Pete was right.

The walls down here are indeed very taupe. A color I’m coming to associate more with confinement than relaxation.

My room (cell) is comparable to a small studio apartment. There's a bed in one corner, a desk with a rollaway chair in another, and a door to a full bathroom over there. The remaining corner possesses a single surveillance camera. It’s too high for me to reach. Trust me, I’ve tried. And it’s seemingly indestructible. As is the rollaway chair I tried to break it with.

There are no windows.

It's been almost two days since they threw me in here. I’ve had no human interaction since, save for a brief incursion with a barber for a buzz cut and the occasional food drop through a slot in the metal door, just like in jail. Which, let's be honest, is exactly what this place is, only with a bit more ergonomic consideration.

In the bathroom, there’s a closet full of the same short sleeve, off-white jumpsuits and whitey-tighties. Along with towels and basic toiletries. There is no mirror. They’d taken my bloody clothes when I arrived and insisted I wash up. I’d since been contemplating the idea of stuffing the jumpsuits up against the shower drain and trying to flood the place. But what would that ultimately accomplish? They’d probably just move me to a new room with less accommodations.

I’m sitting on my bed, jumpsuit donned, when there’s a knock at the door—a superfluous gesture since I can’t open it from the inside anyway—and a group of people walk in: two tough guys in dark army garb with stupid haircuts along with two individuals in business casual. One was a stone faced Asian woman in her mid thirties and the other a plump red-nosed fellow with a prominent gray streak in his well groomed beard. Q clearance was printed on all their respective I.D. badges. From my days in producing conspiracy clickbait, I knew that meant above top secret access.

I snort a laugh. “Oh, look at that. They sent Mulan and Santa Clause for my orientation. How nice. What is this, the Disney underground experience?”

Doctor Shen rolls her eyes at that. The bearded man smiles, takes a step forward, and clears his throat.

“Mr. Cobb. My name is Doctor Browning and this is my colleague Doctor Shen. We’ll be—”

“More like Doctor Brownies,” I say. “What, they didn’t teach you about health in medical school? Or are you not that kind of doctor?”

Browning gives me a smile that oozes with longsuffering, adjusts his spectacles sitting on his bulbous nose, and continues.

“We are uniquely qualified to analyze your condition and have been tasked with doing so.”

“What are you going to do? Cut me up and stuff me under a microscope? Stick a probe up my butt? I can turn my head and cough if it’s helpful.”

“What would be helpful,” says Browning, a little more sternly this time, “is if you agree to cooperate. We don’t want to harm you, Mr Cobb. We want to help you. You’ve had a very unique experience, from what I understand, and we wish to understand it better. That’s it, Mr. Cobb. I bet you’d like to understand it yourself as well, am I right?”

“You make it sound like I have a choice.”

“The alternative, of course, is to await trial in the state penitentiary for the murder of a government agent and the permanent maiming of a first responder—both of which are felonies in the state of Utah, mind you.”

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“Well, when you put it like that,” I say, flatly.

“Good,” says Browning, “then we are in alignment.” He nods to the army dude to his right, who tosses me a black bag.

“If you wouldn’t mind,” says Browning.

I open the bag to reveal two thick orange rubber gloves. I raise an eyebrow at him.

“Just a precaution,” he says.

I shake my head and slide them on.

“And the Velcro straps as well, please,” says Santa.

I squint at him again, then dig deeper in the bag and find two thick Velcro bands. I’m a bit clumsy with the gloves but I manage to secure them around my wrists, sealing the gloves. I lift my hands up and give them dramatic jazz fingers.

“Happy?” I say.

He smiles then motions towards the door. “After you, Mr Cobb.”

“Just … Jack, okay?” I say, as I get up and make my way to the door. I make a quick threatening gesture towards one of the army brutes and the man jumps backwards and puts a hand on his holstered gun.

“Just keeping you on your toes, bub,” I say, walking into the hallway.

The long stretch of hallway before us is painted, you guessed it, taupe. Everything down here is taupe. Even the floor tiles. The only thing not taupe is the humming flat panel lights in the ceiling.

The two army men and the two doctors follow close behind me, saying nothing, except to occasionally tell me which way to turn. It's a maze down here. Hallway after hallway, turn after turn. There’s a door sporadically here and there but mostly it’s just long stretches of nothing.

Secret underground facilities, if you were wondering, are pretty aesthetically boring.

A man in a tie enters the hallway up ahead and I stop in my tracks.

“Keep moving,” says an army guy, with a nudge to my back.

I stumble forward. “Jim? Jim! Gorne, is that you?” I attempt to speed up but one of the Army boys makes a few threatening “hey, hey,” grunts and I’m back to walking.

The man ahead looks up from a tablet, and his eyes go wide. Yep, it’s Jim Gorne alright, my old friend. It feels like ages ago we were in my recording studio cracking jokes about aliens and the nature of reality.

“Jim, you gotta help me. Talk to someone for me. Please, man.” I try to stop as we approach but I’m prodded along. “They’re keeping me locked up down there, and—”

“Jack?” He says, more to himself. But the recognition is still clear and audible. It’s not supersize that registers in his eyes, however.

“Ah, Doctor Gorne,” says Browning, bringing our group to a halt. “You of course know our newest project member, Mr Co—”

“Jim, something happened to me the night we recorded. When the ship went down. I accidentally took off this guy's head and this woman’s hand—she was gorgeous by the way, like a total stunner—and now I'm Chris Kringle’s lab rat.” I shook my rubber flippers for emphasis and could feel the army bro behind me stiffen. Their job, it was clear, was to make sure I don’t do anything … rash.

“I … I know,” says Jim, his eyes drifting to the floor.

“Doctor Gorne will be assisting us in our endeavor of discovery, Mr. Cobb. But not right now. So if you don’t mind. We have much to do.”

I squint. “Of course you know,” I say, shaking my head. I pinch the bridge of my nose to squash an oncoming headache but the rubber gloves get in the way.

As the Army bud nudges me forward, I notice the Q clearance badge tagged to Jim’s shirt pocket. “Just one question,” I say, stopping. The collective group nearly slams into my back. In my peripheral I catch the Asian woman rolling her eyes again and a distant part of me wonders if that’s her primary function here. “Just tell me one thing,” I say. “I have to know. Did you ever lie to me in order to intentionally mislead my listeners?”

It seems like a silly question to ask at the moment, but it’s important to me. I’d dedicated a large portion of my professional pursuits to discovering the truth and exposing the dark secrets of those in power. It was the reason I did what I did, even before the aliens showed up. Also, deep down, it was a way of asking, are we still friends? And Jim knew it.

It was Gorne’s turn to sigh. “Yes, I did.”

I nod, resigned. “Because you were forced to?”

Jim looks at Browning, then back at me. He’s about to respond when one of the army brats steps in.

“Alright, that’s enough,” he says, then shoves me a good two steps down the hall.