Towers of unorganised papers and files were stacked up on Alisha's desk. She sat there staring at her piles of work. It'd take days to get through it all, perhaps longer considering she'd been sitting there for three hours and felt as though she hadn't even left a dent. Ever since they visited the bunker, all Alisha could think about was Ellie.
A nearby phone rang loudly, waking her up from her daydream. With a sigh, Alisha picked up the phone.
"This is Miss Evans speaking. How can I help you?"
"Miss Evans, I'm wondering how the progress is going on this month's report?" A voice asked. It was Stephen Shen. His voice was raspy, worn down from decades of yelling obscenities at the hard working scientists of NEXUS whenever they slipped behind.
Alisha gazed over at the towers of papers again. She had barely started. "It's almost done Mr Shen, I should have it ready before our next meeting."
"Good. Make sure it's done, you have four days." Before she had a chance to respond, the phone turned to the repetitive tone of an ended call. Alisha placed the phone back down on her desk and laid back staring at the blank ceiling, letting out a sigh.
"I really need a drink."
Alisha sat at the bar waiting for the bartender to notice her. A few other NEXUS workers were sitting around, but the bar was mostly empty. It was always empty at this time of day. She fiddled with her hands waiting patiently, trying to decide what drink she'd prefer.
Red wine? Beer? Scotch?
...Whiskey?
"Miss Evans!" A friendly voice called out. Alisha looked up to see Russel, the bartender wandering over.
"Russel!" She returned his genuine smile with a fake smile of her own, although she wasn't feeling particularly happy. Over the years she'd had a lot of practice faking her emotions, and it seemed to fool everyone...
Everyone except Carter.
"The usual?" He asked, taking down a wine bottle from the back wall. She nodded, making her final decision on a drink.
Wine it is.
He grabbed a glass and poured some of the red wine into it. "Busy day huh?"
"Definitely," she sighed. Russel handed her the glass. "Thank you."
Russel walked off to some other customers. She drank slowly, savouring every drop of the red liquid. The taste. The smell.
It was always intoxicating.
A hand touched her shoulder and she flinched, nearly inhaling her drink. She looked to her side and saw Gabriel next to her. She relaxed, safe in the knowledge that she wasn't being arrested. Yet.
"You won't believe this," he slid a piece of paper across the table.
"What is this?"
"An entry form," he whispered in her ear. He leaned over the table with his arm partially covering the paper. Alisha glanced over his shoulder, spying a security camera on the other side of the room.
He's covering it from the cameras... Why?
Alisha scanned the page slowly, trying to find what was so important. It was just a list of names and observations, but one name in particular stood out. Ellie. "Oh crap."
"Doctor Reeves!" Russel cheered. "Would you like anything?" He walked over to them.
"Some water would be great, thanks," he smiled. Unlike Alisha's, his smile was never fake. Or, if it was fake, Alisha couldn't tell.
"This wasn't supposed to happen so soon..." She whispered.
Gabriel placed another piece of paper next to her. "I need to go, but you might need this."
Alisha saw it had a series of numbers written on it. Without getting a good look, she quickly slipped it into her pocket. Russel walked over and gave Gabriel his water.
"Thank you, take what I owe out of my account," Gabriel looked to Alisha. "I'll see you around, Miss Evans," he exited the bar, leaving Alisha to the papers.
Ellie is here, at NEXUS. It's only been a week since she woke up, and somehow, she's already found her way to NEXUS...
She hurriedly gulped down the rest of her wine, before leaving her seat in the bar and heading back to her office.
I have to find her.
Alisha walked into the elevator and pressed the button to get to her level. Just as the doors were ready to close, a manly hand grabbed onto the metal slider, causing the doors to pause. Carter stepped inside the small space. He stood on the far right, keeping a good distance between them, and pressed the level 9 button.
He must be on his way to see Shen.
The lift was so quiet, you could hear the slight sway of the metal cables. And yet...
"How are you?" Carter asked suddenly, slicing through the silence in the lift. He sounded nervous but stern.
"Good," Alisha nodded carefully. "You?"
"Busy... Very busy," he looked over at her, and then down at her hand. She could see him in the corner of her eye, but tried hard to avoid eye contact.
They never used to be like this. It used to be different. Before the Deathwave. Before things got out of hand in the world and the virus took over.
It used to be... Better.
Alisha entered the large hall by herself, feeling a little lost and a little small. She was only seventeen then, young, but not too young to be a scientist. She'd just accepted the job she was offered at NEXUS, and was undoubtedly excited to get started. Although she didn't like the idea of helping the military, she was nonetheless excited to start something new.
She was a fool.
A short man with silver hair approached Alisha with a large welcoming grin on his face. "You must be Alisha Evans," he took her hand and shook it.
"Yes, that's me," she smiled.
"It's an honour to finally meet you in person. My name is Stephen Shen, the CEO of NEXUS," he let go of her hand.
"Oh! Sir! It's great to meet you too!" She hurried.
He laughed, before gesturing to something behind Alisha. "I want you to meet my most promising employee. In a few years, I expect he'll be well up the corporate ladder."
Alisha spun around, and was met with a young man who looked about her age. He was dressed in a neat suit with a black tie. His hair was combed back neatly, styled with gel, and he was cleanly shaven. He seemed to be nervous around her, but washed it out with a small grin.
"Matteo Carter," he offered his hand nervously. She accepted it, a gentle squeeze revealing it to be more muscular than she expected.
"I have some other people to catch up with, I'll see you two soon," Stephen hurried away, introducing himself to other guests.
Alisha pulled her hand away from Carter's. "I'm Alisha, Alisha Evans-"
"I know," he smiled. "I mean, I've seen- heard of you before, on TV..." he rushed nervously. "You're quite popular in the science world."
Alisha pushed a piece of her hair behind her ear. "I guess I am. Well I've never heard of you before."
"I'm sure my name will start floating around soon," he stared at her, as if her appearance was confusing to him. "So, you're working with biological warfare I heard."
"Yeah, since I focussed on cancer research at GENETEC, they wanted me to stick with something that was... Familiar," she replied.
"I've read some of your work, it's quite impressive. Your research on cancer was ground-breaking, and all accomplished at sixteen years old... I'm sure you've saved millions of lives."
"Well thank you," she smiled, impressed he knew about her work.
The crowd started to move towards the back of the hall, and Carter turned to follow them. "It was lovely to meet you, Miss Evans. I hope we can talk some more in the future."
"I hope so too," she nodded as he started to move away.
"There's this uh," he paused, scratching the back of his neck. It was only now she realised how much taller he was than her. "This café, a few blocks from NEXUS. Would you like to get some coffee sometime, perhaps?" He looked down at her.
"I actually don't like coffee," she replied. He seemed to draw back, like he'd failed a lab experiment and wrecked his centrifuge. "But... I do love hot chocolate," she smiled as his face lit up. "I'd love to."
The room echoed with a muffled tapping sound. "Today is a very special day. A day that will go down in history. A day I'm sure none of us will forget."
Alisha turned towards the stage, and found Stephen Shen standing by the microphone. He stood straight, exuding confidence and charisma. He almost looked taller than her from up there...
Almost.
"The war is getting worse, and now we're suffering the consequences. But I can assure you, with our help and our technology, by 2030, America will be ahead of the game, and perhaps we'll be the ones to end the war, too. It all starts here, at NEXUS." Stephen held up his glass high in the air, and everyone in the room cheered and clapped happily.
Alisha joined the crowd, smiling and clapping, happy to know that they were going to save the world.
To reiterate, Alisha was a fool.
Alisha sat at her desk typing away at her computer. Most would think she was working, drilling down her piles of work, but instead she was rapidly navigating classified files from across the NEXUS network. Finding the directory she was looking for, the system prompted her for a password. She began typing up the numbers from the paper Gabriel had given her.
1846 - 4820 - 3650 - 0294
A new message appeared giving her full access to the classified documents. She started searching through the security camera files, looking for anything that might explain what was written on the entry form. She stopped when she found a video of two outsiders being dragged into NEXUS. She opened the file to get a better look at what was happening.
"Take this one to the immune prison," Joyce, a NEXUS employee ordered. She pointed at a tall blonde boy who was on his knees beside a girl. The guards dragged him away. Joyce stepped closer to the girl, lifting her head with a finger. "I want to take a closer look at this one... Send her to my lab."
The guards nodded and dragged the girl out of the camera's sight. Alisha paused the recording, noting the time and finding another camera of the same location, where she could see the girl in question. She recognised her instantly. She had the same hair, the same eyes...
"Ellie..." she whispered.
She rewinded further and had a closer look at the boy in the video. "But who the hell are you..." Alisha took a screenshot of his face, and ran it through their facial recognition software. Information about the boy appeared on the screen.
"Samuel Ridge, Immune. 20. Admitted into Immune prison 07 at 11:37pm..." she read aloud. "Note: Dangerous and clever."
Suddenly, she had an idea. A terrible, terrible idea... And yet...
A brilliant idea.