Adam's head hung low. His breathing was a slow shallow rasp.
Ropes dug deep into the skin of his wrists.
They bound him tightly to the arms of a rough wooden chair. In front of him stood two men.
Both wore police uniforms. One held a polished metal rod in his hand. The other man simply stood with his arms crossed.
His knuckles were split and smeared with drying blood. It was Adam's blood.
He was in an unknown room.
The air was stale and still. A single bare lightbulb hung from the ceiling casting long sharp shadows.
Multiple bruises decorated his face. They swelled his cheek and split his lip. The metallic taste of his own blood filled his mouth.
[Health: 12%]
[Status: Bleeding, Critical Weakness]
The officer with the bloody hands shook his right hand. He was trying to ease a cramp.
"Kid you should have known your place," the officer said. His voice was flat and bored.
"Why did you have to stand up against people so far above you? It was a simple problem. Now it is a complicated one."
The words cut through the hazy fog of pain. Through the dull ache and the swimming vision Adam processed the statement.
His mind replayed the events. The simple choices that brought him to this chair in this room.
It all began a few days ago on a perfectly normal morning. His mother was in the kitchen.
The smell of toast filled the small apartment.
She hummed a quiet tune as she worked. His father sat at the table reading the news on his phone.
He looked up when Adam entered the room and smiled.
"Morning son. Sleep well?" His father had ruffled his hair. Adam had complained but he secretly liked it. That was the last time he saw them.
They were all he had in the world. He was still a secondary school student. He lived under their care and their protection. They had gone to work that morning just like any other day.
But they had not returned.
He ate dinner alone that evening. He expected the sound of their keys in the lock at any moment. He finished his homework.
The silence in the house grew heavier with each passing hour.
He called their phones. Both went straight to voicemail.
Panic began to prick at the edges of his calm. He waited long past midnight. Hope faded into a cold certainty that something was wrong.
The next morning he filed a missing person's report at the local police station. The officer at the desk seemed uninterested.
He took Adam's statement with a detached professionalism that felt like a wall of ice.
For days Adam received no news. He did not just wait by the phone.
He became a ghost haunting the city streets. He showed their photographs to strangers to shopkeepers to anyone who would look.
He asked questions until his voice was raw and his feet were sore.
He found nothing.
No clues.
No witnesses.
No success.
Then came the call from the police department. An officer's voice was cold and official on the other end of the line.
Two bodies had been found by the old quarry. Their condition was poor. Visual identification was impossible.
A DNA test was required to confirm their identities. Adam felt his heart stop. He went to a clinic and provided a sample.
The wait was a special kind of torture. It was a sliver of hope fighting against a mountain of dread.
The result was a match. The two bodies belonged to his mother and his father.
The world collapsed around him. The people who were his entire universe had been stolen from him.
In the depths of his grief he held onto one single thread of hope. The police would find whoever did this. They were the law. They would deliver justice.
That belief was shattered less than a week later. The police officially closed the case.
The official cause of death was listed as a double suicide.
Adam was stunned. The shock was a physical blow that left him breathless.
He knew his parents. He knew their hopes and their fears. He knew they were planning a small birthday party for him next month.
His mother had already bought the decorations. His father had promised to take a day off work.
Suicide was impossible.
He went back to the police station again and again. He was no longer a scared kid. He was a son searching for truth. He presented his arguments.
He showed them proof of future plans. He tried to make them see reason.
He tried to pressure them to reopen the investigation.
Each time he was met with condescending smiles and vague dismissals. "The evidence is clear son."
"Sometimes you don't really know people."
"You should focus on your own future now." Their words were empty. Their eyes were hard.
That pressure ended today. He was walking home from school. His mind was on what to do next.
A black unmarked car had pulled up beside him. These two officers had stepped out. They didn't ask questions.
They didn't show a warrant. They grabbed him.
One pinned his arms while the other pushed him into the back of the car. The door slammed shut and the world went dark.
They brought him here to this cold dusty room. They began the torture.
Now back in the chair Adam lifted his head.
The movement sent a sharp jolt of pain through his neck. He ignored it. He opened his mouth.
His jaw ached from a previous blow. A slow raspy voice emerged. Each word was an effort a final act of defiance.
"Do you know... who killed my parents?"
The two officers stopped their movements. The one with the bloody knuckles was about to say something but he paused.
They turned to look at each other. A small smirk appeared on one officer's face. The other officer mirrored it.
The smirks broke into smiles. The smiles erupted into loud unrestrained laughter that filled the small room.
It was a cruel sound. It bounced off the concrete walls and drilled into Adam's ears.
The officer holding the metal rod stepped forward. His laughter died down to a chuckle.
He hefted the rod in his hand its weight a comfortable presence for him.
"How many times did we have to tell you?" he asked. His voice was no longer bored. It held a note of genuine annoyance.
He raised the weapon high above his head. "But you wouldn't listen. You just kept pushing."
The rod swung down.
It connected with the side of Adam's head with a sickening crack.
[FATAL BLOW DETECTED]
[VITALITY CRITICALLY LOW]
Adam's vision went white then black. The pain was absolute a supernova that consumed everything.
The sounds of the room faded.
The officer's voice was a distant echo a whisper from another world.
"Whoever killed your parents... they've written your last day too. You should have just let it go. But since you're going to die anyway we can at least do you the favor of giving you a little information before the end."