Our Fates are Unknown

A segment of a book I am attempting to write.

 
    Soft urban noises awoke our hero. The sound of cars passing by as the clock quietly ticks on the wall brought him back to consciousness. For a  
moment, Kenton laid there wondering once again what he was doing here. His dream had put him in an ethereal place he had never wanted to leave, and now
he was facing grim reality. The comfort of the place, the soft blowing wind and the silence... if paradise existed, he had seen a small glimpse of it. But
currently, he had to prepare himself for class and forget the fact that he was entering an entirely foreign world. Not just even a different country, and  
entirely different people. What was he doing? He had gone to a random apartment of a woman whom he had met at a restaurant that doesn't actually exist.  
    Slowly but surely Kenton descended the stairs onto the street, heading to another day of class in Russian history. His classes seemed almost irrelevant
to his life now, and our hero looked for any excuse to find something of greater entertainment. Finding a fairly large, clean building along the street,  
Kenton stopped a moment and lit up a cigarette. Inhaling in the thick smoke, he silently stared up and down the street until slowly letting his lungs exhale.  
Someone must've forgotten to throw away their vodka bottle, for it rolled along the side of the street as cars carelessly rolled by. Soon it had lodged  
itself in a street drain, not small enough to fall in nor able to roll it. It simply had stuck, forever to stay there unless hit by another unknowing car.
    The snow suddenly began to fall. Large, fluffy chunks of snowflakes drift peacefully down to earth. Kenton raised his hand out to catch some flakes,  
but the snow itself had already begun to cover his entire body. The tyrannious snow claimed every inch of his body, along with the street, the buildings,  
and its people. Kenton looked up, watching the endless snow from the endless sky. He was one, and they were many. Let the snow claim its world.
    Standing there and staring up at the sky, a bus quietly stopped in front of our hero, opening its doors to a snow covered Kenton. He smiled briefly  
and stepped on. Once on the bus, he looked for an open seat. Slowly his eyes browsed the faces on the bus, most staring straightforward, expressionless. One
girl however, had taken up two seats and was looking out the window. Her legs had been cross sideways on the adjacent seat. The girl was the same one, the one
with the eyes, that he had seen at the Red Jaguar. As he walked toward her, she turned her head and smiled at him, pulling her legs off the adjacent seat.  
    Kenton sat down next to the girl as the bus carried on its way. "Ever heard of search algorithms?" The girl spoke without turning her head.
    "Search Algorithms?"
    "Yeah. Imagine yourself on hilly terrain in the dead of night and no moonlight to allow you to see anything. Let's suppose you need to find the highest
place possible. One possible way is to walk up anything that seems steepest, and if it changes directions, take a few steps towards another direction and  
try again. Another possible way is to simply walk in any direction, hoping you will end up on the highest ground. You would think that the first option  
would be most plausible, the reality is, both options are equally probable."
    "What would you do?" Kenton inquired.
    "...What does it matter?" The bus suddenly stopped and the girl quickly grabbed her purse and moved to get off the bus.  
    "My name is Anfisa, by the way," she quickly searched through her bag and handed him a blank card. "When you need me, you'll know where to find me."
    "But..." She was off the bus before Kenton could ask anymore questions. He looked at the card again, and while he once thought it blank there was  
small watermark that had somehow appeared, displaying a small globe.
    By this time, Kenton was more than lost. He had come to Russia simply to study and live a new life, yet he found himself stuck in the midst of a  
mystery world where a place called the Red Jaguar appeared and disappeared. What could it possibly mean?
    Of course, at the same moment the bus simultaneously passes the Red Jaguar. Kenton jumped up and got the bus to let him off. Stepping back out into  
the street, he stared at his inevitable fate. Cautiously, he walked into the restuarant.  
    Inside was bustling with people. I guess lunch time is a busy hour, Kenton thought to himself. Every table had been taken, and the bar was nearly full
of people, all drinking their quirky drinks. He looked around and noticed the businessmen waving to him from the corner of the room. Walking over, the men  
offered Kenton a cigarette and invited him to take a seat.  
    "Nice jacket--you say your name is Kenton? What an interesting name. Look, my buddy and I want to buy you a drink." The businessmen smiled in a  
friendly, harmless way, motioning over to the waitress and ordering something for our hero.
    "We liked your involvement in our discussion the other night, do you really believe humans have no free will?"
    "Yes, I do." Kenton replied simply.
    "Then surely you must think everything is fated, destined to be."
    "What other choice do I have?"  
    "And what are you doing here?"
    "Now that, I do not even know, as much as I hate free will and an unknown future, my path seems completely obscured."
    The businessmen smiled and laughed lightly. "Such a deep man, you are, when's the last time you had a good drink? Here, this will do you good."
    The waitress had come with the order, a funky zig-zagged glass filled three different layers of colored fluid. Kenton, already apathetic and numb to  
his fate, chugged the drink.  
    "Bravo!" The men cried. "Anyway, we think you should come with us for a moment, we'd like you to see something. It's apparent that you have already
acquired the ability to see more than you used to."
    Kenton had no idea what they were talking about, but found himself almost eagerly following two unknown men who liked his pinstriped blazer to a back
room of the restuarant. As they opened the door, he walked into a small dark room, absent of anything.  
    The men turned to him. "Now, what you are about to see will take you back a bit. Do not worry, this is just like a dream, except no one will recognize
you except us. Please just try to watch, and whatever happens, sticking with us will probably be your best bet, or you may never get out of the dream."
    Kenton's heart dropped a little but felt too compelled to flee. At least this was FINALLY a change of scenery, for better or worse.  
    "Now close your eyes and count twenty seconds, then open them again." Kenton followed their instructions, closing his eyes and counting to twenty.
    When he opened his eyes, he found himself inside an old dusty apartment. Some cobwebs covered stacked boxes, each with random names in Russian  
that he could not understand. Kenton could hear the businessmen talking in a low voice to someone. He walked past the boxes and cobwebs into the adjacent
room, hearing an old squeak,squeaking of a rocking chair. In the rocking chair sat a man, with the businessmen on either side. The man rocked and rocked,  
jerking his head as the men were whispering into his ear.  
    "NO! It's not worth it, I hate them, but it's not worth it.They just don't know me maybe, I don't know. Why doesn't anyone know who I am?" The  
ramblings went on.  
    Kenton meandered into the kitchen as they continued their discussion. An old fridge stood in the corner. Dirty dishes cluttered the counter, and  
mold permeated the air. A small dining room table stood against a wall, covered in papers, magazines, and post-it notes. Some unopened envelopes had been  
covered in writing, as did anything else with blank space. Inspecting the mess, one note read:
 
    This man respects me. I am respected. LOOK at him, he will know I exist.  
 
    It was the mayor's picture in the newspaper. His eyes had been colored in and his mouth had been given vampire teeth. Suddenly, the quiet conversation  
happening in the next room grew louder.  
    "FINE! I'm doing it. If this is the ONLY way, then I'll do it." The man turned around. His nails were long and yellow, his teeth yellow, and his head  
balding. He wore a pince-nez as if from old society, an eerie figure. He threw open the doors of a closet and sorted through his clothes, not even noticing
the business men or our hero. Thrusting his arm into the closet, the grumbling man whipped out a massive, polished, sniper rifle. Kenton gasped, feeling  
his adam's apple rise in his throat and grasping the chair next the to paper covered table.  
    It's just a dream, just a dream. The man noticed none of them, this must be some kind of hallucination. Kenton's knuckles whitened as he gripped the chair  
with all his might. The businessmen casually winked at him.
    Storming out the door with sniper in hand, Kenton could hear the resounding door slam outside. He glanced over to the businessman, calm and relaxed, who had not  
moved away from the rocking chair. They motioned our hero over to them.
    "We know you must be confused, but for now just try to absorb what you can. Please, if you will, close your eyes again. Our work is done, but we  
need you to see something." Their faces were earnest.  
    Kenton took a deep, fulfilling breath, closing his eyes without thinking about his next move. The second his lids closed, he felt his body warm  
and sort of warp without pain, something like children gently pulling on every part of his body. When everything had stopped, he opened his eyes.  
    They were standing on the roof of some old, run-down building that looked out over a highway. Near the corner of the flat roof was the man in the  
dusty apartment, laying on the cement and setting up his sniper rifle. In a short time, a sickness overcame Kenton as he began to realize what was unfolding
before him.  
    Murmuring to himself, this unshaven, unstable person before Kenton adjusted the sniper's focus and began to peer through the rifle. He steadied himself letting out a breathe as he relaxed his shoulders, pointing his gun toward the rush hour traffic on the highway. Kenton's heart began pumping again, and he wondered whether or not this really was a dream. He searched for an answer in the businessmen's eyes, who stood behind him, but they only looked on as this waste case went on his tyrade.  
    Watching with grave intent, Kenton held his breath as the shooter's finger pressed against the trigger. Was he really going to shoot someone in their car, on the highway? Kenton's blazer suddenly felt heavy, as if the material itself was thickening. The thin white pinstripes had gotten wider too. Maybe he was in a dream, maybe it wasn't real.
    But if he's wrong, and these men, these people surrounding him are just some cult of killers, then this would be all on his shoulder. He had to do  
something, before it was too late. Some unsuspecting person, probably on their way to work, was about to be shot. Their family would never see them again.
    The finger pressed the trigger hard this time. Kenton recoiled in fear, then fell into a head-long sprint toward the sniper.
    "NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!" Kenton yelled, the businessmen smiling in amusement.
    A clean shot was heard, and a car on the highway veered off the bridge onto the ground below, flipping upsidedown. Shattered glass and blood covered
the street. All went silent on the roof, and Kenton was stopped in his tracks. Wide-eyed, he watched the sniper pack up his rifle and walk away, still murmuring to  
himself. Kenton felt faint, and everything went black...