"You know Nefertiti retired?" Christina asked, halfway to Princeton. They'd pulled off in a little town on the border of Maryland and New Jersey, stopping at a diner to grab dinner and decide weather or not to find a hotel or keep driving.

"Please," Kuro scoffed, sipping at a vanilla milkshake. "People like us don't retire. We either stay sharp or get sloppy, but we never actually retire."

Christina shrugged, "Fair enough." She popped a fry in her mouth and tapped her fingers over the tabletop, "She'll say yes, anyways."

"Oh, she will, will she?"

"Mm-hm," Christina nodded. "She's drownin' in student debt. Guess being a med student ain't all that it's cracked up to be."

"Medicine, huh?" Kuro cocked an eyebrow, "I knew she always had an interest in the field, but I never thought she'd do anything about it."

"… Nile died three years ago. Car crash," Christina swallowed a gulp of her sweet tea. "Not only was it what got her out of the game, but I think it was the kick in the ass she needed to pursue medicine."

"There's more to that story, isn't there?" Kuro asked with a frown.

"Mm-hm. But it ain't my story to tell, darlin', so if you want the whole series, you'll have to ask her," Christina sat back in her chair, and flagged the waitress down. "Now, are we drivin' or sleepin'?"

They got a hotel room, and decided they'd have breakfast at Nefertiti's.

"She'll shut the door in our faces," Christina mused, staring up at the ceiling of the hotel room, arms crossed behind her head. Kuro was in the other bed, jotting stuff down in a notebook by lamp light.

"Not if we break in before she gets up," Kuro tapped the end of her pen against her jaw, chewing idly on the tip of it.

"… You're nutty, you know that, darlin'?"

"Takes one to know one, doll. Now go to sleep."

Christina rolled her eyes but turned over and did as bid. She fell asleep to the sound of Kuro's pen scratching over paper.

"What… How… When…"

"Hey, Nefertiti. Been a while!"

Christina beamed at the woman who came into the kitchen, watching her carefully maneuver around a stack of boxes in the middle of the apartment's living area. She held up a steaming mug, "You still like your coffee with more sugar than a pixie stick, right?"

"Christina? Where did you come from?!" Nefertiti Storm exclaimed, finally finding her words. She reached over the counter and snatched the coffee from Christina's hands, and then proceeded to down half of it in just a couple of gulps, "Why are you in my apartment?"

"Oh, Kuro and I are going to be running a con, and we need a fence," Christina replied, turning back to make sure the eggs she'd been cooking hadn't burned. She and Kuro had essentially broken in, yes, and were making themselves right at home.

"Kuro," Nefertiti repeated, flatly. "I thought she was in prison."

"Oh, I got out," Kuro said, as she sat up from where she'd been lounging on the couch. Nefertiti jumped, apparently haven't noticing her, "Nef, doll, I thought you retired."

"Well, uh," Nefertiti stuttered, green eyes flickering around the room at the stacks of boxes and packages littering her apartment floor. Anything from textbooks, computers, notebooks, bedding, and… basically, anything a person could use for college life, "I did."

Kuro was working her way through one of the suckers from Nefertiti's stash of candy.

"Hm. Not as exciting as hijacking trucks that are smuggling dryers from Canada, though, huh?" Kuro stood up and started walking towards Nefertiti. Nefertiti let out a squeak and started backing up, until her back hit the wall.

"Well, I don't do that anymore," Nefertiti said in a rush. "Turning over a new leaf, you know. Working on my medical degree."

"Oh, but you were so very good at it," Kuro purred, and Christina pulled the eggs off the stove and turned to watch Kuro circle Nefertiti like a cat did its prey.

"Well, thank you," Nefertiti smiled weakly, nodding. She twitched her head to the side, dislodging a lock of her brunette hair from her face.

"Mm-hm," Kuro pointedly glanced at the wall to Nefertiti's left, where dozens upon dozens of name brand backpacks were hung up. "So, uh, these are all for personal use, right?"

"Why are you two here?" Nefertiti asked, finally losing a little of her patience.

"Christina told you. We have a job, we need a fence," Kuro took another lick off her sucker, raising an eyebrow. "You aren't bored out here, are you Neffy?"

Nefertiti let out a laugh, just bordering on hysterical, "No! No, of course not. Why would you think that?"

"Good, good," Kuro nodded, amicably, looking pleased. Then, she went in for the kill, "How's that student debt treating you, Nefertiti?"

Nefertiti went quiet, her eyebrow twitching and green eyes shining with desperation, "Nothing I can't handle."

"Uh huh. And what if I told you, Christina and I have a job, that is guaranteed to get rid of it all?"

"Yeah? Well, I told you, I'm not in that game anymore," Nefertiti took another sip of her coffee. "I'm out. And I'm fine where I am, thank you."

"It's a very big job," Christina put in with a grin, setting her elbow on the counter and her chin in the palm of her hand. "Pays very well."

"Still not interested," Nefertiti crossed her arms.

"Do you want me to tell you how big the job is?" Kuro asked.

"No,"

"I think I'm going to tell you how big the job is,"

"No, no, I would really rather you didn't…" Nefertiti trailed off as Kuro leaned in to whisper in her ear. Her expression went blank, and her eyes glazed over as Kuro straightened back up. Her voice, tinged with disbelief, was barely above a whisper, "Are you serious?"

"Yes," Kuro grinned.

Nefertiti swallowed, thickly, eyes wide. She looked severely ruffled, and Christina couldn't tell if it was because Nefertiti was on the edge of a breakdown or because she was in shock. She groaned, and let her head fall back to thump against the wall, "Oh, well thanks a lot!"

Kuro smiled, and turned around the corner to duck into the kitchen with Christina, "You're welcome!"

Christina turned her gaze towards the apartment to give the entire space a considering look, "How do you explain all this to your landlord?"

"…" Nefertiti bit her lower lip, "E-Bay?"

Kuro snorted.

"Who's next?"

"There's a guy up in Detroit I've heard about. We'll need his skills behind the keyboards."

"Let me get this straight—you'll be paying me nine hundred million to hack one of the most complex security systems in the world, on the opening night of a new casino in Vegas?"

"Nine hundred thirty-seven million and five hundred thousand,"

"Tomato, tomahto. Is that it?"

Christina popped another peanut shell in her mouth, sucking on the shell for the salty flavor. She chewed as Kuro smiled genially at man on the other side of the bar, waiting to see where this would go.

"You'd be proving yourself as one of the best in the business, Mr. Blackout," Kuro said, sipping at her scotch. "It's a once in a lifetime opportunity."

"Is it?" Tyler Blackout raised a pierced eyebrow, the silver glittering in the spotlights surrounding the top of the bar area.

"You tell me," Kuro shrugged. "You… tell me… if it's worth it to work the rest of your life in this, admittedly very… marginal… establishment, for the next twenty years, just so you can help your cousin through college, and not be able to put any of that hard-earned money into what you want to do with your life. You've got a big heart, Mr. Blackout, and the people I'm pulling together, all do."

Christina cocked an eyebrow to herself and took a long pull from her coke bottle. Now that she thought about it, though, Kuro had a point: Nefertiti, struggling through college so she could get a good job, and she'd never taken any job before that didn't have a big payout, having always wanting to support her brother. Kuro, always willing to bend and break the law so she could help others and had paid for it by going to prison when her brother had come to her for help. Christina herself, she never took a job unless it was to help someone, and this job… yeah, Kuro had come to her for a reason. Lucas, though Christina didn't know him like Kuro apparently did, seemed good-hearted enough. At the very least, he was willing to risk his well-being to help them bring down his father and Nemesis Inc.

They were thieves. But thieves with a different code of conduct than most.

"Wouldn't you like to be able to live your life, without any worries?" Kuro drawled, leaning one arm on the bar to get into Tyler's personal space, "Because you see, I know all about you, Mr. Blackout. I know who you are, I know why you work three different jobs, and I know none of them are what you want to be doing, but you do it for Masamune. You took him in when his father died and his mother disowned him, and I respect that… when no one respects you. But I also know that you have a God-given talent, and to watch that talent go to waste is so, so sad."

Tyler's green eyes seemed to glow, as he held Kuro's own piercing golden gaze. Christina watched over the rim of her bottle as they stared each other down for several long moments.

Tyler broke first, smirking and turning to shout over his shoulder, "Hey boss!"

"What?!" Came the call from a back office. Christina felt her lips twitch down at the blatant annoyance and disgust in the owner's voice, "Quit flirting with the patrons, Blackout, and get back to work! I don't pay anyone for being lazy!"

"I quit!" Tyler barked back, throwing his apron off and on the floor, "Find someone else to clean up your goddamn messes, you fucking pig!"

Christina grinned.

Oh, but Tyler was going to be fun to have around.

"If I thought you'd gone loco wantin' to rope Lucas in, you've gone mental wantin' him on the team," Christina hissed, when she saw who had walked into Antoine's Restaurant.

Nearly three days after roping Tyler into their job, and he'd been travelling with them that same amount of time, too, the trio had found themselves in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana, waiting to meet the sixth member of their team. Kuro only smiled and ate another oyster, her back to the young man who was approaching their table.

At Christina's nine o'clock, Tyler looked up and over, then let out an appreciative noise when he saw him. He took a long pull of his beer, and propped one elbow on the table, "Well, at the very least, things will get interesting around here."

Christina scowled, "Things would have been interesting enough with the characters Kuro's already pulled together. Adding this guy to the mix is sure to cause an explosion!"

"Oh, Christina, but it's lovely to hear your voice again," the man in question drawled as he finally came in earshot. He grinned and dropped in the chair across from Christina, between Tyler and Kuro, and reached up to slide his sunglasses into his wild mess of blonde and black hair, "And don't worry. The only explosions that'll be happening are the ones I'll be causing."

"Nero Konzern," Christina deadpanned.

"diAngelo, now," Nero leaned back in his chair, then flagged down a waiter.

"Your usual, Mr. diAngelo?" The waiter asked, apparently familiar with the other man.

"And the chicken Rochambeau," Nero grinned. "Thanks Jeanne."

"Of course," The waiter smiled in response, turned on his heel, and walked off to put the order in.

Nero's cheer faded, and he tilted his head to look at Kuro and Kuro alone, "What are you roping me into, Blackheart? Word through the grapevine is, you're going after Nemesis Inc."

"People already talking, hm? I'm hardly surprised," Kuro mused with an enigmatic smile. "I'm surprised you actually decided to meet with us, considering… well. Considering."

"My father may have disowned me," Nero scoffed. "And Julian might not have spoken to me in ten years, but he's still the only family in that stuffy mansion that treated me like I was a person."

Kuro laughed, "Oh, but family can be complicated, can't it, doll?"

"It can," Nero agreed. He paused, "And it gets even more tangled when it turns out half your family is mafia."

Both Christina and Tyler choked on their drinks. Christina wheezed, thumping her chest as she struggled to get the water from her lungs. Tyler just coughed viciously, gasping for breath.

Kuro didn't even seem like she was surprised by this news.

"And when Ziggurat bought out Konzern International, one of Hades Inc's Italian headquarters was mysteriously blown up," Kuro smirked. "And following that, his private security detail dropped dead in their homes, killed by mysterious circumstances."

"I love a big boom," Nero shrugged, nodding his thanks as Jeanne came back with a glass of wine. He was silent as the other three put their orders in for the main course, and once Jeanne was gone, he continued, "Aunt Carmen's the one with a penchant for poison, though."

He sipped his drink; a contemplative look on his expression. Christina took the time to look the young man over.

The first time Christina had heard of Nero Konzern, he'd barely been out of his teen, just a couple of years younger than Christina. He'd just been disowned from the Konzern family, an event that had made headlines all around the world, and he'd come to the states to get away from vulture-like paparazzi. Not that it had been all that better here, but Nero Konzern had quickly disappeared off the face of the earth. Murmurings had quickly started, a few months after his vanishing, of a young man of his description making his name in the underground world with his flashy temper, and even flashier ability to walk away from any scene with the ground burning behind him. The first time Christina had met Nero Konzern, it had been on a job in New York with Kuro and Nefertiti, and it had quickly become apparent that they were like oil and water.

In other words, their tempers couldn't handle being in the same room alone for five minutes at a time. Nero was set off at the smallest things, and it was something that quickly grated on Christina's nerves and patience, and when she had finally snapped at him to get a grip on himself, it had nearly turned into World War Three.

Now, though, thirteen years later, the Nero diAngelo who sat across from Christina seemed more subdued. His eyes still flashed with fire, but his body language wasn't screaming that he was spoiling for a fight, not like it once used to. He sipped at his wine, listened as Kuro explained the job, nodding along and asking questions at the appropriate points. He wasn't the brash young man he'd once been, jumping from job to job without a care of his teammates or what bridges he'd end up burning when he finally ran.

It… wasn't quite a night and day difference, but it was a definite change. Christina felt like, at least, maybe, she could work with the younger man if he truly had a hold on his temper as it seemed like.

"So, we're striking him on his opening night, huh?" Nero mused, pulling Christina from her thoughts. He tapped his fingers over the tabletop, "Brutal, but effective, especially when he'll be under so much public scrutiny."

Kuro grinned, sharply, "Exactly. So, now that I've given you the details, are you on board?"

"You haven't given me all the details," Nero said, pausing as their food arrived. They dug in, taking a few moments to get a few bites of their food, before Nero continued, "Now have you, KB?"

Kuro's brow furrowed, "I'm not sure I know what you mean?"

Nero raised a pointed eyebrow, eyebrow piercing catching in the light of the chandeliers overhead, "Perhaps the fact that my brother has been invited so Rago can rub in his face his success with the former Konzern business?"

Kuro swallowed, and gave Nero a dry smile, "Figured you might say no if I told you that up front."

"Kuro, blowing one of Ziggurat's offices up, and watching his private security detail drop dead was just the tip of the iceberg for my quest of vengeance," Nero smirked, a dark look entering his eyes. "I've been waiting years for an opportunity like this to present itself. You really think I'm going to say no?"

Christina laughed, drawing the others' attention towards her, "He's got you there, Kuro."

"Yes," Kuro said, dryly. "I supposed he does, doesn't he?"

Nero diAngelo, formerly Konzern for this fic, has connections to the Italian mafia. This is a headcanon of mine that I've had for years now, of the Konzerns having ties to the mafia, and this won't be the only fic this will be seen in. In this AU, Nero's disowned from his family by his father, and for a while, he kept in secret contact with his brother... until that stopped too. Don't worry, that'll be touched on too.

Nefertiti, I had to alter her story a bit, so I'm sorry to my Nile fans out there who might have been thinking they'd seen him in this fic. Not this time, my viewers. She's still got her medical story, though, so that's something that didn't change. Also, she's the Tammy of Ocean's 8 in this fic, just fencing in a college campus setting instead of as a suburban mom.

So, who do ya'll think will be introduced next? We've had Kuro travel from Portland to grab Christina in Nashville, find Lucas in D.C., Nefertiti in Princeton, Tyler in Detroit, and now Nero in New Orleans. Where else could we go?

Hint: there's only one location left, and it's the final one

Hope ya'll enjoyed and will leave a review! until next time, ciao!