I believe the timeline is this, without times, someone may provide them and there really should be a timeline of all this nonsense.
Nick gets mad and starts talking about this stuff.
At some point, he also talks to Vic and can't really give legal advice but recommends he get legal counsel. That turns out to be BHBH (Nick already knew Ty personally iirc).
Vic retains BHBH and puts down a retainer. This is probably substantial amount of money.
Nick continues to get mad (he's good at that) and decides fuck this, I want to actually do something about it. He creates the GFM.
The next step takes a little while because it is actually fairly legally complicated to set up a GFM if you're a third party and you're raising the money for the use of someone else. Presumably GFM itself had to look into this and probably their lawyers did too, and they went through a fairly complex process of attaching the GFM to the IOLTA (Interest on Lawyer Trust Accounts) account of BHBH, where Nick can't touch it and BHBH can only legally touch it upon itemized bills being available.
Anyone concerned about the ethics of this should know that fucking around with IOLTA accounts is something that will end your legal career fucking instantly. It is one of the few guaranteed "death penalty" offenses in that you just flat out get disbarred for it, reciprocal disciplines means you're also disbarred anywhere else you're licensed, and just forget being a lawyer forever.
Since then, I assume they've already spent Vic's initial retainer and I have no doubt they've consumed some sizable chunk of the GFM itself on this chickenshit discovery nonsense, whether or not they've actually billed it yet.
This is sort of how hijacking victims responded before 9/11. Just let the bad man do what he wants, he'll demand a bunch of Twinkies or whatever and eventually let the hostages go.
If you think instead that the fucker is just going to fly you into a building you have motivation to resist.
People are learning that if you just give in to these fuckers, they destroy you anyway.