The Damaged -RIVERDALE-DISCONTINUED

Fourty Four

An hour after Mayor McCoy stormed the halls of Southside High, Madelyn Jones was released from the hell hole that is the Coopers' house.
The rest of the parents, save for Sheriff Keller, had kept the redhead from leaving the house and attempting to save her fellow snakes from the storm coming their way.
All of them understood, even if they didn't want to admit it, that the young girl was becoming a somewhat friend to their children. Letting her get arrested wasn't an option.
The teenager was speeding down the road, on her way to the police station, when her phone dinged.
Manic rolled her eyes before slowing to a stop.
It was Tall Boy, and Tall Boy only ever texted when things had gone to shit and needed fixing.
She opened the message, only to find that it consisted solely of an address.
An address to the House of the Dead.
Manic angrily typed out a message before throwing her phone down on the passenger seat.
She ran her hand through her hair before slamming her palms onto her steering wheel, cursing as she did so.

Manic arrived minutes after Jughead, the redhead walking in on Jughead furiously belittling Tall Boy's loyalty.
"Are you seriously gonna do this to my dad?"Jughead asked, his glare so focused on Tall Boy that he missed his sister's entrance.
The surrounding Ghoulies scattered, most leaving the room in attempts to get away from the fiery female serpent.
This wasn't their first run-in with her.
"What the hell is this, Tall Boy?" Madelyn asked, a sneer on her lips as she regarded the opposing gang members with disgust.
"The Northside declared war today, and your old man ain't here to call the shots," he said, before turning his attention back to Jughead, "and, yeah, I'm his right hand. That makes me de facto leader, here and now."
Madelyn made her way to her twins side, sizing Tall Boy up as she approached. She didn't like what he was saying, not one bit. Not when it had been known that if something ever happened to FP, then Manic would step up and take his place.
"So things are changing, Jones, either you change with them or suffer the consequences."
"Evolve or die, baby. Evolve or die," Malachi said, a wicked look in his eyes as he stared the serpent princess down.
"Shut the fuck up, Malachi."

"I can't believe you got me to agree to this," Manic muttered as Archie and Jughead forced her down the plain hallway of the prison.
"It's for the gang, Madelyn, it's for the gang" Jughead reminded her, slowly losing patients.
The trio eventually made it to the visiting area, where FP Jones was already waiting on the other side of the glass.
Manic took the seat in front of him, pursing her lips as she stared him down, while Jughead and Archie stole chairs from neighboring visitor booths and pulled them up next to her.
"Start from the beginning, kids" FP said, worry underlying his voice.
Jughead immediately started on a confusing rant, trying to get out the story before his dad could scold him.
Archie piped in a few times as well, hoping to back up his friend, while Madelyn stayed silent
"Hey, you can reprimand me for joining the serpents later, but if we don't do something now there will be no serpents. It'll just be the ghoulies."
"Ghoulies dress like fops, but there a nasty crew. The serpents have survived worse, though," he paused, "much worse. The only hitch is, it sounds like you're outmanned, which means you gotta avoid bloodshed at all costs."
"I agree. One hundred percent."
"So, outthink them," FP said, lowering his voice, "this is about territory. If there's one thing Ghoulies love, it's there crazy souped-up retro cars and hearses."
He took a glance at the guard behind him before lowering his voice once more, "you catch my Riverdale drift, kids? Challenge them to a street race, one-on-one. But keep it on the DL. It's illegal, it'll get you locked up."
This peaked both Jughead and Archie's interest, and Madelyn's too—but she wouldn't admit that.
"Go on."
"Set the terms of the race. Their guys win, the serpents will roll over. But if we win, the Ghoulies will back off. And maybe you raise the stakes, whoever wins controls South Side High."
A smirk slowly grew on Manic's face. There was few things she loved more than racing.
"We get rid of the Ghoulies and get rid of the Jingle Jangle and get Mayor McCoy off our back."
"Oh, this is going to be so fucking fun."
Madelyn, Jughead, and Archie went their separate ways after meeting with FP. Jughead and Archie going to strike a deal with Malachi, while Manic went to ready her car for the race.
It was hours later when Jughead found her, informing her with slight regret that there was more at stake than first planned. This did nothing but make Madelyn more determined to win the race.
She would die before letting the Ghoulies take over the serpents.

The race was less than a week later. It was held in an abandoned parking lot, just down the road from Herk Harvey bridge.
Bulldogs, serpents, and ghoulies alike all crowded the abandoned lot. The three groups still managing to keep to themselves.
The Ghoulies came to support their undead king, the serpents their princess and prince, and the bulldogs their unofficial leader.
Yes, Archie Andrews was going to see this race through.
Manic's impala sat by the starting line as she sat with one of her fellow gang members, Sweet Pea, Betty doing some last minute touches on it as the redhead made out with her boyfriend.
When it was time to start the race, Manic pressed her lips to Sweet Pea's one last time before making her way to her car and sliding in.
Jughead climbed into the back, and Archie took the passenger side. Manic found this odd, but didn't comment on it.
Both Malachi and Madelyn inched toward the starting line, stopping once they reach it, and waited for the race to begin.
Cheryl strutted to the front of the two cars, a grin on her lips as she regarded the two opposing racers.
"Engines warm and ready, lady and gentlemen?"
Manic revved her engine and Malachi gave a hand signal, giving Cheryl the okay to commence the race.
Quite dramatically, Cheryl raised a red scarf over her head before letting it fall back down, the two cars immediately speeding off.
The large group of spectators ran after the cars, cheering and hollering.

It's been literally so long since I last updated, but honestly I haven't been in the right state of mind lately. Due to a lot of different things, I've been kind of depressed lately and lost almost all interest in writing. Recently, some of the issues I was dealing with kind of stopped, i guess you could say? So I've got some sort of interest back, and finally finished this chapter, which literally was started in like September.