After finishing the extremely boring shift, Gil, Vince, and Jorge exited the gigantic elevator to the surface alongside a plethora of other prisoners. Gil and Vince decided to do whatever it took to get out of Energia Tower, which meant completing many bonus tasks to earn more points. Jorge did not want to work more than he was required, so he simply went to his cell and waited for dinner. Vince only needed about four hundred points to be a free man, while Gil needed over a hundred thousand. They signed up to work many extra shifts in order to achieve their goal. That day, they were assigned to work extra in the cafeteria immediately after work, unfortunately, their brilliant plan would soon come crashing down...

As Gil and Vince walked to the cafeteria with strained eyes, they looked at each other sighing from the boredom.

"Today's shift was killer, and now we have to work more to get out early. How long do you think we can keep this up before we crash?" asked Vince.

"Probably only until tomorrow," joked Gil.

"Don't jinx it!" said Vince.

Gil eyed the impenetrable metal walls as he thought about the incoming shift.

"I don't think working in the cafeteria will be that hard. I'm more nervous about working with girls to be honest," laughed Gil.

"Aw c'mon! You're still hung out over that!? I told you, some girls here are just as bad as some of the guys here! Don't get too excited!" lectures Vince.

"Party pooper," said Gil.

"I'm just giving you a heads-up!" fussed Vince.

"Alright fine, I won't get too excited. Just tell me how to talk to them if I end up having to work with one?" asked Gil.

"What do you mean?"

"You know, like give me pointers," said Gil.

"Well... the key to talking to girls is to talk to them like they're a regular person... because they are. And remember, we're not here to make moves on them, we're here to work so that we can get out of here!" explained Vince.

"Talk to them like they're a regular person...," Gil said out loud to himself. "That sounds like great advice, I think I can do that!"

"Besides, I thought you didn't have any emotions, why are you getting all giddy about this!?" asked Vince.

"No idea," said Gil.

They arrived to the large metal door of the back entrance of the cafeteria's kitchen. Vince put his cold hand on the handle and eyed Gil with anticipation.

"Ready for this?" Vince questioned.

"You know it!"

After Vince opened the door, they were greeted by a large bright kitchen that possessed about ten black high-tech stoves. They saw an enormous bag of onions on one of the biege counters. They also saw many packages of frozen meat on the counters.

They only saw five people in the room, three prisoners and two guards. Two of the prisoners were women and the other one was Danny, the man who served chili.

Two guards walked over to Gil and Vince, one was a short bulky man, while the other was a woman with long straight black hair.

"Gillian Zain!? What are you doing here?" the female officer asked nervously.

"I'm here to work for more points of course! So is my friend Vince," answered Gil.

"I hope you don't expect to ever get out of here Gillian. With all of the points you have, you're certainly never getting out of here," laughed the male officer.

"I'm Officer Diaz," said the female officer. "This is Officer Sprouts, we're just here to make sure anyone isn't causing problems?"

"Does that happen a lot?" asked Gil.

"Not really, but I need a paycheck. Vincent Rich, I'm assigning you the tasks of washing dishes with Gretchen," Diaz explained.

"I don't want to work with him!"

Gil turned his head to the right to see that the voice came from a very large woman. She appeared to be over six feet tall, he wondered if she could hit as hard as Bug.

"Just work with him!" Sprouts hissed.

Gretchen rolled her eyes and continued washing dishes, by the packages of frozen meat. "I don't want to work with him!"

"Just go, she doesn't like working with anyone," Diaz explained.

"Great," said Vince sarcastically, as he walked over towards Gretchen.

"Just put the dishes there in the dish washer!" yelled Gretchen.

"Alright, I'm on it!" hissed Vince.

"So what should I do?" smiled Gil.

"Eh... well I don't know why you even bothered coming, but go chop the onions. Maybe crying while chopping onions will make you think about your actions," said Diaz.

"But I... don't know how to chop onions," frowned Gil.

"Wow, how pathetic. Chloe or Danny, one of you teach Gillian how to chop onions. It appears he can't perform the basic necessities. If she were here I'd ask her," said Diaz

"I'd rather not help ma'am," Danny stuttered as he began to chop bacon.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

"I'll help!" Chloe, the red haired woman stated as she walked closer to Gil.

"Good. There's somebody we can depend on," cried Diaz.

"Bet you fifty bucks she'll be a repeated offender," mocked Sprouts.

"Hello Gillian!" Chloe said cheerfully as she shook Gil's hand energetically.

"Eh... Hi," said Gil as he shook her firm handshake. "You can call me Gil."

"How about I call you Gilly!?" asked Chloe.

"Eh, Gil is fine!" said Gil. He began to wonder if Vince's words were correct.

"So, you're going to teach me how to chop onions?" asked Gil. "My mom's a chef so I never really had to learn," he laughed.

"Cool, I wanna be a chef. Maybe your mom can teach me a thing or two!" Chloe yelled.

"Eh, I'll be sure to let her know," said Gil as he picked up a large chef's knife that rested in a brown knifes rack. "Ready to get started?"

"Let's do this!" Chloe cheered as she grabbed another chef's knife. She opened the large onion bag and placed a huge yellow onion on a white cutting board.

"The first step is to cut the onion in half," Chloe said as she quickly cut the onion.

"Ouch," Chloe said as she grimaced with pain.

"Officer Diaz, I cut my finger!" shouted Chloe as she held her finger.

"You cut yourself!? But that was the first step!" shouted Gil. "I thought you could cut onions!"

"Of course I can cut onions! I just made a mistake," pouted Chloe.

Some chef she is! Gil thought.

Gil watched Chloe walk over to the guards to ask for a first aid kit. He noticed that Diaz looked deeply concerned, while Sprouts audibly laughed out loud. It was the kind of laugh where he could tell it was coming from a malicious place. It appeared as if Sprouts hated all of the prisoners at Energia Tower... every single one of them.

He glanced over at Vince and Gretchen; he almost laughed when he saw Vince washing the dishes like there was no tomorrow. It appeared that Vince was correct in his advice regarding women, Gil just never imagined that the woman he'd meet would be as energetic as Chloe.

"I'm back!" Chloe said after walking back to Gil with a new bandaged finger.

"Welcome back! Don't cut yourself this time!" said Gil.

"I won't!" Chloe said as she resumed chopping the onion in a slow manner.

Each step she gave to cutting onions was extremely slow and unorganized, yet Gil felt it didn't look too hard by visualing all of the steps. As long as he didn't cut his finger like Chloe did, he'd be fine. When Chloe finally got to the last step, the diced onions were uneven and were of different sizes.

"Now you try!" Chloe said as she handed Gil a sturdy onion.

"Alright here goes," said Gil before he slowly and accurately cut the onion in half. Afterwards he removed the skin and quickly diced one half of the onion. It was a lot easier than he thought, it almost felt natural.

"Wow, you're a fast learner!" commented Chloe.

"Well, I had a good teacher!" cheered Gil.

"Thanks!"

Gil stared at Chloe with curious eyes. She didn't seem to be a violent criminal, he wondered why she was imprisoned in Energia Tower. He put his hand on his chin as he pondered about what she could have done.

"So... what are you in here for?" asked Gil with curious eyes.

"How about you take a guess," Chloe said before thrusting her head towards Gil. Gil almost thought she was going to headbutt him.

"Um... Let's see. You seem kind of innocent, so I doubt it's something too crazy. Are you here for stealing?" asked Gil.

"Well, I have stolen a lot in the past, but that's not why I'm here! I'm here for first degree assault and attempted murder," answered Chloe.

"You!? First degree assault and attempted murder? No way!" freaked Gil as he dropped his knife on the hard tiled floor.

"I'm serious! People were bullying me back then and I kinda overreacted," said Chloe as she picked up Gil's knife to hand back to him.

"You think!?" said Gil. "But, sorry people were bullying you. Not that it justifies attempted murder or anything, but I feel bad for you."

"I want to do things differently when I get out," Chloe bleakly smiled. "I have about five thousand points left of the total seven thousand I was given.

"I have about five thousand points left of the total seven thousand I was given. I'll definitely be out of here soon. No more crimes for me!" said Chloe.

"I wish you luck with that! When my friend Vince and I get released, we're going to become garbage men. We've already got everything fingered out. You should join us!" said Gil.

"Getting hired as a chef with my criminal record will probably be hard, so your plan sounds like a good idea," laughed Chloe. "You seem nicer than I expected you to be. You've done something worse than I have afterall."

"Don't worry, I'm innocent," said Gil.

As Gil resumed cutting onions, the door suddenly opened. He turned to see who entered the kitchen; it strangely felt as if burning ice entered the room.

"You're late Darcy! What's wrong with you? If you're going to be late to extra tasks, why bother even showing up!" barked Diaz.

"I'm sorry ma'am, there were issues during my main task and I had to stay longer to fix it," Darcy said with a bland, unnerved expression.

"How pitiful, what are you good for?" laughed Sprout.

Darcy looked at him with the same bland expression before looking towards Gil and Chloe.

"Chloe, go clean up the storage room! Darcy go chop onions," commanded Diaz.

"Hey roomy! Glad you made it!" Chloe said to Darcy as she ran to her.

"Darcy, this is my new friend Gil, Gil this is my cellmate Darcy. We're best buds!" explained Chloe.

"Nice to meet you," said Gil as he studied Darcy. Her long black hair was silky like that of a crow's feathers, and her skin appeared to be as smooth as maple syrup. She was extremely beautiful, yet it seemed like her mellow face was only capable of making one bored expression.

"...Do I know you?" asked Darcy after a brief pause.

"Eh, well... I think I saw you one day through the cafeteria," said Gil. He sort of regretted saying that, hopefully she wouldn't think of him as some sort of stalker.

"Maybe that's it then," Darcy said while eyeing the chopped onions.

"Or maybe you saw me on the holoscreens. Apparently I'm famous," said Gil.

"I don't watch television," said Darcy with piercing eyes.

"Wow, so you have no idea who I am?" Gil asked with relief.

"No," Darcy said plainly.

"Darcy don't you know!? He's Gillian Zain! He's guilty of-," began Chloe.

"Don't tell me what he's guilty of," Darcy interrupted. "I don't want to know. Maybe he's a good person, or maybe he's not. I want to see for myself."

"Eh, sorry about that! I'm going to go do some cleaning now. Have fun you guys!" Chloe said before prancing to the small storage room.

"Hey thanks for what you said back there," said Gil as he grabbed another onion. "Many people label me by what I've been accused of doing. You're the first one who didn't, so thanks."

"No problem," said Darcy as she quickly began chopping onions. "I think it's better for all of us to not discuss our crimes with eachtother."

"Guess that means I can't ask you what you did then huh?" asked Gil as he stared into her iridescent eyes.

"Nope," Darcy slightly chuckled before throwing several chopped onions into a large gray container.

Gil continued to chop the onions as he wondered what crime Darcy could have committed. He was wrong about Chloe, so he felt he'd be wrong about Darcy too. Still, he respected her choice of no disclosure, though he really wanted to know.

He watched her onion cutting skills, her technique was immepecable. If anyone were to be a chef, it should be her and not Chloe. He tried to increase his speed in cutting the onions to match hers, but he was unsuccessful.

All Gil did was make himself cry from cutting the root of the onions. He put his sleeve to his teary eyes and desperately waited for the pain to dissipate. He then looked around the room and met eyes with Officer Sprout who was laughing at him as if he were an insignificant worm.

He saw Vince and Gretchen talking - or arguing, it was hard to tell which one they were doing. He saw Chloe walk out of the storage room with a large bag of trash. Working in the kitchen didn't seem too bad, he wondered why some people said it was terrifying. So far, he met great people and chopped onions, what additional tasks could be better?

"How many onions do we need anyway?" Gil asked Darcy after several minutes.

"Probably not much more. We should be almost done," said Darcy.

"Great, I'm tired of getting teary eyed," Gil laughed.

He organized his scrambled thoughts to find a great way to continue the conversation.

"By the way, your cellmate is a little...," began Gil.

"A little energetic?" Darcy completed.

"Yes!" giggled Gil. "I wasn't sure if I should have matched her energy or not."

"She's pretty hyperactive, but I like her. Better than most people here I'd say," said Darcy with the same mellow countenance.

"I totally agree, I've met some pretty weird people here. My cellmate Vince and I are working to get out of here so that we can become the greatest trash collectors of all time. Chloe might join us too, you should join us," joked Gil.

"No, that won't be necessary," said Darcy.

"Aw, why is that? Is it because you don't want to be a garbage collector?" asked Gil.

"No it's not that," chuckled Darcy.

"No worries, if you ever change your mind, let me know," snickered Gil.

Darcy glanced at Gil with shrouded eyes as she picked up the large metal container of diced onions. "Not a chance... I'll be staying here... forever.