Chapter 1: Extra Cheese, Extra Strange
Chapter Text
The pizza oven buzzed softly behind Elliot, humming like it always did when it hit that perfect temperature—just hot enough to bake a pepperoni to golden crisp, but not hot enough to catch fire and ruin his night. It was supposed to be a normal Tuesday. A slow one, the kind where he could fold boxes until his fingers cramped and hum along to the tinny music crackling out of the old radio.
But tonight, something felt… off.
He stood behind the counter, halfway through folding a pizza box, eyes locked on the fog outside the window. The streetlamps were drowned in gray, shadows twitching behind the mist like they were alive. The town didn’t usually get this quiet. No cars. No scooters. No late-night soda runs. Just that thick, muffling silence that made the pizza shop feel like a snow globe someone had shaken too hard and forgotten on a shelf.
“Probably just the weather,” Elliot muttered to himself, voice cracking in the empty store.
He finished folding the box with a crisp snap and slid it onto the stack. Behind him, the oven beeped.
Ding.
Order up.
Elliot turned to pull the pizza out when the bell above the front door jingled. His head snapped toward it.
No one.
Just the door swinging open with a creak, and cold fog curling into the warm, greasy air of the pizzeria.
Elliot blinked. “What the—?”
And then—
“Yo,” came a lazy voice. “You still alive in here or did the cheese fumes finally get you?”
Elliot turned just in time to see him step in.
Chance.
Same ridiculous black fedora. Same sunglasses even though it was dark out. Same smug grin like he knew every secret in the universe and was trying to decide whether or not to sell them for $5 and a slice.
“I thought you left town,” Elliot said, frowning. “You disappear for weeks and then waltz in like nothing happened?”
“I missed the pizza,” Chance replied, walking in like the place was his. “And maybe I missed you too. A little. Tiny bit.”
Elliot just stared, deadpan. “We’re out of flirting specials.”
“Ouch.” Chance clutched his chest like he’d been shot. “Brutal. And here I was gonna offer you a whole rose and half a pickup line.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“And you’re dense,” Chance said with a smirk, leaning against the counter. “I could say, ‘You’re the only delivery I’d never want to lose,’ and you’d ask me if I meant mail or food.”
“Do you?” Elliot asked, genuinely confused.
Chance groaned and let his head fall to the counter with a soft thud.
For a moment, the two just stood there—Chance dramatically face-down on the countertop, and Elliot quietly cutting the pizza into even slices, like nothing was out of the ordinary.
Eventually, Chance lifted his head again, hair a little messy from the humidity in the air. His grin returned, just a little softer this time.
“I’m serious, though. It’s good to see you.”
Elliot gave a small shrug, his eyes not leaving the pizza cutter. “Yeah. You too, I guess. Just… weird night.”
“Fog’s thick out there,” Chance said, glancing at the windows. “Feels like something’s watching.”
“You’ve been watching too many horror movies.”
“You live in a pizza place alone, man. That is a horror movie.”
Elliot cracked the tiniest smile. “Point.”
Chance reached over the counter and snatched a slice, even though it wasn’t his. Elliot didn’t stop him. He never did.
Outside, the fog pressed harder against the windows. The silence beyond the glass felt heavy. Still. Waiting.
But inside, for now, there was warmth. A shared pizza. And two very different boys sitting together at the edge of something they couldn’t see coming.
Elliot wiped his hands on his apron as the pizza slicer clacked against the cutting board. The bell above the door jingled again—not haunting this time, just a cheerful ding as a pair of regulars walked in, hoods damp with fog and faces already lighting up at the smell of melted cheese.
“Evening!” Elliot called, his voice perking up automatically.
The two nodded and shuffled over to the counter. Elliot handed over the still-steaming pizza, exchanged a few polite words, and rang them up. As they left, the bell jingled again.
Then again.
And again.
More customers rolled in, one after another, like the whole town had waited until this exact moment to crave late-night pizza.
“Guess the fog makes people hungry,” Elliot said, shoving a fresh pizza into the oven.
Chance leaned against the counter like he owned it, still chewing on his third slice. “Or maybe word got out that the cute guy’s working alone tonight.”
Elliot rolled his eyes so hard he almost tripped over his own shoelaces. “You’re gonna choke one day saying stuff like that.”
Chance swallowed dramatically. “Then I die doing what I love—flirting while full of carbs.”
Elliot laughed, a quiet, tired giggle slipping through his teeth. He tried to hide it, but Chance caught it.
“There it is!” Chance pointed like he’d just spotted Bigfoot. “The Elliot giggle! Rare. Priceless. I should charge for that.”
“You’re such a—”
“Entrepreneur. Genius. Visionary. I know.” He straightened his tie dramatically. “Honestly, I could buy this whole place and turn it into a casino-pizzeria. Slot machines on one side, deep dish on the other. Maybe a live jazz band. Get your fortune told with every breadstick.”
Elliot blinked, absolutely done. “That’s the worst idea I’ve ever heard.”
“You say that now,” Chance said, wagging his finger, “but one day, you’ll be standing on stage in a red velvet suit going, ‘Welcome to Pepperoni Palace!’ while I rake in the cash.”
“I don’t want a palace.”
“You could have anything,” Chance said suddenly, a little softer. “I’ve got the money. I mean, if you wanted… I could get you out of this place. You don’t owe me anything. You just—don’t deserve to be stuck here every night folding boxes.”
Elliot paused, his back to Chance. For a second, it looked like he might actually say yes.
But then he chuckled and said, “If I leave, who’s gonna stop you from turning the world into a breadstick empire?”
Chance laughed, tipping his fedora low over his eyes. “Can’t argue with that.”
The moment passed. Elliot got back to work, scooping fresh dough, taking orders, shouting over the hum of the oven and the growing line of customers. Chance stayed nearby, chatting with anyone who’d listen, cracking jokes, charming the pants off of half the pizza shop. He had that energy—like a spark in a room full of gas.
And Elliot… he looked tired, yeah. But he was smiling now, even if just a little. He even let Chance sneak another slice when he thought no one was looking.
⸻
Later That Night…
As the crowd thinned and the clock ticked toward closing, the fog outside had thickened into a wall of white. The street was quiet again. Empty.
Chance stood by the window, watching it.
“You ever get the feeling,” he said suddenly, “that something’s coming?”
Elliot glanced over. “Like what?”
Chance shrugged. “I dunno. Just a feeling.”
Elliot didn’t say anything, but he looked outside, too.
The fog was still. Too still.
But inside, the oven beeped one last time. Warmth still lingered in the air. And the two of them stood quietly in that pocket of peace, unaware that tonight was the last time anything would feel normal again.
Chapter 2: Fog Coins and Card Tricks
Chapter Text
By the time the last customer left, the shop was quiet again. The oven had cooled, the soda machine hissed its final sigh, and only the low buzz of the lights above remained.
Elliot turned the sign on the door to CLOSED, locking it with a soft click.
Outside, the fog hadn’t budged.
Chance was still there—of course he was. He sat cross-legged on the counter like it was his living room, chewing on the crust of his final slice.
“You really just gonna sit there till we open again?” Elliot asked, wiping down the tables.
“I mean,” Chance stretched out, “you’ve got heat, leftovers, and no security cameras. That’s already better than half the motels I’ve stayed in.”
Elliot gave him a flat look, scrubbing a stubborn smear of cheese off the table. “You’re not sleeping on the pizza warmer again.”
“No promises.”
They fell into a comfortable silence. Elliot stacked trays and boxes, sweeping crumbs into the trash. Chance spun something in his hand—one of those coins again. It shimmered oddly in the overhead lights, not like normal change.
Elliot caught it out of the corner of his eye.
“You always have those?”
Chance glanced down at it, like he’d forgotten he was holding it. “Hmm? Oh. Yeah. Kind of a… keepsake.”
“Looks fancy,” Elliot said, squinting at it. “Where’s it from?”
Chance smirked. “One of those places where you don’t really pay with money, you pay with nerve. Ever been somewhere like that?”
Elliot blinked. “You mean, like… a vending machine that only works if you shake it the right way?”
Chance let out a wheezing laugh and nearly dropped the coin. “God, no—though that’s probably less risky.”
Elliot tilted his head. “So what kinda place is it?”
Chance hesitated. Not long. Just enough to notice.
“Somewhere with tables,” he said casually, “cards, smoke in the air, music that sounds too classy to be real. And people who smile too wide when you lose.”
Elliot nodded slowly. “…So like, a casino?”
Chance leaned back, watching the ceiling. “Yeah. Something like that.”
Elliot didn’t push further. He didn’t know much about casinos, and the way Chance said it made it sound like he’d just described a dream more than a place. Elliot just shrugged and went back to cleaning.
“You ever gamble?” Chance asked.
“I play scratchers sometimes,” Elliot said. “Won two bucks once. Spent it on garlic knots.”
Chance smiled to himself, then tossed the coin high in the air. It spun, caught the light—and for a second, Elliot swore the symbol on it shimmered red.
But when it landed back in Chance’s hand, it was just a coin again. Plain and harmless.
Elliot stretched his arms with a groan and checked the clock. “Well. That’s everything.”
“Closing time,” Chance said, hopping off the counter. “Another day, another dollar.”
“More like another day, another twenty pizza boxes folded.”
Chance walked to the front, pressing his hand to the glass door. The fog outside had thickened, streetlamps just faint orange glows behind the white. He didn’t say anything for a moment. Just stood there.
“You good?” Elliot asked.
Chance didn’t answer right away. Then—casually—“You ever get the feeling something’s about to change?”
Elliot snorted. “Dude, I’ve been folding cheese into cardboard for three years. The only thing that ever changes is the toppings.”
Chance turned back with a grin, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “Lucky you.”
Elliot locked up behind them, still unaware of how different things were about to become. Still smiling faintly. Still thinking Chance was just a weirdo with too many stories and a casino obsession.
And Chance—well, he looked back at the fog just once, coin tight in his palm.
Then they both disappeared into it.
The glowing sign inside the pizza shop flickering off with a tired hum. Outside, the world was still swallowed in fog. It pressed up against the street like a wall, soft and cold and silent.
Elliot wheeled his motorcycle out from behind the shop, pulling on his jacket and gloves. The seat was slick with moisture. Even his breath made little clouds in the air.
Chance stood nearby, hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched slightly—not from cold, Elliot noticed, but something else.
“You walkin’ home?” Elliot asked, adjusting the strap on his helmet.
Chance blinked. “Huh? Oh. No. I mean—kind of? My place is way out by the hills. Buses stop running after midnight.”
Elliot gave him a look. “Don’t you have, like, a million apps for this kind of thing? Order a car?”
Chance hesitated. “Yeah. I just… don’t really feel like going back there tonight.”
Elliot raised a brow. “You get evicted or something?”
“No. I just…” Chance trailed off, then smiled faintly. “Your couch has better vibes.”
Elliot rolled his eyes but sighed. “Fine. Hop on.”
He reached into his backpack and tossed Chance his extra helmet—his red pizza delivery cap still tucked underneath.
“Wear the hat too,” Elliot said, dead serious. “Gives you bonus points.”
Chance grinned, popping the helmet on over the hat like a sandwich. “Let’s roll, delivery boy.”
⸻
The fog made the streets feel narrower than they were. The only sound was the low whirrrr of the motorcycle’s engine and the occasional splash as they passed through puddles left by the mist. Traffic lights glowed like floating orbs in the air, no cars, no movement.
Chance held on loosely behind him, one hand on the back seat, the other holding his coin again—spinning it slowly like a nervous tick.
Elliot didn’t ask what was on his mind. He could feel something was bothering him. But he’d learned that pushing Chance only made him joke more. So he let the quiet settle, let the engine do the talking.
⸻
At Elliot’s Apartment
Elliot’s place was small—one bedroom, a bathroom, a living room stacked with pizza-themed plushies he swore weren’t his. The walls were plain, the floor creaky, and everything smelled faintly of garlic.
Chance flopped onto the couch dramatically. “Ah. Freedom. No glowing dice. No rigged games. Just cheese air and old couch cushions.”
Elliot tossed a pillow at his head. “Don’t insult my air.”
He pulled out a blanket from the closet and tossed it down. “Couch is yours. Don’t drool on it.”
“No promises,” Chance said, already making himself comfortable. “You know you’re a good guy, right?”
Elliot paused in the doorway to his bedroom. “I’m just tired.”
“Still good,” Chance mumbled, voice quieter now. “Just tired too.”
Elliot left the light on in the hallway. Just in case.
⸻
Later That Night…
The clock on the wall blinked 2:43 AM when Elliot stirred from sleep.
His bed creaked.
He turned slightly—only to realize someone was hugging him from behind.
Tightly.
“…Chance?” he mumbled, blinking.
The idiot in question had snuck into his bed like a cat, arms wrapped around Elliot’s back, forehead pressed lightly between his shoulders. Breathing soft and steady, fast asleep.
“Seriously?” Elliot muttered.
He waited.
No response.
Just steady, quiet breathing.
Elliot sighed, eyes heavy. “You better not kick me in your sleep.”
There was no reply—only the soft rhythm of breath and the fog brushing quietly against the windows outside.
Eventually, Elliot closed his eyes again.
He didn’t push Chance away.
…
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Slam
The room wasn’t lit by anything natural. No windows. No view of the fog outside. Just one long ceiling light, flickering occasionally, buzzing like a dying wasp. The walls were concrete—gray, cracked, and ugly—and everything inside smelled like burnt rubber and bleach.
A table stood in the center. Heavy. Metal. Stained.
Behind it sat a figure in a wide, velvet-red chair with metal studs along the arms. He was well-dressed, but not in a way that said style—it said power. Black double-breasted coat. Red tie. His shirt was crisp and white, despite the dimness, and his gloves were thin leather, stretched over long fingers.
His face was pale. Eyes hollow. He hadn’t blinked once.
He grinned with all his teeth showing, but not a single part of that smile was alive.
A paper sat in front of him.
He dragged his fingers down it slowly.
“Ah…” His voice came low, smooth. The kind of voice you’d hear in a casino as someone lost their entire savings and thought maybe—maybe—they could win it back with one more try.
“One lucky little bastard, huh?”
There was a soft sound. A photo slammed onto the table, pinned in place by the sudden thunk of a knife.
It was Chance.
Still smiling in the photo. Slightly crooked hat. Red cap under a black helmet. That same coin dangling from his fingers.
The figure behind the desk let out a small laugh.
“I love the ones who smile. The cocky ones. They think they’re ghosts, slipping past the cracks, running off with prizes they didn’t earn.” His gloved fingers tapped the knife handle.
“Thing is…” he leaned in, voice dropping to a near-whisper, “they always forget one thing.”
He tilted his head sharply.
“The Sonnellino house doesn’t lose.”
Behind him stood four shadows, each straight as statues.
“Run while you still have legs to run with.”
Chapter 3: The Goon Line
Summary:
Yes I give the goons name and personal
Chapter Text
The back room of the casino was dark and hushed, lit only by the faint flicker of an old hanging lamp. Smoke curled in the air. At the long table sat four shadows—figures with names, reputations, and roles. Behind them, standing in the center like a statue carved from silence, was the boss.
They called him Don Sonnellino. No one dared say it twice in one sitting.
First, slouched in a chair with his boots kicked halfway up on the table, sat the youngest of the crew. His name was Wire. Headphones blinked with quiet neon pulses at the sides of his head, in sync with whatever beat was playing. A contractor by title, but a digital bloodhound in action. His toolset wasn’t a gun or a knife—it was a wooden stick and a wiry brain that thought five moves ahead.
He didn’t have the cold stillness of the others. He bounced his knee. Fidgeted with his stylus. Kept glancing at the Don like a kid waiting for a nod that never came. He was all energy, all nerve—but always gave it everything he had.
People on the floor looked at Wire with pity. Too young. Too eager. Too loud. But the boss never corrected him, never scolded him, never gave him more than a brief glance. And somehow, that stung more than any slap.
Second was Cane, the consigliere. He stood as soon as the Don did, tall and cold like an ice sculpture. A white top hat shaded his eyes. Monocle in one hand, tablet in the other. He spoke quietly and only once per turn.
Third was Beartrap, thick-jawed and built like a brick wall stuffed into a coat. He didn’t blink. He didn’t speak. He just sat with arms crossed, breathing like a bear hibernating in plain sight. Everyone knew what happened when he was let loose.
Last was Echo, the caporegime. Tall, polished, a sleek cut of discipline and violence wrapped in sunglasses and a headset. His hands were always behind his back. His gaze, unreadable.
The boss Don, who had stood in still silence, finally moved. He spoke, voice like gravel over velvet.
“They think distance buys them time. That fog buys them safety. That kindness will protect them.”
He stepped toward the table. One slow step at a time. His shadow spilled over the map laid out before them.
“Problem is… that coin he flipped?”
He reached into his coat and pulled it out—a coin. Not Chance’s coin, but a twin of it. Gleaming. Scarred.
“It never left my table.”
He flipped it. The clink echoed.
It landed on a photo. Chance, mid-smile.
Tails.
“Start the sweep.”
His voice was calm. Final.
“Wire.”
Wire perked up fast, nearly falling out of his chair. “Already scrubbed floor security from the night of the job. I ran thermal bleed on the machines—someone piggybacked the system during the jackpot. Couldn’t find a backdoor, but…”
He glanced at the Don.
“…There’s no sign of cheating. Not the usual kind.”
Echo raised a brow. Cane frowned.
“You’re saying it was clean?”
Wire shrugged, mouth twitching.
“Cleaner than I like.”
He hesitated.
“…either this guy’s blessed, or someone knows how to fake luck better than we thought.”
The Don didn’t respond. Just watched him.
“Location?”
Wire winced a bit. “Closest ping I got puts him just outside the East Fogline sector. Could be static. Could be him. Could be junk.”
Cane adjusted his monocle. “I’ve sent feelers to the transport companies. No official exits. No purchases. If he fled, it wasn’t on anything we own.”
Beartrap grunted once.
Echo finally spoke, calm and clear. “Sweepers are ready. Give the word and I’ll deploy a net along the Fogline.”
The Don leaned down.
Picked up the photo under the knife.
“You don’t run from my table without paying your tab.”
He let the photo drop.
“You don’t win without putting something on the line.”
He turned the coin over in his hand. The same kind Chance once flipped. But this one… was older. Scratched. Weighted.
He flipped it.
Clink.
It hit the table. Spun. Landed.
Tails.
“Sweep the line. South and East. I want boots in the fog. Talk to locals. Bribe rats. Scare birds.”
His eyes flicked to Wire.
“And you. Keep scraping. If he’s still nearby… you’ll be the first to know.”
Wire nodded quickly. “Yes, sir.”
“Don’t let your fingers freeze, kid. This fog’s colder than loyalty.”
Wire tried not to smile. The others moved without a word.
As the room emptied, the Don stayed behind.
Fingers resting lightly on the old coin.
Staring at the table.
Still tails.
.
.
.
.
.
The morning light crept through the blinds, drawing thin golden lines across the hardwood floor of Elliot’s small apartment.
It was quiet. Too quiet.
Elliot shifted slightly, his back cold now. His hand brushed over the spot beside him—empty.
The weight was gone.
He blinked open his eyes slowly, the memory of the night before still hazy in his mind. The soft breathing. The warm pressure on his spine. Chance… hugging him?
He sat up and rubbed his neck. Weird dream?
Except, no. There was a folded piece of paper on the kitchen table across the room, next to a coffee mug. His coffee mug.
Elliot padded over in his socks, hair messy and visor half-off. He picked up the note, immediately recognizing Chance’s barely legible scribbles:
“Yo sleepyhead,
Didn’t want to wake ya.
I got home safe (I think). The wind on your bike was WILD. Felt like a shampoo commercial.
Thanks for the ride. Don’t forget to feed your plant (it looks dead).
– The Luckiest Man Alive ✨”
There was a little drawing of a smiley face flipping a coin.
Elliot snorted softly. “He really is an idiot.”
He stared at the note for a moment longer than necessary, then placed it back on the table with a little smile. The warmth from the night before still clung faintly to his back, a ghost of the hug.
He turned to the window. Outside, the sun was climbing higher, casting long shadows of traffic signs and rooftops. It was a rare morning where he didn’t feel like rushing to work right away.
Usually, breakfast was just another slice of leftover pizza—cold or not, he didn’t care. Pepperoni, sausage, anchovies, pineapple (don’t judge)—he’d eaten it all before 9 AM.
But today… something felt a little different. Not bad, just… different.
Maybe he could try something new.
After all, the pizza shop wasn’t opening until noon today. Early repairs. A chance to eat out for once didn’t sound so crazy.
Ten minutes later, Elliot was dressed in something casual—yellow pizza hoodie, joggers, and his ever-present visor. The streets buzzed softly with morning life. He walked past the corner mart, waved at a delivery drone zooming overhead, and found a small breakfast diner tucked between two apartment buildings.
His boots tapped gently against the sidewalk.
One step at a time, he walked.
A little hungry.
A little tired.
And just barely starting to wonder…
What was Chance really running from?
As he arrived at the diner.
It had bright blue walls, a neon “OPEN” sign blinking quietly, and the smell of eggs, toast, and burnt coffee coming from inside.
“No pizza smell. That’s already weird.”
He stepped in, took a seat near the window, and ordered something simple—pancakes and hashbrowns. Something about syrup that didn’t come from a pizza sauce packet felt like a luxury.
He sat quietly, head resting on one hand, eyes drifting out the window. Across the street, he spotted someone walking fast—wearing a suit and shades.
For half a second, he thought it was Chance.
They were too fast as Elliot was about to call out for him.
But it wasn’t ? Chance already left.
Maybe is someone that look like him.
He shook the thought off. He’s probably back home already… right?
As he poked at his food, Elliot couldn’t help but wonder—was Chance alright? Why’d he crash last night like that? Why didn’t he want to Uber? Something about the way he hugged him stuck around longer than expected.
It wasn’t romantic. Not really.
Just… close.
Too close?
Like he was afraid.
Chapter 4: Out of the Ordinary
Chapter Text
The sun was already peeking between buildings when Elliot finished the last of his breakfast. He didn’t really enjoy it—not because it tasted bad, but because his thoughts had wandered too far, too fast.
His fork scraped across the empty plate.
He’d chewed so slowly the food had gone cold halfway through, and he hadn’t even noticed. With a soft sigh, Elliot pushed the plate aside, and stood up.
Something was bothering him.
Maybe it was the way Chance had left earlier, slipping out silently before sunrise and leaving that ridiculous note on the table. The handwriting had been crooked, like a dice roll mid-air. Full of hearts and awkward arrows, like some schoolyard doodle. It made Elliot laugh—but something about the way it was written stuck with him.
Still…
“It’s nothing,” Elliot muttered to himself. “He probably just didn’t wanna wake me.”
But the unease didn’t quite fade.
He took a long breath in.
And let it out slowly.
“Guess I’ll head to work,” he mumbled.
Is he worry too much?
Maybe he just wanted to feel normal.
Maybe thinking having breakfast out would help him forget the nagging weight in his stomach. Maybe a change of scenery would help get him out of his head. He normally just ate leftover pizza in the morning anyway—something new, something cheesy, maybe a pineapple and mushroom combo that only made sense to him.
Today, he tried something different.
But different didn’t taste better.
Elliot paid quietly, tucking a few Robux under the plate, and stood up with a soft exhale through his nose. His eyes blinked against the sunlight as he stepped outside.
The gentle jingle of the café door bell was the only sound as he walked out, stretching a little, his breath fogging faintly in the morning air. As he greeted by the usual flickering neon signs and NPCs going through their morning paths like wind-up toys.
The Robloxian world was… surreal, sometimes. Predictable in the strangest ways. Unpredictable in others.
And lately, Elliot had started to feel like maybe he wasn’t keeping up.
He stuffed his hands into his hoodie pockets as he walked down the sidewalk. The air was cooler than he liked, and his breath fogged faintly as he passed the alleyways and storefronts. Everything looked normal. Too normal.
Not really the words he was looking for. But maybe that was what made it worse.
He stared ahead, seeing the sidewalk stretch into the distance.
And that’s what unsettled him.
Because he knew what could happen.
What had happened.
He blinked slowly, eyes locked on the cracked pavement as his feet moved on their own, like his body knew where to go even if his mind was elsewhere.
It had been months since the fire at Builder Brothers Pizza.
Months.
But he still saw it every time he closed his eyes too long.
Flames crawling up the walls. Ovens exploding in bursts of oil and dough. Pepperoni sizzling on the floor like it was laughing at him. The burning smell in his lungs. The panicked scrambling of customers trying to escape. The sound of the fire alarm being drowned out by laughter.
Not human laughter.
Not even Robloxian.
That glitchy, crackling, corrupted laugh.
Elliot clenched his jaw.
His place got attack
Noli.
That freak in the tragedy mask, with the glowing eyes and the jagged crown. His glitch star burning like it was alive in his hand. That purple skull-grin like something that never stopped smiling, even when it shouldn’t have.
And beside him—
007n7.
Silent. Staring. Like a broken toy that had crawled out of a digital graveyard. That dumb Burger Bob hat. That Thomas the Tank Engine shirt that made no sense and somehow made it all worse.
They’d stood there. Watched. Didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Just let it all burn.
He remembered standing there, frozen as the pizza ovens collapsed behind him, the world around him melting like plastic under a magnifying glass.
Elliot had gotten everyone out. He remembered that. He remembered yelling, shoving people toward the exit, ignoring the burns on his own arms just to make sure nobody got left behind.
No one died.
But it still didn’t feel like a victory.
Because when he looked back, he could still see their eyes. Still see the flicker of the void in Noli’s grin, and 007n7 smirk.
They are mocking him.
It burn.
Still smell the smoke.
Still hear that laughter.
And he didn’t know why they had done it.
He didn’t understand.
And that made it worse.
The new pizza shop was rebuilt. It stood on the corner now, bigger, cleaner, with new floors and new signs and safety posters everywhere like stickers trying to cover a bullet hole.
But the shadows still hung over it.
At least for Elliot.
He walked slower as the building came into view. His feet dragged just a little. Not because he didn’t want to go in—he had to. This was still his job. He still had to clock in, mop the floors, take the orders, spin the dough, smile at the customers.
But that weight in his chest didn’t go away.
That something still felt wrong.
Like maybe he was walking straight back into a memory that hadn’t finished playing out.
He paused across the street from the shop, staring at the familiar red awning. The window was clean. The door was unlocked. The new manager had left him a message earlier about the soda machine needing restocking.
Everything was normal.
But Elliot stood there, unmoving, just for a second longer than usual.
And whispered to himself—
“I don’t think it’s over.”
The wind shifted gently around him. A few leaves scattered down the sidewalk.
And somewhere, in the back of his mind, he swore he could still hear that laugh.
Faint.
Almost forgotten.
But not gone.
Never gone.
Loud slap
“OUCH, stop it Elliot you have to forget the past”
“I gotta stop thinking about that,” he whispered. “That’s all in the past.”
But he didn’t walk any faster.
As the pizza sign came into view again, flickering a bit like it was trying to blink at him, Elliot realized his heart hadn’t stopped racing since breakfast.
The bell above the door chimed softly as Elliot stepped into the quiet pizzeria, still adjusting the red visor on his head. The faint scent of dough and tomato sauce from yesterday’s leftovers clung to the air like an old memory. The lights buzzed overhead. The floor tiles were cold beneath his sneakers. But even with all that stillness—there was a spark in Elliot’s eyes.
He stood in front of the dusty mirror by the lockers and gave himself a big thumbs-up.
“Alright! Time to be the best employee this town’s ever seen!” he told his reflection.
Never mind the fact that he was the only employee left at Builder Brother’s Pizza. After the whole… incident—you know, the fire, the chaos, the void-wielding freaks—nobody really wanted to come back. But Elliot did. Every single day.
His red uniform was clean and pressed, visor slightly crooked, black pants tucked neatly into his boots. He wore it like armor. The smile on his face? Like a shield.
“This one’s for you, Dad, little sis” he whispered, placing a photo of his family behind the register—a picture from when he was just a little Robloxian, his dad holding him and his sister up in front of the original Builder Brother’s Pizza sign. His mom was in that photo too… her hand on Elliot’s shoulder. But now, she was just a memory.
He inhaled deep. Then, he got to work.
⸻
8:01 AM — The Grand Opening of Another Pizza Day™
Elliot zoomed from counter to counter, sweeping the floors with dramatic flair, flipping dough in the air that nearly hit the ceiling fan, then ducking under it and catching it mid-spin.
“Hah!” he cheered for himself.
He wiped down the tables, checked the soda machine (still sticky), then wrestled with the ancient pizza oven like it owed him money.
“Come on, come on, don’t explode this time,” he muttered, flipping switches like he was defusing a bomb. The oven coughed, then roared to life. “YES! Pizza gods, bless me today!”
⸻
8:15 AM — First Customer:
A kid no older than five marched in with a crayon-scribbled coupon in his tiny hands and a trail of snack crumbs in his wake.
“I want the triangle pizza with no green things!!” he screamed immediately.
“Triangle pizza—coming right up! Hold the green doom!” Elliot beamed, saluting.
The toddler plopped into a booth and immediately spilled juice on himself. Elliot was there in seconds with napkins and a smile, kneeling like a knight in red and wiping the sticky battlefield.
“Pizza isn’t just food, little dude. It’s an adventure,” he said solemnly. The toddler gasped. Elliot gave him a wink.
⸻
8:43 AM — Second Customer:
Two teens shuffled in, all black hoodies and purple hair dye, barely speaking. One of them muttered, “I guess we’ll take… the dark sausage pizza.”
Elliot lit up. “Ah, the Goth Supreme! Excellent choice! Do you want the sauce in the shape of a broken heart or a spiral of endless despair?”
The girl blinked. “…The spiral.”
He nodded gravely. “Spiral of despair it is. Extra melted cheese of loneliness?”
“…Yeah.”
⸻
9:10 AM — Third Customer: The Grandpa with Strong Opinions
A bent old Robloxian came in with a cane, mumbling, “Back in my day, pizza was one flavor. Just cheese! None of these fancy… pineapple mushrooms fusion nonsense!”
“Good news, sir!” Elliot shouted, practically sliding up beside him with a tray. “We serve the exact same old-school cheese slice—crust just the way the 80s intended!”
The old man squinted. “Hmm… You got the folding kind?”
Elliot folded the slice with perfect New York precision and handed it over with a smile. The grandpa grunted, nodded once, and sat down with a sigh of approval.
⸻
9:37 AM — A Kid’s Birthday Party, Apparently?
A group of rowdy kids suddenly stormed in. Elliot wasn’t even told a birthday was happening, but within five minutes, he had slapped on a party hat, set up a table of extra breadsticks, and was spinning pizza boxes on one finger.
“WHO’S READY TO DO THE CHEESE SLIDE?” he shouted.
“YAAAY!!”
Elliot dove onto the checkered floor, sliding on his knees with a cheese tray balanced in each hand, spinning around like a pizza ninja.
⸻
10:30 AM — Back Behind the Counter
After serving, sweeping, singing “Happy Birthday” twice (once in reverse because a kid requested “creepy style”), Elliot slumped behind the counter with a tired, warm smile.
His fingers were covered in flour and pizza grease. A paper crown from the birthday leftovers sat crooked on his head.
He glanced at the “Employee of the Month” frame. It had his face in it, drawn in crayon. No one else worked there. But he still made it feel like a full team.
“All in a day’s work,” he whispered to himself.
The bell jingled again.
He stood up fast, still smiling. “Welcome to Builder Brother’s Pizza! What can I get started for you today?”
Because even after all the chaos, the fires, the villains in weird half-skull masks, and the creeping fear that something’s off…
…Elliot still had a job to do.
And he’d do it with a smile.
Even if no one else noticed it trembling just a little.
Elliot was panting behind the counter like he just ran a marathon inside a pizza oven. His face was flushed, his visor was crooked, and there was a suspicious flour handprint on his shirt that he didn’t have time to wipe off.
He had just finished making five pizzas at once, cleaned a spill, calmed a crying kid, restocked the cheese supply, and helped an elderly lady figure out the soda machine—all in the last thirty minutes. There was no one else working, of course. There never was. It was just him. And his pride.
As he leaned against the counter to breathe, the front door opened with a cheerful little ding!
“AH—!” Elliot flinched so hard he almost fell over the napkin dispenser.
“Whoa! Dude!” came a voice. “Didn’t mean to spook you!”
Elliot blinked rapidly, heart still racing. Standing in the doorway was a young guy with loose energy spilling out of him like a shaken soda can. Big headphones blinked with soft neon pulses around his ears, and a stylus spun between his fingers like he’d been fidgeting since the moment he was born.
“S-Sorry,” Elliot huffed, straightening up. “Didn’t see you come in. You, uh—okay? I mean—I mean, I hope I didn’t make things weird. I just got a little—”
The young guy raised both hands in peace, laughing. “You’re good! You look like you just sprinted through a pepperoni warzone. Respect.”
Elliot chuckled softly, adjusting his red visor. “Something like that.”
Wire—though he hadn’t introduced himself yet—glanced around the place with curious eyes. “Is it just you in here?”
Elliot nodded. “Always has been. It’s… sort of a one-man operation.”
“Dang,” Wire said, visibly impressed. “No wonder you look cooked. You’re like, what, twenty…?” His voice trailed off as he squinted, trying to guess.
“Twenty-nine,” Elliot said, and watched as Wire’s face morphed in real-time from playful to what.
“HUH?! Bro, I thought you were like—twenty-one max!”
Elliot blinked. “That’s… flattering. I guess.”
Wire scratched his neck awkwardly. “I mean, no offense! You just got that vibe. You know. The ‘woke up at noon, lives off cereal’ kinda vibe.”
“I’ve been awake since five,” Elliot replied flatly, trying not to sound like a disappointed dad.
“Man.” Wire let out a whistle. “That explains the energy. I respect the grind.”
Despite himself, Elliot smiled. “Thanks. What can I get started for you?”
Wire glanced up at the menu and pointed rapidly. “Lemme get a big combo. Like, family size. Two pepperoni, one cheese, one sausage-mushroom, and—uh—yeah, you got root beer?”
“I do,” Elliot said, scribbling it all down. “And you sure you’re eating all that yourself?”
“Yeah,” Wire grinned. “It’s been a long day. Got a lotta brain cells to feed.”
Elliot raised a brow but didn’t push. He disappeared into the back, and in a whirlwind of motion, sauce, and oven timers, the pizzas were boxed and steaming on the counter within fifteen minutes.
Wire dug into his pockets, pulling out a crumpled handful of bills and coins. He counted quickly, then frowned. “Ugh. Hold up. I’m like… thirty robux short.”
He looked up. “Lemme just put one back—”
Elliot shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. You’re good.”
Wire blinked. “Wait, really?”
Elliot gave a soft, tired grin. “Yeah. You hyped me up when I looked like I was gonna pass out. That earns a discount.”
Wire looked touched. “Dude. Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
For a moment, the two stood there. One quietly proud. The other quietly surprised.
“You know,” Wire said, picking up the boxes, “this place is kinda cool. Has that… real vibe. Old school. Heart. Like if a hug made pizza.”
Elliot snorted a laugh. “That’s the weirdest compliment I’ve ever gotten. Thanks.”
Wire laughed too. “You ever need an extra hand, lemme know. Not saying I know how to make a pizza, but I could totally clean a floor like a pro.”
Elliot raised a brow. “You got experience?”
“Pfft, nah. But how hard can it be? It’s like mopping a crime scene. Except with cheese.”
Elliot opened his mouth to question that, then closed it.
Wire winked and headed toward the door. “Keep it up, man. You’re killin’ it.”
And just like that, he was gone—boxes stacked high, humming some song only his headphones knew.
Elliot stood there for a moment, blinking. Then he turned back to the kitchen.
His stomach still hurt from the sprint earlier, and his arms felt like wet noodles… but his heart?
His heart felt lighter than it had in days.
“What a nice kid.”
___
The sound of a street sweeper hummed low as the city yawned under the foggy night. Somewhere tucked between rusted vents and flickering neon signs, a manhole creaked open.
Wire clambered out, arms full of food bags tied together with a twine loop, grease dripping off the side of one. His white sneakers hit the pavement with a splat, a fry slipping loose and tumbling into the gutter.
“Restock successful,” he mumbled, brushing crumbs off his sleeves. “Mission: fast food—cleared.”
He darted between cracked brick walls, weaving through the back alleys with a rhythm only he could keep. The other three were waiting—hidden in the recess of a broken subway stairwell, shadows curled under hoods and coats.
“Back in record time,” Wire grinned, tossing Beartrap a heavy sack that thudded like a body. “Try not to choke on the nuggets this time.”
Beartrap didn’t blink. He opened the sack, picked out a single nugget, and stared at it with the intensity of a sniper. Then he bit it—slow, chewing like it owed him money.
Cane, perched against the wall beside a busted vending machine, holding the pizza cheese with clean fingers and a watchful eye. His tall white hat somehow remained spotless despite the filth around them.
“You could’ve gone cleaner,” Cane muttered, inspecting the wrinkled wrapper.
Wire popped a fry into his mouth. “Yeah, well, the clean places don’t serve the ones with secret sauce.”
Echo stood apart, arms crossed. His headset buzzed softly as he monitored signals that didn’t show up on normal maps.
“No chatter on city lines. Whoever we’re tracking—he’s not using anything we can trace.”
Wire leaned back on the concrete railing. “That just means he’s getting nervous. Or smarter. Or both.”
Cane didn’t look up. “Or he knows we’re this close.”
A pause. The weight of their job lingered between steam vents and cold concrete.
Echo finally spoke, voice low. “We split again. Same radius. Quarter the grid. If he’s running, he won’t make it far.”
Beartrap grunted in agreement.
Wire finished his soda with a slurp. “Dibs on the east side. I like the lighting better.”
“Stick to the alleys,” Cane warned. “And don’t play with people this time.”
Wire mock-saluted and turned heel with a flick of his headphones, blue neon lights pulsing faintly. “No promises.”
.___•
The night was getting heavy.
Behind a crooked phone booth, lit only by the dying neon of a noodle sign, Caporegime Echo stood with his coat pulled tight.
Rain was threatening to fall. The clouds above churned like boiling smoke, and the city below didn’t notice.
A voice buzzed through his headset. Static. Another false lead.
He clicked it off. “Still no signal trace,” Echo said, voice quiet but sharp. “He’s moving again. Fast.”
Beside him, the younger wire Contract Hat Henchman leaned against the wall, tossing a coin in one hand. He looked out toward the city streets—eyes sharp, yet somehow still full of wonder. His headphones pulsed faint blue.
“We’ll find him,” the young henchman said. “I’ve been watching him long enough to know his move.”
“You talk like you admire him,” the beartrap replied, unimpressed.
The kid shrugged. “Hey, he got guts. We never win that prize from the boss’s game, y’know?”
There was no laughter. Just silence.
.
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.
The coin flipped. Heads.
“Lady Luck must be on my side tonight”
Somewhere, Chance had woken up.
.
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“You are reckless as always.”
A figure in a long blue coat stood in a dark alley holding an umbrella .
His soft fur icy in the night like a diamonds crown
A different pair of hands locked together—far away from alleyways and static signals.
A voice laughed under the nights, steps fast and full of mischief. Another figure stumbled beside him, breathless from running, yet somehow smiling under those black glasses too.
But that’s for later.
Right now, the hunt continued.
And the city… was holding its breath.
Chapter 5: A Toast to Trouble
Summary:
I got sick and write this in my dead bed.
Chapter Text
A different pair of hands locked together—far away from alleyways and static signals.
Laughter echoed through the nearly empty streets. The sun hadn’t fully warmed the pavement yet, but already, one figure was skipping ahead like the day was his alone. His boots clacked sharp against concrete, steps too quick to be nervous, too full of thrill to be safe.
“Tell me that wasn’t the best score of my life,” Chance said, flipping a coin high into the air, watching the sunlight catch the edge. His grin was wide enough to slice his face in half.
Another figure stumbled up beside him, smoother in movement, but not as breathless. Fancy. Regal. Tired.
iTrapped.
He wasn’t laughing. His hands were in his coat pockets. His crown tilted slightly under the brim of the alley’s shadows as they stepped through a side door of a forgotten bar tucked under a stairwell—his hideout, quiet and clean.
The inside smelled like dust and old sugar. Lights hung low, flickering. A piano in the corner hadn’t been touched in years. The shelves held nothing but old glasses and memories of deals that went quiet.
Chance flopped into one of the booths, coin still flicking between his fingers. “Nobody followed, right?”
“I made sure,” iTrapped said. His voice didn’t sound tired—but it felt it. Flat, smooth, carried like fog on marble. “Sit still for once. You act like they aren’t looking for you.”
“They always are,” Chance smirked, kicking his feet up. “That’s the fun, isn’t it?”
iTrapped didn’t respond right away. His eyes had drifted—not to the coin, but to the thing wrapped in cloth on Chance’s side. The prize. It wasn’t large. Could’ve been anything. But even the cloth looked like it weighed more than it should.
“You know,” iTrapped said slowly, “That wasn’t just any rigged game. That table was sacred. Even the dealer looked scared.”
Chance chuckled, leaning his head back against the booth. “I saw him blink. That was my sign.”
“It wasn’t a sign,” iTrapped said, voice almost amused. “It was fear.”
Chance turned the coin in his hand and threw it again. This time, it hit the table with a dull click. Heads.
“You should disappear,” iTrapped added, walking over to the shelf and grabbing a dusty glass. “Farther than here. Change your name. Bury that thing.”
“But then I’d miss you,” Chance winked.
iTrapped didn’t even glance his way. He poured something dark and uninviting into the glass. “You won their blood. You realize that, don’t you? That prize—it wasn’t for taking. It was for showing off. You think they’ll let it go?”
“I think…” Chance hummed, tapping his boot heel against the booth, “I’m not done flipping my luck.”
“That’s not luck.” iTrapped finally turned. He brought the drink over, setting it down with a gentle clink. “That’s a curse waiting to rip your throat out.”
Chance stared at the glass. Then picked it up. Swirled it around like a connoisseur, then downed it all in one reckless gulp. He slammed the empty cup down and laughed. “Still better than paying rent.”
iTrapped smiled. Not too wide. Not too obvious. Just enough to fake concern. “One of these days, your joke’s gonna be your eulogy.”
“And you’ll give the speech?” Chance asked with a half-bow from his seat.
“I’ll light a candle,” iTrapped said gently, “Maybe cry. Once.”
Chance laughed again, but his knee bounced a little. His fingers tightened on the coin before tossing it one more time.
Tails.
The laughter died just a little.
“You could’ve left it,” iTrapped said, sitting across from him now. The distance between them was small. The air felt colder.
“But I didn’t.”
A long silence stretched between them.
Then Chance pulled out a small roll of cash from his coat and flicked it across the table.
“For the ride. I’m heading out. Gotta stretch my luck in another direction.”
iTrapped caught the cash, not even glancing at the amount. “How generous.”
Chance smiled. “You always like when I spoil you.”
“I do,” iTrapped said with that same soft, amused voice. “Makes pretending easier.”
Chance didn’t hear that part. He was already on his feet, cloak swishing behind him, coin in hand, mouth grinning like a man who thought he could beat gravity.
“Don’t die too quick,” iTrapped added as he watched him go.
Chance lifted the coin without looking back. “No promises.”
The door shut with a clatter. The light swung gently overhead.
iTrapped stayed in his seat, holding the roll of cash, his eyes slowly drifting toward the bar’s dusty mirror. His reflection didn’t smile.
But he whispered, almost fondly, “Let the dice fall hard.”
He tucked the money away.
And never looked back.
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— Elliot —
It had been a week since Chance vanished.
Not a he’s busy kind of missing. Not even the radio silence means danger kind he used to joke about.
No—this was intentional.
A slow burn of being ignored, edged with the sting of seeing that final message marked read with no response.
Elliot hadn’t said anything dramatic. Just a simple message:
“Let me know you’re okay, yeah?”
It wasn’t much. But it was everything.
He’d left the phone on silent since then. Every buzz felt like it might be him, but it never was. The ache had settled into Elliot’s bones. It followed him through the shop, into the cold walk-in fridge, even home in his coat pocket. He didn’t even check notifications anymore. Just stared.
“One of those weeks, huh?” he’d muttered to himself earlier, while folding napkins. He wasn’t talking to anyone.
The bell over the shop door rang with a little ding, and instinctively, Elliot stood up straighter.
“Yo! Pizza legend! You alive back there?”
Elliot blinked. The tension in his shoulders didn’t go away, but it softened. A familiar burst of chaotic energy had just entered his world again.
Wire.
The youngest regular. The only person who still came to his shop like nothing strange was happening. Still bounced in with that wide smile and shiny headphones flashing soft blue lights that matched nothing else he wore.
“Extra mushrooms. No onions. I can smell it already,” Wire declared, tapping a rhythm on the counter like a kid who couldn’t sit still in church.
Elliot smiled despite himself. “Supreme with the weirdest specs on the planet,” he said. “Coming right up.”
“Don’t knock it till you try it, man!”
As Elliot turned to grab the box, Wire continued babbling—about some bug in a game, or a playlist that slapped harder than the last one. The kid always talked in fast-forward, and Elliot found himself laughing once or twice, shaking off the fog that had clouded him all morning.
It felt good to laugh. He hadn’t realized how much he missed it.
And yet—he glanced toward his phone on the counter, face-down and cold. Wire didn’t notice. The young man leaned across the counter now, animatedly gesturing about how pepperoni was overrated and “chewy in a weird way.”
Elliot almost said it out loud. Have you seen him? Have you heard anything?
But that would be weird, right? Wire was just some regular with too much time and too little filter. Not connected.
Definitely not involved in anything bigger.
Right? ⸻
— Chance —
The taxi was quiet.
Too quiet.
Chance leaned back against the window, letting the city roll by like scenery in a dream. His legs were crossed, foot tapping faintly in rhythm. One hand spun his coin with casual flicks, the soft click of metal bouncing off his knuckles. A kind of nervous habit, if he were honest.
He flipped it. Heads.
Again. Tails.
Again. Heads.
He smirked faintly and took out his phone, scrolling lazily through messages.
There it was. Elliot’s last text.
“Let me know you’re okay, yeah?”
Chance stared at it for a moment. His thumb hovered.
The truth was, he missed the kid. More than he expected to. He liked the way Elliot cared, even if it was in quiet texts and awkward silences. Chance didn’t get much of that kind of thing—no one had ever waited on him before.
He thought about writing something back. Just one word.
Soon.
He didn’t get the chance.
The car was moving too smoothly. Too steadily. Like it wasn’t dealing with potholes or traffic. The driver hadn’t turned on the radio. He hadn’t asked for directions. He hadn’t said a single damn word since Chance gave the location.
Builder’s Point. Elliot’s pizza shop.
A quiet visit. Nothing heavy. Just a hello. Maybe a smile. Maybe—hell, maybe even a hug, if the guy wasn’t still mad.
But something felt wrong.
Chance’s eyes shifted to the rearview mirror.
The angle was off—tilted just enough so he couldn’t see the driver’s eyes. That wasn’t normal. Neither were the gloves. Thick, black, tactical. Who wore gloves like that in a cab? Or the cologne. Sharp. Militaristic.
Then the voice came.
“So… visiting someone important?”
Flat. Uninterested. Familiar.
And wrong.
Chance froze. Only for a second. But his smile curled up like armor, a little too bright.
“I might be,” he said, flipping his coin again. It landed on his palm. Tails. “Might be just hungry.”
No response.
The driver’s head didn’t move much. But it moved enough. Too slow. Too smooth.
Chance looked out the window again, then forward, then at the hands on the wheel.
The fingers were too steady.
Beartrap.
He remembered that stillness. That trained composure. The man barely blinked, barely spoke, but when he showed up, people disappeared.
Chance swallowed a laugh.
This was definitely not a normal taxi.
So he leaned back, relaxing into the seat like he didn’t notice a thing. “Well,” he said cheerfully, pocketing his coin, “at least the meter’s not running.”
He stared out the window with a soft smile. But his pulse was ticking just beneath the surface. This wasn’t a ride to visit someone.
This was a message.
And somewhere in that shop, with a phone still waiting, was the only person who didn’t know how deep this ran.
Chapter 6: Redirection(warning)
Summary:
Warning: violence, blood.
Chapter Text
Inside the Car
Chance slumped low in the passenger seat, legs stretched, arm draped lazily across his stomach like he hadn’t just been dragged from a near-death situation two nights ago. His fingers tapped lightly against his leg, slow at first, then quicker.
Beartrap drove without speaking. The engine hummed low. The city passed them by in broken flickers of streetlight.
“…So where the hell is everyone?” Chance finally asked, voice casual.
Beartrap didn’t look over. “Echo and Cane are where they need to be.”
Chance turned his head, eyes narrowing.
“And Wire?”
A long pause.
Beartrap smirked. “Important duty.”
Chance snorted. “Lemme guess. Spying? Killing? Shopping?”
“…Lunch.”
Chance’s head tilted slowly. “You’re shitting me.”
Beartrap shrugged, one hand on the wheel. “He’s picking it up.”
Chance sighed, rubbing his eyes. “We’re really sending the human flamethrower to get sandwiches…”
But then Beartrap spoke again—flat, final.
“And once we meet up with Cane and Echo…Mafioso will be waiting to see you.”
Chance went still.
His body language changed in an instant.
His foot tapped faster. His jaw clenched. A muscle twitched near his eye. His hand curled into a fist against his thigh.
Beartrap caught all of it through the rearview mirror. Quiet. Calculating.
“You nervous, buddy?” Beartrap said. “You should be.”
No response.
Then:
“Fuck him,” Chance muttered.
Beartrap’s eyes flicked to the mirror again. “What?”
“I said—” Chance suddenly grinned, wide, teeth showing, “—fuck Mafioso.”
And then he lunged.
Beartrap didn’t even have time to curse before an elbow slammed against the side of his headrest.
The car jerked violently.
“Son of a—!”
Beartrap twisted the wheel just in time to avoid slamming into a parked van, tires screaming against asphalt.
Chance was already halfway over the center console, hands grabbing for Beartrap’s gun as it left the holster.
Beartrap wrestled with one hand while steering with the other.
The gun went off.
BANG!
The bullet tore through the seat inches from Chance’s spine, splintering leather and stuffing. Blood sprayed. A graze.
Chance didn’t care.
He laughed.
That loud, cracked, gleeful kind of laugh.
“Oh man,” Chance gasped, “I forgot how fun this is!”
Beartrap looked at him like he was seeing a ghost. “You’ve lost your fucking mind—”
Chance slammed a knee into his ribs, twisting the gun barrel toward the roof.
BANG!
The windshield cracked. The car swerved into incoming traffic—horns screamed, lights blinding.
Beartrap reached across, hand grabbing Chance by the throat, shoving him back against the window.
“You little SHIT—!”
But Chance was still grinning through the choke, even as his neck strained.
He jammed his fingers into Beartrap’s eye.
“ARGH!”
Beartrap let go just enough.
Chance yanked the wheel—
—and the car screamed across the street, mounted the sidewalk, and slammed through a chain-link fence into an empty lot.
The vehicle skidded across dirt and concrete chunks, sparks flying as it crunched through trash bins and old metal scraps.
Both men crashed against the dashboard, blood smearing across the cracked windshield.
Beartrap tried to recover—
—but Chance was already on him again, this time behind him, having climbed into the back seat during the chaos.
He yanked Beartrap’s collar and pulled him straight backward over the seat into the back with a vicious snap of the belt.
The two men landed in a heap, fists flying.
Beartrap punched him across the jaw. Chance spit blood and grinned wider.
“You’re not gonna make me cry, old man—!”
“You’re insane!” Beartrap growled.
They thrashed, bruised, covered in glass and dust, the car engine still rattling faintly.
Beartrap got his hand around Chance’s throat again—but this time, Chance grabbed something from the floor.
A tire iron.
He swung.
CLANG!
It slammed against Beartrap’s shoulder. A bone popped.
“AAUGH!”
Beartrap rolled away.
Chance, panting, bleeding from the mouth, wiped his lips with the back of his hand and laughed again, wheezing through his teeth.
“You think I give a shit about dying anymore?” he said, voice hoarse, eyes wild. “I’ve been dying since the day I signed up with this goddamn life of a prize….. You think I’m afraid of Mafioso?”
He spat blood on the car floor. “He’s just another boogeyman in a suit.”
Beartrap stared at him—silent. His breathing heavy. Disbelief in his eyes.
“You are a sicko…”
Chance just gave him a look. One you couldn’t quite place. Not broken, not brave—just somewhere in between. Like a kid that had seen too much and decided to laugh at the worst parts.
“Let dance.”
Meanwhile – Across the Street
Cane lowered the binoculars.
“The car’s off-route,” he muttered. “Way the hell off.”
Echo adjusted his jacket. “Looks like Beartrap’s losing control.”
“Of course he is,” Cane snapped. “We send a psychopath to babysit another psychopath. What did we think would happen?!”
He turned to the rooftop behind them where a figure sat calmly in a folding chair.
Mafioso.
Still, silent, pale suit pristine. His voice was like cold glass when he finally spoke.
“They’re going off course, yes. But look where they’re headed.”
Cane’s eyes flicked to the GPS tracker. “That’s…near the pizza place.”
Mafioso smiled thinly. “Then perhaps it’s time for a…happy coincidence.”
Cane frowned. “You want me to call Wire?”
“Call him,” Mafioso whispered. “Let’s see if our little firebug can…greet the delivery.”
Cane hesitated. “You think he’ll be ready?”
Mafioso’s grin stretched too far. “Does it matter?”
Chapter 7: Burn Rubber and Bad Luck ‼️
Summary:
(Violence, blood, a lot of blood ) you have been warn.
Chapter Text
The bell above the pizza shop door jingled, then slammed shut again as a gust of wind swept through Builder Brother’s Pizza. Elliot flinched, glancing up from the oven where a cheese pizza sizzled—burnt at the edges again. He hadn’t been able to focus much lately.
He rubbed his temple and muttered, “Okay, Elliot. Don’t think about it. He’s probably just…busy. Or hiding. Or dead. But probably not dead.”
The silence from his phone was its own brand of violence. Still no messages. The last one still marked as “read.” No response. No emoji. No explanation. Nothing.
He didn’t check it. He refused to.
With a sigh sharp enough to cut dough, Elliot shoved his phone under the register and groaned, “God, I’m so pathetic.”
“HEYYYY!” a familiar voice rang out across the counter.
He startled. “Jesus, Wire.”
The youngest of the crew—at least in looks and attitude—bounced up to the counter, his headphones blinking like a walking rave. He held up a menu dramatically.
“My man! I’m here for you if you need—but also I want soda right now. A lotta soda.”
Elliot exhaled a small laugh despite the knot in his chest. “If you drink all the syrup again, I swear I’m banning you.”
“You’d never,” Wire said with a stupidly big grin.
And maybe Elliot wouldn’t.
He boxed up the pizza. Tried not to look like he was glancing toward the register. Tried not to wonder if maybe Chance changed his mind. Or got scared. Or got hurt. God, what if—
Wire held the box in one hand and, in the other, slyly checked his phone behind his hoodie sleeve.
One new call. From Cane.
Wire didn’t blink. But something in his eyes hardened.
“You alright?” Elliot asked, seeing something strange pass through the kid’s expression.
Wire blinked, then lit up again like a switch was flipped. “Oh yeah. Just hungry. See you next time, Boss!”
He practically danced out the door.
Elliot stared after him, the hairs on the back of his neck crawling. Something—he didn’t know what was shifting. Like he was standing in the eye of a storm that hadn’t hit yet.
His finger lingering on the phone.
But it was coming.
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Rubber screamed against the concrete.
Chance’s elbow smashed into Beartrap’s face, sending his head slamming into the window with a loud, splintering CRACK. Blood smudged across the glass like a bad smear of paint. The car fishtailed under them, headlights swinging wildly into the storm drain walls as chaos owned the wheel.
Chance didn’t stop to think. Thinking was for dead men.
He ducked as Beartrap came back hard with a punch that could’ve unhinged a damn door. The air trembled with the force behind it. Chance’s forearm caught it—barely—his bones singing under the pressure. “Fuck—” he hissed, but the grin never left his mouth. It widened, split across his face, crooked and wild. Blood on his teeth.
“You really want this seat next to the boss, huh?” Chance laughed, breath ragged but full of thrill. “You gotta earn it, sweetheart!”
The pain in beartrap shoulder still painful, as the joint went sideways with a wet snap, and Beartrap still didn’t go down. The man was an animal.
Beartrap roared, spitting blood, and yanked his gun out with the good hand. “I liked you better when you shut the fuck up.”
BLAM!
The first shot tore into the leather seat where Chance’s head had been a half-second earlier. Chance rolled across the back seats, one hand gripping the roof handle, twisting his torso around and pulling his own gun from inside his jacket suit.
A revolver. Six shots. No more, no less.
BLAM!
BLAM!
Two clean shots at Beartrap’s arm and leg. He ducked behind the passenger seat, gun still hot, muttering, “Three left…”
But Beartrap was already counting.
“Two more,” Beartrap muttered low, almost to himself, wiping blood from his lip with the back of his sleeve. “You fired four. Just two left in the drum. You’re gonna click empty next, you smug shit.”
Chance grinned wider. “You counting for me? Damn, you do care.”
Then the two lunged at each other again. No pause. No break. Beartrap’s teeth were clenched like a pit bull’s. He threw a knee into Chance’s ribs hard enough to make him bark out a cough, but Chance twisted with it, wrapping his legs around the man’s waist, slamming his elbow again and again into Beartrap’s neck and shoulder.
Gun barrels scraped against each other mid-swing. Both fighting over each other’s wrists, fists, whatever wasn’t broken or bleeding.
Beartrap finally landed a shot.
Right into Chance’s side.
The revolver boomed in the tiny metal coffin of a car.
Chance hissed. “FUCK—shit, that burns—”
Still, he laughed. He laughed.
His body slumped for a second, blood seeping through his coat, but the grin stayed frozen, almost unhinged. Beartrap blinked, disturbed.
“You’re cracked, man,” Beartrap growled.
Chance coughed, then spat blood. “Maybe. But you missed anything vital. Which means—”
He slammed the revolver’s barrel into Beartrap’s face, knocking a tooth loose, and then kicked him backward with both feet.
Neither of them were driving anymore.
The wheel jerked violently. The car spun like a rabid animal on the wet bridge pavement, scraping against the metal rails.
Lights flared.
The city roared.
Beartrap glanced up just in time to see the edge—the guardrail ripped open by the front bumper. Concrete barrier shattered as the car skidded toward the drop.
Chance didn’t think.
He grabbed Beartrap by the collar and kicked the window out.
“Out—NOW!”
They both launched themselves through the shattered glass, landing hard on the cold pavement as the car pitched over the side—flipping, twisting, and finally crashing into the shallow canal below with a violent, screeching splash.
Chance rolled once.
Twice.
Then lay still, face up, bleeding and smiling at the sky like it had told him a great secret.
Beartrap groaned nearby, coughing, dragging himself up on one elbow, blood coating the side of his face like warpaint. His dislocated shoulder was a grotesque shape, and he wasn’t even blinking right.
But they were alive.
.
But who to say is it fair for a tie?
The world rang sharp and thin, the metal tang of blood curling on Chance’s tongue.
The crash still echoed, twisted metal screeching across the bridge. Steam hissed from the broken engine like the car itself was screaming. The world tilted sideways as Chance stood, one boot grinding into the gravel, the other sliding back for balance.
Beartrap lay nearby, groaning—his leg bent wrong, red soaking through his jeans.
Chance’s revolver pointed steady as stone at his chest.
“…One bullet left,” Chance muttered, chest heaving with laughter between pained exhales. He pulled his jacket off his shoulder, revealing the fresh, blooming bruises and blood from the earlier fight. His lip was split. One eye already swelling shut.
Beartrap spat, dragging himself up against the busted side of the car. “You gonna shoot me now? This how you treat old friends?”
“You weren’t ever my friend,” Chance muttered, turning his face aside just for a second. Not for regret—just tired. “You were just another piece of the fucked-up board.”
“You’re hesitating,” Beartrap said, voice hoarse. “Why?”
“Because someone once told me,” Chance said, recalling Itrapped’s cold words like a whisper through his skull, “If something’s in your way, make sure it stays dead.”
He raised the revolver.
The barrel clicked as Chance exhaled, finger tightening—
—WHAP!
A pizza box slammed full-force into his face.
Chance reeled back, the box tumbling to the ground with cheese still steaming inside.
“What the fu—”
Before he could curse, a blur shot forward. Wire. That too-young face, always grinning, was now twisted with wild fury. He wasn’t smiling this time.
“You’re not touching him!” Wire snarled, gripping a broken chair leg like a bat.
Crack.
Wood smashed into Chance’s ribs, spinning him sideways. He stumbled, coughing, and caught himself on one knee.
He looked up, slow.
“Kid…” he wheezed, brushing blood from his mouth. “…You brought me a pizza?”
“Shut up!” Wire screamed and rushed in again.
“Get away from him!!” Wire screamed, fury bursting out of him like a live wire.
Chance barely had time to react before CRACK—the stick slammed into his ribs.
Chance gasped as air rushed out of him. He stumbled again, coughing blood.
Wire didn’t stop.
WHACK. SMACK. CRACK.
Each hit landed with purpose. Fast. Clean. Desperate.
He slammed the stick across Chance’s shoulder, then swung upward into his jaw.
Chance’s sunglasses flew off. His head snapped back. Blood flew from his mouth.
Beartrap tried to move, dragging himself forward. “Wire! Back off! He’s baiting you!”
But Wire didn’t listen.
He swung again—Chance blocked this time, grabbing the stick with one hand.
“You got guts, kid,” Chance growled. “I’ll give you that.”
Wire yanked the stick back and jabbed forward, catching Chance in the side again.
But Chance was laughing now.
Really laughing. A wild, high laugh, like he didn’t feel pain anymore, like he liked it.
“Danger’s the only thing that makes me feel alive!” Chance roared.
He lunged.
Wire dodged left—too slow.
Chance headbutted him, breaking the bridge of his nose.
Wire stumbled, the stick falling from his hands, blood pouring down his face.
Chance pounced, punching him across the jaw, then kneeing him in the gut. Wire coughed, trying to catch his breath—then elbowed Chance hard in the temple.
Both stumbled apart.
Beartrap tried to crawl closer, dragging himself with one arm. “Wire—don’t stop fighting!”
Wire groaned, head swimming. But he picked up the stick again, spit blood to the side, and looked up at Chance through blurred eyes.
“I’m not scared of you,” he growled.
Chance wiped blood from his chin, sneering. “You should be.”
Chance stood tall again, staggering, swaying like a drunk but with murder in his bones. His revolver lifted—empty.
Click.
The revolver lifted again.
Empty.
Then—Chance grinned and opened his mouth, letting one hidden bullet roll out from under his tongue.
He was hiding the 7 bullet in his mouth the whole time.
That psycho motherfuck-
“Lady luck’s on my side tonight, sweetheart,” Chance grinned wide, voice dark as thunder.
BANG.
The gun cracked through the still air, and Wire folded, the bullet sinking into his stomach with a choked cry. His legs crumpled under him. He hit the ground hard, one hand gripping his side, blood blooming between his fingers like a flower.
“Shit!” Beartrap roared, dragging himself uselessly across the bridge. “Wire!”
Chance stood over them, the revolver limp in one hand.
Wire’s eyes were wide. He was still breathing—but just barely.
“Could’ve walked away,” Chance muttered, crouching. His other hand wrapped around a heavy rock, smooth and cold.
“Don’t—!” Beartrap screamed. “You’ll fucking kill him!”
Chance’s eyes flickered toward him. His voice dropped into something empty. “Maybe I should. One less hound on my back.”
He raised the rock.
Wire looked up at him, blood pooling under his body, eyes dazed. Terrified.
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to.
The rock came down.
CRACK.
Blood spattered the broken asphalt. Wire’s head jerked to the side and he went still.
Beartrap let out a strangled sound. “WIRE!”
CRACK.
The rock hit again. And again.
Then—silence.
Wire didn’t move. He wasn’t dead, not yet. But he wasn’t going to get up any time soon.
Chance stood over him, panting. The rock dropped from his fingers.
His face—the part you could see through the shattered sunglasses—looked cracked in two. A half-mad grin and half-ghost. And something behind it—guilt? Regret? Maybe fear.
He looked off the bridge. A car was parked far away. Not just any car.
Mafioso’s car.
Chance froze. His body coiled, and then—without another word, he turned and bolted.
He ran off the bridge, boots pounding hard, limping slightly from his own wounds, blood trailing behind him. He didn’t look back.
Beartrap just knelt over Wire, clutching his shoulder, breath trembling. “Damn it, kid…”
The night hung overhead. The bridge groaned. And a shadow loomed from that black car in the distance.
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The dust was still settling. Shattered glass littered the roadside like jagged snowflakes, glinting beneath the bridge’s flickering lights. The car, now a smoking wreck pressed halfway through the guard rail, hissed and popped like a ticking bomb waiting for someone to breathe wrong.
Cane’s boots skidded hard against the pavement as he rounded the wreck, Echo just behind him. Neither of them knew what they expected to find—but it wasn’t this.
Beartrap was hunched over near the edge, blood leaking down his leg, his massive body twitching from pain. His hand was pressing against Wire’s stomach, trying to slow the bleeding. The kid lay unconscious, groaning faintly, his jacket soaked through with red.
“Don’t just stand there—!” Beartrap’s gruff voice cracked, raw with desperation. “Get him help! Now!”
Echo didn’t argue. He was already moving, tapping his headset.
Cane’s brows furrowed. He’d never heard Beartrap like this before. The man had taken bullets before without blinking—but now? Now, he sounded scared.
Mafioso arrived last.
Silent.
Dignified.
He stepped out of the backup car, adjusted his cufflinks, and took one long look at the scene. Broken bones. A wrecked vehicle. Blood on the cement. And the one they needed to catch… gone.
“Chance,” he said quietly, brushing glass from his sleeve like it was dust. “Again, he escapes.”
His gaze traveled down to Wire’s limp form, then to Beartrap’s destroyed leg. The smile didn’t vanish—but it changed. Tightened. Less pleased. More… amused.
“Call an ambulance,” Mafioso said, snapping his fingers to a boy standing at the back of the car.
The boy fumbled with his phone, dialing with trembling fingers.
As the scene quieted and the sirens started to echo in the distance, Mafioso’s eyes caught something—something that shouldn’t have been left behind.
A broken phone, screen shattered like a spiderweb.
Still vibrating.
Still ringing.
He crouched beside it slowly, like someone picking a rare flower.
The caller ID flickered on the screen:
Elliot 🍕💛
He tilted his head, reading it aloud with amused curiosity.
“Elliot,” he repeated softly, tasting the name like it was wine. “Someone important to our runaway gambler, hm?”
He stood, holding the phone delicately between two fingers like it might bite. The shattered glass made the name barely legible now, but he could still see that little heart emoji at the end. That cute little detail.
Something personal.
Too personal.
“Chance…” he said under his breath, his grin curling dark. “You really should’ve kept this close.”
He looked out at the city skyline beyond the bridge, and the wind caught the edges of his coat.
“Now I wonder,” he mused aloud, letting the phone fall back into his palm. “If your dear Elliot… bleeds the same color as you.”
The phone stopped ringing.
Chapter Text
Elliot (nervously holding a microphone):
Uh… hey everyone… so, bad news… um… we’re being told the story’s gotta stop here.
scratches head
Apparently the budget ran out because someone—looks offstage—used it all on “casino aesthetic lighting” and like… seven fog machines.
[Chance slowly steps into the spotlight, sipping a soda with sunglasses on indoors.]
Chance (shrugging):
Look, in my defense, the fog really tied the vibe together.
Besides, who needs a full story arc when you got charisma and vibes, baby?
Elliot (looking at the script):
It says here we were supposed to have a “dramatic rooftop showdown” next… with explosions?
Chance (peeking at the script):
Yeah, no way that’s happening. I asked the director if we could at least get cardboard cutouts—he gave me a broom and told me to act.
[A dark figure steps out from the shadows. It’s Mafioso. He’s still wearing his creepy smile.]
Mafioso:
It’s true. The money’s gone. I confiscated it.
Elliot:
Wait, what?? You stole the budget?!
Mafioso (shrugging):
Family business, kid. No hard feelings.
Chance (grinning):
Honestly? Respect.
Elliot:
So… what now?
Mafioso (pulls out a folded paper):
We read this final line together. It’s in the script. Very emotional.
[They all gather and read awkwardly off the same page.]
All Three (flatly):
“Thank you for watching. The story may end here, but the memories… they’ll respawn in your heart.”
[Beat. Silence. Then…]
Chance (breaking character):
Who wrote this? This is corny as hell.
Mafioso:
I like it.
Elliot (wiping an imaginary tear):
…I felt that.
[They bow dramatically to the audience. Stage lights flicker and fade out with the sound of a broken cash register and distant fog machine hissing.]
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Thank you for enjoying the story..everyone.
THE END…
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Notes:
Just joking AHAH
Chapter 9: The Name on the Screen.
Summary:
I got sick but hi
Chapter Text
The call ended with a dull click.
No voice. No response. Just the silence that always came after.
Elliot sighed as he lowered the phone from his ear, staring down at the screen as it dimmed—
Name still glowing faintly before fading:
🎲 Dummy 🎲
It was Chance’s nickname. A little joke between them.
Because no matter how chaotic Chance acted, to Elliot… he was just a dummy who got himself into messes and laughed through them like it was a game with some half affectionate.
The silence of the pizza place settled around him like a blanket. Fluorescent lights buzzing above. The mop in his hands left a trail of water as he slowly swept across the tile. The chairs were all up, ovens off. Another long night. Another night with no answers.
Chance hadn’t replied in days. No texts. No calls back.
Elliot tried not to panic. People ghosted. Got busy.
But Chance wasn’t like that—not to him.
Chance never went completely silent like that. He was loud, impulsive, always had some snappy remark ready—especially for Elliot. And even when he was in trouble, he cracked a joke before asking for help. That was just… him.
But this?
This wasn’t him.
Elliot stood still in the pizza shop for a long moment, phone still loose in his hand, mop dripping quietly on the tile floor behind him. Outside, it was already dark. Neon from the shop’s sign buzzed quietly in the windows, painting the chairs and counters in a soft red glow.
Then his phone buzzed again.
His heart skipped.
📲 Incoming Call – Dummy
He picked it up fast, faster than he meant to—like it might vanish if he took too long.
“Hello?? Chance?”
His voice came out shakier than he wanted.
But the line was… wrong.
Too quiet.
Not silent, but wrong.
There was breathing.
Low, slow, steady. Not ragged. Not panicked. Just watching.
Elliot’s spine tingled.
He tried again. “Chance? Are you okay? What happened? Talk to me, please…”
Still no answer.
Just that same breathing. Like the phone was alive, but the person holding it wasn’t going to speak.
“…This isn’t funny,” Elliot whispered, more to himself than anything. “This isn’t like you…”
A whisper of movement—cloth brushing, maybe someone shifting their grip.
He almost thought he heard… chuckling? No, maybe not. Maybe his ears were just panicking.
And then—click.
The call ended.
Elliot stood frozen, phone pressed to his ear long after the line went dead. His hands felt colder than they should’ve. The shop was warm, but the inside of his chest suddenly wasn’t.
Something was wrong.
He knew it.
And that second call… why would Chance call back and not say anything?
Unless it wasn’t him?
No
It must be him
Right ?
Elliot’s fingers tightened around the phone.
No texts. No updates. That was already bad. But now—creepy silent phone calls?
That wasn’t Chance.
That wasn’t his friend.
Something had happened.
He stood tall, tossed the mop to the corner without even rinsing it, and locked up the shop in a rush. He grabbed his red helmet off the hook and jogged out to his motorcycle, heart pounding harder now.
Maybe it was just paranoia.
Maybe Chance was pulling some elaborate prank.
But deep down, Elliot knew—
Chance might be a dumbass, but he never ignored him like this.
“You gonna give me a heart attack again-“
⸻
The road ahead blurred in streaks of headlight and shadow. The city wasn’t loud tonight. Just quiet enough to make the wind feel heavier.
Elliot’s bike hummed under him as he passed through the familiar turns of his delivery route. Past empty convenience stores. Past the donut place they used to stop at after late shifts. Past the dark alleys where Chance liked to joke he “left pieces of his soul.”
And then—
Flashing lights ahead.
He slowed.
Pulled to the side.
Killed the engine.
A crowd of police.
Caution tape flapping.
One car totaled—completely bent in, front end smashed like it had hit something head-on or exploded from inside. Glass spread like stars across the road. A faint haze of smoke still hung in the air.
Elliot removed his helmet slowly and move close toward the mess, heart heavy in his chest.
Two officers stood near the wreck, talking low. Elliot paused just out of sight behind a road sign, listening.
“…Wasn’t just a crash. Witness said one car was chasing on purpose or hit the wrong way when being chase, and then they both swerved off. Looked like someone got thrown out during the fight.”
“…Fight in the car?”
“Yeah. Like full-on struggle. Blood’s everywhere. Might’ve been gang-related, not sure yet. Whoever walked away left fast.”
Elliot’s throat tightened.
He didn’t know who had been hurt, but… a voice in the back of his mind whispered something he didn’t want to hear.
What if it was him?
He took a few steps closer, boots crunching on broken glass. The smell of burnt metal and rubber stung his nose. A few civilians were still there, murmuring to each other, and one of them looked up at Elliot.
“Hey, you okay, kid?”
Elliot blinked.
He nodded quickly. “Y-Yeah. I just… I thought maybe someone I knew—”
He couldn’t finish the sentence.
He didn’t know it was Chance. He didn’t want it to be Chance.
But why did this feel like something he would’ve been caught in?
The scene was starting to clear out. Officers taking photos. One man rolled out yellow cones to mark a strange pattern of blood dots—like someone limped far, then was gone.
No body.
No final answer.
Just a question burned into the pavement.
Elliot stood there for a long time.
The wind tugged gently at the sleeves of his uniform.
Behind him, his motorcycle hummed faintly as the cooling engine ticked.
Then, at last, he turned away.
Helmet on. Kickstand up.
He didn’t go home right away.
He drove around the city once.
Past the old casino where the lights never turned back on. Past the alley where Chance once waited for him, flipping a coin and saying “You’re late, Ellie-boy.”
But no sign of him now.
Just that one call. That one missed voice.
That one name on the screen that he didn’t want to disappear.
“Dummy.”
How many call he did this night?
So many
Waiting
And tonight had been nothing but silence.
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Click.
Chapter 10: Dead Signal
Summary:
I hit myself with a car
Chapter Text
Buzzzzz
The street lights flickered as Elliot sped through the city, his red helmet glinting like a beacon in the dark. It was past midnight now, but sleep was the last thing on his mind. His tires cut sharp through the empty roads, neon signs flashing over his face—Open 24 Hrs, Laundry, Pawn Shop, Missing Posters. Too many faces, too many stories. But only one name haunted his thoughts right now.
Chance.
Or as his phone still said:
🎲 Dummy 🎲
That dumb contact name had been showing up just to read the message . And now, it mocked Elliot like a bad joke.
He checked again.
No new messages.
He’d already texted a dozen times:
• Where are you?
• Just say anything.
• This isn’t funny.
• Please reply.
The “Read” mark was there under a few of them. Read at 1:00 am. That’s what it said.
But not a single reply.
Not even a meme. Not even a “lol shut up.” Just the quiet, miserable blue ticks staring back at him like ghosts.
“Come on, Chance…” Elliot muttered to himself, pulling over beside a broken vending machine. “If you’re alive enough to read it, you’re alive enough to say something back.”
The city hummed around him.
He opened the call log. His finger hovered over the contact.
“Alright, one more time, dummy,” he whispered, trying to make light of it. “If I hear your dumb laugh, I swear I’m gonna punch you and cry.”
He pressed Call.
The phone rang once… twice… and then—
Click.
Connected.
His heart jumped.
“…Hello??”
No voice.
Just breathing.
Again.
Same as before. Steady, low, just like someone was listening and didn’t care to answer.
“…If this is you, Chance, I swear—this joke isn’t funny anymore,” Elliot said, voice wavering. “I’m getting really close to calling the cops, and you know how much I hate paperwork.”
A soft sound came through. A slight, noise or wait…… or was that a chuckle?
“Are you laughing at me?!”
Now Elliot was half shouting. “Dude, seriously! You’re hiding out somewhere reading my messages like I’m your ex and I’m NOT DEALING WITH THAT ENERGY RIGHT NOW.”
More breathing.
Then—
Click.
Disconnected.
“…Great.” Elliot stared at the screen. “You ghosted me like I’m some kind of side character in your villain arc.”
He leaned back against the vending machine, hands dragging down his face.
Maybe it was just a prank. Maybe this was Chance’s messed-up idea of fun.
But something was off. Really off.
And the read messages just made it worse.
He lifted the phone again. This time, his thumb hovered over a different number.
911.
“I’ll just tell them someone might be missing,” he whispered. “Just a welfare check. That’s all. Just in case.”
But he paused.
Would the cops even take it seriously? What if they said, “He’s an adult, he can vanish if he wants to”?
And what if Chance was really fine, just being a jackass? Elliot didn’t want to get him dragged into legal trouble over being dumb and cryptic.
Still…
He did read the texts.
He did pick up once.
That meant something, right?
Elliot sighed and ran a hand through his hair, pacing.
“Alright. Screw it,” he muttered.
He tapped the number.
Calling emergency services…
It rang.
One.
Two.
Three.
Then—someone picked up.
“911, what’s your emergency?”
Elliot opened his mouth.
“I need to report a—”
BANG.
A gunshot ripped through the night like thunder.
The phone slipped from his hand.
Everything froze.
His heart didn’t beat. His lungs didn’t pull air. It felt like time forgot how to move.
He looked down.
His white shirt was blooming red from the center of his chest. Warmth poured down his stomach. His legs gave out.
He hit the pavement.
Hard.
Blood splattered across the vending machine beside him, painting the shattered glass with a sick shine.
His breaths came out ragged.
Shallow.
Like the wind was being stolen from his lungs one piece at a time.
The cold crept in.
But even through the blur, he saw something.
Too far to see the face.
Too dark to see the eyes.
But the outline was wrong. It wasn’t Chance.
It couldn’t be.
But the black fedora…
“C…hance…?” he wheezed, blood dripping from the corner of his lips. His vision swam in red and blur.
The figure didn’t answer.
Elliot’s hand reached forward, fingers twitching.
Standing across the street.
Tall. Motionless. Cloaked in shadow.
The face hidden. The body just… watching.
Like it had been there the whole time.
Elliot tried to speak again. No sound came.
The only thing he could do… was stare.
And slowly, the world started to fade. The blood loss soaked his limbs in numbness. His vision went soft and dark.
His last thought was—
I should’ve gone to the cops sooner.
“Dummy” flashing on a screen, and that awful, awful silence.
And then—
Darkness.
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⸻
Elliot sat up with a gasp, drenched in sweat.
He blinked wildly, lungs heaving, heart pounding in his chest like a war drum. His eyes darted around, trying to remember where he was—what just happened—
His room.
The warm smell of pizza grease and detergent.
His posters still on the wall. His stupid lava lamp flickering lazily in the corner.
He was home.
Safe.
Alive.
A nightmare.
Just a nightmare.
He collapsed back onto his bed, hands gripping the sheets, trying to steady his breathing.
“Holy hell…”
He pressed a palm over his chest. No blood. No bullet. Just sweat. Just terror.
The clock read 4:06 AM.
Outside, the city was quiet.
Elliot stared at the ceiling, heart still racing.
“…Okay. Okay. Just a dream. Just a dream,” he whispered to himself. “But if I ever get pranked again, I swear I’m throwing hands.”
Still shaken, he rolled to the side, pulling his phone off the nightstand.
No new messages.
His thumb hovered over Chance’s contact again.
🎲 Dummy 🎲
He didn’t press it.
Not yet.
Because even if it had been a dream…
That silence on the phone earlier?
That was real.
And so was the fear still stuck in his gut.
Chapter 11: The Pizza Boy’s Name
Summary:
Hi guys I land myself in the hospital for driving my car.
Chapter Text
Morning rolled in slow and dull. The clouds hung heavy, like a ceiling trying to cave in.
Mafioso sat in the back of the car, legs crossed, a cup of hot espresso balanced in one gloved hand. His coat was perfectly pressed, not a wrinkle in sight. The broken phone rested on the seat beside him, cracked screen still faintly glowing.
He already knew the name.
Elliot.
He knew the voice too—heard it once in a shaky voicemail still left on Chance’s burner line before it stopped ringing. It was warm. Naïve. Like someone who believed in better tomorrows.
Someone who hadn’t yet learned the rules of the table.
He took a long sip of the espresso. No sugar. He didn’t like things sweet unless he was the one souring them.
Now to find is the location
…
He didn’t like guessing games.
He liked control.
But that emoji pizza was a little helpful to them
And he does remember a pizza box was throw by his henchmen after the fight with Chance.
Echo sat up front, driving, quiet as always.
“Echo,” Mafioso said calmly, “where’d Wire go when he snuck off for food?”
Echo glanced at the mirror. “Some pizza shop in Sector 5. Rebuilt place. Used to be garbage before the fire. Now it’s cleaner, bigger. Safety posters everywhere like stickers trying to cover a bullet hole.”
Mafioso raised a brow. “Huh. I thought he hated pizza.”
“He does,” Echo replied. “But he said their pizza recipe food slapped. Try to drag Beartrap there sometimes. I think he liked the guy behind the counter. Said he had jokes.”
Mafioso smile. Not really. Just the tiniest twitch of amusement.
Wire always had a thing for people who smiled like they didn’t know the world was ending.
“You know his name?”
Echo shrugged. “Nah. Wire only said the dude wore a red visor and remembered his order.”
“Hmm.”
He stared at the phone again. Elliot. A name like that sounded harmless. Soft even. But Mafioso didn’t believe in harmless.
Especially not when someone could leave voicemails like that and live to disappear.
He closed his fingers slowly around the phone.
“Let’s go,” he said. “Let’s pay the place a visit.”
Echo started the car.
—
They arrived ten minutes later.
The new pizza shop stood on the corner—Builder Brothers Pizza
The posters were bright. Cheerful. Almost desperate.
Like someone was trying to forget what happened here.
Mafioso didn’t step out yet. He stared out the tinted window, watching a delivery kid cross the street, then disappear into a nearby alley. No Elliot. No red visor. The storefront was empty for now.
He turned to Echo. “You ever seen the boy?”
“Nope,” Echo said. “Only Wire ever talked to him. We never came here. This place was one of his favorite right now, I think.”
Mafioso narrowed his eyes. “So we don’t know how close he really was with Chance.”
“Not exactly. Just that Wire thought he was funny. Maybe even trusted him.”
“Wire is very cautious, so Chance may have easy bond with the Elliot person sir.”
Mafioso let that sit. He tapped a finger on the armrest.
“I see..Which means Wire was sloppy,” he said finally. “And this ‘Elliot’ might be more than a joke.”
Echo didn’t answer.
Outside, the wind picked up, tugging at the shop’s new banner.
Mafioso sighed and adjusted his collar.
“Well then,” he said softly. “Let’s go say hello.”
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Sneezed
The scent of marinara clung to his sleeves like a second skin. It was quiet now, the kind of quiet that followed a storm—tables half-wiped, a mop leaning tiredly in the corner, and the pizza oven humming like an old friend trying to stay awake.
Elliot adjusted his red visor with a tired sigh. The edges of his sleeves were flecked with flour, grease stains on his apron telling the story of a morning already too long. His back ached, his feet throbbed, and his smile—well, that was still there.
Always.
It had to be.
The place felt lonelier now, even with the music from the old jukebox spinning soft jazz through the shop. Some part of his brain was still chasing shadows—flashes of that night, the chaos, the scream of tires and shouts and—
Gunfire.
He inhaled sharply. Shut it down. Not now. He shook his head like it would knock the memory loose.
“No one wants to see a frown in a pizza shop,” he muttered, forcing the corners of his lips up again, stretching the smile until it felt almost real. “You got this, Elliot.”
He had dropped two wrong orders that morning—accidentally gave a vegetarian kid a pepperoni slice and swapped two sodas with soap water because he was thinking about that again. The memory. The alley. The flash of a muzzle in the dark.
He’d laughed it off in front of the customers, of course. Joked that it was “experimental foam soda.” But inside?
He still heard the bang.
He still felt the air crack.
He should’ve died that night.
But he didn’t.
Nightmare
And so, he worked.
Even if the world kept getting darker, he would still shine here. For his dad. For his sister. For the memory of his mom. For the photo tucked carefully behind the register.
He tossed the mop back into its bucket and wiped his brow with a napkin. The lunch rush had calmed down, and for once, the shop actually felt like it was breathing again. So did he.
Just a minute. That’s all he needed. A minute to close his eyes, maybe.
The bell above the door jingled.
He opened his eyes.
“Welcome to Builder Brother’s Pizza!” he said automatically, voice bright as sunshine, snapping his posture upright and brushing his hands on his apron.
Then he saw the black fedora.
His heart jolted in his chest like someone pulled the wrong wire.
He nearly said it.
“Ch—?”
But no. No, no, no. This man was not Chance.
This man was taller. His coat swept the floor like it had a mind of its own, and his presence was… sharp. Too clean. Too perfect. His shadow fell long across the floor tiles.
And that smile…
Elliot blinked.
It wasn’t a smile made of joy or charm. It was the kind of smile you see in old noir films—something wide and practiced, curling with unspoken promises and impossible-to-read thoughts. It didn’t reach the eyes. It never would.
For a moment, Elliot froze. His instincts kicked up hard. He could feel his stomach twist. Was this—
Was this another threat?
Was it happening again?
He cover his head hurting from the memory of seeing him somewhere before.
But then… something else kicked in too. Something Elliot wore like armor.
His smile.
It didn’t falter.
Instead, it brightened.
He took a small step forward and tilted his head with cheerful curiosity.
“Oh! Sorry, for a second I thought you were someone else,” Elliot said, chuckling lightly, voice as casual as morning toast. “My bad—must’ve been the hat.”
The fedora man paused. Just… paused.
For a heartbeat too long, he stared at Elliot like he’d just spoken a different language.
Elliot caught that hesitation and ran with it, cheerful as ever.
“But hey! New face, huh? First time visiting us?” he asked, already reaching for a menu. “You picked a good day—fresh dough, no oven explosions today, and only one soda mix-up this morning, so we’re on a roll.”
The man tilted his head slightly. His eerie grin didn’t move, but something in his posture flickered—something cold. Calculating. But Elliot didn’t blink. He’d dealt with all kinds of customers. Scary dads. Grumpy teens. Weird birthday clowns.
This guy?
Just another face.
Just another reason to smile.
He handed over the menu across the counter. “Now, I’ve got deep-dish, thin crust, triangle, square, star-shaped—okay, not really star-shaped, I was just seeing if you’d blink—and I can do light sauce, no sauce, triple cheese, meat mountain, vegan heaven, and yes, I can put pineapples on it if you’re brave enough.”
The man didn’t speak yet. He just… studied Elliot.
His grin had not changed. Not one bit. But his thoughts were racing.
Because this wasn’t what he expected.
Mafioso had walked in here ready to make judgments. To measure a threat. To see if this “Elliot” was some kind of weak link Chance had tucked away.
But instead…
Instead, he was being handed a menu by someone with the audacity to joke about pizza shapes and soda accidents.
Instead of fear, there was friendliness.
Instead of suspicion, there was warmth.
Instead of weakness—there was light.
Elliot rested his elbows gently on the counter, chin in his palm, casual and easy.
“So, mystery guy,” he said with a grin. “What’ll it be?”
Mafioso finally blinked.
Just once.
…
The silence lingered like steam from a just-boiled kettle.
Mafioso’s eyes, shaded and unreadable beneath the brim of his pinstripe black fedora, flicked briefly to the menu Elliot held out. His wide, permanent grin didn’t shift—not in mockery, not in reaction. Just… there. Etched on him like a mask.
But behind that sharp, carved expression… his thoughts buzzed.
Too bright in here.
Too clean.
Too warm.
He hadn’t expected this. Not from a place once wrapped in police tape, once filled with shattered glass and charred counters. And certainly not from someone this bright-eyed, this unshaken.
“…I’ll take the Family size combo…it for my “buddy”…he visits here a lot” Mafioso finally said, voice low and dry, like a knife being drawn an inch from its sheath.
His tone was completely different from Wire’s high-speed rambling.
Where Wire’s words were eager, tumbling and tripping with excitement, Mafioso’s came slow. Heavy. Like he didn’t care what he was ordering so much as who he was ordering from. His eyes didn’t leave Elliot’s, not even for a second.
Elliot didn’t flinch. He gave the man another cheerful nod and spun the order pad like a coin between his fingers.
“Family size combo, got it!” he chirped. “Let me guess—big night? You guys must be hungry hungry.”
Still no answer. Just that grin.
The awkwardness could’ve choked someone less practiced. It was like two people from completely different universes trying to share the same space: Elliot’s bright, lived-in warmth versus Mafioso’s icy, calculated chill. Sunshine across fresh dough clashing with the long shadow of a crime lord’s coat.
Elliot, of course, noticed none of that.
He tilted his head as he scribbled down the order. “Hey, actually—your buddy, uh…” He snapped his fingers. “Fidgety headphones guy? Came in a while back. What was his name again? Wire! Yeah!”
Mafioso’s eyes narrowed slightly at the mention.
“He was really excited,” Elliot went on, undeterred. “Said something about needing fuel for a big group party. Got the same thing, in fact. I remember because he kept bouncing while I was taking the order—guy’s got energy, huh?”
Elliot let out a short laugh, turning toward the kitchen window. “Didn’t even stick around to talk. Zipped out like he was in a race.”
Mafioso nodded. Just a single one. No words. His gaze followed Elliot as he moved to the kitchen.
And something strange settled over him.
The boy worked alone.
Not a single other worker in sight. Not a line cook, no server, not even someone folding boxes. Just Elliot—whirling behind the oven, flour on his arms, humming to himself as he spun pans and slid pizzas onto hot stones.
All this, managed by one person.
Mafioso had seen loyalty before. He’d demanded it. Bought it. Broken it. But this?
This wasn’t loyalty. This was…
Devotion.
And it wasn’t just to the shop. The way Elliot moved—his rhythm, his attention to detail, the neat way he wiped a smudge off the soda machine between flips—it all felt too… personal. Like he was carrying something invisible on his back.
Mafioso’s fingers tapped slowly on the counter.
Was this what Chance protected?
Was this who Chance called before he disappeared into blood and wreckage?
His smile, usually empty, shifted just the tiniest fraction.
The pizzas were boxed up quickly—too quickly. Elliot’s motions were like clockwork, complete with floury flair. Four boxes in total, corners taped tight and labeled with Sharpie scribbles and smiley faces.
“There we go!” Elliot declared, wiping his hands on his apron. “One mega pizza pack for one mystery fedora guy.”
He slid the boxes forward and smiled again—still that same worn-but-sincere expression, like the kind someone had to choose to wear every day, no matter how heavy it got.
Mafioso pulled out a sleek, jet-black card and handed it across without a word.
Elliot took it, swiped it, and handed back the receipt with a wink. “Don’t worry, no secret mafia tax or pizza laundering on this one. I’m still a law-abiding slice slinger.”
Mafioso blinked. Again.
Jokes. This boy made jokes.
He turned to leave, already reaching for the boxes when—
“Oh! Wait!”
Mafioso stopped mid-step.
Hand moving close to his weapon.
But no.
Elliot dashed behind the counter again and came back holding a cardboard six-pack of root beer.
“Almost forgot. Wire said he loved this brand. Took three the last time and called it ‘brain fuel.’” Elliot laughed lightly, holding it out with both hands. “On the house. Kinda a ‘thank you’ for ordering the party pack.”
Mafioso stared.
He hadn’t told Elliot anything. Not the information about Wire was hospitalized by Chance. Not that he was anyone but a tall man in a long coat. And certainly not that he was the kind of man who would be offended by such simple kindness.
Yet here Elliot was—offering a drink with no price. No strings.
“People gotta eat,” Elliot said simply. “And if they gotta eat, might as well make it the best pizza they’ve had all week, right?”
Mafioso didn’t reach for the root beer immediately. His hand hovered. Then, after a heartbeat…
He took it.
Nodded once.
And turned.
Outside, the sun hit like heat from an open oven. His goons—Beartrap, Cane, Echo—stood by the black sedan parked at the curb, waiting like wolves for orders.
They blinked in surprise when their boss emerged not with a hostage, not with a gun drawn, but with a stack of pizza boxes and a root beer six-pack.
No one said a word.
Mafioso walked right past them, straight to the car, placing the food inside without a glance.
But something was wrong.
Something was off.
His chest… felt tight. Not like pain. Not like stress.
Like…
A thump.
Like something stirred in his ribcage. Something he hadn’t felt in years.
A pulse.
A beat.
Warm.
He looked back once through the glass door.
Elliot was still inside, adjusting the visor on his cap, smiling toward another family walking in.
Still shining.
Still standing.
Still unknown.
And Mafioso hated unknowns.
But this one?
He didn’t know if he wanted to destroy it.
Or protect it.
Chapter 12: Paper Boxes and Unsaid Things
Summary:
I’m fightin’ for my life beside my lawyer in court… and also writing fanfiction about it.
Chapter Text
Elliot POV
As the bell jingled softly and the black-coat stranger exited through the front doors of Builder Brother’s Pizza, Elliot’s expression didn’t change.
Not at first.
He kept smiling. A practiced, warm, sunshine-on-a-rainy-day kind of smile. He even offered a polite wave through the window.
But the moment the car pulled away…
His knees nearly buckled.
He ducked behind the counter, gripping the edges like it was the only thing keeping him upright. His visor fell crooked over his eyes.
His heart, which had been thumping steadily throughout the encounter, suddenly decided it wanted out of his chest. Preferably through his throat.
He inhaled once. Shaky.
Twice. Useless.
Third time—calm, Elliot, calm.
“Just a regular customer,” he muttered aloud. “Big coat. Big appetite. Regular customer. He didn’t even do anything! No threats, no weapons, no cryptic riddles. Just… creepy eyes. Intense silence. Grin from the underworld. Totally normal.”
He peeked over the counter like a nervous meerkat.
The pizza boxes were gone. The drink too. The payment had gone through. No secret button-pressing, no strange packages left behind. Just… a visit.
Then his brain caught up with him.
“Oh no. What if that card was stolen? What if I just accepted mafia money? Is that a federal offense or a moral offense?!”
He leaned against the soda machine, which was still sticky from a kid’s party spill two hours ago, and sighed.
The image of that customer—tall, calm, cold as a walk-in freezer with a fedora to match—burned into his brain like a branding iron.
But more than the appearance, it was the feeling the guy left behind.
That strange silence.
That unspoken… heaviness.
It was the kind of presence that stayed after the person left.
The same way nightmares do.
Elliot looked at the register, then at the faded photo of his family behind it.
He forced the smile back on.
“…I’m just being silly. A customer’s a customer. People gotta eat.”
He rubbed flour off his hands and went back to cleaning like he hadn’t just served a root-beer-sipping crime boss.
⸻
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Mafioso POV
The inside of the sleek black car was silent.
For once, no tactical updates. No whispered exchanges. No orders barked.
Just silence.
Mafioso sat in the back seat, pizza boxes stacked beside him, the root beer six-pack resting gently in his lap—untouched.
His eyes were locked forward, but they weren’t seeing the road.
They were back inside that pizza parlor. Back across the counter. Back where a boy with flour on his face and hope in his voice had smiled without hesitation.
And said his name wrong.
But that not important
Not his name. Someone else’s.
Chance.
But they have finally got information, the pizza boy. Elliot and Chance are close.
…
Very close for that pizza boy to call out to him as Chance…
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.
A name like a paper cut. Tiny. Quick.
Painful in a way you don’t realize until you touch it again.
Mafioso shifted slightly. The movement finally broke the silence.
What is this felling.
Cane, seated beside him with his pristine white hat and a calm presence, cleared his throat gently.
“Boss… you alright?”
No answer.
From the front passenger seat, Echo, still in his headset and tactical sunglasses, looked over his shoulder.
“He hasn’t spoken in fifteen minutes. That’s either good or very, very bad.”
Beartrap didn’t say anything. He just turned from the driver’s seat and stared at Mafioso with his usual expression: somewhere between confused and ready to punch through a wall.
Cane glanced at the root beer.
“That’s… the same brand Wire obsesses over, isn’t it?”
Echo blinked.
“Wait. Did the pizza guy give him that? For free?”
Cane nodded slowly.
“What I saw inside the window, With both hands. Like he was offering an olive branch… made of carbonation.”
Beartrap’s brows furrowed.
Echo leaned forward, deadly serious.
“Boss. With all due respect… is the pizza guy an informant? Undercover agent? Possibly immune to fear? Maybe even trained in psychological warfare?”
Beartrap let out a grunt. Possibly agreement. Possibly indigestion.
Cane folded his arms.
“Let’s think about this logically. He recognized your presence. That much was clear. But he didn’t break. Didn’t sweat—until we left. That’s classic resistance training. I’d wager he’s been briefed on you.”
Echo’s voice lowered.
“What if… he’s the real boss of this operation? Not Chance. Him.”
Cane:
“A deep-cover strategist. Biding his time. Camouflaged as a humble pizza boy.”
Beartrap cracked his knuckles.
He nodded slowly.
Echo tapped on his tablet with increasing concern.
“He even offered root beer diplomacy. That’s a move I haven’t seen since the Cola Peace Treaty of ‘22.”
Cane stroked his chin.
“Indeed. Strategic kindness is often the sharpest blade.”
They all turned to Mafioso.
Still silent.
Still staring.
Still holding the root beer like it was made of glass.
After a long, unbearable pause…
“…He smiled,” Mafioso finally said. Voice low. Barely audible.
Echo blinked.
“Sir?”
“He smiled… and didn’t ask for anything.”
The three goons looked at one another.
Then Beartrap, for the first time in months, made a sound.
“…Wholesome.”
Silence again.
Cane tilted his head, choosing his next words carefully.
“Sir… shall we intervene?”
Mafioso didn’t answer at first. Then, finally, he placed the root beer on the seat beside him like it was something precious.
“No. Not yet.”
The car began to move again, tires humming along the street.
Mafioso didn’t look back. But his thoughts?
They hadn’t left the shop.
That strange little flame, working the counter.
Smiling through fear.
Joking with death.
He didn’t know if the boy was brave… or simply unaware of the world’s darker corners.
But either way…
He was interesting.
And interesting was dangerous.
Chapter 13: Present Day
Summary:
We win the case! While I finish writing this.
Chapter Text
The front door of his mansion clicked shut behind him with a low, deliberate thud.
Chance leaned against it for a second, letting the solid weight of the wood hold him up. His whole body ached. Not in the “good fight” kind of ache, but the sort that seeped into your bones and clung there like smoke. His suit jacket hung off one shoulder, torn. His tie was knotted halfway down his chest, blood stiff in the fabric.
He shut his eyes and took a breath.
The metallic taste was still there. So was the ringing in his ears.
The couch wasn’t far. But each step over the polished marble floor felt like wading through molasses. His boots tracked faint red footprints. He didn’t bother taking them off.
By the time he collapsed into the cushions, his coat was on the floor, his belt halfway unbuckled, and his holster tossed onto the coffee table. The revolver landed with a hollow clunk. Beside it, a coin spun on its edge before lying flat.
Heads.
Of course.
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Flashback –
(The memory didn’t ease in. It slammed back into him all at once.)
The inside of Beartrap’s car had smelled like old leather, cigarettes, and the faint tang of rusting metal.
Chance was slouched low in the passenger seat, eyes half-lidded, tapping fingers against his leg like this was just another boring drive.
Beartrap didn’t speak for a while. The man could drive for miles without a word, and Chance would let him—most days. Not tonight.
“…So where the hell is everyone?” Chance finally asked.
The conversation started calm enough. But when Beartrap mentioned Mafioso waiting to see him… something in Chance tightened.
He didn’t even remember deciding to fight. It just happened. One second he was smirking. The next, the car was swerving into oncoming traffic, both of them trading gunshots, elbows, knees—
—and laughter.
Chance laughed when the bullet grazed his spine. He laughed when Beartrap slammed a hand around his throat. He even laughed when the revolver round tore into his side and the fire of it bloomed through his ribs.
Not because it didn’t hurt.
Because pain was proof he wasn’t dead yet.
The crash came next—fast and violent. Glass exploded. The guardrail gave. They jumped just before the car dove into the canal.
They weren’t breathing easy for long. Wire showed up with a pizza box in one hand and a stick in the other, swinging like a kid possessed. And for a moment—just a moment—Chance thought it was hilarious. Until the kid actually landed a few hits.
Then it was just dangerous.
The fight turned ugly. Brutal. Personal.
Wire was scrappy, Beartrap was crawling toward him, and Chance—Chance was burning with that wild, coin-flip kind of luck that always tipped in his favor.
Until the bullet hit.
Wire went down. Bleeding. And when Chance’s hand closed around that rock, something in Beartrap’s voice cracked for the first time.
It didn’t stop him.
Not until Wire was still.
And when Chance looked up—Mafioso’s car was there. Waiting. Watching.
That was the moment he ran.
⸻
Present Day
The memory snapped away like a rubber band.
Chance rolled his shoulders, winced, and peeled his shirt over his head. Bloodstains had dried into the fabric. He dropped it to the floor with the rest of the mess. His mansion was spotless most of the time, but tonight? Tonight it looked like a hotel room after a three-day bender—clothes, boots, holsters, empty coin rolls scattered across the path from the door to the couch.
He moved with the same casual laziness he’d used after a job gone right, even if this one had gone sideways in ten different ways.
His Black Sparkle Time Fedora sat crooked on his head, tilted back as he loosened the Clockwork Headphones around his neck. The shades stayed on for a beat longer, hiding the swelling under one eye, before he dropped them on the table beside the revolver.
That coin caught his attention again. He picked it up, flicked it into the air, and caught it without looking.
Tails.
“Guess you’re in a mood too,” he muttered to it.
⸻
From somewhere deeper in the house came the soft sound of claws on hardwood. Then—light thumps, like tiny drums, getting closer.
Spade hopped into the living room.
The giant black-furred bunny blinked up at him with an unshakable calm, ears twitching like she’d been listening in the whole time.
“Hey, girl,” Chance murmured, lowering a hand to scratch between her ears. She leaned into it, nose twitching.
He sat back on the couch, letting her climb up beside him, the weight of her big body pressing warm against his hip. She smelled like hay and something sweet he couldn’t place. For the first time tonight, the tight coil in his chest loosened a little.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he said with a half-smile. “Yeah, I screwed up. Again. But we’re still here, right?”
Spade didn’t answer. Bunnies rarely did.
He let his head fall back against the cushion, one arm draped over the back of the couch, the other lazily stroking her fur. He could feel the dried blood cracking on his knuckles. He could hear the faint hum of the coin as it spun once more on the table before slowing to a stop.
Heads again.
He smirked.
“Guess I’m not out yet.”
But in the back of his mind, he knew his family would notice the bruises, the limp, the smell of smoke in his hair.
And they’d ask questions.
Questions he didn’t feel like answering.
For now, the mansion was quiet.
And Chance intended to keep it that way.
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After a while, his head finally eased up. The pulse pounding in his ears dulled, and the tight knot in his shoulders loosened just enough to let him breathe. For the first time in hours, the fog lifted—and with it came a face.
“Elliot 🍕💛”
The little pizza slice and heart made him snort without meaning to. He’d put it in there as a joke
He found himself humming, a low tune without words, while the memory played in his head. The way Elliot’s laugh shook out of him—short, genuine, unpolished. The way he’d tilt his head when Chance tossed him some lazy flirt, only to shake it off and keep talking like nothing happened. The kid was dense. Painfully so. Chance almost forgot how much he missed that.
Almost.
Without thinking, his hand dipped into his pocket. His fingers brushed fabric. Empty.
“Huh.”
Other pocket. Nothing. Coat pocket—zip. Back pockets—nope.
His smile turned sharp and thin, the kind you wear when you’re trying not to panic.
He started slow. Patted down his chest, his sides. Checked the jacket again. And then the panic hit like a wave.
The search became frantic. Shoes came off. Socks inspected like they might be hiding state secrets. He tossed his jacket onto the floor, crouched to check under the couch, even stuck his head under the table like maybe the phone had grown legs and walked away.
Spade, his giant black-furred bunny, sat in the corner chewing hay after being push off by Chance, her nose twitching lazily. She did not move. She did not help.
Chance stripped off his shirt next, muttering under his breath. Then the pants. Standing there in his underwear, he glanced down like maybe—just maybe—it was hiding in there. It wasn’t.
Is just his golden shine back.
“Where the hell—”
Spade paused mid-chew to watch him squat down and check the waistband like a man possessed. Her ears tilted slightly back, not in alarm, but in the heavy, weary posture of someone witnessing peak stupidity.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he grumbled.
She blinked, slow.
Then the thought hit.
He froze. The air in the room seemed to thicken. His smile fell away, leaving only the barebones of it—an empty expression trying to mask the gut drop.
He’d dropped the phone.
Not just anywhere—there. In the street of the bridge . The exact moment Mafioso’s car rolled up earlier. Right before he’d bolted.
“…Oh,” he muttered, voice flat. “Ohhh.”
His head tilted back, eyes closing in disbelief. “Elliot is cooked—”
Spade’s chewing resumed, but slower now. Her whiskers twitched once. She let out a long, soft bunny sigh, the kind that could be translated perfectly into, You absolute moron. The audience was worried about Elliot, and you just made it worse.
Chance sat back hard in his chair, still in his underwear, staring at the ceiling like maybe it could give him an answer. Spade kept watching, her quiet judgment filling the silence.
Somewhere out there, his phone—and maybe Elliot—were in the wrong hands. And the worst part? He had no idea how bad it had just gotten.
Chapter 14: What the Chance?
Summary:
Sorry for the late writing everyone, I got into a fight with the car accident person. Not my fault that they hit the highway instead 😤
Double injury in the hospital of my home.
Chapter Text
Three days passed.
At Builder Brothers Pizza, life rolled on like nothing had happened. The ovens still rumbled, the delivery bikes still coughed out smoke, and customers still trickled in with greasy hands and impatient voices. The scary man in the fedora—the one whose shadow still clung to Elliot’s mind like soot—never came back. No broken glass, no men lurking outside, no sign of that grin that looked sharp enough to cut skin.
For Elliot, those days were almost… normal.
He took orders, wiped down tables, swapped jokes with co-workers. The nervousness he’d carried after the alleyway incident slowly, almost reluctantly, slipped away. He even caught himself humming while stocking dough, his visor tilted back, eyes relaxed. He told himself: See? It was nothing. Just some weird night. People like that don’t hang around pizza places. I’m fine. The shop’s fine.
But late at night, when the bell above the door stopped ringing and the mop sloshed through the quiet, he’d think of Chance.
And then his phone buzzed.
He glanced down between orders. A message.
Not from 🎲 Dummy 🎲. Not from the number he’d been staring at every night, waiting, half-dreading. No—this was a different number. Unknown.
The message said:
“Yo. It’s me. Lost my phone. New number. Save it now.”
Elliot blinked. His stomach tightened, his heart leapt. Chance.
For a split second, he froze. It was relief and nerves tangled together. Chance—finally, after all the silence—was texting him again. His first instinct was to reply instantly, but something about it made him hesitate.
Lost his phone? That was possible. Chance was reckless. Elliot had seen him shove it into his back pocket, leave it on counters, almost drop it in the fryer once. But still… why not borrow someone else’s phone sooner? Why not come by in person?
Elliot chewed on his lip, staring at the ID. Blank, just numbers. He didn’t trust blank numbers.
“Who is this?” he typed back anyway, cautious fingers pressing each letter.
The reply came quick. “It’s me, dummy.”
Elliot’s brows lifted. Nobody else called him that. Not at least in Chance’s… tone. But the phone still wasn’t saving in his head. He typed again:
“Prove it.”
And that’s when the photo came in.
A blurry mirror selfie—Chance leaning against some run-down bathroom wall, holding up two fingers in a lazy peace sign. The same messy grin, the same scar on his brow, the red bandana tied sloppy at his neck.
Elliot’s breath caught. His chest eased. The doubts melted away.
“Oh my god,” he muttered under his breath, tapping to enlarge the photo. It wasn’t new-new, but it was real. Definitely him. Elliot felt stupid for even doubting.
He saved the contact: “Chance 🌩️” (different from the old 🎲 Dummy 🎲, but hey, new number, new look).
And just like that, relief washed over him.
He texted back, fingers almost shaking: “Idiot. You scared me. Thought you ghosted me.”
The reply came, smooth, casual: “Nah. Just busy. I’m still around. Don’t worry.”
“There so much I need to catch up with you.”
It was simple. Almost too simple. But Elliot wanted to believe it. He wanted to believe Chance was fine, alive, and still thinking about him.
And for the next three days, things fell into a rhythm again.
Chance 🌩️ texted him here and there. Quick one-liners. Jokes that sounded like Chance. Elliot even laughed once or twice reading them on break. He assumed Chance was just busy with whatever crazy life he had. Dangerous or not, it didn’t matter. What mattered was that he was safe enough to text.
Everything seemed fine.
⸻
On the fourth night.
The pizza shop was empty. Elliot flipped the sign to “Closed,” the clink of the lock echoing louder than usual. He stretched, back aching from the day, visor tilted. The neon hum of the sign outside mixed with the faint rattle of the soda fridge.
His phone buzzed.
He fished it out, thinking it was one of his coworkers, maybe his dad reminding him about some supply pickup.
But no.
-Chance 🌩️-
Message:
“Yo. Meet me by the alley of this location. Need to talk. Urgent.”
Elliot’s stomach tightened. He read it twice. Then a third time.
His mouth went dry. The alley? At night?
He actually muttered aloud, scrubbing a hand down his face:
“Dude, this is how horror movies start.”
He paced, mop still leaning against the wall. He could just ignore it. He could just go home.
“This is exactly how horror movies start,” he said to himself. “Dumb kid walks into an alley and—bam—credits roll.”
Chance 🌩️ : “ I do owe you an explanation of why I was absent for so long.”
Oh.
But it was Chance. And it had been too long. Elliot sighed, rubbed his neck, and gave in.
“Fine,” he muttered. “One bad horror movie decision won’t kill me.”
He grabbed his red helmet, slipped it over his head, and rolled his motorcycle out into the night.
⸻
The streets were nearly empty. The city looked hollow at this hour—streetlights buzzing, shop windows blank, the sky cloudy. Elliot liked it that way, usually. Solitude meant peace.
The alley loomed when he turned the corner, a strip of cracked pavement and shadows. A single lamp flickered above, stuttering weak light over bricks stained with time.
He cut the engine, swung his leg off, and stood with the helmet tucked under his arm.
The air smelled like wet cement.
“Chance?” he called quietly.
No answer.
His phone buzzed again.
Chance 🌩️ → “Inside. Door’s open. Surprise.”
Elliot blinked at the screen. Then at the old building beside him. Its paint peeled, its windows shut tight. But sure enough, the front door stood cracked open, darkness spilling out.
“Surprise,” Elliot muttered, his voice wobbling. “Yeah, sure, because creepy abandoned buildings are my favorite.”
Still, he pushed the door. It creaked, swinging wide to reveal a dusty stairwell.
Step by step, he climbed. His sneakers squeaked softly. His phone buzzed every few seconds with new texts, guiding him like breadcrumbs.
“Upstairs.”
“Almost there.”
“Room 17.”
At the top, the hallway stretched long and narrow, wallpaper rotting, ceiling lights dead. He found the number stenciled faintly on one door: 17.
The knob turned easily under his hand.
The room inside was dark. Too dark.
His phone buzzed again.
Chance 🌩️: “Look around 😉”
Elliot, swallowing hard, lifted his flashlight app and swung the beam.
And froze.
His breath caught.
The walls.
Covered in pictures.
His pictures.
Polaroids, screenshots, printouts—all taped, pinned, tacked. Him laughing at work. Him walking home. Him locking his bike. Even one from inside the pizza shop, when he thought he was alone. And mixed in—pictures of him with Chance. Private ones. Ones no stranger should have.
But it wasn’t just photos. Notes, scribbled on scraps of paper. His name circled again and again. Arrows pointing. Strings connecting. A map of his life spread like prey on the wall.
Elliot’s stomach flipped.
“This… what the hell—” he whispered.
His phone buzzed. A voicemail notification.
Shaking, he lifted it to his ear.
The voice that came through was not Chance’s.
It was low, gravelly. Slow.
“You trust too easy, pizza boy.”
Elliot froze. His chest locked. The phone slipped in his grip.
Behind him, the air shifted. Heavy footsteps.
He turned—just in time to see the shadow loom.
Mafioso. Fedora tilted low, eyes glinting cold. His fist came fast, brutal.
The punch cracked against Elliot’s jaw. He hit the floor hard, gasping, the phone skittering across the wood. His vision blurred, cough rattling his chest.
Through the haze, he saw it—the phone in Mafioso’s hand. The one with the contact 🎲 Dummy 🎲. Chance’s real phone.
And in that second -Chance 🌩️- fake one, everything clicked.
The new number. The photo. The easy texts. All of it a trick. Mafioso had played him—played them both.
Elliot’s last thought before the blackness swallowed him was bitter, sharp punch.
His body trembling on the floor, Mafioso’s shadow stretching long, Chance’s stolen phone glowing in the dark.
Chapter 15: Blood in His Smile (warning)
Summary:
i'm aliveeee
Chapter Text
Elliot gagged, coughing up copper. The warm taste of blood clung thick in his mouth, iron and salt rolling down his tongue. He could barely catch his breath before the next wave of pain crashed into him. His ribs screamed, his cheekbone throbbed, and still he couldn’t lift himself from the floor.
The weight of a gloved hand yanked him up by his red shirt collar. He was nothing in that grip, dangling like a ragdoll. Then—another blow.
Crack.
The punch ripped through him, snapping his head back. His visor nearly flew off, the little red brim hanging crooked now as his world spun sideways. He collapsed onto the hardwood with a wet thud, blood splattering the dusty floorboards. His lungs clawed for air, ragged, shallow.
He barely got one word out, his voice breaking.
“W–wait—”
The word cut through the heavy silence. The hand raised above him, ready to strike again, froze mid-swing. Mafioso’s silhouette loomed, his coat hanging like the shroud of a nightmare. His grin never faltered.
Elliot forced his eyes up. His chest heaved, his lips trembling.
“Please,” he rasped, the sound barely human. “Please don’t kill me. I’ll do anything—please!”
The grin widened—if that was even possible. Mafioso’s shadow stretched long across the floor, swallowing Elliot whole. For a second, the only sound in the room was Elliot’s ragged breathing, and the faint drip of blood from his split lip tapping against the wood.
In that moment, Elliot’s mind spun, frantic. Why him? Why was this happening? He didn’t run bets, didn’t owe debts, didn’t deal in anything darker than overcooked Pizza work. The only connection—
His stomach sank.
The memory hit him quick: the first time the fedora man had walked into his shop, shadow spilling across neon light, smile carved like it was chiseled into his skull. Elliot had greeted him with his usual cheer, pad spinning, voice steady even as the man’s stare pinned him in place.
Family size combo Pizza. That’s what the man had ordered. Just another customer, right? Just another face. Except the way those eyes had lingered, locked onto him—not the menu. Not the food. Him.
That night had burned in Elliot’s memory, even when he tried not to think about it.
Now it all clicked in jagged pieces, and panic swelled in his chest. Was this about bad service? Did he say something wrong? Did he smile too much? Too little? Was it all a trap the whole time?
Tears stung his eyes, spilling down his bruised cheeks. His voice cracked as he begged, words tumbling raw.
“What did I ever do to you?! I never asked for money—I’ve never done anything! I don’t even know who you are!” His voice rose, desperate, splitting into a scream. “This is so unfair! W-why me—”
“Quiet.”
The word landed like a gunshot. Cold, sharp. Final.
Mafioso’s voice was nothing like Wire’s excitable chatter, nothing like Cane’s calm rhythm. This was a voice carved out of stone, heavy with power, unhurried because it didn’t need to rush. The kind of voice that could smother a room.
Elliot’s plea died instantly in his throat.
In one fluid motion, Mafioso slipped his tie free from around his own neck. Black silk gleamed faint under the dim light as he wound it around Elliot’s wrists, yanking them behind his back. The knot tightened until Elliot hissed in pain, shoulders wrenched awkwardly. The fabric bit into his skin, no give, no mercy.
Mafioso tilted Elliot’s chin upward with one hand, his grip iron around the smaller man’s jaw. Elliot could feel the strength in those fingers, not squeezing yet but promising they could crush if they wanted.
“Poor little rat…” Mafioso murmured. His grin hovered inches from Elliot’s face, unwavering, eternal. The words rolled slow, savoring. “Thought I was doing this over your debt.”
Elliot’s chest seized. He shook his head frantically, tears blurring the world. “I don’t—I don’t owe you anything—!”
“Well.” Mafioso leaned closer, his breath brushing against Elliot’s cheek, cold despite the heat in the room. His voice dropped lower, like a whisper sliding along the edge of a blade. “You’re right. You don’t owe me nothing.”
For a fleeting second, relief flickered in Elliot’s chest. Maybe—maybe he would be spared. Maybe this was a mistake.
But Mafioso wasn’t finished.
“…But.”
That grin never broke, never shifted. His eyes, shaded under the brim of his pinstripe fedora, gleamed with something unreadable, something dark and unrelenting.
“‘Chance.’ You know him, right?”
The name slammed into Elliot like another punch.
His heart seized. His lips parted, but no sound came.
Mafioso still holding the phone. Black case, faint scratches. Elliot recognized it instantly. His breath caught in his throat.
It was Chance’s phone.
Mafioso held it up casually, like a toy. He shook it once, letting it dangle in his hand. The screen lit up, that familiar nickname flashing: 🎲 Dummy 🎲.
Elliot’s blood ran cold.
Mafioso’s grin widened, if that were possible. “Your friend,” he said smoothly, “stole something of mine. Something important. And now he’s on the run.”
He dangled the phone just out of Elliot’s reach, like bait before a trapped animal.
Elliot trembled, chest heaving, mind spinning in circles. He understood now. He was nothing more than leverage. A piece on a board he didn’t even know he was playing on. Chance was the one Mafioso wanted—but Elliot was the one caught.
Still
Elliot’s lungs burned with every shallow gasp. Limp and trembling. He couldn’t tell which pain was worse—the sharp ache in his ribs where Mafioso’s fist had landed, or the sick weight settling in his chest as the realization dawned that he wasn’t going to talk his way out of this.
The tie binding his wrists cut cruelly into his skin. Every tug only made the silk bite deeper, the knot impossibly tight. His shoulders screamed, nerves sparking from the awkward angle. He couldn’t move, couldn’t crawl, couldn’t even lift a hand to wipe the blood dripping down from his split brow into his eye.
Mafioso crouched in front of him, coat falling around him like the wings of some black bird. His gloved hand clamped Elliot’s chin one again, forcing his head up. The grin carved across his face never shifted, but his eyes—dark, shadowed beneath the brim of his fedora—stayed locked onto Elliot’s. Unblinking. Unyielding.
“And one more thing,” Mafioso drawled, voice smooth as oil. His grip tightened, fingers digging into Elliot’s jaw until it hurt to breathe. “One of my henchmen ended up in the hospital… because of your friend.”
Elliot blinked through tears, his vision blurring. He couldn’t even process the words at first. Hospital? Henchman? His mind scrambled for meaning through the fog of panic.
Mafioso yanked his chin, twisting Elliot’s head toward the dark corner of the room. Shapes shifted.
From the shadows stepped three figures.
Echo. Sunglasses glinting under the dim light, headset crackling faint static. Calm, but tense, his posture straight as a blade.
Cane. Hands folded neatly behind his back, the tall hat giving him that dignified air of a scholar, but his sharp eyes were cold, assessing.
And Beartrap. Massive, hulking, his ushanka shadowing his face. He leaned against the wall with crossed arms, but even at rest he looked like a statue ready to move, all brute strength waiting for a command.
They weren’t here to fight. They were here to watch. To bear witness.
Mafioso’s grin widened. He tilted Elliot’s face back toward him. “Wanna know why? Wanna know what your precious friend did?”
Elliot’s heart pounded against his ribs, loud enough he thought the whole room could hear it. He shook his head weakly, tears threatening again. He didn’t want to know. He didn’t want to picture it.
Mafioso leaned closer, voice dropping to a rasp meant just for him. “At our last meeting, as we all thought he was cornered and finally ready to give back what he stole…” He paused, savoring the moment. His smile didn’t flicker. “He ran. Still tried to run. Injured one of my men. And the other?”
His grip on Elliot’s chin grew tighter, bruising. He stared into Elliot’s eyes, smile stretching into something almost inhuman. “…Life threatening.”
Elliot’s breath hitched, stomach twisting. His body wanted to fold in on itself, but Mafioso’s hand kept him pinned upright.
Mafioso’s tone dropped lower, darker. “He went to kill.”
The room felt colder all of a sudden.
Mafioso let the words hang in the air for a beat before continuing, voice deliberate, cruelly slow. “Picked up a rock about the size of your head… and smacked it into him.”
Elliot’s eyes widened, horror freezing him in place. He couldn’t stop the whimper that escaped his throat.
Behind them, Echo and Cane didn’t move, didn’t flinch. Beartrap’s jaw clenched, just barely, the muscles twitching in his scarred face.
Mafioso’s grin didn’t waver. If anything, it deepened. “Wire. You know the boy, don’t you? He came to your pizza often. Order the big combo Two pepperoni, fidgeted with that little stick of his.”
Elliot did know him. That energy boy, that bright smile when he accepted an extra soda Elliot slipped into his box. Wire had been there more than once, a familiar face, even if he always act loudly, eyes darting.
And now—Elliot pictured him broken, bleeding, his skull cracked by Chance’s hand.
Mafioso finally released Elliot’s chin, letting his head drop forward. Elliot gasped in air like he’d just surfaced from underwater, but his chest still hitched with sobs.
“You must be shocked too, huh?” Mafioso purred, his voice dripping mock sympathy. He rose back to full height, towering over Elliot, coat brushing the ground. “Are you happy your friend did this?”
The words hit like daggers. Elliot shook his head violently, tears spilling down his bruised cheeks. His voice broke in a raw scream. “No! I didn’t— I didn’t know! Please, I didn’t know!”
But Mafioso wasn’t listening. His hand grip Chance phone tighter, retrieving Chance’s phone once more. He held it up almost breaking it, screen glowing faintly.
The tears finally spilled fast down his cheeks, hot against his battered skin. He tried to speak, but his voice broke into jagged sobs.
“Please… I don’t know where he is—I don’t—I can’t help you—”
Mafioso only chuckled, low and rumbling. His gloved hand land grip on Elliot’s throat tightened, forcing his head still, forcing him to look into that endless, hollow smile.
“Oh, I don’t need your help finding him,” Mafioso said, almost kindly. “I’ll find him myself.”
His eyes glinted, sharp as broken glass.
“But you? You’re the kind of reminder men like him don’t forget.”
The meaning hit Elliot all at once. His chest constricted, his stomach twisted, his whole body trembling as the weight of it sank in. Mafioso wasn’t here to kill him. Not yet. He was here to bleed him, break him, and leave him alive just enough to make Chance watch.
The blood dripping from Elliot’s lip hit the floor again, each drop loud in the silence.
“Then again…” Mafioso mused, tilting the device between his fingers, “your friend is still in hiding. These past few days, not a whisper, not a warning. Funny, isn’t it? Almost like he knows I would be here...appear in your place... waiting.”
The phone lit up with a faint notification. Mafioso’s grin gleamed in its glow.
“You know how it goes,” he said smoothly, pressing the phone against Elliot’s chest before pulling it away again. Then, with one gloved finger, he jabbed sharply at Elliot’s sternum. Hard enough to make him wince. Hard enough to drive the words in.
“Someone’s gotta pay the price.”
Elliot shook his head wildly, choking on sobs. “No—no, please, not me—!”
Mafioso bent down, his smile so close now Elliot could see the faint gleam of teeth in the dim light. His words were quiet, but each one was weighted like a stone dropped in water.
“And that someone… is you.”
Elliot’s entire body convulsed with the force of his sobbing. He was trembling so hard his shoulders shook, wrists raw against the tie’s binding. The hopelessness settled heavy in his chest, drowning him, smothering him.
Mafioso tilted his head. In his own silent mind, his heartbeat thundered, not from rage, but from something darker. Watching Elliot’s tears streak down his battered face, watching his chest rise and fall in panicked gasps—it sparked something cold and electric in him.
Cute, he thought, grin stretching. The sight of innocence crumbling, of light flickering beneath his shadow—it made his smile feel almost alive.
“Oh well.”
The words were casual, careless, as if discarding Elliot’s life was no more significant than flicking ash from a cigar.
The fist came down.
Elliot wasn’t ready. He couldn’t brace, couldn’t even flinch in time. The blow crashed into his stomach, knocking the air from his lungs in a strangled yelp. His body curled instinctively, but Mafioso’s other hand shoved him upright again, not letting him collapse.
Another punch.
Then another.
Each one landed heavy, deliberate, timed. Not wild strikes, but measured ones. Designed to hurt, not kill. To break him slowly.
Elliot’s cries echoed through the room, weak and raw, each yelp cut shorter as his breath faltered. His legs gave out, but Mafioso didn’t let him fall—he kept him upright just enough to take the next blow.
Echo, Cane, Beartrap—none moved. None spoke. They just watched.
Elliot’s vision blurred, tears mixing with blood, his cries turning into weak whimpers. His body shuddered violently, the room spinning around him. The taste of iron coated his tongue, dripping down his throat.
And still—Mafioso smiled.
Chapter 16: The Price
Summary:
My back hurt
Chapter Text
Elliot didn’t remember the moment Mafioso finally stepped back. He only remembered the sound—like waves in his skull—the crack of knuckles on bone, the wet sting of copper on his tongue. Then silence, almost deafening after the storm. His breath rattled, shallow but steady, every inhale a whimper pressed between his teeth.
Mafioso stood over him, tall and unmoved, though his chest rose faster than usual. The shadows bent around him, the streetlights weak against the weight he carried. He flexed his hand once, knuckles raw and smeared in Elliot’s blood. Then, almost absently, like it wasn’t even a choice but an instinct, he raised it to his lips.
The taste was sharp. Metallic. But beneath the iron bite lingered something else—warmth, fragility, a hint of sweetness swallowed beneath pain. He closed his eyes for half a second, letting the taste spread, and his pulse throbbed harder in his throat. Obsession wasn’t honey, wasn’t wine. It was blood. Sharp enough to hurt, rich enough to haunt. A reminder of what belonged to him the moment he touched it.
Mafioso’s tongue swept clean across his knuckles, slow. Deliberate. His smile didn’t widen, but his eyes burned with something close to hunger. Cute, he thought again, watching Elliot trembling in the dark, curled on the broken pavement like a discarded thing. His heart kept beating faster, like a drum he couldn’t still.
Behind him, Cane crouched lower, brows drawn. Echo leaned against the wall still, unbothered, arms folded like he’d already seen enough. Beartrap shifted his weight, grunting, but didn’t move forward either.
“You think Chance comes back for him?” Echo asked finally, his tone as flat as a stone skipping water. “That lunatic didn’t even look behind him last time. Doubt he cares.”
Beartrap spat to the side, jaw tight. “He looked back. Don’t tell me you missed it. That split-second, he froze when he saw the car. Maybe he’s not coming for the boy, but don’t fool yourself—he’s not gone either.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Mafioso’s voice cut through, low and certain. “Chance will crawl out eventually. He always does. When he does, he’ll know exactly what’s waiting.”
He turned, his coat brushing the pavement as he started walking away, the others following without hesitation. All but Cane.
Cane’s eyes lingered on Elliot. The kid’s chest rose in unsteady rhythm, his face swollen and painted with bruises, blood smeared across his lip and cheek. He wasn’t going to die—not tonight—but every bruise screamed of what could have been. Cane’s jaw tightened. He muttered something under his breath, then knelt down beside him.
“Stay down, kid,” he grunted, not unkind, his voice low so only Elliot could hear. His hands moved with rough efficiency, putting on a the jacket he have, tugging it Around Elliot’s body fixing jacket straight, pressing fabric against a bleeding cut to slow it. “Ain’t no hero shit here. Just keeping you breathing.”
Echo tilted his head, amused. “Since when do you play doctor, Cane?”
Cane didn’t look back. “Just patching him up enough for the boss to keep going later.” His tone was gruff, dismissive on the surface, but the way his hand steadied Elliot’s shoulder told a different story.
Beartrap let out a low chuckle. “You’re wasting your time. Boy’s already marked. Everyone sees it.”
Cane glanced up once, meeting his eyes. “Maybe so. But not all of this mess is his fault.”
The others didn’t argue. They didn’t need to. Mafioso hadn’t told Cane to stop, and in their world, that silence was permission enough.
By the time they moved out, Elliot was still there, curled and broken, but his pulse steadier thanks to Cane’s rough fix. Mafioso walked ahead, calm as a saint, but every beat of his heart still pounded like the echo of fists. He didn’t look back once. He didn’t need to.
Because in his head, Elliot wasn’t gone. He was still there, trembling. Still his. Still waiting for the next time.
And to Mafioso, that taste would never leave his tongue.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Elliot fumbled with his keys, knuckles stiff and swollen, every movement sending sharp little sparks of pain up his arm. The key finally slid in, the lock clicked, and he leaned his whole body weight against the door to push it open.
The apartment greeted him with silence. No humming refrigerator, no dripping faucet—just the groan of the hinges and the faint creak of the wooden floorboards under his shoes. He staggered inside, barely able to lift his feet.
The place was small—one bedroom, a bathroom, and a living room that doubled as a kitchen. Pizza-themed plushies covered the couch. The faint garlic smell clung to everything no matter how many candles he burned. Normally it was home. Tonight, it was just another box to collapse in.
He coughed hard, doubling over, one hand pressed to his stomach where the bruises throbbed like fire under his skin. The jacket Cane had draped over his shoulders was still on him. It wasn’t his. It smelled like smoke and leather, a sharp scent that made his nose twitch, but it was warm, and he couldn’t bring himself to take it off. The thought of removing it made him feel exposed, fragile.
His bathroom wasn’t far. He staggered toward it, every step heavier than the last, until he caught himself on the sink. His breath rattled, his eyes stung, but he forced himself upright enough to look into the mirror.
The reflection made him freeze.
His lip was split wide, dried blood crusted in dark lines down his chin. One eye was swollen nearly shut, bruises blooming purple and yellow across his cheekbone. His shirt was stained through, stuck to his body in patches where blood had soaked and dried.
And there—bright against the pale of his skin—were the finger-shaped bruises around his neck.
Mafioso’s grip.
Elliot’s hand shot up instinctively, brushing against the mark. The skin was tender, burning even from the lightest touch. He flinched back immediately. It felt less like a bruise and more like a collar, still squeezing, reminding him who had been holding him there.
He reached for the drawer beneath the sink, pulling out a Medkit. The case rattled as his shaking fingers fumbled to open it. Bandages, alcohol wipes, a little tube of ointment tumbled onto the counter. His breath came shallow as he started to clean himself up.
Each wipe stung, the antiseptic biting into cuts and raw skin. He hissed, jerking away, then forced himself to keep going. Slow. Careful. His hand trembled so badly that the tissues came away soaked with blood almost as fast as he could press them down. The trash bin filled with red, a pile of crumpled reminders of just how much he was bleeding.
When he finally taped a bandage over the worst cut on his temple, he dared to look up at the mirror again.
It hadn’t changed.
The same bruised face stared back at him, his eyes ringed dark, his lips trembling. He looked weak. Defeated. Even cleaned, even patched up, he was still the same broken mess Mafioso had left behind.
His breath hitched. His throat burned. He tried to swallow, but it felt like the bruises tightened against his windpipe, like invisible hands were still there, choking him. His chest heaved as the air came in short, shallow bursts. His knees buckled, and he slid down the wall until he was sitting on the cold tile.
He wrapped his arms around himself and let the sobs come.
They were quiet at first, small gasps that slipped through his teeth, but soon they grew louder, rawer. His shoulders shook, his chest convulsed with the effort of holding them back. But the more he tried to swallow it down, the more the tears broke free.
The flashbacks came next. The sound of Mafioso’s voice, low and smooth as he pressed his grip into Elliot’s jaw. The heat of his breath. The weight of the fists slamming into him again and again until Elliot thought his body would cave in. The helpless sound he had made—the begging—echoed in his ears now louder than anything else. He had begged for it to stop. And Mafioso had smiled.
He curled tighter into himself, pressing his forehead to his knees. The shaking wouldn’t stop. His body remembered even when he wanted to forget. Every muscle felt coiled, tense, waiting for the next blow that wasn’t coming.
“Would this be my life?” he whispered hoarsely into the fabric of Cane’s jacket, the words muffled.
The thought clawed deeper into his chest. Would every night end like this—him on the bathroom floor, patching himself up alone, trembling until sleep finally dragged him down? Would Mafioso come back, again and again, until he decided Elliot wasn’t useful anymore? Until Elliot was just another broken body on the floor?
He thought of Chance.
His stomach twisted. What had Chance gotten himself into? What had he gotten them into?
Mafioso’s words cut through him again: “You know the boy? Wire. He came to your pizza often. Are you happy your friend did this?”
Elliot squeezed his eyes shut. He wasn’t happy. God, no. He couldn’t picture Chance’s hand on a gun, couldn’t picture him bringing a rock down again and again on someone’s head—and yet, Mafioso’s description had been so vivid it was burned into his mind. He could see it even though he hadn’t been there. Chance grinning with blood on his face like some monster from a nightmare.
Chance had never meant to kill, Elliot told himself. He couldn’t have. But intent didn’t matter when the result was the same. Wire was in the hospital because of him. Elliot had seen Wire before, had handed him pizzas with a polite smile, never knowing the man would end up bleeding out because of someone Elliot trusted.
The debt wasn’t his. It was Chance’s. Mafioso had said so himself—“the price he stole.” But fairness didn’t matter in Mafioso’s world. Someone had to pay, and if Chance wasn’t here, Elliot was the easier target.
He pressed his fists to his eyes, shaking. His chest hurt, not from the bruises but from the fear itself, raw and gnawing.
Would Mafioso keep coming back? Would Elliot spend the rest of his life looking over his shoulder, waiting for the next time the shadows in the alley weren’t empty?
A sob tore out of him again, and he curled tighter, forehead pressed against the floor this time. The tile was cold and hard, but it grounded him, at least a little.
Cane’s jacket slipped slightly from his shoulder. He gripped it and pulled it back close. It wasn’t comfort, not really, but it was something. Proof that at least one person hadn’t left him to die in that alley. He didn’t know why Cane had helped, why he’d given him this, but it was the only thread keeping him together.
Still trembling, Elliot shut his eyes. His body was exhausted, but his mind wouldn’t rest. Mafioso’s voice lingered, his grip, his smile.
Would this be his life?
The question stayed with him long after the sobs quieted, echoing in the silence of the small apartment, heavier than any bruise on his skin.
-His nightmare becomes a reality -
Chapter 17: Bunny (oneshot)
Summary:
I was bored in the hospital so doing the oneshot bunny one
Elliot is 29
Chance just call him kid cause he is 30 lol
Chapter Text
Bunny world,
Elliot was a round, soft lop-eared bunny, sitting in the meadow with a carrot almost as long as his whole body. He munched happily, floppy ears bouncing with every bite. Sweet berries lay beside him like a snack pile he’d carefully gathered.
From behind the bushes, Chance bounded in—a sleek, scruffy jackrabbit with long legs and twitchy whiskers. He launched himself right onto Elliot, wrapping his paws around him.
“Kid,” Chance hummed, burying his nose in Elliot’s fur, “you have no idea how warm you are.”
Elliot blinked, tilted his head, then just went right back to crunching his carrot. He didn’t seem to mind the sudden cuddle attack.
That’s when a shadow fell over them.
Don Sonnellino, a tall and intimidating black Flemish Giant rabbit, stepped into the clearing. His fur was dark, his eyes sharp, and he never blinked. With one swift move, he knocked Chance aside with a heavy paw.
Before Chance could even bounce back, Don lowered his massive head and pressed his teeth to Elliot’s neck, not biting to kill, but just enough to leave a dark mark in the fur. Then, with surprising gentleness for his size, he picked Elliot up by the scruff and carried him off.
Chance scrambled up, ears pinned back, whiskers twitching furiously. “Hey! Put him down—you overgrown top hat!” He lunged, trying to claw Elliot back.
Don didn’t even look at him. He just kept walking slowly, the carrot dangling from Elliot’s paw as Elliot calmly kept chewing. Crunch. Crunch. Berry.
Elliot, dangling there between the two rivals, seemed completely unbothered—just enjoying his carrot like nothing unusual was happening.
The meadow filled with hisses, stomps, and thuds as Chance and Don fought over him, but all Elliot thought about was: “This berry is actually pretty sweet.”
The meadow was chaos—thumps, growls, and fur flying as Chance the jackrabbit and Don Sonnellino the giant Flemish rabbit clashed over poor, dangling Elliot.
But then Elliot wriggled free, landing with a soft plop in the grass. He padded over, still holding the half-eaten carrot between his teeth. Without a word, he leaned in and began gently licking Chance’s fur, smoothing down the scruff where Don had knocked him.
Chance froze. His ears twitched, his tail gave a nervous flick, but he didn’t move.
Then Elliot turned, just as calmly, and started licking Don’s fur too—right along his massive shoulder. Don went completely still, ears standing tall, eyes unreadable.
The two rivals who had been seconds away from ripping each other’s whiskers out now just… stared at each other. And then, without meaning to, they both slowly lowered themselves to the grass.
Elliot nestled right between them, still grooming their fur with slow, patient licks. Chance relaxed first, letting out a long sigh, while Don—stone-still at first—finally closed his eyes.
The meadow went quiet.
Two fierce rabbits lying in the grass like kits again, and Elliot right in the middle, keeping them calm without saying a word.
Crunch. Crunch. He took another bite of carrot.
.
.
.
.
.
Bonus:
The storm came sudden and fierce. Snow piled high across the meadow, the wind howled through the trees, and the world turned white and silent.
In the middle of it all, Elliot had dug a small cave into the drift, just big enough for three. Inside, his warm fur pressed against both Chance and Don Sonnellino, holding them close as the storm raged outside.
Chance shivered, ears twitching. “Kid… you’re warmer than any blanket I ever gambled for.” He tried to laugh, but his teeth chattered.
Don said nothing. He just pressed closer, massive body curled protectively around Elliot, like a wall against the wind.
Through the long night, Elliot kept them both warm. His steady breathing and soft fur were the only things keeping the cold from sinking too deep. Chance dozed for a while. Don stayed awake, watching over them both.
When the sun finally rose, the storm had passed. Light filtered into the little cave.
Chance stirred first, shaking frost from his whiskers. He nudged Elliot’s side, whispering, “Hey… hey, kid. Wake up. Sun’s up.”
Elliot didn’t move.
Don leaned in, nudging too, more firmly. “Up. Now.” His voice was low, almost pleading.
Still nothing.
The truth crept in slow, like the morning light. Elliot’s warmth had faded. His smile would never return.
Chance froze, ears stiff, eyes wide with panic. “No… no, no, no, kid—this isn’t funny—come on…” His voice broke into a whisper.
Don, the giant who never blinked, pressed his nose to Elliot’s fur and closed his eyes for once. He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to.
The two of them stayed there, curled around Elliot’s still body, as the meadow outside woke to a new day.
And for the first time, neither Chance nor Don felt warm at all.
Chapter 18: ...
Summary:
my back hurt 50/50 but yeah
so what you guy like me to use more Mafioso or Don Sonnellino name?
Chapter Text
Its been a long day.
Elliot sat hunched on his couch, the blanket wrapped so tightly around him it felt more like armor than comfort. The painkillers dulled the ache in his body, but they couldn’t touch the weight in his chest or the flashes that ripped through his head when he shut his eyes. Every creak of the old floor, every gust of wind against the window made him flinch.
He had locked everything—doors, windows, even the tiny bathroom latch. Curtains pulled shut, lights dim, the place felt less like a home and more like a bunker. He buried himself deeper into the blanket, clutching a pizza plushy against his chest like it might protect him from the shadows.
The thought of calling the police came and went, but he shoved it down. They wouldn’t help. They’d only bring more eyes, more danger, maybe even drag his dad into this mess. He couldn’t risk that. Not for himself. Not for his family.
So he sat there, shaking in silence, listening to his own heartbeat pounding in his ears, praying Mafioso’s shadow wouldn’t find its way back through his door.
Elliot had always been the guy who kept moving, even when things were bad. That was the only way he knew how to live—smile, serve, and move forward. But these days at home had nearly broken him.
He lost count how many.
The apartment had felt smaller with every passing hour, the walls pressing in like a cage. He’d cleaned, then cleaned again. Slept too much, then barely at all. The mirror became his worst enemy—each glance catching the swelling on his face, the bruises on his neck, the purple fingerprints that no amount of concealer could erase.
He hadn’t even cooked. Cooking meant energy, and he didn’t have any. Just boiling noodles, slapping vegetables between bread, chewing without tasting. Half of it went cold before he remembered to finish.
But worse than the bruises, worse than the food, worse than the silence, was the constant feeling that he wasn’t alone.
That he was being watched.
He swore he heard footsteps when he opened the fridge. Shadows moving behind the curtains. The same black car parked across the street for too long. Every night he lay awake, clutching the edge of Cane’s jacket even though he’d promised himself not to depend on it. Mafioso knew where he lived. He knew. And any second, that door could open again.
By the fourth day, Elliot couldn’t take it anymore. He forced himself out, hoodie pulled low over his head, red visor tucked deep under the brim. The grocery store was packed, voices bouncing off the tiled walls in harsh echoes. He moved slowly, basket swinging from his hand, grabbing whatever was simple—packaged noodles, sliced bread, a couple vegetables that looked easy enough to boil. He ignored the frozen pizzas. Too on the nose.
People stared. He felt it. Their eyes caught on the marks he couldn’t hide, the yellow skin painted purple and green at the edges. He tugged his hood down farther, heat flushing his neck. Let them think he’d been in a fight. That was easier than the truth.
He paid quick, head down, and bolted back out into the cold.
.
.
.
The bag of groceries sat heavy on the counter, plastic still clinging to the damp edges where condensation had formed. Elliot’s hands shook as he unpacked them one by one—carrots, green onions, a bundle of packaged noodles, a cheap broth packet first. He set them down carefully, like they might break if he moved too fast.
The knife felt cold in his grip when he picked it up. He pressed the carrot flat to the board and began slicing, slow and uneven. His fingers trembled so much the pieces came out jagged, but he didn’t care. Anything to keep moving. Anything to keep from thinking too hard.
But then—he froze.
His eyes caught his own reflection in the blade. Just a blur of pale, sleepless skin and the visor pushed up off his forehead. A faint purple bruise still wrapped around his neck like the memory of hands that had nearly crushed it. His breath caught, shoulders stiff.
How much more of this could he take?
The knife wavered in the air as he lifted it higher, staring into his own reflection. His pulse thumped louder, louder, until all he could hear was his heartbeat against his ears. His hand shook so badly the blade almost slipped from his grip. For one terrifying moment, his thoughts weren’t on vegetables or noodles—they were out of somewhere darker, heavier.
Then—chop.
The carrot snapped in half beneath the blade, and Elliot sucked in a sharp breath, like surfacing from underwater. He blinked, forcing himself to keep cutting, pretending the pause hadn’t happened. Slice after slice, until the board filled with uneven orange circles.
He dropped the vegetables into the pot, added broth, stirred. Steam curled up into his tired face, but it didn’t comfort him. His movements were mechanical. He ladled the noodles into a bowl, sat at the table, and ate quietly. Each bite felt tasteless, just something to fill the hollow ache in his stomach. His eyes weren’t on the food, not really. They kept drifting to the window, to the locked door, to shadows that weren’t there.
Afterward, he sat with pen and paper. The calendar on the wall already had days marked off, scribbled in red pen, counting time since that night. His notes filled the page in messy lines: Chance missing. Mafioso. Debt. stolen item. Location?
He tapped the pen against the paper, staring at the words. His throat tightened.
Where was Chance now? Was he hiding? Running? Did he even know what was happening to him? Elliot pressed the pen harder until it tore the page. Did Chance know that his friend—the one who always waited with a dumb grin and pizza jokes—was bleeding in his bathroom, trembling every night, covering his windows with blankets just to feel safe?
Did Chance even care?
Or had he just left him—crippled, bruised, and terrified—to deal with this alone?
Elliot’s hand slipped, the pen leaving a long, broken line across the paper. He stared at it, chest heavy. He wanted to believe Chance would come back. That Chance would fix this, explain everything, maybe even say Elliot’s name like it mattered.
But the silence on the other end of the line was unbearable.
Elliot crumpled the page in his fist, his knuckles white. He tossed it into the trash with the others—dozens of torn notes, broken questions, useless thoughts.
The room was quiet again. The only sound was the faint hum of the fridge and his own uneven breathing.
Elliot leaned back in his chair, his eyes sinking into the dark circles beneath them, his body too heavy to move. The blanket lay abandoned on the couch, the plushy still propped where he left it. His heart felt stuck somewhere between fear and exhaustion, a place where no amount of noodles or notes could reach.
He closed his eyes. Just for a moment. Just long enough to not think.
The days kept passing, and the marks on the calendar grew. But the silence never changed.
And in that silence, Elliot wondered if he mattered at all.
….
The alley smelled of rain and garbage, but all Elliot could smell was smoke. Not his own—he never smoked—but the bitter drag of Don Sonnellino’s cigarette, curling around his nose, choking his lungs, making it harder to breathe as the hand tightened around his throat.
One hand. That was all it took.
Elliot’s body slammed against the brick wall, head snapping back, vision blurring. His feet kicked uselessly at the ground, searching for leverage that wasn’t there. The glove pressed harder, leather against skin, and Elliot gasped, clutching desperately at the wrist pinning him in place. His visor slipped sideways, useless, his eyes wide and wet with terror.
“Chance,” Mafioso murmured through the smoke, voice smooth as poison. He exhaled slowly, the ember at the tip glowing bright. “Your little gambler friend is very clever. He’s gone now—far, far away. Left you behind.”
“Choosing the easy way out…”
The words cut sharper than the chokehold. Elliot tried to shake his head, tried to make a sound, but Beartrap’s massive hand clamped down over his mouth, silencing every plea. His muffled whimper only made Don smile.
“Disappointing,” the boss whispered, as if speaking to himself, but his dark eyes never left Elliot’s face. “All alone. No one to help you. And yet…”
The grip on Elliot’s throat tightened until black spots danced in his vision. He clawed uselessly at the glove, his nails scraping against leather. His lungs burned. His chest heaved.
“…you bleed so beautifully.”
Elliot’s stomach dropped.
The cigarette lowered. Slow. Almost tender. Don Sonnellino’s (mafioso) gaze lingered on the terrified flicker in Elliot’s eyes, as though he wanted to drink in every ounce of fear before the pain.
Then—contact.
The burning end pressed into the side of Elliot’s neck.
White-hot fire seared his skin, and Elliot bucked violently against the wall, screaming against Beartrap’s smothering palm. The stench of charred flesh filled the alley, mixing with smoke. His eyes watered, his body shook, every muscle tensed in pure agony. His muffled cries turned into broken sobs, tears streaming down his face as his legs gave out.
Cane, quiet and calculated, moved forward—not to stop the torture, but to gently cover Elliot’s eyes with a steady hand. “Shh. Don’t watch. Just listen.”
But the darkness only made it worse. The pain didn’t stop. His imagination filled in everything he couldn’t see.
Mafioso finally pulled the cigarette away, flicking the ash aside like Elliot’s pain meant nothing. He leaned close, so close Elliot could feel the heat of his breath.
Elliot’s knees buckled as the hand on his throat released. He crumpled to the ground, clutching his burned neck, coughing violently as air tore back into his lungs. His whole body shook, his chest heaving, his uniform stained with dirt and tears.
And then—something soft.
A single rose, red as blood, was placed gently on his chest. Its petals brushed his chin, delicate against the raw burn on his skin. Don stepped back, straightening his coat. Echo signaled, and the henchmen moved in perfect formation, leaving Elliot gasping on the ground.
The black car door slammed shut. The engine roared. Tires splashed through the puddles, carrying the mafia away, their laughter faint against the night.
And Elliot…
Elliot lay there trembling, a rose pressed against his chest like a cruel joke, smoke still stinging his eyes, the taste of ash and blood in his mouth. His hands shook as he tried to push himself upright, but his body wouldn’t listen.
The only thing he could hear, over and over, was (Mafioso) Don Sonnellino’s voice—calm, deep, and sickeningly certain:
“You bleed so beautifully.”
Chapter 19: White Walls, Black Debt
Summary:
Wire just like me, in the hospital sob.
doctor said why i am writing so much
you guy should thank my friend for the art.
hehe
Chapter Text
The ceiling was white.
Too white. Too bright. The kind of white that didn’t let you sleep, no matter how many times you blinked or turned your head. It hummed with the faint buzz of fluorescent tubes, and every time Wire cracked his eyes open, the glare stabbed through his skull like a hot needle.
He hated it.
“Feels like heaven,” he muttered hoarsely, shifting on the stiff hospital bed. His voice was weak, rasping against a throat that hadn’t spoken in days. “Nah. Scratch that. Feels like hell.”
The throbbing in his stomach told him exactly where he was — not dead, not gone, but stuck somewhere between the two. The bullet hole burned beneath the bandages like someone had left an iron pressed against his skin, and the memory of the fight replayed whether he wanted it or not.
Chance’s wild grin. The gunfire. The rock smacking the side of his head so hard the world went black.
Yeah. Heaven or hell? Wire figured he’d gotten lost on the way to both.
The doctor had told him he was “lucky.” Wire didn’t think so. Lucky would’ve been walking away with only a scratch, or maybe not running into that crazy gambler at all. But here he was — breathing, hurting, chewing down on bland hospital food that tasted like cardboard dipped in salt water.
He poked at the gray lump on his tray with the plastic fork, frowning. “They call this food?” he grumbled to no one. “I swear, if the boss sent me here just to punish me for messing up, he won.”
The nurse had come in earlier, rattled off things about “bed rest” and “medication schedules.” Wire hadn’t heard a word past “no soda.”
Now it was quiet. The kind of quiet that made him feel small. He hated quiet, too. It gave his mind too much space.
He thought about Beartrap, big and burly, bullets chewing through him like he was made of iron plates instead of flesh. He thought about Echo barking orders, Cane keeping calm even when everything went to hell, Mafioso’s voice steady as stone in the storm.
And Chance. Always Chance. That smile, that danger. Wire’s chest tightened, bitterness mixing with fear. “Almost killed me,” he whispered. “Crazy bastard probably doesn’t even remember my name.”
He sighed and let his head fall back against the pillow.
“Wish I could go back,” he mumbled. “Back to work. Back to the family.”
The walls smelled like bleach and medicine. He missed the smell of gunpowder, cigars, and rain on concrete. He missed laughing with Beartrap even if the guy didn’t talk much. He missed proving himself to Echo, pestering Cane with questions, showing Mafioso he wasn’t just the rookie anymore.
Hell, he even missed the pizza from that little shop. The one run by that red-capped guy who always smiled, even when Wire stuffed half the menu in his face.
He was about to close his eyes when the door creaked open. Wire groaned. “If you’re the doc with another needle, I’ll—”
A hand grabbed his cheek and tugged hard.
“Hey—!” Wire’s eyes shot open. The world spun for a second, then cleared, and there they were.
Beartrap. Cane. Echo.
And they weren’t empty-handed. A fruit basket swung in Beartrap’s fist like it weighed nothing.
“Holy—” Wire’s voice cracked into laughter, relief flooding his chest. “You guys! You actually came!”
Beartrap smirked, or at least Wire thought he did — hard to tell with that poker face. He set the basket down, and Cane immediately took over, peeling an apple with surgeon-like precision.
“Eat,” Cane said simply, slicing neat wedges onto a paper plate.
Wire grabbed one, chomping down like he hadn’t eaten in weeks. Juice dripped down his chin as he grinned wide. “Better than that trash they call food.”
“How you hanging on?” Beartrap asked, voice rumbling low.
Wire puffed out his chest, chewing loudly. “Like a champ. Bullet didn’t stand a chance!” he bragged, mouth full.
Echo pinched the bridge of his nose. “Chew. Swallow. Then talk.”
“Yeah, yeah—” Wire waved dismissively, then sucked in the wrong way. The fruit lodged in his throat. His eyes bulged.
“—ghhhhk!”
He gagged, coughing wildly, face turning red.
“Idiot,” Echo muttered.
Beartrap moved fast, slamming a firm hand between Wire’s shoulders. One, two, three pats, and the chunk flew free, bouncing across the sheets.
Wire wheezed, then laughed breathlessly. “See? Not even fruit can kill me. I’m invincible.”
Cane arched an eyebrow. “You’ll choke yourself into the grave if you’re not careful.”
Wire laughed again, but inside, his chest warmed. This was what he missed. The teasing. The scolding. The weight of family filling up all the empty spaces.
For a while, they talked lightly — about recovery, about Beartrap’s patched wounds, about Echo barking at the new recruits. Wire soaked in every word like sunlight. He didn’t even notice the silence creeping in, until he asked the question himself.
“So… any leads on Chance?”
The room went still.
Cane’s knife paused mid-slice. Echo’s jaw tightened. Beartrap’s eyes flickered toward the window.
Wire blinked. “What? What’d I say?”
Finally, Cane set the knife down and folded his hands. His voice was calm, but heavy. “We found someone close to him.”
Wire’s stomach flipped. “Close? Like… family?”
“No,” Echo said flatly. “A friend. Someone he’s been seen with. Someone important.”
Wire leaned forward, excitement sparking. “Ooh. Use ‘em as bait, huh? Drag Chance out by the collar! Smart move.” He chuckled at his own joke.
No one laughed.
Wire’s grin faltered. “…Wait. You’re serious?”
The silence said it all.
A cold bead of sweat rolled down his temple. His voice dropped. “Who?”
No one answered at first. Then Cane, quiet as ever, spoke the name.
“The pizza boy.”
Wire froze. The words didn’t register at first. The pizza boy? The guy with the visor? The one who smiled even when Wire ordered too much food?
He blinked, half-smiling in disbelief. “Come on. You’re kidding. Right? The pizza guy? My pizza guy?”
No one was kidding.
The silence pressed down until Wire’s chest hurt more than the bullet wound. His fingers curled tight around the blanket.
“We don’t… we don’t gotta hurt him, right?” Wire asked quietly, almost pleading.
Beartrap finally looked at him. One look. Heavy. Wordless. Final.
And Wire understood.
Debt was debt.
Wire’s throat went dry. He forced a shaky smile, nodding slowly. “Right. Of course. I’ll join you soon as I’m back on my feet. Gotta pull my weight, yeah?”
No one answered, but they didn’t need to. They knew he would. He was family.
Even if it broke him inside.
The door opened again, and the air shifted. Everyone straightened.
Mafioso stepped in, tall and dark, his usual smoke curling from the cigarette between his fingers are not here. But his presence enough to filled the room instantly, a weight Wire both feared and admired.
“Wire,” Don Sonnellino said smoothly. “Still breathing, I see.”
“Yes, boss,” Wire rasped, forcing his back straight despite the pain. “Won’t quit that easy.”
Mafioso’s eyes softened just enough to be noticed. He reached into his coat and pulled out something small.
Wire’s breath caught.
His headphones. His hat. The ones shattered in the fight.
Now fixed. Clean. Whole again.
Mafioso placed them gently in Wire’s hands. “Broken things can be mended,” he said quietly. “So can loyalty.”
Wire’s throat tightened. He slipped the hat on immediately, the weight familiar, comforting. His chest swelled with pride, drowning out the fear gnawing at his stomach.
“For you, boss,” Wire whispered. “Always.”
The family stood together in the white room, fruit basket forgotten, silence heavy but strong.
Wire knew then — there was no heaven or hell.
There was only this.
The family.
The debt.
The boss.