PRE-LOG – The Brave 1 (2)

That same night, I found myself in a playground. A man stood in a distance, in the dark, besides a huge machine.

"Who is that?" I hear a voice, of The-Brave-1, who is standing a few feet from me.

"When did we get here?" I ask.

The-Brave-1 gets shook by my voice and looks at me, as if he didn't realise I was there.

"But the real question is…" a third voice says, the voice of the man I had spotted before. "Who are you both?"

"Do you know where this is? I don't remember being here," I say.

"Hmm, a bit too conscious. Probably my fault after all," man says. "This place is… imaginary."

"But I recognise this place," The-Brave-1 says, and I realise it too. "This is the school playground. The playground of my old school."

"Also the place where the snow started," I say, realising.

I did see this machine, spotted it from the mall, besides the playground. When the snow started, I had called my sister, and raced away from the place, as she suggested. She also told me that network outage would possibly occur.

"You people witnessed the start of it. Well, you may not know, but, I'm the one who caused it," man says. "Also, this place is from your minds, it is merely a dream, and not."

"What? Who are you?" I ask.

"It is useless information for you. You can't do nothing about it," man says. "Besides, I'd have been pissed but… I already let a lot of anger today. So just tell me who you are, and why you did that?"

"Did what?" The-Brave-1 asks, but I had, and he too must've guessed that it was about the cell tower incident.

"Luring the people out. It caused disturbances… and deaths," man says with spite.

"Why did you enslave those people to start with? They were just common people!" I say.

"Yes. That is why I put them in that state. They won't bother me, and will only scare away others who didn't fall asleep… it is a win-win," man says. "Besides, I guarantee you worry-worts, none of them died."

"I think you mean warts," I say.

"It just is my accent. Or maybe your ears," man sighs.

"I'm working on it, sorry," I say.

"Okay. Dream. Zombies. Monster. Guy talking to us in dream. What the fuck, you just… this is only a dream. I barely get dreams," The-Brave-1 blurts.

"Why did you do the luring? To what end?" man asks.

"Why does it matter though? I'm going to quote you: you can't do anything about it," I say.

"I just want to know… did you lose someone?" man asks. "You better let me know. I'm not so cruel as to make someone go through that."

"I lost my brother…" The-Brave-1 says. "Did you see a kid…?"

"I saw a lot of kids…" man scoffs. "Does yours have or hang around OMEEBS?"

"OMEEBS?"

"Powered-individuals I mean. Is he, or does he know people who have powers?"

"Not someone with powers… don't know about the knowing powered, part."

"Well, perhaps he is one of them," man says.

We turn behind, and we see all the zombies we had seen before.

"Take your time to look through. I don't care if even there is one other person you know is here. You can only save one of these males, who seem to be young."

Indeed, all present there were younger males. Younger males just staring at us. In a still-state actually, so not staring anywhere either. But it sure gives me the creeps.

The-Brave-1 hesitates, but moves ahead to look through them.

"And what was your purpose?" man asks.

I turn behind and look at him. This guy whom I still couldn't see properly.

"I just wanted to help him," I say.

"You sure about that?"

I feel an ache in my head, as I try to look his way.

Tears dwell in my eyes as I see a girl covered in blood and scars sit in on the ground's floor. As hard as it feels to look at her, I keep staring at her. But as she suddenly looks my way, as if she already was, I fumble backwards.

I turn behind and run, run until I find a few guys in front of me. As they just stare at this crazy person, running towards them, I lift my body and my fist up, and punch downwards, dunking down a person's head, as if it were a basketball.

The thirst in my hand doesn't end, I punch and fight everyone in my sight, and even I eventually get hit, I don't stop, and beat them as much as I can, until I get unconscious.

A voice finally wakes me up. A caring voice. Yet, a voice which was weak.

This voice gets me out of the jail I was out into, for having not finished beating up those guys. I too, was weak.

"I too am weak," I say to the girl. "I'm sorry."

I gasp out of this, and find the man in the playground again.

"After that, I would say that you came to find strength," man says. "Perhaps some fantasy of some explosion or such, gifting you powers."

I stay silent, and don't get a reply, but a feeling of sorry from him. Which again, I stay silent to.

"Mister… he is not here," The-Brave-1 says, coming towards here.

"Hmm, the others from here are alongside powered-individuals, trying to escape," man says. "And some… either way, you may surely find him with powered-individuals."

I look at The-Brave-1 and he is looking at me too.

"Unless he comes with a bunch, foolishly trying to kill me… you can find him," man says. "I'll try not to kill from now onwards."

"Did you kill someone?" I ask.

"Just don't come back again. This is my kingdom now."