---[16th August, 2003]--

--[British Columbia, Canada]--

I tossed my Nokia 3310 onto the bed, its screen still glowing with the last SMS from a friend, congratulating me on completing 12th grade. The sentiment, a snapshot of a moment, felt oddly comforting. I turned my attention to my laptop, and the familiar whir of the CD drive was a nostalgic reminder of those summer road trips spent burning mix CDs for the perfect soundtrack. My inbox was overflowing with emails from classmates eager to celebrate, but first, I had to endure the screeching symphony of the dial-up connection.

The computer finally booted, and I logged into Yahoo! Messenger, greeted by the familiar "ping" of a new message. A friend had sent me a link to their new MySpace page, complete with neon colors and glittery gifs. I smiled, knowing we'd be buzzing about it in person later—social media was fun, but it hadn't yet consumed our lives.

As I looked around my room, now cluttered with used textbooks and heaps of printed college applications, a sense of possibility filled me. The night outside was illuminated by the soft glow of the moon, and the room was quiet except for the gentle hum of the computer. It was an old model, a relic from another time, but it had once belonged to my father, Alexander Ravenswood. He used this computer to write his diary late into the night, a ritual I had inherited, perhaps more out of habit than necessity.

I settled into the creaky chair at my desk, the weight of my father's absence heavy in the room. He was a tech genius at iRobot, often consumed by his work, leaving the house long before dawn and returning well past dark. Since my mother had passed away during childbirth, she had been the only thing that ever really pulled him away from his screens. Now that she was gone, he was more absorbed in his work than ever. I was a bittersweet reminder of her—a blend of her blue eyes and black hair, her beautiful face making him both proud and sorrowful.

I didn't hold his absence against him. He had given me everything he could, even if he wasn't the most present father. Writing on this computer, where he had once documented his own thoughts, made me feel a small connection to him. It was like bridging a gap between us, a moment of pause in the quiet of the night.

As I finished writing in my diary, a distant, unsettling boom jolted me from my thoughts. I dismissed it as a building demolition somewhere far off, but a gnawing unease settled in my stomach. Trying to push it aside, I stood up to close the windows, feeling an odd sense of urgency.

The gate creaked open, and my father's cat staggered in, bleeding and clearly in distress. My heart pounded as I rushed over, desperately trying to assess the injuries. The cat's life faded quickly, and before I could make sense of it, it was gone. Overwhelmed with shock, tears streamed down my face as I clutched the lifeless animal. My hands shook uncontrollably.

In my grief and confusion, anger flared. Why hadn't my father kept his cat safe? As I placed the cat on the computer table, something caught my eye—a bell around its neck. My father had never put a bell on the cat; he always treated it like family.

I removed the bell and discovered a hidden compartment with a syringe and a vial. My mind raced, muddled and frantic, as I spotted a crumpled note attached to the vial. The note was hastily written in my father's handwriting—he was the only one who called me Al.

The note read: "Hey, it's me, Al. I can't explain everything here, but take the syringe and vial, inject it into your blood vessel, and run to our secret safehouse. Do it now. Don't look back."

My thoughts were a chaotic mess, my brain feeling like it was on autopilot after a heavy dose of drugs. The urgency in the note drove me to action. I grabbed the syringe, filled it with the vial's contents, and injected it into my arm. My movements were disoriented as I fled toward the safehouse—an old bunker hidden deep in the woods behind a hill.

My mind was a whirlwind of confusion and panic as I ran. Every step felt surreal, like I was moving through a dream. When I finally reached the safehouse, a searing pain shot through my head, and everything went dark. I collapsed inside, my consciousness slipping away as the disorienting rush of the night's events overwhelmed me.