"Senior Haines, you don't look like you are doing to well at the moment. Deberías dormir un poco tú mismo. (You should get some sleep yourself)," Roberta was still sitting with the girl, who had cried herself to sleep on the older woman's shoulder.

Ethan looked over. He probably need to, but he wasn't sure that it was a good idea given the situation outside. There was too much that could happen, that being asleep would make it hard to react to. Still, if he tried to go into a fight this tired, almost completely exhausted, it might be worse than trying to fight with a couple hours of sack time.

"Fine, keep a watch on the door, and wake me up if anything major starts up. Hopefully they will ignore the storefront.," he said after a few moments.

Roberta eased the half naked girl off of her shoulder and laid her down in the seat, "Si. I will do that. Just get some rest, it would be, menos que deseable. If anyone tries to come through that door, I will light them up."

He nodded and adjusted how he sat against the counter. It took him a moment to finally get his eyes to close. He was extremely attuned to conflict, and he didn't have too much issue sleeping through gunfire and explosions. He usually didn't have people he had to worry about though.

He floated in darkness for a while, until a voice woke him out of his slumber, "God, you look like complete shit."

He opened an eye, and then both as he didn't recognize where he was, "What the hell, where am I?"

The voice came from beside him, "Not where it looks like. I don't know that I could really explain it. I missed you so much."

He stood up and turned, and then was stunned at the person he saw, "Adira?"

"In the... Ok, I did not think that through. I can't say the flesh, since I am dead, but I am also not a ghost. Yes, it is me. I am Adira. I am sexy," the woman he saw said with an impish smile.

"If you are Adira, saying you are sexy is redundant. Just, how?"

The woman frowned slightly, "Well, you know part of it. As for the moment, God is good, and he has mercy. How is she?"

"Hannah, I don't know. I don't know how to understand a kid. She acts like she is ok, but I wish I could tell. She misses you, as I have for so long," he stepped over, and they took each others hands.

"She has always been strong willed, and way too smart for her age. She was trying to speak by the time she was eight months old. I'm glad you didn't kill her when she tried to kill you. My father, I can't believe him. If only I could get my hands on him, I wouldn't be given this chance. I'm so glad you realized who she was. Oh God Caleb, I should have never listened to them," tears started to fall down her cheeks as she let herself fall against him.

He let go of her hands and wrapped his arms around her, "Adira, it isn't worth thinking about anymore. I never stopped loving you. I may have stopped thinking about you so I didn't have to hurt, but I never forgot about you. You can't imagine the pain that tragedy photo brought me. It was Pipsqueak, wasn't it?"

"How did you know?"

"He was carrying my pistol. The one that I forgot when I left. There are only a few like it, and each was just a little different. I wouldn't have thought that even he would ever fall that far. I'm so sorry that I left, I should have turned around the second I saw your old man smiling outside. I should have been there to put a bullet in his head the moment he tried," tears started rolling down Ethan's face as well.

Adira lifted her head to look up in his eyes, "I always worried that you had died after you left. That something had finally ended up being tougher than you. I guess I am glad to be the idiot for once."

Ethan closed his eyes as he laughed, " You an idiot, how the world has changed. It's been really damn close a few times, nothing closer than right now. Still, what did you mean by God is good earlier?"

"You didn't kill the naked girl."

"I didn't kill the naked girl?"

"Caleb, I know how you think, and how risk averse you tend to be when operating. It isn't that different to how I used to work. You should have killed her without thinking about it, but that, damn fine, chick with you, she actually got through to you," she said.

"I forgot that you weren't completely on the straight side. I won't lie and say she isn't nice to look at, but, yeah she did didn't she. I don't want to be that man anymore, not knowing that Hannah exists. I'm going to send her to live with my folks. Apparently, they are aren't as fucking useless as I thought they were most of my life."

"You're, not going with her," the woman looked down.

Ethan grimace, "I don't belong in that world anymore. I became a fucking monster after I left. I've killed who knows how many. Men, women, and children. I didn't care anymore. You were the only thing in my life that gave me a reason to try to be human, and without that, I just didn't try. Where I am now, is the only place left for me. She deserves better though, and I will be damned if I don't at least try to make sure that she is taken care of."

"Caleb, don't sell yourself short. If you can havc even such a small bead of mercy in your soul, your aren't lost. You deserve to pull yourself out of this. You don't have to die in this arimat chra."

Ethan finally looked up and around at their surroundings. It was the old warehouse they were hiding out in during Auschwitz Crows. Specifically the room made up of coffee crates that kept them out of sight. It was where they had actually fallen in love.

"I had almost forgotten this place. Forgotten how cramped it was. I guess the two of us were too critical for an easily found motel room. I was a different man back then. I actually had something worth saving in my soul. I had something worthy of being cared about. I have never blamed you," he looked down at her.

"You should. I wasn't smart enough to see through my parent's lies. They deserve to die for sending their granddaughter to die like that. Caleb, I want you to find peace. Even though it hurts me to even think of you with another woman, find someone that can be a mother to Hannah, and leave and be her father. I know that there are people you care about around you. Try to get them to see that they should leave as well. Find better lives, than they can have there," she said.

"Adira, if it ever comes that I can, I will do my best. I wish, that when I finally find something that I can't stand up against, that I would have been a better man, so that I could be with you again," Ethan looked down into her eyes.

Adira looked back up into his, "You aren't dead yet. You still have the time to show that you have earned a place with me. There are others who want you to join us. Others that cared for you, and know that you can become a better man than you think you have the ability to be."

"Adira, I love you," he somehow knew that their time together was coming to an end.

"I love you too, Caleb. I can't wait for the day that I see you again. Now, go be the mother fucker you were born to be. Cause you were damn good at fucking this mother," the foxy smile on Adira's face was burned into his mind as he woke up.

As he came to consciousness he felt Roberta lightly shaking his shoulder. He opened his eyes and could see shadows of what looked like two armed men, with different styles of rifles, fighting off what looked like smaller individuals armed with knives. He realized that it had to be the denizens of Rattle Alley trying to take more victims. He couldn't let this happen.

He stood up, and pulled his revolver from its holster. He popped the cylinder and saw six perfect primers, and then turned his hand and let the weapon close. He could see the questioning look on Roberta's face as he started walking toward the door.

"Senior Haines, what are you doing," she asked as he reached down and threw the gate up.

The door flew open, and everyone stopped to look at him. The gunfire from the two men ceased, and the Thai turned to look at him. Fear started to creep into the Thai as they saw his pistol come up, and he lunged and grabbed one of the knife wielders by the throat. He slammed the smaller man against the frame of the door he came from, and snapped his neck, as a single shot sounded out, and another had the back of his head eradicated as the round penetrated his forehead and continued on.

Everyone was frozen in shock at his sudden appearance, and the sheer violence that he displayed in less than ten seconds. Another shot was fired, and a knife was pulled, and then buried into a skull as Ethan began moving. Another shot, and another dead Thai from sheer barbaric violence. It was, a work of art, or a work of sheer violence. It was strange to think that at one point he had nearly died from a single round, and nearly had his throat cut from a man much smaller than him. It was an example of a man that had a mission he felt was from God.

It didn't take long for the residents of the alley to retreat. They had not been prepared for that moment, nor had they expected anyone to be there to strike against them.

When they had all retreated, Ethan turned to the Russian, "Vernites' k Bugakovu i skazhite yemu, chto on zdes' zakonchil. To, chto, po yego mneniyu, ya sdelal, i to, kem on menya schitayet, — eto nepravil'no. On ne khochet davit' na menya dal'she, pover' mne. (Go back to Bugakov, and tell him that he is done here. What he thinks I have done, and who he thinks I am, are wrong. He doesn't want to push me any further, trust me.)"

The man tried to lift his rifle, but realized he was shaking too much. He looked around at the dozen or so dead men that had been killed by this man. He just nodded and turned, not even having the presence of mind to say anything.

The other man, a Korean man, stepped over, "Damn, this, is some scary shit. Lt. Yoon. I take it your name is Coffey?"

"To a few people. How do you know it," Ethan had started reloading his empty gun.

The man swallowed as he did his best to not show fear, "I work for Sentinel International Security Services Asian Response Group."

"So you work for my old man. How the fuck does a security company have a full fucking army on speed dial," Ethan closed the weapon and looked at the man with a stern look.

"We are on standby to respond to a need for additional security for clients with facilities in any area that finds itself subject to armed conflict. Conflicts such as wars, civil wars, and national collapse. Ready to respond in less than twenty four hours," the long conditioned response rolled off of the man's tongue.

"I don't need the fucking sales pitch. Where are the lines right now?"

"I don't fucking know. You can see what happened to my men. These cocksuckers just came out of nowhere, and were skinning them alive as they drug the ones they took off. They didn't have a chance with the ones you see, and they did the same to the Russians. What the fuck is this fucking place?"

Ethan smiled, "This is where they send people when they are too evil for Hell to take. Take us in the direction that is supposed to be safe, anything is better than staying here."

"That is the best news I have heard all day. Continue on with the assault, I want that fucking alley, and I want every one of those fucking degenerates dead. Burn the place if you have to, but that sort of Hell doesn't belong on Earth. Over and out," Robert Coffey sat down the radio receiver and took a deep breath.

"Robert," his wife said, wanting to know what he had heard.

"They found Caleb and two female companions. They are bringing them in now. They aren't in great condition, and he scared the ever loving fuck out of the Lt. that found him. Apparently he slaughtered a dozen of the people from that alley to save him and a Russian soldier. He said something to the Russian, who ran off, and then questioned the Lt. I think I am going to have a lot to explain when they get here. I'm just glad they found them. I'm just surprised they found them in the place we were making our breakthrough at," he walked over to a chair and lowered himself into it.

Balalaika was seated nearby, "Did they say anything about the female companions? One was expected, not two."

"Latina dressed in a rather ragged French maid uniform, and then a young Eastern European woman in her underwear, and apparently tied up like a prisoner. They didn't expound on it, but there is some evidence of mental distress. So, we are probably going to have to ask when they get here," he replied.

"Latina, so Roberta is safe. That is a relief. Hopefully they aren't in too bad of a condition. They may be needed on the lines after they get some rest. Even with your men, there hasn't been much progress. What have the last casualty reports looked like," the Russian woman stretched trying to work the stiffness of inactivity out of her muscles.

"We are still coming up better, maybe a dozen dead, still no walking wounded, around a hundred and fifty on their backs. What we have from our counts, and intercepts, about three hundred dead on their side, forty or fifty walking wounded, approaching three hundred on their backs. The only reason that we haven't been able to overrun them, is they have managed to dig in. I'm actually concerned that the Thai Army may end up having to come in if we can't break them fast enough," Coffey stretched his shoulders.

Chang hadn't said anything the entire time, having been entertaining himself with seeing how many almond shells he could toss at the sleeping Ronnie until he woke up, "That, would be less than ideal. My superiors are already concerned that an outsider was brought in. I would hate to have to tell them that the reason that Roanapur is no longer viable, is because the government had to finally acknowledge... what do you want," one of his subordinates came in the room.

"They, are retreating. There was no notice, but they have suddenly started collapsing their lines toward the harbor. Some of their men have scattered, but most have started condensing," the man reported.

"Not unexpected, but sooner than was. Whether this is good or bad is a big question. Do you know if it is their entire line, or only the Chinese front," Coffey sat forward, raising an eyebrow.

"According to Hotel Moscow's men, they are seeing the same, though slower," the man said.

Balalaika crossed her legs as she fished a cigar from the pocket of her coat that was draped over the chair, "Definitely consolidating. They most likely want to collapse their lines from the weaker enemy, that they know they can beat, and throw them into the areas that are harder to crack, and won't stretch their supply lines by trying to encircle. I would say that they are going to strengthen their defense at the end of Rattle Alley, since they know that is where we are trying to push," she stood as she lit the cigar and approached the map table, "Hmm, that puts them close to my territory."

Chang and Coffey stood up and joined her, "I don't know what that you mean by that, but I won't lie and say that the ideas coming to mind are just a little terrifying with how long I have known you now," the Chinese man said.

An evil smile started to cross her face, "The main maintenance tunnels for the city's sewer system run through my territory. It is such a cliche, but I think that we can make use of that. As long as the smell doesn't give the men we send away before they can strike. Two or three men with light machine guns should be able to thin the lines."

Coffey let the possibilities run through his head, until one seemed to just set itself in place, "Why not something, a little more chaotic?"

Delilah Coffey rolled her eyes as she observed the sight. She was seriously wondering if there was going to be anything left of the city at the end of the whole thing. It didn't really matter to her, just as long as she saw her son again. God help them all if he didn't make it back to them.