Lose Myself

Chapter Twenty-Four Part One: Dark Knight

"Emotions run Dominic, he runs on them. Without emotions he's empty, heartless and ruthless - which is just what they want. So he got them erased. Leo on the other hand, without emotion would be completely useless, he wouldn't see reason to live or reason for anything and as a result be dangerously unmotivated. He'd have committed suicide, he can't fight whilst he's dead. And so decisions were made based on those things"

"Once an agent is deemed strong enough, they're emotions are tested to determine their punishment. Dominic's punishment was simple, he'd have no emotions. He wouldn't be able to love anyone, feel anything for anyone and he definitely could not be happy. Oh no, thats bad. He would be emotionless for the rest of his artificially extended life, and there was absolutely nothing he could do about that."

"Leo would suffer. The more emotion he felt, the more ill he would become. Happier, sicker. Sadder, sicker. There's no in between. So really you can't help him, no matter what you try it can't be cured. The ultimate price will be the day Leo feels such emotion that it completely kills him. Sends poison right to his heart."

"How?" I spoke up for the first time, "How can these people control them so easily?"

"Haven't you seen?" she frowned, "Oh. Well they have microchips in their necks, these chips have been programmed to react depending on the chemical balance without their bodies. Chemicals they've injected inside the body will change their formula based on what their feeling and to what extent their feeling it."

"It may seem as if Leo has it worse, but he doesn't. Dominic has it much worse. If Dominic were to feel a shred of emotion, even the tiniest bit... he would die. The chip makes sure. He cost a lot of money - Dominic - 17 billion dollars of our government's money went into making that man what he is. They can't have him going around developing emotions that could lower him to the level of us mere mortals." she laughed sadly, "He can't be mortal. They won't allow it. No emotion. No love. You see?"

"I see. Thats why he can't love me?"

"Yes." she avoided eye contact, "Thats why he can't love you."

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We still sat here, Claire was being awfully kind having been so patient. We'd simply sat and thought, thinking separately but surely about the same thing. Thought at some point I thought about food. 

I had to know some things, just because I wanted to get this out of the way. I didn't want to constantly feel this confused, this... disappointed. I want to deal with these feelings now and never again.

"Can I ask you some things?"

"Of course." she smiled.

"Please," I paused, "Be thorough."

"Yeah," she looked worried, "Go ahead."

"Is all of this fake?"

"No," she smiled sadly, "I believe that Dominic and Leo do these things because they care about us, if they didn't care then they wouldn't do it. Simple. Going to all this effort, for years - just pretending for their own amusement? I call bullsh-t. It would've gotten boring if that was the case."

"Okay." I thought about this, everything seemed real. Sure it was pretend, but it was lying with good intentions. 

"He does have an awful lot of bad habits."

"Like what?" I asked, "I do already know a few."

"Banter." her nose twitched, "Dominic is such a charmer, it makes me sick. He gives compliments, tell jokes and brings up normal conversationalist things that make him seem perfectly fine and perfectly happy. But it makes me so angry when people act like he is, don't get me wrong. People shouldn't treat them different, but those people don't know any better. I like any party like the next girl but I cannot sit by and watch my brother constantly sweep women off their feet and make best friends with men of high calibre. He's being just like the people he so heavily despised. And I bet you a million bucks he still dislikes those types of people, but he doesn't know how else to act around these people and so he does what he saw as a child. Filth. That's what it is."

"Looks to me like its not a bad habit," I chuckled, "A necessity maybe?"

She scoffed, "Maybe."

"Hardly a bad habit."

"Oh yeah," she sang, "What bad habits have you noticed?"

"He's always holding his nose like he's bleeding."

"Oh yeah," she chuckled, "He has blood taken out every month, for some reason his nose always bleeds."

"Oh," I had no idea, "What for?"

Claire momentarily panicked, "Uh, nothing. I don't even know if I'm being honest."

I eyed her.

She let out a yawn, "You know what? I'm tired. Let's turn in."

"Oh, okay."