Realistic or Modern California: The Goddammit Chronicles

[Agent]

(If you can’t read this then don’t. Also, text will be colored to match a dark background. If this bothers you, then i'm sorry but I refuse to accommodate for your needs.)

Episode I: Bill​

My name is Bill Ternster. I live in California.

I work at a one of the popular stores a few miles down the street, ringing up customers all day for their purchases, taking their payments, and cramming their cash into the register. It’s only taken me a few days to learn and perfect using the cash register, since it wasn’t as hard as it looks. I’m known for being a fast and efficient worker, and my boss compliments me for it.
The best part: I don’t have to smile all the time.

7:30, April 10th
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! It was time to get up for work.
Bill contemplated actually getting up outta bed today, as raising any part of his body made him feel real tired.

...should I get out of bed today?
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! The bedside clock was still beeping, and it was quickly getting annoying.

⇾ Get out of bed
⇾ No

 

[Agent]

Oh don't just sit there and stare.
I promise this will have some degree of entertainment if someone would at least y'know... participate?

 

[Winter_Wolf]

> No

 

[Agent]

Winter_Wolf
⇾ No
Bill shuffles a little in his bed, deciding that he can sleep 5 more minutes. After all, he could just drive slightly faster once he's on the road. Pleasant dreams come to greet him as he retains the comfortable feeling that he's been getting in his bed.

2 HOURS LATER
Bill groggily opens his eyes, looking at his alarm clock. It's... 9:30 already?! How long did he sleep for?! "Oh shit oh shit oh shit...!" He tosses the blanket off of him and rushes to get changed. He dons the slightly-ugly, slightly-stylish uniform of the local grocery store, and sprints over to his car without breakfast.

It quickly revs on, allowing him to recklessly drive out of the garage down the street. He recklessly stomps on the gas, causing him to run a 60 on a 45mph road which, as expected, wasn't a very good idea...
Luckily, there are no collisions with other drivers, though a camera might've recorded his blatant disregard for the law.

...though that quickly changes when he tries parking. He hits the headlight of another car that just happened to be parked there(EVEN THOUGH THERE WERE OTHER PARKING SPACES CAUSE IT WAS MORNING) and just walks off, because his job was -clearly- more important.

Before he's even able to get close to the automatic doors to open them, a supervisor stops him. "Bill, this is the 4th time this week you've been late."

"I know, I know! I might've overslept a little, but now i'm here and I can-" He starts, trying to walk past, but the supervisor makes sure he isn't able to just walk in like nothing happened.
The supervisor shakes his head. "No, no. I'm sorry, but we're gonna have to let you go." He holds out his hand for the apron that Bill is wearing.

Bill is just... speechless. The job, which he's been working so diligently on for the past few years, has been taken from him, just because he was a -little- late.

Without anything to say, he just slowly takes off his apron and gives it to the supervisor.
Dejected, he walks out to the parking lot back to his car... and a he gets hit by a wild van speeding down the road.

*static*​

⇾ Get out of bed
...
...
Okay fine, he's gotta wake up eventually. Bill calmly takes the blanket off and shuts off the alarm, yawning. To start the day as usual, he brushes his teeth, cleans himself, does his business, then walks to the kitchen to grab some breakfast.
Ah yes, Sneeri-Os. A cheap, bland product meant for breaking fasts and nothing else. Milk makes it taste a little better...
Actually, should I even eat this trash?
⇾ Yes
⇾ No

 

[Winter_Wolf]

Oh. Well damn. Lol.

Okay....

> Yes. Sure it might not taste great but something's gotta be better than nothing?

 

[Agent]

Winter_Wolf
Ew. It tastes disgusting. Better than nothing, I guess. He could've cooked up some eggs that he had in the fridge, but he just hated eggs with a passion. Now that that was all settled, Bill dressed himself for work, in a slightly-ugly, slightly-stylish uniform.
He packed his essentials and began his drive to work. Nothing like a morning drive to work, right?

8:09 AM, April 10th
It was early, so there were barely any customers in the store at the moment. Or employees, for that matter. Bill walked over to the second aisle and powered up the register. Worked like a charm. There he waited for a customer to come by so he could process their purchase.

In a few minutes, one came by with some vegetables and other organic crap in their cart. "Morning." He says.
"Morning." Bill replies with a slightly uncaring voice. That shitty cereal left a bad taste in his mouth. "Do you have any coupons?" He asks, as per usual.

"Yes, I do. Here's one for two cans of beans." The customer hands over the slip of paper that would provide his meager discount. Seriously, what's the point of letting people have these things? Bill thought as he inspected it.

Deanz brand beans? Yeah that's right.
Same color label, same text font, original...
Expiration date is on 3/11/2017... Idiot, didn't know that the coupon expired. Why can't you just remember those things?

⇾ Use it anyway
⇾ Refuse

Spoiler: Stress-o-meter

This is the stress-o-meter. It measures how stressed Bill is feeling. If it leans towards the Angry side too much, he might just snap. Bill just ate some shitty cereal, so he's not really at his best at the moment.
⇦------◄◄ o ----------⇨

 

[Winter_Wolf]

> Refuse. At risk of causing a scene if the customer won't understand, and thus raising Bill's stress. I'll take the chance...hopefully it was just the customer's simple mistake.

BTW I hope a few more people show up here; I'd hate to be the only one choosing options. It'd be cool to have at least 3 people to vote.

 

[Agent]

Winter_Wolf
"Sir, this coupon is expired." Bill says calmly, placing it on the counter.

He seems to get aggravated by this. "So what? Not for long, right?"

"It's been expired for about a month now. I can't process this."

Goddammit. The customer slams his fist on the counter, clearly ignorant. "I don't care! Why don't you just give me the discount and act as if nothing happened?!"

Bill shakes his head. "I'm sorry, but I can't do that, because I don't want to risk being fired."

"You piece of shit! Quit being such an asshole and fucking do it, cause I don't have time for this!" Jesus christ, what part of this does he not understand?

⇾ Give in
⇾ Refuse +1
⇾ Call a Manager

Spoiler: Stress-o-meter

⇦--------◄ o ----------⇨

 

[Winter_Wolf]

> Call a manager

 

[Agent]

Winter_Wolf
"...do I need to call a manager to spell it out for you?" Bill says in a slightly threatening manner.

"Yeah, you do that!" The customer answers. "And hopefully he isn't as stupid as you..." didn't go unnoticed, though.

Bill pushes a button on the register to call the manager. Within a minute or so, he should be here to get this idiot out of there.

"Hey! What's the holdup?" Bill turned his head. Two more customers had lined up, because it was still morning, and only 2 lanes were staffed at the moment. "This person is holding up the line because he doesn't realize his coupon is expired..."

The manager finally comes over. "Okay, what's the problem?"

"This-" "Your stupid cashier doesn't want to submit my receipt and needs to be fucking fired!"

The manager sighs. "Is it expired?"

"Yes." "No it fucking isn't!"

"Let me see it." Bill hands the coupon over to the manager, who glances at it for a second. "Unfortunately, this is expired." He deftly tosses it in the trashcan behind the counter.

Bill smirks. "That'll be $15.06." He says triumphantly.

He doesn't say anything else as he slaps the goddamn money on the counter. "...asshole." is that he says as he walks off.

Next customer...
"Geez, what was his problem?"

Tone of Response is...
⇾ Frustrated
⇾ Neutral
⇾ Optimistic

⇦------◄◄ o ►--------⇨

 

[Blorf]

A New Challenger Has Arrived!

> Optimistic

Because I don't feel like sabotaging this for now.

 

[Agent]

Winter_Wolf Blorf
(Sorry about the delay, I was expecting another response.)
"Oh don't worry about it too much, it happens more than you know." Bill answers, scanning the customer's groceries. "Oh really? Man... i'm glad I don't work here."
Lettuce, tomatoes, bread... all good sandwich stuff. "That'll be $11.27."

Card swipe. Way easier than picking out individual dollars out, and then opening the cash register to grab some coins which spill everywhere. "You have yourself a nice day." The customer says, taking his groceries. "Same to you." Bill says, slightly more convinced of his faith in humanity.

Now the next customer... wow, just wow. Their cart is absolutely FULL of stuff. It takes Bill a whopping 18 minutes to process all the products, painstakingly putting them all into bags one by one. During that time, no customer dared to stand in line, because it was a stupid waste of time. Damn, woman. Should've waited until Black Friday. Bill shuddered at the thought of Black Friday.

8:34 AM
Luckily, the customer didn't have any coupons, so Bill was spared that kind of torment. "For all this... it'll cost you $61.97." The customer said nothing as they used the pin-pad to make their payment. They took their mountain of groceries and left. "Thank you for shopping at Chalphy's...!" Bill says to the customer, with a slightly hint of sarcasm.

"Phew..." Now that that was over, Bill made a quick inspection of the counter to make sure nothing was wrong, and then patiently waited...

"HEY YOU!" It was that customer with the load of groceries from earlier. A few minutes after they left, they come back in, seething. "Where's my credit card?!"

⇾ "..."
⇾ "I don't know."
⇾ "Can you not yell?"
⇾ "You asking that like I stole it."

⇦----◄◄◄ o ►--------⇨

 

[Blorf]

⇾ "..."

Because silence is always the best option. Actually not but it is the most awkward.

 

[Agent]

Blorf
(Well I doubt Winter_Wolf will be coming back, so I guess you're supposed to replace him.)
"..." Don't answer this woman. She's just overreacting. Hopefully that wasn't the wrong response.

"WHERE'S MY DAMN CREDIT CARD?!" The angsty woman repeats.

Bill just shrugs, because that's a pretty good way to answer someone.
"What's the problem this time?" The manager heard the woman screaming and had come over to investigate. He didn't look too happy about it, though.

Bill points to the customer. "She's going on about her missing credit card, but I looked around for a few moments but didn't see it anywhere."

"He stole it! Make him give it back and then fire him!"

Head shake. That's a solid no to her.
She starts fuming or whatever the heck angry customers do, which was definitely not appreciated, though Bill just tried to ignore it while the manager tried to talk her down.

Actually... there is something interesting going on outside. From a long distance, a man is seen bending over to pick something up off the ground. Seems a bit bright, and just the right size to look like a credit card from a distance. Did the customer drop it? Is that man a thief? Cause it looks like he's about to walk away...

⇾ Run after the suspect
⇾ Report it to the manager
⇾ Lol if this woman is getting mental over this then she deserves to get her credit card stolen

⇦----◄◄◄ o ►►------⇨

 

[Winter_Wolf]

My bad, I've been on a roadtrip without wifi for the past several days. Got some wifi now.

> Report it to the manager

Probably not the best idea to run out randomly, in front of the manager, even if it actually is the card.

 

[Blorf]

I second that vote. Also welcome back.

 

[Tombstone]

Three is the charm. Report it to the manager. Just spotted this and will probably loosely follow along for a while.

 

[Agent]

Winter_Wolf Blorf Tombstone
(Yayyy. Btw if what Bill or the manager does isn't normally allowed, then uhh... Eh.)
"Hey sir, I'm not so sure, but I think that man outside just picked up a credit card off the road." Bill says, pointing to the suspect, who was now starting to walk off in a casually suspicious manner.

The manager looked outside, quickly laying eyes on the strange man. How strange, he wore clothes that shouldn't be worn at this time of the day(a black shirt, jeans, and a beanie), making him look like a blatant criminal. Then he looked back at Bill. "Are you sure?"

Bill nodded. "Yes, unless you'd like to have a look at the cameras, which would give him enough time to walk away."

The manager sighed. "Okay... come with me, madam." He leads the woman outside with him, with her shooting a dirty look at Bill for no reason.
Unfortunately, the suspect moved out of visual range, so Bill couldn't see what was happening outside.

...

A few minutes later, the manager comes back inside, with slight patches of ashpalt on his clothes. Luckily not -too- damaging, so customers would probably ignore it. "So... what happened?"

"That man did in fact steal the credit card, and tried running away. I had to chase after him to get it back."

"Ohh nice. What did the customer think?"

"She said nothing. I prohibited the thief from coming back here, though." The manager said sadly, and he left to go wash his face.

...

4:31 PM, April 10th
The rest of the shift was pretty normal for the most part, and most of the accumulated stress faded away. All that work made Bill hungry, though. Now where should he go to eat?

⇾ Grab a burger and fries at the local fast food
⇾ Cook something at home

⇦--◄◄◄◄ o ►--------⇨

 

[Winter_Wolf]

> fast food

 

[Tombstone]

>fast food. Better be In and Out.

 

[Blorf]

> What they said

 

[Agent]

Winter_Wolf Tombstone Blorf
Yeah, let's go to In N' Out and get a double-double(two doubles is redundant, considering there's only 2 patties) and fries!
Bill hops into his car and drives down the road for a well-deserved dinner. Yes, fast food can count as dinner.

Episode II: Ana​

My name is Ana Winsley. I live in California.

I work as an Emergency Operator. If you don't understand what that is, it's the person that answers the phone when someone calls 9-1-1. I listen to the personal 'emergencies' of many people, and decide the best course of action there. I can direct people to other departments, send entire teams, or just hang up when it turns out that it wasn't an emergency at all. I have a 6-year old son, and his name is Tommy. I work from 6 PM to 12, so I am not able to be around for him for most of the day. So I have to hire a babysitter to take care of him until he goes to sleep.
One day, I hope I can spend more time with my son, instead of doing... this.

6:34 PM, April 11th
The phone makes it's indescribable ringing sound. Ana picks it up. "911, what is your emergency?"

"Yeah, uhh, there was someone driving around recklessly on the highway, and they crashed into one of the lampposts. There weren't any cop cars around, so I decided to call 911."

What will your next question be about?
≫LOCATION
≫INJURIES
≫DRIVER

 

[Blorf]

> Injuries

How bad is it? Does it look like the driver going to be worrying more about how to fix the dent on his car, or the fact that he's crushed and dying? Thats my vote at least.

 

[Tombstone]

> Location. It's more important to dispatch first so that help is on the way. The 30 seconds they spend telling you someone is hurt is an extra 30 seconds to save a life.

 

[Winter_Wolf]

I'm kind of torn, but I'm going with Tombstone on this.

> Location