17 Ch.17 I am

'There's no good way I can explain this. I already showed I'm too smart, they've clearly never heard of different languages, I don't fit in to any other cultures, and I clearly had no knowledge of the world. Do I tell the truth? Would they study me if I did? Do I lie? Fuck me. I don't even know how I ended up here so can I even tell the truth? Nothing makes sense and I don't think that anything pos-'

"Cyrious it's time." Lys' voice took me out of my own thoughts. She was standing in front of me which shows how unaware of my surroundings I was. I looked up at her and she had a neutral look on her face.

"How many people am I speaking to?" Public speaking is definitely the worst case scenario here.

"Don't worry about that, just make sure you're honest." She signaled for me to follow her.

'Damnit' No response definitely means too many people. We began walking and the floor we were on was similar to office floors in business buildings. No carpeting but hard wood floors and not many desk around, I could not even guess what people do here. I don't even know where I am. When I asked where we were going I only got told the "Association Headquarters" and I'm still not sure what the association is even though I've heard enough about it. Then when we went to travel her I got put in the back of a nice looking car, and instead of being able to sightsee the city as we were moving, the inside windows darkened.

The added stress of not knowing if they think I'm a threat hasn't helped me at all. I thought being a new world might be cool but this is just too much stress for me to handle right now. As we navigated through the office space the lack of windows concerned me, it made the room feel more like a prison than anything else.

Eventually I noticed we were approaching a windowed room, and inside I could see a large group of people gathered at a table. I noticed the doctor, Adrian, and Guard sitting together which brought me a little relief as familiar faces are easier to deal with. Everyone else was a stranger, but one man stood out in particular.

He was standing on the side of the table staring at me as I walked to the room. From the distance I couldn't judge his height but I know he's tall, then again everyone is taller than me right now. He had a build of football player, wide shoulders, large biceps, but you could clearly tell he was aged as well. His hair was mostly black but gray hairs could be seen coming in and he wasn't balding but his hair was short and thick enough to prevent having his scalp visible. The sides of his head were almost shaved while the top maybe grew out to more than a few inches. His gaze was the most uncomfortable thing to look at, I could tell he was trying to get a gauge on me, his green eyes seemed to stare into my soul. Lys opened the door and I walked into the crowd of stares. Being in front of him he seemed to be about 6'2 (188 cm)

"Hello Cyrious, and welcome to our meeting room." The old muscular man greeted.

"Hello" I reply

"I am Director Twain current head of the association, and all these people behind me are either Heroes or associates with us." I nod at them. "Now the reason you've been brought here today is simple, we want to help you get back to where you belong. In order to do that, we need to know how you ended up in the middle of our city." His tone was kind, but his eyes were cautious.

"Well uh, Director, I don't know how I came here." I said while trying and failing to keep confidence in my voice. He looked at me clearly wanting me to continue. "I just woke up in in the alley, I waited for a little before going anywhere, I thought someone brought me here and would have done something to help, but no one showed up." At this point I was looking around at everyone to avoid his gaze, but the combined stares of everyone else brought difference. "So I started walking and was trying to look for someone who looked like they could help, but I got tired so I walked back into another alley to rest. And then that's when I saw Guard fighting that man and yeah. That's all I know." I looked back at him to see if he believed me or not and he was staring into my eyes again.

After a short and very uncomfortable staring contest he he glanced at Lys behind me and back to me.

"I see, you don't know anymore than we do, that's unfortunate." The pressure I felt dramatically lessened as he finished his sentence. "However-"

'Fuck me' I think

"In order to help you go home, could you describe where you're from? Who your parents are? Or what you remember before ending up here?" The pressure immediately came back. "For example do you remember the name of your country?"

'Lie or truth, lie or truth, lie or truth' the only phrase going through my mind is that. In the midst of his stare I decided.

"I do remember." I say. Everyone's eyes raised as the people seated turned and looked at eachother. "I was born in the United States."