It had taken her four months to fully plan her escape.  Kore had lived on the Demeter Research campus for the entirety of her life, and though it spanned several miles and was nearly a small city, she had yearned for years to move beyond the walls of the facility.  Her mother had explicitly forbid it.  When Kore had wanted to attend college outside of the facility, Demeter had ensured she was able to do all her coursework at a distance.  Kore had even managed to see headlines about herself once or twice, which had clever titles about the princess in the tower, kept in the lap of luxury.  Her mother had assured her that this sort of thing was not all that abnormal, many people remained within their compounds.  The outside world was filled with disease and danger, her mother said over and over to her, whenever Kore got curious.<br/><br/>Anyone she managed to get close to would get a transfer or fired quite suddenly.  There was always a reason for it.  They were needed in another department.  They stole something from the labs or traded secrets to a competitor.  For a long time Kore just accepted what her mother told her, until she stumbled upon files that made it clear so much of what her mother did was simply out of a need to keep Kore right where she was.  At home, facing down arrested development.  Kore could have accepted her mother's need to protect her, until she stumbled upon some of the experiments that had been done when Kore was only a child.  Experiments done on others, children and adult alike, to help create some kind of cure for the infection Kore had fallen ill with.  She could not bring herself to explore the files fully, they made her stomach turn.  Instead, four months ago, she had turned her mind to finding a way to get out of this place.<br/><br/>It had been easier than she realized.  This was her home, Kore knew the systems like the back of her hand, hacking into the cameras and locks and passcodes was relatively easy.   She just needed to time it all right.  Her contact that had set her up with the Shadowrunner that would be her key to freedom, had made it sound like as long as she could make it outside that night, she would be in the clear.  Kore could not help but think of Mr. Johson in a fond manner, as she packed the last of the few things she planned to bring with her into her messenger bag.  She could not have done this without him.<br/><br/><i>//He will be there at 9:42pm.  If you are not there by 9:45pm, you're going to have to try again.  <br/>
</i><br/>His message had been very clear.  She had to be out on time, ready to go, or the window would close and they might have to wait another few months to try again.<br/><br/>Kore made her way out of her room and into the hallway.  Usually she would have shown up on security monitors as soon as she entered any hallway or corridor, but she had set all of them to run loops from footage at the same time several days before.  It meant she could move through the building without a digital record.  She had also made a keycard a few weeks ago, assigned to a non-existent employee, which lit up the lock at every door she came to, no code or anything required.<br/><br/>She had made it through the building that housed her apartment, the small bit of independence her mother had afforded her while here, and into the grounds of the compound.   The grounds were covered in trees and fiolage, enough that though it was raining, little moisture actually broke through the leaves of the trees directly.  Kore pulled the hood of her hoody up to keep some of the rain off her face and hair.  She had to walk a bit further, and make it through the security building that controlled traffic in and out of her corporation's grounds.  It seemed almost too easy, until she reached that building.<br/><br/>The timing was supposed to be perfect.  The security guard at the front desk always changed there shift over at 9:40pm.  It meant that there was a brief window where the security guard that was leaving interacted with the guard that was about to come on duty.  Kore had watched them for weeks on the monitors, they always talked for a few minutes, enough for them to be distracted as she walked through the front exit of the Demeter Research compound.  The only problem was, as she arrived at the front area of the building, after using her keycard to get through several areas in the building...The night guard was already situated at his desk.<br/><br/>She considered turning back.  She could give up now and try again in a few months.  If she kept going and he recognized her, her mother would likely get even more controlling.  Kore pivoted, ready to turn and head back to her apartment, but as soon as she turned she realized her feet would not allow her to walk back to where she had come from.  If this was her window, she had to try.<br/><br/>As she approached the front desk, the guard smiled.  "Late night?  Haven't seen ya before."<br/><br/>Kore feigned a yawn and lifted a hand to rub the side of her face, as if she intended to push off her tiredness.  In all reality, her goal was to obscure the lighter of her two eyes and the scars that surrounded it.  She held her key card up to the last checkpoint and the light immediately glowed green.  She turned to face the front of the building, turning so the guard could only see her face in profile, the side that had not been damaged by her childhood illness.<br/><br/>"Yeah, trying to make a good impression.  Gotta get home so I can come back and do again tomorrow."  She said.  Her heart pumped wildly in her chest, and she thought it might burst free of her ribs.   The guard seemed to take it at face value.  He nodded, still smiling, and waved her off.<br/><br/>Kore walked toward the doors with a sense of impending doom, but as she walked through them, those feelings all fell away.   It took everything in her not to run full bore for the first vehicle she saw parked in the pickup lane.  Instead, she looked casually at her watch...9:42pm...and headed for the vehicle that met the description that Mr. Johnson had given her.  She got in without fully thinking about her actions, hoping against hope that this was the person who would get her out of here.<br/><br/>"Drive.  Please.  Just drive."  She stammered out, still feeling panicked.  "I need to get out of here.  Please.  You're with Mr. Johnson, right?"<br/><br/><a class="username" data-user-id="2367" data-username="@Beholder" data-xf-init="member-tooltip" href="https://blackdahliaroleplaying.com/members/2367/">@Beholder</a>