"And on today's breaking news, Nutrien issued a lengthy statement just hours ago, apologizing to the parents of scholarship children for being unable to maintain their confidence in them. The directors appear to believe that the conflict is arising from the disconnection parents experience from their kids and the anxiety that results from it. 

They also appear to be taking full responsibility for failing to maintain a healthy channel of communication between parents and supervisors. They will be developing an app that allows parents to receive regular reports and check-in's with the supervisor as they wish. Apart from this, they will be dividing children of the same division into smaller groups. This is to ensure that they are receiving appropriate attention from their teachers. 

There will also be an anonymous review system. Each child shall be given a code that can only be intercepted by the machine and cannot be revealed to any living person. 

Mark Hubert, the CEO of Nutrien, made a personal statement on his ATOM account to dispel rumours of a defamation lawsuit against Jeremiah Brown. He boldly praised Jeremiah for his courage and stressed that it was important for children to hear stories such as his to be able to differentiate between healthy and toxic work environments, and that Nutrien would always have a zero-tolerance policy against ab—" 

"Can you please turn that off?" I say through gritted teeth. The bartender mutes it immediately. I slam my glass down on the counter—with a little more force than intended—and jump up from the tall chair.

I stare at the heavy oak doors, guarding the private room at the other end of this exclusive cocktail lounge, with my hands gripping the edge of the counter. Counting on the liquid courage dripping into my bloodstream, I unlock my phone, press 'Record,' and strategically place it back in my shoulder bag.

"You know, you don't have to watch her leave."

"I wasn't—"

"Save it! You're not fooling me. You didn't go after your dad, one bit. He couldn't flirt at all. I'm telling you, it used to be hard to watch."

"Oh, I believe you. So what do you think? Should I shoot my shot?"

"I don't like mixing my personal and professional life, but if you're okay with that—why not? And if you're asking me what I really think you're asking me—no. I promise I won't tell my brother."

"Well, thank you. I'll have to admit, there is a good chance she might refuse. She's a little unstable, right? She flinched pretty hard when the door swung shut behind her." 

"Fuck's sake, Wayne. The girl just got shot. If she refuses, it will be because she's smart."

"Oh fuck you, Mark—"

"She was right about Bex, you know that."

I pound my fists hard against the door when no one answers. My breath is ragged and there is a dull spasmodic pain in the muscles near my neck. I had rushed up the flight of stairs, rang the bell, and called her name several times before starting to knock.

"Oh come on," I moan, pounding my knuckles against the door again. I walk over to the window a few feet from the door, pressing my forehead against it to catch any movement inside. "Julie? Are you there?"

"Yeah, she was. We still have to be careful. Sure we wrapped a pretty bow around it and the response from Bex was great but that doesn't necessarily translate into votes. I know Councilwoman Kerry called you."

"God, I would kick her off her throne in a second if I could. I can't believe that prick would offer to sponsor her campaign behind my back."

"Mark. She's right. We need to find that whistleblower. It's not just about her. Zach's head is on the line too—by which I mean Westside."

"We can't blindly point fingers and harass too many of them now, can we? It would be difficult to keep under the radar and we'd have another scandal. The shares are looking up again and I am not comprising that. We've fired and settled a lot in the past few years. Aside from that, the whistleblower could still be working for us. It's going to take time! They just have to understand that!"

"I know. All I want to say is that I can help. Maybe your team isn't looking in the right place."

The door swings open suddenly and I quickly push away from the window. Julie stops near the door frame, pulling her cardigan closer to herself. Her loose uneven curls are pushed to the side revealing her bare face. Her eyes are wide and cautious.

"Oh thank god," I sigh, stumbling back with my hand on my chest.

"Do I know you? Can you please take off your mask?"

"I'm sorry, not until you let me in. I'm London. I need you to listen to something."

"Okay," She says, hesitantly. "But just so you know, I keep a gun in my house."

She steps aside, letting me in. I rip the scarf off my face as soon as I am inside. The warmth of her home pulling me into an embrace. It appears to be a modest one-bedroom. The kitchen can be seen from the living room. Aside from the gentle whistling of a kettle, she seems to be alone. She gestures towards the couch and I sit down, pulling out my phone.

"What do you mean by that? Do you have a better guess?"

"I think there are a few angles we need to consider in this story. For example, Julie. Now, I know you didn't ask me to look into this but I didn't want to present you with a half-baked theory."

"Just tell me, Wayne."

"I think she's conspiring with the ONA. I don't think she's the whistleblower. Maybe there is another person involved but I know that she didn't make any suspicious outgoing calls or messages in the days leading to the leak. I called my friend at Orion and had it double-checked. Unless she knew them from beforehand, which is unlikely because we ran a background check, she couldn't have used an underground application. You need personal cell numbers for that."

"So why do you think she's talking to them?"

"I sent a few men, with pictures, to her neighborhood. Just to ask if anyone had seen members of the ONA around her place and two of her neighbors recalled three masked people visiting her twice. They found the masks strange. It wasn't a windy day. I knew Julie's a loner, that's why I chose her. I'm not surprised if her neighbors remember her getting visitors. There were cameras on that road and the car they had arrived in was registered to a woman named Nora something. One of those Spanish surnames. Turns out, Nora's been an ONA member for six years and counting."

"Why didn't you tell me this sooner? This is absurd. I don't care if she's working with the whistleblower or they're not related at all. She's talking to the other side. You need to take care of this immediately."

"Well, what do you want me to do? We could give her a scare?"

"Just take care of it. Do it the old-fashioned way."

"Ah come on. A lawyer throwing fancy legal jargon regarding breach of contract and fines would be enough to—"

"Wayne. We can't have weak links, so don't waste your time and effort trying to be creative. Now shut up. London's on her way back from the restroom."

"Fine. I'll just make a call and be back."

Julie stares at my phone with glossy eyes. I reach out and pause the recording. She hugs her cardigan closer again.

"Do you live alone? Is there anyone you could stay with for a while?" I inquire softly. 

"Who are you? Why were you having drinks with them?" She asks, her eyes narrowing in suspicion.

"I am a reporter at the Reverent. My job often involves coordinating with Nutrien for certain articles and segments. I was the one who gave your name to the ONA."

"Oh, that was you," She mutters.

The doorbell tinkles. She springs up from the couch and rushes to the door. I stand up nervously. I want to scream at her to be careful but to my surprise, Martin and a woman, who's face seems vaguely familiar, enter. They overwhelm her with questions, repeatedly asking if she was okay, and making it evident that she had contacted them when a masked woman had shown up at her door, unannounced. When Martin turns the corner into the living room, his eyes fall on me.

"Are you kidding me? What could you possibly want now?" Martin asks rhetorically with a sharp edge to his voice.

"Let me explain," I say calmly, trying to deescalate the situation. I hit play on the recording again.

As the conversation starts to play, Julie walks into the kitchen and takes a few teacups from the racks. She pours the water from the kettle into the cups and carefully places tea bags, the kind you'd find in nuclear emergency kits, into them. As soon as I hear my voice on the tape, I move forward and pause it. 

"Can you send me the full recording?" The woman says, taking out her phone. "I'm Nora, from the tape. We're lucky we didn't use my car tonight." 

"How did you get here?" Martin asks, looking at me. 

"I took a taxi. I bought a skirt on the way and wore it over my dress too. They'd seen me in that dress already," I reply. My feet move forward gingerly as I hand my phone over to Nora. 

"You're telling us that's Mark Hubert? The Mark Hubert?" Nora comments with her eyebrows raised, as she takes the phone from my hands. 

"Yes," I say, my voice rising in pitch. "He's really here. He's staying at Park Excelsior. I'm not sure when he arrived but he's been here since Sunday morning." 

"His wife has been posting about him as if he's still with her in Ivo," Nora frowns, exchanging a look with Martin. Julie returns to the room and asks them to sit down before she does so herself. 

"I guess, he must be worried. Do you have a clue as to what he's worried about the most?" Martin questions. He doesn't sit down on the couch as Nora does. 

"Yeah, it's Westside. He said that he knows Cherry will be running for its seat in the council and he can't afford Councilman Young to lose," I say bringing them up to speed. 

"Well, we will worry about that later but first of all, Julie, you will have to move out of here," Nora replies. "We can get you to a safe house. It's a couple of minutes from the fringe of—" 

"And what? Stay there alone? I'd be a sitting duck," Julie says, her voice quivering in panic. 

"I promise you they won't be able to find you," Nora stresses. Martin exchanges a look with her and she sighs. 

"Would you be fine staying with me?" Martin asks, softly. "You can have your own room and the place is absolutely secure. There are guards all around the clock. Cherry is staying with me too, for a while." 

Julie nods hesitantly. "I just don't want to be alone." 

"Of course," Martin says offering her a small smile. "You should pack. You can't stay here tonight." 

"Okay," Julie agrees quickly. "Um." She pauses for a second as she stands and then quickly grabs the tray from the kitchen and sets it in front of us. There are some pastel-coloured sugar cookies on it too. "I may be on a hitlist but I can't be a bad host."

We all look at her with baffled expressions on our faces, as she putters away into a room. I grab the closest teacup and hold it with both my hands. Its warmth almost makes me forget where I am. I bring it close to my face and catch a hint of fresh berries. I believe Julie has been trying the new trend of fusing berries in tea. We did a feature on that. I look up to find Martin's cold stare trained on me. 

"Will you be passing this on to Mark?" he spits through his teeth. "Did he tell you to crash our Everton forum?" 

"I couldn't say no to him," I reply, almost in a whisper.

"But you could mislead people into believing that anonymous reviews mean anything." Martin shoots back. "You're the worst kind of person, you know? We're lucky Mark didn't ask you to kill Julie because—oh no—how could you ever say no to him." 

"Hey!" I exclaim defensively. "I would never kill someone, okay? He asked me to tell him what happens at the forum and give a few ideas as to what kind of changes they could bring. That's nowhere near murder. If I said no, he would understand that I'm on your side and I'd be the one with a target on my back." 

"No one's going to get you in your Murrey Gardens—doorman in the foyer—lift the size of this living room—apartment," Martin says, snidely. "Wise up." 

I purse my lips and look down at my tea. It's too hot for me to take a sip but hot enough that I want to press it to my neck to relax the throbbing. A new message lights up my phone with a short chime, the one reserved for work contacts. I quickly unlock it. 

"Drop it, Martin. She's a Northsider," Nora mutters.

"Not good enough. She's still accountable for her actions. I'm a Northsider, you see me pulling shit like this?" he whispers back. 

Sorry that I had to leave early today. Maybe we could get drinks again, sometime? Just the two of us. 

"Who is it?" Martin asks me, his eyes narrowing in suspicion. 

"Wayne." 

"What does it say?" he quickly asks. I sigh and pass my phone to him. He stares at the message for a few seconds and then passes it to Nora to read. She scoffs at it and then holds it out for me. 

"Well, what are you gonna say?" she asks. I grab my phone from her and shrug my shoulders. 

"Yes? No? I don't know. He's looking for the whistleblower. Councilman Hamdi told me there isn't one which means at some point, in their investigation, they'll know that I was the one who gave up Julie's name," I think out loud. My voice shakes. "What do I do?" 

Nora bites the inside of her cheek and turns to Martin. "Get Councilman on the line." 

Martin hesitates for a second and then reaches for his phone. I wait with bated breath as the dial tone rings. We left things at a strange place the last time we saw each other. 

"Emir, we have a situation." Martin sighs. 

"Great. What's wrong?" Emir asks. It's followed by a sound similar to the closing of a door. Martin doesn't hold back as he narrates the evening's events. Emir noncommittally hums to confirm that he's listening whenever Martin pauses. 

"Making sure Julie is safe should be our priority so I'm glad you've got that sorted. When she's feeling a little better, we can propose staying at the safe house again," Emir says once he's all caught up. 

"What about the recording?" Nora asks. "I've taken a copy. We can go over it again."

"Yeah, about the recording." Emir pauses. "I think we've touched a sore spot by mentioning that the whistleblower is an accountant. We know Zach and Kerry were being bribed but this suggests that there is an actual paper trail—one we could get our hands on." 

"Yeah that seems likely," Martin agrees. "I think we should focus on that. If we can get dirt on Zach, it could seal Westside's fate."

Nora hums in agreement. I part my lips and press them together again, wondering if it's my place to contribute. 

"Their campaigning is going to start in full swing. They have prime slots booked for minute—long advertisements already," I finally speak up. "I think you'll have to fight, tooth and nail, for ad airtime once they start to talk. If you still want to hold on to the narrative you've built, you should get the court to reiterate their previous decision on equal media time."  

"Oh, she's on this call. You could have told me," Emir murmurs. "Anyway, yes. Thank you, London. That's not half bad advice. The only problem is that we have other small opposition parties that will also get some airtime."

"Which means, we'll have to bear unnecessary attacks," Nora elaborates for me. 

"What if we could get the smaller parties to turn on them?" Martin says, leaning forward. His eyebrows furrowed in concentration. "If we can find proof of any payments made to Zach and Kerry, they wouldn't be looking at us." 

"You're right," Emir groans. "However, it's going to be impossible to find proof. If we actually had a whistleblower—" 

"We could," I cut in. Nora and Martin look at me, confusion clear in their expressions. "I could try and convince Wayne to give me access to employee profiles. I'll tell him that I want to help!" 

"You mean, the second voice on the tape? The one who texted you right now?" Emir inquires. 

"Yes." 

"Can you do it?" Emir asks, skeptically. "You're not exactly the most trustworthy person." 

I swallow hard, staring at the dark phone screen. I can feel Martin and Nora's eyes on me. 

"I know I've made questionable decisions, but I can do this," I say, firmly. "Please let me try. It might not look that way but I want ONA..."—My voice drops to almost a whisper—"to win." 

"I fucking hate saying this, but she's our best option right now," Martin huffs loudly, running a hand through his hair.

"Okay then," Emir says in a strained voice, "That's settled." 

"Councilman, another thing. Do you want to know who Kerry's new sponsor is? If it's bothering Mark, I feel like it's worth looking into," Nora pitches in. "I think it's Orion as they've been lobbying Kerry hard. They can't do without Bex, right?" 

"Yes and I think it's Orion too," Emir replies. There is some rustling on his end. "It's not a pressing concern so don't bother with that. I need you to run point on something else. We had a meeting this evening and there was no resistance to the arrival of international election observers. Something about it feels sketchy to me." 

"Maybe they're afraid of us resorting to unfair methods?" Martin suggests jokingly, and Emir snorts. He continues in a more serious tone. "Maybe they're mixing fake ones in?" 

"Could be," I mutter. "These are provincial elections." 

"Exactly." Martin nods. Nora looks between the two of us, before asking me to elaborate. 

"If I got mixed responses from observers at Germany's regional elections," I start to explain. "It would be saved for a passing mention in an evening segment. Their ruling party could act unfairly, and it would go right under the radar. International relations would remain golden." 

"Well, that drives home how important it is then," Emir says. "Nora, look into this, will you? I'll take care of the whistleblower with London." 

---

I throw my flask in the garbage bin, sitting in the corner of her building's foyer, before stepping into the lift. When Chloe opens her door, her jaw drops. I stay speechless, for a few seconds, overwhelmed with gratitude for her familiar face. 

"I desperately need a hot towel or something for my neck," I say. My voice breaks as my eyes fill up with tears again. 

"Gosh, come in," She pulls me in, closes the door behind us, and engulfs me in a hug. 

"Door locked. The security key is resetting. Nice to see you, London." Her home security A.I. calls out. 

We walk to her bedroom and she grabs a small electric bag for me. She switches it on and asks me to wait a minute for it to heat up. Sitting down next to me on her bed, she finally asks, "So, what happened?" 

"I fucked up," I reply. I wipe my nose in the soft handkerchief she passes me. "I don't even know where to begin." 

"How about this? Let's wait for your neck to get better. Call your dad and tell him you're staying with me tonight. We will watch the new episode of Cupid's Arrow. I mean, I heard they sent two couples home