Melvin did not immediately open the door.
He stood there with his palm open, hovering inches from the handle. After advancing closer to the door, the knock had not come again.
It was as though whoever it was, or whatever it was that was outside, noticed him approaching. Shaking his head not to make too much thought out of it, he picked up a mob stick lying by the side of the door and returned to the door.
'Okay, you've got this. Take just a second to see who it is. If it's a monster, you strike. If it's human, you… scare them a bit.'
With this thought of encouragement, Melvin swallowed and hoped it wasn't going to be another hallucination or horror of a sort as he exhaled and turned the handle.
Almost at the same time, the door opened to reveal two men. They practically just walked into the one-room apartment of the poor boy without permission, not minding the raised mob stick hovering above their heads.
Gently closing the door behind him, Melvin turned to face his august visitors.
Both wore long, dark coats lined with faint metallic threads that caught the light when they moved. To his dismay… perhaps comfort-like, they were not armed—at least not visibly—but something about the way they were relaxed yet alert told Melvin weapons were the least of their worries.
They dressed like all those officials from top firms, or even from the government.
'What do they want from me?'
Dropping the mob stick from where he had picked it up, Melvin approached the two men.
One of them, who stood on the left, was tall and lean, with an unreadable expression in his eyes as he scanned the room in a single, practiced sweep. The other was broader, looked older, with steel-gray hair pulled neatly back, and eyes that screamed authority.
The older man spoke first.
"Melvin?" he called, as if to be sure they had come to the right place.
Melvin stiffened, shocked for a while as to how these people knew his name. But he didn't let his shock take over his composure.
"Yes."
"You can sit on… that if you call it a bed," the man said, pointing at Melvin's make-do mattress.
The poor boy gritted his teeth and secretly wished he could do a thing to this arrogant man, even if he could pull on his gray hair.
Alas, powerless against this man, Melvin just shot him a look at his hair and further went to sit on the bed.
However, he couldn't back down from the feeling of insult within him as he muttered to the man, "Well, I don't mind if you retire to it, since you've clearly been around longer than the furniture."
At this point, he didn't care what might transpire as an aftermath of not keeping his mouth shut. He simply sat on the bed and waited for the men before him to act in their kind.
But they did nothing. The broader man instead occupied the seat positioned before Melvin's desk and glanced at the lookman among them, giving him a signal that only two of them understood.
With a subordinate nod, the younger man dropped to his knees alongside a heavy, black-lustered box. Then, from within it, he pulled out a rectangle-shaped device in one hand and a wristband in the other. And with professional steps, approached Melvin.
"Your hand," the young man said with a calm voice, extending his right hand.
Melvin was hesitant at first to play by whatever trick or game these men were trying to display before him. They knew his name, possibly who he is, and he hadn't gotten the chance to find out who they are.
But even in this conflicting moment, an inner self in him comforted him and encouraged him to obey the young man before him. This inner self told him that they meant no harm and were just doing what's supposed to be done.
'Supposed to be done? Scratch that.'
Reluctantly, Melvin brought his right hand forward for the young man to take it into his, then wrapped the wristband around it. After which, he brought the rectangular device closer to the wristband and pressed the power button on both devices.
Immediately, something stirred within Melvin as a cold chill ran through him. Then it stopped almost at the same time as it started, and runes only the young man could understand formed on the device.
Melvin was cut short of words as he hadn't expected the wristband to be digital in nature, as it looked like none. Nonetheless, it still doesn't matter. He only shut his eyes close for a brief moment and opened them thereafter.
That briefest moment, he didn't realize, was enough for the two men to get what they wanted.
'Did they just test my pulse?' Melvin mused as he watched the young man unwrap the wristband from his hand. 'Or…' An idea clicked in.
It wasn't often officials like this visited outskirt kids like him for one reason or another. If Melvin were allowed to make a guess, he'd say they never did.
However, these two men had just graced his humble abode out of the blue on the same day he was facing an anomaly he was yet to get a grasp on. If there was something he should be advantageous about after regressing, it should be common sense.
His common sense told him that although the premonition that took place during his previous timeline hadn't happened, the world must have experienced a change. A change that he couldn't notice even after glancing out of the window.
A change capable of affecting the existing characters within, and the way of the world.
Maybe not cataclysmic, perhaps an apocalypse?
But what was this change? What does it have to do with testing people with wristbands? What does it have to do, directly, with him?
Melvin hadn't realized how lost in thought he turned out to be. He only jolted back to reality after two cold hands rested on both sides of his shoulder. Staring into his purple eyes were the dark eyes of the broad man.
"I understand you are worried," the man said with a friendly tone. "That device just now is called a Flux Detector."
"Who are you?" Melvin asked, not paying attention to any other details.
The man rose and, while looking down at Melvin, introduced himself.
"Forgive me for not introducing myself and my colleague earlier," he said. "My name is Edrin, the current Principal of the Axiom Academy, and he's my personal assistant, Vale."
Axiom Academy?
Melvin had never heard of such an academy existing in their continent, Meleny. As ignorant as he was concerning their worldly matters, he didn't fail in taking note of the few academies existing in Meleny. This was because Meleny was a small continental world, more like a microstate.
And, considering that he had done more research than he could count about academies he could get himself enrolled into when he got enough funding, he didn't want to believe these men.
'Don't tell me it's what I'm thinking.'
"Get dressed, Melvin," Edrin said, not minding the look of confusion on his face and heading to the door as Vale followed behind him. "You are coming with us."
"But…" Melvin gestured his hand, which halted in the air as the man interrupted him without turning back.
"Only when you come with us can you kill your curiosity. We will give you space to change to better clothes."
Feeling defeated, Melvin dropped his hand and lowered his shoulder.
Vale shot him a "better comply" look and left with his master.
Then with an exhale, the poor boy turned and headed to his wardrobe to get changed.