I got the call when I was at the gym. I was on the bench when I heard Yelena barking in my ear. I almost dropped the bar on my chest at the sudden noise. I muted her which made her even more enraged. She was shouting with her nostrils flaring. It was a video call and I could see her throwing things around while giving me the finger. I was starting to get stares and just laughed it off. I left the gym ASAP and unmuted her while walking on the street.
She was in the middle of breaking a coffee mug when she saw me come in the frame. If looks could kill I'd be six feet under right now.
"Two seconds. You have two seconds to explain yourself before I castrate you myself."
"C'mon, 'Big Sis' I'm working out right now. You could've just texted me."
"Don't talk back to me! I don't give a fuck what you're doing I should be number one!"
I raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah yeah. So? What's up."
"Tch. Don't think this impudence will go unnoticed. Higher-ups gave us a group assignment. Need to move some weapons from our shippers. Pretty standard stuff."
While she started explaining the details of the gig, I started wiping my face off with my shirt, exposing my still hardened chest. I peeked through a gap and saw that her voice had trailed off. She seemed a little distracted at the sight of my 'striptease.' Her eyes were tracing the movement of the towel unconsciously. She realized what she was doing when she looked up and saw me giving her a funny look. In return, I got another earful about indecency in public and a heavy scowl.
"*cough* Anyways it's on tonight. Half of you will be doing the transport the others will be the lookout. Not like we're expecting anything but it's better safe than sorry."
She reached forward and the call ended.
––––––––––
It was dark and chilly. Thankfully Eve had caught me before I left. She just gave me a look but didn't press upon the matter. She did hand me a jacket saying it would be cold. I was really grateful for that right now as the other guys in the squad were freezing their asses off. They were in super-thin clothing and were giving me jealous glares seeing me all comfortable in my jacket.
We were standing on a dock grouped up behind several shipping containers. Sea breeze was a bitch. There were about thirty of us all huddled around. We were waiting for the ship to arrive. Yelena was also there, near the edge of the port, talking to someone on the phone. Like me, she also seemed prepared for the weather. Her long hair was whipping around her parka as she was yelling something into the phone. When a moderately loud horn sounded, she finally placed it down.
A ship appeared out of the mist following the horn. It was quite large. Sleek with its black hull making it look like it was simply gliding over the water. I could see several men in yellow vests shouting onboard and making motions. The ship silently approached the dock and once it stopped, the men began jumping out. Other people holding rifles walked towards us before letting down the walkway.
That's where we came in. On the ship were over a dozen slick, gray crates. They were around the size of a small rowboat and took three people to move. We split up into our respective roles and began moving the crates out of the ship and onto the ground. As soon as the last one was dropped, the men boarded the ship again and it left quickly.
We just sat around waiting for the trucks to come. We were supposedly supposed to then load the crates into the bays of the trucks which would then be taken to various warehouses for storage. Yelena glanced at her phone, clearly wondering what the hell was taking the drivers so long. She called one of the lookouts and frowned when he didn't answer. We heard the sound of engines but they quickly died off without any trucks appearing. Yelena continued calling each of the sentries but kept being left on the ringtone.
Her tense mood was rubbing off on the others. Everyone else was shifting and pacing around. It was still cold as shit and we all wanted to go home as fast as we could. Then one of the guys started shouting something. Apparently, he had heard a noise in the darkness of the crates.
That's when everyone got tense. Me? I was frowning wondering how much I could handle before getting overwhelmed. I wasn't the greatest shot but I could still consistently hit near the centers of mass. I couldn't say the same for the rest. Most of them were total amateurs with a gun. Their fingers were itching on the triggers and I was more worried that I'd get hit by friendly fire rather than intruders. I mean, these were the bottom-of-the-barrel in mafia society. The throwaways and rejects. Most of these guys spent their time drinking or fucking prostitutes. Seeing a guy like me with a regular job and life was quite rare, especially in a squad like Yelena's.
We weren't not prepared but it still took us by surprise. Like it was scripted, lights flared up simultaneously and blinded us all. When our sight cleared, we saw that there was a wide ring of police officers surrounding us. It was your standard setup. All of them had their M4 rifles pointed at us and were crouched or hiding behind large shields or barriers. Judging by their weapons and gear, these weren't just the normal police. It was fucking SWAT! I could even make out the logo on one of the vans in the dark. The way they were moving, it looked like they were preparing for a warzone. I almost laughed thinking that they saw these guys as a threat.
I didn't bother taking out my weapon. That would be suicide with the several dozen rifles pointed at me. Even if I did, the helicopter circling above us wouldn't miss it and surely radio the ground troops. Instead, I looked over at Yelena.
My god was she pissed. It was pretty clear that we had been set up. Whether it was a rat in our group or another, this whole thing reeked of someone's plan. I had an inkling of who, especially after my talk with Yvonne. But I kept my mouth shut while trying to figure out how we'd get out of this situation. As I was contemplating my options, one of the officers started shouting into a bullhorn.
He was mid-Miranda Rights when a bullet zipped through the air and pierced a hole smack in the middle of his forehead. That's when chaos erupted. None of our guys had fired and judging from the angle it was a sniper. It wasn't Yelena's doing either as she looked just as surprised as us. The man hadn't even fallen down when both sides started firing. The police assumed it was us and were retaliating and our guys wouldn't just sit by. But we didn't draw fast enough and a couple guys were instantly dropped on our side.
Our measly pistols couldn't do shit against the Kevlar and gear of the SWAT. We kept losing more people and some of the more isolated ones were even surrendering. They kept slowly gaining more ground as they enclosed the ring even tighter. Things were looking bad. Bullets were flying and I was nervous about the possibility of a stray hitting me. I was going to duck down under one of the overturned cars but I caught sight of Yelena standing in the open. Her long ass hair and brightly-colored parka was a literal target in the fight.
I sighed. My good nature would surely get me killed. I got out of my hiding-place and ran over to Yelena. I knocked her down and dragged her over to the car I was hiding behind. She didn't object to being quite literally shoved down. I think she was still in shock at how badly things had gone. Now I hadn't done this for her or anything. I would feel bad for Yvonne if she lost her sister and I still owed her for everything she had done for me in the past. Yeah that was the reason.
While we were crouched down, Yelena slowly regained her senses. That's when when we heard a couple screams, this time coming from the SWAT division. I peeked above the hood and I saw a literal rain of bullets landing on the police. I could tell they were from heavy assault rifles too. They were literally ripping through the shields like paper. This time the police were the ones on the defensive and the majority of them had already fallen. The helicopter had also flown away, most likely calling for reinforcements. The remaining police were cornered near one of the vans and were holed up. Gunfire kept pouring over and I saw something being thrown in the air.
I immediately covered my ears but the explosion still shook me to the core. Those idiots threw a fucking grenade this close to us! Were they trying to get us killed too?
I was a little suspicious. This 'rescue' was timed a little too well. Even a minute longer and our position would most likely have been overrun. As the smoke cleared from the explosion I could see the rest of the police lying strewn about in a mess of blood and guts.
The mysterious assailants appeared, their forms coming out of the smoke like ghosts. Like us, they also had the mafia colors and tattoos. But they were a lot tougher and more professional than our guys. They all had these badass guns, leather jackets, and huge frames. Their ringleader, a young blonde man with a long scar running down his left eye sneered when he saw Yelena crouched behind the car. He had an uzi out and was tossing up a grenade in his other hand. His voice was nasal.
"Well well well, look what we have here! Don Marie sent me here saying that you would need backup. I didn't think the young miss of the Marie family wouldn't be able to complete a job as simple as weapons transport."
Yelena was looking down, the hair covering her face. Her fists were clenched and she seemed to be trembling slightly. The man noticed this and his grin grew even nastier.
"What? Too ashamed to respond? I guess this marks another failure for the F-squad. Maybe you'll consider leaving now...If not...well there's always the option of being my wife."
He licked his lips while looking over Yelena's still body.
"I didn't need your help."
"What was that love?"
"I SAID I DIDN'T NEED YOUR HELP."
"PFFFt HAHAHAHA. You were seconds away from death!" He laughed gleefully. "Instead of getting on your knees and thanking me from the bottom of your heart you're being this arrogant! If it wasn't for your pretty face I would've sliced you up for your stupidity."
Yelena gritted her teeth and barked out. "There's no way the police would've known our business deals! Someone ratted us out!"
"And? There's no proof of that. The point is that YOU still failed yet another mission. Didn't the Don give you an ultimatum of a positive mission rate by the next month?"
Yelena was about to argue some more but I stopped her by putting my hand on her shoulder. I leaned over and whispered.
"Not now 'Big Sis.' We should be cutting our losses. It doesn't look pretty on our side."
Yelena calmed down. She knew I was right. She seemed to remember just how many casualties we had taken and gave the mysterious man one last glare before turning around and checking up on the others. The man didn't notice the look and was instead giving me a funny expression. He turned to the side and said something to one of the men flanking him. That man nodded before lumbering away, shouldering his gun. He was starting to give me the chills so I left and speed-walked to Yelena.
–––––––––
Our casualties weren't light. We lost seven men and a dozen more were injured. Since these were our comrades, we gave them proper burials instead of the normal weigh and sink. There was also the matter of informing their families which Yelena did alone.
She was pretty shaken about the whole ordeal, though she did her best not to show it. She had nearly lost half of her group in a single night. Luckily the weapons were recovered so the family didn't technically suffer a terrible loss in profits. She made sure to emphasize that to the higher-ups in the meeting following the aftermath of last night's events. They had wanted a report as fast as possible.
I was waiting for the meeting to end. When it did, I looked around for her and found her sitting atop a wall with her legs dangling over an edge. She had a depressed look on her face. After I had dragged her to safety, she stopped being as harsh as she was before. She turned around when I made a noise and sighed. I lifted myself onto the wall and sat next to her.
"Aren't you getting a little too comfortable around your boss?"
She elbowed me in the ribs.
"So how was it on your end."
She sighed again.
"It's as bad as you'd expect. Got chewed out for not caring about the well-being of my subordinates, having the operations getting discovered, amongst some of the shit they threw at me. Honestly, it's looking bad. Maurice is really egging them on to give me some type of punishment. I'm lucky I got away with just a warning."
"Hey how come you're so invested in this anyways? I'd imagine you could do a lot more than just lord it over a bunch of useless suckers like me."
"A long time ago my father told me I wouldn't amount to shit. I had told him that I wanted to follow in big brother Milkovich's footsteps and join the family business. But he had said I'd just be a nuisance as a woman and that I'd never get any respect or support. So I wanted to prove them wrong! I wanted to show them that I could become the leader of the strongest division in the whole family!"
"I see. Well, they're wrong about one thing."
She turned around with a little bit of confusion.
"Huh?"
"They told you you'd never get any respect or support, right?"
"Yeah, so?"
"The thing is, you've already gotten mine. You've already proved them wrong, yeah?"
I gave her a thumbs-up and leaped off the ledge, landing with a thud on some of the dead grass on the ground. I didn't bother sticking around to see her reaction.
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A.N. Small timeskip and the show for next chapter. Thanks for reading.