"Built in 1805 by the architect Giuseppe Alessandro Vincenzo Marini, the 'Villa della Rosa Nera' was given as a gift by Napoleon Bonaparte to Joséphine de Beauharnais at the height of their romance. She saw the villa as a retreat where she could escape the pressures of court life and the rigors of politics. The peninsula of Porto Ercole, where it is located, offers both access to the Tyrrhenian Sea and a quick route to the capital, Rome."
The guide paused as she invited the visitors to step into the second room open for tours, likely a salon at the time. The room was decorated with Imperial Armchairs and meticulous replicas of period furniture. Elegant tapestries depicting pastoral scenes adorned the walls, while a low-hanging crystal chandelier cast a soft light over the polished parquet floor. Ropes kept visitors from accessing one half of the room.
Jigen scratched his chin. To his right, Lupin pretended to be deeply interested in the golden embroidery on one of the Imperial Armchairs. He leaned forward slightly, his houndstooth flat cap, scratched sunglasses, and fake gray mustache making him look like a curious old grandfather.
"After their divorce, it is said that Joséphine was devastated by grief," the guide continued with a slightly dramatic tone. "She is said to have used the villa as a personal retreat. Some believe she stayed there out of lingering love for Napoleon, but others claim her decision was driven by intense resentment—that she wanted to distance herself from his influence while asserting her independence over… Ah, sir? You can't go that way. Those are offices."
"Oh, sorry, sorry! I thought this was the restroom!" Lupin lied.
Lupin rejoined Jigen with an exaggerated limping gait, a far-too-wide grin plastered across his face.
He sidled up to the gunman and murmured, "The guide's kinda cute, don't you think?"
Jigen elbowed him in the ribs.
"Urk! Alright, alright! Jealous, are you? Anyway, I don't think we can get in that way. There are too many guards everywhere."
Jigen glanced at the entrance Lupin had scoped out. A sunglasses-wearing, overly muscular guard stepped up to close the curtain Lupin had just tried to slip through.
"They're so overstaffed it's getting ridiculous," Jigen whispered. "How are we supposed to get in?"
"Simple, my dear Jigen. If we can't get in through the back door, we'll just waltz in through the front door!"
The next day, two electricians arrived at Villa Rosa, fully equipped for their "job." One had traded his signature red jacket for denim overalls that made his slim figure appear even scrawnier, while the other had swapped his trademark black hat for a pair of safety goggles, hiding the hat under his clothes.
"Good mornin', good mornin'!" Lupin called out, bouncing cheerfully toward the two guards stationed at an electric door. "This where you called us in?"
The two guards exchanged uncertain looks.
"Well, would you look at the size of this house!" Lupin exclaimed, adopting a thick accent that sounded like an old Italian farmer. "I've never worked in a camel before!"
"In a castle," Jigen corrected him dryly.
"You there, stop!" one of the guards barked firmly. "We haven't received any notification about your visit."
"Well, yeah, of course!" Lupin replied, gesturing animatedly. "Your boss called us in, but I don't do notifications on that 'ternet thing. Don't even got a mailbox! Didn't you get my setter?"
"My letter," Jigen corrected again, deadpan.
The guards, visibly thrown off, hesitated for a moment before consulting each other in hushed tones. Lupin and Jigen took the opportunity to exchange a satisfied glance.
Finally, one of the guards said, "Alright, follow me. But no funny business. We're going to see the boss."
They followed the guard inside the villa. The ground floor was mostly used as a museum, so the guard led them straight up to the second floor. According to the intel they had gathered, the second floor was reserved for operational rooms. That's where Jigen would find the electrical room. But first, they needed to get rid of this guard.
As they passed by a slightly ajar door, Lupin discreetly rolled a small bomb inside. It detonated, immediately setting off the alarm. People burst out of the room, coughing as thick smoke began to seep into the hallway.
The guard panicked. "Stay here!"
He cocked his rifle and left without so much as a glance at the two fake electricians. Jigen and Lupin exchanged broad grins.
"I'll meet you at the boss's office," Lupin said with a wink.
Jigen nodded, and the two split up.
There were a few encounters along the way—mostly people heading toward or fleeing from the scene of the 'accident'—but Jigen went unnoticed.
Finding the electrical room was easy. The space was filled with electrical meters, and there was no one around to stop him from causing chaos.
He brought a hand to his ear, where a small radio was tucked away, unnoticed by the guards.
"Lupin? I'm at the generator," he said, pressing a button.
"Already? No resistance?" Lupin's voice crackled through the earpiece.
"Nope."
Jigen set down his toolbox and carefully opened it. What it contained was far from the usual electrician's tools. Inside was a large hammer. Jigen picked it up eagerly.
"Give me two seconds. I'm almost in position."
Jigen hefted the tool, letting it bounce lightly between his hands to gauge its weight—about as heavy as his good old sniper rifle. His eyes swept over the rows of machinery, scanning for the main power source.
"Go for it."
Jigen took a step back, then swung the hammer hard into the largest generator in the room.
Immediately, the lights throughout the Villa went out. The alarm fell silent, its incessant wail replaced by confused shouts echoing through the halls. Jigen delivered another swing for good measure, the satisfying crunch ensuring the damage was beyond repair. Satisfied, he dropped the hammer and darted into the corridors. The backup generator would kick in soon enough, but it still gave more than enough time for Lupin to do what he needed.
Jigen ditched his electrician disguise, now more of a hindrance than a help. As he moved through the hallways, he passed one or two people—civilians, by the looks of them—who quickly lowered their eyes and hurried away.
Suddenly, the power came back on. The lights flickered to life, accompanied by the piercing blare of the alarm. At the end of the hallway, two guards appeared and spotted him immediately. One pointed at him, and they instantly drew their weapons. They didn't have time to fire before they were already down.
Jigen pressed forward, encountering several more groups of guards along the way. None of them stood a chance against him, but the Villa seemed to have an endless supply of reinforcements. Realizing he couldn't afford to waste his ammunition, he was forced to improvise.
He needed to reach the rendezvous point Lupin had given him, but a group of guards blocked the only available path. Getting through them was impossible.
Caught between the first group and another rapidly approaching from behind, he had only one option. He ducked into the first room to his left.
It was a storage space. Jigen quickly knocked out the lone guard inside, then shoved a chair under the doorknob to barricade it.
The guards began pounding on the door, their voices muffled by the thick wood.
"Lupin?" Jigen said into his walkie-talkie. "I'm in a storage room. Where are you?"
"I'm at the rendezvous point."
Good. He wasn't running off to save his own skin, so he had time to guide him.
"Any ideas on how I can get to you?"
"Hmmm… Are you in the storage room in the East or West wing?"
Let's see. He'd gone quite a distance from his starting point. And he'd passed two emergency exits, which meant…
"East, I'd say."
"Ah!" Lupin replied cheerfully. "In that case, it's much simpler than you'd think, my dear Jigen. You're going to have to go out the window and climb up one floor."
Jigen complied. He opened the window and slipped outside. The maneuver would have been impossible a week earlier, but his injury no longer caused him pain—and, more importantly, it had healed enough to let him attempt stunts like this again.
Using the wall's crevices and uneven stones as footholds, he began his ascent. The climb was difficult, and his movements were still a bit unsteady, but Jigen reached the window of the next floor without much trouble.
He quickly checked to make sure the room was empty. It was richly decorated, likely an office. Shelves lined with books, an antique globe, and a golden pendulum clock adorned the room. The coast seemed clear. Jigen slipped through the already open window and landed softly on the floor.
A chair creaked, breaking the silence. Jigen's magnum was already drawn before he even spun around, but the figure sitting there was familiar.
"Lupin!" Jigen holstered his magnum, relieved to see him.
Sitting nonchalantly behind the desk, Lupin leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on the table, scattering dirt across what were clearly very important documents.
Lupin flashed him a dazzling smile. In his hand, he spun the medallion they'd recovered from the ruins, stolen by the Black Dawn, and the entire reason they were there in the first place.
"Hey, ho!" Lupin greeted cheerfully. "No complications, Jigen-chan?"
"Nah. S'all good."
If Lupin was here, then Jigen had landed right in the boss's office. He could relax now. The next step of the plan involved waiting for their target to show up on their own.
Jigen scanned the room, noting the exits and any potential threats. Satisfied, he settled on the edge of the desk, facing the door.
"Now we just wait," Lupin confirmed, grabbing a document that looked highly confidential and flipping through it as if it were a casual magazine. "Our friend Giulio Tregatti will come back on his own once all this commotion dies down. No one's going to come looking for us here."
It was Lupin's job to be confident, but it was Jigen's to stay vigilant. After all, it was his responsibility to protect Lupin.
Jigen cast one last glance around the room and slipped his hands into his pockets. The siren still wailed faintly in the distance, and the sound of guards running back and forth echoed from the floor below. Here, they were in the eye of the storm. All the chaos of the Villa reached them muffled, like a distant echo.
Lupin continued flipping through the boss's papers. Jigen toyed with his magnum, the soft click of bullets sliding into the chamber echoing like the ticking of a clock, counting down the seconds. This moment of peace wouldn't last long.