The Rise Of The Consortium

The sky was bright when Rio looked outside the window washing her hands. She had been working there since morning. She never knew there might be such early morning customers in the city. That made her feel that she was not the only one who works like that. She was happy that she had to fill the containers after other workers started arriving in the coffee delivery section. There was no usual chit-chat, only hands speeding up according to the customers' orders.

As per the schedule, she prepared to leave the cafe. Just as she was going to leave, one of her coworkers handed her a coffee cup with a little smile on her face. "Your reward for coming early, as per the work details." the girl was waiting for Rio to take the paper cup, looking surprisingly patient.

Rio looked at the white badge on her dark green shirt where her name was written. "Thank you, Belloine."

"It's Bel." she gave another short smile and went back to the counter. Rio stood there for a moment, gazing at her cup until her worker ID vibrated in her trouser pocket. She quickly got out of the cafe to have her coffee and took out her ID to see where she had to go next. She found a message from the lab among her other messages while casually checking her ID. there was only mention of the time she had to arrive. She felt relieved that she could walk comfortably and reach there in half an hour.

She walked towards the garden square. She started thinking about why things were getting tense all of sudden. She came across a puddle of smoke ahead, which was spread across the street. People quickly entered the street as that was not filled with smoke yet. It took time for Rio to understand that. She also saw some pedestrians covering their mouth with their hands and rushing into the street. That made her overwhelmed but the only thing she could do was to keep moving ahead.

"Don't go ahead, there's a lot of smoke." one of the pedestrians shouted at her suddenly and moved away. It was clear that he was uncomfortable so he didn't wait for her response.

She didn't bother with the slowly increasing crowd in the street and took a deep breath when she made it to the end of the street. The smoke made everything translucent. Rio stood at a free spot, away from the crowd and looked closely at the smoke. It was shining when she looked it against the dark background of a tree. She guessed that as the dust which she found in machines over the past few days. But where did that come from? Was there a dust breakout at some shop? Or did any factory had a failed machine which dumps the dust? It might not have come from the shop as the dusty smoke was entering that street at the moment. She looked around to see the source of the smoke.

"What are you looking at?" a man appeared from the crowd and stood beside Rio. He was wearing a nose mask and had a black cap on his head.

"Me? Nothing. Nowhere." Rio stopped looking and instead looked down at her feet. She bit her lower lip, thinking that she now looked like an idiot. What she must say to further questions from a stranger? She clenched her fist inside her trouser pockets, trying to remember where she was supposed to head at.

"You should have stayed in street five. The smoke won't go away for at least an hour." the man was sounding nice, Rio thought to herself.

"Do you know where this smoke is coming from?" Rio looked briefly at the man, trying to know who he might be. He didn't look anything like Kner.

"The largest filter in the industrial area is shut down." he looked around to make sure no one was noticing him. Rio's eyes went wide as she heard the words 'largest filter'. Was it the most well-functioning factory in the city of Termist? What would happen to the medicine supply? She paused for a moment to clarify her doubts before she could start worrying.

"The filter of the pharmaceutical company?" she tried sounding even, but even the thoughts of the company going under such an emergency shivered her whole body.

"Yes, it is." the man stood leaning his back on a tree, quietly observing the rushing crowd. Rio took a deep breath. This can no way be possible. If the factory shuts down for a day, many wrong things would happen. She didn't know why but an unknown fear crept into her mind, making her unable to think about anything else.

She was lost in her thoughts until a woman rushed into the street pushing past the crowd shouting, "Run everyone, a Zolzein is attacking in street three and heading here, now!". Rio and the man straightened themselves up at the sound of shrieks of the crowd who were told to quickly run into the street.

"Ridiculous." the man spoke out disgusted and looked at Rio instead, who was looking mildly shocked and appeared to be talking to herself.

"But that's where I have to go," Rio spoke silently, her brows furrowed.

"Do you believe in such things?" the man's eyes pointed out the crowd, perhaps referred to the woman who just created chaos.

"I don't know." Rio now looked at street three ahead, through the lamp post of the garden square.

"Good, don't ever suddenly jump into what people say. Things can be misleading too." he didn't sound very pleased with whatever just happened. "Well, where exactly do you want to go?" the man responded as if he listened properly what she spoke to herself.

"What, where?" Rio felt baffled as she couldn't think where she should go now. Suddenly her ID started vibrating and looking at it, she found that she had less than ten minutes to reach the lab. She had to go now else she might not be permitted without losing some money.

"I've got to go now." Rio became panicked and looked around which way she should take now to reach street three.

"But you didn't say where you're going?" the man observed Rio as she stepped towards the periphery of the garden.

"Did you say who you are?" that was completely unexpected. Did Rio just say that? The man smiled to himself at her response. "By the way, I'm going to the lab. You know, there's only one lab in street three, three blocks ahead of the pharmaceutical company." Rio glanced at the man one more time and thought how disgusting is it going to be, that she had to take a full circle from the end of street five to reach street three but she can't reach there anticlockwise by crossing street four.

"Head office of Stubeleris Corps.?" the man still looked at Rio, who stood there, looking at street three. "You can call me D.L.," he noticed Rio turning towards him, whether she was mad or worried, it was hard to tell.

"D.L. as in Deficiency Low or Decilitre?" she didn't look at him for long and instead began walking clockwise in the peripheral road of the garden. She better should hurry, else Kner would be mad at her. She was going there after how many days, she couldn't figure out. She shouldn't do anything that might disappoint him.

D.L. followed her chuckling. Did she just equivalented his name with a medical term and a measuring unit? She's really interesting. "I'd go with Deficiency Low cause the other one doesn't make any sense."

Rio quickened her steps and approached the crowd filled perimeter, everyone was panicked and hasty. Many things were going on in her mind. What she should do in the lab when she doesn't know a thing about the password? And what's going to happen now that the filter was not functioning for the time being. The chaos about the attack was too far fetched to think about.

DL also walked close to Rio now that there was crowd going clockwise in the perimeter and he didn't understand why she was going somewhere the danger was awaiting her.

"Hey, you didn't say why you were going there?" he asked louder so that she could listen properly amidst the noises of vehicles.

"I work there." she was only focused on going to street three. She had only passed street six in the last five minutes and her ID was vibrating faster. She didn't understand what was taking her longer to get to the lab. She paused for a moment and looked ahead of her to find some empty spots in the middle of the vehicles. She took a deep breath and looked at the man behind her.

"Please, I've got to go. I'm getting late. It'll be better if we go ahead in our ways."

DL looked at the panic-stricken face of her. "OK. But how would I find you next time?"

Rio was losing patience with this stranger. "The way you found me in street five." She turned away from him and took another breath. She began run-walking through the crowd and didn't mind knocking with some others. She had only one thing in her mind, to get into street three real quick.

"But there's an attack going on there." DL hurried after her but gradually he lost her. Maybe she was really in a hurry. He would have to find another way to meet her.