Complete Darkness.  That’s the first thing I see after opening my eyes.  For some people that might be weird, but I have grown accustomed to waking up to complete darkness.  It’s mostly because I’m lazy.  Really, really lazy.  I won’t lie.  In my small 1 bedroom apartment I mostly keep the blinds on my windows closed to not let the morning sun in. The reason; the sun comes up too damn early.  Don’t laugh!  It just wakes me up too early in the morning and I really want to enjoy every second I can asleep.  I mean, I haven’t exactly had a normal sleeping schedule these past 10 years, so every minute asleep means wonders for my health.  I blame my bad sleeping schedule on my work.  It’s definitely not my excessive, borderline extreme, online gaming habits that keep me up every night until 3 or 4 am.  Yep.  It’s definitely because I have to wake up and go to work at 7am, not my goofing off all night.  

Although, compared to my normal grogginess of the morning, my body feels significantly different today.  For one thing, I feel soooo tired right now.  It feels like I just ran a marathon, or did 1000 push ups, or performed a very high intensity workout.  My whole body feels like its just ready to keel over from exhaustion.  

‘What did I do last night to cause my body to feel this way?’

The only part of me that I can still move properly is my head.  

‘Maybe I hit my head or fell off my bed while sleeping?  Or did I sleep in a weird position again?  I did lose feeling in my left arm for a few hours after sleeping on it all night a while back….maybe that’s it?’

The unending soreness from my joints stops my train of thought as I try not to move and make my body feel worse.

‘UHHHHHHHH…..I don't want to get uuuuupppp.  This is going to be a bad day I can feel it.  This grogginess is definitely trying to tell me something.  My body must be telling me to skip work today.  Yep’

I smile in the silence for a brief moment before frowning again.

‘.....ya right...I can't do that.  My boss is already trying to find a excuse to fire me.  Uhhhhhhhh….I need money...fuuuck……..  Screw it!  Time to get up or I’ll be late for work.’

I look around the darkness of my room.  I can't see anything through the darkness though.  

‘I must have slept in because I can’t hear my normally loud neighbors getting up to rush out to work.(they are usually my last alarm in the morning to tell me I’m late)’

Silence.  

‘This is bad.  My boss is definitely going to fire me this time.  No doubt about it.(I have probably been late every day I have worked there too.  I am not a great/model employee!!)  

I sigh very loudly.

‘Don’t blame me boss!  I just don’t have the drive to work.  Well, I don’t really have the drive to do anything I’ve put my mind too really.  uhhhhhh…...I’m such a loser.  Please don't fire me!’

I grone, sigh, and resign myself to my morning dose of self loathing and self pity for a few seconds.

‘I think the only reason they keep me is because they want to have someone to laugh at and feel superior towards.’  

Silence.

‘....no...It's not only that though.’

I frown and close my eyes.  

‘Everyone I know always feels like they need to tell me how to live my life.  To work like this, to make this amount of money, to talk like this, to act like this, to be respectful and hold your tongue, to not let others know how you truly feel or act, to not live the way you want to live but by how society needs you to live.’

‘You have to live by society's rules.  You have to live the way society needs you to live.  You must fit in with society to live a good life.  Society dictates what your purpose is, you can't change it.  Society this.  Society that.  Society, Society, SOCIETY!’

I take a deep breath in the silence

‘......what a pathetic life.  It's like society has become their god…….I don't want to live the way society wants me to though.  I never did.  I want to be the maker of my own future.  To say what I want, to be what I want.’

I pause and think over my goals.

‘hnn…..Even though I say that, I still resign myself to live the way society needs me to live…..heh.  I can't shake the chains society has on me.  Although, I guess to spite society I decided to not have a drive to do anything well.  This way I would become a drag on society and drag it down with me.  That's the only real damage I have ever done to society.’

I pause.

‘Well, I guess that's the only thing I can really do against them.  Be lazy and do the most minimal work necessary to live…..ya..that’ll show them…………………...such a moron.’

I smile and shake my head at my stupidity.

‘No one cares if I drag down society and no one cares about me.  I’m just ones and zeros to them, a profit or an expense line.  I’m only hurting myself really.  If I had the drive to succeed, then I could rise through the ranks and become influential and then I could say and do what I want…….Ya.  Screw society, if I was wealthy, strong, and powerful, then no one would say anything against me.  Nothing they say would matter to me if I was at the top…….’

I sigh loudly again.

‘I’m just realizing this now?’

Silence.

‘No.  I think I knew this when I was younger.  I knew that all beforehand in the back of my mind and yet I still chose this path.  I guess I really am lazy.  No point in crying about it now.  I have already made my decisions.  I made my bed, now I have to lay in it.  I will be a man and not wine anymore.  This is my fate.  I can't fight it.  I won't fight it.’

I sigh loudly again.

‘…...back to reality John.  Come on.’

I take a deep breath.

‘I guess I should at least text them and say that I’m sick or something(with how my body feels right now, it might be truth!).’

“I need to get up.  Come on body.”

I was hoping that given time my body would come back to me and I can start my day, but it seems the only part of my body that I can still move right now is my head.  I’m almost afraid to turn to my left and see what time it is on my desk clock.  If by some miracle I woke up early, then I will praise the gods with both arms stretched out wide towards the heavens and promise to go to bed at a normal time for the rest of the week.  

However, when I turn my head, I don’t see my clock.  In fact, I don’t see anything.  I just see more darkness.  

‘.....weird.  Was there a power outage?  It still feels like nighttime to me.  Maybe I was saved by a freak power outage and I don’t have to go to work today...’

That’d be nice.  Although, the clock could have fell off my desk and I could be really late.  I'll just wait for my eyes to adjust and see if my clock really is on my desk or not.  For now let’s try to move my extremely tired body a little so that I can eventually get off the bed and start my morning routine.  If by a miracle I woke up early, then I won't let my stiff body ruine this good fortune.  

I start with my hands and arms.  I try flexing my hands to get the blood pumping and, after what felt like an eternity of flexing them, they move.  

“Success!”  

‘What the hell did I do last night to make my body so tired?  I don't remember anything weird.  I was playing video games before bed again right?’

Next are my arms; I do the same routine that I did with my hands to my arms and, success.  I still can't raise them yet do to my shoulders stiffness, but that was an improvement.  If I was looking down at me from above right then, I probably looked like a stiff board wiggling two noodles next to it.  I try to purge the idea of me looking stupid this early in the morning and focus on my feet and legs.  While I wiggle my feet, I start to wonder why my eyes have yet to adjust to the darkness.  

‘Usually it doesn't take this long....strange….maybe there really was a blackout this morning….but this darkness is just to much...after I check my clock I’ll grab my flashlight from my desk...then head to the bathroom to wash my face...’

As I slowly get the blood pumping through my stiff joints I notice 3 things that I hadn't before, mostly because my sense of touch was dulled before now.  One was that I was laying down flat on my back.(I usually pass out in my chair hunched over while playing online video games so this is weird)  The second was that I was completely naked.  

‘What the hell?  Did it get that hot last night that I sleep stripped?’

I normally strip before bed because I don’t pay for heating and cooling for my room(It costs to much!) and because it’s the hot season right now I usually sleep in my boxers.  

‘Maybe they came off during the marathon I ran last night.’

I roll my eyes as I chuckle at my own joke.  

‘It doesn't feel hot now though.  It actually feels quite comfortable.  The temperature right now feels like when you take a mud bath or when you are being buried in the sand at the beach; very calming.’

Anyway, the third thing that I noticed was that I was not laying on my bed.  I was currently laying on something hard and wooden.

‘...I guess that explains why I’m laying down.  I fell of the chair last night didn't I!!’

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

I sigh loudly.

‘...I guess my body really needs sleep.  I didn't even wake up from falling on the floor.  I really need to take better care of my body’

I sigh again while promising to get to bed a little earlier in the future.

As I finally get enough blood pumping in my body to move my arms and shoulders, I spread out my arms out to my sides in a T formation to stretch them a little more.  However, I couldn't.  Both of my arms hit something hard and wooden on either side of me.    

‘...weird.  I really need to pick up around my room.’

When I tried to sit up though my head hit something hard too.  This I assumed to be my wooden desk above me.

“Ouch!  Damn it!  Did I really fall under my desk?!?  Really?!....uhhhh….What rotten luck.  Well I’m up now!.........Fuck me.”

I lay back down on the hardwood flooring while holding my pounding head with one arm, and I reach my other arm up to feel for the edge of the desk so I could get up while not hitting my head this time.  I felt the wood above me and I tried to follow it up to find where it ended.  However, I was met with another wooden wall.  This one was above my head.  

‘How the hell did I fall under my desk at stuck an angle?  This is so weird.  I’m going to need to change some habits after this.’

I start to scoot my naked body toward the exit, which I believed was by my feet, but as I moved about a foot downward I was met with, what felt like, another hard, wooden wall.

“The hell?”

I start to panic a little as I move my body around to feel where I am more.  When I finish my physical search of where I am, I’m dumbstruck.

‘...........What the fuck?!?!?!?’

“wait…….WHAT THE FUCK?!?!?!?!”

I was stuck!  I wasn't under my desk.  I was in what feels to be a large wooden box!  No matter how I tried to deny it, I was stuck in this box.  I tried to calm myself down, to think a little.

‘There has to be a reason for this.  Maybe there was an earthquake and I am trapped under the rubble…..Ya...that’s it…I just need to feel around and see if I can move some of the rubble off of me to get out.’

I started to slowly feel around the box again to try and find holes or edges or cracks or something.  After what felt like an hour, I came to a conclusion.

‘It seems like I’m in a box that's 3 feet wide(on my back looking up) and almost 2 feet longer than my body.  It’s a miracle that I wasn't hit with debri from above.’

After searching again and again trying to find an opening to move the rubble, I realized, I couldn’t.  I started to panic.  My breathing became faster.  There were no holes, handles, indents, nothing to grab hold-on to or pull at, just smooth, hard wood all around me.  Then a dark thought came into my mind; I wasn’t under rubble, I was in a coffin.  I could smell the damp earth packed all around me outside the box.  My mind started to freak out trying to make sense of all this and push that dark thought out of my head, but after a few minutes I couldn't find any evidence of anything else this box could be.  

I panicked.

‘What’s going on?!?  Why am I in a coffin?!?  Why am I naked in a coffin?!?’

I start freaking out.  I bang my fists against the roof of the wood and scream for help.  

“HELP!!  SOMEONE HELP ME!!!  I’M TRAPPED DOWN HERE!!  I’M STILL ALIVE!!!  HELP!!!”

I push with all my might against the wooden wall above me, trapping me down here.  I tried kicking the bottom of it to get out; tried pushing the wall above my head, but no matter what I did to the wooden walls, they would not move.  I was truly trapped.   All of my effort, strength and intelligence couldn’t help me in this box.  For the first time in my life I was totally helpless.  No matter how much I wanted it I couldn’t change reality.  For the first time, I felt it; true fear.  It made me feel like vomiting, pissing myself, and crying at the same time.  I felt like my mind was going blank.  I couldn't stop my mind from wandering to dark places.  I wasn't thinking straight.  Eventually,  the only thing that stopped my mind from going crazy was the vomit I spewed out of my mouth all over myself.  I nearly choked on my own vomit.

This was one of the worst feelings I had ever felt in my life!  I never experienced this kind of fear before; true fear.  It's horrifying.  I shouted, screamed, and begged for help as I laid in my own vomit.  The smell choking my nostrils with it's stench.  I kept begging pleading for someone, anyone to help me, to save me.  But…..

The answer was always silence.  

It was a deafening silence.  

I didn't stop though, I couldn't.  I continued to hope, beg, plead for anyone to come and help me, to save me, to take away my fear, but it felt like the world had become indifferent to me.  It felt like the world had accepted the fact that I was going to die.  It felt like the world had turned away, leaving me to die alone in the darkness and silence.

Screaming wasn't working, but what else could I do?  Was this all I could do?  Beg and scream for help?  Was this what my life came to?  To grovel and beg on the hope-against-hope that someone somehow hears me and is desperately trying to help me, to save me?  

Fear kept it's unnatural pace at crushing my mind with madness and pain, taking my thoughts deeper and deeper to dark and terrifying places.  I felt so helpless, tears started to stream down my eyes.  I couldn't see anything but total darkness, I couldn't hear anything but total silence, and I was starting to get light headed from using most of the air in the box.  I was getting desperate! The walls felt like they were closing in around me.  I was getting claustrophobic. I started to hyperventilate.  I looked horrible.  I cried and cried and somewhere along the way, I pissed myself in fear.

 I tried to calm myself down.  I needed to conserve the now putrid air.  I needed to focus.  Panicking wont help me.  I needed to stop this fear from taking over my mind or I truly will die a horrible death.  I tried to slow and control my breathing while crying more tears than I ever had in my life.  I tried to distract myself from reality.  I tried desperately to remember what happened to me before this wooden prison embraced me; to see a reason for all this.  I needed to try and make sense of this.  I needed answers!  Something, ANYTHING to get my mind off of the fear.  

‘THINK!  I wasn't a bad guy.  I went to work, I came home, played video games, slept.’

Enemies?

‘I had a decent life.   I didn't make enemies.  I didn't make friends.  I had no lovers to speak of.  I wasn't rich and all of my family died when I was younger so….why was this happening to me?!?  I lived a normal life.  I followed the rules.  I followed societies restrictions on me.  I did what it wanted.  I wasn't someone special or extremely smart or athletic so why is this happening.  I was what society wanted me to be!  What the world wanted me to be!  I changed myself to live the way they wanted me to live!  Why is this happening to me then?!?  I’m still young.  I’m only 25!!!’

My voice grew desperate.  I was barely able to speak without dry heaving in fear.

“Please! *hick*  I still want to live!  *hick*  I don’t want to die!  I didn't do anything in my life that would warrant this!  I didn’t do anything to anyone to warrant this kind of suffering and pain!  I was what you wanted me to be!  *hick*  Please! *hick*”

I wanted this to all be a bad dream.  I wanted to disappear from this and suddenly be back in my room, back at my home.  But I was not in my home.  I was not near my home.  I was alone, left to die, and I was terrified.  I had never felt such fear and pain in my life.  To be abandoned and left to suffocate in the darkness alone until you died.  To have all of your hope crushed by the unending silence and darkness from a few feet of dirt!

This was the worst way to die.  I was so scared I started to cry even more, begging gods, demons, the devil, the world, anyone to save me.  I’d do anything to escape the fear, to escape death!  

“ple..*hick*..he..he..ze..*hick*..I..do..ho..hont..wa..nt..t..t..to...di..hi..hie!”

The cruel reality was starting to kick in fast.  I was losing air.  I don't know how long I had been in the box beforehand, but I had used a lot of air while screaming and crying.  I might only have a few more minutes left.  I was surprised, afraid, and depressed with my death inching closer to me.  I felt pathetic.  I felt so weak.  

I never thought about death.  I was young.  Death was just something that would happen to you later.  You didn't have to care about it when you were young.  

‘What was going to happen to me after I died?  Everyone has theories, beliefs, religions, practices.  What do I do?  Do..Do I try to make a pact?  Do I..Do I plead to some god that I don't know hoping that after I die I get to be in some paradise?  I never thought about life after death.  My parents had an opinion but I never really accepted it, even after they died.  I didn't even know if there is life after death.’

So many memories started to pass through my mind.  

‘This must be the moment when you see your life flash before your eyes before you died…’

Even if it was my life flashing before my eyes, it was still to fast!  My life was too short to have done anything memorable or worthwhile.  It went by to fast.  The only thing it confirmed for me was that I was a pathetic loser in life and I was going to die a pathetic loser’s death.  I began to accept my fate.  To accept my death.

Then something changed in me.  

I felt something start to bend in my mind.  Something started to change within me.  The fear that was eating away at my soul slowed a little.  I looked over the memories of my life again and realized something; I wasted my life.  I started to hate myself for not taking the chances in my life to be better, to be smarter, to be stronger.  I hated that I never did anything important in my life.  I hated that I didn't take risks or live big and large.  But most of all, I hated that I didn't enjoy my life to the fullest.  I hated that I tried to conform myself to a society that didn't care.  After looking over my life, the depressing feeling returned once more.  I felt that I wasted my life.  I felt like I was a waste of space to the world and the world was better off without me.  

My breathing slowed and I calmed down a little.  

‘......maybe it was better this way…...to leave this world like I lived…...without making a difference in anyone's lives….without doing anything with my life….without living my life the way I wanted…….and now I’m going to die in the silence…..all alone....without even getting a chance to fight for my life, to change it, to make my life better….’  

Then, something broke in my mind and a loud snap began ringing in my ears.

“NOOOO!!"

I screamed at the top of my lungs.  My eyes shot open and I gnashed my teeth.  I started to get angry.  I realized something important that I missed!  SOMEONE put me here!  SOMEONE wanted me to die, to kill me, to put me in this box and leave me to die!  SOMEONE made me feel this way, to make me feel this fear!

It was getting harder to breath.  Less and less air was getting to my brain.  I was really lightheaded but my anger wasn’t going to stop.  

“THAT’S RIGHT!!!  I am being MURDERED!!!  I still have so much life to live!  THEY ARE THE ONES TAKING MY LIFE AWAY!!!  WHAT GIVES THEM THE RIGHT!!!”

That’s right!  If I was alive I would eventually realize that my life was pathetic and would have changed it.  I would have smartened up.  I wouldn't have conformed to society and be the quiet respectful person they wanted me to be.  I would have done so much more with my life!  I would have lived it my way!  I would have traveled the world, had a wife, kids, retired, and given knowledge to others; life lessons to help the young live their lives to the fullest!  

After all that, THEN I could die!  NOT BEFORE!!!  But that chance to live my life is being taken away from me!  Someone put me in here to kill me!  I didn't even get to fight for my life!  I wasn't the greatest person in the world, but I still should have been aloud to fight for my life!  

My rage began overflowing my body.  My rapid heart beat started to ring in my ears.

‘That's right!  If I’m going to die, I’m not going to go quietly.  I will curse at them until my lungs give out!!!!!’

My previously crushing, overwhelming fear turned into unstoppable, unbridled rage and wrath.  Adrenaline started to kick in all around my body.  I started to scream at them, those that put me here.  I started banging my fists with all my might against this indifferent wooden executioner until they bled.  

“You want to take my life like it's nothing!  I WON'T LET YOU!!  I will make you all SUFFER!  I WILL GET OUT OF HERE, I WILL FIND YOU,  AND THEN KILL YOU ALL!!!!!  NOTHING WILL STOP ME!!!  YOU HEAR ME!!!”

I never killed anyone before, but now, who cares.  I would definitely not hesitate or lose sleep over killing someone.  I would not go quietly.  I was going to fight tooth and nail for my life, for my revenge!  Those that put me here obviously didn’t care about killing me, they didn't fear the consequences or what was right or wrong.  So why should I care about it!  As long as I don’t have to feel this fear and pain again, I’ll kill them all!!

“I DON’T KNOW HOW OR WHEN BUT ONE DAY, SOMEHOW I WILL GET MY REVENGE!!   YOU THOUGHT I WOULD DIE WILLINGLY!!!  HELL NO!!!  I’M NOT A VICTIM!!!  I AM A FIGHTER AND I WON'T EVER GIVE UP!!!  YOU WILL ALL DIE BY MY HANDS!!  YOU WILL EXPERIENCE TRUE FEAR AS YOU DIE!!!  THIS I SWEAR!!!”

I started punching the wall in front of me with everything I had.  Bones started to crack and break but I didn't care.  I kept doing it until my hands were nothing but destroyed, broken, bloody clumps of flesh.

It’s strange, the person you become when you face your own death, when you see the end drawing near with no way of stopping it.  In the end, you won't care about morals or what’s right and what's wrong.  You just want to live.  I was a nice and loving kid when I was young.  I was a nice and loving man when I became an adult.  I would never think about hurting anyone unless absolutely necessary, but now.  I will happily throw my morals away if I could just stop my own death and get my revenge!  I would gladly make a deal with the devil to fight and to slaughter them all, to make them suffer like I was suffering, to make them all suffer worse than they could ever imagine!  Even if the gods or the devil himself stands in my way, I would climb over all their corpses to get my revenge!  No matter what!  This desire and rage and hate flowing through me may be due to me losing oxygen to my brain, but I didn't care.  This anger, this rage, it felt good!  The hate I felt, the rage flowing through me, I liked it!  I would get my revenge!!  I could feel it in my soul!

I stopped punching the wall when I started suffocating.  I was losing air.  I was going to die.  This fact quelled my rage for a moment to let me think clearly.

‘.......my last words….damn it!  I can't even think clearly due to the lack of oxygen to my brain…..

I could say something calming, loving, or meaningful….that's what people say you should do to bring peace to your soul right?  To help you move on peacefully to the next life?...right?…...mom?….dad?….’

A tear fell down my eye and I laid there in the darkness suffocating.

‘....no…..I’m sorry mom, dad……..But I don't want my soul to be at peace for this.  I don't want to accept this death.  If I die with a hateful resentful soul, so be it!  As long as I get my revenge, I’ll say everything I want to!  Who cares what I should say!  I’ll say what I want to say…..I’ll finally live the way I want to!  Even if its at the end.  I’ll curse them all with my final breath!’

I take a moment to gather my thoughts.  Then I begin my final oration, projecting every ounce of my soul into my words so that they can feel my will and hate and rage wherever they are.

“.....To those that did this to me, I will find you and you will wish for the pain to stop.  To those who stood by and let them do this to me, I will make your deaths as painful as possible!  And to the WORLD for ABANDONING ME and making my life so PATHETIC, I WILL MAKE YOU MY BITCH!!!  YOU THOUGHT I WAS WEAK AND PATHETIC!  I WILL SHOW YOU!  I WILL LIVE!!  I WILL GET MY REVENGE!!  I WILL LIVE A LIFE BY MY RULES, AND NOTHING IN THIS WORLD WILL EVER BE ABLE TO STOP ME!!!  NO GOD!!  NO DEVIL!!!  NOTHING!!  NOT EVEN DEATH!!!!”

There was no more air in the box.  

I was out of air and time, but I had said everything I wanted to.  

I twisted, spazzed, and gasped for air.

Death was coming for me.  I could felt it.  My body stopped moving.  Silence returned to the box until.

<>

‘.......I guess this is the last thing I hear before I die…..it must be my morals still trying to give me peace of mind...to make me feel like forgiving those fucking bastards that did this to me’

My mind was going blank.  I didn't have any strength left in me but I wanted to answer it.  I wanted to follow through.  To make my drive, my conviction, feel real in the end.  Screw my morals, I’ll answer the voice!  I used whatever strength I had left to answer the voice as I died there alone in the dark and in the silence; my voice, barely a whisper.

“.........yes..”   

<<.................hmmm….ok...I’ll help you then>>

I didn't hear or think anything after that.  I died.  Everything went white and then returned to black.  No more rage, no more fear, no more pain, just nothingness.   

<>