You know you shouldn't be in Griddy's Doughnuts in the first place. You saw all of the probable futures involving you being in here, and nearly all of them ended in disaster with quite a few ending in your death.
Perhaps it was boredom? You had lived a safe life ever since childhood; you saw each and every ending to your actions, and with just a little willpower you could bend time to your will and give yourself a favorable outcome. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing; you could see brief glimpses of test answers and the slightest glimmer of things that could be, but even more than that, you saw so many people die it became hard to bear. How many other timelines existed where those people did die, and you did nothing to stop it? You dig your fingers in the sides of your head, hoping the latent pain might stop your mind from wandering down dark paths.
The woman tending the shop comes out from the back and walks to where you sat at the bar. She regards you with a sad smile just barely hiding pity. You hate that look.
"Another tea?" she offers softly, noting the sad remnants of your tea at the bottom of a small porcelain cup.
You think for a second. You don't need another one; in fact, if this tea were to be your last, you could walk straight out of this shop and forget all the probabilities you saw in which you died. You could avoid all the trouble this shop might bring you.
In a split-second moment of weakness, you nod. "Yeah," you breathe. "That'd be nice."
She takes the porcelain cup from you and disappears back into the darkness of the shop. In the meantime, you continue your calculations with a borrowed pen on a fragile napkin. There is a 33% chance this Griddy's Doughnuts experience would end in your death, and considering much of your previous chances, that is pretty good. Maybe it isn't so bad to have just another tea…?
You glance over to the door just before it chimes a happy tune to signify another customer, this one a boy your age, 22, with dark hair, wild eyes, and a strong jawline. You curse softly under your breath and turn back to scribbling on your napkin even as this stranger sits in the seat next to you. Your chances of death just skyrocketed to 66%, give or take.
You're inclined to leave immediately, but just as you begin packing away your napkin and taking up your math homework to keep you distracted, Agnes comes back out with a steaming cup of tea in her hand. You glance in her eyes and can't bear to leave with that smile engraved in your mind. Reluctantly, you settle back into your seat and give her a small, muffled thanks.
Gingerly, you sip at your tea and avoid the stormy gaze of the boy next to you. He is dressed up in a spiffy over-vest and smart clothes, looking as if he was to be teaching a lecture in the next thirty minutes, but you know he can't be over 25, he seems college-aged. You're tempted to glance over and study him to make sure you don't know him from anywhere, but his eyes are churning so fiercely you are afraid to meet them. He asks for a black coffee; how very mature, you note.
You glance back to your scrambled equations on the napkin and make a few adjustments based on the new possible futures. As you begin finishing up, the boy beside you takes notice.
"What are those for?" he asks, voice hard and cold but eyes curious. You stiffen reflexively.
"Um," you mumble, struggling to come up with an excuse. "Nothing, really, just trying to keep myself distracted, I guess."
"Hm," he hums, dissatisfied. He turns back to take his coffee from Agnes, and you revel in the fact that you might be off the hook for now.
You wisely tuck away your calculations. You saw this boy in your visions, and all roads that stemmed from meeting him tonight ended in disaster, either for you or for a lot of people. You'd need to be careful about this.
You don't realize him staring at the side of your face until he is talking to you. "How long have you lived here?"
You glance sidelong to him, still unable to make full eye contact. "...Why?"
He looks exasperated. "I just need to know the address of this one place, a prosthetic manufacturer," he begins, and on seeing your vacant stare, continues. "MeriTech?"
You peer closely at him now, noting how his eyelashes frame his eyes perfectly and how his hair is so easily combed over. You snap out of the reverie for a moment to shake your head for a moment. "Sorry, I don't keep a database of addresses in my head," you apologize, but quickly pull your old, beaten up phone from your back pocket. "But I can help you find it."
You begin searching up MeriTech in the GoogleMaps app on your phone, but halfway through typing it out your head starts pounding with the beginnings of a migraine. Squeezing your eyes shut, your senses are bombarded by a flurry of immediate futures; in particular, you see a bullet flying through the brain of this strange young man seated beside you. You frown deeply and pry your eyes open, searching your surroundings even as your vision swims. WHere would the gunman be coming from?
"What's wrong?" He asks you. You shake your head, then hone in on the small red dot situated on the back of this boy's head. Panic flutters through your stomach.
"Hey," you choke, bringing your hands up to his arms in a flurry of fear. "You can't sit there."
He gives you a strange look, and you press further, squeezing your palms across his forearms in hopes it might convey this life-or-death situation. "Please, don't sit there anymore," you plead.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?"
He is unconvinced, and yet you convincing him meant life or death for this stranger. Contrary to everything your mother taught you, you need this strange boy alive, you couldn't see his brains splat against the bar when you are so close to saving him. The vision presses closer against your forehead, and you realize you are running out of time. Thinking quickly, you use all the strength you can to throw the boy out of his chair and onto the floor just as an ear-piercing shot rings out through the empty, flickering shop. The bullet goes where the stranger was a moment earlier and careens into the donuts behind the counter, glass shattering and shrapnel flying past you. You shield yourself with your arms, then stumble from your seat, adrenaline numbing the cut of glass into your forearms.
The once cheery bell chime sounds sinister as men and women in black clothing and frightening masks surge through the front door of Griddy's Doughnuts. Your vision is swimming again, but between the flickering half-light of the dim diner and the hurt of a migraine, you see their arms cradling guns and rifles, and a few of them are pointing their weapons at the boy you were trying to help.
Confusion flutters inside of you as you cower into a small, dark corner of the diner. Is this a robbery? If so, why did they let you slip into the darkness? You feel around for your phone, but hiss out a curse once you realize you dropped your cellphone with saving your strange companion. It lies dejected on the nigh demolished bar counter.
The strange masked figures exchange a few words with the uniformed boy from before until, without warning, shots begin to ring throughout the small diner. You cower further into the darkness, hands clutched over your ears and eyes squeezed shut, afraid that opening might reveal some terrifying truth to you.
But, as the gunshots continue for an extended period, your eyes begin to slip open and you see a scene of carnage. The boy from before is zipping around the diner in a way you deem impossible, using improvised weapons from around the bar to make quick work of the mysterious fiends. For a few seconds you see him disappear, then reappear with a stab of a butter knife into the neck of the last assailant. A gust of air brushes across your face as the gunshots fade and all that is left is the heavy puffing of the uniformed boy. He stands, surrounded by destruction with nary a hair out of place. You find it oddly ironic.
He scans the diner for a second and his eyes catch on you. His brows furrow as if he is wrestling with something internally, but he finally relents and gives the slightest of nods to you. "Thanks," he murmurs, then moves to leave out the front door.
"Wait!" You call after him, but as he turns to address you, your mind goes blank, and you forgot why you called out in the first place. After a moment of scrambled thinking, you pulled shaky words from your throat. "Who are you?"
He paused again, another wrestling match in his mind, then gave a tense, tiny smile. "Call me Five," he murmured, then turned once more and stalked beyond the door of Griddy's Doughnuts.
As soon as he was gone, you glanced over at the bar to see Agnes peering over the table, carefully avoiding glass fragments and gunpowder. Outside of the small diner, the night flashed blue and red as sirens arrived. Looks like you wouldn't be out of here for a few more hours.
You were questioned up into the early hours of the morning by detective after detective, all asking to get your perspective of the situation and tell your side of the story again after again. When you saw the sun begin to dip over the trees on the horizon you decided it was about time to get home; you have college classes after all, and your mother must be worried sick about you.
You dismiss yourself from the swarming officers and bluebloods with a sudden wave of your hand, hefting your backpack over your shoulder with a soft huff. Just as you begin to exit Griddy's Doughnuts, you remember that you left your phone on the table back in the fight. With an apologetic smile, you sidestep bagged evidence and pungent bodies covered with canvas to reach the cluttered bar. You search for the familiar phone case with narrowed eyes, but you only find shattered glass and your untouched porcelain teacup framed by cold coffee and old oolong. You wish to tear through the bar to find it, as you can't exactly afford a replacement, but you see the sharp edges of the glass glitter in the waxing sunlight and quickly decide against it. You would need to explain this to your mother later.
You turn away from the bar and pass again through the throng of uniformed officers with a few soft shoves and murmured 'sorries.' You give each of the officers an apologetic smile again, knowing they must be just as exhausted as you are.
The soft morning breeze brushes across your cheeks as you step into the sunlight, bringing with it the aroma of early morning dew and gasoline. It is refreshing to finally be out of that stuffy doughnut diner, especially after witnessing such an intense scene. You smile quaintly to yourself and bundle your arms closer, beginning to cleave through the chill of dawn. Your boots start a familiar path through desolate neighborhoods to your downtrodden, sagging timber-framed house. You don't get very far from Griddy's Doughnuts when your head begins to pound with the beginnings of a premonition.
You pause your walking and clutch your backpack tighter against your shoulder, cringing as you try to make sense of the brief future vision. Lights of what is to come flash before your eyes, motion blurs and dialogue blending together into an imperceivable soup of precognition. Then, slashing through the murky waters comes a clear vision of two masked criminals coming up behind you and taking you to the ground with deadly efficiency. Your heart skips a beat.
You glance back and behind you. You meet a gloved fist as it slams into your right cheek and sends you careening towards the pavement. In the shadows of the surrounding buildings, you glance up towards your assailant's faces but you are met only by the cold, unforgiving stare of masks obviously meant for children. You feel a weight settle on your back.
"Sayonara, sweetheart," says one of your two attackers, a female voice. You open your mouth to respond, but before you can, a jolting blow comes to the back of your head, and the sidewalk is drenched in a thick, inky black. Your head fogs and you lose consciousness.
