𝑮𝑳𝑰𝑻𝑻𝑬𝑹 | 𝑘.𝑏.

02

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D E S P E R A T I O N  O N  A  D Y I N G  M A N
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BIG BOLLIGER'S BETRAYAL SUCKED, BUT Kaz still had a gun pointed at him, so Feta wasn't sure how much this punishment had really accomplished.

"How are you going to wriggle your way out of this one?" Geels smirked. His eyes glinted sharply through the dark with crazed excitement.

"Going out the same way I came in," Kaz replied plainly. Feta watched Kaz's cold stare fall onto Big Bolliger. "Do you know what your problem is, Bolliger?" He hovered the tip of his cane around where Feta's hands were pressed over Bolliger's wound. She gave Kaz a warning look from underneath her sunny curls that had fallen in her eyes. She would have moved them but she was already going to have to spend hours at a sink tonight, she didn't want the chore of washing her hair added to the list. When Feta didn't move her hands, Kaz settled for jabbing the area around the bullet; a fresh wave of warmth spilled between Feta's fingers. Bolliger mewled pathetically. "That wasn't rhetorical. Do you know what your biggest problem is?"

"Nooooo..."

"Give me a guess," Kaz hissed.

Feta bit her tongue. It wasn't a good look to ask for mercy for a traitor, and to be honest, Feta felt a sick satisfaction click deep within her at knowing Big Bolliger hadn't gotten away with backstabbing them. But it didn't feel good to let Bolliger bleed out at her feet, either. Big Bolliger didn't answer Kaz, though Feta wasn't sure if it was because he genuinely didn't know or because he was ashamed. Bolliger writhed underneath Feta as Kaz pushed off of the wound with his cane.

"All right, I'll tell you. You're lazy. I know it. Everyone knows it. So I had to ask myself why my laziest bouncer was getting up early twice a week to walk two extra miles to Cilla's Fry for breakfast, especially when the eggs are so much better at the Kooperom." Feta watched the gun that Kaz believed he had the luxury of ignoring. Geels seemed antsy as ever to pull the trigger but he almost seemed more intrigued to know how Kaz had pieced together Big Bolliger's mistakes. "Big Bol becomes an early riser, the Black Tips start throwing their weight around Fifth Harbor and then intercept our biggest shipment of jurda. It wasn't a tough connection to make." Kaz sighed and turned back towards Geels. "This is what happens when stupid people start making big plans, ja?"

"Doesn't matter much now, does it?" Geels said. "This gets ugly, I'm shooting from close range. Maybe your guards get me or my guys, but no way you're going to dodge this bullet."

"No way at all, Geels." And then Kaz stepped into the barrel of the gun, his shadow gaining an odd, monstrous protrusion, this one being far more unsettling than his cane.

Feta watched the gun press against Kaz's pristine white shirt, settle itself into the divot of his chest. And the fucker is smirking.

"You think I won't do it?" Geels nearly laughed.

"Oh, I think you'd do it gladly, with a song in your black heart. But you won't. Not tonight."

Geels' finger twitched on the trigger. If not for Big Bolliger still roiling beneath her, breath heaving in shaky overtime, Feta would have sworn time in the city had slowed.

Geels' seconds were looking on eagerly. Geels himself looked fit to burst.

The lantern Bolliger had brought for the Dregs gave a timid crackle as the flame flared, the light briefly flashing over the parley's wired figures. The breeze whipped over the Exchange, trying to put the flame back in its place. In the distance, a siren wailed.

"Nineteen Burstraat," Kaz said slowly.

Feta snickered. She could feel Oomen's glare on her but Geels' shifting had been suddenly stilled and Feta couldn't help but let her relief wash over her in waves.