Pharmuria (Boy x Boy)

Part Four

Cultural hegemony: A situation in which a ruling class dominates and manipulates a culture within a society.

My days consisted of three events. In the morning, Max would retrieve me and lead me to the shower area. He only took one subject at a time, so I showered alone. Well... mostly alone. Max would be in the room with me, but he was respectful enough not to glance at me undressed. After showering, I was taken back to my cell and given breakfast. For the rest of the day afterwards, I wasn't to leave my cell, but the scientist-guard came back in the afternoon and evening to deliver more food.

Something that Max did in the afternoon was an activity that he dubbed 'talk time'. He made it his priority to sit down with each subject that he monitored and have a conversation with them for ten minutes. While it aligned with his compassionate personality, the idea struck me with awkwardness at first. Humans and subjects didn't have casual conversation, for it simply wasn't normal. Then again, Max wasn't normal either.

The talk sessions started out one-sided at first. Though the human, or fellow human as he kept insisting, slowly started to extract my confidence, I wasn't talkative from the start. I clammed up whenever he asked a question about my life, simply because I wasn't used to a human being genuinely interested in learning about me. It was why Max usually droned on about his life instead.

"My dad's the main leader behind this project," he explained to me one afternoon. Sitting on one end of my bed, he faced me as I sat on the other side. There was a small distance between us in the physical sense, but emotionally, our gap was closing. "You can imagine how much of a choice I had in my career. I was already meant to keep the secret of an underground city, so I guess it led to being a part of the family business."

"Yeah," I muttered, showing him that I was listening. Though I tried to remain focused on listening to his words, my eyes couldn't help but scan his every detail. His smile was buried in that moment, yet there was still a gentle expression that radiated off of his face.

Max softly chuckled as he looked off towards the wall. "I'll never forget the day that he dictated my future for me. I protested as much as my lungs would allow, but he made it clear that his decisions were set in stone." There was a brief pause for a moment. Remembering such a day couldn't have been a walk in the park, especially for such a gentle soul. "This isn't the career I would've chosen. I wanted to be a nurse, in fact," he looked back at me. "But, I'm glad that I ended up here. I can't guarantee fair treatment for everyone, but I can guarantee fair treatment for those in my section."

"I have a question," I told him.

"Yes? I'm all ears," he replied.

"Everyone who talks to a Pharmurian is either cruel or deadpan. Yet, you're a good person. You're nice to subjects that others think aren't deserving of any respect. What makes you different?" That had to have been the longest thing I ever said to him since we met each other, but my curiosity begged for me to say it.

"To be honest, I don't have an answer for that," Max replied, rubbing his shoulder. "I treat everyone with kindness. The people who abuse you are doing it because in the vast world, they feel weak. I guess picking on powerless people makes them feel like they're on top of the world. I don't have any desire to feel that way, on the other hand."

"You're just that one red marble in a bag of blue marbles," I commented, tapping my fingers against my knee.

"I am always the one that stands out," Max agreed. "I'm different in so many ways, and it hasn't gotten me the best treatment in life. No one's ever harmed me... too much, but I'm no stranger to being made fun of. Though, we're conditioned to prefer people who are similar to us, so I suppose I can't criticize people too much." He mentioned it so carelessly, almost as if he had accepted his fate of being the outcast in life.