I Don't Care About Your Stupid Space Plants

Four

The first thing Maddie felt when she woke up was pain. Not that anything had gone wrong, but as if she'd been lying in the same position for a year straight, and she just now realized how stiff her joints were. Keeping her eyes closed, she wiggled her toes and fingers, confirming that they were all there and that she could feel them. Once she was satisfied that nothing was missing, she slowly opened her eyes, which felt like it took more effort than it should've. What she saw, however, was nothing like what she'd expected to see.

Looking up through the tinted glass of the ACDA, she saw the ceiling of an unlit room. If her eyes weren't already adjusted to the dark, she would've just seen pitch black, which would honestly freak her out less than the lights being off. She waited to see if another Personal Displacement Dude or whatever they were called was going to come get her, but after what felt like forever, Maddie got tired of waiting. She called out "hello? Is anyone there?" After waiting another forever, she decided to take matters into her own freshly-printed hands. She pressed her palms against the glass and pushed as hard as she could. The door barely lifted an inch, surprising her with it's weight. It wasn't that she was weak from the teleportation or anything. Definitely the door.

She curled up into a ball (which was extremely difficult given the small amount of room in the ACDA) and pressed her palms and a foot on the glass. Pushing again, it lifted up a little more than before, but still not enough to open it. Sighing out of frustration, she situated her body again, preparing to use her hands and both of her feet this time. Giving herself a countdown, she pushed one last time. Using as much strength as she possibly could, she was finally able to push the door enough to let it stand up and fall to the side of the machine. The weight of the glass made the door fall a little too quickly, and it hit the outside of the ACDA, shattering with an ear-splitting bang as a million tiny shards of glass were littered all over the floor beside the machine. Maddie kept lying there, unmoving and terrified because she just broke the door of a machine that costs hundreds of millions of dollars. Her heart was racing, knowing someone's going to run in here, flip the lights on, and kick her ass. But again, same as before, nobody came. The lights even stayed dark.

Groaning like an elderly woman, she sat up in the machine, looking around. The room was nearly identical to the one she'd just teleported from, except her stuff wasn't on the counter anymore, and it was almost completely black in there. It even smelled kind of weird, too. Through the darkness, her eyes could just barely see a lumpy shape on the counter across the room, but she wasn't able to tell what it was. Being very careful to not step on glass, she was able to come out of the machine and onto the freezing cold tile floor. Crossing her arms over her chest, she shivered as she walked over to the counter. The lumpy shape was actually a small pile of clothing that someone had tried, and failed, to fold. Whoever put this here must've been really bad at doing laundry. Digging through the clothes, she discovered it was a bra and some boxers, some grey sweatpants, a black t-shirt with the MyceliumRX logo on the left side of the chest, and some running shoes with built-in socks. Assuming they were for her, she slipped everything on and took a deep breath, happy to be clothed again. Except, it felt strange. The bra and shoes were slightly too big, the pants were a little tight around the waist, and the shirt was a little too baggy on her. Guess it was meant to be a one-size-fits-all sort of thing that didn't work out too well.

To her left was a door that was identical to the one in the offices of the building that was back on Earth. This one was slightly open, however. Through the separation, the faint glow of starlight gently poured into the room, which was the only reason she was able to see anything. On the wall beside it was a light switch that was in the "on" position. Maddie flipped it up and down a few times, neither position making the lights come on. Through the opening in the door, she could see the space beyond it was dark as well. She could also tell that the opening was just wide enough for someone to fit through, so she turned sideways and squeezed herself into the next room, the gap being literally the perfect size for her to fit. The next room looked as if it were some sort of reception area, which was different than back on Earth. The large windows on the walls were letting in a faint blue glow from the countless number of stars that were out there. Upon further inspection, however, she saw that the things on the desk were positioned strangely. As if they were just randomly thrown there, or like they'd been there for a very long time. Picking up a pen, she noticed that it felt fuzzy, and that there was a small, darker pen-shaped spot on the desk where it was sitting. She stared at it for a few seconds. "What the hell...?" Taking a deep breath, she blew onto the desk as hard as she could, and a huge cloud of dust came up and slowly swirled around in place.