LEVERAGE AU - volume one

Chapter Three

Pidge and Boomer entered an elevator, beginning to change their clothes.

"Quit peeking!"

"I'm not peeking!"

"Sure whatever. Alrightm going to plan B."

"Well, technically this is plan G."

Alice ran in at another floor, starting to change as well and Pidge kept questioning. "How many plans do we have? Is there like a plan M?"

Jack snorted. "Yea, and you die in that plan, Pigeon."

Boomer laughed. "I like plan M."

Pidge's jaw dropped. "I'm hurt." The team was dressed in business suits. Boomer kneeled to put a brace on Alice's leg while Pidge put fake burns on her face. "Stay still stay still stay still don't blink perfect perfect perfect."

A guard approached the elevator with his hand on his gun. The doors open to reveal Alice walking with a cane, helped by Pidge with Boomer following. The guard covers his gun and stared at Alice as they moved toward the exit.

"Nice, why dontchya just keep starin pal, huh?" Boomer scoffed at the guard, who apologized and let them leave right out the front doors to meet Jack, pulling up to the curb, looking through the doors to the building. The team left the building, gradually dropping the act as they headed for the car. Alice threw her cane to Pidge, who caught it. They all got in the car and Jack drove off.

~~~

They all hovered around Pidge at the park, watching her every move on her small laptop. "I got a couple of Wi-Fi networks with some crappy bandwidth...There you go. The designs are sent, Jack."

Jack nodded, "All right, all right. The money will be in all your accounts later today."\

Pidge nodded, "Anybody else notice how hard we rocked last night?"

Boomer shook his head, "Yeah, well, one show only, no encores."

Alice snorted, "I've already forgotten your names."

"It was kind of cool, being on the same side, though guys, c'mon."

Jack shook his head. "No, we are not on the same side. I am not a thief."

"You are now. Come on Jackson, tell the truth. Didn't you have a little bit of fun playing the Black King instead of the White Knight, just this once?"

~~~

Jack was sleeping in bed still wearing his clothes, little empty bottles littering the nightstand. His phone rang, and he fumbled to answer it, knocking bottles over in the process.

"You screwed me! The designs never got to me!" Dubenich roared.

"No, I watched them go out."

"I don't know what you saw but I received nothing!"

"Look, I told you, you couldn't trust 'em."

"It is not my job to trust anybody that is what you were here for. I am freezing the payments. I am freezing all the payments."

This made Jack sit bolt upright. "All right, look. Look, I will come over there right now, we'll straighten this out."

"No, no, no do not come here. My company has an old aircraft facility outside the city and I will text you the address and you be there, in one hour."

~~~

When Jack arrived, he saw a warehouse of his former, temporary team. What really caught his attention was Pidge waving a gun at Boomer.

"You mind telling me what happened to the designs, Mr. Karate?"

"What makes you think I know what happened? Stupid."

"Look, forget you man. You did it when we were coming down from the elevator."

"Yeah, that makes sense, doesn't it? You had the file every second."

"Hold up Kujo, I did my part, I transferred the files!"

"You better get that gun out of my face..."

"What did you do to the damn files?!"

"...or else I'm gonna feed it to you."

Jack rolled his eyes, his presence not known yet so in hopes of preventing a death or major injury, he yelled, "HEY!" Well that didn't work out because now both were facing Jack, and Pidge now pointing the gun at him.

"Did you do it? You're the only one that's ever played both sides!" Boomer yelled back.

"Yeah, you seem pretty relaxed for a guy with a gun pointed at him," Jack raised an eyebrow.

Boomer snorted. "The safety was on, dumbass."

"Like I'm gonna fall for that." Pidge rolled her eyes.

"No, no, actually he's right, the safety is on," Jack nodded, making Pidge look and within half a second, Jack was in possession of the gun. He then looked at Boomer, "How bout you, you armed?"

Boomer shook his head, "I don't like guns." Boomer looked pointedly past Jack's shoulder. Jack turned, pointing the gun at Alice who is holding a gun on him.

"My money's not in my account. That makes me cry inside in my special, angry place," Alice said as she walked so they were all looking at each other.

Jack slowly reached out to lower her gun, "Did you come here to get paid?"

Pidge snorted, "Hell no. Transfer of funds man. Global economy."

Boomer nodded in agreement, "It's supposed to be a walk away. I'm never supposed to see you three again."

"Then the only reason you guys are here is because you didn't get paid. And you're pissed off. As a matter of fact the only way to get us all in the same place at the same time is to tell us that we're not. Getting. Paid." Jack said as a look of realization goes through the group and they all started to run. Jack opens a garage door and directs them out. Pidge tripped on the stairs but Boomer picked her up with ease and carried her out.

The others exited and Jack looked back to see a ball of fire headed toward him. The building exploded in a ball of fire, throwing Pidge, Boomer and Alice to the ground.