Guns and Roses

Robert Vasquez worked as a police officer in Gotham for close to a decade.

He liked to consider himself one of the good ones, never taking bribes, and always helping his community, even if that meant being stuck in the patrol car for most of his shifts.

Robert tapped his fingers on the driver's wheel as he turned his police car into the warehouse district, his police lights turned off to not attract unwanted attention from the many gangsters who worked in the area.

It was an unspoken deal, They don't commit crimes while his car passes their streets, and he gets to not be lynched by a horde of crackheads.

The City wasn't going to clean them out, and Robert wasn't going to succeed if he tried. Best to keep a low profile in these cases.

As his car reached the first crosswalk in the district, Robert saw that no cars were on the road, something that only happens in these back alley, crime-ridden districts of the city.

He parked his Police car at the side of the road and grabbed his box of cigarettes. His wife didn't allow him to smoke at home, and he didn't want to smoke inside the car either.

Stepping outside, Robert put the cigarette in his mouth a clicked the lighter.

Just as the flame flickered out of the lighter, the ground shook as a huge ball of fire erupted on the other side of the Factory District, causing Officer Vasquez to drop his lighter and quickly get back into the car.

"This is Officer Vasquez, Currently on patrol of the Factory District, Ninth Avenue, There has been an explosion in one of the buildings, I am on my way to the scene, over," Robert Vasquez said into his radio before he stepped on the gas, Ignoring traffic laws in this empty street as he drove to the scene of the explosion.

When he arrived, there was nothing but smoke and debris, Half of the old factory that once stood there collapsed onto itself, likely burying any evidence under the mountain of rubble and ash.

Stepping out of the car to get a better look, Robert whispered.

"What the hell happened here?"

..........................

Thirty Minutes Earlier.

Ronald Dayton liked to consider himself a smart fellow, He grew up in the grime and muck of these streets and he knew how to survive in them like any good gangster.

When he joined the Tire Painter gang, it was barely more than an illegal street racing gang, hosting races for bets and money. He changed things.

Joe Morasio liked his spunk, his drive to do more, make more, and he quickly climbed up the ranks of the small gang.

Drugs, Guns, Hookers and Cash, thanks to his work, this gang had it all.

So when his boss told him that the new Weapons they got were a down payment from none other than the Penguin, who wanted them to steal some experimental steroids from some lab upstate, Ronald did the smart thing.

He shot Morasio in the back and took over the gang himself, ain't no way he's getting himself killed for that flightless bird. He can rob his own lab!

But Ronald knew he had to move quickly, it would only be a matter of time before news of the Tire Painters getting a change of leadership reached The Penguin, and he didn't want to be in Gotham to see his reaction.

Ronald assumed he had five days at least before Penguin got enough guns to flush him out like a pile of shit down the toilet because as highly as Ronald thought of himself, he knew that when compared to the Penguin, the Tire Painter gang was barely a smidge of dogshit on the sidewalk.

They had a time limit, and they had to move quickly.

"Grab everything you can carry and get it onto the trucks!" Ronald yelled to his men as they parked two large moving trucks outside of the abandoned factory that acted as their base of operations.

"Leave the Mechanic tools here, we can get new ones in Bludhaven, It's the weapons and the Drugs that we need to move," His men entered through the door to the factory on their way to press a button on the inside as the rest of the gang waited for the large doors of the factory to slide upwards.

Ronald and his men waited for three minutes before he signaled another one of his men to enter the factory to check what was taking them so long.

"Holy Shit! Get in here!" The man yelled and the rest of the gang slowly entered the factory through the small front door.

As the gang walked into the open factory floor, they froze as they spotted the two men who they sent in to open the doors earlier.

Both gagged and unconscious, tied to a pair of metal chairs in the middle of the open floor, a cardboard box with a single cellular phone sat between them.

Ronald quickly took out his gun and held it at the ready.

"Is it the Bat?" One of his boys asked as the rest of the gang smartly followed their leader in taking out their side arms.

"I don't-" Whatever answer Ronald had to give his underling was squashed as the phone on the box between his two tied men started to ring.

"Don't approach it!" He yelled at his men, stopping them from walking closer to the phone.

He eyes the phone warily, gun raised, and pointed at it. His eyes quickly roved around the rest of the factory floor, searching for any sign of their hidden assailant. Only to find nothing.

After another minute of pointing his gun at the phone, one of his men walked up to him, showing a text message he received just then.

A text message from one of the men who were currently tied to the chair.

"Answer the phone," Was all it read, and Ronald couldn't help but feel the sweat start rolling down his face.

Licking his dried lips, he slowly walked up to the phone, his gun still pointing at it, and gently picked it up.

A series of zeroes appeared instead of the number of whoever was calling, And so with a deep breath, Ronald Dayton answered the call.

"Hello?" He said cautiously, his mind quickly acclimating to no longer hear the loud ringing from the phone.

"Ronald Dayton?" The voice on the other side sounded smooth and professional, something Ronald hated.

"Who's asking?" He answered with another question, his eyes still looking around for anything wrong with his factory.

"Good, I'm speaking with the correct person," The voice on the other side of the call didn't answer, "You are a very unlucky man, Mister Dayton,"

Ronald felt his left-hand start to twitch as his frustration started to grow, "And why is that?"

"A week ago, your old friend Joe Morasio struck this little deal in exchange for some nice guns" The man on the phone kept talking and Ronald's heart spiked for a moment.

"The deal was, Your gang uses the guns in order to steal an experimental drug, Steroid B-19, and in return, you get to keep the guns. A little trade of goods and services, you see? You can't afford those guns, so you do a job to keep them instead, really basic business,"

"How the fuck do you know this?!" Ronald yelled into the phone, "You working with The Penguins? Shithead?!"

A short silence followed as Ronald breathed in to calm himself down before the voice on the phone returned.

"Do not raise your voice at me, Mister Dayton, I am doing you a favor by calling you,"

Ronald grits his teeth before quickly raising his pistol and shooting it at the ceiling of the factory, "Where are you?!" He shot a few more bullets.

"...I see you do not wish to speak any longer, so I will make this quick," The man on the phone said calmly, "I took the guns you got from Penguin, I took the safe you kept in your little office, I had my men lock the doors you came in from the moment you answered the phone, and there are several explosives planted all across your factory..."

Ronald felt his hand freeze as he dropped the phone, it landing on the cardboard box beside his two unconscious men and denting it slightly in the process.

"...I am sorry, I do not enjoy killing people," The man on the other side of the phone kept speaking as it entered speaker mode, "I do hope you will forgive me when we meet in hell,"

Ronald heard some of his men trying to open the door they came in from, struggling to open it as something blocked it from moving on the other side.

"You asked my name before, You may call me Rose,"

Ronald slowly bent down to the box on the floor, lifting it up to see what was underneath it.

What he saw was a remote-controlled explosive device, a small digital clock rapidly counting down.

Ronald felt his entire body freeze as he looked at the red digital numbers on the clock reaching ten seconds.

"Thank you for answering the call, Ronald Dayton,"

Five seconds.

"The Penguin sends his regard."

Zero.

...............................

I calmly hung up before passing the phone back to the mook who I borrowed it from, The Van I sat in was already driving away from the site of the Tire Painter gang's hideout. Now engulfed in flames as the old and abandoned factory collapsed.

"The Drop point is the Fifth Warehouse in the docks, Once we hand over the guns to our boys there, we return to the laundromat and go our separate directions," I told the men in the car with me, Who all smiled to each other at a job well done.

I calmly looked through the window, enjoying the sight of the orange flames and the pillar of smoke painting the night sky in a color that wasn't Gotham Grey.

I was Richard Fisk, The Rose, and I was a Criminal...

I felt a smirk grace my lips as I looked at my clean white suit in the reflection of the window.

I might be a criminal, but I do look cool...

...Perhaps I should go over Richard's memories again, and take a deeper look into them... He was Supreme Hydra for the Nevada branch for a while...

Or is it I now? It's still really confusing thinking about it all.

"Any thoughts, Boss?" One of the goons asked and took me out of my train of thought, it was much too early to start thinking about the meaning of life and the self.

"Yeah," I tap my purple-gloved fingers on the door of the van as we leave the factory district, "Would a girl who's entering tenth grade like Pizza for a 'Welcome to school' party, or do Burgers and Fries work better?"

One of the men in the back chuckles, "My niece loves taking her fries and dipping them in her Milkshake, It's Burgers all the way... Sir."

"Nah man, Pizza, You need to think about their well-being when they go to school the day after, Burgers and Fries are too heavy, Pizza fills the spot of being both light and tasty, Kids love it!... Sir." Another grunt gives his opinion, and soon Half the van is talking about what they liked to eat when they were in middle school.

Maybe I should just ask Rose directly...

........................................

Rose Forrest stared blankly at the feather-looking Knife that lay on her desk over a note.

She remembered clearly hiding the Knife under her bed.

She slowly walked up to the desk and took the note under the knife.

"Meet me on the roof of the apartment tomorrow at Nine," It said at the top half of the folded note.

Rose felt her breath hitch as she read the bottom half of the note.

"You want to kill Tobias Whale, don't you?"

Rose quickly grabbed the note and threw it in the trash, pushing it deeper into the bin so it would be buried by the other contents of the bin.

She took the Feather knife from the desk and got down on the floor, ready to place it back under her bed.

And then she froze when she saw the same knife right where she left it.

Rose's eyes moved from the knife that sat beside the Garden Spade under her bead to the identical knife in her hands.

Her mind went back to what happened a day before, to the man with the owl-looking mask.

She quickly hid the knife under her bed once more, before quickly making sure her window was locked.

Double-checking every lock in her room, Rose collapsed on her bed and uttered a single word.

"Fuck..."