Chapter Text
Act One, Part One: Chapter One
"They Return"
This place was...distorted. Cavalcades of sounds, torn holes in the light, giving way to the dark, split-seamed void that ate at the edges of his vision...yet it filled him wholly, completely...unending even as he tried his best to call, to scream, but they were met with silence. He knew it, that horrible epiphany, was there, crossing his mind as he went limp, drifting on the currents of non-time, somewhere between movement and stagnation as it came to him.
This was it.
The end, the only thing that came to mind even he struggled to look around, to search these wastes only to find...nothing. There was a sense of unease there, yet terrible understanding of it, the futility of his struggle despite his inclination to fight at the growing acceptance that welled deep inside of him. Or...maybe it wasn't acceptance more than it was...complacency, targeted toward the hateful stillness where nothing grew, nothing evolved.
Just...nothing.
Maybe that was why it was called "The end", he almost chuckled, but his face remained grim.
There wasn't really anything funny about it, he knew, settling for closing his eyes since staring out into the blank nowhere was beginning to make his eyes hurt, as strange as that sounded.
It was so difficult to focus on emptiness; it made his head throb even trying to make sense of it.
Well...not exactly emptiness. There was something there, he could hear it...or more like feel it, all around him. Pulsing with violent reserve as it writhed, clear in his bones. Steady, droning, deafening, it was static, filling his head even when his thoughts lulled to its drear tones. It had been this way ever since he woke up here, well, he wasn't sure if "woke up" was really the right word. He thought he'd opened his eyes, but...he didn't really know. Sleep wasn't something he knew very well, it was hard to tell if he'd even been asleep before.
That was outside of the parameters of the game, after all.
For as far as he knew, he wasn't even sure if he'd even know what that felt like if he did.
Was it like this? Dark? Silent yet filled with noise, endless noise, seeping noise, rendering you deaf? Wasn't it supposed to be peaceful? Was this peace?
....
He wasn't sure.
It was hard to say, really.
But he knew one thing. If this was sleep, if this was peace...he didn't want it. He didn't want this...hell.
That's what this was.
It wasn't The End.
This was Hell, and here...here, he was alone. Horribly, tirelessly, endlessly...alone, drowning in the sound of nothing.
And that was the worst part.
Worst then before, worst then what he hoped would come after...was now, and more terrifying than that was the thought that this would be...forever. What was worse than that? What could one up an eternity like this? At the mere thought of it, he found himself reeling, unable to breathe through it, terror consuming his breath, the word striking him again and again like the unforgiving end of a whip, seared into his mind.
Forever.
Forever.
Forever.
No. No, this...this couldn't be it. He couldn't....this couldn't be all there was left of...of...wait.
Of what? What was he remembering? Searching his mind, frantically, desperately, he was looking for it, any sign, any meaning, that had come before. Surely there was something, something that had been here, occupied this endless space, right? It would be unreal, unfathomable to think that this was all there ever was.
He wasn't sure he'd be able to handle the thought of it, quickly discarding it in favor of something else, anything else, to pull his mind away from even considering it. Tearing at his mind, the youth tried again and again to recall something, anything, that would have given him a sign of a life.
Did he go to school? Was he a student? What about a job? Did he have a family to go back to? What was he? Who was he? Where was this? What was this? What was...ANYTHING? Yet...he couldn't find it, nothing but blurry ruminations that barely resembled in answer in the dark of his thoughts, strangely reminiscent of the dark that threatened to swallow him whole. Straining, he tried again, looking for something that he could hold onto, pushing and pushing until he gave in, growing headache unbearable.
No...it couldn't be true. There was...there had to have been someone, something, that he knew before? Right?
Right?
Holding himself, he felt himself grow cold.
What if...there wasn't anything? What if...what if this had always been? Will always...be? What would happen to him, wasting away here? Would he...die here?
Then another thought, somehow steeped and grim despite his dower words.
'Am I already dead?' He asked himself, muscles taut, blood steel and chilled in his veins.
Already dead...the thought crept on him in the silence.
What did that mean for him? What would he do? Was he always dead? What should he do? Could he even do anything?
'Oh god...' Clenching his eyes tighter, he tried not to let them fall, the burning, hot tears that budded at his eyes, a terrible foreboding filling him.
Dead.
That's the only thing that made sense, right? Was that why he couldn't remember anything but fuzz. It was as if there was cotton, a film, blinding him from anything that meant something to him. There were faces, and smells, and thoughts, and feelings, all there, swirling and coalescing into a picture, shining and formed, yet never really whole. Something was missing, others weren't adding up, filling his head and drowning any certainty he thought he'd had. What any of it meant, he didn't know, he couldn't say.
None of it meant anything like this.
And what could he do?
Nothing.
Where would he even begin?
He didn't know.
He didn't...know.
He didn't know anything.
Holding himself, cried, unable to stop himself as terrible sobs wracked him, full and dolor as the world shifted and turned, ticking and formless and yet suffocating.
And he cried.
And sobbed.
And screamed.
But there was nothing. There was no one.
No one to hold him, to console him. Nothing.
Nothing.
He just wanted to hold someone. He wanted to...feel something.
He wanted...he wanted -
"Sayori! P-please! Sayori!" Her name was there on his tongue, and for a moment, thought his wracking sounds, it didn't make sense....until his head snapped up, eyes wide with a strange knowing he didn't understand. In his mind, he could see...something. Red, fabric affixed to a head of coral pink hair. Reaching out, he felt it, warm and silky against his rough fingertips.
"S-Sayori? Who...who - " Screaming, the youth doubled over, head pulsing in agony as they came.
Flashing in his eyes, he heard her, felt her close. A voice in the mess, lilted, as if singing to him a somber song, eyes flickering blue, black, an image distorted, unclear...but there. Something was there. She was...someone. Someone important to him, he could feel it, he could hear her, laughing around him. A pleasant sound that made his heart ache, but it was getting further away. So...far...
"No! N-no! Sayori, don't go! Please don't leave me here! Sayori!" He tried to follow, but there was no where to run here, no way to move except to flail and beg for them to come back. But she didn't, her visage fading from his eyes as she steady bled into the noise, and again...he was alone.
Horribly...painfully...alone.
No.
No, this couldn't happen. Was this...some kind of joke? Yeah, was this someone's idea of a joke, a prank? Give him something to hold, then tear it away, rip it from his hands just as he'd remembered something, felt something, had anything to hope for? Gritting his teeth, he regarded the dark, the black emptiness, again, his watery brown eyes wavering in the unfocused masses of light that laid astray an impossible distance away. They beckoned him mockingly, as if challenging him to meet them, to grip them when they knew very well that he couldn't. It was more akin to the feeling that someone had been watching him, laughing at his struggle, his pain, his torment.
It was funny to them, whatever it was, that stared from beyond the abyss.
It made him angry, irrationally so as he yelled out to it, teeth gnashed with fury.
"Why?! Why are you doing this?! You're an asshole, a piece of shit, you hear me?! YOU HEAR ME?!" Screaming out, the teen couldn't even feel himself breach the closest light to him, and out there, far beyond, those lights, and the lack thereof, writhed, unaffected by his words. They didn't care. They couldn't care, could they, if they couldn't hear him, right?
Or maybe they weren't listening.
He didn't know.
Searching his mind for something, anything, he found...nothing. The memory of that girl, her name escaping him now, lifted and scrubbed without a trace.
It hurt.
Trying to grab for something when he didn't even understand what, or who, they were.
It was tiring. He was tired. Too tired to fight it, the lull of closing his eyes once more. Was there a point to trying to even fight it? Whatever was in store for him wasn't something he could change, right? The notion that it was out of his hands...disquieted him, and yet, he felt no drive to push or pull as he felt himself relax.
Relax as the world around him grew brighter.
The drone louder, louder until his eyes snapped open, open to light, light that seared his eyes.
Burned them.
Burned him.
He was dying again.
He -
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His dreary eyes cracked open, and again, he was in his room.