One Powerful Saint

Vee cruised around Stillwater on his bike as he took Carlos's advice and tried to find some kind of familiarity but everywhere he looked was a bright shiny building normally reserved for the upper class, the rich or the nepotistic. For someone that spent his teen years having to dodge watch hawkers and drug dealers; It was an almost sad thing to see everything change. "Damn…I can't believe I actually miss the smell of cigarette smoke and gunpowder…" Vee thought to himself but stopped at the lights and glanced in a store window; His dishevelled appearance from five years in both a coma and the clink didn't improve how he looked right now so his first idea was to stop for a cleanup and some new clothes.

"Hi! Welcome to Second Hand, where someone's trash is your treasure!" The customary greeting chirped as Vee rang the bell when he walked through their door; They seemed to return to work however when they saw the dishevelled man wearing a prison jumpsuit wander through the door, whether that was out of not caring enough or just minding their own busing was debatable.

"Alright….Too tacky…" Vee mumbled and threw a a sports jersey back on the rack since it was a blindingly bright violet and white, "Too holey…" Out went a sweatshirt that had holes in it from moths and needle tears. "Too…Just no." He stated bluntly as a purple pimp coat went back on it's hangar and put in a far corner. After spending some time looking; he finally managed to cobble together a look that mixed both gang loyalty and his own comfort/style. He ended up wearing a black suit but with a deep purple button up shirt that had white thorned vines trailing along it, silver studded cufflinks along with black dress shoes.

"That'll be $300 for your exquisite taste!" The clerk said with a professional and over the top smile as they rather unsubtly held their hand out for the money.

"Shit…I forgot that they took all my shit when I got in lockup…That or my wallet got lost at the bottom of the sea…" Vee thought as he pat down his pocket for any change and realised he still had his phone and opened it up; "I should still ha-And they took all my money from there…Great…" He grumbled as he noticed that along with all his money from his person, the government drained all the money from a dead man's bank account since he technically didn't need it.

That was when his phone started to buzz, when Vee pulled it out and saw that an icon was on his screen that he had never once seen before; it looked like a white cloud with dollar signs inside of it along with the name of "The Permanent Discount". With a cautious tap on the icon, Vee noticed that the bank balance which showed up next to his phone signal and battery had shot up from $1.50 to $100,001.50 in a single beep. "Thanks for your purchase Sir! Make sure you tell your friends in the homeless shelter!" The clerk called out with a combination of genuine thanks and innocently insensitivity as Vee left both richer and snappier dressed.

"Okay, I have SO many questions for you…..Starting with does this thing have a limit on it?" Vee mentally asked himself as he tapped it again….and again….over and over until he had enough money to feed, clothe, finance and arm a small country with nuclear weapons. "Apparently not….Now let's get ourselves a trim." He mentioned as he now had a pep in his step once he figured out that he had a money button on his phone.

"Hey, Welcome to-Holy jeez!" The head barber remarked out in surprise when she saw the snappily dressed but still unkempt man walking through the door; "Looks like you could use an overhaul, my man."

"Yeah, you and me both….I'll get a full works but I'll say when." Vee mentioned as he climbed into one of the barber's chairs to the sound of clippers and scissors. Before the explosion happened on the boat; Vee had buzz cut short black hair and clean shaven so he couldn't get grabbed or pulled during a fight but when he got out of the barber shop, he decided to let himself have slightly longer hair and even had a neatly trimmed beard that framed his face better than it had before "Just one last stop then I can feel like normal again…"

"Friendly Fire, We put the Hoot in Serial Shooter…." The guy behind the counter mentioned as he saw Vee coming in to scope out the arms he had. "So what can I get for ya?" He asked the suited man as he perused the rifles.

"I'll take this and some extra ammo." Vee mentioned as he pointed to the T3K Urban SMG, "And a few flashbangs just in case."

The man looked to Vee then to the guns; "Alright buddy, but it's a 12 week wait on the background check and a license fee for the gun ownership." He pointed out as he then gestured to the sign; "No Guns for Dummies!"

"What if I gave you 25 grand for the "Express Delivery" and for you to pretend that I fulfill all your needs for this." Vee offered as he pulled out his phone.

"Make it a hundred and I'll throw in this perk to the other chains in the city." The clerk remarked as he knew that phrase was gangbanger code for "I insist…" And he would rather that someone who could casually throw 25k at him buy his stuff then pushing him to someone more obnoxious like Dakka's.

Vee then wired the full 100,000 over to the clerk and added an extra 50 grand to make sure that the guy stayed quiet; "I'll make sure that you and your store fall under the Saints' protection in case the cops come sniffing around."

"The cops aren't the worst thing around, it's the other gangs you gotta worry about….You're in Ronin territory so either stock your rounds up or make sure that bike outside can break the speed limits around here." The clerk warned as he pointed to the yellow graffiti on a still under construction building.

"Huh…I didn't know a new gang set up shop around here..I'm guessing these Ronin guys took over the Vice Kings with their colours." Vee quipped as he stared at the wall art.

"I wish, at least the VKs pretended to be legit, The Ronin are all fast bikes and acting like punks…They came from overseas and just started shooting around…The only reason I stay in business is that they buy my shit and the occasional knife to someone afraid to walk in their territory."

"I'll keep that in mind…Thanks for the advise." Vee mentioned as he clambered on his bike and rode off to the bar to see what he could find out. Thanks to Ultor's refurbishments efforts and expansion; Nearly every place was now tidier and sterilised but Tee n' Ay still looked the same that it had before, Vee smirked a little as he ventured inside and sat at the bar to check the TVs while ordering a beer.

Thankfully the bartender changed over to the news for what was clearly a top story; "It's said by some, to be the trial of the century. A notorious and high ranking member of the gang once known as "The 3rd Street Saints", Johnny Gat was arrested a couple of years ago in an assassination attempt against then decorated police officer Troy Bradshaw. In the resulting trial, Gat was convicted of one count of attempted murder, and a staggering three hundred eighty seven counts of 1st degree murder...promptly sending him to death row. Over the past year Gat's legal team has filed appeal after appeal-"

Vee felt like he was punched in the stomach as the drone of the TV faded out; Johnny Gat was the one who helped canonise Vee into the Saints and helped him out with the Vice Kings though to Dex's chagrin, Johnny didn't much care for new blood but the two helped Aisha escape from the VK's grip through her label and took them down when Tanya started backstabbing.

"Hey Barry…Do me a favour and turn that shit off!" A rather drunk looking man in red demanded the bartender and sat at the bar near Vee as he drank down his beer, knocking Vee out of his shock at seeing Gat after so long and hearing that he was getting the chair.

"I was watching that…." Vee mentioned in a frosty tone as he watched it change from the news over to some Z-List game show involving a pink cat and dozens of mascots fighting each other.

"Not anymore you're not, bitch!" The drunk gloated as he slugged down another gulp of his drink and slammed the bottle down; "Besides, this bar's under the Brotherhood's protection…What we say goes and I don't wanna watch some has-been gangster getting zapped. So unless you got red in that suit of your's, fuck off outta here!"

Vee bowed his head a little with a quiet sigh, he reached down for the drink in the gangster's inebriated hand by the neck of the bottle and then casually swung it upwards with the sound of shattering glass. The drunk got knocked out of his chair and into the air before crashing through a table and landing in an unconscious pile. "Could you turn the TV back on, please?" He asked with the calmness and casualness of someone who hadn't just knocked a surly drunk halfway across the bar, having not yet quite registered how he was able to do that due to the recent talk of executing Johnny Gat. "Oh shit…Hold on, Johnny!" He thought before scrambling out of the chair and turned to see the groaning drunk sat in between the two broken pieces of the table; "Damn…Couldn't do that before…More questions for later…" He mumbled before placing some money for the drink and for the table on the bar to pay before running out.

With the sounds of the streets ringing in his ears and the honks of cars going past, Vee climbed over onto his "Borrowed" bike and started the engine to book it. "HEY! That's the asshole who floored Jackie! Get 'em!" A group of similarly red clad men pointed Vee out in the crowd as they were loading that drunk into the back seat.

"Alright, speed limit be damned!" Vee thought to himself as the roar of the Melbourne's engine came to life and he sped off at full throttle; "Okay, I recognise the courthouse from the outside so hopefully I can get there in time!" He said to himself but heard a honking as several trucks started to speed after him followed by the bang bang! of gunfire as they shot from the windows to take out Vee.

The group were tailing him with Legions and Alaskan haulers since their whole thing was big cars and bigger mouths, they were adamant on avenging their boy since they figured that anyone dumb enough to try messing with them was worth stomping out. "Come on! He's some asshole on a bike, this shouldn't be that hard!"

Vee swerved in and out of the lanes but he realised that after what happened in the bar, no one was ignoring that and he certainly couldn't tell them that he didn't even know how he did it but then it came to him; "The Engine…." He thought and once he focused his mind on it, information sprang up about it like it was something he had memorised word for word; "Combat Healing Enhancement And Termination….Great, I got myself a C.H.E.A.T Engine…That explains sending that one guy flying…" He then rounded a corner with a skid and pulled out his SMG; "Now let's see what it does for guns." He then took an aim at the quickly approaching Alaskan truck at the front and started spraying bullets.

The spread was wide and in true SMG fashion; It did jack all against the strong metal of the cars but it did blow out their tires, sending the front pursuer skidding to and fro before crashing into the following trucks that approached too quickly to stop. "YOU DON'T KNOW WHO YOU'RE MESSING WITH! WAIT UNTIL MAERO FINDS YOU!"

Unfortunately for them, Vee was too far gone to hear their threats as he had more important things to worry about with the courthouse approaching. The Police Guard outside seemed to add more to worry about but Vee wasn't going to let something like General Misdemeanours stop him as he cocked his machine gun.

——Inside the Courthouse——

This was the trial of the century; The most dangerous man to ever come out of the Third Street Saints was now being convicted for his crimes and he was offered no sympathy from anyone, least of all the judge in charge; "Mr. Gat, you've been convicted of over three hundred murders and various other acts of mayhem, do you really expect this appeal to work at all for you?" She would glare at him with the factual understanding that someone like Gat was in no way going to walk away from this.

Johnny Gat shrugged his shoulders like he was being investigated for a faulty tax return and not his laundry list of killing, maiming and anarchy. "Well, it couldn't really hurt to try since I figured with the statute of limitations it really should be closer to two fifty…Besides, look me in the eye and tell me that half those assholes on that list didn't deserve what was coming for 'em."

The Judge blinked at his audacity and his lack of thought towards this whole thing. "There's no statute of limitations for murder! Regardless of whether they're equally malicious or as corrupt as a mass murderer like you!" She snapped at him and pointed her gavel at him; This particular judge was used to the snark and the outright sociopathy that came with incarcerating gangbangers but with someone that had a list of casualties and obituaries as long as her arm, this was far from being ignored.

Johnny struggled in his cuffs as he felt like calling out the BS from a federal judge. "Well why the fuck not? I've seen cops and gangbangers get put up to judges that have a stick up their ass but they always go free, you're just there to off me because you wanna be the one to walk me down there!"

The Judge growled, he wasn't exactly wrong in the matter. Putting away someone as infamous as Johnny Gat was bound to make them a well known name in the Chief Justices but she wasn't willing to admit that. "You better watch yourself Mr. Gat, because if you don't rein it in then I-"

Gat waved her off with a derisive snort and a clearly unapproving glare behind his glasses; "Or what, you'll hold me in contempt of court? You're already planning on giving me the chair regardless of how I plead, you really think I'm gonna give a shit about you not liking me? Fuck off..." He snapped at her with a more than petty flick of his middle finger, intent on staying defiant in front of her and the new crews.

The gavel came down hard as the Judge decided that there was really no point in a jury or a verdict at this time. "I'm curious if you can keep that cavalier attitude when 2000 volts are running through your body." She snarked darkly and watched as the bailiffs were getting ready to transport Gat away, though she hadn't noticed that one of them was reaching for their radio.

Having the joy of putting her down and wanting the last word, Johnny spoke up and decided to make this as unfiltered and as uncomfortable as he could make it. "Oh yeah? And I'm curious if you can keep acting like a douche bag when I shove that gavel up your ass…You uptight, self righteous-" The next few words were quietened down by the roar of the crowds and his lawyer Legal Lee trying to get what he said stricken from the record but needless to say, whatever it was that he spat out; It certainly would've been censored on news reports.

The Judge was about to order Gat to get out of the court room and wish him a quick trip to Hell but gunshots started to echo outside the room before she could bang the gavel. "Bailiff…Go see what that i-"

It was there that a guard was kicked through the door and in stepped Vee who was clutching onto a pair of pistols; "I object to your bullshit, Judge!" Vee announced as the crowds began to quiet down in fear.

One of the guards draws the gun out of his holster to try being a hero and snuck up on Vee but unfortunately for him, the Saint wasn't exactly slow on the uptake.

Vee quickly pointed his own gun between the Guard's eyes with a deadpan stare that warned off any attempt. "Drop it." He warned and then watched as the guard did so. The gun however went off upon hitting the ground, making everyone except Gat panic and hide from what could be something dangerous.

Legal Lee had the lawyer's mentality as he then poked his head back out for a moment from behind the desk: "Anyone hit and need a lawyer?"

Vee ignored him and then grabbed the keys to Gat's handcuffs off ofthe first guard's belt and tosses them to Gat who needless to say was both surprised and happy to see a "friendly" face.

"Shit, 'bout time your burnt ass woke up..." Gat snarked as he undid the clasp on his cuffs and relaxed his wrists; "Here I thought you were dead and at the bottom of the river."

"Are you doing good, Johnny?" Vee asked as he handed Johnny one of his pistols and a knife, checking his other gun to make sure that it still had ammo and oddly enough; Even though he fired off enough bullets to empty the gun, the magazine was full to the brim like he hadn't even fired it. "Huh…Infinite Ammo too, I'm down for that."

"Sure, two yearsa prison and nearly getting lit up in the chair like Christmas lights….I'm fuckin' aces, you on the other hand look different…You finally ditched the peach fuzz look." Gat snarked as he aimed towards the door; "Now let's get outta here before other people start trying to kill us both."

Vee nodded and had a grin on his face as he was now side by side with a ride or die buddy, shooting up the courthouse until they reached the garage. "C'mon, we can snatch one of these and blend in with the crowd."

The sounds of a shotgun cocking broke the quiet of the garage as the judge was standing there with a fully loaded 12 Gauge. "You two aren't going anywhere….Now get your asses back in that courtroom and we can settle this." She snarled as she pointed the gun at Vee once she recognised him. "You're the Number 2 if I read Gat's file correctly."

"The one and only….Just drop it because there's no one else around and I'm only here to spring Gat." Vee detailed but kept his hands on the pistol in case the Judge got twitchy.

"You see, that's the problem…Gat leaves here and another gang goes loose on Stillwater, you might think that Bradshaw's bailing you out with protection and medical bills but he's not going to ignore the Saints coming back." The Judge ranted; "The Ronin, The Brotherhood and the Sons of Samedi are all bad enough but we can put those away, if any other Saint was let loose then I'll ignore it but you two are the biggest offenders! Two mass murdering psychopaths who tried to kill the current Police chief and the former Police Chief, the only difference is one succeeded!"

"You don't want to do this, let us go and you can walk aw-"

BOOM!

The Judge had enough and blasted Vee dead on with their shotgun; Sending the other Saint flying upward and then crashing into one of the walls.

"VEE!" Gat yelled out as he trained his gun on the Judge who was smirking to herself.

"One down…." She then cocked the shotgun and was about to point it at Gat but he ended up beating her to it as he nailed a shot between her eyes.

"One's all you're gettin' bitch…" Gat remarked with a cold anger nestled in his stomach before going to check over Vee, "Come on man, you got back up from a lakebound car, a boat explosion and a fucking coma…You should be able t-" He tried to encourage Vee but then saw that the holes made by the Judge's buckshot slowly closed themselves back up like they were rewound on a video tape. "What the fuck?" Was the only thing and the most coherent thing that Johnny Gat could ever hope to surmise watching his brother in arms get shot and then come back to life like it was nothing.

"Johnny? The hell happened? I think I blacked out for a moment…Oh…Looks like that solves that." Vee said with an almost deadpan expression when he saw the Judge that tried to shoot them lying on the floor and climbed to his feet, "You okay? You look like you just saw a ghost."

"Right now, I feel like I am…But I'll save the questions for later, let's get the fuck outta here before more cops show up." Johnny decided to hold off on the questions as he piled into the back of a beaten up looking sedan and hotwired it while Vee stretched out before climbing in and sped off out of the garage, into the road. "Thanks for springing me, Eesh would've killed me if I got the execution."

"Hold on, you're still with Aisha? How's that working out with…Well, everything." Vee asked as he tuned the radio while weaving in and out of the lanes; "Because last I checked, we made sure that the VKs and just about everyone else thought she was dead."

Johnny shrugged as he peered out of the window; Admittedly he wasn't exactly the greatest driver so he decided to save the trouble and let the guy who could race alongside the Rollerz take the wheel. "Eh, it was a little complicated at the start; Her being on the DL while I was stuck on Death Row doesn't exactly mean movie dates and restaurant dinners but we managed to make it work."

"Speaking of which, Why DID you end up in jail? From what I heard, you tried to knock off a cop." Vee mentioned as they turned off of the main street and into the back roads.

"Once that crooked Chief of Police got taken out, they were scrambling and were looking for someone so they picked Troy to take the reins as the new chief since he cracked down on us…" Johnny explained as he took a deep sigh; "It was weird though…When I first got into lockup. People on the inside were betting how long I'd last…Guards were always tryin' to put me in the ground and the gangbangers who got jailed along with me were all too happy to try helping for over two years. After Troy became chief of police it all stopped…Gotta admit, he's a helluva lot more forgiving than I am."

Vee nearly drove into a mascot selling chicken when he pumped the brakes out of shock; "Hold up, Troy's the Chief of Police?! How the hell did that happen?" He asked in a mix of shock and anger at the fact that if Troy was able to get the role as chief meant he was an undercover guy.

Johnny laughed as he watched the Mascot yelling at them and flipping them off. "You better start getting with the times, man. Julius went missing, King fully dropped flags and wrote an autobiography, Dex is a…Look, don't even get me started with Dex...but the real kicker is Troy. In a couple months he went from an undercover cop to chief of police...and word is he's become batshit obsessed with finding out what happened on your little boat trip with the Alderman." He explained as he saw that Vee was still coming to terms with Troy being a narc. "Trust me, the guys who stuck around were equally pissed about him being a secret cop…Then again, it wouldn't really have surprised me if he had been."

"Then it sounds like I should pay our friend a visit if I get the chance." Vee mentioned with a grumble; "With the Saints coming back, we're gonna make sure that we don't take shit from anyone else."

"Good luck with that, the loyal ones got put down and the others dropped flags to go elsewhere…plus with all the cops after us, it won't be too long before Troy has us sat in his office." Johnny remarked as he pointed Vee towards the place he was staying; "You may as well come in, Eesh'd be happy for old friends."

"Sure, that'd be great." Vee accepted as they climbed out and headed inside. The other Saint had to admit; A dead singer's royalties really pulled through for a swanky house in the good part of Stillwater, catching the beer that Johnny threw him and opened it up with his knife while Johnny settled on using the edge of the coffee table as his bottle opener, though that didn't prepare him for the wave of emotions at hearing a familiar voice from his past.

"God damn it Johnny! I don't care if you just broke out of jail, you do not mess with my furni- Oh my God, it's you." Aisha was in a state of shock when she saw the man that helped her get free of the Vice Kings and who she thought was long gone. "You're really here!"

Vee smirked; "Surprised, Aisha?" He asked as he toasted her but was taken aback by the sudden tight hug that Aisha gave him; "Okay, I'll take that as a yes."

"Well, we all thought you were dead or missing!" Aisha pointed out as she went to go sit with Johnny and kissed his cheek. "In any case for someone who was blown to hell, you look great…I see you decided to grow your hair out, you get sick of the cueball look?" She teased him playfully; Her and a lot of the other Saints liked to make jabs at him for looking like a bowling ball but the guy proved that he could step up when it was needed.

"Yeah, Johnny already hit me with that one…But we've got something to take care of first before we get coffee and comfortable." Vee mentioned as he was getting antsy for action just like Johnny was.

"You two seriously can't wait until after dinner?" Aisha asked them but the look on their faces made her realise that the answer was obvious; "Still the same guys…."

"Well, there is that old saying about dogs and blowin' shit up…So Vee, you gotta plan for this?" Johnny asked since he figured that someone like him would've come up with something on the way to the courthouse.

"Well, I've kinda winged it most of the way…But one thing that I DO know is we need to get our crew together, once we got some loyal guys then we can take back the city from the other gangs." Vee mentioned though a stern looking Aisha managed to poke a hole in this quickly.

"And where exactly were you planning on this lil meeting?" She asked the two of them but she was equally as quick to stop their line of thoughts when they started to look around the house. "Uh uh, No…Absolutely not!"

"We do have a lot of space here." Johnny pointed out as he leaned back on the couch.

"Johnny…."

"The colour's pretty soothing and fits for the Saints."

"No…."

"Aw, come on Eesh…We need somewhere we know and is easy to keep track of." Johnny pouted as he watched Aisha put her foot down.

"Don't you "Come on Eesh" me! This ain't no fuckin' gang clubhouse…" Aisha was adamant on ensuring that the nice clean suburban house was not gonna become their Gang den.

"So new place than?" Vee suggested once he realised that Aisha wasn't budging.

"Sorry man, you good with trying to scope out a new place for us? I'd come out with ya but…Well, me and Eesh need to…Catch up…If you get my meaning…" Johnny mentioned with a sly grin and earned a slap on the arm from Aisha though her own smirk meant she thought the same thing.

"Okay, didn't need to know that part but I'll leave you to it…I'll hit you up once I find us a good place." Vee mentioned as he wanted to get out of there quick when he realised that Johnny was planning something that he didn't want to really be a part of…Or see for that matter as he shut the door behind him.

"Now…How about we make up for lost time~" Aisha purred in Gat's ear as he scooped her up into his arms and carried her upstairs.

Vee meanwhile was outside trying to clear out any mental images and decided to start scouting for Gang hangouts, starting with their old safehouse.