The thief woke up in the midst of darkness, unable to see anything but himself. Looking around, Galis saw only a vast expanding shadow which wrapped its way around all corners of the room. Glancing at his body, he seemed to be tied to a chair of some sort as he wiggled his wrists and tried to stand up, what happened to him?
Pain lanced through his head as flashing images tore through his brain. Right, the Watchmen found him, he was most likely being held prisoner somewhere, probably for information of some kind. Why would they want information from him? Well, thinking logically, he was a seemingly innocuous citizen who had taken an item of great import, maybe they thought he was some sort of foreign spy or something.
‘Pfft, that’s funny.’ Galis chuckled to himself, immediately wincing due to severe pain in his chest. Damn, probably a fractured rib.
He felt unusually calm about the entire situation, but it wasn’t as if he weren’t worried. Rather, it was a hollow feeling that permeated through his being. Galis felt as though a part of him knew it would end up this way, hell, he was most likely one of the only people to evade capture for so long.
If they wanted information out of him, it would mean torture, which he wasn’t a big fan of. The chances that they believed that he was just a random citizen were low, so suffering was bound to ensue.
Galis bit his lip in an attempt to stop tears from welling up in his eyes.
‘I’m such an Idiot.’ He felt a small breath escape him. He wanted to see his family and friends again, even if he hadn’t been especially close to any of them in recent times. Why didn’t he see them earlier? He was so caught up in his problems, thinking that by distancing himself, he was making things better. Galis hoped desperately that nothing had happened to Vini or Marina. If one good thing came from his being caught, it was that now they wouldn’t harass any of the people he knew over where he was.
The silence was deafening as he was left with his thoughts, with how miserable he felt it wouldn’t be surprising if they had left him alone to think on purpose. Stewing in the grave he had dug for himself.
“You are your own worst enemy.” He mumbled. Galis had a bad habit of quoting his father whenever he felt lost; those firm beliefs had always given him a rock to lean on whenever he found himself in a difficult situation. Yet this time, the words he echoed offered resentment rather than comfort. They hung over his head like a noose where he felt suffocated by their presence.
“But you are also your own greatest ally.” A wizened voice responded. Materialising out of thin air in the darkness was a sweeping black robe which lifted its large hood to reveal a familiar grey-haired face. The old man from the case pushed up his triangular spectacles and peered down at him from his floating position. “At least that’s how I remember the saying going.”
Galis blinked the moisture out of his eyes, “How are you here?” He whispered in shock. The rectangular case was safely stored in his home outside the city walls; the spectre appearing here was impossible.
Perhaps he was hallucinating, it was possible that he sustained head trauma after that Watchman had knocked him out. Hell, his head still hurts even now.
“Where the Heximus holder travels, I follow.” The old man tapped the side of his nose and winked.
“What are you talking about?”
“The Heximus Decan! The tablet which we used to speak previously. It’s why I’m able to appear as I am now.”
“…But I left that at home?” He said quizzically.
“Did you, though?”
The old man vanished when Galis next blinked and reappeared at his side. With a withered hand, he reached into the pockets of his trousers and pulled out the very same metal tablet which Galis had stolen some time ago, setting it down on the younger man’s lap.
“Surprise!” He exclaimed, “Still in mint condition!”
“That’s not possible; I left it locked in my bedside drawer.”
“But it is. You see, after our first conversation, I expected the tablet to be used immediately but to my surprise, you left it untouched for the whole night!”
“I wasn’t going to mess with something that suspicious.”
“‘Suspicious?’, come now, did you think it would decapitate you? It’s an entertainment device, not a lethal weapon.” The old man shot back, amused.
“Nothing is entertaining about this situation.”
“I beg to differ, young man; it’s just that you have yet to even attempt to unravel its mysteries.”
Galis leaned back in his chair. “I don’t understand, what does this have to do with the case being here instead of where I left it?”
“It has everything to do with it. After you left the Heximus untouched for some time, I had to refer to my encouragement protocol to help convince you to use it, but only after searching for the code did I realise that half of my data had been corrupted! Can you imagine that?”
“Get to the point.”
“Relax, Galis, Essentially, what ended up happening was I realised that my singular purpose had gone unfulfilled, and so I had a duty to re-explain myself. The only problem was that by the time I had finished restoring the corrupted files, you had locked the tablet in a cabinet which meant I couldn’t do my job.”
It was at this point that the headache Galis had been quietly nursing started to grow, and with it so did the smile of the floating spectre.
“So I may have tweaked your memories, only a little bit, to make you think you left it at home when in reality you had brought it here with you.”
“You messed with my head?!” Galis almost doubled over in pain as sharp needles worked their way through his head. He slowly began to remember slipping the case into his pocket instead of putting it in the drawer and putting on his coat to leave the house.
“You make it sound so violent.” The old man rolled his eyes at him, “This was ultimately for your benefit since now I can talk properly without any of that awful static.”
“That’s not what’s important here.” Galis hissed.
“Who are you talking to?”
Galis stiffened in his seat as a new voice joined the conversation. Its low-synthetic quality told him that it was the same person who had captured him back in Scorch. He searched the darkness for the source of the voice only to find two pairs of bright red circles staring at him from within the darkness, with nothing else visible.
“Would you believe me if I told you I was praying?” Galis muttered, looking at his feet to avoid eye contact with the Watchmen.
“I would not.”
“Well, either way, it's hardly important…” Galis deflected. Hoping to draw their attention away from what had just transpired. “The real question is what you want from me. Considering that I didn’t wake up under a guillotine, there must be a reason you tied me up in a dark room like a comic book villain.”
The Watchman remained silent for a moment before tilting their head.
“You're mostly right, however, I feel I must correct you on one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“This room isn’t dark in the slightest, an interesting phenomenon about the human brain is that when something is too traumatising, it represses the information. Therefore, you are led to believe that it’s dark when the reality is a different story.”
Galis felt his heart drop into the pit of his stomach. They could be bluffing but the Watchmen had a reputation that most crime lords would be envious of, as things stood it was more likely they were telling the truth than not.
“Lovely. Well then, get to questioning, I haven’t got all day.” He said, whilst trying to keep his voice from shaking.
“Ah yes, I’m sure you have a very busy schedule.” The synthetic voice almost managed to sound amused.
“Anything but being here,” Galis said quietly.
“I take it that means you will answer our questions without resistance?”
“Just hurry up already, you monsters.”
If the Watchman cared about his comment, they didn’t show it, simply saying, “Thank you for your cooperation.”
Galis had to admit that he was feeling nervous. He had never been in an interrogation, but from what little he knew they weren’t likely to keep him around for long after he told them what they needed to know. That meant either permanent imprisonment or the far more likely option of public execution.
“They’re a grumpy bunch, aren’t they?” The old man whispered to his left, making him jump slightly. He had almost forgotten he was still there.
“Where is the Heximus?” The Watchman asked bluntly.
Galis pondered on the question for a few seconds. Willing his shaking body to calm down. Should he come clean and tell them the entire truth? Absolutely not. As bad as he felt for breaking the law, he had seen one too many criminals executed over less. Thinking about handing himself in and facing the consequences of his actions were two completely separate things; he may have considered willingly surrendering before, but now sitting in front of his interrogators, knowing his next words could cost him his life, was a sobering experience.
“I thought I knew, but I was wrong.” He said carefully.
“Explain.”
“I had hidden the damn thing in my bedside drawer, but I’m not so sure anymore, and I cannot say with any level of certainty where it is now.” It was a technical truth since he could see the object on his lap, but since his memories had been tampered with, he wasn’t even sure if he could trust that information either.
The officer remained silent at his words and spoke again only after a few minutes of hushed deliberation with the second pair of eyes present in the room.
“You said you weren’t sure, but if you remember putting the Heximus in your drawer, what makes you think differently now?”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“Because I can see it in front of me, although I’m almost convinced that I’m just hallucinating as a result of head trauma,” Galis replied. He had considered lying, but there was no guarantee that these people wouldn’t have a way of telling if he was or not, and he wasn’t willing to take that risk.
To his surprise, the officer didn’t act shocked or perturbed by his revelation.
“Where?” the Watchman asked.
“…You don’t see it?”
“No, is it on your person?”
“I’m not hiding it or anything, I can see it as clear as day on my lap.”
Now Galis was sure that he had caught his interrogators off guard as they didn’t ask him anything for several moments after that. Instead, they went back and forth in the same unintelligible, hushed tones that he had seen them undergo earlier. While Galis couldn’t make out many words, he could tell that one of the pair sounded frustrated while the other felt much calmer. Then the eyes turned back to face him.
“We thank you for your honesty.” The Watchman said, “A medical professional will be here shortly to look you over.”
“…Oh, a-alright.” Galis stumbled over his words in disbelief.
Not moments later, the red eyes faded from view, and he was left alone again in the dark room. Or at least as alone as he could be without a creepy old man hovering above his head. He let out a sigh of relief as soon as he realised that they were gone.
“You sure are lucky, boy.” The old man clicked his teeth, descending until he was at eye level again.
“You can say that again,” Galis whispered, his eyes still glued to the spot where the watchmen had disappeared from. “I wonder why they couldn’t see it.”
“It’s because I made it disappear from their perspective.”
“You can do that?”
“Really Galis? Weren’t you listening the first time I explained this to you?”
“I had…other concerns at the time, so not really, no”
The floating figure glared at him in annoyance.
“Don’t look at me like that! You looked like something out of a child's nightmare with your ominous glowing and gibberish talk.”
The old man pinched Galis’ cheek, something that left him speechless. “It was not gibberish, and I’ve already apologised for my earlier actions. You must understand that if I cannot carry out the task I was given, then there is no point in my existence.”
“It’s because you’re a robot, correct?”
The old man made a strangling motion towards him before raising a palm to his forehead. A tired groan escaped his lips. “Alright, to recap the very important explanation I gave you, I am an artificial replica of one of the greatest scientific minds to ever exist. Phutho, J. Uramu. My purpose is to ensure that new users such as yourself understand how to use this device I created with the help of my brother.”
“I’m following you so far.” Galis nodded.
“Right, the way this works is that once you open the case and activate the tablet, you can complete a set of tasks for me through a digital avatar somewhere in the real world. All in a fun, family-friendly game. In exchange, I’ll give you hints along the way for the secret to my biggest breakthrough from back when I was in my prime. The power over human consciousness.”
For once, Galis managed to recall him saying something similar without any stabbing pains in his head. “…And that’s how you managed to do all this, like slipping the Heximus into my pocket and tricking the investigators.”
The spectre gave him a short round of applause, “Right on the money, Galis, and this time I mean it.”
“So, all this was just to get me to activate it?” He asked.
“Initially, I had planned to simply reveal myself when next you were alone so I could finish my duty. However, I would be lying if I told you I did not spot an opportunity. My prime directive is as a guide, seeing as most people who buy the Heximus do so with the intent to use it, but if somebody else stumbles upon it, then my default programming is to ensure it remains in use: one way or another.”
“You realise how suspicious you sound right? What do you mean the device has to be in use ‘One way or another’? This clearly has hidden strings attached to it! Just because I’m not clever enough to figure out what they are right now and it doesn’t make me any more inclined to use it.”
“Boy, you don’t have a choice.” The old man sighed. “I’ve just about surmised your situation, and if you refuse to do anything, your prospects of making it out of this place are grim at best. I would advise you to think twice before dismissing me.”
“Do you understand how crazy you sound?!” Galis snapped, “The power to change people’s whole worldview, the twisted game you're trying to rope me into, the kind of enemies I’d make if I go through with it. I have an opportunity to wash my hands of this whole thing. I’ll likely rot in prison for life, but at the very least, I won’t be hunted anymore!”
“Then why didn’t you speak up earlier?” the spectre asked, “You had the opportunity to tell these people the whole truth, yet you hesitated. Why?”
Galis felt his lips sour, unwilling to speak further on the matter. They both knew why he had stayed silent and the old man took the opportunity to keep pressing.
“Galis, what you have here isn’t a curse but an opportunity. A chance to not only escape your current predicament but also to become more than you are now. Are you going to just give up without doing anything?”
“I didn’t ask for this.”
“Oh, but you did. Right the way back to when you beat up the previous Heximus owner and ripped it right from his hands, you made a choice. What matters now is how you move forward.”
“You saw that happen?”
“I did.”
“Then why didn’t you stop me from taking you like you did for the Watchmen?” He asked curiously.
“Because that weasel that you stole from had already activated the device, at that point, it was his responsibility. You, on the other hand, are only a potential user which changes the situation entirely.”
“Convenient...” Galis sniffed, looking down at the rectangular case on his lap.
The older man looked at him with a sympathetic gaze; he grabbed the Heximus and held it up in front of Galis’s face. The unique pattern was illuminated by the soft glow of his golden iris’. Then he slipped the object into the younger man’s pocket.
“Whatever choice you make, my duty has been fulfilled.” The spectre said, slowly floating upwards. “If we are to meet again, then it will be within the construct of the Heximus. Good luck, Galis, truth be told, I like you more than the last holder of this item. So, I wish you the best in whatever path you take.”
Now Galis was truly left alone, still haunted by the words of the artificial intelligence.
What did he do? Every fibre of his being screamed to leave it alone. If using this thing really could get him out of trouble, there was no real reason why he shouldn’t. Except for one. It would put the people he knew in danger. Very bad and very grave danger.
He tried to think. What would his father do in this situation? The man he looked up to and had been raised by his whole life. But he couldn’t find an answer. He had already strayed so far off the path of any kind of moral righteousness that he was only clinging to scraps of the past. Looking back, even that incident with the dying man in Scorch had just been a final flare of the way he used to live.
The old man was right; he had made a choice. So, he would live with it. Galis would find a way to escape and make it back to those that he cared about. After that, he didn’t know, but he would figure something out.
After a few minutes of wiggling and shuffling in his seat, he managed to retrieve the Heximus Decan from his pocket. After fiddling with the mechanisms, he felt a familiar click, which caused the entire object to pop open. Only without the shining fanfare it had before.
Within the case lay a small black cube with an inlaid groove matching the appearance of a thumb. It sparkled with shining white light, which pulsed from within in set patterns and intervals.
“Guess this is it.” He murmured.
It would seem like his journey had just begun.
* The Father POV -
Isaac Galapulu was a driven man. Since a young age, he had worked himself to the bone over his work as a musician. Practising and performing until his hands bled and his fingers cried for rest. Even the depraved depths of poverty and a pregnant wife weren’t enough to stop him from achieving his dreams, and after a decade of nonstop failure, he finally saw the light at the end of the tunnel. Turning from a penniless streetside performer to an almost worldwide sensation.
Now in his middle age, he came back to an empty house devoid of the joy of seeing his wife and firstborn wandering around the hallways.
He hung up his hat and scarf by the entrance, slowly making his way over to the living room. Leaning against the couch in the centre of the room was his cello. Still out from when he had been practising the night before.
He walked past it and up to a wall, which had a grey metallic wire hanging from the ceiling resting against it. Isaac pulled a small handle attached to the wire, and a red and white checkered radio fell slowly, nestling itself in his hand.
Wordlessly the musician turned the knob, tuning the frequency to match his son’s radio and pressed a green button on the side.
Bzzt, bzzt,
“This is an automated response. Hello to whoever decided to call this frequency. I would say call me again, however, I’m busy, so don’t. I’ll try to get back to you whenever I’m free but don’t hold your breath over it, kind regards, Galis Galapulu.”
Isaac exhaled through his nose. Another wasted effort on his part. Ever since the city had announced lockdown, he had been constantly calling his son, but none of his attempts ever made it through. He was extremely worried, especially since their last conversation, which hadn’t exactly ended on a positive note. The father knew that his son was likely fine, but on the off chance that was the last conversation they ever had, it would be too painful to bear.
“I suppose it’s about time for dinner in any case,” Isaac said aloud, wandering over to his fully stocked pantry. He had kept a habit of always having food in the house after years of being a family man, but it was more often than not a burden in recent times.
Isaac pulled out a plate and served himself a sandwich made from whatever toppings he could find and sat himself down next to his cello. He turned on the television and flicked over to the recent news channel.
“Good evening, and welcome to channel Zangariu, also known as Z-news, named after our illustrious founders and backers, the Zangariu family.”
A pale woman in an all-white outfit addressed a blacked-out crowd of people who sat opposite her. They all clapped and cheered uproariously at her words. She then turned to face the camera.
“Today’s top story: a terrorist who was the perpetrator of this lockdown for the past few days has finally been caught by our city's finest Watchmen. While the identity of this person is being kept under wraps, they were found hiding out in the empty wasteland outside the Valtsomu, having managed to slip out before the lockdown was initiated. As it stands now, they are being held for questioning and with any luck they will be dealt with and our short-lived state of emergency will be lifted.”
Isaac felt some relief at her words, at the very least, his son would be in less danger moving forward now that this criminal had been caught.
“I’m sure you have all been outraged at the disruption to your lives, but we have been personally assured that the terrorist will receive the maximum punishment allotted for his crime of disturbing our fair peace.” The woman continued. “All courtesy of our steadfast protectors.”
The crowd nodded and murmured at her words.
“Now over to the Watchmen commander-in-chief for a further update.”
The television screen flickered for a brief second as the display changed to a vacant city street. Mansions lined each side of the road like apartment blocks, and the pavement was a stunning black marble, inlaid with gold spread across its edges.
‘The inner-city sanctum.’ Isaac thought curiously, ‘They hardly ever stream footage from here.’
The camera continued to show only empty city streets for a few seconds until a figure winked into existence right out of thin air. The man appeared heavyset; his dark skin contrasted with a patchy beard that added to his rugged appearance. He wore the standard dark uniform of the Watchmen, its fabric stiff and imposing. With a quiet, almost absent gesture, he massaged his wrists, the war medals wrapped around each finger like rings. He stared blankly at the camera with cold, grey eyes.
“Mr. Ino could you please explain the current situation regarding the terrorist.” A reporter walked out from behind the camera, wearing the same white outfit as the first woman. Only the field agent had donned a white, faceless mask.
“I’ve already told you and I don’t feel like repeating myself.”
“haha…alright, well then could you give us more insight into what this person was after or why the lockdown was initiated?”
“That’s above my station.”
The masked reporter looked back at the camera, for a few seconds dumbfounded. Then back at the Watchman chief.
“What about the recent raid on that small place just outside the city where this criminal was found? Our informants tell us that there were quite a few civilian casualties, but we weren’t able to get much else out of the residents who live there. Did these people fight back, resulting in said reports? And what was the purpose of this raid?”
“We did our duty and that’s all that matters, your time is up, I’m leaving.”
“W-wait, Mr Ino, we still have more questions!”
The Watchman Chief didn’t reply, instead, he disappeared in a flash leaving the reporter speechless and staring at the spot where he once was. The masked reporter turned back to the camera trying to regain some professionalism.
“…That’s all from us, Z-news, back to you.”
Another flicker and the pale woman was back on the screen.
“That was certainly interesting, it would seem that the information pertaining to this case is being kept under lock and key, so to speak. That is all we currently have on the situation but make sure to keep watching over the coming days as more information is sure to come to light. Now onto our next story, a group formally known as Kijikou has been on the rise after they promised to make a safe zone free from the influence of leylines. This news is simply tragic, as who but criminals and other low lives would want to shut down the leylines? We at Z-news are saddened to see yet another corrupt group try to ruin the state of this beautiful city.”
It was at that point that Isaac turned off the television. For the biggest news channel in the city, it had a bad habit of slipping into personal bias whenever topics involving noble groups came up and he held no interest in listening to doctored stories and false media.
He felt a growing onset of nervousness as he reflected on the news he had just heard. Galis had been right; the city was eating itself up more than ever before. It felt as though every week there was a new incident, and it was only getting worse.
With jittery hands, he picked up his cello and bow feeling the comfort that they brought. He began to play a quiet and lonely melody.
“I hope you are safe son, wherever you are.” He whispered.
As the night carried onward.