Ring… Ring… Ring…
The phone was ringing, and it could not have rang at a worse time. Taking care of a body was a long and arduous process that had to be done on a daily basis. That's why it was usually done while the host was asleep. That gave us ample time to finish most of the maintenance work and be ready and functional for the day ahead. Having to reawaken, would knock back all the progress made and mean you would have to start all over again. That’s why I decided to ignore it this time again, hopefully it wasn’t something too urgent.
But not long after that, I could hear a knock at the door.
Knock Knock…Knock Knock…
We don’t get too many of those, and considering my phone rang not too long ago… I had a pretty good idea of who it might be. So with no other choice I had to let go of the process and hurry to the door.
Before I was able to do that though, I could hear the door opening already and a voice I well recognized, asking my “father” most probably, since this task has been designated to him well in advance, if:
“Mihai, is he at home?”
Mihai, that was one of my many designated handles. Some knew me as Mihai, some as Miki or Mihalcea or Mirkle Parkle. Most of my people knew me as Zhkri”lis though, but that’s a story for a whole other time. What worried me now was…
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“Who is Mihai?” I could hear my “dad” saying. Khari”lis is quite good at what he is doing, but there’s a reason why he was assigned as support and I wasn’t. Him forcefully restarting his body couldn’t have helped either, his sluggish mind was making it too difficult for him to give answers on the spot. Most importantly though, his code name for me was Miki. That’s why he most probably forgot momentarily that my actual name was Mihai.
Before he could mess it up even more, I stepped up between him and the open door. Although now that I look at the reflection in their eyes, I most probably look like a mess. Unfortunately, it takes so long for us to maintain our body that we don’t have too much time to worry about our appearances. In a way it made it hard to distinguish us from a regular homeless person, but there are signs even still, luckily humans haven’t picked up on them yet.
“Hey guys, sorry I didn’t pick up the phone, I was just watching some anime, you know” I said with a laugh, awkwardly rubbing my hand through my unruly hair trying to pat it down with no actual success.
But, there they were. My friends: Den, Voli, Dragonu, Tudy, Oby and Gheby. Of course those weren’t their real names. That’s just how I chose to call them, just as they chose to call me Miki.
Talking about that, Khari”lis hid quickly back in his chamber, most probably realising the mistake he made, but it’s all good, they’ll most probably forget about it just as quick and not find it too weird, right?
Now, passing over that bit of awkwardness I turn to my friends who most obviously wanted one thing and one only:
“Coaeee, let’s go outside and fuck the anime you’ll have time for that later” said Dien.
Meanwhile all Dragonu and others said was a mix of saying my name. It was always impressive seeing the myriad of meanings and emotions they could express while saying my name all just by using a different intonation. Completely fascinating. Human’s were ever captivating people, as they liked to call themselves.
“Mikiiiii!!!” a sort of excited Miki from Dragonu, most probably at seeing me.
“Mikiiii…” then we had a kind of disappointed Miki from Voli, most probably from seeing the way I look.
The rest were a mix of that, that kinda got lost in translation. It was not easy learning to interpret the varied nuances of human speech, but it was something that I was good at, and very proud of it too. It was something that made me one of the best at my job. Hopefully this will help me in preparing everyone for what’s to come. There’s a lot at stake and there’s many things that I need to accomplish, but first comes first:
“Feck uuu dieen!!! Give me five minutes”, and I closed the door in their noses.