New York Radical

By: PrinceOfNewYork

Chapter 21: And Now Here is Your Prize

Summary: After the turn of the century, as technology is beginning to become prominent in American society, the children of New York are still out working in sweat shops, running machinery, and selling news papers. However, growing up in New York can be dangerous, in many different ways.

Disclaimer: Most of these guys are all mine! However there are a few, that are not, and they are the property of Disney. Also, some are properties of close friends of mine. These friends have accounts on this site under the names of AmbrLupin, and Oberon O'Neil. Beyond that, they are mine. If you need or would like to know which character belongs to whom, don't be afraid to ask.

A/N: The third (and final) installment of the NYR trilogy. So, I hope you enjoy it, don't be afraid to review, and ask as many questions as necessary. Thank you all, and enjoy!

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Eventually, Prince made up her mind to go outside and enjoy the summer air. She hadn't been out in a while to really enjoy herself anyway. She leaned back against the stone wall and stared up at the sky. She saw a couple of birds fly by through the clouds as someone tapped her on her right shoulder. She turned to look but found no one there.

"Gotcha," Red whispered in her left ear as she turned the other way to look at him. She smiled faintly, but had a hard time making it convincing. He could tell. "How you doin'?"

She shrugged. "Nervous," she said honestly.

"Dun blame ya," he said with a small nod as he leaned back beside her. However, he kept enough distance so as not to concern or alert those around them. All the same, in his current outfit, no one really found it odd they were standing by each other.

"So… Mr. Curtis Doyle…" she said giving him a sideways smile.

"He's a good guy," he said nodding a little. "I was surprised… we all were really. But the guys down at Columbia did a good job and were willing to help us out when… no one else would I guess."

She nodded. "It was admirable, not half bad at all," she said slowly nodding her head.

Suddenly something caught the corner of her eye and she turned her head to see what it was, but when she did she didn't see anything. Red noticed her quick movement. "What?"

She shook her head. "Thought I saw something," and she looked up at the sky once more.

"Prince!" she looked back down the street and saw Ace, he hadn't been there a second ago, or maybe he had. She smiled, but didn't make any indication that she knew him. Ace was suddenly shoved forward as Jack stepped into view. The two leaders made their way towards Red and Prince.

"Ya idiot," Jack said, "they dun know her as Prince around here… gotta call her somethin' else."

"Mary," she said with a small smile. "My name is Mary."

"Really?" Jack said and thought for a second. The look on his face showed that he liked Prince better, and it made the young girl laugh a little.

"Look, good news," Ace said. "When these boys came to me to see if I knew of anyone who could help your case I said I really didn't know any lawyers that could help you all out, but then I remembered something. I got a holda Jack and he got in touch with Denton. Denton then called up some of the other newspapermen in town… every paper in the city was represented in the court room this morning. Everyone is gonna know all about this come tomorrow. No matter what happens, you know you'll have the city of New York on your side."

At first, Prince had a hard time understanding, but the more she thought about it, the more it made sense. Of course, if this story was put in the news paper, even if they lost the people of New York would demand that they start keeping better track of the money spent at the refuge. People hate it when they think they're money is being stolen, and that was essentially what the warden was doing. If people have to pay taxes, they had better damn well be going to what they think they're going towards, or people get angry. The more she thought about it the more brilliant it became. She realized that they had officially won the case, even if they had lost!

Avalanche suddenly appeared at the doors of the court house. "Hey," he called to Red. "The recess is about up, we had all better get back inside… heya boys," he said giving a knowing smile to Jack and Ace who simply nodded their heads back in hello and then everyone headed inside to hear what had been decided for their futures.

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When one's mind is racing time seems to slow down, and that was what she was experiencing at that moment. Time was moving at a snail's pace as she was waiting for every juror to file back into their seats. She could feel her heart beat in her mouth, and the feeling made her want to gag. She was so nervous, so scared, so worried. True, it was nice to know the papers were there, but all the same, if things were to go wrong her father must have figured out by now that it was her that leaked the information, she'd be doomed. She could feel herself falling now down into the cellar, never to be let out again. She'd be terrified, she'd die of starvation.

"We the jury find the defendant to be…"

Time froze for a brief moment as her ever active mind raced. They say in the moment before you die your life flashes before your eyes and suddenly that was how she felt. She could remember playing as a child with her mother, running around the house, enjoying herself, her father working all the time, slapping her across the face, her mother leaving, herself running away, her blissful years with the newsies where she may have been hungry but never unhappy. Finally a pain shot down her arm as she remembered being thrown down the stairs into the cellar and then she heard it-

"guilty."

She went numb. Surely it was a trick, surely it was a joke. Surely she had missed the word before that. But no, she hadn't. It was the truth.

"Mr. Snyder you are sentenced to five years in prison for stealing from the government, and the mistreatment of the residents of the refuge. Officers, take him away." You could see from the expression on Monahan's face he wasn't pleased about it, after all, one of his best friends and colleges, and meal tickets was being sent to prison. But with all the papers there and everything else, his power was finally limited. The law had caught up with the Warden, and he was finally feeling the justice he claimed to be doling out for so many years. And this time, it was truly just.

She sat there dumb struck as her father stood and the officers walked over, cuffed him, and carted him away. "This case is dismissed," the judge said as he stood. The bailiff said something about the next case starting at a time and… that was that, just like that, it was over. And just like that, it started.

"Prince," she heard her name for what felt like the first time and it finally felt as though she really was Prince again. No longer Mary, nor Miss Snyder, not Mary Anne, and by no stretch of the mind, was she Princess. No. Finally, she was herself again, and who called her by her other real name?

"Red…" she breathed as she smiled up at him and slowly stood up. "…we won," she said in no louder than a whisper.

"Yeah… we beat 'em," he said quietly back to her. And that seemed to be that.

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To celebrate, Millie, Adam, and Julia offered to come over that night and make Prince a large dinner with the food left in the Warden's house. The house technically belonged to Prince now anyway. Prince however thought for a second. They had far more food than she would be able to eat herself, so she told her Queens friends who had been in attendance at the trial to hurry home, quickly. Get everyone rounded up and bring them to her home in Manhattan for a dinner they'd never forget. Prince kept Jem and Rylet at the house while Wit, and Two-Step ran all the way back to Queens, smiles on their faces, happy to have their true leader back. She told Jack and Ace to run and get the Manhattan boys too, since they weren't that far away, and that all newsies in the immediate area were welcome to come and eat their fill.

Avalanche and Red took Prince home, along with the three who agreed to help with the cooking for the night. They walked into the house and just as Prince was going through the door she heard someone call her name. "Mary Ann!"

She turned around and saw Doyle and his friends running down the street. It was rather comical seeing the rag tag group of college students running at different paces towards her house, like some cartoon. It made her chuckle. Doyle lead the boys up to the gate of the Snyder household and Prince met them there.

"Please boys," she said allowing her voice to slip into it's now natural accent, "ya can just call me Prince."

The boys had a hard time with that, as could be seen on their faces. Perhaps she'd need a different different kind of real name. Something that everyone could agree on. She thought a moment. "How about Mae," she said quietly with a small smile. But of course, it was just her initials after all, M. A. Most people would have a hard time calling her something boyish like Prince. Mae, sounding at least feminine would get her through without dishonoring or disrespecting what she knew, or her family.

Doyle nodded. "Listen, Mae. Due to your father being in jail, there's a few things I wanna bring to your attention, if ya have a minute?"

"Sure," she said unlatching the gate and allowing the boys to come in. "Stick around too," she said, "Julia is going to be making some amazing food."

"We'd love to! Thanks! Sounds great!" the other boys chorused and Doyle chuckled and nodded in agreement.

Prince lead them inside and into the parlor where the piano sat. The boys all pulled up chairs and Doyle brought up his brief case. "Okay, so… Calvin here was the one in charge of what would happen after the case. And he figured out just about every situation, if we won, and lost, and what exactly would happen to us, to you, to your friends and all… Anyway, Cal knows what's set to happen next." So everyone, Prince included turned as the small boy pulled the file in the back of brief case out, and then took an even smaller file out of that.

"This is your file," he explained. "Pretty much, what it says is, this house is now yours. You can do what you want with it. Your father isn't dead but it definitely doesn't belong to him anymore. The government won't take it away from you because you're his relative and technically his heir, still living in it, and essentially able to handle living in it. However, you'll have to pay the government back the money that your dad stole according to what we found and proved. On the bright side, you'll still have income. Technically your father's job is now yours. We pulled a few strings and talked them into turning the position over to you. You can do with it what you want really. You can either start going to the nine to five that were his original set hours, you can hire someone else, you can do what you want. Or you can forfeit it, if you don't do anything in a week or two, the job will be returned to the government and won't be yours anymore."

"Wow… hold on…" she thought for a moment, "so you're sayin' pretty much everythin' that belonged to my father is now mine? Everythin'?"

"Yeah… pretty much. Because you're his daughter, and you're here to accept it all. There's a little paper work involved, but I have that all set just in case this were to happen. You sign the line and you basically take over his estate. And Mae, if I were you… I'd start with the bank accounts after you pay everything off. Even stolen money accumulates interest, and that's all yours."

"…I only have two questions for you boys." Prince said as she looked over the papers. "Where do I sign, and what do I owe you?" she grinned ear to ear. It made the boys laugh to see her so excited.

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The Snyder house hadn't been this lively in ages. Prince was in the parlor trying to play ragtime tunes on the piano. It proved to be more difficult than she had originally anticipated, but she was improving! She had long changed out of her frilly pretty dress and put a different one on, just a plain brown skirt and white blouse, something comfortable and fitting for the evening. The boys were in nearly every room exploring the house. This, of course, included the cellar where many had found the wine and alcoholic beverages and were enjoying them to the fullest. Some of the younger ones were playing in the kitchen with Millie and Julia backing chocolate chip cookies, and some of the older ones were outside with Adam looking at and petting the horses. It seemed everyone was having a wonderful time.

As the night drug on Prince gave up on the piano and said she was going to step outside. So the boys dispersed and went to explore other parts of the house. It was getting later into the night. Already Jem and Two-step had fallen asleep on the couch with cookies in their hands. Many of the Manhattan boys had gone home, while many of the Queens boys had pulled up a cushion and fallen asleep on the soft rugs.

Adam had come inside to grab a bite to eat himself. He gave a nod to Prince as she stepped outside and she smiled back to him. "Just going to see the horses," she said to him. It made him smile a little, and then she was out the door.

It was much quieter outside, she sort of liked it. It was calm and peaceful. She wasn't used to being in her house and happy at the same time, it was different for her. But she liked it. She began to think as she walked around the stables. She would stop from time to time in front of a horse that was awake and pet its nose, which would always make her smile a little more. Perhaps Julia could teach her how to cook well enough from lessons, and Adam would help her sell the horses to good homes. Maybe then she could find enough money to hire Millie on a regular basis. She'd like to get the house converted into a new lodging house for the boys. True, it wouldn't be the same as Queens, but perhaps her house could be different. Maybe she could start a house for runaways who needed a little extra help finding their feet away from home, and a safe place to hide.

As her mind was exploring these ideas she suddenly heard a voice behind her. "Hello Princess…"

Prince whipped around to see who was speaking to her and found herself a mere few feet away from Max Johnson. Avalanche's little brother had a revolver in his hand, pointed directly between her eyes.

"Max… what are-"

"Hush now huh?" he said taking a step closer. "Don't want no one comin' out here to rescue ya. That wouldn't be fair to me would it?"

Prince didn't say a word. She'd been scared of her father, of getting thrown down the stairs to her doom of starvation, but this was a new kind of fear. Starving took time with a chance to be rescued, a gun was a death sentence, instant death, no chance to change your mind or be saved.

"So, I hear your father is gone. 'Bout time, the man was a public menace. This house all yours now huh? Well what happens when you ain't here ta have it? And what about poor poor Red? I think he might have had a crush on you, you little Princess. Let's see how he likes it when I take away from him his newest family member, his new favorite little pet newsie. He'll be sad, I'm sure. And Avalanche? What will he do without his little daughter, or sister, or whatever the hell you were to him…

"Max, why are-"

"Lemme finish!" Prince instantly shut her mouth once more. "See, it's just not fair is it? You lived here and had everything you could ever want handed to you on a silver platter. Quite literally I'm sure. And then your daddy started to work too much, and your mommy left you huh? So when things got a little hard what did you do? You ran away. You ran away from the easiest life and you come to Queens where I could tell right away that you didn't belong…" Of course, Prince remembered the first time she'd seen Max.

"You think you're in a real rough spot I bet," he said to her stopping and glaring at her full on. "Look around. Dere are people everywhere who would kill for a bite of dat food. Starve for a week. See if youse wouldn't do da same," he said before he turned away from her again. She was too shocked to follow after him.

"Then you get lucky enough to meet my brother, my family. You proceed to take him away from me. You take away my only family, the only family I have left. He cares more for you than for me, and would do anything to protect the little princess." Max takes another step forward putting him directly in front of Prince, gun still poised at her forehead. "So now here I am, to get my only family back, after he deserted me for someone he didn't even know, for someone who had everything and wanted more. I'm going to take away everything you have, even your life. I'm going to take my brother back."

"Maximilian Johnson!" Avalanche's voice cut through the hot summer air like a cold knife, and Max's and Prince's heads both snapped to the side to see the elder coming down the back steps, followed closely by Red, not even two steps behind him.

"Brother…" he growled.

"You had the money all along didn't you? You lied to me. You wanted me gone so that you could hurt her."

"Congratulations… Avie," there was a sort of stab in the way the boy spoke to his older brother and said his name. He took a few steps back from Prince with a sadistic smile on his face. "You figured it out. Guess I'm just not as good at improving the truth as you are. And now here is your prize…" Max said as he continued to point the gun at Prince's face. "One dead… whatever the hell this girl is to you. I hope you're satisfied, lose a friend, gain a family member, right brother?" Max looked over at Avalanche, the same scary smile on his face.

Suddenly Avalanche launched himself forward, and oddly enough Red did the same. At that moment that their feet left the ground, time slowed down, and yet everything happened at once. Prince felt herself fly sideways, she heard a gunshot, saw Red collide with the younger Johnson brother, and felt herself fall to the ground, and then her eyes closed.

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A/N: Guess that's the last up date for now. I'll do my best to try and be back here on Thursday. If anyone around is reading this, drop me a reminder and/or a review! And I'll be sure to tell you what happens next. Only a few chapters left, and you won't want to miss the end of this one! R&R please, and we'll see you soon!