Project Raven - chp 1

Uncle Ted always acted like this.
Although his sunglasses hid his weary brown eyes, we could tell that he hadn’t slept the night before again, and could imagine the red blood vein branch all throughout the whiteness of his eyes, each of them standing out as if they were diseased, pulsing venom through his brain.
“Alright! Gather around!” Even his screams sounded tired, a bark from a dog who was yawning at the same time. “Our assignment today is a very simple one, and one that we shouldn’t mess up.”
Like we ever did.
On the side, you could see Josie, the only girl in the group, the only one who was low enough to hang out with a bunch of perverts and lowlifes like yours truly. She tried to act tough, but we all knew she wasn’t, yet we sort of let it go, and we sort of just get along with her pretend toughness, because the group needed some eye-candy, and being a part of a sausage fest was only fun until you realized that you weren’t gay.
Uncle Ted was holding up a picture of some fat, middle aged woman, the ones who had their fake dyed red hair all curly and shiny, just like the movie stars from the 50’s or 40’s, or any other age that no one remembers, or cares, anymore.
Uncle Ted was coughing violently as he tried to speak.
None of us did anything. Sort of just looked at him with a kind of disgusted fascination.
He could have coughed his lungs out, and we would have just stood there staring at him.
Josie looked alright, she had a pair of nice boobs hanging out of her black and red leather jacket, as she dressed all in black to blend in with our torn-out, just-came-out-of-a-homeless-shelter look. We all know that she pads her ass with something to make it seem a bit bigger than it is, maybe to try to look sexier than what she really is.
We all know she pads her ass just ‘cause we’ve all tried touching that ass, and have gone away with a questioning look on our faces as we wondered what we just touched.
Who knows, maybe she doesn’t pad her ass, and that’s how her ass really is. Soft and foamy feeling. Like the feel you get from touching a dinner suit with shoulder padding, or even that crappy foam pillow that you get at shoddy hotels, or even wonder bras…
I started wondering if wonder bra made padded pants for asses now, so that girl’s asses could look bigger and plumpier.
And then I started wondering if plumpier was even a word.
Uncle Ted finally stopped shaking like he was having a convulsion and started talking to us again, holding the picture weakly, as if it weighted tons and tons to no end, and he was just barely holding it up for our sakes. “This woman has hired us to protect her.” He wheezed and wheezed as he struggled to speak, sounding as if he was choking on an entire apple or orange or watermelon. “She wants a complete package protection from her house to the airport at around four in the A.M. tonight.”
“You mean tomorrow morning?” Nich laughed at it.
“Shut up, ya smartass.” Uncle Ted yelled back, even though it sounded more like a whimper through his wheeze. The guy needs to stop sniffing drugs and hanging out with hookers all night long, and actually get some sleep before he gets a heart attack and drops down before paying our paychecks. “If you’re so smart that you can figure out whether it is tomorrow or today, then you should be smart enough to get your head out of your ass.”
Uncle Ted wasn’t the most subtlest of people, in fact, he was quite rude. But we’re talking about a guy who’s wearing cowboy hat and boots for his daily, every day routines, so being rude here and there should be the last of his worries at the moment.
Josie looked over as I looked over to her, and sort of stopped as she zipped up her jacket.
For some reason, I looked down to see if my fly was open.
Just to cover the awkward moment.
A complete package protection meant that all of us would have to be working that night, since it means four cars in front and behind the driver and the client’s car, and also undercover agents before the client even walks out of her doors in both the pick up place with the car to the destination drop off point, where the bodyguards in the accompanying four cars would come out and sort of guard the client until he or she gets to her destination itself.
Sort of an expensive package for that reason, and we usually only get them once or twice every few months.
In between the details and the driving routes that Uncle Ted roughly describes, with very poor visuals as he points it all out with his finger on a fading map with the smallest streets that you could never imagine, I thought back to her and the mixed songs she sent me to my cell phone, a list comprising of the things she loved and the things she wanted to share with me.
The world that I couldn’t see with the reality of my eyes.
As uncle Ted talked about the percentage of the changing traffic and the timing of the traffic light changes, I tried to imagine what she must have looked like as she sent me those songs, ever so softly, her fragile features glooming in the fading dim light.
Uncle Ted looks up at me, and waves me over with a menacing look.
Well, as menacing look could get with sunglasses covering them.
I worry for a second that he’s going to ask me to repeat everything he’s said so far, just to test me to see if I was just daydreaming and not paying any attention at all to all the blah blahs that are coming out of his mouth.
But instead, this is what I get:
“You’re going to be the driver on this one, Ryuji.” He says.
And I look surprised.
“Why me?” Not the smartest remark I’ve ever said, but it works for the occasion.
“’Cause the client said that she wanted you to be the driver, that’s why.”
“But I can’t even drive right.”
“Just shut up and do it, alright?” Uncle Ted’s lips twist into an angry pout. “I’m not paying you to whine like a kindergarten baby and cry about what you can and can’t do. You get paid for doing something, right? So if you don’t do it, you don’t get paid, and it’s as simple as that. Got it?”
I wanted to remind him that kindergarten babies didn’t drive cars either, but I kept my mouth shut and let it go the way it is.
I still haven’t heard the songs she sent me. For some reason, I’m afraid to listen to them at all.
I’m afraid that I’ll start falling in love with her again.
Uncle Ted brings out his suitcases of weapons, and opens them up with a loud snap as the locks pop and splits open, as dramatic as they can be. With his hands reached inside, he starts distributing the guns around.
We all know the guns are fake. Dunlam, our city, is under a strict no-gun law from the federal government itself, and anybody caught with a real gun can receive a severe punishment from the country itself. Some are put to heavy labor at the military factories for years, some placed in jail for re-education before being released into society, and some, well, some just disappear.
I’ve heard rumors that they allow you the choice of fleeing from the prisons if you want, that they’ll place you into a military zone and let you go free if you can escape from it. The catch is that you will be pursued by a new Q team who will use you as training before they’re considered ready, and they will use lethal force and all sorts of vehicles until you are caught. They have a time limit on their training though, so if you evade them till the time expires, you go free, or if you escape from the area itself, you will go free.
The Q team is the military’s best guerrilla team, so good that none of us even know if it exists or not. It’s more like the unknown boogieman that our government keeps, than a sort of accepted knowledge itself. Hell, Uncle Ted would bet money that the tooth fairy existed against an actual Q team working around covertly for our shady government.
Josie always looked scared when she was handed a gun, even though she knew that they weren’t real. She always handled the gun with disgust, as if the thing was covered with excrement, or ant beetles or something.
At the end of the round, uncle Ted closed the suitcases and put them away.
“Hey, how come I didn’t get one?” I protested.
Uncle Ted laughed a scoff and looked up at me through the dark blades of his glasses. “Why you need one for, Ryuji? You’re the freakin’ driver.”
“Just in case they bust in the car while I’m driving, and I need to defend myself or something.”
He laughed at this. “Who do you think we’re protecting, the queen of England or something? Get over yourself.” He placed the suitcases away without a second thought.
“Aren’t we supposed to be prepared?”
“You are prepared!” He screamed back at me. “You’re going to be in a freakin’ car speeding away with four separate guard cars with you. How much more prepared can you get?” He laughed at it. “Hell, you’d probably be able to out beat one of your stupid Q teams or something.”
“Man, they could be real.”
“I don’t got time for your fairy tales or paranoia.” He scoffed at me again as if to remind me of how much he cared. “Just be here at freakin’ four A.M. and drive some old lady to her freakin’ plane, alright?”
I wasn’t that pleased at his answer.
And I’m sure he didn’t care.