McDonald’s Sprite

I am blindfolded in an empty room.

A woman in a lab coat stands adjacent to me.

My palms are sweaty in anticipation of what I am about to receive.

I am told there is liquid substance in front of me.

“Taste it,” the woman exclaims.

Her voice echoed with uncertainty and fear. I pick up the substance and feel a sensation before it has even touched my tongue.

I have just made a horrible mistake.

The psychedelic nature of the substance I had just consumed overwhelms me immediately.

My senses burn.

“Why?” I shout.

“Why?”

My mind races and is overcome with anxiety.

I breathe heavily.

I beg to God for mercy.

He cannot hear me.

Nobody but the woman in the lab coat can possibly hear me.

As loudly as I try and scream, I am completely and terribly alone.

Grasping the reality of the situation, I take a few deep inhales. My body begins to calm down.

My senses still burn, but I can think clearly.

Although I had only a fractional taste of the substance, I know exactly what it is.

I begin to articulate two words that I never thought I would have to say. Two words nobody should ever have to say.

With what is left of the clarity of my mind I utter those two dreadful words.

“McDonald’s Sprite.”

The woman in the lab coat puts a check mark in a block on her paper.

I had never experienced such fear as the fear that had just rushed through my body.

Level 1 is now complete.

The real test begins now.