"-Ter" Peter looked up from where he transported forty-pound bags of saw-dust. Noticing the man that had called his name was his team lead, he placed the bag down and stood to face him. "Mr. Anderson, what can I do for you?" Peter knew he wasn't the best worker out of all his coworkers, however, he also knew that he hadn't done anything wrong since he had first started working.
"Peter, the boss would like to talk to you." Confused, Peter followed his team leads off the floor and into their supervisor's office. "Ah, Peter. Good to see you." Peter took the man's outstretched hand and nodded to his words. "Please, sit." Sitting in the chair across from the man, Peter waited for him to speak first. Even before the man could get a word out, Peter knew by the expression he was wearing that it wasn't going to be a raise.
"I am regretful to inform you that, due to a hiring issue the company has too many employees. This has caused us to have to... let go of multiple people. Of course, we will compen-" Peter didn't hear the rest of the reasons, which he knew were simple excuses as his vision went blurry. Peter was currently in severe debt due to his mother's medical bills, even though they didn't help her in the end.
"Peter, you with us?" Pulled back into the conversation, Peter turned his eyes away from the wall behind his supervisor. "I'm here." Nodding, the man continued. "As I said, you are free to return to your job station, and thank you for working with us." Peter once more stood, before telling them he was taking PTO before walking towards the break room. His team lead and supervisor were not happy with his request for PTO, however, he wasn't going to finish the day for them if he was being fired.
When he entered the break room he stopped as someone called his name. "Peter! You okay man?" Looking over to his buddy Chad, he gave a smile. "Just got fired due to overcrowding." Chad looked confused at his words. "What do you mean? Why didn't they fire one of the new hires?" Shrugging, Peter walked over to his locker and started packing up. "They wanted me to finish the work day too." This time Peter laughed at his own words, not looking over at his friend.
Peter had always known something like this would happen. He figured it was only a matter of time after he had broken up with his now ex, who happened to also be upper management's daughter. It was only after the break up that he found out at a company picnic, one he didn't even want to go to. After she saw him there and proceeded to explode in front of everyone present, his work life had taken a one-eighty turn for the worst.
He had figured out that they were trying to find any reason to get him fired after his workload more than tripled, and any slight mistake was blown out of proportion. If it hadn't been for the medical bills, and the fact that this job paid so well, Peter would have quit long ago. "It is what it is man. You and I both know they have been trying to get me out of here." Chad snorted before cursing a name. "Darla."
Peter nodded before closing his now empty locker and turning towards the door. "Will I see you after work?" Peter paused for a moment before responding. "No, I'm going to take it easy for a day." Waving goodbye, Peter walked out into the parking lot before getting in his beater of a car and driving home. Lost in his thoughts he listened he absently drove home.
"BEEP BEEP BEEP!" Peter's attention was drawn back to reality as the music was cut and an emergency alarm was coming from his radio. "WARNING PLEASE ALL RETURN TO YOU'RE HOMES AS OF THIS TIME." The message repeated itself over and over until Peter turned off the radio. Moments later he received a phone call from Chad. "Peter, you okay?" "Yeah, you hear the message?"
Peter started to get worried as if even the plant had shut down, then this could have been more serious than he had first thought. "Yeah, they wanted us to continue to work, so we all put in PTE and left." Peter had to laugh at that, as the idea of the plant being behind made him a bit happy. "Grab Cynthia and come on over." Peter hung up the phone after hearing an agreeance and increased his speed by another five miles per hour.
Standing in his living room and watching the door, Peter waited for Chad and Cynthia to arrive when the corner of his vision rapidly went black. Falling to one knee and fighting against the growing darkness, Peter huffed out deep breaths of air, before falling into the dark abyss.
Rocketing into a sitting position, Peter's eyes flew open. The first thing he saw was multiple bodies around him. 'Are they dead?!' Peter couldn't help but try and scramble back as he thought it, only to collide with something. "Watch it, idiot." Rotating, Peter found a thug-looking man standing. "What happened?" The man simply scoffed at his question before waving around him. "Why would I know."
Before he could answer the rude man, a Symbol suddenly appeared in his vision. The symbol was a thick blue line in the shape of a circle with a similarly blue line resting unattached within it. Suddenly words appeared below the symbol and a counter below that.
Θ
Time until selection
00-53-11