Chapter 3: Planning out CRME

And… who's ready to set off a Roman candle? …Okay, that was a bad pun. As you probably guessed by the chapter title right above these words, the criminal plot is going to be introduced here. Like any good cop show, you need to have some focus on the perpetrators, otherwise it'll look like the arc villains just came out of nowhere. So, enough said about that, let's read this thing!

xxx

Meanwhile, while a certain hunter duo was getting their detective related affairs in order…

Roman Torchwick groaned as he put his feet up on his desk. So far, he wasn't all that happy with his current long-haul job, for a variety over reasons.

First of all, he had to work with the White Fang. Now, while he had no problem selling some of the dust he had stolen to them under the table (which he was making a killing at, by the way), he did have a problem with the way the mutts handled themselves around his warehouse. It seemed like every day, he had to remind some freak off of his leash not to try and leave their sheddings everywhere. It just wasn't hygienic. Also, they kept on ruining all the facilities that worked perfectly fine before. They kept on clogging the toilets, and apparently very few of them actually knew how to properly handle dust. There had been at least five small fires and three instances of an accidental blizzard in the past month. Didn't they pay attention to that PSA stuff that the Azul Concern put out? Or the instructions that came in the ammo crates he stole? Yet again, none of them were really gifted with the intelligence of a human. It kind of made sense, but that didn't make it not expensive and annoying.

The second sticking point was his fine "employer" and her posse of shithead kids. That Cinder woman had to have known that Roman felt pretty much NO respect for her at all. She kept on acting all weirdly aloof, never bothered to share her plans with him, and kept on talking in very vague sentences. She was acting like such a cartoon villain, that Roman was sure that if she had a moustache, she would be twirling it constantly. And her two sidekicks, the Bitch Brigade, were more annoying than a puppy that wouldn't stop humping your leg. Yet again, that would describe the green-haired one, Emerald, perfectly. It was like her mouth was firmly placed around Cinder's asshole at all times, except to be annoying to him. And that Mercury kid was a snarky piece of shit. "Oh, don't let the door hit your ass on the way out, Roman," or "More like Roman Touchdick," are some of the finer examples of why Roman hoped that Mercury would get leprosy targeted at his penis.

As Roman fumed over these facts in his mind, his vertically-challenged assistant, Neo, skipped through the door of the warehouse office. At least she didn't talk shit about him. Yet again, she couldn't talk period. That was one small blessing to have. Regardless, he wasn't in the mood to be interrupted right now. He desperately needed some free time to himself.

Roman blew away a stray lock of hair from his face. "What do you need, hobbit? Is the Shire in danger again?" he dryly asked to his partner in crime. For that, Roman was rewarded with a glare from Neo and a parasol knocking off his bowler hat.

"Hey, watch the headwear!" Roman complained as he got out of his chair to pick up his hat.

As he bent over and grabbed his bowler, Cinder, Mercury, and Emerald walked into the office. That must have been what Neo walked in to tell him about. Great, now his "me" time was ruined even further.

"Do you three need something? Because, as much as I love our little drum circle pow-wows, I got stuff I want to do too," Roman sneered as he put his spiffy hat back in its rightful place.

Cinder, being the person that she was, strode up to Roman and lightly stroked his cheek. Roman tried not to roll his eyes at the overblown gesture.

"Roman, darling, we have plans to discuss," Cinder explained. As if on cue, Mercury closed the office door, and Emerald closed the warehouse floor window's blinds. Oh, this ought to be exciting.

"I must say, you've been doing a fair job so far," continued Cinder as she walked around to Roman's desk and sat on a corner. "Such a fine job… In fact, we want you to help us in our next step."

"What's that? Because I'm completely lost at what you want," said Roman.

Cinder waved a limp hand. "Oh, you don't need to worry about details. You just need to worry about your job," she continued.

"Care to tell me what you want? You know, so I can actually do it?" Roman complained.

"Don't talk that way to Cinder!" Emerald said, taking a step towards Roman. But, her approach was stopped by Cinder holding up her hand.

"Eager, are we? Well, Mercury is more than ready to answer your concerns," Cinder drawled out as Mercury walked up to the desk.

Reaching into his jacket pocket, Mercury pulled out a folded up piece of paper. Handing it to Roman, Mercury began to say, "We want you to get someone to build this. I'm sure you can manage that, right?"

Roman unfolded the paper and examined its contents. What was written on it was undeniable: it was schematics for a bomb. "So you want me to get a bomb-maker for you?" he thought aloud.

"No, we want you to get us electric toothbrushes. Of course the bomb, genius. Actually, maybe this job is too hard for you," Mercury sneered.

"Yeah, about as hard as your dick in another man's ass," Roman snarked back.

"What was that? I was distracted by your bad wardrobe choices. It's tragic, really," Mercury shot at Roman.

Now that was some good material Roman could work with. "Maybe you should get your eyes checked. I'm Roman Torchwick, not your mom on the weekend."

"Enough, you two," Cinder firmly stated, bringing the fight to halt.

"Sorry…:" hesitantly muttered Mercury as he shrank back to Emerald's side.

Roman allowed himself a smirk. In his mind, he won that one. Score one for him.

"Anyway," Cinder said, "Given your… connections, I can assume that you can get five of those made. Or is that not possible?". That last part didn't come off as a question, but more as a threat.

"I'll see what I can do. After all, I'm like a delivery man: I always deliver," Roman smugly complimented himself.

"I can easily see you being one, Roman," Emerald commented from near the door. Roman, having run out of good insults, resulted to shooting the girl a glare.

Ignoring the comment from her subordinate, Cinder continued on. "Once you get the bombs, you're to bring them to—". She was cut off by a small, buzzing song.

"You are the Dancing Queen, young and sweet, only seventeen/Dancing Queen, feel the beat from the tambourine"

The inhabitants of the room stood around in awkward silence as someone's scroll rang. Well, except for Neo. Instead, she was laughing with some weird, wheezing chuckle.

"You can dance, you can jive, having the time of your life/See that girl, watch that scene, digging the Dancing Queen"

Sighing, Roman pulled his scroll out of his pants pocket. Yeah, that was his ringtone, alright. Looking at the caller ID, he saw that it was his lawyer. Well, he had to take this call. It might be something important.

"Hey, Goldman, you're calling at bad time, so this better be important." Roman said into the receiver. His small scowl turned into a full one as he listened to what his lawyer had to say. "What?! Why the hell did I hire you for if she can do that?!".

Emerald wasn't happy with the way Roman just blew off what Cinder had to say. She was Cinder Fall, damn it! She was paying him good money, and he was ignoring her! So, Emerald took the initiative, and walked over to Roman to swipe the scroll from his hand.

"Hang up! This is more important!" Emerald tried to scold Roman. Instead, all the master thief did was lean out of the way of Emerald's swatting and held up a finger to be patient.

"You tell her I'm not paying a cent for that brat! He isn't mine, I shouldn't have to pay for that waste of space!" yelled Roman into the phone.

Now Cinder herself was getting impatient. "Roman, hang up the scroll, we've got more important things to discuss," she lowly vented at him.

Looking at Cinder, Roman simply said "Nah-ah-ah," and went back to listening to what his lawyer had to say. "She's got nothing on me!" he suddenly yelled into his scroll. "I have the paperwork! That kid isn't mine! He doesn't even look like me!"

Now it was Mercury's turn to try and get the scroll to hang up. Unfortunately, all that accomplished was him and Roman getting into a lame slap-fight that only served to make Neo wheeze-laugh even more. There was no way to take what she was seeing seriously at all.

"Gah—Hang up the scroll, assho—ah!" Mercury grunted as he traded slaps with the bowler-hatted man.

"Mff—Aren't YOU a fucking genete—stop—geneticist! Just stop that broad from getting my money!" Roman yelled at his scroll and Mercury simultaneously. He was having a hard time holding off Mercury with only his free hand, so he had to end this now.

Then, with one last shove, Roman pushed Mercury back and hung up on the call. Trying to regain his composure, Roman straightened his hat and brushed a few stray hairs out of his face. "Now what was it you wanted before I was," Roman shot Mercury a look, "RUDELY interrupted?"

Cinder continued where she let off, except in a much more tense tone. "You're to take the bombs to Mountain Glen, and take some of the White Fang with you. From there, you'll get more instructions. Do you understand, or am I being obtuse?". Once again, she made the end question sound unpleasant.

"Yeah, yeah, I got it. Only… I'm not sure I can get the job done with these dry hands, if you get my drift," Roman snidely said. He rubbed his fingers together to leave no doubt he was talking about getting paid.

Cinder sighed and said, "Oh, Roman. Only thinking about lien,". Then, at that, she stood up and headed towards the office door. Emerald made sure to open it for her, being Cinder's official suck-up.

Pausing in the doorway, Cinder said over her shoulder, "Once that's accomplished, you'll have all the lien you'll ever want."

Out walked Cinder, followed by Mercury and Emerald, who slammed the door behind her. What kind of mature person slams a door?

Roman was officially done with today. Between those shit kids, their MILF who had her hands firmly on the supervillain ball, and being forced into making child support payments, he was simply, utterly, and completely fucking done with this. He hadn't felt this frustrated ever since Neo once hid his hat for a week as a joke.

Slumping into his chair, Roman opened a bottom drawer to reveal a bottle of fine whiskey. He nodded at Neo and said, "Want a glass?"

Neo simply shook her head, and instead skipped over to the mini-fridge that sat in the corner next to the filing cabinets. She pulled out her personal ice cream stash while Roman grabbed a glass from the drawer and poured himself a drink.

Roman enjoyed the nice burn that the whiskey left in his chest. He looked at the drink as he swirled it around in his glass, before glancing over at Neo. She was in the process of scooping out some Neapolitan ice cream and putting it into her favorite mug. Now that got Roman's attention.

Neo finished putting some of her namesake food into the mug, and stashed away the ice cream back into the mini-fridge. Then, she walked over to the old microwave on the table near the window, and slid the mug inside. Roman followed this action with a measure of curiosity. Was Neo trying to make an ice cream drink? If she was, he had to give her some credit for creativity, even if the idea of drinking melted ice cream was pretty weird.

"You're seriously going to drink that?" Roman asked, breaking the silence.

Spinning on her heel to face Roman, Neo gave him a hearty nod of the head. The look in her heterochromatic eyes screamed that she was beyond pleased at coming up with the idea. To her, this was like coming up with a way to drink liquid orgasms.

"You're crazy in more ways than one…" Roman muttered for himself to hear. But, it wasn't meant as an insult. It was more like a light, joking observation. After all, Neo was pretty much the only person here that he held some respect for (other than himself, obviously). She had gone through as many scrapes with the cops as he had, and she was quite the good thief and lookout.

Roman was pulled out of his thoughts as the microwave stopped running. Neo happily tapped her foot as she pulled out her ice cream drink. Then, with a joyful flourish, Neo sat in the chair across from Roman's desk.

"To getting paid," Roman toasted to himself, before taking another sip of his drink. Neo did the same, and took a swig of melted ice cream from her mug.

To say that it looked like Neo's mind was blown was an understatement. After that one sip, she then greedily slurped down the rest of the melted treat in record time (if there was to be a record for drinking melted ice cream). Soon enough, the entire mug was drained, even down to the final drop.

Happily, Neo rubbed her stomach and smiled. Then, noticing Roman watching her, held out her mug to him.

"…?"

"Gonna pass on that offer," Roman replied as he took another sip from his glass.

However, Neo persisted. "…!"

"Look, I'm just not an ice cream kind of guy," said Roman.

"…"

Roman clicked his tongue at Neo. "Yes, I'll have you know my parents DID love me, thank you very much."

"…"

"I don't see what that has to do with it."

"…"

"What? Of course they gave me ice cream! I just don't want any right now!"

"…!"

"I wouldn't say it's the BEST…"

"…!"

Roman just decided to blow off the argument. There was no way he was going to give what Neo non-verbally said a dignified response. "Whatever floats your boat…". At that, Roman decided that what was happening outside of his parking-lot side window was way more interesting.

After sitting a few minutes in silence, Roman eventually broke the air with, "Want to go sell more dust to the White Fang?". Although he wasn't facing Neo, it was clear that he was watching Neo out of the corner of his vision, waiting for a response.

Standing up, Neo blinked. With the combination of her changing eye colors, and the slightly manic grin she was sporting, it was clear that she was ready to make some cash. How else could she afford these fashionable clothes and all the ice cream she ate?

Roman stood up and grabbed his cane off of the nearby coat rack where it hung. "Now that's more like it," he said, matching his partner's grin.

After all, what was the harm in selling off a little dust under the table? It was stolen, and if Cinder didn't notice now, Roman doubted she ever would. Plus, it wasn't like those mongrels in the main warehouse could do anything smart with it.

And so, Roman Torchwick and his height disadvantaged partner, Neo, left the office, ready to make a few quick lien for the day.

xxx

Ohh, foreboding! Maybe. I'm not entirely clear on what that word means. I can't word good. Oh, and credit to ABBA for making "Dancing Queen". Of course Roman had that as his ringtone. Would you expect anything different from a dashing rogue like him? (Maybe). Anyway, like normal, feel free to talk to me about this story so far. Feedback is always smiled upon in The Draigg's domain. Objectivism, however, isn't. Fuck objectivism.

Philosophical opinions aside, let me just say thank you to Jimbo Yokimbo for editing this chapter. Truly, he's da real MVP (of editors). And thus, this has been The Draigg, and I'll see you next chapter!