Cassia's POV

ilbarker was sleeping.

I mean, there wasn't much else she could do at the moment.

I treated her back as best I could (which was pretty much just water and a washcloth I found).

"21 HOURS LEFT, Cassia...."  Dark said menacingly.

I growled under my breath a little.  "Shut it."

I looked at the paper once more.

Kit - 548

So...5th floor....

I checked ilbarker once more before heading up the stairs.

As I ascended, I thought.  What were Kit's fears?

For one, I'd think dogs since she's clearly a cat person.

Speaking of cats, how is KitKat?  Is she in there with Kit experiencing fears with her?  Is she elsewhere?  I'd hope not cuz Kit would not dare leave her stick/kitten/panther behind.

I reached the 5th floor and began watching the room numbers.

501, 502, 503...the hotel did NOT look long enough to have 48 rooms and still be the size they were....

Ah, who am I kidding?  MY room was fricking huge!

I eventually found room 548, and I immediately knew it was Kit's.

It had a cycle symbol that showed a stick, then a chocolate brown kitten, then a chocolate brown panther back to the stick.

I took a deep breath and pushed open the door.

It entered into what looked like a liv----

I cried out as an immense pain filled my head and eyes.

I heard the door slam close behind me as I fell to the ground, eyes closed, cradling my head.

Something was etching itself into my vision, and it freaking HURT.

I don't know how long I was on the ground in pain, but it eventually faded away.

I shook my head a bit and got into a crouch, opening my eyes to examine my vision.

There was a red bar in the bottom left of my vision with my name above it.

In the bottom right of my vision were 3 empty gray boxes.

I rubbed my right eye a bit and my vision changed from the living room area to a black background with a bunch of empty gray boxes next to each other in a 4 by 5.  Almost like...an inventory....

I rubbed my right eye again and it went away, showing the living room and the bars.

I stood up, and the bars stayed in my vision.

What the heck?  Was this like some kind of first-person video game?

I looked around the dimly lit room to see 2 other doors in the room besides the one behind me.

I tried the door behind me, but it was locked.

Nice.

I sighed and went over to a drawer I had noticed, pulling open its drawer.

Inside was some kind of handgun with a couple extra clips.

I picked it up and it disappeared from my hand and appeared in the leftmost gray box in my vision.

A text box appeared in the center of my vision.

You picked up M9 handgun.

Weird.

I picked up the 2 extra clips and they, too, disappeared and reappeared in the middle gray box in my vision.  A 2 appeared in the bottom right corner of the middle box.

You picked up M9 ammo.

This was like a first-person game!  That's so flipping cool!

I sat on the couch for a moment, messing around with different movements to see what I could do since, ya know, I didn't have a keyboard.

I eventually found the rubbing my fingers together on my right hand like the "give me money" thing made the left gray box white highlighted.

The M9 handgun appeared in my hand.

Intrigued, I pulled the trigger and it made a clicking noise.

I poked the clip-loading area and the 2 in the middle box disappeared, meaning that only one clip was left.  The clip then loaded itself into the handgun.

A 7/7 appeared next to the handgun image in the left box.

I feel bad for the author cuz this is a lot of detail!

I stood up and tried to open the door that was to the right of the couch.

...It was locked.

It's locked.  You need Kit's Key to open this door.

Wait, so Kit was in this room?!

I put my ear to the door, but I only heard soft hissing noises.

I sighed and tried the other door at the other end of the room.

It opened up easily into a kitchen.

I poked around a bit and found some kind of small bottle with some kind of pink liquid.

You picked up Small Health Potion.

I mean, I knew I'd get hurt at some point, but just this made me feel more...uneasy.

I tried to open the other door in the room, but it was also locked.

It's locked.  You need Goodog's Key to open this door.

Goodog?  Who or what is Goodog?  And is that supposed to be like good dog or goo dog?

Suddenly, something lashed me in the back and the red bar in my vision lost some red on the right side.

I cried out and whirled around.

My momentum of spinning threw the thing off me and it smacked against the wall on the opposite side of the room.

I took my handgun and shot without thinking.

The thing dodged and jumped at me again.

I aimed as best I could and shot, hitting it directly between the eyes.

Its body crashed into me, causing me to fall to the floor (and lose a tiny bit more health).

I breathed quickly, shoving the thing off me, getting a better look at it.

It was starting to dissolve, but I could tell that it was the shape of a dog covered in some kind of black goo.

Ah.  Goodog.  I get it now.

It dissolved completely, leaving behind a black key with a dog head on the top.  A 2/7 was by the handgun picture.

I picked it up.

You picked up Goodog's Key.

It didn't appear in the boxes, though, because the health potion was in the right one.

I did the finger thing and pulled out the small health potion, using it.  The bottle disappeared and my health went back to full.

I rubbed my right eye and it pulled up the inventory in my vision again.

I know I keep saying this, but this is flipping cool!!

I tried the rubbing fingers thing again and the white box highlighted the uppermost-leftmost box with the key.  A description next to it said "The key you retrieved after defeating Goodog."  I tapped my fingers together and it moved into the right box on the hotbar.

Just outta curiousity, I rolled over the gun and ammo.  The gun had "An M9 handgun.  Fast reload but low clippage (you know what I mean), a good starting gun." and the ammo had "Ammo for the M9.  What else is there to say?"

I rubbed my eye again and pulled out the key, using it on the door.

It disappeared from my inventory and the door swung open.

It was a mediumish sized bathroom with a separate shower stall and large bathtub.  And, ya know, the toilet and counter and stuff.  And another door!  So...a jack-and-jill bathroom.

I checked out the counter first and didn't really see anything, but when I opened one of the drawers, I jumped back.

IT WAS A FRICKING NEEDLE.

Shakily, I picked it up and it disappeared and reappeared in the rightmost box.

You picked up Sensitizer.

Sensitizer?  That's...weird.

I poked around the bathroom a bit more and found a medium health potion and another M9 clip of ammo.

Why the heck was there a clip of ammo in here?!

I opened the inventory again and rolled over the needle and potion, moving the potion into the rightmost hotbar box and the needle back into the inventory.  The needle had "Supposedly brings someone to their senses.  Maybe use on a traumatized person?" and the the potion had "Medium health potion.  Restores half your health back."

It was JUST like a first person game!  SO COOL!

I opened the other door in the bathroom to come into a COMPLETELY different room.

It was an extremely large room with an empty mob spawner in the middle.  Like, without the spinning mob inside it.

Talk about 0-100 really fast.

I reloaded a clip into my handgun and slowly walked forward.

The door slammed shut behind.

I stopped abruptly and whirled around, trying to pull the door back open.

It's locked.  You need KitKat's Key to open this door.

KitKat's...key...?

I slowly turned around to see the mob spawner slowly disintegrate and reform on the floor...into a chocolate brown fluff ball.

KitKat.

I almost started walking towards her, but I stopped myself.

I didn't know if she had been...changed into something bad.

She looked at me with those adorable brown eyes and mewed.

I bit my lip but forced myself to stay where I was.

Then she cried out and fell over, thrashing about on the floor.

Against my cuteness instincts, I pointed my gun at her, ready to shoot if she was...different.

KitKat grew in size until she was her panther form...but she wasn't chocolate brown.

She was...orange...and kinda almost looked like a tiger since she still had a few brown stripes on her.

I was shaking a bit as she stood and faced me, her once brown eyes now red.

She growled ferociously and charged at me.

I shot once before ducking and rolling out of the way...a little late.

One of her claws snagged my leg, causing my health to go down a bit.

Oh, yeah, and it HURT.  I still felt physical pain.

I rolled away and shot another bullet in KitKat's direction.  She cried out and growled before leaping at me again.

I wasn't able to duck away fast enough and she more or less landed on me.

I cried out as she began digging into me.  My health began dropping FAST.

I quickly took the health potion and drank, almost fully healing.  I then pulled the gun and shot the last 5 bullets directly into her open mouth (you know, cuz she was trying to bite me).

She froze and made a gurgling noise before falling over, twitching a bit.

I quickly rolled away and reloaded the gun, preparing for some kind of retaliation.

But it never came.

KitKat shrunk down into her chocolate brown kitten form again and laid still.

And then she mewed softly and looked at me almost...apologetically?

She shakily stood up and hobbled over to me, sitting.

Cautiously, I rubbed her head a little.

She mewed happily and turned back into a stick.

I sighed and picked up the stick, making it disappear into my inventory.

You picked up KitKat The Stick/Kitten/Panther.

I snickered a little at the name and opened my inventory, rolling over the stick.  The stick said "KitKat in her stick form.  Maybe she'll be of use soon?"

I closed the inventory and looked to where she had fallen.

2 keys were lying on the ground. I stood up and walked over, picking them both up.

You picked up KitKat's Key.

You picked up Kit's Key.

I looked around the room some more and saw a chest in the far corner.

I opened it up and....

Holy crap!

AK-47 with 4 extra clips, a machete, 2 full health potions, 2 more clips of M9 ammo, and...a vial of acid?

I took it all from the chest and moved the AK to the left slot, the 2 potions to the right one, and the machete in the middle.

I loaded the AK and paused.

How long had I been in here?

It's felt like only 30 minutes, but how am I to know exactly?

I sighed and unlocked the door, walking back through the bathroom.

Talk about a final battle feeling....