The heist prep was moving along steadily, but Donnie still hadn't found a chance to tip off his handler.
Phil and Dennis wanted to speed things up, so they split the team.
The two of them went to secure weapons and ammo, leaving Donnie and Lawson to handle the getaway vehicle.
Right now, Lawson was driving his Dodge Viper, with Donnie in the passenger seat, heading out toward the suburbs.
"Smoke?"
Lawson pulled out his pack of '15' cigarettes and offered one to Donnie. Through his Hostility Sunglasses, Donnie's silhouette was glowing orange.
The Hostility Sunglasses color-coded a target's aggression level.
Yellow meant neutral—most random pedestrians showed up as this color.
Green meant friendly—these people wouldn't attack him. Blake and Svafa both showed up as green.
Above green was blue, representing loyalty. Blue meant they wouldn't easily betray him.
Donnie's current orange aura meant the guy was actively plotting against him.
If it turned red, that meant imminent hostility—the target was ready to attack at any moment.
Donnie took the cigarette. Just as he was about to light it, Lawson dropped a bomb.
"Donnie, you got a girlfriend?"
"No. No girlfriend. I'm single."
"Really? Want me to introduce you to someone? I know a lot of good girls. Like this one girl named Maggie. She really needs someone to take care of her right now."
The name "Maggie" made Donnie's pupils quake. The cigarette almost fell out of his mouth.
Why? Because Maggie was his wife's name. They hadn't been married long, and she was currently pregnant and needing care.
Donnie didn't know if this was a coincidence or if Lawson knew something.
But it didn't make sense. Lawson had only met him a few times. How could he know about his family situation?
"Lawson, my career hasn't really taken off yet, so I'm not looking for a relationship right now."
Donnie came up with a quick excuse, carefully watching Lawson's expression.
"Is that so? Shame. I heard Maggie's ex-boyfriend was a cop. Suddenly ran off to go undercover and died for nothing. She's heartbroken. Maybe you could comfort her."
Lawson turned to look at Donnie and smiled. To Donnie, that smile looked purely demonic.
Donnie's pupils constricted. His mind was in chaos.
"What... what are you trying to say?"
"Nothing. Just trying to set you up with a girl. Oh, look, we're here."
Ahead of them lay a massive junkyard filled with abandoned cars. In America, places like this are called auto graveyards.
Donnie got out of the car in a daze, following Lawson into the junkyard. It took him a while to remember why they were even there.
"Lawson, why did you bring me here? Aren't we supposed to be getting a car?"
"We are getting a car. Did you think we came here for a stroll?"
"But... where is there a usable car in this mess?"
"I have a way."
Lawson grabbed his toolbox and wandered through the rows of rusted metal. Before long, he locked onto a classic yellow American school bus.
"This is the one!"
Donnie was distracted, but even he could see the bus was just a shell and a chassis. Everything else was stripped.
"What? You want to use this?"
"Yeah! The size is perfect. Just needs a little modification. Come on, give me a hand. Let's make this baby run again!"
Donnie couldn't fathom how they were going to make a gutted shell driveable, but Lawson was already stripping parts from other wrecks and bolting them onto the bus.
Lawson kept barking orders, keeping Donnie busy with physical labor, gradually making him forget about the "Maggie" comment.
They spent the entire afternoon working. The two of them smoked through almost the entire pack of '15' cigarettes. Donnie watched with his own eyes as Lawson brought the scrap-heap bus back to life.
It was like a magic trick—no, it was practically sorcery!
"Now, just need to gas her up!"
Lawson siphoned gas from the Dodge Viper and poured it into the bus's tank.
Then, Donnie watched, jaw dropped, as Lawson turned the key and the engine roared to life.
"That actually worked?"
Donnie's worldview took a massive hit. But that was the terrifying power of the Gearhead Trump Card.
If Lawson wanted, he could probably cobble together a plane from this junk pile. Granted, it might fall apart five seconds after takeoff.
Lawson tested the bus's performance. It met the standard.
"Take a break."
Lawson and Donnie sat inside the bus to rest. It was nearing dusk, and after an afternoon of labor, both were covered in grease.
But now that the work stopped, Donnie's mind drifted back to what Lawson said earlier about Maggie.
In America, sharing a name was common. Especially a generic name like Maggie.
If his wife's name was Cthulhu, running into a namesake would be rare.
But Donnie couldn't shake the feeling that Lawson was talking about his wife.
Finally, Donnie couldn't hold it back anymore.
"Lawson, that Maggie girl you mentioned earlier... what's her story?"
"Why? Still interested in her?"
"No, just curious! You said her boyfriend was an undercover cop?"
Lawson tossed another '15' cigarette to Donnie.
"Yeah. The guy went undercover for justice, thinking he was making a difference. Turns out his handler was just using him. Three years turned into another three years, then six years turned into another three. He spent ten whole years undercover. How many decades does a man have in his life?"
Donnie realized Lawson wasn't talking about him specifically, but the story hit way too close to home.
Holding the cigarette, Donnie asked in a trance-like voice.
"Then what happened?"
"Then? Maggie left him. She couldn't handle a man who couldn't give her a stable future, even though she was carrying his child. As for the cop? The credit went to his boss, the risk was all his. After being squeezed dry, he died quietly in a gutter."
"No name left behind. Just another dead street thug."
Donnie froze. The undercover cop in the story felt like a glimpse into his own future. It was hard not to overthink it.
Lawson didn't expect his remixed version of Infernal Affairs to shake Donnie this badly. The Joker Trump Card was powerful indeed!
After a long silence, Donnie looked at Lawson, his face full of confusion.
"Why didn't the undercover cop realize his boss was using him?"
"There's this thing called workplace gaslighting. It's complicated to explain, but basically, superiors use language to mentally control their subordinates. Breaking it is simple, though. Just remember one thing: Don't listen to what they say. Watch what they do."
In the Hostility Sunglasses, Donnie's color had shifted to yellow.