Painless

Painless

By E. M. Areson

This is boring, Algos thought. Can’t they do something else?

“Excuse me.” He tried to yell but his mouth was nearly swollen shut. “For the hundredth time. I don’t feel pain. You're accomplishing nothing.”

The A.P.P.S. officer scowled, “Don’t run away again.” The man climbed out of the back of the semi and shut the door.

Why don’t they have windows in these things? I climbed out of one once, but it was a lot cooler in that semi. Algos twisted his hands in the shackles suspended above his head. I wonder what they do for handless. He smirked or tried to. His face didn’t want to work. He tried to feel as much of his face as he could with his tongue. Blood. Why do they bother? You know one of these days an A.P.P.S. semi or van is going to get pulled over by the cops and the cops will find someone back here and A.P.P.S. will get it.

Semi started again and for a while, Algos tried to sleep. Thoughts of the home he couldn’t go back to both haunted and comforted. His mother’s face was such a comfort and a terror when shifted between memories of before and after she’d gotten the job. The movement of the semi while trying to sleep was too much and Algos almost threw up.

You’ll never sleep like this. Think of Reading Renaissance. That was the best mandatory reading ever. Seventh grade. He saw the tattered book of Greek legions with a strangle green Hercules on the cover. Why green? Who makes Hercules green? He thought next to the last chapter of the book a genealogy of Greek gods and heroes. Man, that’s a disturbingly inbred family. Algea, goddess of sorrows and griefs, daughter of Eris goddess of strife. What kind of idiot adopts them as family. Me of course but…

The semi bumped down the road. Where are we going? This is kind of like when mom took me to New Jersey and I laid down in the back seat to sleep. Except less kidnappy. And she’s not my mom. She turned me in. Agence for Protecting Personal Security my foot! More like Kidnappers Dream Job Agency! What was I thinking about? Uhh, A.P.P.S. then not-mom, road trip… Oh! Algea and Eris.

The semi pulled over and Algos smelled gasoline. Yuck, wonder what Algea and Eris would do, probably blow things up, kill mortals and whine about things.

The semi opened quickly and two A.P.P.S. officers he didn’t recognize pulled in a girl in a hospital gown and red jacket. They chained her up across from Algos and quickly left shutting the door. But they didn’t shut it fast enough for Algos not to see the nature of his new companion. Her skin was different colors on defined lines, her eyes didn’t look quite even, her arms had two different sized hands. Her hair was three different colors and had several lengths and bald spots.

For a while they set in silence, Algos wondered if she could talk or if she’d seen him.

The semi started and rolled back onto the road. Algos took a breath, “Hello? I’m Algos. I saw them put you in here. What’s your name.”

A tiny cry had come from the dark when he’d first started talking but it was quiet before the girl spoke. “Did you see what I look like.”

She sounded so ashamed. “Yeah, you look pretty cool. Bet you can scare the pants of any A.P.P.S. officers you want.”

Silence.

Okay, that hadn’t worked. “So, why does A.P.P.S. want you?”

“Can’t you see?”

“No, it’s too dark for me. Can you see in the dark? Is that why they want you?”

She laughed softly, it almost sounded like a cry. “Are you here for a bad sense of humor? That’s what it sounds like to me.”

He shook his head then laughed. “I’m stupid.”

He could hear her smile in her voice, “They got you for stupidity?”
“No, I’m shaking my head.”

“I can’t see in the dark.” She laughed softly.

The semi ran over a large bump, startling them both so bad all laughter died.

“Creature. You asked my name. It’s creature, like how in the book Frankenstein they call the monster, ‘the creature’. I liked it better than Monster.”  

“Dido, Monster is never a good name.”

“At least people don’t scream it every time they see you.”

He sighed, “They did once, it’s why I got turned in. At school one day I did something stupid. A guy I knew brought a knife to hurt someone he didn’t like. I should have turned it in immediately but I thought I could stop him. I did but he slighted my thigh when I walked him to the office. I didn't notice, how could I? I can’t feel pain. But everyone else did notice, they saw me bleeding and not in pain and it creeped them out.”

“Was it the school?”

“My mom.”

“I meant that turned you in.”

“My mom.”
She made a sound similar to whimpering. “I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t as bad as most though. She worked for A.P.P.S. and they only wanted to study me, learn why I didn't feel pain. Something about wanting to make the army like that.”

“That doesn’t sound good, an army that doesn’t feel pain.”

“Nope. My name’s Algos by the way. It's Greek for pain.”

“That’s ironic. Your name is the thing you can’t feel.”

He smiled sadly, “That’s why I picked it. What about you? What’s your story?”

“I was in a car crash. I lived in the inner city most my life and I was in the foster system. I’d just turn seventeen a few months before so I wasn’t on my own yet. My foster parents took me to a local doctor,” The way she said doctor made Algos think of air quotations. “They sold me to him and he faked the records so it showed I died in the crash.”

“Man sold by your parents, that’s harsh.”

“They weren’t my parents. I barely knew them.” Her destain was obvious in her voice.

“I’d nearly died in the crash. He saved my life, but he sewed me up with other people’s body parts. I think he stole them. He was developing a secret drug trying to figure out how to stop organ rejections. It works, but it ruined my life. I thought he let me go after he was done. I never knew his name or anything so it wasn’t like I could turn him in. Turns out he really gave me over to A.P.P.S. in exchange for a job.”

“I hate people sometimes. So cruel.” Algos tried to pull his hand out of the shackles.

“Careful,” Creature sounded concerned.

Algos laughed a little, “I don’t feel pain, remember?”

“Yeah, but you can still hurt yourself. You could slit your wrists on accident and bleed out without knowing.” Creature rattled her own chains. “I got my smaller handout!”

Algos’s heart started to race. “Do you have lock picks?”

“I have a bobby pin. Let me see if I can pick the other lock.”

It felt like time froze inside the semi. Algos keep thinking the semi was going to stop and there break out was going to stop before Creature got her second shackle off. He closed his eyes for a minute and when he tried to open them again they stung. His mouth tasted like blood and he wanted to spit. Every time he fooled with his own shackles Creature would stop him. Algos listened to the wiggling noise of the bobby pin and thought of spy movies he’d watched so long ago he’d had a real life and name.

A shackle clanged open. “I’ve got it!”

Algos started doing a little cheer. “Oh. Oh. They left Creature with her key. Oh. Oh. Now we’re going to be free. Oh. Oh.”

Creature started laughing, “Keep talking so I can find you.”

“Ok, I’ll be silent as a mouse.”

“Then I’ll leave you,” Creature said. Algos heard the sound of her crawling over.

“Why are you calling?”

“I don’t want to fall, it might alert the guard.”

Algos felt a rough hand grab his knee. It didn’t feel like a teen girl’s hand, he wondered if it felt more like a teen girl’s hand to Creature. She pulled herself up to his shack and began working on the lock. He couldn’t see but she had to be very close. Their knees were touching and he didn’t feel like running away.

Will I still be able to be this close to her when I can see her? Will I want to run? Will I think she’s a monster?” Algos mentally sighed. I have a bad feeling about the answer. I don’t think I’ll be able to do it. I think I’ll be afraid. Or worse, repulsed.

A shackle clanged open and he left hand fell straight to the floor.

“You okay?” Creature crawled around him to work on the other shackle.

“I can’t feel it,” Algos moved his hand up to his face, bumping Creature. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

He felt the deformed lump of flesh that was usually face shaped. His face felt more like a… well he’d never actually felt anything like it before. Except when he’d felt his face after previous beatings.It was slick, probably meaning lots of blood. “Man, he got me good this time. I must look so gross.”

“You get beaten?”

“Yup.”

“What for.”

“Trying to escape.”

The other shackle opened and his right hand fell just as unceremoniously as the first.

“So now that I got you out what’s the plan?”

Algos sighed, “I don’t know. But we’ll get out of here. I promise you, Creature.”

“Thanks, Alllll…” She made a humming noise, trying to remember.

He smiled, “Algos.”

“Thank you. Algos.

The semi stopped.

“Come on. I don’t know about you, but I’m not going peacefully.”

They stood, both weak, holding each other up.

“Free Freaks forever.”

“Long live the Freaks.”

Photo by: Robson Hatsukami Morgan