Alone In The Darkness

Alone In The Darkness

I should have called in sick that night. Maybe if I had called in sick l wouldn’t situation. Here I am laying God knows where in a puddle of my own blood, helpless to do anything but feel my own life gradually slip away from me. I could feel eyes on me somewhere. Somewhere somebody or something was getting their rocks off watching me die. If only I had called in sick….

It was six o’clock in the afternoon when I had woke up for work covered with sweat. I got up and sat at the edge of the bed, looking at the floor while concentrating on not puking. I just dreamed of a massacre. I just dreamed of my friends, family, and even people I don’t know dieing. They were just standing there one second, looking lost and confused. The next they were bleeding out of the joints of their arms and legs where something had slashed them, screaming for help. What the fuck was wrong with me? Why would I dream something like that?
I took a few deep breathes until I felt I had regained my composure. As I walked downstairs I could smell burgers on the grill outside. I walked through the kitchen and watched my father cook for a sec. My father is an awesome guy. He had always been more an older friend to me than a father. I know some of my friends joked around that he was cooler that I was. I was going to go out to say hi and grab a burger, but lost my appetite when I remembered that look of my dad’s face as he bled out in my dream.
I turned around, hopped in the shower and left for work.

When I arrived at Taco B(H)ell they were running at full speed. As soon as I walked in I could see the look of relief enter into several crew members eyes. At least there was one place where a fuck up like me was appreciated. As I walked in Chrissie, a lifetime friend of mine came up a gave me a quick kiss on the cheek. I could see several older people raise an eyebrow at this. Fuck them. This place was my family.
“You arrived just on time, it’s just complete hell out tonight. Besides it being Friday and getting all the drunks from the bars, we’ve got all the kids coming out of the high school proms coming here to get a bite of food with their dates (romantic?).” I just nodded my head and grunted as I squeezed up to the front cash register so I could sign in for the day. After logging myself in I carefully walked across the greasy floor covered with Taco Bell wrappers and talked to the boss.
“So Sherri, where do you want me working tonight.”
“Allen, good morning honey!” She always greeted everyone with good morning. It never mattered what time of day it was. “Thank god you’re here, will you wash your hands and take Micheal’s spot, he’s killing our drive through time. Do you see that average! Three and half minutes. We need to cut it by a minute by the time the night’s out, or I’m going to get my ass chewed. Ask Micheal to go clean the common area.”
“All righty, Thanks Sherri!” Not that I was really appreciative of her. It was just the way we acknowledged an order. In the military you get “Yes sir” and “No sir”. In a fast food restaurant you get to say thanks to acknowledge an order. We have to look friendly to the other customers.
So I washed my hands and tapped Michael on the shoulder and I swear he was about to take a swing at me. “Sorry Michael, I didn’t mean to startle you. Could you go and clean up the common area. I’ve got your spot covered.”
“Yeah… Thank you.” He slipped off the gloves and I jumped into the expediter position. This position is crucial in a fast-food restaurant. If you ever get the wrong food, it’s more than likely the expediters fault. He had probably slipped the food into the wrong bag and you had someone else’s food in your lap. They made your food, it just went to the wrong place.
“Yes, our Lord of the Taco Hell has returned.” Said Jason, a good friend of mine. I don’t know what I ever did to get everyone’s trust, but somewhere along the way I had earned it.
“Thanks man, let’s do this shit.” For the next six hours we worked, the pace seemingly never slowing. Eventually the lobby was closed, but that didn’t stop the flood of customers. They just went through our 24 hour drive through, the cars circling the restaurant and just barely short of flowing onto the main street. It’s great to be popular.
After six hours without any break, those of us whom were still on shift were triumphant. Sherri was screaming with joy. “Under two and half minutes! Still a little over what we’re supposed to have, but with all those customer’s we had, I don’t think it will matter. The printer was printing out a list of statistics of the day, showing our hour by hour sells. Yeah, from Six to One we were serving around two hundred customers an hour. That’s just counting the drive through.” We were triumphant. Our party had won this battle. I should have been happy. But all I could think of was the dream. The trickle of blood flowing down their arms and legs. I could feel my legs starting to turn to Jelly. My face was flush, and covered with more sweat than normal from a hard nights work.
“Allen honey, are you all right? You look like your about to pass out.” Asked Sherri.
“Yeah, I’m fine…” I lied. I walked to the cash register and punched myself out on break. I went to the back and looked around. Just like the rest of the restaurant it looked like it just went through a war, everything tossed about. Normally, there’s a break table for, go figure, breaks. But today it was covered with boxes and posters for whatever the new promotion was. I didn’t know, I hadn’t looked yet and I had no real interest. Right now I just needed to sit down. I found a pile of boxes that I knew could support my weight. I sat down, struggling to keep concsiousness. Tammy, a small and cute asian I worked with came and started chatting about this and that about her boyfriend. I just kept nodding my head and saying “that’s nice.” until she walked away. As I sat there, my world was spinning like the time I drank a full bottle of vodka to myself on top of several Mudslides. It was while I was in this state that I then noticed that there was a square button on the wall.
Why is there a button on the wall? That makes no sense. Something was wrong with me. I needed help. I tried to say something, but no words came. I tried to get up to get help, but my body wasn’t listening. Before I knew what I was seeing, I watched in horror as my own hand rose and pressed the button. The button started to glow orange, and soon my world dropped into darkness…

When I came to I was in the place of my dreams. I was laying on one of several stone tablets lined up in a row with only several feet between them. Each of them were a different size, shape, and length. They also were holding people, whom looked as lost and confused as I was. As I scanned my surroundings, I couldn’t find any clue as to where I was. All there was darkness, about 15 tablets and thirty people.
“Allen!” It was Michael from Taco Bell. “Allen, what the fuck is going on?!” He asked, as he squeezed through people and jumping the tablets to get where I was. I thought one guy was about to punch him in the face when Michael gave him a polite shove out of the way.
Finally he made it to my tablet. I never very much liked Michael. He was large and because of his size he automatically assumed that he could boss other people around. I am probably about five foot six. He’s got a whole ‘nother foot on me. But at least I had someone I knew here.
“Allen, thank god!” He gave me a giant bear hug. That shows how scared he really was. Normally he would have just gave me shit. I asked him how he got here.
“I don’t know. After cleaning the lobby I went home and I was changing for a party at a buddy’s place. It was going to be great man. I was going to hook up with Shaina man. Then, I started getting dizzy. I thought I could hear screams coming from somewhere and I lied back down on my bed. As I lied there I noticed a button on the side of my bed. I pushed it, and here I am…. How about you.”
I was about to answer him, when the tablet’s started moving. Behind the two of us I heard people screaming and the sound of echoes…. They were falling. I looked in front and saw more pedestal appearing in front of us. I saw some other’s get the same idea I had.
“START JUMPING FORWARD!! DON’T LOOK BACK!!” I screamed. I wasn’t going to die here. I still had dreams. I still had things I had to accomplish. It wasn’t too bad at first. For about the first fifteen minutes, the pedestal were about the same size and had a uniform space between them. Then it became almost impossible. The pedestal’s started moving faster, and started changing shape and sizes and length between them. More and more screams were echoing around me. It was impossible to tell how many people were actually falling, as the screams were continuously echoing. Eventually, I had to make a choice. I had to make a choice between my life and Michael’s. The tablet in front us, there was only room for one. I also know that we were getting closer to the back. I had no idea whether or not one of us had time to wait for the other to jump. If we both jumped at the same time then we were probably both going to miss it. I kicked Michael’s leg out from under him I heard him screaming. Eventually all the screams stopped… But I could still here Michael’s screams. I can still see that look of horror as he realized what I just did. I killed him.

We had been at this for an hour now. There were five us left. There were no more screams, just the sound of heavy breathing. We weren’t going to last much longer. I know I certainly wasn’t. My eyes were burning from the sweat. My body was starting to give out…. I was going to die soon. I looked ahead and saw that this jump was quite a bit further. I wasn’t going to make this.
I jumped with all my strength… My feet never connected. I reached up, and somehow I was grasping onto the tablet. I couldn’t get my self up though. This was it. This was the end for me. Right when my strength was about to give out, I felt a pair of hands grab a hold of mine.
“Be careful. Don’t drop him, or he’ll end up like the others.” The hand’s pulled me up. As soon as I was on the platform I attempted to start running again, but a pair of strong hand’s held me still.”
“Calm down mate, we’re all right. We made it through…. Whatever you want to call that.” I looked around and noticed the platforms had came together. We were standing on a large pedestal. We were safe for now.
I then felt arms embrace me, and lips connected with mine. When the kiss broke, I saw that Chrissie was one of the five.

“Allen, thank God! Do you have any idea what’s going on.” Of course I didn’t. How the would I know what was going on in that madness. It didn’t take too long for the five of us to be introduced to each other and swap stories.
Apparently Chrissie had in the restroom at Taco Bell when she pressed the button. Everyone had a similar story of feeling like they were going to pass out and then seeing a button. Whatever had brought here, apparently didn’t discriminate as the people were quite varied. The man who had helped my up onto the platform along with Chrissie was James. He was from Australia, hence they “mate”. Then there was Gordon, a business man from New York. And the last, I couldn’t say what her name was or where exactly she was from. All I can say was that she was Asian and didn’t speak English.
We sat in the darkness on that platform for what seemed like hours. I was starting to thing that maybe there was hope. Maybe there was a slight chance we were going to live through this. Or maybe I was dreaming this whole thing again. Maybe I’m laying passed out in the back of Taco Bell, maybe I’ll wake up in a hospital. Maybe…
It’s while I was having these thoughts that screaming started happening again. Somehow the skin at the joint’s of the arms and legs were torn open to those around me. They screamed, blood steadily pouring out of their bodies. I did what I could for them, wrapping the wounds as tight as I could, hoping maybe I could save one of them. Tears were steadily flowing from my eyes. What the hell did we do to deserve this! I held Chrissie in my arms, her life visibly leaving her eyes.
“Allen… I know we’ve been friends forever, but I just wanted to say while I still can…” No, this can’t be happening. Please, why does this have to happen. “I love you Alle…” Her chest stopped moving. My body was covered with hers and everyone else’s blood. I was alone. Alone in the darkness.

So there I was by myself. I was angry, confused, tired, and sad. I screamed. I screamed as loud as I could. “What the fuck! What the fuck did we do to deserve this. Why did they have to die! Why did Chrissie have to die!!” Then a better question came to me. “Why am I still alive!!” After crying for who knows how long, I decided that I need to do something with the bodies. I dragged each of them by the arms to the ledge where I laid them down. From their I rolled their bodies, and I watched as their bodies fell. Somewhere in the back of my head I noted that I never heard the bodies hit a bottom. This was even more disturbing. Thinking of the people who fell off the platform, eternally falling in the darkness.
Again I sat there in silence. Nothing happened, after awhile I started getting the same delusional thoughts that I had before the others were killed. Maybe I am special. Maybe whatever had killed them can’t touch me for some reason. Maybe I’m going to live. And that’s when it happened. I felt flesh at my joints tear open.
And I screamed. I screamed and there was nothing there to listen. And that’s how I got to be where I am now. Laying face down in my own blood, ever wondering what any of us did to deserve this.
“Fine, you fuck! You win! I don’t know who or what you are, but you win. What do you want from me? ! Whatever you want, I’ll do it!” But nobody was listening, so I thought. I soon slipped away from consciousness.

“Allen, are you all right?” Asked Sherri. I looked around, and I was still sitting on the box.
“Uh, yeah… How long was I out?” Was it all just a dream?
“Not that long. Your break isn’t even up yet, I just have a couple orders I could use your help on if you’d like to jump up on the line real quick. So I made food while pondering what happened. It seemed like I was over “their” forever. But, it was only about 15 minutes according to Sherri. As soon as I was done I went to the bathroom and washed the sweat off my face. It was all a dream. But as I brought my arms up to was my face, something caught my eye. Two scars across the joints my arms.