He woke up with a start as he looked around the barren cell he seemed to have found himself in. Aside from the fact that that was a horrible run on sentence, he also realized that he had a slight headache. Where was he? Even better, who was he? This little bit of knowledge not being present in his head gave him some concern. He was about to go off on an entirely too long and too boring monologue about his existence in the universe and the need for names and labels, when a hidden loud speaker suddenly came to life and caused him to nearly jump out of his skin.

"And welcome to the Crucible, new contestant!" the voice reverberated in the canned manner of cheesy game show announcers from the last seventies and early eighties. "You have one simple goal, survive and make it to the winner's circle. Fail, and . . . well, you really don't want to know what happens then, does he ladies and gentlemen?" There was silence to allow these magical ladies and gentlemen a chance to laugh or make whatever comments they may happen to make wherever they were.

But now what the hell was this Crucible thing? Why did he have to keep adding questions to his list for the day. Well, knowing he was in the Crucible did answer where he was, he realized after a moment of thought. So finding out about the Crucible just left his question count back at two, so it was a wash. This little sign of progress gave him some sort of quiet relief. And why was the voice now replaced by some classical music?

He stood up and looked around in an attempt to assess his surroundings. There were three gray barren walls in front of him and a wall of sliding bars for the fourth wall. Having watched enough Oz, he knew that he was in a prison of some nature or another. A prison with a mattress hanging from the wall. No wait, it's actually just a mattress up against a wall. Classy. Some sort of run down old prison and here he is listening to some canned classical.

Wait.

This is all sounding way too familiar.

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