General Systrofi

“Do you think acting dumb and pretending like you don’t know anything will save you Mark?”

“I’m not acting dumb; I really don’t know anything”

“Why did you agree to come with us if you didn’t do it?”

“I – I don’t know, you guys never really gave me an option, I had no room for refusing”

“That’s nonsense! You could have”

“Have you seen the two of you?”

“Just tell us where you hid it and we’ll let you go Mark, I promise”

“Hid what?”

“The world is counting on what you helped those guys take”

Silence.

“What exactly is the thing that you guys think I took?”

“We don’t have time for your games Mark”

-

The day before

Mark woke up feeling tired, too tired to even follow his daily routine; “This is going to be an interesting Friday” he said as he opened the bedroom curtains and looked out to the street. It was silent. He enjoyed that, he enjoyed waking up early during the week, before the town got into the buzz of things… He walked over to his bed and began fluffing out his pillows and making his bed. Suddenly a bird hit the window and that sent him to the bed, in a fetal position; “What the hell was that?” he said as he peeked at the window. A while after that bad experience, he got ready for work and left the house. He noticed as he was driving to work that a certain car seemed to be tailing him, he couldn’t take another way to work because he was so used to this routine, if he took another routine – it would probably lead him to being late for work and he was always on time. He drove on until he got to work and once he made it past the security gate, a huge feeling of relief came over him.

Later on, when Mark got home, he took the casual clothing he had lay on his bed in the morning and put them on. He looked in the mirror and sighed; “I hate office parties” he said, “Oh and it’s compulsory Mark” he said as if mimicking someone else. He grabbed his car keys and made his way to the office. As soon as he got there, he felt the need to up and leave. He saw his usual colleagues, the staff from the other plants and the executives of course. He noticed to men who wore the same grey suits; “Really? That is just so high school… matching outfits?” he murmured as he laughed. One of his colleagues came up to him;

“Hey Mark, thought you wouldn’t pitch”

“Yeah, well it’s compulsory”

“That’s true…”

There was silence between the two of them. Mark hated this, the small talk and awkward pauses in between the conversations. He nodded his head and threw out a fake yet slightly casual smile.

“Do you ever feel like you’re being watched?” his colleague asked

“Uh, sometimes… but it’s just paranoia I guess” Mark said as he sipped his glass of punch

“Are crazy people really crazy?”

“Uh, yeah – probably”

“Maybe they are enlightened and because we are sheep and believe in the majority – we therefore coin it as crazy”

“That’s plausible” Mark said as he rolled his eyes

“This punch is nice isn’t it? I’m getting a little tipsy though”

“Uh, I’m having the virgin punch. I don’t drink alcohol”

“You say ‘uh’ a lot”

“Uh, yeah… habit I guess”

“Let me go to the bathroom” his colleague said as he made his way to another crowd of people. Mark didn’t entertain small talk which often led to people often ignoring him or not approaching him a lot. He looked around and noticed that the two men in grey suits were staring at him, dead in the eye. He grinned, lifted his cup to the air and looked away; “What the hell? This is why I hate these things” he said as he walked towards the snack table.

-

“You won’t be in any trouble if you just tell us what we need to know”

“I can’t do that if I don’t know what it is that you need to know”

“What I’m wondering is how you did it”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re just a plain, simple man with a very typical routine. How did you do it Mark? Who helped you?”

“So ‘plain simple’ guys can’t do such?”

“So, you’re admitting to it”

“I’m not admitting to anything… It’s a question”

“Just tell us what we ne-“ the man is interrupted by Mark

“Need to know, that’s all you’ve been saying. And I’ll say it again, I don’t know what you need to know… matter of fact, I too need to know what you need to know”

“That makes no sense”

“This whole situation doesn’t make sense. Please, just let me go. I promise I won’t tell anyone that you two messed up and actually kidnapped the wrong guy”

“You’re the person we should be looking at. You, Mark Holiday”

-

Morning

Mark woke up feeling gloomy, his head was pounding from the day before – from the office party he had attended. He didn’t want to go, he just wanted to sit, and binge watch his favorite series with a bowl of sea salted popcorn, a full plate of vegan nachos and his spritzer water. He did not want to be around his colleagues the whole day; making small talk and hoping that no one pries into his life. The party went on right up until he spewed out most of the virgin cocktails in the stalls and couldn’t take the sight of everyone there.

He made a strong cup of coffee with no creamer and two heaped spoons of honey and put his dishes in the dishwasher. He opened the fridge and realized that he had no food; “Ugh, I really need to go get some groceries” he said as he shut the fridge door closed. He sat on the couch and enjoyed that first sip of Peru imported beans. The room was so silent that all you could hear were the occasional sips and the fridge running. An alarm went off on his phone and he stood up to disarm it, he walked to the bathroom and brushed his teeth, on the vanity there was a rose gold bracelet – which clearly belonged to a woman. He grabbed it and smiled – a smile that faded quickly. “I mean, she did say that I was boring… well not boring per se but a person who doesn’t break out of routine” he said as he gargled some water. He rinsed his face and watered the plants in the bathroom before stepping into the shower.

A few hours later, he got in his car and headed down to the market. He enjoyed shopping at the local market, whether for; fresh produce, Ms McComb’s homemade honey or Jerry’s Vegan meals. As he was scoping through the vegetables, he noticed one guy from the office party – the one who was in the same suit with the other guy whose name he also didn’t catch. He was shocked at the fact that the guy was wearing the same ugly grey suit from the previous night, he brushed it off as he walked over to the guy;

“Hey, saw you last night at the office party”

“Nope” the guy said as he tossed oranges around

“Are you sure? I don’t forget faces”

“So, what are you saying? That I’m blind”

Mark couldn’t help but let out a laugh, that was such a childish comeback he thought. Mark turned around and as he was about to walk away, the guy placed his hand on Mark’s shoulder and said, “I’ll see you sometime around Mark Holiday” and walked away. Mark was startled by that; he didn’t expect that. As he approached the fish tanks, he noticed the second guy from the party, the second guy with the suit. He looked back, looking for the other guy and he just smiled and continued looking for red snapper fish. The second guy walked past Mark and shoved him, Mark looked at him and the guy said, “We’re watching you” as he continued pretending to glance at the fresh produce. Mark grabbed the fish, paid the seller and made his way to the car. He kept looking back while frantically looking for his car keys. He couldn’t find them. He stood dead in his tracks and began panicking, patting himself vigorously and looking through his recycled shopping bag.

“Are you looking for these?” a voice from behind him said. He knew that voice, it sounded like the voice he just encountered. He slowly turned back and saw the first guy holding his car keys,

“Is this a joke or something”

“Or something” the guy said

The second guy approached him and as he was slowly moving back "Come with us,” the two burly men in the grey suits say, grabbing Mark by the arm and handcuffing him. “You know what you did.” But he had no idea.

-

“You guys have been stalking me and you finally dragged me to this isolated area just to blame me for something I didn’t do?”

“You keep denying your involvement in all of this Mark, just give us what we want”

“Let’s say I do give you guys whatever it is you think I took, what then? Will you guys let me go?”

“Something like that”

“No – nope. No way. That’s not even hinting assurance” Mark said as held his head and began to sob

“Are you crying?”

“I’m really tired and hungry – the last time I ate was before you two thugs snatched me”

“Thugs? Do we look like thugs?”

“Well… thuggish I guess – who are you guys even? What? Cops?”

“We don’t owe you an explanation and we’re part of an elite group of investigation gurus”

“Telling me the explanation defeats the purpose of initially telling me that you don’t owe me an explanation”

The door opened slightly, and all Mark could see was a hand holding a brown bag. He tried to stretch his upper body to looking behind the door but was held back by the restraints on his feet.

“Here you go” one of the guys said as he tossed to the bag to Mark, “Eat up and rest, we’ll continue this tomorrow”

“Wait where should I rest?” he asked but was only answered by a slammed door.

-

Mark woke up with so much pain on his neck. He couldn’t believe that he actually slept on a chair and table like a high school child not interested in what the teacher had to say. He saw a cup of coffee on the table with a vegan sandwich beside it. He grabbed the food and nibbled on it while looking around, looking for a possible way out. He saw a pen and paper of the far end of the table and he shook his head in disbelief; this was really happening to him. Once done eating, he looked around the four by four-inch room again, hoping to see something distinct, something that would probably assist him in getting away. He followed the one cable in the room and noticed that it led to the right-side corner of the room – this couldn’t be random. He then looked at the steel wall in front of him and noticed that the shimmer on it was different, it looked like it was chipping. He looked closely and noticed that it wasn’t steel, it looked like paper; “wallpaper” he uttered underneath his breath, “that’s where they are standing, that’s where they are looking” he continued. There were no cameras in the room and that made Mark wonder, how were these people seeing him? He had now figured it out. He scratched his head and began laughing, he didn’t know why he was laughing but he just was.

The door swung open and the two men came storming in. There was silence, the two men looked Mark in the eyes, and he couldn’t help but laugh.

“Paranoia already” the one guy said

“What do you mean? I’ve only been in here for a day” Mark said as he continued laughing

The two men giggled, clearly laughing at Mark. “You’ve been in here for a week now Mark, but you’ll be out soon – if you just give us the location of the SD Card”

“A week? That’s impossible” he said as he looked at the bruising on his legs caused by the restrains

“Just tell us”

“Which part of I don’t know can you guys not understand?”

“Those pictures that were took may lead us to saving the world Mark”

“I don’t know” Mark said as he banged his hands on the desk

“Well then, we don’t need you anymore”

“You have been wasting your time, you’ve never needed me” he said as he laughed

“Well, goodbye”

“Wait, where are you taking me?”

“Where you belong”

“Where do I belong?”

“We know you’ve been trying to hide it; we know you’re him. You created a whole new identity which led us to believe that you witnessed the attack but no… you’re him, you’re the one who orchestrated the whole attack. We know it’s you”

“You guys have got it all wrong, again”

“We found the real Mark Holiday… and he’s in a shallow grave”