I woke up. Again. I don't know how many times this has happened to me now... hah...
Usually, I'd just stay like that, waiting for sleep to take me back. But the woman's words kept repeating in my mind.
'Once you wake up, you should be okay enough to move.'
So I tried it.
I tried to open my eyelids. and to my surprise, they did! Quite effortlessly at that!
For the first time I took a good look around. The room was dimly lit. On my right were a series of instruments I didn't recognize but felt that they should belong in a hospital.
On my left was a window. I took one glance, then looked away, only to do a double take and look back outside.
It was pitch black. With countless blinking lights scattered throughout. Space. I was in space.
MOTHERFU-
*Creak...*
"Oh my~ Looks like your awake."
I sensed her before I saw her —the steady presence at the door. The quiet rhythm of movement that felt grounding when she approached.
When I finally turned to look at her, I froze. She was... beautiful, to say the least.
The doctor stood there, brown hair touched with soft pink accents that caught the light. Glasses framed calm, intelligent eyes. A small mole rested beneath the corner of her lips, drawing my attention no matter how I tried to look away. Beneath her white coat was a simple dress and a black skirt, ordinary but painfully different for me.
"How is your body? All good?" She asked.
I didn't answer. Or rather, I tried to, but my voice won't come out. Was it because I was stunned breathless or was it because I hadn't spoken for so long that I'd forgotten how to speak? Probably the latter.
"Hmm..." She leaned down and touched my throat. "Nothing seems to be the problem. Try to speak, will you."
"Ah... Ahh... AHHH!!! AAAAHHHH!!!!" A scream tore at my throat, the moment I tried to speak and I promptly collapsed. The fear, the trauma, everything I had bottled up ever since that psycho, let itself loose.
She stepped back at first, startled, then approached me, calmly patting my back.
"It's all right, let it all out. I don't what happened to you, but it seems to have left a mark." She said as she sat down beside me, already grabbing a glass of water.
We stayed like that, until I finally quietened down, trembling slightly but better overall.
"Done? All out?"
I nod.
"Great. You need more time? Or should I... give you some space?" She asked.
I shook my head.
"W-where am I. Where is this... The last thing I remember was dying." I croaked out, my voice raspy from the crying.
"Dying huh... Tell me more clearly."
"I... I was killed, by some psychopath who entered my building in broad daylight. I was tortured for god knows how long before I died."
"Hmm... sounds like a standard case of reincarnation..." she said, tapping her chin as she pulled out a notebook from her coat pocket.
"Do me a favour and tell me everything. From start to finish." She said.
I complied. I told her everything. Leaving nothing out.
Why would I do that, you ask? Well, she was the closest thing I could call to support, now. and... well... I really needed to vent. To get this weight off my heart.
Once, I was done, she tapped her chin thoughtfully again.
"You know... I don't know if your a lucky man or not. You died unlucky. You lived lucky. Reincarnation isn't that easy to experience. Not to mention, Since you ended up at our company when you reincarnated, the most likely factor is that FATE arranged for it to be so." She said smiling lightly.
"Fate...?" I croaked out.
"Ahh... right. You don't know that do you. Well, Ahem. Let me explain. FATEs or Federation of Ageless, Transcendental Entities is the Main governing body of the Multiverse. They primarily control the strength and powers or God level entities like Zeus, Odin, Cthulhu and Whatnot. They don't let gods interfere with the exchange of souls between the Underverse. A universe, specifically for the dead. But then again, there are exceptions. Like you for example. FATEs specifically choose some induviduals on their way to the UnderVerse and send them to us. One way or the other, as recruits. By us, I mean CADE-C." She said pointing at the logo on her coat.
"But that's enough from me. Let's go. The big man is wait for you." she said grinning as she headed to the door.
I stayed there, dazed from the information dump.
So... I was in... space...? At a place called... CADE-C? Fuck. I didn't sign up for this. Let me die in peace man!!
"Coming?" She asked.
"I... yeah." I said, and proceeded to get up, only to wobble and fall face first. Again.
"Oh my. looks like your motor neurons are sluggish." She muttered as she quickly moved to help me up. Well, she couldn't I was too heavy.
Sighing, she went to the door and called out someone.
Moments later, a man entered, and picked up like a baby, before carrying me out and setting me down on a wheelchair that was already prepared.
"This sucks..." I muttered
"It does." She agreed as she walked beside us. The man was pushing the wheelchair.
We exited, what I assumed, was the medical block and headed to a... circle?
"From what you told me, I assume you're from earth? Right?" She suddenly asked as we stepped onto it.
"Yeah...?"
"Then you must've never seen this before. Hehe. Be careful. This'll be nauseating~" She said, chuckling before a hologram appeared in front her.
"To the recruitment office please, Cai." She said.
*VMMMMMM!!!*
The circle lit up with Blue lights and we were teleported away.
The feeling was... weird. It was like, my body was being transported to a different place one-by-one.
Like, I felt my arm detach and disappear. Then my other arm. Then my legs, my torso and finally, my head.
It was supposed to hurt. But... I don't know why, but it didn't.
When I blinked my eyes open, we were in front of a door. a giant wooden door.
The nurse knocked on it once. Oh right. I never asked her name. Need to do so. I owe her a thanks.
A few seconds later, a quick grunt came from inside.
She turned to me, smiling. "You can go in~"
"W-wait. What is going on?" I stammered.
"You'll know soon~ Try not to piss the big man off. He's grumpy today." She said, winking at me as I was rolled into the office. It was huge.
Everything looked like it was made for a giant.
Sure enough, thundering footsteps sounded from behind the massive desk. I couldn't see past it because it was too big.
A man appeared.
He looked... sickly. Like he missed quite a few days of sleep. Dark circles under his eyes. A certain slouch in his posture that one can see in people who pull all-nighters. His hair was maroon in colour, and he wore a crisp shirt with a CADE-C logo on it.
"Well hello there kid." His voice boomed.
I winced. My senses... they weren't used to the noise anymore. Just a few days ago I was so used to the silence. Now, it had been a cacophony of sounds throughout the last two days.
"I don't have much time to waste. So listen up. You have one choice. Well, actually two. But the other is... non desirable. Anyways, the thing is, I officially Invite you to join CADE-C. Take it or leave it." he says bending down to take a good look at me.
"Uh... wait. This is too sudden. I... I don't even know what this is. I... Can't I just go back to my world?" I ask. I was shaking in my clothes the entire time. This... this guy was terrifying.
"Nope, kid. We can't let you go back to your world. It'll disrupt the timeline. Then we'll have to label you as an anomaly and be forced to detain you. Not gonna increase our own work. We have enough on our plate as is. Anyways. If you don't want to join, then I might as well feed you to our anomalies. Can't have enough feed." he says, standing back up, and towering over me as he stretches.
"W-wait! I don't want to die!"
"Then join us."
"But I don't want to join!"
"Then die."
"..."
"..."
The silence stretched.
It wasn't awkward.
It was intentional.
The man watched me the way one watches a clock tick down. No impatience. No anger. Just certainty.
Finally, he sighed and rubbed his face with both hands.
"Kid," he said, voice dropping from thunder to gravel, "you're misunderstanding something important."
He straightened, rolled his shoulders, and snapped his fingers.
The room changed.
Not physically—no explosions, no dramatic lights—but my senses screamed.
The walls hummed. The air felt thick, like breathing through syrup. All around the office, something howled. It wasn't loud, but it was wrong—like sound scraping against the inside of my skull. The office was alive. It was watching me.
"CADE-C doesn't recruit," he continued calmly. "We process."
He gestured lazily to the space beside me.
The air folded in on itself, peeling back like wet paper.
I saw it for half a second.
A corridor with cells that stacked endlessly. Inside them were creatures from people's worst nightmares. The moment I looked at them, their eyes—too many to count—turned all at once staring straight at me, piercing my mind.
'When you gaze into the Abyss, the Abyss gazes back.'
I shuddered at the sudden thought.
Something barrelled down the corridor, straight towards me, before slamming against some unseen glass.
I screamed.
The corridor vanished.
I was sobbing before I realized it.
The man crouched down in front of me, elbows resting on his knees, eye level now. Up close, I could see it—his exhaustion wasn't human. It was the weariness of someone who had been making impossible decisions for far too long.
"That," he said softly, "is option two."
He stood back up.
"Option one?" He snapped his fingers again.
A clipboard appeared in his hand, absurdly mundane.
"You join CADE-C as a Containment Class Field officer. I've read your file. You were a mystery writer. We could use your brain. In return, we house you. Feed you. Train you. You work when we tell you to work. You survive."
He glanced at me.
"Mostly."
I wiped my eyes with shaking hands. "Y-you said you wouldn't let me go back."
"Correct."
"Then why—why would joining change anything?!"
He smiled.
Not kindly.
"Because right now," he said, voice low, "you're a recovered asset."
The words made my stomach twist.
He leaned down again, close enough that I could smell coffee on his breath.
"We pulled you out of a cryogenic pod in a Lab we raided. Frozen. Alone. Stripped down to whatever data they could extract from you. That means two things."
He raised one finger.
"First—someone out there still wants you. Maybe to finish what they started."
Then a second.
"Second—without our protection, you go right back to being a test subject. Maybe not by the same people. But someone will find you."
He straightened and took a step back.
"CADE-C doesn't erase people we rescue," he said flatly. "But we also don't let them wander off with classified scars and unfinished experiments in their blood."
His eyes hardened.
"So you don't join to change your fate."
A pause.
"You join so it doesn't repeat."
Saying this, he flicked a something cold into my hands.
A card.
Black. Matte. Heavy.
CADE-C was embossed across it in silver. Beneath it, in smaller letters:
Field Officer -Containment Class
My name was already printed on it.
"I don't—" My voice cracked. "I didn't agree to this."
"Sure you did," he said, straightening. "You just haven't said it out loud yet."
"I don't want to join!"
He shrugged. "And I don't want to be awake for another seventy-two hours. Life's full of disappointments."
The floor rumbled again. That distant howl returned, closer this time.
He turned toward the door.
"I'll give you ten seconds," he said over his shoulder. "After that, I file you as 'Offer declined. Fed to anomaly corridor No.732'"
The door began to open.
Darkness pooled beyond it.
"Ten."
"Nine."
My chest felt like it was collapsing in on itself.
"Eight."
I looked at the card.
"Seven."
I looked at my hands—still shaking, still human.
"Six."
"I—"
"Five."
"I'll—"
"Four."
"I'll join!"
The door slammed shut.
Silence snapped back into place.
The man exhaled, long and slow, like someone finally setting down a heavy load.
"Good," he said. "Welcome to CADE-C, kid."
He turned, already walking back toward his desk.
"Vellinson outside will take you to the orientation. Try not to die before then." With that, he went back to work.
I stared down at the badge in my hands.
It felt heavier than it should have.
Somewhere deep inside, something whispered that I'd just made the worst decision of my life.
And that CADE-C was counting on it.