You awaken with a start. You have no memory at all of what happened last night, and that strikes you as odd.
It wouldn't be weird for a normal kid your age, you suppose; given the kinds of parties that usually go down nowadays, blacking out happens rather often, you'd assume.
But YOU? No, you haven't partied once in your whole life. You haven't even touched a bottle of alcohol.
So yeah, this is weird.
You have to focus. Center yourself on what you know.
Your name is MICHAEL.
You rouse yourself after a few moments of thought and sit up. You immediately notice something on your left wrist - a strange band of a metal and work you've never seen. It looks a bit dinged-up, and has a single worn button. After staring for a second, you press it, and the band emits a crackle of static before clearing. It continues to crackle and glitch out as a message plays.
-GREETINGS -static- USER -static.- YOU ARE NOW IN POSSESSION OF A -static- INTERCHANGING DEVICE, OR PAID FOR SHORT. THE PAID IS A TOOL THAT ALLOWS YOU TO -static- ANOTHER. USING THE PAID, YOU -static.- TO USE THE PAID, SIMPLY -static- PERSON AND PRESS THE BUTTON. ONCE PRESSED, TIME WILL -static- WHO ARE IN POSSESSION OF A PAID AS WELL, AND A -static- BE BROUGHT UP FOR YOUR USE. USING THE -static,- SELECT FROM -static- THEN SELECT "APPLY CHANGES". TIME WILL -static,- THE CHANGES YOU -static- IMMEDIATELY TAKE EFFECT. HOWEVER, PLEASE NOTE THAT PAID WILL NOT -static- TO EITHER THE USER OR THE TARGET.-
-FOR DETAILS ON EACH OPTION, CONSULT THE -static- IN THE -static- AT ANY TIME.-
You're... pretty sure that wasn't what was supposed to happen. It also really hurt your ears.
So, to recap, you don't know what's going on, you appear to have lost several hours of your life, and you have a weird wristband that is disturbingly vague in detail. And... okay, wait a sec... Yep, it won't come off. Wonderful.
Something is definitely very wrong. This thing seems outright dangerous, glitched or no. There's no telling what it truly does without some test work. And if this one exists, others might as well. Ones that aren't glitched and hold even MORE power. Ones that could very well be held by people who want to exterminate everyone else that has one. And you'd be disadvantaged, because by some stroke of terrible luck, yours doesn't work right.
You're getting a really bad vibe from this. It's as if... you're... huh.
You had a strange train of thought there, but following it might give a clue of some sort.
Being a shut-in, you play a lot of games. And most of those games are retro stuff your parents had. One of your favorites had to be Knuckles Chaotix on the old, dusty SEGA.
You learned a while ago that there was a hidden character, one who had been made in the alpha stages but had been scrapped. Playing as the remains of that character was always fun to do, because of the nature of the character himself; he was a glitchy mess, left behind by the last bits of deleted code. He was once meant to be played, but now... well, he wasn't. Playing as him shouldn't be a thing you could do.
The similarities are disturbing. Your... PAID? Is that what it's called? ...It's glitchy, and you can't remember how you got it. It's like someone selected you from a list of people to get one of these, and you were never meant to be selected.
It's obvious now. A normal person to get one of these would probably know all sorts of ways they could use it, and would probably even have a few friends willing to be guinea pigs. You, though... You're a shut-in. You don't know anything about this town, and no one knows anything about YOU. Not even this PAID knew your name.
So, with all this in mind, you guess there's only one thing to do.
You're glad you played a lot of noir games, because it's time to do some sleuthing.  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
| Members who added to this interactive story also contributed to these: |
<<-- Previous · Outline  · Recent Additions © Copyright 2025 KnownAsM (UN: knownasm at Writing.Com). All rights reserved.
Wandering Mind has granted Writing.Com, its affiliates and syndicates non-exclusive rights to display this work within this interactive story. Poster accepts all responsibility, legal and otherwise, for the content uploaded, submitted to and posted on Writing.Com. |
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
More by this author