Chapter 5

Ethan sat at the small table in his apartment. On the floor beside him sat his open suitcase. In his hand was an old S&W Model 10 in .38 Special. The first gun he ever used. The same gun he had stolen from his father's desk drawer close to sixteen years earlier.

He lost track of the number of men who lost their lives to this gun. Even back then he had no mercy. His father had beaten that out of him. He remembered looking over the sights at a man who was on his knees with pure fear in his eyes, and pulling the trigger and letting the round punch a clean hole through flesh and bone, the blood and brain matter splashing back on Ethan.

Back then he had smiled at the sight. He had been turned bloodthirsty, believed that the world owed him in blood the price it had exacted from him for no reason, but now it left him empty. He felt absolutely dead inside. He was barely worth calling a man. The good he had done was outweighed by the sheer amount of evil he had done. He was a disgrace to humanity.

He flicked the revolver open. Six spent shells remained in it. The same as when he had switched to a .357 Magnum Colt Python in 1982. This was the first time he had touched the gun since he had put it in the suitcase. He reached into the case and pulled out a pistol belt with a few rounds of .38 Special in the loops.

It felt right to put it back on now. If nothing it might shut up Revy's occasional spiels about him being useless. He really didn't think he would need it, nobody really threatened him. Of course everyone left Lagoon Company alone if they wanted to live. Rock and Benny were useless in a fight, but Dutch and Revy more than made up for it.

Ejecting the casings he started slipping a round from its loop and pressing it into the cylinder. He repeated this action again, his thoughts slipping to his time around Chihuahua working as a bodyguard to some second rate hood whose name he couldn't remember.

He was hiding behind a doorway. Shots peppered the area of the wall opposite of the door. Every once in a while when the fire slacked off he would stick his .38 out and fire it 'til it was empty and withdraw it to reload. He hit a few and killed fewer, but as long as his employer was alive he would keep fighting.

His employer kept jumping up from behind a thick oak wood table he had flipped on its side for cover and spray the area down with fire from an old MP40. He had yet to hit anything with it, but he thought it made him look tough. How he had yet to be hit was anyone's guess.

A sharp resounding crack, one that could only have been made by a high powered hunting rifle was audible. At that moment his employer popped up, only to have the upper half of his head disintegrate into a mist of blood and bone fragments.

Upon seeing this he holstered his pistol and yelled out to the attackers, "Since the guy paying me is dead I'm leaving."

Looking back on it he wondered how he had survived. Nobody had tried to kill him as he left the house by the back door. Of course he wasn't sure anybody cared.

He went to load another cartridge only to find that all the chambers were filled. He pushed the cylinder closed. Standing he slung the belt around him. Except for being a couple of holes further out it felt almost the same. The holster still hung about the middle of his thigh and the other side of the belt hung above his hip, like how gunfighters in a western movie wore their rigs.

Taking the belt off he replaced the pistol in the holster and hung the gun on the head of his bed. He lay down and drifted off to sleep. Something did feel off as he was drifting, but he was too tired to care.

The clacking of an AK action snapped him out of sleep. Grabbing the grip of his .38 he rolled off the bed as his door flew open. The belt came with the gun and changed the weight, but he had enough experience to compensate. Pulling the trigger a round slammed between some columbian dude's eyes, splattering the wall behind him.

Rolling to his feet Ethan launched himself to the still open suitcase. As he landed he dropped the S&W and reached into the case. Withdrawing his hands a pair of blued Colt Delta Elite 10mms shone in the dim light filtering in his window as he leveled them at the door. The next man stepped up and half his face disappeared as one of the large pistols barked. Another stepped up and shared the same fate.

Seconds passed as he waited for something to happen. Nothing. Standing cautiously he kept the guns ready to fire at a moments notice. He jerked himself to the right and slammed himself against a wall his right hand gun aimed down the hallway in that direction. It was clear. He jumped to the other side repeating the process with his left hand gun. That way was also clear.

He looked at the bodies laying on the ground. Three of them. All were some thugs he had seen at the Yellow Flag. That wasn't surprising. If you wanted a thug that was easily disposed of that was the best place to head to. A gun was a dime a dozen in Roanapur, the people to use them were the same.

Revy woke up. She wasn't sure why. It was unusual for her. It was also unusual for her to have gone to bed sober, but she had needed to. She had not cried in too many years. She hadn't been able to, and when it finally happened it was enough to shake her to the very core.

She wasn't anything. She may have started out at a younger age than Ethan had, but he had her on the things he had done. He had taken more lives than she probably ever would, and he was repentant. She wasn't, she didn't know how to be. Could she even be called human.

She got out of bed and went to her closet. Reaching to a shelf in the top she got down a small box. Walking back to the bed she sat down and opened it. Inside was a little .32 S&W. The first gun she had used. The gun she used to kill her dad, and who knew how many people in Chinatown just so she could survive. She had always hidden it when it looked like she was going to get caught, and went back for it when she was free.

She kept only because it had started her down this road. Yeah she had possessed other guns. She had used an old Browning HiPower when Dutch had recruited her. Then a pair of CZ75s when she had met Chang. Her Cutlasses she had bought from the Ripoff Church and had a local gunsmith customize them to her standards. She didn't believe that she would be able to find any other that she would feel comfortable with now.

Taking the small revolver from the box she marveled at how it still felt the same in her hand after all these years. It was a little too small for her to grip properly now, but she could still use it if she needed to. She knew it would serve her as well now as it had then. Closing her eyes she placed it back in the box and shut the lid. She didn't have the right to get sentimental.

She felt embarrassed at having broken down like she had. She was stronger than that. But his words bit her in a place she didn't know existed. A place that she would kill away if it was possible. She didn't want the bad memories to affect her, she couldn't let them. She couldn't be weak, she had been down that road. All it got her was beaten and raped.

Her ears discerned a noise from the office above her apartment. Reaching over she drew a Cutlass from its holster and walked to the door. Listening to make sure it was safe she opened her door and silently stepped out. Hugging the wall she made her way to the stairs. She took them one at a time making sure to distribute her weight so the boards didn't squeak.

Reaching the door she opened it slowly, bringing the gun to bear upon the room as the door revealed more of the room. Scanning the dark area she noticed a figure at one of the windows, staring out over the city.

"You can relax Revy. Its Ethan. Someone had some thugs attack me at my apartment. It got torn up past being livable so I came here," the figure said turning so she could see its face.

She narrowed her eyes at him, "Give me one good reason I shouldn't go ahead and shoot you."

Ethan chuckled, "Well I could say the 'You would have done it already' line, but that whole thing is a load of shit. I can't really think of a good reason for you not to, so I leave the decision to you. But I would prefer if you found some other way of ending my life if you decide to, I've already heard enough gunfire for one night."

Revy watched him go over to the couch and lie down, removing a pistol belt and placing it on the table before hand. She looked at the revolver in the holster. The odor of burnt powder assailed her nostrils.

"You fought back, I thought you gave up on fighting," she teased trying to get him to go for the gun to give her an excuse, Dutch wouldn't forgive her otherwise.

"You won't get a rise out of me. I did fight back. I may want to live the rest of my life in peace, but to do that I need to live. Of course saying fought back is doing the event too much justice. They never got a shot off. They were some pieces of meat that used to frequent the Yellow Flag. Weren't worth what they were paid to do me in," Ethan said as he fell asleep.

Revy lowered her pistol. No matter what he would always be gutter trash, but there was something more to him than that. He had been humanity at its worst, not just seen it. There was nothing she could do to make him angry, make him pull a gun on her.

She left the office and returned to her room. Returning the Cutlass to its holster she fell onto her bed. Curling up in a ball she started thinking about the last two months.

While she had always known Ethan wasn't on the up and up, she couldn't think of a time when he had done anything before that job for Balalaika that concerned them. He treated the crew with respect and stayed in the engine room most of the time. The only time he had killed someone was when they had been boarded by a guy hired to sabotage the Lagoon during a job. The man had not seen Ethan when he descended the ladder and had gone to work trying to puncture a hole in the block of one of the boat's engines, and Ethan came up behind him and beat him to death with a pipe wrench. The only way they knew his purpose was he had a note on him giving him orders on how to disable the Lagoon the most efficiently.

That hadn't raised a flag on any of their radars though, Ethan had become very possessive of those engines almost immediately. Hurting one of them would have been akin to hurting one of his children. If he had any, she would have to ask one day.

Dutch entered the office still somewhat drowsy having woken up only fifteen minutes earlier. He walked into the small kitchen and started ransacking the fridge for something to eat. Upon finding a half eaten container of takeout that wasn't mobile he straightened up and started for the living area. Dropping down into his chair he noticed something out of the ordinary. There was a gunbelt on the table.

He stared at the foreign item for a while, either waiting for it to perform a trick or disappear, he wasn't sure which, but he knew it didn't belong to him, Revy, Benny, and definitely not Rock. It stayed there unmoving. He racked his mind trying to figure out where it could have come from. He came up with nothing. Then a hand grabbed it and it disappeared.

The half asleep man raised his head and turned it toward the couch and the man in front of it in the process of strapping the item on. Lifting his gaze further up he identified the man, Ethan Haines, his mechanic. The man who had decided to leave war and bloodshed behind him. He was wearing a gun.

"It may be the fact that I am not fully awake, and am currently about to eat some debatable substance that may or may not be food, but I swear I see my ships mechanic standing there wearing a fucking gun. However I have trouble believing that after yesterday's events. If what I am seeing is real then he better start explaining why he is in the office this early in the morning."

Ethan sat on the couch and looked at Dutch. The black man could tell that he was conflicted. It didn't take a psychoanalyst to figure that out. But goddammit he wanted a good fucking explanation. He wanted it fucking now.

Ethan spoke, "I decided to wear a gun, maybe shut Revy up some. As to my presence, some thugs attacked me at my apartment last night. Kicked my door in. Hit one between the eyes with the .38 here, took down the other two with a pair of 10mms. They never fired a shot. I thought someone may have hired them, then I thought on the fact that I carried that case from here to my apartment in broad daylight, so they must have thought it was full of money or drugs, something like that. Didn't want to trek all the way down to the harbor and the Lagoon. I decided this would be the safest place for me to crash, but I forgot about Revy and almost got shot by her last night. Also, if you have a room available I would be obliged to you."

Though not fully aware, Dutch was able to understand what was being said. Yeah, gun may shut up Revy. Was not smart to just walk with the case during daylight hours. Attack was bad, wouldn't want to go to apartment again. Was having him in the same building as Revy after what happened yesterday a good idea? His breathing meant things may not have been as bad as he thought.

Wait. WHAT THE HELL?

Dutch became completely lucid as the information processed. Ethan was wearing a revolver. He had been attacked by some thugs. He stayed here the previous night because of that. And he wanted to live under the same roof as a woman who wanted to use his blood for interior decorating.

"Have you been drinking this morning? Cause last I recall you made Revy break down emotionally. She isn't the kind of person to forget something like that, she is going to want your head mounted on a stake for target practice. If you want the room you can have it, I will take it out of your pay as expenses. I won't however, guarantee you won't wake up dead one day from her," Dutch told the younger man.

"I don't think she will murder me in cold blood like she would most other people. I hit a nerve, not a smart move, but it has her thinking. She will reserve her decision on me until she has had time to think on what she is feeling. I do feel sorry for anyone else that pisses her off. In truth the only person that is safe around her is Rock. I think that she will turn out for the better after this though," Ethan replied, his speech calm and strong.

Dutch rubbed his temples with his left hand. He used his right to drop the questionable food on the table and sat back. He could not even guess at the motives that drove this man. While he wasn't one to run from a fight, he was a deserter from the United States Marine Corps, he had run from a hostile conflict that had left its mark on so many. Ethan was the kind of person who would have rushed headlong into at one point. He was getting too old for shit like this.

"Look in the top drawer of the desk and the keys are there. I don't have them labeled so your going to have to try the doors till you find one that opens. I hope you know what you are doing."

A/N: I am sorry for this taking so long. I just started back to college and I was having trouble with the last section. If things go well I may have another chapter up by my birthday the 20th. No guarantees though. I write as the story comes to me. I am still trying to work on Hell Rising and can't come up with any ideas. Bear with me. And wish me a happy 20th birthday. One more year and I can by myself a pistol. Hurry up 2014.