And a new day breaks

Jane woke up again at roughly 4AM.

"What the fuck happened, my head hurts?"

"You grabbed some evidence from the police and fled with it. The car slid on the ice of the road and crashed. I grabbed you out of the car and brought you here. You asked me to get the evidence on the flash drive to the press."

"Did you...?"

"Yeah, I called a... let's call her a friend of mine. Megan Dapy. The article will be in the morning news."

"Thank god. Did you see what was on it?"

"Yes, I watched it with Ms. Dapy..."

"Good, that means less explaining to do. What happened to the car? And did nobody from the police come and look after me?"

"They did try, but mom and I were quiet and my neighbor told a useful little lie. Officially my mom and I were away, at least for the night."

"Where is your mother by the way?"

"She's away for real, visiting family over the holidays."

"And you aren't?"

"I... have other tasks to do during Christmas. By the way... I have found a place where a medical professional can give you a check-up. I have organized someone to take you there. Just to make sure you didn't break anything."

"James, I can't... As long as the mayor is still in his office, he can use the department to find me in the city hospitals and..."

"It's not a city hospital, it's a women's shelter. They take in abused victims, with a little lie you should be let in."

"I don't know..."

"Jane, please. I know you're afraid, but what if your services as a police officer are needed again? You still have investigations to lead and so on. Take the chance. If they say you just need to rest you can return. Just tell the... driver you need to go here. She should be free all day anyway."

"James, are you prepared for the risk?"

"No, but do I have a choice? I can't abandon you here and I can't let the things you discovered remain in secret. As a journalist, I don't want to keep this a secret. For all intents and purposes I accompanied my mother to the airport early in the night and was thus away when you crashed your car and fled in the woods somehow. Until the news story breaks, nobody will know, least of all the mayor and his allies. Those that will stay by him and those that will abandon ship."

"Hm, I suppose that's well enough. Are you prepared to deal with the consequences, though? Our current mayor has been very accommodating to businesses."

"I suppose it can't be helped if the next mayor has different opinions. But I'd be foolish to expect one party to always remain in control. Sooner or later things will change."

"What am I supposed to do for now?"

"Well, you will be transported to the shelter and they'll do some medical examinations on you. I'm sure the driver I have... ahem... hired will tell you more. For now, just pretend that you dated someone and he roughed you up to get in without much suspicion."

"A-Alright, that seems fairly sensible. And after that?" Jane +5SP (+60SP)

"Depends on you and the situation then. You're always free to return here, just tell me if you need me to stay here. I wanted to go to work, but you take priority now. If you feel like you'd be safe to just go about your normal workday, then do that. In short, decide after the check-up."

"Alright."

"Do you need anything?"

"I'd like something to eat, in all honesty..."

"I think I'm hungry too now. I'll make us something." With that, I hurried into the kitchen. Mom had luckily stocked up everything, so it'd be a while before I would need to go grocery shopping again. I decided to use lots of veggies and rather healthy stuff, with some meat mixed in. Jane would need to recover, I figured that this would be the best meal. I brought both plates to Laura's room, where she still lied on the bed. She was almost falling asleep again, only being woken up by the meal I had made. I sat down and put the plate on her thighs and put the cutlery next to her.

"James, I'm sorry, but can you feed me? I'm very tired and my body still hurts."

"Alright, sure."

Hesitatingly, I scooped up a couple veggie pieces with her spoon and fed them to her. She chewed on it slowly, which I took as an opportunity to eat some myself. Not a great meal taste wise, as it's just a mishmash with a bit of meat, but I mainly went for nutritional value. Protein bars taste bad, too, but you don't eat them for the taste. She was finished with her first bite and I gathered some veggies with a small piece of meat and fed it to her as well. As she slowly regained some energy, she chewed a little bit faster. As I kept feeding her, I had less and less time to eat my meal. Eventually, we both finished our plates.

"You know James, I miss homemade cooking sometimes. I just don't have the time..."

"Yeah, it took me a bit to cut all the veggies, season the meat, and all of that."

"Thanks for the meal, it was really good. I feel like I have a bit of energy again."

"That's great." I paused for a moment. There was one question I wanted an answer to, but I wasn't sure that I was going to like what I was going to hear. "Can I ask... How did you find this tape?"

"I first got wind of some kind of deal when we investigated the company that installed the cameras. The workers there all stayed shut, but it was pretty clear from the get-go that they had ties with the mayor's office. When the former mayor was exposed for his corruption, the journalist could not only link most money that went to the mayor's bank account to certain donors, but also unearth records linking the cash that went in exchange for political favors. That tape itself was just security footage, it has audio for archival purposes. Since the archive administration is federal, no mayor had any chance to mess with these records. By accident I noticed your father's appearance in one of them with the current - and hopefully soon former - mayor..." In that moment, Em's truck rolled in, I could distinguish it now.

"Let's go. Your driver is here." We went outside, into the cold.

Emily: "James, why did you call me here so... yawn... early? And what am I supposed to transfer? To the shelter, no less?"

James: "You're not supposed to transfer a thing, but Jane. Secretly. She needs a health check-up away from prying eyes. As soon as possible."

Emily: "Jesus, what have I gotten myself into with you...? What happened to Jane?" Emily +2SP (+79SP)

Jane: "I'll explain that when I'm ready. Just... get me there."

James: "Do you need help?"

Jane: "If you could lift me up the ramp, that would be great."

With some effort, Jane went up the ramp of the truck. There were some folding seats attached to the walls of the truck, kind of like the ones you have to pull down to sit on in lecture halls or stadiums. I assume it's for when more than two people are needed for a move, since the front of the truck doesn't have a lot of space.

"See you later, Em." The truck drove away at roughly quarter past five. I texted Donna: 'Not sure when I can come into the office today, didn't really sleep tonight. Had to bring my mom to the airport for Christmas. Will try to be there, but depends on how much sleep I'll get.' With that and my semi-breakfast done and eaten already, I set my alarm for 7:30AM.

Jane

Emily and I could talk a bit while she was driving. I wonder why she accepted this on such a short notice.

"Jane, in how much danger am I for doing this?"

"If everything goes well, none at all."

"And if it doesn't...?"

"A fine of 200 to 1000 bucks. You're assisting a low level offense."

"If it's so low level, then why hide?"

"Legally, it's a low level offense for you. However it's one with heavy consequences for some people. I need to hide for them, at least until they give up."

"Alright, I'm not going to ask that many questions about this... Are you fine? What happened to you?"

"Car crash. Many things on my body hurt, but apart from that nothing is all too wrong... But we will tell that I got into an argument with a now-ex boyfriend."

"'Kay..."

"Can I ask you why you're doing this?"

"W-Well, James asked and he pays good."

Hm, not the answer I really expected. She was rather nervous about this answer. I could and probably should dig deeper, but we arrived and I didn't want to make her mad anyway. The place was guarded by two pretty strong-looking women. Em took the lead.

"I'm here for a friend of mine. She got into a nasty argument with her boyfriend, she needs to get a check-up and maybe stay here for the day." The guards let us pass, and eventually, I was sitting in a nurse's office, waiting for my check-up, when I decided to pull out my phone and read the news. I was ecstatic to find Megan's article already published. 'Mayor Anderson in on GRC cameras - wanted a peek' read the headline, I knew it was the right story. Phew, the word was out there at least. I quickly wrote Megan: 'Thanks for your help.' She didn't reply, I hope she could rest.

A nurse came in, asked me about my body pain. She seemed suspicious about my type of injury, but nevertheless tried to help me. She even had an x-ray machine on hand, but all my bones were fine. She couldn't prescribe me anything, but told me to take some painkillers if it got too much. With that, she let me go. Em was still in her truck.

"Where do you want to go, Jane?"

"Honestly, I'm not sure yet... I'm fine physically. Part of me wants to return to work tomorrow, but where should I stay? Here or with James? James would take care of me, so that would be better than alone at home."

"Then I'll bring you to James."

Back in the truck, I decided to be more open with her. "Have you read the news, Emily?"

"No, not yet. Why?"

"The mayor might resign soon."

"What? Why?"

"Recordings of him were made public, it seems like he kept quiet about James' father's spycams in exchange for viewing access..."

"What the fuck?"

"That's the reason I needed the security, Emily. Thank you for that."

"Uh, no problem, I guess. I wish James would have told me sooner what kind of thing I had to do."

"Don't be too hard on him. You seem to trust him a lot, no?"

"W-Well... yeah. I have to."

"Have to?"

She sighed. "This is going to stay between the two of us, okay? I want no police involvement."

"Don't worry. Officially I'm still hanging around in the woods, hiding. At least until the mayor resigns. But no one will know of your involvement in this. As long as nobody besides you is harmed in this, I'll keep quiet."

"Thanks... My father wants me to marry some business owner to found a business dynasty or some crazy shit like that. In fear from my father's ****, I ran to James. We've known each other since high school and I remembered him being a kind-hearted, trustworthy person and it seems like he stayed this way. Not to mention we had a lot of contact because of the whole spycam saga. We decided to play along for now, and stall as much as possible in the hopes that my father kicks the bucket soon."

"That's... awful."

"The thing is, James has been very nice about it. So I don't care too much about doing these things for him. He hasn't asked for much in exchange anyway, so why not keep the guy that my life depends on happy?"

"You do realize how fucked up your situation is, though, right? And how you do the things you want without him even needing to say anything? He has influence over you and if I were you, I'd be a lot more afraid."

"I... know that, Jane. But this is still infinitely better than my father's plans. I take what I can get."

"Fair enough. If you do need assistance..."

"No cops. If you guys get involved, my father's trap snaps shut and everything would have been pointless."

"A-Alright, sorry."