Dre had always believed that the most dangerous person in the room wasn't the loudest — it was the one who said nothing but heard everything. Tonight, he had to be that person. And the room was filled with enemies.
He was seated in the corner of a dimly lit bar, the kind where secrets passed hands faster than drinks. The smell of stale beer clung to the walls, but Dre wasn't here for pleasure. This was business.
A guy named Folarin slid into the booth opposite him. Dreadlocks, tattoos, a twitch in his left eye that gave away nerves he didn't even know he had.
"You Dre?" he asked.
"You came to the table. You tell me."
Folarin scoffed. "Zion's people said you're sniffing around things that don't concern you."
"Then why are you here?"
"I got debts. Zion didn't clear them. You want information, I need cash."
Dre leaned forward. "I don't pay liars."
"I don't lie."
Dre handed him a folded sheet of paper. It wasn't money — it was a photo. A clear shot of Folarin handing off a duffel bag to a rival crew two nights ago.
"You think Zion will care you're feeding info to his enemies?"
Folarin froze.
Dre smiled faintly. "Now we can talk. No money. Just survival."
---
Across town, Zion wasn't sleeping. He'd pulled his crew into an emergency meeting. The tension in the room was suffocating.
"You, Peter — your cousin just got a job at the port. That's where the leak happened. Explain."
"I didn't tell him anything!"
Zion walked to him slowly, menacingly. "I don't trust cousins. I don't trust friends. And now? I barely trust myself."
His paranoia was blooming — exactly what Dre wanted.
---
Back at Dre's place, Okiki was waiting, pacing. "You're provoking a drug lord. You know how this ends."
Dre dropped his backpack on the couch. "Not if he implodes first."
"He's got people in the police."
"Then we go where his influence doesn't reach."
"Where is that? Dre, be realistic."
Dre opened a notebook. Inside were the names of politicians, school heads, shipping clerks — people Zion had bribed or used. Some were still loyal. Others? Not so much.
"We don't just bring him down," Dre said. "We make the people around him start dreaming of a life without him."
"Is that even possible?"
Dre looked at his friend. "Every empire falls. It just needs the right crack."
---
Meanwhile, another character was rising: Adanna.
A journalism student with sharp eyes and a sharper pen. She had seen Dre once at the youth center, fixing the WiFi. She'd watched him from a distance since — always alone, always quiet, always thinking.
Tonight, she stood outside the same bar Dre had visited.
She had a camera, a voice recorder, and curiosity that wouldn't sleep.
Inside, the bartender whispered into a phone. "The boy's been here again."
Outside, Adanna clicked a picture of Folarin leaving through the back.
Something was happening. She didn't know what yet, but whatever it was, Dre was in the middle of it.
And she wanted in.
---
The next day, Dre got a text:
"I know who you are. You're not just playing the game. You're trying to end it. — A."
He stared at the screen, then smiled.
Finally, someone who saw more than the surface.
Trust is dangerous.
But sometimes, it's the best weapon you have.