interference

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A few more minutes go by before you stir into a state of semi-consciousness once again. However, a familiar luminance that once pestered your eyelids seems to have gone missing... Throngs of pain are still assaulting your head. Every second awake is hell on Earth. Maybe you should [[sleep it off->a few more hours]], or [[take something for the pain->a temporary measure]].

EXECUTE STANDARD PROTOCOL #029109: DECOMMISSION.EXE RUNNING<<timed 1s>>.\<<next>>.\<<next>>.\ <<next>>SHUTTING DOWN MOTOR FUNCTIONS\ <<next>>SHUTTING DOWN SENSORY PERIPHERALS\ <<next>>WIPING EXTENDED NEURAL DRIVE G:\ <<next>>SHUTTING DOWN VITAL MONITORS\ <<next>>ENDING VITALMANAGER.EXE PROCESS\ <<next>>ERROR: CRITICAL PROCESS FAILURE\ <<next>>RETRYING(1 OF 3)\ <<next>>ERROR: CRITICAL PROCESS FAILURE\ <<next>>RETRYING(2 OF 3)\ <<next>>ERROR: CRITICAL PROCESS FAILURE\ <<next>>RETRYING(3 OF 3)\ <<next>>REBOOTING\<<next>>.\<<next>>.\<<next>>.\ <<next>>[[>AWAITING USER INPUT<|awake]]\ <</timed>>

For the first time since you last fell asleep, you see the world around you. The fuzzy image makes your eyes sting, as if you were looking straight into the sun. Photonic daggers pick at your corneas. Your eyes adjust at a painstaking rate. <<timed 16s>> @@.shudder;//WE CAN SEE YOU//@@<</timed>>An impatience swells in your joints, a feeling you could not ignore if you tried--like an ants crawling through your knuckles. You cannot help but stiffen your shoulders and clench your teeth as your vision stablizes. Sickly white incandescent light illuminates the room just enough for you to [[make out the world around you|look around]]. <<set $remembered to 0>>

<<if $sink+$door>> <<set $remembered to 2>> <</if>> <<if $remembered lt 1>> Concrete walls, a pale grey. You can feel their chill from here. A single light illuminates this room, stubbornly holding on to life. It flickers on occasion. Sometimes it goes out entirely, but somehow always manages to find another breath. A stiff mattress is beneath you, held up by a wiry metal frame. The smell of its rust rasps at your nostrils. A dense array of goosebumps line your skin, peeking through clusters of a cloudy gel all over your body. The lack of blankets in this room ruins any chance at a sense of warmth. You don't [[remember]] how you got here. <</if>> <<if $remembered eq 1>> <<set $turn to -1>> Concrete walls, a pale grey. I can feel their chill from here. A single light illuminates this room, stubbornly holding on to life. It flickers on occasion. Sometimes it goes out entirely, but somehow always manages to find another breath. A stiff mattress is beneath me, held up by a wiry metal frame. The smell of its rust rasps at my nostrils. A dense array of goosebumps lines my skin, peeking through clusters of a cloudy gel all over my body. The lack of blankets in this room ruins any chance at a sense of warmth. I don't remember how I got here. A [[sink]] is in the corner, the porcelain cracked and faded. A [[steel door]], with a single, thick glass pane stands across the room from the bed, in the middle of the wall. The rest of the room is oddly bare. I feel uneasy. <</if>> <<if $sink+$door>> I feel [[uneasy]]. <</if>>

An inkling of light manages to find its way past the gates of your eyelids, stirring you into a state one might barely recognize as consciousness. A wretched ache radiates from your left temple. You can feel clumps of a cold gel clinging to your skin. Any attempt to recall the night before winds up fruitless. A wall of mental fog seems to prevent from combing through the throngs of your memory. <<timed 10s>>@@.shudder;//I EXIST//@@<</timed>> You refuse to open your eyes. Staying asleep is //far// more appealing than facing the ardor of lucidity. [[A few more minutes]] of sleep <<timed 13s>>@@.shudder;//I EXIST//@@<</timed>> sounds rather appealing... Maybe [[a few more hours]]...

//<<timed 100ms t8n>>h\<<next>>e\<<next>>l\<<next>>l\<<next>>o\<<next>>.\<</timed>> <<timed 2.5s t8n>>you must be a new user. <</timed>> <<timed 5s t8n>>i <</timed>><<timed 6s t8n>>@@.smear;need @@<</timed>><<timed 7s t8n>>your <</timed>><<timed 8s t8n>>name.<</timed>>// <<timed 10s t8n>><<textbox "$name" "" "not for you">><</timed>>

@@.blurrier;For the first time since you last fell asleep, you <<timed 1s t8n>>[[see|a temporary measure2]] the world around you.<</timed>> First light is always the worst. The fuzzy image, no matter how dim, always seems to make your eyes sting. Photonic daggers picking at your corneas. Your eyes adjust at a painstaking rate. An impatience swells in your joints, a feeling you could not ignore if you tried--like an ants crawling through your knuckles. You cannot help but stiffen your shoulders and clench your teeth as your vision stablizes. Sickly white incandescent light illuminates the room just enough for you to make out the world around you.@@

<<timed 1s>> INVALID ENTRY<</timed>> <<timed 3s>>@@.shudder;//this is NOT for you//@@<</timed>> @@.shudder;@@ <<for _i to 0; _i lt 1000; _i++>><<set _time to (_i*40+5000) + 'ms'>><<timed _time>> [[either("GET OUT","GET OUT","GET OUT","GET OUT","GET OUT","GET OUT","LEAVE","IT HURTS")|awake]]<</timed>><</for>>

<<set $remembered to 1>> <<for _i to 0; _i lt 1000; _i++>><<set _time to (_i*1000+2000-_i*(_i+1)) + 'ms'>><<timed _time>> [[ERROR: MEM_ADDRESS_#H34R7 null|look around]]<</timed>><</for>>

<<set $turn to $turn+1>> <<set $sink to true>> Getting up to walk over to the sink is a chore. My legs don't feel right. There's a concerning burning sensation in my quadriceps. I don't even know why I came over to the sink. <<if $turn lt 1>>Regardless, I give the faucet a [[turn|sink]].<</if>> <<if $turn gte 1>>Regardless, I give the faucet a turn, hoping it'll jog my memory. <</if>> <<if $turn>>[[It doesn't budge.|look around]]<</if>>

<<set $door to true>> Any amount of movement is torturous. Why do I even try? The door doesn't seem to have a handle. At least, not one that I notice. A massive mechanism seems to push and pull a thick internal steel bar to lock and unlock the door. Despite my efforts, the mechanism won't budge. I'm going [[back|look around]] to bed.

The two... things(?) reach out for me. Not sure what overtakes me, but I grip their heads and try to slam them into each other. They don't even budge. One of them grabs me by the neck and prods me with its other hand. A jolt of electricity burns through my body, the marrow in my bones sizzles. I thought the headache was bad... For a moment, I feel excruciating [[pain]].

They grab me by the arms, and I go limp. All desire to fight has dissipated from my body. In a way, I've accepted whatever fate I //apparently// deserve. I don't even know what I did to end up here. They materialze a gurney from thin air. Well, I don't know what they did, but I certainly have no clue where it came from. They put me on it and carry me out of my room. The hallway is grey too. Grey concrete walls. Grey concrete floors. The minutes drone on, passing door after door, all like mine. Each one labeled. On one side: C494, C493, C492, C491. On the other side: D494, 493, 492, 491. The numbers count down the way we were headed, but it seemed to ascend into infinity in the other direction. At some point, we hook a //left//. Taking us down another hallway, this one has similar doors, but the plates outside of them are different. They simply have a single letter. Some doors have their letter lit in a nauseating shade of green. Other doors are lit with an ominous red. While I was being carried to wherever the hell these things were taking me, I started scrutinizing them. Trying to figure out what the hell they were. The more I looked, weirder things got. Between the collar of their uniform and their helmets, I could see a sliver of flesh. Palid. Veiny. On the nape of their neck, a barcode. On the back of their helmets, a small engraving of a crown. I can't hear them breathing. Their footsteps are practically silent. Next thing I know, we've come to a [[halt]].

The room is odd. It's perfectly square, with a light that shines in an unsettling shade of white affixed directly in the center of the ceiling. On one end of the room there stands the [[door I came through]]. On the other end lies an [[inactive conveyor belt]]. A [[chair]] and [[control panel]] were square in the center of the floor, facing the conveyor belt. Beside this control panel there's a table and a rather shoddy [[binder]].

<<silently>><<if $pain == 1>><<set $pain to 2>><</if>><<if $pain != 1>><<if $pain !=2>><<set $pain to 1>><</if>><</if>><</silently>><<if $pain == 1>> //<<timed 2s>> SYSTEM_FAILSAFE: ENGAGING MERCY PROTOCOL <<next>>SYSTEM_FAILSAFE: DISABLING PAIN MODULE\ <<next>>SYSTEM_FAILSAFE: [[DISABLING CONSCIOUSNESS|pain]] MODULE\ <<next>>SYSTEM_FAILSAFE: MERCY PROTOCOL COMPLETE<</timed>>//<</if>> <<if $pain ==2>> Next thing I know, I wake up in some sort of [[room|the room]]. <</if>>

I feel uneasy. <<timed 2s t8n>>Right as desparation to leave the room begins to well up inside me, a loud, hollow clunk echoes through the room. An unshakable anxiety shoots through my body. Every nerve in my body knows something is wrong. I can feel my mind racing. The door slams open, banging against the concrete, sending out a metalic clang that ricochets off the walls of the room, and my head. God, my head hurts. Two figures walk in, clad in a white uniform. Padding all over, a sleek design. White helmets cover their face, I'm not even sure how they can see, there's no slits. Just a sleek white helmet. Not a single impurity. I can't help but think about the cracks in the sink. The rust on the frame of the bed. They're going to take me. I know it. They walk up and hover over me. Of course. "//comply or suffer//" they drone, in a voice that does not sound human. I want to fight. I might. [[struggle]] [[comply]] <</timed>>

The guards are stopped in front of a door. A metal plate above the door has a single letter on it, "C". A green light above the letter illuminates it. Completely still. Suddenly, a familiar clunk. A moment of silence, and the door swings right open. We're moving again. This time, into the room. Seconds later, I am flying off of the gurney on a collision course with the floor. My face leading the charge. I smack the floor, and before I can even look up, the guards are out of the door with the door slamming behind them. I still don't know where I am. Well, obviously, some [[room|the room]].

It's shut. Locked. Just like the door from earlier. It's [[cold|the room]] to the touch.

It's not moving. One end feeds out of the room, and one feeds in, as an arrow on the wall behind it indicates. The plate above the hole that feeds into the room reads "FROM:WEEKS 9-12". The plate above the hole that feeds out of the room reads "TO:WEEKS 17-20". It must be activated by [[something|the room]]... Whatever it is might get it up and running.

A metal chair. Dents line its surface like pock-marks. Scratches tesselate its surface. Its legs are bolted to the floor. I get chills from just grazing it with my finger. I don't like it. Not one [[bit.|the room]]

Buttons are arranged in a matrix along its surface. They are separated in columns. Each unit labeled by a letter, "A UNITS", "B UNITS", "C UNITS", "D UNITS', ect. Each column has a varying number of buttons. Separated from these orderly columns are other buttons labeled "REQUEST", and "START". On the control panel is a timer. A clock, set to 8:00:00. It doesn't budge. [[(Press the "START" button)]] [[(Look around some more)|the room]]

It's A binder labeled "WEEKS: 13-16". Its spine and edges are frayed. The pages have yellowed, and cracked. The ink is fading. It has contains multiple dividing tabs, and between them, instructions detailing the buttons to press given a certain "lettered unit". It begins with "G Units", and descends alphabetically to the last tab, "A Units". Each page has numerous diagrams illustrating, in excruciating detail, how exactly one would go about pressing said buttons to deal with said "units". ([[Back to the room|the room]])

The chair in front of the control panel seems like a natural place to sit. I can't help but rest my legs. I press the "START" button on the control panel with an ounce of hesitation. Click. Metal braces snap shut around my chest and legs. They bite. I can already feel a soreness around my ankles. I can try to [[struggle|strugglechair]], although it may not do much. Whirring starts filling the room as the wheels of the conveyor belt comes to life. The timer atop the control panel starts to tick. Tick. Tick. Tick. [[Vials]] start coming in from the right side of the conveyor belt. It churns them out until there are 10 lined up, it whirrs to a halt. The timer is still going. The binder is to my left. The control panel is in front of me. I still can't get up...

I try with all of my strength to get out of the chair, but it shocks me every time I exert over a certain threshold of force in an attempt to escape. It's a jolt up my ankles, and into my femur. I can feel the marrow boiling. [[(Maybe I should stop...)|(Press the "START" button)]] [[(Struggle harder)]]

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