Requiem of The Godfather: Price of a Memory

    BRAKK!

    The sound did not come from splintering wood, but from Eduardo’s jaw colliding with the iron knuckles of Claude “The Sark.” Eduardo collapsed onto the wooden planks of the pier, slick with moss and rainwater. His head rang violently. The metallic taste of blood flooded his mouth, mixing with rain that tasted faintly of salt.

    “Get up, Eduardo. I don’t think my punch was that hard,” Claude’s voice sounded calm beneath the roar of the storm.

    Eduardo coughed, dark red blood spilling from his mouth. He tried to push himself up, but the moment he moved, the world spun violently.

    “I told you… give me time, one more week,” Eduardo rasped, wiping blood from his lips with his hand.

    One of Claude’s men, a bald thug with a scorpion tattoo on his neck, laughed mockingly while dragging on his cigarette. “One more week, huh, Boss? He said that last week. Same thing last month. Sounds like this loser’s mouth needs to be sewn shut.”

    Claude lit his cigarette and crouched in front of Eduardo. He grabbed Eduardo’s rain-soaked hair, forcing him to look into eyes as cold as ice. Claude ruled this old pier. In his hands, human life was worth less than the illegal cargo that came through every night.

    “Hey, asshole… I’m a businessman,” Claude muttered, blowing smoke into Eduardo’s face. “Business is about certainty, not sweet promises from trash mouths like yours,” he whispered into Eduardo’s ear.

    “Claude… I’ll pay my debt… I will…”

    “Shut up, you bastard!”

    Buak… Buak!

    Eduardo groaned in agony, clutching his stomach where he had just been struck, while Claude shook out the hand he had used to punch him.

    “Your debt’s piled up. Just the interest could buy a new car. And now, I want payment. Tonight. Right now,” Claude said with a crooked smile.

    “I don’t have any money left, Claude! You took everything!” Eduardo shouted in frustration. His voice was swallowed by thunder cracking in the distance.

    Claude took another drag and slowly stood, wiping his hands with a silk handkerchief as if he had touched filth. “I know you don’t have cash. But you’ve got something a lot more valuable at home.”

    Eduardo’s heart nearly stopped. “What do you mean?”

    “Your wife’s beautiful, Eduardo. Too beautiful to rot in a shitty apartment with a loser like you,” Claude said casually.

    “Claude…” Eduardo whispered as he tried to stand, but Claude’s men immediately held him down.

    Claude snorted when he saw the fire burning in Eduardo’s eyes. “I just opened a new brothel branch downtown. High-end clientele. Emily will be a star there. Of course, I’ll need to train your wife for a week first, satisfy my appetite. In exchange, your debt’s wiped clean. Fair, right?”

    “BASTARD!” Eduardo lunged forward, but two of Claude’s men slammed him down and kicked his stomach, sending him crashing back to the ground.

    “You should be grateful,” Claude continued, smoking, ignoring Eduardo’s cries of pain. “Emily will get nice clothes, good food, and she’ll serve people with real money. Better than starving to death with you. She’ll be happier with me.”

    “Step over my corpse first, you demon!” Eduardo spat on Claude’s expensive shoes. “I’ll kill you if you touch my wife!” He screamed, struggling with what little strength he had left.

    Claude let out a long sigh, disappointment written across his face. “That’s the problem with poor people like you. Big pride, empty brains.”

    He chuckled and shook his head. “You think you can kill me in your condition?”

    Claude signaled with his finger. The bald man stepped forward and handed him a plastic folder filled with documents.

    “Sign the collateral transfer agreement,” Claude said coldly. “Or I’ll send my men to your place right now, drag your wife out in front of your kid, and you’ll watch me and my boys take turns using her before I put a bullet in your head.”

    Eduardo stared at the document with blurred vision. Emily’s gentle face filled his mind, along with Chloe, his five-year-old daughter. He imagined filthy hands touching them. Rage burned in his chest, eclipsing even his physical pain.

    “So, Eduardo? Easy choice. Emily becomes a high-class whore, or you all die tonight,” Claude said, flicking away his cigarette.

    Eduardo fell silent. He lowered his head, letting his hair hide his face.

    “Okay… I agree,” Eduardo whispered.

    Claude grinned with satisfaction and motioned for his men to release him. “That’s more like it. Now that’s a smart head of the family. Come on, sign it.”

    The bald man shoved a pen and the document toward Eduardo’s face. Eduardo took them with trembling hands. He drew a deep breath, as if it were his last breath as a man with dignity.

    Eduardo looked up. Instead of signing, he gathered all the blood and saliva in his mouth and spat straight into Claude’s handsome face.

    Silence fell instantly, broken only by rain pounding against rusted metal around the pier. Claude’s men froze, unable to believe what they had just seen.

    Claude closed his eyes. He wiped the spit from his face slowly. His hand trembled, not with fear, but with boiling rage.

    “You… just chose the most painful path, Eduardo,” Claude said, his voice shaking with restrained fury.

    “I might be a loser, Claude,” Eduardo grinned, blood coating his teeth. “But I’ll never sell my family to a devil like you.”

    Claude did not shout. He simply nodded to his men. “Break him. Don’t let him die fast. I want to hear every bone snap, one by one.”

    The storm of blows came instantly. Boots smashed into Eduardo’s ribs, forcing the air from his lungs. He curled into a fetal position, trying to protect his head, but they did not stop.

    KRAK!

    His left arm snapped as he tried to block a kick. Eduardo screamed, but thunder swallowed the sound.

    “Die, you worthless trash!” the bald man roared, slamming a pistol grip into Eduardo’s temple.

    Darkness took him instantly. He felt his body dragged across rough wood. The smell of the sea grew stronger. He knew what came next.

    Claude stepped closer, unzipped his pants, and urinated on Eduardo’s face. “Enjoy your last drink, hero!”

    Warm liquid splashed across Eduardo’s face. He tried to fight back, to kick Claude in a final act of defiance, but his body refused to obey his mind. Claude’s men laughed loudly as their boss relieved himself on Eduardo.

    “Throw him into the sea,” Claude ordered coldly as he zipped up and jerked his chin. “Tomorrow morning, pick up Emily. Tell her her husband became shark food. If she doesn’t come quietly, you know what to do.”

    “Yes, Boss!”

    Two thugs lifted Eduardo’s limp body, swung him a few times, then hurled him over the pier railing.

    For a brief moment, Eduardo felt weightless, before icy seawater swallowed him whole. The burning pain faded into a terrifying numbness. He sank deeper, farther from the dim pier lights above.

    His lungs burned as oxygen ran out. Saltwater flooded his nose and mouth. In the pitch-black depths, only one thought remained.

    “Emily… Chloe… forgive me. I was a useless husband and father.”

    His consciousness began to fade. His heartbeat slowed. At the edge of death, regret crushed him harder than his shattered bones. He needed power. He needed a miracle. He wanted to slaughter them all.

    Suddenly, in the total darkness, Eduardo’s chest flared with blinding light, and a cold yet authoritative mechanical voice echoed directly inside his mind, as if splitting his soul.

    [CONDITION MET: TOTAL DESPAIR DETECTED.]

    [ACTIVATING PROTOCOL: EQUIVALENT EXCHANGE.]

    Eduardo’s body sank deeper toward the ocean floor beneath the pier, and with his next breath, his consciousness was violently torn into a completely different dimension.