Saints Row (novelization)
Foreword: Hello, my readers. I'm going to start novelizations on this one and the second game. I know I'm not done with my novelization/revision of The Third, but I had quite an urge to do this.
First and foremost, assuming that my readers had played or consumed the games in some ways, I will note that this won't be a complete revision of them. Certain storyline elements won't be changed, but I may also put my own spin on some of them. I may also put in some more dialogue for the Playa/Boss, and visually, he'll look a little more like the default male for SR3.
Truth be told, I have not actually played the first game (didn't own an Xbox 360), but I do know the story after watching several videos on YouTube of it. So I have a really good idea on what I'm working with here. As for certain changes of the city, I would like to pretend certain things were there all along, like the prison island and the nuclear power plant island.
I know some people have done some novelizations of this one, but like I said, this is done from my own vision. If you have any questions, leave them in a comment or PM me. Enjoy!
Stilwater, known to be a crime-ridden city filled with gangs. The city had a long history surrounding its crime problem for many years. With three gangs running things in various parts of Stilwater, it was time for a new gang to make a name for themselves.
It was nighttime in the district known as Saint's Row. Vince Shane, a Caucasian man in his early-20s walked the streets just to get out and maybe get some exercise. What he wore was an odd choice as he wore a plain black T-shirt and a pair of blue jeans, but it didn't matter. Maybe this was a walk just to clear his head or to get out of the house a bit.
Once he turned left on a corner, a man was heard saying something while holding a case full of stuff.
"Watches! I've got watches here!" the man said and saw Vince walking up.
"Yo, hey, man," the man said. "You'd have to pay $600 for this in the store, but I'll give you a good deal!"
As soon as Vince passed, the man shrugged him off and continued to peddle watches. But that wasn't the only thing trying to sell something.
"Hey, baby, you looking for a good time?" a woman said wearing a revealing outfit, with a crop top and miniskirt. It was clear to him what this woman was selling him on.
However, from a distance, someone yelled out "Oh hell no!" Vince and the sex worker immediately turned their attentions to three men in yellow standing in front of a brick wall with graffiti saying "Rollerz" in blue lettering on it.
"Man, fuck the Rollerz" an overweight white gang member said, wearing a yellow jacket and yellow bandana.
"Levar, you gonna let those bitches diss us like that?" said a black gang member with a white basketball jersey over a yellow T-shirt and a yellow sweatband.
"Shit, what you think?" said Levar, another member of that gang, as he started shaking a can of spray-paint and went to pain over that tag.
However, it wasn't long until three young men in blue gear walked up to the men in yellow when they were spraying over the tag, seemingly of the men in blue.
"The fuck you think you're doin'?" said what seemed like the leader of that small crew, as he wielded a baseball bat in hand.
The overweight man in yellow turned around and said, "Just being 'civic minded,' that's all."
"Oh, really?" said another man in blue.
One of the yellow gangsters walked up to confront the men in blue. "Yeah, some dumb ass cracka went and shit on all over this wall, and we just cleanin' it up."
For that, a brawl quickly erupted. One of the guys in blue hit that guy in yellow in the face with the bat, knocked him down, and Levar punched one of the blue guys in the face and even sprayed some of the paint right on his face as well. The six men just fought each other. Levar even threw the can at one of the guys who ran off, while Vince and the prostitute stood there and watched as all this chaos went down. But it didn't end there.
"Hector says 'buenas noches.'" a red Hollywood pulled up with three gang members dressed in red, all seemingly Hispanic, of Mexican descent. One of the gang members pulled out a T3K Urban and started opening fire. One man in yellow and the other in blue tried to react and open fire. However, the two men weren't so lucky.
Another guy in yellow let out a few shots from his Vice 9 pistol, but another gang member in red opened fire with his K-6 Krukov. Even Levar went right to the source to try to get some shots as the one with the T3K was about to reload. He managed to take down the front passenger, but Levar quickly dropped as the man with the K-6 pumped multiple shots into him. Another guy in blue ran up with a K-6, yelling "FUCKERS!" at the red Hollywood as it was about to drive away. Vince and the sex worker ran out of there to get out of harm's way.
The car was rolling away. The man in blue kept firing at the car. Things happened so quickly that some bullets even hit the driver and the car headed right to the brick way. Vince dove out of the way of the speeding car and hit the ground. BAM! He turned around and saw the car hitting the wall and quickly caught on fire. Whether it was from the impact of hitting the wall, the bullets hitting some car parts, or a combination of both, nothing was certain. All that was known was that three gangs just caught each other at the moment and things quickly escalated.
Vince was ready to get back up and go back to his apartment. But he saw the man in blue walk up to a fallen man in red that happened to still be breathing even from the wreckage. The blue-clad man quickly put the man down by laying multiple shots into him. However, exactly the moment the shooting stopped, the surviving yellow-clad gang member popped that guy in the head, and then saw Vince on the ground. He saw Vince crawling backwards as he raised to point his Vice 9 at him.
"Wrong time, wrong place, dog," the yellow-clad gang member said.
Vince knew that he was a witness to a gang attack and for that, he must be eliminated. He was ready to seal his fate and closed his eyes waiting for the inevitable.
BANG!
Vince opened his eyes. He saw that that gang member was now dead and heard someone with a deep voice saying "You okay, Playa?"
He looked around and saw a younger white man in presumably mid-to-late-20s in dark purple shirt holding a pistol, but what got his attention more was an older black man with a black beret, black leather jacket, and purple turtleneck sweater and gold chains coming up to him and letting his hand out to help Vince get up.
"Julius, let's go!" the younger man in purple said.
Julius, the older black man helped Vince get up and put his arm over his shoulder to get to the younger white man. As soon as they regrouped, BOOM! The red Hollywood exploded.
Julius guided Vince across the street with the younger man following them.
"How am I doing?" Vince said.
As soon as they got to the corner, Julius let him go and looked at him.
"That don't look so bad, you should be fine," Julius said and looked to the younger man. "That's Troy. You can thank him later."
"Hey," Troy said. Vince nodded at him in response.
Julius said, "The Row safe no more, son. We got gangs fightin' over shit that ain't theirs and getting into shit where they don't belong. You just got in their way. They don't care if you claimin', representin', or not."
Sirens were heard from a distance. Troy looked up and figured at the distance they were heard, it wouldn't be too long until the Stilwater Police Department would be right at the crime scene.
"Julius, we don't have time to recruit," Troy said.
Julius looked up at Troy. "We need all the help we can get, son."
"No, we need to get the fuck out of here," Troy said.
"Give me a minute," Julius said and turned his attention to Vince. "Look, the Roy's got a problem. Come to the church when you want to be a part of the solution."
"Church?" Vince said.
"It's just a few blocks from here," Julius said. "You can't miss it."
Vince nodded his head. Julius and Troy took off. Vince looked around and just walked away. He didn't want to be considered a witness to this crime. If this man considered recruiting a random stranger because he witnessed a tiff between three gangs, then maybe he should try to see what they're about.
But in the meantime, he felt that he needed to get some sleep. After all, he was nearly killed by being almost run over and shot just for witnessing the gang fight. So he went back to his apartment to get some rest.
It was now late morning. Vince had trouble sleeping from what had happened, but he got some rest anyway. He got up. He put on a similar outfit, but a completely different plain black T-shirt and different pair of blue jeans. He even cleaned himself up. He got out of his apartment and decided to take Julius up on his offer.
The question on his mind was why. Why did this man see potential in him to be in a gang? Vince had gotten out of a two or three-year run with the military but was dishonorably discharged for allegedly disobeying order. Either way, he had heard that Stilwater was overrun with criminal activity. Maybe this was a way to survive the rough streets of Stilwater.
He walked a few blocks and then got to Mission Beach. The church was hard to miss. It looked like it had seen better days. It was filled with graffiti on the walls, but it had to be the right place. Several people stood outside dressed in purple, which seemed to be the gang's color.
Vince walked up to the group of people that happened to be standing in the cemetery that was on one side of the church. Troy stood at the top of the steps as Julius walked out, seemingly ready to make a speech.
"Every motherfucker here knows what we need to do," Julius said. "Those bitches from other sets be riding around thinking they own these streets. I don't care what flags they're waving. Rollerz, Carnales, Vice Kings, no one's making this nigga scared to walk the Row. We about to lock this shit down, right now."
Just then, everyone stood around started cheering, saying things like "all right" and "yeah!"
"Fuck yeah!" said Johnny, a Korean-American man with a flat-top haircut, dyed blonde on top, he turned around and saw Vince standing there. "Who the fuck is this guy?"
"Troy and I found him," Julius said. "I was going to see if he can ride with us."
Johnny added, "Julius, if he wants to run with the Saints, he's got to be canonized."
"Hey, he's right, Julius," Troy said, with a cigarette in his mouth. "Everyone had to do it."
"You ready for this, Playa?" Julius said. "Let's see what you're made of."
Vince looked up and saw the other Saints putting up their dukes, ready to fight. If there was one thing that he knew about gang life, it's that you have to show what you're made of if you're ready to put it down for the set.
The other Saints, men and women, all approached him ready to attack. Vince was not about to go down. As soon as any of them were ready to throw a punch, Vince was already ahead of them and blocked and/or dodged the attacks and laid a few punches on them. Even with women involved, it didn't matter to him. All he had to show was what he was made of.
It took a bit but he took down four other Saints in succession. Troy and Julius looked on like they were impressed, as did Johnny, and Dex, a younger African-American guy with a denim jacket over a purple shirt and a purple visor he wore with the brim pointing to his left.
Troy walked up to Vince and said, "You earned your colors today. Welcome aboard." He immediately shook Vince's hand.
Dex walked up and said, "That's some impressive shit. The only other Saint who kicked ass like that was Johnny."
"Shit, it took me half the time," Johnny said with such cockiness in his voice.
Julius walked up to Vince and gave him a fist bump.
"Welcome to the 3rd Street Saints, Playa," Julius said.
Julius stood before everyone else, like he was ready to make a speech.
"Okay, everyone, let's get down to business," Julius said. "If we're serious about taking back the Row or at least letting people know that it's still ours, we need to let those motherfuckers know what time it is. We got to let them know it's all about respect. We get enough of it, they'll back off and think twice about coming back. We got some friends in town that could use some help. Lend them a hand. Of course, you could always drop any motherfucker waving the wrong flag. So long as word gets out that the Saints is on the Row. I don't give a damn how you do it, you feel me?"
"Hell yeah!" Johnny said.
Vince nodded his head. For some reason, he was quiet in this. Maybe he didn't want to mess up on making his first impression.
"All right, y'all, we'll talk more later," Julius said. "We need to go handle some shit."
Everyone started to walk away, including Vince.
"Hold on, Playa," Julius said. Vince turned around to bring his undivided to attention to his new leader/boss. "Now listen, you proved you can fight, but we need if you can handle yourself out in the streets. Troy here will take you, show you around to see if you really earned to fly the purple. Do you think you can handle yourself?"
"I know I can take care of myself," Vince said.
"Well, all we got to do is see if you can do it," Julius said. "Go on, go with Troy."
Vince nodded his head and Troy told Vince to come on. It was now time to prove his worth.
One thing that he noticed was that Julius called him "Playa." He was ready to tell him his real name, but for some reason he kind of liked being addressed as "playa." Maybe he'll be called that for now.
However, as he was walking with Troy out of the cemetery, he saw Julius walking up to an attractive Chinese-American woman in a black crop top and purple pants. She caught his attention, but right now was not the time to get distracted. He needed to prove his worth some more.
Another note: That was it for this one. There will be more soon and I will get started on the story for SR2.
As you may already know, I am using the character from my SR3 story. I will have him talk more, but not be as chatty as he was from SR2 onward. He will talk, but it depends.
Next up, Vince/Playa tries to prove his worth. Stay tuned.