Lauren

Sneaky

New day, new me. I wake up early, laying down the grass, as I always did. You see, I prefer sleeping outside since it gets too hot inside buildings for me. Air conditioning won't work since I don't feel cold, and I prefer the breeze of the wind anyways.

I apparently woke up early since, while on my way to the kitchen, I saw most of them sleeping too. They're very sleepy after all, unlike me. I'm some sort of early bird.

If my day has to start off with a well-made sandwich, of course Synapse has to intervene. And thus, my day goes from good to awful.

My phone starts ringing, with an unknown number calling me. I, logically, do what I always did and ignored the call. However, the call gets picked up by force, and a familiar voice is behind the line.

"Ariel, I know you're awake. Take your phone and answer me when I call. Get ready, you're starting today." The audacity...

"Maybe," I reply, setting my phone on speaker mode, "If you say good morning, that is."

"Ariel, I am not joking around."

"I know. You're Libra." I can hear a sigh of disappointment coming from him as I hold my urge to burst laughing.

"You're not in position to be joking around, girl."

"And what exactly are you going to do? Kill me?" He ignores the question.

"If you don't get ready in the next five minutes, we're taking you out of the place by force."

I scoff. "Aww, taking me out on a date? That's cute, but I will have to decline." I giggle after hearing 'Libra' grunt behind the phone.

"You're playing with fire, Ariel. Last warning!"

"Fine, fine," I sighed, on my quest to annoy him as much as possible, "but at least let me finish my breakfast, damnit." He instantly hangs up the phone.

I think to myself, while enjoying my last bite of my sandwich: "Ariel: 2; Synapse: 0"

I slowly get up, stretch my back, and pray that they haven't touched a single hair off Lauren's haircut -for their sake- before leaving HQ, feeling a little better after having a negative impact on that creep's day.

They sent me the route to take to get to her workplace; as if I needed it, I visited her in secret plenty of time. The thing that got me confused is that Libra then messaged me to break in...

Seriously? Break in? at their own workplace? Are they impostors or are they dumb? Whatever...

I ignore their message and head to my usual route...until I get shot and captured by a net.

"Whoa-...Ugh..."

It's Bero again. "Sorry Ariel," She starts, "but I've got to make sure you're not disobeying."

"Ugh, I was not disobeying, I was-"

"From what it looked like, you strayed away from the path Boss gave you." The way she said that sounded...satisfied. Like she won an argument or something.

"Bero, I was not straying away -well kinda- I was just taking an alternate route."

"If you're lying, then it's not believable. If you're telling the truth, then why in the flying fuck would you do this? The path we gave you is the safest; there's no way for you to get caught"

This is starting to irritate me.

"Bero, it's 6 am...and you shot me with a netball..."

Bero then just stood there, in silence. She began cracking down, I could almost see her brain shut down. Now that's what I call overreacting.

"Bero, just let me free and escort me to spy on Lauren." I sharply asked. Bero looked at her handicapped hand and complied. However...

"If you do anything out of the ordinary, I'll kill you on the spot."

I sigh, finally released from that trap of hers. As I was cleaning my winter coat from the dust, I mutter:

"As if we were ordinary from the start..."

I calmly continue my way, jumping between rooftops like a ninja, well because I partly am, while Bero was behind me, silently following my every move with her hands on her suit pockets. Meh, even if i wanted to, escape wouldn't be a wise solution with her apparently. I continue my path until I see the Synapse logo inside an office of one of the many skyscrapers standing. It looks roughly like the letter S with a horizontal line on the middle, inside a dashed circle. Although, I don't like its use of the color green, makes me think of the dollar symbol.

I slow the pace a bit, which took Bero off-guard and caused her to slam her body to a wall. Hurtful, but funny to witness nonetheless. I took this time to pick up the pace, becoming faster at every jump I made, heading towards the entrance, while Bero, desperate, tries to catch me like I was going to warn everyone of something I shouldn't know.

"Stop trying to catch me!" I shout at her. "I told you already: I won't do anything suspicious!"

"Then why are you jumping faster?!" She asked back. "I'm just doing my job and you make things harder for me!"

"I slowed down and you hit a wall. Whose fault is that?" I finally decided to listen to what she said. out of spite. She is trying to catch her long lost breath.

"How are you even going to enter that place?" She asks. I smirk and shrug.

"Like I always did. Surprise attack."