A/N: So this is the edited first chapter, enjoy! I added more detail, and put everything in the present tense. I hope things make more sense now, so please, R&R if you can. PS. Since it's April, I will probably not be working on anything for the entire month cause of Script Frenzy. Unless I get bored of it, of course. Just a notice. So, without further ado—

I shoved clothes and belongings into my backpack; piling everything I had – not much, to be frank – into it. I couldn't see anything through the tears; I couldn't think straight. I couldn't think anything. I didn't need to think. All I needed to do was run.

It was his fault. I swear…upon my friends' graves, I swear that they will be avenged. It was all and only his fault. But no matter how much I tried, I couldn't keep him from coming to finish the job he had started.

I happen to glance at my digital clock right before I yank it's cord out of the wall and shove it on top of the neat pile of belongings. 10:39 PM. It leaves me not much time at all, from what my tip-off had said.

He is coming quickly. Pack up. Leave. I don't know who tipped him off, but it is crucial you understand this – he is determined this time to get to you. At the speed he's coming at, he'll be there by eleven. Hurry, but be thorough. No traces, remember? –A.

I sling my backpack over my shoulder, reaching under my desk to get my laptop case. I slide my laptop in, and shove all my folders in the space that was left. My password file, useful for all manners of hacking into government-only sites? Check. And then…there it was.

I open my earring box and took out the thumb drive that holds my reservoir of information. It was all right there – my past, my present, and hopefully my future. Not the thing he was after, but something that would hit me hard if it got into his hands. I tuck it into my pocket for safekeeping and zip the zipper.

I sweep my apartment for anything I have possibly missed, but it is completely bare. Everything I have ever owned, piled onto my back. It is a sweet, majestic feeling, standing there, surveying a semi-empty apartment. I haven't bothered with junk. Photos on the wall were smashed and the photos shredded, now in the trashcan. Any clues to my hobbies, my life, anything that he could use against me, were demolished in some sort of way. I had thrown my books into the garbage can, and I check my watch now, grinning and sweating. 10:52. Time was ticking, but at least I'm not late.

I flee out the door, down the stairs, watching the street as I come to the bus stop. Where is he? He should be here, if the tip-off was correct – and I sure believe it is correct. Not that I particularly wanted him to be here, because it is a lot more trouble than one would think, being chased by your arch enemy. One eye is on the incoming busses, looking for the bus to the airport to arrive, and the other is on the street. How is he going to arrive? Even though he is the secretary of state of America, basically no one knows his face, voice, name, or whereabouts, which made it very hard to predict how he is going to arrive. He is going to arrive, that was sure, for he never liked others to do his dirty work, and my contact was never wrong in the 30+ times she had tipped me off.

Ah. There he is – the man in orange on a skateboard, riding down the street without looking left or right at anyone, bypassing myself and the bus stop. I would recognize his face anywhere even though it has been years since I have seen him face to face, I being one of the only people to know what he looks like. I can see those piercing green eyes clearly as he rides by…I harbor a grudge and have half a million curses on those eyes alone.

I watch, helpless to do anything even if I wanted to, as he stops in front of my apartment building and begins to scale it. I can hardly breathe with a flicker of hope in my chest, blossoming into something more as my mind began to fantasize. Maybe he got the wrong directions, maybe he will enter someone else's home and not realize his mistake, completely negating all threat to myself, maybe he would decide it isn't worth the effort to find and kill me…and maybe the world will stop turning on it's axis and the sun will spontaneously combust.

He's coming into my apartment, 4B. I could've sworn I locked the door, but I might have been too nervous and jittery to actually lock it. Oh, crap. I check and I find no keys in my pocket. Never a good sign; did that mean I left my phone as well? I check my other pocket and, thank God, my phone is in it, but still no keys. I turn a shade whiter, if it is possible, and hope nothing comes of it. He won't know where all the keys went to, of course, I try to reason to myself.

I look back up to see where he is now. The door is hanging open on its hinges, his skateboard propped up next to it. I know that the image will be branded in my mind forever as the end of my safety in this small city. But I have no chance to do anything else, for right now I hear a screeching noise and smell fumes in the air. It's customary for any vehicle that has been in contact with the parking lot at the airport to hear and smell like they're not oiled and positively horrible. So I turn around, knowing what I will find.

My bus is here.