Analog Pt. I by Yoteicon92

Analog Pt. I

Yoteicon92, Adventure, Broadcasting, Doberman, Film, Friendship, Husky, Introspection, Malamute, Wolf, aviation, business, camera, technology, travel

A snapshot of Rob Barion's life.

Part of my series on FA: https://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2143509/

Analog I

The first teaser of light turned the eastern sky a very deep blue, just a few shades above black. Stars silently twinkled in the clear calm skies. All around, the landscape was white from recent snows, which faintly reflected the pale moonlight. The chilly air was almost motionless, with an icy bite with each breath. From his vantage point, Rob peered out at his sleepy hometown of Newark, its lights faintly making out details of the downtown and suburbs. To his west, Owens Corning churned out clouds of steam from its evaporators and stacks, the brilliant sodium lights glowing orange and yellow with the faint hum of machinery. The cold air had a rather strong stench to it; Rob stood at the top of the city's landfill, to peer down at his city. Rob felt the dump was a fitting place to observe the town he thought was a dump.

Armed with his cine camera and a backpack full of film magazines, Rob waited for the sun to arrive to test out new film from his photochemical factory. Bundled against the cold in his Carhartt jacket and beanie, Rob stood just admiring the scenery, the calmness of early morning. The brown and tan furred wolf-hybrid looked unusually calm; his fierce looking face, prematurely aged, with a menacing dark scar that ran down the left side, was devoid of its usually stern gaze. Blue-green eyes, often looking empty and dead, like pools of polished emerald, watched the stars and city lights twinkle in the cold air. Rob felt calm, but still rather unhappy. He honestly felt numb from the past couple years, plus all the trials and tribulations in his life. At forty, Rob was starting to feel his age, as his beat up body held on. But it was the new year, and on the second day of the new year, Rob wanted to change things up in his life. He just wasn't sure if it was the right thing to do.

After a long period of introspection, the sun emerged over the foothills to the east of town. The eastern horizon turned amber as the sun exploded over the hills, casting long shadows over the Ohio landscape. Rob turned around and squinted a bit. He threw the Arri onto his shoulder, made a quick adjustment of the lens, and hit the record button. The whirr of the film softly filled his hearing.

An hour later, Rob returned to his office. What was once the old Newark High School was now the headquarters of the "empire" Rob had built, United Barev Industries. The old school complex was a three story brick building, with a two story gymnasium that was semi-attached to the east, which served as Barev's broadcasting studio. Rob's office was housed in an old brick farm house to the west of the old school, the old home partially concealed by privacy hedges.

Pulling his red Tahoe in, Rob rolled up to his parking spot and came to a stop. He hopped out, juggling multiple things in his grip. Rob lugged his laptop bag dangling from one shoulder strap, with his bouncing backpack filled with freshly exposed film on his back. In his left paw Rob held his small carrying case, which held his Arriflex, and his right paw held a thermos of coffee from home. Rob pushed the door open and stepped into the lobby, where he said good morning to his secretary Tabby, hard at work at her desk. Rob stepped into the cylindrical glass elevator and made his way up to the second floor.

Opening the frosted glass door, Rob stepped inside, and bumped it shut with his hip. He took a moment to just stare at his office layout. Looking like a long rectangle, Rob's office was neatly furnished with some couches and reclining chairs, all with glossy brown leather. The floor was made of a shiny yellow teak, with brown mottling, and the walls, adorned with certificates and photographs of all the facilities Barev owned and operated were painted a bright cheerful blue. Three large bookshelves housed a collection of manuals and legal books on the law and labor policies. Another bookshelf held a bunch of video cameras on display, and the last shelf was completely dedicated to Rob's video pickup tube collection. There was a computer desk against the wall where his workstation sat, and a big partners desk sat near the window, where Rob worked at. He noticed there were some files sitting on top of his desk. Behind his main desk was a small table, which housed some family portraits, and a silly little sign written in Cyrillic. "Da", written in small black letters, and "NYET!" in big red letters. Rob stood and reflected on the fact that he went from a small video production house to a multi-state business empire in the span of a decade and a half building electronics, medical supplies, photochemical productions, and still video production, with thousands of employees on Barev's roster.

Rob sat his camera case and backpack onto the couch and walked over to his desk. He doffed his thick brown jacket and beanie and stowed them on a coat rack. Pulling his plush office chair out, Rob sat down and got to work for the day.

Grabbing the first folder, Rob found it full of legal documents that needed to be signed and returned to his attorney's office. Rob grimaced at the stack of legalese; he was once again in litigation with the city of Chicago, a "part two" from his lawsuit that he won the year before. In the conspiracy to kill him and the bombing that destroyed "Barev Two", the "Chicago Glass and Optics Factory", the feds made three more arrests of city officials who were in on the conspiracy, and the federal lawsuit that dragged Barev back into litigation. Rob and Barev made off well in the lawsuit, winning a total of almost four billion dollars in damages and punitive damages. But it was a pyrrhic victory to Rob, at such a terrible cost. Rob closed the folder up and set it aside for the moment. He grabbed the second folder and opened it up, revealing the new work portrait of Rob, and a note from his friend Xan, who took the picture.

In sharp color was Rob, posed in a head and shoulders shot with a dark muslin background. Rob wore a white dress shirt and a dark blue necktie. His face looked slightly amused, a sort of smirk, with a very sinister hint to it. Rob hated how he smiled, and he hated how badly aged he looked at forty. His scarred face looked almost sixty and bore the signs of facial paralysis on the left side. At least his hair wasn't turning gray, yet. His brown hair was slicked back atop his head, mobster style, with a wet sheen from a lick of Brylcreem run through it. Behind the color photo was a black and white version, in high contrast. Rob read Xan's note and gently folded it back up. He swapped folders and reached over to grab a felt pen from his pen cup. He opened the folder up with all the legalese and started jotting his signature and initials down when the phone rang.

Rob reached over to grab the handset off the receiver. "Yeah." He calmly said into the phone.

"Rob, let's talk about the studio camera situation!" came the voice of his best friend, Maverick Tokarev.

"...Your office is right next door to mine... you don't need to call me, Mav."

"But it sounds more official!"

"Get the fuck over here, dopey."

Rob hung up the phone and shook his head jokingly. He heard the sound of thundering footsteps and Maverick burst through the side door that led to the conference room. Maverick was a tall Russian husky, with a pelt of mottled gray fur and cheerful green eyes. He wore gray work pants and a winter themed sweater that was blue and white. "Rob!" he greeted.

"Morning." Rob responded in a quiet tone.

"How's it going?"

"Same shit, different day." Rob chuckled as he got up. "It's a Monday."

"Just rip the band-aid off and say fuck it!" the husky laughed.

"Kind of." Rob mustered a smile. "Trying something new this year~"

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah." Rob smiled with a nod. "So about cameragate?"

Stepping through the double doors to the walkway, Rob and Maverick walked to the studio. Their footsteps echoed against the beige brick wall and faded linoleum floor as they discussed recent equipment failures of their analog broadcast gear. Making a sharp left turn, they stepped through an old set of dark wooden doors to enter the studio, which was once a large basketball court. It was a big expansive space, with a ring above where additional seating once sat at. The old wooden floor of the court still existed, the planks of blonde maple restored and polished to a shine. The studio was mostly dim, with only a few lights working, casting bright spots on the glossy floor. Over in one corner, the modern 4K studio cameras sat, awaiting their next assignment on their pedestals. In the opposite corner sat Rob and Mav's "Big Blues", their immaculate, anachronistic RCA TK-47A's.

Much larger than the modern cameras, the TK-47's were uniquely colored blue, a trademark of RCA. Angular blue side panels contrasted with the creamy white top half and viewfinder, plus the black lens hood and attachment point. It was the last studio camera RCA had ever made, and their motley fleet of six "Big Blues" were all built in 1979 and 1980. Though standard definition, Rob and Mav both loved the warm pastel colors the camera's big Plumbicon tubes made. It was a labor of love to keep them going, four decades after production had ended. They scrounged and stockpiled spare-parts, they reverse-engineered components, and even restarted camera tube production to keep them going. But the march of time was ruthless, and the cameras were wearing out from constant use and in major need of a restoration again.

"Maybe we're asking too much after forty-four years." Rob admitted with a chuckle to Maverick.

"Maybe." Maverick snickered. "I mean, that's a lot of TV to record."

Rob and Maverick examined one of the broken down cameras. Of the six TK-47's, two had broken down in November and December. Camera two and camera three had suffered electrical failures; Camera two suffered a major failure of its CTS circuit, which provided dynamic feedback to increase the tubes' beam current if a highlight overload was detected. The circuit malfunctioned and the current spike blew out the tubes and the circuitry that drove the electron beam sweep. Camera three suffered a failure of the green channel's deflection yoke, rendering it out of commission.

They had been two of the original three that Rob and Mav obtained from a small station in North Carolina thirteen years prior. Cameras two and three had started life in 1979 with NBC in New York City. They served the network for almost seventeen years when they were retired in 1996, and sold to the small regional station in North Carolina, who continued to use them for another fourteen years until they ran out of 30mm tubes to replace. Retubed with their stock of Plumbicons, Rob and Mav put the "Big Blues" back to work shooting educational programming in their studio, adding three more TK-47's that had come from a variety of regional stations across the country.

"I had plans on taking them out of service later this year for deep overhaul, but fate had other plans." Rob joked as he marveled at their camera. "Got our money's worth and more outta them."

"That's a lot of fun, that road trip." Maverick chuckled with a smile. "We overloaded the fuck out of that truck to get all these cameras, and the CCU's and cables back!"

"And those heavy ass flood lights that you just had to have!" Rob pointed out.

"Well yeah!" the big husky laughed. "I wasn't gonna say no!"

"God that was thirteen years ago." Rob recalled. "Now look where we are~"

Maverick nodded. "Yeah. But you know, the more things change, the more they stay the same."

Footsteps echoed against the walls as Rob and Maverick climbed the set of stairs to the second floor, to get to the VTR and editing room. Rounding the corner, Rob stepped in and flipped on the lights to the big rectangular room. He stepped inside with Maverick and the two just gazed at the eclectic contrast of old and new equipment. A modern vision switcher and monitors contrasted to the old Ampex station that Rob had revived many years before. Brand new monitors sat side by side to a set of old Sony Trinitrons, complete with faux wood paneling. One wall held racks that contained their hardworking Sony BVH-2000's, the open-reel, one-inch Type C format. Each rack had the VTR, its circuitry, and a small television and vectorscope. The back wall had two massive Quadruplex machines, the high-band Ampex AVR-1 Quad, which recorded onto reels of two inch videotape. Squeezed between the VTR's were the "Big Blues" CCU panels, which were encased in faux wood, a holdover of the 1970's. Shelving sat filled with blank videotape stock, reels and reels of Barev's "500" and "525" videotape.

"All of our salvaged wonders." Maverick chuckled as he and Rob walked over to examine the CCU's. "Say what you want, but this shit got us to where we are now."

"Exactly." Rob nodded. He brushed a bit of dust off one of the panel's small displays. "It's not the age of the equipment, it's what you do with it. If WNCS just listened to us, we would have never have bought all this."

"Dumpster diving!" the big husky grinned with a snort. "You got those Sony's for nothing!"

"They were going to throw all those two-thousands away, and they just let me have it, spares and everything." Rob remarked. "It was a crazy time when all this super expensive stuff back in the eighties was just junk."

"Now it's being sold on E-bay for thousands of dollars." Maverick pointed with a laugh.

"Too much." Rob snickered. "Just because it cost forty-five grand in 1985 doesn't mean it's still worth thousands in 2023!"

Mav smacked Rob on the back with a grin. "That's capitalism! Silly poor people! Money's for rich people!"

"Yeah!" the wolf-hybrid laughed. "All this shit here's gotta get removed and restored. I bet these could benefit from a recapping and some chips being changed out."

"Lotta miles on them." Maverick remarked. "As for the interim TK-47 replacement. I think you'll like the HK-312. I got three in a trade with a guy from Pennsylvania for my SK-110's, and I bought the fourth off a seller on E-bay. All in pretty good shape."

"I never really liked the colorimetry of those Hitachi's, and they never matched up well with the HL-791's or the HL-79's... plus they use Diode-Guns, and I don't have a big stockpile of them in thirty millimeter, except for the stupid narrow angle scan ones for the O-B TK-47EP's. What's all that's left to restore on them?"

"I got the last camera to retube and calibrate, and it'll be ready to go, Rob."

"Remind me again, those aren't A-C-T right?"

"No, standard triode gun." Mav nodded.

"Good. I cannot stand A-C-T tubes. They wear out too fucking fast and they're a bitch to setup."

"Thank god our P5000 can do both." Maverick chuckled. "It can be a triode or a tetrode with just a socket modification and the A-C-T pulse. So we got plenty of those."

"The Marconi's I restored have that highlight overload protection retrofitted in, and they did a shitty job doing it. I can't get the circuits to match up right, and it creates multi-colored comet-tailing. Red and green highlight tails, with a touch of gray from the luminance tube."

"It's just too hard on the gun with that high current beam flood discharging on the fly back."

"Fixed CTS before dynamic circuits came about." Rob shrugged.

"Now just think our cell phones make a better picture than these giant cameras."

"Crazy how technology goes now, right?" Rob laughed. "Just think of where technology will be in another thirty years~"

"Heh, if we're not all dead from our idiocracy." Mav snorted.

"Yeah, true." Rob chuckled cynically. A knock at the door got his attention. Rob turned his head to see his nephew Marcus Barion poking his head in.

"Morning guys~" the white and gray husky waved. "Hey, what's the status on the cameras?"

Leaving the studio area, Rob and Maverick walked back to their offices. Their voices and footsteps echoed against the bleak beige walls.

"I gotta turn that paperwork into Lisa, and HOPEFULLY this fucking legal nightmare can be over Friday." Rob said in an annoyed tone. "Can you believe this shit... almost three years worth of lawsuits?"

"Three years of being stuck in a clusterfuck." The husky shuddered. "Between Mario... and the factory bombing."

"Oh god, I forgot about fucking Mario."

"I'd take the factory bombing shit over Mario Schleppi."

"Mario, the zero-talent assclown actor from Chicago." Rob shook his head. "What the fuck does this motherfucker want? We've paid all his medical bills, agreed to a settlement, and it keeps going back to litigation because he wants more of this, more of that. It's getting ridiculous, and no one is putting a damn stop to it!"

"It's just the way the legal system is built on." Maverick shrugged.

"It's because our whole system is a colossal fuck up." Rob griped. "Our entire legal system, our entire criminal justice system is a joke. Everything in this nation's system is a joke, Mav. How is it possible that this lawsuit with Mario is almost three years into the making, when we've agreed to all his demands!? Because the laws that govern torts allow it. And to that note, how is it okay that judges can wield this much power with little oversight? How is it okay that judges can just decide what constitutes evidence and what doesn't? How is it okay to just overlook laws or dismiss charges at a whim? It's fucking stupid. And how is it okay that half this nation's judiciary are members of a semi-secretive Federalist society?"

"The bedrock of this nation was already built on shaky ground. At least that's how I've always gathered." Maverick quipped as he held the door open for Rob.

"Thanks~ This nation was created by a bunch of crazy people that Europe kicked out and maybe for good reason too?"

"All the religious crazies get put on a boat and sailed west!" Maverick laughed.

"I'd like to put our fucking crazies on a rocket and send it to escape velocity!" Rob quipped with a sardonic laugh.

"Faults or not, the legal system was good to us." Maverick shrugged with a sarcastic smile at his friend. "I mean, we kinda won almost four billion dollars in damages from Chicago."

"They made it easy." Rob chuckled.

"And to think all because you fired Brent and Ryan." Chuckled the husky. "They wanted to kill you, and instead blew everyone else up."

"Yeah, bunch of fuckin' retards!" Rob mocked. "Make Brent built the bomb... I wouldn't let Brent pour gravy into a mashed potato volcano! That dude was a walking fuck-up; he could fuck a cup of coffee up!"

Maverick jokingly shuddered. "Maybe there's a valuable lesson in all of this... maybe it's true that we must weather the bad to appreciate the good?"

"Or don't hire idiots or open factories in Chicago..." Rob rolled his eyes.

Maverick shook his head and snickered with Rob. "Okay, maybe that too. Hopefully this Friday we can put it all behind us. What do you think the outcome will be?"

"From what Lisa is saying, I think we're gonna do pretty good. The jury seems convinced."

"Well I certainly would hope so! Suspicious tax audits, random safety inspections constantly... almost like someone's out to get us... What is this? Russia?"

"Well nobody has fallen out of a window..."

"Or Novachok'ed."

"Or commit suicide with two gunshots to the back of the head." Rob teased.

"Magic bullet, Rob~"

"Apparently."

"Hey, after work, wanna come over and help me with retubing that last three-twelve?"

"Sure~"

"I'll be seeing you!"

After dropping off his exposed film to his friend's photography store, Rob walked to his attorney's office, located on the north end of the downtown square. Bundled against the cold, Rob walked with his folder of legalese tucked under his arm, his eyes peering through dark tinted sunglasses. The mid-morning was intensely bright from the sun reflecting off the snow. Downtown Newark was quiet as usual, with only a few people out and about, and traffic slowly rolling through the roundabouts of the square.

As Rob walked, he took the time to reflect on the past couple of years, the trials and tribulations of the factory bombing and being a target of a vast conspiracy. In a way, Rob blamed himself for the bombing. He pushed the perpetrators too hard, and in the end, he paid the price for it. Rob always thought of himself as the reincarnation of Nixon; he was serious, dour, paranoid, feeling like he was always subjected to the trials of Job in his life. Rob assumed the worst in people, and brought the worst out in them. He remembered a long time ago not being like that. As a teenager, Rob was a kind of shy and awkward teen, but cheerful and optimistic about the future, until his gay bashing that almost killed him. It warped his whole world around, it left him disfigured and in chronic pain. His Nixonian ways stemmed from that singular event in his life. He wanted to leave it behind him with the new year, but old habits die hard.

Stopping at the crosswalk, Rob took a final moment to glance through his stack of paperwork that was neatly paper clipped and organized inside the manila folder while he waited for the light. The factory bombing, another insane event he survived. In 2021, Barev purchased the "Chicago Glass and Optics Factory", or "CGOF" from a major glass manufacturer. It was a virtual steal for Barev, who wanted to get into optics and glassware, which would help with their electronics and medical supply facilities. Rob quickly found CGOF to be an unmitigated disaster because of its inherited management, led by Ryan Vlockner, and his mediocre brother, Brent.

Ryan Vlockner was a well meaning person, of modest intelligence, but zero backbone. Ryan let problems go unabated because of his inability to confront people, especially his brother. Rob had an immediate low opinion of Brent, who he thought was in way over his head running the warehouse. Brent was a simpleton, an incompetent fool, someone Rob thought could "fuck a cup of coffee up". And in typical Rob fashion, he thought he could coerce them into performing better by being ruthless. It only made the situation worse, and they were ultimately fired, which lit the fuse for the bombing.

Unbeknownst to Rob, the Vlockner's older brother, Sam Vlockner, was Chicago's city commissioner. He had come to Rob's office and try and convince him to rehire Ryan and Brent, but Rob refused out of principle. Ultimately Sam used his comfy position in the city to orchestrate the bombing, which was intended to kill him, but instead blew the factory up, killing thirty-two people, and injuring hundreds of others. By dumb luck, Rob survived that, and an attempt by the brothers to murder him with an assault by baseball bats. Rob was severely injured, but managed to kill Ryan and Brent with a bat before Sam was fatally shot by an FBI agent.

And thus, Rob filed a massive lawsuit against the family and the city of Chicago, and won. Not only did he win billions in damages, he survived two more assassination attempts, thus prompting lawsuit part two that he was hoping would put an end to everything once and for all.

Crossing North Park Place, Rob walked up to the entrance of his attorney's office. Lisa Scheiddegger worked at the law office of "Scheiddegger, Manson, and Juarez", a small office space nestled between an eatery and jewelry store. It was an inconspicuously marked door with a dark granite façade. Rob threw the door open and stepped inside the lobby to check in and go upstairs.

"So let me get this straight? The entire section of the highway was completely blocked off, as in, cones, barricades set up. And you drove through that, smashed your vehicle into the giant hole in the lane where they were doing construction, totaled your car, and was injured by the forces of the airbag hitting you, and you are seeking damages from Takata, General Motors, the Ohio Department of Transportation and the city of Newark?" asked Lisa Scheiddegger, a lady German Shepherd in her mid fifties.

"Yes!" exclaimed a chubby black wolf, who's arm was in a cast. "Do I have a case Miss Scheiddegger?"

Lisa leaned forward in her chair and stared at the wolf blankly. She closed her eyes and immediately burst out laughing. "Get the fuck out of my office, you dolt."

The wolf frowned and immediately got up, his face scrunched in discomfort as he quickly left, passing by Rob who had to move out of the way. Rob appeared in Lisa's doorway, watching as Lisa just shook her head with a chuckle as she stowed a file away in her drawer.

"Do I have a case?" Rob asked sarcastically, getting her attention.

"Did you do something fucking stupid and are seeking damages from your own incompetence?" Lisa sarcastically asked.

"Those guys are dead now~" Rob joked as he handed his folder full of paperwork to Lisa, who sat it down on her desk and opened it up to examine it.

"I don't know about you, but I want this fucking case over and done with." Lisa admitted to Rob quite bluntly. She grabbed a pen and scribbled her signature and initials down on Rob's documents. "Rob, you gotta stop pissing people off!"

"That's the plan." Rob nodded. "And you and me both. I'm tired flying back and forth for court hearings, depositions, the whole nine yards."

"The only thing I look forward to is the CHA-CHING!" the German Shepherd laughed. "HEY RICH!"

Rob shuddered a bit at Lisa's screams for her notary, who came running in.

"Can you notarize and sign?" she asked in a friendly tone and smile.

Rob watch the notary look over all the paperwork presented to him, which he stamped and signed quickly. Lisa jotted a note down on a piece of letterhead, took all the paperwork into a stack, and fed it into her copier, which she faxed to the court in Chicago.

"Well I appreciate you dropping those off Rob. Is there anything else I can help you with? Any more clusterfucks you need me to unfuck?"

"Heh, no, not today, Lisa." Rob joked. "Well before I go, I have a curious question that I was hoping you had an opinion for?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you think our legal system is bullshit? That our entire criminal justice system and system of laws is built upon a massively flawed, convoluted way of thinking?"

"Absolutely." Lisa nodded.

"Been thinking about the way this country works, and all the flaws and imperfections and bullshit."

"Gotta have the bullshit." Lisa pointed with a sarcastic smirk. "Then you have fuckers like me and my husband to jimmy the system for our clients."

"Vultures." Rob teased. "Scavengers."

"Say what you want!" Lisa laughed as got Rob up and grabbed his jacket. "Oh Rob, I have a question for you! Since when do you wear cheerful brighter colors? Usually you're in dour shades of gray, black, blue~"

Rob just smiled as he zipped his jacket up. "Trying something new, Lisa~"

"I like it." She smiled.

"Thanks. Take care, and I'll see you at the airport bright and early Friday."

"Early bird gets the worm!"

"You think this will go well?"

"Well yeah~ I'm the one running the show here." Lisa laughed as she and Rob waved as Rob turned to leave and head back to his office.

Stepping back outside into the brisk bright morning, Rob walked back to his office, his mind feeling a lot clearer.

"Maverick's Television Workshop" was the sarcastic name given to his giant heated garage behind the house. The three car garage held Maverick's workshop, and his eccentric Warsaw Pact car collection, composed of a Soviet UAZ-469 jeep, and a light green East German Trabant, which sat in the dim bay.

Under the harsh white glow of fluorescent lighting, Rob and Maverick worked on their cameras. In the background, an old Sony Trinitron strapped down to a cart played the evening world news as snow flurries danced outside the dim windows. Sitting on wheeled tripods were their "new" fleet of Ikegami HK-312's, all with a manufacturing stamp of 1980. Colored a creamy gray-white with a red tally light cover and a black Canon lens hood, the HK-312 was a tub-like studio camera design, with silver carry handles on both sides of the top. Three of the four cameras were restored, and sat off to the side, covered by a sheet of plastic. Camera four was partially dismantled as Maverick worked to clean the optical splitter and filter wheel with alcohol wipes, and Rob worked to reinstall the rows of logic boards that controlled the camera, before retubing it with a new set of 30mm tubes.

Rob, looking calm and content in just his t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants, grabbed each logic board and shoved them back into their slot. Each board had undergone a deep cleaning and recapping with new capacitors and resistors to replace worn out and leaking caps. Rob reinstalled the boards down the line, which controlled the video color circuitry, the NTSC encoding, CTS circuits, and the critical electronics that drove the scanning yokes for the tubes. Checking to make sure they were secured, Rob rolled himself over to a filing cabinet, and grabbed a set of brand new tubes from Mav's storage. He pulled out a rather large box that sheathed a big Styrofoam container. The sight of the name "BAREV" proudly stamped on the box, brought a sense of pride to the wolf-hybrid.

"BAREV ELECTROPTICAL PRODUCTS LTD. PLUMBICON ABO P5000" the box was stamped. Rob cut the tape and pulled the top half of the package off to reveal a set of three 30mm Plumbicon tubes, neatly secured. Rob pulled out the green tube to examine it in his grip. The pickup tube was roughly eight inches long, and an inch and a quarter wide. It was made of glass that was colored black by an internal light shield, which protected the bias light assembly. At one end was the imaging target, made of lead-oxide and colored a light tan. It converted light into a charge pattern. Surrounding the target was a thin faceplate extender, which served as an anti-halation disk. At the other end, which was slightly thicker, held the gold pins that connected to the electron gun, and the adjustable switch for the variable bias light.

Long since obsolete, the Plumbicon was the principle imaging tube for television for almost thirty years. Combining excellent colorimetry with high burn-in resistance, the introduction of the lead-oxide tube by Philips revolutionized color television. Barev's P5000 was heavily inspired by English Electric Valve's licensed copy of the Plumbicon, the Leddicon, as Barev's tube making equipment once was owned by EEV. The desire to replenish their diminishing stock of tubes for their old cameras was the genesis for Barev becoming the manufacturing empire it was now, when Rob and Maverick sank the money in to buy a factory that was still making Plumbicon tubes for medical devices.

The P5000 was the result of a desire to make a Plumbicon tube that was as universally compatible for any camera that used 30mm tubes. Barev's "tube wizards" created the "Automatic Beam Optimization" gun, or "ABO" in 2020, which made the P5000 possible; the "ABO Gun" was a hybrid gun design that could operate as either a triode, or a tetrode ACT tube, via a simple mechanical socket adapter that disabled the extra electrode. The P5000 was capable of replacing legacy tubes such as the triode XQ1020, or the ACT/HOP XQ1410 Plumbicon, and provided a high resolution, separate mesh target, a variable bias light that could either be turned off, adjusted, or fixed on, depending on camera design, and used a thorium doped cathode for extended gun life. It was to Rob, the perfect tube for legacy cameras.

Setting the tube back into the padded packaging, Rob grabbed the scanning yokes for the camera. A big gray cylinder made of mu-metal with copper wiring inside, the scanning yokes were the critical component that made up the camera's guts. They would magnetically deflect and focus the electron beam of the tube, allowing the target to be scanned and discharged for the next line draw. Rob took each tube, removed the protective cover over the target, and mechanically installed it in each socket with a half-twist. He took each yoke and installed it to the optical splitter that Maverick had cleaned. The optical assembly was gingerly placed back inside the camera and secured with a set of screws. Rob then reattached the wiring harnesses to each tube and yoke assembly. After checking the mechanical stability, Rob swung the camera around, aiming it at an evenly lit calibration chart that sat on an easel. Maverick got the oscilloscope turned on and ready for Rob to use.

"This is just like riding a really expensive bike! You never forget!" Rob chuckled as he took the probes from Maverick, who switched the camera's CCU online.

"I remember my first retubing." Joked the husky as he watched Rob switch the camera into overscan mode.

Bouncing between the oscilloscope and the big binder manual, Rob began the critical step of setting up the newly installed tubes. He lined the shot up, and then using a plastic screwdriver, gingerly turned the knobs to adjust the scanning aperture of the target, to get the waveform to look identical to the manual. Going down the line, he set the scanning aperture, and set the beam current to handle four times the peak white level for the CTS circuit to handle the dynamic beam stretch. It would be enough beam current to stabilize the target and minimize lag, but also allow the nice comet-tailing effect. Setting the beam current was critical, as too little beam current would damage the target, and too much beam current would cause a loss of resolution and damage to the gun. Switching out of overscan mode, Rob found on a small display, the properly set up picture that was just out of alignment with major color fringing.

"Auto-center!" Mav exclaimed as he hit the automatic alignment switch. The color fringing slowly disappeared as the CCU's computer setup aligned the tubes to the calibration pattern. The black and white levels, the flare compensator, were all automatically set as Rob followed it with the oscilloscope.

"That's how you do it~" Rob pointed proudly, to a properly aligned, and white balanced picture of the calibration target. "Like I said, it's just like riding a very expensive bike."

Closing the iris up and reinstalling the side panel, Rob left the camera to run for a period of time, to allow the tubes to break-in. To finish their work, they cleaned the cameras up and applied their stickers. "BAREV", in blue square serif was carefully applied, as was a camera number, in italicized yellow.

"That'll do it~" Rob concluded as he threw away some trash in his grip. "We'll install these in the studio over the weekend."

"Sounds good to me." Maverick nodded. "Remember the days when we spent weekends and weeknights keeping our cameras running at WNCS?"

"The struggle." Rob chuckled. "We kept those four Marconi's going for years, and the other motley cameras we cobbled together because the school district wouldn't buy us new shit."

"And they still bitched at us- 'why are you using such old stuff?' Fucking idiots." Rob laughed with a shake of his head.

"You laid out the cost and everything needed for a DV suite, and they said no." chuckled the husky. "I remember you were so pissed."

"Eh. I never really liked DV anyways as a format. It was a compromise." Rob shrugged. "But we made do with Beta SP, and still make an exceptional product."

"That's right!" Exclaimed Maverick.

"And I had you to help me go dumpster diving and unfuck things." Rob said to Mav with a smile.

"And I help you unfuck things here!" the husky grinned big.

"That's correct!" laughed Rob as he went to answer his ringing phone, finding his friend Xan calling him. "Yeah, Xan?"

"Rob! Hey, have got to see the footage you and Maverick had shot with that film. It's fantastic, yo!" came the energetic voice of his friend Xan Radabaugh.

"Oh yeah?" Rob responded as he put his phone on speaker for Mav to listen.

"Yeah, that new film format your company made looks fantastic. I managed to scan all of it and digitize it, and I really want to show you!"

"Sure! Come on over to my place." Mav suggested.

"Be over in a bit!"

Rob said goodbye and ended the call. He stowed his phone back into his pocket. "That'll be nice to cut together for the PSA."

"I look forward to seeing that because we don't usually ever shoot anything in film." Maverick remarked. "I'm actually kind of excited to see what Vistachrome will look like in motion picture."

"The beautiful color of Kodachrome with a bit higher contrast, in a standard color process~" Rob remarked. "I always loved Kodachrome with it came to general color photography, because it had a nice poetry to it. It was nicely saturated but not over the top. Velvia is good for flower photography, but Kodachrome was great for general nature photography when you had good light. Digital photography is great, but you really have to work on it in post to get it to look nice."

"With film you just take it out of the box and it's a masterpiece." Maverick chuckled.

"Exactly! You're right!"

"Only downfall to film is that you don't know how bad you fucked up until you get it back." Laughed the husky. "Bracket! Bracket! Bracket your shots!"

"Or just use a light meter and not be stupid." Rob shrugged.

"Asking for too much." Grinned Maverick.

As they slowly wound down operations in the workshop, Xan showed up, armed with a handful of thumb drives holding their film transfer. Xan, a black wolf from Belgium, with long black hair tied into a ponytail jutting from beneath his beanie, was quickly welcomed inside out of the cold.

"So the film looks great?" Maverick asked as he walked backwards towards his desktop.

"Everyone was blown away when we put it on the telecine!" Xan exclaimed. "I want this film in my camera store yo! We're gonna make a killing like the Vistachrome! People left and right want to buy film cameras and film!"

"We scored big time on it, Rob!" Maverick exclaimed, only to trip and fall onto the floor from forgetting about the step going into the living room.

"How did you play baseball with the balance of a klutz?" Rob joked.

Maverick quickly got up and woke his desktop up, accepting a thumb drive from Xan, Mav plugged it in and opened the folder to find four videos on it. He opened it up to reveal a nicely transferred shot Rob had done at the top of the landfill. In widescreen 4K, the footage depicted sanitation workers inspecting a garbage truck. The footage was overall well detailed, but there was a very subtle softness in high contrast areas, verses the at times harsh sharpness that video made. The colors were well saturated, the morning sky a milky white from overexposure. With the iris cranked down, the headlights of the yellow garbage truck were spread out with a four-point stubby star, the camera's flare taking on a diamond pattern. Rob and Maverick were very impressed by their footage as they watched it.

"So this is for your Licking County PSA?" Xan asked.

"Yeah." Rob and Maverick both muttered.

"Licking County wanted to do a PSA about all the city workers who keep things afloat in the county, so we said we'd whip something together."

"I see~"

"Two commercials, so me and Rob are doing one each."

"Even as the heads of your company, you're still doing the grunt work~" teased Xan.

"Of course!" Rob exclaimed. "Leaders lead by example."

"I wouldn't let Marcus and them have all the fun." Maverick joked.

Before leaving for the night, Rob had all the footage transferred over to their server for storage. Saying goodbye to his friends, Rob departed and walked back to his house a few houses down across the street, under the orange glow of the streetlight.

Typing away on his clicky Model M, Rob entered text in the video editor and manipulated it around with the mouse to get it into position. He leaned back in his chair to see what it would look like on his large television bolted to the wall above his desk. Leaning forward, he dragged in and dropped the logo of Licking County in the center of the frame, minding the safe area zones. Smacking the space bar, Rob watched the playback from the beginning. As he watched the playback of the PSA, Rob grabbed his plate of leftover zucchini spaghetti and nibbled on it. The PSA ran for a minute even, and had a narration that was provided by the mayor, Dennis Greenbaum. It showed shots of the sanitation workers at the dump, police and fire, and construction crews in downtown Newark hard at work, all shot on 16mm film. Rob was mighty impressed by the look of Vistachrome. He sat his plate back down on the desk and leaned forward again to save and render the file. The saving screen popped up as the computer worked full time to render. The fans throttled up as it processed away.

Stepping into his office was his husband Joey, a muscular black and tan Doberman. He wore his usual attire of shorts and a green tanktop that had the flag of Brazil, his home country, on it.

"Why don't you take a break~" Joey smiled as he kneeled down to see what Rob was doing on the monitor.

"Almost there." Rob responded. He glanced over to smile briefly at Joey. "Was having a lot of fun doing this."

"I can see that~" chuckled Joey. "So that's your new film?"

"Well it's Vistachrome, but finally for motion picture cameras."

"Wow. That looks nice." Joey complimented. "That looks like a movie- it doesn't have that weird smooth video look."

"Well gee, Joey, I wonder why." Rob smiled. Joey just laughed.

"I'm not a motion picture expert like you."

"Pfft."

"I'm just a stud muffin'~" grinned the Doberman with a laugh. He jokingly flexed an arm and glanced at it before giving Rob a sarcastic grin.

"How many people can say they were a stripper then became a gunsmith, and also learned how to fly and start a cargo airline with propliners?" Rob joked.

"Makes for a great resume." Joey teased. "Oh look it's done! Lemme see it!"

Rob smacked enter on the keyboard and the video played back. With Mayor Greenbaum narrating, toting the hard work of Licking County's employees, shots of the various city workers played out in bright colorful Vistachrome. The finished video lasted one minute and Rob looked content at it.

"Looks good enough for government work~" Rob remarked as he dragged the finished file back to the server for storage.

"I think it looks nice~ You always make a great product, Rob."

"You say that 'cause you're married to me." Rob joked with a smirk.

"Nonsense~" Joey responded as he gave Rob an affectionate kiss. "You are very good with a camera!"

"A lotta blood, sweat, and tears to get to where I am at now. But I really would like to do more of this. I've been so busy the past couple of years just... dealing with everything and being so stressed out. And finally I feel like my head is clearing up some."

"You also run a giant company that needs constant adult daycare." Teased Joey.

"Well the village idiots that gave me the most problems are gone now." Rob rolled his eyes.

"Understatement of the year!" Joey teased.

Rob checked the time. "I think it's time for bed."

"Yeah, I'm kind of tired myself." Joey agreed. He couldn't help but chuckle. "Ten-thirty and it's bedtime. Maybe this is the sign of getting old~"

"Old fuck." Joked Rob.

"More like gay death." Joey laughed.

"But you're bi?"

Joey just smirked and gave Rob a sarcastic wag of a finger.

Turning the lights off to his home office, Rob went upstairs with Joey and retired for the night. After brushing his teeth and changing, he stepped into his bedroom wearing his red and white striped pajamas. Joey just laid in bed looking at his phone shirtless with a pair of purple briefs on. Rob climbed into bed and stretched out, momentarily wincing from his messed up back.

"You know it's crazy to think that I'm forty." Rob admitted.

"Yeah it's wild. One minute I turned twenty, and the next thing you know, boom, I'm entering my fourth decade." Joey acknowledged.

"You don't look forty." Rob smiled as he rubbed Joey's chiseled chest and abs."

"I know! I still get sexually harassed by everyone~" laughed the dog. "Fucking Travis, I tell ya, I'm gonna chop him up and stuff him in a hollow tree."

"Oh boy." Laughed Rob. "I can't say that... I look so tired and old now."

"You've been through a lot."

"Eh. It is what it is now." Rob shrugged. "I guess not everybody can age gracefully."

"Or want to undergo rounds and rounds of plastic surgery and Botox to look like a frozen marble countertop~" Joey quipped.

"Ugh. Enough surgeries for me." Rob grimaced.

"I get that fully." Joey nodded. "I thought it sucked when I needed surgery on my leg after that cop shot me..."

"That's child's play." Rob joked. "Wait till you have everything put back together."

"I'mma call you Mister Potato Head." Joey laughed with a big grin. "Always having to put you back together."

"Thanks!" Rob laughed. "Which side are you on?"

Joey snickered with his cheerful grin. "I love you Rob."

"Love you too, Joey."

Joey pulled Rob close to him and gently rubbed his back as Rob laid his head on Joey's chest. He draped an arm around the Dober's muscular frame to gently hold his warm paw.

"So I take it you're off for the rest of the week?"

"Oh god... yeah..." Joey chuckled. "Could you believe that the city doing maintenance on the water main would cause all the pipes in the shop to just explode?"

"Water hammer." Rob shook his head.

"I was at the counter with a customer looking over his shotgun and all of a sudden there were a couple loud bangs, and water started shooting everywhere from the ceiling! The basement flooded, the bathroom flooded and the showroom too. Unbelievable! So we're gonna be closed for the rest of the week as all of that has to be ripped out. Can you believe this? This is how our year starts!"

"You know, I know an excellent lawyer." Rob chuckled.

"The city said they will pay for it." Joey shrugged. "Oh well, a sort of vacation."

"I'm sure Andrew is freaking out."

"Oh my Dad... what a miser." Laughed Joey. "Shit happens I guess."

"Wanna fly with me and the entourage to Chicago Friday for the verdict?"

"Sure!"

"Sounds like a plan. We can finally stay at Stonecliff for the weekend~ Well good night, Joey. Love you."

"Heh, good night, Rob. Love you too."

Joey turned the lamp off, plunging the bedroom into darkness. Rob laid on his side and slowly drifted off to sleep, as he thought about the verdict that was looming in a few days.

Sailing gracefully amongst the puffy clouds, high above the snow covered flatlands of Indiana, flew Rob and his entourage aboard "Coneflower". Enroute to Chicago flew the curvaceous Super Constellation, the old Lockheed looking like a pristine flying time capsule. Completely bare metal and polished to a mirrored finish, the L-1049E powered against the headwinds with its quartet of burbling radial engines, driving shimmering propellers that spun circles tipped in red, white, and blue. The upper fuselage was stenciled "UNITED BAREV INDUSTRIES LTD." and the nose was graced with the golden arrow insignia of the "BATS System", "Barev's Air Transport Service".

Inside the narrow propliner was a plush VIP interior, separated into three compartments that were all colored in light earth tones. Towards the towards of the propliner, Rob and Maverick sat with their attorney Lisa and her husband Richard, and company comptroller, Charles Manchester, a sixty-eight year old red Welsh Doberman. They sat at a large card table, strewn with folders, paperwork and their laptops as they worked on the flight to the windy city.

Taking a sip of water from a paper cup, Rob sat it back in the cup holder by the window and adjusted the knot to his dark pink necktie.

"We did everything that we could, and it's up to the jury to decide. They've had a week of deliberations." Richard said over the drone of the engines outside the window.

"This could go both ways." Charles remarked.

"Always the case with a jury." Lisa shrugged. "But their defense was poor, and the jury didn't seem to buy it from what I can tell~"

"Folks, I think this will be our finest hour." Rob assured.

Maverick shuffled through some paperwork. "After all the shit we had to go through at the FotoChem factory. The weird safety audits constantly, the stupid, ridiculous fine over something the safety inspector did..."

"That was caught on video, and they were caught red handed in the internal e-mails turned over..." Lisa pointed.

"As was the tax audit." Rob glared.

"Oh yeah from that... Sanjay... Naga... Naga? Naga... na- NOT GONNA WORK FOR CHICAGO NO MORE!" laughed the husky as he tossed the clipped stack of paperwork back to Lisa. Everyone had a laugh at Maverick's joke.

"I think the moral of the story, ROB, is not to piss the wrong people off!" Lisa teased with a sarcastic wag of a finger.

"Duly noted." Rob shook his head sarcastically.

"I mean, in Rob's defense, who would have through Dumb and Dumber would have thought of such an idea?" Mav shrugged. "Ryan could fold like a napkin when yelled at, and Brent was dumb as a brick."

"Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large numbers!" Lisa teased. "That whole family could fuck a pot of coffee up."

"Makes you wonder how they got so rich." Rob grimaced. "Further proof that being smart won't make you rich, and being rich won't make you smart."

"You got that right~" Mav agreed. "Get this shit fixed, so we can focus on getting rid of Mario once and for all."

"I'm just saying~ Make it look like an accident..." Rob suggested with a sarcastic hand gesture.

"That whole clown show is because his attorney keeps pushing things back, keeps disagreeing and rejecting our settlement offers. We keep offering him a very nice settlement and they won't take it after everything else we've given them..." Lisa rolled her eyes.

"'I objectttttttttt~'!" Richard mocked with a hearty laugh.

Rob shared a laugh with everyone, just as the phone rang on the desk. Bolted onto the desk was the old cabin phone, its black enamel faded with age. Rob picked it up to answer the call from the cockpit and excused himself. "I'm gonna take over and give Felix a break~"

"Sounds good to me, Rob!" Lisa acknowledged as she watched Rob depart for the cockpit.

Stepping through the bulkhead, Rob closed the door and walked through the navigator's compartment, which housed a couple rest bunks for the crew. Compared to the plush and decorated cabin, the redundant navigator's compartment was spartan and bare, with gray walls and floors. Rob stepped into the cockpit to find his husband Joey in the right-hand seat, and their adopted son Felix in the captain's chair piloting "Coneflower". Sitting at the flight engineer's panel was Ivo Horvat, the son of Rob's mechanic Vlado, and his husband, Jordan Hoover, flew in the radioman's seat, directly behind Felix.

"She's all yours!" Felix called as he got up and excused himself for the restroom. Rob climbed over the console and took a seat and buckled himself in. Rob looked content at the helm as he donned his dark sunglasses.

"All's calm here~" Joey remarked with a smile.

"Well I sure hope so." Rob chuckled as he checked the autopilot heading. "Probably another hour to Chicago."

"It's quite a nice sunrise." Rob pointed out, impressed by the blaze of color the rising sun painted on the iceberg like clouds that drifted by.

"I think that's one of the things I really like the most about flying. Mornings and evenings, you get such a unique and beautiful view that not many people get to enjoy." Joey nodded as he adjusted his sunglasses. "I'm glad that I got my pilot's license because it's given me opportunities I never would have imagined."

"You can quite literally fly to new heights." Chuckled the wolf-hybrid.

Joey snickered a bit and crossed his arms, the Doberman looking introspective. "Sometimes I think about our firearms business, and I get uncomfortable. Dad does too sometimes."

"Yeah, I get that sentiment." Rob nodded.

"Too many fucking crazies." Joey shook his head. "I believe in and support the second amendment, that Americans should have the right to keep and bear arms for defense and whatnot, but the fact is honestly, gun culture has just jumped the tracks a long time ago."

"It's not so much about firearms hobby and shooting and hunting anymore. It's become this weird socio-political fetish among so called patriots. A masculine extending mechanical contraption of forged and stamped steel. It's just a gun. People take it too fucking far."

"And then you have the other side." Chuckled Joey.

"Eww guns are icky, and we must ban every single one, especially those evil AR-15's with their child destroying bullets I know nothing about!" Rob mocked in a nasally whiny voice.

"If you ban all guns then peace will descend upon earth and children dance around with gumdrop smiles." Laughed Joey. "There's just no middle ground anymore. It's just yell and scream, no rationality."

"That's America. We've turned this whole country's political process into Jerry Springer. It makes better news when people are yelling and fighting."

"If it bleeds, it sells~" Joey grinned.

"Yeah!" Rob laughed sardonically. "We're too reactionary as a country. We just knee-jerk to any little incident. Drives me nuts, Joey."

Joey crossed his arms as he glanced at the instrument panel. "Frankly I'm getting burned out dealing with all these fucking crazies coming to the gun store. You never saw it this bad until the past decade. You had crazy fucks once in a while, but it's getting worse and worse. And the worst people are buying weapons, stuff I wouldn't personally let if I was in charge! Just reckless and irresponsible people. I remember some broad coming in wanting to buy a carbine, and she just recklessly handled it around and I took it back and said she needed to find another gun store."

Rob just shook his head.

"The past two and a half years have been by far the worst. People angry that I won't sell them a rifle and they pull a gun on me!"

"In a gun store..." Rob chuckled.

"Five times in the past two years, Rob. One dude because he failed his background check due to domestic violence. Big red flag. People who don't have any ID, or they can't fill out a document right to save their life, and I'm the bad guy." The Dober rolled his eyes. "I guess where I'm getting at is... I don't worry about this shit flying and with the air cargo business."

"Nah, you just have tree huggers all up in your face about round engines smoking." Rob teased.

Joey closed his eyes and just smiled with a snicker. "I'm fucked, regardless!"

"People are just fucking retarded."

"Yeah." Joey nodded.

"Coneflower" arrived at Chicago by eight-thirty in the morning. The city was enveloped by clouds, and Rob only guessed his arrival by his radar display. Flying on instrumentation, Rob entered the landing pattern of Chicago Midway, and orbited around while awaiting his turn for the runway. There was practically zero visibility as Rob calmly flew around in the holding pattern. The turbulence was patchy, and the Super Connie yawed and pitched in the snowstorm.

"Hey it's gonna get bumpy here folks, buckle up and get ready for landing!" Rob announced over the cabin intercom. He stowed the phone away to his side and listened to the radio traffic as Joey communicated with the tower at Midway.

Looping around and coming in, Rob used his guided approach and dropped the gear and flaps into place. The Constellation assumed a slight nose down droop as they descended in blind. Joey called out the altitude and controlled the throttles while Rob focused on flying. At two hundred feet, the runway lights finally came into view, and the Constellation burst out of the storm clouds to see a very snowy runway presenting itself. The cockpit grew quiet as everyone concentrated on sticking the landing. Rob worked the rudder pedals to the big triple-tail behind them and cancelled out the turbulence induced yawing. He crossed the threshold and flared for touchdown, as Joey pulled the throttles shut. "Coneflower" touched down smoothly onto the spidery gear, which plowed through the snow. Joey then engaged full reverse thrust as Rob began testing the brakes to check how slippery it was. The Connie touched down on its nose wheel and began bleeding of speed by the reverse thrust and braking. Snow was kicked up by the prop wash.

Rob turned around in his seat to glance at Ivo and Jordan that sat behind him. "That's how you stick your landing in a storm."

"When you're good, you're good, right Rob?" Ivo grinned.

Rob pointed at Ivo. "Damn right."

Chicago Midway was home to Barev's air cargo division, Centoh Intermodal. The large maintenance hangar bore a large neon sign that read "FLY CENTOH CHICAGO" in big red letters that glowed through the snow. The flight line was quiet due to the snow, with only a DC-6B and a R7V-1 Constellation in the process of loading and unloading. "Coneflower" taxied in onto the ramp on its inboard engines, being delicately guided by a tug with a ground controller motioning with a pair of lights in his grip. Rob worked the nose wheel steering control and turned around to park by the hangar. Ivo ran the inboard engines lean for a moment before he pulled the mixtures to "cut", which shut the radials down. The big flat-tipped Curtiss Electric propellers coasted to a stop.

Ground crew approached the plane with an airstair and secured it at the rear hatch. Approaching the plane was members of Rob's security detail, Barev's "Viking Battalion", which protected all of their Chicago facilities. The "Black Death" as they were called in Chicago, the sentries wore their black uniforms with their AK-103's slung over a shoulder by a canvas strap. In front of the sentries walked Bruno Matix, the leader of Viking Battalion's two divisions. A burly malamute dressed in his winter suit, he stood at the base of the airstair, watching as the hatch opened and everyone started disembark.

Felix emerged first, followed by Ivo and Jordan, then their attorney's and Charles, and finally Maverick. Joey and Rob were the last to exit as Rob zipped up his dark blue winter jacket.

"Good morning Rob!" greeted Bruno. He reached out a gloved paw that Rob immediately accepted into a handshake.

"Morning." Rob greeted. "I take it there's been no chaos here?"

"None to report, well, a minor issue, at the youth center."

"We'll talk more about that later, after the court hearing. See you at the photographic plant at one."

"Will do, Rob."

Rob and his entourage hopped into a white Suburban that was owned the company. Rob took his seat at the wheel and they all took off, for the courthouse a half hour away. "Coneflower" was backed into the heated hangar gingerly by the tug to escape from the snow.

Shuffling some paperwork in front of him, Rob sat back in his chair in the courtroom, awaiting the verdict. There was anticipation in the stuffy air of the windowless courtroom. He and Maverick sat flanked by their attorneys, while Joey and Felix watched from the pews behind them. Across from them sat representatives for the city of Chicago; the city's army of attorneys, and the new city comptroller, looking glum. Rob sat looking quite cool and collected.

After winning nearly four billion dollars in his massive lawsuit against the city of Chicago and the Vlockner family, Rob filed "lawsuit part two", after the FBI opened a criminal investigation and broken another conspiracy to get back at Rob, this time with members of the Chicago Police. The FBI caught wind of the plot and broke it up. In the ensuring investigation, it came to light that the city was trying to derail FotoChem's operations through dubious safety and tax audits that resulted in Barev having to pay massive fines over "discrepancies". Rob and Lisa filed suit in late September, and over the next four months went back and forth to appear in court and testify. This time, "lawsuit part two" was given to a jury to decide their fate. Rob felt confident they had argued their case well, as Rob had the smoking gun via the FBI's investigation.

After swearing in the jury, everyone stood for the arrival of Judge Matthew Benedict, a Saint Bernard dressed in his black judicial attire. He sat before his tall podium, peering out before the audience.

"Good morning, on this day, January the sixth, twenty-twenty-three." The judge announced. "The court will hear the jury's verdict regarding the combined cases of Barev versus Chicago, and Barion vee Chicago. I will now turn this over to the jury."

Rob's eyes panned over to the jury, as an older black wolf stood up, holding a small yellow legal pad in his grip. He wore dark brown slacks and a dark green sweater with the shirt collar tucked in and a yellow "JURY" button attached.

"The twelve members of the jury have spent the past three days deliberating the information presented regarding this combined case. The majority of the jury have found that the defendant, the city of Chicago, and its police department, acted in an egregious manner to the plaintiff, United Barev Industries, and its president, Robert J. Barion."

The judge leaned in. "Have you awarded any damages?"

Rob glanced over to see the members of Chicago's legal team grimace and brace for impact.

"Yes we have, your honor." The wolf announced as he flipped a page on his pad. "For United Barev Industries, we award eight hundred and ninety-five thousand dollars in compensation for fines levied against the FotoChem facility for dubious safety violations and tax audits. For the conspiracy to assassinate Robert J. Barion, we award four million, seven hundred thousand dollars. For punitive damages to Robert J. Barion, we award fifteen million dollars even. And for punitive damages for United Barev Industries, we award four hundred and seventy-three million dollars even."

There was a round of applause in the courtroom as Rob sat back in his chair, a smug smirk curling up momentarily on his face. He looked at Maverick, who smiled big, and glanced over at Lisa, who just gave him a smirk and a wink. The comptroller and attorneys for the city looked devastated, with ashen, glum faces staring out in disbelief.

"You may record the verdict. Everyone remain seated until the jury is removed."

Rob could faintly hear the murmurs from the defendant's side, which made him chuckle a bit on the inside.

"How could they do that~"

"We're really gonna strain ourselves in an attempted reversal."

"Appeal. Appeal."

"How do we counter this?"

Rob turned and shook Lisa's paw with a happy look on his face. "You, ma'am, are a heat seeking missile."

"Go for the jugular." Lisa joked with a grin.

"This trial has concluded." The judge announced, with a loud smack of the gavel.

Outside the Richard J. Daley center was a media onslaught. Police held back a sea of reporters and cameramen, all chomping at the bit to get a word from Rob for the evening news. As police held back the press, Barev's Viking Battalion got into position. The heavily armed security of Barev formed a shield as they lined up, awaiting Rob and his entourage.

The elevator doors opened up and Rob emerged with his group, who walked quickly through the expansive granite and marble lobby. Lisa and Rob talked about the expected appeal, and the likelihood of it actually succeeding. The wolf-hybrid glanced ahead through the glass doors at the sea of reporters at the sidewalk.

"Brace yourself, it's coming!" Rob joked as he pushed the door open. Immediately he heard voices all yelling for him, blending together into a practically unintelligible ruckus. Cameras all turned towards him and photographers bombarded him with the harsh flash of their flash guns. Rob kept his composure as he walked with his usual serious gaze. Members of Viking Battalion quickly formed up around him, the menacing "blackshirts" marching with their Kalashnikov's bouncing in their grip.

As Rob rounded the end of the steps to begin the walk towards the parking garage a block over, Rob recognized a familiar face emerging through the sea of people. It took him a second to see that it was none other than the former mayor of Chicago, Laura Earhart. She was a slender aging lady Doberman, with red fur and short brown hair that was neatly permed and slowly graying. Like everyone else, she was bundled against the cold. Her face showed the utter contempt at Rob, an angry, bitter gaze on her face.

Laura's tenure as Chicago's mayor came to a crashing close after Rob had successfully won his first lawsuit against the city. Laura was once seen as a bright shining star for a city long blighted by violence and political complacency. She was elected by her status as a fighter and a political outsider; she was Chicago's first openly gay mayor, a successful attorney in her own right before entering politics. But her downfall came with Rob's lawsuit. By signing the approval of "Operation Defochi", the city's defense against Barev's lawsuit, and signing former comptroller Michael Trenoff and his "get out of jail free card", Earhart sealed her fate in the ensuring fallout. Publically humiliated and indirectly implicated in the fallout of a government trying to assassinate Rob, Laura had no choice but to resign after her approval rating tanked. Taking her place was assistant mayor, Anna Hicks, who just barely won her reelection campaign. Earhart, the once bright star of Chicago's politics, was now reduced to almost nothing after her reputation was ruined.

As Laura approached, the lead sentry stopped and aimed his rifle at her. "HALT!" the husky yelled. "STEHENBLEIBEN, ODER ICH SCHIESSE!"

Laura froze at the sight of an AK-103 aimed at her.

"HOLD UP!" Rob shouted. "Stand down, Randy."

The sentry lowed his rifle, and all the other guards relaxed their pose.

"How may I help you, Laura?" Rob asked, looking unamused at her presence.

Laura walked right up to Rob and crossed her arms. "Well Rob? Are you happy? Are you happy that you just took even more money away from this city?"

"I believe I proved my point." Rob shrugged.

"You just waltz into this city and you think you can just boss us Chicagoans around!?"

"Yeah."

"You know what you are, Rob? You're just a prick. You're just a financial monster. You have taken so much away from us! You've taken so much away from me over everything that happened!"

"Sounds like someone's still butthurt from having to resign." Rob chuckled.

"I had everything going in my favor! And then everything came crashing down with your god damn factory and you driving those fucking idiots to blow it up!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Watch what you're saying there." Rob pointed. His eyes glanced around at the cameras all jumping in to record the fight that was unfolding.

"Why should I have to resign when I wasn't even involved in any of this!?" Laura yelled. "You cost me my whole career over that single document that I signed! Now everyone thinks I'm a damn fool!"

"Well if the shoe fits." Lisa teased. "Lace that bitch up and wear it!"

"YOU STAY OUT OF THIS!" Laura hissed at Lisa, who glared at her.

"Oh man, catfight." Maverick teased.

Rob looked around at all the cameras watching him. The wolf-hybrid kept his calm.

"Laura, you signed a document that basically gave Trenoff carte blanche for your city's supposed defense against my lawsuit, which apparently included political murder. You didn't even know what you were signing. You let your comptroller push you around, create a document, and then you signed it without even knowing the ramifications."

Laura screamed at Rob. "This is not my fault!"

"Sweetie, that's called leadership. You take the credit. You take the blame. Just as I have to do in my business."

Laura's face turned a brilliant red from being called "sweetie". She took a step back and blinked rapidly. "Sweetie!? Sweetie!? YOU'RE GONNA CALL ME SWEETIE!"

"Bitch is another term."

Laura was so gobsmacked at Rob's icy coolness. She took a step back, only to trip on a crack in the sidewalk and fall onto her back, where all the cameras soon panned to. Rob and his entourage just continued walking by her. Eventually the cameras and press backed off as they ventured inside the garage for the second floor, where Rob spotted their Suburban, under the watchful eye of two sentries brandishing submachine guns.

"GOOD MORNING CHICAGO!" came a voice that exploded out of nowhere. Rob spun his head around to spot his friend, Andy Bueller, clutching a microphone. He had two of his engineers with him, one holding Andy's restored BVP-150 tube camera, and the other, holding onto a Beta SP tape deck.

"This is Andy Bueller here for ABC Chicago thirteen! The most accurate name in news!" grinned the white and gray wolf. Superficially looking like his nephew Marcus, Andy was a slender wolf in his late thirties, with a fancy pompadour of platinum blonde hair atop his head. He was the station director for WNBB-TV, Rob's TV station that he owned in Chicago's market, another prize from his lawsuits.

Andy and Rob went back a long ways; they were once best friends when they worked together for the school district's station, WNCS-TV. Rob is the reason why Andy got a job in television. They were close friends until an incident with a camera setup resulted in Rob being yelled at and a sports event not being able to be recorded, which resulted in a major falling out. Rob never spoke to Andy again for fifteen years, until his lawsuit against WNBB for slander, which reunited them. After working out their problems, they became friends again, and with Chicago Metromedia's sale of WNBB to Barev, as a settlement to the libel suit, Rob made Andy the station director.

Andy held the microphone out jokingly to Rob. "Can you tell me- how do you feel about today's verdict?"

"Lawsuit goes ka-ching." Rob joked as he shook his head with a snicker at Andy and the camera. "You're unbelievable sometimes, Andy."

"What time do you want us over to Stonecliff?"

"Uhh, around four."

"I can do that! For ABC Chicago Thirteen! This is Andy Bueller reporting."

Rob climbed into the SUV with everyone and quickly took off to escape the prying press.

Not letting another huge legal victory get the best of him, Rob settled back into work. As the clock struck noon, Rob made his way to his photochemical plant, located on the northwest side of Chicago. FotoChem was one large building, colored white with a flat roof. Two smokestacks gently belched steam that was carried off to the southwest by the wind.

Rob and Maverick made it a goal to periodically visit their facilities and meet and see how things were going. Rob and Maverick toured the factory floor and watched as photographic film and paper was manufactured. Rob always looked intrigued as he watched the rollers and guides run raw film base and paper through and it be cut up into appropriate lengths and widths which ran to the next process for further preparation. It was very similar to equipment Barev One used to cut master tape stock into the lengths for videotape manufacturing. After spending an hour mingling and meeting with workers, Rob and Maverick went to go talk to their plant manager, Jennifer Springer.

In her cozy office on the second floor of the factory, Rob and Maverick sat in plush office chairs as they talked to Jen and the lead chemist for film production, Cyril Martins. Springer sat at her desk, fiddling with a bottle of mineral water while she talked about a couple new film formulas that the plant was working on with the R&D department. Jen was a gray furred wolfess in her early forties; she sported a bob cut of dark brown hair that had a bit of a wave to it, and deep green eyes that peered out. She was trained as a chemist herself, and had once worked for Fujifilm in their photographic film labs. After a decade of working her way up at FotoChem, the company decided to merge in with United Barev Industries, and Jen was promoted to plant manager. She was one of the few powerful women in Barev world, next to Cheryl Voyager, the head of Centoh's trucking division.

"So what did you think of the motion picture format of Vistachrome?" Jen asked Rob and Mav.

"I think it looks fantastic." Rob complemented. "We shot a PSA for Newark with it, and it came out looking beautiful. It's got a good contrast to it, and the colorimetry is just perfect. It has a perfect mood to it- it's not garish and it's not bleak and subdued. Everything is right on the money."

"It handles overexposure better than underexposure I notice." Mav added. "But that tends to be how films go in general, at least for motion picture films."

"When I tested it, I thought it handled overloads far better than what digital cameras can take." Jennifer responded. "To me, that's what always made film so much nicer for photographs, because it doesn't clip the same way a sensor does when you have to exposure for the subject and the sky is all blown out. It fades to white more gracefully in my opinion."

"I think we have ourselves a winner." Rob nodded. "When do you think you can ramp up production on it for a general release?"

"Give us maybe a month or two~ I can't promise anything."

"Of course."

"What's the new stuff coming down the line?" Maverick asked.

Cyril leaned over to pick up a small box off Jennifer's desk. Martins was an older red wolf, in his mid-fifties, with tousled graying brown hair. He wore dark gray slacks, and a blue polo shirt under his white lab coat. The wolf opened the box up and showed Rob and Maverick some rolls of 135 film.

"This roll here is a fine grain, portrait type film at four hundred speed, in C-41." Cyril explained. "This is a medium contrast black and white, and this is a high contrast black and white film, at two hundred speed, again both in C-41."

"I see." Rob nodded.

"This is the film I'm really interested in seeing what people think?" Cyril explained as he held up another roll canister. "This is supposed to give Velvia a run for its money, especially after they discontinued the one hundred speed Velvia. This is not named yet, but the goal for it is to be a good film for flower and nature photography. Super saturated, very brilliant colors and high contrast, at either two hundred or four hundred speed. This one here is a two hundred speed in C-41."

Maverick leaned forward in his seat. "Film is getting hot in the market with the young folks who never got to experience it like we did. So this is just fantastic."

"Film has a special character that I don't think digital cameras can fully capture." Smiled Jennifer. "You can take digital pictures easily and tweak them, but film is just... a masterpiece out of the box."

"You take it out of the packaging and you know your pictures will look great." Chuckled Rob.

"Would you like to take some of these back home with you to try and maybe send to your photographer friends to get a barometer feel about what they think?"

"Sure~"

After finishing up their meeting with plant management, Rob and Maverick prepared to leave FotoChem. In the loading bay area, Maverick packed box after box of experimental rolls of film in the back of the large Suburban, while Rob stood and talked to his head of Viking Battalion, Bruno Matix. The burly malamute was a few years younger than Rob, a tough looking malamute with white and two shades of gray in his fur. He wore a flattop of black hair that was a holdover from his military days in the Army. Around his neck he proudly wore his Medal of Honor, for valor in saving four severely wounded soldiers while under heavy enemy fire in Afghanistan.

"Any security issues in Chicago?" Rob asked him.

"Centoh has been calm, and no issues to report here or at the art museum." Bruno shook his head.

"You said there was minor issue at the youth center?" Rob asked, raising a brow.

"Yes." The malamute nodded. "We broke up a fight on Wednesday in the afternoon. A girl that came to live there in October got into a fight with her uncle, who was apparently threatening her. We pulled them apart and ejected the uncle. He looked like a piece of shit anyways. Lanky dude, cheap knockoff Gucci suit, lookin' like a wannabe pimp muddafucka. We talked to the girl, she's seventeen, and her name is Christine, she reports that her uncle was demanding money. Upon further inquiry she explained that she was sexually abused by him, and that she regularly paid him money to keep him away, for fear of sexual violence again."

Rob tilted his head with a look of concern on his face.

"Christine told us that she reported this to the police last year, and that they told her she was lying and that she made it up, and no rape kit was done or anything else. Family is full of deadbeats- no dad, Mom's an alcoholic. Really sweet girl though... fantastic artist." Bruno concluded.

"Makes you just hate society huh?" Rob remarked.

"Sadly." Bruno chuckled.

"I'll see about it tomorrow." Rob promised. "Thank you, Bruno."

"You're welcome, Rob~"

Hopping into the Suburban, Maverick drove as they departed FotoChem and hit the highway, to begin heading south for Rob's summer home, Stonecliff estate.

"I have to admit that I was surprised you didn't go apeshit on Laura." The husky chuckled as he drove with the flow of traffic.

Rob shrugged as he loosened his tie. "It's not worth it. She can wallow in her own filth."

"Self-made downfall." Maverick chuckled. "Didn't she also basically just piss everyone off in city government here?"

"Yeah. When you literally just spend your entire tenure alienating everyone that you need for allies, in a Democratic stalwart of a city... and when you face criticism you whine that people are just targeting you 'cause you're a dyke or something. It's dumb. Pissed off the police and fire unions, city council, alderman, and who else? 'bUt ItS nOt My FaUlT".

"ItS cAuSe I'm LeSbIaN." Maverick mocked with a snort. "More like just being fucking retarded."

"Let your comptroller rip your fucking diaper off... fucking insane." Rob shook his head. "Fuck her."

"Yeah."

"It's just not worth it anymore, Mav. Not to get upset over someone mad because they have to mix mac 'n cheese at the community center they're reduced to working at because no legal firm will hire her after such a public display of incompetence. Earhart did this to herself because she got arrogant and thought she was untouchable politically. Nobody is untouchable. Nobody stays on top forever."

"Exactly, Rob."

"So fuck her and the horse she rode in on." Rob grumbled.

"I think it's great to see you step away from a fight." Maverick pointed out with a brief smile that flashed on his face. "It's just not worth screaming at people all the time."

"Time and a place I suppose."

"Yeah!"

"Ah, well. Let's celebrate."

Southwest of Chicago was Rob's Stonecliff Estate. Two miles of wooded property surrounded Stonecliff, a fancy home modeled after the famous Fallingwater in Pennsylvania. Situated atop a rocky perch with a waterfall from the stream, the stone and stucco home practically blended into its woodland surroundings. Everything was colored in warm earth tones, its radical cantilevered structures suspended partially over the stream that fed the stony waterfall. The home had once belonged to the incompetent Peter Vlockner, a cousin to Ryan and Brent Vlockner. It was one of the many assets the Vlockners had to surrender to Rob, to placate the court ruling of half a billion dollars in punitive damages Rob had won. Rob obtained Stonecliff and two massive gilded age mansions in Chicago, all opulent and lavish, fit for a king. It didn't matter to the Vlockners regardless, as the entire family was now sitting in prison for federal weapons charges and murder. Of all the assets Rob obtained, Stonecliff was the only one he kept personally. It was now his summer home, and a retreat for Barev's employees in the summer.

The interior of Stonecliff was all modeled in warm earth colors. Walls were made of stone, with metal window frames colored ochre and furniture all in shades of brown and tan. Dark wood floors shone with a polished sheen to them as everyone stood around joking and celebrating Barev's second big financial victory. Very faintly, the sound of flowing water could be heard inside.

Joey and Alvin stood with Lisa and Richard, joking with FotoChem's management team. Charles talked to some of the executives of WNBB-TV, and Felix mingled with the Centoh Chicago team. Outside on the cantilever stone porch, Rob and Maverick stood with Andy and his broadcast engineers, who recorded a segment for the news, on Andy's vintage BVP-150.

"Today, the court ruled in favor of United Barev Industries, awarded hundreds of millions of dollars in damages in what is called the "second half" of a massive lawsuit leveraged against the city of Chicago, for its involvement in the factory bombing of the Chicago Glass and Optics Factory in the Central Manufacturing District. The latest charge came after the Federal Bureau of Investigation busted a conspiracy by members of the Chicago Police Department, looking to try and assassinate Rob Barion, Barev's President, by escalating a police encounter, and additional members arrested in the city government departments who aided in the bombing of 2021." Andy explained into his microphone. "So let me ask you, Rob, and Maverick, how do you feel about today's outcome?"

Rob momentarily pursed his lips as Andy held up his microphone. "I think today's ruling was the only outcome that was right, and I am not saying that in a biased, smug way. That members of a city government think that they are above the law, and that they can act as judge, jury, and executioner, upset that their operating budget was slashed due to financial compensation in a tort? That is unacceptable in any way shape or form. To target the operations of our facilities in retaliation for winning a lawsuit last year, is a blatant abuse of power of the state, and the judicial system checked that with the appropriate application of punitive damages."

Andy held the microphone over to Maverick.

"Uhh, I think it was a fair decision, that was decided upon by a dozen members of our peers." Maverick explained a bit hesitantly. "Uhh, we spent months back and forth presenting evidence, testimony, and it sure helped to have an attorney who knows her stuff. We're very happy that we have been able to stabilize our situation and provide a financial base to expand our company."

"Good enough!" Andy grinned into the camera. "Folks you heard it from the horse's mouth! The city plans to appeal the ruling, but it will be seen if their efforts at a reversal will be successful, given the evidence presented in court. For Chicago Thirteen, this is Andy Bueller, reporting."

"And cut." His cameraman announced.

"I still got it." Andy boasted teasingly to Rob and Maverick, who laughed with him.

"Always have that shit eating grin, huh?" Maverick laughed.

"You know it~" Andy chuckled. "It's been a long time since I've covered stories."

"I can imagine." Rob nodded.

"You guys did it again~" Andy remarked amusingly. "I'm impressed."

"It helps when you know a lawyer who knows her shit." Rob quipped.

"Or people just being fucking stupid." Andy shrugged.

"That too!" Maverick pointed out with a grin.

Everyone sat around the big buffet table that was filled with food that was brought in from catering. A couple bottles of champagne were popped in celebration, and everyone dug in for a nice feast to celebrate. In front of Andy's camera, Rob gave a speech thanking everyone and giving hope that the money awarded would be put forward to Barev and that the crisis could be put behind him. After his short monologue, Rob grabbed some food himself and went to go sit with Maverick and Andy off to the side by the window. It started to snow a bit as they ate, chatted, and watched the snow fall.

"So this is like, Velvia, but in C-41?" Andy asked as he examined the boxed roll of experimental film.

"Yeah. Give it a try and tell us what you think." Maverick smiled as he took a sip of champagne from a paper cup.

"I sure will. In fact, me and the wifey are taking the kids to a botanical garden, so this will be great to test there, since you know... January." The wolf snickered.

"Why don't you try this portrait film too." Rob suggested as he handed Andy a couple rolls as well.

"I sure will!" Andy exclaimed. "Remember when digital cameras looked like shit when we were in school?"

"I bought a Sony Mavica, in 2001." Maverick recalled. "It looked like a giant brick, and took pictures on floppy disks, and the pictures were the size of postage stamps, and they looked like crap."

Rob and Andy just snickered. "Yay one megapixel!" Andy boasted.

"The camera weighed twice as much as my Canon AE-1, and took awful pictures, but people ate that shit up because you could put it on your computer!" Maverick laughed. "Now I have a Sony Alpha that blows everything out of the water."

"Film still has a neat character to it." Rob nodded. "I love my Sony Alpha, and I used to rock that full-frame Nikon that Alvin has, and they were fantastic! But film is just... special."

"I agree."

"So where did you get the BVP-150's?" Maverick asked as he took a bite of his sandwich on the plate.

"Oh man, I got a steal!" Andy exclaimed. "I got eight of them from the storage room at the Cook County Public Library System. They had purchased them in 1985 to upgrade their educational studio. They basically let me have them since they didn't need them. Came with all the cables, cases, spares, the whole smack."

"You don't see too much of that anymore." Rob shook his head. "I remember back in the late nineties and early 2000's when you were literally given all that stuff for free because they were getting rid of it. It was just used space."

"Now most of that stuff is gone, thrown away, scrapped." Maverick shook his head.

"I have more than what I need so I want you guys to have one!" Andy exclaimed.

"Oh! Okay~" smiled Rob.

"I know you're not a big fan of Saticons." Andy chuckled.

"They're an alright tube..." Rob smirked, glancing at a chuckling Andy and Maverick. "But the Mixed-Field, Diode-Gun Saticon is my preferred tube type for Saticons."

"I notice a big improvement with the Barev Saticon five~" Andy remarked. "Sony's Saticon three's are better than some of the triode type Saticons, but the Saticon five just improves the lag and memory effects even more. I mean, the age of the Sony tubes might also have something to say as well..."

"Age and how the targets are constructed." Maverick recalled. "Napier at Barev One found that if he tweaked a few construction steps and increased purification of the phosphors and extremely strict computer application of the vapor deposit process, the Saticon target increases its burn-in resistance. Which is a plus."

"I would say they almost match the Plumbicon in memory picture sticking performance." Rob shrugged.

"Before we forget, we want to gift you a camera that we brought along as well." Maverick pointed out.

"Is it that Sharp camera you guys have gotten your paws on?" Andy asked.

"Yeah! A Sharp XC-B10. Same tube type, the Mixed-Field Saticon."

"You know, Sharp minds create Sharp products~" Maverick added sarcastically.

"Awesome! That way I can keep my tube stock pretty simple." Andy laughed. "Didn't you guys just take your TK-47's out of service?"

"Well we had to." Rob laughed sardonically. "Wear and tear over the years took their toll, and we're gonna commence a deep rebuild and repair to put them into service."

"What's your replacement cam?"

"The HK-312, with thirty-millimeter Plumbicons in triode type."

"Ah. Good choice. Don't need to fuck up the beam current for the return sweep!"

"Oddly specific~" Rob pointed with a grin.

"I hated those tubes back at WNCS-TV."

"Yeah." Maverick grimaced. "You have your normal ninety-five milliamp beam sweep for the raster scan, and then the pulsed defocused beam for the fly back cycle."

"Grid one pulses positive, which increases beam current, and grid four pulses negative to defocus the beam to stabilize extreme highlights, and the picture information below that current level is preserved for the next raster scan. At least that's how the Mullard book explained it."

Andy shuddered.

"Now look at cameras today. You don't have to worry about that shit." Maverick remarked with a laugh. "TV looks pretty, but is the programming any better? Nope!"

Rob shook his head no.

"Sex, violence, and the weather. It sells." Andy pointed out with all of them laughing.

In the evening, the setting sun shone as the clouds moved out. After cleaning up from the party, Rob and Joey decided to go out and explore the estate. Rob wanted to try out his new film and go for a walk while they waited for Maverick to return from dropping Lisa and Richard off at the airport to fly home with Felix and Charles aboard "Coneflower".

Stonecliff's woodland was deep in winter's slumber, and a fresh layer of powder covered everything. The pristine white snow took on the colors of the evening slumber as Rob took a couple pictures with his childhood Nikon F3. The woods were very quiet, with only the faint whistle of the wind through the naked branches of the towering trees, and the distant sound of flowing water over the falls.

"This will look amazing in summer." Joey remarked as their boots crunched through the snow. "I bet the humidity will suck."

Rob glanced at Joey with a chuckle. "And the skeeters."

"Oh boy~" the Doberman smiled with a snicker.

The trail took them to the base of the waterfall, where Rob and Joey stood admiring it. Above the falls stood the stone and stucco house, its glass taking on the tint of the setting sun. Rob set his tripod up and mounted his Nikon for a portrait shot of the house and the falls. He stopped down the iris and put a neutral density filter onto the lens. With the cable release, he lined the shot up and held the release down for a five second exposure, followed by a second, at four seconds.

"This is a really nice place." Joey smiled. "I'm actually kind of glad you kept it."

"I gotta keep a trophy at least." Rob joked as he dismantled his gear. "This one wasn't as obnoxiously arrogant like the mansions in the city."

"I'd be calling you Lord Farquaad." Grinned the Dober.

"Pfft. HA~" Rob laughed. "I'm not that self-absorbed in myself or my money."

"You're also not stupid." Joey smiled with his usual sarcastic quip.

"Yeah, my last name ain't Vlockner..."

"I guess they're proof that being intelligent won't make you rich, and being rich definitely won't make you intelligent!" exclaimed Joey. Rob just gave him a sarcastic wag of a finger in agreement.

"That is a nice waterfall." Rob remarked as Joey put his arms around him.

"We can swim at the base at the pool area." Joey smiled.

"I'm glad I kept this one." Rob smiled at Joey.

Taking down his tripod and reattaching it to his backpack, Rob and Joey watched as a patrol walked by on the trail. Members of Viking Battalion, wearing winter camouflage, marched by in a group, on their evening patrol of the property. Rob managed to take a couple pictures of them on their patrol of the property, to test out the portrait film. As the light further faded away, they walked back to the home, to watch the last bit of light depart to the west on the patio above the stream.

Rob leaned on the railing and gazed up at the westward sky that took on a deep shade of magenta, with purple highlights in the wispy clouds. The cold air was calm, and the sound of water resonated against the house with its mighty roar. Rob admired the scenery, as the stream gave an opening to see the twilight sky. Behind him, he could hear the click and whirr of his Nikon's autowinder as Joey snapped a picture of him leaning on the rail.

"Last one, better use it." The Dober smiled as he handed the camera off to Rob to rewind the film.

"Heh, good point." Rob said amusingly.

"Wow, that was quite a nice sunset." Joey smiled. "I'm glad I went along for this."

"Beats having to deal with the gun store right?"

"Eh... a break~" smiled Joey. "Don't have to deal with the crazies and whatnot for a bit!"

"You got that right." Rob nodded as he turned to lean against the railing again. "The world is a crazy place... clowns to the left of me... jokers to the right, yet here I am..."

"...stuck in the middle with you~" Joey finished with a grin.

Rob grew quiet and just stared out into the deepening purple sky. "I don't feel like I belong anywhere, Joey."

Joey fumbled his brow a bit as he adjusted his beanie. "Why do you say that, Rob?"

"I see how the world works, how we interact with each other, how society functions, our certitudes and ideological beliefs that drive us. And yet I don't see myself falling into any category? I don't function or think like others I've seen. I belong in one class, yet I don't think like them. I'm mixed. I'm a gay guy who doesn't like gay culture. I don't like partying and watching drag queens and being a prissy bitch. I'm a rough n' tough guy who likes to fire machine guns and fly aircraft and tinker with electronics. I'm filthy stinkin' rich, and I just got the company even richer today in the court system, and yet, I don't take the attitude that workers are just commodities to be exploited and pushed to the limit for financial gain, that the system is meant to be rigged and bribed to get the most out of it. And I don't live my life in blissful ignorance like so many people do!"

Joey pursed his lips and nodded. "I get where you're coming from, Rob. You've been through a lot of traumatic experiences."

"Eh. Old feelings die hard."

"I mean, you're not wrong." Joey chuckled. He walked over and put his arms around Rob. "You're not missing much anyways. People are vapid, silly, and worry about the wrong things. I was part of the gay community in my younger days. It's full of insecure, nervous people who care about drinking, fucking, and having a good time to drown the misery and self-loathing. A lot of friendships are shallow as I've found out when I left that life. And I had to! The drug overdose when I was twenty-three was the final straw."

"Yeah, I get that."

"And you're not alone about feeling out of place. I mean, I'm a pretty liberal guy, and I'm a gunsmith and help run a growing firearms business. I'm the antithesis of what you think a gun maker would be."

"What a right wing nutjob, Christian fundamentalist?"

Joey laughed and pointed a finger in agreement. "Nah, just center-left, bisexual, stud muffin."

"You got that right." Rob laughed as he got a kiss from Joey.

Joey laughed and threw his arms out with a sarcastic shrug. "It's conflicting you know? You vote for the same people who call you a baby killer because they don't understand guns and how they work."

"That's the other thing. I wish people learn up on shit before they run their cocksucker about it."

"Pfft. C'mon, that's the American way! Be loud and ignorant!" Joey grinned.

"Yeah!" Rob laughed sardonically.

"It's scary to see where we may be heading."

"Joey I think we're several paces onto the path to genocide." Rob admitted. "With all the violent rhetoric going around, the political division, just all this really sick shit."

"I know."

"I don't worry about myself. I worry about you, I worry about Alvin."

"Well listen here motherfucker, I can take care of myself too~" Joey smiled.

"Now that's why I married you."

"I say the same thing too." Joey smiled. "Now let's get inside. I'm cold."

Rob smiled at his husband. "Okay~"

After Maverick returned from the airport, everyone retired to bed. From the open "public area", Rob, Joey, and Maverick retired to the "private" part of the Stonecliff. The private quarters were smaller and more narrow, with walls adorned in very dark stone and lacquered wood. Rob's bedroom had a low ceiling, and very dark walls, with one whole wall being nothing but a giant picture window with dark red metal framing between the panes.

Rob emerged from the bathroom wearing his pajamas. His brown hair all tousled, Rob yawned and adjusted the collar to his red and white striped pajamas. Joey stood at the window in his purple briefs and black tanktop that clung to his lean, muscular frame.

"Well I think it's time for bed." Rob said. "It's about ten now."

"Sounds about right for forty." Joey laughed as he turned the lamp off, plunging the room into near darkness. The pale blue light of the moon very gently filtered in through the windows, aided by the snow in the woodland. Rob laid down in the bed and got himself comfortable as Joey adjusted the blanket around him. The sound of the waterfall was very faint, taking on a very calming ambience.

"I can't imagine living in such a opulent house all the time?" Rob remarked as he laid in bed, looking up at the ceiling. "That family had too much money and didn't know what to do with it."

"It's a nice summer home." Joey shrugged. "And a worthy prize."

"Blood, sweat, and tears~" Rob chuckled cynically.

Joey had a chuckle and momentary look of thought on his face. "I think you belong right here, with me. From our earlier chat."

Rob gave a reserved smile at his husband. "I agree."

"Fuck 'em." Joey concluded as he gave Rob a kiss. "Love you~"

"Love you too. Good night."

"Oh, one more thing..."

Joey and Rob both reached over to grab their handguns that sat on the opposite nightstands. Rob carried a 10mm Glock 20, and Joey had his 9mm Taurus PT-92, both equipped with a large suppressor screwed on. They both rocked the slide and stowed them under their pillow.

"Night!"

Chicago's concrete jungle cast long shadows as the morning sun glistened off the glass and steel skyscrapers. Broken chunks of ice silently drifted along the Chicago River as Rob, Maverick, and Joey made their way across the city, to finish up their itinerary before heading home to Ohio. Already, Rob had visited the art museum that was housed in a mansion that Rob had donated. He met up with Andy and the WNBB crew to shoot an interview there for a news article he was creating for a news package. Now they were on their way to go visit the Cook County Youth Center, also housed in a giant mansion Rob had donated.

In the north of Chicago sat a giant gilded age mansion, a giant sandstone and granite home that had once belonged to Virginia Vlockner. With almost ninety bedrooms and a property that was just as regal and grand, the mansion was now home to the youth center, a facility for gifted, but troubled youth facing homelessness and violence at home. Rob had given it to the center after seeing the dilapidated old center, which was nothing more than a factory that was converted into a center. Rob and Maverick had gone to visit it after an engine malfunction on a Centoh Constellation dropped debris onto the roof, damaging it. The cold, imposing building, with its fascist overtures bothered Rob, as did its population of sullen, sad looking teenagers.

Arriving by ten o'clock, Rob pulled into the parking lot, parking the company Tahoe beside his security's imposing BTR-70 APC which was painted black. Rob stepped out and adjusted his knit cap and sunglasses. The snow was blinding white. Maverick and Joey walked behind Rob, the two of them lugging around their old video gear; Maverick tested out their newly acquired BVP-150 from Andy, while Joey held the shotgun microphone and videotape recorder strapped to him. Maverick recorded Rob walking to the big mansion and saying hi to one of the sentries who walked by.

Rob stepped inside and signed himself in. He found himself standing in the huge living room of the mansion, with a ceiling that was nearly twenty feet tall. The walls were royal blue still, with fancy white trim accented with some gold in places. A few teenagers sat around reading in the big lobby area. Rob's eyes scanned the room, stopping on a young girl sitting on the couch, drawing in a notepad. She was a young brown and gray wolfess with dark brown hair tied into a ponytail. She wore jeans and a black hoodie as she drew quietly in her sketchpad. Her name was Christine Regan, the girl Bruno was telling him about. Rob kept her on his mind as he went to speak to Latoya, the head administer of the youth center.

Joey and Maverick went to go explore the property with their camera as Rob talked to Latoya briefly about Christine and what was going on with the recent incident. After ten minutes, Rob stepped out of the office area and returned to the lobby area. Rob doffed his Carhartt jacket and threw it over his arm as he walked over to where the girl sat at. Rob wore a dark green sweater over a blue button up shirt.

"Hello. You must be Christine?" Rob asked. The wolfess looked up from her sketchpad, looking surprised at Rob's presence.

"Oh hi. Do I know you?"

"My name's Rob Barion."

"Doesn't ring a bell~"

"I'm one of the financial supporters of the youth center. I'm also the president of United Barev Industries."

"Oh I see. Well, how can I help you?"

"I was told by a member of security that you had a scuffle with your uncle recently?"

"Oh, yeah, we had a bit of a fight, no big deal though." Christine explained nonchalantly. Rob didn't buy it.

"I don't think needing to be pulled back by a member of security is a no-big-deal if you ask me." Rob chuckled. "You were mighty mad, I was told. And from what I hear... justifiably so?"

"It's... it's a private matter." Christine said curtly to Rob. She went back to drawing on her sketchpad.

Rob just smirked a bit and sat down in the chair beside him. "You know, I want to help you, Christine."

"Just call me Chrissy. That's... that's what my Mom always called me."

"Alright, Chrissy. Look, I heard there's a lot of problems going on and I want to help you." Rob reiterated.

"Why do you care, Rob?" the wolfess asked, looking a bit annoyed. "If nobody else gave a shit, why would a stranger care about a teenager who doesn't have a damn home to live in?"

Rob fumbled his brow. "Because I know what it's like first-hand. I got kicked out of my house when I was around your age."

Christine looked up from her sketchpad and slowly closed it up. She looked intrigued at Rob's comment about himself. Rob, usually tightlipped about his life, looked calm as he spoke about his past life.

"I was sixteen when I had to come out of the closet to my family. My Dad chased me out and I couldn't come back, but I was lucky and got to live with my boyfriend and his parents who accepted us and our relationship, well, until my gay bashing that almost killed me. So I know what it's like to be at rock bottom, Chrissy."

Christine looked down at the floor for a moment, a gaze of introspection. Rob let her collect her thoughts.

"I had to get out of there. I couldn't take it anymore." The wolfess admitted. "My Dad... died when I was eight years old... and Mom just fell apart. She started drinking and fucked herself up on alcohol... and then she hurt herself and got addicted to painkillers, and just fucked herself up even more. To her... her goal was just to get her next fix... and she didn't care how or when, or if it hurt me or not... enter my fuckin' uncle Rick..."

Christine took a deep breath. "My uncle Rick is a piece of shit. He's a wannabe pimp... the so-called pimp of South Lawndale... Hah. More like pervert who likes to fuck teenagers and kids..."

Rob just shook his head.

"It started when I was nine... and it kept going and going. He'd booze my mom up, give her pills, her fix, and then he'd go after me. It kept going and going... just... force himself on me... tell me this was good for me... and then when I got apparently too old for his taste... he told me it would stop if I gave him money every month... so I do that... to keep fucking Uncle Rick at bay... five hundred a month, can you believe that shit? That's like my whole fucking paycheck from the gas station I work at..."

"Wow."

She sighed. "I have dreams, but they'll never happen at the rate I'm going. This place is just the calm before the storm. I have to figure out what to do to stay at a shelter or something, because I won't go home. I rather just die before I do that shit again."

"What are your dreams, Chrissy?"

"I want to be an artist. I love to draw..." She held up her sketchbook and turned it around to show Rob what she was drawing, which impressed him of the quality. "I really want to go to school for art... heh... I also really wanted to buy myself a car... but I guess I can't do that when I'm paying my uncle off to not rape me!"

Rob looked bothered by her sardonic laugh. "You know you shouldn't have to live in fear like that."

"What am I supposed to do? I called the cops on him and the cops didn't believe me, said I was just making shit up... nevermind the evidence stacked against him. It's so stupid... you can't even rely on the people who are supposed to enforce the law... what fucking good are they, Rob?"

"I say the same thing."

"So you know..."

"Yeah." Rob nodded. He pointed at his scar. "I'll always be reminded."

Christine just frowned. "I want him to go away for good, and that's why we fought... he wants me to pay him today..."

Rob leaned forward a bit. "What I helped you?"

"How?"

Looking unsure, Christine sat at a booth at the Waffle House a few miles away from the youth center. In her grip she held an envelope with money, nervous fingers tapping on it. Her blue eyes glanced up at the ticking clock as people ate their lunch in private. Her heart nervously pounded in her chest as she waited.

The door swung open to the jingle of the bell attached to it. Stepping inside was her uncle, Rick Regan. A middle aged, sleazy looking brown wolf, Rick walked with an arrogant swagger in his white jeans and puffy white jacket with a bit of a green shirt beneath sticking out. Graying brown hair was greased back atop his head. Hands with shiny rings adorning his fingers swayed with his walk as he walked over to sit at the table. Rick looked at his niece with a sinister smile. "Hi Chrissy, how's you?" His words came out smug.

Christine glared. "Fine."

"So do you have the money?"

"Yeah." The wolfess glared as she slowly slid him the envelope. Rick grinned as he reached over to grab it and examine the cash inside. That's when Christine heard the door swing open again.

Stepping inside was Rob, who immediately made eye contact with Rick. Rob walked with a confident pose, an amused smirk gracing his face as he sat down next to Christine. Rick stared with a confused look on his face.

"Hi~" Rob greeted in a sarcastically drawn out way. A rather evil grin lit up his face. "How's it going, Rick? It's Rick right? Rick Regan? I'm Rob Barion."

Rob held out his paw, and Rick nervously shook it.

"Christine told me a bit about you, Rick. Aren't you some kind of wannabe pimp? Apparently the pimp of South Lawndale? Specialty is young teenagers, like Christine here? Or maybe she's too old now for seventeen. Thirteen year olds your specialty?"

Rick blankly stared at Rob. He glanced over with a serious gaze at Christine, who just glared back.

"I see you're in the need for some money, since you clearly expect Christine to help pay for your tacky ass fashion, so you know what? If you take her money..."

Rob reached into his coat, making Rick lift his paws up nervously as Rob threw a wad of cash onto the table. "Why don't you take mine and leave hers alone?"

Rick saw something out of the corner of his eye. Looking out the window, the wolf saw a bunch of heavily armed men in the parking lot, in black uniforms, brandishing assault rifles. A menacing looking APC sat ominously near the entrance and exit. A couple of them made eye contact with Rick and just glared. The wolf gulped. He turned around in his seat to notice that the entire Waffle House was surrounded. Patrons looked on uncomfortably to the heavily armed men.

"Look at me Rick." Rob ordered. "Christine is with me. And I really don't like what you've done to your niece."

"Yeah... yeah... I get it, Rob."

"You done?"

"Yeah."

Rob's glare intensified as he lunged forward, grabbed the envelope of cash and his own and pulled it away from Rick, who looked shocked at Rob's aggression. Rob took a moment to stare Rick down with his menacing gaze.

"You ever fuckin' come back again, EVER, and threaten Christine? Next time bring a pistol~ That way you got something of a chance." Rob pointed aggressively. Rick looked completely dumbfounded, his mouth slightly ajar.

"Get the fuck outta here you kiddie fuckin' piece of shit."

Rick nervously got up, muttering "it's fucking bullshit" as he walked for the exit. Ever defiant, Rick walked with his arrogant swagger as he approached the exit with all the men of Viking Battalion staring at him, limbering for a fight in the parking lot.

Rob handed the envelope of money back to the girl. "I want you to put that back into your bank account."

"What if he comes back..."

"Don't worry he won't." Rob pointed.

Christine looked out the window to watch her uncle be chased by the members of Viking Battalion. Rick tried to jump into his Audi, only to be yanked back and detained by Randy the husky. Bruno and the others lunged in and starting hitting him all over. Christine gasped as Rob got up, the girl running for the exit to stand in shock in the parking lot.

"Oh my god! Rob! No! No! No! This isn't what I wanted!" Christine exclaimed as she watched her uncle get beat up.

"This is how it has to end!" Rob exclaimed. "C'mon, get in the APC. You'll be late for work." Rob motioned.

Christine looked shocked, yet, in a way, completely satisfied as her abusive uncle got his ass handed to him. Rob stood for a moment and watched the pimp get whacked across the face by the butt of an AK-103. He kicked one security guard back, who quickly jumped back into the fight as Rick fell to the ground. Bruno came marching back towards Rob, to hop into the BTR-70.

"Bruno, I want the girl escorted to and from work and school for the next couple of months." Rob commanded. "And if pedo pimp comes back around, I want that to happen again."

Rob pointed to Rick's brutal beat down, which he and Bruno watched with amused smirks. Rob hopped into the BTR with Bruno and closed the hatch. As the driver fired up the twin engines, Rob popped the top hatch and stood up to get the last glimpse of Rick's beat down. He was hidden behind his car, but Rob watched half a dozen guards continue to pummel him with the butts of their rifles.

"KIDDIE FUCKIN' PIECE OF FUCKIN' SHIT!"

"SUMBITCH! LEAVE HER ALONE!"

"WORTHLESS MUDDAFUCKA!"

Rob couldn't help himself but let out a cynical laugh as they took off for the road. The BTR-70 roared out onto the road with its eight knobby tires burbling on the pavement. Across the street, in an almost empty parking lot sat a black Dodge Charger, with dark tinted windows, one of them partway down. A pair of binoculars peered out watching the assault in the parking lot come to a close. As Viking Battalion got back into their APC's, the binoculars came down to reveal the face of FBI Special Agent Gary Dove, an agent from the Cincinnati Ohio office. A big grin was on the gray wolf's face.

Lying bloodied on the salt crusted pavement was Rick. His pristine white suit was now dirty and ripped up. Its collar was stained red in blood. Rick's face was swollen and bloodied, and he let out a moan as he tried to move his limbs. People stared nervously as Rick laid in the middle of the parking lot.

"Fuckin' faggot... can't fight your own battles!" Rick exclaimed, with bloody spittle splattering on his blood soaked face.

Arriving into Midway a few minutes early was Rob's Convairliner, "Explorer". The twin-engine Metropolitan burbled in on the Centoh ramp, piloted by Felix Barion and his husband Tony Alvarez. Looking like the others in the BATS fleet, "Explorer" was polished silver with a thin blue cheatline that separated the bare metal from the white upper top fuselage. Felix turned to his right and parked. The twin Double-Wasp radials were powered off, and the forward hatch opened and its integral stair was deployed and unfolded. A fuel truck came rumbling over, ready to top up the tanks with a fresh load of 100LL.

Rob grabbed some of his luggage and began carrying it to load into the plane, as he watched Felix and Tony disembark. Speaking to them momentarily, Rob climbed in and sat his suitcase and laptop bag down in the forward lounge area. As he stepped back outside into the cold, he noticed his head of airport security approaching, Senior Lieutenant Bruckner.

"You have a visitor, Rob." The German Shepherd announced. "An FBI agent."

"Oh boy..."

Rob didn't have to walk far, when he noticed none other than Special Agent Gary Dove, resident agent of the Cincinnati FBI office. The gray wolf walked in his blue FBI jacket with an amused swagger to his face, and a big grin awaiting Rob.

"Good afternoon Rob! Funny to run into you in Chicago!" Dove greeted with his voice practically dripping in sarcasm.

"What are you doing here in Chicago, Dove."

"I am not at liberty to discuss an ongoing investigation I am part of, concerning a matter related to a case back in Cincinnati, BUT, I am wanting to inquire about an incident at a Waffle House a few hours ago..."

"Oh yeah?"

"I couldn't help but notice a convoy of Soviet APC's going through the city, and the only person I know who would have BTR-70's is you... So care to explain to why someone's in the hospital in a brutal beat down at a Waffle House?"

"You know Dove, I've been reading up on the constitution lately and I really am intrigued about the fifth amendment." Rob said with an insincere smile.

Dove looked down at the pavement and chuckled. He crossed his arms and laughed a bit out loud. "The guy got his ass handed to him and is in the hospital with a broken arm and dislocated shoulder. Paramedics had to scrape him up off the pavement."

"Isn't that what you're supposed to do with shit, Dove? Scrape it up?" Rob quipped.

Dove just shook his head in amusement. "Frankly I don't give a shit about the guy, Rob, so you don't need to tiptoe around me, which by the way, you're not very good at!"

Rob ground his teeth at the insult.

"His name is Richard Regan. He was busted for child pornography in 1990, but got off on a technicality due to police mishandling of the evidence. There's been several instances of accusations of child and underage sexual abuse by him in three different states, but in each time, no charges were ever filed due to a lack of evidence, and or no witness testimony."

"Or in the girl's case, nobody believed her." Rob shook his head.

"Basically." Dove shrugged. "I've been doing this for twenty-five years, and guys like that need the electric chair if you ask me. I've seen some really sick shit."

"I think what's sick is that our system allows sick fucks like that to just slip through the cracks and keep on abusing." Rob shook his head. "People like him prey upon the vulnerable and the weak to get away with it. And our system doesn't give a shit about it. That's why I made an example, so he'd never bother Christine Regan again."

"So why, Rob? Why did you beat up pedo pimp for some random girl at that youth center you help fund?" Dove asked curiously. "Humor me."

Rob just shrugged. "I felt she had a bright future that was being ruined by her family, and I wanted to help her because I thought it was the right thing to do."

"Just like that Sam Martin back home, eh?"

"I see all those kids there. When I first went to that youth center when our engine dropped parts on the roof last year and saw all those miserable, sullen faces, I felt bad. Being treated like they were the problem, a burden upon the state, kept like political prisoners in a building that would make the Staatssicherheit blush. Now I see happy faces when I visit. They're happy because they're treated with dignity, and they're taken care of, and have a roof over their heads, safe from violence by Viking Battalion. They're happy because they have hope. And it makes me happy to see them happy and have a chance for a future that maybe they can help shape themselves?" Rob explained.

"You don't want them to go down the path you did."

"No."

Dove smiled at Rob. "Empathy Rob! You have empathy for the vulnerable!"

"I live in a society where people lie, cheat, steal, murder, and destroy other's lives and get away with it! We have an entire system that makes no sense, with laws that can be twisted and manipulated, or even thrown out by a whim of a judge, and law enforcement that have no constitutional duty to protect you. There is so much shit stacked against us, and especially against vulnerable youth. I see them, our nation's future, and nobody gives a fuck. And predators like pedo pimp can be castrated and left to die for all I care."

"I get it, I get it." Dove nodded. "Just don't ever let me catch you do that again~"

Rob chuckled at Dove's sarcastic wag of a finger.

"Thank you for your time, Rob."

"Be safe on your investigation, Dove~" Rob pointed with a smirk.

Dove returned the gesture and smirk as he turned to leave for the perimeter gate. Rob breathed a subtle sigh of relief and turned around to resume helping to get the plane ready for their flight home.

Aided by a tailwind, "Explorer" raced home across northern Indiana. The winter landscape was blinding white, and not a single cloud existed in the deep cyan sky as the Convairliner made its way east.

The narrow cabin was largely quiet. The tightly cowled radials were muffled by their exhaust ducting, the roar of the engines further muffled by the cabin's sound deadening. Over coffee and some snack food, Rob, Joey, and Maverick sat around in Rob's office in the tail of his Metropolitan, discussing names for the experimental film. Rob leaned back in his plush office chair, holding a yellow junior legal pad and a felt pen, as he scribbled down names.

"Black and white film is usually just given some arbitrary name or designation, plus a number." Maverick remarked as he juggled a roll in his grip. "You have Kodak T-Max, Ilford HP5, to name two."

"Sounds like naming a gun." Joey chuckled with a smile. "We have the XQ-15 carbine. XQ means "extreme quality".

"It's a high contrast black and white film. Why don't we call it Hicon?" the husky shrugged.

Rob wrote it down. "Not bad. "Like Hicon four-hundred for the film speed."

"Oooh, good one."

"It's kind of hard to name films." Chuckled Rob. "We have Vistachrome for our Kodachrome analog, Vistacolor will be the name for the regular generic everyday use film... As for the super saturated type? I was thinking of making a combination... I have thought about Ikol..."

"Ikol?" Joey asked.

"Intense color. Swap the C for a K, which looks and sounds more authoritative, more powerful in appearance, since if you spelled it with a C, everyone would call it "eye-sole".

"Yeah, eye sore." Maverick laughed.

"See?" Rob pointed. "Eye-Coal, sounds better. Intense color, and then name it with the ASA speed."

"I like it!" Maverick exclaimed as Rob jotted it down.

"I'll let the marketing department there make any tweaks in the next conference call." Rob concluded. He capped his pen and threw it on his desk with the notepad. "All in all gentlemen, I think this was a very fantastic and accomplished trip."

"Guess you were right Rob~"

"I had a gut feeling this would be our finest hour." Rob concluded as he leaned forward in his chair. "Always trust your gut."

"Dmitry sure does~"

"Oh come on." Laughed Joey. "You guys are so mean to him."

"Dmitry makes it so easy. The jokes practically write themselves." Laughed Maverick. "Dmitry is such a contradiction. Smart and dumb at the same time."

"Oh Dmitry. Our one and only Dmitry Tokarev." Rob chuckled as he took a bite of some iced coffee cake on a plate.

"I'm gonna get more coffee! Be right back!" Maverick exclaimed as he got up and left the office for the galley.

Joey chuckled as he handled a roll of film in his grip. "You know Rob, I'm mighty proud of you~"

"Oh yeah?" Rob muttered as he washed down his cake with a sip of coffee. "Why do you say that?"

"You opened your heart up for that girl, and allowed yourself to be vulnerable for once." The Doberman smiled. "You didn't shut your emotions out, and you let your vulnerability allow her to feel more comfortable. I rarely ever see you do that."

Rob shrugged. "She needed help. And I felt bad."

"It's because you care, Rob." Joey smiled.

"I know what it's like to be in her shoes, even if it wasn't a direct example." Rob remarked. "But not having parents who gave a shit, abusive family members, on top of just trying to find your place in life? Yeah, I get it fully. People disgust me, Joey. People like pedo pimp."

Joey laughed cynically. "I don't think he's gonna try anything again."

Rob chuckled as Maverick returned with a fresh mug of coffee. "Make it look like an accident, Joey."

"Chop 'em up is what I say~" Joey teasingly grinned.

"Or just accidentally fall out of a window!" Maverick exclaimed.

One Week Later

Long shadows were cast on the flatlands of northwest Ohio. The sun hung low on the east, coloring the browned landscape a rich gold color. Rob peered out through his dark sunglasses as he guided his truck on the exchange ramp from Route 15 to Interstate 75 in Findlay. Turbodiesel burbling under the hood, Rob held his foot on the accelerator as he kept his heavily loaded Silverado at speed. Rob's giant red one-ton, with its polished aluminum flatbed, towed a large fifth-wheel trailer, which was gray and proudly stamped "BAREV" on its sides. Maverick glanced back in the tow mirror at the trailer rolling along with them as they merged onto I-75, for Michigan.

Rob merged into his lane and engaged the cruise control once again, and settled down for a fifty minute drive to the I-475 exchange in Perrysburg.

"It's going to be weird not having the Big Blues in the studio for a year or so." Maverick admitted.

"Yeah. I agree." Rob nodded.

Maverick glanced at his phone. "We'll drop off all the gear, go explore around Ann Arbor and mess around with the cameras, and then go pick up the stuff coming back and we'll be good to go!"

"Let's hope."

"It's Ann Arbor, what's the worst that could happen?" laughed Maverick.

"Never say never~" Rob chuckled.

"I mean, it's not like we're exploring the ghetto in Detroit, or some bumfuck Uhhia place." The husky grinned. "HEY! LOOK AT THAT!" Maverick quickly threw his 35mm up and fired off a shot with his silver and black AE-1.

"I really am excited to see what this film is going to look like. Go figure that Xan's photo lab equipment would break down at a time like this."

"That's how it always happens." Maverick rolled his eyes. "When you're really wanting to see it... that's when shit breaks down."

"Never fails." Rob laughed. "Murphy's law. Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong."

"I really want to see that Ikol film... because I'm curious if it's going to be super saturated in a good way? Or just an out of control acid trip kind of bad look..."

"Yeah..." Rob cringed. "There's a fine line from great to yuck."

"What do you think about restarting 110 production?" Maverick asked.

"That little Instamatic format?"

"Yeah!"

"Hmm. That we'll have to talk to Jen. You know I forgot all about that weird little format. I used to have a 110 as a kid. It was a pocket Instamatic, and it made okay prints for what it was designed to do. Just grainy."

"All my childhood memories were captured by a candy bar sized Instamatic my parents swore by." Maverick recalled. "So many scrapbooks full of family photos. Well, at least us, and one when Dad went back to Russia in the early nineties, before things became Neo-Soviet under Putin."

"Now your Dad would probably fall out a window in Russia today." Rob chuckled. "Since your parents' defected from the Soviet Union."

Maverick crossed his arms. "Dad told me after he was forced to shoot down a defecting East German crew, he just couldn't do it anymore. He didn't want to shoot them down over a city, and they ordered him to, and he fired the shot and the jet exploded, and it crashed into an apartment and killed a mother and child, and his commanding officer and the others in the V-VPO just shrugged it off. Who cares? It really bothered him for a long time."

"Can you imagine being that unhappy and disillusioned that you'd risk everything to escape?" Rob asked Mav.

"Just like your grandmother and mother from North Korea."

"Yeah." Rob nodded. "At least Mom and Uncle Bae made it."

Maverick had a look of thought on his face as he took a sip of a bottle of water. "Rob... do you ever feel...embarrassed about who you are because of stereotypes?"

"Like what do you mean?"

"I'm part Russian, I'm part Ukrainian. My family defected from the Soviet Union, and I was born here. And I see how Russians think and behave, and I watch the Ukraine war unfold and all the tragedy and just wanton barbarism Russia displays, and I'm just... embarrassed... ashamed. This is exactly what Dad told me about. This disregard for life. And then people see this, and all the spying shit, so people are like 'OH LOOK, MAV MUST BE A SPY FOR THE KREMLIN~ HAR, HAR, HAR.'"

"I'm half Korean, so people don't quite understanding being mixed like this. I'm half malamute, I'm half wolf, and I don't look like either or. I have the fur of a wolf, but I got the body build of a malamute. People can't wrap their heads around it, or the cultural differences being Eurasian, or whatever flavor of the week label they want to throw on me."

"What if you have no ethnicity? What if you're they-them?"

"Get the fuck outta here!" Rob snorted with a laugh.

"I'm just saying!"

"You're fucking retarded." Rob laughed with Maverick. "It's different when you're part Asian. People just assume that if you're Asian, you're this automatic genius. You're just super smart, you stay out of trouble, the model minority. And that creates pressure in itself. These unrealistic expectations that just wear on ya. And being that Mom's family came from North Korea, then people just assume all this other fucking shit. South Koreans thumb their nose at you, you're shunned, ostracized. I've got shit from some Koreans because I speak Korean with a northern dialect."

"Huh, that's weird."

"Yeah exactly." Rob shook his head. "People are dumb. That's the problem with the world."

Mav shrugged. "I don't get people, Rob."

"Neither do I." Rob shrugged as well. "And then you add the autism layer..."

"Oh god, yeah."

"People think you're the weird, defective robotic figure. You're automatically a genius! You're the Elmo Muskrat of the world!"

"Elmo's just a spoiled rich kid in a perpetual meltdown."

"I don't let this shit define me. Fuck, if I let my labels define me, it'd go on forever~ Eurasian, half Polish and Korean, wolfamute, gay, autistic dude."

"You better write small then!"

"See? It's so dumb. And people build whole identities around this shit, and get automatically offended because you don't automatically get it all right the first time! All this pride shit about everything drives me fucking nuts. Just live your lives and don't be a cunt."

"We're eventually just gonna Balkanize ourselves at the rate we're going."

"Yeah. Labels are for soup cans."

"And legal liability from idiots!" the husky laughed.

"That too." Rob smiled.

Compared to his rustbelt hometown, Ann Arbor was the pristine college town, always bustling with activity. The University of Michigan dominated the community, and the near downtown of Ann Arbor was filled with co-ops and buildings run by the university. Rob marveled at the scenery as he drove into town with Maverick. Young people bustled about on the snow covered sidewalks. While the snow was melting in Ohio, Michigan had half a foot of fresh powder covering everything.

Pulling around to the back of the building, Rob and Maverick arrived to their subsidiary, Ann Arbor Video. Housed in an old brick building off Maple Street, AAV was an electronics store and restoration shop of old audio and video equipment. They were the second to last company in the world that could overhaul and rebuild the complex ferrite video heads that went into Rob and Maverick's ancient fleet of one inch and two inch videotape machines. For years, they had relied on AAV to keep their fleet of video equipment running, with frequent trips to Ann Arbor to drop off and pick up heads and other electronic gear. As Barev grew, they offered to buy out AAV as a subsidiary, to give them a stable source of income to continue with their services. Now with a new inflow of money, AAV expanded to start making new parts for old electronics, continuing Barev's support for legacy products in a cottage industry.

Carrying one of their TK-47's into the shop, Rob and Maverick walked slowly as they held onto their "Big Blue" by its carrying handles. The camera, minus its lens, was gently sat down with the other five, as they waited their turn for a major overhaul. The workshop was filled with old gear as far as the eye could see. The heavy CCU's and cables were unloaded and dollied in and everything was catalogued and prepared for the long overhaul that awaited.

Rob and Mav stood and talked with the managers and workers of AAV and saw some of the equipment that was coming back. Sitting over in the opposite corner was a bunch of cameras and their ancillary equipment. Four Thompson TTV-1518's, all ex-CBS cameras, were freshly overhauled, as were their CCU's. Uncommon in the US market, the French built Thompsons were the outdoor broadcast cameras that CBS used through the mid 1970's and into the 1980's. Boxy and rectangular compared to the RCA's trapezoidal shape, and painted in a conservative light gray and black body, the four studio cameras were destined to serve Barev for their analog OB studio cameras, replacing their fickle TK-47EP's and their special tubes. The Thompsons used to the same 30mm P5000 Plumbicon ABO that was in their Ikegami's and RCA's.

Rob walked over to examine the Thompsons and his little studio camera, a teal and gray IVC 501A, from the early 1970's. Obtained as part of an equipment swap from a collector in Kentucky, Rob was amused by the rather lackluster studio camera; despite boasting "excellent colorimetry" with its mixed set of one-inch Plumbicons and a silicon-diode vidicon tube in the red channel, the camera struggled to even make an "acceptable" color picture.

"I remember getting my first gig in television, at a public access station in Ann Arbor!" joked Bruce Matson, the manager of AAV. He was an almost sixty year old malamute, stocky, with tousled brown hair that was halfway gray, and wearing a snug green polo shirt and khaki pants. "We had these 501A's, and most of our stuff was programming for the University of Michigan, and ho-boy, these things could just barely make an acceptable picture!"

"Yeah, that was what I've gathered." Rob remarked. "I'm amused by its mushy pea greens, tepid blues, and noisy, rosy pink for red colors..."

"Yeah, it's pretty awful." Chuckled Bruce. "We were mighty happy when we got the orange beasts! The KY-1900's!"

"Yeah!" Maverick exclaimed. "Polished metal mirrors to bounce light into the tubes!"

"Hey they worked~ Good enough for U of M students!" Bruce exclaimed with a shrug. "Viva la shitty public access TV~"

"Only the best." Rob chuckled.

Helping to load the trailer with all their restored equipment, Rob and Maverick secured it up, before grabbing their cameras to go explore Ann Arbor's downtown.

"Goodbye, Michigan!" Maverick announced as they passed beneath the welcome sign to Ohio. Heavily loaded, Rob's Silverado held its place in traffic as Maverick drove this time on the return trip in the late afternoon. Rob sat in the passenger seat, sending a message on his phone.

Rob stowed the phone back into his pocket and glanced over at Maverick driving. "I need a break from these constant e-mails and texts."

"Adult daycare." Teased Maverick.

"I remember the days when I was very hands on way back when." Rob recalled as he leaned back in his seat. "That shit was fun. I mean, it was a lot of flying at the seat of your pants and just getting shit done at the deadline, but creating programming, shooting it on video, and editing it? I loved it, and I still love it."

"A lot of that in the past." Maverick nodded. "Including the first ten years of our business! I'm not gonna lie, the first two years were really nervous..."

"Yeah..." Rob cringed. "We just barely broke even doing the videotape transfers and programming."

"But I wouldn't have it any other way, because that gambit paid off."

"Just think... you almost made it into professional baseball."

"Almost!" the husky exclaimed. "Played two years at OSU and made a name for myself, but... alas... it wasn't meant to be."

"The Chicago Cubs really wanted you... so did Cleveland."

"That's true. I could have been retired by now and set for life." Maverick recalled. "Lordy... I'll be thirty-nine in two weeks..."

"Old." Rob smiled.

"Listen here, middle age!"

"Middle-age? More like geriatric on how I feel some days!" Rob snorted.

"I know that feeling... dude you sleep wrong at our age and its game over..." Maverick laughed with Rob. "Ya know, I could have played in the pros, made millions of dollars, be famous all over, and have anything and everything I wanted? But maybe I didn't want that? I mean, all the shit that transpired in my life... it would have probably happened regardless. Divorced... heart attack... remarried... Amy dying... I might have never adopted my son... I could have made millions... but I didn't because I chose us, over them."

Rob looked curious as he leaned forward a bit more looking at his friend.

"I knew you had big dreams of making a name for yourself... and television was your calling. And I knew you needed help, and I was there with the knowhow like you, so that's why I chose WNCS over the pros. Plus it probably saved me from needing rotator cuff surgery!"

"You'd be like your friend Rodney back in the day."

"Oh god, tear your rotator up and never be the same after that!" Maverick exclaimed. "Then I'd be like you Rob, having to be put back together all the time!"

"Har, har. You make me roll my eyes so much they're gonna fall out of my fucking head!"

"Well that wouldn't be the first time you had body parts come off!"

"Motherfucker!" laughed Rob as Maverick grinned big. "You big dumb animal~"

"Whoa easy, little Kim!"

"Fine, Pootin."

"GASP! DID YOU JUST ASSUME MY ETHNIC BACKGROUND!" the husky jokingly gasped.

"Oh lord..." Rob laughed.

"On a serious note... that kind of life has to be exhausting... just... always being offended by everything."

"Yeah exactly." Rob shook his head. "The world's different than when we were kids."

"Yeah, I get where you're coming from." Maverick nodded.

"I'm glad I grew up in the nineties when this shit was not around or in its infancy. Everywhere you look now it's just kids on phones, kids being retarded with what they see on social media. No wonder why we have so many issues."

"I think we grew up in a better time, honestly." Maverick shrugged. "People didn't get bent out of shape like they do now over the littlest of things."

"And you didn't get shot over something stupid."

"That too for Newark..."

"I remember not even sixteen years ago hearing of shootings in Newark, and now it's all the time. Drugs and more drugs."

"Newark's fuckin' Methville." Maverick cringed. "I drive around and see all these crackheads just drifting around. Places like Coshocton are shitholes too, but they actually seem to take care of their community, while Newark just takes pride in being this white trash Appalachian town."

"Gotta love it~" Rob laughed. "But it's home."

"Yeah, basically. That's my home since that's where I've grown up since I was three. Who would have thought a family that defected from the Soviet Union would end up in N'erk?"

"N'erk, Uhhia."

"Yeah, you got that right!"

Rob crossed his arms and chuckled with his best friend. "I needed that laugh."

"Life's a joke, have a laugh!"

"Seems like it huh?" Rob smirked. "I think I'm gonna take some time in my schedule and start shooting more video and be more involved in that."

"Do it! Do what you love!"

"Yeah, I think I'm gonna do that~ Show people who's boss."

"Reichsfuhrer der Barev." Maverick teased.

"Shut up, General Secretary Brezhnev~"

"DID YOU JUST ASSUME MY GENDER!"

"DRIVE, MOTHERFUCKER!" Rob laughed.

Rob sat back in a plush chair with the broadcast crew in Marcus Barion's office. Situated on the second floor of the gymnasium, Marcus' office was a large rectangle, with gray concrete block walls, and big wire meshed windows that let the late morning sun in.

Marcus Barion sat behind his plush desk with his feet kicked up on it. He was a slender white and gray Nordic husky, with yellow blonde hair that was slicked back atop his head, and icy blue eyes that stared out. His right arm bore a tattoo sleeve on it, and the husky wore a polo shirt and jeans. At almost thirty-one, he ran the entire broadcasting division of Barev with his motley crew that sat with them in the office. Sitting on a couch beside his desk was his older brother Borr Eklund, who looked like a taller, beefier version of him, with long blonde hair tied into a braided ponytail. Borr sat with Ryan McDowd, and Corey Wilhelm, a gray and white malamute with ruddy brown hair, and a slender Arctic wolf sporting a long black ponytail. Also accompanying Rob and Maverick was the other Barion adoptee, Felix Barion, who despite being in charge of Barev's flight operations, still had some involvement in broadcasting. Their casual meeting was about a big opportunity to make commercials for the Ad Council.

"Its pro bono services, but this could help bring in more customers through exposure." Marcus explained. He flipped through the email to read more notes. "The Ad Council said they really like our retro themed commercials we've made, like the ice cream commercials, and they're wanting us to do something like that for some various subject matter if we're interested in embarking on it."

"What are the subjects?" Borr asked.

Marcus flipped through his paperwork. "Some topics on health, strokes, heart attacks, aging, obesity... youth violence, school attendance, uhh, and education."

"Neat." Rob nodded.

"Well there's your chance to get back into shooting some projects yourself!" Maverick exclaimed.

"I like those topics. It's nothing vapid or stupid." The wolf-hybrid nodded.

"Should I tell them we're interested?" Marcus asked Rob.

"Yeah." Rob agreed. "Tell them we want more information on what they exactly want, and we'll start working on ideas."

"Great."

"This could kill two birds with one stone." Maverick added. "We can get more media exposure for our video services, and it fulfills Barev's desire to do pro bono community good."

"Yeah!" everyone else agreed.

"Plus we can use our tube cameras~" Ryan chuckled, which everyone agreed as well.

"Film and tubes~ Film and tubes." Rob joked. "I like the idea, Marcus. Let's go forward with this."

"With pleasure~"

Following their meeting, Rob and Maverick stepped out to go walk over to their friend's camera store in the south side of the downtown square. The weather was surprisingly mild for January, with bright sunshine and a temperature hovering in the low fifties.

"I like the idea about youth violence, school attendance stuff. I think that stuff is important." Rob said while walking with Maverick.

"Health stuff is nice too."

"That's 'cause you see making fun of Dmitry all over that obesity stuff."

"Okay, yeah." Maverick laughed with a snort. "I heard that and immediately pictured Dmitry pretending to have a heart attack. 'I'M HAVING A HEART ATTACK!' while simultaneously biting into a cheeseburger."

"Oh god..." Rob laughed. "Is that from that stupid life alert commercial on YouTube?"

"Yeah!"

"The shot showing this advanced emergency support center, when in reality it's like some third-party facility contracted out." Chuckled Rob.

"Everyone speaking Punjab~" snickered Maverick.

Rob and Maverick laughed together. "Okay, I could see Dmitry in a health commercial. But you know all about heart attacks, Mav..."

"...don't remind me." Grimaced the husky.

Approaching the entrance to Xan's camera shop, Rob noticed a new sign in the window, promoting the soon to be released Ikol film. Rob and Maverick stopped to notice the image that Xan had taken on a roll they had given him. From the top of the hill by the dump, Rob saw a brilliant sunrise in explosive, vibrant colors. It was the first time he had seen Ikol-200 in action.

Xan had taken the picture with the iris stopped down. The sun was spread out as a fourteen point starburst with the morning sky just ablaze in color. A super saturated red faded to a faint shade of purple and some blue at the edges of the portrait shot. The snow soaked up the color in an intense shade of magenta.

"Wow." They both muttered.

"That's insane." Maverick quipped. "Look at how that just biases the red."

"They weren't joking when they said super saturated." Rob nodded. "Wow. Just wow, Mav."

"Yeah."

Going inside, Rob found Xan's camera shop busy with customers mingling about. At the counter stood Maverick's cousin Sergei, and a fellow coworker, ringing out customers. Maverick called his name and Sergei glanced up and waved. He motioned that Xan was in the backroom. Rob and Maverick stepped behind the counter and went through the doorway to the back where they found Xan sorting some rolls of developed negatives in the lab.

"I'm sorry these took so long!" Xan exclaimed as he led his friends to his back office. "It sucks when your minilabs break down!"

"Those machines are running full time now~" Maverick chuckled.

"I know right?" the black wolf laughed. "Films making a comeback yo!"

"Slowly." Rob smiled. "So what do you think of that Ikol?"

"Dudeeeeeee, insane colors." Xan exclaimed. "Me and Sergei were blown away. Here you should see the ones we digitized."

Rob and Maverick took a seat as Xan pulled up his Mac and opened a folder with Rob and Mav's developed photos they had taken on their travels. The photos taken with Ikol-200 were intensely colorful. A Chicago sunset was a blaze of reds and oranges, the snow soaking up the same color as the naked winter trees of the Stonecliff estate were a deep shade of brown and black. Pictures taken at the Matthaei Botanical Gardens really showed the dynamic range of Ikol-200. The tropical plants and flowers of the giant greenhouse really popped in the photos. The film largely kept greens relatively normal in appearance, but exaggerated reds and blues in that area. One photo that stood out to Rob was a picture Joey had taken of him, a silhouette of Rob peering out over the balcony, the last light of day taking on an intense purple. It was grainy from being slightly underexposed, the formula being rather limited in its dynamic range.

Xan also showed what their black and white films looked like, and the "everyday" film, Vistacolor Plus. The Hicon was high contrast black and white, with chalky whites, and inky blacks, with only a few shades of gray between them. It had some grain to it, but an artful appearance, as photos of Ann Arbor were rendered in sharp contrast. The everyday film had decent saturation, and medium contrast. Rob looked interested at the photos he had taken, including his sentries patrolling Stonecliff in their Soviet inspired winter camouflage. Another photo was of his friend Cyrus, who posed for a portrait in his living room. The blonde furred wolf with his fire red hair took on a beautiful glow from a ray of sunlight through his living room window, his long locks of straight red hair gracefully flowing down his face. Rob was very impressed.

"I like the everyday film, because it's not super specific. You could take portraits with that, landscape, nature, anything really. It has a nice quiet grain at four-hundred speed, and a good latitude in exposure range." Xan pointed out.

"What do you think about Ikol?" Rob asked. "Do you think it needs tweaking any?"

Xan had a look of thought on his face. "Me and Sergei thought that it tends to go overboard on the red, like to the point where it starts to distort colors that even hint at red."

"I notice that..." Rob chuckled.

"Greens look a bit vibrant but normal, but blue and especially red, it'll overpower. Like if you shoot in a shot that has some shade, that cooler area will render really blue in a bad way sometimes. I think the formula needs just a minor tweak to the gamut, to make it less... Ken Rockwell..."

"Your computer screen smoking from the intensity." Maverick laughed.

"Exactly!" Xan exclaimed.

"I'll let our chemist know."

"The other films... perfect." Xan said, with a sarcastic chef's kiss thrown in.

"I want that first shipment, Rob!" Xan laughed. "Gotta help your friend, yo!"

"We'll send you the first shipment when we get ready to release it in May." Rob smiled.

"Whee!"

Rob and Mav looked at each other and smiled. They had a big hit waiting in the product pipeline.

The studio's clock struck three-thirty-forty in the late afternoon. Finishing up a short break, Rob ventured back over to take the controls of his "Ikky". Finally getting a chance to operate their "new" studio cameras, Rob grabbed the controls to the pedestal and swung the camera around from its position pointed down at the floor to protect the tubes. He lined up the HK-312 at Xan, who walked back onto the set. The set for the commercial was a backdrop made of radar absorbing foam spikes that were a very deep gray color. Light shining down on them created interesting light and shadow patterns off the spikes. There was a small circular table which held rolls of FotoChem's new film products, complete with the newly designed packaging the graphics department had made. FotoChem's packaging was gold and black, contrasting to Barev's use of blue and white for electronics, green and white for the medical supply division, and red and white, for Centoh Intermodal. Adding a huge splash of color, a closely spaced gaggle of spotlights, complete with colored gels glowed brilliantly in a corner.

Stepping back onto the set, Xan stretched and grabbed his 35mm, an old Canon AE-1, which he threw over his neck by its strap. He brushed a wrinkle out of his bright green shirt and awaited Rob's instructions as Rob adjusted his headset.

"Let's do the second approach, and see which one is best." Rob suggested as Maverick and Marcus stood back to observe.

"Sure thing!" Xan agreed.

"Be natural as usual." Rob pointed out as a reminder. He toggled his headset to speak to the VTR room. "Ryan, roll VTR."

"Copy that." He heard in his headset. "VTR is rolling."

Rob watched the tally light glow red on his camera as he gave the countdown. Lining up his shot, he zoomed in and got a nice head and shoulders shot of his friend in the viewfinder. Focusing in, he got a sharp picture of Xan with a soft background from the wide aperture.

"Action!" Rob called, as he began following Xan.

"My name is Xan Radabaugh! I'm a local photographer who works with my friends at Barev. FotoChem surprised the world last year with their C-41 process Vistachrome, and now FotoChem has done it again with a new range of photographic film products here!"

Rob tracked with the camera and zoomed out slowly, panning down a bit to get Xan standing by the small table with all the film on it. In the background, the colored spotlights glowed brilliantly, the lights comet-tailing to Rob's motions with the camera. Xan introduced each film and what it was capable of doing, and promising that it would be available by the start of summer.

"FotoChem! Foto's got it!" grinned Xan into the lens.

"Good. Cut." Rob called. "Stop VTR."

Going up to the VTR room, Rob took the helm to the editing station to review what he had shot. Rewinding the VTR, Rob played back both takes as everyone sat back and watched. On the big Trinitron, Xan's promo played out.

Compared to the TK-47, the HK-312 put out a similar picture, but there were a few small differences Rob could pick up on despite the identical 30mm tubes used. Like the "Big Blues", the "Ikky's" had a warm color gamut that was pastel like in color, with a bit of sharpness in the edges. As Xan walked over to showcase the films, the bright spotlights comet-tailed from overloading; the overload presented as a crimson tail off the bright white, red, and orange spotlights, with a reddish-white trail sticking in the shot momentarily. The blue and purple spotlights left a smaller blue flare that didn't trail.

Rob spotted the slight difference in how the overload behaved; on the TK-47, bright red lights had a central core that was yellow. On the HK-312, the overload area took on a violet hue. The comet-tailing was a bit more intense on the Ikky's, due to the slight difference in gain from the tubes' first stage amplifiers, and how the CTS circuits worked between the two camera models. Rob had always run the TK-47 with a gain setting of -3dB, the -312's minimal gain was 0dB. Overall, Rob was content with the HK-312's and how they looked and performed.

Rob added some text and graphics that were pulled off another VTR, and edited through with some music, and the FotoChem jingle at the end. Like second nature, Rob worked quickly and efficiently on the old Ampex editor he resurrected. He played back the finished commercial for a final review, before going to digitize it for distribution. The modern workstation had a custom card installed that could directly control the BVH-2000 and allow direct access to playback the analog feed for digitization into a modern codec. As Rob watched the promo play back again, the wall phone rang, signaling a call from the main office. Rob got up to answer it.

"VTR room. Rob~"

"Rob? It's Tabby."

"Go~"

"Hey I just got a call from the Mayor's office in Chicago, Mayor Hicks would like to speak to you. I told them you were out of your office at the moment."

"Are they on the line?"

"Yeah."

"Tell them I will call them back in half an hour."

"Okay. Will do!"

"Thanks." Rob concluded as he hung the phone back up. He turned around to look at Maverick and Marcus. "Mayor Hicks of Chicago wants to speak to me?"

"Why?" they asked curiously.

"The hell would I know?" Rob shrugged as he looked up at the time.

Stepping into his office, Rob checked the time as he closed the door and walked over to his desk. He still felt pretty good after getting to spend some time in the studio and work on projects. Adjusting the collar to his polo shirt, Rob sat down at his computer desk to review some e-mails that came in from Barev One and Barev Four. As Rob wrote some replies back, his cellphone rang on the desk, an incoming call from his friend, Ronnie Samson, who worked as a sound engineer for another friend of his and his recording studio, Viking Records.

"Hey Ron~" Rob greeted on speakerphone. "What's up?"

"Hey Rob! I'm not interrupting you am I?"

"Not at all."

"Hey, I hate to ask this from you, but do you have any job openings at your places in Chicago? This isn't for me, this is for my friends Todd and Don over there."

"I have a few, why?"

"I can't speak for them, but basically they're both tired of being fucked over by their jobs, and want to try something new, and they didn't know how to get ahold of you, so they asked me."

"Hmm, well, why don't you have them e-mail me their contact info and resumes, and I'll see what I can do, Ron."

"I really appreciate it, Rob."

"Anytime~"

After giving his friend his contact information and saying goodbye, Rob put his phone down, finished up his e-mails and checked the time. He got up and stretched and walked over to his big partners desk to pick up the phone and call Lisa, for advice. After getting the okay from her to speak to the Mayor, Rob got the number from Tabby and dialed it. As it rang, Rob shoved a cassette tape into his tape recorder that the phone was plugged into. He hit record just as the secretary picked up.

"Mayor's Office of Chicago, how may I direct this call?"

"My name is Rob Barion, and I am returning a call to Anna Hicks, please."

"Just one moment."

Rob was put on hold for one minute. He sat down and waited, his face looking tense as he softly bit his tongue.

"Anna Hicks speaking."

"Hi Anna, this is Rob Barion, returning your phone call."

"Oh hi, Rob, how are you doing?"

"I am okay, thank you. And yourself, Mayor?"

"I am doing okay. And please just call me Anna~"

"Likewise, just call me Rob."

"That sounds good to me. So listen... there has been a lot of warring between the city, you, and your business... and I get where you are coming from, and I would like to extend an olive branch, and I was wondering if maybe we could schedule a meeting and meet and just talk things over?"

"How does your legal team feel about that?"

"I consulted with them, and they gave the green light, if you feel comfortable as well, given the conclusion of the litigation."

Rob glanced over at his calendar. "Are you available on a Saturday?"

"I can work that in, though my office will be closed."

"How about meeting at the big bean sculpture in the loop?" Rob suggested.

"I think I can do that." Anna responded, sounding agreeable.

"How about two o'clock?"

"Sounds like you got yourself a meeting, Rob."

Rob jotted the details down on a sticky note. "I'll see you Saturday at two, at the bean."

Solo to Chicago, Rob had the bright sun to his back as he flew west, strapped into the armored seat of "Greased Lightning", his newly acquired P-38J. The distinctive twin-engine, twin-boom Lockheed gracefully flew amongst the patchy clouds, its twin Allisons emitting a synchronized purr as Rob sat in the central pod under the glass canopy. His eyes, hidden behind tinted goggles, watched the scenery and monitored the instrumentation. It was his first flight to Chicago in the newly obtained warbird. Trimmed up properly, Rob found the Lightning flew straight and level, requiring only a minimal amount of input to keep on course. The morning turbulence was nonexistent. He raised his Nikon up and snapped a picture of the colorful sunrise, faintly hearing the film wind over the roar of the engines and radio chatter.

At nine o'clock, Rob arrived at Chicago. The olive drab and neutral gray Lightning orbited around Midway in the holding pattern for three long loops before getting the runway for landing. Dropping everything down, Rob descended in for an uneventful landing. He taxied up to the Centoh hangar, where his hub director awaited him on the tarmac.

The morning air was strangely mild for Chicago, another unusually warm day for late January. Rob popped the canopy and doffed his goggles as he watched a step ladder be gingerly set up by the ground crew. Rob stepped out onto the wing, grabbed his backpack from behind the seat, and carefully climbed down, to be greeted by Gary Morton, the director. The older gray wolf happily shook Rob's paw.

"Rob, I'm always amazed at what you fly in." Gary chuckled with a smile.

"Expensive toys." Rob quipped with a sort of smirk. "Don't scratch the paint, okay?"

"Heh, okay, Rob."

"By the way, I have two guys that I'm gonna talk to about the maintenance administrator position and aircraft mechanic, if I feel they fit the profile and give the okay, I want paperwork started, pronto, Gary."

"With pleasure."

Rob doffed his brown leather flying jacket, revealing a colorful Norwegian pattern sweater beneath. Rob wore his usual black work khakis with the Norwegian sweater, colored deep red and blue, with white winter themed pattern knitted into it. Rob clutched his backpack as he walked towards his company SUV. Departing Midway, Rob sped off in his white Tahoe. Heading southwest, Rob followed his GPS to the suburb of Harvey, where he was due to meet Todd Kennedy and Don Halen. Never in Rob's wildest dreams did he ever envision himself meeting someone at a Hells Angels clubhouse, but here was, twenty minutes out.

Almost a year ago, Rob met a band while out exploring Chicago with Maverick. They were playing music at Lincoln Park that caught his curiosity. Named "Hard Times", the six man band were all Hells Angels, tough looking bikers who had a knack for music. They had their brush with success with two albums, before a tragic plane crash killed their drummer, lighting, and sound engineers. Rob and his friend Varg helped their lead singer, Ron Samson, after his home had burned down in an electrical fire. Having suffered the most after the end of their band officially, Rob had flown him home to Newark, to help him rebuild his life with his son Colt. Varg gave him the job of a sound engineer at his studio, and in the end, they helped restart their band. For his assistance in helping a fellow biker, Rob earned the respect of the red and whites.

Rob pulled up before the clubhouse, an imposing brick building that looked like a factory. It was clearly marked with the HA's death head insignia and 1% sign in the window that was shielded by iron bars. Rob got out of the Tahoe looking a bit unsure at what was walking himself into. He nervously adjusted his shirt collar that stuck out a bit from his sweater, feeling completely out of place in his attire.

Walking up to the red painted steel door, Rob closed his eyes and braced himself as he rang the buzzer. There was a loud set of thundering footsteps and a small slit opened up to reveal a pair of fierce eyes staring at Rob.

"State your business!" boomed the gruff voice.

"Rob Barion, president of United Barev Industries. Here to see Todd Kennedy and Don Halen." Rob said in a calm voice.

"You know a Ron Samson?"

"I do."

The door opened immediately to a big buff Saint Bernard in his leathers. His gruff voice softened. "Come on in!"

Rob was welcomed inside and the big door slammed shut. The clubhouse lobby was quite open and expansive, reminding Rob of a bar or something. Walls that were adorned with flames painted on bore pictures of past and present Angels, and leather vests framed for display. Loud rock music played, and some bikers played pool and pinball. Rob felt somewhat uncomfortable as he was escorted by the prospect.

"Todd! Don! Your guest have arrived!"

Rob saw the members of Hard Times all sitting around a table, drinking some beers and having a slightly early lunch. With Ron as their lead singer, the others members of Hard Times was Killian Halen, a big gray and white malamute, aged thirty-four, with a tousled mop of long brown hair that flowed down past his shoulders. A thick reddish-brown chinstrap beard and goatee complemented his masculine face. Meaty arms were tattooed with black and gray sleeves of biker themed tattoos. He wore jeans and a t-shirt that had the death head logo on it. "Kills" served as the band's guitarist with Todd. Sitting beside him was keyboardist, Adam Stein, a black and rust Doberman, aged thirty-one, who had long locks of wavy black hair that flowed from his head. He wore a similar outfit to Killian. Adam now served as Varg's sound engineer at his new Chicago studio.

Opposite of Killian and Adam sat Killian's youngest brother, Don Halen. Don looked like a near-clone of Killian with the same fur patterns and icy blue eyes. He had long straight hair that was medium brown and tied into a ponytail that fell to his upper back, with a similarly colored goatee jutting from his chin. He had both his arms adorned in black and gray sleeves like Killian, and wore his black leather vest adorned with his patches and shiny black chaps over his jeans and boots. Replacing his late older brother Eddy, Don was the drummer to the band, and the youngest member, at twenty-four. To Don's left sat Todd Kennedy, a slender gray wolf with salt and pepper fur and brown hair that was neatly brushed back atop his head. Todd was the oldest of the band, at almost forty-two. He sat wearing sweatpants and a red hoodie. To the right sat Colt Janssen, a rough looking Arctic wolf.

Looking like a younger clone of his friend Varg, Colt was thirty-five and had straight black hair that flowed around his face. He sported a black chinstrap beard and goatee that was beginning to gray in a few places, his face carrying a serious gaze reminiscent to Rob's own glare. Colt served as the bassist to the band, and with Killian, helped oversee the largest Ford parts distribution warehouse in the midwest. Colt leaned back in his seat as he ate a gas station hoagie.

Rob walked up to the table, and everyone stopped and turned to look at Rob. The greeting was joyous as everyone said hi and asked how Rob was doing, how his flight to Chicago was, and also asking where Ronnie was.

"Hey, where's Ronnie at?" asked Adam.

"I thought maybe he'd tag along?" Killian muttered with a muzzle full of sandwich.

"I asked if he wanted to go along, but he had plans with Talon and their kids to go to a water park for the weekend."

"Ah." Everyone muttered. "Rob! Have a seat!" grinned Killian as he pulled up a chair.

Rob calmly took his backpack off and sat down with the bikers. He pulled out a folder from his bag and sat it on the table with a felt pen. "Alrighty, so I never thought I'd do a sort of impromptu job interview in an outlaw biker clubhouse~"

"A first for everything!" laughed Colt with a grin. "Job time Toddy and Donnie!"

"Oh joy..." Todd chuckled. "Did I dress good enough for the interview Rob?"

"Yeah!" Don laughed.

Rob smirked just a little bit and chuckled awkwardly. "I'm a bit of a different employer some people have told me."

"Do you want a sandwich? A drink?" Adam asked Rob, who politely shook his head no.

"Not yet, maybe in a bit." Rob responded. He opened his folder and sorted through some papers. "So they say you shouldn't run down your employer in a job interview, but I don't give a shit about that, and neither do you, so let 'er rip, boys. Tell me, why do you want to leave your jobs and work for Barev, Todd and Don?"

Todd and Don looked at each other. Don motioned Todd to go first.

"Well I'm currently a salesman, well, sales manager in quotation marks to a big Harley dealership. And the problem is, I have my boss breathing down my neck about anemic sales, since the interest rates have skyrocketed in the past six months to try and unfuck inflation. So naturally... sales have plummeted because nobody wants to pay out their ass for a bike. They'd just hold onto their old Harley for a bit longer and weather out the inflation problem. And frankly Rob, I'm just tired of being yelled at all the damn time about not making a sale, not making a sale. I am being threatened to being written up over poor job performance regarding this issue!"

"Can you believe this shit?" Don chimed in, watching Rob jot some notes down on a notepad.

Todd continued. "I'm not a pushover like other salesmen, and if someone says no, that's it. I can't make them buy a bike. What do they want me to do? Point a fucking gun at them?"

"The thing about management is that you become a manager not because of your skill, but because of how good you are at sucking corporate dick." Rob quipped with a smirk. He made everyone around the table laugh. "What about you, Don?"

The malamute licked his chops after taking a sip of his beer. "I'm a mechanic, and I work at the big Chevy dealership in Harwood Heights. So I'm supposed to have a fully staffed maintenance shop, but instead we're a skeleton crew tasked with taking care of multiple vehicles a day. Like currently I am tending to four vehicles simultaneously. I have to change the CB joint in a Silverado, replace a radiator in a Chrysler van, unfuck a cylinder issue in a F-350 that came into the shop, oh! And I have to help replace a transmission on a Cruze, all of this on top of changing oil and other shit. I have to do this by myself, and I'm fucking sick and tired of being yelled at by a bunch of assholes in suits who don't have to do this dirty work! And I'm sick and tired of being stuck with no help because nobody wants to fucking work! Half the shop calls off constantly and I am stuck doing all this work and being yelled at because it can't get done in a day! I'm doing twelve hour shifts!"

"Don just got written up on Wednesday about this..." Killian added.

"Oh man, that makes me so fucking angry." Don shook his head. "Can you believe that retarded ass bullshit, Rob? Written up! Because they got yelled at by a guy who's truck didn't get fixed right away because I had two other vehicles ahead of him and they got yelled at! And when I hurt my fucking finger and went to urgent care and missed half a day, that's where they nailed me... Attendance... poor job performance."

"Lovely, ambiguous terms to put on a write-up that makes it hard to pin point anything malicious." Rob shook his head. "I feel ya, Don."

"Would love to just have my red and whites go there and shake them down!" Don laughed.

"Don't tempt me with a good time~" Colt snickered.

"So basically..." Rob muttered, looking up from his notepad. "You two are tired of being given unrealistic expectations, and ruthless, unethical management."

"Yeah." Todd and Don nodded.

"I understand that completely." Rob acknowledged. "I used to be given job assignments that required last minute solutions to impossible problems caused by fucking retards in cheap suits when I worked for the school district, so I know the feeling very well."

"Plus I got passed over for a pay raise too. That pissed me off..." Todd pointed. "I've been there almost six years, never missed work, and I get passed over on a raise."

"I don't get paid enough for this shit." Don chuckled.

"So here's where my offer stands." Rob said as he looked at some paperwork. "Todd, have you worked in a management, office like environment?"

"Yes." Todd nodded. "Many moons ago, between my first two bands, I worked at a doctor's office crunching patient data into the computer system and coordinated between doctors, patients, and specialists."

"I see."

"When I'm not doing sales, I do input a lot of data and information to our parts inventory at the dealership since we don't have a parts supervisor at the moment." Todd added, watching Rob jot that down.

"I am looking for a maintenance lead administrator to Centoh's Chicago hub. The job would be to ensure that all maintenance logs are accounted and adequate inventory of spare parts are needed for Centoh's fleet. You will work with my hub director, Gary Morton, and you will also be coordinating with the maintenance administrators at Newark, Lainsville, and Biloxi, Centoh's other hubs and aviation maintenance facilities."

"That sounds nice." Todd nodded.

"If you accept it, you'll get benefits on day one, and I'll start you at twenty-five a hour, eight hours a day, Monday through Friday, with maybe a Saturday here and there if needed." Rob explained. "Can you pass a drug and background check?"

"Hell to the yeah I can!"

"What about you, Don?"

"You can drink my piss, it's that clean!" grinned the malamute.

Rob bit his lower lip and stifled a chuckle. "Maybe someone else will~"

Everyone laughed as Rob smirked a bit and looked away for a moment. "Don, are you willing to go to school and learn how to get a certificate in aviation mechanics?"

"So like working on planes?"

"I need another dedicated mechanic for the hub, who is willing to learn how to service radial piston engines."

"So like certifications?"

"Yeah." Rob nodded. "See, if you blow up a car engine, nobody gets in trouble technically... if you fuck up an aircraft not knowing what you're doing, the FAA will come after you like das ministerium fur staatssicherheit!"

Don blinked at the sudden German Rob muttered.

"We'll pay for the certificate training, and you'll learn at the facility with our certified mechanics. You may have to once in a while fly around to the other hub sites if they need help, which will be done through the BATS system as you've all seen with my company. All internal Barev service flights are paid for and free for employees."

"Awesome!" Don exclaimed. "And they won't explode and kill me like Eddy, right?"

"No." Rob smiled. "I actually take care of my planes."

"And you don't have crazy in your name like that motherfucker..." Killian grimaced.

"Yeah that DC-3 probably should have never flown... gotta love it." Rob shrugged. "What do you say, Don?"

"I say bring me aboard!"

"Will you two be willing to get drug tested today?" Rob asked as he held up the form for drug test and background check.

"Yeah!" Todd and Don agreed. Rob handed them the paperwork and a pen for them to sign. After Todd and Don signed, Rob grabbed them and jotted his name down on the paperwork, making it official.

"Welcome aboard~" Rob concluded as handed the paperwork for them to get drug tested. Everyone cheered and clapped for Rob, who just smiled in appreciation. Rob was happy he could help.

Spending a few hours talking and hanging out with the bandmates, Rob departed Harvey for the Loop. What felt like forever making his way north, Rob arrived at the parking garage where he parked his Tahoe at on the second level. Rob exited the structure and made his way on foot to Millennium Park. It was a sunny, mild day, and people were out in droves to shake off winter's depression to get some sunshine.

In the middle of the plaza sat "the bean", a giant chrome sculpture that was officially named "Cloud Gate" but casually known as "the bean" from its shape. Rob stood there gazing at the glistening sculpture, unsure of what to make of it as the scenery of the Loop reflected off it. He checked the time on his phone, figuring that Mayor Hicks would arrive at any moment.

Rob never imagined that Anna Hicks would ever become Mayor to a city as big as Chicago. Riding in the shadow of Laura Earhart, Anna Hicks was the quiet political centrist, the moderate Democrat picked to "balance the ticket" in the mayoral race. Rob didn't know much about her political career, other than she barely won the election in 2022, after the massive fallout from the factory bombing and lawsuits that revealed the extent of the city government's willing and unwilling involvement.

Exactly at two-thirty, Anna arrived. She was a brown and tan furred wolfess in her mid-forties, with neatly permed curly hair that stuck out from beneath a white knitted beanie. She wore gray slacks with formal black shoes, and a dark burgundy winter jacket that was partially zipped up. Rob recognized her with her single police officer escort to serve as her bodyguard. Rob turned and stood, watching her walk up to him.

"Right on time, Mayor~" Rob greeted.

"It's nice to meet you, Mister Barion." Anna greeted with a smile, she held out a paw, which Rob accepted and shook.

"You can call me Rob." The wolf-hybrid said.

"Likewise. It's Anna." She smiled in return. "I like your sweater~ It's festive."

"It's Norwegian~" Rob quipped with a very brief little smirk. "Gift from a friend of mine who's from Norway."

"It's fitting for winter~"

"That's why I wear it." Rob sarcastically grumbled. "Okay, Anna, why do you want to meet me? What's the deal?"

Anna clasped her paws together at Rob's curt response. "A lot has happened between your company and our government in the past year and a half, Rob. I would like to try and extend an olive branch to you."

"I was quite pissed off over everything that transpired, and that's an understatement too." Rob stared. "For someone to use their position of power to try and bully and get their way, and then try and kill me and inadvertently kill scores of others? Maim hundreds of people to a life of pain and disfigurement? And for those arrested to just... go along with such a conspiracy? To have not even a single clue that what they're doing is going to an insidious plot to kill someone? And to someone like Laura Earhart, I'm the bad guy because I sought the appropriate financial compensation and criminal penalties for a heinous crime that also set the company back?"

Anna looked understanding as she listened. "I understand, Rob. I think your lawsuit was justified, even if I had to play defense. You had one hell of a case."

"It was unfortunate." Rob admitted. "Now look, I'm not a warmonger unless I have to be. People think I'm always out for a fuckin' fight and wanting to destroy everything in my path."

"I was told that Rob Barion is a man of steel, he breathes fire, and has iron teeth~"

Rob couldn't help but smirk a bit as he held back a chuckle. "I wouldn't know. I still use my normal teeth."

Anna smiled and laughed at Rob's dry response.

"I am many things to many people, so it's up to you to decide what Rob you get~" the wolf-hybrid shrugged. "I would like to put what happened in the past, and try and have a peaceful coexistence with the city."

"We would like to work with you as well because you're putting Chicagoans to work."

"Chicago has offered us a massive employee pool to draw from, and it's good for business with excellent logistics." Rob added. "What happened was very unfortunate."

"What happened was a failure to see the corruption in the administration." Anna admitted. "I tried to tell Laura, and she wouldn't have it. Laura thought she was infallible, untouchable. She thought she knew everything, and she picked all the people who ended up screwing this whole thing up. Fenris, Trenoff, Vlockner. She picked people who told her what she wanted to hear, and that they were outsiders like her politically. Laura... she was elected as a political outsider, and she ended her tenure literally as a political outsider."

"So I've heard."

"In her time as mayor, she managed to basically piss everyone off. Police, teachers, fire unions, city council, the alderman. Everyone that she needed as an ally for when shit hit the fan basically let her fall. And... now that I am mayor, I get to spend the next four years having to well... unfuck everything."

"Damage control." Rob smirked.

"Unfortunately." Anna laughed. "But I'm gonna try it my way, which is more of a moderate approach. Yeah I know, in Chicago, a moderate... ha."

"Don't knock it." Rob wagged a finger. "The problem in politics these days is everyone trying to warp everything around their ideology and making it work."

"And that is what doomed Laura."

"Exactly." Anna shook her head. "I'll let the voters decide my fate in four years. In the meantime, I'm going to try and do my damndest to right the ship, get crime under control, and just... improve the image of things after the entire legal shitshow."

"Well I wish you the best of luck." Rob nodded.

"Let me ask you something Rob, you won practically four billion dollars, and you gave a bit over half of that to groups in Chicago and in your hometown. Why?"

"Why?" Rob responded. "I believed it was the right thing to do. On my journeys exploring Chicago, I came across many neat people and many neat organizations who I felt needed help. And I believe it's always safe to do right."

"I'm very impressed by the youth center, the new one. I used to, many years ago, work at the old factory building one... and the walls closed in fast there. I was relieved when I got promoted and left that place. Everything was so sad and sullen, and now the new center, everyone looks happy."

"See what's what I mean. A lot of groups get left behind, and money is tight. It's even tighter when you have penny-pinchers like Trenoff and Fenris. Trenoff was so determined to have the best budget numbers in the world that he would KILL for it."

"Weird~" Rob pursed his lips.

"Oh, right." Anna said with a hesitant chuckle. "And Fenris? Well... he was in over his head."

"What a googly-eyed motherfucker." Rob laughed sardonically.

Anna got a call on her phone, which she promptly answered. Rob took notice that the call sounded important.

"Rob, I hate to cut our talk short, but I have something come up that I need to attend. It was a real pleasure talking to you."

"Likewise, Anna." Rob smiled. He held out a paw, which Anna gently grasped and shook. "I hope to talk to you in the future."

"My number is always available." Anna smiled. "You be safe Rob."

"You too."

Rob turned and began to walk away when he heard Anna call his name.

"Rob!"

He turned around.

"I must remark that I don't think too many people know the real Rob Barion. He seems mysterious, hidden."

Rob just smiled a bit. "Yeah. It's true. And I think it's best to keep it that way." Rob turned around and continued his walk back to the parking garage, as Anna stood for a moment to watch his departure, before heading out herself with her police bodyguard.

Having the sky to himself, Rob flew home, his Lighting aided by a nice tailwind. The twin Allisons purred, and Rob sat back watching the big Curtiss props keep him aloft amongst the clouds that silently floated on by. The engine noise muffled by his headset, Rob peered out through his amber tinted sunglasses, his face largely concealed by his oxygen mask clamped on. Hidden beneath the mask and goggles, Rob's face bore an introspective gaze, as he thought about his latest Chicago adventure. He thought about his visit to the Hells Angels' clubhouse, his meeting with the new mayor, and before he left, a meeting with his head of security, Bruno Matix. '

"You know, I'm curious, Rob. Why did you help all of us when you didn't have to?" he heard Colt ask him in his head. "You were just someone who saw us play for shits and giggles at the park, and you and Varg saved Ronnie, and you gave us our band back from the Carson fucks. Why?"

Rob remembered himself shrugging to the question. "I thought you guys needed help, especially Ron. I thought you were wasted talent because of a vindictive record label. And I hate seeing talent wasted."

"A lot of people give us shit because we're bikers." Killian had remarked. "But you just took us for who we are."

"I mean, we look up to religious leaders, and politicians, men in suits, and they fuck us everyday~" Rob joked, which made everyone laugh. "You're just people in the end, trying to make ends meet."

"Well we really appreciate that."

Rob thought about his meeting with Bruno, right before he departed. He had asked the malamute who led Viking Battalion about any problems, specifically problems with the girl, Christine, at the youth center. Bruno had informed him that things were quiet at the youth center, and escorting her to and from work and school had no issues. Her "pedo pimp" uncle ended up getting nabbed by the feds for child sex trafficking. Rob thought it was ironic; as he laid in the hospital recovering from the beat down of his life, he was arrested by the FBI and charged. It wasn't from all the years of abusing Christine, or all the other poor girls in the poor regions of Chicago. It was from his name being tied to the abduction of a girl who's uncle was a prominent senator from Wisconsin. Once again, Rob thought it was funny how the system worked for those with money and power. He couldn't help but just shake his head in disdain at that thought. But that's how it always worked in America. It was the orthodoxy of the system.

He really felt bad for Christine. When he briefly stopped to check in at the center, he saw Christine sitting by the wintering fountain, drawing on her notepad looking sullen and withdrawn. Rob told Bruno he had a surprise for her since her birthday was coming up soon.

Sitting in silence for an hour, Rob briefly contacted the Indianapolis ATC for a altimeter adjustment, which he input with a turn of a knob on the gauge. Checking his heading, he was a little over an hour away from home. Fuel burn looked good and the engines were running perfect.

It dawned on Rob that it had been a long time since he got into an argument with anyone. Arguing with someone, a screaming match, used to be an almost regular occurrence to mercurial Rob. It was Rob's way to dominate, to keep distance. The past two years was enough for Rob emotionally, and he was tired of fighting constantly. Now it felt nice to just sit back and relax.

Returning to Newark-Heath, Rob circled around once and descended in for an uneventful landing. He taxied back to his museum's hangar, where his ground crew awaited him. After shutting the engines down, Rob climbed down and turned the P-38 over to them, as they prepared to hitch the tug up and tow it back into the museum. Rob ventured on home.

By nightfall, Rob finished up work in his office. With Bruno on speakerphone, Rob sat at his desk, wrapping up a birthday present for his friend Maverick.

"Everything is ready for Christine, and we have the gift stowed away for safe keeping at the airport, Rob." Bruno said. "So just give it to her on her birthday?"

"Yeah." Rob responded. "The money, everything. And I have the cake ordered too so just have someone pick it up from the baker."

"Will do."

"I appreciate it, Bruno."

"Anytime Rob. I hope you have a good night."

"You too. Night and bye."

Rob reached over to end the call, as he put the last piece of tape on the wrapping paper. Rob slapped a bow on it and placed it on a table behind his desk. Exhaling through clenched teeth, Rob rolled himself back to his desk and listened to the drab evening news play on the TV above him while he sketched a storyboard for one of the PSA's that they were to produce. Rob finished the first page, but decided to call it a night as he yawned and shut the TV off.

Going upstairs and brushing his teeth, Rob retired to his bedroom, where Joey sat in bed, messing with his phone as usual. The muscular Doberman wore a white tanktop and his green briefs as he glanced over at Rob in his red and white pajamas.

"Don't you ever get tired of those jammies?" Joey teased with a smile.

"Never!" Rob exclaimed. "It's how I remember Grandpa. He used to always wear red and white pajamas, and he got these when I was really sick once."

"I miss your Grandpa. Level headed." Smiled Joey.

"Unlike your parents."

"Oh boy." Joey laughed. "That's a whole 'nother story there."

Rob sat down on his bed, his face scrunching up a bit as his messed up back ached a bit at the flex. He laid down and looked up at the ceiling. "You know, today was a good day?"

"That's good!" Joey smiled. "See? What did I tell you about letting things be and not festering about shit."

"Yeah, yeah."

"You're not always fuming and bitching." Grinned the dog. "And enticing people to blow things up."

"That's oddly specific."

"Weird~"

Rob just smiled and laughed cynically. "The past three years have been absolute hell."

Joey nodded.

"I spent half of 2020 sick and in bed all the time. Damn hip and knee replacement, and then fucking hospital acquired pneumonia that kicked my ass for almost two months... the pandemic, that damn factory, the lawsuit, attempted assassinations... how many people can say that?"

"None that I know outside of you." Joey teased.

"Maybe that's for the better~"

"I agree."

"Trying something new this year."

"And I think it's working, Rob." Smiled Joey as he gave Rob a kiss.

"Yeah." Rob smiled. "Well time for bed, stud~"

"Hey I like that." Joey chuckled as he kissed Rob again. "Good night, floofy."

"I am not floofy!" Rob protested.

"You're half malamute, so floofy." Grinned Joey.

"If you say so, Joey."

"Night, Rob. Love you."

"Love you too, Joey. Night."

Joey reached over and turned the lamp off and went to bed. Rob rolled onto his side slowly and closed his eyes. As he drifted off to sleep, he reflected on everything that had happened in the new year, and just smiled a bit as he drifted off to a content deep sleep.

Epilogue:

The school bell rang to signal the end of the day. Christine walked with her peers as she made her way out in the mad dash on a Friday. Everyone looked excited for the weekend as Christine walked slowly, not looking at anyone while clutching some books in her arms. In the parking lot of the high school, her ride awaited, a white Barev SUV driven by Randy, a member of Viking Battalion assigned to drive her to and from work and school. Christine hopped in and they took off.

"Everything okay today?"

"Yeah. It's fine."

"Good." Randy nodded. "We have a surprise for you back at the center."

"Oh yeah?"

Returning back to the center, Christine hopped out and grabbed her backpack. She ventured inside to suddenly be greeted by all her fellow youth center peers and staffers, plus Barev's security, who stood around a large sheet cake that had candles glowing on it. "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CHRISSY!" everyone cheered. The wolfess looked shocked.

"Oh my god!" Christine exclaimed, a smile radiating on her face as they sang "Happy Birthday" to her to mark her eighteenth birthday. At the end, she blew out the candles on the giant sheet cake and everyone clapped as blue smoke gently wafted into the air. Christine got the first slice of the yellow sheet cake.

"Hey Chrissy, we got a surprise for you, courtesy of Mister Barion!" Randy announced.

"Oh?" the wolfess responded with a muzzle full of cake.

"When you're done eating, we'll show you." The husky smiled.

After celebrating with her peers, Christine was taken by security to the parking lot where they opened the door, revealing a dark blue Chevy Cruze, with a big red bow attached to it.

"Surprise!" Bruno and the guards cheered as Christine's jaw dropped.

"A car!" the wolfess exclaimed. "Oh my god!"

She ran over to examine it, looking completely overwhelmed. Tears welled up from such an emotional response.

"Mister Barion would also like you to have this." Bruno announced as he handed her an envelope. Christine had to wipe the tears out of her eyes as she opened it, revealing a birthday card with a funny message. She opened it to see a pamphlet from the Chicago School for Art, and a check with a couple thousand dollars, and a note from Rob Barion, written in his neat, rounded cursive.

"Dear Christine,

I hope this helps you prepare for your future.

I know what it's like to be put in your situation,

this feeling that the walls are closing in, and nobody

there to help you. I know how much art means to

you, so the school is fully paid for.

Aim high, dream big, and do good. Don't let your

past drag you down like it did with me. Learn from

my mistake. I know you'll do great.

Sincerely,

Rob Barion."

Christine had to wipe more tears out of her eyes as she closed the card up and ran over to hug Bruno tightly. Bruno hugged her and patted her back.

"Everything's going to be okay, Christine."

"I know it will be~ Thank you, thank you, thank you, Rob!"

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Analog Pt. I

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