Ten Days

Day One

Everything was just as always. Waking up, a quick shower, getting dressed, heading downstairs. "Life is great," I said, while heading to the kitchen. It was a thing my parents and I did. They said I should always start a day with these words, because, if I believed the day to turn out great, it would really turn out great. There was I time when I was younger, when I actually believed this and every time I had a bad day, I thought it was just because I hadn't said it strong enough. Of course, I don't think so anymore, I just say it every day because its a nice way to start off.

In the kitchen, mom was already preparing lunch. "Morning honey. You know its almost 12 AM?" She looked at me with that accusing look of hers that she wore so perfect.

"Mom, please, it's Saturday. I get up early the whole week," I protested. It was really unfair that she wanted me to get up early on the weekends, because had to get up at 5 AM during school time, because I have to catch an early bus. I couldn't wait to get my drivers license next year. That would mean full two hours of additional sleep every day.

Mom just rolled her eyes and focused on dinner again. It was actually surprising that we were related. She had long blonde hair, opposed to my short, black and was pretty tall, while I was the shortest among my friends. Like, by far. Still, I loved my mom. I really did. Of course, she was protective and sometimes doted on me and other stuff that other peoples moms also did that you almost never see but dislike if they do it to you, but she was also funny and forgiving of almost every mistake I made.

Though the kitchen window, I could see that Dad was working in the garden. Mom had been telling him for weeks now that someone needed to dig the whole thing over. He didn't do it so far, yesterday she told him that she would be hiring someone to do it. And, well, he was digging the whole thing over.

That was the only thing you could say to convince Dad of something. Before he paid money for something, he did it himself. Like 'Dad, can I get a bike to ride to the bus station?' 'No, walking is cheaper and I think it's more healthy too.' or 'Dad, I wanna go out with my friends, can I have some money?' 'Not from me. If you cannot afford your booze by yourself, I cannot help you.' That was pretty annoying, truth be told. I mean, I was an only child. What I heard from my classmates, only children would usually get all the love and whatnot of their parents. And I wasn't even getting a bike.

However, unlike Mom, everybody saw that I was my fathers son. We had the same black hair, the same brown eyes, the same slender build... It was almost scary. Still, he was far taller than I was. At least, that made me hope that I would still grow a little.

To pass some time until Mom had lunch ready, I went outside, to chat with Dad a little. "Morning Dad," I said to him, "How's things?"

"Dirty, don't you see?" He replied with a chuckle, showing me his dirty palms, "You should be thankful that Mom did not allow me to wake you up 4 hours ago. You could have easily done this."

"We could have easily hired someone to do this," I said, just to annoy him. I knew what his retort would be, before he even said it.

"Yes and our money grows on trees," well, there was it. His standard response when somebody asked him to spend something.

"Any plans for tonight?" Dad asked, "Going somewhere?"

"Yes, I'm going to an Action Duel with Mischa and Kyle, why asking?" I answered.

"Just because," Dad simply said, focusing on the gardening again.

Just that moment, Mom shouted out of the kitchen window: "Lunch is ready! Get in here boys!"

When I turned around, I could already smell the pancakes she made. Moms pancakes... Just thinking about it made me drool. She made the best pancakes in the world, she did even win a price with them once, I just don't remember which one.

"WAKE UP!"

I stopped dead on my way. A female voice. "Mom, did you say something?" I shouted towards the kitchen, but she just leaned out of the window, asking: "What do you mean honey?"

"I heard a female voice yelling...," I started, but mom interrupted me by repeating: "What do you mean honey? What do you mean honey? What do you mean honey? What do you mean honey?"

I took a few steps back, because that was really scary. "Is... everything alright?" I asked tentatively, but mom just kept on going: "What do you mean honey? What do you mean honey? What do you mean Honey? Mean Honey? Mean Honey? Honey? Honey? Honey? Honeyneyey? Honey?"

"I SAID WAKE UP!"

The voice again. This time I was sure it wasn't my mother, simply because she was still stuck in her strange canon. A few seconds after the second shout, something seemed to hit my face, almost like someone slapping me hard. I was so surprised by it that I ended up face-down in the grass.

"Any plans for tonight?"

I raised my head when I heard Dad say something, seeing that he had returned to gardening. "Dad, what's happening?" I asked desperate, because this shit was really starting to scare me.

However, Dads only response was: "You could have easily done this."

"WAKE UP ALREADY!"

The female voice, the third time. Again, something was slapping me across the face, even harder than last time. I looked around the garden, tears filling my eyes, trying to find a clue on why this was happening. Mom was still standing in the kitchen window, repeating the word 'Honey' even faster than before, while Dad was blurting out nonsense: "Yes, and somewhere, thankful Mom grows on trees."

"WAKE! THE! FUCK! UP! ALREADY!"

Each word one slap and the next thing was that I felt myself coughing up water. Even more confused than in our garden, I tried to open my eyes, but everything I saw was light. Blinding light from multiple lamps overhead.

"He's awake!" The female voice I heard. However, this time it wasn't distant like before, but almost next to me.

When my eyes were finally getting used to the light, I realized that I wasn't in our garden any longer. I was in a small, secluded room with sterile white walls and simple lamps, containing the glass container I was lying in, partly covered in water along with some strange machines, all of which were broken, destroyed by people in gray gear, standing in the room and running around outside.

Hands were reaching out to me, pulling me out, trying to get me on my feet. "No!" I yelled, "Who are you? Where am I? Let me go!" I wriggled and punched everything that came into my reach, but much my hands didn't really do much damage to the armored people around.

"Carry him!" I heard a male shout and another one obeyed, flinging me onto his shoulder like a towel and bursting out of the room, into a bigger one. It was fashioned like the last, sterile and white, with those containers everywhere. As much as I could count, I counted 12. All of them empty.

I punched against the back of the guy carrying me as hard as I could, but I didn't know if he actually noticed. That was because my arms were actually much thinner than I ever remembered.

I also saw people in gray gear, like the one who was carrying me, some of them standing over defeated men in lab coats, with their monsters towering above them, or lying on the floor themselves, with others running past them, without even looking at them.

"FIFTEEN!" I heard someone yell. I was unsure whether this was a code or just meant 15 seconds, but all of the gray people were storming out of the hall in an instant, through a giant hole in the wall, were about a dozen of helicopters were waiting.

My carrier, a giant guy with a shaved head and a scarred face dropped me in one of it, before taking a seat next to me, along with a pale, slender girl with short black hair.

"I'm sure you have lots of questions," the mountain of a men next to me said with a deep, slow voice, "Eventually, you'll regain some of the answers and the rest has to wait until tomorrow."

With these words, the girl on my other side stung a syringe into me and emptied it. From one moment to the other, my sight was blurring and eventually blacked out before I finally drifted off to sleep.

~ END OF DAY ONE ~

"You guess your world was turned upside down at the end of this day, don't you, young one? You have no idea. It is far from over, it has only begun. Lives will be lost, friends will be betrayed. Love will mean nothing. Trust will mean nothing. Truth will not exist anymore. It will take ten days to shatter you into pieces. And it will take the same time to do so to the whole world too. So sleep well, young one. Sleep well."

Yeah, that's a thing now.

I actually wanted to write this thing for a long time now, because of reasons you'll see the next chapters. I won't be going to tell you a lot of stuff, as this is just a prologue (or, well, the first day) but the following: This fic will be composed of 13 chapters total. One for each day, Three for the 10th and I'm saving myself the 13th Chapter either for a small epilogue or if one of the other days becomes so long I have to split it.

Sleep well, until Day Two.