Restart Again: Volume 1 by Adam Scott (pocket ebook reader TXT) 📕

carpet at my feet. The room was dark, with only two small gas lamps lighting the barren grey metal walls. Slamming the door shut, I pulled off my heavy coat and threw it across the room, followed by my gloves and hat. They landed in a pile on the floor, next to the chair which was the intended target.

From the next room, I heard a small shriek and the shattering of glass, followed by quick footsteps leading towards the door across from me. I ignored the approach, instead going about the task of setting a kettle of water to boil with a heating coil on the countertop in the kitchen area. There was a timid knock as the door creaked open slowly. A small, high voice called out to me. “S-sir? You didn’t return on time from your meeting with the Council, I was worried...is everything alright?” 

I slammed the kettle down on the coil and turned towards the voice. “I don’t know, Alda, does everything seem ALRIGHT to you?!” I flipped the switch on the burner and small sparks crackled from the base to the iron kettle. After a moment, it set into its usual hum, and the coil began to heat. I paced over to my pile of clothes on the floor, picked up the coat, brushed some dirt from the collar, then turned and threw it across the room again. “Fuck!”

Alda recoiled at the outburst. “I-I-I’m sorry!” She ran after my jacket, apologizing the whole way. “It was a stupid question, I’m sorry. What can I do to help, sir?” Her small frame disappeared from view for a moment, completely enveloped in my thick coat, then reappeared at the coat rack. Her demure figure was clothed in a traditional maid’s outfit, slightly disheveled from rushing around after me. Her eyes were wide and worried, a pale icy blue, and her young face was flushed. Silver hair flowed down and covered most of the right half of her face as she moved.

“Nothing. You can’t do anything to help.” The kettle had started to whistle, and I crossed to remove it from the heat. Through habit I unconsciously went through the motions of making tea as I stewed in my anger. “The Council, in their infinite wisdom, have decided that I am the ‘Chosen One’ and must travel south at once to stop the rise of the ‘Devil Worshippers of Bahruut.’ What a bunch of fucking nonsense.” I sipped on my tea, burning my tongue.

“No, you can’t leave! If you’re gone, the lab will close down, and then I’ll…” She trailed off, looking down at her awkwardly fidgeting hands.

My rage left me all at once. Though she was trying her best to hide it, the pitiful sniffling sounds told me Alda had started to cry. Oh, now you’ve done it, asshole, I cursed myself silently, realizing too late that I was taking my anger at the Council out on her. I set down the tea and put a hand on top of her head, lightly fixing her hair. “Hey now. You don’t have to worry about that, Alda. I promised you, right?”

She tilted back and looked up at me, her head only just high enough to reach my sternum. Tears were welled up in her eyes, and the adjustment of her head sent them streaming down her cheeks. “But, the C-Council said—”

You put her through this too often. “Since when have I ever cared what the Council says?” I laughed, scratching her head playfully. “Besides, our work here is way more important than some southern cultists, right?”

Alda smiled, her face now awash with happiness and relief. “Right!” She leapt forward and hugged me around the waist for just a moment, before stepping back. Though her face was flushed from crying, I saw her blush even further. “Sorry, sir, I got carried away.” She wiped the streaks from her cheeks with the back of her sleeve. “I’m glad that you’ll be staying...but won’t the Council force you to go?”

I tilted my head to the side, thinking for a moment. “Well, I suppose they can try.” I looked down at her after a pause and returned her smile. “Are you going to let them take me away?”

Her laugh was infectious. “They won’t make it past the doorway!”

“Great! Well, with that settled, we should probably get back to work. Jaren didn’t leave his lab to me so I could sit around whining in it, right?” I clapped my hands and looked around, now reinvigorated in my work. “Were there any developments while I was gone?”

---

Memories from Hedaat were still open wounds for me, and I did my best to clear it from my mind as quickly as I could. Dwelling on that will not make my stay in this cell better. I clapped my face lightly in my hands and shook my head, vocalizing random noises in an effort to reset my mental state. Okay. Tonight is the night.

I sat cross-legged in the center of my cell, motionless aside from the rhythmic rise and fall of my chest. There was no way to measure the passage of time in the dungeon, but I found the quiet to be soothing and didn’t mind the waiting. Eventually, the silence was broken by the echo of footsteps and clinking metal from the hallway.A metal tray appeared, carried by the usual city guard. "Mealtime, prisoner." His gruff voice barked out, same as always. He shoved the tray through the slot at the bottom of the cell and retrieved the empty one I had pushed into the hallway after my previous meal. Without another word, he turned on his heel and left, footfalls fading away into silence once again.

The meal, as always, was unappetizing. After the third day of exactly the same food, morning and night, I had stopped tasting it altogether and ate only out of necessity. With such a lack of substance to the meal, every bite was important. When the tray was clean