[b]Lynn[/b]

Keaton was there with pretzels, making Lynn's mind run through its typical thousand-thoughts-a-second scurry to make sense of things. Lynn had missed her - how? Was Keaton fucking with her? And offering her the pretzels was - well, Lynn wasn't entirely sure what to make of that. You had to be careful with stuff with like that. Now, Lynn owed Keaton. It was small. It was a favor. But nobody ever starts off putting the house down as collateral. You get trapped and tangled in the little stuff, and then suddenly someone needs a favor, and now there's no way out, and they've got the leverage. Was that Keaton's move? As much sense as it made to the cold part of Lynn's mind, the part that did sit-ups on a concrete floor to pass the time in juvy and swapped cigarettes with street rats, sitting on a curb, she couldn't quite square it to Keaton. Keaton had made a good point, in that now they had to show their faces. As Lynn grabbed the flickering, fiery part of her that said to get the fuck out of here, that Radvi was bad news, that there was a doll heavier than Spoons' psych dossier weighing in her backpack, but Keaton was right. She had to be cold as icewater. They'd already been spotted, thanks to Spoons, and if they scurried now, it looked guilty as all hell. Lynn hated she hadn't considered that. [i]There's different rules here, and if I don't learn them they'll be scratching my arm with the needle looking for a vein here soon.[/i] 

[i]She knows how to play me too, damnit,[/i] Lynn thought. "Get a leg up on the cops" was a pretty tantalizing offer to Lynn, prompting a smirk at the corner of her chapped lips. And beyond all that - which Lynn was not dismissing, to clarify - Keaton had gotten her the pretzels. The line was some five minutes long. So when Lynn had split, she'd....gotten in line to get some pretzels. Almost immediately. It was a conscious, deliberate choice to acquire these pretzels. Just because Lynn mentioned them. Lynn could not recall any instance of generosity that would have merited buying these pretzels in return. Lynn did not like the idea of her destiny being chained to anyone else's - not again - and was all too aware of the hundred ways Keaton could stab her in the back. [i]This bitch could be walking me over now to set me up,[/i] Lynn thought. [i]She tells Radvi to check my bag and it's all over.[/i] That was what Lynn would do, if she had to knock a chess piece off the board. [i]I'd tell him that I was forcing her to help, that I said I threatened her. And the other snakes would come slithering out the grass to say that I had, that I'd threatened them before.[/i] It made sense. For a moment, it clenched her fist in her pocket, and made her want to knock the pretzels out of Keaton's hand and walk away.

Instead Lynn took a deep breath (her hair and eyes glowed as if someone had fanned a campfire) and grabbed the pretzels. [i]Besides, if that happens, I will burn Keaton's face so badly she'll have to wear one of those Vader suits to get someone to fuck her. They'll have to do it through those breathing tube holes or whatever.[/i] 

They were warm, and salty, and Keaton had balled out. She'd gotten like every kind in there. This was the shit. This was pretty much the best food option you could get a mall, in Lynn's years of skulking around shopping malls looking for wallets that needed reappropriating. Sbarro would give you some severe problems thirty to forty five minutes after consumption, Panda Express was cold like forty percent of the time, but pretzels were steady. They were there. There was the cinnamon kind - Lynn's favorite - and then regular pretzel bites, and the hot dog ones, which were good for protein and stuff Lynn figured. Lynn glanced up at Keaton, chewing on her lip. Sometimes, when Keaton did stuff like this, or when Keaton asked Lynn how her classes were or they had their chats, it...Lynn felt dumb. Or small. Like Keaton was playing her. Like Keaton had figured something out about her. It made Lynn feel uneasy, but what Keaton had said made sense. [i]She's fucked at this point if it goes south,[/i] Lynn said. [i]Even if she pulls some Judas shit, she's going down too. She has to know that.[/i] Lynn did not know if she could trust Keaton - actually, she did. She knew she couldn't. But she could trust Keaton to do what was smart for her, which was continuing to work with Lynn for the time being. Even telling Lynn she was done and ducking out was smarter than snitching.

Lynn's stomach rumbled. "Thanks, Keaton," Lynn said, looking down at the pretzel bucket. A vague part of Lynn wondered when the last time someone had bought something for her was. [i]Flowers.[/i]The same part was thinking maybe after she stayed with the group only as long as was strictly warranted, she could still go grab some more clothes or something. Just for the excuse. She had to look like the sort of square who shopped at a mall to keep her cover. Lynn missed the days when they just told her whose ass she had to go beat and not getting seen by the cops was the only important part. [i]Christ, Lynn. One pretzel and you're standing here missing Che. Get your shit together.[/i] "I'll get you back sometime," she added quickly, cementing that this debt was recognized and Lynn was good for her word to repay it, and then Lynn was not one to be strung along unawares by this sort of thing, like the dumb fish who took a free cigarette on the first day of lockup. Lynn bit into one of the pretzels. It was likely due in a large degree to Lynn's presence, but the pretzels were perfectly warm. "Damn these are good," Lynn said, chewing. "You want some?" she offered the bucket to her.

"Let's go deal with their bullshit, I guess," Lynn said, chewing another pretzel bite. "Spoons is probably going to try and slap new girl until she's down to a 4 or 5 out of ten - " [i]that'll take a while[/i] " - so at least we'll get a show. I'm not talking to the cop more than I have to. And neither should you." she swallowed. "At least trust me on that shit, there's nothing good from that. He's as gen one as fucking Bulbasaur - " (Lynn had never had the money for any of the newer games, as it were) - "and as crooked as Gennedy." Lynn remembered seeing him from the precinct. She had a good eye for faces. [i]I still need to beat the ass of that Promise guy who strapped me down on the rocket up.[/i] "I say we get Spoons talking about her feelings or something or have Archie talk about boats or whatever and run him off as soon as possible. I don't want to linger here." Lynn shook her head and chewed another pretzel. "Either Gennedy's attack dog starts sniffing - and I'm on probation, remember - or another freak thing happens and one of those two flips. I don't think - " Lynn started to say she didn't think it was a coincidence that Archie's freakouts kept happening, that someone was trying to use a chainsaw to do heart surgery on the Promise, to put out a hit and kill everyone the mark ever knew just to be on the safe side, but that wasn't wise to say aloud. Not now. "Fuck." Lynn glanced up at Keaton, a look that was a mixture of annoyance and respect across her features, a few blue hairs free from the lazy ponytail Lynn had pinned back. "The shit you talk me into, Keaton. Damnit. Let's get this over with." 

Until the end of her days, Lynn would still have difficulty believing that she voluntarily approached a cop at a sketch-as-hell meetup, one which had a documented narc also on the guest list, in the sort of place where they could have officers waiting at every table to pounce. [i]At least there's no clear shot,[/i] Lynn thought. [i]Even if there's a nullifier I've got a chance at running.[/i] Lynn approached with Keaton, doing her best to project neutrality. She had a feeling Radvi would've heard of her interrogation, and beyond that, had no desire to really be polite to him on ideological grounds. Lynn looked at Radvi and saw a mountain of the dolls in her backpack, stacked six feet high and wearing a shiny uniform. If she'd come blowing smoke up his ass, he would've known she was up to something. [i]Beyond buying Xanax in the woods.[/i] Still, she wasn't going to piss him off needlessly and get arrested on whatever Mussolini-ass law Gennedy had put into place around here. She looked at all of them, sizing them up. Spoons looked like she needed a spoonful of something to calm her down. She hadn't seeen Boat Farmer in a bit. He looked good, Lynn thought and promptly dismissed, because what did that have to do with anything.He looked like he was about to have a panic attack, and all Lynn's instincts told her to bolt. [i]It's a set-up and he knows it,[/i] Lynn thought, [i]New girl's a nullifer. Just fucking run. Burn a hole through the cop's chest, see if you can take her out before she takes you.[/i] That was how it was. You had to get them before they got you. New Girl looked housebroken, too. She could see it in her stance. She was relaxed around Radvi. That took years. [i]Were you relaxed when they fucked up, and three hundred people died?[/i]

Lynn would've considered it. But Keaton was next to her, and something about that made Lynn's runaway thoughts run a little slower, and Lynn told herself, more importantly, she was the only one that could get those kids out. If she roasted this guy today, a dozen little girls died tomorrow, needles in their arms and collars on their neck. 

She looked at New Girl. New Girl looked nice. Annoyingly. Natalie did too. Something in Lynn that did not often surface - Lynn's concerns were normally survival, food, and maintaining her respect - came bubbling up. It was the uncomfortable knowledge that she was the ugliest motherfucker at this table. None of the other girl had scars or tattoos - maybe Spoons had some scars, but the kind people pitied and not the kind that made them look away from you. She was short, too, ten inches shorter than Archie and even further from Radvi. Lynn shifted her weight, eating a pretzel and thankful for the bagginess of her hoodie, that a men's XL masked the ribs poking Lynn's pale skin. Spoons had stopped crying long enough to put on perfect makeup. Lynn had never really - well she didn't have a, or - she didn't know...makeup was dumb. It was for people who couldn't accept they were ugly. Lynn ate another pretzel, forcing her heart rate to go down. At the very least, Lynn had practice with a poker face. She'd had to bite her tongue a lot of times in juvy to keep from getting her ass beat, staring down any number of people she'd rather throttle than thank. The cinnamon pretzels helped.

"'Sup." Lynn said, chewing. She wasn't going to introduce herself to New Girl or Paw Patrol. Lynn took a quiet, petty level of enjoyment in that.