Chapter 4: The Blind One

About a week passed since the chip plantation, ever since Roger saw himself as a moving four-wheeled vehicle. The pain stopped, yet he could still hear echoing sounds at the background and see faltering digits climbing up and down. The other differentiating perk about the chip was that he could see his dreams with full clarity instead of separate fragments of senselessness. Some days he would access memories of a distant past, memories hidden deep into his unconscious. At some point, he was starting to get used to the digits every time he closed his eyes and to the distant sounds whenever he was determined to find some calmness, without forgetting the frequent currents that would pass through his skin whenever he touched a phone or a computer.

He painted less often; he tried to paint his father in the simulation once, but he quit right away as his focus was drained by the chip. At night, he would try to figure out what the digits meant, thus he emptied his room of all the portraits, leaving the blankness of the white wall inspire him to dive deeper into the numerical world. Bob called him a couple of times, but Roger refrained from answering. Whenever his Uncle peeked through the door, he would observe the blue light illuminating his face. Some nights were without slumber during the time he searched for Red Tech, trying to know more about Carl Owinson. One of the articles mentioned that he had lost his sight during a brain surgery; the medical record spoke of a tumor that resigned in his brain and that was to be destroyed before it could spread any further.

"The perfect cover story," Roger said.

I already got what I came for anyway

His words were confusing. Somehow Roger had to believe that the chip inside Owinson's brain was not capable of sensing the presence of other chips, because if the opposite was true, Roger was doomed. The night was darkening before the dawn when Roger was starting to yawn and struggle to keep his eyelids risen. He clumsily walked before he fell on his bed, ignoring the tingling low-voltage currents of electricity that traveled in parallel with his own blood like a river. The usual habit was that he would wake up at the time the sun started to lighten the cold streets of Garlem, but his eyelids were still tied to the downer side of his eye sockets. His eyebrows and fingers fluttered occasionally. It was already seven thirty in the morning; the alarm clock was ringing and shaking.

"Stop, I want to sleep," he said.

The ringing didn't stop.

"Stop!" he said while his eyes still closed, and his consciousness misplaced. His face distorted as he coiled his fist in anger, introducing a glitch into the alarm clock. The small explosion frightened the sleeping Roger who woke up finding his alarm clock under the other side of his bed with a small sparkle of dying fire. He almost forgot he had school, classes to attend and exams to pass. He brushed his teeth, combed his hair and tossed limbs into sleeves and pants. He sat by the other side of the table as his Uncle cooked the omelets.

"Ah, never gets old," Uncle said, spotting Roger's dull eyes lost into the infinite blackness of the table. The digits returned, traveling across the table but in a mixed motion, some were slow while others were fast. Some moved in a horizontal line while others in a vertical one. They were intersected in each other; he was about to drop his jaw before Uncle yelled, spraying some spit on his face.

"Hey! You keep on doing this, getting lost and you just can't remember you got lost. What's the matter with you? Every time I tell you to speak to a doctor, you bloody refuse, you need to fix this one way or another," Uncle Derek said, smashing the pan with bubbled omelets on the table.

"I understand, Uncle. I'll go to a doctor. I told you it's just the accident, and I really get lost most days so you won't have to worry about anything. If I'm retarded, then it isn't new, so you won't have to think about it much," Roger said before he picked up the fork, and then attempted to pick up the knife to cut a part of the omelets. As he turned to the left, his wrist was still at the edge of the table and he wasn't holding the knife.

Ah great, this chip is messing up my nervous system.

It only took a few more seconds for his hand to move. He tossed the wet oily piece of omelets into his mouth, wondering if he had lost his taste because of his new digital pathways. He dared not wonder. He finished the meal and grabbed his backpack with him, walking his way out of the house. Uncle Derek was left in deep concern; his eyes lost in his sister's portrait holding her baby. He held the portrait in between his hands, spotting his nephew from the window, walking hands in pockets and eyes on the ground.

"Ah, sister, what a troublesome boy you left me with! I wouldn't want you to worry, he's a good kid… but I wish he had more time with you or with that shithead of a husband you had, if only someone made him feel that he mattered. This is my promise to you, dear sissy, I'll take care of this young chap even if it costs me my age and life, yeah, that's my responsibility," he muttered as the sunshine lit his face.

As he was walking outside, Roger sensed some heaviness upon his back before he saw the arms of his friend Jeremy around him, as if he was to choke him by the neck.

"Look who's here!" Jeremy yelled, bumping his fist into his friend's shoulder. Without raising his hand to unplug the earpods, a single eye movement stopped the music. He didn't bear his mind to think whether it was deliberate or not.

"You didn't come," Roger said, his mind was alerting due to the rushing notifications in his friend's phone.

"I was kinda caught, buddy. We had exams and stuff. Plus, I didn't know about the whole accident thing only after you were out of the hospital."

"You could have come to my place."

"Come to your place and meet that big mouthed monster? I hope you're kidding, bro," Jeremy said.

"Don't talk about him like that, I'll break your jaw if you say a single word about him," Roger said in an aggressive manner with the hood covering his head, letting a shade darken his face from his nose to the top. He coiled his fists at such intensity that his friend's phone battery was heating and hurt his fingers. He had to calm down eventually; anger was not at his service for as long as he couldn't properly control his powers.

"Relax, bro! I didn't mean anything by it, and since you always speak badly about your uncle, I didn't care and just said it. Come on, tell me what happened, how did you get to the hospital?"

"I was with someone in a hovering car, then it crashed. We're both okay," Roger said.

"Who? Oh, I got a strange feeling it's got something to do with that card, isn't it?"

"Yeah, whatever, look he's just a friend of my dad, we talked a bit and then when he was driving me home, we crashed into a building that's why we didn't fall down. It's not a big deal really."

"A hovering car? What did it feel to be in a flying car?"

Roger remained silent for a few seconds, thinking for the suitable words to describe the feeling. He only thought of digits and patterns, of yeses and nos. He refrained from unnecessary complexity.

"High," he said.

That same car was slowly driving into the school's parking lot. The two friends stood from a distance, watching how the vehicle was lessening in its speed. Out of it came out an old man and a young lady, both known to Roger.

"Isn't that the girl you were looking at the other day?" Jeremy said with a chuckle. Roger ignored him, waited for Tamara to get into the school before he sprinted towards the parking vehicle.

"I'll see you later!"

Jeremy stretched his hand to hold his friend but it was already too late. As Bob lit the other end of the cigarette, Roger stood just behind the other side of the windshield panting. Bob walked out of the car, somehow he had expected that the dinner was not the last time he would see his friend's son.

"Hey, kid," Bob said, exhaling two chunks of smoke in the air.

"Listen to me, Carl Owinson came to my house the other day," Roger yelled. The stick of cigarette fell off Bob's fingers as his eyes went stiff; he then grabbed Roger and tossed him inside the vehicle.

"This is not good at all," Bob said, wiping the hammering drops of sweat that descended off the temples of his face. He wrote a code on the vehicle's screen, initiating a special seal to lock outside intervention. "Tell me what happened!"

"He came asking about the chip. I denied, he didn't insist or anything. He just left once I told him I didn't have it," Roger explained.

"Damn it!" Bob said as he struck the steering wheel with his palm, letting out a short klaxon that alerted teachers nearby.

"What?" Roger asked.

"He knows, he knows you have it, he knows about the whole implantation affair. Someone must have told him, a doctor maybe or… a worker in Red Tech, that's for sure. What was it that I didn't notice? How did he do this? Me and Isaac thought of everything, we planned everything… how could he do this?" Bob exploded in his own delirium, his words interfering with one another. It was the first time Roger had ever seen Bob panicking, totally out of his mind. The redness of the radio screen was glitching, unable to keep stability.

"Why? He was blind and… and… he didn't come after me or anything, he believed me," Roger explained.

Bob held Roger's head in between his palms, so tight that his neck hurt him.

"Listen to me, you idiot! Carl Owinson wouldn't have to come to your house unless he was sure that the chip was in your mind! His blindness doesn't mean anything, he is all-seeing and this isn't an exaggeration. He just came to confirm, and he had his goddamn answer!"

"Oh… that's why he said… he got what he came looking for," Roger said in a calm but disappointed manner.

"Tell me, how many days passed since he had visited you?"

"Two days."

"Eh?" Bob said, leaning back in his chair as he withdrew his hands. "What kind of a trickery is this? This not like him, it should have been your end the moment he confirmed that you were the one with the chip. He must be planning something; otherwise he wouldn't wait for two days. I wonder if it has something with his chip, I don't fully know how it functions," Bob said.

"What? I thought my father and you were the one to design his chip."

"Doesn't count, your father and I only designed the prototype with a few additions to help keep him safe. The difference between the chips depends on their response to the host's brain. His chip's response was different, and we know nothing about it because Owinson disappeared. He is dangerous, I don't think the word 'dangerous' even fits that kind of man."

"What am I supposed to do now?"

"Well, since that he didn't come anywhere near you during the last two days, you're safe for now. However, be no less sure that he's got his eyes on you whenever you go. I figure he's testing you, trying to see how efficient your chip is. Usually he doesn't bother dealing with something not worth the proper pursuit. The less you use your chip, the less he will consider you a threat. He would just consider that Isaac and I failed to create the perfect chip, and thus discord the idea all together."

"But I can't fully control my powers, I can't control my persistent tendency to connect with other machines. I see digits whenever I close my eyes, it's hard to calm myself," Roger explained.

"You will learn to control your chip, I will do everything on my behalf to make sure you do. Still, this doesn't cross me off his blacklist, he must have known that I was behind the chip implantation. Is it possible that he took pity in me knowing that I was to die soon? Could he be planning to do something with me, or worse… to my family?" He said, spotting Tamara opening the window of her class before she sat in her chair, brush in her right hand. Roger thought of his Uncle, his friend Jeremy; everything was at stake.

"Go, Roger, go to your class. I will think of something, I always did think of something," Bob said, lighting the engine. Roger walked out of the car, noticing how the cleaning and patrol robots were gazing at him. Their glowing eyes shook his chest and sunk his heart. He was on the threshold of a road of corpses and regrets. Yet before the whole of it, he was on the threshold of his class, watching how the sun lit the fire of her hair while she put the dots with the light colors. She glanced him looking at her, yet she bore him no mind at all. As he sat behind her and adjusted his equipment, his head rumbled at the sight of her portrait, this time it resembled a chip with glowing red and green lights. Visions occurred; visions that were weaved throughout the sunshine while he closed his eyes. He saw two men placing the chip in his mind using a machine similar to that which picks up dolls off boxes. It was that same chip, that one chip that was planted in his mind.

"I've seen that before," Roger said, almost instantly and already too late to go back. It was the first time he had addressed her; his heart raced in patience for her response.

"My father used to spend his weekends examining it. When I was a child, I used to slip to his basement and watch him adjust the glowing lights," she said, finally and for the first time turning back to him. Their eyes met, but not for long. Both of them blushed, but she was a master at hiding it as she returned to her portrait.

"I wasn't exactly a fan of what they did, no matter how much it meant to them," Roger said, clearing his throat afterwards. She tossed the brush into another dye with a different color in order to set up the background.

"Does that explain what you said to my parents the other day? When they asked you the reason you chose to be this way, to become an Art Major," Tamara said.

"Well, this could be personal rather than too general and philosophical. Chips like the one you paint took my father away from me," he said, seeing his image glitching in front of him, it must had been the chip's strong link to his personal memory. She turned to him with wet eyes, yet he didn't notice as he turned back to painting.

"Would you have loved Garlem if your father was there?" She asked.

"That's hard to answer, it brings me back to what I said to your parents. I guess I wouldn't have hated it, but I wouldn't have liked it either. I know that Garlem is part of the human evolution, that we are ought to evolve and use advanced tools, tools that can resemble this chip. Maybe it's inevitable, maybe this will be the final stop when mind and technology are one, but this is not a future I would choose. Our perception, the way we look at things from a spiritual way, that is not something I'd wanna sacrifice, no, I will hold on into that until the last sane bit of me gives it up," Roger spoke in a calm manner, observing a delusional reflection of him in metallic skin behind her, in the portrait as she colored his eyes and adjusted his nose.

"What are you planning to do after you finish school?" She asked, laying a quick glance at him.

"I'm not sure, I'm not sure of anything anymore. But I had a dream to leave this place behind, to leave Garlem to these shallow people that deserve it. I deserve more, and I think you do too," he said.

"Oh you do? How?"

"The way I saw you paint during the last few months, I think you are sane and perceptive as I am. You deserve to find a place where your talents, your mind are appreciated."

"You know, this is the first day in months I notice you're not painting," she said, looking back at him with a smile.

She noticed me!

"I— lose my muse sometimes."

"So you believe in them, my father used to sit me on his lap and explain to me the impossibility of their existence while I shout that I feel my muse whispering in my ears."

In this exact context, the only thing that whispers in my head is this chip. My muse, she is my muse.

"I hope I'm not interfering, but I heard you the other day saying that Mr. Polion is dying. How are you dealing with it?"

"I'm not feeling anything specific. You only fear the loss of what you grow to like, what you grow used to. I'd miss the portraits, the brush, the colors, but not him. I'd miss mom, terribly, but not him. It saddens a person to become fatherless, but I have been fatherless for a long time. He never showed up at anything, so his presence with us is more hypocritical I guess. Um… you wouldn't mind listening, I'm only saying this because… you lived something like that, did you?"

"I'm growing aware that you would have liked Garlem if only your father was there," Roger said.

She dotted a sort of blackness around the painted chip, leaving no place for the light, trying to make the colored dots in the chip brighter.

"Yeah, I would because… why not? I think the city is beautiful, those robots are beautiful, the hovering cars that fill the sky, the stretching buildings, the lights, Garlem is beautiful. The city doesn't inspire beauty, but it is beautiful. You are right; I would have loved them all if father loved me.

"As an artist, I chase the feeling of love and connection; it moves my hand and fuels my imagination. What do you chase, Roger?" she asked, slowly turning back to him.

"Beauty, I'd chase it to the ends of the earth, and I'd gladly not regret this pursuit if it was just around the corner all this time," Roger answered.

At that moment, their eyes fully met and he could feel that messages were exchanged in that short instant before the teacher walked in with her equipment in hand.

"Good morning!" the teacher said.

Roger cursed under his lips. "Of all the other days, you picked today to come," he muttered, spotting Tamara smiling.

During the trip home, Roger didn't listen to the artificial sounds of the rain, but embraced the fastness of his new world. After listening to what Tamara had said, he struggled on the way back home with the idea of perceiving the sort of beauty Garlem could offer, the chances and passions this ugly city could inspire. Instead of treating numbers as forms of two-dimensionality, they could be the exact roads to three-dimensionality. Instead of trying to resist the voices that rung in his head, ranging from people on phone calls to patrol robots chasing speeding drivers, he wanted to listen to them all. No more would he ignore the voices, the numbers and eventually his own calling. His mind took quick responses with the bits of stimulus activated by the walking pedestrians with their phones in their palms. He would smile at the sight of huge screens appearing in his sight, showing the contents of each scroll, the messages, the pictures, the referrals, the IPs, the intended ads, and the same contents from the side of those they were interacting with in the virtual world. He came to the realization that his ability to focus was widening, like a stretching hole in a shirt that keeps on tearing into the cloth.

With a wink, he blocked a violent picture in a child's phone. With the move of a finger, he fixed the bug in the lady's phone. As he coiled his hands into shaking fists, he alerted the two robots behind him on suspicious fellow that had been tailing the old man with the briefcase. No pain, no prickle, no blood, nothing but total accordance. The choices of his control were being set in front of him, from the lights to the move of satellites up in the far sky. His nervous system was directly connected to the flow of technology, to the flow of these intertwined systems that would only work if all its part complied with its orders, with Roger's orders. Of course, his full control over these machines was far from his capability, but he was sure that with their flow, since that he recognized which transparent cords control which parts of the system, he was in full acknowledgement that one day he would be able to grasp them.

This is not exactly what we are worried about, Roger. I have to be honest, they do pose a danger to your health, but they are also capable of ruining your perception.

From the words of his father's holographic figure, his mind would travel back to what he had said to Tamara a few hours back.

Beauty, I'd chase it to the ends of the earth, and I'd gladly not regret this pursuit if it was just around the corner all this time.

The only question his chip couldn't find the probable answer to was whether he would still be capable of perceiving beauty after he had broken all the walls, after he had connected his mind to every machine out there. At that moment, he stood stiff as a single particle of snow traveled across the atmosphere, willing to land on Roger's hooded head. At the exact second, the world sizzled as a deep crack occurred up in the sky. The stretching buildings moved like faltering clouds. The hovering cars turned to hammering rain. People turned to dust as the howling wind carried them, leaving their phones in the open space. By then, everything clouded and the whole world blackened while Roger felt that he was missing in the midst of a simulation. Strange sharp sounds crossed his hearing as the spasm pushed him to collapse with his hands climbing up his skull. A glitch gave birth to a suited figure with black eyes rather than gray.

"Owinson," Roger said. He stood on his feet, facing Owinson whose eyes were fully black with a few glowing trenches across his eye socket. His hands were held together behind his back as he stood tall with his head held high.

"How?" Roger asked.

"You did not think I did not know, did you?" Owinson asked, raising an eyebrow.

Roger took a step back.

"Then why didn't you do anything about it?"

"An interesting question that is. You are a valuable asset to me, Roger. It has come to my attention that your father did something a bit special with you, using what is known as the irreversible surgery. My chip, Bob's chip, they can be taken out of our minds with a slight percentage of survival. In your case, you can never survive such a surgery. Not only that, but the chip is to initiate self-destruction if it gets disconnected from your mind. I cannot kill you or extract the chip from your mind, that is why I still need you," Owinson explained with a regular tone of voice.

"What do you want from me?"

Owinson stood silent for a few seconds before he looked back at him.

"Everything the chip in your brain has to offer. Let me tell you this, do not even think of fleeing Garlem. I have an army that watches the city guards aside from the chip in my mind that tells me when a fly buzzes in your ears. I will not hurt you, but those you love whether it is about your Uncle or Polion's daughter will be my object of focus if you refuse to comply, and there is nothing anyone can do about it."

"Why are you doing this? There is nothing you can gain if I decide to kill myself. Dad died and Bob is dying. You'd be left with nothing!"

"Oh you cannot kill yourself, you won't. You are still young, Roger. Your father, with all his knowledge and maturity, decided to go against me, let alone someone with your naiveté. You may not understand my vision, but I am sure that before I am done with you, you will understand the essence of my work. The city will be your playground, experiment your power to the maximum of your ability, and if you willingly refrain from doing so, I will consider an unusual approach. Look at me, know that I am not joking with you."

"How? How the hell am I supposed to do that? Father said the chip will ruin me, ruin my perception."

"He is not certain, it is just a form of fatherly love that he used in order to shield you from a danger he is not sure of. You don't have that choice to quit to begin with, and you would still have to walk the line in order to save your loved ones. Your fate is already sealed, I can see it in front of me, but the fate of those you love is not certain. I have thought of a series of trials that you'd have to go through, something you can do to help cleaning this city."

"What am I supposed to do?"

"No, I need you. I have plans for the human race long after our weathering bodies die, and you are going to help me do so."

"Couldn't you do it yourself? I reckon since that you established direct connection with my chip, you are capable of infiltrating every data base that is in your proximity. If I had to bet, the nuclear arsenal is at the grip of your hand. Why bother wasting your time on me? Why go as far as to threaten me with those I love?" Roger said, arms folded with a rising eyebrow.

Owinson smiled, rubbing the hair around his jaw. He gingered a couple of times, yet he maintained his stillness.

"I am tired and I fear I do not have much time with you now, your first role is to infiltrate the Pacific Crime Family."

"What? This wasn't my idea of a trial! I'm not a criminal!"

"You won't be, you just have a specific file for me. You see, we had certain debts and I kindly paid them. However, they got greedy, and thus we are not in an agreement unfortunately. They are in the possession of something, of a certain past mistake. They keep threatening me with it if I don't resume their funding, thus you need to get rid of this file. After that, there will be more for you in store, but let us see if you are as capable as your father wished you can be."

"Mr. Owinson, I can't do this, I have a life, I have—"

"This is your life. Remember what is at stake, Roger. The first thread for your mission is your friend Jeremy's father, he is a pillar in the Pacific crime family. Farewell, Roger, I will see you next time," Owinson said as he dusted into his world of digitals. A second later a shock struck Roger as he jumped and fell on his back, realizing that he was on top of a building and he was one step away from the edge.

"How the hell did I— Oh dear God, he manipulated me," Roger said, crawling a bit towards the edge as he saw the clouds traveling and crossing the buildings, atop one of which he was standing. His heart galloped in fear of the way down, he lied down and spread his arms watching the red sky.

"Oh my God, he manipulated me. How much time passed since I talked to him? I don't understand, I didn't even walk that far inside the simulation. The prick must have controlled my nerves and my limbs, but how the hell did he control my sense of time?" Roger muttered while panting, pressing on his palms and feet to stand up.

"I see now why father, or Bob, wanted to me stand up to him," he said; his chest ached as a result of the constant breathing. He walked to the door that led him inside the building, looking back at the city after the cloud had fully passed. It was sunset. There was no turning back, he fully understood that. He had to perceive Garlem's inner beauty in order to defeat its creator, in order to spark the city's rebellion against its master.

"Garlem, I'm coming for you," he said before he walked inside.