Moving to a different building right before the pandemic hit had been strange. X knew no one in his immediate surroundings. His college reopening was the break from monotony he had been desperately waiting for. In his excitement, he ended up turning the living room into a temporary bag packing area.
His peace was interrupted by three loud knocks at the door.
‘Open up!’
X jumped, dropping the small backpack he had been holding. He wasn’t expecting such an aggressive demand at 4 PM.
The voice sounded gruff and increasingly frustrated. ‘I’m going to have to break the door!’
X moved to the window, trying to get a glimpse of who this aggressive interloper was. He was met by the strange sight of an individual in a trench coat and a full-faced, heavily stylised Venetian plague mask. X retreated slowly, hoping they hadn’t seen him.
CRASH!
X watched in abject horror as his door was flung open and the person stepped into the room, taking in the sight before them.
‘What’s going on?’ X asked, voice shaking slightly.
‘You wouldn’t open the door.’ His visitor seemed completely nonchalant about what had just happened.
X couldn’t think of what he had done to receive such an aggressive houseguest. ‘What are you here for, sir?’
‘Oh, yes.’ He straightened up, adjusted his mask and began speaking in a sharp tone.
‘Right, I’ve caught you.’ He nodded towards the two suitcases on the floor. ‘I know what you’re trying to do.’
X felt very confused. ‘I’m sorry, I think you have presumed something wrong. I’m just packing for college.’
‘Just packing for college?’ He crossed the room and bent down, inspecting the contents of the open suitcase. ‘Everyone knows what people mean when they say they’re just packing for college.’ He picked up a sheet of pills. ‘What’s this for, huh?’
X was carrying some basic medicines in his bag, like cough syrup, antibiotics, and antacids. He also had a tube of mosquito repellent. He knew he had to take all personalised toiletries and medications as they may not be available in Pilani.
‘Those are my allergy meds, I thought I might struggle to find things like that on campus or at the general store, Akshay. Other things like a mattress, a bucket, and a broom I can just buy there.’
‘A-ha!’ X startled again as his companion whirled around and pointed at him. ‘Why do you need cleaning supplies then? I don’t suppose you’ll be taking air freshener too?’
‘No, nothing like that!’ X clarified. ‘Just basic cleaning supplies cause I’ll be living there and will have to maintain my room.’
The guy looked back into the suitcase. ‘Well, I don’t see any clothes in this bag, if you’re maintaining this living-there charade.’
‘Uh,’ X stammered, unsure how far this interrogation was going to go. ‘I wasn’t done packing when you came in.’ He gestures to the larger, closed suitcase. ‘Most of my clothes are in that.’
Immediately, the intruder made for the other suitcase, stumbling and nearly tripping over a pair of running shoes along the way. X spotted that the man himself was wearing tall platform boots; he was probably about three inches shorter than he appeared.
He began searching through the second bag, pulling out the heavier scarves, sweaters, and thermals in the process. Eventually he found a pack of ten masks and waved it questioningly in the air.
‘Why do you need so many?’
X rocked onto his heels, stuffing his hands into his pockets. ‘Doesn’t hurt to be prepared.’
‘And this?’ The guy had found his spare pair of glasses.
X sighed. ‘It’s hard to get prescription glasses there, so I’m taking an extra pair as a backup.’
He humphed as he resumed rummaging through X’s things. X was feeling less tense and more annoyed at this person now.
He triumphantly pulled out a bunch of cables. ‘What’s this? A surveillance system?’
X couldn’t fathom why anyone would think that. He was taking chargers for his devices, an extension board, and surge protector. It was quite obvious that these things weren’t any sort of surveillance system. Was this all some sort of joke? And why a surveillance system in Pilani? The place was overrun with birds anyway.
‘No, it isn’t. They’re just some necessities as I’ve heard the power there can be choppy. Oh and—’ X watched his reaction to his words carefully. He was half convinced he was being messed with. ‘I’m taking a calculator too, before you start making a big deal out of that.’
He sniffed, then looked back into the bag and found a set of locks in it. He removed them and examined them carefully. ‘What are these for? Awfully sturdy for someone just packing for college.’
‘Are you really questioning why I would carry sturdy locks? I want to protect my stuff from random people like you!’ X was done playing along with this charade. ‘Who are you, anyway?’
‘Uh, irrelevant.’
‘I just want to know why you decided to barge in here and question me about all my stuff.’
‘Well,’ his voice sounded much meeker than before. ‘I got a tip that you were packing things out of this room.’
‘Yeah, for college. Who gave you this tip?’
‘Fine! No one did!’ He finally cracked, the words spilling out of his mouth rapid fire. ‘I just didn’t know what I should take when I go to Pilani so I pretended to be doing a sweep!’
X was astounded. He had never heard of people inventing plots like this for such a purpose. It still didn’t explain the outfit. ‘Caught red-handed. You know you could have just asked, right?’
He hung his head. The beaked plague mask made it a comical sight. ‘It felt weird to.’
‘And it’s less weird to storm into my room and go through all my things?’
He didn’t respond, just kept tapping his heel on the floor rapidly. X decided that he had had enough of the bizarre encounter.
‘If you really wanted help packing,’ X glanced ruefully at the state of his previously well-packed bag. ‘I think we covered everything through your sweep. Just remember to take your NOC, negative RT-PCR test, vaccination certificate, and your identification documents for verification, as well as some passport-size photos… Who are you, anyway?’
His uninvited investigator didn’t seem inclined to answer. ‘As I said before, irrelevant. I’m just a free spirit.’
‘Why the plague mask?’
‘Why not a plague mask?’
***
‘KANG!’
The creature hurried to join its companion. ‘Yes?’
Kodos’s third and fifth eyes were spinning rapidly; it was visibly annoyed. ‘They are wearing plague masks again. Test Subject 00B1 proposed that the reason for this is that there is no reason not to wear those masks.’
Kang stiffened its external ears in concentration. ‘Not the outcome we desired.’
Kodos’s skin turned pale in agreement. ‘Subject 00A3 did not even try to dissuade 00B1 from its choice of facial covering. Perhaps an airborne virus is not an effective pathogen. Shall we re-evaluate with a different approach?’
‘No, let’s not be hasty with changing the virus.’ Kang began typing on the console. ‘We could make a smaller change, maybe in the groups of people being taken to their educational institute. Homo sapiens are very sensitive to minute changes.’
It finished typing and glanced at Kodos for confirmation. ‘Rewind?’
‘Rewind.’
***
‘Open up!’
X jumped, dropping the small backpack he had been holding. He wasn’t expecting…