My face heats at the compliments. “Whenever you want.” I shift my attention to the last guy jogging up behind everyone else. Ken. I forgot he said he was working here.
I put my hands on my hips. “So much for only getting called in for small stuff?”
He grins and shrugs. “Well the small stuff led to big stuff.”
I fold my arms. “You didn’t tell me you were on the beta team!”
Ken sticks his tongue out at me. “Neither did you.”
"Wait…" Heaven's gaze flickers between the two of us. "Where do you two know each other?"
I stiffen. "Umm…"
"Oh erm…" Ken rubs the back of his neck, giving a nervous laugh. "We used to work together. Had lunch every now and again."
Vampire's eyes narrow as Ken talks, but if she’s got something to say, she’s not saying it.
“This is where you’ll report every morning for warm-ups and after breaks,” Heaven says. “I’d show you all the other rooms myself, but…” She claps her hands together. “How about I let you all have fun and show Jun around while I take care of all of your diagnostic appointments and personal trainer matching?”
My heart knots up into my throat, but I force a nod anyway. “Sounds good to me.”
“Good.” Heaven checks her watch. “I’ll be back to check on you all say…lunch time-ish in the Review Room?”
Ken grins. “Gotcha." He prods me with an elbow, offering his arm.
I lean away from him, smirking. "No way, Mr. Sweaty Arms."
Heaven smiles, retreating a step. "Very well. I'll leave you all to that."
Ken leads us down a down a white hall. He points at the pair of red double doors all the way down at the other end. "That's the simulation room we're going to be in once you're up to speed. We can't go in now, though."
“Maybe after lunch,” Tempest says. “I think the alpha crew is doing some showcase thing right now.”
“If there’s an alpha crew, then what are we needed for?” I ask.
“The alpha crew are all volunteers,” Blunts says. “And they’re not here everyday.”
“We’re the first full-time team for the simulator,” Tempest says. “So we’ll take over when they’re done.”
Ken raps on the first red door on our left. “This is the battle room. We spar here sometimes as part of our training routine.”
Spar? “You mean with real weapons?”
Ken tilts his hand back and forth. “Yeah, but it’s all safe. There are special shields that protect us from harm.” He presses the pad of his finger to the touch panel.
It beeps, and the doors chuff open.
Glass stalls section off the room into three parts. A circular weapon station like the one I saw earlier stands beside the door with a watch cycling through weapon holograms. Ken stops in front of it. “Here’s the rental weapon station and the settings panel. Here you can download a temporary code for any weapon onto a Gene Watch like this one.” Ken lifts his wrist to show off his black backlit fossil watch with strange rectangular and triangular shapes in the armband. “And when you download a code, the watch can project that weapon for you inside one of the sparring stalls.”
I peer at the watchband. “What’s the slots for?”
“These?” Ken twists his watch to look. He scratches his head. “Um… some kind of stone, I forgot what their called.”
“Chi stones and gene gems,” Vampire says. “Pretty much just rocks with concentrated chi energy that do different things. Most of the time they change the elemental properties of a weapon.”
I blink, more surprised that Vampire actually joined the conversation than at her answer.
Ken snaps his fingers. “There we go.”
“Every weapon here has a melee and a ranged form. Chi stones are usually the ammo while gene gems protect you,” Tempests says.
Ken pats me on the back. “It’ll make more sense once you have a Gene Watch. Maybe we’ll come back for a demonstration if we have time.”
Does your father know about this? It’s hard to imagine Shogun Tatsuo turning a blind eye to the potential here. One of these could’ve saved my career. Jin would’ve never found my gun and I would’ve never gone to Ise. The Geisha would’ve never blackmailed me and I probably would’ve never quit Showguns. I’d have all the money I wanted. I’d have power, respect, and status.
“Hey, come on, Jun.” Ken’s voice snaps me out of my thoughts. “It’s not a Jun special tour if the Jun part is missing.”
“Oh right…sorry.” I jog to catch up with the others at the door and we all go to the next room.
Ken opens his arms wide. “Welcome to the fourth best room on the whole floor!”
Sleek black computers rest atop dark cherrywood desks with headsets. Thickly-cushioned black gaming chairs face them, laden with side speakers, cupholders, and controls embedded in the arms. Orange-scented wood cleaner hangs heavy in the air-conditioned as if cleaning staff came through and wiped all the tables right before we got here.
“Why only the fourth?” I say, walking near the chairs.
“Eh…The battle room ranks third in my opinion,” Ken says. “The simulator is second.”
“Then what’s first?”
Ken and Blunts exchange grins and glances.
“You’ll see,” Tempest says. “Anyway… This is the computer room. For if you want to play a game or two.”
Before I can ask anything, Ken ushers me out of the door. “Now for the best part of this whole place.”
We stop in front of the last door before the simulator.
The door chuffs.
Someone took all the awesome of a penthouse floor and put it in this room.
An elongated couch, seats sectioned like caramel-colored baguettes, circles round a glass table in the center of the room. Potted mint garnishes the quarter-circle cream end tables. A huge flat screen nested in its amberwood entertainment center nearly takes up half the back wall. And gods, that’s just one side of the room. A trio of lights shine on a corner mini bar beside the kitchen’s island counter. Fully stocked by the looks of it. Sun pours from the glass walls leading to the balcony. From here, a pool and jacuzzi’s gleam in the light.
Holy mother of fedora-wearing ancestral gods on a jockey horse.
I think I’ve reached enlightenment.
No, no wait. I’ve died and gone to heaven. No, wait. Praise Fedora. Praise Fedora twice.
A smirk spreads across Ken’s face. “I know what you’re thinking, Jun. No drinking shenanigans yet.”
I almost don’t hear him.
“Jun?”
…
“Gods, breathe woman! Or say something!”
Tempest giggles. “I think the room broke her, guys.”
Blunts chuckles with a pointed glance at Ken. “That’s how it usually goes.”
“What is this for?” I ask.
“This is the Review Room where we spend all of our breaks and downtime,” Tempest says, pointing to a door adjacent to the TV that I didn’t notice before. “There showers back there and beds for sleeping if you're tired. The fridge is usually always stocked. If you want the staff to bring something special, there’s a request form on the counter.”
“We also review game replays here,” Ken says. “Right now Heaven is having us give feedback to other players. It’s dull, but c’mon. We get to do it in this room while we stuff our faces.”
“Speaking of Heaven…” Vampire checks her watch. “It’s almost lunchtime now.”
“I guess we’ll just chill here?” Blunts says, tugging at his shirt collar.
Ken sniffs under his arms. “I’m gonna take a shower.”
Tempest nods. “I’m with you there. And I don’t think we have anymore exercise scheduled after this.”
Blunts pulls up a hologram schedule on his Gene Watch. “Hmm… Looks like we just have a Demo and a Feedback Session for the rest of the day.”
Vampire heads to the kitchen, retrieving a bottle of cold water f
or herself.
I sprawl out on the couch. Blunts picks up the remote from the end table and turns on the tv.
A raven-haired woman with her shoulders shrugged forward is on screen speaking into the reporters appears on screen. “…They were wearing these weird CRISIS-D shirts. I just ran away as fast as I could.”
The screen cuts back to the newscaster. “Well, you heard it here folks. The police are advising everyone who has any information on this strange group to call them. And if you see anyone who might be part of this organization, keep your distance.”
CRISIS-D? Isn’t that what was written on the note to Mai? A slow freeze trundles through my veins. I wonder if Mai got her phone situation fixed? I pull out my phone and scroll for Mai’s number. Let’s try again…
The door chuffs loudly, cutting off my thoughts.
Heaven strolls in. "I presume you had fun?"
"You should've seen her face when she came in here," Ken calls from the hallway.
“It was kind of like this.” Tempest gives a wide-eyed stare with a gaping mouth.
I scoff. “I was not!”
“Oh but isn’t that everyone’s face when they come here?” Heaven leans against the couch. “Anyway, the doctors are ready to see you.”
Guess I’ll have to call Mai later. “Do I need anything?” I ask, rising from my seat.
“Nothing, but yourself,” Heaven says. “I hope you’re fond of sprinting.”
I am not fond of sprinting.
I'm also not fond of pull-ups, lunges, squats, suicides, treadmill running, weight lifting, sit-ups and all of the other exercises the examiner put me through.
Gods, how long does it take for someone to check a cup of piss and a blood sample? I’ve been sitting in this tiny waiting room for an hour already, and no one’s been back to update me since. My only company is a starfish stuck on the mini aquarium glass. I don’t even get a window to look out of. It’s more like one of those padded rooms for the suicidal. Except there’s no padding. Just stucco all the way around.
I know it's probably because of Devil's Disease, but all this delay makes the dread in my stomach tie in knots.
If you're going to tell me I have Devil's Disease just do it already!
The door slides open.
It’s Heaven. She’s got a clipboard in hand. “Hello, there.”
I grip my knee. “Did the results come in?”
She presses a few buttons on the inside keypad. “Yep.” The door locks with a quiet click. She’s not smiling.
“Is there something wrong?”
"Hmm?" Heaven shakes her head. "Oh, no, no. Nothing is wrong."
My breaths shallow out until it barely feels like I'm getting any air. Nothing is wrong? But I'm infected! What does she mean nothing is wrong?
"Jun, I’m going to ask you a few questions. But they might be on the confidential side. Is that okay?” Heaven asks.
My pulse raps against my ears. “Confidential?”
“Nothing bad, but we found something odd when we got results, which is why it took so long,” Heaven says. “I won’t ask you about personal habits, past, or anything. We’re just asking if you may have come into contact with certain things. And have certain symptoms.”
“Oh.” Alright, maybe this is it then. “Okay. I don’t mind.”
Heaven lifts her clipboard. “Do you have pets at home? If so, then what kind?”
“I have a puppy at home,” I say.
Heaven jots something down. “Have you had contact with any other similar kind of creatures recently? Physical or not?”
“How recent?”
“Within at least two weeks.”
“Yes.”
“What kind?”
“A cat.”
Heaven glances over the top of the clipboard.
My stomach shrivels at the look. “Am I in trouble?”
For a few heartbeats, there’s only the sound of Heaven’s pen scritch-scratching on paper. “No.”
I let out my in-held breath. “Do I have Devil's Disease or something?”
“No.”
I don't? Then what are all these questions for? "No Devil's Disease?"
She flips her page over. “Is that what you’re afraid of?”
I scratch at the rim of my ear. “I was, until you said that.”
At this Heaven smiles. “I was going to talk to you about that in a second, but since you brought it up…” She lowers her clipboard and tucks it under her arm. “We did find the disease causing agent in your body and we examined it thoroughly, but we actually found that the Akuma cells that you have are actually being restrained by your own natural type of Radiance cells.” She puts her hands together. “You’re one hundred percent free of Devil’s Disease.”
Energy surges through me, I hop to my feet. “You’re serious? I can’t catch it?”
Heaven nods. “Everyone in the lab was shocked at the results. You’re the first person to have an immunity to the disease itself.”
I’m immune like Mai! I’m not going to die! Ha! I can’t wait to see the look on the Geisha’s face when I—On second thought, maybe I shouldn’t say anything? After all, if the Geisha still believes I have Devil’s Disease, he won’t come near me. It’ll buy me some time until he tries something else. “Thank gods. You don’t know how glad I am to hear that.”
“You’re very fortunate,” Heaven says. “If you don’t mind, would you be willing to let us use your DNA samples for further research to help find a cure?”
“Sure thing! Whatever helps,” I chirp.
"Great." She takes out her clipboard. “But I still have another check to do and you'll be clear for today.”
I sit back down. "Okay."
“Have you had any noticeable changes in sex drive?”
“No.”
“Any changes in appetite or food cravings?”
“No.”
“Any notable physical changes, whether internal or external?”
“What?”
“Any notable physical changes, whether internal or external?”
My brows scrunch together. For an instant, I’m reminded of the cave and the sensation I felt then. But I doubt that’s even worth mentioning. “Umm… no.”
Heaven’s eyes narrow as if looking for something. “None at all?”
“No.”
More pen scritch-scratching follows. A lot of it.
“I'm confused. Is there another problem with my results?” I ask. "I thought I was clear of anything wrong."
“You are. It's just your result were higher than usual in certain categories,” Heaven says. “For the fitness part of the exam: we split stats into agility, speed, endurance, strength, and flexibility. And you scored abnormally high in speed, endurance, and agility compared to an average person. Your hearing and olfactory tests were also abnormally high.”
“Wait a minute…” I get up. “How abnormal?”
“We clocked you reaching a top speed of forty-two which is about as fast as a gray fox." Heaven lowers her clipboard. She lingers on the word ‘fox’, then flips to another page. “Even though you didn’t sustain it, it’s still note-worthy. Even the most fit athletes can only push close to twenty. You also reported smelling things that weren't in the room during the olfactory test, but they were used earlier for someone else's test. I could go on.“
Prickles breach my spine. "So what does that mean? You said I'm not in trouble."
"It's very good for working in the simulator actually. But…" She leans against the wall. "I'm curious about why your scores are that high."
“I really don’t know—”
“No special exercise regimen? No special diet? No steroids?”
“No. I just do whatever I want.” My lips press together. "Could it have something to do with the restrained Akuma cell?”
A small smile dances across her lips, but she shakes her head. “In this case, it’s very unlikely.” She stands up straight. "But with that in your body, I'd advise yo
u to be careful. The Radiance gene can stop Devil's Disease, but it might not stop other unpredictable effects of the Akuma cell. But if you ever find that reason, I’d like to be the first to know."
3-8 'Ah'
Sore, aching, from the fitness exam and a second two-hour round at Ken’s house, I get back home at seven-thirty feeling more animal than human. Hunting for food in the kitchen. Freeze at King’s loud barking. Growl at him to quiet down, but he jumps on me and wags his tail until I pick him up and carry him to Jin’s room. Jin, on the other hand, takes King while eyeing me as if I have a grenade stashed somewhere.
My back erupts in itches the moment I step into my room. I curl my fingers into my palm. Draw in deep breaths. Ken said not to scratch it. I hate not being to do anything about it. I should at least look at it. Closing the door and locking it, I slip off my shirt and check my back the bathroom mirror. My skin is a bit red, but Ken said that’s normal for a new tattoo. Maybe I should let it breathe for a little bit. I lock the door and strip from the torso up. As soon as I finish, my phone meows with a phone call. Regi.
I pick up. “Hello?”
“Hey, hey, how’s that job?”
I place the phone near by my face and lay down. “So far so good. I’ve only done my fitness exams.” Then I remember Heaven’s news. “You’re not going to believe what I found out today!”
“Oh?” Papers rumple on the other end of the phone. “What’s that?”
“When they did my blood test, they found out that I’m immune to Devil’s Disease.”
Thump! There’s a long pause, a mad shuffling of papers and then Regi finally says. “For real? Holy shit Jun. I thought it got everybody. You’re like the first person.”
“Mai’s been immune long before me.”
“Really? How come people haven’t found out about it then?”
“Showguns has its own doctors. Most of us can’t go to ordinary doctors because we’ll test positive for the disease when we don’t actually have it. But in my case, I lucked out that they saw the real Akuma cells.”
“Yeah, but how did you get the real one in the first place?” Regi asks.
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