Chapter Text
Jonny had gone early to the casino to play some cards because they were blowing something up with Tim, which was fine, Jonny could talk care of himself for the most part.
But he was not anywhere they could see when they walked in nor walked around the floor looking for him. Sure they’d spilt up once they found him, but they’d like to tell him they were here at least, touch base, do a check in.
Then someone came up to them.
They raised an eyebrow, “Can I help you?”
There was a smirk on the man’s face they didn’t like, “Are you Ashes O’Reilly?”
Oh they were going to burn this casino to the ground, “That’s my name yes.” Their voice was surprisingly steady for the rage that sat in their heart.
The man’s smirk only widened as he said, “Follow me.”
They clenched their fists but did so.
They came to a table in a private room, Jonny was cuffed to the wall and hand a gag in, their hand twitched towards their lighter.
Jonny’s eyes were wide as he looked at them, not quite scared but he hadn’t expected to me in this position.
A table, a card table, with people all around it. Everyone was laughing.
They looked back at the man who brought them here, he now had a gun to Jonny’s head, finger on the trigger.
“What do you want?” They asked, trying for a tone that didn’t show they were angry beyond belief.
The man laughed, “You win a ten rounds of poker, no cheating, and we let him go.”
No cheating, well that was annoying, “What happens if I lose?”
“He dies,” The man said simply, “He gets a bullet through his head.”
“Ah,” They said, “And if I, hypothetically, cheat?”
“Same things, except through his heart,” The man said.
Jonny’s eyes actually gained a scared quality to them and they froze.
They never went for each other’s mechanisms, sure they could heal even from that, but often times they’d heal wrong and then they’d end up in the lab with Raph fixing it. They especially didn’t go after Jonny’s mechanism, because they all knew how he was with any sort of surgery.
They had three options, first just set the whole place ablaze and grab Jonny and get out of here, refuse to play and see the consequences of that (one of which they were sure would be trust and/or love draining out of Jonny’s eyes), or play the game, don’t cheat, and win.
Option two was out, they couldn’t do that to Jonny.
There were two many people and they didn’t have anything more than a single lighter to start a fire, which meant option one was out.
Which left option three, play the game, don’t cheat, rely on chance and win.
They took a deep breath and met the man’s eyes, “I’ll play.”
The man put his gun back in his holster and let a manic grin grow on his face.
They hated him, they decided, they hated him.
They looked over at Jonny one last time, he was staring back at them.
He couldn’t see the cards from where he was, he couldn’t really see anything, and he couldn’t even see most of the players faces or body language.
And to make it worse Ashes’ back was too him, granted between rounds they kept glancing back at him.
He thinks he was going well, based on the tiniest little bits of body language that he could read from Ashes, but there was still a fury that was underlaying everything they did.
He knew that this was the first time he’d ever seen them play a card game without cheating. He knew it was because of the threat of a bullet through his heart, which made him a little sick to even think about because that meant pain when he came back until he got to Raph and had surgery, and he couldn’t do surgery.
The gag in his mouth brought back too many thoughts of various other kidnappings and prison stays where they decided he talked to much and needed to shut him up. And the cuffs brought him back to many, many times of him being cuffed down to a lab table.
He focused back on what we could see of Ashes, meeting their eyes when they looked back.
He didn’t know what round they were on, he didn’t know how long he’d been here.
The man came back over after a time period he didn’t know, he flinched back, but all the man did was unlock his cuffs with a mildly pissed off look on his face and then walk away.
Ashes was immediately in front of him, “Hey. I’m gonna take your gag off.”
He nodded.
Ashes untied the gag from around his head and pulled it off him.
He coughed, but refused to give into the tears that were burning in the corners of his eyes.
“Let’s go,” Ashes said.
He nodded.
“Got nothing to say now huh boy?” One of the players said from the table.
Ashes’ head whipped over to the table, “I just beat your ass ten times without cheating, while you’ve been hiding cards in your sleeves the whole time.”
He heard immediate angry voices come from the table but Ashes paid them no mind, looking back at him and pulling him up to his feet by his hands.
They left the casino and Ashes immediately pulled him into an alley next to it.
“Ashes,” He started.
Ashes pulled him into a hug.
He tensed for just a moment before melting into them.
“I’m burning that place to the ground,” Ashes said into his ear.
“I know,” He agreed, “I just-Aurora?”
“I can get you back to the ship yeah,” Ashes agreed, still just holding him close.
They stood there for a bit before Ashes pressed a kiss to the side of his head and pulled back.
He pulled them in for a kiss on the lips, it wasn’t anything crazy just connection from one of his partners, that had just saved him.
Ashes smiled at him, “Hey there mo kèr, let me get you home.”
He heard later from Tim about how the casino went up in flames ‘beautifully’ which gave him plenty of comfort that they could never get to him again.