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Trying to write a simple fluffy one-shot will have you looking up the stupidest things of all time. Why did I just go on a deep dive of the history of markers for a one page scene of a character drawing on her girlfriend's arm
With her crew. She will fight whether she is alone or in a crowd and honestly a lot of the time even when she knows it's not a good idea, and if pressed on this she will deny it, but! But. Ajax needs her people with her. She will fight angry and she will fight afraid but she feels safest when she knows she has her crew to fall back on if she really needs it. They give her strength and they give her purpose and Ajax desperately needs that.
[ 🦇 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat is a fear they never talk about ?
Dare I say? Being alone. And yes, this is a woman who is always either passively or actively pushing people away, but hear me out. Ajax is always gearing for a fight because it's all she knows how to do to protect the people she loves and losing them and being on her own again would absolutely kill her. She is a fighter but also a protector through and through and she needs to have people to protect. When she's alone, when she's by herself, she feels useless and adrift and she doesn't know who she is without them.
[ 🗡️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat is a scar that they have but never talk about ?
On her ribs, a small cut from a shard of glass off a broken bottle. She got it when she was still small enough to get pushed around, to get beat on, before she became what she is. It reminds her of being young and vulnerable and helpless and (in her mind) weak. And it's a feeling she refuses to ever feel again.
I HAVE NO ONE TO TALK TO ABOUT THIS!!!! IM GONNA GO INSANE!! THIS IS THE BEST NEWS EVER!! SHE’S GONNA BE SO FREAKING GOOD I NEED TO HEAR HER SOMEHOW!!!
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[ 🪢 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhen was the last time they broke a promise ?
You know I gotta make this about remjax. Last promise she broke was telling Rembrandt she wasn't gonna do some stupid shit again. I think Ajax has made that promise an unfortunate amount of times, where she picks a fight she can't win or gets in way over her head after Rembrandt told her not to, and every time, she promises Rembrandt she won't do it again, she'll control her temper, she's sticking around and Rembrandt doesn't have to worry. But in the end, she never keeps it. I don't think she's able to keep it, and both of them know that.
Rembrandt wants to believe her and expect her to keep that promise but she never truly does. Ajax wants to change and stop putting herself and her family in dangerous situations, wants to stop making trouble for them, but she hasn't figured out how. It's not that she doesn't try, she just... can't seem to make it stick.
But Rembrandt keeps asking. And Ajax keeps promising. And they both understand on some level that it's not going to change any time soon but they say it anyway because it makes it hurt a little less in the moment.
[ 💭 ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they believe they’re worthy of being loved ?
HELL no! Well... not fully. On some level, Ajax very much so views herself as a tool - or more specifically, a weapon - at the gang's disposal, and you don't love a hammer no matter how good it is at driving a nail. For all the trouble she makes, she knows she's enough of a benefit to (hopefully) balance it out. But that's just usefulness. The idea that someone could look past all her faults and love her, not just need her but really love her, it doesn't compute. All the traits that make her good at what she does just drive people away in the end.
🖐️ in the ask game for the polycule (Sweremjax), please?
Oooooo I like this one. Okay okay:
(from the ask game)
[ 🖐️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat do their hands feel like: soft, calloused, trembling ?
Swan: a little calloused, definitely, but I feel like this is a woman who would also moisturize pretty frequently so her hands are rather soft aside from the bits of callous at the base of her fingers. Also, because I run off the headcanon that Swan is a bit of a pyromaniac (after the Molotov scene), she's definitely burned off at least one of her fingerprints.
Mercy: this might be an easy pitch but her hands are soft. They just are. I know it. Very soft and she keeps her nails long and sharp so, in the event of a fight, she has a slightly deadlier weapon than just her fists at the ready (would also like gently dragging her nails along her girlfriends' arms or the back of their necks as she passes behind them because it drives them all insane)
Ajax: Ajax's hands aren't just calloused, they're scarred. Her knuckles have been busted and split open so many times, the skin on them is pale white from all the scar tissue left behind. She's got cuts on her palms from knife fights and overall her hands are just extremely rough and burning hot, but her girlfriends hardly notice because of how gently she holds them.
Rembrandt: hella fucking calloused, way more than you'd expect. She's climbing over the whole city to tag shit, there is no way her hands are soft. She keeps her nails filed really short because she hates trying to clean paint out from under them, and she specifically has a tough callous on the outside of her thumb from her lighter. Also I think she'd have really cold hands
Little addition, I think Ajax and Rembrandt would both have slight tremors in their hands. Both of them are pent up balls of energy in my mind, just in different ways. Rembrandt usually hides hers by fidgeting and Ajax flexes her hands to work the energy out.
₊˚⊹ ㅤa collection of character analysis/headcanon questions to learn more about your character and your partners'! writing/headcanon prompts requested by anonymous. feel free to edit these as you see fit.
[ 🖐️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat do their hands feel like: soft, calloused, trembling ?
[ ☂️ ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they crave touch or fear it ?
[ 🎐 ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they have a sound, like a song or voice, that they associate with peace ?
[ 🕊️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhen did they feel the safest ?
[ 💤 ]ㅤ.ㅤhow do they sleep ? curled up, sprawled, holding onto something ?
[ 🦇 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat is a fear they never talk about ?
[ 🔒 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat is a secret they’ve sworn never to tell ?
[ 🪢 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhen was the last time they broke a promise ?
[ 🫳 ]ㅤ.ㅤwho do they feel they owe, but never paid back ?
[ 💼 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat do they always carry with them ?
[ 🧨 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat’s the quickest way to set them off, even if they hide it well ?
[ ⛓️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat does guilt feel like to them ?
[ 💢 ]ㅤ.ㅤwho have they never forgiven and never will ?
[ 🩸 ]ㅤ.ㅤis there something or someone that, if lost, would break them ?
[ 🌧️ ]ㅤ.ㅤis there a pain they refuse to heal from ?
[ 🪞 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhen have they looked at their reflection and hated what they saw ?
[ 📿 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat superstition or ritual do they cling to ?
[ 🌊 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhen was the last time they cried ?
[ 🐾 ]ㅤ.ㅤdo animals like them instinctively ?
[ 🪶 ]ㅤ.ㅤhow do they laugh ?
[ 🫀 ]ㅤ.ㅤwho taught them what love is ? did it hurt ?
[ 💭 ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they believe they’re worthy of being loved ?
[ 🎀 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat is their main love language ?
[ 🔦 ]ㅤ.ㅤwho do they search for ?
[ 📜 ]ㅤ.ㅤis there a story they love sharing with others ?
[ 🌒 ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they have a dream or goal they have given up on ?
[ 🕯️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat memory do they replay when they’re alone ?
[ 🌪️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat’s the one choice they regret (not) making ?
[ 🧩 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat’s a truth about themselves they refuse to admit ?
[ 🍻 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat kind of drunk are they ?
[ ✉️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat kind of letter would they write but never send ?
[ 🗡️ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat is a scar that they have but never talk about ?
[ 🕸️ ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they have a favourite lie they like to hear ?
[ 🪦 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat would they want on their gravestone but never admit aloud ?
[ 🎱 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat kind of future do they crave, and who’s in it ?
[ 🌀 ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they have a recurring dream or nightmare ?
[ 🍃 ]ㅤ.ㅤdo they feel like they belong ?
[ ⚓ ]ㅤ.ㅤwhat does “home” mean to them ?
[ 🧭 ]ㅤ.ㅤwhere would they go if they could disappear tomorrow ?
Major warning on this chapter for violence, including firearms. We're finally starting to get into the meat of the story, thank goodness writing is going faster than it was. Enjoy!
Previous chapter Ao3
-----
“You can’t keep doing this shit, Ajax.”
It woke her just as the sun disappeared. She snapped upright, facing off with the shadowy figure in the corner of the room. No clear features, no clear voice, everything felt like she was being dragged underwater as fiery eyes stared her down.
Swan’s apparition tapped her temple. “Use your head.”
Ajax, frozen, whispered, “You’re not real.”
She started towards her. “Think it through. I’m counting on you.”
Ajax leapt out of bed, but the moment her feet touched the ground, Swan disappeared. She stared at the space left behind and bit the inside of her lip until it bled. She wanted to see Swan’s face. She needed to see her face. Why couldn’t she fucking remember it? There was a pang in her chest, a claw hooked through her ribcage and threatening to rip it out and break her apart completely. Pressing her fingers into her stinging eyes, she focused on breathing until the tearing sensation faded.
“Hey.” Ajax threw a pillow at D-Train’s sleeping face and almost found it within herself to laugh as she jerked awake. “Get up.”
D-Train groaned and tossed the pillow back. “That wasn’t necessary.”
“The sun’s going down. We need to get moving.”
“Fine.” D-Train sat up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes, watching Ajax stuff their first aid supplies into her bag. “What’s the plan?”
“Go to Hell’s Kitchen, find the Rogues, and beat the fuck out of that bastard until he tells us who really killed Cyrus.”
“And where are we gonna find them? Their territory covers all the way to Central Park. Do you want to just wander through ringing a fucking bell until they show up?”
A wicked grin split Ajax’s face. Her enforcer went pale.
“Nuh-uh.”
“Scared of a fight?”
“That’s not a fight, that’s a suicide attempt!”
“If you got a better plan, I’m open to it.”
D-Train just scowled at her. “Please tell me you’re gonna calm down once we get home.”
“I’ll calm down when I have them back. C’mon.” She reloaded her pistol. “Got a long way to go before we get to lie down.”
“Alright, mad dog.”
Ajax thought, Fitting.
They crossed the border into Rogue territory before midnight. Ajax rattled her paint can, tagging every other block, climbing on top of dumpsters to get higher and crossing out car windows with dripping red. The Rogues’ tag was a shittily drawn black skull which she covered wherever she found it. D-Train had the radio playing far louder than necessary, but this was not a stealth mission, after all, and they needed to hear any announcement the DJ might make. If there was any mention about what happened with the Bizzies, they missed it, and nothing had been repeated since then. After what seemed like hours of loitering up and down the avenues, Ajax seriously considered setting off a few shots just to get their attention. D-Train convinced her the plan would only attract cops.
“How many is that?” she asked as she marked out another tag.
“A couple dozen, I think?” D-Train answered.
Ajax snarled and threw her hands in the air. “Do these bitches not patrol their own turf? What the hell! We haven’t seen a single person in colors the whole time we’ve been here!”
“You want to keep looking?”
“No. No, I…” Pressing Rembrandt’s necklace against her chest, she took a deep breath and looked at the paint staining her fingertips. Slow down. Think. Rembrandt was always so observant. Ajax observed jack shit the whole time they were in the neighborhood. “The girl that knew who the Rogues are at the war council, what’s her name?”
“Dorado.”
“Doesn’t that mean golden or something?”
“She steals shit. Likes gold.”
“Good to know. I saw a payphone a few blocks back. Let’s get Vermin on the line, ask Dorado what else she knows.”
“Heard.”
While D-Train called home, Ajax leaned against the wall beside the payphone. She struggled to light a cigarette against the wind coming off the river just two avenues away, whipping through the streets and freezing her skin where it clawed beneath her shirt collar. Fiddling with her brass knuckles in her pockets, she looked up at the dark sky. A few stars peaked through the clouds and the ever present pollution of Manhattan lights. She saw the stars so rarely.
A car revved down the street. Ajax didn’t pay it much attention. There was always some douchebag with a modified muffler making too much noise in the middle of the night, no matter the neighborhood. It was only when the car started putting towards them that she took real notice.
Of all vehicles to round the corner, she did not expect a hearse.
It crept along, the exhaust rattling, windows tinted dark. She tracked it as it rolled through the red light and down another street until it disappeared from view. Ajax made a face. Fucking creepy.
“Yeah. Yeah, talk to you later.” D-Train hung up the payphone with a solid thunk. “She doesn’t know anything else about them.”
“Dammit.”
“What’s next?”
“I don’t know,” Ajax admitted. She was so fucking tired. “Keep walking, I guess.”
“That’s not getting us anywhere.” She squeezed Ajax's arm. “Look, let’s just find a place to sleep for the night. We’ll try to get some more intel in the morning.”
“From who? You said it yourself, we got no friends in the city and everyone knows the Riffs want us dead. Who’s gonna help us?”
“I don’t know, big dog, but we’ll figure it out. For now we can-”
D-Train was cut off by another revving engine. Stubbing out her cigarette, Ajax stepped into the middle of the street. The hearse came creeping along again. She heard the clinking of glass bottles, and then a high, almost shrieking voice.
“Warriors… come out to play-ay…”
A window rolled down. Ajax met a man’s eyes, the same man from the night of the conclave, the man who ruined her life.
She found herself staring down the end of a barrel.
“Split!”
Luther opened fire.
Hysterical laughter and squealing tires shattered the quiet night as the Warriors took off. Ajax grabbed D-Train’s neck to keep her head down, leading her blind, ducking and weaving around cars and trash cans and anything to cover them. Manhattan was so fucking open! Ajax had been shot at plenty of times before but this was bullshit!
More shots rang out. There was an impact. Her arm. Her shoulder. Enough to make her stumble, burning, tearing through her flesh. She felt herself scream.
D-Train yanked her down a side street and pushed her down into a jumble of construction materials left around the sidewalk. “Shit,” she panted, peeking out of their cover as Ajax pressed a hand over the bleeding wound in her shoulder. “Shit! Ajax, lemme see, how bad is it?”
“Don’t,” Ajax gasped. “I can move it. I’m fine. Fuck!”
More laughter from the street. That awful jeering taunt.
“Warriors!” Like he was singing. “Come out to play-ay!”
His voice. His fucking voice. One sentence from this bastard had spelled Cleon’s end and now Ajax finally had him within her sights. She drew Cleon’s pistol.
“Ajax, what are you doing! Get down!”
She ripped away from D-Train and stepped into the street as the hearse came charging towards her. She saw Luther’s face and the glint of the gun as he reloaded. With a hundred dead Warriors behind her, she aimed. Fired one shot. And hit the driver right between the eyes.
D-Train pulled her back as the car shrieked and swerved and crashed into a streetlight, the pole exploding in a shower of sparks on the pavement. Half a dozen Rogues piled out of the car screaming and running for their lives while Luther yelled "Cropsy wait" after one of them. Ajax let them go. She only needed one. She could have laughed watching Luther fall flat on his face out of the passenger seat and scrambling to get up. Ignoring the agony in her arm, she crashed into him, wrestling him to the ground, kicking away his gun where it fell near the car. She held him by his throat and jammed her pistol against his head.
“Scream,” she hissed, “and I’ll kill you right now.”
“I won’t. I won’t.” He was almost crying. “Get off me, let me go, please, I-”
“Shut up!” Ajax stood and allowed D-Train to come in and drag Luther to his feet. She pointed down the street, breathing hard, towards the piers on the river. “Walk.”
The piers were near empty. She picked one, derelict and rotting, and pushed Luther towards the rusted boat launch with her gun pressed into his kidney. Across the deck in a dark corner of the crumbling shed, a few girls watched them go. Ajax caught the eye of one of them, a girl way too young to be there. She looked like Fox. The Warrior jerked her head towards the shore. The girls took off.
D-Train gave Luther one last final shove towards the water, leaving him stuck between them and a dunk in the Hudson. Ajax fiddled with the trigger and inclined her head.
“Who killed Cyrus?”
“Don’t you know?” Luther sneered. He flashed a wicked grin, but it didn’t disguise his trembling hands. “Your little leader did.”
“Bullshit.”
“Guess you didn’t know her as well as you thought, huh?”
“Bullshit!” Rage pulsed in her chest and it was cold, frozen and cruel and spiking through her blood and how dare he? How fucking dare he act like he knew anything about Cleon! “You wanna know how I know you’re lying? Because this is Cleon’s gun, and she left it in Coney that night. We both know she didn’t kill Cyrus so I’m gonna ask you again. Who did, and why did you blame my warlord for it?”
He kept quiet. His eyes flickered between her face and her weapon, that stupid smile plastered across his face beginning to waver. Ajax sighed.
“That’s how you wanna play it? Fine. I’ll play.”
She decked him square in the jaw. He dropped like a sack of bricks and she was on him in a split second, holding his head down and hitting him over and over until she wasn’t sure whether the blood on her hands was his or her own. She punched until there was red spilling from his nose, his mouth, his eye swelling shut as he cried and begged for mercy. It didn’t stop her. The disgust began to overpower the rage. This monster who sicced the city on them, who caused the death of almost everyone she ever loved, who just fucking shot her twice, now reduced to a sniveling worm the second he was alone.
Could she have gotten the chance to do this that night? To ID him, to uncover the truth before all the devastation? If she’d stayed, stayed with her crew, kept out of trouble, if she did everything different she might have saved them all before this even started-
She drew her pistol again and waved it in front of him as he tried to cover his ruined face. “Here’s what’s gonna happen if you don’t start talking,” she panted. “First I’m gonna cap your left knee, then your right, and then I’m gonna throw you in that water and see how long it takes you to sink.”
D-Train grabbed her shoulder. “Ajax, chill-”
“Stay out of this!” She aimed at Luther’s leg. “Who killed her?!”
“I did!”
It hit like a gut punch. “What?”
“I killed Cyrus! Cleon saw, that’s why I blamed the Warriors!”
Lead settled in her arms. Bile rose in her throat as she stopped breathing entirely, vision tunneling to just his face as he writhed on the floor trying to get away from her.
It was all for nothing. On the word of one man, Cleon died for nothing.
She dragged him to his feet. All the pain disappeared as she pushed him to the end of the boat launch, keeping him on the back foot, until all that held him over the stinking black water below was one heel and her hands. He clung to her wrists as she tilted her head, too terrified to even consider fighting back.
“Why?” she growled. “What was it all for? Cyrus only wanted peace.”
“You think unity would actually work?” Luther spat, with the conviction of a deranged street preacher spouting his message even then. “Look what happened the second one girl was out of the way! I got rid of the queen and the whole kingdom fell apart after, and you couldn’t stop it, and neither could Cleon! The world is gonna burn whether you like it or not!”
“You motherfucker-”
“Isn’t that what you’re trying to do right now? Aren’t you trying to burn the world, too, Warrior?”
She was hyperventilating now, listening to him ramble on and accuse her of following his footsteps. She had a good reason, after everything that was done to the Warriors, she had a right to set the record straight and return their blood spilt in kind. She was nothing like him. Nothing at all.
She felt a steady hand on her back, warm and strong, tugging her away from the water.
I’m counting on you.
Ajax slammed Luther to the floor. D-Train grabbed him without a word, pinning his arms behind his back and waiting for an order as Ajax got out the spray paint.
“Where to?” D-Train asked.
She stood back, staring at the tag she left on the wall. A hand on her chest, urging her on. Another holding the paint can with her. She bowed her head.
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I know I usually write her as anywhere from silly goofy to absolutely fucking depressed but like, credit where credit is due. Look at her:
This woman is cool! Graffiti artist, hates men, can't read maps, no one is doing it like her!!
Also, from her verse in the cypher, and her little rap part she has with Ajax in Roll Call, I do think we missed out on a cool confident Rembrandt we could have seen before the events of the album.
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I'm still hoping whoever was casted as Cyrus comes back as the woman singing in the train car during "Same Train Home." Meta shit. Cyrus has got to be a power house and I NEED them to give that power house more than one appearance
Stillwell Avenue station was as desolate as the rest of Coney Island. Across the station on the F train platform, a woman leaned against a pillar, humming off-key, her voice carrying in the night. On the N train side, someone slept bundled in blankets beneath a staircase. The Warriors waited for the Q in silence aside from Snow’s pocket radio quietly playing a new hip-hop track. D-Train had had it going since they said goodbye to Vermin, hoping to hear an announcement, a clue, anything to give them a starting point, but no. In between the music, there were only regular blurbs they might hear on any normal station.
Ajax tried to rid herself of the thought, but it stayed ringing in her mind: After so long since the massacre, the only announcement they were likely to hear was another fulfilled bounty. Was there a price, she wondered? What did the Riffs offer for their heads? How much did they pay for another vest covered in her comrades’ blood? Or was it simply for the love of the game?
Maybe that was enough. Maybe the retribution was all people needed to bring the wrath of the city down on them. Then again, she reasoned, it was enough for her. And nothing she could possibly do would be worse than the crimes the Riffs already committed in the pursuit of vengeance, but fuck if she wasn’t going to give them a run for their money.
Lost in her thoughts, Ajax wandered towards the end of the platform. She stepped into the shadows beside a dispatch tower. With her fingers skimming the cold, green-painted wall, her mind flashed back to a scene from years and years ago.
Cleon sent Rembrandt to tag the subway station as a warning to anyone coming downtown, claiming their turf from the busiest entrance point. Ajax went along as her escort. She always went with Rembrandt. They had to come back often to redo it because the MTA kept painting over them - they were quick with that - but Ajax remembered the first time. She remembered Rembrandt effortlessly hopping the turnstile, shooting a what are you gonna do about it look at a worker who couldn’t care less, endlessly confident when she had Ajax beside her. She remembered heading home, Rembrandt rattling her spray can to make a beat while Ajax danced along as she walked; a silly thing, just to make Rembrandt laugh. She did anything just to hear that laugh back then.
Ajax fished the can of spray paint out of her backpack. She felt a hand on the back of hers, guiding her movements as she drew a bright red W on the wall. It was crooked and asymmetrical and the paint dripped where she lingered in one spot too long, but it was there.
Rembrandt did it so much better.
“Are you gonna tag the whole time?” D-Train asked behind her.
“Yeah, I am,” Ajax said. The platform shook with the rumble of an incoming train. “I want everyone to know we’re coming for them.”
“Put it away for now.” She jerked her thumb towards the train. “That’s us.”
The only other person in the car with them was huddled in the corner on the opposite end. They mumbled under their breath, a steady chant in a language Ajax didn’t know. In her corner, D-Train sat across from her, angled out, placing herself between Ajax and the rest of the car. She knew the posture well; that used to be her. Ever the protector. Ever the front line. Ever fucking it up.
As they pulled away from the station, her eyes drifted to the person in the corner. They clutched something to their chest, rocking back and forth, repeating their chant over and over. They were praying.
D-Train nudged her foot. “You alright, big dog?”
“I’m planning.”
“Wanna share with the class?”
“We’re going to Union Square. It was our meeting place that night, it’s where Swan said she’d call from, so we’re starting there.”
“Looking for what?”
“I don’t know!” Ajax snapped. “Something. One of Rembrandt’s tags. I know she’d be leaving ’em.”
“You have her paint.”
“She’d get her hands on more.”
“Alright.” D-Train clasped her hands, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees and looking at Ajax over the top of her sunglasses. “What then? We find the crew first and then we go after the Rogues?”
D-Train left it at that. Ajax was glad for it. Truth be told, she wasn’t thinking of jack shit. Nothing helpful, anyway. Get to Union Square, search for any sign of the missing Warriors, and then… what? Start busting down doors demanding answers from every gang she found? Even she knew that was a less-than-stellar plan. She didn’t want to give anyone a chance to prepare for her showing up.
As the train crested up out of the tunnel, climbing onto the Manhattan Bridge, Ajax stared at her hands in her lap. She’d tied one of Swan’s bandanas around her wrist, just in case she had to make a Molotov on the run. That’s what she told herself. It had nothing to do with the reminder of her. Not at all.
Could really use your advice right now, War Chief.
She lifted her eyes to the lights of Manhattan reflecting off the river. Less than twelve hours ago, she was heading the opposite way anticipating a homecoming she didn’t get, a hope which turned into a tragedy within minutes. She flattened her hand over her sternum. In and out. In and out. Focusing on the exhale, controlling her nerves before they took over her rational mind again. She needed a clear head for this. Needed to be smart, cautious, in control of herself. She needed to be more like Swan. More like Cleon.
She thought about what Lincoln said. “Your Warriors need you to be Ajax.” Bullshit. Ajax being Ajax is what landed her in this hell in the first place. If she’d been anyone but herself that night, maybe she would have made it home. She could have identified Luther, gotten the Riffs to turn their fury at someone else, and they’d all be safe and alive.
But no. Because Ajax was Ajax, and she was angry, and Ajax angry made mistakes.
As they pulled into the Canal Street station, D-Train murmured, “We’re set on this plan?”
“If you’re gonna chicken out,” Ajax said quietly, “get off here and go back home.”
“Nah. I’m with you.”
“Good. Here’s our stop.”
The northbound Union Square platform was occupied by a gaggle of drunk college students, a couple smoking pot by the stairs, and scattered evening shift workers wearily making their way home. None of them paid Ajax and D-Train any attention. Good. She refused to take off her colors, no way, not now, but it was still better if there weren’t other boppers sounding the alarm the second they set foot in Manhattan.
D-Train walked a half step behind her as they navigated the labyrinth of the station. Ajax kept her head on a swivel, scrutinizing the floor, the walls, the pillars for their mark, anything to point her in the right direction. Or any direction. D-Train was right, she was winging this, she had Union Square but after that she was lost, she didn’t know up from down in Manhattan or have a single coherent fucking idea where Swan could have possibly taken them and-
There. There, on the wall. They tried to wash it off the tile but not well enough. On the wall, stained in the grout like blood, were the faint remains of a bright red W.
Somewhere behind her D-Train was saying “Ajax, Ajax” but she ignored it. She traced the faded tag with trembling fingertips. A hand touched her back, not D-Train’s, smaller and softer, copying her movements and drawing the shape of the tag across her vest.
“Rembrandt…”
A laugh echoed through the station. Ajax jumped and spun on her heel, expecting wide eyes, a bright smile coming up to her, expecting her, but they were alone. Not a soul but the station attendant asleep in the booth.
“Yo, you okay?” D-Train asked.
“I thought I…” She shook her head violently. “Forget it.”
“You thought-?”
“Forget it! Let’s get out of here.”
“Where?”
“Out. Look for our tag, I know she left more.”
“Yeah, but, when?”
“The fuck does it matter, when?”
“If you’re expecting to find them around here, it matters.”
“Maybe we will.”
“Doubt it,” D-Train grumbled as they ascended into the dimly lit park.
Ajax rounded on her, snarling, “You gonna say somethin’ helpful or just keep questioning my decisions?”
“Here’s helpful.” D-Train looked around, getting her bearings before pointing east. “Walk a couple blocks that way and you’re on the Riffs’ turf. You really want a run-in with them off the bat?”
Shit.
Gritting her teeth to stifle a building scream, Ajax dragged a hand down her face. “How do you know where Gramercy is from here?”
“I looked at a map.”
“You can read?”
D-Train shoved her just hard enough to make her rock back on her heels. “Get a new joke,” she chuckled.
And Ajax felt… normal. For a heartbeat. Tossing the same verbal jabs they would during fight nights, in between bouts that Ajax won more often than not because D-Train had size on her but she’d always been better with her hands. She remembered the rare times Swan joined in back in her early days, the grin on her face whenever she managed to best Ajax, the way she always looked so proud for the mere fact that Ajax was giving her a chance to prove herself.
“Fine. We’ll head the other way. Keep an eye up high. She doesn’t like doing street-level tags, she’d climb.”
“I know it. I remember her initiation.”
Scaling and tagging the face of the Wonder Wheel. Ajax still shuddered at the thought. Cleon was a madwoman for that, but as she explained when Ajax first argued the decision, she knew Rembrandt was strong enough to do it. She needed to see Rembrandt believe it, too. And she did. And she became a Warrior. And Ajax prayed she carried that with her now.
As they wandered the neighborhood, walking along the bright avenues and shadowy residential streets, Ajax kept her eyes up; fire escapes, rooftop HVAC units, faded billboards, anywhere Rembrandt might have made their mark. That night, that awful night in the cemetery, Swan told Rembrandt to do the same thing. Ajax looked over her shoulder to keep an eye on her while she tagged the tombstone, hanging at the back of the pack waiting for her to catch up. When Ajax looked now, she saw only skittering rats behind her.
“I’m not seeing anything, big dog,” said D-Train.
“Keep looking,” Ajax ordered.
“We should start heading towards Hell’s Kitchen.”
“Let’s just see-”
“We’re not gonna find anything!”
“Will you shut the fuck up?! There has to be something here, we just need to look for it!” Her voice broke. “Rembrandt’s tag was in that station, they must have been around here for at least a little while, I know what to look for when it comes to her and Swan-”
“Ajax, think for a second. You said this was your meeting place the night of the conclave. Swan took the others here months ago and unless I missed something huge, we got no fuckin’ friends in this neighborhood. Even if we did, there’s no guarantee they didn’t turn on us after this shit.”
She wasn’t looking at D-Train anymore. She was looking at Cochise. The quiet strategist, the one who could step into any role, holding the gang together when Ajax and her pride were actively threatening to tear things apart. How often had they gone through this, this tired scene of redirected fury because Cochise had known her long enough to absorb every hit when she lashed out? She could have been War Chief if she wanted. Cleon offered it multiple times.
“Not gonna take on a responsibility like that,” she’d said the last time Cleon brought it up, a tiny easy smile on her face like always. “Besides, I’m more versatile than that. You know you need me to stay that way.”
And Cleon listened, because when Cochise disagreed with her, it was usually because she was right.
Ajax needed her now. She needed the comforting smile, the voice of reason. Not clashing with her own replacement while she struggled to occupy a position opened to her by blood.
Turning aside to hide her face, she nodded once. “You’re right,” she sighed. “We’ll head towards Hell’s Kitchen. It’s the A train, right?”
“Or the C.”
“Where is… Wait, what the hell is this?”
A group of people were coming down the street towards them. A group of men, all wearing these stupid preppy patterned cardigans.
D-Train laughed as she stood next to Ajax. “What in the fucking clown school graduation shit is this?”
“I don’t know but I don’t like it,” Ajax grumbled. She studied the way they whispered to each other as they approached, keeping an eye on their hands, open and empty as they flashed simultaneous award-winning smiles. Cowgirl would have loved these guys. “If they start reaching for something, waste ’em.”
“Heard.”
One of the men stepped ahead of the group. “Good evening, girls,” he said sweetly. God, they looked like a fucking boy band. “You’re a long way from Coney Island.”
“We were just leaving,” Ajax replied, fighting to keep her tone calm. “This your turf?”
“Ah, we don’t care about that,” said another man. “Allow us to introduce ourselves. We’re the Bizzies.”
The first one added, “We’re here as friends. We know the hell you been through since Cyrus died.”
Ajax shoved her hands in her pockets, slipping her fingers into her brass knuckles.
“We never believed what they said about you. We know you didn’t kill her.”
D-Train crossed her arms. “Really?”
A third Bizzie nodded, still wearing that corny charming smile. “Why don’t you come back to ours for a while? Have some food, take a load off. You’re looking for your friends, right?”
The Warriors shared a look. D-Train shrugged, gesturing to the crew, waiting for Ajax’s call. Ajax shook her head.
“Nah. Thanks, but pass,” she said. “We gotta keep moving.”
“Let us help.”
“You can help me by telling me where they are.”
The men’s smiles changed. They bared their teeth, grinning now, and Ajax tensed. Each man pulled out a wickedly sharp switchblade. In an almost choreographed flourish, they pointed the glinting blades at the Warriors.
“Hopefully,” said the first man, “they’re six feet under by now. Right where you’re gonna be.”
Ajax threw her head back and groaned. She did not have the fucking time for this. Knocking their shoulders together, D-Train asked, “Are we wasting bullets on these wimps?”
She raised her brass-adorned fists. “Nope.”
The gangs collided. The first Bizzie Ajax got her hands on went down like a sack of bricks, bleeding from his mouth and spitting out fragments of teeth. She caught a blade aimed for her gut and sent another pretty boy to the ground just as fast. He gave a good effort trying to get up but she shut that down with a swift stomp on his ribs. Huh. This would go faster than she thought.
As she chucked a dropped switchblade across the street, she glanced over in time to see D-Train grab the other two Bizzies and slam their heads together, laying them both flat out on the concrete. She couldn’t help but laugh. She fucking missed this.
“Ow! Son of a bitch!”
Ajax brought her fist down hard on one man’s temple. He dropped, blood gushing and pouring into his eye. She looked down to find an oozing bite mark carved into her forearm.
“Are you fucking kidding me?! Nope, no, fuck this.” Ajax drew her pistol and pointed it at the Bizzies. They took off running, staggering into each other as they rounded a corner but leaving behind the man at Ajax’s feet. He managed to get off the ground but no farther before Ajax grabbed him by the back of his neck and pressed her pistol to his head. “Uh-uh, not you.”
On his other side, D-Train grabbed his arm and stood him up. “Where to?”
“This way.”
Ajax could barely see the man’s face as she shoved him against the back wall of an alley, hidden behind a graffiti covered dumpster. She pinned him there with an arm across his throat and fiddled with the safety on her gun. He stared at her, one eye wide with panic, the other stuck shut under congealing blood from the gash on his forehead. He knew better than to try to push her off.
“What’s your name?” she asked, her voice low and dark.
“L-Lance,” the Bizzie stammered.
“Lance. You bit me? Really?”
“I-”
“Shut up, you already pissed me off enough.” She flicked the safety off. “Where’s my crew?”
“I don’t know.”
“Fuckin’ sounded like you know.”
“I don’t, I swear! Y-You, you’re the first Warriors we’ve seen since the night of the conclave, we really don’t know where the rest of you are.”
Ajax’s heart stopped. “What?”
His throat worked under her grip. “I mean-”
“You saw them that night?”
“Only-”
“What did you do?”
“Nothing!”
“Liar! What did you do?!” She jammed her gun up under his chin, forcing his head back as her voice rose to an inhuman roar. “You motherfucker, what did you do to them! I should fucking kill you right now, you piece of shit, what did you do!”
D-Train grabbed her shoulder. “Ajax, cool it-”
“I didn’t fucking ask you!”
“We didn’t do anything!” Lance cried. “I swear! We didn’t get a chance. They got away unscathed, I promise. I don’t know what happened after. I don’t know where any of them are.”
Ajax couldn’t breathe. She stared at him, unblinking, as horrible thoughts rolled like hurricanes through her mind. These bastards put up a good fight, even against her and D-Train, even with them being armed, but her crew had nothing but their fists and their wits that night. Had Swan caught up to them already or were they on their own, lost without orders? How close did those blades get to them? Did they wish she was there? God, they must have been so scared-
“Ajax.” D-Train wrapped her fingers around Ajax’s wrist and lowered the gun until it wasn’t choking Lance anymore. “We gotta get out of here before they come back for him.”
Ajax snarled, never looking away from the Bizzie. He swallowed hard. “Who says they will?”
“Anyone willing to wear those fucking cardigans is loyal to the core. Trust, they’re gonna come back when they realize he’s missing.”
Ajax glanced down at Lance’s bloodstained sweater. She had a point.
The new enforcer continued, “We got bigger problems than him, man. Let’s keep moving.”
Ajax looked at D-Train; at her gun; at Lance. Her eyes followed the trail of red running down his face as a faint tightness encircled her waist, like someone hugging her from behind.
They must have been so scared.
“Hold him.”
The Warriors swapped places, D-Train now pinning Lance to the wall and giving Ajax room to grab the spray paint from her backpack. Pistol in one hand, paint in the other.
She shoved D-Train aside-
“Smile.”
-and sprayed paint in Lance’s eyes.
He got the chance to inhale. Flipping her gun around, she pistol-whipped him square in the temple before he started screaming. He slumped to the ground, drooling, out cold. Staring down at him, something cracked open deep within Ajax’s chest. Something frozen and dark. A part of her now unrecognizable.
Behind her, D-Train sucked in a sharp breath through her teeth. “Jesus Christ, Ajax.”
Ajax rounded on her, snarling and getting up in her face. “Got somethin’ to say?”
“Nah. Nothin’ at all.”
“Thought so.” She glanced at Lance. She thought of the shining switchblade, wondering how close it got to her crew. “I should carve our tag across his chest.”
“You already tagged his face,” D-Train pointed out. She put herself between them, discreetly nudging Ajax out of the alley. “C’mon, big dog. We got more fights ahead of us. We won, leave it there.”
Rembrandt’s voice in her head.
We won, that’s enough!
Ajax spun on her heel and marched out of the alley in the direction she hoped was north. D-Train called for her to wait, running to catch up and reading off street signs Ajax didn’t pay attention to. She couldn’t erase the mounting sickness in the pit of her gut, reaching its claws up into her throat, drowning the world in red and rushing blood.
She left them alone that night. Left them to face the city by themselves, to face whatever horrors occurred after, victims of her pride. She touched Swan’s bandana tied around her wrist and wondered how their fledgling warlord fared. She got them home, at least, until they had to leave again to protect the gang at large. Did she blame Ajax? Did she look behind her for cavalry support and curse Ajax’s name when she found the empty space she left behind. Swan would probably hate her when they saw each other again.
If they saw each other again. If she saw any of them. If they were still on their feet and not laid up in a hospital as another Jane Doe or unclaimed in the morgue-
Ajax didn’t remember stopping. One second she was walking and the next she was howling at the top of her lungs, her knuckles split and her blood splattered on a brick wall. D-Train had her restrained speaking hushed reassurances in her ear and held her there even after she stopped thrashing. Ajax cringed as the pain in her hand surpassed the fading adrenaline. She gave a little shake.
“I’m good,” she croaked. “Let go.”
“Nah,” D-Train said hesitantly, “I’m gonna give you another minute.”
“I’m fine, D. Get off me.”
“Tell that to your hand.”
“Fuck off, I’m not-!”
Red and blue lights. A warning siren. Two men in powder blue uniforms, hands on their batons, prowling towards the Warriors.
“Yoohoo, ladies!”
Ajax and D-Train bolted.
“Hey! Hey, stop! NYPD! Freeze!”
They ran blind through the dark streets of lower Manhattan, already two avenues west by the time they heard the sirens chasing them. It wasn’t all that different than evading them in Coney Island, Ajax thought absentmindedly, disregarding the fact that she had no fucking clue where she was going. They ducked through every unlit alley and alcove passing tags claiming territory she’d never stepped foot in, risking unseen enemies fleeing the very real threat of getting jammed up again.
She couldn’t go back there. No way in hell. She couldn’t be trapped in another jail for one more minute. Her family needed her and no bopper and no bastard cop would stop her.
She spotted a shuttered restaurant on a corner and a gated lot. Dragging D-Train with her, she hopped the fence into an open dumpster and slammed the lid down over them. Concealed in a cloud of rotting trash, Ajax listened to the sirens pass them by and fade into the distance, and only moved when D-Train started gagging.
She stepped easily onto the pavement. D-Train fell to her knees dry heaving and glared up at her.
“That was disgusting. Never make me do that again.”
“Man up. Where are we?”
“Uh…” D-Train poked her head out of the alley and squinted at the street signs. “I think it’s Chelsea.”
“Who owns Chelsea?”
“No clue. Last I knew, a few gangs were still fighting over it.”
“Fantastic.” Ajax picked a few pieces of trash off her vest before grabbing her paint can. “Let more crews know we’re coming for them.”
“We should find a drug store or something.”
“For what?”
“You’ve got an open bite on your arm, one of those preppy boys split my lip open, and we just went swimming in trash. Do you want to get gangrene?”
“You can’t get that from trash, that’s from like tissue death or some shit.”
“Infections can do it, too. I don’t want my face rotting off.”
“Wouldn’t make much of a difference.”
“Yo, fuck you!”
“Fuck you, too.” Ajax sighed and looked down at her arm. “Fine. Fine, let’s go.”
The clerk at the drug store looked only mildly terrified as they dropped a pile of first-aid supplies at his register. He kept glancing at the door as he rang them up, taking their cash and passing back change with hands trembling so hard he dropped their coins all over the counter. Poor guy. The man at the front desk of the sleazy motel they found gave them about the same look, but he also leered a little too long at one of the girls leaving another room so Ajax took pride in the way he averted his eyes from her.
She remained awake long after D-Train fell asleep, staring at the ceiling, idly picking at a bandage on her knuckles, just… thinking. Would Swan approve of how she handled the Bizzies? Would she cuss her out for being stupid, for slowing them down trying to prove a point, or would she look at her with the same unsettled caution D-Train had? What about the others?
It settled like a concrete block on her chest, the gravity of the past twenty-four hours. She was expecting a homecoming and now, now, no matter how much she wanted to believe otherwise, she truly didn’t know if her crew was alive or dead. And now it was her responsibility and hers alone to find out and bring them all home.
She was Warlord.
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I am so so sorry for the long wait life has been odd but I'm back! This whole fic is planned out it's just the actual writing that has been chewing me up and spitting me out
izzy806
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