25th July 1972
Rachele was twelve now old enough her family deemed, to be involved in some aspects of the family business. Today she would be going with Leone and Ricardo to extort some money from a smaller Mafiosa operating within their territory. She was there as the 'muscle' neither Leone nor Ricardo had the same intense combat training she had been given. Ricardo was a muggle who preferred to slink into the background and Leones training had been more focused on politics and influencing people with words, than injuring them. Mamma's focus on physical threats and combat experience had been borderline obsessive, Leone and she often wondered what things Mamma knew things that they didn't.
She was sat in the back of Ricardo's car on the way to the bar where they would be meeting the other group. Leone had explained that any Non-Allied Mafiosa had to pay what he termed 'rent' to them. For being on their land and operating under their safety net. This 'rent' was a cut of their monthly profit. Normally Leone and Ricardo wouldn't be going to extort money out of anyone, their positions were such that they left that sort of grunt work to their underlings. But they were both eager to see just how her first trip out went.
Leone shook her awake when they were 5 minutes from the bar. Rachele hadn't realised that she had fallen asleep 'the bar was only 30 minutes' drive away from the manor how could I fall asleep in that time'. As they pulled into the car park Ricardo spoke "You remember the signal and the code words?"
"Yes, Zio Ricardo, I remember" she told him, he was nervous that his favoured niece would do get hurt and he'd be left to explain to the Don Alessandro how his only daughter got hurt.
AS they got out of the car, there were already a group of people, armed Rachele deduced, stood outside of the bar entrance. They knew who the trio were, they had been waiting for them. Rachele's instincts were on high alert, this wasn't a good sign. They stopped about 20 feet from the group.
"Greetings friends, is your Don here? We require a word" opened Ricardo.
"Leave. Now" responded one of the men.
"gentlemen, why don't we discuss this over a drink? We just want to talk" Ricardo tried again.
The four men either side of the speaker drew their guns. 'shit. This is bad' she thought as the hair on the back of her neck stood on end.
Ricardo took a step forward towards the five men who were stood by the door and all hell broke loose.
One of the men fired a shot and Rachele and Leone dropped to the floor, Rachele looked towards where Ricardo was stood. He was crouched now a red patch soaking through his jacket onto his hand. They needed to retreat. She signalled to Leone to go and cover Ricardo in case they fired even more shots, but he wasn't there. He had gone for cover behind a parked car, leaving her to cover Ricardo.
When she reached him, she ushered him quickly behind the car. He was losing too much blood. This was not good. Even if they could get him into the car and drive it back, he was losing blood quickly, she doubted he would make it back to the manor for medical treatment. She couldn't use the basic medical spells in front of the muggles either.
She could see Leone from her spot on the other side of the parking area. He had his handgun out and was raising it cover them.
"Please just let us leave. We don't want to hurt anyone" Leone shout to them. She looked up above the bonnet of the car. There were three of them stood by the door to the bar. 'wait, weren't there three of them before this?' she thought. One of the three fired a shot towards Leone who ducked down behind the car. Leone responded with shots of his own.
When Rachele turned her attention to an unconscious Ricardo she could hear the footsteps in the gravel approaching her. She gripped her knife and hid behind the big bins next to the parked car, from there it was covered from the gun fight her brother was having at the same time she was covered from where the footsteps were coming from.
It was the other two, the ones she thought she saw by the door when she arrived. Big Ears and shorty she nicknamed them in her head. Shorty raised his gun to Zio Ricardo's head and fired a single shot. Rachele thought in that moment the entire world stopped, she could feel her tears fall uncontrollably down her face. Zio Ricardo's undead eyes looked at hers from where he was slumped on the ground. Blood pouring down his forehead and pooling into the gravel.
Shorty looked over at Leone and raised his gun again. Rachele made her move, she threw the knife holstered to her left thigh, hitting him squarely in the back causing him to fall face first into the gravel. Big Ears looked around to see her running towards him. He was significantly larger than she was. Rachele wouldn't win this with brute force she decided to change her tactics.
Big ears went to punch her, but she deflected it. Now stood behind him she kicked him in the back of the knees causing him to fall. In one swift motion she put one hand on his forehead pulling it back into her chest and raised her other knife to his neck, pressing hard enough to draw a little blood.
"Don't move" she whispered hoarsely. Trying to swallow the sobs that threatened to escape. Big ears remained still. "forgive me" she begged him as she dragged the knife across his throat. Watching as his blood sprayed out across the car park and over Zio Ricardo. Big ears body fell into the gravel and she watched the life drain from his eyes.
'Breathe' She reminded herself. 'You still need to make sure that shorty is permanently out of commission' a voice that sounded very much like her mother's reminded her.
Shorty was still alive barely but alive all the same. She wiped the knife she used on Big ears on the fabric of her shirt and slit his throat in one clean motion. Rachele wiped the knife on her skirt again before putting it away. Then she extracted the knife embedded in shorty's back, cleaned it on her skirt again.
Rachele looked up. Her next concern was Leone. Where was her brother? Was he alright?
She peaked above the car to see Leone piling the bodies of the three into the boot of the Zio Ricardo's car. She walked over to him, and when she reached in Rachele found she couldn't find the words. She looked up at her brother silently asking him to make everything okay, just like when they were children.
The Leone drove back to the manor she was silent in the passenger seat. Rachele found that she couldn't sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Zio Ricardo's dead eyes looking at her and the blood dribbling down his forehead. She hadn't even realised that the car had stopped until Lucia had pulled her out of the car to check her over.
Mamma had told her when she first went to Hogwarts. Somethings you just can't prepare for. In that moment with Lucia fussing over her getting her cleaned up in her bathroom. She swore to herself she would be the last. The last of her maternal line to train their children for this. When she was old enough, she would leave the mafia altogether.