I sat on the medical bed in the equipped room, lost in thought, while Ramez checked the devices and prepared them for the treatment session. I mumbled, saying:
" You may be wondering : Why did I come? Why did you change your mind about treatment?"
Ramez looked at me questioningly without answering, so I continued, saying:
" Someone visited me in my office last night."
Ramiz frowned and said:
- " from? "
- " Someone from the vision I had during the last therapy session . "
Ramez sat next to me, took off his glasses, wiped his eyes, and then said:
" I fully understand your concern. This treatment we are considering, as I told you before, is a new drug. Do you know what that means? A mysterious path that you are the first to explore and discover, so please do not allow any creature you will see to frighten you into turning back. You must conquer your fears and complete what you have started. Remember well that the solid ground we stand on now is that we do not have the luxury of choice."
I nodded, and he got up to go back to his devices.
Ramez paused for a moment, then said:
"You know? I remembered something. When I was a child, when I had nightmares, I would run to my mother at night to wake her up, and she would say, 'Every time you have a dream that bothers you, look for me in your dream and I will come and reassure you. Do this.'"
" What? Looking for your mother?! "
Ramiz laughed, then looked into my eyes:
" No, look for me. You will find me by your side to reassure you . "
- " Looking for you? You are the face I want to run away from the most, Ramez. You are my worst nightmare."
Ramiz laughed until he coughed.
He lifted the sleeve of his white coat to reveal the old Rolex watch and said:
" You always wondered about it, this watch belonged to my father."
He looked at it for a moment, then took it off and put it in my fist.
It was heavy and cold. I looked at him, and he continued:
" Do you feel this? This heavy presence that surrounds it? I have always believed that each of us leaves a part of ourselves in the things we leave behind before we die . Every time I carry this watch, I am certain that I am carrying an invisible part of my father. I take him with me at all times so that he can see my success and share my pride. Whenever I feel frustrated one day, his watch would tighten around my wrist as if it were borrowing his hoarse voice that screams inside me to continue."
He snatched it from my hand, then said:
" I haven't lost hope yet. We will complete what we started despite the monsters screaming in our faces."
Then he let me lie down on the bed, letting the fluid trickle back into my vein.
I closed my eyes for a moment, opened them, and everything in the room disappeared.
I got up to look around and shouted:
- "Ramez, where are you?"
Silence answered me that no one.
I tried to get out of bed, but something was wrong, my hands seemed to sink into every place I leaned on.
I tried to free her from the bed that was beginning to melt beneath me, I tried to hold on to something as I sank into it like a piece of metal in a pot of honey, I thrashed my hands in every direction as I screamed. The blackness almost swallowed me up ... until I felt a hand grab my arm.
I was slowly pulled up until I fell to the ground.
When I got up, I found myself wearing a suit and tie, and sitting in front of me was a man with an amputated arm, a man from this scary world, with an angry look on his face.
****
Ramez looks at the devices in a daze, pumping something into the solution connected to Adam with the syringe, until the phone rings and he is pulled away.
He looks at the name that appeared on his phone, sighs in frustration, then answers:
" What now? "
" Listen to me well, you son of a bitch. I will not accept this offensive tone from you, as you put the future of both of us at stake. You have used up your friendship balance, and from now on I will only treat you officially, with all the threats that the word implies. Do you hear me? "
Ramez closed his eyes for a moment , realizing that he was not the strong party in this conversation, so his tone became less harsh:
" Dr. Mamdouh, I'm sorry, I never meant to be rude. I was wondering: could we meet today ? "
" Of course, after weeks of evasion you now want us to meet ! Listen , bring her today or you're screwed. Do you hear me?"
" Actually I can't, I've used up part of the sample . "
There was a long silence before the voice came:
" Is this a joke? "
" Dr. Mamdouh, I swear by my father's mercy that if you saw for yourself how promising the results are, you would definitely change your mind . "
The voice interrupted him angrily:
" You're experimenting on humans with a drug that has been proven to fail on animals?! You 've gone beyond insanity."
Ramez tried to say something, but he interrupted him again:
- "Dr. Ramez, remember well, you left me no choice."
Then the call ended.
Ramez jumped up from his seat, then slammed the phone against the wall, shattering it into pieces, pieces like the pieces of his professional future. He threw himself on the seat, cold sweat dripping down his forehead, his cheeks trembling, and his eyes unblinking as he looked at the monitor. He knew he was lying in every word... The results were not promising at all, but rather disastrous.
****
The amputee stood before me, motionless. In fact, he looked very peaceful. He was wearing a loose shirt over his thin body and large pleated pants that made his lower half bulge out. He had a strange, dark aura about him, as if he were a genie out of a lamp, prowling the room like a typical ghost. I wasn't afraid; I knew it was all just a dream and it would stop.
- " Who are you? "
I looked at him questioningly, and he replied angrily, in a voice like the wind that came and went:
- " No, you're here to listen and answer only. What are you doing?"
I was unable to reply, so he continued, the dark aura beginning to grow:
" Why didn't you complete the mission I asked you to do ? Why didn't you save them? "
" Save who? You mean those women? I tried, you weren't there. I tried so hard to save them if it weren't for that person who almost smashed my head in. How can you blame me? "
- You know what? You're not real, none of this is real. These are dreams in my head and they will stop, you can't hurt me.
" You and your reckless arrogance . "
He said it, then moved across the room at a terrifying speed until he was inches away from my face.
" We didn't meet. My name is Shawqi, and this entity you're talking about is the one who amputated my arm and left me to bleed to death. I know a lot that you don't know yet. What you see is real."
He said, pointing to his amputated arm.
" Remember well, I didn't want to leave you for them to get you . "
I shouted in disapproval:
- "from?".
And here something strange happened.
I found the wall in front of me had turned into a screen, and I saw myself sitting at the desk with Irene standing in front of me. Then that woman dressed in black appeared, out of nowhere carrying a disfigured child, and the image suddenly stopped.
Then the ghost said: "These are some of the souls of his victims who, as you know, are not as friendly as I am, and you will remain haunted in your world by them until I allow otherwise."
I was silent for a while until I understood. Then he grabbed my collar, his aura growing larger and darker, and he said firmly:
" Save them so you can be saved, that's the only way."
I screamed:
- "But I don't understand anything."
He calmed down and let go of me, then he floated back into the air:
- " When you return to your world, look for someone named Al-Zahid . "
- " What? Ascetic who? "
" Only the ascetic, that is his name, look for him and you will understand . "
He said it, and then suddenly disappeared, taking all the noise with him, leaving silence to surround the place.
I quickly got out of bed, then went down the stairs, and found myself in front of the cellar again, feeling for a wooden door that had been destroyed, the door that I knew very well that behind it were three women waiting for execution in resignation, but this time I decided to bring help.
So I ran out of the villa and reached the road.
I hailed the first taxi to take me to the nearest police station.
Inside the car, I began to feel the seat. I examined the driver's face, who began to send me suspicious glances from time to time because of my suspicious looks.
This is more real than it seems; the driver, the streets, the noise of the passersby... In fact, all of this was real, and I was the only one who felt like I was a fantasy imposed on their world.
If it was a dream, is there a dream with all these details, colors and sounds?
What's happening to you, Adam? What kind of nonsense has pulled you into its arms?
Should I run away? Should I change my destination and stay home, locking the doors and windows?
But if I did, who would save these women? Could I just leave them to die at the hands of a madman with a hammer? The thought plays with me seriously.
But if I change my destination home, will I find my home at all?
The driver's voice pulled me out of my thoughts as he said:
- "We've arrived."
We were already in front of the police station . Inside, the noise had increased, the place was crowded with passersby and those sitting, and I was still looking around suspiciously, waiting for a dinosaur or a monkey or something strange to break into the scene to prove that I was hallucinating, but nothing; the police officer was sitting on a wooden chair and in front of him was an old metal desk with a huge notebook lying on it. He looked at me and said in a hoarse voice for the second time (I had been distracted the first time and was startled):
- "I order."
I caught my breath, then told him I wanted to report a murder and a kidnapping.
- " Killing and kidnapping all at once? "
He replied in disapproval, so I looked beside me at the silent eyes fixed on me, then I spoke again:
" Yes, murder, and also the kidnapping of three women, and I know where they are now, and you must hurry to rescue them."
The secretary looked at me suspiciously out of the corner of his eye, then told me to wait for him.
He disappeared for a few moments, then returned and led me through the crowd until he sat me on a chair in front of the sheriff's office, and said in a firm voice:
- "Wait here."
I sat down reluctantly, chewing on my anxiety, and this muscular young man settled next to me in smart sports clothes that did not suit this place full of thieves and thugs, and he was looking at me curiously.
" I heard you talking to the secretary outside."
I nodded, and he raised his hand to shake mine.
- "My name is Bahir."
I shook the intruder's hand in despair, and he said:
" So, three women have been kidnapped and you know where they are ! If I were you, I would go to that dog myself and kill him with my own hands. Whoever imposes his power on desperate women is a coward."
I smiled at him and said:
" My name is Adam, and I hope you mind your own business."
The sentence slapped him in the face, and the smile disappeared from his face. The scene was interrupted by the police officer who led me into the chief's office. When I entered, I couldn't help but be surprised.
Adel was sitting at the chief's desk in front of me, and Ramez was leaning on the desk next to me, looking at me curiously.
" Adel, Ramez ! Don't you know me? I'm Adam . "
- " Adel? "
Ramez laughed as he pointed to Adel, who appeared angry, and said:
- " His name is Brigadier Adel, you idiot. But who are you?"
- " Really? Who am I? Is this some kind of joke? "
Adel pointed to him with a sarcastic half-smile on his face:
" Fame, my friend, wherever we go . "
Adel continued in the same sarcastic tone, saying to himself:
" Here's another crazy person we see every day, let's have some fun."
"We can meet, I am Brigadier Adel, and this handsome young man is called Lieutenant Colonel Ramez. Now that we have met, tell me your story?"
The shock still took hold of me, so I did not speak, then Ramez said to me:
" The police officer told us that you came to report two crimes; a murder and a kidnapping.
"Okay, where and when? Give us the details."
I snapped out of my funk. Damn, I'd go along with them on that play.
" Yes , please, someone move. Save them . "
" Hold on , my friend. Adam, right? Sit down and tell us the details . "
- " I will not sit down . "
I shouted, and when anger rose on their faces, I responded in a less sharp tone:
" Can't we talk on the way? Please, there's no time. It might all be over by now. I swear to God. He'll kill them."
Ramez looked at Adel seriously when the latter got up from his desk and patted my shoulder, saying:
"Okay. Leave your name and address with the police officer outside, give him all the details, then go home, and rest assured; we are in charge now."
- What is this treatment? Do you think I'm crazy? Come on, move your lazy asses and do your homework.
Ramiz shouted:
- "What are you saying, animal?"
Adel motioned for him to be silent, then leaned over the desk, picked up a card, gave it to me, and said:
" Of course we believe you, this card has my personal number. Just listen to what I say, go home now and rest assured, and if you need anything don't hesitate to call me, we are friends after all. Right, Mr. Lieutenant?"
The signs of anger did not leave Ramez yet, so he remained silent until Adel continued:
" Come on now, and leave it to the experts."
I looked at them in distress, then turned my back and left them. I hadn't left before I heard them laughing.
- "Ramez Pasha, you need some lessons on how to deal with fans."
That was the last thing I heard before the door closed behind me.
Scoundrels... scoundrels in all their forms.
Outside, I was leaning against a lamppost, not knowing what to do. Then a sports car stopped in front of me, and inside was Baher, the muscular young man, who pointed at me and then shouted:
- "Come on, get in quickly . "