WHEW sorry for the delay. looping back around to the a-plot.

@preludeinz​ picking up from here courtesy of @drdone​ and passing off to @akireyta​

Her service weapon and her badge have both been entrusted to her partner, who isn’t happy about the plan, but admits that it’s a good one. It had been his brother who’d been her unexpected ally, who’d taken her side in the argument, and made the salient point that Kayo’s involvement on the inside track of the street racing circuit might just prevent any other kids like Alan from getting hurt, or worse. This is going to happen again anyway, and this might be the only chance they get to make sure they can stop it.

More surprising even than John’s support had been Scott’s eventual, grudging agreement.

So now she walks through the front door of her uncle’s warehouse with her head high and her shoulders back. Brains walks in front of her and she has to slow her pace in order to stay behind him, because her impulse is to stride out in front. It was her idea, after all.

At the far end of the warehouse, the Mechanic waits. She can feel him staring at her. Her teeth clench slightly, but she keeps her head high. She doesn’t flinch as she approaches, doesn’t shrink beneath his gaze, though he hides his eyes behind mirrored orange sunglasses. He’s dressed all in black, leather jacket, jeans, gloves on his hands and heavy soled boots. His hair is dark, shaved close to his scalp, patterns cut into it, razor sharp lines. He’s built beneath the jacket, Kayo can tell just from the way he holds himself, but shorter than Brains. If he’s not carrying a gun, she’ll eat her badge, or would if she hadn’t left it in the car, entrusted to her partner.

And she does trust her partner. Likewise, she can tell that he trusts her, and more than anything she wants to live up to that trust. Scott’s the reason she’s doing this, anyway.

She’s just not sure why Scott is the reason. A little voice at the back of her brain keeps saying it’s because he’s her partner, but it’s more than that. Loyalty was something her family always preached, but her loyalty to her family has been stripped and scoured away, abraded by all the wrong they’d done—not just to her personally, but to the world at large. Apparently the void left by cutting all ties to her background has been yearning for something to fill it. Kayo’s never had a partner before, never had this particular relationship with someone. She considers Scott a friend, but it’s more than just friendship. She feels a bone-deep devotion to him that she hadn’t expected. She hadn’t known what sort of a police officer she’d make—half the reason she’d gone into law enforcement was just in deliberate defiance of her own legacy—but she’d hoped to find herself drawn to something like a cause. Hoped to find something to fill the void where her loyalties had used to lie.

It’s a big, complicated feeling and it fills her up, fuels her, and fires her purpose like clay in a kiln, hardens it and makes it whole. It’s the reason she’s taken a few of her own days off work, in the name of bringing an end to the man who’s brought harm to her partner’s family. It’s the reason she can be here, and be unafraid, as she finally approaches the Mechanic, who stares at her for a few impassive seconds, before he looks to Brains, impatient and expectant. His voice is deep, oddly muffled when he growls, “Who the hell is this?”

Kayo’s got an answer of her own before Brains can so much as squeak out an apology for his tardiness.

“I’m just someone,” she starts, and squares her shoulders, hopes that her brashness and her confidence don’t tip her hand, give her away before the game’s even begun, “who heard that you’re looking for drivers.”