A dark watercolor portrait loomed over the table at Custode Segreto’s well-known local restaurant embedded with an Vitalian heritage.


    Audry looked at the production process of Quinn’s shell on his phone. The waitress arrived, greeted herself, and left for the time being.


    “The roaches keep getting stronger. I think that’s more of an issue than your expo ordeal. That’s all I’m going to say,” Andrew Noire said in his thick New Amsterdam accent. He was never one to agree with the Rion Accord’s policies and way of operation but he was a good friend of Audry nonetheless.


    Audry sympathized with his plight against the Wildfires but there were other things holding his attention. “I’m at the point where the war has taken a backseat. Company development is more important. Without that we’d be nowhere.”


    Andrew Noire took a bite of the bruschetta appetizer, wiping his mouth with his handkerchief. “Yes but I still fail to see why you think a little event is a make or break for the Accord. A true make or break is the Shibboleth armor failing on the frontlines. Or whatever secret little project is going on down in the Basement.”


    “Your track record’s not so impressive for somebody telling me how to run a business that has benefited from my work,” Audry joked.


    Andrew laughed, “Let’s not go there.”


    “We don’t have to. I just want you to know I’ve thought it through.” Audry read the Alto Robotics email in regards to Quinn’s new shell. “I want what’s best for all of us. Everyone is the benefactor at the end of the day. Without effort the world would’ve fallen a very, very long time ago my guy.”


    Andrew finished another bruschetta and seemed to be done until the waitress was to return. He, of all people, was Audry’s go-to for introspection. His work with some of the world’s most dangerous criminals shined through. Audry sometimes felt like he was being interrogated even if they were just playing a round of eight-ball on a Saturday night.


    “I respect that. But who’s to say the Wildfires won’t show up at our doorstep and destroy everything? You know the latest reports are saying they’re getting stronger right? The death toll’s been rising since last December. Now it’s in the millions. The numbers say it all. I hardly feel like there’s truly any progress being made by maintaining a domestic image. We’ve got to be more involved in the world outside. Because soon, whether we like it or not, the world outside will come to us. And I don’t want to see the land I love fall.”


    “Andrew stop worrying. Public opinion matters. It made or breaked military efforts so many times I can’t count it on two hands,” he said. It was a bit annoying for Audry to be in such a relaxed setting talking about how the world’s weight was on him. He drank from his glass, sat his phone aside, and took in a deep breath of the atmosphere. A few booths on their side of the room paralleled the open dining floor and bar on the other side, encompassed by dimly lit bulbs fixated high up within the scaffolding.


    “Still,” Andrew replied.


    Audry chuckled, “I get it. I understand it entirely. I’ve got a plan and I’m going to execute it to the best of my ability. By the time the war is over things will be right.”


    The third member of their party arrived.


    Claire Johannes walked up to the table, her heels clicking the floor. She had a very simple taste in clothes but never failed to wear only blacks and whites. It was as if her morality bled into her style.


    Audry smiled and let her into the booth.


    “How’s your evening going gentlemen?” she asked, sitting her purse to the side.


    “Good. And yours?” Andrew asked.


    “Would have been better if I didn’t have to argue with this chick Dana from PR. Mr. Conroy needs to quit hiring a bunch of assholes,” Claire huffed.


    “What’d she say?”


    “I was just trying to put together something to help your situation with Bradley Bean. But apparently she couldn’t do anything without Con-Boy’s authority. I’ve got the authority over him and all his goons.”


    “I still want some compensation from this. Point Blank Films can go under water for all I care. They may see it as retaliation and sue us but I want them to path. Do whatever you can,” Audry told her.


    “You signed a release form right?” she asked him.


    “Yes.”


    “And yet somehow they still claimed you didn’t sign what you were saying.”


    “That’s because they reprinted my signature on another form,” Audry tapped his fingers on the table as if he was playing a piano.


    “Oh, those damn snakes.” Claire tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, scowling. “You signed another form? Cause the representative claims you did not.”


    “Bullshit. I’ve got pictures,” Audry felt like he had a moment of clarity and sped through his phone. Only a moment later did he show her the original pictures he had signed.


    “Took it with my glasses. So they wouldn’t had known,” he said, feeling like he was a step ahead.


    “I’m already getting my calls lined up,” she told him.


    “Just let me know when you’ve got something rolling, alright?”


    A little terracotta pot stood in the middle of the table with a small fern sprouting from it. He fiddled with the blades, hearing Andrew go on about how the übernationalist Party in the region would cause an uproar and how their employment of Wildfire operatives was a detriment to the peace treaties between the allied countries and the neutral powers.If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    Andrew laughed to himself, his face glowing with thankfulness once the waitress appeared.


    She took down their orders and when the trio had been lost in conversation she returned with plates of delicately crafted, freshly cooked Vitalian cuisine.


    Audry would have never expected being CEO would include so many dinners, venues, meetings, and office time. There he was, in a well-off restaurant at the one of corners of Liberation City’s mainstreet, moving into a discussion about the scheduled meet-up with the Polruszechian head-of-state.


    It was nothing more than a pipe dream to expect a long time enemy to lay down their arms and give up everything they’ve built in the past few decades. But with Polruszechian loyalist movements occurring in western Old Europe, capitalizing on democracy was Audry’s mission.


    From Polruszechian relations, to the wedding of Queen Catori Soliloquy, to a pair of OSI spooks Andrew had come into contact with last week, they enjoyed their meals and each other''s company.


    Andrew excused himself to make a trip to the bathroom after having asked the waitress for their bill.


    Claire ate a sliver of her tiramisù, admiring the taste. “I’ve got to get this more often.”


    “I’ve had better, I’m pretty sure. You ever have strawberry crostata? Or, what’s the name, hazelnut bombolini?” he asked. Nothing could beat the plate of crostata he ate in Napoli, though the crostata of Custode Segreto’s was top tier.


    “Crostata, yes. The other one, no,” she pursed her lips.


    “It’s worth it,” he said, taking a big bite out of it. Gesturing for her to try a portion, in which she did.


    “I might have to get it then,” she said.


    “Yep, do it.”


    She suddenly eyed him as if she had discovered a secret plan. “Oh, I see. You’re just trying to get me fat, boss.”


    “What? No. Not at all,” he scoffed, laughing after.


    “How can I do my job if I can’t walk to the restroom without running out of breath?” she asked him.


    “Remember that Allison chick?”


    “Yeah?”


    “Yeah.”


    She gave him a look of denial. “I’m not looking like that. I won’t. I refuse. I have a booty to maintain.”


    “Sure do,” He said, giving her a nudge. It was at that moment he saw four gentlemen in black three piece suits enter the restaurant.


    “Hm?”


    Audry tried to change the subject for all intents and purposes. “Isn’t it a little chilly today? I thought we were in summer?”


    “You aren’t sly,” Claire laughed as Andrew approached the table with a big grin.


    “You see ‘em?” Audry asked him. Andrew only nodded before taking a seat. It would not take long before Claire caught on.


    He eyed the lapel pins on the three men. The arrowhead sigil of the Op-4 on the right collar and a black widow on their left.


    Widowmakers had arrived.


    Professional and ruthless, the Widowmakers had tried taking Audry’s life before. Another reason why Op-4 operations had to be ended.


    Audry shot Quinn a message to get the car ready at the front entrance.


    Andrew kept the conversation going about how he had found a wedding ring in the bathroom.


    The Widowmakers had been given the booth directly behind theirs. Audry knew the men would have no problem committing murder in cold blood. The public eye was of no relation to them.


    Audry’s heart pumped like war drums. The relaxing atmosphere grew into an eerie space that he hoped was not conveyed onto his expression.


    The waitress approached them with the bill, Audry paid and tipped more than needed much to her delight, and the three made their leave as soon as possible. They hadn’t even left the front door before Audry heard someone call his name. Not even his last name, but his first.


    The audacity, he thought.


    A lady’s gasp, frantic running, and a head turn later, Audry looked as one of the suits opened fire at the entrance.


    He dove to the ground as a bullet cracked the air, shattering the glass doors behind him. Three other men opened fire just as Claire stopped them with her kinesis. A gesture of her hand and she clustered the bullets together, launching them at the first man. The sheer impact launched him into one of the tables, mahogany breaking beneath his body. The other two returned rounds, grabbing their fallen comrade. Audry caught a face full of the stone flooring after a bullet kicked up shards.


    In the blink of an eye the gunfire ceased and the room went silent.


    Audry felt dazed, rubbing the smooth of his fingers across his face. His eyes burned but he hadn’t the slightest debris in them.


    Claire grunted, cursing at the Widowmakers who had taken their leave through one of the side doors.


    They looked around the entrance. The glass panels separating the lot and the interior were shattered. It looked like diamonds had been thrown onto the floor of the Custode Segreto.


    Andrew groaned on the floor, clutching his abdomen. “Forge, help me.”


    “Shit. Hold on Drew, hold the fuck on.” Audry clambered towards his friend, checking his body for injuries.


    “The piece of shit shot me,” Andrew mumbled.


    “Someone call EMS,” Audry yelled into the restaurant.


    A waiter peaked through the doorway, wide-eyed and shaken, “I’m on it.”


    Audry accessed Andrew’s back for an exit wound. He looked to see that his hand was covered in a crimson coating.


    “You’ll be fine buddy,” he said. “The wound’s not that bad.”


    Andrew stared up to the veranda’s ceiling. “I see the light.”


    “Stop kidding around Andrew.”


    “It does hurt though. I can’t lie,” he laughed, coughing and contracting into the fetal position.


    “You’re not acting like it. Now stop moving so I can keep pressure on it,” Audry ordered.


    “I’m tracking them right now,” Claire said, dropping to Andrew’s side.


    Audry looked her in the eyes, giving her the nod of approval.


    She slipped out of the restaurant and Audry applied aid to Andrew with tablecloth and the first aid kit from the backspace of Segreto’s.


    “It’s not much but it’ll have to do. Don’t tense up bud,” Audry said, his hands shaking.


    Andrew laid his head down, trying to relax.


    “If I die, avenge me.”


    Audry thumped Andrew’s forehead. “Shut the hell up.”