Ethan chuckled lightly, noting the slight rose in her cheeks as she admitted to him that she liked it when he called her Char. He made it a point to do that for her. "Well i'll just make sure to keep that in mind. Use it when we're not at work." Despite the way they met and the days that followed, he found that he was actually enjoying her company. Ethan hadn't had a regular job since... ever, really. As soon as he could he joined the military, then went straight to working security and other dangerous "jobs" as soon as he got out. The thoughts surrounding working a 9 to 5'er made him a little nervous. He was already thinking about his arms when Char asked him about them, and he wasn't sure how she was going to take his answer. If he didn't word it exactly right, all the ground they had just made up from his last bumble would come crashing down. In his mind he thought it would be interesting to go out in a blaze of glory. He just never thought it would be a social battle rather than a real firefight.<br/><br/>"Before I tell you about my arms, there's something else you should know." Ethan was nervous to tell her, but he thought it would be best to put just about everything out in the open right then, rather than her finding out from another source later on. "I joined up with the military as soon as I could. I was a bit of a problem kid and figured if anyone could help me focus my anger, it'd be the army. Surprisingly enough, it worked beautifully. I had an outlet. I was focused. I started to shape up. Got into active duty, did great. When the fighting started in Venezuela, I was reassigned there, and in my... third firefight an IBD was fired at the tank that I had the misfortune of standing next to. When I woke up, my arms and legs were gone. Nothing but nubs. Once I quit freaking out, my old CO came to my room at the hospital and asked gave me my options. I could bail out and be given an honorable discharge, or I could sign up for another eight years and they'd give me new arms and legs."<br/><br/>"You can imagine how eager I was to sign that bad boy." Ethan chuckled uncomfortably. It was visibly difficult for him to talk about what came after, but he knew it was important. "Eight months later i'm back in South America. Things are wrapping up, but I was assigned to a new unit seeking out the remaining opposition. These guys were way beyond any issues i'd ever had. They'd threaten townspeople at gun-point for information, get the information, then shoot them anyway. One at a time so everyone in the line knew what was coming and had to live their last minute or two in total fear. They'd rape women then brand them with hot knives. So I did the only thing I could think of... I bailed."<br/><br/>Ethan let that fact soak in for a long moment before speaking again. His eyes made their way up her body slowly until they rest on Charlotte's hues. "If you don't want me to work with you, based on that... if you want to get out now, I get it and I won't hold it against you. Everything you heard about someone getting caught after going AWOL is wrong... it's so much worse than you know. And anyone that gets caught with me is likely to get in just as much trouble." He was obviously rattled about the whole thing, and he was worried that she would leave. He didn't want her to leave him behind, but if she did, it was simply because she didn't want to be involved in something so damning and it wasn't worth going to prison over.