The first thought that crossed my mind when I pulled up to the Stardust was that I got the wrong address.

I was expecting a seedy strip club in the Bronx, a place where the drinks are cheap and the lap dances are cheaper. Crooks, degenerates, and scumbags gathering around to drool over girls half their age as they dance around a rusting pole with enough clothing to cover what's important and not much else. That seemed like the type of place that would be run by mobsters and where a no good sack of shit like Jimmy Rossi would frequent. But instead, I found myself standing outside a high end nightclub in Manhattan, bathing in the white light of the sign proclaiming "Stardust Lounge" as I looked through tinted black glass walls.

A line stretched out half a block outside the door, with the diversity of a bowl of M&Ms: hipsters, businessmen, mobsters, college kids all standing in line trying to ignore each other. A man with the height of a basketball player and the build of a linebacker searched everyone before letting them through. With my low expectations of where Rossi would hang out, I hadn't even considered that there would be a bouncer. Instead of joining the ever growing line of clubgoers, I headed straight for the alley between the Stardust and a drug store.

A single guard stood outside a door leading inside, a greaseball in a suit with oiled hair, a pistol on his hip and a cigarette between his lips. He leans against the wall and flips through a superhero gossip magazine emblazoned with the words "BATMAN'S CONFESSIONS: WHO HE'S SLEPT WITH MAY BE SHOCKING!", occasionally humming in slight amusement. I stride up to him and he swivels his head at the sound of my footsteps, raising a brow at me as I draw closer to him. "Hey, no loitering bud. You want inside, stick in li-"

I reel back my fist and give him a hook straight to the nose, hearing a sharp crack as it crumbles under the pressure of my punch. He falls to the ground with a grunt of pain and I give a hiss and look at the fresh cut on my knuckles, droplets of blood leaking out and mingling with his own. I walk over to his head and raise my foot above it.

*CRACK!*

*CRACK!*

*CRA-gggshhh...*

His head caves under the third stomp, deflating like a popped tire. I pant slightly and lean against the wall, scraping the pulp and brain matter off my shoe and onto the asphalt. Bile rises in my stomach as I stare down at the clumps of hair, meat, and bone that used to be a man's head. A man with a family. A single eye lays amidst the mess, intact despite the brutal stomping. It stares up at me, as if asking me, "Why?"

Why?

Because I have a job to do.

I straighten my leather coat and open the door, walking through it and into the club proper. My welcoming committee is bright lights blinding me and blaring electronica deafening me. Sensory overload. As my eyes adjust to the lights, I see a crowd of the club's patrons dancing to the music, a swarm of sweaty bodies meshing together with fingers in hair and lips on skin. I circumvent the dance floor and head for the booths and tables. That seems more like Rossi's style than the quasi-orgy happening on the dance floor.

"... And that's when I says to him, 'hey, Paulie. You got them meatballs?!'" A nasally voice drenched in a comically thick Brooklyn accent pierces through the music and hits my ears, the roaring laughter afterwards like a blip on a sonar radar telling me where to go. I stalk closer to the source, the feeling of icy cold rage rushing through my entire body and just getting worse the closer I get.

Jimmy Rossi is lounging around in the middle of a circular booth with four of his friends, all mob types from the looks of it. A pyramid of shot glasses is in front of him, while from the looks of it his buddies are all still nursing their beers. Either Rossi's a hard drinker or these aren't even friends, just bodyguards who are doing the bare minimum to humor their boss. Doesn't matter. They're dying all the same.

I walk up to the table. "Jimmy Rossi?"

He turns to face me, quirking a brow while sneering. "Whaddya want, you fuckin' no good chink? I'm tellin' a fuckin' story here, huh!"

"I want you to pray to whatever God you believe in because you're about to go and meet him."

Rossi's buddies are staring at me warily, reaching for their pistols. Rossi laughs. "Is that a threat?"

"No." I pull out my twin Berettas and level one at his head. His eyes widen. "It's a promise."

The gunshot pierces through the music and screams break out. Rossi's brains don't have time to hit the wall before I'm leaping away from the booth and landing back first onto a drink cart, riding it away while firing at his friends. Their bodies shake as the bullets tear through them. The drink cart is stopped in its tracks by ramming into a pillar, sending me to the floor with a grunt. I look up and see the crowd that was on the dance floor pouring out of the club.

In the middle of the crowd is a group of men in black suits pushing against the tide while barking orders at each other: "Get that motherfucker!" and "Evacuate the fuckin' crowd!" are the only two orders I hear before the rest is drowned out by the music and screams. I pick myself up and run onto the dance floor, hopping over the DJ's turntable and taking cover behind it. I hear a click as the song ends and a small arm reaches out and replaces the record, a new one beginning.

Gunshots hit the turntable. I run out from behind it and fire at the group of security guards, taking two down before flattening myself behind a pillar. Shit, how many were left? Seven, eight? I can't fucking tell. All I can tell is more bullets hit the pillar that's acting as my cover. Over the music, I hear footsteps coming for me. I duck down, round my cover, and fire off two shots right into the running guard's stomach; he slips and onto the floor, a pool of blood seeping out from beneath him and staining the glass.

A storm of bullets rush towards me and I roll behind another pillar, feeling a sharp sting in my shoulder. I look and see a bullet hole leaking blood. Shit.

I peek my head out from the other side of the pillar and quickly count. Seven guards. One of them sees the top of my head and raises an SMG to fire at me. Quickly, I duck my head back behind the pillar just before a burst of rounds fly right by where my head just was. Grunting, I pull a flash grenade out from my inner jacket pocket, stolen from the SWAT armory. It's the only one I have, but it would have to count.

Inhale.

Pull the pin.

Exhale.

Throw.

The flash grenade clatters across the dance floor and rolls towards the guards. "BANG! COVER YOUR EY-" The flashbang goes off. My ears ring like I just had a Howitzer go off right in front of me, but my vision is crystal clear. I round the corner of the pillar and fire at the guards. One goes down with a bullet to the head, clean kill. Another takes four to the chest before dropping. The third takes a few to the chest and limbs before a shot to the head puts him down. Fourth man goes down with a shot right through the heart.

I don't hear a gunshot but I feel the sting of one hitting me right in the calf. I fall to the ground and look up to see that the last three actually covered their eyes and can see clearly. I roll on my side away from them and come to a stop against a set of stairs leading up to a second floor. I fire at one, putting him down with a kneecap, and scramble my way up the stairs, counting the steps as I go. Twenty steps.

I check my magazines. One is fresh out, the other has two shots left. I check for spare magazines and realize I forgot to bring any along. Shit. I holster my empty Beretta and grip my near empty one with both hands. There's two more guys. I'll have to make these two shots count.

I flatten myself against the wall and hear the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs.

Five steps.

Ten steps.

Fifteen steps.

Twenty.

I jump out at the guard that just climbed up the stairs and tackle him to the ground. He shouts in mingled pain and anger, flailing out wildly to hit me. I pistol whip him once, twice, and he stops fighting. I stick the barrel of the gun into his mouth and fire. One down. One shot left.

That now familiar sting of a bullet hitting me courses through my body again, originating from my thigh. I stumble backwards and roll down the stairs, banging my head against the steps. As I lay on the ground at the bottom of the steps, the last guard stands over me, pistol pointed at my head. "Any last words you fuckin' prick?"

"... Sorry about the knee." I raise my pistol and fire my last round into his knee. He screams and falls to the ground, dropping his pistol. The gun slides across the dance floor away from us. I stand up and loom over him, watching him writhe in pain for a bit. I put a stop to it with a few stomps to his head.

I lean against the wall and slump down, panting from exhaustion.

"... I'm done."