Pharmuria (Boy x Boy)

Part Two

Frog pond effect: The theory that people evaluate themselves as worse when interacting with others that are higher performing.

Within the comfort - I use that term loosely - of my apartment, I sat at the table in the kitchen area. Atop the smooth structure were two portraits and a candy bar. The candy bar came from the convenience store, but this time I hid my purchase in case any lurking humans felt like ruining my day yet again. Not like it would've mattered anyways. My day was ruined from the second I opened my eyelids to the sight of the dull, colorless ceiling in my room.

Pharmuria was a city built under the United States, therefore subjects were declared as adults at eighteen just like citizens in the outer world. So many differences existed between an adult subject and an adult human, however. In my research, I was made aware that turning eighteen granted a human with a lot of privileges. The ability to change their name, the ability to be in a relationship with anyone that was older than them, the ability to buy lottery tickets, and the ability to vote were a few of said privileges.

I ruptured my stomach with laughter on that last one. Pharmurians didn't even have basic human rights, much less the ability to vote on what future rights we wanted to have. We couldn't choose who governed us, nor what laws were enforced. We didn't even need to be respected by anybody.

Humans only had one law when it came to dealing with subjects: unless it had to do with experimentation, a human could not kill nor hospitalize a subject. With such a vague rule, it went without saying that humans took advantage of being allowed to pulverize subjects at any given time. Even if one's looks disgraced a human's eyes, they were allowed to be beaten just for existing.

Officers, the ones meant to keep order, were most aggressive. It was quite ironic in retrospect. The presence of an officer could make some humans feel safe, but subjects were conditioned to fear an officer and escape their line of vision if out in public. If an officer locked eyes onto somebody, they were dead meat. Nothing could save them except the one law that the humans had to abide by.

Subjects weren't supposed to interfere in situations like these. I knew that much from personal experience. There was one time that I was walking towards the store and I saw a young woman huddled up by a wall. A human was relentlessly beating on her, and she tried everything she could to block his attacks in such a defenseless position. Wailing as loud as her lungs would allow, everyone in a short radius was a witness to the crime, including me.

What were we supposed to do? No subject wanted to see one of their own mistreated like that, but fighting against the aggression was pointless. It came down to a decision between ignoring the victim and ending up with emotional pain or confronting the human and ending up with physical pain. Selfish or not, most of us chose the former.

I tried to keep my gaze forward that tragic afternoon. Sticking my hands into my pockets, I did the best I could to blend in with the background and pretend that the violent situation fell on deaf ears. Instinctually, I stopped in my tracks as soon as the woman cried out for my help.

"Sir, please!" she managed to scream through her incessant sobbing. I turned to face her and caught a glimpse of her bruised and bloody face that only looked rougher with the appearance of tears rushing down her cheeks. "Do something!" Her pained eyes looked directly into mine. The sound of her pleas went straight down my ears and like a lightning bolt striking a tree, my heart split into two.

Yet, there was nothing I could do. I turned back to face forward and kept walking. My fellow subject was now screaming louder, trying to beg for my attention, but her screams were cut-off by the sound of the officer's demands overpowering her voice while dishing out more blows to different parts of her body.