The next morning, Ray woke up to a knock at the door. He went for the knob, but a spark zapped his fingertips.
"AH!" he yelped, and gritted his teeth with frustration.
He hissed a groan, and peered through the door's peephole: it was Jodd Adams, a metal-head rocker boy with spiked wristbands and long black hair, and dark eyeliner. That, or he just didn't get much sleep. Ray's eyes looked much the same, most days. Jodd had three friends with him, and they looked mean... and angry.
"Open up in there, you spooky freak!" Jodd shouted, as he banged on the door.
Ray shook his head, double-checked the lock, and retreated to bed, where he waited in fear for Jodd to leave. Not a single social challenge Ray had yet faced had prepared him for the next, and somehow he'd always felt just as new to school as the day he'd first arrived. It was the same for danger; no amount of brushes with it could prepare him for the brush after, and he'd met with it all over again as if it was the very first time.
"We know you're in there, Ray! You in there dressing up like a giiiirl? Playing pretend? Come on, show us your pretty makeup!"
Ray did not, in fact, own a dress, nor makeup, and was not "pretending" to be a girl at all. Ever since his twelfth birthday, his body had started to change. Gone now were his square hips and broad shoulders, now rounded and lean. His face had softened, and his eyebrows had thinned from their usual thickness. He'd begun to lose the ability to pass as a male, and it was becoming more evident than ever that he was something else. Something in-between. Society was ready for that, and had several pamphlets on the subject – people had long since accepted that humanity is more than a binary selection, and that as many people who fit the mold are as many who don't, give or take! But it did not prepare you for what to do when someone cruel decides that they like you for it. Long before you're ready to be liked. Ray suspected that Jodd's true intention was to find out how far those changes had carried him, and it scared him to death. Death is exactly what arrived; gunshots blew and rang, and Jodd fell silent outside. So too did his friends, after running away, rumbling on the floor and screaming for help. Ray's eyes widened, and his pulse shot with lightning. It was a scare like none he'd ever had in his life. His head pounded, harder than a drum. He waited for more gunshots, waited for a hole to appear in his door. Waited for a bullet to puncture through his wall, and kill him dead where he stood. Ray peered once more, but nobody was there... suddenly, he spied a flicker of light from under the bathroom door across the hall, slightly open... and with blood pouring out all over the floor. Sparks glowed red within, and it was terrifying. He triple-checked the lock, hid in the closet, and pulled out his phone. This time, he was calling for help.
Soon enough, the police arrived... but the killer was gone. A murder had occurred before Ray's very eyes (at least, through glass), and it was someone he regretted wishing would die. Ray's heart seized, and he began to sweat, finally realizing what had just happened. A human being, who once stood in that hallway, was gone. A child from his school. Jodd was never a bad kid, just forceful. The fear Ray had for him was mostly of his own weakness towards the other boys, and his lack of strength to fight them off. The grown-ups were right, all along... violence really was just pointless bloodshed. To see it so close only proved that, and it showed Ray that he was wrong... truly, truly wrong. Death is no laughing matter. This was the kind of thing the UC politicians said didn't happen anymore, because the world had become 'perfect'. Evidently, something, or someone, had yet slipped through the cracks of their seamless world.
The school counselors decided Ray was in shock, and that he'd need a week off from school. He was told to do his homework in private at the library, where nobody else would be, during class. Ray had to agree that shock was indeed his current state, to say the least. If his black hood was pulled tight before, it would be pulled even tighter now... if he hadn't given it away. An object of comfort, which he swore at himself for parting with. He sat back in bed for the rest of the day, a pillow over his head, hoping he could curl together so tight that he could disappear for real.
That was when he heard it: nothing. No birds were chirping outside, even though it was late August. No children were playing, and no teens were rough-housing. Not even a breeze stirred the trees. It was peaceful, and calm. He soaked in it. Then, footsteps. He peered cautiously through the peephole, acutely afraid of what he might see this time. It was his sister's friend Laurice, from Immigrations, and a police officer. They were taping up the door to the bathroom, where Jodd's body lay, with yellow; the words 'Do Not Cross' bound to its surface like runes. He'd no intention of trying. Laurice knocked on the Ray's door, and he answered without opening it.
"Hello?" Ray called out.
But Laurice didn't hear him, and he walked away, assuming nobody was home. Ray wanted to open her door, but he couldn't. Suddenly, he had no idea what was safe. He'd assumed from childhood that school was the place where one could be, on assertion from the rest of the country. Sure, things like this could happen in other places... uglier places. Places where war-torn desolation plagued infrastructure; where corruption ran rampant in the senate and high courts, and politics were nothing but dinner and a show; where rhetoric of 'racial purity' had won out, over the ideals of unity, patriotism, and the dream of a better life; where child soldiers marched in the streets, for tyrants who'd throw them to the fires for a mild whim. Where every citizen was a martyr, and nothing could possibly matter more than the entropic, never-resting hunger of a few oligarchic despots. Places that were always on fire, where nobody dared set foot, for risk of being mangled by some wayward vehicle... like a bus, or a deportations van, or a commercial airliner. Places like what used to be The United States of America. It had fallen on hard times before, back in the second millennium, when The Fourth Reich had risen from the ashes of the Third. And just like back then, nobody had learned a damn thing. Checks and balances went unchecked and unbalanced, except to be paid in full to a criminal and his band of cronies, who didn't deserve a single cent. And when the day was finally saved, it was because the people had stood up for themselves, to drag the soggy pricks out of their pristine offices and toss them into the very prisons they'd built, for their own constituents. At least, most of them. You'd think after that, nobody would ever want to try being a Nazi, ever again. But when The Fifth Reich fell over the USA, it stayed there. All anyone had tried to do was give them a stern talking-to, and that failed for exactly the reasons you'd think it would have. It had only been five years since that day, when Aurson Burns had been 'elected' via rigged vote. Already, the entire country was in smolders. Just like his predecessor, The Unspeakable Felon, had done before him. There was already a section on the conflict in history class, with a lengthy description of how United Canadia had defended its borders, at the cost of trade relations for the forseeable future.
Laurice and the officer left, and Ray waited. His stomach growled – he'd forgotten to eat after getting lost in the woods. Just as he went to open the door – BANG! Another loud noise, but not a gun! Something had pounded on the wall! Terrified still, but confident that he could once again bear to look, he did: it was the wolf boy, his white twin. The boy's hair was combed now, and something about him had changed... he stood straighter, his eyes darted around less, and his breathing was well-paced. Then, he did something Ray could never have expected: he spoke.
"Let me in," he said. "This is my room!"
"Like hell it is!" Ray shouted back.
Even more startling was the sudden voice of the school principal, Mr. Carisol. He was a husky old gentleman with a mustache, whose suit was always just a single size too big. He smelled like a department store, everywhere he went.
Mr. Carisol shouted, "You'll open this door right now, young man, or you'll be expelled!" His voice boomed through the door.
Ray sighed, and cracked it open. The boy barged in, smiling with pointed teeth. They looked unnaturally natural, to phrase it clumsy.
"I sure do miss my room," the boy said aloud. His voice was eerie. Like Ray's, but deeper... and with more purpose. "Thanks for watching it for me," he said to Ray.
"Yes, indeed. Very kind of you." Mr. Carisol followed.
"But this is my room," Ray told the principal.
"Let's see your student ID, then," said Carisol.
Ray palmed his face. "He has it."
"Duh, cause it's mine," the boy responded. "I'm Raimundo Radigan," he announced. "And who are you, again?" he asked, holding up the ID card.
Mr. Carisol looked at the card, then at the two young teens. "My, you must be twins. But I'm afraid this photo matches the gentleman here... as well as his gender, no offense."
Ray looked again: the photo was taken last year when his hair was dyed blonde, and it was taken in black and white. Since then, his darker auburn roots had taken over.
"I knew I shouldn't have gone blonde." Ray slapped his forehead. "But..."
"No 'buts', miss. If you've lost your card, we can go to the office to get another." Mr. Carisol offered. "Assuming, of course, that you ARE a student at this school, hm? Besides, there's been a terrible tragedy, right there in that bathroom. Now's simply not the time for these shenanigans, such as stealing dorms from your brother."
Ray protested, "I KNOW, I was a WITNESS!"
Mr. Carisol's eyes re-adjusted. "Ohhh... OH! I SEE! You were HIDING, then! From the tragedy, from the uh... the shooting! That just took place. I understand, now! Not your fault at all, dear girl. Now let's go, shall we? To my office, at once."
Remembering the gunshots, and the blood, his fears were stoked once more. "Yes. Let's go, please. But I'm not a girl."
"First," the boy (who was now named Ray) said, "grab your stuff. I don't need that girl smell in here." The Fake Ray sniffed around, and made a disgusted face. He didn't seem to care that a child's corpse was across the hall, still pooling blood. It was a minor inconvenience to what was probably his afternoon nap.
The Real Ray gathered everything he owned from the tiny closet, and stuffed the clothes into his suitcase, and his phone and art supplies into his backpack. The school year was just beginning, so he no longer needed any of his old homework, from last semester. Real Ray went to grab his GamePal, but Fake Ray got to it first.
"Oh, come on!" Real Ray sighed.
Fake Ray switched it on, and loaded the game. Right there, on the Gotchimon digital profile, it said: 'RAIMUNDO'.
Real Ray rolled his eyes. "Fine, take it. I've got the newer one anyway," he growled. Ray made sure to grab his GamePal Advance, and his favourite games. At least, he thought, this charity might buy some kindness from his doppleganger.
As they left, The Fake Ray climbed onto the futon, spun in a circle on his knees, and curled up in a ball on top of the blanket. He clutched the GamePal, as its chip-tunes lulled him to sleep.
"What a big heart he has," Mr. Carisol gasped.
Real Ray buried his face in his hands.