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Chapter 1

"Ah, Ms.Kelly. I was worried you'd be late once again. Wouldn't want any inadequate employees taking up space for potential." He smiled but it read bogus all over.

"Probably not." I reply. Mr.Alomine, the boss. If I had a quarter for each time I had to bite my tongue in his presence I could buy myself a Bugatti.

"Let's get started, shall we?" He stands up and rests his hands on the table. "There's been multiple strange cases and their rising. They vary from, one, a strange man proved to me that I'm in a coma, to two, I swear you're in a coma." He mocks the voices. "We have to figure out what this source is and how this all started. I'll give you each a patient for one of these types of cases." He passes out folders, but selectively chooses mine. He grins. Oh brother.

"Lexi," Alexis taps my shoulder. "this is kinda creepy, isn't it?"

"I don't think you're the only one." I look around the room. Everyone had about the same expression, perplexed and cautious. "Let me tell you, this morning-"

"As I was saying," He glances at me. "you will work on your case individually, once a week, we'll have a meeting and you will get to converse with your fellow workers. If you don't return with new information, there will be consequences for the time you wasted." He gives everyone a stern look and we all know what the consequence is. You'll be f-i-r-e-d, fired. "Have a nice day." He strolls out the room.

"Ugh, it's like that man always has something up his ass." Alexis says immediately after he closes the door and we laugh. "What were you saying?"

"This morning this guy told me I was in a coma." Alexis starts laughing. "No but like, he knew my name."

"Everyone knows you're name, you're known."

"What? I'm not known." I roll my eyes.

"How are you not known? You're Lexi R. Kelly, expert psychologist, major in cognitive studies." She announces as if she's an MC. I pull her down to sit in her chair.

"For a 23 year old, you lack much maturity." She giggles.

"I can't help it. But nevermind me, continue what you were saying."

"He also knew my middle name and was talking about how I don't remember him."

"Weird stuff."

"Weird stuff indeed." We start nodding then stroke our chins, making us burst into giggles.

"What if you get him in your folder?" She opens it. "Is this him?" She shoves the picture in my face.

"No, Alexis, that's a female," I push the folder away from my face. "I gave him a card and told him he could talk to me here."

"Was he cute?" She raises her eyebrows.

"Well yes, but either way he's clearly not mentally stable. I'll pass."

"Aye, you can go Harley Quinn and Joker with him."

"Chill," I laugh and slide her her folder. "do some work. That's what a job is for." She sighs and opens her folder.

"Lexi, I have the guy!" She exclaims.

"Oh my god, are you serious?" I start to lean over. "You don't even know what he looks like." She starts laughing.

"You're dumb." She laughs even louder.

"And you're annoying." I click my pen and open my file. Danielle Rodriguez, eighteen, 5"6.

"Interesting, interesting." I turn my head and see Alexis stroking her chin.

"I can't even get through a section without you bothering me." I push her away whole laughing. "Don't you have your own file you should be working on." She rolls her eyes.

"Fine, I'll let you be." She actually gets to work. Anyways, as I was reading. I go through about half the paper. So supposedly she believes that this is some world that holds people in comas. She thinks that we all were put here on purpose and the perfection is hiding us from the truth.

"What in the world......?" I mumble to myself. Well she clearly has strong beliefs so I'll have to approach her in an gentler way. I definitely don't want her to go all hostile thinking I'm against her. I do not want to sit through a ten minute speech of how this is coma world.

She's also finding some way to escape and has gotten arrested twice for meddling with the satellite dishes on the skyscraper. Personality traits: expressive, observant, sensitive, sneaky, and firm. Finally I get through half the stack by the time Mr.Alomine walks back in.

"Today you all will meet with your subject. Therefore I hope you were actually reading and not playing around." He eyes someone across the room. "Here are your times." He passes each of us a half sheet of paper. Great, my meeting is thirty minutes from now. I look up at Mr.Alomine and he's already grinning at me. For the love of God. I strongly make sure my eyes don't roll as I look away.

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I take twenty five more minutes to quickly skim over the rest of the files. I take another look at the slip to see the room number and make my way there. The elevator opens and I step in with the other person, not minding who they are. After two floors, the elevator comes to an abrupt stop.

"Ugh, we're stuck!" The girl next to me says. She begins to push random buttons, and beeping begins to sound.

"Don't do that!" I blurt out. She looks up at me with her eyebrows furrowed. "What if you break it even more?" I begin to repeatedly push the emergency button. I push it so much eventually the button falls out.

"You're the one to talk." She laughs.

"Is it just me or is it getting hotter in here?" I stop pacing and put my hand on the hand. I fan myself and my breathes go faster.

"We can't run out of air in here." She says as if I'm stupid. I turn to give her a look and quickly recognize who she is.

"Danielle Rodriguez, right?" I ask, still out of breathe.

"Who's asking?" She stiffens up.

"Lexi Kelly, I'm supposed to be meeting with you." I stick my hand out.

"Thank God you're pretty. I thought I was gonna meet with some creepy old man again." She sighs in relief. Me, on the other hand, I'm still panicked.

"Than-" I was about to thank her but the elevator dropped about two feet. I couldn't help myself and started screaming and banging on the doors. "Help, help!"

"That was fun." She says while laughing.

"Fun? We're stuck in a freaking elevator!"

"Chill. The fire department will be here in less than an hour."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?" I take deep breathes.

"I mean we won't be out here anytime soon, so there's no point in panicking."

"I guess you're right. Let's just do this," I hold up my notepad. "while we wait." I take a seat in front of her.

"Fine by me."