I woke up in what seemed to be a basement. I felt groggy and my throat felt dry. I reached for some water but I couldn’t see any. Disorientated, I looked around at my completely unfamiliar surroundings. There didn’t seem to be anything in the room at all.

“How the hell did I get here?” I wondered. “Wait? Am I lucid dreaming??”

I tried to make something happen. Anything. Nothing happened. “That’s weird… I thought I had a vivid imagination…?”

I suddenly noticed a cup of water beside my bed. Had it always been there? Was I finally harnessing the power of my mind?

The water was crisp. They really had the good stuff in dreamland.

I relaxed back into the bed, trying to think calm thoughts to not wake up. I knew today was a Thursday after all, and I wanted delay reality as much as I could. I had been working so much overtime recently that my days were starting to blur together, and most nights I didn’t even remember putting my head on the pillow.

Wait - SHIT!

I bolted upright. Did I buy any food for breakfast on my way home last night?? I couldn’t remember doing so… What was I going to eat when I woke up…?

I put my head on the pillow and tried to avoid reality for just a little while longer

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Special Forces Agent ‘Nice’ observed the subject. Unknown to the public, there were some supernatural phenomena that existed and was well studied, but only the top brass of a select few nations knew about it.

Aliens were making telepathic contact with about one in 100,000 humans, and were guiding them in science, mathematics, and technology. For what purpose no one was completely certain, but there was a reason that technology had advanced more in the last 200 years than the thousands of years prior… It also wasn’t a coincidence that many of the so-called ‘geniuses’ in that time period were more than a little detached from their sanity.

He looked as the subject woke up, and looked around with obvious disorientation. The subject seemed to look around wildly for a moment, before noticing the glass of water on his bedside table and drinking it.

What person would wake up in an unfamiliar room and drink a glass of water on their bedside table? The subject was obviously lacking rationality, which was common among the Tainted.

Next the subject seemed to lie back down despite the obviously unfamiliar setting. However, he seemed to almost jump out of bed. Agent ‘Nice’ smiled at the look of horror on his face.

It seemed Subject ‘69’ had finally noticed he couldn’t communicate with the aliens from within this special facility. He watched as the subject slowly laid back down into bed, with denial and grief clearly written across his face.

Agent ‘Nice’ felt vindicated. His fellow agents had thought it unlikely this subject had been Tainted due to his profession, but with all this video evidence it would be clear to all who was getting the last laugh. While the Subject may feign at sanity later, and perhaps even regain a semblance of it eventually once the influence of the Taint diminished, this first awakening combined with all the circumstantial evidence was good enough to serve as a textbook example of someone Tainted.

Subject 69 in the prison in front of him fit all the classic symptoms. He was a recluse, having no family and only calling even the closest of his few friends once every couple of months.

He was also devoted to his work, putting in excess of 100 hours week after week.

On top of that, when Agent ‘Nice’ looked at him work through his work laptop's camera, it appeared the subject would often look into empty space for extended periods of time, before furiously drawing as if having divine inspiration.

While Agent Nice couldn’t understand what was so important about cartoon girls(?) with cat ears, he knew it must be one of the alien’s demented plots to subverts humanity’s culture, so he had been studying the alien-inspired propaganda diligently. After all, If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles… Though this enemy was admittedly hard to understand

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END OF PART 1

I may write more, but I have to wake up for work in 6 hours so its not just Subject 69 that has been trying to avoid reality for just a bit longer :P