Fight for Me

Later that day Layla went to Tyler’s office to help out with his paperwork. She always helped her dad out with his work when she could, so she knew how to do more than just the basics.

But the stack on Tyler's desk was huge. He even got Ben to come and help. But time pretty much flew by when they got to chatting.

“You’re pretty good at this stuff Layla.” Ben says as he staples a stack of papers.

“Oh well. When I was younger, I always helped my dad out at his office. So this is practically a piece of cake to me.” She arranges papers in the filing system she helped to organize.

“You know. You’re pretty resourceful,…and smart. I’m sure a girl like you can easily get a job. Then you don’t need to worry about drifting about.” Tyler says as he lifts another stack of papers from the floor behind his desk.

Ben and Layla just give him an annoyed look, but Tyler doesn’t even pay them any attention.

“It’s not as easy as you’d think.” They look up at Layla and she giggles. “I couldn’t finish high school. And that’s not something employers want.”

“But what about your parents?” Ben asks.

“They’re dead.” She says straight forward.

A silence fills the room as she continues with her paperwork.

“Oh Layla. I’m so sorry.” Ben says as he tries to console her.

“It’s fine. It was years ago.” She looks up and smiles at them, reassuring them.

“And you’ve been on your own ever since?” Tyler questions.

“Yip.”

“So when you’re done here, where to next?” Ben hands her another set of papers.

<If we both make it out of here, travel north. I’ll make sure that you’ll always have a home there.> She thinks back to Blake’s words.

“North.”

“North? Where north? There aren’t many towns up north. And after that there are just mountain ranges.” Tyler is getting curious.

She shrugs her shoulders. “I’m not sure yet. I just know that I’ll go north.”

“How can a human girl be so fearless about travelling alone?” Ben asks.

She sighs. “There’s only so much a person can be afraid of when you’ve already been through hell.”

They both look up at her, but she’s too focused on her work.

They couldn’t finish the paper work that night and had to keep it for the next morning. Surprisingly to them, Nicholas joined to help. Ben didn’t understand why, but Tyler had a suspicion.

Layla and Ben were annoyed when they got there this morning and Tyler took another stack out from a cupboard. He just gave them a pleading look and said it ’really’ was the last.

Even though Nick was quiet, the other’s random chats filled the room. Eventually Nicholas started talking too. He apparently had a few things to say about Layla’s comment on men having waffle brains. They later eventually got a system going with the filing.

In the end it was helpful to have Nicholas there, because there were quite a few folders they needed assistance with, as to which files they need to go under.

As Layla was organizing some folders she saw Ben misplacing something.

“Hold on Ben. That document is on Star Shipping, it should go in another file.”

“What do you mean? Star Shipping falls under Star Corps.” He says as he points to the folder with that name.

She sees Ben and Tyler both nodding at her.

“Yeah, but -.” She sighs as she turns to Nicholas. “Nick. Didn’t you say all shipping documents go under the shipment folder?”

Both Ben and Tyler’s eyes go wide when they hear her call him Nick. But they’re freaked out even more when he just continues like it never happened.

“Yeah. All shipping docs go there, regardless of the company name.”

Ben and Tyler just stare at each other as Layla and Nicholas go over the document again.