It took a couple of months for the world to know what Swains’s arrival entailed.
“I saw him on Odivelas, actually, on the side of the road trying to hitch a ride, but he asked me to go to Paris. I dropped him off near a subway station to the airport. I couldn’t even believe it when I saw him on the news.”
“How could he even afford the trip? If he was from the same place as Jack he didn’t have any of our currency, right?”
“Yeah, no one would accept money from some unknown country.”
It took him about two weeks to get to London, general knowledge. Using Sofia’s simple explanation as to his destination, people carried him as far as they could go while listening to the ramblings of a madman, talking about weapons and coliseums and creatures capable of breathing not only fire, but also water and wind. They dropped him off with a laugh and a shake of the head, but, while they were driving away, they would watch him vanish through the rear-view mirror, and shrug decisively. There was no need to call the police over such a gentle person. What harm could he do if he treasured his rocks and his research so much?
***
Meanwhile, the young girl from Portugal made a primarily self-discovery trip during the time it took Swain to reach London. When she got back home from Roca Cape her mother was already home and made it impossible for her to do little more than search the internet for information about the Unknown and humans capable of changing their form. Other than a lot of space baloney and the definition of a “shapeshifter”, there wasn’t much else she found to be even remotely insightful.
“Are we going to stay with Sofia for a bit now that Jack is out of commission?”
“Well, yes. Why?”
“Did she ever reboot Hidan Battle after they left their place?”
“Yes, of course. With the same disk and console. It was a normal game, where you control a Summoner that uses a scythe, just like Jack, but who is a rising star trying to appease crowds on their coliseums. They have a very complex customization system, both for the Summoner and for the hidan you can use, and of course you don’t steal them.”
“Yeah, the game is about overthrowing an evil organization that wants to use Hidan Summoners to take over the world. Bugged hidan or weapons don’t even exist, and there aren’t mentions of countries called Rujad or Lado. It has very little to do with what happened to Jack or his world, other than the hidan themselves and that summoner/coliseum system.”
“Oh, you played the game.”
“I did, yes. It’s very fun to play. Story is weak, but action game stories tend to be.”
Only the following afternoon, after enduring a long morning of classes, was she able to finally get some distance from the world to try and find out what was happening to her.
Having spent most of the day trying to think how she would explain what had happened to her when she had transformed into a giant green eagle, and without coming up with an answer that satisfied her, Sofia decided to dodge Carlos and Nasser during lunch break, having a small pizza slice from the school’s bar and gulping it down as she made her way to the back of the school. Unlike the tennis tables, facing the grade school that neighboured it, the back of the school was turned to a vineyard, a project of the local city hall who was trying to turn it into something profitable with a variety of different farming techniques. Thankfully, the project and the plantation was mostly ignored during winter, making that side of the school perfect for hiding during very dead hours.
After making sure she and the abandoned remains of the surf club were the only ones in that corner, Sofia dropped her backpack next to a broken board and turned to her left wrist.
“Linvios.”
The snake coiled around her appeared, opening its mouth as if yawning. It stared at her brown eyes for a moment until Sofia, shook her head, remembering she had brought him in with her that day for a reason. She kneeled next to the debris and pushed it down. Then, making sure it was still looking at her, she changed herself into another ice glider.
As she opened her eyes again, the world had grown around her. The broken surfboard was the size of a building, and the school was a light pink, flat canyon. However, before she could contemplate more of her new surroundings, a creature her own size flew down from the mountain of broken items and landed in front of her, folding its wings in a natural, simple movement and staring at her intently.
Even if it seemed pointless in her mind, Sofia tried talking.
“Hey.”
“Yes.”
She held her breath. Not only had Linvios spoken, but it had also responded to her.
“You can talk?”
“Communicate.”
“Communicate?”
Linvios nodded, and something clicked on her mind. It wasn’t that Linvious could talk, but if she was transformed into the same species, she was likely capable of communicating naturally with him. Somehow, anyway.
“Is your name… Linvios, or is it something else?”
“Name. No matter.”
“Why did you come to me? Where did you come from?”
“Looking.”
“Looking? Are you looking for something?”
He nodded. “You or hybrid. Will find him.”
“Oh, so you’re looking for someone. And, me or hybrid will find him?” Linvios nodded again. “But, who’s hybrid?”
“Hybrid.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she tried explaining, but Linvios didn’t answer, merely staring back at her. If he wasn’t going to elaborate on that and she couldn’t figure out what he was talking about, or who he was looking for, it would be better to drop the subject for a later time. “Okay, I’ll think about it. Look, can you teach me how to fly? And teleport? You can teleport, right?”
“Fly. Shift. Yes.”
“Can you teach me?”
With a vigorous nod, he pointed with his head to the blue stripe that ran alongside his body, equal to the one Sofia had. They weren’t different coloured scales, even if they could appear like that to the untrained eye at the distance, but rather a long appendix that inserted itself on the side of the snake’s body, right about where their malleable ribs started.
“Wings. Open slowly, and you fly.”
Cautiously testing them, Sofia tried moving her own wings. She felt them as a set of six long protrusions, connected to each other and to her body by a flexible link, that threatened to move as she commanded it. Feeling more brazen, she opened them and, just as Linvios had said, something pulled her from the floor. Not the wings themselves as she wasn’t even flapping them, but it was as if opening them created a powerful force beneath the serpentine body that pushed it away from the floor.
She stopped the movement, with the six flaps suspended just by her side, and floated a few inches from the floor. If that body allowed it, she would be laughing.
“This is amazing, it’s not actually flying it’s like I’m floating.”
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“Open, fly. Close, land. Slowly,” Linvios said and she nodded to him.
“How about teleporting? Oh, right, shifting.”
“Blink wings open. Think place. Hard,” he managed to say after pondering for a moment. Sofia thought about trying it right away, but the words were cryptic and flying seemed to be a good initial challenge.
“Fly with me,” she asked. “I want to be sure I got it.”
“Lead,” Linvios nodded. Slowly, Sofia opened the wings further, gaining altitude and speed, and the natural ice glider joined her, occasionally chiming in to correct her or give her some small word of encouragement.
***
While Sofia learned how not to crash into walls, Doctor Maxim Swain travelled across Western Europe, learning about their most important and common costumes, well enough that by the time he reached London he no longer had a bad first impression to give those alien people. He was even positively surprised when some immediately offered themselves to take him to the Royal Brompton Hospital when he asked for its location. Soon he was at their general desk, and after waiting for one of the receptionists to finish her important phone call, he greeted her smile with one of his own.
“Hello miss. I am looking for one of your patients,” he said. “He should be a teenage boy with breathing problems, sluggish movements, high blood concentration of fructose and a metal you cannot identify.”
As he spoke the woman’s smile gradually vanished, and in the blink of an eye she reached for the phone, notifying his arrival without ever letting him out of her sight.
“Hmm, so no one was supposed to know. Good, good.”
“Go up these stairs towards the top floor, enter the second hallway on the right and the first door on the right,” the receptionist said, holding the receiver on her shoulder and pointing towards a staircase barely visible behind the window of a door. With a quick thank you and a slight bow, Dr. Swain proceeded where he was ordered to go, reaching a prized, but modest office with a great window behind the desk from which the entire patio of the hospital could be seen.
It shouldn’t have come as surprise that they had sent him straight towards the balding director.
“Welcome. I’m Dr. Pavel,” he hurriedly said standing up from his seat and extending a rugged hand. “Please, have a seat.”
“Thank you.”
“I hear you’re looking for Jack Lonergan,” the director said as Swain pulled his chair forward.
“Well, yes. I believe I should start from the beginning. I’m a physician with a passion for biology. I came from the same place as Jack, although our origins are… not exactly the same, and I believe I can relief him from whatever his affliction may be.”
“Why not just take him back to where he came from?” the director asked with a mild shrug.
“I doubt he’s willing to return, with good reason, I might say,” Swain answered. “I believe you’ve done everything in your power to help him?”
“Yes, with mixed results,” the director said, taking the hint and refraining from asking any more about just where those two had come from. “I might even say we’re finally making progress.”
“Oh, that’s excellent,” it was impressing they had been able to do anything at all when they didn’t know half the elements in play. “And you wouldn’t mind if I tried?”
“If it depended on me, I wouldn’t mind at all,” the director answered with a sigh. “However, the boy’s custodians demand a final saying on everything we are to do.”
“May I speak with them?”
“Of course.”
On normal circumstances none of that conversation had ever taken place and a random stranger wouldn’t just be allowed to come into contact with such a case. However, even if they were making progress, Jack was still far to a full recovery, and if that man knew more about him than anyone else who had stepped into that office, including his alleged family, there was a chance he actually knew what he was talking about.
“Joseph Lonergan.” Announced another man’s voice on the other side of the receiver. The director left the phone on speaker to further judge that man based on his ability to deal with the high manager’s cunning.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Lonergan, this is Dr. Pavel from the Royal Brompton Hospital.”
“Good afternoon, Dr. Pavel. Have you made any progress?” he asked.
“Yes, his condition has finally stabilized and we’ve managed to find a solution that has improved his physical condition.”
“Excellent.”
“And there’s someone here who says he’ll be able to help us further. Would you like to have a word with him?”
“Oh, I see… Put him through.”
From the voice and the tired sigh, it seemed like it wasn’t the first time someone had stepped forward to investigate the strange case. However, Dr. Swain was more than prepared to make a case for himself as the definitive answer to their problems.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Lonergan. My name is Maxim Swain, and I’m a physician who came a long way after hearing about your relative’s condition.”
“That is an interesting way to put it,” he said after a pause. All of them knew that boy was not his son.
“My latest research is heavily tied to Jack’s condition, so I will be of help to the team here.”
“And exactly is his condition? Dr. Pavel tells me it’s similar to lack of iron, but supplements have done nothing.”
“Dr. Pavel is not mistaken. He is lacking something, it is merely the wrong element, one that can be found in the place where he came from.”
“And where exactly is he from, doctor? Is this research going to provide a definitive solution to his problem, or will he spend the rest of his life attending your care?”
“I can assure you we will do our best to guarantee this is no longer a problem.”
“You haven’t answered my first question.”
“I can only say it’s a location that I am most familiar with.”
“… I see. Can you hand me over to Dr. Pavel?”
“I’m right here, Mr. Lonergan.”
“Let him work.”
“Thank you, Mr. Lonergan. Have a good one.”
***
There was nothing there for him.
Even before he decided to set foot there, he knew it was going to happen. It had been the whole reason why he had chosen that place. No one to chase him, no one to judge him, no ghosts to hide from.
But the world itself seemed to reject him.
Not to mention that pain…
Someone was coming. Someone with the one type of scent he never thought to feel again.
A primal fear awoke him and prepared him for the worst.
“Hello, Jack,” said the director as he entered his room. It was a stranger behind him. “How are you feeling?”
He merely shrugged. Not knowing the man standing behind Dr. Pavel was a better start than he expected.
But it was still a hidanna.
“This is doctor Maxim Swain. He’s a physician who’s going to help us with your case.”
“Hello. It’s an honour meeting you.”
Jack merely nodded back. He had lost count of how many people came through that door and claimed to be able to help.
But that was a hidanna.
How did he get there?
“Let’s get started, then.”
“We’ll have to give you a full anaesthesia for this procedure Jack,” the hidanna said while the director quickly tapped on a small device, which he had noticed before was used to quickly summon other doctors and nurses. “We will be infusing the bone marrow of your pelvic bone, which can be painful. We’ll take measures to diminish the pain as much as possible when you wake up.”
“You mean you’ll put me to sleep? No, do something else.”
We’d usually be fine with it, but not with a hidanna being involved.
“This is the safest way to perform this procedure, both for you and for the team we’re assembling,” the director said, having already put his device away and pulling an already prepared syringe from another pocket. “I assure you; you’ll be in good hands.”
Using the catheter Jack had on his arm, the director injected a milky white substance directly into his blood stream, and, against his most ardent desires, Jack fell into a near instant, dreamless sleep.
***
When he woke up, face down on the very same room, Jack’s back ached as if it was carrying lead. However, his head didn’t feel nearly as foggy, and he had enough strength to try and lift his head up from the pillow to confirm what his nose was telling him.
The same hidanna was in the room, this time together with one of the nurses assigned to him, who was preparing a small blue blanket attached with a power chord.
“Oh,” he said as he turned around towards Jack with the blanket. “He’s awake, Dr. Swain.”
“Perfect. How are you feeling now, Jack?”
“What did you do to me?” he blurted out, fighting the rest of the anaesthetic still in his system.
“We’re trying to reactivate your inherent medan production, therefore we had to give you some I synthetised myself. Usually, people need certain levels of different kinds of metal in their bodies to be able to carry out normal functions, and we balance that amount with what we normally eat,” he continued when Jack kept staring at him. “Since there isn’t any medan here, your analytics fell to dramatic levels, especially considering your… unique properties.”
Ignoring his speech entirely, the nurse put the blanket over Jack’s exposed back. It was warm and sticky, and the product eventually seeped into his skin, numbing the pain somewhat.
“Well? Did our procedure work?” Dr. Swain insisted as he remained silent.
“… I’m not sure.”
Truth was, it did do something. Jack was undeniably being able to think better, and his body didn’t feel as stiff as before, even if his pelvic bone disagreed.
But he didn’t want to admit that to someone like him.
“I’d say it did. You’re being able to lift your head and put weight on your arms, which shows an improvement over your previous symptoms.”
“The director needs to hear about this, Dr. Swain,” the nurse said.
“Actually, I’d like to have a word with him first, I’ll join you in a moment,” Swain requested, making Jack’s heart leap.
“Yes, of course. We’ll be waiting.”
“Thank you.”
While the nurse left Jack stared at the doctor, who was pulling up a chair to sit by his side, like the cornered, defenceless hound he was.
“You don’t have to look at me like that,” Swain quickly said. “I’m not from Vulcan and you know it, I’m sure.”
“But you know who I am.”
“I’m afraid everyone in the scientific community of Dunia knows by now,” he answered. “Mabaya couldn’t hide what they were doing anymore, not after their main laboratory was destroyed by the Neal Hidanna and Raytsu was released right on their doorstep. But, as long as you don’t go back, I don’t see a reason for you to worry about any of that.”
“There’s one right in front of me.”
“I’m here to serve your best interests-.”
“Just because,” Jack said before he could finish his sentence.
“No, because I’ve been requested to do so.”
“By whom?”
“Your shapeshifting friend will tell you. She seemed to be rather protective of you, she should come here soon.”
“My who?” Jack asked, slightly raising an eyebrow.
“A young girl, brown hair, a little absent minded. She said she was… Portuguese, if I’m not mistaken.”
It wasn’t hard to pinpoint the one person he could be referring to, but Jack’s confused expression refused to leave for a while as he wondered why she, of all people, was even defending him. Meanwhile, Swain stood up from his chair.
“We’ll have to do these infusions to replenish your medan a couple more times, Jack, at the pace I can synthetize it. I’m sorry it puts you under this kind of stress but it’s the only way we can make it work. What I said about the food is true, but your baseline medan is around 500 times higher than the usual hidanna. Our livers usually recycle it, and for you it seems your bone marrow can help as well, but we need to teach it how to again. We’ll go back to the lab and make some more, should take a couple of days. I highly recommend that you rest until then.”