Have you ever woken up and regretted everything you did previously in life? I know I certainly did, in fact, far too many times I thought about all the wrongdoings of my life. Suffice to say, I'm not exactly proud of myself for the past. I don't think anyone really is, but the argument could be said about the present self as well. Ever wished for a new beginning? Just to throw it all away and begin as a new person once more? At some point in their lives, people are simply disappointed with how they live with themselves and seek out entertainment to distract themselves. I was one of those people, seeking entertainment to distract myself from horrible self-reflection. Manga, books, fan-fiction, but above all else the thing that kept me away from the crippling reality was my love and passion for video games.
One could say I was a lore connoisseur of sorts, delving into games that by all means I had never intended to play just for the sake of story. Although I did enjoy my time playing games, there was nothing that had gotten me hooked as well as sufficiently built worlds with the setting and characterization of others.
Except Dark Souls. How the hell was I supposed to enjoy a game that kicked my ass at every turn? I'm not bitter about it, but as a wise man once said over the internet, 'Git Gud'.
Regardless of my previous little tirade, I had enjoyed a wide variety of stories across all forms of media. From fantasy, to sci-fi, to something in-between that interested me and my own personal interests, there was always something to distract me. Admittedly, I was less into medieval-fantasy as opposed to modern or science-fiction stories. You could only do so much with 'this world has magic' plot-lines over and over again to the point of tedium.
But where my interests shined the most were those about human triumph. Grand stories of heroes defeating villains, stories of progress and scientific knowledge – things such as isekai anime where a scientist or a pharmacist is reincarnated into a world without such knowledge – and above all else, humanity as a whole. I suppose that's why I liked Warhammer 40K as a nerd, which for all its doom and gloom humanity still stood against the darkness, not to mention the sheer variety of lore that had yet to be uncovered.
And guns, of course, I also liked it for the excessive amounts of big guns and warfare.
Hey, I'm a very simple-minded person after all, being a male who grew up around masculine things. Being raised American helped too.
There was one thing that I've noted throughout my years of living is my preference on media, is that I fairly rather enjoyed the power-fantasy of being the hero. Not the dull, boring, and downright nasty edge that some characters had in their stories – I'm looking at you Kirito – but rather, people who simply sought for the best and when they were at the top, lived as they wanted to live.
Of course there were other genres that I sought to explore in my due time, some of which interested me, some of which thoroughly surprised me and sparked up new curiosities inside. Oddly enough I had always been fond of the Lovecraftian theme of certain games, some of which pulled it off well while others did not.
So then who am I to say that I never expected these two interests of mine to collide so violently and so unexpectedly that I would be thrilled to find out how the two meshed.
At least, is what I would have said if I wasn't stuck in the middle of it AS A CHARACTER!
I punched the mirror in front of me as it shattered into pieces. Immediately, I regretted what I had done as I hissed out in pain. Blood splattered across the mirror as it seeped from my knuckles, cradling it with my other hand. I checked to see if any glass fragments were stuck inside.
Fortunately I don't think any of the glass made it into my skin. I would've been upset otherwise considering I had no tools.
[ You've taken damage ]
[ You've gained the skill Physical Resistance ]
Two blue pop-up windows akin to a video game appeared in front of my vision, immediately I dismissed them to look at myself. And found brown, nearing the edge of black, eyes staring back at me.
Great, not even beginning my adventure and I've already injured myself. The pain still stung. I was going to need to either clean it up soon or make a makeshift bandage from my clothes. Hopefully I'd find something better than a red t-shirt and some jeans.
Once again I am reminded of the situation I was stuck in.
I don't even remember how I got here. All I recalled before I was dumped in an unsightly bathroom with flickering lights and a sort of decay that rivaled typical horror-game bathrooms, was the sudden waking of being on cold-tiled floors. The broken bathroom stalls barely hanging on by their hinges, and the sound of the fluorescent lights.
And the moths, the goddamn moths in this bathroom. The flies too.
Suffice to say when I woke up, I was not exactly in the best of states. I must've said something before I came here, made a choice, something that put me in this position. At first, I was scared and possibly thought it was a dream before the conclusion came that it was far too realistic for it to be a dream. I never had dreams anyways, so how could that have happened?
Then I became calm. An unusual calm that washed over me that I didn't even know I had. Or at least, I thought I had before a pop-up appeared in front of my eyes. Do you know how strange it is to see a physical- or I should say visual, object appear right in front of you like a video game? Oh yes, that was the situation I was in and far too often think about in order to escape my life.
The worst thing was that I immediately recognized where, and what it was from. From scouring the internet in search of those 'The Gamer' fan-fictions to reading the actual manga itself, I knew exactly what situation I was in. It took me a fraction of the time due to previous knowledge in order to navigate it. I wasn't even given a tutorial for starting EXP, great.
So here I was, stuck in this dingy bathroom with 'The Gamer' systems – which looked nicer compared to the actual menus, being replaced with a translucent blue with white text as opposed to the ugly brown, small mercies am I right? - and having no clue of where I was.
I checked my bloodied hand to see if it had healed over- It had not. Shouldn't it have healed by now? I understand pain was still interpreted by the system, but why is the effect lingering? In the story – The Gamer's Body sh- wait.
"Skills."
Goddamnit… Did- Did I not- I don't see it. Where there should have been 'The Gamer's Body' or whatever it was called sitting in the skill's window, was a new icon replacing it. In its place was an image of a simple outline of a person without any real definable features about it. Tapping on it, I looked at its description. And what I saw boggled me.
'Gamer's Body'. So it was still there in name at least, but the description was different. For a summary, it mentioned how damage functioned closer to real life – so I'd actually have to put effort into treating injuries – yet still didn't require a need to sleep, eat, or drink water. Evident by the fact, my hand was still bleeding. Whatever, I'll deal with it later. There was also… something that stood out.
[ Upon the User's Death, they revert to the last state saved ]
Huh. Well, good to know I could die without suffering permanent death. I think? Still, it doesn't mean I won't avoid death. I heard dying was a very nasty business after all. Quickly looking at what should've been 'Gamer's Mind' as well, it was in the same aspects of the modified 'Gamer's Body'. Still retaining the same name, but it's icon had been replaced with a new description on hand. After reading through it, I scowled.
For one, it didn't provide me with immunity to mental disorders unlike the actual 'Gamer's Mind'. There was a resistance to mental disorders instead, but like with 'Gamer's Body' there had been something else tacked on. Instead of immunity to one thing, I had a resistance to mental disorders and mental attacks. Which was good since that meant I would be resistant to potential mind takeovers. Useful, very useful… Or at least, it would have been if it wasn't for the fact I was lacking the whole 'can remain logical and think think things through', instead replaced with something similar but essentially meant with enough stress I wouldn't be able to fall back on 'Gamer's Mind' to support it.
After a moment of consideration, I sighed. Bad enough I ended up somewhere I didn't know, but the fact that what would've been strong abilities was being skimped out on added to my frustration.
I needed to get out of the damn bathroom before I started going mad. That, and the flies, moths, whatever- were starting to annoy the hell out of me. I immediately stopped being hunched over one of the ceramic sinks that weren't entirely covered with grim and god-knows what else, and turned to my right.
Strangely enough in contrast with the rest of the restroom I was in, which seemed fairly normal enough by conventional standards. In terms of relative era- although I doubt how 'sci-fi' a restroom could be as opposed to primitive, the door was at least a clear indicator I was somewhere where I was not supposed to be. Instead of, say, a normal restroom door entrance, it looked more like a space ship's airlock system with gray paint that split down the middle of a hexagonal-shaped door.
Not entirely, but you get the point.
I was… nervous, considering the state of disrepair the restroom was in with the fact the door was some sort of sci-fi stand in, I could only imagine what sort of place I ended up in. God I hope it isn't Alien. Actually, no, scratch that at least with Alien I could try to kill it.
"Right, no turning back now." I silently spoke to myself, if only to reassure that nothing would go horribly wrong. Walking closer to the door, I noticed that it had a keypad on one side of it but it was already lit green, did I really need to find a code or-
Before I could finish my train of thought, the door simply automatically opened for me as soon as I started to approach it. Good to know that in the future we didn't need to open doors manually.
It opened up to what appeared to be a lobby of some sort, with surprisingly decent lighting that wasn't flickering. With what I only assumed to be some sort of desk-help to the right of the room with a glass window, some orange-colored chairs underneath some writing and a logo, strangely enough the writing was in some other language that reminded me vaguely of German before I decided to pass on it. But the main feature was the elevator in the main center of the room, pressed where the back wall would be.
At first I had simply scanned the room before heading over to a terminal right next where the elevator was, looking it over… And of course, it was all in… English? I blinked for a moment, rubbing my eyes before I stared back at the writing. No, it wasn't in English but for some reason I could look at the screen and just know what it said in English. Some buttons which labeled for elevator levels which were still in the language for me, calling it, some glowing bits which I didn't make heads or tails of due to the labels also being in the foreign language – but there was a map showing some sort of long 'tube' connecting to blocks underneath a brown-colored background. It didn't take long for me to realize I was underground.
Well obviously I'd want to head to the surface first, right?
Well the top layer above the underground section was something called 'Leng Orbital', with something below that midway underground called 'Oberflache'. Wait, was everything really in German?! Or at least, some variant of it since once you've seen enough bits and words from a language you could pick up similarities.
No matter, I pressed the button for Leng Orbital…
And waited…
And waited…
And waited…
It was only for barely a minute and I couldn't even tell if the elevator was so vastly slow, which it could've been, or the button was broken in the first place. Eventually I gave up on waiting, screw it, who said the surface was for me anyways? The more irrational part of my mind spoke to me.
I turned my head to the receptionist's desk before approaching it, there was something taped to the window. A piece of paper and what looked to be a plastic card of some sorts. I grabbed both of them off the window before I looked down at the paper, handwritten, but evidently I was right on my guess on everything being written in German considering the fact the wording on it was very much in line with German sentences. Before I could even comprehend, a small text appeared overlapping the German like some sort of faintly ghost that I could read in English.
"Due to staff shortages, report new arrivals to…" I trailed off as I read the rest of the paper silently, I shrugged before leaving the paper through the open slot of the receptionist's desk which at this point was most likely the case. Nothing too important, but at least I got it through my head that everything was in German. But it had also mentioned meeting in Classroom C4. Now if only I could remember that.
With the key card in my hand, I looked it over briefly, it was weird looking to say the least. Mostly consisting of symbols that had little bearing on me since I didn't know what most of them were for, but there was something that stood out. 'S-23 Sierpinski'.
What the hell was S-23 Sierpinski? Was it the name of this facility? I have no doubt if it was, but what sort of facility would this place be then? Scientific underground laboratories? A military installation? Something else entirely? Quickly I shook my head out of it, no point in questioning something that isn't too relevant. I could've sworn I remembered the name 'Sierpinski' from somewhere, but from what I couldn't recall entirely.
"Fuck it, I'll figure it out later."
Walking towards the door to the right, I walked up to it to see that unlike the door to the bathroom, the lights on this one were yellow with a lock on it.
Obviously, it means that it was open.
Anyways, sarcasm aside. I didn't see how I could open the door with the key card at first before I realized there was a slot near where the keypad was. Swiping the key card into the card reader, the lights turned to a shade of green before the door opened up.
Only to reveal another hallway with more doors. Lovely. I barely turned my head to notice that out of the hallway, only one door was a shade other than red, yellow and a lock symbol much like the reception doorway was originally. With one door even covered with what looked like hazard tape. Cautiously I tip-topped towards the center of the hallway which was actually 'T' shaped, with my immediate left being the hallway towards another door. The only door that was actually green.
There was a poster on the other end of the hallway near the locked doors, but I didn't bother reading it.
Going through the only open door- I- what the fuck?!
There, in the hallway that had just opened up was a body. Or- Christ, it was difficult to tell if it was even a normal human body. It was a bloated, black mess of… Oh god, the smell.
I vomited right then and there, off to the side. The smell combined with the horrific sight of what was most certainly a decaying body was enough to set me off. The wet splatter made a sound on the ground before I did my best to wipe the vomit off my mouth afterwards. Slowly I breathed in and out.
In. Out. In. Out.
Slowly starting to regain my senses, I forced myself to look at the body once more. Disgusting as it was, and with the revulsion inside of me growing by the second, I made sure to make note of it and how it looked. I didn't even want to stand near it, but I started to tip-toe enough to where I could get a better look at it. Hopefully it wasn't going to hop up and attack me anytime soon.
Although, now that I could get a better look at it. I've noticed it wasn't quite… human. It was humanoid, yes, but it had what could best be described as 'stilts' as opposed to actual legs. And appeared more robotic… A combination of bio-organic and android components from what it appeared to be. It felt vaguely familiar but much like Sierpinski I couldn't place an exact detail on why it was so familiar. The smell and subsequent rot was… I'm not going to get into details about that. At the very least, it wasn't entirely human and better was the fact it didn't so much as twitch as I approached.
After a visual autopsy, I briefly looked in the hallway and saw another body slumped up against the wall. It looked cleaner than the other one, and I could get an image of how it looked. White chest-plate, with white legs and a stripe across it- Instinctively I turned my head away from it. But noticed a door the second corpse sat at near the end with a sickly yellow light.
In fact everything in the hallway appeared inaccessible or locked, with a total of… 5 Doors? With the only exception to my immediate right being open. Yeah, I don't think I want to stay in this hallway. Quickly I moved to enter the next room to avoid not just the smell, but any potential danger if I sought to linger in the area considering the second body appeared somewhat recently. The new room I found myself in was what I assumed to be a security – or perhaps some sort of camera room with the various computers and chairs laying about everywhere. I was most likely wrong, but it was a room to be sure. The ominous red glow didn't help, as I immediately spotted the source of said light.
A single computer with an entirely red screen. I approached it, thinking that maybe it might've been active or I could've gotten some information on this place before I realized something. The entire screen was red because fading in and out digitally were error signs that were popping up, but what sort of software problem had a 'Red Screen' instead of a 'Blue Screen'? About to leave the computer, I was interrupted when a window showed up in front of me – a Gamer oriented one, not of the computer.
It was a save screen. With four save slots with none of them filled out.
[ SAVE PROGRESS ]
Well. It was both reassuring that I could 'save' progress or whatever that meant, but also terrifying as I didn't know what loading conditions were. Did I even want to know? Still, it would be a gamer sin if I didn't constantly save my game every 5 minutes especially when I was given a save station. Pressing on the first slot, it asked if I wanted to save in slot 1 before two more options of a simple 'yes' and 'no' box appeared. I pressed yes, before the Save Slot 1 was filled out.
Before where there had been a simple save slot marked with 'No Data' and a rectangle with lines going across each angle forming an 'x' in the middle, it now filled out what appeared to be a top-down view of the room I was in. But digitized. Everything else about the data… Was blanked out. Or more accurately, redacted with those ASCII blocks that the SCP Wiki seemed so content on using, with what looked to be a date, perhaps a name in the middle, and two uncensored times that read out on the screen.
'19:22:06' and '00:21:45' respectively.
So was one of them the date within the station? But then what of the other one? Questions that had to be answered for later, I suppose.
I took a brief look around the room shortly after, finding two notes. One of which mentioned a safe code which kept resetting to its default code, something which I'd probably need to find later if this was shaping up to be what I suspect to be some sort of horror genre. Which- actually, looking back on it, why was everything set up like a horror game? Keys, codes, what was this Sci-Fi Resident Evil? Well, that or I suppose maybe Silent Hill would be closer? Both were good games, neither I have played.
The jokes on Chris Redfield were hilarious though.
The other note also mentioned using radios to find broadcasting frequencies for the safes, so I guess I'll have to find a radio. There was no radio in the save room unfortunately, which I hoped would've been the case. With a door on the opposite end of where I had just entered from, I left into another long hallway. This place really loved hallways, I'll tell you that much.
Once again, more doors. Immediately, there was a door across from where I had come out of that was open, so I decided to head inside there first. It was a classroom of sorts, if I had to guess what room it was and I'm pretty sure that it was due to the desk designs and layout, I took the time to look around the room. There, where a teacher's desk was sitting embedded into the wall was a safe. At first, I had considered the possibility that this was potentially Classroom 4C before I realized that the wall safe mentioned in one of the papers I read was Classroom 4B. So not the right room, which was due to the fact nobody was here.
Beginning to walk back out of the classroom, I couldn't help but spot a standing flag next to the door. I unfurled it, to see a flag which undoubtedly didn't exist on Earth. A yellow, or perhaps golden telescope emblazoned on it with 3 white stars all surrounded by a golden wreath. Oh, and the flag was in a black, red, and yellow background which I'm absolutely certain was the German flag.
Alright what kind of shenanigans did I walk into? Dropping the flag and letting it hang loosely like it was before, I left the room before heading down the hallway to the only other door which was open.
There, I saw a woman.
A woman with cybernetic legs, black hair, and blue eyes added with red eye shading. All while sitting on a metal column within the room covered in blood and laying in a puddle of it. We immediately locked eyes, and from there I suddenly understood the situation I was in.
The doors, Sierpinski Station, the Cyb- No, Replikas. This was all part of a fictional game which had been praised as one of the best horror games based off a previous older game Silent Hill, all of which included mind-bending psionics, eldritch terrors, and lesbian robots.
I was in goddamn SIGNALIS.
"Fuck."
AN : Hey there, Clonedude here. Back at it with yet another story I will probably never finished! This is more of a self-indulgence fanfiction that I thought of for an entirety of one day. Still, hopefully unlike my other fics where I didn't have anything to base a story off of, this one would be a bit more long-lasting. Cheerios, see you in however long until I get the motivation to write again!
