CHAPTER 19


   As she waited in the car, her eyes kept drifting back over towards the scaffolding and piles of construction material that were stacked up in groups that were each, easily, larger than anybody’s house. Jessica could not help but think about how much of a monumental waste of time and resources that it all was. It was popular though and, for that reasons alone, Jessica could not touch it with a ten foot pole. She would love to do nothing but sit down here at the palace and run stories on government waste and corruption. People’s attitudes towards this palace, added with the dangerous people it might tick off, made that impossible. It was also not what she was really looking at.
The flowers, the little stands, and the blood stains were the things that kept pulling in Jessica’s eyes. She could understand the little memorials that people had put up. The real question she had was, why had no one got out there and cleaned up the blood? Jessica knew for a fact that a cleaning crew had worked for weeks on cleaning up the mess from the Family Day attack. Why was there still blood splatters in places? Couldn’t anyone do anything about it at all? You could still see stains on some of the walls, the columns, and even some of the construction material and they were very obvious.
Another thing that was very obvious were the Germans. They had taken their share of casualties in the attacks. The rumor going around was that their commander had actually been the main target. Jessica was not sure if she believed that or not but, the grenadiers sure did. They were in a less than compassionate mood these days. There had always been reports of violence and crime committed by members of IFOR. They would routinely beat people they didn’t like or maybe even just looked at them the wrong way. They were constantly enforcing rules that stepped on the people who really lived here.
It was another story that Jessica could not report on but, to a degree, she understood it. They were a military garrison and those kinds of problems could usually be expected around any base, particularly one that was little more than an occupation force. Those problems had always been exacerbated by the fact that Earth, all of Earth, had put their official stamp of approval on this and no outside power was willing to step in and help the colony. The German’s simply went unchecked and United Nations rules guaranteed that every single member of the Wehrmacht was immune from criminal prosecution. Still, those problems were also manageable if, for no other reason than the German High Command did keep tight control of their troops. The Family Day Massacre had changed that.
That was why Jessica was somewhat surprised by something else that she saw while sitting in her car. There had been a German soldier who was standing like a statue out in the middle of the park. That was of no great surprise really. You saw them everywhere even if they were never quite so rigid as this guy. Jessica had not even given it two seconds of thought as to why he was there or what he was supposed to be guarding. Everyone around him, both patrons of the park and workers in the palace, did their best to ignore him. That was also quite normal. Then another set of soldiers approached.
What really looked unusual, to Jessica at least, about this particular group of Germans, was how they were walking. Usually, when the Germans went anywhere, it was with military precision, in nice neat lines, and they all seemed to move as if they were being controlled by a single mind. With the exceptions of the uniforms and all the heavy firepower they had strapped on, this group could have been just an ordinary clump of pedestrians. They approached the guard who made some funny motion, with his weapon, and then the new arrivals approached a nearby memorial that had just recently been set up. The soldiers then began laying flowers on it. That really stunned Jessica. They actually looked human.
Jessica almost made a squeal of fear when she heard the car door open. She had been so caught up in watching the Germans that she had completely missed Jake. He had tossed whatever he had gotten from the palace in to the back seat of her car and then slid right in next to her. He was on the phone and only half paying attention to her. He then mumbled to Jessie, “ready? Let’s get.”
Jessie nudged him and nodded towards display of sympathy at the memorial. Jake turned, took a glance at it, and then shrugged his shoulders. He nodded for her to drive and, so, she did. Jake went right back to his phone call, “no, do exactly what I told you.” Whoever he told that too was apparently not happy about it. After a moment of listening, Jake then said, “I don’t know, just go hang out somewhere. I’ll call you back in a little bit.” He hung up and then asked Jessie, “where’s Norm at?”
Jessica’s mind was still back at the Memorial. She had to think on that and said, “oh, I know he made it as far as the electronics shop. Gary called me and said he showed up. He didn’t make it to the pet shop yet.” Then Jessica changed the subject by asking, “you didn’t think anything about that little display back in the park? You know, the Germans? Doesn’t seem to surprise you.”
“Why would it,” Jake really did not seem to be surprised. When it appeared that Jessica wanted an explanation, all Jake could say was, “they lost friends. What do you expect?”
“Well if you put it that way,” Jessie felt kind of stupid when she looked on it with his eyes. She quickly changed the subject, “you said something about a change of plans?”
Jake settled down in his seat as they reached the street and Jessica waited for directions. He told her, “yeah I just got confirmation. I told you about it this morning. I just had to wait till I knew.”
Jessica pointed to the left and the right, “which tells me absolutely nothing.”
Jake had to search his pockets for what proved to be a crumpled piece of paper. It had obviously been in his pocket for a while since Jessie had to flatten it out on the steering wheel before she could read it. It was also in a very sloppy hand writing and that let Jessie know that Jake did not write this. She decided not to ask and just started driving towards the address on the paper.
Jake then told her, “you can just drop me off at that one. Then you can go back to doing… whatever it is you were doing.”
“You mean,” Jessie slowed down for a stop signal, “doing all your work for you?”
“Well,” Jake amusingly replied, “technically I guess you were doing your job while helping out with mine.” With the exception of the first broadcast, from the Foo King, they had been following a list of broadcasts, that Jessie had gotten from her office, and had to make today. As far as Jake was concerned, he needed random and that one was about as random as it could get since he had nothing to do with compiling it.
What Jake did not get was, “you know I don’t get it. Why is it that every story you’ve done today was in front of some business that sounded like you were plugging?”
The light changed and Jessie started driving again. After passing the intersection she said, “that’s because plugging is exactly what I was doing.” When Jake developed a funny look on his face, Jessica rolled her eyes at him, “oh come on Jake. You are not that naive. It’s called paying the bills? Product placement? Paying the rent? Buying cat food?”
He did not answer that and, it appeared, as if Jake was willing to accept the answer. Jessie was the one who was not that settled about it, “besides, we don’t get enough real news stories here. We have to come up with stuff like that.”
Jake had accepted all the other stuff without batting an eye. He seemed to accept this as well. That was why Jessie found it strange that she was the one that did not really believe it. Jake also seemed to pick up on that, “seems to me, there’s plenty of stuff going on here.”
“Yeah well,” Jessie sighed, “not stuff that I can report on, at least, report on and live.”
“You got a good point there,” Jake said in passing.
Still, Jessie was the one having a hard time believing it. She then asked Jake, “you wouldn’t want me to tell everybody what you’re doing, would you?”
“Not particularly,” Jake replied. He then added, “course I wouldn’t kill you for it ether.” They sat in silence for a minute and then Jake suggested, “why don’t you go run a story on that German memorial?”
“Oh,” Jessie started out with some serious sarcasm, “what a great idea Jake.” Then she became quite sullen, “and get branded a Nazi sympathizer. That would really help out my career. Any other suicidal ideas why you’re at it?”
“You’re right,” Jake through in his disinterested towel, “I’ll let you do your job and I’ll stick to mine.”
Jessica snickered at that, “that’s a really god idea because, to be honest, I’m not even sure what your job is.” When Jake did not respond, Jessica went on, “I mean what is it we’re doing? This is not exactly something I ever pictured cops doing.”
“Technically speaking,” Jake told her, “I’m not a cop. If that clears it up any.”
“Ok,” Jessica nodded as she sorted through that, “but don’t you like chase bad guys and stuff? Stop criminals? You know?”
“Sometimes,” Jake replied in a very simple and short tone that spelled out he was not going to give the reporter any more.
While Jake might have been a professional at not talking, Jessica was a pro at getting people like him to talk. She said one word, “spy.”
Jake laughed but said nothing.
Jessica continued, “oh come on Jake. Everybody knows that you treaty guys are just here to spy on us. You said it at the hotel. We‘re both in the information business.”
Again Jake laughed but this time he did say something, “spies are in the business of collecting information that other people are trying to hide.”
“So,” Jessie shrugged.
“So,” Jake came right back with, “near as I can tell, nobody is trying to hide anything on this rock. Everybody is pretty brazen about everything.”
“Have I ever told you,” Jessica said in a sweet and soft tone that quickly soured, “I hate it when you make a point.” She saw the address and then pointed it out to Jake. He then instructed her to pull around the corner where she pulled up to the curb to let him out. Jessica just had to ask, “what are you going to do? Or can I know?”
Jake seemed rather unconcerned about it as he casually replied, “I’m going to steal a car.”
Jessica took the news in stride but, she did ask, “I thought you were supposed to stop people from doing that?”
As Jake closed the door he just shrugged and told her, “it’s ok. This one is already stolen.”
As Jake walked off, Jessica slapped her forehead and closed her eyes as she mumbled, “why do I always bring in guys like him. Can’t one of them ever be normal!” She drove off and went back to work.