Author's Note: Glad some of y'all liked the Baltimore reference. I'm a former Marylander and still a Ravens fan, figured it would be cool to mention the Colts as one of the things that add authenticity to the historical nature of this story. I felt it would be a very realistic scene to have the Colts playing on TV while Conway Twitty is on the jukebox. Many of my other stories like "24 Season 10: God's Country" and "24 Season Zero" also have Baltimore area references. There are also West Virginia references in many of my stories since that is where I live now and as I mentioned before some aspects of Charming are actually inspired by things in the Charleston, WV area.

CHAPTER 16: TURNING THE TABLES

"Stop snitchin'" – Baltimore proverb

ROUTE 26, EAST OF CHARMING

The two other Mayans who were in a Chevy Corvair saw Benito's vehicle speed out of Open Range Steakhouse's parking lot and quickly turned on the ignition to follow, heading three blocks past the garishly lit clump of gas stations and convenience stores next to the on-ramp for the Charming bypass. Due to the loud noise of the vehicles, they didn't notice Wally Glazer's Harley bearing down on them behind, weaving past the moderate traffic that still took the bypass this time of night.

Benito smiled as he looked in the rearview mirror and saw the other vehicle coming. "You see? I told you this little game won't last too long. Maybe if you let us go, they'll kill you quickly. Maybe even allow your pathetic little club to continue running under new leadership, that we approve of, of course. It's about time Charming saw a little more diversity."

JT hoped that Wally Glazer was truly was following just behind them at a distance as had been the plan they agreed upon during their last meeting. They had caught a lucky break that the Mayans weren't on their bikes, but it made sense. A bunch of Mexican bikers showing up on imported motorcycles would be too obvious to the Charming police, even if they didn't have their kuttes on. Besides, JT thought darkly, maybe they needed two vehicles if they had intended to kidnap Thomas and Megan and take them to separate places and make it harder for anyone to chase them down.

JT ignored Benito's taunting. "Take this exit, head east," he told Benito as they passed a highway sign for State Route 26, heading into the open countryside east of Charming. "And speed up."

"You say so, man," Benito said, following the orders he was given. Route 26 was a flat and almost deserted highway, and with the exception of a tractor-trailer whizzing by toward one of Charming's two truck stops, there was not a single other vehicle on the road.

"Faster!" Clay said. By now they were going 85 mph, the dashed yellow lines on the two-lane highway going by in a blur. It would be over 25 miles to the next sizable town. They could hear the Mayans' Chevy straining to keep up. That was a fine model, but it was old and poorly maintained by the Mayans whose specialty was in Japanese and West German imports.

Wally easily sped up as they hit Route 26 and caught up with the Mayans' vehicle. He heard some frantic shouting in Spanish as the Mayans realized he was right behind them. He took out a Smith & Wesson 9mm and fired on the car, hitting both tires. The car spun around and the Mayan in the driver's seat opened up with his pistol. Wally continued shooting, one of the bullets grazing the Mayan driver on the arm causing him to further lose control and another slammed right into the passenger's chest, sending a squirt of blood flying upward.

The Chevy sedan headed off the road into a drainage ditch next to a line of grapefruit trees by a large citrus farm. Up ahead, brake lights appeared as the vehicle commandeered by JT and Piney stopped to turn around. Wally saw some movement from the Mayan in the passenger's seat and shot the man again, finishing him off this time. However, the distraction had given the driver the time he needed to roll out of the vehicle and into the citrus grove. A shock came upon Wally as he went over to the driver's side and saw that it was empty.

He felt a sudden, sharp pain in his back, then throughout his sternum as a force sent him flying face first onto the pavement. He saw the trail of blood smeared on the illuminated ground and knew he had been shot, and that he was hurt bad. Wally saw the Mayan come out from behind a tree like an evil goblin, raising his gun to shoot again. Two separate caliber weapons opened up as both JT and Piney opened up. Despite the darkness, several of their gunshots found their targets, Wally watching as the bullets ripped through the Mayan, sending the biker thug falling onto the pavement as blood sprayed forward. The Mayan's dying eyes met Wally's, but then Wally saw a blinding flash of light, and then total permanent darkness, as the Mayan fired his pistol in one final act of payback.

"Wally!" Piney shouted, coming over with JT.

"Fuck!" JT said, kneeling by their friend's lifeless body. JT shouted in grief and anger as he looked around, seeing that the other Mayan was also dead already. JT went over to his vehicle and grabbed Eduardo, dragging him out of the car and beating him.

"JT! Stop! We need them!" Piney shouted. He then whispered in JT's ear. "We'll kill all of them eventually, but we need these guys right now if we're to get to Frisco. Remember what the ultimate goal is. All this ends once we get our hands on Frisco and put a bullet in his fucking head."

JT was still breathing quickly, his adrenaline rushing from the chase and his anger and grief at what had just happened to Wally.

Piney saw that several lights had come on in the farmhouse in the middle of the citrus groves. "We may be out of Charming but the law's going to be on their way. Maybe they just called in a noise complaint thinking it's a bunch of rednecks doing late night target practice but we need to get these bodies out and get the fuck out of here."

"That car's done in pretty bad, no way it can be driven," JT said.

"At least get the bodies, the less evidence the better, and shoot out the gas tank."

JT did what Piney suggested and within two minutes, they were back on the road, with flashing blue lights very far behind them at the Route 99 bypass interchange as a sheet of flame shot up from the ruptured gas tank, illuminating the farmland like a natural gas well. Now there was the issue of telling the rest of the club the news about Wally.

DOCTOR'S OFFICE ROOFTOP, NEXT DOOR TO OPEN RANGE STEAKHOUSE

"I knew they would take the bait," Frisco said to Oscar as they crouched on the rooftop of a doctor's office along with several other Mayans. "They can't survive on the street the way we can." The gloating in his voice was obvious.

It was the perfect perch, they had decided. Unlike the bank next door, there were no security cameras recording them, and thanks to the windows, the wall was only slightly harder to scale than the border fence they climbed to enter the country. The sound of the large air conditioning unit on the roof covered up their voices as they whispered to each other.

"I respect your decision, Frisco," said Oscar, "But while the Hondurans are expendable, Benito isn't. I'm sorry but it still bothers me."

"They would only take the bait if we had someone as high up as Benito there," Frisco responded, "After everything that has happened between the Sons and us, it will only make sense to send our best. But they won't dare do anything to Benito. Not after what we are about to do."

"Remember also that Benito and Eduardo volunteered themselves for this, mi primo," Alejandro said to his cousin.

And as the Sons took off with Benito, Frisco and the Mayans he had with him got back in their vehicles, keeping a tail on Thomas and Megan. Frisco double checked the updated map of Charming they had picked up at a highway rest area and circled an intersection several miles from the town center. The location of Thomas's home was already circled along with Teller Automotive Repair. Frisco pointed to an intersection in the leafy residential neighborhood where Thomas lived.

"This is where we will do it. Comprenden?"

"Si, jefe."

MORADA CREEK AREA, CHARMING

"Well, I'm glad you and Becca cut me off," Thomas said as they drove down the quiet residential streets of Morada Creek, one of Charming's more recently developed areas. He rolled down the window some more to toss out the cigarette he had just finished smoking. Thomas loved the rapport that Megan had with her bartender friend. There was something that was just so casual and carefree about her workplace that he rarely experienced in his outlaw life. Even selling the Wahewa marijuana on the streets, each customer was a potential stick up man ready to pull a gun on him and take his business, and the spectre of the law always felt like it was everywhere.

"You're still absolutely positive you're okay to drive?" asked Megan.

"Yeah, I'm good. Been on my bike with more in my system than that. I swear you're softening me up, girl."

"You know I try my best to save you from yourself," Megan said, smiling, then looked out the back window, slightly annoyed at the lone headlight from the Harley following them at a constant distance. "Does he really need to escort us like that? Like he's the Secret Service or something? Maybe all that only draws more attention from the Mayans."

"Club's orders," Thomas said, "JT's the big boss. What, you don't like the presidential treatment? Plus, you know Otto from the reservation, he grew up with Lenny."

"Yeah, seem him a few times before I moved to Charming. He was never the friendly, chatty type."

"That he's not," Thomas said, "But he pulls his weight. I think about that day at the mall that started all this shit, he took out quite a few Weathermen and Mayans. Each and every one of us was critical that day."

Thomas paused. "Above all, he was loyal. I doubt your friends on the reservation's ever told you this, but he did 4 years in Stockton because he refused to snitch to the Feds about the weed that Raging Bull's allowed to be grown. The DEA was going to use their pull to get the state charges dropped. The DEA agent in charge of that operation was Mark Tasker."

"I'm sorry, DEA? I thought…"

"Yes, he was DEA before he was FBI. That was supposed to have been the case to make his career, make him the head of the Miami division with all the perks, going to the Caribbean on so-called official business."

"Except Otto Moran didn't snitch. Yeah I can see how Tasker would be totally fucking pissed. Having to settle for San Francisco, and not even being able to be there half the time."

"Exactly. He must have pulled some strings through his family to even be able to land that FBI job after how he botched the Otto Moran case. He certainly didn't make any friends on the state level with his style."

"But what still kinda don't make sense to me is, he was so obsessed about stopping weed, and now based on what y'all have told me, he hates the military more than all those stoned hippies throwing shit on the soldiers as they're coming come. So this is really Tasker's personal vendetta against Otto Moran? Now he does seem to hate JT and Piney Winston even more?"

"Knowing that Otto's a member of this club, yeah that's definitely part of it with their history. Otto was the one who got away, who couldn't break. Who rather spend 4 years in the slammer than snitch, because he cared about friendship and loyalty, something those fucking government suits will never understand.

"But above all, Tasker's a thug plain and simple. Not about righteousness, upholding the law, or any of that idealistic bullshit. He's used to being a bully, to having everyone cower before him guilty or not. He's on a power trip, and JT's refusal to bend over and cooperate with his investigation, which his higher ups have a political motive for by the way, and Otto's history explains his obsession about bringing us down."

Megan had just turned her head back forward and pointed to an interesting yard sign when they heard squealing wheels and a loud crashing noise from behind. They both turned their head around and saw Wally's bike flying sideways into a parked car after a large pickup truck had struck it. Thomas immediately drew his weapon but then a large van crashed into his engine block, slamming his vehicle out of the intersection and into a telephone pole, twisting it and causing the lights in the neighborhood to flicker off.

The doors of the van slid open and Alejandro and Oscar opened fire with fully automatic AK-47s along with two other Mayans. Megan screamed at the top of her lungs, clutching her head in her lap as the broken glass of the windshield rained down on her. Thomas snatched his loaded 9mm Ruger pistol from his glove compartment and fired. He saw one of the Mayan prospects go down with a large red mass on his chest but the barrage of gunfire was too furious. However, he was surprised that neither he nor Megan were hit yet.

"Alto! Hold your fire!" Alejandro ordered in Spanish and the guns quickly fell silent. Several more Mayans and Hondurans poured out of the van.

"Come out! We just want to talk! If we wanted you dead we would have killed you already!" Alejandro shouted as one of the other Mayans from an allied charter translated for him. "Pongan sus mano en el aire! Put your hands in the air! Get out of the fucking car!"

"Meg, we need to stay calm and do what they ask!"

She was crying and shivering. "They're going to kill us!"

"They coulda done it already. Just stay calm and let me handle this. I'm the one they want. They don't even know who you are."

She nodded, her teeth clattering in fear.

Thomas raised his hands as Megan did the same. "Okay! We're coming out! No disparan! Don't shoot! We're coming!"

"Vamo! Rapido!" Alejandro ordered impatiently, waving his AK-47 around in the air. He saw some neighbors looking through a window of a nearby house and fired into the living room. "Get down, motherfuckers, I shoot you! Chinga tu madre, maricones de mierda!"

Thomas and Megan got out of the car and slowly stepped forward.

"Keep your hands in the air! Put them on your head and don't move!" shouted Oscar. His violent urges has only been bolstered by his new status as a fully patched Mayan.

Alejandro stepped forward. "Tie them up!"

His henchman followed his orders and tied both of their hands up with thick masking tape. Another vehicle pulled up and Frisco himself got out of the back, also revealing Otto's badly injured body. At least one of his legs and both arms were clearly broken, twisted into abnormal positions and Thomas could hear him crying out in pain.

Frisco had a smug smile on his face as he approached Thomas. "I'm sure you know who I am by now."

Thomas would typically have been cocky even in this situation, but forced that out of himself due to the knowledge that Megan was also being held at gunpoint by these thugs.

"Yes, Frisco."

Frisco kicked Thomas hard in the balls, a blinding pain spreading through him. "Solo mis amigos me llamen esto. Only my friends can call me that. To you, I am Francisco Martinez."

Thomas knew it was pointless to ask what Frisco wanted from them. "Fuck you."

"Even now, you speak with such gringo arrogance. You and your club have taken so much from me," Frisco said slowly and with deep conviction. "You will pay for everything."

"Just…just take me!" Thomas said. "She has nothing to do with this and….and Otto needs to go to a hospital."

"You are all part of this, Thomas," Frisco said, using the Spanish version of his name "My brother, now so many of my friends. You will learn to suffer what we have suffered. You will learn what it means to lose those closest to you."

Frisco tightened Thomas's restraints and motioned toward Megan. "Take her!"

"No!" Thomas yelled, "Don't you dare lay a finger on her you son of a bitch!"

"Oh yeah?" Frisco said. He then backhanded her across her face, leaving her lip bloody.

"You fucking coward! I'll fucking kill you I swear to God!"

"You wanted me to take you, Thomas. Now I don't know what you would have us do with you. You know, in our club, my old lady, she is just my bitch. I fuck her whenever my dick feels lonely. And when I want a new bitch, I tell her to go fuck herself! But you! You are serious about this kind of commitment? You love her? That is your weakness. I know it. Now, Thomas, here is what will happen. We are willing to make an exchange."

Frisco looked Thomas closely in the eye. "Now I have someone you want. You will give me someone that I want. I will return your old lady to you when you bring John Teller to me so I can kill him by my own hand. As for your friend here, you can have him back. You will probably find him a mile from here."

Frisco laughed and then grabbed the injured Otto, throwing him onto the blacktop and tying a chain around his legs, his eyes widening in horror. Frisco then climbed into the driver's seat and floored the accelerator. Thomas saw Otto desperately try to escape the chains in a futile manner as his body bounced up and down the pavement as he was dragged along the streets.

"You fucking son of a bitch!" Thomas shouted. He grabbed the 9mm pistol he had dropped onto the pavement and aimed it at the taillights becoming more distant by the second down the street. Thomas fired four shots, one of them shattering the rear glass window of the Mayans' van, but none of them hit the chain they had tied Otto with.

MARTINEZ IMPORTS TRADING COMPANY, OAKLAND

Megan knew she was most likely in Oakland when she heard the foghorns of the tugboats guiding the larger oceangoing vessels into the port. This was confirmed when the doors to the van slid open and the salty smell of the bay hung in the air, mixed with the diesel exhaust from the trucks engaged in the port commerce. Only a little less than an hour from Charming, yet a world apart.

"Vamos, puta! Ahora!" Alejandro barked as Frisco appeared behind her.

Frisco slapped her hard on the face. "No tenemos toda noche! We don't have all night!" Frisco spoke rapidly, the Mayan translator working hard to keep up with him. He then grabbed her and violently yanked her out of the van, her knees painfully scraping against the rough pavement. "It will be less painful if you get up and walk yourself!"

"Okay! Okay!" Megan said, her tears barely dry from crying silently most of the way here as the Mayans and their Honduran stooges heaped crude sexual references on her as a demonstration of their traditional Latin machismo.

They took her to a large structure that looked either like a long single-wide trailer or a converted shipping container. She couldn't be sure in the poorly lit environment and in her state of mind. The Mayans threw her inside, where there were two cells. There were still some bloodstains on the wall. It was clear that the cells had only been haphazardly cleaned with a number of maggots still crawling around. Flies also buzzed through the dark, stale air.

"You're lucky you don't have a cellmate," Frisco said with a nasty smirk. "We in fact were holding a man here. Someone whose boss refused to pay protection money to cover his business and the safety of his employees. You better hope for your own sake that your boyfriend can convince the Sons of Anarchy to be more accommodating to our demands. If he loves you enough, he'll make sure that they do. "

SEVERAL MINUTES LATER

"So much for keeping a low profile," Unser said as he walked over from his police car, the blue lights still flashing. The entire neighborhood was up by now and observing the scene, several curious residents even walking up to the yellow crime scene tape and asking the Charming PD officers what the heck was going on. Chief Hancock had asked Unser to take charge of the scene, given his relationship with the Sons. The last part was said very sarcastically to be sure as they left the station. It took a lot of urging on Hancock's part for the county sheriff's department to not be involved.

JT, Piney and the rest of the Sons squealed their bikes to a stop by the tape and went right past it. Otto's lifeless, broken body was on a strip of grass separating the street from a sidewalk. A streak of blood ran the entire five blocks he was dragged before the Mayans decided he was definitely dead and shot the chain. The only description of the suspects the neighbors were able to give out was that they were tough looking, heavily tattooed Hispanic males. With illegal alien crime spreading further into the Central Valley every year, that description was no longer very helpful.

"Otto! Fuck!" JT said as he brushed past several forensics investigators. He couldn't believe the club had just lost two of its members within the past hour.

"Excuse me, sir, Mr. Teller, but…" a young female investigator said, smartly trying to not sound too harsh with him.

"Fuck the crime scene. We know what the hell happened. Fucking Mayans got him!" Clay shouted in her face, getting her to back up with a nervous expression on her face.

JT already had a sinking feeling the moment he arrived at the clubhouse with Benito, Eduardo, and their other captives, when Keith McGee told him Unser had called regarding a Mayan attack on club members inside Charming. He thought he had outsmarted Frisco and his goons. However there was a part of him that had still held on to hope. Otto was a tough guy, who had survived a life on the streets, even four years in prison. Maybe he had been able to fight off the Mayan attackers.

His hopes were immediately dashed as he came upon the scene, with a highly distraught Thomas already there as well. Thomas was shaking in both rage and desperation at what he had just witnessed and experienced himself. At one point, very early on in this war, he had thought about finding a way to make amends with the Mayans over the unintended encounter than resulted in Juan Martinez's death. But now all JT felt was a pure, almost feral rage. Frisco's brother was burning in hell, and he was glad, JT thought. It was the Mayans who had asked for it when they allied himself with the Weathermen who murdered Otis Cross and over a dozen other soldiers and civilians in that cowardly bomb attack.

Now it was blood for blood, and the Mayans would pay even more dearly.

"Tell me what happened, Thomas." JT said. "Talk to me, man. What do you remember?" He tried his best to comfort Thomas and share in his grief, but he needed to get to the bottom of things.

"Me and Megan were just in the car and all of a sudden they rammed us, a total ambush," Thomas told JT. "They took her."

"What?" Piney asked in surprise. He had thought maybe she had gone back to the apartment she rented a few miles from here.

"Frisco kidnapped Megan, JT. He said he's willing to trade her for you."

"That's not going to happen," Clay immediately said.

Thomas gave him a sudden almost hostile look.

"What, you think we're just going to surrender our leader to those fucking animals so they can butcher him?" Clay said incredulously.

"Of course not." He looked at JT. Thomas just hoped that JT didn't sense any wavering in his loyalty.

"We're not going to let anything happen to her," JT said.

"We still have a window of opportunity to figure things out," said Piney. "We can't give up just yet. We need to believe that our brotherhood is stronger than this."

"Did Frisco give you a timetable on when this alleged trade's supposed to happen?" JT asked Thomas.

Thomas shook his head. "No, but he says he now knows about our clubhouse and everything, possibly from torturing the guys at Casa Grande. He said he'll call with instructions and to always answer the phone at Teller Automotive, especially after hours."

"Okay," JT said nodding, "It's time we all went home, got some rest and recoup. I want Keith and Clay at the clubhouse, rotating security duties. We're going to hold chapel tomorrow morning at 11, make preparation to lay Otto and Wally to rest, and come up with a plan to deal with this, because if they're going to murder our brothers and take an old lady, we're going to be the ones to end this.

JT turned to Thomas. "I need you to trust me on this brother. Can you do that?"

Thomas did not answer him and just stared blankly ahead.

"Look at me, Thomas. Will you trust me?" JT asked.

"Yeah," Thomas replied, but the conviction in his voice wasn't there.

Author's Note: Again the circumstances of these First 9 members' death are fictionalized by myself though there may be some contradicting info on the SOA wikia site. I use that site as a guide, not as canon.