Fuck, my head. It hurt like hell. I rubbed my eyes, opening them to a blurry image of the night sky. What the fuck? Why am I outside? My back was cold. I could feel a windchill on my bare feet and chest.
My vision started to clear, and I turned my head to see a set of cold eyes looking down at me. A cigarette butt hit my forehead, bouncing onto the ground next to my face, and the figure standing over me spoke.
“Daniel Martinez,”
His voice was familiar. Fuck, looking at his face, it was definitely that bastard.
“You’ve been selected."
Back in high school, one little parasite had always managed to slip his way into my bubble of peace. No matter how hard I tried to be a nice, normal guy, this one scrawny asshole had managed to piss me off like nobody else could.
Every single time he tried to fuck with me, without fail, I fell for it, and every single time, without fail, he’d find some way to subtly damage my pride. And now, this snake bastard was standing over me with a vicious look in his eyes.
I sat up, returning his glare. He looked calm as he lit up another cigarette. He took a drag off it before asking,
“Any questions?”
Ignoring him, I started to take note of my surroundings. I was sitting in black sand, in the center of a circle of black walls. They must have been at least thirty… no, fifty feet tall. The sky was clear, black, and full of stars that lit up the strange place I found myself in.
Fuck, so much black. It looked like the setting for an edgy version of Gladiator. I looked back at that bastard and responded.
“Yeah, where the fuck am I?”
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“Doesn’t matter.”
His answer came quickly, almost before I even finished my sentence.
Fuck.
This brings me back.
I got up onto my feet, starting to feel sick of this bastard looking down at me.
You’re pissing me off again.
Kenji Nakamura, you son of a bitch.
“Where the fuck am I, Kenji?”
As pissed as I was getting, my nerves were starting to take over. I could feel panic creeping in. Was I being trafficked? It was hard to even draw a conclusion as to why I could possibly be in such a place with my thoughts muddled by confusion.
This environment wasn’t only unfamiliar, but unnerving and strange. Who had ever heard of a place like this outside of fantasy?
Besides, it wasn’t like I was living in some European countryside. How the hell did I get here from my dorm in the city, let alone Kenji? There was one conclusion that I could draw from his presence, let alone his slack posture and aloof attitude.
Kenji probably knew what the fuck was going on. What an asshole. I tried my best to stay calm, but fear was following the panic. I could feel my composure gradually breaking down from the strange circumstance and lack of information.
Phew. at least some of those emotions could be directed at Kenji in the form of anger. That was keeping my head clear enough.
He took another drag off his cigarette and sighed, smoke pouring out his mouth and nostrils and into my face.
“Forget it. There’s really just one thing I’m going to tell you.”
Fuck, what is this bullshit? Ask if I have any questions and then ignore the only one I ask? Damn, maybe he doesn’t know and is just fucking with me.
“Danny, you can go home. The only thing you need to do to go back,”
He paused to take a long drag off his cigarette, before lifting it and tapping the ash onto my head, leaning up close to my face.
“Is kill me.”
Um.
What? What did he just say?
Fuck. This was not what I needed to hear, regardless of whether he was messing with me or not. My face contorted into fear and confusion, and my voice only managed to squeak out a single word.
“Huh?”
And then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a fist flying towards my face.