Andrea was shaking.

Trembling, really. Like a small dog. The Queen kept staring at him like he owed her a favor, and- and really, she wasn’t that much older than he was. She shouldn’t scare him so much, but he had to admit that he was petrified. So much had changed, so quickly. He’d been with the Court for about a year and a half- maybe closer to two, he didn’t know. He wasn’t counting the days; he knew it would only make him more upset.

“Again, and focus on your Rs,” she said. “You can’t roll them. And your As need to be higher.” She rolled her eyes. “The American accent isn’t that hard, Andrea.” She pronounced his name wrong nearly every time, and he wondered if it was on purpose. ‘ANN-dree-a,’ instead of ‘Ahn-DREY-a.’ Apparently his name was a somewhat common girls’ name, in English.

He nodded, jerkily, then spoke again. “My name is Andrew Oliver. It’s such a pleasure to meet you, Your Highness.” The low, unwavering tone of the American accent was alien and uncomfortable on his tongue, but that time he had to have gotten it right. It had sounded flawless to his own ears, and he hadn’t accidentally rolled the R in “Andrew” this time.

His English really was very good, now. When he’d first been- been purchased he hadn’t spoken anything beyond ‘hello.’ For months the only person he could speak to was Perez, certainly not a stellar conversationalist,  but the only person willing to speak in Spanish with him. He was almost a hundred percent certain the Queen spoke Spanish as well, and just wanted to make his life more miserable than it already had been.

The Queen stared, then broke a small smile. “Much better. You’re to speak only in that accent for at least the next week.”

Andrea resisted a grimace. “Yes, Your Majesty,” he acquiesced, straight faced. “What's next?”

The Queen paused, to think. “I think it's time you met your team. But first- come here, your hair is is a mess.” She held out a hand and crooked her fingers to beckon him forward and her plethora of gold rings caught the light brightly, glittering. He took the few steps, hesitantly, feet padding near-silent on the carpet of her room in El Palacio. She brushed her fingers through his fringe, pushing it up and back a couple times until it was decent.

His hair caught on her rings and pulled. He jerked back, reflexively slapping her hand away from him - and froze, stock still.

His eyes went wide as she stared at him in shock. “I- Your Majesty, I'm-” His accent slipped, and he struggled just to keep speaking English.

“Rosa!” she shouted, brow furrowed in an expression more like a pout than a glare, and Perez (who had been standing outside the doors) was at her side in an instant.

“Yes, reina?” Her shoulders shifted, flexed. She didn't have her bat on her, it didn't look like, but Andrea didn't doubt it was nearby.

Oh no, oh no, oh no. He'd- Andrea hated being here, hated it, but he'd always been obedient. Quiet, reserved. He'd never been punished, never had to be punished. He'd heard people screaming from across El Palacio right after the Queen had called Perez’s name and- oh, Dio, he was terrified.

“The boy hit me,” the Queen said, a fake waver in her voice. “Not hard, not on purpose.”

“Which hand?” Perez grunted, and the Queen held out the hand Andrea had hit, but then Perez shook her head. “No, his hand.”

Andrea lifted his left hand, shakily. Whatever nervous trembling he'd been doing before was nothing compared to this. Perez grabbed his wrist, firmly, and he tried to yank it away but her grip was like steel, unbreakable and unwavering. He whimpered, a sort of pitiful, helpless whine that he couldn’t cover. The Queen didn’t watch, distracted by lighting a thick cigar, while Perez pulled a switchblade out of her pocket and-

“No- n-no, per favore, smettila!” he screamed. Please, stop! But she didn't understand, and she probably wouldn't have stopped if she could. He let his legs fall out from under him, putting as much of his own weight behind his struggling as he could, but to no avail. His other hand pried uselessly at her fingers, and when she brought the knife close he jerked it away.  With a horrifying nonchalance, Perez held his left hand in place, pulled back his ring finger, and cut it off the first two knuckles.

“Figa!” he gritted out between his teeth, spitting in indignant, terrified fury. Cunt! Perez just rolled her eyes.

“Do you want this?” she asked the Queen, holding out Andrea's finger in one blood-soaked hand. Andrea was curled up on the carpet, tears stinging his eyes and breath coming shallow in his throat. He shut his mouth, trying to funnel it all through his nose as silently as he could.

The Queen looked up and, when she saw the mangled, bloody flesh and bone in Perez's hand she shrieked, then had the gall to giggle and hit Perez's arm jokingly.

“Rosa, ew!” she said. “Throw that away and call in the others - this is a good test for his accent. Can you hold it up under stress, Andrea?”

Perez nodded and left the room, half-grinning in what was probably the scariest sight of Andrea's short life thus far. She didn't return, and instead two young people entered.

“Wrecker, Bandit, this is Attore,” the Queen said as Andrea struggled to his knees, still cradling his hand to his chest. One of them furrowed his brows and was on Andrea in an instant, taking Andrea’s injured hand and inspecting it.

“What happened?” he asked quietly, sounding about as concerned than he looked - if he wasn’t trying to help, Andrea would have guessed he didn’t care at all, he was so stoic.

“Perez,” Andrea gritted out, forcing out that stupid American ‘R’ sound. “I g-got punished.”

He nodded. “Wrecker, go ask Perez for a first aid kit and some ice.” Wrecker nodded and jogged off.

So this one was Bandit, then. Dark-skinned and handsome, full lips and dark eyes behind glasses, dressed in all black save for white basketball shoes. Andrea resisted a sneer. For all he hated the Queen, she kept him well dressed. Bandit seemed kind enough, and Andrea supposed he could ignore the street clothes.

“What’d you do to get punished?” he asked, turning Andrea’s hand around and wiping away blood with his fingers.

“Th-the Queen was brushing my hair with her f-fingers. Her rings c-caught and I- I hit her h-hand,” Andrea said, struggling with the accent. Bandit’s eyes widened a little in surprise.

“Lucky Perez didn’t kill you, then,” Bandit said, and the Queen snorted.

“The kid’s an investment,” she said, like Andrea wasn’t in the room. Like he wasn’t a human being. “Like you were. I paid too much for him to let him die before he can be useful.”

Andrea bit his lip on another Italian curse. Bandit just nodded, like he understood. She’d had to pay for him, too?

The doors slammed open and the Queen shot a glare at Wrecker, who had returned with the first aid kit. Wrecker was smaller than Bandit, lithe and agile-looking, with a black buzzcut and a broad grin. She was some sort of East Asian, pale and pretty - or, she could have been pretty, if she didn’t have so many piercings and if she tried a little harder. Like Bandit, she was dressed in all black, including the heavy combat boots that look like they weighed as much as she did.

“Here, bro,” she said, handing Bandit the first aid kit. Then she smiled at Andrea. “Hey, kid. I’m Wrecker.”

“Don’t call me ‘kid,’” Andrea snapped, then forced himself to calm. Bandit wiped his hands on his dark pants before pulling on laytex gloves, and then started cleaning the blood off of Andrea’s hand. “I’m Attore.”

“What’s it mean?” she asked. “Your codename. Doesn’t ring any bells.”

“It’s Italian,” he said, glancing at the Queen. He wasn’t sure if they were allowed to know he was Italian - especially if he was hiding his accent. She didn’t make any indication either way, puffing on her cigar. “I’m Italian. It means ‘actor.’”

“So you’re like a spy,” Bandit said, and it might have been a question. Instead of waiting for an answer, he pressed an ice cube into the wound. Andrea hissed and nodded.

“That’s fuckin’ neat, yo,” Wrecker said with a lopsided grin. “You’ll be so useful on heists!”

Andrea furrowed his brow. “Heists?”

“Bank heists, usually,” Bandit said. “It’s what we do. We’re the Heist Crew; has the Queen not told you?”

Andrea shook his head. She hadn’t. “So that’s what I’m here for? Robbing banks?”

“And jewelry stores,” Wrecker added. “And a museum, maybe, one day. A kid can dream.”

“We can’t rob a museum, Wrecker,” Bandit said on a sigh, like it was an argument they’d had before. “There’s only two- well, three of us. And none of us are actually thieves.”

“I could be a thief,” Wrecker said, and Bandit snorted.

“You have the delicacy and precision of a wrecking ball,” Bandit said, then turned to Andrea as an aside to say, “Hence the name.”

“Hey, fuck you, Bandit,” she said, and that forced a smile out of him. Andrea frowned.

“How are we supposed to rob banks if we’re not thieves?”

“I’m a pilot and expert evasive driver,” Bandit said. “Wrecker’s an expert with explosives, firearms, and working under the influence.”

“I’m drunk right now,” Wrecker said, and Andrea couldn’t tell if she was joking. “It’s a gift, really.”

“Caused by childhood alcoholism,” Bandit murmured, and Wrecker shrugged like it didn’t bother them any.

“Why’re you called ‘Bandit’ if you’re not a thief?” Andrea asked.

“It’s pilot slang for enemy aircraft,” Bandit explained.

“Are you successful?” Andrea asked, satisfied. “Your heists, I mean. I haven’t heard of you.”

Wrecker pulled a face. “You haven’t heard of the Heist Crew? We’re the closest thing La Sierra has to celebrities, kiddo!”

Andrea flushed. In his year and a half with the Court, he’d spent nearly all of it inside El Palacio. His education had been focused on mastering English and the American accent, first aid and an aborted attempt at combat training with Park (which had ended in Andrea crying, bruised and terrified, and Park announcing that they would try again when he wasn’t thirteen years old), and a thorough introduction to Intelligence with Roman, who Andrea had grown to respect and even almost like.

After his embarrassing interaction with Park, he hadn’t learned anything about the Military - the entire sect of the Court ey ran. He’d heard a little about something called the Cavalry, which worked closely with Intelligence, but other than that he was in the dark.

“I think I could count how many times I’ve left this place on both hands,” he said.

“Including the third of a finger?” Bandit asked with a joking grin and it honestly startled a laugh out of Andrea. Bandit was nearly done, folding in the end of the gauze. It was a little sickening to look at his hand and- and see that it was lesser, but he assumed he would get used to it. Bandit seemed to notice the look on his face, and softened a great deal. “Hey, it’s no big deal. People lose fingers all the time, in our kind of work. Organized crime does that to you.”

“Yeah, plus I can call you ‘Niner,’ now,” Wrecker said. “Which is way better than your codename.”

“Shut up, and don’t call me that,” Andrea said, but he was smiling. Okay, maybe they weren’t so bad.