A/N: play the song at the end of the chapter🌚
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We let Benjamin marinate a little in the basement for about a day and a half.
Last night, while Reese had taken over for Bàs to make dinner, I'd assist her. Taking the chance to catch up with an old friend in person and not on a phone.
Once we collectively marched towards the room Benny was staying, we decided to do a little mukbang of the feast we all helped cook in front of a starving spy.
The meat on our plates was so juicy and tender, it would have made a mutt salivate for miles.
He was seen licking his lips several times, as he watched us devour the delight on our platter.
Damien went a step further, chucking the bones infront of the man, all just to watch him scurry into the corner it was thrown and attempt to salvage any type of sauce that might have sinked into the meat's bone-marrow.
It almost made me feel bad.
Keyword almost.
Until I realized he might have known about Leonidas picking me up and bringing me back to the house. He could have called the guys who had chased us on our way back from the courthouse.
Who else could it have been?
He was a spy, easily confirmed.
It was a new day. He looked the same. A little different.
The man looked a little overcooked at his age last time I saw him. Not too long ago but Santiago must have done preparation numbers on this man to make him age just a little more overnight it seemed. He slid down the wooden chair.
Chin upwards, was his neck a victim to the sandpaper-like board his back rests against.
He does not lack awareness. Only consciousness.
Two halves of the quadruplets, Agent 004 and 06 line the borders of the room.
To begin at monitoring the man, Leonidas arrived just a little over a minute later. The bandage on his upper eyebrow is now gone. His dirty blonde hair droops in the wet atmosphere.
A lack of a ceiling in this margin is the cause.
His eyebags are visible. Anyone could tell he had been all the more than busy behind those office doors of his. I assume he's done his job at monitoring the supplementary help WEIA sent Joji-Tan Ayumi's way because he's down here. With us.
He might have been awake for a while. But what matters now is that everything is on track for when we go back to our bases. Back to Singapore. Back to Ayumi. Back to basically being a meter away from the structure.
I roll my shoulders, nearing the glass that blocks me from the boys.. I watch as all three men engage further and further into the room.
On the intercom I press on the button that allows my voice to be heard, and speak.
''How do y'all have all this money but can't afford a fucking ceiling up in here?'' Are the first things I say.
Irrelevant, I know.
Damien is the first to whip his head back in laughter, followed by Dominic crouching down to do the same. But it causes my blonde Italian friend to look back at me and smile lazily.
He doesn't mouth what he says. Instead, he signs it behind the transparent glass barrier.
''Ask your rich-ass grandfather.'' Shaking his head he turns his back on me.
I feel the vibrations of thunder rumble under my seat even further as what was once light drizzle, becomes a full on storm.
Lightning struck just above their heads. The electrical currency played in my face. Compulsively flickering on and off at such slow rates.
But the light gray nimbostratus clouds made for enough light for anyone to see on the other side of the glass.
A chain dangles off the neck of the youngest quad, damp dark strands cover his light eyes from my view the way he approaches the man first. The dark wife-beater that adorns his tan Spanish skin forces the white ink on his forearms to pop even further.
He reduces his size to half the way he squats in front of the man. His eyes are well hidden. All you could see was teeth.
Soon, I grow tired of the silence and enter the room, slowly closing the door behind me as I still watch from afar.
My blonde curls are quick to lose volume, draping over my ears like curtains beneath heavy rain. But I still lean on the closed door, arms crossed.
There is a raspy spanish exchange that sounds the moment he turns to buzzcut and tattoos leaning on the wall.
Dominic smiles, the dimple on his cheek deepening with every minute the simper widens. Eyes pointed towards Damien's green ones, there is a mutual nod that crosses the elder brother.
Standing up to his height does Dominic walk around. He examines the room, and just how dirty it had become over the years. The lack of maintenance after many years of criminal conviction served as a biohazard.
We would have worn masks if he could. Slipped our minds.
Common mistake.
I took the chance to always scour my eyes around the room.
In authentic nature; the room was supposed to be cleanly white.
Now, with white tiles having morphed into pink would have been a simple way to suggest just how much bloodshed had gone down within these walls in all actuality.
The faint smell of iron had lodged in my mind, a smell that had often lingered back at Somino Hernandez.
There were chains that decorated the ground surrounding the chair the eastern man had been seated on. His wrists alone had been restricted by the tips of butter knives. Lodged with such a strength to stab through human muscle.
I made a face.
That would have been a sight to see, a sensation to feel the moment the man woke up from his beauty sleep. As more water dripped from the nimbostratus clouds that layered the scene all the more, Leonidas simply laid his back on the wall.
A neutral expression on the face of Santiago, is followed by the action of crossed arms over a bulk chest.
Suddenly, the youngest Alderete twin kicks at one of the leg's chairs, causing the man to stumble on an unstabilized surface. He hits his head on the floor tiles. The absence of a sort of 'boom' made for much relief; he hadn't cracked his head open.
Yet.
Santiago, after what felt like a while neared the man, tied to a wooden chair of now three legs in fetal position. A dagger in his hand, he doesn't make the effort to kneel down the level of the spy.
Instead, it's the heel of his black boot that press on the side of the man's neck. There's a pulse check in process. ''E' Vivo,'' Alive, he states.
It is then that the blondie lowers himself down to the man's level. An indecipherable expression on both his face and Damien's.
Pressing at the daggers blade, he lowered it . That same moment he slips his hand upwards. Crimson is seen tainting the edge of sterling.
Returning the knife to its initial position, he presses harder.
It is then, I see the small frown in Benjamin's eyebrow come to light. He is slow to wake up.
Motioning for the twins to come in a little closer. Dominic licks his pearly whites in distaste the moment the man had opened his eyes to their full potential.
'' Oh,'' he begins to humor, a breathy smile escaping his lips, '' So your ass woke up from that but not from the fall, huh?''There's the single drip of latin words that leave his mouth in malice before the tip of his boot connects to the forefront of his face with the same momentum one uses with a soccer ball.
Whipping his head back does a scream finally release out of the man's lips. I assume not only because of Alderete's action. It had finally registered what had been stabbing at his palms.
Setting him upright, Damien holds him up to steady him. A pained expression on Benjamin's face, one the authority paid them no mind.
Leo is quiet in his work.
Crouching down towards Benny's leg, he pulls a piece of disheveled clothing above his bareskin as the search for the femoral vein begins.
Finding it, the tip of the dagger in his hold glides across delicate skin with the dull aspect of the object. Upon eye contact with the convict, the switch from dim to definite is quick.
The twirl of the blade between his fingers is swift; , but the puncture was an even faster action.
The convict jolts up in pain, catching sight of me standing by the entrance door in observation. What could have only been described as a slight chuckle bubbles up in my throat.
My shoulders bounce humouredly. This man was fucked.
And there was nothing I could have done about it. There wasn't anything I could have wanted to do about it. He dealt with one of the men who had been anticipating the fall of my father.
If anything, it was a good thing that I could have done nothing about it.
He averts his gaze towards the chain, defeated, does he attempt to struggle out of the grasp with every passing moment rain begins to fade to mist.
Leonidas drops the knife to the ground, his hand grasping at his jaw making their eyes connect. Soothing the way the agent rubs at his back in a circular motion. Sharp the way the apprehension in his movements causes his grip to tighten.
I imagine the slight, reassuring, safe smile he lets loose. ''Shh,'' He begins at calming the grown, more than capable man.
Stroking the hairs on his head with a soft smile, does he struggle to glance in every which way Santiago had allowed him to.
Despite his palms vibrating in pain, his shoulders drop, giving off the illusion that he really had seemed to calm down. He did not. But the attempt was good enough for now.
'' Bel lavoro ragazzo, sei un buon ascoltatore.'' Good job kid, you're a good listener. Leo mocks a soft, lull whisper. But urgency had begun catching up to the scene as I watched them throw in their questions.
'' On May 12th around 10 or so years ago, you'd say you had witnessed the death of Tenzin Corinelli, correct?'' Muffled words spill like overflowing tap water. Taking a hold of this man's ears, his grip threatened to rip them off. ''Correct?'' With what he can, he hums in acknowledgement and he lets go of him.
Gripping the butter knives that are currently holding his hands hostage, it's pushed deeper into the wooden armrest beneath it, ''We already know you sent you. We just want to know if you know who sent you,,'' The question had become more of a statement than anything else.
He hadn't told us a name. But it was already determined to be Lori Hamasaki from the connections made in the duration of a single back and forth conversation with him back in the parking garage.
He needed to say his name in full, so WEIA could use his torture as leverage to paint him as some sort of traitor to what the silver empire had worked for. It always made more sense when Leonidas had explained it, but essentially it was a piece to the puzzle we were bound to finish when this mission had ended.
The relief of believing he would have plucked out the knives from his hands fell short. Leonidas had only dug them deeper until what sounded like crackling bone could be heard.
Answers were needed, but they weren't provided at the satisfying speed.
There had been nothing but incoherent groans gritting through his teeth, '' For my–argh–life and loyalty-y to the com-mander do I c-choose s-s-silence in death,'' His eyes lead forward. Our eye contact is brief before Leonidas blocks his line of sight with his massive body.
Dom is seen rolling his eyes along with Damien.
I imagine Leo does the same.
He pulls out the dagger once more, jabbing the tip at the side of his rib. In this moment did It feel like some kind of prideful element, a distantly easterner refusing to let out a peep of pain in the eyes of a westerner.
Instead of letting out a yelp of any sort, he squinted his eyes and clutched what he could have reached.
Sending a quick in my direction before pinning Damien. I stepped closer. His lips don't move, but it's clear communication is exchanged between her and the brothers.
The elder brother, who still stabilizes the chair to a 90 angle, tosses the lighter in the hands of his younger brother.
Catching it with the non–dominant hand does Dominic take the floor. The rain had dissipated, clearance in such weather change allowed for fire to thrive. And so, with the now lit lighter does the younger Alderete near the dancing flame to the nose of the man.
We had all simultaneously cocked our heads to the side, raising his eyes, did I see the perplexed expression. '' What now? Are you going to judge how I hold up the lighter to?''
''Yes,'' Damien shot out with little to no hesitation.
'' Really? The nose?'' Leonidas had questioned, his voice couldn't have been more disappointedly just slightly above a whisper. Dominic dismisses our collective reaction with his free hand.
'' Trust me, it will kill him faster,'' the younger Alderete emphasized on the ' 'now shut up,'' part of his retortion.
He eventually lowers the lighter.
Back and forth had laid low in the scene, '' I am going to ask you one more time; you can decide how you'll end up. Who sent you?'' Silence had wavered over them like a blanket. Meaningless and distasteful the way it grew.
He grows impatient.
Snapping his fingers in front of his face, ''I need words, Benny- Boy,'' Still, nothing.
Taking matters into his own hands, Damien rips out one of the butter knives from his palms, transferring it to his neck instead.
Deep enough to penetrate critically, just not deep enough to kill him.
Finally, after what felt like a lifetime and a half does he crack.
He pleads at the stop, cries lacing his words as his final phrase of, ''L.H sent me!'' His tone had morphed into high pitched with the lack of mercy he had been given on a silver platter.
Finally, does he confess. L.H = Lori Hamasaki.
We've got him.
I see Leonidas pull out what looked like a voice recorder. Turning it off, her chucks in my direction. I'm a solid meter away from where the device is supposed to land. I can't run there in enough time.
So.
I settled to dive for it.
I fail immensely, feeling the device hit the back of my head instead of my palms.
The moment I raise my chin to see Damien's eyes widen, do my elbows start throbbing in pain.
''Ow, Ow, Ow,'' I mutter, getting myself up.
Not a moment later do they focus back on the man, a string of words coming out from each as if they were conversing to themselves. Most-likely commenting on my pain as I approach the scene.
The language change is fluent.
My brain had refused to pick up the Italian, nor the Spanish interjections. But I do see Dominic constantly making good use of my expression.
Soon enough, does the panicked expression transfer onto the eastern man's features, the agent's expression morphed as neutral as a rock would have showcased. Leonidas steps out early, leaving me and the twins alone in the room.
Suddenly, in what felt like the same breath of it all, did Dominic set the man alight.
I pocket the voice recorder, as we encircle the man shaking and screaming in aching agony.
I'm hypnotized by the way the fire consumes flesh. Traveling quickly, it burns everything in its path before it gets the chance to cook.
The screams don't die down. The fire is slow to travel, but there is so much going on at the moment. He just can't focus and neither can I.
It's stressful hearing yells of agony.
I needed to do something and fast.
Extinguish the fire?
No!
Sing!
I look around the room, to see the twins. They stand next to each other, bright orange dancing in their eyes.
Not even a moment later, do their eyes lift simultaneously from the burning carcass of a coward to me.
''She's just a girl and she's on fire.''
I began to bob my head. The rhythm of Girl on Fire by Alicia Keys plays in my mind. My mind mimics the backtracks with what it can when I'm not singing the lyrics.
''Hotter than a fantasy,'' My lips move to the side when I hear Damien add on to the melody. '' Lonely like a highway''
''She's living in a world and it's on fire.'' I nod my head, my fingers begin to snap on their own accord.
''Filled with catastrophe, but she knows she can fly away,'' Dominic vocalizes a little off pitch. But we aren't perfect either. Next thing I know, I'm walking and settle between the two boys, the screams of Benny-Boy still are at its highest.
His pleas to stop the fire before spreading further onto his lower abdomen is outshined by our melodic trio.
Damien nudges me and nods in his direction. I turn my head to him, then to Dom who quickly catches on. He nods. I now turn to Benny.
''Hey buddy!'' His mouth seems permanently screwed open with the way his eyes are staring around frantically in panic. With what was still there, his lower body moves a little as a means to attempt to escape.
''Harmonize and maybe we'll let you go,'' I began before looking around.
''It's the chorus!''I clap excitedly and grin from cheek to cheek.
I stare at the man on the verge of becoming charcoal for someone's barbecue this week, nodding frantically at my request.
''Do you know this song?'' Damien asks.
''Who doesn't?'' Dominic counters.
I simmer down the rising conflict with a beam on my face. I shush them, trying to give the burning man the floor to sing. ''Go on, Benny.'' My smile is encouraging.
My actions are anything but.
His frantic nod slows down as his eyes shut.
''A-ah, ah,ah,ah,ah'...---!'
'' Ein!'' Dominic makes an incorrect buzzer noise of disapproval. He's not impressed.
''That was off key you saggy waste of blood and bone,'' Damien says beneath a chuckle of his own.
My eyes fall onto the bundle flames. It rises a little faster now that it's reached the middle of his stomach. My brain is late to register the horrid smell of crisping flesh. All I can do is one thing and one thing only.
''Guys, let's not bully the guy!'' I shake my head from side to side, looking at them both. I pout, staring at Benjamin, spy. His eyes water, but his tears are quick to make the fire rise.
I show him no mercy.
''Let's show him instead!'' I step back, holding both twins' hands in mine. Both of their palms are laid flatly onto their chest as if we were about to sing out the national anthem.
Instead, we continue where we left off.
''Oh,oh,oh,oh,oh! She got both feet on the ground. And she's burning it down!'' Dominic points at Benjamin, who I'm not even sure is conscious anymore and taunts;
''Like you!'' Before we move on to the next verse.
''Oh,oh oh oh oh,oh oh oh oh. She got her head in the clouds, and she's not backing down,''
As we are about to reach the main part, Damien suggested we sway our bodies from side to side as we huddled.
Within the next moment, we're doing just that; singing at the top of our lungs, while hugging each other in a sway. It gave off campfire vibes.
But don't doubt anyone within a hundred mile radius couldn't have heard us.
''This girl is on fire!''
''This girl on fire!''
''She's walking on fire!''
''This girl is on fi—'' Our voices were too loud to hear the racing footsteps and the door whip open.
''What the fuck are you doing?!'' Leonidas came into the room. Panic written all over his face as his brand new shirt wrinkled quickly with the way his arms were being thrown around.
''Oh shit, you changed your clothes!''Dominic commented at my side.
He motions towards the man, Benny-Boy, who was now consumed in flames.
''We were supposed to bring a corpse to Yad's up north!'' He fails to stay calm, his voice rising in volume with every moment he witnesses our bullshit.
''Okay?'' Damien shrugs as if it was nothing serious.
''One in okay condition, not fucking staked!'' He mocked Damien's tone.
I felt my face pale and my eyes widen when I realized. All three of us are quick to turn around.
"Fuck!"
And suddenly, it was like the world and it's time had slowed.
Me and the twins all ran our separate directions.
My dumbass thought it could have been quicker to blow the flames of a burning man away like I would candles on a birthday cake.
Damien had settled on spitting on the flames, trying to extinguish them in that manner.
All while I heard Dominic unzip his pants and began peeing on the rising flames.
Damien and I both groaned in disgust as our face contorted negatively.
We all tried our hardest, but Leonidas was the one to come back with a water hose.
He extinguished the fire way faster than any of us could have with either of our methods. When all there is left is smoke and the exposed skull of a deadman, Leo is the first to sigh.
''What am I supposed to tell your grandfather now, huh?'' Everyone looks at me and the damp curtains of instant ramen on my head.
I hum. Tapping my foot on the tiles before looking to the side for basically anything. I lose hope, but soon, an idea pops into my head. ''I have an idea!''I exclaim happily.
I rush towards the entrance of the door, opening the second to make it to the room where the intercom was.
I don't miss the, 'We're fucked' comment that comes out of Leonidas's mouth when I step out.
Pulling out a random sharpie marker from the draw, I detach the cap with my mouth before ripping a sticky note from its pile.
Setting it onto the table surface, I write.
And I write the best thing ever.
''SORRY!'' In purple ink.
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A/N : 🌝