Mercedes figured out the best person to go to in finding people was their resident hacker. It has been months since she last saw the girl; Master Farris has been running the girl down with other things, so getting a hold of her has been difficult. Walking down the sidewalk, Mercedes glanced at a small, white house with boarded-up windows. She knew this was the house where Farris kept his specialized hackers at. As far as the curly haired girl knew, the master provided a home for his prized members to keep them satisfied while they worked for him.

Going up the stairway onto the porch, Mercedes knocked on the door for an answer. There was no response for a while until the door swung open as a skinny black young woman revealed herself. She had her braided hair in a bun, while she had one arm leaning against the frame of the door. All the girl did was observe Mercedes up and down.Noticing the dark circles around the girl’s eyes, Mercedes figured she must have gotten no sleep last night.

“Hey, Tash. You look like a vampire,” Mercedes remarked when she called the girl, Natasha, by her nickname.

“Shut it! Just come in, Merci,” Natasha moved away from the door, then signaled for her to come into the house.

Entering the house, Mercedes saw a small sunlight coming from the kitchen area. Making her way into the living room, there were electronics, from laptops to mobile phones, spread all over the floor. The curly-haired girl waved through all the chaotic mess of a room to head over to the kitchen area. 

“How do a household full of expert hackers live like this, especially a girl like Natasha?!” she thought to herself.

Pushing all the junk food off the table, Natasha sat in one chair and directed Mercedes to be seated at the other one opposite to her. The hacker girl did not seem to be in a good mood today, judging by her cranky face. Natasha yawned and rubbed her eyes, trying to stay awake. Mercedes’s eyes darted around the kitchen, trying to figure out how to word her request for the hacker's help cautiously. 

“So… How’s things been?” Mercedes asked, putting her hands on the table and twiddling her fingers together.

“What do you want? Another place you need me to hack? Well, of course, you do! Not that I’m not doing anything!” Natasha said sarcastically.

The way she talked, Mercedes knew asking for a request from the girl and hesitated on it for a bit. Why Master Farris was overworking the hacker more than usual?

“What could the master have given you more to work more on?” She asked Natasha, who took a cigarette out of her pocket for a smoke.

Thank gosh the windows in the back of the house were open, considering Mercedes despised the smell of tobacco smoke. Watching the hacker finish blowing a puff then stopping for a second, Natasha finally opens her mouth to speak.

“It’s not just the master. It’s your shitty father, the master, and the bitch of a pop-star diva that is bothering me! The Master wants me to track down Leticia so his damn son can marry the girl and your father wants me to hack into more of the Anchor Towns records to find more prospective recruits for our group! As for the bitch pop-star….” She stopped ranting before taking another chance to huff her cigarette to calm her nerves down. The hacker finished, “and that annoying diva pop-star wants me to find her dead sister that she still believes her sister is alive somewhere.”  

Mercedes knew what the girl meant when she said, “bitch of a pop-star diva.” She agreed with Natasha's statement because she hated Roxanna Bach, anyway. However, Mercedes did not know that the pop-star even had a sister. Not that it matters right now. Even her father’s work was not on her radar. First, the curly-haired girl asked Natasha about her first work: “Master Farris’s order to find Leticia” and learn how much stuff that the hacker got so far.

“Still looking for Leticia, right? Why don’t we help each other out? You give me what you know so far about Leticia. The master tasked me to find Leticia, Chantel, and Darren, and I don’t know why I didn’t think of asking you first to see if they left a digital trail,” Mercedes offered.

Natasha shook her head in response to Mercedes and answered, “They left no digital trail! They must have stopped using their cellphones after the events happened. I can’t find Leticia or the rest of her traitor group at all. The master left you with a tough task to work with.”

“Perhaps I can be a help to you…” A voice carried over in the room which made Mercedes’s eyes moved over to the kitchen’s entryway.

Mercedes knew that voice from anywhere. The slender-built woman with long, dark brown hair walked into the room. Watching the woman’s cold blue eyes stare at everyone, Mercedes’s brows furrowed in suspicion.  

“Roxy? What do you want? Can you see I am busy with Natasha on my mission? Also, how the fuck you got in this house?!” the curly-haired girl exclaimed.

“Nothing but a little magic helped get me inside. I knocked on the door a couple times, but ya’ll didn’t hear me! So I saw myself in…” Roxy explained, which caused Natasha to get up from her chair, putting out her cigarette in a nearby ashtray.

Scared the hacker would do something drastic, Mercedes hurried over to put herself between Roxy and Natasha to ease the tension. The hacker pointed at Roxy and said, “You better not have broken a single lock in this house!”

“Oh, calm down, dear. Another person in the house let me in after I attempted to mess around with the locks a little. So, anyway, I want to know your progress on finding my dear sister Augusta?” Roxy responded playfully.

Mercedes hated this girl so much. Just hearing Roxy’s cool tone made her want to strangle her right now!

“Look, can’t you see I am busy trying to help Mercedes right now?” Natasha protested.

“Well, whatever you half-supernatural pieces of shit have to do is irrelevant to what I need right now,” Roxy brushed her hair back casually, which made Mercedes furious at the “half supernatural” comment.

“You listen here, you soon-to-be irrelevant diva! First off, fuck you for your half-supernatural comment. Second, no one gives a fuck about your dead sister. Also, wait for your fucking turn!” Mercedes scowled at the diva, not afraid to stand up to the girl.

Roxy shrugged her shoulders, rolling her eyes at them and insulted, “You’re lucky that you're Chris Castillo’s daughter. Oh, wait, half-supernatural daughter, hailing from an Outsider slut. It’s amazing how far you have risen in the Rise of Light. It’s a shame your half-supernatural brother is dead in the ground, but I guess that’s the punishment for having an Outsider for a mother.”

Mercedes shaped her palm into a fist and restrained herself from using her Bio-Kinesis abilities to attack the diva. Natasha waved her hand to stop the conversation between the two of them. She saw the hacker’s eyes dart at her to not use any powers on Roxy. Then Natasha mouthed “Not the time.” Cooling down, Mercedes backed off, watching Roxanna sit in the chair at the table. The diva gave the curly-haired girl a mischievous smile before the diva ran to her mouth again. 

“Anyway, I could be of help since I have a lead that will help you…” Roxy stated.

Mercedes still felt angry about the remark Roxy pulled. Watching Roxy taking out some papers and photos, she sat back down at the table along with Roxy. These photos focused on a young brunette hair woman on the stage with four other musicians. Mercedes recognized the people in the photos immediately in those photos as the rising Supernatural indie band, The Hexes. She wondered why Roxy was showing these people to them, mainly the lead singer, Amelia ‘Electra Star’ Alecsandri. 

“Well, then Rox, you seemed to be a fan. Why focus on that one girl? Plus, how did you get these photos?” Mercedes tilts her head in curiosity while still looking at the photos.

“I’m not a fan, but I have my ways of getting them,”

Natasha fake coughed and spat, “Yeah, mind controlling your legion of fans to get them to do the work.”

“Relax, I only use my powers on the non-Supernatural ones. The devoted ones, however, would do whatever they want to please me,”

“Okay, whatever, but does Electra Star have to do with my mission to get those three traitors?!” The curly-haired girl now got impatient at the Pop-Diva.

She was not in the mood for this girl to talk about in circles.

“This girl may be the key to finding them and that girl. I suspect that she could be related to me. Plus, that group was closest to The Apple Queens and NorthEasters based on my sources…” The diva flipped her hair aside from her face. “My dear Casey has been telling me some rumors about the Supernatural music scene. The Hexes are an odd little group and one of the few musicians that hasn’t joined the cause with us and I want to know why. That Amelia girl also has an oddly similar aura to me as well!” She pointed at the photo and pushed it in front of Natasha.

Picking up the photo, then putting it down, Natasha said, “Why would I want to waste my time looking up a random music magic mage? Plus, how do you know that girl is related to you? Looking for your dead sister is a waste of my time, Rox.”

Roxy leaned over to the table, then grabbed Natasha by the collar. The Pop-Diva smirked, then put her mouth near the hacker’s ear. Mercedes moved closer to make sure that she did not harm the hacker at all. Roxy gazed around the room to see if anyone else was around to hear them. Then she spoke to Natasha in a chilling voice. The voice was loud, but not loud enough that anyone else out of the kitchen could hear her. Within the curly-haired girl’s earshot, she overheard Roxy’s voice turn from a calm to a harsh tone.

“You will help me because you don’t want the word to get out that the Master finds out you have been interacting with an Outsider and going on secret, virtual dates with them. We wouldn’t want Master Farris’s most valuable hacker to be kicked out, would we? Then, I suggest you do what I say and find out as much information on that Amelia girl, then we help everyone here, okay?” Roxy threatened and released the hacker from her grasp.

The diva straightens up her hair before gathering all the photos together and leaving the kitchen. In shock, Mercedes looked over at Natasha, still shaken by Roxy’s threat. She watched the hacker’s shaking hand move over to get her cell phone from her jean pocket. However, Mercedes moved her eyes away once Natasha gazed back at her. Just judging by the hacker’s body language said it all: Natasha interacted with these disgusting Outsiders on the side.

She was furious at this discovery that she learned from the pop-star.

“So you’re gonna tell the Master now, aren’t you Merci?” Natasha asked.

Thinking hard about her answer, Mercedes hated the fact that Natasha was being traitorous behind the master’s back. She could just leave the house, then head to the master's office, but ratting the hacker out would not do well for her favor. Mercedes needed Natasha and while they were not friends, they were partners in crime. So, keeping the hacker’s secret for now was essential for her success. All of this will have to be dealt with at another time.

As she left the table, she stopped at the kitchen entryway, then turned around to look back at the hacker.

“Your secret's safe with me for now, but I still think you’re a traitorous bitch, yet you’re a useful one. Ratting you out won’t help a single bit to complete my mission. So, I suggest you do what Roxy says and do your job,” the curly-haired girl commented and continued her way leaving the house.

Still hating the fact of holding this secret from her master, Mercedes still believed that all of this in the end will benefit her. In her mind, everything was finally going into motion.