Under New Management
Word Count: 3,617
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: I'm actually going to call this gen. At least... I tried to make it that way.
Spoilers: up to 1x11.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. I just break things.
Summary: Everything changes when the Hawks get a new owner.
Author's Note: I realized after a certain point that part of my idea was extremely far-fetched, but I think if there's anyone who could pull it off... It's these people working together. :)

New Plan

"You can't go somewhere else."

"Yo, chicklet. You're not supposed to be here," TK said, frowning as the Santino boy barged into his apartment. This was his domain, his kingdom, and no one entered here uninvited. Well, unless they were a super hot woman or a scary guy who went around in black and was probably a vampire, but that dude hadn't been around in a while. That just left the hot women, but he was down to one of them these days.

If she was still talking to him. He'd lost his temper over the super bitch, said a bunch of crap that he shouldn't have, and Vivica hadn't returned his calls for a while. Then again, he wasn't sure that he shouldn't be pissed at her for that article about the Hawks. Headed for Disaster. New Management, No Team. He knew it was true, but she didn't need to write about his business like that.

"I'm not kidding, TK. You can't let yourself be traded."

"Look, kid, I like you. I like New York. I love the Hawks. I love my kingdom," TK said, opening his arms to show off his apartment. "Thing is, though, dog, I can't stay. None of us can. The whole thing's gone to hell—heck—and we can't play like this."

The boy sighed. "What about your therapy? With Mom? You tried someone else, right? And it didn't work. What if you go somewhere and you can't work with the person there?"

"Aw, how sweet, you're worried about me," TK teased, and Jaybird glared at him. He shrugged. "I'm a big kid. I'll make it on my own. You might want to worry about your moms. Super Bitch dissed her big time."

"What?"

"The new owner? Super Bitch? She fired your mom."

"What? What are we going to do?" Jaybird demanded. TK just looked at him. "Come on, don't you have any ideas? Besides getting traded and ruining the team?"

TK thought for a moment. "Your moms, she did all she could. Mattie D... He did his part, I guess. There's only one man I know who could fix this, and he's long gone, little man."

Jaybird frowned. "Who?"

TK shrugged. "My man Nico would have been able to do something about it, but he abandoned us, yo, and he ain't coming back. Forget that. There's nothing to be done. We'll just party until they ship me off to cold-ass Minnesota, right?"

"Okay," Dani began after one of the longest and most agonizing silences of her life—right up there with telling Ray she was pregnant, "what if you help but you don't help Mrs. Pittman? In fact, you'd be working against her."

Nico frowned at her. "I don't think it's wise for me to be involved at all."

She didn't like the idea of hurting him more because she could tell how hard this was for him—nothing less would have made him turn his back on the Hawks. The worst part was how badly this had shaken his faith in himself. He'd said far too much, revealed more than the Nico Dani had known would reveal, and it just showed his distress. He was coming apart under this—the guilt and self-loathing were all too plain to see. He wasn't wearing one of his suits, his hair hadn't been styled in days, and she had to wonder about those clothes.

"You said you didn't want the team to be collateral damage in this standoff between you and her. Then prove it. Help the team survive without helping her," Dani said, and Nico's expression darkened further. "Come on, Nico. You have the contacts, and you know her well enough to know how much she'd sell out for. Find the Hawks a new owner. The team can work on the damage when she is gone, but if something isn't done soon, she'll destroy each and every man on that team. I've already seen it happening. And, by the way, Xeno quit. Not that you probably didn't already know that, but... it needed to be said. You left the team in one hell of a mess. Is that really how you want to win?"

"I don't—It is not about winning. Not in the sense most people usually mean it. I have to win this because if I don't, I lose all self-respect," he said, shaking his head. "You of all people have to know what this means to me."

"I do," she agreed. She did. She didn't like the way he looked or sounded. This shell of Nico was not the man she'd worked with and slowly come to see as a friend. That bitch had come along and ripped him apart. "I just don't think you have to win by staying completely removed. Hell, stick it to the bitch, Nico. She has cost you everything—I know leaving was your choice, but that doesn't mean it didn't cost you. Make her pay. Take the Hawks back from her. I think you're the man who can do it. In fact, you're probably the only one who could."

Nico looked away for a moment. "The type of money you're talking means a limited number of people would be able to make the investment, most of whom would be no better than her."

Dani sighed. "Then pick the lesser of all the evils."

"The lesser of all the evils already lost the war," Nico said. He started walking, and she ran a little to catch up with him. "Pittman no longer has the free resources to buy back the team, or he would have done so already. She won't sell unless she's getting more than she 'paid' for the Hawks, and no one will be willing to pay that after what she's done to the team."

"If we could get the players to stop the trades and keep the team together?"

Nico stopped abruptly. "Take that a step further."

"What?"

"Get the players to buy back the team."

Dani's mouth dropped open, and then she wrapped her arms around him. He grunted in surprise and tensed when she kissed his cheek. "You are a genius. A genius."

"It may not be possible," he said, pulling back and fidgeting uncomfortably. "Players spend money like there is no tomorrow. Very few of them have any capital saved at all. And you'd have to get a significant number of them to agree to stay first, then get them to risk their money in buying back a team that everyone would consider a poor investment at this point. Still, if you want best case scenario, that's it."

"I still think you're brilliant," Dani told him. She shouldn't have gone so far with the hug or worse, the kiss on the cheek, but he had taken such a weight off her shoulders and found a solution so perfect if they could make it work that she had gotten caught up in the moment. Actually, it was a relief just talking to Nico again. "You're going to start taking my calls again now, right?"

Nico shook his head. "You won't be able to call me until I get a new number. And a new phone."

"What? Why?"

"I refused to take her calls and threw my phone off the bridge. I left the service connected because I knew she'd keep calling. Let everyone think that's still the number I'm using but that I'm not talking to anyone."

"You—Nico Careles—threw away your phone?" Dani asked, shocked. "Wow. It's like a whole new you."

He made a derisive noise. "New, but hardly improved. I'll let you know the new number. Do not give it to anyone else. Even with as many people as she's alienated, she's got enough money to make some of them at least marginally loyal to her."

"This cloak and dagger thing could get to be fun." Nico gave Dani a look at the words. She shrugged. "Sorry. This is all kind of new for me. I feel like going out and dressing all in black and working on a maniacal laugh."

"I thought you already had one of those."

TK shook his head in irritation as he went to open the door. The pounding was just obnoxious. Unnecessary. He wasn't having a party in the kingdom—not right now. No girls. Just a friend, and while it was past that one's curfew, TK wasn't about to kick him out, not after he'd freaked over the whole Doctor D being fired thing. He didn't want to know what the drama queen would do when she found out about that.

He opened the door. "Doctor D? What're you doing here?"

"Oh, TK, I know it's late, but I didn't really think this could wait. Oh, it's so simple that it's brilliant, and I didn't see it at all, but it's the perfect solution for everyone if we can pull it off. Of course, it's going to take teamwork," she stopped and started laughing uncontrollably, and TK wondered what the hell the woman had been drinking. She had to be high or drunk or something. No one was in that good of mood these days. "Sorry. It's just—what is Ray Jay doing here?"

"He came to talk me out of leaving, and I might have let the wrong thing slip over what Super Bitch did, and... Well, he freaked, then kind of wore himself out. You can take him home. He's not hurt, and I swear he didn't do anything. He's just worried about me."

She sighed. "I am, too."

"You seemed happy a minute ago."

"Oh. I am. Mostly. I may have a solution to our problem, one that does not involve you taking a trade," she began, still looking at her son on the couch. "But it's going to take everyone working together."

TK frowned. "I don't know about that. Most of the guys are trying to get the same spots in trade. It's downright ugly."

"But we might be able to make it so that no one has to take a trade."

"Really? And how is that?"

"By finding a new owner for the Hawks. Or should I say owners," she began, and he frowned again. The hell was she on? He wanted some of that. It made her a special sort of crazy. "TK, don't you get it? You and the other players might be able to come up with enough money to buy back your own team."

"Say what?"

"Think about it, TK. A team owned by the players. You are the ones out there getting pounded by three hundred pound linebackers. You're the ones playing the game. You'd know exactly what you're up against, and you wouldn't demand performance like the team was just like any other kind of business because it's not."

"It's a nice fantasy, Doc, but it'll never work. I don't got no three hundred million."

"But together you might."

"Right. Like we'd really put our money together like that. If people even have it. Most of the guys' agents take care of all the money, and there's no way in hell we'd let one of the other guys' agents handle the money for us."

She fought a smile, and TK swore she had to be tripping. Why the hell was she so damn happy? "And what if you had someone you all trusted to take care of all of that for you as long as you were willing to stop the trades and combine the money for the offer?"

TK laughed. "Ain't no such person. You'd be the closest thing, Doc, but the guys won't give it to you. Money and women don't mix unless they're hookers."

She made a face. "Okay, that is completely inappropriate, but I'm going to ignore that because I'm not talking about me. I need you to promise me you'll keep this to yourself, though, at least for now."

"What? And if not you, then who?"

"Nico."

TK looked at her, finding that hard to believe. "Nico ditched us."

"No, Nico had to take himself out of the equation because—for personal reasons. It was something that he had to do, but I spoke to him, and it was his idea to try and get the team to buy the team."

TK wasn't really sure about that. He didn't think much of Nico taking off on them and leaving them behind with Super Bitch, since he knew what was coming, but the man hadn't really steered them wrong before. "The big N's a pretty smart dude. If he thinks it'll work, we can give it a shot."

She nodded. "It's not like we have a lot to lose."

"Matt?"

"Dani? Do you have any idea what time it is? What are you doing here?"

"Using everyone's impression to our advantage right now," Dani said brightly, walking into his apartment. It had been a while since she'd been here, and she would take more time to go over the details, but she wanted this thing in motion as quickly as possible. The sooner they got "that bitch" off of her throne and out of the stadium, the better.

Was it wrong that Dani wanted it even more now that she knew what the woman had done to Nico? No, of course not. She was just being a good friend.

"Okay, what? You just woke me up, so... I'm a bit behind here."

"I have a solution to the team's problems, only we can't let its source be public knowledge, so... I came here in the middle of the night. People will think this is something else. That's not the important part. The important part is the solution."

"Sure... What is this solution, and where did you get it?"

"Nico."

"Nico?" Matt asked, incredulous. He shook his head. "Really? How did you get anything from Nico? He's not taking anyone's calls."

"Yeah, he doesn't have a phone because he threw it off a bridge."

"Nico threw his phone off a bridge," Matt repeated with a frown. "Are we talking about the same Nico here? He never left his phone behind. Ever."

"He's dealing with a personal crisis and wants his part in this kept secret. He did agree to help us against Mrs. Pittman, and his idea is... brilliant. I love it," she said, smiling. Matt didn't seem that pleased, and Dani knew if she had explained the situation with Mrs. Pittman and Nico that both TK and Matt would have understood Nico's actions, but she was not going to betray that confidence. He had been too ashamed to actually tell Dani, and the others didn't need to know about it. "He thinks the team should try and buy the team."

"What?"

"The players. It's possible they might have enough money to get Mrs. Pittman to sell. If she does, then we can get rid of her and have a real chance to remake the team and to make it into something even better than it was because it won't be a business but a team."

"The guys aren't going to go for that. They're already doing trades, remember?"

"TK has already agreed to try and make this work, and he's going to start spreading the word through the team. I'll talk to as many as I can while I still have therapy sessions. I don't like using the sessions like that, but the only way to make this work is if she doesn't know what we're trying to do. Fortunately, without someone in Nico's position with his kind of knowledge, she won't have immediate notice when money starts moving around and agents stop talking, but she'll figure it out sooner or later. We need to be ready before then."

Matt let out a breath. "Okay, fine. Say you get the money. She'll never sell it to a team."

"Nico said he'd draw up papers to incorporate the players, creating a company to make the overture to Mrs. Pittman."

"He can do that?" Matt shook his head. "What am I saying? It's Nico. Of course he can."

"Don't worry about the financial side. That's all Nico. He's good at that stuff. I'll need your help convincing the players—and keeping this from Mrs. Pittman. Especially about Nico helping out. That's not something that can be common knowledge. I know. TK knows. You know. That's it. Trust me, Mrs. Pittman did not take his resignation kindly. She'll wreck this for the same reason everyone's kind of ticked at Nico. It fell apart without him. He made this place work, and she couldn't keep him here. She'll do anything to spite him at this point."

"You said Nico was in some kind of personal crisis. You sure we should trust the future of the team to him right now? You did say not to mention it, but a lot of people are going to have a hard time accepting his help with this because he left us in a time of need."

Dani took a deep breath. She was not going to tell him what the crisis was, no matter how many people had doubts. "What have we really got to lose? Almost all of us are out of our jobs right now."

"Okay, I'm in. I just hope Nico knows what he's doing."

Dani had just closed her eyes to get some sleep when her phone went off. She put her pillow over her head and tried not to scream in frustration. The euphoria of the idea that Nico had come up with had carried her for a few hours, letting her forget how late it was and how tired she was and how TK should not have been around her son, but that was gone now, and all she wanted was some sleep.

She grabbed her phone angrily. "What?"

"You didn't have to answer. This was just my way of leaving you the number."

She sat up. "Nico. Do you ever sleep?"

He laughed a little. "Contrary to popular belief, I am human. I never cloned myself or got cybernetic implants so that I could keep going like the Energizer bunny."

She fell over on her side, curling up as she laughed. "I have got to be dreaming. Or hallucinating from lack of sleep because there's no way that you just said that. Who are you and what have you done with Nico?"

"I have been unemployed since I left the Hawks. No duties keeping me out at all hours, no phone ringing constantly—"

"And so you totally cracked because you're a complete control freak and can't handle it when you don't have something to fix."

"I think you need to sleep."

She nodded, yawning. "Yes. I do. But I missed talking to you. You're not allowed to throw your phone away again. Oh, I should tell you that I already got TK and Matt on board with the plan."

"You work fast."

"The faster the better, right?"

"Yes. I've sent out some inquiries. I believe I can get a low end offer to be made shortly."

"You work fast, too."

"My contacts were overseas. I didn't wake anyone up to drag them into this insanity."

"Nico, this is your brilliant plan, remember?" she asked, frowning. If Nico didn't think this would work, why had he suggested it? Why was he trying to make it work? Why even bother if it was such a crazy idea? Did Dani's words about sticking it to Mrs. Pittman have that much appeal? "You do think it can be done, right?"

"I no longer have access to the financial status of the players on the team, so I have no idea where the combined total would actually be enough to purchase the Hawks. It might not be, even with the salaries and endorsements," Nico warned.

She rubbed her forehead. That was right. He was out of the loop these days. She would have thought he'd leave himself some kind of backdoor into it, but then maybe that was too much. Nico had severed all ties with the Hawks. If she hadn't remembered that little tidbit about his past, she'd never have found him. "I think I can get you the information you need."

"Don't go digging. Something like that will make her suspicious, and now that Xeno has quit, she'll be looking to get a new head of security, one more like me."

Dani frowned. "Nico, why do I suddenly get the feeling that you putting Xeno in charge when you stepped down was a strategic move?"

"Get some sleep, Dr. Santino."

She glared at the phone as it beeped to say the call was disconnected. She didn't know if that was his natural evasion or if she was getting played. If Nico had decided to get his revenge on Mrs. Pittman, then Dani almost felt sorry for her. She had no doubts that Nico could make the woman's life extremely difficult, and that would just be the beginning.