I walked into the house, unsuspecting of the ambush my roommates had set for me

  I saw Boe jump off the couch, running up towards me, “What was that?”

  “Yeah,” Samantha agreed.

  I turned my head to the side, “Sorry, I kinda can’t talk about that, NDA and stuff.”

  “Bullshit,” Samantha spat, “Why are they interested in you? Is it because of that portal thing that got you kicked out of the house and has been all over the news, right!?”

  I shrank back.

  Then Boe stepped between me and Samantha, “Hey, not cool. If he says he can’t legally talk about it, then he can’t.”

  “I’m sorry, but that’s not going to cut it. I’m not risking anything on trusting anybody, so just tell me Jacob, damn it,” I waver of fear coming into her voice at the end.

  I felt the urge to tell her, but when my mouth moved to make the necessary sound,s I felt the pull of Dr. Bekers’ spell, like a muzzle.

  Then Barbra came up to the side of her roommate, saying, “Hey, Sammy, this isn’t going to help.”

  Samantha's face turned into a grimace as she turned away and went into a different room. After that, I went back to my couch, everyone else sitting around as well, waiting for something to happen. They occasionally prodded me for an answer on what happened, but I just didn’t talk to anybody for the rest of the day, letting Orchid control my body so I could rest.

  But Orchid eventually got tired as well, and I was left inside a quiet apartment, waiting again. I walked out of the apartment again, stopping at the railing that hung over the street, and leaned on it. I thought of running away again, but they definitely had someone watching me, and I didn’t want to get knocked out and tied to a chair or something.

  Then I heard the door open behind me and I saw Boe walking out in a thick puffy coat, but were still shivering. They walked up beside and said, “How are you not cold?”

  I shrugged, “Magic.”

  Boe snorted, then glanced towards my plain expression, “Wait, really?”

  “I think. I don’t need that much sleep either.”

  “Now you’re just trying to make me jealous.”

  “You got me,” I said flatly.

  There was a moment of silence, the sound being the wind blowing between us.

  Then Jacob said after clearing their throat, “So about earlier today with that Jenkins dude, I'm guessing it’s about magic.”

  I winced and saw Boe notice it.

  And they continued, “And I know you’re horrible at keeping secrets, so I'm guessing there’s something more keeping you telling me.”

  I gave the smallest and most imperceptible nod that I could muster, feeling the muzzle of Beker's spell coil around me before I could finish it, but Boe had noticed.

  He looked away from me, scowling, “Disgusting, to control another human like that, to practically make them your slave.”

  Orchid and I flinched at the words, but knew they were right. A million things coming into my mind, and I didn’t know how to say them, but I didn’t know if I was going to get another chance to say them, so I just shoved out.

  “Boe.. I think… I never apologised.”

  “For?”

  “Punching you… at the airport, that was kinda a dick move.”

  “Oh, that.”

  There was silence, then I said, “So, are you going to say anything?

  “I don’t think you need to apologise.”

  “What? That’s not true.”

  Boe looked up at the stars, “I asked you if you wanted to meet Dad, you said no, then I did it anyway. And then I doubled down and tried to trick you into meeting him, that’s… that’s not-” Boe sighed, then hung his head, “I thought I knew you better than anybody, no, I do know you better than anybody. But just because a person knows a couple of letters doesn’t mean they know how to write.”

  I looked out into the street, not knowing what to say, watching as a car passed by, its lights blinding me, but I didn’t wince.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  Then I said, “Did you know that carrots feel pain.”

  Boe looked at me, brow creased, “Um, no.”

  “No, that’s a lie, we don’t really know what they feel, we’ve just observed a reaction to what we would perceive as negative stimuli. Like cutting off a leaf or pulling it up, same with insects and birds and lobsters and everything else. But we didn’t really know if they feel anything for sure. Hell, we used to think that human babies couldn’t feel pain until the 80s and used to do surgeries on them without anesthesia, at least that’s what Wikipedia says. But do you know what we did when we learned that?”

  “Stop giving surgeries without anesthesia, I hope.”

  “Exactly, but we still kill chickens and lobsters and carrots despite strong evidence of them feeling pain or at least their equivalent of it.”

  “Are you trying to make me a vegan?”

  I waved Boe off, “What, no, just listen. But doctors stopped with the whole baby torture thing. Now, tell me, what did you do after that incident?”

  “I… I didn’t do anything, I just left you.”

  “Yes, but unless you’re a hallucination, you’re right here right now. And I still love and hate you as much as I ever have.”

  Boe wiped at his eye, shakily saying with a hint of humor, “Leaning towards hate, I presume?"

  “Duh, now stop crying bitchboy, and let's get inside. I don’t want you getting hyperthermia.”

  “Sorry, I should be the one doing this, not you.”

  I rolled my eyes at the words coming from his mouth and said, “I can always kick you in the balls if that’ll make you feel better. Also, GET. INSIDE.”

  Boe snorted, “Were you lying about not feeling the cold and trying to act all manly now?”

  “You know what, I think I'm going to kick you in the balls for fun now.”

  “All right, all right.”

  Boe said as he followed me inside with a grin, and Boe fell asleep before me. So I busied myself before I followed Boe by playing a couple of games, then Bu-Orchid butted in with an idea, playing against eachother. Mainly chess, since that was one of the few games we mutually liked.

  And I noticed throughout our games that they had a very methodical style, planning traps a dozen moves before. Compared to my rather, throw spaghetti at the wall approach, I had to improvise myself out of quite a few tricky spots. Which seemed to piss off Orchid as their plans crumbled on contact with anything, but I couldn’t get my way out of all of them and found myself getting sniped by a bishop or Rook.

  Which ended up with us winning an equal amount of games, though I considered myself the victor since I was winning the game before it was interrupted by a call. I picked up the phone and accepted without looking at the number, being surprised to hear Jenkins voice on the other end.

  “I’m here to pick you up.”

  “For what?”

  “Bootcamp.”

  I sighed, “OK, just give me a couple minutes. By the way, what should I bring?”

  “Nothing, they’re not going to let you bring anything from the outside, like phones and such, it’s secret. Don’t want Australia or South Korea getting ahead of us and all.”

  “Ah, give me a couple seconds then.”

  “See you,”

  “See you too.”

  I hung up and sat up from the couch, hearing my joints crack as I stretched, noticing the clock read 6:38 am.

  ‘Had I really stayed up that long?’

  I shook my head and got my clothes on, leaving a note by my brother along the lines of ‘Being taken to a military black site, don’t panic lol’. Then I left and found Jenkins' car parked close by, and nodded to him as I got inside.

  “So,” I asked, watching as the scenery passed by, “Where are you taking me, and what for?”

  “Boot camp, I already told you that.”

  “Yeah, but why do I need to go through boot camp? I'm not exactly a fighter.”

  “You underestimate invisibility, Jacob.”

  “That can’t be all.”

  Jenkins pursed their lips in thought before saying, “You didn’t hear this from me, but there are only three people in the world who have gone on the other side of those portals and have lived to tell the tales. Most of them only spent a few minutes. You, Jacob, lived 7 hours and weren’t even harmed.”

  I frowned, “Oh.”

  ‘I seemed to have made myself more important than I wanted. Also, that doesn’t make sense, what I saw on the other side of that portal should’ve been easily handleable by a couple of guns. And if it wasn’t, the portal was right there to escape through.’

  “I don’t know,” Orchid replied, “You saw what those Tree Octopi did to those guns. Maybe we’re underestimating ourselves."

  “I hope so.”

  Orchid was about to say something, but was interrupted by Jenkins saying, “We’re here.”

  I looked out the window and saw a surprisingly ordinary building around the edge of Oregon City with only a few signs indicating it was a military building. And the inside was the same as Jenkins escorted me throughout the bland halls with yellow humming lights hanging above. Then we stopped at a door with a piece of paper on it saying in large font.

  “MEETING 7:30 - 8:30, DO NOT INTERRUPT."

  “Get going,” Jenkins said with a point of his chin towards the door

  I followed the order, but he didn’t follow. I looked back at them, confused.

  “I’m not allowed in, secrecy, you know, this is all you.”

  “Ok, have a good hour.”

  “You too,” Jenkins said with a smile

  I smiled back and went inside.

  O O O

  Jenkins watched as Jacob walked inside, dropping the smile as the door clicked shut. Then he pulled up his phone, the only thing inside his notifications being a text message.

  Unknown Number: Update on O,3 please

  Robert: O,3 has started to trust me