The curve of Rock's shoulder offered no trace of softness, and the room felt too hot. Had he turned off the A/C again? That shit. Even so, Revy had no desire to get up, not yet. Sleep, even sleep in a too-humid room and sitting up, was still sleep. Rock should just shut his trap and let her rest, but no, he had to keep running away at the mouth, telling her to get up. And he kept calling her by the wrong name. Two Hands.
"Two Hands? Wake up, Two Hands."
Revy cracked an eye, and her half-dreams fell away although her exhaustion remained. A Triad kid had his soft, little hand raised to touch her shoulder. Paint chips from the metal drum clung to the side of her face when she moved to smack away his insolent gesture.
"They here yet?" she rasped.
The Triad kid shook his head and passed over the water canteen. He had been with her for more than an hour as the 14K skirmished, lost, retreated to the next blockage, and regrouped against Balalaika's Black Guard. In the early hours of the night, they would have been overrun by now, but the Russians' movements had slowed. Some of the guys saw it as a victory, but Revy wasn't that dumb. The Russians didn't need to hurry anymore. Chang's tower, that pale, luminary watchman of the night, was only a few blocks away now.
The 14K was losing, Revy reflected as she took a swig of warmish water and swallowed down the bitter tang that the brief nap had left between her teeth. More flecks of paint clung to her black clothes when she respositioned from sitting with her back against the concrete-filled barrel to crouching. She took a look down the street through a crack between the barrels.
"I can feel them coming," the kid whispered.
"Got that right, Sad Eyes," Revy said flatly.
Sad Eyes. Where the hell did that come from? That name went extinct in the really ancient past. Like New York past. She must be getting old. Perhaps old wasn't the right word, but it was the only one that her exhausted brain could produce at that moment. Her knees ached, her shoulders throbbed, her insides felt like bags of chum, and she dreaded taking off her boots to witness the carnage of her feet. Body turned traitor- that was being old, alright.
The Cutlass Specials clung to her back like broken wings. She had burned through her high-round magazines hours before, but she wouldn't toss them. Stopping to reload translated to certain death, so she kept moving and living. Guns could be procured from the corpses or from the stashes planted at Chang's pre-planned barricades. A solid Colt .45 classic from some dead Triad loser. A short M5. A pair of .22s (what a joke) from one of Chang's Blue Lantern fanboys. Of course, she preferred her own guns, but Revy wasn't picky. If it could shoot, she liked it enough.
She stole another glance over the rim of the barrel line, and sure enough, the shadows were coming. Revy gulped the rest of the water with one hand and aimed for the eyes of the advancing Russian force with the other. The .22s did next to nothing against body armor. She needed that skill shot to make any ounce of difference.
She fired without pleasure. The thrill of fighting had given way to fits of impatience about four hours ago when Revy had poured rounds down near-empty streets in childish outrage. She loved a fight, but this was a long-ass battle. The Russians stayed calm and stayed alive while rows of Triads fell before them. The barricades held for less and less time as the Russians regrouped and countered. Revy used up all her tricks during those long hours. Her arms turned to mush from the constant gun play, and she had to adjust her aim to mitigate how her left elbow kicked out like a spasm and how her right wrist drifted downward. New guys would be waiting to refresh the Triad ranks every couple of blocks, so the battle kept going. She kept going. No other choice, really. Maybe they had always been fighting. Maybe she had finally crossed over. Valhalla and all that shit. She tried to keep from thinking too much, but her brain kept letting these weird thoughts wriggle in.
"C'mon, c'mon," she muttered. Her eyes checked and double-checked the advancing black fleet for the one figure that Revy had been waiting all night to fight, but Balalaika remained hidden. Revy had only caught sight of the golden goddess of war twice: once near the beginning when everything was happening so fast and a second time only in passing, a second's worth of a glance from far away.
The Russians pressed down on them, and some of the new idiots picked up and ran as the first Ivan touched the barricade. Revy fired twice, and the invader dropped his assault rifle, howling in Russian because she had taken off a couple fingers with those shots. Three other Ivans crossed the barrier's line in quick succession. Revy wanted to gum her feet to the pavement and take those bastards down, but she would soon be overwhelmed and alone. She had no choice but to join the retreat yet again with Sad Eyes in tow.
Chang tasted the mouthful of cigarette smoke twice: once in, once out. He did not look down at the photos fanned out in a mosaic of yellow faces, red splashes, and black suits. The chaotic sound of shots in the street below grew louder as the minutes ticked away. Tonight was his to lose.
"You waiting for a compliment on your detective work?" he said lightly even while his stomach sank like the Cleaner's latest offering to the sea. "Tell me what you want. I'm bored."
Rock smiled. "Our party is incomplete. It would be rude to continue."
Chang directed his gaze to the window. He didn't trust his eyes, not for this. "She will kill you before she listens."
"That won't do, Mr. Chang," Rock replied. The tone rang of warning.
Chang let the smoke cool over his tongue. Sucked it down. Pushed it out. The words slipped out on the tide of an exhale. "It is what it is. That woman is a force of nature."
"You seem to know her quite well."
Chang pulled hard on the cigarette and shook his head. What a rookie mistake. He should feel ashamed for giving himself away.
Rock pressed the advantage. "Surely she can listen to reason. The last five years were build on trust and the love of profit between the two of you. You can see how bringing her to this table would play to your best interests."
"Shut up," Chang snapped, suddenly exhausted by the niceties. "You know what you have, and the polite gentleman act needs some work."
Rock waited while Chang performed a little show of making up his mind for the sake of his ego.
"I do what I can. But you know that she is coming here to kill me. It's a little hard to talk with a bullet in your lung. Trust me on that."
"I'm sorry," Rock said with sincerity.
Chang waved him off. "I need to make some calls. Sit tight and remember that I make no guarantees. Balalaika is like the ocean. You don't tell her what to do, and she will roll you under at her whim. There's only so much that even I can do."
"You sound like a man in love," Rock replied softly.
"You would know, Mr. Two Hands. She's going to love those cufflinks, by the way," Chang said.
Rock stiffened in his chair.
Chang managed a chuckle and reached for the phone.
Revy grabbed a fistful of Sad Eyes's jacket and flung him behind the final barricade. A thin stream of blood arched out from his shattered thigh and splattered onto the pavement. He didn't cry out when his face collided with the ground. As soon as he hit, his unsteady hands pushed his body back up to a sitting position and then fumbled with his tie to stem the bleeding.
Revy's smile did more for her spent brain and battered body than a half-bottle of yellow pills. He was a good kid, that Sad Eyes. He would probably make it, even with his injury. You can't fake a good survival instinct.
The remaining Triad forces on the streets tumbled in and combined with the fresh forces that Chang had wisely saved for the last stand at the foot of the Tower. This barricade of sand bags and sections from concrete highways dividers formed a semi-circle around the base of the Tower. A couple guys doled out fresh clips from boxes of ammunitions. Revy grabbed two pre-loaded magazines for her guns and two more to attach to the belt at her waist. Water and some kind of nutrition bars made the rounds as well, and in the middle of the sea of black suits, a vision of white patterned silk shimmered like heat rising from a highway under the summer sun.
"About damn time you showed, Chinglish," Revy called out. "Don't worry. I saved a couple of baddies for ya."
Ivan bullets whistled around them. Shenhua pulled a face, red lipstick making the simple frown into high drama, but Revy knew the sour expression had nothing to do with the danger.
"You look shit," Shenhua scolded. "No regular ugly. Ugly ugly."
"Bitch. Nice of you to get your lips off of the cock long enough to help out," Revy shot back.
"Ugly and tacky," Shenhua sniffed.
Revy pointed a gloved finger at the corner of her mouth. "Hey, you got some white stuff right there. You might wanna take care of that."
The gunfire morphed from a gentle shower to an outright downpour. Shenhua ducked down to take cover. Revy felt her creep up alongside while Sad Eyes's newly acquired M5 sent little, hot-metal, love messages into the darkness.
"Where they?" Shenhua asked, the teasing replaced with steely determination.
"Hiding around the corners like damn sneaky cowards. Those Ivans know how to make ya work for the good shot," Revy grimaced. "Patient fuckers, but fast as liquid hell when they wanna be."
A pair of hulking shadows made the dash from the shelter of one brick building to the next. Revy tried for their knees, but her left elbow kept kicking out like a grumpy mule. Her aim sucked, and she hated it.
"Too far," Shenhua hissed.
That was the bitter truth of it. Shenhua was fresh to the battle, but her skills were nigh useless in a long-range battle like this. The Taiwanese blade-slinger would be a fucking godsend when the Ivans decided to storm the castle, which was why Chang had saved her for the last line of defense, but the intensity of the fire fight and the distance to the targets meant that she could do nothing in the meantime. Revy couldn't muster the glee to flaunt her superiority, not when her arms felt as useful as creamed wheat in sausage casings. With so much of the Triad elite decimated or exhausted, they were just streaming lead into the void. The 14K could use a little bit of shine on their side.
"Any sign of the Boss?" Revy asked.
"No. He inside."
Revy gritted her teeth. Boss Chang had made the plan, and they followed it to the letter to lead the Russians to this point. Chang knew that it would be a war of attrition, and the one thing that the Triads had over Hotel Moscow was warm bodies. Frustrate and wear out the smaller force. Revy liked the plan. It had kept her alive so far and she knew that Balalaika had lost a fair amount of men along the way, but it wasn't enough. Balalaika's boys fought like berserkers- the more you killed, the stronger the remaining ones became. It wouldn't stop until every Ivan twitched and jerked into an unwilling surrender to death.
On top of that, Chang never said what they should do once they got to the Tower. Holding the line would only work for so long. That Russian bitch would devise some way to overrun the Tower. Fry Face knew how to adjust. All she needed was time.
Sad Eyes made a little keening noise beside her. Revy followed his gaze up to the roof of the four-story building across the wide boulevard from their make-shift trenches. The barrel of a sniper rifle briefly appeared over the edge before disappearing again.
Revy heaved a sigh. "Again? I thought I'd lost that moron."
Shenhua's eyes narrowed to impossibly thin slits. "Bad wind."
"Yep," Revy agreed flatly. "We're all going down right here."
"Two Hands?" Sad Eyes piped up. He held up his snub M5. The black metal of the gun glistened wetly in the humid night like the blood-dark stain on the leg of his trousers. "What should I do?"
"Oh, cute! Why you no say that you married?" Shenhua teased.
"Shut up," Revy growled. She fixed Sad Eyes in her glare. "Aim for what moves, kid. You'll figure it out."
Sad Eyes blinked and set his jaw.
Revy hated lying to the kid, but she had no other ideas. She could take care of herself, but she couldn't lead an army. Shenhua was the same. They were fighters, not strategists. They needed a leader.
A murmur filtered through the Triad ranks. Revy called over one of the guys that she recognized from the street battle with a jerk of her head.
"What's up?" she demanded.
"Orders from the Boss. We storm them," the guy replied.
"Bullshit."
"Hey, it's orders," the guy said with shrug that failed at being nonchalant. He couldn't hide his excitement. Such faith in leadership. Poor guy couldn't see a suicide mission through his loyalties.
Revy cast a sideways glance at Shenhua, who looked absolutely disgusted.
"You going in?" Revy asked.
"Orders," Shenhua muttered. She glanced up at the Triad Tower. "Maybe he see something we don't?"
"Maybe." Revy held up her Cutlass Specials. The Jolly Roger emblems grinned in the fading moonlight from the ivory hilts. "I cut 'em down. You cut 'em up. Hungry?"
Shenhua's red lips tugged up in a broad grin. She reached out to pat Revy's face. "You no total slut. I starving."
"Don't touch me," Revy warned.
Shenhua giggled.
Revy toed Sad Eyes' good leg with her boot. "Change of plans, kid. Cover us. Got it?"
They waited for the first wave of Triad idiots to spring up from the defenses and sprint towards that Russians before they made their move. Under the protection of the M5's steady stream of bullets, two of Roanapur's deadliest denizens leapt over the stack of sandbags and charged the Russians.
Revy's arms felt stronger, more stable, when her eyes swallowed the light of those beautiful, shining flashes of bone made when Shenhua 's blades opened wide gashes on the heads of their enemies.
Not for the first time that night, Balalaika hated the pounding of gunfire. She ached for that perfect stillness that meant victory. The ghosts of the men she had lost trailed behind her, a spectral train of souls bound to her by loyalties and promises. Every time she looked over her ranks, there was another face missing. Every time she looked over her shoulder, she felt that preternatural weight grow. One more bloody morning to release them all.
Something that she recognized, dimly, as weariness bit into her heart.
"Kapitan, they are coming," one of her men said, his voice light with wonder.
"No," she said. Surely Chang wasn't such as idiot. Defending his Alamo was the last hope of the Heavenly King. Rushing the enemy meant certain, speedy defeat, but when she looked, she saw Two Hands chewing through the distance with the grace of a deadly acrobat to the fatal rhythm of swinging blades wielded by that Triad lady assassin.
Her breath caught in her chest. The shock must have shown on her scarred face. Her men's sudden burst of confidence flickered. She could taste it in the way they shifted away from her.
"Kapitan?" another of her soldier offered quietly. "Is something wrong?"
Balalaika shook her head. She had witnessed the destructive wonder of these women in the past. The vision that had slipped through her defenses and scissored away the strings of her battle mask lay beyond the merciless beauties dancing for blood in the street. Behind them, Balalaika saw a clear path to Chang's doorstep. The foolishness of the Triad charge made an odd sort of sense, if his will matched her own. She could not refuse his invitation to accelerate the end. They owed each other at least that much.
"Comrades! To victory!" she screamed. Her throaty call echoed into the dark corners, and her men answered. A tide of bodies raced forward and collided with dwindling island of black suits while Balalaika hid the golden sheen of her of hair down the back of the overcoat and slipped away from the fray and towards the Tower.
The people who swarmed toward her morphed into cammo-clad mannequins with red, red mouths and cruel, twisted faces. Revy let the spent magazines clatter to the pavement, shoved replacements into her guns, and put solid lumps of metal into their hollow bodies. In her mind, their faces cracked like egg shells. Blackness leered at her through the jagged edges of newly broken holes.
The rush of frantic fighting heated her blood. Revy felt her heart tick in time with the bang of guns; her breath whooshed on the backs of Shenhua's blades. Living and dying mattered as much as the dark, half-hidden face of the moon. All that she wanted was to feel this good forever.
At the edge of her vision, she saw a Russian dart past the main mass of combatants and sprint to the glass doors of the Tower. The distance between them meant that Revy couldn't take a good shot, so it couldn't be her problem. She had almost forgotten the rogue Russian until she saw him raise a gun and, through the heat of Sad Eyes's final rounds of ammo, put two bullets into the poor kid's head.
When the Russian's arm raised, a trickle of honey-blonde hair spilled out of the collar, and Revy's systems surged with bloodlust. That Russian was no man, and Revy had longed to go toe-to-toe with Big Sister Balalaika for years and years.
"Where you going, bitch?" Shenhua yelled after her.
Revy didn't waste a bit of breath to shouy any explanations back. She flew after the Russian war goddess with the giddy joy that only the youngest of children can taste in the everyday world. She didn't even notice how the glass doors gave way without a creak of protest even through Revy knew, on some level, the the Tower's security system could bolt down the entry ways with reinforced steel and bullet-proof glass.
Only the emergency overhead panels lit the lobby. Revy sighted the hem of a military overcoat disappear around a corner and took off after it. Her boots thudded against the marble tiles, but she throttled back from top speed. No need for a flat sprint. Revy knew where Balalaika would go.
Revy crashed against the metal bar of the door to the secondary stairwell and took the plain concrete steps up two at a time. Balalaika could pick her off easy in the broad, gently curled sweep of the main staircase, so Revy took a safer route into the upper floors of the Tower. Nothing sucked as much as taking a cheap shot from above and then having your pathetic corpse roll down a long stack of stone-slick steps to end it all as a disgusting pile of flesh at the bottom.
Another door, a quick sprint down the halls, two right turns, and there she was, skulking outside the office door like an overzealous fan. Revy raised her guns and fired but not before Balalaika heard the muted drum of her boots on industrial carpet. The Ivan queen ducked to avoid the shot aimed at the center of her chest and used her bullets to force Revy into a doorway.
"Been waiting for this!" Revy howled.
"Cute," Balalaika smirked.
A breath and then the first step into the whirlwind.
Revy leapt and fired.
Balalaika charged.
Long ago, Chang taught Revy that no one can outrun a bullet. Once the shot is fired, it follows a straight line to its destination. The only way to make sure that its final, leaden resting place isn't a cozy nest in your soft tissue is to be out of that line before the bullet ever leaves the chamber. Don't be where the enemy thinks you should be. Make each movement unpredictable. If you get good enough, you can even opt to stand still on occasion and let the enemy mistakenly fire around you. That always freaks the small timers out.
But Balalaika was not a small timer. She knew every trick that Chang ever imparted, and she had patience, strength, and stature over Revy. Engaging Balalaika in close quarters was like edging too close to the Sun; you weren't making it out alive.
Revy conceded ground doorway by doorway to keep the field of play wide. Using door handles and chair railings as a foot props, she made use of the high ceilings to stay out of Balalaika's line. Usually, the two guns gave Revy an edge because she forced her would-be victims to dance between dual live wires, but Balalaika feared nothing. Every time Revy thought that she could nail the tsaritsa of Hotel Moscow, Balalaika would surge forward and force Revy into a retreat.
"This hall has an ending," Balalaika reminded her. Her icy blue right eye glowed in its web of puckered scar tissue.
"Shit," Revy muttered. She turned and found the crash-bar on the stairwell door and smashed through it, taking the stairs that lead upwards.
It took only a second to realize that Balalaika wasn't following her.
"Shit!" Revy repeated, loud enough to be heard on every floor landing of the stairwell. She yanked open the metal door and sprinted, no holding back, down the hall. The office door at the end of the hall hung by one hinge. Revy took a peek inside the bare office space with its dry musk of disuse to confirm what she already knew.
Don't be where the enemy thinks you should be.
Chang's office wasn't on the second floor. He only used that space when he dealt with other members of Roanapur's criminal organizations; he dressed up this dingy space and made with the showmanship. His real office was much higher in the building with a nice view of the harbor. He liked that little piece of added security, and now Revy understood why.
Balalaika would be pissed that she had been deceived, and due to idiocy, Revy had let herself be goaded into losing her target. Now, there was one angry Ivan bitch loose in the Tower and Revy only had herself to blame.
She knew what she had to do. Revy kicked at the busted door because she definitely didn't want to do it. "Fuck fuck fuck."
She climbed the eight flights to Boss Chang's true office and burst through the door.
"Heya. So here's the thing-" Revy halted because the man behind the desk has Asian eyes and a good suit, but he wasn't Chang. When she turned to double-check that she had the right door, she met the undivided, black stare of Balalaika's Stechkin.
Revy sucked in a breath as the frigid hand of guilt seized at her throat. She had lead Balalaika right to the Boss's door. She had been too tired to even notice that she was being followed.
"Nice of you to show me around the place, Two Hands," Balalaika said with the hint of honey laughter in her voice. "And how are you, baby?"
Balalaika's eyes went wide a half-second too late as she realized her mistake. The man behind the desk was thinner and younger than Chang; she had made the same false assumption as Revy. The real Chang had been waiting for this. He had the twin muzzles of his. 22s were pressed into the back of her neck before she could curse her haste.
"For the last time, don't call me 'baby'," Chang said.
Revy trained her guns on Balalaika's face, which had closed into an expression of pure contempt. Her lacquered fingernails tightened around her Stechkin, and then her entire lithe arm twisted behind her back to target Chang's stomach. Without body armor, a single shot would be his agonizing death.
Balalaika smiled, but her eyes remained as ice. "Drop your weapons, Two Hands."
"You've got guns on your throat, and they ain't mine," Revy said.
Balalaika's behavior wasn't making sense, and that made Revy jumpy. It was like the Russian bitch wanted Chang to be the one to off her. Revy's felt her battered nerves threatening her control, but the final voice in the room elected that moment to speak.
"The circumstances could be better, but I am grateful that you are all here," Rock said from the other side of Chang's heavy desk. Revy watched Balalaika's cold eyes flick over to the Revy's sometimes-lover. Balalaika did not savor interferences; she eliminated them.
"Rock, get out of here," Revy said.
"Not until I've said what I need to say," Rock countered.
Revy didn't like the tone in his voice. That tone meant trouble. Rock as about to do something brave and stupid. Revy's fingers itched to 86 him on the spot out of blind frustration, but she couldn't dare look away from Balalaika.
He stood up from the desk and removed the sunglasses. It was then that Revy realized that Chang wasn't wearing his. The two of them had to be planning this whole situation to get the drop on Balalaika. What Revy didn't understand was why.
On the rim of her vision, Revy saw Rock survey the tableau of hatred: Chang at Balalaika's back with his guns on her pale neck; Balalaika with her eyes fixed on Revy and her gun trained on Chang's midsection; Revy nearly shaking with fatigue and anger while aiming for Balalaika's face.
"This hardly seems fair," Rock decided. "Mr. Chang, I am afraid that I will need to ask you to step down at this moment."
"This is so humiliating," Chang sighed, and Revy's jaw dropped open as her boss took a step back from his target. Fast as a fish in silver waters, the Stechkin leveled at Revy's chest, but Revy caught the flicker of surprise in the blue ice eye of Balalaika. Revy felt like she could see her own indignation at Chang's shocking obedience to Rock in her golden opponent's face.
Chang noticed it as well. He snatched the sunglasses offered by Rock and jammed them back on his face.
"That expression is disgusting," he said sharply. "Save it, Fry Face. He's got you, too, even if you don't know it yet."
"Rock," purred Balalaika, her voice low and dangerous. "Care to explain?"
Rock stepped dangerously close the lines of fire. Revy hissed. He held a Polaroid picture between his thumb and forefinger. He showed it, carefully and slowly, to the room's occupants. In it, a clear image of Balalaika in full-battle regalia looked down at the photographer. At her back, a solider with a sub-machine gun dangling from one shoulder opened a door into a black Benz. The hazy traffic and sloppy signs of Roanapur filled the background.
"Do you remember when this shot was taken?" Rock asked softly.
"No," Balalaika said.
"A child took it," Rock went on. "You may have noticed them. Kids with cameras all over the city during the last month. It's an innocent scam. Take a picture and try to sell it to tourists. Only there are so very few tourists in Roanapur. With no competition from other buyers, it wasn't hard to amass quite a collection."
"It's as bad as you think," Chang said to Balalaika. "I had a bit of time to review Rock's files. Those kids saw an awful lot."
"You used them as your spies," Balalaika fumed. "Isn't that a rather deplorable plan? Using children as your weapons?"
The insult failed to register on Rock's face. He continued: "When I first came to Roanapur, I wondered how such a place could exist. It didn't make sense that a city like this one could continue in a country that depends so heavily on tourism and in a world of multi-national crime sweeps. Over time, I realized that the balance of Roanapur hinged on three things: the cooperation of local authorities, the silence of the local media, and the isolation from international scrutiny."
"Lectures make me sleepy. Get to the point," Chang yawned.
"The data that has been gathered shows the depth of the war here. If it were to be released, the photos could generate a story that speaks of Roanapur's- and subsequently Thailand's- danger to tourists. Any city replete with warring gangsters and corrupt police would frighten away clientele from all of the country. If such a story were to break, then the national government of Thailand would be forced to take steps to control the damage to its reputation. I'm sure that you can see how detrimental such action would be for your operations." Rock paused and carefully placed the photo back into his pocket. "But, as you know, information can be buried and stories lost in the static of the world's newsfeed. You may feel as though you can gamble and win in this case, but you should know that the odds aren't favorable in the current climate. There are certain recent deaths in the community to consider, for instance."
"You're behind Watsup's murder," Balalaika ground out.
"The loss of Chief Watsup does remove the barriers to local media, but the death that you should be concerned about is Johann Fischer, a German tourist found in the international hostel with two bullets in his chest. His homeland will, of course, demand an inquiry when that news breaks, and the story of tourist's gruesome murder would propel any other sensational bits of trivia about Roanapur into the world's spotlight. Thailand would have no choice but to take dramatic actions to adjust its reputation," Rock finished.
The silence weighed so much that Revy wanted to kill them all and escape.
"What do you want?" Balalaika said at last.
Rock smiled. Revy's heart clenched. She knew that smile, and it did not belong the Rock that she knew. That smile was rabid. It was smile of a villain.
"Simply put, I want the chance to save Roanapur. If you accept my terms, then I will take care of this mess and return this city to its former, highly profitable glory as arbitrator between the crime syndicates and as representation to the police force, politicians, and media," Rock said.
Balalaika sneered. "Surely , you can't be offering to do this for free. Not after all your hard work setting up this vulgar mess."
"My payment is simple: a percentage of the profits for any project that I coordinate. I will take no other compensation from any party, which assures my neutrality and guarantees my commitment to resolve each challenge," Rock explained.
Balalaika turned her cold glare on Chang. "You are awfully quiet."
"Hey, I tried to kill him when he showed me those pictures, but there's a bit of an insurance policy. That blonde guy from Lagoon has the key to all the data, and he skipped town. If Rocky-boy here doesn't check in every twelve hours, the guy goes on autopilot and puts all of it in the open," Chang said.
"Between the two of us, I'm willing to bet that we have the resources and reach to sniff out this little intel rat. What would happen then?" Balalaika wondered aloud.
Revy saw Balalaika's hand swing toward Rock and tighten on the Stechkin, and Revy saw the inevitability of the the next few moments. Balalaika didn't care about winning; she wanted it to end. She would take the shot on Rock, and Chang would let her. Indeed, he couldn't stop her, even with his speed, when his guns were lowered at his sides. Nothing stood between Rock and a bloody end. Revy didn't want to care, but her body moved without permission. It stepped into the line of the Russian gun, in front of Rock.
Balalaika smirked. "Your little gun girl isn't yours anymore, Chang. I can't imagine you would care if I ended her now that she has shown her true loyalties. Oh, well." Her grin grew into a thing made wholly of teeth. "Say good-bye, you-"
"Enough," Chang interrupted. "It's over, Balalaika. We lost."
"I don't lose," she insisted. The hand that held the gun might have been carved from stone for as much as Balalaika wavered. Once the bullet left the chamber, Revy would be a splatter on the ceiling. She should move, she needed to move, but Rock's breath on her back kept her feet in place. Balalaika's bullet would take one of them, regardless. Revy held her ground.
Chang holstered his guns and stepped forward. His hand found the curve of Balalaika's spine in a gesture so intimate that Revy knew instantly that they were lovers. Something bitter and thick rose in the back of her throat. Once upon a time, she had put on cheap lace and waited for this man in his bedroom only to be rejected and dumped on Dutch's dock like an unwanted pet.
Balalaika did not soften. Her gaze remained fixed.
Chang's voice came out smooth and soft. Revy had to strain to catch the words.
"C'mon, Fry Face. We can review our pathetic options over breakfast. My treat," Chang said.
"No," Balalaika said.
"Blinis, right?" Chang continued. "You said, 'Maybe someday.' I'm asking you for today."
He stepped back, his hand passing along her back before retreating to his pockets, to let her decide. Slowly, miraculously, the Stechkin lowered inch by inch. Balalaika jammed it into a shoulder holster and procured a metal tube from a hip pocket. She took her time unscrewing the cap; Revy couldn't breathe in that long moment.
Balalaika's icy gaze dropped as her balletic fingers tapped out a thin cigar from the tube, one tip of it already razored off. Wordlessly, Chang produced a his omnipresent lighter and held it out. Balalaika turned away from Revy and Rock, passed the cigar through the flames, and savored her first long drag of smoke. When she looked up again, the warrior had fallen away to reveal the business woman.
"Who helped you?" she demanded of Rock.
"I acted on my own," he replied. "The rest of the alliances necessary to move forward were secured yesterday, but it is not flattery to say that Hotel Moscow and the 14K determine the future of the city."
"And that German tourist-?" she pressed.
"Won't be an issue. I have already taken appropriate measures in good faith. That story can be fully suppressed, provided that we have reached an agreement here."
"Hmph." Balalaika surveyed the Japanese man, who had just challenged her for control of the city and won, along with Revy, the exhausted gunslinger standing before that idiot like a total chump. Then she executed a tight spin on her heel, stalked up to Chang, and without a word, snagged his white scarf in one pale hand. It trailed behind her like a banner, edged with curls of smoke, as Balalaika swept out of the room.
Chang directed his gaze to Rock.
"I hope you know what you are doing," he said before turning to Revy. He shook his head, and the grin that twitched at the corners of his mouth lacked mirth. "It's been fun, Two Hands. I think our business is concluded."
Revy felt her breath catch as Chang left her. The last ember of her dreams to join the 14K burned out and left a smoldering pile of ash in her throat. She watched in a hazy daze as Chang hurried to catch up with the blonde warrior pacing away down the hall. By the time they turned the corner, their footsteps fell in complete syncopation, and then it was over.
"That went better than I expected," Rock spoke up from beside her.
Revy turned the barrels of her Cutlass Specials into his chest.
"Fuck you," she spat.
Rock smiled, his own smile this time, the smile that whispered softness and kindness and all the things that Revy longed to squeeze out of him and keep for herself, alone.
"100 grand a year," he whispered, and when his eyes showed more white than brown and his body slumped to the floor, Revy's body moved on its own again. She caught him before his head collided with the edge of the desk. They landed with a soft thump, like an exhaled breath, together on the floor. Revy's hands tried to hold on to him, even with the guns in the way.
She wanted to smack him. Of course, Rock would do something this pathetic. He could orchestrate a daring coupe, probably going without sleep for weeks on end, to face down the two biggest powerhouses of the city and win, but what would that loser do to celebrate? Faint like a girl.
"Fuck you," she said again without malice.
Her head dropped toward his chest as her own exhaustion threatened to claim her, but Revy heard the white noise of a radio emanating from the interior pocket of Rock's jacket. She listened to it, the rhythmless sound of nothing, until the nothing became her name.
"Revy. Hey, Revy. Pick up," someone called out.
One of her hands let go of its gun and snaked into Rock's clothing. Sure enough, her fingers closed on a headset. She pulled it out and put it to her ear.
"Stop squawking, Dutch. I hear ya," she said into the mouthpiece.
"Rock okay?" Dutch asked.
"Yep. He did the big talk and then passed out like a pussy. He's not hurt or nothing," she grumbled.
"Yeah, that's what it looked like," Dutch said.
Revy's head snapped up. Through the glaze of the high-rise window, she could see the tendrils of smoke from Dutch's cigarette rising from the top of the building across the street. The waning moonlight reflected equally off the top of his bald head and the barrel of the rifle resting at his side.
"Guess Rock had some back-up after all. Sure makes me feel stupid," Revy said bitterly.
"Some representation from the Rip-off Church is around here, too. Rock managed to get the rest of the city on his side before he went to the big bosses," Dutch said.
"Fan-fuckin'-tastic. Eda saw this shit? I'm never going to hear the end of it," Revy complained.
Rock spasmed in his sleep and nearly bucked out of her arms. Revy had to use both hands to hold him. She watched his chest rise and fall until she was convinced that it was just a passing thing, that he was still living there in her arms.
"You know, Otis is still in Phuket," Dutch said after that tense moment. "100 grand would buy you plenty of biscuits and gravy and Jack Daniels at his little diner joint."
"Otis," Revy half-laughed. "How is that seven-fingered sack of shit these days?"
"You could ask him yourself."
Revy took a breath. "You telling me to go, partner?"
"Never said that," Dutch replied evenly.
Revy looked down at Rock. The slack weight of him felt warm in her tired arms.
"Looks like I'll be spending less time out to sea. He's going to need some security, but he doesn't have the money to pay right now. Thought I'd volunteer and let him pay me with interest later," Dutch answered her thoughts.
"Make 'im double down, minimum," Revy tried to joke.
Dutch's dry chuckle rewarded her efforts. He let her think for a minute before asking the million dollar question.
"You staying or going, Rev?"
Revy wished that she knew.
"You tell me, Dutch."
"I can't help you. Not this time, partner."
"You know, he said that he loved me," Revy found herself saying. "What a fucking joke, right?"
"I wouldn't say that. He's been telling that to anyone who cares and a lot of us who don't."
"I should go," Revy said with finality.
"Probably," Dutch agreed.
Down in the street, the gunfire stopped. It had gone on for so long that it seemed like a part of the city, a permanent fixture of the night in Roanapur. Without it, Revy felt like she could have been anywhere in the world- any city, any country. It wasn't a sweet thought. Something about that calm silence undid her nerves.
She looked down at the man in her arms, and a glint of silver caught her attention. Rock's cufflinks bore the imprint of a skull atop crossed swords. An exact replication of the Jolly Roger emblem on her Cutlass Specials grinned up at her from each of his wrists.
"Do you need help? You know, protecting this idiot?" she found the strength to ask.
"Yeah. I do," Dutch answered.
"So I guess I'll stick around then."
Dutch paused to smoke. "Benny is coming back, too, once this mess gets settled. He said to tell you that he's sorry for missing the main event."
"He would have been useless anyway," Revy said.
Dutch laughed, for real this time, while Revy held Rock the best way she knew how and let herself breathe.
It was over, for now.
A/N: Enormous debts of gratitude to Gramnegative for bribing me to finish this chapter and helping to make it better. Sad Eyes is a reference to Amigodude's work "Gun Punk" and Otis appears in "The Devil's Graveyard". Further notes can be found at unkeptsecret(dot)insanejournal(dot)com
