89 88. Punishment...

The doctor had come, and since the DeFalco mansion had what you could call a mini-hospital that they used for unexpected emergencies, like cases where they could not go to a hospital to avoid the authorities, she was treated at home.

Her wounds had been cleaned, her head wrapped with a bandage, the issue with her leg was just a strained vein, so the doctor had applied the proper medication. And after running some scans to make sure she had no internal injuries, he had injected her with sleeping serum so she could stresslessly rest.

"She's fine, thankfully none of her injuries were bone-deep, mostly flesh winds and torn muscles. She needs her rest now, so I've administered her something to calm her. She'll probably wake up late too, let's say some hours close to noon. I'll come and check on her again then." The doctor had explained to them before leaving.

"My love, forgive me. I couldn't protect our little girl." Edoardo cried as he sat next to her bed holding her hand. "I've failed you and Luna… I promised to take good care of her and raise her well, and protect her, but I failed. I failed you… please forgive me, my love… Forgive me Luna. Forgive me." He cries and begs, staying there next to her for hours, crying and begging for forgiveness.

Zeno on the other hand, had something to deal with first, and that something was Frankie… Frankie Carbone. The one who dared to lay his hand on his Luna. Edoardo had told him make sure the man suffered a fate worse than death. And he was going to do just that.

Marco had dropped the beast of a man over at Zeno's mansion, and had taken Lorenzo to his own. They'd deal with them separately.

Locked in a place that looked like the dungeons in historical movies, Frankie cursed and swore in rage, as he was chained to some kind of mechanism, hands chained together, legs chained separately. And except for the steel helmet they had placed on his head, he was stripped naked. Completely naked.

The creaking sound of the steel door being opened silenced all his screams. As he walked in. The blue in his eyes sparking a certain kind of fiery anger.

"You could have done any and every other thing, why did you touch her?" There was a kind of wind that followed his voice, and it sent a mixture of hot and cold Shivers down his naked back.

"Because you f*cking touched what was the most important to me, you burnt my f*cking money to the ground. And ruined my business, so I thought I'd do the same, and take what you loved the most… I know you care about that little witch, you Devil."

A throaty laugh echoed throughout the room, and with two long strides, he stood face to face with him, staring into the burning eyes of the man who he called a devil.

"Devil… that's perfect." Zeno says and walks away from him. "Have you ever heard of the biblical explanation of hell?" he turns on a switch, and flames lit up inside an iron chamber behind Frankie, making the man heave and breath with fear, as he turned his head and saw the fire burning like someone was adding fuel to it. It burned so bright and hot that he could already feel the heat from where he stood.

"Let me tell you if you don't know." He clicks on another switch, and the door to the flaming chamber slides open, making Frankie even more terrified that he peed himself with fear.

"You see, it's an eternal torment… Where you'll burn and die, and burn and die, and burn and die, over and over and over again. For your sins." He chuckles.

"I promised you, I'll deal you times two of the damage you did to her. For every kick, and punch, and slap, for every blood she bled… But you're lucky. She's asleep. So I don't know the exact amount of hits you and your men gave to her, so I decided on something even better."

"You see the mechanism you're chained to, it reels back and forth. So when I pull up this lever," he fumbles with the lever, as if caressing it, and taunting the man. "It reels you backwards, into that nice room behind you, and it keeps you there for a little ninety seconds, and then it brings you out again and keeps you out for three whole minutes. Then it starts to reel backwards again. And so it will continue, back and forth and back and forth, over and over and over until someone pulls this lever down."

"So Frankie, I'm not going to send you to hell too early… I'm going to show you hell on earth first. You're going to burn, over and over and over again, and you're going to scream and I'm going to love it. So when next you're reborn, when you here the name Luna DeFalco, you'll run, you'll run so fast that your legs will bleed."

"B__Boss,you can't do this to me… I didn't__"

"Oh, I almost forgot the highlight of the occasion." He laughs. "I have a bigger surprise for you." He walks over to something that looked like a huge square box, that was covered with a black cloth, and pulls the cloth down, and loud flapping and crowing echoed throughout the room, and Frankie shuddered and shivered even more as the sight of the huge vicious looking vultures was enough to drain the life out of him.

"Beautiful aren't they?" He laughs. " They haven't eaten in a long time… you know, they say vultures feed on carcass, but I don't think these hungry birds would mind a living corpse." The smile on his face was slowly transformed into a seething frown.

"The helmet is to protect your eyes from them. You will watch as you burn, and the instant that thing pulls you out of the fire, you watch as they hungrily feed on you roasting flesh. I want you too see as they pick your skin and veins, pecking into you body till there's only bones left. I want you to watch you suffer."

"No one lays a hand on my Luna and lives to tell the tale, and you are no exception."

With that, he pulls the lever and watched as the man was being reeled into the Flames, screaming and shouting, begging for mercy, but there was no ounce of mercy in Zeno's eyes. Only revenge… life-draining revenge.

He turns his back on Frankie and walks away, and as he reaches the door, he pushes a button on the wall, and the cage the vultures were locked in, falls open, releasing the hungry birds as he walked out of the place. And he heard the reeling sound of the machine bringing Frankie out of the fire, and all that followed was screams and more screams as the vultures descended upon him hungrily.

…

"You were right Lorenzo, I really should not have let you go just like that. I should have not only cut off your hands, but your neck also." Marco says to Lorenzo who was tied limbs apart.

"So I'm not gonna make that mistake again… I'll start with your fingernails, and then your toenails, they are too long. I'm gonna make sure they don't have chances of regenerating." He laughs as he fumbles with some tools.

"Please son…"

"I never had a father like you… and I wasn't done talking." Marco deadpans. And Lorenzo shivered with horror.

"After we're done with your nails, I'll slice off your fingers, one by one. Don't worry, I'll give you medical treatment after each process because I don't want you dying on me in between, since you are so old. You'll die when I tell you to. And after we're done with your fingers and toes, we'll do your teeth next. I'll pull out the whole thing one after the other. After all that… I'll then think of how to kill you."

"Nice, isn't it… Now let's start with the first phase."