Chapter Text
The sound of rain was always a noise that was calming and strangely nostalgic. Closing your eyes and listening to the patter of rainfall on the windscreen took you back to a time when you was more content with life, away from life’s responsibilities and daily worries.
You weren’t sure how long you’d sat there listening to the rain but it was long enough. Taking a deep breath through your nose and letting out a long sigh you opened your eyes. Back to reality you thought.
After getting out of the car you made quick work of running towards the apartment building, locking the car on the way and holding your hoodless jacket above your head in a vain attempt at keeping yourself dry. When inside you glared at the stairs, silently debating if you had the energy to climb them or were you prepared to face your fears in the old elevator.
In the end, your fears could be faced another day.
By the time you reached the floor of your apartment you only slightly regretted taking the stairs as you shuffled in front of your door, unlocking it and throwing your bag, shoes and useless jacket in different directions, lying to yourself that you’ll move them before bed or in the morning.
Looking in the fridge you praised your past self for having left over pasta in the fridge, whilst it wouldn’t be a hot meal after a long day it was sustenance that wasn’t ordering out with a nagging voice in the back of your head telling you to stop ordering out every night. Curling up on the couch, turning on a show you’d been passively watching on Netflix, eating cold pasta and scrolling through Twitter was how you spent your night until it was a reasonable enough time to go to bed.
A routine you found most nights after working at a coffee shop all day that drained the life out of you day in day out.
~
Something woke you up, at first you couldn’t recall as your brain attempted to register a million things at once. After a second or two of looking around your dark room you realised it was a thud you heard, a thud inside your apartment.
As quietly as you could whilst in a daze you grabbed your phone and glanced at the time, 3:42am. Against your better judgement you decided to investigate, ignoring all the times you had scoffed and screamed at people doing the exact same thing in horror movies only to end up dead. For some reason, you was confident you wouldn’t fall to the same fate as the movies.
Sliding your phone into the pocket of your pyjama pants you tiptoed through your room, attempting to manoeuvre the best you could without sight and remembering where all the furniture would be.
Initially the plan was to open the bedroom door quietly and peek your head into the short corridor of the apartment and see if there was an intruder there or in the small area of the living room and kitchen you could possibly see. The plan of being quiet was immediately destroyed by the door making the loudest squeak you was sure the entire apartment building could hear. If there was an intruder they surely know you’re awake by now.
None the less you still peaked your head out into the darkness of the rest of the apartment, attempting to see any intruder shaped shadows. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary and there were no sounds coming from anywhere which caused you to let your guard down. It was probably nothing, just a neighbour above dropped something and because you was asleep it sounded like it was in your place.
Feeling your body relax and convincing yourself it most likely wasn’t anything, you opened the door fully and stepped out of your room, walking into the open space that held the living room and kitchen. Flicking on the light to the living room was enough to send you back into a panic and regret every decision you’ve ever made, the past 5 minutes flashing before your eyes and cursing yourself for being so stupid and also for living alone.
Stood between the coffee table and couch was a tall man, long dusty blonde hair partially hidden by a sunhat and an odd questionable outfit overall nursing his elbow with a hiss. When he realised a light had been turned on and he could see again he looked up and stared at you with similar shock, though his face partially expressed confusion also.
“Where the fuck am I?”
You didn’t answer. Your brain just switched off, went into automatic mode and decided not to deal with this like a normal person would. Instead, you promptly turned off the light you had just turned on and headed back to your bedroom, closing the door and climbing back into bed.
It was a dream, surely.
When you hadn’t answered the mans question and turned off the light instead to walk away, you didn’t hear him call out and repeat his question, adding on to ask who you are as he attempted to follow you in the dark and almost falling over the couch in the process.
You couldn’t hear anything, couldn’t focus on anything. All you could feel was your heart racing and pounding against your chest and a loud ringing in your ears as your brain ran a mile a minute to process what was happening and how you are most likely going to end up like the people in horror films.
It wasn’t until the man was in your room that you seemed to come back to reality once again, not hearing and registering that he was knocking on the door trying to call to you to come back out, that he wasn’t a threat before announcing he was going to come in.
Almost like a switch was flicked within you, you decided you weren’t going to be one of the people killed in horror movies for stupid decisions, ignoring the ones you had already made. With adrenaline now running through your veins you sat up quickly and held your hand out towards the door, vaguely making out the intruder at the doorway.
“Don’t come closer, I will stab you!” You hoped you didn’t sound as scared as you felt. You also hoped he couldn’t see that there was not a knife in your hand and it was instead your phone.
After a moment of silence and watching the figure standing there, you continued whilst you was still high from the adrenaline, “fuck off out of here, get out before I call the cops.”
The intruder flicked on the light of the bedroom, taking you by surprise for a moment and flinching for your eyes to adjust at the unexpected brightness. The man stood at the doorway with his hands held up at the waist in an attempt to show that he wasn’t a threat whilst you realised you was shaking as the adrenaline was slowly leaving your body, fear and submission taking over as you began to accept you wasn’t going to see the sunrise.
As you was about to lower the hand holding your phone out in a poor attempt of threat in the dark and admit defeat you flinches as an object collided with your arm and in turn threw your phone across the room and out of your reach. Looking at your arm was a bright green ball spinning and twisting the flesh of your arm and losing all feeling within it.
Whilst you was staring at it in shock, confusion, disbelief and fear you hadn’t noticed the intruder gingerly picking up your phone between his index finger and thumb, inspecting it at all angles.
“Is this some kind of weapon?”
You furrowed your brows as you looked towards him, almost as confused with his question as what was happening to your arm. When you didn’t answer after a few moments he asked again raising his voice slightly with a harsher tone, clearly not happy you kept ignoring him.
“No,” you managed to grumble out through the uncomfortable feeling in your arm. “Now stop whatever this is and just kill me.”
The man sighed and released the spinning ball from your arm. “I told you I’m not a threat, I just don’t know where I am or how I got here.”
“I don’t care if you’re not a threat get out of my apartment asshole,” you grumbled as you rubbed your arm in an attempt to get feeling back into it faster.
“At least tell me which checkpoint or stage this is,” he stated more than asked with an exasperated sigh and placed your phone on the desk behind him, crossing his arms as you looked at him with exaggerated confusion.
“Checkpoint? Stage? What the fuck are you talking about?”
“The Steel Ball run? The worldwide event that’s been happening for the past 2 months?”
This was a new level of insanity you had come across, of which you was actively questioning and encouraging instead of attempting to get this intruder out. “This is stupid please just leave.”
“Have you been living under a rock? Is that why you can’t answer me?” Was the intruder giving you sass? After somehow getting into your apartment at 3am and talking crazy he’s giving you an attitude?
“The Steel Ball run was over 100 years ago dude, please go bother someone else if you’re not going to murder me,” you groaned rubbing your face with both your hands and missing all the blood drain from the intruders face at your words.
“Over 100-“ he started in disbelief, “what year is it?”
“2019 now please-“
You was cut off by the intruder pacing back and forth a few steps and speaking another language that you didn’t recognise, hell for all you knew it could have been made up.
You are too tired for this shit, you really wish he did kill you at this point.
“I know you’re not going to believe me, but my name is Gyro Zeppeli and I’m from the year 1890.”