by Envy Mercury
“Uh, yeah… sure,” I mumbled while attempting not to look too annoyed. I need to keep that job. I finally walked towards my point of interest to get cleaned up. I knocked on the door and leaned close to it. I needed to avoid being a peeping tom with a wet crotch. How this day was going, I could see that being a definite thing in my future.
I shut the door behind me as I made my way into the porcelain throne room. In the sink were some paper towels that some dill hole left behind and wet. I couldn't believe how messy people could be at work. I didn't even want to imagine how they were at home. Sure, I could be lazy, and I had some issues. This was work though, people come in here and see that messy shit. I cleaned up the paper towel mess left by some fuckface and washed my hands before doing what I came to do. I set my bag on the floor and unzipped it, and retrieved my kit that was tucked nice and snug inside an inner pocket. I leaned on the counter and let a long sigh out as I looked up at the mirror. I sat there looking into the face looking back at me, and I felt a little ashamed. It wasn’t like it was all my fault, though, and I didn’t have control over what happened to me. I was just getting by. In that bathroom, the light was angled and bright enough to light up all my faults. It was like I could see all of them. It made me hold off digging into my kit just yet.
I chuckled to myself a little, maybe a bit too loud. Fantastic, now I will be the guy that laughs in the bathroom while he takes dumps. I took some paper towels and got them damp, and started to scrub on my pants a bit. Get some of that coffee out before drying them. I realized I had to get my underwear cleaned up as well. After attempting to dry my pants, I lowered them down my legs, exposing my boxer briefs. I followed the same process as I did with my dress pants. I threw my used paper towels in the trash. Not in the sink like some deviant fucks do around here. I was ready to start pulling up my pants when the lights flickered a little bit. Just one of those slight flickers where you think the power will go out, but it never does.
Then things got fucked up for me. Well, more fucked up than wet pants from a cute coworker bumping coffee onto your junk. There was a noise kind of like a bass drop. I came forward a bit and caught my hand on the counter, and I felt a little dizzy. What the hell? My legs lost some of their strength, causing me to lean into the counter a bit more to support my weight.
The noise again.
The room rattled more this time, and the power flickered. I knew about earthquakes, but we never had them here, and I did not recall there being strange sounds when they occurred. I reached my hand back behind me to grip my pants to pull them up to where they belonged. I figured this was the right course of action as a first step. One does not like to be caught with their pants down, especially if you have to be saved by a rescue squad.
I never got my pants up.
The strange noise was deafening when I heard it again. Was it getting even louder? Whatever was making the sound was getting closer. I heard people outside in the office raising their voices in the commotion and freaking out, and there was hysteria out there. I went to grab my kit, but my hand failed me, and it knocked off the counter, and it slid over to the corner of the bathroom. Sound like thunder cracked in that room, causing me to drop to my knees and cover my ears. I had to close my eyes from the intense bright light that kept getting brighter. My heart was racing, and I couldn’t catch my breath. It was what happened to me years ago. I faded to darkness.
Chapter Two
Under me felt rough like I was lying on a rocky hard surface. I remembered the sounds and shaking and hypothesized that there must have been an earthquake, and I was in some building debris. That would be a worst-case scenario in the situation I was in. I was no longer in that situation, though.
“Mom! What is that man doing?” a child’s voice asked.
“Keep walking, Lalu, and don’t point,” a woman's voice replied.
I started to open my eyes, and it was bright out. Did the whole building collapse? No, things started to piece together pretty quickly once I could see again.
“Hey pal, go take your sexy time somewhere else, away from my stand!” An angry-looking man had a stern gaze on me from what appeared to be a vendor area of sorts. I looked down, and I was on some dirty street. People were looking at me from all directions. Vendors like they had at the park by the neighborhood I lived. It was like a farmer’s market.
“Excuse me?” I said to the angry man as I held my hand up to block the sunlight.
“Come on, sicko. Get out of here,” said the angry man.
I looked down, and my pants were halfway down, and my hand was in my underwear. Fuck, this didn't look good, and I wasn’t even super drunk or high. People were staring at me, and a few mothers were covering their children's eyes. Mouths open, shocked expressions like they walked in on their kid having happy time. I attempted to get up and tripped over myself as I tried to pull up my pants. I fell on my face with my ass out for the world to see. What the hell was going on?
“Guards! A deviant! Come help!” a lady shrieked, waking me from my stupid state. I shuffled to my feet and pulled up my pants, and started running down a side street to where I figured there wouldn’t be people pointing and staring at me. Getting caught in this situation, I saw myself being photographed and listed as a sexual predator on the internet for everyone to see. It was almost enough to make me cry. Hell, I probably was crying. Where was the office, and who were these people? Where the fuck did I end up?
I didn't have time to think about it. All I was thinking about was getting the fuck out of this situation. I continued down the side street. It looked like a reasonably typical place except for one major thing: the types of people here. If I could even call them people. There were some homeless residents like any other city would have. I noticed that some had inhuman features. Were those fucking animal ears? I had been to cosplay conventions before, where people dressed up as their favorite characters from pop culture: games, movies, and anime. I did not see how this could be a convention. Many people looked lightly mixed with animal traits. Many were human, but some had features of cats, rabbits, dogs, and even raccoons. I didn’t recognize some of the races at all, as they were very human-like, except for the ears and tails added to their bodies.
I felt a pull on my shirt, and it was sharp like when a cat grips onto your leg for attention. I let out a breath of anxiety as I looked down towards my leg.
“Hey Mister, do you have any spare Opas?” said the cute yet dirty short girl with cat ears. She looked like a cat. She had claws like a cat. Yes, this was a catgirl. “I'm just so hungry… Gosh, my belly hurts,” she said while making a pouty face and theatrically rubbing her belly. I didn't know what to say. So, I didn't say anything, and I just looked at her. “What are you looking at? What do you think I am some street gutter trash?”
I looked around for the short girl’s mother, with how aggressive the other mothers were in the street and how I looked like a pervert. I really did not want a repeat of my previous experiences.
“Hey, kiddo,” I said as I patted her head. “I don't know what Opas are. So, I cannot give you any.” She got outraged, just like when you pet a cat, and it gets pissed off for no reason and fucking bites you.
“Stop touching me,” she said.
“What?” I replied as she crossed her arms.
“STOP TOUCHING ME!” She screamed with all the fury you would imagine a crazy tiny cat girl could muster.
“Hey now,” I said as I backed away, holding my hands up. “I stopped touching your head. It’s ok… it’s ok.” I gave a halfhearted smile to her. Just then, there was a voice from behind me.
“Hey, are you touching that small girl?”
“Uh, no?” I said as I turned to look over my shoulder. The voice belonged to a man that had armor on, kind of like a guard.
“THE PERVERT TOUCHED ME IN MY SPECIAL PLACE!” The short girl screamed while stomping her feet with a smirk look of satisfaction on her face. “Maybe you shouldn't lie about things, pervert. Like telling women
, you don't know what money is and asking for help. Ridiculous! So that you can touch their special place!”
I realized that even here, you should not touch a cat if they do not trust you. Touch equals death. “Hey- I don’t want any problems, dude,” I reasoned to the guard. I think he was a guard. He got pissed off and started towards me, and I held up my hands in the universal sign of ‘hey, it’s cool. We are chill.’
“You will address me with a proper title, you trash!” The guard grabbed me by my shirt and hit me in the head with a baton, and it struck me with a bit of force. Well, more strength than I was used to. I saw mother fuckin’ stars. Then, Mr. Proper Title started to drag me off across the ground, and he was fucking up my clothes. I wanted to argue with him about my rights and ask why a medieval-looking knight was serving me up some assault and appeared to be arresting me. I didn’t, and he hit my head too fucking hard. While I was dragged away, I tilted my head back and looked up in the direction I was currently being towed away from.
The short girl with cat ears was dramatically waving at me, and a smile stretched across her face as I was pulled away. She looked fucking happy. It was like a ray of sunshine came through the dark clouds of whatever life I had now, and it was lighting her up like a candle Mr. Rogers had lit himself personally. “Goodbye, pervert! Maybe next time, you won’t be such a fibster with money and naughty places! Spinner of yarns!”
Well, at least I made someone smile today. I found a place I hated more than going to work. This Stupid ‘who knows what this place is’ world.
The cell wasn’t too bad. I had been the guest of some pretty shitty low life cells in my day. Those cells were also full of the types of people it would be best to avoid. No guys with 666 tattooed on their foreheads here. Nope, just me and a bench that could be a bed. The floor would probably be more comfortable, considering the wood was roughed up and splintery. Looking around, I noticed some other cells. Many of the occupants looked like they had been there for a while. One man across the way looked worn and deflated. I looked pretty bad when I was looking in the mirror. This dude looked worse than me. I didn’t blame the man. The poor fellow was in a cell, after all.
The circumstances weren’t great, but at least now I had some time to think. There was a lot on my mind with all the situations that had just occurred. Did I do some hard drugs today and forget? Was this what happened to me when I vanished all those years ago. With horror, I realized something, I was sweating, not feeling good, and I didn’t have my kit. This situation was going to suck balls.
From down the corridor, sounds of rattling and metal scrape noises were echoing. The sound of footsteps stepped and squeaked in a steady order. A few people were walking this way. The other residents of this happy little nook moved around in their cells to get a better look. Some had their faces pressed against the bars to get that perfect view. It must be something mighty interesting if these folks were trying to get a look. The footsteps came closer and closer, then the people taking those steps popped into view.
She was beautiful. Well, I'm sure that she looked better in other situations than the one she was in now. She was a bit roughed up. She was shackled with enormous chains. The chains were thicker than my forearm, with chain links that could tow a semi-truck. It was a wonder how she could stand up with all that weight on her. The chains moved along the floor as they ventured further down the way, giving off that metallic sound I had been hearing. She was surrounded by guards, which seemed like an overkill amount to me. As I watched them walk away, I realized that she seemed familiar. She looked like a girl but cosplaying as a demon. How could I know a red-headed demon girl? I chalked it up to those feelings you have sometimes when you feel something that was happening to you at the moment already happened before. Yeah, that had to be it.
As the chain gang party went to turn a corner, the demon girl gave a glance randomly my way. Her eyes widened a bit, and her lips parted. There was a look of recognition on her face as she passed the corner out of my view. The last I saw of her face, it had a tear that was rolling down her cheek. Then she was gone.
I knew what Isekai was a tale of a person going to another world. Summoned as a hero and all that. That was all fantasy crap, though. My situation didn't seem like a dream, and I don’t think I was tripping. Thoughts such as those were something for future me to worry about. I didn't know if I had special powers or where the hell I was. I just knew that I had some issues to contend with, like being in jail in a world full of strange people. I sighed and slumped against the wall. I heard some light laughter across the way from me and redirected my attention towards it instead of my thoughts.
The older man across from me had his face pressed up against the bars of his cell. He had one eye that was staring at me from between the cell bars. With the pressure he was applying, it looked like his eye was bugging out. He was snickering like, well, a crazy old man. Drool dribbled down his lip, dripping onto the floor. I thought about how the old man probably didn't have much fluid left to spare with how dry and dehydrated he looked. But, who was I to get in the way of an older man's entertainment?
“You….” the old man whispered out as he spit. I looked around. Yeah, the older man was talking to me.
“Listen here, old man, I’ve had a rough day as you can see,” I said as I held out my arms, gesturing to the rest of my cell. “I don’t really have the willpower to deal with crazier.” I wondered if that was a bit harsh, but I was sure the old man was used to worse treatment.
“You- you are him,” the old man said as he pressed his face harder against the bars. “The prince of darkness. The final destiny. The destroyer of worlds.” The cell block got eerily silent after the old man spoke those words. I looked and saw more people were up against their bars staring at him and me. The older man cackled, and then he coughed.
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” I replied as I turned my back against the bars and sat down.
“It is you, but you are not you. Older, yes. Either a twin or you are older now, but the spitting image of the God Boy,” the old man said.
“Who?” I asked.
“Rezner,” whispered the old man. “How they keep you here, I do not know. Maybe you wish to be here. Then again, maybe you aren’t the god boy.”
“It isn't him. Just be quiet,” said a younger man next door to the old man’s cell. “You are just going to give the guards a reason to come back.
“His familiar just went past us,” snickered the old man. “She is here, and he is here. What more do we need to have laid before us as facts?”
“Rezner’s familiar would never get caught in a place like this, you know as well as I do, that she could destroy this whole place. Rezner could destroy the whole town. It’s not him,” said the younger man. “Rezner hasn’t been seen for ten years.” Ten years ago, his comment got my attention. It was around ten years ago that I vanished for those couple of years.
I didn’t know what to think of this information. I mean, I was in another world. Anything could be possible. I sat with my back against the bars while I picked at my fingernails. It was an old habit that I did when I was nervous and coming down from my addictions. I would get a whole lot worse soon. That’s when I noticed my hands felt a little funny. There was a tingling in them, kind of like when you fall asleep on your arm trying to get comfortable on a 12-hour bus ride. I shook them a bit like a spaz to get some feeling back into them. The withdrawal was already coming.
I lightly hit my head back against the bars a few times, crying internally about the hell I was going to go through as soon as I went into full withdrawals. Then I was startled by a sharp, piercing scream. I got on my feet and turned towards the bars. The shout came from down the hallway that they led the girl. What the fuck? The others in the cells didn’t seem to notice or care.
“That’s them taking out their aggression on the familiar in there,” said the old man. “They like to get a little rough in there, and I would bet that is only the beginning of the
sounds that will come out of that room.”
I gripped the bars as anger rose in me. I didn’t know that girl, but the familiar did seem familiar to me for whatever reason. I just knew deep down that I couldn’t let this carry-on. I bit my lower lip in frustration as I lightly bumped my forehead against the bars. I looked down at the lock mechanism on the edge of my cell door. If only I had a key. I grabbed the mechanism and gave it a shake, and left my hand grasping it while I thought about a way to get the keys to get out of here.
My hand started to tingle again as I thought about what I should do. Do I distract a guard somehow? How do I even get them to return? Trick them into opening the lock? That’s what would happen in a movie. Then I heard the most beautiful sound.
Click.
I looked down at the lock and thought I briefly saw a blue aura around my hand. I looked up, and the rest of the inmates were looking at me wide-eyed.
“You are him. The God Boy,” the old man whispered. “I saw your hand, and you undid the lock.”
I didn’t know anything about this god boy stuff or how my cell unlocked, but hey, it did. I lightly pushed the cell door, and it opened. Then I stepped out and slowly shut it behind me. “Alright, peeps, anything you can tell me about down that way?” I asked as I pointed towards where the horrible sounds were originating from.
“Many times, they only have one or two people in that room. It’s not a very large room. But they may be crowding it because of who they have captured,” said the old man. “It is where they take you when they either want information… Or they just want to dig into you a little.”
I thought about the situation. I wasn’t one to take on a bunch of people. Heck, I couldn’t really hold my own in a fair fight. So, what could I do here? This wasn’t a game. Bad shit could happen, but I also couldn’t just ignore what was happening. Was I a hero? Nah. Only someone wanting to do the right thing, hopefully. Whatever she did wrong, I did not think anyone deserved to be treated like this.
