find ur girlfriend

You're driving to pick up your girlfriend from the school where she works. It was a long Friday at the LGBTQ* bookshop and you want to find her and get home as soon as possible. You're going to make nachos together and then maybe watch a movie. [[Park up outside the school]]

She's there - lying on the ground. She's stirring, as if she was sleeping and is waking up slowly. [[Move closer]]

Your girlfriend isn't here. This room is full of other people. [[The worst possible people.]]

"Are you OK?" She stirs, opens her eyes as you approach. Smiles. You see her more clearly. And you see the bees. They're crawling all over her. [[Reach out to her]] [[Scream->Run1]]

You touch her. The bees crawl up your arm. Over your torso. They move so fast. [[You are enveloped in bees too.]]

You turn and run, desperately, screaming as you go. Back the way you came, back towards home, hoping this is all a bad dream and you'll wake up safe in bed beside her. Please, please, let me wake up beside her. You don't. [[You just keep running.]]

[[Fin]]

[[Try again->Intro]]

You head back the way you came, along the corridors of the main building and back through the double-doors. Except, wait. These aren't the same double-doors you came in by. You must've found your way to the sports fields instead. [[It's cold and dark out here]]

You go into the classroom and look around. There's nothing on the students' desks, but around the sides of the room are benches covered in stacks of books, scientific equipment, and heavy-looking binders. Your girlfriend's jacket and briefcase aren't lying out. You try the door of the full-length cupboard in the corner, but it's locked. On your girlfriend's desk are lying two pens and a pencil, a biology textbook, and a sheaf of worksheets on photosynthesis. [[Look closer at the worksheets]]

You walk the corridors for a while, just looking. The place is so quiet. You don't want to break the silence to call out your girlfriend's name. [[Wander]]

It's all your exes. It's that one boss at the shitty waitress job who made you cry, every day, for six months. It's the gay kid from your university course who started a queer-centred group and then excluded you because you had a different-gender partner and so "obviously you had straight privilege". He sneers at you. It's that one guy who wouldn't stop DMing you on twitter so you had to make your account protected. He's even uglier than his avatar. It's the straight girl from feminist book club who wanted to "experiment" with you and then never looked you in the eye again afterwards. Now she fixes you with a cold stare. Your exes whisper to each other and start to laugh. [[Fuck.]]

What are they all doing here? Are you in a nightmare? Should you pinch yourself? All of their faces stare at you and, instantaneously, break into terrible smiles. What the fuck? [[Pinch yourself]]

You lock the car and head up, through the school gates, to the double-doors of the main block. Your girlfriend's classroom is in here. It's dark - but that's probably just because most of the other staff have left already. The double-doors have a keypad lock on them, but you know the code. [[Type it in and turn the handle]]

Her classroom is just along here. [[Down the shadowy corridors]]

You reach her classroom and the door's open, but she isn't in there. The lights are off in there, too. Huh. Weird. Where is she? [[Your phone buzzes]]

"What the hell *is* this?" Your exes all laugh together. A heart-ripping, gut-wrenching harmony of laughs. They step closer to you. [[Their hands reach out to you]]

The door is locked. [[Force it]] [[Turn and speak to them->Speak to them]]

You throw yourself sideways at the door, again, again - feeling it start to give way under your aching shoulder. [[It opens at last and you run for your life]]

They touch you and their hands burn through your clothes, burn at your flesh, eating it away. There's no time to reach for your phone, or turn and run. There's nothing but burning, your exes bearing down on you. Now it's the others in the room who laugh, their voices somehow hurting your ears. Everything hurts. Your exes close in, wrapping themselves around you, and you start to struggle for breath. Everything is burning, everything is turning red at the edges. [[Try and fight them off]] [[Call out for your girlfriend]]

[[Keep running - get out of the building->Run2]]

Screaming, crying, blinded by pain, you writhe your body and try to kick at your exes. They barely notice. They're so strong. Superhuman. Their eerie smiles don't waver. Desperately, you wrench at their hands, trying to pull them off you one by one. That's when you notice something. [[When you touch them, you burn them too.]]

Burning. You call out your girlfriend's name and your flesh still burns. That's all. It burns, it burns, it burns, and then you hear a terrible sound. Like the jaws of a dragon devouring a herd of cattle. Like the devil itself eating through souls with a great fiery mouth. [[And then all is black.]]

You pull their hands off you, watching them hiss and writhe the way you hissed and writhed at their touch. It hurts to see them in pain, but you have to get free, you have to escape this hellish place. You keep shoving them away, each one groping back towards you again and again, until finally you've pushed them far enough away to escape. [[Make for the door]]

You wake up in your bed. You can tell from the light that it's early in the morning. Your girlfriend is next to you, in her pyjamas. She puts down her comic book. "What happened? Did you save me?" "No comment." That means yes. She smiles at you. "Are you OK? I was looking for you --" "Don't worry about it," she says, and bends down to kiss you. Her mouth tastes, just a little bit, of burning flesh. [[She says, "Shall we make pancakes for breakfast?"]]

They start at page 2. [[Where is page 1?]]

Maybe she went to the computer suite to print it out? [[Head towards the IT department]]

It's dusk now. The unlit corridors and halls are full of shadows and unknown doorways. You think you remember the way to the computer suite. Hopefully. [[Keep walking]]

You walk on. There's no sound but your footsteps. In fact, it's so quiet you can hear your own breathing. [[Keep looking]]

This is the IT suite - but she's not in here. The computer towers are hulks of blackness on the empty desks. Some are still on, though the monitors are off. Their little green and white lights flicker. They click and whirr softly in the silence. You see something on the other side of the room... [[Is there a light under that door?]]

Yes, there's a light. You move closer. Faint voices can be heard. Maybe somebody got talking to your girlfriend and she forgot the time? You can just make out laughter from beyond the door. If she's not in there, at least these people might know where your girlfriend has got to, right? [[Open the door->Ending 2]] [[Knock on the door->Recursive!!]]

[[Fin]]

It swings open as you run towards it. You sprint down the corridor, heart hammering in your chest, gasping lungfuls of air as the burning of your skin starts to subside. [[Make for your car]]

You're at the edge of the football field, with the tennis courts to one side, and a dark, hedge-lined walkway to the other. You have no idea which direction your car is in, but maybe you can find it by walking around the outside of the main block? Your girlfriend's probably there already. You picture her leaning against your car and reading a comic book. Soon you'll be there. [[Take the walkway]] [[Head to the tennis courts]]

You walk along the darkened path between the school buildings. It opens out into a small quad. [[Look around]]

The iron gate to the courts squeaks as you swing it open. You walk along the edge of the courts, trying to see a route parallel to the side of the school building. There's a little hut-shaped rain shelter on the far side of the centre court, with what looks like an equipment store beyond. Maybe it has a back exit? [[A voice calls from the shelter]]

Your girlfriend's classroom. That's weird. How could that be? You're sure you didn't walk around in a circle. How can it be here? [[You look around the classroom. Maybe you're confused.]]

You take a few turnings, trying to look for hallways that are bigger or seem more central. Hopefully that will lead you to the assembly hall, or somewhere else useful. [[Keep going]]

Maybe you should just try a door, see if you can find somebody to give you directions? You're in a corridor lined with identical doors. None have light coming from under them, as far as you can see. Which one should you pick? [[Try one on the left]] [[Try one on the right]]

As you pass a window, there comes a huge crackle of thunder and the flash of nearby lightning, so bright it hurts your eyes and blinds you for a moment. It starts to rain, immediately, torrentially, pounding at the pane so hard you step back from it by instinct. You blink, and focus back on the darkened corridor you're in. You must be nearly there by now. Maybe your girlfriend will appear any minute. Your eyes keep scanning the hallways for her red hair or a flash of her green work jacket. [[Shiver, and keep moving]]

At last you come to the door of the computer suite. This, at least, has a sign over it, though it seems to be covered in drops of - is that red paint? That's odd. Maybe it's Halloween decoration, part of the Friday 13th spookiness your girlfriend mentioned? You hope she's inside. [[Open the door]]

You find the way out and don't look back, just run through the double-doors and out towards the gate. But what's that? Over the ringing in your ears and the drumbeat of your heart, you think you hear something. Was that a voice calling out to your left? There! Was that a flash of your girlfriend's cherry-red hair? [[Yes - quick, it might be her!]] [[Don't hesitate - keep running to your car]]

You can't see anything out in the open - what about that gatehouse over there? [[There's a light! Is she in there?->Subending1]] [[Further on, down the passageway! Was that a glimpse of her jacket?->Ending 1]]

[[You just keep running.]]

She pulls you in and you kiss her, feeling the bees pressed between your lips. Their silky wings, and little furry bodies move against your mouth. You want it. It's beautiful. You love the bees. You love your girlfriend. [[You sink down into a bed of honeyed earth forever.]]

The car is still there, outside the gates. Get in and drive, drive, drive. Get far away from here. You go back to your house - it's empty - and wait for your girlfriend to call. She doesn't call. [[And she doesn't come home.]]

Nothing seems to lead anywhere much. All the corridors are similar - just different colours of carpet, different artwork on the display boards, which you can only half make out in the shadowy dusk. No helpful signs on the doors or walls. Isn't that sort of weird? You've been in the school a few times, and you're sure you remember following signs for the exits and bathrooms before. Shouldn't there be fire exit signs, at least? [[You walk a little bit quicker]]

You open the door, and -- [[Huh.]]

It's locked. [[Try the one on the left->Open the door]] [[Try another->Try one on the left]]

Everything in the room looks the same as her classroom - the wall displays, the stacks of books. There's no sign of your girlfriend's jacket, or her briefcase. Just one thing is odd. On one of the benches that line the walls, between two piles of papers, is a little box. You go over and look. It's about the size of a dictionary, and matt black all over. It's making some kind of noise, very quietly. You can't make out what the sound is. [[Pick it up]] [[Keep looking around]]

[[Fin]]

"Who's that?" You can't see whoever is calling. You don't recognise their voice. You draw nearer to the shelter. "Hello?" [[And then you see.]]

The voice is coming from a little box that sits on the bench inside the shelter. Must be some kind of speaker. Speakers playing strange noises? Is that the spooky stuff your girlfriend was talking about? You bend over the little thing. It's about the size of a dictionary, and matt black all over. [[Pick it up]]

No response. [[Just open it->Huh.]]

It's surprisingly light, like it weighs nothing. Yet it feels hard, and slightly warm, to the touch. There's a groove around the top like the edge of a lid. A speaker with a box on the top? Or a box with speakers inside? [[Try and open it]]

You know everything. Suddenly. Everything. You know everything. Suddenly. Everything. You know all there is to be known. You know the past, present, and future. You know wind, and water, and earth, and fire. You know every cell of every being and every quark of matter and anti-matter in the universe. You know. You. [[Know.]]

Your body feels like it's rushing through every part of the universe at once. You see everything, feel everything, hear every thought of human and animal that ever was or will be. You laugh, and laugh, because you know the answers now. And you cry, and cry, because you know how small and how cold every little thing is. And yet you laugh, again, for you see all the power in the universe, and you see all the sin, and you will punish it all. And since you know that nobody else is more fearful or powerful than you, you must be her -- the great dark one -- the devil herself -- or else she is living in you -- [[You blink.]]

You cough and splutter for air. You drop the box. You are you. You are under a tennis court shelter in the empty grounds of a school. You are a dog lover. You are a LGBTQ* bookshop employee. You're bi. You're a poet. You're back. [[You know where your girlfriend is.]]

What are you waiting for? [[Get there!->Ending 1]]

You must be getting delirious from hunger or something. The box can't be making a noise. It's probably just got marker pens in or something. You keep looking around. There's a full-length cupboard in the corner. Maybe her stuff is in there? [[Try the door]]

You run towards your car, looking around you. Hoping to see the familiar red of your girlfriend's quiffed hair. Somewhere. Anywhere. You don't see her. At last you reach your car and scramble in your pocket for your keys. [[Throw yourself into the driver's seat->Run22]]

Some of the bees fly up, as if they heard you. They buzz louder and start to make for you. [[Run]] [[Reach for your girlfriend->Reach out to her]]

The engine won't start! Fuck! You're trying and trying to get it to turn over when – [[Someone knocks at your window]]

There's nobody in the gatehouse. It's just one room, with greyish walls and a scuffed wooden floor. The light is coming from a bare bulb dangling above the only piece of furniture in the room: a desk, on which sit a laptop and a little black box. The box is connected to the laptop by a slim black cable. That buzzing you heard is louder now, but you try and concentrate. Isn't this laptop the same kind your girlfriend has? It even has the same crack across the screen, and the bi pride flag sticker… The screen of the laptop is black, but when you bend down to look closer at it, text starts to appear. [[MOTION DETECTED - INITIALISING...]]

_____________________________ UPLOADING… 0% COMPLETE MSG: YOU WILL LIKE IT HERE UPLOADING… 10% COMPLETE. INITIALISING COGNITIVE STRUCTURES MSG: PLEASE REMAIN CALM AS YOU ARE UPLOADED UPLOADING… 40% COMPLETE. CONSCIOUSNESS CODING MSG: WE ALL KNOW SO MUCH UPLOADING… 70% COMPLETE. PSYCHOLOGICAL AVATAR CREATED FOR USER.5.13.02 MSG: YOU ARE US NOW UPLOADING… 100% COMPLETE [[MSG: WELCOME TO THE OTHER SIDE->Subending12]] _____________________________

[[Fin]]

You tell her she scared you out of your skin with the freaky stuff inside the school. "Huh? You mean the Ouija board? Those things aren't real, silly!" You tell her no, that it wasn't just that, it was all the other stuff - "What other stuff? I didn't do any other stuff." [[Look over at her]]

The handle's stiff. It won't budge. [[Shit.]] [[Try harder->Try2]]

Seems like the only thing you can do is give up and try to head back to your car. [[Do it]]

You take out your rainbow hairpin and clear out something dusty from around the lock. [[There.]]

You turn around and - oh. That's strange. You could swear that the brightly-coloured poster on that wall said "Diversity and Inclusion", before. But now it says something different. [[Go closer]]

It's not even in English – what alphabet is that? Has your girlfriend started teaching Arabic, or Japanese, or something? No, it looks like no language you recognise. Strange runic symbols. The wall displays are lined with them. It wasn't like that before. And on this poster, which used to have flags of many countries and pictures of different family structures… [[All the pictures are scratched and burnt out of recognition.]]

[[What the hell?]]

You hear something outside the door. Shit! What is this weird room with all the scratched-out stuff around? How you did you end up here? It it some elaborate prank your girlfriend is pulling? The noise gets louder. Somebody's coming. [[Hide in the corner]]

You duck down in the corner between two sets of cupboards just as the door starts to open. [[A pale figure enters...]]

What *is* it? Some kind of figure, human in shape, but palely shimmering and glowing in the shadowy room. It looks like a ghostly waxwork, face fixed in a smile. It's followed by many others who look the same. They're stepping smoothly between the rows of desks, sort of dancing with each other. Some make deep noises, like the lowing of a great beast. Others whinny and screech. Others still are laughing great belly-laughs, a horrible sound. [[Are they aliens? Is it makeup? Is this part of a prank too?]]

The figures start to perform a repeated movement, coming together in the centre of the room, then breaking apart again. The world goes dim at the edges, like you're about to faint. But you don't faint. The creatures keep on moving, hypnotically, coming together, splitting apart, dispersing to the very edges of the room before turning around again. They're getting closer towards you each time. [[And then one of them sees you]]

It stops in front of you. It looks like an unearthly Ken doll. You're trapped in the corner, vision blurring, heart pounding like hell. There's nowhere to run. It reaches out its hand to you. [[You're frozen to the spot]] [[Scream]]

It touches you on the cheek. [[You black out]]

You scream, and scream, and scream. It tries to touch you and you twist away. You sprint for the door, still screaming, missing their reaching hands by inches. [[Escape]]

You're happy. So happy. [[You wake up in bed]]

You wake up with your spouse beside you. The dog is licking your nose. You have to go and make breakfast for the kids. [[Just another day in paradise]]

You dress your boy children in blue and your girl children in pink, and you know exactly how they will grow up and what they will be. Your life is so happy. So normal. When your spouse leaves for work you call your parents. You offer to have them over at Christmas. It's so nice to have a normal family life. It's wonderful. It's normal. It's so nice. So nice. You're so happy. [[So happy.]]

[[Fin]]

You keep going down the corridor. It twists and turns in unexpected ways. Your feet almost move of their own accord, pulled along the corridor by some nightmarish gravity. All the doors you try are locked. [[At last, one of them opens]]

An abandoned, dusty old staircase. You run down it, half-tripping over the laces of your Docs. There are no landings or doorways. It just goes down and down. You keep running. You call out your girlfriend's name and the noise echoes back along with the pounding of your feet. No reply. There's no light at the bottom. [[Go into the darkness]]

It's hot down here. You're sweating as you keep going downwards. You stub your toe as the steps turn into the floor of – something. [[You call out]]

"Is anyone there?" You call your girlfriend's name. Your voice echoes. And then many voices answer at once. "Who's down here?" [[Hot hands grasp at you.]]

They tell you that you've sinned. They keep talking about a box that shouldn't have been opened, things that shouldn't have been seen, lives that shouldn't have been lived. At first you question, you shout, you scream, you feel self-righteous. What am I doing here? Let me out! Let me be free! [[They teach you, soon enough.]]

[[Fin]]

With a start, you realise it isn't a cupboard. It leads to another room - some kind of stockroom, but with a door beyond the shelving. And then that noise comes again from the corridor. Closer this time, like it's right outside. It's sounds like screaming. [[What's happening here? Is this some kind of prank?]]

Ah. The door sticks tight as soon as you pull it closed. There isn't even a crack at the edge to peek through. You turn around instead and look more closely at the room you're in. A stockroom lined with shelves - but with a doorway at the far end. Every shelf around the walls is full of little black boxes. They seem to be humming slightly. Are they computer parts or something? [[Look at one->Pick it up]] [[Head through the other door]]

Through this door is a corridor like any other. But after what you've seen so far, you can't help but walk briskly along it, still hoping to find an exit or a helpful sign. What is happening? Where is your girlfriend? And what were those screaming noises? [[Then you hear a distant woman's voice]]

You go along the corridor towards the sound. Is it her? It comes again, seeming closer this time. Is it coming from one of the classrooms? You shout out your girlfriend's name, hoping to hear the voice once more, but you hear nothing. Where is she? [[Keep looking->Escape]]

A text from your girlfriend. *It's Friday 13th! Might be some spooky surprises in store! Come and find me haha xx* Where is she? [[Call her]] [[Text her back]]

[[Head back to the car.->Interim story 1]] Maybe you missed each other in the corridors and you'll find her on the way back out. [[Look around the classroom.->Interim story 2]] Perhaps there's a clue to where she's got to. [[Wander the corridors.->Interim story 3]] She must be *somewhere*.

The phone doesn't ring, just beeps - out of service. [[That's odd.]]

*Where r u?* After a second, the phone buzzes again: *Wouldn't you like to know? Haha* And again. This time the message is just a smiling devil icon. [[What now?->That's odd.]]

As you're fiddling with your hairpin you hear an odd noise from the corridor outside. [[Turn around->Do it]] [[Ignore it, open the door]]

At last, the door clicks open. Noise comes from the corridor again, louder this time. [[Pull open the cupboard door]]

You call the school the next day and they've never heard of her. Her stuff is all at your house. Her books, her records. The denim jacket with the patches she sewed. Eventually it turns into your stuff. [[You never see her again.]]

Their hands are so hot, their touch burns you. Until all of you is burned away. Then you are punished enough, and you are happy, and you live in this place of darkness and burning with them. [[Endlessly.]]

Maybe your girlfriend is hiding somewhere through here and you can sneak up on her. Or else you can jump out of the door and scare her right back. See how she likes it. You shudder as the screams come once more. It might just be a prank, but it's seriously starting to get to you. [[Climb through and shut the door behind you]]

You notice something on the floor just outside your girlfriend's classroom. It's upside down. What is that? [[Turn it over]]

A ouija board. It's wooden, and looks old, kind of stained with ink spots and something reddish-brown that might be tea. You look for the little wooden thing that points to each letter - it's lying several feet down the hallway, as if it was thrown away forcefully. When you go over, you can see that the carpet beneath it has a small ring of black, like a singe mark. [[Is this the spooky surprise your girlfriend mentioned?]]

It's nothing really, but in the darkened, empty hallway, it is a little bit creepy. You laugh. What are you doing, getting freaked out by a stupid ouija board? [[Where is your girlfriend, anyway?->Where is she, anyway?]]

Doesn't work. They're still there, still staring, still smiling. [[Speak to them]] [[Run away]]

That looks like the door to the science block. There doesn't seem to be another way out of the quad. Maybe you can make your way through the building to the other side – your car might be there. [[Go in]]

It's a science block, but it looks… strange. Everything is covered with a thick layer of dust. You cough as it gets into your throat. This part of the building must have been closed for renovation. Like, ten years ago? It looks completely deserted, the sparse furniture lying in strange positions as if the last people in here left in a hurry. Still, there is a door with a little window at the far end. That seems to lead back outside. Hopefully it'll link back up to the road where you parked your car. [[Walk over to the door]] [[This can't be the way. Head back to the tennis courts instead->Head to the tennis courts]]

You stir up the dust as you walk between the darkened shapes of furniture. In the middle of the room, the light coming through the door strikes the surface of a nearby table just so, and you think you see – Are those scratch marks? Long, deep score-marks across the wood? Just as you're about to look closer, a door slams somewhere in the building – you can't tell where – but it makes you jump and, instinctively, keep moving forward instead. [[Keep going->Keep going2]]

That night, you dream of the faces of all your exes, everyone who ever made you feel small, the worst possible people. They look down at you, and they laugh and laugh. It's the same the next night. And the next. You get used to waking up beside your girlfriend, adrenaline-high and sweating, every night, haunted by the same nightmare. [[It doesn't go away for years.]]

[[Fin]]

A terrifying face – scarred and leathery, one eye torn out and covered in blood, framed by shocking red hair – It's a Halloween mask. It's your girlfriend. She takes it off and gets into the passenger seat. "Fucking hell," is all you can get out. "Did I get you? You jumped, right?" She's smiling. She looks so untroubled, as if everything's fine. Your breath is still coming in gasps. "What's the matter?" [[Tell her->Run23]]

In the orange streetlamp light her hair glows bright red, like a neon halo. Her face is so open and beautiful. She won't believe you. Who would? "Nothing," you say. You turn the keys and the car starts first time. [[Drive away]]

You hear another door slam somewhere, and then another, and then all of a sudden, orange streetlamp light streams into the dusty room from one side of you. It's another doorway, one you hadn't noticed. The door must have been opened by a gust of wind – you can't see anybody who might have opened it. Was there always a buzzing sound in your ears, or has it just started now? You look closer. This door seems to lead outside, too. [[Go that way]] [[No, choose the other door as planned]]

It's good to be heading into the light, at least, although the buzzing in your ears seems to get louder as you approach the door. And then over the buzzing, faintly, you hear what might be the sound of a woman laughing. "Hello?" If this could just be your girlfriend. If you could just find her, and go home, and have the evening you planned. You're so tired and you just want to lie down with her. Wait, what was that? Did the laughing voice just, faintly, say your name? Is your girlfriend really going to be on the other side of this door? It seems too good to be true - [[You reach the doorway and walk through->Ending 1]]

You finally make it to the door with the little window. Thank goodness it's unlocked. Beyond is a small area of waste ground and a squat building set into the school grounds' iron gates. The gatehouse door is standing open, and a light is on inside. At last! Surely now you've found someone who might know where your girlfriend is? [[Go in->Subending1]]

You frown at the screen, still hearing the buzzing in your ears. _____________________________ COMMENCE MSG IT'S ME CAN YOU HEAR ME I'M IN HERE MSG ENDS PRESS ANY KEY TO ANSWER _____________________________ Is it a message from your girlfriend? Something she learned at that coding workshop? [[Press a key]]

_____________________________ COMMENCE MSG2 IT'S BEAUTIFUL HERE COME AND SEE IT ALL WITH ME WON'T YOU COME AND BE WITH ME MSG2 ENDS [[PRESS A TO ANSWER COMMAND: comewithme->Subending11]] [[PRESS B TO CONTINUE->Press B]] _____________________________

_____________________________ COMMENCE MSG3 DON'T YOU LOVE ME WE CAN BE INFINITE TOGETHER COME AND BE WITH ME MSG3 ENDS [[PRESS ANY KEY TO ANSWER COMMAND: iloveyou->Subending11]] _____________________________