May Kill Me

Twenty-Eight

Drip... Drip... Drip...

Opening my eyes was a struggle. 

The pain in the back of my head was pounding, sharp. 

I tried moving my neck, turning it from side to side hurt so much that it was either injured or I'd been in this position for a while. 

When I was finally able to fully open my eyes and look around, I took in my environment: dirty floor, chains hanging from the ceiling, a massive room. I saw a metal staircase off in the distance.

My hands were bound, as were my legs. I was in a chair, practically immobile. 

And...

"Jonathan!" I cried out in stark panic as I saw him slumped over in a chair, his hands - just like mine - tied behind his back. 

I don't know how I missed him before, but it was clearly him. Jonathan was bound, with duct tape covering his mouth. Something that looked a lot like blood darkened the side of his head, oozing all the way to his jawline. 

Oh my god, was he dead? 

"Jonathan!" I cried out louder, straining my arms behind my back to see if I could set myself free.  

He didn't respond. 

"Jonathan!" I cried again frantically, trying to see if his chest was moving. 

The winter jacket he was wearing was so bulky, it was impossible to tell.  

It was so cold that my breath became tufts of smoke the second it came out.

Panic was rising inside me as questions were circling in my head: where are we, what's going on? Who did this to Jonathan, who did this to me? 

"Help!" I cried out again, louder this time. I couldn't think straight.  

Panic and fear were getting a tight grip on my brain, and my thoughts becoming jumbled and frantic. 

"Oh, will you shut up! There is no one around for miles!" A voice called out from behind me, an angry (and somewhat amused) male voice. 

I tried turning my head so I could see who was talking. 

"Finally, you're awake..." The figure walked around me, coming into the light, and crossed his arms over his chest. 

"Alex Diaz?" I breathed out incredulously. 

"You actually remembered my name, good job," Alex smirked. 

I blinked at him, confused, and scared. 

He was real. 

Was Jonathan telling the truth? 

My brain was still having a hard time processing what I was seeing - Alex Diaz. Tall, blandly handsome, no baseball hat. 

He was real after all. 

"What did you do to us? Did you kill Jonathan?" My voice broke when I asked him about Jonathan being dead. Maybe it was the cold, maybe it was something else... I didn't know. 

"Dead? No, not yet. At least, he wasn't dead when I brought him here." Alex shook his head at me, clearly entertained to see me so distraught. 

"Not yet? What does that mean?"

"It means," Alex shifted his weight, "That I am going to kill him when the time comes. And you, for that matter.

"Kill us? Why?" There was no way this was happening. It was a nightmare, not real life.