Usually, after each mission, the Sergeant would sit everyone down with a nice pie from Little Macho’s. They’d quickly go over what went wrong, how they could fix it, and what to do for the future. It’d be more for the paperwork than for the fun.
This time, they had to genuinely sit with what the hell happened. There were too many questions.
“Cheng, what the hell happened while you were gone?” the Sergeant demanded.
Andrew clasped his hands together. Either from the stress, the exhaustion, or from the sheer pressure, he couldn’t coherently respond. “I don’t know…” he muttered. “I guess she just chased me around. Wasn’t trying to hurt me; I think she mistook me for someone else.”
“Mistook you?” Gutierrez chuckled. “How the hell do you even know her?”
That was a good question. How the hell did Andrew know her? His mind racked itself over and over as it tried its best to whirl around whatever truth that hid underneath this fucked up incident.
What was Andrew supposed to say?
From what he heard from Hannah, he had all the horrid symptoms of someone possessed by a demon. Bad dreams, a hidden voice, memories that weren’t his—it all just got worse the more he thought about it. That feeling he had in the mental institute wasn’t just nostalgia; it was experience.
“Don’t push him like that,” Singh sighed. She was already spitting her nicotine dross into a plastic bottle as she leaned back in her chair. “Sure, it’s a weird situation, but he’s still a member of our team.”
Everyone paused. Smith tried saying something. “But he froze when that demon stabbed him. I mean, we all saw him get stabbed, right?”
“Motherfucker, we all froze,” Singh calmly laughed. She tossed her dirty bottle into the trash—made it in. “None of us had ever seen someone transform into a demon. Sure, there was that time a demon tried disguising itself, but it had three extra fingers, super pale skin, and eyes that wouldn’t blink. This girl looked like a through-and-through human being.”
Nobody had anything to say. Even as the Sergeant replayed footage from the APE cams, they saw nothing that could’ve ever implicated her. Normal enough skin, decent frame, obviously five fingers per hand—there wasn’t so much as a hint.
Gutierrez shrugged. “Shit, well the kid ended up being a demon. It wasn’t Cheng’s fault for being charged away by the thing, but I’ll still say that it was weird that it hardly scratched you. I mean, the pincer only got your armor, right?”
Andrew found all eyes on him again. If he said the truth, and how he initially thought he was going to bleed out, he’d just confuse everyone—including himself. “Yeah. It just got my armor,” he lied.
Fortunately for him, the APE footage didn’t seem to catch any glimpse of injury. It probably helped that APEs are designed to trap as much blood as possible. Other than a strange look from the Sergeant, Andrew didn’t get any real resistance.
“What’s really getting me is the zones,” Smith said. “In all our years in the CDRs, we’ve never had to deal with anything at the mental institute. Call me crazy, but I feel like they didn’t want someone calling us.”
“What do you mean?” Kang asked.
“Well, from my guess, someone big didn’t want us there. But someone must’ve made a report; someone who knows what really went on in there.”
Andrew especially resonated with that theory. From all his hidden memories, all his conversations with Emily, and even his information from Hannah, there were far too many coincidences. Whether he liked it or not, CDR-4 was just a tiny speck in a giant board game.
That was when the Sergeant made an executive decision. As the camera footage went through the scenes of them moving through the zones, their dialogue, and their witness of empty zones, she pulled the flashdrive. “We can’t talk about this to anyone,” she coldly said.
Everyone looked at her. Some of them were in agreement. Some weren’t. “Sergeant,” Kang muttered, “are you serious? We learned there are demons that can perfectly disguise themselves as well-functioning humans, yet you want us to stay quiet?”
“Yes. I do.” Her face didn’t change a bit as she said what she said. “I know it’s against everything you and I believe in, but telling people won’t help anyone. We’re fortunate that this room is soundproofed, because there are likely people in our own chain-of-command that have a hand in this. If we tell anyone, and I mean anyone, we’ll be dead and the information dies with us.”
That seemed to settle it. Even though Kang clearly cringed at the idea of hiding the truth, he knew that everything she said was true. The only alternative was to tell the media, or post about it, but it’d probably lead to the same result: an accidental death off an 18-story building. After a week, nobody would care.
“Any objections?” the Sergeant asked. “I don’t want to miss out on other options, even though I think there are none.”
Nothing. Gutierrez shrugged as he cracked his neck. “I mean, you hit the nail on the head, sar’nt. We just gotta wait for our chance and, hopefully, keep our heads until then.”
“No telling the other teams?” Andrew asked.
The Sergeant shook her head. “Even though they might believe us, given the crazy shit we’ve all seen, we could get our necks on the chopping block if someone tells the wrong person. We have to stay quiet.”
The meeting didn’t last long after that. There wasn’t much to fix, given that there weren’t any real casualties. The only thing to do now was clean guns, equipment, and APEs.
Andrew made sure to scrub off all the blood inside his suit. Sparkling clean, so nobody would know the truth. Maybe, so he wouldn’t know the truth either.
***
There wasn’t much action after that. Emergencies were here and there, but CDR-4 wasn’t called up for those. In that time, the rest of the squad made sure to have some good R&R. Perhaps that was all they could do, given the circumstances.
But Andrew couldn’t join in, not when he couldn’t even trust his own mind. He wondered when things would crack; when the voice wouldn’t be limited to an idea, but an actual echo in his mind. The only solace was his distance from the team. He didn't want to hurt them.
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Smith: Guys, I think I’m finally over her.
Gutierrez: Good job! We should celebrate by drinking again!
Kang: A wiseman resonates in victory. A fool resonates in alcohol.
Singh: You’re just saying that, ‘cause you’re a lightweight.
There was a pause in the group chat.
Kang: I shall prove that this is not the case.
Gutierrez: Looks like everyone’s game. Yo Cheng, you wanna go out with us again?
At that point, Andrew put his phone back down. He couldn’t join in, not when he couldn’t even trust his own mind. He wondered when things would crack; when the voice wouldn’t be limited to an idea, but an actual echo in his mind. The only solace was his distance from the team. He didn't want to hurt them.
Instead, he just sat on his bed and stared into his notebook. He tried writing anything he could; anything that could give him insight to his potential possession. If none of this world made sense, he had to force sense into it.
Dreams: Began somewhere in March, 2035. Setting was the New Changan Mental Institute from the perspective of a Doctor Richard Myers. Initially believed the dreams to be symptoms of stress, but realized to be more vivid.
Andrew paused, then chuckled. He was hinging the majority of his possession on dreams. How stupid, he felt.
Voice: Typically followed dreams. Did not occur much in waking life, other than fleeting glimpses. Sometimes wondered if it was an internal thought, or an actual voice. Possibly negligible.
He wondered if there were any potential symptoms—anything he could work with. Thinking back to his time in the CDRs, he wondered what he could be missing. The idea ended up coming back like a flood.
Regeneration.
He stood in front of the mirror and lifted his shirt. Among the scratches, the bruises, and the normal scabs of CDR life was a massive scar that looked almost like a flower: a center surrounded by rings upon rings of reverberating tissue. He had been stabbed. And he had miraculously recovered.
He didn’t want to write that down. It was, by far, the most profound piece of evidence that he was losing it.
They’ll ostracize you like a leper.
Andrew looked back into the mirror. He could see a formless figure standing behind him. It was as if acknowledging this being would be enough for it to vanish. As such, he just stared at his own face.
Accept what you are. Accept the power of the demons, and you’ll have everything you could ever dream of.
It was the voice. It was the real voice of something that was wriggling inside his brain, like the finger of a demon. Andrew closed his eyes, but could still feel the influence of a being not of this world.
“I am Officer Andrew Cheng of Counter Demon Response Team Four,” he muttered to himself. “I was born August 8th, 2016. I joined the Counter Demon Response Teams in search of a fulfillment that ordinary jobs could not provide. I swore to live for others, to fight for others, and to die for others. This is my creed. This is my duty.”
Andrew couldn’t believe he was really reciting some mantra from boot camp. He expected it to fall through but, when he opened his eyes, the figure was gone. A deep breath was in order, as he sat his ass to the ground.
He checked the time: it was somewhere around 17 to 1800. All of his teammates were probably scouting out some club, while he was suffering in his bathroom. Part of Andrew wanted to give them a call. Another part didn’t.
Fate seemed to decide for him. He received a call and accidentally accepted it before he could even read the contact. “Hello?”
There seemed to be a rustle on the other end. After a couple seconds, a familiar voice replied, “Hey, Cheng. I know you’re off-duty right now, but I think I need your help.”
“Sergeant?” Andrew called out.
“Yeah,” she replied on the other end. “Say, Cheng, did you have any pets in the ‘states? You know, before your CDR life?”
“Uh… I had a dog.”
The Sergeant gave an exasperated sigh. “Well, I guess that’ll have to do. Please swing by as soon as possible. I’ll owe you a dozen favors. Bye.”
“Wait–”
The Sergeant ended the call before Andrew could even protest. Now he was looking at the blank screen which reflected his own exhausted face back at him. “God damn it…” he muttered to himself. Andrew saddled on his jacket and left his apartment.
***
Sergeant Jessica Yang didn’t live too far from the station. In fact, from her apartment window, Andrew could see it like a looming ghost. But, strangely enough, that wasn’t the key detail he noticed.
“You got a cat?”
It was a black feline with fur as smooth as charcoal. It was surprisingly social, as it rubbed itself against Andrew’s leg. Well, now that he thought about it, the cat was just trying to get the excess hair off of its back.
“I found a stray cat on the tracks," the Sergeant said. “I was being stupid, but I ended up grabbing it right before a train came through. Could’ve died, but I guess I didn’t think about that.”
The cat then jumped onto the furniture before jumping onto the Sergeant’s shoulder. It rubbed its head against her cheek, despite her slight discomfort. “Yeah. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I’m pretty sure the animal shelter will just euthanize her–”
“Him,” Andrew corrected.
The Sergeant paused. She took a quick look, then looked back at Andrew. “Ah, I see. The balls,” she chuckled. “Well, in any case, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. We’re busy most of the time, and I’m not sure if I can take care of this little thing.”
“I wouldn’t say so,” Andrew replied. He petted the cat as it sat on the Sergeant’s shoulder. “Dogs will get depressed if you leave for school or work, but cats are decently fine about it. One of my friends owned a cat back in high school. He just had to feed it and keep its litterbox clean.”
“Jeez, that sounds like work.”
“Actually, not really,” Andrew added. He pulled out his phone, scrolled around, and showed her some products. “They made some stuff that’ll automatically do that stuff for you. A litter that automatically cleans itself, a feeder that deposits by a schedule, and even some pet cameras to make sure your stuff is still okay.”
The Sergeant took a good look at it. Actually, it was kind of a funny sight to see the usually intimidating Sergeant wearing her casual outfit and staring at the phone. With her gray hoodie and sweatpants, she looked more like a normal woman in her late 20s.
“Think we have time to run over to the store?”
***
Andrew went to the store as the Sergeant kept watch over the cat. It only took him an hour or two, but it was dark by the time he got back. “I got everything,” he said as he went through the front door. “I’ll help you set it up.”
The cat casually napped on the radiator as the two of them assembled the equipment. It was surprisingly easy to do, since the appliances were made for simplicity. Even a kid could do it.
“So, have you thought of a name?” Andrew asked. He poured the catfood inside the container and tested it out. As expected, it gave a handful of food into the bowl.
“Hm.” The Sergeant set up the cat litter. It was essentially made to dump cat poo into a sealed refuse box, so she could easily clean it once in a while. Not her preferred schedule, but such was the life of a CDR member. “I’m not sure. Part of me is still surprised to see this little guy.”
She took a second to think it over. Andrew could see her eyes look over to the walls, where she had hung up some of her old Marine Corps pictures. One of them looked to be her unit, dated at 10NOV29. They were all in their dress blues at some kind of dinner.
“Wanna hear a funny fact, Cheng?”
“What is it?”
The Sergeant smiled. For a second, she seemed less like some kind of team leader and more like a human being. If they weren’t in the CDRs, Andrew would’ve called her by her first name: Jessica.
“I only fell in love once in my life,” she sighed. “He was some guy who should’ve been anywhere but the ‘Corps. Fresh lieutenant who had come from some bougie college. Man, he was the opposite of the stereotypical infantry officer. Not some alpha male, but some awkward nerd who somehow knew what he was doing.”
Andrew wanted to ask for his name, but he had the feeling she didn’t want to remember. Or, at the very least, she didn’t want to say it aloud. That would be the same as saying a ghost’s name.
“He knew how to talk to people. Fuck, I think he was the first person I told my childhood to. Jesus, it was a mess. I was red-faced drunk at the Marine Corps Ball and sobbing all over this guy’s uniform. He didn’t know how much I liked him, or at least he was professional about it, and just let me keep sobbing.”
After a long moment, she finally mustered the courage to speak again. “Yeah. I think Kylo is a fine name for a cat.”