Bounty Hunter who hopes the CCTV caught them catching you — it was sick as hell, dude
I wrote this part two pretty immediately after the first part, as mentioned back then, but hesitated to post then both because I’d not yet posted the nsfw chapter of Sometimes The Mountain Buries You which I wanted up first and because like... there’s a prison in it and at no point does that get interrogated. Did I want to do the fun Ocean’s Eleven-style leaning against a car while someone gets out of prison scene? Yeah. Do I ever typically write prisons without interrogating what that means in a society and being very upfront about fuck prisons? Nope. Still feel weird about it.
This part two is split in half for an 18+ filter on the nsfw portion. Here’s a link to the full version if you’ve found this post without the latter, nsfw half
When Auzel is told that he has a ride waiting for him, he runs down his list of contacts for who would possibly risk their cover just to pick him up. He’s going over the list for a third time—now in the clothes he arrived in with release paperwork in hand—because no one would but someone apparently had, when he’s through the doors and scanning the parking lot.
Leaning against a pristine example of yesteryear automobile design, all glossy and eye-catching teal, is the bounty hunter who had caught him.
Auzel doesn’t know if he should be pissed or not. He knows it’s a pain in the ass to get anywhere from here. He doesn’t know if Shame has a reason to pick him up—employers of the last bounty wanting more of him, a fresh bounty on him, a job offer. He also doesn’t know where he’s going, so he walks across the parking lot and stops just within comfortable standing and talking distance, just to be imposing.
“Hey little bird.” Shame’s hearty chest rumbling shout of a voice is a little loud for how close Auzel decided to stand. “Ribs okay?”
Auzel was screwing his lips together and leaning towards yes, be pissed. He suspected Shame already knew his cracked ribs healed fine; already got access to his medical report and all the other paperwork generated from getting locked up that meant he was going to have a harder time working. “Are you going to be my ride or not?”
With that same beaming shit-eating grin and howl of laughter, Shame claps a hand on Auzel’s shoulder—Auzel fails to not flinch—and shoves him at the passenger door. They don’t ask where Auzel’s going until they’re turning over the engine. When Auzel says he doesn’t know, they ask if he wants to eat.
There’s a diner between the prison and the sprawl of the distant city. Auzel would be surprised a diner could run out here if he hadn’t come from a town that was five houses, a gas station, and a diner just like this one. It’s quiet and empty and the server doesn’t ask questions or even stay out front after delivering their meals.
Even here Shame’s voice is a hearty chest rumbling shout, Auzel wonders if they know how to be quiet. He stares into the bubbles of his carbonated drink thinking about how he’s always quiet just in case he’s being watched. How stressless it must feel to simply talk, move, exist, without always checking yourself to be quiet.
Shame is explaining how all the injured and offended parties of Auzel’s most recent crimes have settled down and that it’s safe for Auzel to return to the city. “For longer than just getting your shit to leave, if you’d stick around.” They’re absolutely demolishing the mountain of fries that came with their meal, distracting themself to keep from being caught watching the concerning stretch of time Auzel is locked onto his drink. They’re still pretending not to be watching when they say, “Little bird, you know what I like about you?”
Auzel looks up, realizes what he’d been doing—nothing, that he’d been doing nothing—and returns to his slow, mechanical eating. “Yeah, what?”
“Well first, you’re good at what you do, I like that.” Shame licks salt off of their fingers and crumples a napkin in their hands. “I respect most of the jobs you take.” They lean back against the diner booth and don’t look away when Auzel looks at them for more than glances away from his plate. “But it was foolish to stick around for even a minute after the last one, man.”
The calculating gaze of Auzel trying to figure out what Shame is doing breaks into a sigh. “Yeah.”
“You in a rough spot?”
Auzel would sigh again if he hadn’t just. “I’ve been in better spots.” He supposed he was in a fine spot now, if Shame’s assurance the city wasn’t an immediate deathtrap was true.
The excited wiggle Shame does as they lean forward again makes Auzel squint suspiciously at their smile. “Now do me.”
“What?”
“What do you like about me, little bird?”
This is not the worst conversation Auzel could be having. The worst conversation Auzel could be having is probably on a bus he would have had to wait hours for, probably headed to the city and thinking he was headed into an immediate deathtrap. In a way this conversation was comfortable, it was part shop talk, Auzel could do shop talk. “You have good taste in gear.”
Shame is grinning again. Auzel clears his throat, drinks his drink.
Under the table, Shame taps the toe of their big fuck-off boot against Auzel’s ankle. Auzel blinks at them over the edge of his glass, glances at their teal pristine example of yesteryear automobile design parked just outside, and then looks right into their eyes that he could swear were twinkling at him.