District 42-Chapter 186: Stalker
After the failure that Casper had at the simulation room, at the Sgail’s Headquarters, he was told to go back home.
That day served for him as a test drive, so his real training would just start the next day. The Sgails also needed to gather some information about him, to know what weaknesses of the soldier needed to be worked on during that week.
It was already night when he returned to his home. Of course, he just noticed it when he got out from the lastest floor of the Castle and went to his own, a residential floor. The artificial lights were very weak, and their shine was the same that the moon projected at night. They couldn’t let the floors entirely immersed in darkness, so an illumination like that was needed, otherwise, the citizens would not even be able to walk at night properly.
He decided to teleport to a region a bit more distant from where he lived since he wanted to walk a bit and clear his mind. After a harsh day, that was the only thing that Casper wanted to do. It was very efficient, actually, because a lot of stress coming from a tough day would vanish just after some minutes of walk. It was like a quirk he had, in a way.
"I wish I could have done better... I mean, before what happened in the Yanke Forces, I surely would be able to pull through that situation, but..." He gritted his teeth, looking down to the road he was taking in direction of one of the residential zones of that floor. "But now I am broken... And it will be hard to fix it. I thought that I was taking my traumas lightly, and even learning how to overcome them, however, I was completely mistaken."
It was frustrating for the White warrior to come back to square zero again, and return to the same everyday struggle he needed to do to organize his mind and just keep going forward without looking to the past. Easy said than done, though.
"That thing was real in a way that I am still flabbergasted. There was nothing like that in my world. The sensations, emotions, the pain, the city in ruins... every detail was so clear and so perfect that I really got into it..." Casper found the potential of that machine to reproduce reality to be an amazing thing, but there was something more that was concerning the soldier, and even got him a bit shaken.
"But... those people... it’s barely noticeable that they weren’t humans. Their expressions were so lively on their faces... I could even swear to be able to feel their pain, to hear their hearts beating, to tell that they indeed had a soul there...
"First said to me that the simulator gets information directly from my brain. Everything I saw was based on my own experiences. That’s how that thing can do a simulation be so real for me. That’s what is more frightening, though... because..."
Suddenly, the soldier felt the will to throw the few things that he could fill his stomach with during the day. He felt strong nausea but never stopped to walk, instead, he quickened the step.
"Because it could really pull through my traumas and bring the worst ones into reality. Particularly... Particularly that woman... The one at that house under attack. For a long while, I thought I never have seen her face before. In truth, I don’t remember to have had look at her face or her characteristics closely since I got into that house and saved her and her lover. But now... now that I am remembering of everything, her face was just like Ana’s."
Think about her name already wss a hard thing to the soldier, and he needed to fight against his mind to not come up with thoughts about the past events before he quit the Yanke Forces.
"If I keep going to that simulator like this... I will be driven crazy for sure. They will kill me. I have no doubt about it. Because... Because, if I keep up like this, if that simulator discovers more about me... He will surely put me into that hellish mission again, and I won’t be able to pull through it another time, not as I did before."
When Casper realized, he wasn’t walking hastily anymore, but jogging at a high pace. He was taking some turns and rounds in roads that he shouldn’t go through, just to increase the distance to his home.
He decided to keep jogging until he was out of breath and covered in sweat, and so he did, but it barely lasted for twenty minutes of exercise.
"My stamina is still messed... How the hell I could lose so much in just a week, huh? Before, I could do 4 times more than I did just now..."
The soldier opted to go back home rather than keep working out there. He would need his body at its maximum for the next day. He was expecting to have a hellish time at the Sgail’s Headquarters, and he had some work to do into the Main Lab as well, so it would be a very busy day for him.
He went to his apartment, still a bit aloof, but without too many worries or stress, just as he predicted he would. Casper didn’t solve anything with all those thoughts, but, at least, he could vent his frustrations with himself.
The White warrior, before entering into the lobby of the building he lived in, stopped suddenly and put his hand at the knife in his waist. He pretended to let something fall to the ground and crouched to take it, while giving a glance to the sides and looking to the glass door of the entrance, to see what was reflected on it.
"I am sure I felt a sensation just a second ago. Someone is looking at me, I am sure of it." He thought while staring intently at the glass and raising from the ground again, feigning to keep something in his pocket.
He entered the building, always taking care to not show that he noticed something. When he turned to close the glass door behind him, he took advantage to naturally look to the streets and alleys between the buildings outside. He strived to make a relaxed and aloof face as if he wasn’t expecting anything, but his eyes were analyzing each suspicious thing that he spotted happening outside there.
Casper closed the door very slowly. When he was going to finish his inspection and just brush off that matter, he saw a shadow moving into an alley. Once he noticed it, he opened the glass door as fast as he could, but without making any noise, got out of the building and ran through the street towards that alley.
He got to the entrance of that place but stopped there. He wasn’t willing to enter into a dark alley without light or something, and he was just with a knife. The soldier didn’t know who was that person he was sure to see entering that there either, so, in the end, it would be pointless for him to give chase.
Casper just stayed staring at that dark place, with all his body in alert, a chill going down his spine. He was barely in a fight or flight state.
"What I felt here was real. I wasn’t hallucinating... Is it some test of the Sgails, or someone was really stalking me with bad intentions? Would I feel this way if it wasn’t something serious?" He narrowed his eyes, and he was sure that movements were going on inside there.
"If a person is in this alley, then they shall be already getting to the other street. A bit more distant, and I won’t catch up with them..."
The soldier lasted some more seconds there before he just walked off towards the building again.
"Whatever this person is, he knows where I live now, and probably most of my routine... I hope that’s a test because, if it’s not, I am in big trouble here... However, who is that person, and why me?"
He entered the building, went to the elevator, and finally got to his apartment.
Casper made sure to close the door and to make the same with the windows. His apartment was high, but with the devices and equipment of District 42, it wouldn’t be too difficult to climb up there and get him by surprise. He took a quick bath, but with his door opened.
His worries were high, and he couldn’t even remember if he ate or not. The only thing passing in his mind were his mistakes on the first day of training and his possible stalker.
In the end, he felt tired and went to his bed, but just laid there, with the lights of his apartment lit up. Casper couldn’t sleep that night no matter how much he tried.
