Janelle
September 26th, 2007. 2:24 p.m. Josh has been driving us over to San Diego. We’ve been stuck on the five in traffic for at least an hour now… but we’re in our suits so at least we look cool. At least I look cool. Angela’s riding shotgun. I’m sitting in the back with Sejong. Josh has been blasting his burned CDs on repeat the whole trip. Every other song on this CD is Soulja Boy. Not that I mind. This song will never get old. Angela’s DS died so she just pulled out another one from her bag. Is that what she’s been spending her money on? I wish I could spend my money like that… I still have all my loans from my last college to pay off. Aaaaand we’re stuck in traffic again… Should I get some snacks at the next stop…? I mean, I did go for a run this morning, so it should be okay… right?
I turn to Sejong who was just pressing his head against the window. “Hey, Sejong. Just curious, why did your parents name you Sejong? I’ve never heard that name before.”
“Oohoho. You’re going to love this.” he stretches his neck and looks back at me. “So Sejong was the name of the fourth king of the Joseon Dynasty. He’s famous mostly for creating Hangul; the Korean alphabet, but also instituted reforms like maternity and paternity leave, patroned and reformed schools, helped institute great technological advancement, and also redistributed surplus food to peasants and farmers.”
“Ooooh I see.”
“He also banned Buddhism and made all the muslims in Korea convert, but yeah. Cool dude otherwise.”
“Wait, there’s muslims in Korea?”
“Yeup. Since the Yuan Dynasty.”
“Huh.” I blink. “Guess your parents wanted you to be some kind of great scholar then, huh?”
“Yep. And now I’m an art school dropout.” Sejong laughed. “I’m just one big disappointment after another to them.”
“Oh…” I immensely regret ever asking. “Uh… sorry?”
“Wait a sec…” Angela looks up from her DS and towards Sejong. “Sejong, what are you doing here? Aren’t you supposed to be in Korea?”
Sejong tilts his head. “Why would I be in Korea?”
“Didn’t you say you were going to a wedding?”
“No.” Sejong shakes his head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Dude. You totally told me you were going to Korea.”
“Then why am I here?” Sejong looks utterly baffled.
“Huh. Must’ve dreamt that then.” Angela shrugs before looking back at her DS.
“Anyway. Janelle, don’t worry about it.” Sejong waves his hand. “What about you? Why did your parents name you Janelle?”
“Oh, well, my parents are super Catholic and they heard somewhere that Janelle meant ‘God is gracious’ so that’s what they went with.”
“Really?” Sejong looked dumbfounded. “Catholic filipinos?”
Me, Josh, and Angela all look back at him. “Dude, the Philippines were part of the Spanish Empire. It was be Catholic or die.”
“I didn’t know that, man. Am I the only one who’s not Catholic here?”
“Yeah.” I nod.
“Pretty Catholic.” Josh finally looks back at the road and raises his hand.
“Baptist.” Angela doesn’t look up from her DS. “But it’s basically the same thing.”
“My mom would slap you if she heard that.” I chuckle.
“I would slap your mom’s saggy titty off before she ever had the chance.” A disgusting chuckle crept out of Angela’s throat.
… They aren’t that saggy…
…
…
Is sagginess inheritable…?
“Anyway,” I clear my throat. “What about you, Angela? What’s the story behind your name?”
Angela closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. She stalls for a long, long time before answering. “My whore of a mother thought I was going to be a boy, so she named me Angel because God apparently told her to.” Her voice possessed a cadence that I never wanted to hear from her again. “Once I plopped out, she saw I was a girl and just named me Angela instead.”
“O-oh.” I gulped. “What about you, Josh? Any funny name stories?”
“Oho you’re going to love this. My mom was a big fan of The Goonies so she named me after Josh Brolin.”
“Aaaw that’s cute.” I exhale in relief. “Did you ever watch it with her?”
“Aw nah.” Josh chuckles and shakes his head. “She died in a driveby when I was three. Been living with my abuela until recently.”
“Oh…” I look down at the crumb covered floor then back to Sejong. “What about you? Any happy stories to share about your parents?”
“They told me not to contact them until I got a Ph.D.” Sejong smiled.
“I’m just going to stop talking now.” I slump back into my seat and look out the window.
Angela
September 26th, 2007. 4:07 p.m. I’m in a secret facility that I can’t fully describe without committing suicide via five gunshot wounds to the back of the head. I just know we pulled into an underground parking garage and some wall opened up or something. We were greeted by two armored guards that were real friendly. Offered us milk and cookies and everything. Seriously, I was expecting big gruff military daddies, but these cheerful lads are nice too. They showed us around the facility. It looked like a normal bureaucrat's office. Lots of cabinets. Boring-ass grey painted walls. Couple of soda and snack machines. Rows upon rows of computers and locked doors. Everyone else there looked like completely normal office workers with weird implants on the side of their heads and thick body armor. The only other thing that looked out of place was just how bright the office lights were. I was getting a headache just keeping my eyes open. That and there was waaaaaay too much incense and religious icons all over the walls. It looks like my parents’ room on a good day. Before we entered one particularly sturdy looking door, the guard stopped us in front of a locker.
“Alright, heroes.” The guard smiles and claps his hands. “Can everyone let me know their Techs real quick?”
“I can pull small objects towards me.” Josh yawns.
The guard tossed him a beefy looking assault rifle. It looks completely unlike anything I’ve seen irl or in games. It looks like a new game + weapon.
“I can go inside technology.” I raise my hand.
The guard chucks me an identical rifle. Oof… This thing feels like it weighs the same as me… I can feel my arms popping out of their sockets just feeling this thing.
“I can shapeshift.”
The guard pauses before also chucking Sejong the same rifle.
“Pyrokinesis.”
“Ah nice.” The guard begins handing out dense sunglasses to us all. “That Tech will do you far better than anything I could give you. Just don’t go too ham. Put all those on and don’t take them off till you leave the facility. Got it?”
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We all agree and he leads us into the room. The door shuts tight behind us and bright lights focus on the wall across from us. Five sheets of metallic glass cut the room in half. Some big bioscanner console is hooked up next to the wall. Turrets and gas tunnels are hooked up to the other side of the room. Someone is restrained to the wall with a collection of barbed wire, metal belts, chains, and padlocks. She looks like a final boss. A piece of pitch black cloth covers her eyes and a metal box is fastened tight to her neck that goes up to her mouth while her body is restrained in a straitjacket that looks sturdy enough to restrain God. Long, filthy white hair falls well past her feet and lies all over the cell door. Her head rotates to follow us each time one of us takes a step. She’s tall… very… very… tall… Oh my god I love her outfit… I bet she has some sexy eyes and some delectably gross monster tongue hanging inside that box. All that metal and binding can’t hide her voluptuous curves from me…. Oh my god she’s stacked, isn’t she? I knew it… There’s a total monster babe on the other side of that glass. I knew the government was hiding monster girls from us the whole time.
“Okay… so. Quick rundown for ya’ll.” the dude points to the babe. “This is Petra. I just need you all to supervise her, okay? If anything goes down, pull the alarm on the wall over there. The gas and turrets should put her back to sleep in no time. And whatever you do, keep your distance and keep those glasses on. Got it?”
We all nod.
Sejong points at the console. “Should we know anything about that? That looks important.”
“That’s the release console. It opens a door to her chamber. The only ones who can open it are her feeders and doctors. So if you see someone going in there, they know what they’re doing. Any other questions?”
Janelle raises her hand. “Where’s the bathroom?”
“Out the door, down the hall to the right. It’ll be the second door on your left.”
“Thanks. Sorry. I’ve been holding it in for an hour.” she carefully puts down her gun and scurries off to the bathroom.
“Any other questions?”
“Nope.” I shake my head. “Wait, yeah. How long do we supervise her?”
“It’ll be 1500 to 0300 every day this week. Food’s on us.” he smiles and points to himself and heads out the door. “If you need anything else, don’t hesitate to ask.”
“You got it.” Josh gives him a little salute as the door closes.
Sejong and I sit down on the floor while Josh begins pacing back and forth. I’m shuffling through my ipod. I bet I can make a pretty sweet makeshift sound system in this room if I just hack into the wall outlet… “You guys want some music? I got some Miku.”
“Hell yeah.” Josh shoots me a thumbs-up. “Play that.”
I dive into the wall outlet and reconfigure some things. Little while later, boom. We got Packaged playing.
Meanwhile, Sejong opens the sketchbook he brought with him and begins sketching Petra.
“Oooh… you a fan too, huh?” I look down. He’s giving her even bigger titties in the sketch. Very nice.
“How could one not be?” Sejong looks up and begins admiring Petra. “The intricate locks, the monstrous hair that puts lion manes to shame… the sexy mysteries hidden behind those binds and blindfold… I adore everything about her aesthetic.” he blows a kiss to her before resuming his sketching.
Bzzt bzzt. Josh’s phone goes off. He plucks it from his pocket and looks at it. His eyes open wide and his lips curl into a smile. “Hey,” Josh puts the phone away and begins backing up towards the door. “I have to meet up with an associate for something. A thing just came up. Will you two be okay by yourselves? I’ll be back in two to three hours.”
“I’m going with you.” I insist.
“No you-”
Before he can finish, I already jumped into his phone.
“Too late~” I tease.
“I can just leave you here you know.” Josh looks down at his phone.
“You and I both know you ain’t leaving your phone in a federal facility.”
Josh sighs. “Fair point. Sejong, you gonna be okay?” he puts me nice and snug in his back pocket. His butt feels so nice and firm.
“Mmhm.” Sejong smiles at us. “I got Janelle and Miku to keep me company. “I should be just fine. Bring me back some tortilla chips would you? I am in the mood for something salty.”
“Got it.” Josh puts down his gun and begins jogging out of the facility. The guards were willing to let us leave if we made a grocery run for them. Everyone wanted ginger ale for some reason.
Janelle
September 26th, 2007. 4:19 p.m. Facility bathroom. I’ve been sitting on the toilet for ten minutes… It’s so quiet in here. I can’t hear anything going on outside. Inside, there’s not even the noise of dripping water or an air conditioner. Only the sound of my own breathing pollutes this quiet ground. This has to be the cleanest bathroom I have ever seen. Someone must go through here every night and just fill it to the brim with bleach. It would explain the smell and how perfect it is… Every time I close my eyes, I can almost see the secret to inner peace… Maybe that’s why the guard was so happy. There’s a perfect meditation spot right inside his workplace… I’m about to fall asleep on the toilet… but I really don’t want to fall face first ass up in a bathroom sober, so I get up, wash my hands with the warmest, smoothest water I ever felt grace my fingertips, and exit.
EEEE EEEE
EEEE EEEE
EEEE EEEE
EEEE EEEE
Hell. Absolute hell awaited me outside the bathroom. The office had erupted into flames. A horrible, deep red light illuminates every inch of the facility. Bits and pieces of guards were splattered to the walls, floor, and ceiling. The office was flooded with stone statues of terrified office workers. All while high pitched Japanese music accompanies the chaos.
EEEE EEEE
EEEE EEEE
The alarm rattles my head and makes me want to vomit each time it rings. I want to cry. I want to run. My body’s too tense to afford anything faster than a slow shuffle. I hold my glasses to my face and constantly look around me to look for what did this. I make my way to the prison cell after absorbing all the fire in the office area. At least I won’t have to worry about freezing to death…
I enter the prison cell room ready to incinerate anything that moves. The glass barriers have been shattered. Petra is gone. A wounded Sejong lies gripping his arm next to what remains of the barrier. He has a piece of glass the size of my hand plunged deep into his arm and sitting in a puddle of his own blood, but he’s still awake. Sejong’s squirming and cursing in agony, but he’s alive.
“Enigma!” I absorb the fire in the prison room and lock the door behind me before kneeling down to him. I’m sweating like a damn pig and feel small blazes erupting out the back of my neck, but it's better than letting the office burn. “How are you feeling? Can you see me?” I lift my finger in front of his face.
“Phoenix…? Yeah…” he grimaces and clutches the area around the glass shard. “Thank god you’re alright…”
“Never mind me.” I immediately begin examining his arm. I can see fresh fingerprints on the glass shard. “Where are Josh and Angela?” I dig into my jacket and pull out a metallic box.
“They went off on a grocery hunt… They should be fine… Assuming that thing didn’t get them… Hnngh…” Sejong shivers. “What’s that box for?”
“Just shut up and don’t move.” I open my box to show a collection of prep pads, needles, needle holders, a vast array of suture string, sponge cleaners, forceps, and tweezers. I pull out a pad and begin wiping off the area around the shard.
“What are-”
“I said shut up.” I reach into my other jacket pocket and pull out a mouth guard. “Open your mouth.”
Sejong does what I say and closes his mouth around the guard.
I grab the forceps, place them over the end of the glass shard, and sit down on Sejong’s legs. “Get ready to bite.”
“mmft!”
“I said shut up.” With one clean stroke, I pluck the shard out of his bicep and toss it across the room.
“MMMMMMFTH!!!!” Sejong starts to cry and bangs his free hand against the ground. His legs thrash, but that doesn’t throw me off.
I peer into the wound. Two chips of glass are still lodged in. “Stay still and meditate. Try to pretend you aren’t here.” I slide my tweezers in.
Sejong turns his head and cries out.
tink tink
All glass shards are removed. I rotate his bicep to try and drain the blood the best I can before returning it to its natural position. I open up another prep wipe and disinfect the inside and outside of the wound. “You’re doing great so far. Just a little longer. You’re going to be okay.” I say while threading a needle.
“Mftmh…” Sejong whines and tears begin to fall.
I adjust my seat on his legs and pat his head. “You’re doing great. I’m almost done, okay? I’ll even get you some candy while I’m done.”
Sejong whines again. He continues whining each time I close his wound a little bit more. Nine sutures later, I’m done. I close up the wound, snip the thread, burn my equipment, wipe off my equipment, take the guard out of Sejong’s mouth, store everything neat and tidy back into my box, and put it right back into my pocket.
Sejong plops over and squeezes his arm. “W-where the hell did you learn to do that…?”
“Nursing student. Remember?” I dig a small lollipop out of another jacket pocket and give it to him.
“Oh… yeah... Why the hell didn’t you just cauterize it or something?!” He grunts, but still pops the lollipop into his mouth.
“Cauterizing is only a good idea if there is no other way to prevent major blood loss. It also leaves you super prone to infection.”
“O-oh…” Sejong bites his lollipop in half. crunch
“They taught us that my first week there.” I pull out my phone and contact Aegis. “Just be sure to sit up and conserve your strength. Let me know if you have any stiffness or severe itching in your arm.”
We waited locked inside the room for half an hour. The alarm died down. There were no more guards, noise, or Petra around. The stench of blood and soot continued to violate my nose as we waited in silence wondering if Petra would return and kill us… All while suppressing my urge to spray hot bile and vomit all over the floor. My head felt lighter by the second as I waited for something… anything to open the door. Eventually, Aegis agents arrived and escorted us back to the Academy via helicopter from atop the parking garage. Every muscle in my body relaxed, but my clothes still reeked of soot, and the stench of guts still hasn’t left my nose.