By the end of the day, Akane saw Makoto approaching Yamaa-san’s office. She had taken off her jacket, and only had a very revealing red tank top. She was carrying some papers with her. As she walked by my cubicle she looked at me, smile and said “Wish me luck!” I chuckled and said “Good luck” under my breath. She knocked on his door and went in. She walked up to his desk swaying her hips a little too much. Honestly, why did they bother? In the short time Akane had been there she’d seen many girls trying to get his attention and a date… or a night. It never worked. Makoto pushed some papers his way and pointed at something in them, revealing a LOT of cleavage while doing it. Yamaa-san didn’t look. “Maybe he’s gay” thought Akane. He seemed a little uncomfortable. Well she would be too if somebody was pushing her s at her. Akane chuckled again and went back to work. Two of the perks of being completely unremarkable were that, since you knew that nothing was ever going to happen with your incredibly hot temporary boss, she could maintain her composure in front of the guy. The other perk was that serial killers, or kidnappers, targeting beautiful, doll like women tended to overlook you. “Shut up” she told herself, “and go back to work or you’ll never finish on time.”

She hadn’t even started when Hiroshi called her. “Hey would you mind making copies of this and taking them to Yamaa-san for him to sign them? I really have to leave”

“Oh, come on. I’ll never finish with my work. Why don’t you give it to one of the other women here. They’ll be happy to do it.”

“They’d be thrilled to do it, but then they would go fix their makeup, fix their clothes, probably practice a few lines before even doing the copies.” He did have a point there. “Please? Pretty please??”

Akane sighed and rolled her eyes. “Fine. But you owe me. Again.” She grabbed the papers and went to make the copies. Some minutes later she knocked on the door and came in.

“Sorry, I have a few copies for you to sign.” She said. He looked up and looked at her. He tilted his head a little to the right and gave a little frown then he shook his head gave her a little smiled and said: “yeah, sure come on in.”

Oookaayy. That was weird, thought Akane.

“Sorry.” He said. “I haven’t seen you around much. I can’t remember your name. That’s why I was staring.”

“Oh, that’s ok.” She answered. “I’m Kurogawa. Here, this is what you need to sign.” She said with a smile.

“Thank you” he answered smiling back. Man! It was a nice smile.

“You’re welcome” she answered and went back to her desk.

“That guy is impossible.” Akane turned to her left and saw Makoto in her desk next to her.

“I wasn’t trying anything”

“I know you weren’t, but he’s still impossible. He’s probably gay.”

Laughing, Akane answered: “Probably.” And went back to work.

Takara was walking back and forth in the room. She’d been there for 6 days in that yellow room. She would have thought it was a nice room, albeit a little monochromatic. Her bed was, of course, yellow and its head was against one of the walls, right below it there was a hole that communicated to the next room, which was empty. To the right, there was a small table and two very comfortable sofas. Right in front of the bed, she could see the bathroom door. Yes, she would have thought it was a nice room if it weren’t for the tiny and insignificant fact that she was chained to the fricking wall!

There were other women in other rooms. Apparently they all had different colors. Hers was yellow. She had awakened in a strange yellow bed staring a strange yellow ceiling and when she looked down she was wearing a strange yellow dress. It was fitted at the top with a bow at the back and it was flowy at the bottom. It kinda looked like a dress in one of those musicals from the 50’s or 60’s.

She would have thought it was beautiful, if it hadn’t been a strange man who put it on her, after bathing her apparently, and if it hadn’t been for the fact that she was CHAINED TO THE FRICKING WALL!

The other women had been there longer that her. Much longer, and she didn’t understand how they could stand it. She supposed that the fact that they could talk to each other helped. It had helped her when she’d woken up.

But now she had another problem. The man had brought in her food and if Shigeko was right, and being the smartest she usually was, it was her turn with the drugged food. He didn’t hurt them. He bathed them, cleaned the room, changed the sheets and changed their clothes to apparently another dress similar to the one they had on.

She had considered not eating but Keiko had told her it wasn’t a good idea. Rin, the woman who had been there longer than any of them, had tried that at the beginning. The only result had been that she had starved herself and when she passed out, the man had come in, bathed her, cleaned the room, changed the sheets and changed her clothes to apparently another blue dress similar to the one she had had on. So she would be only hurting herself by not eating. And she was already very hungry. And it was her favorite, gyoza. It was always their favorite food when it was time for the drugs. Maybe it was to make it more difficult to resist. It didn’t matter, she didn’t want to eat. She could delay it a little longer. Maybe even pretend to pass out and try to escape? That hadn’t work for Rin, who apparently had tried everything to escape. It hadn’t work for Keiko either.

They had tried other ways of escaping, but the chain didn’t reach the door. They could walk around a little and even go to the bathroom, but that was all the length of the chain would allow. So trying to surprise him at the door wouldn’t work. Hiding wouldn’t work. He could see them and know if they’d eaten or not. Maybe….

“Just eat” it was Rin’s muffled voice. “You know it won’t accomplish anything to starve yourself. We all have to eat and we all do eventually. So stop pacing around and eat!”

Her stomach was cramping. She wouldn’t, she could hold on. She wouldn’t, she could hold on…

3 hours later Takara started eating...