There was only one more stop left before the train arrived in West. Demarcus needed a plan to get off the train unnoticed. He was not sure what to expect in West. He had never been there before. Demarcus decided he would take a walk in the train to see if he could see anything that would inspire him.
He eventually reached the end of the regular passenger section. He crossed over into another type of carriage. He was not sure what was in there. He tried the door. Luckily, for him, it opened. He was in the freight section of the train.
The freight was divided into sections. The first sections were full or almost full. There were some small gaps in these sections for more freight to be added if needed. The rest of the sections were empty. He noticed that below and around each section of freight, there were narrow gaps, indicating some type of door.
An announcement was made that the train was arriving at a station. Demarcus hid behind some containers.
A few minutes later, the train stopped. Demarcus could hear a noise beneath the train. The floor beneath the section closest to the empty sections began to descend. The floor disappeared into the station. Then three smaller empty sections of the floor, situated between the freight loaded in the sections closer to the front of the carriage, descended.
Demarcus then heard the doors of the train open. Passengers began to alight from the train. Shortly afterwards, he heard the new passengers boarding the train. The small sections of the floor that had descended into the station came back up. A few seconds later, he heard the larger section rising from the station. He heard it slot into place.
There was an announcement that the train was departing. A few seconds later, the train began to move. Demarcus came out from hiding to see what had happened with the descending floors. He could see that the freight had been removed from the larger section and that freight had been added to the smaller sections. It was obvious to him, starting from the end of the train, that freight was being offloaded by section.
The carriage door opened. It was a guard. Demarcus hid back among the containers and boxes. The guard went over to a wall panel. He pressed a button several times. Nothing seemed to happen. He shook his head in annoyance. He went out through the carriage door. This time, Demarcus heard the door lock. The locking of the door eliminated any other plans he might have for getting off the train. He really hoped this plan would work. He hid himself in the section he believed was going to be unloaded in West.
Around forty-five minutes later, the train stopped in West. Demarcus felt the section he was in descend. He just hoped he would not be seen. To his surprise, there were no workers in the unloading bay. It was all machines.
Demarcus slipped off the section of floor. The machines did not respond to his presence. Next, he needed to find his way out of the freight area of the station. He remembered Darius telling him about the station in Adoy. He walked past several types of machinery. He found himself in an open space, just as Darius had described in Adoy. He saw a short staircase with a door at the top. To his annoyance, it was locked.
Demarcus heard the train leave the station. He walked back to where the machines were working. He found where the goods from the train had been unloaded. They were on some type of conveyor belt. He looked at the conveyor belt to see if he could find something to trigger it.
Suddenly, the conveyor belt began to move on its own. The floor opened up in front of it, revealing another conveyor belt. This conveyor belt was sloping downward. The goods rolled from the first conveyor belt to the downward-sloping second conveyor belt and then to a flat third conveyor belt.
Demarcus remained hidden among the freight. Eventually, the freight entered a huge warehouse. Demarcus could hear workers talking. He quickly got off the conveyor belt and hid among the unloaded cargo.
Once the workers had moved on, Demarcus searched the warehouse for a way out. He saw two Sapiens come through a door. Once they had left, Demarcus went through the door. He found himself in the large Industrial Zone of the West Region.
Demarcus made his way towards the interior Industrial Zone wall to find a way out without being detected. The layout of West was quite different from Adoy. The Industrial Zone formed the perimeter instead of a segment of the region.
After walking for some time, Demarcus found a building adjacent to the interior wall. He climbed the external staircase. He climbed up onto a ledge that would take him to the wall. This reminded him of what Darius had tried to do several years earlier. This time, no sirens blurted out, and the wall was considerably shorter.
Demarcus pulled himself on top of the wall. He moved along the top of the wall until he found a soft spot to land on. He was now in the West Agriculture Zone. He walked towards the centre of the region. Eventually, he reached a wired fence. He climbed over it.
On the other side was the RollerSphere. Demarcus hoped he had made it into West undetected. He had no idea that the layout of West would be so different from Adoy.
Demarcus looked at his phone to find the address of Lily’s office. It was only about a half-hour walk away. He was very late for their meeting. He messaged Lily to tell her he had arrived in West. She sent him a reply a few minutes later. She told him to meet her at her apartment. It was slightly closer, just a twenty-minute walk away.
Demarcus reached the building. Lily remotely unlocked the main building door. He went up to her apartment. Lily was standing in the doorway of her apartment. She gave him a slight applause. ‘You made it. Well done,’ she said.
‘I’m sorry about that. Getting into West was a little more complicated than I expected,’ responded Demarcus.
‘Large regions have a more sophisticated layout,’ said Lily as she invited Demarcus in.
She led him into her lounge. Demarcus sat on her sofa, and Lily sat in an armchair.
‘I was intrigued by your letter,’ said Lily. ‘You saw more in one week than almost any Sapien would have seen in a lifetime.’
‘I was hoping that you could help me make sense of what I saw,’ said Demarcus.
‘I can do that,’ replied Lily. ‘However, that isn’t where we will start.’
Lily leaned forward in her armchair. She looked at Demarcus carefully. ‘I’m guessing you have a gift. One that may not be so uncommon.’
‘I performed well at school, and I was granted a place at a university,’ said Demarcus.
Lily began to laugh. Demarcus looked a little surprised.
‘How do you think you managed to escape detection so many times?’ asked Lily. ‘You evaded enforcers and cameras. Even today, you managed to travel from Adoy to West completely undetected.’
‘I guess I’m cunning and stealthy,’ replied Demarcus.
Lily began to laugh again.
‘I suppose you have an alternative explanation,’ said Demarcus, sounding a little frustrated.
‘I do,’ replied Lily as she disappeared.
Demarcus stared in amazement at the apparently empty armchair. She had literally just vanished in front of his eyes.
‘Governor Lily, where are you?’ Demarcus called out as he moved around the sofa, trying to see as much of the room as he could. He felt a hand touch his shoulder, but he could not see a hand.
‘I’m here,’ said Lily. Demarcus spun around, but he could not see her. He continued to search the room, but to no avail.
Suddenly, she reappeared. ‘How did you do that?’ Demarcus asked in amazement.
‘All I did was imagine I could not be seen,’ replied Lily.
‘How do you do it?’ asked Lily.
‘I can’t do anything like that,’ replied Demarcus.
‘I think you have already done that several times today,’ said Lily.
‘You are mistaken,’ said Demarcus.
‘I have a friend who is a guard at the station,’ said Lily. ‘I told him to monitor the trains with passengers from Adoy. It did not take him long to locate the train you were on.’
Lily turned her television on. She switched it to computer screen mode. She showed Demarcus several videos from his trip to West. Many of them were from the station. Some of these videos captured him becoming invisible as he hid.
Demarcus was shocked to see himself turn invisible.
‘Tell me what you were thinking and feeling at those times when you became invisible?’ asked Lily.
‘I was scared. I just didn’t want to be seen,’ replied Demarcus.
‘So you wanted to be invisible?’ asked Lily.
‘Yes, I guess, in a way,’ replied Demarcus.
‘Turn invisible for me now?’ asked Lily.
‘I don’t think I can,’ replied Demarcus.
‘If you don’t, I don’t think I can help you,’ said Lily sternly.
Demarcus tried to turn invisible, but nothing happened. Lily was becoming impatient.
‘Turn invisible, or I’ll call security and have you arrested,’ she said angrily.
Demarcus kept trying. Lily sighed in frustration. She picked up her phone and called security. She told them she had an intruder in her apartment.
A few minutes later, a security guard came rushing into Lily’s apartment.
‘Where is he?’ asked the security guard as he looked around Lily’s apartment.
‘I’m sorry. I must have been mistaken,’ said Lily. ‘Sometimes objects cast shadows that look like something or someone else.’
‘That’s fine, ma’am,’ said the security guard. ‘You still did the right thing by calling us.’
The security guard left.
Demarcus was hiding behind the kitchen counter. The security guard should have seen him.
‘You did it!’ exclaimed Lily.
Demarcus looked over at the window. He could not see his own reflection. He was invisible. He came out from behind the counter.
‘I did it,’ he said in a slightly surprised tone.
‘Yeah, you just needed that motivation and that feeling of fear,’ said Lily.
Demarcus became visible again. ‘Can you teach me how to do this at will?’ asked Demarcus.
‘I would not have it any other way,’ said Lily. ‘First, you need some rest. It’s been a long day.’
The next day, Lily began training Demarcus on how to become invisible whenever he liked. She explained to him that he needed to mimic the feelings he had when he turned invisible. For Demarcus, those feelings were fear.
After several hours of practice, Demarcus was able to turn invisible for short periods of time. Lily told Demarcus to try other types of feelings. He tried several, but they failed. Lily told Demarcus to try to imagine being invisible while mimicking the feelings of excitement and/or joy. This worked, and it worked better than fear. By the end of the day, Demarcus was transitioning between being invisible and visible with ease. Lily was impressed by how quickly he mastered this skill.
‘I’m impressed,’ said Lily. ‘You have a natural gift and the required concentration to make the most of it.’
‘This is amazing,’ said Demarcus. ‘How many others have this ability?’
‘I imagine quite a few do,’ replied Lily. ‘Most do not know they even have this ability, and many others are likely to never gain control over it.’
‘Thanks for this training session,’ said Demarcus.
‘It is as much a benefit to me as it is to you,’ said Lily. ‘I needed to know if you could handle and use all the information I’m about to tell you.’
Lily walked across the room. She turned to face Demarcus. ‘I want to show you another trick,’ she said.
Lily began to transform into another humanoid-like being. She became slightly smaller. Her facial features changed; her jaw, nose, and cheeks became more angular. Her eyes remained the same, but they appeared bigger as her face narrowed. Her skin tone changed from a light green to a pale brown. It had become less smooth. Her hair became thinner and revealed parts of her head in places.
‘It is okay. I don’t judge,’ said Demarcus.
‘This is my natural form,’ said Lily. ‘Do you think I still look Sapien?’ she asked.
‘Well, I suppose some might think you sort of do, but no, not really,’ said Demarcus, stumbling on his words.
‘Do you know why I look this way?’ asked Lily.
‘I don’t,’ said Demarcus.
‘I’m not Sapien. I’m Linap,’ said Lily. ‘I’m a different species from you.’
‘As in the Linap God?’ asked Demarcus.
‘Not exactly,’ replied Lily. ‘I will get to that later.’
Demarcus was lost for words. He was overwhelmed with this information.
‘I’m not done yet,’ said Lily.
She then transformed to look identical to Demarcus. Demarcus was even more shocked and a little scared.
‘I am able to shapeshift. All Linap can do this,’ said Lily. ‘We have limits on what we can shapeshift into and for how long. I could hold my appearance as Sapien Lily for weeks, maybe even months. I could hold your form for a much shorter time. I could hold the form of a Sape, but for only a matter of seconds.’
‘Am I able to shapeshift too?’ asked Demarcus.
‘Shall we see?’ asked Lily.
Demarcus used the same techniques he was taught to become invisible, but this time he needed to focus on becoming someone else. After several attempts, he partially transformed into Lily.
‘It looks like it is possible,’ said Lily. ‘You need much more practice, and we don’t have the time for that now.’
Lily transformed back into her Sapien form. ‘It’s not all talent. I have a little help from this device.’
She pointed to a small incision in her foot. ‘Inside my foot is a device that enables me to relax while I hold a different form. It enables me to rest and sleep without turning back into my original form.’
Lily walked over to her bookcase. She pulled out a large book. Inside the book was a much older-looking book.
‘I’m going to tell you the truth, the whole truth,’ said Lily. ‘First, I need to give you some historical context. This is the most sacred book from the House of Divine Knowledge. Only a few Linap are given the privilege of possessing a copy. You will be the first Sapien to receive such knowledge from me. After I have explained the contents of this book, I will explain our current circumstances and answer any question you might have.’
‘I am truly honoured,’ said Demarcus.
