"Tell me something," Jesse said, staring out through the windshield like the answer might be written somewhere in the dark. "Why does every meeting you have in this life feel like it's happening in a place that smells bad?"
Lucas glanced over from the passenger seat. "That's not specific enough to be useful."
"It's very specific. I mean literally. The whole city smells like dust, oil, and bad decisions."
"That's because you live in Albuquerque."
Jesse snorted once. "Yeah, no kidding."
They sat in Jesse's car outside a dim strip of businesses that had mostly given up pretending they were open. One sign buzzed overhead in tired orange light. The parking lot was half empty, with a few scattered vehicles and the kind of silence that made everything feel like it was waiting to happen.
Lucas leaned back and folded his arms. "So are you going to tell me where we're going, or are you just enjoying making this dramatic?"
Jesse turned the key in the ignition once, then stopped. "You ask too many questions."
"You ask for help too often to be vague."
Jesse turned toward him with a look of exaggerated offense. "Dude, I'm not vague. I'm strategic."
"That word doesn't mean what you think it means."
"It absolutely does."
Lucas looked out the window. "Then why are we here?"
Jesse shifted in his seat. "Because the buyers want to see it."
"See what?"
"The stuff, man."
Lucas turned back. "And you're telling me this now?"
"I'm telling you because now we're here."
Lucas stared at him for a second. "That is, by far, the worst explanation you've given me today."
Jesse pointed at him. "You said you wanted the style down. I'm giving you the style. This is my style."
Lucas was about to answer when Jesse's phone buzzed in the center console.
Jesse grabbed it, checked the screen, and immediately sat up straighter.
Lucas noticed the shift. "That them?"
Jesse nodded once. "Yeah."
"What do they want?"
Jesse read the message, then sighed. "They're already there."
Lucas gave him a flat look. "Of course they are."
Jesse stuffed the phone away and started the car. "Alright. Don't say anything stupid."
Lucas stared at him. "You said that like it was a request."
"It is a request."
"I'm not promising anything."
Jesse pulled out of the lot with a muttered curse. "Man, I should've left you at home."
"You didn't."
"Yeah, because I make questionable life choices."
"That part I already knew."
---
They drove in silence for almost a minute before Jesse finally broke it.
"Look, don't freak out if they're a little weird."
Lucas turned his head slightly. "You're warning me about the buyers being weird?"
"I'm warning you that every person in this business is weird."
"That's fair."
Jesse glanced over. "You remember what Mr. White said?"
Lucas's eyes narrowed slightly. "About the chemistry?"
"Yeah. About the product."
Lucas nodded once. "He said it needed to be handled clean."
Jesse let out a breath through his nose. "He also said a bunch of other stuff that made it sound like he was writing a ransom note with vocabulary."
Lucas almost smiled. "That sounds like him."
Jesse tapped the steering wheel. "He's intense, man."
"He's a teacher."
"No, I mean like… actually intense."
Lucas looked at him. "That's because he's not pretending."
Jesse frowned slightly. "Pretending what?"
"Pretending this is temporary."
That made Jesse quiet for a moment.
He glanced down at the road, then back up. "Yeah," he said after a beat. "Maybe."
Lucas let that sit.
He had seen enough to know Walter White wasn't drifting through this casually. The man had the expression of someone who had crossed a line in his head and was now trying to make the rest of the world catch up. That could go a lot of ways. None of them pleasant.
Jesse slowed as they turned into another lot, this one darker and more open. There were two cars already parked near the back. One looked beat-up but clean enough to suggest someone cared about appearances. The other looked like it had been driven hard and then forgotten about on purpose.
Jesse muttered, "Okay. That's them."
Lucas looked through the windshield. "Which one?"
"The second one. The first one is the guy who wants to look like he's in charge."
Lucas sighed. "That narrows it down in a very upsetting way."
"Yeah, well, welcome to my world."
Jesse parked and killed the engine.
Neither of them got out immediately.
Lucas looked at the two cars, then at the empty lot around them. "You trust these guys?"
Jesse made a face. "Trust is maybe a little much."
"Then why are we here?"
"Because they pay."
"That's worse."
"It is. But it's also honest."
Lucas nodded slowly. "That part I can respect."
Jesse reached into the back seat, checked the bag they'd brought, and then grabbed it again like he still didn't fully trust it to exist.
"Alright," he said. "Just stay cool."
Lucas looked at him. "You said that like it was a skill I forgot to learn."
"You kind of did."
"Fair."
They got out.
The air was cooler than the desert but still dry enough to feel like it had teeth. Lucas followed Jesse across the lot toward the second car. As they got closer, he could make out two men inside and beside it—one leaning against the hood with obvious impatience, the other standing with his hands in his pockets, watching them approach with a little more caution.
Jesse muttered under his breath, "Okay. Easy. Easy."
Lucas glanced at him. "You say that like you're trying to calm yourself down."
"I am trying to calm myself down."
"Not working."
"Shut up."
The man by the hood stepped forward first. He had a hard face and the kind of posture that suggested he was used to being the one other people adjusted around. The other one was thinner, more composed, and somehow more unsettling for it. He looked like he was measuring them instead of greeting them.
Jesse stopped a few feet away and nodded. "Yo."
The first man gave him a slow look. "You're late."
Jesse made a face. "Man, I'm never late. Time is just flexible."
The man didn't react to that. "You got it?"
Jesse held the bag tighter. "Yeah."
The thinner man's eyes moved to Lucas. "Who's this?"
Jesse answered too quickly. "He's with me."
Lucas lifted his chin a little but didn't say anything.
The man studied him. "That didn't answer my question."
Jesse huffed. "It answered enough."
The first man looked annoyed now. "We doing this or are we discussing introductions all night?"
Jesse glanced at Lucas, then back at them. "Right. Business. Yeah. We're doing business."
He opened the bag just enough to show the contents inside.
The first man leaned in slightly. "That the full amount?"
Jesse's brows drew together. "You said you wanted to see it."
"We do."
Lucas watched the exchange and noticed the first man's attention wasn't really on the product. It was on control. On whether Jesse would fold, whether the situation could be pushed around, whether the buyer could dominate the room without actually raising his voice.
The thinner man finally spoke. "Let me see the sample."
Jesse hesitated.
Lucas stepped in a little, quiet but steady. "You want the sample, you get the sample."
The first man looked at him. "And you are?"
Lucas met the stare without moving. "The guy who's not here to waste your time."
That got a flicker of amusement from the thinner man. The first man did not seem entertained.
Jesse sighed and reached into the bag, pulling out the small package they'd brought. He held it between two fingers like he still found the whole idea mildly offensive.
The thinner man took it, inspecting it closely.
"Looks clean," he said.
The first man frowned. "Looks aren't enough."
Jesse spread his arms. "Then try it."
The first man stared at him. "We don't 'try it' in a parking lot."
Jesse blinked. "Okay, then what do you want me to do, carry a chemistry set around?"
Lucas muttered, "That would be a terrible idea."
Jesse shot him a look. "I wasn't serious."
The thinner man turned the package over in his hands. "You got a name for this?"
Jesse shrugged. "It's product."
The first man rolled his eyes. "That's not a name."
"I didn't come here to name it."
The thinner man looked at Lucas again. "Your friend always this annoying?"
Lucas answered before Jesse could. "Only when he's nervous."
Jesse pointed at him. "I'm not nervous."
"You sound nervous."
"I sound normal."
"You sound like you're lying to yourself."
The thinner man let out a short breath that might have been a laugh. The first man looked back and forth between them like he was deciding whether the dynamic in front of him was a problem or a useful distraction.
Finally he said, "You boys did good bringing this."
Jesse straightened immediately. "Yeah?"
The first man gave a small nod. "Yeah."
Jesse looked too relieved too fast, which Lucas figured probably meant the guy had just given him the first real sign that this whole thing wasn't going to collapse on contact.
Then the first man held up a hand. "But I still want proof it's worth moving."
Jesse frowned again. "We already showed you proof."
"No," the man said. "You showed us an ingredient. I want confidence."
Lucas looked at Jesse. "He means repeat business."
Jesse blinked, then looked back at the buyer. "Oh."
The first man gave Lucas a longer look now. "You talk like you know what you're doing."
Lucas shrugged. "Usually means I'm right."
The thinner man smiled faintly at that. "Confidence. I like that."
The first man was less amused. "I'm not paying for confidence."
Jesse stepped in before the mood could sour. "You're paying for the product, man. We can get you more."
The thinner man's eyes sharpened a little. "How much more?"
Jesse glanced at Lucas, then answered, "As much as you need."
Lucas looked at him sharply. That was an ambitious answer. Probably too ambitious. Jesse either knew that and was bluffing, or he was trying to bluff his own way into confidence. With Jesse, it was sometimes hard to tell whether he was lying or improvising so hard the distinction no longer mattered.
The first man stepped closer. "And the guy making it?"
Jesse hesitated.
Lucas noticed.
So did the buyers.
The thinner man tilted his head slightly. "What's the matter? He shy?"
Jesse shook his head. "No, man. He's just—he's private."
The first man snorted. "Everybody says that until they get caught."
Lucas said, "If you want the product, talk about the product."
The room went still for half a beat.
Not in a dangerous way.
In a testing way.
The first man held Lucas's gaze. "You got a mouth on you."
Lucas shrugged. "It's been useful."
The thinner man's expression eased a little, like he had decided Lucas was not the one worth worrying about. The first man, however, seemed to be filing Lucas into a different category altogether.
"Fine," he said at last. "Here's what happens. We test it. If it's clean, we talk about volume. If it's not, you don't waste our time again."
Jesse nodded too quickly. "Yeah, cool. That's cool."
Lucas looked at him. "You sure?"
Jesse shot him a glance. "I'm sure enough."
The first man looked at Jesse again. "You always this jumpy?"
Jesse straightened a little. "I'm not jumpy."
"Then stop looking like you stole the thing."
"I didn't steal it."
The thinner man finally reached into his pocket and pulled out a thick stack of folded bills. "This enough to keep you honest for now?"
Jesse's eyes widened just a little before he forced himself to act casual.
"Yeah," he said. "That works."
Lucas could tell from the way Jesse held himself that this was the part he'd been waiting for. Not the sample. Not the banter. The money. The moment where all the chaos became real enough to touch.
The first man handed Jesse the money, then took the sample back. "We'll be in touch."
Jesse nodded. "Yeah. Sure. Cool."
The thinner man gave Lucas a final look as he turned away. "Maybe bring less attitude next time."
Lucas replied, "Maybe bring more money."
That got a real laugh out of the thinner man.
The first man was less pleased, but he was already turning toward the car.
Jesse waited until they were a few steps away before hissing, "Dude. Not everything needs a comeback."
Lucas looked at him. "Yes it does."
"No, it does not."
Lucas looked toward the departing car. "Did they say no?"
Jesse paused, then shook his head. "No."
"Then my comeback worked."
Jesse stared at him for a second. "You are impossible."
"Yet productive."
Jesse looked down at the stack of bills in his hand, then let out a breath and laughed under it like he couldn't help himself. "Yo…"
Lucas folded his arms. "What?"
"We might actually be in business."
Lucas looked at him for a long second.
Then he shrugged.
"Looks that way."
---
By the time Lucas got home, the sky had gone fully dark.
The city outside his apartment was quieter now, the traffic thinned out, and the day's heat had turned into a long, lingering warmth that sat in the walls instead of the air. He tossed his keys onto the counter, checked the time, and immediately saw that the next pull was still hours away.
2:00 AM.
That was fine.
He had learned enough by now to know that the system liked giving him things at inconvenient times and pretending it was doing him a favor. Tonight, at least, he had the chance to think.
He sat on the edge of his bed and looked at the money Jesse had mentioned, then at the phone on the nightstand.
The buyers had taken the sample.
Walter would want details.
Jesse would want to celebrate.
And Lucas—
Lucas mostly wanted to know how long until one of these deals went bad.
At 1:59, he was still awake.
At 2:00, the screen appeared.
[Daily Pull Available]
He rubbed a hand down his face and gave it a tired look.
"Alright," he muttered. "Let's hope you're feeling generous."
He pressed yes.
The spin began.
Symbols flashed.
Then stopped.
[Reward Acquired]
Signal Dampener (Single Use)
Lucas frowned.
"…That sounds suspiciously useful."
He read the description as it faded into place in his mind. For a short window, it would interfere with nearby signals and simple tracking devices. Not magic. Not perfect. But enough to create a brief blind spot if somebody was trying to listen in, follow a phone, or catch a signal they weren't supposed to catch.
Lucas sat back.
That was good.
Very good.
Especially in a business where everybody eventually started wondering who was talking to who.
He glanced at the dark window.
"Yeah," he said quietly. "That'll do."
And in Albuquerque, where every good deal eventually became a problem, Lucas had the feeling this would not be the last time the system handed him something that looked small and meant a lot.