Killing Yuki

Chapter 1.3 - A Stranger at the Funeral

As the chaotic thoughts cleared out, the adrenaline kicked in. He began contemplating other possibilities.

"What if this isn't a prank? What if I was really abducted and left here to die?" he mumbled under his breath.

Emotions bottled-up for thirteen years swelled in Yuki's chest, reminding him of the terror he thought he had outgrown. Unlike the last time, however, he didn't panic.

 This time, he managed to stay composed and think clearly. The first thing he did was check his body for injuries. Nothing was amiss. 

There were no large wounds or trauma except for the few tiny scratches on his arms from the strenuous effort of standing up and a slight stiffness in his neck from sleeping on his stomach for god knows how long.

"But why me? And why am I not hurt? Are they coming back to finish me off?" he anxiously pondered.

"Maybe they thought I was dead and left." A comforting thought but not in the least helpful.

"Or maybe they're still out there, watching me go into a tailspin. You never know what runs through a troubled person's mind," he recoiled.

What began as a calm and wieldy situation swiftly escalated into a crisis. Yuki had watched far too many murder-mystery films to fail to discern how much trouble he was in. 

But unlike films, his situation had no plain Jane plot that guaranteed a happy ending. There was no practical way to predict how things would unfold, with so many unanswered questions and his memory still fuzzy. 

To further complicate things, the fog made it impossible to gauge the vastness of the area he was in or how far he was from the nearest exit. He could be heading deeper into the wilderness instead of toward its edge, for all he knew. 

A single misstep could cause his already dire situation to spin out of control.

It was then that he realized that he hadn't checked his phone yet. Someone must have been contacting him. And he could call for help or check his location through Google Maps. 

He could even hire a cab through GO Taxi and wait to be picked up precisely from where he was standing, although that would be a bit of a stretch, given how remote the area seemed to be from the nearest road. 

At the very least, the cab driver could suggest a specific pickup spot and provide him with directions.

Yuki quickly reached into his pocket to retrieve his phone. But to his disappointment, he found nothing resembling a keitai denwa: rigid, rectangular, metallic, and had buttons on the side. 

Shaken, he turned around and began to walk frantically in the direction he had just come from, fearing that he might have dropped it when he was trying to get up. 

The creases on his knees scraped forcefully against the edges of his grubby tapered jeans as his pace quickened.

"It's not here. Where could it possibly be?" he agonized.

Waltzing back and forth across the empty field didn't help. That phone was his only hope of getting out of there unscathed, and it had vanished. They must have taken it, which further convinced him that someone was toying with him and wouldn't let him go easily.