BLOODSTAIN
It has been a long time since she's done any real fighting. Nothing like the shootout with the Colombians last August. Her face seems eager under the passing light of a streetlamp.
Serbian territory seems quiet. It was never worth much compared to other neighborhoods, always too residential, lacking even a nightclub to draw business. Even still, there's been enough trouble that the local residents are still accustomed to shutting off all their lights and drawing the curtains in situations like this. Even the cats take shelter, and Rock can see their eyes watch him and Revy suspiciously.
"I guess most of 'em are off fighting downtown," Revy says. "I can't see a single sign they're here."
"I wonder why the Triad hasn't advanced," Rock says. Revy shushes him. Someone is shouting off to the north, and there is shooting, closer than the rest of the echoing fire downtown. It seems like the reports of snipers were not exaggerated.
This area had always been quiet, but the fighting elsewhere has made it totally deserted. Rock wonders where the people have gone. Have they evacuated? Did he really cause all this?
They're halfway to the other side, where they can take the switchback road up the hill. They just have to cross a boulevard to get into the oldest part of the neighborhood. It's all one- or two-story buildings on the other side, most of them traditional homes with their own fenced-in yards. For some reason, they both stop and take extra care to look around.
"It's clear, go." Revy nudges him and he sprints across the asphalt. The street is wide open and it makes him feel vulnerable. He jumps over the grassy median, his eyes locked on the little house across the street.
As he gets under the long eaves of the house, he hears a loud crack just by his ear. A gun aimed at him. Over his shoulder, he sees a flash of light as someone shoots at him again. He ducks behind the corner of the house and watches the trash can next to him get torn apart by bullets.
He can already hear Revy returning fire from across the street. "Rock!"
"I'm fine!"
"Keep going! Fuckers came from behind."
It makes sense. If Rock kept on to the church, Revy could focus on finishing them off.
But what if there were more people? Running into them would be a fatal mistake What could he risk? Footsteps rush towards his position. He's lost his chance to move. From around the corner, Revy appears.
"The fuck are you doing?" she says, eyes hard-set. "Go! I've got this."
"What if there are more?"
"There won't be. There's already twenty-something behind us. Move it, dumbass."
He obeys her this time, and moves onto the next house, then the one after that, crossing the little streets separating them. Judging by the sound of her gun, she isn't too far behind.
He sticks to the narrow paths between houses. Revy was right- there are a lot of men chasing them, firing freely at any hint of their presence. He can feel splinters of wood getting caught in his clothes, that's how close they're getting.
There's a narrow gap between two houses. He heads into it but finds that it's a dead end. Five or six houses were built wall-to wall around a central common area, and it boxes in whoever enters. Before he can retrace his steps backwards, Revy has followed him in.
"It's a dead end."
"Shit." She turns around but takes cover when a ricochet pings off the brick of the entryway.
The Serbian soldiers are close by. They must have known about the dead end already. When they find where their quarry has run to, they begin to joke and laugh loudly.
Revy leans around the corner and lets off a single shot. A man screams and the laughing stops.
While they shout instructions at each other and re-organize, Revy speaks lowly to him. "Find a way through one of these houses. This is a bad fucking place to get stuck in."
There are bars on all the windows, and the doors are all going to be bolted, the standard in Roanapur. He tries the doors nearest him anyway, but finds they are locked. The metal over the windows won't budge either.
Kneeling in the dirt, he takes cover at her side. "No good."
She's too busy to answer, shooting one pistol from around the corner. She has to keep them from rushing in. They almost never got trapped like this- when they had Dutch and the boat, it had been different. On their own, they would be vulnerable for the rest of their lives.
Revy grabs his collar. "Jesus, Rock. Pay attention, I'm running out of ammo. We need a plan."
Surrender is not an option, and the homes blocking them in would not open their doors to save them. Roanapur is not that kind of city.
"We could get on the roofs," he says.
"Easier to get hit up there," she says. "But, goddammit, if this situation gets any more shitty-"
She hears someone move in the alley and has to start shooting again. Rock's search becomes more frantic. The only light he has comes from a single ancient-looking bulb at the top of a wooden pole. Then one of the men outside shoots it, and the tiny courtyard is nothing but shadows.
He remembers the night he offered himself up, stepping into his apartment in complete darkness. He was back there again, trapped without light, except for the flashing fire from the muzzle of Revy's gun and the faint light of the moon.
Then he notices something. It brings him out of his memories. At first, he can't identify it.
The door across from them is moving slowly, as to not make a sound- was someone coming to offer them refuge? No. This is not that kind of city. Rock is so sure of it that he begins standing up out of his crouch. Revy won't react in time- everything seems to move so slow now.
Before Rock's eyes, the door swings wide and Bogdan steps through, a machine-pistol in his hand. The intruder can't see well in the dark, but once he spots Revy, his body turns, his arm moving.
Rock reaches under his belt for his gun- he carries it loaded and with one in the chamber, just like Revy taught him. His arm moves to raise his weapon, quick and effortless just as he trained. The white stripes of Bogdan's red tracksuit are easy to see in the dark, and he focuses his sights on the center of this shadowy form.
He squeezes the trigger and is not surprised by the light and the sound that erupt from his gun. The silhouette jerks. Rock's finger pulls the trigger again and again.
Bogdan collapses, falling to his knees before tipping over onto his face. Rock stops shooting.
Revy turns to look at the door. "What the fuck?"
Rock lowers his weapon and gulps air before talking. "That's our exit."
She lets off a last burst down the alley and follows him through the exit, stepping over the puddle of blood growing from Bogdan's body. She closes the door with her heel and Rock moves a table to barricade it.
"They'll have to go around," he says.
Revy has a mag in her mouth but grunts to agree. Bogdan's failed attempt at an ambush had given them an escape. There's no time to discuss it any further.
They slow down only once they have run through to the other end of the neighborhood. The road to the hill lies ahead, and the Serbian mafia is no longer following them. The roads aren't paved this far out.
Revy takes a deep breath, trying to recover. He can tell she doesn't like having to run from trouble instead of taking a stand and exterminating it. She brightens up when she sees the spire of the Church. "Fucking Christ, finally."
The hilltop is still quite a way off but hiking the winding trail would be easier than climbing straight up the rocky slope.
Rock puts his gun back into his pants as they begin to walk up the hill, but Revy keeps hers out.
"You shot that guy yourself, huh?" Her voice is softer than usual, coming above the sound of their walking.
"I guess I did."
"Must have been pretty fast on the draw. By the time I even saw him, he was dead."
"I just happened to be looking in the right place."
"Who knows what could have happened if you didn't ice him when you did."
Is she worried about how he is processing it? He had nearly forgotten that he had killed Bogdan, with all of the rush for escape. Plenty of other people were dead because of Rock, for years and years he had been adding to the number. It was just a more direct death this time.
"We were lucky," he says.
"Sure," Revy says. "But we're not done yet. Better hope Eda is feeling real fucking charitable, or we're gonna be stuck outside."
It will be different from now on. The Black Lagoon would not be their refuge and Dutch wouldn't be their leader. It all lay in the hands of Eda, and the forces she served. She might not be feeling merciful. They round the last corner on the road and see the Church at the end of it.
"Think she's even going to open the door for us? You fucked her plan up."
"It was just a small difference in scheduling." Already, he is preparing himself to negotiate for their lives. They have nothing to offer beyond themselves.
He's never been to the church at night and nearly misses the entrance. The only thing that stops him is a single spotlight being lit up, hitting him directly and bringing his hand up to block his eyes.
"Pilgrims? At this time of night?" The voice of Sister Yolanda comes from the church steps, which have also been fortified by sandbags.
Rock thinks he can see the barrel of a machine gun poking out from the temporary fortifications.
"Jesus Christ, will you let us in already?" Revy shouts back.
"Why?" Yolanda asks.
Revy shrugs, looking to Rock. "Your turn."
He steps a little ways forward. "Is Sister Eda there?"
From the shadows of the chapel, Eda appears, her jaw set with tension. She comes close enough so they can talk in low tones, unheard by the people behind the sandbags.
"What the hell do you think you're doing here?"
For some reason, she must feel she has the advantage. There isn't any particular sign of stress.
"We need shelter, just temporarily."
"Temporarily? After what you just pulled on Balalaika, you need permanent protection."
Rock feels his rib twinge. "Permanent protection?"
"Think about it," she says, smirking. "You got one of her best men killed. Do you think she'll let you walk even if she gets forced out of the city?"
The worst part for him is that he knows she is right. More than that, he had thought about the possibility, he just hadn't had the time to plot it out. Just last night he was calling Lotton. Now he has blood on his hands.
"You just couldn't wait, could you?" she says. "Just a week or two, and I could have got something going that would have been airtight. Instead we have a jury-rigged clusterfuck with your name all over it."
Revy steps closer to Eda so they can stare each other down. "Don't fuck around, Eda. Just say it: Are you gonna let us in or not?"
The answer comes immediately. "Yeah, but you're going to owe me."
"Owe you what?"
"I don't know yet, but it's going to be big."
"Fuck that." There's violence in her voice.
Rock tries to get Revy to one side so they can discuss the situation in whispers. There are a lot of eyes on them.
"I don't think we have a choice," he says. "We won't be able be to go back the way we came."
It isn't in her nature to seek shelter. They all know that, standing there under the spotlight. Her eyes have lost some of their ferocity, but the way she keeps looking from side to side tells Rock that she is not going to be tamed as easily as he was. The threat of being hunted by Balalaika is the most persuasive aspect of the situation.
She makes her decision and lets her hands settle at her side. "Alright, fucking fine, I owe you, Eda, you fake fucking nun."
"I knew you had it in you." Eda pivots and extends a hand in the direction of the chapel. "Get inside. I'll be right behind you, right after I discuss the details of your room and board with Yolanda."
They are allowed over the line of sandbags and up the stone stairs. The heavy wooden doors open up, and Rock moves into the dark interior of the church, a holy place so quiet he thinks he hears each exhalation echo. Then he realizes the sound is Revy. He turns his head back and sees the narrowing gap as the doors close behind him. Eda and Yolanda, covered heads close together in discussion, and then the night sky, so far in the distance.
"This would have been a crypt, if there was anyone worth burying in here. Instead, this is where Yolanda keeps sensitive guests." Eda's voice sounds louder in the tight confines of the brick-walled corridor.
"Sensitive guests? Like what? Terrorists?"
Revy's guess is so far off that Eda stops in the middle of unlocking the first metal door in the hallway. "Hell no, not unless someone's paying her to keep them. Do you know how much you two are costing me per day?"
"It can't be much compared to the total black budget of the C.I.A," Rock says.
He senses an imbalance here. Unlike him, Revy isn't sworn to serve. She will not take orders, even if it gets them both in trouble.
"We can talk about payment later," Eda says, opening the door to show them into another room.
A bare lightbulb swings from the ceiling, pushing bright light along the cracked concrete floor. There are two cots inside, two folding chairs, and one folding table. Nothing else.
"I'll be back in the morning. Let me know if you need something then."
The lock in the door clicks as Eda leaves to rejoin the rest of the church's staff, keeping guard over their hilltop. Even if the basement is very shallow, they are behind enough earth and brick to not hear a single sound of the battle, only the faint buzz of their lightbulb.
"Christ, this is worse than lockup," Revy says. "At least there you get to flush."
Prisons and jails are complete enigmas to Rock. He lays in the cot and searches his memory. The closest experiences he has are from when he was kidnapped. The next closest thing was when his mother used to punish him by locking him for hours in the storage shed in winter. It could get cold in Tokyo, and even when his body went numb, there would be no help on the way.
"It's no use," he says. Revy's been beating on the metal door and shouting curses at Eda.
Revy stops pounding to look over her shoulder. "What's got you down? You wanted this, right?"
Did he want it? It is hard to tell anymore. He is tired, and now that this environment is settling again, he has already begun slipping back into his memories. Lotton was dead, and Sawyer and Shenhua could be too. Dutch and Benny were out there somewhere, maybe caught up in his mess, maybe already escaping to somewhere like Hong Kong or Brunei. Everywhere else in the city, there is trouble. Just like in his dreams, it the imagined final battle of Armageddon, the end of the world.
People are dying, two hostile forces trying to exterminate the other, an entire apocalypse that Rock cannot see with his own eyes. Now that he is safe underground, he cannot hear it, either. It exists only in his mind, among dreams and memories.
Really, he's only seen one life end. The Serbian gang leader in front of his own gun, the muzzle flashing, the body dropping, Revy looking at him with something different in her eyes...
She gives up on the door and slides down the wall, sitting on the floor by the head of his cot. She says nothing for a while, just pulls the boots off her feet and rests an elbow on her knee. Rock stares at the ceiling. She stares at the wall.
She speaks after a while. "I left out a few details of the first time I shot a guy."
He stays silent and she continues. "I ran off into an alley right afterwards and puked my guts out. My hands were shaky as shit. I don't think I actually wanted to do it. It was all automatic, all self-defense."
She had said in New York 'no repeats, no questions' like all she wanted to do was tell her story and maybe purge it like a toxin. The past is not done with either of them.
"I mean, I spent years thinking about having that gun and shooting a guy, and when it actually happened, part of me just couldn't handle it. I thought making them die was the point, but the only part I wanted was my finger on the trigger. I hated the shit that came afterwards."
She has been playing with her lighter. Finally she spins the wheel and the fire comes out. She holds one of her cigarettes to the flame, then sticks the filter in Rock's mouth. His lips touch a finger that lingers too long.
"All I'm saying is, maybe I get it."
The trigger has been pulled, and now Roanapur is going up in smoke. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Part of him hopes he chokes.
In the morning, Eda unlocks the door. Revy practically knocks her down by kicking the door open.
"What the fuck?"
"She left her boots," Rock says. "She's coming back."
"Hmph." Eda walks in, taking a seat, sniffs the air. "You've been busy."
No comment from Rock. She stares at him hard, probably expecting more cooperation than he feels like giving. Time stretches on in silence.
"You know, I had a dog once," Eda says. "The bitch ran away on me when I was still in grade school. Man's best friend, until the day they wake up and remember they were wolves once."
"Have you decided to let us out?" He still won't look at her.
Eda sighs. "Listen, Rock. I'm pretty forgiving. I didn't lock you up in here to teach you a lesson about taking initiative. I don't give a fuck about the chain of command, as long as I get what I want."
Rock sits up slowly, his body still tired. "What do you want, then?"
"What I want right now is a little more decorum. If you want to stay in God's good graces, you need to do a little lip-service, say a few prayers, attend Mass every once in a while."
She loves metaphors, loves speaking in riddles, loves to tell sideways truths. She's been a spy for more years than Rock was with the Black Lagoon, living submerged in lies like a fish in water. He had thought Roanapur was a place where he could have lived in truth.
"What should I do?" he asks. "I have nothing else to offer."
Eda shakes her head. "Your thing with Lotton was sloppy, but I'm not looking for an Operations man. I need what's inside Rokuro Okajima's head."
His old name, or maybe his true name. The self he had wanted to leave behind: the identity of a dead man.
"Rokuro Okajima, of Asahi Heavy Industries. Went missing in the South China Sea after a pirate attack, presumed dead. He worked in the Materials Procurement department, eventually being transferred to the Rare Earths office. According to company documents, he was never a candidate for promotion."
Her face is smug as if she knows just how much it stings to have the past thrown at him in this moment.
"Rare-earth metals are a strategically important resource. You must have known that already, with how long you spent tracking them on the job. I don't care if you got turned down for a promotion, the knowledge you have from running that job is valuable enough."
"Is that what you need me for?" he asks. "My experience from years ago?"
"Yeah." She tugs on her habit to straighten it out. "Here's the agenda as I see it: the Chinese are producing rare-earth oxides at many times the rate of the rest of the world and the United States has almost no domestic capacity. They're more than happy to sell to us now, but..."
"Twenty years from now, international rivalries could put significant strain on supply," Rock answers. "That leaves the military in a bind."
"You get it," Eda says. "We'll be up shit creek without a paddle if we don't start collecting intel on alternative sources."
When he sees her leaning in, Rock recognizes that he's about to get her ultimatum.
"The Cold War is long gone, Rock. This is the age of the pax americana. Times are good, right? Worth carrying into the 21st century?"
For some, maybe, he thinks. The people of America must have been having a good decade. But Japan was stagnant, Thailand was sliding backwards, and Russia was a mess. The utopian age envisioned for the new millennium seems hollow to him, the product of wishful thinking.
Seeing his reaction on his face, Eda nods to herself.
"Yeah, I don't buy it either," she says. "I have my own reasons for doing my job. I don't care what yours are, so long as the work gets done."
Balalaika would already have a bounty on his head- there was no escaping Hotel Moscow and its vast stable of ex-military and ex-intelligence personnel. He had sacrificed his life as Rock to start the fire. What could he do now? Eda wants to resurrect his past self, a little man at the bottom of a massive organization. He cannot think of any other option. It's reincarnation.
If he lets imagination take the reins, he might be able to envision another future, one where he and Revy live rough in a hundred different places around the world, always on the run, just them and their guns in the shadowy web of the world, living each day with their lives in each other hands- living in the heat and the danger and the threat of it all.
But that is nothing but a dark dream, a reflection of Revy's past. Would she choose to go back to that life? If so, why had she pulled him into her life, made him a part of her crew, set herself up as his partner? She wants change just as much as he does. Perhaps even more.
Eda waits for his answer patiently, legs crossed with one arm thrown back behind the folding chair. For him, it is the difference between life and death. For the United States, it is a minor strategic move in the game of resource acquisition.
Rock chooses quickly.
"I'm yours," he says. "On one condition."
Eda raises an eyebrow. "Oh?"
"Revy comes with me," he says. "She gets a clean slate."
The condition is not a total surprise, but Eda does have to think about it before answering. "I don't think she's getting her name back. If you stay together, anybody who looks up her name would be able to find you. You two need entirely new identities, stuff the Russians won't ever be able to track."
Rebecca Lee, too, would join Rokuro Okajima in the next world. It strikes him again how much they share despite being so obviously different.
"Having another name isn't too bad," Eda says. "You get used to it."
When she stands up from the chair, her hand is extended, and it takes Rock a few moments to realize she wants to shake hands. Her grip is firm and she mercifully does not squeeze very hard. "Welcome aboard, Rock. It's time for you to get that 'view from heaven' you were asking about last year."