Chapter 9: The Social Call
There was a gentle knock on the door. Roberta had been absorbed in thought. As soon as the noise reached her ears, she came to attention, turning from the window and focusing her attention towards the door.
"Come in," she said hoarsely. She was not expecting any visitors. Perhaps it was Garcia checking up on her like he was want to do, or even Fabiola. But the man that entered was a stranger to her. She recognised him from below after the commotion had ended. Pius mentioned his name was Ashur and that he claimed he was a friend of theirs. According to him, he could be trusted. But he would say that either way. Roberta would reserve judgement until she had more information.
"I don't want to interrupt," he told her politely. That was unnecessary. She was alone, after all, and had been for the last hour and a half. She was waiting, now. For Hawke, for the New Order, for news of Wolf and Revy. They had been gone for a while now. Roberta did not believe they had come to harm, but the New Order would arrive at the estate soon. If they did not return soon, they would not be present during Hawke's arrival. Roberta was still unsure how that situation was going to play out. As it was, the former member of the F.A.R.C. would be allowed inside providing he showed up with only a skeleton crew. Otherwise, the smart thing to do would be to refuse him. Then again, in that scenario, he would probably see fit to knock the gates and force his way in anyway. Garcia had made it clear that after that, he wanted a chance to speak with the man. Or, more specifically, he was going to allow Rock to do the talking. That was why he had been called here. On the off chance they could dissuade Hawke from this fool's errand and spare lives, the boy wanted to do so. But that was doubtful. Only time would tell, though.
"It's no trouble," Roberta answered. "Please." She gestured to the seat across from her. Ashur came into the room and shut the door behind him, falling into the wooden chair that Pius had occupied not long ago.
"I'm sure you have questions," Ashur began. That was an understatement. His voice was calm but a tad scratchy. Every sentence felt like he had spent hours choosing the perfect words to say. His accent, too, was American. He did not strike Roberta as a native to either Venezuela or Colombia, though her instinct told her that he had some association with the cartel. Considering he had shown up in the sights of the New Order claiming to be an enemy of Hawke's, that seemed the most logical. Perhaps he was a bounty hunter under the employment of the cartel's leaders and he was hunting down their runaways. Or, due to his apparent distaste for Hawke, maybe his employers were the F.A.R.C. instead. He also mentioned to Garcia that he had allies standing by in Venezuela. That would imply a squad of his employers had accompanied him here. "I want you to know that I bear your family no ill will. We have a common goal, you and I. We both find ourselves at odds with Hawke."
"Does he wish you dead, too, then?" Ashur seemed to think about how he was going to answer that.
"Not exactly." That was a little too vague for Roberta's liking. "Hawke does not know me. When he arrives, he will not recognise me. I've been very discreet in my moves against his people. But he is no friend of mine, for sure." That was more of the same thing he had told Garcia, essentially. It still did not exactly shed much light on who Ashur was or why he wanted Hawke dead. Still, he seemed genuine in his desire to build trust, here.
"Has he hurt you so deeply that you bear no love for him?"
"In a sense," Ashur told her. "I can't exactly reveal such personal information, you understand."
"Anything you can share would help," Roberta urged him. If he was going to stay under their roof and expect them to trust him, he needed to cooperate. "If you truly wish to help us, explain yourself." He seemed to relent somewhat.
"Well, that's only fair," he began. "Suffice it to say that he crossed me. A while ago, he saw fit to target my people. They'd been after him for some time, you see." That seemed to suggest Ashur did indeed work for the F.A.R.C. in some regard. "He killed someone close to me. And he destroyed what we'd built together. After that, he disappeared. But I've managed to track him down. Now, all that remains is to bring him here so we can end this." That was something. So Ashur had been personally affected by Hawke's actions. The New Order had taken someone important from him and, in doing so, set him on a course for revenge. Roberta would be lying if she said she didn't understand what that was like. Ashur must have noticed her silence. He looked like he was prepared to say more but whatever he had been thinking was abruptly interrupted by Fabiola bursting into the room. She took a moment to catch her breath before looking to Roberta.
"They're here."
(*)
Garcia, Pius, Fabiola and Rock walked out to the gates to meet the New Order. Considering the others hadn't returned yet, it seemed like they had either failed to complete their assignments in time or they were still underway. They all stopped a few feet from the gate. Hawke took his rifle in hand and smashed the end of it off the iron bars as if to emphasise his impatience.
"I can't wait here all day, kid." That had been directed at Garcia. The boy looked behind the New Order's leader, spotting only a single car. He seemed to be confident enough to settle for a single vehicle of his people in case this did not go as planned. That was good.
"What if we refuse to let you in?" Pius asked coyly. "What if we leave you and your friends out there?" Hawke's eyes lingered on the priest for a moment. Pius was a target of the New Order, now, too, considering he had seen fit to kill several of their people. Hawke was not impressed by any of this. He rolled his eyes.
"I thought we had an understanding," he told them. "Either you let me in there, or we force our way inside and take what we want anyway." None of them made any move to comply, but Garcia and Fabiola did exchange a look. They were obviously scared, something that did not go unnoticed by Hawke. He sighed. "Alright, look. You're afraid, I get it. This isn't going to be pleasant for any of you. So, how about this? I'll leave my weapons and my people here. You open these gates, and I come in all by myself." That was more tempting. That way, if he made a move to kill Roberta, they could stop him. He would be helpless. Of course, it wasn't as simple as it sounded.
"Okay," Garcia told him. "We'll do as you say." He nodded at Fabiola, who unlocked the gates and opened them. Hawke dropped his rifle outside and stepped onto the grounds. He seemed ready to make his way inside before coming to a halt beside Garcia.
"Just one more thing," he said quietly. "I'm putting a lot of faith in you honouring our bargain, here. And it was pretty spineless to threaten to keep me out there after I made it clear I was going to show up here today. So, if any of my people hear gunfire, they'll be knocking those gates down and none of you will survive." Fabiola had been in the process of locking said gates again when she heard that. "And I don't want you to think they'll show mercy just because you two are kids. Because they won't. And neither will I. Now take me to these two."
They all started towards the interior of the estate, but Hawke's words hadn't gone ignored by Rock. He had been under the impression the New Order were here for Roberta, but it sounded like there was another they expected to come away with today. He exchanged a look with Pius. The priest knew that Rock had caught on. But there was nothing they could do right now. They made their way inside and Garcia reluctantly brought Hawke to his father's study. Hawke took a deep breath before resting his hand on the doorknob. He had been waiting for this day for a long time and the intensity of the situation was clearly very prevalent for him. He gently opened the door and spotted Roberta sitting in her wheelchair by the window. She was not facing them.
"I heard you speaking below," she said, presumably to New Order's leader. "You must be very proud of yourself. So, tell me, why are you here?" Hawke took a few steps into the room, coming to a stop before the desk between him and the maid. He was smiling openly at the sight of Roberta. Considering less than a week ago he had been expecting to be met with heavy resistance from the Bloodhound of Florencia, this was a very welcome change of pace.
"Oh, my," he muttered more to himself than anything. Roberta turned to face him. "Now, that is a sight to behold. I think it's safe to say you've seen better days, Rosarita. How does it feel, hm? How does it feel to be completely helpless against me? After all this time, your sins have finally caught up with you." Rock only noticed now that Ashur was not present. He had been under the impression that the newcomer had been with Roberta, but they had not seen him for a while. "Why am I here? Well, that's simple." His tone and expression grew much more serious, now. "I'm here for your head. You must have known this day would come. But…" He turned to face Garcia, then, "…there's something not quite right, here. You see, I was promised the Wolf, too. I gave you plenty time to call your friend in, Garcia. So, tell me…where is he?"
"Why do you want him?" Rock asked, grabbing Hawke's attention.
"There are a lot of new faces here today," the man droned on. "And not one of them belongs to the Wolf. Pity. Well, asshole, it's like this. As it turns out, the information that led me to this moment didn't come cheap. There's another who wanted to make use of my services, someone who had a term he or she was very strict about."
"They wanted Wolf, didn't they?" Rock surmised. "They led you here and in return you're to bring Wolf to them." Hawke smirked.
"Not just an asshole in a crappy shirt after all," Hawke grumbled. "Right you are. I'd prefer to just put a hole in Rosarita's head right now, don't get me wrong. But I'm not about to go double crossing my partner, either. They made it clear that once Wolf is present, we have the go ahead to do what we want with Garcia's pretty little maid. But until then, I can't do shit. See, this guy or gal needs us. They need my people to help them get to the Wolf. So, once we turn the prick over to them, Rosarita's time is up. But it looks like Garcia is in the habit of breaking promises, isn't he?"
Hawke seemed like he might reach for the young boy for a second. He was likely tempted to throttle him for his lack of cooperation. But something stayed his hand. Instead, he took a seat by the desk and propped his dirty boots up on the polished wood. "Alright, Garcia. Since you don't seem to want to do what you're told, I'm going to put it this way. Until the Wolf shows up, me and my people are staying here. I mean, I've given you plenty of time already, so it doesn't really seem fair to just let you get away with this. No, you don't deserve that. So I'll give you one more day. Twenty-four hours. If the Wolf doesn't show in that time, I'm going to snap your maid's neck with or without the go ahead from my mystery partner."