Tale of The Broken Sword

Chapter Thirty Nine : What Am I to You?

18th February, AD 2057

Washington D.C. - Former City

"Brother?" the young man had asked. The beam of light shining brightly from the crevices of the ceiling, inching its way into the dark chasms of the seemingly huge complex has added a fair bit of touch to the eerie feeling surrounding me. The creaking sound of worn-out machines laying still for almost two decades and the echoes of the wind raging above the complex, amplified by the narrow cracks and openings on the ceiling and a lone figure whom had called me a 'brother' of his.

I could not see him clearly as the beam still hadn't found its way shining onto the man. I hear him approach slowly and closer from the other side of the visible beam on the concrete floor. Finally, the young man had revealed himself. Clenching a gun on his right hand with his teeth gritting with a hint of pure pain mingling around with his mind, the young man clad in a dusty, bloodied trenchcoat resembling those of the past times. His dark, shining hair slicked to the back of his head, with some of those strands jutting out of the thick and somewhat-oily mess.

His grip on his gun loosened and his expression turned almost instantly like those performed by mask-experts one would see in those Chinese districts. From a tone of a hostile one turned into one belonging to a man who hadn't seen his family for decades.

Stupefied, as I would call it.

"You're alive... brother! You're alive!" The man muttered, shaking his head with disbelief and wishing to convince himself that I, or his 'brother' was indeed standing and moving right in front of him.

I could've done something out of that long five minutes of awkward silence, and dealing with a psychopathic man thinking that I was his brother seemed to be a pain. But judging by his clothes and a coincidence of this man meeting up in a place where no people would have the guts to venture, I remembered those words spoke by the other person who wore this similar attire before leaping of the train few months back.

"Who... who are you?" I shouted at him, touching the tip of the holster. "I'm not your brother. Get your mind straight, man!"

"It's me! Everent, your older brother!" He lowered his gun hurriedly; afraid that he'd wouldn't convince me to think so.

"Everent?" I replied. "What kind of name was that? I don't have an older brother. My family disappeared when I was young!" I argued with his statement.

The tension mounted. I took five paces back and slowly slid out my gun. Everent kept silent, slowly pondering about the words that I've said to him. I'm not sure whether I've said it too loud that it might be almost like an insult to him, but his face changed again, this time for the worst and he clenched his fist tightly around the handle of his pistol caked with dust and dirt.

"They changed you to that extend, huh?" Everent spoke silently. "What a joke."

"What do you mean by changed?" After reaching the last of the five steps away from Everent, I tried to convince myself that there's an opportunity for me to leap of from here and into the nearby stair and make a run for it. "I've seen many shitty things before I come here, some weird ones and you looked like one of them, and you call this a joke!?"

I looked at Everent questioningly, with him pulling his gun from a firing position and pointed forward towards me. I heard a quiet clanking of the gun lock coming out from his gun. Everent was ready to fire, if he wanted to. Sweat began to drip out from my face; I can feel my collar shirt damped from the sweat.

"What had they done to you, brother?" Everent kept his raging emotions to himself, trying not to lose it. "Filling up your mind with their lies and depriving you of the real truth that stands in front and around of you..."