The Edgehaven Gazette

[Steven Fitzgerald]

Steven left his flat and walked down the road to The Edgehaven Gazette offices. It was a rather small building with a old sign above missing rather alot of letters, reading:

he Ed eh ven G zette

Have I got the wrong address? He wondered pushing open the glass door. He was greeted with a receptionists desk unnecessarily close to the main door. Behind which sat an old security guard who seemed to be asleep. There was a bell on the desk so Steven decided to press it.

The guard looked up from under his sleepy eyelids. "Yes?" He asked, his voice heavy with contempt.

"Hi there! Steven Fitzgerald, please to meet you buddy! Say there is this The Edgehaven Gazette or an I in the wrong place?"

"Down the corridor on your left Michael's expecting you." said the security guard his eyes already closed.

"Cheers m' friend." Steven smiled walking down the dimly lit corridor. He came to an open door and stuck his head around.
"Knock knock." He said already in the room.
A man looked up from the other side of a desk. The only light in the room was that of his computer screen.

"What the hell?" Asked the confused man.

"Hey Mikey it's Steven! Steven Fitzgerald, we spoke earlier." Steven explained.

"Oh right yeah Steve, come in, take a seat."
Steven did as he was told.
"Your press badge is on the table and your contracts here somewhere..." He paused and checked the desk. "Ah here it is, ignore the jam stain."

Steven took the contract and signed it. "You're on basic minimum wage. An cause your our only reporter at the moment the entire papers going to be your stories, I don't care what you write as long as it sells. Got that?"

"Yes sir!" Steven smiled, Now this was more like it!

"Good, now get out there and get me some news."

Steven quickly left the room, walked past the sleeping guard. "Cheers buddy." He called to him as he past. He walked out into the street and laughed. This town was his, now to make some news!

[Austin]

Please Note
Time Jump Initiated
All following events are at least two months after those above

[Miranda Burke]

The once dilapidated offices of the Edgehaven Gazette stood on the first floor of a shared office block that had seen better days but was in much better condition than it had been a few years ago. It had a slim staff, which was split between people who had been there for years and people who had not long joined up. It consisted of a few reporters, the editor and Mrs Dilys Price, the tea lady. Mrs Price was Welsh, getting on in years, had married a vampire and treated most of the staff like her own children. 

In the main office, Miranda Burke adjusted her black blazer with perfectly manicured hands, picked up her mug containing coffee that you could stand a spoon in and strode purposefully into her editors office, kicking the door shut behind her. "Ye wanted tae see me, Bill?" she asked, taking a seat in front of the editors desk and setting her coffee down on it.

The current editor, one Mr William Hart, was by no means a pushover. But there was something about Miranda that made him put up with lot more from her than he would from any other reporter, which is why her somewhat rude entrance raised nothing more than a brief cough.

"Yeah," he replied gruffly, leaning forward in his chair. "Look Miranda, you know as well as I do that nobody's interested in all this fuzzy, happy bullcrap we've been spouting out lately. Sure, it's alright for filler but this stuff ain't headline material. I mean, look at this one," he picked up the top paper from a stack on his desk, "'woman weds cerberus breeder'. That's page 20 stuff, what's it doing on the front? Did the guys dogs eat any of the guests? No!'" he threw the paper down, exhasperated. Miranda sipped her coffee and waited for her boss to get the point.

He sighed and ran a hand through his graying hair. "We've had a good run over the last couple if years with that Lemartes business, the decline of the Night Watch and the rest, and the public have come to expect that standard from us." he looked the calm, currently brunette, woman in the eyes.

"I'll level with you. You're our best reporter. The rest of those pansies out there don't know what makes a good story. You do. I need you to get out there and find me some real news. Can you do that?" 

Miranda nodded and drained her coffee. "Aye, Bill, you can count on me," she replied as she lowered the cup. "Good." the editor replied, managing to make the single word mean several things at once, the main point of which was that Miranda was dismissed. She pushed her chair back slightly and left the office, the heels of her designer shoes clicking on the tiled floor. Her boss shook his head. "What a reporter like that is doing in Edgehaven, I'll never know." he muttered as the door swung shut.

[Miranda Burke]

Back in the main office, Miranda laid her empty coffee mug down on the desk. She checked her computer quickly for emails - one of the reasons she was the best reporter in Edgehaven was her network of contacts that meant she often got wind of stories as they happened. Nothing. Flipping the lid down on the slimline laptop, she retrieved her handbag from the bottom drawer of her desk and checked the contents. Notebook, pen, spare pen, PDA, mobile, make-up and mirror, Glock 26. All as it should be. She pulled a second gun, another, larger, Glock, out of the drawer as well and slid it into its holster beneath her jacket before locking the drawer. 

She picked up her hat - a wide-brimmed 40's style black number today with silver stars around the band that matched her bag and set off the midnight blue daydress she wore beautifully - and did a final check of her appearance in the mirror that stood beside her laptop. Satisfied, she slung the long-strapped bag over her shoulder and descended from the first-floor office to the streets of Edgehaven. There was a story out there just waiting to be written - Miranda's job was to find it.

[Miranda Burke]

Miranda strode in to the office, dumped her bag unceremoniously next to her computer and took out her PDA. Plugging it in to the PC, she set the files to transfer and made herself a coffee while she waited.

A quick glance at the editors office told her that Bill Hart was still there, and that meant she still had plenty of time to get her story ready.

Placing her coffee on the desk, she slid in to her desk chair, cracked her knuckles, put on her headphones to listen to the recordings she'd made with Carla, and started typing.