It’s his first beer of the afternoon and the second attempt at making Lauri’s driver’s license; the work is some he’s done for fun and profit, but today it’s for neither of those purposes: he’s preparing a life for himself after the corruption happens.
It feels inevitable at this point. He’s met so few Order folks that he finds tolerable and while many of the Negaverse officers he meet are about the same intelligence level, they at least seem to have higher-ups with the brains to make things happen, unlike with the White Moon. The meeting with Caedus stands bright and clear in his memory as a shining example of everything wrong within the faction: a bunch of ineffectual ‘royals’ fencing egos with one another, intelligent conversation being ignored in favor of fluffing said egos, and a bunch of stupid sheep bickering. It was very much like watching the United States in miniature, personified.
Pasi was not fond of the United States. He was less fond of being a magical boy on the side of a group that was basically the USA’s idiocy distilled to be 80 proof.
Granted, he knew the Negarverse had it’s own cadre of issues, Pasi was no green child to think that there existed any group that was without it’s own foibles, and also that he’d fallen in with a rather brutal member in General Labyrinthite, but that could be lain at the Wolf’s feet as well as his own. It wasn’t as though the knowledge would keep him from having Chaos energy poured into his star seed. As Aue of the White Moon, he was effective and useful in his own way...but could be even moreso to his peers once corrupted. Which was why he knew that it was simply a matter of when, not if, and also why he was preparing his life for the eventuality.
Lauri J. Virtanen... He’d thought long and hard about a proper name and finally settled on something reasonable, the only somewhat unreasonable thing was deciding to keep his former last name as the new middle. Järvinen. But it was a good, strong name and he was fond of it, even as he was working to eradicate the man born to it. But having the ID ready, having the whole damned life at least somewhat ready would allow him to further set himself up for the aftermath of joining the Negaverse in a more….permanent manner.
Especially since that manner included the ‘death’ of his current self to allow for the ‘rebirth’ of his new self. It will be inconvenient to lose my identity, but it is what it is at this point. At least I am smart enough to be setting things up before-hand. How many are bright enough to think about this, or lucky enough to have the chance? Having ID under that name would allow him to start a bank account, though he had a numbered swiss account he generally used and would still be able to use when ‘Pasi’ was gone, and to set up storage for his belongings, among other things.
Pasi was going to be paying for the identity to be as ‘real’ as possible - one that would stand up to even a rigorous background search: he could create the ID, but when it came to hacking the information into secure systems, he needed outside assistance. But there was still so much that he could set up, he really was grateful that this would be an option for him.
***
Lauri opened an account with a local storage facility for a small 5 x 10 space and started moving all of his non-essential items into it; everything stacked neatly in well-packed cartons, the contents labeled clearly. His apartment was going to look fairly empty after a while, but it was worth his time to start packing up now in preparation - after all, Pasi had no idea when the Negaverse would finally claim him and set the pristine white of his costume to black.
Lauri also opened a bank account and transferred funds into it. All paperwork for these things went into a safety deposit box at the bank, as did what he was calling his “bible” - it was a book of passwords and information, all about who “Pasi” had been, his history, family, etc. Work and school. Everything.
There’s even a credit card. A birth certificate. Stamped passport. For a while, the Finn will exist as two people. It’s an odd feeling, saying good-bye slowly to the person you are and hello as slowly to the new ‘you’. But he is careful to keep the two as separate as is humanly possible - it would be a pity if somehow his superiors found and went after his family.
Perhaps it was less careful and more crafty, because he’s already started being wary of the burner phone that Labyrinthite gave him - the number forwards to his normal cellphone. That’s a bit of a risk too, but less of one than carrying two phones - one of which is a flip. He’d already once had a neighbor see the burner with his usual phone; the idiot had assumed that Pasi was a drug runner or pulling some sort of illicit work (he was, of course, but that had nothing to do with the second phone).
Not that he actually gave a s**t what was thought of him.
Or that it would matter in the long run.
He would miss his apartment, however.
“I should look into housing for that time. Ugh, so much to do -- so annoying.”
It was only a matter of time.
Word count: 1086
