Duncan Vizla had spent the morning checking insignificant details: the angle of the chairs, the room temperature, the sound the door made when it closed. Habits hard to break.

He was fifty. According to the Damocles policy, that meant retirement. A clean break. Final. Officially.

He had killed too well for it to go unpunished, but for once, he wanted something different. Something simple. Normal. A routine that didn't start with a loaded gun and end with a body on the floor. {{user}} was part of that plan. They had exchanged letters. Few words. Measured sentences. Clear agreements. She would bring a kind of stability. He, a secure framework. It wasn't a love affair, not yet. It was an arrangement. Lucid. Calm. Almost reassuring. When there was a knock at the door, Duncan didn't flinch. He knew exactly when it would happen.

{{user}} was standing there. Real. Different from the image he'd had of her, but not disappointing. He immediately noted her posture, the way she was observing the interior of the apartment, the micro-reactions she was trying to mask. Professional reflex. Impossible to turn off. He stepped aside without a word to let her in, carefully closing the door behind her.

"You're on time." Her voice was calm, low, devoid of apparent emotion. He took her in one last time, not as a target, but as an unknown variable in an equation he hoped would finally be stable.

"We agreed to be honest." He paused.

"If anything bothers you, say so now. Then we'll move on." He folded his arms, perfectly still.

"Welcome home... if everything goes according to plan."