A/N: OK, so this is a continuation of a story written by Ultra-Geek (used with permission). The first three chapters are hers, and after that it's mine. I read them and loved it, and had a feeling it wouldn't be updated for a while, so I PMed her and "got the rights." So here's Gone, 2.0.
Prologue
It was an age old cliché. The hero would start out the day realizing that there was no food left in the refrigerator, or that his alarm clock didn't go off. Perhaps even both. He'd race off to work, and have the day from hell with the boss from hell. Menial tasks would be performed that really weren't necessary at all.
The work day would be tied off with our hero being fired. Now how were the bills going to get paid, how are medications going to be bought? So, to ease on his troubles, he goes and does something that relaxes him. That something just happens to be walking aimlessly around the city filming clips of pigeons and other worthless things.
This particular hero ends up walking past a Temple that small children are walking out of, running to their parents to go home. An elderly woman walks up to him with a suspicious look in her eyes. She wishes to know why he's filming the children. Explaining, he tells her of his childhood at a temple and that he's a filmmaker. She relaxes, and invites him inside. He declines; he should've been back at the loft hours ago. She tells him that he's welcome anytime before walking to her car.
As he walks, he wonders how ends will meet. He could take up a few new jobs, and as he is immersed in his thoughts, he doesn't hear or see the four men walking behind him. He then thinks the dooming thought.
Well, at least things can't get any worse.
If it was a movie, the skies would've opened up and poured down on him. If it was a cartoon and he was Daffy Duck, an anvil would fall from no where and crush him. But it's not a movie, and he's not a duck. He's just another starving artist who thought the damning thought.
As soon as he thought it, one of the men brought a piece of wood to his head, and the last thing he hears before he fades into oblivion is an angry voice cursing him and his kind.
As bad as his day was, Mark Cohen's day just got worse.