Who: Ryan and Seven What: Mumford sons bust up the joint Where: A scummy club for all your scummy drug lord needs When: Recently Warnings: Violence! Bloody violence.
Ryan liked the quiet of VIP rooms above clubs. The ground still shook with each blasting beat of the electronic music he couldn’t begin to understand, but it only seemed to bring home how peaceful the room was. He liked how the velvet couches, glass tables and expensive art were all just decorations to make the occupants feel superior of the writhing sweat stained bodies below. He wasn’t personally charmed by it, but he always appreciated a good illusion and anything for the semi rich and powerful certainly was. That’s why he dressed nice. Always in a cream or gray vest. Always with a clean button down shirt. Always in slacks and nice shoes that were deceptively easy to run in. Usually with a good three or four concealed weapons scattered under his clothes just in case something got dicey. Avarice made people appreciate little things like a sophisticated wardrobe. It made him seem just as dignified and quiet as this VIP room.
Tonight, though, he didn’t even bother hiding his guns. Two revolvers, strapped to his sides like some kind of noir gangster, he leaned on a nearby wall with his arms crossed, sniffing for trouble. His mind began to wander, started playing a short assortment of Bruce Springsteen songs in his head when Ryan realized he wasn’t exactly sure where Seven was. Somewhere in this room, sure, but what if he decided to wander downstairs without telling him?
“Seven. It’s your babysitter. Are you being a good boy?” Ryan spoke into a comm stuck up one of his sleeves. Something was off. Something big. But, he hadn’t found it yet.
Always the contrast to Right-Hand Ryan (as Seven had recently taken to calling him, encouraged by Ryan’s raised eyebrows of disapproval), Seven was dressed in motorcycle leathers and a plaid flannel shirt over a simple black tee. The elbows of the flannel were thinned and worn out and the cuffs were pushed up, showing off the taut muscles of his forearms and the tattoo on his wrist: the roman numerals VII, inked in simple black where it contrasted against his tanned skin. His only concession to the club’s dress code were the expensive Italian shoes on his feet, but the bouncer’s reluctance to allow him past the velvet rope had been quickly remedied when Seven had arched a brow and surreptitiously slipped him a folded bill in a handshake. The bribe wasn’t necessary - the reputation bubble that surrounded the two men and left whispers trailing in their wake was more than enough to grant them access - but Seven preferred to make sure that the security detail was motivated to be on their side, rather than merely tolerating their presence.
At the moment, Seven was tucked away in a corner booth with a client, a wealthy Armenian big-shot who wanted to build a new hotel and was responsible for Seven’s most recent construction contract. The man was drunk on expensive champagne that Seven ensured was flowing steadily, red in the face and blathering on about marble flooring in the lobby and gold fixtures in the penthouse bathrooms. Seven, however, was far more interested in the man’s son, tagging along to learn the ways of the business at the tender age of twenty-four. He also wasn’t paying very much attention to his father’s barely-coherent ramblings. In fact, he was too busy making eyes at Seven to notice much of anything.
When the familiar buzz in his ear sounded, Seven somehow managed not to wince. The damned thing was too loud again, turned up to the middle setting so that it could be heard over the club’s music - but apparently the middle setting was also the bleeding-eardrums setting. He managed to excuse himself under the guise of ordering more champagne to their table, and found some privacy in an alcove.
“You better have a good reason for interrupting, Ryan,” he drawled into the comm that was attached to the collar of his shirt, no bigger than a button, his usual smirk clearly evident in his voice. “I’ve got a rich playboy practically begging to suck my cock in the men’s room. Where are you?”
Ryan barely smiled, eyebrows up even though there wasn’t very many ways Seven could surprise him anymore. Seriously, the idiot could call him from space and Ryan would just shake his head and says Typical Seven. “Something isn’t right.” Ryan had a little trouble in his voice, like he walked into the kitchen and forgot what he wanted. Something was out of place and Ryan could smell it like dogs could smell earthquakes. “I just wanted you to know that if I suddenly get killed by some sexy ninjas, I love you. I’ve always loved you.” Delivered all overly dramatic in Lifetime movie channel fashion. Ryan would never admit it to his CIA buddies, but Seven was his bro. His bestest of bros. And, the kind of drug dealing he did was so mild compared to the fucked up shit he had seen overseas and with a real syndicate that it almost felt comfortable. One day he’d probably have to leave Vegas or start training agents fulltime, but for now this was a good way to live.
It was a bit of good luck for the both of them that Seven couldn’t hear Ryan’s silent suggestion that he didn’t deserve the same clout as a ‘real syndicate’. It was entirely true, of course, but that didn’t mean Seven - in his everlasting sensitivity to the smallest slight - had to like it, or would suffer hearing such blasphemy without breaking something in his immediate vicinity. Of course, since it was Ryan, he would probably have settled for scuffing up that fancy suit. But still. It was best for all parties involved that his buddy kept such thoughts to himself, for the most part.
“Your Spidey senses tingling again, huh?” Seven mused thoughtfully, soft enough not to attract any unwanted attention while he stepped halfway out of the alcove and surveyed his corner of the VIP room. He had rolled his eyes good-naturedly and ignored the rest of Ryan’s melodramatic swooning, cruising around the back corner table he had previously occupied and casually strolling in the direction of the area where he’d last seen his partner. There were the roped-off steps leading down to the main floor, but no one had gone up or down in the last fifteen minutes or so - which, now that he thought about it, was probably a bit unusual. He knew there was another bouncer down at the bottom of the staircase, but Seven didn’t know him personally and hadn’t managed to grease his palm, either. He was suddenly quite aware of the cool weight at the small of his back where his stainless steel SIG Sauer P226 was holstered.
“Guess it does seem a little quiet up here. That main staircase is looking lonely. Got anything more concrete over on your end?”
“Give me a second.”
Ryan went quiet, hand on his gun like he was lightly holding onto a door handle or a woman’s wrist. The line went dead for a moment as he went to check the second staircase before something could get the pounce on him. The Mumford boys liked to strike hard and suddenly. Once he heard of them them going after a faulty investor during brunch on his porch. They boasted that the breakfast omelette was still warm enough to eat once he was dead. Crazy motherfuckers. Maybe he was being paranoid. Maybe the appearance of Rogue in his head fried his senses. But, Ryan knew the death of Papa Mumford was going to bring him trouble.
He turned to check the aforementioned stairwell with the bouncer neither of them knew only to see three well dressed men walking up towards him. “Oh shit.” He murmured as their dog ears picked up and their faces turned cold for the hunt. Ryan slipped back around the corner, his bushy fox tail barely making a quick getaway before the first shots were fired up the hallway at him. “Seven.” Ryan said, pulling out both guns as he ducked behind some cover. “I’m in some shit. Stay where you are.”
Seven had pressed into a deserted doorway while Ryan checked out his area, listening intently to the crackling silence of the line and the throbbing pulse of the music vibrating up through the floor. With one hand under the back of his shirt around the grip of his gun, he glanced around warily. Strangely enough, the VIP room felt significantly more... empty than it had when Ryan first buzzed him on his earpiece. Not a good sign, hoss.
Suddenly Ryan’s voice cursed in his ear, harsh and full of static, at the same time that shots rang out. They were twice as loud, echoing against the hard plaster of the walls and ceiling and sending feedback through his comm, and Seven flinched visibly before he got his bearings and talked himself through the situation. Ryan was in shit, being fired at by Mumford boys or god-knows who else, and he wanted to Seven to stay where he was.
“Not fucking likely, love. Get some cover and hold tight, I’m coming after them.” Seven swore under his breath and yanked his weapon from its holster, switching off the safety and chambering a round in one smooth, practiced motion. With the gun held out in front of him and his left hand supporting his wrist, he crept across the room and made it to the bar around the same time as the men rounded the corner of the hallway and buried several bullets in the surrounding walls.
Seven fired off a round before he rolled over and behind the bar and searched frantically for Ryan’s location, peering over his gun’s sight through narrowed eyes before he spotted the back of a familiar head poking out from behind some furniture as the man shot at their attackers. Confident now he wouldn’t accidentally kill his partner, he aimed the barrel of his gun at the nearest thug and opened fire. He pulled off four rounds before he hit his target in the arm and then hit him twice more before the retaliatory fire forced him down behind the bar, cursing loudly as half a dozen bullets shattered some of the bottles behind the bar and sent a spray of glass and liquor down on his head from above.
“Motherfucker. Why are they after us, Ryan? Pull any shit I don’t know about?”
Ryan looked up to see Seven’s entrance and as if they had done it a thousand times before, synchronized with his shots. He liked chaos because it gave him a chance to be the eye of storm, the one piece that was collected, simple and precise. Even when this particular storm was heading right towards him. “Mumford got offed, they’re looking for answers.” Ryan shouted over the gunfire, rolling to a position behind a plaster column. The pause in gunfire gave him enough time to get over to Seven. “I know what you’re thinking. I didn’t kill him. I’m not that fucking stupid.”
And, he wasn’t. Killing the old man wouldn’t just get him in deep shit with the mobs, it’d eventually get around to his real bosses, the CIA. He hadn’t been trained, hadn’t been pulled through everything they could throw at him, hadn’t been undercover for years just to do something that stupid. “But if these assholes want to die just so I can claim self defense well that’s just alright with me.”
If Ryan in a firefight held the essence of a deep, calm fury, then Seven was the very definition of chaos. As the world exploded into a thousand fires and shards of glass rained down over the shoulders of his flannel shirt, he only smiled - something tight and grim, with his canines exposed and his lips flushed. In the first instant that the foreign gunfire hesitated and the shattering of bottles slowed behind him, he was leaning on the bar with his SIG in front of his face and emptying everything she had. His bullets bit into abandoned tables and wine glasses and the soft, flabby stomach of the point man where he crouched in the doorway at the top of the stairs.
“Maybe you didn’t kill him, but god himself be damned if you’re innocent. You’re one bad asshole, have I told you that lately?” Seven’s shout was full of approval as he finally sent the point man flying back down the stairs to the first landing, where he crumbled in a ball in an widening pool of blood. As he appreciated the view, Seven realized that his gun was only click, click, clicking as he pulled the trigger. Shit. The extra mags were safely tucked in the pockets of his leather jacket, where it hung in the booth he’d shared with the rich client.
Fuck. Okay. Uttering a silent prayer to no particular deity, Seven scrambled down the length of the bar with his hands running over the underside of the counter, ducking his head just enough to avoid getting a stray bullet in his skull. Finally, as he reached the end of the bar, his hands found what he’d been looking for - it was a spring-loaded shotgun mounted on the underside of the bar, and it practically leapt into his hands as he jumped up behind the counter. With a quick pump of the barrel and a thunderous blast, Seven aimed the barrel at the nearest stranger’s chest and pulled the trigger.
Now, being shot point blank with a shotgun was a messy affair. The gun was built for spread to knock down or annoy a couple in a short distance. But when one asshole was dumb enough to get right up to the bar and get shot through the guts with a gun like that? Blood, lungs, you name it, flew everywhere. It was enough to freak out the remaining men and make them run down the stairs like scared sheep. Ryan jumped up and pointed across the bar. “Go get em, you assholes! Freddy. Make sure the party is still pumping down stairs and do not let one idiot up here until we get a cleanup.” Ryan shouted like the goddamned second in command that he was.
He peeked over the bar at the man who looked like he died in an Alien movie and whistled. “When I was a kid my dad killed our old dog with a shotgun. Looked a lot like that.” Ryan turned to pick up one of the only unbroken bottles of booze and opened it. “Thank god the whiskey is okay. Don’t worry baby, the bad man can’t hurt you now.”
With Seven panting like an overexerted dog, eyes bright and wild with something that resembled a satisfying high or some other dangerous sort of intoxication, the bloodied room seemed to grow smaller around them. Seven took a quick survey of their downed opponents after the remainders had fled. The one splayed out where he’d fallen under the blast of Seven’s borrowed shotgun, his guts were strewn about in an undignified heap. Ryan certainly wasn’t exaggerating, but Seven still thought he deserved a little more credit.
“Shit, he looks like a half-butchered veal calf. Don’t sell me short, hombre.” Seven shot a breathless grin in Ryan’s direction and leaned the barrel shotgun against his own solid shoulder so that it pointed up and away. “Told you we should have greased that bouncer, didn’t I? And don’t even try to pretend like you’re not gonna share that. You should be groveling on your knees after I saved your fine ass.”
“I’m just tired of watching money go to usually inefficient bouncers.” Ryan wiped the blood of the bar with a hanky and then sat on top of it. “Usually, I catch them wandering off on the job or making nice with the local women.” He straightened his tie, smoothing his hand over the front of his suit in a simple motion of regaining composure and then downed a gulp of whiskey. “Tonight, I was wrong. My economic policies were too fiscally conservative.” He handed the bottled over to Seven and sighed.
“I didn’t kill Papa Mumford.” Ryan said it with conviction. Like he was in church or something. And, to an Irish Catholic mobster, that was a big deal. “But, I need to find out who did before they come after me again.”
“They’re all inefficient,” he rumbled softly, green eyes rolling before he lowered the shotgun and started to empty out the cartridges into his pocket. “And they’re all worth greasing. I keep telling you, there’s no guaranteeing which boys are gonna lock and load us into a deal, and who will sell us out to the dirtiest bid.”
With the gun emptied, he tossed it onto the bar and grabbed his own gun off the countertop. Pulling himself up onto the bar at Ryan’s side, he swung his legs over the side so that they were propped up against the bar stools and he had an excellent view of the main staircase. Taking the bottle, he downed a few good mouthfuls before clearing his throat against the burn and handing the bottle back.
“So if you didn’t kill him, where are we looking? We haven’t heard anything through the usual mob faces, you know. Are we looking at going under again?”
“We?” Ryan wasn’t a man of honest reactions, but he nearly spat out his whiskey at the idea Seven would help him. Well, of course he would. He wasn’t like most of the old blood back home and he certainly didn’t like his most loyal buddies. Ryan smiled. It was almost like he was friends with this hardened criminal he was lying to. Yeah, this was as close to friendship as a CIA agent was ever going to get. “Good. I’ll probably get my ass killed or worse if I tried doing this alone.”
Ryan sighed and took out his tablet. “He was in Vegas when he died. Or at least, he was in town right before it happened. All I have to do is narrow it down to the only guys in town when he was and beat them over the head until they tell me something useful.” He had a list and one of the names, Andrew Mumford, had a note next to it that said Passages.
“Yes, we. I know you’re not exactly new that this, but you clearly haven’t had the right partners. Until now.” His tone was full of affectionate mockery, accompanied by gracefully arched eyebrows and a lazy smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth. Ryan was a good friend, which was exceedingly hard to come by in this business, and Seven enjoyed the company as much as he appreciated the man’s skill with a gun. Sometimes he enjoyed the company more. After all, finding a hired gun in this city required about as much effort as blinking - it was the loyalty that was worth its weight in diamonds and high-class whores.
After swiping the bottle back and taking a few thoughtful swigs, Seven licked the whiskey off his hips and slammed the half-empty bottle down on the bar, because loud noises helped him think. Then he turned his attention to his pistol, inspecting it carefully after the firefight, lips pursed as he concentrated. Taking care of his guns was practically better than therapy for what it did to sort his head right, had been ever since he’d first picked up a weapon way back in his days as a two-bit thug from the Bronx. There were something about it that just soothed a man. Once assured that all was in good working order, he turned his head and squinted at Ryan.
“I know you well enough to be sure that you’ve already got leads. So, my friend, enlighten me. Where are we dragging our asses next? I’m telling you, it’s been way too long since I’ve swung a hammer outside of a construction site.”
Ryan’s finger stayed on Andrew’s name and he paused. The right thing to do would be take care of the rest of the guys first and then ask Andrew. Not the most efficient or even what he was trained to do in the CIA, but part of him hoped that going through a list of idiot thugs would get him answers faster. That ain’t what your gut is sayin. Was all Rogue had to offer. She was right, but that didn’t mean Ryan had to listen to either her or his gut.
“I think I know who sent those boys over. A little payback would be nice, right? Maybe we can get some ideas from him.” Ryan took a final swing of the whiskey and placed it back on the bar neatly amidst the broken glass and spilled booze. “I’ll give you the details later. You need to get the hell out of here while they call in clean up.”
“Revenge is an acquired taste, and I’ve had plenty of time to practice, darling.” Seven jumped down off the bar and swept his partner an ironic bow before he re-holstered his weapon. Then he cocked his head and swept his gaze over the shotgun he’d borrowed where it lay on the bar, reaching out to caress it with a lover’s touch. “Beautiful. It was lovely working with you both, let’s do it again real soon. Catch you later, Right Hand.”
Seven tapped one index finger against the side of his nose and aimed the other in Ryan’s direction as he backed away across the room, his expensive Italian shoes crunching over broken glass. He grabbed his jacket from the booth - sparing a wistful glance for the seat abandoned by the rich Armenian’s son, that was a pity - and rounded the corner, disappearing down the far staircase and sauntering off into the night.