Rock...

"Revy versus the world, cutlasses in hand. Admirable." Rock remarked drily somewhat amused at her current plight. "You hang on to your past like a drowning woman, wearing it like a badge of honor as if you can't grow from who you were back then."

Relaxing with his back kissing the cool wall, Rock ignored the bite of pain, feeling the bruise protesting at the intrusion. Two fingers securely held his cigarette between his lips as he takes a draw from the end. Calmly, he kept watching as Revy desperately fumbles with her gun like a crab handling soap for the first time and finding the exercise equally unpleasant. He took another long drag from his calm-me-down stick to help him think while listening to the sounds in the room; frustrated grunts mixed in with the lazy whirl of the AC overhead, his exhales as he releases the confined smoke through his nostrils slowly.

Were he an evil man or even one out for revenge as Revy seems to believe he is, he could have used his toe to nudge the gun out of her hand with just the slightest effort. She was in such a weakened state, one would think that she would keep her ass quiet and wait until she was back to 100% to make death threats. Were he the type of man she's been trying to make him out to be, right now would have been an excellent time for the silent treatment just to fuck with her since he now knows she hates silence. He could torment her for a long damn time. As a man who enjoyed living in his head, hours upon hours of silence were the perfect vacation. And that would be the least of what he could do to her. Years of bullying in every way possible can make a man exhibit traits best performed in darkness. And he's had experiences aplenty to draw from.

A full minute passed as he thought and she struggled; warring with the wrinkled sheets, her sleeping fingers unable to get a grip on the handle of the gun properly. With all the shit she's put him through, the last three months alone would be enough for him to act on the appealing thoughts nudging him on to take this opportunity for payback in the most imaginative ways he could come with. And to be honest, he wasn't short in that department either. Were he an evil man, that is.

He bit back a curse. "I hate women like you." Rock voiced after a while breaking the silence between them. Revy had yet to say anything so concentrated was she on getting her gun cocked and aim at him but that admission paused her movements for the briefest moment then they resumed, her efforts redoubled as her goal of holding her gun securely in her hand grew into reality. Rock looked down at his feet through a smoke-filled gaze, "I've had a draining day yesterday and an even worse night before that because of you. Then my apartment got vandalized and I lost everything but the clothes on my back, again! Then I had to work an all night commission directly after, " he bitched, rightfully so. He paused for a long moment to take a drag on his cigarette before slowly spitting the words piece by piece at her, "then all I wanted to do was sleep."

This wasn't good. He was getting angrier with her the more he recounted the events that brought them to this point. With her trapped and cornered and naked in every sense of the word and his thoughts taking on a darker tone than he was comfortable with. Damn it! He'd warn her not to fucking play with him and she didn't listen- Because apparently, I'm a plaything to torment! To belittle and toy with based on what? Someone's whim? The fucking weather. Control. Control. Control! - a deep inhalation followed by another then another, - Fucking Hell! Goddamn it!

Rock bit the inside of his jaw, inhaling deeply for a calm he could not feel.

In one smooth action, he moved from his spot, took the gun from her hands just as she finally managed to get a hold on it then tossed it to the far corner of the room. The loud clattering noise the thing made interrupted the silence in the otherwise quiet apartment. For a second, Revy gave him a shocked-deer-in-the-headlights-look as if she couldn't quite believe he'd just done that. He could just as well have interpreted her expression like one a child would evince when their favorite toy is unjustly punished by a mean older kid. Then came the blue streaks! His name mixed in with language potent enough to raise demons. Pissed, Revy questioned the legitimacy of his birth, degraded his mother and her feminine parts and his father's sexual status and his ability to a man.

Rock listened wordlessly to her spitting fire at him and maybe it was cruel of him but just get to her, he moved out her line of sight back to the wall knowing full well that with her in that position, flat on her stomach and in her condition, she couldn't see him. She might as well be a turtle flipped on it's back. She would only be able to hear him. Torturous as it was, he found that he was enjoying himself. Bad idea, since nothing good ever came from him enjoying himself but he couldn't help it.

"Sleep was all I wanted," Rock repeated as if he couldn't hear a word she said as she continued to curse him. He didn't enter into shouting match with her. He didn't even raise his voice above a conversational level. His tone, however, dictated the intensity of his words, the kind which demanded you listened.

"Then you made me want more."

"Fuck you!" Revy spat acidy at him. "Pissed because I didn't let you fuck me-?"

"Shut your fucking mouth!" It was a reaction that surprised both them, Revy more so. A few seconds of shocked silence reigned before, more calmly Rock stated, "I shouldn't have to tell you that when you're in a situation where you are at a disadvantage you either shut up or come up with something clever." Reiterating a lesson he'd learn from Balalaika back in Japan. When the cold nozzle of her gun pressed against the skin of his forehead, her manicured finger lovingly stroking the trigger as she contemplated if the next second she would terminate his tenure in her employment as an interpreter, permanently. "In your present state, naked, vulnerable and alone without your guns, one would think that clearly, you are at a disadvantage." The passive-aggressive calm fluctuating in his voice was scaring the shit out of her, he knew, but she's been asking for this as proof that he was just like everybody else she's encountered in her life no matter what he said or did or didn't do.

"So you got some balls now because I'm like this?" Her voice held a note of confirmation as if she would have said 'I knew it.'

He ignored her question, his words danced between volumes, fluctuating between loud and dying softly as he continued, "I warned you, didn't I? I repeatedly asked you to stop, to not toy with me but you continued anyway. Are you happy now?!"

It would have been better if he was threatening her with a loaded gun, this side of him was what she didn't like one bit because she couldn't tell what he was going to do next. Abruptly he barked out a bitter laugh unsure of what else to do about their...whatever this was...he couldn't tell any longer.

"You fucking lost it?" Revy asked but her bravado before had abandoned her voice leaving a shadow of itself in her words.

Rock moved back into her line of sight, deliberately leering at her naked body and making sure that she sees him looking at her before their eyes met. Though she tried to hide the terror in those brown pools and maybe with other people she could conceal it perfectly with bravado and call it a day but he would know that look anywhere. He's seen it too many times in the mirror!

Turning the volume back to that same conversational tone, Rock continued, his voice honey soft, "Is this what you wanted to see? Me, like this? Does this prove to you that I'm like anybody else in this city? Everyone you've met? What's next? Am I going to force your legs open and satisfy myself with what you started while you try to fight me?" he let those words sink in, watching her skin physically goosebumped out of fear as the silence ticked on. "Yes, Revy, I'm pissed. Rock, from the safe bubble community, is pissed but not because I didn't fuck you," he quipped.

Sitting next to her, he lowered his lips to her ear, one long arm stretching over her, flanking her torso. This close he could make out several piercing scars along her earlobe. Revy tried to turn her head away which caused her hair to tumble over her face. He could tell she was trying hard to control her breathing as he gently used a finger to sweep the lock of hair behind her ear. His lips were so close he knew his breath felt hot on her earlobe. He wished he was whispering something else. He wished he wasn't the one making her try to suppress the terrified shivers no doubt running a chilling route up and down her spine.

"I wonder," he began gently stroking her soft hair, unable to help himself, "what someone out there," he gestured with his chin to the blind covered window cocooning them from what Roanapurr had to offer, "if they were in my position right now with you like this, I wonder what they would do to you?"

"Don't touch me," That was almost a sob.

Rock refused and continued to stroke her silky mane, loving the way her hair felt sifting through his fingers, hating the way he was loving this. It was all too easy for him to imagine her in his arms sleeping peacefully, the morning light just intruding on their reality and him playing lazily in her hair like this. He hated the words he was about to say but they had to be said.

"Yeah," He said vexedly though his tone was cool. Rock forced himself to continue speaking as if he was answering a question, "I'm sure you know that they would touch you when you don't want them to, in places you don't want them to and they'd laugh as they did things to you, things to make you pray for a swift death as a kindness,"

"Me? Pray?" Revy said condescendingly through gritted teeth but again he ignored her.

He scented her hair then fisted sheets. "This would have been a golden opportunity for anyone who's ever want to humiliate in the most degrading of ways, again and again, the great and powerful Two Hands, right?" He didn't wait for her answer, partly because he didn't want to hear what she had to say. "Not a one would even be decent enough to consider your feelings on the matter of you. And yet...I...did."

"Did?" She asked but he didn't answer her.

"Even with what you've put me through these last three months. Today alone should have been enough for me to hurt you. Do you think I'm soft because I don't retaliate?" Rock buried his face in her hair and she flinched.

Neither for them said anything for a few heartbeats until Rock let out a deep sigh then abruptly got up as if she'd stung him.

"So let me get this crystal clear," Revy began contemplatively, "you hate me and I'm completely defenseless and you're not going to do a damn thing because of you're imaginative morals? You are a fucking pussy."

Never has he had such a strong urge to throttle someone. Rock clench his fist as he thought in resignation. I'm talking to a broken record, a fucking brick wall with an attitude problem.

He dropped the cigarette butt on the tile then stomp on it with his bare heel. Picking up her cigarette pack from the side of the bed, he took another lighting it immediately, responding as he did so. "And you're a bitter bitch who wouldn't know a decent man if one had you naked and helpless in his bed," he snapped back.

"Decent." She spat scornfully, "You want a medal for not raping me, Rock...yet? For keeping it in your pants so far?"

He grasped one of her elbows and in one fluid motion flipped her onto her back. Revy bounced on the spring mattress, her eyes widening at her sudden change in position, lips spluttering angrily. In another second, he was top of her, knees straddling her torso, both hands planted at the sides of her head. He hovered over her, not touching. He could tell that he was asking for a bullet between his eyes for scaring her like this. Maybe he was even picking at some emotional scars but fuck her! She did the same to him by behaving so much like the people he's tried so badly to forget. Eyes locked onto hers he whispers menacingly,

"let me spell it out for you, you left the same man you've been bullying for the last three months sexually frustrated after you pretended to want me and now you're naked in my bed and under me. In comparison to what's out there and what anyone else would've done to you, you're fucking right I deserve it."

He briefly considered lowering himself, to make her feel a part of his misery that would be her nightmare if he had a mind to act on it. His pride stopped him.

Fucking pathetic. He thought disgusted with himself. Lusting after someone who pretended to want you, Rock? Toyed with you? Yet his attraction to her wouldn't wane further adding to his humiliation. That made him roll off her to sit on the side of the bed. His back turned to Revy, tunneling his fingers through his hair and smoking his cigarette determined to block out thoughts of her body out of his head, what she felt like on his skin, between his fingers, tasted like on his tongue.

After a long silent pause, Revy asked, "why you said that?"

"Said what?"

"That you hate me."

She wasn't going to let this go, was she? "I said I hate women like you," he corrected.

"Why?" Revy asked again, "Do I remind you of someone you want to forget?" She was fishing for an answer he wasn't about to give, though his shoulders stiffened slightly at her words. She must have noticed because she continued, voice growing cockier by the second, "Maybe, I remind you of the same person that gave you that scar on your leg?" He could almost feel her face splitting with that wolfish grin of hers at gaining a victory of sorts over him.

Damn her,

Turning back to her, he explained, "Women like you who think they have a right to toy with others because they're attractive. You think it's ok to put a man through hell because he's interested in you. But don't worry, I no longer have any interest whatsoever. Lesson learned." He gestured to her body with a careless wave of his hand, his rancor at its peak when he told Revy, "even with all you have to offer right there for the taking, I don't want it."

Her victory grin fell off her face.

He forces himself to turn away from her as to not look at her breasts or roam over her sun-kissed skin or drink in her luscious curves.

Exhaling a smokey breath, Rock pinches the cigarette using his index and thumb removing it from his mouth, leaving his lips free.

"I think I understand why you're so angry at me." Rock stated, addressing the elephant in the room, "because my imaginative morals as you put it got smeared in shit three months ago, around that time you stop seeing me as you once did." He turned to look at her, watching her brows furrow in comprehension. Rock continued on, refusing to avert his eyes from her face, "the day I stepped into the darkness possessing this city. The day I changed and made you remember what you didn't want to. Isn't that right?"

"You fucking knew, didn't you?" her head shaking slowly as if to deny what he was saying.

Rock shook his head too, "I listened as you punched me in the face on the boat during the Maid incident and the rest figured out on my own. But I'm not going to apologize for that. I'm not going to apologize for stop being the Rock you've come to think you understand when you haven't even tried to get to know me. To know who I am?"

"You fucking bastard, you fucking knew all this time." She repeated.

"I'm not stupid. Besides you are easy to read into, Revy. Your actions were basically screaming everything at me."

"But wanted me to spell it out for you like I'm an idiot?"

"I was hoping" he interrupted, " that we could be mature about it and talk it out," Rock said with a grunt then more to himself, "wishful thinking, I suppose." he felt a nudge on his lower back from her foot followed by curses. Crushing his half-done cigarette, Rock laid back on his side of the bed, getting comfortable, unsure of what to say after what was just said. It was strange, this 'relationship' between him and Revy. Opposites and yet...

"I think" he started after a minute, "I understand you Revy-"

"Like a spoiled little nerd like you could possibly understand me. You had it fucking easy!" Revy interrupted accusingly before he could continue, "born with a silver fucking spoon up your ass," her voice approaching scream-level. "talkin' bout you understand me! You don't understand shit."

"If that's what you want to believe," Rock looking down at her after putting on of the pillows under his head. "You sound jealous of my 'easy' life? Did you want it? Is that why you're so insistent on my leaving Roanapurr because you believe I had the cushy life you've always wanted but felt you forfeited it.

"Fuck you,"

"Well, you certainly acted like wanted to fuck me. Convinced me, too." It was a cheap shot admitted but- I'm allowed to have some petty moments, right? "Do you pity me Revy, is that it? For my bad decision in staying here with you? Is that the reason why you've been so mad at me? Did I represent all you've ever wanted but never within your reach before I changed three months ago?"

Only silence met his barrage of questions accompanied by her poker face he's come to associate with Revy's way of 'letting you wait', confirming the truth of what he was saying.

"I never ask you to put me on some pedestal, I was never pretending with anyone over the year we've known each other. I was only showing you a fragment of my personality just as you have been doing with me. Fair is fair, Revy. You can't keep blaming me for failing to be who you've built me up to be when you've never even tried to understand me fully."

When another bout of silence followed Rock gave up. Feeling the tension of the argument oozing out of him, he put an arm over his face; sleep creeping back into him like a sponge soaking up water.

I must have gotten less than I thought or maybe I'm just mentally exhausted. That would explain why the hunger gnawing in his gut wasn't noteworthy right now.

Inhaling deeply, Rock releases a few contented sighs, his body registering one thing.

One of my bad habits.

Once Rock's mind was set on something there was no changing it. Right now that was sleep! He could feel the tiredness seeping into his bones. Lacking for food, it was that much more intense. Sleeping right now felt like a really good idea. Even with a killer naked and pissed at him, at his heels- literally, it didn't matter. He no longer cared.

"You had a mom, right?" Revy voiced long after what he would classify as the argument being closed. Why did she have to choose that moment, just as bliss was settling in, just his breathing grew into a relaxed pattern to restart their conversation?

"Hm?!" Rock grunted irritated. "What the fuck?" he muttered drowsily followed by an annoyed sigh.

"I said you have a mom that was around, right?"

"Doesn't everyone?" He retorted sardonically. Gimme a break, now you wanna talk? He was certain she was being spiteful or maybe he was just grumpy.

"You gonna get smart ass with me?" Her voice telling me to watch it.

"I want to sleep and I thought the conversation was over since you chose to be silent after my last statement. But yes, I have a mother and a father and an older brother. Yes, Revy I have a family."

"Then you had it easy, Rock." She insisted.

What the hell? Were they going to play "trade" to see who had to worst childhood? Does the winner get to shut the other up?

"If that's what you want to believe." He repeated, a yawn dulling the sharpness of his words. "My death was probably the best thing that ever happened to my family," Rock admitted after his yawn died, his arm still over his eyes. He released chuckled humorlessly, voice laden with exhaustion, he continued. "Rokuro Okajima, the blight of the Okajima family, the bad investment they wasted their resources on, finally taken care of. Final...out of the way. I'm sure my funeral was just a formality as to not lose face in the upper-middle-class social circle. What family doesn't mourn the loss of their son, right?"

"So your parents hated you and loved your brother, that's it? That's your sob story?"

"Shut up Revy, I want to sleep." Fed up with her and mad at himself for disclosing that tidbit about his past. He's always told himself that he didn't give a damn. I don't care. Not at all. His own family neglected his very existence except when other people of note where watching.

"Someone's grown some balls."

"You were feeling them up a little while ago, you tell me?"

"I'm gonna kill you in your sleep," Revy told him after few moments.

"Whatever you do," Rock said, turning his back to Revy, "don't wake me."