“Ken, it’s Jaime” the woman remarks, pressing the headset of the desktop phone to her ear whilst she sorts through a stack of papers with names and faces across each one. “Listen, I know you’ve got plenty going on and you’re not too happy with mom and I, so I’m trying to respect that you want to be left alone” the chancellor continues, shaking her head in disapproval with each discarded page, “I just wanted to let you know that I won’t be home for a day or two, so don’t panic.”
Left just off to the side, a paper-clipped manilla folder sits with an abundance of loose papers still waiting for her attention, its contents the next in line to be explored. “And I called Cody a few hours ago, and he said mom came into town to clear her head for a little bit. I guess it has something to do with Chris or something, I don’t know” Jaime persists, failing to see anything of value in yet another document, “the point is, she’s fine. Anyway, I hope you’re doing fine. Take care.” Returning the phone to the receiver, the chancellor continues about her business with a tall glass of wine sat beside her, the glass it sits in already having been refilled within the last half hour. “Long night ahead?” Julia inquires, watching Jaime’s head lift from her business for a moment as the voice standing in the open doorway catches her by surprise. “I guess you can say that” the dirty blonde woman replies, leaning forward in her seat with both arms pressed against her desktop, one propping her up whilst the other sifts through each page. “What’re you up to here?” Julia queries, slowly approaching the paper-strewn desk with an eager eye for detail, her reply being given with total honesty. “I’m sorting through some records the NDF left for me” Jaime replies, discarding yet another page. For a moment, the doctor looks down at the stack of papers left by the side of the chancellor’s desk, squinting at the information detailed upon each page face. “Are these citizens?” the woman inquires, looking over details ranging from eye colour and ethnicity to employment status and past criminal convictions. “It’s everyone we house in the Republic and outward into the old city” Jaime answers, again refusing yet another loose sheet as she reaches for her glass, “at least, it will be.” “You do realise that we have electricity, right? You can just get these all in some spreadsheet. We don’t even keep paper records at the hospital” Julia questions, reassured of the chancellor’s sanity. “I have a copier printing more papers than I can keep up with. We may have the NDF and security systems up and working, but the grid is still too fragile to depend on entirely” Jaime responds, “besides, it’s easier to skim through papers than it is to keep track of who does or doesn’t stand out.” Pressing her fingers against the smooth face of one discarded sheet, Julia’s curiosity peaks whilst her chancellor remains hard at work. “And what is it that you’re looking for them to stand out in exactly?” the woman inquires, struggling to find a reason for her political acquaintance’s decision to keep herself from being able to leave the office. “I’m trying to find people that both seem like fits to be peacekeepers and a motive to smear my capital in blood” Jaime answers honestly. “And that seems like time well spent to you?” Julia quickly challenges, her words not phasing the woman who flips through yet another sheet of the stack. “It seems like time spent trying to keep my hold on power over a town constantly evolving before my eyes” the chancellor responds, another sip taken from the glass she’s more capable of considering a best friend now than she had been in past months, “if you understand the people, you understand their motivations.” “And here I thought you didn’t care about what the people thought” Julia replies, lowering herself into the chair across from the chancellor’s desk with confidence as the woman across from her looks up. “One whole public display of dissatisfaction later, and it’s almost like the ‘I choose an iron fist’ line was just that- a line” the woman quips, watching the puckered frown on Jaime’s face deepen as her eyes fall. “There are things more important than that now” the chancellor remarks, justifying her change in attitude, though not necessarily considering it a change for the best, “I have motivations of my own to look after too.” Matching the woman’s puckered lips, Julia lets a slow nod roll over her as she sinks further into her seat, allowing her arms to lay against the sides of her chair as the woman in the mightiest chair the Republic has to offer returns her gaze to the documents at her disposal. “Is that why we have tanks rolling through the street? Or men in camo uniforms on patrol throughout all hours of the day?” Julia queries, slowly regaining the attention of the woman sitting opposite her. “Hell, let’s stretch farther than that. Is that why the other half of Los Angeles we never had our hands on- pretty much nothing more than a burnt skeleton at this point- is held by the NDF?” the doctor adds, “what do those guys even want to begin with?” With a pause, Jaime’s eyes take toward the open spot on her desk between the assortment of records and the chair-occupying woman that sits in her presence, thinking of a reply to herself through momentary silence. “Something they can’t have” the chancellor answers, flipping through another sheet before steadying her attention solely on the woman sharing the room with her as she sits back in her seat, crossing both arms over her chest. “Why are you here?” Jaime suddenly wonders aloud, the question having dawned on her minutes ago, but only now feeling the need to make itself heard. “You’ve got a sea of new recruits in the hospital from what I’ve heard. Isn’t keeping them from performing surgery on a grape a bit higher of a priority to you than- whatever it is you’re doing here?” Angelino’s chancellor inquires, a question she’s not proven wrong in asking. “My brother and I own the building, but that doesn’t mean we’re the only doctors there” Julia replies with a smirk, one leg crossing over the other as her hands fall over the lip of the chair’s armrests. “Don’t you have something better to do with your time?” Jaime questions, still yet to understand precisely why the woman she shares the room with occupies the seat ahead of her. “I suppose I could go home and sleep, but that second thing isn’t something I’m very familiar with” Julia retorts, only continuing to puzzle the Republic’s chancellor. “Then what is it that you’re here for?” Jaime wonders aloud, the question ringing through her head like the thud from the crash of a drum’s symbol, “late night visits aren’t usually a thing people have for me without wanting something in return.” “What? I can’t just check in on a friend?” Julia wonders back with a smile, her head tilting ever so slightly to the side as her eyes lock with the chancellor’s, “you’ve got a busy schedule, a quite rambunctious little sister and plenty on your plate. Sometimes you need a friend to come in and make sure everything’s doing alright.” Lifting the corner of her lip, Jaime squints with a smile as her chin lowers, a subtle nod rolling over her as eyes keep on the ever-present doctor. “Is that what we are?” the woman inquires, met with silence as the medical professional waits for the added verbiage she knows lies just around the corner. “Go out to brunch and get our nails done? Meet up after work for drinks to talk about boys and gossip? Is that it?” she continues to ask aloud to no response, “is that it? We’re friends now?” “Jaime, I’m not-” Julia begins to reply with a smile, only to come to the realisation that her response isn’t needed or wanted by the woman she offers it to, the chancellor’s interruption only proving that her words were destined to fall upon deaf ears. “Because we’re not friends. I hope you understand that. We’re not friends” Jaime explains, the audience her voice is intended for sat in complete acknowledgement of the power imbalance described. “You run the hospital we collect crops from and send our sick to. I’m the chancellor that’s meant to make sure both of those responsibilities are met and undisturbed” she furthers, watching the slight narrow in Julia’s eyes take shape, “we are two women with a mutual interest in maintaining the status quo, and we use each other to do so. We are business partners at best, and that is where the buck stops. If there’s any misunderstanding of that on your behalf, it’s not because of me.” In silence, Julia looks into the eyes of a mentally-worn, physically-exhausted and emotionally-drained leader, one simply trying to ensure the undisturbed existence of her nation and the safety it has provided itself with. Behind the pupils of the tried and tested chancellor, the doctor recognises an increasing lack of care toward most of anything that doesn’t have to do with her role at the helm of the Republic, a lack of care she prefers not to test by standing on the opposite side of. “Understood” she simply replies, uncrossing her legs and propelling herself forward, leaving her chair before departing the room without as much as a second word. As her visitor’s footsteps across the marble floor just beyond her office’s door begin to dampen, Jaime’s head bows as she tries to settle back into her work, holding back the increasing urge to free her pent up frustrations as the next page in the long line of documents is returned to the discarded pile. Shaking and tense, Jaime’s hands press their palms against her desk as her eyes close and head tilts back, joining her body in sinking into her office chair as the pressure clearly begins to mount. Forced into retreat from her ever-growing duties, the chancellor reaches for the dial to her nearby radio and tries to calm herself, steadying each breath and subduing the sensation of pins and needles that run across the sole of her feet, almost as if her every step were taken over hazards. “And I’m sure this comes as no surprise, but the truth has never been more clear” a deep voice speaks through the station, the contents of its remarks yet to fully find themselves understood by the chancellor’s brain, which sits in an almost novocaine-state. “Your leaders are failing you. They’re playing the same game your institutionally-corrupt and morally-bankrupt politicians had just before the catalyst, and it can’t stand” the voice continues to speak, slowly earning the Jaime’s attention. “There is only one way to cleanse the Angelino Republic of this cancer, and it’s the price of what too many people aren’t willing to offer- the truth” Jaime hears spoken, turning the dial to raise the machine’s volume as she takes interest in what’s being said. “Therefor, in an effort to keep the peace, we are demanding the truth be provided toward Jaime Morris’ crimes and the Republic’s secretive ties to the New Democratic Front” the post-catalyst iteration of Max Headroom declares, “if your leaders choose to continue concealing this truth, then they will burn with the rest of the Republic beneath the eternal flames, all lit in the name of washing away the cardinal sins of a corrupt establishment and an irrefutably vile organisation.” Her expression overtaken by a vicious, fully-enraged visage, Jaime looks at the speaker to her machine as the interruption cuts off, returning the tune of Janis Joplin’s “Cry Baby” to the airwaves. Fuming, the chancellor sits in her chair overtaken by the urge to rip throats out and bring upon suffering to those that threaten her rule, both the ones she does and doesn’t align with. = Dire is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 Media from the start of Season 1 onwards = “I would stay low for a bit, Chevy. We appreciate you and all, but there’s no telling how this plays out” Clark remarks into his end of the phone as the father-to-be occupies the other end of the line. Covering his opposite ear, the peacekeeper’s speaker continues the conversation until a chorus of jeers erupt, an immediately-defensive group speaking through loud voices in demand for a cease on the verbal assault. “Chevy, I’ve got to go- take care and keep in touch” Clark interjects, cutting the man off before shutting the top half of his flip phone and turning his attention toward the bar’s entrance, where a familiar set of faces stand. “Where’s Clark?” Blake calls out, looking around the room before his instincts immediately take him to the liquor counter where the man stands, his grizzled expression hanging as his hand reaches for the nearest bottle of hard booze. “Am I in trouble?” the older gentleman inquires, his grey beard spotted with droplets of the same vodka he reaches for a new bottle of. “Eventually, but not right now” Blake answers, stepping away from Willy’s side as he departs the strength of his armed militia, taking a seat at the opposite side of the man’s serving counter. “It seems like you’ve gotten yourselves into quite the predicament making a fool of the chancellor like you have” the militant remarks, watching vodka spill over the brim. “You can’t make a fool out of someone that already is one, you stupid cocksucker” Clark responds, taking a long drink from his overflowing glass with a satisfied smirk on his face. “Mess with the bull and you’ll get the horns. Mess with the people, and the revolution will be bloody” he continues before interrupted, the remarks he’d been making added to by the foremost member of Jaime’s private detail, “mess with the chancellor, receive a bullet to the head.” Shrugging, Clark smacks his lips together and leans forward, refusing to show an inch of fear toward the group of individuals he considers to be scum just the same as the power that employs them. “You can’t scare a man by threatening to take away his life when he’s already lost everything a really, really long time ago” the amateur bartender remarks, a gesture his greatly disrespected adversary doesn’t refuse. “No, but when he runs a movement like the one you’ve got going on- and you’ve cornered the market on whether or not they get the right to feed their families- you find other ways to scare them” Blake replies, finally earning legitimate attention from the increasingly-less sober speaker, whose lack of full sobriety fails to keep him from understanding what’s being said between himself and the heavily armed opposition he faces. “I mean, come on. You can’t expect to smear the capital in your insignia and hack into the domestic broadcast feed without a little blow back, right?” Blake questions, immediately watching the defence spread across Clark’s face like a wildfire. “We had nothing to do with that bulls-” the server begins to declare, uttering the innocence of himself and his group to a pair of ears not only uninterested in their pleas for a cleared name, but well-informed of it. “Yes, you did. You approached the capital with buckets of pig blood and smeared the capital with your branding” Blake remarks, not yet finished with his recollection. “And as we currently speak, you’re hurrying away from the hospital where you breached procedure and gained unwarranted access to the broadcast system, isn’t that right?” the man continues, watching the confusion spread across Clark’s perplexed visage. “As a matter of fact, this conversation isn’t happening. I was never here, my men were never hear, and you didn’t get back here until twenty minutes from now” Blake continues, making his point gradually less difficult for the intoxicated speaker to understand. “Are you trying to tell me to take the fall for something we had no hand in?” Clark inquires, struggling mightily to understand the story being spun by the equivalent to his group’s meal ticket. “You’re tired of the chancellor’s governance, and have taken toward brazen public displays like these to get your point across” Blake remarks, “that’s the story we’re running with, and that’s the narrative we need to spin if you want any chance at taking Jaime off the throne, is that understood?” Pressing his eyes closer together, not even Clark’s lack of full-sobriety prevents him from noticing the remarks made by the man across from him. “We’ve both got a vested interest in seeing that woman get knocked off that pillar we’ve all been building for her over the last year and a half, and that interest won’t be met if you and these bottom feeders try to play ‘polite revolutionaries’” Blake declares, though not making his true allegiances known, clarifying who he doesn’t align with. | “Every week, they come by and load a bunch of crates into the back of this truck. Same time, same day” Kennedy remarks, walking directly between her two closest allies as they near the rear entrance to the hospital. “Ken, we’re both sure you’ve done enough research to know what’s going on, but that doesn’t make this any more feasible than it already wasn’t” Chevy responds, walking to the right of the teen girl whilst his wife walks to the child’s left, holding her hand as they travel. “I don’t trust him, and I don’t trust his sister. These deals are shady, and if this doesn’t help us find out where mom is, at least we’ll know what’s going on” Kennedy remarks, preaching to a choir that already understands the positives and negatives. “We don’t trust them much either, but that’s beside the point. We already told you what Jaime said” Chevy explains, immediately drawing the young girl’s ire. “Yeah, and I’m gonna believe what Cody says when he’s the other guy in this scenario” Kennedy cuts back, only for their forward progression to cease when Kayla lowers herself to one knee. “Honey, we don’t know what to tell you” the mother-to-be confesses, looking the teenaged girl in the eyes as her hands rest on each of her shoulders, “we hear what you’re saying, but you have to understand that it’s really difficult to follow some of the lines that you’re drawing.” “Kayla’s right, Ken. I understand why some deal between this place and Lancaster would appear unusual, but connecting it to your mom skipping town for a couple of days is a pretty hard stretch to make” Chevy doubles down, immediately noticing the disappointment in the girl’s face. “If this doesn’t lead anywhere, I don’t know what will” Kennedy admits, hanging her head as the couple that have become a second family listen to her with open ears. “Mom doesn’t just skip town. She didn’t even tell Chris she was leaving, which is how I know this isn’t all just in my head” Kennedy proceeds, spinning a web she doesn’t like having to create, but understands its importance. “We’re not saying it is, honey” Kayla responds, her motherly instincts already beginning to take form in the tone of her voice, “we’re just trying to help you understand that there’s a fine-” Interrupted by the tires that kick up dirt and rocks on their way around the corner, a white box truck nears the rear entrance to the hospital with surprising speed, it’s each stop sudden and each turn harsh. “Over here, come on” Chevy instructs, guiding his wife and their beloved sidekick behind the cover of a large bush off to the facility’s side, watching and listening as a timely soul steps out from the quartered-off section of the building. “There’s Chris- right on time” Kennedy whispers beneath her breath, each remark she makes catching the incredibly receptive ears of the captivated couple, both watching in wait with hopes of seeing the same thing their third party does, hoping for something that makes her drastic stretch less difficult to conceive. “How many!?” Cody calls out, shouting to the man that steps out to greet him as he hops out from the driver’s seat. “Ten!” Chris replies, earning a nod from Lancaster’s sovereign. As if given his seal of approval, Chris leads himself back the way he came momentarily whilst Cody follows closely behind, disappearing with the doctor for a few, brief moments. “Alright, Ken. If you’ve done your studying on this, what are we supposed to be keeping our eye out for?” Chevy asks aloud, refusing to disrespect the girl’s line of thought in a search to uncover exactly what she sees. “I don’t know, they’ve never done this before” Kennedy replies, immediately drawing intrigue from the man she responds to. “Done what?” Chevy wonders back, listening to the words the young girl speaks to herself in an effort to comprehend what she’s watching. “Usually, Chris walks out with a big, wooden crate on top of a dolly” the youngest Morris sibling replies, “Cody refuses to help and just stands there. Like, he goes out of his way not to help. This is new.” “Do you know what’s in the crates?” Kayla inquires, her attention kept on the quantity of the perceived shipment, unsure of what Cody would be picking up from the hospital of all places. “No, but they’re usually a lot lighter than they look” Kennedy replies, waiting with her peers for the return to sight the doctor and his town-overseeing trade partner will inevitably make, “the crate fell over one time, and Chris pulled it back up and lifted it into the truck.” Watching Cody press his back into the rear door and prepare to step out for a moment, a thought creeps into the back of Chevy’s mind and takes a moment of dead silence as the time to proclaim itself. “Lancaster’s self-sufficient. What would they be trading with the hospital for?” the man asks himself just loud enough for his contemporaries to overhear him, their eyes trailing in his direction for just a moment before the duo in question reemerge from their compound. “What the fuck is that?” Kayla gasps in vast intrigue, watching the men carry a stiff, elongated object through the door wrapped in a heavy amount of sliced-up plastic wrap. Too obstructed from the incredibly amateur covering, the trio watch patiently as one item after another is carried into the back of the truck, all ten wrapped objects eventually loaded into their ride bound for the town on the opposite side of the Angeles National Forest. Prompted into action, Chevy ducks out from cover the moment Chris and Cody return to the hospital’s inside, ushering for Kennedy and his wife to stay back and keep themselves unnoticed. “Where are you going!?” Kayla hisses, both clearly struggling with the fear of the man being caught. “I’ve got to see what’s in that thing before it drives off. Keep your heads down” Chevy replies, brushing off any interference as he pulls out of cover, casually making his way toward the truck. Stepping off the grassy hill and onto the unused side road leading to the hospital’s rear, Chevy sheds his jacket and folds it, leaving it behind a bright yellow fire hydrant before emptying the small amount of water he carries in a plastic bottle over his head. “What’s he doing?” Kennedy whispers aloud, hearing the amused sigh leave the lungs of the accompanying woman behind her. “He’s being Chevy” Kayla replies, shaking her head with a smirk, “he’s gotta cover all his bases.” His grey t-shirt soaked at the collar as his scruffy beard lets water trickle down it, Chevy makes his way to the box truck’s driver’s side before gradually descending upon its open back-end. Rounding the vehicle’s end, Chevy peers into the open chamber at the vehicle’s rear when the hospital’s entrance parts once more, releasing the doctor and his sovereign guest back toward their duties. “Chevy?” Chris calls out, an obvious surprise and worry at the man’s presence made clear and obvious in his posture, one that the unexpected visitor notices before even turning his head. “Oh, hey Chris” Chevy responds casually and with a welcoming tone, nudging his chin toward the open compartment with a curious look, “what are these? Fish?” Watching anxiously from their floral cover, Kennedy and Kayla hold off on their involvement, trusting the man to talk his way out of the situation at hand, though the youngest Morris sibling’s greater concern still lies undiscussed. “Uh, yeah” Chris replies, quickly stepping ahead of Cody as he tries to talk his way out of any further questions, “we have a few employees that go out and catch bass. It’s not much, but Lancaster pays well enough for the excursion to be worth it.” Nodding, Chevy tucks one hand in his pocket whilst letting the other hang by his side, “bass are pretty common in the fall months, right? I’m not really that familiar with fish.” With a shrug, Chris reaffirms the man’s nonsensical remarks and pats him on the shoulder, slowly walking him away from the rear of the vehicle as Cody follows on, their stroll and conversation proceeding on the side of the truck incapable of being viewed from the hill the circumstance’s third wheel came down from. “We should start going back before someone else comes around” Kayla remarks before immediately meeting resistance from the young woman beside her. “Fine, you head back” Kennedy responds, standing off her knee before setting her sights upon the truck ahead, “I’m going to finish what we came here for.” Without a warning, the teen girl steps out from her shady cover and parts from her chaperone, hurrying down the grassy hill whilst the coast is clear. Unable to stop the child from pulling away before the distance between them has already been made, Kayla is left to watch as the girl hurries to the truck’s passenger door, listening to the muffled conversation happening just one side over. With reluctance, Kennedy tries to open the heavy entrance before finding her attempts to be futile, her only way into the truck locked and inaccessible. With little other option, the girl’s mind concocts a plan- one not even she has full faith in. Peering beneath the vehicle to see the three pairs of feet far enough away to present her with an opening, Kennedy sneaks around to the back of the truck, peering into the dark, visibility-depriving box without certainty of what resides inside, though that uncertainty fails to breed within her a fear powerful enough to convince her not to follow through. With a quiet sigh, Kennedy hops onto the platform and slowly advances all the way to the compartment’s back wall, the mountain of plastic-wrapped products that sit at her feet presenting her with cover. Getting low to the ground, the girl shuffles herself into one of the truck’s unoccupied corners and props one of the many individually-wrapped items against her, concealing her from the sight of anyone who dares look for her. Her breathing kept to a minimum, the girl quietly waits for the conversation outside- one which she can hear with now-resounding clarity- to conclude. “Well, when you turn back to go the way you came, let Kayla know we wish her well and lend her our best wishes” Cody remarks, one which Chevy playfully laughs off in appreciation, his affable demeanour allowing the conversation to end in a civil and friendly manner, freeing the Lancaster sovereign to return to the truck’s end. Nothing out of sight to his eyes, the man reaches for the truck’s cord and slams it shut, locking the things at the cargo end of his vehicle- both wrapped and unwrapped- inside. Keeping her eyes open, Kennedy listens to the man climb into his truck and turn the key in the ignition, starting the engine up before slowly making his way out of the hospital’s backlot, his eyes solely set on returning to Lancaster with a safe and easy journey- unaware and unassuming of what sits one wall behind him. | “When you run out, you’ll come back to the pharmacy on the first floor and pick up a refill, alright?” Julia explains to a wheelchair-bound woman with a smile, hanging a stethoscope over her neck as the patient rolls off. “Take care, hun” the doctor concludes, patting the woman’s shoulder before turning back for her office, the friendly smile immediately fading upon her expression’s concealment, souring into a frown the moment she steps out of the walk in clinic. “And roll yourself off a cliff, you dirty bitch” the woman mutters beneath her breath, clearly taking as much disdain for her employment as her visage would leave to be believed. “I take it you don’t care much for the disabled” a familiar, yet unexpected voice murmurs from around the corner, prompting the doctor to turn back in a worry that ears her voice had not intended to reach captured onto her declaration. “Oh, it’s you” Julia replies with a sigh of relief, watching a crossed-arm Jaime lean against the nearest corner, a moto jacket wrapped around her body as she pushes her shoulder off the wall. “Yeah, I don’t really care one way or another” the chancellor remarks, curling her upper lip as she shrugs, “it’s not until they start telling you about how they became a cripple that they get annoying. It’s like ‘I don’t need to hear about your car wrapping around a utility pole, I’m having a good day.’” With a subtle chuckle, Julia continues to walk, both her shoes and the boots the Republic’s leader wears tapping along the linoleum floors on their way toward the doctor’s office. “I was told we weren’t friends last night by a pretty reputable source” the white coat wearing worker remarks, strolling forward as Jaime hangs her head toward the ground, both hands tucked in the pockets of her coat as she simply follows to sound of the woman’s feet, “so what can I do you for, chancellor?” Staying silent until the doctor’s office can be reached, Jaime follows the woman through the open door and immediately lowers herself into the woman’s chair, allowing her to remain standing through the duration of their conversation. “I need you to do me a favour” the chancellor responds, breaking the ice in the least subtle way imaginable. “Funny, I thought friends asked friends for favours” Julia replies, noticing the slight shift in the chancellor’s demeanour take shape, one of semi-regret for the declaration she made one evening prior. “But, I don’t really tend to do favours for people in general- let alone friends” the doctor continues, speaking whilst Jaime looks her in the eyes, patiently waiting for her to finish, “if you’re asking me of anything, it won’t be a favour- it’ll be a deal. So, what’s in it for me?” Smirking, Jaime sits back in the chair and plays around with the amount of give it presents her with in comparison to her chair at the office, both hands interlocking their fingers to crack the knuckles that host a great deal of tension. “You do realise that I can just tell you to do something under the threat of execution, right? Like- I’m the chancellor of the Republic” Jaime inquires, making both her point and her civility noted, “even though I wouldn’t do that, I still could if I wanted to.” “Yeah, I get that. I also get that I’m one of the closest people you have to a confidant, and of those people, I’m one of the few that actually still talk to you” Julia replies, her own leverage pressed upon the chancellor, whose title doesn’t change that it’d been the doctor she’d sought the help of. “You’re here on your own, not making demands, and being respectable for someone that doesn’t have to” the doctor continues, “we don’t have to be friends for me to be the closest thing to one.” The sarcastic visage falling out of favour as she recognises what the doctor describes, Jaime’s powerful posture begins to slowly subside. “Will you please just help me out here?” the chancellor politely requests, unknowingly shifting the balance of power between those occupying the room, one lending the medical professional leverage she didn’t otherwise have. Frowning her lips as a breath leaves through her nose, Julia’s shoulders hang as she puts on the posture she deems most unlike the thought that runs through her mind, giving into the courteous approach despite her own confidence being significantly strengthened by it. “You’re lucky I like you, Jaime” the doctor remarks, giving into the plea presented to her by taking one of the chairs typically reserved for her clients and visitors, “what do you need?” Hiding her smile as best she can, Jaime tucks her hand back into her right pocket, retrieving from within it a single piece of paper. “This is a list of the people I’ve found have the most motive to stand with the peacekeepers” Jaime remarks, tossing the paper to the doctor’s side of the table for her to inspect, leaning back in her chair as she concludes her statement, waiting for Julia to take from the note what she wishes to. “Whatever ins you had to the peacekeepers before, I need you to see if those are still accessible” Jaime explains, “I want you to hand that note to their leader, have him come in voluntarily for questioning, and see if he’d be willing to make a deal with me.” Following the request until the final part, Julia squints her eyes in confusion before returning the paper to the chancellor, calling into question her concerns before the note can switch hands. “Why do you want to make a deal with them? I thought the whole point of cutting off their rations was to create a viable opposition to you?” the doctor inquires, immediately watching the woman’s expression sour further, though not at her this time. “It was until Wade decided that it didn’t align with his world view” Jaime replies, clearly annoyed at the call to cooperation that she has to make, “now I’ve got to keep all sides happy so he doesn’t feel the need to get involved.” “So, this is what the NDF wants?” Julia replies, her confused expression still worn as she leans in her seat, staring off at the ceiling in thought. “The NDF wants a lot of things, but like I said- they won’t get some of them” Jaime answers, pushing herself out of the chair as the conversation draws toward what she believes to be a natural conclusion, “this is one of the things where I can actually see eye-to-eye on them with. The question is whether the ‘keepers think I’m too far gone.” Not wishing to dwell too much on the circumstances at bay, Julia takes from the discussion what she feels are most necessary to read into, allowing the chancellor to make it to the door before silence is broken. “So, can you get it done?” Jaime wonders aloud, calling the question out to the doctor for an answer, one that only requires a smirk along the doctor’s face to be given. “What is this?” Clark asks, looking at the paper presented to him whilst leaning against his tavern counter, the rest of the building flooded with his peacekeeper brethren. “You know exactly what it is” Blake replies, a stone cold expression worn on his face as he answers the question, not willing to play dumb with the man already a good few drinks in. Snarling at the context on the paper handed to him, Clark grimaces at the man and holds the page’s face toward the peacekeepers to read for themselves, a disgusted look held in his face. “This is the chancellor’s idea of cooperation!” the half-buzzed but fully-minded speaker remarks, spit flying off his lips as he calls out to the gathered populous. Upon the page, an abundance of names, some present and others not, are scrawled above a threat that he’ll come in willingly or face consequences. “And it’s the best that you’re ever going to get with her” Blake reiterates, regaining the attention of his drunk adversary, “she doesn’t care about you people and she’ll root out whatever descent she finds necessary. What she cares about is power and how to keep it, so like it or not- this is necessary.” “If this is necessary, why doesn’t she bring her air-headed ass down here then?” Clark inquires, quickly switching his interest from one question to another, “as a matter of fact, which side are you really on?” Without hesitation, Blake leans closer toward Clark’s face and answers the question without a shred of remorse in his voice. “I’m on the side that I know is going to win” the man says with unswayed confidence, “that side isn’t hers and it isn’t yours.” With his own brand of confidence, Clark takes the note and shoves it into Blake’s chest, lowering his eyes to the man’s gun for a moment before urging him to follow through on his position of power. “Oh yeah? In that case, fuck your cooperation” the tavern owner replies, swinging his hand across Blake’s face to a roar of cheers from his peers, “force my hand.” In many ways offended, disrespected, and aware of the man’s unpersuadable pride, Blake takes a moment to gather himself before doing as desired, unholstering the firearm from his side and taking aim between the drunk’s eyes. “Put the fucking glass down and get in the fucking car” the forefront detail member commands, his presentation immediately bringing a hush over the crowd, many of whom attempt to climb out from the pack in an attempt to overwhelm the guard. “Don’t move!” Clark orders, holding his hand toward the few that split off from their contemporaries at the moment of their attempt’s launch, his command the only one they’d be willing to listen to. “The last thing we need is to make this more than it has to be. There are bigger things in store for all of us now” the buzzed gentleman remarks, slowly lowering his hand as he directs his eyes toward the populace, “you all know what we need to do, and you all know how.” With a gentle nod, Clark lifts his hands in the air in a display of surrender, allowing Blake the unspoken allowance to lower his weapon. “It’s time” the unarmed, grizzled man declares, turning his back toward the armed man and beginning for the door, all eyes left on him as his hands fall whilst he makes his way through the crowd. Without another word, the man steps onto the Angelino Republic streets and joins a second fleet of militia detail waiting for him just outside. In a calm and orderly manner, the man steps into the vehicle’s backseat and joins the detail in their venture toward the capitol building, not an ounce of reluctance or hassle presented to the militia further. With a folder of documents carried in her arms, Jaime steps out of her office and begins walking with Blake, who’d waited patiently for her to prepare the descent into the dungeons below. “How long has he been waiting?” the chancellor inquires, prepared to speak peacefully and approach the closest thing to her opposition’s leadership since the man who’d taken her fiance’s life. “We arrived about forty minutes ago and have been waiting for your call” Blake replies, still playing the side that will benefit him the most, loyal to the call for the moment that stands. “Have your men ask him if he’s actually willing to cooperate or if he’s just here because he has to be” Jaime requests, not wanting to waste time on someone unwilling to fulfil their end of the barter at play. With the tap of an earpiece, Blake calls in his request before Jaime changes the conversation, redirecting their professional connection to one on a more personal level. “Do you have a family, Blake?” the chancellor inquires, a question too unexpected and out of left field for the man to answer immediately. “Uh, I-” the man stammers, trying to uphold his composed, stoic demeanour, though is incapable of answering any way other than honestly, “two kids and a wife, ma’am- and a dog.” Bobbing her head, the woman lets the conversation die there for seemingly no reason, neither dissatisfied or pleased with the response she receives. “May I ask why you ask?” Blake inquires, watching the smile form on Jaime’s face as she slowly shakes her head. “Sure” the chancellor replies, flashing her smile to the man as her face turns to look at his, “-but you’re not going to get an answer.” “We need someone down here now!” Willy calls back in a panic, his voice bursting through the speaker in Blake’s ear loud enough for the chancellor to hear, the mood between the two immediately shifting into a shared worry. With a sprint, Jaime takes the lead on her detail as she rounds the corner, carrying herself down the stairs into the unspoken bowels of city hall. Hurrying to the state of frenzy halfway down the dungeon’s corridor, Jaime squeezes through a parting sea of militia members and scrambles into the gruesome scene that sits before her. “Who was supposed to be looking after him!?” Willy exclaims, shouting at the various silent members of the group that all look to each other in hopes that one unlucky soul would be the first to speak up. “We didn’t have anyone watching over him because he came here voluntarily!” Blake responds back, his sprint not enough to beat the chancellor to the interrogation room, one that presents an immediate challenge from the Republic’s frontwoman. Fuming, Jaime’s eyes tear from one corner of the room to another, the unbelievable pool of blood that covers the floor having turned a less-than-innocent cellar into the scene from a horror movie. Self-caused with the use of the switchblade that lays in the palm of his lifeless hand, Clark’s abdomen wears the many tears, punctures and gashes he’d made to himself in the name of his group’s prosperity. “You didn’t figure that he could’ve had a knife on him when we led him out of the room!?” Blake exclaims, shouting an inquiry toward the many militia members that stand before him, the same argument from before used to justify their own inaction. “He came here willingly! There wasn’t a need for a pat down!” one man calls out from the crowd, presenting the three figureheads before them with an argument not worth having. “The better discussion to have now is where we go from here” Willy responds, cutting Blake off from interjecting his own opinion toward the militia whilst wiping his bloody palms against his pants. Not phased by the man’s suicide, Jaime’s attention is paid to what’s been purposefully left behind for her own eyes to see, a message that makes it clear her efforts to make peace will forever fall futile. Written in blood, Clark’s dying moments were spent warning the chancellor of the hell that is soon to follow her, one that will be waged by the peacekeepers and won in the name of provoking change to a system in dire need of one. “No answers, no cooperation, no peace without you gone” the words read, scrawled across the cement wall that his limp body lies against, a peace symbol scrawled in the space just below the statement and slightly above his head. Irate, the chancellor seethes at the display she’s presented with, her mind funnelling through many thoughts as one question lingers in the back of her mind, an immediate answer leaving the tip of her tongue to the question Willy had presented her with. “We stop trying to reason and start punishing” Jaime responds, truly setting truth in motion to her declaration of leading with an iron fist, efforts exhausted beyond the point she’s willing to put up with. “He’s made it clear that they won’t cooperate, so I’m not going to waste my time talking to a brick wall” the chancellor declares, looking at Willy before turning back toward Blake, his bemused face looking toward that of his direct superior. “We find them, we bring them in, and we give them a choice” she continues, her commands made clear to the man she turns her attention toward. “They’ll shake my hand, or they’ll die by it” Jaime concludes, living up to her status as chancellor and fully fitting the iron fist to her hand. == Dire ==
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Handcuffed at the wrist, a woman is led out of the rear of a box truck by a large group of armed men, their casual attire differing drastically from the republic’s uniformed garb. Her face concealed behind the cover of a black spit hood, the woman joins a litany of others- most of whom struggle against it- in being sentenced to their undeserved, unrequested imprisonment.
Relenting to the will of those that beckon her toward their intended destination, the woman simply hands her head as she follows the guide that leads her onward, not a word shared between herself and the captor she resides in the control of. Grimacing beneath the hood, the woman reacts to the nails of the man whose hands hold her wrist, still feeling a lingering pain that she’d been forced to cooperate in the wake of. Barefoot atop the hot, sandy asphalt, the woman is soon led down a small, grassy hill before finally being freed from the autumn, mid-noon sunlight by the shade of a busy, bustling warehouse. “Wake up, Kessler!” a guard exclaims, lashing the back of a man with a leather belt, earning a grunt that far fails to reach the level of response most in such a scenario would bellow, implying it wasn’t the first time his sweat-covered flesh had been assaulted by those that watch over him. Though she’d initially been able to see the ground in light of the sun making the ground outside too bright not to see even from behind her cloak, the woman is now left in utter darkness, the ground she walks ahead left entirely up to those that hold her captive. “Heads up, people! Keep your fucking heads up!” another man shouts, earning a much louder yelp from a man whose back he lashes to a number of laughs, the small gaggle of armed patrol taking amusement in their display of power. As machines exercise their designed purpose in the background, the various chambers of suffering she is led through pass by one after the other, none any dissimilar from those she’s blindly navigated, the sounds of horrifying negligence sung like a twisted melody throughout. Finally reaching the culmination of her journey, a chain around the woman’s waist is tugged at by an extension that soon connects to the degrading belt-like restraint, allowing guards the pleasure of removing the cuffs from her wrists. Red marks worn around the base of her hands, the woman’s arms drop to her sides as the bag is ripped from her head, fully releasing a wave of white light from the overhead bulbs to her delicate eyes. Pressing her lids shut, the woman turns her head away, looking to the ground as her chin is taken into the hand of her captor, his fingers pressing against each side of her face as he pulls her eyes toward him. Looking at his light brown skin tone, bushy eyebrows, snarled lip and irritated eyes, Alex veers past the strands of dirty hair that falls in her face to see the visage of a man as evil as the surroundings they share, the torture in each direction presented to her incarnate. “Work” the man orders, not caring to waste any breath he hadn’t already expended before turning way to walk back the way he came, leaving the cut and bruised mother of two to fend for herself. Left only with the machine that sits in front of her, Alex stares blankly at the many cogs without certainty of how to use it. As quickly as her captor left, another arrives, his belt already swinging through the air as he steps through the doorway to the cramped quarters she’d been left in. “Aargh!” Alex screeches, falling to her knees as her already heavily-scratched back is met with the smooth, leather strap, her defenceless flesh left exposed in all areas aside from the bra and underwear her wardens had provided her with the decency of. “Work!” the large, pasty-white brute of a man exclaims, spit flying from his lip as his hand falls back toward the air on the follow-through of his lashing, ordering the woman to do precisely as he instructed. “How!?” Alex exclaims, forcefully brought back to her feet by the man’s hand, which wraps around the back of her neck and violently pulls her upright. With his free hand, the man pulls the lid to a machine down upon a trey of medicinal capsules, applying force gradually before the device just refuses to relent any further, this signal allowing him to release his hold of the handle and return the press to its overhead position. Without warning, the man yanks the plastic tray of freshly-pressed capsules off the machine’s surface and steps back, releasing Alex’s head after holding her face toward his presentation. “Get to work!” the man shouts, again spitting through the air as he walks off, leaving with the platter of pills as the mother is left to fend for herself once more, this time at least aware of what is being demanded of her. Wincing, the woman struggles to keep herself standing upright as she guides her hand toward a stack of trays just off to the side, each brief movement prompting her to wince in pain. Shaking, the woman’s hand hovers over the tower of platters before finding itself held within the grasp of another, the trembling in the young lady’s hand equally violent and pain-induced. Momentarily confused, Alex’s eyes lift toward the person that silently calls for her attention without concern, her eyes widening when she realises who stands just beside her. “They’ll kill you if you try anything” Amelia whispers, the look on her heavily-brutalised face one of great relief to finally see a familiar face, though one that comes at significant cost, “-but they’ll keep beating you if you don’t.” Almost failing to recognise the girl at first, Alex looks at the girl’s right eye, which is beaten into such a discoloured state that it swells shut, her bottom lip puffy and cut, and the side of her face carved by the blade of a knife with an almost surgical accuracy. Feeling her chest grow tight and lungs be deprived of oxygen, the imprisoned mother finds herself starved for words, incapable of truly registering the world she finds herself incapable of escaping. = Dire is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 Media from the start of Season 1 onwards = As his right arm presses into the side of his chair, Chevy’s left hand wields a fork that unenthusiastically pokes at a clump of mashed potatoes. Seated just beside him at one end of the dinner table, Kayla gently wipes at the corner of her mouth with a cloth napkin to relieve herself of the barbecue sauce stain that sits in the meeting point between her lips. “What’s got you guys so quiet?” Jaime queries, wiping the corner of her mouth with the knuckle of her thumb as she places a set of ribs back upon her plate, passing a curious look to the man she sits directly across from. “We haven’t seen each other in months, yet you’ve barely said anything all night” the chancellor remarks, shrugging her shoulders as another scoop of mashed potatoes are taken onto the prongs of her fork, “what gives?” “We’re sorry, it’s just been a long few weeks” Chevy quickly explains, not wanting to encourage suspicions in the mind of the republic’s foremost voice, “we’ve just been getting into our own heads over the whole ‘baby-situation’ and, well- we haven’t really been ourselves.” From between her teeth, the fork is guided from Jaime’s hand to the side of her plate, a nod coming over her as Kayla remains silent, not something the chancellor is used to, but something she doesn’t question. “We’ve all got a tendency to do that, don’t we?” Jaime replies, looking back down to her plate as she shakes her head, taking a short sip of wine from her glass before leaning back in her seat. “The world we live in doesn’t exactly make it easy to paint things out as black and white anymore. Hell, it already barely did before the catalyst” the woman continues, disheartened in having to admit what she does, “bringing a baby into it only further complicates things. Don’t worry, I get it.” His hands folding over the plate that sits before him, Chevy looks at the expression on Jaime’s face slowly fall into disappointment, not one taken from himself or his wife, but something clearly rooted in something she doesn’t speak much of. “Everything alright, Jaime?” the man inquires, watching the woman’s eyes momentarily pass a glance at him as he proceeds with his question, “with how fast everything’s happened with the N.D.F, it’s understandable to take a moment to breathe” Laughing through her nose, Jaime smirks as her head bows, her dominant hand reaching for the glass of wine once again. “There’s no breathing around here anymore” the woman replies, pausing as she takes down her sip of vintage red varietal, shaking her head as her hands return to the rack of ribs, “not for me, at least.” “Why not?” Chevy interjects, watching the woman’s eyes take toward him once more, waiting for him to follow through on his counterpoint, “the people have food, you’ve got an organised militia propping up the republic- your biggest threats have all gone the way of the past.” Shaking her head, Jaime returns the dinner to the porcelain plate before her, wiping her fingers off as she leans back in her seat. “The threats never stop. Never. They only ever get replaced with new ones” Jaime retorts, passing a glance to the luminescent towers just beyond her hillside mansion’s window. “If it’s not the catalyst- it’s the shortage of crops, if it’s not Ryan- it’s someone else, and if it’s not the peacekeepers- it’ll be someone else too.” “Woah, hold on” Chevy interrupts, waving his hands in the chancellor’s direction to halt her from progressing, “the peacekeepers are only a threat because you shot one of them dead in broad daylight.” With a bewildered expression, Jaime lowers her chin and shakes her head. “He killed Jordan, who thought I was going to let him live after that?” the woman responds, “if anything, he’s lucky I didn’t drive a knife through his chest before he could even get hooked up to an I.V!” “That doesn’t change the fact that killing him in front of everyone was what made you an enemy to them” Chevy rebukes, not shying away from confronting a dear friend when it matters most. “I was an enemy long before I even brought Ryan into that dungeon. Again- they shot Jordan” Jaime doubles down, letting her hands fall into her lap, “-and had he not gotten between us, that bullet would’ve come at me.” Lowering his chin as his eyes drift to the side, the expecting man falls quiet for a moment, collecting his thoughts before his wife picks up where he’d left off. “Why did they come after you?” Kayla inquires, quickly becoming the centre of the chancellor’s refocused attention, “before they shot Jordan- and before all of what’s happened since- why did they come after you? Why was hurting you their goal?” Parting her lips, Jaime pauses before she can allow herself to respond, already privy to the true motivations behind the peacekeeper’s actions. Bowing her head, the woman attempts to silence herself before a set of knocks emerges from the front door to her home, gathering the collective attention of the already-present audience. Departing the dinner table to greet those anxiously waiting for her answer, the chancellor is followed closely behind by her married friends. Answering hurriedly, Jaime looks to a small grouping of armed security headed by Blake, whose composure is made resoundingly clear in light of Willy’s angry demeanour. “Chancellor, there’s something you need to see” the foremost armed detail remarks, standing at the forefront of his personnel with a rifle draped across his chest. As time passes, Jaime’s feet collide with asphalt as she joins Chevy and Kayla in climbing out from the backseat of an armoured, black SUV. “Who the fuck was supposed to be standing guard?” the chancellor asks aloud, her lead serviceman the first to speak out. “The building was unoccupied at the time. We had no reason not to send extra units into the bigger city” Blake answers, “I made the call to send troops off into downtown.” Letting free a sigh, Jaime lowers her head to keep her aggravation qwelled, trusting the man speaking to her to have made the right call- regardless of the outcome it’s left her with. “Do you see now?” the chancellor wonders aloud, stepping ahead of Chevy and Kayla whilst peering to them from over her shoulder, “-do you see now why the peacekeepers are a threat?” Astonished, Chevy and Kayla join their dear friend in looking out at the front of city hall, its large pillars and marble face stained in a crimson mask, the blood that coats its walls also adorning the many steps that lead to its entrance, though the ascending staircase is made to stand out- the blood it’s splashed with forming the questioned group’s peace-sign symbol. | “You’re a terrible driver” Kennedy remarks, stepping through the door to her sister’s hillside estate as Julia follows closely behind her, groaning at the young girl’s proclamation. “And you annoy me” the doctor replies, glancing around the empty room she joins the youngest Morris sibling in to find it empty, the cold food that sits atop three plates at the table making it clear that the home was left abruptly. “Are you good to go for the rest of the night?” Julia inquires, the visible disgust she has for potentially requiring to look after the girl for any longer than she already has, making it clear which answer she hopes for. “You still haven’t answered my question” Kennedy replies, stacking the used plates from the dinner table atop each other before carrying them to the nearest sink. “Which is?” Julia responds, watching the girl continue to trek from one side of the room to the next, cleaning up after her sister and the unknown company she’d recently shared. “Where’s my mom?” Kennedy repeats, the question drawing an eye roll out of the doctor as she struggles to handle remaining in the same room as the child for even a second longer. “Ugh. Kennedy, I don’t know” Julia responds, clearly irked by the incessant questioning raised by the young girl, “just stop trying to go into that goddamn cafeteria and you won’t have to see me anymore, alright?” Clearing the unfinished food into the bin whilst waiting for the tap water to heat up, Kennedy flashes the doctor an unassuming smile as she breaks out a bottle of soap. “I heard you loud and clear” Kennedy replies, taking the soap to the rough side of a sponge as Julia nods her head, pleased enough with the girl’s answer to show herself out. Without another word shared between the two, the doctor steps through the front door whilst the teen girl stands still for a moment, listening to the engine outside roar as the car it belongs to is taken back to the hospital. Her content expression fading, Kennedy turns off the water and returns the sponge to the side of the sink, her eyebrows furrowing as her unassuming face puts on a scowl. With intent, she marches across the room with a confident pace, taking the headset off the receiver and punching in the only number she’s ever known to heart. Waiting for the ringing to cease in favour of a reply, her eyes take to the empty dining room table, curious as to the company her sister had held. “You’ve reached Chevy and Kayla. We can’t pick up right now, leave a message” the voices greet, prompting the inspective young woman to reply in kind. “It’s Kennedy. Have either of you guys seen my mom?” the girl inquires, trusting the expecting couple to provide her with insight neither doctor finds themselves capable of offering. “She wasn’t home when I woke up this morning, and I think she went somewhere last night” Kennedy continues, “she left her phone next to her bed and hasn’t come home since. Chris hasn’t seen her and Julia says she doesn’t know anything, but I don’t trust a word that comes out of her.” Pulling the headset from her ear, Kennedy prepares to end the call before thinking twice, her hand hovering over the receiver before returning the phone to her ear. “I know we haven’t talked to each other for a little while, and I know you have a lot going on, but it feels like everyone’s pulling away from me” she speaks, a defeated tone taken, “-but you guys are my friends. If you can’t help, that’s okay. I just hope you guys can help me- ‘cause if you can’t, I don’t know who can.” Slowly, Kennedy sets the phone back to its receiver, her sad eyes falling as she retreats to her room, walking through the mostly-dark hallway on her return to isolation. | “What the hell was that!?” Chevy shouts, throwing his arms out as he enters the bar from the alleyway alone, looking out at a sea of revolutionaries, all of which peer back at him confused. “What happened?” Clark inquires from behind the bar, sipping on a glass of craft beer as he watches the man angrily stop in the centre of the room. “Don’t give me that ‘what happened’ bullshit!” the man warns, pointing his finger in the older man’s direction, “what’s with the fucking stunt!?” “Chevy, calm down-” Clark attempts to respond, gesturing for the man to have a seat as he steps around the bar, only for the accusation-flying man to refuse such a request. “No, I will not calm down!” the man shouts, his face beginning to sport a small patch of hair around the length of his face, “you guys are public enemy number one, and pull this shit? What happened to keeping a low profile!?” “What shit!?” Clark finally shouts back, understanding his lack of ability to cool the man down and instead opting to meet fire with fire in hopes of uncovering the source of his outburst. “The shit you pulled at city hall!” Chevy responds, immediately finding the speaker’s face shrouded with puzzlement. “What shit at city hall!?” the man calls back, stretching his arms out at each side with such speed that a small amount of beer spills over the brim of his glass. “The pig blood! And that symbol you smeared over the steps!” Chevy shouts back, his brain struggling to catch up to the realisation his mind is slowly coming to. “What the hell are you talking about!? We haven’t left this place all day!” Clark proclaims, watching the invasive gentleman fall quiet as he continues to speak, “we had a town hall run overtime and it just finished twenty minutes ago!” Falling to his sides, Chevy’s arms join the rest of the man in concession, “you didn’t paint that shit on city hall?” he asks, met with the same refusal he’d received upon arriving. “Whatever the hell you’re on about- we had nothing to do with it!” Clark remarks, his voice slowly coming down from the heights it had shared with the fleece-jacketed man, “besides, where the fuck would we even find pig blood to begin with? We barely have enough booze to hold me over!” “Well, I’m just assuming it was pig blood. The alternative would leave me with a lot of questions” Chevy admits, “but if it were real blood- y’all are the ones volunteering for the hospital!” Placing his glass on the bartop, Clark looks Chevy in the eyes as he closes the distance between them, lowering his voice to a more civilised level. “Chevy, we had nothing to do with whatever you’re talking about” the group’s speaker explains, escorting the man away from the group’s view as they make for the rear of the building to speak in private. “If you had nothing to do with it, then someone’s out to make you look worse than whatever Jaime already thinks of you” Chevy replies, watching the speaker’s head nod. “Yeah, that’s why we’re walking somewhere quieter than the middle of the damn bar” Clark explains, finally coming to a dark corner of the backroom before continuing the conversation, “now, explain to me what the hell is going on.” Pulling in a deep breath through his nose, Chevy composes himself before he begins speaking, trying to clarify his thoughts before attempting to put them into words. “Someone splattered some kind of blood all over city hall and painted the steps with the peace sign” the man explains, not saying much that the speaker hadn’t already gathered. “So someone’s trying to make us look bad, got it-” Clark replies, shaking his head as he shrugs his shoulders, thinking to himself momentarily before looking his friend in the eyes, “-what’s the big deal?” Pulling his head back, Chevy looks at the man with confused eyes, struck by surprise at the nonchalant attitude the gentleman takes to the revelation. “What’s the big de- what!?” the man repeats, “someone’s out to make you look bad, what do you mean ‘what’s the big deal’!?” Unable to do much more than seem less than amused, Clark honestly conveys his thoughts to the concerned visitor. “We’ve been branded as a group of evil, blood-thirsty revolutionaries ever since a sideshow gaggle of idiots that were with us decided to take potshots at the president- or whatever she calls herself now” the man replies, “is any of this really as bad as being known as the group that killed the girl’s boyfriend?” “He was her fiance, but I see your point” Chevy answers, letting his head fall into the palm of his head as Clark’s hand leads him by the shoulder the way he’d arrived. “Listen- Chevy, I appreciate you looking out for us. But at the end of the day, nothing’s gonna change the fact that we’re the bad guys in that girl’s eyes” Clark explains, deeply angered at having to say such a thing, “you and your misses are welcomed here as spectators only for a reason. You can’t play both sides.” “I’m not playing both sides, I’m playing the same side’ Chevy responds, eager to correct the man whose breath smells like the high-percentage alcohol beverage he’d just temporarily parted from, “-the only caveat is that neither side realises that they’re supposed to be teammates.” Stepping through the back door, the man looks back at the narrow-eyed Clark as he proceeds to shut the entrance, highly sceptical of the man’s claim, “are you absolutely sure about that?” “Yes!” Chevy responds without the need to think about it, refusing to believe either side is on the wrong end of the history books. “Everyone in that bar wants a system better than the one before the catalyst. The only thing different between you guys and her is that you disagree on who should be in charge of it” the man continues, again watching the hesitation sprout across the speaker’s face. “If that were the case, she wouldn’t have tanks in the streets right about now” Clark replies, his claim again running into reluctance. “She’s just as mad about that as you are, but she’s got no other choice” Chevy responds, the doubtful visage across the speaker’s face continuing to show a reluctance toward aligning himself with Chevy’s outlook. “Even if that were true, she’s settled on letting them make themselves at home in the same place they nearly drove into extinction” the speaker replies, a statement his guest fails to argue against as the door slowly shuts on the dialogue, returning the group to their secluded place of self-questioning and discussion. | “Sorry for the mess” Jaime greets, stepping through the open door to her city hall office, where she finds Wade sitting in one of the empty seats before her desk. “Yeah, I wasn’t too pleased to see that on my drive in” the man responds, making himself at home with a bottle of the woman’s wine, the glass he wields filled to the rim. “These peacekeepers you keep talking about- they’re the same people that killed your partner, right?” Wade inquires, crossing one leg over the other as Jaime takes a seat in her chair, pouring herself a glass from the same bottle her visitor had chosen from the nearby rack. “I think so. I’m not really sure who they are or what their hierarchy is, but I know there are more of them than I first thought” Jaime explains, “how many there truly are is the answer to a question I have yet to find.” “You ought to do so soon then” Wade quickly responds, fixing the silk tie that sits around his neck, uncrossing his legs as he stands from the chair, seemingly uninterested in spending another moment away from his leisurely activities than he already has. “If these guys are going to continue making a mess like this, you’ll find me cooperating a lot less than I already do” he warns, taking another sip from the glass before setting it upon the desk. “I need to know that- if I’m to maintain Los Angeles as a stable camp to expand inland from- it’s left with a leader that can make sure I don’t have to keep coming back to fix what she doesn’t seem to be capable of fixing herself” he concludes, turning away from the woman to begin his retreat for the door. “Is that a threat?” Jaime calls out, watching the man bow his head with a smile as he stops in the middle of the doorway, kept from walking off at the sound of her voice. Growing silent, the air between the pair remains tense as the woman steps out from her desk, slowly rounding it to present the man with the same image of the chancellor that has struck cooperation in most of the people that have come across her. “The NDF may have some things my republic doesn’t, but make no mistake about it- I will blow your goddamn head off if you overstep your boundaries” Jaime replies, watching the smirk deepen as the man takes amusement from her remarks. “No, Jaime- it wasn’t a threat” Wade answers, calling back to the initial question that had prompted her to leave her seat, “it was a warning- if anything.” Turning around, Wade adjusts his suit jacket as he pats himself off, clarifying his words to leave no error in understanding. “Jaime, I’ve let you stay in charge of this city because you’ve proven yourself to be capable of running it. In times of peril, in times of success- you excel. You’re worth more in that chair than having to find someone else for it would be” the man explains, “but with that said, you’re still there because I allow you to be. Your republic is just a placeholder for mine.” Clearing his throat, the man steps past the chancellor and makes his way toward the window at the back of the room, continuing to speak as Jaime’s eyes follow him from the front of the room. “Your people will eventually be my people. And when that day comes, I want to make sure they can co-exist without me having to lead public executions to set an example they should already be following by then” Wade remarks, “by that standard, it would be beneficial for you to start setting that example.” With her chin lowered, Jaime’s eyes press closer together as she watches the man stand before her window, a question lurking in the back of her mind. “And what if I don’t want to give it to you?” the woman inquires, prompting the man to turn his gaze toward her from over his shoulder, “after all- we may not have the manpower that you do- but we don’t need to cross the Pacific in order to regroup like you would.” Laughing through his nose, Wade’s head bows for a moment before he turns back, heading back for the woman’s direction with a smile. “You know that wouldn’t be a good idea- for you or any of your Angelinos” the man replies, his smirk slowly beginning to fade into a nostril-flaring scowl, “even talking about such a thing is a dangerous game to play, chancellor.” Without hesitation, Jaime removes a brass jacket from her pocket and the revolver from inside her boot, loading the bullet into the cylinder and letting it spin before meeting the base of her hand. “Dangerous games are the ones I perform best at” the woman replies, tilting the barrel toward the ceiling, “do you want to have a turn at it, or should I?” Unimpressed but clearly intrigued by the display the woman sports, Wade remains silent and allows the chancellor to make the decision for him. “Fine, I’ll give it a shot or two-” Jaime replies, putting the barrel to her head before pulling the trigger twice, adding a third at the end to the same, empty effect the first two had been met with, “-or three.” With a chuckle, Wade watches the woman remove the bullet from the weapon and return it to her pocket. “I don’t fear you, Wade. I don’t fear your threats, I don’t fear death, and I certainly don’t fear whatever vision for the future you’ve got in that empty little head of yours” Jaime declares, cutting the distance between herself and the man in half as she inches closer to his face, lowering her voice to a near-whisper, “but if you underestimate me in any way- I’ll give you something to fear.” Amused, the man bows his head for a moment and nods to himself, refusing to utter another word than what he’d already provided before stepping through the door and returning the way he’d entered, leaving behind the woman and her cosy office. Sliding the gun back into her boot, Jaime watches the man step off into the night as Blake and Willy stand closeby, noticing the humoured expression on the gentleman’s face and the content look on their chancellor’s, her warning issued in full. == Dire == Wearing a grin capable of making a lion pull away in fear, Julia stands with her hands by each side just a few, short metres away. Amplified by the torrential downpour that crashes all around the building, the unspoken tension cuts with ease as the women stand across from each other, both sensing exactly what each other’s motivations are. Slowly lowering her hand from the door’s bar, Alex turns the rest of her body toward the onlooking nurse, remaining entirely silent as she does.
“What’ve you got there?” Julia inquires, resetting her sights upon the key that sits in the door’s lock, genuine intrigue taken in its sighting. With a gentle pull, the Morris matriarch removes the metal piece from the mechanism it had sat within and presses it hard against the skin of her palm, its jagged teeth leaving marks in her flesh. “What’s behind the door?” Alex replies, immediately jumping to the question that sits on her mind, an inquiry that prompts the doctor to shake her head. “You don’t want me to answer that” Julia responds, her head beginning to lean toward one shoulder as her hand stretches outward, an open palm displayed to the mother of two, “give me the key.” Her rigid body only growing colder with the request, Alex thinks to herself quietly for a moment as water droplets continue to run down her hair and inevitably collide with the puddle below. Passing a glance toward her pressed-shut hand, Alex soon returns her gaze to the woman ahead, lips parting well before she actually answers the request. “What’s behind the door?” she wonders for a second time, once more receiving a hesitant reply from the Avallone sibling. “Let’s not do this” Julia replies, letting her open palm lower to her side for just the moment, allowing her to step forward with a less-imposing figure, “just give me the key and leave. We won’t talk about this again.” Less threatened now than she is determined, Alex gently shakes her head as she matches the doctor’s approach, taking one step backward to meet each step forward the woman takes. “What’s behind the door, Julia?” the woman asks for a third and final time, not allowing the question to go without an answer, one that prompts the smile and semi-inviting demeanour the scrub-adorning woman wears to fall, pushed aside in favour of an exhaustion with the situation at hand. Beginning to stare at the visitor with a scowl, Julia’s head straightens out as she looks to the woman’s hand, a slow look of acceptance coming across the doctor’s face. “Fine” she replies, looking the mother in the eyes and letting out a sigh, “let me show you.” On edge already, Alex watches the woman’s hand slowly lowering to her side and dip into her pocket, jingling a small set of keys before removing them to present, the key picked from all others matching the one she grasps. Opening her free hand to present to the woman across from her, Julia approaches carefully, reaching the assortment of keys toward the double doors as Alex steps to the side. Keeping true to her word, the doctor unlocks the door and returns the chain to her side. Pulling back, the woman leaves the doors for the mother to interact with, not stepping between the woman and her eagerness to have curiosities put aside. “I tried to stop you” Julia whispers, making room for the mother to rest her hand on the crashbars whilst waiting for her entry into the yet-unknown. Hesitating, Alex waits for a moment as she pushes the crash bar in slowly, both building up the courage to step inside whilst also trying to prepare herself for whatever situation may play out. With the force of a shoulder tackle, Alex’s time to weigh options depletes immediately, her body slamming into the door and crashing into the uncertain room as the doctor’s body weight crashes into her unexpectedly. Falling to the ground, the mother’s eyes immediately take to a set of empty cages off to the room’s side, barely able to make them out for what they are whilst only able to see them through the light of the moon that shines through an overhead window. Left with no time to think, Alex watches Julia approach with a syringe in hand, the expression of a woman enraged to the point of murder sported by the medical specialist. Her breath stolen beneath the woman’s weight, Alex takes her opportunity to swing her leg in the doctor’s direction, watching the woman release a hold of the plastic needle as she tumbles to the floor, crashing onto her side with a loud thud. Hearing her groans, Alex makes the most of her opening, climbing to her feet as best she can before hurrying through the same doors she was thrust to, the doctor not too far behind. No longer having words to share with each other, the women’s interaction boils down to a chase, one side of the coin desperately trying to flee the life-threatening scenario whilst the other attempts to fulfil her part in it. Back into the mostly-empty lobby, Alex turns the first corner and shakes off Julia’s hand, which grabs her arm for a brief second before failing to latch on. With the distance closing, the mother chooses to turn around and fight, looking to keep the clock from running out by giving herself a chance at adding some extra time. With the push of her hand, Alex shoves the doctor into the nearest wall and kicks her away, creating space between them that is nothing short of much-needed. With eyes on the front doors, the mother’s intended departure carries her toward the incredible rainstorm just beyond the hospital’s lobby, the headlights on her car still aimed toward the building. With a second wind, Julia matches the mother’s stride and soon exceeds it, gaining ground on the woman and lunging forward just as they near the entrance, her momentum too great for either to control. Wrapping her arms around Alex’s shoulders, Julia takes both women off their feet, their speed carrying them through the air as they fall forward, breaking the lobby’s entrance and shattering the glass that separated it from a rainy parking lot. Rolling on the pavement, both women come to a harsh stop at the hospital’s emergency entrance, their skin scraped and bodies battered by the force of their respective collisions. Wincing in pain, Alex grasps at her shoulder and groans, turning her body in an attempt to climb up once more, only to feel Julia’s weight take her to the ground yet again. The anguish of a torn shoulder labrum quickly fading, Alex’s pain is stolen just as her consciousness is, the sudden, stinging impact of a needle stabbing her in the neck forcing her to grow weary and dizzy. Still mustering enough strength to operate on, the mother tosses Julia aside and leaps off the ground, making it back to her feet before immediately feeling the injection’s effects take hold of her, distorting her vision as easily as it unsteadies her balance. Able to barely make out the direction to her car, Alex sets her sights on the only source of hope she can look to, soon finding even the headlights too dim to set her sights on. Putting one, final nail in the coffin that is their scuffle, Julia throws her shoulder into the medicated woman’s back yet again, this time shoving her into the hood of her own car and to the ground without a second wind to depend on. Leaving a dent in the black sedan’s front cover, Alex slides off her vehicle and onto the ground, falling limp as the drugs take her into a state of unconsciousness, unable to fight off the doctor’s will any further. Gasping for air as she leans against the vehicle, Julia lets the syringe fall from her hand, its bouncing rattle rolling along the ground and coming to a stop near the mother’s body. Having made her mess and being left with the responsibility of cleaning it up, Julia takes a moment to collect her thoughts and figure out where she goes from here. In due time, the woman drags Alex’s body and throws her into the trunk of her own car, taking her brother’s key from the woman’s hand before seating herself behind the wheel, driving off for the republic’s border as the night grows old, her parade rained on by a storm the nation barely ever gets to see. = Dire is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 Media from the start of Season 1 onwards = “How’re you feeling?” Chevy asks, his wrist sitting atop his truck’s steering wheel as his sights set on the woman beside him, her eyes closed and the seat leant back. “Fine. I think the nausea’s calming down” Kayla replies, slightly losing her train of thought as the sounds of droplets crashing against the vehicle bring about a peace of mind she rarely gets to experience. “That’s good” the driver replies, taking his free hand and resting it on the back of the one his wife lets sit in her lap, their patience spent waiting for the arrival that soon presents itself. Stepping into the alleyway, Clark shields his eyes from the headlights that plaster the rear entry to the peacekeeper’s bar in an ocean of illumination, listening to the driver step down from his vehicle to meet him. “Is everything alright?” Chevy inquires, shutting his door and sinking his hands into the pockets of his sweatshirt as his hoodie is soon fully drenched in rainwater. “Yeah, the bar’s fine. The people are alright too” Clark replies, speaking with the slightest smell of booze in his breath, something the man across from him keeps from pointing out. “In that case- what did they want?” Chevy responds, his massive shadow cast along the back of the bar, an imposing figure that at least lets the slightly-intoxicated peacekeeper spokesman lower his vision-shielding arm. “Us” Clark answers, a reply that the father-to-be had not anticipated hearing, forcing him to take a verbal double-take. “Us?” the larger, long-haired, thick-bearded man inquires, finally met with his answer. “They told us they’d supply the food we were getting cut off from and then some if we volunteered to work at the hospital” Clark reiterates, the extending of a pack of darts politely refused by the visiting man, “they were behind on recruits, so they needed to look for people other than the Angelinos. At least- that’s what they said.” “So they just came in to negotiate? Give you some food and get you to work at the hospital in the first place?” Chevy asks, watching the flame shoot from Clark’s lighter as he lights the cigarette he holds between his lips, “so, cutting your rations was just a ploy to get you to volunteer for the hospital?” Letting a puff of air leave through his lips, Clark shrugs his shoulders with little answer to offer other than the one he’s been presented with. “If there’s an ulterior motive, it ain’t very easy to figure out” the drunkard replies, tucking a single hand in his pocket as he stares off into the distance, “all I know is that we start work tomorrow.” Momentarily confused, Chevy looks Clark in the eyes as his passenger door swings open, his immediate interest taken toward the man’s declaration. “What do you mean you start tomorrow? You took the deal?” the man queries, watching the group leader’s eyes widen in an instant. “Of course we took the deal” the smoker replies as Kayla steps to the side of her husband, slowly becoming privy to what had been shared without her as time passes. “Chevy, those people have families to feed. You don’t think they could pass up something like that, do you?” Clark replies, not initially getting a response as the man looks off to the side, trying to clear his thoughts. “I didn’t expect them to refuse it, but it’s hard to see how little they think of Jaime and assume they’d just be fine with going to work for her- regardless of the return” Chevy explains, a gesture the man across from him can’t fully disagree with. “Listen, we don’t like Jaime. There’s not much more to it than that” Clark replies, again taking another drag off the dart he shields from the elements beneath his chin, “but you’ve got to put food on the table somehow. What other option would there be if not this one?” Bowing his head, the question sits in Chevy’s mind for a moment, only put aside when he nods toward the smoker’s direction and turns back for his vehicle. “What’s happening?” Kayla asks, joining her husband in returning to her seat and slamming the door shut. “Jaime offered them their food rations back if they volunteered for the hospital” Chevy answers, summing the brief conversation up as simply as he can. With her eyes squinting, his wife’s mind immediately presents curiosity, the declaration not appearing to her as cut-and-dry the way it seemingly does to Clark. “Didn’t they have an uptick in volunteers not too long ago?” Kayla asks, a recollection her husband knows to be true, “what the hell do they need more for? Let alone the peacekeepers?” Resting his elbows against his sides, Chevy shakes his head at a loss for answers, knowing what’s been shared with him doesn’t line up on face-value alone. “Maybe she’s looking to have something more to control them with?” Chevy suggests, as doubtful in the assumption as he is in the offer’s motivation, not certain he can even begin to make a well-informed guess on the matter. “Is that even what she wants anymore?” Kayla wonders aloud, letting out a sigh as she sinks into her seat once more, looking toward the ceiling as she continues to speak aloud, “it’s been a few months since we talked to her. Maybe she’s not looking to make enemies with them now?” With the subtle shake of his head, Chevy surrenders to his uncertainty, putting the car in reverse and backing out of the alleyway as he admits defeat. “The only sense that we have is that it doesn’t make any” he confesses, pulling onto the main road with the hope of returning to a warm, quiet home. | Sitting by the pool as the sun begins to set on another, less-rainy day, Kennedy loses herself in the pages of her book as she tries keeping to herself. Listening to a door shut in the front of the home, the girl continues to go about her day until a set of knocks soon follow, prompting her eyebrows to furrow. “Go around the back!” Kennedy exclaims, barking orders to the person at her door in confusion, having mistaken the car for someone entirely different than one who’d be requesting entry to the home. Following the directions he’d been given, Chris steps through the connecting entrance and makes his way to the backyard, looking around for a moment before setting his eyes on the pool below. “Sorry to interrupt” the man apologises, genuinely sorry for having to impede on the girls’ day, an obvious confusion over something that wraps around his mind. “I thought you were mom” Kennedy replies, setting her book upon the nearby desk as she pays her full attention to the visiting doctor, the source of her remark immediately prompting the man to reply. “Yeah, speaking of which- where is she?” Chris replies, watching the look of surprise come across the young girl’s face, “she’s not answering her phone and Jaime hasn’t seen her since last night. I figured she’d be here, but-” “She’s not here” Kennedy interjects, climbing off her seat and ascending the stairs to join the doctor’s level, “I just thought she’s been with you the whole day.” Shaking his head, Chris refuses the notion, peering through the large, glass windows that line the hillside mansion to see no sign of the woman, the only life occupying the property being that of the small child that stands before him. “We had plans to go out to lunch tomorrow, but the place had to shut down. I guess the storm knocked out the power and the food spoiled” Chris explains, “I’ve been trying to call her to reschedule, but I haven’t got an answer.” Unable to offer anything more than the shake of her head, Kennedy puts her hands on each hip and opens the home’s backdoor, stepping inside and leading the gentleman behind her into the living room. “I haven’t seen her either dude, I don’t know what to tell you” Kennedy replies, stepping aside to open the floor for the man to explore, “you can look around if you need to, or- I don’t know, write a note? I haven’t seen her either.” Showing his teeth, Chris lets out a disappointed sigh before shaking his head, beginning to walk for the front door as he pays the girl his parting words. “Just tell her to check her phone if you do see her, please?” the man politely requests, stepping through the front door before pausing, looking back into the home for a moment, “and if you need help or something, call the hospital and I’ll swing around.” Mustering an unconvincing smile, Kennedy nods in the man’s direction as the kind gesture falls on deaf ears, the door closing on his return to the car whilst the youngest Morris daughter is left with a large, empty house once more. The first two digits on the nearest clock reading ‘10’, Kennedy sits beside a light whilst reading her book, losing track of time as the minutes pass like nothing. Flipping through pages, the girl pays no mind to the night sky or the well-lit towers in the distance, instead reading the tale of a young man’s adventure through an unfamiliar land in the name of freeing those he cares for. Not a sound surrounding her, the ability for a pin to drop and send soundwaves through the room make it impossible for the soft buzzing in the near distance to not catch the girl’s ear. Slowly lifting her eyes from the fragile pages, Kennedy’s sights set on the dark corridors of the residence, not a single person having slipped through the front door other than Chris himself for the sound to emanate from. Her curiosity calling her to action, Kennedy sets the book to the side and climbs off the couch, an empty wine bottle taken into her possession in the event a weapon is called for. Not wasting a second of time, the teenage girl steps through the hallway in search of the noise, walking as if there were no reason for concern in her search for an answer. The final buzz coming in just as she passes the room in question, Kennedy’s sights take to the screen that lights her mother’s quarters with a dim glow, its display only remaining active for a few seconds before falling dark. Flicking the light switch, the woman’s daughter enters her bedroom, staring at the empty bed and at the pile of clothes her mother’s sleepwear is comprised of. Not finding anything to be out of the ordinary, Kennedy stares at the nightstand with a single, open drawer before glancing back to the phone, its silent occupation of the table’s surface striking her as odd, but for reasons she doesn’t quite understand. Finding Chris’ name on the phone’s outer display, the girl thinks for a moment before returning the phone to where she’d found it, her mind having been made up on her next course of action. Parking out front the lobby’s entrance, Kennedy leans her bike against the concrete column propping up the hospital’s covering, the ground just before its emergency room doors covered in tiny fragments of glass. Making herself at home, the girl steps through the mangled entrance and walks through the halls, taking one long stretch of hallway after another before stumbling across a familiar sight, her travels having taken her back to the mysterious set of double doors. With furrowed eyebrows, Kennedy looks to the crash bar with interest and turns her back to what she believes is an empty lobby, unaware of the quiet set of feet that step out from around the nearest corner. Pushing the bars in to no avail, the youngest Morris sibling finds reluctance from the locked doors, prompting the voice behind her to call out for attention. “Can’t sleep, Ken?” Julia wonders aloud, watching the small girl turn to look at her, not showing an ounce of fear or strife. | “A glass of wine, please” Jaime replies to the waitress taking her order, pinning her hair behind her ear as she reads from the menu, her right leg crossed over her left. “And for you, sir?” the server inquires, turning her attention toward Wade as he parts his eyes from the laminated registry of courses. “I’ll have your oldest merlot” the man replies, flashing the woman a half smile before returning his attention toward the menu, the woman’s heels tapping along the ground as she departs. “Do you go out to dinner often?” Wade inquires, unravelling his silverware from the cloth they were housed in, watching Jaime read through the assortment of meals she holds in her lap. “No, I usually have dinner with my family” the woman answers honestly, setting the menu aside as she takes a sip from the nearest glass of water, “why do you ask?” Adjusting his tie, the New Democratic Front’s founder bows his chin toward the woman’s apparel, her casual outfit out of place for the establishment. “I figured you’d have run out of formal dresses to show up to a place like this in a t-shirt, jeans and a jacket” Wade replies, watching the republic’s chancellor squint for a moment, slightly offended. “I’m sorry I was never the ‘stick up my ass’ politician type” Jaime retorts, earning an amused chuckle from the man across from her, “I don’t usually care for places like these.” “Well, when I asked where you’d prefer to have dinner, why did you reply with here?” Wade inquires, a smirk of curiosity adorning his face. “It’s the closest place within walking distance to city hall” Jaime replies, shrugging as she admits to having very little alternative reason. “It’s a good reminder, though. A nice little look into what’s been able to happen in the republic, isn’t it?” the chancellor inquires, watching the man’s head fall as his smile is taken with it. “You’ve done a fair enough job at keeping Los Angeles afloat, yes-” Wade responds, purposefully referring to it by the former title, “-that’s why we’ve kept you around.” Parting her lips to reply, Jaime holds her thought as the waitress returns with their requested drinks, a pen and pad in hand to jot down their orders. “I’ll have the cooked salmon with a side of asparagus, thank you” Jaime remarks, bowing her head toward the pad as her friend-via-circumstance takes his turn to order. “I’ll have the twelve-ounce steak cooked medium rare” Wade replies, quickly sliding his menu to the centre of the table as Jaime politely hands hers off to the uniformed server, an appreciative smile given to her. “You don’t get to choose whether or not I stay around, let’s get that clear” Jaime resumes her thought, the intrigued expression on the N.D.F founder’s face reading of a mix of displeasure and amusement. “You can call yourselves whatever you want and told guns around until the sun comes up, but the Angelino Republic is my domain” the chancellor declares, putting her finger to the surface of the table, “and if you were to try and take it from me, I’d make sure you’d stand to gain nothing.” “Jaime, the need for baseless threats is futile” Wade quickly interrupts, holding his hands toward the woman’s face as his demeanour adjusts, putting forward an affable and cooperative expression in the face of presumed hostilities. “You are the chancellor, this is your Republic, and I’m not launching some campaign to have you removed from your post” the man confesses, subtly leaning back in his seat as he places his hands down, “-that said, there are things we’d like to see you improve.” With a glare, the woman’s head turns toward the side just slightly, looking to the man out of the corner of her eye. “From what I’m hearing, you’ve got some issues with an underground group out here” Wade continues, watching the chancellor’s head dip and nod as he resumes speaking, “whilst we’re not too enthused about the ‘iron fist’ display you put on a few months ago, we understand where it comes from. We just want to know it’s not something to be greatly concerned with.” “The peacekeepers are taken care of. I’m using them to take a page out of your book” Jaime replies, immediately watching the arch in Wade’s eyebrow take shape, his intrigue never lessening as far as the chancellor is concerned thus far. “Starve the peacekeepers, make them the enemy in the eyes of the people that we keep fat and happy, and both sides go to war with each other instead of me” the woman remarks, flashing a smile toward the man who’d been doing much the same to her throughout the night. “Is that what you think we did?” Wade inquires, the look in the eyes of the woman across from him insinuating just that. “No. We simply took the stupidest from both sides and turned them into a reliable voter base” Wade refutes, placing his hand to the side of the empty plate that sits before him, “we were constantly attacked- getting away unscathed was never the point. We needed to make sure we had people to defend us to the death whenever those attacks came around.” “Is that why you poisoned the water system?” Jaime quickly interjects, the question one that prompts the man to bow his head, a more obvious disappointment taken from the accusation. “I never poison the well, so to speak” Wade argues in his favour, his head still facing downward as his eyes look up at the woman across from him. “The point was population control, not mass-tragedy” the man continues, making himself heard with profound clarity, “what happened with Project 1172 was accidental.” “Is that what you’ll tell the others when they come looking for you?” Jaime inquires, cutting the man off with the same haste he had just seconds prior, “we both know you don't have all the time in the world at your disposal.” “That’s why I’m here” Wade responds, matching the woman’s quick interruption with one of his own, the air growing still and quiet the moment he speaks. “Response will be harsh and violent. Other nations will immediately look at us to repay what was never our intention” the man continues, deconstructing his motivations in a precise and easily understandable way. “If they are presented with a weak N.D.F, they will come at us for everything we have. We will be forced into extinction and people like me will be the first to have their heads removed” Wade explains, looking Jaime in the eyes as he nears his point, “but presence on the mainland- presence in your republic- it will show the rest of the world that we’re not down for the count just yet.” “So this is all just a way to save your ass?” Jaime refutes, the suggestion she’d taken from the man’s words quickly argued against. “No. This is a way to make sure you and I- just like everyone that looks up to us for leadership and support- have a world to live in past today and tomorrow” Wade concludes, “I weeded out all the corrupt, partisan hacks because I knew what they would use 1172- er, the catalyst- to push. I wouldn’t let things be any worse than what they were.” “So you’re a martyr?” Jaime concludes, unimpressed with the speech the man provides to her, one that she can’t tell whether or not to perceive as genuine. “Someone that- while yeah, used to be that same corrupt hack- doesn’t feel that way anymore?” the chancellor continues, trying to dig further into the skin to see how far she can get before blood is drawn, “-someone who finally saw the error of his ways and wants to do good now that he’s wiped out, what? Half the population?” “Project 1172 was not my plan, but yes-” Wade replies, finding common ground with the woman as the server returns with two plates, quietly setting them before the people she assumes she’s better off not interrupting. “-yes, I want to do good. That starts here-” the man concludes, passing a glance at the exquisite restaurant they sit within, “-in the Angelino Republic.” Though his words speak tales she struggles to assume are genuine, Jaime can’t help herself but question the man’s motivations. “I don’t believe you” she responds, looking the man in the eyes as his sombre expression slowly turns into a devious smile, one that accompanies him as he leans back in his seat. “And you shouldn’t” Wade replies, picking his utensils up and cutting into his dinner, pointing the prongs of his fork toward the woman’s plate, “eat up.” Her lip curling, Jaime takes the glass of red wine into her hand and takes a sip from the cup, stepping out of her seat and turning for the way she came. “Ms. Morris-” Wade calls out, stopping the woman’s departure after a few seconds of letting the display play out, allowing him a moment to chew his first bite, “-our military is still the strongest in the world, our navy is top-notch, and we still command most of what’s left of the western world. Of course they won’t retaliate.” Nostrils flaring, Jaime takes another sip from her glass before turning back, looking at the man with inquisitive eyes as she returns to the table, though not intending to retake her seat. “What makes you think I won’t?” the woman queries, setting her drink back on the table as she presses both hands to each side of her plate. “Because you’re smarter than that” Wade quickly answers, this reply both genuine and honest, “you could see through that thick pig shit I just spewed off to you with flying colours. I know I made it obvious, but that’s still impressive.” “Then what do you really want?” Jaime counters, locking eyes with the man before standing straight up, waiting for his answer. Slowly chewing his next bite before staring off into the distance, the man answers with one word before chewing the chunks of meat that sit between his teeth, “everything.” Reaching for a moist towelette, Wade wipes the corner of his mouth before pressing his elbow into the table, keeping his eyes on the woman’s own as he speaks. “Project 1172 introduced the people that are still alive to a very different, entirely new world than the one we’ve left behind” the founder explains, “it’s honestly quite telling that Los Angeles would be one of the few pillars it left standing.” Remaining quiet, Jaime gathers all that she can from the man’s remarks, noticing the egotistic and power-hungry desires that flood through the man’s mind, his idea of a new world introducing the hurdle that stands before her republic. “People have a duty to serve their superiors. It’s why we built businesses to the blueprint of empires. One person on top, a million little soldiers at the bottom, and a few, good men in the middle” Wade concludes, “I’m the one on top.” Grimacing, Jaime shakes her head in refusal, downing the rest of her wine before throwing the glass to the ground, allowing it to shatter whilst her opposition and forced-ally remains unimpressed at the display. “Is this outburst supposed to enlighten me to some greater truth you’re hiding?” Wade queries, genuinely looking for an answer that comes in the form of the chancellor’s headshake. “I’ll play nice with you while I have to, but don’t get this twisted- you and I are not on the same side” Jaime declares, a revelation that comes as a surprise to neither patron. “If you try to replace me, I’ll make sure you feel every last bit of fight these people- my people- have to offer” the chancellor concludes, slamming her fist upon the table and pulling away to leave, “this is my republic.” Walking for the door, the woman’s attention is called for by the man once more, her eyes glaring at him from over her shoulder as her hand rests on the handle to the front door. “I just want you to remember, chancellor- you have no power here as it is. I feed your people, I clothe your people, I keep them supplied with gas and protected with men on the ground” Wade explains, “as far as your republic goes, it is to me exactly what you are to me- a puppet.” Seething, the woman’s eye twitches as her breathing grows heavy, nearly taking the form of a growl as the founder concludes his thought. “It’s time to give up on your dreams of being the one at the top. There’s nothing wrong with being one of the good men in the middle-” Wade concludes, looking at Jaime’s reflection in the glass panels of the door she stands at, “-start solidifying your place there before you find yourself knocked to the bottom... as just another little soldier.” Not wasting another moment, the woman leaves her salmon to cool as she steps through the door, re-entering the Angelino Republic as her apparent superior remains behind, enjoying his meal and a night on the town to himself, treated to luxuries just the same as he anticipates receiving when his vision of the new world takes shape as described. == Dire == |
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