A/N: Now we're starting to get somewhere ;)
Kenny and Craig were reviewing some operational plans of the Syndicate when the former's phone buzzed in his pocket. The blond took out his phone and opened his texts. Kenny paled significantly as his eyes scanned over the message. "Shit... I'm so fucked...."
"Huh? What?" Craig dropped the documents in his hands on the desk carelessly before moving to his friend's side. He read the text over Kenny's shoulder and inhaled sharply. "When would he be here?"
"Probably an hour, give or take," Kenny replied.
"What?! That soon?!"
"He went to the site himself since he happened to be in the area when the report came in. Just my luck I guess."
"An hour...." Craig repeated, thinking.
"Welp," Kenny grabbed a bottle of whiskey from the beverage table and drank it straight from the container. "It's been an honor." He threw his head back and took another swig of the liquor.
"Don't fucking say that," Craig hissed.
Kenny chuckled, setting the now empty bottle down. "I was just joking, man."
"I'm not. Don't joke about this shit. If anything happens to you-"
"Nothing is going to happen to me. He wouldn't kill me off, not over this."
Craig looked at Kenny silently, a scarce look of great worry evident in his eyes. "What do we do?"
"Not 'we,' 'I.' That warehouse was solely under my management, and I want you to wash your hands of it as much as possible."
"What? I can't just watc-"
"You have to. If we want to finish what we came here to do, one of us has to be in power. Right now, I have one strike under my name, so you can't have any."
"We're supposed to be in this tog-"
Kenny held a hand up, motioning for Craig to stop talking. He pulled a drawer open and retrieved a device from it. Kenny turned on the bug detector and quickly scanned the room for any hidden cameras or microphones, something they did constantly before they talked about sensitive topics.
Craig took the cue and went to lock the door as well.
Kenny put the detector away when he found nothing of concern, sliding the drawer shut. "Who do you think did it?"
Craig fell silent for a moment to think. "You don't think it's the girls, do you?"
"The Hit and Run Girls?" Kenny questioned. It wasn't that much of a surprise when groups of low-level mafia members were murdered. Over the last year, however, they started picking up on a particular pattern. Many of their members were found dead while clearly ready to engage in sexual behaviors. The scene of crime occasionally yielded a pair of female items of clothing, pointing to two girls behind the killings. Over time, Kenny and Craig had dubbed the two mysterious girls as the Hit and Run Girls.
"They've been picking off more and more of our lower level henchmen, getting braver and braver each time. If they caught wind of your warehouse..." Craig trailed off.
Kenny plopped himself down on a couch and dropped his voice until it was only audible to Craig. "I mean, we've been plotting about that warehouse for a while. If it was them, those girls did us a favor."
"Not by dragging you into the mix. We were gonna clear you of it first."
"That wasn't exactly possible. The warehouse has always been under my jurisdiction, that's not something we could've gotten around."
"Then we wouldn't have done it."
"And then what? Let those drugs circulate the market? Let more lives be ruined by the Syndicate? Whoever it was, they pulled the trigger that we were too squeamish to pull ourselves."
"But now what? What do we do about you?"
"There's nothing that needs to be done about me."
"Higher-ups will be here in less than an hour."
"Okay, and?"
"Do you understand how serious this is?"
"We made sure our branch isn't the worst-performing one despite everything we've been doing. Even if the axe does fall, it wouldn't be on my neck."
"You know better than anyone how much that warehouse was worth."
"In the two years that we have assumed positions, the Colorado branch has been more stable than ever. Even if we account for my loss, we still average out better than a good handful of other Syndicate branches in the other states. I'm still useful to them. I'm too valuable for them to just kill off."
"How can you be so sure?"
"I'm betting on it."
"This isn't a fucking game we're talking about here! Your life is on the line."
"My life isn't on the line. I'm gonna be fine."
Craig buried his face in his hands, frustrated and fearful.
Kenny sighed, reaching over and grabbing his friend's wrists. "Feldspar... no... Craig. I need you to promise me something."
Craig looked up at Kenny with uncertainty written across his face.
"No matter what happens, I need you to steer clear of this."
"Ken-"
"No. Listen. If we ever want to... if we ever want to see our sisters again, one of us has to stay in the game. Right now, I'm the bishop, and you're the king. You don't risk the king for a bishop."
"Kenny, I can't just-"
"Relax. I'm not gonna die... but if I do-"
"That is the most unreassuring thing you could possibly say!"
"Look, it's not gonna happen. I'm saying just in case-"
"There is no 'just in case.' I can't have anything happen to you!"
"Just let me finish. If anything happens, please, find my sister and tell her that I'm sorry."
Craig put his face down into his hands again, his breath hitching in his throat.
"Now that we have that out of the way, I'm gonna tell you again... nothing is going to happen to me. I'm probably just gonna get shouted at and threatened, but he's not going to kill me. Trust me on this one."
Craig tugged on his own hair, a foreign feeling of anxiety coursing through his entire body.
Kenny sighed, pulling out his gun and checking that the safety was on before tossing it onto his desk. "We might as well go wait for him in the meeting room."
Craig nodded slowly, also taking out his gun and ditching it on Kenny's desk.
"Leave your other weapons too," Kenny added while pulling out a few knives he had hid on himself and leaving them with his firearm.
Craig did the same before his hand lingered at his belt. He had always kept a hidden blade strapped horizontally on the inside of his belt. Craig moved his hands away, dropping his other knives on the table but leaving the one on his belt.
"Wish me luck I guess," Kenny muttered before leading the way out of his office.
Craig trailed behind, keeping a hand on his friend's shoulder.
The two entered the luxuriously decorated meeting room and stood in the center, both of their arms stuck by their sides and clasped in front of themselves by the hands. The atmosphere was heavy with tenseness and anxiety.
***
Karen returned to the farmhouse and was immediately greeted by Tricia.
"You're back!" Tricia put an arm around the blond immediately.
"Wow, I am. Oh my gosh." Karen replied sarcastically.
Tricia snorted and playfully smacked her friend on the shoulder. "Go clean up and meet me in the bedroom when you're done. I have a present for you."
"A present in the bedroom? Ooo," Karen teased.
Tricia rolled her eyes and flipped her friend off.
Karen stuck out her tongue before running past Tricia to go clean herself up in the bathroom. She wiped off the blood from her body and changed into more comfortable clothing before joining her friend in the bedroom. Karen immediately noticed two printed out pictures with names pinned on a corkboard.
"I just found our next targets, two very highly ranked Syndicate members. One for you, and one for me," Tricia explained, nodding at the photos. She picked up the laptop from the bed and began reading from it. "I found a file that was sent out to all the Syndicate subdivisions in Colorado announcing the inauguration of the new leaders in charge. The two of them oversee the entire branch in the Colorado area."
"... The entire Colorado area...."
"I know what you're thinking, but sadly, no. It was a single guy in charge when we were taken. He was K.I.A. two years ago when his tracks were somehow leaked to the police. They thought it was an inside job, but they never found the ones responsible. During the police stakeout, the two who are currently in charge apparently single-handedly-"
"Double-handedly," Karen interrupted jokingly.
Tricia rolled her eyes before continuing. "Double-handedly forced the entire SWAT team to retreat just after they managed to eliminate the previous leader. I guess the SWAT really did a favor for those two."
"Huh, sounds like a good hunt to me." Karen rocked back and forth on her feet with anticipation.
"I know, we've got some quality prey this season." Tricia gestured back at the corkboard. "Meet Mysterion and Feldspar, ex-leaders of the Syndicate branch when we're through with them."
"And I know just where to start looking for them." Karen held up her phone triumphantly, a tracker dot moving across a map on-screen.
"Ooo la la! Well, it's your turn to take your pick," Tricia said to her friend, nodding at the two pictures as she pulled out a knife.
Karen's gaze fell to the blond and felt a weird sensation that she had never felt before. After killing so many Syndicate members that she had long since lost count, for the first time, she felt a pang of... sympathy? She didn't know what it was, but she was unwilling to harm the mafia leader named Mysterion. Karen pulled out her knife and raised it before she sent it flying, the blade plunging into Feldspar's name.
Tricia grinned. "I wanted blondie anyway." She swung her arm out casually as her knife stabbed into Mysterion's name.
"We'll need to bring our A-game. These two won't go down as easily."
"Say that again when they're both six feet under."
"Let's roll."
***