Recap

With that the involuntary introduction seems to peter out. With a blank mind, and minutes of me being still I calm down enough to think. I pontificate into the ether feeling absurdly whimsical at my fate.

How I wished today was better than yesterday.

Chapter 2

The rat scurries up toward my building and starts to climb the floors toward my window. As it does so, I get snapped out of my own delusions of death and grandeur. Cutting off my visions of making my own obituary speech.

‘Focus, focus, focus.’ I repeat the mantra priming myself to do the smart thing. I turn and run away.

‘Hey, I'm not facing a 5 foot tall monstrosity that looked like steroids were the only thing it's eaten since it was born; And pumping weights was its only goal in life. I ain't about that life.’ I try to justify myself: to who, I don't know.

Running away. I opened the door and scurry out. Grabbing my hockey stick along the way. I hear a distinct shattering of glass and then a few seconds later the door. I very nervously, hesitantly, and absolutely freaking terrified out of my life, take a look behind me.

While sprinting for my life of course. A muscle bound, giant of a rat, is behind me looking around, sniffing and turning its head towards my direction.

This is it, ladies and gentlemen. That muscle bound rat, does what many do to burgers and fries, absolutely pulverize them.

‘Why, oh to god, why is this happening?!!’ I yell in my mind not. I don't want more rats to target me so stay quiet. Even though I want to scream, cry, laugh hysterically and collapse in a heap with the inevitable futility of it all.

I am feeling slightly unhinged. I somehow make it to the stairs before the Roidrat behind me and do a quick jump. 10 stairs, not that bad, find a lot more on a dare during my game days.

It does space me away from Roidrat so small mercies. I jump again and again till I make it down. Looking up, the rat seems slightly stuck on the stairs. I can easily go down but maneuvering all that roid rage seems to be its weakness. Small mercies for small hallways. I generally hate my overpriced dwelling, but thank god for greedy contractors.

I take the last few steps out the door to the staircase, and emerge into an oddly empty lobby. I seriously thought that this place would be a bloodbath. If a rat turned into that monstrosity, imagine what would happen with any other animal, plant, and bug. Heck, maybe golems and flying cakes also exist!! Scanning my surroundings, I see a student to my right. He is slowly backing away while staring at something in front of him.

As I walk over I can see a cockroach the size of my leg. “Fuck, fuck, fuckity, fuck on a stick up a clowns ass, why, why did you have to prove my thoughts correct universe?!?!?!!! Why?” I involuntarily yell.

Even on my good days I tolerated bugs, some I even left alone or rescued. Roaches are not on that list. This fuck off huge bug is a Nope. Kill it with fire a primal part of me screams. I would, I reply, if I had a flamethrower, this Giga Roach and that Roidrat would be roasting. As it gains on the poor student he freaking trips backward and lands hard on his butt. Oof, his tail bone is going to torture him in the future. Force on that is not a fun way to feel aches and pain.

Well let's get to it then. Self motivation is the most important. Being the only one with a weapon I decided to save the poor kid. Walking forward I bash the cockroach with the hockey stick. A good straight downward swing. Now as anyone who dealt with a roach should know that they are slippery and avoid a good bit of hits. Well this one doesn’t and I thank the stars. Splat goes the cockroach. Doot doo da doot doo. The kid looks at me with horror and scrambles up, turns around and flees up another staircase.

“Well you're welcome kid.” The lack of manners these days. Really, he could have just said thanks before fleeing. It's the apocalypse, but that doesn't excuse being rude, especially to someone that saved your ass.

Feeling slightly embarrassed as I make a comment like one of those old and cranky grandpas, I turn around and look at the roach. It looks desiccated and leaks Mist. As I focus on it, I feel something flowing into me.

It seemed to have started the moment the roach was dead and continues on even now. I infer that it will stop when all the Mist stops dissipating from the corpse. It feels like an intangible thing. An idea or a concept seems to flow into the tangential section of me. As I observe it I inevitably focus on the pure energy connected to the tangential section of me. My god, how I wish I could use that unlimited source of energy. Just use it as a power source for a wish. A wish that all of this stuff never happened except the healing. That was nice. As I try it out just to see if it works I seem to not have that power. It would have been awesome to have that, but back to business. My clothes are full of roach bits. Not pleasant, not at all.

The kid did a good job running away as quickly as possible. Yeah, there's a Roidrat I am pretty sure is making its way down hunting for me most likely.

It’s like a 5 foot steroid and muscle junkie. Pretty sure the kid would have been pulp the moment he tripped. Looking at the cockroach the size of my leg as it stops leaking the Mist makes me think back to its size. I am 6 foot 1 with a good amount of muscle on my bones.

Well, I used to be more bone than muscle but the healing did wonders. I used to feel like a mummy, everyone worried saying I needed more meat on my bones. It's a double standard, too skinny is not enough meat on the bones and too much is also bad. And just enough is not enough. Men made the standards and I flipped them off.

I wear baggy clothes, generally as they hid me from all the concerned and slightly disgusted stares. Only Ashley knows everything that happened and saw everything. And god bless her beautiful and still annoying lovable sould but she didn't care.

Thud! Thud!

Thuds distract me from my distracted thoughts. I noticed the roach once again. With the roach about 3 feet tall or so it begs the question. If a roach is usually less than the size of a finger from the tip to the first joint, and sometimes near till the second joint, and it turns into a 3 foot monstrosity.

Additionally a rat usually the size of a hand or a scented candle jar turns into a 5 foot Roidrat. What would a dog or a buffalo, a seal or god forbid a honey badger, and or murder hornets turn into. Let me tell you that there is nothing more deadly than a pissed off, badger. Drug it up on Mist and The Universe will regret the day it made this simple and costly mistake.

I snap out of my doomsaying musings as I hear a thudding knocking sound behind me near the door. I notice that there is a pretty big dent in it. I distinctly remember it being pretty sturdy. Now this isn't a high quality door, it's a college apartment, for god's sakes. None of these are high quality, but it's functional and it's sturdy.

Now that sturdy metal door has a freaking imprint of our much loved Roidrats paw in it.

Sarcasm, much sarcasm. I back away while looking ahead and head toward the kitchen area behind me. Being to the right of the door should give me a few seconds to move before it notices and heads toward me, right? I question the ether. Not receiving an answer made me sigh in relief. At least that didn't change much.

The dent grows bigger and bigger as a pounding noise mixed with metal screeching fills the area. I hear a deep crunch and a whistling noise, and there goes the door.

Umm. The door is now flying straight across perpendicular to me. I'm in an intersection where I can pretty much run behind me to the kitchen area and get out of here like the kid. Looking forward I see the windows to the outside and to my surprise there is no other animal or person out there.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

I definitely thought that more animals would stream in from the noise. In front of the rat is another hallway leading to the main lobby a bit away with couches and a tv. The rat is in the door, looking forward. Now I'm pretty sure the rat can't see me as I am to its right.

Observing it a bit I notice a distinct red on its head. It seems to be bleeding and the body is shaky and it's acting drunk. I slowly ready my stick as I slink closer. Step after step right when the rat takes a step or moves. I think the rat just decided to ram its head into the door. The door must have hit something important while it was folding and rammed out. Bet it got hit right in the noggin. That seems to be the best case scenario for me. It was disoriented and I can make it my prey.

The thought to run and never look back did cross my mind. Who in the right mind would willingly fight that thing. Not me, no sir. Not for a million, not even for a billion. Instead this is mostly because of a pretty scary notion, what if after it recovers it continues hunting me.

I bet it has my scent or something and as I am covered in bug guts, it should be even easier to find and track me. No. Leaving now means fear and death in the future. So I step forward with my hockey stick held at the ready.

I know this is stupid but I am doing it anyway. Very absolutely stupid. This stupidity isn't like jumping off a cliff into a lake below stupid. No you're pretty much going to survive if you know how to swim and we make sure there aren't any rocks to splat you.

This stupidity is like jumping out of an airplane, not double checking if you have a parachute. Not double checking if your backup parachute is reliable. Then you accidentally lose your first parachute mid flight. And as it floats away you're relying entirely on that single backup parachute to work before you splat to the ground in like 5 minutes.

This is the scenario I was in. My one single parachute with no backup plan is killing that thing deader than dead. My fall is facing this thing. And the height is how dangerous that Roidrat is. Step by step I make my way closing that distance between me and the rat.

I freeze as it looks in my direction and feel a rush of relief as it turns away. The Roidrat is blind. The blood from its face and possibly the door crunching must have damaged them. It keeps screeching and roaring. Pawing at its face as it futilely tries to fix what is hurting it.

I am just a few feet away from it. Taking the lightest steps of my entire life up till this point I get closer. And closer. It is just in front of me not even 3 feet away. The rat keeps pawing at its face, swaying all the while.

I slowly lift the stick above me, making sure it doesn't notice me. I aim to hit it where it is most effective. Right on its head where it's already damaged. The Mist abuser seems to wake up a bit. A groggy, drunk type of awake.

I decided to rush this thing gladiator style. And I go ham. I bash its head before it decides to make my insides, my outsides, and my outsides the new decor and painting of our absolutely wonderful apartment walls. Sarcasm. Very much sarcasm.

The first hit knocks it even more off balance making it fall. Definitely hit something important. Next thing I do is kick it in the face. Directly next to its ears, directly in the head.

It seemed to shake it up a bit more as I heard a pop. Eardrums are gone. That has got to be a disorienting feeling. It shook and tried to swat at me but there was no coordination there. It's barely even the correct direction, much less distance and location.

I bring up the hockey stick and go to town. Hit after hit. Screech after screech responds back. It tries to bite near me and misses. It then faces upward to get at the stick as it comes down overhead. It succeeds.

A breif instant of panic makes me freeze. And a hit from the paws graze me. They push me back. Falling down with the stick in my arms and the end in the rat's mouth I pull. I swat and swipe and twist the end out and I carefully stay out of strike range.

A free hockey stick plus a pissed off world champion hockey player and a target equals blood. Lots of blood. And teeth, most broken and bloody.

Unfortunately for the Roidrat a fast moving metal stick plus open mouth equals broken dagger teeth and dislocated jaw. Again and again I hit it after pulling my stick from its destroyed jaw and I'm pretty sure that beautiful, disgusting, spine tingling, crunch it involuntarily made is its temple caving in.

Freaking A, that is one for the list. Wouldn't be happy with it if it happened to my own arms or legs or head, but I'm pretty sure that crunch means I got a good chance of possibly not being the new decor. The red style, of course.

As the Roidrats temple is caved in I decided to end its misery. Again and again my stick makes contact and then finally the screeching and whimpering quiet down.

The sounds at the end were sad. A sick animal crying out for help. It wanted to live and tried its best. It was in so much pain. It seemed to know that the end was near and it was looking for a way to make the pain stop. It made me feel pity and sapped my resolve after my adrenaline ran out. I was definitely berserking, being in a life threatening situation by a rat really turns on the adrenaline spout.

As the thoughts of sick animals like a dog or cat flows through my head my heart rate goes down a bit. It also puts me in an empathetic, remorseful and sorrowful mood as my heart seems to cry for the animal.

I look down and see splattered brains everywhere. I mean, I'm not happy, but some feeling of melancholic joy flows through me. I understand that it was Roidrat or me and I would always choose me. But logic and survival instincts are not able to influence the heart. It is emotion all the way and it says that this is wrong, that it is not something to be happy about. It is sad, it is life lost and that life had meaning and now it's gone forever.

I slowly recover my composure as Mist starts flowing out of Roidrat. It continues on and enters the fourth direction to enter the tangential me. This is not something you can accurately describe.

It's not normal front, back, up, down, left, or right. It's skewed. Tangential to reality in a sense. I'm going to call my tangential self, Soul. Because why not. Tangential me gets old real quick and it's long.

Everyone always believes there is a soul so why not. I'm pretty sure this existed before the Mist and being able to see it in that weird seeing but not way. So everyone else, the gurus and hippies might be referring to this, or not, but who cares. It's me and mine, so Soul it is.

The poor rat also becomes a desiccated, deflated mess and the same energy as before flows into my Soul.

The Mist just disappears and the Soul Fog, yup that is the name of the new energy, just appears in my Soul. The Soul Fog, or just Fog to abbreviate, seems available to me unlike my unlimited energy. My unlimited energy source is always present. It's always powering the Soul through the energy link, or string. I mean I can name it whatever I want but I'm not gonna call it Force or something.

Pretty sure Star Wars is going to sue me if I call it The Force. I also can’t just call it The Mist which is already on the floor, can I. It gets confusing doesn't it. So, Soul, Soul Fog, and The Pure Source shortened to just Source or Pure for the unlimited energy and then Link for its connection to the Soul and the body.

Pretty self explanatory. So you kill a bug, it leaks Mist, I believe, and then the Mist disappears and Fog appears in the Soul. The Pure provides energy to the Soul through the Link and the Soul also has a Link to the body, which is me.

The Fog seemed available, like I can take it and mold it into myself while the Soul seems to act as a container. Weird is the primary descriptor that I would use for this situation.

I have a feeling that I can use the molded Fog to make everything better. Like some sort of clay, for pottery. That is the impression I'm getting from this whole introspective dive into tangential reality.

I really don't think that's safe for many reasons, very much opposing my instincts. They seem to perk up and want to subsume it immediately and I am going to table all this until I get some actionable info.

The first to do something is someone who usually failed a good number of times and got a result that barely works. The latest is usually cutting edge and supremely functional, adaptive and robust. Now that I think about it, a normal rat plus Mist equals Roidrat. Me plus Mist or me plus Fog equals something that is either good or steroid Jay. The absolute amount of muscle is a Nope.

Well, don't get me wrong, muscles are awesome. They help you a good bit. Make everything look pretty and are highly functional for life. A major priority and people like them. Now Roidrat level muscles. No. Nah, no way. It ain't happening to me. No Sir. So I'm looking to postpone everything at this point and see if I can get a tutorial of what's going to happen.

Or an example of what's going to happen also helps. Somebody kills something and then uses the Fog and I am going to watch. I'm probably gonna feel pretty sad and definitely pity the poor sod who decides to experiment with it first. Hope things work out and if not well I am strong enough to survive for a bit.

I decide to check both corpses once more to find possible weaknesses that I can exploit in the future. As I look around the desiccated mess that is Roidrat, I find a dagger tooth unbroken and try to get it loose. As I jostle and hit near its root with the stick it flies free. I recoil and it flies away from me near the Giga Roach. Leaving that alone for the moment, I circle the rat and I see nothing that I can use. The supposed weakness also doesn't show up.

Taking a few minutes to just look and not touch, who knows if it can infect me or something, I walk to the tooth dagger and the corpse of the roach. Getting the dagger and inspecting the roach I find an orb of sorts that seems free from any of the guts and gory bits. It does sit near the middle of the bug inside its body. There is a kitchen nearby, I can grab some gloves and get the orb.

Going and doing just that after also cleaning my arms and face of the slight splatter of bug blood I also do a quick raid of the fridge. Taking my food and the loot in different bags and grabbing the orb with the gloves I head on up past the rat and back to my room. I look into my ruined room and nope out of there. There was no wall where the window was. Swearing quite creatively I look for an open room. While doing so I grab something to drink and chug it.

Today is a wonderful and horrible day. Here's hoping time helps me adapt.