(the) Jaeger - WTF

So time before last, when I saw the Mechanic he was pretty testy, prickly. And one of the things he asked was for me to retrieve some message from "the Jaeger" for him. Which I did, and that whole affair was fairly profitable to me.  So, I shouldn't complain.

But I will complain, though not about Mechanic, per se. Now I understand the whole bat-shittery and he was just trying to pass off an annoying problem, and he did. And now I'm stuck with the annoying problem. And that problem's name is "the Jaeger".

So the original message pick up was suspect right from the word go.  Mechanic tells me "an old friend" is trying to pass an encrypted message to him, and he wants me to get it.  Ok, spycraft isn't really my thing, but I know what a dead drop is. And, sure, picking up the drop, getting it out without being tailed or followed, yeah - that's important and possibly dangerous.  Sure, I'll do it.   But then it gets weird.  So where is this drop?  "the Jaeger did not specify, but he left a clue...".     I'm sorry, but what sort of nonsense is this? How is a dead drop supposed to work if one party doesn't know where to pick up the package?  I didn't voice my doubts to Mechanic, I just went. Some bullshit test or something.

It was pouring rain when I was in the nature reserve.  A deluge.  From the clue I knew it had to be a hunting blind, and those are easy to spot, right? Fubar.  Amazingly, I found it, next to an old plane wreck that's rotting in the woods.  You know what might make for a better clue? I'll give you a hint, it begins with "plane" and ends with "wreck".

So I get the message, it's just some paper, soaked by the rain.  The ink had completely run, if it wasn't "encrypted" before it sure was now.   I hand the message in to Mechanic, looking like it's fresh from a toilet, and he doesn't even look at it. Drops it right into a wastebasket. Tells me he'll tell the Jaeger I got it and tells me where to find him.  Bullshit test.

But it gets better.  The Jaeger tells me "So here I am on the side of those who clean our land from various infections, the ones that drag us further into the dark abyss..."  and on and on. You know the type. Back in the states he'd be just another racist uncle complaining about rap music, kids today, and the last thing he saw on Fox. It's bonkers. We are literally surrounded by Russian armed forces, being starved, unable to leave Tarkov because of Chernobyl-knows-what fuckery TerraGroup was brewing, and this fat fuck is upset about kids that wear baggy pants, immigrants and loss of national pride. 

This guy clearly drinks from the same teat as all the survivalist prepper end-of-world fanboys out there. Probably has a Russian translation of Left Behind under his pillow with his Jergens. 

And, what does Dr. Prepper want from me? He wants supplies!  He's offering me 35K rubles for 50K rubles of supplies. I kid you not.  What a poser, loser and total pain in the ass. Thanks Mechanic!

But, now that I've gotten that off my chest, he's not completely useless as I am literally left behind in hell on earth. He sold me those shotguns, and that helped me get better footing with Prapor.  He definitely has connections, money, and if I had to wager, maybe a way to get out of this hellhole. And, for that, I will put up with a lot of bullshit.   But as I learned the hard way, you can't get decent sleep when you are bunking with crazies - always have one eye open, tovarisch, one eye open.