Chapter 1 - Trey's Last Day on Earth

 

Preparations complete.

Initiating vortex and opening gate.

Total earthborn participants registered: 7,988,012

Uploading consciousnesses and DNA sequences to Nirvana Worlds in:

 

  5.

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          3.

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Upload sequence round 2 commencing.

 

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“Reports continue to roll in of missing people as the United States Government issues a press release in Washington today. As stated in previous broadcasts, the phenomenon appears to be concentrated in the Midwestern States - though reports from as far as Canada and Mexico seem to be connected to the incident where, 3 weeks ago, nearly 4 million people simultaneously disappeared... Eyewitnesses state that the people in question seem to have just vanished in-”

The TV was switched to another channel. He hated the news lately, it was the same story over and over again, and none of his family had been UFO’d up into nowhere. He felt bad and slightly worried about what was happening, but he didn’t want to let it get to him. His life was already hectic enough.

Getting back to business, he lowered the pistol and fired. The shot echoed across the small office as the man tied to the metal chair slumped down, his pleas stifled. Ominous silence filled the air, and blood began pouring out along the back of the man’s skull while dribbling onto the plastic sheet underneath.

Trey hid his grimace from the three cronies surrounding him and placed his 9mm Glock back into his black suit-jacket’s holster. Despite the numerous times he’d done this, he never shook the feeling of regret. He had always wanted to live a simpler life… perhaps own a bar, have lots of sex, get drunk on the weekend with friends and play videogames in his spare time. Not that he didn’t do those things now… but it would have been nice to do them without the life of crime.

Alas, his father’s position as a mafia head didn’t allow him to live a life outside the underworld he’d come to know too well. At 28 years old, Trey had killed 22 people and had ordered the executions of far more than that. Every time he did it, he could see the disappointment in his mother’s eyes… her happy, kind little boy had become a cold-blooded killer.

He took out his flask to down some liquor, the silver one he always kept on him. Usually it was filled with vodka, but today it was rum. He’d recently turned to drinking heavily because of the emotional trauma he underwent with this job, and his recent theatrics concerning his ex-girlfriend certainly hadn’t helped. His mother had advised therapy, but how was he supposed to talk to a therapist about killing people? Perhaps she’d just meant the relationship. Hell, he wasn’t even sure if his mother knew that he hated his job. His father did though, and that’d been a constant source of disappointment for the good old pops.

The plastic wrapping underneath Trey’s feet shuffled and stuck to the bottoms of his shoes as he silently walked out of the dimly lit room. He felt a hand on his shoulder as his friend Kyle stopped him with a meaningful grin.

“You alright Trey?”

Kyle was a well-built young man about Trey’s age and had come to be one of Trey’s favorite friends. He was already balding and many jokes at his expense were made regarding the unfortunate lack of hair, but had a cliche dragon tattoo stapled to the top of his head to make up for it.

Trey adjusted his suit-jacket and nodded, brushing his short brown hair back with his fingers to more easily reveal his handsome yet scarred features. He was very self-conscious of the long blatant scar that came across from the top left to the bottom right of his face. The man who’d tried taking his life a couple years ago had come very close to succeeding, but the machete had only done superficial damage. Nevertheless, Trey avoided mirrors as much as he could… and had hated his own reflection ever since.

Letting out a sigh and letting his eyes fall back to his most recent victim’s corpse, he put on a grudging smile. “I’m ok. I just wish I’d picked something else to do with my life…”

Kyle snorted as the other two cronies began cleaning up the mess Trey’d left behind. “You mean you wish you’d been BORN into something else. When you’re in charge of the family, you’ll be making the rules and can change how things are run.”

Trey gave Kyle a nod of acknowledgement, but he knew full well his father wasn’t going to step down any time soon. Throughout his time in the mafia, Trey had known his father to be a kind and caring man to friends and family… while being absolutely ruthless to his enemies. Rival gangs, cartels, and other criminal organizations that dared to get in their way found their families strung up in their own homes before having all their fingers cut off and their tongues cut out. Then, after some time to fully grieve their loss, their bodies would be found stuffed with cement at the bottom of some lake years later. Perhaps this was the safer way, the more successful way to run this business… but Trey wasn’t sure he wanted to continue it if that was the case. He was certainly good at his job... years of training to become the killer his father wanted him to be made sure of that, but he didn’t like it much.

They continued to walk off into the larger central room of the warehouse, and Trey pulled out a handkerchief to wipe a drop of blood off of his right lower pant leg. No doubt it had been backsplash from the bullet he’d put in that cartel member’s head a little over a minute ago. The lights overhead creaked and swayed as a door on the north side opened and slammed shut opposite from where Trey stood, giving him pause to wonder who else was here. They had some girls coming over soon, but they never parked at the back entrance when meeting here.

Kyle looked a little confused as well, walking over to peer around one of the many crates stacked high to their left side. As soon as he did so he let out a low groan, only to be mimicked with a similar groan as Trey turned to the corner too.

“Why the fuck is Chad here?” Kyle asked under his breath so the big man approaching them couldn’t hear. “God I hate this asshole.”

Trey couldn’t agree more. Chad was similarly ranked in the hierarchy of the Bon family, being pretty high up, and was one of Trey’s cousins. He too was a professional killer but was far more ruthless than Trey was, and Trey was convinced that Chad killed many of the people just because he liked it as opposed to actually doing it for any other more sensible reason. Whenever it came to torture or executions, Chad was always the first one to volunteer.

Chad wore a sleek black suit along with sunglasses despite it being not only inside a building, but also nighttime. He was a big man, bigger than Trey was anyways. Trey may have stood a good six feet tall with an athletic build... but Chad was approaching seven; with muscles that Trey was thoroughly convinced were contrived via steroids. Not that Trey cared too much, he truly hoped Chad was using steroids because that’d mean his balls would shrivel up and he’d die of an early heart attack any time now… but perhaps that was just wishful thinking.

Behind Chad came three of his underlings, all in sleek black suits just like Chad, Trey and Kyle wore. As Chad stopped in front of Trey to look down on his cousin with a sneer, his cronies fell in quietly behind him with folded arms.

Trey and Chad stood awkwardly staring at each other in the dim swaying light of the overhead warehouse lamps, with Chad pulling out a cigarette to light and puff on it a couple times as he brushed a hand over his short-cropped marine-style haircut. Eventually he took off his sunglasses, took the cigarette out of his mouth, and blew smoke into Trey’s face with a growing grin.

“Hello Trey. Finished your work here yet?” Chad’s deep voice kept a hint of amusement, though Trey didn’t know why.

Trey folded his arms and stood his ground, his jawline becoming tense as he seriously thought about putting a knife in Chad’s gut just for the good of all humanity. He thought better of it though when he thought about how much trouble that’d cause between his father and his uncle, no need to start a blood feud between the two sides of the family. “Hello asswipe. Why are you in Dallas? Aren’t you supposed to be corralling crocodiles in New Orleans with all the other buck-toothed rednecks you oversee?”

Kyle chuckled and tried to stifle it unsuccessfully as he caught a glare from Chad.

Chad’s fingers flexed, obviously wanting to take out Kyle’s teeth, but controlled himself as he put on a fake smile with his hands sinking into his pockets. “I’m just stopping by to visit the family. Maybe get in on the fun with these cartel wars you and your branch have started up in the past couple months. I’m itching for some action, figured I’d lend a helping hand.”

Trey grimaced and took a look back at the dead man in the room they’d just left, who was currently being wrapped up in the plastic for transport. “I think we’re good. Unless hell starts to freeze over, I think I’ll avoid asking for you or your New Orleans branch to help… after all, I don’t want the feds coming in to investigate after you start murdering children to send a message like what happened last time.”

Chad chuckled deviously and placed a hand on Trey’s shoulder with a firm grip. “Shit happens! If they hadn’t been born to fuck-up parents, maybe they’d have lived. You are too weak-willed for this job Trey, you need to take after your father more. Ford is even a little concerned about how you’ll run things in the decades to come if you don’t shape up that attitude of yours. But don’t worry… I’ll be here to set you straight.”

The white toothy smile Chad gave was a little more than creepy and Trey promptly brushed off Chad’s grip. “Do you have anything useful to say? Or did you just come to fuck with me?”

Chad sighed, putting his hand back in his pocket and shrugged his huge muscular shoulders. “A little of both. I did come to let you know that we have a shipment coming in today, an unexpected arrival. It’ll be at the drop point around 3:00 AM tonight… wouldn’t want you to miss it or it’ll be both of our asses.”

“What’s the shipment of?”

“Cocaine mostly, but we have a couple people we’re trafficking on board too. Some Russian women who don’t speak a lick of English.  How are you and Amanda by the way? I heard you had some problems with your girl.”

Trey felt his body grow ice cold. Chad wouldn’t have asked about it if he didn’t already know, he’d never asked about Amanda before… and Trey could feel his fingers itching for the gun on his side as his heart clenched up at hearing her name. “Amanda and I… didn’t work out.”

Amanda had been the love of Trey’s life, a brunette beauty who’d ended up with a serious case of bipolar disorder that’d presented itself halfway through the relationship. She hadn’t known about what he did for a living, only that he was a successful ‘businessman.’ They’d dated for two years after meeting on a dating app of all things and hit it off well in the first year… but that second year was nothing but every-other-day fights. What were the fights about? Anything and everything under the sun. Despite his best efforts to work things out and fix it, they’d ended up apart. She’d cheated on him when high on one of her manic episodes, he’d found out, and she’d left him for that other guy. That had been the end of it. She’d walked out on him, the woman who had promised him unconditional love, without a single fuck to give. He was still having withdrawals, finding himself already crying as he would wake up every night at 3 or 4 in the morning and have to sob himself back to sleep. He didn’t ever tell anyone about it, but ever since their break up two months ago he’d seriously considered suicide at least three times.

“That’s unfortunate.” Chad’s deep voice cut through Trey’s out-of-body experience down memory lane. “Perhaps I should pay her a visit and show her what it’s like to bed a real man?”

In response, Trey ripped his pistol out of the holster under his jacket and fired into Chad’s left kneecap.

Chad screamed in surprise and pain, falling over on his side to the ground as Kyle, Trey’s other two underlings who’d been carrying the body out of the office, and the three cronies behind Chad all drew out their own weapons and started pointing at each other.

“YOU DUMB FUCK!” Chad screamed in rage, his face a hot fiery red as he glared up from the floor while clutching his wounded knee.

It was a stark contrast to the cold, hollow feeling Trey felt. There was no emotion betrayed upon his features as he raised his pistol to aim at Chad’s head despite the six other weapons being pointed across the ten foot gap in opposite directions. He knelt down, still aiming at Chad’s head, with a stone-cold unsmiling face of someone who would not hesitate to kill.

“If you ever… EVER… talk about Amanda like that again… I’ll kill you. If I even THINK you’re going to try something with her, hurt her, or send your men to do something to her… I’ll personally put a bullet in your head. I don’t give two fucks if you’re family or not… this is a promise. Do you understand me? Look into my eyes and tell me I wouldn’t do it.”

Chad’s rage was intense, but he knew better than to push his luck with the current situation. Instead he just gritted his teeth and thought of how he was going to get Trey back later. “You just royally fucked up Trey. I won’t-”

Trey brutally slammed the butt of his pistol into the side of Chad’s head with a swift motion, leaving a large gash there and knocking the bigger man unconscious. He then slowly stood up and frigidly stared at Chad’s cronies. “Get him the fuck out of here and to a hospital. Now.”

The three men across from him all glanced at once another, lowered their weapons and began to carry their boss out of the warehouse with a trail of blood left in their wake. Trey watched them go with the cold glare of a killer, and wondered whether or not he should walk out those doors now before they left so he could finish the job.

He thought better of it when he again considered the potential complications that would create within the crime family. His father, Ford, would understand his actions after the things Chad had said… but outright killing Chad was a little out of the question. As unfortunate as that was…

Kyle’s gleeful laughter began to erupt from behind him as Trey turned around to see his bald friend holding his sides.

“What’s so funny?” Trey asked, his cold attitude flowing away as a small grin replaced the blank stare he’d had on seconds before.

Kyle leaned against one of the crates and the two other men further down went back to picking up the wrapped body they’d dropped. Eventually Kyle calmed down, though the smile was still very evident. “I love it! You gave that bastard what was coming to him!”

Trey did have a sick sense of satisfaction, that was certain… though over the past ten seconds he’d come to realize what this could mean for Amanda. Sure, they were likely never going to get back together… she had cheated on him... but he still loved her. His heart throbbed and he began to get nauseated as he thought about whether or not he could have just made things worse for her… and the sense of guilt caused him to pull out his flask and take another swig of the vile alcoholic concoction.

He would have to have a serious talk with his parents and brothers to get their input and guidance on what to do next.

“Hey Kyle, got anything on you?”

Kyle raised an eyebrow, lost the grin, placed his hands on his hips and gave Trey a confused look. “Excuse me?”

Trey gave his friend an impatient grunt. “Drugs man. I need a fix.”

Kyle’s features turned into a frown, and although he fetched a bag of white powder from his left back pocket he handed it to Trey with hesitation. “Aren’t you going a little hard recently? I realize that the breakup has been rough on you… I get it, but you’re going to turn yourself into an addict if you keep this up. Or an alcoholic. Probably both.”

“I’ll be fine Kyle.” Trey dismissed him with a wave of his hand. He couldn’t give a rat’s ass about that right now. The waves of depression overcoming him were immense now that Amanda had been brought back up… and burying his problems with drugs, alcohol and sex with random women had been rather good at temporarily fixing his problems. If anything, they’d probably been the only thing that’d helped thus far. He didn’t know why everyone thought they were such a bad thing, because for him… it was a method of coping that worked.

He set out a line of white powder on one of the crates, pushed his nose to the wood and took the hit as his other nostril was kept shut. Leaning back and feeling the cocaine take hold, he enjoyed the creeping feeling of euphoria that began to slowly drown his sorrows.

“When are the girls coming over?” asked Trey casually, as he walked back inside the office, plopped down onto the leather couch and went back to watching the large screen TV. It was some sort of old soap opera, but he couldn’t care less what it was as long as it took his mind off the present.

“They’ll be over in a few...” stated Kyle. “You know how girls are when it comes to getting ready for a night out. Ridiculous. Glad I was born with a giant mamba between my legs. Know what I’m sayin?”

Trey raised an eyebrow and smirked after glancing briefly towards Kyle and then turning again to flip through the channels on the television. “You sure would be one ugly girl. You’re already ugly enough as a dude. You bald fuck.”

Kyle laughed aloud, shook his head, and then snorted in defiance. “Don’t be jealous I get all the babes Trey.”

“Uh huh...” stated Trey absently while lazily staring at the TV screen.

An echoing knock at the warehouse door closest to them brought Trey swiftly to his feet. He made his way across the polished wooden floorboards of the office into the main storage area, high as hell, all the way to the front of the building opposite of where Chad had come in. Opening the door, he saw the beaming face of the girl he had been talking to for the past couple of weeks. Her name was Rachel, and she was gorgeous… but truthfully she meant nothing to him other than being a means to escape his own depression. A means to take his mind off Amanda. Rachel was the daughter of one of their hitmen, and was fully aware of who and what he was.

Perhaps that was a needed change in his future choices concerning relationships.

“Trey!” exclaimed Rachel as she brushed her long red locks away from her face and gave him a big kiss on the cheek. “Why aren’t you ready yet!? You were supposed to wear the blue suit, remember? To match my dress!”

“You can’t tell me how to live my life!” Trey exclaimed in a teasing manner and laughed, trying to look as upbeat as he could despite how shitty he felt.

Rachel poked him in the stomach and headed into the building, followed by her two shorter friends Sara and Abbey.

“WHATUP LADIES!” screamed Kyle obnoxiously from across the room. His eyes stayed glued to his phone as he tapped away furiously. “GIMME 5 MINUTES AND I’LL BE GOOD!”

“You never stop working in your off time do you?” stated Abbey slyly as she came over to hug Kyle from behind. She gave Kyle a peck on the cheek. “Good to see you again Kyle.”

Within a couple minutes the alcohol had been taken out and the small office was lively with music as the girls began to gossip. Talk of work, their futures and what the night would bring them were among the hottest topics, with a laid back hip hop mix in the background.

“Hurry up and change Trey!” Rachel exclaimed and playfully shoved him off the couch. She pulled out a blunt and passed it to Kyle for a light. “I’m anxious to get out tonight!”

“Fine! But don’t get too high, we don’t want you crossfaded.” Trey shook his head and stood up. He didn’t bother to tell her that he was already high on coke and had been drinking for a while now. “Give me just a minute. I’ll be right back!”

Winking, Trey got up from the couch and headed to his room. He rather enjoyed these nights out and it was a good way to take his mind off of the menacing real world problems or feeling of impending doom that multiplied by the day. A few bounding steps and he had crossed the office over to the back room through a small hallway. Upon entering though, Trey began to feel uneasy. A sharp twinge in his chest sent an unsettling shock through him.

Well that didn’t feel good.

Trey gasped as the pain radiated through his sternum and he looked down in concern.

“What the hell?” Trey muttered and sat down on the bed slowly. Another sharp pain ricocheted throughout his abdomen and pelvis. He furrowed his eyes in worry.

If he didn’t know any better, he’d say this felt a lot like a heart attack. His hands felt clammy, he began to sweat, and a dull ache began to throb in his chest. Had that line he’d taken been too much?

“Kyle, come here for a second…” Trey called out loudly with an undertone of worry. He was way too young to be having any heart problems… but then again he’d heard of young people dying from overdose before.

Fuck.

But before Kyle could make it to the room, Trey’s world went black. It would be the very last time he’d ever see the inside of that room, and he would never forget the way Rachel’s perfume lingered in his nostrils during the final moments of his life on Earth.

If only it could have been Amanda’s instead.