#leon stefanski

[quailhogs]

IV. Three Bodies

Fortress Rock, New Hampshire, 1885

Leon; his brother, Jeremy; and Shaw Blightwood were assigned to steal elixirs from an apothecary in New Hades.  Daniel was specifically interested in a crimson-colored concoction called “Nocturnis Vitae,” which the apothecary allegedly kept secured in a vault.  The three malefactors charged in through the front door, armed with rifles and shotguns, and their faces covered.

Without warning, Shaw abruptly fired his shotgun into the back of a black-haired woman who had been talking to the man behind the counter.  She collapsed and bled into the carpet, her top hat rolling off to the side of the room.

Leon stared at the woman’s lifeless body as the shopkeeper hid behind the counter.  Her pale green eyes looked eerily familiar.  He realized that it was Gregor’s wife, Theresa.  Leon felt his blood rushing to his face.  He was furious.

Turned his attention to Shaw and punched him in the jaw, “Why did you open fire?” Leon shouted.  “Loose ends,” Shaw replied emotionlessly, sounding both moronic and callous.  “What do you think we are covering our faces for, you fucking idiot?”  Distracted by his own rage, Leon had been ignoring the man who was hiding behind the counter.  Daniel’s three men were apparently not the only ones who were armed.

The shopkeeper fired several bullets into Leon’s back as Shaw and Jeremy bolted outside into the pouring rain.  With what little strength remained in him, Leon fired his rifle and covered a landscape painting with the contents of the apothecary’s head.   When he clumsily backed into the door jamb, Leon could see Shaw and Jeremy already far into the distance.  He wanted to shoot them both.  Leon wished he could blast Shaw’s pretty face through the back of his head, and then he would shoot his own cowardly brother in the ass.

“You cowards will be fucked here and in hell!” Leon rasped before using the remainder of his energy to crawl over to a lamp post and bleed to death.

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[quailhogs]

III. Frankenstein

Fortress Rock, New Hampshire, 1885

It was a seemingly peaceful yet typically rainy evening.  After a week of lackluster criminal performance and ridicule, Dorian found an opportunity to relax on his old, tattered sofa in his dilapidated townhouse in New Hades.  Dorian was the quieter and more unassuming of the Blightwood brothers.  In comparison to his brazen and sharp-tongued brother, Shaw, Dorian would have almost seemed sensitive under one’s first impression.  But in reality, Dorian was a bitter, self-loathing, and angry man.

That evening he was occupied with reading the book Frankenstein, by Mary Shelly.  Dorian found the book to be depressing, but he empathised with the monster, despite himself being conventionally handsome.  Amid a paragraph, Dorian was disrupted by the sound of the wooden floor creaking behind him.  He had been so absorbed in this bleak book to not notice that a man had been hiding within his home.  Without turning around, he dodged the tip of a knife as it penetrated the upholstery of the couch.

Dorian upper cut the man and successfully wrestled away the knife before turning it on him.  Dorian pressed the edge of the blade against the man’s neck.

Dorian exhaled heavily onto the man’s neck, "Who sent you?”  “M… Mister Frankenstein!”  the man stuttered.

Dorian glanced over at his book on the couch and groaned.  “You’re a shit liar!  You know that?”  “That’s what the man told me!”  “What did Mr. Frankenstein look like?”  “I don’t know he had his face concealed… a white guy, average height, brown hair!”  Dorian rolled his eyes, “You’re describing me, you useless fuck!”

Dorian forced the man onto the floor and sliced his throat clean open.  He didn’t want to ruin the couch any further with the man’s blood.  He looked up and realized that the curtains on each of his windows had been wide open this whole time.  He quickly rushed over to shut them.

Daniel had been watching Dorian from a telescope in a nearby building that he owned, “So, what was it exactly that you were trying to show me, Leon?”  Leon sat there quietly, coincidentally also reading Frankenstein.  

Daniel snapped his fingers directly in front of Leon’s face, “Leon, what in Franklin B. Evans’ cock did you do?”

Leon looked up at Daniel with slight annoyance.  “I hired an assassin to kill Dorian,” he responded in a clinical manner.

“I do recall telling you not to kill Dorian!  If insubordination is justification for death, then perhaps you are on borrowed time, Leon!”

“You also told me that you wanted to let the Pennsylvania farm boys show their potential.  If Dorian can survive the assassination attempt, then perhaps he isn’t completely useless.  Otherwise, no loss.”

Daniel pressed his fingers against his own eyes in irritation, “Well your pathetically inept assassin is dead on that man-monster’s floor!  I do hope that this fuckwit of a mercenary did not expose you… and me by proxy!”

“Your neuroticism is not a dignified look on you, Daniel.  I know what I’m doing.  We are fine.”

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[quailhogs]

II. Withering Sister

Fortress Rock, New Hampshire, 1885

Leon’s younger sister, Lucetta, had been suffering from an unusual virus and had been bedridden because of it.  Over the last month, she has been treated by Dr. Gregor Goth.  Though Dr. Goth was eccentric and occasionally theatrical, he was easily one of the kinder physicians in Fortress Rock. Unfortunately, Gregor’s pleasantries were not going to cure, or even provide relief for, Lucetta.

“Mr. Stefanski, as I said earlier, I am afraid there is nothing that can be done to cure your sister of this disease.  And at this point she seems well beyond treatment.”  Leon fought his despair with skepticism, “And what exactly brought you to that conclusion?”  “Her heart has beaten exactly three times within the last minute.  The only thing that has awakened her thus far is the sensation of choking on her own blood. The fact that she has survived this long astounds me.”  Leon removed a clean handkerchief from his pocket and leaned over the bed to wipe the excess blood from his sister’s face from her most recent coughing fit.  He shot Gregor an irritated glare.  “So that’s it?”

Gregor sighed, “I am embarrassed to admit that I am perplexed.  Your sister does not have tuberculosis.  Her symptoms are oddly similar to a recent outbreak that took place in Hungary.  People had been consuming a concoction believed to cause immortality.  Most of the people have become bedridden before exhibiting erratic behavior and insatiable hunger.”

Leon became more agitated, “My sister is not an inebriate!”

“I apologize for misleading you.  The drug had since been outlawed in most countries, including this one.  I just have never seen anything like this here.”  “How did you even find out about this shit?”  “My wife has been studying it.  She believes that the alchemy behind this concoction might have some merit to elongating one’s life.”

Gregor’s wife, a woman whom Leon had been informed was addicted to her own drugs, was apparently the most brilliant apothecary in Fortress Rock.  “So your only explanation is that Lucetta either succumbing to an illegal drug… or you do not know.”  “Mr. Stefanski, I have searched the sky, I have searched the ocean!”  Leon was growing increasingly impatient, “Have you searched up your own ass?”   “Yes, I even searched there, Mr. Stefanski…. We do not have sufficient details, and I truly apologize for besmirching Lucetta’s character.  She has always been kind.”  Leon stared down at the bed quilt, averting his eyes from his dying sister.  “If you were in my place, would you end her suffering?”

Gregor stared at Leon, processing what he had subtly suggested, “I am not obligated to tell you my personal feelings on this matter.  The outbreak in Hungary was handled with nothing short of violence.  But as a person who does not condone violating the law by committing acts of murder, I would strongly advise against ‘ending her suffering.’  Good day!”

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[quailhogs]

I. Barwick

Fortress Rock, New Hampshire, 1885

Leon Stefanski was a seemingly unremarkable whose ancestors immigrated from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the 18th Century.  He lived in a large yet unpretentious house with his wife and younger sister and hoped to eventually start a family.

Aside from Leon’s inconspicuous personal life, he was also an emotionless criminal, who rarely hesitated to end a life if he believed it served a practical purpose. He was at a high level on the chain of command for a syndicate based in a district colloquially known as “New Hades.”  He had only recently met one of the architects behind the syndicate, an Austria-born man named Daniel Keilhaus. 

Daniel was born into a poor family, but had accumulated a reasonable fortune in manufacturing, partnering with his older brother Jakob. However, Daniel recently parted from the industry due to a rather strong disagreement with Jakob. Daniel’s current business was established upon smuggling, thieving, and occasional assassinations.

Leon sat in the office of Daniel’s home.  Daniel was a private man, and despite the pride he took in maintaining his home, he rarely accepted visitors.  He utilized subordinates such as Leon to distance himself from the lowlier criminals.

Daniel stared up at Leon, his pale eyes shadowed by the brim of his top hat, “Take a seat, Mr. Stefanski.”  “Please call me Leon.”  “As you insist… but do take a seat.  I do not appreciate people hovering.”

Leon sat down in an ornate yet very uncomfortable chair, “So what have you summoned me for?”

“Always to the point, I do appreciate it,” Daniel responded with a mild grin, “I wish for an update on those two young gentlemen from Pennsylvania.  How are they faring?”

Leon rolled his eyes, “Shaw and Dorian Blightwood?  Terrible.  Shaw is insubordinate and Dorian is borderline incompetent.”

“Please explain.”

“Shaw is self-explanatory.  He does not follow directions, does everything his own way, despite how detrimental it is to our plans.  He recently shot a sleeping vagrant in the face within earshot of the police!  He argued that the bum could have been pretending to sleep and somehow had knowledge of us robbing a warehouse two nights prior.”

“That does not make a lot of sense, Leon.  What about Dorian?”

“He’s the opposite!  He was supposed to shoot Franklin Barwick, that fat thieving shit!”

“You all are thieving shits, Leon,” Daniel interrupted, “but yes, Barwick was supposed to die.”

“Well, he missed Barwick intentionally!  Nobody with a working pair of eyes and functional reflexes could have missed that shot!”  “That’s not incompetence, that is also insubordination.  And how was this Armageddon of shit resolved?” “I took care of it!  It’s just… Dorian is a liability.  We need to get rid of him!”

“Well firing is not an option, so you mean kill Dorian?”

Leon smirked in affirmation, which unnerved Daniel, “I know very little else about this man and you want me to ratify his murder?  Do you lot ever have a more creative approach to these situations beyond slaughter?”

“That’s the business, right?  Either we kill him or he’s going do something else idiotic that gets us all killed instead!”

Daniel sighed, “No offense to you and your brother, but I grow weary of hiring siblings in such a volatile business.  If we kill Dorian, then we need to kill Shaw before he finds out and exacts revenge.”

“And?”

“It is wasteful, Leon!  Let these moronic farm boys prove their potential!”

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