2 1- Ah Hell Nah
Cal couldn't think. Every cells of his body were individually irradiating more pain than he had felt in his entire life. Combined.
But this wasn't even it, as after some quantitative value between 1 second and &÷&#€$€ seconds, raw pulsing agony rose from the bottom of his feet and procceeded to climb proggressively higher.
If he had to define that pain, he would say it was the feeling of being cut, hit, burned, electrocuted, pierced, dissolved and sandblasted all at the same time. From a purely logical stand point, the feeling was, the pain was so high that it literally came back as every other physical sensations ever. Goosebump, tickling, even a caress. His brain and heart should've already stopped working long ago at this point. But they didn't.
Still hurt like a bitch time a 1000 though.
More frustrating was that however much he wanted to scream, or even just tear off his limbs just so they would stop hurting. He had no mouth hole to do so and seemed to be frozen in whatever state he was in.
So he could only endure, his mind utterly void aside from the everpresent thought of wanting it to stop.
Yet, even then. It's when the wave of agony reached his chest that things truly became weird. Mostly in his head.
Nobody in the history of ever would ask, how would it feel to have your brain totally reconstructed to data and have an intrusive force trying to forcefully modify it?
Firstly, it's like having a metaphorical itch you couldn't scratch in the back of your brain.
And secondly, It's also like trying to hold up the entire earth on your back while simultaneously trying to keep all that good air inside your lungs despite being the metaphorical equivalent of pasted on the ground. The oxygen in this case being your sense of self, and the weight of the earth being the intrusive entity.
It exhaust you, instantly. It drown you in a river of sluggishness that wash away your freedom and your awareness.
Slowly, ever so slowy, you can feel yourself being branded, chained. To be made ignorant and obediant.
That's how it felt for a split second, at least. Cause just as the agony reached his head, 'something' seems to react to the invasive force and suddenly made all the pain in his body converge on it. At last, a sublime burst of pain exploded behind his eyes and between his temples. And then, the intruder crushing his will didn't feel like an impossible foe anymore.
If before, it felt like a planet, now it merely felt like a mountain. A mountain he was somehow barely able to lift, and push back.
And so he did.
It wasn't easy. However, it didn't matter. He could barely be qualified as conscious at this point. The only emotion keeping him pushing right now was his anger. His sheer frustration, fear, and wrath was so vast that instant that it made the mountain like weight trying to crush him into submission look puny in comparison. His mental teeth were gritted so hard if he had a physical form his gums would bleed without a doubt. Faced with this, the intruder wasn't able to take anything else from him, and was kept away until it simply vanished by itself.
As soon as it did, something clicked in place. There was no more unimaginable pain. No more unknown force trying to mind rape him. Only a strange feeling of weightlessness remained. Opening his eyes, he was met by a sight he would never forget.
A world of black and green, with flitting green light going everywhere and nowhere. Nothing seemed substantial in this place, he had the feeling this world was very 'maleable' for a lack of better word.
However, he got an idea of what was happening, or rather what had happened to him when he brought his hands to his face. As they were see through, outlined in green, and glitched occasionally. Through his chest, in the place of his heart, he could see a bundle of liquid blue and green light. Similar to what he had seen in the light that had sent him here.
And in his core, at the level of his navel, he could see a folder.
On it, in white highlitghed letters. Was written CAL.CHR.
Reality came back crashing back like a tidal wave around him, making him wretch on the ground. Ground that was apparently a very beautiful concrete pavement now by the way.
Spitting one last time, he sat on the ground, feeling very dizzy. "Wha- What the fuck?"
Looking around him and seeing he was in a perfectly normal neighborhood. He muttered to himself. "Scratch that, where the fuck am I?" Then, a bunch of odd memories came to him, and the dizziness faded, along with the color of his face.
Jumping to his feet, he almost fainted seeing that the spit and rainbow puddle he just made had vanished into thin air. "Ah hell nah."
Closing his eyes forcefully. He told himself. "Deep breath, Cal, Deep breath. Remember, nothing matter outside filling your lung with air." Repeating to take deep breathes as if it was a manthra, Cal quickly calmed down. His tense slowly shoulders relaxed, colors came back to his face and his expression became neutral.
Taking one last breath. He opened his eyes and took careful stock of his surrounding...
"Yep, perfectly normal neighborhood. If a bit too perfect." Nodding to himself, he looked toward the group of houses he was waiting in front of. His eye twitched. As he recognised them, they were used as one of the background or setting for Doki Doki Literrature Club. The very first the player saw, to be exact. It was never directly said, but it was easy to guess it was supposed to include the MC and his childhood friend's house.
However, despite his new memories telling him he shouldn't be shocked, as it was supposedly an image he saw almost everyday. The shock he felt when he saw the door of the rightmost house open and recognised the one who had opened it was indescriptible.
Closing the door in a hurry, the girl with short orange hair turned toward him and and yelled to get his attention. "Heeeeeeeyyyyyyyy!" Wildly waving at him with both arms like she had no care in the world, the girl ran at him.
His brain too busy melting inside his head, he didn't came back to his sense until Sayori caught up with him. "Aaaaah...Aaaaah. I overslept again! But I caught you this time!"
"Maybe, but only bec-"
'What am I saying!?' He had blurted the words on instinct, almost reciting the exact same answer the protagonist would have given to her in the game. But he wasn't that guy, that guy was dead, and he never had free will in the first place.
Seeing Sayori tilt her head in confusion. Cal wanted to bang his head against a wall. What the heck was he supposed to do!? Taking a deep breath, and go with the flow for now. That's what he should do.
So that's what he did. Clearing his throat. He said. "You caught me only because I was in a good mood."
"Eh? Does that means you would have ignored me otherwise?" Sayori pouted at him. And while it was, let's say it, very cute, the fact he knew deep in his guts that it was far from a genuine gesture ruined it.
"Ignored? Of course not, from my point of view, the only thing I would've done is running away from a tornado. Today I felt ready to take it on, that's all."
"You think I'm a tornado?" His neighbor asked, a bit confused.
"Sure, a tornado of sweet wind and sunshine." Cal, in an act of let's say: Idon'tgiveashit, said with a smile and pinched Sayori's cheek lightly. Despite his urge do it harder due to his startling realization that he was unable to feel any cringe despite his very cringeworthy words.
Turning away from the shellshocked face of the orange-haired girl, Cal went on ahead and waved her on. "Come on, if we don't hurry. We're gonna be late."
"Co-coming!" And with that, the girl joined his side. Looking inordinately happy. As expected from her description in the game, Sayori was a chatterbox. She just kept talking about anything and everything, problem was, she wanted his participation in the conversation, or she became worried that she was annoying him or that he thought her boring. And non-stop talking had never been the game's MC's style in the first place, and it certainly wasn't Cal's.
"Cal?"
"Yeah?"
"You're not answering me."
He took a serious expression. "I'm not. But I'm listening. That's what friends are for, right? It's not neccessarily because I'm uninterested in what you say that I'm not speaking up. Of course, if you really want me to answer something, I will. However, I'm more comfortable listening than talking between us two."
His answer made Sayori stay silent for a while, before she spoke up with a quiet. "Really?"
"Really."
She chuckled nervously. "You never told me you felt that way."
Cal thought hard for a bit to give an answer. "Who said I was aware of this yesterday?"
"Oh! Isn't that called an epiphanie?" Sayori's eyes lit up in recognition.
"I guess so." Cal chuckled, inwardly patting himself on the back for his improv skills.
The rest of the way to school went by with surprisingly less talking from the bubbly girl, as by stealing some glances at her when she wasn't looking, Cal could see she was preoccupied with something. Probably something he said, to be honest. Hopefully it was nothing too negative.
On the way to school and on place, Cal got extremely disturbed by how every people he would meet would just be various shades of greys and would lack distinct features. He could hear them talk and chat normally, but they were just that. Background noises. Allarmingly enough, each times he would think about going to talk with one of them. A sort of compulsion stopped him from doing so. He had the feeling he could ignore it but it would take a huge effort. So he didn't for now.
School ground too was kinda bland, no benches, no trees. Just grey people talking and moving along. If they had bigger head and eyes, he'd thought he was on Mars.
No fucking wonder Monika was crazy. Besides her entire worldview shattering in an instant.
That was just details.
Nonetheless, it was undeniable there was a certain logic to it all. He just had to find it. Or else he may just try to kill himself in the future for the lolz and some stimulation.
Worrying, that his thoughts came to that barely half an hour into this place.
He wondered where he had left his sanity?
Oh right. Probably in the real world. He shouldn't be too surprised though, it kinda fit the theme of the world after all.
Of course, there was also the elephant in the room with the strange space he had seen in the beginning. The space of black and green lights. Shits kinda reminded him of the matrix. That's not even speaking of what he had seen INSIDE of himself. A bundle of potential and a character file. Very possibly his. It had his name on it after all. Elementary school logic dictated it was thus his.
All of this rose a ton of other questions too. Questions that gave him a headache just trying to guess their answers.
Technically, he was self-aware right? Did Monika already know? Could she modify him like she could for the other characters? If yes, did that mean he needed to worship her as his new goddess?
Anyhow, bunch of questions that needed answers asap if he wanted to...
Wanted to what?
Survive? Not possibly end up as a beautiful's girl slave? Yeah, let's go with that.
Sitting at his 'usual' desk in one of the classroom on the first floor, Cal deadpanned as one of the background character, let's call them the greys from now on, entered the class and began to take presences.
'Please NO, anything but going through math classes again! Whatever gods out there, I BEG OF YOU!' Praying fervently inside his mind to make it stop. Cal became surprised as the world seems to hear his plea and the world began to darken, litteraly, it was like he was slowly closing his eyes. But he was more surprised by the fact that he felt he could try to resist this fade to black. For that, he'd apparently need to... Push back the weight akin to a hill currently trying to squash his will?
'Oh... OH. Interesting.' Just before the entire school day was skipped in favor of 'gameplay', Cal's eyes began to shine with a sharp light and a small smirk tugged at his lips.
