Henry hoped in all honesty that it was Homer even if it sounded nothing like him. Instead it was a small yapping dog in a compound, playing with a boy child and jumping around with a hose of water. Henry watched them for a moment. A smile unconsciously came to his lips.“You wish he was yours, don’t you?” Henry was startled at the new sound. He turned towards it.It was an older man with a walking stick. Henry had never seen someone alive yet so close to death. Sure, there were plenty of those in the hospitals and sick centers, but this was different. This man seemed like he had so much life in him, yet his body could not assist with his brunt of this life force in him. Henry stuck his both hands in his pockets and looked him straight in the face.“Hi.”“Hello there,” the man tapped his walking stick. “You wish it was your dog, didn’t you?” He was referring back to the yapping dog that Henry had been staring at.“No, no I don’t. I have my own dog.” A dog that used to keep him sa

Henry gulped down his cup of coffee. He couldn’t remember how long he’d been there drinking the hideous thing, but he knew he would have to stop abusing the intake. Besides, the coffee powder was almost finished.He sighed as he left the kitchen and went to his bedroom to pick up his tablet. There were several important mails which he went through and gave his consent. Then something caught his attention in his mail box.“What the heck?” He muttered.He opened the email. There was one single word. Netherlands. There was no sender address, only a receiver address, which was it. The name brought a chill to him; this was the same word the old but not old man had said. Netherlands; the academy where he can find his power and system back. How had it ended up at his mail box? Who sent it? Why was it so creepy?“I should track this,” Henry said to himself.He went to his call logs and dialed Louis number. Louis picked on the first ring; his voice was breathless and rushed.“Mr. Henry, I was

Henry grabbed the man before he fell to his feet. He let him lean heavily on his body then took them both to the pavement so the man could sit on it. The man sat heavily on the pavement, still holding on to Henry for support. Henry glanced about to see if anyone had seen them; it would be catastrophic if someone had seen them. Already it looked as though Henry had triggered his reaction and still didn’t try to call the ambulance. He would have done that, since he wasn’t expecting the man’s triggering reaction, yet he couldn’t allow him to go so soon. He needed to find that information as fast as he could. There was not much time.“Listen to me,” Henry implored to the man. “Care you hear me? Can you see my face and the fingers I put out?” Henry held three fingers to his face.The man nodded slowly and coughed so he could speak. “Two.”Henry clamped down on his rising impatience and worry, “What do you mean ‘two’? There are three fingers up.”He nodded like he could understand but Henry

The lights were blinding. Henry instinctively closed his eyes back. He waited for a moment, then slowly opened it in every inch, allowing his eyes to get used to his environment. His memory took him back to when he had travelled realms just to get the pieces of his souls that were scattered about. The system had been brutal with him, but at least he needed it had helped him more. Henry did not believe that he would die easily with the system gone, the way the old man had. In fact, he knew the old man must have had other things about him, other reasons as to why he aged that fast.Henry would never know, since the man in question wasn’t there to answer his queries about his life. He even doubted that he lived a stable, emulative lifestyle. He probably just did things he wasn’t supposed to; because it felt odd that he had died that quickly. Did he break a law? Refuse countless tasks? Henry wouldn’t know, but now that he was here, he was certain that the absence of the system would never

WAS he really naked? Henry peered closer and saw that he was indeed naked, only that his privates were blurred. Blurred with what, exactly? He didn’t know, except that the man’s private looked empty and looked like skin. It seemed as if he was looking at a truly naked man without the organs to make one embarrassing.“This is weird,” the Chinese girl said. “Are you seeing what I’m seeing?”“The naked man but not naked man? Yes,” Henry said.“I thought it’s different for everyone, that people see things separately. Glad to see that this is not.”Henry glanced at her when she spoke. She really knew a lot of things that he would like to know too, but for the life of him he couldn’t fathom why she was being so defensive in sharing knowledge. Did she think she would survive on her own? Henry decided to move back a little, to distance himself. He would watch from this angle and try to ascertain what was going on. Other than that, he won’t disturb the girl again. Besides, if this thing were t