There was no way Dr Ezra Mayur could have known when she woke up that morning that her day was going to be anything but ordinary, even mundane. Not when the trusty toaster stopped toasting her bread, nor when her once-involuntarily-retired police officer- slash - technician dad stomped downstairs on his last-century prosthetics and said, "Visiting a scene today. Might be late. Don't wait up," as he grabbed a hydroponically grown banana from the fruit bowl and headed out.

Even Shaki, the perpetual snoozer, had left home earlier than either of them—spouting something about hiking the wilderness with her girlfriend. Ezra would pay to see that! Her nerdy, home-bound sister, who'd rather solve complex math problems for her than go out and smell the roses in national gardens touted to add years to your life.

Ezra went about her day as per usual. A brisk run on her second-hand stationary treadmill at 6:30 AM, followed by a quick five-minute shower, then at exactly 7:30 AM, breakfast — usually a toast with whatever fruit was on hand. By quarter to eight, she was on the road, literally. Couple of years back, she'd bought a decent road runner—that's what they called old vintage cars that ran on the physical roads these days. It had taken her a while to find an instructor who could operate and teach her how to drive one, but in the end, her dad was a better instructor. He knew those machines better than any instructor worth their dime. So these days, she drove herself to work. At least she didn't have to run for the bloody train all the time anymore. The traffic was little to none, anyway. Besides, she'd rather feel the bumps and bends of those relic paths than sit for hours in air jams.

Like clockwork, by nine, Ezra arrived at the lab, where she'd often see the morning staff scramble about, getting updates ready to hand over to her. In the ten years since Dr Archer had disappeared, Ezra had brought GenDesign a long way. They were now at the forefront of food design, harvesting, food production portfolios, HardySeeds, a trademark that showed their successful preservation of most varieties of produce which were fast disappearing around the world. There'd been a time when herbs were becoming rarer, many fruit and vegetables varieties were going extinct, and some could say, the world would have been a dark place without all the berries. Ezra was proud they'd save them all or most. The world got to enjoy certain foods again because of her and her lab's hard work.

It still felt weird, to say her lab. She had never thought she'd get to say it. But now, with no one to steer GenDesign—not since Archer—the board and the staff had voted for her to be its head. Some days, she still had to pinch herself. In fact, that's exactly what she did as she stepped into her office to put away her bag and put on her white coat. The office looked different from that night. But memories of it were still fresh in her mind. She's changed the layout of the furniture, none were Archer's. She even ripped up the bloodstained carpet and laid down a laminate floor. But the room was the same.

What really happened to him? She still wondered every time she eyed the wall where Archer's desk had been once. They never found him or his body.

"Dr Mayur?" Someone knocked on her door and Ezra looked up, peeling herself away from the memories. "We have the results you asked for. Shall we go over them when you get a chance?"

It was Tehreem's assistant. They were handling the modification of several ancient grains using resistance microbe genes to create hardy next gen-seeds.

"Is Dr Malik ready?" Ezra grabbed her glasses from her desk and followed the assistant out.

Thus, her day went as it should have. She caught up with Tehreem Malik's team. Then caught up with the new diseases team, busy identifying and sequencing the latest microbes devastating the new crops. She caught with all the departments under her, reassured all the scientists that they were on the right path, corrected or made suggestions for new research directions for those getting no where or achieving little to no reliable results. By the time her day was ending and most teams were wrapping up for the day, she was dead tired with still needing to catch up on her own research and papers.

"You're not working tonight, are you?" Tehreem popped her head in, her handbag already in her clutches.

"Unfortunately, I am." Ezra smiled, tired as heck, behind her desk. "Besides, no one's home tonight. Dad's gone back to work, and Shay is out with her girlfriend."

Tehreem tutted, strutting into the office and placing her bag on a chair opposite her friend. "Ezra!"

"Yeah?" Ezra flipped through the pages before her, skimming their topics.

"It's your birthday."

"What?" Ezra looked up, stopping for a moment. "No, it's not."

Tehreem leaned over the desk and closed the file. "Yes, it is."

Ezra glanced at the date on the corner of her computer screen. 31st October. Halloween, and it turned out, her birthday.

"You forgot, didn't you?"

Ezra shrugged. "I hadn't paid attention."

"Why am I not surprised?" Tehreem walked around the desk and wheeled her away from the desk. "Come on. We're going out and celebrating!"

"On Halloween?" Ezra scoffed. "Every place will have been booked out months in advance."

"Doesn't matter. Grab your bag. Let's go."

"But I have so much work to do."

"Work can wait. Life will not."

And thus, at 6:45 PM, Ezra's day took a different turn than usual. She willingly went with her friend. One night. She could afford to let her head down one night.

As they exited the lab, waving goodbye at the few student researchers and cleaners, an air taxi pulled down next to them, compelling Ezra to ask, "Where are we going?"

Tehreem shrugged, a faint smile tugging at her lips. "For once in your life, Ezzie, let something remain a surprise."

"But I don't like surprises," Ezra grumbled, piling into the cab with her friend prodding her back. "I like to know what the world is about to throw at me."

But nothing was going to prepare her for what was to come.

Almost an hour later, their taxi pulled up outside a blank building. It bore no signs, no identification marks. Faint music filtered out of from its opaque glass walls.

"What is this?" Ezra stood on the footpath, gapping at the building.

"You'll see."

#

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY, EZRA!" A chorus of yells and squeals erupted around them as Ezra and Tehreem stepped into the building.

Hundreds of balloons — round, and number three and four—floated around them. Poppers burst with small bangs, and streamers fluttered, hanging from the ceiling. Among friends, mostly colleagues and students from the lab—when did they get here?—stood Dad and Shaki, smiling ear to ear.

"You both lied to me?" were Ezra's first words. "Crime scene?" She looked at her father. "Hiking?" She turned to her sister. "Seriously? Those were the lame excuses you two came up with?"

"You've done so much for us over the years, the least we could do was lie to your bloody face and do something nice for you for a change, loser!" Shaki chuckled, pulled her into a tight hug, planted a big fat sloppy kiss on her cheek, and said, "Hope you like it! I love you, to earth's core and back. That's 2,900 km times two, if you're wondering."

"That's a lot of love, maestro!" Ezra laughed, returning the squeeze. "I love you times the number of E.coli in a colony!"

"Eww, gross!" Shaki pushed away, scrunching up her face, allowing Dad the chance to get in.

"You started it." Ezra laughed, throwing herself in Dad's arm. "Thank you so much for all this. I love it."

"Love you, kiddo. Thank you for everything you do for us." She felt a faint kiss on her temple, but before she could get teary-eyed, Dad pushed away, still holding onto her shoulder. "You have someone else to thank as well, I think."

Ezra followed his gaze toward Tehreem, who was smiling ear to ear. "Happy birthday, Ezzie!"

"I can't believe all three of you pulled this off without me catching on." Ezra hugged her friend, too. "How long did all this take to pull together?"

"Months!" Shaki proudly informed. "Now, come on. We can't spend all night hugging and crying. All this food won't eat itself!"

As the party wound down hours later and friends started drifting off home, Ezra made excuses to her family. "I really have to do some work tonight. The board will have my head tomorrow if I can't brief them on all the progress we're making."

"I'll come with you." Tehreem moved to grab her bag.

"No. You stay!" Ezra squeezed her friend's arm. "I'll still need to read everything myself. But thank you for everything you do. I could not do what I do without your help."

"How long will you be?" her dad asked.

"Couple of hours, max." Ezra eyed her watch. It was 11PM. "I should be home by two, promise."

"Don't work too hard." He kissed her head one last time.

She patted Shaki's head one last time. And she waved goodbye, stepping out into the light drizzle where a taxi waited to take her back to work.

But it would not be a mundane night.

Ezra Mayur returned to her lab, alone, by 11:45PM. Five minutes later, she was marching down the quiet, deserted hallways towards her office, where she dropped her bag, kicked off her jacket and heels, then donning her office shoes—cloud shoes—she hummed a tune playing in her headphones, all the way to the kitchen.

As she filled the kettle, outside the lab, dark unmanned vans pulled up, lights dimmed, engines silent as a murmur.

As she rummaged through the selection of tea, spending the time the kettle took to boil to choose her tea—Hmm, I'll go for Darjeeling tonight—men in black, near invisible in the dark, slipped into the building as easily as if they knew how to bypass all the alarms and biometric entry codes.

As Ezra poured water in her cup to let the tea steep and grabbed a packet of complimentary cookies—she had insisted they have plenty for those poor students who could use the sustenance like she could have—the men easily navigated the maze like building, heading straight for her office.

As she headed back to her office, listening to her music and making notes in her head for all the research she needed to read reports for and summarise, those men spotted her and waited in the dark.

When Ezra finally sat in her seat, pulled the first report toward herself, took one sip of her tea and opened the file, those men flanked her office, guns up, eyes hardened on their target.

Ezra Mayur stood no chance that night. She did not get to finish her Darjeeling tea, nor did she get to bite into her cookie, or read a word of the several reports sitting on her desk. She stood no chance.

Within minutes, they gagged, bound, and blinded her with a dark hood placed upon her head. Soon after that, she could hear the damage they wrought in her office.

Her heart hammered in her chest. Her first thoughts were, I have to tell my family... Dad. Shaki... as they fired a few shots, causing her to jump with fright, and as they hauled her out, dragging her through the building, her thoughts changed to, Is this what happened to Archer?

A/N: Ezra's day started off so well, but now, she's not so sure.
What do you make of the new events?
Who do you think they are?
Any theories? 😄