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Chapter 5: May

Jahorii walked down one of the nearby streets extremely disappointed in himself. He had been too careless about what was going on and had had to confront the target directly. Everything did end up going exactly as planned but he was not supposed to directly interfere. It was against the rules. If he showed himself directly then he could be found. As he walked along with his white lab coat he reflected on the notion of how much better it was to stay at the edge of perception than to be seen. So long as he never did anything to bring particular attention to himself no one would remember what it is he looked like, only that he wore his coat which could be discarded at the earliest sign of trouble. But there were too many risks involved in that particular incident.

What would have been worse, however, is if someone else had found that but had managed to still been able to achieve the effect. That would have been disastrous. Without that particular target being the particular one getting the effect of the Incident the results further down the line would not be able to be controlled. In fact if it had activated on an especially wrong candidate then there would eventually an exceedingly large number of casualties.

So long as things remained as they are the plan will continue and finish without anyone having any chance of changing the results afterwards. Next will be the bird in the sky, followed by the awakening of the dragon. Once the dragon awakens there will be no chance for it to be stopped. The events will simply start to build upon themselves while everyone else is looking at something else.

Even still Jahorii had to chuckle a little bit to himself over the response the humans have been giving this whole ordeal. They all seem intent on mulling over the little things and then end up completely overlooking the important things, the deliberate things. And at the same time completely miss the reasoning, the cause.

"They probably will be looking for me now, if they hadn't already," Jahorii speaks to no one but the wind, reflecting again on the fact that he was seen.

He was fine with that fact. It would simply mean he would have to become a lot more careful in the future, to spend so much more painstaking effort to ensure that he isn't caught too early.

"It will soon be time to progress up to phase two," Jahorii muses after paying for a loaf of bread in a nearby store.

He leaves the store and continues walking down the road, noting some police moving around the area and a couple of them see Jahorii and begin walking towards him. It was always all according to the plan.

"What can I do for you, officers?"

"It's nothing to be concerned about, sir. We'll just need to see some I.D." one of them states. "It's just a protocol we have had to start following ever since the second Incident happened last month. We're just doing a routine check on anyone that matches the description of our target."

"That's okay," Jahorii responds, frowning somewhat but hands his driver's license over to the officer and then reaching into another pocket in his lab coat and pulling out a laboratory notebook and a pen. He flips to the next available page and immediately begins scribbling in it.

It was too soon for this to happen. Jahorii needed to recalculate the parameters to try and see how best he should adapt his plan to see to it that what he wants is accomplished. Particularly on his equations are if she should kill the two officers or not. The partner notices the notebook and the scribbling while the other goes back to their nearby car to go run his license through their machine.

"So what is it you're working on there?" the officer asks.

"Oh, nothing much," Jahorii lies. "There's a problem at work that I need to try and figure out. I had a thought and needed to write something out."

"Really? So what's the job about?"

"I would tell you," Jahorii finishes scribbling, finding that the likelihood of him succeeding is far greater if he acts completely normal this time than if he tried to intervene, "but I had signed a non-disclosure agreement with the people I work for. And believe me," Jahorii makes an almost shrugging motion after putting the notebook away, "the people I work for are very strict about things like that."

"Oh, I understand, sir. Think nothing of it."

Jahorii still spends a moment considering his decision to simply let them go for a minute or two and is just about to go ahead and take the extra risk when the other officer returns with Jahorii's license.

"Looks like everything checks out. Sorry to inconvenience you, sir," he hands it back

"No problem. Have a nice day officers," Jahorii puts his license away before begins walking away from the two cops.

Jahorii finds a nearby bin and throws the loaf of bread into it before continuing his path down the road, stuffing the bag that the loaf came with into his pocket after smashing it into a small ball. He was definitely glad that they allowed him to go without further questioning. He wasn't so much feeling any emotion whatsoever regarding the lives of those two people but rather his concern over how messy it would probably be if he did have to intervene in such a way. More importantly it would definitely cause him to have to drastically change his plan. It would not change the overall outcome nor even the targets succumbing to the Incidents but it would make the byproducts of them far less containable and far more unstable than he would prefer.

Along the wall of one of the nearby buildings is a particular advertisement. Upon seeing it Jahorii stops and takes out his notebook again before scribbling in something on one of the pages. Once he had finished he puts the notebook away again before flipping the advertisement off and then continuing on his journey. The most beautiful thing about the plan is that only someone who knew about the plan in its entirety could have any chance at successfully intervening and stop one of the Incidents. Anyone else might be able to get an idea of what was to come but without knowing the specifics or the means at which it is carried out they would underestimate and miscalculate and likely end up either ensuring the next Incident happens or just end up getting involved in the aftermath of it all. Jahorii takes the next corner and continues walking, looking briefly at the cloudless sky before looking down at a watch on his wrist.

"Looks like we're going to be getting quite a storm soon," he states out loud to no one.

Jahorii was very much not looking forward to how he would likely be reprimanded for what he did in the last Incident. Everyone that was participating in the plan had agreed before it started to not directly interfere with any of the targets. Observation and indirect interference was fine but none of them should not ever learn of that person's face or name. Should they decide, like Jahorii had to directly interfere with one of the targets his safety could no longer be ensured. On top of that the other members might decide to take it out on him for any complications he made on their own calculations.

It was almost time to advance things into phase two. Jahorii sees a taxi driving down the roads and he signals to it. It pulls up alongside the road and allows Jahorii to enter it.

"Where to?" the driver asks, not really even bothering to turn around.

"Seventh and Q," Jahorii responds, indicating a location that is clear on the other side of town and heading in the opposite direction from the way the taxi had been facing.

The driver mumbles something or other but Jahorrii wasn't really listening. As the cab begins moving again Jahorii reflects on what would the humans running the investigation on the Incidents would probably think if they learned the truth. It's a thing that brings a smile to Jahorii's face, the thought of how likely it'd be that they would not believe the whole purpose to the plan and consider it pure insanity despite everything that has already happened.

As he rides in the cab the driver seems very intent on talking about all kinds of things. Jahorii nods as if listening for a while before after hearing of him making a mention of the latest Incident Jahorii reaches into his pocket and pulls out his notebook and begins scribbling away at it again. Once he's done writing he puts it away and speaks up.

"This should be good."

"You sure there? We've only gone a few blocks. If you want me to shut up I can easily do so."

"No, this will suffice. How much would it have cost to take me the entire way?"

"I don't know, maybe a twenty?" he guesses.

Jahorii pulls out his wallet and grabs twenty two dollars and hands it to the driver before stepping out of the car, not saying another word to the driver. The driver accepts the money but continues to give Jahorii a strange look before driving off. Jahorii moves towards a hotel that is across the street from where he got out. Once he gets into the lobby he approaches the front desk and addresses the person on the other side of the desk.

"May I borrow a phone, I need to leave a message with the person in room eight fourteen."

The person shrugs and slides the phone his way. He types in the number for the room and waits for someone to pick up. Once he hears the response he waits a few seconds before speaking up.

"Thirteen, Seven, Six," he states before hanging up the phone and thanking the lady behind the desk.

Jahorii turns around again and walks out of the hotel before turning the corner and began walking down the road again. The second phase of the plan would certainly be an interesting time, Jahorii muses. When he reaches a bridge overlooking a river he stops and pulls out everything that was in the pockets to his labcoat and places each and every item carefully on the ground. He grabs a very heavy looking cube and puts it back into his coat. He then removes his lab coat and tosses it over the edge of the bridge and watches it a moment as it flies towards the river. Once he's sure it's been carried into the river and no longer in view he reaches down and grabs the plastic bag and begins opening it up. Once fully opened he starts placing all of the other items into the bag. Once he had taken everything that had been placed onto the ground he starts walking again.

"The second phase is certainly going to be fun," he comments to no one in particular.

Jahorii is half tempted to go and see about visiting the target for the Second Incident but considering how much they'd have him under lock and key due to fear of it spreading. Especially since Jahorii can't be too certain that the person won't still recognize him without the lab coat. And if they were paying attention to surveillance it might give him away. So instead Jahorii simply continues walking down the road and considers what all would be required for preparing the next Incident considering how withdrawn the location is.