InsaneJournal

Jack, Ruprecht, Closed
He'd finished up two quick jobs that were on his list then gone back to his apartment. For a moment he just looked around. It was small, usually cold, but it had been home for a while now. But not anymore and while he might miss it a little, Jack was looking forward to the change. He'd lived in shitty hotels and apartments his whole life. Time to move up.

Out of uniform and in jeans and a dark blue button down Jack headed down into the basement, looking far more calm than he felt, and to Ruprecht's office, knocking and poking his head in.

"Decided to show your face did you?"

Jack jumped and spun around to find Ruprecht behind him, a look on his face that made Jack cold all the way down to his toes.

"I - um - need to talk to you," he said and when Ruprecht took a step forward Jack took several back, backing into the office and putting as much distance between him and the other man as possible.

"I give you the time off you ask for and then you're not back more than a day before you up and vanish in the middle of your shift," Ruprecht snarled, taking a deep breath of the fear tinged air and savouring it. "I should fire you." Jack opened his mouth but Ruprecht continued. "But that would be far to easy. No I have another, much better, way to handle you. The sub-basements need organizing."

Jack wasn't afraid of much - other than Ruprecht - but the sub-basements terrified him. Even if he hadn't had a place to go he might have well quit just from that. But he did have a place to go, and someone waiting for him, and that thought made Jack straighten his back and lift his chin.

"No."

Ruprecht looked up slowly from the stack of papers on his desk.

"What did you say?" he asked, drawing the words out like a hiss. Jack trembled but didn't back down.

"I said no," Jack repeated. "I didn't come here to get a lecture or beg forgiveness. I came to give notice. I quit. And I'm not giving you two weeks because I know what those two weeks will consist of." Ruprecht's lip peeled back in a snarl and his teeth looked unusually sharp and Jack fought not to run screaming.

"So you'll be leaving the Manor," Ruprecht said. Jack shook his head and his changed from fear to fear with a hint of smugness.

"I'm moving in with Declan McNamara," Jack said. "I'm going to be a tenant." He actually managed a bit of a smirk. "Which makes me your boss."

There was screeching sound as Ruprecht's nails dug grooves into the wood of his desk as his hand curled into a fist. If Jack was moving in with a tenant that meant Ruprecht couldn't do what he wanted to right now. Someone would miss him.

"You have til Friday to get your shit out of the apartment," he growled and Jack took a step back at the look in Ruprecht's eyes. "Friday by ten in the morning. Anything left by then is mine."

Jack was pretty sure that included his ass if he still happened to be in the apartment at that time and he nodded then gave in and fled as Ruprecht began to come around the desk. He was at the stairs to the lobby when he heard the slam of the office door and a howl go through the basement and while it put extra speed in his step as he flew up the stairs it couldn't get rid of the smile on his face.