Frankie lay under a shady tree, high atop the hill near the swimming hole where she first met the DiCaprio boys.  Her eyes were closed, and she could feel the warm sun on her face.  Beneath her head, Tony’s legs acted as a pillow.  His fingers ran through her dark hair again and again. 

A drop of rain on her face, caused her to wince.  Another drop.  Then another until a deluge came crashing down upon her.  She struggled to breathe in the dark water that covered her mouth and nose.  She flailed but could not get up.  Tony’s hand was holding her down… it was Tony’s, wasn’t it? 

She could hear his voice, one single word was all she could make out, “Live.”

Frankie was pulled up out of the five-gallon bucket, sputtering and coughing, trying desperately to get air.  Her lungs burned.  All she could think about was air, precious fucking air!

She felt her body moving through the air, as if someone had swooped her up like a rag doll by the throat and slammed her hard into something.  Her head and back cracking into a firm surface… a wall perhaps.  She tried to open her eyes and remembered someone was talking to her.  Someone was asking questions.

“You want to live?”  A female voice asked.

Frankie spit water and blood and then felt her windpipe cracking.  Her vision swam.  White stars flickered across her eyes.  The goon who was holding her to the wall and cutting off her airway was dressed well, but his leather gloves were sticky with the blood of her friends and family.  She shivered from fear, from cold, and from the severe beating she’d taken.

“I’d rather we killed you, to be perfectly honest, but my Don… she sees things another way.  She sees a use for you… and your connection to the Old Country, so let’s try a new tactic.”

The woman waved her hand and a door at the far end of the room opened.  Two men entered dragging her cousin Jacqueline’s husband, Sullivan.

“That’s far enough.”  The woman ordered.  She could hear Sullivan trying to speak but he was clearly gagged, though she could not make out with what… her eyes were so swollen she could barely see that it was him.

“So, since you have so little regard for your own life, here’s how this goes down.  I ask you once more if you want to work for my boss and you say yes… then we let Mr. Black get cleaned up and he goes on his way.  Then, you and I get on a plane back to New York – we get an alliance with your Grandfather, Don Enzo, and we act like this whole unfortunate mess of you shooting one of my guys didn’t happen.  Coppers calm their shit, and everyone goes back to making money. BUT...  if you spit, sputter, or even look at me cross ways again,” The goon holding Sullivan pulled a gun and put it to the back of his head.  “…and Mr. Black have an unavoidable accident just like your husband.”    

Frankie tried not to think about what she was agreeing to.  The war had taken everyone, her entire family so far as she knew, and now here was her family … TRUE family by marriage, and his life was hers to save or lose.

“Yes.”  She said stuttered with bloody blue lips. 

“What was that?”  The woman asked.

“I’LL GO BACK!”  She shouted.

“Put them in the room.”  The goon took her off the wall and tossed her into an empty room, devoid of furnishings… just green paint over cinder block wall – no window – and a drain in the middle of the cement floor.

Frankie scurried to a corner shivering and flinched when she heard the meaty thud that was probably Sully being thrown in behind her.

“We’ll be leaving in a few hours.  Don’t get too comfortable.”  She heard the goon say.  Then the door shut and locked behind them.  They were alone.  Broken.  Defeated.  The dream of a Mighty Messina empire in America now seemed over and Lucy’s Tower – she now wished to God she’d done what the woman had said and run to Seattle days ago.  If she had… perhaps none of this would have happened.

Frankie curled into a fetal position and whimpered in the corner, wearing nothing more than scraps of the dress she had on earlier and the slip beneath it drenched in water and blood.

Sullivan stared through the fog as it rolled into the harbor as if it would grant him some grand vision... He could feel Jackie beside and turned to look at her with a smile. She hugged him tightly and even gave him a kiss on the cheek. And another... And yet another... "Wake up,"  Another kiss on the cheek. Again and again, she kept kissing his cheek. "Hey, wake up!" He furrowed his brow looking at her lips. What he heard didn't match what her lips were saying... It looked as if she were saying "I love you, Sullivan Carlisle Black", but all he continued to here was "Wake up! Wake the fuck up kid. I need you alive."

Slowly his eyes opened as the kisses stopped and turned in to a hand smacking his face lightly, a bumpy car ride helping to jostle him. "C'mon, wake up! There we go! Heh... Had me going there for a bit, Blacky Boy."

Sully eyed a heavyset porker of a man that grabbed his jaw. "Can't have ya dyin' on me kid. Boss needs ya alive for a plan a'his." The man grinned and released Sullivan's face. His head felt like it would explode, pulsing from the back, and all he wanted to do was scream. Now awake and in the car, he knew Jackie was certainly dead... His head hung as tears stung his swollen, blood-shot eyes, and he again tried to scream but nothing would come out. His mouth was dry as could be and felt like cotton. A sock was stuffed in his mouth and tied tight with his own tie. Disgraceful... Sullivan merely sat quietly, wishing repeatedly that he was lying dead with Jackie in their own Asphodel Meadows...

-"I'll see you again, someday soon my love..."- he thought to himself as they continued to drive.

The car pulled up to a small house on the outskirts of Vegas and the portly man slid out of the back seat, tugging Sullivan's bound and gagged body with him. Luckily, Sullivan didn't weigh that much and the man simply carried Sully inside... He could hear someone yelling about wanting to live and it sounded like they were really giving it to someone bad in there. Then, suddenly, the door was thrust open and he was drug in.

-GREAT, I'm next...- were the only thoughts that crossed his mind as he felt the cold, hard floor beneath him when his head made contact. The pounding in his head intensified and he groaned from the pain of it all, laying there half unconscious and bleeding now from the back and front of his head. It was nearly guaranteed that he had a concussion. He tried to yell out as he looked over and noticed Frankie, but the sock kept him from doing much more than muffled, incoherent mumbling.

"Shut up..." one of the men whispered as he kicked Sully's stomach which made him gasp for air (which was hard being gagged), effectively making him be quiet.

------

“So, since you have so little regard for your own life, here’s how this goes down.  I ask you once more if you want to work for my boss and you say yes… then we let Mr. Black get cleaned up and he goes on his way.  Then, you and I get on a plane back to New York – we get an alliance with your Grandfather, Don Enzo, and we act like this whole unfortunate mess of you shooting one of my guys didn’t happen.  Coppers calm their shit, and everyone goes back to making money. BUT...  if you spit, sputter, or even look at me crossways again,” The goon holding Sullivan pulled a gun and put it to the back of his head.  “…and Mr. Black have an unavoidable accident just like your husband.”    

Frankie tried not to think about what she was agreeing to.  The war had taken everyone, her entire family so far as she knew, and now, here was her family … TRUE family by marriage, and his life was hers to save or lose.

“Yes.”  She said stuttered with bloody blue lips. 

“What was that?”  The woman asked.

“I’LL GO BACK!”  She shouted.

“Put them in the room.”  The goon took her off the wall and tossed her into an empty room, devoid of furnishings… just green paint over cinder block wall – no window – and a drain in the middle of the cement floor.

------

Sully was completely out of it for a bit. He didn't even feel the floor beneath him as he was tossed in the room with Frankie. He simply laid there, the whole world spinning chaotically around him. He was cold, everything felt cold... But all he could hang on to were Jackie's words as he held her bleeding chest just hours earlier...

"Don't do anything stupid... I love you. Live for me."

He fought back every urge to pass right then and there. She didn't -WANT- him to forfeit his life... So he wouldn't. He would, however, make SOMEONE pay for killing the one thing that kept him sane. Forcing his eyes open, he finally looked at Frankie in the corner, huddled and whimpering, half-naked and beaten. Truthfully? It infuriated him. Both for her and AT her. One part of him was angry she'd agreed to anything that left him alive and without Jackie! It was SELFISH of her to keep him from his loved one! But at the same time, she'd saved him... And he knew if she was here, and it was him that they'd brought as leverage, that Tony was also dead... Her husband and his wife were both dead.

As an inchworm would, Sullivan slowly worked his way over to Frankie and plopped his head into her lap.

"Wa...uh...uhk?" he labored to get out through the sock. He tried to cuddle up to Frankie, knowing she was cold... But also because he needed help to get untied. Hell, she could have his clothes if she'd get that damned sock out of his mouth...

Frankie felt the warmth of Sullivan's body and drew herself into and around him.  She could smell blood and some other harsher scents that she didn't want to think about the nature of - given his line of work.  He struggled to speak and while everything on her body hurt she knew she could at least help him with that.

She leaned down near his ear and whispered while she pulled out the tie and removed the sock from his mouth, "I was on the phone with Don Enzo when they took me..."  Her words were slurred and stammered from blood in her mouth and the constant shivering.  "I didn't hang up before they..."  She couldn't say it.  She wouldn't say it now or she'd lose all faked composure. 

"He heard everything."  Once the obstructions from his mouth were clear she VERY gently kissed both his cheeks and helped him sit up.  Seeing him hurt so badly, it gave her something to focus upon other than her own agony, and sorrow.  He needed her to save him.  If she could just focus on that - maybe... maybe they'd both survive and get revenge for what they did to Tony ... and Jacqueline.  She realized that if they brought Sully as leverage, and not Jacqueline, it meant they killed her.  She'd had not given up the Messina family or it's US holdings.  She must have been killed before they realized who she was or... or maybe... maybe she couldn't be broken. 

Frankie tried not to think about the fact that her death meant Jacqueline had proven the more loyal of the two of them; that everything Frankie ever told herself about who she was - had been proven lies in a matter of hours, "You need to hold on Sully."  Jackie would want Frankie to save her husband.  So, that was what she was going to do.  Just as she hoped Jackie would have saved Tony if their roles had be reversed, "Don Enzo will send people.  I promise he will.  Then... we'll make them all pay.  We'll make all of them pay."

She wrapped her arms around Sullivan, she shivered violently, "Just don't leave me... please?"

Sullivan took a deep, unhindered breath and almost choked himself out now that his airways were not blocked by a nasty sock. The cloth had blood dried on it and it was obvious it had been in his mouth for more than a few hours, soaking up his saliva and blood until his mouth was sore and dry. His voice cracked as he tried to speak, but it still sounded like the sock was shoved down his throat. He frowned and shrugged, staring up at Frankie's face. He nodded along as she spoke to him, but when she asked him to not leave her he lightly leaned himself onto her body and kissed her cheek with dry, busted lips.

"Never..."  he hissed out painfully and laid his head on her shoulder.

Frankie hugged him as tightly as she could, biting her own lip and fighting back tears, trying to be strong. She untied his hands and his feet for him, but she couldn't fool him. Sullivan knew her well enough to know that she was screaming on the inside.

"It's okay, Frankie," he croaked. "You can cry..." His body heaved a bit as he sobbed near silently, streams of tears and blood rolling from his beaten and bruised face.

"She's dead... I held her as she died." It was so quiet that Frankie barely even heard it, but she hung her head in understanding. Her cousin was gone, and Sullivan had held her until her final breath escaped her. He'd felt as her soul pulled away from him, and ripped a part of him with it. She could feel his mourning, but she could also feel the seething rage hiding buried beneath. Now he cried... Eventually, he would snap though, and he would need his family more than ever at that point.

He licked his lips and leaned back, wiping the blood staining his face.  "You're all I have left now... You, Harvey, and a corpse in my basement..." Sully sniffled once and then cleared his throat and swallowed. "They weren't even tactful. They blasted her in the back four times! I had just walked away from her to pay for our morning coffee and I turned with the gunshots... She stared at me before she dropped. I don't think I even grabbed my money clip. I dropped everything and ran to her, screaming for help, but no one would. I tried to stop the bleeding... I tried everything I knew, but one bullet had clipped her spine, and two had punctured her lungs. She didn't even die from bleeding out, she fucking drown in her own blood and there was nothing I could do but squeeze her hand and tell her I loved her, and that everything wa-" he choked up on his own words, tears welling in his eyes yet again, clouded with the blood that remained.

"I told her everything was okay, that I understood it was time for her to leave me. That she had made me the happiest man on this fucking rock and that I was lucky to have gotten the chance to touch her soul and have her song touch mine..."

He slumped to floor and broke down in tears, sobbing heavily. She'd been his heart and soul, and now it was gone... Ripped away by the tear of a bullet and sputtering coughs with blood as she drowned. He'd watched as her neurons began bursting and she exclaimed it as being beautiful. And all he could do was fucking hold her hand, fighting himself to not cry as she stopped breathing. He didn't want her to know he was crying, and he couldn't kiss her because it would have taken her breath earlier, but she begged for it and he couldn't turn her down...

"I took her last breath, Frankie... I fucking killed her... Just so she could part with a kiss. All I want to do is die..."

She listened to his words, strained and painful from sorrow and physical wounds.  Strangely as he grew weaker, more consumed in his sorrow, Frankie found her courage bit by bit.  She pulled herself up from the place she'd collapsed into him.  She pushed away the thoughts of her friends who had died today and would not see her in Hell by their sides.  She even put away the horrible images her mind had created for what they'd done to her husband and her sweet cousin Jacqueline.

She put a hand on either side of Sullivan's face.  "Look a me Sully..."  She said in a stronger toned whisper than she thought herself capable.  "Look at me."  She heard herself say more sternly until his blood shot eyes met her own.  "We don't do this now.  We can't."

She wiped his tears away.  "We need to find weapons.  They're going to come back through that door and try to take me to New York and they say they're gonna let you go Sully but they're not... they WILL kill you and then there will be no one to carry out vendetta for Jacqueline.  We can't let that happen.  So..."

She drew a breath and tried to imagine her spine like a steel rod, she did her best impression of what she thought Tony's face might look like in a moment like this, "Pull it together.  You're not dying like this... not today."  She kept her eyes locked on his, afraid if she looked away he'd lose himself to his horrible memories again.  "Now think... you're smart... help me think... what can we use?  What do we have?  Anything..."

Sully sniffled again, staring deep into Frankie's eyes, his seeming hollow behind the bloodied pupils. His irises shrunk and grew as he refocused on her in the dim light. Frankie's muster of courage didn't even really seem to register with him at first. Sullivan just seemed like a lost husk. No vendetta for Jackie? Who cared, it wouldn't bring her back... Nothing could bring her back.

"Sullivan, snap out of it!" Frankie beckoned him, pleading as she held his face and kept her eyes fixated on his. Nothing seemed to take hold in his eyes. They continued to stare blankly at her. Finally, she raised her hand from his cheek...

"I'm sorry..." Frankie whispered, then hauled off and slapped the hell out of him.

His head snapped quickly to the right and back to stare at her, blinking. She could see the anger swell, and she almost feared the snap that might come from it, but before he spoke he breathed out slowly and looked at his cousin. His eyes softened and he spoke through a pained mouth.

"Thank you, Frankie... Sorry." He stood and looked around, "Let me get my head on straight... Weapons, weapons, wea...MY TIE!" He spun and looked at her. "It's literally a garrote. I sowed a piano wire in -every- tie I own..." He grinned. Kind of a shitty weapon for an assault, but it would do SOMETHING in a pinch. He chuckled thinking about it.  "We're pretty fucked aren't we?"

He sighed, but then looked back to her. "Fuck it though. How are you holding up? I'm pretty bruised, but I'll live, and I'll be damned if these mother fuckers are going to keep me from burying my God damned wife."

With a strained attempt, he cracked his neck and his knuckles... Determined, Sully bent and scooped up his tie, then began looking around the room. It was hard to see, but he could barely make out a sink in a corner. In another corner, there was a trough. Next to them was the rope used to tie and bind Sully. And in the center of the room, there was the dreaded five-gallon bucket still full of water.

Sullivan started to make a list out loud for Frankie...

"Sink, porcelain. Break it and we have shards that are sharp enough to cut through skin and puncture deep enough into the stomach lining for evisceration. However, that will need something heavy and probably cause a lot of noise... However, it also gives us pipes and spraying water for them to deal with."

"Speaking of pipes... We could probably kick the plumbing loose on the sink and simply have the pipes as weapons. However, that still leaves us with loud noises and a lot of water spray."

He began to walk around the room and survey it as he spoke.

"The trough would be great to push someone's throat down on its ledge and suffocate them. Though they could just as easily push back."

He turned back to Frankie and pointed at the rope.

"There's always more rope to choke and beat people with. Quick whipping would make small lacerations, and if we could break the sink quietly then I could make a cat of nine tails from the rope, basically... Porcelain shards in the end and swinging it to cut the bastards."

As he walked to the center of the room, "And, we cant forget your friend." He kicked the bucket, almost as if the action were ironic to him.

"Put it on someone's head, hit them with it, drown them in it, whatever we wanted with it. That is pretty much it for our options with weapons... I'd say we break the sink, and get ready for it when they come and check. Stab the porcelain into the neck of the first bastard that walks through and take their weapon..."

He looked at Frankie and wondered what she might be thinking as he spoke.

"If I ever see a bucket of water again... it'll be too soon.  I want those fuckers in cement shoes for this - see how they like breathing water for a while."  She crawled over to the sink she previously hadn't noticed in the room and then decided to answer his question about her health,  "I'm fine."  She lied - in truth she knew she had some pretty bad injuries that would be weeks in healing.  And maybe an injury that she could not know for sure without a doctor, which would tear out what was left of her heart if it had happened. 

She shook her head to cast out the memory of the last time she saw Tony and all the things she didn't say.  Ripping a bit of her dress, her eyes locked on the sink with a sense of purpose.  "I never spent time with the women in Sicily.  Jackie ever tell you that?"  She shook her head.  "My mother passed young and I was always with my uncles and my Grandfather - that included times they fixed things so... while I can't make Cannoli, fuck I can't boil water, I can dismantle a sink."

She reached up under and behind the sink and found the shut off valve for the sink.  Then she located a large nut which connecting the trap to the long part of the sink's piping.  Using her dress fabric to get a good grip on the nut she began using every bit of strength she had to loosen it.  Her fingers slipping grip again and again, with each slip she managed to cut her hand just a little more from the force and friction against the metal and fabric.

"Frankie..."  Sully started to speak and she shook her head. 

"It only works if we get this pipe... I'll get it."  A few more tries and it finally came free.  She quietly laughed.  "There we go."  Her fingers wet with her own blood pulled off the small metal nut and trembling went down to the swivel nut at the other end of the pipe.

"What's the plan?"

"I get the pipe..."  She says softly.  "Lay on the floor back where I was.  Hide the pipe in my grip.  You go to the door, stand behind it and call for help.  You're a doctor, or as good as one, tell them I'm not breathing.  Maybe I swallowed too much water or something, I don't care what, but they've made it clear their boss wants me alive so they'll come in.  I got the pipe, I'll take my shot on whoever walks in the door... they won't come alone, they're not dumb so the other one is on you with the garrote from behind."

"What if there is three?"

Frankie pulled the lead pipe out of it's place.  She smiled at it.  "Either I'm faster ... or we have dinner with our spouses in Heaven.  Either way, I'm not going anywhere with those fuckers."  She slid herself back to the place she lay before.

"Sully?"  She managed though tears welling up in her eyes against her every effort to remain stoic, "I ... I didn't get a chance to tell Tony today, but I'd like to say it at least once before we..."  She drew a shuddering breath.  "I think I'm pregnant." 

She laughed through the tears that finally rolled down her cheeks; the whole thing was ridiculous.  Tony had gone out to get her breakfast because she was 'sick' again.  She knew, now, that it had to be true.  She told herself as soon as he got back she'd tell him; but he took so long coming back that she broke down and called her family first. 

She had just told her Grandfather and old Don Enzo was shouting to his men in the room that she'd done it - when the front door exploded and men with guns came rushing in to drag her away.  The whole time she was screaming to her Grandfather for help, help which she could not know if he or her missing bodyguard Bruno would be able to find in time.  If Bruno had followed her here – if he’d gone looking for anyone who had survived, then maybe there as a chance… but it was slim.  Too slim to gamble on.  And so... this was the only way out, this or the body bag she'd been too afraid to choose earlier.

"So... let's give this a good effort?  Okay?  If they're gonna send us to see them today... let's make 'em work for it."  Curling up with the lead pipe hidden under her body she waited for whatever was going to come next.

Sully sighed... There was no way this was going to work. He knew there were three of them that had brought him, who knew how many else were in this safe house. He eyed Frankie for a bit as she laid herself down and hid the pipe...

"At least wrap your hands so you don't get anything in those damned cuts... Including their blood. Who knows if any of them have diseases, fucking decrepit mother fucker that took me smelled like he was half dead already."

Sully grumbled about a piggish asshole that smelled of rot and five day old musty clothes.

Taking one last glance back at Frankie, he nodded, then moved to the door. Now, for the acting...

"Frankie... Frankie are you okay? Hey now, don't leave me yet... You can't, Frankie?!"

His voice started low, but quickly escalated so that it all seemed real...

"Frankie! HEY! C'mon now! Wake up! Don't DO this to me! I CAN'T LOSE YOU BOTH! FRANKIE! WAKE U~"

He acted like he stopped talking to Frankie mid-sentence and began yelling louder as he faked a few steps to the door and began pounding on it.

"HEY! HELP! ANYONE OUT THERE! SHE'S NOT BREATHING! SHE'S NOT FUCKING BREATHING! OPEN THE GOD DAMNED DOOR! I CAN SAVE HER I JUST NEED TO OPEN HER AIRWAYS! I NEED MY TOOLS!"

He began faking a sob with each bang as he slumped on the door so it all looked and felt legitimate... He wasn't half bad at faking this stuff! Probably learned it in grade school from the larger bullies of kids picking on him.

"I ca-... I can't fucking lose her! YOU ALREADY TOOK MY WI-"

The door swung open as three guys made their way in to the room.

"Alright alright already! What's tha fuckin' problem 'ere?"

Sully, standing up and looking at one, tears in his eyes (damn, he was good), simply pointed and sniffled... "She... She's not breathing. I think she may have sucked too much water into her lungs... I need to drain them. If you get me a small tube and a large needle syringe, I may be-be-be able to save her..." He feigned a huff to sell the act as he spoke.

One of the three nodded and left the room, shutting the door behind him.

Two were left. Standing behind them as they looked over Frankie, holding her breath, he grinned wickedly...

"You know, she holds her breath really well..."

It all happened so quickly, Sully's tie was wrapped around one of the men's throats and his knees were kicked out from under. Sully, being taller, easily placed his knee in the man's back and pushed, effectively cutting off his air supply until he turned blue and went limp.

Of course, Frankie had leapt to action as well, swinging the metal piping into the other man's head as he turned to look at Sullivan. He fell quickly and she pulverized his skull. He wouldn't be moving ever again, at least of his own accord. If he survived he'd be better dead.

Sully flipped his tie loose of his target's neck and allowed him to slump to the floor beside the bloody pool of Frankie's piñata.

"Quick, take their guns and we should be able to do some damage!"

Sully grabbed his man's gun and waited for Frankie...

Frankie bent down and grabbed hold of the pistol she saw one of the guys holding when she heard a sound that made her blood run cold, a gun chambering a round and it wasn't Sullivan who she could see out of the corner of her eye was pointing his gun at something that clearly scared him. 

"That's two of my men you've killed."  She heard the woman's voice again, the one who had been talking while she was being drown in the bucket, and without looking up yet, Frankie knew she had a LOT of friends with her - she could hear them shifting, breathing, and readying weapons.

"I was clear as fucking daylight," The woman went on, "...about what would happen if you tried shit with me again, Messina.  It didn't have to be this way.  Remember that."

Frankie glanced to Sully, who had never lowered his gun.  His eyes, wild with rage and an absolute commitment to the course, were locked on the woman speaking.  He was going to die - surly - but this cunt was going to hell with him.

"E 'stato un onore."  she whispered.

"Stand up."  The woman ordered.  "I want you to watch his brain color the walls."

"Come famiglia."  Sullivan replied.

Frankie took hold of the pistol beneath her hand, trying to hide it as she rose up and then spun as fast as she was able - prepared to shoot and knowing it was the last thing she'd ever do.  She held her breath and as the woman and her five men came into her line of sight, the sound of a large engine could be heard coming towards them at a great rate of speed.  The woman and her men turned to look behind them at the garage-style warehouse loading dock door - but their ears had not failed them.

Sully grabbed Frankie and pushed her out of harm's way, realizing that someone was coming through that door and they had no idea if it was friend or foe but THIS was the chance they'd been waiting for!  If they could only survive it.  Diving for cover, they narrowly avoided being run down by the massive truck that burst into the room and from it came a small army of men and women with guns raining hell down upon the woman and her allies. 

The heat he felt on the back of his neck was beginning to be bothersome as Tony finally decided to slide over to the other side of the park bench which had been covered partially by the shade of a palm tree. He was watching the fountain spew water at the center of the man made pond in front of him. There had recently been so much death and destruction that this had been a well needed break from it all. Although it was still hard for him to enjoy it as he knew some people he knew from Las Vegas were still unaccounted for including Frankie Messina and Sullivan Black. 

Just as the funnies section was coming up next in his newspaper, one of Tony's men came over and held a piece of paper in front of his face. The annoyed look on Tony's face must have tipped him off that he should back off ever so slightly. 

"So what is this? Why is it so important that you interrupt my reading?" The words came out with a bit of anger.

"Sir, it's about the whereabouts of Frankie Messina and Sullivan Black. A man called and is awaiting for you to contact him at this number. It is someone from the the old country. They..." Tony instantly took the piece of paper and hurried past the man to get to his car.

There was no time to waste so he took the drivers seat himself and told his men to just get in the car. As soon as the key was turned and the engine sounded off, they were on there way flying down the street. It was only a short drive back to Villainy Inc. Headquarters and he wanted to waste no time.

As he slammed on the breaks in front of the HQ he quickly hopped out of the car and left it to his men to park the car. He ran up the steps and went inside the building. Up to the second floor he went to get to the phone in his office. He sat down at his desk and as he reached for the phone he saw the knife that Frankie had given him at the celebration he threw for reaching the rank of Don.....he knew he had no time to waste. He picked up the phone and put in the phone number he had received....

Just a moment went by and a voice was heard on the other end of the line, "Hello? Anthony is that you?"

Tony knew immediately that it was Don Enzo Messina from Sicily, '"Yes Don Enzo. It is me. I was told you have heard about Frankie and Sullivan. Anything you know will be better then what we have found out so far. I've got to save somebody."

There was a long pause before Enzo finally decided to speak, "Well first I would like to inform you that I have been told that their loved ones may have met an untimely end if you've not heard yet. Second, they have been taken by some people who work for another organization back here in the old country. I have a man who should be at your headquarters now to help guide you to the location that they have been taken to. I have no idea how much time they have left, if any. I ask you to hurry and do everything in your power to save Frankie and Sullivan."

"Yes Don Enzo. Frankie has been a long time friend during my rise to power. I would not abandon her if I knew I could do something to save her. I will bring an army to get the job done. For the ones who have done this. Nessun Superstite." The line went dead as Don Enzo and Tony knew what was about to happen whether Frankie or Sullivan were alive still. 

He rushed outside and was met by Don Enzo's man, Preeyah, and about 23 other men. A large military truck and a few cars were waiting for them as well. As Tony hopped into the back of the truck he saw all the Thompson sub-machine guns waiting for those who would wield them today. It was essentially a small army convoy that was now departing from Villainy Incorporated Headquarters in order to take down anyone who stood in their way.

A short time later...

The man driving the truck shouted back, "We're almost at the location, where should I park?". Which got a quick reply from Preeyah, "Inside the god damn building!". With that the engine roared even louder as they felt the jolt of speed that sent them racing through the loading dock door. The collision caused a few of them to fall over, but not Tony. He had an iron will to see this thing through and he wouldn't let anything stop him now.

Tony jumped from the truck and leveled his gun at the people in front of him. Some were standing and some were still getting back up from the ground covered in dust. Time seemed to slow down as each shell casing popped out of the sub-machine gun...

The others were quickly by his side as they either exited the truck or walked in through the gaping hole it had made in the side of the building. Bullets were raining down on these strangers and they were quickly falling back to the ground from which they had just risen. Tony saw one man running for a few boxes and focused his fire, causing on of the mans legs to crumple underneath him as he screamed out in pain. 

Two men came in from a side entrance and were quickly met by the hailstorm of bullets from Tony's miniature army. The gun shots slowly began to fade and Tony began to look around. He could not see Frankie or Sullivan anywhere in sight, although that was most likely a good thing after the amount of carnage that just took place. 

He looked over to spot a women on the ground slowly crawling for her pistol. Before he could even say anything Preeyah walked over, placed her foot on the woman's wrist.....BANG.....one more bullet to the back of her skull. Just as the shot rang out, he finally spotted Frankie and Sullivan helping each other walk out into the open. He ran over to them and helped to support their weight. 

"Frankie! Sullivan! I'm relieved to find you two still alive. We weren't sure if you had made it this long or not." Frankie gave Tony a thumbs up and Sullivan gave his best attempt at a smile.

As they got them into the backseat of one of the cars Tony spoke, "Frankie, you'll be happy to know that Don Enzo was the one responsible for me finding you." He pulled out the knife Frankie had given him a while back and smiled, "I did not want to let my friend down."

Tony shut the car door and motioned for the driver to take them back to Summerlin so that they could rest and get themselves back to full strength. He had plans for those two in Summerlin and he would need them at one hundred percent in order to set those plans in motion....