CHAPTER 10 – 3-4 = -1 (3)

The one who called upon this guy, Shetty, was probably his teacher, and Lost-Bird must have been acquainted with this teacher, seeing as to how he was right besides him.

The-guy, and his probable teacher, converse in a different language.

I turn away, and just slip out. Not too far, I find a vacated bench, and sit there.

The results load in no while. Here there are just 18 entries. Moreover, the first face I see, is of Lost-Bird. Or, Harsh Aaditya.

He really was a professor. In the aeronautical department.

According to the entries… he had come even on Sunday. So that does it. Even when Sunday was suspicious, it was true overall.

I just sit there for too long, staring at the screen.

Finally, I get up from my coma, and walk to the biometrics scanner, and remove the pen-drive.

Outside, I meet the-guy again.

"Oh, the ditch," the-guy says. "It's rude to ditch a person you know."

"I did not ditch you."

"Yes you did. You literally left me there."

"I had to… I ditched you. BUT, I don't want to get on the bad list you know. I'm just in my first year now."

The-guy laughs. "Mm, but you still ditched me."

I scoff, "don't be a baby."

"Hey, I just think it's fair that you… ah! Repent for it."

"That's a big word," I say.

"I just merely want to get coffee…"

"I'm more of a chai person."

And so we go beyond the building of Sanjana and Aarshitha, and to the canteen. And sit there, with our chai and coffee.

"Ah, you are pretty," the-guy says, as I remove my mask.

"Don't look bad yourself," I tease.

Then, sudden silence starts.

"So, you are one of the people who hear about that Quetzalcoatl shit," I say, to break the silence.

"I guess no one missed that… shit."

"Ah, well, how did you take it?"

The-guy laughs, understanding what I was doing, probably. "I guess something has to happen. Many probably were wishing for world to become a Sci-Fi movie."

"Guess they regret it now."

"Guess they do. But here is the thing; the world still was so… messy. Racism, sexism, capitalism, all of those '-ism's. Now this is just… a direct version of an attack. You can witness these kind of physical attacks, not those mental kind, those are easily masked, like us."

"That is some nice intellect," I say, impressed.

"Well… let's just say that it is a collective one, with one of my friend. Can't take the full credit," the-guy laughs.

"Mm. But wouldn't it be hard for a normal person, at times like this?"

"Probably. Guess this weird masked people want-"

His phone rings, and he signs me a sorry face, and asks for a moment to attend it.

"Hello? Yeah... no, in the canteen. Uhuh, see you then," the-guy cuts the call. "Sorry, just… girlfriend."

"Oh," I say.

"Mm, nothing?" the-guy asks.

"Well, you wouldn't still be flirting with me, if you had a girlfriend," I point.

"You got a good intellect too," the-guy laughs.

We just drink our drinks silently, letting wind be heard for a while.

"By the way, what's your name?" the-guy asks.

"Asking too soon," I scoff. "You just flirting, without knowing my name?"

"To flirt… the two people just need to be single, that's all. Besides, I'm asking now," the-guy points.

"Well, still, introduction is usually at the start of a conversation," I say. "With all the talking about many things, we already crossed that point."

"Still don't know names…"

"Well… maybe at the start of another conversation."

"So, there will be another?"

"Don't get your hopes high."

"When?" the-guy asks, regardless.

"Whenever we have a next conversation. Whenever that could be."

"Tomorrow then."

"Don't get your hopes high."

"Meet you at your building."

I give a dumbfound expression.

"How old are you?" I ask.

"Ah, and this is allowed?" the-guy asks.

"Well, these are an in-between conversation thing."

And his turn comes, of giving a dumbfounded expression.

"I'm twenty-eight," the-guy says. "You?"

"Thirty-one," I say.

"Wow, three years?" the-guy asks. "Not bad, not bad."

We just sit there, in silence, talking random stuff about the course and all. I give him a fake reason of why I took up the course.

At 11:30 A.M., the-guy gets a call.

"Wow, it's been a while," the-guy says. "Hello? A what?"

The-guy gets up and rushes, and I follow him.

"What's the matter?" I ask.

"Ah… those… those people," the-guy signs a mask with his hand. "They have opened up a 'test', in the college."

I hurry with him, and we see many people gathering, but staying weary from the aeronautics building.

"You should at least be able to pass this!" someone yells, and gun shot is heard, followed by some more. "Pathetic humans!"

The voice seems to be amplified, probably by a mic or something. Or maybe…?

"Is there a way to go up, without from the inside?" I ask.

"Huh?"

"There is this thing I wanted to do, you with me or not?"

The-guy leads me off, to a climbable side of the building.

"You asked-" the-guy says, probably thinking I'll complain, but I climb. "H-hey!"

The-guy follows me too, and we get to the highest floor, a vacant floor. He helps me open the window, and we step in, silently.

There was a windowed semicircle at the roof. I scan everything, and weigh my options.

"We are doing so many things for a first date, huh?" the-guy asks.

"For a first date, you have to make it official first. Don't be so rude," I laugh.

"What will you: throw a brick on him?"

I place my bag on the floor and realise… shit, I had bought a gauntlet of each type.

Causer was a kind of gauntlet, which let me use the UoL, or the Urge of Lightning, used to paralyze people… well, beings.

The thing was, UoL… had a… cool down time of sorts.

Absorbers, on the other hand, absorb UoL, or other energy sources, they are basically defence and a sort of insulators, to help defend such an attack.

I needed only one UoL… on the guy. But… I could just ask this guy to look away, while I do that.

"Could you look away?" I ask.

"Um…?"

I just take out the two gauntlets and place it beyond the bag, outside.

The estimate of time I could make, according to last time, is about… 30-40 seconds, on a mutated bird. I could only hope that on normal humans, it'd be better.

That is, hopefully, this was a normal human.

I wear the bag, seeing that the-guy had turned away, but is looking all around, as if looking out for something.

Damn, he was adorable. But he was a human.

I wear both gauntlets, on their respective fit hand; causer on the left, and absorber on the right hand.

I point the causer towards the-guy, taking a deep breath. An urge rises up my arm, I concentrate it… hopefully the energy doesn't drain, it was four floors afterall.

I release the UoL at the-guy, and right as I do, I move the other hand to the released lightning. The-guy stays there, and I just turn behind, I grip on the floor fence with my left hand, and pushing my hand as low as possible, I aim at the guy holding a gun.

Glittery golden mask. Only a human, right?

I release the trapped energy, in the absorber, basically throw it, and as it shoots across the floors, I jump. Looking down, I reach my hand to the windowed roof, with bars on the side, and watch the energy fade.

Shit I knew it.

Good that I knew it.

I hear a slash sound, not too after that, then a thud, then a bang, and screams.

Did I miss?

I see everyone running towards where the guy was, that was answer enough. And before either could spot me, I break the glass and move outside.

I peek inside, and the-guy stares right at me, and without trying to give him a reaction, I just scoot away. A random knife killing a person, moreover glass breaking above head, surely must have brought attention.

Without worrying whether the-guy would be suspected, I jump towards the garage kind of place. Looking both outside and at the floor besides the shed, I choose the floor, where there is no one.

I basically run towards the closest gate, away from the aeronautical building, after bagging my gauntlets.

I wasn't the only one to do such a run, so it was fine. I must just have seemed like a coward to everyone.

I take an auto, then a bus, then take a walk, and reach the apartments.

Rusk vouches me as a guest, and makes the watchman let me into the building. And I reach into the room.

"You are here early," Wrap says.

I sit at the couch, Psyand's mother gets me some water, and by that time, I sanitize my hands.

"You seem beat up," Rusk says, as I chug the water. "Bad news?"

Psyand's mother asks for Psyand to go to another room for sometime.

"Well…" I say. "Lost-Bird… no, Harsh Aaditya… may have died."

"What?"

And I tell them the full story.

Rusk looks up the news on it. And we find that ten people died at the incident, no one merely injured, except for the terrorist, the golden-mask himself.

We wait for Lost-Bird to come, anxiously, without a clue whether he was okay. All the few blurred-out-face bodies shown in the news articles we scrolled through, didn't have the exact body structure of Lost-Bird. His body was on the bulkier-side, like Wrap.

Every minute feeling like an eternity, Rusk finally gets a call that there is a visitor at the gate, a guest, and we take a sigh of relief.

"Could you be teaching Psyand in the room?" I ask, to Psyand's mother.

"Okay, all I care about is, that he is fine," Psyand's mother says.

Rusk returns with Lost-Bird, in a while. Lost-Bird wears a beat-up expression the whole time, and goes and freshens up.

But Lost-Bird doesn't say a word, not after he returns, not at dinner, not at the stroll, with the stroll again being a silent one.

I kind of understand and feel bad for him. More on: him not saying a word about it. But I make sure not to ask or doubt him, from here on. He too, was only a human.