Peppermint

Chapter 31 - Another Place

***GABE***

My first challenge is to remember which room off this corridor housed the space rocks. Unless Peppermint has moved them by now? It's been a few days since our last attempt at breaching this place, so I wouldn't be the least bit surprised.

Why is it that every time I breach a place, there's always a long corridor with too many rooms leading off it? I almost want to analyze it for symbolism, but I'd probably find myself tumbling down yet another rabbit hole.

Wait.

I hear something familiar, not just the sounds of Peppermint plants struggling to get back to their feet after my icy lightning attack.

Beyond a door, the only one even slightly ajar instead of fully closed like the others, is a "Whoa-oh-oh" I know all too well.

Except it's not the original artist. This guy can't sing with ChronoWulf's emotional range. He can't sing, period. Yeah, I know, I'm the pot calling the kettle black when it comes to anyone's singing. Judge me too, assbutts. It's only my karma letting it happen.

Or can he sing? Maybe I'm not hearing it right because it's filtered through that door.

Nah, when I actually open the door, I hear it for real and it's not just the acoustics. He's genuinely unable to stop the pitch of his voice from wavering all over the place. And while I can't see his entire face, the side view I get looks pained as hell.

I have no idea who this guy is. He's white with brown hair, and not very big. Average-sized, maybe, but next to someone as tall as me, he looks like an even younger boy. And I'm not just saying that because he's got a bit of a baby face, even with the stubble creeping up his jawline. It's easy to forget that he's got some kind of Peppermint affiliation, because he just looks so sweet and innocent.

If only he could sing worth a bloody damn. This must be how Alex feels when I sing his favorite songs. Hell, even when I sing my own favorite songs.

He twitches, as if hearing my thoughts through the heavy, industrial-strength headphones he's got on. Turning my way, he pulls those headphones off his ears, allowing me to hear the actual sounds of "Another Place" on his phone or iPod. Amazingly, for a guy working for one of Apple's biggest rivals, it really is an iPod, and a very vintage one too, dating back to the days of the click wheel. As 'Wulf sings about the mesmerization borne of this ethereal world, my new friend, whomever he may be, adjusts his tie and loosens the collar of his plaid shirt, which he keeps untucked.

"Winn Schott?" I ask, unable to resist. "Is that you?"

"Now you know whose basement the CW locked me up in after they ruined Supergirl," he says with a chuckle. "Ezra Mientus. And you are?"

I find myself reaching out to shake his hand, in spite of myself. "Gabe Snow. So you're...you're the..."

"The guy who started this company and now his best friend stabbed him in the back to take it all over?" Mientus doesn't sound pissed about it at all, strangely enough, but that could just be him being hella good at hiding the pain. What's even more strange, though, is that he's not reaching out to shake my hand. Is he a germaphobe or something? Should I bump fists with him instead?

"Yeah," I find myself saying slowly. "That."

"Don't worry, it's not as dramatic as it sounds when I introduce myself that way." Mientus sighs softly, staring through me almost as if I'm not even there. Maybe to him, I'm not even. Except he said hi to me. What gives with this guy? Who does he remind me of...believe it or not, not so much Winn Schott, but Absolem from Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. Obviously not in terms of appearance, but in terms of his oddly blah attitude about where he is in the space-time continuum.