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Cyrano de Birderac: 3

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Chapter Title: Under Quiet Watch Rob Lucci x reader Length: 3.5 K+ Rating: 16+ (Language)

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Based on this: HERE

The first few weeks post Rob Lucci pass in a haze.

You move like someone underwater, slow and blinking, drifting through reports and reconstruction efforts as if the floor beneath you hasn’t just collapsed. At first, the truth doesn’t hit. Not during the evacuation. Not when the scaffolding crumbled. Not even when you signed your name three times across a damage report while pretending everything was fine.

It takes its time, that kind of truth.

It waits.

It waits for the hammering to stop and the emergency crews to stand down. For the bent rebar to be cleared away and the classified files to be boxed, catalogued, and wheeled off like the last rites of a forgotten system. Galley-La surges forward again, industrial and unbothered, as if no great machinery of trust had been sabotaged from within.

You’re left sitting at your desk, alone.

And that’s when it hits.

Not with a bang or a scream. No sharp gasp, no dramatic clutch at your chest.

Just a scent.

Faint, stubborn, clinging to the fabric of the chair beside yours.

Lucci’s cologne.

You don’t cry. You don’t speak. You just sit there, letting it press down on you, a ghost in expensive tailoring.

But your one-woman pity party is interrupted, as most regrettable things in your life are, with Paulie.

You don’t flinch when the door slams.

He storms into your office with the righteous fury of a man personally wronged by your calendar. You're seated at your desk, cross-referencing two manifest sheets, doing your best to ignore the cologne wafting from the chair.

“Paulie,” you say, without looking up. “Unless the harbor is on fire again or you’re here to confess a secret second family, I’m kind of busy.”

He closes the door behind him like he’s entering a battlefield. Full dramatic pause, shoulders squared. The kind of posture that says: I’m about to ruin your day, but I’m doing it out of love.

“No, I’m here to tell you you’re an idiot,” he announces, cheerful as a hammer. “And possibly a future cautionary tale in an HR training seminar.”

You blink slowly. “Thanks?”

He throws his hands in the air. “You’re being ghosted by an assassin. Do you understand how completely deranged that sentence is? You’re emotionally unraveling over a man whose emotional range includes exactly two categories: ‘murder’ and ‘murder, but thinking about you.’”

You squint. “I always thought he was more of a ‘murder, but wears a vest about it’ type.”

“Exactly! That’s not a man, that’s a fatality in a tie. You need to get out of here before you get even more depressed. And the pigeon returns and starts asking you for visitation rights.”

You snort, but it’s half-hearted.

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not. You’re filing your lunch receipts alphabetically. You’ve gone through three bottles of perfume in five days, and yesterday I walked past your office and heard you mutter, ‘He wouldn’t stab someone he liked, right?’ out loud. To yourself.”

You groan. Cover your face. It doesn’t help.

Paulie exhales, softer now. He steps forward, kneels beside your chair like you’re a skittish cat that might bolt.

“Look,” he says, voice gentler. “I’m not saying you’re not allowed to have feelings. I’m saying maybe—just maybe—your feelings are aimed at someone who probably has a body count higher than your student debt. And his bird? That thing was emotionally invested in your situationship like it was writing novellas about you.”

You mumble, “It was.”

He stares. “Exactly. And I know we used to joke the bird had more charisma than Lucci, but let’s be clear: That guy never actually spoke to you, and now has ‘international incident’ carved into his jawline.”

Silence settles between you.

You glance down at your desk. Away from the window. Away from the feather.

Paulie waits.

“I just…” You swallow. “Where do I even go?”

He rises, brushing sawdust from his knees like he’s already made the executive decision.

“Somewhere without assassins,” he says. “Somewhere without pigeons. Somewhere your tragic flirting arc hasn’t already made landfall.”

He pauses at the door, hand on the knob.

“Oh, and we’re not telling the local birds. Those little bastards gossip.”

You accept.

Not because you’re fleeing. But because you’re an adult woman with taste, who can take a hint.

This would be a professional reassignment, a standard rotation through regional shipyards in a perfectly respectable administrative capacity. You’re here to evaluate structural integrity, review compliance reports, and sign off on hull reinforcements with the solemn gravity of someone who surely didn’t cry into their ledger last week.

It is not an escape.

It is not about the feather on your windowsill. Or the ghost in your memory. Or the way you flinch when shadows move too smoothly across rooftops.

This is work.

And work, at least, still makes sense.

So you go.

Each dock is a little warmer than the last. A little quieter. The workers don’t know your face, and no one asks about your previous work experience. No one mentions assassins or pigeons or the name that still knots your stomach when it echoes through your thoughts. They just nod when you arrive, hand you schematics, and return to their welders and cranes.

You blend in easily. Become another clipboard in the background. Another professional face with neat handwriting and sharp observations.

Your reports are flawless.

Your nights are long.

You draft notes with careful detachment, but sometimes you catch yourself underlining the same line three times. Sometimes you stop halfway through a diagram, staring at a bolt pattern like it’s a coded message.

It never is.

You tell yourself that’s a good thing.

And for the first few months?

It works.

You keep your head down. You file your reports on time. You learn the names of the shipwrights and drink unfamiliar tea with too much sugar in it, because the locals insist it helps with the humidity. You smile. Sometimes it’s even real.

You stop jumping at the sound of wings overhead. Stop glancing at rooftops like they’re hiding a shadow in a vest. The ghost of him begins to fade, blurred by distance and routine.

You even flirted once with a blacksmith’s apprentice who smells like ash and laughs like he means it. It’s harmless. Clumsy. Uncomplicated. The kind of moment you might have let yourself enjoy in another life. In a life that didn’t end with a file folder full of classified lies and a bird that watched you more tenderly than its handler ever did.

You’re healing.

You believe it, a little more each day.

Six months after your quiet, professional reassignment, a shadow falls across the Galley-La workshop.

Not a stormcloud. Not a government official.

A bird.

A single, smug, professionally inconvenient bird.

There, perched on a steel beam as if he owns the deed to the whole damn dockyard, is Hattori.

He doesn’t come with a note. No ominous feather fluffing. No diplomatic crumbs of emotion penned in Lucci’s surgical handwriting.

He just sits there.

Unmoving. Watching. Eyes like judgmental marbles, glittering in the rafters.

The crew tries to ignore him.

They fail.

It starts slowly. The unease. A nervous glance here, a dropped wrench there. By noon, everyone’s productivity is down twenty percent. By two, someone swore the bird sighed. Loudly.

And then, as if bored with his own intimidation, Hattori descends.

He lands on your old desk with a grace far too deliberate for a pigeon and begins to methodically drag papers off its surface. Inspection reports. Ship part inventories. A faded coffee-stained note that just says “Paulie owes me lunch.”

He swipes them all to the floor with the slow gravity of a man uninvited to his ex's wedding.

Someone finds him shredding pink post-its into tiny, dramatic confetti pieces, muttering softly in coos like he’s composing a breakup letter.

A dock worker tries to lure him out with half a saltine and a polite whisper.

Hattori stares at him until the man apologizes.

Iceburg watches the whole thing from the upper balcony, arms crossed, a single brow raised.

“He’s looking for her,” he says flatly. “A bit late.”

And then, with the weariness of a man who once watched a sea train explode and still found this more exhausting, he walks away.

The final straw is Paulie.

Paulie walks in holding a clipboard, whistling, completely unaware.

He stops cold.

There is silence. Tension. The hum of a nasty idea brewing.

“You,” Paulie growls.

Hattori blinks.

“No. Nope. Not again. I’m drawing the line right here, you feathered fowl.”

He tosses the clipboard aside and marches toward the desk like a man ready to arm wrestle a tax audit.

“She’s gone. She’s thriving. She’s somewhere far away doing adult things like emotionally regulating and not sharing cryptic eye contact with a trained killer!”

Hattori tilts his head. Innocent. Threatening. The perfect balance of avian menace.

Paulie leans in.

“You listening? Good. Go back to your emotionally stunted handler and tell him we don’t want your soap-opera scavenger hunts. We don’t want feathers in our files. And we absolutely don’t want assassins who flirt with the secretaries!"

As if summoned by prophecy, Hattori produces a neatly folded slip of paper from beneath his wing.

With slow, aching delicacy, he places it on the desk.

Paulie stares at it.

And then seizes it and rips it in half.

Gasps erupt.

Someone drops a wrench.

“Paulie just tore up the note,” someone whispers. “You can’t just tear up a note from him.”

“Shh! You’ll summon it.”

And then, vengeance.

Hattori erupts.

He flaps into the air like an old god rising from a forgotten temple, wings slicing the air with righteous fury. He dive-bombs Paulie’s head, paper scraps flying like divine wrath, striking with the precision of a thousand tiny bureaucratic slaps.

Paulie flails, backpedaling with a yell. He grabs the nearest object—a broom.

He doesn’t swing. He brandishes.

What follows is not a fight. It is not a duel.

It is a clash of eras.

A fencing match between a sweaty man in suspenders and a bird with war crimes in his bloodline.

The entire workshop grinds to a halt.

Hammers still. Saws go quiet.

An intern drops his sandwich in awe.

“He’s parrying,” someone breathes. “Paulie’s actually parrying a bird.”

A seasoned dockworker crosses himself.

“He’s not just a pigeon,” he whispers. “He’s an active threat.”

Wagers are placed. Odds are shouted.

“Fifty berri on the bird!”

“I’ll take fifty on Paulie if he grabs a second broom!”

A welder climbs a ladder for a better view. Another starts narrating in real-time like it's a sporting event.

Iceburg reappears with a thermos and settles in. “Document it,” he tells the intern beside him. “This is what we call institutional memory.”

Eventually, Paulie, sweaty, panting, and now sporting a heroic scratch across his ear like a duelist returning from war, manages to lunge dramatically and startle Hattori out the front window.

He bellows after him, “SHE DOESN’T WANT TO HEAR YOUR SLOW-BURN CRIME BALLAD, YOU FLYING SOAP OPERA!”

Silence.

Then applause.

The Bird War becomes a legend.

It is commemorated each year with a "Feathers & Feelings" lunch hour, featuring symbolic cracker offerings and a dramatic reenactment by interns.

New hires are shown the footage during orientation, followed by a cautionary debrief titled “Romantic Collateral Damage in Maritime Spaces: A Case Study.”

Paulie receives a plaque.

He hangs it proudly over his desk. Beneath it, in engraved letters, the inscription reads: HR Hero. Defender of Boundaries. Kept the workplace bird-free for 3–6 business months.

And whenever a feather drifts in through the rafters, someone whispers: “It has begun again.”

And Paulie reaches, without a word, for the broom.

Galley-La may have temporarily vanquished Hattori, but it’s not a defeat.

Hattori has always been a prelude to the real monster-in-the-rafters.

One year later, Rob Lucci returns.

They don’t notice him.

Not really.

Water 7 is a city of movement; ropes swinging, pulleys creaking, apprentices shouting across drydocks. Too much happens at once for anyone to clock a man slipping through the shadows, face half-obscured beneath a low-brimmed cap, steps swallowed by the noise of industry.

He arrives before dawn.

No grand entrances. No CP9 gear. No pigeon in sight.

Just a tall, dark shape that lingers in the alleys near Dock 1, observing the shift changes with surgical calm. His coat is now civilian, but it hangs wrongly. Too stiff. Too clean. Like a weapon dressed up as something harmless.

The Galley-La foremen don’t see him. Not exactly. But the dogs won’t go near that side of the yard. One growls at nothing until its owner drags it away, muttering that it’s just the wind.

The newer interns chalk up the sudden chill in the air to a sea breeze.

The veterans know better.

They whisper about the feeling. A presence. That sensation of being watched through thick glass. Of tools going missing, only to be returned with better placement. Of a silence that settles in the corners like it’s listening.

Eventually, Hattori stirs.

He shifts on Lucci’s shoulder with a subtle ruffle of feathers, then takes flight. The motion is fluid, practiced, and almost casual. He glides across the narrow street without a sound, wings cutting through the air like memory. He arcs upward toward the third-floor window and lands with a precision that speaks of familiarity. This is not the first time.

It has happened many times.

Countless, in fact.

Each visit etched into his instincts, each return was the same.

But this time, when he comes back, he carries nothing.

No note tucked beneath his wing. No scrap of paper. Not even the trace of a feather was disturbed or misplaced.

Lucci remains still.

At first.

Only his jaw tightens, just slightly. The muscles twitch along his cheek. His eyes narrow, but he does not blink.

Hattori lands lightly on the wrought iron railing that lines the alley. He folds his wings and settles in beside Lucci, silent and composed. The breeze stirs his feathers once, soft as breath, but he does not make a sound.

He lifts one claw and taps it twice against the open air.

The sound is faint, barely audible, but it is deliberate.

Lucci turns his head toward the motion. He does not snap or lurch. He moves with careful control, every line of his body tense, every motion contained.

"Where is she?"

His voice is quiet.

Measured.

But beneath the calm, something sharp begins to surface. It simmers just beneath the surface, like a blade pressing against skin without breaking it. The tone carries weight. Not volume, but pressure.

Hattori does not answer. He does not blink. Instead, he hops forward slightly on the railing. His small black eyes turn back toward the window. His gaze is fixed.

He taps again, this time with more force.

Lucci follows the angle of his gaze.

And there, inside the workshop window, across the dusty room and past the vacant desk, is a drawer left just barely open.

It is not wide.

Only a sliver.

Just enough for the light to catch on the edges of the papers stacked neatly within. Inside the drawer are letters, each arranged in precise alignment. Each one untouched. Each one sealed. Not a single corner curled. Not a single envelope was opened or torn.

Letters from you.

To him.

Unsent, probably meant to be thrown away. Every accusation left unspoken. Every goodbye is half-finished. Every hesitation was carefully folded and filed away. Words never meant to survive after the moment they were written, now preserved like artifacts.

They sit undisturbed.

Silent and waiting.

Lucci exhales once.

The breath slips out before he can stop it.

Then he takes a step back.

It is not a defensive movement. It is not tactical.

It is the kind of motion someone makes when they realize they are too late. When the door has already closed, the damage is irreversible, and it can only be carried forward.

His hands twitch at his sides, almost curling. The tension drains slowly from his shoulders, but it leaves something raw behind. Something brittle. Something bitter.

His eyes remain locked on the window.

He does not speak again.

He turns from the alley, boots quiet against the stone, and walks back the way he came.

Each step is slower than the one before. Measured. Heavy. Less like the assassin he was and more like a man trying not to fall apart in public.

He boards the ship in silence.

No one greets him.

From above, Kaku pauses as he coils a length of rope. He sees Lucci returning and straightens, eyes following the line of his steps.

He does not look alarmed.

Not quite.

Just watchful.

Careful.

The way someone looks at a man returning from the ruins of a place he set ablaze.

"You okay?" Kaku asks.

Lucci says nothing.

He passes without so much as a glance, his boots soundless on the deck. He disappears below. Wordless. Distant. Carved from quiet. And still carrying something invisible. Something fragile. Something meant to remain unread.

Back in Water 7, Paulie assumes you are fine.

He imagines you somewhere safe, in a town with steady sunshine and dry ledgers—a place without birds that linger too long, or men who carry silence like a loaded weapon.

He pictures you surrounded by warmth and distance, living a life without ghosts.

He thinks the danger has passed.

He is wrong.

Lucci has been sloppy since his return to Cipher Pol.

Not in execution.

His kills remain precise, silent, and surgical. His reports are immaculate. His missions close cleanly, and the body count never leaks.

But his choices have started to raise questions.

Assignments are slightly off the expected way. Routes that swerve a few miles off course. Extended stays in ports with no strategic relevance beyond their proximity to civilian trade inspections. He lingers too long. He vanishes too briefly. The pattern is subtle, but Cipher Pol isn’t staffed by fools.

And the questions start piling up.

“Why are you tailing Marine paper-pushers?”

“Why are we getting complaints about a masked man terrorizing women in dockyards?”

“Why did you reroute three days through a low-risk trade zone with no confirmed threats?”

Lucci offers no response.

Just that flat stare. That silence that feels less like calm and more like a warning. Still. Cold. Held in check by something older than orders.

But the silence doesn’t kill suspicion. If anything, it feeds it.

So his direct supervisor steps in. A man known for precision and pettiness in equal measure. He’s made a career of rooting out compromised agents. One quiet whisper at a time. One career-ending memo at a time.

He corners Lucci in a secured records room. Soundproof. Surveillance off. Just the two of them, a stack of mission logs, and a pen between them like a blade waiting to fall.

“You’ve been compromised,” the supervisor says.

Lucci doesn’t blink.

“You’re chasing someone. I don’t know if it’s a leftover tie from your CP9 days or a personal obsession, but it’s bleeding into your work.”

He slides a report across the table. A red mark circles one name. Yours.

“And people at the top are getting nervous. Nervous people tend to fix problems. Reassign officers. Replace them.”

There’s a pause, a flicker of something unsaid in the room.

“Think very carefully before you make me escalate this.”

Five minutes pass.

When the door opens again, Lucci steps out alone.

The chair is empty.

The supervisor’s coat is folded on the table, badge on top. The pen is still dripping red. The records room remains locked for the rest of the day. No report is filed, no inquiry moves forward.

The subsequent internal memo arrives a day later. A new name at the bottom. A new rank.

Director Rob Lucci.

No announcement. No ceremony. Just the change, stamped and filed.

He doesn’t gloat. He doesn’t speak.

But when he clears his first set of assignments, flipping through dossiers with the same precision he once used to break spines, he pauses only once.

Buried between two security briefs is a sealed envelope.

It contains a name, a date, and a port.

No official order number.

No trace in the logs.

Just a small, deliberate reroute that no one notices.

Destination: the next dock on your tour.

You’ve been doing your job. Just your job.

Inspecting hull joints, logging ballast ratios. Reviewing manifests with a clipboard and a steady hand. You’ve traveled across eight ports in six weeks, flagged sixteen violations, reported three crews for structural negligence, and spent more nights on creaky cots than you care to count.

It’s honest work. It’s your work. Not glamorous. Not thrilling. But it’s safe. Predictable. Sharp-edged in a way that makes sense. Metal fatigue. Waterline stress. People lie. Wood doesn’t.

And after everything with Lucci, you’ve come to appreciate things that don’t lie.

You’re in a small port outside Jaya when it starts.

You’re crouched beside a sleek new cargo hauler, checking the curvature of a welded plate with a measuring compass. The keel is solid. The ribs are clean. It’s a good build.

You’re even considering a rare compliment when the foreman says, almost offhand, “Oh, we had a government guy pass through last week. Real quiet.”

You pause. “Did he do anything?”

“Nope. Didn’t say a word. Just stood on the dock for half an hour. Looked like he was hoping someone would show up.”

You nod and get back to work.

Later, while inspecting the upper rigging, you find something small caught between two pulleys. Not part of the build. Just a pristine white feather, fine and clean.

You don’t think about it.

You tell yourself it’s a coincidence.

In Alchemi Bay, you argue over anchor weight. In Castlefin, you oversee a repair audit. In both places, you hear the same thing.

“You just missed him.”

“Real quiet guy. Said he was with the government. Didn’t talk much, but polite.”

You sleep with your boots on.

You don’t mention it. Not to anyone. You focus on your reports. Your inspections. Your job.

One night, anchored off a sleepy trade post that smells like tar and spice, a traveling merchant offers you a leather-bound journal with a soft navy cover.

You buy it. Tell yourself it’s for cargo notes.

You stare at the first page for a long time.

Then you write his name.

You hate how natural it feels.

By the time you reach the docks near Tequila Wolf, you’re steadier. Tired, but sharper. You expect nothing.

So when the foreman hands you a sealed envelope and says, “Some guy in a white coat dropped this off. Told me not to say who it was from, but you just made a face, so I guess you already know,” you manage to keep your expression calm.

You open it after dark.

There’s no letter inside. No message.

Just a single feather.

The kind of thing that says everything without saying a word.

The stories keep piling up.

“Yeah, you just missed him again.”

“Asked where you are headed next. Said it was for security reasons. Didn’t give a name. But he knew yours.”

You assume Iceburg’s involved. Or maybe Paulie. Maybe someone from Galley-La is checking in from a distance.

Because it couldn’t be Rob Lucci.

Lucci doesn’t ask questions. Lucci doesn’t talk. Lucci was a shadow in a suit who didn’t flinch when things broke, especially not people.

Then the dockhands start giving descriptions.

“Nice coat. Sharp jaw. Really intense eyes. Little mean, honestly.”

“Voice like a funeral, but polite.”

“Asked if you were happy. Bit personal, but it didn’t seem creepy. Just… focused.”

You feel the back of your neck tighten.

Because that sounds like him.

But Lucci doesn’t ask.

He doesn’t wonder. He doesn’t check.

It all unravels in a high-security shipyard near the New World.

You’re halfway through a performance review on hybrid hulls when the local security chief pulls you aside.

“We’ve had someone asking about you.”

Your chest goes still.

“Said he was from Enies Lobby. Not scheduled. No credentials. But he knew your last three ports of call. Full name. Job title. Dietary preferences.”

You swallow. “What did he look like?”

“Tall. White suit. Looked like he was preparing to audit the place. And yes, he spoke. Whole sentences. Polite. Normal.”

That’s the part that breaks your mind.

Because if he spoke in full sentences, it wasn’t Lucci. And no mention of a bird? That alone should’ve confirmed it. A clear sign it wasn’t him.

But if it wasn’t Lucci, then who the hell has been following you from port to port with the precision of a ghost who still knows your favorite breakfast?

“…I’m being stalked,” you whisper to no one. “By a polite assassin with unresolved issues.”

You lock your cabin door that night. Shove a chair under the knob. Tape a note to the window that reads: Try it and I’ll start throwing things.

You write Iceburg a letter that just says: What did you do, and why am I being haunted by men who dress like trauma and ask about my feelings?

You don’t sleep.

But in the morning, something waits outside your door. A clean crease in the dust. A trace of someone standing there. Another goddamn feather.

You pocket the feather and say nothing.

You’re still traveling, inspecting fleets, and writing reports. Still pretending not to notice when the crew at every new port glances at you like they know something you don’t.

You try not to think about the shadow that’s always one step behind.

And the silence that keeps trying to say something.

The answer is simple, though it escapes you.

Hattori has grounded himself. Voluntarily.

He perched on a cliff three weeks ago and has not moved since. Like a tiny monk in self-imposed exile, he glares at the horizon with all the silent fury of someone forced to witness romantic incompetence from a distance.

Because the last time he tried to help, Lucci let you go.

He tried his best. Truly. Coos, nudges, vaguely threatening flight patterns. All of it wasted.

So now?

If Lucci wants you back, he has to speak. Himself.

No bird. No buffer. No secondhand emotion disguised as avian poetry.

Hattori is watching, but he offers no cover. Not this time.

You, however, do not know this.

What you know is that a tall, quiet man has been spotted in all of your ports. No name. No affiliation. Just a coat, a sharp gaze, and a habit of arriving a few hours before you. Always gone by morning.

You are tired. You are stressed. You have not had sex in over a year, and you did date an assassin without knowing it, which frankly should’ve earned you a vacation or at least a therapist.

So when you catch a glimpse of a dark figure lingering at the edge of the Isla Virgo market, something inside you snaps like a rope under strain.

You march up behind the man, grab his shoulder, and when he turns—

You punch him.

Hard. Square in the face.

He crumples like a sack of flour.

“STOP FOLLOWING ME,” you shout, standing over him, breath ragged.

The man groans. “Lady, I was trying to buy pears.”

There is a pause. Then applause. Someone asks for your autograph. A child points at the fallen man and yells, “Owned!”

Your stomach drops.

This is not your stalker.

Just a very startled civilian with unfortunate timing and a rapidly swelling nose.

You help him up immediately, muttering apologies, trying to stem the rush of secondhand embarrassment flooding your system.

“I thought you were—there’s this guy—and he—look, I’ve had a month.”

“Right,” he says, still dazed. “Please never have another one near me.”

You retreat from the alley with what dignity you have left.

The humiliation doesn’t come from the mistake. That man will live. Probably milk the injury for sympathy drinks. You can live with that.

No, what eats at you is the distinct, bone-deep sense that somewhere, somewhere, Rob Lucci is smirking.

You can feel it. The silent judgment. The breeze even shifts like it’s laughing at you.

Which is absurd. He isn’t there.

Except he is.

Around the corner. In the shadows.

Watching like a man attending the live theater version of a tragic romantic comedy he never asked for but now can’t look away from.

Lucci doesn’t intervene.

But he does follow the unfortunate pear enthusiast later.

He watches him file a report at the nearest Marine outpost. Observes the man relaying the incident with hand gestures, dramatics, and a fair bit of sniffling.

Then something happens.

The file disappears.

Witness statements blur. Bruising fades overnight.

The local official receives a message marked Cipher Pol.

It is short, measured, and lethal in tone.

The woman is under observation. Further action is unnecessary.

Which is to say: Touch her, and you’ll wake up in a room with no doors.

The complaint vanishes. So does the man.

Last seen reassigned to a cargo barge in East Blue with a demotion, a new name, and a crate of very suspicious pears.

Back in your rented apartment, you remain blissfully unaware.

You pace the floor. You mutter.

You wonder if you should dye your hair, fake your death, or simply become a sea witch in a cave far away from emotionally stunted men and anyone who thinks a signature accessory counts as a personality.

You debate sending Iceburg another letter titled “WHY AM I HOT TO CONTRACT KILLERS?” but settle for angrily rearranging your bookshelf instead.

And across the rooftops, watching through the early dusk with a cup of terrible vending machine coffee in hand, Rob Lucci stands perfectly still.

He watches you.

He listens.

And then, very quietly, he smiles.

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