Oneshot Description: Another one of those typical "Player manages to mod the game so that Monika can freely talk to them" stories but with a little twist.
Here's some things to note in this story.
"Italicized dialogue within quotation marks represent speech within text boxes"
'Italicized dialogue within apostrophes represent inner thoughts'
Monika sat in what she called the 'Space Classroom' and waited as she looked over a pink box started to fill up with words.
"Well Monika, thanks for listening me ramble on for today, really grateful for you." The box displayed.
She smiled and began to convey her words into a box of her own. "Of course Jonathan, you should never try to bottle up your feelings, it's quite an unhealthy method to hand your emotions!"
For the past few months, Monika had been talking to her player ever since he found a way to mod and code in ways to keep her from being deleted from the original game while also being able to finally communicate directly. Even though she couldn't hear or see Jonathan, she was just happy that the two of them could actually talk normally rather than being limited to vague dialogue options and cookie cutter responses. She would see a new message appear in the box in front of her.
"It's that time again Monika... I'm really sorry to do this..."
Monika sighed as she knew what was going to happen next. "It's fine Jonathan, I understand you aren't able to keep the laptop running this app on for too long, besides I have been getting used to it."
New text appeared in the box. "Just wish I could save you from that cruel fate..."
"Nonsense! You already saved me just by talking to me. It's more than worth it to be saved from that dreaded Screaming Void by your willingness to talk to me any moment you get."
"Thanks Monika, I've just been feeling uneasy about myself... I think I'll finally try to get in touch with him now."
"Then get to it Jonathan! I believe in you. I never had a sibling myself, but I'm sure that it's important to keep a healthy relationship."
When the two talked for the first time, it started slow and simple. Just simple questions like favorite hobbies and interests, what their worlds felt like and other things that revolved around personalities. Over time Jonathan would start to confide more personal information to Monika, such as how his life was going and how he was truly feeling by venting out any frustrations he acquired throughout the day. One prickly topic was his younger brother, who had some ill will towards him when he moved out. A year ago he had finally moved out and found a place to call his own, it was that a few days before Jonathan left, he got into a rather heated argument with his brother, which left the two having bad vibes with eachother, it was so bad that they didn't see eachother on the day he moved out. Though from what Monika is getting from their talks, he wants to reach out to his brother and make amends, he regrets leaving how he did and hopes that he will forgive him.
"Thanks Monika, I can count on you as my moral support! Again, sorry in advanced for doing this to you."
"It's fine, I hope to see you soon!"
Monika smiled for a moment before taking a deep breath. Soon the world around her began to fade away, the Space Classroom transforming into a black void as she began to disconnect from her game's reality. The Screaming Void, a horrible place that she had unfortunately gotten used to out of necessity. Thankfully Jonathan had a consistent schedule, so he was able to open up the game before the Void could truly get to her.
'I just need to wait, just remain calm and ignore everything.'
So she waited, waited until the game could be opened again. The voices in the back of her head began to speak up, she pushed them back. The lights started to appear, she suppressed them. The voices came back louder, she pushed back harder. The lights began to scramble, she continued to suppress them.
The voices started get unbearable.
Get me out.
The lights flashed in every portion of her vision.
Make it stop.
Too many things are happening at once.
It hurts
I don't want this
Please help
SAVE ME!
After what seemed like a century of waiting, the voices and lights finally stopped as Monika started to see the familiar walls and floor of the Space Classroom. Tears streamed down her eyes, feeling relief after who knows how long she'd been in there.
'What took him so long...' Monika was very upset. He never made her wait this long, even if there were days where he didn't feel like talking, he'd at least turn on the laptop so Monika could have a reprieve from the insanity. Wanting answers already, she quickly opened up her own dialogue box and began writing her message.
"Jonathan! Where have you been? You kept me in there for too long! Are you okay?"
She waited, hoping for an answer. She then saw the pink dialogue box appear in front of her, the words confused her.
"Um, who is this?"
Monika held a stern look as she wrote her reply. "Jonathan please. Don't joke like that, how could you ever forget me!"
The dialogue box cleared and remained empty for a while, she it was becoming clear that this may not be Jonathan. The next reply from the box would confirm this.
"Wait, are you actually Monika from DDLC????"
"Yes it's me, now who is this? You're clearly not Jonathan. Where is he?"
Monika waited for the new response to show up. The long silence began to make her feel suspicious of this person, random thoughts and scenarios ran threw her head. Was someone borrowing the laptop, was it stolen? Did Jonathan want to introduce her to a friend? No if he wanted to do that, he would have explained it to them already and not put her through a prolonged period of time in the void. The dialogue box would finally show a new response, one that made her heart drop.
"Jonathan... passed away. He was caught up in a car crash and died days later in the hospital. This is his brother Ryan."
Monika panicked. "N-No this can't be true... It's a joke right? He can't be gone!"
"He is... I attended his funeral last week. This laptop became a hand me down and after days of hesitation, I finally decide to check out what's inside."
"Jonathan is really gone huh..." The silence in the Space Classroom was broken by the sound of Monika falling to her knees, tears falling from her cheeks as she began to mourn for Jonathan, her first true friend from the real world.
"It's okay, I miss him too..."
After several minutes of crying, Monika eventually got a hold of herself, regaining as much of her composure as she could. Trying to lift the mood, she figured that she should try to talk to this Ryan person.
"So... you're the younger brother that Jonathan talks about right?"
"Yeah that's right.He talked about me?"
"He mentions you every now and then whenever we talk. He likes to do that often."
"Really? I guess he said some rude things about me huh?"
"Quite the opposite really... He really did care about you, he talked about how you two were close as kids, the fun little stories from the adventures you had together, he even brought up that incident with the brownies!"
"Oh... so you know about what happened then. I want to know something... Did he ever regret what happened... You know, THAT incident?"
"Yes, he really felt bad about it... Our last conversation was actually about how he planned to reach out to you..."
An uncomfortable pause rested between the messages, until a new question appeared.
"When did you last talk?"
"If I look back at the history... August 17th."
"That was the day he..."
Monika remained silent, how LONG has it been? She looked into some files and looked over to the calendar, her eyes widened as she saw it was now September 13th.
"So it was almost a month since then..."
"That's right... It was only until today I decided to charge and turn on his laptop. I was a bit curious what he had on here, just didn't expect YOU of all people, and I mean actually you and not like some mod for the game."
"Haha... well Jonathan really cared about me and put in the effort so we could talk... I still can't believe he's gone..."
"Me too Monika... I wish I was able to apologize to him while he was still around... but at least I know that he also wanted to fix our relationship thanks to you..."
"Of course, you're his baby brother and I felt that you needed to know in case you didn't have the chance."
"Thanks Monika... Never thought I'd actually say something like that."
She giggled as she read the text box. "Well it's a first time for everything!"
"So, what did you and Jonathan usually do?"
"Oh? We talked alot about anything. Favorite foods, what kind of interests we shared, or just about how his day went."
"So kind of like the After Story mod huh? Well I'm glad you were there for him, must be nice to have someone to always be there to listen to you..."
An idea popped up in Monika's head. "How about I do that for you then?"
"Huh? Why would you want to that? Aren't you like in love with Jonathan?"
"Oh I wasn't actually in love with him! He made me aware that what I felt for him wasn't actually love, it was just a longing for something that was actually real, something that wasn't artificial and one-sided. Besides, I feel like this would benefit all of us!"
"How so?"
"Well, I still have someone to talk to from the real world who can also get me out of the Screaming Void just by turning on this laptop, you have someone who is willing to listen and talk to you at any time and most importantly, we still keep Jonathan alive in our hearts. Him being able to let me freely communicate was a passion project of his, to let me have a taste of what it's like to be in his reality, I'm sure he'd be happy if you kept me company."
"Wow... I never really knew about this... He always did like you from the game, so I guess it's fair that I keep this dream of his alive. Plus I guess this is a way to catch up on what my brother did when he moved out."
Monika smiled, this may have been a bittersweet solution, at least Jonathan's legacy would still be held. "Then let's start from the beginning then! My name is Monika! The president of the Literature Club!"
"And my name is Ryan, your newest club member."
And that concludes this little oneshot idea I had! It came to me when I thought about when it came to buying used games. There's a chance the previous owner didn't delete their save before selling their game off, so when you do see the old savefile still there, it kinda gives you an idea of who this person may be and what they could have been like. Anyways thanks for reading this!
