i always tell the truth, even when i lie...
{prologue pt two: how Kova is formed}
A/N: hey guys, so this is just blurbs about how each vlog squad member became real members of David’s gang. I left some people out just cause they don’t fit in the narrative I’m picturing. But I hope you enjoy! Strong violence ahead folks, as well as the rest of the series! A couple deaths too.
Alex always knew something about David was off. He always thought he saw the charming brunette hiding dead eyes behind feigned excitement. Too calculated for a boy of only nineteen. But Alex saw himself reflected in every move the man made.
Alex could relate to his friend more than anyone else he’d ever met. He instantly respected David and latched onto him. You don’t meet many people in this world who are as uncaring and unconcerned in the way they climb the ladder to the top as David and him were.
David hid behind charm and likability.
Alex hid behind innocence and religion.
Alex doesn’t say anything about it until David comes to him one evening and tells him he’s going to see their friends at the Denny house to offer them... a new business venture.
He offers it to Alex first.
Alex says yes, took you long enough, what do you need me to do, who do you need me to act as? Willing as always to take on any role he had to, to get what he wanted (or in this case what David wanted).
David knows right away Alex will always be on a different level than the rest of the crew. Alex will be more his equal than anyone else he has to corrupt.
Because he doesn’t have to corrupt him. He doesn’t have to convince him. Alex is willing and as ready as he is.
Alex is also good with guns. He talks Tomas into letting them add a large gun running operations revenue to the drug running money they’ve been laundering. (That’s the first fucking nail in the coffin for Tomas, but the large, dumb man has no idea.) The weapon buyers and sellers like Alex way better than they ever like Tomas. It’s a profitable situation for all.
In the car ride back to their apartment, leaving the first meeting with Tomas since Alex established himself with the weapons clientele, Alex says, “Your business needs a name.”
“It has a name, the Brothers’ Circle.”
“That’s the name of the cunts Tomas works for.”
“That we work for, Alex,” David facetiously reprimands, pushing to reveal the true meaning behind his friends words.
“Yeah,” he answers, looking out the window of David’s beat up Corolla, “for now.”
It makes David’s heart fill with love for the man. His best friend is thinking bigger picture just like he is. He feels validated in his internal descision to make this man the de facto co-leader of his future gang.
(Alex comes up with their name, Kova, a throwback to David’s origins and core of who he really is. A boy born in nowheresville Slovakia who’s gonna take over the world.)
Liza is like a lump of clay when Gabbie introduces her to David. He’s immediately drawn to her soft face and lively personality. He wants to ruin her. (Gabbie pulls him aside at the party they’re at, long before Kova was even a thought, and tells him she’s a gift. For being a good friend. And that he can make the dark skinned girl into whatever he wants her to be. “She’s young and insecure, go play.” Gabbie’s always been a dark minded girl, she used to read David like a book.)
He has fun reeling Liza in with his boyish charms and faked romantic sensibilities. She’s sooo easy. He picks apart her mind, morals and principles in one night, the night he first tells her he loves her.
He’s not lying, not really. He loves who he’s going to twist her to be. His perfect Harley Quinn. He’ll rip the compassion out of her if he has to.
He doesn’t actually have to, the girl is just a sweet little teenager looking for true love. It makes him laugh in hindsight at how simple it actually was. At how much goodness was once in the girl he’s seen curb stomp a drug dealer in the back alleys of LA because they refused to cut profits with Kova. She broke his jaw and David fucked her in his Tesla, giggling out a narrative of how the guys teeth popped out of his head while she rode him.
Liza would burn the world for David when he meets (Y/N).
She gets jealous and insecure by that fact that she needed to be programmed by David with a darkness that (Y/N) wore like skin, comfortable and natural.
You don’t pose a threat, not right away.
And if you send her into a trap, a drug drop off that was being ambushed by a rival amateur gang, that leads to her untimely death...
Well, what were you suppose to do? David would never do it. Too proud of the work that went into the weak girl.
And you wanted the man to yourself.
(He’s impressed, as you are smarter and more conniving than the guinea pig he’d been given as a present by Gabbie would ever be.)
Liza’s there at the beginning of Kova and she plays her part. Until you decide you can play it better.
But that’s a story for later...
Gabbie is easy. She wants money and attention and acceptance. She hands over her merch account info and starts finding leads to other vloggers who have a substance abuse problem. They always have friends who are as addicted as them, Gabbie explains, which is long run profitable. The girl is ruthless and David admires that about her.
She was one of his first close friends when he moved to LA. He’s stoked she’s progressing so nicely in his operation.
David includes her in his plans from the beginning, because she’s loyal and as obsessed with money as he is. But when he takes her to meet Tomas with Alex and Liza the first time, she’s so freaked out. Gabbie doesn’t grasp the severity of the situation until she’s in a warehouse full of drugs and guns.
David meets with her the next day and offers her an out. It’s late at night after the long, winding talk, but Gabbie is relieved and accepting that she can back out, promises not to tell anyone. He respects and genuinely cares about Gabbie and gives her what she wants, like promised. But not before Heath and Zane grab her arm and hold it down while David carves Kova into her upper arm.
Gabbie takes it, she understands.
It’s not two months later when he gets a call from Liza telling him that Gabbie’s trying to talk her into leaving him and helping her go to the cops. (Gabbie mistakenly thinks that because Liza was her friend first that her loyalties wouldn’t lay with David. She’s wrong.)
David brings Scott and Zane to grab her coming home from a late night gym session (that she’s stupidly been Snapchat-ing all evening).
He doesn’t need to torture her, but he thinks it’s a good lesson for Scott and Zane. The word will spread quickly through Kova.
You don’t fuck with David, ever.
The man could have deep love and respect for you, but he’d put a bullet in your head without thinking twice and if you make him angry enough to hurt you before that, well... you’ll be wishing he had just shot you instead.
The boys burn her body in the desert while David waits in the car and finishes editing his next vlog.
She was always reliable as clickbait for a thumbnail.
•Scotty Sire and Kristen McAtee•
Scotty’s chomping at the bit when David first offers the dude a bag full of cash late in the early morning at the Denny house. He can’t help the large, wicked smile on his face the entire time David spiels to the group.
He’s in from the first sentence, desperate to channel the darkness his depression had cursed him with from childhood. He could do this, and much more. Scott’s excited to become apart of something bigger than him. He’d happily worship the gospel of what would later be called Kova.
Kristen is easy to drag along, especially because of her addiction to pills and then later, more heavy drugs. She’ll do whatever she has to keep her man and her fix. She turns a calculated blind eye to their dealings and separates herself as much as possible.
David doesn’t like loose ends.
Word about Gabbie gets to her and she internally freaks out. She doesn’t know why, she doesn’t really care. Gabbie fucked up and got what was coming to her. But it feels like the calm before the storm.
David tells Scott he needs more from Kristen. He wants her to wear the Kova brand, he wants them all to after Gabbie tries to fuck them over. But he wants the curly headed girl to be first. Scott understands, he’s front row to the distance she’s created between her and the Kova family.
She’s partying with them all when Liza lures her to talk in an isolated bedroom, where Scott, Alex and David are waiting.
“Sorry, Kris. It’s just how it is,” David’s telling her when Scott and Alex maneuver her to the desk chair while their leader cleans a knife. “And you should be honored, I want you to be the first. I want you to start the family. Cause that’s what we are. We’re a family above all else. You wouldn’t betray your family, would you? You wouldn’t be Gabbie... Would you?”
Kristen resigns to shaking her head no, allowing Scott to extend her arm as David encroaches and presses the tip of the knife into the sensitive skin of her upper arm. Liza and Alex stand back, watching and blocking the exit. Kristen looks to Scott who only nods his approval before shutting her eyes tight when David begins slicing her arm.
The bass of the music throughout the house muffles her screams.
(Scott feeds her Percocets when it’s over and promises her the world. That’s the night she’s introduced to heroin.)
The rest of them receive the same mark personally from David by the end of the week.
•Zane Hijazi and Heath Hussar•
Zane’s psychotic. Genuinely a mad man, and David loves it as much as it’s a liability. Heath is a good reprieve though, knowing how to wrangle the crazed man.
They’re a fucking pair, that’s for sure. And with Heath’s experience in drug dealing and Zane’s past with beating the shit out of anyone who tried to stop or hassle Heath, they fit into Kova like they’ve been waiting their whole lives to be in the upper echelon of a gang. (They have.)
Heath is the guy David sends out to potential drug suppliers, such a people person and manipulator that David wishes he could bottle the man’s relatability to dose his entire crew with. The man has made him some serious fucking money with his banter.
Zane’s the guy David brings out at night or to see Tomas’ men, to terrify the peasants around him into submission. Zane is his guard dog on a short, but removable leash. The taller man is always just looking for a good time, whether that’s doing shots or breaking someone’s arm.
With the boundaries of what it means to be Kova and family set, etched into his skin, Zane becomes determined to protect his new clan, and his new always changing and addicting life.
David buys him a Porsche after he beats a thug of Tomas’ to death with his bare hands. The man had insulted David, his height and his hair. It rolled off the leaders back, but set something alight in Zane.
David doesn’t call him off until his hands are completely coated in blood.
(Tomas doesn’t say a word except to tell his men to clean up the mess and apologize to David. The fat man slaps Zane on the back on his way out, murmuring, “That’s a man you want around.”)
Jason is his personal sounding board. The man is so much smarter than he lets anyone see. Jay can see from the outside in, how people will preceive them and how to effectively hide in plain sight.
Jason has a family, so it’s a little more difficult to convince him to give David his loyalty. Until the money is presented and David offers his family a clear cut and prosperous future. And to keep them out of all of it. The older man says yes after a couple days of thinking.
David seals the deal by bringing him to Miami, meeting with some drug runners from Belarus. They try to haggle David, get the price higher that what Tomas had offered. Jason laughs at them and follows David when he goes to walk out.
One of the men grabs Jay’s wrist and yanks his hand back to the dinner table they’d been sitting around and stabs his palm through with a steak knife, pinning him to the table in a bloody mess before hissing about disrespecting his boss.
Jason takes the knife out without flinching and stabs the guy in the aortic, blood splattering on his own face and chest.
“Don’t try to fuck with us,” Jason says so calmly to the criminals watching in awe, it’s unnerving, “and keep a leash on your puppy.”
The boss from eastern Europe laughs and apologizes before continuing the transaction with the original offer. He gives Jason the dead man’s Rolex, as a token of good will.
Todd is a guy who wants to be smart, and just fucking isn’t. He’s easy. Money, girls, drugs and Todd is fucking his. It only takes a itty bitty cocaine addiction and Todd’s loyalty is an ever lasting stream of favors and obedience.
Scott takes Todd to kidnap a daughter of one of the Mexican mafias generals. David wants to run a piece of West Hollywood that he currently controls.
David is highly impressed with the lies Todd weaves to the pretty girl, keeping her calm and placated through out the ordeal. He’s even more impressed when Todd follows his orders to cut off her finger to send to her father; the olive skinned man doesn’t think twice. And the girl is still stuck deep in her Stockholm Syndrome, even after she only has nine fingers.
They return her to her family, no worse for wear, when the general gives up his terrority in WeHo.
David rents out a Vegas strip club and penthouse for Todd. He did well.
•Carly Incontro and Erin Gilfoy•
Carly and Erin are too fucking excited about Gabbie’s death. He watches them pick apart the story from Scott and Zane, and laugh manically when David tells them too much detail about the torture she had endured.
They are great to use strategically with their seduction or mask of ignorance used as a weapon. He has them paired up with a couple of guys higher up in Tomas’ operation, waiting like sleeper agents for the day when David will tear apart Tomas and his men. They’ll deliver the first bullets, crippling the obese excuse of a man’s team so that David can go in for the kill.
He had them train with Alex, who reports exactly what he had predicted about the girls: they’re addicted to the perks, the money, the clothes, the power. They love David, they’d do anything for their boss and friend. It makes David so happy.
They’re his favorite little princesses.
David’s been working on Corinna since high school. She doesn’t contribute anything but her tits really, he only needs her every once and a while to seduce someone before killing or maiming them. He gives her to Todd to make her happy and keep the overly horny man satisfied.
But she’s loyal, has been since David met her. She tells David the things the vlog squad thinks he doesn’t know. She’s like an internal mole, not needed in most moments, but useful when people start getting too big for their britches.
Like Matt King. Zane vouched for the guy, (Heath tells David privately not to trust his best friend because his judgment is always clouded when it come to new people offering him a good time) and David lets it slide.
Until Corinna comes over one day, leaving Todd at home to fuck David while he edits and Liza is in New York. The blonde is sucking his cock, when she pulls back and says,
“Matt is trying to convince Zane to move to Europe. Says he has friends in Amsterdam doing bigger things than Kova.”
David comes in her mouth and kisses her forehead before sending her off and telling her to round up Scott and Todd and send them his way.
David picks up Heath and Zane, asking if it’s true. Zane says yeah, but he thought the dude was kidding, they were drunk as fuck at Todd’s.
(Zane doesn’t lie, he doesn’t have it in him. Too insane to try to manipulate or spin his words like his best friend.)
Heath is livid when they meet Scott and Todd at one of their hideouts filled with money and weapons. David is tired and thinks this is a good opportunity to release the reigns a little bit. He tells the men what they’re going to do and watches them plan how to end the bleached blond man’s life.
He leaves when they’re loading up one of their nondescript SUVs and Alex is arriving. His best friend is grabbing his arm, halting his steps as he makes his way to the Tesla, leaning in and asking, “Are we gonna make him hurt before we bury him, or nah?”
David gives him what do you think eyes, and replies, “If they come up with the idea themselves, I’ll buy them all fucking Tesla’s.”
The next day he’s purchasing four Tesla coupes and sending Alex an envelope showing the stock he now owns of Elon Musk’s company, valuing upwards of five hundred thousand dollars.
Jeff approaches David, which is a first. But David’s well aware of the man’s past before he introduces himself. He’s just as dumb as his new friend Todd and more naive. He fits him to the same role as Todd after watching the man put a bullet between the eyes of a lackey that couldn’t pay up fronted money David gave the guy.
But, Jeff proves way more useful than David ever could have imagined.
Jeff slaps down a duffle bag in front of David one day, oddly symmetrical to the way David had started everything. He says it’s a gift from his uncle in New Jersey. There’s two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in it along with a hard drive of incriminating photos, videos and documents on Tomas and his men.
“My uncle doesn’t like how Tomas runs the most lucrative port on the West Coast. You... you he likes, David,” Jeff tells him, crooked grin on his lips.
And that’s how David finds out that not only is Jeff the nephew of the last Godfather of the Italian mob in the United States, but that the centuries old organization is actively courting him to take over.
David still demands loyalty though, even from a man owned and born into the Italian mob. He doesn’t get Kova carved on his arm, he gets it cut over his heart after he and Alex mentally break Jeff down over the course of a weekend in David’s basement.
“And what do you have now, Jeff?” Alex asks, as David finishes up the A in Kova with his dagger. The modelesque man doesn’t flinch with the cut, he just stares ahead, tears dried on his face from a long weekend of reprogramming.
David laughs as he wipes away the blood from the man’s chest and disinfects the wounds so they don’t fester.
He’s got international backing and a spy now.
David buys Jeff a nice house and spends an insane amount of money ruining his ex-girlfriends acting career. He likes the malicious look on Jeff’s face when he sees the tweets roll in, exposing Cierra’s MDMA addiction and several crude sex tapes from Jeff and her’s threesomes with a married director.
Jeff thinks he made the right choice.
Family over blood, always.
That’s how the kids become Kova.
And how David builds his empire to reflect his strength.
