„Name is Laura McFadden, she's fifteen years old, went to bed yesterday, like every other night but wasn't at home in the morning. Her mother called the school up and her best friend's parents but nobody has seen her since she's told her mother good night yesterday", Jack informed his team before he gave everybody their assignments: "Andy, you and I are going to speak to her family and take a closer look at her home. I don't think her disappearance has something to do with that but you can never know."

Agent Andy Banks nodded and got ready to go.

Jack turned to Vivian. "Viv, I want you to go and speak to the friend, Sylvie Thomas, and her parents. You're taking Agent Taylor with you. Later I want you two to go to her school; talk to teachers and other students. Find out as much as you can about Laura. Her mum says she's had the feeling that her daughter hasn't been happy lately, and we need to know why."

"Probably rejected love. And that made her run away to be alone and sulk", Agent Taylor suggested in a pitiless voice as he looked at the picture on the board. It showed a smiling teenage girl, and even though there was certainly something sympathetic about her, she couldn't at all be described as cute or pretty; round face that implied she was overweighed, spots and huge glasses.

"We don't know that, yet", Vivian said. But she had to admit; Laura McFadden looked the kind of girl to do as the young agent presumed. "We hardly know anything about her, so don't judge her just now."

"I'm sorry, it's just that I thought, we have to come up with any possible suggestion. And this is more than possible I'd say", the young man defended himself half-heartedly, shrugging.

"Well, there could still be a lot of other explanations for her disappearance", Viv said as she grabbed her coat. "And we won't know unless we start finding out. Let's go now."

Five minutes later they sat in the car. Agent Taylor was driving while Vivian sat in the passenger seat watching him. He looked concentrated. Not a word was said for another five minutes or so, until finally Vivian started to speak: "You really think that kid ran away?"

"I don't know. But I can't imagine her really being in trouble. I mean, look at her; wealthy family, happy home, caring mother… Who should have gotten her into trouble?"

Vivian smiled, but there was some bitterness in her smile. "Obviously you've still got a lot to learn. There can be a hundred of possibilities why she could be in trouble. Things aren't always like they seem at first sight you know. Just because you grow up as a kid whose parents own money doesn't mean you've always got it easy. I agree with you about the possibility of rejected teenage love, though."

"Well, my guess is that she'll turn up again today, maybe by the afternoon", Taylor said with a shrug.

Vivian looked at him with knitted eyebrows. "You don't seem to feel a lot of pity for this girl, do you?"

"No. She's got a caring family who sitting at home now, worrying themselves to death while she's probably somewhere hiding from the world that's been oh-so-mean to her. I don't think that's right."

"She's probably got a lot of problems. I mean every teenager usually has got her or his problems but she… well, maybe the other students at school were giving her a hard time. And she had to go there every day to be laughed at by all the pretty girls…"

"So you're going to tell me that makes it ok she's got everybody so worried? I tell you what, in my opinion it's her own fault if she gets laughed at. Usually there are ways of working on one's appearance and if you don't want to you've gotta live with other people's comments. It normally doesn't kill you."

"And you know that because you've had the same problems before?" Vivian asked. Although she tried she wasn't able to ban the sarcasm from her voice.

The younger agent didn't answer at once. They kept on driving on silence before they had to stop for traffic lights. After hitting the breaks Agent Taylor turned to give Viv his full attention. "I've made my own experiences", he said, obviously unwilling to explain them further. "And by the way, you know, things such as good looks don't mean you've always got it easy either."

After that the conversation was over and Vivian knew better than to try and start any further discussions with Agent Taylor right now…