The Story of Blood and Roses

The mission had been a success, obviously, and the soldiers were escorted back to US soil and their medical bills covered by the government. Two out of the four that were left committed suicide and the other two went through heavy therapy. Ethan had been discharged from duty with full honors while the other survivor had to be institutionalized. Coming out as the only one who truly survived, the man had found himself in a bit of a mess. He had nowhere to go and no one to turn to. The boy had been orphaned when he was right out of school and never attended college. He had opted for the army and continued to study free courses and took extensive training to reach where he had. He had no job or particular degree to land him one.

He then tried his hand at applying for jobs for guards in companies. He had believed that he would have to guard complexes and the sort but had ended up with no job. No one wanted to employ a man who was in therapy and in danger of being hazardous to people around him. Anthony had been the saving grace, as Ethan had earlier told me, and offered him a job as his bodyguard. This was before my mother was killed or him taking over the Murray businesses. So, it posed a huge question. Why had Anthony hired Ethan?

Surely he had not been following the footsteps of the people who were on a mission to seek his father out. This was around the time when people still thought that he was dead or underground. But knowing the cunning nature of Anthony, he might have plotted this out and turned the man against the people who had rescued him. It was possible. If Anthony provided Ethan with the money to get access to the basic necessities of his life he would, inadvertently, consider him his God or something of the sort. It was as simple as that.

Though, I had to admit that they had developed a lot from that. They didn't seem to have a relationship where Ethan was eternally thankful to Anthony for employing him. Theirs was a simple relationship. They could very well pass off as friends. They probably were.

That was not the main question. I had to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the man. His weaknesses would be his mental instability and vulnerability in small places. The man had a severe case of claustrophobia. His strength exceeded his weaknesses, though. He had a well-built man and able to employ a good level of force. Being a leader would make him a master strategist. His role as a bodyguard ensured that he could overcome any mental or physical attack. Last but not least, the man was fiercely loyal and would budge at no costs.

I was highly impressed by what I found about Ethan and didn't feel an ounce of pity for the man. He was a strong man and a soldier at that. He didn't need any pity. That could be a reason why he did not like revealing his story. He had mentioned to me that he was uncomfortable and hadn't opened his mouth during the debriefing after the interview as well. That was saying something. In light of the situation, his tattoos could also be a ploy to hide his wounds (the visible ones). I imagined that they would stretch over all of his body leading him to ink himself over. Or he fancied the tattoos and wore them in memory of his battle wounds.

The mention of these things reminded me of what Sean had told me about Ethan being a brilliant secret-keeper. It made sense.

The boy knew much more than one could give him credit for. He would come in use in later times.

A smile spread across my lips as I considered the strength of the pseudo-informants I had gained and the fact that they trusted me. Now that I knew about the people who were operating the show that Anthony controlled, I could go into battle with the knowledge and prior plans prepared to destroy their plans.

All was done. What was left was to wait for Anthony to call me back to work. Waiting was not one of my strongest points. So, I tried proving Anthony wrong and went off to sleep. It was a personal challenge—to sleep longer hours until I was summoned to do my duties.

I won that challenge.

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