Work Text:
Day One
Jim wakes up to a ring at the doorbell. “I think it’s here!” He exclaims to himself. He gets out of bed, walks to the door and looks outside. A light-brown box stands on his porch. Jim takes the box inside and brings it to his bedroom. He opens it, and out comes his brand new computer. Jim sets the computer onto his desk and starts it up. Three apps are pre-installed on the computer: The news, an online store, and Ro-Chat, an online messaging app. Jim opens Ro-Chat to zero messages and closes the app. He opens the news; nothing special, just an announcement for the grand opening of a new refinery in town. Jim opens the store and buys a couple gear. “I’m getting tired…” He says to himself as he turns off the computer and steps off his chair. He turns off the lights then gets into bed.
Jim wakes up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. He shakily gets out of bed and creeps into the living room, eyes darting around, as if he’s looking for something. He walks over to one of the wardrobes and opens it with shaky hands–nothing. He closes the doors of the wardrobe and walks over to the other one across the room–nothing again. “It’s safe…” Jim mutters to himself. He tiptoes back to his bed and falls back asleep.
Day Two
The doorbell rings again. Jim opens the front door to another box; it’s the gear he bought yesterday. Jim opens the box and takes the gear inside, setting them on his couch. He goes into his room and starts up the computer, opening the news first. The news reads that a person has gone missing last night, with no traces of what happened to them besides a foul smell. Jim opens Ro-Chat–no messages again. He closes the computer and toys with the gear he bought for a while. “Time for bed…”
Jim wakes up in the middle of the night again. He stumbles into the living room to open the two wardrobes again. Right as he closes the wardrobe he hears a faint ‘scratching’ at the front door. Jim is even more shaken up by the sudden noise, and nearly falls tiptoeing to the other wardrobe. “It should be safe now…” He whispers, sounding like he’s about to cry. He stumbles back into bed and falls asleep.
Day Three
After waking up, Jim immediately starts up his computer and checks the news app. More and more people have been going missing, and the police department is baffled by it, the news says. He opens Ro-Chat and once again finds zero messages. Jim spends the whole day on his computer, and eventually gets tired and goes to bed. Each day it feels as if Jim is going to bed earlier and earlier, and getting tired more easily. He notices that the sky is suspiciously growing darker with each passing day as well. Regardless, he shrugs it off and assumes all is well.
Jim wakes up to a loud static noise coming from the TV in the living room. Covering his eyes to adjust to the brightness from the screen, Jim stumbles into the living room and fumbles around the TV until he finds the power button and shuts it off. “I never turned the TV on…” He says to himself as he tiptoes to the wardrobe to open it. Nothing. Every time there’s nothing in the wardrobes, but he insists on checking them anyway. As Jim goes back to his bedroom, the computer suddenly turns on with a notification sound. He sits at his chair and checks Ro-Chat. A new message. The sender has no name, and the message sent is just one word: Prepare. The message sends a wave of shock through Jim’s body, making him fall out of his chair and faint.
Day Four
Jim awakes lying on the floor. “Wh-Huh…? Why am I on the floor..?” He asks himself. Then he remembers what happened last night, and immediately turns the computer back on. He opens Ro-Chat to check if that weird message was actually real and not just a hallucination. It was real. Jim’s heart is practically beating out of his chest as he closes Ro-Chat and opens the news. The mayor states he’s acknowledging all of the recent disappearances and the chemical spill at the new refinery. Jim closes the news and opens the shop. In a hurry, he buys some water, beans, and some wooden boards and nails. Strangely, all the things he bought arrive later that same day. He hears the doorbell ring and brings the boxes inside, setting the beans and water by his bedroom door and taking out the boards and nails. He takes a hammer and boards up the windows around the house. “I think that’s good enough for today…” He mutters to himself before getting into bed for the night.
“Someone is inside my house.”
Jim shoots out of bed. His eyes dart around, his eyes and hands twitching. The darkness under his eyes has grown more apparent, he notices, looking at his reflection in the black of his computer screen. He stumbles out into the living room and opens the wardrobes. Nothing. There’s always nothing. No matter how many times he tells himself nothing is there, Jim still checks the wardrobes every night, as if his body senses something there. Right as he’s about to go back to bed, Jim hears a faint ‘creak’ come from the front door. He turns around, and audibly gasps as he finds the front door ‘wide open’. The pitch blackness of the night sends a shiver down Jim’s spine as he walks to the door and closes it. “I…think it’s safe…” He sniffles. Jim stumbles back into bed and lies facing the wall, his whole body shaking uncontrollably.
Day Five
Jim rises from his bed and looks out the window. The sky is a red-orange mix, and the clouds are grey like ash. He checks the news on his computer. The mayor has shifted authority to the Robloxia Military, and has ordered all citizens of Robloxia shelter within their homes. The major continues to deny the claims that the recent disappearances are a result of the refinery’s chemical spill. Jim opens the shop and buys one item–a p____l. The box arrives later that day, and Jim sets the pi___l on his desk. “I’m tired…” He mutters.
The sudden notification coming from his computer wakes Jim up. He sits down and opens Ro-Chat. Another message from the strange nameless individual. “Remain calm, do not make any noise.” Jim turns off the computer and puts the pi__ol in his right hand as he steps into the living room, checking his wardrobes in a hurry. Suddenly, the TV turns on to an Emergency Alert System broadcast announcing a shelter-in-place warning. The sound from the broadcast hurts Jim’s ears, and he runs over to turn the TV off. After turning off the TV, a loud ‘banging’ comes from the front door, the same ‘banging’ and ‘scratching’ coming from the windows too soon after. Terrified, Jim raises the pistol and holds onto it with shaking hands. He aims it at the door and the windows, expecting something to break in at any second. The ‘banging’ only grows louder as his whole body begins to tremble even more. “No… No…” He cries as he shakily turns the pistol around and presses it against his chin. He’s hesitant at first, but after a few seconds he pulls the trigger and an ear-piercing bang follows before everything goes to black.
Jim’s body was discovered in his house weeks later, after a neighbor reported a foul stench coming from the house. Police officers broke down the door to find Jim, his pistol, and the remains of his head splattered across the living room, the blood from the gunshot a dark maroon staining the floor and wall. All of the canned beans and bottles of water were untouched. Neighbors reported that Jim was always the “closed-off type”, staying in his house most of the time after he was diagnosed with Paranoid Personality Disorder. He never trusted anybody and was always worried someone was “out to get him.” When it was discovered Jim had committed suicide, most of his neighbors weren’t very surprised. “If I was constantly paranoid and heard a ton of people were disappearing out of nowhere I’d probably kill myself too,” one of his neighbors reported. “I mean, he probably thought he was going to disappear next, so he took the easy way out instead.”