Rose Petals & Petty Rivalries

Part 1

((This was originally posted in bullet-points on tumblr so uh if it reads a little weird that's why))

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The Hollywood Rose is a florist, run by Axl Rose and Izzy Stradlin (in the place of the actual owner, who never seems to make an appearance), with Duff McKagan behind the wheel of the delivery truck. Axl likes working there; he likes the flowers, he likes the quiet, and he likes how things don't ever change: business is slow but steady, customers are as predictable as ever... and the tattoo parlor next door is still a pain in his fucking ass. Don't even get him fucking started about how it scares off the Rose's customers by attracting seedy thugs, or how the owner is a fucking creep that Axl may or may not have history with.

Seriously, don't: Izzy might actually gouge his eyes out with plant clippers if he has to hear Axl's rant one more goddamn time.

Tracii Guns opened up the L.A. Guns tattoo parlor a few years ago, and he doesn't plan on moving anytime soon, no matter how much animosity he gets from the flowerboy next door. Business is going well for once; so well, in fact, that Tracii has decided it's time to hire a second artist.

There's just one problem with that: There's only one tattoo artist in LA who is both up to Tracii's standards and looking for a place to set up shop, and that person is Saul Hudson, better known as Slash, a talented, hotshot artist who also happens to have a rivalry with Tracii dating all the way back to their school days when they first upgraded from stick-and-pokes to cheap tattoo kits.

Tracii left his mark on more of LA's reckless youth than Slash did in their teen years, but just barely and only because Slash was often distracted by anything from BMX to zookeeping. He may have gotten a slower start to his career, but Slash's talent as an artist is now making him a hot commodity in the tattooing community – If Tracii doesn't grab him now, someone else will hire him soon enough, and Tracii can't risk that kind of competition.

So Tracii reaches out and Slash accepts the job offer, but that doesn't mean their little rivalry has been resolved. Tracii tells Slash that there's not enough space in the tiny shop for both of their work stations on street level, so he assigns Slash the basement. Slash actually really likes the space, once he gets it all cleared out and set up the way he likes (he calls it "the snakepit" in his head), but he's not about to let Tracii get first pick of every customer who walks in the door. Whenever he's not with a client, Slash is hovering around upstairs, putting his art up on the walls, greeting potential customers from behind the counter, and generally doing everything he can to poach Tracii's clients. Tracii does not appreciate his efforts, but when he's in the middle of an appointment there's nothing he can do to stop him.

So now Tracii has to deal with competition from his own employee (though by no means is their feud one-sided...) on top of his pissy neighbor who somehow manages to give Tracii an impressive amount of attitude while also blatantly ignoring him. Of-fucking-couse things only get worse when the two meet.

Duff is new in town, fresh from Seattle, Washington, and working two jobs to pay for his shitty bug-infested studio apartment: by day, he drives the Hollywood Rose delivery van, and by night he waits tables at a steakhouse across town. So he's not entirely caught up on the details of Axl and Tracii's bad blood, and comes into work one morning eager to show off his brand new tattoo.

He got it from an artist that his buddy Steven recommended. "It's just the place next door, Axl, have you gotten any of your tattoos done there?" An innocent question, perfectly reasonable, and yet –

"...Oh. You went there?" Poor Duff has done nothing to deserve the look of sour disdain that Axl is serving.

"Uh. Yeah, I got it done in the basement, seemed like a pretty neat place. Why, what's up?"