Chapter 5 – Chisoutsa: The City of Demons

Each photo and picture lay on the table when Charles Thompson and the Professor guessed worked the whereabouts of the missing man. They had been researching the man who knows Chisoutsa’s past for the night. Cups of coffee have been drunk in veil as Charles pointed at one photo.

          “This guy could be anywhere. All we have is pictures of this six foot tall giant man. Where do you think he’s hiding?” Charles asked Professor Walken.

The Professor paused for a moment and moved a few photos together. His thoughts were fixed on the photos and piecing the puzzle together.

          “I don’t think he lives in a house, I think he lives in an old building somewhere. He isn’t looking after himself very well if you see the way he has been dressing. You see here he’s a loner so he possibly doesn’t know many people,” Professor Walken said.

          “There’s an old torn building near there, the rooftop might be your best bet for finding him,” Charles suggested.

The Professor rubbed his chin and took some papers from the table and looked at Charles.

          “I’ll go and see him, if he’s there. You stay here with Chisoutsa. Don’t tell her where I’m going. This will be an interesting time tonight,” the professor said to him.

          “Well Jonathan you better be on your toes. You don’t know what this guy could be like if someone disturbs him.”

          “Yes I know. It’s not the first time I’ve disturbed people in the dark,” the professor answered.

He left the room and Charles was left to study the photos by himself.

 

It was some time for the Professor to drive to the right location so he could walk from there to the run down building in the ally ways. Black cars kept driving around the area where some Kaiser Unit men were watching the professor. He turned the corner and nearly walked into another man.   A large overweight man carrying food boxes smiled at him. It was Tyrell.

          “Hey I know you,” he said to the professor.

          “Know you now, from where?”

          “You’re the friend of Chisoutsa. She comes around my grill and bar sometimes to chat. Yeah the mentor. What you doing here?” asked Tyrell.

          “Oh, interesting to hear. She didn’t tell me that. I’m on a secret business,” the professor answered.

          “Don’t worry I hear the same stuff from Chisoutsa. Just a word from me, watch out for the uniform goons and there’s a man up on the rooftop. Not sure if he’s friendly or not,” Tyrell said.

          “You seem to know a lot about things,” the professor said interested in him.

          “Yeah that’s Chisoutsa says too,” giggled Tyrell.

Tyrell nodded his head and moved on up the street towards his store. The professor walked into the ally way and saw the stairs leading to the top.

          “Always stairs but not the lift for us crippled people,” he murmured.

He started to climb the stairs taking each step at a time. The higher he went the darker it became. The stairs made a noise and become louder when he heard something else. He quickly run up the stairs with his cane as pain showed on his face. He came to a room where four Kaiser Unit men held guns towards a broken door way. The professor watched on when they started shooting at a figure in the distance. The shadow figure appeared and disappeared up to the roof top. The Kaiser Unit men followed and the professor kept up with them. The trained guards fired bullets at the figure and it came up to one and grab one by the neck and smashed him against a table. The guard fell dead and took the gun and fired back at the guard’s heads and two more fell down.

 

The professor watched on where the figure took the last guard and held him up.  He saw some storm lightening in the background and he took out a photo of the masked man. He looked back at the pair and watched the man grab the shoulder blade of the guard and ripped the arm off. The professor fell backwards and a bolt of lighting smashed the rooftop with blood pouring the ground and the body fell to the ground.

          “What is it?” the professor cried.

The figure then took all the bodies and threw them out the building down to the ground on the other side of the ally ways. He then looked at his shirt and tossed his head and ripped it off and threw it down. The professor appeared from his hiding spot from the stairs and spoke out to the man.     

          “Hello there may I talk to you?” he called out into the darkness.

Three lamp lights switched on and the figure appeared in front of the professor. The old mentor was standing strong and eyeing him.

The man had blonde messy hair and his muscle chest wider then the doorway. His arms and legs were as large as machine guns and had a long shorts and bare foot. The rooftop was messy and had food cans, clothes and blood covering the floor.

          “Who are you?” the man asked.

          “I have looking for someone like you. Someone who can help me with my search on the past. My name is Professor Jonathan Walken Do you have a name?” the professor asked.

The man pushed a lounge and chair over to him and he grabbed himself a large cigar and lit it. He lay over the lounge and some of his behavior touched the professor. It reminded him of Chisoutsa a lot. Was he like her in some way? He drew back the cigar and the professor watched the smoke burn go back. He drew the whole cigar in one puff. He closed his eyes and blew it out in a large bubble of smoke around him.

          “My name is Jiko and I live here by myself. Not much but I like it here,” Jiko the figure answered.

          “I’m looking for information about the past of the businesses. About their projects,” Professor Walken said.

Jiko looked down and said up and walked over to the edge of the building with broken glassed window in front of him. The professor’s head turned to the window and Jiko.

          “Do you know the girl Chisoutsa?” he asked Jiko.

At the window a quiet and worried Jiko played with the broken glass with the professor in the background watching him.

          “You know her don’t you? You know who she was and what happened to her,” Professor Walken said.

          “Yeah I do. It feels so long ago when we last met in the hyper camp. I thought she died,” Jiko said looking at the window.

          “No she didn’t die. I found her dumped in the allies when she was 16. She was very special in unnatural ways,” the professor said.

Jiko turned around and the professor watched him, “Chisoutsa and I weren’t the only ones in the hyper camp. There were about twenty of us I think.”

          “What was the hyper camp?” the professor asked.

          “It was a camp for young children with special abilities. They did all of these testing on us,” said Jiko confused.

 

The professor watched Jiko for a while and it seemed that Jiko had a scattered memory of things in his past. He was better then Chisoutsa who has no memory what so ever. The professor leaned forward to Jiko who was back on the lounge and wanted to pull out more of the hyper camp.

          “What type of testing,” he asked him.

          “We took a lot of drugs and needles from nurses. We also went through the DNA chamber,” Jiko answered.

          “What’s the DNA chamber,” asked the professor concerned.

Jiko was quiet again and stared off into space for a moment. He was thinking of the past. Of his time in the hyper camp.

          “That was when I first met her,” he said after the silence.

          “Was she in the DNA chamber?” the professor asked him.

Jiko ignored him and thought about the time.

          “She was beautiful back then. So young and so fair,” he said.

          “What happened to the project?” Professor Walken asked.

Jiko snapped out of his thoughts and turned back to the professor.

          “I was rejected. I wasn’t good enough for him.”

          “Why were you rejected? I saw you rip an arm off a man. How could you not fail,” Walken asked amazed.

          “There was a problem with me and they couldn’t fix it,” Jiko answered.

          “What was that?”

Jiko looked up and looked at the professor in the eye, “I had a heart.”

The professor leaned back and tried to take in all the past of the hyper camp.

          “And that wasn’t good enough for them?”

          “It wasn’t good enough for him,” Jiko answered.

          “Who is him?” the professor asked.

Jiko paused again and stared into space. The coldness of being on the rooftop was getting to the professor as he rugged up to his jacket.

          “He was our father. Our giver. He gave us everything,” he answered blankly.

The professor started to ask more questions but Jiko was wandering in shadows. His hand moved towards the professor and he grabbed his hand. It started to glow light aqua blue.

“Look inside me Professor, see through my eyes, let the pain of my past and the mystery of Chisoutsa be revealed,” he spoke ghostly to him.

 Their minds disappeared from time and space. It appeared again in another time and place where the heart of the City of Demons lay and when he was young.

 

It was white. Covered with many rooms and beds and training rooms. Young children to late teenagers lived in the hyper camp as it was called. Jiko was found in a training room when he was fifth teen. One doctor and a couple nurses were assisting him with Jiko. Jiko was only dressed in his underwear as part of his testing to check on his progress.

          “Five foot eight, weighting ninety seven kilos and ninety five percent muscle. This is looking promising. Continue the food diet and the heavy training,” the doctor said.

Jiko put on his long jeans and fronted out of the room as another young man was pushed in.

He walked past a few people until he came to a meeting room with a group of doctors. An oval shaped table was set with papers and profiles of the people who trained here.

          “We must continue to remove weaknesses from the teenagers. They are super fit but some of them worry about their missions and tests. What should we do?” asked one doctor.

          “Just reject the ones who were rubbish and keep the good ones. The hyper camp has enough people for work to begin,” answered another doctor.

          “Don’t worry our special one will be the perfect model for us,” said the main doctor at the front of the table.

Everyone smiled at each other and Jiko looked away from the room door and wondered what the special project was.  He walked towards a number of smaller rooms and down the stairs to a lower level. The white lights turned green as he approached a small and creepy room at the end of hallway. The large steel door blocked his way and he wanted to see inside. He smashed the window sector where the key went in. He started to pull the door off and his muscles flexed, some strain showed in his face and the door pull apart. He carried the door under his arm and walked in and dropped it on the ground. There he saw the DNA chamber and a flash of eyes moved of Jiko and then the professor watching and thinking.   

 

He looked inside the DNA chamber box and for a moment saw a young girl inside. So innocent and native. So young and so fair. She lay in the chamber and Jiko just knew she was the special one that the hyper camp was working on. He moved his hand over the chamber box closed his eyes in sadness. Why would they cage her at an age like that? He always wondered why they were made for. He looked over to the side panel which called the project Chisoutsa. He punched in a few keys on the chamber and the door side open. He pulled himself up by his arms to look at the girl. She started to wake and looked at Jiko.

          “My name is Jiko, do you know who you are?” he asked her.

She looked quiet and blank. She didn’t have anything to say.

          “Do you have any parents? I have some but the doctors won’t allow me to visit them,” Jiko said.

          “What is a parent?” she asked him.

The professor lowered his head in grief watching the images and Jiko moved his hand over her head.

          “I don’t know but they tell me they are care takers,” he answered.

She turned away and closed her eyes and Jiko closed the lid of the DNA chamber.

 

The professor’s thoughts were wild. Chisoutsa was the special project, but for what and for who? Who was their father of the hyper team? Jiko voice came over the image of Jiko walking down the hallway by himself.

          “She was special for a reason but only dear father knew. Only he knew why Chisoutsa was his special girl.”

Jiko turned the corner and froze in his spot. In the distance was a figure in a blue shirt and white jeans.

          “Father,” he whispered.

The professor face changed to confusion. The father was only in his early twenties. How could he be their father? Was he really their father was he their creator? He walked up to Jiko and smiled at him.

          “Jiko, how are you?” he asked.

          “Good, my training is very good father,” Jiko answered him.

          “How much can you lift?” he asked.

          “About 180 kilos,” he answered.

          “You are improving. But remember as I have told you before. Your heart is not wanted here. It will tell you lies. It will lead you off the road of glory success here,” the father answered.

Jiko nodded at him and the father walked with him until they came to his room. The father nodded at him and walked into a room and closed the door.

The father appeared over a late aged teenager girl. She was dressed in her underwear after her checking with the nurses.

          “Are you going to check me out now,” she smiled at him.

          “Sure I will my girl,” the father smiled.

He leaned over the bed while Jiko watched through the window as the short blonde girl lay on the bed smiling. The images started to blur again Jiko let go of the professor’s hand.

 

The professor looked at Jiko with a new found understanding of Chisoutsa’s past.

          “He was not your father. He was your creator. I still need to know who this person is. He’s the key to everything,” the professor said.

          “I left the hyper camp when they rejected me. I learnt a lot of skills by myself. I’ve lived on the streets since then,” Jiko said.

          “I have to return back home but I will return with news. I have to talk to a friend of mine about this.”

          “I’ll be here if you need me,” Jiko said.

Professor Walken stood up with his cane and smiled at Jiko and his mind moved to who the creator is.

 

It was late night television at the professor’s house and Charles was watching in the background reading the paper. Chisoutsa was on the lounge with a large pizza on her side and a large beer bottle in the other.

          “This is great stuff, this film hey,” Chisoutsa cried out.

          “Yeah it is,” Charles answered half interested.

          “What are you doing?” Chisoutsa asked him getting up from the lounge.

          “Nothing much, reading the paper and some of the clues to our mystery man,” Charles answered.

          “Let me guess. He’s gone to see him and I’m not supposed to know?” Chisoutsa said.

          “Well we try our best to hide things from you. We are working on different things in order to get the best information we can find,” Charles answered.

Chisoutsa turned back to the television and Charles’s phone rang. The phone voice came on and it was Professor Walken.

          “Professor how was things?” Charles asked.

          “I saw the past, I saw many things,” he answered.

Charles turned walked away from Chisoutsa to a corner and whispered in the phone, “What about her? What did you find out about her?”

          “She was a special project for a business. There was a place called the hyper camp full of these people but Chisoutsa was their special one. I don’t know why but someone they call by their father haves the answers,” the professor explained.

          “Which one of the three I image,” Charles said.

          “That’s another time and place for us to find out. I want you to look after Jiko, the man I was speaking to. Just come to the rooftop and explain you and say the professor sent you,” Professor Walken said.

          “I’ll go pick him up now Jonathan. We have to step carefully now. Who knows what else knows what we know,” said Charles.

          “Yes, see you soon,” the professor said shutting off his phone.

Chisoutsa turned away to see the door closing and walked to the table. She looked at the photos of the mystery man and slipped more of her beer. She knew she had to remember this man but she never could from those years ago.

 

Two men arrived inside Charles’s house and a large figure walked up the stairs to the bar room. Charles placed his phone on the table and Jiko looked out the window towards the city. His feelings towards the city were mixed, much like Chisoutsa.

          “It has been a while since I was in section of the city. What about you?” Jiko asked Charles.

          “I’ve lived here most of my life. You get used to things in the city. So how old were you when you were in the hyper camp?” Charles replied.

          “I started there when I was ten years old. I left when I was seventeen. I’m now twenty two,” Jiko answered.

Jiko was now dressed in a white shirt and jeans, large enough for him. He looked towards the centre of the city where the three business building stood. Like three battle ships targeting each other for war. For a moment he lost his step and Charles watched him. He stood again and tall. The buildings burnt in his eyes and the shadow of the father rose within him.

          “What is Chisoutsa like? She was young and beautiful when I first met her. What does she do nowadays?” Jiko asked Charles.

Charles thought for a moment, “She’s very beautiful and sexy. She’s a very nice person and a good role model. No hang on, she drinks and smoke at times, never sleeps, goes on killing sprees for fun and haves causal sex with men. No she’s a bloody terrible role model. What did you see in her?” Charles snapped by himself.

          “I didn’t know she was like that. But then again I’m not very surprised at all,” Jiko answered.

 

Charles poured some wine for himself and placed a couple of beers on the table for Jiko. He slipped his drink and thought about it.

          “Why isn’t it surprising?”

          “All the people in the hyper camp must have had their DNA changed in some way. We were built like warriors for a mission. Our emotions are also high charged. There’s a killer instance inside of us and the scary thing is sometimes we can’t control it. If like our father is still controlling us somehow. In the camps it was normal for us to get angry easily and battle each other. To desire one other often and or care for others and think for ourselves,” Jiko explained to Charles.

          “You will meet Chisoutsa tomorrow. You two might get on with each other hopefully. You know they took away the very soul of you people. Who knows what you would have been like if you led a normal life,” Charles said.

          “And that I’ll never have,” Jiko answered him and Charles breathed deeply.

The pair watched over the city as the morning rose for another day. The past could set the future free.