Chapter 1: Erratic Individuals

You wanna know something funny?

In just a few hours, I'm dead. That's kind of an expected thing when you're in death row. Framed up for something I didn't do, I took the fall for my so-called "friend" and I learned the hard way that you can't trust anyone. Believing in the good in people? Nah, that'll just get you killed.

So the funny thing is, I'm still alive, and I'm out of prison. The guards told me that there was a priest arriving to "absolve" me of my so-called sins.

He never got to do that.

Instead, as if by some kind of strange twist of faith, a strong blinding explosion caused the walls behind my cell to crumble. Shielding my eyes from the unexpected blast, I looked at a huge gaping hole that looked like it could lead to the sewers.

I may be innocent, but nobody believed that, so what was I to do?

I ran the fuck away.

I woke up on a familiar feeling…wet. I was wet, and so was everything around me. I could smell shit on my clothes, so I thought that I must have gotten to a sewer.

But what the fuck was I doing there?

The last thing I remember was… not much. I know who I am, that much is for sure. Oscar Chase, 20 years old, a gamer and movie/tv series lover. I remember that yesterday I stayed at home all day and marathoned all Shirley Temple movies. Today I was supposed to marathon all Lilo & Stitch movies including the tv series.

Or was I supposed to be doing something else?, I thought, as flashes of being on a beach and swimming in the ocean went through my head. When did I do that?

I got up, feeling sober and confident that I never drink, so this could not have been Hangover-style amnesia.

There were people walking towards me. Two security guard-looking people and… a priest?

One of the guards knocked the other one out, and before I could fully realize what was going on the priest and the other guard were dragging me towards the sewer exit.

"Have you seen someone walk past you besides us?" A deep voice asked me. It was the priest, he looked like a cross between Terry Crews and Morgan Freeman, or something like that.

I shook my head and the next thing I knew, I was in some kind of van.

I opened my eyes to the sound of nurses rushing around. I could feel pain all around me, not physical pain, though, this was something else. There was a good looking man, a doctor perhaps, he was trying to revive a patient, but I could tell the patient was already dead. He gives up, not on the patient, but on himself.

I tried to sit up but the pain from the car crash last night made me want to stay lying down. I'm gonna go to sleep again, and something tells me that when I wake up, I'll see Milton again.

I close my eyes to sleep, usually I get a feeling of what else might happen sometime later. I usually see a beautiful blue butterfly flying around, telling me what I should do.

But not this time.

"Let me get this straight," I said to the fake priest who took me last night. Apparently his name was Milton Winter, and he has a nice mustache. "I'm looking for a 10 year old girl named Bo Adams?"

"Yes," he replied, "We're running out of time, we have no choice but to ask you to do it while we look for the man originally planned for the job."

"What the hell kind of name is Bo?" Was all I could say. They explained a bunch of things to me last night, about how important she is and how evil people who want to exploit her are looking for her. I personally think it's a nice premise for a movie, but these people look serious so I agreed to help. I had no idea what was going on exactly (a feeling I'm all too familiar with), so I was just along for the ride.

"That's what you're worried about?" Channing, a pretty Asian-looking lady who looks as tough as she talks, remarked. "How can we even be sure this man can protect her?"

"The explosion yesterday, didn't look man-made," Winter said, "It felt…unnatural. And something tells me, he had something to with it."

They both looked at me like I'm some kind of unexpected messiah, and I just shrugged. Deep inside I was saying things like, I could be watching Lilo and Stitch right now…

But I guess I'm stuck with this responsibility for now, at least until they find this Tate dude that was supposed to be in charge of what I'm about to do.

But I gotta be honest, I'm kind of looking forward meeting this Bo Adams.

After all, I love kids.

SENGA.

Dr. Terry, the man who gave up on himself last night, could save SENGA. All he has to do is to believe in his self again.

At least, that's what I felt when he first talked to me, asking me how I was doing.

But when I met this next man, who claims that Milton sent him to protect me, things felt…different.

The mental image I used to have of Dr. Terry and SENGA had become blurry.

And when I looked at this man, I think his name was Oscar, he felt…strange, like he didn't belong. And more importantly, I felt his heart beat faster when he walked closer to me. He had this fleeting feeling he was trying so hard to keep bottled up. What was that feeling called?

Infatuation?

"Hey," he said with a trembling voice as I changed from the hospital gown to my clothes. He looked like he was previously crying, and he stunk like he'd been wading in poop. "I guess we're stuck with each other for now huh?"

"Yeah," I replied, struggling to put on my shirt. Oscar helped out and I felt his heart beat even faster than before, it was a strange thing to read from someone, he didn't show pity or empathy like the other people I've been with. Some people looked at me like I was either a dangerous monster, or I was a very fragile flower vase. But he didn't. He didn't look at me like I was a child.

"Um…" He mumbled, blushing, with his eyes looking somewhere below me, "Nice panties…". He had the awkward smile of a teenager as he noticed the blue underwear I was wearing.

"Thanks, I guess…," I couldn't help but blush and at the same time part of me wanted to tease him for being such a…"…Pervert." Oops, I said it, anyway.

He scratched the back of his head in some kind of 'I can't help it' motion, and I looked at him from head to toe, gauging if his outside and inside persona look the same.

He looked young enough to be a teenager, but I could tell he was in his 20s, tall enough to look like an adult, with a cleanly trimmed military-ish hair and an equally clean looking face. He wore a simple white shirt with some design on it saying "Bitch Please", partly covered by a simple black jacket and matching nicely with his jeans. Besides the fact that he smelled like poop, he was decent.

"Excuse me?" A female voice called from the door before I could even put my skirt on. She looked like a doctor, but there was a looming feeling of dread emanating from her.

"Oh, uh, it's not what it looks like!" Oscar shouted with fumbling hands, "She needed to be transferred so I asked her to change to her clothes and stuff. I totally don't care about what she's wearing undernea-"

"Allow me to transfer her," the lady said with a straight face, "Let me take care of this,please."

"Um, no can do Ma'am, I was assigned to transfer her to um…" He continued, looking like he's starting to regain some composure, "Doctor…"

"Dr. Terry," I helped him out, before the woman sees through his bluff. I'd already finished getting completely dressed when Oscar rolled the wheelchair to me.

I sat on the wheelchair, acting like I was still having a hard time walking, and waved goodbye to the lady. We were both smiling at each other, knowing that we were also both faking our smiles.

I felt a sudden aura of hostility and looked behind me to see the woman about to take out a weapon-looking thing from her robe.

"Osc-"

"-ar!"

Bo's sudden shout put my whole mind and body at a state of alertness. My body felt like it had a mind of its own, or at least I felt like I would start moving on my own. It felt like anything I do from here on out would be pure and simple reflex.

I let go of the wheelchair in time for my hands to grab the gun from the woman who was going to try to shoot us. Her free hand tried to punch me on the ribs, but I managed to parry it, and I charged her towards the wall. I slammed her hand on the wall, trying to make her let go of the gun.

I saw Bo run towards the other room, god knows what she's up to.

The woman, or as I'd like to say… this bitch, finally let her gun fall down. What I didn't see coming was a knee to my gut.

I fell down and keeled over, trying to catch my breath. I saw her gun at the floor and tried to reach for it.

Her foot went straight to stomp my hand, but somehow I managed to catch it and throw her off balance.

Still hurting on the floor, I'm slightly glad we're at least on even ground. I struggled to stand up while lunging for the gun, but slipped back down when she kicked me on the side.

We both hurried back on our feet, and looked at each other like Mexicans on a stand-off. The killing intent was written all over her face, and for some unknown reason that didn't scare me. Our eyes locked, and we both ran towards each other.

Her jump kick caught me off guard, hitting me straight in the chest. My body trembled from the sudden pain, but I kept my footing and saw that she was going to follow up with a round house kick, probably aimed for my head.

I don't know how I did it exactly, but I instantly dropped on my knees, avoiding the foot from hitting my head by mere inches. My fist moved on its own and I punched her on the knee, feeling the tremble of our bones clashing. I heard some sort of crack followed by her shriek of agony as she fell down, so I assumed that I probably dislocated her knee or something.

I stood up and saw that Bo found a syringe of god knows what from the other room. I took the syringe from her hand, pinned the bitch down and gave her a good dose of whatever was inside. Before she could get back up, Bo and I were already dashing through the hallways.

"I got that bitch good, I think," I said, trying compose myself, my hands were trembling, "Though I have no idea how I did those stuff."

"Her name is Moore," she replied. She had this strange aura surrounding her, and only now while in a potential life-or-death situation did I notice how beautiful she is.

She had smooth and fair skin that was completely understandable due to her age. Her blond hair, slightly disheveled from running, with strands sticking adorably to her face and lips. Oh, she was a beauty alright, and without even meaning to my mind had gone back to what I saw a while ago, before Moore ruined our moment. Bo Adams changing out of her hospital gown, standing around in nothing but her underwear. The blue cotton fabric of her pan-

"You shouldn't think about those kind of stuff right now," Bo spoke up all of a sudden, and I was brought back to Earth. "We still need to get out of here, you know."

"Right, sorry," I said and wondered what she meant by that, and jokingly said, "What're you a mind reader?"

"Kind of, sometimes, I guess." She replied, and I had never looked at someone with such awe written all over my face. She must've seen it, because she smiled ever so sweetly and blushed (at least I think she did).

"So you… knew what I was thinking…?"

"Bits and pieces, yeah."

"Did you see…"

"Me in my undies?" She replied with a giggle, "Unfortunately,yes."

"Well," I replied,probably also blushing, "This is awkward."

We both had a dumb smile and a false sense of security to share with each other, and as we rode that bus that would take us to Winter's so-called safe house to meet up and strategize, I wondered how she managed to read my mind and still be able to smile and joke about it. I may be no criminal, but I know for a damn fact that my thoughts aren't exactly the cleanest, and a 10 year old girl would do well to stay away from me after knowing the things that go through my head.

Instead she just smiled at me, it was almost like she trusted me.

And that just made me love her more.

Milton sure sent a strange man to look after me, after getting a peek in his thoughts I had so many questions in my head. But more importantly, there was this nagging feeling that he didn't belong, that he shouldn't be the one holding my hand as we got off the bus. You know that kind of feeling when you wonder if you actually locked the door before you leave, or if you already brushed your teeth or not and it leaves you so confused? It was kind of like that.

There was this weird feeling, as if things aren't as they should be. It felt as if things have taken a turn for the worse.