Chapter 450: Fast

Frightened, Mina did not come out from the safe zone until Bressaw came to check on her. She told him that she would not move until the man she had just outrun calmed down. There were many things Mina did not know about men, but she knew that some of them could not take losing out to a woman, which was why Wayvair separated its grading system, setting aside categories for top male and female students, instead of just having one high scorer.

Enraged by Mina's refusal to budge, the man kept shouting. He was under the impression that Mina had been trained at another Lee facility, and Dom was using her to try and embarrass him. Mina had no idea that the two men had a complicated relationship, and she saw the whole exercise as nothing more than a way to get the man to stop talking down to her friend.

In response, Bressaw had pushed Mina behind his back, trying to get the man to relax but he refused. Unable to take the man's spoiled behavior, which Mina was beginning to see was more of a sore loser's tantrum, she agreed to race the man again. This time, she only gave herself a fifteen second head start and elongated the distance from twenty feet to thirty feet.

The truth was that the man was not considering the science behind why Mina was able to outrun him. In a one-on-one race, she would be sure to lose, but he was starting from a seated position. There was no way he would catch up to her before she got to the safe zone; not even president Lee could.

Once again, the results were duplicated, and the man's violated rant turned into one of shame. He hung his head low as the people who had seen his defeat mocked him. Mina tried to console him, but her words came off as gloating, making the others jeer even more.

"If it were a straight race, you would win, I am just more agile." Mina was giving the scientific reason she could move the way she moved, but all the man heard was 'straight race.' He took her up on her 'offer' at once.

Mina knew she would lose, but she still indulged in the man's request, not wanting to make another enemy in the time she had left. To her surprise other people joined in on the race, and Mina found herself becoming serious. She was okay with losing, but she suddenly felt like she had to at least try her best.

The race started with Dom's word, and although Mina was losing, she could not stop herself from laughing. The last time she had so much fun running was when she and her sister had snuck out and were in danger of missing the bus. They made the bus, and while inside they laughed so hard that the bus driver thought they were drunk, which made the situation even more comical.

"You are fast," said Bressaw, still panting as he extended his hand to Mina, who had sat down on the track. "Again?" he asked, seeing that Mina looked much livelier.

"Let's add obstacles," Mina suggested.

----

When Ian got to his facility, he received an update on Mina's location and found her running with a bunch of his men. To him, it appeared as though they were conditioning the woman to flee from him, and he reacted by loudly questioning his subordinates. Mina jumped when she heard his voice, and it made her appear guilty.

Ian did not know what he expected from Mina, but he had believed she was over trying to run from him. He also found himself wondering how she kept convincing people to go against his orders. Not realizing he was misunderstanding what was going on, Ian tried to approach Mina, but she ran, pushing rolled mats behind her that successfully tripped him up as he tried to follow.

Mina let out a satisfied chuckle when she heard the startled gasps of the burley men who had gone quiet when their boss arrived. She did not know why she was running or where she was going; she just wanted to be annoying. She was caught, but she felt good about having made the man run.

With Mina draped over his shoulders, President Lee walked across the track and he gave a guard he passed an order that made Mina shudder. She started to struggle, but President Lee was stronger than her. She bit the man's ear and he dropped her with a curse.

Before the guard was out of earshot, Mina shouted out a set of orders of her own. The guard paused, not knowing who to listen to, because Mina held a special status within the facility, and in truth, he was afraid of her.

"Do you hate me so much that you have to hurt people who were just trying to be nice to me?" Ian could not tell if Mina was being sarcastic, but he chose to answer her question anyway.

"There is a difference between being nice and disobeying orders." Mina scoffed.

"Yes, but we were just racing. If I had known they were going against orders I would have stayed back in the recovery room." Mina was calm as she spoke, and she wondered if she had been given something while she slept. President Lee made a gesture to the guard who was waiting, and the man left.

"Why did you run from me?" Ian asked, and Mina held her hands palm up.

"I really just wanted to irritate you," she confessed. "But I won't do it again." Ian looked at Mina finding her surrender more suspicious than her running away, so he decided to test her.

"Where is the remainder of your healthy child file?"

"You think I would be dumb enough to keep it?" In hindsight, Ian knew Mina was right. If he were in her shoes, he too would have destroyed the files.

----

Mina sat in a small office with the Witt doctors. She kept throwing death glares in their direction, but only Rebecca seemed annoyed by it. The woman eventually broke from the sorry facade she was putting on and confronted Mina directly.

"Don't pretend you wouldn't have done the same to me."

"I wouldn't have," Mina shouted back. "I have a conscience." Rebecca glared at Mina, who she now knew was telling the truth.

"Don't think you are better than me because you are not. If we had grown in the same environment, you would probably have been worse."

"Stop blaming me for your insecurities. I never disputed the fact that we were the same. The only thing is that I learned how to be a better person, you seem to have never even tried." Doctor Witt did not like to argue about what ifs, but Mina's rebuttal forced him to interject.

"Mina that isn't true. People do not learn how to feel. You may have been taught to behave less awkwardly, but your emotions are completely your own." For over sixteen years Mina had been waiting to hear someone say those words to her, and now that she was finally hearing them, she felt, underwhelmed.

"Taught," Mina repeated sarcastically. In reality, she had been conditioned. "Why am I here?" she asked, realizing that there was no reason for her to sit face to face with two people who scared her near to death for the sake of science.

Rebecca looked away, not wanting to tell Mina that they had been grouped together in preparation for an execution. She was angry that she was not going to die by explosion, or by chemical reaction, and instead had traded her life away on a failed hypothesis, but Jeremy was unperturbed.

"We are waiting to see if we survive this mistake or not." Mina laughed, thinking the man was joking, but then she remembered to whom she was speaking.