

WASTELAND

by

Keith Crews

SMASHWORDS EDITION

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PUBLISHED BY:

Keith Crews on Smashwords

Wasteland

Copyright © 2010 by Keith Crews

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

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WASTELAND

CHAPTER ONE

THE LAST CHANCE

(1)

Angelo Marchetti was a killer.

Vengeance had tempered the hitman's long journey with a test of age while death had come to season with a harvest for the worthy. The end would be heralded upon a gun's barrel as an empire of corruption collapsed into the barren dust. It was a dream realized, yet stolen, bittersweet and satiated with hollow sentiment for fate was a thief and a whore that sold its virtue to the cruel.

But then the hitman was also cruel. Surely his currency had paid the way with suffering.

Should not the hitman suffer as well?

The night breathed neon from an urban jungle while the world below turned upon an axis of pandemonium. Sirens screeched into the ebony, damning the hitman to that place which would soon lay claim. Death had ripened the man with the steel gray eyes and soon the scythe would separate the stalk from the chaff.

It was to be expected.

The hitman's piercing eyes faded under the fall of heavy eyelids as the blood let. His slender fingers touched the scarlet fissure at center chest where a fire burned fiercely. The bullet had torn clean through the heart, not a trace of lead to be found therein except for its spicy aftertaste.

The end drew nigh.

He stared upon the bleak nondescript horizon and to a deaf city that marked his passing with an indifferent shade of boredom. Here, he had finally come to the end of all things and nary a soul batted an eye nor ventured a glance in consideration.

Death offered a lonely bed of sorrow to lie upon.

In the soul's dying light, dreams succumb to darkness. The woman that never was had departed him, lost forever to circumstance and a love unrealized. Perhaps their paths might chance to intertwine in the hereafter. A fool's dream suffered to the hard spike, but it would be there that Angelo Marchetti's journey would truly begin.

(2)

The hitman's eyes slowly parted to an open. A pale horizon of silver-gray lay beneath a depressing canopy of charcoal sketch, the land a flat barren waste of gray ice and dull snow. Angelo crawled into a stiff slouch, that fearsome pain within his chest a faded memory. Carefully, his fingers inspected the wound: no hole nor stain of blood, just a dark denim shirt with black ebony buttons in store bought condition.

Angelo's skilled hands ducked beneath the narrow lapels of his full length leather coat and swiftly withdrew Thunder and Lightning. The guns were composite black, ammo clips loaded down on eleven hard spikes with two additional nails chambered into the pipes. The howitzers were cold to the touch but felt good inside the skilled grip of the hitman's slender hands. The weapons were dark trophies, harbingers of death and the fire with which the hitman struck. The guns were reliable tools of the killing trade and they had come to be in the hitman's possession at a great personal cost. The weapons were more than just guns, they were symbolic of an unimaginable hardship both endured and conquered.

The Archer Howitzers had been paid for in blood.

The guns retreated back into their well-worn, well-oiled leather strap shoulder holsters, where they nested beneath his muscular arms in perilous wait. His fingers, cold and raw slid into the mild warmth aside his ribs, soaking up heat as the vicious wind kicked sharpened bits of ice into his eyes and stern lined face.

The hitman did not know where he was, but understood it was not the world he'd come from.

Perhaps an alternate universe?

Wherever it was, Angelo needed shelter or else he would die from hypothermia, and he had already suffered the weight of death once this night and would not bear its company again.

His keen eyes scanned the horizon in search of civilization only to find the desolate plateau of a frozen wasteland. In the distance a subtle light glowed dim on a shade of ethereal amber: a destination. Removing the belt from his coat's waist, the hitman tied it firmly around his head like a bandana, covering the aching ears aside his head from the bite of frost. The buttons of the expensive Italian coat were fastened up to the neck, the thin lapels tucked awkwardly beneath the press of his square chin as a breaker.

It would be a long walk.

His snakeskin boots trudged forward through the snow, carrying him off across a frozen waste towards what could only be described as a slight glimmer of hope on an otherwise bleak frontier.

(3)

The town was small, a series of humble wooden shacks surrounded by a horse paddock of barn board fencing and the sight brought to mind where such timber had come from.

Angelo's toes felt frozen within the wedge of his snakeskin boots, his fingers beaten by a frigid hammer, the cold flesh tied around his skull ached to a split. Regardless of who or what lived here, Angelo could not deny the immediate need for shelter. Despite the danger, the hitman staggered forth, eyes blurred by a gale force wind that seemed driven by a sentient will.

A wooden hand painted sign flapped overhead inside the gusts of an angry wind which simply read "Boondocks." Angelo's cubed feet stumbled through the town's rickety gates and down its solitary street which separated a sum of twelve humble wooden buildings. The snow lay thin along the cracked tundra but had drifted neck deep in some corners. A cold dull light spilled through several frosty windows of each building, a wispy shade of orange as thrown from weak oil lanterns and dim candles. A few silhouettes fleeted behind the panes which ran the length of main street.

Someone lived here and they were watchful.

From beneath his hide of leather lay the guns.

What would they feel like inside his cold hands?

He doubted his frozen fingers would even recognize their touch. Still, the howitzers wanted to be held, to protect their guardian, but Angelo kept them holstered. Despite the fact that the hitman was vulnerable, he felt a show of strength would not work in his favor in these cursed lands. He needed the kindness of strangers and he wouldn't invoke much sympathy with angry gun barrels.

At the far end of the modest shacks stood a two story building constructed from black castle stone and ashen barn board. It had a tall fort door that was flanked to either side by sectional plate windows that were buried beneath a thin layer of white ice. From behind the translucent panes, a bright orange glow promised both warmth and untold knowledge, perhaps the very meaning of life, or in this case, death.

The hitman's boots stepped up onto the open porch of warped boards that ran along the building's forward veneer like broken piano keys. The sound beneath their heels was dull but nonetheless glorious. Angelo's hand came out of hiding from within the folds of his jacket and laid itself upon a wrought iron door handle. The metal's touch barely registered and the hitman couldn't help but think on Thunder and Lightning again.

If he had to throw down, would he even be able to pull their triggers?

The handle clicked and the heavy beam door swung open.

(4)

Aromas greeted Angelo: cigar smoke, booze, cooked meat and old wood that had eaten more than its share of hard age. But there was also something else in the mix, subtle and faint, a staleness associated with rot, dead that had died.

Logs laid piled within the colorful quartz hub of a stone hearth fireplace that cast off an inviting warmth. The pine wood kindling popped and hissed under the burst of red-orange embers with an almost musical rhythm.

The old man behind the mahogany bar was tall, lean, had hungry eyes. He worked a white dishrag into a clear shot glass with long slender fingers. He regarded Angelo without the slightest hint of surprise as if he'd been expecting the hitman all along.

Despite Angelo's concern that he might be walking into trouble, he nonetheless lumbered inside on legs that felt weighted down on blocks of granite. The hitman casually assessed the bartender with the thick dark moustache and crooked nose.

There was a tense pause, an ominous quiet that only gave up its silence to the snaps and pops of explosive sparks.

"Howdy," the bartender said in a calm even voice. "Welcome to the Last Chance Saloon."

"Evening," Angelo said with a courteous nod. "Mind if I cozy up to your fire?"

The bartender gave a crooked grin, one that was knowing and spoke on many different levels. "You and I both know what you really need, Angelo."

If he wasn't already frozen, Angelo would have given a shudder. It wasn't that the bartender had known his name, it was how he had said it. There was a strange note of authority within the old man's cadence, words spoken by someone who wasn't quite human.

Angelo shuffled over to the bar on heat deprived legs, still wondering just how heavy Thunder and Lightning would feel inside the mitts of his cold dead hands. The hitman lifted an arm and removed the leather belt that had kept his ears from falling off the sides of his head. It was an arduous effort, a struggle he kept hidden from the barkeep with a well practiced poker face. However, the bartender's eyes knew better and could see through such bluffs, because he wasn't of the natural world, but rather a creature of the hereafter.

"What's your poison?" the bartender asked as he slapped a shot glass down onto the bar.

"Dark rum," Angelo replied, unable to stop his voice from stammering ever so slightly from the cold.

"No...I don't think you understood the question," the bartender said as he leaned onto the bar, arms braced wide, eyes locked with Angelo's as if peering into the dark recesses of the hitman's soul. "I said---what's your poison?"

Angelo managed to crawl up onto a barstool with a fair amount of grace. His body, though dead, still had some life in it. His eyes never left the bartender's and Angelo's face never hinted once that he was confused.

What's my poison?

Deluca came to mind, but Angelo knew intuitively that wasn't the answer the bartender sought. What was his poison?

"My heart."

The bartender gave a slow nod of understanding. "A man who can answer that honestly, deserves a goddamn drink."

The bartender reached beneath the bar and withdrew two more shot glasses, which were casually set next to the empty glass the barkeep had just cleaned.

Angelo gave a faint smile. "Line'em up barkeep. I've had one hell of a night."

The hitman managed to say this without a tremor.

The bartender pulled out a transparent glass bottle which he sat beside the small trio of empty shot glasses. This unlabelled bottle was half full with a crystal clear liquid that Angelo pegged as homebrewed moonshine. It may not have been rum, but anything that could kick like a mule was welcome company on this side of the rainbow.

The bartender poured out a measure of hooch into the first glass, a strange concoction that was the color of dark russet. Angelo immediately studied the bottle, noted how the liquid inside had not changed from its transparent texture.

How was that possible?

The second shot glass was filled, except this recipe wasn't brown, but a deep shade of sunset scarlet. The bottle's mouth then kissed the third glass and out spat three fingers of watery black oil. Still, the transparent solution within the unmarked bottle remained ever clear.

"And one more for the sinner," the bartender said as he touched the bottle to his lips and tossed back a good stiff hit. The bartender then set the bottle back down where Angelo once again examined it closely.

There was still no sign of discolor to be found within.

"Neat trick," Angelo said with a curt laugh. His voice sounded a bit breathy, chilled, but steady just the same. "What do you do for an encore?"

The bartender fixed Angelo with an expression which may have been either respect or cold calculation. "You've still got your wit. That's good...for a dead man."

There it was, dead man, those telling words, the goddamn finality in them.

"So, when do I get to meet God?"

The bartender crooked a smile and then gave the slightest hint of a chuckle. "Got a bunch of questions flapping around inside that mean head of yours, don't ya Angelo?"

"Riddled with them," Angelo replied.

The hitman felt as though he should be relieved, that finally he was going to get some answers. But that weird feeling that had given him the unfortunate news that he was dead earlier said words to the contrary. It told him to keep Thunder and Lightning close, and to be extremely cautious of the bartender.

Angelo let his eyes fall onto the drinks.

They were beautiful, but that gut feeling could sense their danger. They were supernatural potions as prescribed to the damned, and although Angelo craved a good hard drink, the warning within his heart wanted no part of those eerie tonics.

Still, his curiosity was ravenous.

What did they do?

Why had the bartender poured out three?

Was the barkeep expecting company, some other drifter to come waltzing in through the door?

Angelo could feel the fireplace pour heat back into his icy body, and as a result his hands and ears ached terribly as the blood slowly made its way back into his frozen veins. Still, the hitman took it as a good sign that on some level, part of him was not only human, but alive as well. However, questions continued to rattle around inside the hitman's head like bats in an attic, the biggest question of them all involved the ghostly drinks on the bar.

Why three?

"I'm not your guardian angel, Marchetti," the bartender said with a serious intonation. "I am what I am, and what this is depends on if you want to know."

Angelo went to harbor a question on just that, but the bartender raised a finger in silence.

"I'm not a sympathetic ear nor a priest to absolve a confession of sins, Marchetti. You've come to Boondocks and like those before, you will adhere to the house rules."

Angelo thought to ask, or what, but kept silent. He didn't need a confrontation at the moment, even though the pain inside his hands had slowly begun to fade. True, they were recovering, but they were far from being useful in a shootout.

The ladies would have to sit and wait regardless.

"Take your fill death merchant and lets have at it with due diligence." The bartender's eyes briefly caught sight of the door as if to look beyond and out into that bitter darkness that sucked the life out of the very soil. "There's sinister work to be done this night, and as always my service is to Sartomonius."

Again, Angelo thought to field a question, but he could tell that the bartender had yet to finish his nonsensical spiel, which didn't sound so much like a riddle, but a rant.

"Three drinks have been poured before thee, and three drinks you shall bear, fates damn you." The bartender then let his hollow eyes sweep along the shot glasses with such a fierce gaze, that Angelo was almost certain that they would burst into flame. "See them well death merchant, and see them through from brown to black. Taste of one, and a question shall be granted an answer. Taste of another, and an answer shall favor curiosity once more. Drink the third and the last words asked shall be met with certain knowledge." The barkeep crossed his arms and nodded decisively. "These are the house rules of The Last Chance Saloon, death merchant. So as they were...are...and forever shall be." A wide pompous grin aligned the barkeep's thinly wound lips. "Complete these three tasks and then safe passage from Boondocks shall be granted, so say the house rules, amen."

Angelo shuffled uncomfortably upon the barstool, wanting very much to knock the shot glasses and the bartender onto the floor. The hitman didn't care to be spoken to in such absolute terms. The only orders Angelo received came from a fat guy they called the Big Greasy---Romulus---not some ugly suds monkey with a shiny handlebar moustache.

Thunder and Lighting suddenly felt as though a heat had begun to emanate from within their well-oiled chambers. They didn't care much for the bartender's tone either, but Angelo kept them leashed as he didn't yet fully grasp what he was up against. Perhaps on this side of the rainbow bartenders were bullet proof and ate mafia hitmen for nice light snacks. Angelo would play it cool, drink his fill of magic hooch and then ask three paltry questions.

What could the hitman possibly hope to learn from such a limited exchange? Directions to the bathroom---where to get a good cigar---if they sold those beef jerky strips that he enjoyed so much back in the land of the living.

What would he ask?

But more importantly, what did those drinks on the bar do?

Angelo examined the shot glasses with a mindful eye. The drinks had an almost incandescent quality, a glow that seemed to pulse like a faint heartbeat.

Were they alive?

Parasitic organisms that wormed their way into the brain via the liver?

Angelo's cold but steady fingers picked up the first shot glass of brown and raised it in a toast salute. "Here's mud in your eye, barkeep."

With that said, the hitman threw back the muddy drink in one quick toss and then slammed the glass back down onto the counter. The aftertaste was like damp soil that had been laden down with a snarl of slick earthworms, the kind of vermin that fed on funeral casket parfait. The hitman wanted to gag, but he kept that reflex in careful check lest he appear weak in the barkeep's eyes.

Always the tough guy.

As for Angelo's eyes, they were a completely different story.

They had a mind of their own, rolled lazily around inside his head as if their owner were totally exhausted and ready to pass out. However, the hitman's mind remained wholly alert, its thoughts plotting a course of action, like the most efficient way to aim Thunder and Lightning with his vision on the fritz, and how much those special ladies would weigh inside his cold grip.

The killer hands at the ends of his wrists prepared to respond, to bring on the storm, when his eyelids suddenly steadied. The hitman regarded the bartender with a not too impressed sentiment, to which the barkeep grinned fiendishly.

"Tough as nails and thrice as sharp," the bartender said with a shake of his ratty head.

The bartender had seen many a soul pass out over the ages, some even die. Very few stayed conscious after tasting a good stiff shot of yester, let alone remain seated on their barstool like this mean spirited thug had.

"Now death merchant, gaze into my mirror and show me your poison. Then I'll fancy thee with an answer to your first question."

Angelo thought to sarcastically ask for another tip of brown, but worried that might constitute a genuine question. Instead, he bade the bartender's request and let his keen eyes examine the mirror on the back wall, his body always warming, hands always preparing.

The mirror was enormous, framed in by golden ornaments which resembled human and animal bones alike. It stood before a huge selection of spirits, booze that came in many different sizes and colorful bottles. Of course part of that bounty was an illusion, the mirror's reflection added dimension to the room and exaggerated the amount of liquor by a factor of two. Still, it was a good stash, perhaps even enough to get a few dozen loan shark leg breakers nice and jagged.

As for the looking glass: it changed, resembled a pool of liquid chrome, a surface whose boundary could not easily be plotted. Its high sheen surface rolled like a seamless wave upon a lake of silver sterling. It had taken on an entirely different dimension, one that perhaps did not reflect images but imitated them, because in truth there had never been a mirror there to begin with, just a large smooth eye that showed what it saw and saw what it coveted.

Angelo tried to look away, but was unable to pry his eyes free from the freaky sideshow mirror. The mirror hooked the hitman's sharp wits by the brainstem and pulled his soul out through the apertures of his unblinking eyes like a black hole swallows light. Angelo's posterior remained planted upon the barroom stool but his mind tumbled through time and space, thoughts dizzy on a stiff shot of yester. But before Angelo Marchetti's essence impacted with the warped border of the barroom mirror, he heard a recognizable sound.

It was grating and made the stomach tighten in a way that only one noise could.

It was none other than Mount Hope's mid-morning recess buzzer.

CHAPTER TWO

BROWN

(1)

The punch had been square to the nose, and as a result, Patrick Shea had once again knocked Angelo Marchetti onto his arse. Blood spurted from both nostrils and ran down the back of Angelo's throat in hot generous gobs. His gray eyes blurred and watered from the unprovoked strike, but the boy on the ground didn't dare cry. Things would be worse if he did, because if there was one thing Patrick Shea reveled in, it was someone else's tears.

Angelo wanted to crawl off and lick his wounds, but he kept a firm lip and kept seated, because as the schoolyard rule book stated: you stayed down when you'd been put down. Still, that didn't stop Angelo from regarding Patrick with cold eyes that would someday have their revenge. Today however, was not to be that day, and so the only thing that Angelo Marchetti could do was sit on the cracked pavement and bleed buckets.

It was humiliating to be made spectacle of in such a manner. If only it had been a fair fight then Angelo could of at least have taken solace in the fact that he'd met combat in good form. But as far as that brief slug match with Patrick had gone, Angelo had been beaten like a mangy dog.

In Angelo's peripheral vision, stood other orphans who had also felt the heavy mitts of the Mount Hope Bully. They looked on from relative safety like docile sheep, and the sight of them made Angelo's blood boil, those weak timid ewe faces which had stood by and done nothing to help. However, what bothered Angelo most of all was his own frailty, the prepubescent limbs at his sides that lacked both strength and skill, their poor coordination hopelessly bound to a twelve year old body.

"What are you looking at, Angela?" Patrick asked with a mean spirited laugh.

Patrick loved to call Angelo, Angela, that and wop faggot.

Angelo slowly took in Patrick's details with murderous disdain: the way Patrick's curly red hair was wound too close to his otherwise thick skull. The dull unremarkable eyes of outhouse brown and the beefy meat hooks that hung stupidly beside his overly plump frame. Yes, Patrick was nothing but an ugly fifteen year old idiot, a genuine sack of crud with the brains to match, and someday, God help him, Angelo would make the Mount Hope Bully pay in blood.

To an adult, Patrick was not an intimidating specimen, but rather an armchair athlete with a fondness for pork rinds and soda pop. However, to a flock of young children he was a giant. Angelo understood this, but that never made accepting the beatings any easier. Patrick had three years on Angelo and at least seventy-five pounds. If Angelo was ever going to win a fight, he would have to grow like a weed on steroids, because on this level of the schoolyard jungle, size was paramount to leverage, a commodity Angelo Marchetti did not have in abundance.

"Didn't you hear me, Angela?" Patrick razzed. Patrick knelt down to gloat over his handy work. The bloody nose on Marchetti's face was deeply fascinating, the shiny redness of it, the way it splintered down his chin and onto his neck like scarlet tree roots. "I said what you looking at?"

Patrick never cared much for the way Angelo regarded him. It wasn't so much a hostile glare inside the skinny wop's cold eyes as it was something else. Something strong, a trait that perhaps fought oppression and challenged Patrick's absolute authority over the orphaned residents of Mount Hope. Patrick felt that such a seed must not be allowed to blossom. So Patrick had taken it upon himself to make sure that the little snot nose was taught a lesson on a regular basis. Still, as much as Patrick enjoyed walloping Marchetti's ass, he couldn't help but feel as though the little prick was plotting something, a nasty deed that might get Patrick Shea in trouble with the orphanage's strict administrator, Edgar Cornwall, or maybe even the authorities. Whatever the little wop bastard may have had planned for him, Patrick didn't like it. The uncertainty of it put Patrick in mind of an open ended threat. Angelo felt like a loose end that must be tied, and the best way to put out that fire would be with buckets of Marchetti's blood. Given enough time, Patrick was certain that he could hammer the lanky little wop into complete submission, just as he had with all the rest. And so the beatings would continue until that weird glimmer of light went out of Angelo's faggot eyes once and for all.

As for Patrick's question, Angelo's reply was muffled out by the recess buzzer, and it was a good thing that it had, because the kid that bled buckets had said something that would not have helped his situation in the least. In fact, Patrick Shea might very well have kicked Angelo to death if he had caught wind of it.

As for what Angelo had said, it was a simple melding of two words, one that would've cut right to the core of Patrick Shea's dark soul: Murder-suicide.

Those two words were the reason why Patrick Shea had come to be in the good care of Mount Hope Orphanage. Rumor had it that Big Daddy Shea had killed Patrick's mom with a serrated steak knife when Patrick was nine years old, and rumor also had it that poor old Patrick had witnessed the terrible scene. In fact, if one cared to look beneath Patrick's frayed striped shirt, they'd see that the Mount Hope Bully had one hell of a beauty mark carved into the center of his own chest, and no, it wasn't a surgical scar.

Seemed that Big Daddy Shea had taken it upon himself to perform a post-birth-abortion just before he hung himself from the garage rafter. Of course, Patrick had survived the attack, and in honor of that murdering son of a bitch father who had maimed him so deeply, Patrick had taken it upon himself to see that the old man's nasty disposition lived on within his son.

Murder-Suicide.

No one dared to speak those words to the Mount Hope Bully, because the last kid that did had lost an eye and picked up a terrible stutter. According to that tale, the assault would've been murder if a teacher hadn't intervened and saved the kid from being pummeled to death. Still, enough damage had been done to the boy to render him a handicap, and as for Patrick, he'd served only three years in reform school as punishment. But thanks to budget cutbacks and a lack of alternative accommodations, Patrick was once again back amongst the regulars of Mount Hope Orphanage, and wouldn't you know it, he was meaner than ever.

So much for reform school.

Patrick stood up and looked down on Angelo with a twisted sneer, his thin pale lips parted enough to show stained yellow teeth. "Time for class you stinking wop faggot. And don't think about telling on me, or I'll slit your freaking throat. You hear me, Angela?"

Angelo nodded slowly as he wiped the blood from the lower part of his face. He'd never been so glad to hear that miserable old buzzer which usually went through him like nails along a chalkboard, but today it had saved him from his own stupidity.

Patrick casually retreated back into the building's ocher bricks while Angelo stood upon legs that felt as though they might buckle at the knees without warning. Angelo was pumped up on adrenaline, but had enough flesh dipped into the mundane to let him know that he'd been hurt bad. The bloody nose was just the icing, there were other injuries to contend with: bruised arms, swelling on the side of his skull and a nasty scrape on his left shoulder. Angelo was a sorry looking soldier, but any battle you walked away from was undoubtedly a good one. Now he would hobble back into school, clean up in the washroom and then make up an excuse as to why he was late for class.

Of course all the students would know what had happened, but none of them would confess a word to the teachers either, lest Patrick somehow find out and pound them into hamburger. No, Angelo was on his own, and the only thing he could do was tend to his cuts and avoid Patrick as much as possible. Of course there was that certain sick knowledge that always preceded the inevitable, the absolute certainty that there would be other beatings to contend with. Perhaps not this week nor the next, but soon enough. Angelo could already feel those injuries yet to come screaming through his nervous system.

But what was he to do?

What could he do?

Wait until that someday came along, the day when his twelve year old body grew into a man's and then god willing, Patrick Shea would get what he had coming to him.

Angelo's eye spotted a figure just outside the schoolyard's chain link fence. It was a large bear of a man dressed in a brown waist length leather jacket, dark blue jeans and expensive leather shoes. The big galoot ate shelled peanuts out of a brown paper bag as he watched Angelo with a keen interest. Angelo spat a wad of crimson onto the pavement, angry and well-aware that the greasy guy had probably watched the entire fight and done nothing to stop it.

Who needed to watch cable when a person could walk down to the orphanage and watch a couple of kids duke it out for free?

Angelo immediately concluded that the bastard was just one more sicko in the world, a messed up adult who had no problem watching others suffer. Angelo flipped the guy the one finger salute as he slowly sauntered back toward the school. However, the big mean looking bull surprised Angelo by actually applauding. At first, Angelo thought the gesture was a form of sarcasm, but soon realized it was offered out of a genuine sign of respect.

Suddenly, Angelo felt bad for having been so rude.

The kid drew in his horns and let his eyes find the ground as he skulked back in through Mount Hope's stone archway and down into the lower locker rooms to lick his wounds and get cleaned up for class.

(2)

The movie had been an atypical slasher flick with big Hollywood special effects and a tacked on romantic plot which just didn't seem to fly. Still, the gore had been top notch, especially the scene where an alien sucked a guy's brain out through an eye socket.

Now that had been damn fine cinema.

The matinee reel may not have been a contender for an Academy Award nomination, but it had been a great way to kill a couple of hours on a Saturday afternoon. Angelo couldn't help but think that Peach would've loved it. In fact, Angelo could just hear his old friend's enthusiastic comments now.

That was so freaking gross Angle! Yowsa! The sound that slimy thing made when the eye popped out...oh yummy...damn tasty if I do say so myself!

But Peach wasn't in the game anymore, at least not in the litter pool that is. Peach had won the orphan lottery and had moved out west with a young married couple who were software engineers or something of the sort. Christians who had lost a son around Peach's age several years earlier in a boating accident, a kid that just happened to bear a remarkable resemblance to good old Peach Pit.

In the end, Angelo guessed it didn't matter why they had taken Peter "Peach" Pit with them, only that they had.

Anything had to be better than Mount Hope.

Hell, as far as Angelo was concerned, he'd shack up with the Manson Family if it meant he got out of that miserable dung hole.

Can you say amen brother!

Still, Angelo couldn't help but wish that his old friend was here, or at the very least, had seen this particular movie with him. Peach would've really gotten a kick out of it.

Yowsa! The sound that slimy thing made when the eye popped out!

"Yeah Peach...damn tasty," Angelo muttered.

The alleyway behind the theater was relatively empty, save a few trashcans and a gauntlet of black garbage bags. The pungent odor was of sour pop, moldy popcorn and stale nachos. It was the less glamorous exit of the movie house, but it was closer to the bus terminal. Angelo always hated getting stuck amidst that slow penguin march to the lobby doors, not because he hated crowds, but because it felt vulnerable. A great place for an attacker to casually stroll up behind you and then, BAM! Good night nurse.

Angelo hated to think in such paranoid terms, but that's how his mind was hardwired. Perhaps that mindset had to do with living in the orphanage, always being on guard for Patrick Shea and those other lesser tyrants who were always on the prowl for fresh meat.

It was a survival mechanism, Angelo's way of observing the world as an environment of potential dangers. Threats such as neighborhood street gangs, desperate crack heads who'd roll a nun for a quarter, opportunistic child molesters and just mean spirited dung heads like Patrick Shea.

It was a terrible thing to live in fear, but it also made Angelo sharp of mind, tuned the senses with a battlefield mentality. Life to Marchetti was like living inside a muddy foxhole twenty-four-seven, where those hit-miss mortar shells rumbled like thunder and flashed like lightning from sunup to sundown. True, Peach may have been gone, but Angelo was never alone, fear was a constant companion.

Angelo walked down the alley, finished off a soda pop with a slurp and then ditched the spent cup into a dented container. A healthy belch resounded from his diaphragm, an example of poor manners that would've tickled Peach's funny bone to no end. Beyond the narrow passage of ashen cinder block lay the theater parking lot. It was relatively empty this afternoon, most people were at work, not to mention there wasn't really anything worthwhile listed on the marquee playbills. Summer's blockbusters were still a few weeks away, so for now the house only spun B-flick drama on a shoe string budget.

The sun had grown in strength since Angelo had gone into the theater and had become uncomfortably hot. It was a good feeling, one that let Marchetti know that soon there would be summer camp, and for a few blessed weeks he would be free of Patrick Shea and those like him. Of course camp always had its share of idiots, but even those bullies seemed to busy themselves with productive endeavors for the most part. Having something to do could work miracles with problem kids, especially if that activity was situated in the great outdoors.

Angelo exited the alley and into the sting of sunlight. Brightness squinted his eyes and for a second the world was overwhelmed by daylight. A clammy hand wrapped firmly around Angelo's neck and tossed him back into the dank partitions of the alley. Angelo almost fell onto his ass, but managed to hold his feet with a quick well-placed shuffle. His eyes cleared in the shadows, and when they did, they looked down the shiny edge of a switchblade knife.

"Give me your money kid," whispered the raspy voice of a middle aged man. "Or else I'll slit your throat!"

Slit your throat was a promise recently uttered by Patrick Shea, although at the moment Angelo hadn't placed the connection.

Angelo's hands instinctively wrapped around the bony wrist that helped to secure him. The man's arm was scrawny, but held amazing strength. Angelo's eyes adjusted on the man's disheveled features and beheld a sorry specimen that looked anorexic. The dirt on the man's cratered face and foul stench emanating from his oily hide suggested that he hadn't bathed in at least a decade. Pimples dotted his pale skin, greasy hair draped across a wrinkled forehead like wet seaweed and within the crazy wild light of blood shot eyes lived unimaginable desperation.

This was the face of a hungry drug addict, a junky who'd probably stab Angelo regardless if the kid gave him what he needed to secure a fix or not. The weird light inside those dead eyes said they had nothing left to loose and that they had bottomed out years ago.

Angelo eyes glanced past the junky's shoulder and out into the parking lot. In the distance, an elderly couple slowly sauntered up to their car. They'd never see Angelo from their angle, let alone the knife wielding maniac who held him captive in the shadows. Still, there was a powerful urge to cry out for help, but the kid at the end of that bony wrist knew that the knife would steal the air from his lungs as easily as a needle pricked a balloon if he did.

"I've got five bucks," Angelo said through constricted vocal chords.

The junky was really putting the squeeze on Angelo, and if it continued, Angelo would probably pass out from a lack of oxygen to the brain.

"Get it!" the junkie growled.

Angelo's hand fumbled into his back pocket and withdrew a wallet and held it up for the junky to see. There was a strange insane moment where the junky seemed to be calculating some kind of crazy math, perhaps figuring out how much money he owed against how much money he needed to secure the next fix.

It was here that a baggie hit the pavement beside them.

Angelo's eyes twisted down onto the ground and so too did the junky's. In that all too brief glance they could see a plastic baggie with a round piece of whitish crystal inside. Drugs, the hard kind that sucked the souls out of people, the very poison that had drained the spirit from this poor excuse of a man years ago.

The junky's eyes widened at the sight, and Angelo couldn't help but note the intense reaction. Not once had the addict bothered to look over his shoulder to see whom had thrown down this tiny piece of heaven, instead his attention held onto the crystal the way a starving dog fixated on prime rib. At that moment there were no consequences, just the object of the addict's infinite affection. The junky's interest in the boy and his measly five dollars fell into abandon, and before Angelo knew it that knurled hand that had wrapped so tightly about his throat, released him so it could go and snatch up that coveted piece of hard candy.

Angelo could breathe freely again and wasted no time setting foot to heel in the direction of the parking lot when a large shadow suddenly appeared and loomed within the alley's entrance, effectively blanketing out most of the day's remaining sunlight. The sizable silhouette put Angelo in mind of a bear, except that this bear wore a strong splash of cologne, gaudy gold rings and a brown, waist length, leather jacket.

"That's it pooch, fetch the nice treat," the bear said in a low threatening tone.

The junky froze, his grungy fingers caught in the anxious process of tearing open the dime-store-baggie. The junky's waxy ears recognized the deep voice and as a result the junky froze. Suddenly, that voracious need inside those polluted veins departed and was replaced by a strong lick of fear.

Slowly, the junky turned his mangy head towards the source of the voice. "Vincent?"

"Bad pooch," said Vincent with a tisk-tisk.

The junky examined the baggie and then the shadow named Vincent. "I wasn't going to hurt the kid, honest."

Angelo took a step backward as the hulking frame of Vincent the Bear sauntered into the alley with a confident swagger. Marchetti thought to run, but for some reason his legs couldn't move. Fear had him firmly rooted in his tracks.

The junky stood cautiously, his stature at least a full foot shorter than Vincent the Bear's. "Can I keep it, Vince? Please can I?"

The junky sounded like a small child asking if they could stay up late to watch television. Part of Angelo almost felt sorry for the addict, but the memory of the switchblade knife made short work of that compassion.

Vincent casually took hold of the junky's hand which held the knife. "What's this pooch? Is this how you beg for change these days?"

A swift motion followed by a loud crack announced that the addict's wrist had just been expertly broken. The knife fell to the concrete as did the junky. However, the junky did not cry out, instead, his mealy mouth shaped a scream that had no air on which to place its note.

Angelo winced, imagined how such an injury most surely hurt seeing as the back of the addict's hand now touched his oily needle pricked forearm. Surely the limb would never work again no matter how much surgery it received.

"Don't mess with the family!" Vincent growled. "Don't ever mess with my family!"

The junky regarded Vincent with questioning eyes, eyes that said they had no idea who the kid was and just how truly sorry they were for having trespassed against someone who was obviously a member of the Gambaro crime family. However young that little master might be.

"Say you're sorry pooch," Vincent ordered with a sadistic grin stenciled across his tanned face. "Say it, or I'll rip your stinking hand off and shove it up your dung hole!"

The junky looked at Angelo, tears streaming down the blackheads and zits that scarred his face, and somewhere from deep down inside, the junky's voice found enough strength to say one thing---sorry.

Angelo nodded, although he was more in a state of shock than morally offended by the junky's inexcusable actions.

"Now, get the hell out of my sight pooch, before I decide to give you a lobotomy with your own blade, you freaking speed monkey!"

Vincent grabbed the junky by the neck and then tossed him into a pile of trash cans. Angelo wasn't sure, but he thought he heard yet another crack of bone as part of the addict's skeleton gave way upon impact.

Vincent regarded Angelo with a father like concern, as if he wanted to chastise the boy for being so goddamn careless. "It's cool, Angelo. That idiot won't ever bother you again, bet on it."

Angelo swallowed and nodded. He was stunned to have been witness to such a brutal display of violence, but then again, Angelo too had felt the receiving end of such cruel practices, just ask Patrick Shea about that.

"Jesus," Vincent said with a warm smile. "Goddamn, you've got your mother's eyes, you know that. God rest her soul. And you also have your old man's chin, the crazy bastard." Vincent said this character disparagement about Angelo's father with the sentimental endearment of an old friend. "God I miss him."

Angelo was confused and more than a little bit shell-shocked. Things had happened so damn quick, and now this big thug with the slicked back Italian hairdo and linebacker physique was reminiscing sentimentally about who---Angelo's parents?

That was the kicker.

What possible connection could his deceased parents have to this heavy handed leg-breaker? Everything about the guy felt wrong, not that he was a liar, but that he was strongly linked to a criminal element, perhaps even organized crime itself.

It was the wise-guy accent, mannerism, clothing style, the practiced way he had interacted with the junky, it all rang of trouble in a professional sense. Whoever this guy was, it was obvious he worked with the kind of people who sold items off the back of a truck.

"Come," Vincent ushered with a genuine sense of compassion. "Let me get you out of here."

Angelo regarded the junky with curious and fearful eyes. The addict laid on the ground, sobbing softly, eyeing Vincent the Bear with a beaten dog's attention. Still, he clung desperately to the plastic baggie with the icy white crystal inside, a drug that promised to ease his suffering and take him to that wondrous castle of the mind.

"Don't fret the pooch none," Vincent said with a tender voice, a parent assuring a child that the monster couldn't hurt him anymore. "He's been neutered."

Vincent gave the junky a gesture of a knife slash across the throat, which Angelo did not see. It told the junky that tonight, Vincent the Bear would find him and put the poor pooch out of its misery once and for all.

Tomorrow that addict's badly beaten body would be found floating in the harbor, but that was okay, because no one ever made much fuss over a dead junky.

Case closed.

(3)

They walked slowly across the parking lot under the warmth of an afternoon sun. Vincent the Bear regarding the boy with a sort of awe struck fascination, one that marveled and perhaps even loved.

Who was this big maniac?

Sure, the big lug may have just hauled Angelo's bacon out of the fire, but that didn't change the fact that Angelo was still terrified of him.

Little did Angelo know, but most folks who knew or heard of Vincent the Bear were terrified of him. Apparently, Vincent had a nasty reputation for being a mean spirited son of a bitch who'd crushed more than his share of skulls and testicles in a vice down inside Calvetti's frozen meat warehouse. Not to mention that Vincent was an intimidating specimen to begin with: a goon with big mitts and big bones that could throw one hell of a jawbreaker.

"Would you like something to eat...something to drink?" Vincent asked. He could tell the kid was unnerved, and that fright made Vincent fume inside. Tonight the junkie would pay dearly, balls in a vice dearly. "I could take you back to Mount Hope if you'd like?"

Mount Hope!

The name felt like ice water: sobering.

Angelo stopped mid-step, to which Vincent halted his gait as well.

"What is it?" inquired Vincent.

"You knew my parents?" The question was a bit shaky but not without its nerve.

Vincent touched Angelo's face with a thick hand that had more than its share of scars and twisted knuckles that had been broken and poorly reset over the years. "Yeah, Angelo...I knew your folks well."

"Who are you?"

"Jesus!" exclaimed Vincent with a hearty laugh. "Where are my freaking brains? I never introduced myself. My name's Vincent Marchetti. I'm you're old man's brother, which makes me your uncle. Va-Voom!" Vincent feigned a punch to Angelo's arm and then messed up the kid's hair affectionately. "We is family little Capone. Me, you and someone's cousin back in the old country I suppose."

This was said as a joke, but Angelo failed to get it, he was still trying to process the information.

"I don't understand," Angelo said. "Why...I mean, they said I was an orphan...no family."

Vincent stopped smiling and looked away as if hurt, and perhaps he had been. "I'm sorry Angelo. I guess your momma and poppa wanted to spare you certain details." Vincent spoke as though he understood this, but it nonetheless caused him some pain, perhaps embarrassment. "Black sheep of the family, that's what Uncle Vincent is little Capone. The freaking black sheep." He brokered a smile that seemed genuine enough, one that spoke of water under the bridge. "But don't blame your folks none...they were just looking out for you, that's all."

"Where have you been all this time?" Anglo blurted out the question as if it were an accusation. Angelo felt divided, both angry and grateful. Mount Hope was hell and here this big goon with no neck hadn't stepped forward to claim him, to free him from the dark dungeon daycare and the evil clutches of Patrick---

\---and that's when it dawned on Angelo. This had been the guy back at the schoolyard. The gorilla that had stood by and done nothing but stuff his face on shelled peanuts while Patrick Shea hammered Angelo's nose into tomato paste. Suddenly, Angelo's face went flush, his hands tightened into fists and Vincent the Bear could see just how put out his little nephew was with his new Uncle.

"I can explain, Angelo," assured Vincent in a voice that sought forgiveness. "It's complicated, but if you'd let me tell you why, I'd be as pleased as pussy punch."

Angelo almost smirked at the pussy remark. No adult had ever spoken to him like this large ogre had. And truth told, Angelo was never more happy to know that he had family. However colorful that relative's tainted history might be. Yes, it was true, Angelo wanted to punch Vincent's eyes out for letting him rot away inside Mount Hope, but Angelo also wanted to give the big galoot a hug for having both saved and found him. Besides, the Bear said he had an explanation, and Angelo Marchetti very much wanted and needed to hear one.

Angelo nodded an agreement, to which Vincent grinned most favorably.

(4)

The apartment was extravagant and not at all what Angelo had expected: a brick studio style loft with a freight elevator, a huge pair of skylights, the décor straight out of a home renovation catalogue. But aside from high end furniture, there were wonderfully framed photographs upon the walls, images Angelo recognized. The one picture that drew Angelo's attention most was a black and white portrait of his mother, Angelina. She stood on a west coast boardwalk beneath a summer sky, wind caught within her long dark hair, her attractive smile locked in time. A white cotton dress hung off her delicate shoulders, a tiny heart shaped locket draped lightly around her slender neck, the kind that held precious keepsakes within. Angelina was beautiful, the way Angelo remembered, and it warmed his heart to know that at one time she had been happy. However, Angelo was ill-prepared for the strong emotional impact the image would wield over his heart.

A part of Angelo's soul had just broken and he had to fight off the tears.

The boy had not one picture of his own to enjoy for all such treasure had been lost in the house fire that had claimed his parent's lives so long ago.

"That's my favorite one of your ma," Vincent said as he took up the role of museum curator. "Your dad took it." Vincent let his wide thumb trace the frame. "He told me that he proposed to her that day...she said yes...a year later you were born." Vincent placed an arm around Angelo's shoulder. "She loved you dearly...they both did." Vincent shook his bull sized head and frowned with thick homely lips. "Goddamn, what a freaking waste."

Angelo's eyes closed as his eyelids soaked up tears.

Vincent was right: it was a waste, a terrible one.

Angelina was so beautiful, both his parents were and they were gone.

Life was cruel, Mount Hope was cruel, Patrick Shea was cruel, the junkie was cruel, and yes even lovable Uncle Vincent was cruel. Nothing made sense, everything was pain and loss, and Angelo had paid more than his share already.

The first five years of life had been blessed with love, and then the following seven long years and counting had been cursed with violence and sorrow. Angelo had seen refugee children on television, boys and girls that had been maimed in war and starved by drought, but none of those media blogs had ever shown his story.

Did kids like Angelo count for anything?

Too close to home, that was the problem. No one wanted to look in the backyard and see that kind of trouble next door. It was better to distance such issues, because if society could do that, then it could go on believing that things, although not perfect, were nonetheless peachy. Besides, the old adage "children were to be seen and not heard" still very much applied around the world, although Angelo felt anything but seen. But then again, Vincent had seen him and seen him quite well. Perhaps this could be a turning point in Angelo's life, a loving guardian come to save him from the land of the forgotten. Somehow that blessed miracle felt provisional, and the reason for that would no doubt have to do with Vincent's colorful past and ongoing lifestyle.

"Here," Vincent motioned.

The Bear led Angelo to another picture, one that showed Vincent as a boy. In the photo, the big galoot stood next to a skinny kid that held a remarkable resemblance to Angelo.

"There's me and your pop. We used to spend a lot of time together when we were younger, " Vincent said with a soft laugh. "He was thirteen in that picture and I was fifteen."

Vincent's large shape dwarfed Alfonso's meek frame, two odd brothers on opposite ends of the spectrum, but nonetheless bound to each other by blood.

"I used to toss him around like a bean bag until he took a growth spurt at fourteen. Christ the little pecker-head got strong. After that, things got a little bit more even." Vincent rubbed his jaw as if recalling one strike in particular. "Va-freaking-voom!"

Angelo felt a sudden kinship to Vincent through these telling images, pictures that spoke their story like nothing else could. There was no denying that the big galoot, however rough around the edges, was indeed family.

Angelo followed after Vincent, listening intently as Vincent led the boy through the extensive collection of family photos. Vincent complimented the images with a personal narrative that added vitality to the slide show as only a familiar firsthand account could. There were interesting tales of triumph, loss, sadness, comical situations and of course love. And in the few short hours that it took for Vincent to reiterate the Marchetti time line, Angelo had learned more about his parents than he ever thought possible. The information was truly a magnificent gift to receive and Angelo's gratitude toward Vincent went beyond the scope of any spoken thank you.

Still, there was one matter that had yet to be resolved: why hadn't Vincent come forward to claim Angelo after the tragedy? Despite Angelo's wish for it to be otherwise, he was nonetheless bitter towards his uncle. The boy felt slighted to think he'd been deliberately abandoned by Vincent, and even more so the better he got to know the big goon. In a short amount of time, Angelo had grown to like Vincent, almost love him, and so that emotional connection amplified his feelings of abandonment.

Together they sat on a sectional leather coach before a glass coffee table where the family photo album laid open onto a series of hospital pictures: Angelo's birth. Angelo's parents were nothing but smiles, happy and loving toward their newborn child.

Vincent stopped talking, eyed the boy with a somber expression of a man who was about to confess to a terrible deed, one that might very well be unforgivable. Vincent enjoyed this family time with his nephew. The boy had begun to feel like more like a son than an estranged nephew, and Vincent feared that once the kid heard the whole story, he'd bolt out of the apartment never to be seen again. There weren't many things in this world that could hurt Vincent deeply, but something like that most certainly would. Vincent wanted to leave the explanation for another day, but knew he couldn't. He'd made a promise to the kid to come clean on certain issues, damn important ones, and that was what this stand up guy was going to do.

"Angelo," Vincent said and then paused.

God, the kid reminded Vincent of Alfonso, the square cut of his jaw, the thin lay of his piercing steel gray eyes. Angelo was an attractive kid and someday would grow into a handsome man. Vincent had always envied that beauty in his kid brother, and as he recalled that foolish pettiness, he couldn't help but feel ashamed.

"I loved your dad more than anything, but there were certain things we didn't see eye to eye on."

"Like what?"

Vincent ran his big mitts back through his gelled hair and sighed deeply. "Well, we grew up in a pretty wild neighborhood, you know what I'm saying...drug dealers, speed monkeys, merchandise players, street gangs and an...organized...crime element."

"You mean the Mob?"

"Va-voom," replied Vincent with a click of his tongue and a wink. "Anyways, Alfonso was a straight shooter. Kept out of trouble."

"But you didn't," concluded Angelo.

Some things were just too obvious to let slip by.

"Va-voom again." Vincent had begun to wring his hands like a nervous child and looked as though he was about to mope. "I used to make a few extra bucks carrying packages back and forth between Dante's Pool Hall and Puccini's restaurant. Sometimes I'd even carry some packages across the border."

"Drugs?" Angelo asked without reservation.

The boy was not surprised but oddly quickened by the idea as it felt so forbidden.

Vincent eyes drifted to the floor. "Yeah, drugs. Sometimes cash, other times guns and every once and a while..." Vincent looked at the kid and decided not to say. Hearing of body parts was too much too soon. "The money was damn good. In less than a year I had squirreled away enough cash to buy a brand new car and not a low end one either, but a fine sports car."

"Wow," Angelo said with a bit of awe.

"That's what your Grandfather Bussi had to say, too," Vincent said with a look that suggested that Grandpa Marchetti was a man who could get quite mad when he had to. "Well, long story short, Bussi was pissed and so was Alfonso. Your pop said I was heading for trouble if I kept in with that crowd, but I told him to mind his own damn business." Vincent closed his eyes and shook his head. "I was kicked out of the house shortly after, and that's when the real trouble began."

"What happened?" Angelo was intrigued by this tale, it sounded like it was out of a movie.

"I was making good scratch running packages for Romulus. But now that I was out of the house, I wanted to make more green." Vincent sat back on the couch and took on a stance that looked justified in its thinking. "Jesus, here I was surrounded by these dung heads that were making a freaking fortune working for Romulus. I mean, I was making peanuts compared to these idiots. I wanted in big time and I told the man in no uncertain terms that I wanted in."

"So what happened?"

"Romulus tells me to go pound sand," Vincent replied in a tone that said he was anything but pleased by the big cheese's response. "So I keep on him over the next few months. I want better work, I want the good jobs, teach me, teach me, teach me. So one day he loses his temper with me and yells, "you want a cut of the big pie tough guy! Okay, go to the backroom of Dante's Pool Hall tomorrow afternoon at one. See a guy named Vanni. He'll set you up good. Now get the hell out of here before I bitch slap the crap outta ya!""

"Were you scared?" Angelo was captivated, lost to the flow of this story that sounded like a crime confession, which is what it was.

"Hell yeah," Vincent laughed. "I'm sure if Romulus had had a gun at that moment, he'd of capped me good. God I got on his nerves. I learned later that's how a fella lost his wedding package once. Never hound Romulus or bad things will happen."

Angelo subconsciously let his hand gently cup his genitals in protection. "So what happened in Dante's?"

"I walk into the pool hall's backroom, ready to show this Vanni idiot that I'm a wise guy first class with a length of steel running down my spine that's sturdier than a flag pole, when I'm met by three freaking leg breakers with whiskey on their breath." Vincent's features went dark, his eyebrows hunched and his fists tightened. "The next thing I know, there's a freaking pool cue wrapped round the side of my head. Then there's some idiot choking me with his bare hands, while the other two mothers take pot shots at me from behind."

"What did you do?"

Vincent glanced at Angelo, noting how entertained his nephew was by this savage retelling. Hell, if Angelo liked this story, maybe he'd like to hear some of the others. Suddenly, Vincent the Bear thought he might actually have a chance to keep his nephew in his life.

"Well, I freak. I knee the bastard who's choking me square in the balls, so he goes down to the mat, and then I elbow the idiot that's walloping me in the back of the head, it gets him square in the nose and his snout crunches the way only bone can."

Angelo suddenly recalled the incident with the junkie, that sickening crack when his wrist snapped. Vincent was right, bone had its own distinct noise when it let go and it wasn't a pretty tune either.

"By this time, the other leg breaker nails me hard in the kidney." Vincent reached behind and caressed his backside as if the thing still stung to this day. "It was a nasty punch. A real dirty hit, and Jesus did it ever freaking hurt. So by this time, Mr. Kicked Nuts reaches out and snags onto my pant leg, while broken nose wraps his arm around my neck in a choke hold. I can't get my balance, I'm losing air, the third leg breaker's as fresh as a daisy, va-voom! So I do the only thing I can think of. I fall forward onto tapped nuts and broken nose falls with me. Together we've got to weigh over four hundred pounds and tapped nuts is bearing every freaking pound of it. He gets the wind knocked out of him, while broken nose's face squashes into tapped nuts' shoulder and he bellows out in pain. His grip around my neck loosens and then I'm free to deal with leg breaker number three. I stand up, huffing and puffing, mad as hell, but I can already feel the welts throbbing all over my hide. I'm in a bad way, blood flowing from my mouth, my ear, my hands, I'm a total freaking mess. Anyways, number three looks at me and starts to smile. I says, "what's so freaking funny moron?" And then he says, "congratulations tough guy, you got the freaking job.""

Angelo's jaw hung open. "You mean that was an interview?"

Vincent nodded slowly. "Toughest interview in my life little Capone."

"So you were in?"

Vincent regarded Angelo with a knowing grin that was tainted on its share of regret. "Oh yeah, I was in all right."

(5)

The kid took the story with little resistance, although, Vincent knew that hearing about such brutal violence and being witness to its horrors were completely different issues. In Angelo's eyes this tale of a mafia initiation was little different than the movie he had seen this afternoon: a work of fiction. But if Angelo had personally stood inside the pool hall and seen firsthand what a pool cue could do to a man's face, then his reaction would've no doubt been noticeably different. But the kid had no relative reference to draw upon, and that was a good thing, because such innocence was necessary when you were twelve years old. But soon a line would be passed, a moment when the awful truth would not only touch Angelo's young ears, but his young heart as well.

Would the kid be strong in the face of such knowledge or would he cower down?

Only time would tell, and so Vincent continued along with his tale.

"The job I got wasn't exactly what I thought it would be," Vincent confided in a humble tone. "But..."

Vincent looked at Angelo, noting the boy's wide gray eyes, the way he hung on every word. How could Vincent do this tactfully? There was no good answer.

"Angelo, I've never killed anybody who never had it coming. Capisce little Capone?"

And there it was, out there, those dreadful words that told so much. Killing was completely different from snapping a junkie's wrist and having it out with three leg breakers. Thou shall not kill was one of the ten commandments, a big one, the kind of transgression that got a guy juiced in an electric chair or locked away in a remote concrete timeshare with an indefinite lease. Vincent had put a great deal of trust into his nephew, but what else was he to do? The kid had to know why he'd been left to stew in Mount Hope, and the only way to do that was to play the game straight like a genuine true to the article standup guy.

"Kill?" Angelo asked the question, but he still didn't know how he felt about the question. One thing he did know was that he needed to hear more, all of it if need be.

"Ain't no sugar coating the deed little Capone," Vincent explained with an easy shrug. "A man's got to make choices, and I made mine a long time ago."

"You killed someone?"

"No," replied Vincent with a soft voice. "Not someone...a lot of someones."

Angelo watched him with eyes that were wide and lost for direction. Here, he was sharing a sofa with a confirmed killer and Angelo didn't know if he should be scared or not. Would Vincent murder him if he acted inappropriately? Would Vincent use those big mitt hands of his to squeeze the life out of Angelo's throat if fate took an ill-turn? A part of Angelo wanted to run out of the building screaming, but another part wanted to stay.

Why was that?

Because despite Vincent's ill-deeds, he was still family, and after spending the better part of his life being tossed around within the government child welfare system, Angelo had learned an important thing: family was everything. It was a fact most folks could never have understood unless they themselves had walked that lonely mile to the cemetery.

So the question was, could Angelo forgive Vincent's murdering ways?

The answer turned out to be yes, because in the end it was better to have the love of a confessed killer, than to have no love at all, especially when you were just twelve years old.

"Are you a hitman?" Angelo asked.

The answer felt like a foregone conclusion, but when a man spilled his guts, you wanted to make damn sure you'd heard him correctly.

"I'm a hitman little Capone," Vincent replied with surprisingly little remorse. "I take care of trouble makers, and like I said before...I ain't never killed anybody who didn't have it coming."

Angelo stared, blinked and then stared some more. What was he supposed to say to something like that? What was he supposed to do?

"I'm sorry," Vincent apologized. "I know it's a bit much to digest, but I needed to tell you, because you deserved to know exactly why I never came to claim you from Mount Hope."

"You were in jail, weren't you?" Angelo concluded. "That's why you're not in most of the later pictures. That's why you weren't at the hospital when I was born." Angelo tapped on the photo album as if to drive home the point.

Vincent smiled and messed up Angelo's hair playfully. "Kids got brains. What do you know? Va-voom!"

"What happened to you?"

Vincent sighed and shook his head in a pissed off gesture. "A freaking wire tap connected my name to a couple of dead bodies. Then some prison snitch named Pico gave testimony to the cops that he'd seen me plug some moron in the back of the head with a magnum. Greasy little moron wanted an early release from the hoosegow. You know the type."

Angelo nodded, while in actuality he had no experience to draw upon. The greasiest person he knew was Patrick Shea, and although Angelo wasn't sure if Shea were the snitching type, he nonetheless supposed this Pico character probably had a lot in common with a guy like Patrick.

Morons always had similarities.

"Long tale short, I ended up serving fifteen years in the pokey before Romulus's fancy lawyers managed to spring me." Vincent became somewhat withdrawn, lost to a set of memories that must've been horrible in their recollection. "I'd have rotted in there if it wasn't for Romulus, little Capone. I'd have been buried in the prison graveyard where the posies don't grow and the dirt is a dry chalk sand in perdition's bleak garden. Can you say va-freaking-voom."

"Va-freaking-voom," Angelo whispered without realizing it.

Vincent regarded the boy for a second and then burst into a hearty laugh. "You're okay little Capone. You know that. Okay by a long shot."

Angelo nodded a thank you and then gave the convicted killer a genuine smile. "So you were in your own prison, just like I was stuck in mine."

Vincent reached over and took hold of Angelo's hand and squeezed just tight enough to let the boy know that what he was about to say was to be remembered.

"I'd of walked through hell to find you little Capone...bet on it...nothing...nothing's more important than family...nothing! You hear me?"

Angelo felt his hand all squished up inside Vincent's, but the dark brown eyes that held him felt even tighter. "Yeah," Angelo nodded. "Nothing's more important than family." And then for further measure the boy added, va-voom.

Vincent laughed and tucked the kid under his big arm in a playful headlock. "Look out world, the Marchettis are back in force, va-voom!

"Va-voom!" Angelo shouted, his voice muffled by Vincent's jacket.

Vincent let the boy go and studied Angelo's face with eyes that looked as though they might begin to cry.

"I've waited a long time for this day, Angelo. You have no idea."

Vincent placed a hand on Angelo's cheek. The palm was rough, calloused, but Angelo hadn't felt an act so tender in sentiment since his mother was alive. Somewhere between the movie theater and this artsy apartment, Angelo had fallen in love with Vincent in a way that only those who shared blood could. He was family, they were family, and nothing was more important than that, nothing.

"Am I going to come and live with you now, Uncle Vincent?"

Never had Angelo wanted anything more in his entire life.

Vincent pursed his lips and reluctantly shook his head. "I'm sorry little Capone. I've already had Romulus's lawyers check into it. I've got a record and given the nature of my...lifestyle, well let's just say that child services does not approve of such activities."

Angelo bowed his head sadly. "Will I see you again?" His eyes closed as he braced to learn the worst. Angelo figured it would be just cruel enough for it to be so, one more rug to be yanked out from beneath him.

Vincent reached into his pocket and removed a key, Angelo stared at it and wondered what it went into.

"Here," Vincent motioned. "Take it."

Angelo wrapped the key inside the palm of his hand.

"It's the key to this apartment. You stop by whenever you like, you hear."

Angelo smiled broadly and Vincent once again messed up Angelo's hair affectionately. God the kid looked so much like Alfonso that it was uncanny. Vincent may not have been able to make amends to his deceased brother, but he sure as hell could proxy them on behalf of his brother's son.

"Don't tell anyone that you've seen or talked with me, Angelo," Vincent explained with a pointed finger. "There's apt to be trouble for both of us, especially me."

"Not a word," Angelo certified with a cross of his heart. "A secret between you, me and the banana tree."

"When you turn eighteen you'll be an adult, then you can come live with me full time if you'd like. Until then, we keep a low profile."

"Got ya Uncle Vincent."

"There's one more thing, Angelo."

"What?"

Vincent pointed to a gray metal fire door that was set within the studio's decorative brick wall. "That room's off limits...keep out...capisce?"

Angelo studied the door curiously. It looked normal enough, but that didn't mean it housed the run of the mill knickknacks. There were secrets to be had in there, the kind Angelo was better off not knowing.

Angelo regarded Vincent with a single nod. "Keep out means stay out, got ya."

Vincent's eyes smiled brightly. "So, what time you have to be back at Mount Hope?"

Angelo looked at the clock on the wall and sprang to his feet. It was four-thirty-eight. "Damn it! I'm supposed to be home by five."

"Keep cool little Capone," Vincent said with a steady motion of his huge hands. "I'll drive you back. Drop you off a few blocks from the school so no one sees, capisce."

Angelo felt the key within his hand. It felt sacred, a key that could open up a magic doorway into a world he never knew existed. Yes, he was frightened, but at the same time exhilarated. Vincent had done terrible things, but he had also served his time in prison for them, well, at least some of it. But that technicality didn't matter, because Angelo could tell that Vincent Marchetti was at heart, a good guy. Whatever trouble he may have been in before was yesterday's news, and the bear deserved a second chance.

As Vincent stood, Angelo abruptly hugged him. The boy's short arms couldn't extend around Vincent's girth by a long shot, but that was okay, because the big goon in the expensive Italian leather jacket understood what the boy had just conveyed to him, family, at long last, he finally had family.

Vincent hugged him back, his tough looking face pressed against the top of Angelo's thick dark hair. "Don't worry. We're together kid. Nothing's gonna change that now, va-voom."

They separated slowly, but continued to hold one another within each other's eyes.

"Thank you for rescuing me Uncle Vincent."

"Thank you for not judging me."

As they headed out the door for Mount Hope, Vincent inquired about someone he'd seen Angelo with just the other day, a kid Vincent would come to know as Patrick Shea.

(6)

Ten bucks had transformed Angelo Marchetti into the most respected kid in all of Mount Hope Orphanage.

But how could that be?

Vincent had been in Angelo's life for a couple months, and in that short time the boy had come to learn a few things from the big bear: that Angelo's old man used to jump off the Cross Way train bridge into Stick River, (a good sixty foot fall) and that his mother had played the violin, (Angelo had even heard a rare recording. It was a bit pitchy in parts, but nonetheless displayed a genuine musical talent) and he had also learned some other interesting things.

Philosophy had been part of Angelo's tutelage, extreme beliefs as taught by Vincent Marchetti. Those sessions reflected religious ideologies, social structures and the overall meaning of life. And through those discussions, Angelo had come to understand a great deal about personal perspectives: views such as right and wrong and the gray areas that obscured those absolute certitudes. Angelo had come to see that moral ambiguity was everywhere, and that religious fundamentalism was by nature, hypocritical. Everything in the world was open to interpretation: art, music, literature, law and most of all, God.

Angelo was a good student: young, impressionable and soaked such knowledge up like a biscuit in gravy. He accepted Vincent's words as gospel, because they not only made sense, but they also carried water from the well.

One of those teachings in particular pertained to humanity's justification of killing.

Angelo was taught that governments killed every day under the guise of securing public safety and enforcing various other ideologies. These mandates for war were sometimes blatantly obvious, but more often than not they were subtly obscure. Their motives usually rallied support via differing political views, or territorial and legal acquisitions of natural resources that if not protected could undermine free market economies, and thus influence cultural liberties by a slow arduous death of attrition. Technology, oil, democracy, diamonds, gold and religion, each of these things were the bloody gears inside the global killing machine, each motive sanctioned under the moral certitude that God had ordained a country to declare an act of war, because in the end it ultimately served The Almighty's enigmatic agenda.

Death was sold to the masses just as easily as it was sold on an individual basis, that's if you knew how to put the right spin on it. And as for Angelo Marchetti, he had very much been sold.

(7)

If Vincent weren't a hitman, he surely would've been a salesman. He was a first class liar with a merit badge in people skills. Sure, Vince's face may have looked like a catcher's mitt, but the guy could talk a good game. Here, he had sold a twelve year old kid on the idea that murder was normal, watered it down until its taste wasn't so cold and bitter on the tongue. That ability took a combination of smooth talker talent and a susceptible pupil of naïve experience. It was the kind of brainwashing done in third world countries daily, recruiting the young in a cause that was dipped in blood. Of course Vincent had no intention of introducing Angelo into the hitman lifestyle, Vincent merely wanted a sympathetic ear to bear his confessions, a boy that would come to regard him as a father figure and love him unconditionally. But the only way Vincent felt he could have that was to desensitize the boy to killing. So he justified this terrible pursuit as being quite harmless, equated it to hunting deer or rabbit. After all, it wasn't like the boy was in training to be a killer. Vincent was just opening his beloved nephew's eyes up to the nature of the world.

What harm could there be in that?

None, that's what. So the mafia strong arm continued to talk his game and toot his horn, because it was all supposedly in the spirit of helping Angelo understand life.

Of course the best lies told were the ones we tell ourselves. Vincent knew this, but his need to have the boy in his life outweighed any concerns as to what might happen. In the end, Vincent was just smart enough to be dangerous. He didn't realize what manner of man he was creating and perhaps if he had, then he might've left Angelo to his fate.

Who was to say which future would've been preferable?

Sometimes the coin had crap on both sides, and what you ended up with after the flip was bound to stink no matter which way it fell.

Vincent may have been selfish in that regard, but he did have some redeeming qualities such as loyalty. Vincent was the kind of guy that if he was your friend, you could have none better, but if you got on his bad side, then lord help ya. A quick sense of humor and the ability to look you in the eye with an endearing smile while secretly sizing you up for a casket had helped him climb the ranks in the Gambaro crime family over the years. Still, he would've gone further up if had more style, skill and of course an even temper. But despite the handicap, Vincent had done quite well for himself: a good wad of cash in the bank, a nice studio warehouse apartment downtown, and an ample share of high end hookers and strippers that frequented his bed chamber in exchange for either cash, or by far favorite, a good supply of dope.

This was how Angelo had come to understand the nature of women as explained by Vincent "The Casanova" Marchetti. Women for the most part were bitches to be used and exploited by men, except on those rare occasions when a man was blessed with the good fortune to meet a genuine Italian angel. Angelo's mother had been such a precious creature, as too was Vincent's late mama, Theresa, God rest her soul. Other than that, females were sperm dumpsters, things that relieved your "condition" as Vincent so succinctly put it. Further he'd said that when it came to a man with a huge slice of salami between his legs, or a thick wallet pasted to his hairy backside, the cash would win over a woman's gold-digger heart every freaking time.

Vincent also added that he was fortunate in both those departments, va-voom!

The ongoing lessons were both interesting and enlightening in their jungle street mentality sort of way, but to a kid like Angelo the most important thing that he had learned from Vincent to date, was literally in the form of ten measly bucks.

Treasure sometimes could be found in the strangest of places. For Angelo Marchetti one-hundred dimes wrapped inside two rolls of bank paper had seemed like gold bullion bars.

(8)

The recess buzzer went off and as a result a swarm of students exited their respective classrooms for the temporary reprieve of the playground. It was mid-September, warm, but a coolness had crept into the air, especially early in the morning. But for now, it was sunny, almost hot, but there was a weird glint in the sunlight, or perhaps a strange scent in the air that put Angelo on edge. There was danger afoot, he could smell it, and that meant Patrick Shea was on the prowl in search of his favorite punching bag.

Angelo slipped his hands into his new leather jacket's pockets and casually walked to the edge of the playground towards the wire mesh fence. If the schoolyard were a coral reef, then the outer edge near the fence was the equivalent of shark infested water. It was always wise to stick close to the school doors in case one had to make a quick escape inside. That foresight had saved Marchetti on several occasions in the past, but today he had other ideas.

Angelo adjusted the jacket across his youthful shoulders with subtle movements, relishing its tailored fit. The jacket had been a gift from Vincent, a black beauty calf hide with stylish lapels and ebony stone buttons. There'd been lots of gifts lately, most of which Angelo kept at Vincent's apartment so people wouldn't get suspicious of their origins.

Questions as to how an orphan could afford such luxuries would be difficult to explain.

As for any curiosity about the jacket, Angelo had merely said that someone had donated it to a second hand clothing store and he'd been the lucky son of bitch to nab if off the rack first. It seemed plausible, so no one bothered to push the issue further, after all, even orphans got lucky sometime.

Angelo stood before the spot where Vincent had looked on while Angelo had gotten his bell rung by Patrick Shea. He recalled giving Vincent the one finger salute and couldn't help but grin. Vincent later had said how proud he'd been of Angelo, of how he had taken those lumps and hadn't cried like a baby. It showed that the kid was tough, that Marchetti blood did run through his veins. Besides, Vincent said that there were always lessons to be learnt from losing a fight. It taught a man humility, it tempered him with experience, and if that man were a Marchetti, it also poisoned him with a need for vengeance.

Vincent had told Angelo on several occasions that if you knock a Marchetti down, you'd better make sure they don't get back up again, because when they do---BANG! To the morgue my good Bentley and don't spare the whip. As for Angelo, he had learnt his lessons well. Humility, experience and now all that was left to discover was vengeance.

"Angela!"

The voice of Patrick Shea went through Angelo like diarrhea. Angelo's heart pumped like a cam piston as his breath ran shallow and his pupils widened to full aperture. It felt like getting sick, the way fear made your knees wobble and how the adrenaline injected a cold fire into your tense muscles.

The clash would be inevitable now.

Soon the taunts would cease and Patrick's fists would begin to fly. Angelo glanced back across the schoolyard which was a cluster of screaming kids actively at play. If he broke into a run now, Patrick would overtake him before he managed to crawl back through half the crowd. Still, he entertained the notion of just tucking tail and chancing it. But he could hear Vincent's voice inside his head, telling him to hold ground, to remember what he'd been taught and what had been practiced.

Angelo took a deep breath, then, like a boxing match bell signaled round one to commence, he clearly said, va-voom!

(9)

"Where'd you get the nice jacket, Angela...your boyfriend?"

By this time several kids had stopped playing to watch the drama unfold before Mount Hope's wire mesh fence. This fascination spread quickly throughout the playground ranks like a frightened bird alerting a flock to danger. A crowd erected a semi circle around Angelo and Patrick, effectively penning them against the fence. Both boys were in the spotlight now and what the crowd demanded was arena blood.

Angelo gave them a brief glance, disgusted by their morbid fascination and obvious hypocrisy, especially those armchair dung heads who had also felt the heavy hands of this bully over the years.

Had they forgotten what this kind of attention felt like?

Angelo wanted to spit on them, but deep down he knew that if their roles were reversed, he'd probably watch the show, too.

And why?

Because this was the jungle and in the jungle predator and prey always promised exciting action.

"Didn't you hear me faggot?" Patrick teased in a babyish voice that mocked Angelo. "Is that your boyfriend's jacket?"

Angelo faced the Mount Hope bully with stern features etched into his face like chiseled stone. For the first time, he resembled the man he would someday grow to be: Angelo Marchetti, hitman extraordinaire. There was an unnatural power within his gray eyes, courage and something else that was not readily identified. It was that elusive quality Patrick had seen from the get go, the unnerving character trait which the Mount Hope Bully had sworn to squash into oblivion. There was an unexplainable strength lit within those eyes, and as Patrick tried to stare that strange quality down, he felt an unusual amount of uneasiness to be had within himself.

The little puke wop stood a foot shorter than Patrick did, but for some unknown reason the scrawny kid exuded an aura of height. Patrick didn't care for that sort of energy, hated it in fact, because on some psychological or even perhaps spiritual level, it threatened Patrick's supremacy. That could and would not be tolerated, especially in the presence of such a large audience. Yes, today would be the day that Angelo Marchetti got put in his place once and for all, and the only way Patrick could do that was to make the little bastard bleed buckets.

Patrick's freckled face twisted into a flush shade of anger as his fists knotted up into two sizable clubs. "Don't you look at me like that you little wop!"

Angelo felt lightheaded, pumped up on fear and rage. He hated Shea with every ounce of his fiber, but he had to let that weight go. Right now he had to remain cool, get on top of that fire or else it would consume him. Vincent had taught Angelo that fear had to be channeled into a weapon, its energy harnessed, because if the fire raged out of control, it would drown a man's thoughts until he was a mindless idiot. Fear fed muscle, while the mind worked strategy. If Angelo remembered that, then the combination would lead him to victory every time.

Angelo concentrated, and as he did, the Mount Hope Bully finally came in swinging.

(10)

Angelo calculated his position in relation to Patrick, balanced his stance. This was it, the moment Vincent had prepared him for, the thrill of combat. Marchetti yanked both hands free of his jacket. They were cold, clammy, but firmly grasped the wrapped dimes for dear life. For a moment the boy in the leather jacket thought they might bust open under the squeeze of his sweaty palms, but they kept firm: fifty coins a hand that transformed two fists into weighted hammers.

Patrick was almost on top of him when Angelo dropped to one knee. He only had one shot at this. If Angelo missed, he'd have to improvise.

Angelo's arm drew back, a fist full of change clutched tightly inside his right hand and threw a punch for all its worth. The knuckles on his hand buried deep into the pocket of Patrick's exposed crotch with devastating force. Angelo could feel the bully's flesh give way to the rolled coins like a steak under the swing of a heavy mallet. Still, there was no time to register the strike's effectiveness, because Angelo had to keep up the momentum like Vincent had taught him. Angelo rolled down onto his left shoulder and came up behind Patrick where he launched a blow into the bully's left kidney, while an additional right punch found the organ's twin. Another volley connected with Shea's right ear, bursting an eardrum. Patrick rolled round. Angelo delivered another blow that instantly swelled an eye shut. By this time Patrick had fallen onto his knees, one hand cupped over his family jewels while the other ineffectively tried to shield him from Angelo's onslaught.

The Mount Hope Bully couldn't believe this was happening, that such a tiny little puke could hit so damn hard. The kid's hands felt like wooden clubs, and each time they hit Patrick he could feel his body shudder from the impact like a Jell-O mold. Meanwhile, the crowd that had gathered around the spectacle began to scream and holler in frenzied excitement. They called out things like, get him Angelo, and kill him! There was little if any sympathy for Patrick Shea, and that fact injured the fallen boy as well.

The words of the mob were lost to the sound of the heart beat that boomed inside of Angelo's ears. For the first time in Angelo's young life he felt in control of his destiny. Revenge tasted sweet, a vintage wine that must be savored to the last drop, and as far as Marchetti was concerned the bottle wasn't even half gone yet. Angelo was no longer cool and collective, he was like a dog that had been trained to kill, driven by primal rage. He lapped up the shouts for blood like a reward, because he deserved their praise, and the more the crowd complied the more he loved them for it.

Angelo suddenly stopped, stood up and glared down on the fallen bag of guts called Patrick Shea. The kid's fists of iron ached and throbbed. It was a good feeling, the pain sharpened the wits and gave him focus. Patrick looked up at Angelo with an expression that was vacant of its former rage, a boy who'd been brought to his knees and now sought the mercy of his former prey. Surprisingly, Angelo felt a stab of compassion pierce his heart, and for a brief second his anger dissipated to reveal a ray of sympathy. Suddenly, the Mount Hope Bully was just another frightened kid, lost and alone inside the senseless violence of a cruel jungle. The eyes of his tormentor pleaded to be left alone, they swore never to bother anyone ever again if Angelo would just stop hitting him. Those eyes said they'd learned their lesson and they'd swear on a stack of bibles that they'd seen the error of their ways.

Angelo was torn on what to do next.

But Vincent had already anticipated this kind of scenario and had previously instructed his young nephew on what to do. Now those words rang through Angelo's thoughts like a loud church bell. It had been a quote from some book called "War and Peace," as spoken by a guy named Tacitus and went as follows: "He that fights and runs away, may turn and fight another day. But he that is in battle slain, will never rise to fight again."

There in lied the wisdom.

If Angelo let Patrick Shea up to fight another day, then his retribution would be terrible. No, Marchetti had to send this bastard a message in the only language Patrick's kind could understand.

Angelo did not hesitate again.

A hard kick from a sneaker heel found Patrick's nose. There was a loud crunch of bone followed by a gush of blood from both nostrils. Patrick gave a shrill anguished cry. The Mount Hope Bully fell backward onto the pavement, where Angelo wasted no time in taking advantage of the situation. Marchetti jumped on Patrick's stomach, to which Patrick wheezed and choked on the blood that now ran down the back of his throat in generous streams. Angelo straddled the injured boy's shoulders with his knees, pinning his victim to the ground in an extremely vicarious position. Patrick could see what was going to happen next, but he was in too much pain to throw Angelo off. Any other day it would've been laughable, that a hundred pound kid could pin down someone as big and strapping as Patrick Shea.

But today was a day of reckonings.

Angelo stared down on Patrick with eyes that seemed detached from reason.

Was this what it was like to murder someone?

It was horrific, but as terrible as this situation was, it was nonetheless better to give than to receive. Angelo hauled back and let those hands loaded down with wrapped change do their sinister work. Blow after blow tenderized Patrick's face until it was nothing but a bloody pulp of eyes that had swelled shut, a nose that had been shoved over to one side and a muted grin of yellowish broken teeth. Angelo tried to stop the pounding, but found he couldn't. This was his one chance to make sure that Shea got the message, and to do that, Angelo would have to drive Patrick close to death's doorstep.

But when would that be?

How much could Patrick take before he actually died?

Thankfully, Angelo never found out, because before he knew it a group of hands hauled him off of Patrick Shea and pulled him back into the crowd.

It was utter chaos.

There were celebratory pats on the back, congratulations given, criticisms that he'd gone too far and even a few kisses offered from some girls. Through it all, Angelo never once let his eyes leave Patrick Shea's fallen body. He kept expecting the Mount Hope Bully to rise like a giant and come barreling down on him, eyes shut, face a slather of wet blood, broken teeth wrapped around a screech of I'm going to kill you Angela! But Patrick never moved, save to breathe.

At least he did that much.

Everything felt tilted, as if Angelo had injected a tainted narcotic and had taken a bad trip. The approval of the mob felt electric, their crazed energy hardwired into his thoughts which only fueled that low grade dope like a breeze stoked a flame. Any worries over what consequences might befall Angelo for these actions were lost to the intensity of his victory. A strong division threatened to unhinge his mind. Regret, validation, fear, courage, an entire gambit of emotions exploded along the synaptic fibers of his brain. If this was what warriors called glory, then he could understand why some men craved it. It was exhilarating, an endorphin rush and deeply empowering, as if you'd looked God himself in the face and the Almighty had embraced you into a bosom of gold plated armor.

In the background the Mount Hope buzzer signaled recess had concluded and its dull flat noise sobered Angelo enough to remember something else Vincent had instructed him to do. Without thinking, the boy with the cut up knuckles tore both rolls of dimes open and tossed them into the crowd. Little did he know what such an action signified, but as Vincent would someday show him it was always best to dump your weapon at the crime scene.

Meanwhile, the other kids scrambled to scoop up the loose change, and as they did, Angelo used the distraction to slip back into Mount Hope to tend to his bloody knuckles and his frazzled nerves.

(11)

Patrick had spent several days in hospital, enough time to set a nose bone, stitch up a couple deep wounds and perform a few medical tests. Brain scans mostly, checking to see if Patrick had one if you asked Angelo. But now the Mount Hope Bully was back, and trudging through the hallways like a humble monk who had found religion. Of course there had been a battery of questions about what had happened, but no one had said anything to anyone.

What happened on the playground stayed on the playground.

The guardians of Mount Hope had taken it upon themselves to expose this little conspiracy of silence in order to punish the culprit, or culprits who were responsible for maiming poor Patrick in such an unforgivable way. But as to date those government appointed guardians had discovered nothing. A strict curfew along with a loss of entertainment privileges still hadn't been enough to loosen the orphans tongues. The kids kept quiet, rode out the inquiry until it had eventually blown over. Even Patrick had kept his mouth shut, said he'd been jumped from behind and hadn't gotten a look at who'd done it. But just why he'd done that was anyone's guess. Only Patrick could answer that question as to why he hadn't sold Marchetti out to the authorities. Perhaps that silence had to do with the embarrassment of being thrashed so badly by a much smaller opponent, or maybe it was because Patrick had learned in reform school that snitches did more than toss the salad, they tasted the shiv. Whatever Patrick's motivation, it suited Angelo just fine. Sure, Marchetti had harbored concerns that Patrick might seek revenge, but after an incident in the locker room bathroom, Angelo had laid those worries to rest.

(12)

The episode had been brief, but telling: Patrick Shea taking a piss in the bathroom urinal, when in walks Angelo.

They both made eye contact at the exact same second.

Patrick had casually glanced over his shoulder and had caught sight of Marchetti. Patrick immediately stopped pissing and zipped up so quick that he almost circumcised his foreskin. Angelo regarded the Mont Hope Bully with genuine surprise and braced for some form of immediate reprisal. They were completely alone, two archenemies who had spilt each other's blood, eyes locked across twenty feet of aqua marine ceramic tile. It kind of felt like a quick draw showdown, two gunslingers who had unsettled business to hash over and issue that involved ten bucks in shiny rolled dimes.

Unfortunately, Angelo didn't have so much as a nickel in his pocket, and at the moment he couldn't help but see just how much of an oversight that lack of preparation could be.

What was the saying: hope for peace, but prepare for war?

Whatever the idiom, there was no denying that Angelo was ill-equipped for combat. He was vulnerable and if Patrick Shea wanted to even the score, then there would be little Marchetti could do to stop it.

Patrick stepped away from the urinal stall and stared at Angelo with a blank expression. Stitches crossed Patrick's forehead, chin, and eyebrow which kind of made him look like a lackluster Frankenstein. A dim hue atop Shea's cheekbones showed the fading remnants of two black eyes. Patrick continued to look beaten, but on the mend nonetheless.

Again, one of Vincent's teachings came to mind, something the Bear had learned on the street during his "car theft phase" as he liked to call it. Poker was more than a game, it was a philosophical approach to life. Sometimes chess served as an excellent metaphor, in political affairs mostly, but in the cruel landscape of angry junkyard dogs, poker was the currency everyone recognized. Its rules were simple, yet complicated, a game of discipline whose complex art was built on subtleties. In poker you learned to read people, to anticipate their bluff or the strength of their hand. Observation was a gift you cultivated over time through experience. Then there was the other side, the not being read aspect of the game, or misleading your opponent into thinking you had one thing, when in fact you had something completely different: the bluff.

At present, Angelo had the upper hand thanks to their last battle and ten bucks in rolled change. If Angelo tucked tail and ran now, that power would shift back into Patrick's favor once more, and that was not the place Angelo wanted it to be. If Angelo was to uphold the leverage of that victory, then he would have to maintain momentum.

Vincent's words spoke: "If that Patrick bastard comes back after you, then you raise the ante. If he throws a fist, then you swing a bat, if he draws a knife, then you pull out a gun. That's the only language these idiots understand Little Capone. Eat or be eaten. And never ever let them see you sweat. If they smell blood in the water, then that moron's gonna take a bite, bet on it."

Angelo slowly let his right hand move toward his back pocket, his eyes narrowing into what would become their trademark expression someday. Those sharp gray eyes watched Patrick with unusual cunning and with that weird glint which Patrick had come to loathe and fear.

Patrick swallowed, his brown lackluster eyes growing wide, and that's when Angelo knew he had him. Angelo paused, kept his hand hidden behind his back as if he held something dangerous.

"I'm a minor Patrick," Angelo said with surprisingly little emotion, which made him sound even more vicious. "If I carve you up, nothing major is going to happen to me. Capisce?"

Patrick didn't reply, he just stared on with complete shock.

"You'll be dead, and I'll get out in a few years, and then when I'm out, I'll drop by to piss on your grave, capisce?"

This time Patrick nodded.

"Hell, I might even take a crap if it's a nice day," Angelo smiled, showing his enemy that he was not afraid and more than just a little bit crazy.

"I'm sorry," Patrick apologized in a voice that cracked and wavered. "They're transferring me out next week...I'll be gone for good, Angelo...swear it...just leave me alone...please!"

Would Angelo let Patrick go?

Of course he would. Hell, he'd pack Patrick's suitcase and pay the cab fare if it meant Shea left Mount Hope.

Angelo let his hand slide forward until it rested easily beside his waist. "I don't want to see you between now and then. Capisce?"

Patrick nodded, rushed past Angelo and out the door where he wasted no time hightailing it back to his dormitory room. Later, Patrick would claim to have come down with a virus and spend the last remaining days at Mount Hope in bed out of sight, but never out of mind.

It was the last time Angelo ever saw the Mount Hope Bully.

(13)

On Angelo's fourteenth birthday he had gotten big news.

An older couple in their mid-fifties by the name of Joseph and Helen Montgomery had decided to adopt Angelo. True, Angelo had gone through all the usual polite interviews over the years, but nothing had ever come of them. Time and again he'd been passed over in preference of a younger child. Newborns were the hot commodity. No one wanted a grown kid, especially a teenager. Couples wanted a child that they could shape in their image, and the best way to do that was to nab a toddler while they were still in training pants. But here, despite the odds, Angelo Marchetti had finally won the litter pool, and as a result, he didn't know exactly how to feel.

Every kid in Mount Hope had the dream that a wealthy family would come lay claim to them and whisk them away to a better life where love was just as plentiful as the provisions. Angelo didn't know about the Montgomery's love, but as far as acquisitions went, he'd hit the jackpot big time.

The Montgomerys were both influential doctors with money to burn. Helen was a world class neurosurgeon, and Joseph a high end plastic surgeon to the social Elite. Both had been featured many times in numerous medical journals and had even once attended a formal dinner with the Queen of England. No, they hadn't sat at the same table, but they nonetheless had broken bread inside the same room. Needless to say the Montgomerys rubbed elbows with money and power, and here Angelo Marchetti was being inducted into their prestigious clan. He should've been doing back flips over his good fortune, but instead he couldn't help but think of Uncle Vincent.

They had grown close over the past few years, close enough that the term "family" was more than just a word or a moral obligation, it was something you'd willingly lay your life down for. Angelo loved Vincent dearly, and knew the big goon with the slightly punch drunk mannerism felt the same way about him, too. They were best friends, and here these rich do-goods were threatening to break that family up.

The Montgomerys lived four hundred miles away, and if Angelo went to live with them, he and Vincent would fall out of touch. It wasn't as if Angelo would forget Vincent, it was just that Vincent really wasn't an internet chat or email type of guy. Vince didn't write ditzy letters and hang off the phone for hours at a time shooting the breeze with people, he was an "in the flesh" kind of guy. Deals were done with a handshake, payments were cash, friends hung out in the usual spots on a daily basis, and family lived and died in the neighborhood.

Four hundred miles just wouldn't cut it with the Bear, not by a long shot.

But then what choice did Vincent have?

Of course Vincent had said he'd understood, that it would be an amazing opportunity for Angelo, but still, there was something cold about Vincent after hearing the news. An emotional detachment that had unnerved Angelo in a way he never thought possible, and the kid knew what it was. For the first time Angelo had seen the cold blooded killer within his uncle's dark eyes, and it had sent a shudder through the kid. Angelo had tried to put it out of his mind as best he could, but some things in life had a tendency to linger.

Just like that unfortunate business with the Montgomerys shortly thereafter.

Fate as it turned out had a nasty sense of humor, and as far as that rare adoption of Angelo's went, fate had told the kid one hell of a real knee-slapper.

(14)

The signed adoption papers sat on Mount Hope's Senior Administrator, Edgar Cornwall's desk. The man with the small round spectacles regarded Angelo with pale eyes that were not without their share of pity. It was a look that Angelo had come to despise, the "poor little orphan" gaze that so many people often expressed when they heard of his unfortunate circumstances. That look seemed so damn condescending, and as a result the boy in the leather bound chair had to concentrate on not getting angry. Fortunately, he had bigger things on his mind, issues that distracted his attention easily from the well-meaning attentions of Edgar Cornwall.

Angelo hadn't had much interaction with Edgar over the years, just those usual social pleasantries like the occasional nod and faint smile as they passed each other in the hallways. For the most part they lived separate lives. After all, Angelo's existence for the most part was spent within Mount Hope's bricked walls, where as Cornwall's exposure was limited to a fancy office from nine to five, Monday to Friday where he played provisional warden and institutional father figurehead. Still, Edgar had put forth a genuine effort with the kids, like committing their names to memory and working to secure the best resources available for their future. But as with anything people had a tendency to dwell on a person's negative attributes, rather than their successes. With Edgar it had been a pile of stupid things: poor posture, shoes that squeaked, the poor lay of his comb over, trivial details that kids just loved to nitpick. But at this moment, Angelo couldn't recall a single one of this man's failings, the kid just kept staring at the government issue document with eyes that were lost for an appropriate emotion.

"I'm so sorry, Angelo," Edgar offered. "I know you hardly knew the Montgomerys, and I can only imagine how you must feel right now."

Angelo let his attention find Edgar's wrinkled, but otherwise pleasant face. "Thank you."

Edgar sighed, folded his well manicured hands together and continued to offer condolences. "It's such a waste. They were wonderful people. They would've given you a good home, I'm sure. Maybe..." Edgar was going to say something stupid like perhaps another rich couple might come along and adopt Angelo, but the government suit stopped short of tasting that particular foot inside his mouth. To make such a statement would not only be an insult to his, but to the boy's intelligence as well. "Well, you still have us."

Angelo understood that sentiment, but the words still felt like a kick in the nuts. Angelo wanted to assure Mr. Cornwall that he did indeed have more options, that he was loved by Uncle Vincent, but caught that poorly spoken wisdom before it flew off his tongue. There was no need to complicate this issue with details that involved a former mafia hitman.

"Yes," Angelo nodded. "I know."

"Perhaps we could arrange a special treat for you," Edgar proposed.

It sounded like a lousy second place consolation prize, perhaps a small plastic trophy that couldn't even hold a decent shot of hooch.

"We received a donation recently," Edgar explained in a tone that sounded hushed, as if he were speaking a great secret. "It's supposed to be a birthday present or Christmas gift, but I don't see the harm in letting you have it. We've been quite blessed this year in our fund raising efforts and public contributions." Edgar gave an insider's wink as he opened the top drawer of his oak desk and withdrew a palm computer. "Here you go my boy. I hope it's to your liking."

Angelo reached over and took possession of the portable device. Angelo didn't have the heart to tell Edgar that Vincent had bought him three of these things over the past year, and the worst of that lot was still better than this low end model.

Angelo was right: it was a lousy consolation prize.

"Thanks," Angelo said politely, although his tone was anything but enthusiastic.

Why was that?

Wasn't he glad that the choice to go with the Montgomerys had been settled by fate?

Didn't he want to stay with Uncle Vincent?

Angelo felt confused and couldn't understand why.

Edgar pursed his lips and frowned. There was little else he could do for the boy. The kid had been screwed over and no trinket or words of wisdom would fix that. Time was what Angelo needed now, and hopefully that slow medicine would weave its practical magic on his wounds sooner than later if God willed it.

As Angelo stood from his chair and walked towards the office door, Edgar offered up one last bit of solace. "You still have family here, Angelo...you do know that don't you?"

Angelo squeezed the palm computer within in his hand and nodded. "Yes sir...I most certainly do."

(15)

Angelo laid awake in bed, his palm computer lighting up the room with a dim olive glow. The LCD screen displayed a web page that provided macabre details that surrounded the mortal demise of Doctors Helen and Joseph Montgomery. The print explained that the couple had died on impact after careening down a steep embankment and into a snarl of trees, victims of an apparent accident, although no exact cause for the crash was given and so the matter was subject to an ongoing investigation.

Ongoing investigation.

The words whispered inside Anglo's mind, making it difficult for him to bundle down into a restful sleep.

Why was the matter ongoing?

What were the authorities hoping to find?

Vincent's eyes kept coming to mind, the way they had taken the news of Angelo's adoption. Angelo laid the palm computer down and stared into the darkness. He felt cold, nervous, as if perhaps he had taken part in the Montgomery's untimely fate. But then that was crazy. After all, what had he done to them? Nothing, that's what. However, there was a seed of doubt inside his heart, small, but tenacious nonetheless.

Had Vincent whacked the Montgomerys?

Angelo twisted his head deeper into the pillow as if to grind the question out of his mind, but it was no use. The eggs were already inside the cake.

Ongoing investigation.

Angelo recalled the meeting earlier with Edgar Cornwall, and couldn't help but surmise that the senior administrator must've known about Angelo's uncle. No doubt there was a document on Edgar's laptop computer or tucked away inside one of his office filing cabinets that listed the orphans' family lineage, both living and dead. Vincent's name had to be in there, and Edgar Cornwall in all likelihood had seen it. Still, the kindly old gent hadn't mentioned a single word that acknowledged Vincent had even existed.

And why?

Because Vincent Marchetti wasn't just bad people, he was a convicted felon. No responsible adult would point a child's attention in that dark direction, especially if that kid happened to be alone in the world. The promise of family could be a strong pull to an orphan, and Edgar Cornwall along with Mount Hope's faculty understood that Vincent Marchetti had the destructive potential to pull the boy into a sinister world that was comparable to a spiritual black hole. But if Edgar discovered that Angelo not only knew of Vincent, but visited with him frequently, then that might push the situation with the Montgomerys in an entirely different direction, namely into a criminal investigation.

And there it was again, the questioning, the uncertainty and the coincidence.

Had Vincent taken the Montgomerys out of the picture?

Angelo pulled the covers over his head and tried to escape into a gentler world of dreams, but sleep was elusive. If only he had kicked up a stink, defied the adoption procedures, then perhaps the Montgomerys would still be alive today. In that sense, he felt every bit as much a killer as dear Uncle Vincent, because Angelo had seen into those soulless eyes when they'd been given the adoption news, and still the kid had done nothing to thwart the Montgomerys' ill-placed efforts.

The darkness of the small dorm room closed in while doubt continued to turn Angelo's stomach and gnaw upon his bones.

Had Vincent done something unspeakable to the Montgomerys?

The question tortured Angelo's conscience, implicated him by association.

Had there been a choice that could've changed the outcome?

The memory of his uncle's cold killer eyes insinuated the potential for foul play, but that didn't stop Angelo's heart from begging for it to be otherwise. To Angelo, Vincent was the salt of the earth, a big goofy, but lovable goon. And hadn't that big goof told Angelo that he didn't murder people anymore?

Actually no, he hadn't.

What he'd really said was that he "hadn't killed anybody who didn't have it coming." But that didn't mean the mafia slaughterhouse was still open for business. Far from it. What it meant was what it said, nothing more. To read things into it was not only paranoid, but disrespectful to a stand up guy who had gone out of the way for his nephew.

Was this how Angelo rewarded such acts: with suspicion and persecution?

Yes, Vincent may've hung out with a rough crowd, but that didn't mean he was fitting folks with cement footwear either, it just meant---

\---it just meant that Angelo had been lying to himself.

Truth told, there was a damn good reason why Angelo had wanted to go off and live with the Montgomerys, reason enough to turn his back on Uncle Vincent. And as hard as he tried to deny it, he couldn't, because that small gloomy room behind the metal door said things to the contrary.

(16)

Sunlight poured in through the apartment skylight and filled the large brick wall room with a crisp natural glow. It was late afternoon, one week before Christmas. Vincent had business uptown and wouldn't be back until late tonight, so Angelo had the run of the place. Angelo had just finished watching a movie, a flick about a pharmacist named Galan Whicker who had an entire small town addicted to a supernatural prescription. It wasn't exactly an Oscar worthy film, but nonetheless entertaining, the sort of fiction you'd compare to an ice cold beer with a greasy slice of pizza: sinful mindless pleasure.

Angelo sat up slowly upon the coach where he had been sprawled out on for the past two hours. His sock feet slapped down onto the hardwood floor. It was quiet, no sirens or traffic to be heard, a welcomed rarity. Weekends were spent at the apartment. This reprieve from Mount Hope was usually accomplished by means of a clever lie which involved the cooperation of one of Vincent's regular squeezes, a bartender stripper named Tracy Malone. Tracy had a daughter named Tina. Tina was Angelo's age, so the story told to Mount Hope's administration involved a fictitious chaperoned sleepover so that Angelo could be close to his special friend. Of course Tracy had signed all the necessary papers of legal responsibility and answered Mount Hope's random phone calls to check on Angelo's status, but in the end the nonsense was well worth it, because it freed Angelo up to spend more time with Uncle Vincent.

Dumb bitch had been the words Vincent had used to describe Tracy often. Apparently her best quality involved the ability to suck a golf ball through a garden house as well as slip a condom onto a dick with just her mouth. (Vincent had joked that if Angelo were ever to meet such a woman, then he should marry her, va-voom!) As for Angelo, he liked Tracy well-enough, not because she had helped with his weekend getaways, but because she was always upbeat. Of course most of that joy stemmed from the cocaine Uncle Vincent fed her on a regular basis, chemical bliss she inhaled a gram at a time, but still she was never lost for a kind word or a smile.

She was a hardcore junkie with the hard luck lines circling her otherwise sharp blue eyes and pouty mouth. But when she caked on the makeup and teased up her curly blond peroxide she was quite the head-turner. Firm ass, tiny waist, big tits, low IQ, no self esteem and a heart of gold made for easy exploitation. She was a walking talking bull's eye, the kind of dame that attracted abusive boyfriends and yes, guys that would feed her dope until she finally began to really look her age. On that day she would finally be out on the street with no education and no marketable skill-set, that's unless you counted being able to suck a golf ball through a garden hose, as well as slip a coat of latex over a Johnson rod with just her mouth a skill-set. Then there was the possibility that she could just overdose. It would sure save a heck of a lot of time. Besides, women like Tracy usually showed up on a morgue slab with a mile of train tracks running down the length of their forearms, needle scars that invariably led to their final destination. That didn't make it right, but it sure as hell made sense, because when you courted the lifestyle you also inherited the baggage.

It bothered Angelo to see Vincent use Tracy in such an unhealthy way, but then he supposed that street ran in both directions. After all, Vincent was paying out good hard cash to keep up with Tracy's habit, and not once had Angelo ever heard Tracy say she'd pay Vincent back for his trouble. They had a symbiotic relationship like a plover grooming a crocodiles teeth. Vincent provided blow and Tracy provided blow jobs. Although Angelo himself was in no position to pass judgment, because he too had sinned, and that transgression involved Tracy's daughter, Tina.

Tina was a cute girl, not gorgeous, but do-able as Angelo liked to put it. She had her mother's shapely body, but her father's pointy nose and big gum smile. Still, Angelo had had sex with her dozens of times. It wasn't like they were boyfriend and girlfriend, they were just friends with benefits, although Angelo suspected Tina wanted more of a commitment. Angelo however, had always been distant when it came to getting close to others. It was a defense mechanism which protected him from being emotionally hurt. Angelo understood that life was fleeting and if you invested too much stock into any one person you could be left for broke if and when the market crashed. He could tell you that that kind of hurt went deeper than deep, it burrowed down into the very spiritual foundation of a person's soul until everything that was built upon it thereafter was always provisional. Every decision made was based upon an inevitability that death would eventually claim that which Angelo coveted most: love.

It was best to keep a distance, even from family like Uncle Vincent.

Needless to say, if Tina wanted tenderness, she would have to get it from someone else, because as far as Angelo was concerned those who wore hearts on their sleeves bled the hardest. But none of that mattered at the moment, what did was that Angelo had the apartment to himself this afternoon, and that was a rare treat.

Angelo stood from the couch and into a yawning stretch. Overhead, a cerulean blue sky deceived the eyes to how chilly it was outside. No snow had fallen as of yet, but the weather forecast had predicted a big dump within the next few days. Apparently it would be a white Christmas after all. Without premeditation, Angelo's eyes fell upon the locked metal door that was deemed strictly off limits. He'd contemplated its mystery since the first day Uncle Vincent had forbade him entry. It kind of put him in mind of Eden's forbidden tree of knowledge, of God's decree that Adam and Eve could eat of every tree in the garden except from the tree of good and evil, for on that day they would surely die. The door had always represented a puzzle to Angelo, the missing piece that could possibly explain his big galoot of an uncle once and for all.

Everyone kept some little secret about themselves hidden, an impure thought or minor act of indecency that served more as a social embarrassment than a spiritual condemnation. But as for Vincent, his secrets were so big that they rattled like a skeleton's bones inside a closet, a closet which just so happened to have a fireproof metal door. Behind that door surely an interesting answer must lie, but Angelo had given his word that he would never go inside that forbidden room. But this afternoon as he stared at the flat gray surface that was basked within the clear wash of midday sun, he contemplated the unthinkable.

Angelo moved across the living room and stood before the door, examining its dull smooth surface with eyes that were analytical and calculating. The itch to pick the lock was damn strong, ran deep into the bone. The only way to scratch it would be to find out what mystery lurked behind Vincent's vault of the unknown. But how could he compromise such a formidable barrier without leaving any evidence of tampering?

If only he had the key.

Over the past year, Angelo had become something of a thief. It wasn't like he needed the money, (Vincent was quite generous when it came to handing out cash to his nephew,) it was just a crazy way of showing his beloved uncle how alike they were. After all, Vincent used to hotwire cars when he was sixteen and then drive them to a neighborhood chop shop, so when Angelo stole, in a way he was paying homage to the Marchetti family tradition, and although Vincent had voiced his objection to such actions, Angelo had nonetheless seen the pride light up inside his uncle's dark eyes. But five finger discounting gold watches and popping car locks to lift a few stereos was one thing, cracking a door that was built like a bank safe was something else. Perhaps if he had a cutting torch and a stick of dynamite he could blow it down, but then that would leave one hell of a mess and invite Uncle Vincent's terrible wrath.

It soon dawned on Angelo that he'd been overanalyzing the situation, and when he realized that, he couldn't help but crook a clever grin.

(17)

The upstairs loft had three bedrooms: Vincent's, Angelo's, and a spare guest room. Angelo had only been in Vincent's bedroom twice. Once when the big galoot had overslept, (a bad hangover had been the culprit that morning,) and the second time had been to sneak a condom when Tina had unexpectedly shown up one morning for a quickie. Both times had been brief visits, but in each instance Angelo had noticed one thing in particular: a black metal cash box on a table beside the dresser. On several occasions when Angelo had been in the hallway he had heard Vincent fiddling with the box. The sound always began with keys jingling, then the crunch of metal penetrating a lock and finally the soft yawn of hinges. Shortly thereafter, Vincent would always go downstairs when he thought Angelo wasn't looking and open the metal door in the living room. But Angelo had been watching, and the kid had concluded that the key to Vincent's mystery door must be kept inside the metal cash box.

It was almost laughable really, a sturdy security door whose key was kept inside a flimsy flea market cash box for safety. Angelo felt it was like putting a back screen door on a bank vault: ridiculous. Still, if no one knew where the key was, then they'd have quite the scavenger hunt to find it, not that anyone aside from a burglar would look for it, and most likely that frantic search would involve too much effort. No, the key was probably in as good a place as any, and sometimes the best place to hide something truly was out in the open.

Years from now that philosophy would actually save Angelo Marchetti's life, but as for now it just felt like a simple practicality.

Angelo lifted the cash box up off the table and examined it with eyes that had become quite adept at thievery over the past year. The box was weighted down with something heavy, probably a gun or maybe even a hand grenade---who knew. But what Angelo did know was that the lock mechanism would be an easy pick. The kind of job thieves called a candy. (As in taking candy from a baby.)

The boy had come prepared, a thin sliver of metal he had purchased from a hardware store pressed skillfully between his thumb and forefinger. It was feeler gauge, flexible, strong and a bit thicker than a piece of paper. It was better than a credit card in the right hands and right now it was in a master's. Angelo edged the gauge in between the thin crack of the cash box, wiggled it towards the lock, jiggled, twisted gently and a few seconds later the box sprang open.

"Voila! Presto magnifico!" Angelo said upon successfully opening the box.

The shim found Angelo's back pocket, while the cash box found the table beside Vincent's dresser once more. Marchetti had been correct on one assessment: the cash box did house a gun. Carefully, he lifted the firearm up and inspected it with curious fascination. It was beautiful, a brand new nickel plated Archer Howitzer automatic pistol with enough kick to drop a bear at twenty paces. Angelo had never seen this gun before, although he had held Vincent's nine millimeter on many occasions when they'd gone shooting out in the country. Beer cans, pop bottles and the occasional animal had served as target practice on those days. At first, Angelo hadn't wanted to shoot the critters, but Vincent insisted that the boy learn how to kill. He said that every man should know what it felt like to take a life, to remind them it was in our nature to do such things. He also stated how much he hated those bleeding heart liberals who'd buy a steak at the grocery store while at the same time condemn an act so barbaric as hunting. According to Vincent those idiots were hypocrites who deserved to be shot.

Sometimes Angelo was frightened by Uncle Vincent's views. They were extreme and the way Vince spoke of them with such passionate conviction was nothing short of unnerving to say the least. In the end, Angelo had obeyed Vincent and had killed dozens of squirrels, raccoons, porcupines, birds and even a coyote once, and the boy's natural talent with the sidearm hadn't gone unnoticed by the big goon. The kid wasn't just accurate, but lightning fast, could reload quickly and calmly when pressed to do so. That took a certain type of person, what Vincent recognized as a potentially talented assassin. Although the big galoot had no intention of guiding his nephew in such a dark direction. Still, Vincent understood the need to be strong, that nature always defeated nurture no matter how well nurture presented its case to the jury. The world was a jungle, eat or be eaten, and Vincent would do everything in his power to see that his nephew was well-equipped to meet whatever nastiness life threw at him.

Angel looked past the gun and noticed several other pieces of treasure inside the cash box: a pair of brass knuckles, a jet-blade knife, a few expensive rings, a small baggie of cocaine, and last but certainly not least, a key ring.

Presto!

Angelo replaced the Archer Howitzer, scooped up the keys and ran downstairs to the metal security door. This was it, the moment of truth. There were six keys in total on the ring. One looked as though it went to a pair of handcuffs, another to a bus locker, three resembled keys Angelo himself owned that went into the apartment front doors, and the last was a heavy double sided monster that was sculpted from stainless steel.

Pay dirt!

(18)

The thick sturdy key slid into the metal door's lock and turned easily.

"Oh crap," Angelo whispered. "What the hell am I doing?"

A good question, after all this was a violation of Vincent's trust, not to mention that once an oath had been broken, then no oath thereafter could ever be trusted. Angelo's words would become the words of an accomplished liar and that was not how he perceived himself. It should've been a simple choice to walk away, but still he hesitated.

Why was that?

He wasn't sure.

A noble virtue such as honor was frequently tarnished by better men than Angelo. Circumstances had a terrible way of wearing a man down over time, and once that gracious asset became pitted by corruption, then never again would its armor shine so bright. Compromise claimed many a man's nobility, but such negotiations always had their roots grounded in the common good. Pragmatism twisted issues into practicalities, and that religion perverted ideology into political debate.

Angelo shook his head, blinked and locked the door. He was over thinking the issue, but thinking in this case was definitely warranted. One might even say he was being pragmatic. You either honored your word or you didn't, there was no in between. And as much as the curiosity tugged on his wits, Angelo had to retain that virtue. Yes, he may've been a thief, but there was still a line that he would not cross.

"Boo!"

Angelo turned so fast that he looked like a blur, and before he knew it he had Tina grabbed firmly by the throat with his fist drawn back to strike.

"Jesus it's me!" Tina screeched.

Angelo relaxed his fist and released her. "Goddamn it, Tina! You scared the crud out of me!"

Tina rubbed her neck and laughed nervously. "Dido."

That laugh helped to ease the tension and allowed Angelo the presence of mind to manufacture a smile.

"You must've been some deep in thought not to hear me come in," Tina said as she wrapped her arms around Angelo in a lover's hug. "Did you forget I was coming over?"

Of course he had. He'd been so preoccupied with the movie and now the security door, that she had completely slipped his mind. Angelo rolled his eyes and bowed his head apologetically. "I'm sorry Tina. I just..."

"The front door was left open," Tina said, motioning with her head.

"The damn thing's been locking on its own," explained Angelo. "I threw the trash out the other day and accidentally got locked out myself. The landlord is supposed to fix it tomorrow."

"Oh," Tina nodded. She then planted a big wet kiss upon Angelo's receptive lips. "Well, I just let myself in. I hope you don't mind?" Her hand dropped down to his crotch and massaged his manhood to which an immediate erection replied.

"No," Angelo smiled. "Not at all."

A few more French kisses and sexual petting easily disarmed the situation.

"Mmmm," Tina grinned. "Let's go upstairs."

"Sure," Angelo whispered and then offered another kiss.

"You got any beer?"

Angelo nodded. "Couple cans in the fridge."

"Good," Tina giggled. "It'll go good with this." She removed a joint from her cleavage. "Let's get stoned and shag all night."

"Nothing wrong with that," Angelo replied with a sigh. "Wait here."

Inside the fridge sat twelve cans of cold brew: Vincent's stash. Angelo quickly scooped up two beer and returned back to the living room.

It was here that he found Tina deep inside the forbidden room.

(19)

Both cans fell out of Angelo's hands and down onto the hardwood floor with a dull thud. "What are you doing?"

Tina did not reply, her attention was too captivated by whatever she was seeing inside the room to notice Angelo.

Vincent had once said that fate had a way of making up our minds for us. Without realizing it, Tina had done just that. Now, Angelo had no choice but to go inside that room. Sure, he could've asked Tina to come out, close the door and not tell him what she'd seen, but that would be impossible for her. Tina couldn't keep a secret if her life depended on it. Her loose lips and pierced tongue would soon be blabbing on about everything she'd seen, and she wouldn't let up until she'd gotten it all out of her system. Angelo would have to be that ear, not her mother, because if Tracy found out she might tell Vincent. Then everyone would be up crud's creek without a roll of toilet paper.

Reluctantly, Angelo stepped over the fallen beer cans and into the room, his oath not so much as broken as it was cracked.

(20)

The room was bigger than Angelo had imagined, large enough to park two cars within its cubed dimensions. The space was cool, dry and smelled of cement dust and something chemical, the mild aftertaste of a potent pesticide perhaps. A solitary fluorescent light buzzed from the ceiling which lit the smooth white concrete floor and walls up with an uncomfortable brightness. Gray metal stock shelves lined the walls, the kind you'd see in a pharmacy storage area, except these shelves didn't hold prescription remedies for itchy hemorrhoids or flaky dandruff, these shelves held a huge arsenal of knives, guns, pipe bombs, ammunition and remote detonators. It was a survivalist's wet dream, your one stop shopping needs if you had someone who absolutely positively just needed to be whacked.

It was an overwhelming discovery, but still not enough to render someone deaf and speechless as it had with Tina. No, the thing that had done that sat in a corner on a short wooden crate of dynamite.

Angelo stepped past Tina, who remained open mouthed and quite incapacitated by what she'd seen. He thought to shake her senses back into her head, but instead focused his keen eyes on the source of her distress.

(21)

Translucent plastic had been wrapped loosely around the bulky remains of a stale cadaver. It had not yet begun to rot, but it had begun to stink. It then dawned on Angelo that this dead body was the source of that chemical like odor, its pasty white skin not quite yet a soft mildew film, perhaps in a few more days it would start to exhibit graveyard wax, but as for now it was solid enough.

Surprisingly, Angelo's heart did not race nor was he truly surprised. A voice inside his head said that this was to be expected, that someday something like this was bound to happen. It was apparent that Vincent Marchetti was still very much in the whacking game, and this victim was in temporary storage until Vincent got round to throwing out the trash.

"Son of a bitch," Angelo muttered, more pissed off than frightened. After all, Uncle Vincent was supposed to be on the straight and narrow these days, not feeding the fish with people. Angelo clenched his teeth and balled his hand up into a fist. If Vincent were to walk through the door right now, Angelo would've popped him right in the nose. How dare he do this, let alone leave Angelo in the apartment with a dead body.

What the hell was the crazy mother thinking?

Maybe Vincent and Tracy had been snorting the kind of low grade blow that rotted your brains. What other explanation could there be?

Just then Tina began to scream.

It was a good scream too, the kind that made your eardrums bleed on the utter shrillness. Angelo turned, grabbed hold of her, covered her mouth, dragged her out into the living room and wrestled Tina onto the coach where he threw her down and laid on top of her.

"Tina...Tina..." Angelo hushed in a subdued but anxious tone. "Shut up! The last thing we need right now are the cops coming in here, okay."

Tina settled, let her wide wild eyes study the handsome features of Angelo's face. She could see that he was upset too, that he had no idea the body had been in there, but she could also see that he understood the seriousness of the situation, even better than she did. Tina nodded once to show that she would keep silent, at least for now.

"Look," Angelo said as he climbed off her and sat before her on the coffee table. "We can't tell anyone about this. Capisce?"

"What's going on, Angelo?" She was surprised that she could find her voice, let alone that it would sound so steady.

"I don't know," Angelo shrugged. "But I do know this: if Vincent finds out we went in there...that we found that body...then we're going to end up on a milk carton."

Tina shuddered, drew in a sharp breath and for a second Angelo thought she might actually scream again.

"You've got to keep this secret, Tina. I'm not kidding, this is big time. Do you hear me?"

Tina looked past Angelo towards the door, to which Angelo grabbed her by the chin and directed her stare into his eyes. "Do you hear me Tina? Not a word to the cops, your mother, or in your prayers if you say them. Capisce?"

Tina swallowed hard, almost began to cry and then nodded quickly. "Not a...a word."

Angelo put his face into his hands and sighed heavily. "Why the hell did you have to go in there?"

"Curious," Tina whispered, as if that were an appropriate excuse.

Angelo regarded her with an expression that almost looked amused. "Yeah, well we all know what curiosity did to the cat, don't we?"

"Who...is that?" Tina said as she pointed a shaky finger toward the room.

Angelo glanced back at the door and then shook his head. "I don't know, but what I do know is that the poor bastard probably had it coming."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Angelo could hear Vincent's words inside his head: I've never killed anyone who didn't have it coming Little Capone.

"Look, we can't stay here tonight...not with that body in there," Angelo said.

"We can go back to my place, if you'd like."

"No," Angelo replied.

Angelo suspected Tina would look too spooked for the next little while. Even if her mother was stoned out of her head most of the time, she'd still see that fear inside her daughter's eyes. No, they had to go somewhere else for a while.

"A motel," Angelo said "We can chill out up the street at the Bell Water."

Tina nodded, almost broke into tears again, but shook it off. "Okay, we'll crash there tonight. But what are you going to do about that...guy?"

Angelo stood, faced the metal door, placed hands on hips and let a flurry of expletives fly. He couldn't believe this was happening, couldn't believe that he'd been so naïve to think that Uncle Vincent had changed his ways.

How gullible had he been?

Angelo thought to go back inside the room and check on the roll of plastic. A part of him debated the evidence, said that perhaps they'd seen it wrong, that maybe it was a manikin or a Halloween prop, one that could hop up without notice and shout boo or maybe even va-voom. But that stale smell said better. It said whoever sat on top of that crate of dynamite had once been a living breathing human being, and regardless if they'd been shot, stabbed, strangled, drowned, or bored to death, it didn't change the fact that they'd been murdered.

What was he to do?

The door was relocked and its key replaced back upstairs.

Angelo and Tina vacated the premises as quick as they could for a seedy motel where the management had no reservations about renting a room to a fourteen year old kid and his girlfriend.

(22)

That had been the crux of the situation, the reason why Angelo had wanted not only a change of venue, but lifestyle. The body inside the forbidden room bothered him deeply, and what made it worse was the not knowing, the active imagination that filled in the nasty details of how that cadaver in rolled plastic had come to be there.

Did they deserve it?

There was no resolution.

The incursion into the room had been kept from Uncle Vincent successfully. Even Tina hadn't breathed a word of it to anyone, she never even spoke of it with Angelo. Unfortunately, she had stopped coming over to visit and had ended their intimate liaisons shortly thereafter.

Angelo couldn't blame her.

Tina wanted out of the scene and so too did Angelo. But it was different for him, Angelo was bound by blood and one didn't turn their back on family without a damn good reason. Murder, when you were a Marchetti was insufficient grounds for separation, especially when you were well-aware that your kin had a prior history of criminal assassination. But then there was that legal loop hole, a technicality which courted a strange sort of moral ambiguity: adoption.

Angelo was an orphan, and as such could be optioned off to potential couples who sought to expand their bloodline. It was the law, and moreover it was Angelo's only ticket out of the dark shadow of Vincent Marchetti. Still, he had felt guilty, because the Vincent Angelo knew was a kind, funny and friendly type of guy. Sadly there just happened to be that other side of him, the fractured split in his personality that killed people for money.

I've never killed anyone who never had it coming Little Capone.

Miraculously, Angelo had been given a way out: the Montgomerys. But now they were dead, and the official report warranted an ongoing investigation. That always indicated suspicious circumstances, and if the crown could establish motive, then the bloodhounds would be set loose. There'd be a manhunt and it wouldn't take a rocket scientist to see the connection. Here, the Montgomerys were about to adopt a boy who just happened to be related to a "former" mafia hitman, and now those good people were dead under suspicious circumstances.

Do the math.

How terrible would that be if Angelo had to take the stand and testify against an uncle he had come to love. Fortunately that day had never come, the Montgomerys' deaths had eventually been deemed a mechanical failure, so Vincent never went to jail, and as for Angelo, things went on as they always had, at least until he turned sixteen.

(23)

Florence and Aiden Tyler were their names, two poster children for gamblers anonymous. The Tylers owed the Silver Fox Casino a bundle, so much in fact that there was no chance in hell that they could ever hope to pay it back.

Chuck Tollo was the Fox's sole proprietor. Tollo had a gentleman's contract with Romulus in regards to casino security: debt collection and some other side ventures for a certain percentage of casino take.

That's where Vincent came into the picture.

Vincent handled not only debt collection, but other miscellaneous issues, and as for those other issues, tonight they involved Florence and Aiden Tyler and a shallow grave in the wilderness.

The couple had been bound and gagged, stuffed into the caddy's trunk and trucked fifty miles outside of town to a spot Vincent affectionately referred to as "Marchetti Meadows." Many a dead beat gambler and rival family faction member had been laid to rest within the harsh soil of Marchetti Meadows. Some shot, others strangled, some stabbed, hell, even one guy had been skinned alive. Now that took real sand to do something like that, but damn if that miserable prick didn't have it coming, at least according to Vincent he had.

But as for Florence and Aiden, Vincent wasn't so sure.

And the reason for that change of heart had to do with something he never thought possible: a young boy's love.

Angelo had become like a son to Vincent over the years, and as a result the big goon with the face like a catcher's mitt had come to value life in a way he hadn't before. It was hard to be a cold blooded killer when you were concerned about things like if you had left enough food in the fridge for Angelo to eat, and did Angelo remember to wear his jacket because it had been chilly lately, and was Angelo getting sick because he'd coughed a few times this morning. The list of stupid worries went on until Vincent was faced with the sudden realization that he wasn't just a murdering son of a bitch, but also a concerned parent.

Where did he draw the line?

Somewhere between the day Vincent had first seen Angelo on the playground and the other day when he had dropped him off at school, Vincent Marchetti had gotten soft. And in a harsh mafia business such as his, that kind of weakness was akin to disaster.

(24)

Florence and Aiden had been dragged out of the trunk and knelt down before a three foot deep hole that would serve as their bed of sorrow until the end of time. Tears stood in their eyes, pleas for mercy muffled behind rags sealed over with strips of duct tape, ropes cutting into their lanky wrists and ankles.

Neither Tyler was in peak physical condition: die hard smokers who drank more booze than they did water and ate more take out than they did home cooked meals and they had the potbellies to prove it. Not that any of that mattered at the moment, because they were hyped up on adrenaline, and most of their aches and pains were like screams heard from the distant end of a long tunnel. They were big time losers, gamblers who'd bet the farm that they were about to die from a bullet to the back of the head. Fate sometimes had a funny way of twisting events into bizarre outcomes that you would never have bet on, so on that previous wager, the Tylers would have both lost yet another pot again.

(25)

Vincent paced behind the Tylers, inspired by a crazy idea that had him weighing a critical decision. Mathematical numbers crunched inside his head, figures that calculated money owed against time served. In two more years, Angelo would be eighteen years old and legally an adult. Then he would be free to walk out of Mount Hope forever. As for the two bozos that knelt on the ground, they owed forty three thousand dollars to Chuck Tollo's Silver Fox Casino, and would be dead in a few more minutes if Vincent couldn't figure this situation out realistically.

The question was: how bad did Vincent want Angelo out of Mount Hope Orphanage?

Forty three thousand dollars worth?

True, the Bear did have a bunch of cash saved up, a cool million in Grand Cayman, a quarter mill in Switzerland, five hundred grand in various holding companies located on the Island of Mann, not to mention a hundred and fifteen thousand on credit with the Silver Fox Casino. If Vincent used that credit against these idiots debt to Tollo, then he could blackmail the couple into helping him out with Angelo. Of course they would never be able to walk into the Fox or any of its subsidiaries ever again, but that was okay with Vincent, because he didn't need their continued business, he just needed their compliance.

An Archer Howitzer tapped on Vincent's sturdy thigh anxiously as he drew back the bolt. At the sound of this noise, Flo and Aiden replied with an even greater degree of protest. Death was close now, literally at their heels with a finger poised on the trigger.

How had it come to this, a shallow grave dug in the middle of nowhere?

Debt, plain and simple, too much money in arrears with one of the most corrupt gaming houses on the coast and no way in which to pay it back. Someone had obviously decided to call in the loan, and that person wanted the bill paid for in blood. It would serve as a lesson to all the other deadbeats that if you owed the Fox, then you sure as hell had better pay up.

Another noise came from behind, this time a soft snap followed by a series of low computerized tones. It was a cell phone being dialed, and the voice that spoke into it had asked to speak to Chuck Tollo. The man and woman who knelt on the ground listened intently, aware that their lives depended on what would be said next.

The Tylers felt like condemned convicts waiting a stay of execution.

There was a brief pause, followed by a loud animated conversation. Expletives roared and colored most of the dialogue with veiled threats and warnings that insinuated dire consequences if the big goon with the nickel plated Archer Howitzer didn't get what he wanted. After all, he worked for Romulus, not Tollo, and if the goon said Tollo was holding back, then Romulus would believe it. Shortly after that bomb had been dropped the angry tone of the conversation died down to a more civilized medium in which specific dollar values were logically discussed, and an item simply referred to as the "trash" was promised to be dealt with sternly.

With that bit of business transpired, the big Bear stood inside Flo's and Aiden's bed of sorrows which barely came up to his wide hips and stared at them with an expression that went beyond serious, it looked wholly possessed.

Whatever the goon wanted, he had just negotiated a mint for it, and the determination inside his dark eyes said that Flo and Aiden had better not mess it up or else there'd be another hole dug with a zero chance of reprieve. It was here that the thug in the pricey Italian loafers and tailored leather jacket made the middle aged couple an offer they could not refuse.

(26)

The air had tasted sweet, the stroll down the front walkway performed on heels that felt as light as helium. It was flying, truly the way a bird felt after it had been released from a cage after years of imprisonment. Admittedly, it was a harsh description of an institution that had fed and clothed Angelo for so many years, but it was nonetheless how he felt. Sure, the trek too could've been performed in fairer company, but at the moment Florence and Aiden Tyler held the wondrous beauty of heaven's highest archangels.

The plan had been three months in the making, a deal worked out with Vincent and two slot monkeys who couldn't win a bet with an inside tip on a sure thing. Still, Flo and Aiden had no criminal priors, and thanks to Vincent and a few wise guy connections, the Tylers had secured excellent jobs working for of all places, a casino.

Well, at least on paper they had.

In ink, Flo was a bartender and Aiden worked security, a stretch of the imagination to say the least, but if you didn't know them, then perhaps you could almost swallow the possibility. In actuality the lackluster duo resembled a pair of sweat shop seamstresses rather than a hale guard and a breast implanted barkeep, but on paper anything was possible. And so the lie had been effectively sold to the establishment, and as a result, Angelo Marchetti now had legal guardians who in reality owed their lives to one Vincent Marchetti, which in turn meant that Angelo belonged to Vincent. So at the end of the walkway it was not surprising to see Flo and Aiden climb into a city cab and Angelo climb into a black limousine.

It was a special occasion, and as such Uncle Vincent had pulled out all the stops. There would be a celebration tonight at the Silver Fox where a belated sixteenth birthday cake would be served, and after that they would go down to Mandy's Escort Service and lay as many high end whores as they could before staggering back to Vincent's pad for some shuteye. It would be the first of many such nights to come, because this was what men did according to Uncle Vincent, they took their pleasures like a lion. And on that first night they had indulged themselves greedily, drank their fill and laid their share of loose women. But that celebration would come to an end shortly after sunup, and when it did, nothing would ever be the same again.

(27)

For the first time the apartment hadn't felt like a secret hideout, but rather an actual home. After years of sneaking in and out of Vincent's brownstone, it was a relief to finally not to have to worry about being seen by someone. He was here by the legal consent of his adopted mother and father, Florence and Aiden Tyler. Perhaps not so much pillars of the community, but when it came to signing on the dotted line, their John Hancock met all the necessary criteria.

Angelo hadn't been privy to the specific terms of the adoption, only that Flo and Aiden had been "recruited" to adopt Angelo on behalf of Vincent until Angelo turned eighteen at which time the contract of convenience would be legally nullified. It wasn't really fraud so much as it was an ethical ambiguity, a victimless crime where no one got hurt. Still, Angelo had a few reservations, namely the way Florence and Aiden acted whenever Vincent was around. Those interactions with the big goon had been brief, but telling. The look inside their otherwise empty eyes radiated primal fear, as though they were looking into the face of death itself. That regard alone gave Angelo pause for consideration.

What had been the price of this adoption?

It was too easy to see that this wasn't just a favor owed to an old friend or a few hard luck cases jonesing for a few bucks, they'd been forced into this contract, and the details of that extortion had no doubt been dictated from the barrel of a gun.

Angelo tried not to sweat it, to let those questionable circumstance along with their selfish motives slide. After all, what could he do about it? The deed had been done and as a result, Angelo had walked out of Mount Hope with two years still left on the clock.

In a way, Angelo could empathize with Vincent's release from prison. Mind you it was a stretch, but only as close to actually experiencing such a hardship as Angelo would ever hope to compare. But those darker days were behind both of them, especially tonight, because this was a celebration of freedom, a declaration to the future that said the Marchetti family, no matter how small, was together once again.

They sat on the couch, each with a can of beer in hand. A pale hue of purple could be seen through the ceiling skylight as dawn rose out of an eastern sea. Neither Marchetti felt any pain. It was quiet, the mood calm as the clock wound down towards daybreak. It was the sort of interlude where seldom spoken words found form and hidden truths confessed and sought atonement.

"Jesus," Vincent said after he took a large gulp of brew. "I'm glad you're here Angelo. You know that?"

Angelo nodded and sipped his beer. "I wanted to thank you for everything you've done for me Uncle Vincent." Flo and Aiden flashed into his head. Even the dead body that he and Tina had discovered a few years before. The visions tainted his perception and called into question the virtues such a man as Vincent the Bear could possess. Everything was relative in the end, no pun intended. Family was close and owed its principles to a different code of doctrine.

Was Angelo truly thankful?

Could he be grateful to a cold blooded killer?

Surprisingly the answer was yes, and moreover embraced with genuine love.

"Hey, we're family Little Capone," Vincent replied with a deep resounding beer belch. "We Marchettis have to stick together."

Angelo smirked, finished off his beer and then crushed the can. "Ain't that the goddamn truth."

"Va-voom!"

Vincent laughed heartily. The Bear was more than a little bit buzzed, he was freaking polluted. So too was Angelo, but at this moment his line of thinking had never been more sober. Subconsciously he had always know that this moment would come, that the confessional would perhaps set a strange rite of passage, that of untold knowledge being passed down from master to what---an apprentice? That idea sent a cold surge of electricity down Angelo's spine, because at its heart a great truth was there to be found, and at its core it said that Angelo Marchetti was in actuality fascinated by Vincent's macabre profession no matter how hard he had tried to deny it.

Why was that?

Vincent's line of morbid work wasn't glamorous, nor was it a game or a make-believe matinee flick. People died and when they did they stayed dead. And that finality courted the most dire of consequences: prison, execution, not to mention the emotional fallout of guilt. Anyone with a conscience would surely tally up a bitter sum of emotional baggage over time, bricks you'd have to carry until you finally laid down inside a cold dank grave yourself. Yes, it may have been cool to carry a big gun, to shoot scumbags that got in your way, but life wasn't a Louis L'Amour western. People died for real and when they did, nothing was ever the same after.

How could it be?

Did Vincent have psychological scars and regrets?

As the daylight grew, Angelo knew that if he was ever going to discover those answers it would have to be now.

"Vince?"

"Yeah?"

"What's it like to kill somebody?"

The smile bled out of Vincent's face, leaving a stunned expression to take its place. Still, Angelo fixed his uncle with a determined gaze, one that sought important answers and would not rest until it had them.

"Jesus," Vincent replied with a faint laugh that said it was not impressed with such an inquiry. After all, they'd been having a blast up until now. Why ruin it with talk of business? "It's late Little Capone. Let's call it a night."

Angelo remained seated, his gray eyes burrowing into Vincent's with stubborn willpower. They exuded an age that went well-beyond those of youthful years, making the kid look like an old soul, and at the moment Vincent felt compelled to confess to them as a catholic dispensed sins into a priest's ear.

"It's not for you Little Capone," Vincent assured in a soft voice that conveyed that it did indeed have its share of regret. "When you take a life, part of you dies as well. There's no glory in killing. It's just a means unto an end. It's business Little Capone. A freaking paycheck...capisce?"

"But it gets easier, doesn't it?"

Vincent shuffled uncomfortably as if the heat in the room had suddenly shot up a dozen degrees. "You get desensitized, yeah, but it's never easy. Being a...killer, well, it takes a strong mind, and a...cold heart." At this, Vincent let his eyes fall to the floor, then slowly find the metal security door as if perhaps someone or something were inside listening. "Everyone's good at something Little Capone...whacking morons came naturally to me...it's in my blood." He then let his gaze find Angelo, and when it did, the big goon smiled. "And I guess that means it's in yours, too."

That statement frightened Angelo. He wasn't sure if the booze had Vincent talking so or if the big bear were simply departing with his personal belief on the matter. However, Angelo did not cringe nor offer up protest, instead he contemplated the remark with an odd fixation that made his heart beat faster. Fear had stolen a part of Angelo's mind with a question that seemed to have no resolution.

Was killing in his blood?

"Do you still do contracts for Romulus?" Angelo asked.

Vincent raised an eyebrow, his facial expression implying a displeasure with the question. "What do you think?"

The question sounded defensive, which it was, a man who'd been tagged for what he was and didn't care for the spotlight.

"I think you're still doing contract killings for Romulus," Angelo charged in a calm even voice. "You don't know any other way to live, except in the taking of life. You're what people would call a monster dear uncle. A cold blooded killer."

Angelo couldn't believe he had said such a horrible thing to his beloved uncle. To be so openly disrespectful to a man who had done so much for him was unforgivable. Insolence however, had not been the boy's intention. It was just the bitter sound that such language made when it spoke the truth.

Angelo bowed his head briefly and frowned. "I'm sorry."

Vincent considered, nodded and then replied. "You say true Little Capone. I am what I am, and I make no apologies for it. If God judge me damned on judgment day, then I'll walk into that hellfire without hesitation, because in my heart I know what I am...a beast." Vincent finished off his drink and then tossed the beer can onto the floor. "There are wolves and sheep in this life, Angelo. I say it is better to feast on the flock than bear the monster's fangs, amen."

"You speak in such absolute terms," Angelo countered. "What ill-fate befell such a man as yourself as to turn his heart to stone?"

Vincent's expression hardened, his lips twisted as if he'd just tasted a sour shot of piss. "Such words would consume your mind with anger. Such knowledge would poison your heart until your dying day." Vincent smiled wanly and in the dim morning light he looked near death, as if Angelo's last question had stabbed him in the heart and the wound had been fatal. "Ignorance is my gift to you," Vincent offered. "And so I'll say this to you just once...let it go."

Let it go.

What kind of an answer was that?

Cryptic to say the least. Angelo was ravaged by curiosity. How could he let this subject go? He was close to a big answer and he simply must have it. Besides, what kind of knowledge could change Angelo's heart? The potential answer felt like a poetic metaphor perhaps, a resolution that was not to be taken literally.

If only he knew.

"I'm not a child Uncle Vincent. You can tell me anything."

Vincent stared at him intensely, and for a brief moment, Angelo thought the big lug might actually begin to cry.

"What I am about to give you is a crown of sorrows Little Capone. Regardless of what you may think of yourself, until this moment you were innocent as a newborn babe. Now, that darkness will twist your soul and take it down into misery just as it has taken mine."

Angelo pondered the warning, but could not heed Vincent's caution. Tonight had been a night years in the coming, and as such owed its inspiration to fate. Who was Angelo to dismiss this providence? But it was more than that, and it had to do with that which had killed the cat. Angelo needed to know everything, and if such knowledge burned him, then so be it. Truth told he'd bear the fires of hell for an answer to the Marchetti mystery.

"It's a price I'd pay gladly," Angelo assured.

Vincent arched his thick brushy eyebrows and barred his teeth like a trap. "Then welcome to my hell Little Capone...welcome to my hell."

(28)

Vincent regarded the skylight with displeasure, a vampire dreading the coming dawn along with the dark secrets that would be revealed within its garish light.

How had they come to this place?

Truth told, Vincent had always known a day like this would come. He just didn't think it would be this soon. But here it was, in all its lackluster glory, and for all intents and purposes he felt the disclosure was pressed for time, as if such words were never meant to be touched by daylight.

"Deluca," Vincent mumbled.

The Bear's huge fists wound into tight clubs and his entire persona became volatile, a volcano on the verge of exploding.

Angelo could see the disdain within Vincent's less than attractive features as if the word just spoken was in fact the devil's actual name. "Who's Deluca?"

Vincent shot a sharp glance at Angelo, one that said the boy was not to speak, but to listen. "He's the source of mine and your despair...the cancer that's been eating at us since you were five years old."

Five years old? Angelo tried to recall the name Deluca, but came away empty. The thought briefly crossed his mind to field another question, but he understood this was not to be a Q&A session, but rather a dark narrative.

"Eleven years ago, me and your old man had it out."

Vincent unconsciously stroked his jaw, a gesture Angelo recalled from the first day they had met. The motion implied a serious altercation, one that had been violent.

"We were in business together, Angelo. And it wasn't selling bibles either. Out of respect for your pop, I won't get into specific details. All you have to remember is that your pop was a good man." Vincent pointed a finger at Angelo most forcefully. "Capisce?"

Angelo nodded, but was nonetheless shocked to discover that his father was engaged in criminal activity. Suddenly, he wondered if his father whacked folks too, that maybe killing really was in his blood.

"We had a package to deliver," Vincent continued. "A briefcase. We didn't know what was in it. All we knew was that the courier said it would explode if it went through an X-ray machine or if anyone tampered with the lock, and that if it didn't get to its destination within fourteen hours, it would self-destruct. Needless to say, we wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible. No one wants a bomb hanging off their goddamn wrist if they can avoid it.

"Problem was we delivered it to a guy who just so happened to be dead. Of course no one knew at the time that the son of a bitch was tits up. Killed by a professional assassin we would come to discover later.

"Anyways, we go into this dead man's house only to find him sitting in his den with a hole the size of a silver dollar stamped into his forehead. At this time, I had never seen a murdered body, but your old man had. It threw me for a loop at first, but your old man calmed me down and got us the hell out of there double time."

Angelo wanted to ask Vincent when his father had seen a murdered body before, but doubted Vincent would say. Vincent wanted to preserve Alfonso's memory as best he could and the best way to do that was to omit certain sordid details involving Alfonso's past.

"So there we are: two dopes carrying god knows what to god knows where while the clock ticks down. We decided to call Romulus, ask him what to do. But we can't reach him because as luck would have it, his mother had just died." Vincent sat forward. "Now you've got to understand, Romulus loved his mama more than anything. If we disturb him while he's in mourning, it better be with news that we just found a cure for dead, because if not...in his grief...well, he just might arrange for two certain bulls to be castrated.

"So when we call in, we find out that Deluca's been put in temporary charge of family business." Again, Vincent became disturbingly dark, the thought of Deluca raising hot blood into his face. "Now he's as useless as a butthole on your elbow, but what are we supposed to do? Romulus is in mourning, and his last orders were that Deluca was in charge for the time being." Vincent folded his big mitts together and they shook slightly as if he held onto someone's neck and was strangling them. "Normally, we'd have said the hell with this crap and figured it out ourselves, but whatever's inside this briefcase is crazy hot and set to go off in a couple of hours. Kaboom! We need help from the top. We need direction. We're not in our own pond. We're in a strange city. There's no safe house and as far as we know we're alone.

"Deluca says he's aware of the situation involving the briefcase. Said its going to have to go back to where it came from until things get sorted out. We say fine, so where's that exactly? Deluca says to take it to the airport. Said there's a private charter waiting to take it off our hands. We say fine and then hightail it to the airport. After a few code words were whispered into the appropriate ears, we gained access to a terminal back door which led us out onto the tarmac. There we found a fueled up jet prepared for takeoff." Vincent paused, twisted his neck as if trying to swallow an unusually large chunk of rage. He took in a deep breath and slowly let it out. "Some fancy pants suit steps off the plane and asks for the package. We hand it over to him, and then what does numb nuts do? He goes to throw down on us." Vincent shook his head in disbelief. "If it wasn't for your old man, we'd of been goners."

Angelo was captivated by this retelling, and although he intellectually understood that his father was involved in serious mob business, he couldn't restrain a certain amount of pride. After all, his father had led an exciting life, kind of like a secret agent, and as a result, Angelo had been struck by misplaced hero worship.

"This suit reaches into his jacket and before he can get the gun out, Alfonso's got his arm in a joint lock." Vincent grinned. "You should've seen the look on that idiot's face. Anyhow, your pop puts him on his knees with a submission hold and I take the gun. Suddenly he's all apologies and assurances that he wasn't going to shoot us, but we can tell that we were going to be buzzard meat, you know."

Vincent glanced at the skylight with growing annoyance. The day was coming fast and he felt this tale must close before the sun's strength came pouring in through the glass. Some things were just never meant to be spoken in daylight.

"Jesus...for that son of bitch to do something like that for no good reason...I mean, who were these people? That's taking a huge chance. There's security cameras everywhere, not to mention your crew manifest and flight number are all going to be registered with the flight tower. A gumshoe would've tracked the suit down in about five minutes." Vincent's fingers stroked his chin. "Why take a chance like that?"

Angelo couldn't help but respond. He'd seen enough movies and read enough Tom Clancy books that dealt with espionage not to be somewhat of an authority on the subject.

"You were involved with government agencies," Angelo replied. "Guys who'd kill you and never have to worry about standing before a judge. Guys that could make a flight disappear. As for what was in the briefcase, I'm guessing it was weapon related. Not guns, but rather nuclear or maybe even biological in nature. Something with huge political and economic value on the global market. As for the suit, he was told to minimize the witnesses. Maybe that's what happened to the guy with the hole the size of a silver dollar in his head. Maybe he was pitching for the wrong team, and what you got caught up in was the fallout of an interdepartmental civil conflict."

Vincent wasn't the smartest guy on the planet, but he seemed to follow that twisted scenario easy enough. Besides, at its heart the motivation involved money, greed and power, and who couldn't relate to those human jewels.

"Maybe," Vincent nodded.

The Bear regarded the skylight again and continued his tale.

"Alfonso snaps the suit's wrist and breaks his trigger finger. The guy screams and before we know it two other suits jump out of the plane, handguns loaded. I drop to my knee and take aim with the suit's gun, while Alfonso yanks out his archer so fast its little more than a blur. Your old man yells for everyone to keep cool. Meanwhile, the briefcase is on the ground next to Alfonso's foot. Needless to say, the situation is tense. We got an injured suit on the ground, two suits taking aim, and me and your pop holding ground."

Vincent began to giggle, amused to no end over what was to happen next.

"I'm thinking we need to shoot these mothers right now, but I'm holding out for what your pop's gonna do. I hadn't expected him to say keep cool, so I figure he's got an idea in that wild head of his." Vincent winked at Angelo. "Your pop was a smart cookie."

Angelo smiled faintly and continued to listen.

"Your old man gets that crazy look in his eye and then aims his gun at the briefcase, to which the three suits get that, what the hell are you doing look in their eyes. It's obvious that they understand one thing. If your pop shoots that case, then we're all dead. It's here that Alfonso lays down the law. He tells them to get back on the plane and get out of here or else he'll blow a hole into the case. The trio of expensive suits confides that if they leave without that case, they're dead men. It is here that we realize that we have a true Mexican standoff. Me and your pop prepared to die for our reasons, and they for theirs."

The sunlight from the skylight dimmed as a cloud passed by overhead. It felt like a enough of a reprieve to allow Vincent to finish his tale in relative darkness where it belonged.

"One of the suits aims his gun at the injured suit on the ground and says to your pop like, "this idiot overstepped his authority." "Then he fires a cap into the injured suit's melon, killing him instantly. Problem solved assured the suit. He then said that if we gave him the case, then nothing more would be made of it. We could each go our separate ways in peace." Vincent raised his thick bushy eyebrows and shrugged. "The situation was edgy and the case was our only leverage, but still, we wanted to be rid of the damn thing...bad. At this point we just want out, so Alfonso agrees and steps back away from the briefcase. The suit comes forward picks up the package and he and his associate...the one's that's still breathing, pick up the dead suit and climb back aboard the plane and flew off." Vincent cracked his knuckles with a degree of professional satisfaction. "That's when me and your pop went home." Vincent then regarded Angelo with eyes that were hollow from a deed long since departed but not forgotten. "That's when the trouble really began."

(29)

Outside a flash of light was followed by a volley of thunder which sliced open a storm cloud. Rain danced off the skylight in thick melted sheets and filled the relative empty space of the apartment with a low tinny rhythm. Suddenly, it was almost pitch black again, as if the lords of karma understood that a terrible dark knowledge was about to be exposed, one that must never embrace the day.

Angelo could feel his stomach tighten and his mouth go unusually dry. He realized that in a few moments his entire world would be turned inside out.

The answers were close now.

"It was late when we got back to town," Vincent explained. "After midnight. I escorted your pop back to his house. It had been a long day. We figured it was best to get a good night's rest before standing tall before Romulus or Deluca in the morning." Vincent crooked a barely noticeable smile, the slightest wedge of a tear stuck in the corner of his eye. "You're mom greeted us at the door. She was pissed that we were so goddamn late, but you could see she was worried." Vincent touched at his eyes with a forefinger and carried on. "God I loved her...she was the best...your pop was a lucky man."

Again, Vincent touched his face as if remembering a strike. It didn't take a genius to figure out that Vincent had been romantically in love with Angelo's mother who also happened to be Alfonso's wife. Finally, Angelo understood the nature of the conflict between the brothers, a love triangle that had seen siblings come to physical blows over a woman. Through Vincent's recollection Angelo could see that the big Bear's heart had been horribly broken by those events long since passed, a pain that remained with him even until this day. As a result, Angelo couldn't help but feel a deep gush of pity for his uncle. Angelo thought to sit closer to him, to offer him a shoulder in comfort, but such an affection was not the Marchetti way. According to the family doctrine strength alone dictated a man's actions, and if he were compelled to express a hint of compassion, it was only to be in regards to young children or a loving wife.

No exceptions.

"Wait," Angelo interrupted. "I thought you said you were in prison during that time of my life...you said that's why you weren't in any of the photographs...that's why I...we never saw you."

Vincent looked at Angelo with a bit of embarrassment, like a child that had been caught in the middle of a bold faced lie. "It's...complicated Little Capone...your mother and I...your pop...it's a bit sordid."

And there it was again, that telling look in his eyes that spoke of how much Vincent had loved Angelina Marchetti. It was obvious that he had distanced himself from her, because the pain of seeing her with Alfonso, of seeing them so damn happy was tearing him apart inside.

Angelo raised a hand in assurance which said that those specific details involving the timeline were not important, and in that gesture, Vincent could tell that his nephew had seen straight through him, that he understood how complicated and strained the trio's relationship had been.

Vincent nodded in gratitude and gave the kid an affectionate wink. "Thank you Little Capone."

And out of nowhere Angelo added. "I loved her, too."

Vincent's eyes glistened and he smiled warmly. "We all did."

Then after a brief pause, the big galoot continued his story.

"I needed to take the edge off," Vincent confided. "You mother, god rest her soul, did not permit alcohol in the house. She was a strict catholic. So I politely excused myself to walk down to the corner store and pick up a bottle of Jack."

Vincent bowed his head and placed his face into those big mitt hands of his. For a moment Angelo was certain that the big goon would cry, but he kept firm. But the next time the large man with the uni-brow showed his face it looked not just heartbroken, but seasoned on a kind of hatred Angelo never knew existed. This went beyond the disdain Angelo had witnessed on Patrick Shea's round scarlet mug, or even that sick desperate hunger that consumed the junkie like a ravenous cancer, this was demonic.

"When I came back the fire had already started," Vincent whispered as he gazed into space. "I tried to get to them, but...the man in the black sweater...he wouldn't let me."

At this bit of news, Angelo's blood began to boil.

Who had dared to stop his uncle from rescuing his parents?

Suddenly a flash of lightning lit the apartment and a burst of thunder shook the roof as if it too had been enraged by such an act of evil.

Without realizing it, Angelo had jumped to his feet, hands curled into fists, eyes wide and menacing. "Who wouldn't let you?" It wasn't so much a question as a demand.

Vincent looked up at his nephew, his teary eyes caught between despair and a cool anger that had simmered on years of misdirection. But there was more than that, there was also a deep rooted shame, guilt for not being able to have saved them. That expression looked weak, helpless, something so pathetic that it had even humbled an intimidating specimen like Vincent the Bear.

"Forgive me Angelo...I just wasn't...strong enough."

Upon hearing this, Angelo's fists relaxed and his intense gaze eased into an expression of confusion. Until this day his big brute of an uncle had seemed a force of nature, a wall of impenetrable stone, but at this moment he looked disturbingly fragile, as if he'd been eaten away by a vicious cancer that began in the heart and slowly wormed its way into the brain until every thought had been infected.

Who could be so strong as to stop Vincent the Bear?

What horrible beast could have stood in the path of a such a formidable man as to keep him from saving his only family?

Angelo doubted if even an Archer Howitzer would've dissuaded a man like Vincent from racing into that house, but where a powerful weapon would've most certainly failed, something, no, someone had most certainly succeeded.

Angelo sat back down, bowed his head, hands folded together as if in prayer, but in truth they were braced for the sour news they would inevitably receive next.

(30)

"I dropped the bottle of Jack," Vincent continued as his eyes slipped back and forth with vivid memories. "The smoke was already in my nostrils before I bounded two steps. It lit up the night like a freaking supernova. I ran for all my worth, calculating how I was going to get all of you out." He wiped at his brow with a hand that displayed a slight tremor. "There was so much fire...it poured out of all the windows...through the chimney...goddamn it, I was at least a hundred feet away and I could still feel that miserable stinking heat. It was like hell, and the man in the black sweater was..." Vincent clutched his fists and shook back and forth with anger. "He was the goddamn devil."

"What did he do?" Angelo asked in a voice that sounded more like a wolf's growl than a human tongue.

"It was almost as if he came out of the flames," Vincent described, but he couldn't have. "He must've come from beside the house, through the smoke. He startled me, but I wasn't thinking clearly. I needed to get inside that house! I needed to save my family!"

"He started the fire didn't he?"

"Yes," Vincent nodded. "He was there on purpose...waiting for me to come back. At first I thought he might've been a neighbor, that maybe he had tried to get into the house himself, but then I saw the look in those dead eyes. Cold...dark...no emotion, just a heartless killing machine."

Angelo thought Vincent saw eyes like that every time the Bear shaved, but the comment was uncalled for, let alone true.

"I had to act fast," Vincent said in a voice that had become unusually soft.

It was obvious the Bear's thoughts were replaying the details in a way that sought a deeper understanding of what had actually happened. Perhaps he questioned how it could've gone differently: if only he had done this or that, then maybe, just maybe.

The Bear blinked as if his head had suddenly cleared and continued to speak briskly.

"He drew close enough that I could see the thin scar that ran beneath the wisp of his grayish hair. I reached for him, but he slipped aside so easily and gracefully that I knew instantly that I was up against a professionally trained fighter." Vincent rolled his shoulder and cracked his neck in a telltale gesture that denoted a man who had extensive experience in combat. "I had some training, too. Six years of judo and a lifetime of dirty street fighting. But this guy was something special. The entire dance was done in the blink of an eye. When I threw, he dodged, when he returned, I unfortunately collected." Vincent ground his teeth. "Damn the little bastard could punch!"

More lightning flashed which was followed tightly by a heavy split of thunder.

"Somewhere in the fray I managed to grab hold of his arm. I held on for dear life, trying to manipulate the short mother into a submission hold. But he was too good. Too well trained. And all the while I'm thinking about my family inside that burning house...how the valuable seconds are ticking down. I'm sure I can hear the screams, but I know it's only my imagination. This little bastard with the heavy knit sweater isn't the type of guy that burns people alive, he's the kind that whacks folks first and then disposes of the evidence nice and neat afterwards. In my heart...I know...the fire is just to get rid of the bodies...my family is already dead, and in less than a minute I'm going to be dead, too."

Despite the fact that Vincent was alive and breathing and narrating this story, Angelo still couldn't help but worry for uncle's well-being, as if by some miracle the Vincent in the story had actually died and all that was left of him was this clever replica.

Vincent then grinned an absolutely wicked little grin, one that said payback was a bitch.

(31)

"The tiny dirt licker got my arm in a wrist lock. The pain was excruciating." Vincent clutched his fist. "But somewhere between dropping the bottle of Jack and butting heads with this idiot, I completely snapped. I was beyond reason...beyond grief...beyond pain. And when I overpowered that miserable maggot...when he heard my wrist break and I kept grinning at him while reclaiming my arm...that cold dead look inside that little prick's eyes turned to fear. I was like a junkie pumped up on PCP. There was no pain nor consequences, just utter rage.

"I had totally lost my mind, but had still managed to hold onto enough of my sense to devise a plan. I knew he was going to try and shut me down by one of two ways: crush my windpipe or squash my balls. Pain or no pain, if he shuts off my air, then I'm a goner. So I leave my crotch open...let him have my nuts, and I can feel that sharp thick pain radiate out of my entire body. But I swear to god it feels good, sobers me, hypes me up even further. That pain is like a cold fire as seen from a distant shore. It wasn't part of me at that moment, it belonged to someone else, someone who crumbled under such agonies, but that someone was not me. The beast within me didn't care what happened to its body, it just wanted revenge. And I remember that crazed man praying to Satan to grant him such a reprisal, and he did." Vincent then gave a curt laugh that showed nothing but contempt for his opponent. "In that moment he was all I had...that and my hatred. We were locked together in a match for survival. But the only difference being was that I didn't care if I lived or died, and that is why I am here to tell this tale."

Angelo nodded, anxiously awaiting to hear how his uncle had made the man with the thick black sweater pay for having killed his parents. Although, Angelo knew nothing would be good enough to reward that foul deed, nothing aside from an eternity inside a lake of molten fire.

"My teeth parted and closed on his neck...a second later his jugular vein was spurting streams of blood down my throat. He tried to twist my wrist in a circle...I could hear the bones snapping, the pain exploding up my arm and into my brain, but I stuck to his neck like a vampire, tearing out mounds of flesh until I could feel bone and cartilage on my tongue. With my free arm I continued to hold him until I felt the strength run out of his knees, and then I let him drop."

A satisfied grin aligned Vincent's wide lips, as if the taste of that bastard's blood still lingered upon his taste buds and its residue had never been sweeter. The Bear had been granted his revenge, but as for Angelo, his retribution would forever go unrealized.

"Thank you," Angelo said in a soft voice. "Thank you for killing my parent's murderer."

Vincent nodded, although his eyes suggested there was more to the tale, much more, and that Angelo's gratitude unfortunately was partially misplaced.

"I suppose you're wondering why you weren't killed that night."

Presumption projected from Angelo's eyes. At this point in the story he had assumed that big brave Uncle Vincent had stormed into the house and rescued his sleeping nephew from the deadly smoke and fire.

This had not been the case.

"As much as I hate to admit it, Angelo, I tried to get into that house, but that prick had taken too much out of me," Vincent confessed in a humble tone. "I watched him die in front of my eyes, but when I turned to make the front steps my legs gave out. The pain of my injuries had come home to roost and my head swam with distorted images...he had taken the best out of me Little Capone...I had failed. I'm not really sure what happened afterwards. I recall crawling towards the house. There were sirens...people yelling...and then there were hands on me. I tried to fight them off, but there were too many."

Angelo nodded in understanding, although he was admittedly a bit confused. "I was told that someone had left me in the neighbor's backyard hammock wrapped in a blanket. I barely remember it. It was like a dream. I remember being carried, but I don't recall who had done it. I slept through most of it."

Vincent gritted his teeth and twisted within his skin. "The man in the black sweater must've done it. He wasn't a complete monster, but damn I hate to think that I owe your life to him...little mother!"

Angelo didn't know how to feel about that information. Would he have rather died with his parents than have been saved by their executioner? He couldn't decide. Meanwhile, another flash of lightning followed by a whip crack of thunder added an element of drama to the narrative.

"Their deaths...it involved the briefcase didn't it?" Angelo surmised.

Vincent closed his eyes and sighed. "That goddamn briefcase...and the man named Franco Deluca."

(32)

The world teetered like a child's top that had run low on spin. The icy wind that howled outside rattled the rafters and shook the windows and doors within their jams. The fire from the stone hearth filled the bar with a hellish heat, but despite its uncomfortable sting, Angelo nonetheless felt unnaturally cold, as if he'd been encased in a monument of ice like those odd shapes he had first seen upon arrival to these strange lands.

Angelo's eyesight blurred as if reality were viewed through a pair of eyeglasses dipped into thick clear soap. The effect exaggerated dimensions and added qualities to items which they normally would not possess. The colorful bottles on the bar appeared to burn like cathedral candles, the mirror gleamed like a star of quicksilver, and the bartender's face was a compilation of rugged bones, a skull covered over in a thin burlap of dead skin.

Beneath Angelo's arms the Archer Howitzers vibrated like tuning forks, the energy reminiscent of a song whose title and melody eluded their owner. But still, they sang their beautiful music, a tune that reached into the very center of Angelo's soul and gave him strength. In an instant, he understood a great many things, that on this level of reality he and the guns were one, that the thing he had to do was---

\---but the hitman never got that all important answer, because the bartender had sensed Angelo had slipped out of the mirror and back into his body, and it was here that the barkeep sang his own song, an alien chant that lulled the hitman back into a realm of reflection where yesterday confessed the kinds of secrets a man like Angelo had no interest to declare.

(33)

Previously, Franco Deluca's name had been little more than background noise in Vincent's tale, now it blared like an air raid siren inside of Angelo's ears. Who was this man and what connection did he have to the deaths of his parents?

The drone of rain pelted the skylight while a shadow of storm clouds kept dawn at bay. There was still time to finish this tale before the sky cleared, but then given this latest bit of news, nothing, not even the break of day nor a brilliant sunset would keep Angelo from hearing the rest of this sordid drama. The answers were too close to simply be postponed until a later date. The facts no matter how painful, had to be spoken, there was just no other way.

"Useless as a butthole on your elbow," Vincent repeated from a previous character assessment of Deluca. "Like I said: Deluca had temporarily replaced Romulus who was in mourning over his mother."

"Did he order you guys killed?" Angelo asked.

"It's more complicated than that Little Capone," Vincent replied. "First let me tell you that I was arrested after gaining consciousness inside the hospital. The cops pinned the murder of the man in the black sweater on me, seeing as my teeth marks were in his neck."

"What was his name?"

"No identification was recovered from his corpse...no fingerprint trace or dental charts could reveal his identity...it was as if he never existed."

Angelo felt a bit of a shudder as if Vincent had described a ghost instead of a man.

Even though Angelo was young, he understood that whomever that man had been, he must've worked for some very powerful people. Perhaps NSA, CIA, or some other covert government agency which had links to organized crime. It wasn't impossible, in fact at one time in history the CIA had agents running drugs out of Vietnam during the war, so it wasn't hard to imagine certain individuals in government till this day, still using that exclusive power to make money through various underworld institutional connections. Greed was the most powerful weapon known to man, and when added to political immunity then you had all the makings of a doomsday bomb.

"Couldn't you have claimed self-defense?"

"I had a couple priors," Vincent snuffed. "Assault with a knife, assault with a baseball bat and a few others. That and they'd had their suspicions of my activities with the Gambaro Family, although they couldn't officially link me to the Family. Of course they tried to get me to talk, to turn evidence against Gambaro, but I told them to go screw themselves."

"I don't understand Uncle Vincent," Angelo interjected. "I thought you said you were a hitman. When exactly did you take up that...job?"

A sighed passed off of Vincent's wide frowning lips. "I began my career as a courier for Romulus. Me and your old man." Vincent's laugh was bitter sweet. "Wrong place wrong time Angelo...me and your folks...go figure." Vincent rubbed his large hands through his thick black hair and then slapped them down onto his sturdy thighs. "In Gambaro, I was involved with petty mule crap...you know...hoofing the trails with money, drugs and various illicit paraphernalia." He gave another sour chuckle, which showed his contempt for circumstance. "Here, I was little more than an errand boy, and what happens? I go up the creek for committing the big body job...forget about it.

"Anyhow, it took years, but the Gambaro lawyers eventually secured my release."

"And when they did..."

"I went on the war path Little Capone...I finally became a hitman of my own accord." Vincent became somewhat introspective, recalling details within his own troubled thoughts. "I killed a good many folks who messed up that deal with the briefcase...that is everyone that wasn't made."

"Made?" Angelo had heard the term before, but wasn't sure what it meant.

"When a guy's been made, then you can't touch him without explicit approval of the crime boss...godfather, capisce? And even then there's no guarantee that the head honcho will be able to break the code and have a guy whacked. It's complicated, but it keeps order within the organization, there's a law that each member must obey, even the top pit bull."

"Then Franco Deluca...?" Angelo asked.

"Is a made man," Vincent replied in a tone that was both bitter and apologetic, a man who had been cheated not only of his revenge, but his nephew's as well. "I'm sorry Little Capone, but Deluca can't be touched by a lowly soldier such as myself...not without say so from Romulus, and even then it might be a tentative order. If Romulus were to cross the line and violate that code without sufficient reason, then there would be pandemonium within the Family."

Angelo bounded to his feet, his face a mask of anger. "What! What do you mean you can't touch him? He killed my parents! He tried to have you killed!"

Vincent raised a hand in an attempt to calm his excited nephew. He knew Angelo had a right to be pissed off. Hell, Vincent wasn't happy about the situation either, but he understood the flow of things when it came to working within a crime family. There was a code and buddy boy you had better not break it or else you'd end up wearing your balls for earrings.

"The matter of Deluca is complicated, Angelo."

Angelo sat back down and let his face collapse into his hands. All his life he had thought that his parents' death had been an accident and now this. At least the mother in the black sweater had met with justice, but what about this guy Deluca? What was his goddamn story?

"Jesus Christ, Vincent...Jesus freaking Christ...please...please explain this to me! What did Deluca have to do with this...?" Angelo couldn't finish, he was too disgusted to go on.

Vincent regarded his nephew with the deepest of sympathy. If only he would have stayed with Alfonso, then perhaps none of this crap would've happened. Of course Vincent knew better, knew that he would have been as dead as his dear brother and sister-in-law if he had gone into that dark house with them. The man in the black sweater would have seen to that readily enough. But there was no way that Vincent would go inside the house without downing a bottle of Jack to ease the emotional pain of having to see Alfonso and Angelina together, no sir no how.

Ironically, his broken heart had spared him a bullet to the noggin.

At least it had been good for something.

(34)

"When Deluca took over for Romulus, he was in communication with the supplier of the case, some government numb nuts named Landry," Vincent explained. "Apparently, Deluca had been under the impression that me and your old man had found out what had been inside the case. When Deluca dropped that bomb, Landry flipped."

Furious as he was, Angelo still had the presence of mind to follow the story intelligently. Questions begat questions within his troubled mind, but he was smart enough to sift through the clutter in search of the relevant information.

"Speaking of bomb, how the hell were you two supposed to have figured out what was inside the case if it was wired with explosives?" Angelo asked.

"Exactly Little Capone," Vincent nodded with a 'I couldn't agree with your more' type of sentiment. "Deluca messed up. But I know why the fat bastard did it." Vincent tapped a sausage sized finger against his temple in a gesture that displayed smarts. "He alone was in charge and didn't want to mess up a job this big...not on his watch. He didn't want any loose ends so he decided me and your pop were expendable. To hell with what happened to us, just deliver the goods and then off the messengers." Vincent bit down on his bottom lip and scrunched up his nose angrily.

"What about the code?" Angelo asked. "You guys were in the Family...surely you were made men. Deluca couldn't touch you without breaking the code, right?"

The smirk on Vincent's face spoke volumes, and what it had to say suggested that honor amongst thieves and cut throats did have its limits. "Deluca isn't Gambaro...Deluca's a mutt."

"What's a mutt?"

"A mule of another sort," Vincent explained. "He's carries information between Gambaro and various governments agencies in exchange for merchandise and cold hard cash."

"Whoa!" Angelo exclaimed. "Back up a minute. I thought you said that Deluca was a made man...that you couldn't touch him without proper authorization, and now you're telling me he isn't Gambaro...that he's just a glorified government clerk."

Vincent rubbed his eyes. "Romulus extended the code as a..." At this Vincent chuckled with pathetic amusement. "Jesus Christ...as a honorary membership...a wise guy brand of ambassadorial diplomacy if you will."

"What the hell does that mean?" Angelo spat. "A freaking honorary PHD I've heard of, but not honorary membership into a crime family!"

"Deluca is an egotistical mother," Vincent said with a strained effort as though he couldn't believe what he was saying himself. "Deluca wanted to be a tough guy. He wanted to be made just like in the movies. He got a kick out of the idea. So a certain ceremony was performed with the understanding that our rules applied to Deluca, even though he wasn't a pure Gambaro...a mutt."

"Jesus H Macy!" Angelo said with astonishment. "Did Romulus suck his dick, too?"

Vincent gave Angelo a sharp glance which said he should show Romulus more respect, after all, he was the big cheese, not to mention that deep down the greasy gangster was as stand up as they came. Still, the kid was upset, and because of that a certain degree of latitude was granted.

"Romulus wanted the money and the government protection such a marriage with Deluca could promise," Vincent explained. "So he wined and dined Deluca. Gave him his mafia secret decoder crime ring and baptized him in good fella gold. Now he was more than just a business partner, he was a made man with all the privileges thereof." Vincent offered up another curt laugh of revulsion. "What a joke."

"But still..." Angelo inferred.

"He was a mutt," Vincent stated. "And that made him dangerous, because the code to him was provisional. It could be ignored if he chose to wear the government liaison hat instead of his gangster panama. He could kill without fear of retribution, because in reality he wasn't actually a Gambaro."

"Screw me," Angelo muttered. "So he cut you guys loose because---"

"---he wasn't entirely sure what we knew. There was a panic on. Romulus was indisposed, and Deluca didn't want to take any chance of being wrong. You see, guys like me and your pop are like dirt between Deluca's toes. He'd have no problem scraping us off and flushing us down the porcelain pipe without hesitation."

"And he did," Angelo surmised.

"Damn straight!" Vincent agreed vehemently. "You see, Deluca's got the goods on everyone...even Romulus. If something happens to Deluca, then the entire Gambaro Family will fall. Still..."

"What?" Angelo asked after Vincent's unusually long pause.

"Romulus."

"What about the prick?"

Again, Vincent gave the boy a discouraged expression that showed he was not impressed with such a blatant display of disrespect. "Don't be so quick to judge Little Capone, not until you've heard what I have to say next."

(35)

Angelo waited on Vincent's words of justification, something that could adequately explain away Romulus's half ass choices.

"Romulus spoke to me before I went inside," Vincent explained in a tone that became both low and respectful, a man in the presence of an absolute authority. "We were at the restaurant in his office. It was here that he offered me---"

"---a lame excuse!" Angelo scoffed.

Vincent regarded the boy patiently, well aware of just how emotional Angelo must feel right now. "No...he offered me his condolences and something else...an explanation."

A brief lick of shame filled Angelo's heart with regret for having spoken so ill of Romulus. Still, its power was short lived and soon replaced once more with its former bitterness.

"Romulus had apologized for the tragedy involving your parents," Vincent said in a compassionate voice as if recreating the manner in which it had been offered to him. "Said it had been an unnecessary waste. I agreed and furthermore strongly suggested that something should be done about it."

The skylight overhead continued to ripple from the pounding rain. From its dim gloom the apartment managed to hold onto the night's gray shadow like smoke trapped inside a jar, but its vapors were nonetheless thinning, and soon even the heavy downpour would not be strong enough to dispel that demon sun from blowing light back into the room. Still, Vincent dawdled, weighed his words as if time were a static hand upon a broken watch.

"It was here that Romulus reminded me about Deluca's made man status," Vincent said. "That in itself told me that your folks deaths were definitively connected to Deluca." Vincent then rolled his shoulders as if preparing to take a poke at some moron who desperately deserved it. "Said Deluca had gone off half cocked...cleaned house with a freaking flame thrower when all he had to do was lightly dust the china."

Angelo drew in a deep breath and slowly let it out. The alcohol in his system had burned off within the fire of his anger. If Deluca were here right now Angelo would have cut his balls off with a rusty razor dipped in iodine. Perhaps later he'd go good on it, after all, Angelo wasn't a made man, and so the rules of the crime family didn't apply to him. Still, he doubted killing a man as powerful as Deluca would be an easy trick to perform. The guy probably had an army of thugs around him at all times, not to mention the security systems money such as his could easily afford. His home was no doubt a castle fortress where an idiot of a king occasionally resided.

"Romulus apologized again for my dilemma," Vincent said. "He understood that I'd been done over for no reason. He understood that I wanted revenge, but he reminded me that the code applied to Deluca. Said that at the end of the day business was still business, and sometimes that meant mistakes were made and deals went bad."

"Business!" Angelo said in a voice that was little more than a whisper, but held all the ferocity of a growl.

"I'd asked him what the hell had exactly happened, but Romulus couldn't give me specific details, because of the sensitive nature of the operation...but he did offer me something else." A faint grin laid loosely upon Vincent's wide lips. "He promised me that the lawyers would fight tooth and nail to get me out of prison, and that when I got out, he'd have a list of names for me...idiots that had something to do with Alfonso and Angelina's deaths."

"Guys who weren't made?" Angelo asked, although he felt such a sentiment to be hollow, seeing as those goons would've just been following Deluca's orders to begin with. If anyone needed to be whacked it was Deluca, not some symbolic effigies.

"Government guys I could take retribution on Little Capone," Vincent replied in defense. "Romulus didn't have to do that, but he did this at risk not only to himself, but the Family. And when I got out he had gone good on that oath."

"But what about Deluca?" Angelo snapped. "That bag of dirt deserves---"

"---a thousand deaths I know!" Vincent barked. "Don't you think I know that? Haven't you been listening? But to kill Deluca would be like assassinating the goddamn President of the United States: difficult to say the least. Not to mention they'd have..." Bowing his head, Vincent closed his eyes as if in prayer.

"They'd have what?" Angelo demanded.

Raising his large unruly head, Vincent gazed at Angelo with tired old eyes that were lost for purpose, save one.

"Romulus said that he sympathized with my loss, but reminded me that I still had something very much to lose."

"What?"

"You."

Angelo's piss and vinegar bled out of his veins as if his limbs had been effectively severed by a sharp machete. How was he supposed to respond to such a statement? Anything to the contrary would've not only sounded like childish vibrato, but also insensitive to his beloved uncle's feelings towards his only nephew, his only living blood relative. The Bear had shouldered an incredible burden: the deaths of Alfonso and Angelina along with the protection of his young nephew. What choice did he have, but to comply with Romulus's warning. Sure, Angelo may've been gung ho to kick some ass right now, but the only reason he was alive and on this couch today was because his uncle had had the wisdom and foresight to let some unspeakable injustices slide. How hard must that have been for a take action kind of man like Vincent Marchetti not to avenge his loved ones deaths and let their killer go free, a man who he indirectly supported through Gambaro Family business.

It was goddamn unthinkable.

"Do you understand, Angelo? Do you see why I had to let him live? I couldn't let them take you, too. I just couldn't. Something of Alfonso and Angelina had to survive, and that something is you."

Angelo rubbed his eyes and shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. "Romulus would've actually killed me if you had---"

"---no, not Romulus," Vincent interrupted. "He made that much clear to me. Said he would never touch the boy, but he said others would, and there would be nothing he could do to stop that from happening."

Angelo sighed and then laughed in disbelief. "Forgive me uncle, but this nonsense is totally crazy. I mean this whole thing started over the stupidest thing, a miscommunication and an anally retentive butthole who's a neat freak when it comes to tying up loose ends. I mean, Deluca's a psychopath, he has to be. This all could've been settled with a freaking phone call. You guys aren't going to lie about the briefcase...it's not a matter of credibility, it's just...insane!"

"Did you ever see a movie called "The Warriors"?"

Angelo blinked, studied Uncle Vincent as if he had perhaps lost his mind. "What?"

"A movie called "The Warriors"" Vincent repeated without humor. "It's an old flick, but it centers around this gang that gets wrongly accused of shooting this other gang's leader, a guy named Cyrus who's trying to unite all the city's gangs into one super gang."

"What happened?" Angelo was surprised he'd actually asked the question. It seemed out of place in this discussion, irrelevant.

"There's this one punk who gets it in his head to shoot Cyrus."

"Why?"

"Good question," Vincent shrugged. "It doesn't make sense. All the little bastard said was that he liked doing stuff like that."

"Jesus," Angelo muttered. "Are you saying that's Deluca? That he likes doing stuff like this?"

"I don't know Little Capone, but some men have a terrible itch that can only be scratched one way...just because Deluca wears high end suits and rides in a limo doesn't mean he isn't a sociopath or a psychopath. Maybe he was the kind of kid who pulled the wings off flies...maybe his father buggered him in the chute until he bled buckets, who knows? But I do know this, a man that can kill with a phone call is far more dangerous than a man who kills with his bare hands."

Angelo contemplated that statement and couldn't help but agree. It was a mark of power, killing on a completely different level, one where bloody campaigns could be waged from the cushy comfort of an easy chair or a water cooler war room.

"Damn it," Angelo whispered.

A puddle of tears had funneled into the corner of the kid's eyes, but he would not dare to let them fall. No, Deluca had taken much, too much, but he would not have Angelo's sorrow as well---vengeance yes, sorrow most definitely not.

"Purpose...I was hoping to find a purpose to their deaths, but it was meaningless, wasn't it? An act of senseless violence dictated by a man who places absolutely no value on other people's lives whatsoever," Angelo said as an after fact.

"Someday Little Capone...someday."

Angelo fixed Vincent with a stare that shared a common understanding of someday. "When you got out, you said you went on a warpath. What happened there?"

"Rest assure those government henchmen connected with the assassination of your folks have met their ends most slowly and painfully in a war, I might add, that was carried out under the direct instruction and protection of Romulus."

"Did Deluca know?"

"Of course he knew, but he didn't care. His balls weren't being crushed in a vice, his eyes weren't being plucked out with pliers. He was safe on his goddamn phone, smoking Cuban cigars and nibbling away on tins of caviar, son of a bitch."

"So he did nothing."

"Romulus explained the situation to him, and it was my understanding that the miserable mother actually liked the idea...it sounded so "Godfather" part one, two and three to him. A Francis Ford Coppola flick right out of a Mario Puzo novel."

"He almost sounds like a...freaking mob fanatic."

Vincent made a gruff noise that almost passed for a laugh. "He's a complete nut. Has every mob movie and documentary ever made. He's a collector, too. Al Capone's furniture, house, cars, clothes and a whole warehouse full of other gangster crap...mostly from the early twentieth century."

"So he's living the life of a mobster, but with diplomatic immunity because of his government position."

"He's the devil Little Capone, a soulless son of a bitch."

"And we can't touch him."

"Someday...someday."

Perhaps that day might come, but for now Angelo regarded Vincent with an utter loss for moral, emotional and spiritual direction. "And what now dear uncle...what now would you have us do?"

Vincent stood and looked down on the boy with eyes that had shed more than their share of tears over the subject, now they looked honed, rattler eyes that lay in wait to strike when the opportunity availed itself. "For now I would have you sleep and have sweet dreams of your mother and father."

Angelo stood, nodded and then embraced his uncle the way a man showed his appreciation to another. And with that done both men quietly went to their separate rooms to dream the kind of dreams that always accompanied those who only ever dreamt of vengeance.

(36)

Beneath the covers, Angelo stared into the dim paleness of his darkened bedroom with fuzzy eyes that had begun to spin like gyroscopes. The booze had turned toxic inside his bloodstream, morphing into what would no doubt be a world class hangover in the hours to come. But the aches and pains associated with that parched desolation were easily discarded for another sort of misery, that which only heartbreaking news could dispatch.

Vincent had warned him what such knowledge would most certainly do, and it had. Now Angelo Marchetti's heart was filled with hatred, and how could such an emotion ever hope to yield anything beautiful? Hate was the kind of poison that you alone drank until it either killed you, or you somehow resolved the issue within your own heart. Misery was its constant companion, and despite the darkness within the bedroom, he could nonetheless feel its cold shadow within its wake.

Welcome to my hell Little Capone...welcome to my hell.

Vincent was right, Angelo had been innocent up to this point, despite the horrible crud he'd seen and been through during his sixteen years of life. Knowledge could either enlighten a soul or condemn it, and right now Angelo's soul waded through a lake of fire.

Franco Deluca.

The very name made his gut tighten, his teeth grind enamel. How hard must it have been for Uncle Vincent not to avenge his family? Unthinkable. Angelo had been a liability and still was. If only there were a way that he and Vincent could circumnavigate the wise guy code, the bureaucratic nonsense that gave Deluca immunity. But how? The answer required the mind of a strategic genius, and as for the Marchettis they both had a problem spelling more without the on. No, this problem was freaking huge, Rommel in Africa kind of huge. They were surrounded on all sides by politics. If Vincent sought vengeance then Angelo would be punished, if Angelo went after Deluca, Vincent would bear the brunt.

But if they worked together, they just might be able to get themselves both killed.

Angelo tossed and turned, buried his face deep into his pillow and before he knew it he began to scream.

(37)

Eighteen years old.

It didn't particularly mean much to Angelo, one more year down the drain and one more year of failing high school, that about said it. Soon he would drop out, probably tomorrow. Besides, Vincent had said school was for schmucks, and if anyone disagreed with him, all they had to do was look inside his thick Gucci wallet.

Of course the most important thing about being eighteen was the freedom from Aiden and Florence, those dead beat parents who had never once sent him a birthday card or a Christmas present. But then that was to be expected, because their short term relationship had only ever existed on paper. It wasn't like they were tethered together or living under the same roof like a regular dysfunctional family. The Tylers had served their sole purpose and were effectively out of the picture for good. Angelo had never harbored any illusions that just because they had signed his adoption papers that they were morally obligated to express him any affection. No, Flo and Aiden were reluctant figureheads, and Angelo doubted very much that they'd look back on their days of parenthood fondly. After all, the boy had been like a Damocles Sword above their worried heads for two years, and now they were finally free to blow town and mess up someplace else, probably at a casino that'd be stupid enough to front them credit.

In the end it didn't matter, they had paid their debt to the Marchetti Family in spades, and regardless of how they may've felt towards erasing that debt, that too didn't matter. They were gone and Angelo wished them nothing but luck, although what they really needed was a good long stint in gamblers anonymous, that or a winning hand in a million dollar blackjack tournament.

Angelo waited in the apartment for Uncle Vincent to come back from an important meeting with Romulus. Vincent hadn't said what the powwow was about, but the kid could tell the big goon had been nervous about going. The Bear had paced the floor while muttering crazily to himself.

Through those nonsensical ramblings, Angelo had discerned a few key words: made, family, and most cryptically of them all, boondocks.

Was the meeting with Romulus to take place out in the boondocks? Or was boondocks an actual spot on the map? Perhaps a business or a club. The word could've meant anything.

"Boondocks," Angelo whispered, and as he did, he suddenly felt faint, dizzy, as if his feet didn't belong inside this upscale apartment, but somewhere else. A place much further down the road, as far as one could possibly travel, perhaps even to another dimension.

Suddenly, the apartment door opened, slammed and then the heavily laid feet of Uncle Vincent marched his wide girth into the living room. There, the big Bear looked down on Angelo with a strange sort of apprehension.

Something big was up, and whatever it was, it involved Angelo specifically.

"Hey," Angelo nodded, a look of worry lain across his handsome face. "How'd your meeting with Romulus go?"

"Stand up!" Vincent exclaimed. "Stand the hell up!"

Angelo climbed onto his feet not so much with caution, but with guarded curiosity. There was sweat on Vincent's thick brow, his breathing appeared shallow as if he'd been running. He looked all bent out of shape and that immediately put Angelo on edge right away.

"What's going on Vincent? Is everything ok?"

"Come with me."

Vincent reached over, grabbed Angelo's leather jacket off a chair and tossed it into his nephew's arms. Angelo quickly slipped into the sleeves and then regarded his uncle with further unease.

"Vincent...what's up?"

"Let's go!"

(38)

The trip in the elevator had been tense. Vincent would briefly glance at Angelo, prepare to say something and then fall strangely quiet. The suspense had the kid wound up tight, but he knew better than to badger his uncle with a barrage of questions. The big galoot seemed to be under enough pressure as it was, the last thing he needed was a game of twenty questions. Besides, Angelo already had an idea what this odd bit of business might be about.

He was eighteen now, an adult, and as such was free to set his life in any direction that he pleased. There was no need to worry about child services coming to haul him away because he hung with the wrong kind of people. Those days were gone forever. He was on his own now, so if he messed up, then he alone would have to stand tall before the man just like everyone else. Bad decisions courted serious consequences now, the kind that either saw you hanging from the end of a rope or stuck inside a freaking bird cage. No more juvey detention hall or house arrest for pinching car stereos, now a fella did hard time next to the psychos and hobos inside a high security Johnny Cash Folsom.

Beyond eighteen the stakes grew significantly, and if Angelo continued down the path he was headed, then tragedy would inevitably find him. Such was the way of the gangster, dangers from both without and within the organization.

They exited the brownstone and got inside of Vincent's luxurious gray Mercedes coupe. The interior smelled of Italian leather and Cuban cigar smoke. Angelo thought to turn on the stereo to ease his anxiety but abstained. Vincent hated Angelo's kind of jungle music at the best of times, not to mention that Angelo knew that if his uncle was going to open up, he'd most certainly do it on the drive.

They weren't two minutes into the trip when Vincent finally broke the silence.

"Romulus wants to meet you."

Despite Angelo's suspicion that this adventure involved the Gambaro Family, he was nonetheless surprised to hear Romulus's name. He thought it would be a lowly group of thugs, loan shark leg breakers, maybe even a bookie, but the big man himself, The Romulus. That was indeed big----huge as a matter of fact.

"Jesus," Angelo whispered.

Suddenly, the kid's hands had become cold and his heart had quickened its beat.

"Freaking hey," Vincent concurred with a curt laugh. "So be on your best behavior Little Capone. No spitting when you talk or picking your nose. And for god's sake call the man sir. No lip, no guff, just Mr. Manners in a Sunday morning church suit...capisce?"

Angelo nodded, although he had secretly dreamed of giving the big cheese an earful for allowing Deluca to go on living and breathing considering what had happened to his mother and father. But today was not the day to air the Marchetti unmentionables, today was a day of acknowledgement, and that in itself was a profound offering of respect from a man who didn't have to give a snot nose punk like Angelo the sweat off of his hairy change purse.

"Why does he want to meet me?" Angelo asked.

Taking his eyes of the road for a moment, Vincent regarded his nephew with an odd curiosity. "He's curious...maybe..." Vincent shook his head and continued to drive. "You know, I've never pressured you to..." Vincent didn't finish the statement, there was no need to, some things were just a given, inherently understood.

"I've wanted in for a long time compadre, you know that." Angelo glanced out the side window, watching the buildings without actually looking at them. "I tried to deny it to myself, tried to convince myself that I was romanticizing murder, but goddamn, I swear this junk is in my blood."

"Blood," Vincent reiterated with a sigh that sounded overly tired. He then crossed himself like a traditional catholic, an act Angelo had never seen before. For a second he actually thought Vincent might burst into flame or get struck by a bolt of lightning. "Forgive me."

Angelo had a suspicion that Vincent hadn't invoked the lord's name, because the prayer for forgiveness had actually been meant for someone else: Angelina Marchetti, Angelo's beloved mother and Vincent's forbidden love.

The car stopped in a small parking lot that was tucked behind the back of a modest Italian restaurant called Donatello's. The parking spaces were a showroom of high end automobiles, imports that cost more than an average man's yearly salary. Here too was the appeal of the gangster lifestyle, that upper class element built of finer things which to many was completely unattainable. Sure, Angelo could go to college for ten years and study his ass off to attain such a lofty income, but why do that when he could have it all by the time he was twenty five.

It was a no brainer.

Easy street was the only road to travel. The Gambaro Family had a top notch organization, and here the kid formerly of Mount Hope Orphanage just happened to have an uncle in the union. He'd be a fool not to pledge to such an exclusive fraternity: the brotherhood of wise guy goodfellas. Sure, some of its shady members needed to be tenderized with a meat hammer, namely Franco Deluca, but the best way for Angelo to get that messy business seen to was from the inside. There, opportunity would patiently wait until that time came, and when it did---bye bye Deluca.

Vincent parked the car, checked his watch and then turned in his seat to look directly at Angelo. "Listen Angelo, I wanted to tell you something. I just wanted to...you know, get some things off my chest."

Angelo nodded and briefly glanced at the Donatello's heavy oak door. For a moment he felt cold, as if he'd seen a door like that somewhere before, perhaps in another life. And then, for a short second, Angelo's feet left the car floor and went travelling through time and space once more, somewhere over the rainbow. Bright colorful candles spotted his eyesight, and for a fraction of a second, Uncle Vincent resembled a ratty haired pirate of a bartender in a midday matinee, Treasure Island or perhaps Sinbad the Sailor. The trip however, was short lived, and soon enough he is back inside the car breathing strong leather and chewing on the pungent aftertaste of cigar smoke. He pegged the experience on nothing more than bad nerves and a lack of sleep the night before. Still, there was a residual feeling trailing closely behind, and it's mild wake was nonetheless distracting. Here he was about to meet the big cheese himself, the one and only Romulus, so the last thing he needed right now was to be off somewhere daydreaming.

"Are you listening to me Little Capone?" Vincent asked with a hint of annoyance.

"Yeah...of course...go on," Angelo assured. "I'm listening."

Vincent crooked his mouth, considered and then accepted the boy's guarantee. "We've known each other a while now and..." He shook his head and laughed at his poor attempt to say what was on his mind. "Jesus H Macy! Here it is Angelo. When I came to you, it was out of love, capisce. Nothing more. Never once did I have an ulterior motive. Never once did I expect anything from you. You were my nephew, my brother's son, and your place was with me, no one else's!" He drove home this latter point with a slam from his beefy hand upon the steering wheel. "Family is everything...blood looks out for blood...everything and everyone else is secondary." At this he bowed his head almost timidly like a submissive dog fearing its master's wrath. "Do you believe me...do you Angelo?"

Why wouldn't Angelo believe Vincent after everything the big goon had done for him? Still, Angelo had to admit he felt morally deceived, or perhaps better stated, manipulated. Motives were seldom selfless, each person had something to gain from their actions. Even good deeds served a Samaritan's emotional addictions with warm fuzzy feelings inside. As for Vincent, he wasn't a saint or a Samaritan, he was very much into the "me" business. He wasn't dishing out bowls of hot chicken noodle at the soup kitchens or stuffing crisp bills into homeless people's hands, he was too busy building himself a huge nest egg while blowing a fair amount of scratch on Columbian blow and high end hookers. But that crap didn't matter to the kid, because if Angelo had that much dime he'd be doing the same thing, too.

The pot and kettle were black and damn proud of it.

Still, where was this going?

That kind of ignorance was downright laughable. The kid knew damn well where this was going and welcomed it with open arms. And perhaps that was the greatest deception of all, the boy letting the big goon in the wide lapel leather jacket think he had led them in this direction.

There was only one thing to say.

"Of course I believe you," Angelo smiled. He was a good looking kid, rugged and rough around the edges the way most girls liked, a rock n roll rebel. "We're family, blood first and foremost, nothing comes before it."

Vincent raised his big head and regarded the young man with deep satisfaction, as if a large weight had been partially lifted from his wide shoulders. "You know what's inside that restaurant...you know where I'm taking you and what will surely follow thereafter."

Angelo nodded once. "I know we've never openly spoken about this, but we both know it was what I wanted...what we wanted."

At that inclusion, Vincent couldn't help but look away, as if seeking an answer from the Almighty. "What I said earlier...I meant it...I never set you on this path knowingly...but..." He closed his eyes and rubbed at his nose as if it had a bad itch and then stared deep into the boy's steel gaze. "I'd be lying if I said I didn't want you in with me...that I haven't thought about it for a long time."

A soft casual smirk lit up Angelo's stern face. He was young, but he looked weathered on an age that set its clock by an old soul's timepiece. "I'm a Marchetti...I was born to be what I am...and I have no regrets nor will I ever. This choice is mine alone, not yours. But I am honored to hear you say that you want me in with you, and I'll gladly accept that position if Gambaro will allow it."

Reaching over, Vincent let that giant mitt of a hand of his press upon Angelo's athletic neck tightly, but affectionately. "You're a man Little...no...no more Little Capone...just Angelo."

Angelo raised up his hand and squeezed on Vincent's. "So...what do you think? Should we go inside and dazzle these mothers with some Marchetti charm or what?"

A boisterous laugh erupted from Vincent's wide mouth in a roar. "Classy gents off to the goddamn county club. Va-voom!"

Both men climbed out of the car and into the sting of a hot afternoon sun.

It was here that Angelo got his first clue that something was terribly wrong.

(39)

Midday heat wrapped its hot electric fingers around Angelo's face as the sun made his eyes squint from its brightness. It was a gorgeous day: no wind, no clouds, nothing to come between the sun and the warped cracked pavement of the Donatello's back parking lot.

There in lay the problem, the conflict.

Why was that?

Angelo couldn't figure it out. It felt as though the world had just lied to him, that somehow in a less than effective effort to bluff its way through an old story of which it had absolutely no recollection, it had messed up and had inadvertently tipped its hand. But what cards had it shown? What was the dilemma?

Angelo walked beside Vincent, their feet choreographed with confident footfalls. One a sizable linebacker of a specimen, the other a tall lean quarterback with wild dark hair. They had determined looks upon their weathered faces, but as for the younger of the two, he nonetheless appeared to be preoccupied, as if perhaps he had just received a full out case of the heebie-jeebies. An odd thing to have happen on such a lovely day, but its presence was incontrovertible.

Vincent's big mitt grabbed onto the large iron handle of the restaurant's heavy oak door and pulled. As the door swung open, Angelo was taken aback by a variety of strong odors. Cigar smoke, cooked meat, old wood that had eaten more than its share of hard age. But there was also something else in the mix, subtle, faint, a staleness associated with rot. Dead that had died if that made any sense, a conundrum.

Immediately, Angelo's hands darted beneath the stiff lapels of his leather jacket with incredible speed. They were searching for something vital, something that should be there but wasn't.

"What's the matter?" Vincent asked, startled by Angelo's quick moves. "You okay?"

Angelo's hands came away from his ribs and hung empty beside his hips. He felt naked, vulnerable and eerily out of place. It was kind of like déjà vu without the familiar backdrop. And there it was again, that blistering sun baking the high end luxury automobiles in garish urban light. It didn't belong here, at least not today and just how he knew that was impossible to explain. But if the kid could compare this experience to a déjà vu, then he'd say the thing that felt missing was thunder and lightning.

That was it! The goddamn weather was wrong! It was supposed to be raining today, buckets if he wasn't mistaken, but even that forecast seemed incorrect.

Thunder and lighting.

"Angelo?" Vincent snapped his fingers in front of his nephew's face. "Anyone home?"

Angelo blinked, stretched his fingers and then nodded with a slight ease of a smile. "Sorry Uncle...I just felt...a twinge in my back. It's okay now."

Vincent appraised his nephew with due consideration. "Well, just don't be making no herky-jerky movements in front of the big boss man, capisce. He might think that you're going for a gun or something, and that's bound to be bad for both of us."

"Yeah," Angelo laughed with a laid back manner. However, the kid felt wound up, disoriented and more than a little bit confused. "Oh, wasn't it supposed to be raining today?"

Vincent hunched his eyebrows and then laughed. "Get the hell out of here. What do I look like, a freaking weathervane?"

Angelo smiled warmly and shrugged, but inside he couldn't help but feel as though thunder and lightning were missing.

(40)

The Donatello was a dimly lit bar and grill, late night ambiance would be the best phrase to describe it. In here it always looked like midnight, a den where seasoned alcoholics no doubt came to nurse old habits and where deals with the devil were often made. The mahogany tables sat empty, hardwood leather upholstered booths vacant, a small pool room in a separate section haunted by a short old man who might've had one inch on a midget. This skinny elf wore a blue polyester leisure suit, and when he noticed Angelo and Vincent standing in the entrance, he merely nodded cordially and then snapped off a powerful break with the cue ball.

Four balls went in.

Angelo trailed after Vincent as they moved through the dining area and around a corner to where a well stocked bar sat beneath a trellis of wine glasses and creeping vine lights. The mirror on the wall was spotless, except for where someone had written on it with red marker.

Shots $3.00

Hard stuff $8.50

Beer $8.75

Kitchen open till midnight

Happy Hour 6 till 9 Monday-Friday

But it was not the menu that gave Angelo pause, it was the thing that sat in the middle of the mirror like a big eyesore. There someone had drawn a huge question mark between a set of wavy quotation marks. Why had they done that? It had no relevance to anything, but then again, Angelo felt it was of the utmost significance.

"Have you thought of your question yet?"

Angelo spun quickly, eyes narrow and sharp, stance poised for sudden action. "What? What did you say?"

Vincent stopped, turned around, surprised by his nephew's reaction. "Jesus...what's with you today? Judging by the way you look you'd think I'd just said something disrespectful about your mother, god rest her soul. Are you okay?"

"What did you say? Something about a question."

Vincent nodded, regarded the mirror for a second and then fixed Angelo with a strange stare. "What I meant was that you must be wondering about Romulus...you must have a few questions for him...I was curious if you knew what you were going to ask him, that's all."

Angelo squeezed his eyes tight and then rubbed at his forehead with massaging fingers. "I'm sorry, Vincent. I guess I'm just a bit edgy." He looked at the mirror with the gaudy question mark. "What the hell is that thing supposed to mean?"

Vincent studied the grammar symbol and then shrugged. "Damned if I know...maybe it's supposed to be a hook or a cane."

"Inside quotation marks?"

Again Vincent shrugged. "It's irrelevant. Come on, let's get a groove on. And by the way, no questions about Deluca or your folks, capisce."

"Capisce."

As if Angelo had to be told that bit of information. He may've only been eighteen, but he wasn't stupid. No, the subject of mom and pop and that miserable son of a bitch named Deluca were most definitively taboo subjects when it came to Romulus. But then again if the big cheese should offer to mention the incident, then Angelo would jump on the opportunity with both feet.

As they walked, Angelo's caution gave way to the significance of the grammar symbol on the barroom mirror. Its presence denoted a question as well as Vincent's suggestion. Was that a coincidence? Angelo couldn't decipher it, and what his gut said didn't seem to make much sense either. It insinuated that's why Angelo felt so weird, awkward, so hopelessly out of place. It suggested that maybe the bar and everything in it was in actuality built from the deceptive smoke of a dream. But that was crazy, right off the freaking map kind of crazy, but still, the gut grumbled and complained and it was everything for Angelo to ignore it.

(41)

They walked past a row of one armed bandits, a gaming room filled with roulette wheels flanked by a dozen or so blackjack and poker tables, and into another lounge area with a small stage that was cluttered with musical instruments and amplifiers. It was beside this stage that they saw six men who easily rivaled Vincent in size and power: the Gambaro hired goon patrol.

They stood causally before a thick door that had been fashioned from a sturdy trunk of maple, a door that had a solitary symbol engraved into its finely sanded wood. It was of a serpent, a king cobra coiled on its tail like a roll of rope, its hooded head bowed, fangs exposed in a poisonous hiss. It was an amazing work of art, but the snake's exquisite detail escaped Angelo's mindful eye and was perceived by his imagination which couldn't help but notice just how much the damn thing looked like a question mark.

The goons offered no greeting, just the dangerous eyes of very large men who knew how to hurt people. It was obvious that they'd been expecting the duo, and judging by the expression on their faces they seemed quite curious about the young man with the shaggy hair and the Manhattan designer jacket.

Systematically the Marchettis were frisked and checked for weapons. After a clean bill of sale the duo were permitted access into the Big Kahuna's chamber of secrets and it was in there that the very world fell out from beneath Angelo's feet once and for all.

(42)

Lightning blinded Angelo's eyes while thunder deafened his ears. A sour bitter aftertaste of muddy soil filled his mouth and permeated into his nostrils with a stale stench so vile that it constricted his stomach into a single spasm of projectile vomit. All was darkness, except for that residual remnant of the lightning flash which continued to show Angelo's brain a dull display of mute fireworks.

Dry heaves gasped out of his parched mouth like a beached fish. His body felt deathly cold, cocooned within a frost so hard that it splintered the bone. Somewhere in the dark his hands itched and burned from frostbite, his toes felt crushed, his ears two husks that had been submerged into liquid nitrogen. But despite the severity of these torments, they were nothing in comparison to the angst within his heart. This ailment wasn't physical, but psychological, maybe even spiritual. It felt as though he had regurgitated more than just a bad batch of booze or a poorly settled breakfast, but as though he had puked out a part of his very soul.

How could that be?

He couldn't have, it was impossible, damn foolishness to think otherwise, a man hurled cookies, not karma. But nonetheless, Angelo felt emptier, depleted of a goodness he never knew existed, perhaps robbed of that virtue known as grace. Regardless of the sorrowful sensation, he willed himself to ignore it. Instinct reminded him of the importance of being mobile, only poets had time to bleed buckets, as for pirates, they just got nasty.

Angelo clenched his teeth, growled, squeezed his hands into two frozen clubs. Knuckles popped and cracked, felt as though they might split at the joints like fractured doweling. The pain was excruciating, but served to clear his head, and before Angelo knew it his thoughts had flown back out of the barroom mirror and into the crusty frigid shell that was his waiting body.

CHAPTER THREE

RED

(1)

The entire experience had only taken a second, as if Angelo's spirit had just performed a quick paranormal bungee jump. Time, like that ethereal bungee cord had somehow stretched perception and warped space, exaggerating the incident by a supernatural factor of approximately ten billion. With great effort, Angelo launched off the barstool and onto his feet. The heels within his rattlesnake skin boots felt rickety, but able enough to stand. Meanwhile, his frozen hands touched the smooth slick handles of Thunder and Lightning, prepared to draw steel and blow deadly smoke up the bartender's ass at the slightest provocation, when he suddenly paused.

There appeared to be no immediate danger. The fireplace continued to blast out scorching heat, while the lanterns and candles continued to throw their eerie yellowish light from wall to wall. As for the huge decorative mirror, it clung stubbornly to its bony frame, seemingly quite docile in nature, or merely content for the time being. Still, Angelo appraised the room and the bartender with shrewd eyes that showed they were more than just a little bit pissed off, they were furious.

"You son of a bitch!" Marchetti snapped. "You could've at least warned me!"

The bartender grinned, picked up Angelo's shot glass, spat in it and then proceeded to wipe it out with a dish rag. "Ask your first question death merchant, and then let's have at red."

Question?

Of course, the hitman had a question to ask, the first of three. The question however, was what question to ask? Slowly, Angelo wandered back over to the bar where he reclaimed his barstool and fixed the glorified suds monkey with a gaze that had no qualms about expressing how much it would like to pop the bartender square in the nose.

The bartender was not intimidated, in fact he seemed relaxed to the point where he was almost bored. What was the source of that smugness? That was a good question to ask, but unfortunately not very helpful in this situation.

Angelo analyzed the situation like a job that had unexpectedly gone bad, which wasn't far from the truth. What were the priorities? Foremost as always was survival, secondary in this case would be direction, thirdly would count on the first two. Three lousy questions, not enough information could possibly stem from three stinking questions. What's the meaning of life? Is there a God? What happened to Jimmy Hoffa? Big answers for big questions, but on a smaller scale you had to nitpick the details in order to construct a plan, because if you didn't get the specifics correct, then you could end up, well, almost anywhere. Dead inside a dumpster, tits up in a snow bank, lost somewhere over the rainbow, take your pick.

Angelo eyed the next drink, red, contemplating his next move like a champion chess player.

What question would he ask?

(2)

What had become of Bianca Gambaro came to the forefront of the hitman's thoughts: had she survived her father's wrath? But such knowledge was irrelevant to Boondocks and this situation in particular. The hitman needed to remain focused on the task at hand if he were to survive. Angelo recalled the bartender's dictation of the house rules: complete the three tasks and safe passage from Boondocks would be granted.

Safe Passage to where?

Although the barkeep had not specified that the three questions were intimately connected to that state of liberty known as safe passage, Angelo nonetheless believed their presence within the drinking game to be of paramount significance. They were insane rules concocted by an enigmatic spiritual bureaucracy, perhaps by the very cosmological entities that decided that daylight should burn vampires and silver bullets should kill werewolves.

There was no logical sense to be had here, and if Angelo tried to discover it, then he'd be on a quest to piss in the corner of a round room. What he needed was the safe passage guarantee, and the best way to assure that release was to successfully maneuver three measly questions.

Outside the wind moaned like a mindless zombie, shook the door with phantom fists and cursed the hitman for having escaped its cold embrace. Marchetti ignored the haunted wail, reached over and placed the scarlet shot glass between his thumb and forefinger, examining its ghostly radiance with lackluster enthusiasm.

What would red taste like? And after he drank it, where would he go flying next?

He had no desire to find out.

What do I ask? What's your favorite color...number...song...flavor ice cream...sexual position? Who cuts your freaking hair? Where can a guy have a squat, shave, and a shower? Oh, and why the hell am I drinking this swill?

And then it dawned on him.

There was only one question to ask, one so simple it had eluded him. He guessed the old saying was true, sometimes the best place to hide something was out in the open.

"Can I go back?" Angelo said as he nodded at the mirror, implying that the looking glass were perhaps a time tunnel or dimensional portal, a doorway between worlds that could possibly allow a man to pass through and live again.

If that were so, then where and when would it send him? Into the distant past or a second before he got a hole blown through the middle of his chest on that humid casino rooftop?

Angelo awaited the reply.

The bartender glanced back at the mirror and nodded in understanding. "Second chance huh? Figure you've got some fences to mend back on good ole terra firma. That it Angelo?"

"You gonna answer my question with a question barkeep, or are you gonna give me my due?"

Angelo had posed the question with more than its share of attitude. He was still steamed about the brown incident, and not likely to forget the experience anytime soon.

The bartender crooked a grin and nodded an agreement. "So be it death merchant...you've paid your fare."

"Taste of one and a question shall be granted an answer," Angelo recited.

"So say the house rules," the bartender concurred. "And as such, I shall answer your question. The answer is...yes...a man may go back and live of flesh and bone again, for the boundary between the planes of existence is..." At this the barkeep smiled with a dangerous cunning. "Flexible."

Flexible---what the hell did that mean? Already Angelo had another question. Damn, this was going to be just as the hitman feared: the barkeep's answers would only beget more questions. With only three questions the outcome would look circular, a riddle with no definitive answers. Suddenly, Boondocks and The Last Chance Saloon felt like monuments to metaphors, the kind of vague interpretation that always courted abstract art or a T.S. Eliot poem.

Still, what were Angelo's options?

Slowly, his eyes fell upon red with more than a share of hesitation. Brown had tasted like mud from a dirt floor whorehouse and had made him puke so hard that it felt as though a part of his soul had shot out into the darkness just behind his butthole. He had no desire to taste that scarlet red upon his reluctant tongue, but he needed another answer, and the only way to get it would be to bear red's bitter sting.

Unfortunately, the only thing Angelo could count on was that the shot glass held an evil certainty that he would soon drink, and then as before, reality would drift like smoke upon an unpredictable wind, and where it took him then, only red would know.

(3)

In one quick toss, Angelo swallowed scarlet red. It rolled over the tongue like molten lava, an acidic cocktail seasoned on hints of copper and sulfuric brimstone. It was hot, syrupy, a mixture of fire ants covered in a slick coat of Tiger Balm. The unearthly heat plunged down the esophagus and splashed into Angelo's guts until it tied his intestines up into tightly wound knots of barbwire. Every muscle tightened, convulsed, twisted beneath a slick layer of sweat that had suddenly broken out over his entire body. His fingers worked the shot glass clumsily until it cracked down the center and dropped onto the bar counter in two jagged pieces. Blood poured from the hitman's cut fingers, but the wounds hadn't registered with Angelo's nervous system at all. He was too busy cataloging the passage of fire engine red through his vital organs to notice something as inconsequential as a nasty boo-boo.

The hitman leaned forward, elbows braced precariously upon the bar counter for support. If brown had been like graveyard soil, then surely red was like the Devil's blood. Still, despite the agony inflicted by the poison, Angelo abstained a scream of pain. Instead, he focused on the mirror with stubborn determination, teeth jammed together in a steel bear trap, eyes fixated on the ethereal looking glass with a shade of deep seeded defiance.

Last time, the mirror had sucked him in by surprise, but not this time. This time he would meet the damn thing head on, and when he did, he'd be ready for it. Despite the pain that burned his guts into parched ash, Angelo concentrated on the immediate surroundings. He told himself that if he could remain alert, that when their minds touched, then perhaps he might be able to glimpse into the mirror's essence and salvage some useful information or a valuable secret mayhap.

"Now you're riding a bull from the Devil's own herd," the bartender said in a glum tone. "Two fingers of damnation brewed in a cauldron of dragon's breath." He nodded, casually saluted and then gave a cordial wink as if bidding an old friend so long. "Ride hard Marchetti and ride quick for death merchants spark the finest kindling on the forbidden trails of Boondocks."

Angelo didn't much care for that wink. It looked too final, too sure of itself. The hitman thought to ask what kind of nonsense the old fool was rambling on about, but his tongue felt as though it had melted and slid into his stomach. There would be no arguing or sarcastic witticisms until after this leg of the journey had been completed.

The fire that ran from the hitman's tonsils down into his bowels felt like a strip of napalm and began to spread into his frozen limbs and brain, but still the fingers at the ends of his hands ached of cold. How could that be? It seemed to defy the laws of physics.

Meanwhile, Thunder and Lightning kept their silence, as if they too had lost their voice to the scarlet brushfire. Whatever was happening to Angelo, he understood that scarlet red wanted him to just let go, to stop resisting the urge to fight and simply fall back through the looking glass to a time and space of the mirror's choosing. The drink spoke to him on a subliminal level, whispered its commands into his subconscious mind like a skilled hypnotist. It promised the hitman that the pain would cease if he complied with its wishes. But Angelo continued to defy reason, bucked the bull, sucked up the pain and kept his thoughts firmly anchored inside his aching head.

(4)

The bartender studied Angelo with noticeable curiosity and mild astonishment. Never before had he seen a soul hold out against scarlet red for so long. If Angelo was truly riding the bull, then the hit man had just set an all time dimensional record. Still, the bartender reminded himself that battles such as these, although rare, had one thing in common: the inevitable. Soon the ground would give out from beneath the hitman, and when it did, the hitman's essence would slip out of its body and dip into the magical mirror where untold knowledge would illuminate The Last Chance Saloon like a movie shown inside an old time nickelodeon theater.

Nonetheless, the barkeep felt uneasy, concerned that maybe this soul might be different in some inexplicable way, that perhaps Sartomonius might actually do the unthinkable: yield an answer to final black.

Impossible?

But just when the bartender began to entertain the absurd, the defiant hitman began to slide into the mirror just as all those who had come before him had. This surrender came as a great relief to the bartender, but then it was not to be unexpected. After all, no one had ever defied scarlet red indefinitely, and no one, but no one throughout all of spiritual history had ever asked a question of final black.

So said the sacred parchments, amen.

(5)

Slowly the entire bar dipped into a shade of scarlet red before Angelo's watery eyes. At first it had been a stalemate, a place where neither push nor pull could claim victory of his mind. But that delicate balance had eventually shifted in favor of scarlet red. It felt as though Angelo's snakeskin boots had suddenly slipped out from beneath him and as a result the hitman had been tossed into a slow motion freefall. His thoughts tumbled across the bar just as they had before, except this time the bar looked different. Now it resembled a pagan church built to a god that demanded blood rituals. The liquor bottles had transformed, coiled and hissed like basket vipers that had been charmed by a magic flute's warbled tune. The mirror was a sea of shiny sails, thousands upon thousands of razor blades adrift on a tiny ocean of liquid silver. The bones inside the frame expanded and closed like rotted fingers, reaching out from beneath the heavy press of a tomb's slab as if to grab the hitman and drag him into a realm of spiritual bondage.

Thunder and Lightning itched for some target practice, but Angelo reminded them and himself that an answer was to be had within. So he let his essence willingly delve into that mesh of steely teeth, and as it did, he tried to snatch a glimpse into the mystical workings of the enchanted mirror. But as he did, he couldn't help but notice that a strong odor had been stuffed into both of his nostrils.

It was the scent of Old Spice and burnt tobacco leaves.

(6)

The wild carnival ride had deposited Angelo back inside the Donatello restaurant with remarkable precision. The young man with the waist length leather jacket and faded denim jeans had absolutely no recollection about falling through a demon mirror nor tasting the devil's blood which a mangy old barkeep referred to as scarlet red. As far as the kid was concerned, not a single second had passed since he'd last stood inside Romulus's back office. A gray shade of amnesia had befallen the kid's mind, told him everything was just peachy, that there was no question mark to be found on the barroom mirror, just a short list of beverage prices, that was all. As for the weather, that too was as it should be. There was no concern that there should be thunder and lightning today, in fact he was quite certain that reality was exactly as it should be.

The door to Romulus's office was quietly shut behind Vincent and Angelo by one of the goons, all of which remained outside on guard.

The office was large, decorated with luxurious furniture that had been skillfully upholstered with red Italian silk. Oak shelves accessorized an oak desk which was an organized clutter of official documents, a crystal pentagram ash tray, a 357 magnum, a laptop computer, and a nest of family photographs along with miniature military figurines such as the Esercito Italiano and the Marina Militare.

As for the man behind the desk, he wasn't anything like Angelo had expected.

This man smiled warmly, looked hale despite his obesity and thin oily hair. His aging skin was oven roast brown, slick with a Mediterranean olive oil texture, a man who'd probably sweat in the dead of winter. Still, he looked clean, like an old barbershop cutter who reeked of pomade and shaving cream. When Romulus stood, he adjusted his belt as though there wasn't enough fat to keep his brown polyester pants wrapped snugly around his wide hips. As he approached, the scent of Old Spice and tobacco pushed out before him like a pressure wave off the bow of a boat. Romulus must've bathed in the cologne, but then Angelo figured it was better than sniffing B.O.

"Vincent," Romulus said with wide open arms. "Welcome back my amico fidato."

Both men hugged and slapped each other firmly on the back. Despite Romulus's impressive size, he was still nonetheless dwarfed by Vincent.

"Grazie," Vincent replied.

When they separated, their attention immediately focused on Angelo. A few words were exchanged in Italian, most of which escaped Angelo's ability to translate, but what he did gather from the brief conversation were the words, nephew, family, scrapper and hoodlum.

"Ah Angelo," Romulus said with a broad grin which displayed a gold incisor tooth. "Welcome to the Donatello." He then hugged Angelo and swatted him on the back so hard that the kid almost belched. "You like it here...we put you to work, yes?"

Romulus released the boy from the bear hug embrace, but still held him tightly by the shoulders. For a moment, Angelo could imagine how easily it would be to offend a man such as this. He could tell Romulus was the type of individual folks described as being "big feeling." This man took everything to heart, wanted everything his way, and if things didn't go in that direction, then lord help those responsible. Yes, a man like this could turn on a postage stamp, shake your hand just before he ripped your throat out with little to no warning.

Despite Romulus's apparent cordial nature, Angelo could see this man for who he truly was: a predator. And as Angelo had learned from Uncle Vincent, the best way to please a predator was to hunt within its pack.

Angelo smiled and then nodded. "Yes...of course...work here...absolutely sir...that'd be just great...thank you."

Romulus continued to stare into the boy's eyes for an awkward length of time, appraising the kid in his own unique way, perhaps sizing him up for a coffin, who knew. Meanwhile, Vincent studied Romulus, trying to imagine what the big cheese thought about the Bear's beloved nephew. It was almost as if the big greasy were purchasing a used car or a dress suit. Did Angelo get excellent mileage per gallon? Did he come in pin stripe gray? Whatever the big chief was thinking, Vincent nonetheless understood that if he wanted to stare, then you let the big guy stare.

As for Angelo, he was a bit more presumptuous than Vincent. He was certain that he understood what was going through the top dog's mind, and that mysterious something involved a slew of unmentionable issues. And just how the kid knew this involved a reading of the eyes.

Angelo may've been young, but he was observant and seasoned with an edge of experience that went well beyond his years. Tragedy had a way of tempering a soul, hammering and folding it like a sword upon an anvil. In this case, Angelo's keen edge had easily sliced through to the truth and exposed Romulus's mind via his muddied brown, but telling eyes. Those eyes spoke of an unfortunate situation which had yielded terrible circumstances for a young boy a long time ago. They told their deep regret in regards to that sad state of affair. They acknowledged the injustice that had been dealt to the young man, confessed to it, but they nonetheless reserved the right of executive privilege when it came to dispensing with such matters. With Romulus the buck stopped here, and the code dictated the flow of things.

Made men were not to be touched.

And although Angelo may've understood the nature of that mafia doctrine, it didn't mean he had to like it.

"You'll do well here, hey," Romulus said with a light wink, his Sicilian accent thickening. He then gathered an arm around Angelo's shoulders and sat the young man down in a plush leather chair before the oak desk. "You're uncle is good people...he's stand up guy...you be a stand up guy, too...I see...I know."

Angelo bowed his head respectfully and smiled. "Thank you sir, you honor me with your kind words."

Vincent sighed quietly, relieved to see that Romulus was taking to his nephew and that Angelo was being nothing but a complete little gentlemen.

"Ah," Romulus said with another wink as he retook a seat behind his cluttered desk. "Manners...is good you speak well, hey. You tell me what you likes, no."

Angelo smirked, thought to say pussy, but reminded himself to be professional in such fair company. "Cars sir...I like cars and money just fine."

Romulus laughed loudly, tapped the desk with the big gold rings upon his thick beefy fingers. "And when you have the cars and the money, the woman come easily."

"Va-voom," Angelo said, surprised to hear his uncle's catchphrase had worked itself into his vocabulary.

"You get car...money come too if you work well," Romulus assured as he eased from a laugh into a warm smile that really showed off his gold incisor. "Climb the...how you say?" This request was almost barked at Vincent.

"The ladder," Vincent replied with a polite nod.

"Yes. You climb ladder," Romulus nodded. "Make money, drive nice car, settle down with a good Italian girl, have babies, name them after me." Again Romulus burst into laughter, amused by his own cleverness.

Both Marchettis reciprocated the man's humor with sincere enough chuckles.

Truth told one never got too comfortable in the presence of Romulus. Sometimes the man had a nasty tendency to go cannibal for no obvious reason, and so it was always best to keep the man happy and remain on his good side if at all possible.

"Loyalty first and foremost," Romulus said more as instruction than warning. "Respect the Family...uphold the Gambaro name and all your dreams will come true."

Kill Deluca whistled through Angelo's mind like a cold Arctic wind, but the boy showed no expression of murder upon his face, instead he displayed the mild amusement of a young man who had just been charmed by a gracious host.

"Yes sir," Angelo nodded. "I would never do anything to dishonor Gambaro." Glancing back over his shoulder briefly, Angelo gave Vincent a quick confident wink. "My uncle has taught me well over the years sir. Gambaro's values and mine are one and the same."

"Excellent," Romulus grinned as he rubbed his thick hands together. "An apple fresh off the Marchetti tree." Romulus then sat forward, his hands loosely laced together, his face growing ever so lightly somber. "It is a good name...the Marchetti. Good history...vintage name...old name...trusted name...Gambaro love Marchetti like own blood. You bleed, Gambaro bleed, you hurt, Gambaro hurt." He then offered up a wicked little grin, one that said don't mess with the bull. "But no worry...no one mess Gambaro, hey...no one mess Marchetti, too...capisce?"

Angelo nodded with the understanding that Romulus had just extended Gambaro's protection around Angelo. It was a strange feeling, like being sheltered inside the jaws of a hungry shark.

"Capisce sir," Angelo replied.

"Gambaro most powerful family in entire world," Romulus boasted with visible pride. "Cross sea more than century ago...built from nothing...now international organization. Gambaro...how you say?"

Romulus looked to Vincent for an answer, but the reply came from Angelo.

"Bigger than Jesus."

Romulus looked at the boy, furrowed his heavy set brow and then broke into a fit of boisterous laughter. "Yes...yes...bigger than the Jesus!"

Again, Angelo and Vincent sang in chorus with Romulus's merriment lest they offend him in same inane manner.

"Tomorrow morning, nine o'clock you come Donatello...meet Two Tone Marty...he put you work," Romulus instructed.

Of course Angelo had school tomorrow, but he had plans of dropping out anyway, this job offer just confirmed it.

"Yes sir," Angelo nodded. "Thank you. Nine o'clock sharp. I'll be here."

Romulus stood, extended his hand across the desk to Angelo in a warm handshake. Angelo stood, reached over and took hold of Romulus's meaty hand, and that's when the kid messed up royally.

(7)

The moment had been perfect, the wrapping up of a short impromptu business meeting which had seen Angelo welcomed into an organization of long standing tradition. The deal was done, Angelo had Romulus's flesh pressed firmly within his own. Tomorrow morning Angelo would return to the Donatello and report to a guy named Two Toned Marty for workplace orientation.

How could anything possibly go wrong?

But it had.

And all because of a casual glance.

Except the glance had been anything but causal, it had been blatantly telling. Angelo's steel gray eyes had caught sight of a picture upon Romulus's desk, and then those eyes locked into place for all of about three seconds. It had been here that a pressure had begun to wander up through Angelo's wrist as Romulus's big mitt of a hand began to press down onto Angelo's with surmounting weight. That sensation had snapped Angelo out of his brief trance with incredible efficiency.

Romulus's eyes locked onto the young man with severe consequences in mind, preparing to go cannibal, when Romulus suddenly eased up his grip and much to his own surprise began to grin.

Romulus had no doubt how rough around the edges this Angelo kid was. Hell, the boy was Vincent Marchetti's nephew, that fact alone said the kid was no damn saint. But here this nasty little street punk hoodlum had done the most endearing thing, and as a result, Romulus had been immediately disarmed. It was such a simple act, but enough to save the kid's ass from being dragged out into the Donatello's back alley and beaten like a mangy dog.

And what pray-tell had that gesture been exactly?

Angelo Marchetti had blushed.

It had been such an innocent thing, a young man who had been immediately smitten on sight with a picture of Romulus's only daughter. Now the street smart kid wore puppy dog eyes, the stern lines in his ready face had gone limp. No, the boy had not looked at his daughter with lust, but with genuine virtue, and as such had been helpless to thwart off her infectious appeal.

"My daughter...Bianca," Romulus whispered with a smile that was not without an element of danger.

Angelo nodded, turned an even deeper shade of red and then actually stammered. "Oh, she's, I, nice yes."

And despite himself, that steadfast determination that Angelo prided himself on, his eyes nonetheless betrayed him once more as they stole yet another look without thinking. It was only after a few seconds that he even realized that he was doing it again and had to pry his eyes away from her image.

Now Angelo's tongue didn't work at all.

Sweat broke out upon his brow in visible beads, the warmth of his hand transformed into ice, his mouth dried into desert sand. It was obvious that the big boss had seen straight through him, and as a result, Angelo didn't know what to expect from Romulus. How stupid could he have been? How goddamn careless. But still, the girl in the photograph was a vision, the most beautiful creature he had ever seen, and if he didn't think he might get his nuts cut off with a rusty razor, then he would've most gladly ventured one last glance.

"She's going to marry a nice boy...capisce?" Romulus said with a playful, but serious wink.

Angelo swallowed hard and nodded in understanding.

It was clear that Angelo was not a nice boy, at least not in the eyes of Romulus Gambaro. Angelo was the lowly hired help, and Bianca Gambaro was an unattainable mafia princess. The two elements did not mix. If Angelo was lucky maybe someday he might hold a door open for her, but as for laying his filthy peasant lips upon her, forget about it. Angelo also understood that the big man was cutting him a break for whatever reason, and that it would be wise for him to slip out of this office quickly and quietly, and in the future to only speak to Romulus when spoken to.

And that's exactly what Angelo Marchetti did.

(8)

Outside on the Donatello's parking lot Vincent hauled off and gave Angelo a good swift smack across the back of his idiotic head. "What the hell was that crap?"

Angelo rubbed the back of his head with care. It felt like he'd just been clipped by a rock. "I..."

"You what?"

"I...I...screw me."

"Don't you be ogling Bianca," Vincent growled. "Or the old man will deep fry your balls and that's nothing compared to what I'll do to ya. Capisce?"

Opening the car door, Vincent sat down inside with the kind of speed that always proceeded those who were royally pissed off. As for Angelo, he reluctantly took the passenger side seat, mindful that a lecture was just about to begin.

"Jesus H Macy, Angelo," Vincent yelled as he slammed the car door. "What's a matter for you, huh? You got dung for brains or something? That dick of yours is going to get you castrated! Of all the stupid things to do! I praise you up, get you a freaking job, and you go make eyes at the boss's little girl!"

Angelo had no intelligent reply, and although he realized just how close he had come to being dipped into some serious hot oil, he couldn't stop thinking about the girl in the picture, the one he would never have.

(9)

The jobs had been the pits, but the money was good. At least good enough for Angelo to move out of Vincent's brownstone and into his own bachelor pad. Those dreams Romulus had promised may not have come true yet, but they were definitely on the horizon. Hell, he was only twenty one years old and already he had a German sports car bought and paid for, plus an apartment full of all the modern luxuries. If things kept up this good, within another four years he would buy a house outright with cash.

Still, he worked in an environment where the high rollers came to dip their beaks on a daily basis, the Gambaro inner circle of the mafia's who's who. It served as a constant reminder of just how low on the totem pole Angelo sat and what real money looked like. Those jet-set wise guys always drove the best cars, courted the finest women and carried the thickest money clips inside their designer suits. When a made man strolled into the joint, you could recognize him by the confident swagger, the gorgeous dame on his arm and the aura of notable wealth. Those guys always tipped big time and were shown the kind of respect reserved for kings. They were the masters of their age and Angelo Marchetti wanted very much to be listed amongst their ranks.

Of course when you played on that level of the game, folks not only got hurt, they got killed. Sometimes high rollers disappeared into nowhere, like this one guy named Easy Eddy. Easy had been a good looking guy with a fondness for red heads with ample assets. The guy had been dopey comical in nature, cool and laid back with the ladies, the kind of guy you wanted at your party. He tipped the Donatello bus boys and serving staff generously, and offered Romulus impressive tributes whenever fate had tossed him a good business deal. But still, despite being popular, the guy had up and vanished into thin air, and that could only mean one thing: someone out there hadn't liked Easy Eddy as much as everyone else. Regardless of why or what had happened, it didn't change the fact that Easy Eddy had disappeared like wood smoke in an august gale. Angelo guessed that in the end all the big tips and clever jokes in the world hadn't been enough to save Easy Eddy from a shallow grave. It was the kind of lesson the kid took to heart, reminded him to be wary of friends and enemies alike, and that the eyes that really mattered were the ones in the back of your head.

Yet despite the risks, Angelo still wanted in. The lifestyle was too seductive to resist, too exciting to ignore. The element of danger only amplified its romantic appeal, made you feel alive. So he played the Gambaro game patiently, waiting for that one big break that would elevate him onto the next level where the money bought prestige and prestige courted respect.

And when that big opportunity finally arrived, Angelo didn't just climb the ladder of success, he shot through the stratosphere like a goddamn rocket.

(10)

It had been a beautiful spring day, one that had seen the Donatello close for a very special occasion. It was an invitation only function, a birthday celebration for Romulus's daughter, Bianca Gambaro. She was turning twenty-one and the big boss had emptied the bar of its usual criminal riffraff in order to give his special princess an extravagant party. The dining room was a clutter of colorful streamers, helium balloons and poster sized pictures of Bianca throughout various stages of her young life. There were tasteful photos of her horseback riding, playing on park swings, riding a red tricycle, performing a pirouette in a ballet recital, skiing down a rough patch of mountain moguls and many others. Each image told the tale of a very happy and active life, but the picture Angelo loved best was the one where Bianca wasn't doing anything at all. In that ordinary shot she simply stood on a summer beach boardwalk, head tilted slightly to the side as if to say stop messing around and take the picture already.

Angelo studied that picture with complete adoration, worshipping the girl he would never have with wanting eyes. All morning he kept coming back to it, staring while everyone else busily prepared for the party in the hours to come. If only he could take it home, then he'd put it on his bedroom wall, a shrine where he could worship her in private. But he didn't dare touch it, for if Romulus found out that he had stolen it, then Angelo would lose his manhood for sure.

No, snatching this work of art would be worse than stealing the Mona Lisa as far as the consequences went. Besides, there was a sign just inside the Donatello's main door which pretty much said it all.

"Five finger discounters get five finger screwed!"

Needless to say, no one messed with the law.

(11)

The clock over the bar read eleven-fifteen in the morning. A few dozen early birds settled into their reserved seating assignments throughout the dining hall. The group was a mixed bag of relatives, teenage friends and general well-wishers. The hodgepodge of a group had piled birthday presents upon a designated gift table, which had been set up next to the bandstand. Most of the crowd pecked away on a wide variety of finger foods while they waited. Others took the opportunity to load up on an ample supply of free booze.

Overall, the bar's atmosphere was subdued, but nonetheless tempered with an excited energy that always preceded a party. Bianca would show up at noon and then the meal would begin at one o'clock. At two o'clock the cake would arrive. Afterwards, there would be live entertainment, a rock band and a standup comedian, then the floor would open up for a dance DJ to spin some contemporary hits. Supper would follow at six until seven, and then the party would rock out until the wee hours of the morning. That was the schedule as set down by Two Tone Marty, the Donatello's bar manager slash money launderer extraordinaire.

Marty was a number cruncher, the kind of guy who could logically argue that two plus two was eight with any government tax attorney no matter how well educated that bean counter might be. As a result, Two Toned saved Romulus millions at tax time by playing the penny-nickel-dime shell game with certain declared revenues, which were brilliantly offset against one another as it pertained to moneys earned and moneys lost---the pluses and minuses.

Marty was the kind of thief who worked legally within the system. He didn't use a gun to rob the taxman, instead he used a laptop computer along with a complicated spreadsheet. The numbers he spun were a maze of utter nonsense, an ambiguous obstacle course that courted the letter of the law just enough to be legal. Finding refund loopholes was his specialty, and the harder the government eggheads tried to tighten those legal nooses each year, the more Two Tone Marty loved it. It had become a matter of pride with him, raising the revenue bar, topping the amount of money he had thwarted the government from collecting in the previous tax season.

Needless to say, Two Tone Marty was an important Gambaro asset, and as such, the man was treated like royalty. Marty delegated matters, he himself was not delegated to by anyone aside from Romulus. If Marty were ever to go missing like Easy Eddy, then the entire organized crime world would grind to a halt until Gambaro had found out what had happened to their golden boy. Then the leg breakers would go medieval on the responsible son of a bitch, and the worst thing about that was that Two Tone Marty knew it.

So he was condescending with the wise guys. Made fun of the way they talked, dressed, carried themselves and there was nothing anyone could do about it. As for Angelo, he had come to respect the miserable son of a bitch, not because Marty could get away with murder, but because the man was so damn smart. A veritable Jeopardy champion who always got the final answer in less than a second. Guys like Marty were a rare item, men who had snatched a unique glimpse at the world which just so happened to be balls on accurate.

Angelo had learned a great deal working under Two Tone, the most surprising matter involved mathematics. Two Tone Marty had shown Angelo a technique that the man himself had created, a means of associating numerical integers into easy sequences by virtue of associated memory queues. These queues allowed Angelo to retain lengthy numerical digits so that adding, subtracting, multiplying and division of large numbers could be broken down into easy to assemble variables. Thus the kid could instantaneously calculate sales tax, sum up the value of a long grocery list of items before he hit the cashier and dazzle folks with curious feats of incredible mathematical ability.

It was at its heart a simple, but brilliant trick based on a system Two Tone Marty had used to count cards.

It was during that pursuit that Romulus Gambaro had discovered Marty.

Apparently, Two Tone had been cleaning out one of Romulus's casino clients, and the gaming house hadn't been pleased about the situation. They were convinced Two Tone had been cheating, and so they called on Romulus to put the bastard in the vice.

That crushing vice had been none other than Vincent Marchetti.

Vincent had nabbed Two Tone Marty and dragged him down to an abandoned warehouse to discuss the importance of playing fair and vital biology. But Two Tone, God love him, had dazzled Vincent with his charismatic charm and gift for numbers. He had not only convinced Vincent that he had not been cheating, but talked the Bear into fleecing another gaming house that was protected under a competitive crime family banner.

The two villains had made out like bandits.

But still, the matter of Romulus had to be dealt with. That's where Two Tone had suggested to Vincent that perhaps there might be a way that he could help Romulus make some extra money.

The rest had been history.

So the guy who was destined to be castrated in an abandoned warehouse storage room was now the most protected, highly paid man in the Gambaro crime family.

That earned the man a certain level of respect.

As for the nickname Two Tone Marty, it had do with a genetic disorder which made his skin patchy, as if parts of his flesh had been bleached by a chemical or burnt in a fire. The disease was officially known as Vitiligo. It was an autoimmune condition in which there was a loss of pigmentation in the skin and hair. Marty's condition was severe, to the point where he had gray eyelashes, a gray scalp and a jigsaw puzzle face of mismatched patches.

He was self-conscious of the illness, avoided crowds and hated to go out in public.

It was unfortunate, a brilliant amicable young man who just so happened to resemble a creature that had been sewn together from dead body parts. Still, his mind was incredible, sharp, well-read, genius in its function, and Angelo had come to regard the man as a close personal friend.

Their first meeting however, had been anything but pleasant.

(12)

Angelo's first mistake had been to stare. It had an unintentional social faux pas, not unlike the matter involving Romulus's daughter, Bianca. But Angelo had let his eyes show their curiosity and as a result Two Tone Marty had shown a lack of tolerance for such an ignorant individual.

"What are you staring at you little idiot?"

Angelo blinked, regrouped and then decided it would be best to state his purpose for being here. "I'm---"

"---I know who you are!" Marty scoffed. "You're the nephew of that big dumb gorilla with no neck."

This time it was Angelo who got upset. "Whoa there Marty...say what you will about me, but never disrespect my family...capisce."

Marty fixed Angelo with a stare that was stuck somewhere between anger and downright hilarity. "What?"

"You heard me."

"Screw you, you little moron," Marty laughed in a condescending tone. "I'm the grease in the gears around here you little prick. I'm the man with the goddamn plan. Just ask anyone. Don't you ever threaten me, and don't you ever eyeball me like I'm some kind of sideshow freak either, or I'll have both you and your uncle tarred and feathered...capisce."

Angelo's face took on another tone itself, one of cherry red. Vincent had told him how critical this man was to the organization, that to touch Marty would invite dire consequences, but the kid nonetheless entertained thoughts of murder.

"Got anything clever to say you little idiot?" Marty studied Angelo. He could see the kid was on the brink of losing it, and decided it would be fun to push the wet behind the ears punk completely over the edge. "Ha, I didn't think so. All talk and no action."

Angelo felt his hands twist into two tight fists.

"What...you gonna take a poke at me baby? That it? Am I supposed to be scared of a little snot nose punk like you? Huh?" Marty tilted his head back and looked down the length of his Dalmatian spotted nose. "You think you're a wise guy, Angie? You think you got these?" Marty reached down and cupped his own balls inside his patchy hand. "You got big enough balls to take me on?"

Reason battled to calm Angelo's mind, but the fire was getting the best of him. If he didn't regain his faculties in a few more seconds he would snap and break Marty's two toned nose.

Angelo took a slow easy breath and then turned to walk away.

That's when Two Tone Marty dropped the A-bomb.

(13)

Insults hurt at the best of times, especially when spoken with malicious intent. Words could sting every bit as hard as sticks and stones when thrown by a sharp tongue. Marty had to bear the brunt of such attacks for the better part of his life. Childhood had been extremely traumatic for him. Kids and adults alike had teased and tormented him mercilessly and had beaten him at every opportunity. Physical and psychological scars dotted his body and soul as much as the disease that had discolored his skin.

He was a natural born victim.

Part of Marty's ability to survive involved a keen talent to dish out insults as well as take them. It was a skill that he had developed over the years, and as a result he had become a world class put down artist. He had an incredible insight into people's personalities with otherwise very little information to go on. This gift allowed him to isolate and then apply pressure onto a person's psychological weak point, crushing them in an exchange of harsh words.

Although no one had told Marty that Angelo was an orphan, Marty had nonetheless tasted blood in the water as it pertained to the kid's parents. Marty didn't know what it was exactly, but he could smell the pain on the boy like the Old Spice cologne off of Romulus's ample body. There was no rational way to explain the strange gift, it was just a psychic twinkle, and right now it was shining like crazy.

"I guess your old man didn't have any balls either," Marty said as he tossed back his head and laughed loudly. "Maybe your whore of a mother swallowed them when she was sucking his dirty old rod."

The words slammed into Angelo's heart with devastating efficiency, shook its foundations to the core. For an instant murderous rage burned through his mind, consumed all semblance of intelligent thought, but strangely enough that inferno quickly succumb to an ice cold calculating reason which Angelo never knew he possessed until that moment.

Suddenly, Angelo's fists went limp, his adrenaline cooled into a calm collective frost. A smile even managed to touch the kid's lips, one so genuine and sincere in appearance that it had stolen Two Tone Marty's thunder with preternatural speed. Yes, Angelo's mind's eye could still see Marty with a bullet between his brown eyes, his shady neck choked off with a knot of piano wire, but Angelo let the fire cool. After all, there was a bigger agenda here, and in order to achieve the goal, he needed to think, not react to some idiot with sensitivity issues.

"It's a sad state of affairs really," Angelo said with a somber hint of melancholy which further threw Marty off balance.

"What do you mean?" Marty asked in a voice that tried to sound demeaning, but came off uncertain.

Suddenly, Marty felt a chill radiate throughout his bones. A strange kind of cold came off the kid and touched Marty's two toned flesh with eerie precision. No one turned emotionally on a dime that quick, no one who was of their right mind that is. There was something wrong with this kid they'd sent him, something unnatural.

"I was told that you would be the greatest of teachers...a man of inspired and unimagined genius...yet here I find an angry defensive soul so caught up within the mundane pettiness of life that enlightenment escapes him." Angelo bowed and shook his head. "If I offended you, forgive me. But even in so saying, I fear that my apology will only find deaf ears, for a man with a serpent's tongue will only taste poison whenever he listens."

Marty blinked, smiled wanly, frowned, hunched his eyebrows for he was at a loss for an articulate response.

That's when Angelo finally dropped his A-bomb.

"You have my pity."

Angelo turned his back and walked towards the Donatello's back door, when he unexpectedly felt a hand gently take hold of his shoulder. The kid turned, fully expecting a set of knuckles to the jaw, but what he found was a face sewn together from two shades of flesh lit up with a peculiar smile.

"Get the hell out of here," Marty laughed, still unnerved by the kid's sudden change. "Where the hell you learn to talk like that? Shakespeare in the park?"

Surprisingly, Angelo found that he too was amused with what had just been said. "That my friend, was divine inspiration."

Marty narrowed his eyes cunningly and smirked. "I still think you're screwing with me, but I'll say this...you're the smartest monkey they've sent me in a long time." Marty almost blushed and perhaps he had, it was hard to tell because of his condition. "I love to read Shakespeare...love the English language...right after numbers that is."

"I butcher English at every occasion," Angelo confessed. "Environment can have huge impact on the vowels and consonants we pronounce."

"Ain't that the goddamn truth," Marty joked. "Listen kid, we got off to a bad start. You kind of got me on a bad day...I'm sorry." He extended his multicolored hand and Angelo received it without hesitation. "Name's Marty Pallini. But these idiots got it in their heads to call me Two Tone cause of my skin...idiots."

"Marty," Angelo returned with respect. "I'll be honest, it caught my attention, but it don't bother me none. Besides, haven't you heard? Beauty's only skin---"

"---shut the hell up!" Marty laughed. "Before I bitch slap you."

Angelo laughed and nodded in understanding. He couldn't imagine how many times Marty had heard such pathetic euphemisms over the course of his life. Angelo would spare him from bearing any more in the future.

"Well, I can see that we're off to a fabulous start," Marty said. "If we keep up at this rate we'll be having a knife fight by lunch, and dueling with pistols by supper."

"Sorry, left my knife at home. As for the pistols, they're being held in an evidence locker in relation to a case where I shot and killed a previous employer."

At this Marty laughed most sincerely. "Oh, lovely. Then I guess a reference from said employer would be out of the question."

"Well, not without a Ouija board or some really strong smelling salts."

This time they both shared laughter, and it was good, disarmed the residual hostility between them with relative ease.

"Okay wise guy," Marty nodded. "Today's lesson will be on how to run a bar. Money drops, ordering supplies, arranging security, and being seen and not heard." At this Marty placed a finger to his mouth and made a shush noise. "You're going to hear a good many things spoken around the tables of this fine establishment, but you don't ever speak of them to anyone. You're like a priest now and the bar's the church confessional. What happens in the Donatello, stays in the Donatello."

Angelo nodded. "Got ya."

"You're job is going to be doing everything from serving drinks to delivering goods," Marty explained. "Do a good job and keep your mouth shut and you'll make good coin. Be slow or worse...loose with the lips..." To this Marty only shook his head, which implied the most dire of consequences, and no, getting fired wasn't it.

"Understood," Angelo nodded. "I'm new, which means I'm the lowly gopher and obedient chauffer."

"Don't sweat it kid," Marty assured with an easy laid back attitude. "You're smart, you'll do fine. In time, you'll be one of those morons out there scheming a job over a few drinks, that's if you play it straight with the house. Just be careful which crowd you fall in with though. Some of those guys are just born losers. Trouble sticks to them like crud to a blanket. Those kind of guys aren't long for this world. They have no common sense. They're unnecessary risk takers. Trust me...that kind of dead wood is only good for one thing...the fire." He shook his head in amazement. "End up before a grand jury where they'd sing like canaries in order to negotiate lighter prison sentences." He then fixed the boy with a knowing stare and winked. "And of course Gambaro can't allow that."

"No...I guess they can't."

"Deadwood, Angelo...mind the deadwood...men such as those end up in shallow graves. Greed and foolishness are a dangerous mix in this game." Marty laughed softly. "Dumb idiots would light a match inside a gunpowder shack to see better I'd reckon." And then added. "Screw me." Marty studied Angelo with deep curiosity. "Earlier...when I said some disrespectful stuff about your family."

"Yeah?" Angelo felt a spark of annoyance touch his heart but he immediately doused it.

"I'm sorry. But I've got to ask. How did you throw that crap off so easily? I mean, I've made a career out of getting under people's skins...no pun intended."

Angelo thought, couldn't find an answer, so shrugged. "Not sure...just felt a cold ease fall over me."

At this Marty looked somewhat worried. "There's only one thing more dangerous than a man who can't control his temper, and that's a man who can. Especially one that can turn rage stone cold."

Angelo's eyes narrowed as he considered the wisdom. "That may be so, but what I know is that I'm here to learn the business...not get into a pissing match with you. Besides...I've got bigger plans than this gig...bigger game to hunt."

Marty grinned with a shrewd effort. "Ah, my young apprentice has a hidden agenda."

Angelo kept cool for he knew he had said too much. "No Master Jedi, no agenda, just ambitions."

Marty tilted his head and pursed his lips as an act of acceptance. "Nothing wrong with wanting to get up in the world. So I guess your ability to let's say...compromise anger for ambition makes you a pragmatist."

The look inside Marty's dull brown eyes insinuated much to the contrary. That he thought Angelo was as much of a pragmatist as he was a born again Christian. No, the kid definitively had a secret plan, and that stuff was cool with Two Tone. What he wanted Angelo to know was that the kid wasn't pulling any fast ones while Marty was on watch.

"Yeah," Angelo replied with a smart ass smirk. "I guess that makes me a pragmatist."

A subliminal understanding took place between them, each aware that a lie of omission had just been spoken, and that an underlying truth had yet to be discovered. Still, Marty offered no effort to pursue it, nothing more was said on the topic, nothing challenged.

And then with that bit of ugliness and casual deception behind them, Angelo began his first day of work.

(14)

That meeting with Marty had been three years ago, and today as the Donatello prepared to wish Bianca a happy birthday, Angelo couldn't help but wonder where the time had gone. Much had happened over those three years, many lessons learned under the odd tutelage of Two Tone Marty, everything from running a wet-vac to doctoring receipt books. As a result, Angelo had become an alumni of the Gambaro school of hard knocks.

Or so he had thought.

The final lesson would actually be today, although Angelo had no idea what was to come and what that last bit of education would entail.

"Jesus Christ in a side car," Two Tone Marty muttered as he walked up beside Angelo. "You gonna stand there all day and pretend not to look at that goddamn picture or are you going to help me with the kitchen staff?"

Blinking, Angelo then turned and looked at Marty with an innocent expression. "What are you talking about?"

"Oh screw off you little bastard," Marty grinned as he punched Angelo in the shoulder hard enough to rock the kid on his heels. "I've been watching ya. I was wondering when you were going to haul out your pecker and start whacking off for Christ's sake."

At this remark, Angelo couldn't help but smile. "Would you rather I had a fondness for boys, Marty?"

"If that meant you'd get cracking and help me organize the staff, then yeah, that'd be just peachy."

Angelo regarded Bianca's picture once more and sighed. "It's a damn shame you know. She's probably going out with some jerk, completely unaware that the man of her dreams is right here under her nose."

"I'm glad to hear you say that about me, Angelo, I'm touched. But I don't think big daddy Romulus would approve of my patchy snake nesting inside his daughter's virtue."

This time Angelo was the one to punch Marty, and he hit the guy hard enough to make him turn a faint shade of red.

"Little mother," Marty grunted.

Truth told, Angelo had felt an unexpected wash of jealousy come over him at the thought of Two Tone Marty having his girl. It was a vulnerability that Marty would pick out of Angelo's steel gray eyes and then peck at if Angelo didn't cover up that feeling really quick.

It was just in the man's nature.

"Come on," Marty urged. "Let's rally the cooks and waiters before you get a chance to embarrass yourself again."

(15)

The staff had been thoroughly whipped into action. Shiny steel pots and silver trays dished out hot helpings of food and sweets while busy waiters worked the room efficiently from one end to the next, making sure that everyone got their order. The atmosphere in the dining hall was electric and Angelo couldn't help but be infected by it. For years he had dreamed of meeting Bianca in person, and in a short while he would finally see her in the flesh. He had daydreamed all kinds of scenarios when he'd heard the Donatello would host her birthday party, fantasies that involved a love at first sight encounter on the dance floor, a meeting at the bar in which Angelo said all the right things and swept Bianca off her feet, and of course a passionate romp in the back coat room. He was a guy after all, and healthy males tended to confuse love with sex at the best of times. But still, Angelo felt different when it came to Bianca. She'd been placed upon a pedestal, and once a man did that, then he assigned the woman a position of supreme power. A woman worshipped was often seen as a virginal goddess. This appeased the male ego for awhile, but would ultimately fall apart once the guy found out how many boyfriends the woman had before they met.

As far as meaningful relationships went, Angelo was as innocent as a newborn babe in the woods. If lucky, she would cut him quick, and then the damage would be done. If not, well, there was always the chance that he might get lucky. One thing was certain, Angelo was in the falling stage, and that was a dangerous place to be. If someone suggested Bianca could walk on water, the kid might very well believe it. Although seasoned beyond his years and experienced on street smarts, Angelo's romantic heart was still twenty-one years old. That heart had never been in adult love before, and so it had never been broken, and until it was, it would be defenseless, and as such, would be left foolishly unguarded.

The clock above the bar read five minutes to twelve when the Donatello's front door opened and in strolled Romulus with his beautiful daughter, Bianca on his arm. They were trailed by a procession of six goons, bodyguards of which Uncle Vincent just so happened to be one. This starter line football team of thugs tried to look like casual business associates, but the more they tried to look relaxed, the more tense they appeared to be.

Why was that?

It didn't matter, because such trivial details were inconsequential to Angelo at the moment. If the goon patrol sported pink ballet tutus and oversized clown shoes he wouldn't have blinked an eyelash, because his attention was fixated solely on one person: Bianca Gambaro.

In fact everyone's attention was centered on Bianca.

The dining hall erupted into applause as the crowd stood and cheered happy birthday. Bianca beamed a perfect smile, her high cheek bones a glow with merriment. Even Romulus's ugly mug seemed to take on handsome features as if the light cast from his daughter's aura illuminated him within a radiance of grace.

Angelo felt his heart begin to race, and it was then that he realized just how much trouble he was actually in.

If only he knew.

(16)

Shattered glass from the Donatello's front windows accompanied dark choking smoke on the heels of an explosion. For a second, Angelo's ears rang with a high pitched trill before they dulled down to the muffled tone of screaming guests. In the second it took Angelo to realize what had happened, he was already feeling through the hazy smoke for Bianca and Vincent. Three years of working at the Donatello helped him to move through the fog, but still he was disorientated.

From a sore spot upon Angelo's forehead, hot liquid dripped onto his soot covered face in generous streams. The condition along with the sharp pain within his ribs was ignored. Cries of anguish filled the dimly lit recess of the Donatello with chaos, but from within the wall of panic came a foghorn clarity: Vincent's powerful voice coordinating disaster relief with his team.

"Cover Romulus! Cover the girl!"

A thug replied to Vincent's charge, but the goon didn't sound too healthy. In fact, his voice sounded eerily wet and soaked on a thick fluid which did not belong there. Angelo reached forward, eyes squinted, lungs burnt on acrid smoke. The fingers on his right hand contacted with a wooden column which he immediately recognized. From that landmark, he mentally retraced Bianca's and Vincent's location in relation to his immediate position. Gingerly, Angelo stepped forward, almost stumbled over something that felt like a sandbag which turned out to be a goon's body minus its head and arm. Whatever type of explosive had gone off, it had been goddamn powerful. Shuffling ahead, Angelo discovered two more bodies: another dismembered bodyguard and a kid minus a leg who couldn't have been more than sixteen years old. The disgusting site of death stirred an ire within Angelo, and he swore on his parents graves that he would avenge this cowardly act. God help those responsible if Angelo discovered Vincent or Bianca in a bloody pile of guts!

From within the fog emerged the shape of a big man covering over another big man's body. Vincent lay atop an unconscious Romulus with his trusty Archer Howitzer drawn, searching for an enemy target to lock onto.

"Vincent!" Angelo called in the throes of a dry cough.

Vincent aimed at Angelo, adjusted his eyes as best he could and grinned. "Thank god! Now get the hell out of here, Angelo!"

Angelo knelt next to his uncle and appraised Romulus's condition. The big cheese had a nasty head wound, but his breathing appeared to be regular. As for Vincent, he didn't seem to have a scratch on him, and such was Angelo's relief that he almost shed a tear of joy.

"Go you dumb fool!" Vincent bellowed. "And for god's sake, keep your head down!"

"Not without, Bianca," Angelo muttered.

Inside the rolls of thick smoke, Angelo crawled along the restaurant's cluttered floor. Broken glass, chunks of fractured drywall, shattered brick, pink snarls of dusty insulation and one of Bianca's giant portraits lay tossed upon the splintered pinewood.

The poster of her riding horseback.

Angelo crept across the hardwood, hands and knees sliced by bits of glass and jagged slabs of fractured wood. Despite his disbelief in the Almighty, Angelo whispered a prayer for God to help him find the girl as he combed through the blast wreckage. And it was beside a blown over dining room table, tattered wrapping papers and cracked dishes that the prayer was answered.

Unfortunately, that's when the gunfire erupted.

(17)

At first it didn't register, the sudden sound of sharp cracks in the company of ricochet whistles, but soon enough Angelo knew that someone outside was using the Donatello for target practice. Angelo covered Bianca with his body, pulled a stylish high back chair down to shield them from the direction of the gunshots, mindful of just how vulnerable they were. If a high power caliber round hit the table or the chair, they would most likely be killed.

He had to get them out of here.

Shards of plaster and chipped brick spat debris across the room as hundreds of rounds punctured the Donatello's dining hall with steel rain. A hail of building materials showered down upon Angelo as he continued to use his body as an umbrella to shield Bianca. Amidst the turmoil of gunfire, he couldn't help but notice how beautiful she was, even as dusty and damaged as she might be. This was their first meeting, nothing at all like Angelo had imagined it, but still, despite the dire circumstances, there was an odd comfort to be had lying here, to finally be so close to her, to actually touch that which he had only dreamed about for so long.

Did he love this girl of which he knew absolutely nothing about?

The answer was absolutely yes.

Angelo had never been more certain of anything in his entire life. And as he protected her with his very flesh, he couldn't help but think that only fate could be so cruel as to allow this injustice. First death had stolen the love of his parents, and now death would claim that which Angelo dared not dream to love: Bianca.

A burst of glass shattered beside them while a wall of transparent jagged shards fell down upon them. Angelo hunched, shifted his body, covered Bianca over as best he could from the fallout. He could wait no longer. He had to get her to safety.

But where?

Floor schematics flashed into his head. The best way out would be through the back, but who was to say that gunmen didn't lay in wait out there as well. Besides, the smoke was too thick to find the way. The fire was beginning to roar out of control within the dining hall. Soon the entire Donatello would be an inferno and then there would be no escape for anyone.

It felt terrible to be so goddamn helpless.

How had this happened?

Rage boiled Angelo's blood. If only he had a gun then he would make challenge, charge out of that front door and unleash hell upon the sons of bitches that had done this to them. But he was unarmed, except for the jet-blade knife inside his back pocket. Hardly a match for a group of morons with automatic weapons. Angelo didn't pack heat at work, guns made Two Tone nervous. Marty didn't like the idea of an employee carrying a piece, however well-liked that kid might be. It offset the balance of things, especially when raises were due. But at the moment, Angelo couldn't help but curse himself for not having lied to Marty about holding fire, because if he had, then they would at least have a fighting chance. But here he was, impotent as a broken pecker, and what good was a broken pecker to him or the girl he loved. He had failed her, there was no other way to say it. Angelo was supposed to be the dashing hero and here he was nothing more than a sitting duck in a carnival shooting gallery. If he survived this ambush, he swore never again to be caught in such a compromising situation unarmed.

If he survived.

As Angelo lay atop Bianca, he noticed she was unnaturally still. Immediately, he pressed an ear against Bianca's nose to which no breath offered a reply. Angelo let his fingers search Bianca's delicate neck for a pulse: there was no rhythm.

She was quite dead.

(18)

Their first kiss wasn't anything like Angelo had expected, Bianca as dead as Marilyn Munroe while Rome burned amidst a firestorm of arrows. Romantic perhaps, but a wilted flower nonetheless sown in a vineyard of tainted soil. Mouth to mouth resuscitation was a medical procedure best performed by trained technicians, not some nervous kid who caught the general gist of it from a few movies. Still, Angelo gave it his best, blowing life giving air into Bianca's quiet lungs between hand pressed pumps upon her resting sternum. Repeatedly, he performed the CPR routine, but each time he checked her pulse there was nothing to be found. It was during these routine inspections that a stark realization invaded his thoughts: the human brain could only go without oxygen for a short while, four minutes if he wasn't mistaken. Anything after that then brain damage would most certainly ensue.

How much time had actually passed since the explosion?

Thirty seconds?

Fifteen minutes?

There was just no telling how much time had passed when you were under the gun. For all Angelo knew, Bianca may very well be far beyond that critical threshold in which case the girl would be a complete vegetable and better off dead. That idea sent shivers through his soul, welled tears into the corners of his eyes. Again, only fate could be so cruel as to allow something this terrible, and it was that sour truth alone which made any of this horror real for Angelo.

Still, he struggled on, performing the CPR ritual without pause, mentally willing time to slow down, well-aware that each fresh breath that went into her lungs kept her brain from becoming a turnip.

An array of emotions played through him like wild music on a broken instrument. The Donatello was in total anarchy and so too was Angelo Marchetti. The flames continued to grow, the bullets continued to whistle and Bianca continued to imitate a corpse. It was here, while Angelo thrust weight down upon her docile breastbone that he began to understand that the girl was far beyond his reach.

There was only one thing he could think to do.

(19)

The gunfire was loud, but intermittent. The roar of fire a steady drone that amplified its tone with each piece of fuel it ate. There was a chance, albeit slim, that his message might get through. That perhaps on some level Angelo's words, or prayer might transcend the corporeal and discover that junction where the soul parted ways with the living world.

Despite the urgency of the moment, Angelo laid his lips aside Bianca's delicate ear and whispered with a voice that was deceivingly calm.

"Bianca...I'm Angelo...you need to wake up...you need to fight to come back home...please...there's a lot of people down here that need you, Bianca...there's a lot of people who love you, so please...come back."

Angelo closed his eyes and stole a sniff from her silky brown hair. At that moment if a bullet had cut him down, he would've died happy. Despite the tragic circumstances, he was close to the woman he would never have.

If this was the end, then so be it.

In Bianca's presence, there was peace. Vengeful thoughts of Deluca fell into abandonment, lost to the closeness of two human beings who had come to journey's end.

She would not die alone this day. Angelo would see to that.

A soft cough gasped out of Bianca's mouth, but her eyes remained closed. Angelo bolted up and felt her neck: a pulse, faint but predictable.

For a second he almost gave way to tears, for he had dared not dream to hope, but alas she breathed. He wanted to cradle her in his arms and hold her close, but this was not the time nor the place for such expressions. The first battle for survival had been figuratively won, but the war was far from over. If he was going to claim that glorious prize, then he needed to get mobile.

Carefully, Angelo scooped Bianca up into his arms, aware that a hail of bullets could strike them down at any second. In the urgency of the moment there was only one thing he could think to do: set boot to heel and run deeper into the Donatello where the fire burned strongest.

(20)

"With me!" Angelo cried to Vincent as he hurried past.

"What the hell!" Vincent protested.

"No time!" Angelo screamed as he disappeared into the smoke. "Come now or die!"

A strafe of bullets tore up part of the floor close to Vincent and Romulus which covered them both in jagged splinters.

"Screw me!" Vincent cursed as he climbed onto his feet, hoisting Romulus over his shoulder like a wounded soldier.

Running into that fire went against every instinct in both men's fibers. Dumb horses ran back into a burning barns, and that's what they looked like, stupid animals with no common sense. But into that blazing inferno both men did go.

The heat from the flames penetrated quickly into the skin, burnt the upper epidermis to a pinkish red that would blister in a few short seconds to come. Angelo thought to Bianca's physical state and wondered what kind of injuries she had sustained during the attack. If only he could've kept her in place until the paramedics arrived, but unfortunately the gunmen outside had left them no other option but to retreat. If they were very lucky, then this bumpy trip to the kitchen wouldn't aggravate her condition further. If they weren't, then Bianca would bleed to death from internal injuries.

"Ah!"

"Vincent!" Angelo cried.

If it weren't for the heat pushing them forward, Angelo would've most certainly froze in mid-step, but there was no time to dawdle. The heat would peel their skins off soon if Angelo didn't get Bianca and himself into the kitchen. Then, god willing, if the fire didn't construct an impassable wall, Angelo would go back for Vincent.

The thick black-gray smoke had become impenetrable. It scorched Angelo's lungs into a convulsive cough, dried the membranes of his nasal passages into cinder ash. All he had to go on was his knowledge of the floor layout and the familiar way the hardwood felt beneath his leather biker boots. In his mind's eye he could see the bar counter to the right, see the corridor that led to the black double doors that swung out into the kitchen.

He was twenty feet from the finish line, maybe thirty.

As he moved forward the heat died down to an annoyance, but the acrid smoke kept him blindfolded and smothered on toxic fumes. In a few more seconds he would succumb to smoke inhalation, drop Bianca onto the floor and there they would eventually roast. But something inside Angelo kept him walking.

It was either love of Bianca or hate toward their attackers.

Whatever was responsible, it gave strength to Angelo's feet and he used that momentum to move Bianca and himself steadily onward.

(21)

The double door burst open into a kitchen that was relatively clear of smoke. Angelo staggered inside on failing feet with Bianca slung between his arms like a limp hammock. Angelo eased her onto a stainless steel kitchen counter where he once again checked her vitals.

She was alive, but still unconscious.

Angelo collapsed onto his knees and fell into an uncontrollable fit of coughing which saw him vomit out a large breakfast onto the kitchen floor. The room spun before his eyes as the threat of unconsciousness tried to wrap up his mind inside a smoky towel. Darkness lulled and deceived him with lies that said it was okay to lay down and take a breather. At any other time he would've gladly gone down into that soft deaf oblivion if not for the memory of his uncle's cry and Bianca's condition.

Somehow, Angelo's legs found strength, and before he knew it, Bianca was in his arms once again and they were heading out the backdoor into the parking lot.

It was here that he ran into an unexpected friend.

(22)

Two Tone Marty stood inside the door with an Archer Longbow held within his jigsaw puzzle of a hand. He watched with nervous apprehension as Angelo lumbered forth with Romulus's only daughter in his arms. She looked near death, and given their current circumstances that was probably close to the truth.

Angelo was relieved to see a friendly face. There had been the real worry that perhaps the gunmen had surrounded the Donatello and lay in wait for anyone to blunder out the backdoor where they would be cut down in a wave of metal jackets. But Marty's presence implied an avenue of escape, and that alone gave rise to a hope that perhaps it wasn't Bianca's or Angelo's time to die.

"Angelo! How the hell did you get out?"

Angelo offered Marty a weak smile that showed a small degree of humor between gasping coughs. "Good to see...you...too," Angelo panted. The smoke had stolen most of Angelo's oxygen, and as a result it felt like he had just run a marathon across a scorching desert.

Marty nodded and then crooked a grin. "Should've known you'd make it out kid."

"Too tough...to kill...to stub...stubborn to die."

Marty turned his head to the side and examined the girl. "How is she?"

"Hurt bad...got to go...back...Vincent!"

Marty let his eyes glance over Angelo's shoulder towards the dining hall. "He still alive?"

"Yeah...hurt though...got to go...back." Angelo coughed so hard he nearly dropped Bianca. "Look, no time to talk...take girl."

Marty frowned, examined Bianca and Angelo with eyes that were on the verge of tears.

It was at that moment that Angelo knew who had set off the bomb in the dining hall.

Angelo quickly measured up the situation: the Archer Longbow was an awkward handgun that was built for power, lots of kickback when it went off. It held seven huge rounds, any one of them capable of dropping a charging bull.

Angelo would only have one shot.

Angelo took an intense coughing spell, slipped to his knees and then gently lay Bianca on the kitchen's bright white linoleum as not to drop her. He crouched before Marty, hand covering his mouth as he honked and gasped for air. It was in that instant of apparent vulnerability that Angelo used a tactic from Sun Tzu's "The Art of War."

Hide strength within weakness and then strike!

(23)

Angelo's knuckles found the soft folds of Marty's scrotum with devastating speed and force, while his other hand snatched the Archer Longbow from the jigsaw puzzle of a hand. As a result, Marty collapsed onto his knees, both his hands cradling his jewels as if his balls had been spiked like a pin cushion. Immediately, Angelo cocked the hammer back on the longbow and placed the muzzle of the gun against Marty's patchy forehead.

"Why? Why did you do it?"

Somewhere amidst his throes, Marty regarded Angelo with eyes that weren't deceitful or malevolent, but rather remorseful. "I...no, Angelo...I wouldn't do that...I---"

"---Why goddamn you! Why'd you do it!"

Angelo twisted the gun into his friend's forehead until a bead of blood had begun to wander down between Marty's dull eyes. Angelo wanted to beat the answer out of him, but reminded himself that time was of the essence. Bianca needed medical attention and somewhere back inside the dining hall Uncle Vincent needed help. t was here that another terrible feeling overwhelmed him, one that easily rivaled this betrayal, and that said Uncle Vincent was probably already dead.

"I...I'm so sorry, Angelo...I had no choice...I swear I didn't want to hurt you...please forgive me!"

"Is there anyone out back behind the building!"

Marty slowly shook his head and shrugged. "I don't know, Angelo! I don't know! I'm just a pawn. I'm so sorry...please...!"

"Who's responsible? Who planned this?"

At this part, Marty clammed up tight, as if to speak that name invited a fate far worse than death. Angelo could read it in Marty's lackluster eyes. Angelo was certain he could beat the information out of this back stabber, but there was no time. Angelo thought to leave Bianca in Marty's care, but knew the moron couldn't be trusted. If he let Marty go, he might come back with reinforcements and cut them all down.

No, there was only one choice, and both Angelo and Marty knew it.

"Goodbye old friend," Angelo said with surprising little emotion.

"No Angelo! Don't do it! Don't!"

Marchetti's eyes narrowed as his heart hardened. They had once been good friends, but now they were enemies.

How had they come to this place?

In the end it didn't matter, they were here, although not by Angelo's choice, Two Tone Marty had made that fateful decision for both of them.

Still, there was little solace to be found in that realization.

Angelo pulled the Long Bow's trigger.

Despite Angelo's feelings towards his good friend Marty, that didn't change the fact that there was killing to do, and Angelo was apt to see that it got done proper.

(24)

The explosion had been deafening, the longbow's kick legendary. A bright orange flame spat out of the barrel to which Angelo's arm recoiled upward as Two Tone Marty's head disintegrated in a messy haze of blood and bone fragments. Drops of scarlet red splattered up against the wall, dripped from Angelo's soot covered face and tarnished Bianca's soft smooth skin.

It was murder at its worst: cold and malicious, but well-dispensed nonetheless.

The longbow dropped beside Angelo's hip as he examined the girl with the greatest of care. Bianca remained unmoved, and for that Angelo was eternally grateful. The sight had been gruesome, not something a twenty-one year old girl should be witness to on her birthday, nor any other day for that matter.

Angelo climbed onto his feet and then peeked out the back door into the parking lot. He could see his car and the two meter wooden fence that penned in the lot. Beyond these lay the plush greenery of trees and bushes which would make excellent cover for a spying gunman.

Angelo did the math in his head. Thirty feet to the car translated into ten seconds of travel. Three seconds to unlock the door, three seconds to place Bianca inside and ten seconds for him to drive the hell out of here.

Almost half a minute to escape.

Plenty of time for a sharp shooter to fill them both with lead. No, he wouldn't risk carrying Bianca out into a possible ambush, that or leave her unattended inside the car. But still, he needed to protect her, not to mention that Uncle Vincent needed his help. There weren't enough hours in the day to do what he needed to do, and the longer he thought about it the less likely Uncle Vincent would survive the flames.

He needed to take a chance, gamble the Marchetti mettle on a long shot.

If he was correct, then the fire department would be here in a few more minutes. Until then, Bianca would be safe inside the kitchen. When the rescue teams showed up, there would be a commotion, perhaps enough to scare those wolves outside off. Of course there were no guarantee, but as far as Angelo's gut was concerned the idea carried a reasonable amount of water to the well.

And just like that it was decided: Angelo would leave Bianca here in the relative safety of the kitchen so he could focus on saving Vincent.

The longbow's barrel slid into Angelo's waistband as he quickly gathered up a dish towel and soaked it down with water from a nearby sink. He then tied the rag snugly around his face, making sure to cover his nose and mouth thoroughly. He kind of looked like an old west train robber: Jessie James or Bill Miner.

Before heading off, Angelo once again checked on Bianca: her pulse was good, breathing regular.

"Please god...keep her safe."

Outside the sounds of emergency sirens shrieked and honked as they closed in on the Donatello. Remarkably, sporadic gunfire was still to be heard from the restaurant's front side, and that could only mean one of two things: either Romulus's goons had a few morons pinned down, or those trigger happy sons of bitches didn't know when to get out of Dodge.

That latter option unnerved Angelo most of all, because such a daring act of aggression surely courted those who neither feared nor heeded consequences. If that were the case, that meant Angelo and company were in very deep trouble.

It also begged the question: To whom then did such men heed?

Perhaps later there would be time for such conjecture, but as for now Uncle Vincent needed help.

Quickly, Angelo ran back through the kitchen's double doors and out into a wall of solid smoke.

(25)

Angelo's eyes were instantly rendered useless, even the water soaked rag over his nose and mouth did little to discourage the toxic fumes from stinging his lungs.

How then could he possibly hope to find Vincent let alone stay alive?

The longbow was placed in hand while Angelo dropped to his belly and searched for a gap below the smoke, a buffer zone where the air wasn't so poisonous. There was one, about half a foot high, barely enough to crawl through, but clear enough to plot a course back across the dining hall.

"Vincent! Vincent!"

A stray bullet tore through what must've been part of the ceiling.

How long would those idiots continue to take potshots at this place?

Angelo shimmied across the floor, eyes on the hunt. He spotted some bar stool legs and a pile of broken glass splayed out upon the floor before a bar fridge. Further across the room, he spied some dining room chair legs, but still no Uncle Vincent. Where the fired burned hottest, orange flames illuminated the smoke like a stellar nebula. If Vincent were close to that spot, there'd be no reaching him.

In fact, he'd probably be quite cooked by now.

No, if the big goon had any chance of being alive he would've probably---

"Angelo!"

Angelo's attention shot to the left and towards the bar he'd just crawled past. "Vincent!"

"Angelo here!"

How could Vincent be by the bar? Angelo had looked right at it when he crept past.

"Vincent!"

"Here! We're here!"

Backtracking, Angelo shimmied quickly across the hardwood planks towards the pile of glass from the fridge's broken door. As he crawled nimbly around the bar counter's corner he saw something he never knew or noticed before: a cellar door hatch.

Uncle Vincent's wide anxious eyes peeked out from beneath the heavy wooden lid, his hand making a hurry up gesture. Beside the cellar door laid a piled up rug which explained why Angelo had never noticed the hatch before. It had been concealed beneath the rug, but just what the door concealed was another question.

"Vincent! Are you okay?"

"What the hell do you think?"

By this time, Angelo had clambered beside the door and could see just how glad his uncle was to see him.

"I've been shot at and almost blown up!!" Vincent grumbled.

"It's good to see you too!" Angelo grinned.

Vincent nodded and then let his big mitt of a hand wrap around Angelo's neck. "We're Marchettis...survivors!" He then glanced over his nephew's shoulder. "Where's the girl? Where's Bianca?"

"Kitchen! Where's the big guy?"

"Sub basement!"

"What are we doing? Is there a way out of here through the sub basement?"

"Yeah...maybe! What about the kitchen?"

Somewhere in the background a large section of the building collapsed under the roof's weight. Now the roar of fire sounded like a giant waterfall.

"Jesus Christ!" Vincent shouted. "In or out!"

"Screw me! Vincent, is there a way out of the basement! Yes or freaking no!"

The big galoot's eyes darted back and forth and then he finally nodded. "Yeah, there's a way!"

"Wait here! I'll get Bianca!"

"For god's sake, hurry Angelo!"

(26)

Angelo stood up and ran back into the kitchen using his memory of the floor plan as a guide. He nailed something solid on the sprint, hooked a knee on something sharp and as a result had torn the skin wide open.

The pain was ignored.

Scooping Bianca caringly up into his arms, Angelo carried her quickly back towards the dining hall. But as he kicked open the kitchen double doors, he heard the sound of someone else kicking in the kitchen's back door behind them.

Immediately he turned and saw three goons armed with Archer Longbows and 357 magnums.

(27)

There was something very different about this unholy trio and Angelo spotted it right away. They weren't your usual good fella wise guy crowd. They looked more anal, clean cut, well-dressed and that's when it occurred to Angelo who they were probably up against.

The men outside weren't from a rival crime family, but rather government thugs that had been sent here on official duty. That was why they had dared to hang around so long, dared to be so bold. They weren't afraid of getting pinched by the cops, because these guys had some sort of legal immunity to such things. These wolves wore an armor of the law which came with a license to kill. And when the dust of this terrible deed finally settled, when the bodies had been buried, and the burnt ruins of the Donatello were carted off to the landfill, then these guys would sit safely at home, reading about their handiwork in the newspaper and watching the gory details on broadcast news.

This was just another day at the office for these morons, and shortly after they killed off these last few stragglers, then they would break for dinner and talk about their day over a tall cold one.

In that all too telling instant, Angelo had looked into his enemy's face and saw their commitment. There were no mistaken intentions between them, just the clear cut lines that saw you on either one side of the battle line or the other.

One of the goons, a guy with bright red hair, flinched and drew his weapon on the decapitated body of a guy who had once been known as Two Tone Marty. This distraction was short lived, and a second later he and his posse had trained their ammo on a young man carrying a pretty young lady back into a burning inferno of choking black smoke.

(28)

Angelo ducked as bullets blew wide gaping holes through the kitchen's double doors. A hot piece of shrapnel nicked his ear, cutting and cauterizing it in one quick slice. Smoke blinded his eyes, but there was no time to slow down and feel his way along the floor. When those goons got to the door, they would spray a wide swath of metal into the haze without hesitation.

Angelo had to get to the cellar door fast.

He cradled Bianca's face into his chest, mindful that the smoke would fill her lungs within seconds. He didn't know exactly how bad off she was, but he knew well enough that the smoke wouldn't help her condition.

With eyes closed tight, Angelo shuffled madly across the floor, hoping to kick the trapdoor with a foot as he ambled along or to have Vincent's big mitt of a hand grab hold of his ankle. With luck, there would still be a gap in the smoke against the floor big enough that Vincent would see him coming.

Thankfully there was.

Vincent noticed Angelo's black leather biker boots scampering across the hardwood and immediately called out directions. Angelo followed that voice blindly, and when he felt Vincent grab hold of his foot, Angelo wasted no time handing Bianca off to Vincent.

By this time the gunmen had found the double doors, and as predicted, they had begun to fire round after round aimlessly into the black roiling smoke. Amidst the inferno's roar was the distinct sound of plaster being torn, wood splintering, glass shattering and brick cracking into dust particles. The entire web of smoke moved with sharp teeth, like a demon in search of a tender morsel to chew upon. Angelo dropped to his belly, stuck his head down into the cellar door hatch and opened his eyes. His eyes still stung, but he could nonetheless see that Uncle Vincent had carried Bianca safely down into the basement. From down below Vincent looked up at his nephew with wide anxious eyes, waving for Angelo to hurry up and climb down.

Angelo moved like a snake, a wiry twenty-one year old man in peak physical condition. In one fluid motion he had swung his legs down onto the ladder and then shut the door above. But as the kid began his rapid descent, he suddenly stopped.

"What are you doing?" Vincent yelled.

Angelo regarded his uncle with a cold steel gaze, an expression that would temper his disposition in years to come. There was unsettled business to take care of and Angelo was apt to see that it got done proper.

Angelo withdrew the longbow and then drew back its sturdy hammer. He climbed back up and cracked the cellar door open just enough to see out and take aim. Within the last few inches of clear buffer zone between the smoke and hardwood floor, Angelo could see half a dozen feet which belonged to three treacherous gunmen.

They continued to blast blindly into the smoke, emptying cartridge after cartridge without pause. Angelo took aim, pulled the trigger, to which a loud report replied. The recoil kicked the longbow back so hard that the cellar door bounded briefly upward from the jump. Still, despite the jolt, the round had found its mark.

A set of feet gave out from beneath one of the gunmen, dropping him heavily down onto the floor as his foot exploded into a mound of shredded flesh. A hoarse scream of agony cut through the inferno's gruff voice, which was followed by a second blast from the longbow. Angelo scored another direct hit on the second gunmen, and the first set of fallen feet was joined by yet another. The third victim followed in rapid succession and fell down where he joined the other two in shrieks of pain as he too cradled bloody strips of torn flesh that had once been a foot.

(29)

With the trio fallen, Angelo wasted no time and slid back down the approximate twelve foot drop of the ladder to the basement's cobble stone floor. There, Vincent regarded his nephew with a hint of mild awe and deep seeded pride. Despite the seriousness of the situation, Vincent couldn't help but offer a curt laugh.

"Look at you. Mr. Bad Ass."

Angelo grunted, nodded and then let his hand gently touch Bianca's neck. The pulse remained but she looked ghostly pale.

"Okay, where's the exit?" Angelo asked as he slowly and easily took Bianca back into his own arms.

"Through the sewer grate," Romulus murmured.

Angelo and Vincent both regarded Romulus. The Big Greasy was barely conscious but cognizant enough to realize what was going on.

"Bianca?" Romulus inquired, the worry evident in his voice.

Angelo moved towards the big chief who laid propped up against an old concrete pillar. "She's alive, but she needs a doctor," Angelo explained.

Romulus smiled, and for the first time in perhaps years he wept for both heartbreak and joy. Yes, his little girl was hurt bad, but she was alive. "Thank you, Angelo. Thank you for staying with my little girl."

Angelo offered the man who had once wanted to have him beaten like a mangy dog a crooked smile and a quick decisive nod. "We need to get out of here sir. Where do we go?"

Romulus tried to find his feet, but was unable. Seeing this, Vincent quickly swept in and placed an arm around the boss and helped him into a haphazard stand.

"Back beyond those crates," Romulus gestured with a weak motion of his head. "There's a steel gate...behind is tunnel...beyond is metal door that leads to sewers."

At this bit of news, Angelo could see the old man visibly slump as if aware of a defeat yet to come.

"What is it?" Angelo asked.

The group had already began their injured crawl to the gate.

"Gate's locked with the chain and the padlocks," Romulus explained. "You shoot them off good, but door is burglar proof. Can't get open without proper keys is like you say...difficult."

Angelo felt his blood pressure damn near shoot through the top of his skull. After all they'd just been through: the bomb, the gun shots, the fire, Two Tone Marty, the three thugs in the kitchen, after all that, they were finally going to be done in by a locked door. If this had been any other situation, Angelo would've most certainly laughed, but to laugh now would be to concede defeat, and Angelo was not ready to lie down and die just yet.

"So that's what you meant when you said you weren't sure about the exit," Angelo noted, not in sarcasm, but in a genuine need to explore their options.

Vincent grunted, muttered some incoherent sentence and then spat on the floor in anger.

Angelo looked down on Bianca, marveling at her beauty and how peaceful she looked. That kind of easy lain smile put him too much in mind of a corpse in a coffin. "I'll get you out of here," Angelo whispered. "I promise."

(30)

A thick chain rope kept the rusted gate tied to the foundation via a jagged hole that had been plasma torched through a wide steel column in the foundation's concrete partition. Angelo gently laid Bianca next to a wooden crate and then withdrew the Longbow. Skillfully, he cracked open the weapon's cartridge chamber and performed a quick check of its inventory: three bullets remained in the quiver.

"What's your situation?" asked Angelo of Vincent.

Vincent eased Romulus into a sitting position next to his daughter and then withdrew his Archer Howitzer along with a smaller Archer Crossbow which had been strapped around his sweaty ankle.

"Eighteen rounds in total," Vincent replied.

"The Crossbow," Angelo nodded.

Vincent understood, approached the gate, took aim and then blasted two rounds into a rusty chain link from the Crossbow. The weapon's report was loud, but tinny, a gun that could kill at close range, but for the most part lacked impact. Still, it had been enough to shatter the linkage and as a result the old chain fell away into two limp pieces. As for the gate, it slowly swung open without need of assistance as if it understood what was to be expected of it.

Beyond laid a dark tunnel that reeked of stale dampness and bacterial mold.

"Wait here," Angelo instructed.

Vincent gave his nephew a look which suggested that a social slight had just been committed, one that said youth consulted experienced age before setting off on a course of action. Still, the big goon offered no protest and fell into line with no coaxing. That alone told Angelo the big lug not only respected his nephew as a man, but that he also believed in his ability as one, too.

(31)

Water dripped in chorus to the sound of biker boots shuffling across cracked concrete as Angelo felt his way forward through the dark. Rats and spiders moved silently within the dim lit shadows, vermin that Angelo's imagination could see with perfect clarity. There was probably an overhead light within this musty tunnel, but Angelo suspected it had probably burnt out months if not years ago. It wasn't like someone came down here on a regular basis. The basement, let alone this tunnel, were the kinds of places people only ventured when something went wrong: a broken pipe, a worn electrical wire, a rodent infestation, those were the only issues that warranted a human presence down here.

The Longbow within his slender hand offered a modest sense of security, although it wouldn't be of much use if he couldn't see to aim. If a diseased rat decided to lunge at his throat, then he'd have to club the thing to death, not shoot it, and that kind of a struggle would not only be frantic, but messy and prone to the kinds of injuries that always left scars.

Angelo clenched his teeth, cursed and then focused on finding the damn door.

Slowly, his eyes adjusted to the dimness. The dull light from the exterior chamber where Bianca and the others waited leaked into the drab grayness in meager sums, but nonetheless allowed enough ambience to expose that final obstacle.

The door was the color of ebony and set within a blackish frame which in itself was surrounded by a thick wall of gray cinderblocks. The knuckles on Angelo's free hand rapped upon its surface to which the door replied with a dull recognizable thud. Angelo had heard that kind of noise before inside the Silver Fox casino when he and Vincent had gone to collect a kickback for Romulus. When Vincent's big mitt had knocked upon that cash room door, Angelo had noticed how peculiar the tone had sounded. Dull, muffled, as if the cool smooth surface didn't like to give sound back. That casino door had been fabricated from the same cutting edge carbon composites as this one, which any burglar could tell you were the toughest materials to break through. But to make matters worse, even the door's two deadbolts had been crafted of similar construction.

It was a formidable barrier, an obstacle that had all the makings of a dead end.

Angelo looked down on the Longbow as if it were a toy gun and whispered, "We're screwed."

(32)

Angelo's return into the exterior chamber was met with an equal share of optimism and apprehension. Romulus comforted his unconscious daughter while Vincent paced wildly back and forth like a caged lion. Both large men regarded the young man with anxious silence, reading that demoralized look upon Angelo's blood stained face like a terminal diagnosis.

Vincent wound up his fist and hammered it into one of the crates with such force, that the two hundred pound plus box shifted half a foot. "Screw me!"

"I'm sorry uncle...it's a composite door...bullet proof."

Romulus examined Angelo with a weakened effort, his usual dull brown eyes lit up with a mixture of tears and a glimmer of hope. "You get us out, yes...you think hard...you think now...you save my baby."

To hear such a sincere plea spoken by such an intimidating personality was emotionally moving. Here, this big mean son of a bitch was begging for Angelo Marchetti, the kid who sometimes served his greatness drinks, washed his car and picked up his dry cleaning, to perform a miracle on behalf of a girl that Angelo himself would gladly die for.

"Okay," Angelo nodded. "I'll think of something."

Somewhere overhead a loud crash announced that a sizable chunk of the Donatello's roof had just collapsed onto the floor above. It was a race now.

Would the flames eat up their oxygen, or would the burning debris come crashing down onto their heads and kill them first?

It was a morbid competition with only one conclusion in which they lost either way.

Angelo needed another option.

"What's inside those boxes?" Angelo asked of Romulus.

"Sump pump parts...damaged beer kegs...a few burnt out electrical motors...maybe a few other things."

Angelo looked at the crate Vincent had just punched. For some reason it reminded Angelo of the cashbox inside his uncle's bedroom, the one that had housed the key to the metal security door inside the brownstone's living room. Angelo doubted very much that one of these crates had a key stashed inside or anything else that could open a carbon composite door, but perhaps it just might---

\---and that's when it dawned on Angelo.

A back screen door to a bank vault.

Vincent had spent a good deal of money on such a high tech door, but in the end he had left its key inside nothing but a flimsy little cashbox that any idiot could open with a credit card. It made as much sense as having a screen door on a bank vault. Thus its security was fundamentally flawed, as was the composite door at the end of the basement's dark tunnel.

A crooked grin broke out upon Angelo's lean face to which Vincent and Romulus both began smile.

"What...what is it?" Vincent asked.

"We're getting the hell out of here," Angelo replied confidently.

(33)

Angelo ran back behind the crates and retrieved a rusty pry-bar that had been leaning up against a wooden box. Angelo returned and then handed the tool to Uncle Vincent.

"You're not going to smash that door down with just that," Vincent objected.

"I know," Angelo replied. "But I'm betting..."

Bianca made a sudden gasp for air and as a result everyone else stopped breathing.

Angelo felt his stomach constrict, the strength bleed out of his knees as if he might swoon. She couldn't die, mustn't!

Romulus placed a thick sausage of a finger onto her delicate throat and felt for a pulse.

It was dangerously weak.

The big cheese then snapped a glance at Angelo, one that said he had better not let him down. "Do now! Go do!"

Angelo immediately took heed, not out of fear of Romulus, but out of concern over Bianca's deteriorating condition.

If she died, he would never forgive himself.

"Give me your guns!" Angelo yelled to Vincent. "Hurry!"

Vincent passed over the Howitzer and Crossbow without hesitation.

Loaded down with a tiny arsenal of weapons, Angelo ran blindly back into the black tunnel, letting his intuition guide him back to the security door.

(34)

Angelo stopped just a few inches short of colliding with the door. He dropped the pry-bar onto the concrete floor where it bounced with a metallic twang. The weaponry was laid next to the bar while Angelo's hand traced the door's edge. Quickly he plotted its dimension in relation to the cinderblock bricks. It would be a gamble that the designing engineer or architect may have made a structural oversight which Angelo could exploit as a strategic weakness.

As he bent down and felt for the crossbow, he could hear Bianca once again gasp for breath. The sound blew through his ears like a cold arctic wind.

Angelo's fingers scraping across the damp cement sounded too much like raspy breathing and he couldn't help but fear that the girl would die while he was busy working a miracle. He forced the idea into submission, but its effect lingered on within his heart just the same.

Crossbow in hand, Angelo stood, calculated his position in proximity to one specific cinderblock, took aim and then fired. The usual tinny report of the Crossbow was amplified by the arched passageway of the tunnel. Now it sounded more like a mortar shell striking a fuel depot. There had been a brief flash from the muzzle, enough to dazzle Angelo's eyes and blind him temporarily in the spark's aftermath. The fingers on his hand wasted no time and immediately felt the brick for damage. A jagged hole had been torn through the cinderblock and as a result it now bled sand granules. The bricks surrounding the door had been filled in with common beach sand, and as such, were vulnerable to gunfire.

The question was how much firepower would it take to blast out an opening.

Again, Angelo fired off another round to which the tiny hole widened. This continued until the Crossbow had been effectively emptied of its cartridges.

Now it was the Howitzer's turn to take a kick at the can.

The Howitzer's report was deafening as a bright orange flame spat out of its barrel like a dragon's fiery tongue. Shards of mortar exploded in every direction, effectively cutting Angelo's hands and face with shrapnel. The whole tunnel seemed to shake from the gun's recoil, but never once did the Howitzer kickback. The weapon remained inside his firm grip like a warm handshake, completely under his control.

It was an excellent weapon.

It took only one round for the Howitzer to blow the remainder of the brick into tiny pieces. Angelo knelt, peered through the opening and saw a crisp ray of sunlight escalating downward from a narrow seam inside a street sewer grate. Wasting no time, he dispensed the Howitzer's last ten bullets into the disintegrated brick's neighbors, opening a passage big enough for a small child to climb through.

Still, the portal would have to be bigger if he was going to get two big men like Romulus, and Vincent out of here.

Angelo shot off the last two rounds inside the Longbow, but the fissure still wasn't large enough to accommodate them. It was here that he set the gun down, picked up the pry-bar and began to wail on the hole's outer edge with everything he had. The vibration from the pry-bar rang like a tuning fork, sending the energy through his hands and up into his arms and shoulders with painful efficiency. Yet he never let up, kept banging away on the cinderblock, that hoarse gasp of air from Bianca's delicate mouth driving him on like a salted whip across his back.

His ears screamed and ached with each strike. The previous gun roars coupled with this latest bit of makeshift demolition had the skins on his eardrums wound so tight that they were close to snapping.

"Angelo!" Vincent shouted.

"Almost there!" Angelo yelled as he continued to pound on the cinderblocks.

Angelo looked possessed, an insane prospector infected with a serious case of gold fever.

"Jesus Christ! You'll break your arms off!" Vincent shouted as he brushed his nephew aside and strong-armed the pry-bar out of Angelo's aching hands.

Angelo was briefly disoriented, confused as to why Vincent had stopped him. Soon however, it was apparent that the big goon had a far greater talent of swinging the persuader than his smaller nephew. Chunks of concrete gave way under Vincent's mighty chop and for an instant Angelo was reminded of the childhood tale of Paul Bunyan.

Vincent the lumberjack and his blue ox named Babe.

"Go get the girl!" Vincent grunted between thrusts.

Angelo immediately set off to retrieve Bianca, the tune of the pry-bar still singing its metallic song within his ears and upon his sore arms.

(35)

By this time, the hatch-door on the ceiling had collapsed under piles of smoldering debris from the Donatello's fallen roof. Black smoke now poured freely into the basement through the exposed opening in thick toxic bales, while flaming embers rained down upon the basement floor like scarlet hellfire.

Angelo fixed Romulus with a stare that sought an assessment of Bianca's condition.

"Is she...?" Angelo couldn't bring himself to ask it, feared what the crime boss's reply might be.

"You carry her," Romulus ordered as he climbed into a tipsy stand. "I walk myself...we go now, yes?"

Angelo nodded. "Yes sir, we go."

Angelo gently and carefully scooped Bianca up into his arms and made tracks towards the tunnel, mindful not to jostle her about lest he aggravate her injuries. On the short trek toward the door, Angelo kept glancing back to see how Romulus was holding up. The big cheese was a tough old bird, shaken but still able despite the obvious concussion he must've received from the blast. If the old guy was lucky, he might be asleep inside his own bed tonight, Bianca however---

Angelo shuddered to think what her diagnosis might be, tried not to dwell on it. Instead, he gave thanks that he got to hold her once more and that maybe, just maybe, when all this was over, he'd get a chance to tell her just how he felt.

"Romulus! Are you still with me compadre?" Angelo asked.

"Si."

"We're almost there!"

No sooner had Angelo said those words when Uncle Vincent's huge lumbering shape rolled into view. The goon stood before a strange web of background twilight, and it was here that Angelo could tell that Vincent had taken out more than enough bricks for a doorway.

It was an impressive feat of strength, one not easily duplicated. If the job had been left solely to Angelo, he would have still been hammering away with minimal effect.

"Let's go!" Vincent barked. "Come on...move!

Angelo crouched slightly with Bianca in his arms as he stepped through the arch and out onto a walkway platform which ran beside a slow meandering stream of excess ground water and human waste. The smell was rancid but bearable just the same. Romulus emerged next, his lumbering weight pressed against the sturdy shoulder of Vincent for support as the Bear aided the crime boss to move.

In their tail's wake drifted the pungent odor of acrid smoke, but its choking vapors could no longer harm them.

They had made it out.

(36)

They had traversed the simple labyrinth of sewer canals and had exited out onto a busy street thru a metal service grate. There, they had called upon a pair of ambulances which had arrived amidst the tooting of horns, as a blocked procession of traffic patrons gawked and stared at the curious quartet that crawled out and onto the street.

The arriving paramedics quickly appraised Bianca's and Romulus's status and then swiftly loaded them into the bandage wagons which subsequently sped them off thru blocks of congested traffic on route to the hospital.

Vincent rode with Romulus, while Angelo rode with Bianca.

The trip took forever.

While on route, the paramedic worked on Bianca: blood pressure checks, pupil dilation exams and an exotic blend of I.V. tonics was administered. The medic bantered back and forth with the driver as they discussed medical terminology and a potential diagnosis with technical words that sounded dire and grave to Angelo's attentive ears. The medics quickly concluded that Bianca had suffered serious head trauma, in which case the brain was bruised and potentially bleeding internally.

Angelo wanted to hold Bianca one last time for fear she would pass into the hereafter in the few short moments ahead, but he dared not interfere with the paramedic as she tended to her patient. So Angelo suffered in silence, his fingers wrapped tenderly around Bianca's foot in comfort and reassurance.

The ambulance skidded to a halt in the emergency center's parking lot. Bianca was whisked into the trauma unit The hospital was a buzz of activity, its brightly lit rooms burdened down with both gunshot and burn victims from the Donatello restaurant. Doctors shouted commands while skilled nurses rallied resources like battlefield soldiers. It was coordinated chaos at its best, a choreographed training simulation made real thanks to a bunch of crazies with automatic weapons and a motive to act upon.

Presently, Gambaro was in the fallout stage of the attack, that frantic aftermath state in which the Family assessed its loses, licked its wounds and plotted retribution.

But who had masterminded the attack?

Was it another crime family?

A power struggle from within Gambaro's signature ranks?

Or was it someone else?

At this stage of the game no one knew. All they had was Two Tone Marty's decapitated body, and at last check it wasn't talking.

In every corner stood a wise guy gabbing into a cell phone, goons trying to get to the bottom of the sordid mess by networking with both internal and external sources. Tonight would be a night of long knives, an evening when the movers and shakers got shook down for information. Limbs would be broken with hammers, heads dunked into grungy toilets and guys hung upside down from lofty balconies as the goon patrol searched for those responsible for the attack. And somewhere within all that pain and terror someone would eventually crack, and when they did, the chase would be on. Then the Gambaro bloodhounds would sniff out the trail and take the war to the guilty culprits.

And it would be a messy war, too.

Slow and agonizing the way Romulus would insist. Blow torches, pliers, acids, live electrical wires and rubber hoses would be the tools of choice, everything from the medieval toolbox for the man who absolutely positively had to get things fixed.

In the end a strong message would be sent to the criminal underworld, one which would eventually come to be a tale of legend.

The Evil Wrath of Gambaro.

As for the massacre itself, it had already made international news and the headline caption had already named the tragedy with a cheesy title---Death at the Donatello! According to news figures, the Donatello had suffered a very bloody day: out of a hundred and fifteen guests, thirty four had been shot and killed, sixteen had perished in the initial bomb blast, while twenty-five had succumbed to the ensuing fire.

In total that accounted for seventy-five dead and seven wounded.

And as for one of those seven wounded, he sat on a blue vinyl chair, white gauze bandages taped to a head that had escaped with just a few minor lacerations. Medically, he was pretty much peachy, but other than that, he was an emotional train wreck.

(37)

Angelo's skull seemed to throb in time with his heartbeat, but despite the pounding migraine he couldn't think of anything else aside from Bianca. Occasionally, there were brief flashes of anger, a need for retribution against those responsible for this betrayal, but for the most part, his mind had settled into a kind of weird pocket of prayer.

And there it was: Angelo Marchetti the heathen atheist, praying for a goddamn miracle. Surely a bolt of lightning would strike him down for such an outlandish request, he who cursed the lord's name with every second breath and gave rise to the wicked through a rally of misdeeds. He was sinner, trespasser, malefactor, scoundrel, wrongdoer, yet despite his failings he nonetheless redeemed some degree of quality with his love for the girl. Still, for the blasphemer to place a prayer upon the altar of the lamb was nothing short of desecration to the lord's noble sacrifice. Angelo felt his hypocrisy, spiritual unworthiness, but continued to pray anyways.

"Angelo," Vincent said.

Angelo looked up and saw the tired worn face of Uncle Vincent. A single bandage laid askew over the Bear's bushy eyebrow, a gauze saline wrap taped to a nasty burn upon his left hand. His designer clothes were stained with black soot as were Angelo's, but other than that, Vincent seemed to move along well-enough---no broken bones or internal injuries to offer a hindrance.

Vincent took a seat next to Angelo, where he placed that big mitt of a hand upon his nephew's muscular shoulder. "You did good today. I'm real proud of you."

Angelo focused on his uncle's words, trying to push those concerned thoughts of Bianca aside just enough to communicate. "We both did."

A weak smile touched Vincent's thick lips, and for a second it looked as though he might swoon. He was obviously exhausted, they both were. "Romulus wants to speak to you."

"How's he doing?" Angelo asked.

"A slight concussion, that's all." Vincent offered a short quiet laugh. "He's got a head like a granite rock."

"And Bianca...what about her?"

At this, Vincent pursed his lips and shook his head. "She's in surgery...ruptured spleen, and some internal bleeding in the brain...they're giving her even money on surviving."

The beat of Angelo's heart quickened. Suddenly, he was on his feet pacing back and forth, hands rubbing his wounded forehead for an idea. But there was nothing he could do, he was helpless to do anything aside from wait.

"Goddamn it!"Angelo grumbled.

Vincent stood, regarded his nephew with a peculiar expression, one that retraced history back to that eventful day when Angelo had first met Romulus, or moreover, the incident with Bianca's picture.

"Jesus H Macy," Vincent said with half a smile. "You've really got a thing for her, don't you?"

Angelo stopped pacing and studied Vincent with eyes that were lost for direction. "I...love her."

Vincent let a slow easy whistle pass through his teeth. "Screw me." Vincent stood and then let those powerful hands of his find Angelo's shoulders. "You don't even know her, Angelo...she's a total stranger...snap out of it."

"I know, but I can't help what I feel Vincent...I can't change..." Angelo was at a loss as to what to say next.

"Romulus would never let you near her," Vincent said, but then the memory of their recent adventure flooded his thoughts. Angelo had saved the girl and Romulus knew it. If ever there was a debt to be repaid by the big cheese, it was to this young man who had acted so bravely in the face of such danger.

But would Romulus actually allow this young gangster an opportunity to date his daughter? If karma truly dictated the flow of things, then Romulus dared not deny this man anything until his debt be repaid.

"I'm sorry Angelo...you're a grown man... sometimes I forget," Vincent said in a soft subdued tone. "If you say you love her, then I believe you." A concerned sigh passed off Vincent's lips. "Fate has dealt you a dirty hand my young friend...that your first meeting should be like this." The Bear touched the side of Angelo's face with a rarely expressed act of affection. "You have my sympathy and my prayers."

Angelo took hold of that hand and squeezed it tight. "Thank you."

For a moment they stood in silence, both fraught with a lifetime of tragedies. They had both paid fate with more than their share of blood and it would be unjust for fate to continue to collect on that hefty fare with such steep interest. And if fate should claim Bianca's young life this day, then what would become of the young man named Angelo?

Would he ever dare to love someone again?

The future balanced on the tip of a bullet.

Vincent released his nephew's shoulder, the worn features on his face hardening ever so slightly. Business demanded a certain professional protocol, and the business they had to discuss was of paramount importance.

"Romulus wants to see you," Vincent said.

"About what?" Asked Angelo.

Vincent's eyes narrowed as he took on a stance that suggested deep rooted pride, a soldier saluting their national flag as he replied with just one word.

"Elitario."

(38)

Angelo had heard Vincent speak of the Elitario when they used to live together in the brownstone. An Elitario was a very special unit of mob soldier, their inception early twenty-first century. They'd been originally created by Sicilian Gambaro to deal with the menacing threat from Russian Mafia Hitmen who were killing off Gambaro members at an alarming rate. The Elitario were rumored to be the best in the business, the group responsible for bringing the title and prestige of Mafia back to its Italian origins.

At one time it was almost like a goddamn trophy cup, a matter of national pride within an organized crime syndicate where the players didn't get penalties, they got whacked. Those historical battles had been messy, many worse than the Donatello on a far grander scale. Thousands had died over a period of seven years during that legendary mob war, that was until an uneasy truce had been negotiated between the crime families. Ever since then the international lines had been drawn, each side keenly aware that to breach the border would be an immediate declaration of war. So the peace remained provisional, but in times of peace one prepared for war, and that's what Elitario did: they trained with the understanding that at any moment their incredible skill may be called into action. Gambaro Elitario was the equivalent of military special forces, for therein laid the source of its training.

Ex CIA, KGB, NSA, British SS, each branch had been recruited from around the globe to train Gambaro Elitario, and each of these tutors had filled their pockets with Gambaro cash in exchange for the forbidden knowledge of how to be the most effective killing machine. And that's what Gambaro Elitarios were: killing machines. Not hitmen, not assassins, not hired guns, they were cold calculating killing machines that lived for one purpose and that was to protect Gambaro with death.

One of the qualifications to be a Gambaro Elitario had to do with bloodline, namely its purity. There were no mutts permitted within the ranks, no half breeds. If you weren't a Sicilian through and through from balls to bone then you could never pledge the fraternity.

And it didn't end there either.

Not only did you have to be a thoroughbred Italian, you also had to have been born on Italian soil. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. So to hear Uncle Vincent say the word Elitario to Angelo as though his nephew even had a remote chance of being considered for such an exclusive membership, went against everything Angelo had ever heard about the organization.

"Elitario," Angelo repeated.

Vincent nodded.

"What about them?" Angelo asked.

Although intrigued, Angelo couldn't help but think about Bianca.

Vincent shrugged, but his eyes suggested a hint of possibility. "Not sure...Romulus asked me if you had ever heard about the Gambaro Elitario. I said yes, then he sent me to fetch you for a chat."

Angelo blinked, tried to imagine what relevance such a request might have, but his thoughts were too muddied down with worry over Bianca. He then thought to Romulus, of how this situation must be playing out in his mind. Here, his only daughter's chance for survival was now in question, flesh of his flesh, blood of his blood. To a man like Romulus nothing was more important than family and loyalty. But today he had not only been betrayed by a former employee, but was now in danger of losing the one person he loved more than anything else in the world.

"Okay then," Angelo acknowledged. "Let's go see the old man."

(39)

The private hospital room was guarded by a dozen inconspicuously armed goons. The group was obviously on edge. All and all it was the kind of security entourage reserved for kings and rock stars, a gauntlet of strong arms that'd shoot first and ask questions later if given proper inclination. No one who wasn't a trusted confidant would get close to Romulus tonight, tomorrow or for the foreseeable future. But as for Angelo Marchetti, he had been granted an all access backstage pass for a single engagement.

Thoroughly frisked by a pair of angry faced thugs with no necks, Angelo was eventually allowed to pass. But before he entered into that quiet hospital room, he paused briefly to glance back at Uncle Vincent. The big lug leaned casually against the corridor wall, his eyes lit with pride. It was almost as if Vincent were watching Angelo graduate from wise guy college, or accept a medal of honor for battlefield heroics. But then it was more than that, as if the big lug were imagining himself in Angelo's place, living vicariously through his protégé like a loving parent who genuinely aspired greater things for their beloved child. And despite Angelo's concern over Bianca's health, and the uncertain path that unfolded before him, he couldn't help but offer Vincent a sincere smile, however wan it might be.

They had both lived hard lives, seen and done much together, and Angelo couldn't help but feel as though his uncle should be at his side, to stand as family and be recognized for their accomplishment. But this was not the time for such indulgences. Gambaro was at war on western soil for the first time in more than twenty years. Ceremonies and celebrations would come in a time of peace, and those lucky enough to survive this latest clash would relish in its glory. But until the entire group responsible for orchestrating the Donatello attack were dead and buried, then no one would be eating cake and drinking champagne.

Vincent winked, Angelo nodded, and with that done, Angelo quietly slipped into Romulus's room.

(40)

Romulus lay on an adjustable bed which had been set into a sitting position. He looked at the ceiling, eyes scheming. Vengeance was obviously on his mind, it exuded off of him like the strong Old Spice cologne he always wore. Angelo politely cleared his throat which broke Romulus's singular fixation with an invisible spot in midair.

"Angelo," Romulus said with a troubled smile. "Come sit my amico fidato. You honor me with your presence."

Angelo took a seat beside Romulus's bed. "Thank you for seeing me sir." Angelo thought to ask about Bianca, but knew Romulus would be in the dark about her condition as much as he was. They would both have to suffer the desolate emptiness of time in their own way, until either death claimed Bianca's soul, or God graced her with a continued existence.

Romulus laid his bandaged head to the side and blinked slowly as he regarded Angelo's features. IV lines ran into his burly forearms delivering a pharmaceutical cocktail of medical remedies, but nothing that would ease the anguish within his heart.

"My baby...she...sick."

Angelo's lips pursed, his eyes moistened, but still they managed to hold onto their fire. "Yes, I know."

"My work...dangerous for me and...family."

Angelo nodded, understood that Romulus was shouldering an incredible amount of guilt.

"Protect best I can, yes. But sometime...sometime wolves get through...attack sheep."

Angelo watched as a syrupy tear slid from Romulus's eye. The old man was torn apart inside, jumping from anger to sorrow like skipping from rock to rock across a raging river.

"You a shepherd...you like your father...Marchetti...killers."

Romulus whispered this last part, which drove the point home in a way no other tone could. Still, Angelo felt divided by the assertion, as if it weren't so much a character assessment as it was an accusation. Angelo's thoughts drifted briefly to Alfonso Marchetti and the father he never knew.

What kind of man had Alfonso been?

Obviously one with a sinister skill, so much so that Gambaro's top dog was well aware of that dark talent and revered it. How then was Angelo to feel about such a man, let alone to be measured in comparison to him?

The answer surprised him.

To be assessed with such value purchased strength, and to purchase such strength wielded thunder and lightning, and a man endowed with such quality could release the storm and rain vengeance down upon the wicked. For the first time ever, Angelo couldn't help but feel the description suited him to a T.

"You helped Bianca...you helped me." Romulus reached over and took hold of Angelo's hand. Surprisingly there was remarkable strength to be found therein. The old man would soon recover from this sucker punch and when he did there'd be hell to pay. "Grazie."

"You're welcome," Angelo replied in modesty.

"Forgive me Angelo, but a favor I must ask, yes."

Angelo sat forward, eyes locked with Romulus, two men with a deep understanding that difficult things would soon be required of them. "Yes Romulus...I'm listening."

"You go Sicily...tonight yes...train Gambaro Elitario."

It was just as Vincent had suspected: Angelo would be trained to be a professional killer, a goddamn Gambaro Elitario. Under any other circumstance he'd have been blown away, but given the current situation the honor felt tarnished by Bianca's blood. He'd gladly renounce this appointment if it meant that Bianca could be spared harm, but that kind of negotiation had long since past. The only thing left to do now would be to use the knowledge he would gain in Sicily to strike back at her attackers, a lesson he would generously dispense when the moment came.
"Why me Romulus? Why have you chosen me for such an honor?"

Romulus crooked a smile. "You save Bianca...you save family...now I give your family justice in payment, yes...I give...Deluca."

(41)

At the sound of Deluca's name the hair on the back of Angelo's neck immediately stood at attention. Those keen eyes of his let their pupils dilate to full aperture, the young strong heart within his toned chest sped up to a steady gallop. This body language did not go unnoticed by Romulus. After all, the boy's family had been denied justice for too many years, and in the light of Bianca's delicate condition, Romulus's guilt for having allowed such an unforgivable transgression to elapse made him feel like a gutless worm.

Yet despite Angelo's overwhelming lust for vengeance, he could not set aside his feelings for Bianca. She was injured, close to death, and although Angelo had dreamed of this moment for so long, to finally be let loose upon his archenemy, this too felt tainted by her blood. If there was to be justice, then let it not be Bianca to herald its coming at the cost of her flesh. No deed could warrant such an oppressive tax, not to Angelo, and certainly not to her father.

"Must I go tonight?" Angelo asked. He did not wish to leave Bianca behind, not without knowing her ultimate fate.

Romulus smiled weakly, his eyes offering up their sincerity and years of wisdom. They could tell the young man was infatuated with Bianca, and for that, Romulus couldn't help but love Angelo like a son, the boy who had carried his daughter through the fires of hell.

"You go...see girl...she remind you why you go, yes...her..." At this thought another tear slid down the length of Romulus's rough cheek, as if in the crime boss's heart his baby girl had already passed into the hereafter. "Her memory will remind you of why you fight." He coughed, his old lungs still bothered by the amount of toxic smoke they had ingested this day. "In time you come back...you stand beside Gambaro...Gambaro stand with you...together we both find justice...together we both have revenge."

Angelo's eyebrows hunched sharply. "Romulus, do you know who's responsible for the attack?"

Romulus closed his eyes. "Go now Angelo...see Bianca...Gambaro collect you soon enough...then Sicily...be the Elitario, yes...grazie."

(42)

"Well?" Vincent asked with a curiosity that was borderline ravenous. "What'd he say?"

"I'm off to Sicily tonight," Angelo replied with a certain measure of emotional distance.

"Jesus H Macy," Vincent whispered. "The old man actually did it...got a mutt inside the big boys club."

"Must've had to beg, borrow and steal to work that kind of a miracle," Angelo assumed.

"Freaking hey," Vincent agreed. "But you're in...the first mutt to ever bridge the divide...va-voom!"

"Yeah," Angelo nodded somberly. "I'm in...but it isn't on scholarship...it's on karma."

Vincent thought about that for a moment before his hard features shaped around the idea with a clear understanding. "Capisce...truer words never spoken."

"Vincent, I'm kind of on the clock here," Angelo said in an apologetic voice. "I'm going to visit Bianca before I go. If you wouldn't mind I'd---"

"---Say no more compadre," Vincent replied. "I know how you feel about her. It's cool. Go."

Angelo wrapped his arms around Vincent in a manly embrace, both men slapping the other on the back for good measure.

"You take care over there, Angelo. Watch your back, capisce," Vincent said.

"You too," Angelo replied.

They separated and regarded each other for a second, both with the understanding that in the breadth of a few short hours, Angelo Marchetti had proved himself as a man. The baptism had been by fire, but the guy with the steel gray eyes had come through it in style.

(43)

Bianca's room was secured by four knuckle dragging goons and three shifty eyed cops. They regarded Angelo with a peculiar curiosity, perhaps aware of the great obligation he was expected to fulfill. The strange feeling emanating from the group was palpable, and as they carefully studied him, their eyes betrayed their intent. Yes, he was not yet a Gambaro Elitario, but someday he would be, and as Angelo walked through the gauntlet of mafia strong men, he knew they could smell that designation upon him like a potent musk. It was a strange yet familiar feeling, like being back in Mount Hope when the bigger stronger kids had showed him a sort of provisional respect, one that suggested that perhaps their mettle should be pitted against Angelo's if only to remind themselves of the order of things. That's how these goons looked to Angelo, as if to say what makes you so damn special, that perhaps the old man had in fact made a mistake and should've chosen one of these Cro-Magnons for an Elitario position instead.

Whatever their stance on the matter, it didn't change the fact that Angelo was the monkey with the banana, but he'd willingly trade it in exchange for a clean bill of health on Bianca's part.

Angelo stood in the doorway chest tight on shallow breaths of air.

Bianca had just come out of surgery.

Three nurses tended to the young woman while a tall thin doctor scratched details down upon a medical chart. The doc's lips pouted, the expression on his face brooding, an educated man whose thoughts were professionally troubled. It was not the easy laid back face Angelo had wanted to see, but rather a precursor to a messenger who delivered bad news.

Angelo entered the room, to which the dutiful staff took notice of him with mild annoyance. It was obvious they didn't want him in here, they were too busy to deal with visitors, but they nonetheless understood that the young man had been granted special permission by the father, a man who just happened to be one of the most powerful crime bosses on the entire western continent.

Angelo slowly approached the foot of Bianca's bed, mindful to keep out from underfoot while the medical personnel performed their duties. The girl looked peaceful, eyes closed, soft brown hair shaved off beneath a white cap head bandage, a breathing tube had been shoved down her throat via the mouth. By all outward appearances she looked to be simply resting, a deceptive façade that misled the eye to the seriousness of her condition. Beside the bed a computer screen displayed bio stats, none of which Angelo could decipher. What he did gather from the readouts was their dismal tones. The clicks and hushed air of the respiratory system sounded too much like an old clock winding down, its cogs and wheels thirsty for a precious drop of oil. Bianca too looked thirsty despite the cocktail of IV solutions being fed into her forearms.

Was the heart beneath her modest bosom slowing to a halt?

Memories of the Donatello flooded Angelo's thoughts: the smoke and fire, finding Bianca's injured body amidst the debris and the betrayal by Two Tone Marty. It was supposed to have been a celebration, not this abomination.

Angelo's hands squeezed into fists that had to be content with strangling empty air. Marty had acted alone in planting the bomb, but who had arranged the massacre? If only there'd have been more time inside the Donatello to explore that topic, then Angelo could've beaten the information out of Marty, would've enjoyed it despite their previous kinship, but limited time had left Angelo with no choice but expedite Marty's departure into oblivion.

Now it would ultimately be up to Romulus and his bloodhounds to shake the trees to see what fell out, not Angelo. After all, business had him assigned elsewhere: Sicily. Still, it felt like he was deserting his comrades in the middle of a fight, and not just Gambaro, but Bianca as well.

Who then would look out for her while he was gone?

Of course Angelo knew that Romulus would protect her far better than he could, that any other suggestion would surely be nothing more than romantic vibrato. Although if not for Angelo, Bianca would've most certainly have died back at the Donatello. That alone proved that Gambaro was not all seeing and all knowing. That fact also bothered Angelo deeply, placed doubts within his thoughts that Gambaro might falter at a critical moment.

What if Bianca desperately needed him and he was stuck in Sicily?

It wasn't going to be easy, but Angelo would have to let go and trust that the Gambaro's leg breakers wouldn't mess up and in turn accidentally allow some bastard to kill off the mafia princess. Then again there were no certainties that Bianca would survive this night, no assurances that Angelo would become an Elitario, and no promises that said Deluca would die by Angelo's hand. There was just a future of unseen darkness which offered little solace, but more than an ample supply of fear.

"Hey," Angelo whispered.

The trio of nurses turned briefly, realized they were not being addressed and then returned to their tasks.

"I've gotta go away for awhile," Angelo continued. "Your father is sending me to Sicily. He seems to think I've got what it takes to be a..." At this piece of classified information, Angelo opted to abstain from such a boast given the present company. "An executive."

Bianca remained unmoved, either asleep or oblivious.

"I'm sorry this happened to you. I wish I'd have gotten you out of there sooner, but..." Angelo felt an explanation at this point would only sound hollow, although nothing could be further from the truth. "Please fight...please live...remember what I said back at the restaurant? I said you had a lot to live for, and you do." His hands relaxed, fingers caressed the bed sheets where her feet lay cool and motionless beneath the thin covers. "I know you don't know me...that we've never actually met, but..." Angelo regarded the nursing staff, wished that he could have this forum with Bianca in private, but alas that was not meant to be.

It would seem a great deal of things were not meant to be.

"I..." A slow tense breath was drawn in to carry those precious words he absolutely positively had to say. If he left this night and things went astray, if Bianca succumbed to her injuries or an assassin's designs, then he'd never get a chance like this again.

No, these words dare not find the smooth polished epitaph of cemetery granite, they had to be declared in the living flesh.

"I love you."

At this statement, the three nurses briefly regarded the young man with a warmth generally reserved for such romantic proclamations. Surprisingly, Angelo felt a slight flush redden his cheekbones with mild embarrassment. Such gentle sentiments were a rarity in his world. To be so genuinely sincere in such a public situation exposed just how vulnerable he truly was to Bianca's charm. In the end, he was every bit as defenseless as the girl in the coma, more so, for his heartbeat was a slave to hers, not vice-versa.

"Angelo."

Angelo turned and spotted a short man in dress pants, dress shirt and a tweed dinner jacket. He had seen the guy around before, recognized him from the tax office where Two Tone Marty had sometimes did creative bookwork. Anthony was his name, the type of wise guy who carried a pen and a calculator instead of a forty-five.

"We have to go now," Anthony explained in an anxious tone. "The plane is waiting."

It was obvious today's business had Anthony unnerved, because no one knew who had done the Donatello deed, nor when or where they might choose to strike next. For the time being it was best to grow eyes in the back of your head, especially since word of Marty's cowardly betrayal had leaked out onto the street.

It's the night of the Long Knives, Angelo thought. Can you feel them cutting?

Angelo regarded Bianca one last time, then reluctantly turned and walked out the door, his education in the matters of Sicilian strategy officially under way.

(44)

Carlos was the biggest prick to ever walk the planet: mean, sadistic, selfish, arrogant and those were his good traits. Most of that sour disposition had to do with twenty years of Sicilian tradition having been broken on account of one little snot nose punk who couldn't speak a lick of Italian. That social slight pissed Carlos off to no end. It wasn't just an insult to Gambaro law, but to the racial purity of the core Elitario itself. How dare Romulus send such a miserable recruit to be trained, a goddamn mutt! The entire outrage stank of political patronage, a favor lobbied on behalf of a corrupt man endowed with the soul of a pig.

If only Carlos could get Romulus's little abomination to wash out, then the core could legitimately get rid of him. But the little puke turned out to be damn tough, and that tenacity had allowed the little maggot to endure the rigorous training and daily hardships inflicted by the cruel tutelage of Carlos. But then there was even more to it than that, and that something stirred Carlos's ire as nothing else could.

Angelo Marchetti was the best Carlos or anyone else in the core had ever seen, a goddamn prodigy. If the kid had been born on the proper side of the ocean in God's country and spoke the native tongue, then he would have been heralded as a hero. Honors would've been generously bestowed upon him, ceremonies conducted in celebration of his talent. But alas, he was just a mutt, a desecration to the Elitario's order, and no one no matter how graced with an unnatural ability could ever hope to change that.

On a nightstand beside Carlos's bed sat a hollow tip bullet with Angelo's name on it. Every morning when Carlos awoke, the butcher debated whether or not to end Angelo's education with an act of cold blooded murder. It would save time, save face and restore the thoroughbred bloodline of the organization as it should be. But that extermination would be taking the easy route out, admitting defeat by an act of cowardice. No, in time the little bastard would meet his end in the village square, and in that fatal end, Romulus and all those after him would understand that if you weren't a thoroughbred Italian with Sicilian dirt beneath your fingernails, then you were a lesser mortal incapable of the title of Gambaro Elitario.

There were two days left in Angelo's training, just enough time for Casa Diavalo to work its divine miracle. As always the Diavalo was the last resort for weeding out the undesirables, and come two days from now, Angelo Marchetti would come to his end before the old bell tower of the village church in time honored tradition.

(45)

So far Marchetti had repeatedly endured days without sleep, the psychological warfare and the intense physical duress which in actuality felt like acts of torture. For two years he'd been beaten like a mangy dog, starved, burnt, cut, bruised, electrocuted and almost drowned. But still, he had held on, learned the deadliest martial art combat moves known to man, studied a wide selection of weaponry, everything from knives, to swords, to guns and explosives. He practiced these skills with zealot like dedication and to the point of near exhaustion. But despite his triumphs, Carlos always found something to complain about.

Nothing was ever good enough, and Angelo understood why.

Marchetti was a mutt, an embarrassment to the Elitario, and in an organization like this, if your commanding officer didn't like you, then they found a way to kill you. There were no transfer orders to contend with, there was just a shallow hole in the woods where they would invariably toss the body. Many a night Angelo expected Carlos to sneak into the barracks and slay him while he slept, and that wasn't just paranoia, but rather a genuine concern grounded in a stark reality. And as the calendar counted down to that final day when Angelo finally got to go back home, he was acutely aware that Carlos had become ever more exacting when it came to discipline. Angelo knew he was ultimately being set up for an accident that would see him dumped into a shallow grave.

Suffice to say, Angelo had to come up with a plan to survive.

Romulus couldn't have known what misery he had condemned Angelo to when he'd sent him here for training. Hell, even Uncle Vincent had acted as though Angelo were simply going off to scout camp for the summer.

Did they not know what this place was like?

Of course not, no one except a Gambaro Elitario knew what went on here, and as far as Angelo's take on the program was concerned, his experience was extremely unique. The mutt that had broken ranks and had been brutally punished for it.

If only Angelo could talk to Romulus or to Vincent, but communication with the outside world was forbidden. No letters to or from home: those were the rules. That aspect of the training was perhaps the most difficult, to be so completely cut off from society and Bianca.

Constant thoughts of her dogged Angelo from sunup to sundown.

Had she survived the night of the Long Knives?

Was she happy and healthy?

Had Romulus spoken to her about him?

Had she heard Angelo speak that night in the hospital?

The not knowing was nearly unbearable, and to make matters worse there was the real possibility that he would never have those answers, because he would soon be dead.

"Two more days and you can go home," Angelo whispered into the barrack's stolid darkness.

Angelo's head rolled restlessly upon a canvas pillow stuffed with rough straw. There were no creature comforts here, no running water, electricity, soft down cushions or orthopedic mattresses to ease a body's aches. There were just the bare essentials which were barely enough to begin with. Angelo's cot was constructed of knotted hardwood, its bedcover a gray woolen blanket with the itchy coarse texture of sandpaper. The floor was dirt, the ceiling leaked whenever it rained, and the wind drafted in through cracks in the walls with little resistance. Drinking and bathing water was gathered from a rusty old bucket from a stream that ran nearby.

As for the compound, it was geographically remote, located in the mountains, surrounded by coniferous trees and a hard rugged soil that was laden down with snarls of unyielding bedrock. Snow covered the hill most of the year, beautiful to the eye, but raw to the touch.

Not twenty miles away laid a lavish ski resort, one that Angelo had once considered visiting a few years back. But those earlier days of leisure existed in another lifetime and in a world of trivial concerns.

What he wouldn't give to have them back.

Now those former carefree concerns worried about things like starving to death, getting shot during a training exercise, being irreparably maimed in hand to hand combat, or freezing to death in the dense forests.

Life along with its priorities had changed.

Angelo's clothing was limited to a humble dull white garb consisting of canvas pants and a sleeveless poncho. Sandals woven from tough strands of leather served as uncomfortable footwear year round. Rags acted as insulation for the feet and hands which had to be bound skillfully together lest they fall off during morning calisthenics or wilderness training. Those tattered rags were your life, the difference between losing fingers and toes to frostbite. Meals consisted of the exact same things daily: combinations of water, rice, fish, a slice of lime at supper to ward off scurvy, and a whole wheat bread roll to fill the pit inside an empty stomach with fiber. Angelo had lost twenty pounds of fat and gained fifteen pounds of toned muscle since he'd come here. Still, he looked malnourished: pronounced cheek bones, skin wound too tight across his stern angular face, dark patches beneath a wolf's glare of cold steel eyes.

He'd been a lump of soft flesh that had been worked over on a blacksmith's anvil until it had become iron: defined abs, efficient lungs to carry thin traces of oxygen, heightened combat reflexes and the psychological conditioning to utilize them in an instant. Angelo had become the tip of a goddamn spear, sharpened by severe discipline and the harsh regiment of strict routines.

As for those routines, they were often interrupted by what Angelo called "the shock drills." Alertness and readiness to fight were always being put to the test. Sometimes it would be a simple case of a sucker punch while Angelo was distracted with another task, while other times the bullet would graze the flesh just enough to let him know that in the real world, he'd have been a dead man.

Truth told, there were days when Angelo wished those sniper bullets had found their mark and put him out of his misery. But he was close to the end now. There would be no accidents if he could help it. Like it or not, Carlos would have to accept the fact that Angelo Marchetti was going to walk down this mountain as a Gambaro Elitario, and if Carlos tried to stop him, then Angelo would gladly kill him.

Angelo however, had learned over the past two years that Carlos was a sneaky bastard who was sadistic by nature. Carlos would be creative in Angelo's demise, construct a plan worthy of a true blue butthole.

The question was: would Angelo see it coming in time?

Whatever Carlos had in mind, it would be the ultimate sucker punch, a cowardly act by a racist man with little to no honor to speak of.

(46)

The night dealt out drafty chills that made Angelo's shack of poorly tacked together boards creak and moan in the company of bitter temperatures. It was the kind of weather that helped to mask approaching footsteps. If Carlos decided to come like a thief in the night and steal Angelo's young life, then Angelo dare not sleep. But if Angelo didn't get some much needed shuteye, then he'd be useless for his last two days of training.

This was a typical dilemma.

At night Angelo would place a bucket by the door with a small rock beneath it to keep it precariously off balance. If anyone opened the door, the bucket would fall over and make enough noise to wake him. As for the wooden flap shutter in the shack's glassless window, he would bind it shut with one of his hand wrappings and then set a series of tiny stones along its edge so that they would fall onto the floor if the binding was cut, or the flap was suddenly forced open. Of course there was no guarantee that Carlos might just kick the door in and then spray the room down with bullets. That in mind, Angelo always slept beneath the cot with the hope that perhaps the bed's boards might provide enough shelter for him to mobilize a counter attack if Carlos came a calling.

Each night had been spent like this, but then this wasn't like most nights.

There were two days left on the clock, two days left for Carlos to fill that shallow hole in the wilderness with Angelo's mangy hide. It was certain that the royal bastard would not allow a mutt to graduate his exclusive academy, and if Angelo didn't wash out tomorrow, or the next day, then Carlos would have only one option: termination.

As usual it was a roll of the dice for Angelo: close his eyes and sleep, or lay awake and listen. Angelo realized that this too was another form of Carlos's strict training and a form of sadistic torment, something to keep Angelo frosty and off balance. Carlos knew that if Angelo lost enough sleep, then he'd wash out for sure, because fatigue was the kind of adversary that dogged you like a shadow, always at your heels and forever in your thoughts. Yet despite those concerns of a late night raid, Carlos had never once stormed into the humble barrack the entire time Angelo had been here. Yes, the butcher had barged into the other recruits shanties, which belonged to three other inmates, but never Angelo's.

Angelo had been deliberately segregated from the other recruits, at least until it was time for combat training. Only then would Angelo get down and personal with his small community of neighbors, men that would come close to killing him on a regular basis, or vice versa. Angelo was forbidden to speak with them, not that they would have understood him anyway. Those Sicilian candidates only spoke Italian, where as Angelo's grasp of the language was still quite wanting. And as for that mysterious trio of Elitario undergrads, they were an interesting bag of mixed nuts. Two of the recruits looked like brothers: flat noses, round chins, thin sandy hair, rolled shoulders which Vincent referred to as a boxer's hump, and the same eerie green eyes. They were both Angelo's height, perhaps a smidgen taller if they didn't slouch. The brothers were never pitted against one another in combat, which further suggested that they were relations, not to mention that they fought with the same predictable dirty moves. Angelo had picked that out the first day they'd stepped into the courtyard to do fist to cuffs. Gambaro Elitario had wasted no time throwing their newest cadets into combat. On that particular day, Angelo exchanged blows with the brother he affectionately referred to as Tweedle-Dee. Angelo had easily defeated Dee with little effort, despite Dee's attempt at sneaky crotch shots and dirt slinging.

As for brother number two: Tweedle-Dumb, Angelo faced off against him three days later, at which time a similar style of fighting quickly revealed itself with more sneaky crotch shots and more thrown dirt.

Dumb had gone down even faster than Dee.

The brothers may not have been fraternal twins, but they sure as hell worked on the same wavelength.

As for resident number three: he was unusually tall, six-seven, had a barrel chest, and dark raven hair that sat atop his otherwise smooth pale complexion, a faint five o'clock shadow covered his very square jaw. As for three's remarkable eyes: they were pearl black, both pupils lost to the oily pools of the surrounding iris, a medical condition which was the product of a rare genetic disorder called, Aniridia. The condition was usually associated with poor vision, or sometimes blindness, but as for contestant number three, who Angelo referred to as Ghost, his vision appeared to be flawless.

Eight days after their arrival into the compound, Angelo finally met Ghost in open combat. Ghost gave nothing away in regards to intention or emotional presence through his eyes. They were dead eyes, mute and courted by an equally vacant expression. Ghost was a strategist. He did not telescope when he threw hands, barely flinched when struck, waited patiently for the right opportunity to counterstrike, and was only predictable in one regard: he always made the first move. Perhaps that in itself had shown a lack of patience, but Angelo doubted it. Ghost was a cool customer when it came to doing anything. If he initiated combat, then surely it would be a tactical decision to do so, not an emotional one.

As for that first altercation on the grounds: Angelo had lost royally, and had been beaten into unconsciousness in less than two minutes without so much as leaving a scratch on Ghost's smooth face. Since that day two years ago in the courtyard, Angelo had managed to give Ghost much more of a challenge in their subsequent engagements. But never once had Angelo beaten Ghost in those dozens and dozens of painful grudge matches that followed.

Ghost was the compound's undefeated champion except when it came to weapons.

Put a gun, bow staff, or knife in Angelo's hand, and not even Ghost could hope to compete. Sure, Ghost was more than able with a gun, but when it came to coordination and agility with a sidearm, or manual weapon, Angelo was the undisputed king.

Upon graduation, Angelo imagined a man like Ghost would most likely serve his masters as an expert leg-breaker or the type of goon who worked guys over with such brutality that it would make him the subject of gothic legend. As for Tweedle-Dee and Dumb, they were bomb makers, the idiots that'd spike your drink with cyanide or wire your toilet with C4 just to get a few lowbrow laughs.

The brothers were crud on a biscuit, easy to prepare, but hard to stomach.

The one thing each recruit had in common was that they'd each slid a little bit down the evolutionary scale since coming here. The program did that, brought out the baser nature and honed the killer instinct.

They were becoming Elitarios.

A strong breeze blew out of the east and the window shutter rattled enough to make the stones shake. Perhaps Carlos would send the entire group to partake in Angelo's execution tonight, in which case sleeping under the bed would be of little use. He reminded himself that there was no point thinking about such morbid outcomes. After all, the valiant only ever tasted of death but once, and Angelo so very much wanted to be valiant. So Angelo decided to do as he always did since the first day he had come here.

He closed his eyes and let fate decide if he should live to see another sunrise.

(47)

Dawn had come and gone and not one sound had heralded its arrival. The mental alarm clock inside Angelo's head had roused him from a restless sleep plighted with dreams of frozen wastelands and bitter aftertastes. They were the kinds of dreams that evaporated in daylight, lost to a form of amnesia that no doubt shielded the mind from horrors best left forgotten in the netherworld. Dreams however, were the least of Angelo's concerns. It was the stolid silence that had hold of his attention, that dead quiet which was quite out of place in an organization of strict rituals.

Why hadn't the compound's morning buzzer gone off?

Was it broken?

Angelo listened for some sort of earth shattering crash to fill in the noiseless void, but nothing came. He held his breath in anticipation and still nothing stirred. No gunfire, nor bombs, nor screaming maniacs filled the dawn's pallid air, just the calm bitter cold of an empty morning.

Two more days was all he had to survive, just two more days.

Seconds ticked into moments.

Angelo allowed himself to breathe again, certain that Carlos would hear that soft exhalation and pounce down upon him like a rabid beast. But again, nothing came.

Slowly, he crawled out from beneath the cot and untied the wrappings from the window's shutter. These worn garments were quickly and skillfully wound around his calloused hands and fingers like a boxer's wraps. Next, the bucket was removed from its shaky perch and then placed quietly beside the bed. Angelo's hand rested upon the barrack door latch, uncertain if he should exit this way, or out through the window. In his mind's eye he could see Carlos standing outside, a sadistic smirk plastered across his homely face as he waited with a machinegun in his wart riddled hands.

"Good morning!" Carlos would yell, and then a fountain of spent cartridges would fall onto the frost bitten ground as a barrage of metal cut Angelo's guts to ribbons. "You didn't think I'd let a mutt like you graduate from my academy did ya? Ha ha!"

It felt like a setup, the kind of cheap prick shot that Carlos would be famous for.

Angelo's muscles tightened as the latch clicked into the open position.

(48)

Marchetti dove out through the barrack door and into a roll as he made speed across the compound's damp mud in search of cover behind an old latrine.

The morning was penetrating cold.

A heavy downcast bale of clouds shook off the remnants of a light snow with some sparse flurries, while a flock of high flying birds sang a song of faint squawks. The compound's dozen barracks along with its main building sat silent, either vacant, or occupied with sleeping residents. The perimeter of heavy logged paddock fencing and rusty barbwire that surrounded the grounds showed no sign of activity. No guards on patrol along the watchtower. The outside shooting range sat quietly next to the chicken wire combat dojo. But most notably of all was the absence of a sadistic butthole with an automatic weapon waiting to cut Angelo in half. Still, the lack of movement felt every bit as dangerous as a maniac with a machinegun.

What kind of game was this?

Eyeing the fence, Angelo entertained the idea of making a break for it. Suddenly, he felt more like a P.O.W. than a recruit, and perhaps that description was truer to this stark situation than any other. This had to be a test, some sick twisted scheme that Carlos had dreamt up, something to tempt Angelo into flight so Carlos could say that Marchetti had washed out. No, he wouldn't give the bastard the satisfaction of running out into the wilderness where Carlos and company would be waiting to dump his body into a shallow grave.

It wouldn't be that easy.

Angelo would either leave here tomorrow as an Elitario, or in a body bag: one or the other. Still, where was everyone? Should he go knocking on barrack doors like a concerned neighbor? Should he inquire at the main building?

Angelo's breath hung in the frigid air like a gray web as he devised a plan of what to do next.

(49)

"Rise and shine beautiful," Carlos said as he aimed a polished nickel plated Archer Howitzer at Angelo's face. "Time to meet your maker you miserable stinking mutt!"

The trigger was pulled, the hammer clicked, but no explosive report followed.

The gun was empty.

Of course that was to be expected. Even Carlos wouldn't be stupid enough to shoot the camera that recorded this video message. Besides, the sight of the howitzer was enough to remind Angelo just how much damage a weapon like that could do. It was the type of gun hitmen called a 'fire and forget,' because nobody ever got up after being shot by a howitzer.

Forget about it.

That shiny howitzer always hung off of Carlo's hip as if were a goddamn gunslinger. The sight of it put Angelo in mind of those early Clint Eastwood movies, the spaghetti westerns shot by Italian production companies under the direction of Sergio Leone. Angelo imagined Carlos was probably a big fan of that genre, that he probably posed with the howitzer in front of his bedroom mirror as he quoted memorable dialogue from those cinematic classics gone by.

The idea of that always made Angelo smirk, a grin that Carlos had seen and punished on more than one occasion. Still, to imagine the butcher that way was a form of retaliation. And as such, Angelo would continue to see the Elitario's headmaster in that silly way to remind himself that no one controlled his personal thoughts.

"By now you've explored the compound and have discovered that you're all alone," Carlos said with a pompous grin. "No fellow students on campus nor teachers drinking gin in the school's lounge." Carlos pointed the howitzer back at the camera. "Your last day in the course approaches. If you live till noon tomorrow." At this idea Carlos offered a sarcastic laugh. "Then you'll become an Elitario." Carlos cracked open the gun and withdrew a single hollow tip bullet. "If only you knew how many times I wanted to shoot this into your brain Marchetti." Carlos then made a clicking noise with his tongue and shook his head with a note of regret. "But alas, that would be cowardly, an unfitting end for even a mutt such as yourself." Carlos took his attention off the camera and then let his dull eyes wander around the room, which of course was the very room in which Angelo now stood. "On the wall there is a map of this mountain. You'll notice I've taken the liberty to mark on it. There are three ways out of here Marchetti. To the north is a rugged mountain pass that would take you to the heights of this mountain and over to the other side. If you take that route, you'll either freeze, or fall to your death seeing as you don't have the proper equipment to undertake such a perilous journey. The second route is along the glacial river. It's a rushing train of whitewater rapids, a wide gully of jagged rock and steep embankments with no narrow point at which to safely cross. Again, you don't have the necessary equipment to traverse such an obstacle." The expression on Carlos's face then became one of great anticipation like a fiend relishing a sinful pleasure yet to come. "The third route leads straight down the mountain through a well-worn trail to a small village in the foothills: Casa Diavalo."

Angelo recognized the name, had overheard Carlos speak of it with one of the compound's martial arts instructors, an Israeli Krav Maga expert known as Saul. As far as teachers went, Saul was Angelo's favorite, not because the man treated him any better than the other instructors, it was because Saul was damn good at what he did.

Saul was lethal, and Angelo had learned a great deal from that skilled master.

"This route is by far the most dangerous," Carlos continued. "It is tradition that one of the students be selected as the fox while the others act as the hounds in a game to the death. That fox is to be you, Marchetti." A sick smile trembled the corner of his mouth, as if he had a nervous disorder. "Here are the rules of the game." Carlos leaned closer to the camera, dull eyes lit with a perverted fascination. "Survive by all means possible." He then backed away from the camera and became much more business minded. "To graduate you will have to locate an item that is hidden somewhere in the village. Find it before high noon tomorrow, and you will be a Gambaro Elitario." Carlos then cleared his throat and smiled broadly. "Oh...by the way...in order for the other three recruits to graduate, they must find and kill you before noon, or they themselves will be put to death. It's what I like to call an added incentive. You know....weed out the cows from the bulls so to speak." Carlos holstered his gun and then placed his wart covered hands upon his wide hips. "Goodbye Marchetti. May God see fit to at least let a mutt like you die well.

Now...let the Trial of Daggers commence."

The video ended.

(50)

"Bastard!" Angelo exclaimed as he ripped down the video monitor and spat on it.

Angelo looked around the wide open room which was relatively empty. A modest dining area with old cooking appliances sat in one corner. Its cupboards and refrigerator doors had been left open intentionally to show they were barren of food. An open concept washroom with two stall partitions sat in another. In the third corner an ammunition closet along with several rows of gun racks had been looted of armaments. In the room's center floor a grandfather clock with a trio of gold faces ticked and tocked. As for the corner where Angelo stood, the inventory consisted of a few wooden desks, a floor globe with a crack near its equator, and of course the large wall map of which Carlos had spoken. Angelo stepped over the fallen monitor and stood in front of the map, tempted to rip it down in spite. Three trails were clearly displayed in colorful shades of ink: the mountain pass to the north was marked with a brown jagged line---the path to the glacial river was indicated with a brush stroke of scarlet red----lastly the trail to Casa Diavalo was represented by a twisty black line.

They were a gauntlet of deadly choices, but of course there could only be one decision.

It would take hours to get down to Diavalo, and once there, Angelo would have to confront the Three. Not good odds considering he had no weapons and his opponents were probably armed to the teeth. It was obvious that the Trial of Daggers would be terribly one sided.

In the background, the grandfather clock chimed six bells.

It would be dark in another fourteen hours or so. If Angelo was going to get down to Casa Diavalo, he would have to leave soon. Travelling at night would be hazardous, not to mention that he would need a good rest before he went up against the Three. But before he got moving he would need to scavenge the compound for anything he could use on the journey.

He considered the map once more.

The geographical layout of Diavalo offered little in the way of fortification. It basically rested upon on an open foothill plain amidst a dense forest of deciduous wildwood, a narrow peninsula closed in by a glacial river tributary, which flanked the town to three sides. The stream itself offered no obvious resources. Thirteen structures had been drawn upon the map in pencil, the furthest building upon the solitary street was marked with a cross which signified a church. The town followed the angle of the peninsula, which would limit Angelo's advance to just one possibility. If he approached at dawn from the east, the sun would be at his back and thus shine into his opponent's eyes. That's if the sun was not shrouded by overcast skies. It would be a modest advantage, if any, but if Angelo was going to win this battle, then he would have to draw upon every little scrap of help he could hope to scrounge up. He decided it would be best to bring the map, for if graced by inspiration he could consult its topography in real time. But as his hands reached up to tear it off the wall, he was suddenly overcome with a disturbing feeling.

The colors!

It had something to do with the goddamn colors Carlos had used to mark the trails.

Brown, red and black.

Something about their shades was familiar, but what?

A sudden dizzy spell clouded Angelo's eyes, and for a second he almost swooned, but managed to hold onto his feet.

"Boondocks...scarlet red," Angelo said in little more than a whisper.

Spinning quickly, he reached under both arms and withdrew---nothing.

Something important was missing, something crucial!

The eyes inside his head cleared but they didn't trust what they saw. The world felt every bit as cracked as the floor globe, a world that spun upon an axis of smoke and mirrors. Angelo rubbed his lean ribs and felt an unexplainable emptiness there. It was then that the three faces of the grandfather clock stopped ticking and began to chime a strange melody. The tune was hypnotic, soothed the part of his mind that questioned reality, and although he tried to hum in chorus with the clock, he found he was unable to duplicate the oddly strung notes.

When the clock finished its short seductive song, Angelo tore down the map and folded it up for transport. He then began a systematic search through the building for supplies, unaware that anything was out of the ordinary.

(51)

The sun had begun to set, although in the mountain's shadow it felt closer to night than dusk. It was cold, damp, close to snowing, even though the sky had cleared to reveal a rich tapestry of stars. Judging by the map's lines, Angelo was close to Diavalo, an hour's hike, perhaps two. He would make camp for the night and then get an early start in the morning.

He rested in a massive crevice of rock which served as his shelter and an improvised command center. It was here that Angelo inspected several items of value salvaged from the compound: a blanket, a nine volt battery, a razor blade, some steel wool and a pair of one inch diameter wooden dowels that were half a foot long and sharpened to a piercing point at either end. The dowels had once been ladder rungs. They were plenty tough, and would serve as excellent fighting sticks if he ever managed to get in close enough to one of the Three. The purpose of the blanket was obvious: warmth. The two inch razor blade would help shave kindling, thus making it easier to start a fire. As for the fire starter, the nine volt battery when rubbed across steel wool would ignite to flame. Initially, Angelo had thought it unwise to make a campfire, but doubted he would be in much danger tonight. Tomorrow would be the Trial of Daggers in Casa Diavalo, not out here in the wilderness. The fox and hound game was an old ritual, and Angelo doubted that even a miserable pig like Carlos would violate that time honored tradition. No, Diavalo was where the fight would go down, nowhere else. Besides, Casa Diavalo and the Trial of Daggers sounded like a spaghetti western movie title, and Angelo knew a bastard like Carlos would have a real hard on for something like that.

For a second, Angelo not only smiled broadly, but burst into a boisterous fit of laughter. He could see Carlos in his mind's eye, swaggering across the village square, Archer Howitzer holstered against his wide hip, a cigarillo perched between his thin wormy lips, eyes squinted like Clint Eastwood's. Yes, he would be quite the comical sight, Mr. Cock of the Walk out for an evening stroll. Good evening ma'am. I reckon a young filly like yourself should get out of town. It's not safe here. There's killing to be done, and I reckon I'm the one to do it.

Sticks gathered from the forest were shaved with the razor and then piled together like an Indian teepee. Angelo rubbed the nine volt against the wool and the resulting flame was touched to the carved splinters. In a matter of minutes a blazing campfire lit up the crevice and filled the night sky with the sweet scent of wood smoke. The smell made Angelo's stomach grumble and he couldn't help but wish that he had some wieners and marshmallows to roast. He hadn't eaten since last night, and the hole in his gut needed to be filled on something soon. The last thing he needed was a stomach growl that could potentially give away his location at a crucial moment.

Several white birch trees stood at the forest's edge. He recalled that Native Indians used to eat the inner bark in times of starvation, and if he wasn't mistaken, the Indians may have even made flour from it. He wasted no time stripping off large sections of bark which he ravenously wolfed down as he sat next to the fire. The soft inner layer was sweet, but far from delicious. Still, it would suffice for now, and hopefully give him enough strength to fight the Three tomorrow morning.

With his hunger pangs gone, he laid back beside the campfire and allowed himself to relish the heat. His body hadn't felt this kind of warmth in awhile, and for a moment it felt as though his bones were like branches snapping after the lift of a heavy frost.

What a sight he must have been to behold: a feral animal wrapped in dirty canvas clothes, skin soiled, eyes as wild as a wolf's. But he was strong, well-trained and anxious to meet the Three in combat. And as much as Angelo hated to admit it, Carlos had done a fine job at instructing his pupil. As a result, Angelo had become a piece of iron with knuckles that could easily break both board and bone.

What a waste it would be to discard all of Angelo's hard work for the sake of a contaminated bloodline, or in Angelo's case, his birthplace. It was insane, cruel, but then that's what Gambaro Elitario was. Carlos may have drank champagne and ate caviar when in Rome, but in his heart the bastard was nothing more than a savage barbarian.

As Angelo had become.

"What's the old saying," Angelo whispered. "When you dance with the Devil, you don't change him, he changes you."

Suddenly, Angelo felt racked with regrets.

What part of his humanity had he given up to become this monster?

And why had he done it?

To kill Deluca?

If Carlos was indeed the devil, then Angelo had sold him his soul, and come tomorrow, Carlos would send the Three to collect on that debt.

What kind of a man would Angelo be after tomorrow?

Whose feet would touch home soil again if he survived the battle of the Three?

Surely not the Angelo Marchetti who left two years ago as a naive soldier. No, this man would be harder, meaner and a genuine killer.

He thought of Bianca.

What kind of woman could love him now?

Perhaps the kind of women that corresponded with prison inmates, but not Bianca Gambaro, for she was fashioned from finer silk. Marchetti would be nothing more than a pit bull when he got back home, Romulus's guard dog with the nastiest of bites. That kind of animal could never be domesticated. Those beasts always slept outside in a cage.

"Got to let her go," Angelo muttered, uncertain that she was even still alive.

Fate had decreed Angelo Marchetti's mission long ago, and that task involved a miserable son of a bitch named Franco Deluca. Vengeance was the engine that made Angelo's heart pump, not love. To think otherwise courted confusion and that risked certain failure. No, if Angelo was to fulfill his destiny, then he had to do it with a clear mind. Love was clutter, divided the path with options. There could be no alternative choices, just the one.

Angelo drew in a deep breath and sighed. "Forget her Marchetti...the Three...focus on the Three."

It wasn't easy, but Angelo managed to put Bianca out of mind so that he could concentrate on the task at hand.

How could he ever hope to counter such unfair odds?

By now the Three would have surveyed the best spots in Diavalo. They would possess firsthand knowledge of the town's topography and structures. They also would have had time to rig booby traps and secure weaponry. Their bellies would be full of food and maybe even wine. They may have even had time to rest on down filled pillows and spring coil mattresses.

Yes, there was no doubt that the Three would be fresh for the fight. This fox and hound game would be a joke, it was more like the eagle and the worm, cowardly and woefully one sided. But then that was to be expected of a miserable son of a bitch like Carlos. Courage wasn't exactly his strong suit, but pride was. No way was he going to risk having a mutt graduate the Elitario, and the best way to secure that end was to fix the game in favor of the hounds.

Yet despite the Three's obvious advantage, Angelo nonetheless believed he could win the battle.

And what exactly justified that arrogance?

Superior motivation.

Failure was not an option. After all, Angelo had places to go and people to kill. As for the Three, they would just be the first on that hit list, nothing more. Marchetti had an appointment with a man named Deluca, and come rise of Rome, or fall of Saigon, Angelo intended to keep that date. So he settled in to a restless sleep beside the fire, mindful that only one course of action had been afforded him: improvisation.

(52)

Darkness along with a light frost greeted Angelo when he awoke. The campfire remnants were a dull mess of spent embers. The fire's heat had kept his canvas clothes and wrappings dry, and the remaining birch bark helped to quell his stomach growls. His body now fed on adrenaline which heightened his alertness. He was as combat ready as he could be and eager to put his mettle to the test. Soon, he would meet the Three in Diavalo, and there, fate would decide who lived and who died.

Travelling quick and light, Angelo easily navigated the forest's well-worn trail all the way to Diavalo's outskirts. Trees and bushes flanked the town on most sides which made for excellent cover. From these hiding spots, Angelo assessed the battle theater with a tactician's eye.

Dim starlight revealed a small village of traditional Italian design: modest pastel homes and businesses constructed from sandstone and clay brick with terracotta pan tile roofs. It was picturesque quaint, a veritable holiday post card backdrop. But in a short while its peaceful atmosphere would be disturbed with violence.

A community well with a canopy trellis stood in the village square, a wooden bucket hung from its wrought iron spindle, a historical attraction that was more decorative than functional. Along the village's solitary street were a dozen buildings in total: a mercantile, blacksmith shop, post office, butcher's shop, bank, motel, eating house and sawmill. Behind the mill the rush of white water from the glacial tributary could be heard to roar, its racing current captured in part by a sizable waterwheel. As for the few remaining buildings, they were two story homesteads, except for the church which sat at street's end.

The cathedral's tall white steeple loomed against the early morning stars like a religious cenotaph, its moderate sized bell tower sat quiet beneath the shadow of a dark cross. A large antique clock with wrought iron hands hung above the church's beamed doors. The weak glow of candle and lantern light radiated from within the frost paned windows which gave the small town an eerie ambiance.

A shudder suddenly painted a coat of gooseflesh upon Angelo's thick hide.

This village reminded him of some place he'd been before.

But where?

Déjà' vu preoccupied Angelo's thoughts. He tried to ignore the strange sensation, but could not dismiss the feeling's relevance. Whatever its connection to Diavalo, he knew it was of extreme importance.

If only he could remember.

Overhead, the stars began to slowly fade from sight. Dawn would be here soon and with it would come the challenge of the Three. The sun would be up, and in its waking glare he might have been able to move toward a building without being detected, but on the horizon a bale of storm clouds closed in on the breath of a phantom breeze.

He would need another plan.

If only there were a way he could get on top of one of those rooftops without being seen, preferably the mill's, then he would have an element of surprise, for surely the Three would be expecting him to be limited to a ground approach. But in order for him to get up onto a rooftop, he would have to fly.

But then again, there might be a way, although it would be extremely dangerous.

The pointed dowels were squeezed inside his cold hands as he weighed a critical decision. There were no practical alternatives, and the idea was so crazy that Angelo doubted anyone, even Carlos would have thought to counter it.

He eyed the church steeple, that eerie feeling of déjà vu saturating his bones like icy embalming fluid. His body felt unnaturally cold, out of synch with the surrounding temperature, and he understood that too was relevant to this situation.

But why it was he could not explain.

Angelo tucked the dowels into his leg wrappings and slipped back into the woods, preparing to risk everything on a wild stunt that no sane person would dare attempt.

(53)

The water was colder than cold, it numbed the mind of rational thought and threatened both hypothermia and cardiac arrest. Angelo tried to breathe steady, but found his lungs were a flutter of short rapid gasps. Soon the whitewater would drown him, bind his limbs in liquid ice and drag them down into the swift current where death would bury him in a watery grave.

Seconds were all he had to work with, a single miscalculation in timing and he would be swept away forever. There would be no second chances, no battle with the Three nor appointment with Franco Deluca.

The water's voice ran as deep as a bottomless chasm, an animalistic roar driven by a mindless rage. The river was a tempest at war with everything in its path, and Angelo had willfully stood before that campaign. White water boiled, wound its way around jagged rapids in great frothy bales. Eddies spun like dark tornados. The water tried to drag Angelo deeper into the slipstream, but he fought off the undertow with help from the dowels.

The sharpened sticks scraped along the river's rocky edge, anchoring him to the shoulder between sporadic bursts of motion. If the dowels strayed too far from the rim, then Angelo would quickly succumb to the river's torrent. He had to keep control, ride out the wake until he reached the waterwheel. But the current was much quicker than he thought it would be, and much colder, too. Already he could feel the strength bleeding out of his hands, and if his fingers let slip that precious dowel, then Angelo would be gone within a matter of seconds.

There would be only one chance to get this right.

But with a single haphazard stab of the dowel stick, Angelo slipped and began to drift towards the river's violent center. In that brief instant all hope had been lost. It was everything for him not to cry out in anguish. To have been so close and then to suddenly fail was absolutely heartbreaking. After all he had been through just to die like a cat drowned inside a potato sack seemed a cruel and unusual fate. Justice denied by a fraction of a second, and as a result the proceeding dominos would not fall accordingly.

Angelo had lost.

(54)

The impact had been hard, but it nonetheless offered Angelo another opportunity. With what strength remained inside his frozen legs, he pushed against the slippery rapid and propelled himself back toward the river's edge. There, the dowel wasted no time dragging him along the rim as it had before, guiding Angelo on a direct collision course with the fast spiraling waterwheel.

It was close now, the glistening buckets bailing out large scoops of water before tossing them back down into the river's fury.

He would have to time this perfectly.

Angelo gulped in a breath of air, ducked his head beneath the raging current in a shallow dive. All was black, a storm of garbled chaos. The coldness drove icy nails into his skull and threatened to unhinge his sanity, but he held on, hands reaching blindly into the darkness for that one bucket that would lift him heavenward.

(55)

Contact with the waterwheel's bucket had been perilous. The rectangular box was slippery, dragged him further into the icy depths, tried to drown him, but then hauled him upward and out of the water in one rolling motion as it spun him out onto the other side.

It was a Ferris Wheel from Hell.

Angelo's lungs sucked in air, his frozen fingers struggling to hold his weight as the wheel pulled him up unto its ever turning summit. He would have to roll off before the bucket dragged him back down the other side where it would most certainly kill him. Within the faint light of an encroaching dawn, he could see the wheel's service ledge as he was pulled up towards it. The service walkway was narrow, wedged between the mill and the wheel. The mill's wheel didn't use a sluice, but rather a lift platform that could raise the wheel up and down on a dove tail column in order to accommodate the river's seasonal levels.

As the waterwheel quickly reached its apex, Angelo prepared to lunge for the warped planks of the crude gantry. Using the momentum of the waterwheel in chorus with a push from his arms and legs, Angelo twisted his weight so that the wheel would eject him out onto the platform. The calculation had not been perfect, but close enough that Angelo hit the mill's wall and then bounded down onto the maintenance scaffold in relative safety.

The impact with the walkway was mostly absorbed by the pliable floorboards, but the slam against the mill's wall would probably leave a bruise on his shoulder about the size of a ripe orange. Still, his muscles were rigid from cold, and the shock with the gantry registered as an off the top rope body slam.

For a second he was dazed, eyes lost for direction. He had lost a dowel, but the other remained tucked within his leg wrapping. This utility was immediately clasped onto with both hands and he held it close to his chest. Angelo wasn't a religious man, but at that moment he couldn't help but thank God that he had survived the wet and wild thrill ride.

Shivers rattled his bones and chattered his teeth. His heart ran at full gallop and his lungs anxiously gulped in air. It had been an amazing feat of physical strength and agility, but Angelo nonetheless understood that the waterwheel had been the easy part of this task. The Three waited in Diavalo, and defeating them would be far more difficult than riding out a carnival big wheel.

A cold wind began to blow out of the east in the company of an approaching dawn. It was an added misery, one more hardship Angelo's rugged body would have to endure. If this had been two years ago, he would've succumbed to hypothermia by now. But the Elitario had made him hard and toughed his hide into burlap. It would take more than a spot of bad weather to kill Marchetti, it would take nothing less than the Three working together.

(56)

From the mill's rooftop beside a brick chimney, Angelo spied the street.

There was no sign of the Three.

Nothing moved, save the tree branches pushed by a growing wind. In fifteen minutes or so there would be enough daylight to read by, at which time movement between structures would be extremely difficult, if not impossible.

At a forty five degree angle to the mill stood the church. Angelo eyed the steeple with its thin peak tower. He recalled Carlos's message that an item had been hidden within Diavalo, an object Angelo must possess before noon or he would not graduate the Elitario. Angelo would bet money that Carlos had hidden the mystery item within the church, and the reason for that deduction had to do with those Sergio Leone spaghetti westerns. Carlos would see Diavalo as a movie set, use it like Sergio Leone would have done in one of his motion pictures. The item would be either on the altar, inside a confessional, or stashed inside the bell tower.

It would be more dramatic that way.

It would also probably be rigged.

No mutt would graduate the Elitario while Carlos was regent, and if he had to cheat to secure that end, then so be it.

When Angelo got inside the church, he would have to be careful.

A flicker of light shot into his eyes and he immediately ducked his head.

Had he just been spotted by a flashlight?

His ears listened intently for footfalls along with the eruption of gunfire. But what his ears heard instead was quite unexpected.

It was none other than the delicate sound of thunder.

A storm was blowing in.

(57)

Another flash of lightning lit up Diavalo to which a distant rumble of thunder replied. Judging by the speed of the approaching thunderheads, the storm would reach town shortly after sunrise. The wind had already begun to ramp up into a strong gale, soon the river's roar would be swallowed by it.

Lightning would come to blind eyes and deceive sight with shadows. Perhaps the storm would even the odds out against the Three. Still, the church would be watched closely, and if the Three already waited inside, then all the bad weather in the world wouldn't be of much use to Angelo. If only he could smoke them out of hiding. Perhaps if he lit the entire town on fire, then that would do the trick. But he would never succeed with such a bold plan. The Three would easily spot and then kill him for the effort. No, despite the elements, today would be an exercise in stealth and patience.

If Angelo waited until noon, then the Three would be compelled to organize a search, lest they themselves be summarily executed. That rule of the game served in Angelo's favor. The Three would be eager to kill him so that they might save their own skins. If pressed for time the Three would take greater risks and that would be their undoing. Angelo could then bait them, lead them into traps, but where would he set such snares?

Ultimately in chess someone had to make the first move, and that person would have to be Angelo. So far he had snuck into Diavalo without being seen and now occupied an elevated position without having set foot upon village soil.

That was damn impressive.

It was the kind of maneuver an adversary would never have suspected, so the Three wouldn't waste energy searching the surrounding rooftops.

Why would they?

The Three would've prepared for the expected, not the impossible. They would've set booby traps and alarms around the village, took position in the best observational vantage points. The Three would be armed for war, dug in, but also able to redeploy with little notice if need be. They had expert training and the best motivational need to drive their success which was survival.

Another flash of lightning pulsed across the sky and on its heels a deep resounding bellow of thunder. The storm approached with the coming dawn, and so too did the battle with the Three.

(58)

The mill's loft was bedded down with yellow hay. A mess of old junk lay scattered about. Rusty tools and wooden mallets hung from boarded slots on the wall. A dozen empty rum barrels sat to and fro. Thick spiny lengths of hemp lay piled upon the straw. A tall shelving cabinet stood alone, its double doors swung wide open to reveal a series of closely stacked shelves that would be ideal for holding small items.

The scent beneath the beamed rafters was of age and sawdust.

Angelo had snuck into the mill through a loose air vent, mindful that one of the Three may have been waiting inside. Obviously that had not been the case. The upper level of the mill was vacant, save its forgotten treasures.

He'd been lucky.

Another volley of thunder rumbled in the distance, louder and closer this time. Soon it would be on top of Diavalo where it would dump gallons of rain and blow with gale force winds. Angelo waited on its arrival, but until then, he would utilize the time efficiently.

The equipment in the loft held no practical use. However there were a few corroded bale hooks, deadly if swung at the correct anatomical body part. The tips were dull, but more than able to get good penetration into flesh if wielded with sufficient force. They would work better than the dowel, so Angelo discarded his stabbing tool for something with a bit more zing.

He held the bale hooks within his frigid hands, swinging them powerfully through the air to which they replied with a soft swooshing sound. They weren't guns, nor throwing knives, but they would work well if he could get in close enough to an opponent.

Across the loft descended a staircase. Below on the mill's ground level, the sound of large machinery turning cogs and crankshafts was easily heard. A slight vibration could be felt through the floor from either the heavy equipment or nearby river, either way the effect was still the same: a palpable flow of energy.

The wrappings around Angelo's legs and hands dripped continuously as did the rest of his canvas attire. The dampness was worse than uncomfortable, it impaired mobility, robbed precious heat and served as a constant distraction. Placing the bale hooks on top of a rum barrel, he tore off the wrappings and then hid them beneath a patch of hay. Concerns of frostbite gave him pause, but the climate, although chilled, was nonetheless warmer at this altitude than that of the Elitario compound. Besides, the adrenaline in Angelo's system helped to warm his bones, although there was a real danger that he could develop pneumonia.

At that idea he couldn't but crook a smile.

To die of pneumonia would be a far preferable fate than dying at the hands of the Three. If he was fortunate this time tomorrow, he would be as sick as a dog, in fact he'd welcome it.

He eyed the stairs, weighed the odds that one of the Three might be hidden down below. The sounds of industry on the ground level would mask the sound of footsteps on creaky stairs, but it wouldn't render Angelo invisible. Suddenly, the image of the church flashed into his mind, its tall steeple along with its black wrought iron bell. It was the town's crowning jewel, the monument at the end of the road. Inside would lay Angelo's redemption, a diploma of sorts, but would it be rigged? As always in the matters of developing strategy, everything hinged on good intelligence. Improvisation could only take him so far. It couldn't tell him where the Three were hidden nor could it show him where Carlos had stashed the item. Improvisation, albeit incredibly useful, was nonetheless blind to certain things. Intelligence was the key to devising a good plan, and as Angelo studied the stairs he couldn't help but realize just how deaf and dumb Carlos had left him.

Admittedly that was a defeatist attitude which did nothing to boost Angelo's confidence. In such dire situations it didn't pay to be a pragmatist, but rather an optimist.

Angelo would have to be a gambler if he was to win this war.

Proceed with care, but do so daringly.

(59)

Angelo's foot stopped at the top step when he realized something was wrong.

Why was the saw equipment running this early in the morning? It was obvious Casa Diavalo wasn't an actual community, but rather another Elitario training compound. Diavalo was an elaborate test range, like a military base mockup for urban warfare. That meant the Three had flipped on the mill's power switch intentionally, not some Johnny Punch Clock. And if they'd done that, then what other modifications might they have performed downstairs?

Paranoia had Angelo second guessing himself, but with good reason: the Three would kill him if given the opportunity.

The bale hooks in Angelo's hands would be little more than air rifles if met by gunfire. Again, he appraised the loft for a useful weapon. The hammer if thrown like a tomahawk would give him distance, but those mallets were awkwardly proportioned, dead blow hammers with big pitted heads that had no balance with their awkward handles.

They were useless.

The rum barrels if pushed down from above would flatten an opponent. The loft however, was closed in, and the odds of getting one of the Three to stroll beneath a waiting barrel bordered on the ridiculous. Unfortunately, the bale hooks were the only realistic weapons available. And so Angelo gripped the bale hooks tightly with the understanding that they were all he had for protection, and together he and the hooks would have no choice but to descend those miserable stairs together.

(60)

The bottom step eased out onto a floor of hardened mud. The sound of the mill saw and its medieval engine had grown considerably louder. Down here a person would have to shout to be heard. The steps had led Angelo to a relatively remote corner of the mill. Stacks of pine crates and burlap bundles shrouded the loft stairs with a makeshift wall. It was warmer downstairs, a fire gave off heat from nearby. The sensation was orgasmic, worked magical fingers into Angelo's frozen hide until a shudder of delight wormed through his brainstem. To pull that energy around him like a blanket would be paradise. Every cell in his body wanted to seek out that flame, but he knew the warmth had been laid as bait.

Someone else was definitely in here.

He would avoid that temptation, retreat to the drafty edges of the mill, for there the hunter would be hiding.

But how would he proceed?

Angelo crouched, cautiously peeked round a pine crate before retreating back behind the relative safety of the makeshift wall. In that all too brief glance he had seen an elevated platform with a large rotating saw blade---pulley belts turned gear shafts and cams with the power generated by the waterwheel---a table cluttered with tools and replacement parts sat next to a set of barn doors that had been barred shut with a thick beam which hung between two iron hooks. The scene put Angelo in mind of a castle dungeon's, except this pit came with a wide sectional plate window that gazed out onto Diavalo's solitary street.

Still, he hadn't seen one of the Three, but that didn't mean they weren't there.

Angelo looked ahead, spotted a rum barrel similar to the ones upstairs, except this one had been converted into a scrap can. It was wedged into a corner beside a cabinet that was identical to the one up in the loft.

That corner would offer him shelter from view.

There was just enough room for him to squeeze between the barrel and the wall with the shelf to one side, a temporary hiding spot from which to calculate his next move. It wasn't the best place to hold up, but it would do for now.

His leg muscles tensed, ached from the cold, but launched him swiftly and quietly towards the adjacent landmark. No gunshot resounded, just a flash of lightning followed shortly thereafter by a boom of thunder. Angelo's breathing remained a steady rhythm, a soft sigh lost amidst the clank of gears and the whine of a saw blade. The mill was relatively dim of light, but the dawn had nonetheless set upon Diavalo. Despite the grim shadows of billowy thunderheads, the masked daylight would soon illuminate the buildings and alleyways with its lackluster shine. Hiding in the open would be impossible, save an act of clever ingenuity.

Angelo let his eyes cross the floor to a side wall and to a hearth mortared together with gray stone. A potent fire burned within. The firelight was strong, but pale in comparison to the waking day. It threw weird shadows into the mill's corners and across its dirt floor with a dance of faded scarlet. It deceived the eye, invited the imagination to make false assumptions.

Eyeing the overhead beams that ran along the ceiling, Angelo calculated the height in relation to the distance from the main door. If he went topside, climbed the rafter and shimmied along overhead, he might get a drop on one of the Three. Problem was the ceiling was high, not to mention too well lit for that kind of a fancy maneuver.

The bale hooks shifted within his hands as he plotted.

Angelo's eyes slowly eased above the rum barrel. The saw's cutting table sat empty, nothing for its razor like teeth to chew upon, the blades circled mindlessly, biting at air. The idea of sabotaging the saw came briefly to mind but then departed. The commotion would no doubt summon the Three's attention, but then they had been trained to anticipate such blatant diversions. Naturally, they would be curious as to what had happened to the saw, but then they would conclude that Angelo had been responsible, in which case he would've merely alerted the Three of his presence and thus lose the element of surprise. No, the Three wouldn't poke their heads out to see what had happened to the saw, they would sit tight, watch and when they felt it was time to move, they would.

Angelo tried to get inside his opponents heads, tried to anticipate their location. Behind the saw would be a good place to hide. From there you could keep an eye on the street, the front door and the fireplace. Even on the remote chance that someone came down from the loft, as Angelo had, they would still have to pass between the fireplace and the front doors and into plain sight, and then wham! You'd have them.

That's where one of the Three had to be camping, behind the saw.

Angelo stood at the ready, mindful of his surroundings. He briefly glanced inside the rum barrel he'd been hiding behind and performed a quick inventory. There was a bunch of narrow boards stained with spots of oil and a mixed hodgepodge of small mechanical parts. There was nothing of any real use, except for a jagged tooth gear that was approximately the diameter of a soup can. He fished it out and then cinched it into the crude canvas belt of his wet pants for safe keeping. The gear could be used as a ninja throwing star if need be, perhaps not enough to kill, but more than enough to injure.

Angelo took in a deep breath and prepared to move.

If spotted, he would lunge toward the front end of the saw platform and throw the rusty gear cog while in mid flight. Then, if he was lucky, climb up on the far side of the saw, leap over its spinning blade, and attack whomever was on the other side. Of course there were no guarantees that he'd make it to the saw alive, but at this point his choices were limited.

Slowly, he inched round the rum barrel, eyes on the hunt. And as he circled to face that dark nook behind the saw, he realized he had just made a huge mistake.

(61)

The alarm inside Angelo's mind shrieked. Here, the answer had been under his nose the entire time and he hadn't seen it. He felt like a fool, to have been so damn stupid as to miss such an obvious clue.

What had he been thinking?

But then there was no time to think, only time to react.

At the first realization something was wrong he had already begun to turn. In his peripheral sight, Angelo could already see the cabinet doors opening. Normally, there would be no way that a man could fit inside such a thin narrow cupboard, but if a man took the time to rip out those numerous tightly packed shelves, then with a little bit of effort he could easily squeeze inside.

That's what Tweedle Dumb had done, and as Angelo spun on his heels, bale hooks slicing through the air, he couldn't help but curse himself for not having recognized that discarded shelving inside the rum barrel immediately.

If he survived this encounter he vowed it would never happen again.

The long sleek barrel of an Archer Long Bow rose upward, hammer cocked, trigger poised as Dumb emerged from the cabinet and took aim. In the rush of adrenaline, time distorted, wound down into a slow motion movie reel of heightened sounds and senses. Angelo could count the thick matted hairs on the back of Dumb's knuckles, read the manufacturer's engraving on the bow's revolver chamber, hear his heart beat like a bilge pump.

The bale hooks swooshed as they raced gunpowder to an inevitable explosion, in which case all bets with Deluca would be called off. Dumb's homely face was a mask of concentration, jaw muscles tight, brow pulled down towards a set of unruly eyebrows. The red branch of veins within his eyes made him look pumped up on methamphetamine. Dumb was possessed, an Elitario that had eaten too much hardship and strict discipline that any semblance of the man he had once been was lost to the man he had become. He was a killer from balls to bone, a core assassin with the mindset to follow through on what must be done.

To Angelo it felt like looking into a mirror.

One bale hook collided with Dumb's Longbow, the other his left cheek. The Archer flew across the room where it came to rest beside the fireplace. The bale hook had torn a wide gash into Dumb's face, leaving behind a bloody shine of crooked teeth and a receding gum-line. The jagged flap of flesh hung from a patch of scarlet bone. Dumb's hands instinctively cradled the gash, but the blood continued to pour between his trembling fingers in generous jets.

An opportunity had afforded Angelo a chance to land-base the first of the Three with an expert side kick to the sternum. As a result, Dumb flew backward into the cupboard, cracking its wooden spine neatly down the center with a rough line of splinters. With an upper cut, Angelo drove the bale hook's pointy tip up into the soft nest below Dumb's chin where the rusty steel nailed the man's jaws shut.

Dumb's screams of agony were muffled between teeth that had been jammed together by a rugged hook.

Angelo yanked Dumb forward like a fish impaled on a gaff and then drove him down onto the floor. The force of the fall coupled with the bale hook's hold, broke Dumb's jaw with an audible snap. Dumb's feet kicked aimlessly while his body squirmed and his eyes watered streams of wet pain. Dumb's hands clasped onto the rusty bale hook, seeking to relieve that awful hot pressure that was ripping his face apart, but Angelo offered him no reprieve.

It was a sadistic sight to behold, enough to make a person's knees turn to jelly, but Angelo remained rigid. The Elitario had taught him well, desensitized him to such horrors through various harsh measures. The Elitario had taken away a vital part of his humanity and had replaced it with the necessary tools to survive. Still, there was no need to continue this torment. Dumb was of no practical use, in fact he was a liability.

Angelo would end this quick.

Skillfully, Angelo punctured Dumb's jugular with the remaining bale hook, and then watched as the life slowly bled out of the first of the Three's glossy, but otherwise unremarkable eyes.

(62)

The Archer Longbow felt good inside Angelo's hand. It still had seven bullets inside its sturdy chamber, more than enough ammo to inflict serious damage upon what was left of the Three. Dumb lay dead upon the mill's muddy floor, the blood from his wounds congealing into a dull crimson within the snarled mats of straw. Angelo scavenged an eight inch dagger from a sheath on Dumb's thigh, a wrist garrote wire spool and perhaps most wonderful of all, a few dry articles of clothing. Tweedle Dumb was smaller than Angelo, a medium in garment size by comparison to Angelo's large, but the fit, while quite snug, was well-worth the plunder. It had been two years since Angelo had worn a pair of socks. They were wool with reinforced stitching at the toes and heels and had wrapped around Angelo's cold feet like paradise personified. The cotton boxer shorts, while tight, felt exquisite. Even the simple long sleeve undershirt, which Angelo had managed to wriggle into felt as though it had been woven by heaven's looms.

Angelo found that after two years of wearing canvas sacks the thing he missed most of all was his snakeskin boots, the ones with the low heels and pointed toes. He loved the sound they made whenever they touched pavement, and the way they had molded to the shape and curves of his feet. They were like a baseball mitt's well-worn pocket, and as any athlete could tell you, that kind of shaping took time. Angelo had been everywhere inside those boots, got more mileage out of them than the snake had, and here they had been callously burnt to ash in exchange for a lousy pair of leather sandals. That alone was worth a bullet to Carlos's head.

As much as Angelo would have loved to have traded in his rugged sandals for Tweedle Dumb's hiking boots, there was just no way his larger feet would squeeze into them. However, Angelo could stuff his limbs into Dumb's black denim pants and wool coat, and he did so eagerly.

Angelo regarded Dumb's naked body with a fair measure of bitterness. Carlos had adorned the Three in fine clothes, given them food to eat, weapons to use and a soft place to sleep.

What had he ever given Angelo except for a kick in the ass?

It didn't really matter, because Tweedle Dumb was dead and Angelo was alive. Soon Angelo would have all the fine clothes he could ever hope to wear, the best cuisine to dine on, and maybe even more.

He checked the Longbow once again. It was in fine condition, ready and able, and so too was its master.

(63)

Thunder and lightning made their exchanges with loud booms and bright flashes. The storm had grown intense in a very short time. Angelo peeked out the mill's rain splattered window and recalled that somber morning with Uncle Vincent, the day when Angelo's entire life had changed. Back then he had learned of a terrible man called Franco Deluca, and today he would learn if he would become an Elitario.

Diavalo was a natural peninsula, which meant the only way Angelo could hope to approach the village was to do so by way of the mountain trail. That meant that he would have to enter the village from the east side, which just so happened to be the beginning of Diavalo's solitary street. If Carlos wanted to keep the item away from Angelo, then he would hide it in the furthest place from that entrance, that being the church. That way Marchetti would have a longer walk and thus be more aptly killed by the Three, or by the Two as they had become recently.

But Angelo had gotten the drop, snuck into Diavalo via the river, which meant he had an element of surprise. True, Tweedle Dumb had almost dusted Angelo's sorry ass, but that didn't mean Dumb had expected Angelo to show up where he had. That cabinet had faced out towards the front door and the street. Dumb had obviously been waiting for Angelo to approach from the building's forward veneer, but here Angelo had come in from the loft, and that had to be unexpected. Of course there were no guarantees in the game, just gut feelings that were either bang on or off by a country mile. In the end, Angelo would still have to hazard guesses that could easily get him killed if he got them wrong.

Across the road stood a mercantile---beside that a bank---next door to that a wood shop followed by a jailhouse. It was Carlos's idea of a spaghetti western town, an imported boondocks recreated one board at a time on a mafia budget. Except in this one horse town cowboys didn't say, "howdy partner," they said "forget about it," and on rare occasions maybe even, "va-voom."

The church location was symbolic of Angelo's struggle for salvation, that's if the Trial of Daggers followed a movie script, or at least that's how Sergio Leone would have drafted it. But metaphors aside the question remained: were the other Two holed up inside the Lady of Perpetual Peace? Dumb hadn't been, but that didn't mean the other Two weren't scattered about also. Strategically, it would be best to divide the team in order to survey a greater amount of Diavalo's rugged acreage.

But would the Two follow such a logical course of action?

The map's layout played over in Angelo's mind. He had committed every detail to memory. There were thirteen structures with thirteen probabilities to sift through. If Angelo were to organize an ambush, he would stagger their positions in relation to one another. Given that realization meant that one of the Three had to be stationed across the street. It would also be likely that the Three would've positioned themselves so that they could keep an eye on one another. Thus the distances between the buildings in relation to their angle of observation narrowed the probability to a few choices.

The mercantile, bank and of course the church.

Angelo eyed the church steeple through a wash of rain. Outside the world shook in the throes of a sudden storm. If the rain pelted just a bit harder, then perhaps it would be enough to mask Angelo's identity as he moved about the street. Of course that would be a long shot seeing as Angelo had a bigger physique than Dumb, and the standing orders between the Three most likely consisted of keeping in place until a mutually agreed upon time. There would be no logical reason for Dumb to be out gallivanting around the street, and if such a situation was to arise, he would most likely be shot on sight for his trouble.

It was time to roll the dice once more, but not without an element of insurance. Angelo would plot the next step and try to anticipate the unexpected. First and foremost he would have to defy the laws of physics. To cross the street without being detected would take a goddamn miracle. Angelo would have to be invisible to manage a ruse like that. No amount of thunder, lighting nor rain could ever hope to accomplish an illusion of that magnitude. Perhaps Harry Houdini might be able to perform a vanishing act to that degree, but not Angelo Marchetti.

But then again, there might be a way.

(64)

If it didn't get bogged down in the mud, then it just might work. Of course as soon as Angelo opened the mill doors the remainder of the Three would start blasting away. He'd be like a duck in a carnival shooting gallery. Angelo doubted very much that the Three had armor piercing rounds, but if they got lucky and hit the same spot twice with a Longbow's bullet, or with its sniper cousin, the fifty-caliber Archer Talon, then Angelo would be done for.

Still, what other choice did he have?

Angelo had to take the offensive, because if he camped here, they would eventually conclude where he was and what had happened to Dumb.

He needed to keep mobile.

Angelo kept low by the window as he checked out the area. He didn't dawdle, promptly assessed the situation and then pulled back into the shadows. Outside a brilliant neon lightning flash was accompanied by an immediate burst of thunder. The storm was directly overhead and posed another element of danger to Angelo's already risky plan. If a lightning bolt touched down while he was on the move, then he'd be burnt toast. However, the odds of a lightning strike were remote, somewhere up there with being hit by a meteorite as far as Angelo was concerned. The real danger would come from a Talon, especially if its scope crosshairs came with an infrared heat sensor. Angelo reminded himself that men such as General George Patton never dug in, and that Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" said something to the effect that when in a position of weakness---show strength,----that deception would be an essential key to securing a victory here. Such wisdoms made it clear that Angelo was to act bold, embrace the military philosophy with the understanding that in order to win you must be prepared to lose everything.

If he was going to do this, he couldn't doubt nor second guess himself. In a moment of crisis he would trust reflex over reflection. And maybe, if he was lucky, Dame Fortune would reward those labors with the hardest of sevens.

(65)

The sawmill blade was six-foot in diameter with diamond coated teeth designed for roughing out lumber. It was old, dull, rust covered most of its lackluster shine of narrow tool steel. At its center lay a small hole with a drive-pin slot to accommodate a spindle. It leaned against the wall, just one of four others of equal size and quality.

In a corroded angle iron rack, Angelo spotted a small inventory of bar-stock: two inch diameter rods ranging from half-foot to five-foot lengths. A quick search located a bar that would serve as a makeshift axle, plus it would help damn up the hole from incoming gunfire. Shrapnel however, could be like beach sand and find its way into just about anything. Still, it would be a difficult shot to hit a moving sawmill blade dead center in a rain storm. Not so much for Angelo, for he had a special gift with firearms, but as for Tweedle Dee and Ghost, they'd have a tough go nailing that mark, even on a sunny day. But anyone could get lucky, and if a bullet smacked into the bar stock, then the foot pound impact alone would be enough to send the axle flying out of Angelo's hands and possibly even break them.

Although the sawmill blade was thin it was quite heavy: at least three-hundred plus pounds. Fortunately, Angelo wouldn't have to carry it, he would only have to roll it. But it would take strength to move it and balance to keep it from falling over, especially if he came under gunfire. The ground itself was muddy, but the layer beneath the slop would be hard on a season's worth of frost and thus sturdy enough to support a rolling wheel if it kept mobile.

"Wheels," Angelo muttered as he associated the irony.

First a waterwheel had plucked him from the river and now a sawmill wheel would shield him from a steel rain. He wondered when his next encounter with a wheel might occur, perhaps inside the church in the form of a prayer circle.

One never knew.

The saw blade was pulled into a delicate balancing position. It's heavy weight dug into the floor, but not so much that it could not be moved. In fact, Angelo was surprised by how easily it rolled once it got going. The bar stock fit snugly into the axle sleeve but turned freely, allowing just enough resistance to serve as an adequate control arm. If he really pushed it, he could probably cross the street in less than ten seconds, that's if he didn't run into trouble along the way, which would almost certainly be the case. However, what really worried him was being able to aim the Longbow while on the move. The gun would be awkward to hold onto as he ambled across the road. Controlling it and the blade at the same time would be a juggling act, and apt to get him killed if he couldn't find a balance between the two. He would need to cater to the gun's limitations, and the best way to do that would be to narrow his opponent's line of sight. Angelo would have to lure one of the Three into a predictable position. But in order to do that he would have to make his opponent greedy for the kill.

But what kind of bait could make one of the Three chance such a careless confrontation despite everything they'd been taught over the past two years?

When the answer finally dawned on Angelo, he couldn't help but feel like a complete and utter monster.

(66)

Dirty trick was the only way to describe it, something a bastard like Carlos would do in order to get a rise out of you. The idea reminded Angelo of the puppies, the Rottweilers assigned to each recruit after their first month inside the Elitario compound. Carlos had said the pups would be trained as attack dogs, and that each student was to hone their killer instinct as well as that of their designated canine. Angelo had thought it to be an odd instructional tool at the time, but then who was he to argue such matters. He was there to learn and if that meant they wanted Angelo to scrub the latrine with a toothbrush then that was the drill.

However, Angelo would soon come to discover that the actual motive behind the man/animal pairing was far more sinister in nature than he had ever anticipated.

After a month the students had begun to bond with the dogs, had even given them names. Angelo had called his Vincent, in honor of his beloved uncle. Tweedle Dumb had named his Menace, Tweedle Dee had christened his Max, and Ghost had knighted his Fang. The masters and their beasts had become teams. And as much as Angelo hated to admit it, he had begun to regard his dog not just as a weapon, but as a pet. Vincent was a trusted friend and offered companionship. It was when these intimate bonds had been forged between man and animal that Carlos had ordered the dogs summarily executed.

And who had done the killing?

None other than the new recruits themselves.

Carlos had ordered the students to use their bare hands to dispatch the dogs.

But then there was more to it than just that.

The murder of the pets was to be performed in a specific manner: the legs were to be broken first, then the animal was to be spun by its tail, then the eyes were to be plucked out, the jaws pulled apart and then if the animal still wasn't dead, it was to be strangled.

The execution of the pups had taken forever, and Angelo had almost wept openly, but he kept that merciful compassion along with its moral revulsion to himself lest Carlos devise some other sadistic activity in order to strengthen Angelo's resolve. The episode with the pups had probably been one of the worst days of Angelo's life. The senseless cruelty towards an innocent creature in order to desensitize the students to any semblance of kindness was barbaric. And Angelo didn't know which was worse: the fact that someone had come up with the sick idea in the first place, or the fact that it had worked.

It had taken time for Angelo to adapt to the tortures and mutilations. In total he must've slaughtered hundreds of kittens, rabbits and puppies, but in the end he had gotten use to their screams. And when he did, Carlos took Angelo to the next horrific level. As for that escalation in terror, it had involved a holy nun and a handicap child in a remote mountain abbey.

Angelo put that episode out of mind and focused on that task at hand.

Angelo picked up Tweedle Dumb's severed head and studied it for what it was: a tool. Its purpose was to get an emotional response, and when Tweedle Dee saw his only brother's head laying in the street, he would go ballistic. Dee would be intellectually off balance, given over to revenge instead of rational thinking. Dee would feel compelled to avenge his brother, and as such would be greedy for the kill. That kind of energy was something Angelo could use, and that kind of strategy owed its inspiration to none other than Carlos.

(67)

The mill's double doors banged open, Tweedle Dumb's head flew through the air, the bloody skull plunged into the muddy street with an audible smack.

The gauntlet had been figuratively thrown down.

Rain spattered down onto Dumb's matted hair in drops the size of dimes. An intense split of thunder and lightning opened yet another hole inside a storm cloud. Streams of waters rushed down the street. The gale force wind picked up noticeably, but the decapitated skull remained stuck inside the slush like a stubborn boulder.

If only a laser sight's red dot would touch Dumb's head, then Angelo could get a location on one of the Three's firing positions. In this much rain the light stream would hold a solid line straight back to its source, but nothing stirred.

Had anyone seen the head?

Of course they had, at least the gun in the church should have. Still, no targeting light marked Dumb's skull. But then these guys were Elitario. They would not make such an amateur mistake, they were pros after all, and they wouldn't use laser sights nor would they shoot unless they knew what the target was.

Yet that wasn't just any guy's head out there lying in the street, that was Dee's brother, and professional or not, that was bound to get Dee's blood up good. Dee was a short fuse type, and as Angelo could tell you, a man who could control his temper was far more dangerous than a man who couldn't.

Dee would soon put that saying to the test.

Angelo drew in a deep breath, braced the saw blade against his left shoulder and grasped the axle with one strong hand, the Longbow was clutched in his other. Angelo adjusted the wheel's angle and then pushed forward, teeth clenched as the strong muscles inside his legs worked for leverage. The wheel lumbered and rolled as Angelo and shield stepped out of the mill and into the pounding rain.

(68)

The bet was that Dee would be inside the bank. Soon, Angelo would find out if that wager would pay off. There was a chance that Dee had not yet seen his brother's skull rotting in the street. But when he did, the emotional suddenness of seeing his murdered sibling would send him over the edge. In that brief moment, Dee would let his guard down and then make challenge. Guns would blaze and Dee's retribution would be swift. But Angelo would not grant Dee satisfaction. After all, Angelo had his own vendetta to attend to. There would be nothing sadistic in Marchetti's actions, he would kill Dee mercifully, and as such, eliminate an adversary that would've hunted him relentlessly until vengeance had at last been satisfied. Angelo could sympathize with such a cause, for after all, Angelo had Deluca to contend with.

There had been nothing personal in Dumb's beheading, the body had merely been a tool to leverage against the Three. A hollow sentiment to a brother, but nonetheless the purpose behind the desecration. Still, Dee would be blood drunk, anxious for the kill, given over to a state of madness, and as a result, be sloppy.

It was that kind of irrational abandonment that Angelo was counting on.

In order to be effective, Angelo had to narrow the location potentials of his adversaries down to a minimum. By cutting diagonally across the street, the saw blade would shield him from the church, mercantile, as well as from the bank's left front window and front door. That would leave the bank's right window in Angelo's direct line of sight. There, he would concentrate his firepower. That intentional opening would bait Dee, corral him into a narrow corridor as to engage Angelo in a head-to-head firefight.

And when that happened, Dee would come to suffer the hard spike.

(69)

The first bullet sounded like thunder, except this boom came with a powerful kick. As a result, the saw blade wobbled, vibrated like a tuning fork, but continued to roll forward unabated. The dent from the bullet strike turned over Angelo's shoulder and then down into the mud as the saw-blade circled. The shot had come from a Longbow, not a fifty-caliber Talon. Another hit in the exact same spot might get penetration. However, the wind and rain were heavy, and helped to distort perception. It would be a lucky shot to repeat that hit again, and not likely to reoccur in the time allotted to cross the street.

The wind blew a powerful gust, pushed on the saw blade, and for an instant, Angelo thought his feet might slip out from beneath him. A crosswind however, helped to steady the blade, and even pushed against Angelo's back as if to assist him across the street.

Another explosion twanged off the blade, this one much closer to the center. The impact had left an impressive dent. It had also left a sizable split close to Angelo's wrist. If that shot had hit his shoulder, it would have fractured the bone, perhaps even toppled him over beneath the blade's cumbersome weight.

Angelo braced his gun hand and set his eyes upon the bank's corner window.

Two shots fired in rapid succession, both hitting close to the saw-blade's center. Angelo's weight shifted, compensated and quickly recovered as he trudged on. The journey was half-over and still no sign of Dee. Three quick shots blasted the mud before Angelo's feet, to which three sizable divots leapt into the air. The mud had almost blinded an eye, but instead fell short and settled upon his cheek. Angelo was now three-quarters of the way across the road and Dee still hadn't shown up. Perhaps Dee was inside the church taking pot shots, but somehow Angelo doubted it.

There was no emotion in that gunfire, just cold calculation.

Ghost was obviously in the church, so where the hell was Dee?

A crazy idea suddenly occurred to Angelo, one that almost made him pause mid-step. With one great effort, he pushed the wheel as hard as he could until its momentum was sufficient enough so that it could roll on its own without assistance. He then spun round and aimed the Longbow behind him.

A strange man with a long narrow face and graying hair watched Angelo without the slightest semblance of concern. He put Marchetti in mind of a pirate. But this bandit did not belong here, not today nor any other, he wasn't one of the Three, he was part of the supernatural.

But just how did Angelo know that.

It's a goddamn hex! The son of a bitch hexed me!

Thoughts of Diavalo along with its Three fell into abandonment. There was no danger from the Three, it was the thing that stood in the rain, grinning its fiendish grin that was the true threat. The thing's eyes captivated, radiated an energy that went beyond the corporeal, but there was also something else: the thing looked surprised as though it hadn't expected Angelo to notice its presence at all.

The figure was a distracting sight to behold, but Angelo understood that right now he had other game to hunt. Perhaps later there would be time to mull over the strange figure's origins, but as for now, Angelo needed to be elsewhere.

With that realization, Angelo spun round upon damp heels and fired blindly.

The boom of the gun was deafening, kicked back as hard as it had that day inside the Donatello. It was an amazing shot, intuitive in a way that was almost psychic. Dee had been standing in the bank window, prepared to fire, when Angelo unexpectedly got the drop. As a result, Dee had suffered the hard spike to the forehead.

Dee was quite dead.

The saw-blade kept rolling and Angelo moved with it. There was maybe ten feet left until it collided with the bank. More than anything he wanted to look back, to see if that stranger with the owl eyes still stood there, smirking, but Angelo kept to the game plan. He followed the wheel to the edge of the building, where he quickly ducked into the relative safety of the alleyway between the bank and a carpenter's woodshop. Six final shots rang off the saw blade, knocking it over onto its side with a dull plunk. Two of those six rounds had ricocheted into the alley, buried deep into the woodshop wall, but neither one had not come close to striking Angelo.

He had made it.

Angelo ventured a glance back out into the street. Dumb's head remained stuck in the mud, but as for the whereabouts of that unnatural stranger, he was nowhere to be found. Angelo wasn't surprised, expected it to be so as a matter of fact. But just how he knew that, he could not explain. Perhaps it had something to do with that strong sense of déjà' vu he was experiencing.

Had he done this before?

His keen eyes looked skyward, fluttered in the spit of rain. There was no time to question such conundrums, the church waited and so too did Ghost. Afterwards there would be time to mull over such peculiarities, but not now, there was killing to be done, and Angelo was apt to see that it got done proper.

(70)

Unlike the bank's solid rear wall, the mercantile had a back porch with a screen door. The mercantile also had a window that looked in upon an open concept shopping area which was compiled of empty mason jars, bolts of raw sewing material, and various handmade farm tools. Nobody moved within, but then that was to be expected. Ghost was holed up inside the church, and both Tweedle Dee and Dumb were dead.

The rain continued to pelt Diavalo, Angelo was soaked to the marrow. Still, the wetness was warmer than that of the glacial runoff, and Dumb's clothes were much more forgiving to the skin than the canvas had been. Angelo held the Longbow in the ready position, braced against his shoulder. The church was not in view from his angle, which also meant that Angelo was hidden for the time being. As for Ghost, he would no doubt be busy figuring out what to do next. It was still anyone's game. The question was who would make the first move?

Angelo smashed out the mercantile's glass with an elbow and then carefully stuck his head inside. There appeared to be no booby traps, but then there was no guarantee. Ghost was inside the church, Dumb had been inside the mill, and Dee had settled into the bank. That left a gap in their defenses: the mercantile. The best way to close that opening would be with a bit of added protection. At least that's what Angelo would've done had their roles been reversed.

The mercantile's door would likely be rigged, that's why Angelo had avoided it, but it probably wasn't the only danger. He surveyed the store's interior, noting how many potential spots could cause him harm.

He would not chance to go inside, it would be too risky.

Angelo thought on his adversary. Ghost would be a wildcard, unpredictable, versatile and possibly mobile. If Ghost snuck out of the church and managed to flank Angelo, then the advantage would fall to Ghost. No, Angelo had to contain Ghost, and the best way to do that would be to eliminate his avenues of escape. The best place to do that would have been from inside the mercantile, where he could have observed the street and the back woods with a fair degree of shelter. Problem being, the mercantile would most certainly be booby trapped. Besides, Angelo couldn't camp there indefinitely. Come noon, Ghost would be euthanized by Carlos for having failed to kill Angelo, and if Angelo hadn't secured the item by noon, he too would be summarily executed. Suffice to say, neither Ghost nor Angelo could afford to play the waiting game, they needed to finish this quickly.

(71)

Angelo glanced back over his shoulder, sensing that unexplained stranger on the street had returned. However, coniferous trees and a sharp elbow in the glacial river was all he found. Chills made the hairs on his body stand at attention. It was as if Casa Diavalo basked inside the residual energy of an evil poltergeist. Angelo tried to shake the sense of foreboding, an impression that suggested that he might already be dead, but the feeling remained.

The church bell rang with crystal clarity, a note of beauty amidst the ugly uproar of a savage storm. It was a message from Ghost, but what was he trying to say? But then Angelo knew exactly what Ghost wanted, and that was to lay down their weapons and meet face to face in hand to hand combat.

Angelo regarded the callused knuckles on his rugged hands with due concern. The Elitario had turned him into a piece of iron, tough and resistant to pain. Still, Ghost was a master of the combative arts, a goddamn prodigy. Over the past two years, Angelo had become an expert fighter, but still paled in comparison to Ghost's unnatural ability. If He and Ghost were to meet in a sidearm showdown, Angelo would easily be the victor. But if they met in a street fight, Ghost would most certainly triumph. Ghost would realize that as well, and if his ringing of the church bell was indeed a personal challenge, then Ghost would want their final battle to be settled on his terms, not Angelo's.

How many times had Angelo stood toe to toe with that goliath with the black pearl eyes? Seventy, perhaps ninety times. And in each instance, Angelo had felt the cold hard earth across his backside. Ghost was freakishly strong and quick to the point of supernatural ability. He seemed devoid of emotion, which left Angelo to conclude that there was either something wrong with Ghost medically, (aside from his eyes of course) or that he was one step up on the evolutionary ladder.

If that were indeed the case, did Ghost's nervous system register pain the same as everyone else's?

The question felt more than relevant when in the heat of combat, for what man could take a knockout blow to the skull and still remain alert. No one human could do that, unless there was something very unusual about their physiology. Whatever the case, there was no denying that Ghost was an oddity, a three-ring-circus sideshow and worthy of a chapter in "Ripley's Believe it or Not."

The church bell rang again, followed by an explosion of thunder. It felt as though even the heavens were calling Angelo out to fight. In the moment, Angelo's sensibility felt more like cowardice. After all, there was honor in Ghost's challenge, although Ghost's superior fighting ability no doubt added to his sense of nobility.

But what else was Angelo to do?

As far as ideas went, Marchetti had hit the wall.

Their current situation was obvious: Ghost had Angelo pinned down and Angelo had Ghost pinned down.

It was a stalemate.

Ghost however, held an elevated position in the church steeple which gave him greater visual acuity. Such a vantage point would give Ghost a fraction of a second lead over Angelo when it came to the draw, and in such a tight race that marginal leverage could prove fatal for Angelo. Level to level, eye to eye, Angelo could outdraw and outshoot Ghost, but that superior skill could fail Angelo given their present positions.

Angelo looked skyward, a thick spatter of rain made his eyes flicker. The mercantile's interior offered little in the way of inspiration. There were no large sawmill blades to hide behind, nor waterwheels to ride out, just a thin wall that divided two killers.

Angelo tried to fend off a defeatist attitude, but doubts nonetheless crept into his thoughts. Ghost's gracious offer would no doubt be provisional, so if Angelo was going to accept, he would have to do so soon. The Longbow felt like the ace up Angelo's sleeve, to discard it now would be to throw away his only advantage.

The church bell rang for a third time and Angelo understood that it would not ring again.

Ghost demanded a response.

Angelo cracked open the Longbow's chamber and examined its six remaining bullets. To set the gun aside now was comparable to suicide. He closed the gun up and bowed his head as if in prayer.

Where was his third option?

Where was that improvisational maverick that had carried him this far?

If Angelo back trailed, searched through the other buildings, he doubted that he'd find anything useful. Giant saw wheels only worked when you "crossed the T" as they said in battleship terminology, on a direct approach vector such a device would be useless. Besides, that card had already been played. What Angelo needed now was a goddamn tank or battle armor, neither of which would be laying about a spaghetti western town.

Noon drew closer.

If Angelo were to locate the item, he would need time to find it. There was no assurance that Carlos had left a trail of bread crumbs leading to its location, in fact the miserable bastard may have hidden it where Angelo might never chance to find it. Regardless of that potential, it was still in both Ghost's and Angelo's best interest to finish this trial once and for all.

Thunder and lightning crashed overhead while the wind continued to scream through the trees with a mindless rage. Reluctantly, Angelo had to concede to just one choice. The Longbow aimed straight up into the air and then fired off a single round.

The challenge had just been accepted.

(72)

Angelo stood in the street, unarmed.

Ghost stood in the steeple tower, unarmed.

They regarded each other through a torrential downpour of cold rain, two warriors with an unspoken agreement that they were to settle this matter old school style. Suddenly, Angelo felt as though he were back in Mount Hope Orphanage and Ghost was none other than Patrick Shea. Except this time, Angelo wouldn't have a roll of dimes to fall back on.

It was hard to see Ghost through the gray sheet of rain, but Angelo was certain that he had seen his opponent nod in understanding.

Ghost slowly stepped back into the bell tower. After a few minutes he reappeared in the church's double doors. He moved down the steps with deliberate caution, his brown duster flowing loosely at his heels. His large impressive hands were empty and remained by his sides as he walked. The downpour had matted his dark mane of hair to his skull, stained his duster with pools of water.

For all Angelo knew there could have been an arsenal laying beneath that full length coat, but Ghost never hinted any sign of deception. Of course to do that would be to display an emotion, which Ghost to date had yet to do. Still, Angelo braced for a rapid retreat at the first indication of betrayal.

Thunder and lightning lashed out another jab, split the sky with a fractured bolt of neon violet. The wind droned through Diavalo's eaves and alleyways as if it reveled in the violence to come. The storm churned the dark energy of Diavalo like a witch's caldron, and Angelo couldn't help but feel once again as though the he'd been hexed. The idea of that sent a cold wave of blood coursing through his veins. His heart almost stopped. It was like being back inside that glacial tributary, drowning inside the freezing dark current.

He felt colder than cold, he felt corpse cold.

Ghost approached with a slow easy gait, his dark eyes emerging from the rain like two smooth rapids in a gray stream. He held all the cheerful charisma of a cemetery undertaker. Ghost stopped twenty-feet from Angelo, his posture neither tense nor relaxed. As usual, Ghost was somewhere in between, and perhaps that's what made him neutral, emotion free, a state of perpetual uncertainty that always kept you guessing. Still, those black pupils surrounded by those black irises radiated malicious intent. Ghost had serial killer eyes, empty eyes that denoted nothing substantial behind them. They perceived the world with a predatory attraction, broke decisions down into black and whites which were invariably colored in gray. He was Mr. In Between, and although such a presumption held no professional merit, it was nonetheless how Angelo felt.

Actual names had been forbidden knowledge to exchange amongst the recruits, but Angelo felt a need to explain himself in at least some limited fashion. After all, he had nothing personal against Ghost, this war was not of their choosing, but rather the Elitario's.

"Nice weather we're having," Angelo nodded.

Ghost remained silent, motionless, a statue with unblinking eyes.

"My name's..."

At this bit of news Ghost quickly raised his hand in silence. "No names...no need."

Ghost's accent was not Italian, but rather Russian.

But how could that be?

How could a mutt from Russia be inside the Elitario?

Russia had their own Mafia, a powerful one with lots of resources.

So why was Ghost here?

"To the death," Ghost said in broken English.

With that statement uttered the reason for Ghost's defection no longer mattered. As it had been since day one inside the Elitario compound, it was all about survival.

Angelo's feet slowly twisted into the mud for traction as his hands came up and closed into two tight clubs. Angelo's stance was boxer traditional, but his form of combat would be freestyle. He would use a dozen different fighting techniques in order to strategically offset Ghost, but the man with the ebony eyes would counter Angelo's efforts with masterful efficiency.

It was here that Angelo realized that perhaps he had made a big mistake by accepting this challenge, and he couldn't help but wonder if Dee had left any change inside his jacket pockets.

Two rolls of dimes worth.

(73)

Ghost stepped forward, went to Angelo's right in a slow easy circle, his shark like eyes offering no hint as to what tactic he would lead with. Together, they had performed this un-choreographed dance dozens of times inside the camp's chicken wire dojo, and every time it had ended the same way. Today however, things would be different, they had to be, because if Angelo lost, he wouldn't be punished with a regiment of difficult calisthenics, he would die.

Angelo adjusted his angle, drew back a step, shifted his stance into a right hand jabbing position. Ghost kept moving, his knuckles cracking as his hands balled up into a pair of fists.

The game was on.

Ghost's first punch was lightning quick, but blocked just as quickly. Despite being cold and wet, Angelo was in good fighting form. Ghost dropped a tae-kwon-do axe, which Angelo slid out from under. Ghost's long leg crashed down into the mud. The strike would have easily broken Angelo's collarbone had it made contact. Angelo's counter attack was a left side kick with an inside crescent which Ghost skillfully redirected. For the next two minutes they fenced and parried with dozens of lightning fast kicks and punches, each gauging the other's response while battling the slippery terrain.

The storm added an element of difficulty to the battle, blinded the eyes with brilliant flashes of lightning and distracted the senses with ear pounding thunderclaps. The storm was the third opponent in this death match, and both Angelo and Ghost were having difficulty dealing with it.

Suddenly, Ghost rushed inward. Angelo countered by retreating backwards. Angelo dropped down, spun a low kick that sought to steal Ghost's balance. The goliath responded by hopping into the air with catlike reflexes. Ghost's defensive action was transformed into a powerful counterattack, in which he flew through the air, knee projected forward as he dove down towards Angelo. Angelo rolled to the side. Ghost collided with the ground, his knee driving deep into the cold dank mud.

Had Angelo received that hit, it would've have split his sternum like dried kindling.

Again both men were on their feet, circling, looking for that one opening that would assert a crushing victory. The wind blew rain into their eyes, dumped buckets of water down their necks. It was ice cold but the temperature failed to register. They were given over to the heat of the moment, but nonetheless, Angelo felt colder than he should, and that realization had to do with the stranger he had seen in the street earlier, that goddamn pirate with the long stringy hair.

Ghost was airborne with a side kick to Angelo's chest. Marchetti slipped aside, rolled with the impact, but the kick had delivered most of its force into Angelo's ribs.

A break could be heard beneath the rumble of thunder and the splash of rain.

Angelo's left arm dropped slightly as part of his skeletal structure gave way. Ghost spotted that injury immediately and wasted no time taking advantage of it.

That devastating blow Angelo had worried about had finally come.

(74)

In an instant the world was overcome by a vibrant explosion of bright orange sparks. Angelo's feet were like helium, balloon ball light. It was almost a pleasurable experience, sleep tending to a state of exhaustion. But still, that inexplicable cold remained, its teeth gnawing upon his bones, its frosty gums sucking out his marrow. Yet the cold helped to sober Angelo's wits, stirred him back into consciousness.

His backside had not yet met the muddy street, but it was well on its way. He staggered, regained footing, but this recovery was not entirely of his design. Something had propped up against Angelo, something hard, but before he could figure out what it was, Ghost had landed a reverse roundhouse kick which connected square to Angelo's jaw.

Once again reality teetered.

The sky split into a bright neon of tangled branches, a loud roar seemed to come from the center of his head, the sound of high tensile steel succumbing to stress. And then Angelo's feet were helium again, and as they flew silently through the air, the world and all its fervor was swallowed up inside a tunnel. But these sensations were not hallucinations, but quite real. Angelo's feet were indeed flying. No---not flying---but rather falling. And as for that tunnel, it was in actuality a corridor built of smooth stones that had been fit together into a crude jigsaw puzzle.

Angelo had just fallen into Diavalo's solitary well.

(75)

For a few seconds, Angelo remained underwater, lost and disoriented. The water was shallow, but had been deep enough to absorb most of the impact. Still, his left shoulder blade had taken a good hard smack, although the injury had not come from the ground, or the water, but rather from something else. The wound burned and throbbed, more so than his broken rib. He wanted to cry out in pain, but the water muffled his voice and threatened to drown him if he so much as uttered a single plea.

From beneath the shallow pool, he could see the dimensions of a rectangular object floating on the surface. It had been a piece of wood that had given him a good hard thump, a sturdy piece of board probably from the sawmill.

Quickly, Angelo found his feet, his lungs gasping for air as he broke the surface. He looked upward toward the well's canopy and a wooden bucket which hung from a frayed length of flaxen rope.

How could he ever hope to get topside again?

Ghost would now go back inside the church and emerge with his Longbow where he would then proceed to shoot Angelo like a trout inside a barrel. Angelo needed to get out of this well before that happened, but given his injuries coupled with the difficult climb, there'd be no way he'd make it out on time.

Ghost's pale face appeared from atop the well. The goliath looked down on his handiwork with neither satisfaction nor complacency. There was still work to do, and as his empty face slowly drew back and disappeared from sight, Angelo knew that Ghost would soon be back to finish it.

Angelo had a minute to live, maybe less.

Ghost would not scurry to get the gun, but he would not dillydally either. Emotionless or not, Ghost would move efficiently.

The pain inside Angelo's shoulder blade was on fire and running with the kind of warmth that accompanied a gaping wound. Even if Ghost didn't return, Angelo would probably die down here from his injuries. There was no way in Hades he could ever hope to scale the slick walls in such poor physical condition. He had one, maybe two broken ribs, a fractured shoulder blade, and potentially a broken jaw as well.

Ghost would be doing Angelo a favor by sparing Marchetti a slow arduous death. Still, Angelo liked breathing, had grown used to it as a matter of fact. He had no desire to lie down like an old dog and take one behind the ear.

But what options did he have?

He glanced at the board he had fallen on with piercing eyes that were loaded with hate. If only he hadn't hit that damn thing he might have been able to shimmy up the well, even with a broken rib. There was Longbow sitting on the mercantile's back step with five rounds chambered.

If only he could get to it.

A brilliant flash of lighting lit up the well for an instant, just long enough to let Angelo notice that the miserable piece of wood he had fallen on was in fact a wooden box.

(76)

The latch was awkward to open with wet fingers, but Angelo had managed it just the same. In his mind's eye he could see Ghost walking back down the church steps towards the well, Longbow at his side. In less than thirty seconds, Ghost would return, and when he did it would all be over.

Angelo's eyes strained to see inside the well's dimness. There was a small object, faint, but shiny. His finger traced it carefully before picking it up.

It was streamline smooth---a bullet jacket!

Angelo recognized the gauge by its feel. The bullet went into an Archer Howitzer. Again his hands searched the case to discover the dimensions of not just one, but two such guns.

This was the item Carlos had hidden.

Here, the bastard hadn't stashed the item inside the church, but rather dropped it down the well. Normally, Angelo would've cursed Carlos for hiding the item in such an unlikely spot, but given his current circumstances, he couldn't help but praise him for it.

Angelo had a chance now, remote, but a chance nonetheless.

That's if he could load the gun before Ghost got back, not to mention if the blessed thing would fire. Angelo knew a gun could fire wet, but there was always a chance for mechanical failure. Perhaps there had been a micro-fissure within the shell casing that had allowed water to leak in and effectively soak the bullet, in which case it would not fire.

But there was no time to contemplate that potential, in his mind's eye he could see Ghost, twenty feet away from the well, maybe fifteen and closing.

Angelo hurried.

A long sustained flash of lightning lit up the well. He could see the twin howitzers inside the wooden box, and knew intuitively that they were empty of ammo. He understood Carlos well enough to know that the son of a bitch had left him just one bullet for a reason: symbolism. Perhaps this hollow tipped beauty had at one time been set aside to end Angelo's life.

It didn't matter what the significance the bullet's deeper meaning meant, what mattered was surviving. And so Angelo chambered the single round into the howitzer, released the safety and then drew back the bolt. The gun aimed upward, Ghost glanced over the edge.

It was time to end this once and for all.

(77)

Ghost had afforded Angelo a clean head shot, but Angelo had hesitated. It had occurred to Angelo that if he killed Ghost, then he would still be stuck inside the well. If Angelo had any chance of getting out of here, he would have to time this just right. Too soon and he would blow it, too late and he would be dead.

Ghost's eyes would take a second to adjust to the dimness, not that he would have to be accurate to kill Angelo with a Longbow, but like any professional killer, Ghost would want to make sure that his opponent was indeed dead.

And sure enough, that's what Ghost did.

By the time Ghost's eyes caught sight of the gun looking up at him, it was too late. The howitzer blasted and the bullet penetrated Ghost's forehead.

The gun's report bellowed with an enormous boom, echoed off the walls, and for a second, Angelo thought he had gone deaf.

It felt like standing inside the belly of a cannon.

A mist of blood and brains drifted down onto Angelo, and so too did the reason for his hesitation: the Longbow. The weapon fell out of Ghost's dead hand and down into the well where Angelo caught hold of the gun before it fell into the water.

It was a good catch, worthy of an Elitario, which is what Angelo was.

(78)

Angelo had realized that he would need Ghost's Longbow to get out of the well. If he had fired before Ghost brought the weapon into view, then the gun would have been lost. But with the Longbow drawn as to aim, Ghost would be in a good position to drop the gun down into Angelo's waiting hands. And that's exactly what had happened. Now, Angelo had his dead adversary's weapon, and with it there was a chance for escape.

The revolver opened to reveal seven bullets. Angelo locked the chamber back up and then gave it a quick spin, the bearing clicked like a rattler's tail. The gun aimed, blasted a hole the size of a bowling ball through the thin decorative roof. Debris fell into the well and so too did the rain. The wooden bucket below the canopy quickly filled with water, and as its weight grew heavier with each droplet, it gradually dropped down into the murky depths of the well.

Angelo placed the gun box along with its howitzers inside the bucket. The Longbow was cinched into the waist of his pants. The climb upward was arduous, each pull on the rope an exercise in agony. Angelo's ribs screamed and his shoulder sang in chorus. But he was determined to make that ledge, even if it killed him.

If this had been two years ago, he never would've been able to endure such physical hardship, but the Elitario had made him strong, fast, tough. They had physically and psychologically torn him down and then built him back up again, forging his flesh into an Elitario's, and as Angelo reached that coveted ledge, he could not quell a personal sense of pride for the accomplishment.

It was official: he had finally defeated the Three.

(79)

The bucket along with its armaments were hauled topside and sat on the well's stone ledge. But before Angelo retreated into the shelter of the church, he paused to regard Ghost. The man with the black pearl eyes was a mystery, and the fact that he was a Russian only served to deepen that mystery.

How had he come to be here of all places?

Regardless of his origins, Ghost had fought fair and met combat in good form. He had been a warrior in the proudest sense of the tradition, both courageous and noble in battle.

If anything, Ghost had Angelo's deepest respect.

"To the mutts," Angelo said with a slight nod, as if offering up a toast.

Angelo then moved into the church with the gait of a man who had seen better days, although not many.

(80)

Rain hammered the stained glass windows with blunt fists, but the church interior remained blessedly warm and dry. A pillar stone altar stood upon a pulpit of oak with an alabaster Christ hanging in the background, his head tilted, eyes closed, brow spotted with a torment of sins. Oil lanterns dangled from brass fixtures, but lay dim for lack of flame. A pair of confessionals stood in the corner with wine colored drapes for doors. A set of pinewood stairs rose up to a modest choir theater and again into the bell tower.

The church was vacant, as though even God understood that this position of worship hadn't actually been built to praise him, but rather to appease the ego of a Sergio Leone fan. Diavalo was nothing more than an elaborate village of smoke and mirrors, a Hollywood stage backdrop where the actors got paid in blood, in which case Angelo had been well compensated. The village had been appropriately named, for who better than the devil to create such a theatre of deception. Yes, the business that went on inside the town's tiny borders was indeed the devil's work, and Carlos worshipped his master with a dedicated zeal. Yet despite the true purpose behind Diavalo's creation, Angelo couldn't help but feel that the church still represented a sanctuary.

But why did he feel as such?

It didn't matter, although exhausted he was nonetheless elated, for he had survived the Trial of Daggers.

Soon he would go home.

He was empowered now, a walking weapon with a definite purpose. And maybe, just maybe, if he was lucky, after the gun smoke settled and Deluca had paid his restitution, then there might be a future with Bianca.

If she was still alive.

Admittedly, that was just a dream, but Angelo didn't care. He'd been through the fires of Hades these past two years, and he deserved his dream if only imagined.

He looked upon the gun case with eyes that hinted a smile. There would be no graduation ceremony, nor pats on the back to recognize his achievement, but that was fine. He didn't need the insincere hoopla, what he needed was to go home.

Come this time tomorrow, his tight belly would be stuffed on steak and wine, his muscular body bathed in rich scented soaps and then buried deep inside a soft hub of warm blankets. It would be absolute bliss and a deserving reward for a job well-done.

The church clock gonged the first of its twelve midday chimes.

The Trial of Daggers was officially over.

Soon, someone would come to retrieve and then transport him to the nearest hospital, most likely in Rome, where a doctor would attend to the injured Elitario before shipping him back home, or so he presumed. There had been no official instruction afforded Angelo as to what to do in lieu of a victory over the Three. However, common sense dictated a certain logical flow to things.

Surely, Carlos would not abandon Angelo to his fate---would he?

Suddenly, Angelo's expectations were thrown into question:

What was to become of that, which had been setup to fail?

The answer, if anything, felt ominous and courted more than its fair measure of justifiable concern.

He regarded the box which held the Archer Howitzers: a common case, no monogram nor special engraving on its dull flat surface to suggest any particular significance, a pauper's box. He cracked open the lid and let his cold wet fingers examine the guns. Despite the box's bland exterior, it nonetheless housed a treasure. The guns were of exceptional quality, field worthy weapons, skilled tools of the killing trade. The Howitzers were perfectly balanced, their sleek dark bodies forged from carbon composite castings---almost indestructible.

A single gun alone would be the equivalent of an average working man's salary for a year, and here Angelo had been gifted with two. Despite his supposed lowly mutt status, he had nonetheless achieved their worth, and as such, had come to show his quality.

A second gong from the clock rang while the storm continued to pound upon the church rafters. Angelo set the box on the pew and withdrew the Howitzers. The guns felt fitted to his hands as if tailor made for him personally. He could not have chosen two finer companions, and felt that such an exquisite pair of ladies should be graced with a name. He was in a church after all and what better place than this to have a christening.

A third gong was followed by an eruption of thunder and lightning which shook the church upon its cobblestone foundation and lit up the stained glass windows with a brilliance not easily endured. A faint smile touched Angelo's lips as his razor sharp eyes examined the pistols with a certain understanding.

"Thunder and Lightning," Angelo whispered.

And with that said the guns were graciously anointed.

(81)

By the fourth gong, Angelo had begun to feel increasingly uncomfortable.

Something was wrong.

The memory of the figure in the road came to mind, that which should not have been.

Was it still out there in the storm?

The memory evoked a feeling of disquiet.

The Howitzers were exchanged for Ghost's Longbow.

Angelo stood and appraised the church with wary eyes. His ribs screeched with pain as did his shoulder blade, but they were mild in comparison to the voice inside his head that screamed with warning. The fifth gong sounded and still the sensation of doom would not yield.

Was he just being paranoid, or was there an imminent danger?

Something wasn't adding up with this scenario and it had to do with Carlos's offering of the Archer Howitzers. Angelo regarded the guns: sleek and deadly, but quite harmless without ammunition.

As the sixth gong was swallowed up inside an explosion of thunder, Angelo was reminded of Two Tone Marty. Marty had been a friend, but still the bastard had betrayed them all. Carlos was no friend, and for Angelo to believe that the son of a bitch would bequeath such fine cutlery to an abomination such as Angelo, flew in the face of common sense. No, Carlos definitely had something planned, something worthy of the world's biggest prick shot.

But what?

But then Angelo knew that it had something to do with the guns.

Angelo wedged the Longbow into his pant's waist and picked up the Howitzers. The seventh gong of the clock chimed throughout the church. He dumped the gun magazines and inspected them with professional care: they were clean, nothing out of the ordinary.

Angelo sat the guns back down upon the pew and then lifted up the box. The box interior was nested down with a black velvet cloth. Carefully, his cold damp fingers worked the material away from its bed. Hidden beneath the dark fabric was a molding of C4 Factor X, an incredibly powerful explosive, enough to level the entire church.

It was obvious the guns were meant to distract and bait Angelo with their magnificence. With the Howitzers in hand, Angelo would let his guard down, believe that he had won the Trial of Daggers, and when the clock struck twelve.

No more mutt!

Carlos had never meant for Angelo to win, and this discovery confirmed it.

Angelo had to get rid of the case, but how?

If he ran now, he would never get far enough away before that twelfth gong coincided with what would undoubtedly be an impressive explosion.

Unless---

Despite a hindrance of injuries, Angelo moved quickly down the aisle with the box in hand. He emerged from the church doors out into the storm's fray where the wind and rain lashed at him like a salted whip.

The clock's eighth chime bellowed overhead.

His sudden movements made his bones feel like split kindling. Fire lit up his nervous system and stabbed daggers into his mind, the pain was torturous. Still, he lumbered though the motions, ignored the body's miseries so that he might commit his last act of redemption.

Through the strong push of wind and the agonizing groans of severe wounds, Angelo drew back that cursed box and threw it with as much precision as he could muster under current circumstances. The case sailed through the air. The wind caught hold of its smooth flat surface and shifted its trajectory. As a result, the box had not fallen down into the well, but rather landed upon the well's stone ledge beside the corpse of Ghost.

If the bomb went off there, Angelo would be done for. If only he could run down and push the box into the well, but he would never make that distance before the clock struck twelve.

Angelo removed the Longbow from his waist, raised the powerful weapon and then took aim. The effort to hold the gun steady was arduous, but the Elitario stepped up to the challenge with focused determination.

The gun's report was deafening.

The well-stone beneath the box shattered into dozens of jagged shards. The bomb however, failed to plunge into the well. Angelo continued to blast away the wall, and as the Longbow's recoil pounded his injuries into submission, its huge powerful bullets also pounded the well-stone into dust.

At eleven gongs the box finally succumb to gravity and plummeted down into the dark passage of the well. The massive explosion that followed the twelfth gong was almost immediate.

Diavalo's well spat out a giant column of fire into the storm. A shock wave rippled through the ground. The village windows shattered into pieces. Well-stones catapulted high into the air. Debris rained down across the square. Rocks pelted off the steeple bell, smashed holes through roofs and thudded down into the greasy mud.

The blast wave tossed Angelo back into the church and clear up to the altar. The protests of his body upon impact were fervent. His shoulder and ribs cried out for the kind of care that only a vial of morphine or an unconscious mind could subdue. His wounds had been severely aggravated, but still he was alive.

Regardless of what would happen next, Angelo was at least certain of one thing.

The Howitzers were his to keep.

(82)

Rain poured in through several large gaping holes in the roof. Stones from the well had crashed down into the choir theater, tearing out fissures big enough for a man to fall through. One such stone had landed beside the altar where it was wedged into the hardwood floor, but not so deep as to penetrate into the basement. The rock was in a state of limbo, up to its figurative waist inside a skirt of splinters.

But the stone and how close it had come to killing Angelo were of little interest to him. What mattered was the rain that fell in thereafter. He was desperately thirsty. His tongue felt like a dry slug. If only he could have a bit of that rainwater to swish over his gums, something to soothe that parched plain between his jaws. The bitter thirst was a sure sign that he had lost a lot of blood. If he didn't get medical attention soon, he would be dead before sundown.

Slowly, Angelo rolled onto the side of his body which hadn't sustained broken ribs. It was a strenuous effort, comparable to operating on your own spleen with a dull spoon. He was unbelievably cold, shivering, but in the same measure his wounds were like hot seething coal fires. Like the rock next to the altar, Angelo too had landed in a strange state of limbo. Shock would soon take him, and when it did there would be nothing else for him to do except to lay down in the cold obstruction.

Angelo positioned his head back and opened his mouth to receive that blessed gift of rain. He would need to keep his fluids up, but more importantly his wounds need stitching. The water would help, but only on provisional terms.

The rain poured over his parched tongue and down the dry chimney of his throat in a steady stream. However, there was nothing soothing to be had therein.

A strong stench of sulfur filled his nostrils as that blessed water betrayed him, scolding his tongue like napalm. Quickly, he jerked his head aside but it was too late. A few corrosive drops had managed to spill down his throat and into his stomach, effectively transforming his intestines into a steam boiler.

Dry heaves knotted Angelo's muscles into cramped spasms, pulled on his skeletal frame with taut ropes of tendons that made his bones feel as though they might snap. He gagged, tried to eject that poison but it would not depart him. His vision blurred and the church transformed into a glass menagerie of distorted shapes and figures, entities of pure evil.

This was not Diavalo's wretched church, but somewhere else, somewhere further down the road, somewhere far removed from the land of the living. This netherworld of phantom silhouettes spoke with an indecipherable whispering, a coven of black robed witches and warlocks attending a dark cauldron, their voices together in a demonic incantation as if to say:

"Feed us Angelo...feed us your sins...feed us your pain...feed us your poison...feed us your soul death merchant!"

Suddenly, Angelo remembered everything.

His soul was locked inside an enchanted mirror. Thunder and Lightning sat with him on a barstool in a place called the Last Chance Saloon in a small frozen town named Boondocks. Somehow, Angelo had peeked beneath the looking glass, and had snatched the tiniest glimpse of Boondocks' hidden secrets.

The imagery was disjointed and liken unto an abstract painting. The number of figures was indeterminable, their faces built upon shadows that were without proper form or substance. Spots of colors flickered within the gloom which he recognized as the serpent candle light he had seen after drinking Brown. These decorative orbs of rainbow floated upon a listless breeze and Angelo knew intuitively that they were a collection of lost souls.

"Feed us Angelo...feed us your soul!"

The residents of Boondocks were consuming him, but not in the carnivorous sense of the word, but rather milking him like livestock. They fed on his dark experiences and the emotions they induced like parasitic organisms, tapping his spiritual energy in order to sustain theirs.

He regarded the glowing orbs with an eye for numbers, some lights brighter than others, some so faint that they barely registered, their combined sum was beyond vast. It was like counting all the stars in all the galaxies, a number so grand that it bordered on the infinite.

Those lost souls, like Angelo's, had fallen into this purgatory-like-world's trap.

If only Angelo could fight back somehow, kick, run, anything to escape being bled further, but his soul was adrift upon the dead breath of the coven's dirge. There was nothing to ground him, no physical body to call upon, it was like being suspended in midair.

Angelo concentrated on the aspect of himself that sat on a Boondocks barstool, and on what he believed might serve as a set of spiritual anchors:

Thunder and Lightning.

(83)

The interlude ended with the re-materialization of Diavalo's damaged church. That gaping hole in the rooftop now allowed cool water to flow within---just as it had so long ago. The storm raged outdoors with blasts of thunder and sparks of lightning---just as it had so long ago. And as for Angelo, he remained in bad shape---just as he had so long ago.

Except something had changed, something critical had shifted in Marchetti's favor:

He could remember.

And as memory served him, he was dead, and holed up in a small town called Boondocks having a drink with an old pirate. None of this was real: Diavalo, the storm, or the Three. This reality was built on smoke and mirrors, and especially one mirror in particular: the barroom mirror of The Last Chance Saloon. Scarlet red was working its deceptive magic on Angelo's soul with enchanted dreams. Unfortunately, his aches and pains felt too real, and with each labored breath his body protested its displeasure with convincing realism.

Yet despite the suffering, Angelo staggered into a stand that wobbled on loose heels and made his way back to the pew and to the Howitzers.

They were still there---just as they had so long ago.

The logical side of Angelo's mind said he should seek out the Longbow, seeing as it had ammunition, but this wasn't about logic, this was about securing a firm foothold inside reality, or at least into a preferable state of one.

Reaching for the guns was almost unbearable, but he had managed to pick them up just the same. He stood center aisle, guns at his sides, eyes closed, soul searching for that banged up vessel he had once called his body.

"You are inside the mirror," Angelo whispered. "This isn't real...any of it...so wake up."

Had the guns just vibrated slightly, or was it his imagination?

He recalled how the guns had felt inside Boondocks, and how they seemed to sing for lack of a better word. When he had been alive, they had never done such a wondrous thing, but on this side of the rainbow they had spoken in their own unique voice. But as for now, they remained silent, and doubt began to cloud his judgment, suggested that the guns could do no such thing, because they were in fact deader than he was. They were after all, two hunks of composite material that had been handmade by some skilled craftsmen in Germany. Guns did not speak nor sing, the only noise they ever made was bang. But he could swear they had spoken to him inside of Boondocks by vibrating against his cold ribs like tuning forks.

"Sing to me," Angelo whispered. "Please...sing to me."

If this dream continued down the old familiar path it was heading, the powers that be would soon feed on an exceptionally painful part of Angelo's history, which was an era that he had no desire to relive. He would not willingly feed them the intimate knowledge of future things to come. Would not let them dine on the death of Uncle Vincent, nor sup upon the bitter heartbreak over Angelo's loss of Bianca, nor feast upon the bones of those innocent souls he had sent to an early grave during the Gambaro Turf Wars. That bed of sorrow was for Angelo alone to lie down in, not theirs.

This stroll down memory lane had to end.

Outside, the wind groaned, spoke with a breathy voice as if to say:

"Feed us sin...feed us death merchant...feed us your soul!"

Had the guns just given a slight tremor that was almost too faint to feel?

"Sing to me," Angelo said clearly. Then despite the pain burning inside his ribs, he drew in a deep breath of air and shouted at the top of his lungs. "SING TO ME!"

The bell in the tower gonged, collapsed through the damaged church steeple and then down the front steps into the muddy street where a bolt of lightning scorched its iron surface with a deep groove of scarlet red.

"SING!" Angelo shouted again, to which the guns replied in kind.

Their song was beautiful, crystal clear chimes that sounded like angelic harps. And although Angelo had no idea why the guns sang as they did, he didn't care. All that mattered was that they had, and their song was glorious.

Then suddenly, there was no more pain, no more cold wet clothes, nor vicious storm tearing through the village square. Diavalo was gone, fallen out from under foot like a gallows trapdoor, and Angelo was falling back through time and space.

But just where he would land this time was something only the guns would know.

CHAPTER FOUR

BLACK

(1)

The bitter expression upon the barkeep's narrow face suggested that he'd been cheated of a delicious meal. Angelo had returned to the Last Chance Saloon on his own ticket while there was still plenty of time left on the dream meter. But there was more than just an indignant look inside the barkeep's inhuman eyes, there was fascination.

How had the hitman removed the spiritual blinders from his eyes?

How had he defied the magical influence of Scarlet Red?

It was impossible, but the man in the full length leather jacket had done just that.

What did it mean?

Was it significant?

Throughout the ages the barkeep had encountered more than his share of willful souls, but this son of a bitch wasn't entirely human.

He couldn't be.

Even a full-fledged fire demon, or an archangel would've had difficulty riding out blood from the Devil's herd, but this man had done so with relative ease.

How?

The barkeep regarded the essence of Angelo's soul, searched the hitman's spiritual aura with a discerning eye. Nothing in the hitman's color suggested anything out of the ordinary, in fact he appeared quite common. But then he wasn't common. There was something extraordinary about this death merchant, this deceiver.

The bartender kept his eyes on Angelo while his fingers touched the cool smooth surface of Final Black's shot glass---the final drink that blinded all. Despite Angelo's early arrival, the hitman was nonetheless primed to receive Final Black, and when its dark potion touched his lips, it would be over forever.

No one, but no one had ever asked a question of Final Black, and no one ever would.

So said the ancient parchments---amen.

The barkeep would have eons to discover the source of the hitman's uniqueness. After Final Black, Angelo would be locked into the spiritual paddock with all the other lost souls, and there the hitman would feed them until his light dimmed into a tiny black dot.

Yes, there was absolutely nothing for Boondocks to fear from a mere mortal. The barkeep, Sartomonius and the servants of the purgatory-like-world were crafted by the immortals. They were at the top of the food chain, and as such, they did not heed nor give thought to the peculiarities of their prey.

(2)

Despite the fire's heat, Angelo was still quite cold, although he was warmer than before, but that rise in body temperature had nothing to do with the hearth fire, but rather Angelo's defiance of Scarlet Red. Intuition told the hitman this, and it also said that the fireplace along with Boondocks wasn't what it appeared to be. The Last Chance wasn't so much a product of smoke and mirrors, but rather a chameleon adept at camouflage. Again this knowledge was instinctual. However, the nature and purpose of this town, along with the creatures within remained a mystery.

What drove and motivated such entities?

The answer to that question would surely court madness.

The barroom mirror looked docile, although Angelo could sense its unseen malevolent eye watching him. Those liquor bottles on the shelf had returned to their ordinary state and no longer burnt like candles, nor coiled like serpents as they had while Angelo was under the influence of Scarlet Red---a clever deception.

Angelo could tell that the barkeep felt short changed. The milking had ended prematurely, seeing as the cow had kicked over the pail, but the game was hardly over.

Final Black remained unchallenged, the third and most dangerous drink of the evening.

If Angelo tasted of its sour nectar, would he be able to repeat his previous performance with an early departure?

The hitman was deep into the drinking game, and he doubted the barkeep would simply let him walk out of Boondocks before finishing.

Besides, where would Angelo go?

The winter tundra and the freezing wind waited outside to encase his bones in ice. No, there would be no skipping out on the bill, he was here for the duration. He would have to bear Final Black regardless, because therein lay his salvation: a third answer to a final question with its guarantee of safe passage from Boondocks.

However, the language of that agreement felt provisional, not to mention that a creature that enslaved souls to service its appetite may lack honor and integrity when it came to such agreements. Some folks were just sore losers, and solemn oaths were seldom made of oak when fashioned from cheap brands of morality.

"Back so soon?" the barkeep asked.

Angelo nodded as he considered the barkeep's intention. The barkeep looked pissed, but of steady mind. Angelo thought to ask him what he meant by "back so soon," but feared that might constitute a second question.

"My question," Angelo said in a decisive tone.

"So be it death merchant," the barkeep said as he fixed the hitman with a gaze that could burn through stone. "You've paid your fare to Scarlet Red...ask your question, and then let us have at Final Black."

Angelo nodded, snatched a glimpse of Final Black, and then set the barkeep in a direct line of sight. Question two would have to be in accord with question one if he were to get any results.

"How do I get back to my old life?" Angelo asked.

"The Avalon," the barkeep replied without hesitation. "Lie down in the cemetery of the ancients and let those of fair judgment pass sentence upon thee...if thee dare."

If thee dare?

At least the answer wasn't entirely cryptic. If there was a small town called Boondocks in the middle of nowhere, then surely there could be a cemetery called the Avalon. At the very least, Angelo had a destination, all he needed now was a direction and a means to travel.

Both Angelo and the barkeep regarded Final Black.

It sat on the bar like cancer in a shot glass, the blackest shade of black Angelo had ever seen. It had the same effect as staring into a high watt light bulb which invariably left a hole in your vision. Slowly, Angelo let his icy fingers wrap around the shot glass. The hitman expected that drink to weigh a thousand pounds, a quantum singularity brewed inside a cosmic still, but it came away from the bar with ease.

The drink hovered before Angelo's discerning eyes like a retinal eclipse.

If such a beverage could cut a hole in his eyesight, then what would the drink do once inside of him?

Brown had shown Angelo his distant past, Scarlet Red had shown him the days immediately thereafter.

What would Final Black show him?

The answer to that question was just a quick toss away.

"Take your fill death merchant," the barkeep said in a voice that sounded impatient. "Have at it with due diligence, fates damn you."

Angelo regarded the barkeep with an easy smile and a quick cordial wink. "Here's mud in your eye."

And with that said, Angelo drank Final Black down in one swift knock.

(3)

Final Black tasted like empty air. No, less than empty air, empty air would've at least been something, this drink was absolutely nothing.

Angelo inspected the shot glass.

There wasn't a lingering drop of Final Black to be found within.

The glass was sat back down onto the counter. Angelo peered into the mirror. No out of body sensation swept over him. Those trusty snakeskin boots around his ankles kept rooted to the floor. Still, his cold hands braced against the bar for balance. Anticipation was the only impression afforded him, the quiet pause before impact. Surely, Final Black would be the most formidable drink of the trio, and as such its bite would be fiercest.

But nothing happened.

The fire continued to crack and snap its spent embers, and the barkeep continued to regard Angelo with a perturbed vexation.

Was the barkeep's annoyance based on the fact that Angelo had not fallen through the looking glass as he had before, or was it rather a form of patient malice in the face of the expected?

As far as Boondocks went, everything appeared to be normal. No, that was incorrect, the room had grown noticeably dimmer.

Had the oil lamps and the hearth fire burnt down, or was Final Black stealing his eyesight from the inside out?

Angelo's eyes narrowed as he inspected the bar's surroundings. The height of flame inside the grate as well as that of the lanterns was still quite tall. Plenty of light spilled into the room, but still it had grown darker by a significant factor and continued to do so.

But why was that?

The answer visited upon the hitman with a sinister realization.

Boondocks' wooden walls and floorboards were transforming into a smooth black unyielding rock, a purgatorial rendition of a medieval dungeon.

"Behold, your fate death merchant."

Angelo looked at the barkeep, but it was not He who had spoken. This voice was deeper, angrier, and seemed to come from the depths of the mirror.

Angelo fell back a step and in one fluid motion drew Thunder and Lightning. He targeted both the barkeep and the mirror, gun triggers poised. The bitter frost remained inside the hitman's limbs, but his motion was both rapid and graceful. His body had either grown used to the cold, or the cold wasn't what it actually appeared to be either. Perhaps that misery too was made from smoke and mirrors, another form of spiritual bondage to keep him incapacitated.

"I've drank my fill of your poisons!" Angelo said in protest. "We had a bargain! Grant me an answer to question three and then bid me safe passage from Boondocks, goddamn you!"

A gruff laugh filled the saloon with sour notes, as both the unseen source that resided within the mirror and its evil minion the Barkeep shared in merriment.

"No question has ever been asked of Final Black, death merchant," the barkeep explained with sadistic entertainment. "For in order to bear Final Black to the end, you must serve an eternity in service to Sartomonius. So say the ancient parchments, amen!"

Final Three was a paradox, Angelo could see that now. The only way he would get an answer to the final question would be to carry Final Black inside his belly until the end of time. Only then would his fare be paid in full, at which point, he'd be free to ask any question he wanted.

But he'd never get there, because tomorrow never comes.

Knowledge from Final Black was infinitely expensive, its interest steeper than any nasty mafia loan shark's, and Angelo had unwittingly signed into the contract when he drank from the first shot glass of Brown.

"Get out Little Capone!" Vincent's voice shouted from inside Angelo's head. "Get the hell out of Dodge before it's too late, capisce!"

But it was too late.

If this were the natural world there would be familiar rules of conduct: a hammer dropped against a bullet anvil made an explosion, and if someone, or something stood in front of that explosion, they fell down.

Did those rules apply on this side of the rainbow?

Did Thunder and Lightning still possess worth, or were they merely novelties to a quaint little reality in which science dominated the laws of physics?

Nothing was for certain, not Boondocks, the Barkeep, Sartomonius, and yes sad to say, even Thunder and Lightning. There was a doubt that suggested the gun triggers would not blast off a powerful round when pulled, but rather make empty clicking noises. Hell, maybe even a little flag popped out of the barrel with the word "Bang!" written upon it.

Angelo hesitated, to have Thunder and Lightning let him down in this most dire need would be unthinkable.

The confident glare in the barkeep's eyes spoke to a certain inevitability, that many souls had come to Boondocks before Angelo, and each and every one of them wound up inside the animal paddock. There was no escape, because no one ever had.

So said the ancient parchments, amen.

Angelo's eyes narrowed and as his thoughts gave way not just to cold blooded murder, but to a state of mind that could only be described as death incarnate.

"Listen fellas," Angelo said in a calm even voice, mindful that a man who could control his temper was far more dangerous than a man who couldn't. "I don't think you realize who you're messing with."

More laughter tittered through the dungeon passages and stoned archways of what had once been a saloon.

"Your fate is sealed, death merchant," the barkeep assured arrogantly. "Demons and angels combined would be hard pressed to thwart off the fangs of halfway hounds, let alone a lowly man-thing. Relinquish your assertions of freedom and submit to feed us your soul!"

From the darkest corners of the dungeon, things stirred, shuffled and hissed. Eyes of scarlet and amber stared out of the shadows, hungry eyes that wanted to be fed.

Despite the seriousness of the situation, Angelo crooked a smile, an act of defiance that enraged the barkeep. The hitman however, remained steady.

"Oh, I'll feed you," Angelo replied. "I'll feed you all the poison in my heart."

Thunder's trigger was pulled and the hitman was not disappointed.

(4)

A loud report erupted from the Howitzer as a hole the size of a fist ripped through the barkeep's chest. Shock shaped the barkeep's facial features as he examined the gaping wound with blood stained fingers. He regarded Angelo with wide eyes that were bereft of disdain and malice, but rather held a mute wonder.

How could this be?

How could a mere mortal man inflict such damage upon a minion of the House of Despair?

It was impossible, wasn't it?

Guns weren't supposed to work inside Boondocks for the drinks rendered such physical manifestations of the lower order inert, and primed souls for processing. But here, the death merchant had not only suffered their unholy fruit, but thwarted off the effect of their magical toxins as well.

How could that be?

If only the barkeep had three questions to ask, then perhaps he might find an answer. But he didn't, and as his knees gave out from beneath him, his essence both physical and metaphysical, dissipated in a wispy cloud of icy gray smoke.

(5)

It had been a good shot, dead center.

But the best thing was the expression on the barkeep's face, those wide questioning eyes that conveyed their shock and surprise. Angelo understood in that all too brief second that the guns had done something extraordinary, and if they could do that, then they, and perhaps he, could do even more. Suddenly, Boondocks wasn't a place built so much on absolutes as it was upon misplaced assertions. There was leverage to be had here, and although Angelo didn't know to what extent, he would use it as best he could.

"Death merchant!" wailed the unseen presence within the mirror. "Lay down your arms and submit your soul! There are far worse fates to be had than being corralled into the herd!"

Angelo did not hesitate.

Lightning released a shell into the looking glass, to which the barroom mirror stretched inward and then rebounded outward like a trampoline. The bullet ricochet, grazed Angelo's temple as the mirror reflected the bullet back towards him.

The hitman would not make that mistake again.

Angelo's attention turned to the shadowy corners of the room where terrible eyes continued to regard him with dim witted and malevolent fascination. They were the halfway hounds the barkeep had spoken of, and judging by the sinister scarlet light inside their glowing eyes, they were no doubt vicious mindless creatures.

Beasts such as these only considered one thing: to feed.

To the rear, the Last Chance's door remained. However, it was taller, sturdier, and now barred by a rugged crossbeam that was thick enough to hold off a juggernaut set on a castle siege. Bullets from Thunder and Lightning would have little effect on such a formidable obstacle, seeing as their ammunition was in short supply. Where those frosty sectional plate windows had once stood, were now arched portholes closed off by rusted prison bars. Again, for lack of bullets, the guns would be unable to breach such lengths of metal.

The way out was shut.

Beyond both sides of the mirror, stone passageways led past dozens of solid, iron door, jail cells where souls were bled of their vitality until their spiritual light dimmed to darkness. There was a vast reservoir of misery to be found inside of Boondocks, and although this prison was not in actuality the Lake of Fire, Angelo felt it nonetheless qualified as a close suburb.

The voice within the mirror bellowed out a strange dialect, a master issuing a command to his attack dogs to kill, and that's exactly what those beasts within the dim shadows struck out to do.

(6)

Within the low amber glow of torch light, Angelo could see the halfway hounds. There were four in total, big as prize bulls, fiendish creatures with wolf like heads surrounded by black manes of putrid tendrils. The hounds' slimy lips were pulled back by guttural snarls, their crooked jaws pitted with jagged teeth which gnashed and snapped. Festering quills protruded from their greasy gums. Eyes of red-amber burned pyres atop their wide grunting snouts. Their rugged bone skulls were festooned with giant tumors.

The hitman marked them well with his guns.

They moved quickly on sturdy haunches of hairless hides, pushed forward on broad shoulders in rapid gallops. Hooves clattered across the cold wet stones, filling the dungeon with the dangerous energy of a wild stampede.

Angelo only had a second to react.

The howitzers held twelve bullets each, and Angelo had already burnt through two rounds. Eleven shots aside made for twenty-two hits, and that may not have been enough bullets to take on this brand of the devil's herd. Logically, given such a predicament, the best option would be to run, but where? The doors behind were barred shut and those cellblock passages offered no guarantee that they might lead to a rear exit. Unfortunately, there was no time to debate the issue. The only avenue open was forward, and that's where Angelo would have to go.

The hounds drew in from the four corners with efficient speed, but the hitman was quicker. He jumped upward, braced a hand upon the bar counter and threw his feet towards the wicked mirror.

The hounds converged, smashed into the bar counter like a pack of angry football players. The counter shattered into lengths of splintered wood under their immense weight as they collided and fell into a clumsy pile of bodies. For a second, the hounds were disoriented, perhaps knocking the wind out of each other, but they were recovering with preternatural speed. It was in that brief lick of time that Angelo got a good whiff of their sour breath. The scent was reminiscent of the odor inside of Uncle Vincent's mystery room: death and decay, both old and putrid.

The hitman rallied, blasted a dozen rounds at point blank range into one hound's skull. The fiend howled, recoiled and then lost its stride as its diseased head tossed off large wet divots of flesh and bone. The beast slumped, rolled its fiery eyes back into its skull and then fell dead.

The remaining trio gathered their footing, bucked against the fresh corpse of the hitman's handiwork and immediately gave chase.

Angelo turned and raced past the mirror that had caused him such misery, but not without first catching a glimpse of his own reflection.

(7)

The image had been fleeting, caught on the tail end of escaping heels, but still, the hitman had recognized its significance. Angelo's head was a decomposed mask of rotted flesh, his eyes dim lit pyres that had been bled of their spiritual essence to the point that they were no longer consequential. He was an empty shell, gutted of any semblance of intelligent thought.

That's what you'll be if they catch you! Angelo thought.

The mirror's rendition of the hitman's future added speed to his feet. He charged down the passageway, boot heels clicking hollow notes upon the floor stones. In the background the rattle of hooves returned with a steady rhythm, drawing closer.

The hall unfolded into a division of choices: left or right. If he could make that distance before the hounds finally nipped his heels, then he could buy a few seconds by out maneuvering them. Angelo dug down, pumped his legs higher and harder. If this didn't work he'd be done for, in which case it would be best to lodge a bullet into his own brain.

That option opened up an interesting philosophical argument: could the dead die?

If Angelo committed suicide, would he automatically end up in one of the prison cells, or would he go straight to Hell?

It would make for an interesting choice: a lake of fire, or a paddock stall for all eternity? Neither option seemed preferable. They were the sort of morbid choices that put Angelo in mind of one of Uncle Vincent's peculiar sayings. "If you're up to your neck in dung, and someone throws a bucket of snot at your head, do you duck?"

It had been a rhetorical question, but as Angelo faced the real possibility of eternal damnation, he began to weigh in the subject with serious consideration.

Would he duck?

The passage split approached and so too did the hounds.

Angelo chanced turning left, banked sharp, and that's when his boot soles began to slide. For a second he could see himself, sprawled up against the wall under a linebacker pileup of angry livestock. His right heel connected with the raised lip of a floor stone, effectively recovering his balance. He cut harder, hugged the wall edge, and began a one-eighty degree spin as the hounds entered into the turn.

(8)

An elephant on roller skates would've been more graceful. The hounds' hooves rolled completely out from beneath them as they tumbled into the wall with a solid crash. The trio of beasts stumbled over one another, knocked each other down as they struggled to regain footing. The beasts were eager to recommence the chase, and as such, had sacrificed their balance.

The gamble had paid off for Angelo, and he wasted no time utilizing the advantage.

Thunder and Lightning blasted off another six rounds, three aside. The hound on top of the pile screeched, threw back its oily head, its fleshy mane spitting out thick black gobs against the wall as it fell over dead.

The guns were down to ten hard spikes.

The remaining duo kicked and pawed at the fallen hound, squirmed beneath its dead weight. Angelo took aim at the one closest to the wall and fired off a round which missed completely.

Impossible!

How could he have missed such an easy target?

In the hitman's eagerness to finish off the herd, he had not noticed that a squid like tentacle had emerged from a visor slot within one of the cell doors. The scaly appendage had wrapped its sticky white suckers around his wrist, effectively throwing off his aim.

Angelo had reacted instantly, called upon the free hand with Thunder to challenge this latest threat, to which the Howitzer split the tentacle apart with three well-placed rounds.

Six hard spikes remained.

The two remaining hounds found their balance and reset their charge. The hitman aimed. Three bullets were offered. The first beast collected a head shot, the other, a pair of shoulder wounds. Howls of pain reported their misery, but still the fiends made challenge. The hitman turned and ran, willing his legs to carry him on to the next corner in the labyrinth and beyond the reach of those razor sharp teeth.

(9)

The steady rhythm of hooves sounded uneven, broken. The gunshot wounds had the hounds laboring to keep up. Still, they would overtake the hitman soon if he did not reach the corner's bend.

Ahead, the passageway's dim lit torches made it difficult to gauge distance. Angelo could be staring into miles for all he knew, perhaps even eternity. The muscles in his legs grew tired, his lungs worked for air. The race would soon take his heart, and when that happened, he would have nothing left to offer except defeat.

But that was not an option.

No, he would put the hounds to the dust before that end, even if he had to do so with just his hands.

The wall ahead branched into two corridors, a T like junction of choices: left or right. This time the hitman would bank right, just in case the dim witted beasts anticipated a repeat performance of last time. He doubted the hounds possessed such cunning intellect, but he would alter any predictable patterns just the same.

But as the wall drew closer, his heart suddenly sank.

There was no T in the corridor, nor an L for that matter, just a heavy iron cell door set within that final wall which turned out to be a very dead end.

(10)

Cell doors lined both sides of the passage and offered no alternate route of escape. Angelo was running straight into a barricade where the hounds would crash down upon him like a truck load of rancid beef.

It was the end of the line.

To turn now might give him enough time to kill one beast, but their momentum coupled with their proximity would ultimately prove fatal. Dead or alive, the hounds would crush him against the door.

The end closed and Angelo prepared for a daring maneuver.

His timing would have to be perfect.

The hitman raised a foot in mid-stride and placed it upon the door, letting momentum carry him up the wall. He was three steps into the climb when gravity began to take hold. His thighs tensed, pushed with all their worth against the door, launching him into an airborne reverse somersault. Below, the last remnants of the herd crashed into the door, and as Angelo arced overhead he let Thunder and Lightning unleash the storm. Two hard spikes found their marks at near point blank range with two clean head shots aside.

He came down hard behind the hounds, but managed to hold onto his feet.

The reckless stunt had paid off.

Upon the passageway stones before the door a hound writhed in agony, its shark like teeth shaped around a bitter howl. The other lay quite dead. The surviving hound's scarlet eyes grew bright as it battled to right itself up again, but it was hopelessly pinned beneath the weight of its fallen sibling.

Angelo had one hard spike left.

Would he offer it to this beast in a mercy killing?

"No...no mercy for those who are without mercy," Angelo whispered. "Amen."

The beast's scornful eyes slowly faded while the hitman looked on without the slightest touch of compassion.

(11)

The halfway hounds were dead, but the danger wasn't over. Angelo was still trapped inside of Boondocks and soon other things would come to collect him, perhaps even the thing that resided within the mirror.

He had to get out of here.

He looked back the way he came. He could not assume that Boondocks followed a rational architectural layout. The floor plan of a spiritual prison may very well be erratic and perhaps even changed in size and shape on occasion. Besides, to backtrack would lead him closer to that cursed mirror, not to mention closer to the things that resided behind the iron doors along the passageway. He regarded the dead-end where two tons of rotten beef lay dead and bleeding. A wide curve in the door's surface denoted a sizable dent. If he had been caught between that door and those charging beasts, the hounds would have turned him into a pancake. His eyes followed the door's seam, noted that the warp of metal had pulled in from the edges of the surrounding jamb ever so slightly. A rivet had cracked on the lower hinge, but the three others along with the four in the top hinge held firm.

Suddenly, a shrill inhuman scream rang through the passageway.

Angelo turned, took aim with Lightning and its last solitary bullet.

Nothing stirred except the darkness, yet something evil was obviously on the hunt.

The hitman crouched down and contemplated a plan. One bullet wouldn't be of much use if another hound came calling, in fact it would probably only piss it off more. Brains, not brawn, would be required in this situation.

The squeal returned, except this time it was louder, closer.

Angelo's eyes searched.

Nothing moved.

The only sign of motion was in the distance, phantom silhouettes which may or may not have actually been there. The hitman stood, regarded the fallen hounds with a hint of regret as he considered his poor state of ammunition.

Could he have killed the hounds with fewer rounds?

He wasn't sure, but understood that such conjecture was ultimately self-defeating.

The unseen beast returned, its scream jabbing hot needles into the hitman's ears.

It sounded right on top of him.

Again he surveyed the distance.

Nothing moved, save those strange inconsequential images.

Perhaps the monster was invisible, leisurely stalking up on him, its transparent body distorting the distance with some sort of dark magic. Any second now he would smell the thing's vile breath as it unhinged its snake like jaws to swallow him whole. He drew back, the carcasses of the dead hounds pressed against the back of his boot heels. It was here that he felt a soft draft touch the edge of his hand, except this breeze wasn't cold and damp, but rather hot and dry.

(12)

Angelo reeled, expecting to find that the hounds had somehow resurrected, but the beasts remained deathly still. His fingers traced the draft back to a fracture just below the damaged hinge. He knelt, and from that vantage point he could see a thin slice of what might have been sunlight seeping in through the crack.

"The light at the end of the tunnel," Angelo whispered.

He stood and regarded the Howitzers with considerate eyes. They were powerful guns, but they wouldn't blow away that hinge with just one bullet. Perhaps if he had two shots, maybe three, then perhaps, but just one kick at the can wouldn't cut it.

Another scream bellowed, seemed to shake the passage upon its foundations.

It was an awful noise, grating, primal.

There was no time left to think. He would have to chance sacrificing his last bullet on a lost cause. True, he would rather go down fighting, but if the bullet could crack the hinge further, then maybe, just maybe he could get out.

Lightning prepared to fire its last solitary bullet.

"Please," Angelo muttered. "Let her kick like a goddamn mule."

The tentacle was damn fast, streaked out of its jail cell door and grabbed hold of the hand which held Lightning. The gun went off, effectively spending its last hard spike on the ceiling stones.

Both Howitzers were now empty.

But that was the least of Angelo's worries.

The tentacle had hold of him, and it was not letting go.

Angelo used Thunder to hammer the greedy mouths that gnawed upon his hand. He fought to free himself and the gun he had worked so hard to earn, but the beast was strong, wiry, a creature built of sturdy tendon and muscle.

A chorus of screams swept through the passageway as an army of tentacles slapped open the cell door visors along the corridor. In an instant the entire length of the tunnel was transformed into a throat of hungry limbs, a gauntlet of dark alien flesh blindly searching for a victim to clasp onto. They squealed as they called out for Angelo in the forbidden language of a cursed tongue.

"Feeds us death merchant! Feed us your soul!"

The cell doors shook violently within their jambs and threatened to let spill a shapeless evil onto the passage stones.

He placed his feet upon the cell door and pulled hard. His eyes narrowed and face flushed as he wrestled for life and liberty. Another tentacle from a neighboring cell door claimed his ankle with a tight strangle hold. It yanked his foot away from the door, weakened his leverage and placed him in the middle of a powerful tug of war. Soon his limbs would come off like a fly's plucked wings, and then the feasting would begin.

If only Thunder had a couple of hard spikes, then he could shoot his way out, but the gun's chamber was empty. It had performed its swansong for the ceiling, and as such, would sing no more.

Sing! Angelo recalled.

In Scarlet Red's version of Diavalo, the guns had worked magic, but could they sing for the hitman inside of Boondocks? Casa Diavalo had been a dream built on deceptions, but then wasn't Boondocks made of similar materials as well?

Angelo tried to steady himself, but it was impossible. The tentacle around his ankle had been joined by a third that had looped itself about his mid section so tight that he could hardly breathe. His mouth opened, tried to call out as it had in Diavalo, but there was no air on which to place the words.

The passage dimmed before his eyes.

"Sss...in...g!" croaked out of his mouth, a command that was weaker than a whisper.

The Howitzers kept silent.

(13)

Thunder and lightning ripped through Casa Diavalo's church, while the wind and rain pounded the rafters into submission. Despite the storm's roar, Angelo could hear the solid click of leather bound soles as they walked casually down the aisle's wooden floorboards. They were high heel cowboy boots, the type a huge Sergio Leone fan would wear in a town like Diavalo.

Angelo opened his eyes and watched as that bastard Carlos arrogantly approached, his crooked yellow teeth barred together in a smug smile. The son of a bitch stopped, his wart riddled hands straddling his wide hips. Every fiber of Carlos's being reveled in Angelo's misery, every cut, ache, broken bone, a delectable treat that must be savored.

"Howdy Mutt," Carlos said with a cruel grin. "You look a little worse for wear."

The church floor wobbled beneath Angelo's feet. Blood loss had his brain running on fumes. If he didn't get to a hospital soon, he would die.

"I won," Angelo said with a tongue that felt as dry as sun baked stone. "I'm an Elitario."

The wrinkled corners of Carlos's smile sank into a grimace. "You're a mutt, Marchetti...always have been...always will be."

Angelo raised Thunder and Lightning and aimed them at Carlos. "These say different."

"They're empty victories, Marchetti," Carlos scoffed. "Empty of significance, and quite empty of ammunition."

"No...they're symbols of bravery...good merit...skill," Angelo declared. "I am an Elitario...I have endured the Trial of Daggers, and you will recognize me."

The floor felt soft, and Angelo had to fight to keep his knees from bending. Ghost's Longbow was somewhere beneath a toppled pew and quite out of reach, not that it would serve any practical purpose aside from vengeance, because if Angelo killed Carlos, then Angelo killed himself, and Carlos knew it. There'd be nothing practical about that situation, and despite Angelo's overwhelming desire to kill Carlos, he had to remain very practical.

Self-interests often served self-preservation.

Suddenly, the room blurred and distorted into a square tunnel. The rumble of thunder rang inside Angelo's ears while lightning seared his optic nerves.

Had something moved beside Carlos, a dark shadow that looked like a snake?

If only his eyes would clear, then he could see for sure. But he was barely conscious, dizzy on feet that felt as insubstantial as daydreams. Angelo squeezed his eyes shut, and when they finally snapped back open, they found Carlos standing before a heavy iron door.

(14)

Squid like arms slithered around Carlos's cowboy boots, sailed through his smoky body like boats in a thick fog. Yet Carlos paid this intrusion no heed, instead, he fixed Angelo with a face so flush it looked ready to burst a blood vessel.

"I will never recognize you!" Carlos bellowed. "You're a goddamn mutt! You'll never be an Elitario! Do you hear me, Marchetti! You're nothing but the litter runt of a dirty whore!"

The fire came from everywhere: Angelo's arms, legs, heart, every cell in his entire body converging upon the center of his mind. How dare that ugly bastard speak to him in such a disrespectful tone! How dare he utter such obscenities against his mother! It was unforgivable! Angelo had more than paid his fare, and now Carlos was going to pay his.

Rage consumed Angelo's thoughts, stole away his intellectual reason. It was true, a man who could control his temper was far more dangerous than a man who couldn't, but when a man was given over to wrath, his options no longer abided consequences.

It was in this mindless fervor that Thunder unleashed the storm.

(15)

The report went beyond loud, it deafened. The roar of a tank cannon as heard inside an amphitheatre. A large scarlet flare spat out of Thunder's barrel, robbed the world of sight in the wake of its brilliance. The recoil was so fierce that Angelo's arm felt torn off at the shoulder.

The hitman was blown backward, ripped free of the tentacles that tugged war upon his bones.

Had the gun exploded?

No, the gun had not exploded, it lay intact upon the passage floor stones, a thin wisp of smoke twirling out of its spent barrel. As for Angelo's arm, it ached like a son of a bitch, but it was still attached to his shoulder.

His eyes quickly searched for Carlos.

There was no sign of the miserable prick, but then that was to be expected of a hallucination. However, Angelo had not fantasized the fact that Thunder had fired off a thirteenth round. As a result, the dark passage was now full of dazzling garish light that poured in generously from where a heavy iron door had once stood.

Thunder had blown the door away, peeled its hinges back like a corn husk.

He was now free to escape, but to where?

Was that brassy light shining upon the damp stones cast from an earthly sun, or was it the spiritual energy as shone from the mother of all milking paddocks?

Angelo picked up Thunder and climbed onto his feet. He felt dizzy, but nonetheless able now that he could breathe again. The squid arms had been momentarily frightened by the gun's loud explosion. They also appeared to have an aversion to light. The arms would briefly touch the spot of light on the floor and then quickly pull back. Still, they seemed to move with cunning, testing the environment for weakness.

The hitman had a few seconds before the arms would rally another attack. He searched the damp floor for Lightning. There was no sign of the gun. His eyes retraced the path of the arm that had first grabbed hold of his hand. The slick appendage was still there, its length timidly hanging out of a cell door visor, Lightning perched vicariously within its suckers.

He would not dare to leave Boondocks without that gun!

Thunder aimed, but its trigger would only click out an empty reply. Angelo would have to challenge the limb to a test of strength. He pulled on Lightning, but the gun was slippery, covered in vile mucus from the arm's sour secretions. The appendage contorted, twisted violently and then vanished back inside the cell with Lightning still clutched stubbornly within its ropey limb.

Angelo pounded upon the cell door with angry fists, pulled on the handle, but the barrier would not budge. A tentacle from an adjacent jail cell squirmed over his foot and up his pant leg. He jumped back, adjusted his balance, feigned to move in one direction, but jumped in another. The limb missed, curled along the floor. There was no time, the tentacles were growing bolder and losing their fear of the light.

He had to leave!

The hitman regarded the cell door once more, hoping that the beast within would tire of the odd trinket it had stolen and thus toss it back into the passageway, but it did not reappear, nor did Lightning.

With the greatest of reluctance, Angelo turned and dove through the door, well-aware that he had just abandoned a part of himself.

CHAPTER FIVE

13 WALKS THE LINE

(1)

Piercing heat slapped the hitman in the face as he bounded out through the broken door into the unknown. At first his eyes were overwhelmed by the sudden brilliance, but that harsh blindness quickly faded. He crashed down onto an ashen hillside of a gradual sloping rock face. His chest absorbed the brunt of the impact, his hands braced forward as they tried to stop his tumble down the rugged slope. Unfortunately, the angle of descent coupled with his mass afforded him too much momentum.

Thunder was held awkwardly, hindered his ability to grasp firmly onto the rooted rock, but he dared not release the firearm, not after losing Lightning to the demon inside of Boondocks. He would ride out the fall until gravity had finally satisfied its law, or perhaps until one of those arms snaked out of the door behind him and clutched onto his ankle.

But nothing grabbed hold of him and so he was left to tumble.

An arc of stone smacked him in the shoulder. His hip dashed off a jut of rock and then his knee followed in kind. The rock face beat him like a dusty rug, its dull unyielding surface punishing him for having had the audacity to escape. Then, he no longer scraped down along the rock face, but rather fell silently through the dry stale air. The final leg of the plummet ended with a sudden collision upon a flat barren landscape of ashen soil. Dust spooled up around him.

Angelo groaned as he lay in the dirt, bruised and beaten, but not defeated.

After all, he had finally made it out.

(2)

Slowly, he climbed onto his feet. His body was a protest of aches and pains. The cold that had encased his bones had been replaced with the kind of deep penetrating heat that threatened to melt him. But at the moment the hitman didn't care. The hot salted whip of sunlight felt good, and if in time it saw fit to set his flesh to flame, then so be it.

He wedged Thunder into its holster and stepped away from the cliff face. He looked back up over the steep ledge and to that miserable acreage called Boondocks. There, he would surely find a fortress of black castle stone with iron shutters, the sky above a frozen bale of wintry storm clouds. However, what he found was quite unexpected.

Boondocks was a shimmer of hot gas, like a hazy mirage as seen across a vast desert landscape. The cobalt sky and the ashen rock fluttered inside a translucent wave of heat vapors. The door he had jumped through was in fact an energy portal, a vortex that spun like a scarlet red hurricane. At its core a shiny ripple of quicksilver stared down on him with a lidless malevolent eye: the barroom mirror.

Boondocks was an evil entity that resembled a tempest in one of Jupiter's bands, and all of its dark energy circled around that wickedness that lived inside the mirror's hub.

Angelo took a step backwards. Thunder was empty of ammo and Lightning was a casualty of war, but Angelo nonetheless felt stronger than he ever had felt in his entire life. He had escaped Boondocks, and if he could do that, then he could do anything. If the chrome beast swooped down from its wretched perch, then Angelo would meet it in good form. But the glittering evil remained fixed in place, glaring down on him with a hunger and a hatred that once again encased his bones in frost.

There would be no going back up that hill to retrieve Lightning. The gun belonged to the chrome beast now, and as such, was gone forever, and for that Angelo couldn't help but feel deeply saddened. The Howitzers were separated, and he couldn't help but feel it was a bad omen of things to come. Angelo's karma felt unbalanced, out of step. After all the hardship he had suffered in Diavalo only to lose the weapon to a mindless beast was unthinkable.

Angelo bowed his head and leaned forward with his hands upon his knees. His eyes closed as he tried to think of what to do next. Somehow the Avalon felt like a big pipe dream. No one ever came back to life, except for a guy in a toga two thousand years ago, and even then that miracle seemed highly suspect to Marchetti.

But then where else was he to go?

Angelo straightened back up and looked at Boondocks.

It was gone, vanished, lost to that translucent flutter of thinly blown glass upon the hilltop.

"Good riddance," Angelo muttered, although its absence served to reinforce the reality that Lightning was gone forever as well.

He turned around and faced out into a vast empty wasteland of sun baked desert. There were no waypoints or signage to advise him.

He was alone.

He removed his leather jacket and slipped it over his sturdy shoulder, preparing to set boot to heel. He did not know where the Avalon was, but knew intuitively it would reside at the end of a long arduous pilgrimage.

(3)

Mile after mile fed into a barren wasteland. The blazing sun scorched its sweltering heat down upon the hitman with a cruel persistence. Thirst had rolled his tongue up inside of burnt sand and made his head pound like a tribal drum. Each step felt timed to the beat of a death march. As a result, a dangerous state of delirium had stolen a part of Angelo's mind, leaving him to mutter incoherently and hallucinate.

"Gonna die out here I reckon," Carlos said.

Angelo could see Carlos waiting ahead, a canteen of water held within his wart riddled hand. The son of a bitch drank generously and then poured the remaining water down over his homely face until its last few drops were wasted upon the barren hardpan.

"Shut up," Angelo muttered.

"Now is that any way to talk to an old teacher?" Carlos said with a sarcastic lilt. "Don't forget, I was the one who made you strong, Marchetti. I was the one who made you into an Elitario you ungrateful mutt. You know, hate can take you a long way, Marchetti!"

"So can love," Bianca's said softly into Angelo's ear.

Angelo stopped and turned.

She wore a white summer dress, its spaghetti strings hanging gently over her delicate tanned shoulders, her long dark mane of raven hair covered over with a wide brimmed hat of white lace.

"I miss you," Angelo said.

"I'm so sorry, Angelo. I never meant to break your heart."

Angelo closed his eyes as an old sorrow visited his heart. "I'll see you again angel...I..." Angelo opened his eyes---she was gone. "Not real," Angelo mumbled with a bit of a laugh. "Damn heat has me seeing things."

"Va-voom!" Uncle Vincent said as his big mitt of a hand clasped onto Angelo's shoulder. "Good to see you Little Capone."

"Good to see you, too," Angelo replied.

Angelo's previous assertion that these visitors weren't real was promptly forgotten.

"That was quite a show back there in Boondocks," Vincent said with a wink.

Angelo offered a wan smile. "Yeah...guess it was, wasn't it?

"Damn straight!" Vincent replied.

"Lightning's gone," Angelo said with a sigh "Lost it to a goddamn squid arm. Can you believe that?"

"Don't sweat the small stuff kiddo," Vincent replied. "Survival is often won at the cost of sacrifice."

Angelo tapped the holster which held his last remaining Howitzer. "Thunder shot a lucky thirteen...un-freaking believable."

"I guess thirteen is your lucky number," Vincent said.

Angelo shook his head gently, hunched his eyebrows with the kind of effort reserved for deep thought. "How could it do that? How could it fire a thirteenth round? It couldn't...I mean, I must've miscounted."

"Did you?" Vincent asked, as if already knowing the answer.

Angelo considered and then shook his head. "No, I know how many rounds I fired...twelve aside...it was definitely twelve aside."

"So where did thirteen come from?" Vincent asked.

Angelo let his hand wipe a layer of perspiration from his slick brow. "Don't know...perhaps the tooth fairy...va-voom."

Vincent roared laughter. "Well here's hoping on a lucky fourteen."

Angelo raised an eyebrow. "Wouldn't bet on it."

"You didn't tell them did you?" Vincent asked.

Angelo shook his head and jabbed a finger in between his own eyebrows. "Nope, nota. The number's up here, and there it's apt to stay until judgment day."

Vincent laughed and slapped Angelo on the back. "Ah, Deluca's gonna have a fit when he realizes what you did."

"A lot of people are gonna pinch a loaf when they find that out," Angelo smirked.

Vincent suddenly lost his merriment. "It's too bad you're dead Little Capone. You know they killed you on that casino rooftop. You're stuck out here."

Angelo paused and considered just that. "No...I just have to get to the Avalon...then I can go back home."

Angelo staggered forward once more, his friends and enemies having abandoned him for the time being. But he knew they would be back soon enough, and when they returned, he knew it would be for their final farewell. In this heat without water and shelter he would soon perish, and perhaps that's why the chrome beast inside the fire storm of Boondocks had not pursued him. It knew that he would eventually succumb to the elements, and when he did, his soul would drift back to Boondocks where it would be promptly locked away forever.

His snakeskin boot unexpectedly clipped a stone, and before he could throw out his hands to catch his fall, he was face down in the desert's parched soil.

(4)

Angelo rolled onto his back, his face smudged by a thin crust of dirt. The fall had been easy, the landing hard. He was sprawled out, spine arched across a long smooth obstruction, boot heels propped up on a hard rectangular surface.

What in damnation had he tripped over?

With a great effort his torso lifted into a sitting position. His eyes squinted, the sun was brash, bright. He inspected that which had stolen the feet out from beneath him: train tracks, a veritable set of black iron rails spiked to a foundation of railroad ties.

He looked up and down their length and into a distance that went on without measure.

How had he missed spotting such a blatant landmark?

He crawled into a tired stance, boots kicking at the iron rails and wooden ties to test their validity. They were indeed real. He knelt, placed a hand upon the smooth strip of metal. It was hot, cooked by the sun to a temperature that would easily set a man's skin to blister. That pain reinforced the legitimacy of its presence and convinced him that the tracks were not a hallucination.

But where did they go?

And who had put them there?

He wanted to put an ear to those rails and listen for a train, but knew the heat would fry the ear like an omelet. Besides, he didn't know if that kind of nonsense actually worked. Sure, cowboys did it on the big screen, but what flew in Hollywood seldom courted practical science.

From across the waste's vast expanse, a steam whistle blew out a long lonely note. He raised a hand to the level of his eyes and peered deeper into the barren wilderness to find a thin brush line of black smoke trailing the horizon.

It was a train and it was coming his way.

Angelo laid his jacket out onto the ground and sat beside the tracks.

"You're going to make it," Bianca whispered into his ear.

"There were so many things I never got to say, " Angelo said.

"Shhh," Bianca hushed. "I know...and I'm sorry."

"Perhaps in another life," Angelo said softly.

Bianca's full lips touched the side of his rugged face. Her delicate caress both cooled and comforted the hitman. "Perhaps," Bianca replied. "Perhaps."

The woman departed, leaving the hitman alone to suffer the demon sun.

He checked Thunder: no bullets nor magic energy resided within. The power of lucky thirteen remained a mystery, but that was alright. He was free of Boondocks, and in a little while he would jump a rail car and be on his way.

The hitman holstered the gun and then fixed the distance with a determined gaze. Regret had cast a shadow upon his fortune with the absence of Lightning. One Howitzer would have to suffice for the journey ahead. He thought to number thirteen again and his need for bullets. Arguably if there were railroads with trains in this vast desolation, then there had to be ammunition as well. In time he would find some, and when he did, he would travel beyond the scope of the Avalon and return to the land of the living. After all, there was still a great deal of killing left to do, and the hitman was apt to see that it got done proper.

The End

WASTELAND II

LAST TRAIN TO DIAVALO
CHAPTER ONE

RIDING THE RAILS

(1)

The imagery was disjointed, a void without proper shape or form, yet vaguely familiar. The hitman told himself they were just dreams, but each time he awoke there was always that dull pain aside his ribs where Lightning used to be. It was a peculiar feeling to have towards an absent gun, but it was nonetheless how he felt, as though a part of him had been stolen away.

He rubbed at his side with curious fingers. He had heard of a medical condition known as phantom pain in which the body compensated for a missing appendage by sending a false signal to the brain.

Was the loss of Lightning doing something similar?

Thunder was removed from its designated holster and then placed within Lightning's: the experiment failed, the dull ache remained, the body like the brain knew the difference between the identical weapons. It, like Angelo, could not be fooled by a clever imitation. Like Thunder, there was only one Lightning, and although most people would have been hard pressed to tell the difference between the guns, to the hitman their uniqueness was obvious.

A dim spoke of light crept in through the freight-car door. He moved his hand through its wake, sensing the heat of an encroaching day. He didn't much care for the sleeping arrangements: a bed of straw along with an itchy woolen blanket, but when compared to the harsh accommodations of Gambaro's Elitario Training Camp, this humble boxcar was like a five start luxury hotel.

He placed Thunder back into its designated holster and eased into a sitting position. Mornings were cold, but soon the temperature would soar and the boxcar would become a dry tinderbox of sweltering heat. In two days time the Demon Moon known as the Medusa's Eye would arrive and with it would come the Riders.

Angelo would be unprepared.

He had yet to find bullets and couldn't help but think that he'd have a better chance of locating Elvis rather than a decent stash of ammunition in these cursed lands. Still, the hitman had patiently waited for the Wish-Maker to work their magic mojo. Unfortunately, when it came to conjuring up a cartridge box of Marksman-Strike or Diamond-Back-Cobras, the Wish-Maker had left a lot to be desired.

Of course the Wish-Maker had afforded them the bare necessities, such as food and water, and sometimes graced the group with an occasional treat like chewing gum, beer, and coffee. But still, no bullets had come forward to feed Thunder's hungry Magazine.

Sometimes the Wish-Maker retrieved electronic gizmos from the lower world, but none of those cell-phones, MP3 players and other various knickknacks would function in the desolate scope of the Wasteland. Those useless articles of technology were always discarded out of the freight car door. However, not one of those broken trinkets had ever touched the Wasteland's barren soil, for the cursed train gave nothing back to the desert, especially its prisoners.

Angelo slowly stood and approached the splintered wall beside the freight car door. Two days ago the hitman had boarded the train, and as he looked out between the boxcar's wooden slats upon the vast expanse of sun baked hardpan, he couldn't help but reflect upon that strange arrival.

(2)

The train rattled towards Angelo, its tall smokestack choking out a large black thunderhead into an arid sky. Within the dark plume resided a demonic face, its grotesque features tarred by a veil of charcoal soot, its coal dust eyes ablaze with sparks.

The hitman blinked as if to clear his eyes of an illusion but the image remained.

A monster two stories high, its thick metal hide polished to a black pearl shine, its firebox and boiler extending to a distance twice that of a conventional train. The locomotive's cast iron steam pipes burned a scarlet flame, while its crimson lanterns glared onward with a predatory like fascination. Where huge spool wheels, chrome pistons, spring valves and locking brakes should have been, were instead a dark procession of sturdy mechanical limbs. These powerful arms of forged iron jointed into black metal talons which clasped onto the sun baked rails with tenacious fingers, a monster that crawled along the tracks the way a man clambered up and down a ladder. At first glance it looked like an awkward mechanism, but the way in which the beast carried the steam engine upon its metal claws was not only smooth, but flowed like black magic.

The damn thing was alive, a giant lumbering machine with an evil spirit seated inside the smokehouse.

Instinctively, Angelo felt for Thunder, but knew that even if the gun had been loaded, it would be no match for a Goliath such as this. No, he would need a nuclear warhead to do battle with something this formidable.

The sight of the monstrous machine was brief, but memorable: a mechanical leviathan crawling on past with neither consideration nor heed.

But would this devil train pass him by completely, leaving him to cook beneath the scorching rays of the demon sun?

In the engine's wake trailed a procession of railcars, each metal coffin tethered together by a knuckle bone coupling. A scaly translucent skin of webbed veins and crimson arteries cocooned the entire line. This train wound across the desert wasteland like a massive serpent, slowing digesting the railcars within its rancid innards as it ferried lost souls between unimaginable destinations.

Angelo unconsciously took a step backward, his stern lined features drawn together into a mask of disapproval. He suddenly felt no desire to book transport upon such a foul conveyance, and concluded it would be best to face the harsh elements of the wasteland rather than to set foot upon such a sinister mechanism. The train was probably a trap just like Boondocks, except this prison transport was more like a meals on wheels rather than a spiritual milking paddock.

Hell, the train might even be bound for Boondocks.

If that was the case, then it was obvious why the mirror eye hadn't pursued him across the desert. It knew Angelo would wander out into the wasteland and then jump a boxcar to safety, and when he did, the train would simply bring him back to Boondocks where the hitman would serve out his sentence in servitude to Final Black for all eternity.

Reluctantly, Angelo turned his back on the train and stared out upon the vast wilderness of sun baked hardpan. Dehydration had stolen most of his strength, but his legs could still carry him further. Soon however, his body moisture would dry up, and when it did, he would collapse, and then his bones would be left to bleach beneath the searing rays of the demon sun.

But what other choice did he have?

The train felt wrong, its demonic countenance screamed trouble. Thunder had no ammunition and Angelo was in no condition for hand to hand combat. He needed rest, food, shelter and most of all, water. The wasteland offered nothing but the absolute certainty of death, while the train offered a deadly uncertainty.

If only he had both Thunder and Lightning along with a bandolier of ammunition, then he might have a fighting chance. But he was weak and vulnerable, and the very desert beneath his snakeskin boots seemed to know it, too.

He closed his eyes and tried to think.

If he walked out into the desert, it would be to die, but at least that end would be on his own terms. But then that would be giving up, admitting that Boondocks had beaten him. If only he knew the rules of this afterlife, then he could plot a course of action, but nothing here made sense and the only certainty afforded him was the certainty of death out on the wasteland. But then even that death would be provisional, or perhaps better stated, transitional, because he was already dead, or that's to say in one of death's various states of being.

Still, he would have to make a decision soon.

(3)

The railcars clattered past, their iron wheels whistling like music on crystal. The procession seemed without end, a great dark parade of metal carcasses whose colossal weight sent shudders through the cracked ground beneath the worn leather soles of the hitman's snakeskin boots. He stepped in closer to the train. The scent of burnt oil and scorched steel was almost noxious. The demon sun had made the train's reptilian skin as hot as a coke oven.

His eyes searched for an open freight door. Car after car streaked by and through the train's scaly husk he could see the shapes of dark figures within the passing windows.

Were they human or were they demon?

A boxcar with an open freight door rattled into view. Angelo's knees bent and his hands shaped into claws. For a second he almost swooned from heat exhaustion and fell beneath the train's heavy iron wheels, but his balance kept steady.

It was here that the sunlight suddenly disappeared inside the fall of a cold dark shadow.

(4)

The hitman spun upon dusty boot heels with Thunder drawn.

A black cloud from the locomotive's smokestack had blotted out the sky, its ghostly thunderhead mimicking a bear trap of teeth as set beneath the ramming thrust of pointed bull horns. The demon descended with unnatural speed, crashing down onto the ashen soil in a hot gale force wind, enveloping the hitman within an acrid fog of choking plumes. The smoke filled his lungs with foul air and burnt his eyes shut with acidic toxins.

Angelo stumbled blindly, knees crashing down into hardpan as he fell. The black cloud was a shapeless adversary, an opponent by which no conventional combat maneuver could ever hope to thwart. He crawled, struggled to reach back into that harsh measure of sunlight where the air was more forgiving, but the smoke coiled round about him like a ghostly snake, determined to squeeze the very life out of him.

Exhausted and deprived of breath, he finally succumb to that vile air, falling into an impenetrable darkness that claimed all semblance of waking thought.

(5)

The entire composition was out of meter and held no predictable rhythm. Yet despite the poor performance, Angelo still recognized the song as none other than Stephen Foster's "Camptown Races" as played on a harmonica.

But who played it?

The hitman tried to open his eyes but his lids failed to part. He drew in a slow deep breath and focused. His sinus cavities burned and itched. The skin on his body felt grimy, saturated with some sort of petroleum paste. His muscles felt like tight bands of shrunken leather. Yet despite his poor condition, he couldn't help but listen to the song and try to recall its lyrics.

De Camptown ladies sing dis song, Doo-dah! doo-dah!

De Camptown race-track five miles long, Oh, de doo-dah day!

I come down dah wid my hat caved in, Doo-dah! doo-dah!

I go back home wid a pocket full of tin, Oh, de doo-dah day!

Gwine to run all night!

Gwine to run all day!

I'll bet my money on de bob-tail nag,

Somebody bet on de bay.

The rhythmic clack of train wheels as they passed over the subtle breaks in the rail line told him he was onboard the train.

But how had he gotten inside?

He couldn't remember.

If only he could open his eyes, but his eyelids would not budge. The flesh on his palms explored the surface he was lying on. It felt cool, almost like plastic, but was not. He deduced it was straw and that somehow he had been scooped up by the black smoke and tossed into a freight car with someone who couldn't play the harmonica worth a pinch of bat crap.

A sudden sneeze blasted out of his nose, sending a wave of dull pain throughout his dehydrated body. For a second the harmonica stopped, but soon went back to playing, except this time it warbled Percy Montrose's "Oh My Darling Clementine."

The hitman squeezed his eyes tight. The thin cover of skin tugged upon the taught blindfold until the dried mucus finally gave way like old Velcro. Through a blurred halo of light he could see a bright beam of sunlight burn through several broken slats within the boxcar's weathered walls. Slowly, he sat up, his muscles protesting with the kind of pain usually reserved for a trauma unit. The heat exhaustion had his cellular tissues stretched thin, his bones as brittle as balsam wood.

His ears followed the sound of "Clementine" to a stack of hay bales at the freight car's far end. Angelo felt for Thunder: the howitzer was safely inside its holster. He was relieved beyond measure to discover that he had not lost another weapon. However, that comfort was fleeting. He was still on death's doorstep with no ammo and in no physical condition to put up a fight. He found a knee but still had to use his hands for balance. The subtle rocking of the boxcar felt like an earthquake, the soft rhythmic clack of the heavy iron wheels like mortar explosions.

Heat exhaustion was the ultimate hangover.

If he didn't get water and cool down soon, it would escalate into sunstroke, and then his kidneys would fail, and then after that, every other organ system would shutdown.

But then did he actually have internal organs inside his spiritual body?

The notion of that gave him brief pause for consideration.

He was already dead, killed on a casino rooftop, so the question remained: could something that was already dead, die again?

He recalled killing the barkeep back inside of Boondocks. The bartender's expression alone should've been answer enough, but Angelo was nonetheless uncertain. Perhaps spirits got the three Rs on this side of the rainbow: reused, recycled and reincarnated.

But then what of the halfway hounds he had slaughtered in the dungeon hallway?

What had become of their essence?

There was no resolution, just the age old mystery that was as prevalent in this purgatory-like-world as it was in the land of the living.

Angelo drew Thunder, felt its hot surface meld to the flesh of his hand. He wished the gun would sing now, if only to give him some of its magical strength or at the very least perform a duet with the harmonica. His legs struggled into a stand, but his posture was far from sturdy. His knees trembled and his balance swayed as he crept towards the hay bales. If he fell now, he doubted he'd ever get back up again.

He pushed Thunder forward, letting the gun lead him round the stacks of hay.

True, the howitzer wasn't loaded, but the person with the harmonica wouldn't know that. If Angelo was going to win any sort of confrontation, he would have to play it bold by bluffing the strength of his hand. Sun Tzu would agree: when weak, appear strong to your enemy.

And so he gripped Thunder, stepped round the hay bales and took aim.

(6)

The hobo was old, unkempt and quite drunk. A faded blue flannel shirt along with a cowhide jacket covered his upper body. He sat propped up against the boxcar's slatted wall. A moth eaten wool blanket laid draped across his legs, a bottle of amber whiskey nestled into the cleft of his thighs.

Angelo crouched down, nested both knees within the boxcar's bedded straw. Despite his ill-condition, the hitman fixed the drunk with a set of narrow eyes that were lit with an incredible determination. The hobo stopped blowing into his harmonica, tossed back a stiff shot of whiskey and then resumed crooning darling "Clementine."

"Water," said Angelo in little more than a croak.

The hobo stopped playing "Clementine" and then began harping out a tune called "Cool Water," by Bob Nolan.

Angelo didn't see the humor.

"Water," Angelo repeated more forcefully. Thunder's hammer was also clicked back to reinforce the seriousness of the situation.

The hobo let the harmonica fall into his lap next to the whiskey bottle. He then let his old wrinkled hands slowly reach down and pick up his traveling bindle. Angelo watched the old man work the red knotted rags until they came loose. The bindle fell open upon the straw like a picnic blanket to reveal an odd assortment of knickknacks: an animal hide pouch stuffed with tobacco, a deck of playing cards, a box of matches, a buck knife, a tin of sardines, beef jerky, an apple, an orange, and lastly, a plump brown wineskin.

It was the wineskin that the hobo picked up with trembling hands and passed to Angelo. The hitman grabbed the bloated skin and felt its weight. It was full of liquid. He pulled the plug open with his teeth and then waved the spout beneath his nose.

It was indeed water.

(7)

The strip of sandpaper inside Angelo's mouth cried out for moisture, but the hitman hesitated to drink. He wasn't sure if his body had passed over that invisible threshold into that medical condition otherwise known as sunstroke. If it had, then drinking the water would be unwise. Sunstroke needed to be treated by cooling the body down first. But in order to do that he would need to use what little water there was inside the wineskin on his neck and armpits.

There was perhaps as little as three liters stuffed into the skin.

He would not dare to waste a single drop and so would chance drinking.

The warm water was beyond delicious it was life-giving nectar as drawn from heaven's springs. It slid down the back of Angelo's throat, lubricating his vocal chords as it fell. He paused in midstream to appraise his stomach's reaction to the liquid. His gut kept steady, carried the water as easily as the wineskin had. Discipline paced his rate of drink, lest he forfeit its treasure on the pangs of gluttony. Slowly, each drop was nursed from the nipple until the skin could offer no more satisfaction.

"Thank you," said the hitman as he dropped the wineskin back onto the bindle.

"You're welcome mister?" replied the hobo in kind, although his mood was anything but cordial.

Angelo holstered Thunder. "Don't worry old codger...I'm not here to hurt you...I'm just passing through."

The hobo's posture eased ever so slightly.

"What's your name old timer?"

"Samuel Birch," replied the hobo with a nod.

"Hello Samuel Birch. I'm Angelo."

"Nice to meet you."

""I'm new to these parts Samuel Birch. Can you tell me where I am and where we're going?"

"You're aboard the train of the damned," replied Birch without the slightest hint of misgiving. "And where we're going is nowhere."

"Everything goes somewhere eventually old timer," countered Angelo. "To use a euphemism, all roads lead to Rome at one point or another."

"Not this train," said Birch. "At least that's what we...I mean that's what I've discovered in my brief time here."

Angelo nodded and grinned. "And how long have you been here?"

"A few weeks," replied Birch. "Just long enough to know that we're not going anywhere."

The hitman contemplated a strange idea:

How long was a day in the wasteland?

Angelo lent an eye to the bright garish sun that burnt a ray of light into the boxcar. The hitman didn't know how many hours were in a day on this side of the rainbow, but he felt it probably mirrored the regular world close enough to pass for a clever forgery. Still, there were other factors to take into consideration, like latitudinal plane, time of season, or if the wasteland in fact turned upon the axis of a planetary globe. Perhaps the landscape here went on without end, in which case the concept of day and night would defy scientific explanation.

"So you're all alone here?" asked Angelo.

Birch pursed his lips. "Yes sir."

Angelo nodded and then examined the bindle once more. The sight of the hobo's food made his stomach rumble.

"I'll give you what I can spare," assured Birch as he gestured to his modest bindle. "Best thing for you to do would be to move on up the line, I reckon. There are ample supplies in the forward cars. But best be mindful of Mr. Stiles."

"And who is Mr. Stiles?"

"Why he's the master of the train," replied Birch. "He don't care for the riffraff in the aft part of the train...he keeps to the luxurious cars in the forward section...lives like a king up there they say."

"Who says?" asked Angelo.

Birch narrowed his thin lips and twitched a crooked smile as he took on a defensive posture. "Please mister. Take my possessions and be on your way. There's nothing for you in here. The forward cars...that's where you want to be. Gambling, drinking, ladies, they have it all up there. I also reckon they'll have bullets for that big gun of yours, too."

"Perhaps you're right," replied Angelo. "But if you don't mind me asking, how did you know I needed bullets for my gun?"

Birch paused, blinked, and then shifted anxiously. "I didn't know...it's just that...well I just assumed you'd want some bullets...that's all."

"I see," said Angelo with a decisive nod. "Makes sense, I suppose. But again, if you don't mind me asking, seeing as you've been here for a few weeks, where are you getting your food and water?"

Birch opened his mouth to reply but nothing came out, instead his eyes inadvertently glanced toward a large pile of hay in the corner.

Angelo followed the path of Birch's unintentional glance. "So...is your friend in the hay going to come out on their own, or am I going to have to drag them out?" The hitman was beaten and exhausted, and doubted he could perform such an exertive task, but he nonetheless felt the response was warranted. After all, Birch was not only lying, but also hiding something. Angelo would not, nor could afford to let pass anything that might prove to be a vital resource in his campaign to survive.

"Please," pleaded Birch in a desperate voice that was just a bit above a whisper. "We don't want no trouble here. Take our food and be on your way death merchant. Your kind don't belong back here. They all go forward."

Angelo turned suddenly and glared at Birch. "Death merchant? Last time I heard that personal character disparagement was in a small town called Boondocks. Why did you call me that? And what do you mean they all go forward? Forward where?" The hitman could feel adrenaline pour energy back into his muscles. Perhaps he was not as worn out as he had first thought or perhaps such physical sufferings were also the product of smoke and mirrors.

As Birch stammered and searched for an articulate answer, the hay stack suddenly began to rustle.

The proverbial needle had just been found.

(8)

A girl no more than eighteen emerged from the haystack, her long dark hair littered by a snarl of dry straw. She was an attractive girl, her eyes a piercing shade of ethereal jade that seemed to reside on the borderline between two states of spiritual being. Those eyes were almost magical, and they held onto the hitman with such a force that Angelo ventured a thought that he might not be able to escape them.

What did those supernatural eyes see and to whom did they abide?

The hitman did not know, but understood that there was indeed a resource to be had therein, and he would utilize that power to leverage an advantage.

"Who are you?" demanded Angelo.

The girl brushed the straw from her smooth delicate features and offered the hitman a genuine smile that was tempered with a bashfulness that was quite endearing.

"My name is Tracy," the girl replied. "I brought you here to help us."

"You brought me here," reciprocated Angelo with an almost amused sentiment. After all, the girl was not hale nor built of demonic smoke. No, the train had brought the hitman here, not this unassuming child.

The girl nodded. "Yes, I brought you here. I watched you escape from Boondocks and then cross the wasteland beneath the hateful gaze of the mirror eye. You are a death merchant from the lower world, equipped with tools of the killing trade."

The girl's words rang true, and the hitman could not help but to think upon those strange eyes of hers, for surely if anyone could claim to see such things, then surely it would be this young woman.

"How did you bring me here?" asked Angelo, his question validating the girl's claim. "Why have you brought me here?"

The girl sat on the straw with her legs crossed in a lotus position and smiled warmly upon the hitman with an affection not easily discarded. "In time Angelo...in time...but first you must rest...there's a great task set before you and you will need your strength to complete it. Soon the Medusa's Eye will be on the prowl and with it will come the Riders."

"Listen," said Angelo in a calm even voice, although he was more than a little bit impatient for answers. He was in control here, not some old hobo and most certainly not some teenage girl. "I want answers and I want them right now young lady."

"Sleep Angelo," said Tracy with a strange note of authority. "Slip down into that dark nocturnal realm and let rest attend your soul. Be patient, there's time, although not much."

"He's too dangerous!" protested Birch to Tracy. "You're playing with fire! We need to move him along. They all go forward damn it! They all go forward!"

"No," replied Tracy. "This one is special. He is different than the others. I can see it in his soul."

Angelo began to stand when he suddenly realized that he was in fact lying on his back staring up at the freight car ceiling. The aches of his body seemed to ease with the effort and he held no apprehension about taking a measure of rest in the company of strangers. Logically and strategically it made absolutely no sense to render one's self so vulnerable with sleep, but then the condition of his ailments had roosted and thus needed respite. Still, a stubborn part of the hitman steeled himself against that mystical charm that sought to close his eyes, and the more it fought the magic, the more he realized that he had been tricked.

That had not been water in the wineskin, but rather something else.

But it didn't matter what the hitman had drank, for it was too late now, he was already down deeper than deep, in fact one could say that he was almost deader than dead.

NOTE TO THE READER:

Wasteland is book one a five book Wasteland series.

http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/keithcrews

