“I just know those things. It is too quiet. Not even birds. We should leave her here.
“If you are part of me, then how the hell can you see things like that and I can’t?”
“And how I am stronger, faster and even better, that bitch is not able to control me.”
“So, all this time, all those fits it was you, trying to get out?”
“I don’t think so, I don’t remember any of that. Maybe.”
“What is your first memory then?”
Several big drones approached the house dropping electronic devices which looked like automatic weapons on wheels.
“We are out of here!”
The drones were surrounding the house, all but one of them which was now following them. The phone in the backpack rang. Iker answered while the other guy kept driving.
“Who is this?”
“Come back now!”
“How do you know this number?”
”Excuse me, I am taking this phone call.” The other guy said. “We have one of those things following us, so…”
“I have weapons here! Come back to the house!”
The car took a drastic U-turn.
“I hope you know what you are doing!” Iker said.
The other guy drove over the two armed robots on wheels attacking the house and Mercy quickly got into the car. She started to load the guns.
“I need you to drive steady. I have been practising but I cannot do miracles.” Mercy indicated.
She started shooting the drones effectively until the tires got cut on barbed wire laid on the pavement. The vehicle was useless so they had to step out of the car.
“We need to leave you behind.”
Iker and the other guy started to run but she shot at a tree nearby.
“Don’t move!”
“They know you are here. That is why they sent drones, machines on wheels and traps. If they sent soldiers, you can control them. They had figured you out.”
“I never agree with him but my left hand is right this time. There is no point in dragging us down with you. Please.”
”Don’t say anything stupid about me, hide the money and take another dose of the injections.”
Mercy left them to go deep inside the forest, alone and angry. Iker and the other guy went in and took the opposite direction.”
“So, tell me, you always know what to do. What now?”
“Well, I think it’s pointless. I think they are going to get us anyway but the good news is that nobody else can see me. Only you and her. I promise I will behave, you will have your limbs back if you go to prison.”
“I think I am going to need your help in there more than ever.”
“Oh, that is so sweet of you. I would give you a hand job if we were not in a rush.”
“Not now, thanks, I am good.”
“Let’s go to the river, it would be less difficult for them to track us and I could help you with the swimming.”
“Damn, the video files, we need to destroy them.”
Iker took them out of the bag and smashed them against a rock. He then, hid the money under some rocks.
“Let’s get another dose of these. Maybe two. What do you think?”
“Do you really care what do I think?” Iker replied.
“Not really,”
The other guy smiled and injected Iker with the three doses available.
“What about the phone?”
“It’s waterproof, silly.”
“How do you know those things?”
The other guy pushed Iker into the river. Both fell into the current and swam together for a while until they were surrounded by police units. Iker was careful enough to let the backpack into the stream so no evidence would be found with them.
“Do you want me to go?” Said the other guy panting as soon as he left the water.
“Not really, I don’t feel safe anymore if you are not around.”
“You are so getting that hand job.”
“The first of many.”
The police arrested Iker, processed him and kept them under guard for months. They never mentioned Mercy, Taran or Braith’s abilities. He was just charged with aiding a fugitive. His legal rights were reduced and they made sure he did not represent a danger to society. After a few months, hundreds (or what it felt like) of medical tests and many interrogations, he was sent to a medical facility with tight security measures. He had the impression he was in another country because the TV was only in English and the staff spoke many languages. He had little contact with other patients and the few around were not very talkative. The government created a story to his family about a sudden job he had to take abroad. The other guy remained silent most of the time, always observing the surroundings, alert, taking mental notes and present in Iker’s life. He became a guardian angel, alerting Iker about people and situations but rarely taking control of speech or making suspicious moves with the left limbs.
Once at the patio, he noticed a new intern, someone who had just been transferred.
“There is a guy here, he is different, he reminds me of Mercy, only he is not as annoying as she was.”
Iker was afraid they could hear him talk to himself, so he got a pen and paper and wrote: “Who?”
“Thiago, the blind man.” Said the other guy.
Iker scrapped what he wrote and changed it for a “Why?”
“I think he can see me or sense when I am around.”
“Do you think he is hiding what he is?” Iker wrote on the piece of paper and then threw it away.
“Like us, yes.”
Thiago was walking in the garden of the facility when Iker intercepted him.
“Sooner or later, they are going to find out about you both.” Thiago said to them.
“What about you?”
“I managed to run away for a while.” Thiago replied.
“Are you like Mercy?” Iker intervened.
“Somehow, she made me like her. I guess it was within me. I am a cross between you guys and her.”
“What?” They both said at the same time.
“I have another guy but he does not talk.” Thiago replied.
“You are very lucky, my one talks non-stop.” Said Iker while his other guy laughed.
“Mine one just made me blind from time to time, it is his way to keep me safe, to make me look vulnerable, to guide me. Well, it is a fact that I can’t see at this very moment.”
“There is no much to see right now but is good to know that we are not alone.” Said Iker.
“We are four.” The other guy said.
“This girl, Ciana, she could feel me.” Thiago pointed out.
“She was tracking me. The snow in my eyes could sense her too and that part of me is the one able to understand your guy, which exists as part of you. He knows things you can’t but a part of you knows them too.”
“And your point being…?” Iker replied.
“It is like an awakening, a collective one, from you, me, Ciana, Mercy and God knows who else.”
“So, what now?” The other guy asked.
“What happens after you wake up?” Thiago answered.
“You stand up.” Iker said.
“We have to learn how. Look what happened to Mercy and Ciana. There is no need to draw attention until you are ready to play the big fight.” Thiago said.
“He is right, we need to learn who we are, what we can do, and how to stand up.”
ADAM
One of his first boyfriends broke up with him for being too square. It wasn’t the first time in his life that he heard that word as a complaint regarding his personality. In fact, he understood its meaning and learnt to embraced it to the point of making fun of himself and putting that up front both at work and socially. This approach worked as he showed what he was, no tricks, it was like signing a release form. At his very young age, he was already an engineer with a master in railways. With his current partner, a civil servant as square as him, were planning on m
oving in together and getting the finances ready for a mortgage. Despite the rigidness of his way of thinking, he was conscious too that the circumstances in his life were not ordinary at all, he was not ordinary at all and his main motivation was actually be the most ordinary guy in England. He made an effort in normalising his sexual orientation with his family and friends, even though there was a history of homophobia in his neighbourhood and school. Also, he made it look perfectly regular that despite his upbringing in a borderline poor area in the Midlands, he was close to earning a six-figure salary. His Synesthesia was a similar matter in the way he wanted to catalogue, label and package it as soon as he realised of it when he was thirteen. Adam went through every study he could find, public and private doctors and even met specialists about it. He rejected a few offers like the one from the institute because they were on the experimental side and he refused to use his body as a testing ground for others. His priority was to understand in which ways he was different, how he would socialise with others and if that type of perception would affect his education. By the time he was completely sure that his peculiar type of synesthesia wouldn’t be an issue in any way, he lost interest in the trials and studies. The institute contacted him from time to time to insist on different models of trials which were tempting for the extra money, but he was doing a great at his job and there was no need for that. During a night out celebrating one of his friend’s birthday, a guy in the club caught his eye. He was unlike anyone else in the place, in fact, he stood up from the regular crowd at the club that it was obvious it was his first time there. The guy kept looking at Adam from time to time and seemed to follow him everywhere in the club. After a three-year relationship, the spark between Adam and his boyfriend was fading and although he had never cheated on him, and was not planning to, he thought that a bit of flirting wouldn’t hurt. When approaching the guy, he took him to a cubicle in the men’s room which scared him but the guy blocked the door.
“Listen, kid, we don’t have much time so you better pay attention.”
“What? Let me out, I don’t do these hook-ups.”
“This is not a hook-up. You are in danger, you must be careful.”
“Is this some sort of a prank?”
“This is no prank. I have been following you for a while and so have they. This was the only place they let the guard down. We need to meet in private. Go alone to this hotel on Monday after work and there will be a room booked in your name. Wait for me, it is very important, your life depends on it.”
The guy left so fast, Adam could not track him among the club’s sea of people on the dance floor. Adam kept wondering if it was a trick from his boyfriend to check if he would cheat on him. Certainly, the guy was very attractive in a rough way but everything else was very confusing. Maybe the idea of a prank from his friends was the most plausible. Whatever that was, he decided not to go, no matter how curious he was about the stranger. On Monday, he had a regular night with his boyfriend, just the two of them making dinner, watching TV and nothing unusual happened until two days after. At the beginning of another ordinary day, just when they finished telling each other about their days, Adam felt something different, like a peculiar smell. His Synesthesia was very developed, partly due to his acute perception and, this time, there was a strong scent in the flat, like a presence. He noticed the door at the balcony had been forced and when he was checking on that, he heard a noise behind, like a heavy thud. His boyfriend laid on the floor at the feet of the stranger.
“Sorry, kid, but don’t worry, he did not see me. I can’t let anyone see me around you.”
“What did you do to him?” Adam shouted at the stranger while checking on his unconscious boyfriend.
“It’s fine, he will wake up in a couple of hours.”
“Are you insane? I am going to call the police!”
Before grabbing his phone, the stranger snapped it out of Adam’s reach and pushed him to the sofa. His strength was scarily overpowering, not to mention how fast he was. Adam wondered at that moment how that guy could have climbed to the balcony located on the fourth floor and then forced the door with no tools.
“I am going to be as patient as I can with you because I can see that you are a stubborn little bastard.”
“Get out of here! I am going to scream so loud…”
The stranger grabbed him by the throat in what it seemed it was a hand of steel.
“If I wanted to kill you or your boyfriend, I would have done so already. I just want you to listen to me and then I will go, alright?”
Adam nodded so the guy released the grip on his neck.
“You have a condition called Smell to Colour Synesthesia. It is similar to the one I have.”
“How do you know that?”
“You have taken part in small studies at an institute here in London part of a Multinational called Tecnium XG and they tried to recruit you for further studies, which you have rejected many times.”
“That’s private!”
“Your life is not private anymore. They are following you and keep track of all your movements. I used to be part of that institute, that is how I know all that information. I have your file which is part of a list.”
“This has gone far enough.”
“I haven’t. Not yet. You are very special to them. They have developed a treatment and you are very important for that program. They need you because your type of Synesthesia is not that common. Not everyone is suitable for that and you are.”
“But I’ve said no to them many times, they cannot force me to be part of it.”
“You are wrong, they will, eventually and once they finish with the studies, they will own you, they will even kill you if you don’t do as they say.”
“This is crazy, you are crazy.”
“All I can do is warn you and if you need help, you can contact me on this blog. Post a message asking anything about Dubrovnik. It is a fake blog about travelling.”
He handed him a card with the address.
“I was part of their program and now I am on the run. I must leave the country soon. My name is Braith.”
“Could I see the files on me? Do you have them with you? I need proof that all of this is real.”
“You can’t go to the police. They are partly funded by the government. Besides, there is not much in your file except one bit I haven’t been able to decrypt.”
“About?”
“I don’t know exactly, it looks like a file from another patient. I don’t understand it.”
“You realise that you coming here and dumping all that info on me is surreal?”
“I know but…”
“I need proof.”
“You don’t have time for that!”
“Then what do you want from me?”
“To be safe, not to die or disappear like the others.”
“Get me some proof that all of what you are saying is real.”
“I’ll do my best.”
The guy went to the balcony and took a gravity defiant jump to the rooftop. In a matter of seconds, he was gone. After putting his boyfriend in bed, a confused Adam took a drink at the balcony, not knowing what to do. However, his attention shifted a few days after when he fainted at work and was taken to the Doctor that the private insurance of the company covered. He found the incident very strange and ordered several exams to be done as soon as possible. His boyfriend was very supportive and decided to go with him for the first scheduled round of tests. In route to the exams, he got a video message on his phone from an unknown number. By the thumbnail, he could tell it was from Braith but Adam did not want to play it in front of his boyfriend, just in case he could remember Braith from the apartment the other day. Braith insisted he knocked him down with a single blow from behind and, as he predicted, when he woke up, he did not remember how he got to bed. Adam told him he fell asleep very quickly on the sofa and a bit reluctant, his boyfriend bought the story. Once at the medical facility, Adam excused himself to go to the toi
let and played Braith’s video.
“Listen very carefully, kid, because this video will erase after one play. I finally found someone able to decrypt the last part of your file. It is a back-up plan to enrol you into the institute even if you don’t want to. They would do this as a last resort but it doesn’t say when or if they would actually do it for sure. The idea is to stage a disease, a complex but a very scary, long-term, painful disease. It will all start as a routine health check-up or something and then they will “discover” something odd in you. After some exams that they will manipulate in a private facility, they will tell you that you are sick. It would be a long process and eventually, you will “accidentally” stumble upon the institute you have avoided so much. They will be presented as an alternative with an effective but still experimental approach to cure you, in exchange for you know what. I’ve sent you the documents by post. I know you won’t believe me but it is all there. I am leaving the country today. I will be taking a ferry from Southampton. I wanted to stay longer but you are pretty stubborn and it is difficult for me to stay on this island. Good luck.”
Adam’s boyfriend knocked at the bathroom’s door, telling him that the nurses were waiting for him. Scared, he opened the door.
“I am not doing this. I am sorry you came here but I can’t do this today.”
“OK, no problem, let’s go home and talk it out.”
“No, there is somewhere I need to be.”
Adam ran leaving his boyfriend behind, trying to call Braith, leaving messages in the fake online forum, rushing to take a train to Southampton and asking everywhere over there about departures. He ignored his boyfriend numerous calls because there was no plausible explanation for what he did. He freaked out and decided to take the first train he could. It was one of his fantasies about breaking the routine and go to Waterloo, take the first train and plug his headphones in order to ignore where he would arrive. Such plan was full of impracticalities and he knew he would never do it but there he was, pretending at least, it was the best he could do. Sitting in a rundown bar near the port, being the only one sipping Gin and Tonic, he felt that overwhelming smell.
“Thanks for ruining my “off the grid” escape. Now everyone at the port knows I am leaving. I think you asked around almost every human being who looked remotely like a sailor.”
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