You wait inside for what seems like an eternity. Screams, both human and monstrous, erupt from outside. With no windows in the hut you can't tell exactly what's going on, but you hang your head low, hoping it will all be over soon.\n\nAnd like a wish come true, it is. Eventually the door opens, and in steps a tired, frail shell of a man, his shaking arms covered in black soot as he struggles to hold aloft the flashlight. \n\n"They're gone...for now." \n\n"What happened to you?" \n\n"These creatures suck the life out of you. I can shave some years off my endlife to get it back, but I should wait and see if I'll heal naturally, first." He stumbled, grabbing onto the table for support. "They'll be back." \n\n[["We need to find a way out of here."]]
You dodge out of the way, and the hell lord continues its charge, crashing into your boyfriend and crushing him underfoot. \n\n"No!" You scream. "Bido!" \n\nBut it's too late. He's gone, and the pocketwatch is destroyed. \n\nThe hell lord disappears into the shattered sky, and with it his billion companions. There's no need to take you with them - they've won, and you're never going home.\n\nYou travel the desert forever, or until you take your own life. \n\n"Don't blame me," a voice calls out from the oasis. "Blame yourself, or God."
You spend the rest of your life waiting for something that never happens. \n\nTHE END\n
You travel west for some time, but before you can get further than a few miles, another blinding flash sets your world ablaze, and you wake up feeling disoriented.\n\nStill in the desert.\n\n[[North]]\n\n[[South]]\n\n[[East]]
"Good. Now toss me the flashlight." \n\n"Hurry up! We have to go before it makes another pass!" \n\n"Toss me the goddamn flashlight!" \n\nYou've never heard him speak like that before. Frightened, you toss the flashlight over to him. Suddenly the world begins to flash. \n\n"I love you. I've always loved you, and I always will. You know what right?" \nSuddenly it dawns on you.\n\n"What? NO! Get the fuck in here, right now!" \n"I can't. The temporal break was damaged by that thing, and it's only got enough juice for one of us. It has to be you." \n"NO!" \n\n[[Step out of the containment field. He's coming or you're not going.]]\n
"We were always meant to be, of course, but the universe has other designs." \n\n"Obviously. So where the hell are we, anyway?" \n\n"Hell, or at least something like it." He shrugged. "Every time we found a new way to communicate, the universe lurched in response, until finally it decided to remove a variable we couldn't seek to overcome." \n\n"It removed you." \n\n"Right. And dropped me here - wherever here is - in an attempt to rid me of the timeline. This isn't Earth anymore, babe, and it's definitely not connected to it. That much I know for sure.\n\n[["Then how the hell do we get home?"]]
"Four minutes!" \n\nRight. You take a deep breath, focusing as the hell lord charges. It's taller than the greatest skyscraper you've ever seen, and louder than a million marching bands. As the sky continously splits, blackness begins to pour across the desert.\nAnd through that blackness, billions of hellbeasts. \n\nYou could never catch them all if you wanted to, but the ones that die give a satisfying shriek. \n\n"Three minutes!" \n\n"I've only got one shot...gotta do this!" \nYou charge at the hell lord, desperately shaking your flashlight as you play a terrifying game of chicken. \n\n[[Ram the beast]]\n\n[[Dodge at the last second]]
"I'll be there soon," he said. \nSoon? That was two hours ago. We're well past soon, you thought. No, something's gone terribly wrong. He'd have made contact by now. Against your better judgement, you've decided to go out and search - rules be damned. After all, he could have been hurt. \n\n[[Grab your jacket and make a break for position 1.5]]
"We've only got one flashlight. You'll just be a target." \nBut he wasn't hiding anything. You could see the wounds on his arms, and the way he held his side as he walked. He was in no condition to fight.\n\n"Then let me use it," you said, forcing the flashlight from his hand. "I'll hold them off." \n"If you insist. I'll direct." \n\nReady...\nSet...\n\n"Here they come! Shine left! Now!" \n\n[[Shine Left]]\n\n[[Shine Right]]
There was no escape. There was never any escape. You could run forever, but somehow the creature manages to always catch up to you.\n\nYou wake up somewhere foreign, somewhere you've never known, and no matter what you think or feel, somehow you know you're never going home.\n\nYou have no mouth, but you must scream.
You travel east for some time before coming upon a small, deserted village in the desert. The ramshackle homes are made from what appear to be dead trees, but...you certainly haven't seen any.\nThough you suppose that's why they'd be dead.\n\n[[Explore the village]]\n\n[[North]]\n\n[[South]]\n\n[[West]]
Mere inches from the beast, you crack the shook-up flashlight over your knee. The impact both breaks your knee and destroys the flashlight, shattering it into a million brilliant pieces, all reflecting the blinding explosion. \nThe light grows in size and intensity, engulfing human and hell lord alike. \n\nWhen the dust settles, you emerge victorious. The hellbeasts shy away from your body, covered in brilliant, life-giving light. \nYou're in control now, and they know it. \n\n"It's almost ready...almost ready," he calls over, stunned. "How the hell did you..." \n\nIt's time to address the hellbeasts.\n\n[["Go now. Return from whence you came, or die in misery."]]
You travel north for some time before coming upon a large pyramid. Could he have entered this pyramid for shelter? \n\n[[Enter the pyramid]]\n\n[[South]]\n\n[[East]]\n\n[[West]]
"I can take it!" You shout. "I can take it!" \n\nThe world ends not in a scream, but a whimper, as you're tampled underneath the hell lord. \nYour fate ended here, but what of his? Did he ever make it home? \n\nUnfortunately, you'll never know.
"Way ahead of you on that one," he says, pulling open the only shelf in the hut. \nInside is a small pocketwatch fastened to a gold chain. \n"This chronometer should have just enough power to send us home. I've spent a long time working on it, you know?" \n\n"Chronometer?" \n\n"Yeah. There's a lot of weird, alien tech here in hell-"\n"Or whatever this place is." \n"Yeah. But the normal laws of physics, they don't necessarily apply. I mean, as you've already seen. I've been studying ground zero - the site where I, and presumably you emerged, and I've managed to reserve-engineer the time displacement field." \n"In English, babe?"\n"If we can make it back to the place we landed, we can make it home." \n\n[[Great. Let's go.]]
"Hello, 911. What is your emergency?" \n\n"Hey, I just found my boyfriend's car crashed on the side of the road. He's not in it. I think he's missing. Can you get someone out here?" \n\n"Please give us your location, miss." \n\nThe police arrive, but results are inconclusive. He's definitely missing. The car is set to be impounded, but you have a moment before the wrecker arrives. \n\n[[Check out the car for clues]]
He wasn't kidding. Swarms of the hellbeasts poured from every direction, but somehow you were managing to hold them off. You deftly swing the flashlight back and forth, silently praying for it to all be over soon.\n\nBut in this makeshift hell, prayers are worthless. \n"Five minutes!" He calls, desperately tinkering with the pocketwatch. "Shit. Fuck. What the hell is that!?" \n\nThe ground shakes under every step as the monster approaches, literally tearing the sky in two with its shrieks.\n\n"Can't you do this any faster!?" You shout, swinging the flashlight in the hell lord's direction. Its skin is lightly singed, but the beast is otherwise unharmed. \n\n"I'm trying!" \n\n[["What do we do!? It's coming right for us!"]]
You explore the strange pyramid, unable to comprehend the markings inside - which makes no sense, because you've never had a problem reading heiroglyphics before. \n\nBut these aren't normal Egyptian writings. There's something distinctly inhuman about them, though you can't quite put your finger on it. \n\n[[Head deeper into the pyramid]]
Something definitely seems off about this village. At the outset it looked nothing more than a deserted, ancient town, but upon closer inspection there's something distinctly...inhuman about it. \nJust who was living here?\n\n"Hello?" A meek voice calls out from behind one of the huts.\n"Is...is somebody there?" \n\n[[Run Away. Run Away Now!]]\n\n[[Call out to the voice]]
Position Unknown
As you move through the desert, clinging to his arm, he swings the flashlight back and forth threateningly, shaking it to keep the batteries charged. \nWhere had that flashlight come from, anyway? Some unlucky soul who'd been deposited here before? \n\nSomehow you made it back to ground zero.\n"It'll take twenty minutes to get the chrono-break set up, babe. Here, take the flashlight." He tosses it over to you. "Once the universe detects another temporal displacement, you'd better believe it'll throw everything it's got at us. I need you to be ready, okay?" \n\n[["Okay."]]
As you enter the driver's side of the car, your entire world disappears in a bright flash. \n\nWhen you awaken, you're in a desert. \n\n[[Shake your head and look around]]
The light pierces through the creatures, sending them swarming in every direction, desperately seeking cover.\n\n"Another volley! Right! Go right!" \n\n[[Shine to the Right]]\n\n[[Go after the stragglers]]
"Just hold it off somehow! Four minutes!" \n\nRight. You take a deep breath, focusing as the hell lord charges. It's taller than the greatest skyscraper you've ever seen, and louder than a million marching bands. As the sky continously splits, blackness begins to pour across the desert.\nAnd through that blackness, billions of hellbeasts. \n\nYou could never catch them all if you wanted to, but the ones that die give a satisfying shriek. \n\n"Three minutes!" \n\n"We're out of time, babe! It's on us!" \n\n"Fuck! Move!" \n\n[[Hold your ground]]\n\n[[Get out of the way]]
There's no stopping the hell lord, but somehow you both manage to dodge it. \nThe temporal disruption is halted, however, as the hell lord's power begins to distort everything around you. \n\n"No!" Your boyfriend shouts, desperately fiddling with the pocketwatch. "No, no, no!" His face is like a stone as he shakes his head. \n"We can still make it work. Come on. Get in the center, now." \n\n[[Head toward the center of the distortion]]
He wasn't kidding. Swarms of the hellbeasts poured from every direction, but somehow you were managing to hold them off. You deftly swing the flashlight back and forth, silently praying for it to all be over soon.\n\nBut in this makeshift hell, prayers are worthless. \n"Five minutes!" He calls, desperately tinkering with the pocketwatch. "Shit. Fuck. What the hell is that!?" \n\nThe ground shakes under every step as the monster approaches, literally tearing the sky in two with its shrieks.\n\n"Can't you do this any faster!?" You shout, swinging the flashlight in the hell lord's direction. Its skin is lightly singed, but the beast is otherwise unharmed. \n\n"I'm trying!" \n\n[["Keep it up. I'll bring this motherfucker down."]]
Yep, definitely a desert. Is this what happened to him? Did he get sent to this desert, too? But why? \n\nAnd furthermore, which way do you go? \n\n[[West]]\n\n[[North]]\n\n[[South]]\n\n[[East]]
"Hello?" You call back, a feeling of dread washing over your body. \n\n"Another one," it says calmly, stepping out from behind the shadows.\nThough it's impossible to describe exactly what it was, most accounts, your own included, can only make the assertion that it was a creation both miserable and horrible, but not at all unfathomable. \n\n"Where do you keep coming from?" It asks, sizing you up. "Are you going to try to run?" \nBefore you can answer, however, a beam of light shreds the creature in two. \n\n[[Look toward the light]]
As you move through the desert, clinging to his arm, he swings the flashlight back and forth threateningly, shaking it to keep the batteries charged. \nWhere had that flashlight come from, anyway? Some unlucky soul who'd been deposited here before? \n\nSomehow you made it back to ground zero.\n"It'll take twenty minutes to get the chrono-break set up, babe. Here, take the flashlight." He tosses it over to you. "Once the universe detects another temporal displacement, you'd better believe it'll throw everything it's got at us. I need you to be ready, okay?" \n\n[[Okay.]]
You miss the swarm of creatures, who descend upon you and feast. \n\nYou spend the rest of eternity here, locked in a fleshy cell that grows smaller with each passing year. \n\nYour boyfriend is nowhere to be found, but one can only surmise he's met a similar fate. \n\nYou'd call out to him, but that would never do. You have no mouth, but you must scream.
You miss the swarm of creatures, who descend upon you and feast. \n\nYou spend the rest of eternity here, locked in a fleshy cell that grows smaller with each passing year. \n\nYour boyfriend is nowhere to be found, but one can only surmise he's met a similar fate. \n\nYou'd call out to him, but that would never do. You have no mouth, but you must scream.
You travel south to some time before coming to an oasis. You drink mightily of the life-giving water, but it doesn't seem like anyone's been here before you. \n\n[[North]]\n\n[[East]]\n\n[[West]]
The pyramid opens into a great chamber, and on the alter is a...is a...\n\n"Oh my god! No!" \n\nYou reach the dais, but your greatest fears are not confirmed. It's not your boyfriend who's been sacrificed to whatever alien gods these things worshipped, but a man you've never seen before.\n\nWell, that's a relief. \n\n"Bido?" A voice calls out from deeper inside the pyramid.\n\n[[Head toward the voice]]
"That's the question of the hour. But more importantly, we should get somewhere safe. Come on." \n\nYou follow him a long way until you reach another makeshift hut, this one obviously built by human hands. \n"How long have you been here?" You suddenly ask, noticing that he looked a lot more scruffy than he did yesterday.\n\n"Time doesn't work quite the same way here," he replied, staring up into the sky. "But I'd reckon at least two months." \n\nSuddenly, a dull, groaning wail shook up the conversation. \n\n"Shit," he said, shaking the flashlight. "They're coming. Get inside, love. Now." \n\n[[Get inside. Now.]]\n\n[["No. I want to help."]]
And there he was, standing in the deepest chamber of the pyramid. \n"I thought it was you," he called as you entered, shining his flashlight in your direction - though stopping suddenly before its beam could touch you. "Oh, that's right," he said, breathing a sigh of relief. "You're not...gah. I'm so glad you're all right."\n\nA hug and a kiss later and you're still rather confused. \n"Look," he said, "I'll try to explain as best I can. Somehow our communication has opened a hole in time and space--" \n"Our communication?" \n"Yeah," he replied. "Don't you think it's funny how every time we find a new medium to speak through, something works to cut it off? That's...not a coincidence." \n\n[[Press him for answers]]
"Way ahead of you on that one," he says, pulling open the only shelf in the hut. \nInside is a small pocketwatch fastened to a gold chain. \n"This chronometer should have just enough power to send us home. I've spent a long time working on it, you know?" \n\n"Chronometer?" \n\n"Yeah. There's a lot of weird, alien tech here in hell-"\n"Or whatever this place is." \n"Yeah. But the normal laws of physics, they don't necessarily apply. I mean, as you've already seen. I've been studying ground zero - the site where I, and presumably you emerged, and I've managed to reserve-engineer the time displacement field." \n"In English, babe?"\n"If we can make it back to the place we landed, we can make it home." \n\n[["Let's go."]]
And there he was, standing before the crumbled mess on the floor.\n\n"I thought it was you," he called as you looked up, shining his flashlight in your direction - though stopping suddenly before its beam could touch you. "Oh, that's right," he said, breathing a sigh of relief. "You're not...gah. I'm so glad you're all right."\n\nA hug and a kiss later and you're still rather confused. \n"Look," he said, "I'll try to explain as best I can. Somehow our communication has opened a hole in time and space--" \n"Our communication?" \n"Yeah," he replied. "Don't you think it's funny how every time we find a new medium to speak through, something works to cut it off? That's...not a coincidence." \n\n[[Press him for answers]]
After what seems like an eternity, you finally see it - the car you've spent so much time in. But it's empty now, not like before. Not like the smiling faces - your smiling faces - that once populated it. \nThe car is run up on the ditch, and driver's side door is open. Something definitely happened. \n\n[[Call 911]]\n\n[[Check out the car for clues]]
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You made it to 1.5. Nothing. 2. 3. Empty. There's nothing. \nWhat the hell, you think to yourself. He wouldn't just not show up. He wouldn't do that. So where the hell was he? \n\n[[Go home and wait for him to make contact]]\n\n[[Keep searching]]
The hellbeasts scatter into the shattered sky, never to bother you again. \n\n"Jesus...you really tore them a new one," he says, heading to the center of the containment field. "Come on. Let's get the hell out of here, huh?" \n\nAnd in a blinding light, the two of you emerged back next to the crashed car. Back in the real world, together.\n\nIt was dark out. How much time had passed? \n\n"We made it!" You shout excitedly, hugging him tightly. "We did it!" \n\n"Yeah...but now we've got an even greater challenge," your boyfriend remarks, that frustrated look on his face. Usually it concerns you, but today you love it. You kiss him, happy to be here. Happy to be alive. \n\n"What's that?" \n\n"Getting you home." \n\nTHE END
Anonymous
"What the hell!?" You shout, ramming the invisible wall. "What did you do?" \n\n"I'm sorry. I had to. I love you so much. Goodb-" \n\nYou wake up next to the abandoned car. It's dark out now. How much time has passed? \n\nWiping the tears from your eyes, you begin to wander home. Not toward the house you live in, but the one you've always broken into. \n\nTime to break in one last time...\n\nTHE END \n\n(Play the game differently to see the true ending!)
The battle continues, and somehow you manage to fend them off. \nAs the two of you enter the hut unscathed, a quick kiss ensues before you mouth the words you both were thinking.\n\n[["We need to find a way out of here. "]]