His worthless treasures are kept secret, folded into neat squares and placed in a toiletry case he keeps in the bottom of his bookbag. He can't read the words scribbled across the pages or the delicate blending of the charcoal drawings, but he can feel the emotion on the pages. Iggy lives in a world with only four primary senses: touch, taste, smell and sound.
Of the four that are left he rarely uses tatse unless he's eating. Sometimes he wishes that couldn't taste such delicacies as roasted fieldrat. Who could blame him.
Off track, the point is that he uses his senses to 'see' the emotion in a piece of paper. Gently he caresses the letters and feels where the pen stroked forcefully with emotion. Iggy often wonders what is on the pages but he wouldn't dare ask anybody to read or describe them to him. Who could he ask? These weren't the left-behinds of strangers in the park, no, these were creations of his family, his flock.
Finally, one day, his curiousity filled him to the brim. New York City, It was a place of people, a place of strangers that did not know him, didn't ask his name or already know it. It was a place to discover the secrets in those letters.
While the rest of the flock was soundly asleep he slipped out of bed. Hotel stays were the only times when they didn't have a watch. It was kind of obvious when the enemy had to crash through and door, wall or window. He grabbed his bookbag and headed down the stairs. He couldn't bring himself to take the elevator even though he knew it would take him forever to get to the lobby.
"Hello, sir', can I help you?" A soft female voice asked from his darkness.
"Yes, you might be alble to, I suppose." He said and ventured closer to the voice only to stumble into a low set table.
"Are you okay?" The voice asked coming closer.
"Define, okay? I am blind, you know." He said.
"I'm sorry- I mean... I'm Kelly, the night auditor, how can I help you?" She asked.
He smiled at her, letting her know he wasn't offended. "I have some papers here that I would like you to read to me, if you don't mind. I've been trying to find somebody who would do it for me."
"Sure, there isn't a whole lot to do here at this hour." She said and helped him to a chair. Kelly only grabbed his hand and placed it on the chairs edge. He liked that she hadn't tried to seat him as the flock would sometimes do. "So where are they?"
Iggy pulled the papers out and handed them to her. "If you could read them from the bottom up, so they're in chronological order, I'd appreciate it."
Kelly cleared her throat and began with the first letter.
"June 21st,
I guess I should be telling this to a person, but somethings are to hard to say. So I'll just write it down and leave it here, in this log. Why does this have to be so hard? We've been friends forever, longer it seems, but I can't let him know what goes on inside my head. I can't tell him about the truely horrible nightmares and the things that flit through my mind while I'm looking down at their sleeping forms. I can't tell him how much I worry when they aren't in eye-sight. I can't tell him the things that let him know who I really am as a person.
The Sergan Major Admeral General "
"That's such a strange way to sign off a letter." She said but picked up the next paper.
"July 4th
Happy Indepence Day? I don't know about that. We just got here and I feel like everything has already fullen apart. I don't know how long I can keep pretending that I'm holding it together. I have to watch the kids , but I wish I could do more. I wish I could make them suddenly have their parent's and their homes and normal lives. Instead we're all here, baby-birds who've fullen from the nest waiting for a cat to come along.
Mother Hen"
The crisp sounds of unfolding paper were followed by more and more notes, each a testimate to Max's fear and insecurities as a leader. He had been keeping track and knew that there were only a few more actual letters left, the drawings were on the top of the pile.
"The world as I have always known it has come to a screeching halt. Fnick said something to me that made me want to rip my heart out. Sometimes he wishes that he could be like everyone else, juat a normal teenage guy, a guy who doesn't have to deal with a crazy girl with a learship complex. Doesn't have to hide forever, doesn't have to worry where he'll be next week or tomorrow. I can understand that. I really feel it too. But he said it as if, I liked having to live like this. Worse yet, is it hurt me because I want all of that normalcy for him. I want him to be happy. I wish it was something simple. I wish it was something I could to do change it. If leaving or dying could fiz things, believe me, I would.
Miss Matched"
Then came the final letter.
"Iggy, I know that you find things. I'm not stupid. I just thought my secret would be safe with you. I know that Max's have been. So, here goes.
I don't know how to say it, so I'm going to be blunt about it. I think I've fallen in love with somebody who doesn't exhist. I see her smile and her tears, and I love her for them both. I see her stand brave, trying to protect and raise the kids, and I love her for that too. But there are times, when she thinks she'a alone that I see the part of her she hides. When I see that, I know that I'm falling even harder. I do not know this girl who's been inside of my friend. I do not know what she thinks or feels. I do not know if she is capible of letting me know her. But it is an obsession of mine. I sit, a quiet shadow, waiting for her to walk calmly into the woods and lay on the ground, looking up at the sky. She thinks and cries, sometimes she even screams, but she doesn't know I'm there, and I'll probably never tell her.
Fang"
Kelly described the pictures to him. They were pictures of the flock. Rough drafts of Fang's sketches. Of course Kelly didn't know that. She could only describe them for him.
Finally, two hours after she'd started, Kelly handed Iggy the papers back. "So it sound's like you got the answers you wanted." She said softly.
"I just wanted the answers before I die." Iggy said still holding the papers in his hand.
Kelly froze for a moment. "How did you know?" She asked.
"The night monitor's name is Jack." Iggy said with a sad smile.
"I'm sorry... I have to." She said softly in the darkness.
"I know." He said, with a shrug. He could hear Kelly crying softly. The the sound of a cocking gun.
It hurt, a lot. The pain tore through his chest. He could feel his heart stop beating. Kelly knelt down beside him. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry."
And then he was gone. His hand droped slack beside the chair, the papers flittering into a growing pool of blood
She reached down and picked up the bloodstained papers. Maybe in another time, another place things could have been different. Something in the letters touched her and made her wish that life could have been different, for them and her.
She rolled the letters up and stuck them in her purse and took the elvator up to the third floor...
"Report 21-5768-057 Clone # 487 is a failure. Extrememly emotional. Experiment will be exterimanted after testing. With proper corrections the next clone will be successful.
Clone # 488 however, is successful. 488 successful exterminated subjects 6,7,8 and captured the rest. The model, one Dr. Martinez will brought in for more DNA specimens. We hope to put the clones to use as soon as next month.
J.W - President of ITEX corp.