Click!
The door opened.
"Everyone do your job".
Alexander's team entered the room. The five of them immediately separated and looked at different parts of the room. Efficient and effective. That's what this was. After a mere few seconds, something was found, and a decision was made.
"I found a diary. It says there's a to-do list on the computer", Alexander said, making his presence known in the middle of the room. "But the computer needs the password. We need to find the password", he said; it was clear who the leader was.
"Let's clean up the room. That way, it'll be easier to look for clues", Isabella suggested.
"Everything's moving so fast", Destiny said, smirking.
"You can't keep up?" Alexander condescendingly asked.
"Oh, I'm keeping up just fine. I was expecting this. If it wasn't like this, I would've had to take control", Destiny replied, walking away.
Alexander scoffed; he didn't bother to reply. The team swiftly cleaned and organised the room. During the cleaning process, they searched every nook and cranny for the password but didn't find it.
"Has anyone found the password yet?" Luna asked, looking around.
"Nope", Frank replied for the whole team.
"Have you checked under the treadmill?" Alexander asked Frank.
"Yes, I lifted it a little and looked under. There was nothing underneath it", Frank replied.
Alexander walked back to the study desk and picked up the diary again. Frank walked over to him to check what he was doing. He was reading the lyrics on the last page. He already read them before, but this time, he looked at them with an open mind to see if they meant something. Luna and Isabella awkwardly looked around the room for something to do.
"Izy, can you throw the basketball to me?" Destiny asked.
"Izy?! When did she get nickname privilege?" Isabella thought. She looked to her left and saw the basketball lying against the wall. She picked it up and threw it at Destiny.
Destiny caught it and was caught off guard by how soft it was. She pulled a face and pushed the ball inwards after feeling how soft it was. She smirked. Destiny walked to the kitchen area and opened a drawer. She pulled out a sharp knife.
"Destiny, what are you doing?" Isabella worriedly asked, seeing the knife in hand.
"Hmm, that's a good idea", Luna said, seeing Destiny hold the knife in one hand and the basketball in the other.
"Huh?"
Destiny stabbed the basketball, carving it open before reaching inside. Isabella saw her take out a piece of paper. "No way", Isabella quietly reacted. "What kind of maniac would think of that?".
Destiny confidently strolled over to Alexander with the piece of paper in hand. Alexander swivelled in his seat as he felt her presence.
"I found the password", Destiny said, holding it up between her index and middle finger.
"Show me", Alexander replied, holding out his hand.
Destiny dropped the paper in Alexander's hand. Alexander looked at what was written on the paper and typed it in.
"Looks like it's one-nil to me", Destiny said, seeing the computer unlocked.
Alexander had to accept that she was right; he ignored her, though. He found the to-do list and read what was on it. Isabella and Luna were also by the computer, so they saw the list.
"We've already done one of the tasks", Luna said, referring to cleaning the room.
"That's handy", Isabella commented, reading the rest of the list.
"I'll do the exercise", Frank said, leaving the group and going to the treadmill straight away.
"I'll bake the cookies", Luna volunteered.
"Do you know how?" Alexander asked to make sure.
"Yeah, if they have all the ingredients, I should be fine", Luna replied. She went to the kitchen to get started.
Alexander didn't completely trust her. He opened a web browser and quickly printed a recipe.
"Give this to her", Alexander told Isabella, handing her the recipe. Isabella took it and went away to give the recipe to Luna.
"What should I do?" Destiny pestered Alexander, peering over his shoulder.
"Feed Gary", Alexander bluntly told her.
"There's no fish food", Destiny replied.
"Find it".
"We both know I can't find something that's not in the room", Destiny cheekily replied, checking her nails.
"It has to be in the room, otherwise, it wouldn't be on the to-do list", Alexander said, looking through the computer.
"What's the shop?" Isabella asked, appearing out of nowhere.
Alexander clicked on the shop app he had ignored before, and a tab opened showing different products.
"Escape. $100", Isabella said out loud. She looked at the TV showing their amount, which was still at £0. "How do we get money?" she rhetorically asked.
"Oh look, fish food", Destiny said, pointing at the screen. The screen showed fish food for $20. "Looks like it's two-nil to me".
"Congratulations on proving me wrong. Now go do something that will actually help the team and not your own small useless accomplishments", Alexander replied. "It looks like you're too attached to beating me", he said. Alexander wasn't as fazed as he was before. He evaluated the situation in his head and realised that Destiny wanted to prove a point, so she was trying her hardest to prove it by 'beating' him in small, trivial things. Having that mindset, Alexander didn't mind Destiny's taunts.
"My small 'accomplishments' are helping the team progress," Destiny bit back.
"I've got an idea", Isabella said, breaking the two of them up. "Alexander, is the phone password somewhere on the computer?" she asked. After a few clicks, he found it in the notes tab. "Great. Destiny, how about me and you do the respond to the family task and look through the phone?".
Destiny smirked, "Sure, let me help the team out more as if I haven't already", she said.
Isabella took Destiny away, leaving Alexander alone at the desk.
"Finally", Alexander quietly said.
He quickly got started on the assignment task. He found the assignment and clicked the link to where it was supposed to be submitted. He uploaded the assignment and waited.
"2 hours to upload?" Alexander reacted in his head. His face showed his discontent at the upload rate. He didn't dwell on it for too long as he went straight to the email inbox. He swiftly responded to the five emails and completed that task. After over 15 minutes, Alexander completed two tasks and had nothing else to do. He messed around with the computer for a few minutes, trying to search for something extra but got distracted by,
Ping!
The sound came from the TV. Their money total changed.
It was now $37. At the same time, Frank had stopped running on the treadmill. He was breathing heavily while he stepped off. Alexander got up from his chair and went to check up on him. Frank had his hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
"Are you okay?" Alexander asked, looking down at Frank.
"Yeah, just give me a minute", Frank replied.
Alexander walked over to the treadmill to look at the screen. "A 5K run", he said. "The quicker you did it, the more money we'd get".
"I tried running at eight, but halfway through, I had to turn it down to six", Frank replied, controlling his breathing.
"You did well. $37 is a good start", Alexander said. He looked to the rest of his teammates to see what they were doing, and he didn't know what they were doing. "Why are you dressing the mannequin?" he asked.
"We need to take a picture with the mannequin, don't we?" Isabella replied.
Alexander looked at them, confused. "Yeah, we do. But why does the mannequin need to be dressed up?". Alexander didn't see the point.
"For the picture, duh", Destiny replied.
Alexander didn't respond again; Destiny knew how to keep him quiet.
"We can take the picture now, join us", Isabella said, waving to them to come over.
Alexander and Frank walked over and stood with them to take the picture. All of them smiled except Alexander, who kept a straight face. Once the picture was taken, Isabella took the phone off the makeshift tripod and uploaded it.
"Have you baked the cookies?" Alexander asked Luna.
"Yeah, they're finished", Luna replied.
"Good", Alexander said. "I know how we're going to escape", All of them looked at him. "We're going to buy our way out".
"And how are we going to do that?" Destiny asked, raising an eyebrow. She was the first one to question him.
"We're going to sell everything in this room through that glass window", Alexander said, pointing to the glass window next to one of the doors.
Everyone didn't expect that. No one thought about that either. How did he come up with that solution?
"Can we?" Isabella asked, thinking it sounded a little far-fetched.
"We have to find out", Alexander replied. "It's the quickest way to escape".
"Hey genius, we still need to buy fish food to feed Gary", Destiny said, trying to get under his skin.
"Do you think I haven't thought of that?" Alexander replied. "The list said to feed Gary. It didn't say to give him fish food. We can give him a bit of the cookie. As long as he eats it, we've fed him".
Destiny's eyes widened; even she was shocked. "How far did he plan ahead?" she thought.
"How many cookies did you make?" Alexander asked Luna.
"I could only make twelve", Luna replied.
"Give me one and sell the rest", he said with no hesitation.
Luna listened and went to the kitchen, picked up one cookie and gave it to Alexander. Alexander broke a little piece off and went to the fish tank. He dropped the little piece in and waited for Gary to eat it. Everyone watched and waited for the result. The little piece floated at the top. No bite. Alexander broke another small piece and dropped it in to catch Gary's attention. It worked. Gary swam up and ate the pieces floating about.
"Done", Alexander said, walking away from the tank.
"You know it's not good to feed fish cookies", Destiny told him.
"It will be fine. It only had two small pieces", Alexander replied.
"What are you going to do with the rest of the cookie?" Destiny asked, seeing him still holding the cookie.
Alexander put the whole cookie in his mouth and walked past her.
Destiny let out a little laugh. "I didn't know you had a sense of humour".
"Alex, I'm going to take a quick shower because I'm all sweaty", Frank said. Alexander put a thumbs up as he couldn't respond while eating.
"We've only got the video game task, right?" Isabella said. "I'll do it right now".
"You know how to game?" Luna asked, not expecting that.
"A little. I used to play video games with my little brother", Isabella replied.
"Same. Actually, I still play video games now", Luna said, scratching the back of her head in embarrassment.
Isabella giggled, "You can help me if you want when I get stuck", she said.
"It's fine, I'll watch", Luna replied.
While that happened, Alexander put the cookies on a plate.
"Don't you think two people on one task is a waste?" Destiny asked him, seeing Luna and Isabella walk to the game console. She thought Alexander would be against it.
"It's the last task, and we have plenty of time until the assignment is uploaded. It's not a waste", Alexander replied, walking to the glass window. He lifted the glass and slid the plate of cookies to the other side. "Now we wait".
Five minutes later.
Ping!
The number on the TV changed.
"$59. So each cookie was worth $2", Destiny said. "Luna, you must have made some damn good cookies".
"I didn't do anything special", Luna replied, mashing the controller buttons. She had already taken the controller off Isabella; the game was too hard for her. Frank had also got out of the shower.
"$41", Alexander mumbled. He walked to the make-up table next to the bed and picked up everything he could. He didn't know what he was picking up, but he cleared the table. He grabbed everything that could fit through the little window. Alexander was holding about fourteen things while he walked to the glass window.
"I feel bad for the mannequin", Destiny commented, watching him.
"It's not a real person", he replied, sliding each object out the window.
Another 5 minutes passed.
Ping!
"$73. Each item was worth a dollar?" Frank said, hoping for a higher amount.
"Now I feel worse for the mannequin", Destiny added.
"We can still sell more objects", Alexander said, feeling optimistic.
As time went on, they kept selling more objects. They sold smaller accessories, the stuffed animals on the bed and clothes that could fit through the window, but objects like the guitar and kitchen pots and pans couldn't.
Ping!
"$102", Alexander said. He immediately went to the computer and bought the escape ticket for $100.
Ping!
Another notification popped up on the screen.
"The doors will open once all the tasks are complete".
"What tasks have we got left?" Frank asked, scared they might've missed something.
"The assignment still needs to be uploaded. It's got 15 minutes left", Alexander replied. He looked over at Luna, who was still playing the video game. "Has she completed the game yet?" he asked Isabella.
"Yeah, she completed it a long time ago. She's speedrunning the game now for fun", Isabella replied.
They stood there awkwardly for a few moments.
"Are you sure that's all? Gary still might be hungry", Destiny said, trying to cause chaos.
"If he is still hungry, then we can sell more stuff and get his fish food", Alexander replied, sounding bored of her.
Destiny looked around the room, which was bare. There was nearly nothing left. Destiny put an arm around the mannequin. "Mannequin, I'm so sorry for all of this".
15 minutes passed.
Click!
The door opened.