Cross My Mind

THE ASSASSIN APPROACHES

Garba slowly regains consciousness to find himself in the room on the opposite side of the one he initially was, his skin color is back to black and his body weight feels just right. A few minutes earlier he and Mila have initiated a cross back to their original bodies, making them faint and lose consciousness.

Having woken up back in his own body, he stood up to enter the bathroom and wash up when he saw a piece of paper fall from his body, he picked it up and realised it must be Mila that has written it so he opened it without hesitation.

“I want to use this chance to say thank you for saving my life back in the chess court, I was out of my wits and was making random decisions that would have gotten us all killed. You truly saved me. If we ever get out of here alive, I’ll make sure you and your sister don’t ever suffer discrimination for your eye color, I’ll help you move to the US if you want”.

Garba smiled at the paper and folded it carefully and putting it in the breast pocket on his shirt. He proceeded to the toilet to wash up.

In the room opposite his own, Mila woke up a few minutes ago back in her own body. With a sense of relief, she stood up and went to the bathroom, where she washed up and dressed again in the clothes she was given, a nicely done jeans trouser, folded with precision and a turtle neck top to go with nice t-shirt. A few minutes later, both were invited out to a conventional dinner to celebrate their victory.

At the table, Mila and Garba were Joined by Akihiro and Nora who sat opposite them on the dining table. The four sat in awkward silence waiting for their Dinner to be served. On each sides of the white tiled and exquisitely decorated room, two armed guards stood to ensure the safety of Akihiro and his assistant against any attempts that Mila and Garba may decide to make to try harming them.

After an hour of waiting, five properly dressed servants walked into the room and presented over seven different cuisines, deserts and dishes spread over the wide rotatable dining table.

“What do you people want with us now? After what you forced us to do it is hard to believe anything else you say afterwards, this fancy dinner must be a means to another one of your wicked experiments I am sure” Mila blurted out of nowhere.

Akihiro stopped his spoon halfway on its way to his mouth and started laughing like a mad man, choking on a piece of pie that was already in his mouth and started coughing badly. After he has managed to cough out the piece of pie, he smiled at Mila and went on.

“We are here simply to give you a chance to ask any questions you may have as a sign of respect before we let you back into your lives” .

“In that case why did you lie to us, why did you use the Neuraface to mess around with our perception of reality and have us kill ourselves in a silly little game. Have you people no human hearts?” Piped out Mila in a raging voice.

“It was simply an experiment to determine who among you will figure it out first and as well a means of removing fear from you minds to let you go all out without limitation due to fear of death or injury. This is all I am allowed to tell you” Nora quickly said.

At this point, Garba and Mila have finished two plates of the food each because they have not had a decent meal in over a month, all of a sudden, it dawned on Garba that most of all of the times they have sedated and tranquilized throughout the experiment was through the food they were given.

“It seems like you have realized it now, but I am afraid your perception is a little….. too slow I would say, too late” Akihiro said.

Garba turned to his side where Mila was seated eating, he saw her already slumping on the dining table passing out.

He turned around to look at Akihiro and Nora, they were still eating their food and discussing something, he could not hear what they are saying and slowly, his consciousness seeps out of him and once again, everything fades into looming darkness”.

**********(Somewhere in California)***********

Agent stone has arrived at the edge of the mountainous forest terrain where he set his camp with his riffle hanging around his shoulder. He proceeded to camp tent and uncoupled it into a folded small square, he pulled out his backpack and stuff the foldable tent inside, proceeding towards a nearby clearing in the forest where a Carbon black 1971 Model third generation Dodge Charger was parked.

He approached the vehicle and inserted a small key in keyhole of the trunk, twisting the key and lifting the trunk lid open. Inside the trunk, over twelve different types of firearms can be seen, ranging from simple pistols, to muffled submachine guns, assault rifles, shotguns and sniper riffles. To the right side of the guns are Different military service standard daggers of different sizes and shapes, stun guns and boxes of ammunitions.

To the right side of the assorted firearms, Agent Stone pulled out a box with a metallic surface and a charging cable connected through a little port at the innermost side of the trunk just above a couple of well folded dresses.

He closed the trunk of the vehicle and placed the metal box on top of it and opened it with a combination of security codes he typed in the unlock panel displaying a simple screen and numbered keys. He swing open the box revealing a military grade custom computer. After a couple of biometric authentications, Agent stone unlocked the computer and on the first screen after unlocking, shows a Picture of Dr. Reece Mallory and her complete identity details, last seen location on a live map and requested cause of deaths showing accident by fire highlighted in green. The agent removed a phone from his pocket and dialed in a code combination displayed on the lower bottom of the screen of the computer. After a few seconds, his phone beeped twice and he quickly said

“Agent Stone, code Triple zero six, mission accepted” and immediately the computer displayed a long written details of about seven pages giving specific details regarding the mission and immediately he finished reading it, he pressed a few buttons and his phone beeped, showing the map indicating Dr. Reece's last seen location live.

He closed the computer box and opened up the trunk again, placing the metal box on the side and removing his camouflage clothes and folded them nicely, picking a black nylon bag and stuffed them inside. He pulled a fresh pair of clothes from the inner surface of the trunk and removed them from the nylon bag they are inside. Putting back the camouflage he just removed and putting the metal box back on top of the pile of clothes.

Having dressed, a black jeans trouser, black leather boots and a dark brown leather jacket. He pulled out a couple of suppressed pistols and loaded bullets in, strapping them in his waist, his upper arm under the jacket and strapped to his feet.

Having finished his preparation, Agent Stone looked at the map on his phone once more before pulling the door of his charger open, stepped inside and with a burnout covering the road with smoke, he drove off heading towards California Institute of Technology.

Back in CALTECH, Reece and Ababio have been secretly moving some computers to the secret board room in her Department building, after realising that Jefferson Lockwood and Senator Baker John may send hired assassins or the secret services to kidnap her or even worse, assassinate her and cover it up as an accident.

The two computer geniuses set up a decoy signal set to point anyone trying to track them to the computer laboratory on the highest floor in the building, while they would secretly be on the second floor in a board meeting room that only a few high ranking professors and researchers know exist.

After Moving a few computers to the secret board room, Ababio set up a sensor at all the entrances to Reece’s Laboratory on the top floor of the building so that when someone enters the lab through any of the entrances, they would quickly check the camera feeds of the laboratory to identify their pursuers and take effective action to escape.

On the campus outskirts, Agent Stone has driven his Charger through the entrance for security verifi,cation and he pulls off an identity card, immediately the security guard sees the identity card, he beeped him through the gate. Agent Stone removed his phone and once more looked at the map, this time around zooming inward to see the specific location a CCTV surveillance camera has picked Dr. Reece the previous night leaving the school grocery store and going back into the Department building.