I regain consciousness some time later. A horrible headache is adding to my free-floating anger.

Wait... why was I angry again? Right, that woman in the Halloween costume was doing... uh... doing something. I guess it probably wasn't a costume though. Wait, where is she anyway?

I seem to have been moved to a new location while asleep. I am now lying down on fairly comfortable bed positioned against the window. The daylight reveals a cozy wooden cabin. I would get up and investigate, but I don't think that's possible for now. Since my legs are securely chained to the feet of the bed. Sigh.

I'm wearing some sort of a simple brown shirt and pants now, so I guess I was changed in my sleep. They're a bit itchy. If I were to make a guess from appearance, I'd say they were cut from a burlap sack. But since no one would make actually clothes out of burlap, it's probably something else.

A lot of things are happening to me without my input recently. I guess that's not too different from usual, though.

I depressed myself again. Get it together Jonathan.

Wait, there's some kind of a hole in the shirt, at about the level of my belly button. It seems to be created intentionally. Or... no, wait, there's no way it would be intentional. That wouldn't make any sense, so I'm going to ignore that possibility.

Through the hole, I notice a ring-shaped bruise is surrounding my belly button. With what happened before I passed out... never mind, I'm going to ignore this as well.

Next to the bed, a table is covered with some objects that look like fruit. I say look like because their identity as fruit is itself questionable. The coloration is a striking blood red, and the surface of each fruit is decidedly scaly. I have an uneasy feeling that they may have at one point been carnivorous. Is this even safe to eat for humans? Is this possibly an elaborate prank?

Oh well. It seems likely these have been placed here for me, and I have a policy to never reject hospitality when chained to a bed. It helps that I'm also really, really hungry.

*****

Turns out there is no need to be so suspicious of the scaly fruit. It tastes a lot like grapefruit. Peeling them is painful, however, because the scales are extremely sharp, fully capable of slicing the skin through casual contact. If I were not so hungry I'm not sure I would still be resolute when receiving so many wounds. I'll have to thank Dad for his training in pain resistance.

As I eat the last one, a familiar figure pushes through the door, backwards. She drags a large carcass of a boar behind her.

On second look, it's not a boar, is it? The tusks and hooves are more or less where you would expect, but unlike a boar, it has 6 eyes, mandibles, and no snout. Its fur is a sickly yellow color that is reminiscent of vomit.

I could swear see one of the eyes blinking at me, as though desperately pleading for help.

With the carcass though the door, Halloween skillfully tosses it towards what I assume to be the kitchen area, where it crashes down with a wet crunch on top of an over-sized cutting board. I belatedly notice that a clean hole extends through the center of its chest, like the path of a high powered rifle. Actually a rifle wouldn't leave a hole quite this clean, probably; it would take something more like a concentrated laser. Coincidentally enough, Halloween's right arm is dripping in red fluid.

For no particular reason, my gaze returns to the chains attached to my feet, and I wonder idly about what tools I would need to break them, and if any such tools might be within arms' reach. These actions are of course a pure coincidence. I cannot stress this enough. Something like fear of a girl in a Halloween costume with fruit juice dripping off her arm won't happen even if I'm chained to the wall. I've changed my mind, it must be a costume. I must have been delirious before.

When I look up, her predatory gaze has fallen on me again, complete with the sort of charitable smile usually reserved for pets that become incontinent during a thunderstorm. Her eyes fall on the empty tray of scale fruit, then on my bloody hands, and the look of pity intensifies further.

But since it doesn't make sense to pity someone as amazing as I am, I can only conclude that her expression instead indicates that she is thoroughly impressed by my ingenuity and fearlessness in the face of pain. I make a mental note that her ability to express emotions accurately may be severely impaired.

"Good morning," she says, in perfect English. "That's the phrase, right?"

"Uh..." I respond, stupidly. I was fully expecting her words to be gibberish again, so I initially don't know how to respond.

"How are you feeling?" she asks, unperturbed.

"Uh, well..." I think a bit. Thinking back to before I lost consciousness the last time, I remember feeling considerably drained, like all my energy was being sucked out with a straw. And then fainting. Didn't feel all that great.

Before that, I was bleeding out from a head wound after hitting my head on a rock. That felt worse.

Compared to that, I feel pretty decent right now, extreme hunger and bloody hands notwithstanding. Yep, not too bad.

"I feel fine, I guess," I conclude truthfully. "Still pretty hungry though."

"Wonderful," she says, sounding pleased. "As it happens, I brought this fellow to solve that problem. It's fortunate I remembered that humans need to eat regularly."

"Uh... yeah. That is... fortunate, isn't it. Could I maybe ask some questions now? About where I am? And who you are? And what happened to me?"

"Are you able to eat it raw?" she asks, as if not hearing anything I'd just said. "Or does it have to be cooked?"

I look at the insect-boar again before responding, one of its six eyes still desperately signalling for help. Sorry, I think it's probably too late for you. Plus, look at me. I'm a prisoner myself.

"Um... truthfully, I'm not sure I'm actually hungry enough to eat that... fellow. Maybe you could unlock these chains and let me look for something to eat myself?" I ask hopefully.

"Nope!" she says cheerfully. "Raw or cooked?"

"...Cooked, then."

"Very well, I'll be counting on you to replace my Mana afterward."

While saying something ominous I don't quite understand, Halloween girl turns toward the insect-boar and advances toward it. The eye starts blinking a lot faster. Sorry dude, nothing I can do. You see these chains?

Almost as soon as she reaches it, Halloween's right arm begins moving at an unbelievable speed, moving in complex directions. Through the boar's body, in fact, and practically without resistance. She doesn't even bother to pick up a knife. Now that I mention it, I can't actually see any knives or cutting implements of any kind from here.

Within a few seconds, the insect-boar thing she'd called a karaak is neatly separated into several hundred meat cubes. She simultaneously throws out the unusable pieces like the bones and organs through a nearby window in a high-speed stream.

Before my brain can catch up to these events, she gestures toward the pile of meat with her palm, and intones a single word with strange force:

"Fuuz." she says. Ugh, it's gibberish again.

Or so I thought, but immediately afterward, a perfectly round fireball appears surrounding the pile of meat, bright enough to blind my eyes. I can feel the heat from here. Less than a second later,

"Refuuz." she says. And the heat immediately disappears.

When my eyes recover, the meat is clearly significantly charred. I want to say, "cooking isn't really about burning things as fast as possible," but I think I'll keep that to myself for now. I'm not sure if Halloween is the type to easily accept constructive criticism.

For some reason I notice a few wisps of blue light swirling around the vicinity of the charred meat, but I think there are other issues currently that seem to have greater immediate relevance.

Although I really want to dismiss this all as special effects, I guess I'll have to accept that maybe I should stop being in denial about this situation and accept it as reality. I think I've come to this same conclusion recently and forgotten it, but what can I say. I'm under a lot of stress lately. It can't be helped if I forget things.

*****

Mom used to tell me that I have 'a tendency to avoid reality' and that I 'only believe what I want to believe'.

"Jonathan, don't just accept what people tell you at face value," she said once, after I got lost following a nice man offering me candy. I wasn't sure what she was talking about, though, since we never made it to the van. There could have been candy. She was just making assumptions. Really, she was just being rude, I thought.

"Strangers won't offer you anything for free. Just because you want something to be true doesn't make it so. Believe in your own eyes and ears, your own judgement. If you stop talking yourself into ignoring your own judgement, you won't be tricked anymore."

"OK Mom," I said obediently. Inside, though, I was thinking about candy. I didn't really understand what she was saying, after all, so I might as well think about something more interesting.

"Jonathan," she said, sounding distressed. "I need your to listen to me. This is important. Honestly, you're even worse than your father."

"Uh huh," I said, of course not listening. Anyway, how many licks does it take to get to the center of a...

"On second thought, don't use your judgement. Use my judgement. Just use my judgement from now on, OK?"

*****

Meanwhile, Halloween (I should really learn her name soon) deftly carries the mound of carbonized boar-insect meat over on a plate and deposits it on the table next to me. She sits on the side of my bed with an unnecessarily flirtatious posture. As I recoil a bit involuntarily, she flashes a wide smile, showing off her abnormally sharp teeth. Her tail waves around quizzically, like a cat staring at an interesting toy.

"Open wide," she says with joy, picking up a piece of meat from the plate, lightly tossing it up and down like a baseball.

"Wha-" I start to say, but as soon as my mouth opens to speak, she expertly throws a piece of blackened meat into my mouth at professional fastball speed.

"GOahg", I continue, sagely, the meat blocking my windpipe. I somehow manage to move past the crisis and swallow it without choking. Much like what I expected, the taste is not too different from my imagination of charred sewer rat.

"Stop-" I manage somehow, but the next piece is flying into my mouth at high speed.

This situation repeats itself until all of the vile meat is gone. By the end, Halloween's eyes are sparkling with barely restrained euphoria.

Can't she find something more constructive to do?!

"Now you're a happy, well fed human, yes?" she says, clearly not intending for me to answer. Not that I could answer, anyway, as I'm currently trying my best not to vomit charred monster bits everywhere.

"I will of course now have to recover the Mana I spent in order to graciously feed you. You are truly lucky to be treated so kindly. Even I am jealous of you."

Even though there are so many points I'd like to challenge here, all I can currently do is cough weakly.

"Just lie back and relax. We wouldn't want to upset your stomach after such a wonderful meal."

Finding a hidden pocket of rebellion, I find the strength to disobey and stare with as much resistance as I can manage while inches away from vomiting. I doubtless struck a heroically defiant pose.

Then she gently pushes my shoulders, and I gently fall back. It's not like she completely overpowered me or anything with just a tiny fraction of her strength, I just suddenly decided to agree, okay? Obviously I just decided to help her out out due to my generous nature. The charitable smile appears again, but since I already know it indicates great respect, it doesn't bother me.

"So without further ado..." she says, licking her lips.

And her mouth closes over my navel again, in a shape roughly matching my bruise. The action is quickly followed by the sensation of energy getting sucked from my body. Again. This time I notice a few wisps of blue gas circling around her mouth, before getting sucked in.

Oh, so the gas is actually coming out of my body. Interesting.

I decide to quietly observe the movement of the blue gas in order to escape reality. Oh, am I in denial again? Oh well.

I wonder if I'll faint again...