7. Where do you live? Describe your neighborhood and your home, inside and out.
Scan this, chummers: despite your expectations, the over-educated and occasionally verbose elf known to you as Rake is not living large in some high-end lady-killing bachelor pad. Bull-drek, you say? Some of the stuff I've shared, sure, maybe, but not this time, omae. I'm keeping my living arrangements simple for the moment, for several good reasons. They are still charging rent, you know... Whatever. Just kick back for now and allow old man Rake to tell you slots about the places he currently calls home.
First, the place I mostly live, my apartment in Tacoma. I'm in a low-rent tower complex with mostly wageslaves of the chipped-and-wired workforce. Factory workers, skilled laborers, warehouse grunts, docksiders - all those jobs they called "blue collar" last century. The good part about a place like that is that everybody is mostly happy to keep to themselves. The bad part is there aren't any residues of luxury and precious little to spare for comfort, either. My ride is a bit too slick for a place like that, so I rent a separate parking spot in the more secure garage across the street. To keep costs manageable, that leaves me with little in the way of options beyond a basic studio apartment.
As for the details of my one-room pad, there's nothing much to discuss. The plumbing is solid, the soymat and the autocook mostly work, the local node is good enough for me (plus, there's a better public one within signal range of my implanted 'link), and there's room enough for my futon and some storage racks. No, I don't see much point in a proper bed; it's not like I'd use it more than a few hours a day, and there's not much extra space to waste, so I don't, so ka? There's even a functional trid in the corner. I like to keep my gear in order, but that's probably not much of a surprise to anyone who's run the biz with me before. I have a good maglock on my gun cabinet, which is firmly bolted to the wall and floor.
Everything I'd care to take in a hurry would fit in my ride, with room to spare. Part of that comes from living life in the shadows, part of it comes from the fact that I don't consider this place in any way a permanent home, and another part of it is a holdover from my days in the UCAS Army where 3-hots-and-a-cot was all you got somedays. Any way you hack it, though, it's a relatively safe place to hang my proverbial hat. But it's not much for looks, so I tend to steer any female companions who show an interest back towards their pads at the end of the night. And that's all I'll say on that subject, since Tryx would purge anything more from this post later.
Finally, a brief word about another place where I pay "rent": I keep a safehouse over in the industrial slums of Auburn. It's completely bare-bones, a few linked units in an abandoned storage facility, but it's squarely within the turf of the Diamond Dogs gang. After setting things up with their leadership, I send them payment every month through their member Cholula, and they let me use the place whenever and however I like. They appreciate the courtesy call if I plan to do any shooting, and their presence provides me with cover and protection. As long as the Dogs keep their ambitions to their turf and beneath the attention of the Knight Errant hounds, then the safehouse should remain useful to my crew.
Now, if you slots don't mind, I'd like to get back to biz. We've still got plans to finish for this zoo meet that Milo set up with Tripwire. Look for another message from me with details on that.
-Rake