[2]

Gabriela's Market was a place that Dante had grown quite familiar with over the years, and was a convenience store that he frequented relatively often, especially after finishing basketball practice at school on the days that it transpired.

As it was what the boy pulled up to after he arrived back in the area he lived in, craving a snack for the night before heading home, the boy didn't think much of it.

However, once he entered the convenience store and greeted the cashier, he walked towards the back while searching for what exactly he wanted. It was during that process that the entrance doors opened a second time, the bell resounding throughout the area, when two different voices suddenly began clamoring at the front in a threatening manner, causing Dante to recoil in surprise and discreetly peek his head out from a corner, as he immediately set his eyes on a pair of thugs pointing their guns at the cashier.

It was a robbery, from the looks of it. Not only that, though, because it wasn't hard to spot the purple gang attire notably adorned across their bodies either. This was the work of the Ballas, and as he watched one of them step behind the counter before placing their pistol against the innocent man's head, it was clear that they weren't playing any games either.

From the moment they stepped into the convenience store, it felt like he was witnessing everything in slow motion, or at least in a manner similar to that effect. His adrenaline had shot up, and now he was just waiting for the best opportunity to haul ass out of the area, having completely disregarded his desire for a quick snack.

Eventually, the duo acquired what they came here for, all without even noticing him hiding in the back somehow, as the pair barged out through the entrance and ran towards their getaway car, a driver already waiting for them. Just in that moment, however, a barrage of gunshots rang out, some of them puncturing holes in the vehicle, while the others meaninglessly shattered the store's windows, amongst a few other things.

Uncaring for that, though, Dante's main priority conveyed his desire to escape the building he was currently trapped in, and as a result of that, he followed in their footsteps shortly after the thugs had ran out of the store. In turn, once another car rolled up towards Gabriela's Market, at least three or four guns hanging out the vehicle's windows, it was essentially too late for him to even react.

All the boy felt was a surge of heat that suddenly began coursing throughout his body, which occurred at nearly the exact same time as when the strength in his legs gave way to his face meeting the pavement originally beneath his feet.

Shortly after that, Dante's vision quickly went dark.

----------

Blearily opening his eyes, the first thing he initially noticed was a slight pain around his forehead and in between the eyes that he had occasionally felt due to the sun's blinding rays of light in the past. Aside from that, once he attempted to move his limbs, they seemed almost too heavy to lift, which caused a certain amount of panic to begin rising within him.

Eventually, he turned his head to the side, only to see a familiar view of southern Los Santos through an open window, but since it was accompanied by a nearby monitor obviously meant for his vitals, it wasn't very hard to figure out what exactly might've occurred to result in the boy waking up in such a dizzying position.

He was clearly in the hospital, and it was most likely the Central Los Santos Medical Center as well, as that was the one closest to his neighborhood.

After an indiscernible amount of time had passed, the door to his room quietly opened, which subsequently revealed two medical professionals. While one of them moved towards the monitor, the other grabbed a nearby stool and gently placed it next to his bed before sitting down, a clipboard held in the man's hands.

That slightly unnerved him, for whatever reason.

"You're finally awake, that's good." The doctor softly delivered, careful to not provoke any sort of negative reaction. "Can you explain to me how you're feeling? You've been asleep for quite a while."

It felt like a nightmare when, once Dante tried to speak, nothing came out. He initially thought it had just been a weird figment of his imagination, but as he continued to open and close his mouth, all while attempting to utter even just a syllable in the process, reality eventually stabbed him in the heart with a jagged piece of ice.

The face that the doctor made in the end made it even worse, like the man had known ever since he stepped through the door. In hindsight, Dante supposed that even he should've guessed that there was no possible way he could just live through something as traumatic and damaging as that, and not possess any physical repercussions as a result. What a shame.

Once the tears began to unabashedly fall down his face like a broken dam, the doctor eventually decided to give him some much-needed space, briefly informing the boy that he had been stuck in a two-month long coma before awakening, and that his parental guardian would be made aware of his status very soon.

With nearly half of his body covered in bandages, the boy had a feeling that there would be a lot of shit to work through before he could even walk normally again. He just knew it.

----------

For once, his heart felt warm. You know, full.

Not too long after waking up from his coma and catching himself up on what happened since then, he ha finally been able to look through every letter and card or gift sent to him by the people that had paid him visits over time.

Although it wasn't much, it was still something to acknowledge and take in, and it honestly helped him throughout the duration of his physical therapy that he had no choice but to endure. Most notably, one of the more recent letters had come from Tracey's father, a cryptic man known as Michael De Santa, who initially started it off with describing just how worried and distraught his daughter had been after hearing the news.

That was somewhat nice to hear, even though it was connected to such a negative thing.

The man's letter eventually veered off from that, however, and delved into how he initially didn't really care or even think about the incident, or at least that was the case until he started hearing the topic get brought up more and more at some point. Apparently, once Michael began to feel like he could relate with quite a bit of what he had either accomplished or gone through in his life, his sympathetic nature for others that have been in similar situations as him finally shined through.

…Or something like that, anyway.

He was pretty blunt with most of it though. It honestly kind of hurt reading some parts of the letter, but that was besides the point.

In the end, while Dante was still grateful towards what the man had sent him, as well as what he said throughout his message, he started losing him near the end once Michael began to throw some life advice at him. The boy felt like he didn't need that sort of thing, as he had been living just fine before all of that occurred, but it was just one of those cases where he had been caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Not only that, but he was angry. Ever since he opened his eyes and realized that a bunch of doctors had to go to some relatively-extreme lengths just to keep him alive throughout that whole healing process, there was a fire full of hatred towards those that had forced him into this position gradually building up inside of him while he tried his best to stay strong and not give up as he was surrounded by medical professionals, forced to endure feeling like he was useless and that he should just pull the plug on himself throughout his recovery.

No, Dante would get through all of this. He would continue to live and fight against his own body, uncaring for it's limits. At this point, knowing there was even the slimmest chance of a full recovery, the kid was willing to do damn near anything just to witness the life leave the eyes of those who had wronged him once he got out the hospital.

----------

After nearly two weeks, he was out of the wheelchair he originally needed to move around in.

Once he reached that point, it was all over. The rest of what he was required to do felt almost too easy in comparison, as he started to really get in the groove of things within the later stages of his physically-therapeutic recovery.

It was on the day that he had finally been permitted to leave the hospital, walking just like he once was on his own two feet as the boy waited for somebody to come pick him up, that something very strange occurred. Initially, Dante had thought it was simply a figment of his imagination, but the longer it seemed to linger within his vision, he eventually concluded that it had to have been real.

A wave of multi-colored light briefly washed over his surroundings, before that too dissipated and what was left turned out to be some kind of transparent screen, which was reminiscent of a few videogames he remembered having played in the past.

The only problem was, since he didn't want to get pulled back into the hospital after having just left it for the first time in months, he had to act like everything was normal. It was a very strange experience, all things considered.

Quest Completed!

[Recovery]

Objective: Heal up from the incident that put you in the hospital in the first place.

Reward(s):

[Gamer's Manual] - [Inventory] - [$10,000]

While the first thing his eyes looked towards was the money, he checked out the first reward first, as his stoic mask cracked slightly just from the sheer confusion coursing through him.

Since the manual appeared to be quite full, he glazed over most of it's contents, not really understanding some of the things that were contained within the book. He planned on reading it some more later on, though, so it didn't really matter either way.

Aside from that, the inventory was pretty obvious. He had played enough videogames to understand that reference, fortunately.

The boy wasn't able to contemplate the newfound development much further once a familiar car pulled up to the curb in front of him, however, as a relatively-built black man and fit Hispanic woman exited the vehicle before practically rushing him with tears in their eyes.

All Dante could really do was smile, readily reciprocating their love for him.

He was back.

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If anyone would like to check out the MC's physical appearance, it will be located within this chapter's comment section.