Starlight Saint

Starlight and Paul took their time heading to the church by eating at one of the numerous Freckle Bitch’s around the city. It wasn’t that they weren’t aware that they needed to be quick to press the attack on the Carnales now that Hector was no longer leading them, they simply weren’t looking forward to dealing with Dex and his ego.

Taking out Hector Lopez would send a message to Angelo and the rest of the Carnales that they weren’t going to be around much longer. Starlight was sure that many of their members knew how much of a loose cannon Angelo was and the only one who could keep him from doing something stupid now was Victor Rodriguez, his enforcer. That would be something that Starlight intended to rectify soon.

Starlight had no doubt that Angelo was shaken up after a vicious combination of terrible events reached his ears at nearly the same time. Between his brother’s death, the loss of his wealth and the paranoia he likely felt about the “Triad” and the Saints working together against him, Starlight was expecting him to try something stupid soon.

Once they finished their meal and threw the wrappers in the trash, since they were gang members, not litterbugs, the two sighed in resignation and headed for the church and Dex’s office.

Once they got there, they noticed that he was with Troy discussing their next move. Starlight noticed Troy pulling out what appeared to be a photo as they entered the room. “Wong's people have Angelo pretty unnerved, more so than I expected,” Troy noted. “Right now he's got Victor and his crew going after just about anyone who pisses Angelo off. But right now we have bigger fish to fry.” He laid the photo on the table, displaying the face of a middle-aged man that looked familiar to Starlight before she remembered that video that Laserbeak recorded and recognized him as Manuel Orejuela.

Troy continued, “This guy is the mouthpiece for the Colombians, Manuel Orejuela. He's the source of the Carnales' power. Smoke this guy and the Carnales will be crippled for good.”

“Yeah, but so will we,” Dex pointed out. “Kill him and the Colombians will be all up our asses. We need to figure out what his game is first, then we’ll decide what to do.”

“How are we gonna do that?”

“Best thing would be to meet with him and find out. You know where he hangs out?”

“Yeah, well, I’d start with the strip clubs.”

Before the conversation progressed further, Starlight had to interject about this. She had a feeling that they were about to overstep the authority Julius had allowed them in dealing with the Carnales. Dealing with an international drug cartel didn’t seem within the scope of their campaign. “Wait, hang on, are you proposing that we meet with the Colombian representative?”

“Yeah, why?” Dex asked.

“Because I’m pretty sure that meeting with foreign representatives, especially the most powerful cartel in the world, goes beyond the scope of what we are allowed to do against the Carnales. We need to bring Julius in on this.”

Dex stood up and glared at Starlight, “I’ve got it handled, we don’t need to involve Julius in this.”

Starlight met Dex’s glare with her own, “Even so, if would be better safe than sorry to have Julius’ input on the matter. I see nothing wrong with that.”

“Fine! If you don’t want to be a part of this then get out of here and go be a bitch somewhere else. I don’t need you anyway, I can handle this myself.” In a huff, Dex walked out of the room and headed toward the exit.

Starlight took a deep breath to calm herself, trying to shake off some of the annoyance she felt for the petulant man. She then looked at Paul, “I hope I don’t regret saying this but…” she sighed, “...go with him. Make sure he doesn’t get himself killed. As much as I would rather see him shot up for his stupidity, he's still a Saint. I'll go inform Julius about this.”

Paul shrugged, “If you say so.”

As Paul quickly headed out to catch Dex before he left, Starlight left the office while still trying to work out her irritation. She thought about how Dex had become less bearable because of his overinflated ego. The man was becoming more of a liability to the Saints because he always considered his plans were the best ones and he hardly considered the input of others while thinking he was a big shot. In short, he was a narcissist.

By the time Starlight found Julius, she had calmed down enough for her to hide her irritation and maintain a professional demeanor. Julius saw her coming and addressed her, “What’s up, Starlight? I thought you would be with Dex right now.”

Starlight gave a tiny wince as Julius uttered the name but kept her cool regardless. She then proceeded to inform him about Dex’s plan to meet Manuel Orejuela of the Colombians which caused the man to frown. Starlight also pointed out that she tried to get Dex to consult him on this but he wouldn’t listen.

Julius gave a grunt of dissatisfaction, “Thanks for bringing this up with me instead of going with Dex on his fool errand. You're right, he should have come to me first before heading out to meet with the Colombians. He doesn't seem to understand how disrespectful it is for a lieutenant to meet with someone like Orejuela before me. Let's hope they don't meet 'cause that could cause problems for us.”

“Yeah, the last thing we need is for the Colombians to come down on us just because Dex didn’t show proper respect to their liaison.” Starlight sighed. “Anyways, I’ve heard from Mr. Wong that the Carnales are pulling back for some reason and that has me worried that they might be planning something.”

“Good instinct, you really are a lot like your father in that way,” Julius complimented.

“I think he’s smarter than most people give him credit for, it shows that he can pull off some daring stunts and return home without any permanent injury.” A thought crept across Starlight’s mind about her father in the Army as a top grade soldier but chuckled at the thought as she figured that he would get kicked out within a week with the way he was.

Shrugging, Julius steered the subject back to more important matters, “Since the Colombians and the Carnales are at each other’s throats now, I’ll see what I can do to get the Colombians on our side. Can I trust you, Paul and Troy to finish off the Carnales?”

Starlight quickly picked up the implications of what Julius just asked and felt an equal but great amount of relief and joy at that. She determinedly nodded, “Count on us!”

Julius nodded, “Good, now go wait in my office, I think you will enjoy this.”

Starlight headed to Julius’ office and waited in a seat since Troy was inside as well sitting on a sofa. The two didn’t say anything important in case one of the other Saints was listening in and Starlight didn’t want to blow Troy’s cover by accident.

The two waited a few minutes before they heard the sound of a car pulling into the parking spot by the fence. It was a few more minutes before the doors opened and an irate Julius entered followed by a confused Dex and an indifferent Paul.

“Julius, I don’t see what the big deal is,” Dex said, clearly not knowing what he did wrong.

“The deal is that you went to talk to the Colombians without me!” Julius snapped.

“We didn’t even get to meet him, Jules.”

“And don’t call me Jules, you haven’t earned it.”

Dex rolled his eyes, “Fine. Julius, you put me in charge of the Los Carnales…” He paused as he realized his grammatical mistake before he glared at Troy. “Shit, now you got me sayin’ it!”

“I don’t need you becomin’ another Warren Williams,” Julius warned. “Don’t act bigger than you are.”

“I had it handled, Julius,” Dex tried.

Having enough of Dex’s attempts at justifying his actions, Julius got into his face, “Not anymore. You're relieved until further notice. Starlight, Paul and Troy can handle the Carnales from here.” He then backed away and addressed the others while Dex stomped out of the room. “I'll arrange a sit down with Orejuela. Meanwhile, I want you to find a way to take Victor Rodriguez out of the game for good. The sooner he’s out, the sooner we can finish off Angelo.”

Starlight nodded, “You got it!”

After that, Starlight and Paul began looking around the city for signs of Carnales activity. However, even in their own territory they seemed to be acting as if they weren’t on the verge of falling apart while guarding the five neighborhoods they had left.

Since Victor was proving difficult to track down, Starlight and Paul decided to find something productive to do, such as finding more vehicles for Miguel. They decided to steal a Reaper sedan from one of the city’s funeral homes while making sure to not steal one that had a casket in it as they had no intention of crossing lines that shouldn’t be crossed.

After delivering the Reaper, the two decided to explore downtown until they found a yellow Compton that had been abandoned by the Vice Kings after their gang disbanded. Paul had the car customized with the necessary parts before he delivered it to Miguel before the two resumed exploring the southern island for any sign of their quarry.

“Where is he? I would think Victor would be out hunting Angelo’s enemies,” Starlight complained.

“Maybe he decided to fuck off and leave town?” Paul weakly offered.

Starlight gave Paul her flatest stare that she could manage since he said something that was simply dumb in her ears. “Do you seriously believe the words that came out of your mouth?”

Blushing, Paul lowered his head in shame, “No…”

The two shared a laugh after that. It was an amusing bit since it took their minds off the frustration of Victor’s elusiveness.

Starlight’s phone rang. She found that Wong needed them for something which she guessed was another client needing something, which if the pattern held then it would have to be someone wanting their help stealing sex workers from pimps again. “Hello?” she responded.

However, Starlight was caught off guard when the call was not what she expected as she heard the sound of gunfire in the background. Dread creeped in as she had a bad feeling of what was going on. Thankfully, Wong sounded slightly amused when he called as he chuckled. “Hello Starlight, it would seem that your plan worked a little too well. It would seem that our mutual acquaintances decided to go after me. Would you be so kind as to remove these annoyances from my lawn?”

“We’ll head over right away.” Starlight ended the call while a deep frown crept onto her face. “Angelo has balls, I’ll give him that. Seems he ordered an attack on Mr. Wong. I’m not sure how he managed to slip a crew past our lookouts, but that doesn’t matter since we’ve been called to exterminate some pests.”

“I’m always up for causing some mayhem,” Paul responded. “With any luck, we’ll find Victor there.”

“Right, let’s get going.” Starlight drove her car as fast as she dared on the streets as she needed to avoid traffic and still manage turns. It was a good thing that the police still ignored traffic violations; one time where Starlight praised police apathy.

Once they arrived, the two were shocked by the number of Carnales vehicles parked in front of Wong’s manor. There were enough cars to fill a small parking lot in the area with what seemed like nearly a hundred Carnales pointing their guns toward the manor. There were also a few carrying RPGs so the situation didn’t look too good. More importantly, they spotted Victor’s Bulldog SUV driving around the area.

“Holy shit! There's gotta be at least half of the Carnales here!” Paul exclaimed.

Starlight stepped out of the car and drew her sword while her hands began to glow. “Doesn’t matter, we’re going to mow them down like the weeds they are. You ready Paul?”

Paul pulled out an RPG, “They’re about to be on the receiving end of a Michael Bay movie.”

Not wanting to engage Victor just yet, Paul and Starlight slipped past Victor’s patrol pattern while Paul rushed forward and tossed a few active grenades beneath the vehicles of a few unsuspecting Carnales thugs. The resulting explosions sent a number of cars flying into the air and the thugs flying away. This opened a hole in the siege and allowed the two to slip past the line before the thugs knew what was going on.

Seeing the two coming, Price, who stood at the entrance of the mansion, called for his men to provide covering fire to take the pressure off the two. Price led them into the mansion and out of enemy fire for the time being.

“Am I glad to see you two,” Price voiced with relief. “Mr. Wong wants these guys out of here, pronto. I ain’t lettin’ them anywhere near Mr. Wong or Donnie.”

“We’ll take care of this,” Starlight assured. “I think it’s about time I showed these guys who they’re dealing with. Time to cut loose!”

“Somehow, I get the feeling that the next few minutes are going to make people question their grip on reality,” Paul commented.

“The ones who survive, anyway,” Starlight added with a chuckle.

While Price ordered covering fire for Starlight and Paul once again, the two began avoiding fire from the Carnales attackers before Paul looked for opportunities to use his RPG to blow up more of their cars. He also tossed grenades and pipe bombs to thin out the attackers.

Starlight, deciding not to hold back anymore, started showing off with her magic by levitating their cars and hurling them into others, terrifying the Carnales who survived such an ordeal. She also caused some of their cars to start driving on their own while smashing themselves into other cars and running over a few thugs like they got caught in a demolition derby.

Starlight’s display of power destroyed the morale of the attackers and caused some of them to flee. However, Wong had men stationed in buildings around his mansion and were ordered to ensure that none of them escaped. The ones who surrendered were captured while the ones who resisted with their guns suffered bullet wounds to their arms and legs before they were captured. The ones who tried to get into their cars to escape were stopped as they noticed a minefield in the street and surrendered afterward.

Once the Carnales numbers were thinned out, Starlight decided that it was time to go after the leader of the attack. The issue was that Victor was constantly moving around in his SUV so she couldn’t get a lock on him with her magic. Price noticed what she was trying to do so he had some of his men force Victor into slowing down with grenades in his path so he would focus on evasive maneuvers. This gave Starlight the opportunity to make her move on the enforcer.

Once he slowed enough, Starlight locked on to the vehicle and teleported to the roof. She quickly raised her sword and pointed it downward to plunge it into the roof and into Victor’s right shoulder. The pained scream she heard informed her that she had succeeded in her stunt.

“Argh! ¡Maldita bruja! (Fucking witch!)” he screamed. He then tried to throw Starlight off his vehicle by wildly swerving his vehicle. Since she had nothing to hold on to, Starlight figured that she would need to make a quick exit but not before she magically locked his car doors and reinforced the glass to make sure he couldn’t escape from the Bulldog SUV. She then jumped off while using her magic to levitate herself onto the lawn of Wong’s mansion.

Victor didn’t see where he was going as the pain of the sword in his shoulder and his desperation to remove the dangerous girl from his car had temporarily blinded his spatial awareness long enough for him to crash his car into a nearby building.

With Victor trapped and stunned from the crash, Starlight quickly began Victor’s execution by piling a few cars onto Victor’s Bulldog. She then shot an exposed gas tank under one of the cars which caused fuel to leak out and leave a trail on the street. She then called for Paul to give her one of his molotovs which she lit with a small magical flame before she aimed her throw at the flowing fuel trail.

“¡Vaya con Dios! (Go with God!)” Starlight called out before she tossed the bottle that shattered on the fuel, igniting it. She also made sure to undo the spells she put on the Bulldog at the last second to prevent the chance that Victor would survive what came next because of her own power. The trail quickly traveled back to the punctured fuel tank.

The resulting explosion caused a chain reaction which blew up every other car next to it, including Victor’s Bulldog. The explosion also set the building that Victor crashed into on fire, but Wong would later tell Starlight that he had that building evacuated beforehand.

The explosion also sent Starlight’s sword flying from the wreckage and toward Starlight where it landed harmlessly by her feet with the blade slightly embedded into the ground. She collected her weapon and sheathed it.

Paul quietly walked up to Starlight with an awestruck expression as his eyes were unable to leave the flames for a time. After a few minutes, Paul finally found his voice again as he expressed what he saw. “That was…intense. And so badass.”

Starlight breathed a sigh of relief as she broke free from the same trance that held Paul. “Yeah, when I think about what I did, I think I scared myself a little.”

“Well you scared the shit out of me. I had no idea if you were going to survive that or not.”

Starlight chuckled, “Well, I guess that's what happens when you lead an interesting life. Anyways, we better go make sure Victor was caught up in that. When it comes to a man who survived a dozen drive-bys, you don’t leave anything to chance.”

“Right.”

Using her magic, Starlight lifted the cars she piled on the Bulldog before examining the wreckage. She quickly spotted an unmoving burning body within the remains. She barely managed to recognize Victor’s features before his body was completely engulfed in flames.

Satisfied with the confirmation, she returned to Paul to continue watching the blaze. A disturbing thought crossed her mind at one point where she thought of Troy lighting a cigarette over Victor’s burning corpse but quickly filed that thought in a place in her mind where things went to be forgotten forever.

Paul shrugged and placed a hand on Starlight’s shoulder. She looked at him as he pointed a thumb at the mansion. “Well, I think he’s definitely dead at this point. Let’s go check on Mr. W to see if he’s okay.”

Starlight nodded, “Yeah, with Victor gone, Angelo is out of allies so now we can start taking what’s left of the Carnales territories with ease.”

Starlight and Paul headed back to the mansion reinvigorated with the thought that the end of the gang war was finally in sight.