Opening the door of our apartment, we were greeted with a loud silence. It seemed that both our parents were out, and we were the only ones inside the house.
"Good. There won't be a chance of anyone listening in on us."
The two of us made a beeline to our room, and as I reached my hand behind me to close the door, I saw it automatically close and lock itself.
"Thank you, Ava."
From behind me, Oliver's words calmed down the shock in my heart, and I slowly made my way to our bed. Sitting down, I saw Oliver take a seat next to me, and gesture to whatever had closed the door to sit on his chair. Then, turning to me, he pointed to the being that was apparently on the chair and introduced them.
"Oliver, this is Ava. She's my system."
Looking at the chair where 'Ava' was, I saw it move as if someone was sitting on it and pressing down on the back area,
"Since Ava is a system, people normally can't see or hear her, so she makes a great teammate in passing messages between us and the MDVA research team."
In response to Oliver's words, as if agreeing, the chair squeaked as it moved forward by a small bit. However, listening to Oliver's words, I could only furrow my brow and ask.
"If people normally can't see or hear her, then how are you able to communicate with her? And, how can she pass messages between the MDVA research team and you?"
The chair squeaked again, drawing my attention away from Oliver. Then, as I saw the back of the chair rock to and fro, I heard Oliver answer my questions with a complicated tone in his voice.
"It's because I signed a contract with Ava."
I turned my attention back to Oliver and saw a slightly aggrieved smile on his peaceful face. The two emotions were so contradictory to each other, yet they made a perfect picture of love and hate weaving together into a single emotion.
"A contract?"
The chair was silent, the system sitting on it choosing to stay quiet as Oliver shook his head in regret.
"It's a contract I don't regret making, but I can't recommend you to take it. Ava also probably won't sign one with you. And hopefully, she'll never have to."
Oliver's voice was serious as he spoke to me, and I couldn't help but glance at the chair.
"Does the contact have unfavorable terms?"
Lowering my voice, I leaned towards Oliver and whispered into his ears. Hopefully, the system was still sitting on the chair and couldn't hear me.
And as Oliver heard my words, he laughed and shook his head.
"Not at all. In fact, the systems have been such a huge help that signing a contract is more than worth it."
However, after a small period of laughter, the smile slipped right off Oliver's face and a slightly sad look replaced it.
"It's not the terms that are terrible. It's the requirements."
Oliver lifted his head, his gaze shifting to the chair, or the system on the chair, as a sigh escaped his lips and his eyes glazed over. His voice turned hazy and took on a nostalgic quality that signaled his mind had traveled to a more peaceful and happy time in the past. However, that happiness didn't seem to last very long, and sadness soon dyed those near-obsidian orbs. Then, when the sadness got too potent, it seemed to drag Oliver back to the present and his gaze focused back on me.
"Part of the requirements to sign a contract with a system is to have less than 20 years to live."
20 years...
That was a time that was neither too long nor too short. However, considering Oliver's age right now, that meant that the maximum age he could live to would be 27. And 27 felt way too young for such a genius to die.
Shocked speechless, I could feel my mouth open, but no words seemed to form in my brain or throat.
"Well, 20 years is the maximum, but I doubt I will live for that long."
Shrugging his shoulders as if he were talking about someone else's lifespan and not his own, Oliver's gaze suddenly filled with love and longing as he seemed to remember something again.
"Besides, I have already lived for long enough."
Oliver closed his eyes, as if reminiscing about something, and his voice turned nostalgic again.
"As part of the contract with Ava, I got to spend 20 years together with my sister. And that's more than enough for me."
Opening his eyes, Oliver's gaze only remained soft for a couple of seconds before they hardened again.
"Those people from High Street will probably not let me live long, considering my plans to demolish the Anti-MDVA Prevention Act once and for all. And those people would rather execute others than admit that they made a mistake."
Oliver sighed once more, forcing himself to calm the rage and disappointment that bled into the sneer that came out when he finished his sentence. Then, turning to me again, he put on his mask of a smile.
"Anyway, that's the main reason I can see and hear the systems. And the reason why the MDVA research team can communicate with us is because they too have someone bound to a system there. Raven."
Mentioning the young genius researcher's name, I couldn't help but sigh as the lifespan of another genius was cut short.
"Since Raven was not originally born in High Street, those people don't consider him one of them, so he won't get a pass on the law."
With another shake of his head, Oliver directed his attention back to the chair and seemed to gesture to the system. Then, with a wave of his hand, the chair squeaked as it was pushed back, presumably by the system standing up, before Oliver turned his attention fully to me.
"Ava just recently got a signal from another system nearby so she just went out to investigate."
Standing up from the bed, he stretched and headed over to the bookshelf to retrieve one of his papers hidden there.
"Until she comes back, there's not much we can do."
Oliver walked over to the chair his system used to sit on and straightened it with some small motions. Then, sitting down, he opened the research paper and started reading. Based on his actions, it was as if he had just explained to me the plot of a fiction book.
Except the door really was closed and locked, and the marks left on the floor caused by the chair squeaking across it were still there.
"...Why did you decide to tell me this?"
I sat on the bed, stunned, as my brain tried its hardest to accept all the information that had been thrown at it in the past hour alone. However, rising above all the loose ends and tangled threads that fought each other to take center place in my mind, one question stood out from them all.
Why? Why me?
Sitting on the chair, Oliver froze in the middle of flipping a page of the research paper and looked up. The two of us met eyes, his near obsidian orbs reflecting my confused expression as they stared at me.
Our staring contest lasted a couple of minutes, and I couldn't tell what was going on inside Oliver's brain. However, in the end, it was Oliver who broke eye contact first to return to his paper. He flipped the page, the noise infinitely loud in this heavy silence that had descended into the room.
"Because I need your help."
The silence finally broke, crashing like pieces of glass smashed onto the ground, and I could hear the noise reverberate in my ears. I stared at Oliver, in shock but also in confusion.
What could a child like me do? Wouldn't it be better to seek help from the adults, who had the money, power, and strength to actually do things? And yet, even though all these questions roared in my brain, I couldn't say a single one of them.
I remembered Oliver's words in the beginning when he had first revealed the papers to me. 'But adults have their own circumstances.'
Was that why he didn't trust adults? Or was it because they wouldn't take a child like him seriously, even if he was a genius? But wasn't he currently being taken quite seriously by the MDVA research team? He was in charge of finding volunteers, which seemed to be quite an important part of the whole experiment. And other than that, he probably is trusted enough by the team to act as their communicator, since Raven and Oliver have to have a certain amount of trust among the MDVA team if their communications had any meaning.
Questions swirled in my mind, all of them more twisted and warped than the last, until they all clashed with each other and were jumbled up into a ball of questions that would never be answered.
Taking a deep breath, I cleared my mind of this ball and stood up to head to the bookshelf. Oliver was currently escaping any questions by reading his papers, and I certainly didn't have any concrete questions that, once answered, wouldn't bring about at least 10 more questions.
I grabbed one of the newsbooks off the shelves and flipped through the pages. Oliver had mentioned that the current leader and vice leader were doing some projects. If that was so, no matter how secret it was, there would surely be some signs of it in the news.
Skimming through the book, I stopped at a certain article made sometime 2 months ago. Just a couple weeks after Alex's death. If there were going to be any signs, it would happen after this article.
'Second longest acting leader of the Anti-MDVA prevention act faction, Vincent, executed under conspiracy charges.'
The picture in this article was like the one for Andrew's execution. It didn't show the gruesome site of his death, nor did it focus on the hate and anger that was surely bubbling under the skin of the protesters at that time. Instead, the article that Camellia decided to paste here talked about Vincent and Mary's achievements in life, zooming in on the contributions they made to the faction and what type of people they were.
The picture showed a man and a woman. The man, Vincent, had long and silky hair, a face with no blemishes, as well as an air that screamed that he was part of High Street. The woman on his left, Mary, gave off a similar vibe to him. She stood straight and stared directly out of the photo, the pride and strength in her posture showed that she wasn't born to fear for her life nor bow her head to anyone.
Narrowing my eyes at the photo, I took another look at the article. Vincent and Mary were large contributors to the faction, leading several harmless projects that lightened the load of life on many in Middle Street and Bottom Street, as well as dodging all sorts of schemes hatched by those in High Street to legally capture them. All in all, they were a real thorn in the side for High Street.
Reading the snippets of stories that were included in the article, I couldn't help but smile at how much they had done for the world. Their high-profile work included funding orphanages that took in children who lost their parents due to MDVA or any other means. Frequently organizing community gatherings that encouraged people to share resources they couldn't fully use on their own, and distributing these resources to those who needed them the most. They held workshops to teach those who didn't have skills a way to make a living, bought out abandoned buildings, and turned them into apartments for people to live in. The list just went on and on.
They were heroes. And they died for it.
Flipping the page, the more I read, the more something felt off about the pair. Where did they get all this money from? Currently, from what I know, the faction usually gets money through donations from people from High Street. This was an unsaid secret in the faction. No one knew who the sponsors were, for if their identities were ever leaked, they might fall into danger and the faction's monetary resources might be put into jeopardy.
But even the donations from High Street weren't this generous.
I paused at a page of their achievements, my original purpose put aside, as I stared at the words, willing an answer to pop from the pages and reveal itself.
Gripping the book and deep in concentration, I suddenly felt something touch my shoulder and instinctively jumped in shock. Then, whipping my head to that area, I saw nothing but thin air.
"Welcome back, Ava."
Still seated on his chair, Oliver turned the page of his paper and looked up at the area right next to me.
"So? How was it?"
Hearing small thuds leaving from my side towards Oliver, I estimated Ava's position from where Oliver seemed to be looking and saw him nod with a serious frown.
"I see."
He returned his gaze to the paper and gave a helpless shrug with his shoulders.
"History repeating itself is not something that I would like to see."
A childish thump came from the area in front of Oliver which sounded like his system, Ava, was throwing a tantrum.
"Seeing you do that in that form feels quite off."
Oliver nonchalantly commented on Ava's actions, and the thumping immediately stopped. Then, small footsteps came running over towards me, and I couldn't help but imagine a little child pouting as they stomped away from Oliver. Then, feeling a touch on my arm, I imagined the child leaning over my shoulder to look at the article I was viewing.
The weight on my arm increased for a second, before completely disappearing, and I envisioned the system letting go of my hand. Swerving my head toward Ava's direction, I caught sight of a piece of paper floating out from the bookshelf and onto the floor. After that, a pencil wiggled its way out from between two books and started scribbling on the paper.
'What are you looking for?'