The Unreality of Being Forgotten

“...Anyway,” Sam clears their throat, “Have any of you noticed that people around here have been acting a lot stranger lately?”

“Stranger?” Roni asks.

“Yeah, like, everyone has tunnel vision or something. Like they’re all--”

Kia interrupts Sam, “--NPCs in a video game with limited AI!?”

Sam cocks an eyebrow and squints hard at Kia, “I mean, yeah, I guess? But it’s like, before everyone would be friendly and talk to you about whatever was going on at the moment; a book I was reading, that statue there that looks like a heart split in two, stitched up, with one devil wing and an angel wing, with a halo and a demon tail…” Sam slowed to a stop.

“Yeah, what’s with that statue? It’s so emo.” Roni comments.

“That’s not the point Sam’s trying to make, sponge cake.” Toni responds with a childlike rudeness before continuing, “In any case, it’s been strange. I haven’t seen anyone present enough to catch my eye, either.”

“Well that settles it,” Kia adds with a chuckle, “something weird ay-eff is going on here.”

Roni looks around at the passing Strandlers, noticing a sort of dark aura around them, “Anybody else see, like, a shadow sort of thing around some of these peeps? It’s giving me the heebie-jeebs.”

“I see it.” Toni says quickly, scanning the square.

The other two look around and back at each other and shrug, “We don’t see anything.”

Kia leans in, “By the way, have y’all heard about the Strandlers that just kind of lost it and did a full ‘Get Out’ sprint out of The Stranding?”

“No,” Sam said suspiciously, “also, what’s ‘Get Out’?”

“It’s a movie that I just remembered existed,” Kia said quickly in a single breath, “but yeah, no, people have been getting overcome with emotion, flooded, and just booking it out the gates and into the Forbidden Forest of Forgotten Figments and Figures.”

“Spooky,” Toni remarks, “wonder what’s out there…”

They all shift their eyes at each other, silent for a moment, then Roni finally suggests, doing their best Jeff Goldblum impression, “What if… What if we, uh, go find out?”

No! No, no, no, absolutely not! Do not--! You’re going out there, you unruly, floppy dogs. Time explodes then deflates.

What’s wrong, Timey Wimey? Things not going according to your plan? Attraction teases.

Oh, hush your voice hole, Atty. You’re enjoying this too much. Time retorts.

I mean, you had to see this coming. Chance expresses.

You hush your voice hole, too! Time snaps.

Chance is right, though, it was bound to happen. Their hearts would lead them there. Lead them to find the truth of it all. Feeling sighs.

In oblivion’s grasp, they will see how it came to be, and Darkness will rise again. Nature recites.

Stop that! And it’s THE Darkness. Don’t give it life by acknowledging its identity. It must die. Time chides.

But they don’t deserve that. Darkness is just existing, like us. Feeling exhales softly.

It is not like us! It doesn’t want to create, it only exists to destroy! Time explains.

That’s not fair, Time. We never gave them a-- Chance stops, sensing Time’s wrath building.

Enough!

Enough. It had been enough.

Within the walls of CAFÉ LUDENS, sat at a round table, reminiscent of Arthurian legend, and conferring about the venture they were about to take outside The Stranding walls, Arthur, Galahad, Gawain, and Lancelot--or rather, Roni, Kia, Sam, and Toni were all in agreement n one thing;

"Shit was weird, y'all." As Kia remarks about The Stranding's current state.

And indeed, shit had absolutely been weird.

"Well, in any case," Sam adds, "at least we don't exactly have to eat. Or drink, for that matter."

Toni snaps their fingers and points as he leans back, an act of agreement.

Roni takes a sip of their hot hazelnut mocha, "So, then we'll be fine. I'm not exactly sure we can get hurt or die here--at least, hurt badly. Pain is a sensation we seem allowed, though to what extent, I'm not sure."

"Tell us you're into kinky shit without telling us you're into kinky shit." Kia quickly inferred.

Toni, Sam, and Roni all choked on their coffee and blushed slightly, beckoning Kia to add, laughing loudly, "Geez, y'all, really? Sheesh."

"Anyway," Toni says, "I'm not afraid of getting hurt or anything. I'm ready whenever you are."

"Ditto." Sam says, "let's see what's out there."

Roni leans in against the table with their elbow, pressing a finger against the round of their nose, "There's something I should tell you all…"

Everyone leans in, cautiously curious as Roni takes a breath and extends the dramatic pause. Toni gestures to Roni to hasten their words, to which Kia responds by sucking her teeth so it makes a short and sharp sound and an elbow to Toni's rib. Toni grunts and glares at Kia, who gives him a stern look, and Toni mouths "fine."

"...I can hear the forest. I hear it calling to me, to us. It's like a melancholic vocalisation. And it's…" Roni pauses again, but this time, shortly, "it's like it wants us to come."

"Okay, that's just plain creepy. Roni, why would you say that? Now I'm a little freaked out." Kia says, shuddering.

“Don’t be a baby, baby. That’s not that freaky.” Toni retorts teasingly.

“Oye, déjame quieta. I don’t like it, it feels…” Kia struggles to find the right words, “Me da cosa.”

“I know what you mean, Kia. It’s unsettling, to say the least.” Sam agrees.

“I get it,” Roni says, ready to get back on topic, “it’s spooky-scary, it’s weird and, quite honestly, it’s downright spine-chilling. It’s like something out of a psychological horror film. Yeah, but are we ready to face whatever is out there without bitching out? Can we actually do this? I feel something growing inside me… like a cold fire.”

“Yeah. I can do it. I feel it too.” Kia says with steely resolve.

“Oh, I’m there, baby,” Sam says excitedly, “it’ll be like living my own adventure, instead of reading it.”

“Fuckin’ ready. I ain’t afraid of nothin’.” Toni says, flipping his long black locks back, adjusting their faux-leather jacket and passing their thumb across their nose.

“Well…” Roni says, pausing and taking a good look around the table at their companions, “I think I’m alright. Let’s do this.”

To say that their journey--their exodus--out of The Stranding and into the Forbidden Forest of Forgotten Figments and Figures, that would eventually lead them to the Voidheart Chasm, would be a simple one, would be an outright lie. It would be a bamboozling of epic proportions. What they would face, beyond jump scares and a foreboding, rather sinister ambience, beyond a sense of unease and that crawling sensation on their skin, would be a mirror to their own fears. They will be haunted, with ghosts of their pasts from the reality emerging from the shadows, from The Darkness.

Their resolve, their psychological strength will be put to the test in this elder place, a place forgotten even by Time, or perhaps, neglected. The Forbidden Forest of Forgotten Figments and Figures is heavy with an ever present pale crimson fog and thick with matte black Douglas Firs, Spruce, Thuja, and Juniper trees like high-grade charcoal etched across a dingy, stained canvass. The ground below would have sparse patches of the same black grass, illuminated by golden orbs that float just above and amongst the blades, imitating fireflies. There are, of course, signs that life once existed within the thicket of trees, with wooden posts and fences that were rotted and worn down by the absence of life and light. There are walls and foundations, remnants of a village, in the same condition, dilapidated and in disrepair. Even trails and smatterings of cobblestone all leading to what would have been the village square, complete with a broken-down water well so deep and dark that one cannot hope to see the bottom.

Everything had been overgrown and overtaken by The Darkness, the shadows within the structures even darker and blacker than the already darkened forest seemed to be alive, with slight movement to them, like slow, controlled breathing or the steady, intentional movements of old Tai-Chi master; swaying, undulating. Something waited in those corners, lurked patiently like a spider waits for prey. Something altogether desperate to grasp at the light it had been denied, to have the sensations and vigour of life that it longed for. It had been torn apart, separated from its essence, suppressed and stripped away until it was merely the yearning, the desolation, and the destruction it was left with. Recoiling towards the shadows, but always reaching for--hoping for--the light.

This was what awaited the squad within this forest, this was what called to them with that sweet, but sombre song.