Chapter 4: Roll On The Patrol

The chapter title kind of rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? Well, to me it does. But, you're not here to hear about me. You're here to hear about Sun and Neptune and their cop stuff while they're still there in the department. Try to say that ten times fast. Not that I can hear it, of course. But, it's still fun to do. Like reading! Speaking of reading, let's get to this latest chapter!

xxx

Sun and Neptune showed up at the Vale City Police Department that morning, at nine o'clock sharp. But, what was less sharp about the duo was what they were wearing.

For some ungodly reason, Sun had gotten it in his mind last night to dress up like the typical 'loose cannon cop' character archetype. So, he was wearing a pair of weathered jeans, a dark blue flannel shirt that was less than halfway buttoned up, and a yellow letterman jacket. Oh, and a pair of orange aviator sunglasses, too.

Neptune on the other hand, was practically forced by Sun to wear boring brown slacks, a white shirt, dark blue tie, and grubby blue flannel blazer with leather patches on the elbows. And, when 'forced' was mentioned, it was more along the lines of, 'Sun had thrown his regular clothes out the window, leaving only these ones'. Sun was glad, though. Now they really looked the part of a buddy cop duo! They were the winning combination of a by the book, straight-laced detective, and a reckless cop who didn't play by anyone's rules!

Spitting out the toothpick he was chewing on, Sun turned to Neptune and said, "Ready to stop crime, partner?"

"Let's just go in already," Neptune groaned. He seriously needed either a strong cup of coffee or a fistful of aspirin. Maybe both. Probably both. A bullet to the head would be nice too.

As the hunter pair walked through the police department, Neptune couldn't help but notice a bunch of strange looks thrown their way. Mostly at Sun, but quite a few were cast at Neptune as well.

"Uh, dude? We're getting looks," Neptune pointed out to Sun as they walked past all the officer's desks.

"Ignore 'em. They wouldn't know a badass cop duo if it bit 'em in the dick," disregarded Sun.

All Neptune could do was groan as he and Sun walked into the briefing room, where a bunch of police officers and detectives were gathered.

Sun was trying his best to keep up his cool, detached attitude. But on the inside, he was really wanting to give everyone high-fives and make guitar riff noises with his mouth. This was SO badass! He was going to be fucking Riggs! Or, he would be thinking that, if the Lethal Weapon series existed in their world! (Instead, they got Fatal Gun. Close enough).

Just as Neptune and Sun slipped into two free seats in the back of the room, Chief Irons stepped up at the front. Gripping the podium, he began to give everyone their morning briefings.

"Mornin'. Now, I'm gonna make this brief, since we've got a lot of cases to work on today. Now, to you patrol officers, just stay on the same patrols as yesterday,". Chief Irons paused to clear his throat. "Anyway, same cars, same patrols. Moving on, detectives. Ingram, Brown, get on that Hojo case. Seed, I want you to pay a visit to the Nielsen's. They've been quite for a little longer than I'd like. Hanson, Penhall: keep working on that drug bust. And Runge, we've got a lead on those hospital murders. Get on it, okay? Now, if there's any concerns about your assignments, now's the time to bring it up."

Neptune and Sun raised their hands at the same time. They briefly looked at each other in confusion, before Sun dropped his hand. He and Neptune were probably thinking the same thing. Might as well let the one on the suit do the important talking.

Chief Irons noticed Neptune's raised hand in the back of the room. "Yes, Vasilias?"

"Sun and I didn't get an assignment," Neptune pointed out. An uncomfortable silence lingered in the room. Chief Irons tapped his fingers on the podium as he thought of an assignment for them.

"Tell ya what," Irons finally said, "You'll be on patrol today. Ya know, to get a feel of being a cop? Just ask Morales for the keys to the Gabby."

"The… Gabby, sir?" Neptune couldn't help but ask. He could have sworn that he heard a few officers snickering at him. But, that could have been the air-conditioning too. An old building like this one had an AC system that sounded like a wheezing man on life support.

"Right. You'll be ridin' in the Maxwell Flats today," Irons ordered. Then, raising his voice, he said to the rest of the gathered officers, "Now get going out there! Oh, and the annual baseball game got pushed back to the third of next month."

That got a few disappointed moans from the crowd, but they didn't take their displeasure further than that. They had work to do, after all. Baseball didn't really fit into any ongoing police investigations. That, and everyone had their fill of baseball related murders ever since that one spree killer last year. Now that was a bizarre case.

Standing up, Sun made a beeline for the door, with Neptune following right beside him. He had trouble catching up, as Sun was walking much faster than normal.

"Dude, we're gonna get a fucking car!" Sun excitedly exclaimed. He just couldn't contain his excitement at that point.

"But it's called The Gabby…" Neptune complained. He just couldn't trust a car with a name like that.

"Hey man, don't be hatin' on weird names. If you did that, then you'd be hatin' on most chicks at Beacon, right?" offered Sun.

Sun certainly did have a point. Given some of the names of the students at Beacon Academy, Neptune couldn't really complain about a car named The Gabby. Off the top of his head, he could count some of the odder names he had heard mentioned around school. Names like Tor Brick, Rickert Pines, Katz Kobayashi, L'Davina Plaid, Darrel Carrot, and Velvet Scarlatina. And, as much as Neptune hated to admit it, his own name wasn't very common either. So, he had to agree with Sun that he had no real ground to judge things based on names.

"…I guess…" Neptune mumbled in defeat.

"Bro, think about it! It's probably some slick muscle car or something!" Sun continued to think aloud as they walked over to the armory.

"Sun, I doubt that they'll hand their best car over to a buncha rookies," said Neptune.

"Where's your sense of fun, man? You're fuckin' lame, I swear," Sun loudly groaned.

"Hey, I know how to have a fun time!" Neptune protested. "I'm a fun guy!"

"More like a bitch-ass nerd…" Sun mumbled at Neptune.

Now that pushed Neptune's buttons. "Hey, I'm no nerd! I'm an intellectual!" he heatedly argued.

"Oh yeah, then why does an 'intellectual'," Sun air-quoted, "carry around a D20 in his pocket? Huh? Answer THAT."

"It's a good luck charm!" was Neptune's defense. But, it was immediately shattered when Sun noticed him unconsciously playing with the die in his slacks pocket.

"Yeah, right. Admit it, you just wanna go back to the days of being a troll-elf or whatever," Sun said, his smug grin growing. He knew he had this argument in the bag.

"Okay, first of all, that isn't even possible! I mean, what would his character alignment even be? And don't get me started on classes. So, don't EVEN talk about stuff you don't know about!" Neptune angrily yelled.

"Proved it," chuckled Sun, as he relaxed his arms behind his head.

Neptune briefly snapped out of his anger at that statement. "Huh? Wha?". But then, he swiftly realized that he had been had. He played right into Sun's argument. Damn that monkey man!

"Oh, fuck you…" Neptune moaned.

By the time that argument finished, Sun and Neptune had already walked through the armory's doorway. And, of course, Officer Morales must have heard the very loud argument in the hallway, because it looked like he was trying not to laugh at the pair.

"Oh, hey, the married couple's here," he quipped at Sun and Neptune.

"Ha. Ha," Neptune sarcastically laughed. This day just wasn't going well for him so far.

Sun scratched the back of his head. "Look, Morales. We need the keys to The Gabby. Think you can just hand 'em over so we can get a move on?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure." Officer Morales said. He got out of his chair and walked over to a peg board full of key hooks. He browsed the selection of keys briefly, before he apparently found the right set. Taking the keys, he slid them under the window to Sun.

"It's parked at the back of the garage. Oh, and bring it back with a full tank," advised Morales.

"Yeah, whatever," Sun said, grabbing the keys and twirling them around his finger.

"Chucklefucks…" Morales muttered under his breath as Neptune and Sun walked out of the armory. But, at least he didn't have to drive that thing. Those rookies were in for a fun time indeed.

xxx

A while later, after Sun and Neptune had gathered all their supplies from the locker room, the pair walked into the parking garage located behind the station building. Of course, by the time they found the right way to get to the garage, most of the regular patrol officers had already left. But, being a little late wasn't a problem. There was always time to stop crime!

"Dude, this is gonna be fucking sick! We're really in it now!" Sun exclaimed as he walked down the mostly empty parkway.

"Yeah, I guess so," Neptune agree with a small grin. Sure, this morning wasn't that great, but if he could get out there and be a huge badass, then things might actually start to look up.

"Look, I think that's it!" Sun announced, pointing to a car in the distance.

"Where?" Neptune asked, squinting.

"The muscle car over there. Right next to that busted-ass van," the monkey Faunus clarified.

"Huh. I guess we did get one, huh?" Neptune observed. But, by the time he looked over at Sun to gauge his reaction, his partner had begun to sprint ahead of him.

"It's beautiful!" Sun thought as he raced towards the muscle car. It was everything Sun could have ever possibly wanted in a slick police car. Black rims. A dark blue paint job with red racing stripes. And a badass, rumbling engine noise when it started up.

Wait, why was it starting up?

Wait, why was it driving out of the garage?

"Oh, sonuvabitch!" Sun yelled in frustration as his dream car drove off. He stopped in place to watch his sweet ride drive off, almost unable to believe that he wasn't going to drive that piece of art.

As Neptune caught up to Sun, he heard his partner yell, "Get back here with my car, you fuckin' cockbite! Fucking fuck!"

"Calm *huff* down, Sun *puff*" pleaded Neptune as he caught his breath. He considered leaning on his friend's shoulder to catch his breath, but considering the mood he just entered, that probably wasn't a good idea.

"God DAMN it! We're stuck with that shitty fucking van?!" Sun cried incredulously.

"Looks *huff* like it," observed Neptune. Truth to be told, that was probably the last car that was available to them, unless they felt like stealing someone's personal car. But then there would be no point to being a cop anymore. They were here to stop crimes, not commit them.

Resigned to his fate, Sun walked up to the van, with his partner following him. In hindsight, he probably should have been like Neptune, and judge the car based on its name. Because, for a van this crappy, The Gabby seemed like an oddly fitting name. It was at two decades old, some of the black and white paint job was chipped, and the VCPD logo was just stenciled on the sides of the doors. If they were lucky, the sirens on the top might work.

Sun climbed into the driver's seat, and Neptune into the passenger's seat. Looking around, they noticed that the front of the van was separated from the back by a mesh grate, with only a small hatch giving them access. Well, on the plus side, at least they could hold criminals in here. The back was roomy, and had benches lined alongside the walls. Still, that didn't make up for the fact that this was a horrible car.

When the key was turned in the ignition, the engine roared—scratch that, wheezed to life. Sun rolled his eyes so much at that sound that he almost made himself dizzy.

Just before he pulled out of the parking space, Neptune stopped him. "We should probably call in us leaving, bro."

"Yeah, yeah…" Sun muttered, looking for the car number of the van. Looking at the label hanging off of the key ring, apparently The Gabby's car number was A-12.

Sun flipped on the radio attached to the dashboard and said into the receiver, "Dispatch, this is car A-12, heading out."

A voice crackled on the other end, "Roger that, A-12."

Tossing the receiver back onto the dashboard, Sun took The Gabby out of park and began to drive out of the garage.

Yep, he and Neptune were on the patrol now. At least busting criminals might make them feel better. Probably.

Maybe.

xxx

Really, none of you should be surprised that they're driving a van. Think about it. Nearly every car someone drives in my stories is a van. The only exception was a truck that one time. But yeah, somehow, vans are just funnier to write about. They're like a truck's fat cousin. That, and it's easy to make vans look sleazy as shit. Anyway, enough about vans, I've got other things to talk about. Like leaving me reviews or messages! Those are always fun for me to read. So get on those, please!

This has been The Draigg, and I'm done here for now!