"Confusion"

3 - "again?"

Stanley woke up, feeling quite confused when he found himself in the same place where he had started.

Stanely walked out of his office, and the narrator said the exact same thing it had said before.

"All of his co-workers were gone. What could it mean? Stanley decided to go to the meeting room; perhaps he had simply missed a memo."

Stanely stared blankly at the ceiling for a moment in confusion, 'what the hell is happening?' Stanley though before he shook his head in an attempt to just shake off the thought.

Stanley decided to go the same path he did before.

"When Stanley came to a set of two open doors, Stanley entered the door of his left."

Stanley blinked, he already knew where the left door is because of the last time he was there, so Stanley finally entered the door on his left.

As stanley walked through the hallway he heard the narrator quietly say "this is a story of a man named stanl...." Stanley raised a brow but decided to ignore the weird narrator.

As Stanley was walking, he entered a room that was much more darker than other rooms Stanley has been in.

"Yet there was not a single person here either.

Feeling a wave of disbelief, Stanley decided to go up to his boss's office. Hoping he might find an answer there."

Stanley looked around the room for a moment before walking out of the room.

There was a door that Stanley was interested in, the door wasn't anything special at all, but when Stanley attempted to open it, it actually opened.

Stanley grinned as he entered, what Stanley supposed was, a closet.

"Stanley stepped into the broom closet, but there was nothing here, so he turned around and got back on track."

'But there was!' Stanley though, again feeling slightly annoyed, like the last time with the narrator.

There were things here, was the narrator blind or something?

Stanley sat down in the broom closet. He grabbed the broom that was laying against a wall and proceeded to simply touch every thing with the broom.

"There was nothing here. No choice to make, no path to follow, just an empty broom closet. No reason to still be here."

"But it is comforting to sit here.... Sort of!" Stanley tried to reason, but yet nothing came out of his mouth.
Stanley sat quietly in the broom closet, holding his broom.

"It was baffling that Stanley was still just sitting around in the broom closet. He wasn't even doing anything, at least if there were something to interact with he'd be justified in some way."

Stanley raised an eyebrow and smirked, it was simply too amusing that the narrator was so annoyed over him just sitting in the broom closet.

"As it is, he's literally just standing there, doing sweet FA."

Stanley blinked, he wasn't sure what sweet FA was but it wasn't like he can question it.

"Are you...are you really still in the broom closet? Standing around doing nothing? Why?

Please offer me some explanation here; I'm genuinely confused."

'Because I have... Free will?' Stanley though, not quite sure with his answer.

"You do realize that there's no choice or anything in here, right? If I had said, 'Stanley walked past the broom closet,' at least you would have a reason for exploring it to find out.

But it didn't even occur to me because literally this closet is of absolutely no significance to the story whatsoever. I would have never thought to mention it."

Stanely shrugged and layed on the floor of the broom closet, with his broom laying on his stomach.

"Maybe to you, this is somehow its own branching path. Maybe, when you go talk about this with your friends, you'll say:

"OH, DID U GET THE BROOM CLOSET ENDING? THEB ROOM CLOSET ENDING WAS MY FAVRITE!1 XD"...I hope your friends find this concerning."

Stanley stared at the ceiling with a "are you serious?" Look, the narrator obviously didn't know that Stanley was a living... Probably not breathing...and probably not even human... But a living being!.... Okay, maybe not living but still... A being capable of emotions and free will! That makes him human enough, right?

"Stanley was fat and ugly and really, really stupid. He probably only got his job because of a family connection; that's how stupid he is. That, or with drug money.

Also, Stanley is addicted to drugs and hookers."

Stanley frowned and furrowed his eye brows, the narrator really is a short tempered meanie, eh? Well so then be it!

Stanley, both absolutely irritated and saddened by narrator's insults, decided to stay in the broom closet just a bit more.

"Well, I've come to a very definite conclusion about what's happening right now. You're dead."

Stanley raised an eye brow, 'am I dead?' Stanley deadpanned.

"You got to this broom closet, explored it a bit, and were just about to leave because there's nothing here, when a physical malady of some sort shut down your central nervous system and you collapsed on the keyboard / in front of your screen."

Stanley shrugged as he lifted the broom up and started spinning it around out of boredom.

"Well, in a situation like this, the responsible thing is to alert someone nearby so as to ensure that your body is taken care of before it begins to decompose.

HELLO?! ANYONE WHO HAPPENS TO BE NEARBY!! THE PERSON AT THIS COMPUTER IS DEAD!!"

Stanley cringed, if the narrator plans to "alert" somebody near by the probably non-existant computer that somebody is dead, then the narrator should be louder, way louder.

"HE OR SHE HAS FALLEN PREY TO TO ANY NUMBER OF YOUR COUNTLESS HUMAN PHYSIOLOGICAL VULNERABILITIES. IT'S INDICATIVE TO THE LONG-TERM SUSTAINABILITY OF YOUR SPECIES."

Stanley blinked, 'your species....Is the narrator.... Not human?' Stanley was gonna be honest, he knew the narrator was not... Human, but Stanley did think that the narrator was just a voice in his head, though it seems he was wrong... Or not?... Maybe the narrators species-

"PLEASE REMOVE THEIR CORPSE FROM THE AREA AND INSTRUCT ANOTHER HUMAN TO TAKE THEIR PLACE AT THE COMPUTER,"

-are just voices without bodies?... It makes sense.

Well, at least stanley thinks so.

"MAKING SURE THEY UNDERSTAND BASIC FIRST-PERSON VIDEO GAME MECHANICS, AND FILLING THEM ON THE HISTORY OF NARRATIVE TROPES IN VIDEO GAMING,

SO THAT THE IRONY AND INSIGHTFUL COMMENTARY OF THIS GAME IS NOT LOST ON THEM."

Stanley sighed, getting up in a sitting position instead of a laying one.

It was getting boring standing around in the broom closet...

"Alright, when you've done that, just step out into the hallway."

Stanley stood up, and made his way out of the broom closet.

"Ah, second player! It's good to have you on board. I guarantee you can't do any worse than the person who came before you."

Stanley stretched a bit before finally going...Stanley didn't exactly remember where but he knew that it was somewhere.