A House of Many Doors

BSA slid out of the haystack as she finished buttoning up her shirt. Behind her, a pale muscular German in lederhosen tried to follow but fell back exhausted. BSA turned to him with an aggrieved huff and a smile as she adjusted her jet cufflinks. “Oh now you’ve wrinkled my jacket shatzie, maybe you should just lie there and rest for awhile.” She bent down to retrieve the crumpled suit jacket, stealing another kiss from her latest conquest. His lips were cold, and his chest wasn’t moving. Worried, BSA searched for a pulse. Did she kill him? She became more frantic as memories crowded her mind. Candles, moonlight, that stupid Chihuahua, and a lifeless Fernando, clutched in her arms over spilled reams of black carbon paper.

She awoke with a gasp and found herself lying on a cold tile floor. The tiles were a dingy white, with even dingier grey tiles forming diamond patterns. Grimacing at the tasteless floor décor BSA sat up and looked for her teammates, who she found flopped on the floor around her. WW was beginning to stir, but TA and DFL were still out. They were so cute when they were asleep! BSA resisted an urge to tousle DFL’s hair and checked out their new surroundings.

They were in the center of a large, narrow, oval shaped hall. The ground floor had white marble columns, topped at the second story by gothic arches painted a dark, petulant red. A second story balcony ran along the walls until it reached the ends of the gallery, where a white marble spiral staircase sloped gracefully between the floors. An ornate iron railing guarded the edge of the balcony, while affording a view to the center of the hall. Tall, windows over the staircases let in shafts of cold light, their high gothic points giving them a sinister, watchful look. The marble was worn and scratched, the paint was cracked, the air was stale and cold; BSA figured she could flip the whole room for about $20,000 dollars and sell it for $80,000. WW groaned and sat up, running a rueful hand through her short cropped hair she grunted “Where are we?”
“I’m not sure, you guard the others while I take a closer look.” With vampiric grace and speed BSA floated through the hall, noticing for the first time a series of heavy square doors set into the walls.
“Hey batchick!” WW called, “You might want to get back here!”
BSA whisked back to the center, “What is it?”
“They’re waking up” WW pointed out helpfully.
TA groaned and stirred, the heavy protective fabric of her gi rasping over the tiles.
“Ow,” she said ruefully as she rubbed her cowl.
DFL reached up a languid hand, “I’m ready for my Diet Coke now” she drawled. When no drink was forthcoming, she cracked an eye open and took stock of the situation. “No coke, sub-par accommodations, creepy ambiance, this sucks.” She concluded.
“Does anyone know where we are?” asked TA.
Blank glances all around. “We need more information.” TA sighed.
“Obviously we’re dealing with some powerful magics.” BSA pointed out, “Not only were all four of us transported, but WW’s even been cleaned up!
WW blushed as she proudly petted her restored leathers. “I know!” she brightened, “The Old Crone of Knowledge. She’s great at this kind of stuff.” WW reached into a pocket, whipped out a flip phone, and jauntily started dialing. Her face quickly fell, “I can’t seem to get a signal.”
“It’s cool,” DFL replied as she whipped out an even smaller flip phone, “I have Verizon.”
She attempted to dial. A slight frown creased her brow as she attempted to dial again. She held the phone over her head and dialed again. Horror dawned on her face, “It… It can’t be. I have Verizon! No Coke and NO PHONE??!!” DFL’s voice raised in pitch as the glass shuddered in the heavy gothic windows.
The three girls stepped away from the enraged dictator. “Dude it’s okay, we’ll think of something” TA tried to placate her.
“No Phone?! I Need to TEXT!!” DFL yelled as the cracks in the walls shuddered and grew longer.
TA looked over at WW, “Hey I just got this leather nice again.” WW said defensively.
“And I want my frigging coke!” DFL demanded as the glass finally gave and shattered explosively across the staircases.
“Okay, why don’t you calm down and we’ll go look for a vending machine.” TA suggested cautiously while sliding into a defensive stance.
DFL shot a look at the dictator, the force of it ripping up the tile between them as the ninja flipped away from the glare and behind the Amazon.
As Dictator whirled towards the pair, a smoky fog coalesced behind her, forming into the darkly immaculate BSA, who grabbed Dictator from behind in a massive bear hug. “Group hug!” BSA crowed as DFL struggled to break free. But then her eyes rolled back and she sagged in BSA’s arms. “Come on you guys!” BSA looked over at WW and TA.
“Oh heck no.” TA answered as she put a restraining hand on WW’s arm, “I can see from here that you’re draining her chakra.”
“But she’s so much more calm now.” BSA looked down at DFL, “S’all right?”
“S’all right” DFL replied dreamily.
“See?” BSA pointed out happily.
“We need her coherent” TA warned.
“Fine” BSA conceded and released the Dictator.
“DFL, are you all right?” asked a wary Wonder Woman. (I had to spell it for that lovely alliteration).
DFL smiled, “I dreamed that I was in a story. And that I. . . was the star of that story.”
“Okay,” WW drawled, shooting a look at a smug BSA.
“Hey, at least she’s not trying to kill anybody” BSA sighed with an overdramatic frown, “caffeine addiction can be a brutal master.”
“We need to get out of here,” TA said, “have you looked around?”
“There is a row of doors in each wall, I haven’t been upstairs yet.” BSA reported.
“Check it out, we’ll start examining the doors down here.” TA replied.
BSA snapped off a cheeky salute before bursting into dozens of squeaky bats and flying off to the second story.
WW and TA shared a concerned look.
“I have a cross” WW said helpfully.
“And I have a wallet of wadded receipts.” TA replied thoughtfully
“I love rock and roll” DFL sighed happily.
“We should find an exit before she gets hungry” TA resolved, and WW nodded in agreement.
The doors were solid rectangles of dark stained oak. Iron rivets studded the surface and each door had a large, wrought iron door latch. None of them featured an exit sign.
“Just more doors up here!” called BSA, hanging over a railing.

As our heroes examined the doors more closely in the weak light they noticed that some of them appeared to have been blackened and warped, as if exposed to some great heat. Other doors radiated a biting cold, forming into frost crystals as the girls drew nearer.
Still others had deep scratches gouged into their wooden frames.

“I guess we’ll just have to pick one at random” WW conceded.

So, which door would you like to try?

A: Normal Door
B. Cold Door
C. Burned Door
D. Scratched Door