It was another boring day for Vincent Cain, or so he thought. At six AM his alarm clock screeched to life forcing him from his dreams into reality. At Seven ten he arrived to work ten minutes late to find his mother in the arms of a man who was not his father. At seven thirty he gets in a fight with his mother over what he had seen and cancels his dinner plans with her. During his lunch break he gets another college letter denying his admission. At this point he is numb to the disappointment that would usually follow, he hears his mother crying in the backroom afterwards. He spends the rest of the day hiding among the shelves of books in his mother's store and pretends to stock them, in reality he's avoiding her gaze. He thinks about the revolver his dad left in his inheritance slightly but pushes the thought out of his mind. By seven in the evening his mother tells him to go ahead and clock out, which he does without saying a word to her. He places an order for pizza on his way home and picks it up leaving a larger than normal tip because he thinks the girl behind the register is cute, and then heads home for a lonely night of pizza and mountain dew. I've had worse birthdays he thinks to himself as he drives home listening to the radio. He has no idea whats waiting for him. As he steps out of his clunky Toyota into the cold winter air he pauses for a moment, letting the cold sink into his bones. Of all the things he had grown numb too this is one of the few sensations that reminds him that he is still alive.
Meanwhile a woman who lives next to him leaves her shiny red Ford and waves at him "Hey Vincent!" she says passing by. Uncomfortable Vincent gives her a silent wave as he remembers he has left his pizza in the shotgun seat of his car and bends down to retrieve it. She giggles a little bit knowing that getting him to even respond was a small victory and begins to climb up the stairs to the second floor. "Oh by the way" she says stopping to turn to him He looks up from his care to catch her green eyed stare "Someone was here to drop off a package for you but you weren't here, I called the manager and he brought it into your apartment" he pauses for a moment and smiles "Errr...Thanks you" He says shyly as he looks over her. Tight jeans, long boots, close fitting tank-top, she reminded him of his high school crush for a moment, although she had never even noticed he existed. He locks his car and follows his neighbor up the stairs, pizza box in one hand and a two liter of soda in the other. The concrete seems to echo each step off of the building around them obnoxiously loud. As he reaches his door he sets down the bottle of soda and fishes through his pocket for his keys, pulling them out they jingle as he inserts on into his lock and opens his door. "Catch ya later Vincent!" his neighbor replies as he slides into his apartment "Yeah..catch you later" he replies quietly.
Once inside he kicks the door closed and tosses his keys onto his coffee table and kicks his shoes off. The room in dimly lit and smells like cigarettes from an old tenant. Setting down his dinner at the same coffee table he pauses "Oh for fucks sake.." he mutters to himself as he heads back to the door and retrieves the bottle he had set down just outside of it. Cradling the bottle of sugar and caffeine Vincent sits down on his shabby beaten up couch and sighs. "Happy birthday to me..." he sings in a slightly defeated voice. He takes a look around, aside from the couch he was sitting in and the bed in his room he didnt have much furniture, just a stale brown carpet with a variety of stains and whatever he had left laying about. Suddenly a large box caught his eye. "Oh that's right... a package." he mumbled to himself. He strode across the empty room and picked it up setting it also on the coffee table. After opening the box he finds a variety of books, a pouch that jingles when he pulls it from the bag, and a very ornate box lined with psuedo leather and fake gold trimming to make it look elegant and mysterious. At the bottom of a box was a cream colored envelope. As he pulled it out a sheet of white paper slides out which he catches. Unfolding it he sees the unmistakable handwriting of his father.
Dear Vincent,
If you're reading this now then I've probably succumb to my illnesses that have long plagued me before I saw you turn twenty-one. I am very sorry that I could not see my son become a man, but instead I leave you this gift. Its the rules for playing a game called Althanas, which I had enjoyed as a young man of your age as well. It really helped me come into my own and I hope it will do the same for you...
Vincent frowned and looked at the stack of books that seemed to be in great condition. "A gift from after death and it's a Dungeons and Dragons knock off?" he sighs. He graps a slice of pizza and begins to nibble on it as he pulls one of the books to him and begins to read. Time seems to pass him by as he sinks into his read learning about the creatures and nature of the land, before he realizes it he's read three books and four hours have passed him by. Half of his pizza is gone and the bottle of soda is barely a quarter full. He frowns. "Well where are the rules to this game?" he mused aloud flipping idly through anther book. Suddenly the box catches his eye. COuld they really fit in such a small box? He wonders as he reaches over to grab both it and the pouch. Pausing he stops and opens the bag to see a full polyhedral set of dice. "So there is dice rolling" he mutters as he opens the box. One card slides out, the rest empty. Vincent pauses for a moment before picking it up and turning it over. On it a man dressed in mottly dances over a skull, with a scroll like frame with a simple message on it. "0-the fool" Before he could really register anything about the card a cacophany of voices ring through his head in unison. WHERE THE JOURNEY BEGINS suddenly Vincent found himself falling backwards. "What!" he exclaims as he tries to turn midair only to see nothing but black. His apartment is no longer there, in fact he's falling through nothing but darkness.
"You've got to be fuckin-" but before Vincent could finish his sentence he landed face first into a large body of water. Panicked he struggled to the surface and glanced around finding that he was in a small ponds and quickly swims to the shore. All around him seems to be a grass field, and right on the ground by his dripping shoes were two simple things. The box with the Fool card sitting there, and a simple twenty sided ivory dice with scarlet colored numbers.
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