by GoozX, I'm Not Mister Mxypltk and Nadia
"Your name is Mick. During a recent operation, your plane was shot down over enemy territory. You were taken hostage, tortured. Everyone else was killed. We managed to save you. Your injuries were bad, and we did the best we could. You had deep cuts in your throat, internal bleeding. Your voice box was punctured.
"I'm sorry, soldier, but you might never be able to speak another word in your life."
...open the door...
What?
...c'mon, man, open the door...
I-I can't. It's locked.
...don't be stupid, just open the door...
I said I can't open it. Leave me alone.
...c'mon, man, don't be stupid, just open it...
Fine. I'll just look the other way.
And then Mick Harrison opened his eyes. The uneasy feeling he had was explained when he realized he was lying in a bed in a room that wasn't his own. He sat in the bed and started looking around him. He was in a woman's room, that was for sure. Was it possible that he got lucky last night, he thought? Nah, he would remember that.
Then the door opened, and a beautiful woman walked in. He thought he would definitely remember her.
"Mick, you're awake! Thank God. I was starting to get worried," she said. She started yapping and yapping about how she saw him in the circus, and how she read about him and his friends in the paper, and how he was a hero, and how worried she was for him... but he didn't listen. He was just looking at her.
When he overcame the initial shock of her beauty, he started thinking something was deeply wrong here. She spoke as if they had met before, but, again, he would remember her. She was obviously concerned about him too. Why? Who was she? He opened his mouth to ask that question, but instead all he got was an annoying pain in his throat, and he remembered.
She noticed he seemed to be in pain and asked, "Mick? Are you okay?"
He answered by pointing at his mouth.
"What? Y-you can't talk?"
He nodded.
"Oh my God, what happened? I mean, I'm sorry, I... take this," she said as she handed a paper and a pen to him. "Tell me the whole story. I wanna know."
How had he ever forgotten her, he wondered. Then he started writing:
"The last thing I can remember is being at my place in Chicago with my roommate. Next thing you know, I'm in a Mandelovian hospital. Some guy was telling me that I was in a plane that was 'shot down over enemy territory,' taken hostage and tortured. He said that they managed to rescue only me, and they did all they could, but the cuts in my throat were too deep, and I'd never never talk again. He said I was taken to Mandelovia because the terrorists had kept me near the border. Then I was released from the hospital. I just started walking on the streets, still shocked and confused, until I realized how much this whole thing sucked. I went to a bar. I sat there for hours wishing I could get drunk (the doctor told me to drink only water for three months). Then, I guess I did. I don't know, I think I passed out."
"Oh my God," she said, horrified after reading what he wrote. "I-I found you unconscious on the street and took you here. My God, that is horrible. And you say you don't remember any of that happening? Wait, they only rescued you? Your friends died?"
He looked at her with a puzzled look on his face. He took the paper and pen again and wrote:
"What friends? My band?"
"Oh my God, you don't remember that, either. You poor thing."
She guessed that he was probably on a mission with his group of Revolutionaries, and that they were captured by some anti-metahuman group. She hypothesized the shock of being tortured caused him amnesia. She believed he didn't remember meeting her, or what a great hero he was.
"Don't worry, Mick," she said, "I'm gonna take care of you."
The dark-bearded man sat back on his chair, stroking the hair on his chin, listening attentively to the shorter man in front of him.
"Mick Harrison?" he interrupted the short man in mid-sentence.
"Oh, yes. After we 'neutralized' his power source, we dropped him back off where he came from. As an untrained human, he is useless, a waste of our time."
"I agree. The girl?"
"A spy. She was not on any of our records. We suspect that she joined at some point after our trip back. She was never supposed to join. Either way, she can be of much use to us. A pleasant surprise, if you will."
"The subject matter at hand. Daniel Hearn?"
"He has gone through the process. We wiped his short-term memory. He will make an excellent addition to our organization, after all."
The bearded man smiled, enjoying what he was hearing. "It was not nice of Dr. John Feldman to betray us like that. Not nice at all."
Li'l Jo:
I have been wandering for many nights. The trail scent of Tobias and the others is weakening day after day, but I can still feel it.
I must confess that I have crossed the path of many other cats (and kittens), and none of them was sensing the same odors I did. "You are smelling ghosts," they kept telling me. I wonder if it's Tobias' smell or something totally different that I feel.
Anyway, I have gone through many plains, woodlands, mountains, along a big road where many cars and trucks run very fast. Tobias, where are you?
Meow.