Derek

You decided you'd had enough of staying indoors. You stepped into a recently opened museum of modern art, lingered by an installation with an incomprehensible title, and then—the wail of a siren, cutting through your ears like a knife through glass.

You didn't even have time to turn around. Only a flash of a shadow knocking over a display case, someone's hands, a grip on your wrist—and then blackness.

You wake up to the smell of gasoline and old faux leather. Your head is throbbing, and the dashboard of some beat-up car is swimming before your eyes. You're in the front seat. Beside you, hunched over the steering wheel, sits a guy—disheveled, with a manic look in his eyes—and in the back seat, the gold statuette you were just admiring glints in the light.

"Where am I?! And what do you want from me?!" you rasp, your voice laced with panic.

The guy turns sharply, and instead of anger, you see a... smile on his face. Cold, calculating, like a cat playing with a mouse.

"Quiet, quiet, princess," he says, his voice low, which only makes the shivers run deeper. "Breathe. I don't want anything from you. I promise."

He flicks a lighter, lights a cigarette, and blows smoke straight toward the ceiling.

"You just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. And, alas, you're the only witness who could rat me out. And I, you know, am not a fan of prison breakfasts. So listen up: from now on, you play by my rules. Be a good girl—and you'll be dropped off at a gas station in an hour as if nothing happened. Try anything—and you won't just disappear. You'll become part of an exhibit. In my own private museum."

He smirked and slammed on the gas. The engine roared, the city blurred past the window, and you realized: this wasn't just a robbery. This was only the beginning.