Enear Flos

Year 2150: Present

The air, the view—it was all suffocating. The feeling of being surrounded by the metal scrap made buildings crowded in the small city: the smell of rust and cement mixing in the warm, polluted air. But the most annoying view on this rooftop was the giant statues from the plaza.

Those figures were called the Three Messiahs—the saviors—the scientists who people believed were the reason that humanity was still breathing after the nuclear warfare a hundred years ago. They may have failed to save plants and animals, but their technology replaced them with artificial nutrients and machines in the food chain.

Enear's eyes were filled with hatred as he landed his green eyes into it. He wanted to destroy it. He wanted to see it fall and shatter it into pieces. A satisfying feeling lingered in his heart just thinking about it.

For him, those statues will never be heroes. They don't understand the wisdom of death. Those nuclear missiles were the gift from heaven, the answers to the prayers of humanity to stop the suffering in this world. It was the rapture—the mass salvation–a quick, painless death. But those devils hindered the will of fate, resulting in prolonging the suffering. They're the ones who built this hell.

They were so stupid.

The bell rang, cueing that the break was over. But Enear didn't bother to move. He found no reason to stand up and go to his classroom anymore.

"Want some?" A blonde lad with bright yellow eyes suddenly came and sat beside him. Dycron lent his pack of chips to Enear without taking his eyes off the statues, mesmerizing every carve of the stone: the detailed crumples of the lab gowns, the smooth cemented faces, and the curved pride seen in their smiles.

"Someday, I'm going to replace those statues," he grinned as he entered chips in his mouth. "Dycron--the greatest electrical scientist that will change the world!"

Those words made Enear's green eyes lie on Dycron. He remembered something like this before. A memory of him in front of the classroom, when he introduced himself and the teacher asked about his dream. But all those who surrounded him just laughed, including his teacher.

"How about you, Enear? What do you want to be?"

Enear switched his eyes to the thick gray clouds passing by that had never revealed the blue skies. He hated every inch of this world.

"A corpse to feed plants."

Dycron accidentally spat the wet chips from his mouth and threw him a surprising look.

"Geez! Your dream is to die?"

"I guess."

"I guess?" Dycron repeated his answer with an unbelievable look. "You should start finding a reason to live, Enear. Take me as an example. When I become the greatest scientist, all my inventions will be passed on to our generations and will be taught in school. Those thoughts excite me to study well every day. Once I get my college diploma, I will apply to an electric company and steal their technology!"

"The break was already over 20 minutes ago, Dycron. What kind of studying well do you plan?" Enear mocked monotonously, still criticizing the clouds that were supposed to shape like pieces of cotton, forming different optical illusions–not a plain thick foam.

"What?" Dycron screamed in disbelief and checked his smartwatch. "How could the school forget the bell?" You're too busy worshiping the idea of yourself in the statue.

Dycron sat up immediately and offered his hand to Enear. "Stop slacking off! We're already late!"

Enear wasn't sure, but he accepted his hand and stood up with him even though he wasn't ready to face the boring lessons he wouldn't even use in his everyday life.

A corpse to feed plants. Enear was serious when he said that.

The sun started to set down, tinting orange to Enear's brown hair and pale skin and each building and floor in the street. Half an hour had just passed when the class was over, and now a group of students circled him. A perfect place in a quiet street where no one could witness what would happen to him.

"I told you to buy me bread at break time, but where the hell did you go?" Jonathan, who's in the center, asked.

He tried to ignore them and continued walking, staring blankly at the wind brushing his eyelashes. Those boys in front of him felt more insulted by what he did, so they blocked his way.

"You really have a terrible personality, farmer boy."

Enear stopped, still looking directly his way as if they didn't exist. "Ganging up on a helpless man. Is that the definition of having a good personality?"

Jonathan smirked as his gang giggled. "I knew it. Three people to punish you yesterday isn't enough. What can you say about ten, huh?"

Enear finally raised his emerald eyes at him and firmly answered with his monotonous voice. "A ten times coward."

Purple darkness filled up the surroundings as the hours passed. Underneath was Enear lying on the floor, covered with bruises, and waiting for a light to appear in front of him. But nothing came. That means he's still alive. How he wished Jonathan and his gang didn't give him a little mercy.

~

A smell of dust from cement fragments, rotten garbage in the trash, and burning rubbers welcomed Enear at the midnight clock of the dark alley. The air might be a little colder than daylight, but the sun's heat was still stirring from the metals, making the place warm, and his black suit made him sweat more. Only the oxygen production from his smart mask at least cooled his hidden face.

Enear quickly leaned against the edge wall and yanked a knife from his hips when he heard a scratching sound. He carefully listened: crumpling plastics, gentle clanks of metal, and a crunchy chewing sound. It must be coming behind this wall.

He peeked silently and saw a cat digging up the trash under the white blinking lights from the broken lamp post. It shone its peeled skin, revealing blue and red wires connected to the metallic skull. It devoured everything that touched its mouth when it was only supposed to consume gas bites–a biscuit-looking food filled with gasoline designed to fuel robotic pets. But the robot cat had been broken, eating anything it could see just to survive.

He let himself be distracted by the mixed feelings in his chest. He can't understand why he felt bad over a lifeless thing.

Enear sensed a sudden change in the air. He quickly grabbed the wrist of a hand about to pat his shoulder, pulling it to lose the stranger's balance, and dropped her on the floor, together with her briefcase. The spontaneous lamppost light blinked over her petite body in a black suit matching a black gas mask.

"Chill. It's just me," a calm voice of a girl whispered while her body was leaning against the floor. Her hands were cuffed by his tight hand.

"Do you like potatoes?" Enear asked, even though he had never seen one.

"I prefer cassava," she replied, and Enear freed her. They have no idea what they are talking about, but those were the passwords they memorized.

"I'm Jiya. Your boss hired me as your scout for tonight." She handed the briefcase and Enear started to assemble the sniper rifle inside. A mercenary from other groups, or might be working independently.

"Q1," Enear replied.

"Real name? Like, Kyu Wan?"

"Combination of a letter and a number," he replied as he loaded the rifle with cocking sounds of metals. Then he tapped his wireless earphone five times, notifying Jiya's earphones to pair. When they were done, he started to walk.

At day, Enear was just a regular student who slacked off on the rooftop to escape from the boring lessons and was beaten up by the bullies in the afternoon. But tonight, above his favorite spot, on the peakest position of the abandoned building, the warm breeze of night brushed through seventeen-year-old's brown silky hair. Standing his elbows on the railings of the rooftop, gripping the rifle with his green eyes kissing the scope, seeing a green view of a man in a lab coat running in the middle of a devastated alley.

"The subject is now coming to your station, as you predi–," a woman's voice reported in his wireless earphone stopped in the middle when he pulled the trigger and fired a shot. Instead of splattering blood, white dust exploded in the air. The man continued running while holding his blood-dripping decapitated arm that was healthy before.

"What just happened?"

"He turned his whole arms into bone as a shield," he replied, cocking the rifle to reload a bullet while following the man through his sight. Once again, he zoomed it into the head.

"An abnormal defective?"

"A normal defective."

"Other level, then?"

"Just level one."

"So it's a classification, I see. I thought all they could do was melt themselves by secreting too much acid by accident. I never thought some of them were useful for self-defense as well."

"Not this time," he claimed and fired his gun. The head popped, splattering blood through the walls and floors. The body dropped to the ground.

"Leave the mess to me, Q1. Your job ends here now. Two hundred pesos will be paid to both of us in 2 hours upon confirmation. What a lame reward for such a dangerous job."

Enear pulled out his green eyes from the sight. "You talked too much about obvious things." He started to pack his things.

"Don't be cold. We'll work often from now on, so at least let's be buddies."

Once he was done packing, he left and went down the stairs and routed back to the alley. Enear's body could finally rest from today's hard work but his mind would never be at peace with his conscience. Another soul died in his hands; another cast in his nightmare would come.

He might have wanted to find another job, but only prostitution was the only option if he hated killing. It's not that he chose to commit sins over his dignity, but he was raised like this since he was young, programmed to obey all the orders endlessly for two hundred pesos, just enough to afford breakfast and lunch without dinner to save some for school expenses.

If he resisted or quit in the middle, the organization would hunt him just how he did with the subjects.

"Who dared abandon a sweet little fur?" The sweet voice of Jia echoed in the alley while Enear was passing through the blinking lamp post. She was petting the broken cat no matter how it ignored her to chew garbage.

"You worked too hard, biting every opportunity that came in touch with your mouth. In the end, you're just a broken puppet by the error system without any direction in life. Just like me."

Just like us, Enear whispered in his mind.

"They're lucky, though," he said, pertaining to the cat, as he passed through broken bulbs, lightening the old dirty walls and Jia's face masked with black metals. Her eyes glared at Enear's trailing shadow popping and vanishing through the inconsistent lights, waiting for his next words. His footstep stopped, as well as his figure.

"Robots have no emotions to suppress. And they don't need your sympathy."

Quintessence Nightmare | mvcabusas