Milo
Fifteen years ago.
I look down at the dead man at my feet, and I feel nothing.
My first kill came at nine, already late by my father’s standards.
Death has never frightened me.
This world does.
From the moment I was born, I searched for something good in it, because all I have ever witnessed is suffering, despair, and cruelty.
I understand that I was born into the Bratva, and I don’t shy away from the business itself.
What I can’t accept is my father’s other enterprise.
I am young, but I’m not stupid.
I know the Markev Bratva buries trafficking beneath its official fronts, arms, narcotics, laundering.
And I know Viktor sits at the very centre of it.
He shouldn’t walk this earth.
I hear them cry for mercy… beg.
He never stops.
He despises me for my so called weakness. By his definition, weakness is refusing to sink to his level.
But I would rather die than become that.
It started a year ago. He tried to force me on a girl.
I refused.
So he had me beaten within an inch of my life and left me there to rot for a month.
I don’t care what it costs me. I’ll pay the price every time. I would never lay a hand on them.
And yet, each time it happens, I feel like the greatest failure alive because I can’t stop it.
I can’t help them.
One of his guards drags me down the corridor and pushes me into a room.
I follow without resistance, already detached.
Detached from this life.
The room is dimly lit. The air is thick with cigarette smoke and stale alcohol. Laughter echoes through the space. I take in the men seated around the table, all of them dressed in expensive suits, their expressions revealing the rot in them.
“Ah, you’re finally here. Very well,” Viktor says, getting to his feet as he takes a slow drag from his cigar. “Bring in his gift.”
My heart pounds so hard in my chest, but I don’t move.
The door opens behind me and shuts again. I hear a soft sniffling before I see her.
The guard drags a young girl forward and drops her at my feet. She hits the floor and looks up at me, her eyes wide with fear.
I don’t move.
I can’t let a single thing show on my face, but inside I am seething.
“We’ll try again,” Viktor says. “Perhaps tonight is the night you finally rid yourself of those inconvenient morals.”
“You know what to do.” He gestures toward the girl in front of me.
Her sobs grow louder.
Again, I don’t. Move.
I see Viktor’s jaw tighten.
“Very well,” he says after a moment, when it becomes clear I won’t react.
He grabs the girl and tears the dress from her body. “We’ll change tactics tonight,” he adds, a slow smile forming as he looks at me.
He steps back.
“You either fuck her,” he says evenly, “or you kill her. Because if you don’t, what I will do to her will be much worse.”
The girl’s crying grows louder, though she tries to smother the sound with her hands.
I remain still.
“You have thirty seconds,” Viktor roars, and the girl flinches.
“Please,” she mouths at me. “Kill me… anything but this.”
Fuck.
I would sell my soul for the chance to wipe them all out, once and for all.
I signal for him to hand me the gun. I see the disappointment on his face, the disgust, but I don’t care.
I lift the weapon and aim it at the girl.
It won’t be easy, but I will eventually kill my father.
And every man who stands with him.
I pull the trigger.
Whatever was still recognisably human in me dies with that shot.
I hear her whisper, “Thank you.”
And I know she is better off this way. Once Viktor had her in his grasp, there would have been no escape.
A roar bursts out of me.
I turn the gun on my father and fire…
A guard crashes into me from the side, and the hit to my head is savage.
The world goes black.