“Hee, hee, hee, hee.”
Again, those unbearable giggles coming from a place he couldn’t pinpoint. They were children’s laughter.
Children could be cruel. How did he know it? Perhaps someone had told him or, like most things he had learned, he had heard it from someone. But why were they laughing at him? Wasn’t laughing at adults considered rude?
Because, although some people treated him as if he were a child, he was already an adult. Only adults grew hair on their faces, right? And he had to be… What was the word? Shaved off?
Besides, he would soon be twenty… twenty-something. How old was that? Who knows! They had never taught him to count, but it must have been quite a few; he knew it from the conversation he had overheard between those two men-nurses, the other time, while they were bathing him.
“And you were betting that he wouldn’t be more than twenty years old!” the man who always smiled had said. “Just look at him! He’ll soon reach prime age.”
The other one, who was always in a bad mood, had snorted. “And so, what?” he said then. “The prime age would have been important if his partner had also arrived alive. Huh! To run away and freeze to death! What an ungrateful brat that kid was!”
“Don’t blame the kid, Dimitri. It was the director’s wife who was responsible for that.”
That Dimitri guy laughed. “That woman really went off big time! She even loosened some screws in the boss’s head before she left. Ha! I won’t lie to you; there are days when I’d have liked to witness that, especially when it’s payday.”
“I heard that another of the doctors did it with a wheel wrench,” the smiling man contributed.
The grumpy one nodded yes. “Yeah, it happened down here, in the garage. My brother was one of the guards. They fired him for not seeing the little kid when he was running away. Can you believe it? Whatta lucky bastard! Whereas I, twenty years later, am still here, bathing this cripple.”
“C’mon, Dimitri! Don’t call him that, will you?”
“Why not? He has no idea what we’re talking about. His head is in space. Trust me, you’re the only one who cares for this guy. Don’t you realize we’ll have to take care of him until the day he decides to die? I dunno about you, but I can’t imagine another twenty years in this place. I hate it! I live with a frozen ass!”
“C’mon! Columbia isn’t so bad. They recently inaugurated the tropical dome. Why don’t you go there on your day off and dip your ass in the hot springs for a bit?”
“I’d rather do it on the Middle Ecuadorian beaches.”
“Well, stop complaining and ask for the transfer at once,” said the smiling one.
“Ha! As if it were that easy! You know Dr. T. doesn’t like those kinds of requests.”
“What are you talking about? Scott asked for it and now he’s with him in Pannotia.”
Those two were talking about old Bernardo. There, in the cold lab, everyone called Bernardo Dr. T. and always talked about him even though the old man hadn’t visited them for a long time, probably because he’d forgotten about them. When was the last time he had seen the old man? A long time ago, yes, in the study room, through the glass, because Bernardo no longer wanted to approach him. Everybody there wanted to avoid getting sick from the light that he gave off, the light that made the doctors sick, and since Bernardo was getting older and older, and the elderly had to take care of their health...
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
After the bath, the men-nurses dressed him in his pajamas and accompanied him to his room, and after putting him to bed, the one who always smiled left the TV on so he could watch his favorite shows until he fell asleep.
“Is it necessary to leave him locked up in this decorated cell?”
“At least he has something to watch,” said the grumpy one. “I have hours of sitting in front of a fixed camera awaiting me.”
“But is that... Isn’t it enough to keep him away from the world?”
“You can ask Perez’s widow; she’ll tell you if it’s enough. You heard those scientists. His energy was already toxic, now, it’s also unstable.”
“And aren’t they responsible for that? It’s obvious the treatments aren’t working. But of course, as long as he is in the most inhospitable continent on the planet, who cares if one day he bursts?”
“The most inhospitable continent, huh? I thought Columbia wasn’t so bad.”
“Oh! Shut up, Dimitri.”
Yeah, you better shut up, Dimitri.
The men-nurses would close the heavy glass door behind them and then they would hit some buttons out there, in the hallway, and there would be a Puff! and from the grates in the ceiling, there were jets of cold smoke, which meant that the hermetic lock was sealed and that everything was in order, as they said.
In that place, many people feared him, and very few loved him. The smiling nurse was one of those few; he even used to wave goodbye with a, ‘Sleep tight, Brun.’ And the other was one of those strange talking robot men, one of those Cytlopes androids, one that, from time to time, while the rest slept, would visit him to give him his medicine.
“Be quiet, Brun, okay?” said the robot man when he entered his room, and putting a finger to his mouth, asked him not to open his. It was funny because Cytlopes didn’t have a mouth, just a huge glowing red eye, and yet this android made the motion as if he had one. Then, he would turn one of his fingers into a needle and prick him in the shoulder. “Good boy, Brun. That’s everything for now. I’ll be back next week with more medicine, okay?”
He just nodded. He didn’t squeal with the prick because the Cytlops needed silence to do his thing, and since he wanted the Cytlops back, he behaved well. The medicine from the robot man made him feel better and stronger, not like the medicine from old Bernardo’s doctors, who made him sleepy all the time.
On one occasion, one of those doctors almost busted the android. When the Cytlops had finished pricking him and was about to leave, the doctor entered the room.
“What is this A60 doing here?” he asked, somewhat annoyed.
“Which A60, sir?” replied the guard, who was always in the corridor, leaning out the door.
“Well, the one here!” said the doctor.
The Cytlops was still; he didn’t move or speak, and he wouldn’t say a word either; he had promised the Cytlops he wouldn’t.
“We don’t pay you to sleep, but to guard,” the doctor raged.
“I’m sorry, sir. I don’t know how it happened, I...”
“This is the second time I’ve found you sleeping so far this month. If you can’t stand the night shift, I’ll ask that you be relieved.”
“I’m sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.”
But next week, when his android friend came back to prick him, the guard went back to sleep, and this time the doctor slept too; he saw them lie down on the hallway floor, through the glass door of his room.
“Hee, hee, hee, hee, hee.”
Those damn laughs! They had sounded again! With so many memories floating around him, he’d almost forgotten them.
That was the only bad thing about the Cytlope’s medicine. Every time the android injected him, he heard those horrible laughs, and they got louder and louder with each jab.
“Hee, hee, hee, hee, hee.”
Shut up! Don’t laugh at me! he yelled.
“We’re not laughing at you,” said one of the laughing voices. “We laugh because we are happy.”
Startled, Brun looked up. It was the first time the giggles had turned into voices. Who said that? he asked, looking for the source of that voice.
“We did. Who else?” they responded naturally.
“We’re happy because you can finally see us,” another voice clarified.
But I don’t see anyone, he said.
And then, ahead of him, a mist appeared that came not from the grates of the room, but from nowhere, and mixed with clouds of dust that had not been there until a moment ago, and together they became a very dark sky, full of stars and reddish clouds, a deeper sky than the one he saw from his window at night, a sky that came from far beyond.
And of that night that opened like a dark flower, some small silhouettes emerged that approached him, taking on a human figure until they became a bunch of children.