Chapter 1 of my as of now untitled novel and UPDATE

The update is at the end if you're just here for that, but I hope you all do read this original work of fiction I'm writing, and enjoy~!

Light peeks in from behind the blackout curtains adorning my room.  Morning has arrived.  Wonderful.  Another night spent wallowing in my own filth, too tired to shower, and too terminally online to feel anything at the sight of the sun.  I blacked out my curtains to avoid this sinking feeling that I’m wasting my life, why do they still not hide me away?  Let me spend what little time I have on this rock getting into fights online, God.  Anything outside of this 400 square foot hovel DOESN'T matter.  Quit trying to act like I have anything out there.  I’m about to go to sleep, everyone else has already started their meaningless, toiling lives.  At least here I can pretend I have something tangible.  There are few joys in this world, so I’d rather not think about the outside when I could focus on the insular.  I know that’s a scrambled mess that needs to be sorted out after all.  I won’t leave this place until I’ve done that.  To go out would mean falling prey to the insipid claws of IRL living that gnash away at humanities collective sanity.  Everyday is another story in the endless noise cycle.  Was it a shooting that was on my feed today?  Or was it another of the famous repression bills being passed?  Hell, it could be both.

I slosh my head around, eyes still in ache of the light peaking in as I wonder just how people can keep doing it.  How can they keep on going out there when the world is a vulture?  Ready to gobble your insides at the slightest slip up.  I don’t wanna be a page in another newscast.  I just wanna stay here and perceive life through the window of fiction.  My precious books and animation.  At least there I can imagine a better world.  The latest releases always stimulate my imagination.  My focus is less on the material itself, and more so on how it functions.  How can I take that and conjure up new scenarios in my own head?  Our minds all perceive things and distort them in different ways.  What you read in a book or watch on a screen, is all a jumbled vision of how someone else sees the world.  When you consume someone's artistic vision, it’s like a gateway into their dreams.  Their psyche.  In my imperfect 4 walled world, I can decompile the parts of what they built, and construct something similar.  Through doing that, and analyzing myself, I’m sure I can make sense of my own head.  Descramble it.  Then I can go and face the noise.  I could do it.  I really could.  I know I could.  I will one day.  I will.  I trust me, right?

Do you?  It’s as you said just earlier, even if you could go out and face the “noise”, the purpose of the noise is to get you back in here.  They want you to toil in here Ren.  They want you to go out and get defeated so you come back right here and never leave.  Make sure your prepared before you do that.  Don’t regret it.

“Ahhhhh you’re right.  I should make doubly sure I’m ready when the time comes.  Thank you.”

Of course.

With words of preparation, I finally stand up and make my way towards the curtains.  It feels a little chilly, so I pick up the brown robe on the ground next to me, and put it on.  It’s odd, usually I keep a decent temp here, but I guess it’s just one of those days…

Mindlessly thinking that to myself, I begin the short walk.

Jeez.  Why are people so stupid?  Art which transgresses over social norms is important.  It shows the reality of our thoughts which get distorted.  It’s fiction.  You think about it only in the realm of “what if?”  It's something you can look at and find some ideas, and meaning.  On occasion you can be moved and apply it to yourself, but only a wired in noisespitter would think it's 1 to 1.  Why can't people get that?  These stories are an escape from our shitty world, and even then, they’re still reflections.  Distorted reflections of how someone else see’s things.  Why does everyone feel the need to bite and claw at the remaining scraps of my sanity?  It’s everyday with them.  They should all just die.  Fuck.  I suppose it's  really my fault for playcating them though.  Yep.  It's all on me and no one else.  So really, I should just die.

Chuckling self derisively, the light from the window seems to grow bigger as the room gets colder.  Odd.  But my eyes are probably just adjusting.  Or I’m having another delusion.  I really should get some lights in here.  It might help.  But then again, it might not.

I’m practically at the window, but something stops me from reaching out and fixing the curtain.  There’s clearly a breeze emanating through the window.  I can feel it.  It’s not just my mind playing tricks, it’s clearly right there.  Against my palm.

Someone’s here.

Scanning my pereprial, I see movement.

They're here.  They found me.  They want to take me outside.  I’m too late to stop them, and I have no means of protecting myself here.  All I can do is take cover in the darkness.

But…  I’m already so close to the light.  They can see me clear as day, no doubt.  God.  Fuck.  Oh god…

“Who’s there!?”

Swinging my arms out and turning around violently, I scream the question out with all my might.

Ren.  Come with us.  We’ll help you.  With what's troubling you.

The formless shadows approach me.  Culling my senses of everything but fear.

Ren.  Everyone is already here.  Waiting for.

“S-shut up-!”

I can barely get that out as they encroach me.  The light from the window is fading as the shadows draw closer.  Soon they start speaking to me in tongues I can’t quite understand, thoughts as shapeless as them.  But their eyes direct a clear intent.

“Come with us.”

The light is fully gone and I fall on the ground.

I tear the hair out of my head, begging, pleading with them to go away.  This isn’t the reality I wanted.  Why can’t they be nice to me?  Why did they have to come to me like this?  These shadows…  They’re evil.  They want to take me.

“I DON’T WANNA!!! STOP IT!  PLEASE!!!”

I shout as loud as I can, clumps of hair now in each of my hands.  But the shadows don’t stop.

The shadows finally take form as they finally surround me.  They transport me to a place I’ve been before.  Many times.  My face is wet.  I see the familiar internet tower blinking red in the distance, a television illuminating the night.  I can’t make out what’s on it, but it’s all I can look at.  I’m not getting any sleep tonight.  Tomorrow is a day that will bring the undeniable truth of what’s happening right now.  I feel uncomfortable.   I don’t understand the scene playing before me.  What is this?

*BANG BANG BANG*

Denying the existence of the memory before me, I slam my head hard against the wall.  It hurts.  But it stops the playback.

“DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE!!”

Like a broken record, it’s all I can say.  Jolting instantly to my feet, I rip the curtains off the wall to repel the shadows haunting me.

Blinding light fills the room.  My tears finally stop, and I can acknowledge the delusion for what it was.

My eyes take a while to adjust to the new change, and I see something I haven’t seen in a long time.

A complete mess.  My apartment is disgusting.  Cans everywhere, dusty, barely functioning as a living environment.  I’ve just been falling asleep wherever I feel comfortable for a while now, and I can tell that from the human shaped patches where there’s no garbage.  Looking around at it all makes me come to my senses.  How long has it been this time?  I’d forgotten what things looked like.  The shadows that were encroaching me were actually just some appliances that looked strange in the night.  The light I saw was just the red light of the coffee maker informing me that it needed water.  God.  I feel so silly now.

How easily I got swept up in nothing aha.   Turning around to hang the curtain back up, I look at something I probably haven’t seen in a month.

The sky today is overcast.  It’s not morning, it’s actually encroaching nighttime, and the neon lights of the streets below are turning on.  Now that I think about it, there’s no feasible way anyone could get in here.  I live on the 32’nd floor.  I am so high up, they put nets below me to stop me from offing myself.  Of course no one’s going to get in here through the window.  There are people walking to and from the various shops below.  The state of the world, despite my racing mind earlier, wasn’t too far off from what I remembered.  I see some thugs in a grimey back alley trading “mind enhancement chips”, the 'wired connection' adult store across the street is as lively as ever with customers piling in to live out their wildest fantasies, and the billboards are all ablaze with the latest noise.  The headline today reads “Cyborgs are abducting the youth and forcing them to get new parts!  Parents beware!”  Ahhh… When it comes down to it, it’s kinda sad that the world hasn’t changed.  I keep hoping that everytime I look down on it something will be done, but alas, it stays the same, stagnating place.  All one big house of cards ready to tumble at any moment like my psyche.  No wonder I feel at home.

Okay Ren, are you going to keep ignoring it?  Or are you going to look him in the face this time?

Waving my hand behind me to silence my friend, I finally examined what it was I noticed when first looking out.

I look horrible.  My reflection in the window is pale as a ghost, my eyes have bags so big I didn’t know it was possible, and my hair and beard haven’t been washed or shaved in ages.  My eyes darken at the sight.  My emotions towards this view are never positive.  I tried to fix it for a while, but it was clear that it wasn’t ever going to work out.  So I just gave up completely.  I tighten my robe a bit more to hide my visible rib cage, and try to run my fingers through my matted hair.  No avail on that end.  I try to examine how much my beard has grown out this time to get a gauge of how much time I spent under this time, but it’s so knotted together I can’t tell.

“I hate you.  Why do you look like that?”

I question myself like I’m not the one in the reflection.  I mean, it doesn’t feel like that, so hey accurate, but no.  That figure is undoubtedly me.  Sadly.

“Heh… Shame about that net.”

Not that I had actually planned on jumping on a whim like that, but still, sometimes I want the comfort to feel close to the ledge.  Knowing you have a choice, even in something so morbid, was a comfort to me for a long time.  The out I used to have is long gone.  I’m stuck here to burn with the planet when the time comes.  God… Why do I even…

My cynical train of thought gets stopped by an odd sight.  I focus on it and zoom in my vision to make sure I’m not just seeing things, but I see a figure down below.  Which isn’t an odd thing, but this one was staring right up at me.

That can’t be right.  I’m 32 stories up.  No one should even notice me, vision enhancements or not.  I’m high up.  I’m out of the field of vision for anyone down there.

But this girl..  She looked like she had been waiting on me to open the window and notice her.  Looking closely, she had a demon-like grin on her face, fangs sticking out and all.  The red eyes peeking through her purple bangs spoke clear intent, but I had no idea what that intent could be.  Her manner of dress stuck out like a thumb, being from what must’ve been over 150 years ago, yet no one paid her any mind.   When she saw that I was staring at her, she smiled wider, put one hand to her chest, and the other outstretched towards me.  Like an opera singer on stage.  She then began to move her lips.  It looked like she was singing joyfully, but I had no idea what, or why.  But… Something about her was just so enchanting.  I couldn’t pin it down, but it was like she was plucked right out of my head.  Everything about her was appealing to me, and I wanted to talk to her.  I wanted to hear what she was singing, see her up close, and smell what was most definitely her flowery perfume.  The more I looked, the more I melted into her gaze, my own eyes lighting up at every syllable she annunciated.

She was perfect.  But I was me.

I was hallucinating.  There was no way.  How could everyone going about their day down there not notice her?  She stands out like a lovely picnic in the middle of a warzone.  If she was real, the sleazies in the back alley chip trade which just wrapped up, would snatch her up in a heartbeat.  I thought I was all there, but I wasn’t.

As if she noticed my change in demeanor, her smile evaporated.  Despite her being fake, that made my heart ache a little.  Putting her arms back at her sides, she made a stride befitting royalty and disappeared towards what seemed to be the lobby of my apartment complex.   Just like that, she was gone, and I was left to myself again.

Deciding to get a grip of myself, I did what I hadn’t done in a long time.  I hopped in the shower, and started scrubbing off the month long bender of 24/7 wired in darkness and depravity.

Also just to clear my head.  I’ve never lost it to the point of still seeing things I shouldn’t after coming too.  My life was falling apart faster than I thought aha.

The warm water hitting my head was calming.  It took awhile, but I finally managed to wash my hair too.  God, living like this is going to kill me one day.  That’s not to say it doesn’t have its perks though.  The fridge restocks on its own, it is undoubtedly comfortable, and I can more or less survive as is off of my meager earnings from being a deranged maniac online.  I’m not outright DYING.  I’m just far from thriving.  Being a self proclaimed, “creative type”, I make a living making bad art and analysis for a small audience.  Especially lately.  I had figured losing my mind would make for good things, and while It did for a while, eventually I guess you have no more mind to lose.  It’s a shame, because it worked so well for a long time too.  But now even my meager audience seems to be losing interest.  I’m running the well of myself dry, and hell, I’m tired of hearing about me too.  But that’s always what my stories end up amounting to.  Art is just reflections of the author, but the hardest part as a writer is being conscious of that.  If you aren’t then in the end you have little more than a shitty biography.  Which is the last thing anyone wants to read.  No one what’s to hear about someone they’re not invested in.  You have to make it big before you can release a cash grab like that and retire off the profits.

I sure have a cynical way of looking at this, but honestly, it’s not as bad as I’m making it out.  My mind races most of the time, but I still have days like this where I can put a stop to it all and think clearly.  I can shower, actually eat a good meal, and breathe in relaxed breaths.

I start washing my body as I think about that girl again.

“Why would I hallucinate something like that?”

I say the words aloud to try and garner some answer from some nonexistent individual, but no response.  My best guess is that after recalling something I’d rather not, my brain just wanted to be nice to me for once.  The way she looked at me, it was scary, but I kinda like that sorta thing.  It makes my eyes glimmer with joy to see that kinda sadistic look.

In between wondering if I’m too far gone, I start to analyze her appearance.  She dressed like she was in the 1920’s with her dress shirt and skirt combo.  Though, her black leggings were the only thing contradictory to that antique image.  Her hair also was a beautiful shade of purple.  Contrasted her fiery eyes in a manner befitting of her sheer presence.  She commanded attention through her posture, and her rolled up sleeves and suspenders supported that notion.

Not to mention… she looked really nice…  Ahhhh I don’t know how to say it without feeling weird about it.  When I saw her figure, it made my heart race.  It was jarring when I first saw her, but I know that’s just because she was so… everything.

I can’t think clearly.  Honestly, I take back what I said.  Seeing such a person like that, clearly my mind was still being mean to me.  Giving me hope that there’s still beauty in the world.  God.

Washing away the notion of her existence, I dry myself off, put a towel around my head to dry my hair, and then it happens.

*KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK*

I hear someone at the door.

END OF CHAPTER.  

This is subject to change, but I really like where this this story is going.  I hope you all can enjoy it too.  It's been a lot of fun, and I hope to keep updating with chapters as I feel they're ready.  Let me know what you all think, and I will see you very soon with the KnK 6 video, which is literally in editing as I write this, and a good amount of other content.  I love you all, and I'm sorry things have been so strange as of late.  This year hasn't been kind to me, and I've spent a long time sorting myself out.  It's not fair to you all especially.  Thank you for supporting me at a time like this.  I am finally in a happier spot, and have been able to create again.  Almost too much in fact aha.  KnK 6 is like an hour long, the Fate Extra video is even longer, I've been doing prelim work for a series on Subahibi, that podcast I kept bringing up is about to record it's first episode, this novel is finally moving in a direction I'm very proud of, In terms of patreon request, I have all the ones I've been giving thus far also in the editing bay, and I've been thinking about starting a second channel if anyone would be interested in that kinda thing.  I'm not gonna over promise anything too hard or that'll all come out instantly because every time I do that I get anxious about it and fail to meet deadlines lol.  I just want you all to know that I haven't been resting on my laurels all this time essentially.  It's been a fucking hectic year, but things are actually looking up.  I hope you're all doing well too.  As always, I hope to keep providing you all with the best I can, and though I have a lot on my plate creative wise, for the first time in a long time, I am starved and ready to eat.  All the love, 

~Sleepy