The Life Of Normal-Taro

Chapter 26: Headache from the past

Seven years ago; Lonappan was playing cricket before his house with his five year old son, when his wife called him inside since the landline rang and the person on the other side asked for him. He picked it up. "Hello?"

"Lonappan, it's me." Ponnappan's voice came from the other side of the call.

"Oh, hey! What is it?"Lonappan asked.

"Well, it's important stuff." Ponnappan replied.

"Dude, I can guess that since you called in on the landline. Now, I asked the reason behind this." Lonappan spoke.

"I don't want to speak about it like this. I wanna meet you." Ponnappan answered.

Lonappan sighed. "Fuck! Okay, I'm coming." He slammed his phone on the desk before turning to his wife. "Babe, I gotta go. Boss says it's important."

"What are you waiting for then? Go!" His wife slightly nudged him. It was supposed to be an off day for everyone and yet Lonappan had to leave. Although it disappointed her, she knew Lonappan loved this job and didn't want to stop him from doing it.

"But" Lonappan hesitated from leaving the house. He glanced at his son playing cricket all by himself and felt like he was a bad father.

His wife understood his thoughts. "Don't worry. I'll manage that part. Go do your job." She assured him.

"Thanks, babe." He gently kissed her on the cheek and headed towards their son. "Son, daddy's got some urgent work to do. So, I'll have to leave now. Will you be fine?" He asked as he stroked his son's head.

"Don't worry, dad! I'm a big boy now. I'm not sad." The kid said as he tried flexing his muscles.

Lonappan chuckled. "Yea, you sure are!" He said as he kissed him on his forehead and got up. With a heavy heart, he stepped out of his household. Before actually heading to the MIB base, Lonappan headed to #306, Holy Land.

"Hello there, everyone! I'm going to the MIB base. Therefore, I'll be locking this room from the outside." He proclaimed as he opened the door.

Four people stuck out their heads upon hearing this for a moment before sticking it back in; they were the resident aliens of the past. "Whatever, dude. Not like we care anyway." Alien number one replied, as he continued playing on his game console. He didn't a shit; the other two didn't either.

One alien did though. "Dude, can you buy me some potato chips? It looks like it's gonna end." Alien number four spoke as he pointed out a mountain of potato chips.

Lonappan choked at this sight. "Huh? Yea, sure." He wanted to quickly close the door and end dealing with them.

"Okay, cool." Alien number four also got back to his slacking off.

Lonappan sighed. "Damn, why does every alien who enters this room end up like this? Like, I have no problem with them playing video games, however, they should at least clean up the room they are living in, for fuck's sake!" He muttered under his breath.

#

MIB base; Lonappan stood before the commanding officer's room for a hot minute before entering inside. There, Ponnappan sat waiting for him. Eight years had passed and one thing that changed from when he began his career as a senior field agent was how Ponnappan ended up becoming the commanding officer, taking the reins off from Lonappan's father-in-law. Originally, the father-in-law wanted Lonappan as his successor and wanted to keep it inside the family. However, Lonappan didn't agree to it and wanted to continue his life as a field agent, which led to Ponnappan's emergence. Lonappan was happy about it, since he felt like his senior deserved this. However, as of lately, he had been hearing rumors about Ponnappan's strange behaviors sometimes. He didn't have concrete evidence about that, so he decided to leave it at that.

"Welcome, Lonappan! Come in and take a seat." Ponnappan pointed at the empty seat.

"So, what made you call me in person?" Lonappan asked as he made himself comfortable.

"Bring it in." Ponnappan ordered. An agent walked in with a handcuffed alien. The alien was smirking when he saw Lonappan.

"Agent Lonappan! Do you remember me?" The alien asked as he tried removing the face mask. However, since his hands were cuffed, he had trouble shaking it off his face. "A little help please?" It asked the agent that brought it there. The agent nodded and helped it take off the face mask to reveal the shiny interior and gave out its rendition of an evil laugh.

However, unlike what it expected, Lonappan didn't recognize it. Hell, he didn't even bat an eye. "So, why did you call me?" He asked Ponnappan.

"What! You don't remember me! How dare you!" The alien tried attacking Lonappan. Its advances were quickly stopped by the agent beside it.

Yet again, Lonappan didn't care about it. "What is this? You told me you got important stuff to speak with me and I came. And now you show me this--weird thing?" He asked as he gave out a disgusted look towards the alien.

"No! Just no! That look you just gave out! No one dares to disrespect the heir to the Kingdom of Ciabatta!" The alien cried.

"Why would I care if you own a piece of white bread? Wait! I remember making this lame joke at someone." Lonappan spoke.

The alien got excited. "Me! That would be me! Remember anything now?" It asked.

"Well, yea! I remember every joke I say. Even if it's lame as this one." Lonappan laughed.

"I hate you! I freaking hate you! You remember the joke you told eons ago, yet you have difficulty remembering the person you made fun of?" The alien screamed at the top of its respiratory organ.

"Of course. I meet with and work near many aliens, so it's difficult for me to remember one specific alien unless they did something really memorable." Lonappan explained.

"So, what you mean is that I'm not even worthy of your attention. The heir of Ciabatta isn't even worth your attention!" The alien cried.

"Dude, don't take it that personally! I just said that I don't remember you. Nothing that big of a deal. Isn't it better if people forgot about you? Like that's like the main shit that MIB strives to achieve!" Lonappan tried to salvage this situation, but to no avail.

"That might be your case, but I'm the heir to Ciabatta, for fuck's sake! I've always strived to gain people's attention. Now, this random guy tells me that I'm not even worth his attention and I'm just another mob character. Tell me how you'll feel if someone told you that." The alien gave out its emotional speech.

To a certain extent, Lonappan felt bad for his actions. "I'm sorry, dude. I didn't think of what you're going through. My bad!" He apologized.

The alien did not expect Lonappan to apologize. "Nah, it's fine. I just had to get it out of my chest." The alien forgave Lonappan, before he quickly remembered his original intention.

"Well, now that everything's gone calm, why don't you reveal what you told me back then?" Ponnappan asked off the alien.

The alien took a deep breath in. "Eight years ago, when this guy caught me selling drugs, someone else clearly saw the entire thing and was clearly communicating with him. At first, I thought maybe he was a fellow agent. However, later I heard him question your agent about me. By the way, he also saw my real appearance and yet Lonappan did absolutely nothing about it." It explained.

"Wait, you're that person!" Finally, Lonappan finally realized the alien's identity and turned back towards Ponnappan. "So, you're going to believe this junkie now?" He asked.

While the alien fumed behind trying to find a right counter, Ponnappan took the lead. "Well, we did make it undergo a lie detection test. And it seems that the alien's speaking the truth." He replied.

Lonappan sighed. "A lie detection test could be cheated though. You know that, right?" He asked.

"I'm aware that normal tests could be cheated, but we're MIB. Our techniques are top-notch." Ponnappan assured.

"By the way, I read your handbook. It says that in such situations, an official should use the neuralyzer. However, I'm pretty positive that this guy didn't do that!" The alien added fuel to the fire.

"Will you shut up, man?" Lonappan glared at the alien before sighing. "Why do you even remember all this stuff?" He asked.

"Eight years in the detention center doesn't let you forget things pretty quickly, buddy!" The alien replied.

"So, what's your excuse?" Ponnappan asked.

"I was a rookie official back then. You think I'll get hold of a neuralyzer just like that on my own? That'd mean I have to capture both and put the other person in detention until I get permission. Besides, I saved the situation with my impeccable lies." Lonappan explained.

"So, you don't deny what the alien just said?" Ponnappan asked.

"Dude, you're missing the point! Well, whatever. You look like you're not gonna listen to me anyway. So yeah! I don't deny it. But!" He tried to counter.

However, Ponnappan stopped it. "I just wanted to hear you out about this. Now that I have, I've made my decision. There's no choice other than to use neuralyzer on that person." Ponnappan declared his verdict.

#