Instincts premeditated her moves before her subconscious guided her movements. Paris attaches the access badge to the biometric scanner, and a ding signals her about the entrance they earned.

Paris and Andriana slid into the security room with stealthy steps. They turned off most of the lights, except the one focusing on the monitors. Paris quickly operated the system connecting all the five monitors mounted onto the wall. Managing the time, she prevented herself from lacking in speed as she typed away rapidly onto the keyboard. While Andriana stood behind her, keeping her eyes on the security guard they fooled five minutes ago. He could be returning any minute by now.

"Did you got your fingers on anything?" Andriana whisper-yelled, but Pairs only shushed her.

A few minutes later, "Wait, there's no footage of Fifth February." She looks at the sweeper she bribed with money and drinks. "You said they kept all the footage here?" She turned back to the fifteen cameras capturing routine corners of the building, even the areas not in use. "What are we gonna do?"

Andriana pauses, broods, and says, "We gotta look into Cubin's office."

"I don't like the sound of it." Paris fixes her cap.

"Me neither, but you gotta move."

They moved through the corridors connecting the three hallways and stopped in the second hallway.

"You are not coming in?" Andriana shook her head, "Then how am I supposed to find what we are looking for?"

"I've risked enough for you."

"Then why did you help me from the beginning?"

"Because you seemed desperate, and you also paid me. Cubin comes in after eleven. You still got two hours." She said before using the access badge.

"Fine. Look out for me?"

"Look into the lower drawers." It was the last thing Paris heard before Andriana locked her inside, guarding the door herself.

The hallway was empty, scantily lighten. Rock music rocking people sounded muffled on the other side of the building. Andriana had always craved such thrilling adventures, but she was mostly helping Paris because she wanted to see Peter Cubin behind bars.

She comprehended conspiracy when she noticed beaten-up Paris entering the club. Her appearance was catchable due to her hideous attire and early hour entrance.

Andriana wanted retaliation for all the humiliation she suffered under Cubin for five years. Footsteps ruptured the excitement of her envisioned future as the same guard they stole the id card from, approached.

"What are you doing here?" Fumbles of words straighten out only in a moment,

"I am looking for my broomstick. I lost it somewhere."

"Oh, man! You lost it too?"

With wide eyes, "Why? What did you lose, Stephen?"

Stephen hesitated and leaned over to whisper, "My badge."

Andriana gasps dramatically, "Shit! Stephie. What are you gonna do?" She asked the young security guard. He was like a son to her. Hoping he doesn't get her in trouble and not get himself in trouble either, she said, "I think I saw you drop it at the counter when you were talking with Isac. I may be wrong, so you should check there once."

Before striding away, "If you want, we can look for your broomstick together after I find my badge. Your shift's over. Martin must be waiting for you."

"No. Don't worry about that. I must have left it somewhere around here." It convinces Stephen as his tall-bulky figure exits the hallways.

"You gotta move faster. People are questioning." She talks to Paris through the closed door, knowing how effortlessly her voice could travel through the thin door.

"Found it!" Paris emerges back from the office, claiming her success by waving the compact discs crammed in the small box with the date registered in red ink. "He had it saved in his vault..."

"How did you open that?"

"He had written his password in his diary and left it on his desk."

"Shit!" Andriana was too dumbfounded to say anything. "That's too easy."

"Do you think that it's a trap?"

"Not at all, Sherlock. Cubin is just dumb." Paris only rolls her eyes before they move back to the security room and shuffles through the fifteens CDs Paris got her hands on.

"Which one could it be?" She gesticulates through the discs as there were fifteen recordings of the different cameras.

"Try five," Andriana suggests.

"Are you sure? We don't have much time. We need the right one. Do you remember where those events took place?"

"You and that girl were sitting on the right side of the bar counter before that guy came."

"Right side of the counter? What camera number records that? Are you sure it's the fifth one?"

"No. Try seven. Seven is my lucky number."

"We're not playing lucky draw here."

"You got any other idea?"

A decisive moment later, "Fine. Nine is my lucky number, then." Paris rolled her eyes at her own childish give-in.

It was not the number seven or nine but the number eleven.

With anticipated spirits, they watched the CCTV footage.

Tipsy Paris stumbles through the nightclub, sober enough to scan the crowd and locate an isolated stool at the right end of the bar counter to get more inebriate.

Her loitering lasts more than twenty minutes before she again glances at the dancing and drinking throngs of people, and her eyes stop at a blond girl sitting only a few feet away from her. Even through the degradable video quality, Paris realized her heart thumping hoping Andriana wouldn't hear it by looking at the gorgeous virtual Monica.

If only she could recapitulate their only meeting.

Paris didn't stagger her way to Monica as she had predicted. Clicking the fast forwarding key, Paris and Monica chatted for the past forty-five minutes, mostly Monica crying and Paris consolidating her. The camera had an adequate focus on their movements.

They were settled at a distance from the entrance, missing the entry of Julian. He stomped across the room before abruptly standing in front of the pair.

Paris seemed bewildered by his hasty arrival and moves back as his forceful pop-up had her stumbling. He immediately starts holding Monica as if he was harassing her, making Paris an intruder between them instead.

The truncated events quickly lead to more horrendous circumstances. Monica was already tipsy to focus on anything that Julian had to ascertain. Paris only stood beside them, probably not deciphering the situation other than thinking how FOMO she felt by their behavior.

Paris was a stranger to them, and they were also strangers to her, but anyone could tell how flattered Paris looked next to Monica and by Monica.

Julian's hostility must be flustering for her but Monica's dismal against him had Paris on her lookout.

The loud music must be hindering their talk. Julian clasps Monica by arm before abruptly dragging her out of the room.

He would rather convince her in private than display their couple ruction in front of a stranger.

Paris and Andriana closely watched Paris following Julian dragging Monica upstairs. The couple's fight must have been concerning for her as she decided to take off after them.

Playing another compact disc, following people's movement in the footage, skipping through the two floors, Julian settles for the rooftop they could talk peacefully.

Their fight was probably for the reason Monica mentioned in her Diary, her request for Julian to surrender.

Andriana knew the camera number taping the rooftop. She plunged out the fifteenth disc from the pile before inserting it into the system. The cameras did not tape audio. Andriana was clueless about everything.

"You're only collecting evidence, right?"

Paris nods, "I have amnesia. I don't remember any of this."

Andriana stares at Paris, unable to form any sentence, only interpreting the severity of the events she was able to watch.

Peter Cubin was a small-time criminal, usually foul playing with drugs and women. Andriana could foresee his jail time approaching. She did not help Paris for only money, but she really cared for the poor girl. She almost died and still looks like being hunted by drastic tragedy.

Refocusing on the videotape, Julian seemed wrathful and Monica sorrowful with tears pouring down her face. Their trivial quarrel soon swiveled into an appalling brawl between them with only Julian violating Monica and her crying vigorously against his transgression.

Andriana flinch with a gasped at his violent act, not believing something like abuse could take place in a public place. Paris nonchalantly leans over. Andriana thought she was anticipating something only she knows about, but the corner of the screen shows Paris standing at the entrance of the rooftop watching the two stoushing couple.

With thumping hearts, Paris and Andriana watched, and in a matter of minutes, Julian was pushing Monica off the building.

Paris must be traumatized as if some magic turned her into a statue, unmoving.

"He-He killed her!" Andriana shrieks. Paris also was in a state of bafflement at the abrupt-killing spectacle. "Everyone thought she jumped from the rooftop."

Julian was riding onto the horses of wrath. He saw Paris standing and watching him, witnessing his crime. Without further undo, Paris started running back and Julian started chasing her.

"He must have chased me till I got into the accident." Paris states.

"This is too...worrisome." The gruesome silence settles between them, acknowledging the grief of the loss of such humanity.

They retrieve back both, themselves and the footage as evidence. Paris convinces Andriana to testify for her in a court of law and later sends her back home to her family.

Andriana didn't need to discern what happens between Julian and Paris.

Paris wouldn't make Andriana a part of her problem as she unknowingly did with Jordan and Kehan. She wouldn't repeat the same mistake.

She entered the rooftop, before locking the door behind her. Fixing her maroon coat, and grabbing her phone, she punches in the text, 'I am waiting at where it all started.'

It was enough of an invitation for Julian to come to her.

Paris had sacrificed enough, both, people and herself. It was finally the time for Julian to make his repentance.

_________