“Hurry up, please… This way!” the doctor called over, his thick Neo-Asian accent cutting through the air. If the continental language already sounded rough in a Neo-Asian’s voice, this man’s tone made it almost harsh.

  From what Juzo knew, the doctor was in his forties, yet the person waving him in from the doorway looked like he had an extra one or two decades weighing on his shoulders.

  The man had a gaunt, angular face with wrinkles etched around his small eyes like rows of furrows. A scraggly, gray goatee dangled from his chin, resembling some odd badge of honor for premature aging. His slicked-back hair was oily and tied into a messy bun, with stray hairs sticking out. Those high-water pants looked pitiful on him, and the sandals were even worse. But the cherry on top of his disheveled appearance was the stench of cheap booze on his breath, along with the yellow stains on his lab coat and the worn-out scrub top peeking out underneath.

  He’s drunker than… Juzo tried to think of a clever punchline, but nothing came to mind. He wasn’t good at witty comparisons, nor did he care to be. After all, in a situation like this, a sharp sense of humor wouldn’t sober this guy up, would it?

  The doctor made a rude gesture, signaling Juzo to hurry.

  What’s with the nerves? Sure, what they were about to do was illegal, but hadn’t this rundown old man been doing the same thing for years? By now, routine should have dulled his fear of being caught by the authorities—or so Juzo thought.

  But no. The man’s paranoia was fueled by alcohol, not inexperience. That tragic expression on his face could be traced back to an empty glass—or rather, an empty bottle. Just one more reason to turn around and walk away.

  But there was Vicky behind him, arms crossed, waiting for him to take the first step inside. He couldn’t disappoint her—didn’t want to. Even though he knew his life would change forever if he crossed that threshold.

  Forever. What a heavy word—a timeline that stretched far too long.

  Vicky had undergone the same procedure years ago, and it had worked out fine for her. There was no reason it couldn’t for him.

  Yet the thing keeping him standing in the hallway wasn’t fear of something going wrong—of walking in and being carried out under a sheet due to some massive cardiac arrest, like so many others. No, his hesitation came down to a matter of principle.

  A few minutes ago, Vicky was driving her dark off-road car through that run-down neighborhood, looking for the doctor’s office.

  “Ninety-two percent Middle-Ecuadorian DNA, Juzo!” she exclaimed, still in disbelief. Beside her, her partner was silent, arms crossed.

  Ahead of them, the full moon hung low, so large it looked like a ripe fruit dangling from a tree dissolved into the night—just within reach of anyone willing to stretch out a hand.

  “Ninety-two freaking percent! Do you know what that means? I think you’re more than qualified to pass this test. You don’t have a choice.”

  “There’s always a choice,” Juzo countered, his eyes scanning the houses they were passing.

  Around them, there wasn’t a soul in sight, no sounds to be heard except for the wind rushing through the buildings, no movement save for the trash swirling down the empty streets. Most of the houses were abandoned, their windows boarded up, and just a few had lights on. Sure, people lived in this neighborhood, but not many—and those who did didn’t want to be noticed.

  “You know what, Juzo?”

  He muttered, “Uh…?” with little interest.

  “This is our eternal argument,” she said, ignoring his lack of enthusiasm. “You’re a rebel through and through, a true Troublemaker. Fine. But let’s say one day you’re stranded in a desert with nothing, starving to death…”

  “In a desert, I’d probably feel more thirsty than hungry,” he mused.

  “Doesn’t matter,” she dismissed his comment. “The point is, you’re starving, and then you see something. ‘Is it a mirage?’ you wonder. But no—it’s a Flag.”

  Juzo tried to follow where she was going with this. “A Flag? As in…?”

  “Yes, Juzo, a Flag, like the fast-food chain sponsored by your much-hated Empire.”

  Juzo rolled his eyes. “I know where you’re going with this, Vicky, but your analogies… Ugh.”

  “My analogies are brilliant, so shut up. Anyway, you find a Flag, and you can either starve to death or swallow your pride, forget your principles for a moment, walk in, and order a burger—or a soda, since you’re in a desert.”

  “You know what I’d do,” Juzo nodded.

  Vicky pushed the hypothetical scenario further, doubling down like it was a high-stakes bet. “You’re in the desert, and you’re not just hungry—you’re on the brink of starvation. That Flag is the only thing left standing in the entire world.”

  Juzo sighed. “I don’t know. Maybe…”

  “Aha!” Vicky slammed her hand on the wheel triumphantly. “I knew it! You’d dive into those burgers like a chimpanzee on a banana tree, and only then would you stop to think about who made them! It’s pure survival instinct!”

  “Vicky… This isn’t a Flag, and what I’m about to do isn’t ordering a burger.”

  Her eyes shifted toward him. “No, it’s being ready to face the enemy.”

  His eyes shifted toward her. “No, it’s stooping to use their resources and becoming one of them.”

  Vicky snapped her fingers. “Right, silly me! I forgot you and your Troublemakers make your own weapons and… Oh, wait! You don’t. You steal them from the Empire. So that’s a resource you are okay stooping to use?”

  Juzo was left without a retort.

  They turned the corner and stepped into another long, filthy street. A cat leapt from one trash can to another, its wide, glowing eyes fixing its gaze on them briefly before resuming its hunt for food.

  “Listen, Juzo, I’ve already paid for it, okay? Do you have any idea how much money I spent on this? The amount is astronomical—I’m broke! All my savings, gone, here in this miserable neighborhood. I won’t let you back out now.”

  “I’m not backing out,” he replied. “And stop exaggerating. That treatment is way too expensive for you to have paid for it by yourself with your hairdresser salary.”

  Vicky huffed, offended. “Hold up! I make more than you, okay? I’m the manager of the best salon in Markabia—well, starting from the bottom up. And let’s not pretend you make a fortune delivering vegetables every morning!”

  Juzo shrugged. “At least I’m not hacking into my father’s bank account.”

  “That’s because you don’t have a father to steal from,” Vicky shot back. “If you’d had one like mine, you’d have drained him dry and taken way more than the measly amount I’ve taken from mine so far. And if that’s not true, then my name isn’t Victoria Marie Viveka. Besides, part of that money is technically mine. By law, the General is supposed to give me a percentage, but he doesn’t.”

  Juzo glared at her. “He should’ve if you were still under sixteen.”

  She waved him off. “Bah, details! Do you think Ulfric Viveka, the great General of Benetnasch, doesn’t know his vault has a leak? Do you think he doesn’t know where the little sum that disappears from his account every month is going? If you think that, it’s because you don’t know the General.”

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  “What does that have to do with what you’re doing?”

  “It means the General doesn’t care what I do with his money. Otherwise, we wouldn’t even be in this car, because there’s no way I’d have saved up enough to buy it.”

  “See, Vicky? And you claim you’re not privileged? You’re contradicting yourself just as much as me. If we’re not sitting in a cell right now, it’s because your father doesn’t want us to be.”

  “No, Juzo. We’re not caught because—”

  “Don’t say it’s because of our Seven-Frequency transmitters,” he cut her off. “That might fool the street cameras, but it won’t work on human eyes… And no, don’t tell me those stupid wigs and glasses make us unrecognizable.”

  This time, Vicky had no retort.

  “Look, Juzo, can you stop tangling me up in your endless arguments? We’re not talking about my father or my so-called privileges as his daughter right now. You’re not going to confuse me and make me back out. Whether it came out of my pocket or not, I’ve already paid for this treatment. It’s ridiculously expensive, and I’m not going back to Markabia until I’ve finished what I came here to do. Besides… we’ve already discussed this.” Vicky took a deep breath. “I need you to take this weight off my shoulders. I can’t keep doing this alone; it’s exhausting in ways you can’t imagine. Please.”

  Vicky was right. She couldn’t keep doing what she was doing in her current state.

  Now, in one of the building’s shadowy corridors, Juzo stood beneath a faint light fixture that was giving off its final flickers. The damp, moldy smell from the carpet was strong, but the stench of cheap liquor on the Doctor’s breath was even stronger.

  The aging man refused to step out of the doorway to his office, instead waving frantically for Juzo to hurry up.

  It was time to move. Juzo filled his lungs like a swimmer about to dive into a dangerous sea, took a deep breath, and stepped forward. Vicky followed close behind.

  The Doctor quickly shut the door, locked it twice, and slid three heavy bolts into place with an agility that was surprising for someone who had clearly been drinking.

  “There. Now we’re good,” the guy said with a relieved sigh. Then he leaned back against the door and shot Juzo a hostile look. “Every second I keep this door open is a second I risk getting caught,” he scolded him.

  Correction, Juzo thought. That raspy voice carried traces of alcohol, but it was also thick with paranoia. Just as the liquor stains on his white coat revealed his drinking habits, what hung next to the door betrayed his fear of being found out.

  Mounted on the yellowed wall like some eccentric decorative piece was an electronic panel full of tiny circuits and capacitors. It resembled a massive microchip, with small lights blinking intermittently.

  “This is…” Juzo murmured.

  “An Eight-Frequency neutralizer,” Vicky confirmed. “Must be over fifty years old.”

  “Fifty-two, to be exact,” the Doctor corrected.

  “Ever since Seven-Frequency came into use, they stopped making these,” Juzo said, studying the electronic panel. His amber eyes traced the intricate web of circuits. He leaned in, listening to the faint hum of the capacitors at work. It was a marvel. “If someone finds out you have this…”

  Like a child guarding his favorite toy, the Doctor grabbed Juzo’s arm and pulled him away from the neutralizer.

  “If someone finds out about this, all it’ll do is add to my charges,” the man snapped. “My lab is full of illegal equipment that, if I were a model citizen, I would’ve disposed of a decade ago when the Empire’s new regulations took effect. Now, are you going to follow me already? I’ve had enough of your little scene out in the hallway.”

  Juzo didn’t apologize. After all, he felt like he’d been dragged here against his will.

  “Calm down,” he told the doctor. “Eight-Frequency will have already intercepted any tracking signals they might be using to find you. That is, if anyone’s even looking for you. To me, your paranoia just seems like a reflection of your inflated ego.”

  The man froze in place and turned toward him, his small, bloodshot eyes wide and bulging, brimming with liquor and wounded pride.

  Juzo forced himself to smile cynically, feigning a satisfaction he didn’t feel, just to heighten the Doctor’s arrogance. He wanted the man to snap and throw them out. Sure, he was curious about what other contraptions the Doctor might be hiding in his office beyond the second door, but his desire to leave far outweighed his curiosity.

  “I didn’t force you to come here!” the Doctor growled, the veins in his thin neck bulging like overinflated cables. “If you’re going to insult me in my own office, get out right now! I don’t need your money.”

  Bullseye, Juzo thought, enduring the Doctor’s alcohol-laden breath with a grin.

  Vicky stepped in, offering a smile even more fake than Juzo’s.

  “My friend apologizes for his words,” she said.

  “No, I don’t,” Juzo said with a shake of his head.

  “Yes, you do, Juzo. You’re going through with this, whether you like it or not.”

  The two locked eyes, and her determination matched his stubbornness.

  “Fine,” he relented at last, brushing past the Doctor and heading toward the second door despite the man’s clear gesture to leave.

  With an exasperated huff, the Doctor led them into the inner office.

  Inside, a chair awaited—one eerily similar to a dentist’s chair, made of steel and rubber, surrounded by orbiting instruments, sliding trays, monitors, and a massive lamp overhead that only made the whole setup even more intimidating. The upholstery was worn, the metal arms’ paint chipped from use. It looked like a twisted, and highly illegal, dental lab.

  In one corner stood two drum-shaped energy condensers, as tall as a person and as wide as beer barrels, connected to a computer. The condensers’ metal casings were rusted and scratched, but the engraving on them was still legible: ‘Property of the Markabian Imperial Army.’ Beneath it, the Empire’s diamond-shaped crest with the image of a winged horse gleamed faintly.

  Every surface—the walls, the ceiling, even the floor—was covered in foam panels meant to muffle noise. They were grimy with age and neglect.

  “Take off your shirt and sit down,” the Doctor commanded as he locked the door and powered up his equipment.

  Juzo shrugged off his shirt and handed it to Vicky. His build was lean but well-defined, his chest dusted with brown hair.

  “You’d have done better to shave beforehand,” the Doctor remarked. Still, he made a dismissive face, as if it no longer mattered. “It’s just for better electrode contact. No big deal.”

  Juzo lay back on the chair. The cold rubber bit into his skin, though the chair turned out to be surprisingly comfortable despite its battered appearance. How many people had sat there before him? How many had been through this just today?

  Vicky watched him, her expression serious. That damn woman should have been smiling—she’d gotten her way, after all.

  The Doctor adjusted his lab coat and, perching on a rolling stool, positioned himself beside Juzo. As he pushed up the sleeves of his coat, tattoos of Neo-Asian symbols were revealed, covering nearly his entire thin arm. When he adjusted the V-neck of his grimy scrub top, more tattoos could be seen rising from his chest. He lit a cigarette, took a long drag, and exhaled slowly; he frowned to keep the smoke out of his eyes, and the lines of age creased his face.

  Juzo’s curiosity went straight to the tattoos creeping up from the base of the Doctor’s neck—something the Doctor seemed to misread.

  “I know, I know,” the man said, excusing himself as he tapped the cigarette bouncing on his lip. “This habit will kill me. But hey, we’ve all gotta go somehow, right?”

  Despite the lingering scent of cheap liquor, the image of the drunkard who’d opened the hallway door minutes earlier had faded. The man sitting beside Juzo now—smoking over a patient who might not appreciate it—was entirely different.

  “Relax,” the Doctor advised. “It’ll be better for both of us, trust me.”

  From a nearby cabinet, he retrieved four adhesive electrodes and placed them on Juzo’s chest.

  The generators roared to life, their hum muffled by the foam walls.

  Juzo took a deep breath. The chair reclined, turning into an examination table that left him lying flat. The screens surrounding him lit up, displaying his vital signs and other charts he couldn’t make sense of. He wanted to know what they meant… But no. Better not to know. Better to ask the Doctor after the agony was over—because, according to what they’d said, that’s what was coming next: agony.

  The lamp’s glare was so strong he could barely see, though relying on his other senses didn’t help much either. The Doctor’s voice, muffled by the cigarette hanging from his lips and his thick accent, was barely more than a mumble, and Juzo’s nose was overwhelmed by the stench of alcohol and burnt tobacco.

  “Do you have the money, miss?” the Doctor asked.

  “I’ve already transferred half the amount to your account,” Vicky replied. “You’ll get the rest once the procedure is done.”

  “Perfect. But you do realize there’s a high chance your friend won’t make it out alive, right?”

  Vicky and Juzo exchanged a look. Don’t you dare say a word about DNA tests or survival odds, her eyes warned.

  “We’re aware of the risks,” she said. “And don’t worry, I’ll pay the full amount as agreed.”

  The man turned to his patient.

  “Well then, kid… you’ll feel a sliiight—”

  A sharp sting shot through Juzo’s arm at the elbow, followed by the deliberate slide of a needle piercing his skin—slowly, maybe more slowly than necessary.

  “Son of a…” he muttered, coughing, and as a reflex, his eyes flew open despite the lamp’s glare. Then he tried to relax, waiting for the anesthetic to kick in… waiting for the anesthetic to… to… kick in—yes. It was working.

  His muscles went numb, and suddenly, his eyelids weighed a ton. He tried to catch one last glimpse of the Doctor before losing consciousness, afraid he might never wake up again, but the lamp above him filled everything with that awful whitish light.

  He couldn’t see a thing. Everything was white and blurry, and then—black.

  “So then, kid,” came the Doctor’s voice, echoing from far away, “are you ready to become a Grenadier?”