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intro

Jack had on hand a variety of things, as one never knew when they would be needed. The usual sundry items such as pens, water bottles, and sticky notes were obvious, but every once in a while he carried something more unique: red t-rex sticky notes, a travel head pillow for longer days at work, a particularly odd watch at his wrist. Sometimes his desk was home to nothing but paperwork for sorting, sometimes it was completely bare save for scant notes, and sometimes it looked so normal (stapler, scissors, pencil cup, ruler, measuring tape, hand sanitizer) that it might have belonged in a cubicle rather than the Life Labs. Every once in a while, even items from the infirmary made their way over such as runic bandages, patient files, gauze, latex gloves, and wrist tags were leftover. On particularly trying days, snack bars and chips made their way into the throng (and yet surprisingly not ever chocolate).

In spite of all the things he looked after, he was an organized man. He was not, however, omniscient.

It Started With a Pen

He didn't notice the missing pen for a day. Only when he was getting ready to sign off on his current review of mission reports did he notice that his good one, ergonomic and with a gold tip, was missing. Jack had spent a good fifteen minutes checking around, stubbornly refusing to use any other pen until it became apparent that he had misplaced it. Or someone had stolen it.

He went with that after he realized he had a lot more looseleaf on his desk than he had previously. To be fair, it was a nice pen.

Sighing, he pulled out a sticky note (this one a yellow ankylosaurus) and made a note to himself to find some replacements the next time he decided to use leave for shopping, along with more green hair dye, alcohol, and Halloween decorations for his upcoming birthday, and stuck it by the keyboard.

It Started With A Pen

A few days later, Claude did another slow stroll by the desk. That pen was ******** awesome. She hoped the owner of this desk would be the type to have more of the same kind. She was rather disappointed to see that that wasn't the case. She did stop, though, to read the new sticky note that was on the keyboard, and in the shape of a dinosaur.

The corner of her lips pulled up briefly.

She'd stop by this desk again. She would wait and see if he got more pens, hopefully.

Posterboy

She did another slow stroll to check for more pens. Growing comfortable doing this, she strayed closer to the desk in her pass, and paused to lean over it, peering down. Hrm. Ring covered fingers riffled through the cups for any more good pens. No such luck, yet.

She was about to turn away when she felt her boot nudge something. Blinking, Claude leaned back to see what she had nudged. Hrm. The trainee leaned and pulled the item, finding it to be a rolled up poster. Kind of like a treasure map. The thought at her smirking, and it was simple curiosity that she pulled off the rubber hand, unrolled the paper and looked over the poster.

Oh.

Oh.

Her smirk widened. This poster was funny enough on its own, and then apparently it had more commentary...hrm. Green hair. She remembered seeing one of the desk notes listing green hair dye...maybe this was the desk owner? Claude tilted her head as she stared at it longer before she got an idea.

She laid the poster on the desk, using two cups of utencils to keep it flat. She then pulled out the white out, and made work of whiting out the entire area underneath the body, making it look like he was posing on a white mat. She then took some high-lighters and colored in some ovals.

Now it looked like the Green Haired Dead Hitler-stache Pirate was playing Twister. Claude put the white out and high-lighters back, but left the poster out on the desk held down by two cups.

She left then, with the rubber band on her wrist.

All Your Notes Belong To Me

He didn't notice at all until a very random moment while drinking coffee. Someone had passed his desk and without warning had yelled at him, "Hey, Hawthorn! Moisture is the essence of wetness, and wetness is the essence of beauty, right?"

Naturally, he whipped around to tell the d**k off and in the process spilled some coffee over his desk. No important files were harmed, but some of it did land on his sticky notes. Grumbling, he had inspected them for damage: the anklyosaurus was alright since it had been on the bottom and avoided the majority of the spill, but the t-rex ones had been on top and suffered the blunt of the coffee catastrophe.

Surprisingly, Jack found himself mildly upset about it.

But it was then that he noticed there was a noticeable difference in the number between both dinosaur-shaped pads, and he had to wonder if he was starting to get paranoid thanks to his mysterious thief or if the hunter had literally stolen some of his sticky notes of all things. Either way, he needed to get to the bottom of it or he'd never stop feeling vaguely anxious every time he left his desk.

So to start things off, he pulled off a t-rex and wrote:
If you can read this thief then
stop or you'll regret it

Like a true adult.

and then he sighed and began to mop up the mess. His desk retained the faint smell of hazelnut even after the fact.

All Your Notes Belong To Me

Well, that note definitely had to be for her.

Oops.

She'd probably be hitting his desk up one too many times now...and maybe this guy was more observant than usual. She couldn't find it in herself to stop now though. This was becoming something like fun. The next time Jack returned to his desk, he'd find one red T-rex sticky note posed to look like it was eating one of the anklyosaurus notes on the middle of his desk.

Claude also took the note he had written for her.

All Your Notes Belong To Me

He actually laughed a little when he saw the combating dinosaurs. Then he took a photo. Then he peeled them off and threw them away and tried to get back to work.

His mind kept focusing on scheming instead.

Posterboy

The anklyosaurus note was gone, and in its place, two yellow sticky notes. Two of Jack's own yellow sticky notes. Written in actual had writing this time.

First note:
Don't die.

Murder is a large jump from petty crimes such as theft.

Second note:
P.S. When are you getting more of those ergonomic gold tipped pens? Those are nice.