The Sweet Taste of Jealousy [Solo: John Sears]

Info:

John had received a letter after his job in Peace Village. Someone in Cedar requested a person who was capable of working with the utmost discretion along with a willingness to do things that were less than legal, and less than moral. John had been recommended to him by a friend as one such man. The letter mentioned vaguely his work in Peace Village, with the unnoticed extraction of a certain piece of information. The letter said to meet a certain Red Simpson at a bar in Cedar to discuss business and mentioned the potential payment for successful completion of this job. Seemed like good enough business for John.

Upon his arrival in the bar at Cedar, John found the specified table and sat down at it. Waiting for him was a rather nervous looking man, one who had clearly never hired a professional like John before. He was young, in his early twenties. John looked around and saw some people smoking in the bar and smiled, pulling out a cigar, cutting the tip and putting it in his mouth. With a flick of his mechanical thumb, a flame appeared on its tip. He held it up to the cigar, sucking in some air to give the flame oxygen in order to ignite the tip of the cigar. He puffed it a bit after it was lit, getting it to smolder nicely. He held the smoke in his mouth, enjoying the flavor and the rush of nicotine as it reached his system before looking up a bit and puffing the smoke out of his mouth, making a smoke ring. He exhaled the rest of the smoke normally before looking at Simpson.

"So... you have work you needed done?" He asked, taking a puff on his cigar as the boy responded.

"I uh... well there's this girl I like, and she has this guy she likes... I heard he's actually going to propose to her soon. So I need you to uhh... well... get them to break up. I've got some nasty letters I wrote to sound like they're from him, and uhh... forged his signature pretty well. So you know... I just need you to deliver those letters for me."

"I'm guessing there's more to it than that." He said, smoke blowing from his mouth as he spoke. The kid shifted uncomfortably, clearly out of his element in asking for this sort of stuff, and the older man in front of him casually discussing the business as he smoked was clearly not helping.

"Y-yeah... I uh... I need you to make sure he doesn't talk to her at all for a while... I don't want you to kill him or anything, but uh... yeah... I don't know, keep him away somehow. I already wrote in the letters that he'd be leaving for a while, so it won't look too suspicious."

"Sounds good." John answered. "And about the payment. Half now, half when I'm done."

"Um.. yeah... yeah... sure thing." He said before taking out some money and handing it over to John, along with the letter. "Right. I'll let you know when the job's done." Simpson nodded and gave John an address to contact him at before the mercenary stood and left, heading to deliver the letter. It was morning time, in fact, he had seen the mailman making his rounds before he had entered the bar, so he could easily deliver the letter without arousing suspicion. It took him about five minutes to walk to the girl's house and deliver the letter. Her other mail was still in the box. There was no one around at the moment, so he wasn't seen. With that part of the job done, the second part had to be done. He already had an idea of what to do for that as well.


It was around ten in the morning when Frederick Derkley received a knock on the door. "Who is it?" He called. John didn't answer, but knocked again. A rather annoyed young man answered the door. "Hello? Who are you? I wasn't expecting any company."

"Mister Derkley, I'm here representing the Rune Knights. Would you mind if I came in?" John asked, quickly flashing a badge he had stolen off of one of the knights on an earlier job. Sure, it didn't have his actual identity here, but he flashed it fast enough that the boy didn't have the chance to respond. "Oh uh... no, not at all, sir. Please, is there anything you need?"

"I don't actually need anything from you, young man. I've just come to talk to you." John said, stepping inside and letting Derkley close the door behind him. "I understand you're courting a miss Karen Glee."

"K-Karen? Y-yes, I am... has something happened to her?"

"No, nothing has happened yet. But I've come on behalf of the Knights to warn you that something may. An investigation of a local crime syndicate has indicated that she may be involved. She is a potentially dangerous individual, and I'm here to advise that you break off contact with her until this investigation is concluded. We don't want you getting wrapped up in any of this, understand?"

Derkley was in a state of disbelief, "Karen... But she's so nice. I could never have guessed...

"You do understand the situation, though, yes? Keep quiet about all this and break off contact. We want you to be safe, but we don't want to tip them off at all, so don't discuss this with anyone else."

"I... I understand, sir... I won't be seeing her until you tell me it's safe." He said.

"Good. We had you pinned as a smart kid. Thank you for your time, and stay safe." John told him before leaving. The dumb kid took it all without question. This was even easier than he thought it'd be. He met up with Simpson again and received the rest of his payment before moving on out of Cedar, his pockets a bit heavier than they were before.