Chapter 11: I guess puppets can grow a heart too

POV Katsura

Today was the day. I stare into Hori sans eyes and she stares back at me. Our expressions are very serious. We are in her house. Souta is out playing and her parents as usual are not home. Well that gives a much quieter environment for me to deal with.

 "So you are really going to do it ?" she asks seriously.

I nod nervously. "Well…. you have to believe, what I say, I won't lie to you."

She nods, her expression quite serious. She was taking this seriously, well that's one hurdle cleared, last thing is I want her to think I am a liar.

"So…., I am what you would call a government agent. Not just any government. I belong to a united world government, participated by most countries of the world. Their main purpose is fighting the global enemies, namely terrorists and huge scale organised crime."

I pause for a moment and look at her. She is looking intensely at me. I couldn't read her face; did she believe me? Or is she going to burst out laughing?

Thankfully she didn't. She just nodded, and signalled me to keep going.

I continue "Now, the weird part, I don't have parents. I was created in a lab, under a special project for creating special trained agents who would be incorruptible, puppets, they wouldn't be tainted by worldly desires and would only be faithful to the fight against the evil. Not many subjects survived, apart from me only 3 others survived till my age. Since birth, we were bred in captivity under instructors, teaching us basic knowledge for the world and mostly espionage stuff, and combat. Our genes were tailored for this stuff, and we were literally coded to be inhumanly resolute. After we were 11, we were sent for missions.

The base idea was supported by this theory; nobody suspects children. Almost all of organised crime use children for the groundwork, poor ones, way different from us, but they were extremely effective, an invisible army, untouchable by the law enforcement, the 'good people' of various governments soon began to play with the concept of this idea and how it could be beneficial for the 'greater good', we slowly infiltrated these organisations and got close to the leaders, and took the killing shot, it saved a lot of government red tape. It takes months years to pin them for thousands of crimes, and most of the time, they walked scott free. A simple gunshot saved all that, and many lives. That was the logic, at least on paper. The idea was successful for a long time, and by the time I was fifteen, I was among the most dangerous assassins in the world. And the best part, no one knew. Apart from select presidents of the world and the managers of operation, no one knew…. Then…." My voice quivers

POV Hori san

"Then…" I hear his voice quiver. Then everything fell apart. That's how every story goes. I couldn't still completely process all he was saying. It sounded like a plot of an American action movie not reality, but it actually fit perfectly with the current situation, what he was saying was bound to be the truth. It has to be the truth which would explain everything

I stare into his eyes firmly and give confident nod. He seems to calm down a bit.

"Then, as you can guess everything fell apart. Almost a year ago, I was tasked to infiltrate a terrorist organisation in the middle east who were in talks for creating nuclear weapons, it was a task of supreme importance, and I had to carefully infiltrate the organisation. Around 7 months ago, after a few months of hard work, I was about to close in on the kill, when everything went wrong. By the time, me and a team of undercover agents were to report in the location of the weapons, our transmitters jammed and before we could realise that we had been made, I heard a few gunshots, and could hear a few bodies thump on the ground. My entire team dead in an instance. I got shot too, in the leg, non-lethal. Their orders were probably to kill us all, but they decided to keep me as a hostage…." His voice was shaky again.

Afraid. I could already feel what was coming next. I didn't want to hear it, but I couldn't ask him to stop.

"Well, they strung me up in chains, and decided to have some "FUN"' he said, with a pained voice.

"I won't go into the details, but it was weeks of brutal torture… I.. I…" he choked on his words.

He slowly starts to unbutton his shirt. I could see the bandages that covered his chest, his numerous injuries coming to light. "Well, you see... this is what they did to me…" he sighs

I see the scar on his stomach, better than before but still too grotesque, I see his body littered with scars and cuts. I could see patches of dead and burnt skin, along with a few holes that looked like gunshot wounds. I slowly move my hands towards the bandage on his chest, close to his heart. What horror did it have to hide?

Midway, he grabs my hand by the wrist, not hurting me but just stopping me. I look into his eyes, they were wide with terror, they seemed to plead, "don't", as if his eyes were begging, I slowly reassure him by stroking his grip with my other hand. He lets go.

"You don't have to tell me what happened." I say calmly "I don't need to know the rest."

"No… I will, I have to.. you are probably my only friend, you should know" he says, composing himself. He quickly buttons his shirt back on and starts again

"Well, by the time they thought I was dead, they laxed security a bit. Somehow, I had managed to slow down my breathing hard enough to feign temporary death. I was in no position for active combat, but under that intense adrenaline fuelled condition, I had to do the best I could. I somehow, limped to the guards to my cell, and disarmed them.

It was actually pretty easy, as they thought I was dead. These are a superstitious bunch of people, so they probably thought I was a ghost or something, then I managed to get my hands on a transmitter and manged to send my coordinates to my handler. By that time, I had figured that the head of operations was probably a leak, and he had orchestrated this entire project, just to make one group very powerful, by making us put down their rivals, the handler was the only one I could trust. Long story short, she rescued me, with a bunch of American marines, and I was brought back to a hospital.

Since I was artificially genetically engineered, it wasn't too difficult to treat me, under intense care." He pauses for a moment. Then he resumes "Well, the head of operations was arrested soon after by my handler, and I filed for a discharge from the service. The handler supported my claim, she even threatened the governments by saying that she would leak all their misdeeds if they refused to comply, she actually set me up with the apartment and a nice monthly salary of sorts, which is just a 'keep quiet' money. I guess she probably felt guilty for having a hand in destroying my life turning it into absolute living hell"

He pauses again and heaves a sigh.

"You know, after all this, I still visited the head of operations in prison, since he was one of my instructors since childhood. I never understood why I did that but I did it anyways. It's just, what he told me has been bugging me ever since…. He told me that there was no other way. I was born a monster, and to even desire of going to a 'normal' life was a blasphemous idea for me, he told me monsters like me only bring death and suffering. It's just that I…..I…" his voice breaks off

"Nonsense." I cut him off. I am surprised at my own retort. I could feel my voice loud and strong; I could feel his pain, I could never imagine what he went through.

He is right. A "NORMAL" person, can't identify with him, but anyone, who heard him out will probably know who the true victim is. He looks up at me surprised. I could see his eyes, watery, he shouldn't have brought all of this up. These memories needed to be buried deep and forgotten, not relived

"You are no monster. That's for sure. Other people made you that way, you never had a choice did you ? If you even think for a moment that I am going to push you out of the house after hearing your story then I will hit you. You saved Souta, heck having you around, these past few days really helped us all, even Mom likes you, don't even dare to think, that you are the evil, you are the victim if anything" I shout out.

I feel enraged suddenly. I want to punish all the people who put him through this much suffering.

And I thought my life had problems.

"Sorry.. sorry.." he says, his voice forcefully holding back tears.

"Why are you apologising? Why do you always apologise Zura, even when you don't need to?" I ask.

"I never wanted to be a part of this…. I….I" his voice broke again

Suddenly, my body moves out of its own, I hug him hard. I feel that he needed it the most. Being brought up like that, a machine, a puppet, he needed something to connect to. I could feel him shaking against me as he cried, he was silent, but I could definitely feel the warmth of his tears on my shoulder.

I remembered him a few days ago, patting my head, when I needed it the most.

"There.. there.. It's probably not my place to say this, but you did good. You are free now"

POV Katsura

I didn't know what came over me, before this time, I have never cried in my life. It was a new feeling, something else entirely, before I knew what was happening, my eyes were blurry and before I could stop it seems something I had been holding back shattered free from its chains and before I knew it I was sobbing like a child on Hori sans shoulder, It took a while for me to calm down.

She listened to it all, and didn't throw me out. So…. it was a lie all along. Since my childhood, I had been told, that my job was to protect the "NORMAL" not be the "NORMAL" I was a puppet, nothing else. I guess even a puppet can change sometimes.

After I am done, we don't speak for a while, both of us just sit there unsure what to do. Finally, Hori san gets up and prepares some tea for the both of us. Soon Souta returns home, and we are all playing video games again. It was as if, nothing happened. Nothing changed. We still had our normal interactions. I guess it was her way of thanking me for being honest about my past.

A dam of lies, surrounding my soul had been broken and as Hori san put it, I was finally free. The ghost of Harry Freeman was still there but he is as much of a victim as I am.

I became part of the 'Normal' knowing I would die, and I did die. The lies and the darkness did. What remains after is probably the 'life' I will gain in exchange for my years of servitude. I guess if everything has a price and if my past was the price for a chance at a 'happy' life here, amongst such kind people, I am happy to pay for it.