Chapter 6(a): The Intuition of the Chameleon
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July 25, 2004
There was a sewing machine sounds, was rhythmic from the second floor of Ben & Yanasari's home, in the B-5 Block, Soralla District of West Kartajh. A middle-aged woman looked focused there, her hands merrily next to the sewing machine's straight-pilled bite. Looks like someone's been chasing her. Something like a deadline.
(Chika Yanasari)
For a moment, her hand stopped. She also stopped the sewing machine. She looked out of the window. She heard the ambulance sirens coming from the driveway.
She seemed distracted. The familiar voice with the critical condition made her daydream, seeming that something was pulling her back into one of the memories of the past, when the Hidden Service was hurt.
The greenish-white rose petals fly swiftly, like the wind that has a letter that must be delivered to the recipient immediately. Through the darkening twilight sky, it leads to a place quite far from the heart of Northern Kartajh, to a village with a quiet population. The darkness of the night added to the cozy silence there.
The flying petals halted slowly in front of a medium home, with a wide yard in front of it. There appears to be Doma Nuel and all those she brings, dead or alive.
No one saw their-out of customs-landing, all the doors of the houses that were also seldom seen open were closed, only the lights of the houses that were visible from the windows that were covered with curtains. Nor a single yard dog would bark at strangers like them.
Nuel, who had been looking so seriously, she's not crying anymore, 'Learning to subdue her weepy'. She quickly went to the door with a strongly installed board on the front roof, saying: 'Darmo Animal Hospital.'
She knocked on the door, hoping that someone from inside the house would quickly come out to her.
Doors open.
"Nuel!" greeted someone pleasantly. The terrace lamp showed a mother's silhouette from afar. "It's been a long time since we've seen, Nuel," she said, hugging the girl in front of her. "Going to play with Mira?"
"Not this time, Auntie. I need her for an emergency. My friends were badly injured," explained Nuel, showing the Hidden Service Guardians were lying on the lawn, there were some who could sit. It's obvious their wounds are seen even from a distance.
"Who is coming, ratna?" asked a man from inside the house. Curiously, but his eyes still fixed on the TV in front of him.
"Oh, my God. What happened, Nuel?" Said Aunt Ratna.
"The explanation is long, Aunt," replied Nuel, she gulps, her dry mouth tries to restrain her from speaking freely. "They need immediate treatment," she added.
"All right, let's bring them in," said Aunt Ratna. "Quick call Mira in her room..!" she added to the man in the living room, her husband named Darmo.
Her husband wondered, "Who is coming?"
"Come on, get your daughter..," replied Aunt Ratna without tolerance. Mr. Darmo immediately went to his daughter's room, leaving behind the beat-up TV he'd just seen. The excitement of watching the evening news is slightly disturbing.
Nuel, Stephen Colbo, Roy and Aunt Ratna immediately brought the people inside. The wounded Mr. kaimanh came to help. It is more important for the emergency than for the conventional easy handling. His big pregnant wife--who no doubt was shocked at recent events--was led into the house by his son, Wigi. They're in turns.
"What's the matter, Dad..?" asked the daughter, a close friend of Nuel in college, Mira Miranda, as she took the stairs, heading downstairs. His father just stood by, walked in front of Mira, saying, "I want to ask you the same question."
The two of them found the lower floor already full of seriously injured people. Unfamiliar faces. Wait, 'Isn't this an animal hospital? What brings them here?' I think Mira and her father were thinking about. Mira then found her friend there, Nuel, holding an injured man in her arms, sprawled him onto the sofa. She hurried over to her.
"Nuel?" she yelled as she embraced Nuel, she saw the restlessness on her friend's face, and there was a look of gloom, sadness. It's an absolute emergency. She suspended questions that popped into her mind, 'For later'.
"Please, help us..," demanded Nuel.
"Whatever it is, Nuel, but this is so much, the three of us can't afford it," explained Mira, giving a logical reason. "And you know as well as I do my Mother and my Father are just veterinary doctors," she added, looking at her parents who also felt the dilemma, what they wanted to help, if they put aside the history of education.
Look up there, 23 men, 12 women, all injured. Five of them have serious injuries. Plus no needed medical equipment.
"Why don't we call the hospital to send medical assistance down here immediately?" asked Mira.
Nuel shook her head, saying with a serious look, "Not for that. We have every reason not to appear in public."
Mira and her family seemed to wonder
"Look, Mira..! I haven't introduced myself to you properly. I can do magic techniques. I can take you to a pharmacy or a hospital or anywhere you want in a matter of seconds. Just tell me what you need, I'll take you to find it," Nuel said, looking at her friend in the eye with all seriousness.
Normally what Nuel is talking about is impossible, what? In a second? Anywhere? Isn't that quite the whole thing? But if it's looked at again, the arrival of Nuel with dozens of wounded men is also an abnormal thing, instead of coming to the hospital coming to a small house away from the city, and there's no sound of the vehicle they think they used to get here, there's nothing in the yard.
Is there any way to avoid any of this abnormality? Other than dealing with it, or going down the drain?
"All right, we gotta handle this," Mira responded.
Mira nimbly analyze the circumstances of all the patients--of course, all who get hurt for her are patients--are there. Her hands quickly wrote down all the necessary medical drug and medicinal equipment, which was not on the manifest in her parents' cabinet.
"I did," Mira said after a minute or two of viewing the situation and the condition.
"Hold my hand firmly!" said Nuel as she grabbed Mira's hand. Immediately they both vanished and shifted into flight roses, blowing fiercely out of the house. Leaving motionless Father and Mother of Mira's standing there, seeming to wonder, 'Where are they? How can they just disappear?'
Mira was also shocked, the first experience with a magical technique was the 'White Rose' that would normally make people sick the first time they did it, especially if she was not used to do a magical technique yet that was still strange and seemed impossible to her.
She and Nuel quickly looked for what was needed and then returned. There were several medical equipment they pulled secretly from the needs room at the hospital where Mira was engaging in field practice, where she was a resident in. "Please let us use it for a few minutes..!" Mira blurted out whenever she took something from the hospital's room.
Due to the medical equipment at Darmo's Animal Hospital, such as the operating table and the mattress for patients, there are only a few, as well as substandard quality, and finally many patients are laid on the floor, put on regular blankets. They were stretched out on the sofa, also in the rooms. Mr. Darmo and his wife twisted their brains to do their best: 'First aid.' 'When you're in a blind alley, think of all the possibilities. There could be an exit from the unexpected direction. There could be thin walls to break. A dead end doesn't mean the end of the trip. The dead end ahead could be the blind result of the blind eye, the biased result of the heart giving up.' 'No sign of an opening. Even the leaves.'
Mr Darmo and Mrs. Ratna had first aid, and a makeshift treatment until Nuel and Mira came. Moments later Nuel and Mira arrived with their luggage, and Susan was carrying groceries in her hands. She's nauseated, staggering, trying to reach out for something to grab onto. The curly-haired girl had been the result of a recent spout of the road.
"Nuel, how did I get here? Isn't this Mira's house?" Susan asked before taking a good look at Mira's home. "I was talking to you on the cell phone, and now I'm in..," she added, still panting.
Susan then stood up, looking around the living room. Is this the hospital emergency unit? The room looked so transformed that it looked like an emergency room.
Mira is rushing in, collaboration with her parents. "Help us, Susan..," asked Nuel, she also hastened, loaded in the tools she had just brought. Susan looked inside the living room, there was a sight that forced her to keep quiet, not the time to ask questions now. Time to move. She placed her shopping down and then moved closer to her two friends.
"Nuel, we're still short of people," said Mira, preparing various medical equipment. "Relax, Mira. You'll be how many do you want," responded Nuel with a puzzling greeting, holding Mira's shoulder. But mira can't think for long either, the condition is critical at the moment.
"How many do you want?" asked Nuel again. Still holding her best friend's shoulder.
"At least six experts," replied mira hesitantly.
"Precisely, there are six people here. You can use our bodies, Mira," Nnuel said. The glint of Nuel's palm, then emerged from Mira six clones, exactly like her, translucent.
All in attendance were surprised, let alone mira, to see a copy of herself. Mr Darmo and Mrs Ratna had prepared themselves, since seeing the flower rose petals that had disappeared Nuel and their daughter just now, they were sure there would be other strange things about Nuel and his mysterious group.
"You can enter our bodies, and do whatever you can to treat the wounded people," explained Nuel.
"All right," replied Mira firmly. She had trusted her friend for years, what prevents her from trusting that girl now? Mira's cloning soon penetrated the bodies of her Father, her Mother, Nuel, Susan, Stephen Colbo, and Roy. Immediately installed medical equipment, treated patients. Never doubt the expertise of female clones from Tanjung Pryoch University's student. A lot of people get the broken bones, few impaled on the metal spikes of the Mac, but not right on the vital organs.
But a wound is a wound.
A few hours passed, Mira's clones in different bodies looked exhausted, some artsitting for a while, resting after patients were cared for. Someone was standing in front of the second operating table. There are only two operating tables in there. She's stitching the patient's abdomen. Her hands moved nimbly in the lamplight of the operation. Then a few tears came out, pausing her busy hand with the sewing kit.
"Nuel?" asked clone of Mira in Nuel's body. Not that the body entered by cloning would be temporarily paralyzed, the soul remained conscious. For a moment, there was no answer.
"Nuel, I'm so sorry," admitted Mira, her clone, she remembered someone lying on the sofa, the old man who was on Nuel's marriage party last time, Nuel's Father. It was the first time she met nuel's Father at the ABCD stall, and this was her second meeting, in unfortunate circumstances.
Nuel was still crying and then slowly controlling her emotions: 'It would be unethical to interrupt a friend who is trying to help her.'
Mira continues her work, subtly trying to create a diversion, saying, "fortunately, this patient can be saved."
"All thanks to you, Mira. Thank you..," she said.
Finally, everyone was getting treatment. Mira's cloning returned to the original body. And unfortunately, there are three persons who cannot be saved among the wounded.
"Five Hidden Service martyrs have fought honorably in this incident. We honor, Diana Ross Lynch," said Mr. Kaimanh in front of five bunks with white bodies covered in sheets.
"Deni Putrajaya, Rega Sasana," he added.
All in attendance had tears in their eyes. They're not just friends, they're family, they're a respectable family. Some who can still stand around each other, sharing their sorrows. There, four officers of Mr. Anthony: Marlo, Daffyn, Topan and Usup, wept and choked. Their friend, Deni, had already left them. A young, eight-year-old Wigi hugged his mother, and he must have felt the breathtaking atmosphere of the evening.
"Then, Donna Erika, who fought her enemie to the last breath," said Mr. Kaimanh, as well as he mourned, and he felt the weight of the day. "And our Father, Mr. Dobade.., A friend, who doesn't count in our favor. May they all find the peace."
Mira, and her parents, as well as Susan, who had not yet been briefed on the tragedy, shared in the loss. 'The tears of someone who thinks of us as friends are the tears that come out of our own eyes.'
The night passes more dark, darker and darker. A night that was unforgettable, a night that gave us painful memories if we're trying to know it again.
Almost instantly the tears had soaked through the suture. Her hand immediately rose, holding her eyes together, "Nuel, for how long are you going to be a crying, Girl. Let it go..!" she said.
"They all smile at you. Be a strong woman.."
Her efforts to comfort herself from her sorrow.
Suddenly the walls in the back of Nuel opened, a woman who looked at her age, with curly hair. "Yanasari, how long do you have left?" Her voice shattered the mood of sadness in Nuel's heart.
Nuel quickly wiped away her tears, clearing her throat, answering the woman's question, "I'm so close, Susan."
Yanasari? Why did Susan call Nuel with another name? Since the seven years since the tragedy, nyuel has been determined to bounce back. She has to take good care of the Tanglo. Don't let anyone else get hurt. SHe did not want the sacrifices of those who had made their own sacrifices to be in vain. SHe changed her name to 'Chika Yanasari,' while Stephen Colbo was renamed 'Ben Deriawan.' Not only did they change their faces, but not a plastic surgeon. Mac and his men must not recognize them. The secret of the Tanglo must be buried deep with the old identities of the two couples.
"Susan's fashion show is about to begin. The exhibition hall was full of spectators the whole time," Susan said. She then found red under Nuel's eyes. 'Ah.., this girl..!'
She immediately took Nuel in her arms from behind her, tightly. She said in a feigned tone, "Don't you know Susan Amanda that's been legendary in these years? She's a famous designer in the Noes Antara, and soon to go international. You're not going to mess up that girl's good dreams, are you?"
Nuel smirked, saying, "You're a confident person for someone who takes advantage of someone else's hand, Susan."
"That was also a skill, Girl.."
They laughed.
"Stand up, let Miss Susan finish the job," Susan said. "Go see Gen on the front porch, he seems pretty alone.
"All right, good luck to Susan's 2004 Fashion Show, and don't forget the most important thing.."
She started on her feet, makes her way up to the first floor, to meet the love child, Gen, Johnatan Gen.
"Of course, you won't. I was the punctual boss on time to give a commission," Susan said, immediately doing some finishing.
It's been two years since Susan's name as a national designer was high across the city. It's even been suggested three times that she has a fashion show. Many capitalists would invest in her, plus some recent foreign investors have made contact with her, 'An overseas debut. Go-international on the way.
But there is a little secret to her success. Only she, Nuel--call her now by her new name: Yanasari--and her husband, as well as Mira, and all Hidden Service Guardians knew of it. Most of the work at Susan's Fashion Show was Yanasari's. 'Susan Amanda' is, you might say, the stage name of the friends' collaboration.
The two houses side by side with each other on the property of Ben Deriawan. The foreign youth played a large part in family monetary and the new Hidden Service. Complicated things like changing identities aren't that complicated for him.
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