I watched the man who stood about two miles away, waiting for me to come out. I didn’t. I wouldn’t give the satisfaction of getting me the same way he got my team, just standing there and waiting for them to pass.

It was a good plan, I’ll give him that much. He bunkered down in a spot where you could only see him if you were to approach from where he was facing, but a couple miles out, there was a small clearing that you could see him from without being exposed, and I had a clear shot. I aimed right at his chest before raising the rifle so the crosshairs sat just above his heart, and fired.

He looked down at where I shot him and raised his hand. A whistle sounded out and we both stood from where we hid.

“Really? You had to shoot me from there?” He walked closer and held out his hand, as if he were greeting me for the first time, and I took it, shaking it quickly before letting go and patting him on the back.

“You and I both know that you would’ve won if I didn’t think before running around a corner.” I stretched, joints audibly popping as I returned to my normal position, and I caught the mild disgust on his face.

“It's perfectly normal to do that,” I said indignantly. He shook his head. “Not that loudly, and not to that extent.”

I shrugged before glancing around at the area, the only other person being the referee. “Where’d everyone go?”

“We took too long. They’re all at their houses right now.” He frowned as he began to remove his equipment. “Damn it. I need to text Gabe.”

“Why?” I had already removed all of the supplies and began packing the airsoft guns.

“Made a bet. If I beat you he owed me a hundred. And then you went and won.”

“You could just say you won.”

He shook his head as we left the building. “Not how I do things and you know it.” He opened the passenger side door. “A man is only as good as his word.”

“You sound like my dad.” I shook my head as I began to start the car. “I can cook something for you at my house, if you don’t want to go home right away.”

“Nah, I don’t want to owe you anything.”

“Doesn’t matter, do you want me to make you something or not?”

He slumped into his seat as he finally began to relax. “Fine. Nothing fancy though.”

I nodded as we pulled out of the lot, beginning the long drive to my home.

———————————————————————

I set the bag down on the floor as my friend threw himself on my couch, sprawled out in a way that took up the whole thing, and I went to the kitchen, pulling out a large pan and a few brown potatoes.

“You still have the Alexa?”

I had just started to peel the potatoes when he’d asked that and nearly cut myself with the peeler. “Yeah, why?”

“Alexa,” he said as he ignored my question, “what’s my name?”

“I’m talking to Mark. This is David’s account.”

Mark frowned. “Hey, how does this thing know my name?”

I set aside the one I had fully peeled and started on the second one. “It has a voice ID thing that you can activate. I did it last time you were here, remember?” I started on the last one, and he stared into space as he thought. “I don’t remember that.”

I shrugged. “You were baked when we got here and all you really did was snack. Now,” I said as I pulled out a cutting board, “will you let me cook, because I can’t talk to you and make decent food at the same time.”

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

He nodded before looking down at the couch as if he was looking for something. I just turned my attention back to the food, and after dicing the potatoes into chunks, I began cooking.

Step one: Turn on the stove and heat the pan. If you put the canola oil in first it could end up burning and making a mess. As I waited, I turned to Mark, who was now watching the news.

“Why’d you ask Alexa what my name was?”

“I wanted to see if you made it something weird,” he said honestly. He frowned at the TV. “There’s a robber now. Shooting up banks all over the city. You have insurance, right?”

I nodded. “I don’t have to be worried as far as I’m concerned,” I said before turning back to the pan and pouring a bit of oil in.

Step two: Add the potatoes and season accordingly. I opened the pantry that sat above the stove, jumping back as bottles of seasonings and dried herbs fell out, making an annoying sound along with a mess.

Mark leaned to look in the kitchen, going back to his original position when he saw the mess.

…

I’ll clean it up in a bit.

Looking over the scattered bottles, I grabbed paprika and garlic powder before taking the salt from the cabinet. I poured the potatoes into the pan, hearing the satisfying crackle they made before applying the seasonings, giving a healthy coat to the potatoes that I had just poured in, and let them sit before stirring them around until all of them were a nice golden brown, with them all being well coated.

Final step: Cheese. Specifically, shredded Colby Jack. I turned off the stove and put a handful of cheese all over it, after which I put a lid over so it would melt the cheese with the steam.

Two minutes passed by and I took a spatula and put them out onto a plate, grabbed a water from the fridge, and put them down on the table before “lightly” shaking Mark, who had fallen asleep.

“Stop, please.”

I stopped. “Food’s done.”

He seemed to…compact himself somehow, body becoming flatter and a bit shorter than it was when he sat normally. He stretched out like a cat in the sun before getting up to go to the table, grinning at the food. “Thanks man.”

I nodded. “Hey I have to go to the store, you have the key to the house, make sure you finally take your stuff out of the guest room. It takes long enough to clean my room when I’m fixing up the house.”

“Okay dad,” he said. He took a bite and smiled a bit. “You’re getting better at this.”

I was already out the door, grinning as I heard the comment.

———

I was maybe halfway to the store when I realized something, and I scrambled to check my wallet as I reached a stoplight.

“Hey Siri,” I said as I began to drive, “where’s the nearest bank?” My phone, attached to a holder thing on the windshield, immediately pulled up some directions, and I tapped the one that was only three miles out.

Why did I need to go to the bank? The store I was going to was, in reality, a farmers market of sorts. I would go there some days to sell when I had made something I thought was good enough. Sometimes it worked out, sometimes it didn’t.

I’m getting off track.

The point is, all of the vendors I needed to see only took cash, and the most I had was $6.27 left from the airsoft place. Enough for a snack, but nowhere near what I needed for the food I would have to buy.

I pulled into the lot and headed into where they had the ATM since they didn’t have a drive-through or anything, and was greeted by the odd, semi-quiet atmosphere that these places had.

I walked to the machine and took out about $200 for the market, but as I turned to leave, a loud bang resounded through the room, near me, actually.

“Hands in the air!” I slowly turned to see a guy, around 5’ 10” wearing a mask and sunglasses, with a gun in his hand. He held it close, where it wouldn’t just be hard to grab, it would be stupidly easy to shoot someone if they came at you from anywhere but behind you. I was behind him, and, rather dumbly, I charged him from my position.

Unfortunately, I was more or less stomping at him rapidly, and as I prepared to tackle him, he whipped around and shot me, point blank, in the chest.

Was I dead right away? No, but it was over pretty quickly. The last thing I remember is my body lying on top of him, some guy taking his gun, and someone calling the cops.

Then I was dead.

———

Or so I thought.

Everything went blacker than the soul of a megachurch televangelist before I opened my eyes again, and when I did, I took a deep breath in, feeling water rush into my lungs. I then realized I was under water, and I kicked my legs, arms flailing as I attempted, and failed, to surface. The only feeling that I had as I drowned was confusion, because I swear I just got shot in the chest.

It took me way too long to realize I was coming back to life like the guys from isekai stories, and I was nowhere near as lucky as them with the sheer amount of deaths I went through.

* Drowned underwater. Estimate: Twenty seconds.

* Got mauled to death by a pack of feral dogs. Estimate: One minute.

* Hit in the head by a large rock, thrown by what appeared to be a troll. Estimate: Five minutes.

* Eaten alive by sirens. Estimate: One minute and ten seconds.

* Drowned again due to a water-horse thing. Estimate: Two minutes.

* Shot through the head by a jet of water. Estimate: 5 seconds.

* Incinerated by what appeared to be Satan. Estimate: 10 minutes.

* Stepped on by a giant. Estimate: 12 seconds.

It was, to put it simply, hell, and I began to wonder if it would ever end. It did, just not how I had hoped.

After the giant, when I woke up again, I was free falling from high enough that I was above the clouds, and I believed I was back home, at least until I collided with a dragon. I didn’t die though! No, I rolled off its back, slowing my fall but not stopping it, and when I fell off the tail, it was about a twenty foot drop into the treetops, where I hit a branch and-

Oh. There goes my spine.

Still falling, and sustaining multiple injuries, all I could really think was that I wasn’t dead, somehow. As I crashed through the lowest tree and hit the ground, I tried to move. Fruitlessly, of course, but it was worth a shot.

Maybe I could take a little nap… Yeah, I deserved it after everything I had gone through so far. Plus, if I die, I might end up somewhere safe.