Blood And Honor

by ecdemomania

This is the story I have been working on for a long time. It's not fan fiction, it's original. I just wanted someone to read it. It's the story of a woman named Faye, and how she rises to power in the underworld, seizing the nation.

Kieran O'Brien

Blood And Honor

Chapter One

Faye's badly beaten Doc Martens slapped against the wet concrete steps outside of the Detroit Women's Prison, and she breathed a nearly incredulous sigh of relief. It had been five years since she had set foot on any ground that didn't belong to the penitentiary besides court, and now she was free. Before a person has been locked in a cage, they never truly appreciate their freedom, just like a person that has been born blind can't miss seeing. She took a deep pull of her Marlboro before flicking the butt onto the rainy pavement, and watched the smoke slither away until it was no longer visible. Reveling in the opportunity, she lit up another, careful to keep the rain from dampening it. Out of habit she ran her long, thin fingers through the nearly non-existent hair that had once been down to her hips.

Today the world was tinted with an impregnable grey, from the thin watercolor sky to the solidity of the streets splashed with neutral tones, swarms of people brushing against one another, talking over each other, ignoring each other. Voices and sirens merged as one, filling the air. It was all the same as it ever was on the outside, but how could that be?

Of course it was the same; it was only her lengthy removal that made it feel so strange, yet familiar. Time stopped for no one, no matter his level of importance. Time changes, but time itself is unchanging, always linear.

On the second day of her arrival into the main population, Faye had gotten into a brawl with two other prison inmates. These women saw the way that all the butches in the joint, even the ones with committed partners, had looked at her; like a glass of water in the middle of the desert. She could even tempt some of the straight women. Who could blame any of them for looking? They satiated their appetites on whomever they could for so long, that they had forgotten what beauty was really like. To the more feminine women, she was just another bitch that could steal their woman. For a lonely lifer this was the biggest issue; no one wants to be alone for the rest of their life, even women that come in straight. So they decided to carve up her face. They didn't notice the coal black eyes or the knuckles covered with thick webs of scar tissue when they decided to attack her. They overlooked the tattoos, vivid black on stark white flesh, creeping up both arms and suggesting that there was much more under her Bob Barker uniform. Faye was sitting at one of the sterile white, circular cafeteria tables; a tray of food that she didn't once acknowledge occupied the space in front of her. She didn't have to eat. She'd trained her body to ignore its basic needs and to survive without them for as long as possible. Her eyes surveyed the room, analyzing all the faces it held, gathering all the information it betrayed. She would know all of these people without ever having to speak to them; all she had to do was observe them. When the Cholas approached her from behind, she already knew. She could see it in the way that all the eyes in the room suddenly avoided her. The first was tall for a woman, with lean muscles and long black hair. She had some noticeable Native American blood in her. The second was squatty and wide, with pencil-thin eyebrows and a makeshift shank concealed in her pudgy hand. The corners of Faye's mouth began to turn up into a small smirk, ironic commas forming on both sides of her plump lips. The first conflict of her stay was starting, and she took great pleasure in it. There were many things that she was good at, but she was superb at fighting.

As the large woman's hand was about to graze her shoulder, Faye grabbed her by the wrist and the crook in her elbow, making a relatively small maneuver but easily breaking the joint and tearing the rest of the arm out of the socket, then slid her hands up the confined limb. Her right hand gripped under the arm pit as she stood, and the left clenched the broken elbow as she hurled the woman onto the table. By this time the other individuals that had been located in the vicinity of the fight had all backed away, not wanting to be caught up in the violence or the punishment that would be dealt to those that propagated it. The small woman, surprisingly quick for her robust stature, stabbed Faye's exposed back with her weapon, only to find herself quickly bent over the table and subdued, with her arm twisted behind her back. She screamed as it was forced further, being held at an extremely unnatural angle. Her face was pressed to the table, wet with tears of agony. Faye looked around the room with those cold, wild eyes. Everyone was paying attention now, staring at her in fear. For the most part they would all take great care to never look at her again after this, after hearing the wet crunch of this woman's arm being broken.

"If anyone else wants to try to fuck with me, I'll make an example out of you, just like I did with these two cu-" Before she uttered the last syllable, four guards put her in a hold, and a fifth stuck a needle in her. Her body, still fighting like hell, eventually collapsed. Faye never finished her sentence, but the point was made clear. Do not oppose her.

Faye was given a month in the hole, a punishment that all inmates fear; prison within a prison. Every single day she refused to come out for her allotted hour, snarling at the guards, calling them worthless peons. She did not eat the food they brought her, hardly drank the water. All she did in that godforsaken space was dread her hair. She made dreads as big around as golf balls, greasy and matted from her sweat. Her body became very weak and malnourished, but she was relentless in her independence. Her face grew gaunt, but that lucid fire remained; her indomitable will would not crumble over something she considered so insignificant.

How long has it been? I haven't seen sunlight in weeks. My sense of time has nearly died in here. I haven't eaten in at least fifteen days, but I can go longer if I must. I will not give in to their punishment. It had been twenty-nine days. Her skin clung to her skeleton, but she didn't feel pain. She didn't feel anything. This was enlightenment.

Prison is good training. I know I will not spend the rest of my life captive to someone else's authority. I will be back on the streets soon enough. I just have to set my court up, pay a few people off. That can be achieved easily, if I can be patient.

She could be patient. She could bide her time quietly.

This is like chess, isn't it?

Except in chess you don't starve yourself inside of a metal box.

They don't want me here anyway. I frighten them.

When she was released from confinement they took her to a white room, similar to a hospital room but without any metal objects or a bed. She stood in the center of the room above a drain, and waited to have her hair shaven off. Her dreads had become infested with spiders, and as they were shaven off, they tumbled to the floor, making a soft thump as they hit the sterile tile. The once-cornsilk hair was now lying at Faye's bare feet in piles. The dark woman who had given her a check-up and shaved her head stared at the nape of her slight neck. An Othala rune, a symbol of Aryan pride was inked there, above a Totenkopf, Death's Head. Its empty eyes peered at her, reminding her that this girl was a killer, that this girl hated her beyond all things. Behind her left ear the number 14 boldly stood, representing the fourteen words: We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children. The right side bore 28, Blood and Honor. Above the beginning of her hairline, centered by a widow's peak, was an acronym; ORION. Our Race Is Our Nation.

If a black woman could have turned pale, she would have. She professionally dismissed a grinning Faye, remembering to breathe after the air had entered the room again. She reminded herself that she was the one that would go home to her family tonight. She was larger, was in the position of power over this inmate. She was not afraid of the butch women that towered over her, with bulking shoulders and hands the size of dinner plates. Why was she so affected by this young, thin thing, even if she was a Nazi?

She knew the answer. She was afraid because Faye was different than any other person, and could therefore not be predicted, interpreted, or prepared for. Faye was a woman with no soul in her eyes, no love in her heart and no mercy in her actions. She was rumored to be a sociopathic prodigy, with an intellect to rival that of Stephen Hawking and a beauty that Helen of Troy would have looked upon in jealousy. Even with a shaved head, there was no detraction to her looks; it simply increased the enticingly cruel side. This was a dangerous creature indeed. The psychiatrists were right. This woman was a different case, and none of them felt that they were qualified to handle it.

No one ever did.

As Faye sucked on the end of her cigarette, she strode down the road to the taxi waiting for her.

"Still to Dearborn, ma'am?" the cab driver asked, lazily lolling the words in his southern accent as she had seated herself in the back of that white Impala. He looked into the back seat with eyes magnified by thick spectacles, and there were bandages on his dry, cracked hands.

"Yes, but first I need to go to the Gaelic League." A very large black bag was waiting for her in the back of the bar at this moment. It was the sort of bag that is carried by two people at a time, and doesn't fit through slimmer doorways. When she got out of the car to go retrieve it, she was hounded by one of the many homeless men lurking outside the building.

"Got any spare change, lady?" the bum wheezed. She ignored him from behind her dark sunglasses, pushing open the door and moving to the empty bar, bum still in tow. He had noticed her Jackie O's, and he wasn't giving up easily. "Come on, help me out." She pretended she hadn't heard.

"Faye, I'm glad to see you. I knew you'd get out. Your stuff's in the back," said the bartender, grinning at her. She looked a moment at him, as if he was missing the punch line in her joke, and sat down on a barstool.

"Get it for me, and while you're at it, get me a glass of water," she ordered, and as he walked to the back, she raised her voice to say "I want a clean fucking glass, Bud," then she pointed a finger at a man at the end of the bar, who was talking to the men playing pool, "Robert never washes them out, he just sticks them in the dishwasher." He jumped at the sound of his name. In the dim light of the shabby pub, factored into the thick clouds of cigar smoke rolling around in the air, she was almost surprised that he could see her. He came sidling up to her, sitting one stool away. Everyone knew that Faye liked to keep her distance from people, and this desire was easily obliged. Being close to her was like standing to close to a fire; after a while it burned. In spite of this, the bum continued to pester her, and she continued to ignore it.

"Just a couple bucks, lady." Tolerance wasn't one of Faye's strong traits, but she was in the best mood she'd been in for half a decade and so she let him annoy her for a while. Your first drink of clean, non-prison water in five years was something to be deeply appreciated.

Obviously the man wasn't from around here, or he would have stayed far away from her. Some folks crossed to the other side of the street so that they didn't have to walk past her, but most of them were law-abiding, upstanding citizens. Or people that simply read the newspaper.

"No JD today?" Robert smiled, his overbite winking at her. Faye laughed, after scowling at him and eliciting a frantic, drawn-out apology, avoiding her temper's wrath. He had seen her get shitfaced in here for years. She wasn't of legal drinking age back then, but she would have dared any bar to refuse her their service, especially with the company she brought in with her. She shook her head and teased him good-naturedly about his graying hair.

"Yes, I'm not as young as I once was… but at least it's not leaving completely yet. Yours is all gone!" he retorted, "What a shame it is, too. It was lovely." He looked at her admiringly, obviously dazzled by her, long hair or no. Once the aforementioned bag was in her possession, she unzipped it a little and plunged her hand inside. When she pulled it out again, a crisp, new Benjamin was in her grasp. She held it between her index finger and her thumb as if it was something dirty, and thrusted it out to the homeless man.

"Now you leave me the fuck alone, and for Christsakes, go take a shower. Don't you dare tell anyone that I gave you this, because I won't have fucking bums following me and asking me for cash. Now get out of here and don't let me see you ever again." The people that had been paying attention laughed at how the man had run out as he saw Faye take her sunglasses off and point toward the door, boring into him with those melanic eyes that could be so agonizingly cold and still scorch you.

"That was sweet of you," smiled Bud precariously, but he watched her with round, apprehensive eyes to see how she would take his teasing. Faye frowned.

"No it wasn't. My best bet is that the first thing he'll do is get some dope and get loaded. But if that's the case, he's just giving the money back to me, technically." She had Robert go to the safe and break three of her bills; one into tens, one into twenties, and the other into two fifties. After finishing her water she departed, sliding back into the taxi.

"I'm ready to go to the Carlton now."

"It'll be a nice change from the slammer. What were you doing in there, darlin'? Did you write a bad check?"

Faye looked at his eyes in the rearview mirror, crinkled at the edges. She would not have let anyone less gentlemanly patronize her with such a term of endearment. "I was charged with three counts of first degree murder." He glanced up at her in astonishment, then asked a question that goes through everyone's mind, but is rarely asked.

"Did you really do it?" Did it matter what answer she gave him?

"No," she lied.

She had killed many, many more than that, but that was only the beginning of her crimes.

His expression was still concerned by the time they pulled into the parking lot of the Ritz-Carlton hotel. He didn't seem afraid of her, but afraid for her. She thought about it, and was glad that she had worn a turtleneck, and that there was now enough hair on her head to cover the tattoo on her crown. She didn't want to frighten this man, who seemed so kind and innocent. She wondered why such a nice man was driving a cab in Detroit. She wanted to make sure no one mistreated him.

"Thank you for driving me," she said with the utmost seriousness, and handed him a fifty dollar bill for the fare and the other fifty as a tip. He stared at her in amazement as she walked away, lighting up another cigarette on the way across the road. By now it was about seven o' clock, and the streets were filling up. Faye did not use the crosswalk, but simply walked out in traffic, indifferent to the angry drivers and the chance of injury or death. These things were the least of her worries, which were very few in the first place. People screeched to a halt, swerved, and some tried to hit her. None of this affected her. Once you've been in prison, your priorities are different, and so are your concerns.

The Ritz-Carlton was exquisite in its furnishing; in the lobby there were cream-colored, high backed chairs placed around a large rectangular table of mahogany polished to the likeness of a mirror, beautiful red wooden paneling on the walls, which were adorned with paintings bordered by expensive frames, and a sparkling crystal chandelier hanging from the intricately decorated ceiling. There was lavish furniture that no one would ever sit on. Faye wasn't particularly interested in any of this, making her way to the check-in desk directly. Her presence in the room made every eye turn to look at her.

"Welcome to the Ritz-Car--" began the bird-like receptionist.

"I know where I am, I assure you," Faye said, irritation rising in her voice. "I want your best suite, and I would appreciate no more formality. Just give me the key to my room." Those were the last words Faye spoke to the receptionist after she handed her ten grand and accepted the card key. That amount would buy her a four-day stay.

In the luxurious suite, she threw her heavy bag on an oversized chair near the grand piano and opened it up, revealing two cartons of Marlboro Menthols, a pair of black leather gloves, a package of four large Bic lighters, and enough hundred dollar bills to fill up a Jacuzzi. No wonder it was so heavy. She was glad that she'd declined the driver's offer to take her baggage; he looked frail. She looked at the contents uninterestedly then zipped the bag up again. She sat down on the piano bench, ran her fingertips over the smooth keys in order to familiarize herself with them again, and began playing. Her fingers danced on every note, hands fluent in the language of beauty. Her closed eyelids flickered as if she was dreaming, and she began to cry and laugh at the same time as she played the Moonlight Sonata.

The next few days went by in a blur of places and people. Faye was readying herself to get back to the work that she started so long ago. Everywhere she went she knew someone, and usually more than one someone. While she was out in town she bought herself new clothes, but nothing from anywhere notable, as you would expect from a woman with a bag of money. Mostly it was just thrift stores, Goodwill, and obscure music shops that she knew would give her clothes for next to nothing. The only new items she bought were a brand new pair of black Doc Martens and some clean, white laces. She threw the old ones out; the laces were a dishwater color now, and the boots had the beginnings of holes in the toes. Walking down the street one day, she came in contact with someone she hadn't expected to see for a while longer.

"Faye?" appeared a deep voice in the crowd, not very loud, but striking. Faye whipped around, coming face to face with an extremely large, lean skinhead with kind, round brown eyes and dark stubble on his very square jaw. She would have recognized him anywhere, because he towered at least a head above even an unusually big man.

"Ash!" He stood about four feet away, beaming at her, but holding very still. "Don't just stand there gawking at me, come here!" she laughed. He approached her, like a cat darting to catch a mouse once it has determined the time is right. Instead of ripping her apart, he bent over and picked her up, her arms around his neck and her boots dangling nearly two feet off the ground. He kissed her on the cheek and set her down, then smiled in delight. Faye couldn't help but return his grin, as his face changed from an intimidating man's to a gleeful little boy's again. Ashley O'Connell sometimes seemed more like a son to her than anything. She knew he needed one, no matter how grown up he got. His mother died when he was ten, taken by brain cancer, and so he clung to Faye in a way that only an orphan can cling to a strong woman. His stomach growled, and he laughed; he was accustomed to going hungry. You'd never be able to notice the loneliness inside of him, the longing for companionship. He was a good actor, but he never wanted anything more than love in his whole life.

"Are you hungry, Ashley?" she interrogated, her eyebrows drawing closer together. When she had met him, she had unconsciously adopted him. It was not in her nature to worry about other people's problems, but he was so terrible at taking care of himself. He stuffed his hands into his pockets, face reddening a bit.

"Yeah, I was just walking to the Exxon to grab a fifth of vodka and a hot dog."

Faye wrinkled her nose at him, disgusted. "And that's when you saw me and your plans changed." He furrowed his brow, confused.

"What do you mean?"

"You're going to go across the street to Chili's and have lunch with me, and then you're coming with me on my cab ride downtown to pick up a car. If I decide to buy more than one, I'll need someone to drive the other one back to the hotel for me." He grinned down at her, raising his eyebrows.

"…I thought you hated restaurants. And you never eat anyway!" She gave him the gimlet eye.

"Don't argue with a free lunch, or I'll be forced to think you very unintelligent."

"I wouldn't want that." He smiled sheepishly and decided it was wisest to agree with her.

Faye had ordered a car a few days ago, a jet black Ford GT, and today it had arrived in Detroit. She saw it sitting out on the lot, and a wide grin spread across her face. The sleek beast stared back at her, the pearlescent paint sparkling in the sun. She was driving past the Cadillac dealership in it after she'd traded her cash for the car, Ash fawning over it as any man would have, when she saw a brand new champagne-colored Escalade. He saw her looking at it with lust as they passed the dealership.

She didn't let Ash drive the GT once she had purchased the Escalade, no matter how much he begged. Her grand total for the day came to $251,460, not counting the two plates of ribs and three beers she bought him. The people from both dealerships started kissing ass as soon as her boost hit their property, because everyone knew that she paid up front, in full. Faye bought a lot of cars. But now she was running out of money, with only three thousand dollars left. The time had come to pay a visit to Mikhail.

Chapter Two

"I see you've put my money to good use," he smiled, his eyes aimed out the window. The words came out like a chime ringing, impossibly clear and sweet. Faye still remembered the hold that this voice used to have over her.

"Your money!" she laughed, in disbelief. "And just whose money is it really? Who worked for every cent of it? And then who pissed it away?" He was not disturbed by the ice in her voice, as anyone else would have been. He only smiled wider, his perfectly straight teeth gleaming at her. The charm of his smile could not shake her resolve, not this time. She lowered her voice, so that it was just barely audible. She knew he would strain to hear it. "Do you think you can just give me some pocket change and expect me to receive you in my home with open arms? You are a fool if you believe that, Mikhail."

He stood up from his tall armchair in one fluid motion, and his voice was like a cat lapping up cream. "I didn't give it to you as a request for your forgiveness, my dearest love." He shrugged, his frame relaxing and his expression unphased, as if it was carved out of marble. "I gave it to you as a lure to come back once you ran out, and hopefully with a cool head."

"I'll maintain my composure as long as you meet my demands."

"And what would those be?" This resembled what it used to be like, this was closer to the sweet, accommodating voice of the man that had loved and worshipped her. But memories were dead now, and there is no sense in thinking of the dead.

"First of all, I want my money secured. Every cent I ever earned. All of it. And I want to see it in my Swiss bank account, right before my eyes."

His nonchalant composure broke into shock, or at least what shock looked like on his now practically unreadable face. The life he'd taken over had hardened him. She hadn't expected him to be able to do it. They locked stares, Faye's coal eyes wrestling with Mikhail's icy ones. He was close enough now that she could smell the subtle, faint cologne that she had loved best on him so long ago. Now it only filled her with disgust. Looking at his perfect face even filled her with revulsion.

"What if I refuse?" he said, as if he was asking what the weather was like outside. She smiled at him, as she sat in the chair across from his desk, crossing her legs and lacing her fingers behind her head.

"Then my men tear you apart and I take over again by force."

He paused.

"They aren't your men, Faye, they're my men now. They have been for five years."

"You know where their loyalties lie. The only reason they didn't rise up and overthrow you is because I told them to lay low." She was breaking him down. Take a man's confidence away and you have defeated him. He wasn't dumb, of course he knew they loved her. He thought of it every day. He had convinced himself that they would someday accept him as their rightful leader once she was gone long enough.

"And you know that some of those men would rather die than be subservient to a woman." This was a main staple in the argument with his subconscious.

"Not the men that I brought in. The men that joined on your time are the only ones that would oppose me. And you know that if they do, they will be exterminated. If they aren't for me, they are against me, and if they are against me I will eliminate them." This was the way it had always been and the way it would always be. When you are in a position of power you cannot afford to be merciful to those that will cripple your progress. Faye had been called cruel, evil, and ruthless for almost as long as she could remember, but she knew what Caesar's mercy brought him.

"How much do you want?" She knew he hadn't given up yet, only changed tactics. She stood, drawing herself up to full height. The floor was familiar under her feet, and she could imagine the pearly marble tiles cold against them. This was the same floor that they had danced together on, naked in the sunlight of the open balcony. They had made love on the Victorian chaise longue that she had been sitting upon. Faye felt repelled by it, wanted to get as far away from that artifact of their past as soon as possible. He had made himself her enemy.

"You know perfectly fucking well how much, don't be coy with me. When I was locked up I had six billion to my name, and my income was increasing every hour! I controlled the trafficking of every shipment of heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine through North and South America, obliterating the Colombians' and the Mexicans' business by allying myself with the Mafias of the world, which you also botched while I was gone! I was the third largest arms dealer in the entire world, and I was well on my way to being the second after I got things running in the Middle East. And I hear you've exchanged this opportunity for organ farming in undercover hospitals? You've given up on all of the businesses I practically usurped, because keeping up with the numbers was a chore, and none of them are paying me anymore. You are an idiot, you have no idea what you have done to my empire, and I ought to kill you where you sit!" Her balled fists tightened as she said this, and her mind tempted her with visions of his death, but this was not the option that was in her best interest as of yet. He frowned and cast his eyes out towards some ocean of thought. He knew he'd betrayed her. But he loved power more than he ever loved her. She saw it in his eyes that day at The Dining Room, when she told the owner that she wanted everyone removed from the restaurant after she came in without a reservation. Within fifteen minutes they had the restaurant to themselves, and in another thirty she had filled the place with six dozen Nazis. Upon leaving, she presented them with ten grand for the meals, and three grand as a tip. He was dazzled at this woman's beauty, her undaunted charisma, and most of all, her all-encompassing power.

"I can't give you the money," he finally said, his voice returned to what it had been when they were lovers. Simple, honest, sweet, and sad. This was the lost immigrant she met at the coast, wandering the dock. It almost made her regret how things had to be from now on. Almost.

"You mean, you don't have the money to give to me."

Mikhail was silent. He had a taste for expensive things, and the desire for them often overwhelmed his logical, calculating mind. He was apt to get into debt, to make a careless mistake and unravel the intricate, delicate web that she had woven. "Fine. I'll take twenty million for now and be on my way." He looked relieved that he could get rid of her presence, if even momentarily. He had practiced opposing her in his mind for so long, and he felt unprepared still. He ordered a man that she didn't recognize to fill up four large suitcases with money. She waited until the last stack was put in, inside designer luggage that was bought with her money.

"I want it in mine, not yours," and she gestured to her Escalade outside. There were cases in the trunk. She smiled sweetly at both of them, reminding them that she was still on top, even without the title, even without Louis Vuitton suitcases.

Faye left the penthouse with no blood on her hands, but she gave him his final notice.

"You have six months to get me my money, starting tomorrow. I don't advise disappointing me." He watched her pull out of the driveway and speed away, leaving a long J-shaped black mark on the roundabout as she drifted it and made the turn off to the road. The J was ominous in Mikhail's subconscious, as omnipresent as Faye herself. The perfect, all-knowing goddess that he had once known her as had come back, and he was standing in her shadow again. No, I proved that she has no such power. She can be locked up, confined like any other mortal. She bleeds; she needs air to survive, and food and water... She can be contained. He was sweating now. But she got out. Now he could not blot out the memories of that woman with hair like the white fluff of dandelions, and those accusing eyes darker than the deepest part of the ocean. The eyes of the woman that took him home with her that day that he had arrived in New York from Germany with nowhere to go. She taught him to speak English, Italian, and Spanish so that he could work; she gave him a purpose in the world, created him as a person.

And now she had to destroy him.

Two of the twenty million went to the house that had caught Faye's eye, a plantation style home with a wrap-around porch and a large garden surrounding the patio in the back.

"You at least got a nice house out of it! It really doesn't seem very you, though," smiled Ashley. Faye glared at him, and he sunk down a little in his seat on the couch. He was silent for a few minutes, and after a good deal of staring out of the large bay window sulkily, he turned to her again. "He still loves you, you know," he muttered. He seemed embarrassed to think of the love that had existed between Faye and Mikhail. A lot of people were; they looked exactly as if they could be brother and sister.

"He doesn't love me, he loves himself and the power that I gave him," she snarled, in a manner than assured Ashley that if he pushed the subject further he would regret it.

She had let Mikhail start recruiting and training men for his own division as his twenty-third birthday present, and the men he was in charge of were the most conspicuous, foolish, uncooperative and undisciplined men she had ever seen, and it showed through in everything they did. She had heard about a few of them going out at night, running train over young women for fun. Faye did not approve of this behavior and made it well known, but Mikhail did nothing to discourage it. She took matters into her own hands and paid them a visit during their training hours. She had put up with enough. There was no place in her world for someone disobeying her.

Listen up, you disgusting, fucking pitiful clowns. I've heard some of you've been gangbanging, and after I specifically said that it was not going to be tolerated. Now what sort of fool would defy me openly? The kind of inbred, nigger-loving fucks that I've allowed to be recruited in the past month! Running train is for coons and spineless faggots, now which are you? She harassed them, insulted them, and mocked them mercilessly. A middle aged, graying man with a large swastika tattooed on his chest approached her, looking down at her. She was tall for a woman, but small compared to a good-sized man. In stature, of course, never in presence.

You should be cooking my meals and washing my clothes, little girl. What are you doing running the world? This elicited wild laughter from the men, and at this point the kid gloves had to come off. Faye put three bullets in his skull before he hit the ground, spraying the room with his blood and grey matter.

Are you listening NOW? Any one of you want to argue with me? Anyone want to test my patience? I will NOT TOLERATE insubordination. I'm not one of the doormat women that it's been so easy to abuse, not one of those young girls that you've battered and raped. From the time you became a part of my empire, I became your father. And you will obey. Her face was spattered with blood, contorted in fury. Then the SWAT team kicked down the door, decked out in all their gear. It was a setup, and Mikhail was the only one that had known where she would be. She kicked out a window, leapt out and landed on her hands and feet on the pavement a story down. She took off, long legs reaching out for more and more ground with three officers behind her, firing as she serpentined down the alley. As the rubber bullet hit her in the left thigh, she continued to run. They hit the right one and she went down, face against the rough asphalt.

"Who is that man that I keep seeing driving past your house, Faye?" Her veins ran cold with ice. So she was being watched by someone. Was it one of Mikhail's men seeking revenge? Was it the Colombians extracting information on her operations?

"What does he look like, and what was he driving?"

"It was a blood red '57 Coupe De Ville. The man inside is a Nazi; he has bolts on his neck and his hair is always taken all the way down when I see him, but he's no one I know. He looks to be about my size, probably broader, and he has a dark beard."

Not familiar. "Why didn't you let me know sooner?" she muttered, angrily.

"I thought you knew him. I didn't want to… pry." She knew what he meant by that.

"When would I have time for that, Ash? I barely have time to sleep. I have an empire to restore. And the problems just keep piling up. It's going to take a good share of my time to achieve control again." She sighed, the first trace of weariness Ashley had ever witnessed from her. Nothing but complete confidence and dominance was allowed to compose the mask of her power.

Chapter Three

Ashley had talked Faye into taking a half a day off to smoke some peyote with him, and in the evening it was still swirling in her head as she walked down a vacant street, hands shoved in the pockets of her trench coat. The sun was going down on the horizon, but she didn't see it tonight. Encompassing her line of vision were old, boarded-up buildings surrounded by boxes and crates. Ahead was a functioning public phone, with a closing plexiglass door. Approaching it, she saw a people heading in her direction. Six black kids dressed in blue, most about college age, were breaking into the empty buildings, breaking the windows of the buildings that still contained glass panes. That same old rage rose up inside her chest, threatening to rip out of her. Why couldn't they go anywhere without destroying something?

"Get the fuck out of here, niggers!" she yelled. When they started to come after her, she pulled out two .44s from her coat. "Didn't you hear me coons, I said get the fuck out!" They subsequently fled the area, calling her a cunt and a bitch over their shoulders as she tucked the firearms back into the holsters and out of view. She pushed her sunglasses farther up the sharp bridge of her nose, dropping quarters into the pay phone. She pushed the sticky buttons with a single gloved finger, and waited.

A murmured, broken "Rahowa," emitted from the earpiece.

Racial holy war.

It was only clear enough to barely make out, as Faye wouldn't hold the plastic to her ear. She wrapped the spiraling cord around her finger, unwinding and tangling it absentmindedly. Such an action was usually unlike her; everything she did had a purpose when she was sober.

"Roa," she countered.

Race over all.

In less than a second the connection was clear again and another voice came on the line; a throaty woman's voice.

"Faye." It was so familiar, as familiar as the pink in the west, bordering the blackness of the buildings against the sky like an Andy Warhol painting.

"I need to have a meeting to properly apologize to Brother for the wait."

She needed to speak with her former allies and reestablish their connections.

The line went dead. The runners had been informed of her plans and would make sure that the words turned into actions. Now she would wait. She couldn't talk with Marguerite quite yet, as much as she wanted to speak with another woman.

She set the phone back in place, taking a deep breath. She hated to wait, especially on something as important as this. Would it all go as planned?

No. I will not let myself wonder. I will wait; we are all pawns of chance.

The cracked concrete was finally covered in shade as she walked down the darkened alleyways, rememorizing the places she had once prowled on instinct. The debris spilling out of the trash cans was strewn everywhere, as were stacks of wet cardboard boxes. The air was thick with a perfume of mold, heavy and bitter, and the heat did nothing but encourage it. Darkness was approaching fast, much more quickly than the last nights. Of course, it could be the peyote, coming on in another burst. She could hear faint sirens in every direction; she could identify screaming, the mutterings of meaningless conversations, men hitting their crying wives, cars on the highway. Thumps and mumbles and creaks in the hinges of the world. It polluted the air just as much as the stink of garbage. Something was different though, out of place. Foreboding. The angles all seemed sharper, the colors less real. Something was wrong. The noise of her boots against the ground wasn't even right. It sounded like…

Two sets of feet.

The knife was cool against Faye's throat, but burned as it cut through the flesh and blood sprayed out, spattering the filthy brick wall and a rusting blue trash disposal. The incision stopped growing as she grabbed the blade, cutting her hand badly but achieving her one goal, a goal that would delay her death until she could extract revenge. She whipped around, slashing blindly, but hitting her target. She felt the steel go through flesh, muscle, down to the very bone, and then withdrew it, only to shove it back in again and again until she could no longer hold herself up. The screams of Joaquin Guzman Loera were masked by the noise of the city's breath, its heartbeat. It was as if this spilled blood was what it thrived on, terror nourishing it like a mother's milk. Faye was bleeding out, collapsed on the ground, and she was losing her grip on this internal fight for life. The new white laces of her Docs were now a precious scarlet all her own, composed of the ice of Norway, Denmark, and Russia. She stared up at the sky, a sky that looked like a bruise, and her resolve crumbled under the tide of pain washing over her. Her eyes flickered, as if she were playing on that grand piano again, and she let go.

Then the world

became a void of

nothing.

Yellow window sills, linoleum tiled kitchen. Did I live here once? Yes. I remember. Crawling on this magenta carpet spotted with patches of light from outside. Mommy, whassat? There were only three times that I ever went into his office in all my memory. That's the symbol of our family's love, and of the pride we have for who we are. Flags all over, red and white and black. Not supposed to touch them. Fingers always sticky with jam. Grass stains on my knees. Blonde ringlets covered by a straw hat, dappling sunlight on round cheeks. What's its name? That rocking chair, with its carved Celtic knots and dusty purple cushion that she sat on in the parlor. It's called a swastika. She gave me my sippy cup, filled with apple juice.

Do you ever feel scared, sweetie? A bristly, dark mustache. It was scratchy on my skin, tickled. Shoulders of concrete. Yes, but only when you're not here. He was always trying to teach me something. Never too young to absorb knowledge, to learn. Can you imagine anything Daddy would be scared of? What's the right answer? The truth, of course. No, you aren't scared of anything in the whole world. He was God as far as I knew. That's not true. Part of me didn't believe him. It isn't? Surely he was testing me. I'm afraid of losing you, of losing our people's purity. Purity? What are you talking about, Daddy? We are the chosen people, Faye, the white people. God has made us in His image; we are his chosen children. It was in the way he said it, it made his green eyes twinkle madly.

Hold it, steady like this. Good. Now don't pull; you have to squeeze the trigger. I could make up for it, it would be like he didn't need a son. Perfect. Oh how I loved it when he said that. I loved to please him. Is that good enough? I knew that I would be good at this, and I knew that it would excite him. I was very young, but I was focused and driven. It's wonderful. You are already as good a shot as your brother ever was. He never talked about Shamus anymore, not since I was up to the center of his thigh. It was as if he never existed. It sounded like he was happy again.

Why do they cross to the other side of the street, Mommy? All these people, some maybe even going to our own destination. But none of them could walk near us, even the light skinned people. They looked like they were ill, like they were risking their lives. Because they know we're better than they are. We burn brighter than anything they've ever seen. She had gained that singsong accent again, like I remembered as a toddler when we lived in Denmark for the first time.

You are so beautiful, my little Faye. As fair and ivory as anyone could be. If he thought I was beautiful, then nothing else mattered. Mother was so lovely, and I knew that if I was ever as pretty as she was, then he would love me forever.

Light blue suitcase on the floor, I had used it once. Now it was filled with her clothes. Where are we going, Mom? And the look on her face… so detached. Like I was as dead as Shamus. Your father and I have to leave. Well, of course. There are bags packed. The house is empty. But where are we going? And then those words, those cold words that fueled my hatred for so long. You can't come with us, Faye.

Daddy… mommy… come back. They never did. Where are you? Why did you leave? Please come back. I need you. Please, Mommy… I'll be better. I'll be smarter. I'll be prettier. Just come back. I didn't mean to make you not love me anymore. Laying in bed in an empty house. On my own now. I would have slowed them down. They couldn't make their escape with me to worry about. A ten year old was of no use to anyone.

Faye awoke and shot up in bed, but her eyes were immediately blinded by the overwhelming whiteness of the room, and the light coming in through the window. This window sill was white and thin, unfamiliar. No, not the same at all. I was dreaming. She became aware of the needles in her veins and the pain in her throat, her cold feet underneath layers of hospital blankets, and finally noticed a man she'd never seen before sitting across the room, looking into her face intently.

"Who are you?" she whispered. Her voice was barely even capable of this much. Then she realized who he was. Shaved head, broad and hard-bodied, long legged, jaw shaded in a dark beard, and black bolts practically screaming at her from the left side of his neck. He sat silently, knowing that she would come to her own conclusion whether or not he said anything. "You're the Coupe de Ville. You've been driving past my house, you've been following me." This too came out as no more than a murmur. He nodded his head once, confirming her accusation.

"You really shouldn't be talking," he smirked, impressed with her efforts. But then his voice became very serious and concerned. "You need rest." It was deep and sure, but ironic. It reminded her of her father's. A voice that knew everything.

"Fuck you." She coughed, and tears welled up in her eyes. It was agony, but she'd been wounded before. The physical realm couldn't touch her. The man stood and approached her. He must have been over seven foot, or was it the perspective she sat at? Formidable. And what could she do, as weak as she was? She didn't have any weapons, and she couldn't even stand as far as she knew.

It was as if he'd read her thoughts. "I've watched over you for the past six days without killing you. I bandaged you and brought you here after you had your throat slashed by that drug-peddling spick, which I also disposed of while you were incapacitated. If I wanted you dead, I'd have left you there to die in that fuckin' alley. And secondly, if I hadn't been close, you'd be in a wooden box right now." Faye might have been stubborn and proud, but she was not foolish. She knew this to be true. But she also knew that people often have unseen motives. He sat down in the chair next to her bedside, his hazel eyes tracing underneath the gauze where the wound had been inflicted. Cold, calculating, cruel eyes. She had seen that look in the mirror. Those eyes were so sharp. They met Faye's hazy, drugged ones, holding their gaze until she fell back asleep. He looked at her slender hand, lying limp against the bed rail, stared into her perfectly sculpted face. His hand reached out to graze her cheek. Someday you will feel safe. She whimpered in her sleep, and he pulled his hand back before he could touch her, clenching it into a fist at his side. I must not be tempted. Sasha Romanov drew himself up and crossed the room to the other chair, guarding her from a distance.

Chapter Four

The inside of the Coupe de Ville was meticulously clean, and the pearl-crafted steering wheel glittered in the sun as Sasha turned the corner to his apartment. He had Faye's guns and coat inside, and he invited her to retrieve them for herself. She agreed to go with him, half out of curiosity and half out of self-preservation; it's always wise to know where your potential enemies sleep at night.

Sasha kept the thick velvet curtains drawn at all times, blocking any shred of sunlight that dared find its way to the barrier of his windows. He turned on the light in the kitchen; it shined dimly and cast everything in red. It was night in this apartment, every hour of the day. The light reflected off of the oak cabinets and chrome appliances, bathed the walls in scarlet, and exposed dark, coffee-colored shadows.

Faye stretched her long legs out on the stone coffee table, glad to be dressed in denim and leather rather than the cornflower blue hospital gown she had worn for far too long.

Sasha came into the living room bearing the blood-stained trench coat and the two .44 Magnum Desert Eagles.

"Your holsters are fine, but I think this is ruined," he frowned, looking at the coat. She glanced at him vacantly, checking out for a second. It had belonged to her father at one point, and when she was too small to wear it she would wrap herself in it at night, clutching it in her arms like a baby blanket. She had loved it; it was another item on the shrine to her father.

"Throw it away; I'll get a new one." He set the guns on the table, barrels pointing to the unused window. He turned on his heel, back to wherever it was that he had brought her things from. Faye picked up a bong from the table, opened the small box next to it and loaded the bowl with opium. Sasha returned and threw a black double breasted trench coat on the couch next to her. She stared at him as he silently went into the glowing kitchen to get a drink of water. "I don't need your charity," she frowned as she took a hit and sunk into the couch, examining the coat out of the corner of her eye.

"And I don't need that coat." He grinned and peered at her over the top of his glass as she looked at it more carefully. Of course he had no use for it; it wouldn't have fit him even remotely. He wouldn't have been able to push one of his hands through a sleeve. The coat was either for a woman (though it had no trace of femininity) or a small man. The leather was soft and well broken in, as if it had been worn for many years. But it was obviously new, because there wasn't one blemish on the material. Faye raised one perfectly arching eyebrow.

"Where do you get off following me- and buying me things? Because I know this isn't a hand-me-down. What are you going to do next, start paying my bills?"

"If you play your cards right."

"You're really serious about all this, aren't you?" she laughed.

"I am," he said solemnly.

"What are you expecting to get out of it?"

He sighed, setting the glass down on the counter. "When you got set up that day, skins around the world found out within hours. You have a large following in my home country. Russia loves you because you have been kind to them. They see you as selfless, overlooking your illegal activity because you are their benefactor. You don't deal with the government, you go directly to the people, and you have helped so many families I knew." She had tried to give all that money anonymously, but there was no anonymity to be had in such a situation. "I came to America to help you." Then silence.

"…to help me what?" She spread her hands out, palm up.

"Rebuild."

Chapter Five

The wind knocked against the side of the house, nature itself attacking the graveyard of memories, that fortress of pain. A ten year old Faye cried in her departed parents' bed, shivering under the covers and praying that they would be back when she woke up. She knew they wouldn't though. They'd cut their losses and split, taking absolutely nothing.

Faye sniffed, dabbing at her eyes with the sleeves of one of her mother's favorite turtlenecks. She had remembered it from early childhood, the delicate shell pink material soft as a cat.

She crept out of bed, tiptoeing to the grand piano as if her parents were in bed asleep. Her father had always wanted her to learn the violin after she had mastered the piano. She could play it with her eyes closed, and could read music or play by ear. She sat down at the bench, pressing her cheek into the shiny lacquered lid that was folded down to cover the keys. She had a smaller piano in her room that she was free to play, but she had always preferred this big antique.

With her head at this angle, she could see her father's shelf, high on the east wall of the room. This is where he kept his two books, encased in glass. These two books were his greatest treasures, and it horrified her that he hadn't taken them with him. Later she would realize that he was leaving them to her, so that she might have a scrap of his legacy.

The first volume of Mein Kampf was published in 1925, and the second was available the year after. First-edition copies of both were smuggled into Norway from Germany by Faye's great grandfather. These books were both signed by Adolf Hitler. She had read them both three times by now, as she was as fluent in German as she was in English. She didn't understand why it was natural to hate anyone that didn't have the same skin as she did, but if her father believed in it, then it was right.

As she whimpered in the dark, mourning her parents and her childhood, she heard a great crash from downstairs. This was the noise of the front door slamming, she recognized it. She bolted upright, wiping the piano with the back of her sleeve, erasing the condensation from her breathing. She dashed to the bed, wiggling underneath it. She was barely able to squeeze in. Another child her age couldn't have fit underneath, but though she was tall, she was abnormally thin. She crammed herself in between large plastic boxes, full of art and writing that she and her parents had created, on canvases and envelopes and post cards. Breathing was not an option in this miniscule space.

The door to her parents' bedroom swung open, the brass doorknob piercing the wall. Three sets of feet came into the room, the voices belonging to them yelling, laughing madly. They threw down two large, heavy bags, both thumping dully on the wooden floor. She couldn't understand what the men were saying, partially because their accents were so thick, and partially because she had disassociated from her body. Her mind now floated at the ceiling, intangible and weightless. She could see her own body, limp under the bed, could see the men now quite clearly. Their skin was so dark that it looked reflective and their eyes were as black as hers. She had always felt guilty about the darkness of her eyes; no one in her family had eyes like that. They were all green and blue. She remembered seeing the disapproving and concerned looks as a younger child, when they thought that she wouldn't be able to discern emotion.

The bags were opened and their contents dumped out onto the floor. Faye's mother laid on her stomach, and her father's body fell across his decapitated wife's, a hole in his chest big enough to fit a tennis ball through. His eyes were sunken in and had turned an indescribable hue of grey; they looked as if they'd been pierced and deflated, pushed in by fingers. The flesh of the bodies seemed to shrink, and wrinkled like the skin of an old apple. It was completely grey and green, covered in the slick sheen of death. She could smell the hideous, stomach-turning stench of decomposition, even outside of her body. It was inescapable mixed with the odor of lighter fluid. The men sprayed it around the room, down the stairs, through the entryway and out the door, lighting the trail when they'd exited the house.

A trembling Faye clambered out from underneath the bed frame, once she had reentered her corporeal form. She couldn't allow herself to panic at a time like this; her father's memory would be ashamed of her if she couldn't gain control of the situation. She wouldn't allow their family to die out just because she couldn't bring herself to leave the corpses of her parents in a burning house. That would be foolish. With shaking hands she grabbed the trench coat from the bed before it could catch fire. Coughing, she moved the piano bench to the eastern wall along a path that had no lighter fluid, removing the glass casing and slipping both books into a pocket. She neared the bodies, holding her breath and erasing all emotion as she dug into the pockets of her father's jeans. She found his wallet intact, and clutched it in her small hand. These men hadn't wanted or needed his money, they just wanted him dead. She opened the top drawer in the bureau and pulled out the .44 within, grabbing three boxes of bullets. The bodies had begun to burn now, and she was trying her damnedest not to vomit. She crammed these things into the pockets as well, then rushed to the fire escape and opened it, climbing through. The heat from the fire inside warped the air around the open window, blurring reality. She wiped the rain off of the metal railing, pulling herself over it and onto the steel ladder. She dangled from the last rusting rung, blinking back tears, and let go, dropping onto the top of an old car that sat underneath it. Her legs buckled underneath her, and she slipped, hitting her chin on the roof of the old junker. She crumpled into a ball, sobbing in pain and misery and trauma. The rain spat on her face, mingling with the salty sweat and tears that also flowed there. Her damp hair clung to her cheeks, blonde curls stinking of fire and dank with death.

Wandering the streets of San Francisco at night is dangerous business, especially for a young girl. Faye walked for an hour, the bottom hem of the coat tucked into the waist of her jeans, until she found an alley that was lit up. A solemn-looking, pale old woman stood next to a lawn chair, warming her hands by the fire in the oil drum in front of her. She looked older than time itself, with more wrinkles than the face of the earth. When her hands were warm again, she slipped her gloves back on, rubbing her palms together. Faye crept nearer, flames reflecting in her tears. The woman looked at her silently, then turned from the fire and approached her.

"I don't have anywhere to go," Faye cried, shaking uncontrollably. The crone held her in her arms, soothing her as if she were her granddaughter.

"Did you run away?" she questioned, gently.

"They ran away from me…" The woman held her closer as Faye started to cry again, her green zip-up jacket becoming thoroughly dampened with tears and snot. She stroked the crying child's head, like Faye's mother had done when she was trying to put her to sleep. This woman represented the eternal mother; the mother we turn to when our earthly mother has failed us, because she won't ever fail.

When Faye woke up in the morning, there was no old woman. There was no oil drum and no lawn chair either. There were only stacks of old, wet newspapers scattered on the pavement of the alley, and the noise of the city. She felt as if all the tears had been extracted from her.

Faye wandered to a bus stop, snatching up a schedule with a map and delving into it, trying to find someone with the means of helping her. She recognized an address on the map, of another white supremacist family that her parents had been close friends with. They had a nineteen year old son that had befriended her, amazed by her beauty and intelligence. She began to formulate a plan in her head, a plan that would get her out of California and bring her to safety, or as close to safety as she would ever experience.

"We need to go to Russian Hill. There's a man there that will sell you a 1969 Chevrolet Bel Air for 800. It's a four door, so it will fit comfortably with anything you want to pack, and it has air conditioning," she recalled, photographic memory feeding her mouth the information like a reporter reading a teleprompter. She had to turn her somehow hypnotic reasoning up to full force in order to make him do what she wished him to do, like she'd seen her parents do to anyone that would disagree with them. They could talk an individual into something and make him think that it was what he'd wanted all along. "Then we can license it. That leaves us with at least $24,000. Let's say we find a trailer for ten grand; we'd have fourteen thousand left for gas, food, bills, and other miscellaneous things, until we can get jobs."

"We, Fadrian? Who would hire you?" he laughed. This was no more than a joke to him as of yet.

"Don't fool yourself. It may not be legitimate, but I'll find work." She seared him with her eyes until he squirmed under the pressure.

"You've really done your homework," he finally said.

"It's called common sense and a public library." She rolled her eyes; information could be obtained so easily… it was dangerous how easily, if you really thought about it.

"And what about the kidnapping charges I'll face?"

"My father took care of that unknowingly. The media is still propagating the lie that he concocted in Denmark four years ago. He set up a façade, and now our whole family has been pronounced dead. No one will be looking for me… at least not the law enforcement anyway."

He took this into consideration, but found another argument he considered valid. He had been wanting out of his parents' household for a long time now, but had never had the means of doing so. It seemed very unlikely that this little girl, for that's what she was despite her superior mind, would be the bearer of these means. "But what about school? Wouldn't you like a high school diploma?"

"Matthew, you do not understand how serious I am. I've gone through all of this in my head, at least a hundred times."

"But still… don't you want an education?"

"I don't need a government-given education! I read and write on a college level, I speak four languages fluently: English, Spanish, German, and Danish, all taught to me from birth. My prowess in mathematics exceeds that of my Yale-graduate mother. My father taught me enough about chemistry, biology, physics, and psychology for me to fill volumes with! I don't want to go into fifth grade and learn about division when I'm already manipulating roots and expanding polynomials. Can you even appreciate how degrading that would be? And if they ever figured out just how much capacity I have, what do you think the government would do with me, an individual that has been raised to see past the deception and never fear or bow to authority? They would exterminate me like an ant infestation in their kitchen of tyranny and injustice. I can't stay here; my parents have been killed in this city. My home burned down here. I need to find a new one. I need to make a new life, and I don't want that new life to include the adult-child pretense. I am capable of making my own decisions, and as long as I have a place to stay I will be able to live well. So will you. This is why we're leaving."

Chapter Six

"Faye…" sighed Marguerite, "I'm so glad you're here again." She squeezed Faye's hand tightly with her long, dry one, and a tear dripped off of her flat chin. Franco held onto her more tightly, his hand at her waist. She wiped the wet trail from her cheek, embarrassed. No one in the Empire Bar paid any attention, and probably couldn't see her anyway. You couldn't discern who someone was if they were more than fifteen feet away from you, and no one but her brothers and Faye ever got that close to her as long as Franco was watching. He wasn't a big man, but he had a reputation that defended him well. Many rumors circulated about him, and quite a few of them were true, such as the time that he got liquored up and ate a live snake on a bet. Most people didn't want to get on his bad side after that.

"Hey Franco, I bet you won't eat a snake."

"I betcha I will, and I'll eat the fucker live, too!"

Franco wasn't trying to impress people, but he was trying to impress himself.

In the Empire you could find all sorts of characters, but they all had one thing in common; they were all white. This was the only reason Faye had been drinking in here for so long. Other than that fact, it was a dumpy, dangerous, and disgusting place. As they sat upon their barstools, Faye looked down at the floor a few feet away, spying a used tampon. She grimaced, glad that she always wore closed-toed shoes. She thought of the prostitutes in the upstairs apartments and laughed, thinking their feet almost as dirty as their cheap commodity.

"You knew that I wouldn't be gone forever. There's no cage in existence that can hold me," Faye smiled, wiping the tear from Marguerite's face. Faye glanced at the door as it swung open, and two brown-skinned men speaking Spanish entered. The sound was rapid and low, and the frequency and pitch felt threatening. They headed directly to the back and her eyes followed them. The only people that went to the back room had business with Charlie.

Charlie was the dope fiend that owned The Empire, and was employed by Faye as an outlet to market her goods. She had many more outlets, and liked to drop in once in a while to see how business was going, and if it was being operated the way she wanted it to be.

"DIRTY FUCKING WETBACKS!" screamed Franco, spilling his beer on his pants. Marguerite frowned; she hated conflict and didn't mind anyone of another particular race. But she loved Franco, he loved her, and so it didn't matter. Faye gave him a sideways glance, and it was enough to make him shut up. He might not respect anyone else, but he respected her and that's all that counted to Faye. He was a skinny, fiery bastard, but he had a good heart and took good care of Marguerite.

She set down her bottle and stood up, peanut shells crunching under her boots. As she approached the threshold of the back room, she pulled on her leather gloves. She pushed open the door, with its missing knob and chipping green paint, exposing the two men talking to Charlie. They weren't just talking, they were giving him money. Slipping her coke into their pockets.

"How you doing Charlie. Did you know I got out? Apparently not. That's a real shame, for all of you." His face drained of all color and his jaw slacked. She could feel his heartbeat across the room. The men had pulled guns on her, but she wasn't concerned.

"No! Don't fucking pull your guns on her!"

"Who's this little cunt?"

She raised her eyebrows, teeth exposed in a smile that wasn't a smile.

"Who am I? I'm your God."

By the time he cocked his gun, she had slit him open from throat to belly with a switchblade, then disarmed his friend after gaining control of his wrists, stabbing him up through the jugular, and firing the rest of the bullets into the ceiling. Not five seconds had gone by as she turned on Charlie, who was cowering in the corner of the room.

"FAYE PLEASE DON'T KILL ME FAYE, I'LL DO ANYTHING JUST DON'T HURT ME PLEASE." He was shuddering, babbling, snot running down his nose. She stared at him in contempt, grabbing him by the throat. She slashed an X into his forehead, then made four more marks on the ends. He started going into hysterics, throwing up on the floor while the swastika bled into his eye.

"Get up, coward," she snarled. "You aren't going to die tonight." He looked up at her with wide eyes, bent down to her feet, groveling and thanking her incoherently. "I'm stationing my men in your bar to make sure you heed my warning. No fucking primates, spics, terrorists, Zhids, or baby-eaters. The only reason I'm not killing you here like the filthy traitor you are is because you own this bar, and I don't have the time to take it from you. This shithole saved your life, Charlie. Now where'd you stash the safe? I'm taking the cash."

Faye retrieved the money, and made a fire in an empty coffee can.

"Give me the marching powder you just sold to these fuckers." He handed her the plastic bags and she threw them into the can. Charlie almost started to yell and crawl over to the dope, but she pointed a finger at him and he fell silent and still. "It's filthy now that they've touched it," she spat, and then paused, assessing the room. "I'll have a few of my men dispose of this mess. They'll be watching your every move until I conclude that I can trust you. You can't run, and you can't hide. Just toe the line and we'll have no problems."

"I thought it was okay! I mean, Mikhail said-"

"Mikhail is a dead man." Just saying his name filled her mouth with a bad taste. Thinking about his sleepy, sad eyes made her want to pluck them out. Remembering his sweet voice made her want to silence him forever. She smiled, eyes far away, and walked out the door.

"Faye, what happened?" Marguerite gasped. "We heard gun shots and-"

"Nothing you need to worry about, sweetheart. Now I have to go, and it is much safer if you both leave too. Go home, and I will call when I can to check up." Marguerite's lip quivered a little.

"You're not going back to prison, are you Faye?"

"Never. I promise. Franco, take her home."

Faye watched their car pull away and fade into traffic. She went back inside, giving a nod to three men sitting in the corner. They sauntered into the back room as she had Charlie close the bar and kick everyone out. Once disposal and clean-up were handled, she emerged back out under the streetlamp to find a certain Coupe De Ville awaiting her.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you were stalking me," Faye frowned. Sasha opened the passenger door for her.

"Well, then it's fortunate that you know better."

Chapter Seven

"It's not safe for you here anymore, Matthew," Faye's dark eyes clouded over, knowing that she couldn't let him stay with her any longer. "You're going to get hurt." He whipped around, his eyes looking as destroyed as the rubble that surrounded them.

"Fadrian! That's out of the question! I'm not leaving a fourteen year old kid to fend for herself in Detroit. I can't leave you." Faye leaned on the window sill, her pale hair glowing pink. Red paint covered the glass of the window, vandalism from years past. This section of the room was bathed in rose as the light leaked through.

"Don't argue with me, I've already scraped up the money for you to leave. I have a ticket for you, so that you can take the bus to the airport. Go anywhere you want, make a new life there; your life can only end if you stay here with me."

"Faye-"

"Enough! Take it!" She pushed the ticket and the money into his chest, eyes downcast, staring at a fallen ceiling tile and blinking back the tears in her eyes. In the two years that they had lived in Michigan, Faye had found them a trailer and developed a business with the Northern Hammerskins. Using her knowledge of chemistry, she produced mass amounts of methamphetamine, GHB, ecstasy, rohypnol, and also refined cocaine into crack. The Hammerskins, as well as other well-to-do clients paid her for her high quality dope, pleased with the amount that they could sell it for. Everything was going smoothly until someone caught wind of her operation and came to rob her in the night. She shot and killed two men and dissolved both of their corpses in a lye bath after dismembering them. Faye notified her employers that she needed to relocate and that 24 hour security would be necessary. When she sent Matthew away, she isolated herself from her old life completely. No longer could she call herself Fadrian Lothbrook, descendent of the Norse Viking king Ragnar Lodbrok, kin to Odin. She was no longer daughter to the infamous killer Caleb Lothbrook. She was now born of herself; she now existed purely because she desired to exist.

She gave the Hammerskins the money to buy the abandoned United Artists theatre, and set up her lab there. As demand for her products grew, she began to employ young homeless women to help her keep up with the orders, and allowed them to live in the theatre in exchange for their work.

Faye sprawled out on the mattress in the middle of the room, sitting on the floor next to a defaced statue. She ran her hand down her bare stomach and pulled on her cigarette with bright red lips. At fifteen, she was making a comfortable living in a very dangerous lifestyle. She produced the best drugs in Michigan, oversaw her own boarding house downstairs in the gigantic theatre, and was taking apart stolen cars to sell the parts. With her ambition, intelligence, and deadly self-preservation skills, she was the perfect businesswoman of the underworld. She exhaled, practicing puffing out smoke rings. A huge German shepherd curled up on the mattress, laying its head on her lap.

"Hey, Blondi, how's my pretty girl?" Faye smiled, eyes dilated from testing the latest batch of crank. She scratched the panting dog behind the ear, taking another drag and pushing the hair out of her face. As she turned her head, she saw a man come through the threshold. She raised her eyebrows, surveying him. A fair man in his thirties, his features were each plain by themselves, but together were attractive somehow. He looked down at her on the floor, eyes running down her shirtless torso, her oil-stained Levis, and her Doc Martens. "Fremde," said Faye, and hearing this, Blondi started to snarl, baring her teeth. The man threw his hands in the air as if he was at gunpoint, hoping he didn't get mauled by this bear of a dog.

"Hey, whoa, I'm looking for whoever owns this place." Faye sighed, crossing her legs.

"Besiegen," she muttered, and the dog ceased snarling and curled up at her master's feet. Faye looked back at the man, "What do you want?"

"None of your business, kid," he grinned, crossing his arms, his head tilted back. She withdrew a gun from beneath her pillow, pointing it at his head and cocking it.

"Don't patronize me," she spat, "I'll happily blow your fucking head off." His eyes widened, and they darted from her face to the gun and then to her face again.

"Are you shitting me?" he yelled. He wasn't frightened, but excited. She arched an eyebrow. "That's a Luger P08, isn't it? It is! How much did you pay for that?"

"It was a gift." Faye muttered, thinking back and setting the gun down next to her on the mattress. He gaped at her, pondering which enticed him more, the smile creeping across her face, or the pistol next to her that he recognized as one used by Germans in the second World War.

"Can I hold it?" he whispered, after a long pause.

She puffed on her cigarette, uncrossing her legs and laughing quietly to herself. "No, but you can look." He approached and sat down on the floor next to her, examining the firearm with an expression of lust. Faye looked at him more closely, peering curiously up his t-shirt sleeve at the tattoos on his arm. He felt her eyes on him, and looked down at her.

"So you run this operation, don't you?"

"You ask too many questions."

"But you can't be any older than seventeen. You're too young to be living this life. It's dangerous." Faye met his gaze with her own black stare, her smile fading. She took her cigarette in between her thumb and index finger and pressed the red hot cherry onto the tender palm of her hand, exterminating the flame. He watched her flick away the butt, horrified.

"Do you want a place to stay or not?" Faye sat up, snapped her fingers, and Blondi got off the mattress and came to sit down on the floor by her side.

"I'm… I want to make a deal with you." He looked at her, trying to be professional despite the fact that lying in front of him was a shirtless and quite apparently insane young girl. Faye lit up another cigarette.

"How much will I make off of it?" She laid back down, turning on her side to face him.

"Wha-"

"If I let you deal arms out of my theatre, how much will I make?"

"I don't get it, how did you kn-"

"That's not important; just give me an estimation of my monthly profit from your business." He gave her a look of awe and confusion, the corners of his mouth turning up into a sheepish smile. She noticed that his teeth were a little crooked, and that it seemed to improve the charm of his face.

"At first, not much. Maybe a few thousand a month. But once things start into motion, you'll be seeing a hundred times that at least."

"So you're importing them from China."

He paused, wondering if he should again ask how she was aware of this without being told.

"Yes."

"I will allow you to live here and run your business for fifty percent of your gross income from all sales." Her tone left no room for negotiation.

"And what is my new landlord's name?"

Her name. What did she want her name to be? She gave a different one to everyone that asked. The time had come to christen herself.

"Faye Jericho." Jericho, the ancient city, meaning moon. And Faye… because that's what her father called her.

"I'm Paul Olivia." Faye reached out the hand that bore no cigarette burn, grabbed his face, turning it right then left as if she was examining him. She smiled, stood up, and dug in her pocket, handing him a key.

"You're going to make me a lot of money, Paul Olivia."

"…What's your dog's name?"

"Blondi." Paul looked at the dog, who was now sniffing his hair.

"But she's not blonde."

"Really? Thanks for bringing that to my attention," Faye frowned, "I named her Blondi because Adolf Hitler had a German Shepherd, and that was her name."

"Are you a Nazi?"

"I'm a Purist."

"What do you mean by that?" He stared up at the tall girl, watching her blow smoke rings, delicately holding her cigarette.

"There's only one sort of human being, and they are of the pure white race. The rest are just garbage that ought to be disposed of." Paul smiled up at her, cautiously reaching to pet Blondi. The dog looked up at Faye, waiting for the okay. "Freund," she nodded, and Blondi wagged her tail and pressed her nose into Paul's hand.

"What did you say?"

"I told her that you were a friend."

"Why?"

"If I hadn't said anything, she'd have sunk her teeth into your jugular and ripped it out."

"So…You trained her in German?"

"Correct. Since she was a puppy I talked to her, like you do with a human baby. I didn't train her necessarily, I just taught her German. She can't speak back, obviously, but she takes my commands because she considers me her mother." Faye grinned, "Watch. Öffnen Sie das Fenster." Blondi dashed over to the back wall and pressed her nose onto the glass of a window, pushing it open.

"Are you fucking serious?" Paul laughed, clapping his hands. Faye smirked as Blondi ran over to her, and she kissed her on the tip of her nose. Paul watched the gesture of affection, smiling. "That's adorable." Faye glowered down at him.

"I can still kill you."

In seven months, Faye was making nearly twice the money she had been pulling in before Paul came. She also grew fond of Paul. She pushed him away and pushed him away, but he was resilient and persistent. He didn't take anything personally and never got upset no matter what. When Faye would go off at him or threaten him, he'd just smile and return a few hours later with a present for her. After a while, he got used to her pulling guns on him when he made her angry, and it didn't affect him.

"I got you something, Miss Faye."

"Fuck you, Paul. Go to hell." He had touched her Desert Eagle.

"You're still mad at me? Come on, baby, I brought you an old Dean Martin record. Let's listen to it. Come dance with me."

"I said fuck off!"

Paul leaned on the record player as the vinyl spun around. A smug Faye appeared in the doorway, arms crossed and grinning. He sauntered over to her and put his hands on her hips. A few weeks ago, he woke her up in the night, playing old '30s music and demanding that she dance with him. Paul could swing dance and he was really exceptional at it, and despite her protests, Faye was beginning to be a more than adequate partner. He never played any black artists, as she would probably cut him with the shards of the broken disk, just for bringing it into the house.

"If you get to teach me this bullshit, I get to teach you something." Faye was sprawled out on a dusty velvet couch, cleaning the Desert Eagle. The white walls reflected with sunlight, and people lounged on the floor and on pieces of furniture lazily, high. "I'm going to teach you how to play the piano," breathed Faye, exhaling pot smoke and watching it swirl in the sunlight. "I haven't played in a long time. But if you can get me a piano…" she trailed off, thinking of the ivory on her finger tips.

"Um… I could find you one, and bring it here," came a voice from across the room. Austin had been living at the UA for six months, and still had not uttered more than ten words to anyone. He was shy and thin, the sort of person that isn't noticed in a room. He seemed almost transparent, sitting there in a cloud of smoke. This is what made him an excellent thief. He didn't have to be invisible, he was already perfectly unobtrusive. One could mistake him as a statue, he was so still and expressionless.

Faye glowed in the patch of sun she sat in, squinting her eyes and beaming. "Do that for me and you can take a week off work, how 'bout it?" His bland face lit up, filled with joy for a moment. In the half year he'd lived with her, he'd never lost his awe and fear of Faye, who was nearly half his age and infinitely more intelligent and capable.

The piano was there by nightfall, and she could not be parted from it for three days. She didn't speak to anyone, and only paused to smoke and pet Blondi.

Faye laid in her bed, looking out the window and listening to the noise of the city. It was a noise she had grown up around, and it comforted her in a sad way. The moon and the lights outside illuminated the room, and she heard sirens around the corner, coming in her direction. Most underworld business-owners would panic at the sound of them, but she had paid off the cops and city officials very nicely. The powers that be needed her to provide them their vices, and the ones that didn't could be greased. The economy had affected them to the point that they needed her money. Such venal men…

When she had time to sleep, she thought, and she thought a lot. She thanked the gods for the opportunity to make her existence mean something, and thanked them for the suffering that made her strong. She thought about herself, and her entrance into womanhood. Faye had to transcend her gender to survive, she had never thought of herself as a girl or a boy; she did not feel asexual, her gender just seemed so irrelevant. But now she had to recognize it. She was almost sixteen and she had never let anyone emotionally near in six years. She'd never had a boyfriend, simply because she was too busy and too repulsed by people. Almost everyone disgusted her.

On Halloween, a newly sixteen year old Faye was walking into an Exxon to pay for her gas when she saw a girl that she wasn't repelled by. The girl had lucid brown eyes and pretty rounded lips above a flat chin. She seemed anxious, stalking up and down the aisles of snacks and drinks, then down by the wine and beer. As she passed the boxes of Corona for a third time, Faye stood in front of her, blocking her path. She looked down at the girl, smirking. Though she was younger, she was much taller.

"What do you want?" snapped the girl, coiled and ready to strike. Faye smiled wider, sauntering towards her. Her boots clunked on the white and grey tiles.

"Marguerite, are you going to rob this place or not? You're sure taking your sweet time," she smiled. The girl's eyes got wide as she heard her own name. She was silent, putting up barriers in her mind against Faye. "No? Shall I help you? If you don't hurry up, I might get all the cash for myself."

"Back off," Marguerite muttered. Faye smiled and walked past her, her arm brushing against a tense, bony shoulder as went to have a cigarette outside. She returned when she heard Marguerite yelling.

"GIVE ME ALL THE MONEY IN THE REGISTER! KEEP YOUR HANDS UP!" She was waving the gun in her hands in all directions, but she didn't look frightening. She looked terrified, and was shaking visibly.

Faye didn't bother to stub out her cigarette as she walked back in. As she came into view of the counter, she saw Marguerite being restrained by a large black man, and the cashier was calling the police. Faye whipped her Desert Eagle out, pointing it at the man restraining Marguerite.

"Nigger, get face down on the ground before I blow off your kneecaps," then she turned to the girl behind the counter, "And you, put the god damn phone down before I shoot it out of your hand. Give me all the money in your register and nobody bleeds to death on the floor, got it?"

"Why did you help me back there?" Marguerite looked over at Faye shyly, pulling fuzzy gloves over her hands and tucking them into the crooks of her elbows. Faye could tell that she was one of those people that always felt cold, no matter how many coats she put on.

"Because you didn't know what you were doing. You aren't someone that enjoys conflict, but you need the money and have no way of getting it because you can't seem to get hired."

"How do you know all of this? You knew my name, and I've never seen you before."

"It's hard to explain verbally, not for lack of the right words, but because those words would likely cause you to panic. I can help you feel it, though." Marguerite looked at her, brow furrowing. Faye smiled and gently extended her mental probe, touching the barrier of this confused girl's psyche. Marguerite's eyes widened in a look of panic, trying to comprehend this unnatural, unfamiliar feeling. It felt like something inside of her head was being pulled on, like the attraction of two magnets. "Don't be afraid. I'm not going to hurt you."

"What are you doing?!"

"I'm entering your mind. I've become skilled enough at it that if I don't want you to feel it, you won't."

"That's frightening." Marguerite looked down at her shoes as they moved down the sidewalk, a plastic bag with paper and coin rustling at the bottom dangling from her hand.

"I could've kept you in the dark about it."

"Why didn't you?"

"I would've, if I wasn't sure that you were going to be my best friend." The girls smiled at each other, and they both felt like the words were prophesy.

Faye had turned one of the larger rooms in the theatre into a shooting range, and she spent much of her time there. Since October she had progressed very much in her rapidly growing industry. She had started traveling across the country, uniting her work with that of others, offering protection and funding to many different groups. She had taken three trips out of the country to recruit men for her business. She paid for them to travel to America, and now about 500 immigrants in Michigan were working in service of her cause. She had earned their trust and respect by paying for their families' needs. She sent the promising to college, provided medicine for the sick, and housed many of the homeless and less fortunate. In exchange, they sent her their sons. Rumors spread from mouth to mouth that Faye was building an army. She talked to very few, and spent most of her time trying out new brands of weapons, training, and playing the piano. She bought a violin, but mostly she just stared at it as she laid in bed at night, thinking of her father's wish for her to learn it and wondering if she would ever finally bring herself to do it. She wondered, would she be doing it for herself or for him?

"Why don't you ever come out of there anymore?" Paul mused, standing behind her as she fired off a round into the bull's eye of the target in front of her.

"Because I wear the pants in this little family and so I'll stay where I please. What's it to you?" Once the clip was empty, in one swift motion she ejected it and reloaded it with the full one at her hip.

"I miss you, I only see you when I come down here, or hang around the piano room at four in the morning." He had started bringing her coffee and sitting on the floor by her as she played, rolling joints and precariously handing them to her as she took breaks in playing. She was more wrathful than normal when something interrupted her playing, and that was hard to achieve.

"Too bad for you."

"Aw, come on. You know you miss me too."

"Apparently not enough to make time for you." Faye continued playing. She wasn't ignoring Paul, in her mind he just wasn't there.

"He's obviously in love with you, Faye," Marguerite noted, as they lay on the queen-sized bed that took up nearly of the whole bedroom in her boyfriend's apartment. She wanted Faye to meet Alex, her fiancé. She had moved in with him a few months ago, after being evicted from her apartment on the west side.

"If he's in love with me, then he should leave me alone. I don't have time for love."

"You're the most solitary person I've ever known. Why is that?" Faye rolled onto her side, and the girls faced each other, close as if they were making secret plans that no others could hear. Faye's voice was hollow and soft as she stared out the window, but not looking at anything outside.

"I prefer my own company. I get very little from society." The girls were silent and solemn, their fingers laced together.

She jumped up as she heard the front door open and slam against the wall. She'd had a bad feeling about this man from the beginning. A man that would send an eighteen year old girl to rob a gas station for rent was not a man that she cared to be friends with.

By the end of the night, Marguerite was a tenant in the United Artists theatre. Faye wouldn't put up with the way that Alex tried to manipulate them both with intimidation. She ended up confronting him about it, and he didn't like it, so he stood up and towered over her, yelling as she sat on the low couch. She stood up and met him eye-to-eye, squaring her shoulders and boring into him. He tried to push her back down, but it was as if her heels were nailed to the ground. She told him that she would skin him and wear his flesh as a coat. He broke a beer bottle on the table and threatened her with it, and she lurched at him, catching his kneecap with her boot and driving it down to the center of his shin. He screamed, falling to the ground on his back, and she kicked him until he was ventricumbent. She planted her boot in between his shoulder blades and grabbed him by the ponytail, pulling his head back until she could look at him.

"You woman-abusing piece of shit." Faye spit in his eyes. "Has he ever been violent with you?" Marguerite gasped, her heart in her throat. She looked like a quivering puppy, curled up against the arm of the couch, eyes wide.

"DON'T YOU DARE-" Faye kicked Alex in the back of the head, then stepped on it.

"Tell me."

"…yes." She swallowed, tears rolling down her face, her shoulders heaving. Faye tossed her the keys to her car.

"Go start the car, I'll be there in a minute."

Marguerite left, glancing back through the door as she descended the stairs. Faye shut the front door after the screen slammed shut, and extracted a small pill from her jacket pocket.

"Eat this." Alex tightened his lips, snot running down his nose. "Eat it or I'll cut your throat open and shove it in myself." He opened his mouth and swallowed the cyanide capsule.

Faye pulled out of the driveway without a word.

"What did you do?" Faye remained silent. "What did you do to him?"

"I killed him." She dialed a number on her cell phone and pressed it to her ear. "I need a clean-up at 188 C, Oregon Avenue. The door is unlocked." She hung up, dropping the phone in between her thighs.

"…why did you kill Alex?" Faye stopped the car and took Marguerite by the hand, looking at her gravely.

"Because parasites like that don't deserve life."

Chapter Eight

Mikhail paced the room, eyes darting across everything in sight, but not taking anything in. His fists were clenched and his pulse was rapid, booming in his ears. He had just gotten word that Faye was planning to take him to court to reclaim her house and to remove his name from her Swiss bank account. He was frustrated and confused. If she wanted something, she was the kind of person that would simply take it. What was she doing this for, when she could've just chosen to kill him? Maybe she had been circulating that information on purpose, luring him into a false sense of security. Maybe she really would kill him. He sat down on a couch in the upstairs parlor, staring at his hands.

As she got off the phone with her attorney, Faye smiled at Ash brightly. He watched her as she sat on the window sill, one long, bare leg dangling out of it. She was glad that there was a man that did not look at her with anything but familial love.

"Good news, Mikhail just got caught fleeing the country."

"Do you know where he was headed?" Ash inquired. Faye swung her leg back inside and walked to the couch, sitting down and crossing her legs. She leaned over to the table in front of her, plucking a cigarette out of her open pack and lighting it.

"Apparently," she exhaled, "he was fleeing to Germany. Back to the Land der Vorfahren."

"How'd the prick get himself caught?" Ash held out two fingers to take the cigarette. Faye handed it to him and uncrossed her legs, standing up.

"He was fool enough to pay for his ticket in counterfeited cash. He was apprehended as he was about to board the plane to his fatherland. He is now out on bail, but even so, he's a frightened mouse. Twenty of my men have been dispatched and are guarding him. He's imprisoned in the very house he stole from me." She chuckled at the irony, lighting up another cigarette. "Go ahead and have that one. They're good for you." He smiled and stood up, hugging her.

"You're gonna win."

"There's no other option, Ashley."

By spring, Faye had started tidying up her business. She met with her former partners; the Russian, Italian, and Celtic Mafias. She set up meetings with at least seven hundred bosses, reestablishing their alliances and assuring them that the way things had been operated previous to her release had come to an end and that she was back in control. She even formed a treaty with the Yakuza, and while they were not her allies, they were no longer enemies.

The Russians had sent her 20,000 men that had sworn loyalty to her cause. Each of them was from a family that she touched in some way, and every man pledged to lay down their lives for her. She stationed them in strategic places throughout the country, providing them with housing and jobs. She had 700,000 more soldiers around the globe, all of whom were now living comfortable lives. She employed every single one, paying them generously, but demanding her expectations be met. On more than a few occasions they had to be executed for dishonesty, but for the most part all of the soldiers under her command would rather have died than betray her.

Faye was known to all other crime families as the most important source of drugs in the world, as she had usurped all non-white manufacturers apart from the Yakuza and made her products ten times cheaper than anyone else could. She was now the third largest arms dealer alive, and had control of hundreds of private and public contracts. She controlled thousands of businesses, each giving her a set amount of money every month in exchange for protection by her highly trained soldiers. At the rate in which her empire was progressing, she would be making more than 50 billion a year by fall. She had finished building another instruction facility; with the rate that immigrants were coming in, she would have to have many more constructed to supply the two-year training that each man would go through.

She had called together a meeting, and in attendance was a leader from nearly every non-colored crime family in the world. She was allying them all under one flag, the flag of white progress.

"I have a proposition for each of you to carefully consider. Traditionally, law enforcement has been our enemy above all else, even each other. It inhibits us in many ways, hindering our progress and adding much complication to our intentions. Consider what would happen if they were our allies." A murmur erupted, echoing in the massive, impenetrable room.

"Are you suggesting we compromise with, even befriend pigs? Ridiculous!" shouted Salvador Montagna, who was currently acting as boss of the Bonanno Family. Faye smiled charmingly at the handsome man, his hair shot with silver, and thick, expressive eyebrows arching above dark eyes. She looked at him through thick black lashes, assessing how his angry demeanor slightly melted as she turned on her charm.

"Salvador, you ought to know me better than that. I would never suggest such things. Please reflect on what I have to say, if you would," she retorted, gently. She knew how to manipulate these powerful men. With a flash of her allure she could make them malleable in her hands. "Imagine a body with a blood disease. If you can steadily inject new, clean blood, and extract the old, diseased blood, the circulation will be pure again and the disease will be eliminated, while keeping the body alive and intact." She paused, letting her words sink in before continuing. "Because I respect each of you, and hold you all in the highest regards, I wanted to consult you before I take action. I propose that we filter out the police, and replace them gradually with our own men." The murmur turned to a roar of voices, arguing amongst themselves. This was dangerous territory; she had barely been able to eliminate the enmity between these groups. She couldn't afford fighting.

"Gentlemen, I will speak to each of you individually on this matter. For now, I must thank you for joining me here today, and ask you all to accompany me to a private dinner." Food and alcohol are usually effective tools to end quarreling amongst males.

After dinner was over and she had personally thanked every man in attendance, Salvador approached Faye, eyes taking in all of her features, complimented by the thin indigo dress that fell over her slim figure. He couldn't tell that she hated dresses.

He murmured to her in Italian, his voice low, asking if she would care to join him for a drink in his limousine. She smiled coyly, accepting the offer.

Sasha Romanov was agonized. He sat, hunched over and crumpled, but still enormous. His hands clutched at his head, gripping tighter by the second, as if they could rip all the torturous thoughts out if he could just break the barrier.

She has penetrated my mind and killed off any other thoughts, made me unable to think of anything but her. I cannot sleep because I only dream of her, when I dream at all. This is misery. I have been skinned and gutted. I am vulnerable. Those dark eyes see everything, know everything. She is supreme, omnipresent. And she haunts me. Do I dare reach out to the only one that ever meant anything to me?

Sasha pressed his chest with one hand and his stomach with the other, as if trying to keep his heart and guts from falling out. He cried out in a guttural roar, face contorted in anguish.

Can a goddess fall in love with a man, or am I fated to be alone forever?

Salvador offered Faye his arm, and she slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow. A man waiting beside the car bowed his head to them as they neared him, and he opened the door to allow them in. He crossed to the other side and slid into the driver's seat, putting the key into the ignition.

"Don't you dare turn that key," Faye snarled, holding a knife to the man's throat.

"Faye! What in God's name are you doing?" yelled Salvador.

"Shut up," she muttered, then pressed the blade lightly onto the driver's Adam's apple, her lips very close to his ear. "Have you heard of the WASP injector knife? It's fascinating, really. You see, it's a hunting knife equipped with a compressed gas cylinder and firing mechanism. If I stick this into you, basically your organs will freeze, and maybe your throat will even explode. That sounds like a nice way to die, doesn't it?" She sighed, contentedly. "It's a weapon designed for animals, which is why it's so fitting that it should end your life." Then she stabbed him in the back of the neck and fired. She was correct; his throat burst and splattered all over the windshield.

"FUCK!"

"Sal, calm down."

"YOU CRAZY BITCH, YOU CRAZY FUCKING BITCH!"

"Your limo was rigged to explode once the key turned in the ignition."

"What? How the f-"

"It doesn't matter how I know. I'll prove it to you if I must." She opened the door on her side. "Follow me." She showed him the mechanism underneath the hood. The bomb would have been detonated with a small turn of the man's wrist, and they all would've been blown to hell.

"Jesus Christ…" whispered Salvador.

"Don't worry. I'll take care of this. I'll arrange for you to be escorted to your hotel in one of our cars."

She watched the Benz pull away, a shaken and silent Salvador Montagna riding in the backseat. She smiled and turned around, knowing what to expect. There outside her building was a red Coupe de Ville.

"You've stopped surprising me, you know," she grinned, looking up at the tall man standing in front of her. Sasha gazed down at her, nothing cold or hard in his hazel eyes. He winced when she turned around to look at him, his insides feeling torn out. He was no longer strong enough to hold it all inside of him, he needed to release the raging fire within him.

"Have I?" he murmured quietly, betraying none of the violent, raw emotion that he felt. His rough hand cupped her chin, and he wiped a speck of blood from her cheek with his thumb. There was something electric in his touch that made her hands tremble at her sides. He wrapped his other arm around her waist and bent down so that his face was just a hair's breadth away from hers, pressing their lips together. She felt his beard and breath upon her skin and realized she hadn't let anyone touch her like this since she was last with Mikhail. But this was different; this was so unlike how it was with him. Sasha kissed the corners of her mouth, her jaw, across the scar on her throat, drinking her in with an unquenchable thirst. Faye's hands traced the muscles underneath his shirt, the contours of his face, memorizing him as if she were blind and only saw through touch. As he held her and touched her with such longing, she came to a realization.

I have a choice. Whether or not to be alone…

For the first time in more than ten years, Faye felt the burn of tears behind her eyes.

Chapter Nine

Loneliness. The word is a paradox. Loneliness does not stem from being alone. Nothing and no one is ever truly alone. In order to be alone, nothing else can exist. But yet there is a petulant sense of nothingness. Why do we feel this emptiness? Emptiness. It implies that there is something to fill. Therefore emptiness is validation of one's existence. How does one become full? Happy? Is this something that is found within one's self, or is it to be sought outside of self? Or in someone else? What is the difference? There is no difference. There is no question of purpose; your purpose is to find that which makes you feel as if your soul has meaning. It is the end that justifies the mean, the thing that fuels your will to exist. Exist? Define existence. A state of being? Opposed to what? A state of not being? As soon as the mind perceives this thought, it is something, which means that it cannot not exist. Exist. What proves that we exist? Our capacity? Our emptiness? The void in our hearts that we must disguise so that we will not break. But if you ignore this pain, you ignore your very soul. Is this why we need others around us? Because we ignore ourselves? We can only be valid through others, because at conception we reject our existence by avoiding all sources of pain.

Chapter Ten

Faye's bedroom was exquisite, extravagant in every way, and newly refurbished now that she had regained her property and rid it of Mikhail's looming aura of greed. The floor was pale, reflective marble, glowing deep sapphire like the light that seeped into every corner of the room. The ceiling was covered with hanging silks in blues and violets, and the intricately carved paneled walls were so dark as to almost be black, and they shined under the deep light. Transparent curtains billowed out onto the balconies, fluttering in the wind. In the center of the room stood a massive four poster bed, dark drapes on all sides, and covered by villus white blankets of chinchilla fur. This was the house she had missed so much.

Sasha stared at her naked body in wonder, making love to her and savoring the beauty of the only person he ever felt anything for. He still gasped every time she touched him, though they had been in bed for two days and three nights. In his heart he wondered if she could ever love him, and feared that she was not capable of it. Faye felt this fear as he touched her, it emanated from his very pores. She wondered the same thing; could she ever feel love again? Or more importantly, could she afford to? She knew she was capable, she loved Ash and Marguerite, but she did not know whether or not she could allow herself the tenderness of romance.

"Where are you going, darling?" Sasha mumbled. His Russian accent became much more prominent when he was sleepy. Sometimes when they were lying in bed, he would speak to her in his native tongue, and his voice became a soft, low poem of gravel and mist. He was truly commanding, even while merely whispering nothing in particular into her ear. Faye felt as content as she ever had, laying with her head on his well-muscled chest, held loosely by massive, tanned arms. But now she must leave this haven, venture out into the real world.

"I'm going to check on Charlie this morning." Her fingers traced across Sasha's face, feeling the back of his head growing stubble. "I can't very well rule the world with you around to distract me."

"And what shall I busy myself with while you're doing business?" He stretched in bed, grunting and resting his head in the palm of his hand. The light spotted on his lean legs, colored by the stained glass, and if you sat long enough, you could see it travel up his body as the sun moved. Faye pulled on black trousers, and they fell off her hips until she strapped on black suspenders over her white cotton t-shirt.

"I'm sure you'll find a means of entertaining yourself. It's really none of my concern what you do. If it were, I still wouldn't care"

"You dress like a man," he said, matter-of-factly. Faye turned to him and smiled brightly, revealing perfect pearl teeth and a happy, resounding laugh that held none of the dark heaviness that usually tinged her voice.

"You're mistaken. Men dress like me," she grinned as she slipped on her boots.

"You're irrefutable, Faye… you could convince anyone of anything. Anything that passes through your lips is engraved in stone as far as I'm concerned." She took these words of sincerity as the mutterings of a man half asleep as she walked out, heading to her Escalade. Her fingers grasped the handle, and as she pulled on it, her front door swung open and Sasha sprinted out, buttoning up his jeans as he ran. She let go of the handle and was about to say something, but as she opened her mouth he pulled her up, her thighs against his hips, his hands steady underneath them. He kissed her hard, as if he would never touch a woman again. He tried to breathe her in, to make her a part of him. He craved so desperately to touch her, but she felt so far away.

Chapter Eleven

Please love me, don't leave me. I want to see you. Where are you? Please come back. Come back. I remember your faces, but they are fading. Where did you go? Why did you leave me? Please just love me. LOVE ME. I'LL DO ANYTHING; JUST LOVE ME. LOVE ME. COME BACK TO ME. I NEED YOU, COME BACK. DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE HERE. I WANT TO SEE YOU. JUST LOVE ME.

Oh.

You can't.

You won't.

Never.

Because.

You're dead.

The sky was blackened, the clouds spreading, fingerprints in charcoal and ash on a sky of pale canvas. The thick, dank smell of pollution penetrated everything, choking out any chance of limpidness. Trees were replaced with skyscrapers and smokestacks, lawns of concrete stretched out over the land. The first droplets of rain hit the ground, and a small girl lay underneath a bridge, awakening to the sound of cars rushing by overhead. She had lost her parents two days ago, and was now waiting for her day of escape. The dirt she rested on was melting into mud, and it clung to blonde ringlets and fair skin, but Fadrian Lothbrook was not concerned. She rubbed her face, staining it with dirty fingers. She wondered if Odin would protect his youngest ancestor, as she was the very last of his blood.

The rain can't even wash away this wretched plight. My heart has been impaled by the love I feel for my parents. But I will not be destroyed; I will no longer be helpless or afraid. I will rise above and conquer.

One more tear slipped from the young girl's eye, but that was all she allowed herself. She thought back to her favorite memory with her father, the day he was the proudest of her, when he took her to that tall, empty building that seemed to stretch into the sky for miles. He let her press the buttons on the elevator, and jumped with her when it started and stopped, feeling the rise and sink of their stomachs and laughing together. They reached the top and he took her by the hand, his other holding a large black case. They approached a window across the vacant room, and he sat down on the floor, unlatching the case. A nine year old Fadrian peered inside, eyes following her father's movements as he assembled the Barrett M107, his rough hands deft and knowing. She silently wished that someday her hands would look that beautiful and sure doing anything. He stood it up through an open window, pointed down at the street below.

"Now, my love, you are going to learn to shoot this rifle, and how to fire at moving targets rather than stationary ones. It is easy when you can interpret their movements, as I know you can," he petted her soft blonde head with an affectionate smile, "Are you ready to begin sweetheart?"

"Oh yes, Daddy, I am. What will I be shooting?" The little girl looked up at her father with wide eyes of worship.

"Not this time, Faye. You must be bigger to shoot this gun. But when you do decide to use this sort of weapon, you may shoot anyone you'd like to, under the condition that he not be white. Never kill your brothers unless there is no other choice, for it is them that we are trying to save. Do you understand?" he said sternly. Fadrian nodded her head, and her face became very somber.

"Why do you hate every race besides ours, Daddy?" she asked cautiously, making sure her tone would not upset him. He knelt down and took her small face in his hands, their foreheads pressed together for a moment. His lips touched the tip of her nose, in a very soft kiss, and he stroked her cheek with a large thumb. She was surprised; he was usually not affectionate, but she took it as an opportunity to reach her arms out and hug him, smelling the familiarity and resting there, her eyelashes brushing his neck. He was so sturdy and safe. She sighed, a tiny smile on her face as she embraced her beloved father.

"Faye," he began, his deep voice very quiet, "We are the only race there is. All others are birth defects, mutations; they are a waste and deserve to be aborted rather than brought into this world. They rape and kill and suffocate our people, so that we may never prosper from the work we have toiled upon for centuries upon centuries. They are parasites, and we cannot be hosts to them any longer."

She saw him aim the gun, looking through the scope, and squeeze on the trigger. The shot was so quiet that it appeared that the black woman's head exploded on its own. Faye watched the panic, people swarming like little ants, unable to determine where the bullet had come from. Caleb directed her to watch him carefully, to memorize every motion. She saw him fire eighteen more times, a satisfied smile on his handsome face and a bright shine in his eyes.

"I want to try," Faye stated, and her voice was not a child's as she spoke these words. It was not a request, it was a demand. Her father looked down at her, stepping away from the window, nodding once in assent. She touched the smooth weapon, and it felt like she had held it many times before. It became an extension of her body, like a sword to a warrior. As she open fired upon the colored San Franciscans, she felt no recoil against her shoulder. Watching the people below her, their bodies bursting and crumpling, watching them die, she felt like a god of supreme power. She saw her father nod again out of the corner of her eye and she immediately stopped, dissembled the firearm, and put it back in the case. They rode the elevator again, and in the car Faye held Caleb's hand. He smiled the whole way home, looking at her now and then. She could feel how proud he was of her, and she gloried in it. She looked at her parents together that night, so in love, so beautiful, and knew they could never be wrong.

The families and friends of thirty-three people mourned the lost lives of their loved ones, and despaired that the person responsible was never discovered.

Chapter Twelve

Imagine, you open your eyes and can see nothing. The area around you is unfamiliar and pitch black, wreaking of bodily fluids and a dank smell of rot. You feel disoriented, and your head is throbbing with pain, but all you can feel is the heavy pound of your heart. Your wrists and ankles are bound to a cold surface, and you are naked, lying as if nailed to a crucifix and are unable to move. In a few minutes a light turns on; an oppressing florescent light, bright and hard and cold. You are staring at a painfully white ceiling, and as you turn your head to spare your eyes of the blinding lightness, you see a large steel door. This is the only entrance into the room, and there are no windows or vents. This is why the stench is almost unbearable; There are hundreds of jars all around the room on shelves, filled with hearts, brains, ears, fingers… so many organs. There were corpses that had just started to decompose, all grey and bloated, some that were already rotting away, and one that was almost nothing but a skeleton. On a table beside you lay shining surgeon's tools, neatly ordered and lined up. You scream and it echoes, and rings in your ears… then silence. You scream again, but the result is the same. Thrashing does you no good, and begging for God does not bring you salvation. Your mother is not there, no one can save you. No one can hear your cries of "Help me!" No one can see you stricken with panic and fear, like a small, helpless animal. A predator looms overhead as you hear the door slam shut. Your eyes dart to a tall, lithe woman with a beautiful, terrifying, and utterly expressionless face. She is dressed all in black as if in mourning, but it is not half as dark as her eyes, which stare directly at you, focused, penetrating. She moves nearer, looking down at you, assessing your body. She is calculating; you can feel it. The woman rolls up her sleeves. Her skin reflects the light, ethereal in a disturbing way, and she grasps a scalpel in one thin hand. She puts her free hand on your face, pushing your cheek to the table. You struggle, screaming and trying to bite her and spit at her, fighting with everything you have. She rolls her eyes, strapping your throat to the table.

"Behave," she says. Her voice is commanding, and it comes across as neither male nor female. She uses a peculiar clamp to keep your mouth open, and exchanges her scalpel for a pair of pliers. You feel them lock down around your left front tooth, ripping it out. She extracts all of your teeth, dropping each one into a jar with a clink. With the scalpel she slices off your tongue, then sews the wound up so that you don't bleed to death. She does the same to each of your extremities, your blood spotting her skin as she deftly wields the needle and thread. First your ears go, then your fingertips, and soon you pass out from the pain. In a few moments you are woken up again. "You will not be spared."

In a week you are nothing but a torso. You cannot see, hear, or speak. Every day you can feel your skin being stripped off. Once you are allowed to die, you are dumped off onto the floor next to your new companions, a vacant thing just lying there to mentally torture another.

This is not your fate to suffer, but the fate of a man named Mikhail Askew.

Chapter Thirteen

In the New York Harbor, a young German man had arrived in America with nowhere to go. He stood in the brilliant sun, long blonde hair shining and whipping in the wind. He looked skyward, his breathing shallow; crowds surrounded him, but he felt alone. He didn't pay attention to the people staring at him, assessing him, analyzing his features. Women wished they were that beautiful and perfect; they gawked and giggled as they passed by him, craning their heads to get one last look... But he felt very small. How he longed to be great, powerful, how he craved meaning! He was simply an ignored middle child, running from his motherland. His eyes looked out at the ocean, and he thought about the miles between him and his family, and how it didn't feel any different after all; they were always far away. The sea glittered in all the same colors as those sad eyes, equally glorious in blues and greens. It was somehow comforting to Mikhail that no matter what happened to him, it would stay the same. It enveloped the world, ancient and wise. The ocean would still be there if he came back to it 200 years from now. He bent over the concrete barrier, flaxen hair dangling in his face as he looked down at the water. His long hands clutched the railing, lest he fall. Then again, he thought, maybe I want to fall in.

A shipment of foreign weapons had arrived in the harbor about an hour ago, imported from China at very little expense to the man that was bringing them in. Men in delivery trucks would unload the crates and deposit them in a warehouse owned by an ambitious young woman nearing her eighteenth birthday.

Mikhail sighed as he leaned against the concrete. What was he going to do now? Now that he was in America… where he didn't know anyone, didn't own anything, and couldn't even speak the language capably.