[Knowledge]

Am I dead?

I don't feel dead. If I was I don't think I would feel anything. Unless I'm in hell, then I think I would be tormented to feeling nothing but pain until the end of time. Yet...this isn’t pain. This feeling...is strange. I don’t have a banging headache...this is...quiet. The thoughts that run concurrent to my own are not here. The several tracks that my train of thought can try to take at once are not here.

Everything feels calm.

Is this a personal hell where my punishment is to feel calm in nothing? I must said that's almost poetic, but something's telling me I'm not actually dead. I open my eyes and feel a dim coldness as a green light shines in front of me. It looks as if a monitor of some electronic device had turned on. It dimly illuminates the room around me. Walls surround me on every side in a small rectangular room. A pair of eyes shadowed in darkness appears on the screen, they seem to glow.

"Well, hello there Gavin. I assume you've enjoyed my game of cat and mouse so far?"

"Your game…?” I called out to the darkness. “Who the fuck are you?” I ask, finding my voice is harder than I thought. It sounds like I just got finished smoking a few packs.

"Well, that’s quite a loaded question,” the voice calls back.

“Loaded, you mean full of shit? Are you going to give me answers or just be cryptic as shit like everything else?”

There is a moment of silence where I think the answer to that is yes. But when the voice carries back, it’s...softer, smoother. “I wanted you to come here, Gavin. I wanted to meet you."

"Huh, that's interesting, most people would just send a Facebook message or even stop on by in person. Kidnapping was outdated even before SAW came out," I said.

"Ah, there's the sarcasm," the voice said. “Thought you were only just edgy for the sake of it, but there is still a bit of wit there.”

I took in a sharp breath and closed my eyes. This motherfucker was avoiding answering on purpose and it wasn’t doing much for me keeping headache free. "Hey jackass, you still haven’t shown yourself. Kind of rude when you’re supposedly waiting on meeting me. Who are you, why did you want to meet me?”

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"You can call me Micah, everybody does," the voice said.

"Everybody? I don’t see anybody else here."

"It was a joke."

"What part of that was funny?” I ask. “Real shitty comedian here,” I turn to the side. Trying to find anything that resembles an exit in this godforsaken prison.

"I'll answer them in person, it would only be more fitting," Micah said.

"Okay, I’m going to ask this one last time. Where. The fuck. Are you?”

"Well, I need to be sure that you won't cause any damage," Micah said. “Defeats the purpose of all that I’m doing if you won’t be cooperative.”

"Well, kidnapping someone isn't a good way to assure that," I said.

"Point taken, but once I’m able to explain you’ll understand that out of the available options it was the best one.”

"Well, okay, but how long do I have so sit in here?" I ask.

"It all depends on you, Gavin. You'll know what you need to know and then it will be the right time," Micah said.

The screen turns off. I was left there in a shocked awe. It all depends on me? Well, I want to get the hell out of here! How about that?

"What the hell do you mean it depends on me you lunatic? I'm the one locked in the stupid box!" I yell out, but it does nothing.

I slam my fists against the wall and again it does nothing. I lie down against the wall and stare into the darkness. Having what little light I had taken away really sucks right about now.

I take in a deep breath and sit down with my back against the wall with the monitor on it. Right now would be a perfect time for one of those visions. It'd at least give me something to do. I see something in the darkness then, a bubble in front of me appears. I lurch up back against the wall as it bounces off the ground once, twice. And then moves slightly toward me. Inside its reflected surface is a sight of the outside world.

I relax and crawl closer toward it, inspecting the edges. It looks like any sort of bubble a kid might blow. It was so strange...inside it I could see perfectly like a window into another world, but everything outside of it was still cast in perfect darkness. If I were anywhere but here I’d think to contain it and investigate these...otherworldly qualities. Light doesn’t work like this. At least, this here shouldn’t.

I lean in closer to see it as it floats up and down, the view inside starts to move, shifting faster as if it were attached to a helicopter flying through the air. It changes and fades to an inside view of the Republic Plaza building—terribly awful memories coming back to me of where I came from. Questions join the memories of how I got here, but before I can dwell on them for too long I feel myself being sucked into the bubble. I feel my head shaking back and forth and then the weightless feeling joins me altogether.

The darkness has left me, but confusion becomes my constant companion. I know not where I am but what I see before me.

The innards of the Republic Plaza.