//December 30, 20XX, late afternoon.
Five college-aged friends converge on a mountaintop in the small town of Proctor, an Appalachian town they grew up in, on New Year’s day.//
(click:?Page)[Ida returns to Samantha, who is waiting on the mountain trail for Ida to return from doubling back to her car to retrieve something she forgot. Ida blames her anxiety for making her forgetful.]
(click:?Page)[Samantha apologizes for making Ida anxious by inviting Emilia to the gathering they're heading toward. Samantha hoped that Ida could reconcile her relationship with Emilia after a romantic falling out earlier in the year. Ida comments on Samantha’s tendency to assume the best outcome. Ida feels pessimistic.]
(click:?Page)[The two walk up a forested mountain path to meet with their hometown friend group while visiting during Winter break from college. They discuss the gathering, hosted by Joel whose family owns a lot on the mountaintop. Samantha adds that Jamie will also be present. Ida demonstrates some veiled scorn for Jamie, but Samantha defends Jamie, causing Ida some jealousy. Ida complains that Joel’s meetup time is too late in the day, and Samantha agrees but mentions plans for a bonfire. Ida presents herself as irritable and somewhat passive aggressive, which Ida internally scolds herself for, not wanting to push Samantha away.
[[Next|opening02]]]Why would they? Samantha's my only friend here.
[[Next|a01]]The feeling of dread intensifies and Ida feels her hear being to beat strongly in her ears. The sensation in her hand becomes so strong that the rest of the world feels as if it's dimming by comparison, pushed away by its strong influence.
(link: "Are the others watching? There's no way they're believe me... if I told them how this felt.")[
(set: $paranoia to $paranoia + 1)
(goto: "choice03")]
(link: "There's no way something like this can exist. I don't know how to explain it, but... this sensation is real. There's no way I'm imagining this.")[
(set: $vulnerability to $vulnerability + 1)
(goto: "choice03")]This is too strange. I don't think I have any other option. I need to trust them.
[[Next->b01]][[Back->opening03]]
{
(set: $paranoia to 0)
(set: $vulnerability to 0)}
Ida mulls about awkwardly, approaching the spot where Joel and Jamie had been digging while feeling frustration. She sees the earth shifting and feels some fear, but also feeling self destructive, tosses her concern away and reaches for the object. Before she makes contact, her hand is pulled sharply toward it.
(click:?Page)[Startled, Ida feels a hot, wrinkled, crawling surface under her hand. She feels an intense dread paired with the unreality of the sensation.
(link: "This can't be real. This has to be in my head. Anxiety, or something.")[
(set: $paranoia to $paranoia + 1)
(goto: "choice02")]
(link: "What is this? This feeling is... unnatural.")[
(set: $vulnerability to $vulnerability + 1)
(goto: "choice02")]]Mixed into the feeling of dread, Ida's social anxiety mixes itself into her swirling panic. She considers, nervously, how this will come across to the others. While terrified, she fears they will chide her for overreacting, and for scaring herself with her idle hands while the others are tending to Jamie, who she has ignored.
(link: "Everyone will think I'm crazy, for sure. And careless. Reactive. Crazy, and an idiot, and a jerk.")[
(set: $paranoia to $paranoia + 1)
(goto: "choice04")]
(link: "Something like this... is worth mentioning. Even if I'm overreacting to nothing, I can't keep this feeling to myself.")[
(set: $vulnerability to $vulnerability + 1)
(goto: "choice04")]If I told them what I'm feeling, would they really believe me? Would they care?
(if: $paranoia > $vulnerability)[[[There's just no way they would. If it was Sam, it would be different, but why would they listen to me?|choose-a]]](else:)[[[It's embarassing, but... I don't think I can hold this feeling on my own. That would be too much.|choose-b]]][[Back|choose-b]]
Ida pulls back with a shriek, losing her balance and falling backward. The group notices this and Samantha quickly attends to Ida.
(click:?Page)[The group bombards her with panicked questions, and Ida feels embarrassed to be the center of attention amongst people she had been feeling frustrated with. She explains feeling disoriented and nauseous, blaming her anxiety. She suspects she's overreacting to a simple surprise.]
(click:?Page)[Jamie denies this speculation, corroborates Ida’s experience with hers. This surprises Ida, not expecting the soliIdarity from Jamie. The object sits in the lump of earth, resembling a knotted silver sphere of worms. Ida sees it crawling, which she feels in her hand.
[[Next|b02]]][[Back|a01]]
She composes herself and goes looking for the others. She sees that their belongings have moved as well. She finds Joel, shocked to see her. Quickly putting on a casual air, he asks where she’s been. Joel’s face twists at her answer and he asks Ida to wait while he gets the others. Ida is confused but agrees, not sure how else to respond.
(click:?Page)[The others gather and Ida hides the details of her experience. She hides her hands behind her back, noting their staring. Samantha begins to ask where Ida has been, but cuts herself off. Ida feels the others are acting suspicious, internally asking if she missed something. She notices that Emilia has hung back, watching from a distance, upset. Ida worries if Emilia has exaggerated their falling out, making the others weary of Ida.]
(click:?Page)[Remembering Jamie’s sickness, Ida tries to overcome her contempt and asks Jamie if she’s alright. Jamie bluntly turns the question around on Ida, prying into Ida’s recollection of the day. The others reproach Jamie and Ida feels cornered.
[[Next|a03]]][[Back->b04]]
Congregating again in the front office, the group agrees not to split up. Ida is distracted while looking over the office’s walls, worried she is forgetting something. She scours her memory for more details of what her purpose in this lab is. The others look for a map, but Ida insists she doesn’t need it.
(click:?Page)[The group proceeds down the halls together and comes to a corridor with lab equipment and find recordings on a cassette alongside a binder of test results and photographs depicting mutilated bodies alongside a transcript indicating an audio recording. The transcription is heavily redacted but resembles Ida’s condition, so they use their flashlight batteries to revive a cassette playback recorder. The recording plays back with two babbling voices which turns to shrieking. Samantha cuts the recording. The group finds it extremely disturbing and Ida corroborates what the recording said, based on what the angel told her. The group, uncomfortable, explains that they couldn’t understand it.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//Inspecting the text history, we see that the garbled dialog is readible from Ida's perspective, having understood the meaning of the gibberish.//]
[[Next->b06]]][[Back|b07]]
Ida and Emilia now stand in a stairwell above several stories of descending grated metal steps. Ida is quiet as they descend, but something seems to weigh on Emilia who calls for Ida to slow down. Emilia brings up their falling out, wanting to address the tension. Ida seems incredulous, causing Emilia to double down and provide even more apologetic reflection. She expresses guilt about having abandoned Ida at a time when Ida had been faring poorly.
(click:?Page)[After allowing Emilia to talk a while, Ida offers her own apologies. She disavows her past actions, wishing she had behaved more empathetically and been more responsible for her own feelings and reactions in the matter. Ida's apology seems well formulated but impersonal, making very few comments on explicit examples of her own behavior. Emilia gladly accepts the apology, however, and seems more relieved to be forgiven by Ida than to receive an apology of her own.]
(click:?Page)[Internally, Ida reflects on the apology she just provided. Ida doesn’t actually remember this conflict and had been responding in relation to the information Emilia volunteered in her own apology. She offered this apology sincerely, though, truly finding her evaluation of herself through Emilia's story to be distasteful.]
(click:?Page)[She questions why she would have ever acted the way she did in Emilia's commentary, indicating that Ida’s personality has shifted dramatically over the course of the day. She wonders if she used to be a much more closed off, self-hating person in her unrecallable past.
[[Next|b09]]]While searching for a spot to dig, Ida sees a copy of herself approaching from a distance.
(click:?Page)[Ida is apprehensive, concerned, questioning why her copy is appearing before her while she still lives. She wonders if the others had some details wrong, or perhaps didn't tell her the full truth. Ida anxiously worries that her copy is about to replace her //forcibly//.]
(click:?Page)[Ida's copy approaches Ida without reproach, seeming somehow excited and relieved to see her. The copy asks asks Ida for an explanation of what’s happened, seeming out of sorts. Ida hesitates to explain, finding herself unprepared for this event, but her copy seems patient and accepting that Ida may not have an answer.]
(click:?Page)[The copy explains that she is missing her memory, or so she thinks. She can't tell, but she's seen things that make her wonder if she's forgotten something important that's happened in the recent past. The copy seems disappointed by her forgetfulness, but surprisingly unanxious.]
(click:?Page)[Ida had been resolved to kill her copy, but now struggles to imagine following through with the act. She had been expecting to kill something inhuman, but now sees another version of herself before her and feels empathy instead. The copy seems pure, curious, and uninhibited by the pain that Ida now holds in her heart. She feels very different from her copy, Ida feeling moreso that her copy's disposition seems more like that of a lost child.]
(click:?Page)[Ida speaks to her copy, suggesting that there had been more copies of them in the past, and that it's exceptional that the two of them can be meeting like this. Her copy seems to understand this easily, unsurprised, which unsettles Ida. She wonders why her copy doesn't share her own unease. Ida lets on to her copy that she wants to end this constant cycle of death and rebirth, wanting to ensure that there are no more copies after the two of them. Ida becomes tense and imagines pursuing her copy. Her body shifts subconsciously, or so she assumes, because her copy seems to instinctively sense danger in Ida's demeanor. Growing startled, the copy flees.
[[Next|collapse02]]][[Back|collapse02]]
Ida can feel something hot and wrinkled in her hand, wondering if the other her managed to touch what she was reaching toward. Her vision slowly returns and she sees Samantha approaching her. As she approaches, Samantha becomes streaked with blood, but doesn’t appear troubled by this. Ida looks up at Samantha’s face, expressing genuine concern, but covered in something pink and chunky. Ida is shellshocked and can only see Samantha’s mouth moving.
(click:?Page)[ Ida’s senses slowly return and she feels a throbbing in her arm.]
(click:?Page)[She looks to it, seeing it suddenly bruising deeply, starting from the fingers and traveling up her arm.]
(click:?Page)[She begins perspiring blood and as she tries to move her hand away from the object she’s touching, her arm droops limply, clearly dislocated.]
(click:?Page)[Samantha screams.]
(click:?Page)[ Ida wonders if she is dead.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:cyan)[The end...for now ;)]][[Back|opening01]]
The friends gather at the mountaintop lot. Joel and Emilia talk while Jamie listens and smokes cigarettes. The group drinks cheap beer, except Emilia and Ida. Ida feels uncomfortable, having apparently always felt like an outsider, internally fixated on criticizing Jamie’s behavior. It becomes clear that Samantha is Ida’s social comfort blanket, and Ida feels resentment toward Jamie because of her growing friendship with Samantha.
(click:?Page)[The group chats about college, family, and the holidays: Jamie is apparently staying with Joel despite having family nearby; Joel has a brother with a complicated personality and hints at a family history of mental illness; Ida and Jamie are both intellectually motivated; Samantha has a large family and is the eldest child; Emilia lives with her mom and has been struggling with being back home. Ida feels some a combination of anger and guilt toward Emilia, but feels shame for her judgements when she learns that Emilia is having a difficult time at home.]
(click:?Page)[ Ida quiets as the conversation continues, which Samantha notices, occasionally prompting her to participate. When asked about her last year, Ida becomes dodgy, clearly avoiding the topic. Samantha takes notice of this.]
(click:?Page)[Moving on, Joel elaborates that the property belongs to his family; his grandfather’s house had burnt down when Joel was young. His grandfather was an abusive alcoholic who was disliked by neighbors and family alike, apparently dying from cancer shortly after. Though the government had attempted to repossess the land through eminent domain, they were unsuccessful. Now his family wants to sell the land to ease finances. Apparently his grandfather grew insane, rumors spreading from neighbors. Joel explains he prepared equipment to look for scraps from the fire before it sells.]
(click:?Page)[Ida appears uncomfortable during this conversation, and Samantha discreetly asks if she’s ok. Ida avoids the topic, asking Samantha not to worry about her, feeling she should not burden Samantha with her feelings.
[[Next|opening03]]][[Back|opening02]]
Joel tries to use the metal detector but Jamie has to help him. The others feel too uneasy to partake, the mood feeling congested. Emilia sits silently nearby, clearly uncomfortable, which Ida takes personally.
(click:?Page)[Samantha discreetly comments on the strange mood of the gathering to Ida. Ida comments that Samantha wouldn't understand. Taking some offense to this, Samantha asks why Ida is in a mood. Dancing around the subject, they come back to the topic of Emilia and Ida’s tension. Ida describes microaggressions by Emilia from earlier conversation, though Samantha claims these are out of context. Samantha encourages Ida to simply talk to Emilia about it, and that Samantha is upset to hear Ida criticize her friends who have all had difficult years. Ida claims her year was difficult as well. Samantha encourages her to elaborate. Ida falls silent, telling Samantha she’ll explain later. There is now a noticeable tension between them, and Ida internally criticizes herself.]
(click:?Page)[Ida and Samantha are distracted by a bickering Jamie and Joel. The metal detector has shut down after locating something. Unsure where to dig, Jamie temporarily fixes the metal detector long enough to pinpoint a digging location. Jamie digs and hits something hard. Uncovering the object, the earth seems to shift and she questions whether she’s had too much to drink. She uses her hand to reach for the uncovered object but hesitates and instead covers her mouth.]
(click:?Page)[Ida ruminates on her feelings of distance with the group, which Samantha tries to temper. Samantha wants Ida to feel included, but they are interrupted by Jamie loudly gagging before running to throw up in some brush. Emilia rushes off too and Ida recalls Emilia’s repulsion toward vomit and “body stuff”. Samantha helps Jamie, who tries to describe seeing something, but can’t find the words and instead blames the combination of substances in her system. Ida feels contemptuous toward Jamie’s drinking, smoking, etc, and is upset that Samantha has left to tend to her.
[[Next|choice01]]][[Back|choose-a]]
Ida pulls back, losing her balance and falling backward. She takes a moment to collect herself, then realizes her friends are not around, leaving her alone. She feels both relieved and ignored after this frightening event. Ida looks back toward the dug up earth, seeing nothing. She wipes her hands on her pants, noting the dirt caked under her nails.
[[Next|a02]][[Back|a02]]
Ida realizes her backpack is no longer where she remembered it being. Asking where it is, Samantha shows her to it.
(click:?Page)[Searching the bag, Ida finds some of her belongings are missing. Panicked, Ida questions this and Samantha cautiously admits that Jamie has them.]
(click:?Page)[She approaches the others and askes for her keys back. Jamie tosses the keys to Ida without resistance. The others seem concerned, but Jamie offers that it would be easier for them this way, asking if they think Ida is too unstable and will try to hurt herself again. Ida is angered by these comments, questioning why Jamie would know this, hinting at previous self harm. Ida feels a mix of confusion, shame, and rage at these hostile comments.
[[Next|a04]]][[Back|b01]]
Joel ponders if it’s connected to his grandfather, elaborating on rumors of his strange behavior in a joking tone. This disturbs the others, which sobers Joel’s attitude. Joel reaches for the object but is stopped by Jamie who warns of possible risks.
(click:?Page)[Emilia, uncomfortable with the strange nature of events, anxiously recall’s Joel’s comment about the government trying to repossess the land. Ida calls this as well, remembering a period where government agents visited, Jamie being involved. The memory seems to slip away from her as she tries to recall more.]
(click:?Page)[Ida is distracted by something she sees, a large and imposing half-shadow shimmering on the horizon. It appears unfocused, more like an absence of form than a presence. Scared, Ida closes her eyes, willing it to disappear, and it does. Terrified by these apparitions, she moves away from the object. Doing so, she sees something crawling under her skin and struggles against something invisible. Distantly, she hears her friends exclaiming through the haze of panic. She suddenly goes still, calm, and goes to retrieve the object.]
(click:?Page)[Her friends appear extremely distressed. Ida comments on the crawling she felt in her body, claiming that if she takes the object with them she’ll be ok. Confused, the friends question her, asking about her behavior and her report of a crawling sensation. Very alarmed, they claim that they had been restraining her while in a delirious fervor, clawing at her skin. She notices blood and skin under her fingernails, having no recollection of this happening.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//Inspecting the chat log, we see that the unknown "???" has shared information, which accompanies Ida's hallucinations. We also find that small segments of dialogue from her friends has small segments replaced with gibberish.//]
[[Next|b03]]][[Back|b02]]
Samantha suggests they drive Ida to the hospital in her car. As they descend the mountain, Ida convinces herself that she needs help, terrified of what’s happening to her. She grounds herself, casting away the belief that the object is protecting her, instead fearing for her mental health. She debates leaving the object behind, which her friends encourage.
(click:?Page)[Ida abandons the object in the brush, and shortly after she she again begins to hallucinate. She sees wormlike growths emerging from her skin, feels them inside of her bones with a building pressure. She feels her skin is about to burst with parasites, seeing them wriggle out of her eyes through her tear ducts. Pulling at them, her consciousness fades.]
(click:?Page)[She comes to, noticing the sun is lower in the sky. Ida struggles at first to understand where she is and to recognize her friends, but it comes back to her after a few moments.]
(click:?Page)[Her friends have been debating what to do, scared. Ida explains her hallucination to them, wanting to leave to get mental help, fearing schizophrenia. Jamie counters this, believing it’s strange that Ida can identify these as hallucinations. They also uncomfortably reveal that Ida’s eyes began running with blood. In disbelief that this goes beyond her mind, she uncomfortably reveals that while unconscious, an angel appears to her with instructions.
[[Next|b04]]][[Back|b03]]
Ida leads the group to a metal door in the woods, constructed into a rocky face. Joel is disturbed, not recognizing this despite his familiarity with the area. Ida enters automatically, the group asking her to slow down and explain. She pauses, confused as if she forgot the others were with her, and describes what she knows of the location, vaguely. The group is unsettled by this knowledge but the situation is too strange, and Ida is too persuaded, for them to relent.
(click:?Page)[The facility they enter is built into an old mining tunnel. They come to a small office and activate a generator, lighting old rope lights. The office contents suggest a defunct government operation. The lit tunnel appears to go on for a long time. Everyone becomes preoccupied with trying to understand the space, mulling about and inspecting things. Joel and Jamie go to inspect the depth of the tunnel. Jamie hears a noise and follows it ahead of Joel. Pursuing the noise, she sees someone looking like Joel ahead of her in the darkness, dressed differently. They slip away, and Joel catches up to a frightened Jamie, disturbing her further.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//Inspecting the text history, we find that Jamie's past dialog is entirely replaced with gibberish. We also find that the segments of gibberish in other character's dialog has increased.//]
[[Next|b05]]][[Back|b05]]
Ida breaks down under strain, and the group assures her they will help her. She reveals that her hallucinations will only go away once she serves a purpose, bringing the object to the bottom of the facility. She explains that she has been hearing the angel the entire time. She is extremely disturbed.
(click:?Page)[The group of friends promise to get through this with Ida. Samantha expressing a deep compassion for Ida. Samantha asks Ida to promise to stop holding her troubles alone and trust her friends to help, touching Ida. Ida internally questions if she has even been invulnerable with them, realizing she can hardly recall their past interactions. Ida feels as though she’s only ever existed as she is now, in this place.]
(click:?Page)[They descend a staircase and come to a locked door, though Ida opens it easily. Her friends are stunned by Ida's knowledge of the door code, reinforcing the sense that Ida's hallucinations are not mere delusions.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//We can find the door code in the dialog history, attributed to ???.//]]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//Inspecting the text history, we find that Sam's past dialog is entirely replaced by gibberish. We also find that the segments of gibberish in other character's dialog has increased.//]
[[Next->b07]]][[Back|b06]]
Ida becomes very pale, her friends noticing. Ida asks her friends to trust her and follow her instructions. They ask for an explanation, but she cannot tell them, which they push back against given their previous conversation. Although she wants to be honest and vulnerable, she explains that she already knows what’s in the room, and if they see it, it may break them.
(click:?Page)[She asks them to chat as they follow her with their eyes closed, holding hands. Joel leads the conversation, but the conversation slowly dies and they proceed in a tense silence. There is something in the room mumbling, incoherantly, in human voices.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//Inspecting the text history, the mumbling is transcribed, inserting segments of Jamie and Samantha’s dialog from earlier, mixed in with other strange dialog.//]]
(click:?Page)[They reach the end of the hall and pass through a door, which Ida locks behind them. The others open their eyes, silently aware that something in the room was alive, shifting and crawling near to them. Ida assures them that everything will be alright.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//Inspecting the text history, we find that Joel's past dialog is entirely replaced by gibberish. We also find that the segments of gibberish in other character's dialog has increased.//]
[[Next->b08]]][[Back|b08]]
Emilia and Ida enter a chamber with lab equipment. Through an observation window they observe a deep, deep room contained by a heavily sealed, gated wall. The room they look into appears empty, but upon inspection, the walls in the room appear to be moving very slightly. Emilia points out that the room they’re in has a crack from which a fleshy mass is growing into the lab, like a slime mold. It pulses. Although Emilia is deeply disgusted by this, Ida seems oddly comforted. She recalls a warm memory, the smell of someone's skin, though she cannot remember whose.
(click:?Page)[Emilia asks what to do. Ida hesitates, uncomfortably, but collects herself and opens a container that allows her to drop the object into the containment room. Ida somberly speculates that they’re done, their purpose served. Emilia questions this, confused and frightened by Ida’s tone.]
(click:?Page)[Inside of the room, the walls seem to melt, a fleshy sludge growing around the object. It comes together into a single mass of flesh, a liquid pooling around it until the mass floats in the center of it. The mass begins bifurcating slowly, then dividing more and more quickly. An embryo forms but quickly becomes incomprehensible in shape, resembling Ida’s earlier hallucinations. Ida’s perspective becomes hazy, seeing the shape disappear into a singularity. Her mind becomes blank.]
(click:?Page)[(text-colour:grey)[//Inspecting the text history, we find that The entire text history has been erased.//]
[[Next|b10]]][[Back|b09]]
Coming to, Ida cannot access her memories. She has a thorough understanding of the facility, navigating it easily. Her mind feels clear and good, realizing the voice that has dominated her mind is gone. Realizing she is free to leave, she makes for the exit. She sees decomposing bodies along the way, which look familiar but unplaceable. She feels a distant pain, speculating that it’s better she doesn’t understand.
(click:?Page)[She comes to a decomposing version of herself, which startles her. Her copy seems to be dying under an immense physical pressure, gasping for air, asking for help. Ida tries to revive her copy, full of sorrow for her copy. As her copy dies, she feels a deep loss of something beyond her recollection.
[[Next|b11]]][[Back->b10]]
Ida returns to the mountain top, following a floating feeling of familiarity like deja vu. She wonders what her purpose is, and why she is in this place.
(if:(history:) contains "a14")[
[[Next|collapse01]]
](else:)[
[[Did something happen here before?|choice01]]][[Back|a03]]
Ida angrily rushes down the mountain toward her car. Her thoughts are conflicted, questioning why the others have acted this way.
(click:?Page)[Thinking she is following a familiar path, Ida instead comes to the entrance of a cave. Confused, she turns to leave but hears Samantha calling her and enters the cave to hide from Samantha, too overwhelmed by confusion, suspicion, and guilt to face her.
[[Next|a05]]][[Back|a04]]
Ida calms down and sees a faint light from within the cave, proceeding cautiously. Deeper in the cave she sees bioluminescent worm-like moss in the rock. Her curiosity distracts her from her anguish. She avoids stepping on the moss, approaching a bright patch cautiously. She sees decomposing remains in it and realizes they are human. She is shocked and begins to worry that her friends’ strange behavior is connected to it.
(click:?Page)[Losing her composure, Ida accidentally steps on the moss, which shrieks and extinguishes its light. In the pitch blackness, Ida flees blindly toward the entrance. She is suddenly blinded by Samantha’s flashlight, who takes her arm and leads her out of the cave in a subdued panic. The two walk quickly, nearly running, out of the cave. Ida worries if she can trust Samantha, questioning the corpse in the cave and her friends’ strange behavior.
[[Next|a06]]][[Back|a05]]
Samantha and Ida return to the mountaintop where the group waits nervously. Ida has become properly scared, worried her friends are manipulating her, the corpse weighing on her. Ida wants an explanation for their behavior and they hesitate to answer. Jamie taunts them to explain.
(click:?Page)[Cautiously, Samantha shows Ida photos on her phone taken at the mountaintop. Ida doesn’t recall these, although she is in them. Ida is alarmed about the implications about her memory, but they try to comfort her, claiming they all are suffering memory loss and none of them remember taking the photos. Confused, Ida asks for an explanation, extremely anxious. They seem hesitant but corroborate that they all remember arriving to the mountaintop to dig on Joel’s family land.
[[Next|a07]]][[Back|a06]]
They ask Ida to calm herself first, then explain that they’re in a horror movie scenario. They believe themselves to be reborn copies, stuck in a cycle of death and rebirth on the mountaintop. As their copies age, they become unstable, and thus become easily “persuaded”. Ida asks if this means there was another her, and they claim this is also why her belongings have moved; she did this, and much time has passed. Ida is incredulous and wants proof.
(click:?Page)[They reveal a journal, explaining that they cannot leave the mountaintop and recording information has become difficult with limited resources. They have a notebook, reading from it, describing past versions of themselves trying to understand their situation. Ida cannot believe this, asking to see it. The journal is filled cover to cover, with different colors of pen layered in places to maximize the space. The most recent recordings are made with improvised ink; charcoal ink, berries, and blood.]
(click:?Page)[They explain that the mountaintop seems to provide them everything they need, but they can still die. Ida understands this means they have died before. They claim suicide, starving, or any killing doesn’t make a difference. Each time, a replacement shows up before long. Additionally, it seems an entity consumes them. It is normally masked in illusions, but the entity can implant thoughts into a weak mind and lead them to its mouth. Ida has a realization about the cave, and the others see this in her face. The group encourages Ida to rest, as the mountaintop is otherwise a safe utopia and they’ve learned to survive.
[[Next|a08]]][[Back|a07]]
Ida tries to sleep but is disturbed by the eerie silence. Ida goes over her situation in her head. She wants to believe this is all a lie, but the idea of her friends pulling a prank also disturbs her. She worries they’re pulling a cruel prank to punish her, or have become crazy, or that they are in a death cult. She can’t make sense of it, also worrying that she’s lost contact with reality. What if this is all in her head and she’s become psychotic, hallucinating all of this.
(click:?Page)[Ida wonders if perhaps Samantha’s photos are edited. Ida steals Samantha’s phone, with much guilt, and realizes the photos look weird when she inspects them closely. They are vaguer than she remembers, some elements seeming blurred, smeared, or simply filled in with visual gibberish. She feels betrayed, especially by Samantha. She feels everything she has in this town is false, self pity turns into fantasies about driving her car off the road, but she pushes away her morbid ideations, knowing she’s too cowardly to try.
[[Next|a09]]][[Back|a08]]
Ida sneaks away, convinced her friends are tricking her. Ida descends the mountainside, finding her car.
(click:?Page)[She starts her car and drives a short distance. Ida quickly pulls over, feeling nausea and eye strain.]
(click:?Page)[Ida exits the car and looks toward the distance in the light of her car's headlights. The landscape beyond looks odd in her headlights, as if shifting, its space not making sense. It appears indescribable and vague, like old AI images.]
(click:?Page)[Dread hits Ida and she runs back to the mountaintop. Her friends are waiting, and ask if she saw the outer edge.
[[Next|a10]]][[Back|a09]]
They discuss the landscape and its vagueness, realizing that if they look closely, the vagueness is everywhere. Joel claims it’s hard to see something you don’t know in this world, because your expectations fill in the blank space. He asks Ida if she could draw her moles onto her body from memory. She focuses on her skin to see her moles shift within a general area of where she knows them to be. They encourage her not to look at things too hard.
(click:?Page)[They believe the world around them is constructed of their combined memories, which are inherently vague. The only details reflected in this world are ones they’ve all been aware of. Ida reflects on this in her own life, recalling how she’s overlooked details of things she believed she knew well. Ida relates this world to the concept of top-down processing in cognition. The others finish her explanation, having learned from a past Ida.]
(click:?Page)[Ida questions why the vagueness beyond the mountain would appear as it did, then, and not be filled in with their expectations. They worry that this world is becoming smaller with pieces of their minds lost with every rebirth. Their journal indicates that the vagueness was once more distant. The others speculate that once the vagueness consumes their mind, they would be lost to madness, as gazing upon it fills the mind with ambiguous senses. They agree that it goes beyond the limits of what the human mind can process. Perhaps this world is also just their collective minds making sense of something massive and beyond their comprehension in what limited ways they can.]
(click:?Page)[Even though they cannot substantiate this, they hope that somewhere, their originals live on. They choose to believe this, finding value in choosing a hopeful truth to believe in, rather than settle for cold realism. Ida struggles to accept the idea of subjective truth, leading her to seriously contemplate suicide. She outwardly admits to having tried it before, unsuccessfully, and being too afraid to commit. Now, she feels it’s objectively her best option. However, she feels guilt about leaving her friends to clean up the mess of her death, and knows another copy will simply replace her. Will this copy do the same, creating an endless cycle of burden on her friends?
[[Next|a11]]][[Back|a10]]
Ida finds some comfort in comparing herself to gut microbes within a larger creature, understanding that she and the mountaintop are similarly trying to survive their circumstances.
[[Next|a12]][[Back|a11]]
Time passes and Ida’s trust in the others grows, as does her self confidence. However Ida senses an inevitable shift approaching. Ida delays accepting this. Samantha appears to be becoming more reactive, deteriorating, and Ida worries that this spells her impending death and replacement, seeing her own earlier neurosis reflected in Samantha’s erratic behavior. Samantha, usually compassionate and understanding, is becoming impatient and showing cracks in her mental health, making uncharacteristic passive aggressive jabs at the others, who understand the impending meaning of this.
(click:?Page)[Ida helps Samantha with a task near the spot where the group originally dug. Ida has deja vu, remembering the time she touched something strange in this area. Something about this event felt pivotal and Ida feels she may uncover an important detail about this world by retracing her steps.]
(click:?Page)[Finding the spot, she sees the group has left their event site largely untouched, speculating that this area now serves as a preserved memorial to the last day they all share memory of. Ida locates the hole where Jamie dug and finds that the earth looks different than how she remembers; it's buldging, the dirt freshly disrupted. Ida digs at the hole with her hands while Samantha is occupied. She recalls details of the memory of her first day in this world, remembering dirt caked under her fingernails.]
(click:?Page)[Ida finds a fleshy protrusion, which she believes resembles a cancerous polyp. Knowing this is a sign of the ailing world, she considers her options: let it grow and eventually kill their host, or cut it to prolong its health. Allowing the cancer to develop means the potential end of her and her friends’ lives in this world, and she’s again faced with an existential weight. Ida struggles with this conflict but chooses to excise the cancer, prolonging their survival.]
(click:?Page)[Ida digs deeper to unearth the mass and finds that the polyp is a pseudo-fetal development of Samantha’s new copy. Their copies growing underground, Ida realizes that their bodies exist in this world not as food for a beast, but as a cancer eating away at it. Perhaps the cave was not the world’s stomach, but the world’s immune system.]
(click:?Page)[While Ida ponders this, she is interrupted by Samantha who sees the growth. Samantha considers it quietly, but suddenly takes one of the tools of their task and attempts to hack at the growth. The clone screams and Ida tries to stop Samantha, explaining that she’s killing herself. Samantha already understands this, telling Ida that she is making this decision because she is exhausted. To Samantha, this act is self mercy. She can’t live like this anymore, the stress eating away at the core of who she is, seeking oblivion as freedom.]
(click:?Page)[Ida is overcome with guilt and feels she has been a burden to Samantha. Ida resists the urge to stop Samantha, allowing her the personal decision, feeling she doesn’t have the right to intervene. Samantha kills her developing copy, feeling relieved, while Ida looks on, disturbed by the event.
[[Next|a13]]][[Back|a12]]
Some time passes and Ida narrates that Samantha is no longer present. She believes Sam was successful at eradicating the growing seed of herself. Ida is consumed by guilt, feeling she was a part of the weight that drove Samantha to end her life in this world, and has fully internalized the idea that she is a cancer, both to this world and to her friends.
(click:?Page)[Ida plans to kill her own seed as well and end the cycle for herself.]
(click:?Page)[The remaining friends are slowly coming to the same belief as she and Samantha, feeling worn down in this dying world, their comfortable survival seeming less and less likely with each passing cycle as the world shrinks.
[[Next|a14]]][[Back->a13]]
Ida spends day after day searching for the growing pseudo-fetus of her future self, digging around the mountaintop. She hopes to find it before her current lifespan ends and her new copy is born to replace her, forced to carry out another cycle in this cruel world.
(if: (history:) contains "b11")[
[[Next|collapse01]]
](else:)[
[[If I can't manage this, another me will have to go through this all over again.|choice01]]
][[Back|collapse01]]
Ida pursues her copy, taking her shovel with her. Ida internally assures herself of the choice to kill herself to end the cycle. Ida pursues her copy to where Ida originally dug up the mass that became Sam. Suddenly coming to a halt, Ida slows her persuit, apprehensive of her copy's sudden change in behavior. The copy looks pained, crying. Knowing that this is the same spot where Sam ended her own cycle, Ida understands that her copy is reacting to Sam's presence in this location as well. The copy addresses Ida, cold and confused, asking if there was someone here named Sam once.
(click:?Page)[Not expecting this reply, and feeling pained to be in this place, Ida recalls her despair and self-hatred, lunging at her copy with a revived determination. Ida wrestles her copy to the ground, wrapping her hands around her copy's neck. Ida strangles her, channeling her own self hatred into her attack, feeling she's responsible for Sam's absence and despair.]
(click:?Page)[Her copy struggles to speak, uttering that her life has only just started. Ida’s mind is made up to kill her copy, although her emotions are now muddied and swirling with pain and despair. Ida asserts that death would be kinder than this world. Her copy asks why, and Ida realizes her copy is innocent. She doesn't hold the same rage, paranoia, resentment, pain, or self-hatred that she does. Tears welling in her eyes, Ida finally relents, her feelings too complicated to carry out the murder. She sees that her copy is the version of herself she wants to be.]
(click:?Page)[The copy struggles to recover. Ida backs up, watching her copy try to come to her feet. She attempts to utter an apology, offering broken phrases with explanations for her feelings, but she realizes her copy isn’t listening to her.]
(click:?Page)[The copy begins writhing in a stilted away, as if she is still being strangled restrained. Her body tightens, compressing into smaller and smaller positions, until the compression reaches a point where her limbs are forced into unnatural positions, popping out of their sockets to be compressed further. The air shimmers around her copy and Ida is paralyzed by fear and shock, watching horrified as her copy struggles against the invisible force in what feels like slow motion. Small wisps of blood squeeze out of the copy under compression and Ida hears the popping of joins in her copy's body as if they were happening in her own.]
(click:?Page)[Ida’s head rings and she slowly begins to feel pain and a building pressure around her. The pain grows and Ida’s consciousness begins to fade, but she sees her copy struggling to reach out, mouthing words to her which she cannot hear. Losing feeling, Ida feels warmth blanket her. She realizes there is a large dark stain growing from where her copy was, and that the sky looks red.
[[Next|final]]]