A sharp knock on the door instantly jolted me from my half-sleep.
For a moment, I just lay there blankly, staring at the ceiling. After all, I live alone in an apartment. Who would be knocking on my door now? And even if someone did come, the mail carrier always rings the bell.
Fuck... so it wasn't a dream, I thought, my stomach tightening.
The door opened slowly with a quiet creak, and Nurse Helena walked in with her typical enthusiasm.
"ROUNDS! Good morning, young man. How are we doing today?"
"Sleepy, but good," I replied in a raspy voice. "The soup helped yesterday, and my head doesn't hurt at all anymore."
The faster and more politely I answered her, the sooner she would leave, and I could go back to sleep.
"I'm really glad to hear that," she smiled warmly. "You're a bit of a miracle, Patrik. Did you dream of anything last night? Or... did you remember anything?"
There was unconcealed curiosity in her voice, but at the same time, a subtle, almost imperceptible tension.
"No, nothing at all. I don't remember my dreams, nor what happened before."
It was the absolute truth. I rarely remembered my dreams.
The nurse visibly let out a breath, her shoulders dropping as if a heavy weight had been lifted off her.
Was she afraid I'd be psychologically traumatized because someone tried to murder me? flashed through my mind.
"Many people who go through something so serious have troubles afterward. Sometimes bad dreams, fear, or anxiety return," she said cautiously. "Your case is a bit different, though. You have amnesia, so you might not remember the incident itself at all."
She paused for a moment.
"But that doesn't mean you should ignore everything. If you start remembering anything, or if you feel strange, please tell the orphanage director or one of the staff. We've already informed them. If needed, we can arrange a psychologist to help you cope with everything that happened."
She looked at me seriously.
"Will you promise me that, Patrik? It's for your own good."
"Of course, nurse. As soon as I remember something, I'll tell the director," I replied with a childish smile.
I was lying, of course. I didn't need a psychologist, and besides—the incident hadn't happened to me. At least, not in the true sense of the word.
The original Patrik... the boy this body belonged to, was supposed to die. And now, there was me.
I had no idea why I had ended up in his body, nor why someone had tried to take his life. But the least I could do for him was find out the truth.
The silence in the room was suddenly shattered by a sharp knock on the door.
"Come in!" Helena called out without hesitation.
Shouldn't I, as the patient, be the one to answer? crossed my mind. Oh, right. No one actually expects anything from me. I'm just a kid, after all.
I sighed heavily to myself. This is going to be damn hard.
When Doctor Barlow entered the room, I instantly sensed that something was wrong. His good mood was gone. There was a tension in his face that boded no good.
"Good morning, Patrik. How are you feeling today?" he asked, attempting a smile. It was so forced and strained, though, that it unnerved me rather than reassured me.
"What happened, Doctor?" I asked directly.
It had to be something serious. Barlow had been honest with me yesterday, so I didn't want to waste time with pointless questions and went straight to the point.
The doctor turned tensely to the nurse. "Helena, please leave us alone for a moment. I will finish the rounds myself."
We waited in silence until the nurse left the room. Once the door clicked shut, Barlow turned to me.
"There is a police investigation underway at the orphanage," he said quietly, tension thick in his voice. "Bates was arrested yesterday. The police had been monitoring him for a while. They were convinced he was behind what happened to you, but they were still missing something to connect him to it." He paused for a moment and swallowed before continuing: "Then he came to see you. Despite the ban. It's as if he didn't realize that by doing so, he would give the police exactly what they were waiting for."
"That's good news, isn't it? Now that we know it was him," I remarked, watching his reaction closely. I trusted my instincts, and Bates had seemed like an incredibly slimy guy to me from the start.
"Yes, it is good. He won't hurt anyone else," Barlow replied, but kept his eyes fixed on the floor.
He was hiding something from me. I watched him clench my medical chart so tightly that his knuckles turned white.
Why would anyone want to kill an eight-year-old kid in an orphanage? kept nagging at me. The motive is key.
"Why did he want to kill me?" I asked aloud.
Doctor Barlow froze at my words. He slowly raised his head and looked at me. For a moment, we just sat there motionlessly. Finally, he let out a helpless sigh and slumped his shoulders in resignation.
"You're far more observant than you should be at your age," Barlow remarked quietly.
I needed to know what the hell was going on here. What had actually been happening in that cursed orphanage? What had this little body had to endure? I trusted Barlow. I understood he only wanted to protect me, but from my own life experiences, I knew that the cruel reality is always better than a sweet, merciful lie.
"Thank you. So why did he do it?" I pressed, meeting his gaze firmly.
"I shouldn't tell you. It really would be better if you didn't know, Patrik."
It was starting to seriously piss me off. His evasive answers were driving me insane. I have to know. I owe it to the boy whose life I've been entrusted with.
"I want to know, Doctor. Tell me," I said, my tone almost commanding.
My high-pitched, childish voice didn't help much in that moment. It lacked the weight I needed. Still, under my unyielding stare, I saw Barlow's resolve to remain silent slowly crumble.
"The director of the home should really be the one to tell you," he sighed at last, looking directly into my eyes for the first time since I'd woken up.
In that moment, something inside me exploded. The frustration and thirst for information were so powerful that they completely consumed my consciousness. And then, it happened.
The world around me vanished completely for a hundredth of a second.
A flash.
A dark night street, rhythmically cut by sharp blue police lights. I see police cars and two men in uniform aggressively shoving a handcuffed Bates into the back seat.
A flash.
An older woman's face flashes before my eyes. She is waving her arms in despair, her voice echoing directly inside my skull: "...we will need to thoroughly investigate every single child! This is a massive systemic failure..."
A flash.
The sound of crackling static. I see the hand of a uniformed officer gripping a radio, speaking into it: "...Bates is a registered pedophile. He was in the database, he had no business being in that home..."
That thought instantly snapped me back to reality.
My heart began to pound wildly, I gasped for air, and a sudden, heavy fatigue washed over my body.
What the hell was that? What just happened? Bates was a pedophile?
I tried not to let anything show. Taking a deep breath, I gathered the last remnants of my strength and, in a calm voice, asked the question:
"Doctor... was Bates a pedophile?"
Barlow's pupils dilated from sheer shock. For several seconds, he just stared at me in silence, as if trying to process what he had just heard.
Then, he slowly let out a breath.
"How did you figure that out?" he asked after a while.
I didn't answer. I just stared quietly, straight into his eyes.
Barlow studied me in silence for a few seconds. He was clearly trying to understand how I had reached that conclusion.
"You know, Patrik... most children your age wouldn't even think about such a thing," he said quietly at last. "But yes. You are right. Bates was a pedophile. He confessed to everything during his interrogation."
He paused for a moment.
"However, what I am about to tell you, you must keep to yourself. This is still part of an ongoing investigation, and I cannot freely share this information. Furthermore, as a doctor, I am bound by patient confidentiality."
He looked at me gravely.
"But I think it would be worse for you to remain in uncertainty. Right now, only the police, the director of the home as your legal guardian, and I know about this."
"I promise, Doctor. I'll be silent as the grave," I assured him quickly. I didn't want to risk him changing his mind.
Barlow sighed.
"Fifteen years ago, Bates was convicted of sexual assault on a child. He ended up on the sex offender registry. After eight years, he was paroled for good behavior, but he was banned from working with children or being in environments where he would have unrestricted access to them."
He paused for a moment, and his expression hardened.
"But then, a fatal failure occurred."
"What kind of failure?"
"When hiring a new employee, the home's management must run a background check. But Bates put his name on the application with a minor change. Instead of Bates, he wrote Battes."
I frowned, confused.
"The director subsequently ran the check under that name. And since there was no Battes in the database, the check revealed nothing. No one noticed it was the exact same person."
Barlow pressed his lips tightly together.
"A single typo in a name. A single oversight. And the result was that a man who should have never been near children was allowed access to them."
A wave of pure disgust washed through my stomach.
Pedophiles had always triggered a single reaction in me—disgust. Vile people who ruin the lives of innocent children.
Still, one thing struck me.
Did a simple typo in a name really suffice? In 1988, there were no interconnected databases like today, right? Were people verified only through paper records and phone calls?
Another sharp realization that I wasn't in my own time or my own body hit me with a delayed force.
"We were incredibly lucky that Bates only worked at the home for less than a month," Barlow continued. "During interrogation, he claimed he hadn't managed to abuse any child yet."
His expression darkened.
"But he admitted that he tried to knock out a little girl with chloroform and drag her to the maintenance room. Only, you caught him in the act."
He paused for a moment.
"You started running and screaming down the corridor. Bates panicked and chased after you. He caught up with you under the stairs and hit you directly in the head with a pipe wrench."
Silence filled the room for a moment.
"There was a lot of blood. When he heard approaching footsteps, he got scared and fled."
Stupid, filthy bastard.
"Since the staff immediately called an ambulance and the police, Bates didn't get a chance to do anything else. The police started questioning everyone present, and it soon became clear that it was no accident. A fall down the stairs would look different. Besides, several children heard your screams."
Barlow paused for a moment.
"You had no other injuries, fractures, or bruises that would correspond to a fall. Just a single wound on the crown of your head caused by a blunt object. The case was immediately classified as attempted murder."
"And by coming in person to see if his victim survived, he basically incriminated himself," I remarked coldly.
"Exactly. After the transfer, we ran complete tests on you immediately. Aside from a severe skull fracture, we found nothing else. And today, from a medical standpoint, it inexplicably appears fully healed."
Barlow smiled slightly with relief.
"But the most important thing is that he didn't manage to do anything more to you."
I felt relieved, too.
What could have happened terrified me more than the attack itself. The thought of someone taking control of a completely helpless child's body and life was disgusting.
At least this time, the bastard hadn't managed to hurt anyone else.
When I'm older, I will find you.
And you will regret the day you were born.
I made this promise in my mind to the boy whose life I was now living.
"Thank you for your honesty and for all the information, Doctor. I really appreciate it."
I gave him a grateful smile and then asked curiously, "What happens next?"
"We will finish the rounds, and the director of the home will come for you after lunch," Barlow replied with a smile. This time, he seemed a bit more relaxed.
He had probably expected a different reaction. Maybe fear, crying, or panic. Instead, I accepted his words more calmly than anyone would expect from someone my age.
The doctor gently palpated the crown of my head again. He muttered something in fascination under his breath for a moment, then jotted a few notes down in my medical chart and said goodbye.
"If you need anything, don't forget that red button above the bed," he reminded me from the doorway.
Then he left.
I slid deeper into the pillows, clasped my hands behind my head, and stared at the ceiling. Finally, I had some peace to think.
What exactly were those flashes I saw when I looked into Barlow's eyes?
Were they his memories?
Barlow thought I had simply deduced everything. That meant only one thing—the images I saw weren't random figments of my imagination. They were real.
And if they were real, then I had to admit a possibility that sounded completely insane.
I was in another world.
The question remained—which one?
Telepathy. Superhuman regeneration. Could I be the result of some genetic mutation? Something like Marvel's X-Men or DC's metahumans?
Or...
Was it magic?
Legilimency from Harry Potter came to mind. The ability to look into someone else's mind, read memories, gather information with a glance.
The more I thought about it, the less absurd the possibility sounded.
Even that regeneration would fit into that world. Magical injuries and healing never worked by the rules of ordinary medicine. You only had to think of Harry and his strange accidental magic abilities.
And then there was that name.
Rosier.
It was incredibly familiar, yet for the life of me, I couldn't remember where I knew it from.
I have to try using that telepathy again. At the very first opportunity, I resolved.
The silence of the room was interrupted again by a gentle, polite knock.
"Come in!" I called out.
A young student nurse I remembered from yesterday walked in. She was carrying a food tray. Perfect—my stomach had been protesting with loud rumbles for a good while now.
"Is our little Patrik hungry?" she asked me in that mildly annoying baby talk tone adults often use with small children.
"Starving," I replied, trying to manage a sweet smile. "I think I could eat the whole plate."
Eliza smiled in amusement.
"Well, here you go. We have an omelet, toast, and fruit yogurt. Enjoy your meal."
She set the tray on my table and turned to leave.
"Thank you, Eliza," I called out after her before she could close the door. "You're very kind."
She smiled at me and then left.
The door clicked shut quietly, and I dug in immediately.
Breakfast was quite good for hospital food. Maybe not exactly a culinary experience, but from a nutritional standpoint, I couldn't complain.
Once only an empty plate remained on the tray, boredom slowly crept back into the room.
I had no idea what world I had ended up in, but this body was incredibly weak. I had to get it into shape. The world out there wasn't fair, and no one would spare me just because I was in the body of a child.
Dumbbells and heavy weights were out of the question at this age. If I really did have enhanced regeneration, it would be a huge plus, but I still didn't have it one hundred percent confirmed. I definitely didn't want to risk injury or stunt my growth just because I was working out like a grown man in a child's body.
I'd stick to the good old boxing classics. Squats, push-ups, crunches, and hopefully I'd find a pull-up bar somewhere outside. On top of that, shadowboxing and power stretching for the whole body.
But shadowboxing right after a severe injury directly in a hospital room would be extremely suspicious. So, I decided to start with stretching. Even the mild pain of tight muscles was a thousand times better than biting my nails out of boredom.
While stretching, I realized one thing that would be of key importance for my future.
My brain was clean, as was my mind. No games, no Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok. No constant notifications, new messages, or utter nonsense to break my focus. No bad habits, just a clean slate and the ability to dedicate all my energy to what actually mattered.
On top of that, I had the knowledge of an adult with all the life experiences. I knew exactly how the tech world would develop, which industries were bound for massive growth, and which companies would be worth investing in. In theory, I had a massive advantage over everyone else.
The only thing standing between me and fabulous wealth was starting capital.
But that was a problem I decided to solve later.
Priority number one was to find out which universe I was actually in. The sooner, the better.
Priority number two was my abilities. I was sure I had some. At the same time, I realized that in any universe where people with similar abilities exist, there is also extreme danger.
I absolutely wanted to be in control of my own destiny.
I wiped the beads of sweat from my forehead and sat back down in a lotus position. Time to meditate. If I wanted to better understand my abilities, I had to start right here.
The truth was, I had almost no experience with meditation. I had tried it once in my past life, but I'd never taken it seriously. However, I remembered that the absolute foundation was breath control. And I did have experience with that—pre-fight stress had taught me how to calm my body and get my mind under control.
I closed my eyes and began slowly counting the rhythm in my head.
Inhale... one, two, three, four.
Hold the breath in my lungs... one, two, three, four.
Exhale... one, two, three, four.
I had no idea how long I sat like that, focusing on my breathing. Somewhere in the back of my mind, though, I was still waiting for something extraordinary to happen. For me to discover some hidden core of energy, feel a rush of power in my body, or suddenly hear the thoughts of everyone in the entire hospital.
Naturally, nothing of the sort happened.
"Fuck!" I swore aloud and opened my eyes in frustration.
So no game system, no cheats, no free handouts. Just hardcore mode in a harsh world. Only my own mind, a weak body, and abilities I currently knew jack shit about.
It's going to be tough, but I have to grind. In real life, nobody gives you anything for free. You have to fight for and earn everything. I'm not some oversensitive pussy, after all.
Let's keep moving.
Having vented mentally, I forced myself to focus again, closed my eyes, and resumed breathing.
***
Author's note:
What do you think about this chapter?
What did you like, and what didn't work for you? When I read it back myself, it feels pretty okay, but I'd love to hear your thoughts.
Your feedback really helps me and motivates me to keep writing and improve faster.
And if you enjoyed the chapter, don't forget to drop a Power Stone — it helps a lot and keeps me motivated.
Anyway, I wish you all a Merry Christmas.