A/N: I want everyone to know I didn't go into this chapter with a plan. I understand that many people are going to hate me for how this chapter turned out, and you have every right. I like to think that I have kept the development of the characters to the same quality that Rei Hiroe has. I don't know if I have with this chapter, but, I think this is an important chapter, and will have far reaching consequences for how the story progresses. I know I often ask for reviews, and that has never been more important than now. As much as I love writing this story, if i have failed to meet what my reader think is truly who the characters are, that their development makes them seem so real. Then I cannot see myself fit to finish this story. Please, I need your opinions more than ever now.
"Ooooohhh, fuck me. Just, fuck me. Better yet, just fucking shoot me," Ethan said as he started to wake up, a hangover of proportions he had never felt before assaulting his head.
He very slowly managed to sit up. Opening his eyes took quite a bit longer, but when he did, he couldn't quite understand why he was seeing what he was seeing. His dick. He was seeing his dick. He did not sleep naked, you never knew when you might have to fight out of nowhere, and nobody wanted to fight next to a naked man. It was distracting. So, where were his clothes? He did have clothes, he was sure.
He lay back down again with his hands over his eyes, tired of the pain that the little bit of light was causing. At least it was relatively quiet. That was a tender mercy he wasn't sure he deserved. He couldn't even remember what had happened after the entirety of the Yellow Flag decided to unload on the idiot Serbian who called all of them mother fuckers, and Bao just said open bar, drinks were free for the rest of the night, probably not knowing what else to do when all his patrons focused on one target, instead of completely destroying the building. Ethan also remembered tequila, lots of tequila. Nothing after that.
He raised his hands up perpendicular to his body, and then let them fall. His left hand went off the bed, but his right, fell on something firm and soft. Firm and soft was a very specific combination, there was only thing he knew of like that, and he could not think of it at the moment. He squeezed the item his hand was on. It was squishy, pleasantly squishy. He squeezed again, and heard a somewhat magnified sound, mostly from the hangover, that sounded like a moan. Why would squeezing something cause him to hear a moan? Feeling around he felt a little bump on the item. This elicited another moaning sound. If he didn't know better, this felt like a tit.
Opening one eye enough to see he followed his arm down to his hand, and indeed he saw a titty. Why was he seeing a titty? Looking up he saw a face mostly obscured by red hair. That was interesting, he didn't really sleep with anyone regularly these days. Wait, what was that tattoo at the top...
"WHAT THE FUCK," he suddenly yelled as he shot up and fell out of the bed.
"Please be quiet, my head, oh my fucking head. Rock you know how I am with a hangover," Revy said as she tried to draw herself smaller, not quite aware that he wasn't Rock, and both of them were naked.
"Revy, I am not Rock. Where the, fuuuuuck, oh my head, where are our fucking clothes," he said, still suffering.
The woman sat up, not opening her eyes all the way, "Ethan, why are you in my room, and WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU NAKED? FUCK SAKE, PUT THAT FUCKING THING AWAY," she yelled before she halfway passed out again.
Ethan looked around them. This was not Revy's room, nor was it his. He didn't know where the fuck they were. There wasn't even a blanket or a towel available for either of them to cover up. This was, something new even to him, and he was no stranger to getting black out drunk.
"Revy, I don't know where the fuck we are. Please don't yell like that. Oh no, we are naked in the same place, we didn't, oh please tell me we didn't," as his mind cleared, he suddenly realized what that could have meant.
"Seeing the size of that, I would know, and I don't feel like my hips are broken. So no, we didn't, thank god. What the fuck happened last night," she asked as she arranged her limbs so that the most of her was covered as possible.
Ethan Immediately stood up, and as soon as he found the door, fell on his face trying to walk to it. After a few minutes he managed to get up and make it to the door. It was locked, and the lock would turn, but the door wouldn't open.
Upstairs Rock looked up at Heidi as she quietly, not that she was ever anything but quiet, but was more quiet than usual, read a magazine. He heard yelling below him and it took him a second to remember how both the gunslingers had gotten themselves so sloppy drunk that they hand been so covered in vomit they put them in an unused room and Heidi had taken their clothes to wash.
"Um, Heidi, you did remember to take their clothes back to them last night, right," he asked the girl.
The girl simply looked up with an innocent expression.
"Please tell you didn't leave them naked and lock them in there," he suddenly remembered who this girl had become.
She simply signed, "I didn't lock them in. I tied the doorknob to the door across the hallway. It is entirely different. The door locks from the inside, they could get out easy."
"Heidi, they are going to kill you. You know how they get when they are hungover," he groaned.
"They shouldn't have thrown up on my favorite shirt then," she signed in reply.
Heidi was more than suited to Roanapur these days. They hadn't really expected it, but she was a vindictive bitch when she wanted to be. Granted they had at some point started to treat her like a communal daughter as much as a housekeeper, they also may have given her way too much leeway.
Thankfully Dutch had been coming back from wherever he had gone last night, and couldn't understand why there was a rope in the middle of his hallway. It had taken him a while to stop laughing after he encountered a naked Ethan trying to hide his crotch with one hand, and failing miserably, while a naked Revy yelled at him to sit down and stop showing her the full moon. They were appreciative of being released, and marched off to their respective rooms with as much dignity as they could muster.
Ethan and Rock decided that leaving Revy alone for the day wouldn't be a horrible Idea. So they took a walk, which wasn't a great idea most of the time, but most knew who they were and would leave them alone. They weren't alone together often, so they took the chance to get to know each other a little better.
"So you actually lived in Japan for a while," Rock hadn't expected that admission.
"Yeah. I got pretty badly hurt at one point about three years ago, and I spent about four months living in Kyoto. The women were all over me, and the cops kept hassling me. I was there as legally as I could be, remember I didn't even remember my name until a few days ago. It was a good downtime, I actually got some rest, which was rare, and had a whole lot of sex, with a whole lot of women, not uncommonly at the same time. Apparently they had something for tall, dark, and dangerous looking," Ethan regaled Rock with, a somewhat questionable, tale.
"How much did they cost," Rock chuckled.
"My wallet felt it for sure. Damn you, I should have known you would see through that one. Really though, what I did was do bodyguard work for some rich corporate type. Interesting dude, I can't remember his name, but he was obsessed with his whole samurai heritage. He made me actually learn enough about using a katana so he could practice by trying to beat the hell out of me. He didn't understand the idea that a natural born fighter who had an idea of how a weapon was used, would totally roll some amateur with no talent. It was easy work though, paid ok, once I was healed up enough I went back to Eastern Europe and, I can't remember exactly what I was doing when I got there," he shrugged as he finished.
"I can believe that part all the way. Whether it is true or not, most of the presidents of Japanese companies claim they are descended from very powerful people or warriors. It isn't uncommon for them to be embarrassed when someone points out that their ancestor either didn't exist, or their bloodline died out generations before their closest ancestor was born. Vanity is a universal sin after all, and one that makes an ass out of people in the best ways," Rock copied Ethan's shrug and the two men started laughing wildly.
"So who is this chick you are wanting to introduce me to. You said she was Chinese, but works for the Sicilians," Ethan asked.
"Don't ask. If you dig into too many stories here, you either get shot, or your head explodes trying to make sense of it all. I gave up a while back, I stay in the moment nowadays. Anyways, she said she had something for me, related to a matter I asked her if she could look into regarding my previous life. But yeah, I don't get to see her much these days, so it is a good diversion," he said.
"It wouldn't happen to be that woman running away from those Chinese dudes, who are moving a lot like I have seen PLA special forces move in the past," Ethan pointed at said woman.
"I thought we had all that taken care of? But yes, that is her, and we may want to help her. I really thought that was all taken care of," Rock was irritated that she still in some sort of danger, as Ethan drew and fired, killing the two they saw.
They didn't see the third that body checked Ethan. The impact knocked him down, and sent his .38 sliding on the ground. Ethan rolled over a couple times before he could roll himself to his feet, just in time to take the force of the much smaller man straight to his chest, forcing him against a wall. He threw a wild punch that the man dodged before throwing him to land on his back.
The man straddled his chest as he pulled a knife, "Nǐmen zhèxiē yúchǔn dì měiguó rén, nǐmen yīnggāi yuǎn lì bù shǔyú nǐmen de dānyōu."
"I don't understand a fucking word you just said," he told the man as he managed to catch his wrist mid stab.
The problem was that Ethan's arm was twisted as he grabbed the other man's wrist. Ethan was a hugely powerful individual physically, but even he was a slave to body mechanics. He couldn't produce enough force to throw the man, and the man's knee was in the elbow of his other arm. All he could do was try to keep the point of the knife away from his throat, while the man had the advantage in being able to put his full weight into it.
The Chinese man smiled, "Let it happen, American. Die like you people died at Chosin, died at Wndengli, at Pakchon. Join your ancestors."
"Fuck you, and your broken fucking English, you poorly trained shithead," well, poorly trained may have described the typical Chinese conscript, this man was a little better to take on someone like Ethan who had the experience of many wars and massacres.
The knife kept dipping closer and closer to its target. Ethan was putting every bit of strength he could muster into his arm, but he could already tell that he was losing this battle. This was not how he wanted to die, not like this. He didn't see much choice in the matter though. Shit, he really wanted another chance to see his little sister again before he kicked it.
"Why you fight, American. Go quietly to death, keep you dignity. Don't fight. Just die," he was really irritating Ethan, but he knew that he had the advantage, and the point of his knife was getting close enough that a reply wasn't an option for Ethan.
Ethan just kept pushing as much as he could, trying to delay the inevitable. He was starting to have trouble breathing from the amount of exertion it was taking to push. If he just had his other arm free he would have had options. If he had his arm free he could have knocked this guy in the head and gave him a good concussion. He just didn't have that arm free.
A crack was heard. Ethan recognized the report of his own gun. Of course he would, how many rounds had he sent through it. He just didn't know who fired it. He did know that the guy had gone limp and stopped pushing, which let Ethan push him off to the side. He took in full deep breaths, thankful that he could still do so. Then he looked in the direction the shot had come from, and was completely shocked.
"Rock, just breath," he said as he got himself to his feet.
Rock didn't say anything. He just stood there with the revolver held out at arms length, not unlike the stance Ethan or Revy took when they were shooting. A small bit of smoke still exited the barrel. The man holding it was like a statue, no, he was actually shaking slightly. Killing a man wasn't necessarily easy if it wasn't a part of who you were, and he had seen many people in such a condition the first time they did.
"I, I, I, I, I," was the only sound that Rock could make.
"It's ok Rock, thank you. You saved me, you only had two choices, kill him, or let me die. I wouldn't have blamed you if you let me die, but I really thank you for not doing that. Come on, let's get you sat down, and I am going to go call Benny to come get us. Go ahead and give me the gun, we don't want any accidents. There we go, you were brave. Thank you," Ethan said soothing the man.
"Where is he," Revy demanded as she came into the office.
Apparently someone from the Flag had seen what happened, and it was now all over the city that the one person who refused to kill, had shot a man execution style. News like this was not common, and was always a big deal.
"He's in his room. As soon as he stepped in the door, he pushed me back and locked it," Ethan sat in his usual chair, his revolver sat on the table in front of him.
"What the fuck happened, why would he even have to do that? What the fuck kind of situation did you get him in you fuckwad," Ethan had never seen Revy this angry, nor had he heard this particular tone in her voice before.
"Someone he said the two of you know had something for him. We found her being chased by some PLA special forces types. I shot the first two, killed them easy. We, didn't know there was a third. The bastard managed to get me on the ground, and nearly gave me a second hole to breathe through. I didn't even think about Rock being there, until I heard my gun go off, and I was able to push the corpse off me. There was Rock," Ethan never took his eyes off the gun the whole time.
"Rock was never supposed to kill. He was supposed to be the one fucking chance of light in this fucking hellhole. It wasn't supposed to happen," Ethan finally looked up to see tears in Revy's eyes.
He stood up and walked over to hug her, "It's ok. Either he let me die, or he saved me. Which would you have rather it been? We had no clue that it was going to happen. It wasn't like some sicario putting some poor bastard on his knees in front of me, Rock's action had real meaning. He won't even acknowledge us right now, do you want to try?"
Revy nodded with tears in her eyes. She broke the hug, and left the office. For a long time she could only stand in front of the door, her hand raised to knock, but she couldn't. What was she going to say to him? She hadn't ever thought that this day would come. She didn't know what to tell someone like him after the first time they took a life with their own hand. She didn't know if she really wanted to see if the twilight had finally faded away completely. She had to do this though.
Upstairs the new arrivals were as concerned.
"I am, rather shocked. Of every person I have ever met in Roanapur, Rock is, unique. He would demand slaughter to save a single life, but he would not pull the trigger himself. That is the gun," Balalaika was in just as much shock as Revy had been, though her emotions were much better controlled.
Chang's eyes took in the weapon, "I used one like it a lifetime ago. Strangely enough,I never took a life with it. Smith and Wesson Model 10, the world's favorite police pistol. Kinda fitting that it was used to save a life, in the same moment it took one. Dutch, and I am sure I speak for Fry Face here as well, if he needs anything, just let us know. I can't imagine what is going through his head right now."
"Thank you. Hopefully we don't have to ask for anything. I don't think any of us could see this coming. How could we? This, I mean, how the fuck does any one predict Rock, shooting someone," Dutch was appreciative of the two mob bosses.
Balalaika turned to Ethan, "How are you doing, Mag? You were close to dying when he pulled the trigger?"
"My right elbow is sprained, but that is the worst I really took. It will heal in a few days, I don't know if Rock is going to be able to recover fully from this though. Fuck, Sofiya, I, I know it isn't my fault, but I got taken down. I didn't even think about having lost my gun. I hope Revy has some luck talking to him. For all I know, she is going to kill me when she walks back in here, and I won't stop her."
They sat in silence on the edge of the bed. Rock still hadn't said anything, nor had Revy. Revy for once, was unarmed. She just couldn't bring herself to bring her cutlasses in the room right now, not with what had happened. It would have just been cruel.
"You look wrong without them," Rock finally said.
"I figured they would be the last things you would want to see right now," she replied.
"Revy, I'm not afraid of them. It, is, something else that has me scared."
Revy looked over at him, "What was it that scared you?"
"I liked it. I didn't try to kill him. I thought, that if I just hit him, it would give Ethan a chance to finish him off. But when I pointed the gun, something in me just, it made me point it at the back of his head. I don't even remember pulling the trigger. There was this voice in the back of my head, just saying, more. I want more. That scares me, because I know that isn't who I am, at least not who I have been," Rock let his had fall into his hands.
"Rock, I, I am not the best person to try to say anything to help you. That voice you heard, I hear it every time I fight. It wants me to spill more blood, and I want to spill more. Were you willing to let Ethan die," Revy wasn't sure if she wanted the answer.
"No, I, Ethan is my friend. He is there for me just like you are. He told me that it was a relief I couldn't answer him whether I wanted him to teach me to shoot, or to kill. Even you told me never to pick up a gun I never had to. I had to though, or Ethan would have died. Revy, who the fuck am I anymore, I don't know," he started to hyperventilate.
Revy just hugged him, "Just lay back with me and breathe. Just close your eyes, and think of something that makes you feel good. Don't focus on what you did, just focus on something that makes you happy," she told him as she lay down an pulled him with her, petting his head as she did.