I groaned, my eyes fluttering open, and squinted to look at my surroundings. I was sitting on a chair in a dark and empty room. When I tried to move, I felt some kind of cold metal scraping around my wrists.

"Handcuffs. Great, " I muttered.

Then, a thought came to mind. I didn't remember falling asleep.

Shaking my head, I began messing with the handcuffs, using all the tactics I could think of to escape them. Nothing worked and I was left with no choice.

Taking a deep breath, I bit down on my lip as I dislocated my thumb and slipped my one hand out. I repeated the trick with my other hand before stretching.

"Impressive, " a voice said and I froze. Slowly, I turned around, coming face to face with a ridiculously tall man.

He had dark brown hair with matching dark hazel eyes. I'd say he was in his late forties or fifties. I had no idea who this man was but he seemed eerily familiar.

"Hello, person I've never met, " I raised my eyebrows at him and he smiled, stepping closer.

"I apologize. I am Alexander LX."

My eyes widened. "LX? The 60th?"

"You know the Roman numerals very well, " he nodded, a hint of amusement in his voice.

"Uh, thanks. Not to be rude or anything, Mr. Alexander—"

"Call me Alexander, " he insisted and I cleared my throat.

"I'd like to know where I am and if I should be worried at all, " I finished; he tilted his head in confusion.

"Worried?"

I nodded. "Yeah. Wasn't I abducted? Or am I hallucinating?"

"No, but I wouldn't call it something as drastic as abduction. You were simply taken to fix a misunderstanding, " Alexander replied calmly.

"Call it what you want. It's still illegal, " I said but my words didn't seem to faze him when instead, he smiled in response. Suddenly, someone pulled in another chair and Alexander quietly thanked him before sitting in front of me.

"Now, what exactly happened? Start from the beginning."

I told him the entire story, from when I was leaving school to when I woke up here. Excluding the part that River was my crush. "And that's basically what happened."

"I see, " Alexander murmured. My eyes wandered down to the floor as I waited for him to speak when something on his shoes caught my attention. I jumped back, alarmed.

"You're one of them!" I exclaimed while I stared, wide eyed, at the red stain on his shoes. It was clearly blood. Fresh, too.

He looked up at me and smiled. "You're very perceptive... Wait, you did not tell me your name."

"Good. I guess I did something right."

"I'm not going to hurt you—"

"Who are you? Truly?" I cut him off, narrowing my eyes at him. He sighed and stood up from his chair.

"Who I am is not as important as who my son is, " Alexander answered ominously.

"Who is your son?" I asked, slowly and reluctantly. Alexander gave me a small smile while I squinted at him skeptically.

"Meet my son, " he announced as someone entered the room. "His name is River."

My eyes once again locked with the familiar dark green orbs and I touched my forehead, overwhelmed.

"This just keeps getting better and better, " I muttered under my breath.