BEEEEEEEEEP!!!!!!!

Stanley woke up to a sound, that went away as quickly as it came. He could see bright light through his eyelids, and feel the warmth beyond. Was that sunlight?

The heat from the light warmed his face which was otherwise very cold for some reason. Fortunately, it was just his face that felt cold. Every other part of his body felt warm enough.

He leaned away from the sunlight and opened his eyes. The sudden brightness made him flinch and close his eyes harder, and he had to take some time to get used to the bright light around him.

How long had it been since he saw light? His eyes watered at the bright light.

Opening his eyes fully after adjusting to the light, he saw a meadow of green grass half covered in snow with a few trees around it. The sky was open with a few white clouds, and the sun was high in the sky.

Stanley felt confused. Where was he? What was he doing here?

His head hurt for some reason. Had he been hurt some—

Memories flooded his mind. He remembered the lightning. He remembered the pain. He remembered the feel of Nova as she lay burned and charred in his arms. He remembered Fred and his last push.

He remembered running away.

He remembered being the only one to live again.

Once again, he had let others die. When was he going to stop letting people die around him?

His Mother, his Brother, Bella, and Freddy were four people whose death made him feel the worst. Now he added two more names.

Nova and Freddy.

He stayed where he was, thoughtless, trying to understand why it all happened to him.

’More dead,’ he thought. ’And I can’t even cry for them.’ He felt sad, but no tears came. Had he seen so many deaths that he subconsciously knew that there was no point in crying?

He sighed.

At least, he had killed the one that was responsible for the two deaths this time around. As long as more—

He finally remembered the blast, and now he could imagine how many had died. His stomach twisted into a knot, making him want to vomit.

So many had died, because he failed.

He desperately hoped that he had somehow returned to the past again, that he had one more chance. But no, this was different.

He had never been to this place before.

Time had moved forward, so there was nothing he could do. Not without turning back time again and he had yet to know for certain how he could turn back time.

Lost in his own thoughts, he started moving from the spot he was in. Now that he was looking at himself, he saw that he was inside of a sleeping bag with only his head sticking out.

No wonder everything but his head had been warm.

Also, didn’t he wake up to some sort of loud sound? Where had that come from? Actually, where even was he?

He moved his body inside the sleeping bag and found pain blossoming in different parts of his body. How badly hurt was he?

The sleeping bag ripped along the seam as Stanley tried to wiggle out, completely tearing it open. That surprised Stanley a little. Who had put him there in the first place?

There were so many unanswered questions here and he had to move on. He tried to push himself off the ground and stumbled to the left, falling back down. He looked at his left hand and realized he couldn’t feel it.

He touched it, grabbed it, squeezed it, but there was no feeling to it. There was nothing he could do with it. His mind knew a hand was there, but his body didn’t respond.

It was fully dead.

Stanley didn’t know what to feel. He could get it healed right? Surely Amy could do it if he got back to her. She could heal anything short of death.

"I just have to make it back to..." his words trailed off as he found something bright orange sticking out of a tree which could not be missed in the green and white surroundings.

Stanley started walking toward the orange thing, feeling the soft grass under his feet.

He saw that he was wearing some sort of black clothing, which was completely skin tight, with no place for pockets anywhere. The entire clothing seemed to be one piece as well, so it would most likely be hard to get in and out of.

Thanks to the cold, he wasn’t planning to.

Pain moved up his back every time he stepped on his right foot. He had to get used to that until he got back to AAA. Certainly, they wouldn’t still ask him to continue his mission, would they?

He arrived by the tree where the orange thing was stuck and saw that it was an orange cloth that was tied around something. He had a hard time opening the knot on the cloth with just his right hand, so he used his teeth.

He finally managed to open it up and the contents fell to the ground. A small paper card, a metallic box, a box of something, and a single glass bottle with something inside of it.

Stanley knelt down and picked it all up, placing it on the orange cloth on the grass. He picked up the metallic box, the glass bottle, the box that he could now see was a matchbox, and the glass bottle.

He finally picked up the card on the ground and was surprised to find words written on it. He was even more thankful that he could read them. His chip wasn’t set up to read many languages, so he had gotten lucky.

He read the side with the text.

Welcome to a game of Death and Glory

A Game of Survival, Betrayal, and Violence

And in its Nexus may you write your Story

For all Sound is Chaos, and the Order is Silence.