Day 1:

What a place to begin work.

Shaw was carefully observing the brunette inside the tiny yet cozy house, following her every move with careful attention. This was her first mission from the ISA, and she was determined to nail it. At least that way she wouldn't have to do lame runs like this one. Whoever the dumb idiot at the ISA was, he was surely going to regret assigning her this. Shaw was all set and ready to go– except the 'nice lady' she was supposed to be keeping an eye on for now was rushing up and down and all about the house – picking up odds and ends from various corners and gearing up to leave for the supermarket somewhere nearby. Shaw was quite excited – and on the verge of breaking through the glass and yelling at the god damn woman to just leave for the supermarket already so that she could get to work. The woman however didn't seem to be going anywhere anytime soon.

Shaw decided to pass sometime by reviewing the mission and what it exactly was. It was a completely odd, random mission – but Shaw was taught to not ask questions and just follow orders – something she excelled at with relative ease. The operation was to somehow get the 'Nice lady' – who was apparently a hacker extraordinaire – to hack into secure Chinese servers and obtain some crucial data off it. How it was done was apparently irrelevant – all that the ISA wanted was the hacker at a secure facility nearby at a specified time and willing to hack the that wasn't difficult enough – Shaw didn't have much time to gather much intel on the lady. All she had was a photograph, a name "Samantha Greenfield" and an address. What surprised Shaw was that she wasn't assigned a partner on this case, but she just assumed that being the 'baby' of the whole agency – they just handed her the easiest case for the time-being.

The cherry at the top of this cake would be that this hacker seemed like an absolutely harmless little puppy, bumbling and bumping into every second object in the house. How exactly she was supposed to get this little mouse to willingly hack servers for her – well that was going to be a challenge.

Well I do like my conquests the hard way.

Besides, the first objective of course was to survive the hot, humid weather of Bishop, Texas while dressed completely in black.

After what felt like ages, Samantha finally left her house, leaving the coast all clear for Shaw.

Let's roll.

After breaking and entering, Shaw did her routine check of the entire house, looking high and low for any clues that might help. Finding none, she decided the best thing to do was to leave a bug under the computer table and head out. Perhaps stalking the lady would prove to be more helpful.

Pretending to shop at the supermarket was boring; this mission thus far seemed to be too easy for words. Standing as far as she could from Samantha without losing track of her, Sameen couldn't help but wonder if she was right. This homely looking kitten - a hacker? The picture seemed to match – but the attitude? It didn't seem plausible. But again – the thick-rimmed glasses, the obvious awkwardness, the loose hair, the fumbling with the hands – it all smelt like dork alright.

Why do I get all the lame people when do I get to shoot people up.

Occasionally – Samantha did look up from her intent shopping and notice Shaw eyeing her intently, but every time she did, Sameen just continued trying to pick stuff up from the lonely supermarket's shelves.

At this rate, I'm going to be blowing my brains out soon.

After seeing the hacker fumble with her credit card as she paid for the stuff, Shaw was just about at her limit. Besides, Shaw still had no idea how she was going to approach this lady and ask her to hack servers for her.

Slipping outside and maintaining a considerable distance, Shaw did her best to follow Samantha – hoping that finally this woman would do something interesting. However as the woman kept walking on, any hope of that steadily waned.

Right until the two of you were about to cross an abandoned alleyway – and some guy grabbed Samantha by the shoulder her and dragged her right out of Shaw's sight. Shaw could hear the muffled screams of what she thought was the hacker and rushed quickly. Sure enough – she found Samantha pinned to the wall by a huge, thug – waving a rather nice pistol in her face.

Now where does a street thug get a weapon like that.

There wasn't much time to ponder that – as the brunette looked like she was about to die in the ruffian's chokehold, and Sameen had been waiting for something like this since forever. Swinging a blow to the guy's head, he let go of the trembling hacker, who looked like she was about to burst into tears. Shaw managed a few more punches and kicks – the guy almost didn't seem to mind as he backed off and ran away.
Wishing that he hadn't gotten away so soon, Shaw did feel a bit relieved after all the pent-up nerves from the day. She had quite forgotten about Samantha, who was still shaking as she picked up her glasses which had fallen off, and the bags of groceries that had fallen to the ground.

" You okay?" Shaw tried, hoping that this was her way to somehow get closer to the lady.

" Yeah, fine – nothing like a good roughing up to shake some sense into you."

After helping her as much as she could manage, Shaw decided that the easiest thing with these 'friendly' people was to talk her way through.

" You live far from here?" Shaw prodded, spite knowing very well exactly where she lived.

" Not really. And thanks for that." the hacker mumbled, finally standing up and beginning to walk away. Shaw knew she had to get a jump-start on things if she had to get this hacker, so she decided that 'friendliness' would somehow help.

"I'm Sameen. Shaw. Call me Shaw." Shaw quickly recovered, and she would have kicked herself for that.

Sameen? Since when did you introduce yourself as Sameen?

The hacker didn't seem to mind the note of hostility in what she had said though, because she was immediately grinning this innocent smile and holding out a hand.

" Samantha. You can call me Root."

"Root?" Shaw asked, taking the hacker's hand, which was still faintly trembling.

"It's a programming thing, Superuser of Computers, you know?"

Shaw really didn't know, but she didn't mind. So far, two things were confirmed – One, this was the woman and two –the name Root definitely did not suit this woman at all. This woman seemed the more rambling, nervous and anxious kind, and less like the self-assured and cocky hackers she was used to.

Well orders are orders.

So Shaw did her best to maintain the most mundane small talk with 'Root', asking her what she did and walking along with her at the same time. Root, on the other hand was such an affable person, giggling at little jokes and blushing very easily. All this Shaw noted but she had to keep reminding herself of why she was actually here whilst trying to think of ways to get Root on board with her operation.

In all honesty – Shaw couldn't see this hacker just nodding her head with a grin if she asked her to hack into international servers for her, so Shaw could see one thing clearly.

This is going to need a lot more planning.

Root – well Root just wouldn't shut up – talking about her 'poor old mother' who she was looking after here, and about her programming stuff.

After leaving Root at her doorstep and making sure that she got in fine, Shaw slinked back to her little makeshift loft, a plan slowly forming in her head.

Shaw didn't stop to think why exactly her job was to get ahold of this particular hacker and get her – but she should have.

Root, after getting home, rushed to the window to check if Sameen was still out there. She knew very well that she wouldn't be able to stalk Sameen back to wherever she was lodging – but that was quite unnecessary. Seeing that Sameen had truly left, Root made a very important phone call, picked up her keys and rushed out again to the abandoned alleyway, the one she had been 'assaulted' at.

Out of the shadows stepped out the very thug that had assaulted her, holding up her Double Tap Pistol.

"Nice work Thomas. Next time pretend to fight back though." she genuinely advised, her face a mixed with playfulness and seriousness, holding out her hand to get her pistol back.

" Whatever lady – just pay me my money." the thug shrugged, placing the gun back in her hand. Root couldn't deny – the whole evening's nerves were half pretense – and half because she was worried about this idiot mishandling her precious pistol.

Never again. I should have packed more guns.

"Oh Thomas, don't you know the first rule of business?" Root inquired, all the time loading her pistol with a fresh magazine and making sure that it was all in order.

"What?"

" Don't mess with the lady that has the bullets to the gun." Root finished with a sweet smile, holding out the gun and aiming it right at the guy's chest. Thomas, scared out of his wits tried to run – again.

Root shook her head at that and fired a shot right into the back of the guy, who immediately fell to the ground, yelling out loud. Root, in her fashion, slowly walked up to the screaming, squirming body on the ground and lined up another shot – straight to the head.

"Amateurs."she sighed, sauntering out of the alleyway.