A.S.H

Magic of Coffee

"Department number 2: testing with and non organic material, probably where you will be working I'm assuming. With the whole virology background, I think you'll be working on observing and modifying how tested formulations work on live matter. Yeah I got briefed on your scientific status by Dr. Turner, which I have to admit, I'm quite impressed with." She sent a small grin my way as we entered the department room. 

Much like the first, there were large ceiling to floor sized, tinted windows to one side of the room. However, it was more segregated seeing as there were partitions between each of the work benches. Not that they were completely opaque, but they did the job of providing a barrier between deskspaces, giving the whole place a sense of order amongst the multitude of busy bodies working aimlessly with whatever they could get their hands on. The wall opposite to the window side was a deep turquoise, matching the colour of the lanyard she handed me; I guess each lanyards were matched according to whichever department you worked in.

This time, rather than simply watching and keeping towards the frontal area like in the first department, Victoria led us further, allowing me to get a closer up look at what was happening. "Well if it isn't the Queen of England herself," one of the scientists a couple years older than myself piped up, removing his gloves and goggles as he ambled towards us, "had anymore kids yet? The Brits want to know how big their families should be- damn, what's with the eye daggers?" He feigned innocence, holding his hands up in a mock surrender. I chuckled at his antics, which turned his attention towards me, "and who might you be?"

Judging from the slight accent embedded between his word, my guess was that he was most likely Spanish, and to be honest, his appearance mimicked my suspicions. The natural golden hue of his skin made him look more like a model than anything, along with the soft blue eyes that peered at mine in interest. I'd peg him as a total surfer boy, but I had to admit, the scientist dress up gave him a more professional appearance and he suited it. 

Rolling her eyes at him once again, Victoria proceeded to inform him, "Dakota, this is Alice-" his eyes lit up with a humorous gleam and he cut her off, "does that mean the Mad Hatter is around? I've always wanted to meet him." I raised a questioning eyebrow, "whatever do you mean? I'm staring at him right now." 

"If you wanted to go out for a drink, you should've said, though I must warn you that Rosie over there-" he pointed to a female "-did ask first, and then Becky, then Kiara, then Isabelle, then a bunch of others, but Rosie was first. She might pull out her claws of I say yes to you before her." The wince on his face gave me enough evidence to believe that she'd use actually use violence. "Good thing I don't want a drink." He laughed at my response, "which department you working in?" He asked after the laughter subdued. "This one I think." A wide grin crossed his face almost instantly, "aren't you lucky? You get to work with this" he motioned to himself, "everyday. I bet Viccy here is jealous she can't have the same luxury." "Yeah right Romero." She scoffed and turned back to me.

"Shall we move on?" I nodded, and after bidding a temporary farewell to Dakota, followed Victoria back to the elevator. "Are we not seeing Department 3?" I asked, noticing how she pressed D4 on the elevator buttons, rather than D3. "Oh, Department 3 is the security floor. You know, the whole monitoring through cameras, regulating safety precautions for staff, controlling the patrol teams and security guards, all that sort of stuff." She said, "also, that department can only be accessed by the security teams and higher ups...like Dr. Turner and there's no reason for us to check it out anyways. We're here as the science nerds not the macho men, right?"

"Nerds? Really?" She nodded, "just go with it, I don't think it's that bad," I gave her a weird look, "nope. You are not changing my mind, it's not that bad." "You do realise 'it's not that bad" quite literally means it's still bad." I said, giving her a mini smirk, to which she responded with a sarcastic smile of her own, "I said go with it." Her tone however, pretty much implied the fact that she knew I was right but refused to agree with such.