Chapter 2: Nine years ago

The lecturer told us that there were few new faces today that would be joining our group.

"NOOO."

"No way-".

"You can't do that to us."

There was a burst of loud protest from everyone in the class.

"Do we really have to shuffle the groups now?" Betts snapped angrily. Some of the people from other department were joining our unit. To accomodate the transition, we were told be prepared. And it seems that the preparation was about changing our group structure for the project.

I agreed entirely with Betts' reaction. Just last week, after a week of brainstorming, we finally agreed on the duties and responsibilities of each of the team members. And now we have to change it again to fit the two new people joining our group.

This sucks!!!

"The more, the merrier, right?" Phil, the only male in our team, said as he smiled at Betts and me.

"You are only saying that cause you will have more guys to talk to in the team, aren't you?" Betts questioned him.

"No, no-not al all, Betts," he tried to defend himself, raising his tone a bit. That made it more suspicious.

"Look, there will be two more people to join our team, and we can have them do the fieldwork required for the project," he explained to Betts. "You know how you were complaining about how you don't want to do all those fieldworks? Now you can have them take over the work. Problem solved, right?"

He looked around at Katie so that he would find someone to support his point.

Katie looked at him with a frown. She didn't like him putting the defence on her. The crease on her forehead showed that she was thinking but she appeared calm. Well, she would be because she was the strategist of our team. I am sure she could come up with something to fit those two. And if they fail to meet the standard, I was always there to be the devil's advocate.

"Keep it down, everybody!" The lecturer said in a loud voice. The students reluctantly stopped their protest. The lecturer than invited the new students into the class. All six groups in our class were getting two new students each in the team. The new students were asked to introduce themselves and find their allocated group.

"Group 5 here!" Phil enthusiastically called out as he looked over at the new students. Two guys heard Phil and made their way towards us.

As they walked near us, I noticed that both of them were tall, maybe few inches over six feet.

Once they reached us, Phil excitedly stood up and shook their hands.

"Nice to meet you all, guys. I am Josh, marketing specialisation," said the one standing near Katie as he shook our hands after Phil's. He was tall and had a strong build. I think I remembered him delivering the welcoming speech in the orientation program of the new semester. He was the representative for all first years.

"Hi, I am Liam, the same specialisation," the other guy said as he introduced himself. Just like Josh, Liam was tall but he was more on the lean side. And he had a friendly smile.

These guys are perfect for fieldwork, I thought to myself and smiled. However, I never thought that this shuffle would bring so much chaos and craziness in my normal everyday life.