5ive: This is a little oneshot I wrote a while ago. A few people said it was pretty good so I thought I'd bring it to... here. Not my bed but wtf. READ, REVIEW, AND CRITICIZE!
It was the beginning to any other day; I woke up around ten or eleven – having graduated school and not working till late tonight meant I got to sleep as much as I wanted. Normal morning so far. Got up after a few moments of lying in bed, threw on some pajama pants and a t-shirt, and then checked my phone.
One text from my fiancé, some messages from the app my work uses, and finally emails from YouTube gamers I follow: Markiplier, PewDiePie, CinnamonToastKen, TobyTurner, Cryaotic, and a few others. TV is one of my things, but lately I've been watching more of YouTube than anything. I owe my life to a few of them for helping me through my roughest of times, so of course I'd watch them any chance I got.
Texting my fiancé a 'good morning' and 'I love you~' I checked on all my emails and deleted the ones I didn't care for. Some of Ken's videos were games I'd already seen so I deleted them and saved a co-op for later, deleted all but Toby's Happy Wheels let's plays, saved all of Mark's and PewDie's, only SeaNanner's Prop Hunt videos, and finally stopped at Cry. He had a full play through of Walking Dead episode three – the only series I didn't watch from Pewds – and a Cry Reads. Those I preferred at night because his videos were so long.
Then my phone buzzed. The inception ring tone I had making me jump and nearly drop my phone. "Dammit. Still cool as shit though." A smile on, I backed out of the email to check on the new one received. Another from Cry? His Walking Dead video was from the 19th and this Cry Reads was from today, the 22nd. He uploaded twice? Unusual, but he's done it before.
Curious, I tapped the email.
The icon of the video was gray with three dots. That means that the video is deleted or has no icon at the moment. Maybe it was just that new? I shrugged. Cry is one of my favorite YouTube gamers so the thought of missing a video of his scared me.
I pulled over my laptop and opened it, logging in and pulling up my email. I found the email there still so clicked the video and waited for the message saying the video was taken down by the user or because of copyright.
It wasn't. A black video popped up with the loading circle.
I blinked at the computer getting ready to click the gear in the corner to turn it to high quality when the video started.
Once it started I was met without an intro or even 'On the last video'. Instead it was as if the video had been cut and was playing from a few minutes in.
"Bottle, bottle… Oh! …Nah." Cry was looking around at the objects on the shelves. It looked like an indie style game. One of those good ones with a realistic feel to it. Much like Amnesia where you can interact with almost everything but with much better graphics altogether. "Finally! I've been looking everywhere for this fucking key! Now," he turned away from the shelves to a door opposite the room, "to put you in the door and get the fuck out of here."
I then realized that there was no play/pause button or even a timeline on the video. In fact, the entire bar on the bottom of the video was gone. I couldn't full screen unless I double clicked – which I did – and even that didn't pause the video. My computer has been bugging out on me for a while now so I just sighed and sat back. Better to watch the video as is than to refresh and had my internet fail on me all at once.
Cry continued on as usual, talking to himself about how pretty the game was but that he was disappointed that he hadn't seen a monster yet. Again, the game reminded me of Amnesia as it continued into a hallway that had me think of a castle. Tapestries hung from the walls every once in a while with torches on either side to light up the beautiful artwork. Cry made a point to walk up to one just to show off the beautiful work.
Again he went about his way down the hall growing quiet as he checked each new room. As the video proceeded I was feeling as if… was this a livestream maybe? I scrolled down but there were no comments. No loading to be done and no suggested videos. This video wasn't like his others. If he let something sit when he isn't talking then that meant he either finds something or this leads up to something. Three minutes went by with nothing happening. Cry had stopped talking altogether. He was just looking through all the rooms for a key to a locked door he had found.
No talking.
No sounds from the game.
This was more eerie than it should be.
Finally he sighed and it made me jump. "I've looked through every room. Now, game, please give me the key. I've run out of stuff to blab about." A soft meow had him laugh. "Yes, cat, you can just- NO! Cat!" Loud clicks and purring filled the mic. "Cat, down!" More clicks and meows and finally back to just Cry. "No, cat. I gave you a chance."
At least something happened. It had been scaring me.
My phone buzzed again so I reached over for it. It was a text from Twitter.
CryWasTaken: Cry Reads vid up! Sorry no games. I'm sick. /xhpMLA6zjhM
I felt my heart stop. My eyes turned back to the video that was still playing. That was Cry. No one could fake that voice so easily. Who the hell had just tweeted from his Twitter?
I opened a new tab and threw a message at him in reply to the last tweet with the link to the video. There was almost no way he would check it but I just had to know what this video was! I still didn't even know the game!
Then it also hit me. I was so absorbed into the game play that I hadn't seen that it was the only thing on the page. Just the video itself. There was no title, no like button, no video suggestions, no comments, no search bar, or even the YouTube logo in the top corner.
Something that was that huge of a difference and it hadn't even occurred to me.
My phone buzzed with several tweets to Cry from others I followed telling him to get better but no one responded to my link. I was freaking out for no reason. Obviously this was just a bug in the YouTube system. Maybe this was meant to be private and he'd upload it later and somehow I received it.
Even so, there we no breaks in the game play at all to skip past this awkward silence. Usually if I found a video boring then I'd just click right out, but I needed to see this. There was just something so wrong about this.
"Oh damn. It's almost one. Heh, I've been playing for almost an hour."
Cry was an hour ahead of me – I only knew because of his tweets. Out of habit I looked to my clock. Almost twelve. It was just a coincidence. Maybe he meant one in the morning.
"So much to edit out later…" Again he set off on his search for the key. "I'm gonna have to look up a friggen walk through! Everything is hidden too gewd!" The funny and familiar voice of Cry playing around had me smile slightly.
And then the game got scary again. The white behind the video faded to a beautiful picture with forest, leaves, and a tiny Cry off in the corner staring at a floating blue light. Cry reacted to it, and then laughed. "It's so boring in this that my own background scared me."
I felt my face pale. "B-background…?" I squeaked, hearing my own voice in my headphones and covering my mouth.
Then the screen froze. Or at least I thought it did.
"Hello?" Cry began to look around.
Wouldn't be the first time I felt like one of the gamers I watch reacted to my voice. It's happened on several occasions with PewDie and Mark. But it's never been like this. Not where the video takes up the entire browser and I can see their background.
I opened my mouth to say more but words didn't form. Not even a sound came out. The fear that attempted to beat through my dumbstruck heart was still processing if he had actually heard me or if it were the game. My fingertips were numb, tingling from my fluttering heart.
Cry was eerily quiet again, not moving his character in one direction or the other. Just… looking. Then a loud sound came and he called "Hello?" again but from further away. He had taken his headphones off.
After a moment he put them back on. "Great, now I'm hearing things." He laughed. "This game is driving me crazy! Something needs to happen soon or I'm quitting." He looked down at a door. "And then I find the key. Thanks game!" He grabbed it and set off back down the corridor to the locked door at the beginning.
"He did hear me," I breathed just above a whisper.
Again Cry stopped. "Yes, I heard you. Now where are you monster?" He went to a door and stepped in.
Again I felt cold. Or perhaps even more cold than before. Not only did he hear me but he responded. I began to breathe heavily, staring at my computer in a stunned and bewildered fear that I found myself grasping both sides of the screen as if I thought it would fall away. "Cry?"
And once more he stopped. He took a moment to speak, voice shaking. "Hello?"
There was a crash from the computer. Cry's character looked everywhere all at once before stopping on the hallway while the sounds continued from his end. I expected to hear screaming or at least Cry yelling about something, but all I heard was the thrashing. And then my phone completely blew up with messages from Twitter. All of them from Cry.
I wasn't able to keep up with them as they rolled in. The first ones saying things like watched, talked to me, watching me, they see me, they found me, can't run. It escalated so fast that I felt like I were watching a horror play out right in front of me.
CryWasTaken: It's in my house
CryWasTaken: I fucking see it
CryWasTaken: It was on my twitter
CryWasTaken: That's not me
CryWasTaken: It's going to get me
CryWasTaken: It's going to get me
CryWasTaken: It's going to get me!
CryWasTaken: IT'S GOING TO GET ME
CryWasTaken: HELP
CryWasTaken: SOMEONE HELP ME
CryWasTaken: THATS NOT ME ITS NOT ITS NOT
CryWasTaken: GETTHEFUCKOFF
CryWasTaken: GOAWAY
CryWasTaken: HELPMEGETHELP
CryWasTaken: ITSNOTMEISWEAR PLES NIOAJrtaao;aaghjahEH
CryWasTaken: FSDA JO Ajgrio;;;ghfjfslkar2975bbjrjekqu3i4s3jfb
CryWasTaken: asl
Then the posts from Pewds and Cry's girlfriend rolled in. I'm sure there were ones from Mark and Ken but I wasn't following them.
After another minute of my phone blowing up, the sound in my headphones halted. In a panic from the silence I turned all of my attention to the computer.
The game closed out to show off Cry's background. It was the same as before, the blue tinted trees and the tiny Sup guy off to the side staring at a blue light. All the sound I could hear was a soft static. It sent a shiver up my spine with each spark that clicked to life inside my headphones.
A shock ran through me. I threw my headphones to the bed as sparks shot from the speakers. Again my eyes fell on the screen. The entire screen turned black for some moments before blue light gently lit up the lower half of the screen and all I could make out was a crooked smile just as the screen turned gray and the message "he's dead, Jim" popped up with the dead jigsaw puzzle piece.
I didn't know what to do with that now. I just stared at my computer screen wide eyed. The entirety of my body was ice cold and my heart was beating in my throat. I wanted to write my fiancé, make a journal on DeviantArt, a video, something! But all I could do was stare.
I rechecked my phone and all tweets from Cry were still there along with the ones from his friends. Once again I had no clue what to do. After moments of thinking and staring at the computer, I pulled up Microsoft Word and started writing.