"You're the clean-up crew? Damn. I wish we had your kind of clean-up back home. I might have stuck around longer."
Cole couldn't quite put his finger on what was wrong with the woman. She looked like a typical Scav really. There wasn't a lot to what she was wearing to paint her as anything other than a vagabond. He really doubted she was some kind of authority figure. Police had badges, uniforms. People in this era were given to wearing things which distinguished them on a professional level. They still had enough to where they could be picky about their clothes.
No one was picky in his time. They couldn't afford to be. Clothes were useful if they kept a person warm. Freezing to death was a real concern during winter. Hypothermia was a bitch as Ramse would have said. Cole had put his clothes together in a hodge-podge of non-matching pieces. He chose the darkest colors he could manage. It wasn't a smart idea to draw attention to himself. Scavengers only lived as long as they could stay under the radar if they were freelancing.
He didn't want to get wrapped up in another group like the West VII here.
Standing up, Cole moved back from the corpse. It had nothing on it he wanted. He had no idea why she would want it. What was the point in cleaning it up? It was one of many things which baffled him about the old times. People worried about cleaning when they should have been worried about preparing for the future. Everything was going to be dead soon. No one cared what the ground looked like when they were dead.
"Why you so interested in cleaning up? You just like a neat space? I don't think they're doing more than stinking. No biohazards as far as I can tell."