The Jacksons

Andrew’s finally starting to get better. He’s not completely recovered, and still is spending most of the day resting, but he’s able to walk around a little, and it doesn’t seem like he’s going to die. Which is a big relief. The Jacksons may not be friends, but they’re still roommates. I don’t want to see them die.

Since I talked with Dumas, I’d been thinking about how he said Gabriel wanted to talk with me about how he became a proxy as well. I’d been putting it off, but with the good news I felt it was time to talk to him.

It was really awkward dropping mention of the subject, especially since I talk with them so rarely. Earlier today I caught Gabriel in the kitchen, and decided that then was as good a time as any other.

Di: “So… um… I heard you might want to talk to me… about you and your brother’s past….”

G: *His eyes narrowed at me.* “And who told you something like that?”

Di: “Oh… you know… I just… heard it around… and stuff….”

*He kept staring at me with that hostile look.*

Di: “I’ll… I’ll just be going, then….”

G: “No, wait.”

*I stayed, waiting for him to talk. It took him a few false starts before he got going.*

G: “I never used to worry about this stuff. Dealing with Runners should be easy. Most of them are just scared kids. Sometimes they get lucky, but usually they only manage to kill someone if the proxy hunting them gets stupid. And while we may have a lot of stupid people in our gang, Drew and I aren’t. We should know how to take care of ourselves. But that guy…. He wasn’t some green student flailing around like they’d never fought in their life. He fought like a street brawler, and a damn good one. I wouldn’t want to go up against him again unless I’ve got six others backing me up, and we all have shotguns. Last time I saw anyone like that was… well, it was back on the streets.”
*His eyes got a faraway look, and he started to tell his story.*
“Drew and I didn’t get our lives handed to us on a platter. When you’re gringo growing up in the barrio, you have to fight if you want to keep going. It also didn’t help that our parents were nutjobs who were planning to sacrifice us to Slender Man.
Our mom and dad had joined this local Slender Man cult led by a crazy who called himself ‘The Vanguard.’ The only reason they had us was because Vanguard had told them they needed to offer children as sacrifices in order to be accepted as true disciples of Slender Man. Course, the moment we figured out what they were planning, Drew and I ran. I was ten at the time, he was nine. Not the best age to start living on the streets, but it was better than dying on an altar in someone’s basement.
The two of us ran with the local gangs for a while. Didn’t join any big groups; we were just focused on keeping our heads down and staying alive. We learned a lot during that time. If we hadn’t, we’d have ended up dead in an alley. Sometimes we’d run into people from the cult, but we kept our distance. They stayed out of gang business, and the gangs stayed out of their business.
A lot of years passed, and we became good at what we did.” *For the first time I’ve ever seen, Gabriel smiled.* “We didn’t even need to stick with a gang anymore. Everyone knew not to fuck with the Jackson Brothers. We had a good thing going.”

*I was still waiting for the proxy part of all this, but he finally started on it.*

G: “One day we found out that a new player was coming into the area. At first we didn’t know who they were, just that they were throwing a lot of money around and buying their people some really nice guns. Whenever someone tried fighting back, they got crushed.
Didn’t take long for these new people to contact us, and that was when we first met Truth. He was just setting up shop then, but the man was determined to have the entire city under his control by the end of the year. Course our history with Slender Man cults made us suspicious of him, but then he gave us our first job: Wipe out Vanguards cult.”

*I had never heard Gabriel laugh until that day, and I never want to hear it again.*

G: “With the toys and the backing Truth gave us, killing off a dozen starved, religion-crazed squatters was easy. Then when we got to Vanguard himself….”
*The smile suddenly left.*
“Sick bastard. Those children he’d been asking for as sacrifices? They hadn’t been going to Slender Man. He had a special room in his place for them. The stuff we saw in there… if Drew and I had spent all day killing him, it still wouldn’t have been enough. I don’t even think Vanguard even believed in Slender Man. He was just a nut who found a lot of scared people and took advantage of their fear for himself.”
*Gabriel shook his head and was quiet for a moment, then resumed.*
“After that, it was just usual proxy work. Truth set us up in this apartment with Lepidus and the crazy girl, and we’ve just been doing our job since.”


He stopped there, but I was fine with that. I never thought I’d hear Gabriel talk for that long. And I guess with that, I’ve covered everyone I’m living with.