Stranger in a Dark World

Chapter 2: Enter Dan Newman

 

Dan was not having a good day. Or rather, he was taken from his excellent existence and placed into this macabre episode. He figured something inside his mind must have snapped. One moment, he was finishing his last year of postdoc at Oak Ridge. The next moment, he was living out an acid junkie's worst trip. The bled-out, naked girl only took his situation from strange to horrific. That being said, Dan was a man of action. He sprinted over to the girl and knelt down. Checking for a pulse, he found none. Checking for pupil dilation by covering her eyes, he found no sign of brain activity.

The logical side of his mind was still hoping this was some hallucination. The more instinctive side was furious. He turned to the spectre. "Are you telling me you did this?" Dan asked with a hard edge to his voice.

"Yes! Now let me back into my body."

"You're going to have to explain why I should let you do that." At that, Adar added new chapters to his bungling by telling Dan the events leading up to their current predicament. I can't believe it. I'm in a psychopath LARPer's wet dream. "Go fuck yourself!" Dan recovered in time to say. At this point, Dan was working on pure spite. If life were to snap back to normal, he would go back to being a prodigious polymath with a good number of scholarly articles and minor patents to his young name. Instead, he seemed to be stuck in a game of Dungeons & Deviants. If everything was indeed a dream or hallucination of some sort, he would play it out until waking up. On the off chance that some cosmic fuckery was indeed happening, Dan decided he would need to get a grip on his situation. The first order of business was giving this murdering fuck the middle finger.

Dan took a look at himself, seeing arms and hands a shade paler than his own skin tones. He was about the same high, just short of six feet. So at least height would not be disorientating. He felt slightly weaker. Despite being a science nerd, Dan took care of himself. He certainly did not neglect the gym too much. This Adar fellow, on the other hand, was a skinny piece of shit. Dan would have to rectify that if he got the chance.

The only sign of civilization he could find was the marble edifice of the Magisterium. Guessing that was where Adar came from, he walked towards it. He ventured through the front gate. Anyone he met, he would spin a tale of getting bumped on the head and not remembering where his room was. Eventually, he found his way to Adar's room. It was a small cell, but well furnished with study material. He had books, parchment, quills, ink, a wardrobe, a small but comfortable bed, and other such basic supplies. Among them, Dan procured a travel bag. He took a few vials of unknown substance and several coins of copper and silver before heading out. If this place is a medieval-ish fantasy world, I'm going to need to visit the larder or kitchen.

Dan hurried through his plan, taking preserved meats, hard breads, nuts, and fruit for the journey. Any place that permitted murder on its grounds was not a place Dan Newman would want to stay.