Angelo stared them down and Viper crossed their arms, body language saying 'I'm waiting but I don't have the patience to wait forever, so get to it'.
He had nothing to offer them that they wanted or needed that they couldn't just get from someone else.
And if anyone had blackmail here, it would be Viper.
"You're right. There's nothing I can say to convince you. Perhaps except the truth."
Despite themself, there was the spark of curiosity.
Angelo leaned back to pull out a drawer and retrieved a folder, dropping it on his desk with a slap, "There is something brewing."
Oh come on with the dramatics.
That just sounded worryingly like the beginning of a main quest.
(Shit. Video games!
There had been that avatar game someone was making, they'd never get to play it.)
Barbed wires materialized from their cloak and lifted the files up in the air. The room was briefly filled with the sound of pages turning as they scanned through the contents.
Hitler had made contact with multiple black societies in the Triad, seemingly securing alliances. Estraneo had imploded, falling into clans and barely able to stay afloat, while their renowned R&D in particular had disappeared from mafia society -so fast they didn't even give the vultures circling them to poke at anything. Giglio Nero had had a very methodical elimination of all its five heirs, the famiglia losing all its previously far-reaching prestige. Todd famiglia had the most members currently being held by Vindice after a series of incidents, the Beccio based in the Americas were splintering, an inheritance wars, while the LeiLei brothers were losing their grips on their south east asian counterparts -conveniently losing them to the Triads.
Yes. The reason why they said 'mulling over' killing Hitler, and not just 'shut that fucker down', was because this Hitler, was starkly different from the Hitler of their previous world.
This Hitler, while he was publicly gathering support to push back communism, he had the rather stark lack of antisemitism that had been one of his main themes then, which in turn had gathered him more supporters than his parallel. On the other hand, despite no concrete evidence to point to his direct influence over the circumstances, Viper had the supernatural opportunity to be certain that he was planting roots in multiple parts of the Flame Community which had Viper concluding that he probably was Flame Active himself -with all evidence so far pointing to being a Sky- and he'd been stirring some things between Famiglias, particularly those with high amounts of Flame Active members.
Multiple people had even been able to draw the Vindice out to be taken into custody for quite some spectacular fights.
Puzzlingly, that seemed to be his goal, and Viper wondered what he ate to willingly provoke the underworld boogy men.
"I am already aware of all these. What of it? How does this have anything to do with breaking into Delta's base?"
Viper was really reluctant to accept this mission. They had a feeling they knew exactly who Delta was.
An often quoted description of them was 'DaVinci's second coming' (only better, some would mutter after).
Viper had no desire to get into direct contact with Verde so soon.
(If possible, then never at all. They didn't know anything about the Arcobaleno curse, if someone could simply replace them or if it had to be them specifically, if it required them to form a bond with the other members, and the whole concept was just too confusing and incomplete in the show that they weren't quite willing to risk it, even with their supposed assurances.)
"We believe that Delta is working directly under Adolf Hitler."
That gave them pause -a nazi character huh?- before they continued.
Angelo, and possibly Daniela de Vongola herself, were clearly planning to counter Hitler, for whatever reason.
"So how did that factor in 'grabbing whatever I can'? I'd have expected you to be more specific."
Angelo shook his head, "We wish we could, but we truly don't know what they're planning. We're still piecing the bigger picture, but Delta is an avenue we have yet to get eyes on."
"... Mu~, I see."
Viper, very carefully, didn't mention that he could have just asked them to 'find out their plans', rather than opting for the open ended 'grab anything you can'.
Viper had never aimed to be the number one of anything, never laid their eyes on the title of Greatest.
They had too much personal hang ups to be so optimistic and driven towards a spot light.
They had always been a firm follower of 'the greatest trick Satan pulled was to make everyone think he didn't exist'.
They had dutifully maintained a rare commodity status.
By only accepting requests from certain scrupulously selected famiglias and therefore building a rapport with them while keeping their presence scarce outside of that circle, Viper managed everything to secure a stable income without drawing hard lines on their capabilities but neither encouraging any thought of absurd requests.
Nothing too troublesome, and Viper could still enjoy the elegance of life.
They weren't dedicated to this line of work enough to die and live by it.
They could die for it, sure, a pill you just had to swallow because there's no real thing as getting out of it, too many things they'd done that if they simply stopped -stopped sleeping with an eye open, stopped considering everyone untrustworthy until further notice, stopped micromanaging every arrangements they make- everything would simply catch up to them.
"All right." They returned the files with a sigh, walking away with a half-hearted wave, "Make it a hundred million and I'll take it, I am curious myself."
(Perfect. If they took their personal share from their previous job, they could just not dock on this. Then that would be a hundred million for their network's monthly maintenance. A million for each of their twenty-nine 'scouts', and then the paid agents among the three hundred 'watchers' would have two hundred thousand. The sixty five million left would just be enough to cover their agents -specifically the retirees- tracks that they didn't have the time nor energy to individually track down and personally cover up. Including the communications between and the budgets for their gofers.)
And while they were at it, they'll also look into the heart of the matter.
Just because it wasn't a request, didn't mean Viper couldn't go satisfy their own personal interest.
XxXxXx
"Viper?"
They frowned, "Gabriel. What do you want?"
He -rudely- stepped into the room without invitation, playing with his hands awkwardly, "Um, hey. You're leaving?"
For a twenty-four year old man, he acted younger than them.
Though, come to think of it, he didn't actually know their age, did he? Viper's superimposed older-clone illusion over their form was a permanent fixture. So it stood to reason, he might've easily taken himself as someone younger.
Viper didn't know what to think of that.
"Don't say obvious things."
"Right. Hey- can I... um, ask a favour?"
"No."
"Please? I overheard what you were talking about."
Viper pressed their suitcase and turned around.
"... Mu~, I'll consider it."
Gabriel beamed his trademark beam as if they'd already said yes, "You- can you find out what they're up to? Delta, that was. It's really been bothering the famiglia."
His smile turned more subdued.
Viper considered him.
"How much money do you have?"
As the younger of the brothers, Gabriel had a bit more flexibility when it came to his future and he had chosen to open up a chain of seafood restaurants. It was big enough to have branches all over Italy and even one in France. From what they'd heard, he'd kept it as separate from any illegal practices as he hadn't wanted to depend on his famiglia.
Gabriel blinked, took a look at their smile, and winced. "... twenty million right now, I'll... probably have twenty-five by the time you return."
Minus his employees wages and other miscellaneous expenses including money set for emergencies, then it would be about that.
"I'll take it all then."
Before he could change his mind, Viper disappeared in a twirl of Mist.