Walker wished he could say the next days flew by, but they didn’t. Early in the morning, Walker was running a fever, so Egor readministered a few tests before instructing Walker to take certain pills at certain hours of the day.

Egor, apparently not confident in his current cognitive ability, made Walker write it down. He opted in for the opioid that Egor pointed out and took the rest. For the rest of the second day, he couldn’t walk further than a few steps at a time before becoming exhausted. As such, like a cat exploring a garden, Walker donned a crutch and limped around the room to stare at the different tools, insects, and plants.

Though he made sure to shoot off a few quick texts to Chet and Sonya. Chet responded within a few minutes to comment how tremendously thick his skull was to receive such a pounding. Sonya took a few hours but asked him when it was a good time for all of them to meet up to talk about what happened. Both made sure to ask him how he was doing.

The third day was by far the worst. On one hand, perhaps as a consequence of taking the pain medication, his eyes had focused, and his brain cleared up. As such, a hunger unknown to him ravaged his stomach, throat, and mouth. After explaining to Egor how hungry he was, Egor made a call. Forty-five torturous minutes later a gluttony of rice, chicken, and vegetables in large vats was brought into the room by one woman and one man. Walker did not question how he procured the food but instead dug in.

As that need was being sated, another arose. The skin beneath his bandages itched as if hundreds of papercuts followed one after the other. The more he scratched at his bandages, his wounds worsened, and his bandages needed to be changed. In between bouts of scratching, he would shovel whatever food he could fit into his mouth, he rarely chewed. In the evening, he would endure brutal digestive expulsion. He ping-ponged in and out of the bathroom for the rest of that day.

However, on the fourth day most of his skin, to the astonishment of Egor, had closed to leave faint white scars crisscrossing his body. Only his knees, elbows, and fingers still held open wounds. Although, he no longer needed to bandage them.

“It’s incredible, I haven’t seen this kind of epidermal regeneration since…” Egor frowned at the chart. Walker was beginning to see why there were such deep creases around the old man’s eyes. “You feel strong? No heart palpitations, seeing things that aren’t real…”

Walker scratched his forearm to leave red marks, “How would I know what I was seeing wasn’t real?”

“Cognitive dissociation, deduction, and experimentation.”

“I’m no longer shitting bricks, and if the outside of my body is any indication of the inside, I should be okay for a few days.”

Egor scribbled something into a notepad and dropped it in his inside coat pocket.

Walker rubbed the back of his head, “And…”

Egor squinted at him.

“Thanks for patching me up. I don’t have much, but name something and I’m your guy,” he finished.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Egor replied.

With that out of the way, Walker slapped his thighs to make sure he had his phone and wallet and stepped out of the room, through Archepeligo’s main shopping area, and into a blanket of humidity.

Walker’s skin crawled. He reached for the stars and stretched; the wind must have been coming from the east because the earthy musk of forest swept by him. The sun hadn’t risen yet, but the world was waking up. His fingers trembled. He sprinted forward, past the booths being stocked, past the few that staggered on the sidewalk, past the shadows that whispered in corners.

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Concrete transformed into dirt. His throat burned, sweat stung his eyes, and his muscles strained to react to the first anaerobic movement in days. As he ran, shrubs grew bolder and ate up the path. Branches reached for him. Grass poked his ankles.

Like a rubber band stretched too far, his quadriceps spasmed and he crashed into the ground. A slab of dirt and grass cradled him. Walker cackled and jammed his hands into the mud to watch them disappear. The cool, sloppy, texture of the mud erased the itchiness in his hands. He threw off his backpack, and like a hog after a rain, rolled.

After a few minutes, he was gasping on his back. The ground hugged him; he was here. His body mewed; he was here.

“I’m-” a choking laugh exploded out of his mouth,

“I’m alive,” he murmured. Walker slammed his fist into his chest and screamed. He stayed there until the sun rose from its slumber.

When the heat became too much to bear, he moved swiftly. One sure step in front of the other. Eventually, he found himself standing on the balcony of a rickety one-story house. He peered behind him; Yttrium buildings poked above the trees.

He retrieved a keyring from the small front pocket of his backpack. He had searched it thoroughly when Egor returned it to him to check if anything was missing. There wasn’t. The lone ring had a lone key. After a cautionary knock, he inserted the shaped brass into the doorknob.

Except, it wouldn’t enter. He tried again. Nope. Walker ground his teeth and slammed the key into the lock.

It wouldn’t budge. He attempted to tear off the key, but the ring warped under the pressure. The skin on his fingers tore as he finally ripped the key away from its prison and flung it into the unkempt grass surrounding the house.

He stomped around the house and pulled on the backdoor. Locked. He went round the house, opposite where the city lay. He grasped the bottom of a dingy window and pulled up. After some resistance, it gave way and Walker threw himself in. Walker’s sweat intended to keep him cool turned icy in the air-controlled room.

A twin-sized bunkbed sat opposite the door which meant it was in the corner to his right. Pushed against the soot-colored wall to his left was a wooden desk. On either side of a keyboard that glowed red, green, and blue, the desk sported discolored ovals that were significantly lighter than the dark wood around it. He tapped a few of the keys on the keyboard and sighed before pulling away.

He exited the room and almost tripped over something soft. Before him sagged two bulging black trash bags. He peered into them; they were filled with clothes. He pulled out the one on top, it was a ragged grey tank top with holes poking through it sporadically. A memory of him racing down a steep hill, hitting a log, and crashing into gravel slipped through his mind.

“Piece of shit…” He murmured, not necessarily directed to the clothes before him.

He grabbed what he needed and surveyed the living room. It wasn’t a large house, so he didn’t even need to take a step to see the rest of the house. The room was one big rectangle split into thirds: the kitchen, dining table, and living room area. One room was behind him, and the other room, the master bedroom, was on the opposite side of Walker.

He turned to close the door that had the sign “George” taped to the front. Walker grimaced, once upon a time it had two names on that door. Envelopes cluttered the circular dining table. He rifled through them until he picked one up that was addressed to “G. Walker” from the University of Yttrium.

Inside held a letter with a card attached to it. The letter read:

Attached is your identification card tailored to the University of Yttrium. The identification card can be used for access to sites such as university classes, dorms if required, and specialty buildings such as the Terminal, Turing Laboratory, and Welting Greenhouse.

The last building’s name elicited a small huh from Walker. The card was chrome with his brother’s name captioning a headshot. Walker wasn’t that different from George, certainly while George had curly hair he had straight, and while George had a youthful angular face, he seemed beaten down in blocky. Though, it wasn’t like he was trying to get drinks at a bar, as long as no one looked too closely he would be fine. He pocketed the envelope and the contents inside it. At that point, his salivating mouth alerted him to the fact that he was starving, a sickly reminder of the last couple of days.

Instead of exiting out of the front door, which would involve unlocking the door, Walker exited through the window and closed it behind him. It was time to pay a visit to the Pavilion and retrieve his earnings from both Walker and Chet’s capture of the enormous feline, and curiously, the capture of Welting frogs.