17 - Cycle

The hallway was dark, the sole source of illumination being the glowing bulbous objects that occasionally appeared on the ceiling. The creaking of the wooden floorboards combined with the veil of dust made it very apparent that this was not a place used often. “I wish they’d renovate this place. Yeah I might be the only one who comes through here, but still,” Pierre grumbled to himself as the groans from the floorboards grew louder.

Without much warning, the hallway ended, leaving nothing but a singular lightbulb hovering over an unceremonious wooden door. Sighing to himself, he turned the rotting door knob, revealing a room of solid darkness. Pierre walked into the room, his form slowly changing. Within a few minutes, his height had increased by at least a meter.

After squeezing his knuckles until he heard a small crack, he fished his hand through the darkness until it found a thin string. With a tug, a singular lightbulb flickered to light, revealing a table, chair, and a peculiar device set up in the corner.

Awkwardly, Pierre took a seat in the old chair while ignoring all of the blisters he had just received, and he took a look at the mysterious apparatus. There wasn’t much to the device. It looked to be a small, metallic gray cylinder that had a similarly colored button of sorts placed at the bottom. On the back of the device sat a handful of dark colored cords that vanished into the back wall.

“Gods know how they come up with this stuff,” Pierre muttered as he pulled out a piece of scribbled on papyrus from the side of his tunic under his blue chestplate. The slip looked to be in poor condition, likely due to it being one of the first of its kind. On the piece of papyrus sat each letter in order with a combination of dots and dashes next to them.

After glazing over the note for a minute, Pierre hovered his finger over the lever and began pushing it down in a sequence.

‘LGP is here,’ Pierre inputted. Well, at least that’s what he thought he said. After a few minutes' pause, the metallic cylinder suddenly vibrated, causing Pierre to nearly fall out of his seat.

‘GB is here,’ Pierre translated quickly while desperately hoping that the person responding would slow down. But, before he could even put down the sheet, the cylinder started vibrating again.

‘Mission status,’ the device groaned, causing Pierre to sigh. ‘Failed. Target MIA,’ Pierre typed. ‘Dtails,’ the apparatus responded, causing Pierre to run his hand through his thinning, black hair.

‘Lost. Rebels likely involved,’ Pierre messaged as the memory of Ándras’s scent vanishing replayed through his mind.

‘Report to capital ASAP. Any other notes,’ the cylinder asked, causing Pierre’s thoughts to shift towards his other discovery. ‘Not now,’ Pierre simply typed, figuring that it would probably be best to explain the situation in person.

‘Ok. End,’ the metal device shook before returning to its previous state of stillness. “Damn, I really hate this job,” Pierre complained one last time before pulling the string again and walking out of the door.

…

The air was still as a lone figure leaned over a clean, metal table. The figure was fairly tall at around 180 centimeters; though, all that extra spine served to do at that moment was give him more trouble as he huddled around the metal, gray cylinder.

The man had a similar piece of papyrus in his left hand as the message ‘LGP is hese,’ was translated through the device. Hearing the typo, the man snickered slightly before sending a familiar message.

’GB is here. Mission status.’ His fingers were fairly slow due his muscular physique leaving much to be desired in the dexterity department. ‘Failed. Target MIA.’

These words caused a frown to appear on the man’s bronze face, his deep, black eyebrows furrowing. ‘Dtails,’ he inputted at a fair pace. His right hand traced his long beard as he awaited a response.

‘Lost. Rebels likely involved,’ the device revealed, causing a heavy sigh to come from the man. ‘Report to capital ASAP. Any other notes,’ he quickly inserted into the device. “Damn rebels,” he cursed under his breath.

‘Not now,’ LGP told him, causing his frown to deepen. ‘Pierre’s got something to say? That’s new,’ he thought to himself before ending the conversation.

With a sigh, the man stretched out his back. For a moment, the man thought to himself. ‘Well,’ he eventually determined, ‘they probably aren’t going to do anything to him that we weren’t.’

As the man turned his back to the device, it suddenly began shaking again. Not wanting to miss the message, he quickly hunched back over and translated.

‘CIC. How many of the targets have been eliminated,’ the machine asked, the sheer length of the message causing a sigh to fall from his mouth. After thinking to himself for a minute, the man hunched back over and began typing. ‘GB here. 9 of 10. Last fled,’ the man inserted as the incident regarding the last target replayed through his head. Honestly, why couldn’t she just give up?

One more, the other party began sending a long winded message. ‘Are you certain target nine had died,’ they asked. Thinking about it one last time, the man decided to stick with his story. ‘Hell, if he was captured, being dead would probably be the best scenario,’ he thought, causing a thin smile to appear on his lips.

‘Certain,’ the man said, convinced that this target nine was either dead or worse.

After an unusually long pause, the man received a response. ‘Very well. End,’ the device declared, causing the man to stretch out once more. Convinced he was finally done, he haphazardly shoved the decoder into a slot in his dark skirt before walking out the cold, metal door.

…

As the sun began peeking over the horizon, the plain, wood brown ceiling Ándras had been staring at all night finally began to appear. Even after staying up for over twenty four hours straight and using over half of those to walk, Ándras couldn’t get himself to fall asleep.

His mind raced as it tried to wrap itself around what had happened, however, at the same time, it felt numb. Nothing felt quite right, and it wasn’t just because of the lack of sleep.

The sun continued to rise into the sky, but Ándras continued to mindlessly stare at the ceiling, not a single ounce of emotion present on his face. Around the time the sun had waved goodbye to the sandy horizon, a soft, familiar knock echoed through Andras’s room.

“Ándras,” Voós’s muffled voice began, “I am aware that it is quite early, but, if you wish to see the demonstration you requested, now would be the best time.” Still staring through the ceiling, Ándras didn’t answer Voós’s recommendation, opting to blink for the first time in who knows when instead.

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After a long pause of silence, the door slowly creaked open, its hinges squeaking as Voós’s glowing green eyes appeared in the doorway. “Ándras,” he echoed, his lips thinning, “I can see that you are awake.”

Without responding, Ándras mechanically stood up out of bed, his gaze falling onto whatever happened to be directly in front of him. “Well, at least you’re not completely despondent,” Voós stated, his grimace easing ever so slightly. “Now, lets go. Maybe seeing this will be able to take your mind off of things for a second.”

Again, Ándras robotically walked over to Voós and followed him into the hallway. From there, Ándras kept all of his exterior focus aimed towards Voós’s feet in order to not be left behind. The rest of the walk felt like a dream that he would wake up from any second. A dream that he had to wake up from any second.

However, it seemed this dream planned on continuing for the time being as the sun’s rays alerted Ándras that he had arrived outside. “Ándras,” Voós softly said as he planted his feet, “this is Meirákio.” As Ándras looked up, a boy no older than twelve entered his view. The boy’s skin seemed quite ashy, his brown hair too thin. Weirdest of all, his facial details seemed a bit… off, though Ándras couldn’t really say why. Maybe it was because the boy was sitting down, but, to Ándras, it kind of seemed like his dark eyes were uneven.

“…Hi,” Ándras muttered in a low, uneven tone; though, this failed to get the attention of the boy, who was running his fingers through the dry, sandy dirt with a distant, oddly depressed expression. “Meirákio,” Voós uttered as he nudged the boy’s shoulder. However, even physical contact could not break the boy’s focus.

With a sigh, Voós reached into a pouch connected to his maroon skirt and pulled out a handful of small, spherical objects. After that, Voós knelt down next to the boy with his hand still on his shoulder and brought the small objects towards Meirákio’s gaze.

The boy’s eyes suddenly flicked open in surprise as they fixated on the objects. “…seeds,” he babbled in a questioning tone. “Yeah, seeds,” Voós repeated, a soft smile growing on his face. “Would you like them?”

Softly nodding his head, the boy delicately grabbed a single small seed and stood up, a pure smile replacing the look of melancholic sadness. “But, before you plant them, I brought a new friend that I want you to meet,” Voós whispered as he slightly turned the boy to face Ándras. “This is Ándras, and he wanted to watch you plant the seeds today.”

The boy made eye contact with Ándras, a glint of curiosity appearing in his near black eyes as he further clutched the seed to his chest. “Hi,” he squeaked. “Uh, hi,” Ándras repeated, his eyebrows furrowing. However, before Ándras could ask why he was brought here, Voós gently grabbed the boy’s hand and led him inside while beckoning Ándras to follow with his eyes.

With a sigh, Àndras followed the two through yet another series of hallways; though, this time, they arrived at a medium sized room made purely out of a transparent material. “Where are we,” Ándras asked. “The garden,” Voós answered as he opened the glass door and led Meirákio inside.

For a garden, the inside of the glass dome was surprisingly bare. Hell, the soil hardly looked like it was even capable of growing cacti, so why exactly was the room called a garden?

“Now then Meirákio,” Voós softly uttered while taking a knee, “do you think you could plant us some olives?” With a nod, the boy shuffled over to a random spot in the room and dug a small hole: a task that proved more difficult than Ándras thought due to the thin consistency of the soil. Despite this setback, the young child set the seed into the ground, covered it up with a layer of dirt, and, without an ounce of hesitation, spat on the small mound he created.

Opening his mouth, Ándras prepared to ask what was happening, but figured he’d probably find out in the next minute or two. After making sure the small ungerminated orb was firmly secure, the boy rushed back to Voós. “Done,” he muttered under his breath, causing Voós to grin. “Alright, thanks for your help,” he said while handing him a few more seeds. “Here you go. Just make sure not to plant them outside.”

With a nod of his head, Meirákio quickly stumbled through the door, leaving nothing but two grown men and a mound. “So… why exactly am I here,” Ándras asked after waiting since he was taken from his room. “I told you I’d show you a demonstration of what this method could do, remember,” Voós said. This only served to confuse Ándras more.

“Yeah, but what does any of this have to do with demonstrating power? All the boy did was spit on a seed,” Ándras groaned. “An apostle of Demeter’s spit is known to be one of the best fertilizers second only to their corpses. Believe me, this is the least unusual ability you’ll see here,” Voós chuckled while looking at Ándras.

With a sigh, Ándras leaned against the glass door. Despite his unimpressed appearance, his heart was racing with expectation. After all the hype Voós generated, he couldn’t help but to anticipate something at least a little amazing.

Before Ándras could even blink, the ground began shaking lightly as a small stump broke through the coarse, sandy ground at a more than noticeable rate. “I recommend stepping out of the room now,” Voós laughed as he sprinted towards the door while leaving Ándras behind. Panicked, Ándras ran after Voós desperately hoping that he’d be able to escape before whatever Voós was talking about happened. However, just as the open doorway was within reach, something suddenly propelled Ándras into the wall on the opposite side of the hallway with enough force to nearly injure him.

As Ándras gained his bearings, he noticed that Voós had slammed the see-through door shut, revealing that the entire room had been filled to the brim with a gargantuan amount of leaves that were unable to hide the extremely large olives that sat under them. Out of all the things Ándras had been expecting, this was not one of them.

Making sure the door was shut tight, Voós looked over at the stunned Ándras, a smirk crossing his face at his disheveled appearance. “Hey Ándras,” Voós blurted with a giant grin on his face. “Wanna know something?”

Not sure what that offer entailed, Ándras kept motionless. Despite this, the question was answered.

“The seed I gave him was a cherry seed.”

…

The air was heavy and eerily silent down in Aunt Gyn’s hospital room. Due to the lack of natural light, Fíle was completely unable to tell what time it was. As his eyes slowly creaked open, the soft pulsation of the machine Aunt Gyn was hooked to crept into his vision, reminding him of the previous day.

With a yawn, Fíle stood up and hovered over his aunt with a bittersweet expression on his face. Suddenly, the bulb on the ceiling came to life, causing Pierre’s figure to appear in the doorway. “Morning,” he groaned as if he had gotten no sleep the previous night.

“How long was I out for,” Fíle asked. “Hell if I know. I just woke up myself,” Pierre responded, causing Fíle to sigh. Ignoring his rudeness, Pierre quietly entered the room and leaned against the wall. “So how are you liking the place,” he inquired. “I mean, it’s okay. Kinda weird, but if it’ll help Aunt Gyn…”

Pierre nodded in understanding. “Most of the place is brand new. And by that, I mean the underground part is new. I don’t know how many people have been here yet, but you’re probably one of the first,” Pierre chuckled while grinning. The revelation caused a small amount of blood to rush to Fíle’s head.

“Anyway,” Pierre began, “Wanna take a look around and have a chat?” After thinking to himself for a bit, Fíle nodded his head and, after looking at Aunt Gyn one last time, followed Pierre into the hallway.

Not much had changed in the one day that had passed since Fíle’s arrival. Everything looked the same for the most part, however he did hear murmurs coming from inside doored rooms from time to time. “Are the other people here all injured,” Fíle asked in a slightly worried tone. “Not really. A few sick soldiers here and there mostly. Aside from the doctors I mean. And the painters.”

Fíle raised an eyebrow. “Painters?” Pierre sighed. “I know. Out of all the things they could paint, they chose the secret underground hospital,” he griped.

The hallway was well lit, allowing Fíle to notice the branching path coming up. “So,” Pierre suddenly said, interrupting Fíle’s thoughts. “I know now might not be the best time, but… have you thought about it at all? About me teaching you, I mean?”

The conversation from twoish days ago flew through Fíles mind. The thought that they only met a few days ago was weird to Fíle. It felt like they had known each other for at least a month or two.

“Not really,” Fíle responded after a pause. “But would now even be a good time to do that? I mean, don’t I have to look after Aunt Gyn?” The duo suddenly came up to the fork as a muffled conversation reached Pierre’s ears. On their right sat a tired looking man who was leaning against a wall and a tall, leaner fellow who had a giant tub of paint positioned on his right.

“Hello, Gentlemen,” Pierre greeted while waving his hand. In response, the tired guy simply looked over in his direction and gave a subtle nod. On the other hand, the painter hadn’t seemed to even notice.

Somewhat concerned with the lack of response, Pierre turned back the other way and took the path left of where they had come from. “Sorry. People here can be… well… different,” he muttered. “But, about your Aunt… that’s what the doctors are for. I get you’ll always be worried about her, but there really aren’t any better hands that she could be in.”

Not very assured, Fíle’s eyes gravitated towards the ground. “I know that,” he stuttered, “but still…” Pierre nodded in understanding. “I get it. But not doing anything isn’t going to do… well, anything. You might as well do something to pass the time,” he argued.

“Yeah, I guess,” Fíle sighed. If he was going to be stuck here without anything to do, he might as well learn how to use his powers. “But this doesn’t mean I’ve agreed to go to the academy, ok?”

Pierre smirked. “Got it. We can start whenever you’re ready,” he admitted. “What about right now,” Fíle asked while raising an eyebrow, causing Pierre to shrug. “If you really want to. But I figured you’d want to eat first.” Feeling how empty his stomach was, Fíle decided that would be a good idea. On the way to the cafeteria, the two passed another strangely despondent painter, but decided that it would be best to ignore him.

“How is Aunt Gyn going to eat, anyway,” Fíle asked, confused. “I told you already, doctors,” Pierre responded. Fíle raised an eyebrow. “What about drinking?”

Pierre shrugged once again. “Doctors,” he repeated, causing a smirk to form on Fíle’s face.

“Shopping?”

“Doctors.”

“Cleaning?”

“Doctors.”

“Chores?”

“Doctors.”

Fíle chuckled. “What about looking after her,” he asked, expecting the obvious. “Hm… probably the painters,” Pierre joked, causing a warm smile to come out of Fíle.

The two continued joking with each other as they walked down the hall. Meanwhile, another child sat in a humid, dark room, his nerves buzzing from previous stimulation.

“Please,” he whispered to himself while quivering. “Please. Stop.”

The only answer he received was the sound of running water slowly creeping through the tunnels of the beast, promising nothing but future pain.