Date of Origin: January 14, 2021
"I just- Detroit, please," I frantically whimpered into my phone with a whisper, "You have to do something."
"Uh-huh," From the other side of the phone, my friend's voice sounded sluggish, "Oookay... And what would that 'something' be?"
"D-Dammit dude I-" I peeked over the stack of boxes I was hiding behind to check my surroundings before ducking under again, "S-Something! I don't know... You can do, like, everything!"
"Well, what exactly is the issue, again? I couldn't really tell over your frantic sputtering."
"D-D-ggfghh..." An inhumane noise fell through my lips, "I-I got into some shi-stuff again... And they're after me."
"The black market guys?" I heard his voice pique with interest, causing my hands to start shaking as the crushing reality of what I was doing and where I was fell on my shoulders.
"O-Obviously! Now I'm hiding behind a piss-stained stack of boxes and it smells like rotting corpses!"
I heard a scoff of amusement, "Yeah, uh-huh... Probably because there are rotting corpses."
"N-N-No! I-" My face flushed, "Now is not the time to be cracking jokes, smart-guy. Just do your thing!"
"Alright..."
The silence was followed by the furious clacking of a clicky keyboard. I continued to scan the area as quickly and discreetly as possible anytime I heard so much as a rustle of a leaf.
"I can't wait until this is over..." I mumbled through shaky breaths.
"Tch... 'till what's over? You know you got a thousand more lifetimes ahead of you of this."
"Gghh..." I squeezed my eyes shut, "Right..."
"Back onto the important stuff, I was able to get into their car's built-in GPS because I guess these idiots thought an electrical car was a good idea," Detroit continued to type rapidly on his keyboard, "They've all turned around and I sent 'em to IKEA. No one can resist IKEA."
"Ah," I nodded, "That is a good point. No one can resist IKEA, not even sh-shady black market guys," The tremor in my voice began to lighten up with the good news.
"Yeah, so, you're not on the brink of blowing like a bomb, right? 'Cause you know when one of us goes then we're all-" He made a KCHH sound with his throat, mimicking a noise of someone getting their throat cut.
"Don't worry, I'll figure it out, okay? At least to th-the best I can..."
"Mmmhmm," I could hear him take a slurp from a can, "Let me know how that goes."
I let out a sigh through my nose as I finally stood up, gripping the boxes to get my footing from my aching knees and muscles that had been worn thin from all the running it took to escape my doom. It was a temporary relief, but in a whirlwind of chaos like this, any millisecond of nothing but the gentle breeze in your face and the hum of cars drifting by was a millisecond that you would latch on for your entire life... Or, more likely, lives.
