#( drabble ) :: so what are you gonna say at my funeral now that you've killed me?

[melis-writes]

hi melis! idk if this is unconventional or if it's something you might have already written but i wanted to maybe request a drabble/oneshot set during the godfather part II about what's going through michael's head while he's having fredo killed? if this isn't something you're interested in or something you've done before that's perfectly fine and I hope you have a good rest of your day!

Ooh, this prompt!! 👀Not unconventional at all, it’s a hell of a prompt idea! 💓 Thank you for requesting it!! It’s by far one of the most heartbreaking scenes in the film, so let me delve into Michael’s mind (in his POV)! 😅

One by one, death comes to take all of us either planned or natural. Everything is the way that it should be; everything falls into place, everything and everyone has their reasons.

Fredo had his reasons, just as I have mine.

“Johnny Ola told me about this place, he brought me here!”

I’ve seen my own fellow countrymen die before my eyes in the most gruesome, harrowing ways possible. I’ve lost dear friends and colleagues over the years, seen others descent to madness from what they’ve been battling in their mind.

“I know it was you, Fredo. You broke my heart.”

I wasn’t home when I heard the news that my eldest brother was killed, nor did I make it back in time for any funeral preparations. It was as we had all expected, if Santino was going to die in this life he would be slain by our enemies, not by the hand that fed him—not by his brother.

“Fredo, you’re still my brother! FREDO! FREDO!”

Father’s disapproval and overlook of the family already tells me now that if he was still with us, he would have forgiven Fredo. Father never forgot, but he always forgave and that was his weakness—a weakness he knew far too well.

It would have never mattered to my father what Fredo did, and this would apply to any one of us—his children.

Mother would have never gotten herself involved with intentions and reasons, but she would never give up her sons no matter the consequence and while I have fondness, love and respect for my parents, I cannot accept their weakness as my own.

“Where’s my brother?”

In truth, the views and opinions of those around me do not matter. When it comes to life and death—just as I had learned during the war—emotions cannot get in the way of what is right. To let this go, to pretend everything is “fine” is obscene, it cannot be allowed. I won’t allow it, I can’t.

“Tell him I know Roth misled him, he didn’t know they were going to try and kill me.”

Fredo was never misled, but he misled us all. He is still the son of Vito Corleone, whether he believed he could live up to our father’s legacy or standards. My father still loved him as a son when he knew Fredo was weak, when Fredo failed to protect him amidst assassins.

“I haven’t got a lot to say, Mike.”

My brother’s own personal weaknesses and insecurities never concerned me. They’re his problem and his alone. I always knew Fredo had an inferiority complex, he never hid it from us. It almost seemed as if he enjoyed putting himself down, like he preferred to stand in the shadows of others.

“I was kept pretty much in the dark.”

Outspoken Fredo, charismatic Fredo, the underboss of the family business, Fredo. He could always talk to me. He could be upfront and honest with me and if not me, then Tom, then Connie. We were still a family.

“I didn’t know all that much.”

Fredo made the decision to go behind my back and consort with my rivals. He was the one who decided not to tell me that Ola and Roth approached him.

“I didn’t know it was gonna be a hit, Mike. I swear to God I didn’t know it was gonna be a hit.”

He never thought about what it meant for me because he was selfish, insistent on proving himself to those who never doubted him to begin with, including me.

“He said there was something in it for me, on my own.”

There is nothing in my mind that can convince me otherwise. I know my own brother wanted me dead, one way or another.

“I’ve always taken care of you, Fredo.”

If he truly believes I was stepping over him, that I was forcing him to live a life sheltered with my “rule”, then isn’t that enough reason on its own to do what he thought he had to do?

“Taken care of me? You’re my kid brother—you take care of me? You ever think about? You ever once think about that?”

Tom wants to believe Fredo knew nothing but the truth speaks for itself. I know enough, I know what I have to know. I made my decision then. I didn’t have to see my brother again or have him come out of hiding in New York.

“That’s the way I wanted it.”

I’ve decided my brother’s own fate and it lies before my own eyes at my home now. The home I told Fredo I never wanted to see him in again—the home he almost had me killed in. It’ll be fitting now for him.

“Fredo, you’re nothing to me. You’re not a brother, you’re not a friend. I don’t wanna know you or what you do. I don’t wanna see you at the hotels, I don’t want you near my house. When you see our mother, I want to know a day in advance so I won’t be there. You understand?”

I’ve never been one to forgive nor forget. I cannot allow an attempt on my life to be swept under this weakness in the name of “family” or “love”.

Fredo is none of that to me anymore. He’s neither my family nor do I have any love for him as a brother, a friend, or otherwise. For those reasons alone, I will not regret his death but welcome it before my eyes, no matter how hard it may be to accept a brother’s betrayal.

As I watch Al Neri silently pull out his pistol and aim it to the back of my brother’s head, I’m unable to quell the sound of bullets flying over my head from the attempt on my life, and only once I see Neri’s finger wrap squeeze the trigger do I finally know I’m even with my brother.

[asmodaiisis-blog]

H O T    C O M B S

               ❛ ... fascinating ❜               this interrogative report was dragging on far longer than he had patience for. and his patience was already wearing thinner and thinner by the day upon every hour.

              the suffocatingly comfortable warmth of downtown’s few remaining hotel rooms was beginning to put him to sleep, despite the cracks in the salmon painted walls, the handful of times his bodyguards had killed roaches the size of his fist, and the general fact that he’d had to suffer the actual presence of bodyguards in the first place.               somewhere in the back of his mind, a hazy voice of inconvenient reason would chime in in a tone of softness and dull clarity that he had no mood to pay much attention to. at least, not when he was already so preoccupied with the shivering collection of bones and meat crouched before him on all fours, a .45 pressed deep into the knot of his tangled ponytail.

              that’s right, he was supposed to be interrogating this youkai. what was he asking him again? he couldn’t recall...

              ❛ --? ... no, my apologies, i wasn’t paying attention, nor did i hear you. mostly because you didn’t make yourself clear... ... and mostly because you’ve come before me, twice... empty-handed.  ❜

              the sigh that left King’s lips should have sounded theatrically exhausted, but it was an expression far more robotic and taught than was reasonably comfortable. glancing briefly to his left, catching the corner glint of reflective shades of one of his taller guards, the man shifted like oil, and brushed a few inaudible words to the hairdresser currently at work on the thicker locks of one of the escorts, seated between the woman’s knees. 

              ❛ i hope you realize that, at some point, i’m going to have a difficult time believing you every time you report back to me with little to no information regarding the progress made by sanzo’s group, as well as how you’ve attempted to impede their progress... ❜

              the guards at the violet haired youkai’s sides shifted then, lifting the man’s arms effortlessly despite his exhausted attempts at struggling, which was laughably weak as he seemed to sort of pool into a pile of spaghetti limbs and repressed sobs and sighs before their present Leader.               despite all of the man’s theatrics, Kougaiji still leant forward over his knees, resting his weight on the knees of his starched black slacks and reaching a hand out, carefully, to slip through the locks of the shivering mass before him.

              at some point, he remembered being able to know... to really grasp and comprehend what this feeling was. the coarse texture of strands beneath his touch, the scent of pomade that filtered through the air as he disturbed the fibers. somewhere in the back of his mind, he had the reflex and the though to grasp hold of this, to study and analyze it ( perhaps to remember it ), but the idea was gone as quickly as it had arrived.

              just as it always was... just as it always did. 

              ❛ ... are you afraid of them? ❜ are you afraid of me?               the answer was always yes.                              of course it was.               King was the head ( temporary head? ) of The Family, who wouldn’t fear man of his stature? especially those that had heard rumors and whispers of how different Prince was now than he was before he adopted the title of King.

              King wasn’t entirely sure what the purpose of such discussions were, as he did not find himself in the company of gossip, nor entertained any of it’s rumors fairly deeply. either way, it was always something that nagged in the back of his mind. just a general curiosity, of an idea that he might have been Someone Else before he was Who He Figured He Was.

              ❛ you don’t need to be afraid of me, as long as you tell me the truth, ❜ he continued in a voice as soft as it had been from the start.                allowing the man to be settled ( or more specifically thrown ) between his legs, he slipped long manicured nails through the kinkier strands of his captive’s hair, gingerly working out the little knots and snags that his motions encountered.               ❛ all i ask of you is the truth... that’s all i’ve wanted from the start, ❜ he breathed slowly, placing a hand upon the violet’s shoulder, as the other traced soothingly idle patterns in his scalp.

              ❛ if you can tell me this, if you can just be honest, then you know i can be reasonable... i know you’ve heard those rumors, and know them to be true--  ❜

              but there was an immeasurable level of silence, an unsettling amount of stillness, even as ‘King’ continued to caress and cajole the confession he wished from the lips of his henchmen.                his stubbornness seemed unfortunate to him. and also foolish, because if there was one thing that King and Prince shared, despite being two sides of the same whole, it was their general fairness in any given situation.

              fairness.... to a fault--

              ❛ ... you’re silence is an unfortunate declaration-- ❜               and he’s not sure if the violet haired creation in his grasp meant for it to be an obvious act of defiance, or just a general reflex of panic, but regardless of either of these truths, King has already reached forth to grasp a fistful of the retreating figures locks, curled his nails around them, and forced them back into the crook between his legs.                looping one leg over the man’s shoulder, he secures him in place a heel digging pointedly into his thigh, into the flesh and into the ground below as he wrenches his skull to one side by the roots of his hair as he accepts the cooled handle of a hot comb into his grasp by one of his guards.

              ❛ i didn’t want to do this... and i want to say you left me no choice, but honestly? i’ve been wondering about the scent of warm hair for quite some time you see--  ❜

              he’s audibly aware of the pungent sensation of screams, more than he is of the scent of burnt hair and scalp. he goes through the motions his mother used on him, taking each strand of hair, carefully at a time, and pressing them flat and thin and straight as he draws the comb up along the length of hair towards his chest.               he’s aware of the motions. and he’s aware that the aroma of cooked flesh and fibers fills the air and mixes in the back of his primitive mind in an unfortunately mouth watering way. because somewhere in the back of his person, behind King, further past prince, and further beyond is some sort of animal and some sort of creature that shivers and quivers at the idea of tasting a drop and a dallop of just an iota of that charbroiled flesh upon his tongue.

              ❛ we can stop any time you’d like... all you must do is to tell me the truth... if you can do so clearly, ‘round your auditory dissonance, that would be preferable, since you’re not being very clear at present.❜

              the garbled sobbing, rigorous thrashing, and the persistence of oily burnt flesh continues to fill the air every time King presses the hot comb further and further and further into the scalp, and nerves and marrow of the man between his knees.               and you know, he’s trying to do his best here? flat-ironing hair is kind of a big to do. it takes patience, practice and the absolute cooperation of your client, and the more this man moves, the worse his service is going to be.

              breathing with a bit more force, King settles to wrap his legs around and over the man’s shoulders, yanking gently on another section of the man’s hair as he grinds and twists the hot comb down into his skull.               roots were always the trickiest to get the straightest, after all, and it required a very precise sort of patience and care to get each little kinky knot to cooperate.

              and he pulls, and pulls and pull and pulls and pulls until silky, smoothly it pops!               and here he is with a fist full of snarled hair in one hand, dripping, dropping, singing and smelling deliciously of ash and fire and blood and tantalizing textures at the end of strangled fibers.               he knows he’s starving and he knows there’s chocked screams mingling with his own idle thoughts about the idea that eggs and bacon sounds perfect right about now, but he tosses the thought and the forgettable remnants of this man’s scalp over his shoulder into some corner of the room.

              ❛ now... as i have said before-- ❜ he continues calmly, heavily, slipping gently fingers through fresher untouched strands of highlighted hair, free hand idly inadvertently warming the comb in his grasp--               ❛ Queen requests an answer... so-- where is sanzo’s party currently, and how are you still alive after encountering them?  ❜