“Wha...where the fuck am I now?”

I could hear my voice echoing through the darkness that surrounded me, but I couldn’t even see the hand I knew I was holding just a few inches away from my face. This was certainly not the sidewalk beyond the apartment parking lot that I’d been on moments ago, unless the moon stopped reflecting the sunlight and the stars burnt out, there’s no reason it should be this dark right now.

“Welcome, Dominic...to your future.”

I felt myself blink but saw no difference in lighting, as I ran my hands along my arms, checking for whatever hole must be in there from the needle that injected drugs into me for this to happen. I must be out of my fucking mind, some unknown voice talking to me in the dark.

“What’s going on? My future?! There’s not anything here, God damn it!”

“Precisely.”

I frowned, my heart beating in my ears as my mind raced to comprehend what was going on. If there was nothing, this must be some clever way of telling me I have no future...and that’s bullshit.

“Correction, Dominic, it makes perfect sense.”

What the fuck, now it’s a psychic.

My eyes darted through the darkness for the source of the voice, expecting it to somehow appear through the bog of nothing and surprise me. I got no such thing however, just another chuckle through the dark to fuel the anger burning within.

“Whoa there,” called the voice, a soothing ring to it, “Calm down...it’s alright. Dominic, you still have a chance to change your future of nothing, you just have to pick the right path. The path will eventually reveal itself, it’s up to you however to recognize it.”

If there’s one thing I’ve always hated...it’s riddles. I was never very good at solving them, my impatience often coming back to bite me in the ass as I gave up with it and moved on. Yet there was a part of me that, for whatever reason, didn’t think it would be so easy this time.

It was pissing me off.

“Come now, Dominic...surely it isn’t that hard. Just think of all that has happened, think of the people involved in your life right now. Trust your heart, not your instincts...and lose all thoughts of right and wrong. Suki, Chris, the Sharp family, Bradshaw...they hold the keys to your future, but how you handle yourself around them will determine what you see.”

This was too much, too soon. I blindly covered my ears and began to run, though I wasn’t sure where. The voice continued to ring it my head however, pushing me to the brink of madness as I held back the urge to scream in protest. It kept telling me there was another way...what other way could there possibly be? I’ve tried everything, and Bradshaw was my last hope...wasn’t he?

...he was, wasn’t he?

“That you will soon discover is true, though it may not be in the way you’d imagined. Yet Bradshaw’s not the only one involved, Dominic...this you too shall soon discover.”

I could hear whispering all around me, as brief flashes of light crossed my vision. The presence that accompanied the voice faded, and I suddenly felt alone.