ID: Artemisia Sinclair | Location: Eternity One Career Expo

As the metal plate loudly clattered on the floor, Artemisia glanced towards one of the many corporate drones, the ones keeping an eye on the hall for her parents. A tiny, almost unnoticeable shake of her head, and she knew that the man would be struck from the process, unable to proceed to interviews or anything of the sort even if he managed to score superhumanly on the other sections. There was no place for snivelling cowards at Eternity One.

With a hum, she returned her attention to the applicant beside her. “Clever, aren’t you? Though sometimes the fodder surprises us.” Artemisia paused for a moment, slowly looking around the room, before looking back at Delphine as she stood from her chair. “Good luck, Miss de Rosier. Though it seems it is not needed,” she added, with an amused smile. “May you find the grass on this side to be greener.” With that, she strode away, not casting a glance backwards as she began to make her way through the rest of the list of potentially useful candidates.

While Delphine was clearly highly skilled, she was far too intelligent for her own good, Artemisia decided. Far too confident, even in how she spoke to the heiress, and too clearly aware of her position compared to other applicants. That kind of talent would be invaluable to have at Artemisia’s beck and call, but she would have to keep a close eye on the woman. Another job for her little spy, she supposed. It would be easy enough to find out what made Delphine tick, and exploit it - ambition, she thought. Or spite. Or a falling out of some kind, familial issues. There were too many possibilities. She made a mental note to get Mouse to investigate what she could of the situation at Elysium Core, and why such a prized applicant full of potential would be here, of all places.

As she reached the main area, she beckoned one of her parents’ observers over from his position along the wall, giving him a few subtle motions to instruct him to keep an eye on the de Rosier girl. Though Artemisia doubted she was here to spy for Elysium Core, it was a possibility she couldn’t be seen to neglect. And if she truly was here for legitimate reasons, then Eternity One couldn’t afford to lose the chance to snatch such talent - a couple notes from an observer, and her parents would understand that. As the man moved away to reposition himself, she began to make her way across the room to the stairs up to the viewing platform.

This year’s stress test was specially planned by her parents, and they seemed enthusiastic about its chances. Artemisia was more doubtful. The false timer alarm was inventive, she granted, but while its purpose was to make the candidates believe they had used far more time - and thus had far less remaining and lower chances of being hired - than they truly had, she suspected most candidates were aware of the times they had spent at various stations. This would weed out only the weaklings who had little chance of success anyway, the ones who had already been dismissed by the observers. Still, it was the type of test best watched from above, to see whether candidates’ speed and performance were interrupted on a broader scale, and so she began to climb the viewing platform’s stairs.

After a minute or two, spent making sure she was acquainted with the rhythm of the crowd before the stress test, Artemisia clasped her hands on the railing and gave a nod to one of her parents’ observers. Another brief moment, as the message was relayed, before the false chime was sounded, attempting to convince the candidates they had spent well over half an hour longer on the premises. The rotating hologram in the centre of the foyer lit up accordingly, an extra layer adding to the fabrication, and Artemisia watched like a hawk as the weakest candidates began to increase their pace, stumbling into one another - and employees, and as the number of errors at stations began to increase.

ID: Delphine de Rosier | Location: Eternity One Career Expo

The interaction had been short, as expected it had been eloquent and polite in tone but there was an understanding established almost immediately. It would be naive to assume that she wasn’t being watched closely, the Sinclair family knew who she was and where she was. The invitation was likely a form of test, perhaps a few rolled up into one pretty package. To test her loyalty to her lineage, to test her capabilities and to determine if she was there purely to benefit Elysium or herself. Quite clever.

As Artemisia made her exit, Delphine hovered in the spot where the conversation had ended. The grass may be greener but she did not doubt that there were snakes hiding within it.

A slight tap on her shoulder made the woman turn around, locking eyes with an older gentleman offering her a nervous smile. His hand moved from her shoulder to gesture at the station she was blocking.

“I apologise, ma’am, but may I use this station?” He asked in that overly polite corporate manner, to which Delphine met him with a placid smile and nod of her head before turning to walk to the next station. The moment she turned away, all hints of kindness dropped from her face and fell into a cold analytical gaze.

She was only a mere two minutes into fitting the artificial liver when the loud alarm rang out across the halls. She didn’t need to look up from her station as the message was on her screen, flashing amber. Her hand paused, still holding the portal vein elevated from the model as she looked at the announcement.

Delphine’s pause was momentary as she continued her work, neither a waiver in her pace nor her demeanour. That announcement was impossible, she had only completed two stations and that had taken under fifteen minutes. Even with her short interaction with the Sinclair heiress, it had not been that amount of time. Either that or she had time jumping powers she was unaware of.

Delphine kept to her work, as did a few other applicants, meticulously tinkering away on their models. Others were not quite as composed, the sound of metal hitting the ground came more frequently, as did the mutterings of people as they talked themselves down from an attack of some sort. In fact, it was rather distracting to Delphine when the person beside her began shaking their leg uncontrollably, their breathing harsh and loud.

Her head did not move, but her arm shot out from her side and clamped down on the man’s thigh and pushed it down with greater force than her small arms could be expected to exert, the cyber joints locking into place and divoting the muscle beneath his dress pants. He sucked in a surprised breath and snapped her head up to look at Delphine, eyes wide and sweat beading on his brow.

“Would you kindly stop vibrating and huffing like some sort of animal, it is terribly distracting.” Delphine’s comment was a level volume but the venom behind it was poignant in the way she articulated her consonants.

The man nodded after a heartbeat, a little too frantically for Delphine to feel any sort of sympathy for his anxiety as she peeled her hand away from the man and rose to her feet. She had completed the implantation with her other hand whilst speaking, the monitor attached flashing yet another impression time as Delphine stalked away from the station.

ID: Mouse | Location: K9's Apartment

She followed the trajectory of the chip with her eyes for a moment before focusing back on his face. At least he’d agreed, though he definitely didn’t seem eager about it. Perhaps he considered all of those people to be the same - she certainly had, at one point. But in a group of evils, there was always a lesser one.

“Yep. You at least get a couple hours of warning.” Mouse leaned back on the counter, resting on her hands. And he should consider himself lucky for those couple of hours, in her opinion. Usually Miss Sinclair would just tell her to go somewhere immediately. For someone who spent so much time dealing with corporate schedules, she seemed completely incapable of understanding the existence of other people’s schedules. Maybe that wasn’t a Miss Sinclair thing. Maybe it was just a corporate elite thing. They’d probably never had to adjust to anyone else’s schedules before, probably never even considered the existence of them.

“And yeah, it could’ve been a phone call or a text. But Miss Sinclair’s all strict about that kind of thing. Makes sense, I guess. If you were creating an empire under the nose of another, you’d avoid anything that could be traced, too.” If the mystery of the whole chip and the promise of escaping the elder Sinclairs didn’t snare him, she was sure that hinting at Miss Sinclair’s ambitions would pique his interest. She’d probably get one hell of a lecture if that got back to her boss, but that was a problem for later - or, hopefully, never.

Those ambitions were the reason Mouse considered herself an employee of Miss Sinclair rather than the cruel heads of the family - well, the ambitions and the fact that she owed Miss Sinclair her life after that disastrous attempt to infiltrate Eternity One. She certainly understood the woman’s determination to keep them secret, given that the upper city seemed as vicious as the lower city sometimes, but while her philanthropic mask fooled the upper class - and the middle class - people down here had learned long ago not to trust kindness if it came in the hands of an elite. Especially a Sinclair. Hinting that Miss Sinclair might be seeking to topple the system, particularly her parents, would appeal far more to the types of people who lived in the lower city. Most of them had a reason to hate the Sinclairs - they may not like the heiress, but Mouse suspected that most of them would understand her ability to take the revenge they couldn’t. Whether they thought she’d be any better was a concern for later, and for Miss Sinclair to consider rather than Mouse. Maybe it made her a terrible gutter rat, but she didn’t mind the corporate types being in charge so long as they let her get some crumbs of the pie.

She tilted her head, grinning at him. “So? I’ll be seeing you there?” She’d be needing to get back to Miss Sinclair soon, the woman was always more strict if she thought Mouse was delaying her errands. The hiring event had given her a decent section of time to work with, but she suspected she’d be called on before it ended.

ID: K9 | Location: K9’s apartment

He raised an eyebrow, the sharp arch of the thick hair abrupt before falling back down. Under the nose of another, that was interesting. This young upstart corpo was going to try and wrench free from her blood relatives. Harsh and cold, he thought. Then again, most people were in this city.

The moment of interest quickly passed as K9 dwelled on the premise that he was going to be cog in this family feud, which would likely end in his demise. A painful death, drawn out and pointless in the grand scheme of things. Delightful.

He lifted a hand, the one without the chip, and waved it dismissively. “Whatever the Sinclairs do doesn’t particularly interest me, either way I’ll get the short end of that stick.” K9 sneered mildly, leaning back against the kitchen counter, his hand gripping the edge of the plastic topper.

Lifting his head, he saw the wide grin of Mouse as she peered over at him, ever the strange creature in the way she was perched on the opposite counter.

“I doubt I have a choice.” The quip was barbed, hinting at the rising irritation that fizzled under his skin. A moment later, his chest inflated and compressed with a huge sigh, head dropped. “I’ll be there, Mouse.” His voice was resigned, tired and pliable.

K9 pushed his way off of the counter and stalked out of the kitchen, immediately plunging into the sunken sofa area, melting into the stained cushions. His arms extended over the back of the chair and he tipped his head back to look up at Mouse. His hair flopping towards the floor, exposing his entire face to her, it was deadpan.

“Why is she upsetting her perfectly ideal life? The wealth, the power, she has it all on a silver platter. Gold platter, even.” K9 couldn’t help but sweep his eyes in a long roll. “Why give allat up? I’d be livin’ the life if I had that kinda cash.” He would have a decent apartment to start, not this moulding pathetic excuse of a home.

Didn’t really help any aspect of his life, this apartment. Cost a small fortune, broken into every second month, stains from god knows where. Not only that, if he managed to attract any sort of attention from a woman, she would be expecting a luxurious apartment if his bike was anything to go off of. What was he supposed to do? Walk her back here and pretend that nothing was odd about that? In fact, he didn’t even want to bring his few friends here, it was frankly, disgusting.

ID: Delphine de Rosier | Location: Eternity One Expo / Street

There weren't many stations left in this area for her to complete, a few small things. Ports, chip readers, dermal implants. Nothing impressive, nothing worth wasting her time on. If she could install a dual operator optics unit within ten minutes, she could slap some dermal armour onto an arm in moments. As much as she didn’t want to peek over at the board, she did and spotted her name at the top. Lingering for a moment to observe the other names, just in case some one came crawling up from the trenches to threaten that lovely ranking. When the four names below her stacked on another load of long times, Delphine kissed her teeth and peeled herself away from the implant room.

Everything else in this expo was more analytics based, seeking out good managers, errand runners. Delphine didn’t need to concern herself with that at all. It seemed she had already drawn enough attention anyway if the interaction with Sinclair Junior was anything to go off of. Besides, she had someone to meet.

Delphine slithered her way through the main hall, ignoring the other frantic prospective employees, stepping out into the smog-covered street. The noise increase was noticeable, the walls of the corporate building dulling the revs of suped up engines, the distant rattling of gunfire. The serene atmospheric ambience of Eden.

Whilst she was a well put together young woman, dressed to the nines and clearly a corporate worker, Delphine yearned for the excitement that others bathed in. The adrenaline that their lives were filled with made her so unapologetically jealous that she could almost chew on the emotion. Of course, she was no fool. Living in constant fear of a rogue bullet taking you out or a rival gang jacking your brain in the night, that wasn’t the part she was craving. It was the high speed chases, the thrill of a heist, the desire to have a close knit group that she trusted more than her own blood. Call her spoiled an stupid, but she felt the way she did and she would never apologise for it.

K9 was the first brawler she had seen in the ring the very first night she has ventured down to The Pipes. Delphine had made sure she looked the part, dirt smeared across her skin, an oversized hoodie that was almost ripped to tethers and unkempt hair. In fact, the first thing she witnessed of K9 was the brain rattling sound of his fist colliding with the jaw of his opponent, steel enforced and K9 had crumpled it to an unrecognisable mess.

When he had finished and stalked to the bar, Delphine had followed him and eventually he convinced her to head out on a ride with him. She suspected he was trying to get lucky, like most men, but it didn’t pan out that way. Unluckily for him. Instead, in the past year and half they had become close friends. At least, as close as you could get in Eden. Unfortunately, in the past few months Delphine had been tied up with her work for her parents and they hadn’t seen each other.

But tonight, tonight there was a race. Delphine had secured him the best wheels out there, the newest designs with the hottest injection of nitrous oxide mixture. He was going to eviscerate the other racers tonight and win the jackpot. Her only condition was that she was the ride along in the race. She would provide the funds, the wheels, the buy in cost, but she had to be in that car. Of course, she would never ask him to risk ruining his motorcycle.