The Fire We Deserve

                       SCENE 1: BLACK SUNDAY

POV: Eli Mercer

Location: Valeburn – East Gate Market

Sunday morning in Valeburn never stayed holy for long.

The streets wore heat like perfume, rising off the concrete in thick waves. The open-air market bustled—grandmothers trading catfish, kids hawking bootlegs, grease dripping from styrofoam trays. But there was tension beneath it all, a hum in the air Eli could taste like static on the back of his tongue.

He moved like he belonged but knew he didn’t anymore. Not fully. Not after prison. Not after Jayce. Eyes followed him through the stalls—some wide, others narrowed. Familiar faces tried not to recognize him.

A child dropped a red plastic toy.

Eli stooped to pick it up.

The mother jerked the boy back fast. "Don't talk to him."

He froze. The toy in his palm. Her fear curled like smoke.

He straightened slowly and handed the toy to the child anyway, ignoring the mother’s cold stare.

“I’m not the monster you heard about,” Eli said softly, “but I can be.”

The mother didn’t reply. She pulled her son away, fast.

He watched them vanish into the crowd, then turned, lit a cigarette with hands that used to hold promise.

That was the thing about this block—it never forgets, and it never forgives.

---

                SCENE 2: LIONS DON’T BOW

POV: Jayce Navarro

Location: Navarro Estate Boardroom

The table stretched longer than it needed to. Oak carved, blood polished. The Navarro Estate’s war room.

Jayce sat at the head, dressed in obsidian black. His shirt unbuttoned at the collar, diamond ring tapping against the tumbler of scotch.

Keon stood at his side, pacing. "Warehouse Four got hit. They left Benny with two in the chest and took a full crate."

Jayce sipped. "Which crate?"

"The 48. The one marked La Bomba."

Jayce's eyes narrowed. That shipment was a silent handshake with the southern corridor—a weapon, not just weight.

“Someone’s not just trying to rob us. They’re trying to start a war.”

Keon leaned closer. “You think it’s Eli?”

Jayce didn’t answer.

Across the table, the room filled with murmurs. Fear disguised as strategy.

“He’s just a ghost, right?” someone muttered.

Jayce slammed the glass down. “That ghost’s the reason y’all still breathing. He built half this throne and bled for the other half.”

Silence.

Jayce stood. Adjusted his cuffs.

“You want to know if I still trust him?”

He walked out without answering.

---

            SCENE 3: THE CONVERSATION THAT WASN’T

POV: Eli Mercer

Location: Basketball Court

The rim had no net. The court had no lines. Just concrete and memories.

Eli leaned against a rusted pole, bouncing a deflated ball slowly, staring into the dusk.

Jayce’s car pulled up.

He walked toward him slow. No guards. No threats.

"Still coming here, huh?"

Eli didn’t look up. "Place remembers me better than people do."

Jayce sat on the bench beside him.

"People remember. They just choose to forget." Jayce’s voice was low, smooth, and tinged with the scent of shared pain.

“I know about the warehouse,” Eli said.

Jayce raised a brow.

Eli pulled a file from his jacket. Tossed it on the bench. "You got a snake inside. Someone feeding the cops. And someone else feeding Rico Vega."

Jayce flipped through the photos—overhead shots, text logs, locations marked in red.

He looked up. "Where’d you get this?"

Eli: "From a ghost."

Before they could speak more, the echo of gunfire cracked—twice.

They ducked behind the bleachers.

Screams broke out nearby. A boy stumbled out from behind the gate, shot in the side, blood spilling across his shirt.

Jayce froze.

Eli ran forward, dropping to the boy’s side.

"Stay with me, stay with me—"

Jayce pulled him back. "It’s too late."

The boy’s last breath rattled in Eli’s hands.

Jayce said nothing.

---

                SCENE 4: THE FIRE WE DESERVE

POV: Dual – Jayce & Eli 

Location: Jayce’s Bedroom

The lights were low. The rain had started. The windows blurred.

Jayce stood at the edge of the bed, shirt unbuttoned, the bandage around his side stained.

Eli poured whiskey into a glass and walked over. Handed it to him.

“You ever think we’re cursed?” Eli asked.

Jayce stared at him. “I think fire follows us because we don’t run. And maybe that’s what scares people.”

Eli stepped closer. “We touch everything and it turns to smoke.”

Jayce’s fingers grazed his jaw. “Then maybe smoke is the only language we know.”

Their kiss wasn’t gentle. It was war dressed in desire.

Clothes fell. Fingers fumbled. Mouths burned.

They made love like confession. Slow and bruising. It wasn’t about forgiveness—it was about release. Need. Fear. Survival.

Afterward, tangled in sheets, Jayce whispered, “If I die, I want your name to be the last thing I taste.”

Eli replied, “Then stop dying in pieces.”

---

              SCENE 5: A PROMISE IN SMOKE

POV: Eli Mercer 

Location: Rooftop | Midnight

He stood alone again. Back where it began.

The boy from the market, the blood on his shirt, the file in Jayce’s hands. It all swirled in Eli’s chest like glass.

Mama Inez’s voice echoed in his mind:

> “The fire you’re running from? You lit it.”

He lit a cigarette and watched the city burn slow beneath him.

Some thrones weren’t inherited. They were survived.

And love? That was the cost of staying alive.