Chapter 122: The Images

During the rest of the night he passed practically sleepless, walking from one side to the other. His restless mind could not manage to conciliate the sleep as he realized on any other day.

He had not even connected again to the network. It was an absolute loss of time. He would only obtain as result the reading of stupid opinions.

His time was not sufficient for that.

The sheets of paper and the ancient newspapers that he had gathered with so much care in a past, lay scattered everywhere. On their yellowish and whitish surface, now were found random phrases written with a type of special madness.

Practically he had reduced his mental state to an early madness.

Adopting the appearance of a hermit who promised to be about to discover the truth behind the universe.

The neon lights had never disappeared during the night and the dispersed noises never ended. The police sirens and the almost invisible flutter of the drones had been perpetual.

But his attention at no moment had dispersed itself.

In a especially lucid sketch, a creature was outlined with imprecise strokes. Monstrous, only a prototype.

It had long nails and some fangs that stood out.

Below, only one word was written:

Vampire.

"I should go to sleep. The tiredness does not affect me so much after so many sleepless nights, but I still need to rest."

He dragged heavily his body until the bed. He could support even more, but it was an unnecessary sacrifice in which he was not disposed to participate.

He would only manage to exhaust his body chronically.

All the writings scattered through his small apartment were the evidence of his resilience.

He had carefully charged himself with filtering all his useless thoughts and archiving the important data. From his strange conversion to a Sleeping Vampire, his evolution and the successive events that had led him until that point.

He understood that there was a fundamental difference when one was armed with knowledge and when not.

An enormous plane of events began to coexist in his mind. With his brain calculating at the speed of a computer— Ancient and probably damaged.

***

His entrance to the plane of the dreams was common. There existed no class of revelation or strange interferences.

But it did not last much time.

A sudden alert awoke him.

His temple pulsed from the tiredness.

Even so, rapidly he dressed. Stumbling finally he was ready. The alert came from a public siren at district level.

Anything that related itself to the event of the previous day was important. Those meetings of public and governmental character were extraordinarily rare.

They only happened once in a lifetime.

The destination was the governmental building within the district, a site where the employees only dedicated themselves to wasting time idly.

Or it was only what the old men repeated.

Its doors seemed to belong to a different epoch. Enormous and of iron. They seemed to belong to an enormous battleship.

Evidently its aesthetics was not harmonious in comparison of the partially abandoned apartments in conjunction.

Even so, each district had a similar building. Its importance was strategic and based itself on functioning as the heart of the security of the citizens.

Inside innumerable citizens gathered who situated themselves on prepared chairs and others remained standing. The anxiety and the confusion was practically a spirit in common that all shared.

He preferred to remain standing, choosing a strategic corner where he could see directly the exposition.

There were known and unknown faces among the peers. His memory still functioned to remember faces. But at the same time, it was a useless effort, for many would die constantly and others would occupy their previous places.

It was the hardness of Neo-Atlas Inferior.

"Really it is you, Gabriel."

His attention was immediately intercepted by a harsh and little familiar voice. His eyes scanned the origin and rapidly formulated a response in his head.

An ancient drug addict whom he had saved from the suicide.

"If you continue consuming that garbage, I will break your teeth." Answered Gabriel, with a friendly smile. He shook his hand with warmth.

By coincidence or act of a greater destiny, in the past he had ended in a compromising situation where finally he ended up saving his life.

"I no longer have teeth, friend. Try it." The young man showed him his mouth. Where, effectively, there was no real tooth. "With time I could remodel a denture."

"Only try to behave well. There is a lot of shit happening lately." Murmured Gabriel, with the eyes darkened. Soon the multitudinous warning would begin.

"The no man’s land. I live under a bridge and even so I have found out. The people are frightened." His gestures were uncontrolled, moving without direction in the small space.

The murmurs that repeated themselves around them were not different.

The classic fear that impregnated an old and sick animal.

His chat was interrupted when the presenter in charge of the meeting climbed until his podium. His features denoted youth, but his movements exposed his experience.

He wore a fitted suit, moving dominantly in the enormous interior. He cleared his throat before taking the voice.

"Of those present, the majority will be knower of the reason behind this emergency meeting." He said with solemn voice, traversing his gaze among all those present. "It is not only a threat that ominously covers our district. It is at governmental level."

His words fell on deaf ears. It was the same type of discourse that they had heard one and another time. Nothing of substance that would manage to move them.

The discontent began to generalize, until a phrase managed to silence them:

"Please, see these videos next."

On an enormous rear screen, camera records began to appear. The site was a chaos, with fire and smoke everywhere.

The place of the destruction.

The records were short and successive.

Persons fleeing desperately from an imminent and unknown danger.

Buildings falling until their foundations.

And the specialized teams working in conjunction to end with the consequences of the attack.

Until the camera captured a creature. It was dark and measured more than two meters hunched, using its four extremities to move.

It was blind and apparently invulnerable.

A savage Pseudo-Tyrant.

The shock arose like waves among the multitude, with the murmurs amplifying. The majority had never seen anything similar.

The images were crude and grotesque, without any class of edition to protect the sensitivity. They showed directly the chaos that the West Sector had experienced before and after its destruction.

Gabriel remained standing, totally silent. His mind already worked three steps ahead, guessing the true cause of the attack.

His surprise only came from the drastic decision to convert it into a public knowledge.

It was simply impossible to avoid the clandestine diffusion.

Another possibility fell in that they were preparing the society for an even more drastic turn.

"Those are the images. The unfortunate disaster that occurred in the West Sector, was occasioned by the act of these odious and monstrous beings. The governmentation will take emergency measures. Please, be attentive and take care of your security." Thanking lightly the presence of all, the young orator withdrew from the stage.

But behind him still remained a little harmonious multitude that demanded responses.