196 BPM: Elude

Title: 196 BPM: Elude

Year: 2015

Word Count: 8,800

A very blond and tan Asian boy ran swiftly past New York’s cloudy, barren blocks; quiet sneakers crunching against concrete and cigarette butts, pairs of leather shoes clicking after his footsteps. He looked back and saw the small squad of men in suit and tie running towards him. He looked at their lanky leader in the eye, gave him his best smile, and slid easily through the pack of people in the bustling streets.

To his dismay, the crowd split like the red sea a minute later for the group of men behind him, leaving him in bright spotlight.

He ran faster, looked around, and ran to an unsuspecting stairway leading underground. He was glad this crowded terrain made it impossible for the cops to whip out a gun. He made it to the subway entrance, grabbed the bar over his head and used the momentum to jump over the turnstile. He let out a satisfied laughter as he ran down the second flight of stairs to the platform. Far behind him, the tacky men yelled out to have the wheelchair gate opened for them.

Johnny Satria, 22, blond and careless, boarded the subway after running in the alleys from Roger Wu, 27, the only person in the whole FBI who was so into catching the elusive conman. Johnny had been MIA since he was 16, casually milking money from big companies using fraudulent checks and false identities. His impressive track record made him the badge of honor to Roger Wu; the agent's door to instant, skyrocketing promotion.

The train announced its departure and its doors closed. The men came just in time to see the train leaving with Johnny waving them a mischievous goodbye.

÷

Johnny Satria had always like sitting alone by the window, wondering what kind of person would be seated beside him. He watched as a tall boy walked towards him in the slim airplane aisle. The boy stopped, looked down to his ticket, then to the row number above Johnny’s head. He put his bag in the overhead cabin, and smiled a hello as he sat down.

“Is your mom supposed to sit here? I’m sorry.” Johnny asked out of courtesy and stood up.

The boy scrunched at the bluntness. “Excuse me?” He laughed. “I’m what, twenty five? And you expect that seat beside me to be my mom’s?”

Johnny couldn’t help his baffled expressions.

“I’m Cakra. A singer hopeful.”

“No way,” Johnny laughed. The little boy was older than him. “I’m really sorry.”

“What’s your name?” Cakra asked, right hand waiting for a replying shake.

Johnny wondered what to reply. Johnny, James, Jarod…

“Tirta. Twenty seven. A nomad, I guess?” He shook the hand firmly. “I’m sorry again.” He had gone all over the world on the same passport, introducing himself proudly to strangers under pseudonyms he made up on the spot. He had never introduced himself using his real name before.

“It’s cool. I get that all the time,” Cakra smiled. “You got cool hair, by the way. I would love to do it like that later when I’m singing on national TV.”

“T—thanks.” Tirta looked shocked and immediately touched his hair cautiously. “What’s with my hair..?”

“It’s—you know. Ombre.” Cakra touched the ends of his own hair to emphasize his point. “It’s like brown but all blonde-ish at the bottom edges.”

Tirta’s eyes widened. He didn’t get to look at the mirror when he hurriedly sprayed the temporary brown dye over his blond hair in JFK’s men’s bathroom. Looked like he wasn’t that good at self-disguise after all.

÷

“Present, Dr. Orel.”

“Mr. Rasya Hadian, age 35. Has malnutrition due to bowel perforation. Patient has a history of inflammatory bowel disease and is currently receiving parenteral nutrition to substitute solid food.”

“Other causes of bowel perforation?”

“Ulcer, obtrusion by foreign objects, and ulcerative colitis.”

“What do you do?”

“Um,” the new kid stuttered. He sifted through memories and jumbled Latin vocabulary. “We can…” The boy stifled a jaw-cracking yawn, trying his best to sound fresh after just nearly two hours of sleep.

“Are you too sleepy to impress me now, Mas Orel?”

“Um, no, Sir.” He shook himself awake. He kept thinking, his eyes unconsciously glued to Doctor Cahyadi’s. “We run tests and see if there is any internal bleeding.”

Hasan Cahyadi, 33, was tending to Rasya Hadian, 35, a thin young man with thin bowed lips. He was scheduled a surgery in a little over 24 hours because his intestines couldn’t absorb. His excrement was food puree. His skin was paper white and his muscles nonexistent. Orel Danujan, 23, wanted to go to sleep.

“Get him an x-ray and a CT as soon as possible. I want to see the results by noon. Let's go check Mr. Josef.” Doctor Cahyadi said and turned around. He batted away the green curtain separating the two patients and disappeared behind it.

“That sounds so cool,” the patient whispered to Orel hoarsely from his blue bed. Orel looked back at him, and the patient was smiling. Orel could imagine Mr. Rasya’s face being as full as it could have been. “I get to get a body scan and a surgery,” Mr. Rasya said softly. Orel’s fingers meddled slowly with the seams of Mr. Rasya’s record file. They would have to take out the gaping holes in Mr. Rasya's stomach, sow back his guts before his body could freak out from a puke flood. Orel couldn’t give a comeback.

On the other side of the curtain, a patient watched with solemn eyes as Doctor Cahyadi entered his space, face tainted with fatigue. “Good morning, Mr. Josef. Did you get a good night’s sleep?”

“I did,” Josef Winarta, 30, whispered, smiling under his fogging oxygen mask. He let Doctor Cahyadi take his right arm for BP, the grip on his arm as confident as the doctor himself. The curtain whisked open with Orel scurrying in as the sphygmomanometer deflated with a funny hiss.

“I’m sorry,” Orel panted.

“90 over 62,” Doctor Cahyadi said bitterly at Orel’s lateness, peeling the Velcro loudly off Mr. Josef’s arm. Orel hurriedly flipped through Mr. Josef’s records to jot the numbers down.

“Is Mr. Rasya going to be okay?” Mr. Josef asked. Although depressing, this room was Doctor Cahyadi’s favorite room. Calm, positive patients that could always cool his bad day with how softly they speak.

“You made friends,” Doctor Cahyadi noted. He looked at the green curtain, then back at Mr. Josef. “He’s going to be fine. We’re going to take the fluid out of your lungs so that you can breathe more freely now.”

Mr. Josef nodded at the request. Unlike Mr. Rasya, Mr. Josef was not flat out gray and skinny, although equally as sick. His sensitive lungs were cut and battered, puddled with blood and pus from infections by microscopic smog particles.

Doctor Cahyadi gripped Doctor Orel Danujan’s arm tightly and whispered, “If you fail this task, I hope you don't mind having your behind served medium-rare on a silver platter,” before letting Doctor Orel step up to take his place. Doctor Orel gulped, but he took a deep breath and put on a big smile.

“Hello, Mr. Josef. How are you today?” Doctor Orel smiled kindly, being the sweet person he always was. He took the catheter from the little cart. “I’m going to make a little cut on the side of your chest, slide this plastic tube in, and let the pus in your lungs flow out into this bag. I promise you,” he peeked a glance at Doctor Cahyadi, “that you won’t feel any pain.”

They left the shared room with a polite smile. The hallway wasn’t bustling with people, but it was alive enough for any public place at 6 AM. They separated ways: Orel Danujan dragged his way to the records table and Doctor Cahyadi took the staircase down to the doctors’ cafeteria.

“One chicken porridge and one unsweetened green smoothie are on the way," Doctor Cahyadi heard, only seconds after he showed up in front of the cash register.

"Seriously."

The Cook, 33, was responsible for the home foods section at the doctors' cafeteria. Doctor Cahyadi's order would be his first one for the day.

The Cook slid the plastic cup of smoothie and the plate of sandwich onto a tray. He took Cahyadi’s money in between his fingers.

"I've heard enough of you smart doctors talking about how bad ramen and spicy food are for the body. You've had enough of both at the same time." The Cook gave Cahyadi his change on the tray. "Here you go."

Cahyadi took the tray and looked at his trusted cafeteria cook. "Thanks."

÷

“Hi. Can I book a vocal practice room, please?” A White man with catlike lips in black jacket asked with a weird, western accent.

“Your Musica Academy ID please.”

What’s a Musica Academy ID? “I. I’m a police,” he said in his awkward Indonesian. He fished his wallet and showed the woman his police ID. “One of your students is a criminal.” He took a picture from his breast pocket he’d been holding on to for the past four years. “I would like to see him, please.”

The woman couldn’t help but give a freaked out face, and she slowly took her desk phone to ask for help from her immediate superior. It wasn’t the first time they had freaky fans trying to gain entrance to the building. She greeted her boss on the phone and covered its mouthpiece. “What’s your name, Sir?”

“Carl Anderson.”

“Carl Anderson,” the woman repeated to her boss, suspicious eyes still glued to the guest. She listened to her boss and nodded along, answering ‘police’ somewhere in between while glancing at him with scrutiny. She hung up the phone and stood up from her seat.

“Follow me, Sir.”

She led Carl Anderson through a series of white, modern hallways with wooden floors. Carl Anderson looked at his surroundings. The interior designer must’ve been told to save on the tiles and put the same dance flooring all around.

She opened a door to a cramped space, containing only a keyboard, colorful sound absorbers on the walls, and posters of successful label artists on one side. He thanked her, sat on the keyboard seat, and let her close the door.

The desk attendant closed the door behind her and walked to a dance class three doors away to call Cakra, 19, a new singer-to-be freshly scouted from the states. The class door opened, stealing attention from the panting students. The instructor came up to the door.

The desk attendant whispered to the instructor. The instructor nodded promptly and stuck his head back to the room.

“Cakra,” the instructor called. He turned his head and walked to the door.

“Yes?” Cakra closed the door behind him. The hallway was silent, tinted with the soft pounding of bass cranked up too loud.

“You have vocal practice from eleven to two. The teacher called for you.” She said. Cakra looked at his rubber wristwatch. He did not remember having vocal until three in the afternoon.

“Alright, thank you.” He bowed with a smile. The woman left and Cakra went back to the classroom to take his bag. He changed his sweaty clothes and went to the room he was assigned to.

“Excuse me,” he said as he entered the vocal practice room. “Please forgive my unpunctuality.” The teacher kept silent, too engrossed in playing the cheap black keyboard. Cakra put his bag in the corner and sat there waiting for the teacher to finish the song he was playing.

The teacher finished his song and lifted his head to greet a friendly, “Hello, Cakra,” and Cakra immediately stood up, knocking the stool he was sitting on. “How do you like Jakarta so far?” The teacher, Carl Anderson, asked in perfect English with a sly smile.

Cakra didn’t think any further when he ran out the door, out the white hallways, out the building, to save his dear life, as fast as his feet could carry him.

÷

“This is your pager,” the nurse said, showing a small, rectangular clip-on device.  “You press this for incoming pages,” she demonstrated, “then this button over here is the back button. You can go back,” she pressed the button, “and page people if you need assistance,” fingers and words faster than her sole audience could digest at once. Tirta Satria, now Banyu Prakoso, 28, regretted picking up Orel’s identity right off the bat.

The nurse kept walking quickly, showing everything in the most comprehensive manner she could. “You punch in here, patient records are here, front desk..." She looked around, trying to find what else she could show and mention. "Vending machine only for visitors... I think that's all. You'll get used to it. It gets busy, but the hours aren't that bad," she added. "Your boss asked you to meet him again once you're done with me."

"I understand. I'll do my best," he said, ending the orientation session with the nurse. He was to meet Doctor Ambara, the head of the emergency department. Doctor Banyu, six years younger than he claimed to be, went to the office and knocked on the white door.

“Come in,” a coarse and muffled voice answered. Doctor Banyu opened the door.

“Did you have fun going around the hospital?” Head Doctor Ambara, 39, asked from behind his desk.

“Yes, Mr. Ambara.”

“Come,” he said, telling Doctor Banyu to come in from his awkward place sticking by the door. Doctor Banyu walked towards the desk, and Doctor Ambara stood up, brooding, despite his warm attitude. “I’m glad we have a brilliant addition to our great staff. The pit’s always busier after midnight—you know, when people drunk-drive, sleep-drive, do impulsive mistakes.”

“Yes, Sir.” Doctor Banyu smiled confidently. He had come home from the stationery store with a stack of ivory paper and blue stamps to paint a convincing 3.95 grade point average on his homemade certificate from the University of Indonesia’s College of Medicine. If he wanted to stay, he at least had to convince his boss.

“There you go then. Get on it. Once again, welcome.”

“Thank you, Sir.” He smiled, and stepped back. “If you would excuse me.”

Doctor Banyu closed the door behind him and walked his way to the elevator.

“Kak Tirta!”

Doctor Banyu froze. He didn’t know whether he should run or wait, but before he could decide, a warm arm curled around the shoulders of his pristine white coat. He turned his head carefully.

“You work here?” Orel asked excitedly.

Doctor Banyu immediately put his finger on his lips with threatening eyes. He pointed the nametag on his coat, looking around cautiously. “Orel, what’s the pit?” Tirta whispered carefully.

Tirta Satria, 24, then still Johnny Satria, 22, met Orel Danujan for the very first time in a music store, a week after Tirta had dyed the rest of his hair a subtle jet black. They bonded over Tchaikovsky and medicine on the seater of a grand piano. Orel was the only person Tirta had told everything to, including how he became Johnny in New York, how he managed all his different IDs, and how he became a judge at the tender age of sixteen. In turn, Orel told Tirta everything, including how he got into Jakarta General Hospital and how he learned to stay up for twenty three hours every day.

“Banyu… Prakoso…” Orel read out the nametag, then he looked at Tirta’s eyes, confused.

“OH,” Orel exclaimed, and hurriedly covered his mouth. “Oh.” Orel said. “Okay, Doctor… Banyu.”

“Hello,” a voice greeted proudly, making Tirta jump again. Tirta turned around to see a man his height trying to play it kind and low-key. “I’m Doctor Hasan Cahyadi, Orel’s attending,” he said, extending his hand. “This is Doctor Orel Danujan.”

“I’m Doctor Banyu Prakoso,” Tirta said, taking Doctor Cahyadi’s hand, then Orel’s (with a quick, worried wink), and shaking it convincingly. "It is a pleasure to meet you."

“Everyone’s been talking about you. Fresh from New York, graduated top of the class from FKUI’s program I heard?” Doctor Cahyadi smirked politely. “I will definitely need your help on some cases I’m handling.”

÷

Running, running, and running had led Cakra, 19, to a clogging street with blinking lights and wailing sirens. That day, he melted into the crowd and looked over his shoulder to see the White man, Carl Anderson, gladly running a league behind. Cakra squeezed his way through Jakarta General Hospital’s crowded parking lot, slipped into the closest storage room, and hid in the furthest corner from the door. He woke up to darkness the next day to find himself a set of fresh peach-colored scrubs and walk out the door.

“Hey, why are you here?” someone called. Cakra froze. “Go back to the pharmacy.”

Cakra didn't pay the voice any apology, but he smiled to himself and walked slightly faster in the original direction he was heading. He walked to the pharmacy as asked, opened the employee door, and felt relieved to see everyone in the same colored uniform.

Cakra learned to alternate between the cash register and the pharmacy, and soon enough, he found himself walking comfortably around the hospital complex. Taking soft-cased pills from the shelf, crushing tablets into pink dirt was new, liberating. No wooden floors, no scrutinizing mirrored walls, no sets of eyes watching him in expectation. One day on lunch break, he patted his same-shift buddy on the back, walked outside, and decided that he would have a quick bento from the convenience store on the other side of the block.

Cakra entered the convenience store, picked a chicken rice box, and waited in line. He absently looked past the cash register without expecting to see Carl Anderson and his team partner, Roger Wu, sitting in suit and tie with coffee at one of the round tables. His heart jumped, and he immediately hid his face, looking down to his fingers waiting for his turn to pay. His fingers fiddled and he looked up again to see Carl Anderson turning his head to him. Carl Anderson stared for a good while, as if recognizing Cakra, before finally looking back at Roger Wu, his comrade, laughing. Cakra did not know whether Carl Anderson did recognize him, but at least the man didn’t scramble to catch and cuff him on the spot. He couldn’t avert his eyes.

“Next in line,” the cashier called.

÷

“What—what on earth was that, Orel?” Tirta gasped as soon as Doctor Cahyadi finally left them alone in the surgical theatre, three hours after their first encounter. Guessing that Kakak was shocked white and clueless, Orel had to peel the latex gloves and wash all the gore off of Tirta’s shaking hands.

“That was a broken kidney, Kak. Cahyadi likes you,” Orel answered, rubbing the pads of Kak Tirta’s fingers affectionately under the disinfected water. He tapped the blue cloth lightly around Kak Tirta’s hands, and he yawned casually as he washed his own hands. “Ngh, I’m sleepy.”

“I need to quit this hellhole.”

“I mean. If you could survive working in a court, why not a hospital?” Orel commented naively and opened the door for them. He cracked open and chugged his third bottle of Red Bull since 2 in the morning. They walked the staircase to the doctors’ cafeteria in the basement.

“People at the court eat bullshit all the time they can’t even smell it, Orel. Cahyadi can. He can find out about me anytime. I’m dead meat, Orel. Help me.”

“Eat, Kak.” Orel looked at the overhead menu of the noodle parlor.

On the other side of the cafeteria was Doctor Cahyadi standing by the home-foods cashier counter.

“How was Handsome New Guy?” The Cook asked Doctor Cahyadi over the hissing vegetables. He was preparing another tray of bok choi for the doctors’ eternal lunch hour.

“You heard about him? I took him on my nephrectomy procedure just now.”

“You took him to your what?” The Cook stopped and took the gigantic wok to the front tray.

“Taking out a dead kidney. He didn’t know shit. UI my ass. They said he was the top graduate on the year before mine, and if he were, I definitely would have heard of him! He's got to be a goddamned fraud.”

“Don’t curse in front of my food, Mas Hasan. Plead repentance,” The Cook warned.

A phone vibrated in Doctor Banyu’s pocket on the other side of the cafeteria.

“I thought no one knew your number,” Orel commented as Tirta stared at his blue, pixelated screen. On their table was two bowls of good old chicken noodles.

“I know,” Tirta replied. He looked at his phone, weighing too long whether he should answer the stranger before flipping the phone open. “Hello?”

“Hey, Johnny,” the caller greeted, the name filthy in his ears. “How’s life going with you?”

Tirta stared in panic at Orel, as if asking for help. “Excuse me?”

“Your new place is in Condet, am I right? Close enough for you to go to work, cheap enough for you to pay. Smart choice.”

“Who is this?” Tirta asked in controlled fear, his tone firm.

“Roger Wu,” the voice answered casually. “I believe you're doing well.” Tirta’s eyes widened. Orel watched in anticipation.

Tirta slowly put his cheap phone bent open on the table, eyes blank. Orel watched, chopsticks dipping idly in his bowl. Orel started, very carefully. “...Who was that, Kak?”

Tirta took his phone and watched the call timer tick by, Roger Wu’s voice seeping through the speaker. He didn’t say anything.

"You don't have to answer," Orel said. Tirta took a deep breath and shut his phone to kill the conversation.

"It’s Roger."

Orel stopped meddling with his noodles. He looked at Tirta’s idle fingers. “The FBI Roger guy you were always talking about?”

Orel waited for a reply, but he didn’t get any. “He… he caught up pretty fast,” Orel commented a beat later.

Tirta didn’t say anything. He pushed his tray and left Orel to eat alone.

A dead kidney on his first day, Roger Wu finding his whereabouts. It was getting too much for Tirta and he thought he could use a little break. Tirta lodged his weight to the pharmacy’s checking counter and, “Hey, can I have some aspirin billed to my name? I have a ridiculously bad headache—“ his eyes widened and his tongue spontaneously switched to English, “—what are you doing here?!”

“What are you doing here?!” Cakra, 25, the boy-man from the airplane, asked back.

Doctor Banyu could only look puzzled. “I thought you were a boy band trainee.”

“I thought so, too, but life happened.” Cakra turned his back to the unlimited shelves of pills by pills, “Here’s your aspirin, Mas Johnny,” Cakra muttered, writing on the prescription note only because he had to, and gave the pack with a note stapled.

Stranger-On-The-Plane couldn’t possibly know Tirta’s most notorious alias. “What?”

“They used to call me Little Chuck back in the day. The two of us kind of do the same monkey business, you know, that’s why I decided to flee New York for freakin’ Jakarta. Let me see,” Cakra looked down to his pants pocket and stopped to page someone. Tirta’s pager beeped. “God bless these Paleozoic pagers.”

Tirta looked down to see the message he just received. Cakra leaned closer. “I saw Carl Anderson and Roger Wu earlier today. That little pager better keep you alive.”

÷

“So, what did he say?” The square-jawed comrade asked as soon as Roger Wu turned off his phone screen scoffing.

“Nothing. At least silence always means confirmation,” Roger Wu smiled lightly. He put the big phone in his bottomless dress pants pocket. “Come on, let’s get rolling. What about your guy?”

“Little Chuck’s surprisingly in the same premises as Johnny—Tirta, whatever. Been skipping off dance practice for two weeks now. Probably can’t face the idea of having me spotting him immediately on national TV.” The man followed his friend’s lead standing up from his seat. Carl Anderson, 27, threw his can of latte and walked confidently away from the convenience store. Neither of them saw Little Chuck in a blue raincoat carefully walking past by them.

They walked to the train station efficiently. They paid for their fares and only talked after reaching the platform.

“You know,” Roger Wu started, “back in New York, I promised Johnny Satria when he climbed up the vent in that theatre, that I would get him, whatever it takes. I promised him, I promised myself, and I’m not going back. I’m on my word.”

It was not the first time Johnny Satria slipped right out of grasp. Multiple verbal self-affirmation was always a sign of doubt. Carl Anderson shrugged with a dismissive snort. “Cool.”

The bell dinged and the automated voice politely announced that the inbound train was approaching. The train hissed by, and it stopped, letting an influx of people out before Roger Wu and Carl Anderson could hop in. The lazy man’s voice announced the train’s departure.

÷

“Hi Doctor Cahyadi, hi Doctor Orel,” Mr. Josef greeted with a smile under his fogging oxygen mask later in the afternoon. He was the one sleeping by the door, always the first one to see the doctors entering the room.

“Hello again Mr. Josef,” Doctor Cahyadi greeted back—small, canine-like teeth lined up in a professional smile. “We’ll get to you in a minute.”

When Doctor Cahyadi and Doctor Orel got to Mr. Rasya’s side of the room, a nurse was wiping his pale face and reddish lips with wet cloth. He looked like Snow White, only male, in a hospital gown, and without dwarf friends. The nurse stepped back, put down the cloth, and reported to Doctor Cahyadi and Doctor Orel, “He’s been vomiting blood and breaking cold sweat the past hour.”

Doctor Orel jotted down the nurse’s report on Mr. Rasya’s charts, while Doctor Cahyadi dismissed the nurse. She nodded and stepped back, still hanging around in case Doctor Cahyadi needed another set of hands. Doctor Cahyadi was just about to tell Mr. Rasya that he planned to move up the surgery, hoping to have arrived before this could happen.

“Mr. Rasya,” Doctor Cahyadi began.

“Please help me,” he cried. He tried to hold the heaving, hastily trying to grab his puke bowl. The nurse rushed to him and let him vomit, blood a fresh red. His heaves were mixed with cries and pained whines.

“Orel, move up our operating slot immediately,” Doctor Cahyadi said. “I’ll check Mr. Josef and prep Mr. Rasya with the nurse.” Orel nodded to the order and sprinted out the door.

He patted the nurse softly on the shoulder and whispered, “Can you prep him for surgery? I’ll update the other patient real quick.”

Doctor Cahyadi turned on his heels and went to Mr. Josef’s side of the room. “Hi, Mr. Josef.”

“Will Mr. Rasya be okay? He doesn’t sound okay,” Mr. Josef commented. Doctor Cahyadi stuck the stethoscope to his chest, fast and efficient. His breathing was still coarse and weak. “Will I need surgery?”

“Your sickness does not require surgery, Mr. Josef. In fact, we are going to discharge you once your lungs are strong enough. Thing is, you’ve been exposing yourself to the many air pollutants out there that you’re sensitive to, and it’s been accumulating over time.”

Mr. Josef nodded, but did not comment anything about his status. He breathed a slow, nasty croak. “Mr. Rasya can have my intestines if he wants,” Mr. Josef said. “If you want.”

“It’s okay, Mr. Josef—“ barf, cough, “—I’m okay, thank you.” Mr. Rasya called from the other side of the curtain.

“We can run tests to find if the both of you match, but I believe you need your bowel more,” Doctor Cahyadi smiled kindly. “We appreciate your noble offer, Sir.”

Orel ran back to the room and gave a panting nod to Doctor Cahyadi. The three of them took Mr. Rasya’s bed, and amidst the weak whines, Mr. Rasya managed to say a clear, loud, “Bye, Mr. Josef. Don’t die on me—” He vomited again into his vomit bowl before they rolled the bed away, and in the blink of an eye, Mr. Josef was left all alone in the big, empty room.

÷

Mr. Rasya kept writhing and whining on the surgical table despite the dose of morphine.

“Mr. Rasya, we need you to stay still. I’ll put you to sleep so you don’t feel it anymore, okay?” Doctor Orel Danujan said softly from behind his mask. Mr. Rasya slowly straightened his feet from his fetal position, and he bit his lips hard to divert his attention. Orel took the anesthesia mask closer to Mr. Rasya’s face. “Everything is going to be okay.” Mr. Rasya nodded and breathed the ether, finally at ease.

The insides of Mr. Rasya was a bleeding mess when Cahyadi slit him open. If malnutrition didn't kill this man, blood poisoning would. All Cahyadi needed to do was take out the perforated parts of Mr. Rasya's bowel and stitch up the damage it left, but  he was racing with time.

Orel didn't know he was holding his breath, watching Mr. Rasya's heart rate on the monitor constantly surfing near danger lines, and watching Cahyadi's hands skillfully navigate through living blood and human guts, as if following a beat to the beeping. Orel knew this would not be too simple a procedure.

"Doctor Orel," Doctor Cahyadi called from under his mask. Orel stepped up to the call to see a gaping, jagged hole staring at him. "Take out the damaged part and stitch it back for me."

Orel nodded and took the scalpel from Cahyadi's gloved hand. He took a deep breath, looked at Mr. Rasya's cloth-covered face, and carefully did his job cutting gut and sowing it back together.

"Very good," Doctor Cahyadi praised. He took over the table and continued the procedure, only calling Orel again to close Mr. Rasya up. Orel obediently sowed the kind man’s skin, still unable to believe that this stomach actually belonged to a living, talking person.

Doctor Cahyadi congratulated everyone for the successful surgery and left the OR to let the scrub nurses clean after him. Orel waited until the scrub room was empty before he washed his own hands in silence. Orel took off his mask and went over his moments of victory as he washed his hands. He dried his hands with the provided cloth and left the scrub room.

Just when Orel left the sterile area, a doctor whooshed past him, followed by a lanky, handsome man whose face he managed to look at long enough. For that kind of height, Orel would have thought the man was Head Doctor Ambara, if it weren’t for the black suits and brash attitude. The characteristics (tall, handsome, perfect hair) really reminded Orel of Kak Tirta’s unique descriptions of the FBI Roger Guy—

FBI Roger Guy.

“—Kak Tirta!” Orel called then ran behind them.

The men disappeared on a turn and when Orel followed, FBI Roger Guy stopped in his tracks and was panting, mussing up his own hair in desperation. Orel watched, but FBI Roger Guy turned around and cornered him against the wall instead. "Where is Johnny!" He barked.

"I—I don't know, Mister—" Orel stuttered in poor English. The man made him feel very, very small. Orel whimpered when Roger Wu pulled on his collar.

"Please do not lay hands on my staff," Head Doctor Ambara's voice called from the end of the hall. Every pair of eyes were watching the scene, but Head Doctor Ambara remained serene as he walked closer to Orel and Roger Wu. Roger Wu sighed and left Orel be.  As Head Doctor Ambara stopped, one foot in front of FBI Roger Guy, the fear stricken intern was awed to see a person physically looking down at Doctor Ambara.

“This is a hospital. We have sick people, expensive equipment, and dangerous chemicals lying around. Please do not run or make a scene, Sir.” Head Doctor Ambara sternly warned. He moved his gaze to the awestruck intern. “Good work today, Doctor Orel. You may leave.”

Doctor Orel Danujan nodded quickly at Head Doctor Ambara and stole a scared glance at FBI Roger Guy before sprinting away from the scene. With Head Doctor Ambara's eyes boring down into his, FBI Roger Guy sighed and took his ID wallet to show. “With all due respect, two of your staff are criminals, Sir.”

÷

A hand swiftly pulled Tirta into the storage room when he turned left in the hallway. Tirta saved himself from crashing into the racks and when he turned around, Cakra was glaring at him. He couldn’t look away because he was too intent on catching his breath, heartbeat drumming in his ears.

Cakra huffed in irritation when he broke the gaze to bend down and take stuff from an expensive-looking shopping bag. He gave Tirta a set of casual clothes, then he gave Tirta instructions by sticking his pointer on the shirt, then on Tirta’s shoulder. Tirta nodded. They were aware of the bickering and shuffling over them outside.

Cakra, already clad in a suspicious blouse and tight jeans, proceeded to take other things from the bag. He looked at Tirta with angry eyes and hissed, “Hurry!”

They dressed up in silence as efficiently as they could. Tirta was zipping up the borrowed jeans when he looked up to see an obnoxiously pretty woman combing her hair with her fingers. “Cakra,” he hissed.

Cakra turned around, still with a sour face, then continued fixing his wig, as if dressing up as a woman was never a big deal. Tirta never noticed how dumb he looked like when he ogled. He forgot whatever he was in the middle of doing.

“They went in here, I believe,” a muffled voice said from outside.

The both of them flinched. They could hear footsteps coming closer. Tirta didn’t see the door handle turning behind him, but Cakra slammed him into the door and started hissing and whining like a girl over his shoulder, sticking lips to the door. He kept making lewd noises when he pulled Tirta’s ear to make Tirta cry out in pain.

“Goodness gracious! People nowadays,” the voice said in disgust, exactly behind the door, and the mob behind him broke into gossiping murmurs as they left. Cakra peeled himself—herself—off Tirta, professionally, and dusted his feminine outfit.

“You are so gross,” Tirta panted after holding out his breath.

“I am so staying alive,” Cakra defended. He sighed and put their old scrubs in his boutique bag, after making sure that they left nothing else behind.

“Thanks,” Tirta whispered. Cakra managed to silently put everything in the bag and give Tirta a black cap to wear. He made both their outfits look halfheartedly worn before holding the door handle.

“Let’s go,” Cakra the girl said, then opened the storage room door.

Cakra, 19, a freshly screwed woman, had her walk of shame down the East Surgical Wing of Jakarta General Hospital. Tirta, face hidden under a cap, followed her out the closet not too far behind. They made long enough a walk, took one flight of stairs, walked their way to the elevator, and got off on the first floor. They turned on a corner to the main entrance.

“Kak,” Doctor Orel Danujan called. The wheelchair he was pushing squeaked as it rolled. It was Mr. Josef smiling under his oxygen mask.

Tirta and his camouflage girlfriend Cakra turned.

Orel looked into his eyes with a mix of disbelief, affection, and betrayal.

“What are you gonna do now?” Orel asked him softly.

Tirta fell mute.  His eyes were brimming with guilt.

“Kak,” Orel demanded.

“Doctor Orel,” a voice broke together with approaching footsteps. Orel turned. “Can you make sure to check on Mr. Rasya every hour and make sure he goes through the night?” Orel took the chart Doctor Cahyadi handed, and Doctor Cahyadi moved his gaze to beyond Orel’s shoulders. "Eh," Doctor Cahyadi leered at the two people Doctor Orel was talking to. “Doctor Banyu,” Doctor Cahyadi saluted.

The girl in tow hooked a possessive arm around Tirta's and politely bowed, tugging Tirta at the elbow. Tirta bowed with her and answered. "It was nice working with you. I will see you soon," he said poliltely, and hurriedly turned to leave.

÷

“Take it off, you’re freaking me out,” Tirta complained. They were standing in a train car heading as far as they could wish. They were nearing the end of the line.

Cakra waited for the train to arrive at its final destination. “I will still be a girl—your girl—until Carl’s arrival forces me not to be.” Cakra retaliated. They stepped out of the train. “In the meantime,” Cakra leaned his head on Tirta’s shoulder and took his hand.

“Gosh,” Tirta groaned, trying to shake Cakra off of him although Cakra wouldn’t budge. They went outside the platform to see a crowded shopping street, grateful that they could at least be anonymous in a crowd before finding a place to hide.

There was a police car and a sealed building not too far ahead. Tirta seemed to catch the same sight. “Sweet,” Cakra grumbled.

“Do you want to try my place? Or yours?” Tirta asked.

“No. They probably sealed it, too,” Cakra said. “Now let’s just walk away slowly…”

They walked away from the scene as if nothing happened, as if they had nothing to fear about yellow tapes or the police. It was a good hundred, two hundred meters from the site before they suddenly heard a siren wail on their right, and being afraid, they jumped out of their skin and ran as fast as they could.

A phone rang loudly in one of their pockets. Tirta and Cakra looked at each other.

Tirta took out his phone from his jeans pocket, still running, and half-yelled, “It’s a stranger’s number. It’s Roger. He knows that we’re here.” He flipped the phone open to throw it away. A passing businessman looked at him in much surprise. “Throw away your phone!”

While running, Cakra immediately nodded and prodded her own jeans pocket. She threw his phone away.

Another siren went off on their left.

“Throw your pager, too!” Tirta cried.

Another siren rang in front of them, and they stopped before finding another path to turn to.

“We’re trapped!” Cakra called out. Another siren rang.

“I know,” Tirta yelled.

As they ran, Cakra peeled off his wig and shimmied out of his floral blouse. He was a dignified man; he did not want to be caught dead in drag.

More and more sirens started wailing on top of each other. They did not know where to go.

They turned to an alley without knowing that it was a dead-end. The sirens ringing together were starting to grow confusing in their ears.

They stopped in their tracks when they saw Roger Wu in front of a wall, pointing a gun.

They froze and lifted their hands. Deep down, they knew they were not afraid, despite their knees shaking underneath their jeans.

Roger Wu took slow steps forward, and they slowly retreated, not wanting to be killed. Cakra peeked a glance at Tirta. Tirta subtly nodded.

“Run!” Cakra yelped. Just when they turned around on their heels, a car screeched to halt before their eyes. A man hopped off the driver’s seat and pointed his gun at them. They raised their hands, now in utter defeat.

Carl Anderson smirked with his gun pointed at the two them and called, “Freeze.”

÷

Tirta Satria, 22, hated prison to his guts. His fingers squeezed the seams of his hideous orange jumpsuit, making the fabric rustle noisily. He stopped looking at the ceiling and moved his gaze to the cell across. Cakra, 19, was scribbling on paper with a short pencil.

Feeling the gaze bore on him, Cakra looked up and saw Tirta's eyes. He smirked and continued his scribbling.

Tirta sighed and wiped his face, his palms still not used to the facial hair he hadn't shaved for over a week. They would not give inmates the liberty of using a razor. He envied Cakra for having a pencil and a shave-free face.

"Whaccha doing?" Tirta asked from across the aisle, happy to have his conversation encrypted in English.

"Finding a way to get out of this shithole," Cakra stopped scribbling and smiled prosaically at Tirta. His expressions changed as he went into deeper thought. "You look pretty damn good with that stubble going on.”

“We're not friends.”

“Oh shut up. We're kinda stuck with each other for all I know." Cakra quit the conversation and returned to scribbling an escape plan.

Tirta looked at the barred window on the other side of his cell. He wanted to just get out there and pick up a new name already. He could hear metal rattling slowly outside and he couldn't care less, until a paper plane hit his arm and dropped to the cement ground.

Bye, loser! it read.

He jumped awake and dashed to his cell bars, and without surprise, Cakra's cell door was wide open. He could hear the uniform pants rustling loudly and the clapping of sandals running away, and there Cakra was at the end of the aisle, fighting his way through pissed off guards.

Tirta scoffed to himself and slumped against the wall on his metal bed. He listened solemnly the guards wrestling Cakra only to let him slip from between their fingers.

The other inmates cheered. He moved his gaze on the wall to the upside down paper plane on the floor, only to find that its underside was not empty.

The alarms started wailing, but Tirta could not care less as his attention was fully directed at Cakra’s paper plane. Tirta took the paper plane and when he unfolded it, a small hairclip fell out. He held the hairclip and read Cakra’s scrawny but perfectly drawn master plan.

In envy for freedom and passion for escape, Tirta decided to play this round.

÷

“Everyone's been talking about you since Doctor Banyu left,” Doctor Cahyadi said, then he took a sip of his soup. “Is it fun being infamous?”

"If I weren't infamous I wouldn't be eating lunch with you for over a week, Sir," Orel sulked. He was never the type to talk back, but two weeks of Doctor Cahyadi had drawn him thin real fast.

Two tables down was where he belonged, with fellow intern Baram and young nurse Kala. Ever since Doctor Banyu had been discovered as an internationally searched impostor on the run, Doctor Cahyadi had made Orel stick with him like a sleeping sloth on a tree.

"Mr. Rasya is coming at two for post-op checkups. Take care of that for me," Cahyadi said.

“Yes, Sir.”

Orel continued eating. Behind him at the food bar, The Cook was busy sauteeing beans.

“Does Doctor Banyu really mean that much you?”

Orel looked up from his bowl.

“He's my friend. I live next door from his now-sealed rented room and he used to treat me noodles and tell me his fugitive stories. He might not understand surgery, he might be an international fugitive, but I know very well that he’s teaching me about life better than many of my seniors in this hospital. So I guess, yes, he means that much to me.”

÷

Tirta watched the ugly blotches of mold on his cell’s ceiling.

He pulled himself up to sit, and across the aisle was an officer and two handymen trying to fix the bars Cakra wrecked.

He really wanted to go. After all, he was the world renowned master of flight.

Tirta started coughing lightly. In one minute, his coughing grew coarser and deeper, as if he had a century’s worth of wet boogers sitting deep in his lungs. The officer and handymen turned their heads, because it started to really look like the inmate was dying.

“H—help,” Tirta croaked nastily, and the officer scurried away to find help, while the handymen went closer to his cell cautiously, in fear that his cough was contagious.

This was the cough that had saved his life a million times over.

He knew to keep coughing and croaking, until he could hear pairs of leather shoes running his way.

“Johnny,” Roger Wu’s voice called. They both knew the drill. This cough had always started their cat and mouse game for over six years now. The hallway guard opened Tirta's cell door. “Johnny,” Roger Wu reassured.

Tirta panted from coughing too much, then he coughed again, before Roger Wu helped him up.

Tirta looked into Roger Wu’s eyes with suspicion before accepting his help, still playing cough. Roger Wu grinned and handcuffed both Tirta’s hands behind Tirta’s back, before handcuffing those hands to his own left wrist. The cuffs made it very awkward for them to walk together, but Roger Wu really knew better than to lose Tirta for the nth time.

“Come,” Roger Wu beckoned. Tirta kept coughing and panting coarsely, while Roger Wu had his hand dragged behind Tirta as if holding the small of Tirta’s back.

“You little shit,” Roger Wu hissed as he led Tirta through the open hallways to the Care Unit.

In response, Tirta dragged his cough even longer.

"You're not going anywhere this time."

As soon as they reached the big room with a dozen empty gurneys—and only dignified by patient curtains—Roger Wu made the both of them sit at the closest bed possible while waiting for a physician to come. Tirta made his breathing croak, only coughing once every minute or two.

“SCREW YOU ALL. GET OFF ME.” Cakra—unmistakably Cakra—yelped from the end of the hall, accompanied by more than a pair of struggling footsteps. Tirta straightened up and snapped out of his thoughts to see Cakra, uniform pants a muddy mess, kicking and thrashing to hurt the guards with what little free limbs he had left. The guards were holding the elongated sleeves of his straitjacket, trying their best to tie him down without breaking his arms with this kind of resistance. Carl Anderson was walking behind him, trying to find something in his pockets.

Carl Anderson found what he wanted, so he lifted it—a loaded syringe—high in the air and aimed for the back of Cakra’s neck. Tirta gasped because he could not find his voice, and Roger Wu took his right hand to cover Tirta’s sight. “You don’t want to see this part,” he warned, but Tirta tried his best to shake his head away from Roger’s hand and only got to see Cakra again after he heard a thud.

The next thing Tirta saw of Cakra was Cakra being cradled in Carl Anderson's arms, cocooned snugly in the white straitjacket. Cakra was barefooted; his feet tied, bloody and dirty. Tirta had never seen Cakra's face being this peaceful. It made him wonder how much sedative Carl Anderson forced into Cakra's bloodstream.

As Tirta waited, he regretfully watched Sleeping Cakra helplessly being lifted onto the gurney beside his. Watching Cakra being taken down had made him forget to breathe. It was such a shame that a fox like Cakra wasn’t cunning enough to find the way out.

“What are they going to do to him?” Tirta asked in pity.

“Tirta Satria,” the physician, a woman, called. Tirta turned his head. The woman continued. “I will have to draw blood, and then I’ll give you a shot of vitamins, and you’ll be good as new.”

Both Roger and Tirta knew about the vitamin: it was real and it really could pump up the recipient, but only Roger and the physician knew that she was lying this time around. Tirta was elated. Prison doctors hated their jobs too much to want to lie.

“I will need your arm,” she said.

“Can’t you just shoot it from behind him?” Roger Wu protested.

“No, I won’t be able to see his veins.”

Roger Wu sighed and freed Tirta’s left wrist. The cuff linking the both of them dangled awkwardly.

The woman did her job and inserted needles into Tirta’s arm. Tirta was a tough boy. He did not flinch the slightest bit.

The woman then looked at Roger Wu, asking to speak in private. Roger Wu protested. “I can’t leave him alone.”

“One minute? I need a word.”

Roger Wu sighed again and cuffed Tirta’s wrists back together before swiftly replacing his left wrist with the metal bedframe.

Tirta felt slightly drowsy as he watched the both of them walk away, but it was expected from the injected vitamins. He produced the hairclip from Cakra from under his sleeve and probed the cuffs blind trying to get himself out of there.

Soon enough, he managed to free his wrists. He fled the closest door possible and ran like the wind.

Roger Wu turned around to check the gurney when he heard metal rattling. “Damn it.”

÷

Tirta felt his heartbeat racing way faster than it should. He was panting hard, his vision spinning.  He looked back and he knew he needed to run now before Roger could get him. He referred to Cakra's little map. The sewer opening by the gate was a few turns away.

A good distance behind Tirta, Roger Wu traced Tirta's steps, because he had other plans. Everyone knew Tirta was worth more than rotting in Nusakambangan. He looked at his tracker and looked up to see the door to the sewer.

Tirta heard the echoing creak of the sewer door a distance behind him, so he immediately ran to his original destination.

When he reached the ladder, he was panting very hard. It felt like he could faint anytime soon and that moment he knew, the woman did not inject goddamned vitamins into his body.

Tirta composed himself. He held his pounding head tight, took a deep breath, and climbed his way to the opening.

When he opened the sewer seal, five masked officers were pointing freaking snipers at his head. He sighed.

"Johnny," Roger Wu called from his feet. Tirta's eyes grew wide.

"Johnny. I come alone and I will drop my gun. You can trust me, or you can climb up there and go straight back to your cell."

Tirta thought about it.

"Surrender," one of the masked men ordered.

Tirta looked down at Roger Wu, then he looked up at the cops.

"This is Roger Wu from the FBI speaking. Tirta Satria is in good hands," he called up, hoping that the cops would understand with what little English they had. Tirta decided to close the sewer door and climb down the ladder.

"This is not a trap," Tirta asked.

"No. This is not a trap," Roger Wu reassured. He took the gun out of his pocket and put it on the ground. He looked straight into Tirta’s eyes.

"What do you want?" Tirta pointed out.

"I want you to get out of here. You know what we both live on."

"This is a trap. You’re setting me up," Tirta accused.

"You live on the rush of the chase, Johnny. Admit it." Roger Wu grinned. Tirta was still on his heels. "Get out of here. Find a new name. Edward. Michael. Or hell, Udin."

Tirta kept silent. He could not trust Roger Wu for whatever reason.

"The safest exit is three doors down. No one on duty really watches that exit, but stay alert. Remember to take the gate right ahead of you; there's a small dog hole you can pass through."

Tirta could not trust Roger Wu, despite the very wealth of information he just spewed.

"If you're done running, you can work for me. Go back to the states and detect forged documents for the FBI. Good pay, free rent. No charges."

He still did not trust Roger Wu's words.

“But now run, while I'm at it. No one's chasing you.”

Tirta looked at the empty sewers. They’re treating Cakra like he's crazy and now he was caught only to be let go so easily.

“I said run, Johnny.”

Tirta looked at Roger Wu, and back at the empty hallways.

“RUN!” Roger Wu yelled.

And Tirta ran. Long strides, short steps. He looked back as he waited for the sirens to ring for him, and Roger Wu stared coldly at him.

They say a man's maximum heart rate decreases one beat from 220 per minute for every year he spent living.

Roger Wu picked up his gun and pointed it at Joonmyun as if he would fire, and Tirta ran, ran, as fast as he could.

"See you, Johnny!" Roger Wu yelled. He shot the sewer door above him, making the policemen reply with an echo storm of boom-pop-clanks.

One hundred and ninety six heartbeats per minute.

÷÷÷