"You've gotta be kidding me!" Armani stood from the bed and stared at Nixxon.
Nixxon even felt like he was kidding himself, too; he was still trying to understand Neireda's mysterious message and the fact that he could now understand the human alphabet and words.
"Nixxon, look at me," Armani cleared his throat and placed a gentle hand on Nixxon's shoulders.
Nixxon slowly raised his head and looked at Armani, his eyes calm but curious.
"Okay, I need you to answer me honestly, yeah?" Armani asked.
Nixxon nodded. "Okay," he replied.
"Have you been playing us all along? Trust me, Vernon's going to be so mad if he discovered you've been shitting him. Have you been shitting us?" Armani was exasperated as he stared at Nixxon's confused face.
"You don't understand?" Armani rubbed his face in frustration.
Nixxon nodded. "Don't understand," He stated.
Armani was sure he was going to lose all his hair by the time Nixxon left Vernon's home; he'd never felt so stressed out his entire life.
"Okay, let's try it this way." Armani flipped the pages of the dictionary and pointed to a word.
"Here, this is what I mean, you understand it, right?" He questioned with furrowed brows.
"Trick? No. I don't trick you," Nixxon confirmed.
Armani sighed and took out his phone from his pocket. "Okay, it seems I can't handle your case alone. I'll have to let the doctor know," He said and started to pace the room, his phone placed beside his ear.
Nixxon watched Armani with interest, he wondered what Armani's reaction was called in the human language.
"Hello, Dr. Zee. Yes, it's about Nixxon... he suddenly started to read, huh? No, I'm not forcing him to remember all at once. Sure, I will. Thank you very much." He removed the phone from his ear and stared at Nixxon.
"You're a special case... interesting." He went back to sit beside Nixxon.
"I'm sorry for trying to force you to recall things; Zee said I should just continue to guide you until all your memories come back. I told him about your recent development, he said you're likely to heal faster than others, which is surprising. But it's okay; I'll help you every step of the way." he held Nixxon's hand.
Nixxon smiled, "Thank you."
Armani chuckled, "You're welcome. Tell me more about how it works. Do you now know every word and meaning, or can you now read and understand?" He wasted no time in flipping the dictionary, showing Nixxon the words 'read' and 'understand' respectively.
"Yes, read and understand," He replied.
Armani nodded. "Fine. Then it seems like my workload is reduced; you just have to... finish reading the whole dictionary... baby steps, of course. I'll do more of teaching you about everyday life and most importantly, how to walk," He said with a smile.
"Baby steps?" Nixxon stared up at Armani.
Armani chuckled, "Yeah, baby steps... it just means the process of your healing is going to be slow, messy, annoying, full of trial and error, but in the end, you'll be successful, just as babies eventually get to walk after so many falls," He calmly explained.
Nixxon watched Armani's eyes as he spoke. he couldn't understand all his words, but he could feel that Armani was giving him some words of encouragement, so he simply nodded.
"Thank you," He smiled back at Armani.
***
Three months later, Nixxon was walking beside Armani with a small book in his hand. He was glad he could draw once again; he loved drawing.
That morning, they were walking around Vernon's compound, enjoying the mix of modern architecture and the calming natural environments.
However, Nixxon was never allowed to go anywhere alone. His dream was to go to the Lake at the far corner of the large compound and have a nice, long swim, but Armani never let him go, reminding him that he was still a prisoner and wasn't allowed to walk freely.
He realized that even though he was out of water, he still craved it on his skin. The human shower did good with just watching off the dirt from his body, but he craved the deep cleansing of a much larger water body. He couldn't wait to be set free from here so he could go live freely and do whatever he wanted.
The past three months had been a little hard for him. Armani had taught him everything he needed to know as a human, he could now hold a proper conversation with anyone, even though it had been only he and Armani for the past months.
He hadn't seen Vernon since the day he found himself in his room, and he never asked about him. He was glad Vernon was gone; it let him have a glimpse of what a normal life would feel like.
His learning has been effortless, thanks to the mysterious locket Neireda gave him, he had come to realize that he could adapt quickly to things.
He had also come to understand the locket better; Neireda's message had also become clearer. The locket- he was still learning how to communicate with it, but so far, he understood that it helped him focus on things, understand them, and adapt; mostly with adaptation; he had only learned to walk for just three minutes before he surprised himself and Armani by taking control and walking by himself.
He wondered what else the locket could help him with, he was curious to see how far the locket would guide him in this new world, apart from helping him to understand and adapt; there had been nothing else it had proved to do, but he knew there was more, Neireda had told him so.
"Want to sit for a while?" Armani asked as they approached a large tree.
"Sure." Nixxon nodded.
Armani led them to the grey bench under the tree and lowered himself onto it.
Nixxon hesitated for a while before he joined Armani on the bench.
"So, why are we out here?" Nixxon questioned.
Armani sighed.
"You love nature, right? Yeah, so we're out here to enjoy the morning sun and listen to the birds." He replied.
Nixxon smiled, "It's beautiful. I'll draw." He said and slid a pencil out from his pocket.
Armani shifted away from him, he knew that Nixxon loved his privacy each time he was drawing his paintings, which he never let anyone see.
"What do you always draw?" Armani asked for the nth time.
Nixxon didn't reply, he focused on the book on his lap, the mouth of his pencil dragging gently along the white sheet.
"It's personal," Nixxon finally replied in a quiet voice.
Armani laughed, "I know."
He stared at Nixxon and wondered how he had learned so fast; he had thought walking would have been the hardest part of their mission, but it turned out nothing was too hard for Nixxon.
Nixxox had been so excited when he learned how to write, and Armani had wondered why he was so excited, but after he saw him start to draw something he couldn't understand, he realized that not only did his muscle memory in writing return, the drawing aspect recovered as well. Since then, Armani had been left to wonder what Nixxon always drew.
Armani immediately stood and walked away from Nixxon when a call came through his phone.
He didn't want Nixxon to hear what Damon had to say; to him, it would always be bad news.
"I understand," Armani responded to Damon, who was on the other side of the phone.
Vernon had returned.
As he answered the call from a distance, he stared at Nixxon with worry. He was worried for him, and now, he wished he'd told him about his worry the moment he started his learning journey, but it was too late now. He couldn't stop Nixxon's straightforwardness...Vernon was back; that attitude was going to be a huge problem.
Nixxon was politely rude without even knowing it, he was like a new teenager who hated you but would subtly show it in his actions and coated words. The difference was that the teenagers did it to spite you while Nixxon did it because, well... he was Nixxon; that was who he was.
Vernon had asked for Nixxon, but Armani was scared for his life and Nixxon's life. Vernon might as well kill them when he realized that Nixxon still maintained his stand on not knowing who Raja was.
He walked back to Nixxon and cleared his throat, clasping his hands together.
Nixxon closed his drawing book and looked up at Armani. "You have something to say," He stated.
"Um, yeah. Vernon's back; he's asking for you," Armani informed.
Nixxon's heart flipped a hundred times in his chest; his fingers dug into the corner of his book. Memories of the last time he saw Vernon crawled right back into his head; he felt the cold chill seep back into his bones; he had forced himself not to think about it all this time, but, now, the devil was back, and he was asking for him.