He looked at the watch on his wrist. The slightly glowing shorter arm pointed at the nine, though concluding from the darkness that was already taking over the sky, he could tell the evening was gradually bleeding into night. He took another hit on the remains of the cigarette in his hand before throwing the left-over bud on the floor and stepping on it to erase the last glow of it. Yet immediately he stopped in his tracks. It was a bad habit he wanted to get rid off. With a long sigh he bowed down to pick up what he had thrown down just mere seconds ago. Before he could turn around and go back inside the rundown building, he stopped again. Right next to the filled trash cans that were already spilling over, there was something. Usually, he didn’t pay the unusual trash bags any mind, but this one was in a far too familiar shape to ignore it. It was something that did not belong here, nor anywhere else that wasn’t a crime scene, a hospital or a morgue. A body bag. The same black plastic, with the same plain zipper running down the middle. Quickly he approached it, kneeling down in the corner which was hidden by the shadow so he didn’t draw too much attention to himself from the non existent pedestrias. He had to decide fast. If he opened it, he had to act depending on what he found. It wasn’t safe to just report something like this to a police station either as they could be involved too. Everyone in this neighbourhood was corrupt in some way or another, he was not an exception. If he didnt decide to open it though, he would betray his own, probably more twisted than actually just, sense of justice. It could also have the same outcome as opening it anyways. There were probably people watching the bag or taking notice of the activity here the entire time so either way just noticing the bag was a danger to him. Fuck it, he thought. With that he stood up again and bowed over the bag, hesitantly taking hold of the metallic zipper... One, two. With another deep breath he opened the bag and stared at the insides. It was merely a boy, small stature, probably in high school. He wasn’t filling the entre bag though, as he was laying on his side, his pale looking arms embracing his knees softly. The other half of the bag gave of a foul odor. There were mouldy cardboard boxes with pictures of pizza and other take out on it. Empty cans of energy drinks, beer and other beverages along with other smelly garbage was packed inside like it was just a regular trash bag. Almost immediately he turned his head and felt bile rising and his eyes watering from the stench of Ammoniak that also exited the bag. He pulled up the collar of his jacket to cover his nose and turned his head back to the body bag. With the smell slightly muted, he could now take a closer look at the bag without being distracted. Inhumane, was his first thought. They killed such a young boy yet they didnt even pay a little respect to the body and put it into such a humiliating state. All the boy was wearing was a pair of shorts, his almost transparent body exposed to the disgusting garbage in the bag. His skin looked dirty, though he couldn’t tell whether there were bruises as well. It wouldnt be surprising. Not so slowly but surely he inspected the body. There were multiple bones broken in both his arms and his left leg, but contrary to what he had first believed, the fractures were not post mortem to fold the boy into the position he was in. His position looked natural, calm and not strained at all. The fractures were caused before his death. Now that he had seen what was in the bag, clarity returned to his mind. What should he do now?

  One thing he was sure of was that he didn’t want to leave the body of the boy in the same bag as the rotting garbage. Sure, the boy didn’t smell the stench but it just felt wrong to leave the boy in there. As he made up his mind, he rolled up the sleeves of his tattered old jacket cautiously. He started to take out the trash from the body bag. He retched involuntarily, but he had made up his mind to get everything out. When he was finished, he shifted his attention to the crippled body. Carefully he took hold of his fractured arms as to not further damage them and placed them next to the boy and finished pushing him into a straightened position. Continuing to look at the boy, he felt his heart sink further with every breath. The boy was too slim for his height. He had probably been starved for a long time, maybe that was even the cause of his death. His ribs were easily discernible from one another and could almost be identified in their colour through the pale skin. At that moment he noticed something he couldn’t have seen when the boy was still laying on his side. Slightly, just very slightly his ribcage was moving. He crouched down further to get a closer look. At first, he thought it had just been his imagination but then it happened again. And again. And again. His ribcage expanded, then settled back down in a slow but steady rhythm. He felt his breath catching as he continued to stare at the rhythmic movement. For minutes he couldn’t break away, his stare fastened upon the body. Then it clicked. Within the blink of an eye he had zipped up the bag again and picked it up with swift movements. He practically ran to the stairs, his muscles hot from the sudden movement, but the adrenaline kept him on his feet. Another second and he conquered the stairs, opening up the door to the first apartment in just two more seconds with the key that was still stuck in it. He felt his arms trembling yet he kept the bag securely in his arms until he reached the bed in the only seperate room of the apartment. At leadt it didnt have another door to open though. Carefully he placed the bag on the soft fabric, ignoring how dirty the bag still was. Slowly he opened the zipper again, afraid he had imagined the movement after all. With his breath still uneven from the running and his eyes restless, he confirmed it again and again before finally finding the courage to even touch the body again. It didnt take him long to find the place below the boys jaw he was looking for. There was a pulse! He sighed in relief. But at the same time, he felt his mind wander. What could he even do to treat the boy?

  He had not gone through a traditional military schooling. He didnt want his Fingerprints to become hostages of the system so he never even thought of enlisting. He had neither general medical training, nor had he ever been confronted with a situation like that at all in his life. All he had was some basic first aid knowledge he had picked up from here and there and the safety and emergency instructions he somehow still remembered from his time working in an underground Laboratory years ago. He couldn’t go to the hospital either. Fuck. People from the ghetto like him had no way to get medical aid, not here at least and not legally either. Not to forget, the next hospital was at least an hour from his place. He shook his head. What use was there to complain to himself when he was the one who brought this upon himself. He had to focus on things he could do for the boy instead of what he couldn‘t do. With that thought he took of his jacket and placed his hand on the pulse of the boy again. There were no abnormalities but he still wanted to act fast. As he rummaged through his closet, he brought a t-shirt and a first aid kit next to the bed. With a wet towel he cleaned the boys body as much as possible and disinfected the open wounds, patching them up as well as he could, before making the unconscious wear the t-shirt that was at least two sizes too big. Better than nothing, he thought, at least he wouldnt become any colder than he already was. Afterwards he improvised a sloppy cast arounde the boys’ arms and the leg that seemed to have been fractured. Within an hour the boy now lay clean on his bed.

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  He had found his remaining antibiotics and painkillers in one of his bathroom cabinets and wanted to place them on the night stand beside the bed as he stopped in surprise. He was doing that a lot this evening. The eyes of the boy were opened and now staring at him in a confused but simultaneously oddly numb manner. So that’s why they had kidnapped a boy like him, He thought as he looked at his eyes. The boy was exotic, he was a Mimick, a shape shifting rarity. His eyes were blue but that was not what made him notice it. His Iris was larger than those of other humans, taking over almost the entirety of the usually white parts of the eve and his upils had a strange rectangular shape like a goat maybe, or a non mammalian animal?

  The boy tried to sit up and closed his eyes as he groaned painfully. When he opened them again, they were back to a human shape. Odd. But that shouldnt matter, he had no way to determine what kind of Mimick the boy was to be helpful with his medical care. “You are awake” He croaked involuntarily, still not entirely clear headed with curiosity still taking over his mind. the boy did not answer. He just continued to stare at him cautiously. After a while of standing in the doorway uselessly he gestured to the glass he was holding in his hand. “ I brought you something to drink and painkillers so that you can be more at ease.” He said awkwardly. He put down the glass on the stand but again the boy did not answer neither did he move from his tensed up position. At least he didnt flinch. “I am Ben, I found you outside.” Ben said, then paused for a second. “you are safe with me.” Ben noticed the sceptical stare that still plastered the boys face but he didn't try to add more to convince the boy of his good intentions. His expression seemed to at least slightly relax after he said that, but the caution didnt completely leave the boy. For a long while they both stared at each other until Ben finally broke eye contact and left the room to give the boy some space.

  He scratched his head. An eerie feeling ran down his back but he shook it off. Finally Ben noticed how bad his clothes were smelling from touching the dirty bag and the garbage inside it. His nose wrinkled up as he thought about how bad that bag had smelled and how much of that disgusting stench he had now stuck to him. An adult who smells like garbage. His nose continued to crinkle up until he finally stripped of all his clothes and jumped in the shower. What a strange day. When the cool water hit his back, he felt the exhaustion from just a minute ago melt away. The tension of his shoulders left him and a relaxed buzzing feeling spread all over his body. As he became more calm he felt his thoughts become more tangible and clear. Now that he knew the boy was a Mimick, he felt like he had even more of a reason to take care of him. The boy must have been a rare one to have been kidnapped, it happened way more often than it should. Abduction, even murder, or in this case attempted murder... Ben had to find a Mimick doctor that specialised in whatever the boy was, but what would that even be? Ben had heard of Mimicks that exhibited traits of other species than what their genetical makeup and insides looked like in rare cases, so it wasn’t even all that far fetched to think the boy was such a case considering what they did to him. Were there doctors for such cases? He sighed again. He had been doing that an awful lot today too, he noticed. He turned off the shower head but did not exit the cabin just yet. There was no going back now so he would do everything in his power to help the boy. It probably wouldn’t take long to find his parents or some kind of family after he got the boys name or some other information out of him and then hed be free of all this thinking again anyways.

  A loud shrill noise like glass shattering almost made him jump out of his skin. With one hand he grabbed a towel as he stormed out the bathroom. He slammed his hand into the wall as he entered the room to stabilize after the sprint. the boy was still there. On the bed. His head was not turned towards Ben, it didnt even seem like he had notices Bens rushed, loud breathing. Following his gaze to the side of the room, Ben relaxed again. It became very clear what had happened when he saw the glass shards from his vase on the floor. Ben had left the window open and the stray cat had snuck in again, throwing it down in the process. The cat meowed softly, unbothered as it looked at Ben expectantly. He went to the window and grabbed the cat carefully, petting her. He opened the window further to put her down on the window hilt again where she had come from. She meowed again but let it happen without complaint. “Next time" he mumbled but she just looked at him as he closed the window, licked her paw and jumped down, vanishing into the darkness of the night.

  As he turned back to the boy, the boy was gazing back at him. It was neither a scared expression nor a particularly emotional one either. He looked uncertain, but of what? It was a look of assessment maybe, he thought. In that moment the boys mouth opened. “You are not one of them.” He whispered. His voice was raspy, maybe because he hadn’t talked in so long. Bens thoughts clicked into place. He shook his head quickly. “I don’t want to hurt you, I want to help you.” The boy nodded. “You would be a bad abductor if this had been an honest try to detain me here.” The boy said as he gestured towards the window that had just been open a minute ago. Not sure whether that was the boys attempt at a joke or his honest thoughts, he smiled awkwardly. “ you are right.”

  Trying to not make the situation stranger than it was he smoothly took a t-shirt from the closet that was still wide open and quickly put on some clothes “ thank you.” The boy said and raised his arms while looking at the bandages Ben had put him in. “ Its just first aid, i just hope i didnt do more harm than good to your bones.” He said as honestly as possible. “I need something to call you.“ He added carefully, never leaving the expressions of the boy slip his eyes. The expression on the boys face darkened and his mouth closed shut. Was asking that too much? “ It doesnt need to be your name or anything, just anything youd be comfortable with for now is fine.” He added after a long while, slightly frustrated, but he didnt show it. This isnt a sprint its a marathon, he reminded himself. He couldnt expect the boy to trust him immediately, even though it would help Ben to actually help the boy. All with due time.

  “ just call me anything” He said quietly. They both stayed silent for a while. Ben really wasnt the person anyone would want to think up a name for them. It wouldnt do him any favour to think hard about it so he just went with the first thing that came to mind “Okay then Lalius.” He said. He was glad the boy probably didnt know his first thought was the colour of a fish hed worked with before. Some of those fish had the same colour as the boys eyes.