Minus Determination (Continued)

Chapter Ten

What-where? 

Where was he? Jake sat up, groggily. He rubbed his eyes and the first thing he noticed was the shiver of the cold yellow tiles underneath him. He was in some sort of chamber with buttons on his left, railings just above his head. His first instinct was to take out his gun. But he decided against it. He read the buttons on the elevator that were marked in painted black. One was for opening, one for closing. The other three buttons read "HELP", "LAB", and "B1."

B1? 

Jake was curious to say the least. And that curiousity overtook him as he pressed the button. The light to the elevator broke with a scream and the tiles suddenly seemed to be tainted red and purple. He wanted to shout for help- he wanted to do something- anything. The elevator plummeted downwards. 

Then it stopped with a pleasant ding. 

Jake blinked. What had just happened? The doors opened with a slight hiss and opened up to a clean turqoise tile room. There were a few shelves gathered around a desk full of papers and books. Jake attempted to read it, but the scrawl was too messy. He poked around the papers until he saw the cover of a pink book sticking out from underneath some blueprints. 

"Mew Mew Kissie Cutie V.S. Woof Woof Metal Robot"

Jake confusedly put the book into a shelf. The room could use a bit of cleaning and Jake was what his sister called a "neat freak." A pang of guilt and sadness rippled through Jake. Clarissa. How was he going to get out of here and find her? He tidied up the papers into stacks and placed the pencils into a mug which had the same pink cat girl from the book printed on it. There was a large doll of the girl in one corner and posters of her littered the area. The pink was hurting his eyes. Whoever worked here had an obsession, he decided.

"O-oh!" A voice, high pitched and surprised nearly screeched. 

Jake was so disoriented that he thought the poster he was looking at was talking to him. He scrambled backwards into a yellow lizard with a lab coat on. "Ah, sorry, I wasn't watching where I was go..." Jake looked at Alphys. Alphys looked at Jake. They looked at each other. Jake nearly dropped the Mew Mew Kissie Cutie merch he was holding.

"...ING!" Jake finished, running to the other side of the room. Was she a lizard? A dinosaur? A wyvern? Jake didn't know what it was, but he knew that he was terrified.

"O-oh, hu-human!" Alphys stammered, "U-um...shoot...I...I-I'm s-so sorry! E-er-"

"Huh?" Jake scratched his head. Apparently this scientist lizard-dinosaur-wyvern thing was a bumbling Mew Mew Kissie Cutie fanatic? 

"Dang it..." Alphys mumbled, "Do I still have some ramen on my face..?"

"Pardon?" Jake asked.

"ALPHYS, DARLING!"