9

Everyone was trying to escape.

In just a matter of minutes, everything went dark. The whole sky was covered by smoke. Everything smelled of burning. All of the commotion and screams were drowned out by the ringing sound of gunshots. Someone was screaming, and then it stopped. Viktor couldn't hear anything at all. He just looked around for his family, and luckily, he didn't have to look far to find them. They both ran into each other's arms.

"Mom..dad..." He whispered softly, tears falling from his eyes. "Where are Grandpa, Papa, and Yuri?"

Chapter 2

Yuri woke up feeling tired. He was lying across a soft carpeted floor in an unfamiliar room. As soon as he opened his eyes, he noticed that his entire body hurt. His entire body ached, and the room was awfully cold. As he slowly rose into a sitting position, he looked around the room for someone, but there was no one in sight.

"Hello, is anyone here?" Yuri called out as he sat up straight against the wall.

A few seconds passed before he realized that he hadn't been speaking to an invisible stranger. He slowly stood up from the floor and looked around again. Nothing.

"Okay then..." Yuri muttered to himself as he began walking around. "Looks like I'm in an abandoned building...or a hospital, maybe?"

Suddenly, he suddenly remembered what had happened before he passed out. The fight between the two men, and their fall.

"Wait a minute..." Yuri said to himself. "If they wanted to kill us, surely they would've done it already? Why wait till now to attack us? And then, where is everyone else? Has something happened to them?!"

There must be some kind of explanation to all of these things. But Yuri knew that there were probably many things that he didn't understand.

The man in red appeared in front of Yuri again, causing him to jump backwards in fright.

"Who are you?" Yuri yelled at him angrily, as he pointed at him accusingly. "How'd you get in here?!"

That's when he noticed the other man. He had black hair, and he didn't wear glasses, unlike most other people Yuri had seen.

He looked calm, but then he looked into Yuri's eyes, and suddenly, he became terrified. It felt as if a giant hand was crushing his chest. The pressure increased until it felt like his lungs were about to burst. And then, everything went blank again.

Yuri woke up with a start. He glanced at the clock to see that it was 3:30AM. He got out of bed and looked around the unfamiliar room. He couldn't remember how he had gotten here last night. He had fallen asleep in a chair with his laptop still open in front of him. Had he stayed awake all night? That couldn't be right...he had never slept that late before. Usually, he would've been asleep by now.

Then he remembered. Viktor told him earlier today that he needed to visit the doctor. At first, he was reluctant because he wasn't sure whether Viktor's injury was serious enough for him to go somewhere. But after listening to Viktor patiently, Yuri finally agreed. So, once Viktor was finished, Yuri headed to the doctor'.