The time when humanity would cease to exist was about to happen sooner than later. It could happen tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. But it would be sooner than expected by any scientist, by any religious fanatic, by any nation leader, or world leader, or by people who believed that humanity would thrive throughout the universe. It would happen soon. But for the exemplary parents of identical twins, Enzio and Claude, today was the end of their world. Today, for Omar and Lyn, their world had fallen and seemed to stop existing. Because their twins were gone from sight like a bubble popped in the air.

Omar had just seen them earlier playing in the bedroom with smartphones when he checked on them. But when he and Lyn got into the bedroom, they were no longer there. How did that happen? The window in the bedroom was shut. The door leading to the living room, where Omar and Lyn had been working, was shut too. Only the bedroom door was open, but they hadn’t noticed them snuck out. They had been busy with their work-from-home jobs, in separate closed cubicles in the living room. Omar had been monitoring the queue of his customer service team to meet the client’s service level agreement while Lyn had been talking to her client via Skype. They didn’t notice the twins had gone out.

Lyn looked at the bunk bed of the twins. They had left the smartphones on the messy blankets at the bottom bunk. She didn’t mind what was playing on phones, as her thoughts were on them. Omar checked every corner of the house. He checked around the house, from the porch to the lawn, to the backyard, and outside the gates. But the twins were nowhere to be found.

Omar ran outside from one block of houses to the next one, knocking on every neighbor’s door and asking if they had seen his sons. He ran back to the opposite block of houses and also knocked on the doors. He ran to the houses with locked gates and gripped the gates tightly and tried to shake them as though he was trying to yank them. He got tired, not just because of running back and forth and asking every neighbor or person he met in the streets, but because of his worries about what happened to his sons. He remembered the news of a white van going around the city to kidnap kids and sell their organs to rich but dying patients because of damaged organs. He wandered back to his house and fell down by the paved way to the gates. He looked up at something he didn’t see. He looked at the air and it seemed he could see it. But it was not the air that he was looking at. It was the smiling faces of his twins superimposed in the air. Tears streamed down on his cheeks and he sobbed, shaking and hitting the concrete pavement with his bare hands as though the pavement could hear and tell him where the twins had gone.

Lyn hurried out of the gates like a dog that was about to defecate but couldn't because it was constipated. “What are you doing?” she said, as she moved to him. “Get up there! We cannot find them if you’ll sit here crying.”

“I didn’t see them,” said Omar. “I’ve asked our neighbors. They didn’t see them.” He wiped his tears on his T-shirt.
 

Tears about to explode, Lyn smacked Omar on the shoulder. “Stand up there!” She pulled his T-shirt, almost ripping it off from his trembling body. He rose to his feet. She knew he would follow her as she strode to the guardhouse of the subdivision. Although he felt tired, Omar took long strides, moving past her, didn’t wait for her, so he could be the first to reach the guardhouse.

The security guard was busy playing a MOBA game on his smartphone in the guardhouse. Omar heard the voice-overs of the characters on the MOBA game as he approached the door. He peeped through the small jalousie window to the left side of the door.

“Hey, buddy, have you seen my twins around?” he said, trying to control the shiver in his voice.
 

Startled, the security guard put his smartphone on the table right away, but the voice-over and sound effects of the MOBA game went on. He moved to the door and opened it. He hadn’t heard Omar. “What can I do for you, Sir?” said the security guard.

“My twins are gone,” Omar said in a tone with a tinge of regret. “Have you seen them around?”
 

“I haven’t seen any kids who happen to pass by here, Sir. I would have reprimanded them to go home.”
 

“Have you seen a white van get in and out of the subdivision today?”

“No, sir,” the security guard said firmly.

Omar tried to question the guard’s truthfulness. How could he be sure when he had been busy playing a mobile game? But he realized that anyone who entered the gates, even by foot or by a vehicle, could only be allowed if the security guard pushed the button to open the automatic gate control.

“Haven’t you seen them?” Lyn chimed in, catching her breath.
 

The security guard shook his head. “No, Ma’am.”
 

Lyn looked at Omar, and they were about to cry, but they didn’t want someone to see them that way. They didn’t want the public to see them cry.
 

“When was the last time you saw them, Sir?” the security guard asked.
 

“This morning we saw them in their bedroom. And just a few minutes ago when I checked them, they were not there. I think they might have sneaked out of the house, played outside, and someone got them. I don’t know. But I checked with our neighbors and they didn’t see them either.” Omar sighed, but it did nothing to regain enough air for him to move on, for him to think of what to do.
 

Lyn cupped her face in her hands and started to cry silently. Omar moved closer to her and rubbed her back.
 

The security guard picked up his radio. “Tiger, Tiger, this is Panther, over. Mister and Missus Paz are here. Their kids are missing just this morning. Over.”
 

“Panther, panther, this is Tiger, copy that. We’ll be there in a bit. Over,” said the man on the other line of the radio.
 

“Sir, we’ll search around the subdivision once my comrades are here. We’ll also check the CCTVs recorded today around the subdivision. In the meantime, I suggest you go back to your house and try to look for them nearby again. They might just be around, hiding.”
 

“Can you get the CCTV recorded earlier today, right now?” asked Lyn, wiping her tears on her T-shirt sleeve.
 

“That’s not possible now, Ma’am. We can only get them from the security office.”
 

“Then we’ll go to the security office,” Omar snapped.
 

The security guard pressed the radio to his mouth. “Tiger, tiger, this is Panther, over. Mister Paz wants to see the recorded CCTV today around the subdivision, over.”
 

The radio hissed. “Tell them to wait there. We’ll pick them up. Over.”
 

“Copy that.” The security guard turned to them. “Sir, you can wait inside. There’s a chair for Ma’am. The sun is burning.”
 

They got inside the guardhouse. Lyn sat on the stool while Omar stood by the door. The security guard was standing by the gates, looking out to the main road where several vehicles were moving the opposite ways.
 

“Where can they be now?” Lyn said, with no intention of Omar to hear it.
 

“I don’t know,” Omar murmured. “They might be somewhere within the subdivision.”
 

“I hope so. They rarely go far from our house street.” The tears on Lyn’s face had almost parched.
 

“They are just there. I can feel it,” Omar said, trying to be strong but deep inside him, he was about to explode with tears and sobs.
 

“It’s your fault!” said Lyn, gritting her teeth.
 

Omar looked down at her. “You blame me for that? You know that we both have a job.”
 

“I wanted to hire a nanny for them, but you said we should be practical these days. If we had a nanny, this shouldn’t be happening now.”
 

Omar shook his head, clucking his tongue. “Here we are again. Same thing. Same reason. The same cause of our strife,” he said intensely but remembered the security guard was just a few paces away from them.
 

Lyn sniffled, and Omar wanted to embrace her, but his ego prevailed over compassion. He knew from himself that losing his sons was not his fault. He did his best. He worked hard to get a promotion, so he’d increase his salary so he could buy a house and a lot for them and even hire a permanent nanny until the twins go to college.
 

The sound of the car engine coming got the security guard’s attention. “They’re here, Sir,” he declared.
 

Lyn stood up and Omar stepped out of the guardhouse. Lyn followed him.
 

Another security guard, who had a mustache and a nose like a strawberry and a build like one could say that his previous job was in the military, climbed out from the front door of the passenger seat of the security car. “Sir, you can come with us, we’ll check the CCTV records earlier today.” He sidled back to the rear door and opened it for them.
 

Omar let Lyn in first. He followed and shut the door lightly. The sweat streaming out from their bodies had become cooler as the strong air-condition of the car engulfed them. They didn’t mind wiping them. It was bad for them as it lowered the body’s natural defenses, but it didn’t matter for them because losing their twins had already lowered their psychological and physical defenses.
 

“What time did you see your kids, Sir?” asked the strawberry-nose security personnel, taking a glance over his shoulder at Omar.
 

“This morning we just saw them in their bedroom. That was around nine, right after breakfast.”
 

“What time did you notice they are gone?”
 

“Less than an hour ago. Maybe forty minutes.”
 

Strawberry-nose looked at his watch and it was past twelve noon already. “Have you tried looking for them in the neighborhood?”
 

“Yes, I did,” Omar said. “I searched for them as far as four blocks from our house, but I didn’t see them. Nobody saw them.”
 

“Did you try asking all the homeowners near your house?”
 

“Yes, I did. But they didn’t see them. Of course, I didn’t try those houses with locked gates. I’m sure they are not inside those houses. The gates are closed obviously.”
 

“What is your block?”
 

“Block twelve, Celeste street. Our house is the third one from the corner, from here.”
 

The car slowed down. “What the hell is that!” the driver exclaimed.
 

They looked ahead. There were more than a dozen people running in the car’s direction, seeming to be in a hurry, as though they were flight passengers who had been paged several times and were about to be left by their plane.
 

“Stop the car,” Strawberry-nose ordered the driver, as they got near to them. He opened the door and, when he got out, they crowded him in like he was a celebrity.
 

There was noise about. Crying. Sobbing. Shouting. Moaning in lamentation. Groaning in despair. Everyone was trying to say something that Strawberry-nose couldn’t understand. “Please calm down, sirs and ma’ams,” he said loudly. “I can’t hear you all.” The cries became murmurs, the sobs stopped, the shouts were gone, and the moans and groans fell silent, and only the whir of the car engine filled the air. “What’s the matter?” he said.
 

“My kid is gone!” said the woman in her duster with flower designs.
 

“Somebody has kidnapped my child!” shouted the man at the back.
 

“Somebody got my Sharlyn!” said the young woman, clutching at a young man.
 

“They took my kid!” cried the middle-aged man with lines on his forehead.
 

Then, their complaints were back again in the air like the buzz of hundreds of flies hovering over a decaying dead cat. Strawberry-nose couldn’t bear them anymore and so he yelled, “Stop!” he slightly pushed them away. “Look, we cannot find your kids if you act that way. We are heading to our office to check the recorded CCTV around the subdivision. We will investigate what happened. You can follow us.” He got back inside the car. The driver pushed a honk and the distressed parents moved out of the way.
 

They turned in the next corner and the next until they pulled over in front of the security office. The office seemed to be a commercial space for rent, but since nobody had tried to rent it, the owner had transformed it into the security office. Over the door hung a white placard with blue lettering “Falu Security Office”. One might ask what Falu meant. It was the Hungarian name for “village”.
 

Inside the security office, with an area that was roughly twenty square meters, were three tables; one, two steps from the door; two, at one corner of the office; and three in the middle of the office. A security personnel was sitting at the first table playing a MOBA game on his smartphone, like the one being played by the security guard at the gates of the subdivision. The table in the corner had a computer, but it was not occupied. The table in the middle, with an old computer, had another security personnel, also playing on his smartphone, probably the same game as the one near the door. This table faced a couple of TV screen monitors of old models piled near the wall. They had stickers on top of the screen bearing the name of the block and street being captured by the CCTV connected to them.
 

Upon smelling that Strawberry-nose entered the office, the two security personnel turned off their smartphones. They stood straight like cadets, waiting for an order from their superior.
 

“We’ve got work to do,” Strawberry-nose declared. “Nico, get me the video of block twelve, Celeste street between nine-hundred and eleven hundred hours today.”
 

The security personnel at the middle table, a well-rounded guy in his mid-twenties, sat back in his chair and began jogging his fingers on the computer keyboard.
 

Omar and Lyn walked inside the office to the well-rounded security personnel. They watched the video on the computer screen as he forwarded the scenes while looking at the timestamp running below the screen of the footage. He slowed down and played the scenes at the time requested by Strawberry-nose. They waited patiently at the part they thought the twins had gone out of the house until other parents arrived outside the office, shouting and crying like rallyists who demand the government to stop corruption and jail officials who are guilty of it. Shortly, the scene showed the twins coming out through gates, walking like they were somnambulating.

“There they are!” Omar shouted. “You see?”
 

“Yes, sir,” Nico said, switching to the CCTV records on the next block where the twins were headed. “This is the CCTV on Domingo street. There, you see them?” The twins crossed the street to an undeveloped lot in the part of the subdivision until the CCTV couldn’t video them anymore. In a moment, another group of children crossed the street in the same direction. The CCTV recorded captured eight boys going to the undeveloped lot until the CCTV couldn’t reach them as well.
 

Lyn and Omar stared at each other, as though they hadn’t seen each other for a long time. Their minds seemed to communicate with each other and agree with the idea that their twins were probably just within the subdivision premises. Lyn cried. She couldn’t control it. Omar hugged her, not minding Strawberry-nose, Nico the well-rounded guy, the security personnel at the door, and the parents trying to get in.
 

Strawberry-nose walked calmly to the door. “I’ll let you get in and see the CCTV videos, but I need all of you to calm down. My office is small and I cannot accommodate all of you. We’ll do it one family at a time. You don’t have to worry, we have located where the kids go.”

The parents toned down, although the cries and sobs could still be heard.
 

Omar and Lyn hurried out of the office. They were used to extending their thanks to people who helped them, but this time they didn’t say a word as they moved out. They knew what part of the subdivision the CCVT lastly captured their twins. Domingo Street was just around the corner of the block where their house was. They walked and strode and sometimes ran, then slowed down, and walked again. Along the way, they saw some residents, most were adults and teenagers, and one or two small and young children about the age of their lovely twins. They walked past their house and when they arrived at the corner, at Domingo Street, they ran to the undeveloped lot, but all that was waiting for them were grasses contesting to grow and shrubs ahead by the concrete wall of the subdivision.

Omar raced to the shrubs and got in through them. The twigs, branches, and leaves created rashes across his arms. He felt a sting of pain when his sweat drenched the rashes.

“Are they there?” Lyn shouted, waiting at the part of the lot that was worn out of grasses.
 

Omar went out from the shrubs, face twisting in fear and worry. He shook his head, full of regrets. They tried searching in the nearby houses but they didn’t hear a murmur of a single child. They continued searching until other worried parents arrived and did the same. There was no trace of the children. How did it happen? All of them asked themselves.
 

Omar and Lyn walked back to their house under the heat of the afternoon sun, eyes not blinking to every likely spot where a child could hide. They walked as though promenading alongside flowers, wilting for worries and for fears of completely losing the twins. They walked, not listening to the shouts, cries, and sobs of the parents they left in the undeveloped lot. They walked while in their minds were the smiling faces of the twins. They walked, splashing tears on the ground they stepped on. They walked hoping the twins were waiting for them home and that they would cuddle with them on the sofa chair as they watched their favorite cartoon TV shows while eating cookies baked by Lyn or french fries she had ordered from McDonald’s or Chicharon she had fried or their favorite Piatos. They walked, thinking that this was the end of their world. They walked, thinking that it was time for them to cease to exist if they wouldn’t find them. But they still hoped to see them. And they still hoped to live for their eldest, a daughter, who was in Leyte with the care of Lyn’s mother. But today, their world seemed to have ceased to exist.

​

(end of Chapter 1)