Following the moment their meal orders had been served, it didn't take an hour for them to eat their brunch dinner at the Royalty Grill Hub in the city. They didn't talk that much since the students were enjoying the food for the first time in their years. It was a rare sight for Travis and he was happy about what he had witnessed.
The only thing the students had been thinking about while eating were their families. They had been wanting to eat like this with them without trouble facing and with no stumbling block ahead of them. Emily, when she ate the first three spoons of the food on her table, had fortuitously recalled the time when she was bullied — at school and even at home — and that made her eyes moist until they dropped constant tears rolling down on her red cheeks.
"What's the problem, dear?" concerned Travis, instantly getting the tissues placed at the center of the dining table to stand up to wipe her tears off even though she was far from his reach. That made Kenneth stop eating and looked at her without any phrase.
"T-The food..." she started, staring down at the omelet in her sight. "The food is good." And she continuously ate the served meal on her table, sobbing, as her tears proceeded down her face and to her food. The staff in the restaurant gazed at her and noticed her crying. But Emily did take no attention to it, but to the meals and the memories that had come to her head.
Getting back to his seat, Travis had his face half-beamed but couldn't help but be concerned. And on his front, Samantha was about to tear up as well as she glanced at the food on her table, and at the same time heard Emily bawling in tears. It reminded her of her family at home. Her mother — no, she had no intention to mention it. She would get carried away and wail at any moment. She had always hated crying. There's a suitable place where she had to do that which was at her home. She only had to cry at her home. "Yes, the food is good," she had said. There was sadness in her tone obviously.
Seeing Emily tearing up like that, Kenneth stared at his food for too long once again and then began eating like a hungry dog in no time, with no tears and no expression on his face. He had known something was up to his classmates but just minded his own business since he had thought he had no right to interrupt their lives.
Since they had finished eating, the three had been completely silent. Emily had already stopped crying and then Samantha gave her some tissues. They had no clue what they were currently feeling, whether they were full, or what they should do next because it was already pretty late, and their parents might reprimand or punish them for returning home at midnight. But they still chose to come with Travis so if something might happen to them at home, then that's that. There will never be any difference anyway.
"Go first, my students, okay? I will be with you in a minute," Travis said. Since they all felt sorrow about something personal, the three of them went outside first and hopped into the car without saying any word. They had completely forgotten that they promised earlier about never wanting to ride this car again with Travis as the driver. But with their private troubles stuck in their minds, they never remembered their words again.
Inside the car, Samantha had some tissues in her hand and she gave them to Emily who continued sobbing after sitting next to each other. With Kenneth in the same seat in the car as earlier, he put his palm under his chin, resting his elbow above the backrest of the seat while observing his classmates. He ignored them later on and turned his gaze back at the restaurant. He saw Travis stand up and went over to the counter to hand some money to the servers — Kenneth thought that that might be the bill for their orders. But looking at how it happened, maybe that was not the case. Supposedly the servers should be the ones to come after him, not Travis himself. And Travis even conversed with them like some normal colleagues or friends like they had known each other for a long time. This made Kenneth remember what he had thought earlier before coming into this place — to dig deeper and gain information about Travis.
"Thank you so much, Auriga Team Agents, for taking some of your time today with me." Travis shook the hand of the staff named Junxing Huang, the one who had come to get their food orders from earlier. There were a total of ten people of them in the restaurant, gathering around Travis, whom he had mentioned as the "Auriga Team Agents".
"You're very welcome, sir," answered the other person named Aaqil Ismail, welcoming a warm smile at Travis. "We took care of the original staff here upon your notice."
Observing them, Kenneth couldn't help but frown in curiosity, and thought, "What the heck? Why are they assembling around Travis? Is that some kind of operation or meeting or something? Are they forming a ritual or something else? And why are they smiling and appearing like they are so grateful for him? This is nothing but creeps my nerves out."
"Really?" Travis looked at them one by one, "Thank you so much, my dear agents."
"Now that I've seen Emily, Samantha, and Kenneth personally with my own eyes," the other worker (or agent), Kirana Anwar, started, "they truly looked so precious and their faces... it seems like they are models or something."
"Agree!" the other staff, Amelia Williams, acknowledged, "It suddenly makes me feel weak when I saw Emily cry. Poor kid."
They were known as the Auriga Team agents belonging to the subgroup that Travis had been handling for years called the Auriga Team. They were a group of representatives who had been gathering data about the students of Class 11-5, and at the same time, they were protecting them as well. But that wasn't really their primary goal. The same with Travis, their main aim was to terminate the CEO of the company that had been handling the Bihira High, which was Algos, the third Elite himself. It just happened that the Class 11-5 students were part of their investigations since they had also been part of Algos' victims for two years.
Before this moment, it happened that Travis would want to spend the midnight with his students in this restaurant. So he asked his subgroup agents to take part in this and borrow the restaurant in the meantime. The original workers of this restaurant had been in the staff rooms, deeply sleeping safe and sound since the agents didn't harm them, just brought them to sleep for a while. After this instant, they had to go back to their original business and the original staff wouldn't remember any of what happened to them.
"Your students are so lucky to be treated in a meal by you, sir," the other staff, Zoey Bouchard, jokingly said and acted like she was crying over it.
Chuckling, Travis tapped her shoulder, glancing at them, and said, "Don't worry. I will treat all of you once, whether we will succeed or fail after this. So, keep alive till then, okay?"
They all went satisfied and bounced in happiness, feeling so thankful for him. Kenneth, on his end, had become even more eager to know what happened. "Why were they jumping with joy? Did something happen? What the heck happened?" And then he remembered what Travis had mentioned earlier that he had reserved the restaurant so maybe they really had known each other before? Or was he just imagining it? Or was he wrong about it? Either way, Kenneth wanted to know more and had no intention of just jumping to conclusions. The important thing was that he had already the idea that these restaurant servers weren't just normal servers which Travis had recently known. For sure there had to be something more behind it.
"Hmm? What's with that guy?" Kenneth noticed the Chinese worker, Junxing, staring at the car where Kenneth was sitting, even though the car window was a tinted glass. It seemed like he had seen through the car like it wasn't anything. And following that, Junxing looked at the area surrounding the car, like some guard doing his job guarding the car or whatever even though he's way too far from it.
"Now that I think about it, the workers kept on eyeing outside the restaurant when we were eating. And they rarely talked to each other as well unlike some normal restaurant workers. And now they're partying and acting so close to each other after Travis went after them. I also noticed earlier when Emily cried, the servers went somehow alarmed." Kenneth then noticed that half of the workers seemed to be observing the surroundings of the car where the three of them were in. "And now these creepers are watching outside the restaurant when they knew it is now midnight, literally no customers are coming around. Are they spying on us?" Not just Junxing which Kenneth had caught seeing through inside the car, but the other three Malaysian, Indonesian, and Canadian workers — Aaqil, Kirana, and Zoey — as well seemed to like staring through at them — rubbernecking at where Samantha and Emily had been located. While the other workers were busy talking with Travis, Kenneth had thought that they were pretty unusual for normal workers compared to other restaurant workers, but if their intentions weren't to harm them, then that would be something to be pleased about. But still, they kept petrifying Kenneth out and it made his novelty initiated at the moment so he had to know more.
All of them had waved goodbye at Travis, and him as well, after he had gone outside the restaurant to come back to assist his students. He was so glad to see them outdoors aside from seeing them from their headquarters since it had been always at the headquarters where they had to see each other for job matters. So it was really a rare sight for the agents to see Travis —they had been wishing to see him more often.
Upon Travis going inside the car, Emily had intentionally ceased crying so it won't be too obvious for him that she continued letting her emotions out in places like this. But Travis glimpsed a second, catching her instantly wiping off her tears and faking her smile. Thus, Travis knew what she had been intending and was then too sharp to understand her so he faced in front, acted like he didn't see it happen to keep his student reassured, and then he started the engine. Taking a deep breath, he turned his head behind to glance at his students, "I'm going to take you all home, okay? Don't worry, I won't be showing my face to your parents."
And with that, he also looked at Kenneth who was still staring at the workers in the restaurant who were also gazing at them thoroughly. "Maybe he had a glimpse already? That they're my agents? Or somewhat they aren't really just some ordinary restaurant servers?" Travis thought. "That would be good then. I hope he will know about them soon, that's up to him if he'd be willing to know about them. I believe he can do it since I trust my student's abilities."
There had been no coincidence at all in the very first place. The truth was, Travis had planned all of this even from the start (except for that dark site case where Kenneth had almost been brought into danger — that existed all coincidence that would help them lead Kenneth to be in this restaurant). As Travis wanted to treat them to a restaurant, he also wanted Kenneth to grow suspicious about the workers, or about Travis himself, and in that way, then Kenneth would want to know about them, investigate them, and then he would spread the word to the class (or rather help the ones who are curious as well) as the only mind and brain student among all of them. Once they would've had already known about Travis' main objectives, Travis contrived on making them his allies, and then once they'd be freed and be part of the school with no restrictions and no rules like some ordinary students in Bihira High, Travis would have his students help him with the investigations and gather shreds of evidence related to the crimes committed by the Bihira High students as well as their parents. Then at the same time, gather information about Algos, the CEO and the third Elite, and Woohyun, the Chairman of the school and the fifth Elite to get rid of them. Not all will be wiped out, but that would at least lessen the crimes in this world. That would be the plan.
If Travis hadn't been intending to have Kenneth suspicious about them, then there would be no agents replacing the original workers in the restaurant in the first place, or there would be no regular restaurant opening at midnight around this place, or there would be no people protecting them, or there would be no workers observing and eyeing them, or there would be no plan at all.
It's still a long way to go and there had so many tasks needed to accomplish, so Travis and his company would have to double time. They had to build new organizations and have greater allies to support their pursuits for the betterment of the world. As the Headman of the Elites, Travis just couldn't terminate Algos, Woohyun, and Emil (who had been the head and responsible Elites for the increasing crime rates) that easily as he had to amass more concrete evidence about their crimes first and then have them completely penalized with death, otherwise Travis would be penalized in return and had to face death instead. As the chosen Elites, they should diminish the crime rates in the world, not help them increase it. But as the Elites who had been perpetrating heinous offenses, they are nothing but a traitor to this world. What they had been doing was treason.