“Let me out! Let me out, I say. Do not cower from your Fate. Your Destiny. There is work to be done…”
“Stop it!” The man uttered as he clutched his head. “Just shut up. I can’t sleep. Hell, I can’t even think straight. I’m not crazy. I’m not mad! Not mad like my…”
His eyes strained and veins pulsated at the side of his temples. He could not imagine the thought of him becoming insane like his sibling. The man looked up from the floor and squinted at the family portrait. His blurry vision reminded him that he did not have his eyeglasses on. Removing his spectacles from his white lab coat pocket, he placed the small stylish pair on his face. The picture frame had cracks encircling him and his sibling. He only had one photograph as a reminder that he needed to leave his past behind in order to work on the Project.
“Andre, you fool.” The man grabbed the picture and stared long and hard at the scene of when the two shared a private moment. The event marked the day of change in their profession and psyche. “You could have been great. My creation could earn me a prestigious award. All I have to do is reveal it to the world. But this Project is enslaving me. I won’t become obsessed like you, brother. Women or any other material object will not be my downfall!” His thumb applied pressure onto the glass, cracking it some more. He placed the picture back on the shelf and shifted his long scraggly dark hair. Turning to the right, he observed his computer screen. His fingers twitched from all the aching hours of data entry. The man glanced up at the ceiling, realizing just how small his enclosed office was. The clock was positioned on the ceiling for easy access whenever he had a mental block. “3:00 am already, huh?”
“Time is of the essence,” the Voice spoke. “A war is brewing. No. The war is still ongoing. It has been so long. The war has been rewritten so many times. Make haste, Kilo. Make haste!”
Kilo fidgeted and grabbed his forehead. “Enough of this already.” His shouting made him realize what was happening. He shook off the mental image and unknown Voice. “I need a smoke.” Kilo pulled out an empty pack of cigarettes from his pant’s pocket and cursed himself for forgetting to restock.
“Ignore me all you want. Nothing will change the fact that I’m speaking to you. There are more codes, numbers, and equations to be inputted. The Project cannot be denied. Nor can it be delayed…”
“Bastard!” Kilo threw the crumpled cigarette pack at the computer screen. The screensaver disappeared and the program titled Dead Soul was open. There was nothing but numbers. The numbers were lined up in a pattern. Only three numbers were used in the entire program. Zero, three, and seven. Not wanting to look at the program, he closed it out and shut down the rest of the terminal. He ejected the CD, containing the Project, out of the terminal, and snatched it. Kilo cursed the disc. He put the disc inside his lab coat pocket and took his badge off of the computer desk, pinning it on himself. Kilo walked over to his small office window and observed the dark abandoned warehouse.
In the center of the facility resided an enormous silhouette. Several sheets covered the object’s appearance, trying to conceal the Project. He sighed and remembered that he had to compute more codes into the mainframe before he was completely finished. The scientist turned his head to his desk and saw the envelope of resignation from the science department sticking out of a drawer. He did not want to be apart of anything anymore. It was his creation. He shifted his gaze back to the window and thought about the Project once more. Kilo did not understand that it had taken only seven years to construct the giant by himself when it should have taken him a lifetime. It was the powerful Voice that spoke to him. The Voice told him what to do. He realized that no mortal man could construct a grandeur Project with technology that did not exist on Earth. But Kilo managed it with the help of the strange omnipotent presence lingering within his mind.
“I’m tired of being told what to do. Listen to myself. I’m freaking talking to myself. Shit. I need a breather.” His eyes wandered over to the picture. “I’ve got to go back to New York and leave Japan for a short visit. I need to see Andre. One last time.”
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