Re reading my Il Merlo rants and I hate them all, he's NOT the right amount of insane and soft. I think i did better with Corrado but I didn't get Damiá right
fuuckk fuck. fuck. now im thinking about nolan and dokkaebi fallout.
post-mwiii. makarov alive, only konni is in shambles and they're coming up with a new plan. one that includes the north koreans, it's bigger this time, more serious (for the sake of mw4 relevance ) now they've got nothing to lose & going all in.
dokkaebi tells nolan she's thinking of terminating her contract, that she finds this plan stupid and unsafe, they can't trust the north koreans. she's speaking from experience, nolan already knows all about it but he still listens to her.
now i don't know how makarov handles resignations or people no longer working with him, i don't want to imagine it. nolan takes it upon himself to try to convince her before she goes to the boss.
he wholeheartedly believes in this new plan, because of course he does, and he wants ari to see it too. he wants her to be by their side when they win, that this is the end game and none of it will matter soon, but it doesn't work. they end up arguing, not reaching a conclusion, standing on two different opinions.
few weeks pass, they barely talk, both busy with their respective tasks but actively avoiding each other doesn't help either.
nolan gets the news from makarov on a random evening. maybe they're having dinner, sharing drinks, whatever. makarov suddenly breaks it to him.
"Ari left tonight."
nolan almost chokes on his drink. "What?"
"She didn't want to make a big deal out of it."
"And you let her?"
"I'm not going to keep someone close if I'm not a hundred percent sure of their loyalty."
nolan doesn't know where to even start digesting this news. before he opens his mouth to ask, makarov answers for him.
"Mutually assured destruction," makarov explains, "She knows one wrong move to screw us will get her killed."
smart girl, nolan thinks. he's sure there were negotiations. he also knows very well that makarov would've killed her already, no matter what she has on konni group, because the no loose ends policy is strict and they have put down men for less, but he has a feeling this one is personal. perhaps he did this for nolan, he doesn't ask.
they finish their meal. things move on as usual, but it does sting a little that she didn't bother saying goodbye. that is until nolan gets a knock on his door in the middle of the night, opening it only to find one of dokkaebis remote controlled robots on the floor.
it's one of those early prototypes, nolan remembers it well because he was in the lab with her, making it his personal job to be a bother while she was trying to build the damn thing, offering criticism where it wasn't needed and getting a punch in the ribs for it.
he leans down to find an envelope tucked somewhere in there, one thats titled "urzikstan", full of photos they took during their deployment there together.
it brings a smile to nolans face as he takes the envelope and shuts the door to the ugly robot.
💭 | Damiano arrives home from the mines with anger in his mind and blood on his face. You make it all better.
Decided to write that little fic idea I posted about 🙃 could not stop thinking about it. I have been in love with Damiano since the release of this game. The world is in desperate need of more Damiano. I hope that anyone who reads this likes it and thank you for reading 🩶 this is my first time ever writing for Damiano so I do apologise if parts of him seem OC but I do think he would behave different with his wife.
Shining in from the open windows of the home you share with Damiano, the Sicilian sun warms the skin of your face and arms. An occasional breeze blows in past the trees of the private land and offers a fanning of cool air. You sit in a cozy armchair in the parlour, drinking from a fresh preparation of tea and reading small portions from the usual newspaper that sits spread out on across the low wooden table in front of you.
The sound of a car screeching to a sudden halt right outside of the house pierces through the peaceful air. You lower the porcelain teacup back onto the painted saucer that sits atop the small table beside the armchair with a resounding clink as your attention snaps toward front door. The harsh slam of a heavy car door follows shortly after, reaching your ears with ease through the open windows.
Your eyebrows furrow with rising concern. You were not expecting Damiano to be home from the mines for at least a few hours longer at this point. It was not often that he was ever able to or allowed to return home earlier than planned. Such a thing is not a liable luxury in his line of work. His line of work never fails to be time consuming and demanding at the best of times. Even then, Damiano did always try his hardest for you at least. You had given new meaning to him and your marriage had only strengthened that further.
Suddenly, the front door all but thunders open and thuds back against the wall. Damiano steps in through the frame, his steely gaze is locked on the ground beneath his boots. Your lips part with an unstoppable gasp when you see him. One of his hands is covering the side of his face as the unmistakable crimson colour of fresh blood drips down his knuckles through the gaps of his fingers. His other hand slams the door closed again behind him, locking out the outside world. “Damiano-” you start. Your voice wavers with overpowering concern. His hair is in a far messier state than when he had left earlier. Multiple strands of his hair are loose from the usual immaculate style he had brushed it back into before leaving. No doubt the result of some kind of violent altercation.
His head snaps up to face you at the sound of your voice calling out to him. Upon the mere sight of you looking back at him with visible worry on your face, his intense and stormy eyes soften by a massive fraction in a way that only you can cause. “Cuore mio…” Damiano clears his throat in a desperate attempt to wash away the lingering threat in his low tone. You watch in a shocked silence as he fully straightens his slightly hunched back, still grasping at the side of his face.
It is not the first time that Damiano has come home with blood on him. He has come home with bruised and split knuckles more than once in the past. You are always the one to sit him down and clean his hands for him while he looks up at you like an angel sent from high above for him and him alone. You have observed fresh stains of crimson on his clothes more times than you can even count on both of your hands. But he had never once arrived home with such a notable wound to himself. He had never been one to let another person get the upper hand on him.
You stand up from the armchair and rush over to him in a series of hasty steps. Your heart thumps wildly in your chest with a rush of fiery adrenaline caused by your concern. “Damiano, what has happened?” You ask, stopping in front of him. “Let me see…” you lift a careful hand to his face, intending to pull his hand back and observe the state of the hidden wound. Damiano takes a small step backwards, turning his head away from you with a stubborn tilt of his chin. “No. I will deal with it myself.” He declares.
Your eyes soften at the familiar tone of his voice. You can see the invisible walls he is attempting to build up around himself in the moment. You can see the vulnerable spark in his endearing eyes and hear it loosely disguised in his voice. You can always find it and see it. No matter how much he attempts to hide it away from you. “Come over to the kitchen at least.” You sigh, aching to at least sit him down and not let him lock himself away in the bathroom or bedroom to clean his wound up alone.
Taking his free hand that hangs idle by his side, Damiano allows you to guide him over into the sunlit kitchen and sit him down in one of the wooden dining table chairs. His hand still refuses to drop down from his hiding whatever wound marks face. Turning around, you grab a clean rag from the countertop and run it beneath the tap, drenching it in cool water and ringing it out. You throw a glance back over your shoulder. Damiano is staring at his dust covered boots. You can almost see the heat of rage and humiliation steaming on his skin and radiating in the air around him. His hands are trembling with unbearable anger and what you have no doubt is a sense of unfamiliar embarrassment. Your heart tightens at the sight of him in this state.
You pull a chair up to sit close enough to him until your knees brush together. “Lift your face, Damiano. Please.” You plead softly, moving your free hand that is not holding the damp rag to settle on his knee, stroking the skin through his dusty trousers. You can smell the lingering scent of the sulphur mines that still clings to his skin and clothes; a mixture of blood, sweat and earth. It is a scent that you are long since used to by now and yet you still find yourself resisting the urge to wrinkle your nose at it. At the pleading tone in your voice, Damiano relents. He was never one who could let you want for something. He was never one to deny you or something. Damiano lifts his head to face you. He swallows thickly when you bring your hand to cover his own on the side of his face.
“Let me see.” You stroke his crimson covered knuckles, noting how a large amount of the blood has since dried and is cracking against the skin like a staining mask. “It is not pretty, cuore mio.” He warns, his voice thick with glaring resentment for someone unknown to you. “I do not care. It needs to be cleaned and I will not have you doing that alone. I want to see it.” You reinforce. Damiano lets out a low, gravelly chuckle at the burning fierceness and stubbornness on your face and in your tone. “As you wish.” He breaths heavily.
Damiano watches your face as you slowly pull his hand away from his face. He waits to see the disgust. He waits to see the disappointment. He waits to see the embarrassment. None of it comes to your face. He only observes your eyes and your face softening even further than before with blatant worry for him at the sight of the now revealed wound. The cut is an unbearable size, spanning a sizeable length up along his cheek beside his lips all the way up to the very corner of his eye. Most of the blood seems to be dried now but some large pearls of dark red still rise from some sections. With no doubt in your mind, you can recognise that the smooth cut was given to him by a sharp handheld knife of some kind. It was certainly no accident.
You do not ask questions for now and simply bring the cool rag in your hand up to his face. Your hand halts. “This will hurt a little bit, my love.” You prepare him. Damiano meets your gentle gaze with a swift nod of simple permission and understanding. Glancing down at his lap, you notice that both of his hands are sitting limp atop his knees, still trembling in place with the intensity of his emotions that are boiling inside of him. You reach down with your free hand and take one of his hands into your own. Instinctively on contact with the familiar warmth of your skin, Damiano squeezes your hand. It is a little thing that he has done for a long time now. As if having to prove to himself that you are truly here and not a lonely delusion or a fabricated angel of his imagination.
When the damp rag makes direct contact with the deep cut, Damiano immediately stitches his brows inward, biting back a grimace that threatens his stubborn resolve with a quiet, rumbling groan. “‘m sorry, my love.” You apologise, offering your own comforting squeeze to his hand as you watch his face. “Not your fault, cuore mio.” Your hand pauses in the middle of cleaning the wound for a fleeting moment before resuming again. “Who… what happened, Damiano?” You hesitate.
You can see the way he grits his teeth together at the question alone, the aggression and hatred in his eyes from earlier when he had first stepped into the house returning with a sudden burst as he thinks back. “Just a little rat from the mines; a worthless nobody who has no idea what is coming for him.” He spits the labels out with a spiteful venom, causing you to instinctively begin stroking the back of his hand with the pad of your thumb in an effort to calm his spiking anger. “He got out and ran like a rat from the mines. I have to leave soon to find him. Rats do not get far but...” he trails off and averts his gaze toward the open window above the sink. You do not even need him to finish to understand and know exactly what he is too stubborn to admit aloud in this moment. He needed to come home for a moment. He needed to breathe in the signature rosewater scented air of you. He needed to see you. He needed to feel your skin against his.
His lips part with a sudden breathy groan of pain that he fails to bite back when you continue to clean the cut and brush against a particularly sensitive part of the wound. The grasp of his hand tightens around your own. You can feel the small grits of dust and sand from the mines itching against your palm from his skin. You can tell that he is attempting to hide the deep stinging pain from you. “You need to rest, Damiano. Not go searching for someone. Let the others do it. This cut is bad and you have been working like a dog for the past week.” You plead with him, noting how the endearing steely blue of his eyes appears darker than usual with tiredness. Damiano shakes his head with a quiet sigh, looking into your eyes as you continue to clean his face with a gentleness that makes his chest warm with a sensation that arises around you alone.
“I cannot. Spadaro wants me there searching with the rest, cuore mio. I have to do it.” You bite your tongue at the mention of Ruggero Spadaro. As much as you may hate it, Damiano and his brother are loyal to the older man. “I will find the rat and deal with him.” He assures, his voice ringing with a violent promise, though it sounds directed more at himself than to you. Damiano lifts your hand up to his lips and presses a deep, lingering kiss to your smooth knuckles. “Then I will come back home to you.” He finishes, breathing in the scent of your rosewater perfume on your wrist with a quiet hum of approval.
After a few more moments of dabbing at his irritated skin, the wound is as clean as you will be able to get it. You drop the stained rag down onto the kitchen table and observe the cleaned cut. “That will leave quite the scar.” You point out, offering Damiano a small smile as you tuck a stray strand of dark hair back out of his handsome face. “But lucky for you…” you lean in and brush your lips against the slice in his face, planting a featherlight kiss to the split skin. The sound of his breathing growing heavier at the intimate contact fills the room and throws a heavy veil of tension over the air. “I think you will look handsome all the same - with or without a scar, my love.” Damiano turns his head and immediately presses his lips to your own in a deep, wanting kiss that steals the breath from your lungs and makes your head feel light.
Damiano takes ahold of your hips through your expensive dress blouse, carefully but quickly pulling you up from your chair and onto his lap so that you sit sideways across his thighs. You hold his cheek as he parts your lips with his tongue and pushes it inside to meet your own. You are careful to keep your hand a good distance away from his wound whilst holding his cheek, not wanting to press down on it and cause more pain for him. His own calloused hand holds the back of your neck, tracing the sensitive skin below your ear with his thumb. The feeling of his body easing and relaxing beneath your weight is unmissable. The tight tension in his back and shoulders is loosening and melting down into nothingness from the mere feeling of your skin against his and your lips on his. His earlier anger and humiliation is being overshadowed and washed out by his intense love for you and the attention he dedicates to you in an almost religious manner.
The sound of birds chirping outside and the occasional breeze blowing through the air fades away into the distant background of your minds. The kitchen fills with nothing more than the quiet sound of open mouthed kissing and deep breathing with the occasional creak coming from the chair that now holds both of you. When you eventually force yourself to pull away from the kiss, Damiano blindly chases your now swollen lips but only finds the skin of your cheek instead as you turn your face away from him with a quiet laugh. “I believe that is more than enough for now, mr Bastoni.” You tease softly, leaning further into his chest.
Damiano leans his forehead against yours, his eyes heavy now lidded and hazy, swirling with a newfound passion and heat that makes the room feel ten times warmer and smaller than it is. “It is never enough for me with you, cuore mio.” He rebuttals. His breathing is heavier from the kissing, the feeling of his breath is hot as it fans across your lower face.
Before you can even think of responding, Damiano stands up from the chair and hoists you up off your feet, all but throwing you half way over his shoulder with an ever surprising ease. “Damiano!” You gasp out with a breathy, surprised laugh. “Put me down right away.” He simply chuckles lowly, keeping a secure hold on you and walking out of the kitchen, heading toward the stairs that lead up to your bedroom. “You teased me, cuore mio. You know what happens when you tease me.”
At that, you bite the inside of your cheek, a familiar heat igniting deep inside of you. Your lips curve up into something awaiting and eager as you smile to yourself, watching the staircase and the back of his boots move with his hasty steps.
Safe to say, you were most certainly going to help him forget all about the distant sweltering, demanding environment of the mines and relieve his pent up anger and you were going to take the greatest pleasure in doing so.
Thinking about Il Merlo using Gaetano as a teddy bear, not even in a sweet and loving type of way, he just needs the support to get comfortable. Corrado walks by and sees Gaetano silently begging for help but Corrado just shrugs and walks away, Damiano used him as a pillow for years and now it's someone else's turn.
What if Gaetano lived and we got to see a whole other side of Enzo that wasn’t sweet-boy-who-won’t-meet-your-eye-with-disrespect?
What if, in that barn at the beginning of Famiglia, Enzo tells Gaetano (wounded) to follow him at a distance, and when Il Merlo and all find them, the first thing to leave Enzo’s mouth is ‘run’ but Tàno (1) doesn’t want to leave his friend, and (2) can’t because a couple men blocked the exit? What if Enzo turns into a damn honeybadger, swearing off the men cornering his friend with threats that mean nothing from a boy in his position, saying ‘don’t touch him don’t touch him I’ll kill you don’t touch him!’ and things of that nature?
What if, when they’re saved, and Enzo is able to get to his feet, his first move is defensive, getting Gaetano behind him, arm out and checking for an instant to make sure he’s there and safe and alive still? And that fire Luca talked about seeing is even more evident and Enzo has more to live for than himself so he has more bite than he should, but it pays off all the same??
And maybe he insists that Gaetano stay unmarred and not take part in jobs that involve violence or bloodshed, attempting to protect him, to shield him from any and all threats and horror because he failed to do so that final day in the mines and he isn’t going to let that happen again— but it means nothing when Tàno sees him come in with blood on his sleeves and he’s beat up and cut up and tired and…unmoved. It means nothing when he watches Enzo become—in his eyes—a monster.
They fight when he gets made. Gaetano calls him a hypocrite, says he doesn’t even recognize him anymore, says he’s tired of living under murderers and tired of watching them make his best friend into one. Enzo says this is their way to a good life. Gaetano reminds him about America. Enzo doesn’t respond kindly.
But then— Gaetano asks why he can’t go out on these jobs with him, can’t help him, at the very least, to make sure Enzo doesn’t lose his head. They fight. Enzo relents, taking Gaetano out to look for Lorenzetti back in Collezolfo in what he thought would be an easy enough mission.
We all know how that chapter went.
Gaetano gets in the way, panics and makes Enzo lose focus, nearly getting them both killed in an already risky situation— and then he wants Enzo to have mercy on them? It’s safe to say that Enzo is pissed by the end of the mission. But he’s too tired and has to report to Torrisi and doesn’t want Tàno getting too involved with him either, so he gives him a once over, tells him to wrap a burn, and sends him off to bed.
And before I get in over my head about describing the conflict after THAT mess of a chapter, I’ll make sure to mention the other possibility of if we have this same situation and issue between these two, but Enzo thought Tàno was dead for a year+ and just gets him back, so he has a reason to be protective, but is only even more overbearing with it. They have a huge dispute over something as meager as Gaetano collecting money with Luca— which would’ve been fine, but isn’t because Luca gave him a gun to threaten the citrus farmer (I forget his name and don’t feel like rabbit-holing I’m sorry…).
But I digress. I only mention this because I feel a vomitable fic fragment coming on and want to mention my idea here in case I forget. But to wrap this up—
They argue, Enzo walks out, Gaetano cries. Maybe he goes to the stable to hang out with the horses and check on Nivula, soothing himself in the process, but Luca is there. It’s not hard to tell Tàno and Enzo have been having a hard time with each other, so maybe he tries to talk to the former about it. Maybe Luca makes him feel a little better, maybe he makes him feel worse— no matter his efforts.
Gaetano and Enzo would most likely grow apart, with Enzo climbing the ranks— and, hell, maybe Gaetano disobeys his friend and follows him right up the hierarchy. Maybe he reaches his doom before Enzo, maybe he lives and goes to America with a deep-seated resentment for Isabella that he holds steady solely by the stillness of his lips.
Or maybe, the first mission with real violence needing caused that he goes on with Enzo is before Industia or even Disgrazia— maybe he rushes away, riding out to the mountains himself upon hearing Enzo went after Messina in Il Barone, or perhaps he comes with Enzo in Vendetta D’onore, and Enzo ends up having to shoot Ludovici when Gaetano was supposed to, because he’d seen Tino’s gun and wouldn’t let what he knew would happen happen.
So Tàno is horrified, looking at Enzo with terror and fear and nausea, and suddenly nobody in the world feels safe. He wants something familiar, wants something that reminds him of the comfort and warmth he used to know, so while Enzo gets made, he stays in the casena, curled into himself and feeling like every late-evening shadow is weighing down on his soul and mind and he doesn’t want to move his eyes beyond the cot he and Enzo share, in fear of finding them staring right back at him.
But good horses always come home, so maybe—just maybe—that night, while everyone is drunk and unaware, he leaves. He takes Nivula and rides back to Collezolfo, shooing her back home because he knows that—unlike him—she’ll always go back to Villa Torrisi, to Enzo. She always did prefer the older boy to him, and he was usually the one checking in on her, cleaning her, both working and figuring her out. Because maybe Gaetano likes horses, but prefers the company of someone he can talk to and feel present with, and he just doesn’t have that anymore. And he’s lonely and scared and doesn’t know why he’s doing this or where he wants to go and all he can do is run to the home of the only one he knows the name of here.
Anyways yada yada Spadaro: HEYYYYY LITTLE SONGBIRDDDD!!! CAT GOT YOUR TONGUEEE?!?!.?.!.! ALWAYS A PITYY FOR ONE SOOO PRETTY AND YOUNG!!!.!1!
Ok I’m going to grab my food and go because I need to at least try to make it home tonight with some energy so I can write that fic fragment for ya’ll— and maybe work on some sketches…
I will write the whole developed from his rescue to this point later but I can't stop thinking about Gaetano who survived the collapse (because this plot needs it) and ended up being recruited by Spadaro, he survived being crushed in a pile of rocks despite being a bag of bones so he's surely better as a soldato than a miner, Gaetano manages to get the money to spadaro too, so the Don is impressed. Enzo is nowhere to be found, he later discovers what happened and is partially glad he's no longer in spadaro's claws.
There's obviously a lot of developed that needs to be done before we get there but I like to think about obsessed Il Merlo, Gaetano doesn't challenge him like Enzo did so Damiano sees Gaetano as a more soft and tame version of Enzo. He slowly pulls Gaetano in, promises of comfort, status, maybe he can get himself a name, go to his uncle in the future like a respectable man and not a rat. He tells Gaetano he better stays here for a while, to build himself up, that he would be an inconvenience to his uncle if he went to him now, plus he's being so kind to Gaetano, feeding him actual meals and not the rations Ignazio works his ass off to stretch as much as possible and end up tasting like nothing. He has a decent attire now too, nothing fancy but significantly better than the sack with holes he used to wear, he was a bed now for God's sake, after years of sleeping in a filthy cot that used to give him rashes he now has a bed, it's obviously a very small one but it's an actual mattress and blankets, a fluffy pillow too.
So he stays and despite how gross he feels, he also doesn't escape Il Merlo's constant stalking. He still remembers this abomination in the mines, the fear he felt when he heard his screams get closer, how his entire system tensed when he heard that whip hit someone's flesh and fearing it would be his own soon, the blood on his boots, the joy in his face when he ended someone's life.
This man is everything Gaetano had nightmares about for years of his sweet childhood, his boogeyman wasn't some magical shadow man, he was made out of bones, flesh and blood, he was a real man.
And still, he's eventually in Il Merlo's bed, he's in pajamas and so is him but too close, too much touch. Nothing sexual, he's being held as a fucking teddy bear by the most sadistic man in collezolfo and he feels dizzy, his throat is so tight he feels like he might vomit any second, his skin feels slimy and wet despite being dry and warm, he feels disgusted by this man touching him so lovingly, his hold is firm but not painful.
And despite all his disgust, he likes it too, he likes the comfort, the warmth, the sensation of being held firmly but lovingly, being protected, being sheltered now, favored, praised.
"Nobody could ever love you like I do...protect you like I do..."
And as Gaetano closes his eyes and rests his cheek against his chest, he starts to believe it.
@cuntycalloway this was NOT what we talked about but it's based on it 😭 sorry if it's too creepy, also I clarify that there's at least 2 to 3 years between Gaetano being offered a position with Spadaro and ending cuddling in that man's bed 😭
So besides Mafia my favorite game rn is the forgotten hill series, there's this one that's called Forgotten Hill Memento: Playground and this is our child (we're the father) and BRO 😭😭😭😭 THE HEAD AND THE EYEBROWS ARE GIVING ME CORRADO
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