Ryder yawned leisurely before sitting down in the crappy plastic chairs that sat together in rows in the makeshift briefing room. He hadn't slept for hell last night, or the night before. Their hours were all over the place. He had gotten sent out at 19:00 to patrol the quarantine fence line. The particular area he had been in charge of had the highest amount of escapees and damage reported. It was a line where the fence broke through a nearby tree line that provided lots of cover for those seeking to damage it. If he would have been consulted, that would have been the first thing to go, as well as a few other thousand recommendations he had. Unfortunately, he hadn't been consulted, only recruited to enforce, so that's what he did. He had got in at 3:00 am after one chase resulting in a capture, one chase that had resulted in an officer getting shot with no capture, and one suspect taken in with the contents on his person to make a homemade bomb.

The kid hadn't wanted to hurt anyone thankfully. He just wanted that fence down. They all did. People didn't tend to see the sane reasons why certain people were being kept quarantined away from others. They didn't see that these measures were being enforced for the protection of others. No, all they saw was the military keeping their mother away from them. Their brother being taken away for no reason at all. It made him irritated that people wouldn't use their damn heads.

He had shuffled in and gotten about four hours of sleep before having to wake up and report to the briefing room. He sat back in the chair, his eyes glancing at the coffee machine in the corner. No one had bothered to make a pot though, the empty canister sitting near the machine. He made a mental note to get coffee the second he got out of here.

Folders were passed around the room at random. Today they would be finding aliens who hadn't checked in at the Visa department. Most of their locations were unknown, and none were reported on the deceased list. Ryder opened his folder and looked over the picture of a brunette male, age 37, wife recently marked deceased. His eyes scanned the page twice before shutting the folder.

Yawning again he leaned forward in his chair, his eyes glancing lazily at the officer next to him. The guy's folder was open still and Ryder's eyes glanced at the picture. It was her. It was the girl he had an...altercation with days ago. "Hey. Switch with me." The other guy looked a little confused but Ryder grabbed the folder from him without waiting for an explanation. He shoved his folder at the guy and stood up, jogging to his barracks. He changed out of his uniform and put on civilian clothes, keeping his weapons, badge and identification hidden. He sat on the edge of the bed and read her file.

GRIFFITHS, BRIANNA MAY

Age: 24

"Anna my ass." He murmured to himself as he continued reading on. She looked like a different person in the picture on her Visa. She was smiling, in an inciting and dangerous way. She wasn't a stranger to breaking hearts. 

She was from Australia, visiting for holiday. At least that part had been somewhat true. She had come into the country with her mother, father and brother. He pursed his lips a moment when he read over the report marking them recently deceased. He had been right. She was in a bad spot. He read over the rest of her papers before putting her folder on the nightstand that he was using as a makeshift desk. He ordered a car and got in, giving the guy the directions to go downtown. That was where he had first seen her and decided that was as good a place to start as any.

There weren't too many places she could be hanging around. He didn't know how much money she had on her, but he figured she couldn't get a hotel without an ID and that would have been flagged in their system. No, she had to stay somewhere low. He sat back in the car, a yawn escaping his lips. They were about ten minutes down the road and he spoke up, "Hey, actually take me to a coffee shop." The man nodded and Ryder closed his eyes. He wondered why she didn't check-in. Surely she could see that they would have given her some grace. They wouldn't have shipped her out immediately. True, she wouldn't have been able to take her parent's or brother's body back with her, that would have to wait, but hiding wasn't going to help that.

The car stopped and Ryder got out, making his way to the coffee place. When he entered, the smell of freshly baked bread made his stomach protest so he ordered a red-eye coffee and a croissant with it. He paid the barista and took them outside, walking over to the car. He told the driver he'd walk from there and nodded a goodbye. He walked back to the outdoor seating outside the coffee shop and sat down, sipping the hot liquid. His eyes glanced over the crowd and the people nearby. Most were keep a good distance, but a few were hurrying around and pushing much closer than 6ft. 

He leaned back in the chair, relaxing and letting the coffee warm him up. His eyes had followed the crowd until they landed on a blonde, a table up from where he was, her back to him. He watched a second, debating on what to do. He wasn't completely sure it was her. What the hell, he thought to himself. He walked over, his eyes falling upon her soaking up the sunshine. It was definitely her. He sat down at the table across from her, his face relaxed, a grin on his lips, "If I didn't know better I'd worry you're stalking me." 

Ryder could tell the irritation in her face that arose from his presence immediately. If she didn't hate him, he probably wasn't too far from that line. He didn't care. He had a job to do. There were more important things to worry about than if some girl didn't like him. He had tried offering her a hand, a lifeline when it was clear she had needed it. She had instead chosen to get pissy and indignant about it all. Whatever transpired between them had been her fault, at least in his mind of course. When she said the line belonged to her he laughed, "Don't flatter yourself sweetheart. This isn't a big town." He took another sip of the coffee, the warm liquid waking up the parts in his brain that were still sluggish. He glanced over at her leisurely and found she was boring holes in him with her narrowed eyes. He was thankful at that moment that he had worn Kevlar under his shirt, if she had a weapon there was no doubt in his mind she'd use it on him.



She asked why he was there and he lifted his coffee cup, "Wanted coffee. Then I saw you here and thought I'd offer to buy you a cup to make up for our last meeting." He finished off the remainder of his croissant while he watched her internal struggle on whether or not to believe him. Damn, she really did hate him, he thought a little humorously to himself.

He had just taken another sip of his coffee to wash down the buttery pastry when she felt the need to assure him that she didn't like him. He laughed, "Oh yeah? Well, thanks for letting me know. I mean, I thought the go-to-hell looks were flirting but yeah, thanks for clearing that up." He wondered what the hell was going on in her mind. Normally he could read people easily but she was like a damn brick wall in hieroglyphs. "At the risk of pissing you off further...you're not my type so no worries there." He sat back in his chair a second, letting out an exasperated sigh. "Look, I'm not here to get on your nerves or piss you off. I thought I'd offer you a coffee and that's that. If you want me to leave just say the word." It wasn't true of course, but it wasn't like he could actually tell her the truth. Plus he'd much rather gain her trust a little bit so that when he told her she had to come with him there might be a little less hostility.



He looked at the table next to them and grabbed the to-go menu from it, his eyes scanning over the list of foods and beverages they offered. "They also have frappes, whatever the hell that is." He scanned the menu once more before sliding it across the table to her. Ryder then pulled out his phone and pretended to write a text, as if she was the last thing on his mind. Just a normal guy doing normal guy things. He kept his eyes on his phone, his fingers moving as if he was texting as he quietly hummed the song No Games by breaking benjamin.

Ryder watched as she crossed her arms. She wasn't biting, not in the least. His mind quickly ran into overdrive trying to think up a way to make this easier on her. Tried working out a new plan to get her to talk to him but none held water. She wanted him gone. She looked tired and she was wearing the same clothes she had been wearing when he had first met her. She wasn't in a good place mentally, and he knew those conditions only made it harder for him. She told him the best thing he could do for her was to leave her alone and he nodded, "Yeah. I know that, I get that." He sighed.



He glanced around them. There were more people out and about in the walkway than he would have preferred. He wished she had listened to him and sat down. He wished she had dropped her anger enough to hear him out. He could have slowly led into his job, slowly let into the reality that she would be coming with him, no choices about it. Instead she had tried to kill him with her glares, tear him down piece by piece with her words.



Ah to hell with it, he thought irritatingly to himself. "I can't though Brianna." He tried to speak softly to her, he tried to convey a calm gentleness. He met her eyes, hoping she could drop her cursed anger for him a minute to rationally listen to him. Ryder unzipped the jacket he had been wearing, opening up the right side of it where a military ID was clipped in. "I'm a warrant officer with the military. Your visa was flagged." She had to know, surely she had to know there would be no way to get around this. That she was going to have to come with him, at least if she planned on staying out of trouble. "I need you to come with me. We need to get some questions answered." There weren't too many options that she would be looking at of course. She would be deported and that was all there was to it.