Unlikely Friendship

Author's note: Okay, so I sort of changed my mind. Like in my story for SR3, I will be including some interludes to help the story a bit. This will be a prelude to the next one. In fact, I posted two chapters. Enjoy!

After meeting with his two superiors, Veteran Child set out to go look for any of his guys around the campus. Usually two of them would be around a certain area, especially with one of them handling matters in an alley in the town area, probably for fraternities to get high on Loa Dust.

He was dropped off by the driver of The General's limo in Stilwater University. How he would have to get back would be anybody's guess, although he could get a ride from his fellow Sons of Samedi members back to the building where the Gen X studio was, which was in the northern parts of Stilwater near downtown. That was where he had his Topher van parked, which had a psychedelic paint-job, but more in Rastafarian patterns, rather than typical tye-dye patterns.

Right near the big building in the center of the university area, he noticed an outline of a body and some bloodstains on the ground, like someone had been killed in the middle of the street and what looked like a damaged Wellington.

Shit, was Mark killed? Veteran Child thought. It wasn't long until a green Danville pulled up with a black woman in a green crop top and short shorts and a black man with a fedora hat, black vest, black pants, and a green shirt got out.

"Relax, guys, it's just me," Veteran Child said.

"Oh, Veteran Child," the female member said with a Caribbean accent. "We thought you were someone else."

"Sorry about that, we will be on our way," the male member said, also with a Caribbean accent.

"No, wait, stop," Veteran Child said. "I hadn't heard from any of my guys. Do you know what happened to them?"

"Can't say that I do, rasta," the male member said. "Some of our men and women saw some guys in purple around here."

"We found the bodies at the observatory," the girl said. "But nobody say nothing to us, ya dig?"

"Wait, did you say purple?" Veteran Child said.

"That's what we heard, but we only came by a little while ago, ya hear?" the guy said.

"Did you check the bodies of any of my guys for any of their stashes?" Veteran Child said.

"We couldn't find anybody," the girl said. "All we found were blood and outlines of the bodies."

"Wait, bodies?" Veteran Child said. "You mean to tell me that all of my guys are dead?"

"That's what we believe, brotha," the guy said.

"I can't fucking believe this," Veteran Child said.

On the plus side, he didn't have to resort to cutting off some guy's hand. It was as if he wondered if he was in over his head in his involvement in this gang and he hadn't been in the life for too long. He mostly got involved to score some drugs and to do some dealing, but also had his career in being a radio host on Gen X 98.0 and also being a DJ at the On Track nightclub. But at the same time, he knew what the General and Mr. Sunshine were capable of and would probably think twice than to cross those two.

"Do you need a ride, Veteran Child?" the guy said. "I will call some of the others to give you a lift back to the studio if you'd like."

"Nah, I'm good," Veteran Child said. "I need to get some shit off my mind right now. I need to walk. I'll probably ask some others to give me a ride in a bit."

"No problem, Child," the guy said, as he and the girl got back in their car and took off.

Veteran Child walked along the sidewalk and right when he reached the gateway into the University district, he turned right and went into Sommerset. He knew he was in Brotherhood territory, but all he needed was to get his mind off stuff. When those two soldiers mentioned guys in purple, did they mean what he thinks they met? He had only been in the gang life for about a year or two up to that point, as well as pondered about a failed relationship with a female stoner, enough that he dedicated a song to her on his radio show, which was "Hate" from Plain White T's.

As he walked on the sidewalk, a red Alaskan and a red Legion pulled up alongside the road. Four people got out to approach him, wearing some red and black, or even beige clothing, as there were two men and two women who looked like punk-types and had piercings and tattoos.

"What are you doing walking around here, hippie?" One girl said, who had short and spiky blonde hair.

"Are you in the right area?" One guy said with a mohawk and ponytail.

"Guys, stop it," one guy said.

"He's cool with Maero, remember?" the girl said, who was Hispanic and had short hair with a fade.

Veteran Child looked at them with a bit of confusion and mild concern. "Yeah, yeah, Maero's a cool guy. He could tell you that we're cool."

"Oh, you're that DJ guy," the blonde girl said. "Sorry about that."

"It's cool, it's cool," Veteran Child said. "I may run with the Sons of Samedi, but I don't really get too involved in their shit. At least I try not to." He said that last part under his breath.

"It's all good, man," one of the guys said.

"Thanks, hey, listen, I got a question for you," Veteran Child said. "A couple of my fellow gang members said something about guys in purple going into the University and killing some of my guys. Did you guys see anything about guys in purple?"

All four Brotherhood members looked at each other with stern looks on their faces.

"Yeah, I think we saw them pass through here," the Hispanic girl said.

"They were the Saints," the Blonde girl said. "A bunch of washed-up has-beens."

"The Saints?" Veteran Child said. It turned out his intuition was correct. So the Saints had risen from the ashes. While they're presence was known about what had happened only a week prior, it seemed as if they were really making a mark for themselves in Stilwater.

"I see," Veteran Child said. "Thanks for telling me this, guys."

"Hold on," the main guy of their group said. "You know, if you're cool with Maero, then you're alright with us. I just wonder why you don't hang with us instead of those voodoo guys."

"Not that simple, and besides, I try not to get in too deep with the shit that they do," Veteran Child said.

"Okay, I get it," the Hispanic girl said. "Anyway, you want to ride?"

"Sure, just take me back to downtown," Veteran Child said. "My van is there."

Veteran Child climbed into the backseat of the Alaskan and the Brotherhood members gave him a ride there. Suddenly, there was an ad on the radio for Rusty's Needle, a known franchise for a tattoo shop, with Matt from the Feed Dogs advertising them. Though Veteran Child thought that Matt was an alright guy, he still was not sure about playing the Feed Dogs' music on his station because he didn't think they were that good.

Now that the Brotherhood filled him in on who caused the deaths of his dealers, it would be a good idea for The General and Mr. Sunshine to know who took them down and what should be done about them.

ELYSIAN FIELDS

It was getting darker, closer to dusk, and many explosions went off in the trailer park. After the final explosion, Vince felt that it was mission accomplished for bringing down the drug labs that the Sons of Samedi had in the trailer park. Shaundi had filled him in on the labs over there when he gave her a ride back to the crib. While he was at it, he also took out down a TV producer who lived in the trailer park. He killed two birds with one stone.

Suddenly, Vince received a call. "Shaundi, what's up?"

"Hey, Vince, come meet me at Rebadeaux in a bit," Shaundi said. "I have a plan to handle the cooking of Loa Dust. I'll tell you the rest when you get here."

"On my way," Vince said. What was Shaundi's plan? Vince was now about to find out, especially after taking out a few dealers earlier that day.

Another note: This will lead into the next one, which will include the jailbreak.

As for Veteran Child interacting with the Brotherhood, I wanted to make reference to the homie conversation from Saints Row IV between him and Maero. They seemed to be friends despite their standings with rival gangs.