Pristine's Problem | ONC 2024

09 | invisibility attained, manipulation retained

The thick lines of his brow jumped in astonishment, eyes alarmingly widening the catatonic stupor.

Can I hide anything from these people?

Each and every letter that had leaped out from Hemant's mouth were solid truth with no objections to deny or conceal his statement. Alan shrank his shock-faced intensity and made a practical approach – to listen to Hemant rather than questioning how he knew all of this.

Hemant's stiff features delicated as he took a deep breath, easily throwing the business-mode that he had employed minutes ago. Seeing the young boy eager to listen what he had to say, Hemant said, "You need to know about someone who played a major role in the crime."

He knows the killer?!

Several notions with muffled answers clashed with one another, barricading Alan's ability to comprehend his interlocutor's simple-yet-hard-to-understand statement.

"You know the killer?" he blurted bitingly.

Why had he been quiet the whole time then?

Hemant disregarded Alan's furious question and continued, "Have you heard about any person from Pandora named Romine?"

***

"My goodness! That is so cheap!" Romine shrieked at the reception desk, providing ample amounts of second-hand-embarrassment to the vexed boy beside her.

Avril wanted to run away from the scene but was unfortunately hindered by other customers who stood behind them. Flinging stones of glares hard enough to knock some senses, Avril awkwardly faced the receptionist who stood with a mixed expression of awe and astonishment.

"She's from another worl– I mean, from a different city," Avril reasoned and turned behind to apologize to the customers for her crude behaviour.

"Please fix this room," Avril urged to hasten the process.

The faster I make it out, the better.

"Sure, sir!" the blonde receptionist chirped, "Please wait in the lobby! The room-cleaning is in process, we will hand over the keys once it's over. Please make your payment at the opposite counter!"

***

"We pay around 40 prens for a single room in Pandora! I can't believe the mundane world is so cheap!" Romine exclaimed as Avril returned from the payment counter.

He sat beside his hire and irritatedly bent his neck, reclining on the soft cushions. His eyes displayed a tinge of drowsiness as his body began showing symptoms of fatigue and cramps. They had spent the whole day touring Ariston, a town comparatively far away from Caperwood, to find a temporary abode for his vexatious agent. As he trailed back the tiresome events of skimming through several blocks of illuminating hotels and motels, something within his body stirred in exasperation.

A loud demonic growl erupted within the walls of his fragile body, causing ripples of shudder through his skin. Avril bolted upright, ceasing his sluggishness. He skittishly glanced at his surroundings in search of the growl's owner.

Am I hungry?

A vague question wandered through his mind, flying unnoticed. He had never seen his body growl that ferociously for hunger. Moreover, it did not seem like a growl solely for hunger. It created a sense of burning rage, zeal and malefic within Avril, wanting him to pounce on everyone he encountered with gaze.

Avril panicked as he realized his body was momentarily not his own; something controlled his thoughts and actions. Something wayward with a potential to possibly kill.

"Romine!" Avril panicked, "Did you hear that? That growl? Like a werewolf?"

"What growl?" Romine answered, mouth filled with loads of ice-cream. That's when Avril noticed that the grown-up woman had mixed two contrasting flavors of ice-cream she had brought into a single container and blended them into an awful shade. Despite the disgust and angst after seeing Romine merrily scooping the no-more-ice-cream mixture into her wide garrulous mouth, Avril remained expectant of some befitting answer.

"No," Romine shook her head vigorously as the cream covered her entire lips which she didn't bother to clean.

Avril's apprehensive gamut swelled in size, engulfing his nervous body and drowning his thoughts. As the growling intensified within his gut, Avril sensed the presence of something moving within his body. Something alive.

Don't listen to that woman, Avril!

Avril jerked in bewilderment; his skin turned into a bubble-wrapping-sheet as goosebumps inundated like the flood. The muffled, guttural voice spoke to him, within him and Avril lost all notes of sanity he had in his purse-like mind.

"It's speaking! It's speaking!" Avril freaked in a shrill tone, alarming the ice-cream munching woman to pause her eating. Romine immediately attended to Avril's agitated call and asked "Who? Who's speaking?"

"I don't know! Something – someone is speaking within me! It says – says – not to listen to you!"

Romine raised her brow cynically and rolled her eyes.

"Seriously, Avril! You could have told me directly, instead of putting –"

"No! I am serious!" Avril snapped, his eyes flickering in ire.

"If you are serious, then ask that voice itself!" Romine challenged, crossing her arms as she bent backwards.

Her unseriousness and nonchalance piqued the wrath meter, but Avril decided to follow her bleak suggestion.

"Who – who are you?" Avril stuttered, his voice feebly directed towards himself.

Me? I am everything you have desired for and  are deprived of, Avril!

 I am the light that was surmised to make you shine, I am the darkness that engulfed your heart when bereaved of solace. 

I am the detested fragment of your soul that has been thrashed and mauled by impudent humans, I am the anticipated magic that your body has stifled. 

I am the concealed blessing, waiting to unleash my powers for your benefit, I am the real companion who will never leave your hand.

 I am none other than your alter ego, Avril.

Listening to the voice with a blend of dread and disbelief, Avril narrated each and every word of the proclaimed alter ego with his rigid face washed in terror. Romine leaned forwards from her relaxed posture, her pupils widening in radius, her mind awestruck in stupefaction.

Once Avril had completed his narration, he turned towards Romine. Droplets of sweat rapidly trickled down his edgy face as his hands clutched her wrists in complete terror. His shaky eyes demanded her to answer the identity of the voice, whether she was aware or not.

"Avril," Romine responded as she conjectured her intuition to be the answer, "I think it's your power speaking. It is the shape-shifter within you, who has come out of its cage. Avril, you are speaking to your alternate self. The one you ought to be."