It was a slow day so far. Usually, more than twenty people or so came in for something. Pizza, a drink, both. From nine-am to now, there's only been ten.

Ten. Maybe Mr. Builder would cut wages if it kept being so slow. That would probably mean working overtime, and you already worked a lot harder than most. Being required to do that wasn't going to make it any easier.

Deliveries, manning the cashier, sometimes even cooking the pizza if it was just you working. You did it all. Employee of the Day: Elliot was the constant plaque in the halls leading to the manager's office in the pizza boxing room.

You were the best goddamn employee here. (It felt like you were the only one, sometimes, too.)

Despite that, you still loved your job. Helping people? Feeding them? Being happy to help? It was your life at this point. Even if the occasional rude customer had you wanting to lunge over the register and use your hands for more than pressing buttons or kneading dough or revving delivery bikes.

Even if customers were never a normal bunch.

Like right now.

But the tall, yellow man in three layers and a fedora doesn't seem intent on ordering pizza. You've seen him before. Familiar, incredibly so.

Is he the one ordering those three pizzas every other week? Because his appearance fits the voice you hear on the phone.

And his head is slightly tilted down, further obscuring his face. You can only see his mouth. He isn't smiling. Not remotely.

Because to him, to Mafioso, you have debt. A pizza place worker probably making minimum wage, being worked overtime daily, with debt. Joining the pool of people with more confidence than safely spendable money.

You have, approximately, three thousand in debt, to a table of Blackjack. Gambling. A degenerate act of entertainment and manipulative advertisement that promises big rewards.

That's what the high-debt list says anyway in his office.

And Mafioso's come to collect the debt directly. At your work. There's nobody else here, anyway, besides a rat or two you have yet to capture.