Chapter 2 - Blood

It was a pretty normal day at the South Sector of Paedgu County's Forest Preserves. Paedgu was a huge county-the Forest Preserve District controlled over 100,000 acres of land but the county still had plenty of room for both residents and business development. Due to budget cutbacks, the West Sector shops had been folded into the South, leaving three sectors (North and East being the additional).

Each Sector had eight trucks, six Rangers and during the summer months, at least four seasonal employees apiece (though East had the most-twenty five, due to Blue Water Forest Preserve's boat launch and concessions, among other things). That morning, four South Sector rangers did the usual "opening rounds" (that is, unlocking the heavy front gates of the preserves to permit entry by the general public).

Truck #217 belonged to Lauren Fisher, an attractive brunette of 32 who quit her original job as an attorney to work outdoors. Having finished a degree in law in only two years, magna cum laude, from a prestigious University, Lauren had her pick of jobs. She originally signed a six-figure salary deal with Anderson-Magneson Power, a nuclear power plant operator who had become the sole provider of energy in her state due to "clean energy" mandates. AMP was considered one of the "greenest" power companies in the United States, due in part to its "buy out and shut down" attitude toward dirty coal plants. In the past five years AMP had purchased and shut down twelve coal-fueled generators, replacing them with experimental GEN-V Traveling Wave Reactors (taking a significant up-front loss on each). These reactors, once thought to be purely the stuff of science fiction, used previously useless nuclear waste as fuel, and when done, left said fuel in a state of radioactivity equal to or lower than naturally-occurring uranium.

What caused Lauren to walk away from a desk job that paid in the six figures, on track to seven or eight ten years down the road?

AMP's Site #3, an ageing "standard" fission reactor, suffered a minor containment breach that let an inconsequential amount of radioactive material into a nearby stream. Usually, such claims are settled quickly and quietly, because heaven knows what kind of public relations nightmare will occur if the words "nuclear" and "leak" get into the press. However, Miles Stensen, chief of the Legal Department, had other ideas. Stensen was incensed at the concept of even admitting fault on the (harmless) incident. He'd managed to get every claim against AMP dismissed or convince the plaintiff to walk away. He wasn't about to let this little leak spoil his record.

To make a very long, boring legal story short, Stensen ordered his people to dig around for dirt on the plaintiff, the Forest Preserve District of Paedgu County. Finding none relevant to his case, he then attempted to cover up the entire incident using a mix of charisma and "offers you can't refuse." This failing, Stensen resorted to his last tactic, which he called "The Bleeder." The goal was to create such a legal mess that it would cost the plaintiff more than it was worth to get past a blizzard of motions, time-wasters and objections filed on behalf of AMP even if the court found in favor of the plaintiff. Lauren Fisher was one of three attorneys charged with "bleeding" the Forest Preserve to death. Lauren had never even been to a forest preserve, and she started her work with the same diligence she applied to everything else. However, as the days progressed, Lauren and the other attorneys (Monica Clearwater and Erika Long) began to doubt the merits of what they were doing. Stensen never really gave them the low-down on what happened, he only told them to figure out how to win the case. When they "came up for air," so to speak, and found out that the case in a nutshell revolved around Miles Stensen's ego and little else, they began to speak out.

Within days, protests (calling for Stensen's head) erupted outside Site #3 and at the Forest Preserve near the river affected by the leak. Within weeks, corporate responded. Miles Stensen was placed on administrative leave. Eventually, he would be terminated for "frivolous, wasteful and malicious misuse of company resources." Fisher, Clearwater and Long were hailed as heroes. At a ceremony hosted by local environmental groups at Heron Lake Forest Preserve, they were lionized both by AMP corporate (who were looking for a reason to axe Stensen since his bleeder tactic was creating many enemies for the company) and environmentalists, freshly energized from seeing movies like "Avatar" that promoted pro-environment messages.

It was at this point Fisher decided to change her occupation. She'd already made a huge pile of money, more than enough to pay off the student loans that put her through school. She'd done her "good deed" at AMP by shutting down a megalomaniac bent on fighting even the most minute issues down to the last dollar. After the ceremony, she handed in her resignation and parted ways with AMP amicably. Having been with the company only five years, no retirement benefits were available, but she didn't need them. Lauren spent the next year traveling and spending time outdoors, something she hadn't done in any significant amount since her days in the Girl Scouts fifteen years ago.

Having spent several weeks camping in various national parks Lauren wondered what it would be like to work for the National Forest Service, or something like it. So she applied on a lark for an open Ranger position at the Forest Preserve District of Paedgu County.