As Marcus left the doors he inhaled a deep breath of the evening air, thinking to himself of what he was going to do now that he had no income.
'Fuck it, I'll think of something. I get my last payment through in a few days and that'll keep me steady for a month or 2 if I'm careful. Shit I hate being careful' he thought, and he is right he could normally blow through his payment in a few days, but having lived on very little for a long time before getting this job he had his own methods of spending less.
The only problem with this method was that it meant a few days of not eating every now and then.
After pondering on his future for a few more moments, he pulled out his packet of smokes and started walking.
The walk could usually take around 15 minutes if he was quick, but he had decided to take the long route today, in order to clear his head, which could take an hour or so as it circles half of his home town.
As Marcus was walking he passed through several dark alleys and a few tunnels but as he enters the town centre he sees a group of 4 men walking in the opposite way.
These men were walking while taking up the whole path and laughing to each other, they were young and looked like they would usually be up to no good, but Marcus didn't really care and pushed his way through the middle.
"Who the fuck are you pushing? Are you trying to start something? " One of them, who was vastly overweight with dirty blonde hair, asks with a look like Marcus had just slapped him in the face.
"I was just walking pal, but you know when there's no fucking space something has to give" Marcus replied without changing expression.
"Fuck off mate there's plenty of space there, use that" the same guy said while pointing at the road to the side that had a constant stream of cars passing by at high speeds.
Marcus laughed a little right in his face before he held back into a mocking smile and said "I'm not the walking crash bag you fat fuck, just because you've got cushion protecting you from a speeding car doesn't mean we all do."
The next thing Marcus knew there was a fist colliding with his face, 'this fat bastard is faster than I thought he'd be' he thought while falling to the ground.
The other delinquents then joined in and started to kick Marcus while he was on the floor, he felt several ribs break and something he was sure was something bursting, but he was helpless to the beating.
The group finally started to get bored with thrashing him and decided to get rid of him, picking him up and slinging him over one of their shoulders. The group walked for around 15 minutes with Marcus barely holding onto his consciousness before stopping near the river and throwing him in.
"Enjoy the swim, you smug fuck" said the fatty as Marcus sunk into the water.
Marcus was still conscious as he was sinking but couldn't do anything due to his injuries. As he was getting deeper and deeper he realised he was starting to run out of time.
'Fuck it, there's nothing I can do. I could barely breath before I was under water' he thought as he gave up.
Sinking deeper and deeper he was still holding on to consciousness despite his lack of strength, but suddenly he felt a difference in the water. It felt as if the water was moving downwards at a high speed as if trying to fill a void. But that can't be possible, as far as Marcus was aware this river had been here for thousands of years and never dropped, he'd even remembered it being mentioned in history lessons in school. It wasn't a natural river as it had been constructed thousands of years ago by a conquering nation to make transporting boats loaded with supplies and troops easier. The sides and base should be thick solid stone with no way for water to flow out.
However as Marcus reached the floor of the river he seemed to pass right through it, the stone not even reacting as if he and the surrounding water didn't exist, like a ghost passing through a wall. The stone was incredibly thick so it took a few seconds to pass through, although he was still drowning Marcus was curious about what was on the other side.
Upon reaching the other side of the stone all he saw was darkness and then he noticed the water was gone, taking a deep breath for a moment he stood up and checked himself.
"What the actual fuck just happened?" He mumbled as he felt that he was completely dry.
Standing up to figure out where he was he noticed the pain in his chest was gone and he didn't have a scratch on him. "No, like seriously, what the fuck?"
He stood thinking about how this could be possible, but he couldn't make any sense of it at all. It just didn't make any sense, he was drowning with broken ribs and was slowly dying then passed through a riverbed and was fine, 'how? Why? What the fuck?'
Eventually he gave up with that line of thought realising he's never going to figure it out just standing here in a deep darkness not even able to tell how big the room or chamber was, so he started walking forward.
There was no way to see anything other than darkness so Marcus took slow careful steps just trying to find a wall or something to use as some form of limitation to the room but for 15 minutes he found nothing, until he felt the floor angle downwards slightly.
'This has to be something' he thought with sudden hope. As he felt hope he gained confidence and took a big step forward, shifting all his weight into the foot as it descended with a victorious smile on his face that nobody could see.
His foot swung down and as it went past the point where he thought it would land the smile disappeared, "SHIT!!" There was no floor there, he was too confident and stepped into an empty space and now before he could fall he started panicking until it hit solid ground again "oh thank fuck, it was just a step".
And slowly looked for the next step with his foot, he had learned his lesson about being overconfident.
Looking for the steps was effective and he started counting them in case he had to go back, " 8, 9, 10, 11, 12"
On the 12 step he stopped for a moment because he had a sudden feeling of unease.
The uneasy feeling was unexpected and thinking there was no possible reason for it as total darkness didn't allow him to see any evidence to feel uneasy he decided to ignore it and went for the next step again using too much confidence to try to override the uneasy feeling.
But there was no next step and as leaning down for it he fell.