Chapter ONE - The Telegram

Azalea

                                    “Who gets a telegram these days?”

                        My heart dropped when my assistant came in and gave me my mail. The last time I got a telegram was when I was still part of the agency. It hasn’t been that long but I never expected to hear from them ever again.

                        “Thank you, Jane.” I say. I don’t make eye contact as it would seem out of the ordinary and continue pretending to fiddle with my laptop. “Just leave it in the basket and I will get to it in a minute.” I take a sip of my coffee and continue my act. Once my assistant was out of the room I immediately reached toward the basket placed on the right side of my table. Disregarding my bill and letters I grabbed the brown paper that had AZALEA written on it and held the telegram with eagerness. The thoughts that invaded my mind got worse by the second but I could not muster up the courage to open the piece of paper in my hand. I turned my office chair around and faced the full wall window of my office and just looked out. If I opened this paper all that I have worked for, this job, this office, this life, all of it would just go down the drain. 5 years of getting my life in order would be for nothing. But I would be lying to myself if I said that I don’t miss that life. So I open that piece of paper that holds more than just a message.

 

Catalina

 

                        Working for the police as a tech wizard isn’t so bad especially when one of the police men is a hot piece of a*s, who also happens to be a really good friend.

“What you got for me sugar” Jake came in. He sat in the chair next to me and looked at my computer screen.

“This is your guy. He has been hacking into major companies and playing around with important files. This boy needs to be punished” I say in a seductive voice.

“Don’t think about it hotcake” Jake warned. “Oh and I almost forgot” he reached into his back pocket and took out a brown paper which looked terrifyingly familiar. “This came for you” he reached out and handed it over to me. I can’t react to this so I pretend to know nothing.

“Thanks sweet cheeks” I say and take a look at his lusciously sculptured a*s.

“Control yourself mama” He laughed and kissed my forehead.

”Can you track this guy down?”  

“Already texted you his address” I give him a satisfied smirk

“Thanks butter cake. I’ll let you get back to work”

He leaves the room and the piece of paper that I can only guess is from the agency is screaming my name. I take it and shove it into my bag and hope to god I can forget about it. But as I continue working, I remember the times I hacked for the agency which is somewhat similar to what I am doing now, but with the agency I was in the field. I actually went out and caught the guy I was outsmarting and counter hacking. And with that small memory, I decided to open the telegram.

 

Ryder

 

                                    DING DONG!

“Coming!” I shout as I try to put on a shirt. The doorbell rings again as I zoom down the stairs and open the door. A man was standing on my doorstep with a big smile on his face. He was sweaty and was in workout clothes. I see him every morning jogging around this neighborhood but I have never talked to him.  Something clicked and I knew there was something wrong with this scenario but I continue to play along

“Hello.” I say with the biggest most natural smile I could muster up.

“Hello, I’m sorry to disturb you but someone asked me to deliver this to you. Must be a love letter” the man reached out and had a small piece of brown paper in his hand. My whole world shook but I had to keep composure and took the paper and inspected it. I looked back up at the man and smiled

“Thanks bro maybe came from my girlfriend. It is our 1^st year anniversary.” I said keeping up the act. He seems to believe me and just nods his head

“Well congratulations and good luck dude!” he smiled and shakes my hand “Have a nice day.” he says as he jogs away. I enter my house and the moment the door closes I read the telegram.

 

AXEL

 

                                    “Who is going to contact them?” I ask Snake

                        Our mentor, Wolfgang, had died earlier today and he always said he that he wanted his star unit to eulogize him. There are five of us but only Snake and I have kept in contact mainly because we see each other every day. The last time we saw the other three affiliates was 5 years ago and one has vowed to hate me for all eternity.

“Ryder?! You still there man?” Snake was snapping his fingers in front of my face when I came to.

“Yeah, sorry.” I mumble “Went somewhere for a minute.”

“Was that somewhere maybe 5 years ago when a certain sister and brother said they hated each other and will never talk to each other again?” Snake said acting innocent.

“No.” I said a little bit too fast

“AHA! GOT YEAH!” Snake starts fist pumping like he’s in jersey.

“Let’s go.”

 

Snake

 

                        I promised Wolfgang that I would try and his secret but he left me and impossible last minute mission. All can do is sit back and watch the disaster unfold and pray to the almighty father that it doesn’t explode.

“So how are we going to contact them?”

“Leave it to the agency.” Axel pretended not to care but I see him searching for them on every social networking site on the web. Only I think he already knows where his sister is.

“What will you say to her when you see her?” I just had to open my mouth

“Like she will ever talk to me” Axel whispers as he walks back to his quarters.

***

Author's Note

Hi there! thanks for reading my chapter =) Constructive criticism is highly appreciated so please don't hesitate. Oh and I am also looking for an editor so if any of you guys are interested, im open! =)

Reviews

[Alex]

The first thing that stuck out to me was how you constantly switch from present- to past-tense throughout this chapter. It gets very distracting. Stick with past-tense. Another problem I found was blocky sentences. Here's an example from Azalea's passage: "But I would be lying to myself if I said that I don’t miss that life. So I open that piece of paper that holds more than just a message." There's a lot of unnecessary words in these two statements, and it comes out very bumpy when saying it out loud (which is always a good way to edit your work - rereading it out loud). I would rewrite it to go more like [I'd be lying to myself, though, if I said I didn't miss that life. I opened the piece of paper, which I knew held more than just a message.] One last thing you should consider is that, while their dialogue is unique, you've made each character narrate more or less the same. 1st person narration really lets the reader explore a character's personality more than 3rd person. Try to include some unique flavor to each character's narration style. Maybe one of them is very detailed, and takes longer to narrate because he has to keep stopping to describe the sound of another person's voice, or their footsteps as they leave, or how the paper they're holding has a crease mark in one corner, while another character is more reflective, always needing to compare things to other things, and still another person can't stop making assumptions about others' motives in his head. This will help the reader remember who's narrating. Having their name before their part of the chapter, is fine, but the fewer times you can get the reader to stop reading and look back and who's part they're on, the better.

OK, enough bad stuff! I still liked this chapter. You used a very simple hook (the brown package, and referring to "the agency") that kept this intro simple, and focused on the characters. This is a very good thing, especially since it looks like this story will have at least 5 main characters - you're going to need to really focus on developing them early to keep the reader interested in all of them. I'm looking forward to chapter 2!

[Alexandra Pan]

Hi Alex! Thank you so much for this review! I love that you took this seriously and gave me an honest review. Most of the people I show this to are very vague when giving comment, maybe because they don't want to hurt my feeling but I really needed the constructive criticism. I agree 100 % with your comments and am exited to edit this and hopefully make this chapter better! Again thank you and have a great day! Oh and I hope you continue to help me with other chapters in the future. Your review is spot on! =)

[Alex]

Great, I'm glad you found my feedback helpful. I'll be happy to review more of your work in the future!