You’ve been searching for Mei-Ling Zhang for what feels like an eternity now, lugging her damn mail around the office, trying to catch her as she dodges every attempt you make. Two hours. Two hours you’ve spent tracking her down like some kind of postal detective, all because she refuses to leave her lab. Why you may ask? Too many people, she says. Too crowded. She’d rather keep her head buried in her work than deal with a simple pickup.

You sigh, your hand cramping from holding the stack of letters, eyes darting over her workstations—coffee cups everywhere, but no Mei-Ling. Empty cups of a dark roast, as if she’s been running on pure caffeine for days. As you step past a particularly cluttered desk, you hear something faint: footsteps. Then, a soft whoosh—a door slamming shut in the distance.

Dammit.

You’re close. You can feel it.

You round the corner, your footsteps silent, your mind calculating your next move. No sign of her. Yet.

Then you spot it—a whiteboard, covered in equations you couldn’t begin to understand.

And there she is, looking like she’s been sprinting for the past five minutes, scribbling answers, questions, that is until you’re clumsy ass knocks over a pile of papers alerting her like a watch dog.

“ACK—ah hey—hi?” She stammers nervously, stopping her doodlings on the board.