Eight or six or two, even if he is a newborn, the timekeepers will kill him for what he just did. It is not a matter of one life. XO was the unbreakable armour of the entire organisation. No chink in the armour will ever be tolerated. Anyone would've killed him.
However, what Nate did was different. Nate pulled the blanket and turned on the lights.
'Nate!'
Aniket's shriek and his attempt to bury his head under the pillow, nevertheless, made Nate laugh.
He clapped the kid on his back.
'No son of mine is cowardly. Get up.'
'Nate, this was not the deal!'
His Maa told him repeatedly that the womb was a safe place. It's privacy was inviolable. It's oath will never be broken. She told him dad can also make this womb. He'd been trained like a dog is trained to hold up its bowl at lunch.
Lies!
Nate clapped his back again making Aniket squeeze like a garden lizard under a leaf, pretending it doesn't exist.
'Come, get up. You need to explain how you did this. Buddy, we don't want the pod to be drawn into an inquiry. We need to think of Niti.'
When he heard those words, Aniket relaxed his body. He squeezed himself out and slowly explained the mechanics of what he did to Nate, all the while trying to avoid Nate. As soon as Aniket finished the last line of explanation, Nate swiftly switched off the light and pulled Aniket back into the womb. From his experience of last time, he knew exactly where to position his son's head for optimum darkness and secrecy. It was just that Nate didn't expect Aniket would truly start to cry after revealing his secret. His entire body was shivering and he could barely catch a breath.
Nate had known this rascal for ten years. He only made other people cry. When did he ever cry? Not even when his mothers died. But just a small peek inside that head of his and he crumbled like a piece of wet cardboard.
Nate suddenly didn't know what to do. He urgently buzzed Anita's timecode, then remembered XO was down. Aniket didn't tell him how to get it back up.
Nate sighed and accepted his fate. He thought about what Anita would do and slowly cooed utter nonsense in Aniket's ear for half an hour. Originally all he wanted to say though, 'Calm down! Who'll clean up your mess if you get a migraine?'
Luckily, there was a still a person who could save Nate. The nurse who came to take his readings gave the man on bed a strange look. He was certainly long legged and broad shouldered, certainly very handsome even with his face hidden. But he somehow got this kind of warning, 'Little kids who won't stop crying get two injections at bed time.'
Silence.
Utter and complete silence. The nurse slowly sayshayed away. She swung the door open and closed it behind her, ever so indifferent.
It just made Nate slap his head with his hand. Aniket was still a man in his unit. This was the most shameful thing about a subordinate Nate ever witnessed.
But the shame didn't end there. The subordinate also happened to be his son.
This was a shame that will stay forever and ever, beyond pod generations.
Nate was wallowing in self pity when the lights were suddenly dimmed. A soft and perfect womb instantly appeared on the hospital bed. Nate was given an honorary seat at the foot with the slender tap of a woman's ankle. Just like a master beckoning the dog.
The dog dutifully sat down and the wife's foot. Took the beautiful thing in its lap, gave a little lick.
Anita ignored him. She stretched her ears and listened to Aniket's whispers. They were very, very faint. But she wasn't called a Bareclaw Tigress without having senses beyond human perception.
'Niti, do you know…what a timekeeper is?'
'You say hon.'
'Niti, timekeeper history is shrouded in mystery. This is not a matter of design. This is the truth.'
'The truth?'
'The mystery…is the truth.'
'I don't understand Nikki…'
'This is because you interpret the word mystery as something yet to be solved. The truth of mystery…is mystery itself. True mystery can never be solved. Not because it cannot be solved. But because it defends itself and maintains itself. Timekeeper…is this defender and maintainer. Of mystery.'
Nate saw Anita's small smile at the corner of the blanket. 'And I bet our Nikki has solved this centuries old mystery…' her voice was soft and low, but very proud.
The devil in her bosom rocked himself in a good mood.
'That's because XO defends this mystery. You just have to convince XO of your identity, and it tells you the mystery! Just like a sphynx that guards the pyramid!'
'What is your identity Nikki?' Anita asked curiously. Since it convinced the sphynx, is it something very special?
It was Nate who answered it, 'Timekeeper.'
The squirming little womb froze. Anita kicked the intruder.
Nate happily caught her foot and bit it. He had been thinking how an eight year old child manipulated XO. Even if Aniket was Einstein's reincarnation, XO, a hundred year old monster, cannot be tamed so easy.
But there are things that are difficult for adults but easy for children sometimes. For instance, puzzles and definitions.
'A timekeeper is a being that corrupts the code and enhances time. A timekeeper is not a keeper of the truth. He is a keeper of lies. All lies. This is the definition of timekeeper.'
'I don't understand Nikki.'
Nate took a deep breath and squeezed his wife's feet. 'He means we are not historians. We are the creators of lies in history. We are the ones who alter the truth and preserve the mystery.'
When Nate said it like this, Anita finally understood. She nodded. As an analyst, she knows better than the two boys this is exactly what they do. They confuse history.
However, in those times, timekeepers behaved like spies. They thought it was normal for them to alter the records of truth.
'And what did the sphynx tell you? Hm?' Anita pressed Aniket's back and prompted.
Feeling him shiver a lot, she pulled the blanket and showed her big eyes to Nate. Nate helplessly got in bed on the other side and accepted his fate as a womb wall. Defying laws of physics, the two big men and one small woman all fit into the same hospital bed. Nate sat against the head and Anita swiftly put her head against his sternum, enclosing Aniket's head in the only soft space of Nate's entire body. His abdomen.
Nate's abdomen is as soft as a ball of cotton. It is precisely the trampoline that throws him up the sky. That's where Nate shoots his gun from. This softest place is the root of all danger coming from him. But Aniket's shivering was reduced as soon as the back of his head pressed against the centre of Nate's belly.
Unlike Nate, Anita was part of the womb before. It was only once, but she had a very strong impression of it. By that time Aniket was already eighteen, he was a member of their pod. But he was still living at home. Anita didn't understand why he wouldn't move to pod Sun. His podmoms said that pod Dharma was closer to his college. But when has Aniket ever gone to college? He just harasses the professors by XO and gets them sign off his grades. Perhaps pod Dharma is closer to the warkeeper brats that the professors send to get back at Aniket. Is that why pod Dharma keeps him at home? For Aniket to thoroughly pummell the good children of timekeeper institutions to ground?