"They Kill Everything You Believe In" - Warriors musical fanfic (part 3/11)
I'M BACK! Come get your angst
Previous chapter ao3
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Stillwell Avenue station was as desolate as the rest of Coney Island. Across the station on the F train platform, a woman leaned against a pillar, humming off-key, her voice carrying in the night. On the N train side, someone slept bundled in blankets beneath a staircase. The Warriors waited for the Q in silence aside from Snow’s pocket radio quietly playing a new hip-hop track. D-Train had had it going since they said goodbye to Vermin, hoping to hear an announcement, a clue, anything to give them a starting point, but no. In between the music, there were only regular blurbs they might hear on any normal station.
Ajax tried to rid herself of the thought, but it stayed ringing in her mind: After so long since the massacre, the only announcement they were likely to hear was another fulfilled bounty. Was there a price, she wondered? What did the Riffs offer for their heads? How much did they pay for another vest covered in her comrades’ blood? Or was it simply for the love of the game?
Maybe that was enough. Maybe the retribution was all people needed to bring the wrath of the city down on them. Then again, she reasoned, it was enough for her. And nothing she could possibly do would be worse than the crimes the Riffs already committed in the pursuit of vengeance, but fuck if she wasn’t going to give them a run for their money.
Lost in her thoughts, Ajax wandered towards the end of the platform. She stepped into the shadows beside a dispatch tower. With her fingers skimming the cold, green-painted wall, her mind flashed back to a scene from years and years ago.
Cleon sent Rembrandt to tag the subway station as a warning to anyone coming downtown, claiming their turf from the busiest entrance point. Ajax went along as her escort. She always went with Rembrandt. They had to come back often to redo it because the MTA kept painting over them - they were quick with that - but Ajax remembered the first time. She remembered Rembrandt effortlessly hopping the turnstile, shooting a what are you gonna do about it look at a worker who couldn’t care less, endlessly confident when she had Ajax beside her. She remembered heading home, Rembrandt rattling her spray can to make a beat while Ajax danced along as she walked; a silly thing, just to make Rembrandt laugh. She did anything just to hear that laugh back then.
Ajax fished the can of spray paint out of her backpack. She felt a hand on the back of hers, guiding her movements as she drew a bright red W on the wall. It was crooked and asymmetrical and the paint dripped where she lingered in one spot too long, but it was there.
Rembrandt did it so much better.
“Are you gonna tag the whole time?” D-Train asked behind her.
“Yeah, I am,” Ajax said. The platform shook with the rumble of an incoming train. “I want everyone to know we’re coming for them.”
“Put it away for now.” She jerked her thumb towards the train. “That’s us.”
The only other person in the car with them was huddled in the corner on the opposite end. They mumbled under their breath, a steady chant in a language Ajax didn’t know. In her corner, D-Train sat across from her, angled out, placing herself between Ajax and the rest of the car. She knew the posture well; that used to be her. Ever the protector. Ever the front line. Ever fucking it up.
As they pulled away from the station, her eyes drifted to the person in the corner. They clutched something to their chest, rocking back and forth, repeating their chant over and over. They were praying.
D-Train nudged her foot. “You alright, big dog?”
“I’m planning.”
“Wanna share with the class?”
“We’re going to Union Square. It was our meeting place that night, it’s where Swan said she’d call from, so we’re starting there.”
“Looking for what?”
“I don’t know!” Ajax snapped. “Something. One of Rembrandt’s tags. I know she’d be leaving ’em.”
“You have her paint.”
“She’d get her hands on more.”
“Alright.” D-Train clasped her hands, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees and looking at Ajax over the top of her sunglasses. “What then? We find the crew first and then we go after the Rogues?”
“We just need a starting point.”
“But what’s after?”
She didn’t answer. She didn’t have one.
“Are we winging it?” D-Train pressed.
“No, we’re not fucking winging it,” Ajax growled. “I’m thinking, alright? Lemme fucking think.”
D-Train left it at that. Ajax was glad for it. Truth be told, she wasn’t thinking of jack shit. Nothing helpful, anyway. Get to Union Square, search for any sign of the missing Warriors, and then… what? Start busting down doors demanding answers from every gang she found? Even she knew that was a less-than-stellar plan. She didn’t want to give anyone a chance to prepare for her showing up.
As the train crested up out of the tunnel, climbing onto the Manhattan Bridge, Ajax stared at her hands in her lap. She’d tied one of Swan’s bandanas around her wrist, just in case she had to make a Molotov on the run. That’s what she told herself. It had nothing to do with the reminder of her. Not at all.
Could really use your advice right now, War Chief.
She lifted her eyes to the lights of Manhattan reflecting off the river. Less than twelve hours ago, she was heading the opposite way anticipating a homecoming she didn’t get, a hope which turned into a tragedy within minutes. She flattened her hand over her sternum. In and out. In and out. Focusing on the exhale, controlling her nerves before they took over her rational mind again. She needed a clear head for this. Needed to be smart, cautious, in control of herself. She needed to be more like Swan. More like Cleon.
She thought about what Lincoln said. “Your Warriors need you to be Ajax.” Bullshit. Ajax being Ajax is what landed her in this hell in the first place. If she’d been anyone but herself that night, maybe she would have made it home. She could have identified Luther, gotten the Riffs to turn their fury at someone else, and they’d all be safe and alive.
But no. Because Ajax was Ajax, and she was angry, and Ajax angry made mistakes.
As they pulled into the Canal Street station, D-Train murmured, “We’re set on this plan?”
“If you’re gonna chicken out,” Ajax said quietly, “get off here and go back home.”
“Nah. I’m with you.”
“Good. Here’s our stop.”
The northbound Union Square platform was occupied by a gaggle of drunk college students, a couple smoking pot by the stairs, and scattered evening shift workers wearily making their way home. None of them paid Ajax and D-Train any attention. Good. She refused to take off her colors, no way, not now, but it was still better if there weren’t other boppers sounding the alarm the second they set foot in Manhattan.
D-Train walked a half step behind her as they navigated the labyrinth of the station. Ajax kept her head on a swivel, scrutinizing the floor, the walls, the pillars for their mark, anything to point her in the right direction. Or any direction. D-Train was right, she was winging this, she had Union Square but after that she was lost, she didn’t know up from down in Manhattan or have a single coherent fucking idea where Swan could have possibly taken them and-
There. There, on the wall. They tried to wash it off the tile but not well enough. On the wall, stained in the grout like blood, were the faint remains of a bright red W.
Somewhere behind her D-Train was saying “Ajax, Ajax” but she ignored it. She traced the faded tag with trembling fingertips. A hand touched her back, not D-Train’s, smaller and softer, copying her movements and drawing the shape of the tag across her vest.
“Rembrandt…”
A laugh echoed through the station. Ajax jumped and spun on her heel, expecting wide eyes, a bright smile coming up to her, expecting her, but they were alone. Not a soul but the station attendant asleep in the booth.
“Yo, you okay?” D-Train asked.
“I thought I…” She shook her head violently. “Forget it.”
“You thought-?”
“Forget it! Let’s get out of here.”
“Where?”
“Out. Look for our tag, I know she left more.”
“Yeah, but, when?”
“The fuck does it matter, when?”
“If you’re expecting to find them around here, it matters.”
“Maybe we will.”
“Doubt it,” D-Train grumbled as they ascended into the dimly lit park.
Ajax rounded on her, snarling, “You gonna say somethin’ helpful or just keep questioning my decisions?”
“Here’s helpful.” D-Train looked around, getting her bearings before pointing east. “Walk a couple blocks that way and you’re on the Riffs’ turf. You really want a run-in with them off the bat?”
Shit.
Gritting her teeth to stifle a building scream, Ajax dragged a hand down her face. “How do you know where Gramercy is from here?”
“I looked at a map.”
“You can read?”
D-Train shoved her just hard enough to make her rock back on her heels. “Get a new joke,” she chuckled.
And Ajax felt… normal. For a heartbeat. Tossing the same verbal jabs they would during fight nights, in between bouts that Ajax won more often than not because D-Train had size on her but she’d always been better with her hands. She remembered the rare times Swan joined in back in her early days, the grin on her face whenever she managed to best Ajax, the way she always looked so proud for the mere fact that Ajax was giving her a chance to prove herself.
“Fine. We’ll head the other way. Keep an eye up high. She doesn’t like doing street-level tags, she’d climb.”
“I know it. I remember her initiation.”
Scaling and tagging the face of the Wonder Wheel. Ajax still shuddered at the thought. Cleon was a madwoman for that, but as she explained when Ajax first argued the decision, she knew Rembrandt was strong enough to do it. She needed to see Rembrandt believe it, too. And she did. And she became a Warrior. And Ajax prayed she carried that with her now.
As they wandered the neighborhood, walking along the bright avenues and shadowy residential streets, Ajax kept her eyes up; fire escapes, rooftop HVAC units, faded billboards, anywhere Rembrandt might have made their mark. That night, that awful night in the cemetery, Swan told Rembrandt to do the same thing. Ajax looked over her shoulder to keep an eye on her while she tagged the tombstone, hanging at the back of the pack waiting for her to catch up. When Ajax looked now, she saw only skittering rats behind her.
“I’m not seeing anything, big dog,” said D-Train.
“Keep looking,” Ajax ordered.
“We should start heading towards Hell’s Kitchen.”
“Let’s just see-”
“We’re not gonna find anything!”
“Will you shut the fuck up?! There has to be something here, we just need to look for it!” Her voice broke. “Rembrandt’s tag was in that station, they must have been around here for at least a little while, I know what to look for when it comes to her and Swan-”
“Ajax, think for a second. You said this was your meeting place the night of the conclave. Swan took the others here months ago and unless I missed something huge, we got no fuckin’ friends in this neighborhood. Even if we did, there’s no guarantee they didn’t turn on us after this shit.”
She wasn’t looking at D-Train anymore. She was looking at Cochise. The quiet strategist, the one who could step into any role, holding the gang together when Ajax and her pride were actively threatening to tear things apart. How often had they gone through this, this tired scene of redirected fury because Cochise had known her long enough to absorb every hit when she lashed out? She could have been War Chief if she wanted. Cleon offered it multiple times.
“Not gonna take on a responsibility like that,” she’d said the last time Cleon brought it up, a tiny easy smile on her face like always. “Besides, I’m more versatile than that. You know you need me to stay that way.”
And Cleon listened, because when Cochise disagreed with her, it was usually because she was right.
Ajax needed her now. She needed the comforting smile, the voice of reason. Not clashing with her own replacement while she struggled to occupy a position opened to her by blood.
Turning aside to hide her face, she nodded once. “You’re right,” she sighed. “We’ll head towards Hell’s Kitchen. It’s the A train, right?”
“Or the C.”
“Where is… Wait, what the hell is this?”
A group of people were coming down the street towards them. A group of men, all wearing these stupid preppy patterned cardigans.
D-Train laughed as she stood next to Ajax. “What in the fucking clown school graduation shit is this?”
“I don’t know but I don’t like it,” Ajax grumbled. She studied the way they whispered to each other as they approached, keeping an eye on their hands, open and empty as they flashed simultaneous award-winning smiles. Cowgirl would have loved these guys. “If they start reaching for something, waste ’em.”
“Heard.”
One of the men stepped ahead of the group. “Good evening, girls,” he said sweetly. God, they looked like a fucking boy band. “You’re a long way from Coney Island.”
“We were just leaving,” Ajax replied, fighting to keep her tone calm. “This your turf?”
“Ah, we don’t care about that,” said another man. “Allow us to introduce ourselves. We’re the Bizzies.”
The first one added, “We’re here as friends. We know the hell you been through since Cyrus died.”
Ajax shoved her hands in her pockets, slipping her fingers into her brass knuckles.
“We never believed what they said about you. We know you didn’t kill her.”
D-Train crossed her arms. “Really?”
A third Bizzie nodded, still wearing that corny charming smile. “Why don’t you come back to ours for a while? Have some food, take a load off. You’re looking for your friends, right?”
The Warriors shared a look. D-Train shrugged, gesturing to the crew, waiting for Ajax’s call. Ajax shook her head.
“Nah. Thanks, but pass,” she said. “We gotta keep moving.”
“Let us help.”
“You can help me by telling me where they are.”
The men’s smiles changed. They bared their teeth, grinning now, and Ajax tensed. Each man pulled out a wickedly sharp switchblade. In an almost choreographed flourish, they pointed the glinting blades at the Warriors.
“Hopefully,” said the first man, “they’re six feet under by now. Right where you’re gonna be.”
Ajax threw her head back and groaned. She did not have the fucking time for this. Knocking their shoulders together, D-Train asked, “Are we wasting bullets on these wimps?”
She raised her brass-adorned fists. “Nope.”
The gangs collided. The first Bizzie Ajax got her hands on went down like a sack of bricks, bleeding from his mouth and spitting out fragments of teeth. She caught a blade aimed for her gut and sent another pretty boy to the ground just as fast. He gave a good effort trying to get up but she shut that down with a swift stomp on his ribs. Huh. This would go faster than she thought.
As she chucked a dropped switchblade across the street, she glanced over in time to see D-Train grab the other two Bizzies and slam their heads together, laying them both flat out on the concrete. She couldn’t help but laugh. She fucking missed this.
“Ow! Son of a bitch!”
Ajax brought her fist down hard on one man’s temple. He dropped, blood gushing and pouring into his eye. She looked down to find an oozing bite mark carved into her forearm.
“Are you fucking kidding me?! Nope, no, fuck this.” Ajax drew her pistol and pointed it at the Bizzies. They took off running, staggering into each other as they rounded a corner but leaving behind the man at Ajax’s feet. He managed to get off the ground but no farther before Ajax grabbed him by the back of his neck and pressed her pistol to his head. “Uh-uh, not you.”
On his other side, D-Train grabbed his arm and stood him up. “Where to?”
“This way.”
Ajax could barely see the man’s face as she shoved him against the back wall of an alley, hidden behind a graffiti covered dumpster. She pinned him there with an arm across his throat and fiddled with the safety on her gun. He stared at her, one eye wide with panic, the other stuck shut under congealing blood from the gash on his forehead. He knew better than to try to push her off.
“What’s your name?” she asked, her voice low and dark.
“L-Lance,” the Bizzie stammered.
“Lance. You bit me? Really?”
“I-”
“Shut up, you already pissed me off enough.” She flicked the safety off. “Where’s my crew?”
“I don’t know.”
“Fuckin’ sounded like you know.”
“I don’t, I swear! Y-You, you’re the first Warriors we’ve seen since the night of the conclave, we really don’t know where the rest of you are.”
Ajax’s heart stopped. “What?”
His throat worked under her grip. “I mean-”
“You saw them that night?”
“Only-”
“What did you do?”
“Nothing!”
“Liar! What did you do?!” She jammed her gun up under his chin, forcing his head back as her voice rose to an inhuman roar. “You motherfucker, what did you do to them! I should fucking kill you right now, you piece of shit, what did you do!”
D-Train grabbed her shoulder. “Ajax, cool it-”
“I didn’t fucking ask you!”
“We didn’t do anything!” Lance cried. “I swear! We didn’t get a chance. They got away unscathed, I promise. I don’t know what happened after. I don’t know where any of them are.”
Ajax couldn’t breathe. She stared at him, unblinking, as horrible thoughts rolled like hurricanes through her mind. These bastards put up a good fight, even against her and D-Train, even with them being armed, but her crew had nothing but their fists and their wits that night. Had Swan caught up to them already or were they on their own, lost without orders? How close did those blades get to them? Did they wish she was there? God, they must have been so scared-
“Ajax.” D-Train wrapped her fingers around Ajax’s wrist and lowered the gun until it wasn’t choking Lance anymore. “We gotta get out of here before they come back for him.”
Ajax snarled, never looking away from the Bizzie. He swallowed hard. “Who says they will?”
“Anyone willing to wear those fucking cardigans is loyal to the core. Trust, they’re gonna come back when they realize he’s missing.”
Ajax glanced down at Lance’s bloodstained sweater. She had a point.
The new enforcer continued, “We got bigger problems than him, man. Let’s keep moving.”
Ajax looked at D-Train; at her gun; at Lance. Her eyes followed the trail of red running down his face as a faint tightness encircled her waist, like someone hugging her from behind.
They must have been so scared.
“Hold him.”
The Warriors swapped places, D-Train now pinning Lance to the wall and giving Ajax room to grab the spray paint from her backpack. Pistol in one hand, paint in the other.
She shoved D-Train aside-
“Smile.”
-and sprayed paint in Lance’s eyes.
He got the chance to inhale. Flipping her gun around, she pistol-whipped him square in the temple before he started screaming. He slumped to the ground, drooling, out cold. Staring down at him, something cracked open deep within Ajax’s chest. Something frozen and dark. A part of her now unrecognizable.
Behind her, D-Train sucked in a sharp breath through her teeth. “Jesus Christ, Ajax.”
Ajax rounded on her, snarling and getting up in her face. “Got somethin’ to say?”
“Nah. Nothin’ at all.”
“Thought so.” She glanced at Lance. She thought of the shining switchblade, wondering how close it got to her crew. “I should carve our tag across his chest.”
“You already tagged his face,” D-Train pointed out. She put herself between them, discreetly nudging Ajax out of the alley. “C’mon, big dog. We got more fights ahead of us. We won, leave it there.”
Rembrandt’s voice in her head.
We won, that’s enough!
Ajax spun on her heel and marched out of the alley in the direction she hoped was north. D-Train called for her to wait, running to catch up and reading off street signs Ajax didn’t pay attention to. She couldn’t erase the mounting sickness in the pit of her gut, reaching its claws up into her throat, drowning the world in red and rushing blood.
She left them alone that night. Left them to face the city by themselves, to face whatever horrors occurred after, victims of her pride. She touched Swan’s bandana tied around her wrist and wondered how their fledgling warlord fared. She got them home, at least, until they had to leave again to protect the gang at large. Did she blame Ajax? Did she look behind her for cavalry support and curse Ajax’s name when she found the empty space she left behind. Swan would probably hate her when they saw each other again.
If they saw each other again. If she saw any of them. If they were still on their feet and not laid up in a hospital as another Jane Doe or unclaimed in the morgue-
Ajax didn’t remember stopping. One second she was walking and the next she was howling at the top of her lungs, her knuckles split and her blood splattered on a brick wall. D-Train had her restrained speaking hushed reassurances in her ear and held her there even after she stopped thrashing. Ajax cringed as the pain in her hand surpassed the fading adrenaline. She gave a little shake.
“I’m good,” she croaked. “Let go.”
“Nah,” D-Train said hesitantly, “I’m gonna give you another minute.”
“I’m fine, D. Get off me.”
“Tell that to your hand.”
“Fuck off, I’m not-!”
Red and blue lights. A warning siren. Two men in powder blue uniforms, hands on their batons, prowling towards the Warriors.
“Yoohoo, ladies!”
Ajax and D-Train bolted.
“Hey! Hey, stop! NYPD! Freeze!”
They ran blind through the dark streets of lower Manhattan, already two avenues west by the time they heard the sirens chasing them. It wasn’t all that different than evading them in Coney Island, Ajax thought absentmindedly, disregarding the fact that she had no fucking clue where she was going. They ducked through every unlit alley and alcove passing tags claiming territory she’d never stepped foot in, risking unseen enemies fleeing the very real threat of getting jammed up again.
She couldn’t go back there. No way in hell. She couldn’t be trapped in another jail for one more minute. Her family needed her and no bopper and no bastard cop would stop her.
She spotted a shuttered restaurant on a corner and a gated lot. Dragging D-Train with her, she hopped the fence into an open dumpster and slammed the lid down over them. Concealed in a cloud of rotting trash, Ajax listened to the sirens pass them by and fade into the distance, and only moved when D-Train started gagging.
She stepped easily onto the pavement. D-Train fell to her knees dry heaving and glared up at her.
“That was disgusting. Never make me do that again.”
“Man up. Where are we?”
“Uh…” D-Train poked her head out of the alley and squinted at the street signs. “I think it’s Chelsea.”
“Who owns Chelsea?”
“No clue. Last I knew, a few gangs were still fighting over it.”
“Fantastic.” Ajax picked a few pieces of trash off her vest before grabbing her paint can. “Let more crews know we’re coming for them.”
“We should find a drug store or something.”
“For what?”
“You’ve got an open bite on your arm, one of those preppy boys split my lip open, and we just went swimming in trash. Do you want to get gangrene?”
“You can’t get that from trash, that’s from like tissue death or some shit.”
“Infections can do it, too. I don’t want my face rotting off.”
“Wouldn’t make much of a difference.”
“Yo, fuck you!”
“Fuck you, too.” Ajax sighed and looked down at her arm. “Fine. Fine, let’s go.”
The clerk at the drug store looked only mildly terrified as they dropped a pile of first-aid supplies at his register. He kept glancing at the door as he rang them up, taking their cash and passing back change with hands trembling so hard he dropped their coins all over the counter. Poor guy. The man at the front desk of the sleazy motel they found gave them about the same look, but he also leered a little too long at one of the girls leaving another room so Ajax took pride in the way he averted his eyes from her.
She remained awake long after D-Train fell asleep, staring at the ceiling, idly picking at a bandage on her knuckles, just… thinking. Would Swan approve of how she handled the Bizzies? Would she cuss her out for being stupid, for slowing them down trying to prove a point, or would she look at her with the same unsettled caution D-Train had? What about the others?
It settled like a concrete block on her chest, the gravity of the past twenty-four hours. She was expecting a homecoming and now, now, no matter how much she wanted to believe otherwise, she truly didn’t know if her crew was alive or dead. And now it was her responsibility and hers alone to find out and bring them all home.
She was Warlord.
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I am so so sorry for the long wait life has been odd but I'm back! This whole fic is planned out it's just the actual writing that has been chewing me up and spitting me out