The Door to Tomorrow

Distrust

My anxiety heightened as I rushed to Hallway 1. I kept an eye out for the others, but they were nowhere to be found. Assuming they were all in their respective rooms or something, I retreated to my own. I set the painting, sketchbook, and journal down at the foot of my bed, then approached the bedside table. I immediately called the Control Room. Of course, I was still excessively bitter about the way Mr. Peterson handled the situation early that morning.

"Hello?" Mr. Peterson answered in his usual husky, relaxed tone.

"Motherfucker, you tricked me. You left the door open."

"...To clarify,I never promised we would dispose of the body or lock the door."

"What the fuck? Why did you put the key on the corpse, of all places? I got caught, asshole!"

"You were caught because you acted too suspiciously. Anyway, that's simply the way things were meant to happen. I was only doing what fate intended."

"Oh, please," I rolled my eyes. "If I can't trust you to be my ally, then how am I supposed to trust you with the money?"

"Heh..." Mr. Peterson,who up until that point showed no emotion, suddenly responded with a short burst of weak, unenthusiastic laughter. I could've sworn I recognized the pattern of his laughter from somewhere. It felt weird and I didn't like it.

"Don't be ridiculous," he continued in a brittle voice.

"Why was that funny to you?" I tried not to overreact.

"...It wasn't. I wasn't laughing at anything in particular." His tone remained unchanged. It was kind of hard to hear him, actually.

"You're crazy," I spoke my mind.

"I prefer the term 'mentally ill'. Think twice before using the term 'crazy'."

"I-Is that a threat?" I inquired, genuinely afraid.

"No. Just a word of advice." He hung up.

"He hung up already? Oh,hell no!" I fumed as I redialed.

The phone rang for a few seconds before he answered again.

"...What?" Mr. Peterson whined.

"I'm not done, sir. I have some other questions."

"I see. Go ahead."

"First of all, what are Alois Valentine's paintings doing in the Library? I mean, you obviously know he was my friend, since there was also a painting of me and a note explaining my relationship to him."

He didn't give a direct answer at all. "About a year or so ago, I commissioned him. I told him to just paint whatever he wanted, and he did just that."

"That's not what I asked!" I told him firmly.

"The rest of the answer will have to wait, Mr. Munakata." He claimed,then ended the call a second time.

I stood tapping my foot on the ground in frustration for about a minute before dialing a third time.

"Hello?" Narrator answered.

"I would like to speak to Mr. Peterson."

"Sorry. Boss handed the phone to me because he's tired of your shit," he boldly admitted.

"Guess I'll just have to ask you about the Prayer Room, then. What's with the sketchbooks in the first two drawers?"

"The...what?"

"You know what I mean."

"No, I don't. Those drawers are supposed to be empty. What's in those sketchbooks?"

"Drawings of some young guy, and in one picture he's holding a baby. The second book is scribbled on, wrinkled, and torn up.

"Uh...hold on." Narrator put the phone down to speak with his boss, then returned a few moments later.

"Okay, so this is kinda bad. You weren't supposed to see that, according to Mr. Peterson. Now I'm in trouble. Thanks, asshole."

"Did you draw those or something?" I asked, recalling the drawing of the dog he was working on when we first saw each other.

"No, but I left them in the Library. The day before the game, I was looking through them,and—" Just then Narrator got interrupted by an aggravated Mr. Peterson, who was in the background. While speaking to his boss, his tone suddenly changed from rude to compassionate. "What? Relax, it's not the end of the world, dude. This isn't the first thing that's caught us by surprise." I heard a thud in the background from Narrator's end. "I-I have to go," He abruptly hung up.

I slammed the phone back down and groaned. I had no idea what was going on up there, but I didn't exactly care too much.