Read_Me.txt

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Year-2017

Erin Barnes wakes up with a start.

Lurching up from her bed in a cold sweat. As a strange dream that lingers in the back of her mind makes her heart try to beat its way out of her chest.

Each boom, boom, boom hitting against her rib cage. As a sense of reality quickly begins to settle onto her shoulders.

Gripping the sheets, the sensation of her muscles clenched to their prime, and the feeling of bile rising up her throat gives the college student a sudden sense of disgust and revulsion as she falls off of her bed.

Half stumbling and half staggering out of her bedroom, Erin makes his way to the bathroom in a blundering mess.

Remnants of last night's dinner beginning to come up her throat like water in a hose before quickly spilling through her lips. Causing her throat to burn, and her cheeks to feel like they were about to burst. Before she falls to her knees and releases the entire load into the toilet bowl.

When she's done, saliva is dripping from the corner of her mouth, and her fingers are shaking against the tile floor as her heavy breaths hit against the ceramic toilet seat.

T̶h̶e̶ ̶f̶e̶e̶l̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶d̶i̶s̶g̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶h̶a̶s̶n̶'̶t̶ ̶l̶e̶f̶t̶.̶

So with wobbly legs, she makes her way to the sink.

Splashing cold water on her heated face, she holds the liquid to her mouth and against her pores before pouring everything back into the basin.

Taking a moment to watch as it all drains down before she clenches her hands by her side. A mantra beginning to repeat itself over and over again in her head like a ritual.

It was just a dream, it was a just dream, it was all just....a dream. (A dream that has her teeth chattering and her knees shaking but a dream nonetheless.)

Either way, after the tenth repeat, Erin realized that the mantra wasn't working. She was still jittering, body still convulsing nonstop. So sucking in her breath, Erin squeezes her eyes shut, and does the old trick of counting up to twelve.

By the time she reached eleven, her body was still, the memory of the nightmare had gone away. And Erin was safe.

With a sigh, the young hacker pushed back her damp hair. Hands becoming just as clammy as the rest of her body before she snapped her eyes upward. Vision settling on her reflection in the mirror.

Flickering her gaze left to right, and up and down. Erin begins to take in every detail of the face that she has seen a million times before.

The eyes.

The nose.

The freckles.

Before noticing that the only difference this time, being the fact that instead of a ghostly pale complexion. That derives from never seeing a hint of sun, her face was red. A vibrant furnace that seemed to have been going off right under her skin.

Other than that, everything else was still the same. The old scar above her eyebrow remained the same, and her hair was still cut short just the way she liked it. Long enough to run her hands through, yet minuscule enough to not go an inch past her earlobe.

And her eyes, her eyes were still that dull brown that reflected not even a bit a life.

So yes, she was right, everything has stayed the same.

Everything has stayed, boring.

Seconds pass for minutes and unknowingly, Erin begins to tap her finger in an out of beat rhythm against the porcelain sink, before frowning slightly.

"Look at you, Erin" She demands, voice shaking. "You're twenty bloody years old, and you still can't get a good night sleep like a normal human being. Fucking pathetic."

Averting her eyes down, Erin realized that yeah, that's what she was. She was just a pathetic girl, in a pathetically small bathroom. Talking to herself in the mirror like some type of mental p-

"Erin?"

Jolting up in fear, Erin snaps her head towards the bathroom door. Her attention settling on worried eyes and open arms.

In the short second of confusion, her brain supplies her with a name of the stranger leaning against the entrance way .

"Sorry, Kenya." She says quickly. Words not really holding any true weight as she shuts off the water. Before turning her full body towards the red head.

"Did I wake you?"

Quickly quirking her right eyebrow. Kenya's eyes go from worry to skeptic in a heart beat. And Erin realizes that yes, Kenya knows what's wrong with her, she's just not going to comment on it. Till Erin acknowledges it herself.

So in retaliation, her fellow hacker goes to lean up against the door frame. Hand tightening around the white sheet covering her body, in a poor attempt at modesty. Before opening her mouth.

"How could you've not Erin, when you go running out of the bed like your life depends on it."

A second passes.

"S-sorry, I just had a nightmare."

There, she acknowledged it, she acknowledged the problem. She acknowledged that something was wrong. And in return, she watches as Kenya arms clench for a second, before calming again. But nothing else changes, Kenya still lays her head against the doorway, looking as relaxed as ever.

"Was it about your Mum again?"

"No, I um, can't really remember."

'Thank God'

Kenya's eye's loose any sense of their calmness at her reply, and in its place is the look that Erin has seen her entire life.

'Pity.'

An unintentional grimace appears on Erin's face, at the discovery. She doesn't want Kenya to pity her. Not anymore anyway as she watches Kenya force out an awkward chuckle. Red string around her pinkie vibrating with her body, before she straightens out her back.

Brain probably getting ready to spew out a poor attempt at a joke to light up the tension.

"Oh, and here I was thinking that my bedroom skills were so bad, that you were tryin' to save me the embarrassment and leave before I asked how it was?"

Putting away the thought that Kenya was just as predictable as ever. Erin instead focuses on her split second of confusion by Kenya's words. Until she finally took notice of the fact that Kenya was indeed just wearing a bed sheet for a reason, and how Erin was in fact just wearing an over-sized shirt for a reason. The conclusion was pretty obvious.

They must've had sex...again.

Either way, It takes a moment, for Erin to actually reply to Kenya's comment . And when she does, she just gives a short, one worded answer that she forgets as soon as it leaves her mouth. Before brushing past the red head and going back to her bedroom.

When she arrives back in her room, the sun was leaking through the blinds, and Erin searches through her drawer for clothes. Ignoring how she could feel Kenya not so subtly boring her eyes into her back. And for a second Erin suspects her fellow criminal to call her out on her bullshit like she always does.

But she says nothing.

*

8:09 am

All things considered, out of all the regulated meals society said was important, breakfast was Erin's favorite. It was quick, and not much thought was really needed to be put into it, as you got ready in the morning.

Just a bowl of iron and milk was enough to get anyone by. And it wouldn't be considered unhealthy if you didn't eat more when you compare it to lunch or dinner.

Not only that, but Erin didn't have to worry about hacking, or college when she was having breakfast. Everything was quiet, everything was suppose to be peaceful.

Sadly, that rule didn't seem to apply today.

Unlike most days, Erin doesn't eat breakfast at her place with Kenya. Instead, breakfast consisted of sitting inside of a coffee shop, hands surrounding a cup of mocha that she spiked with rum when no one was looking. As she occasionally stole muffin clumps from her lover's plate.

Spreading her legs in a comfortable position, her vision settled on the pair in front of her. A tall dark man with freckles who was shifting his eyes around the coffee shop as if scaling the place, and his shorter counterpart who was tapping their fingers on the table impatiently.

Averting her eyes downward, Erin watched as their strings connected. Before quirking her eyebrows in an unbelieving position as Kenya rolled her head back in frustration.

"Wait, so let me get this straight, you're plan is to have me die?"

The shorter one furrowed their eyebrows.

"Don't be so over~dramatic Erin, we just need you to make the transaction yourself, this time"

"Oh okay, so suicide is the term you're looking for?"

Looking about ready to throttle her, Geo had already begun to lean over the table, before the taller man put his arms in front of them.

Unusually long limbs blocking any attempt at Geo hurting Erin. As Erin watches the tension in Geo's shoulder's slowly go away before they sit back down. And for a minute, Erin wonders if the man, no if Bennie was an animal trainer in his past life.

"Erin-" Bennie interjected, interrupting her thoughts. "It's fine if you don't feel comfortable doing this, it's completely understandable."

Erin waits for the punch line.

"But-"

'There it goes'

"-It took us months to track down a dealer that would be willing to sell us the Raspberry Pi in this area. But he is only willing to sell it to us in the 'Crows' territory. And you know how strict that gang is about dealing in their territory without permission. Not only that but they already know me and Geo's faces from the last transaction. If they see us again, they'll-"

"Then how about I do it."

Turning her head towards the voice, Erin stared up at Kenya's irritated face. Watching as her eyes momentarily faced the ceiling before striking her green irises towards Bennie's brown ones.

"I dealt before, I have experience."

Bennie and Geo looked like they knew she was going to ask this. Because Bennie sighs without missing a beat, before replying.

"Yeah, but you're also the only one here that knows how to hack through the Police Department to get into the street cameras. While Erin's making the deal you'll have to look through and maintain the camera's on the street, you know, make sure that no one interrupts."

A scowl appears on the redhead's face anyway.

"Oh, well then what will you two be doing then, while Erin and I do all the work? Giving out social commentary?"

Over~dramatically and extremely unnecessarily if you asked Erin, Geo's hands slammed against the table, before standing up.

Momentarily catching the attention of some of the other customers and employees. Before whispering harshly, so no one but them could hear.

"Look, if you want to lose the only chance we have at even attempting at hacking into Swift Rivers, just because you don't want your fuck buddy to get hurt, then just leave."

A spark ignites and Erin watches in short-lived amusement as Kenya and Geo begin arguing, again.

This was going to take an awhile.

Averting her eyes downward, moments pass, and Erin finds herself quickly losing interest in whatever they were yelling about as she presses her hands to her shaking knees. Quietly cursing herself for forgetting to take her Adderall this morning as her thigh continued to jump up and down.

Groaning Erin began surfing through her phone, before staring at the message that she got before showing up here.

From:thatasshole

Quick group meet up @ the cafe, found a solution to our problem.

Hah, quick meet up her arse. They've been here for almost half and hour by now. She should've known that meeting up with the group for a conference would've taken longer than necessary. Especially when they jinxed themselves saying that it was going to be quick.

At this rate, she was going to be late for class too if she didn't leave now. Letting out a low sigh, Erin finds herself bringing her nails between her teeth. Hard bones rubbing against her fragile nail beds as her thoughts began to wander.

In a weird way, it was almost hard to remember that the only reason they were doing all of this was because they were trying to hack into one company.

One annoying, bloody company, that was making this a hell of a lot harder than it should be. In other words, for the people who don't understand.The Swift River Institute was the most infuriating building Erin has ever had the pleasure of attempting to steal from.

With a five-star rating on 'Google', the company that was mostly known for being a rehab for people with every addiction under the sun. You would have had never guessed that they were running a scheme which involved getting a third of their patients more addicted to the drugs they previously came to help for, so that they could experiment on them.

And when the experiments go weary, and the patients do survive. They cleanse their body parts of the drugs before selling them on the black market and telling their families that the patient ran away. Or that's what they've been sued multiple times for doing anyway. The issue of their not being any plausible evidence though for their crimes being the only thing causing the company to go home scot-free.

Adding insult to injury, Geo had a cousin who went their before then mysteriously running away without a trace, so the situation hit a little bit too close to home.

Scratching against her cheek, Erin wasn't going to lie that she was surprised that most of Geo's anger towards the company was not only just to seek vengeance for their cousin but also towards knowing that the people who were trying to get help; ended up getting murdered by the people they trusted.

Since not only had she pinned the fake ginger as heartless, but they as a group of hackers practically do the same thing to people on the daily basis. Stealing from unsuspecting people, raping them of their money and years of hard work for a quick buck. Practically murdering their lives for their own personal gain.

"-rin"

But she guesses that even the most heartless of people have their moments. Hm, she wonders if-

"Erin!"

Snapping out of her thoughts, Erin's eyes focused on the short stack trying to get her attention.

"I swear, Erin, you fucking twat, can you pay attention for one fucking second?"

"Oh, sorry Geo, you're just so short that, it takes a while longer for your voice to-"

A very sharp fork finds itself getting etched into the table a wee bit too close to her hand before she could finish his sentence.

"Nice" she whispered. As Geo gives her a psychotic smile and Bennie silently begs her to shut the hell up.

"Now, what were you saying?"

Erin blinks her eyes innocently. About to open her open her mouth with a retort but Benny cuts her off before she can cause any more damage.

"Erin, will you do the transaction or not?"

Time stops for a second, and Erin doesn't think twice before replying. As her mouth forms the words everyone secretly wanted to hear.

"Of course."

--

Looking back at the moment know, Erin should've wondered why Geo and Bennie never answered Kenya's question.

--