1 The Wounded Man

Hiding in a dark alley with hands and shirt covered in blood, a man was breathing heavily with sweat running down his forehead. His eyes were watching his surroundings carefully while his ears were perked up, ready to pick up even the tiniest sounds.

It was a rainy night, with thunders roaring ragingly, accompanying the heavy downpour. The sounds of police sirens were blaring in the background, seemingly coming from every direction.

Roar!!

After a flash of lightning, a loud thunder came in a clamor. Its deafening boom didn't seem to have affected the bloodied man, however, since his focus was somewhere else.

"Shit! How did it come to this..." he said weakly.

Sheltered by the roof platform above his head, the man was safe from the rain. The blood on his hands had partially been washed off by the rain, but a lot still remained. Right now, he didn't have time to clean himself as his pursuers were closing in.

"I can't get caught here! They'll definitely declare me as the suspect," he said, his eyes lit up with determination.

The man continued running down the dark alley, not caring about the rain coming from above. Blood trails were left behind in his wake, but he didn't have the leisure to worry about them. Besides, the heavy rain should wash them away soon anyway. Right now, he needed to get as far away as possible.

"Garret Russo! We have had you cornered! Stop running and turn yourself in!" came a shout from not far behind him.

The man kept on running without heeding the warning. He couldn't afford to be caught right now, so he had to get away no matter the cost.

"Like hell I will do as you say. You pigs just want to get a suspect and close the case as soon as you can, regardless of the truth," he muttered under his breath. There was a hint of anger in his tone.

The alley was dark, but the frequent lightning lit up his way, enabling him to see even for only a split second. Relying on his exceptional memory, he remembered all the obstacles in his way and managed to avoid them, even only barely. His physical abilities didn't seem to be as extraordinary as his mental capacities, after all.

Bang!

A shot was fired from a dark corner of the alley. The bullet, piercing through the air, hit the man in his ankle!

"Argh!!" a pained groan came out of his mouth, but he didn't stop running.

His right leg felt like a burning hot knife had been stabbed into it. Stinging pain coursed through his body, blurring his focus. Red blood came flowing out of the wound, and the rain made sure that the blood could keep flowing without obstructions.

"Pant... Pant... I can't get caught now... I need to find the truth..." he mumbled in pain.

"Garret Russo! Stop running and come with us!" an intimidating shout came from far behind him. It might even belong to the shooter. Beams of light could be seen from afar, but it was too distant to reach the man.

The man didn't know if the person had aimed for his ankle on purpose or had missed, but the fact that the person could shoot in the dark from that distance filled his heart with fear. He had to get out of the person's line of sight quickly!

Roar!!

Lightning and thunder came again. The man memorized the path in front of him within the split-second window presented to him. It was a matter of life and death, so he couldn't miss the opportunity.

"Argh!"

He struggled to push a wooden box out of his way and continued running while bearing with the pain. His balance was all over the place because of his right leg while his consciousness was slowly fading because of the pain. It was apparently the first time he had been wounded that badly in his life, and he was not used to it.

"Delilah, Mischa, I will not end behind the bar. I will find out what happened to you no matter the cost!" his voice was weakening, but the fire in his brown eyes was still burning as strongly.

With all the strength that he had left, he continued his way in the dark rainy alley. He was aiming for a small opening to his left that the previous lightning had revealed to him. It was his only hope of ever escaping his current situation, so he didn't hesitate to take the chance.

"Hmph..."

The man squeezed through the small gap between the walls with slight difficulty. Fortunately, it was big enough for his slender body to fit in.

In the pitch blackness, he had no other way but to press forward, so he kept on walking sideways down the small gap, not knowing where he would end up. At least, for now, he knew his pursuers shouldn't have seen where he had gone because of the same darkness. Or at least that was what he hoped.

"The rain should take care of the blood from my wound," he said to himself quietly.

He kept inching farther and farther into the gap, feeling the hard concrete walls behind and in front of him getting tighter and tighter with every step he took. The skin of his palm rubbed against the hard surface of the wall while the cold rainwater fell on his curly brown hair.

"Shit! Where did the suspect go?!" came a shout from afar.

"Check over there!" another person gave an instruction.

The sounds of several footsteps against the watery ground could be heard heading towards the opposite direction where the pursuers came from. Judging from the sounds, there were at least five people chasing the man.

"It seems that I'm safe for now..." the man let out a breath of relief. However, it didn't make him stop moving. He kept creeping farther and farther into the gap, with each step taking his strength away.

The stinging pain on his right leg became more and more intense the more time passed. He was losing quite a lot of blood already and his strength was at its limit. Although he was safe from the pursuers, he was not out of danger yet.

"My dear, I refuse to die like this..." he muttered weakly. His voice was hoarse and pained.

In the dark, he kept on going, anchoring himself to reality solely on the fact that his hands were still touching the concrete wall. It was getting more and more difficult for him to stay conscious, but he was hanging on to the thin thread persistently.

Thud!

Suddenly, his left leg hit something hard that felt like thick, round metal. The object was blocking his path, so he mustered his strength to push it away with his left leg.

"Urgh... move...!"

But the object wouldn't budge.

His energy was slipping away, so was his consciousness. He couldn't gather any more strength to do anything to the unknown object and climbing over it was something impossible for him in his current condition.

"*Panting* I'm sorry, dear. I don't want it to end like this..."

His breathing got heavier as even more blood left the wound on his leg. His head grew heavier and heavier while his consciousness started fading despite the stinging pain from his leg torturing him.

Suddenly, he felt that something crawled from the direction of the metal thingy over his left leg. It felt cold and sticky despite his pants being in the way between the thing and his skin. The thing was probably the size of a big worm and was wriggling across his leg towards his right one. A feeling of fear and panic quickly overcame him, but he was too weak to do anything about it.

"Aaaarghhh!!!"

Without a warning, the thing crawled into the wound on his right ankle, drilling itself into it. The cold sensation he had felt before was no more and was replaced by a scorching feeling in his wound. It was many times more painful than when the bullet lodged itself in his flesh, and the pain lasted longer.

Having no strength left, the man could only stumble helplessly on the ground with his ankle still feeling like hot lava was being poured inside it. In the cramped space, he fell sideways as his consciousness left him. There was now only darkness and pain, and then there was nothing.

...

"Did you hear that? That might be the suspect!" a man wearing a blue trench coat spoke.

"But it's coming from behind these buildings! He couldn't have gone that far with his injury!" another man wearing a similar coat replied.

The first man shone a flashlight on the wall carefully as if searching for something.

"There must be an opening that we have missed. Let's look for it! The others, you circle around these buildings to find the back street!"

Three men nodded and quickly ran towards the other direction, leaving the other two behind.

"The rain has washed away his blood. We'll never know how he has escaped this way," the second man said in frustration.

"There must be something around here. He is the prime suspect in the serial murders, and we can't let him get away or the public will lose their trust in the police!" the first man said rather angrily.

"But we are only suspecting him of killing his wife and daughter," the second man interrupted.

"Yeah? And the declaration from the killer leading us to their apartment while he was bathing in their blood? That thing is no coincidence! He must have thought we wouldn't be able to solve the letter quickly enough to get him!" the first man insisted.

The two of them were still shining their flashlight on the wall searching carefully for clues. The roaring thunder in the background didn't bother them in the slightest.

"Anyhow, we need to capture and question him either way..." the second man said, "But there is nothing here but concrete walls! How did he get away?"

Thud!

The first man kicked a trach can in frustration, sending it flying several centimeters away.

"Dammit!!"

...

"Delilah!!!" the man was suddenly jolted awake, screaming.

His thoughts slowly came back to him and he looked at his surroundings in confusion.

"Where is this? How the hell did I get here?"

The man found himself lying on the floor of an abandoned office building. His shirt and pants were still soaked in rainwater, and judging by the sound of it, it was still hammering outside. However, he saw that the footprints that were most definitely his had begun drying, which meant he had spent quite some time lying unconscious there.

"Besides my footprints, there is nothing else..." he said, perplexed, and then got up, "Does that mean I walked all the way here myself? But I don't remember any of it!"

The place where he was in had its light bulb turned on, but the light was flickering. The surfaces of the floor and the tables stacked on one corner of the room were covered in a thick layer of dust. Strangely, however, the thing that he was looking for was not there.

Looking at his right ankle, he became even more surprised. The wound that should be there was gone!

"That explains the lack of blood, but what the hell is happening!"

There was not even a hole from the bullet there, and in its place, his skin had grown back. There was a small red spot that looked like a mole, but other than that, everything seemed normal.

"Is it that worm thingy? Did it do this? But that's just impossible!" the man said in disbelief.

He ran his finger across the red mole on his ankle and felt that the skin didn't give off any strange sensation. Comparing it with his left ankle, he came to a conclusion that nothing had changed about his skin around the mole except for the color.

Suddenly, he had the urge to tap his right foot on the floor while looking at himself in the mirror. Feeling weirded out, he tried it anyway. There was a small, dust-covered mirror on one of the walls in that building.

Approaching the mirror, he wiped the dust off it using his wet sleeve. A faint sound of squeaking was created as the tip of the sleeve ran across the surface of the medium-sized mirror.

Once the mirror was clean enough, he stood in front of it and focused on his reflection.

Tap! Tap!

Woosh!!

Suddenly, his vision changed!

Surprised, the man took a step back in fear. However, he noticed that it was not just in front of him, but everything around him changed. He also started to get a headache that grew more intense with each passing second.

"What the heck is this?! How do I return?!!"

Around him was no longer the cold and dim abandoned factory, but a world of red and yellow. Things seemed to be burning, but he felt no real heat nor pain.

Taking a deep breath, he tried not to panic. He then tried to touch the flaming looking mirror in front of him, which should feel rough and hot like burning rock. However, it wasn't what he got, but instead, his skin was touching a normal plastic frame that was around the mirror. At that moment, he realized that it was just his vision that was affected.

"What in the world...!!" he exclaimed in skepticism and slight fear.

Suddenly, he was yet again shocked when he saw the 'him' in the mirror. It was no longer a human, but a charred corpse with a dark aura surrounding it. The man couldn't believe his eyes and tried rubbing them, to no effect. The charred corpse was still standing there, doing exactly the same as what he was doing.

"So that's me? And what's with the dark aura? And why is my heart black?!" he muttered incredulously.

The longer he stared at his reflection, the more he noticed that there were words carved all across that naked, charred body of his. He carefully read the text while bearing with the ever-growing headache as best as he could.

'Garret Russo'

'29'

'Writer, Observer'

'Weakened, confused, suffering from a headache'

The man raised his eyebrows and took a step away from the mirror. He still couldn't believe his eyes, especially since the information on the charred corpse was very accurate.

"What the hell is this?! Am I hallucinating?! Something like this is impossible!"

He tried tapping his right foot twice again and suddenly, everything returned to normal. The cold, abandoned office building had returned and the fiery world disappeared.