Mobster Son Bonding

His name is Karkat Vantas. He is six and a half sweeps old. And this is the story of how his (stab)Dad taught him to rob a bank.

-()-

The most pointless thing in the world, ever, without a doubt, Karkat decided, was geology. Honestly, the study of rocks. Rocks from Alternia, rocks from space, rocks from his backyard, it didn't matter at the end of the day. They were hard and you could throw them at people you didn't like. End of thought process.

It didn't help that geology class was the last class of the day, and by 2:15 Karkat's brain typically wandered off onto more interesting topics, or things that had made him angry throughout the day (often these two things coincided). That left 45 minutes of unmitigated suffering at the hands of Worldly Vanguard and his unnatural fixation on anything forged in a volcano.

Not that Karkat minded volcanoes. Only decent thing in geology class, really. Pity they'd covered them briefly in the first quarter, and Vanguard didn't seem to have anything more to say on the topic.

Karkat was beginning to seethe over the fact that it was still only 2:30 and his brain was slowly turning to mica-flecked sludge when Terezi kicked him in the shins. "Fuck you," he hissed, automatically.

"You have plans for tonight?" She waggled her eyebrows in a possible attempt at attractiveness. Why it was successful, Karkat would never be able to explain. Even with her wearing that stupid dragon shirt he had the nascent prickles of flushed feelings swelling up inside him. It was all very confusing, and consequently fairly enraging, and he really wished Terezi wasn't Snowman's adoptive daughter, because then maybe he'd be able to ask Slick about his feelings without sending the man on a rant about how dames are nothing but trouble and any self-respecting person would simply avoid stupid emotional commitments to them.

The irony of Slick's deep-seated and obsessive hatred for Snowman had not escaped Karkat. To his credit, though, Karkat was smart enough not to mention that.

Lacking any witty response, Karkat glowered at his desktop. "No."

"Nothing to do on a wild Friday, hm? Lame." She swung her legs back and forth, idly, apparently only half-listening to the teacher. That zig-zag smile slashed across her face, wide and sharp. "If you're home alone we should hang out. I'll tell mom I'm going to the library; Vriska never follows me there."

Karkat snorted. "I don't know if I will be or not. And don't fucking assume I want to hang out with you – I'm still mad at you and your stupid family. Mostly your stupid family, but you by proxy."

"Troll me when you find out." She plucked a red crayon from her box (not that any other color would have even been considered – every crayon in the box was red) and underlined a sentence in her textbook. "I'll be wai-ting," she singsonged, under her breath.

Karkat glared at his desk and pretended like he wasn't even more anxious to get home. It would be as simple as asking about dinner – Slick would probably fly off on some vulgar rant about Karkat feeding himself because adults are fucking busy, and there's twenty dollars under the desk blotter and he'd better fucking see some change. Exit stage right, slam door. Main player: pretend like you weren't all that anxious to troll Terezi anyway, and are doing it out of boredom.

His pencil creaked in his grip. Fucking feelings.

-()-

Twenty blocks away, there was a meeting underway. The Crew had assembled at Slick's place that day, not out of deference to their leader, more due to the fact that Slick's place was where the leftover food from that banquet one of their casinos had catered last week ended up. Even Droog wasn't above the bachelor's inherent gravitation toward free leftovers.

Building plans and a map of the west side of the city were spread out on the table, weighted down by liquor bottles and halves of sandwiches. Photos of a bank's interior were scattered on top, amongst the lettuce shreds and fallen tomato chunks.

"It's so goddamn tiny," Boxcars pointed out, tracing a line from the back door to the vault. "Gotta be the smallest bank in the city."

Droog shook his head. "That's Flute's United on forty-fifth. This is the second-smallest."

Clubs leaned back in his chair and flicked through the pictures. "Gosh, guys, I don't even think we'll need C4. Boxcars should be able to just move stuff."

"The best fucking part of it," Slick said, gesturing wildly with his sandwich and flinging turkey chunks around the kitchen, "is there ain't any guards. They figure you buy a fenestrated wall, for the front door and the back door, you don't need anything else." He paused for a bite of sandwich, which at this point was basically just two pieces of bread clamped together. "Take out the fucking wall, you can stroll in like a walk in the damn park." He prodded the building plans, littering the paper with condiments. "The cable for the wall runs along this beam, with all the other cables and shit. Just lob through all of it, done."

"But for the part where there wouldn't be any power then," Droog pointed out. "And severing the alarm cable will automatically summon the police."

"So will taking out their fucking walls."

Hearts shrugged his massive shoulders. "They could figure on mechanical problems, buy us some time while someone goes to check it out."

"My thoughts exactly." Droog quirked an immaculate eyebrow. "Better yet if the watchman is caught sleeping – assumptions of laziness on the part of the watchman will overrule suspicion that the walls have been tampered with, rather than malfunctioned."

Spades smirked. "Predictable bastards. Sleeping, huh?"

"Dex won't show up on any tests if they investigate afterwards. No way to trace it." Droog produced a bottle of over-the-counter medications from his coat. "Five capsules ought to do it."

"He'll never take all five!" Clubs exclaimed.

"You break the capsules, asshole," Slick snapped. "Put 'em in something – coffee or some shit. Honestly, it's like you've fucking never robbed a bank before."

"Oh. Right. Now I remember."

Hearts leaned onto the table, which creaked in protest. "Droog'n I cased the place all week – best times're between eleven thirty and three. Night watch goes into the viewing room at seven, eats dinner about nine and change, drifts off around eleven. Might not even have to use the juice."

"Better safe than sorry," the second-tallest mumbled.

"Obviously." Slick leaned back in his chair, his hand in his jacket pocket, frowning thoughtfully. "Alright, fuckers, so the strategy –"

Droog held up a hand. "If I may, Slick." He looked to the other two, who hurriedly looked anywhere else, including to the hideous art-class creations Karkat had hopefully taped to the fridge. "It's not a big place."

"Consider that fact fucking established, Droog."

"Right, well, we hardly need all four of us to knock this place over." His expression was rigid, neutral, calm. "In a setting this size, a larger group might even be considered a liability."

Slick thought about that for a moment. "You and I did do Flute United alone. Same shit might work here."

"Perhaps. But Slick, if I may point out, Boxcars might be a better choice in this instance."

"Oh, come on, the safe's not that fucking big and it's the oldest model they can probably still get fucking serviced. It's a damn miracle no one's robbed them yet – a kid could crack it with a fucking stethoscope."

Droog nodded. "Perhaps. But in addition to expediting the process, Boxcars hasn't sustained the same level of injury in the recent past."

There was a pregnant pause, stretching out across the room and through the whole house. Slick leaned forward, elbow propped on the table, pointing at Droog. "This is about the arm. You're fucking making this about the fucking arm thing."

"And the eye thing," Droog agreed mildly. "Although I admit that doesn't warrant the same level of concern."

"Un-fucking-believable, Droog." He scooped up a stack of pictures. "I picked this fucking joint! I planned this entire goddamn heist!" The pictures exploded across the room, around Droog and Boxcars, who simply watched. Clubs, to Slick's right, leaned over in his chair a little, away from the other man. A knife thudded into the blueprints. "You all fucking work for me!"

Boxcars nodded gently. "Yeah, Boss, we do, but maybe you wanna sit one out here and there?"

"I'm not sitting one out, shit-for-brains, you jackoffs are fucking skipping off without me."

"Slick, don't be dramatic."

"Fuck you, Droog, I know this was your goddamn idea."

"You're going to get the same amount of money, Slick, for less work."

Clubs nodded eagerly. "It's a great situation."

"Shut up, Clubs." He whirled out of the chair, and paced around the kitchen, a black slash of jittery rage. "Never mind that it's the most retardedly fucking easy heist we'll have pulled off in months. Never mind that I just, you know, fucking picked the place and planned it all out for you idiots. Never mind that Droog and I could probably manage this alone without either one of you assholes stumbling around behind us."

"Hey," Clubs warned, brows creasing.

Diamonds stood up and intercepted Slick, pinning him in the corner of the fridge and the wall. He squared his shoulders and clasped his hands behind his back. "Calm down, Slick."

"Fuck no, I won't calm down. My own damn Crew is fucking culling me like the fucking trolls do to their retarded little grub things or whatever."

Droog sighed, as close to exasperated as he ever got. "Spades, your new arm will be here in a few weeks, and then you can rob as many banks as you want, and knife everybody else up."

"It's a wonder you haven't got that fucking Zahhak kid's weird-ass horse-fucking guardian here to drag me out back and fucking shoot me –"

"Slick."

"– which might be more merciful than fucking letting me watch the three of you nooksniffers gallivant off into the fucking sunset with my plans –"

"Slick," Droog insisted, while Clubs mouthed 'nooksniffers?' to Boxcars.

" – I mean, why not just fucking retire now and become the goddamn Godfather or something and fucking grant wishes and decapitate hoofbeasts and –"

"Jack."

Slick's verbal tirade skidded to a stop, just as the man himself froze mid-stride. His eye narrowed. "What, Draco?"

"Don't be a child." He glanced at the mess on the floor and his nose wrinkled, very slightly. "Spend a night with Karkat. And perhaps a mop. Sleep in a bed, don't get shot at, and wake up $100,000 richer. This is hardly something to complain about."

Slick made to cross his arms, but remembered halfway through the gesture and shoved his hand into his pocket. "Well of course when you put it like that . . . And don't tell me how to clean my house, dick."

"I made a suggestion, nothing more." He put a hand on Slick's shoulder, and ignored the shorter man's snarl. "Someone was going to sit this one out, regardless of everything else. The job's too small."

"Usually it would be me," Clubs volunteered happily. "But this time I actually get to drive the car!"

Boxcars sighed, even as Droog shook his head and stepped back, grabbing Clubs under the arm. Spades had simply gone very, very still. "As usual, Clubs, you managed to find precisely the wrong thing to say. Goodnight, Slick. We'll be in touch."

"What? What'd I say? It usually is me that gets left behind on account of Slick saying I'm so fucking usele –"

Boxcars laid a heavy hand on Clubs' head and steered him out of the kitchen. "Shut the hell up, Deuce." He shot Slick an apologetic look over his shoulder. "Sorry, boss."

The throwing knife thudded into the door a half-second after it closed. The sword, scalpel, switchblade and butcher knife that followed likewise scarred the wood up – he'd need a new door, that sword probably went most of the way through – but at least they were fucking palliative.

-()-

In fact, the sword and the butcher knife went the entire way through the front door, a fact which did not escape Karkat's notice when he arrived home from school. He sidled through the narrow crack allowed by the embedded metal, shut the door behind him, and simply absconded upstairs. Some days, that was the easiest answer.

He was about to log onto Trollian and initiate conversation with Terezi – he was pretty sure Slick was around, which ruled out any kind of actual contact with the other troll tonight – when the door to his room slammed open. Fuck.

"Get the fuck into my office, kid."

Karkat turned around, confused. "I didn't do anything. I literally just walked in the front door."

But Slick was already gone, his voice retreating down the stairs. "Why do you always fucking assume you're in trouble? Just get the fuck down here."

- gallowsCalibrator [GC] began trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] at 1600 –

GC: SO WH4TS TH3 D1ZZ34L K4RKL3S?

GC: 1S TH3 SL1CKST3R OTH3RW1S3 OCCUP4DO?

CG: NO HE'S FUCKING HERE.

CG: I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON – MY ASS HARDLY BRUSHED MY FUCKING CHAIR BEFORE HE'S YELLING FOR ME TO GET THE FUCK INTO HIS OFFICE.

GC: H3 1S SO CH4RM1NG.

GC: W1LL YOU 4BSCOND?

CG: AS IF I COULD – HE'S FUCKING RELENTLESS WHEN HE'S LIKE THIS.

CG: IT'S EASIER TO JUST FACE THE FUCKING MUSIC AND SEE WHAT THE HELL HIS PROBLEM DU JOUR IS.

GC: B3ST OF LUCK K4RKL3S. MY THOUGHTS W1LL B3 W1TH YOU.

GC: 1 W1LL TH1NK ONLY POS1T1V3 TH1NGS.

GC: 4LL TH3 POS1T1V3 TH1NGS.

CG: WHATEVER TEREZI.

- carcinoGeneticist [CG] ceased trolling gallowsCalibrator [GC] –

When entering Slick's office, it was always prudent to enter slowly, more so since the man's blind spot had increased exponentially a couple months ago. The caution was unnecessary today, though, because Slick was simply sitting at his desk, bent over a pile of papers, his fingers twisted into his hair. "Sit," he snapped, without looking up.

Karkat obliged and reflected – as he sat there in front of the desk of the man who was somewhat reluctantly his guardian and primary caretaker – that while it was usually easy to forget that Slick had once worked at a cush government office job, when you stuck the man behind a desk and threw a bunch of papers in front of him, it was like he'd never done anything else. The suit didn't help matters any, even with the eye patch. Karkat suspected it was something to do with the neurotically alphabetized filing folders and the paperclips. The cigarette smoldering in the ashtray and the half-empty bottle of bourbon did little to offset the picture.

"What?" he asked, after Slick didn't seem about to say anything else. And indeed, the man didn't actually say anything at all in return. He simply shoved a stack of photos across the desk and returned to flicking through the pile of knife-pocked blueprints. "It's a fucking bank," Karkat observed after the first two or three pictures. He brandished the stack. "Is this your next job or something?" A nod.

Karkat craned his neck to see the blueprints. "So when're you gonna knock the place over?"

"Tonight."

Karkat flicked through the pictures again and then shrugged, depositing them on the desk. "Listen, Dad, sorry I like, freaked the fuck out last time but I mean, this is just a bank robbery, you really don't have to tell me because I usually find out when the cops show up."

"You should study those pictures," he growled.

Karkat cocked his head. "Why?" Another thought occurred to him, and he glanced around, into the shadows. "Shouldn't you and the Crew be getting ready or something?"

"They are."

Karkat's expression went flat. "You need me to drive you to the fucking bank, don't you."

Slick looked up sharply, shark teeth bared. "Alright, first of all, you little shit, it's not like you would have any other options if I did. And second of all, I need you for more than just a fucking getaway car."

"Huh?"

The gangster sighed and dropped the blueprints back onto the desk, leaning back in his chair. "Karkat, you're six and a half now. You're in goddamn middle school."

"Thanks, Captain Obvious." Although, if he were to be honest, he was amazed the man remembered.

Slick grabbed the bottle of bourbon and looked reflectively at it. "And you know how to drive a fucking car."

"Yeah. So?"

"Well." He took a belt of the liquor and smirked at the troll. "Don't you think it's about time you learned how to rob a bank?"

-()-

MOBSTERS MAKE GREAT PARENTS. :D