Snippet #2453728

The day was going surprisingly well and Samantha didn't have any troubles with scoring big at the alcohol auction. The system worked surprisingly well really. Scavengers that dug out new tunnels to find houses brought what they fund of alcohol which were then sold in large amounts to the bar-owners in the city. The reason it was sold in bundles was to avoid the average worker to buy with him a lot of the liquid that was found, breaking down the business for the bar-owners. Now, in auctions like that, there was only one rule. The winner takes it all. And that was exactly what she did. She spent big to earn even bigger. Russian water was common find because it didn't freeze up, so there was no process melting it at the right temperature to maintain the taste.

Bringing the liquid back to the bar was a bit of a harder task, as it had to be carried, since there were no cars as far as she knew that was allowed to use to avoid polluting the inside air. Therefor, she gave a bottle of vodka to a nice, largely built Russian man who then carried it under the arms. It was a cheap price compared to having to walk with it all in her hands. She could easily have paid him four or five bottles, but he didn't want more, so it didn't matter at all.

The bar was still nice and clean, and the front door still had a working lock. She turned it before stepping inside, following the rule-set the bar had and took off her shoes immediately when entering. It stood on a paper held up by a stand found in a restaurant and said that all shoes had to be taken off before entering to avoid damaging the floor. A lot of people walked around with spiked boots which would almost immediately leave nasty marks on the floor. It didn't matter though, the room was almost thirty degrees warm anyways. So she took off the heavy leather boots and stepped up the two stairs so she entered the actual barspace. A spacious room with several tables with thin walls between them. It all had a bright wooden color apart from the seats, which were red cushions. Besides this, there was the barbench of course, with a large bookshelf in a dark wood with all the different liquids that were in at the moment. There was no price list though, it was always ask and then get. Besides this, there was a register which she kept all the money she got in. Close to the entrance were weapon lockers. There was a no-weapons rule as well, but there were a set of storage boxes with locks that had the keys hanging in them, so if someone had a big gun or two, they could throw it in and lock the locker.

The final notable thing was the trapdoor behind the barbench, which leaded down to the bottom floor where the real amounts of liquid was as well as her reliable power source. Soundless, efficient and constantly running was the keywords. Not to mention that it didn't pollute at all. It couldn't be done in a large scale of course, but it was efficient and that was what mattered after all. Besides that, there were several crates with nametags on them for whenever she needed more liquids for the guests. There were always a lot of people late at day after all.

After getting all the liquids in place, she opened the register and pulled out a pair of cigarettes and stepped outside, leaving the door open to not freeze to death. She wasn't a polar bear like all the others, she didn't have the advantages they had. She lit one of the cigarettes while leaning up to the wall behind her, sighing before taking a long pull, blowing out the smoke after a short short while. It felt good, better than anything in Paradise had.