9 SQUARE

Kyu woke up against a chipped and scratched, dusty wooden floor.  He coughed wetly, supposing he was experiencing residual water clogging in his lungs.  His clothes were torn and dry-crunkled.  Kyu felt dejavu of the time he nearly drowned in a river in India, attempting to rescue an 8 year old ESL student who had followed a silvery fish into the griping current.

The room was quite small, easily walked across in six or seven steps.  Three of the walls were rich forest green; the remaining one unfinished white brick (with two large rectangular windows centered in it, like robotic eyes).  Bright red trim lined the floorboards, the two doorways, and the wooden grid of the window frames.  The musing unexpectedly came to him: someone knows I’m here.  

The space was empty, save for a black, six-foot folding table with a closed book on it. Kyu lifted himself with a hint of drama from the floor, his face contorting as if he were rising in a stage-play after having been stabbed with a mock-sword.  With a wandering bound he came to the table.  The book’s black-ink title read: The Abridged Analects of Confucius for The Future of Humanity, Version 3.

As the reader you must now decide:

[A.) Continue in the real world, where a knock is heard at the door, at 8 square, or

B.) Step outside of the 9-Square grid and examine the book on the black folding table]