After quickly catching 2 hours of sleep Brian woke up to his alarm. Three times he hit it until he finally gave in. If a truck had run over him he'd probably feel a whole lot better.
With a headache from hell and a throbbing nose and eye he decided to skip the shower and the coffee. Instead he popped two advil in his mouth, washed it down with water from the tab and then got dressed.
His gun lay on top of his drawer...without a magazine. It took the cop a second to remember that Jack had dropped the magazine in the alley, where he decided to turn his face into minced meat.
Jack, the bastard. He had to be adopted!

Brian's anger flared up all over again so he shoved a new magazine in his gun, holstered it and grabbed his keys.

After a stop at his gps office, who confirmed a broken nose and stitched up the inch long gash above his eye, Brian pulled up in front of the Miami Police department, main building.
The lump in his throat was growing by the minute. No make up could hide his brothers doings and he might as well give up his badge or his brother now.

With determination he walked along the hallways until he reached the chief's office.
Without warning Brian entered and demanded. "Take me off the case!"

Captain Hoitz, a grey man nearing his 60's looked up from his computer screen when someone, officer Brian O'Conner, burst in to his office unannounced. The department had offered O'Conner a clean slate job because the man held good credentials in between his failures, but as of late that same department was beginning to grow doubts on this decision. O'Conner had been put on the case of the theft of expensive cars for his experience and driving skills, but the only progress that seemed to have been made was that, ironically, the man's younger brother turned out to be a possible suspect. Last night though, the thefts had taken quite the explosive nature on the police impound lot.

"O'Conner, just the man I was looking for. Sit your ass down." He commanded, completely disregarding the officer's demand of being taken off the case. As he leaned both elbows on the desk in front of him, he folded his hands and studied the man's face. Broken nose, cuts, bruises...

"I assume you've already heard what happened last night." It wasn't as much as a question, and thus he didn't wait for an answer when he continued. "Two cars stolen from the impound lot, hundreds of thousands dollar damage, and despite an intense chase, no trace of the two perps dressed as police officers. You wouldn't happen to know anything about this, would you, officer O'Conner?" He stared intently at the younger man, looking for any signs of discomfort.

"This is your case, O'Conner. And with the possible involvement of your younger brother, and now this sudden request for resignment off the case, I have reason to believe you no longer see things clearly. If you know anything, now would be the time to talk." He raised his eyebrows as if it would actually force the cop to spill his beans.

Mira, who had been sitting at one of the desk in the office had to hold in a gasp when she saw Brian. He looked like hell. She watched him walk straight into the Captians office. As she leaned her head she listened to the other cops in the room talk about the shape Brian was in. At least they had stopped talking about her and Brian being in a realtionship.

Since she hadded been able to get close to him since they had their last talk with Hoitz, Mira decided to wait for him. She still had one question that was nagging in the back of her mind. Why had Brian lied about her badge? For the last few night that one question had kept her from getting a goodnights sleep.

Max layed at Mira's feet glad to be back on the job as a Police canine. This way he could protect his human and not spend all his time pacing the apartment.

In an attempt not to give away and information Brian stared at the man in front of him while he was panicking inside. What now? Lie, say he knew nothing, give it all up, come up with some sort of strange story? Everything he had come up with was suddenly bullshit in his mind.

So he tried to buy himself some time. "Er, what?"
What a sorry attempt.
Of course his boss could see right through him.

In the short amount of time he had he remembered what mattered to him. Brian wanted to do the right thing, protect the people but family also mattered to him. If only Jack would feel the same way. His brother didn't seem to care what Brian believed in, that he'd ruin his career, possibly made him an accomplice and on top of that didn't give a shit about him personally...simply called him pig. So Brian made his decision to no longer protect him.

Trying to sound as calm as possible he said in a low voice. "You're looking for my brother. He's totally out of line. He's the one who stole the cars..." Purposely he neglected to admit anything else. He didn't want Jack to be on trial for blowing up the other cars or assaulting him.

"I think you can see the conflict of interests here. That's why I need you to take me off the case."
He could feel his heart sinking. Had he just really ratted out his own flesh and blood? Now he was really a pig.

Captain Hoitz unfolded his hands and leaned back in his leather chair. He kept looking at the officer, his expression not changing even as O'Conner revealed the information he had already suspected. The prints on the NSX had come back as belonging to Jack O'Conner, a punk ass kid trying to make a name for himself. He wasn't unknown to the department. Theft, participating in illegal street races, even assault were all part of this kid's fill. But so far, for the recent cases of GTA, there was still not enough hard evidence gathered to make an arrest on the prick.

"Alright, O'Conner." He leaned forward and scribbled something on a notepad on his desk before he turned his attention back on the officer. " You know how this goes. I'm going to need you to make your statement official, which means I'm asking you to go on record against Jack O'Conner." He wasn't asking though. It was standard procedure, and the man had opened this can of worms on his brother himself.

He shook his head when the request of being taken off the case was repeated. "Absolutely not. I put you on this case because I trusted your abilities, O'Conner. But after last night you made a mess of things, and you will clean this shit up." He barked before he pressed the button on the intercom, asking for officer Hobbs to be brought in to his office.

"Now Jack O'Conner has been a royal pain in the department's ass for far too long, the kid has a talent for boosting these expensive cars, I'll give him that, But what he doesn't have is the influence nor means to be shipping them any further than his own backyard, and these cars don't just disappear on their own either. Which means he has to be working for someone else this time around." He stood up and walked towards his windows, looking at the street outside. "You're his brother, O'Conner. Family. He trusts you. Take any information, any evidence, you can get from this jerk-off. If there is a puppet master, find out who it is. And once we have the big fish..." He smirked as he snapped his fingers. The department would have two for the price of one.

"Officer Hobbs, take a seat." He ordered when he heard the door to his office open. He turned around and looked between the two. "We all know what happened on the Toretto case back in LA, and since we don't want history repeating itself, I have assigned officer Hobbs to watch your ass 24/7 throughout this. Anything you do will be reported back to me, understood?" This was going to be a test for both O'Conner and the rookie. She wanted to climb the ladder of promotion fast, and this was the only (technically second) chance she'd get to prove herself.

Mira sighed when she was asked to go into Captian Hoitz's office. Either thing were about to get better or they were going to get ten times worse.

She sat down in the chair next to Brian and looked at the Captian. He may have been older but that didn't mean he didn't intimidate her alittle. "Understood sir."

She glanced at Brian and then down to the floor. Things weren't looking to good for either of them. They had a rough start and definitly were not going to get along right away expecialy since now it seemed they would be spending every moment of the day together. There was going to be at least a few fights between the two of them if how their first encounter was any clue. Mira could already here all the rumors that would get passed around the office now that she and Brian were working together.

"You gotta be kidding me."
Brian shook his head and let his flat hand hit the desk in front of him.
"I want to be taken off the case! My brother doesn't know who's behind it. And I'm not going to be the one arresting him. Aside from that he wants nothing to do with me because I'm a pig...as he says."
Brian was rambling off letting his collected anger from the night before shine through his voice.

"You brilliant plan doesn't work even if I wanted it to. Look at my face...what reason would I have to come back to him and offer help? He'd know what's going on like that." Brian snapped his fingers.

"And on top of all that I don't want somebody wiping my ass for me. I don't need her. I have my integrity straight, sir. That's why you need to assign me to a different case." He glared at Mia, then back at his boss not caring if the man liked his attitude or not.
"Give it to her. She's a racer she says! I'm out."
In one swift move he was up and turned to leave.

Captain Hoitz raised his eyebrows at the officer's outburst. He didn't care for any personal problems, family problems. He did however, care for insolence as he didn't tolerate it in the least bit. He had a job to do here, to bring these bastards down before they tore up the whole city, not to run a nursery of some kind. But if O'Conner kept refusing to do his orders, then he was left with no other choice.

And thus it was his turn to slam his flat hand on the desk, drawing the cop's attention back on him. "You want to be taken off the case? Consider it done. Officer O'Conner, I'm here by demoting you to desk duty. You are to report to police sergeant Davis tomorrow morning at 8 am for reassignment. Do you understand me?" He walked towards the officer and unclipped the gun holder on the man's belt, removing the sidearm as he glared the cop straight in to his eyes. "You're lucky I'm not kicking you off the force all together, son. Though test me again, and I might reconsider this act of kindness." He said without any of the mentioned kindness in his voice.

He placed the gun on his desk before he grabbed a couple of thick folders, containing everything on the recent thefts, possible leads, older similar cases, and of course.. everything the department had on file about Jack O'Conner and his relations. Then he turned his attention on the rookie cop.

"Congratulations, officer Hobbs. You have just acquired your first big undercover case." He dumped the folders in the stunned looking young woman's lap. "Bring this to a good end, and you will have a bright future on the force." Though he had his doubts whether she could handle the case, but time would tell.

His eyes shifted towards officer O'Conner for a moment before he motioned towards the door. He'd still have someone keep an eye on this cop in particular. The man could shout he had his integrity straight all he wanted, but it was better to verify rather than to trust on such matters.

"You're both dismissed."

Judging by the chiefs reaction Brian had gone too far. But when the man actually granted him his wish he was actually relieved. That only lasted for about two seconds until he heard what his new assignment was...the worst for a guy like him-desk duty. He'd rather hand out tickets than type reports.
"What? Why? Why are you punishing me when I all I do is be honest?"
If he didn't really get out of there fast Brian was afraid that his boss would not only fire him but throw him in one of the cells in the back because he'd jump at his throat.

The part with Hobbs was just a joke on Brians side but when she actually got handed the case Brian couldn't help but dish one out to both her and the captain. "At least we can be sure my brother won't get caught then, can't we?"
Once again he looked back and forth waiting for them to tell him that the captain had been kidding.

The laughter didn't come. So Brian shook his head snorting and left smashing the door behind him.
"Fuck."
In front of him half the office was looking at him. So Brian let his head hang and walked away. Outside he lit the first smoke in ages and took a deep drag. Where the heck did it come from?
Padding his pockets he noticed that he was still wearing Jack's jacket. So the next thing he did was shoving the pack of smokes in his pocket, taking the jacket off and dumping it in the next best trash can. Then he finished the cigarette and rubbed his hands over his head. What on earth had just happened?

Mira looked down at the file completely stunned. What the hell had just happened? She sighed and walked back to her desk. It seems as though her boss was setting her up to fail. She stuffed the folders in her back pack and walked out with Max happly following at her heals.

As she walked out to her car she noticed Brian. "Well O'Conner I hope you're happy." She was a little pissed off at him but at the sametime she understood why he wanted to be off the case.

Max looked at Brian wondering who he was. Taking a careful step forward he sniffed Brians and after a few seconds of thought started to wag his tail.

Calmer but still in a shitty mood because of the turn the events had taken Brian crushed out the cigarette and looked up at her while he blew out the smoke.
"Oh look who the cat dragged by Turner and Hootch." Brian mumbled.
"Sure I'm happy. Can't wait to sit on my desk." He shrugged.
"Good luck catching my brother...you'll need it....oh and duck when he swings at you!"
Brian didn't know why he was giving the woman the lip. None of this was her fault. She was just a pawn in the game of cops and robbers. He should actually apologize but just couldn't bring himself to.
Briefly he opened his mouth for a sorry but closed it before it left his lips.

"I'm gonna need the luck." Mira sighed. Fighting with him wasn't getting her anywhere. She pulled out her own cigerette and lite it taking a long drag. "Look Brian I know things between the two of Use started out alittle rough but....I am gonna need your help. I know you're not on the case anymore but you know him and I don't."

Max nudged Brian's hand. There was something different about this man. He wasn't like the others his human talked to.

Officially Brian was off the case, sure. That was a good thing, too. Unofficially he still wanted to make sure Jack wouldn't catch a bullett..at least not from any other cop or gangster.
For a long moment he frowned at her, then gave a short nodd. "Under one condition. You can bust him up all you want...and please feel free to do so ..but don't kill him. If he draws his gun on you or anybody else-he won't shoot. I know that!"

Uneasily he rubbed his hand over his face touching the delicate spot under his eyebrow and flinched. "Why am I doing this again?"
Another long pause followed. "Maybe because you're the cutest rookie I've come across in ages."

With that he walked off down the road to where his Skyline was parked.

Mira turned bright red. She haddn't expected that at all. "O'Conner wait!" She ran over to him with Max. "I have a couple of questions for you. If you have some time." A small smile spread acrossed her face. "Besides you look like you could use a drink." A faint blush still covered her cheeks as she waited for his answer. Normaly she would never normaly ask one of the people she worked with to get a drink with her but there is a first for everything.

As far as Brian was concerned today was a day off. He was too beat up to work, which he thinks his doctor will agree with. Brian was still pissed off but since it wasn't her fault and Brian was in the mood to get his brother back he agreed to come along for a drink. "That actually sound like the first reasonable thing I hear today." He nodded and waited for her to catch up.

When she reached his car he opened the door. "Where are we going? Do you know the club near my boat house? Let's go there."
The drive would be long enough to work our some anger by driving. Plus he'd stop by Angel's place, which he should have done ages ago.

TBC@ Talking business (btw Mira-can you open that thread under the bar section?)

"Yeah I know the place. I guess I'll meet you there." Mira was stightly surprised he said yes. To tell the truth she had execpted him to say no. It seemed today was getting better for her.

Mira walked to her black and blue dodge charger smileing. If Brian was willing to help her maybe she would be able to catch who ever was pulling the strings behind the car theif. She opened the car door for Max, who happly jumped in. She then got in a drove off.