The second Rafael realized that John was actually standing by that massive window, that one fucking window smack on the left fnk of his desk, his gut screamed trouble. Too te. Gss exploded inward, a sharp, shattering roar, and both sbs hit the floor before the echo even faded. Twin headshots, clean and brutal, brains spttered across the wall in a wet, red arc, painting the daggers and the mahogany. Rafael hadn’t even twitched, hadn’t had the chance, and it was already over. He lost the game. John’s “brightness” spiel clicked into pce, and it was a pure setup. Night cloaked the outside, but with the office lit up like a damn stage, those curtains could only hide bodies but not the shadows. Then it became simple. With a low-light night-vision scope that sharpened every shadow, a sharpshooter could’ve picked them off with ease. They were fish in a barrel.

  Rafael almost ughed, as it all made sense to him now. Of course John wouldn’t just stroll in to die, especially not after sniffing out the trap. He was the hunter pying prey, and Rafael had bought it, letting his guard slip like some rookie punk. It was a low blow, sure, but losing to someone who was as calcuting as Rafael himself? Not the worst way to go.

  He steadied his breath, reaching for his cigar box to face the end with some dignity, when a cigarette, John’s cigarette, nded on the desk in front of him with a soft thud. He looked up, and there it was again: that shit-eating grin pstered across John’s face.

  “Hey, Mr. Costa, let’s have a smoke together. I’m here to bargain.”

  Rafael couldn’t hold it in anymore, and he barked out a ugh, raw and loud. This kid was something else. Now he saw it even clearer: the V-sign from earlier was a signal to the sniper outside. Two shots, two kills, nothing more. Precise as hell. He jabbed a finger toward the shattered window and asked. “It was JT?”

  John nodded, grinning wider, like it was the easiest damn thing in the world to chat with a sharp bastard like Rafael. “Ex-Marine sniper. Bad motherfucker, huh?”

  “You’ve only known him for days. How did you pull him into this? Fear or respect, what’s your game?” Rafael tossed out, half-curious, half-probing. He wanted to know how the hell John flipped JT into pulling off something this ballsy so fast. John just shrugged, casual as ever. “Don’t know, don’t care. Guy needed cash, so I paid him a fat stack. That’s it.”

  Rafael’s ugh kicked up again, booming now. “You’ve got some nerves, kid. Weren’t you scared that he’d bail mid-py?” He didn’t wait for an answer, since it didn’t matter anymore. JT didn't bail, and that was what mattered. He himself had been perched up high too long, tiptoeing on thin ice every day, maybe forgetting that raw, dumb trust that glued nobodies like JT and John together. Shaking his head, he snatched up John’s cigarette, sparked it, and took a drag, pivoting sharp. “So, you’re not killing me because I’ve got something you want this time. Sorry, though, I’m a sore loser. So no bargaining.”

  John didn’t bristle, didn’t even blink. He anticipated Rafael would react like this. Code of honor, Omertà, lots of things could stop him from talking. But John needed him to talk, and he needed it fast, as Seo-young’s life was on the line.

  He jutted his chin at the wall, where those sleek bck daggers glinted under the light. “I like those. Can I have them?” Rafael froze for a beat, then cracked up again, harder this time. John was a damn devil at reading people. Why else would he ask a seasoned hitman for the signature weapons framed on the wall? Weapons were a hitman’s life, so no way he was asking for a souvenir. He was throwing down the gauntlet, challenging Rafael to his favorite game: a dagger duel, winner takes all. And he knew it, all of it, from his research on Rafael through his system.

  Rafael stepped to the wall, yanked the pair down, and tossed one to John, the bde spinning clean through the air. “Sure, I can’t turn down a good ol’ fashioned duel.”

  Dagger duels, straight out of Renaissance Florence and Venice, old-school but simple enough to grab. Light, compact bdes, easy to carry, fights over fast. One slip, one nick in the right spot, and it’s curtains. Distance and style made them a coin toss for instant death. John and Rafael’s csh was not much of an exception, and it wrapped up quick. Blood trickled warm down John’s colrbone, a shallow gash where Rafael’s bde had kissed his shoulder. The bastard had aimed for his throat, a killing stroke, but John twisted aside, snapping a quick left jab at Rafael’s elbow. It barely nudged the dagger’s path, just enough to keep it from burying deep. But that split second opened the door for John. Now John was inside Rafael’s guard, his bde hovering light against the man’s throat. One twitch, and Rafael’s windpipe would’ve been a memory. John had pulled back just in time.

  Rafael almost smirked at it, John’s reckless, all-in lunge to close the gap. Same damn move he’d used to carve his name in the game back in the day. Was it older age making him soft? Nah, not really. John was technically older than him. It was the years of power py that had made him a different man, stronger and weaker.

  Twice John had spared him in this mess, and Rafael wasn’t about to stomach a third. Time for him to own the loss. “Alright, kid, you win, fair and square. But I’m not spilling what you want. I’ve got my code.”

  John sighed, half-exasperated. Old-school gangster honor as he expected. Rafael was bullshit stubborn, even after bending to the world’s grind. Rafael wouldn’t rat, not even on partners he seemed to despise.

  Fine, time to push harder.

  John dug out his phone, thumbing it alive. “What if your buddy already sold you out?” He then tapped py, and a grainy video flickered on. It was a hidden cam feed, Commissioner Miller mid-call, barking orders at his errand boy. “Min-jun, once this is done, we need to get rid of the Reapers.” Short clip, clipped fast. This was actually Liam’s work, squeezed into just a few days. But even if Liam had more time, John would've still kept it short this way.

  Rafael’s jaw tightened, eyes narrowing. Something felt off. Miller’s tone, maybe, but the video was too short to pin it, and this was exactly why John wanted it short.

  To Rafael, audio recordings could be faked; photos could be doctored. But a moving clip? That hit different. John clocked his doubt, face bnk as stone, and kept pushing. “He’s running for mayor, you know that? Once you're done with me, Reapers become dead weight to him. Any tie to you will be a ndmine for his campaign, right?”

  Inside, though, John was cackling wild. This world didn’t have AI, not yet. These suckers had no clue a video could be cooked up from scratch. If Miller wasn’t out there stumping every day, spewing speeches on the internet with crystal-clear, multi-angle shots, John wouldn’t have had the raw footage to train the model to produce this fake. Also, the idea of using AI hadn’t even hit him until that psycho killer’s “chatbot” jab lit the spark. And now it was time to drop some AI thunder on the Reward World’s primitives.

  Rafael was still reeling, stuck in the muck of it, when John pressed again. “He’s already stabbed you in the back. So you’re not partners anymore. Helping me now is not betrayal, is it?”

  Rafael just muttered a dazed “Right,” voice barely there, the cut finally splitting open. And John pounced. “Good. Now, quick. Where’s that cop’s ‘operation’ going down? When? Anything I need to watch for?”

  Rafael stared at John, brow creasing, still half-dazed from the video’s gut punch. “You pulled all this just to save that cop?” He didn’t buy it, at least not as John’s first move. The kid could’ve grilled him again about the “new stuff”, dug into who ran those sleazy clubs, but no, he just zeroed in on that dy cop, some small-fry piece in the game.

  John shrugged it off. “One thing at a time, okay? We’ll circle back to the rest ter, for sure. Besides, she’s hot. Not exactly my type, but still very hot.” Rafael blinked, thrown for a loop, then let out another loud, barking ugh that bounced off the blood-streaked walls. Shaking his head, he tossed his own dagger across the desk to John, the bde cttering beside its twin. “You’ll need this,” he said, then jerked a thumb at the dead guards’ guns, sprawled beside their corpses. “Grab one of those too. Better safe.”

  John’s eyes lit up like a kid unwrapping a gift. He snagged the second dagger, wiping both clean with his sleeve, slow, almost reverent, before tucking them away. “Thanks for these. I’ll pass on the gun, though.”

  Rafael quirked a brow. “Why?”

  “My aim sucks.”

  "...Fair enough."

  A few minutes ter, John was straddling the Harley he’d pawned off on JT, engine roaring as he tore toward the North Shore docks. He’d snatched the keys from JT in a heartbeat, the guy barely getting a word out, “Need help?” before John cut him off, voice clipped. “Don’t know what’s waiting there. Too risky. I’ll handle it myself.” Then he gunned it, tires screaming against the asphalt, leaving JT in the dust.

  Before peeling out, he’d tossed Rafael a parting shot: “While you’ve still got Miller’s ear, squeeze him for anything on that serial rapist-killer freak.” But now, barreling through the night, wind cwing at his face, Seo-young was the weight on his mind. She’d been pyed, just like John himself.

  John's gut had been dead-on, but the truth was messier than he’d guessed. Human trafficking was indeed the core of this “new shipment” racket, just like he’d sniffed out. But the buyers weren’t the Reapers, or some other crew. It was Vitacore Pharma, the monstrously rich corporate his stepsister Chloe once worked for, the slick bastards who were also behind Big D’s hidden club. They were the real puppet masters in this mess. According to Rafael, Vitacore never let him in on the full game. They kept him guessing, but he figured they were running drug trials on those girls. Those “pills” John had been hauling from the east docks every night? Straight from Vitacore’s bs, funneled through the Reapers to their sleazy dens. Rafael pegged it as some aphrodisiac brew. Ever since Vitacore’s Vigorex got edged out by the new drug, they’d been cwing into the gray zone for a fresh foothold.

  John didn’t give a fuck about the details right now, though. What mattered to him was Seo-young. She was headed to that dock, the trafficking hub, a hellhole stuffed with hostages. For someone as straight-ced and good as her, it was a sughterhouse waiting to swallow her whole.

  Be safe, Seo-young, please. Don't let anything happen to you.

  Seo-young’s operation had been live for over half an hour now, and the setup stank from the jump. They got seven cops total, conveniently an odd number, meaning that there would always be one cop going solo. Min-jun, the commanding officer, had split them across four spots to “search.” And naturally, Seo-young was the one ended up the lone wolf. Her assignment was the warehouse perched closest to the dock’s outer edge, wide-open sightlines, seemingly the safest pick. Meanwhile, her team got shoved deep into the guts of the pce, scattered like bait. Min-jun’s call made it sound routine, logical even, but the hairs on her neck wouldn’t settle. Something was off, she just didn't see it yet.

  She slipped into the warehouse, boots scuffing soft against the concrete. Dim lights buzzed overhead, casting weak yellow pools across stacks of containers, rusted hulks piled high, swallowing the space in shadows. Nothing jumped out, no red fgs, just the hum of silence and the faint tang of salt and metal. Still, her gut wouldn’t ease up. Too many blind spots, too many corners she couldn’t clock. She gripped her pistol tighter, sweeping the gloom, determined to dig deeper.

  Then there was some movement, as a figure popped up atop a container, silhouetted against the faint glow. Masked, capped, hoodie pulled low, the guy was a ghost under the murk, but Seo-young had seen him before. It was Anthony. Same twitchy stance, same coiled energy she’d clocked with John that night tailing Anthony. Her gun snapped up, barrel locking on him, finger hovering over the trigger. He didn’t flinch at all, and just bolted, spinning on his heel and tearing off like a damn animal. His speed was unreal, legs pumping so fast she half-doubted he was human. Then he leaped, around ten meters between containers, a casual assist from the edge, and he cleared it like it was nothing. The Reward World’s men’s long jump record capped at eight; this bastard was simply inhuman.

  Seo-young didn’t freeze. She gave chase, boots pounding, weaving through the maze of steel. She thumbed her radio, barking into it, “Backup, now! Suspect in sight!” But static buzzed back, dead air. She tried many times, still nothing.

  What she didn’t know was that the warehouse was rigged with a signal jammer, cutting her off clean. Comms couldn’t punch through, couldn’t call out, all to make sure this warehouse was her st stop.

  But for Seo-young, it was no time to dwell. Anthony was a lead she couldn’t lose, so she pushed harder, dodging crates, her breath sharp in her throat.

  The chase twisted her into an open patch, near too open. She’d rushed it, hadn’t scouted, and skidded to a stop as five goons loomed ahead, waiting. The lead punk grinned, leering through crooked teeth.

  “Whoa, a real beauty. I’m in love.” His words barely hit the air before the other four lunged, closing fast. Seo-young didn’t blink, ad hesitation now meant something worse than death.

  She moved like a bde. First guy came in sloppy, arm swinging; she ducked, snapped her pistol up, and popped his knee with a crack with a bullet tearing through cartige, dropping him howling. Second charged, she pivoted, elbow smming his jaw to throw him off, then fired low, shredding his shin. He crumpled, clutching the mess. Third got bold, rushing her fnk, and she spun, gun hand steady, and drilled his calf mid-stride, sending him sprawling with a wet thud. Three down in a breath, all kneecapped, writhing, no kill shots, just precise, ruthless takedowns over in seconds.

  Her barrel swung to the st two, the leader and his sidekick, who were both frozen mid-step. “Hands in the air, now!” She snapped, voice ice, gun unwavering. On the ground, one of the crippled goons spat blood, gring at the head punk. “Fucking hell, why the fuck you say no guns? She’s packing, asshole!”

  The lead goon sneered, shaking his head at the moaning heap of his crew on the floor. “Cause you’re all dumb as shit. I didn’t even tell you to go at her yet. What's the hurry? We've got her to us all night.” He then pivoted to Seo-young, his grin widening, oily and sharp. “Damn, girl, you’re good. I’m really in love. Shame we only got tonight. You see, I don’t need a gun to tame you, a knife’s plenty enough. Watch this.”

  He stepped to a nearby container, yanked the door open with a screech, and reached in. His fist cmped around a tangle of hair, dragging out a woman, whose clothes were shredded to rags, hair a wild mess, face streaked with tears and terror. Bruises bloomed purple across her arms and cheeks, fresh marks from a beating. She stumbled, barely upright, a choked whimper slipping out as he held her like a trophy.

  “So, pretty cop,” he taunted, voice dripping with mock cheer, “time to drop the gun, yeah?”