DISSOLVED GIRL
Roanapur is hard to adjust to after the chill of New York. Dutch greets Rock on his first day back in the office, as cool as ever.
"How was business?" he asks. "Our clients satisfied?"
Rock shrugs uneasily. "The Triads got what they wanted, but Hotel Moscow did not. Balalaika couldn't get her boss to calm down about it either."
Dutch sets aside his book. "That doesn't sound good. But it's the middle of tourist season. I don't think they're going to act."
From his point of view, the news is so positive. Rock knows their ties with the 'Bougainvillea Trading Company' are key to Lagoon's protected existence. Without it, they could be stuck with the rest of the smugglers and pirates that ply their trade at the port.
However, they do not work exclusively with Hotel Moscow. Proof of that comes through a special order for that day. Dutch hands Rock a manila envelope full of papers.
"What's this?"
"Mr. Chang wants to see some paperwork from our last few jobs for him." Dutch says. "He asked for you to deliver it personally."
Dutch seems apprehensive, but he has no reason to intervene yet. Still, Rock can feel his eyes on his back as he steps outside.
The paperwork was an excuse to get him in front of Mr. Chang. It is time for the Triad's periodic report to Eda. Rock is looking forward to gaining new information on Hotel Moscow's activities, but not the prospect of meeting Chang face-to-face.
Still, he finds himself outside the Triad's office, looking up at Chang's penthouse from the pavement outside. He tightens his tie before approaching the door. Things have entered a new phase.
Eda and Revy are drinking beer on the couch when Rock lets himself in. The two had been quick to repair their friendship after Revy got over the surprise of finding out Eda's true allegiance. Eda isn't in her church disguise, and her mini-skirt is too revealing when she recrosses her legs.
"The big gigolo himself," she says.
"What are you doing here?" Rock asks.
"Sisters get a few days off now and then. I was just dropping by my homegirl's place, but now that you're here, I'm thinking we could try out a three-player game."
Revy tosses an empty can at her. Eda knocks it out of the air and reveals her real reason for being there. "What kind of intel did Chang give you on Hotel Moscow?"
She must have set the intel exchange up herself. Rock sits, cracking open a cool can of beer. "The situation in Russia is putting pressure on the local branch. After what happened with the Triad in New York, Moscow leadership is ordering a massive cut in operations even before the tourist season ends. Mr. Chang told me that Russians are selling their bars and nightclubs in Bangkok."
"Sounds good for me," Eda says. "If Balalaika goes to war with fewer resources, it'll be over faster…"
Revy gives Rock a hard look as she lights up a cigarette. "I need to be let in on this plan."
Eda shrugs. "There is no plan. Me and him are just on similar wavelengths. Don't be jealous, now."
Revy growls. "What do I have to be jealous of? I can fill in the blanks. You want the Serbs gone and getting rid of Hotel Moscow is just the icing on the cake. 'Cause you two are just a fake nun and a Jap businessman, you can't do anything real to get rid of them, so you're going to use the rest of the city to do the hard part."
"Not bad for a girl who never made it to high school," Eda says.
"Education doesn't have shit to do with it," Revy says. "Rock told me the whole story last August."
Eda lowers her sunglasses. "I didn't tell Rock to make a plan until December."
"Funny how he works." Revy blows smoke.
"What's our timetable on this?" Rock asks, eager to change the subject.
"My timetable says we'll be ready to roll a few weeks after March, but that's only if I bust my ass to make it happen."
It must be a CIA priority to have Roanapur fully functional until peak season drops off. A potential conflict would be less messy once international tourists have returned home.
"Skip the fucking paperwork," Revy says. "A few months from now, your opportunity is gone."
Rock nods. The situation is changing with every day, and he can't bear to wait for it.
"My money, my schedule," Eda says. "Neither of you move until I've got the pieces in place. Got it?"
"Whatever," Revy says.
"Good girl." Eda throws her the middle finger as she walks out the door.
"Fuckin' Christ, Rock, of all the people you had to start sucking up to..." Revy shuts the door and locks it. "She made a move on you yet?"
"Of course not," Rock says.
"Yeah, she doesn't have the guts."
For the next few months, a revolution is impossible. The city is unwilling to change, its alleys and alcoves flooded by a burst of foreign cash. It's the only kind of foreign invasion that could be effective. Opposed to the regular tourists who begin in Bangkok and make their way across the country, many of the visitors have come to Thailand specifically for Roanapur. Rock can see the men in the streets moving in packs, drunk or high and stumbling to their next fix of creature comforts—Rock rarely has the displeasure of talking to one of these tourists, but they seem to be a seasoned bunch.
They can't find what they like in other cities anymore. They openly decry the 'bargirls and streetmeat' scene in the more pedestrian cities. Roanapur had the dirt and dark of the entire world spread out in attractive displays, and the foreign men abandon themselves to the feast. Rock does not know where they return to, nor where their money comes from, but he knows that these anonymous faces are what have made the city so important. During the Vietnam War, soldiers on R&R created a market for sex, drugs, and nightlife. Their traditions continue, old demons in the body of new men.
Their debauched campaign through the streets needs constant resupplying, and the Black Lagoon carries a few rush shipments from time to time. Sometimes alcohol, sometimes drugs, sometimes women. Dutch prefers not to accept unwilling sex migrants onboard, but the line is hard to see and everyone limits their scrutiny, for the sake of their own sanity. That is how Roanapur makes all men complicit in its sin. Even the innocent look away for their own good.
Rock watches his face becomes set in the mirror, deadening into an impassive mask as he waits for Eda to give him the sign. He looks down on the streets and dangerous thoughts fill his mind. The city is safe for these men, at least compared to the rest of the year—the Commission that governs the city ensures a heightened peace with threats of violence and monetary payments the pickpockets, thieves, and robbers. If a bad reputation spread, they would never return to the city, the men would all seek their pleasures just across the border in Cambodia or Laos.
The pigs are on parade, and Rock eyes them as a predator would, hungry, scheming. These foreigners all have to come from somewhere, most of them old enough to have families of their own. Their governments would not want to see them hurt, just as much as Mr. Chang and Balalaika do not. It is an opportunity that only comes once a year, and the stakes will never be higher than right now in 1999. Rock finds that he cannot wait for a new millennium. He feels the compulsion to act before Eda is ready. Invisible plans have been forming in his head, but he manages to hold each impulse back at the last moment, right before he picks up the phone and starts making calls.
A few days before Valentines, Rock is interrupted from his silent struggle against his impatience. Dutch, Revy, and Benny are out for the day getting new parts for the boat. He is looking up at ceiling tiles, fingers twitching at his side as he lays on the couch.
A phone call comes. Rock barely even lets it ring, snatching the receiver and sitting up.
Oleg is on the phone, making an appointment between Rock and Balalaika to discuss potential business for the next month. It's a common occurrence, but Dutch is usually the one who makes the in-person visit. He feels no apprehension about getting out and heading down to her. Maybe the tourist buzz has detached him from reality, or maybe he sincerely thinks there is nothing to worry about from Hotel Moscow.
He is well known at the headquarters. They do not even bother to thoroughly search him anymore, already convinced that Rock will never pose a threat. He has never disclosed the existence of his special holster and the handgun stored below his belt. Revy told him to keep it a secret, at any cost.
When he arrives, the head of Hotel Moscow is still embroiled in some other issue. Rock approaches the desk but waits patiently. Balalaika acknowledges him with a small nod.
"Tell the lieutenant to come here himself," he hears her say to a subordinate. "I'm too busy for games."
To Rock she explains "The leytenant from Mexico is running low on girls for his houses. He should have considered his lines of supply before his offensive on the Colombians, but I'll forgive him for that. He would not be the first commander to extend himself too far."
Angel is at the office within a few minutes, even though most of the people in town prefer being fashionably late. He's eager, and his hair has been growing in since August, so he seems far from military.
He turns his gaze away from Balalaika. "Ah, Rock is with you."
They shake hands and Rock feels the violence in Angel's fingers, hidden just below the skin, just behind the eyes. He fits well into the city, despite the illusion of change.
When he steps to Balalaika's desk next, she doesn't stir. "Save the handshaking for after the deal. I hear you want to borrow some of our girls."
"We can pay," Angel assures her. "We did not account for the vacancies within Colombian territory."
"Reconnoiter your targets better next time," she says. "I can lend you a few girls for now. They won't be clean, but they should suffice. If you want more, you will have to pay me half their take and a few thousand as a security deposit."
"You do not trust me?" he asks, hand to his chest. "But very well, Capitan. I accept those terms."
She waits until he is gone and the door is closed before smiling to herself. "He is still learning how to command at this level, but initiative outweighs experience in my eyes."
Her opinion of Angel seems high, perhaps higher than Dutch or Mr. Chang. If Rock hadn't seen her indifference towards outsiders, he would have thought Angel was being mentored by her. What had Revy said about Balalaika having a 'type'?
The business the offers the Lagoon Company matches well with what Mr. Chang has told him: one-way smuggling runs as Hotel Moscow tries to offload its merchandise. After years, Rock has enough experience to hammer out the details with her—what ports they will go through, who they will make deals with, and how much will need to be paid in fuel and bribes. Even so, each upcoming contract takes time to plot out. The sun begins to go down, and Rock looks to the sky beyond the window. Revy must be back in town by now.
Balalaika stops working for a second. "You aren't tired, Rock? You have quite the work ethic."
"I'm fine," he says. "New York was like a vacation."
"A vacation." She repeats the word sourly.
"Unfortunately," Rock adds, remembering the sudden falling-out that gave him the time off.
"I don't blame you," she says, and he nearly believes her. "Every treaty comes to an end, and I've been waiting for this one to die for a while."
She seems relaxed. "I have unfinished business with Chang and the Triad. Maybe I should be grateful instead?" Finally, she is talking of war. the conflict that he has dedicated himself to achieving. She seems so willing to bring it. It is too good to be true.
"I never cared about this city," she says, then her eyes turn to him icily. "That's why I haven't tortured you yet to find out who is backing you."
Just like that, the trap is sprung. Her posture has turned predatory, and her smile shows teeth clenched on a cigar. She removes it to speak. "I know you're talking to someone, Rock. I found out on the day you brought Angel here. As a sniper, I understand sight-lines. You claimed to see things that your eyes could not have perceived."
Rock knows he's done, can already see that he is dead in her eyes. In Japan, he saw her shoot people just after giving them a moment of surprise. He can imagine her gun already.
The gun. Rock remembers the Glock holstered below his belt. Could he draw it? No, he knows better. There is no way he can shoot his way out of Hotel Moscow's headquarters.
"You're thinking about your gun," she says. "I developed a technique with the Afghans. One can easily pick out the fighters among the civilians by threatening their lives. The innocent ones are nothing but afraid. Enemies would not panic. The dushman looked like you do right now, japonski. A civilian begs for their life on instinct, but you, you must be thinking about whether you can kill me."
She laughs when she sees his expression of guilt. "Chang really had his way with you, didn't he? Was that all it took? I should have told Dutch to make you carry a weapon much earlier. There is a saying in my country: In a quiet lagoon, devils dwell. Only now do you show your true face."
Rock inhales, forcing himself to regain his composure. Then he does the only thing he knows how to do: speak. "You don't think I'm a threat, do you?"
Her gaze turns impassive again. "Don't flatter yourself. I do not tolerate the existence of threats. You are a resource, for now. I don't think you'll continue plotting now that you know I am watching you."
"Is that your honest opinion?"
"Yes, it is," she says, and her stare freezes him as she sets her cigar aside to burn uselessly in an ashtray. "You do not reach my position without being able to judge people. Do you know what I've learned? The closer a man is to death, the truer he is to himself. I found it quite funny, when I first pressed my gun to you and found what a foul little devil wore your skin."
She laughs a bit. "You're not a devil because you are powerful or evil, no. You're a devil because you have nothing in you but self-interest. My men were pushed to this life by deprivation. You drifted into Roanapur and chose to stay here from nothing more than bourgeois boredom."
Rock can't disagree with her. The pretense of schoolboy morality has long since been dropped from his value system. Yet still there is something in him that cares, or so he hopes.
She smiles at his inner conflict. Balalaika's sadism is purely cerebral, and she seemingly never has enough. She had been the one who sent him the photograph of Yukio Washamine straight from their kill board. The picture still had the girl in her school's seifuku uniform, but with a red X marked out over her face.
"Can you tell why I've let you go on this long?" she says, almost sneering. "How could I have kept a collaborator so close?"
Is she about to kill him to keep her secrets safe? That would be one way to start the war.
"I permit your existence because you are predictable. I could hand you a knife and turn my back, and you would not be able to stab me."
She is right. He has only gone as far as he has because he thought that Balalaika was in the dark about his plans. The surprise confrontation has paralyzed him.
Her high-backed chair swivels away from him. "This is the last time we'll be seeing each other. Before I take the city, I felt it necessary to remind you I knew this could have happened, all the way from the beginning. Now that the battlefield is set up, I need nothing more from you. Just don't get in my way, Rock. I'll kill you."
There is a split second where Rock thinks he can say something, anything, to take back the dignity he has just lost. But the Lagoon Company has been doing her jobs, paid with her money. Despite being born under a different economic system, Balalaika understood capitalism quite well.
With nothing worth saying to her, he simply steps out of the room, closing the door behind him. There isn't a driver waiting to take him home this time.
Rock doesn't know how to go on. How often had he dreamed of this confrontation? His fear and his fantasy- a climax that would satisfy after months of building tension- his showdown against the city. The bubble has popped too early, his moment ruined.
He does not remember how he leaves Hotel Moscow's building. He stumbles through the streets of Downtown through throngs of tourists, directionless. At some point, he finds himself in front of Revy's door.
He knocks and she answers, confused.
"A gentleman caller, this late?" Eda says from the couch when she sees him in the door. "Damn, Revy."
"Shut up," she says, still looking at Rock. "What happened?" Her hand settles on his shoulder and pulls him inside.
"Balalaika knows," Rock says. Revy pulls him through the door and slams it shut, locking and bolting it. Eda racks the slide on her Glock and peeks over the window.
"She isn't angry," Rock says, but Revy drags him down to the floor.
"Rock, you need to shut up now," she says, and nudges him under the bed with her boot. She listens at the wall by the doorjamb, then gestures for Eda to peek the blinds again.
Eda watches for several long seconds before determining that they are not being assaulted. "We're clear for now. Now let Rock explain how his cover got blown."
He crawls from under the bed. "She sprung the surprise on me just now. She knows I'm in with Chang, but I don't think she knows about you on the other end."
Eda holsters her gun. "That's a big assumption."
"She could change her mind whenever," he says.
Eda shakes her head. "She's a soldier. If Rock was a target, it would be obvious."
"Yeah," Revy says. "They'd probably be giving him back to Dutch in installments right now."
"She wants the war," Rock says. "And not a skirmish or two. She wants peace off the table entirely."
"That explains why you're still skin-on and bone-in," Eda says. "But if she finds who else is backing you..."
She doesn't have to finish. Balalaika's animosity towards the U.S Government and its spies was overwhelming. Not even Dutch would be safe if Rock were identified as a CIA asset.
"No face-to-face contact outside the Church now," Eda says. "I gotta split before I run out the slim chance I'm not fucked, too. The timetable will be the same. No fighting until the tourists are out of town."
Revy takes a while to wind down after Eda is gone. She's looking over from the bed when he comes back from the bathroom. "You look burned out."
"Who isn't?" Rock sits by her feet.
What was an anticlimax for Rock is much different for Revy. This moment always comes when he's got a plan, the time she puts aside her version of events and sees the reality of who he is and what he does. He had been honest with her, but Revy has long lived on the rule of 'seeing is believing'.
"They're all using you," she says. "You know that, right?"
Balalaika only wants to fight. Eda only wants to hamper Russian crime and remove the Serbian Mafia. Chang wants to leave a clean slate for his successor. For this moment only, all of their desires coincide in Rock.
She sits up to stare him down. "You're just going to take that? Just because she told you she has eyes on you?"
"I haven't accounted for her." Rock scrunches his fist.
"This ain't like you." "You're acting like you have three bosses now."
He grimaces. "You're right. But they're not my bosses. They're the pins that keep the rest of the city in place. I can't change the board under them."
"Bullshit."
Rock is surprised by the interjection. She has stood to the side on most of his scheming until now. "What?"
"Bullshit that you can't change the board. Who cares who's been calling the shots before this? Fuck 'em, it's your turn now. Make your move."
She's challenging him on purpose, the look in her eyes sparking something at the base of his brain. She is right. He needs to disregard everything already committed against him on the board. There have to pieces that have not yet been called into the game. It takes a couple of minutes to come up with a solution, while he paces across the floor of her bedroom.
For all of his talking and thinking on the issue, Rock knows there's one group he hasn't factored in- the last player in the game. The Roanapur Police. While Chief Watsap and his officers take an absurd amount of bribe money, the police force has certain limits on its tolerance. If their authority were challenged directly, they would respond with violence.
Rock has seen drunks and junkies getting beat in alleyways, has seen the bloody aftermath of the small gangs trying to get by without paying hush money. The police are not afraid of violence. Every now and then, Roanapur's police need to offer up a sacrifice to show the national government they are doing their job. Usually they used some local gang that wasn't up to date with its bribes. But from time to time, the Commission running the city lets Watsap take a larger bite. When they feel like they need to prove themselves, the police will act quickly and without mercy, using all of the equipment they've confiscated and hoarded from years in Roanapur.
Mr. Chang and Balalaika are already willing to go to battle. They both act as though they have absolute control of the world around them, but he sees no reason why they should decide when the war starts. In his eyes the conflict can be started quite easily by a third party. It will need no approval from a higher power.
Rock's first call goes to Shenhua's place.
The lady of the house answers. "Who calling?"
"It's Rock."
"Aiyaa, Rock? Why you call? Revy in too much trouble again?"
"No, it's not that. I have a job for you."
She gives him a few beats of silence before answering. "You make trouble. Mr. Chang say I no take jobs from you. Bye, okay?"
"Wait, wait," Rock says. "Could you put the Wizard on the phone?"
She sees no reason not to let her least capable roommate to the phone and relents. Lotton 'the Wizard' announces himself soon afterward.
"The Lagoon Company's tactician makes calls in the dark of night... Surely, there is business afoot- or perhaps it is just the first purifying breeze of the new millennium..."
There's no point in refusing to play along. "Indeed, Lotton," Rock says. "There are deeds that need doing, but there are few in this hellish city who have the resolve to act."
"Resolve, you say?" Lotton inhales sharply, probably making some pose on the other end. "It is true that the shadows of this city are made of a shade darker than black. One can lose themselves easily in their depths..."
"If you believe you can brave the night, I have a job for you," Rock says, feeling more than a little foolish. "A man needs to die, but it must look as if it has been done by a certain person."
"Truly dishonorable, Rock, but if these eyes of mine have seen anything of your actions beneath the moonlit sky, I know that you have some purpose of your own... And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches towards Roanapur to be born?"
"It's big, Lotton. It's the turning point"
"You are asking me to burden my soul with the life of another man. That is a lot for me to wager, Rock. What offer you against such a weighty penalty?"
"200,000 dollars," Rock says.
The Wizard sputters before he gets the line he wants. "T- The Hounds of Hell stir in my heart once again- they are baying for the blood of a stranger. Um, and where shall we meet to discuss the details?"
Rock smirks. Even subconsciously, he had known a time like this would come. He's been scrounging money for years. Lotton will get nearly all of it. There were no limits now. He would break Roanapur or die trying.
Revy watches as he dials in the next number. "Who are you gonna call next? The cops?"
Even despite the seriousness of the situation, he smiles. "Yes."
The next day, Benny sees him walking down the street and pulls a bootlegger's turn to get on the correct side of the road. Rock barely notices the sound of shrieking rubber.
"What are you doing out here?" Benny asks, beckoning him into the car. "How did that thing with Balalaika go today?"
"It's already done."
"If you say so," Benny says, as his eyes glance over to check Rock's expression.
He has the Trans Am rolling through town at a sedate pace, turning in wide, slow arcs. He keeps the engine in low gear the entire time. Even uphill, Benny controls the throttle and clutch with such precision that the engine seems to only growl softly as they climb.
"Me and Dutch dropped some cargo off at that man's place in Yala."
"Volatile cargo," Rock guesses.
"It was definitely explosive. Packed in sawdust and everything. You remember the older guy from the Kuala Lumpur run in August, right?"
Rock remembers him, or at least the burst of inspiration he had received on the trip. "Warid."
"Yeah, the guy with the scars. He came on board and inspected the shipment, but all of the actual orders were coming from another man, a guy who looked local. I guess that means Warid is a consultant."
"I didn't know you were that interested in this," Rock says.
"I'm not. I just thought you would want to know."
They exchange glances. Benny doesn't ever look into things beyond his orbit. That is how he chooses to survive in Roanapur.
The car is headed out of town along the coast. Benny pulls onto a gravel lane that offers something of a scenic overlook. Even from the window, they can see steep hills descending down to thin beaches, and the sea spreading far out beyond it. The engine idles and they both listen to the car run for a while before Benny shuts it off.
"What's going to happen to us?" He asks the question like he's asking about the weather.
"What do you mean?"
"Ever since you got back from New York, I've seen that look in your eyes. The one you get when you're playing for keeps. If something's coming, we deserve to know."
Benny's concerned expression is so rare that Rock feels some form of obligation to answer. Rock decides he is owed an explanation. He won't be able to stop it, anyway, even if he wanted to.
"I'm expecting a wide-scale conflict in the very near future," Rock says. "At first, it will only be the Triad versus Hotel Moscow. Once Balalaika pulls out and Mr. Chang has left to return to Hong Kong, I'm expecting the Commission they built to collapse. The ensuing conflict will either destroy the city's crime infrastructure or get global attention. Either way, Roanapur won't be able to return to what it once was."
Benny breathes deeply through his nose, holds it, then lets it go. "I only needed the part up to where the first war happens. That's where the Lagoon Company gets fucked."
"We can survive it."
"Even if that's true, I think you shouldn't say 'we' so casually. Dutch made it clear the last time you wanted to cause trouble. He doesn't do politics."
"I might be able to make it without Dutch," Rock says. He has been preparing for that by being useful for Eda. His partnership with her was never supposed to be suicidal. Even if it had involved sacrifice, it was meant to be transformative.
Benny's voice grows louder. "What about Revy? You're going to leave her?"
"Why does that matter to you?"
Benny opens the car door instead of answering, and they both step outside. There is only a weak wind, and the waves are dozens of meters away. It's quiet.
"I'm serious, Rock. You're taking her with you, right? You're not just leaving her here."
"It's not about what I want," Rock says. "You know Revy can survive anything in the city. Why is it important she ends up with me?"
He still isn't sure why Benny is so insistent. For some reason, he wants that piece of information first.
Benny is leaning against the hood of his car, holding his glasses in one hand while the other pinches the bridge of his nose. He looks older now than when they first met. The entire crew has aged, but the bags under Benny's eyes say a lot.
"I guess none of us ever told you," he says. "But I used to have a thing for Revy. She saved me, just like she saved you. Pulled me into the crew of the Lagoon."
That fits in Rock's mind. There always was a tension between Benny and Revy that didn't exist with Dutch. He had thought it was just a personality clash at the beginning. How deep had it gone?
"I'm surprised she didn't tell you," Benny says. "I used to be worse than you ever were, whining about right and wrong all the time, talking about good and evil and justice and all that stuff. Then one day, I told her off for shooting an unarmed guy and Revy turned the gun to me. Right then I realized I didn't really care about morality one way or the other. I guess that's the difference between you and me."
"What do you mean?"
"Let me put it this way: When Revy bought me the Hawaiian shirt, I never took it off."
Benny puts his glasses on but keeps his eyes on the sea. "With the way she is, she isn't going to ask you up-front to come with you, but you better make space for her, because no one else will."
It's a lot for him to say.
"Thanks, Benny."
"Don't mention it." He settles back into his car and starts the engine before realizing something. "Just do me one favor. Let me know when you're about to pull the trigger. I need to set myself up for life after the Lagoon Company."
"The shooting has already started," Rock says, looking at his watch. "Should have happened five minutes ago."
Benny blinks in shock. "Wha... Already?" His hand settles into his bangs for a second. He accepts it quickly. "Fine, Rock, but I have to drop you off somewhere. I have people to contact."
"You don't think you're being too hasty?" Rock asks, already buckling his seat belt. "Mr. Chang won't be leaving for months."
Benny pulls onto the coastal highway, headed back towards Roanapur. "There's no such thing as too early. Take it from me, I found out the hard way. You need a real head start to get it right, unless you like waking up to an AK in your face on day three."
Before they even get into the city, there's a police checkpoint. The police sergeant there takes a look at both of them, then checks Rock again. "You still with Hotel Moscow?"
Benny freezes up, too careful to say anything, but Rock leans forward. "The Lagoon Company is strictly neutral, Officer. Why? What seems to be the problem?"
The Sergeant grumbles. "Police business. Move on."
Despite the policeman's reticence, Roanapur's "Finest" are making the greatest showing in their history. They have checkpoints throughout the city, using their cars to block off lanes while sandbags are being piled up at certain corners.
Most of them are wearing old flak-jackets from the Vietnam war, except for the few rich enough to purchase newer bulletproof vests for themselves.
"Do you actually have an idea on what happened?" Benny asks, eyeing the rifle-toting cops.
"A Thai cop shot by a Russian gun," Rock says.
"You set that up?"
Rock declines to answer, for Benny's safety. He gets let off in front of the warehouse.
"Okay, man," Benny says. "You know what to do, I guess. You've known it for years."
"Good luck with your preparations, Benny. Thanks for the ride."
Rock climbs the stairs to the warehouse and waits at the top long after the Trans-Am's engine has faded out of earshot. He can sense something in the room behind the door, or maybe he has just been expecting it. He turns the door handle and enters, and the first thing he sees is the gun in Dutch's lap.