Job #2: Arrived Locally, Awaiting Delivery



Character journals, part 2: Jeanette



Entry



We came up with five different jobs. An open call for boats for the civil war going on in the South Sound, a security job, a closure job, a warehouse job, and a repair job. It took a lot of debate but we finally settled on the warehouse job. It didnt have the greatest payout, but it was the best one for trying to avoid a fight. With the Preacher down his shotgun and me only knowing basic self defense our chances in a brawl arent so good at the moment. Its being done by a professional negotiator, Mr Price. This guy is supposed to be one of the best, and I would tend to agree since no one really knows much about him or where he actually is. If you can get to a point where people pay you to negotiate on their behalf, have every taker know your name, and still have no one know where you are you definitely have some skill.



Im a little bit nervous to go up against that. But if I can get one up on him. Thats not only a huge plus for us for the job, but also another point of bragging rights for me. Heh, maybe I could get to a point where I just negotiate for other people and not have to go out anymore. I would probably get bored though, just hiding behind a screen somewhere. I wont do anything outright stupid, but no one can say I dont put myself out there.



Entry



Id hate to have to pay the maintenance, but I have to admit I like the truck. I managed to push Mr. Price all the way up. So he not only covered all our costs, but he also doubled the price of the job and gave us a truck. This job was a lot more Active, than the last one. We paused at a Safeway to get out of the truck and stretch. I managed to find some kids books for Eric, I hope he likes them, but Rayne fell through a soft spot in the floor to a Casualty filled basement. I guess she was going for the message board in the middle of the entry way. One of those spots where people put up their stories to at the very least say that they existed, and at best to try and reunite with friends and family. Im kinda surprised that any of it is still legible. It was back far enough to be out of the weather, hence why the floor caved in. But I would have expected most of it to be sun bleached by this point.



When we came across a chunk of the road swarmed by bugs Jax decided to take us off road. Took us a while to find a way back on the highway after we managed to leave that behind, but Im glad he made that call. For one, bugs are gross and I had volunteered to ride in the bed with my dog. But more importantly because bugs usually swarm around dead things. I dont really want to speculate on what we would have found as we crossed through there.



The Amazon Distribution Center in Kent was the warehouse for the job. The Client wanted the parts for those delivery drones that Amazon had been working on. Of course the warehouse had already been broken into and searched, but they were sure the parts would still be there because they were locked in a secure vault. When we got down to Kent it was wrapped up in one of those quintessentially northwest fogs. Couldnt see clearly more than about 20 feet in front of us. We decided to cut the engine and coast down to the fence, take out the few chompers whose attention we got, then push the truck the rest of the way up to the building. That way if we needed to make a quick get away we wouldnt have to go far, but we were also able to get in without making any real noise.



Unlike whoever had put the holes in the walls. If it can make Jax freak out I know I dont want to meet it in person. We loaded Pagan and Mars into the cab so they wouldnt draw attention, and we had Jim stay with them too for back up. Inside the place was a mess, just everything everywhere. I know people would be in a panic and hurrying and all, but you would think they would still leave some sort of a path, at least for their own escape. It was a little overwhelming to try and think of how we were going to do anything in that jumbled chaotic mess, and I was distracted enough that I have no idea what got Jaxs attention.



I got Rayne and the Preacher to duck out of sight and wait with me for an alls clear from Jax before we started moving forward. Its almost too bad we dont have some sort of two way com on that drone of his. Or at least an LED we can flash in some kind of a code. Maybe thats something well figure out before we go on the next job. Either way, when he had it come and buzz past us I figured we must be good to move ahead. Maybe he had just wanted a better spot to cover us from, hes always thinking about the strategic positions so I wouldnt be surprised.



Our attempt at Casualty distraction didnt work out anywhere near as successfully. I got one of my extra batteries hooked up to an old alarm clock no problem. But it kinda has to land somewhere farther away if we dont want them to come right up on top of us. So we ended up making a stupid mad dash across the masses of boxes and deserted product to make it to the offices where we figured any kind of secure items would be. At that point we needed it for the cover anyway. There were swarms everywhere from the noise we made and the noises the other swarms were making knocking stuff over. Jax took the silencer off his rifle at one point to help get them off of us.



Luckily we guessed right, there was a lead I could use to get power to the controls, it had been sitting there for long enough that it had completely reset, and we were able to find a post it that had the default login and password. Unluckily we had a swarm outside trying to push the walls down around us, we had to do a couple of tricks to get the whole password, and I had to call Taj to figure out exactly how to put everything in. Now I like the guy, hes pretty nice for some of the Marines I have to deal with on a regular basis. But hes loud. Yes, Im in the middle of a job. You watched us leave. But no, we couldnt possibly be in a life threatening situation where you geeking out about getting to see what we do on a job could be detrimental. Take your time, look around at the dim dirty remains of civilization. Oh this Casualty gnawing on me? Thats nothing. Now well get to find out if I am immune or a latent or not! And if not youll have some awesome webcam footage of someone going vector and freaking out. Itll be fine!



Anyway. I could hear the two of them taking shots as I was trying to read off the serial numbers so he could help me with the controls. Managed to get it all open as our cover was fully compressed under the press of rotting bodies. So I just shouted for everyone to get in the vault. I dont really regret making that call, it saved our lives and all, but Im not really happy about it. My battery only powered the controls on the outside, so we had no light, no air vents, no sound. Just locked in the dark with a fanatic and a moody marine. Waiting to find out if Im gonna live or die. Just like before Needless to say it was a very tense hour and a half we sat in there.



Finally the vibrations we could feel through the door stopped feeling like the clumsy fumblings of the ravenous dead and more like the deliberate movements of someone who was conscious. I was hoping it was the cavalry arrived at last, but I really had no way of knowing. I made the call to open the door while the two of them had weapons at the ready. At the time we almost shot him. Looking back on it now it was like a scene out of an action movie. We open the door and theres Jax, standing with his rifle at the ready, just covered head to toe in gore. There are bodies all over the place and broken windows and the only sounds are of slight movements from outside in the fog. Then when he saw it was us and we were OK he dropped the gun down and gave a sigh of relief.



It was like all of the tension went out of all four of us. Yeah the job wasnt actually over yet, but we had survived a pretty damn close call. First we had to find something that we could cover Jax in so that no one else would get infected from the goo all over him. I managed to find a tattered old coat that wouldnt do much of anything but worked for this at least. Then he went and got Jim and the truck while I searched around for any other bounty we might be able to grab. Then we loaded up the truck and booked it. I wasnt sure what was in the other two big boxes, they were like the two that we had gone down to get but didnt have the drone logo on them. Just an item number code. On our way to the rendezvous Jim was looking them over and then started acting funny. He had been going on this whole trip about how he wanted a Dronkey, How he was hoping we would find one while we were down here, or maybe make enough to buy one, or blah blah blah. So when he got back into the truck and was trying to act all nonchalant Jax jokingly asked him if there was a Dronkey back there.



Jim is a terrible liar. His no was about as convincing as Jacob or Jasons when you ask them if they did something wrong and the broken glass is still on the ground behind them. So the two of them proceeded to start arguing about whether to sell them or not as the engine cut and we coasted the last bit up to where we were dropping the parts from the job. I had already decided we would keep them. Yeah we could have potentially sold them to this guy for more than we could get for them back home, but I also knew how bad Jim wanted one and anything that can haul some extra gear that I dont have to pay the upkeep on is a bonus. They were still debating and trying to make motions to me one way or another as I went up to close the job. Mr. Prices associate was curios, but I shut that down pretty quick so we could get our bounty and get home.



Triumphant.



Hope that trend keeps up. Both jobs weve done so far have gone our way, if not to plan. But Ive invested my extra bounty between the laptop and making some contacts to find a new place for my family to live. If I come up against a hard ass and cant get him to cover at least our equipment we could be screwed. There goes most assurances that we will survive the job, the ability to make the bounty I need to move my family off this rock, any chance of finding the resources to educate my son and brothers so that they know how to live and not just survive. Guess that means I better just show off that Buchanon backbone and not give an inch unless we can turn it to advantage.



Entry



So tonight was interesting. Probably the most lively a good portion of Deception has been in a while. Im sure people will be talking mostly about the train wreck that seems to be Raynes homelife for the next several weeks, but all I can really think about is how that almost split this enclave into a civil war and destroyed it. So, the story is that while we were gone on the Seattle job Raynes little sister Erin got herself into some debt with Cash.



Cash is a sleazeball of an ex-marine who works on the docks now. Ive always made a point of avoiding him and keeping the boys away from him. I understand everybodys gotta do what they can to make it, but Im not gonna let anyone in my family stoop to doing business with him unless its an absolute last resort. Im positive that he would sell his own mother if there was a profit in it and would be willing to bet that he did in order to make it this far.



But what Rayne did? She tried to accuse him of peddling children in order to discredit him and get him to back off. While he was in his usual spot on the docks where his clientell know where to find him. Which is in sight and ear shot of everyone and anyone. Rayne is hard, but Cash is sensitive enough to know just how far he can push this community before they retaliate against him. He isnt anywhere near that line yet and he knows how to play a crowd way better than Rayne does. Everybody could hear him when he shouted Are the Marines accusing all of us. I dont remember the rest of exactly what he said but that was the part that got everyones attention. The only part that anyone seemed to care about.



I dont know what angle he was trying to play with that stunt. Seemed like he was trying to discredit the marines and get himself in better with the fishermen. Or maybe I give him too much credit and thats just the part hes going to take advantage of while he was really just trying to get her to back down. She made some quip back that I didnt catch before I could get up there, and then Erin showed up and it all seemed to just get worse. Rayne almost kicked her out, but came back from the edge of her temper just barely enough. Probably remembered that Erin and her boyfriend, Carn I think?. Something that starts with a Ka sound. Were some of the only people who care to keep company with her and that no one can make it through this alone. So Rayne threw some bounty at Cashs face, Im guessing how much he was owed, before getting ready to storm off.



Which was right when Jax showed up. Hed probably been working up in the spire. And you could see other Marines up there with binoculars, leaning out and trying to figure out what was going on. He gave her a very loud and very public dressing down about the whole thing. Besides his quick temper, I know why he did it. He had to do something to show that the Marines arent against the Docks at all and that this was all on her. But I hate that it reinforces the idea that people like Cash can get away with pulling crap like this around here. Maybe Im not the best example of a moral person, but there should be some kind of limits. Some kind of law in our enclave besides Touch the road and do a shift. There just isnt right now, and I doubt there is going to be with the kind of folks we have here. Damn hard workers and good friends to be sure, but crass and misogynistic. Obviously not the best of role models as I heard Fitz yammering about a peeping tom incident later.



But at least it gave me something to distract Dane with for a little while. When I got home later he was just staring off into space while Jacob was standing on the roof throwing stuff at Jason, who was on shift for whatever reason, and Eric was no where to be seen. I wanted to be mad, I was mad at first. I really need to know that I can count on him to hold things together when Im not around. I had to get Jacob under control and send him out to round up Eric and make sure he wasnt about to get seriously injured in any of the various death traps littered around here or cause any other problems I would have to solve. Like Erin did for Rayne. But then Dane mentioned that Chop had been by, saying that we had to pay more rent. And I could see that frustration building back up in him again. That darkness that I might lose him to.



This has been harder on him than on most other people. It was bad enough to lose a leg when we still had all the comforts of being middle class Americans. When he could go to physical therapy to figure out how to move again, and doctors for prosthetics, and a psychologist to deal with the depression and anger. And then the blight came and tore down what little we had been able to rebuild. So I know this has been probably harder on him than it has been on me. Somehow I have to find a way to let him know that Im still here for him, and to let him know that I still need him. Maybe I can find him a new prosthetic while were out on a job. Or bribe my brothers into taking the kids off our hands for a while. Pretty hard to find any kind of alone time when there are four of us living in a two room shack. And God knows I could use it as much as he could.