X.

H A R D  L E S S O N

—aka, you gotta put them down to bring them back up,

EXT— A COURTYARD.

VENICE, ITALY — MIDNIGHT.

CONT. SCENE I.

"SLEEPING PILLS HAVE never worked on me," Kristoff said serenely. As if we were simply chatting into the night about mindless, meaningless facts about ourselves. Like lovers. Friends, sharing a good bottle of Bordeaux with a polished box of chocolates dented on glass and laughter.

As if Archie didn't have a gun aimed at my forehead, breathing ragged, glasses askew; as if Sophie wasn't stock-still beside me like one of those statues sat on benches to look as if they're having a grand time being pooped on by birds, assuaging her own anxiety by pinching my elbow through our interlocked arms again and again as if she was signing in morse code.

Oh, not as if imagining, she really was.

Stop. Bitchy. Shit. Die. Wanna?

I found her hand and squeezed it comfortingly, not removing my eyes from the real predator. Or Archie with his gun and awkwardly rigged stance. He looked like a rookie, probably someone who learned it for the sake of being able to use it for emergencies.

Definitely not for foot soldier duties.

Although right now, eyes burning on my forehead marking his own bullseye, he looked like he wanted to.

Well, yes I understand. I tend to receive that look often. Hard to blame him on that front.

"So I should've gone with something harder," I said, chirpy despite it all, winking. "I'll remember that next time."

"Let me shoot her," Archie growled, fists tightening on the gun, finger twitching on the trigger. "Good God, let me."

Kristoff ignored him, choosing to fix his hair against the night wind. "Can I ask you a few things, Miss La Verne?"

I smiled sweetly. "Please do. I so love answering things.''

"What do you want?"

The smile turned sour into a smirk. "Always down to business. You know, one of these days I'm honestly going to start pouting."

"And why so?"

"Because you don't seem to care about the things that I did."

He sighed, this one felt like I managed to strangle a little bit of annoyance out of him. "Because you are acting like a child throwing a tantrum. Instead of speaking, addressing the problem by raising it to me or Archie, you chose to act out. But you're more calculative than that, I know you could be." His eyes glinted, his words stripping me off by layer. By armour. Showing me he knew me, better than I thought he knew.

"What all of this is exhibiting emotional want. So what is it, that you want so we can have this over with?"

I felt gutted, just a tad, then the anger came back in fuelling force. Not that he was treating me like a child— although that was a burn that kept on giving — it was the fact that he knew me so well, and yet couldn't understand why I was doing it?

I couldn't help myself, the emotion was so raw and too hard to grasp that it got out without any thinking.

"Is my life really that meaningless to you?" I asked, voice soft and hollow, my own throat a cavern in its wake.

Look, I felt Sophie tap right after a very sharp pinch. Glasses.

My eyes flickered to Archie, and he has this habit of counting underneath his breath. Everything else, he could do in his mind, but counting (and maybe talking shit about me), he always did aloud, no matter how soft his voice is. His lips moved.

15... 22...28... His eyes widened and moved closer to Kristoff. They were too far to be certain on what the one-sided conversation entailed, but when he moved and one of the low-bearing lampposts caught the glint from his earpiece, I knew KC was here.

And he had been counting our witnesses, our support surrounding us in these windows. These rooms that lead to several housings and businesses at the front, and store rooms, rooming, or anything that might be a bodega at the back.

As he stared at me and Archie confirmed the presence of other people around us, watching us like a colosseum of theatre awaiting the bull, the horn, and the splatter of blood— I stared right back at him as I turned to Sophie.

"What is he saying to him?"

"Confirming your little crowd to your lover," Sophie whispered back. She was better at lip reading than I am. "And I've found your sniper." I stretched my hearing past the sound of my own heartbeat. There were quiet taps, muffled even more by her coat. Sophie's ability to use a phone while barely moving was a magnificent little act. "A few of them have seen him, on the roofs. One said he looked sorta rabid, one said he looked drunk. No gun, they think. Not a sniper at least. He had no intention of killing you."

"Not tonight, maybe. And not him." I leaned away, my bitterness a sour little trail. Louder, for their benefit, "Did you want to know who they are?"

It stopped their conversation. Archie's eyes furious as he raised the gun, but Kristoff lowered it down, his stance still calm. At least the monster knew this was a battle he couldn't win with aggression.

Not yet at least.

"If you would, please."

I smiled. Ever so polite. "They're my colleague's witnesses. She needs it, to keep herself safe. And now me. Anything happens, even if you order KC to shoot them all down, there will still be someone, maybe a few someones, who will be fast enough to send evidences of your presence here and what happened to us, if anything ever goes... wrongly."

"But this has gone wrongly," Kristoff said. "You betrayed me."

"I haven't done anything of the sort. Not with the intention to harm." He raised an eyebrow. I scoffed. "She knows, because I've been keeping her updated that I'm alive. She was here long before you came around— here, when Yuna arrived. If you want to punish me for her knowledge after the fact, then punish me. But that's a technicality that might make you a sour loser, darling, so I'd step a little carefully in that direction."

"And the rest?" Archie asked, more growl than bite. This situation was out of hand; thirty witnesses to his face and Kristoff's was too much. Even if KC could kill all of them in time, that was a lot of bodies to clean.

And Kristoff's operation in Venice wasn't as strong yet, that's what all those parties and all those mingling with old folk was. In the heart of the city's waters was a closed, tight-knit circle of old rich folk who had known each other since their ancestors were breathing.

He had no strong point to be bringing thirty dead bodies in their territory.

Okay, so maybe the last bits were conjecture, but I could listen and pick apart a few Italian to understand this wasn't Kristoff's playing field. Not yet. He was still picking and choosing comrades.

Thirty— plus two — was a weight to an unstable transaction that might tip everything he was working hard for, in the opposite direction.

I'd consider that an extra point in my favour.

I snorted. "Calm your pants, Noh. They know even less. The only instruction was that they stand by to witness. Nothing more, nothing less. We're paying them handsomely for their troubles. Plus, they're local so its pretty cheap."

"What is it that you want, Antonina?" Kristoff asked, tone exhausted. It had been a long day, then a long night. If my body was any indication of the hour, it was nearing dawn.

Voicing out my wants and needs now felt so strange, like something I had to strangle out of me. His voice, tone, demeanour... I felt ashamed of my own demand, and I felt sick for it. Everything felt so elaborate all of a sudden, when I was really just scared of asking to live.

These feelings were unnerving that it took me a second to reply, my own self torn. Sophie nudged me, her voice gentle. "Nins?"

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I didn't like this feeling, this feeling like I was balancing on the edges of a knife. But it was a hard skin to rub; it felt old.

I met his eyes again, reminding myself of who I am right now. My name is Antonina La Verne. I'm a bad bitch. So many names, so many characters... sometimes one forgets.

I took a deep breath, and every word out was said levelled and firm.

"I need a stronger ground than your promises of winning. I know you're still having KC look out for me, and I don't like it. I feel like there's a bullet with my name on it. Any little mistake, any little trip, I could just have it buried at the centre of my brain like I mean nothing."

I smiled, bitterly. The words said out loud painted my tombstone in better light. I could have died if I had not demanded. I could have just disappeared, everything I had worked hard for, everything I fought to have, gone.

"And I know I am, in the grand scheme of things. To you, or you—" Archie's gaze was still so stark with emotion, anger and disbelief, even with the little scoff he made that Kristoff didn't shush. Instead, the billionaire looked contemplative. Taking in my words and picking them apart. So I spoke to him, turning to him to demand and plead. It was up in the air whether he would follow through, but I was crossing my fingers that all this patience he meant he was hearing me.

"If you really want me to be a part of this, choose your side in absolution, then we all play on equal grounds." My voice hardened, my bargain the only choice. "I don't like playing like a toy, something to be tugged and pulled and shown off off to others with other pretty toys, but if I have to do it, I will. I will be the best fucking toy you could have ever laid your hands on. But I will not be toyed with."

My eyes flashed ire, hands in fists on my lap, one arm still over at Sophie's. "Not like a child, not like a dirt under your fucking shoe, and definitely not like a girl mewling for attention. You show me the respect I deserve or I make this unpleasant for everyone involved. You said so yourself. I'm calculative. I act emotionally loud when I feel threatened. I could make an entire fucking musical off of you, if you so choose to make me feel, yet again, like there's a noose on my neck just because I want to survive."

"Hmm." Kristoff straightened. "What do you want me to do?"

"Kristoff!"

"What she's asking is fair," he replied to a purpling Archie Noh. "Neither you nor KC has a soldier monitoring your every move. Calculating how much of that is in my best interest."

"That is because we have been in this business with you for far too long than she has." Every word was grounded through molars and teeth. Hissed and bit, Archie was having a hard time strangling back composure in a game he was losing. "We have earned our freedom and respect. She was cajoled to be a part of this, by no less than your sister. We still don't know where her loyalties lie, if she even has them."

I raised a hand. All eyes turned. "I mean, I can confidently answer that for you. My loyalties lie to myself."

"See!" Archie inhaled, deep from his chest. "We can't trust her. Not fully."

"Then don't trust her," Kristoff said, as if he was making a math problem out of soup. "Keep an eye on her. Because if tonight was any indication, the soldier has befriended the con artist." He raised an eyebrow. "Isn't that how you got KC to drink? You have to admit, Archie, that KC doesn't lower his guard for anyone."

"And look what happened to him?" Archie threw a frustrating hand in the air. "He's barely upright and I'm not fucking sure that wasn't him slipping on the roof tiles with the rats." He winced. KC must've have shouted his side of the story.

I loosened my arm on Sophie and stood up, shaking my head at her when she had attempted to stand. As bright and loud Sophie was, I'm sure Kristoff and Archie were memorising her now, enough to try and make a profile out of her.

I needed them to listen to me now. To pay attention to me.

Memories were so fragile, especially in tensed moments.

I made sure my coat obscured most of their view of Sophie.

"Look. You've made sure to know just about the good amount that Yuna was blackmailing me with, and I worked under those circumstances. It might be flimsy to you, but that's enough for me to move on your side. I don't need a bullseye on the back to keep me in check, I have more tack than that. I just don't like feeling like a rat always fearing for the fat cats around me to finally go hungry. I just want to know I'm safe, choosing your side."

"But that doesn't answer betrayal." Kristoff nocked his head to the side. His voice still sounded fair, calm. "You said what I know is a mirror to what Yuna knows. You could betray me for her, or anyone with the same knowledge as them. How do I ensure you are on my side?"

That was a fair point.

So I chose honesty, and hoped that the space transcended.

"My word and my secrets are all I have, Mr. Park. I have no real ally or weakness, just a lot of comrades willing to help and a future I want. It's terrifying to imagine, but with a little bit of creativity, I'm sure you can find a space to use me. And trust me at an... arm's length."

"A future you want..."

I smiled. "That's your best bet, you know. I respond better to greed than violence."

"A price then. For you."

"For me. And might I just say early on: you won't regret your purchase."

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