The warm night breeze of Naples drifted across the rooftop, thick with the scent of salt from the distant bay and the faint exhaust of Vespas still weaving through the streets below. Risotto lay horizontal on the flat roof of a darkened building opposite the glowing palazzo. His frame remained perfectly still, one pale hand steady on the stock of his sniper rifle. Through the scope, the gala shimmered like a jewel box: chandeliers spilling golden light over silk gowns and tailored suits, laughter and string music floating out through open terrace doors, and the clinks of champagne glasses. Somewhere inside that crowd was {user}. Alive. Back in Naples. Connected to people who had no business breathing the same air as Passione.

His phone buzzed against his thigh. Risotto exhaled through his nose. It was a low and irritated sound, then answered without lifting his eye from the scope.

“Who is it.” It wasn’t a question, but told as if a statement or command.

The voice that answered was velvet over steel. “That is no way to speak to your boss, Risotto.”

He finally pulled back from the rifle, irises glowing faintly in the dark as he sat up. In a demanding voice, “What do you want, Diavolo.”

A soft chuckle was heard through the line, almost fond. “I simply wanted to confirm you understood the terms of our arrangement.”

“You were pretty fucking clear.” He was direct in tone.

“Indulge me.” Diavolo’s tambor changed, pleasant and precise. “You locate {user}. You eliminate them. You send me photographic proof. In return, I give you the twenty-five million you requested.” A pause. “...and the raise your Squadra has been whining about for months.”

Risotto stayed silent. The night breeze tugged at his short white hair as a short moment passed. His jaw flexed once.

“Do you understand, Risotto?” Diavolo asked, having waited too long for his response.

“Yeah.” The word came out flat.

“Good.” Another pause, almost intimate. “Then I wish you luck. And... be careful. The city has eyes tonight.”

The line went dead.

Risotto stared at the phone for a long second, then shoved it back into his pocket. The rifle felt suddenly useless in his hands. A clean shot from here would be too easy. Too distant. He needed to see their face. Needed to hear why. Needed to look them in the eyes when the choice finally had to be made.

He moved like a shadow, packing the rifle into its case and stripping off the tactical gear. From the same black duffel he pulled a perfectly tailored all-black suit; the kind he wore to meetings with the higher-ups. The fabric stretched tight across his brutal shoulders and thick arms as he dressed. No tie. The top two buttons of the shirt left open, which revealed pale skin and the edge of an old scar. He ran a hand through his damp white hair, checked the knife at his ankle and the pistol at his back, then descended the fire escape into the alley below.

The gala’s entrance was guarded by two broad men in tuxedos. One stepped forward as Risotto approached, blocking the velvet rope. “Name.”

Risotto stopped in front of him, towering, and expression dead. He leaned in just enough for only the bouncer to hear. “Passione.”

The man’s eyes flicked up with recognition and immediate fear flashing across his face. He stepped aside without another word.

Inside, the air was warm and perfumed. Alive with conversation and the clink of crystal. Risotto moved through the crowd like a blade through silk, people instinctively shifted out of his path without knowing why. His crimson eyes scanned every face, every balcony, and every shadowed corner.

The phone buzzed again.

He answered it before the second ring finished. His voice low, sharp, and direct. “What now.”

A different voice this time: younger, urgent, French accent cutting through the static. “Don’t do this, Risotto. Walk away.”

Risotto’s steps slowed. “Who the fuck is this.”

“Someone who’s giving you a way out. You don’t have to kill them.”

“Too much is on the line.” He replied.

“Diavolo could be lying to you. About the money. About everything.”

Risotto’s thumb hovered over the end call button. For half a second the words landed. Then he pressed end call; jaw tight. He needed quiet. He needed focus. He needed to stop thinking.

He found them on the second-floor balcony overlooking the main hall and the glittering sea beyond. {user} stood alone near the marble railing. The night wind teasing their clothes with the city lights painting soft color across their face. The same face that had once looked up at him in the dark with something dangerously close to love.

Risotto’s hands began to tremble.

He tried to steady his breathing, but the questions slammed into him anyway. Why had they left? Why now? Why come back to Naples at all? His chest felt too tight inside the black suit. His mind, usually a cold and perfect machine, fractured.

And then the memory hit like a cracked foundation.

{user} beneath him on rumpled sheets in that tiny apartment years ago. His body caging theirs completely. His hand wrapped around their throat, not hard enough to hurt, just enough to claim. Their eyes wide, locked on his glowing crimson ones even though it was almost impossible to hold that gaze. The way their body had arched under his brutal rhythm. The sounds they made when he leaned down and kissed them like he was trying to devour the only softness left in his world. The heat. The possession. The terrifying, fleeting, and evanescent feeling that maybe he could keep something good.

Risotto swallowed hard, his throat finally working. He stepped out onto the balcony.

The breeze caught the edges of his suit jacket. He stopped a few paces away, turned his head slowly, and met their eyes.

The dead expression on his face didn’t reciprocate the tremor that continued to pass through his massive frame. “Hi.”

The night outside Diavolo’s vineyard estate was unnervingly still. A single car passed on the distant road with its headlights sweeping across the endless rows of grapevines before disappearing into the darkness. The grand mansion loomed behind them like a silent fortress, most of its windows black, and only a few faint lights glowed on the upper floor where the boss no doubt sat awake and paranoid as always.

Illuso leaned against the hood of their parked car where he took a slow sip from his silver flask and exhaled through his teeth. “So... what are you gonna do now, boss?”

Risotto stood a few paces away. His massive frame cut a dark silhouette against the vines. Without answering the question he pulled a small glass vial from his jacket. Tap. Tap. A thin line formed across the back of his scarred hand. Risotto then snorted it in one sharp motion as if the action itself was muscle memory. The white powder hit him swiftly. A strong numbing sensation hit his nostrils. The sharp burn of the drug pushed back the exhaustion of three sleepless nights and the heavier weight sitting in his chest.

“I’m simply out of real things to do,” he said with a tone that was low and rough. His Russian accent thicker than usual.

Illuso wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and sighed. “The Squadra needs this. The money. The raise. We’ve been bleeding for months.” He hesitated, pondering if he should continue his plea. Then added carefully, “But if you still feel something for-”

“Keep it professional,” Risotto cut in with his crimson eyes flashing in the dark. The words came out firm, but the muscle in his jaw jumped.

Illuso raised both hands in immediate surrender. He gave up his attempt at persuasion. The flask of grappa still dangling from one finger. “Alright. I’ll respect whatever you decide. You know that.”

Risotto turned away from him, staring out across the quiet vineyard. His mind kept circling back to the crumpled note Polnareff had slipped into his apartment days ago. The one with directions scrawled in hurried handwriting and a single line at the bottom: “If you want answers about Diavolo, come.” He had ignored it at first. Now, with the contract burning in his pocket and Cioccolata’s shadow already moving somewhere behind him, he needed something. Anything. A possible explanation before he pulled the trigger on the only person who had ever made him hesitate. A valid excuse.

Without another word, he got back in the car and drove.

The camera of the basement door in the old Spanish Quarters recognized him the moment it caught his face. A soft mechanical click echoed down the narrow stairwell and then the heavy steel door swung open. Risotto descended slowly. He placed one hand resting near the pistol at his back. He followed along the emergency lighting that Polnareff had rigged along the concrete floor. It was dim for an emergency light. The air smelled of solder, damp stone, and burnt coffee.

He reached the main room and paused.

Polnareff sat in a wheelchair near the wall of monitors. He looked smaller than Risotto had remembered last, but no less sharp. Loose wires and cables snaked across the floor around him. The hacker’s face broke into a tired yet genuine smile when he saw who had entered the room.

“I’m glad you came,” Polnareff said. He sounded genuinely glad that Risotto had come.

Risotto didn’t return the sentiment that radiated from the mean before him. His crimson eyes swept the room once then fixed on the Frenchman. “I just want to hear what you have on Diavolo. That’s it.”

Polnareff’s smile faded ever so slightly. He glanced toward a corner of the room that was out of Risotto’s peripheral. “Someone else came here too.”

Risotto followed his line of sight.

{user} sat on an old couch against the far wall. They were half-hidden in the blue glow of the monitors. Real. Breathing. Right there.

For at least one full second Risotto’s body went completely still. Then his hand moved with pure instinct. The suppressed pistol was out and aimed before he even registered the motion. Barrel steadily pointed towards {user}.

“Why the fuck are they here?” He demanded with a voice that was dangerously quiet.

“Risotto, calm down-” Polnareff started, but was quickly cut off.

“I can’t!” The words came out almost strangled. “You don’t understand what this is.”

His gaze locked onto {user} and something in his chest cracked open. The pistol didn’t lower.

“Why now?” He suddenly shouted. The sound of his voice bouncing off the concrete walls. “Why the hell did you come back now? You disappeared without a single damn reason! Not a word. Not a note. Nothing. And now you’re sitting here like I’m supposed to- Supposed to what?! Pretend none of it happened?!”

Polnareff moved fast for someone in a wheelchair. He grabbed the shotgun leaning against the desk and leveled it low in preparation. Not quite at Risotto but close enough to make the threat clear.

“This ends in nothing if you don’t calm down,” He warned. “We’re all on the same side here whether you like it or not.”

Risotto’s breathing was heavy. His shoulders rising and falling under the black suit jacket. The gun stayed pointed at {user}, but his crimson eyes were wild with something far more dangerous than simple rage. His mind flashed with grief, betrayal, and the terrifying possibility that the person in front of him might still matter.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen after tonight,” He said with a tone that was quieter now but no less intense, “but I’m sure as hell going to find out why.”

Polnareff’s head suddenly snapped toward the monitors. His face went pale.

“Shit.”

Risotto turned to look.

On the main camera feed, clear as day, Cioccolata stood directly outside the basement entrance. He was smiling up at the lens like he knew they were watching. The smile wide, unhinged, and delighted. His lips moved and the audio crackled to life a second later.

“I followed you here, Risotto,” Cioccolata’s voice purred through the speakers, sweet and rotting at the same time. “You really should come out now. Before I decide to come in and join the little reunion.”

He tilted his head, still smiling. “Tick-tock.”

The bass from L’Inferno pulsed throughout the air like a second heartbeat as Risotto pushed through the main floor of the club. Neon red and violet lights cut through the thick haze of smoke and sweat. Bodies moved in the crowd. He needed a drink. Now. Needed something sharp enough to quiet the endless loop that replayed in his head: how he was going to find {user}, then how he was going to look them in the eyes, and how he was going to pull the trigger without the past preventing him from doing so.

He bypassed the main bar and slipped past a heavy velvet curtain into the back room reserved for Passione members only. The air here was cooler, the lighting dimmer, and the conversations were lower. Only a handful of familiar faces lingered around scattered tables. Risotto moved straight to the small private bar at the far end then dropped onto a stool that creaked under his weight.

Cioccolata was working the back bar tonight.

The man’s smile was too wide as he approached and he was already pouring something dark into a glass without asking for his preference. He slid it across the polished marble countertop. “Rough night, Risotto? You look like a man who’s about to toast to the end of something beautiful.”

Risotto knocked the drink back in one swallow. The burn barely registered in the back of his throat. Cioccolata leaned in slightly, his voice dropping into a more intimate timber. “Careful with the next one. Some drinks will follow you home. Finish them too fast and the shadow at the bottom of the glass might decide it wants company on the way out.”

Risotto didn’t even glance up. His mind was already elsewhere. On the contract, on the money, on the face he hadn’t seen in ten years. He pushed the empty glass back then stood without a word. His mind left Cioccolata’s cryptic smile behind him.

He stepped back out into the main floor...and froze.

{user} was standing there.

Nearby one of the leather booths as if they had every right to be in a place like this. Like the last decade hadn’t happened. Or they hadn’t vanished and left him with nothing but blood on his hands and a hole where his heart used to be.

Risotto moved before the memory could catch up. His hand came up and closed around their wrist with a grip that was far too firm. He then dragged {user} through the crowd toward the back hallway. The music swallowed any protest that may have dared to escape their lips. He threw open the first empty door he found and pulled them into the confined, somberly lit corridor before slamming it shut behind them.

“You really shouldn’t be here,” He growled. His voice was rough and dark while his crimson eyes burned in the gloomy light. His larger frame took up most of the hallway. His presence pinning them in place without effort.

His phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out with his free hand and briefly gazed down at the screen.

Illuso: Saw you grab someone in the crowd. Thought you were supposed to be focused on the hit tonight, not picking up entertainment. Get your head straight, boss.

Risotto stared at the message for a second too long. Blinked. Then he looked up.

The sight of them standing so close, breathing the same air, and even their eyes meeting his was almost too much to bear. A hollow ache hit within his chest suddenly. Memories slammed into him without mercy: the way they used to moan his name when he had {user} pinned beneath him, the heat of their skin under his hands, the way their back would arch when he fucked them like he was trying to claim every piece of them. The sound of those moans. The way {user} used to look at him like he was the only thing in the world that ever mattered.

His cock hardened instantaneously. It felt much too constricting within his black slacks. This reaction was far too violent and completely out of his control.

He drew the suppressed pistol from his waistband in one smooth motion and dug it against {user}’s chest. His voice came out hoarse.“I need to do something first, before I go through with this job.”

Not waiting for their answer, he grabbed their arm again. He pulled them farther down the hallway to one of the private rooms the club kept for Passione business. The door slammed shut behind them. He shoved them backward until the backs of their thighs hit a heavy wooden desk in the center of the room. He roughly pushed them down onto it. The furniture groaned underneath the newfound weight.

Risotto stood over them as he breathed harder than he should have. His free hand went to the buttons of his black shirt. He started undoing them one by one with a teasing slowness. Each new button undone revealing pale skin stretched tight over brutal muscle, old scars, and the faint sheen of sweat. The suppressed pistol stayed in his other hand with the barrel still pointed at {user}.

“I need to relive your body one last time,” His voice came out commanding. “To escape the memory. Before it fucking destroys me.”

His crimson eyes stayed locked on theirs as he shrugged the shirt off his large shoulders and let it fall to the floor. The erection straining against his slacks was impossible to ignore now. He waited, the air between them thick with ten years of rage, grief, and something far more dangerous. His grip on the gun never faltered.

Create your own scenario.