The Blind Victim

It was last fall that I first realized my peculiar aptitude which led me to a life of darkness. This ability was like no others that were shown on television although no one watches them now. Still, I enjoy watching them. It makes me feel related and linked to others around. The laughter and all the talking inside the little box brings me to the place inside. I can't remember how long it has been since I’ve talked to a real person. Of course I can just walk out my place and talk to the puppets wandering outside. Those puppets are so messed up. I think they are real, like living things, and I really would like to talk to them. But it has become impossible to do that. My apartment is hidden, like a car key that you lose and can never find. Actually, it is not the apartment; of course it is not its fault. It is mine. No one can visit my place except for me, probably because of my ‘peculiar aptitude’. So, let me talk about this ability I have.

About a year ago, about last fall, I was enjoying my day unlike other boring days. I shifted my work and planned to give myself a little break. It was my 25th birthday. I was walking by the streets like an airplane trying to reach its destination. I couldn’t hide my smile on my face because it was right after I received a gift from the company ‘sight’ for the celebration of the birth. The brand new bionic eye B-10. Yes, we all work for the company ‘Sight’. It is the only company that exists today. They cover every quality of life and no one disrespects them. We like what they do and we are quite satisfied with the bionic eye that they provide. You see, we cannot see without the bionic eye. After the explosion of the nuclear power plant in Europe ten years ago, human eye were no longer able to survive in the deathly chemical that flew around in the atmosphere. Anyway, back to my story, I could not wait a second to wear them on. I took off my old bionic eye which looked like an old potato and replaced it with the B-10. At first my eye felt a little soar but it usually took some time until I got used to new bionic eye. However, there was something quite peculiar about what I was seeing. I could not believe what I saw. I was seeing illusions, but those illusions seemed so real that I even tried to talk to them. Of course no illusion reacted to my call. They were just living puppets. Suddenly, something fell from the sky.

“tick”

I felt a tiny poke on my forearm. It was water. A drip of water hit my arm. Suddenly the tiny drop brought thousands of its friends to kill me. It was like needles falling from sky. My head was spinning like a merry-go-round and my guts started to stumble. There was no use of trying to flee all the falling knives. I stood there and bared them as if I was waiting for a decapitation. But nothing happened. In fact, I remembered.

‘The rain’

It was the rain. I did not know how I remembered but it just swifted through my head, the ‘rain’. It was just so familiar, yet I have forgotten that word and its meaning for a long time. The weird thing was that no one tried to take shelter from the rain. They did not even realize the rain. A man dressed up in a black suit walked by me. I asked,

“Hey, don’t you see the rain? do you have an umbrella?”

I did not even remember how I’ve came up with the word ‘umbrella’.

“wah..t? ran? Rain? what are you talking about? What’s an umbrella anyway?”

The man with the black suit looked at me as if I were a criminal.

“ you don’t see this? This.. falling from sky?

“I have no idea what you are talking about right now never heard of it”

The man walked passed and gave me a suspicious glance.

Suddenly, a string of yellow light emerged from the sky with the sound of a tiger growling.

“grrrrr”

The sound scratched my ears and I am pretty sure my ear bled.

“peoples!, are you all seeing this? I… I cannot believe my eyes!”

All the walking people stood still and stared at me. A woman in a red coat shouted.

“ I see nothing. What an earth are you talking about?”

All the people continued to walk to wherever they were heading. In a second, another thought hit my head. ‘The thunder’, I remembered. It was the thunder. I also realized a white muscular lump flying in the air. It was the cloud. At that point I was quite confused about everything. No one saw what I saw but those allusions were definitely familiar and of course, I remembered its names. Another loud sound occurred.

“grrrrrrrrrr”

It was another thunder. Strangely, I was so captured by the moment of the sky. I somewhat thought that I was supposed to be scared of the yellow light, but I was not. The thunder was a colorful laser light and the sound of it was like a fanfare that welcomed me. ‘What could this be?’ I thought. ‘Probably just a simple illusion.. but what about those puppets?.. they seem so real… the rain…I still feel it…’

“tick, tick,tick…”

The rain drops got heavier and it was even quite difficult to open my eyes because of the water entering . I ran back to my apartment. I flet dizzy, it was cold, and I went straight to bed, thinking about all the things happened that day.

And here I am, locked up in my old apartment like a prisoner. After that night, I tried to figure out the mysteries that I’ve seen. I asked all the workers at ‘sight’ if they had seen what I saw but no one had the answers that I expected. Instead, I got fired from my work. Apparently, my ‘mental disorder’ was ruining the atmosphere at ‘sight’. No one tried to talk to me and everyone avoided me. I have become a wickedness of the society.

“Ding”

It was the bell. I was so shocked how anyone could actually ring the bell of my apartment. ‘The person must’ve been mad’.

I sneaked slowly towards the door and shouted,

“who’s there?”

“Is this Mr. Raymond’s house?”

It was a voice of a woman and I could feel her urgency’.

“yes...I mean.. yes! This is him!”

“well.. Than.. do you mind opening the door?”

I was half welcoming and at the same time, a little scared at this unknown woman. I opened the door with cautiousness.

“Hi there”

I spoke gently.

“Hello. My name is Celine”

The woman was about five feet tall, with blond hair and beautiful blue eyes, eyes that I’ve never seen before. Her eyes, definitely, captivated my whole mind.

“Come on in, welcome, I wasn’t expecting a guest today”

It was quite embarrassing to show her the house. The house was a complete mess.

“So, Celine, what brings you here today?”

“Well, I’am here to talk about your eye”

“My eye?”

I answered in surprise.

“I mean, your bionic eye, have you been seeing things unreal lately? something peculiar, that no one sees?”

She was exactly right. I had goose bumps all over my arm. She knew what I was seeing. She knew about the illusions.

“Yes, I have been seeing a lot of things lately. These people don’t realize anything, although something familiar started to emerge from the sky.”

“You mean.. the rain?, the clouds?”

My heartbeat stopped. Then it suddenly started to beat faster and faster. The red fist inside my heart punched me from the inside and it startled me. The woman also saw illusions!

“How.. how did you know? I thought.. I wa..

“You thought you were the only one?, no, of course, there are countless people in the world just like us. Raymond, could you please take off your bionic eye?”

I wondered, what if this woman is lying?, what if she was from ‘Sight’?, trying to monitor me? But still, my hands were automatically headed to my eye as if there were some magnetic force, because than I realized that Celine was wearing nothing on her eye. Nothing technical, it was just her naked eye.

“pshhhhhh”

A smoke puffed from the b-10 right after I took it off.

“Yes, of course yours is also malfunctioning”. Celine said.

It was true. B-10 was not working at all. The strange thing was, I still had my vision without the bionic eye.

“pretty neat, huh?” Celine laughed.

“yeah.. how.. could this happen?”

“well, to tell you the real story, we were all being controlled, by ‘Sight’. Those jerks.”

“controlled? I.. I do not follow you” I asked back.

“umm… where should I start. You see, those bionic eyes were not just equipment that allowed us to see. In fact, that piece of garbage controlled our whole system. Our mind, our memory, and even what we see, it was all made-up fake story by ‘Sight’. The day you got your B-10, it was already broken and that is how you’ve got your memory and sight back. The illusion you saw, there are no illusions, they are real!”

I felt as if a metal ball hit my head. I was a man like a kid who was riding a rollercoaster for the first time. It was the real world. The world that hid from everyone’s sight was lying upon me. Although I have been seeing the same thing for a year but this was different. Now I’ve realized that those illusions were actually real, I was dreaming no more.

“ but.. Celine, those people out there are still being controlled, aren’t they?”

“yes, of course, or we never know, some might be seeing the truth, and that is the reason why I’ve come to see you. We’ve got to change them, we have to free them from chains and let them see the real world!”

My blood was up. It was getting hotter and hotter. I should have been scared but I wasn’t. My feet were already heading for the door. I finally found the key to open my doors outside. Ittook me a second to reach to door while usually it seemed to the longest hallway”.

“Squeak”

I twisted the doorknob and let myself out. The warmth hugged my whole body and the air kissed my face. It was so bright, that I could not open my eyes. I closed my eyes. It was dark. I was in a dark cave. I closed my eyes again. Suddenly, the dark cave disappeared into a room of oblivion and a bright sky stretched out inside my eyelid. I was brought to another world. The sky over my head became cloudy and it turned into a feast of strong color that I’ve never imagined before. I saw a lot of colors. All of them were new areas that I missed from the spectrum. All of a sudden, all the colors formed a mosaic and it shattered away. But one, there was this one color that only became larger and louder. The color spat out the heat and it filled the whole world I saw. I opened my eyes. It was the sun, emerging endlessly up to the sky. Celine and I started to walk by the pathway created by the light of the sun. We will

never stop, just like the sun