𝕯 𝖊 𝖘 𝖕 𝖊 𝖗 𝖆 𝖉 𝖔 // vincenzo cassano //

- prologue -

"Ten seconds, max."

Ottavia swallowed, her elbow digging into the muscle of her propped leg while she knelt, but not for much longer.

"Holding on yellow," she reported to her spotter. The tall figure of a middle-aged, eastern-european man in all-black designer suit and pants stood just behind the closed glass doors of the opera house.

Ottavia counted two more seconds. Couldn't help the amusing thought as it popped into her head; he was all dressed up and ready for his open casket.

Lucky him.

Her own father certainly hadn't such luxury.

"Target visible. Befana, the target is open—you're green."

At this, she aimed for his head rather than a clean shot through his heart. If only because she didn't want his ghost to come haunting her later, for ruining his perfectly tailored suit jacket with one of her bullets.

She prepared the shot beautifully. Worked with a talent that'd taken eight years to master. And even if she knelt on this open rooftop, she knew there was nothing to worry about. They wouldn't ever spot her. She was just that good, and the distraction of noise from the festival echoing all the way from south to north was a nice bonus.

What wasn't that nice, however—

"Cazzo," Ottavia let out, just in time to stop her finger from squeezing the trigger as a little boy ran behind the male target.

'Fuck.'

Her hand shied away from the trigger but instinct kept her knelt down and looking for a way to complete her mission.

"I repeat: Befana, you are green."

A nerve in her jaw ticked with the furious clench of it, refusing to take the shot when there was this little boy—no older than ten—prancing around her target's legs.

"No," she looked through the scope and shook her head, "I've got a protocol breach." There had to be another way.

"Take the shot." It wasn't what she wanted to hear.

Ottavia relaxed the tension built on her neck and reported back, "Code five, on-site. Code five."

"Overridden," urged her spotter, "take the shot."

She swore she could hear the little boy's laughter in her other ear as she saw him raise up his teddy bear to her target's chest.

"Window is closing. Befana, I repeat, take—"

"Listen, I'm not taking the shot with the kid here," she said, breaking any semblance of professionalism over the radio.

"Then you'll be fucking up ten years of la Regina's work..."

Ottavia sighed, finger curled and still a shy whisper from touching the trigger. Knowing that if she didn't take the shot now, something worse awaited her back at her new home.

Because she knew just as well as anyone, there was nothing la Regina di Corvi hated more than cowardice coming from the members of the Stormo di Corvi. It was a fact that didn't escape Ottavia. And she was well aware of the punishment. Being la Regina's only daughter wouldn't save her from it, either.

Because another thing to know about her mother, la Regina? It was that she only ever thought of her as a daughter whenever it benefited the organization. And, innocent kid or no innocent kid, fucking up a hit that had taken a decade to achieve was clearly not beneficial.

Still, Ottavia needed to hear the orders once more before she could make sure to go through with it.

"Orca," she spoke into the radio device on her left wrist, "please reconfirm." No response from her spotter, so she tried again, "Reconfirm. Orca, do you copy?"