Chapter Twelve
"MOTHER FUCKER!" Revy screamed, waking up enraged. As the sunlight hit her eyes, she squinted, groaning in agony.
"Shit! What the fuck did I drink last night!" She roared. Rock sighed and handed her some medicine to take care of her hangover. She snatched it out of his hand and drank it in one gulp, grimacing at the taste.
"I'm not sure what you drank…" Rock said quietly. "But it must have been powerful to put you under like it did. You weren't making much sense when I came home."
"So, birthday boy… Did you get laid like you were hoping?" She asked mockingly. Rock didn't say anything. It wasn't worth it to start another fight with her and risk getting his leg broken again.
"Hey, Rock!" Benny said cheerfully, walking into the room. "Here ya go, Revy, some earplugs so that you can drown out some of the noise." He said, throwing her a pair of polyurethane earplugs, which she immediately stuffed into her ears, and went back to sleep.
"So, how did your birthday dinner go? Did you get all the presents you wanted?"
"They weren't the presents I would have asked for back in Japan. But they were just what I needed." Rock said, taking out the pair of kerambits, the handgun, the gutblade and shuriken. Benny whistled appreciatively at the gifts.
"Those were from Sawyer, Lotton and Shenhua, I take it?" He asked. Rock nodded.
"Sawyer and I were actually attacked for our money last night, so I was able to test out the shuriken. I told the moron that he should count himself lucky that it wasn't Sawyer defending us. She would have ripped his insides apart with her chainsaw."
"Oh, boy. And I assume that you at least let him off with his life." Benny laughed.
"Well… Minus an eye. I threw one of my shuriken at him and hit him in the eye. Still, I'd rather be minus an eye than minus my life." Rock said honestly. Benny nodded as Dutch came in.
"Well, Rock… Now we need to give you our gifts… We don't celebrate Christmas, except to go out drinking. But birthdays are a special day of the year." Dutch said cheerfully, handing Rock a box with pink and purple wrapping paper on it. The whole effect was rather garish.
"Oh, thank you, Dutch…" Rock said, opening the package carefully, making sure not to rip it and finding a pair of trench knives with spikes on them. Rock smiled, and put them aside with his other weapons, folding up the paper up and setting it aside to be reused. Benny handed Rock his gift next. Rock couldn't help but think that maybe people in Roanapur were nicer than others gave them credit for.
"Certainly, he had celebrated Dutch's and Benny's birthdays, and gotten them gifts. Fancy liquor for Dutch's birthdays and software or something like that for Benny's. Somehow, they never celebrated Revy's birthday. Rock didn't doubt that nobody even knew when her birthday was, likely because she never told anyone. She probably wouldn't want her birthday celebrated, as it would be embarrassing for her.
Benny handed Rock his gift next, and like the last one, Rock carefully opened it, setting the paper aside, and finding a rather fancy laptop. It was extremely compact and light. Rock smiled.
"How did you get the money for this?"
"Oh!" Benny said, laughing. "Well, I sell programs that I create myself. From spyware to antispyware to computer games, I sell just about anything related to computers. Though I've never actually sold a computer." Benny said, thinking about that last one for a moment.
"But you've never gotten each other anything so expensive…" Rock said, a little perplexed as to why they were spending so much money on him. The liquor must have cost over 100 dollars, assuming Rock was right about the value, and the computer could have cost over 1,000.
"Well… We're making up for lost birthdays. This is your third birthday here." Dutch said. Rock nodded.
"Well, I won't say no to any of this." He replied, plugging in the laptop and starting it up. Something was odd about it, though. There was no brand name on the back, and computers always had their brand on the back. It was an aluminum casing, and lighter than any Rock had heard of. He knew a fair deal about computers, given that he worked for such a large company for so many years. Computers weren't his specialty, but he had to know a bit about them.
And so, he kept up on his knowledge of electronics even after he went to Roanapur.
"Benny… You made this yourself, didn't you? It doesn't have a brand name on the back, it's lighter than any computer I've heard of, and it's using an operating system that, as far as I know, doesn't exist."
"Well… Part of it I made myself. I work with Jane. She's a hacker by trade, but between the two of us, we can make a pretty good computer.
"She's able to get the parts we need from all over the world for wholesale prices, often lower because they're black market, and the two of us program them. We've actually made millions of dollars selling them on the black market. They're faster than almost any computer out at the moment, so they can program viruses and spyware incredibly well, and they're not registered in any system, so there's really no way they can be traced, or have malicious software traced back to them." Benny said.
"And, I know you're not a computer nerd like I am, but I thought you'd appreciate it. Especially since there's almost no chance that they'll contract malicious software on them. No hacker makes malicious programs that correspond to these computers. However, if you don't like it, feel free to sell it." Benny said, seeming to actually mean that. Rock nodded.
"No, I do appreciate it. I can start training at home in the martial arts that I've also been taking classes for. Maybe you could help me break into private information on websites that you need to pay to be on?" Rock asked. Benny laughed.
"I thought you'd never ask!" He said, helping Rock set up the computer, and heading onto the internet, and into the Dark Web, where he began typing furiously, before hitting print, and watching as dozens, hundreds of pages of information began printing out. Rock looked over the information, finding that it was about dozens of styles of martial arts, including several that he was learning, and even more that he had never heard of.
Rock smiled, and started reading. It was still pretty early. He didn't have to go running until early afternoon, and Revy wouldn't be up for at least four hours when her hangover began to subside. He started on the information about Silat, learning as much as he could about wielding Kerambits, finding that they were more often used for assassination than for head on fighting.
"Hey, Rock!" Revy said, thrusting a wrapped package at him. Rock reacted pretty quickly, grabbing the box, and unwrapping it, finding a gift card for a tattoo parlor in Roanapur. It was for 200 dollars. Much more generous than he had been expecting from Revy. She seemed to be in a pretty good mood.
"Hey, Revy… I got some fancy liquor for my birthday…" Rock said, taking out the bottle of amber liquid, and pouring two shot glasses, handing one to Revy and sitting down.
"Thanks…" Revy said. She was used to drinking heavy stuff, but never anything as high quality as this. It was pretty nice bourbon. Rock took a deep breath. Now seemed like the time to ask her about lowering her rate for Lotton.
"Listen, Revy… Lotton is having trouble paying your… Admittedly high rates for his gunmanship lessons. He says that he appreciates you spending your time on him. But… In your own self-interest, if you charge a lower rate now, he'll be able to afford them for longer, and you can take 5% of his profits once he succeeds at becoming a mercenary until he pays you off.
"That way, you'll make more money in the long run, and considering the admittedly large sum that you just made off of Anita, I think you can afford to allow him to pay a little less for the time being."
"I won't accept less than 10% per job, as long as he still pays me 100 dollars a month for now." Revy said, pouring another glass and downing it quickly. Rock knew that she wouldn't negotiate further. She was already being fairly reasonable… Well, reasonable for Revy. Rock nodded.
"I'm sure he can work with that. He'll be over this afternoon anyway for another lesson." Rock said. He was sure that Lotton would be grateful for the subsidized payment plan. He would still have to pay 100 dollars a month, but considering Revy's skill, that was actually fairly low. He went to the phone, and dialed up Frederica.
"Hello, Sawyer the Cleaner of UG Pork. How may I help you?" Frederica asked. She was being very businesslike. Was she expecting a job?
"Hey, Frederica…" Rock said, feeling nervous for some reason.
"Oh, Rock… Did you enjoy our birthday date last night?"
"Yes. Very much. Oh, I have good news for Lotton. Could you put him on the line for a moment?" Rock asked. Sawyer agreed and handed the phone to Lotton. Rock could hear their conversation in the background.
"What does Rock want?"
"I don't know. Just take the phone. I'm sure it's nothing bad." Frederica replied. Lotton took the phone.
For a moment, there was static, then a soft, gentle sounding voice came over the line.
"Hello, Rock… Is something the matter?" Lotton asked.
"No. Revy has agreed to subsidize the rate for your lessons. She still expects 100 dollars a month as long as you're still taking lessons. But once you stop, she'll expect 10% of the payment for each of your jobs until you pay her off."
"That sounds reasonable. Did you have to get her drunk to have her agree to that?" Lotton asked. Rock laughed. That sounded like Revy. She was a mean drunk, but she was less rational, so she might agree to something stupid when she was smashed.
"No… I shared the bourbon I got from Dutch for my birthday with her, and put her in a better mood. She wasn't drunk when she agreed, though." Rock replied. Lotton nodded.
"Thank you, Rock. This is greatly appreciated. Revy was going to bankrupt me with her rates. 400 dollars a month was going to put me in crushing debt before I knew it. I know, for a successful company like yours, it doesn't seem like much. But for me… Well, I don't get very many job offers, and…" Lotton whispered the next part. "I'm pretty sure Miss Shenhua and Miss Sawyer were tired of lending me money." Rock laughed.
"It's no problem." Rock replied.
"I'll let you get back to Miss Sawyer. Thank you." Lotton said, handing the phone to Frederica. Frederica picked up the phone.
"Hello, Rock. Shenhua and I also appreciate your diplomatic abilities with Revy. We've been taking turns helping Lotton pay for his lessons.
"We expect that eventually he'll be able to pay us back."
"That's surprisingly generous of you. I never knew the denizens of Roanapur could be so kind."
"Well, I don't mind, but Shenhua is calling it a loan. She intends to be paid back with interest."
"Ahaha… I could see that…" Frederica said, her laugh sounding like gravel, especially over the phone, with the static. Rock didn't mind, though.
"Sounds a bit like Revy, too." Rock replied. "She's the type to charge 500% interest and still not be satisfied when she was fully paid off." Frederica laughed at Rock's statement. It was a bit of an exaggeration, they both knew. But it came from the truth.
They talked for a while. Finally, Revy shouted from the other room.
"Hey, asshole! Get ready to train! Rotten is here!"
"It's Lotton… Miss Revy…" Lotton said quietly. Had he really been talking to Frederica for that long? No. That was impossible. He checked his watch. He had been on the phone for over an hour.
"Listen, I have to go… Revy's calling for me to start gunmanship training. I love you, Frederica…" Rock said. Frederica gasped. He had never said that to her before. She had never even heard her mother tell her that. Of course, it was well known to her that her stepmother had hated her. Still, it was gratifying to hear it.
"I love you, too… Rock…" Frederica said in her growling, mechanical tone.
Rock hung up, sighing happily. Revy seemed even more irritable than usual when he came into the other room, hooking his 45s onto his belt and standing at attention, waiting for Revy to order him.
"Okay, Rock… You've got your own guns now. Let's see 'em…" Revy said. Rock handed her his guns. She inspected them, looking them over for a few minutes before handing them back to him.
"A little small for my taste, but they'll get the job done, I guess. You won't be blowing anyone's head off with those, though, so aim for the chest." Revy said, setting up smaller targets than she had done last time and telling them to hit as many bullseyes as they could. Rock had to get bullseyes on at least two out of three of his shots, or she'd drop him as a student. Lotton had a less stringent amount. For him, it was one out of three.
Rock counted himself lucky that he had used some of his money that he got from Anita to buy more bullets for his gun. At the time, he wasn't skilled enough to use the guns in combat. But he still needed to train. So he aimed carefully and fired, hitting right on the center. Lotton had already put off three shots, and only hit one of them on the center. The target practice continued like this for an hour, by which time Rock was almost out of bullets.
Still, he had made four out of five shots that day. He was pretty satisfied with his progress, and although Revy wouldn't say it, she was angry at him, she seemed to think so as well.
"Alright, maggots! We're going running now. Hurry up and get changed. We've been doing this every day for almost a month, now! So we're going Freerunning. Rotten, you'd better keep up! How're your martial arts classes going?"
"Very well, Miss Revy… My Freerunning teacher says I'm getting better. My skill in acrobatics is improving as is my skill in jumping." Lotton said in his usual quiet tone.
"Well then you have no excuse!" Revy snapped. "Get your fucking sneakers on and shorts!" She yelled.
Rock nodded, getting dressed for running, making sure to put his guns and other weapons around his waist before heading into the other room. Revy laughed, seeing him like that.
"You don't need those weapons! I'm all the protection you need!" She snapped. Rock nodded, dropping the belt and heading out with her. She had planned a different course that day, longer than past courses.
As they started picking up speed, Revy made commands like "show me some of your acrobatic skills… Rotten…" Lotton nodded, leaping up and catching a fire escape, swinging and landing on one of the steps, leaping to the next ladder and catching it, falling back to the ground, bending his knees and continuing to run. Rock leapt onto a small stand, jumping off of it and landing on the ground.
He wasn't confident enough to do flips yet. Revy seemed relatively satisfied, though.
"You're getting more flexible… Training to do some of those Kama Sutra positions you Japs are so famous for?"
"The Kama Sutra isn't… Japanese… It's Indian… And it's none of your business…" Rock snapped, gasping for breath as he bent his knees and leapt over a chair that he had nearly run into.
"Hmm… Not bad. A clean jump. Still, you have a lot of work to do. Keep running!" Revy demanded. Rock kept going. Finally, after two straight hours of running various courses throughout the city and being ordered to leap over and through almost every conceivable obstacle, Revy let them stop and rest.
"You didn't suck as much as usual today… You can go home, Rotten… No wait… Lotton…" Revy said, her expression softening slightly.
"Alright, both of you!" Revy shouted, calling Lotton back. Lotton hurried over, knowing that she wouldn't be patient if he took his time.
"Tomorrow, we're having practical training. Bring an airsoft gun, preferably with metal pellets. I want you to feel the bullets. No way to lie, then. Each of you will count the number of times you were hit and tell the opponents their score. Got it?" Revy ordered. The two men nodded.
"Good. Come back tomorrow. Same time. Now get out of my sight." Revy said. Rock sighed, stretching before heading back to Lagoon Company's apartment.
