title: Who's Robin?

summary: Crime/Drama AU- Konoha is a filthy city overrun by the Akatsuki. A homicide triggers Tenten and the girls to start their own vigilante group to fight for people powerless against the mob—The Merry Men. This quickly putting a target on their heads, when a hit squad is hired to gun them down.

notes: (I'm posting this unbeta'd because in light of the recent manga chapter I am depressed and mourning my OTP.) I'm playing with new things here, mainly time jumps. Also centering this around my lovely princess Tenten. Neji/Tenten will be the main pairing, but there will be hints of the other three because I can't resist.
Heavily influenced by Fight Club, Pulp Fiction, The Boondock Saints, Sons of Anarchy, Kick Ass, as well as a badass playlist to coincide with each chapter.

(Song lyrics are Come As You Are by Nirvana, but you should know that.)

And I swear that I don't have a gun
No, I don't have a gun

No, I don't have a gun

He cracks his gun across the side of my head and I'm seeing dark spots in my peripherals. I feel something warm dripping from my ear; I'm sure I'm bleeding. But this is something I've become very used to over these past weeks. A little blood never bothered me.

The pain isn't even that bad either. I remind myself that in high school we learned there are monks that set themselves on fire and don't move a muscle. They don't scream or fidget. I can take a little blow to the head, for the monks of course.

"Who's Robin?" He spits in my face again, but really if he thinks a couple blows to my head is going to make me squeal he's got to be kidding me. This fake macho-man needs some better interrogation tactics. Hasn't he seen a single movie?

And he's supposed to work for the mob.

"I think you're supposed to point that gun at my head when you ask questions," I say. I'm only trying to be helpful, but that comment earns me another blow to the cranium. I have to blink and focus on my lap for more than a few seconds this time. And by now I've become very annoyed with the fact that my wrists are bound behind me with a profuse amount of duct tape because it would be very satisfying to rip that gun from his hand and beat him over the head with it to see how he likes it.

Also when I eventually get this tape of it's gonna hurt like a bitch.

"Who the fuck is Robin?"

"Robin, who?" I ask in my best impression of innocent. Not that I want them to believe I'm innocent, I just love to mock fuckers like him. My head tilts to the side, shifting brunette bangs out of my eyes so I can get a better view of him as I squint. He's all pale blue and razor edged teeth. I wonder if he was born this way, some kind of medical condition, or if he's purposely altered his body to seem more menacing.

There's fear in a name, but this man isn't living up to my impression. This is child's play.

"Oh you mean the Robin that shot your buddy, Hidan, out in that back alley?" I say as I squint like I'm trying hard to remember. The man in front of me growls in response.

"Because that, that wasn't Robin." I shake my head playfully. "No, that was just me."

Really, it all started with a sneer.

This creep Hidan started to frequent my bar just a few weeks prior to the particular incident.

That sounded callous. It wasn't an incident so much as a homicide. Either way it happened. And it all happened because of this stupid sneer of his.

It was no secret he was a lackey for the mob, I mean it wasn't hard to figure out with that mouth of his.

A few too many glasses of scotch and that night in particular he started to get loud. Normally, I'm not one to confront a loyal customer, and certainly not one with that kind of power to back them up. The Akatsuki is the major crime syndicate of Konoha. They aren't just a mob, they are the mob. They have most of the police force on their payroll, and they bully anyone they please.

Most of the time it's as easy as keeping your head down and your mouth shut. They won't bother you unless you're in a particular line of work. However, owning a bar in downtown Konoha meant guys like these were around a lot.

But tonight, well tonight was that tiny pebble that shifts and causes a rock slide—avalanche, more like it.

Hidan started to get too rowdy, smirking to his asshole buddies and giving them the gory details of his collection from earlier in the night. He was one of the sick fucks they sent to settle debts. Settle by any means necessary, that is.

The guy was bad news, but he had bought six rounds for his table that night in celebration, so I wasn't about to piss him off. But when he had started that high-pitched dog whistle whenever Ino walked by his table to serve drinks, I shouted at him from the bar.

He sneered at me. Any ugly sneer, as if he was saying "What are you going to do about it?"

And I glared something furious and deadly as he turned away and took another gulp of scotch. Because what would I do? What could anyone up against guys like him ever do?

Two hours later and I let Ino off her shift early because Hidan's table was the last to empty out for the night. She grabbed her coat and headed out the door with relief.

I headed to the table with the tab, but was met with only five lackeys. "Where's Hidan?"

"Went out for a cig," One of them shrugged. I blinked, and immediately charged toward the door.

I ignored the immediate chill of nighttime on my bare arms. No one was outside the front of the bar, so I rounded the corner into the back alley and sure enough I saw a silhouette looming.

"Hey!" I shouted. I rushed towards them, leaving loose gravel skittering. The alley was dank and littered with windswept garbage. But it wasn't the stench of filth that made me instantly nauseous, or at least that kind of filth. A few feet away from me was Hidan, pressing Ino to the brick wall and holding her there with his body weight, one hand cradling her chin firmly.

It felt like ice was creeping through my veins, frost collecting on the cells in my blood stream. I was shaking from the inside out.

"Can I fuckin' help ya'?" He turned to me without letting go of Ino. His breath came out in small clouds and I imagined it as the smell of alcohol and evil rather than cold. I could see her trembling beneath him, those blue eyes glossing over with tears as they fixed on me.

And then he sneered. That fucking sneer of his, man it was getting on my nerves. As if he was all powerful, as if Ino and I were pathetic little ragdolls that he could throw around and take advantage of as he wished. No, this is just a man that thinks he has all the power because he has a gun in his hand and a dick between his legs.

Adrenaline heated the congealing blood in the pit of my stomach. I was done being powerless.

"Let her go now," I didn't raise my voice. I wasn't even being stern. Because my mind was already made up—he wasn't going to let her go and walk away.

He wasn't going to walk away at all.

"Do you know who I fuckin' am?"

My hand pressed to the small of my back and pulled the hand gun from the waist band of my jeans. The one I always kept on me at work, although I'd sworn I'd never pull the trigger. "Yes, you're Hidan, collector for the Akatsuki mob…or you were that is." I pointed the gun at him, and cocked it in a single movement.

The thing about guns is they even the playing field.

He jumped back from Ino, sending her stumbling to her knees and crying out. He reached clumsily for his own gun hidden under his jacket, but I had no reserve about killing him.

Maybe time only seemed to slow because he had a decent amount of liquor in his blood stream…

I pulled the trigger twice, stiffening my arm against the kick back. The first bullet sunk into the center of his chest, the second a little lower and to the right.

He toppled backwards, blood seeping out and staining his white button up the same way that water droplets soak through paper. Ino let out a piercing wail.

"Oh my God! Oh my God! What did you do?" She shrieked from her knees, her hands raking back through her blonde locks and clutching at them hard enough to make me fear she was about to rip them out in thick chunks.

"Ino, calm down," I crouched down next to her and cupped her face so that she couldn't look away—couldn't look at the dead body lying disjointed just a few feet from us. "You are safe. It was self-defense. You need to stop screaming or his buddies inside are going to come out here. I only have four bullets left. Who do you think will win?"

She swallowed and barely nodded, he eyes moving towards where Hidan lay. "Th-thanks," She choked out. She was still shaking, but that was good. This was only going to work if she could stay convincingly terrified. It seemed like no one inside the bar had heard the gunshots.

This could work. This could totally work.

I stood up and stepped over to the body carefully, wiping my palms on the front of my jeans. My mind was clear, but my body was still trying to react differently. I had to stay focused.

I tilted my head to get a good look at him; his head had fallen to the side. His silver hair was normally slicked back cleanly, but the greasy strands were mussed up now and fly aways were haloing his face. His mouth was slightly agape and his eyes open. People's eyes don't shut when they die like in the movies.

Although I really wish they did, it would make for a much less unsettling crime scene.

I glanced at Ino, still huddled on the ground, trying to steady her breathing. Then I reached down and tentatively searched Hidan's pocket for his wallet.

"What are you doing?" Ino whispered at me through clenched teeth.

I flipped open the leather and pulled out a crisp hundred dollar bill before placing it back into his jacket. "Just covering his tab." It's not like he would need it now anyway.

"Are you kidding me?"

I bit back the insults that were always my usual reaction when Ino questioned something I did. Now really wasn't the time. I turned back to her as I shoved the money in my back pocket roughly, and realized the familiar pressure of the gun in my waistband was gone.

I had dropped it next to Ino, and swooped to pick it up as I walked back to her. "Listen, we need to act like this was a hit on the Akatsuki. I need you to scream and cry. Act as traumatized as possible. Got it?" I grabbed her hand to help her stand.

"That won't be a problem," She said as she swallowed.

"Now," I said. On cue she let out another blood curdling scream.

I started running, dragging her behind me and throwing ourselves at the door to the bar. Ino was already blubbering and I let a violent tremble rack my body. "Oh my God, oh my God!"

The lackeys still guzzling scotch and slapping each other on the back stood up immediately, their hands flying to the guns they kept concealed. "What happened?"

"They—they killed him!" I shouted before I buried my face in my hands and sunk to the floor.

"What!?" One of them shouted and they all rushed towards us.

"We were ou-ou-outside and two guys…" Ino trailed off, still crying.

"They ran into the alley and shot Hidan. They were in all black, ski masks and everything. They just shot him!" I finished for her.

Poor little traumatized girls.

One of them took charge and turned to the others, "Call the boss, we've got to get rid of the body." Three of them charged out immediately, while one of them started mashing numbers into a cellphone with his fat, grubby fingers.

The last man crouched down to me and put a hand on my shoulder. "Listen, you and your friend are going to go home and not say a word to anyone. You're going to give me the keys to the bar right now. I'll lock up for you and leave the keys wedged on top of the door. You hear me? Neither of you says a word to anyone about this. Now go calm down and forget this ever happened."

I looked at Ino, who was wiping away black streaks of mascara. How stupid could this guy be? All he saw was a couple of wounded puppies cowering. If he was really concerned about my wellbeing he may try and hug me, and his hand would surely brush against the hand gun that had shot his friend point blank in the chest that was concealed at the small of my back.

If he glanced down, he'd see my fingers clenched tight into fists—knuckles white as the stars I'd make him see if I chose to punch him as hard as I could in the face. And I wanted to. Boy, did I want to. With the adrenaline still coursing in my veins I was sure that I could take him down, enough to stun him and pull out my gun.

Leave him splayed out on the bar floor, ruining the woodwork with his blood. His buddy on the phone wouldn't be fast enough, I'd turn the gun on him before he could reach into the holster clinging to his ribcage.

But instead I nodded and pulled out my master set of keys to the bar. I dropped them into his outstretched hand.

What this city needs is someone to stand up for them—someone to spit back in the face of evil, to shout into that dark void.

That's a little prophetic for my tastes though. This is not a comic book. I am not Batman.

I'm a girl that has seen her home swallowed up by scum, men that will attack and kill with no remorse or afterthought. They take because they can and because they want to. And we are too powerless to stand up to them.

One of those men attacked my best friend and I was no threat to him. I was another girl he could stop and rape on her way home from work. I was not someone's daughter—I was an empty vessel that he could steal.

Every time I feel a shred of doubt that what we are doing is wrong—that finding these bastards and hunting them down like the feral dogs they are is wrong. I remember. Remember the way he pushed himself flush against her, wouldn't let her move; the way he clipped her wings and caged her with his body.

And I think how many other girls have been in the same situation, with no one there to rescue them?

No, I'm not Batman. We aren't some superhero crew. I may work for the good guys, but that doesn't mean I'm one of them. Because I don't believe in not fighting back with everything you have, I am willing to break just as many laws as they are.

I don't believe in showing mercy to evil.