Chapter 18
August 12,1982
Near Tula de Allende
Hidalgo, Mexico
With every pull of the trigger one of the glass bottles would quiver, but never shatter. The .38 projectiles seemed meaningless to them on the late summer day. A slight click signaled the reloading of the weapon, and soon six more rounds traveled down range. Again not a single bottle turned into a spray of glass shards. The effort was in a single word: pathetic.
"Nino, I told you before, pull the hammer back and point. Aiming with a pistola is useless. Point at the target. Double action fire is heavy and inaccurate, accion unica is lighter and more accurate, less time for the gun to jump. Try again," a weathered Mexican said sternly.
"Si, Manuel," sixteen year old Caleb Coffey said.
Lifting the gun so he could see it down the sights with both eyes he fired at a bottle. A heartbeat later the bottom of the bottle collapsed in on itself as a 130 grain full metal jacket sped through it. A smile cracked the face of the older man, and spread as the younger clicked the hammer and dropped it busting the last five. The boy was rough, but he had the potential to really be great at this god forsaken profession.
"Espectacular Caleb, now you have nothing to fear from any botella de refresco in the world. We get you this good with a rifle or escopeta then the world will start shaking in its boots. Now, what should we do for cena?"
September 12, 1997
PT Boat Black Lagoon
South China Sea
"Jink right, jink right," Ethan yelled.
As the boat jerked to the right Ethan and Revy let out bursts of automatic fire taking down the men chasing them on the jetskis. Rounds pinged off the armor around them as they took cover from badly aimed fire. The events leading up to this were interesting.
"Revy, remind me to kick your ass when we get back. IF, we get back."
"You know how I feel about people grabbing my ass. Next guy that does it without me giving him the look gets his bullet between the eyes," the female gunslinger called back.
"WHAT LOOK, you have only three looks, drunk, bored, and excited/murderous. You could have at least waited until we had made the exchange completely. I mean honestly, who shoots the guy that has the money before he hands the money over. It is stupid."
Which was true. Most people with any business acumen know that the gun smuggler is always a bad man, and the bad man has a large number of not so bad, but still not very good, people with guns he pays to shoot people who cross him. Rock had tried to warn the currently deceased smuggler that the looks he was making towards Revy would not be healthy, but he was a greedy idiot who had probably been brought into the family business, and hadn't fully realized the idea of risk and reward.
The M60s that the two of them had managed to set up in the machine gun posts were the only thing that was keeping the smaller craft at bay. Thankfully Rocks idea that they should have some arming there considering how often they were pursued had finally been agreed to by Dutch, though Revy and Ethan had both agreed that a couple of .50 cals or maybe a couple of 25mm guns would have been preferable. Still they were putting out more fire than the 9mm sub machines guns they had aimed at them.
"Honestly, this is frickin' ridiculous. Who carries that many jetskis on their yacht? I know he had the money, but jeese motherfucker have some fucking sense," Ethan grumbled as he stitched a particularly long burst across a pair of them, the corpses sliding off the slowing machines.
"No kidding. Though I'm more impressed that they are doing this without even being on a payroll now. I mean, we just keep mowing them down and they keep coming. It's like one of those scenes from a bad action story. They must have really liked the guy," Revy stated as she replaced the belt on her weapon.
"Professional image. You litterally covered several of them in their boss' brain matter in front of them. They don't kill us who is going to hire them after this. You still shouldn't have fucking done, and now I'm out of ammo."
Typically a person with an empty machine gun took cover. That is if they had a great amount of common sense and weren't desensitized toward excessive violence. Ethan being the exact opposite simply drew his current chosen gun, a long barreled .357 magnum. Without a hint of hesitation he fired his first shot, sending a 132 JHP toward the men on the watercraft, and consequently acquired every muzzle in his general direction.
"Good one."
"Shut it Revy. I got this."
Raising up enough to see down the sights he managed to knock a couple more out, and the rest finally turned away. Probably more from fuel than fear. Regardless both of the gunners slumped back in their posts and breathed a sigh of relief
"Hey Ethan, who taught you to shoot like that," Revy asked later as they caught some rest in the hold.
"I might have been sixteen. Old Mexican that was like a father to me taught me. Said that aiming took too much time with a sidearm, so he trained me so that I can do the old movie quickdraws and such. Wouldn't try one in a real fight, but it does scare the hell out of people."
As Ethan sat back against the cabin he closed his eyes and let his mind wander back to those happier times. There weren't many of them, and he cherished every single one of them. It took him most of his life to understand he couldn't replace them with booze and easy women, but he finally did.
"You ever have anything like that Revy, I mean everyone has to have that one bright point in their lives. And I don't mean all those times you just popped a hole in between some idiots eyes," he asked his female counterpart.
"I had Chang when I first got here. Guess he is similar to what you had. Still, we aren't meant to have happy times, why the fuck do you think we are criminals living in the worst city on earth, we won some fucked up lottery? Get fucking real man," she said chuckling.
"Still, there has to be more to life than all the killing, I've spent sixteen years in this game, coming up on seventeen and it hasn't been all artillery and napalm. I got to see the world, and screw women of every skin color. There are men who dream of that kind of thing, I've done it and found out how hollow it is. I mean, you can't stand there and say that we don't have the right to fight for something better than to end up in a gutter with a .45 in the back of our head."
"They must of scooped out the part of your brain that had any sense in it. I am going to stick by my motto. Live fast, die young and leave a good looking corpse. Makes things so much simpler."
Ethan could only chuckle, "Hail Ceasar, we who are about to die salute you."
Revy's only response was a middle finger.
"It is Ok Dutch, even I would have trouble faulting Rebecca for her actions. I must say that even I am not a stranger to such conduct," Sister Yolanda told the two men.
Looking at her Ethan had trouble imagining the image of someone groping the Mother Superiors posterior. Especially with that one eye missing, that was creepy on a nun. Though she may have been quite a looker in the 40's. The tall slim number next to her was a different story though, kinda reminded him of someone he couldn't quite place off hand though. He might have to try to see under that habit one day, despite the Glock 17 under her shoulder.
"Revy blowing a guy with lead for copping a feel, classic," the hot sister commented.
"Eda, mind your language. I have already told you that we are going to tone down your disrespect and blaspheming. Which reminds me, I found your little booze stash hidden in the confessional."
Eda stiffened, "That one isn't mine. Revy must have hidden it to frame me, you know how it is with her. It might even be one of the other acolytes."
"I will deal with you later, mustn't be a bad host now. I will look for a new buyer for the weapons, hopefully an end user rather than a reseller. I seem to have such a streak of bad luck with them. Anyways, do not feel that your reputation and relationship with us has been impacted in anyway with this incident. We will continue to rely on you for waterborne transport of our products."
Ethan wasn't the best businessman, never actually needed to be that good at it, but he knew when to give unconditional respect, "From the bottom of our very selves we thank you for your understanding, Mother Superior, and look forward to many years of continued dealings."
"My dear Ethan, I've told you before that you mustn't be so formal. Despite it being nice that there is a gunslinger in this image of Sodom and Gamorra that can show such. I am ashamed that even my own do not always show such deference. That is something that I intend to remedy in the coming months."
PLUBBM.
The heavy bag shook as Ethan's blow landed solidly followed by another three blow combo. Keeping himself in shape was the same as staying alive. Fat mercs live short lives. It wasn't a health slogan, it was reality. He had lost count of how many fat men he worked with that had been to slow to dodge a rifle burst. He didn't plan to be one of them.
"Still mad?"
"Need to even guess? Revy, I may be one to talk, but you are fucking reckless. I at least wait until an engagement to start doing something stupid. You could have gotten all of us killed. This life isn't all a murder show. I know you have been sheltered from the wider reality of it here, but the people of this place are burn outs. They are worthless and worn out from the rest of the world. Which makes me wonder, what are you doing here?"
Revy scrunched her nose, "What the ever loving fuck does it matter cockhead? It isn't your place to lecture me on anything. What I do is on me. I don.."
"YOUR FUCKING RIGHT IT'S ON YOU. Our deaths will be too if you don't wisen up. What happened on that yacht was stupid. We had a missile on the Lagoon with a two mile range that would have sunk it without anyone knowing. Force for force in that case. Regardless, I could have died, Dutch could have died, Benny could have died, and even Rock could have died. Why? Because you don't know how to think before you act. Revy, I have led people like you more than once. I watched each and every one of them die. I don't want to see the same happen to you, whether I'm leading you or not."
"You really mean that," the woman replied.
Ethan caught the bag from his last blow, "Revy, your like a little sister to me. I've told you my story. I was an only child, and I never had a chance to form this kind of bond before. I was always on the move. Killing in one spot, running VIPs in another. I yearned for some kind of family, but I always had to suppress that part of me."
" I know what you mean to a point. Look don't repeat this to anyone. I was born in NYC. Lived most of my childhood in Chinatown. Specifically Mott St. It was a real shithole, not too much unlike here. I ran with street kids most of it. My old man never cared, even used it as an excuse to beat me half unconscious. He blamed me for whatever happened to my mother. Whatever the fuck that was, happened before I can remember. Me and the other gutter rats. Eight years old I found a little .32 S&W, a Model 30, still have it and everything about it burned in up here. I put a pillow over his head, but I didn't do anything that first time. I should have, cause it got worse. At thirteen I did it. Spent the next two years on the street. I got a 9mm S&W and learned to shoot it in a back alley. Killed a guy by accident and got picked up by a couple of pig cops. Raped me in a holding cell, nobody even tried to stop them. I somehow managed to get released from juvie after a couple years, and just floated. First I tracked down and killed the bastards that worked me over. Ran down the coast, and I stowed away on a cargo ship. I didn't know that this ship was in the path of a torpedo boat that was interested in robbing it. While Dutch robbed them I managed to sneak on the Lagoon. When he found me he actually laughed. Which thinking back it was kinda funny. I was trying to hold his shotgun on him, and at 17 the thing was bigger than I was. Malnutrition and all that jazz.
Said something along the lines of, 'Take me somewhere that has some food and hand over any cash you have'. Long story short, he had me hanging upside down by the foot before I even knew what had happened. Come to find out at that time he didn't keep that shotgun loaded most of the time. I really wouldn't have blamed him if he had busted my skull open on a bulkhead, instead he gave me a sandwich and a beer. And it wasn't even out of pity, he just thought that the first look at me had been utterly hilarious. He made port in Roanapur a couple of days later to deliver the load, he wasn't based here at that point. He made the delivery to Chang, who seemed to think I was just the most precious little street rat he had ever seen. So I kinda got adopted into the Triads. About '94 I ended up working for Dutch, and the rest is history from there."
"Abusive fathers seem the norm for our kind. Revy, I'm sorry. I shouldn't be yelling at you for this. We all have our pains and bullshit. This shit with these Russian cuntfaces has me on edge. I think the lack of attacks has me fucked up."
Revy huffed, "Yeah, I guess your right though. I don't think, and fuck you and the horse you rode in on."
"I'm guessing you couldn't duck fast enough after you criticized her for stupid recklessness," Dutch said flatly.
Ethan gave him a sideways look as best as he could with half his face swollen up, "Gwro Yurk Buort Melf."