for him!' Piranha shouted.

'We can't, he's taken control of the car!' I explained. 'We'll have to go back later!'

When we got back to our lair, there was a note on the door that read:

"I'm fine, don't look for me.
Sincerely, Mr. Vulture"

'We're gonna need a new hacker,' I said.

'Someone smaller, this time,' Snake said, licking his lips, 'Like a guinea pig.'

We never saw Vulture again.

~-~

'Are you sure you weren't embellishing some details?' Diane Foxington asked.

'No need,' Mr. Wolf replied smoothly. 'I'm really that good, ma'am.'

'I know,' Diane agreed, 'but I also know you only call me "ma'am" if you're trying to impress me.'

'I do?' he asked.

'Yes, mister wolf, you do.'

'Well, how about that...'

'My turn, I think,' Diane said. 'Let me set the scene:...'

Chapter Text

Paris, almost seven years ago.

The first step was to get rid of the guards. Because the guards in that place were relatively low-tech, they couldn't be diverted by hacking, and knocking them all out would take too long and draw the attention of the others in the meantime. The idea was that Kitty Kat would distract them as a fake thief while I disabled the roof security and stole the Ironite Flamingo that way. She had kept both our cuts of the Crown Jewels as insurance that I wouldn't simply take off with the statuette by myself, but I had a workaround planned. A small device that I would use at the rendezvous to confuse her brain and allow me to escape with everything.

When we got there, however, the guards were nowhere to be seen.

Kitty went to see where they were and why so they couldn't surprise us later, and I got to work on hacking into the security system to disable the sensors and cameras on the roof. It was actually quite a fascinating system to hack into. I started by bypassing the Threat Recognition Parameter Check stage of the --

You don't understand a work of this, do you? Maybe I should tell this story to Webs instead.

Anyway, I hacked the system, disabled the roof security, accessed the roof, snuck in through a skylight, grabbed the statue, and just as I was leaving--

The main door opened and the Bad Guys entered.

I'd heard a lot about the Bad Guys, but I was never really that impressed. They seemed to do heists mostly for spectacle, putting more effort into showing off than --

Yes, I know you heard my inaugural speech as governor, and I know I said all of this at the Golden Dolphin awards when you were disguised as "Mister Poodleton", and I also remember how I stole some things just for fun, myself, but that's different. Why? Why, you ask? Because I was doing that for me, not to make a scene. Didn't I tell you that--?

Never mind. Where was I? Ah, yes.

As I was saying, the Bad Guys saw me leaving and soon chased after me, but by the time they reached the roof, I was riding away to the rendezvous, sure I'd forgotten something but unable to remember what. It was only when I reached the rendezvous that I realised Kitty had swiped the Flamingo from me and used my own brain scrambler against me so I wouldn't notice. I was about to leave empty-handed when she walked in with the vulture from the Bad Guys and the Crown Jewels but no Ironite Flamingo.

'They swiped it from me and escaped,' she growled.

'Well, maybe if you hadn't swiped it from me--' I began, but she interrupted me.

'What was I supposed to do, share!?' she retorted.

'We had a deal!' I reminded her.

'You had a brain scrambler,' she pointed out. That was true, to be fair, but still...

'What's he doing here?' I asked, hoping she wouldn't notice that I'd changed the subject.

'He's going to help me get revenge,' she said.

'I'm sick of them,' the bird explained. 'They keep talking like they know better and insulting me, ever since Wolf got us together for our first heist at that casino.'

'You're making things personal!?' I asked as Vulture started typing something.

'They started it!' she protested. 'I'm just finishing it.'

'And I'm finishing our partnership!' I declared. 'Goodbye, Kitty Kat.'

I tried to activate my brain scrambler, but Vulture hacked it and it backfired.

Literally.

~-~

'So that's what happened to Vulture?' Mr. Wolf asked. 'The little snake!'

'I don't know what they did after that,' Diane Foxington admitted. 'Do you think he was right?'

Wolf looked thoughtful. 'We didn't mean to,' he admitted, 'but I suppose we might have been too hard on him.'

'I wonder why you never met either of them after that until the whole rocket incident,' Diane said. 'I suppose things didn't work out between them, like with Kitty and I.'

'On the contrary,' Wolf replied. 'I think that worked out great.'

'It did, didn't it?' she mused. 'I hadn't realised teamwork could be such hard work, but I also didn't realise it could work so well.'

'We do, don't we?' he replied smoothly. 'By the way, how did you remember this stuff in so much detail if it was that long ago and you got your brain scrambled twice?'

'I may have filled some blanks with a little imagination,' she admitted. 'Did I ever tell you that a wolf and a fox aren't so different?'