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[the_real_ray]

One thing Ray could say with nearly absolute certainty about Gus Knickel: he wasn't going to get knocked up. The same couldn't be said for the rest of their desk staff, as they kept demonstrating to him. Not that he begrudged them their kids or anything, not most of the time, just when he was the one stuck covering desk duty because they didn't

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[crazydetective]

"As long as you don’t mention that you talk to the dead, you’ll be fine." Charlie said. With top drawer advice like that, Raines was just glad he wasn’t about to step into the ring with Sugar Ray Leonard.

"There goes my opening line... Why, huh? Why? What is this? Do you have to be here? I can handle the first day all on my lonesome, mother," Raines informs him through clenched teeth and barely moving lips. Being caught talking to thin air would probably negate the possibility of any actual first days that may happen.

"Moral support?"

"Distraction."

"Personal cheering section?"

"Heckling peanut gallery. Shoo!"

Charlie’s gone before his former partner can rap on the door, poking his head inside before the rest of him follows. Much to his relief, the man behind the desk looks nothing like Sugar Ray Leonard. "Uhhnm...hi. Are you the go-to guy for a job around here?" If not, could you tell me where I could find him? Or her.

[the_real_ray]

"I would be, yeah," said Ray, looking up from a report that mentioned the word 'zombie' a little too often for comfort. "At least I am while Vimes isn't in the office. I take it you're looking for one?"

[crazydetective]

"That I am," he confirms with a nod. "If you're hiring." Despite having all the necessities of survival at his disposal without having to work for them, it was all he knew. Continuing to sit around doing nothing would likely drive him out of the rest of his mind.

[the_real_ray]

"We're always hiring," said Ray, shoving the papers away, "as long as you know what you're getting into. It's a jungle out there, and for once that's actually literal."

[crazydetective]

"I've noticed." It was pretty harp to ignore, really, after he's gotten lost in said jungle a few times now. "I'd say I've seen it all, but in light of some of the most recent events, I realized how wrong that is. Still, I wouldn't be here if I didn't want to be or if I hadn't taken all of that into consideration."

[the_real_ray]

"After a few weeks on the island, everyone needs something to do," said Ray. Even him, who once thought he would've taken to early retirement like a wolf to donuts. Of course, that was back in civilization. "So give me an idea of your qualifications."

[crazydetective]

“Before I got here, I was with the LAPD is some capacity or another for twenty years; beat, vice, most recently, for the last...uh, thirteen years, give or take, I was a homicide detective.” He doesn’t usually play the numbers game, he hates it, in fact. Unless, of course, those numbers were being waved under Boyer’s nose mockingly and accompanied by childish, sing-song taunts of, ‘I out rank you. Neener-neener.’

Sometimes there was even a little dance to go along with it.

[the_real_ray]

"LAPD, huh?" said Ray. "I was a detective in Chicago, myself. That is, before I got stuck helping head up the police here on the island. I, uh, don't suppose you have any kind of wilderness training, do you?"

[crazydetective]

"Uh... Not much outside of the The Boy Scouts of America guide book." Was here a book? Jack never mentioned a book when he'd been dragged along on those camping trips. If there had been one, Raines would have sooner used the thing to swat the mosquitoes that were using him as an open bar than actually stopped to read it. "I can make a fire." After only forty-two minutes and a half dozen heckling children mocking him the entire time. Twenty minutes tops without the heckling, he'd be willing to bet.

[the_real_ray]

"Well, that's something at least," said Ray. "Not a lot of people show up here knowing how to deal with it, but we learn. Or we never leave the compound. I'll just make sure we partner you up with someone who's a little more, you know, jungle-savvy."

[crazydetective]

"That would probably be for the best." He decided to forgo mentioning the fact that he'd gotten lost in the jungle not too long ago. He and the well beaten path had gotten incredibly close since then. "I'm Michael, by the way. Michael Raines."

[the_real_ray]

"Ray," he introduced himself belatedly. "Vecchio, not Kowalski. You'll see why the distinction is important after you've been with the IPD for a while."