Chapter Text
You sit, your legs crossed over each other, smoking a cigarette as the other grunts bicker and banter with each other. Boss had called you to the office, and it looked like another job that would require blood. You aren't noticed. You keep it that way. For most people, you were just an errand runner who hadn't become a made man yet, one of the many in these city's streets who worked for the mob to survive.
Inhale the poison. Exhale the smoke.
“Hello!” The receptionist calls out your name, gesturing you to come over. You flick the cigarette into the ash tray, and get up, smoothing your suit and straightening your lap. The rowdy crew snickers, looking at you with your suit and your polished shoes (battered to hell and back), but you pay them no mind. The lady looks up from where she was reading her book, and says, ”He's in the room to the right.“ and doesn't wait for your reply. She doesn't need to. You're here, and that says enough.
You go down the hallway, the grunts' conversation fading behind you as you stand in front of the lily-lacquered door. You don't flinch at the smoke that hits your face, watery and lung-clogging, and open the door.
The boss narrows his eyes as you walk into the door. Sterling’s a sneaky motherfucker with dirty fingers with nails that are never cleaned and a cheap suit with even cheaper cuff-links. He's not a big fish in this swarming yellow pond. Just one of the greedier ones.
He leans forward, on the desk carved from rich oaken wood and in the windows behind him, you can see the filthy streets and a child being kicked and run off for begging.
He says, “I would think you already know what I have tasked for you, hey?” With a little smile on his face.
You put your hand over your heart, that tender left side of your chest.“Yes, Mr. Sterling.”
He nods, leaning back. “Need a man dead. Didn't pay his protection money. You know the drill.”
He likes your loyalty, the Don. He likes you at his side, more intimidating than he could ever be, a slim shadow that could push you down and put his fingers around your teeth and yank. This is how you're climbing the ranks, and it's why you don't wear cheap suits. “Yes, Mr. Sterling.” You bow deep, and his grin grows wider.
Pathetic, pathetic little man. You couldn't wait to crack him to pieces.
He turns around so he's facing the skylights, and you can only see the back of his chair. The both of you are looking at the city. Beautiful, old city where the poor die young and the rich live in their towers never coming down until their corpses need to meet the grave. You stand there for one long moment, at your city with its old buildings and washed out gutters, cast in perpetual shadow except from the occasional flicker of light from the streetlamps that didn't have their lamps shot out. He thought it was his, as did every wannabe in this city. But when you looked at it, you knew. You knew it was yours.
You just needed to take it.
You turned on your heel and left the building. It's time to find your target.
A few targets actually. The blood will flow in the streets tonight. You have your knife in the back pocket, your pistol in the holster, and they comfort you as you trace the outline of their shapes as they hang from your hip. If you had your Tommy gun, that would be just perfect, but you kept that in your apartment where no one could steal it off of you. You don't like to soil it with this dirty business so it stays there until you can bring it out for your holier purposes.
Soon, you find the target. He's in his apartment. He knows he's about to die. Doesn't notice you though, when you slip in, silent as a shadow, and only whips your head when you're behind him. “Get away!” his badly shaking hands aim his gun, “Get out!”
You stalk closer.
“I'm warning you! I'll shoot.” but his trembling upper lip shows this is just a man who crossed the wrong guy, out of lazy greed and wasn't prepared for the consequences. Stupid. You'd feel sorry for him if he wasn't a dumbass who crossed the mob for an extra few bucks.
Besides. You flick out your knife, and it gleams its sixteen-inch blade as it lashes out. You're the guillotine blade, not the sledgehammer.
You crouch above the dead body. The apartment's dead silent as you pick up his arm, choosing which finger you should take back to the boss as evidence. You didn't think Sterling would appreciate the middle finger so you choose a thick, hairy thumb instead. The line across his neck, a thin perfect slash seeps red like rose petals, and you'd admire your work if you weren't so pissed off.
The thumb falls to the ground and you toss the mutilated hand away. This was taking too long. The don needed to go and he needed to do so now because you were pissed at this city. But your plan, so close to fruition as it were, still needed extra polish. It's impossible to stay on the top unless you're perfect, ruthless. Eclipse from Naff city was perfect proof of that.
What would be the collateral that would keep people in line?
Because goddamnit, you had your crew and your resources, people would be willing to follow you. You just needed to make your ascension to the throne as bloody and ruthless as possible.
You leave the apartment with the chopped off-thumb hand, wiping your switchblade and pocketing it. Your city, your beloved city. I'm so sorry people are treating you like you're a pot to piss in.
You make your way back to your home, an abandoned place that's perfect to simply collapse at. The thumb's been mailed to the guy, along with the watch, and Sterling would get a good laugh when he saw it in his inbox.
Shadows dance in the streets. Towering buildings, wooden, stone, moldy, fill up the city as you walk on past, hand always clenched around your knife. There's no such thing as safety in this flawed metropolitan hell.
Soon enough, the sun starts setting behind the rooftops and the orange glow of the evening is replaced by smoggy shades of dull blue and a crescent moon. You're dimly surprised by the flickering streetlights that struggle to say on, but then you remember this is one of the areas that pays protection money so no wonder they're in somewhat better upkeep than the rest of the town. Depressing way of the world.
You're just about to your house when a red gleam is spotted in the alley. At first, you're ready to ignore it and move on. It's probably just a blood puddle pooling from some mangled corpse. You start walking up the steps to your house, getting out your keys and jiggling one into the doorknob--
A snarl, low and guttural, echoes through the air. Your hand stops mid-key unlocking.
An eye looks at you with a pupil so dilated it feels like it's going to split the optic into two. Optic. You get down from the stair steps, moving closer, your hand going to your gun.
In an alleyway, among the filth of the cement floor and behind a garbage dumpster, is an animatronic with its chest split open and mouth covered by a muzzle.