Starting From Scratch

Indie (Beyond Reality - present)

There’s a pounding in my head. My ears are ringing and a feeling of nausea sways over me.

I open my eyes and view a whiteboard straight ahead. Surrounding me are various desks - some empty and some with individuals in them. I twist and turn my head around to inspect the room further and count seven other individuals, not including myself. We’re all sitting in desks.

“Excuse me.” The person to my left says. “Indie?”

The second I see his face I say, “Yes,” without thinking. It’s an automatic response my brain is clearly trained to give to the word “Indie” when referring to myself. 

“My name is-“

“Ilya.” I say this before he could finish. 

“Uh- yes. Do I know you?”

My brain wants to say yes, playfully shove his shoulder, and tell him to stop acting weird but maybe I am the one acting weird. I freeze, unable to process.

“I-I think so.”

“Where are we?” Robin says. She sits to my right hand side and I question how I know any of these people’s names. Somehow I do. Nobody responds to her question right away. 

Ding!

All of us snap our heads in the direction of the sudden noise. I feel my heart beat faster and urge myself to chill. There’s a blue letterbox that sits on the desk at the front of this classroom with a yellow note sticking out of it. The paper seems to have sprung out of a small opening on top of the box and awaits retrieval. The platinum blonde girl whose name is Scalene - I decided to just accept the fact that I somehow knew all these peoples name - goes up to the desk and pulls out the paper. She reads it out loud. 

“Rule one,” she says. “Group must find the answer to each riddle in order to pass each test. Every answer will identify a person who betrayed the group.”

Confusion spreads over me. I can see Sean on the edge of his seat, ready to say something but Scalene continues without letting him intervene.

“Rule two,” Scalene continues. “Every failure requires a restart. Rule three: those who act recklessly or unprecedented will be eliminated from the game.”

A chill runs down my spine. Scalene flips the paper over.

“Riddle one: everyone who eats is punished. Two eat to conceal truths.”

When she says nothing more Lee says, “The hell is that suppose to mean?”

“It’s probably nothing,” Sean says.

“Are we in some kind of prank?” Rêve says.

“What kind of prank is this?” Pan says.

“I don’t know.”

We all look around the room. An unsettling feeling spreads. 

All of us seem to already know each other’s names: Scalene, Pan, Lee, Robin, Ilya, Sean, Rêve, and I. We do not know much of anything else including who we are to each other and how we got here. I myself struggle to recall any memory of before I ended up in that room. When I try I simply get more frustrated at the blur my mind is in. 

We exit the classroom together and are met with a gorgeous sun shining on our faces. I squint my eyes in response. When my eyes adjust, I gaze upon a quaint vegetable garden. 

Ilya bends down and places his hand on the dirt. When he does this his hand starts glowing. My face reacts in surprise. 

“What’re you-“ I start to say. 

A plant sprouts from the dirt Ilya touches in real time and I’m dumbfounded. It stretches out leaves and blooms into fully red strawberries. Ilya picks a few and extends his hand to me.

“Want some?” He asks.

“How’d you do that?” I say. 

Ilya shrugs. “I don’t know. I just thought about it and then it grew.”

“But how’d you know you could do that?”

“I don’t know. I guess I just never thought  couldn’t.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

Ilya shrugs and I accept a strawberry anyways. When I take a bite, I taste what must be one of the sweetest strawberries I’ve ever tasted. It’s so delicious I find myself scarfing it down. I grab another one and then another. Ilya laughs slightly in response. 

“I guess they must be good?” he says. 

I grin but then suddenly my head is throbbing. I grunt in pain, feel a weird sensation of movement, and then my feet are stumbling over each other. It takes a considerable amount of conscious effort to not fall over. 

Yellow sheets of paper are falling from the sky - hundreds of them. The eight of us are showered in them and pretty soon, I can’t see anything else. 

“What’s happening?” I hear Scalene saying.

I feel a million tiny paper cuts on my body. I barely see anything but yellow. Then everything fades to black. 

There’s a pounding in my head and my ears are ringing. I open my eyes and view a whiteboard straight ahead. Surrounding me are various desks. The yellow papers are gone. 

Confusion and serious Déjà vu clouds my mind. Everyone else is darting their heads around the room. 

“What just happened?” Rêve asks. 

“Is everyone okay?” Scalene asks.

“Apart from the billions of paper cuts - just peachy,” Lee says. 

“You’re bleeding,” Ilya says. 

I jump not expecting to see Ilya at my side. I glance down to my right arm and see a red colour staining my white button-up shirt. The pain is subtle but stings. Ilya bends down, rolls up my sleeve, and dabs the cut with a tissue from his pocket. I cringe through the pain. 

The cut is deeper than I expected. A ten centimetre red line that scars my forearm. I smile at Ilya’s kindness and thank him. He smiles back. 

My instinct tells me that Ilya usually has a kind personality that strives to help others in any way he can. He is considerate, generous, and is easily distraught by unnecessary conflict. He enjoys baking and singing along to pop songs in his bedroom at night. I have a faint recollection of joining him in a duet karaoke where we danced the night away. He wears soft pastel colours and keeps his blonde hair at shoulder length, giving him a sort of androgynous appearance. 

“Okay but seriously,” Pan says. “Didn’t we just-“

Ding!

All of our heads turn to the blue box at the front of the classroom with the yellow note. Goosebumps form on my forearms. Scalene gets up and tugs the yellow note. 

“Riddle one,” Scalene says. “Everyone who eats is punished. Two eat to conceal truths.”

“What the fu-“ Pan says.

“Did the day just - restart?” I say.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Rêve says. “Days don’t restart.”

“Then how do you explain what just happened?”

“I-I don’t know. Maybe we’re all just tired.”

“Tired?” Robin says. “Tired doesn’t explain how we all just experienced the same thing.”

“Maybe we’re all just so tired that we’re in a shared delusion,” Ilya says.

“Ilya,” Robin says and exhales. “Ilya sweetie, I love you but that’s one of the dumbest things I’ve heard-“

“There’s more you know,” Scalene says. 

We all turn our heads to Scalene.

“On the note.”

“Why didn’t you say that before?” Sean asks.

“Well,” Pan says. “Don’t keep us waiting now.”

“There’s a single line on the note,” Scalene says. “And Indie’s name is beside it.”

I gulp and inspect the note Scalene is holding. “Was that there before?” I ask.

“No,” Scalene says. “At least I’m pretty certain it wasn’t.”

“It’s a strike,” Ilya says. “Indie received one strike.”

“And how do you know that?” Rêve says.

“I-I’m not sure. But think about it. The note had rules and a riddle on it: those who eat are punished. Indie ate the strawberry I offered her and then the day reset back to the beginning and Indie’s arm was scarred. I just have a feeling that means something.”

“What’re you basing that on?” Pan says.

“Just have a feeling.”

“Geez,” Lee says, folding his arms. “None of this makes sense.”

I stare at Ilya for a moment and then stare down at the scar on my body. I stroke it lightly and tense at the spike in pain. I relax my arms and then look back at Ilya.

“How many strikes do you think we have?” I ask. 

Ilya makes eye contact but doesn’t answer me right away. “I wish I knew,” Ilya says.