Hiding out... or not

You arrive at Mel's apartment in the posh downtown section of the city and flop down onto the couch with a groan. Yeah, you'll definitely need to look into finding someone better: Mel could stand to lose quite a bit of weight and while you could do that yourself, she's only a means to an end. You think about her neighbors: who would be the best to be, who would be the easiest to get. For the next hour as you fix a snack and watch a bit of television you run through the possibilities before finally settling on the best possible one.

On the floor above Mel is a couple: the Chans. Ronald Chan holds a nice VP position at a large bank while Janice, his wife, works as a secretary for Veronica Bell herself. As a bonus both are fairly young, in maybe their mid thirties, and good looking. Plus Janice would undoubtedly be home due to the incident at Veronica's company.

So with that you aim the pen at yourself and fire opening up Mel's skin and stepping out. You want a little bit of a clean break before switching after all.

You then step out into the hall and take the elevator up to the next floor. You walk down the hall before finally finding what you were looking for almost directly above Mel's apartment. You then knock on the door and wait. It's about a minute or so and you're ready to knock again before the door opens. An Asian woman answers, fair-skinned, slightly curvy and chipmunk cheeked. Her hair, while a bit frazzled, is pulled back in a bun and glasses cover her slanted eyes.

"Can I help you," she asks though with a bit of a tired, distracted tone.

"Yes, hi my name's... Andrew. Andrew Lowe," you state with a charming smile. "My car broke down right in front of here and I just need to use the phone to call a tow truck."

She eyes you oddly, "You don't have a cell phone," she asks.

"It, ah, died," you reply sheepishly, "I'm really bad at keeping track of the battery life. Happens quite a bit."

"The third floor's kind of out of the way too," she adds.

Another sheepish grin, "Yeah, I tried a bunch of other places. Either nobody answered or I got the door shut on me."

Janice again eyes you but finally, possibly due to being worn down by the events of the day, she relents and opens the door wider to let you in. "The phone's in the kitchen," she calls out as she closes the front door.

"Oh, I'll definitely know where it is," you state to yourself. Once her back is turned you pull out the pen and fire.

A few moments later you're in the bathroom, dressed in a loose fitting shirt and yoga pants, your hair loosely tied up. "I don't know why I think I need to lose weight," you state as you run your hands over your thighs, "I'm better off than Mel."

You spend the next little bit lounging around before shrugging and hitting the liquor cabinet pulling out a bottle of nice wine. You're about to pour a glass when the doorbell rings. You head over to the door and look out the peep hole to see another Asian woman standing there. Janice's memories tell you that this is Tina, Ronald's sister. Tina and Janice have been best friends since college and she's the one who introduced Janice and Ronald.

You open the door and greet the taller, slimmer, short-haired and pants-suit wearing woman. "Tina, hi! What brings you around," you ask her as she steps into your apartment.

"I saw what happened on the news and figured I would come by to check on you, see how you're doing," She then notices the wine bottle and glass on the counter. "That rough," she asks.

You sigh heavily, "You have no idea. There was just an explosion, a fire and then it was pure chaos. Nobody knows if it was just some kind of industrial accident, some kind of sabotage or terrorism or what."

"Oh, Janice I'm so sorry," Tina replies and pulls you into a friendly hug. "Was anybody seriously hurt?"

You shake your head, "Not that we know of so far, thank god, but..."

You pause as you hear a bunch of doors closing outside and check out the window that overlooks the parking lot. A lot of black SUVs and guys in suits are entering the building. Bell's security? Why would they be here though? Well, Janice works for Bell so maybe they're just checking up on employees... especially someone who works so close to Veronica herself.

But another thought strikes you: Michelle Jackson went in one bathroom, Melinda Curtis came walking out of the same one a short time later. Did they find Michelle in a daze in there? Did other witnesses somehow allow them connect Melinda to Michelle? Could they connect Melinda to Janice?

It might be best to stay calm, stop being paranoid and lay low as Janice. Plus as Janice you'd have unfiltered access to Veronica and her company and after catching you and developing this pen you're interested in keeping a close eye on things.

But if they have made a connection... you look at Tina. She's the mayor of the next town over. Young, pretty, amiable and popular to boot. She'd have nice security too, a great safety net and would be hard to touch even if a connection was made from Melinda to Janice and then Janice to Tina. It might be a good idea to stay as you are for the moment but then it might also be a good idea to switch over to Tina Chan.

(Author: rugal b.)