We left him there...

-What??? i had given you specific instructions that he had to be eliminated!

-there were those things....those things with the bright eyes. They were looking straight at him. he can't have survived.

-No, it is not enough! They want him dead. Who's gonna tell the Boss? he took big money for this job. The reputation of all the family is at stake. We cannot fail. Go down and ensure he is dead!

-But....

-"But" what? what? eh? the only "butt" here is yours, the one I am gonna kick if you two don't go down there and complete your job! you know what? this time I'm coming with you. If you try to flee i'm gonna leave you down there! let's go.-

They left the car a block away and continued on foot. The narrow streets of the lower levels passing over as they strode towards the blind alley. The manhole was an old one, with the crest of the Visconti Family, now adorning the new Town Hall.

The air was cold as the men in suits opened the lid to the Underground. Mist covering the streets, above which huge flyover roads buzzed with the sound of E-cars. Drones patrolled the sky shouting their ads while neon light flickered in the darkness around them, suggesting visions of holodreams and cheap smoke. A greyish Iced rain came down, masking the sound of the coins ticking in a homeless man's hat.

The first of them hit the ladder with his shoes, his shoulders almost too wide for the narrow passage. He was followed by their leader, his grin making the scar on his face even more menacing as he looked at the last of them with satisfaction.

-I'm gonna show you why they call me "Finish" - he said - you may be too young to remember but it was the name of....-

-...Of that dishwashing soap you used when you were cleaning dishes for the boss in his restaurant blah blah, then you rose to his second in command blah...you never left a spot after a job blah...you told us that story so many times-

Alfredo "Finish" Moneta put a heavy and worned out hand on the shoulder of the young man and pinched. the guy shrieked.

-And you're going to hear it a lot more times. You're gonna have to wash a lot of dishes before you can stand in my shoes, ragazzo!-

They slipped silently and steadily down the ladder into the darkness of the sewer system, long forgotten in a city where waste was dried and water recovered for the 'ponics. The sewers were no more than obscure relics now filled with an unknown and seemingly treacherous enemy: the Bright Eyes.

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They had been around since some time. At first it was believed that they were little more than a legend but with time more and more people had seen them and finally the authorities were able to take some footage of one. But what they ended up with was a darkened shadow with two glowing eyes and a seemingly humanoid shape.

That image was obtained at the cost of ten men's lives. Having other pressing matters to attend to, (namely the elections) the city management decided to steer the public concern towards other issues, closed the case, blamed the rats and covertly sealed all accesses to the underground tunnels. Save for a few known only to the crime syndicates, smugglers and the authorities themselves.

-Bah. i say it is only rats. Coupled with that bad smoke that the Ubantu Clan have sold for years- Finish said.

-it's good actually, you should try it-

The young man's face became red, from the slap the man hit his face across with.

-Stop with that, it is going to make you dumb like your cousin-

-i'm sorry Finish...i....-

-Shhhh. i hear something- Big Shoulders had spoken for the first time in an hour or so since they'd been walking down the tunnel, covered in saltpeter and algae residues. Something was moving near an intersection, lurking behind a corner.

Finish took out the gun from his jacket and loaded a magazine of shapies. Those bullets would fly as fast as a crossbow bolt but more silently and the stopping power was left to the shaped charge in the tip. They also had auto targeting. Neural. One of the finest stuff on the black market; Finish had named her Berta. She had never failed him.

the three men gathered near each other, Young Lad and Big shoulders flanking their boss and proceeding cautiously.

when they reached the end of the tunnel they looked around: nothing. Squeaking, a rat ran away form the light of the flashlight, his eyes glowing against the beam. Now they were knee deep in the water, in what seemed to be a flood drain. They moved forward.

-It's just rats, i told you. the water is getting deeper as we go, we'd better take another tunnel or we'll be subm....-

There was almost no sound, save for the splash of the water and the muffled scream of the young guy, who had now disappeared underwater, taking the flashlight with him. the light illuminated the muddy stream, now filling with blood.

-What the...what happened?? Ragazzo! where are you?" Big Shoulders was trying desperately to grasp his mate and pick him out of the water. He reached his arm and grabbed it.

He did pull it out. but the rest of the body was gone. the smell of blood started to attrack rats that were now getting bolder and bolder.

A sinister wailing cry, like that of a badly tuned death whistle filled the tunnels. and suddenly the noise of a thousand feet and squeaking answered the call.

-Damn it! Figlio di pu****a! ti ammazzo!- Finish was furious. his eyes glowing almost like the rats' as he started shooting. Big Shoulders let the arm go and in a fit of rage hit the water with his fists, recovering the flashlight and hitting the rats as they came nearer and nearer.

in the bright light of the torch, now flickering as it had been damaged in the fight, hundreds of white rats with red eyes, surrounded the desperate men in a pool of blood and algae stained water; they were shooting and hitting the animals and the beast were trying their luck at taking a bite of that well dressed human delicatessen.

But soon the bullets were gone and the light gave up. And as the last ray of light gave way to the darkness, the men screamed in terror as a massive army of sharped teeth plunged to their long awaited lunch.

Far at the end of the tunnel, bright green eyes blinked in the dark and then disappeared.