Jessica "RAT" Whitlock

In 1980, Within the small town of Ashbourne in the North of England, a child was born to Simon and Charlotte Whitlock, a married Engineer and Electrician of 13 years. Her 7th Birthday, when she was gifted a small smart circuits kit by her father, starting the obsession into the world of engineering, one which her mother and father greatly supported.

From testing a homemade miniature rocket with her father, to happily going with her mother to her place of work to observe all the wondrous things within. Passion for the fields only continued into her Advanced levels, taking Engineering, Electronics and Computer Science, deviating very little from her previous subjects in the same pattern was typical. Upon the day of her results, she was not nervous nor paranoid; She was enthused.

Her parent’s fights grew progressively louder with every night, and she saw herself… alone. No friends to speak of, but by the end of it… What did she have? A piece of paper? Even worse… The unthinkable happened to her, denial from her main university choices due to her cover letter… poorly read, one university had stated, forcing her to go to her reserve university option and study Electrical and Electronic Engineering at Hull university without an industry placement nor time abroad, and after those 4 slow years? It all came crashing down, locking herself away into her cocoon of her room. Her mother left the house one day, never to return, and her father? He tried to toil on, but sickness held a grasp over him and 6 days before the girl’s 19th Birthday, Gone. She was alone now.

No matter the work she tried, she couldn’t hold it long, too many people and too much annoyance, not enough money in this economy, no hope for affording a car let alone a bike, even with only one bloody wheel! But what could she do? She saw herself become cruel yet knowingly misguided, but none of that mattered. None a moment of joy between mates nor a night out of pre-bought drinks could stifle her absolute feeling of despair outside of her life’s work, chasing a dream. Wake up, barely search for work before giving up yet another day, back to the workshop, go to sleep. Again and again, with sparse interruptions to such routine. Her work mattered more to her, it was all she really had at the end of the day. A reason to keep going, a reason why she existed on this god-forgotten scar of a fucking earth. A reason for her to spite all those who do not, and never, feckin’ believed in her anyway. WHAT DO THEY KNOW?!. But she needed something more. She had to prove it was all FOR something, lest it would all simply be the anxious ticks of a most mentally unsound rat of a person, and she found it.

Whilst working at a supermarket to barely make ends meet amongst other lacklustre failures and those who desperately awaited the end that surrounded her, she met Badger. An oaf who had a perchance for the alcohol counter, to the extend that the pair had began to have the odd… pleasant conversation, believe it or not. Then the opportunity gracefully fell upon Ra- Jessica’s lap-- A blessing, yes, A blessing. A meeting of people most similar to her in their desperation for something grander. For something Better. For more. Despite this, the meeting went… not-terribly. But she was no longer just… toiling away to live in a two bedroom apartment with a weird man named Steven with a U-- She never knew where the U went, but he was an oaf regardless--, but working towards something that could make her not just comfortable, able to afford Double-paned glass… But more than that, more than triple paned glass, or perhaps even a spaceship, able to blast off to a world without those she loathed… Greed took hold in her pursuit. A complete lust for wealth and power rivalled only by her own desperate pursuit in her passion… Ego.

Jessica found herself the Technician of the four, but that wasn’t particularly a high bar when dealing with people like this. Their natural roles came to them rather easily, with the other pair being given the apt roles of a driver and the honeypot-- Though those nasty teeth didn’t aid much. Badger was naturally the man in charge of this aptly named delusion, and the most confident that his little dream of lounging on a Caribbean island till his skin went sagged and his years dragged on was merely a job away. Even despite this talk, Jessica was rather new to the little club, a mere 7 months to learn how deranged the trio would end up being, with little jobs littered between their exploits in order to build up some semblance of confidence. Muggings, Shoplifting for supplies, even a small robbery of a café. Little things, of course, but achieving very little… After all--

Their best take is the Cafe’s 23 Quid! Even their weeks of attempted naming ideas turned up with a less-than-adequate result: “The Animal Farm”. Badger had been fond of Orwellian classics, hence the choice and resulting disguises… Animal masks, four dotted along the three-legged table. A Badger mask, a Banshee Mask, an Ocelot mask and of course… A rat Mask. The choice was obvious.
So, after months on end of most relentless tinkering and working upon her rather neglected physical form with a bar and some loose weights, She set her alarm for 11am, Wednesday.

Wednesday.

It was all a blur. The 21 Park St Bank and all.

Ping! Cries of joy shout within, cash in hand and down the pockets of the full.
Too slow, far too slow to cash out.

Smoke, gunshots, Who shot? Where? Million thoughts flying through.
Screams, reverberating off the walls of the bank, bouncing away and away.

Badger on the floor, writhing. Who shot Badger, a guard?
Greed, He did it for greed, he must have!

Shots again, aimed at Ocelot, he must have shot him for the cash, we were home free!

Bang, Bang, Bang, All fall down.
We must hide away, hide away in the corners.
Grab It! We must!
Run Rat, Run!

Little legs carry forth big dreams, but not a good driver.
Keys in the ignition, speeding off to another
Keys in the ignition speeding off to yet another
Keys. No keys, no more.
But a different type of key, A garage key.
Hide Rat, Hide!

Wednesday was not a day to remember, blotted out of the mind like another bad memory, sat upon the rocking boat, barely able to keep her stomach down, cradling her backpack and far too many suitcases close, akin to a second heart. She had to logically ditch the mask, but she didn’t want to see herself like this…. Dad wouldn’t be proud, no, that’d be awful.

She had to travel far and further than that. To another side of the world… America. But first, to France, as a direct trip from her home would only be asking for capture. More and More money out of the collection she’d worked SO hard for.

Despite the rampant paranoia, the girl only took 2 plane trips to arrive within Baton Rouge Metropolitan Airport with all her belongings. She’d made it sure, but the paranoia never truly went away, clawing at her neck every time. Every. Single. Day.
Baton Rouge was chosen due to this fear, from the childish reasoning that no one in the UK had even heard of Baton Rouge, so she couldn’t be found there! So off she went, flying high, and settling down in a shithole motel in the corners of the derelict pit of existence. Despite not knowing the absurd error of her choice until a while later, fear continued to haunt her for her actions, crawling on her very back, sins scraping skin.

Every doorbell is a paralysing fear, every police car happening down the street had the potential for her to be caught forever. Eventually, she embraced the life of the paranoid, and started to rampantly stock up supplies into her rather large apartment, from canned food to barrels of water, enough to last her all the time she wanted to work upon her passion projects… And eventually? She simply sealed herself off behind her door, and didn’t look back-

That would be a rather ideal end to things, wouldn’t it? Think Lady Luck would finally give her a break? God no. You see, RAT just… Couldn’t cope, ta’ be frank. Constantly being on edge and constantly having your very sanity worn away by the mere idea of being caught for a past mistake wears on a person, let alone an animal.
You’d think RAT finally starting to travel anew would do her some good, some grand soul searching, but what she searched for corroded her spirit even more through momentary lapses in her total paranoia. With so much money at the time, and so little self, there was only one apt route for her mind to go. Based off a connection with a mate, though barely met within the bars of Baton Rouge, she took a small trip to Knox County, Kentucky. Even more a shithole than Baton Rouge, with folks less polite to boot. She wouldn’t have left her bubble of safety and come to this shithole for any other reason: Snow. Bolivian marching powder, Yayo-- Cocaine, okay? Narcotics. Yes, her dad would be endlessly disappointed in her, but it gets to a point where…things… wear on your mind, and you just need an outlet. The dealer herself, Victoria, wasn’t too much a prick, but you don’t exactly come to them to make friends. For the next couple of months, RAT headed up to Kentucky for the occasional Fix and to do an odd job for the lot-- Fixing generators up to their little play place or whatever the fuck they called it, and coming home a happy rat.

This pattern continued upon itself, again and again, until the fateful date. Her last big purchases of the Marching Powder may as well have saved her sorry ass, as RAT remained within her little hole between April and August-- For the most part. Sure, she went out for food, ordered too much takeout to count, like a kid who had just gotten their allowance, but her social exposure was… Limited. A saving grace. So, upon August 25th, 2001-- Things truly started to go ta’ shite, yet RAT was not wised-up to it until the 26th, with the WHO bollocks and everyone freakin’ out in tha’ streets… Constant Riots, constant screams-- FUCK THAT! WHY AM I STAYING HERE? I GOTTA GET THE FUCK OUT!-- Sanity. RAT began to rapidly pack, priorities would have gone first but her supply was aptly dried out at that point, so what food, water and tools she could scrounge up fell into her backpack for the trip ahead, fleeing to the north away from the Metropolitan coast, electing to instead head upstream alongside the Mississippi, aiming to get to Fort Adams-- That has to be a military base, r- right? So she walked, and walked, and walked. When she saw any movement however? She ran, oh she ran as fast as her little fucking legs could take her. Rapid. She wasn’t big-boned by any means, having kept up with what physique she could since the incident for the express purpose of fleeing anew if needed-- Good job she did, Christ.

Then she saw it, September 8th, A hulking mass of steel drifting alongside the riverbed… Safety? Who’d fucking kno’, but it’s something. She desperately flagged down the ship, and at the next possible time, was able to lunge onto the rope ladder draped over the side of the ship, clambering on. Where was it going? Pft, Anywhere but here for sure! Get me tha’ FECK OUT!!