24 New Discoveries and a Bad Morning
Baby shark, doo doo doo doo doo doo
Baby shark! ♪ ♪ ♪
Mommy shark, doo doo doo doo doo doo
Mommy shark! ♫ ♫ ♫
Daddy shark, doo doo doo doo doo doo
Daddy shark! ♪ ♪ ♪
Grandma….
"Stop it!"
Aditya woke up, instinctively covering his ears with his hands. He was really regretting buying those child rhyme books and watching those popular children songs on Youtube.
It had been a week since Aditya had started his life as a car mechanic. He liked this life very much as he likes playing around cars. Though the penthouse was a little crude and uncomfortable compared to the school or his home, he had adjusted to this living the past week.
Aditya started earning money from the very first day as he was proficient in preliminary, superficial work like dealing with small dents, paint scratches, flat tyres. Since yesterday, he was allowed to take up small repairs regarding car engines like replacing the battery, changing brake pads, changing the spark plugs etc.
Aditya wanted to take up the 'real' car repair jobs like changing the engine or at least changing the clutch but Kranthi's father wanted to take it slow and check Aditya's prowess in all aspects before letting him do sensitive repairs.
Aditya had already shocked Ramlal with his fast learning capabilities and 100% success in repairs take up by him. The skill of tools in Aditya's hands was like how those street magicians play with cards. It was like giving a wand to a wizard. Those tools, be it screwdrivers or wrenches danced between Aditya's thin fingers, every movement was fluidic and consistent, no abrupt or jerky motions were seen which demonstrated his confidence and capability. There was always a small smile on Aditya's grease-stained face as he really felt at peace.
Coming back to the present, Aditya had kept true to his word that he would let Tya learn about this world. Aditya had already thrown away his mobile phone and all cards (most of them had become useless anyway). Anything which connected him to his previous self was left out. So, he was basically penniless. But, as he began to work in the garage, his income began increasing.
Aditya was sure that given his capabilities, earning money was not a big hurdle for him. So when he got some money from Ramlal, he had brought some textbooks of the national curriculum or other sources so that Tya could start from scratch.
Tya proved himself more intelligent than Aditya as he devoured all these books at a glance that even Aditya was shocked. Aditya just had to flip the pages of a book like how you check if two pages are sticking together or how you search for a particular page number and then that's it Tya would be able to memorize, comprehend and even improvise on that knowledge.
When Aditya asked Tya about this, Tya had cutely answered that what happened in one second in the real world was 60 seconds in Tya's world. So, though it looked like Aditya was flipping the pages at a rapid speed, it was actually pretty slow according to Tya. Besides that, Tya was genuinely sharper than Aditya. But along with the education of Tya came a tragedy i.e. Tya liked these child rhymes and songs very much. So, whenever Tya woke up, he would like to sing these songs just like now.
Aditya could actually block Tya's words if he willed it, but every time he did that Tya would feel bad and become all teary that Aditya was shutting it out. So, unless Aditya had to do it like he would block Tya whenever he was naked as he felt embarrassed, during other times Aditya would leave the connection open.
Aditya did not know why a million year old foggy looked like a cute boy or why he liked children songs but he was getting the feeling of having his own exclusive children songs radio FM inserted in his mind. Every morning he would be awakened to these songs.
"Tya, please stop." Aditya pleaded inside. He was in his shorts and black cotton basic vest. He was as thin as ever but Aditya had noticed that his body was undergoing some subtle changes which he had not noticed before. His muscles though they stayed lean were actually brimming with energy, his skin had become more and more compact and no fat layer could be seen thus exposing the lean muscle outline to the eyes. His skin shone radiantly in the sun revealing its healthy condition.
When Aditya had talked about this to Tya. Tya had said that these though Tya was the one being in a dormant state and absorbing the energy to make up for its loss, it had noticed that most of the energy it absorbed from its world was being taken up by Aditya's body leaving it very little for it to use. Now that Tya had been given all the basic knowledge of this world up to high school, it was able to engage in discussions with Aditya. Otherwise, before whenever Tya heard Aditya speaking with others, it could not understand 80% of terms and words.
Aditya had wanted to see whether it was only a feeling or his body's athletic performance had really increased but he did not get the time to verify this theory. He had noticed these days that he could work for hours on end without getting exhausted which pleased Ramlal very much as he thought Aditya was a hard-working kid. But the fact was that Aditya did not find this work stressful at all both mentally and physically.
"Adi, good morning." a pleasant immature voice sounded as Tya greeted Aditya. These days Tya became the closest person to Aditya who was with him 24*7. Aditya had become accustomed to conversing with Tya without arousing the attention of people around him. It was like he had a younger brother. An innocent, pure, obedient, amicable younger sibling who made him almost forget about his troubles. He still did not know if Bunny had spoken the truth about people who wanted to kill him. If it was the truth, where were they?
"Good morning Tya, could you stop singing now," Aditya spoke as he jumped out of his bed. His bed was a small wooden cot which came along with this penthouse. There were two rooms in total and a bathroom. These rooms were painted in pale yellow in colour. Though the rooms looked old, everything was neat and clean.
Though Aditya had woken up just now, his body didn't uncomfortable or stiff at any joint. His body felt as flexible and convenient to move like how one usually feels after a warm-up exercise. Aditya went into the bathroom to cleanse himself while blocking Tya. Tya had also being accustomed to being blocked during some 'special' times though it did not understand the significance. Like every day, Aditya spat mucus which contained some dark black material. In the beginning, Aditya was shocked when he saw this black phlegm. Later when he thought that it started from when he started smoking, Aditya stopped smoking for a day to check. Surprisingly. He did not form any kind of dark mucous the other day.
After Aditya did some research on the effect of smoking, he found out that many tiny carbon particles (which are mildly toxic in nature) are inhaled when people smoke which are black and brown in colour. But usually, these particles are ingested by white blood cells in the blood and are stored as toxic waste which is why lifelong smokers lungs are usually black in colour in contrast to the healthy pink colour of normal people.
Since Aditya had adopted to his 'abnormal' status, he had unconsciously started thinking of out of the box theories for the uncommon things that happen to him. Based on this way of thinking, Aditya had summarized that his body's toxic resistance had somehow increased to a higher level where the body ejects all the toxic and unhealthy substances in his body daily through all kinds of excretions like tears, stool, mucus, sweat, urine.
This theory had been further strengthened by the fact that Aditya's stool was extremely smelly and an unnatural tinge of black in it for two continuous days. Even a dark sticky substance was secreted from his skin when he woke up. Aditya had a hard time 'not vomiting' when he inhaled that stench. But after that, Aditya felt light as if his body was floating the air. After he finished his bath, he could feel his skin becoming softer like that of a middle school student.
So, Aditya had confirmed that after his mind absorbed Tya's energy, he got super memory and calculative skills. In the same way. Now that his body is absorbing the energy from Tya's dormant state, though this energy was not as much as the initial amount which almost killed Tya, it still started 'slowly' modifying Aditya's body.
Aditya also found out that, whenever he smoked, the first cigarette of that day felt like he was smoking for the first time of his life. The light headed feeling or getting a little high experience was usually a one-time thing for smokers in their whole life. But for Aditya, every day's first smoke had the same 'first-time' feeling which intrigued him.
After a bit of study, Aditya found out that this lightheaded feeling is caused by a stimulant called Nicotine in the cigarette. So, a person's body would develop tolerance to this nicotine as a person smokes causing the loss of the pleasant sensation. So for an initial smoker who gets a little high with one cigarette would need many cigarettes to get the same effect after a few days of smoking. But Aditya whose body was 'different' did not develop this tolerance for nicotine nor did it get physically addicted to this stimulant. By this Aditya could enjoy every first cigarette he smoked that day like he was smoking for the first time. So he did not need to worry about him developing smoking addiction and he could cease smoking whenever he felt like it.
Aditya did not know how to feel about these changes, neither did he know what was the endpoint. As Aditya cleansed himself, took a bath, an excited shout was heard from Chakri, a co mechanic, whom Aditya had met the first day when he came to this garage. He had also become his first friend.
"Adi, a hummer has come for servicing, come quickly."
Aditya's hands trembled when he heard that sentence but shrugged his fears away quickly. There are many hummers in Bangalore, it can't be hers. But frankly, men had a thing for 'big' things. So, of course, Aditya was fascinated by Hummer, so he quickly wore his mechanic clothes as he spring jumped down the stairs five at a time and ran towards the other end of the garage where all high-end cars were serviced.
When Aditya reached with high expectations, he saw a 2.2-meter giant talking with Chakri looking down like how an adult would talk to a kid. Frankly, Chakri did look like a kid before this hefty personality. When he saw that guy, all of Aditya's positive thinking and hopes crashed to the ground, he skidded to a halt and wanted to escape from there at the same speed before any of them saw him. But destiny was not on his side as Chakri turned his head towards the entrance to see Aditya.
"Adi, come, didn't you say you dreamt of studying the 6.0-litre V8 engine of Hummer, Big brother Dev does not mind if you just watch, come quickly, Boss is also coming."
The 'giant' who looked taller than 'the great Khali' (a WWE champion) had muscles as if they were made of wrought iron and a big, thick beard turned to see Aditya with his small but sharp eyes. Aditya really wondered how Chakri could maintain his composure being in front of this guy. Maybe there were many Hummers in Bangalore but he was sure there was only this guy and there was no second one. When the Hummer and this guy were in the same place, Aditya knew whose car it was.
Aditya smiled which was uglier than a crying face as he walked as if his feet were shackled with chains weighing a tonne. His fortune stars seem to have taken a break today.
