Author's Note: Okay since I was in a rush to get the last chapter out since I wanted to do so before I went to bed there were several notes I missed out on.
This mission is inspired by the "Three Kings" mission from "Saints Row 2" in which the Boss had to perform different tasks for Carlos, Shaundi and Pierce all in one sitting.
The first part of this mission with Artie helping Rodrigo steal cars belonging to rival gangs is inspired by "Gang Car Round-Up," an optional side mission Claude could carry out on behalf of the Uptown Yardies in GTA3 in which he had to steal a Diablo Stallion, Yakuza Stinger and Mafia Sentinel all for them and deliver them to their secret garage.
Darius McLaren, the 'General' of the Aces is basically a bald version of Ice Cube in regards to his physical appearance. Regarding the other higher-ranking Aces mentioned in the last chapter, Sala is inspired by Jimmy Blood from the long forgotten "Ready 2 Rumble" boxing game that used to be on Sega Dreamcast, Jason Rivers is sort of inspired by Nightwolf from the Mortal Kombat games (with shorter hair and minus all the mystical abilities), Koji is inspired by Yuu Tanaka, one of the Japanese survivors from Dead Rising 1 who was also intended to be inspired by the NCR field medics you could encounter at Camp Forlorn Hope and Bitter Springs in "Fallout: New Vegas," Mickey and Ollie are inspired by Carter and Dawes, both Powder Gangers from New Vegas (their merchant and doorman respectively), Lexie by Princess Kitana also from Mortal Kombat, Philly by the professional wrestler known as Low Ki (a.k.a. Kaval in the WWE), and then Rodrigo is meant to be a cross between Joseph Price and Donnie from the first SR in regards to physical appearance. I also forgot to mention this earlier in regards to Kato, but physically I would say he is largely inspired by M. Shadows, the front man of Avenged Sevenfold.
Okay, I hope that's everything out of the way so I can get on with the story now!
Chapter 28: Three Aces and a Joker, Pt. 2
"Alright, where the hell are you woman?" Artie asked darting his head back and forth between both sides of the street, trying to make use of the little information he was given.
It was nearing the early evening hours and by now a majority of the college's students had been let out for the day, thus ensuring the streets would be packed to no end.
Thankfully the gridlocked traffic had enabled him to scan the passing streetwalkers more carefully and as expected saw mostly young women, but how could he manage to pick a gangbanger out of the 'normal citizenry' clogging the area.
He passed a Beaver's restaurant, where several jocks pummeled away at a hapless fellow dressed in a Brady Beaver costume while their girlfriends cheered them on, yet they looked like your typical ditzes who were more worried about finding the next shoe store to max out their credit card at rather than battling a rival gang.
Situated across the street was a Mainline Books bookstore and out front a local women's group was in the midst of carrying out a protest against Mayor Walker's plans to cut equal pay for women, limit their access to contraceptives and also do away with the free cancer screenings carried out at the local Dr. Tweeter's Fun Time Abortion Clinic.
"Granted they do seem militant," Artie thought to himself as he noticed the group's leader barking out orders through a megaphone, "yet at the same time too 'peace and love' to be gang members," he added, noticing how the other women stood around holding placards, but doing nothing else, "then again, don't know if they're on their periods or not."
The errand boy moved further along spotting a few women lugging shopping bags and window shopping, chatting on cell phones, or lounging about and as he passed the university itself he noticed a lawn where the cheerleading squad was in the middle of practice, but no one who struck him as a potential gang member.
He continued further down the street until he happened across the Jackin' Jill's Diner and found a dark blue Pony van parked out front and a young woman seated on a bench near the front entrance typing away on a laptop.
She was short and slender, having slightly tanned skin which suggested possible Hebrew ancestry, with long curly black hair with a blue headband keeping it out of her eyes. Aside from the headband she also wore a blue midriff top that showed off her toned abs, blue jeans with numerous tears in them, blue sneakers and black fingerless gloves, exposing fingernails that had been painted a matching dark shade of blue as everything she wore.
"That must be her," Artie told himself parking across the street and making his way towards her.
"Are you Zivah?" he asked.
"Hold on one second, I'm just finishing a bleet," the woman said keeping her eyes glued to the screen before hitting the 'Enter' key, followed by an electronic ding. "Okay done, yeah you're talking to Zivah. I take it you must be that Artie guy they were talking about earlier?"
"Yeah, you're looking at him. So Darius says you need some help with an assignment, right?" he asked as the woman closed her laptop.
"Sure thing, get in," she said motioning towards the van, "You're gonna have to drive though. I'll explain in a bit."
"Whatever you say," Artie replied climbing into the driver's seat as the Ace reached over to switch the radio station t Rasta 106.9, playing "Buffalo Soldier" by Bob Marley and forcing the hitman to stifle a grunt. He hated reggae music.
"Alright, so what's on the agenda now?" the hitman asked as they pulled out into traffic.
"We're going to be making a 'withdrawal' from the Imperial Bank of Rushmore. If we're going to beat the Redcoats and their bitches then we're sure as hell going to need a whole lot more money than what we have right now," the Aces' treasurer replied.
Artie took a peek over his shoulder, finding a sleeping bag, some empty beer bottles and a few small nondescript boxes lying around, "So where's all the big guns and funky costumes for that? Not to mention the extra manpower we should be packing."
"We're not going to be robbing the bank itself genius," Zivah replied with a roll of her dark eyes, "With as limited manpower as we have right now they'd wipe the floor with us. We're not that fucking suicidal," she said reopening her laptop, "We're gonna be hitting one of their trucks. From what we know so far it should be making its rounds somewhere around this area."
"And just how exactly do you know which truck to hit?" Artie sprung as a heavily-armored green and white Securicar with a Gruppe 6 logo on the side drove past them.
The blue-clad young woman turned her laptop's screen towards Artie, who stole a peek to reveal a GPS layout of Jefferson Vale's streets and a blinking red dot moving down one of the longer routes.
"Some guy I used to fuck works in the main office and lately he's been feeling pretty disgruntled with his boss, so I convinced him to sneak a tracking bug on the truck carrying the largest shipment. This red dot you see is that truck moving along and we need to get to it before it gets back to the main branch office over in Washington Common," Zivah explained.
"Anything else I should know?" Artie asked as they pulled up to a stoplight.
"Well it's a Securicar so obviously it's well-armored, so obviously we can't just shoot it up. We're gonna have to ram it up good until the punk ass inside bails out. Mason told me this particular driver is pretty skittish, so it could either play in our favor or against us, only time will tell. Once it's all said and done, we need to get it back to the headquarters," she further explained.
"Gotcha, although it's gonna be one hell of a long ride from here to Lincoln Shore," Artie replied, but then again remembered he had Randy's phone number in speed dial if need be. The little turd owed him one for nearly getting him killed the other day, all because he just had to boast of some menial, dead end job that the hitman could give two shits less about, one where he'd probably only be around for a week or two given his shitty luck.
"So how did you end up in the Aces if you don't mind me asking?" he asked in an attempt at making small talk.
"Eh, accounting school wasn't doing the thing for me so I decided to 'change careers' so to speak and now here I am. Sure, this job doesn't have any health or dental, but it sure has the excitement," Zivah casually replied.
"Can't say I disagree with you there," Artie chuckled, "I'm not really office material myself, unless it involves me getting to bang the secretary in the copy room."
"Hmmm, doesn't sound like a bad idea at all," she replied with a wink.
They exited the University district and made their way into neighboring Osbourne Dale, passing a recording studio where more of those tough, black-clad punks hung out, faces he knew he had seen before.
"More of those Crimson Matters rejects," Artie scoffed as he witnessed one of them in the midst of tagging the King's Diamonds jewelry store.
"They're called the Brood and they're not as much pushovers as you might think," Zivah replied, "I used to date one of Vile Crud's roadies, the whole band belongs to the gang. I've been there while they shot it out with those trust fund assholes from Gold Valley. They really know how to bring the pain, guess writing songs about dismemberment and the horrors of Hell somehow makes you tougher and more desensitized to the actual violence."
"Looks like there's quite a few of 'em," Artie remarked noticing quite a few of them hanging around the Margera Skate Park.
"Relax, they're cool. As long as you don't start shit with them they leave you alone. It's mostly members of the Mars Pentecostal Church coming over here to cause trouble for them," the treasurer replied, sighing out the church's name.
"Aren't they those guys who picket all those military funerals?" Artie asked, remembering stories about them from Weazel News, VBC and practically every other news outlet in the United States.
"That would be them – holy shit, that's him!" Zivah suddenly shouted pointing wildly at a passing Securicar, one that looked just like any other in Rushmore City, yet stood out like a sore thumb to the treasurer.
"I'm on it," Artie said jerking the wheel and lurching the van into an abrupt spin that cut off an oncoming convertible and speeding towards the heavily-armored transport truck, slowing down so he and Zivah wouldn't go flying through the windshield.
"Brace yourself," he instructed before ramming into the truck's rear bumper.
The truck swerved after being struck from behind and the skittish driver sped up, right through an intersection and plowing through a taxi with a powerful knockout blow that crumpled the smaller vehicle like a soda can.
"Oh god no…they're out to get me…again," the flappable man whined, his trembling hands leaving him unable to keep the truck in a straight line, causing him to pull up onto the nearest sidewalk and nearly run over some members of the Brood, who naturally didn't take too kindly to that and began firing upon the truck as well.
Stepping on the gas Artie again rammed the truck's rear end, causing the driver to jump and clip a nearby parked Patriot, following up with another ram that sent it knocking over an ice cream stand and yet another that sent it crashing into a parked Stallion, flipping the muscle car onto its roof.
"Oh God! What did I ever do to piss you off so badly? Is this because of me saying no to Father Deebs wanting to show me that hamster he kept in the confessional?" the driver whined just as the truck rocked again, causing him to shake the wheel violently and leave him bobbing back and forth between lanes, causing more cars to swerve out of his way.
"Damn this fucker," Artie shouted as he swerved to avoid a Contender that itself had moved abruptly to avoid the bank truck.
"Just don't pussy out and you'll have the bastard right where you want him!" Zivah cried out excitedly.
Artie said nothing and sped up until he was again on the truck's tail, smashing against it repeatedly before pulling alongside it and trying to force it into more parked cars, creating a ripple effect of stationary vehicles being shoved into the street and onto the sidewalk as the Securicar was forced into them.
Eventually the truck came to a T-junction and was forced right into a group of bikers, plowing through each of the grubby men like dominoes and slamming head on into a tree, finally forcing the driver out of the cab.
"Oh god, my life is so shit!" the man screamed as he bolted far away from the scene of the accident.
"Alright, now's our chance," Zivah cried out as Artie brought the van to a halt and jumped out with her and she rounded the dark blue vehicle to throw the back doors open and begin digging through the boxes.
"Then what's your fucking hold up?" Artie demanded just as he could hear the roar of more motorcycle engines and turned to see another brigade of angry bikers rapidly encroaching upon their position.
At the front of the pack was a burly bearded man with horns attached to the side of his helmet, designed to make him look like either a Viking or a demon, whose barrel chest made it easier to see the patch embroidered to the front of his vest, one of the Grim Reaper riding a skeletal horse.
The Children of Chaos, sworn enemies of the Luciferian Brotherhood!
"Payback's got your name on it boy!" the man hollered withdrawing a sawn-off shotgun and firing a blast which sent Artie tossing himself against the Pony to avoid it.
"Damn it," Artie hissed knowing he was once again left in a tight spot. Because he had been brought there at the last minute he hadn't had time to obtain a bigger gun or a bulletproof vest, leaving him nearly nude.
He was sent slinking further along the van as a biker on a Nightblade sped past firing away with an Ingram MAC-10, another man following up on a Daemon with a sawn-off shotgun.
A line of bikers began to circle the hitman, forcing him into precarious cover as they pelted the Pony and the Securicar with gunfire, leaving him no room to fire back.
"Welcome to Hell!" the gang's leader cackled, only to find his chest riddled with bullets that hit him hard enough to send him flying off his bike and then rolling backwards like a bowling ball, breaking up the even line his buddies had been moving in.
Artie turned to find Zivah emerging from the Pony's cargo area with a HK53A3 assault rifle in hand, firing another burst that traveled along one of the men's Wolfsbane and eventually struck him in the thigh, causing him to fall to the pavement and be crushed by his own ride.
"Here, take one!" Zivah said tossing him a rifle along with a Kevlar vest, "I figured there'd be some schmucks who'd wanna throw down, plus I brought a shitload of grenades along too!"
"I like your thinking," Artie called back with a nod of approval, "Perhaps I might be able to find some friends in this group after all."
Zivah resumed her counterattack against the rampaging bikers, managing to drop another man in a barrage of screaming lead before her gun clicked empty and she grasped frantically for a new clip.
Artie was now covered and ready to join the fight, striking the front tire of a Wayfarer that sent the biker clattering to the ground and crushed by his own bike.
The remaining bikers dismounted their motorcycles and were taking cover behind whatever was available, the sounds of battle sending pedestrians fleeing in all directions.
"The Children don't forget! Kill one of us, you got all of us to answer to!" shouted a man with long fiery red hair matched by a shaggy beard that felt to his considerable gut.
Artie ignored the man's threat and continued firing away until his clip ran dry and he was forced to reload, a bullet ricocheting dangerously close to his head and sending him collapsing to the ground.
Zivah saw his predicament and rose to provide cover, managing to snipe down a guy peeking out from behind a fountain before she was forced back into cover.
It had been enough for Artie to scramble behind the Pony for cover and stick his rifle's barrel out, dropping a bald-headed man with a three shot burst to the chest and mangling the arm of the man next to him, sending him falling to the ground screaming and writhing in pain.
He was pissing through ammo at an alarming rate and all of the dead bikers were too far away from him to loot their corpses, soon to find himself in another sticky situation.
Suddenly, he remembered the grenades Zivah mentioned and bolted towards the Pony's cargo area, throwing the back doors open and leaping inside to find an entire crate. Feeling as if Christmas had come early, he scooped up as many as he could and took cover just in time to avoid another barrage of firepower aimed at his head.
"Hopefully this'll make them scatter," Artie whispered to himself before pulling the pin on one of them and chucking it around the van.
"Oh shit, grenade!" a biker shouted as he attempted to run away. The grenade exploded behind him and the grungy man was sent airborne by the blast, slamming his head hard against the pavement with a sickly splat.
Artie didn't wait for the smoke to clear and chucked another grenade towards the Children, managing to kill two in one blast and critically injure another. Emboldened by the results he wasted no time chucking a third, which failed to hit anybody, but did blow up a parked Daemon and sent an already deceased biker's body flying into the air.
Seeing what he had done to the bike an idea popped into his head as he saw a cluster of motorcycles parked closer together. Pulling the pin on a fourth grenade he tossed it and sent it rolling along the ground to land at the foot of a Nightblade. The grenade detonated and took the motorcycle with it, followed by a chain reaction that created one spectacular ball of fire.
"Damn, you sure know your way around those babies…I like that," Zivah remarked before nailing another biker with a round to his groin and then finishing him with a blast to the throat as he buckled over.
The wail of police sirens resounded in the background and through the pillars of smoke the hired gun made out the flashing of blue and red lights.
"Shit, we've gotta get going," Artie said tossing a few more grenades wildly before bolting towards the Securicar's opened door and pulling himself inside, waiting for Zivah to join him before shifting the armored truck into reverse and inadvertently flattening another bellicose biker.
Pulling away from the scene of battle he looked out the window to see several police cars speeding into view and swerving to a halt, their officers jumping out and exchanging gunfire with the remaining Children.
"Alright, looks like the pigs are more worried about them," Artie said pulling away from the scene and speeding up, ejecting a self-help C.D. that was playing on the truck's C.D. player and turning the channel to Radio GX, which was currently playing "Milligram Smile" by From Autumn to Ashes.
Zivah nodded remaining on guard with her HK53A3 ready in case there were any more threats nearby. Once they were far enough away from the sirens and gunshots she relaxed, "That was some pretty badass shooting back there."
"Eh, I do what I can," Artie replied trying to sound as modest as possible.
"Guess we'll be having to do more work with you in the future if you can keep this stuff up," Zivah said as Artie allowed the truck to halt at a stoplight, noting that everybody seemed to be minding their own business for once.
"Don't know how much longer I'll be here, but yeah I'll need the money," Artie replied looking out the window and watching a woman trying to fight back against her abusive boyfriend.
"So you're not from around here, huh?" Zivah asked as they pulled into the Lakeview district.
Artie did not reply immediately. The trip took them past Donnie's condo and he could see his cousin's Banshee parked in the driveway, along with a '08 Pfister Comet, a Grotti Turismo and a '92 Bullet, suggesting he had company.
"Either they're some of his 'friends' he's always rambling on about, or just some random ladies he's fucking left and right," Artie thought, until he suddenly remembered the woman had asked him a question and he was snapped back to reality.
"No…no I was just passing through when that shit went down over at Churchill International, so I'm stuck here for the time being. Once the blockade is lifted I'm probably gonna be getting the hell outta here and never looking back. I haven't been here long, but I've seen enough shit already to know I don't want this being my new home," Artie replied bluntly.
"Yeah, that's kind of how it was for me too," the treasurer replied, "but next thing you know, one thing led to another and here I am now, a part of the Aces. Guess you could say this city has a way of drawing you in."
"Heh, now you're starting to sound like my cousin Donnie, except you seem to have your libido more in check than he does," Artie laughed.
"Well that can be subject to debate once I've had a few too many to drink," Zivah replied with a wink as he approached the ramp that would take them back to Lincoln Island.
Artie was about to reply, but then stopped himself remembering Gladys probably wouldn't like that, and instead continued driving along until they were entering the Kasich district adjoining Lincoln Shore, where by now most of the Redcoat bodies had been cleaned up and some flatbed Recovery tow trucks were seen lugging away the charred husks of the destroyed vehicles.
Instead he focused on making his way towards the Aces home base and it wasn't long before they were pulling up to the storage units behind the Aegean Café. He waited for Zivah to exit the truck and go over to open one of the garage doors, then waiting for some Aces to show up and start emptying the money in the back.
"A job well done," Zivah remarked, "Give us a call next time you need some help."
"I'll definitely hold you to that, but I think I still have more work ahead of me," Artie replied pulling out his cell phone and dialing Darius' number.
"Darius, we got the truck taken care of. Your boys are unloading the money as we speak," the errand boy reported as he watched the Aces continuing their work, the truck carrying much more money than expected.
"Hell of a job," the Aces leader remarked, "Alright, now that you've got that taken care of I need you to meet up with our enforcer Rex. He's waiting over in Camden Heights so you shouldn't have a hard time finding him."
"Alright, I'll see what he wants done," Artie said before switching his phone off and making his way over to a dark blue Washington to begin his next objective.
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Author's Note: And so ends part 2 of "Three Aces and a Joker," which I've decided I'm going to make into three separate parts detailing each task Artie must carry out with the Ace lieutenants, so it's obvious this chapter is going to be much shorter than most of my works my readers have come to expect.
And now onto the randomness…
Zivah is the latest Ace to be introduced and she's basically my take on a Jewish, bisexual version of Shaundi from Saints Row 2 and ever since "the Third" has come out I've decided to splice in a few elements inspired by Kinzie Washington with her having excellent computer skills.
The scene with the women's group protesting Mayor Walker's policies outside of Mainline Books again alludes to some real-life political happenings going on here in Wisconsin, where Scott Walker has recently repealed an equal pay enforcement law where women were to be guaranteed the same pay as their male counterparts and he's also been very hostile towards the access to contraception since he's one of those hardcore pro-life douches who opposes abortion even in cases of rape, incest or the mother's life being at stake, and lastly them being pissed off at Dr. Tweeter's Fun Time Abortion Clinic for doing away with free cancer screenings reflects upon the recent backlash against the Susan G. Komen Foundation after they recently decided to do away with free cancer screenings that would have been provided by Planned Parenthood, just the kind of stuff you'd expect a women's rights group to protest about.
This task was inspired by the "Van Heist" mission assigned by Joey Leone from GTA3.
King's Diamonds is a reference to King Diamond, who has served as the frontman of both Mercyful Fate and his own self-titled band.
The Mars Pentecostal Church is meant to be a spoof of the Westboro Baptist Church. They are inspired by Pastor Richards, the corrupt televangelist guy from "Vice City" who was trying to raise funds to have a giant statue of himself erected and then launched into space. Mars is an allusion to Mars, Alabama where he is listed as coming from and I figured since he reminds me of Fred Phelps in some senses why not give him his own kooky congregation?
Well I think that's all for random notes to be made and so now it's time for me to get onto the third installment of this chapter!