The President's men, or the Anti President's men, knocked on the door the day after Michaim Toutatis' death.

Ane, Sveta, Logar and I had been locked up in the house. From what Sveta and Logar were saying, I figured Logar had killed The Anti.

He looked a little out of it, and kept touching his bloody face. He kept saying things like, "Who would have thought... I've never hurt anybody. Anybody."

And it was probable, I thought, that he hadn't. Whatever happened with The Anti must have been self defense.

When Ane went to open the door, she waited a while before replying. We couldn't hear them, but they were asking questions.

And then one of the men kicked down the door, and not the way one of us did sometimes to crash into the house. It came falling down from its hinges.

They soon went for Logar Iris.

"We are here to complete Michaim Toutatis' job," a man said. "I'm Mister Osiris-Rex."

"Go figure that when The Anti decided we should take our names from the asteroid some fucker thought it was his occasion to become double-barrelled," Logar said. Osiris-Rex kicked him in the face.

"What the hell are you doing?" Sveta cocked her rifle. "We are already hurt!"

"Of course, you did in your boss, I expect you to be at least a little hurt," Osiris-Rex said. "The four of us are the ones who were closest to The Anti. We know a little of his secrets, and, you understand, we don't want anyone else to know them. We were also part of the group who wanted to kill Marcum White to replace him with the new President White."

I noticed one member of the group was a woman. She took out a syringe, and showed it to us.

"I'm Doctor Itokawa. You're familiar with this liquid. Michaim Toutatis asked us to shoot it into your veins after Lix was killed, because he noticed that if the three of you were united against him, you could do things that you'd come to regret. He decided to separate Sveta from the rest of the group because both Logar and Percie liked her in different ways. But what happened is that Sveta made herself a new life as a boy and became Logar Iris' sidekick. This time, such thing will not happen."

"It is probable, in fact," Mister Osiris-Rex said. "That such a thing would happen every time someone tried to divide you. But this time, the liquid will choose just some areas of the brain to infect. You will retain your memories of who you are and what you've done here, but you will not recall the good times you had together or the love you felt for one another. The memories will be blurry. This will last five or six years, but don't worry --- we will make sure it works by injecting the dose from time to time."

"You sick assholes," Sveta spat. "You'll not turn me into some kind of junkie. You'll never take me alive. Bring that syringe any closer to me and I'll send you to a heavenly meeting with your boss."

"Mouthy," Osiris-Rex said. "Let us start. It will take a few days to forget, so you won't feel it as soon as it takes over. Then, of course, we have to understand which one of you killed The Anti and dispose them the only way I can think of --- by killing them."

"I still have my rifle," Sveta said.

I didn't understand her. I wouldn't have blamed her, but I thought she'd never do it. However, Michaim's sidekicks had another idea. But the Doctor looked at the gun and simply said,

"I know when someone is bluffing. You don't have bullets."

And Sveta lowered her eyes. But she didn't lower the weapon. "I can still use it to fight," she said.

"We have no trouble believing it, Jonath," the Doctor said. "But whatever you try, it still won't be enough to save you."

"The memories will take a while disappearing," Ane reasoned to me in a whisper. "We can think of a plan in the meantime."

I appreciated her resourcefulness, mainly because it was the only thing we had. "Alright," I replied.

The Doctor made her way over to Logar with the syringe in her hand.

"Can I say a few last words?" Logar asked.

"There's no need."

"But I want to."

Logar smiled, and his smile was horribly beautiful and bloody.

"If you have a humiliation kink," he started out. "Then you can become a Visionary when you're older. People will beat you, humiliate you and single you out just for being yourself. But if it doesn't work out..."

Doctor Itokawa, despite herself, looked like she was waiting for the punchline.

"If it doesn't work out, then you can become a referee."

"What?" the doctor asked.

"Soccer. The man who makes the decision and everyone screams insults at him --- the perfect job for someone with a humiliation kink."

"Iris," Osiris-Rex promised. "We will make you regret you were born."

"Oops," Logar laughed. "Too late."

"I can't seem to understand why someone came close to dying so many times, and then always decided to keep living. You saved your own life, Iris."

"I didn't do it," Logar gestured at us. "But they did."

We all exchanged surprised looks. Sveta looked close to breaking down, while Ane and I were simply happy to be acknowledged. But I think that the quote changed something, just then.

"Touching," Itokawa said. "Ane Dioretsa will be the first we inject with this syringe."

When the doctor almost shot the liquid in Ane's veins, my best friend kicked her in the shins. "Run away!" she said selflessly. "I'll hold them back!"

"No, this time we're doing it together," Logar bit back. 

When Doctor Itokawa was about to restrain Ane, she took the syringe from the doctor and shot the liquid into Itokawa's arm.

"Do not worry," Osiris-Rex said. "It only cancels out the positive from your last year or so, and I doubt you'd seen many positive things."

"Perhaps she has a family," Ane replied. I didn't understand why she would bring that up when the doctor was already angry at her, but then I understood. She had a plan.

"Yes," I said. "What about the moments Doctor Itokawa spent with her husband?"

"Wife," the doctor said. She looked horrified. "Osiris-Rex! Tell me how to stop this process or I'll inject this in your arm."

"I do not have good memories of this year anyway," Osiris-Rex replied, but he was looking at the syringe with a troubled look in his eyes. "If someone says something to you that reminds you of this meeting, in the future, Itokawa, your memories will come flooding back. I must warn you --- it will only kickstart the process. It will take years either way to get them all back."

While my plan, and Ane's, had worked, we weren't feeling so confident anymore. Especially since an infuriated Doctor Itokawa used the moment to inject the syringe in Ane's arm.

"You'll be the first to forget. The Anti's daughter. Those words will make no sense to you now, but they will, in a few days tops. They just remember you as that, you know, his daughter. They do not know that you've been abused by him for years. They do not remember your wise, gentle and selfless soul and the fact that you shed tears when you killed somebody. They do not remember the nightmares about the blood on your hands."

Ane was crying and screaming. For now, we saw her like we'd always seen her. But I knew it wouldn't last, and the realization was making me feel empty inside.

"I want to be next," I said, because I was waiting for Logar and Sveta to make up a plan in the meantime.

"Alright, Tolkien, the invisible one," Doctor Itokawa said and put the needle in. "They don't remember that they've seen you, in the end. They just remember that you blended in with the furniture, and that sometimes you've thought of them as reckless and told them so. Your warnings will sound like you've offended them. They do not remember your sacrifices."

I didn't know whether I was screaming or crying, but I think that I was.

"Sveta Metis, or Jonath Cincinnati," the doctor called out. "Put down that weap-"

The sentence was cut abruptly by Sveta hitting the doctor in the face with the butt of the rifle. I understood then that Sveta's plan was violence and Logar's plan was non-existent.

That was the moment I understood he didn't have any magical powers. Where were the seizures when we needed them?

The Doctor grunted and put the syringe in Sveta's veins. "They do not remember that you were brave, stubborn and a vital part of the cult. They just remember all the time they've argued with you. I cannot turn you into what you are, a scum from the Dormitory, because it's unlikely that this is tied to their worst memories of you. But whatever they thought of you during the fights, this is what they think now. The memories of Jonath Cincinnati will be just a blur."

"I will never forget Jonath Cincinnati!" Logar screamed. "And I won't forget Jay either!"

"Be as it may, you'll forget the happiness," the Doctor said and finally put the needle in Logar's arm. "The leader of the cult, never been much of a leader. Where are your guts, Logar Iris? People kicked you around and you couldn't even stand up correctly. They do not remember your best witticism, the times you protected them, your acquired handsomeness, your weaknesses that makes you human. They remember the leader of the cult, insufferable, complex, difficult Logar Iris. It is hard to see you and see something else."

"But I do," Sveta replied. "I see something else, and I forever will!"

"Touching, but you won't see anything," Osiris-Rex said. "In fact, one of you will be killed to pay for the crime of taking Michaim Toutatis' life, and it will be you, Grenade."

"Sveta didn't do anything!" I yelled, because I believed it.

"We will come here with a judge, who will decide who did what, but I bet money on the Grenade. He will then give us permission to carry on with the death sentence."

The judge took about one day to arrive, though time didn't matter to me much. I still had all of my memories, but sometimes I would look at Ane and see a stranger I barely knew. I wondered whether she was mad at us for killing her stepfather. It lasted only a few minutes, and then it went away.

Sveta didn't say much at all, but sometimes she would exchange jabs with Logar, before they snapped out of it.

Logar wasn't confident anymore. He was crouched and lonely and he even stopped saying jokes. Sometimes his manic deep blue eyes seemed to say that he hated us, but this clouded his glances for only about a minute.

Ane looked like she barely understood who we were, and sometimes made little mistakes talking to us, like when she told me she'd barely caught my name or was surprised that Sveta was also Jonath Cincinnati.

"Do you remember us at the start?" Sveta asked us in one of the moments of lucidity. "We were ready to tear each other apart because we were scared, and because the only adult we knew wanted us to hate each other. I do not want to go back to that!"

"And if the process isn't kickstarted, we might never get our memories back," Ane complained. That was when the judges knocked on the door.

They were followed by Osiris-Rex, who had a gun with him.

"Thank you," Sveta beamed. "I really wanted one since I ran out of bullets."

"Is this the girl you've accused of Michaim's Toutatis' death?" one of the judges asked. "Congratulations, girl. You've just signed your own death sentence."

"Michaim Toutatis was stabbed, you idiot," Logar said. "Or should I say Michail..."

His face turned the colour of sour milk. "I do not remember his name anymore! Somebody tell me why I don't remember his name anymore!"

"Well, they injected us with..." Sveta started saying.

"No, I do remember that! I was just panicking."

"Perhaps you should act in a moment where they are less lucid," the judge told Osiris-Rex. "So that they won't even get to defend their friend."

"Like hell we won't," Logar Iris said. "Say whatever you will about me. Say I don't have guts, I was never a leader. Alright, this is fair. This is true. But hurt even the little finger of any one of my friends, and I will destroy you. And I'm fairly certain I felt this way even when the drugs took hold and made me forget they were loyal to me in return, because this is how I've felt all of my life towards my father!"

"That's important, what you just did," Osiris-Rex said. "You just showed us one of your worst weakness. I wanted to shoot you, Logar Iris, for running your mouth and for bleeding on the parquet, but now I now what I have to do."

He shot Sveta. First, in one of her legs. Then, in the other. Her knees buckled. She was losing too much blood.

"Now," Osiris-Rex added. "I will shoot her in the head, if the judge says I can."

The judge took one look at the man's gun. It was probable that he was a very corrupt judge either way.

"Very well," he said. "I give you permission to shoot the murderer."

"Stop!" Logar had his phone in his hand. "I just called the police."

"What for? I am part of the only police force existing. They will not turn against me," Osiris-Rex said.

"I turned myself in. For Michaim Toutatis' murder."

Ane and I started begging him, and telling him it was a foolish thing to do. But at least Osiris-Rex did not shoot Sveta in the head. So, if that was what Logar wanted, he got it.

"It's only fair," he said. "They will come to take me, and decide whether to kill me. I killed The Anti. Of course, the people would never expect Logar Iris to turn himself in! I pretended someone had stolen my phone and sent a message. The people will know that it's true, that I killed him. He was so mean towards the end. You can tell the public that, if it helps. I will certainly tell your fellow pigs that, when they come to take me."

"Iris," Osiris-Rex enunciated. "I will not shoot you because the other pigs will kill you soon enough."

The doorbell rang.

"I never knew we had a doorbell," Logar said. "I will savour this as my last memory."

"Logar, please!" Ane exclaimed.

"I killed your stepfather, Dioretsa, and I am accepting my punishment. If Sveta wasn't half-dead, she'd thanked me."

If Sveta wasn't half-dead, she would have killed herself not to let them take Logar. It seemed so unfair, in that moment, that he would never know.

"Wait," I said. "Ane. Ane is the closest thing The Anti has to a daughter."

"He has sons and daughters, and biological at that," the judge said.

"They're not here, are they? Ask Ane what punishment will fit the crime."

"Very well," the judge said, and opened the door. A woman officer came in.

"Logar Iris," she declared. "We have to examine the crime scene before we declare you under arrest."

"Crime scene?" Logar asked. "I didn't kill Sveta Metis, I swear! It was just an accident, we were playing with her rifle."

"Logar, knock it off," I couldn't help but think it would have been terrible if Sveta really died.

"I shot the girl," Osiris-Rex said. "I thought she killed Michaim Toutatis."

"Well, we have a witness declaring that this young blond man here killed Toutatis," the woman replied. "So, is this the crime scene or not?"

"It isn't," Logar replied. "Gosh you must be really terrible at your job not to know the body of the Anti President was thrown from the window of the hospital down into the street with a knife wound in his chest. Couldn't they send a more prepared officer?"

"Do not test my patience, Logar Iris. Do you admit to killing The Anti?"

"Never," Logar spat at the officer.

Ane and I didn't understand what he was doing. It was so borderline crazy it was almost funny. If Sveta wasn't lying half-dead on the floor, I was sure she would have laughed.

"Well, somebody sent us a call from an anonymous number and a weird, robotic voice framing you for The Anti's murder."

"For goodness's sake, he's done it," Osiris-Rex said. "Remember how weary and beaten up he looks in the last pictures? It is probable The Anti laid hands on him, and the young man killed him, like a rabid dog turning against his owner."

I looked at Logar, curiously. I wondered if that was what had happened.

"Maybe," Logar said. "Perhaps. I will not say anything until you call my non-existent lawyer."

"Ane Dioretsa, the stepdaughter of the victim, asked for permission to decide what will happen to Logar Iris," Osiris-Rex continued.

"Very well," the police officer said. "I hope you know, Dioretsa, that if Logar Iris will not be killed, you can only choose the Temple as other option."

"Not the temple!" Logar laughed. "Not the Temple! I know how to get out."

"What the fuck did you say that for?" I asked, panicked. The police officer, in fact, seemed to shocked not to believe him.

"I assume killing him is the easiest way," she said.

"No!" Ane yelled. "I decided another way. Michaim Toutatis once brought us to the old prison. You can open it up, just for him, and keep him there."

"It's a life-long stay, you know that, right?"

"I would rather die!" Logar screamed. "Kill me now!"

"We will not rather have you die," I explained patiently. "We'll figure something out. If they killed you while Sveta was out, she'd never forgive us, or herself."

Logar, who had turned himself in for Sveta, didn't have much to say to that.

"You will forget about all of this," he warned us. "You will forget, and I'll rot alone in an abandoned prison for all of my life. I would rather die."

"Unless," Ane said. "Unless someone kickstarts the process. That way, it will take us years, but we might remember."

Logar rolled his eyes as if to say, I really have to do everything, don't I?

The police officer said, "Reinforcements are coming. You better give yourself in."

It was 20.32 pm.

Other guards and officers opened the door.

"Logar Iris," one of them said. "You're under arrest for Michaim Toutatis' murder. Do you have anything to comment?"

Logar smiled. It was going to look perfectly fucked up in his mugshot.

"I didn't do it," he said, cocking his head at us. "But they did."