Do not fall for the lie.

There was a mental sickness, a sort of snap in behavior some people got under significant stress. It messed with their judgment and understanding of reality, sometimes causing them to act strange or even violent. When they broke the law, they were arrested and brought here for questioning, but during their nervous break, it was common for them to lose the ability to speak clearly. Their voices distorted and slurred into nonsense. Patient detectives could decipher what they meant to say with time, but Jerry Speaker could do it better.

Jerry Speaker had been a part of the translation team since he was three years old, which had initially scared him given the subject matter. He'd rather be doing anything else with his time, but his parents insisted he continue the job out of moral obligation since he was so talented at something so necessary. Being the only one who could instantly translate important information came with always being on call for urgent situations. He had no idea how much he was going to do. Everything was on Hellen's time.

Going down the elevator with Hellen Swartz, Jerry stood by her heel just as she had taught him when he joined the team. He stood as tall and proper as he could, but he always felt silly next to her. He was short, hairy, with rabbit-like ears, all clear signs of his condition, but without his goofy appearance he wouldn't be there. If only his condition was just skin deep. Besides the obvious bodily deformities, his brain had the miraculous ability to understand all voices. No matter what anybody said, and no matter what language, if Jerry was close enough to hear it, he knew what it meant.

Any voices unfortunately included the nonsense rambling of the criminals he was tasked with translating, but such a valuable skill wasn't without drawbacks (besides the obvious). Jerry could understand just about anything, but he couldn't speak the languages, and he couldn't write them out either. This fact tended to frustrate people who didn't sign like he did.

It wasn't that he was stupid or didn't understand the task, but that everything his brain wanted to do, his mouth and hands were consistently unable to express. Despite this neurological disability, he could always nod for yes and shake his head for no, and he could smile when he was happy and frown when he was sad. He couldn't convey meaning with alphabets or his larynx, but he was always able to emote and gesture, and over time they taught him to turn those simple gestures into signs, and then into sentences, signing with the vocabulary of his parents and classmates and coworkers. The same vocabulary he used to sign to Hellen what he heard.

The elevator door opened up to the third basement level of the facility. Rooms made to interrogate and restrain stood before them. The low light and lack of decorations was a subtle reminder of the attitude he had to hold. Jerry sighed. He could see the door to the room they were heading toward. Beyond it was going to define his night.

Hellen opened the door for him and they both went in. Bare bones seating and recording equipment, as well as a few verminators were already inside. Being the best translator, Jerry didn't have the luxury of interrogating non-violent perpetrators. A metal wall separated the room in the center, a reinforced vent was the only way for organic sound to travel through it. Jerry couldn't see them, but a dangerous criminal was on the other side. He was thankful for the separation, to hide his identity as well as to keep him safe in the immediate situation. Some people were stronger than they ought to be.

Hellen picked up her mic. There were enough chairs for herself, the recorder, the security officer and Jerry, but she preferred to stand.

"Start recording," Hellen told the recorder.
"Testing... Testing.. I think we're all good to go.." the recorder said.
"Are we all clear from the other side?" Hellen asked. They waited a moment.
"That's an affirmative. All ready to go," a verminator officer on the other side said. A dangerous criminal wasn't without their escorts. Hellen nodded to Jerry, signaling to her that she was about to get started. Jerry nodded back.

"Good evening. Hope you're comfortable... My name is Hellen Swartz, verminator general. Let's start with an easy one. Do you know why you're here tonight?" Hellen asked.
Nobody responded. Jerry's long ears awaited something to pick up. He could hear breathing. "Not talking? I'm not a big fan of the silent treatment. We have a translator with us, so I guess it's whenever you're ready, right? Is that what we're doing?" Hellen said.

"You.. You captured our princess!" the criminal said.
"You captured our princess!" Jerry looked to Hellen and signed.
"So you wanted to be a hero and save her by coming here then?" Hellen asked.
"Of course! I am her soldier, her knight! I'll K-KILL you if you do not release her! I'll put your HEAD on a S-STAKE!"

Jerry translated it.
"Shock him," Hellen said. Screams echoed from behind the wall. Jerry winced, listening.

"Ever consider the fact that your princess was trespassing on highly restricted territory? Territory that is heavily guarded and obviously off limits. She knowingly broke the law and you're only making her sentence longer by trying to interfere."

"You.." the criminal slurred his speech, "You think you're so.. so mighty.. You're kidding yourself," He spit, "You think you can go around and say where we can and can't walk? That's bold for someone with very brittle flesh.."
Jerry translated it.
"And you're bold for someone locked up. But I don't like bold people. Shock him again until I say," Hellen said.

The criminal's escort started to shock him, letting it burn continuously. Thirty seconds went by.

"That's enough," The shock stopped. Jerry heard the criminal gasp and cough once it was over, "If you've come to your senses, I suggest you give up the threats. We both know nobody's coming for you, and that you're never getting out of here unless I say so. Now, I'm going to ask you a few questions, and you will answer them quickly and honestly if you want me to keep my temper. I'll know when you're ready when you say 'yes ma'am'," Hellen said.

Nothing.

Jerry held his breath, watching Hellen's expression. At any second she could snap and ask that the criminal be shocked again.
Without being provoked, roars developed from the other side, not from pain, but like some sort of panic. It almost didn't sound human.

"He's going berserk! Restraints holding!" An escort on the other side said.
"Let him have his fun. There won't be anything left in him once he's exhausted it," Hellen said.

This wasn't the first time Jerry had heard a criminal try to go berserk. In fact it was really common, even if it wasn't always as noisy as this. Sometimes he would hear that some restraints had broken. Sometimes he would hear that a subject was going berserk but wouldn't hear the episode play out. Sometimes people would scream for nearly thirty minutes and have to be taken back to their cells before they could be interviewed again, but Hellen didn't like to do the last one.

Luckily the current criminal didn't have a lot of energy left. He faded to soft panting.

"Feel better now?" Hellen said sarcastically.
"No.." The criminal said.
"He says he doesn't feel better," Jerry signed.
"Aw, that's too bad," Hellen said sarcastically, "Screaming your head off didn't help you? What a surprise. I didn't hear you say 'yes ma'am' so I sorta feel a bit upset right now. Like maybe I could just zap you again.."
"Yes..Yes Ma'am.. You evil witch..." the criminal said.
"Yes ma'am," Tie said.

"Aw, what a relief!" She put her hands together, "Alright, let's get to the good stuff. Where do you live? How many are living there, and how old are the youngest in your group?"
"I don't want to tell you..." the prisoner whimpered, "I'd get kicked out of the crusades so bad... My friends..."
"I don't want to tell you. My friends would be upset," Jerry said.
"I think there's more present matters you should be focused on. Forget about seeing your friends ever again without my help. Don't bother lying either. We will find out," Hellen said.
"I don't want to tell you..." the prisoner said again.
Jerry translated it.
"Do you want your princess to double the sentence I already gave her!? Cause you're starting to sound like that's what you want!"

"No.."
Jerry shook his head.
"Then TELL me. I'm getting impatient."
"Ok... Ok.. We crusaders live in a castle in the mountains east of here. Maybe three hundred rabbids.. they come and go. The youngest rabbids are around twenty years old. There's not that many young ones.. Maybe two..."
Jerry translated it.
"Are you still at war with the equestrians?" Hellen asked. She was pacing in the room, thinking.
"Yes.."
Jerry nodded.
"What's it looking like? Give me an update," Hellen said.
"The crusaders have the equestrians on the run. They don't have a home base, they live with the herds.. They're vulnerable. Their territory is gigantic and they get mad at us for 'messing up nature' when they literally have the whole world to roam in. Petty land hogs.." the criminal said.

Jerry translated it.

'Rabbid' was a word he heard often here, and he knew it very well. Criminals affiliated with the word's punk roots. To be a 'rabbid' was to be a member of a gang or an identity based in lawlessness. The word was also a part of his disorder's name: rabbid condition. The definition of 'rabbid' only partially had to do with the condition, as anyone with rabbid condition had the ability to understand the nonsense insane punks that labeled themselves as 'Rabbids' said. With this known ability, along with the obvious ties to the way the condition made him look like a rabbit, the name stuck with the scientists who coined the term hundreds of years ago.

Throughout history very few people had been born with rabbid condition, but nearly all of them worked in the same field Jerry did now. Statistics predicted he would never meet another person with rabbid condition in all his life. With so few cases, there was hardly anything known about the condition, so he was often obligated to frequent visits with doctors, who sometimes referred to it properly as a genetic disorder.

Whatever the proper term, he wished he didn't have to repeatedly explain that he wasn't a terrorist because he was diagnosed with what was essentially 'terrorist disorder'. He had never been told this, but he assumed his ability to understand criminals was granted by his condition permanently altering his brain structure so he was always having the same type of 'mental break' the criminals experienced temporarily.

He hoped that was the last of the supposed similarities. Because of privacy he knew little about the people he helped interrogate, but there were times when they vividly recounted murders at their own hands and a variety of other gruesome crimes. He hated to hear them in pain during his translations because they were people, but he knew they weren't innocent even if he didn't know why. For how much longer would Jerry be innocent? No.. He couldn't think that way. He was just a boy. A very kind fifteen year old boy who would never do something like that. His parents knew that. He knew that.

After an hour he was starting to feel the interrogation come to a close.

The criminal definitely thought he was some sort of old world crusader fighting a holy war against humans. Criminals like him did tend to believe they were so much more fantastic than they were. He had been in the room with so called necromancers and cyborgs and time travelers. At least all their nonsense made their crimes possible hallucinations. He'd hope the worst of what they said was made up too.

"I think that's it everybody. Freeze him. I'll figure out what to do with him later," Hellen said.
The verminators around her nodded. The recorder stopped the audio feed.
Jerry stretched. Another night over.
His ears twitched. Roaring from the other side returned.

"He's going berserk! Restraints..!? Oh my gosh!"

Jerry froze. He didn't even know what the restraints were made of, but he could hear them snapping on the other side. There was some struggle between the escorts and the convict, but the criminal got away from the verminators. He ran up the wall's vent.

"GEN-ER-AL!" He bellowed, punching the vent and the wall. He punched it again, making a dent even Jerry could see. The verminators on the other side shocked the criminal, and kept shocking him until Jerry heard him collapse.
"Holy crap.." a verminator said on the other side.

Hellen walked up to the wall and leaned down, looking at the visible dent.
"Bradley, send an email out. I want an inspection on all of our cells, freezers, and any containment units written up by tomorrow. We're going to need stronger equipment," She stood tall and pointed to the dent, "Never underestimate their strength people! ...Somebody get Damian and Zander some extra help. I don't want this subject getting loose on the way back."

Jerry couldn't keep his eyes off the dent. Nobody had ever made a mark on the wall like this before. If they ever got out of their restraints, they usually went after their escorts. This convict had gone after Hellen. He wasn't the first to go after her. Jerry reached to touch the dent. Hellen put her hand on his shoulder, stopping him.

"I need you for something," She said.
"Ok.." Jerry said. He could hardly fingerspell due to his neural condition, but sometimes he could get across things with only two letters as long as he didn't think about it too much.

Hellen led Jerry out of the room and back into the elevator where she brought him to the ground floor. He didn't feel any lighter up there. Hellen was clearly about to do something he didn't like. He followed her to a physical archive where she fished out a couple of small pages with words written on it. She handed them to him.

"You can read that right?" She asked.
"Yeah.." Jerry said. He had read stuff like this before. He forgot which language whispered things in your head like this. Was it French?

Hellen went to another shelf in the physical records, and pulled a stack of papers out of there too. She brought them to the desk at the front of the room and sat down. Jerry pulled up a chair next to her.

"We have reason to believe what's written in these papers may be classified documents from the government. To make sure of this, I am going to have you translate them, got that?" Hellen said.

Jerry nodded. He was trying really hard not to sigh. Hellen would notice. He had to accept that sometimes he would stay longer than he anticipated.

Two hours had gone by before Hellen started to wrap up. She had written a translated transcript version and paperclipped it to each original, as well as putting any papers mentioning 'cloning' in their own pile. Maybe the government was planning to learn to clone people for some sort of conspiracy. It wasn't Jerry's job to ask questions, as much as he'd love to actually have a conversation while at work. The more he knew the more tempting it was to tell people what he shouldn't, so maybe it was for the better.

"You do a great service Jerry," Hellen said, organizing the papers into folders, "I think that'll be all for tonight."
Jerry nodded.
Hellen took a radio from her belt and turned it on.
"I need an escort for Jerry Speaker, we're in the physical archive on the first floor," Hellen said. They waited.
"On it.." a verminator said through the radio

It was a thirty minute drive from the verminator headquarters to his home. Low in light and population, they mostly drove through a void of trees. Silent snowflakes hit the windshield, glittering in the headlights. Their unpredictable patterns calmed and hypnotized him.

When he got home the driver stopped in front of his house and unlocked the door. Jerry got out and went up to his porch. He had a key and there was a stool outside so he could open the door all by himself.

His escort was still in the car, watching, waiting for him to enter the house. Jerry swung the door open and turned around.
"Thank you," He said before he went in. The escort nodded, putting his car into drive and turning around the way he came.

Inside it was dark and quiet. His parents had gone to sleep hours ago. Some people were afraid of their own houses when the darkness transformed it, but not Jerry. The old wood floors with gaps and worn away tracks would never betray him. The lone clock ticking and the hum of the fridge was as close to him as his heartbeat and breath. The rugs and carpets were bound to have more fur in them than he currently had on his entire body, and he doubted any effort to clean them would ever change that. He wished he could wrap his mind forever in the countless comforters and quilts. The parts of the wallpaper that were starting to peel only added to its evidence of life. Small drawings and stickers he had put on furniture when he was young were still there if he only looked. Every single corner from the top of the stairs to under the table was a memory.

He went upstairs, creaking every other step. Up there was his room as well as a small bathroom and a TV room. His parents were well into their years and didn't like going up and down the stairs, so the space was mostly reserved for him. At the top of the steps was a two foot dark steel wolf statue. It used to be an outdoor yard decoration, but Jerry had decided to have it guard the steps to ward off dark spirits. He pet the wolf as he passed it, and pushed his door open to his room. Accommodated to his height, everything in his room was adapted to fit him. His bed was still the toddler sized twin he had as a child. His clothes were housed in two nightstands so he could always reach them. He had a toy chest, as he still loved to play with toys. His bookshelf was clearly meant for an elementary schooler, but he had had it so long the style had lost its meaning to him.

Exhausted, he took his pajamas out of his nightstand dresser and started to take off the sweater, tee and his pants and underwear he had been wearing. His clothes were delivered to his house rather than shopping for some, as his strange body shape didn't work right with normal clothes. His face lacked a nose but he didn't have any trouble breathing when his gigantic mouth was closed. His legs were very, very short. He was covered in fur besides pink hairless patches on his palms, his lips, his stomach and ears. Unlike other kids, his ears were placed on the top of his head and were very reminiscent of a bunny like his condition's namesake. His eyes stuck out much more than everyone else's, and he had hands and thumbs but no fingers. He liked to think they must've melted together before he was born.

The wind from a developing blizzard rippled his window, startling him. Something about it reminded him of his job.

The window was another barrier protecting him from the wild things in the world. It started to make him think about things that made him nauseous, that made him confused. Things that he should probably ignore and sleep away, but instead he climbed up to the window to watch the snow.

There was a time when there was no cozy room, no toys and no books to find comfort in.

By day it was easy to forget if nobody mentioned it, and if he was preoccupied he might gloss over it for even longer, but by the end of the day when he had nothing left to distract himself, his mind would go back to his earliest memories. A large part of him thought of them as nothing more than dreams, but an equally large part kept the memory intact just in case.

At the dawn of time the big bang exploded and launched him far across the stars. He crash landed onto the frigid coast where light had only just begun to reach. There was nothing illuminating the world besides the moon and the stars, and their reflections off of the snow. The shadows of unknown objects ruled the world.

For a long time he would walk not knowing why. There were valleys and mountains of different textured masses from tall scratchy ones to short spiny ones, to sharp thin ones, and walls of glowing white snow. The only constant was the sharp and numbing freeze digging deeper and deeper into his skin. The longer he went on the stronger the wind and the fiercer the cold.

Carried through the air were unholy screeches and roars that he could not explain. Maybe things like himself experiencing their own terror in the lonely gasp of the beginning of the world. Maybe they were huge specters changing the shape of the land. Ghosts creating the surface of the Earth so that he could experience it. Their heartache falling from the sky piling up for him to dig through.
He walked in pain and confusion for a thousand years, growing slow like he might join in the stillness of the land.

But as he thought this may be forever, the landscape began to change.

Flat black stone paths cleared of snow.
Yellowish bright stars sticking out of the ground, emanating from square holes cut inside massive rectangular structures.

Without knowing why, he headed toward them, entering a large hole in one of the structures with a parked vehicle inside. For the first time there was something in the air that wasn't so harsh. The building radiated warmth, especially from the parked vehicle. He went underneath it where the wind had trouble reaching him, and curled up trying to keep his arms and ears away from the harsher air around him. In this comfort, he slept.

As time marched on the temperature began to drop again, the warmth fading from what he had taken safety in. Asleep for so long, he hadn't even realized how bad it was getting. The center of his spiraled body was kept warm by his form. He couldn't will himself to destroy it and move. He grew even more trapped as his energy faded.

At some point the world was bathed in daylight for the first time, but still he laid dormant, knowing a transformation in the world had occurred, but with so little warmth left and such little energy, he barely noticed it.

Strange sounds in the snow were hardly a threat. Even as they got closer to him, he couldn't will himself to react. They scooped him up in blankets and brought him inside the building although he didn't remember being brought in.
For the first time not only was there warmth but it seemed to spread from his center and even the outside of his curled up body. Eventually he felt comfortable enough to relax and stretch out. When he gained enough energy he used it to take a look around.

He'd come to know it as something of a breakroom at a warehouse. Most of the faces he saw were completely fascinated by him, while also seemingly confused. He'd come to be accustomed to the confusion even in his current life.

They'd want to hold him in his blanket. They'd want to pet him or play with his ears.

They'd say things like:
"He's so cold.."
and,
"What is that?"
and,
"He's looking at me.."

It wasn't long before he got enough energy to break out of the blanket and start exploring. Looking back the man that rescued him had been anxious, following him closely, but so was everyone else.

When they would talk to him, Jerry would pause to listen.

It wasn't strange to him now, but something about how they spoke was different than what he was used to. Not that there was anything to compare it to.
Still, he could understand what they said, so naturally he wanted to join in, but whenever he said anything, no matter how plain, it never got across.

"What's that?" He'd point. But they wouldn't get it, "Can I see?"
They'd only say back "Ba ba ba?" as if that's what he sounded like.
This was a recurring issue that he'd grow used to in his current life too. A disconnect between his brain and his voice.
As much comfort as he got being with the people of the warehouse, he was never understood.

He had only been there for a day before Hellen arrived, but she had been invited. The warehouse people knew their relationship with him was temporary, so they called upon experts to take him somewhere more permanent. These experts were indistinguishable from soldiers, but looking back were definitely verminators.

They took him firmly, refusing any dispute about his discomfort in the process. They put him in a cage in their van and covered it with a black sheet so he couldn't see.
He tried to ask them where he was going but they wouldn't answer, as if he hadn't said anything at all. The warehouse people didn't worry, so he tried not to either.

The soldiers brought him to their building and isolated him in a locked room with only his necessities and what he'd later understand was a camera in the ceiling.

Unlocking the door every day, a kind man would give him meals and talk to him, sometimes even coming inside to give pats as well as toys, snacks and blankets. Sometimes he would sit and ask Jerry questions. Sometimes he would ask Jerry to do different tasks. Sometimes he would come in with a party of strangers and he would interact with them. Sometimes he would try to teach him to write. Sometimes he would try to teach him to speak, but none of these sessions ever made any progress. There was something about this that no amount of teaching could change, no matter how easy it looked. He could remember when one of the lessons stopped in the middle. How the man left disappointed, without saying anything.

One day though, they had a breakthrough.
There were languages of gestures and expressions that people communicated in called sign languages, and gestures Jerry could do. This made him and the kind man very happy, and Jerry started to do more with him more often. Jerry would also start to see Hellen more often, but she would never say anything directly to him. She would whisper to the man with a fierceness that held all of his attention. Jerry could never pick up any of what they were saying, and couldn't remember if he asked about it afterwards.

It might've been only a week, but eventually the kind man introduced him to people he'd come to know as his parents: Mrs. Kelly Speaker, and Mr. Jean Speaker, who had no children of their own. At first they visited once and Jerry didn't see them for a few days, seeing other couples who signed like they did. None of the others he saw again, but he started to see his mom and dad every day until it was time to move in with them.

In the same house he lived in ever since, he learned in a similar fashion to the way the kind man used to teach, but with his mom now. They got him some clothes that fit his unique proportions, his own room, and new toys to play with which he quickly got favorites. They told him over and over that he was going to live here with them and that he'd be their son from now on and that he could call them 'Mom' and 'Dad' if he wanted, and that he was going to be called 'Jerry' if he thought it fit (named after the famous mouse). Most of this was told to him by his mom, who could speak audibly, while his dad sighed to him at a speed and complexity he couldn't yet follow. For the first time there was good food and heavy blankets to warm him, and they promised it would be from now on.

He caught his own reflection in the window. The boy that miraculously survived a blizzard thirteen years ago was here now, with the exact same face.
It had been thirteen years since he had been adopted, but no matter how different life became he couldn't let his initial experiences go. No matter what he would come to know about himself and his condition, events at the dawn of the time still stood the same, with no answers to satisfy him. Maybe he wouldn't like the truth if he figured it out.

Why was there a naked little boy all by himself wandering the wilderness for what might've been more than 24 hours? Where were his birth parents? Did they die in an explosion?
There wasn't any proof of this, but he had an idea that his real parents were so disgusted by him, that they abandoned him thinking he wouldn't even feel the storm. Maybe they were the ones who set off the explosion that he remembered so clearly.

He had been old enough to walk pretty well then. People assumed he had been only two at the time, which was why they knew he was fifteen years old today and not thirteen, but who knew really. He could understand voices. He could read. Somebody must've taught him.. Somebody he had forgotten.

Even more nauseating were things earlier than the dawn of time. Prehistoric dreams. The only image he could interpret was a hall of mirrors of his own face staring back at him a thousand times over a thousand.

A legion of Jerrys.

There wasn't much of a point in recalling what he'd never understand. He had questions nobody could answer that made him dizzy, insecure. One day he'd finally put it to rest, but for now he was the one who needed sleep.

6/21/2024