The following post is rated R for Restricted. (Jak Black is a pretty bad dude, Yah shouldn't be reading it if you are under 18...You were warned)
The things I will do for ratings, Andrea thought to herself as she entered the “Scrap Yard”. It was painfully loud, she could feel the beat of the music slamming into her. Her recording drone was having fits between the strobes and the music and it was returning nothing but crap for signal. She was also sure the Ape at the second door she had to pass through had felt her up while checking for “concealed weapons”. As if the the battery of scanners she had to walk through to get in here would not be enough... Oh, and to top it off it stank of sweat and piss. Her channel had put out the feeler for an interviews to half a dozen of this seasons contestants, unfortunately this Jak Black, some C-Fed wannabe thug from out in the periphery was the only one to respond. As the lead reporter here, the face of Chan6 Solaris, she had to go interview him. He probably picked this place to push some bad boy image, as there was no other reason she could think of that anyone would ever hang out in dives like this, full of gutter punks and joy girls and rough necks.
She was currently being lead across the huge hanger bay dance floor by no less than 3 rejects from some elemental program somewhere. She briefly wondered why they got to go armed as they showed her to a lift. She was relived when the doors closed and both the music and stink faded as it rose, despite being stuffed in between these three stooges. When the lift stopped she was motioned forward into some kind of a meeting room. It was soundproofed and while you could look out the glass wall that filled up one side of it you could hear nothing from the dance floor below.
Jak Black, stupid name and all, was sitting there waiting for her. He motioned for her to come in and sit as he looked up from a data slate. Stripped to the waist and sporting a mix of ghetto tatto's and scars he looked like he was trying to hard to be a gangster. Course the bio wraps to treat a fresh burn all over his one real arm (the other was some kind of synthetic) and side of his face threw her off briefly, but she beamed a smile sat down, checking to make sure her drone was functional. Her background information on him was spotty, and smelled of being made up. It was like they cooked up some space pirate out of the holo-vid market and tagged it on this guy as some kind of PR campaign.
She started off easy enough, introduction, thank you for seeing me, blah blah blah and then hit him right across the face with a question about if he had underestimated the opposition here in Solaris based on how badly his first rounds were? He had gotten a leg ripped off in his first round foolishly closing with a mech 20 tons heavier than him on a catwalk. He then proceeded to cook his mech and himself apparently going to to toe, again with a heavier mech, in his second round. He had brought up the rear of the ratings at the start of the season.
She did not get the result she expected. Instead of being taken aback or angry he leaned forward calmly, smiled, and gave her a stare that was so empty and so feral that she herself was stunned. She had to look away and take a minute to compose herself, she had this all wrong... He was not pretending to be some pirate gangster, he was a damn pirate gangster and he looked at her like he was going to rape her, chop her up and sell her parts to some meat doc down here in the gutter where he made his home. He left it there, that uncomfortable silence just long enough to cement the effect before leaning back in his chair and saying, simply, “No, I figured that was how it was going to shake out.”
“Now cher' that I have done your interview you get to do your part and put this out there.” Quicker than she would have thought possible he snatched her record bot from the air and pointed it at his face. “There is a clan scumbag by the name of “Flashman”. I have put 1mill up in an Anonymous C-Star account for whoever takes his ride out of the mix.”
As soon as he finished he released her drone, hit something beside him on the table which caused the elevator door to open and dismissively waved her away. She almost ran to the elevator, despite the three waiting behemoth's inside of it. She had dozens of questions for him, but she was not even remotely upset to be out of there. It was not until she was out of the club and halfway back to her hab in uptown that her heart started to calm down. The theatrics of the interview alone would drive the ratings up, even without the bounty... The channel was going to love this, she was sure. However she made a vow, then and there, that she would never interview or be in the same room with that one again.
(Written by Jay)
