Finches: High Voltage

A Brush with Justice

"Car! Sophie! Car! Atom-damnit Sophie get down!"

"What?"

"Get the fuck down!"

Instantly Sophie dropped to the ground, rolling deftly into a bush as sirens sounded shrilly, ringing off in the distance. Holding her breath, though she needn't, Sophie listened as the sirens grew louder and louder, drawing closer until two large black vans loomed like storm clouds over the horizon. They were nearly flying down the road with the speed they were going, the doors of which were brazenly stamped with CORP's logo and crest. Like hellhounds harbingering her eventual death, the ruckus the vans were making pressed hard into her ears, consuming her mind entirely. It was all she could hear, the terrifying sound drowning out even her own thoughts. Though, just as the crescendo rises, it also must fall. Luckily for her, the CORP issued vehicles and blaring sirens did the same as they shot past Sophie's location, continuing down the street just as fast as they had come.

She waited as the vans roared past and away. Hardly daring to move or even breathe until the faintest sound of them in the distance had died and their tail lights could no longer be seen, the panic they had caused her still fluttering anxiously in her chest. Taking a few deep breaths and exhaling the last, incredibly loudly Sophie pressed her finger to the small headset enveloping her ear. "Atom Echo, that was close," she sighed, crawling from out of the bushes, collapsing face first, flat onto the lawn. "Warn me earlier next time, please?" She whined, her voice muffled by the expertly trimmed and kept, grass.

Clicking her tongue at this, Echo's voice switched almost instantly from concerned to annoyed. "I did! You were spacing off again like an idiot!"

Letting out a small snort and pushing herself onto all fours, Sophie shook her dyed black hair, watching it dance in front of her vision. The onyx strands she had done herself, changing to a stark and drastic difference from her natural orange-red. "I'm just still upset with Russ. That was a nice safe-house and because of his stupidity, we had to bail. Fuck even Jonás kept his boyfriends outside... and you know how many of them there were," she pouted childishly, flopping back into a sit, crossing her arms and furthering the appearance of her attitude.

"Yeah, I know."

Rolling her eyes, Sophie stood back up, dusting off her ripped pants. "Alright, alright, I'll quit complaining. I'm taking the midnight SkyRail back to Genesis tomorrow," she murmured, checking her watch absently, not stopping the flicker of a grin that passed over her face as her eyes connected with the broken glass. It happened every time that she caught sight of it, even if it was just a glance from a gesture, the watch warmed Sophie's insides fully. With Echo's small giggle, however, she snapped her arm back down to her side, glaring at the nearest tree as if it too had laughed at her. "It's twelve now so--"

Interrupting, Echo chuckled sweetly again. "You do know how adorable you look when you catch sight of that antique?"

"Shut up," Sophie snapped back only to have more laughter respond. "I'll contact you when I'm in the city. Hopefully, I'll meet up with Jade and Russ again. If not, they'll show up eventually," she added with a sigh, disdain for the male bleeding through her words. Not saying goodbye or even waiting for Echo to confirm, Sophie removed the earpiece, switching it off before tucking it into her pocket. She wasn't angry with her friend and Echo would have known this, but with the day she had experienced, Sophie didn't want to hear about anything in relation to her watch or her attitude towards it.

Looking around from her current position, hands on hips, Sophie finally allowed herself to take in the neighborhood surrounding her. The houses, if mansions could be called that, loomed up from their expansive yards and gardens, sporting rare, exotic flowers and perfectly trimmed hedges. Though Genesis had its mansions, nothing compared to these. While technically a Super City as well, Legacy was more land than building like Genesis, until the heart that was, as then it became a smaller, scaled down splendor of the capital. More than anything Legacy, for the most part, looked like castle after castle, many elites of Genesis even having a summer home in the wealthy countryside. Wine vineyards and sprawling acres with tennis courts to swimming pools and everything in between. In fact, the mansion's yard she had just ran though housed a massive pen and mini lake where she had seen every kind of peacock she guessed existed.