Previously on Renzo : After Hours: The Epilogue reel revealed one final clue: Vienna. The city of light and disguise.
Renzo, Xander, Sebastian, and Elias have followed that trail east—where a private auction promises to sell the original Project Muse negatives.
Whispers say Marcel is behind it.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Vienna was snow at dawn and gold by dusk.
It looked like a city that had learned to hide its truths behind architecture.
They took rooms above an old café near Karlsplatz. The owner spoke in soft German and left candles burning on the stairwell. Every step felt like walking into a photograph from another century.
Elias spread blueprints across the small table, the edges held down by coffee cups.
“The auction takes place beneath the Imperial Museum,” he said quietly. “Private invitations only.
The host calls himself M.”
Xander leaned closer, tracing a finger across the floor-plan. “M for Marcel.”
Sebastian gave a low whistle. “He always did love theatrics.”
Renzo said nothing. He simply stared at the candlelight bleeding through the paper, thinking of debts that never die.
That night, Vienna sounded like violins through open windows.
They sat together by the fire—Sebastian cleaning camera parts, Xander jotting notes in a small leather book, Elias reading dossiers in silence.
Renzo watched them, the flicker of light drawing their faces in strokes of bronze and shadow.
They’d become his frame—each man a different reflection of what he used to be.
Sebastian caught his gaze. “You’re thinking again.”
Renzo smiled. “That’s dangerous, isn’t it?”
“Only when you don’t tell us what about.”
Renzo hesitated. “About trust. And how easily it can turn into possession.”
Elias looked up from his papers. “That’s why Marcel wants the footage—owning beauty is easier than understanding it.”
The line hung there, soft and cutting.
Even Xander paused writing.
Renzo rose and crossed to the window. The street below shimmered with rain. “Then tomorrow we remind him beauty can choose who sees it.”
They entered the museum through the service corridor at midnight.
Elias led, whispering codes into the door locks; his gloved hands moved like a pianist’s.
Inside, music drifted from above—muted strings, polite laughter. They climbed a narrow stairway to a balcony overlooking the auction floor.
Below, men in black suits stood in half-circles around a glass display.
In it, the Muse reels glowed like relics under gold light.
A familiar voice echoed through the speakers.
“Gentlemen, what you are about to acquire is not art. It is immortality.”
Renzo froze. Marcel.
The years hadn’t softened him. His hair was silver now, his smile the same precise cruelty.
“And as with all immortality,” Marcel continued, “it comes at a price.”
Sebastian whispered, “He’s selling us.”
Xander’s jaw tightened. “Then let’s make sure the sale fails.”
Elias pulled a small transmitter from his pocket, eyes bright behind his glasses.
“If I overload the security feed, the room will blackout for twelve seconds.”
Renzo nodded. “That’s enough.”
When the lights died, the room inhaled.
They moved fast—Renzo down the stair, Xander and Sebastian covering him from above. Elias’s voice guided them through the dark: “Two meters left… now.”
Renzo reached the glass case just as emergency lights flickered on. Marcel’s gaze met his across the chaos.
“Renzo Vale,” Marcel said softly, almost tender. “Still chasing ghosts.”
Renzo lifted the reel from the case. “Only the ones you created.”
Security surged forward, but Xander and Sebastian intercepted—quick, precise, the choreography of men who trusted each other’s breath.
Marcel stepped closer, unafraid. “You think destroying it will free you? It will only erase what made you valuable.”
Renzo’s reply was quiet, almost a whisper. “Then consider me worthless.”
He snapped the reel open, exposing the film to the floodlights. The emulsion blistered, curling into smoke. The room gasped.
Marcel smiled faintly. “Beautiful. Even your rebellion is performance.”
Then he turned, vanishing into the confusion like a director exiting his own scene.
They didn’t stop running until they reached the Danube.
The night smelled of metal and rain. The burned reel still smoked in Renzo’s hands.
Elias looked shaken. “You destroyed it.”
Renzo nodded. “Because he would have owned it. And us.”
Xander pressed a hand to Renzo’s shoulder. “Then what’s left?”
Renzo turned toward the water. “Whatever comes next.”
The three of them stood together, close enough that their reflections merged in the black surface of the river. Elias watched from a few paces back—half inside, half apart, the chronicler of something he wasn’t sure he believed in yet.
Behind them, church bells rang midnight.
The air trembled with what wasn’t said.
Next On Renzo: After Hours — The Vale Archive (PUBLISH DATE - Will be April 2, 2026)
The reels may be gone, but Marcel isn’t finished. A digital restoration of Project Muse appears online under an anonymous account tagged Vale-Archive. The trio realizes someone close to them is leaking the footage — and Elias might know why.
Add comment
Comments