"Wait—" Gera's voice was sharp, but Ryu ended the call.
"Well, there goes your protégé. Guess she doesn't like listening to the dumb bitch either." Said Echo.
Gera said calmly, with amusement hiding in her smirk.
"You never get tired of that, do you? Calling me names so you can forget what they call you."
Echo paused, as the words landed exactly where they needed.
He said, snickering.
"At least I didn't butcher my own family to make a point."
Gera's words sounded almost menacing.
"At least I had the guts to face mine. You're still hiding from yours. Afraid mommy and daddy won't love what you've turned into?"
Static silence followed, almost breathless for anyone in the room present.
Echo breathes sharply. His jaw tightened.
When he finally spoke, his voice was lower, almost bitter.
"You think you know broken, Gera? Try being auctioned off like cattle at twelve."
Gera said mockingly and in a low tone.
"Oh! But didn't you get rescued by Eel two days after? Don't pout, Echo. You're worse than me, and that sentence says something."
She cuts the call. The camera lingers on her face—half amused, half dead cold.
Her phone rings with the caller ID Eel.
"Gera here," she said in a low tone, unable to detect any emotions.
"Can you do me a favour...
The timing is right, the target is in his club right now … can you make it look like less of a dealing aftermath case in this short period of time?"
"Send the location, I am in the mood for it now."
She pockets her blade and heads for the mission.
They whispered her name in the corridors of the organisation, never loud, never when she could hear.
The dumb, broken bitch.
The girl who slaughtered her own family had adopted her.
Not out of vengeance, not out of betrayal…just killed them.
Who does that?
Only someone too broken to belong anywhere.
Only someone too dumb to know what family means.
That's the story they told. The one that stuck.
What they never saw was the truth.
The bass is pounding. Neon lights flicker across sweat-slick bodies. Gera moves through the crowd like a shadow in red silk.
Hands brush against hers, some drunk, some lecherous.
Dragged down the stairs. Breath reeking of liquor, small hands clutching the Bannister. A child's voice pleading, then silenced by the back of a hand. Bruises blooming where no one cared to look.
A locked room. Laughter outside the door.
Family.
The memory whispers like smoke in her head.
She doesn't react. Not anymore.
Her eyes lock on the target. Laughing, surrounded by men. Arrogant, unguarded.
Her smile sharpens.
She glides closer. The noise swallows everything.
The target peaks backwards and smiles, "What is a girl doing here? I guess you can smell powerful people from afar."
She smiles towards him. She approaches him with an obedient cat façade.
She leaned casually beside him, her hand brushing his arm as if she belonged there.
Her memory bled into the present.
A knife in her palm, heavier than her own courage. The first cut wasn't rage. It was silent. The following was freedom. By morning, the house was a mausoleum.
And she walked away without looking back.
The guards didn't even blink, as if she were just another pretty distraction.
Then her fingers closed around the cold metal at his waist.
Steel scraped leather.
By the time the boss realised, his gun was gone. She had already been fired. The first guard's skull burst open, spraying the wall in a jagged arc of red.
"Blood on my hands. His eyes widened when he realised I wasn't afraid anymore."
Past and present overlap.
The club dissolves into that old room. His laugh turned into a scream.
Her lips curved... not in joy, not in hate, but in power.
The second turned, too slow. Her second shot caught him in the throat. He gurgled, clutching at the fountain of blood pouring between his fingers before crashing to the ground.
The boss stumbled back, reaching for his other weapon. She stepped in, fast, and drove her heel into his knee, and shot the knee and hand with the gun.
The joint gave way with a crack, and he collapsed, cursing, pain twisting his face.
She ripped the pistol from his weakening grip, yanking it free as he tried to cling to it.
His blood smeared across her hand, hot and slick, but her grip didn't falter.
Now both guns are hers.
The boss was on one knee, blood running down his leg, spitting rage. His empire was reduced to silence and corpses in seconds.
She lifted one gun, pressed the muzzle against his forehead.
Her red dress was dark with blood. Her breathing was calm.
"I don't miss," she whispered.
The whispers would start again in the corridors of the organisation.
"She's insane."
"She doesn't hesitate."
"She killed her own family."
The dumb, broken bitch.
"Now follow my instructions, otherwise…"
The music from the club below was still pounding when the last echo of gunfire faded into silence.
The body slumps...
Gera stepped out onto the balcony, her dark silhouette framed against the neon skyline. She didn't look at the man lying broken on the pavement below.
His story was already over.
To anyone who came after, it would look like chaos, a shootout, A tragic fall. A messy, reckless death. But not hers. She had scripted every beat of it.
She pulled out her phone, fingers gliding calmly across the screen, and dialled.
The line connected.
"Sir," she said evenly, no emotion in her voice.
"The job is done. I'll expect the payment by morning."
There was a brief silence, then Eel's gravelly tone cut through, steady and approving:
"I never doubted you. Not for a second. You make it look effortless, Gera."
A faint smirk touched her lips, cold and sharp.
"Effortless is the only way I work. And I hope your golden girl manages to end the mission cleanly. If not…"
She paused, her tone dropping lower, deliberate.
"The boss may have to put me on your trail next."
Eel chuckled under his breath, but there was an edge there, too. "You'd enjoy that too much. Keep your focus."
"Always," she replied, and cut the call without waiting for more.
Her phone lit up again, this time with Ryu's code. She answered, leaning against the balcony rail, watching the chaos slowly forming below as lights and sirens stirred in the distance.
Ryu's voice came from the other side. Calm, efficient.
"Mike's next schedule is confirmed. Should I make a move now?"
Gera's low voice came through, cautious, almost questioningly, "The details match the ones you sent me. Make sure you don't leave a single trace when you go for him.
Clean. Precise. No mistakes.
Don't make me regret leaving this part to you. I don't forgive weakness."
She didn't wait for her response and ended the call.
Sliding the phone back into her dress, Gera turned away from the balcony, her boots crunching against shards of glass. Behind her lay a perfect illusion, a crime scene begging for theories.
None of them would be true.
And she preferred it that way.
The dancers keep dancing in the club on the lower floor.
She walks away without looking back.
Gera says quietly to herself.
"Authority isn't given.
I take it. Every damn time."
She didn't care what they called her. Dumb. Broken. Bitch.
She is Unshaken. Untouchable. Dangerous.