It was as if he could somehow know that behind the wires of the 32 security cameras in the place, carefully distributed so that no column or door created a blind spot, they were watching him. He had never forgotten that day at the bank, when by an oversight of the teller, he was able to observe in his documents the classification with asterisks: Alien. Since then there hadn’t been a day when he could free himself from the certainty that he was being watched. It would be no different now.
After two consecutive weeks, that discomfort in his shoulder had brought him to this situation. ”– Room 120B,” grumbled the receptionist, “it’s the next room, following down that hallway with the door already open.”
The direction was a bit strange, after all, the five people seen before him had been instructed to remain in the not-at-all-comfortable waiting room, crammed with green chairs already occupied by people coughing and a TV showing some morning program where the host swore he had a new way to lose weight by eating hamburgers. But not him. His instructions were to follow to the end of an empty hallway and wait. Even displeased, he followed the instructions and went on.
”– Sir, sir! Please, your health card and your ID,” the unusual heat at this time of autumn seemed to be messing with the receptionist’s patience, who made a point of demonstrating her bad mood.
“Damn Stark!”, he thought. Since the infamous explosion in Stamford, the discussion about the registration of superhumans had been gaining unexpected proportions. He handed over the documents and tried to distract himself using his cell phone, hoping not to be identified just now. He had spent the last years taking all the necessary precautions to make sure that, in everyone’s eyes, he would just be one more.
Already in waiting room 120B, completely empty, he heard the steps coming down the hallway. It wasn’t possible that doctors wore that kind of shoe. They were heavy boots, probably German. The uniform sound of the steps also showed an atypical discipline that derived much more from barracks than from medical offices. “Think fast,” he repeated to himself. The steps were getting closer and he had no more than a few seconds. He slid under a table, turned right at the narrow corridor and took the chance to grab a lab coat that was hanging on a chair. He put it on quickly, just in time to hear one of the employees exclaim: “He’s not here, we have to find him, we can’t waste time!”.
In a green lab coat and being very careful to try to blend in among the mass of employees, he took the first open elevator, right at the end of the hallway. “Mars heat!” – complained the nurse. With the latest blockbuster that had exploded in theaters recently, any reference to Mars wasn’t a mere coincidence.
The descent of the elevator took a few seconds, everyone was going to the first floor, time to get rid of the lab coat and try to find the exit door. But this wasn’t the same elevator he came from, and he got confused with the hallways, which all seemed the same. He decided to take the first hallway on the left and the next one on the right. “X-RAY ROOM – Exams in progress, knock before entering”. So many turns and he ended up finding himself in exactly the place from which he had been fleeing so much. “Turn around, hurry your steps, be discreet,” this habit of talking to himself came from his childhood. “Mr. Pereira? Eduardo Pereira?”. His body froze, for an instant he thought of running, screaming for help, or pretending it wasn’t him. Using his powers was out of the question. Not here, not in this place full of cameras. He turned around and faced his examiner. 5’2” tall, Asian, terrible accent – there were no doubts, he was being cataloged.
“Please, stay still, with your back to me, don’t move. It won’t take more than 5 seconds” – Klapuft! – Done, now there were 3 different X-ray images that would reveal what everyone wanted to know and he needed to hide. “Your exams will be sent to the orthopedist, you need to come in for the appointment on Monday at 11am”. – Orthopedist, the same kind of doctor that had identified the flexible bones of Rubber Man, and the webs hidden in Peter’s hand, when he went to consult about a broken nail. Everything made even more sense.
His mind was still spinning as he walked toward the exit and thought about how to get his hands on that X-ray before the orthopedist. He glanced sideways at the receptionist, who with a devilish smile murmured: “See you on Monday, Mr. Pereira”, as if to make sure that, in addition to having to come back on Monday, he had already been duly cataloged.