Chapter 32: The Italian Job
The Yellowflag was quiet tonight, quieter than usual, as a matter of fact. Apart from Revy, Rock, Daisy, and Cletus at the bar, the only others were a small group of Mexicans in the far corner and the thief Nimble Nick at a table with three others, presumably his personal street urchins that scouted locations to burgle. Rock was currently sifting through some papers on the far left of the bar, with Revy on the other side enjoying her Bacardi and the other two in between them. Bao's establishment was getting less and less lively as of late.
"Jesus," Revy groaned, content to sit in silence no longer. "It's like a fucking graveyard in here. What you do, Bao, give the girls upstairs crabs or something?" Bao made a noise of annoyance.
"Ah, it's that Irish bastard the other side of town," he explained. "I hear business is booming over in the Pot-O-Gold. You just can't get loyal customers these days."
"I don't blame 'em, if ya ask me. This place gets shot to shit on monthly basis."
"If you like, I can send you the bill," Bao spat. "You and your friends have been the reason for half of those incidents."
"Consider me being here an investment, then," Revy quipped, setting her head down on the bar tiresomely.
"It ain't all bad over in Four-Leaf's," Cletus chimed in. "If I'd know this place was gonna be such a drag, I'd have headed over there instead, to tell you the truth."
"Is that so?!" Bao asked, irritated. He snatched up the empty beer glass in front of the American man and began to wipe it with a dishcloth. Cletus gestured for another one rudely. It would be a miracle if Bao didn't spit in it first.
"What's got Rock concentrating so dang hard?" Daisy asked, turning to the Japanese man. Indeed, he hadn't been listening to a word they had been saying as he surveyed the papers in his right hand. The glass of rum, too, sat untouched on the bar.
"Must be worrying about this job we've got tomorrow," Revy told them. "Hey, jackass!" she yelled down the bar. "Work on your own damn time! You even gonna touch that drink?!" Rock suddenly looked up, dazed.
"What?"
"Are there titties on that piece of paper or something?! You haven't said a damn word since we've been here."
"I just want to make sure everything is in order," Rock said defensively. "The last thing we need is to get halfway there only to realise we've been left short. We don't want any trouble with the Cosa Nostra."
"Jeez, you need a fucking babysitter? Ronny knows what he's doing, quit worrying. Anything gets left off that list, it's his fault, not ours. We're just the delivery boys."
"You doing dirty work for the Italians?" Cletus asked, snatching up his next beer and guzzling down a quarter of it.
"A simple transportation job, that's all," Revy elaborated. "Ronny's already giving us more business than that other asshole ever did."
"Two-Hands!" Revy looked over her shoulder to see the source of the voice and Eda walked up to the bar in her casual clothes. It was rare to see her out these days. In fact, it was rare to see her at all.
"Hey, Eda," Revy greeted her as the nun took a seat beside her and ordered a scotch. "Long time no see. The fuck have you been up to lately?"
"Oh, you know, a little of this, a little of that."
"Real specific."
"You know how it is," Eda told her roguishly. "You've been busy yourself, Revy. A little birdie's been singing all kinds of songs about Lagoon Company and their adventures."
"Fuck me," Revy groaned. "For once, I wish you'd keep your nose out of everyone else's business. You know what they say about curiosity."
"Relax. Were you always this wound up? Have another drink to calm your nerves."
"Don't have to tell me twice."
"Say, what's with Rock?" The two women looked down the bar at the Japanese man. As soon as the previous conversation had concluded, it would appear Rock had returned to his silent examinations of the paperwork he possessed.
"Never you mind," Revy warned.
"Don't be like that," Eda said in an overly whiney voice. "Come on, Romeo, what's got you thinking so hard?" Again, Rock looked up from his papers, startled.
"Oh, hey, Eda. Sorry, I'm just looking over the details for tomorrow. We've got a job from Ronny."
"Hey, Rock," Revy began. "Learn to shut your fucking trap every once in a while."
"The Italians, huh?" Eda asked with mischievous curiosity. "It's not like them to pass around jobs to just about anyone."
"They didn't," Rock chimed in before Revy could bring the discussion to a halt, though his eyes were still scanning the papers in his hand. "We received the job through Old Lady Malee." Malee was someone with connections to each of the major gangs in Roanapur in the sense that her job was to put the word out that a particular service was being sought after. She would then consider potential candidates for the job in question, though reputable outfits like Lagoon usually had no problem getting work through her. She filled a similar role to Donnie Yen, who also provided jobs to the criminals of the city on behalf of the various gangs and cartels who could not be bothered seeking help themselves.
"You don't say?" Eda said nefariously. Revy immediately became suspicious, distracting her from her desire to scold Rock for speaking so openly about confidential client information. Lagoon rarely revealed information about their next job, and only discussed the details once the job had been completed with certain individuals. Suffice it to say, Eda was not considered trustworthy, at least by Revy.
"What are you planning, Eda?" the gunslinger asked.
"Keep your panties on, Two-Hands. I don't care what you get up to in your spare time."
"I'd sooner drink a leper's piss than take your word for it."
"Charming, as always," Eda joked, taking the glass of scotch in her hand and having a drink. "Say, you're not looking so good. Who'd you piss of this time?"
"The fuck is that supposed to mean?!" Revy screeched.
"You look in a mirror recently? You sure as hell didn't do that to yourself in your sleep. Was it the 216? Heard you got into a pretty rough spot with them not so long ago."
"Keep talking and I'll make you swallow so many teeth you'll be shitting them out for weeks."
Rock finally folded the papers over and slipped them into his pocket so he could enjoy the rum that had been sitting there. None of the drinks behind the bar were refrigerated, but for some reason Rock's was even warmer than he had expected when he took a sip.
"Ah, look who decided to join the rest of us," Eda poked fun at him.
"I could say the same about you," Rock shot back. "I haven't seen you around recently."
"Aww, you been looking for me, Romeo?"
"Not exactly," Rock told her. "But we missed you in the Rip-Off Church not so long ago." Eda almost froze on the spot when she heard that. "We had to meet with Yolanda and Rico, instead. It's not like you to miss a meeting like that. It looks like we aren't the only ones who have been busy the last few weeks." For the first time in a long time, Revy looked delighted with Rock's words and immediately turned back to face Eda with an enormous shit-eating grin on her face.
"You keeping secrets, Eda?" Revy asked. She was joking, of course, in an attempt to poke fun at Eda and turn the tables for once, considering she was often the butt of the nun's jokes. "Don't want Yolanda to know you like to whore around at night, is that it?" Eda managed a forced laugh to shake off the ridicule.
"Real funny," she joked. "You're just jealous no one's taking you for a ride, Two-Hands. If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say it's been a while since anyone tried to get into those booty shorts." Revy's face instantly dropped and the others all anticipated a fight. Even Cletus and Daisy, who did not know Revy that well, had gotten a good enough impression of her the night they went after the Cat Lady that they knew what to expect from her.
"Alright, you asked for it, bitch!" Revy snarled.
"Don't kid yourself," Eda told her. "I wouldn't want to give you another black eye to match the other one." It took a lot of restraining on Cletus's part and several more rums courtesy of Rock before she eventually calmed down.
(***)
"We're just finishing up on our end," Rock said, the cell phone to his ear. "We should be there shortly."
"Alright," Dutch said on the other side. "I'll leave the details up to you, Rock. You know the drill, as soon as you're done head straight to the boathouse, no detours. Understand? I don't want to give Ronny a reason to complain."
"Come on, hurry it up!" Revy hissed. She was addressing the enormous bald man who was transferring several large crates from a van into the trunk of Lagoon's GTO. Despite his size and bulging biceps that were barely contained by his undersized leather jacket, he did not rise to her and continued to move the goods.
"I got it, Dutch."
"See you in five." Rock stuffed the phone back into his pocket and fell in beside Revy as they waited for the large man to finish. The cigarette in her mouth burned out and she let the butt fall to the ground, prompting her to light another one. Usually, that would have relieved some of the stress, but Revy was anything but predictable.
"What, ain't they paying you enough, big man?! What's the fucking holdup?!"
"Hey, Two-Hands!" came the voice of the van's driver. He stuck his head out the window and prepared to give her a piece of his mind, obviously at his wit's end listening to her moan. "You want to keep your fucking voice down?! We're not exactly supposed to be here. Didn't Dutch tell you this was on the q.t?" He was right about that. To Lagoon, this was another run of the mill job, but Ronny would have preferred if they kept a low profile. Any job came with an implied confidentiality, that was just how it was. But that was the case tenfold when the job involved any of the major gangs, especially given they were meeting with a two-bit weapons dealer in a back alley. The Cosa Nostra had a lot of enemies, and they would be sure to take advantage of the situation if they knew this was going down.
"Great," Revy grumbled quietly. "Now I'm getting words from the fucking driver."
"All done," the big man said at last.
"Fucking finally," exclaimed Revy, hopping into the passenger seat while Rock had the driver sign the paperwork. When he was done, he sat into the car and they drove out of the alley and turned left towards home. The van pulled out shortly after, turning right and disappearing into the night. It was just gone one in the morning and the city was dead, so Rock took the GTO across what would have been some of the busier streets during the day to try and save them some time. Nearing the coast, he took a sharp left onto Maadhav Street and prepared to take the main road back towards Lagoon's apartment. However, as soon as he turned the corner, he noticed the entire street was blocked off. From one side to the other, the way was blocked with cars and a line of people. Rock's first thought was a police roadblock like what had happened with the 216, but none of these men were police officers. He didn't recognise any of them, in fact.
"Oh, brother," Revy groaned. "Who the fuck are these assholes?"
"Beats me. Word must have gotten out that we were working for the Cosa Nostra."
"Wouldn't surprise me, way you were blabbering in the Yellowflag."
Rock watched the men for a few moments, but there was no use trying to ram his way through. They would have the GTO shot to pieces by the time he got to the other side and then he and Revy would be slaughtered. Instead, he took a turn into an alley to try and bypass them. That way, he would emerge onto the next street and make for the exit to the main road. Strangely, though, none of the men started shooting. The reason why became clear soon enough. Only seconds into the alley, the mouth Rock had planned to drive out of became blocked by dozens more of these people. Furthermore, they then drove a jeep across to bar anyone from leaving.
"This isn't good," said Rock.
"Yeah, no shit!" Revy replied, taking her Cutlasses in hand as she evaluated the situation. There were a lot of people in their way and even more had started to enter the alley behind them, so reversing back out onto Maadhav Street was no longer an option.
"You think you can take them?"
"You shitting me? I eat pussies like these guys for breakfast. But we need to get the goods to Dutch. Otherwise, this is a huge waste of time." Rock had no doubt in Revy's abilities, but he had to admit she was probably being a bit overconfident. As dangerous as she was, there were dozens upon dozens of these strangers and almost all of them had guns of some kind. This was a tricky situation, even for the likes of her.
Rock suddenly heard the sound of a motorcycle engine and he glanced out of the passenger side window. There was a narrower alleyway there branching off of the main alley that lead out onto another street. From there, Eda rode up on her bike and came to a stop beside the GTO while the strangers halted their advance for only a moment. Revy rolled down the window.
"Well, would you look who it is! We've got to stop meeting like this, you know that?"
"What the fuck, Eda?!" Revy spat. "You better not have anything to do with this."
"The thought did cross my mind when I heard you guys were pulling off this job," she teased, though they found it hard to believe even Eda would go that far for a quick buck. "But it sounds like someone else beat me to the punch. Word got out about what Ronny was doing even before Rock spilled the beans. You ask me, one of the smaller gangs hired these guys to steal the goods."
"That's a great fucking story," Revy growled. "Now how's about helping us out of this mess?!"
"There ain't nothing in this life for free, Two-Hands. You want my help, you're gonna have to pay for it."
"That's not funny, Eda!" Rock shouted from the driver's seat. It wouldn't be long before the strangers were close enough to take the cargo from the trunk. Thankfully, they hadn't started shooting yet, probably because Revy hadn't either. They weren't here to hurt Lagoon Company, they were here for the weapons.
"You're a real piece of shit, sometimes, you know that?!" Revy told her venomously.
"Tick, tick, tick," Eda said with far too much giddiness. "Time's running out, you two."
"You're barking up the wrong fucking tree! If you seriously think we're gonna-!"
"You got it!" Rock interrupted. "Name your price, Eda. Just get us out of this."
"Rock!"
"The job is to deliver the shipment to a village in Vietnam. If you want a cut, you'll have to accompany us on the Lagoon and make sure we aren't followed." Eda raised one eyebrow in thought.
"A deal's a deal," she told them after a brief moment. Then, she stuck two fingers in her mouth and whistled.
Suddenly, a jeep pulled up behind the men at the entrance of the alley and Shenhua leapt out of the sunroof with her kukri in hand. As soon as she fell down towards the ground, she started to slice and dice the men into pieces. Similarly, at the other side of the alley in front of Lagoon, Sawyer hopped over the jeep that the strangers had used to block the GTO's passage and started to cut down as many people as she could with her chainsaw. Lotton, it seemed, was driving the jeep that Shenhua had been in, perpetually doomed to sit out of the action whenever something went down. The carnage was over with quickly and there were gallons of blood splattered across every surface, amidst the mangled bodies.
"And I didn't even have to fire a shot," Eda said happily. "You two better get moving. I saw reinforcements coming towards you on my way here. Whoever it is trying to mess with Ronny's plans really knows how to mess shit up. These were Bren's guys." Bren, or Bren the Black Death as he was widely known, was in charge of a range of thugs and troublemakers who could be hired to interfere with the operations of others. His people had a reputation for being wild and difficult to control, and were often utilised to really upend carefully constructed plans. They were the perfect spanner in the works.
"You can meet us at the boathouse," Rock said eagerly.
"ROCK!" Revy screeched.
"That's where Dutch will be picking us up. After we return to Roanapur and get the payment from the Cosa Nostra, you can have your share."
"Much obliged," Eda told him. Sawyer had driven the jeep out of the way while they had been talking and Rock stepped on the accelerator as hard as he could, taking the GTO back out into the open. It would not be too long now until they were at the boathouse.
"Rock! What the fuck was that?! You got any kind of a brain in there?! You can give that skank your cut of the money all you want, but she's not getting a fucking cent of mine!"
"We needed an easy way out of that," Rock explained. "I just told her what she wanted to hear."
"The fuck is that supposed to mean?!"
"She won't be getting any of our cash, Revy. Trust me. She just needed to think she was so we could get her help." Without elaborating, he took the phone out of his pocket and dialled.
"What is it?" came the disgruntled voice on the other side.
"Dutch. Change of plan."
(***)
Eda hopped off of the motorcycle and put down the kickstand. She glanced up at Lagoon's apartment, hoping to see movement that would imply someone was home. Then, she looked over at the boathouse. The door had a large padlock on it. The jeep pulled up shortly and Shenhua hopped out.
"You say they be here!" she whined, immediately noticing that no lights were on in the apartment. It was as quiet as a cemetery tonight.
"They will be."
"I no see them. I no hear boat!"
"Will you keep your fucking voice down?!" Eda snapped. She looked over at the boathouse again. Not only was the door padlocked, but Shenhua was right. There was no engine noise and no sign of Rock or Revy anywhere. There weren't even tire tracks from the GTO. None of Lagoon had been here all night. It suddenly hit Eda that she had been played. Rock must have told her to meet at the boathouse so he and Revy could make their way to another location and have Dutch pick them up out of sight. They had fooled her to get out of paying her and the others. She had to admit, that was almost impressive. "Well…shit."