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.*･｡. EFF IT! .*･｡.
————PILOT
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003.
CONVERSE, BOOT, CONVERSE.
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   For a moment, as she stared at the safe, Sonny thought her eyes were going to bulge right out of her head. 

"Holy shit," she breathed.

It seemed like all was forgotten in that moment: why they were there; why Sonny had been hiding under the bed; why the teenagers bumped into each other. As they stared at the safe in palpable silence, it didn't seem to matter anymore. It seemed futile now because in that safe sat stacks of cash, an envelope and a gun.

A freakin' gun.

Sonny had never seen a real gun before.

She had also never seen that much physical cash up close, within reaching distance. Most of the money she had was via credit card, and she didn't think people even had any physical cash anymore. It was a dying trade, what, with the recent rise of contactless payment and online banking. All the old dudes complained about it, how it would kill the economy, blah, blah blah. All that crap.

Her parents were super loaded, but it never meant Sonny carried her money around in dollar bills. There wasn't a gun in her house either. Penbrook's were a strictly anti-gun family; it was considered kind of strange in the OBX, seeing as most families owned an armed weapon. But the Penbrook's never did, and the gun that was in Topper's house was a hunting rifle in a glass case below the stairs, not the kind of pistol that was in that safe. And all her life, Sonny avoided gun counters and target ranges, anything remotely close; guns were not her thing. She knew how dangerous they were. So, no. Safe to say Sonny had never seen a handgun — and she never planned to, for that matter.

Sonny felt sick to her stomach, why was there a gun?

"Yeah," John B murmured, "Holy shit."

It was an eery enough motel room as it was— so the fact that there was a sunken boat connected to it, and now a gun with stacks of cash in a safe, was creepy. Totally creepy. And Sonny didn't know what to make of it, how to react. But, it seemed she didn't really have to.

JJ did all of the reacting for the both of them.

"Dude!" He grinned.

Sonny didn't have to open her mouth.

"Dude, Dude!" He clapped John B's shoulder, shaking it with an excited laugh.

Of course he was excited by a gun, Sonny puffed. He was very well known as a delinquent in the OBX; always in the sheriff's station, always running from the cops, always doing something illegal. JJ Maybank was known for that— it was his brand; and he often dragged the other Pogues down with him on the odd occasion they weren't already playing a part.

While Sonny had never seen a gun, she didn't doubt that JJ probably had. She didn't doubt that he'd dreamt of having a gun of his own, either.

    "A gun!" He near squealed at John B, "Hell yeah!"

   While John B tried to keep the gun situated in the safe and away from JJ's grubby little hands, Sonny turned to focus her attention on the stacks of cash. She frowned and rubbed at the sore sport on her nose, from when she had been hiding under the bed. When that thing fell and hit—

   Wait.

   Ignoring when John B asked what the fuck she was doing, Sonny threw herself onto her knees and crawled back under the bed. She wildly waved an arm around, dragging her fingertips across the dusty carpet and grimacing at the dirt under her nails, until she finally bumped into the object that had hit her in the face.

   Her breath hitched in her throat, and Sonny took a very short moment before sliding it out from underneath the bed. Out from below the mattress, she was able to see it better and it didn't take much time for Sonny to realise exactly what had very potentially bruised her nose. It was exactly what she had thought it would be after seeing the safe.

   Money!

   A whole damn lot of money!

Unable to fully comprehend how much money was stashed away in this motel room, or why it would have been, Sonny stared down at it with wide eyes.

   What the fuck was going on, here? This stupid boat clearly had brought Sonny Penbrook into a fucking riot. Copious amounts of money? A gun?

   It didn't seem right; it made her feel uncomfy.

   Sure, guns and money weren't exactly foreign in the OBX, or in the rest of the United fucked up States of America, but she couldn't understand. Sonny had only gone to tell someone she found their sunken boat and now she was in an empty motel room with two Pogues, dollar bills, and a criminal weapon. Her head was starting to pound.

"Don't grab— okay, you grabbed the gun."

She hauled herself off the floor when John B and JJ started to bicker, that latter smacking his friend's hands away as he reached to take the gun back, too excited to even think about putting it back in the safe.

"Put it down!" Sonny hissed, pocketing the cash.

"This is a SIG Sauer!" He told them, putting out a hand to keep John B away as he giggled like a kid.

John B huffed, "Put the gun back, JJ!"

"This is a fucking spendy gatt, man!" JJ insisted. He started to swing it around childishly, pretending to shoot it like he was in an action movie or a video game. Either he didn't actually understand John B and Sonny were being serious, or he really didn't really care; but the boy continued, either way. "Bam! Bam! This shit is so fucking sick!"

"Stop it!" The girl rushed around the bed and pushed her way between John B and JJ, "Just put the freaking gun down!"

Sonny tried to reached for it but he swiftly swiped it out of her hands and over his shoulder, trying to look like 007 while he did so. He could tell she wasn't amused, neither was John B, who had his teeth gritted and a frown on his lips.

Sonny glared, "It is not a toy!"

John B was shocked.

Kinda.

He'd never heard Sonny Penbrook say so much, though he assumed it was mostly down to the stress of her being stuck in a motel room with two Pogues, the dumber (only marginally) of which had a gun cocked at her like a toy. If Sonny didn't already dislike the Pogues, then she certainly wouldn't like them now. Kooks weren't known for getting along with Pogues. So, the fact that Sonny had yet to fully dash out of the room was pretty impressive. Then again, she wasn't exactly an average Kook. Anyone with eyes could see that. John B had known it from the day he first saw her, back when they were kids and she was on her way to a ballet class, a huge frown on her face as she ripped her tutu with a paperclip.

Sonny Penbrook never really acted like a Kook, or like most in the Outer Banks. Sonny Penbrook was her own — independent and brash, a girl who appeared not to enjoy human company. He had seen her out in the sea with dolphins more than he ever saw her with humans, but it wasn't hard to beat Kook company. John B was rather spend his time with rats.

Parties were the sole place Kooks and Pogues collided, and she was at some of them. They were places to get drunk and high, and Sonny could be in the same space as other humans without having to actually talk to them.

John B assumed that was why she attended a few.

She usually just observed.

Whether she had no real discernible personality was still a question, but John B decided she was just a person that liked being alone. Some people were.

"Get that thing outta my face," she seethed, pointing at the blonde boy in front of her.

JJ snorted and put the gun back in a shooting stance.

"Hey— think about it!" He ignored her instruction. John B noticed the muscle in her jaw feather. "Sk'pow! Sk'pow! Bam!"

John B shoved him.

"We are not stealing anything!"

Sonny couldn't decide if John B chose to see the best in his friend or if he was just dim. Because, judging by the item that stuck out the pocket of JJ's shorts, he had already opted not to listen to instruction.

After all, she doubted JJ had shown up with deodorant in his pocket — just a hunch, an obvious one.

"Just take a pic of me!" JJ said. "Right here!"

He moved back a couple steps and broadened his stance, holding the gun by his head so the barrel pointed at the sky. He smouldered slightly, but the others just watched blankly.

Was he being serious, right now? Sonny had heard stories of JJ Maybank being a little unscrewed — that there was something not quite right about him, but she'd always thought them to be Topper, Kelce and Rafe being assholes and exaggerating purely because they didn't like them, However, hearing him ask her and John B to take a damn picture of him with the gun they'd found was proving those stories correct. This kid was fucking insane — that's what Sonny'd decided, then and there, as JJ fished out his phone from his pockets.

John B blinked.

"You want me to take a picture of you?"

"Yeah, dude!"

"Like, make our own incriminating evidence?" He retorted. He thought it was obvious that being caught with a firearm at sixteen — a stolen one, at that — would be an offence. "Is that what you're talking about?"

JJ's lip formed an O.

"Are you—?" Sonny pinched the bridge of her nose, "You are literally insane," his chaos physically hurt, "What the fuck is wrong with you?"

"Oh? I'm insane?" JJ shot back.

    "Look at you!"

"Well I'm not the one who was hiding under a bed! Was I, now, Kook?"

Sonny grit her teeth at the name.

"What are you even doing here anyway?" He interrogated her, and John B couldn't prevent his eyes from flickering over to her, as well. "How'd you even get in? Door was locked! We have the key!"

John B arched a brow, fair play.

For once in his life, JJ was asking the right questions. He knew it was weird that Sonny had somehow wormed her way into the room, and somehow knew about the boat out in the marsh, and John B had to give JJ props for beating him to it. John B was usually the one bursting with questions while JJ just sat and smoked.

For a moment, he decided to think like high JJ. Was Sonny a practicing magician? Had she been kidnapped?

"I came in through the—"

As she went to point to the window, there was a sudden tap as something hit the glass.

The three of them jumped, tails between their legs. They all exchanged a look, each hoping they had imagined it, the room lapsing into an eerie silence.

Another tap. Then another, and one more.

Definitely not imagining it.

"What the...?" John B gently moved Sonny out of his way, hand placed on her shoulders in a strangely polite manner, and then peered out through the slither of open glass Sonny had left after climbing in.

JJ and Sonny watched wordlessly as John B backed away, jumping over the bed closest to the door. Neither of them dared speak as he peaked through the blinds, instead waiting in anxious silence.

"Shit!" John B cursed.

"What?" JJ whispered, "What is it?"

"Cops."

Their eyes widened dramatically.

A tense moment ensued before the sudden scramble, three teens running around to hide any evidence that put them in the morel room. John B flicked off his light, leaving them in the dark and purely relying on JJ's phone light — which was useless as it bounced between the walls, almost blinding both Sonny and John B as he rushed around.

As John B and JJ shovelled some of the money back in the safe, Sonny swiped her penknife from the floor and shoved it into the back pocket of her shorts. She scanned the room for any notable signs they had been there, but found nothing she thought was incriminating or traceable. Sonny had a feeling the Pogues wouldn't want to be caught either. Call it another hunch she had.

"Kildare County Sheriff's Department!"

"C'mon!" Sonny hissed quietly, pushing the window open as quickly as she could. "Go!"

They didn't question it.

Maybe because they remembered her saying she had got in through the window, or maybe just because they were reckless and didn't care about clambering onto the sides of creaky old motels. Either way, John B gracefully hauled himself over the window pane and JJ followed, swiftly slamming the safe shut with his foot — just as a key twisted its way into the lock.

Sonny's head snapped to the door, a breath caught in the back of her throat. Shit!

Shit, shit, shit—!

Thinking fast, JJ grabbed her waist and practically yanked her through the gap in the window, a palm atop her head to keep it from smacking on the wood. John B swiftly pulled the glass down after them, narrowly missing Sonny's left foot, and scrambled out of sight.

As her back hit the rough wall, Sonny almost cursed aloud. It scraped against her spine uncomfortably but JJ had already slammed his hand on her mouth; something he would likely regret at some point in the future.

"Sh!"

Sonny peered up at him with big eyes, realising how close his face was to hers. He held a finger to his mouth, showing that she needed to be quiet.

After a moment, she nodded once. JJ mirrored her, then carefully inched them further away from the window when the motel room door finally opened. He pressed them both firmly into the wall, his body covering most of hers. Sonny had never been so grateful for growing so lean. If it meant a lower chance of getting spotted, she'd take it.

"Go ahead and check the bathroom."

"Yes, sir."

Sonny mentally groaned, did it have to be the deputy?

Her converse balanced awkwardly on the tiles and Sonny tried not to dwell on how precarious it was being squeezed atop a dormer window. There wasn't much room for their feet, and it was a wonder her and JJ were able to even fit on the same rim without falling.

Their feet were positioned between each other, a pattern consisting of converse and boots, her left leg put between his and his left between hers in an interlocking of limbs that was somehow keeping them in place. One of JJ's hands gripped the guttering while the other was no longer over her mouth, instead beside her head. Sonny knew that if she moved even an inch, then JJ was definitely a goner.

And despite owing the kid nothing in the grand scheme of things, Sonny didn't really want him to fall to his death and have it end up being all her fault. Talk about trauma. She'd have to carry that guilt around forever. JJ was the one thing keeping Sonny from falling anyway, so she tried hard not to breathe too hard so their chests didn't bump. The thrum of her heart was already strong enough.

"It's clear."

"What are you guys doing?" Somebody hissed somewhere below. Sonny dared steal a glance over JJ's shoulder.

She supposed she should've known better than to think John B and JJ would sneak around on their own, because there Pope Heyward and Kiara Carerra were; ducked low into the shitty Pogue boat, watching in disbelief.

Not only was Sonny Penbrook clinging onto the side of a building, but people were watching her do it. Fantastic. Fan-fucking-tastic! She wanted to scream and tell them to piss off, but that was a bad idea.

   Pope blanked.

    "Is that Sonny Penbrook?"

Kiara squinted, "What the fu—?"

   John B signalled for them to get down and be quiet, and JJ had the nerve to jeer about a tad, trying to make light of the situation when no one asked.

   The movement made Sonny wobble and her fist clamped onto his tank top, yanking him back to stand still. When he realised he was putting them in even more danger, and that maybe the girl might actually be worried about falling, he sent her a sly grin. She glowered in return. Suddenly Sonny had changed her mind.

   If she breathed too hard and JJ fell to his death, she'd let him. Maybe she wouldn't even feel guilty.

   "I said it. Didn't I say it?" Deputy chuckled.

   John B peered through the gap in the blinds and frowned, eyes locked onto whatever the deputy and his officer were up to. JJ followed in suit, leaning his head over Sonny to catch a small glimpse of it.

    "Go ahead. Throw these in a bag, would ya?"

    "Yes, sir." The officer nodded. There was a silence in the room, but Sonny couldn't see why for. Her back was to the wall. "Sir...?"

    "Everybody's gotta dip their beak."

   JJ mouthed WHAT THE FUCK.

   Sonny shot him a questioning look, confused, but he didn't really respond to it.

    "Right, right..." the woman said, "...their beak, yeah."

   The cops laughed together and the two boys watched, the baffled looks on their faces telling Sonny all she'd needed to know. Was it even possible to lessen her already large lack of respect and faith for the sheriff's department?

    "Do you believe...?" JJ whispered, lifting his hand off the wall and throwing it out in disbelief. The movement caused his hand to bump his board shorts and knocked an item he had stolen from his pocket.

   Sonny couldn't tell what it was, but she could hear it hit the dormer with a loud smack. Everybody in the general vicinity probably heard it slide off the tiles and clatter an old sign on the ground below. Pope and Kiara gasped from below while John B and JJ exchanged a grimace. Sonny was trying not to push him down after it; their cover was totally blown. It was over — they were dead.

God, they were so screwed...

   Sonny shrugged into the wall even further, her chin tucked tightly into her collarbones.

    "Oops..." JJ whispered, but she ignored him.

   She just kept a firm grip on his tank top as he shuffled the two of them slightly. He was practically hugging the guttering from over her, blocking her view of the window. Not that she even dared look at it— she had heard somewhere that if you could see them then they could see you. Sonny hoped that was true because, while it wasn't her first time hiding from cops and tiptoeing her way out of handcuffs, it was her closest call yet. And she knew who to blame.

   Was JJ Maybank always such a loose canon?

   Sonny wasn't sure how long the tension lasted. Seconds? Minute? Hours? But eventually it stopped and it was quiet.

    "Alright then."

John B threw Sonny and JJ a low thumbs up, hand by his side, signalling that Shoupe had left. Their shoulders sagged in relief. There was a faint scuffing sound as Shoupe swiped the keys and the duffle bag from the floor.

    "Let's go," the cop said.

Sonny could've screamed in joy.

   When the door to room 229 finally slammed shut, the trio let out loud sighs. They slowly peeled themselves away from the wall, no words exchanged.

But, despite his silence, JJ was watching Sonny with raised eyebrows, as if asking: how fun was that?

She narrowed her eyes and shoved at his shoulder, making him wobble. JJ had to grip onto the guttering to keep steady, then let out a laugh. Like a total psycho. Like he had no fear of falling, like he ate anxiety for breakfast— which, honestly, he probably did.

   Slowly, they climbed down from the dormer the same way Sonny had got up. JJ swiftly snatched his fallen item from the floor before anyone could see it, shoving it back into his short pocket like there was nothing to see, while John B decided to make sure that Sonny got down alright.

   But, when he turned to check, she wasn't there.

━━━━━━━☆☆━━━━━━━

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