Agent Armstrong - Villa Of The Weapons

Jethro packed up his shower gel, running his fingers through his sweaty, walnut-coloured hair. Fuck, that hurts. He’d been feeling the sunburn for hours now, but it seemed to be getting worse every time he moved. At this point, his neck had taken on the colour of a ripe paprika and started to peel. And all that trouble simply because he‘d forgotten his sunscreen in England! He pulled his towel out of the black plastic suitcase, taking up most of the floorspace between the beds. It was still moist from when he had foolishly dropped it onto all of his clothes after the morning shower. The sun stuck in the thin, elevated clouds, while slowly illuminating the fouth day of the youth research camp – which actual designation Jethro hadn’t been able to remember for longer than a half day. His Roomie, Jack Webber, laid still as a corpse in one of the lower beds and read a book. Jethro had only heard him speak twice so far, not including necessary forced answers, rarely exceeding one syllable. He was skinny and it was a miracle, that he’d even managed to cope with the last four days’ tasks. Jethro laid down his glasses next to a near empty bottle of what looked like ice tea, the brown-ish liquid barely still covering the bottom of it. Lost in thought, he walked through the corridor. Take a left, short straight, second door on the right. Five minutes later, he came, shivering but mentally present, out the shower. 17:27 O’clock. Got three minutes ‘till the meeting. If that’s not what I really need right now! He shuffled into his room, threw his towel back where it had been and incompetently stuffed his dirty clothes into the laundry bag. Just as he was to leave, the British co-coordinator glanced into his room, her fingers tight around the door sill, only letting her head and upper body stick out, as if that disturbed his privacy less than just standing like a normal person. „Hi, Jethro, I was just going to remind you of the meeting that’s about to start in a minute or two.“ No shit I know, please just fuck off, thank you. „I’d be happy if you added a little to the conversation, you know, just tell us your stance on what you’ve learned so far. Baxter said he’s looking forward to you guys’ opinions.“ He absolutely fucking isn‘t. Guy’s not got any feelings, besides limitless confidence. Josie, the annoyingly polite and childish woman, left the room. Jethro decided to wait a little before going, so he’d not have to walk with her. When he did enter the classroom-sized room, his roomie was already sitting with his iPad, working, fully concentrated, on their essay. Jethro hadn’t even realised the boy hadn’t been in the room after he’d left the shower. James Cameron, the boy with the strictly combed hair from somewhere in London, sat right next to him and whispered corrections in his ear, which Jack silently acknowledged – probably. Jethro took a seat. A young Italian woman that looked to be in her early twenties was knelt down, her elbows suppoting her on one of the way too low tables at the other end, which led to quite a bit if whispering amongst the boys’ tables. Bloddy annoying woman. Type of person to invent introduction games! „Three minutes, everyone!“, Baxter Coleman barked.

The next hour was spent presenting what they had learned and what they’re expecting to happen in the coming days. Getting to hear all of these recaps made Jethro realise where he was. He’d been anticipating this project for weeks and now he was finally here. Nothing but vacation, nature and a little relaxation. And he’d be able to prove his ability to come clear alone, without his parents surveilling his every move.

2 days prior to the departure

„What is it with these bloody people…“, Jethro’s grandad muttered, as he drove out his parking spot at the Waitrose supermarket they’d spent the last one and a half hour in. The plan had been a short supermarket run to stock up for the next few days, however, ‘short trip’ was not a term the Williams family was familiar with. They had stopped at every ‘sale’ sign they’d come across. Every singe one, no exceptions. So if the mince in the overdimensional size had a cheaper price per kilogramm, it was – after a unnecessarily long discussion – put in the cart. As if prices per Kilogramm weren’t enough, there was also the fresh foods counter – a whole new science field in itself. After the young woman behind the fish counter – she was Vietnamese, which seemed to be a vital part, considering the mention in every complaint – seriously put a single Gram of salmon too little on the scale, they kept on shambling through the store, always on the hunt for the little, red price tags. Just as Jethro assumed he’d have to sleep accompanied by mushy peas and frozen fish staring at him from the seafood counter, they reached the checkout. He realised how tired he really was, when the Audi Q3’s brakes slammed him into his seatbelt, then pressed him right back into his seat as they parked in the driveway. The uncomfortable click,click,click of the handbrake, paired with the goosebump-creating sound of creaking plastic, he hardly noticed. It was the first of three days the 16 year old would be spending with his grandparents, because his parents would be heading to the funeral of a friend of a colleague, somewhere up the north, but he was already yearning for a little break, alone. The hours before the shopping trip he had spent explaining math problems to his classmates, and oh boy had that been a pain. After two hours of trying, he’d told them they’d be well prepared if they just watched the explanatory video, he’d sent them. Now – that was a blatant lie, and he wasn’t all that pleased with his decision, but he wouldn’t have been able to get them to stop otherwise. Ehy they even studied during summer break in the first place, he couldn’t fathom. They would forget everything anyway until school started.

„Blimey!“, his grandad said, throwing Jethro back into the here and now, as he heaved the heaviest bag out the trunk. All of them were sorted by category and he had, out of all the bags there were, grabbed the battered Tesco bag fileld with frozen fish and veggies. Jethro had – against all reason – put the watermelon in that exact bag. He got out and took the bag out of the elderly man’s hands. Shit! The watermelon had crushed the frozen chicken nuggets he’d smuggled on the conveyor! Here we go again, now I’ll have to listen to how dumb that was, as if couldn’t see myself!

A few hours later, they all sat together in the Garden. The birds chirping, the new grill sizzling about. Jethro watched, as his grandfather used every free opportunity to check on the AI summary from their security cameras, that’d been recorded during their shopping trip. They lived in a calmer, more laid-back quarter of Birmingham, only little opportunistic crimes happening every now and then, the mention of which never stopping the investigative journalist retiree from surrendering to his paranoia. That said, he used to get blackmails and threatening letters, reason being the fact that his job involved working with – or against, rather – well-known companies lawyers. Now, his wife wasn’t so keen on the whole thing, but what could she do?

Jethro poked around his marbled steak – which had been on sale, of course – and thought, in awe, about what stood before him. He’d signed up for the youth camp month ago, when he’d been on active search for distractions from school, which – he found – he simply wouldn’t get without actively following goals and pushing himself. But he knew he’d need to force himself to sign up now, if he didn’t want too much time to sink in his self-pity. „Jethro? Are you looking into next week already?“, his grandma smiled. „Yeah,… sorry what?“, he replied and saw her holding a plate with various different steaks and sausages right where his blurred, mentally absent gaze had technically been pointed. It’s like 19 O‘ clock, why the hell am I so tired? He grabbed himself one of the chicken skewers and began sorting aside the burnt paprika pieces, stuck between the good stuff. What’s it doing in there, anyway?

After the table had been cleared, he sat – phone in hand – in the living room, his grandmother sweeping out the plates with paper towels – for some reason. He dropped his phone on the table and rubbed his eyes, causing his glasses to follow his phone’s course. He was, despite the Red Bull purple edition, which he’d chugged after dinner, exceptionally tired. Damn, I still need to pack up! I’ll do it tomorrow, surely.

He actually did spent the next day packing his stuff. Wasn’t too hard, given that, since he wouldn’t get back home before departure, he had taken everything he found necessary with him to his grandparents already sorted. Just as he was done packing painkillers, cough drops and other miscellaneous plastic cylinders with cryptic depictions printed on them, his grandfather entered the room, snapping him out of his daydream. „Hi, Jethro, sorry to disturb. I’ve got this Meta Ray Ban glasses thing here – thought maybe you’d want to try it out? A former colleague of mine lent me this, he’ll be gone for a few months anyway, don’t think he’ll mind.“ I'm sorry, WHAT? Is my grandad just casually offering me to try thr most hyped tech currently available? - like it’s nothing, aswell! This thing is like five hundred quid. „Should have about your prescription values, I think, maybe, plus five, should be fine? As if I knew, my mum does that part, I don’t remember the numbers, did you forget who you’re talking to? „Sure, It’ll be fine, I’ll try them on.“, he said, voice sounding indifferent, as if someone had just recommended him a special balm with a nonexistent effect. He was overly excited to try it. The door had barely shut with the satisfying ‚click‘, he had the glasses on and the wristband tightened. He connected the glasses to his phone and started letting the built-in AI explain obvious stuff he was seeing. Just to try it, start off easy.