Inspirational quote: Whoever is trying to bring you down is already below you. Don't ever forget that. It's very important.

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Kieran and Agent Ezekiel both glanced at Demetrius, Kieran looking a little bit mortified.

"What? Are you saying that you're going to kill Esperanza?!" Kieran echoed, which drove Dr Kozak really crazy after a short amount of time.

"What? No. Of course not. We're friends, unlike me and Lauriel, before I had to kill
her, plus today is her birthday. I would never do something like that, Kieran. I'm not that malevolent, you know."

Right.... Says the guy that killed his wife and long lost daughter. Pfft. Who are you kidding? No one.

Silence between the three of them for a while, Esperanza still sleeping. In the meantime, Dr Kozak just hopelessly pretended that he didn't hear what Kieran had just thought to himself.

Or Esperanza was dead, it was really hard to tell in this particular scenario, after all.

"I'm really confused," Agent Ezekiel told Dr Kozak, Kieran wrapping his hands around the back of Agent Ezekiel's seat.

"On what?" Dr Kozak asked, staring straight at Ezekiel.

"Why did you kill Lauriel and Astera in the first place," he answered, and the answer that Dr Kozak had said back was a lot more shorter than Kieran had personally thought.

"Don't worry, it's not important... and Kieran, don't you dare say anything," Dr Kozak explained, fixing the bow tie on his tuxedo.

Well, to be honest, Kieran wanted to blurt everything out to Ezekiel.. but he didn't.

He genuinely respected Dr Kozak's decision, so he had therefore kept his mouth shut about the whole situation, even though he didn't want to.

He seriously didn't want to.

"If you say so," Ezekiel replied, feeling sleepy all of a sudden. There was another monotonous silence in the car once again until Dr Kozak ended everything by saying:

"Right! End of conversation. Kieran, we're at DIE ANNA INCORPORATED now, the traffic has finally moved, can you please tell Esperanza to wake up?"

Kieran didn't need to tell her to wake up because Esperanza had woken up herself. She was yawning uncontrollably, the headphones still placed on her head, although half broken on the left ear.

"Hey guys, just woke up. Was there anything that I missed?"

All the men in the car were just looking at her blankly, none of them replying.

"Why are all three of you staring at me like that? What have I done wrong?"

Dr Kozak replied for her, also ending up avoiding the question completely.

"Nope! Nothing you've missed!" He lied, trying to conceal the fact that they got chased by a stupendous and holographic elephant, all nearly fell off a bridge and died and their car getting set on fire three times but luckily all of them had survived each fire.

"Anyway, like I said. We got here really late, over two hours even, everyone needs to get out immediately."

Agent Ezekiel was about to open the car until everyone heard some sort of sobbing sound going on in the background.

"Who's crying? I hear crying," Dr Kozak muttered, looking at Kieran and then Ezekiel, both of them looking like they hadn't been crying.

"Esperanza then," Dr Kozak told them, turning to face her, also looking at her really angrily.

"Explain to me why you're crying on your birthday?" He hissed at her.

"It's just... I keep thinking about my brother's death and the whole text message that my mother sent me. It's just too sad, I can't take this anymore and-"

"Well, woman up, Esperanza," Dr Kozak snapped at her. He was supposed to be calm but he wasn't, for some reason he thought that it would be a good idea to snap at her on her birthday.

"You're seventeen today, you shouldn't let the stupid death of your stupid brother affect your stupid life. I mean I'm sick and tired of you complaining and mourning over a godforsaken death. You don't see me crying over loved ones, do you?"

"Actually you were crying just a few minutes ago over Agent Mordecai's death and-"

"Shut up, Kieran," Dr Kozak interrupted, almost shooting him again, had Kieran not ducked right in time... Once again!

"Look, Esperanza. Please, I don't care if your brother dies, we're running late, do you really want my arch nemesis Diana Valentine to think that we're naive and weak when she sees you crying? She'll probably think you're crying because you think that you're going to fail this mission or something! So please, woman up and stop sulking, it's just a stupid death, the past is the past, you can't redo it, and start to live your life in the present! Jesus!"

And at the end of Dr Kozak's lecture, Agent Ezekiel and Kieran were just staring at him monstrously as Dr Kozak was hyperventilating.

Just then, Esperanza madly stormed out of the car and into DIE ANNA INCORPORATED, yelling to Dr Kozak 'go away, you're so rude!' and storming off once and for all, slamming the car door, almost breaking it.

"Girls," Dr Kozak told them, rolling his eyes and applying his 25th toothpick in his mouth today.

"Actually, what you just said to her was really harsh, especially on her birthday," Agent Ezekiel told him. "Never knew you could get so hostile, Demetrius."

Demetrius rolled his eyes once again, pressing the honk of his car for no reason again.

"Gosh I feel so bad now," he told him, watching Esperanza just sit there, waiting for Kieran.

"I'm such an idiot sometimes."

Sometimes? Kieran thought, where Dr Kozak just glared longingly and malignantly at him in return. Thought she was your favourite child. That's not how you treat your favourite child.

"You stay out of this, Kieran!" Dr Kozak declared, looking at Kieran who didn't leave his eyes from Dr Kozak's for about a second before looking away again.

"Kieran, kid with the awesome handwriting, are you going to get down?"

This was coming from Agent Ezekiel, in which Kieran just shook his head as an answer.

"No. Not yet."

"Why not?" Dr Kozak had inquired, fixing his eyes on Kieran once again.

"Erm.." Kieran trailed off, he didn't really like it when people were intently staring at him like Dr K and Ezekiel seemed to be doing but he couldn't do anything about it.

"I'm sorry this is on short notice, but I kind of need to talk to Dr Kozak about something."

Dr Kozak and Agent Ezekiel said nothing else after what Kieran had said.

"Go on then," Agent Ezekiel urged.

Kieran couldn't take this anymore.

"Uhm... I meant that I need to talk to Dr Kozak in private." Kieran told him. "Agent Ezekiel, if you don't mind?"

Agent Ezekiel then nodded and undid his seatbelt, heading out of the car instantaneously.

"It's fine. I can find my way from work here anyway, via train. Thanks for the ride, Demetrius! And good luck on your first mission, you'll need it, Kieran!"

Agent Ezekiel smiled and waved at both of them, Dr Kozak and Kieran doing the same thing until he finally left and was out of earshot.

Instead of being smart, Kieran decided to go to the front of the car where Agent Ezekiel had sat by literally sort of doing a backflip at the back of Agent Ezekiel's seat and landing there, Dr Kozak just kind of watching him ghastly, with an eyebrow raised the whole time.

"Kieran, are you feeling okay? Realise that you could have just opened the car door and hey presto! Ended up at the front."

Kieran shook his head.

"Too original. I wanted to try something different."

Dr Kozak didn't say anything for a while, just scanned Kieran's eyes up and down.

"Okay..." He told him, looking away, winding up the window, no wonder as to why it was so cold outside.

"So what did you want to talk to me about in private then?" Dr Kozak asked, Kieran just frowning.

Although before Kieran was actually about to say something, Dr Kozak had totally beat him to it.

"And can it wait?" He wanted to know, frowning at what the time had currently said on Dr Kozak's phone. "You and Esperanza are really late for your first mission."

Kieran shook his head vigorously, playing with his fingers.

"No. No sir, it can't wait. In case I forget, because my memory is becoming worse every day for some reason."

"Okay, so what it is? What do you want to tell me so badly in private?"

Kieran sighed and turned red.

Would Dr Kozak have been mad at him if Kieran told him what he was about to say next? He didn't even have time to think about it.

"You okay, Kieran? I can see that you're turning red all of a sudden?"

Kieran nodded really slowly.

"It's just, I've never really had a private conversation with you before so I'm scared you'd get mad at me if I told you what I am about to say next."

Dr Kozak just pushed him playfully.

"Come on, Kieran.You're wasting our time. Trust me, I've had plenty of private conversations so I'm used to it. What is it?"

"Okay. So... Please don't get mad at me yet but... Well... You know when you asked me why I would tell Agent Astera that you were a mind reader?"

Dr Kozak nodded, then became internally livid at the thought of the past event.

"Yes. And I'm still mad at you. Why would you tell her that? Except from the fact that she is-was- my wife and I can't keep such secrets away from her?"

Kieran frowned. He didn't know how to say this without making Dr Kozak mad.

"Okay, please don't get mad again but-"

"I'm kind of mad now, because you refuse to say it. What is it?"

"I'm really sorry Dr Kozak if you take this the wrong way, but I kind of heard everything that you and Esperanza said about me and got really ticked off..."

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Moral of chapter: One nasty word can ruin someone's day.