𝐀𝐃𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐄

- PICKING UP THE PIECES -

A girl, roughly the age of twenty five slobbed on her couch. Beside her: an empty litre of lemonade tipped over beside her resting, dead hand. She seemed to solemnly stare at a flat-screen TV, which was the only ample light source in the room: flickering a soft blue. Its screen spewed out muffled conversation of another new virus, a little overtaken by a thunderous rain outside that whipped and slashed down at the windows with an iron fist. Yet, The girl quietly stayed in her position, as she had done for the previous two hours.

A firm knock echoed from down the flat hall. One, two, three, four. Everything fell back to a quiet mumble again before another set of knocks rang out again. One, two, thre--

"What do you want? " The girl was already at the door, letting out a tired, frustrated sigh.

"Inspector auryn. you're Zoella Thatcher, correct?" a strong male voice replied, possibly in his early to mid thirties.

"..I think you and I both know the answer to that. Now what DO you want." the girl, Zoella, snapped back.

"I'm here to discuss matters about your brother -- arthur thatcher."

"He's dead. Got that? Great. Night." Zoella spoke without feeling, in the middle of closing the door before it was forcefully apprehended.

"--I knew him."

"Okay..? Everybody knew him. And everybody knows me. They know all of us."

"No, not by the status, but by a case."

"My.. brother hired you?"

"Something like that - yes."

Zeolla opened the door fully again, a curious and tired expression now plastered to her face.

"Come in--" she offered rather awkwardly, the inspector striding in afterwards.

The two walked into the kitchen. The walls were a dark grey, that reflected ever so slightly with the modernised light in the centre of the room, directly under an island counter with chairs. Despite the nice applianced kitchen, it wasn't exactly well kept: littered with food and drinks in a solem display of grief. Auryn sat down on one of the island chairs, as zoella wandered off to the back counters.

"You want anything--?" she asked. "No, I'm fine, thank you." auryn replied, zoella now going to make a drink for herself.

. . . .

"So.. what was the case about?" she asked after a moment of muffled kettle squeaks.

"Apex corp, he was interested in what they were doing with all the recent employee disappearances. Said he had lost a friend to it."

"Oh. ollie. Yeah. they used to work for that company a long time ago. ..just went missing one day."

"But that's the thing, they didn't just 'go missing.' they were killed. murdered."

"So?"

"So ollie knew something apex didn't want them to know, and was set up for assasination.  And I have reason to believe your brother suffered the same fate."

".... that's-- that's an accusation alright." zoella slightly stuttered, stirring her coffee.

"But it's not far off the truth though. Think about it. Ollie knew something. Dead. Arthur, curious about his friend's death. Dead. Both found mangled in the same way."

"..i suppose that's-- suspicious, yeah." she hummed in thought.

"I'm glad we can come to an agreement. .. I wanted to ask you something, and that, if you wanted to - I continue this case with you. I find out my answers, and you find yours. It'll be a two-way work contract."

"Let me just ask you something first. if YOU were the one hired to find out what happened, how come they didn't kill you, and not my brother?"

"That's something I do not know. My best guess is that your brother started leaking the information."

"That still doesn't explain why you're alive."

"I'm good at my job, what else can I say?" auryn snapped back in response, the two falling quiet as Zoella went to lean back on the other counters properly again - sighing.

".... two-way work contract, huh?" she asked, glancing back to see a nod from inspector auryn. "What do I need to do?"

"Lay somewhat low, and tell me if there's any strange activity at your... job.." auryn seemed rather grimaced at her.

"You got a problem with competitors?"

"No, no. i just think it's rather stupid to put your life on the line for racing. .. that's all."

"That's all? Sheesh." She sipped from her drink—
"Anything else you're dying to tell me?"

"Oh, right-- take this." he slid a card onto the counter. "It's got my number on it. Use it to contact me." auryn stood up.

".....thanks." Zoella nervously responded, taking it and playing around with it from the light reflection.

"I'll probably message you tomorrow. You finish at 5, right?"

"Am. not pm."

"Got it. I'll speak to you then." he spoke firmly as he walked back down the hallway, exiting through the front door.

Zoella stared at the small card in thought, flipping it over and reading the inked numbers onto the back, letting out an interrupted sigh, broken up by the ringing and buzzing of a phone next to her. She flipped it up the right way, pulling out its charger as she answered it.

"Convinent timing much?." zoella spoke.

"Oh? I was?" a female replied.

"Yeah, some inspector came to talk to me, just left like three minutes ago."

"Huh! Weird!" she replied again, her voice slightly drowned out by a harsh rain and wind, followed by muffled street traffic from 60 feet under her.

"You out right now?"

"Yeah, just hangin' around."

"Fair-- why did you even wanna call me anyways?"

"Asking if you're coming in tomorrow, you KNOW we have a tournament on Saturday. And in case you haven't checked the date, that's in two days—!"

"Yeah, yeah-- I know echo."

"So... you coming in?"

"Unfortunately, ye—"

"Great!!! Ill see you at 9 then!"

". .Bet."

The call ended, zoella staring at her phone as the screen slowly went black, her gaze shifting off to the window, left with a resedue of wonder. How was that call so well timed? . . . . Zoella would shrug off her superstition, going back to the sitting room and sighing at the sloppy mess she had made.

'.. tidying is a social construct.'
She mumbled, turning off the TV and slouching off to her room for the night, left alone with the sounds of Xavada's carnage as a lullaby.

[CHAPTER 1: "picking up the pieces"]