Women's side of the Camp

Seated upon a rather uncomfortable bench made out of some type of plastic Simon allowed his hands to fidget nervously while he hunched his back so as to appear as small as possible. Occasionally his head would dart from side to side as people entered and left the room but for the most part he kept his gaze focused on his lap as thought it were the most interesting thing in the world, ‘How long can it take to run a few numbers through a machine?’ he asked himself testily as he directed a carefully hidden scowl towards the opaque glass which concealed the area one of the secretaries had strolled into with his carefully forged paperwork. As his eyes settled upon the blank glass though the merc found himself once again staring at a complete stranger. The individual in question appeared to a young man between roughly 18-22 years of age with thick obsidian hair which lay messily atop his cranium and dangled awkwardly in front of his pure emerald green orbs forcing him to blink occasionally to clear his vision. The man had a thin, almost willowy build which was hidden somewhat by the crisp navy blue pants and collared shirt of a camp guard but were not enough to completely disperse the strange awkward aura which seemed to hover around him

‘Incredible’ Simon thought not for the first time as he reached up a hand to run across his brow and watched as the stranger in the impromptu mirror did the same. ‘I must to find out how to do this myself.’ Hunters staff had truly outdone themselves when they were set with the task of giving the 18 year old mercenary a completely different identity. They had dyed his hair with an absurd number of different liquids, altered his eye color with a matching set of tinted contact lenses and even gone so far as to change the shape of his face with some type of rubbery glue which matched the tone of his skin. The process had been long and tedious and the way the women had chattered constantly about their petty lives while they worked and rapped him on the head whenever he moved had nearly driven Simon insane but now that he could observe the fruits of their labour the British merc had to grudgingly admit it had been worth it.

However it hadn’t been enough to simply to change his appearance, well not by the elementals standards anyway; Zephyr had seen this new assignment as a chance to expand upon an idea which had become lodged within his mind ever since his chance encounter with the Kabals spy Calley; the shifter was one of Hunters key informants and therefore was capable of emulating a professional type persona but perhaps more importantly the boy was capable of hiding it behind an almost perfect aura of childhood like innocence. The value of such a performance had not escaped the mercenary and in the weeks following the encounter he had toyed with the idea of developing such an alter ego himself and after a few successful experiments in the more hectic sectors of the city to build his confidence the elemental had finalized what he thought of as a prototype persona which could be used in more social situations where he cared little about his own dignity. However those had always been short term performances where escape had been only a single alley away, when Zephyr had been given his latest mission he had seen it as a way to test himself and so had set himself the goal of attempting to maintain his new persona for the entire duration of the mission.

“Well this all seems to be in order”[/color]

Giving a small start that befitted his new role Simon jerked his head round and actually jumped a little out of his seat as he turned to locate the source of this new voice. The elementals emerald orbs swiftly settled on a bespectacled old woman who had resurfaced from behind the counter after having disappeared a few minutes prior.

“Oh, that’s good to hear” the merc offered in an uncharacteristically pleasant tone.

“Less work for me at any rate”[/color] the old woman replied off handedly as she shuffled a handful of documents on the desk before pushing them towards young man in front of her, “This’ll have everything you need; badge, ID, time sheet you get the idea, any problems don’t come to me”[/color] she told him tartly before settling back into her seat behind the counter an pulling out an aged magazine of some sort.

Looking slightly put out Simon hesitantly accepted the small bundle while the giving aged pensioner an undecided look which well masked his true feelings, ‘As if you could help anyone you old crone,’ he thought with a slight tinge of annoyance before he was struck with a flash of inspiration which caused an amused smirk to dance upon his lips for a brief second before he settled into his new role once more.

“Um, e-excuse me” he stammered nervously causing the old dragons eyes to flicker back to him and narrow in aggravation from over the top of her magazine.

“What?”[/color]

“Well uh, where exactly am I supposed to go now?” Simon replied attempting to appear as oblivious as possible as he shuffled the papers in his hands awkwardly. “It’s just that I don’t really know my way-”

“What did I tell you just a second a go?”[/color] the aging hag asked sharply still refusing to lower her magazine.

“You said that I uh, shouldn’t bother y-”

“So why are you still talking? Go ask some else.”[/color] She retorted in a tone of finality as she swiveled her chair round 180° and attempted to once more start reading whatever mundane article the editor of such a work had seen fit to include.

“…but you’re the only one here.” Simon replied simply in a slightly resentful tone as he made a faint motion with his empty hand to the empty office behind the unhelpful woman. “Who else am I supposed to ask?”

“I don’t know! Just go find someone else!”[/color] the old hag snapped at him in obvious aggravation as she slapped the magazine on the arm of her chair. Today was not turning out to be a good day for her… it wasn’t going to get any better.

“… but what if I go somewhere I’m not supposed to?” Simon asked in a whining tone he had often heard young children use on their parents. Who would have thought that such inane questioning could actually prove entertaining? Watching the old crone completely discard whatever semblance of poise she may have had would have normally only rated as a mild interest for the merc, however knowing that he was the cause behind such behavior leant a whole new dimension of entertainment to the scene and so it was all he could do to limit the expression of his internal laughter to a slight twinkling of malicious amusement in his currently emerald eyes.

“You’re the security here, what could possibly be off limits to you?!” [/color] the aged crone nearly screeched at him as she swiveled her chair round to face him once more.

“How would I know? I only just got here.” the response was delivered in the same tone of oblivious innocence as before but this time was accompanied by a confused shrug of the shoulders.

For a moment the woman was completely silent. Then, gradually her face began to fade to a dull crimson making her appear so much like an overripe tomato as she struggled with some type of retort before she simply decided to cut her losses and fell back in her chair with a slight thump. “That hallway, on your left, it’ll take you to canteen… just go”

“Thanks, uh..” Simon leaned forward and peered at the minute nametag on the woman’s blouse “..Gladys, thanks a lot” with a final at the bespectacled crone the elemental made a brief show of regathering his small bundle of documents and striding purposefully down the hall to his right for about five meters before turning round and walking meekly past Gladys as headed down the correct corridor, however he wasn’t even able to proceed 10 meters before a loud obnoxious voice caught his attention.

“Who the hell are you?”[/color]

Simon blinked at his reflection once and took a moment to remember his role before turning to the speaker with an expression of slight surprise and raised his left hand to point at himself in a classic “who me?” gesture in order to make himself appear completely clueless.

“Yeah you, I know everyone here and I sure as hell ain’t seen your scrawny ass before”[/color]

The speaker in question was a heavyset man in either his earlier forties or late thirties, a receding hairline and an enlarged gut the man appeared physically unfit, however Simon’s professional side swiftly noted the mans bulging arms, which and the flatten nose which hinted at a somewhat violent history. The mans eyes also told of one who was used to throwing his rather substantial weight around and would likely take an opportunity he could to make himself feel important which, judging by the badge on his chest would be quite often.

‘Ah the stereotypical bully, where would we be without them?’ he mused dully as he maintained his guppy fish expression and started spouting the script Hunter had given him almost a week ago. “M-My names Robert Peel sir” He stated in a slightly quavering voice which never the less deeply emphasized his British accent, “I just um, transferred here from London a little while ago and the guys in New York assigned me here.”

“Is that so?”[/color] The heavy set man replied with an all too obvious sneer as he looked down the length of his nose at the seated elemental before him. “and why the hell would the shame!s upstairs send me a tea drinking pansy like you?”

‘…did he really just say that?’ Simon thought incredulously as his brows furrowed and he gazed at the large man with undisguised resentment while allowing a note of skepticism enter his voice “Sir?”

The man gave an exasperated grunt before using his thumb to stick out the over polished badge on the front of uniform, “Watch your tone kid, the names sergeant Miller and since your wearing that uniform I’m your direct superior”[/color]

‘God help us all’ the merc mused dully as he maintained his uneasy stance and leaned back slightly to escape the mans foul breath while at the same time giving a mental sigh, ‘Still I suppose I should establish my role with the higher ups now rather than later.’ “Y-Yes sir” he stated nervously while simultaneously attempting to give a salute using the hand which was holding his documents and promptly spilled the files across the metallic floor. Crouching quickly in order to retrieve the papers Simon risked a brief glance up at the sergeant and noted with a certain smug satisfaction that the man was making no attempt to hide his disdain of his latest “recruit”.

‘That should do’ he told himself silently as he continued to scrambled the papers together in ruff order and heard more than saw the sergeant walk away. ‘It shouldn’t take long for rumors of the ‘clumsy foreigner’ to spread around the barracks. The only question now is where do I go from here?’

--

Standing in rank among the other guards who lined the perimeter of the camp Zephyr gazed out dully at the currently desolate camp grounds, the place looked as though it had taken directly from an old WWII movie. The earth seemed to consist of some type of gray dust, which judging by the lack of surviving of vegetation, was incapable of supporting any type of life. The rough shacks which were scattered around the grounds and would serve as the mutants sole form of shelter from the elements were all constructed from the same shoddy timber and appeared to be half rotten in some places. The one thing that held the elementals interest, albeit mildly, as he waited for the first shipment of mutants to arrive was the ancient corpse of a great oak from the branches of which hung a series of empty nooses.

‘Who the hell designed this place?’ A high school drama student?’ he asked himself disdainfully as his eyes scanned the deserted grounds once more, almost expecting to see a tumbleweed role by. Whoever had been left to design this construct clearly had a flair for the dramatic and Simon would have liked to meet them, if only to put them out of their misery; there were just some clichés that were best left alone.

The low rumble of motor engine suddenly caught his attention and Zephyr found himself turning instinctively towards the main gates for his half of the camp. The heavy titanium wrought gates gradually rolled to the side among an almost imperceptible pneumatic hiss as they made way for the approaching convoy of obsidian vans currently containing the newly “registered” mutants.

Simon watched in silence indifferent from the other guards who casually or gladly threw their pitiful insults at the “freaks” before them as the heavy armored vehicles pulled into the complex in a ragtag order as they sorted themselves into vertical rows in front of what had been termed the integration chamber where the new residents would be relieved of all their worldly possessions and introduced to the camps new uniform decorum and overall lack of hope. Surprisingly, albeit one or two nuisances on the male side of the camp, the whole procedure ran very smoothly and in just over an hour the entire first shipment had been processed and were loitering listlessly around the camps grounds in their new, and rather drab, attire.

‘They act like cattle come to slaughter’ he thought impassively as he stared at the multitude of bleak expressions decorating the faces of the prisoners. ‘Have they truly given in or are they simply biding their time as I would?’

The mercs attention abruptly focused on a group within the female half of the camp, it was obvious from the way they huddled together that they were all acquaintances of a sort and they sought some type of safety in their numbers, however what had drawn the elementals attention to this little gathering was their posture. These girls held themselves differently from their current companions for they still seemed to posses a backbone; there were no slumped shoulders here or any downcast eyes, these individuals still had, for lack of a better term, spirit.

‘Most interesting, they will bear watching’

And so when the time came for the camps new residence to be cordoned off to their huts Zephyr silently followed this fascinating group to their new homes and after a muffled exchange with one of the guards on duty and an agreement that the man owed him some strong liquor at a later date Simon assigned himself as the shacks advisor.

--

((OOC: At long last I have managed to make my entrance post. I apologise for the length but so much had happened by the time I finally got around to writing and I wanted to demonstrate Zephyr’s alter ego somewhat.

On a side note as many of you will have noticed by posting has been somewhat sporadic of late due to RL issues, I am able to post during the weekends but even that time is somewhat unreliable. Because of this I will be changing Zephyrs role somewhat so that he is more of an observer and only have him participate if completely necessary in order to try and avoid slowing the plot down and/or holding certain people up.

If I need to change anything just send me a PM))