Mistaken for a Mission

Spring was finally settling into a super long summer. And I sure was excited about it. Yes, summer is tiring and endless, but I admire its consistency. Also, you can have countless ice creams, go for a swim, wear pretty dresses, enjoy longer days, and have so much energy the entire day to go on adventures.

I was blissfully making summer plans when the heat made me suffocate. It was an ordinary afternoon, a bit hotter than yesterday. Also, the rise in humidity had made staying indoors insufferable, so I trotted outside for an afternoon walk.

 

I stood under the shade of the big tree in the backyard and looked at how it had shed so many leaves to welcome the season of growth. I was walking on a blanket of dead, crunchy leaves. Suddenly, I spotted something sparkle in the mass of brown; I bent down to pick it up. It was a weird coin; its notation was blurred out and not visible clearly.

 

It started to sparkle brighter and grow warm in my hand. I felt myself being pulled towards it until the pull became too strong. I tried to keep my feet on the ground, but the coin whisked me off it, and I fell into a black abyss.

 

I soon landed back on my feet and looked down at myself, and my jaw dropped; my clothes had transformed; I was wearing a fabulous black jumpsuit just like in those incredible spy movies, and looking about, I realized that I had teleported right on the set of one.

It was a big dark room illuminated with neon lighting. And big screen all around. Weird gadgets and tech stuff stood on the walls, and many other people were in the room, too. All the girls were wearing black suits like mine, and the men had white costumes, which were a bit out of place, but who could stand against the costume designers? Before I could tell someone I was on set by mistake and had no script, the screens around the room flickered to life.

 

An older woman, dressed meticulously in a black suit, her grey hair in a pristine bun on her head, peered over us with her round spectacles before announcing, “Agents, your next mission is essential for all of us; you need to get through it or die trying. All the best.” The screens blacked out, and the lights shut, but somehow, no one screamed, not even a single hoot, not even from me.

I waited for the director’s cut because I couldn’t have come on a mission. Could I? Especially the one involving death, shouldn’t my first mission be stealing something from the house of a weak and old villain with just two bodyguards?

 

Well, the coin in my hand had its other plan, and like any weird sci-fi film, I had transported to my next location, defying the fundamentals of physics.

Air flew out of my lungs as I saw where I was. It was dry ground with gravel stretched about, and the trees grew heavily. It seemed like we had arrived in a forest clearing. The extreme humidity and heat suggested it was a rainforest. But as I turned around, I saw we were at the bottom of a mountain with smoking on top.

Can we pause for a minute? Is that an active volcano? Why are we at an active volcano? I don’t like this at all.

 

But to add to my discomfort, I saw people emerge from the woods in the clearing. My teammates and I were being corned, and then chaos broke through. Everyone went to fight the bad guys, with kicks and punches flying about. Pocket knife slashing through and gunshots being fired.

I valiantly ducked behind a bolder. My head was spinning, my stomach churned horribly, and my chest was constricting with a panic attack. I tried to get my bearings, but I still couldn’t understand why I was mistaken for this mission; I wasn’t cut out for this stress level. I looked at the coin still in my palm and tried to read the words on it.

‘The chosen one,’ it read. This was an extreme level of a fiction adventure story. I can’t be the chosen one. I didn’t feel special at all, but my teammates were falling. I saw all the white men fall. We were going to lose if I didn’t spring into action.

 

I walked out of my hiding spot and tried to concentrate to bring out my inner Hulk, but I managed to freeze on the spot and be tied up with the remaining agents. So, much for walking out of the safe place, I acted like a stupid horror movie actress, the one who would probably die before the interval.

 

We were loaded onto the jeep that started to make its way up the mountain. I tried to concentrate on my surroundings, but the noises seemed muffled, and the lights seemed sharp to my eyes as my head was still throbbing painfully. The extreme heat was choking me, and my throat felt like sandpaper. We reached the top and were forced out near the crater's edge. Heat blew in my face, and my body broke into a sweat; I squirmed in my bounds with discomfort.

 

I could hear them discuss a ritual and blood; I didn’t like the idea of blood and ritual together. Instead, I was happy to be left free to walk away. But being chosen comes with the perks of being the first to be placed on the platform.

 

When they were coming for me with the syringe, I knew this was my cue for breaking free from the ropes tying me up and hitting the crazy guy in front of me with a solid round kick, flipping back and pulling out my two draggers and getting into my better than Black Widow spy mode to knock all of them up.

But all I could do was let out a pathetic scream as the scringe was plunged into me. I thought scraping my knee was painful, or getting bit by a wasp was actual pain, or falling from the scooter was horrible. But giving out three bottles of blood was agony metamorphized. It was hell rationalized.

I grew weak, and my knees clacked as I slid on the ground. I felt my hands and feet clammy, and my steady and strong BP fell. I saw black spots flash before my eyes, bile rose in my throat, and my stomach felt queasy, trying to heave out the bits of food it had.

But I was too drained even to breathe correctly; my eyes began to shut. All I could feel was the scorching heat from the ground and my body trying to breathe. The ground felt good, though a bit soft but secure, and its heat made me break into a cold sweat.

 

I opened my eyes; I was back in my room; the bedside table held the set of next pills and a glass of water that I used for my parched throat. I stretched, my head no longer spinning, and it seemed I was back to normal temperature. I got up and decided to complete some college assignments. Viral fever will take some days to recover, which meant the mission was still on.