Eddie was a fairly ordinary Earthman, who led an altogether unremarkable life on the largely unknown planet Earth. He was an out of shape twenty-nine year old man, who stood about five feet and ten inches tall and weighed about one hundred and seventy-seven pounds. As mentioned previously, his life had been fairly unexceptional. He grew up in a small city, attended university, graduated, and moved to a large metropolitan area, where he hoped that by some miracle someday he'd make a name for himself. I won't keep you in suspense; he never accomplished that goal, unless you count the time he tried getting his friends to call him "Captain Mick" because of his propensity for ingesting shots of spiced rum of the same name. Much to Eddie's dismay, the nickname never stuck. Instead they took to calling him Captain Moron because they felt it suited him better.
After graduation Eddie had gotten a job working for Singular Laboratories, a company that stood on the cutting-edge of clinical research. He was thrilled at the possibilities the company seemed to offer. He imagined an exciting career as a research specialist, furthering the knowledge and well-being of mankind while making enough money to live more than comfortably. As an added bonus he could really stick it to all those bastards who'd always told him that he'd never amount to anything.
The reality of the situation fell far short of this idealized picture he'd painted in his head. In actuality he was working as a paper-pusher in a department that was tucked away deep within the bowels of the large facility and was not allowed near the areas where any of the actual research took place. To make matters worse, he had to work with a pushy condescending bitch who was 75 pounds overweight and $25 grand overpaid. She despised her life so much that she needed to channel all that hatred into belittling and humiliating Eddie, who believed that she had single-handedly put the "cow" in coworker. Ironically the harlot's name was Serena. Apparently her hippy parents thought that by giving her a name that implies calm and peace, she would grow up to be a calm and peaceful woman. They were dead wrong.
Serena was a proud alum of Bitch University, where she double-majored in Bitchology, and Sadism with a minor in Beratement. She graduated at the top of her class with honors. Hanging above her desk was her diploma, and next to it a photo of a 2 year old child, which one can only hope was the child of some distant relative, and not her own. If the child was actually hers, one could only hope that it was now dead, for its own benefit as well as the benefit of mankind as a whole, which would be far better off without those bitchy chromosomes continuing to pollute the gene pool in future generations.
Serena had a commute of one hour each way, which meant that in the morning she got to spend an hour in her car thinking of new ways to make Eddie's life a living hell, and an hour every afternoon being satisfied with what a great job she'd done at being such a heinous bitch. Not to mention the 8 hours she spent at work, where if she'd channeled all her potential into her job instead of spending most of her energy on being a miserable cunt, she would have exerted enough productivity to run the entire company single-handedly and still have time for coffee breaks.
Eddie's morning commute was 15 minutes, which was barely long enough to include a crying fit and enough time to then dry his tears and regain his composure before working his ass off for 8 hours for which he would be compensated with barely adequate wages that allowed him to live hand-to-mouth in an apartment that was barely up to code. His afternoon commute was between 45 minutes and an hour in bumper to bumper traffic that dragged like the tail of a slug on valium. It seemed that the cruel hand of fate was determined to further his suffering by keeping him away from the safety of his home and his sanity for as long as possible every afternoon. Fortunately he had a large collection of music to listen to in the car to take the edge off his boredom. Unfortunately the car radio stopped working a week into his job. He was currently saving up for a new stereo and would be able to afford it in about eighteen and a half months, but only if he subsisted on a diet of nothing but ramen noodles and if Singular Labs gave him that pay raise they promised he'd get next spring. To be frank, the plan was not that much of an inconvenience to Eddie anyway, considering that ramen noodles was the only entree he knew how to prepare.
Chow Kyun, his boss seemed blissfully unaware of all the harassment that took place under her watch. Instead of trying to heighten morale and efficiency in her department she was content to sit at her desk all day, chatting on the phone with her family and friends in a high-pitched infantile voice that was notoriously despised by those forced to work within earshot of her, but most cats and seven month old babies found very appealing and relatable. She somehow reasoned that everyone in the office would find it adorable when she spoke in the child-like pitch that made Eddie want to gouge out his eardrums with a rusty nail. That voice was enough to single-handedly eradicate professionalism from the whole of Singular Laboratories forever. Eddie found nothing more annoying than having to answer to someone in a position of authority who spoke in such a juvenile manner. And to make matters worse, when she really wanted to drive home what she thought was an important point, she would childishly stomp one foot on the floor at the end of a sentence, as if placing an invisible punctuation mark on the floor. Eddie couldn't help but marvel at the fact that Chow Kyun was happily married, forcing him to wonder what strange sociopathic pedophile of a man would marry someone who behaved more like a two year old than a full-grown adult woman. He was also forced to call into question the sanity of the human resources coordinator who decided that it would be a good idea to hire her. Considering the tough economic times the country was facing he found it difficult to believe that there was not a single applicant more qualified for the position than the train wreck of a woman he was now forced to answer to.
What irritated Eddie most about his job was the knowledge that he had so much more talent than all these idiots that he was forced to work with at the bottom of the totem pole. But he was not allowed to actualize the potential that so fervently pumped through his veins, and so every night he had to fill his circulatory system instead with alcohol in order to numb the pain.
One thing Eddie always yearned for in life, aside from occupational success, which now seemed like a pipe dream, was falling hopelessly in love with the woman of his dreams and spending the rest of his life with her. Sadly, the closest he had ever come to a romantic encounter was one time on the city bus when he discovered a gorgeous woman staring at him. At first he thought he was hallucinating, but then realized that she actually was staring at him, and even smiling, perhaps a little flirtatiously he decided.
Finally, after several minutes of awkwardly catching her eye, then looking away shyly, and then making eye contact again, he mustered the courage to go over and talk to her, which was in and of itself an amazing feat considering how much of a coward he was. But this just felt like fate and he knew he couldn't let it pass him by or he might regret it for the rest of his life. In the end, after an embarrassing exchange it became apparent that she had a lazy eye, which mistakenly found its way over towards his general direction, and the smile she had on her lips was actually intended for the man seated across from her, upon whom her good eye was focused. Upon realizing all this, embarrassment flooded over him and his face immediately turned a color about 6 shades darker than crimson. Feeling an immediate and suffocating need to remove himself from this mortification he disembarked at the next stop and was forced to walk the remaining two and a half miles back to his apartment in 94 degree heat while carrying four bags of groceries. Fortunately the bags were relatively light considering they contained mostly packets of ramen noodles.
Eddie spent much of his spare time in the evenings watching television, getting pissed off because his cable service got cut off, ineffectually smacking the side of the television unit, spending a half hour digging through his pile of unpaid bills to find the appropriate customer service number, calling up the cable service, waiting on the line for a quarter of an hour for an available customer service representative, getting frustrated and slamming the phone down, and finally going down to the bar for a drink and a game of pool, which he always lost at because he couldn't seem to get the balls to go where he wanted them to (i.e. into the pockets).
Eddie's favorite bar was Blake's Tavern, a small, dingy dive bar, where the drinks were inexpensive, low-quality, and high in alcohol content, much like the women who patronized the establishment. Eddie enjoyed Blake's Tavern for one reason only: a portion of the neon sign out front was burnt out and had been for as long as he could remember, and at night it read "Bla Tavern", which was a more fitting name for it anyway. Eddie loved to call up Billy, his drinking buddy, and shout into the phone "Hey buddy, let's go to 'Bla Tavern'!" followed by a chuckle of self-satisfaction.
Billy would groan and remark that the joke wasn't funny and hadn't been since Eddie had started saying it a year and a half ago.
Eddie would apologize reluctantly, unable to understand why no one else could find humor in what he thought were clever observations and plays on words. For the next four to five hours he would drink himself into a stupor at Blake's Tavern, numbing all the pain he had accumulated throughout the day and then stumble home, making several stops along the way to empty the contents of his stomach and bladder into the hedges and driveways of local homes.
This pattern defined most of Eddie's dull and wasted life until one evening. After a long an almost unbearable workday followed by an excruciating commute, he made his usual call to Billy, inviting him out for an evening of inebriation and the inevitable humiliation that accompanied it. On this occasion, however, Billy relayed some startling news. "Dude, Blake's Tavern's closed" he reported grimly.
"What? This can't be happening." Eddie felt his life crumbling before his very eyes, much like an old and poorly constructed, termite infested structure that wouldn't be missed by anyone.
"I'm afraid so, buddy" Billy's voice was heavy with defeat.
"So what do we do now?" he tried not to sound panicked, though that was how he immediately felt.
"Don't worry. I got another place. This guy I know from work goes to this place called the Brick House. It's only a few blocks north of Heckfield Park."
"Thank God." Eddie sighed, relieved to know there was another place he could go to kill the brain cells that were responsible for the self-hatred he felt.
"I'll meet you there in a half hour" commanded Billy and hung up the phone.
So many questions flooded Eddie's mind at that moment: Would the drinks be as cheap? Is there a pool table there? Are there gonna be a lot of people there, because I hate large crowds. Oh God, and I bet there's gonna be hip-hop music playing. I hate that stuff. It's just a bunch of noise. I know it's not gonna be anything like Bla Tavern… Bla Tavern... he he he.
Eddie downed a few shots of rum for the road and hurried out the door, determined to get to the bar as quickly as possible, which meant cutting through Heckfield Park, which didn't bother him, even though it was dark outside and the park was notorious for the number of muggings that took place there. He reasoned that it didn't really matter if he got mugged because he didn't have anything valuable for anyone to take, with the possible exception of his life, which hadn't been appraised lately, though it couldn't have been worth much these days either.
As luck would have it, most of the lampposts in the park were burnt out, probably because tax dollars were being wasted on expensive prisons to house criminals instead of paying for public lighting, which would protect people from being ambushed from said criminals in the first place.
One particularly nasty and selfish lawmaker, who held large amounts of stock in the prison industry once made an off-the-record comment explaining his highly enlightened viewpoint on the situation: "Any idiot who walks alone at night without a gun deserves to be robbed and killed." Ironically, he was mugged and beaten within an inch of his life a week after making that remark. Following the beating, he lie unconscious for three hours, during which he went unnoticed by over two dozen passersby due to inadequate public lighting. Eventually he regained consciousness and managed to crawl a quarter mile to a well-lit area in the park, where he was finally discovered by another would-be mugger, who in a moment of generosity phoned an ambulance. The paramedics did what they could, but given the fact that he hadn't been rescued sooner, could not save the use of his legs, and so he had to spend the remainder of his life in a wheelchair. Fortunately the remainder of his life was cut short when he was robbed and killed several months later.
Eddie just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time (or right place, depending on how you look at it. I'll let you decide for yourself). He'd spent the last ten minutes strolling through the park, when suddenly he heard a sound behind a nearby hedge. Stupidly, he decided it would be a good idea to find out what was making that strange struggling and gasping sound, and who it was that was whispering "Shut the fuck up or I swear to God I'll slit your fucking throat."
To Eddie's surprise he discovered a man in a suit being held down at knifepoint by another man dressed all in black. He couldn't be sure, but he thought he noticed an intricately stitched crest on the sleeve of the victim's suit, but the poor lighting made it difficult to get a good view of it. Also, he could have sworn the man's suit was purple, but again, the poor lighting.
Suddenly he remembered a story he'd overheard at work during a rare moment when Serena was not screaming at him. The story was about some rich old bureaucrat who had been mugged twice and killed. He didn't know why, but for some reason the story made him realize that what he was now witnessing might very well be another mugging. Not wanting to have anything to do with it, he very quickly made his way into the nearby woods, which he assumed would be safer than standing out in plain view of any muggers who might be hiding in the woods waiting for passers-by to ambush.
He was wrong. The woods were not safer.
He continued on until he came to a small clearing. As he approached, a column of orange light roughly the size of a coffin, but cylindrical in shape appeared mysteriously before him.
I wonder what the hell that is he mused, and without a moment's hesitation stepped into it.