Chapter Sixteen
"Hey! HEY! Rock! Wake the fuck up!" Revy demanded, going to kick Rock to wake him up. Linus put a hand on her shoulder though, stopping her.
"Hey, Rev… I'll get him up. Just… Calm down, yeah?" He suggested. Revy bared her teeth at him, turning and storming off.
"Hey, Rock… If you don't want to be kicked next time, you might want to stop pretending to be asleep when she tries to wake you up, yeah?" Rock sighed as the new guy said this.
"Yeah… I was trying not to flinch… I knew she'd kick me even harder if she knew I was faking… But you really have a way with Revy.
"Back when I was the new guy, she tried to kill me more than once. The scary thing was that I knew she wouldn't be punished for it. There's no real consistent law enforcement here."
"You… You really think so?" Linus asked, his eyes lighting up.
"You have feelings for Revy… Don't you?"
"She acts so strong… But there's a sort of vulnerable despair underneath her strength… She's a woman I'd love to get to know better… Get to understand. She's beautiful… Well, if she could stop smoking… Her cigarette smoke is clouding my aura sense, yeah."
"More powerful men than you have tried to change Revy… And failed."
"I doubt that. There are only a handful of men in the entire world more powerful than me at best, yeah. And they've disappeared into the underground of whatever country they happen to be in now. You met three of them just yesterday. Alric is one of the best hackers in the world, infamous in the international underground for being able to hack unbreakable systems and then emasculate them by crashing their computers with viruses that don't correspond to any known malware.
"Garda… She's got immense skill at fighting, but her physical strength is second to her agility. She could outmaneuver… Well, I doubt you've ever heard of Rosarita Cisneros."
"Are you joking? She almost destroyed Roanapur twice and declared war on the United States. She's a maid now for the Lovelace Family. If your Garda can defeat her, that's quite a feat." Rock said.
"And Astrid… Well, she's never been beaten at Freerunning. Her flexibility and agility allow her to slip through spaces that would trap a less able person of her size. Even amongst the 100 men and 100 women amongst our fellow soldiers, she was the best, yeah."
"You really miss your former comrades, don't you?" Rock asked. Linus sighed, nodding.
"Yes… We were closer than any brother or sister in the world because only we truly understood each other. Our masters didn't understand us. They only saw the numbers. They saw what we represented to them, the next step of humanity and a way to make a lot of money, but they didn't know each of us. Garda had a strange quirk of cracking her knuckles… Alric… Well, he couldn't lie without blinking a lot. We had to help him overcome that particular problem, yeah.
"Astrid… Well… She enjoyed pressing flowers. But the scientists never knew any of that. They couldn't detect when Alric was lying. He blinked a lot, but showed no other physiological symptoms of his lies. The scientists never saw any of us as individuals…"
"And you… Well, you have the habit of adding 'yeah' to the end of most of your statements." Rock said. Linus laughed.
"No, no… I added that later… My quirk was that I wrote poetry. I was pretty good, too. I brought some of my poetry with me. Much of it was about a fellow experiment. Actually, you met her. Garda… Her red hair and mismatched green eyes are so exotic. It was about as close to romantic attraction as I could feel at the time. I understood the concept of love, but only really on an academic level, so my attraction to her, and her to me was superficial at best." Linus said, blushing slightly. Rock's eyes went wide.
"The woman with one dark green eye and one light green eye? She was the woman you had feelings for?"
"In a manner of speaking, yes. It wasn't necessarily what either of us would have called true love. But our feelings went deeper than that of simple comrades in arms. If we were actually commanded to mate with a fellow experiment, we would likely have chosen each other.
"As it stood, we went our separate ways after we escaped, agreeing that large congregations of superhumans travelling together would draw far too much attention. I told her I wanted to continue travelling with her, that two of us, even if we occasionally slipped up and revealed our abilities, would be able to blend in in a large city. But she disagreed and we went our separate ways. I… Must confess… I was sorely tempted to join the three of them in their future plans.
"I would still hope to be friends with you and Lagoon Company. But I would not, strictly speaking be working for you. I think Revy feels threatened by my presence. She saw what I could do last night and I fear she hates me because she thinks I'm here to take her place. Garda… It's a beautiful name, don't you think? Old High German, Teutonic by background. It means Guardian or Guarded One." Linus said, going on a non-sequitur.
"She always was the cautious one amongst the thirty or so members of Genesis who escaped. If we had joined forces, we could easily have created a fighting force that would have been unmatched by any military in the world. We could have charged any price we desired for our services. We would have been unstoppable. But we went our separate ways because of Garda's warning. I believe now that she was right. I almost got caught once right in San Diego by a man who recognized me.
"He had once been a social worker who observed our mental and emotional states while the doctors assessed our physical wellbeing. He was fired and his memory effectively wiped after we escaped. Actually, it was more like his memories were swept under a carpet and hidden from him. A run-in with me on the street jogged his memory and brought it back… I'm afraid I had to kill him. I invited him over for dinner and killed him quickly and silently. Very little pain. It wasn't his fault, after all." Linus said.
"How did you kill him silently? It's not that easy, even with the skills of a marksman." Rock said. Linus laughed, seeming amused by Rock's assumption.
"You think marksmanship and diplomacy are my only skills? I'm also skilled in hand-to-hand combat, Master Level in twenty martial arts. I learned a completely silent way to murder an enemy. You stab them through the ribcage and collapse their lungs.
"If their lungs are collapsed, they can't breathe, so they can't scream. Then a simple knife to the heart is enough to kill them. Three seconds at most and they're dead. Use a special chemical reagent to completely erase the evidence in the apartment and dissolve the body in Hydrofluoric Acid." Linus said, showing very little emotion. Rock shivered at how methodical Linus could be about killing a man and reminded himself not to get on Linus's bad side.
"You don't need to worry, Rock… I have no intention of hurting any of you in Lagoon Company. You're about as close as I've had to friends in a long while. Revy… Good morning. You're looking surprisingly alert today, especially after all the alcohol you drank last night." Linus whispered. Revy flipped him off, though. Linus hurried to his bag and took out a bottle of pills.
"Here… Take two of these. They'll cure your hangover in approximately twenty minutes. Back in the Genesis Facility, they tested the effects of alcohol on us. They forced us to drink until we were completely shitfaced, then they tested how long it took for us to become hung over, then how long it took for our hangovers to subside. They developed this medicine based on that research. It was still experimental at the time, but it worked well for the test subjects." Linus said.
Revy snatched the pills out of Linus' hand and swallowed them.
"Shut the fuck up, cocksucker!" Revy snarled. Linus laughed.
"#lol. You know, you're not gonna make any friends with that kind of anger." Linus said with a cheerful grin. That was obviously the wrong thing to say, though because Revy shrieked, pulling out her gun and aiming it at Linus, right between his eyes.
"You've got a big mouth, asshole!" She growled. Linus chuckled.
"Yeah… I hear that a lot."
"Then you probably hear this a lot, too!" Revy said, cocking her gun.
"More than I'd like, honestly. But I can handle myself. Revy, do you mind if I ask you a question?" Linus asked. Revy's angry face went slack. Then she seemed to get her composure back.
"So long as you consider a gunshot an acceptable answer." She said with a cruel laugh. Linus shrugged.
"I can't control how you answer. I met some old friends of mine at a restaurant when Rock and I were out Freerunning. They invited me to join them. They're planning to set up shop in Roanapur as well. Your boy Rock is pretty charismatic… My friends aren't easy to influence, but he convinced them to join one of the local mobs and not expect exorbitant sums for it."
"Well… That's his job. He's the mouthpiece of our company. He's not strong and he can't outrun me or Dutch, but he can talk his way out of most problems. Way I hear it, he talked his way into Leatherface's pants." Revy laughed meanly. Linus looked at her, puzzled.
"Leatherface?" He asked.
"There's some bitch in this town named Frederica Sawyer. She's a fucking cleaner and a bounty hunter, and she uses a fucking chainsaw as big as she is. She and Rock are a fucking item… Well, 'till she realizes that there are better men than him in the fucking gutter."
"I can't quite tell whether you're just jealous of their relationship or if you legitimately hate Rock. He seems like a nice person." Linus said. Revy's face wrinkled disgustedly.
"Jealous! Of that idiot and his half-robot girlfriend? Bullshit!" Revy snarled.
"If you say so… Have you ever considered quitting smoking? You would be far more energetic and have greater lung capacity if you stopped." Linus replied, smiling at her in a strangely calming, charismatic way that offset her anger at being told what she should do. Still, if anybody could get angry at someone trying to help them, it was Revy.
"Fuck you, asshole! If you ever try to tell me what to do again, I'll slit your fucking throat and watch the blood leak out!" She shrieked madly. This only caused Linus to laugh.
"Ahaha! Funny, pretty and talented. The day you could beat me in a fight is the day I jump off the Empire State." He said with a good natured laugh at his own expense.
"Oh, yeah! Fine! Prove it to me! Right now!" Revy demanded, grabbing Linus by the collar of his plain white, long sleeved tee shirt that seemed very well worn.
"I make it a point not to hit women." Linus said, taking the high ground, but grabbing Revy's wrist and compressing hard enough to force her to release her grip.
As he compressed, Revy heard loud pops and cracks in her wrist and let go, struggling to pull her hand away until Linus let go and Revy flew back, landing hard on the floor. This only angered her further and she leapt up and ran at Linus, grabbing her gun. However, the minute she pulled it out of her holster, he grabbed her wrist and twisted, forcing her to drop it.
"You can't beat me, Revy… You are talented, strong and beautiful. But your abilities are only those of a human." Linus said, a severe look on his face. The look in his eye though unsettled Revy. There was something about him, she thought that seemed like he wouldn't hesitate for a moment to kill someone who attacked him. He had let her off the hook for whatever reason, but she suspected that if she tried to shoot at him again, he would put her down.
But she couldn't let her humiliation at his hands go.
"I will kill you one day! You can't escape death forever!" Revy snarled. Linus looked at her, his anger subsiding and a level of empathy for her situation setting in.
"Revy… I don't want to fight you. I like you. You seem like a fun person. I haven't been bored yet with you.
But if you force me on this… I will destroy you… I can guarantee you that." Linus said, his expression changing to the dead-eyed expression that was so common in Roanapur, the look in one's eyes that indicated that they had completely killed anything even resembling a conscience inside of them. Occasionally, Rock showed that expression, but it was still rare-ish for him. He had to show that side of himself during Roberta's second coming. But he tried to hide it.
He didn't like that aspect of himself, and he didn't want Frederica to think that he had become just like everyone else in that shit covered city. Somehow, Frederica still thought that he had maintained some semblance of his humanity, and he wasn't eager to dissuade her of that impression.
"I… Would love… To see you try…" Revy sneered, her grin widening until she, as Fabiola said, looked like the skull from the Day of the Dead Festival.
"Fine… I'll beat some respect into you. I'm not used to assaulting women, but I doubt a woman of your strength would want to stand on tradition, yeah?" Linus asked, removing his glasses, which were strictly for show and dropping his belt that had his guns on it.
"Shall we simply have a fistfight? Or would you prefer to use some sort of weapons? Dealer's choice, yeah?" Linus asked, smiling politely, but showing the steel behind his humored façade.
"Doesn't make a difference to me! I'll beat the shit outta you regardless!" Revy snarled, putting her guns aside and showing that she had no firearms on her.
"Very good then. I will abandon all my weapons, including blades, shuriken, guns and smoke bombs. It seems only fair that we begin on equal footing… In the way of weapons, anyway."
"A fair fight is a fight you're determined to lose. Bring any weapons you want to against me! I'll crush you all the same, cocksucker!" Revy snapped.
"Are you certain we can't reach some sort of truce, Rebecca?" Linus asked. Revy's eyes widened.
"What did you call me, shitface!"
"Is your name not Rebecca? Sorry… I guess I misunderstood." Linus said.
"Call me that again, and you'll have to try to call me it through broken teeth!"
"Well then… Let's finish this scuffle so I can spend the rest of the day doing something I actually want to do." Linus said, walking down to the street. Revy followed him and squared off against him. Linus put a single hand in front of him and put the other one behind his back.
"So that I don't risk killing you, if you can force me to use my second hand, I'll declare you the winner." Linus said, seeming to show some contempt for the rather vicious woman in front of him.
"That's fine!" Revy shouted, laughing as she launched into battle against Linus, throwing a smoke bomb at the ground in front of him, blinding him and throwing a punch. Linus grabbed her wrist, though, twisting and throwing her into the building, cracking the stone that it was made of with her impact.
As they fought, it was loud enough to draw a crowd, and they all seemed excited to see the two battling. Rock started taking bets even, figuring he could make some money.
"Alright! Who wants to bet on Revy Two-Hands?" Rock shouted. One of the spectators narrowed his eyes.
"Where are her guns?"
"She decided not to use them in this fight. Didn't think she'd need them."
"Why is the man only using one hand?"
"If she can force him to use his right hand as well, she wins. She doesn't have to beat him up. Just force his hand… Quite literally." Rock said.
"I'll put 500 on Two-Hands!" The man said. Rock nodded.
Soon, a number of other people had put money on Revy as well. A few, mainly risk takers bet on Linus, who was a new guy and a wild card. Some had heard wild stories about him, but most believed they were ridiculously exaggerated. Linus' left hand shot out and grabbed Revy's face, jerking downward, throwing her to the ground. Before she hit, though, he kicked her in the stomach, driving the wind from her. She gasped, falling to her knees, gagging and coughing. Linus still had his right hand behind his back.
"Do you give up, Revy? You should see that you can't win." Linus said apathetically. He looked around, seeing that he had even drawn in Garda, Alric and Astrid. He wondered how Ludmilla and Jane were doing. They had always been free spirits, and decided to go off on their own.
"You ain't beat me until I stop moving!" Revy shouted, pulling a gun from her belt and pointing it point-blank at Linus' face.
Linus sighed. He had come to expect this kind of treachery from people. He had hoped that it would be different here, but he hadn't kept his hopes up. As he heard Revy's muscles contract to pull the trigger, he dodged to the left, twisting and grabbing her wrist, compressing so hard that her bone fractured and her shoulder and elbow were both dislocated in the same split second. He then used only his left hand and chopped her Carotid Artery, knocking her unconscious.
"I am sorry, Revy… I didn't want to fight you in the first place." Linus said, seeming legitimately unhappy that he had won. The crowd was stunned into silence. Revy was known as a juggernaut of death. Only a precious few people had ever been able to beat her. Now, this man with no weapons had beaten her into unconsciousness with such ease. Not to mention amongst the crowd, they had lost a total of about 7,000 dollars.
Rock split the money in half and distributed the 3,500 evenly among those who bet on Linus and pocketed the other 3,500. He didn't really need the money. He still had a large portion of the money they stole from the bank. But he could use it to buy a gift for Frederica. They were coming up on their one month anniversary. It seemed only right.
"Hey! Gook! You cheated us, didn't you! You knew that unarmed man would win, didn't you!"
"How could I possibly have known that?" Rock asked smoothly, reaching for his gut knife in the event that he had to fight. He hoped that he wouldn't. He didn't like his chances against an entire mob. Fortunately, Garda, Astrid and Alric stepped in and took out their weapons, keeping the crowd at length.
"If you want to keep all of your digits, we suggest you scatter. We have seen this 'Gook' as you call him fight. He could kill all of you before you blinked." Garda said quietly but with an air of contempt for the crowd. The crowd seemed to pause, and finally, they thinned out and hurried away, though whether because of the weapons pointed at them or because they actually feared Rock, he didn't know.
