Day Four

  Kitchen, Next Morning, Present

  Niche comes downstairs, still half asleep. Mika's eating cereal straight from the box while watching something on her phone.

  "That's disgusting," Niche says.

  "Bowls are all dirty."

  "So wash one."

  "You wash one." She doesn't look up. "Oh, Maruka came by yesterday. You ghosting her or something?"

  "No."

  "She thinks you are."

  "I've been busy."

  "With what?" she asks, glancing at him. "Actually, don't care. Can I borrow twenty bucks?"

  "For what?" Niche asks in suspicion.

  "Stuff."

  "What stuff?"

  "Stuff you wouldn't understand." She's mocking him now. "That's what you sound like."

  “Fine. But I’m not too stacked on money either. This is a one-time thing.” He pulls out his wallet and gives her the money. She pockets it.

  "Thanks. Try not to die or whatever you're doing,” Mika responds monotonously.

  "I'll do my best."

  "Also, Mom's freaking out about the bathroom. Says it looks like someone had a fight in there."

  “Raizen,” Niche mutters under his breath. Looking back to his sister, he says, "Maintenance issue."

  "Sure." She says, heading to the door. Before she leaves, she takes a good look at the bills in her hand. "Where’d u get this money from anyways? If you're dealing drugs, I want a cut."

  "I'm not dealing drugs."

  "Disappointing." She leaves.

  Niche makes breakfast and gets ready for his big day.

  City Center, 3:18 PM, Present

  The interrogator waits at the heart of the city. A vast concrete plaza stretches out, filled with people. In the center, taking the attention of the civilians, lies a raised dais the size of a room. This platform features two chairs that face each other. On one chair sits the interrogator, adjusting his tie. "Let's get this over with,” he mutters under his breath, clearly sweating and uncomfortable in the heat.

  Looking over at the empty chair, the interrogator checks his watch. “Where the hell is this guy?! Doesn’t he know formalities? Being on time is the first mannerism of any professional situation.”

  Just then, Almajara enters the plaza from inside an alleyway.

  Rounding the corner to walk to the interrogator, he appears calm and composed, contrasting his run on the way there. Niche – or Almajara rather – brandishes no visible weapons; he is just a man here to talk.

  When he maneuvers in between the crowd made up of thousands of people, Almajara gets to the chair facing the interrogator and sits down. Media channels take this as a sign, and the cameras roll. Live to the nation.

  "Good morning, citizens,” the interrogator introduces, forcing his frustration away. “I'm here with Almajara, who has been sharing... concerning documents about our infrastructure."

  "Concerning truths," Almajara corrects gently. "The people deserve transparency."

  "These are complex matters that are to be handled with care. There is no inherent oppressor group that explains what you desire. The answer lies more in nuance."

  “I would disagree. I think there is -”

  BANG. A loud shot rings through the air.

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Almajara jerks back, clutching his chest. Blood spreads across his shirt. He falls back in his chair, collapsing on the floor.

  Chaos. Security scrambling. The interrogator stands, genuinely shocked—this wasn't the plan.

  The crowd, realizing what happened, instinctively scatter in all directions. Some run away or hide, foreseeing following gunshots. Other look for the sniper with malice. The empathetic ones are focused on Almajara’s rigid body.

  The news reporters zoom in on Almajara’s body and the interrogator’s reaction, intrigued that some drama is surfacing.

  As the interrogator stands in shock, security swarm Almajara as paramedics rush in.

  After a few minutes, the crowd settles down and Almajara’s mess had been cleaned up. His person had been carried on a stretcher to the ambulance. He now laid inside the ambulance, waiting to be driven to the hospital. Tape was wrapped around the dais area, and the crowd was focused on Almajara.

  Something was delaying it.

  Suddenly, the back doors of the ambulance were being rustled, but from the . The door is kicked until it is broken. Swinging the doors out, Almajara jumps down from the ambulance onto the floor, standing triumphantly while the paramedics stand in shock, unsure whether to intervene or not.

  "Bulletproof vest." Almajara says nonchalantly, pulling out something from under his shirt. He stands, bloodied but unharmed. "Nice try, government."

  Almajara walks to one of the many news cameras pointing at him.

  "You see?” he starts, talking directly to the live viewers. “I come here peacefully, and they try to assassinate me. This is how your government responds to truth."

  Almajara takes this camera and points it to the interrogator, who stands in shock.

  The interrogator backs away. "I had nothing to do with—"

  "Where has the sun's energy gone?" Almajara advances. "The energy you've been siphoning?"

  "We're not—I don't know what—"

  Almajara hands the camera back to the news reporter and walks towards the interrogator.

  Raizen materializes from Almajara’s shirt.

  The crowd instinctively gasps and back away from this concealed weapon.

  Almajara leaps towards the interrogator. It takes merely one clean stroke.

  The interrogator's head falls, his body going limp and also falling on the ground.

  The crowd shouts, some in anger and others in joy.

  Almajara turns to face the camera directly. The news reporter gets nervous but keeps the camera on Almajara in hopes of good footage.

  Almajara starts with an emphatic tone. "Now, for all of you citizens, our government has betrayed us. They have tricked us and lied to us. For that, they are our enemy. They just tried to kill me for speaking out about it."

  Almajara secretly presses a button in his pocket. The camera feed cuts to black.

  Almajara turns to another camera, looking extremely surprised. “Did you all see that?! They tried to censor me! The government took down this one news channel because I was speaking the truth to it! Who knows what they had to have done to get this done?! And so quickly! Maybe they threatened the news channel owner. Or…maybe the news channel is working for the government! All of them are! They look to divide you people, but really, they are all controlled by the same people!”

  The crowd looks at this, horrified. They have no idea what the explanation could be for why the news channel cut off. Could it really be the government? They have no idea.

  But Niche knows.

  Niche continues talking to the other camera. "Citizens, we will fix this country together. On my behalf, I will continue to remove those from power who hurt their own citizens. Continue to support me, and we will transform this nation."

  Sure of the censorship by the government, those who had previously screamed out in anger now either stay silent or joyfully chant Almajara’s name. Those voices who stayed angry even after Niche’s camera trick are drowned out by the rejoiceful chanting of Almajara’s name, many of whom who are chanting it having no clue as to what they are advocating for.

  Niche’s House, Mika’s Room, Present

  Mika walks home from school, staring at her phone. Intrigued at the new headline “Government overthrown in a day, but why?”, Mika enters her house, going up to her room. On the way there, she glances inside her brother’s room at his empty chair.

  Moving on, she puts her stuff down and closes her door.

  Sitting on her bed, she opens a social media app and starts typing a post. "This is crazy, but that Almajara guy shows up?? The way he holds himself is weirdly familiar..."

  She deletes it. Too paranoid. Tries again.

  "Anyone else notice Almajara appeared right when a bunch of people went missing? This feels connected. I feel like the government might have something to do with it. Maybe it’s a clapback for that Almajara thing."

  she thinks.

  She clicks post. Her phone immediately starts buzzing. Retweets. Comments. Other people listing missing family members.

  Maruka texts Mika, "TAKE THAT DOWN NOW."

  "Why?" Mika responds.

  "Just trust me. Delete it."

  “I…can’t. Not now. It’s already at 500 retweets and it’s rlly blowing up,” Mika texts back.

  “Shit.”

  Hospital, Present

  An ambulance, swerving through traffic, gets at the hospital in record time. The interrogator's body is dragged out and rushes into the hospital beyond the typical rooms for normal patients. A doctor dressed in black walks in with a few nurses; all these workers have a symbol printed onto their smocks. The doctor pulls back the sheet on the interrogator’s face and steps back cautiously. The doctor and nurses surround the patient and watch, nervous.

  "Is he gonna do it? When? What will happen?" some nurses ask.

  From the severed neck, tissue begins to bubble and reform. Bone reconstructs. Muscle weaves. Skin stretches.

  Within minutes, a complete head forms.

  The doctors gasp in shock, but the interrogator simply gets up and walks out of the door.

  “Sir!” the doctor calls from the room. “You can’t leave yet!”

  The interrogator ignores him, walking out of the hospital. "This Nishihara will be a problem," he murmurs under his breath.