Zebra V.

You have a nice confidence in your pictures.. not a snobby confidence but a natural confidence that you do not usually see in photos. 

So a story.. here we go down the rabbit hole -->

It will not stop raining. For the past week I have been trying to follow this man and he always ducks out on me in traffic or in an alley. It's like this guy just disappears into thin air every time I get close. So here I am, waiting.. waiting in the rain and the fog by this old taco stand on 68th and Pine. 3am, no sign of life anywhere in this part of the city. Most people will not even travel this part of the city after 5pm. Here I am.. waiting for this person, waiting to see who he actually is, where he goes and what he may know. If I could only catch this guy. It's been a week! It never takes me this long.

All I know is he must have some very important information. Most likely some new design for software or hardware by one of the major corporations in the USA or China. Most companies do not pay this much for a normal investigation.. but whoever secretly hired me to tail this guy REALLY wants him.

So here it is.. 3:15 and I spot movement out of the corner of my eye. My heart races and I start sweating.. there is now a pounding in my head. I can hear my heart. It's got to be him. I run to the alley where I saw the movement. I have to be very careful that nobody sees me. I have to stay close to these old brick walls.. I have to be ready to duck back at a moment's notice. I creep my way to the alley hugging the wall. I look over my right shoulder and peer into the alley. I do not see a thing. Weird.. it seems completely black. Way darker than the surrounding area. I have to go into the alley.

I slowly make my way down the alley.. I cannot see a thing. I need to put on my heat visor. The heat visor can see heat and detect minor changes in air pressure. Just hope that I never get caught with these things. They were outlawed back in 2031. The CIA uses them though and they do not seem to keep track of their equipment. This pair just happened to fall out of the back pocket of one of the CIA officers. That's the story that I'll tell them if they ever catch me with them. Hell, they use my services almost as much as the major corporations do so they hopefully will not mind too much. I do not want to be exiled to that island like all of the other 'infomation terrorists'. 

Wait! I see movement.. It's coming from a box down at the end of the alley. I walk slowly.. very slowly over. Weird, the heat visor is not picking anything up? It's got to be nothing. If it were an animal or human, it would have indicated that by now.. very strange.

I slowly come closer to where the movement came from. BAM! There he goes, he is running now. My visor is not seeing him!?! What gives??? I take off the visor and start chasing him out of the alley on the other side. He jumps over a iron fence and into the building behind it. Damn.. I got to go faster!!!! I hurry through the door and spot him make a left at the lobby. I follow quickly behind. An old man bumps into me cursing me as he drops a bottle of what looks to be batteries on the floor. He slips on them as I run past and he calls for help. "Nothing I can do right now old man.." I've got to find out who this guy is! 

I run out of the front of the building and just miss the man as he get on a hoverbike. I have no time or no chance to get him this time. I have to get this job finished! I run into a cleaning van and the guy shouts at me to get out of his way. I do but I open the door and push him out of his van. "Sorry sir but I have to do this!" I tell him. He tries to grab the door as I speed off trying to chase this man down. He makes a quick right and hits a car that was illegally parked in the middle of the street. That happens to slow him down just enough for me not to lose sight of him. He makes a right onto Trubea blvd. I follow him down. Strangely enough.. he slows down a little. Does he think I am no longer behind him? He does not know that I am in a van. Ah! I can tail him with less worry now. He goes about two miles down by Watermans department store.. right across from XXV Mobil. Strange.. this seems to be the exact same way he went the last time I was on his trail. 

The man makes a right on Blaylan rd. I follow fairly far behind but just enough to be able to catch right up if I have to. Then I notice.. he is getting off of his bike. Shit, I'll have to park this van and get out on foot. I really hope he does not notice me. I cannot make out his face and it's hard to make out his clothing as well. Am I going blind? Why am I having such a hard time with seeing this man? I continue on.. The man goes down another alley and through a very small park on the other side. This is VERY familiar.. this is right by my apartment. Wonderful.. that's all I need now. If my landlord sees me running by or one of my neighbours, my cover will be blown! Well, I have to hope for the best.

I am still following him and sure enough he is coming close to my apartment building. That's just great.. just great.. Wait.. the man stopped. He is looking back this way. I have to push myself behind some old drunk and make it look like I'm arguing with him so this guy does not see me. I yell at the old drunk and I'm able to keep him blocking the man's view of me. I see the man turn and head right to.. what? Right into.. MY BUILDING. Oh great.

I almost lose him but he did enter my apartment building. I follow him inside. He does not see me.. good. He is taking the elevator. He must not know this building well because the elevator does not always function properly.. he gets in and I see the elevator is going to floor 33. Crazy.. that's my floor! I take the steps and run up as fast as I can to try and keep up with the elevator. Whew! I make it to floor 33. No sign of him. No sign of him but there are signs of other people. I see a few of my neighbours. Wonderful. Well, I fucking lost him again! I am not going to get paid for this job if I cannot catch this man. How easy this should be.. he is in MY building but there is no sign on him. I look all over and find nothing.

Well, I figure I'll call this a night and try again tomorrow night. I know he goes to the candy club on Friday's so I will go there in the evening and wait. I am so thirsty and I am in the lobby so I guess I'll stop at the coffee shop. I walk in and see Angel. She works the late nights here and she loves to talk. She is about 40 and divorced. She lost her left arm and her 6 year old daughter in a hit and run about 4 years ago. Her husband blamed her for the hit and run and the death of their daughter. He left her out in the cold and she had to start over. She hit the bottle for about a year before her sister got her to wise up. She got a job at the coffee shop shortly thereafter and has worked in my building ever since.

"Hey Angel." I say as I walk through the door.

"Hi Michael. I have your coffee."

"When did I order coffee? I hate coffee? Don't play around with me Angel, I'm not in a good mood tonight."

"What the fuck are you talking about Michael? You just ordered this about 3 minutes ago?"

"you're kidding right?" I say.

"No, you said 'one coffee black. I'll be right back to get it.' she tells me with a pissed off attitude. 

I NEVER order coffee and if I ever did order coffee, I certainly would not order it black. 

"Angel, I just came in here so I did not order it. You have to be messing around with me!?"

"You said make the coffee and I'll be back down to get it and to put it on your tab. Are you going crazy?" Said Angel.

Not sure what hit me right then but I ran out of the coffee shop and started running up the stairs to my apartment. Not sure why I did. It was just an instinct. This guy must know who I am. I must have messed something up. He knows me now. Now there will be no way to catch him!!!

I run and get to my apartment door. I notice that it's cracked open. It does not look forced. Crap, I get my gun out and slowly creak the door open and move into the apartment. I try to turn the lights on but they will not come on. I put my visor back on but I do not see anything. Nothing else alive in my apartment except me. "So weird" I say out loud to myself. I look around the apartment and see nothing. Nothing unusual. Wait.. I see my computer is on. I know I turned it off. I bet that asshole hacked into my system and stole my data!

I get to the computer and I see a heart. A heart on my desktop.. what the fuck. I get closer and the heart has a warning that states: FOR MICHAEL ONLY - CLICK HERE

What the hell, I go ahead and click the heart. Nothing happens.. I wait.. nothing happens. I do not understand what is going on? Why would someone break into my apartment and put this crap on my computer? I take about 10 minuets searching the hard drive to make sure it's clean and it is. No viruses or trojans. Hmm.. 

So this guy has to know who I am. He had to have been the one that put that on my computer. 

Now, from this point everything freezes.. I cannot move my body is stiff and I cannot see much.. I do notice the light comes on.. I hear a voice or actually voices? What is going on here I wonder. Why can I not move and talk. What is going on. I feel trapped. Like I'm held together with concrete!! What is going on. I have to calm my mind down because I hear the voices... there are voices.. there are people in my apartment. I listen now because there is nothing I can do..


Man 1 -- "So you see, he has no idea."

Man 2 -- "Are you sure about this. I mean yes, he's not moving and does not seem to be active but I have a feeling he can hear us."

Man 1 -- "Well, even if he can hear us, it's over. The test is finalized and we have to go back to headquarters and file the report."

Man 2 -- "If he can hear us then he will remember what he is hearing now."

Man 1 -- "No bother, will tear him apart and he'll never be able to report this."

Man 2 -- "Is this legit? Are we supposed to be running this test without permission?"

Man 1 -- "Listen Chuck. You want to move up the ladder or out the door? There is only one way to make it to the top and that is to get there before anyone else. Once there, you have to have the information. That's the only way."

Man 2 -- "Okay well, it looks like we have a goldmine of information now so I guess we should bring it all back to the lab and get it up the ladder. We both deserve this!"

Man 1 -- "We.. uh, hmm.. I'll do that."

Man 2 -- "Okay, you mean, 'we' will do that, not I right?"

Man 1 - "Wrong!"

BAM - I hear a loud noise. Not sure what it was but after that, the men no longer talked. What is going on I thought again. What is wrong with me..

About 10 minuets pass.. 

Man 1 - "Ah you stupid electronic fool. I am going to have to take you apart and bring you back to the lab and wipe your memory. And all this time you thought you were a human. You thought you were chasing someone. You thought you were human and you thought that you had a purpose."

That is when I finally realized.. I am an experiment.