Jarvis Chen.
Age 18, and counting.
Estimated years left to live is 5.
Cause of death; Incineration due to eruption of solar flares.
It felt like some sick, twisted joke.
Not only had this site told his past and current circumstances, it had even predicted his future and his death.
Five years plus his current age meant 23 years. This damned site had declared a death verdict over his head.
Jarvis heaved heavily as he reached the bottom of the site.
No matter how much he tried to brush this off inwardly, that it was a big lie meant to scare him, deep inside he feared it to be true.
How would you feel if your life was laid bare on a public site?
But here it was, his deepest secrets and future, told on a charlatan site so bluntly, and even having a death sentence attached.
Who had the capability and means to do something like this?
Did this mean all his life he had never had privacy?
Why him though?
Who would have so much information on his daily life?
To the point of being able to predict his future?
His heart pounded crazily within his chest. He couldn't stop looking around his room, almost imagining countless eyes looking back at me from the darkness.
'I should forget everything, put this off and sleep,' Jarvis sighed inwardly.
Just before he could close the laptop, he noticed that further text had been added at the bottom of the page and there was a yes or no option attached.
[Do you want to change your fate?]
His eyes were glued to the last piece of text on the page. Below the question, the options yes and no were like bright beacons, blinking rapidly on the page.
'Do I want to change my fate?' Jarvis wondered aloud.
There was no response; He lived alone in a dingy apartment he had rented with the money he received as compensation when both his parents died.
The landlord was an old friend of his father's. Thus, when he requested for a room, he rented it to me at half the price.
Of course, there were other tenants in the complex.
Either they were fast asleep by now or were still out on the streets, trying to make money with their bodies.
Jarvis cradled his head in his hands, his eyes never leaving that message.
It called out to him, beckoning with a frightening allure of the uncertain unknown.
What would happen if he chose yes? What would happen if I chose no? There was no way to know. Not if he picked one of the options.
What did the message even mean by changing his fate?
Did it mean if he chose yes, his death in five years would be erased? Or did it mean that his mediocre life would turn out for the better?
Jarvis knew his future was bleak.
Just like all the other guys out there on the streets of New Prosperity, they were the discarded, unwanted, unlucky.
Even now, while he stared at the message, he still didn't know what he was going to do with his life.
The content he had read on the site, his life history, began to play in his mind like a flashback.
When he moved from Elmhurst to New Prosperity after his dad lost his job as a scientist for Valoran Industries.
When he came home to meet his parents dead in the house, blood stained on the wall and floors. The police brushed it off as a robbery gone wrong.
When slowly, as the years passed, his confidence and his academics dropped to rock bottom. His appearance sloppy and barely passable.
When he had to drop out and start delivering food to make some money.
He was hopeless.
Subconsciously, Jarvis' fists clenched and he closed his eyes. He didn't know how much time had passed but now he knew his answer.
Unhesitatingly, Jarvis clicked on the bright green YES.
His laptop screen flashed with bright light and inexplicably went off on its own, leaving him confused.
Jarvis lips twitched. '…How weird.'
He closed the laptop and put it away before lying back down on his bed. His arm covered his face and he was lost in his thoughts.
Soon enough, Jarvis drifted off into sleep.
…
8:30 AM, New Prosperity.
His alarm woke him up with a start.
Like a zombie, Jarvis stumbled away from the bed to the sink. He turned the tap on but only gurgling sounds rang out.
No water.
Jarvis then decided to settle for the next best thing. Picking a water bottle, he poured a little of it into his towel and wiped his face slowly, absorbing the dampness.
It was still his birthday.
There were no wishes, no cake, nothing to even show that this day was meant to be special for him.
Jarvis was used to it though.
The last time he had eaten a cake on his birthday was rather vague in his memories. He was what, was it ten or eleven years?
That was way back in Elmhurst.
Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, Jarvis picked up his toothbrush.
After flossing, he just did dry cleaning with the damp towel. That was what everyone did here when there was no water supply.
Jarvis walked to the desk opposite the bed. That was where he had hanged his work clothing.
Pulling the red T-shirt over his head, he wore his usual dirty faded jeans and a red cap alongside. He laced his dull black sneakers and walked to the mirror.
A gaunt stranger with blonde hair peeking underneath a red cap and seemingly lifeless blue eyes stared back at him.
His own reflection seemed so alien.
At that moment, the question he had seen on his laptop came to his mind again. 'Changing my fate, huh?' he muttered.
Why was he even deceiving himself, thinking he could change his fate?
He already knew deep within that nothing had changed even after clicking that yes button.
Well, whatever.
It was time for him to go to work anyway.