CHAPTER EIGHT
interrogation.
THE THREE TEENS WERE QUIET, THE SHEER SILENCE OF THE ROOM OVERWHELMING. The aching in Jennifer's face had muffled, though, blood still dropped from her nose and lip. Steve's face was still bloodied and bruised, though, it had started to dry. Robin's would have easily been in the best state, her face clear of any blood unlike the other two. "Honestly, I don't really feel anything." Steve murmured, breaking the silence. "You guys?" He questioned.
"I mean, I... I feel fine." Robin replied, the three quiet for a few more moments until Jennifer piped in.
"I feel good." She said, Steve and Robin chuckling in agreement.
Robin spoke between breaths. "Wanna know a secret? I like it, too!" She laughed out.
"Morons. They messed up the drug." Steve said, Jennifer and Robin repeating his words in a jumbled up dialogue. The three started calling out to the Russians, calling them 'morons', their cheeks becoming flushed as they laughed harder.
"Oh, no. There's definitely something wrong with us." Robin said, though she continued to laugh. An alarm buzzed and the door into the room opened, the same Russian commander walking in with one other soldier and Dr. Zharkov. The teens went silent, their pupils extremely dilated; they looked around cautiously, setting the doctor lay out countless instruments, many of them looking less than safe. "Would now be a good time to tell you that I don't like doctors?" Robin spoke, receiving no response.
"Let's try this again, yes?" The Russian man spoke. "Who do you work for?"
Steve was the first to reply with a chuckle, only annoying the commander. "Scoops." Robin and Jennifer softly laughed at his words. "Scoops Ahoy. Well, except for her." He murmured the last part, his body lazily gesturing over to Jennifer.
"How did you find us?" He asked.
Though, realistically, Jennifer was sick of hearing the same questions falling from the mans mouth, with the amount of drugs she was on, she only found it amusing.
Steve chuckled. "Totally by accident." The commander spoke something in Russian, the doctor picking up one of his instruments and walking over to Steve. "What is that shiny little toy?" Steve questioned, amusement laced throughout his voice.
"Now, that doesn't look very fun." Jennifer murmured, a small smirk on her face.
The smile that had sat on Steve's face quickly disappeared when the doctor lifted his finger, beginning to pull at the boys fingernail. "There was a code! We heard a code!" Robin called out, the doctor freezing his movements.
"Code? What code?"
"The week is long. The silver cat feeds when blue meets yellow in the west. Blah, blah, blah." Robin responded. "You broadcast that stupid spy shit all over town, and we picked it up on our Cerebro, and we cracked it in a day. A day! You think you're so smart, but a couple of kids who scoop ice cream for a living cracked your code in a day, and now, people know you're here." She teased to the man.
The Russian man snapped. "Who knows we are here?" He questioned angrily.
"Uh, well, Dustin knows." Jennifers smile quickly fell as Robin called out, trying to stop the boy. "Yeah, Dustin Henderson, he knows."
"Steve, shut up!" Jennifer whined out, her head falling back.
"Dustin Henderson." He repeated back. "It is your small, curly-haired friend?"
"Oh, curly-haired. Great hair. Small. Kind of like a 'fro. Yeah." Steve spoke. Jennifer, as best as she could, shoved him with her shoulders, the boy turning his head to her as far as his restraints would allow him. "Ow." He over exaggerated.
The man looked at Steve, his face now slightly upturned after receiving what he deemed useful information. "Where is he?"
"He's long gone, you big asshole. And he's probably calling Hopper, and Hopper's calling the US cavalry." He laughed out, Jennifer and Robin joining him. "They're gonna come in here, commando-style, guns a-blazin', and kick your sorry asses back to Russia. You're gonna be two pieces of toast." He snickered.
The man crouched down closer to Steve's face. "Is that so?" He teased, Steve simply confirming his words as the three teens laughed aloud. Yet again, the sound of an alarm buzzing - one similar to the alarm they had heard before they were captured- caught their attention.
They looked to the door for a moment before Steve looked back at the man, giving him a teasing look as if the alarm had proved his point - that they were gonna 'get their asses kicked'. The commander and the other soldier left the room to see that the commotion was about whilst the doctor stayed with the teens. Despite the drugs flowing through Jennifer's system, a part of her felt anxious, almost wishing she had more drugs to calm her nerves.
Suddenly, Dustin burst into the room screaming, some type of large taser in his hands as he rushed up to the doctor and pressed the weapon into his chest until he fell to the ground. The teens laughed out, excited to see him and Erica. "Hey, Henderson!" Steve called out. "That's crazy, I was just talking about you."
"Get ready to run." Dustin ordered as he began pulling the restrains off the three.
__________
THE FIVE MANAGED TO GET BACK TO THE NEVER ENDING CORRIDOR, THE ALARM CONTINUING TO SCREAM AT THEM IN THE BACKGROUND AS THEY SPED THROUGH THE HALL IN ONE OF THE SMALL CARTS THEY HAD FOUND. Jennifer, Robin, and Steve were cramped up in the back whilst Erica and Dustin were in the front. "Jesus, slow down!" Steve slurred.
"Yeah, what is this, like, the Indy 500?" Robin exclaimed.
"It's the Indy 300." Steve tried to correct. Jennifer simply leaned against the wall, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion and her mouth agape as she tried to grasp what was happening around her.
"No, dingus, it's 500!"
"It's 300!" The two bickered.
"Let's say a million." Jennifer burst out laughing first, Steve and Robin joining after at, what Erica and Dustin saw to be, a humourless joke. As they reached the elevator, Dustin hadn't slowed down enough in time, resulting in the car hitting a pile of barrels, the three teens hitting their heads against the metal vehicle.
"Ow..." Jennifer murmured out, rubbing the back of her head with a pout on her lips. Dustin asked the three if they were okay, though, the simply replied with a groan.
After having to be dragged out of the back, they finally made their way into the elevator; the contraption shooting up back to the surface. The entire way up felt like a blur to Jennifer, she, Robin, and Steve had been messing around as the elevator went up, stumbling around despite their heads and bodies aching. Dustin and Erica had tried to check on the three, determining that they had been drugged based on their extremely dilated pupils and their bizarre behaviours.
"Oh, can we make a pit stop at the food court?" Steve asked aloud as Dustin tried to question him.
Jennifer gasped, quickly agreeing with the boys idea. "I would kill for a hot dog on a stick." Robin said.
"A cheeseburger..." Jennifer cried out, her eyes watering at how hungry she was, the drugs making her more emotional than she would ever usually be. Robin and Steve quickly agreed with her, this stomachs aching for food.
"All right. Yeah, food. Yes, you can have as much food as you want, but only if you tell me where your car is parked." As Dustin spoke, Robin and Jennifer quickly looked at one another, their fingers intertwining with wide smiles on their faces as they shared their excitement to eat.
"Uh-oh."
"Uh-oh?"
"The car's off the board." Steve slurred. "They took the keys. The Russians, they took the keys. Like, forever ago. That's a bummer, right?" He said, the three teens laughing aloud at nothing in particular.
Once they finally came to a stop and got out the elevator - Dustin and Erica walking ahead - Steve, Jennifer, and Robin's odd behaviour only accelerated. "Oh, my God, that tastes so good. Ah!" Robin exclaimed, having big gulps of fresh air. With the three still extremely drugged and blatantly unaware of what was happening around them, they weren't quite sure why the two kids had rushed them off, back inside the mall.
Quickly, the group moved into a move theatre, Steve grabbing a box discarded popcorn from the bin on the way. The three teens somewhat quietly took a seat, hardly comprehending what they were saying as Dustin and Erica took their seats on the other side of the theatre.
Somehow, for some reason, Steve, Robin, and Jennifer left the theatre mid-movie - despite them having already missed half of it -, and moved outside near a water fountain. "That's amazing." Steve gurgled out as he took large gulps of the cold water, Jennifer having drank some right before him.
"So, like, I wasn't totally focused in there or anything, but... I'm pretty sure... that Mom was trying to bang her son." Robin said.
"Wait, wait, the hot chick was Alex P. Keaton's mom?" Steve questioned.
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure."
Jennifer was quiet yet again, her mouth agape and her eyes in the midst of a thousand-yard stare, just barely listening to the other two's conversation. "She was hot." She slurred, Robin giggling in response.
Eventually, they had moved to look up at the lights that were scattered across the roof. Their vision was blurred, appearing to spin in circles, the movement making them feel dizzy and nauseous. Jennifer was the first to rush off to the bathroom, Robin and Steve right behind her as she burst into one of the stalls, throwing up into the toilet.
Jennifer grimaces, hating the feeling and taste of bile rising in her throat; though, she immediately started feeling better as the drugs started leaving her system. "The ceiling stopped spinning for me. Is it still spinning for you?" Robin asked the two, her legs propped up on the door of the stall with her back against the cool tile floor.
"Holy shit. No." Steve spoke. "You think we puked it all up?" Before either of them could answer, Jennifer started throwing up again, the drugs clearly not entirely washed out of her system just yet - which made sense considering she got the same dosage of drugs as the other two despite her smaller frame. "Spoke too soon." He murmured.
WORD COUNT: 1,733