In the Dark
Chapter 1
Rock and Revy stood on the deck of the Black Lagoon as the fiery remnants of the Lagoon Company's office fell to the earth. "Those fucking bastards," Revy screamed out as she started running toward the burning wreckage, Cutlasses drawn. But Rock quickly jumped forward and pulled her to the ground, pinning her to the deck with all his might. "Rock, you bastard, let me go."
"No, Revy," Rock said as he struggled against the gunslinger's strength, "it's too late." As idealistic as he was, even he couldn't deny what had just happened, "Benny and Dutch are gone. We have to get out of here."
"Don't give me that shit, Rock," Revy managed to get an arm free and elbowed Rock in the ribs, but he held firm, "I'm going to kill those fuckers."
"Revy, you can't. There's too many of them, and I'm not going to let you die as well. Nothing you do will bring them back." He felt Revy relax under his hold, "Dutch told us to get out of there knowing he wasn't going to make it," Rock released Revy and stood up, "We don't have any other options." Saying this, Rock felt his heart drop. For all his life he had been searching for meaning…some reason to actually wake up and go about his day. And the Lagoon Company was his wake up call. But now, seeing it up in flames, he knew that there was nothing anyone could do.
"What's going on, Rock," Revy said as she sat up. She holstered her Cutlasses and continued, "What the fuck are Balalaika and Chang doing? How could they let this happen?"
Rock just stood there for a moment, looking past what remained of their company to the city beyond. Gunshots were ringing out throughout the entire city. In the dark night, he could clearly see the numerous buildings caught ablaze, and the explosions going off left and right. He closed his eyes, trying to piece together what had happened.
-It had come out of nowhere. One moment Rock was handling some finances from their recent jobs while Revy slept on the couch beside him, snoring, with a magazine resting on her chest, when suddenly they heard a chain of explosions. Revy woke up from the sound, but they both decided that they best not get involved in what didn't concern them…. until Dutch barged through the door, blood flowing from two gunshot wounds—one in the arm, another in the gut—and screamed, "Get the boat started, now." He tossed the keys to Rock and grabbed his shotgun from a mount on the wall.
"Dutch, where's Benny?" The ex-salary man asked, noticing that the crew's techie had not come back with Dutch.
"They got him outside the Yellow Flag," Dutch said through clenched teeth as he started loading shells into his gun, "now RUN."
Without further delay, Rock and Revy scaled the fire escape to docks and ran toward the boat. But as they reached the ramp leading to the deck of the old PT boat, they heard a deafening boom behind them and turned around to see, to their horror, pieces of the building raining down in a fiery inferno…..-
Rock opened his eyes and snapped back to reality. "Let's go," he said, and the two made their way toward the cabin, "Once we get some distance between us and whoever is doing this, we'll try to contact someone.
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Once the two had put a couple of miles between them and the war that was Roanapur, they set anchor and went about trying to figure out what was going on. "Miss Balalaika….Come in, Miss Balalaika. This is Rock from the Lagoon Company. Do you read?" Nothing, just the empty hum from the receiver, "It's no good, Revy. Chang, Balalaika, no one we're on good terms with is getting our signal."
"This is bad, Rock. If someone's got the balls to take on both Balalaika and Chang, not to mention all the criminals they'd have to go through in the streets alone, and still get these kind of results…Something's not right."
"What do you mean?" Rock took out the earpiece and placed it on the radio.
"I smell a rat. No one would be able to pull this off without having someone on the inside fetching information."
"I see," Rock leaned back in his chair as Revy sat down in the free seat next to him, "but the question is who was he infiltrating. Balalaika's men are loyal to a fault and she personally knows everyone in her organization that could get close enough to get any relevant information."
"Yeah, and Chang's no slouch either. But something about this just screams 'rat.' Hell, even the Rip-Off church isn't picking up."
"Regardless," Rock said, "that's not important right now. We need to figure out what we are going to do from now on."
Revy was shocked by what he had just said. Normally Rock was the one who would be the most concerned about getting to the bottom of something like this. It wasn't like him to just turn his back on a mystery. She just couldn't believe such a suggestion came from his mouth. "Rock," she said, casting him a wary look, "what are you suggesting."
"Roanapur's lost, Revy. Dutch and Benny our gone. And considering that this attack didn't just target the large syndicates, I'd say that someone is aiming to wipe all traces of the city off the map, which means that we aren't safe."
Revy shot up and started screaming, "So what, just run?"
"What else are we supposed to do?" he screamed back, looking up at her from the chair, "We don't know who we are fighting, we don't know what they want, and we certainly don't know what they are planning next. But face it the Lagoon Company is finished, and we have to run."
Revy was furious. She pulled her arm back, ready to strike Rock, but, biting her lip, let her arm fall to her side. "So what now?" she asked, shaking, "where do we go? Japan? Fuck that. You and me will be on the run there just as much as here after all that shit we pulled." She turned and looked out a window at the distant City where the flickering lights of flaming buildings and the occasional flash of an explosion were the only sight of the city remaining. "And what place exists to house the living dead?" Her eyes narrowed in a depressed droop that Rock hadn't seen since their job in Japan. "Roanapur was the only place on earth for people like us."
"Then we change." Revy looked up at him, confused, but he kept going, "Everything we've done up to now was to survive, right? So if we have to change to survive, then so be it."
"You think it's going to be that easy?" Revy said as she took her seat. "Rock, after all this time, you still don't get it, do you? You've changed. That man you see when you look in a mirror is not the same naïve, whimpering, dumbass I took hostage. We both smell of blood. And no matter where we go, on the surface we may look like any normal man and woman. But the people who see us will sense something. They may not know what it is, but at the depths of their hearts they'll know something is off with us." She pulled out a Cutlass and aimed it at the warring city, "Because the truth is, no matter how long I put away my Cutlasses, they'll always be calling to me." She lowered the gun and looked at the man, "But the question is, what will be calling you?"
Rock stared at her with a blank face, taking in each word she said and systematically trying to find fault in her logic. But he couldn't deny it. Even now, being just a few miles from Roanapur made him feel as if he were lost in the world. He closed his eyes and leaned forward, "Even so, we have to go somewhere if we want to survive."
The two sat, silently staring at each other for a few minutes before Revy sighed and stood up, "Fine then. Let's go."
Rock stood up and followed her to the living quarters below deck. The two quickly pulled the mattress off the bottom bunk and tossed it to the floor.
"Damn," Revy said as she pulled a knife out of the drawer from the small table across the room, "Never thought I'd live to see this getting used." She brought the knife down on the mattress and cut it open, revealing a small stash of money hidden within. "Dutch sure thought ahead, didn't he?" She said as Rock started pulling out the stacks of bills.
"We'll have to sell the boat, too." Rock said. Both of them felt their chests tighten at the thought. "Wherever we go, owning this boat will only cause trouble."
"Yeah," Revy said in an empty tone, and the two finished packing away the bills into a small duffel bag.
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"Passports, papers, and a flight…the works," Rock put the sheet of paper with all their requests on the table and pushed it to the man across him.
"Hmm…" said the old man as he picked up the paper, "that's quite a large order. It won't be cheap. And with your company up in flames, do you even have the means to pay me?"
"Arjun Bai," Rock said as he reached into his pocket, "you see that boat we came in?" he pulled out the key and held it out for the man, "if you get us everything on that list, it's yours."
"Dutch's Lagoon….hah, he must be fighting through every demon in hell right now trying to stop you from doing this."
"Maybe, but that's my problem. So, will you take it?"
Bai looked at the keys, then at Revy, standing a few feet behind Rock with a cigarette in her mouth. "You've got yourself a deal."
Two Years Later
Two men sat across each other in the principal's office of Bellman High School. "Well, I must admit, this is quite the resume," said Principal John Harkman as he closed the folder and placed it on his desk, "but one thing. Your track record is clean, and I've found nothing negative about you in your background check. But it concerns me. Why is it that you haven't been employed for the past two years?"
"Oh," said the man sitting across from the principal, "it's nothing really. Working for that company made me feel like I was missing something in life. So I quit in the hopes that I'd be able to move forward. Then I realized that I just had to get away from my home and get a fresh start."
"Very well," said the principal, and he smiled, "well then, I'd like to welcome you to Bellman High School, Mr. Okajima" he extended his hand, which the man shook.
"Thank you, sir."
"So tell me. Have you found what you were looking for?"
Rock paused for a moment before smiling, "We'll see."
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