BITE

The Beginning

It’s on a late Friday night and Arthit is still at the shop doing inventories.

    His friends had invited him earlier for a drink, but he had declined. The shop being short staffed, Arthit has to do most of the important stuffs that the other employees cannot.

    He’s a recent graduate with a mechanical engineering degree; at first, Arthit thought he would land a job at the company where he had interned at, but unfortunately, they haven’t any position available for him. Thus, Arthit finds a temporary job at a supplies shop, managing their inventories and deliveries.

    It’s not something Arthit sees doing for the rest of his life, but it pays the bills, and he needs every experience he can get to move forward. He plans on staying here until he finds a more suitable job for him and his degree, but that would have to wait.

    Arthit glances at the clock which reads 8:34pm. It has taken him a lot of time finishing the report since there was a problem with one of their suppliers, hence staying up late on a Friday night.

    He’s supposed to be having drinks with his friends like any normal fresh-out-of-university guy, but instead, he’s hunched in front of his computer trying to fix their delivery schedules for next week.

    He sighs, taking a sip of his pink milk, when his ears catch onto something.

    Arthit is at the backroom, and he has turned off the light at the front to conserve energy. He turns towards the direction of the sound, making a move of standing up when he hears a loud crash coming from inside the shop.

    He rushes out of the dinky office, having a hard time making his surroundings due to poor lighting, but the glass windows of the shop has clearly been shattered.

    Arthit’s heart beats fast in his chest. He is clearly not prepared for a robbery, and the only self defense he knows is to scream really loud in hopes someone hears him.

    He treads carefully, thinking of turning on the lights, but that would alert whoever is mugging their shop, so he opts to leave them off.

    He jerks when a silhouette of a person suddenly stands up, emitting a sound closer to a squeak. Arthit is about to shout when he gets tackled to the floor.

    It happened all too fast. He finds himself on the floor immediately, fearing for his life. The guy who tackled him – someone with sharp jaws, tan skin and piercing eyes, crouches low enough for Arthit to study him.

    The guy looks around, seemingly listening to the surrounding, before hoisting Arthit up like he weighs nothing.

    For a second, he looks startled, but Arthit gathers his composure, ready to call for help, but the guy puts his palms on his mouth to shut him up.

    “Don’t say anything,” the guy says with a low voice.

    Arthit blinks, but doesn’t protests. The guy seems like he has no intention of robbing the shop, but he does wonder what this person is doing breaking inside.

    He looks at the shattered window and frowns. How is he supposed to explain to his boss that they had just been broken in?

    “Where’s the back exit?” the guy asks.

    How is he supposed to talk when his mouth is being covered?

    Arthit points towards the backroom. The guy nods, taking his hand off of Arthit’s mouth before rushing them both at the back.