Chapter Text
The first time Neenah saw them was on a hot, dusty Thursday evening, when she’d parked outside an alleyway in the ass-end of Mercado to check her phone. She was halfway through a text when suddenly something slammed into the side of her car with an unsettlingly human yelp of pain, making the entire vehicle rock. Dropping her phone, Neenah scrambled for her gun instead, her chest and throat going tight in alarm; she just caught a flash of movement through the car window as whoever had hit it was yanked away, and the tail end of a threat as she shoved the door open:
“—think you can get away with that, in our city—“
“Fuck you,” was the snarled reply, high-pitched and angry, “get your fucking hands off me—“
By then, Neenah was rushing to get out of the car, her shock giving way to her own anger. The sensible part of herself knew she probably shouldn’t get involved, and that whatever this fight was was none of her business—but you didn’t slam someone into a girl’s car and not expect a response, goddammit.
“Hey, asshole! You wanna watch what you’re doing?”
The two—she got a brief impression of a large, intimidating guy, pinning a smaller person in black against the wall—looked up, but before anyone could say anything, the smaller figure lashed out, landing a solid punch into the other guy’s jaw that Neenah heard crack all the way from where she was. She winced as he stumbled away, but his opponent wasn’t ready to let him go that easy: they lunged after him, slamming the entirety of their weight into his middle and tackling him into the wall on the other side of the alley, then snapping their knee upwards between his legs. The big guy went down hard, and his opponent wasted no time scrambling atop him to punch him again. And again, and then a third time for good measure, before they grabbed the front of his shirt to jerk him towards their face so they could snarl at him.
“Tell your boss to leave me the fuck alone, or come after me himself when he finds his balls.” They let go of him, climbing to their feet and finishing with a sharp kick to his ribs. “Now fuck off.”
Neenah exhaled slowly, watching in silence as the guy scraped himself up off the sidewalk and stumbled away. She tentatively relaxed her grip on her pistol, slowly lowering it as the other person turned to assess her, breathing hard through clenched teeth.
She thought, at first, that she was looking at another woman: a little shorter, slim and wiry like a feral alley cat, with dark hair pulled back in a bun that was falling loose around her face and sharp, searching eyes. But then, after a second, she reconsidered: they also could have just been a feminine, twinky sort of guy. Not that it was really any of her business, and the important part was that she wasn’t about to underestimate them after that little display.
She let out a breath, and for a moment, silence stretched between them.
Finally, the other person spoke first, clearing their throat awkwardly.
“…uh, hi. Sorry ‘bout your car.”
Neenah snorted out a laugh, casting a glance at the vehicle in question. “Yeah, I…think she’s fine. Lucky.” She looked back up, assessing the stranger. They seemed friendly enough, anyway, considering the circumstances. And pretty calm, all things considered. “That happen a lot?”
They grunted, reaching up to pinch the bridge of their nose; a nasty cut stretched across it, and they sighed at the sight of blood on their fingers. It matched the blood on their knuckles. “…you’d be surprised. Business rival.”
“Gotcha.” Neenah frowned, pausing to look them over. “Are, uh…you okay?”
“Been worse,” they answered, before sighing again, more resigned. “Probably going to be worse, actually. Fucker’s probably going to get his friends and jump me again.” They grunted at the thought, crossing their arms for a moment, before reaching up to tuck a lock of hair behind their ear. The ends were dyed a faded purple, barely visible in the evening light.
Despite the calm, matter-of-fact way they said it, they were frowning as they looked off into the alleyway, and there was a nervous tension in the set of their shoulders and the way they rocked back on their heels, like they were considering running. Neenah had made the decision before she even realized it; she took a breath, then cleared her throat and, when they looked back up at her, gestured loosely to her car with her pistol.
“Need a ride?”
“So…you got a name?”
Neenah hadn’t intended to ask, really. It was none of her business, and probably safest that they know as little about each other as possible. But, dammit, none of this was any of her business, really, and she was already too involved. Besides, it was hard not to be curious about them, after the fight by the alleyway. If she hadn’t seen it go down with her own eyes, she wouldn’t have thought someone like the stranger in her passenger seat was the sort to get tangled up in that sort of mess…or the sort to survive it, considering the guy they’d been fighting with.
“Nick,” they answered, with a firmness that seemed out of place. Then, almost in a sheepish sort of afterthought, they added: “If we're friends.”
Neenah quirked an eyebrow at the emphasis, and wondered if the fact that they didn't volunteer any other name meant they were friends now. She wasn’t going to pry, though.
“Neenah.” She tilted her head, considering Nick as she drove.
They (he? unless Nick was just a nickname for Nicole or Nikki or something) couldn’t have been older than 25—if that—and were dressed almost head-to-toe in black in the way of artsy outcast sorts—goths and the like. She knew the type. In this case, it took the form of a faded Lamb of God shirt, torn black jeans (she was pretty sure they’d intentionally been torn before the fight. probably.), and scuffed purple Doc Martens. They looked like some college kid who spent more time making complicated art projects to loud music and complaining about the establishment than knocking some guy's teeth down his throat in an alleyway.
Probably. Hard to be sure, with the artsy ones.
Clothing aside, they were pretty in a fierce, scrappy sort of way. Or maybe she just got that impression because they were covered in dirt and scrapes and still bleeding from the cut on their nose. A light scatter of freckles covered the middle of their face, and their eyes were ringed with smudged black eyeliner—she wasn’t sure if the smudging was intentional, or a side effect of the fight she’d seen. Could’ve been either, judging by their clothing. They’d since fixed their bun, but their hair still fell a little loose around their face.
They were almost too pretty to be a guy, but also almost too angular to be a girl, and the flicker of streetlights through the window cast their face in stark shadows that didn’t help clarify things any. Still, her general impression and the pitch of their voice made her suspect the latter. It was, in part, why she’d offered them a ride at all: someone about to be hopelessly outmatched by a bunch of thugs they’d pissed off in Santo Ileso’s alleyways at night was one thing, especially if it was some mess they'd gotten themselves into. Another woman, though…well. Maybe she felt a bit of protective kinship. There were some things you just didn’t let happen to another person if you could stop it, regardless of anything else.
She wasn’t going to ask if she was right, though. The supremely awkward topic of “so are you a boy or a girl or what?” was definitely none of her business. Anyway, she’d already committed to getting them home, which was all that really mattered right now. Or, well, to whatever address they’d given her, at least. No reason to make it a weirder trip than necessary.
“So…what business do you do?”
Well, that wasn’t her business either, really. And probably a more dangerous topic, at that. But she’d already asked, and Nick tilted their head, considering her with sharp hazel eyes.
“Bit of this, bit of that,” they answered slowly, in a way that meant it wasn’t up for in-depth questioning. Neenah quirked her eyebrows. Point made. “Whatever needs done that pays the bills.”
“You get a lot of ‘business rivals’, then?” She wasn't entirely expecting an answer, as cagey as they were being, but got one anyway.
“Depends what needs doing,” they said vaguely with a shrug. “Some people got enemies.”
Neenah made an indistinct noise of vague agreement and left it at that, letting them nurse their injuries in silence for the rest of the trip. Clearly. She wondered how many enemies they had, and then cast a brief thought towards wondering if they might add her to their shit list, after pulling Nick’s ass out of their line of fire.
Well, fuck. Too late to do shit about it now, though.
Once she pulled up to the address Nick had given her, though, they cleared their throat.
“Hey, uh…Neenah?” She made an affirmative sound in her throat, and they continued, “So…hey. Thanks. For the ride. And not shooting me for slamming into your car.” They were looking down at their phone as they talked, and she wondered briefly if they were too sheepish about thanking her to meet her eye.
It was an oddly endearing thought.
“Wasn’t really your fault, that one,” she answered agreeably, “Wasn’t like you specifically got to pick my car for some thug to toss you at.” They gave a little shrug in answer.
“Sure, but still, lotta people would’ve…anyway, thanks. Not kidding, that fuck probably would have waited around to jump me again, and…well.” They took a breath. “It woulda fucking sucked and I owe you one, is what I’m saying.” Unexpectedly, they looked up, and held their phone out to her. It was open on an empty “add contact” screen.
“So…” They cleared their throat. “You know. If you wanna call in the favor someday…”
“Oh.” She blinked in surprise. “Oh, it’s fine, you don’t have to—“
“I know I don’t fuckin’ have to,” they answered without any heat. “I want to. You probably saved my ass. Not many people do that shit.” They gave a pointed little shake of their phone. “Don’t make a thing of it, okay?”
Neenah took it without arguing further, inputting her information before handing it back. Nick tapped away at the screen for a second, before Neenah’s own phone went off; when she checked it, she’d gotten a message from an unlabeled number.
It was short: Hey, it’s the dumbass who you saved from getting pasted. She couldn’t help but break into an amused smile.
“Got it,” she confirmed, and they nodded, tucking their phone back into their pocket.
“Right. Like I said…I do a lot of stuff. You got a problem that needs solved…” They trailed off with a shrug, and Neenah quirked an eyebrow at them.
“You think I got a lot of problems?”
“I think most people do,” they answered, flashing her a quick, cocky smile before getting out of the car. “Night, Neenah. Thanks again for the ride.”
Before she could answer, they shut the car door and headed off into the night. Neenah watched them go for a moment, then shook her head before turning her attention back to her phone.
She paused just long enough to add their number to her contacts, then backed out to head home.