James’ dad didn’t come to work today, and John can’t blame him. He’s worked enough to deserve a couple vacation days, especially after what happened. Regardless, John had lots of work to do that day. He woke up earlier than most days as there was highly important work to do that morning, like how they had to put up another billboard on the highway for Pepsi’s new spicy flavour (trademarked). They had to accelerate production after finding out Coca Cola’s own yellow lemon blast (trademarked) was set to release a day earlier than expected. After that he had to put up the billboard for Coca Cola’s yellow lemon blast.
It was done by 8 am. John took a break and readied himself for the next task. He took off his cap-mask, cleaning the sweat off his forehead. The break couldn’t be too long. He went down to get three burial devices.
He was alone in front of the mansion door. It was like nothing happened. They don’t want to alert the population. John stopped in front of the door. He knew what they had just done, and so he couldn’t bring himself to open the damn door. The morning sun hadn’t risen completely, but its rays burned John’s neck and back. He felt like he had spikes in his guts. He turned the doorknob and opened the doors.
There were no bodies. John went through all the rooms in the building. They were nowhere to be found. He sighed in relief. He knew where they went, but he still worries. The UPA won’t be kind on them, he thinks as he pulls out a tiny communication device to submit a report of the situation.
Hansen couldn’t even get up off his back. Laying down in one of Karim’s guest bedrooms, he moaned in pain. That stunt he performed back in the castle was cool and all, but he couldn’t even feel his legs now. The room was supposed to be pink with a bit of white, but it’s so dark Hansen can’t even make up the colours. He shifts and moves around in the sheets, not being able to catch any sleep.
Consciousness came back to him at one point a little bit after 8 am. He found himself in the magenta dress from the basement’s basement. He tried to get up, but soon realised his legs had given up on him. Dim darkness burned his eyes; a bit of sun light came through gaps in the curtains. With this little amount of light, he could make out a cat in front of him, sitting down on the bed with Hansen. He tried to reach out to the cat to pet him but stopped once he saw the cat more closely. Its expression was one of disgust and hate. The cat figured out complex human emotional responses and it was transmitting it to him. Hansen froze.
James came through the door, lighting up the room with the living room’s light and then turning on the bedroom lights. That stunned Hansen. The cat walked off the bed and out the room.
“Ow! Dude, watch the lights!” Moaned Hansen in more pain. James quickly turned off the lights again. “Sorry! Sorry…” James brought water for him. After rehydrating, James asked. “How are you doing man? You really made a big mess back there…” Hansen took a bit of time to answer, settling in the bed again to rest his bones. “I’m dead right now dude. I went a little bit too nuts.”
Nobody said anything for a while. You could almost hear Karim working outside watering the crops in the middle of birds chirping and the wind blowing. James wasn’t as physically hurt as Hansen, but all three of them felt this exact dawning feeling. “What a day, huh.” Said Hansen to break the silence. “Yeah, Jesus.” They were all tired. James struggled a bit to get up from the laziness.
“Well, Karim is gonna make beef stew, but right now he’s a bit busy taking care of the crops… I think he should, like, get some workers to do hard work for him sometimes, you know?” Hansen nodded slowly. “Well, I’m not gonna bother you anymore. I’ll call you whenever the stew is ready!” James walked out the room. Hansen was left looking at the door blankly. He went back to trying to sleep.
Outside, Karim watered the crops, bringing with him a water hose. The day was still burning, so he was wearing summer clothes and a straw hat. James was sitting by in a bench outside the farmhouse, right bellow an extra roof Karim added a while ago for summer and rain. He was still working with his laptop on top his lap. Every so often, Karim took breaks from carrying around that thing and drank some water, but sometimes he just sprayed himself with the hose and kept working. James looked over every so often amid his work.
Once, Karim went on to sit next to James. “Yo, watch the lap.” Noted James to Karim. “Oh right, sorry.” Karim’s side of the bench was soaking. It evaporated with the heat quickly though. As Karim gulped, James couldn’t help but look. Lots of stuff in his mind at the moment. At one point Karim broke the silence.
“So, how’s your vision?” He asked. “Still kinda fucked. The dots won’t go away, and yeah, you’re still glowing.” Responded James. Another moment of silence passed until he continued. “Hansen is glowing harder than last night too. I don’t know what any of this means, but it looks like I can see the sickness? I still don’t know though.”
Karim heard. Another moment of silence passed, and he tried to lighten up the mood. “Hey, how bright am I?” James smiled softly. “I’ll be honest man, you gotta keep your game up. You’re no brighter than that lightbulb…”
“Aw, come on dude!“
“Alright, that was a bit hyperbolic, but you are still just ever so slightly brighter than a lightbulb.”
“Good enough for me!” The bit was shitty, but it amused them.
Another moment of silence passed until James broke it again. “You know, it’s handy we have someone like you with us.” Karim is a bit confused. “What do you mean by ‘a guy like me’?”
“You know, like, fit and stuff. You are hardworking and strong. You could carry me and Hansen up with both arms if you wanted to!”
“Heh… I could. Still, it’s just what I’ve gotta do. And you’re also very hardworking, you should give yourself that!” Said Karim, talking about James’ laptop. “Oh, well, this? This is a bunch of bullshit, you know. I’m doing a program for more efficient cookie tracking for some corporate sites. You know how they do with the information for targeted ads. I’m the reason it looks like Google is reading your mind!”
“Yeah, see? That’s impressive man!”
“Maybe, but it’s also… not very good, y’know. You’re feeding people, I’m tracking people.”
Karim stood in silence while he tried to think what to say next. James saved his project and closed his laptop. “You work on farms that feed you and other people. You manage to do it all by yourself even when everyone, even your family is gone…” James realised what he said, and he rushed to apologise. “Oh, no, don’t worry. Fuck those guys.” Responded Karim. “Ok, uh… Yeah so you do it all alone and you even serve us from time to time.” Added James.
“It’s just the way it is you know. I like doing it.”
“Well, haven’t you thought of contracting some helpers?” Karim went silent again. His face was one of reflection and memory. “…Never.” James was thrown off by the severity of his tone. His face was still calm, a little pained, but joyful, but his tone changed for a second when James wasn’t looking. Another moment of silence.
“Alright… What about a friend to help you out and work alongst?” Pondered James to Karim. He gave it a thought and looked over at James, examining him another time. He’s familiar with him and his body, but he likes to be reminded. “…Sounds good. Then you can get as wet as I am!” Karim said with a smile. James’ face got a bit red, but he smiled back. Karim’s wording was a bit awkward for them, but they picked it up not long after.
“Maybe we can get Hansen to work out a little.” Added James.
Shortly after, both went back to work. By around 9:45 am Karim was done with the crops, and James helped him in the kitchen. By 10:30, the food was ready, Karim helped Hansen out of the visitor’s bedroom and into the dining room. “How are you holding Hansen?” Asks Karim. “I’m still in one piece, I’ll give you that. Ow…”
They sit down and eat. They eat mostly in silence. The outside still exists, sounds of birds chirping and the wind enter through the semi open sliding door, and at some point, Karim’s supposed cat comes along to annoy and ask for food. “Since when do you have a cat?” Asked Hansen. “Since last week. He just kind of appeared and he’s just been coming and going for food. It’s a wild domestic cat!”
Silence drowned the dining room. The sun was hot on the roof. No one talked unless it was for the most menial things like “pass me the salt, please.” And such. Of course, another emergency meeting was up.
“So…” Karim tried to start the conversation. “Yeah.” Agreed Hansen. James nodded. The subject was pretty obvious. “Now that we’re all together, we gotta have a game plan.” Added Karim. No one had anything to say. “Do you guys still have your… er… tools? Like, whatever the fuck this is.” James said as he made a gesture with his hands of hold something and a bright cyan sniper rifle appeared on his hands. Karim did a similar holding gesture and his bright yellow hoe appeared. Hansen too, but the large pickaxe was too strong for Hansen’s weakened state, so it fell to the floor with his arm making a dent on the wooden floor. Hansen whimpered. They helped Hansen back up on his chair.
“What are we supposed to do with these… things?” Asked Hansen, still pained. “Well, do you guys remember anything that weird kid said?” answered James with a question. “Nothing specific, no.” Hansen got reminded of the child and extreme melancholy hit him. James and Karim felt it too, but not as intensely. “You guys feel it too? Hell, we gotta do something.” Said Hansen. The memory of the child was impregnated with sadness in their brains.
“So, are we being persecuted or what? What the hell was up with that giant man that popped up?” No one said anything. “Well, it’s dead, so we don’t have to worry about it anymore.” Said James. “But are there more? Like, was that another accident?” Karim kept questioning. Hansen felt something build up from inside him. He remembers the moment he decapitated that thing. At the time he didn’t give it too much thought, but the thought came back to him now and it made him nauseous. “Oh god, I killed it.” Even though hours had passed, only now did the regret come around to bother.
James and Karim looked at Hansen, worried. “It doesn’t matter though!” Karim tried to console Hansen. “Yeah dude, that thing tried to kill us, remember? It almost cut Karim’s head off!” Rationalised James. Hansen’s mental state worsened by the second. He started crying inconsolably all of the sudden.
Hansen fell to the floor too. Karim tried to pull him up. James went to get some water or something in the chaos. Hansen was uncontrollable with emotion. He was whimpering stuff like “I’m sorry” while drowning in tears. He also looked frightened by something, and it was constantly berating him.
At some point the moans and whimpers became coughing. He was going to throw up. They both helped him to the bathroom, where they kneeled Hansen on the toilet. The coughs continued, and then something started to come out. A spherical blob of probably matter was thrown up by him. It fell on the toilet water and did a splash. Hansen shed some more tears in some sniffs, but he didn’t look as sad or frightened, but instead disgusted.
An orb with the face of the same giant man in a suit was floating on the toilet water. James and Karim were as confused as Hansen. James saw the light in Hansen stabilise at the orb of light left his body. They stared at it for a while. “What the hell is that?” “How did that even fit in my mouth?”
Hansen felt well after that. So did James and Karim, but specially Hansen now that he wasn’t dying in his deathbed. They took the orb with a face out of the toilet water, washed it, and put it on the table. It had snuck into Hansen some way or the other. “…What are we supposed to do with this thing?” Asked James. Hansen and Karim shook their heads.
A noise came from outside, startling the three of them. They instantly got in guard and drew their weapons. Now Hansen could brandish his pickaxe. They saw the child still engulfed in darkness but out in the sun too. The waves of melancholic fear hit them. He looked even more ghostly, barely a shape in the world. They were transported to a different version of the dining room, just like what happened in the child’s bedroom, with the outer world becoming a void and the unnatural light.
“You found him!” exclaimed the child in excitement.
“Find who?” asked Hansen. His response was given in the form of a frightened cry from Karim and James, who looked to the right and saw the giant man in front of them again. They put their guard up again, but the child stopped them.
“Wait guys, no! It’s my dad!” Said the child.
“This thing is your dad?!” Interrogated James still panicked. The giant wasn’t doing anything, he was just standing there. The child went to give the giant a hug, and the giant hugged it back. The three boys stood there, confused, but they did let their guard off after seeing this. “Huh.” Expressed Hansen. They were still very confused.
“Guys, this is my dad. Well… he’s not really my father, but he’s taken care of me for as long as I can remember! He’s going to have to go back to the UPA’s basement. Thankfully he can’t talk, so he can’t be made to talk!”
“Your dad tried to kill us last night dude!” Claimed Hansen.
“He’s just taking orders, you know.”
“He crawled into my body, and then I vomited him!”
“Don’t worry. Now that he’s here he’ll have to be decommissioned for like a month. You guys will be done before that, though! Hopefully…”
“Wait, no, hold on. What do you even want us to do? How are you here? What?!” James asked the questions first.
“But I told you guys already! I need you to free us! Also, I can barely materialise myself out here because of my father’s containment orb. We can share the energy that way and so we don’t dissipate back into nothingness.”
They saw how the giant took a more passive stance, sitting next to the child both as brother and father. The boys put down their weapons.
“I think I owe you guys an explanation…” said the child, a bit embarrassed. “Good thing you guys got a hold of controlling your psychic weaponry in time! God, that would’ve been devastating.”
Of course, the boys had a shit ton of questions. “What did we get involved in, dude?!” Asked Hansen. “How do our weapons work? Why are my friends glowing?” Asked James. “Are we being persecuted? Are more coming their way?” The emotions were rattling up chaotically thanks to the child’s weird aura. However, they calmed down quickly as the child prepared another monologue.
“What I gave you guys are psychic weapons… There’s really nothing to them apart from the fact that they’re psychic and you can summon them at will, as you’ve already shown me…” The boys looked embarrassed. “Don’t worry about it. Anyways, these weapons give you certain abilities that are very useful for teamwork. You, James, are a scout. You can detect stuff. You’re a healer, Karim. I recommend after this you guys finish eating that food he made. That’s actually what got my dad’s orb out of your system, Hansen! Talking about that. Hansen, you’re a bit of a tank yourself. Thanks to your especially loose valve I can concentrate bigger amounts of power in your system. Of course, you’re gonna have problems adapting to it. All of you are gonna have problems. But that is still your valve, so you will definitely handle it well! I think…” The child stopped for a moment. The boys looked at each other, worried.
“What do you mean ‘I think’?” Said Hansen, sharing the anxiety from everyone in his voice. “Uhm… We haven’t tried anything like this yet… This is like a bit of an experiment! I mean, I have all the confidence in the world that you guys will do fine! Don’t worry!”
The boys of course worried. “I mean, Karim can heal you guys! And you still have a lot of psychic powers we don’t actually know about… Like, this would be easier if we had a better connection with our real mind real… We’ve gotten weaker and less wise as a result. but you guys can learn as you go! It shouldn’t be that hard. After all these weapons are now imbedded deep in your subconscious…”
“They WHAT?!” Exclaimed James. “Yeah. Like, you feel that on the back of your necks, right? Right between where your head starts and your neck ends? They’re there deep in your system… So, if you wanted to opt out then… It’s gonna be hard.” James was freaking out, scratching his neck. Karim tried to calm him down while Hansen processed the information. Once again, the child had to calm them down with his weird aura.
“It’s not that bad guy, come on. You’re going to need them for when they come again!” The boys had to stop and think for a minute. “So, it wasn’t just a one-time thing.” Said Karim. “Yeah.” Confirmed the child. “By the way, my dad says he’s very sorry for trying to decapitate you yesterday…” It was a bit awkward for Karim, but he had nothing else to say anyways, because Hansen did end up decapitating him back. “Uh. Apology accepted.”
“Anyways, I know what you guys must do next. Pay attention. There’s something hidden in the basement of the local college campus, ok? Check the library and the computers for any signs, James. First, you’ll have to spend your day like you normally do. Don’t go right now, they’re already there. I’ll give you a sign for when the coast is clear. I’ll repeat myself. Please help us get free. The world is getting destroyed.”
This was a lot of pressure on them. However, Hansen still asked something: “What are we supposed to find under the university?” The child responded quickly, almost like Hansen stole the question from the tip of his lip. “Another research base. There isn’t anyone there that I know of, but there’s a map of the basement’s basement and important info.”
Another moment of silence permeated the ethereal dining room as the child gave them breathing room to process the information. James and Hansen were out of questions, or more accurately, they had so many questions they didn’t even know where to begin. Karim had one question: “Are you sure we’ll do it? Us? College dropouts good for nothings?” The child took more time to respond this time. He looked over at his father almost like asking for advice. Shortly after, he responded: “…Sometimes… people… need someone to think out the box.” The boys were not convinced. “…Whatever, we’ll do it. We don’t really have much else going on in our lives anyways, and I don’t plan to die yet.” Declared Hansen finally. Karim and James agreed too.
“Great! I’ll see you guys whenever I can to guide you more. OH! I almost forgot! You guys left these back there…” The child took out from nowhere three pieces of clothing. These were the clothes they wore down in the basement, “These can be your costumes for battle! I put some protection in them too. Since they were manufactures in the basement’s basement, they’re a bit anomalous, and so they can be summoned like your weapons!” The three of them put on the clothes quickly in excitement. They had their weapons, and they had their costumes. Hansen had his royal dress; James had his performance suit; Karim had his work attire. “Hell yeah, dude!” Exclaimed James in excitement.
No long after, the child and the father had disappeared. The day came back to them, blinding them temporarily for the change in scene. They were still in their combat clothes, but they soon learned how to change between their casual and combat clothes.
“You know, we should have a name!” proposed Karim. “Like a superhero team name!” James and Hansen liked the idea. “What about… ‘The Iconoclasts’!” Put forward Hansen. “Dude, nobody knows what an iconoclast is anymore…” said James, smirking. “It sounds cool though!” argued Hansen. “To be fair, it does.” Agreed Karim.
“What about something like ‘The outcast trio!’” Proposed James. “Eh. It doesn’t click that well…” Commented Hansen. “Also, there’s already a group called ‘The outcasts’, just with a K instead of a C.” The clothes they wore had an uplifting effect of them. It wasn’t just pure excitement because they like the clothes, but there’s also some stuff imbedded in them to give that effect.
They tried out names for a bit, wasting some time while they finished their beef stew. The stew invigorated them, and they felt good about themselves. The pressure was building up all the same in the back of their minds while they joked around in their energized state. They changed back into their normal clothes and they noticed the vigour pull back as they left Karim’s house to pretend as if nothing happened.
