"GGillean, are you OK?” Asteria asked carefully when she took the blindfold off Gillean’s eyes.
"II need to have a break,” Gillean replied, panting.
"OOf course, go and breathe some fresh air.” Asteria said.
Gillean left the room and slowly walked down the corridor. The memory hurt him deep down, although it’s been stupefied for a long time. Having been forced to recapture the scene of his friend being dead made him want to sit down and cry. This is something that no one should ever see—someone they cherish dying right in front of them. He was already outside. Having found a perfect spot on the fresh green grass, slightly damp with the dew , he collapsed and tears gushed from his eyes. His deceased friend’s face emerged in Gillean’s imagination as if he were sitting with him. “ Sorry that I wasn’t quick enough. I could have prevented this accident,” he thought and the tears intensified. “Why is it so painful to remember the dead?”
After a while, he managed to pull himself together and get up. He headed towards co-working again. The experiment went way further than he’d thought it would go.
"GGuys, I’m here.” Gillean said and waved to Asteria, Gwen and Lucas.
"SSorry for exposing you to something so negative.” Asteria said with guilt in her voice.
"There's Nothing to be sorry for; it’s totally okay. Every person has their own weak spots. And the saying about time curing your wounds isn’t true, because it only stupefies the pain deep down until you are reminded of the very thing that hurt you. “ Gillean replied softly.
“ Are you ready for the second part of our experiment? “ Asteria asked carefully.
“ Yes. What am I supposed to do?”
"LLet’s try it this way. We’ll blindfold you again and you need to focus on the ambience around you, here and now. Try to keep the clarity of present moment; don’t delve in any memories at all.”
“ Gotcha! Let’s start.” Gillean’s mood started to go up; the perseverance was gradually coming back to him.
Gwen came closer to him and whispered, “Good luck.” She blindfolded him and helped him sit down. Asteria and Lucas were observing Gillean attentively. He inhaled deeply and started listening to the sounds around him. He heard his colleagues breathing shallowly and the gust of wind from the opened window, One of the guys was shaking their leg. His breathing was steadying little by little, and the emotions were fading away. After a short while , the darkness and silence started brightening up by something. Gillean was blinded by an unpleasantly white source of light. He was in an operating room in some kind of hospital. “ Jeez , what are they doing?” he thought. They were taking something out, but not saving the person.
"AAaah!” the man yelled in pain. “ Is he without any anesthesia? Gillean’s amazement was getting bigger with every passing second.
"PPay for what you’ve done! You’ve burned the governmental facility; it’s absolutely unforgivable !” the surgeon hollered in response.
"YYou’ll never redeem yourself; we need to ditch you,” said a woman standing across from the surgeon.
"MMs. Arnolds, don’t do it, please. It hurts!” the man yelled and started shaking in convulsions.
“ Although I’m just a nurse, I’m a true patriot of our country. Never have I even attempted to do something against our government! And you shouldn’t have done anything like this. But you have, and now it’s high time for you to pay for your foolish actions.”
“ I tried to protect my children… from being persecuted… this country is meaningless , oppressive and needs to be wiped off the face of the Earth. “ the man started suffocating and suddenly got silent. His face was blue; the man died.
"HHow’s his heart?” the nurse asked her colleague.
"II’ve already taken it out; that’s why he died.” The surgeon replied.
"WWe ought to go and report it to the Guardians," the woman said.
"II need to immerse his heart in formaldehyde first," he responded.
***
"WWhat punitive measure did you urge them to utilize during the session yesterday?” the judge asked.
"TThe surgical intrusion," another man, with the word “attorney” on his badge, replied.
"MMr. Stevenson, how exactly did you punish the man?” the judge asked the surgeon.
"II removed his heart. I used some drugs on him before to dampen his consciousness. Then I used the electric current and poured nitric acid on him and the man started having convulsions. Afterwards, the operation commenced. He yelled about the desire to save his children and implored not to torture him, but I ignored his words.”
"GGreat job, my dear patriots!” the judge exclaimed, giving something to the surgeon and nurse.
Gillean had a closer look and saw that they were holding medals. “ These are for your resilience and exceptional patriotism. “
"WWe’re really honored to get the Bold Award!” The man and woman divulged in unison.
"WWe are honored to have such people around us," the judge and attorney replied.
***
"WWhat the fuck!” Gillean yelled and took the blindfold off his eyes.
"WWhat happened?” Lucas said cautiously.
"II saw an innocent man being tortured. They removed his heart and poured acid on him.” Gillean said, his voice shaking.
"Who-they?” Asteria asked.
"TThere was a surgeon and a nurse. They punished the man for opposing the government. He burned some kind of government facility. He said that he just wanted to protect his children from being persecuted. Than he died.”
"HHm, it’s absolutely wacko. It doesn’t make sense at all.” Asteria replied.
"IIs Marcus still asleep?” Gillean inquired.
“ Yes.” Gwen and Asteria said.
"WWe need to wake him up ASAP.”
“ Ok. He’s going to be angry with us, though.”” they responded.
"IIt doesn’t matter at all. We need his help.” Gillean said it with a grey voice. The color drained from his face like ink seeping from wet paper. His normally warm complexion turned ashen, and the blood seemed to retreat to deeper recesses of the body. His cheeks lost their usual healthy glow, fading into a muted, pallid tone. Even his lips, usually touched with a subtle pink, now appeared drained of life, a ghostly shade against his skin. His eyes, wide with terror, seemed to magnify the effect. The contrast between the dark irises and the now starkly white sclera was huge, giving him the appearance of a frightened animal caught in a spotlight. Each passing moment seemed to intensify this transformation, as if the very essence of his vitality was being leached away by an unseen force. His whole countenance betrayed the overwhelming sense of dread consuming him from within, manifesting visibly as his once vibrant complexion surrendered to the ghostly pallor of fear. He closed his eyes and hid his face in the coldness of his mighty hands.
"WWhat’s the matter?” Marcus asked and shook Gillean’s shoulder slightly.
"WWe tried to conduct an experiment to check my extrasensory abilities. As a result, I saw the future. There was a surgeon and a nurse. They punished one man by removing his heart for burning one governmental facility. He did it for his children, who grew up in a peaceful country with a democratic regime. But he died because he had his heart taken out! Doesn’t it mean anything to you?” Gillean’s voice was louder, on the brink of hysteria.
"RRun to the lab!” Marcus shouted. Everyone in the room noticed a glimmer of hope in his eyes.
"WWhat’s going on?” Asteria whispered and gestured for Gwen and Lucas to come after the two men, scurrying to the lab at the fastest pace they could.
"HHurry up, guys! This whacky scientist has made something up again.” Asteria said it with a slight shade of sarcasm in her intonation. They were running down the corridor, tripping over their own legs.
***
They came to the lab and saw Marcus finishing the memory chair. He was welding something, connecting some peculiarly long wires, and hitting the buttons on the remote controller. Finally, the remote controller beeped, and the chair was finally ready to be used.
"LLadies and gentlemen, behold! My newest and hardest creation is the memory-stimulating chair. It’s aim is to help people regain some particular recollections or the memory as a whole since it’s got the capacity to indicate the mind and memory diseases of any kind. “ Marcus declared, his eyes bright with happiness and hope.
"YYou’ve finally finished!” Asteria shrieked and hugged Marcus.
“ Wow. And what’re we going to do with it now?” Gillean asked and came closer to the chair to have a look.
"NNow, let’s try to exploit it. You’ll need to sit down and I’ll fasten all the belts and stripes on you. For instance, this red stripe is responsible for the analysis of your painful recollections and traumas that cause alterations to your brain chemistry. The yellow belt is attached to your wrist to measure your pulse and the quality of blood circulation in your body. Are you ready, my dear guinea pig?” Marcus asked sarcastically.
“ Yeah. But what do you want me to do? What am I supposed to think about?”
“ Oh, sorry. You need to concentrate on yourself as a whole. Try to recapture something from the distant past, something that happened not a long time ago, a couple of month before you got to the future, give or take. And eventually, try to ponder about the future of ours in here. Think about the vision in the operating room the reward and so on. The mixture of three events from different periods of your life will conjure an understanding about your overall mental state and we’ll be able to understand how to use your newly-acquired extrasensory abilities to fight injustice and finally overthrow the government. “
"HHm, I’ll try. It seems sort of tangled, though.” Gillean said this and inhaled deeply. He sat down carefully and Marcus started fastening all of the belts and stripes. Gillean’s body started itching because of the dozens of wires being connected to him.
"BBrace yourself. Breathe in and out.” Marcus spoke softly to make Gillean feel peaceful.
Gillean took a deep breath and clutched the sleeve of his sweater in his hand. He was shaking, waiting till Marcus got everything set. The chair started vibrating, and the remote controller beeped, signifying that the operation had commenced.
***
"MMommy, for how long are we going to live in South Carolina?” a cute little boy asked, looking at his mom anxiously.
"IIt’s our new home, sweetie.” She replied and embraced the child. He started crying and fell asleep in mom’s arms.
Having gotten from the gloomy Glasgow to the hot Charleston in South Carolina, Gillean’s mom woke him and the twins Sian and Sunna up. They went through all the check-in procedures and left the airport.
"IIt’s so sunny here!” the girls exclaimed with joy.
"IIt’s not so rainy like Glasgow.” Gillean said that and looked around. Moving away was a hard thing to process for him. Especially after realizing that his father died from being poisoned.
***
“ Gillean , you’ve got a new colleague! “ Gwen said solemnly.
“ How old is he?” Gillean asked, feeling kind of lost.
"YYou’ll find it out directly from him,” she replied.
“ Hello! I’m Brandon MacCauley .”
"GGet to know each other; I gotta go!” Gwen said.
***
Gillean was running on a crowded street, pushing people to get through. The people were shouting, trying not to lose each other and keep the crowd. The heavy drops of cold rain were falling down, making everyone attempt to keep their heads from getting wet. The cops were running around, shooting loud people and those who were fighting to get to the parliament building. The dead bodies were falling on the ground, creating puddles of burgundy blood underneath. “ Guys , where are you?” Gillean hollered and stopped running. Gwen was hurrying to him, and Asteria was right behind her. “ Lucas is in trouble!” they shouted, panicking . “ Where is he?” Gillean yelled. “ Run after us. He needs help!” the girls said in unison and scurried. Gillean was racing with them when the wind blew harshly in his face, making his eyes cover with tear. “ And Marcus? “ he asked, panting. “ The girls stopped and they saw Lucas all bloody and beat up. “Marcus is fighting near us.” they replied.
"LLucas, how are you?” Gillean muttered.
"II’m dying,“ he whispered.
"NNo, no, no, you’re not going to die!” Gillean cried out. He picked Lucas up carefully and carried him away to a hotel building near the square where the hullabaloo was going on. “I’ll get the doctor for you.” Gillean murmured and dialed the ambulance’s number on his phone immediately. Meanwhile, the clarity in Lucas’s gaze was gradually fading away, making him look weaker and weaker with every passing moment. Something exploded outside, and the building started shaking. Gillean jumped up and covered Lucas. The walls were falling down, and the two men lied underneath. Everything went black.
***
"TThe heart rate is too high! Give him the medicine!” Asteria yelled and started hitting the stop button on the chair remote controller. She hit the “print“ button, and the papers about Gillean’s current brain chemistry and overall feelings in the body were getting printed. She saw that the chair measured his body temperature at 39.5 degrees Celsius. “ H’‘s got a fever. We need to get him in his bedroom.” Asteria said it again. Marc, Lucas, and Gwen came to her, and together they unfastened all the belts and stripes, and Marcus carried Gillean to his bedroom. He was lying absolutely unconscious on the bed; his nose was sniffling. “Should we leave him alone here for some time?” Asteria asked, her voice trembling.
"II didn’t expect that he was going to pass out.” Marcus replied and scratched the back of his head. “We ought to let him get over it.” he said kindly.
"II’ll stay with him.” Gwen replied. She sat on the edge of Gillean’s bed and looked at him with love and care in her eyes. The other guys left them alone and closed the door. “I hope we’re one step closer to victory after the sacrifice of your effort and health. I’ll sacrifice mine as a sign of gratitude. Your devotion to the things you do is immense. Not everyone is able to do this.” Gwen said that and stroked Gillean’s hair.
