[Orig] Verita Nascosta (Ch. 1)
Title: Verita Nascosta
Author: Umi-chii
Credits: Umi-chii owns everything, from letter A to the dot to the comma to the plot.
A/N: I have no idea what prompted me to revive this very, very old work. Verita Nascosta derives back to my early first year high school days, and was left to collect dust in the corner of my cabinet for two years. Now, I'm back to writing it, after the creation of Stockholm Syndrome, a sort of continuation to Verita Nascosta.
Summary: In Rome, Italy, there lives a girl who leads a boring life. Life is nothing but just a cycle of typicality. Everything changes though, when she saved a dying Daniel, a special task force agent from Vatican. From then on, her entire life is tied to his. Bloodbath ensues.
Word Count: 3139
Verita Nascosta
Chapter 1 - The Magician
The smoke is getting into her eyes. Her mother’s already on the brink of collapsing, both from heat and exhaustion. The fire department couldn’t do anything to stop the fire. The policemen couldn’t even find the cause of the explosion. Worse, Helios is still inside the burning church.
Her father is restless. He has been trying to pry the firemen off of him, so he could run inside the burning church and save Helios. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t at all. No matter what he does, he can’t get them off of him and Selene couldn’t do anything at all but watch at as fountains after fountains of water extinguish the blazing fire. The water doesn’t help though. They seem to ignite the fire even more.
“Oh, Lord above! Someone please save my son!”
She could hear her father’s frantic voice. It’s right next to her. Distantly, she sees a shadow approaching them from the left, but she pays it no heed. Her eyes are transfixed at the burning church, at the blazing fire. She’s expecting her brother to emerge from within and through the wall of flame around the desecrated sacrament. Her face is devoid of any emotions; she lost them to the fire. Her mind is blank, she couldn’t think of a word to say, to comfort her mother, to shut her father up. All she could do is stand there, rooted to the ground, and just watch. Watch and watch and watch even more with despair.
Suddenly the fire explodes. It explodes unlike anything mankind has ever witnessed before. The explosion has caught everyone off guard, has stopped the firemen from extinguishing it. Instead, it blows away everything surrounding it. The wind picks up and adds even more to the force. Selene could feel everyone backing away. Her mother is already a yard away from her, pushed back by the sudden hard gust of smoky wind.
“My son!”
Burnt, charred woods are seen at the sky before they land in a pile in front of them. They stare at the remains of what used to be pews and mounds of saints that decorated the hallways and altars of the church. Her father stares at a particular burnt object with horrid splayed all over his face, his eyes wide with fear and mouth gaping at the disgusting sight. It’s a bloody, burnt arm, its skin roasted black. An end of a bone could be seen sticking out, and the sight made her father’s knees even weaker, until he finally collapses and stares at it with fear. What if Helios is sharing the same fate with the hand? What if the hand is Helios’ itself? The thoughts enter and leave his mind in an instance, as he starts to lose his senses. His wife is already out cold; seeing the remains of a body missing an arm and a leg has made her faint.
The only person who doesn’t recoil from the sight is Selene, simply because she ignores the heaps of remains. But there is also another one. This time, it’s a man, a young man who’s in his early 20’s in a dark black suit, his red necktie the only color in his entire being.
His presence alerted Selene, making her look up from her stand and at the man beside her. She looks up and notices the distant look the man has in his blue eyes. The man then looks down at her; he has noticed he’s being watched.
“Why is the world so evil?” He asks her. Selene says nothing. She just continued staring at him, but breaks into a gasp when he laughs at her ignorance, chuckling softly. “It’s because everything that is good isn’t around anymore. If there are, they’re already tainted.” Before Selene could find her voice to reply, the man walks away, a hand inside his pants pocket. Something silver glinted from the depths of his coat, but Selene doesn’t pay any attention to it. For the first time, she has turned her back on the burning church and watches the man leave the street, his coat moving against the wind. By the time new recruitments finally appear at 3:00 AM, they found the young girl distantly staring off at something far away, at a clock tower that has its second hand stuck in 12 forever.
No one knows why.
[xxx]
Dean Anderson is like no any other guy out there. He’s suave, charming and has a great charisma. Unlike his little brother, who couldn’t do anything but stare with his boring eyes and do nothing else other than being a bookworm, Dean is an action-packed man. He’s a black belt, a master of fencing, and the best in archery. Thousands of ladies have swooned at his feet by the sparkle of his smile. His eyes has never failed in charming a woman, may she be married or widowed, to his bed. In short, Dean is perfect-except for one thing; judgment. Hence the reason why Dean couldn’t keep a relationship that lasts beyond a week.
“When are you coming back home?” Mikhail, his annoying, little brother, is very stubborn. It’s one of the traits that he shares with his brother, much to his dismay. The boy is only fourteen, and yet his brain is already as adept as his own. The boy is a born genius, but just like him, lacks something. But unlike him, his brother is completely cold and uncaring. He swears the boy wouldn’t even cough up ransom money if their parents got kidnapped.
“I’m still in the job, alright? Call me later.” Without waiting for a reply, he cuts the shared line and stuffs his phone back inside his coat. It’s only in phone calls where Dean can shut Mikhail up for real. He’s already starting to dread the end of the mission, wishing that hopefully, the mission would go on longer so he can spend more time without his brother’s presence. Yes, his brother is a real headache.
Resisting the urge to rub his forehead, Dean heads straight to his Mustang parked at the corner of the street. Settling inside his car, he quickly grabs the bottle of perfume kept inside the car cabinet and sprayed a generous amount over his coat. The itch of the smoke is grating his nerves. Even his hair has the scent of carbon dioxide on it. It seriously ruins his person.
Reviving the car’s engine, he steps on the gas and drives straight to the Sistine Chapel. Far behind him, the reflection of a still burning Church of Santo Stefano turns red with its fire burning ceaselessly. The image of it burns itself in his mind as he remembers the embers and ashes being carried by the wind. But most of all, he can never forget the young girl with her dead grey eyes. Never in his entire life have he seen eyes these dead. Even Mikhail has life, if not then little, in his eyes. The mere memory of it brings shivers to his body.
Fixing his hair with one hand, he glances at the side mirror. There’s nothing trailing him from behind. All of the cars are heading straight to the burning church. Good then. That means he can go to Sistine Chapel to run his errand without any distraction.
Stepping harder on the acceleration, Dean speeds the car up, running over the red light. Time is precious, and to him, there’s no time left to waste. He must hurry at all costs, before the world crumbles around him. He won’t let his sacrifice go to waste; after all, he didn’t ignore Irise’s call for some simple reason.
In the far recesses of his mind, he could already imagine Irise blowing off at him. Damn the woman and her deviltry.
With all honesty, Dean is not quite the man perfect for assassination. True, he has done all sorts of odd jobs that can put any syndicate to shame, and that his resume befits that of a mercenary. The thing is he never includes assassination in it. His license to wield guns doesn’t mean he’s an assassin for hire. His guns are there for several purposes. To kill is one of them, but never to assassinate. He strongly believes his soul is far too good for such a hideous and cowardly crime.
Just then, his phone starts ringing again. Ignoring his phone and the vibration it’s causing against the inside pocket of his coat. He turned for the left and shifted gears. The top of the Sistine Chapel can already be seen from the distance. His mind has already pictured the works of Michelangelo, especially the Creation of Adam. He couldn’t help but smile sardonically at himself. The image of God reaching out his hand to Adam makes him laugh. The painting is so ironic for the modern age. Indeed, he wonders where the Lord is right now in this god forsaken world. There’s not much to answer to his million dollar question, but he couldn’t help but think wistfully about it. It never stops amusing him about all the possibilities and immediate thoughts that surface on his mind.
Before stopping his car before the chapel, he extracts his phone from its place. Flipping it open, he ignores the missed call icon and instead, pushed in a memorized series of numbers. After a ring, the other line picked up and a heady voice answers him.
“What?” The voice was rasp and Dean could feel it was being hissed at him. He only grinned at nothing though and replies coolly. “I’m here. Where are your men?”
There’s a slight pause before the designated answer. In most circumstances, most people his age would be tearing the roots of their hair or rushing through everything. In worst case scenarios, they would be yelling frantically at the other line to hurry up. But like what’s mentioned before, Dean is like no other man, may they be the same age as he or not. Dean is very calm and collected, and his cool persona should never be underestimated. That’s why he remains cool and still, smiling loftily at himself in the rear view mirror.
“Go and stand before The Temptation of Christ, facing the north wing. There you will find what you’re seeking.”
A soft click follows, telling Dean that the other line has disconnected. Blinking at nothing, Dean then stares at his phone and at the blank screen it’s showing. The missed call icon is still there, albeit smaller and displayed in a corner. Making a mental note to himself to call Irise later, he steps out of his car and slips inside the chapel, striding towards the fresco by Botticelli.
Sandro Botticelli, famed Renaissance artist, has always been admired greatly by Dean and, surprisingly, his little brother. When he first brought Mikhail to Italy and here to the chapel, he was surprised that his brother was mesmerized by the paintings, especially at Botticelli’s. If he can reckon properly, Mikhail’s personal favorite is The Punishment of Korah. To his childish eyes, he interprets the people present in the painting as ‘confused’ and ‘obsessed’, just like the way he sees the world today.
Finally inside the dark chapel, Dean doesn’t find it surprising at all that there’s no presence of any security. Ah, how amazing the Kritiker works.
Walking straight towards the instructed fresco, he stands before it and gazes at its impeccable beauty, before finally facing north, awaiting the so-called answer. Funny he has actually expected the message to be a real object, to be passed to him by a messenger in black. But alas, to his great surprise, what comes next after him isn’t anything that he has awaited. Instead of someone dressed in black carrying a box, or at least a little note taped to the wall, a bullet comes flying pass his ear, missing a scant of his hair. His head quickly turns in a whiplash, eyes widening an inch. For the first time in his life, Dean is caught off guard, and terribly surprised. It has never happened to him before. He’s famed and greatly noted for his calm and cool demeanor.
The bullet hit a wall far ahead of him, imbedding itself in one of Raphael’s tapestries hanging on the wall. How the tapestry has gotten there, he doesn’t know; the cartoons are only hanged during special occasion, and he couldn’t count this moment as one. The chosen tapestry is the cartoon, the Christ’s Charge to Peter. And much to his dismay, the bullet is directly at the forehead of the Savior. Dean doesn’t know if he should start fretting over the waste of such a marvelous piece of work.
Then like before, his phone suddenly vibrates, jolting him out of his panicking. With a shaking hand, he fishes out his phone and answers it. He tries his hardest to calm his voice.
“Hello?”
“You see it then, I take it?”
Dean stares at the tapestry, now with a grimmer expression. His eyes narrow when he realizes the damage is actually greater than he thought. A hole can now be seen from the tapestry.
After a long pause, he asks softly, “What do you want then?”
He’s starting to become aware of his surrounding. He feels like a lost black sheep inside the heavenly chapel, defiling its holiness. Dean could hear a deep chuckling resounding through his phone. He’s starting to have the gut feeling he’s going to regret taking up the offer. Oh, if only Mikhail’s life isn’t that precious to him.
“You know very well what I want.”
Like before again, the line clicked shut. Dean let the phone stay pressed against his ear, its screen going blank. He hangs his head down, along with his eyes. He couldn’t bring himself to look up at the tapestry, much less at the predicament he has put himself in. There’s no way he could pry the boy and give him to Kritiker without Ægis suspecting him. Finally, after a few more moments of relapsing composure, Dean fixes his coat and tie. He keeps the phone on his hand though. Fingers pressing hard on the keypads, he covers the screen with his palm. In the same fashion of how he enters the chapel, he slips out quietly, and walks straight back to his car. He didn’t dare look back over his shoulder at the looming chapel. He has a distinct feeling he’s being watched.
Without much fervor, when he’s finally inside his car, he drives back to his hotel. Throughout the entire ride, his mind is on a lot of things, going from Mikhail to the young girl, from Irise to Kritiker, and finally, the entire time he has spent inside the chapel. It’s too bizarre for him to take up, too surreal. To think that he has survived it all without a single trace of some security chasing his tail…
He’s already guessing that by now, Irise might be having some sort of suspicion on him. He couldn’t help it but nodding along to himself. It makes a lot of sense, if Irise will end up doubting him. After all, he hasn’t been quite the goody two shoes. One of the protocols is not to join any other organization once a part of Ægis. A member of the organization must cut all of his ties with other organizations. Dean didn’t do that. Instead, he continues working as a mercenary while working as a secret agent. Yet he has to admit that he’s not being a double agent. No, he’s far from being a double agent. Let’s just say that unlike others, who take part time jobs like delivering pizzas or taking nacho orders, Dean takes it up to a notch higher than the norm. He doesn’t exchange his suits for ordinary red, striped, checkered shirts while serving hungry, greasy and obese teenagers. Dean is a man of great dignity. He keeps his coat around him, and actually uses his guns. His guns are never worthless to him, even when locked inside a huge closet type freezer.
By the time he’s finally inside his hotel room and ready to go to sleep, he rechecks his sent items, making sure he has sent a note to Andrew. It’s about time to abuse some family friendship bonds. Besides, he knows the other won’t mind knowing that he has visited one of his ancestor’s works. After all, Andrew Botticelli is a man who is very just like him. Though the younger man-Andrew, actually has a deeper sense of pride and prefers to keep himself to the shadows than squander his way around, Dean is very sure Andrew won’t mind bending some few rules around. That’s how cool Andrew is. He never hesitates in doing anything that can help him achieve his goals, may they be personal or not. This is why whenever Dean needs help that requires powers greater than the Pope himself, Dean would always resort to Andrew. It’s not that Andrew is the king of the world-though he’s very sure Andrew could pass for it, and in fact, qualify for it. To Dean’s biased opinion, Andrew is probably the world already. But it’s probably more to the reason that Andrew has this aura around him that always makes everyone bow down to him. Every corner he turns, no one would dare to stare straight at his eyes. In a sense, Andrew owns the world if he wants to. Even the Pope would give in to Andrew, who doesn’t have to do anything charming. All he has to do is just stand there nonchalantly. A second later, everyone would be kneeling down and bowing their heads without a short of command. If no one is able to kneel down, then they would either have fainted from awe or stand there on their ground, dumbstruck and flabbergast. Hence the reason why Dean is very careful when it comes to matter concerning his friendship with Andrew. Truth be told, Dean could consider himself as Andrew’s best friend. Outside Andrew’s world of business and power, he really doesn’t have anyone aside from him and his little brother, the dear Amadeo. Speaking of which, Dean missed that kid. He’s such a bundle of joy and fun. Never losing spirit. So opposite from his older and colder brother.
Sighing softly, he drags himself to the soft, white hotel bed. His phone lies beside his silver watch and twin pistols. Nuzzling the pillow, Dean welcomes sleep as the moonlight shines its light pass the window. Suffice to say, his sleep is plagued with little dreams, except for the soft, dark and low laughter of a satanic voice. The imaginary voice itself is enough to keep Dean awake until he wills himself back to sleep.
TBC
Author: Umi-chii
Credits: Umi-chii owns everything, from letter A to the dot to the comma to the plot.
A/N: I have no idea what prompted me to revive this very, very old work. Verita Nascosta derives back to my early first year high school days, and was left to collect dust in the corner of my cabinet for two years. Now, I'm back to writing it, after the creation of Stockholm Syndrome, a sort of continuation to Verita Nascosta.
Summary: In Rome, Italy, there lives a girl who leads a boring life. Life is nothing but just a cycle of typicality. Everything changes though, when she saved a dying Daniel, a special task force agent from Vatican. From then on, her entire life is tied to his. Bloodbath ensues.
Word Count: 3139
Verita Nascosta
Chapter 1 - The Magician
The smoke is getting into her eyes. Her mother’s already on the brink of collapsing, both from heat and exhaustion. The fire department couldn’t do anything to stop the fire. The policemen couldn’t even find the cause of the explosion. Worse, Helios is still inside the burning church.
Her father is restless. He has been trying to pry the firemen off of him, so he could run inside the burning church and save Helios. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t at all. No matter what he does, he can’t get them off of him and Selene couldn’t do anything at all but watch at as fountains after fountains of water extinguish the blazing fire. The water doesn’t help though. They seem to ignite the fire even more.
“Oh, Lord above! Someone please save my son!”
She could hear her father’s frantic voice. It’s right next to her. Distantly, she sees a shadow approaching them from the left, but she pays it no heed. Her eyes are transfixed at the burning church, at the blazing fire. She’s expecting her brother to emerge from within and through the wall of flame around the desecrated sacrament. Her face is devoid of any emotions; she lost them to the fire. Her mind is blank, she couldn’t think of a word to say, to comfort her mother, to shut her father up. All she could do is stand there, rooted to the ground, and just watch. Watch and watch and watch even more with despair.
Suddenly the fire explodes. It explodes unlike anything mankind has ever witnessed before. The explosion has caught everyone off guard, has stopped the firemen from extinguishing it. Instead, it blows away everything surrounding it. The wind picks up and adds even more to the force. Selene could feel everyone backing away. Her mother is already a yard away from her, pushed back by the sudden hard gust of smoky wind.
“My son!”
Burnt, charred woods are seen at the sky before they land in a pile in front of them. They stare at the remains of what used to be pews and mounds of saints that decorated the hallways and altars of the church. Her father stares at a particular burnt object with horrid splayed all over his face, his eyes wide with fear and mouth gaping at the disgusting sight. It’s a bloody, burnt arm, its skin roasted black. An end of a bone could be seen sticking out, and the sight made her father’s knees even weaker, until he finally collapses and stares at it with fear. What if Helios is sharing the same fate with the hand? What if the hand is Helios’ itself? The thoughts enter and leave his mind in an instance, as he starts to lose his senses. His wife is already out cold; seeing the remains of a body missing an arm and a leg has made her faint.
The only person who doesn’t recoil from the sight is Selene, simply because she ignores the heaps of remains. But there is also another one. This time, it’s a man, a young man who’s in his early 20’s in a dark black suit, his red necktie the only color in his entire being.
His presence alerted Selene, making her look up from her stand and at the man beside her. She looks up and notices the distant look the man has in his blue eyes. The man then looks down at her; he has noticed he’s being watched.
“Why is the world so evil?” He asks her. Selene says nothing. She just continued staring at him, but breaks into a gasp when he laughs at her ignorance, chuckling softly. “It’s because everything that is good isn’t around anymore. If there are, they’re already tainted.” Before Selene could find her voice to reply, the man walks away, a hand inside his pants pocket. Something silver glinted from the depths of his coat, but Selene doesn’t pay any attention to it. For the first time, she has turned her back on the burning church and watches the man leave the street, his coat moving against the wind. By the time new recruitments finally appear at 3:00 AM, they found the young girl distantly staring off at something far away, at a clock tower that has its second hand stuck in 12 forever.
No one knows why.
[xxx]
Dean Anderson is like no any other guy out there. He’s suave, charming and has a great charisma. Unlike his little brother, who couldn’t do anything but stare with his boring eyes and do nothing else other than being a bookworm, Dean is an action-packed man. He’s a black belt, a master of fencing, and the best in archery. Thousands of ladies have swooned at his feet by the sparkle of his smile. His eyes has never failed in charming a woman, may she be married or widowed, to his bed. In short, Dean is perfect-except for one thing; judgment. Hence the reason why Dean couldn’t keep a relationship that lasts beyond a week.
“When are you coming back home?” Mikhail, his annoying, little brother, is very stubborn. It’s one of the traits that he shares with his brother, much to his dismay. The boy is only fourteen, and yet his brain is already as adept as his own. The boy is a born genius, but just like him, lacks something. But unlike him, his brother is completely cold and uncaring. He swears the boy wouldn’t even cough up ransom money if their parents got kidnapped.
“I’m still in the job, alright? Call me later.” Without waiting for a reply, he cuts the shared line and stuffs his phone back inside his coat. It’s only in phone calls where Dean can shut Mikhail up for real. He’s already starting to dread the end of the mission, wishing that hopefully, the mission would go on longer so he can spend more time without his brother’s presence. Yes, his brother is a real headache.
Resisting the urge to rub his forehead, Dean heads straight to his Mustang parked at the corner of the street. Settling inside his car, he quickly grabs the bottle of perfume kept inside the car cabinet and sprayed a generous amount over his coat. The itch of the smoke is grating his nerves. Even his hair has the scent of carbon dioxide on it. It seriously ruins his person.
Reviving the car’s engine, he steps on the gas and drives straight to the Sistine Chapel. Far behind him, the reflection of a still burning Church of Santo Stefano turns red with its fire burning ceaselessly. The image of it burns itself in his mind as he remembers the embers and ashes being carried by the wind. But most of all, he can never forget the young girl with her dead grey eyes. Never in his entire life have he seen eyes these dead. Even Mikhail has life, if not then little, in his eyes. The mere memory of it brings shivers to his body.
Fixing his hair with one hand, he glances at the side mirror. There’s nothing trailing him from behind. All of the cars are heading straight to the burning church. Good then. That means he can go to Sistine Chapel to run his errand without any distraction.
Stepping harder on the acceleration, Dean speeds the car up, running over the red light. Time is precious, and to him, there’s no time left to waste. He must hurry at all costs, before the world crumbles around him. He won’t let his sacrifice go to waste; after all, he didn’t ignore Irise’s call for some simple reason.
In the far recesses of his mind, he could already imagine Irise blowing off at him. Damn the woman and her deviltry.
With all honesty, Dean is not quite the man perfect for assassination. True, he has done all sorts of odd jobs that can put any syndicate to shame, and that his resume befits that of a mercenary. The thing is he never includes assassination in it. His license to wield guns doesn’t mean he’s an assassin for hire. His guns are there for several purposes. To kill is one of them, but never to assassinate. He strongly believes his soul is far too good for such a hideous and cowardly crime.
Just then, his phone starts ringing again. Ignoring his phone and the vibration it’s causing against the inside pocket of his coat. He turned for the left and shifted gears. The top of the Sistine Chapel can already be seen from the distance. His mind has already pictured the works of Michelangelo, especially the Creation of Adam. He couldn’t help but smile sardonically at himself. The image of God reaching out his hand to Adam makes him laugh. The painting is so ironic for the modern age. Indeed, he wonders where the Lord is right now in this god forsaken world. There’s not much to answer to his million dollar question, but he couldn’t help but think wistfully about it. It never stops amusing him about all the possibilities and immediate thoughts that surface on his mind.
Before stopping his car before the chapel, he extracts his phone from its place. Flipping it open, he ignores the missed call icon and instead, pushed in a memorized series of numbers. After a ring, the other line picked up and a heady voice answers him.
“What?” The voice was rasp and Dean could feel it was being hissed at him. He only grinned at nothing though and replies coolly. “I’m here. Where are your men?”
There’s a slight pause before the designated answer. In most circumstances, most people his age would be tearing the roots of their hair or rushing through everything. In worst case scenarios, they would be yelling frantically at the other line to hurry up. But like what’s mentioned before, Dean is like no other man, may they be the same age as he or not. Dean is very calm and collected, and his cool persona should never be underestimated. That’s why he remains cool and still, smiling loftily at himself in the rear view mirror.
“Go and stand before The Temptation of Christ, facing the north wing. There you will find what you’re seeking.”
A soft click follows, telling Dean that the other line has disconnected. Blinking at nothing, Dean then stares at his phone and at the blank screen it’s showing. The missed call icon is still there, albeit smaller and displayed in a corner. Making a mental note to himself to call Irise later, he steps out of his car and slips inside the chapel, striding towards the fresco by Botticelli.
Sandro Botticelli, famed Renaissance artist, has always been admired greatly by Dean and, surprisingly, his little brother. When he first brought Mikhail to Italy and here to the chapel, he was surprised that his brother was mesmerized by the paintings, especially at Botticelli’s. If he can reckon properly, Mikhail’s personal favorite is The Punishment of Korah. To his childish eyes, he interprets the people present in the painting as ‘confused’ and ‘obsessed’, just like the way he sees the world today.
Finally inside the dark chapel, Dean doesn’t find it surprising at all that there’s no presence of any security. Ah, how amazing the Kritiker works.
Walking straight towards the instructed fresco, he stands before it and gazes at its impeccable beauty, before finally facing north, awaiting the so-called answer. Funny he has actually expected the message to be a real object, to be passed to him by a messenger in black. But alas, to his great surprise, what comes next after him isn’t anything that he has awaited. Instead of someone dressed in black carrying a box, or at least a little note taped to the wall, a bullet comes flying pass his ear, missing a scant of his hair. His head quickly turns in a whiplash, eyes widening an inch. For the first time in his life, Dean is caught off guard, and terribly surprised. It has never happened to him before. He’s famed and greatly noted for his calm and cool demeanor.
The bullet hit a wall far ahead of him, imbedding itself in one of Raphael’s tapestries hanging on the wall. How the tapestry has gotten there, he doesn’t know; the cartoons are only hanged during special occasion, and he couldn’t count this moment as one. The chosen tapestry is the cartoon, the Christ’s Charge to Peter. And much to his dismay, the bullet is directly at the forehead of the Savior. Dean doesn’t know if he should start fretting over the waste of such a marvelous piece of work.
Then like before, his phone suddenly vibrates, jolting him out of his panicking. With a shaking hand, he fishes out his phone and answers it. He tries his hardest to calm his voice.
“Hello?”
“You see it then, I take it?”
Dean stares at the tapestry, now with a grimmer expression. His eyes narrow when he realizes the damage is actually greater than he thought. A hole can now be seen from the tapestry.
After a long pause, he asks softly, “What do you want then?”
He’s starting to become aware of his surrounding. He feels like a lost black sheep inside the heavenly chapel, defiling its holiness. Dean could hear a deep chuckling resounding through his phone. He’s starting to have the gut feeling he’s going to regret taking up the offer. Oh, if only Mikhail’s life isn’t that precious to him.
“You know very well what I want.”
Like before again, the line clicked shut. Dean let the phone stay pressed against his ear, its screen going blank. He hangs his head down, along with his eyes. He couldn’t bring himself to look up at the tapestry, much less at the predicament he has put himself in. There’s no way he could pry the boy and give him to Kritiker without Ægis suspecting him. Finally, after a few more moments of relapsing composure, Dean fixes his coat and tie. He keeps the phone on his hand though. Fingers pressing hard on the keypads, he covers the screen with his palm. In the same fashion of how he enters the chapel, he slips out quietly, and walks straight back to his car. He didn’t dare look back over his shoulder at the looming chapel. He has a distinct feeling he’s being watched.
Without much fervor, when he’s finally inside his car, he drives back to his hotel. Throughout the entire ride, his mind is on a lot of things, going from Mikhail to the young girl, from Irise to Kritiker, and finally, the entire time he has spent inside the chapel. It’s too bizarre for him to take up, too surreal. To think that he has survived it all without a single trace of some security chasing his tail…
He’s already guessing that by now, Irise might be having some sort of suspicion on him. He couldn’t help it but nodding along to himself. It makes a lot of sense, if Irise will end up doubting him. After all, he hasn’t been quite the goody two shoes. One of the protocols is not to join any other organization once a part of Ægis. A member of the organization must cut all of his ties with other organizations. Dean didn’t do that. Instead, he continues working as a mercenary while working as a secret agent. Yet he has to admit that he’s not being a double agent. No, he’s far from being a double agent. Let’s just say that unlike others, who take part time jobs like delivering pizzas or taking nacho orders, Dean takes it up to a notch higher than the norm. He doesn’t exchange his suits for ordinary red, striped, checkered shirts while serving hungry, greasy and obese teenagers. Dean is a man of great dignity. He keeps his coat around him, and actually uses his guns. His guns are never worthless to him, even when locked inside a huge closet type freezer.
By the time he’s finally inside his hotel room and ready to go to sleep, he rechecks his sent items, making sure he has sent a note to Andrew. It’s about time to abuse some family friendship bonds. Besides, he knows the other won’t mind knowing that he has visited one of his ancestor’s works. After all, Andrew Botticelli is a man who is very just like him. Though the younger man-Andrew, actually has a deeper sense of pride and prefers to keep himself to the shadows than squander his way around, Dean is very sure Andrew won’t mind bending some few rules around. That’s how cool Andrew is. He never hesitates in doing anything that can help him achieve his goals, may they be personal or not. This is why whenever Dean needs help that requires powers greater than the Pope himself, Dean would always resort to Andrew. It’s not that Andrew is the king of the world-though he’s very sure Andrew could pass for it, and in fact, qualify for it. To Dean’s biased opinion, Andrew is probably the world already. But it’s probably more to the reason that Andrew has this aura around him that always makes everyone bow down to him. Every corner he turns, no one would dare to stare straight at his eyes. In a sense, Andrew owns the world if he wants to. Even the Pope would give in to Andrew, who doesn’t have to do anything charming. All he has to do is just stand there nonchalantly. A second later, everyone would be kneeling down and bowing their heads without a short of command. If no one is able to kneel down, then they would either have fainted from awe or stand there on their ground, dumbstruck and flabbergast. Hence the reason why Dean is very careful when it comes to matter concerning his friendship with Andrew. Truth be told, Dean could consider himself as Andrew’s best friend. Outside Andrew’s world of business and power, he really doesn’t have anyone aside from him and his little brother, the dear Amadeo. Speaking of which, Dean missed that kid. He’s such a bundle of joy and fun. Never losing spirit. So opposite from his older and colder brother.
Sighing softly, he drags himself to the soft, white hotel bed. His phone lies beside his silver watch and twin pistols. Nuzzling the pillow, Dean welcomes sleep as the moonlight shines its light pass the window. Suffice to say, his sleep is plagued with little dreams, except for the soft, dark and low laughter of a satanic voice. The imaginary voice itself is enough to keep Dean awake until he wills himself back to sleep.
TBC