Click.
Click.
Click.
A dim yellow light split the darkness of the room in two, shining down on the face of its only inhabitant; me. I was sure the glow from the computer screen painted my face into a sickly pale creature made of dark purple bags and gaunt cheeks. My eyes though, would be a startling green, sharp and aware. Inherited from my mother, I suppose they were my one good trait.
Click.
Click.
Click.
My finger lightly tapped the mouse’s button making the images on the screen change after each click. To anyone looking over my shoulder it would I appear like a normal bedroom. Looking closer they might even discern it belonged to that of a teenage girl. They might wonder of its importance. Why I had been stationed here for the past two years, living in this room, this chair, for what appeared like an empty room. They would never know.
It was hers.
It was Clara’s.
“Rob!”. A sharp voice cut through the thick silence startling me enough to make my heart skip a beat although my surprise was indiscernible from my body language. Reluctant to take my eyes off the screen I slowly swiveled around in my chair to face the source of the interruption.
“How may I help you,” I paused for a moment allowing my eyes to fully travel up the figures 6” foot frame, stockily built and tense before they settled on a pair of beady, dull blue eyes. “Lieutenant Crass?”. I allowed a slight hint of sarcasm, a mere droplet of disgust, into my voice when I said his name. It was enough to cause the creases in his forehead to deepen to valleys of distrust but not enough to cause a verbal reaction. I folded my hands and leaned back in my chair, presenting what I hoped to be the picture of confidence I waited.
“She would like to see you in her office,”. The Lieutenant’s voice was filled with an undertone of self-satisfaction that made my skin crawl in loathing. He didn’t have to say her name for me to know who he meant, and I gritted my teeth as I watched him take smug pride in watching how this new information made me squirm. I let a small sigh escape from my chest, my shoulders sagging slightly as my body prepared itself for the near future. I rubbed a hand over my face as if that would wipe off some of the filth, cast one last look back at the monitor before standing up and walking out the door.
I remembered when I first came here, plucked fresh out the group of squealing interns, I couldn’t imagine how I would be able to navigate such a maze like space. The building was literally built to resemble a game of tetris and had some harry potter aspects to it; the walls moved. Although everything was color coded so it wasn’t too hard to catch up. If I couldn’t at least do that I would never have been chosen for the task.
As I made my way out of the worker hive orange sector and deep into the jade green of the corporate managers I couldn’t stop my heart from beating faster. Adrenaline: a hormone that is released in the body of a person who is feeling a strong emotion (such as excitement, fear, or anger) and acts as a neurotransmitter that causes the heart to beat faster while giving the person more energy. My brain rattled off the scientific explanation for what was taking place inside of me. Rather than gaining more energy I felt like I would retch at any given moment. Fitting as I was in the green sector. Too nervous to laugh at my own sick humour I walked steadily on.