Far from Grace / 1 /

Jonathan Bassett thought back on that day in Moira Singh's office only once or twice after he left the room. He would never know if he made the right choice, all he knew was that if he was going to leave the Security Force, he would do it on his terms. Several months passed and he learned the difficult way that being blacklisted by Golden Lion Enterprises meant more than a rough break at the interview table. He was radioactive as far as legitimate businesses were concerned and true to what Moira Singh had said, Jonathan was unable to get a job providing security for any of the major companies.

If he did not want a career change, that meant that Jonathan could protect the drug dealers he used to bust or he could watch a door at a dark club. Jonathan settled for a change of career and now he lived in a small room above the gym where he worked. It was a downtrodden place owned by a downtrodden man named Marcos. The place made enough that Marcos could afford to bring on Jonathan part time to clean the place up. Everyday they had the same conversation, everyday Jonathan told him Marcos the same story about why he no longer worked security. It was a lie, but it was also true.

Today's routine would be just like the last few weeks. Jonathan woke up, he cleaned up and changed into new clothes before heading down the stairs. After working for an hour or two to clean up anything that got messed up overnight, Jonathan would go out on a run through the neighborhood and try to not think too hard about why all the doors were closed, why everyone else stayed inside.

After his run, he checked in with his Marcos to make sure that there were no special requests for the day and then he would head to whatever isolated corner of the gym he could find to finish his work out in. Half of the day would be over by the time Jonathan finished working out, then he would go to Concessions.

In more affluent neighborhoods, there were Personal Concessions but here in Bleak Barrow where Jonathan had landed, there was only Concessions. It was a mess hall, it was a grocery store, and it was the only place to safely get food. Jonathan went there everyday to pick up food for himself and his neighbors. No one bothered him because of his history and the giant question mark on the Net when they tried to search him. The rumors that he had been Security Force kept everyone away. Others were not so lucky. Most people could not go through Concessions without getting shaken down by some two bit thug.