'Black coffee... don't fail me now!' Jim Romelo downed the entire contents of the cup in one gulp before feeling his senses heighten due to the raw caffeine in the drink. His appearance was a far cry from his usual grooming standards. His brown hair was sticking out all over the place and his amber eyes had streaks of red in the white areas. On his desk were stacks of reports and records from a few of the orphanages set up by the Abyss in various PLANTs. He had been slowly examining one pile at a time and regardless to say, there was something off about the paper trail. It had been pretty tough to detect but that tiny clue was enough to drive him to comb through the other reports and find the other discrepancies.
It had been fairly easy to get the reports since he was a member of the parent organization that ran the orphanages. The employees had all explained the process of how the reports were compiled. Normal protocols were that the orphanages would not do follow-up checks after children have been released since the screening process for parents interesting in adopting an orphaned child is intensive and allows the staff to quickly spot who would not be suitable parents. All the activities that the children were engaged in didn't seem out of the ordinary. There was a decent balance between educating activities and activities that allowed the children to unwind. Their movie and game library seemed pretty normal with stacks of discs in jeweled cases that had coded labels on them to make things easier for the staff to find things.
The discrepancies in question were the actual people who adopted the children. He had to take a lot of time to cross-reference actual PLANT population records against the named people who were adopting children. Once in a while, something didn't add up properly in terms of who had adopted that child. For example, a record from an orphanage in Aprilius City listed a child being adopted by Karen and Lester Bana... an elderly couple who lived in November City and needed constant care in their nursing home. Jim had found at least two hundred of these discrepancies and upon seeing the fruits that his investigation had yielded, the man's faith in his organization had started to crack. There were too anomalies in these records that had not been accounted for.
He considered checking up with some friends in the organization that he could trust but that route is too dangerous. The best plan of action is to dig deeper to find out what happened to those children but the feeling in his heart already had a good idea of where those children wound up. He wasn't sure how long he had until someone notices that he's been doing some snooping around in places where he shouldn't be. Grabbing his jacket and a list of names to check up on, he exited his quarters and as he turned right, he bumped into one of the few people in the organization that unsettled him. "Geez!! I'm sorry but I'm just in such a big rush and I really should be going!"
"Not so fast, wise guy..." The slow tone used by Ash Gray sent a nervous tingle up Jim's spine. "That's the problem with everyone these days. They're so much in a damn hurry to stop and smell the flowers. Just take a damn minute and breathe..."
Jim really didn't have the time for this and he really didn't want to spend more time than necessary in the former ZAFT pilot's presence. Ever since he was recruited as the newest Abyss ace pilot, Jim was well aware of the man's lust for blood, be it Natural or Coordinator. "R-right..." He needed to keep a cool head throughout all this. Otherwise, he could wind up dead.
"Hey... did I ever tell you about the joke about the guy who wound up deep in shit because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time?" Ash's smile was anything but friendly as he asked this question. The other man started sweating like crazy even though he tried to keep a good grip on his emotions. Then the other man gave a hearty laugh. "Ha ha ha!! Did you see the look on your face? That was awesome..."
Jim blinked in confusion. "Huh?"
"There's nothing to do around here until they get the Testament running properly so scaring the shit out of people is the only hobby I got around here. Anyways, I'm gonna go scare the shit outta some more people! See ya!" And just like that, he moved past a stunned Jim while humming 'It's a Wonderful World'.
The other man let out a sigh of relief before heading out. 'I hope I don't run into him again.'
**********
He waited until he had put a good enough distance between himself and Jim before taking out a cell phone and dialling a number. The other end picked up within the first three rings. "So tell me again why I shouldn't be killing this guy? He is a potential security breach you know."
"He is a fairly known individual here and his disappearance could raise unwanted questions. The paper trail that he is following will eventually get him to come to us and we will deal with it there."
Ash gave an impatient snort. "And what do you plan to do to him?"
"Give him the same nanite treatment as we have given you. After all, they do have useful abilities that create an incentive for an individual not to step out of line. It's worked well for you, hasn't it?"
The Testament pilot growled at the particular memory of Steamhein demonstrating the damage that could be inflicted by the nanites if he ever had the urge to use his fellow members as outlets to satisfy his blood lust. "Give me a little credit, doc. I've behaved a bit back in ZAFT."
"The two key words here are 'a bit'. You still destroyed Erudou when they failed to stop the Junk Guild from crossing their territory. Just keep an eye out for him and any other curious little members of our group. Steamhein out."
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(Posted Sat, 04 Nov 2006 22:54)
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