CHRONOSPACE DREAMSCAPE! THE FINAL CUT DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF PHOEBE "PE-BE" LEE CREATED BY JULIE "WHISKERPILLAR" BELL, "SKCRO" AND "AKIDWITHATOPHAT" CHRONOSPACE IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY HARASSMENT, INTRUSIONS OR PHYSICAL/PSYCHOLOGICAL/MENTAL HARM YOU MAY EXPERIENCE WHILE YOU USE OUR SERVICES. Saturday, August 23rd, 1993. 4:22 PM. You eagerly rush down your hallway holding a box containing computer software, uncannily impatient. Dad: Hold on, Wade! You slide into your room, giddy as a horse, as your parents step in, not getting the hype. Dad: Are you sure about this...? Mom: It can help him with his schoolwork, John. Besides, he, you know... struggles with making friends out there. Maybe this can help that, too...? Dad: If you say so... Your parents murmur to themselves, but you ignore them and unwrap the box from it's plastic hell and stare at it up close. You are holding a copy of Chronospace's newest piece of software, Dreamscape!, 'the ULTIMATE expansion to your Windows experience! Never be without it!' You were so excited you turned your computer on before you left! How cute. You open the box and pull out a floppy disk before sliding it into the computer. It makes computery noises. Ooo! Hopping into your chair, you shove your little face into the monitor all excitedly. You click through the Program Manager, on the A:\ drive. Inside the folder, a large array of files appear as the cursor clicks on "DreamscapeSetup.exe". Your parents step closer to the monitor as a bit-crushed man appears on the screen. "Hello! And welcome to the future of computing! What you have just inserted into your computer is the next generation in accessing the World Wide Web! Welcome to Dreamscape!, by Chronospace!" Dad: I wish I could be as cheerful as him... "To get started, click 'Next' in the bottom right." You go through the setup under the supervision of your parents. "Now, we'll choose a screenname for you! Keep it civil, everyone can see it! Everyone." You look upward, thinking for a bit, before typing away into the box. "wadebraid? Is that right?" The cursor clicks on "Yes". "Right, then, wadebraid! From hereon, you will be known as user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve on-line! Now then, time for the part that matters most: Actually getting Dreamscape! installed!" Dad: How does he understand this stuff...? Mom: He's young, young people adapt to newer stuff better. Dad: Pssh, I can barely switch the phone from pulse to tone on my own... With the browser finally installed, you open it, immediately met with a pop-up. "To start using Dreamscape!, your computer will dial a toll-free number to find the best number for your area." Clicking ahead, another pop-up appears. "Dialing 1-800-192-9210..." Your computer speakers begin emitting abhorrent noises. Dad: Jesus, what is that? Mom: Lord only knows... After a brief pause, the pop-up changes. "Dialing 1-484-820-1337..." The speakers continue emitting abhorrent noises as the heartbeat sensor in the bottom right begins pulsing up and down as a Web portal with an abundance of links prints onto the monitor. Your face fades into the monitor as you lose yourself in the wonders of the Internet. Surely, it'll never change, right? Right? Right. Wrong. Saturday, October 30th, 1999. 9:43 PM. ... ...... Tha-clunk! Whirrrr... Niiiiiin... Brrrrmbrrrmbr-brmbrm! Clickclickclickclickclickclickclick.... MRRRRR! beep! The faint sounds of an old personal computer starting up fill an otherwise empty and noiseless void. On the screen, various commands related to hardware are run as a Packard Bell logo appears in the top left. “America grew up listening to us. It still does.” After a rather long wait, the computer finally boots to an extremely familiar sight: CS-DOS 9.20. C:\> It’s waiting for a command to be input. With the rather rough clicks of an ancient keyboard, C:\>cd WINDOWSILL C:\WINDOWSILL> C:\WINDOWSILL>WINDOWSILL.COM The screen goes black as the computer begins loading a legally questionable fork of Microsoft Windows 98, Chronospace Windowsill ‘99. The screen lights up with a splash screen. The Chronospace logo engulfs it. The splash text reads: “Starting Chronospace Windowsill ‘99... Please wait... We mean that, by the way! Wait!” The screen momentarily goes black with no more than a command prompt in the top left reading: “Starting Windowsill ‘99...” before going back to the colorful splash screen. After what feels like an eternity, the computer boots to a log-on screen, with a risque picture of a posing rabbit woman as the wallpaper. “Please input your Chronospace Windowsill username and password.” User Name: Wade Harris Password: ************ Enter. A rather cheerful tune plays as an extremely unkempt desktop loads up. There’s a mouse cursor in the center of the screen. The cursor moves over to a folder on the desktop labeled “Dreamscape!” and, with two quick clicks, it opens to reveal a list of files related to some sort of Internet access suite. Slowly scrolling down the list, the cursor lands on a file: “Dreamscape.exe”. Double click. What appears to be a mix between a Web browser, an instant messenger app, an electronic mail client and a phone dialer all simultaneously appear on the screen. In the bottom right corner, what looks like a heart monitor isn’t looking too happy... It’s red, and flatlined. According to the .txt file that hasn’t been opened in months, this means the client is disconnected. A pop-up appears on the screen. It’s a log-in prompt for a dial-up network connection. E-Mail: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve Password: ********************* Phone number: 1+(484)-820-1337 Access type: Modem Service: Dreamscape! * Do you want to save these details so that sign-on is quicker next time? Sign-on! Click. Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... The rather shrill sound of this computer's internal modem dialing out to Chronospace echoes through the dark void, piercing the ears of anything in a 500 mile radius. After a while of back and forths between an Internet service provider and this computer, the modem finally shuts up as the heart monitor in the bottom right turns green and starts pulsing up and down. [SIGN ON REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] [CONNECTION STARTED] A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen. The main page shows an abundance of hyperlinks to various websites. Doodaloo! The instant messenger client chimes. One friend is on-line. It’s your friend Wallace, better known as wallpaste@WebTV.net. You click on his name to start a chat. A one-on-one chat-room opens up. Wade Harris (user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve) has joined the chat. Wallace Clark (wallpaste@WebTV.net) has been added to the chat. wallpaste: yo wadebraid: Hey man wadebraid: I think you need to get a computer man wallpaste: fuck off wadebraid: You know i’m right lol wallpaste: no ure not wadebraid: I think i am bro Doodaloo! Another friend is on-line. It’s your other friend, Betty, better known as user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve. wallpaste: uh oh wadebraid: Sht up Betty Kristoff (user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve) has joined the chat. bettyboop: hey wadebraid: Yo bettyboop: what’s going on? wallpaste: nothin bettyboop: still haven’t got a pc yet, wallace? wallpaste: those goddamned idiots won’t pay me more than like 7 bucks an hour man wadebraid: Maybe if you didn’t go home early to whack off you wouldnt be fucking broke lol wallpaste: like you dont do the fucking exact same wadebraid: what bettyboop: guys, did you hear the news? wallpaste: what that wade is a fuckface? Yea i heard it LOL wadebraid: Get serious, wallace, we all know you sold your body out to those gang boys outside that 7/11 bettyboop: he did WHAT? wallpaste: wade you weren’t supposed to tel anyoney ou FUCKER wallpaste: tell* anyone* you* wadebraid: Bet you wish you had a computer, huh wallpaste: fuck yourself bettyboop: chronospace has openings for the tech position! wadebraid: Say what? I thought they had robots or something in tht shit bettyboop: they must hve run out or something lol bettyboop: anyways, i was thinking maybe we could sign up? wallpaste: us? Why lol wadebraid: Nah she kinda has a point...we already break into their shit enough,this’ll give us a chance to get in and stay in legally bettyboop: exactly! wallpaste: maybe we’ll get access to this “wi-fi” thing theyre testing wadebraid: maybe...betty, what’s the url again? bettyboop: it's here (https://vinnyflowers.neocities.org/apply) wadebraid: thx Wallace Clark (wallpaste@WebTV.net) has left the chat “[CONNECTION TERMINATED; CLIENT HUNG UP]” wadebraid: LOL i think u crashed his box bettyboop: lmao wadebraid: Betty...? bettyboop: what? wadebraid: They have our names on this website bettyboop: HUH? wadebraid: they blocked my IP too bettyboop: weird, i can see the apply button wadebraid: Don’t clear ur cache, click it, those old clients don’t refresh their cache properly when clicking through a site bettyboop: ok, hold on Wallace Clark (wallpaste@WebTV.net) has joined the chat. wallpaste: im back wadebraid: wallace, they’ve got our shit on their website wallpaste: that doesnt surprise me, we totally wrecked their shit last time wadebraid: Haha yea true bettyboop: GUYS I GOT IN wadebraid: Told you wallpaste: told her what wadebraid: You so stupid wallpaste: no bettyboop: i registered apparently, they’re gonna contact me soon wadebraid: And then send the Feds to your house bettyboop: very funny, wade Wallace Clark (wallpaste@WebTV.net) has left the chat. “[CONNECTION TERMINATED; CLIENT HUNG UP]” bettyboop: oop wadebraid: Shitty ass webtv moment wadebraid: anyways, i think i’ll go see about getting into that tech system they got bettyboop: alright then, i’ll see you around Betty Kristoff (user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve) has left the chat. “[DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; USER LEFT]” You click the “Leave chat” button. [DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; USER LEFT] The chatroom window closes. You click various links in the main window, looking for something interesting. Maybe the forums are good today? You click on a link labeled “Dreamscape! TalkCity”. A list of chatrooms drops down. You click the top one, labeled “General”. ... The chatroom window opens. user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve has joined. wadebraid: List There are 5 other people in this chatroom right now: user.nolannips@chronospace.eve, user.bluuudroks25661@chronospace.eve, user.skcro@chronospace.eve, user.littledog@chronospace.eve, user.jarhead@chronospace.eve (marked as away) littledog: So basically yeah, they left this BIG ASS link that leads straight into Testdrive on their portfolio lmao skcro: no wonder chrono keeps getting breached lol skcro: they should literally just hire me to do their website for them lmao littledog: true that bluuudroks25661: hi wadebraid :3 wadebraid: Yo nolannips: Hey there skcro: hi littledog: hey wadebraid: I see you’re discussing the TestDrive breach littledog: yea that shit was crazy lol wadebraid: You won’t believe me but i helped do it littledog: Man get out lol wadebraid: Nah i’m serious lol ... wadebraid: I dug into the source, found this loophole that allows me to circle into the admin log-on screen, which let me open the editing panel. wadebraid: In the root directory, there was a series of links, one of which being to an unlocked TestDrive page, so i hid it on the page right on the hyphen in the second line on the third row of their portfolio skcro: aint no way lmao littledog: god damn man lol littledog: so you’re wade? wadebraid: Yea bluuudroks25661: Harris wade??? wadebraid: yea that’s me bluuudroks25661: noooo way what you did with that tech site was insane :3 wadebraid: So i’ve heard jarhead: asbestos wadebraid: What bluuudroks25661: What? littledog: what skcro: wha nolannips: huh skcro: OH FUCK GUYS wadebraid: ? skcro: A TECH PERSON JUST SIGNED ONTO TALKCITY 💀 bluuudroks25661: woaaaa nolannips: man FUCK that i can’t get banned again or i’m perma banned littledog: what? nolannips: IM OUT OF HERE FUCK THIS ... user.nolannips@chronospace.eve has left the chat. “[DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; USER LEFT]” littledog: bro is overreacting lmao skcro: maybe i am A distinct cheerful chime plays as a distressing message is printed to the chat window. Wackadoo! Raelyn Miller (tech.cinnapoodle@chronospace.eve) has joined! littledog: OH FUCK skcro: OH NO cinnapoodle: What??? littledog: WADE GTFO You reach for the phone cord at the rear end of your PC. cinnapoodle: Oh... Hello, Wade. skcro: i have NOTHING to do with this You sit up straight in your chair and shove your face back up to the monitor. wadebraid: Hello cinnapoodle: I sure do wonder what you’re doing here... With ALL of these other known Dreamscape! Hackers. wadebraid: We’re discussing the weather outside, fed cinnapoodle: Listen, Wade... I don’t want to fight. And I don’t want you to get banned either. wadebraid: Then why do you hunt me down? cinnapoodle: Because you’re too... predictable. wadebraid: Huh cinnapoodle: I’m a technology specialist, Wade. I can see where you are on the Internet, and where you intend to go from where you are. You’re a hacker, Wade. cinnapoodle: I know exactly when you’re going straight for a service URL, and I know exactly when you’re going to exploit the source code. You don’t hide your tracks at all. Even the smallest cursor hover over a service URL leaves a track. I would know... I’ve been in your seat before, Wade. wadebraid: Have you now? cinnapoodle: Yes. Why do you think I work for Chronospace? Because I broke into their main system. Got past their shit when they were still dumb in ‘94. wadebraid: That was you??? cinnapoodle: Yep. And they, and me, have been making right sure... that nobody else is. You have been disconnec9852jfsfdl2347&!- Your speakers rather violently pop. Your monitor goes pitch black as your computer’s modem emits a busy tone, before cutting to dial tone. [CONNECTION TERMINATED; ADMINISTRATOR TERMINATED CALL] The computer cuts back to the desktop. The Dreamscape! folder is still open. Determined to get back at them, you double-click the executable again. A pop-up appears on the screen. It’s a log-in prompt for a dial-up network connection. E-Mail: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve Password: ********************* Phone number: 1+(484)-820-1337 Access type: Modem Service: Dreamscape! * Do you want to save these details so that sign-on is quicker next time? Sign-on! Click. Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... The rather shrill sound of this computer's internal modem dialing out to Chronospace echoes through the dark void once more, still piercing the ears of anything in a 500 mile radius. After a while of back and forthing, your computer loads up a warning page. [BANNED FOR TWENTY FOUR HOURS] [DATE: Saturday, October 30th, 1999] [TIME: 10:22 PM] [MODERATOR MESSAGE: This Dreamscape! account was used to facilitate discussion about breaching internal Chronospace services. The associated users this account spoke with have been reasonably moderated as well. Enjoy your time in purgatory, Wade! <3] Your monitor cuts to black once more. [CONNECTION TERMINATED; NO ACCESS] Sunday, October 31st, 1999. 7:14 PM. Halloween night. All of the normal people are skipping about, on a collision course with type 2 diabetes, the perfect time to go on-line. ... ...... ......... Knock, knock, knock! Your hand smashes against a hardwood door. step... step... step... step... step... step. The door opens. Who is it? A stranger. ???: Oh, hey guys! You: Hey. ???: Trick or treat! You: Shut up, man. ???: I take it this is about the whole being banned thing? You: Well... We’re not here to discuss the ‘80s, so yeah, I’d say it is. ???: Well, come on in! The stranger parts to the side as you and “a colleague” walk into their house. Nothing wrong can happen by going into a stranger’s home. As you, “a colleague” and the stranger walk through the house, various old looking pieces of furniture and trinkets dot the walls and halls, and every room bears an uncanny resemblance to homes of the 1950’s. Various faint murmurs can be heard from other strangers inhabiting the house. But you don’t care about that. You don’t like small talk. You like long talk. Because you’re long. And you’re proud of that. After a bit of incessant walking, you come face to face with a stairset, very obviously leading to the second floor. Your days with Encarta have not failed you yet, thankfully. ???: After me, gents! The stranger takes the perilous climb up the rather long stairset, leaving you and a colleague to stand at the bottom. What’s “a colleague” doing? Trying their hardest to focus on something else. In all of the 18 years, 221 months, 961 weeks, and 6,732 days you have existed on this Earth, you have never seen anyone struggle so hard to not focus on the rear end of a woman going up the stairs as hard as “a colleague”. You should do something. WHACK!!! You hit “a colleague” in the back of the hand with your fist. ???: OW!!! What the hell, man?! You: ‘Thought you could use the focus! ???: Man, shut up! You would’ve done it too. You: Shut your stupid ass up and get up there! “A colleague” shakes his head and begins walking up the stairs, rubbing the back of his head. You step one foot onto the stairset, and begin climbing it. Unlike “a colleague”, you don’t focus on the rear end of people going up stairs, especially not another man’s. Finally reaching the top, the stranger has been waiting for you and “a colleague” for a few moments now. ???: Come. ???: Jesus, Betty, how far up is your room? You: You’ll live, now get your dumbass on. ???: He’s right. You, “a colleague” and the stranger walk down the Americana-fueled hallway before stopping in front of a door that is certainly not Americana-fueled. It has modern bands on it. And Weezer. A shit-ton of Weezer. There’s a sign on it. It reads: “Betty’s Domain! TAYLOR STAY OUT!!! Mom and dad, knock first, thanks.” The stranger opens the door to reveal an extremely geeky looking room. Rock band posters, boxed figurines and various cassette tapes of science fiction shows and movies dot the room. Betty: Welcome to my domain! Wallace: Damn! It’s like a guy’s paradise in here! Betty: Hey now! Girls can like sci-fi too. You: She’s right, you know. Anyways, let’s pretend for a moment we don’t care about all of that, even though we really do, like come on! Look at it! We came here to get back at those tech morons. Betty: Figures. Wallace: Wait, that’s why we’re here? Why didn’t you just come to my place? You: Because you live in the past, dummy. Ain’t no “getting back at” happening on a shitty WebTV box, genius. Wallace: Give it a rest already, Wade! Betty: You’re really not gonna get a computer, are you? Wallace: If my folks would give me money, I would! You: Whatever, man. Let’s get on-line already! Betty: Right! She leads the two of you over to a behemoth of a computer rig. Three monitors, a full sound system, a custom Model M, an IntelliEye mouse, and even a high-tuned office chair. Woah. Damn! CTRL+C You: CTRL+V You: Damn! Wallace.exe has stopped working. A problem has caused the program to stop working correctly. Please close the program. → Close the program Betty: Pretty sweet, right? You: Sweet is an understatement! This is incredible! How could you even afford all of this?! Betty: Christmas comes and goes, you know. You: We should get on-line before we die of a geek attack. Wallace: Yeah, man! We gotta show those techies that we mean business! He punches his palm. Betty: Let’s get you boys seated. step. step. step. step. KSSSSSSSH! She opens her closet and drags two office chairs out of it. They make barely any noise against the slick hardwood floor. KSSSSSSSH! She closes her closet. Betty: Heads up! She kicks the chairs towards you and Wallace. Wait... Wait...... Wait......... CATCH! You catch the chair with your hands. Wallace emits a rather girly scream. THUD!!! Chair used Body Smash! It’s super effective! Wallace fainted!... But not really. Wallace climbs to his feet hastily and puts his hands on the chair, acting as if he caught it. Betty walks over and sits down in her chair. Glisten~! You and Wallace lock eyes, competitively. FACE OFF!!! Wade used Sweet Ass Spin! You spin the chair around roughly and sit in it mid-spin, stopping yourself slowly, ending face to face with the rig. Wallace used Critical Spin! Wallace spins the chair around roughly, but as he tries to sit in it... WHACK!!! One of the arms hits him directly in the stomach. As he falls forward... SMASH!!! ...he smashes his face into the violently spinning chair’s back, causing him to fall back and... CRASH!!! ...land head first into a trash can full of soda cans and bottles. COMBO!!! X3! K.O!!! Wade wins! Wallace: Ow... You: That’s what happens when you’re a poser! Betty: Oh, Wallace... You’re cleaning that up. Wallace: Yeah... I know. He proceeds to not clean it up, and instead sits in his chair normally. The three of you, rather awkwardly, all shove your faces right up to the monitor. Unfortunately, there’s not much to be gained from... looking at a blank monitor screen. Well, there are your reflections! How do they look? ... Not good. You wouldn’t look out of place in a horror game. Or Janet Street-Porter’s works. That fits you better. Janet Street-Porter’s works. To the left, a “man” with short, frizzy brown hair wearing a spiked choker around his neck. He has a disoriented and unamused face, with a black left eye and bruising from his recent tumble, along with faint mutton chops. Disgusting. In the center, a woman with luxurious shoulder length blonde hair wearing a hippie headband and a pair of rather oversized glasses, with a mischievous looking face. She has a band-aid on her left cheek. Wonder why? To the right, it’s you! A man with long, curly brown hair wearing a pair of thin framed glasses that actually fit his eyes, and a brown flat cap. You have a tired looking face, with no facial hair, save for a faint mustache. Your jaw is crooked. Damn. Click! Whirrrr..... Clickclickclickclickclickclickclick.... mrrrp! .... Bip! The pleasing sounds of a rather silent computer starting up fill an otherwise noiseless room. Various commands and hardware checks and tests appear across the screen, as a Packard Bell logo appears in the top left. She’s a woman of culture. “America grew up listening to us. It still does.” After a surprisingly short wait, the computer boots straight to the splash screen of Chronospace Windowsill ‘99, and rather quickly loads the log-on screen, with a bitcrushed .jpg of the cover to Weezer’s Blue Album as the wallpaper. “Please input your Chronospace Windowsill username and password.” User Name: Betty Password: ***************** Enter. A rather cheerful tune plays as a rather well-kept desktop loads. There’s a mouse cursor in the center. Betty: You’re up, Wade. She rolls back from the desk, waiting for you to take her spot. You roll your chair to the side, taking the helm, as she takes your spot. You shove your faces back into the monitor. The cursor moves over to a folder labeled “Dreamscape!”. Double click. The folder hastily opens, and equally hastily reveals the files inside. The cursor hovers over “Dreamscape.exe” and double clicks. What appears to be a mix between a Web browser, an instant messenger app, an electronic mail client and a phone dialer all simultaneously appear on the screen. A pop-up appears on the screen. It’s a log-in prompt for a dial-up network connection. E-Mail: user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve Password: *********** Phone number: (484)-820-1337 Access type: Modem Service: Dreamscape! * Do you want to save these details so that sign-on is quicker next time? Sign-on! Click! ... ...... Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Beeeeep! Beeeep! Beeeep! Beeeep! Betty: Ugh... Excuse me, guys. She gets up out of her seat and stomps to her door, opening it, before screaming down the hall: Betty: TAYLOR!!! GET OFF THE DAMN PHONE!!! ... You and Wallace look at each other in concern, before looking back at her. click! She shuts the door. Betty: Try it now. You shove your face back into the monitor. Click! ... ...... Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Dingdingdingbwooooobwaaaaaa... NOOOOOONEEEEEEEEEEEEEBWAAAAAAAKSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHBWBWBWBWOOOOOUUUUMMMKSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHH!!! The shrill sound of dial-up never goes away. [SIGN ON REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] [CONNECTION STARTED] A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen. The main page shows an abundance of hyperlinks to various websites. The cursor hovers over a link labeled “Dreamscape! User Pages” Betty: These techies like to put their websites in mundane categories. Try looking far back in the kids’ zone. Wallace: Why would a techie put their crap in the kids place where... you know, kids can see it? You: Considering you put your site in the kids zone for a brief period, it’s not that weird. Wallace: It was a dare!!! Click. A list of categories for user websites prints onto the screen. The available options are: General Adults Only 18+ TeenTalk KidKorner Search by name, keyword or theme The cursor hovers over KidKorner and double clicks. A list of user websites created on Dreamscape! slowly print onto the screen. The cursor grabs the scroll bar, and slides to the bottom of the page. A number list from 1 to 19, and a typical Chronospace property notice habits at the bottom of the page. The cursor hovers over Page 19, and clicks. A whopping number of TWO pages print onto the screen. Kassie's Place by user.glowingstar@chronospace.eve (https://vinnyflowers.neocities.org/kassies-place.html) jimmys home by user.jimmyhernandez@chronospace.eve (https://vinnyflowers.neocities.org/jimmys-home.html) You: I don’t think either of these are run by a techie... Wallace: Hey, you never know! Betty: He’s right, Wall. A techie always has a bit more than... that, on their page, even if they’re hiding from the public. You: I don’t know about you guys, but I am not scrolling through all of these pages and clicking on every single page to find one techie. Betty: Which techie are you even looking for? You: Her screen-name is cinnapoodle. Betty: Oh, Rae... I know where she’s hiding. You: You do? Wallace: She’s a she? Betty: I do. What’s better is, she’s in the General tab! In plain sight! You: Is that good or bad? Betty: For her, bad. For us, good! This is the URL. (https://vinnyflowers.neocities.org/cinnapoodle) I’ve gone to it before, all I had to do was spoof my IP with that of a leaked Chronospace employee’s. You: Kickass. ... ...... ......... Betty: What the fuck? You: Betty, you said you went there! What happened? Betty: They must have found out that the IP got leaked... Wallace: But how did they know it was you, Wade? You: I dunno, but however the hell they’re tracking me... You look out the window to see a silhouette staring you down, with a glowing red eye. It’s creeping me out. Wallace: We should probably get off-line before they get you too, Betty. Betty: Yeeeaaahh, sorry Wade, but I don’t want to risk my account getting the boot. You: No trouble. If they’re banning anyone, it’ll probably be me. You click the X in the top right of the window. A confirmation dialogue appears. “Are you sure you want to sign off of Chronospace? → Yes → No → Maybe so?” You click Yes. The window closes as the modem speaker restarts briefly, emitting dial tone, before shutting off. The cursor hovers over the Go! button in the taskbar, and clicks it. The Go! menu, which totally isn’t a copy of the Windows Start menu, prints onto the screen. The cursor hovers over “Shut Down or Sign Off” and clicks it. A pop-up appears. “What do you want to do? There’s a dropdown. Clicking it, the options are: Sign out of Windowsill Shut down your computer Restart your computer Restart your computer in Chronospace Disk Operating System” The cursor clicks “Shut down your computer”, and then clicks “Confirm”. The desktop fades away as the splash screen reappears briefly, before cutting to black, and an ominous message. It is now safe to turn off your computer. Click. The monitor turns completely black, with only your reflections on it. Monday, November 1st, 1999. 6:21 AM. Silence. Beautiful silence. Everyone else on the block is asleep, but you’re just getting into your habitat. Click! Whirrrr..... Clickclickclickclickclickclickclick.... MRRRRR! beep! Whatever silence there was sure is gone now. The less than faint sounds of an old personal computer starting up engulf an otherwise dark room, faintly echoing off of the floor and walls. On the screen, various commands related to hardware are run as a Packard Bell logo appears in the top left. “America grew up listening to us. It still does.” After a wait time that classifies as a CIA torture method, the computer boots to an all-too familiar sight: CS-DOS 9.20. C:\> It’s waiting patiently for a command. With the rough clicks of an even rougher Model M keyboard, the command prompt is commanded, promptly. C:\>cd WINDOWSILL C:\WINDOWSILL> C:\WINDOWSILL>WINDOWSILL.COM Enter. The screen goes black as the computer begins loading a legally questionable fork of Microsoft Windows 98, Chronospace Windowsill ‘99. The screen lights up with a splash screen. The Chronospace logo engulfs it. The splash text reads: “Starting Chronospace Windowsill ‘99... Please wait... We mean that, by the way! Wait!” The screen momentarily goes black with no more than a command prompt in the top left reading: “Starting Windowsill ‘99...” before going back to the colorful splash screen. After what feels like an eternity, the computer boots to a log-on screen, with a risque picture of a posing rabbit woman as the wallpaper. “Please input your Chronospace Windowsill username and password.” User Name: Wade Harris Password: ************ Enter. A rather cheerful tune plays as an extremely unkempt desktop loads up. There’s a mouse cursor in the center of the screen. The cursor hovers around the desktop, rubbing against the corners of the screen, almost as if the person controlling it was bored. Wait. You are. The cursor hovers over a shortcut labeled “Dreamscape! E-Mail” and double clicks it. An electronic mail client opens. Nothing’s happening. Maybe if you weren’t so impatient about your slow computer, it would do something. A dialing window appears. “Dialing 1+(484)-820-1337...” Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Dingdingdingbwooooobwaaaaaa... NOOOOOONEEEEEEEEEEEEEBWAAAAAAAKSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHBWBWBWBWOOOOOUUUUMMMKSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHH!!! That’s still the worst sound you have ever heard in your life. After a few moments, the dialing window closes as a list of your inbound e-mail messages prints onto the screen. Your latest is, unsurprisingly, from Wallace. It’s addressed to both you and Betty, and the subject is: “this is bullshit” Click. An e-mail message loads. “Subject: this is bullshit From: wallpaste@WebTV.net To: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve, user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve Sent from: WebTV Classic (Philips Magnavox MAT960A103) Imma be real with you both, i am starting to genuinely save up for a computer i’m tired of THIS shit happenin man Anyways If you two have any money you can spare that would be greatly appreciato thanks cya P.S: stop bullying me ‘Live long and prosper.’ - Star Trek: The Motion Picture (the best film evar made!)” There’s an image attached. Click. ... It was downloaded, rather quickly. It’s amusing, to you at least. If your WebTV reciever is no longer calling from 412-673-XXXX, choose 'Moved' to check for local numbers. Explain Same Place Moved However, that’s his problem, not yours. The cursor hovers over the “Reply” button, and clicks it. A reply box opens. “Subject: Re: this is bullshit To: wallpaste@WebTV.net, user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve From: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve Sent from: A personal computer running Chronospace Windowsill ‘99 Fuck off lmao. Get your own money. We already made the mistake of giving you money, and you went and bought that dumbass thing where you get called a cocksucker in 7 different ways and get harassed with those damn commands that turn your shit off. Remember when your box called 911? Not making that mistake again” Send. ... It sent. However, he’s not going to respond to it because he’s asleep. You have better things to do, anyways. Like breaking into Chronospace! Nobody’s awake at this hour, so it’s the perfect time to at least try. The cursor clicks the X in the top right, hovers over to a folder labeled “Dreamscape!” and double clicks it. The folder opens to reveal files related to this abhorrent Internet suite. The cursor hovers over “Dreamscape.exe” and double clicks it. A mix between a Web browser, an instant messenger app, an electronic mail client and a phone dialer all simultaneously appear on the screen. Since you already dialed into Dreamscape! to check your e-mail, you don’t need to do it again. A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen. The main page shows an abundance of hyperlinks to various websites. The cursor clicks on a link labeled “Dreamscape! TalkCity”. A list of chatrooms drops down. You click the top one, labeled “General”. The chatroom window opens. user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve has joined. wadebraid: List There are 8 other people in this chatroom right now: tech.sudokoko@chronospace.eve, tech.thephreakingsky@chronospace.eve, tech.amye@chronospace.eve, tech.cinnapoodle@chronospace.eve, mod.chandlerj@chronospace.eve, admin.gazingatthemoon@chronospace.eve, admin.nolanr@chronospace.eve, admin.patrickhobbs@chronospace.eve You just strolled right into the lion’s den. sudokoko: for the last time, i don’t know how they got in, so i can’t tell you nolanr: Well then you should get to figuring that out <3 sudokoko: it’s not that easy, though, one of them busted our tracking system, and unless we were to somehow get them to tell us how, we’re fighting a war we’re losing cinnapoodle: Well, I think we can ask one of them right now! Hello, Wade! This was the worst idea you could’ve made, and you confidently made it. Good luck! patrickhobbs: WELL, IF IT ISN’T BOY BLUNDER, LEADER OF THE BAND OF ‘TARDS! WHAT BRINGS YOU HERE? wadebraid: A sleepless night chandlerj: why would you come here when we’re actively chasing you lmao nolanr: You made yourself obvious owo wadebraid: Well, i have a real habit of barging in Your screen shakes violently. cinnapoodle: Yeah, WE KNOW! You’re pretty notorious, sir. thephreakingsky: Yeah, we all know about you, Wade amye: and we know you broke the tracking shit wadebraid: I’m flattered you think that, but that wasnt me sadly sudokoko: i find that HARD to believe thephreakingsky: No, he’s right Koko, the guy who did it didn’t leave tracks like Wade does wadebraid: Thanks for the compliment cinnapoodle: Shut up. If it wasn’t him, who could it have been? There’s no other hackers as... can’t believe I’m saying this, as ambitious as Wade is. gazingatthemoon: There is one. sudokoko: who? gazingatthemoon: It’s someone that Mr. Brave over here knows. A Betty Kristoff, screenname bettyboop. cinnapoodle: Oh, her... I know all about her. thephreakingsky: How are you sure it’s her, other hackers might hide their tracks gazingatthemoon: I’ve seen many hackers in my time here. None of them have masked their footsteps like she does. nolanr: What about their other friend? gazingatthemoon: Wallace Clark? LMAO, that stupid son of a bitch ain’t got shit to even hack with! Wade and Betty run around with their custom computers, yeah, we know you two modified your computers, which is illegal by the way, Wallace on the other hand rolls with one of those dilapidated WebTV boxes. thephreakingsky: Plus? gazingatthemoon: No. cinnapoodle: I almost feel bad for him, but then I realize he’s a fuck. wadebraid: Are you idiots done bashing my friend for me or are you gonna let me go cinnapoodle: Let you go? Absolutely NOT! As a matter of fact, you’re going to help us. wadebraid: Hold the phone, I did not sign up for this patrickhobbs: TOUGH SHIT, ROOKIE! YOU’RE GONNA GET US INTO YOUR LITTLE GIRLFRIEND’S HEAD, ONE WAY OR ANOTHER! wadebraid: And if i don’t? Beep! Beep! Beep! Bebebebeep! Bebebebeep! You pull your face out of the monitor to find a red laser pointing at your keyboard. Turning your head to the right, a silhouetted figure with one red eye stares you down. Wait... There’s two. No, three! There’s four... FIVE?! FUCKING SIX?!!!? S E V E- Oh, wait, no... There’s just six. FUCKING SIX?!!? You shove your face back into the monitor. patrickhobbs: THAT’S WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF YOU DON’T, CURLY HAIR! What? tech.cinnapoodle@chronospace.eve has left the chat. “[DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; USER LEFT]” wadebraid: Wait, how did you know that i looked out my window gazingatthemoon: We see all, Wade. You, your pity friends, all of the kids on your block, everyone. We are Chronospace. We are everything. We are everyone. We are everywhere. We are every entity you comprehend in a day. Chronospace is upon us. The window begins to garble and glitch, with all text except for the chat text becoming incomprehensible. patrickhobbs: CHRONOSPACE IS UPON US. sudokoko: Chronospace is upon us. amye: chronospace is upon us chandlerj: Chronospace is upon us! gazingatthemoon: Dasvidaniya, puppet! When we need you... we’ll find you. admin.nolanr@chronospace.eve has left the chat. “[DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; USER LEFT]” wadebraid: but i’m right here gazingatthemoon: Not on-line, Wade. Not on-line. You have been disconnected from TalkCity. [DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; REMOVED BY ADMINISTRATOR] That could have gone way better. You pull your face out of the monitor to look out your window again. The figures are gone, but your window is open. You get out of your chair and walk over to your window. A barely illuminated yard lies outside it. Nothing to be gained by taking in the sights of something you see every day, so you close the window and lock it. You turn around and walk back over to your desk, and sit back down, shoving your face back into the monitor. Ding ding! You have a new e-mail message. You click the e-mail window in the taskbar. It maximizes to the display. You have an e-mail from thephreakingsky. The subject reads: “URGENT: READ NOW!!!” What a hypocrite. You click the e-mail in skepticism, but become rather surprised by the contents. “Subject: URGENT: READ NOW!!! From: tech.thephreakingsky@chronospace.eve To: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve Sent from: Apple Macintosh Color Classic II (Performa 275) Wade, listen up. I know you don’t have a good relationship (like, at all) with me or any of the other “techies”, but I need you to turn your ears to me just this once. Chronospace is a brainwash op. Most of the people working there aren’t themselves. They’re confused, impure souls wearing the skin of someone who can’t fight for themself. And they’re just forced to be heinous, even if the person was a sweetheart before. Whatever you do, DO NOT LISTEN TO ANYTHING GAZINGATTHEMOON TELLS YOU TO DO! She’s trying to turn you into one of them... a mindnumbed husk of who you used to be, to be used as a vessel for utter chaos. They do it to regular people too... most computer owners aren’t themselves anymore. Wade, you have to listen to me. Me and a small group of tech supporters are the only “pure” ones left who actually stuck around. We’ve been blending into their mayhem, forcing ourselves to commit online atrocities just to satiate the horrid needs of Patrick and Kate. You were fighting for a free Internet on your own with your friends... but now, you’re not on your own. Wade. You need to help us. You need to help us take back the Internet from these monsters. You need to help us return the digital world back to solace, and free these poor brainwashed souls. I don’t care how you do it, but you need to shut Chronospace down. Be it rallying a community to hit them head on, sneak in the way you usually do or some other unknown way, regardless of how you do it, regardless of how volatile or lethal you are, you have to kill it. Kill Chronospace. This might sound cheesy, but the Internet quite literally depends on you, Wade. You’re the light at the end of the tunnel for most of us, don’t let yourself extinguish. Before you do anything though, you’ll want to arm yourself in the real world, because the moment you fuck with anything internal on a broad scale, they’re gonna send their Dreamscrapers after you. Better safe than sorry, right? Wade... Don’t see this as just a joke, please. I have effectively given up my life just to send this e-mail to you. They know where I am, and they don’t want to chat. But I’m not scared. I knew this day would come. Print this out, Wade. Before it’s too late. You’ll be contacted by any surviving tech supporters in the coming days with more vital information to help you reclaim the Internet. You and your friends carry the torch now. Light these fuckers up. For the Internet. For everyone. Goodbye, Wade. End communication. - Barbara “thephreakingsky” Kornell” You stare at your monitor in disbelief for a few moments, before quickly clicking the “Print” button at the top. Your printer starts... well, printing the e-mail to various sheets of paper, using an inbuilt laser to suture the pages together. Pulling the abnormally long sheet of paper out of your printer, you hold it against the wall with one hand, and tack it down with push-pins. Knock! Knock! Knock! ... Someone’s at the front door. Given what you just read, that’s either a good thing or a really bad thing. Grabbing a golf club, 9 iron to be exact, you raise it like a baseball bat and slowly open your door. A dark hallway greets you. No way, man! Facing a possible intruder has your name all over it, but the dark? Hell no! You walk back into your room, and over to your desk. Rummaging through it, you pull out a flashlight. You walk back over to your door, and aim the flashlight down the hall. Click! The light turns on. You step out into the hallway, and walk towards your front door. ... ...... ......... Face to face with your front door, whoever lies on the other side can only be friend or foe, and you have a big feeling they’re a foe. With an inhale, you unlock your front door, and open it. Who’s there? A stranger, obviously. It’s a short-standing lady with short curly brown hair, and scenecore clothes on. You: Can I... help you? ???: You’re Wade Harris? You: Yeah, that’s me. You grip the club harder. ???: Can I come in? It’s urgent. You make yourself bigger to prevent any unwanted entry into your house. You: You’re not taking a single step in my house until you tell me who you are, lady. She drops her shoulders and sighs. cinnapoodle: I’m Cinnapoodle, that “bitch techie” you keep running into. This concerns what happened to thephreakingsky... God rest her soul. You: How about... no? We can have a conversation right where we stand. cinnapoodle: Stubborn even in the real world, I see. You: Sure am. cinnapoodle: Well, if you insist, we can talk out here. She sits down on the porch. Any chance you had of defending yourself is gone, because you just closed the door behind you and sat down with her. You: So... is there a reason you came to my house instead of... I don’t know, e-mailing me? cinnapoodle: Because I actually want to live, Wade. The only reason they got her was because she e-mailed you. They can’t track me if I don’t use Dreamscape! to talk to you. You: Right... cinnapoodle: Listen... They’re probably going to come after you, y’know? You: Why? Don’t they have better things to do? cinnapoodle: Yeah, and those better things are kidnapping you, Wade. Barbara is dead, and you’re next probably, because you’re who she spoke to last. However... they can’t get you if you don’t exist. You: But I do exist...? cinnapoodle: Not if you disguise yourself. See, Dreamscape! doesn’t consider a new user on the same computer, number or IP to be the same person until up to 30 minutes after the user was made... So if you just keep making new users... they can’t get you. Not only that, but the server wasn’t set-up to properly accommodate new users on the same system or setup, so the more you do it... the deeper in you can go. You: So you’re saying... cinnapoodle: ...that if you account hop, you can get as far into Chronospace as you want within that time-frame. You: Didn’t think I’d be taking advice like this from you, considering you like to jack up my shit. cinnapoodle: And I didn’t think I’d be giving advice like this to you, considering you like to jack up my shit. You: Fair point. She stands up. cinnapoodle: You should sleep, Wade. You’ve got a lot to do if you’re gonna bust in. You: Wait, wait, wait... How the hell am I gonna make more than one account every 30 minutes? There’s a 5 minute cooldown. cinnapoodle: Unless... you macro. She presents a soldering iron out of her bag. You: I like the way you think. cinnapoodle: Are your folks home? You look at her with an unamused look. You: What? cinnapoodle: I don’t mean like that, stupid. I’m not driving 7 miles in the other direction just to sleep at home and then drive 7 miles back this direction just to help you. You: *sigh* No, they’re not. You open your front door and walk in. ... Walking through your house, your unlikely companion dives onto your living room couch, throwing her bag onto the floor. You: Isn’t that uncomfortable? cinnapoodle: No way, man! I sleep on the floor some nights! You say nothing, and walk down the hallway to your room. Stepping in, you forgot to sign off of Dreamscape! before you left, so your phone bill is gonna be through the roof. Damn. You close your door, place your 9 iron back in the corner, toss your flashlight on your bed, and sit down at your desk. Shoving your face back into the monitor, you click the Go! button on the taskbar, as the Go! menu prints onto the screen. The cursor hovers over “Shut Down or Sign Off” and clicks it. A pop-up appears. “What do you want to do?” There’s a dropdown. Clicking it, the options are: “Sign out of Windowsill Shut down your computer Restart your computer Restart your computer in Chronospace Disk Operating System” The cursor clicks “Shut down your computer”, and then clicks “Confirm”. The desktop fades away as the splash screen reappears briefly, before cutting to black, and an ominous message. It is now safe to turn off your computer. Click. The monitor cuts to black. Tuesday, November 2nd, 1999. 12:22 PM. The ever-looming thought of your impending doom lingers on your body like a sick vest, harnessed around you, bringing you down. That made no sense at all, but that’s okay. ... cinnapoodle: Hey. ... cinnapoodle: Get up. You open your eyes to find a figure who’s just made authority their bitch. You: Oh, right... You’re here... cinnapoodle: You’re not having second thoughts? You: Heck no, man! I don’t wanna die! cinnapoodle: Then get up, and help me. You slowly sit up and look around. It’s your room, alright, only cursed by the presence of your number one enemy. Looking towards your desk, she’s set up a workbench of sorts to create a physical macro. You crawl out of bed, and to your feet, standing wobbly due to three things: Iron deficiency. Asthma. Being on “the spectrum”. Three things that are fine on their own, but volatile when mixed. cinnapoodle: Damn! She snaps her hand up in pain. You: What? She looks at you. cinnapoodle: Burned my hand... You: Tough luck. Brain blast! You could probably benefit from having Wallace and Betty over! It would certainly make the strangeness of two young adults of opposite genders being alone in a room go away, since there would be four young adults of opposite genders alone in a room! You walk over to your desk, and reach behind your computer. cinnapoodle: What are you doing? You: What does it look like I’m doing? You unplug the phone line from the back end of your computer. cinnapoodle: Going off-line. You: Close, but no cigar. cinnapoodle: Do you even know what a cigar is? You: No. You plug the phone line into the bottom of your wall-mounted phone’s base, and take the handset off the hook. You put it to your ear. Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr......... Dial tone. Typical, considering you haven’t dialed any number yet. You begin typing out a number on the number pad on the base. 412-238-7315. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... A faint click is heard over the phone. Betty: Hello? You: Hey, it’s me. Betty: Wade, hey! What’s up? You: Something big, to say the least. You gotta come over. Betty: ...What? You: It’s too much to explain over the phone, you’d believe me better in person. Betty: Okay, then... I’ll be there in a few minutes... You: Great! You press the hook button on your handset for a few moments and then release it. Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr......... The poor man’s way of hanging up without actually hanging up. You begin typing out another number on the number pad on the base. 412-673-8456. Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiii- A faint click is heard over the phone. Wallace: Yeah? You: Hey, man. Wallace: Hey, fuck you! You: What? Wallace: I got your e-mail, man! How could you do that to a friend? You: You won’t be a friend if you keep asking me for money. Anyways, you need to come over. It’s urgent. Wallace: Fine, but if this is to bully me, I’m gonna kick your ass. You: You wish, Dumbo. The line cuts. He hung up. What a chode. You put the handset on the base. cinnapoodle: Sounds like fun. You: An utter blast. cinnapoodle: Say, you wouldn’t happen to have a spare phone cable, would you? You: What for? cinnapoodle: Well, unless we modify the browser, we’re not connecting to a proxy server any other way. You: Hold the phone, I thought we were making a macro to make mass users. cinnapoodle: We are. We connect to a proxy server to get around the sign-up cooldown, and run the macro to constantly send the sign-up command to the server with gibberish in all of the fields except for the access number field. You: Sounds complicated... cinnapoodle: Has anyone told you that you have a real habit of stating the obvious, Wade? You: Many times. So how are we gonna connect this thing to a proxy? cinnapoodle: It’s easy. She pulls out two laptop computers, and a 4-way phone line splitter. cinnapoodle: You connect to one of these, of which that one will connect to this one, which then connects to Dreamscape! normally. Turns out basic comprehension wasn’t one of the optional skill points. Stupid. You: ...right. Knock, knock, knock! ... Someone’s at the front door. Click! Creeeaaaaaaaaak.... ... The front door opened. SLAM! ... step... step... step... step... step... step... step. ... The doorknob on your door turns, and it opens to reveal your circus of idiots, Wallace and Betty. Betty: Hey, Wade! What’s u... The two of them stop and stare in confusion at your colleague. Betty: Who is that? Wallace: God damn, Wade! I didn’t know you got around! You: Zip it, dummy. Rae stands up. cinnapoodle: Don’t kill me, but I’m Cinnapoodle. Their expressions go from confusion to blank. Betty: Wade...? You: Before you ask, me and her aren’t even friends. She rolls her eyes. You: It’s a long story, but Chronospace is kinda... what’s the word? Wallace: Stupid? Betty: Crazy? You: Insane. They’re after me. Betty: That’s obvious, though! You: No, like... after me. Like, in the real world. Betty: Wha...? cinnapoodle: It’s true. They went after one of their own, and... She gestures to the printed out e-mail on your wall. As the two of them read it, they go from confused to scared to horrified. Wallace: This has to be some kinda joke, right...? You: No, it’s not. They killed her, and they probably plan to kill me, next! Betty: That’s not legal! How can they do that?! cinnapoodle: Are you seriously asking how Chronospace of all companies is able to pull off the act of homicide? The government doesn’t give two shits about what they do, because Chronospace supplies them. Wallace: This is some bullshit, man. What do we do? You: That’s what I’m... er... we’re, trying to figure out. cinnapoodle: We know of a way to overload their servers, and of a way to get deep inside them, but it’s gonna take some work. She sits down, and continues soldering bits to other bits and coding on her terminal. Betty: So... you’ve got the tech supporters on your side now, or... what? You: Not all of them. Some of them are too far gone. It’s just her and a handful of others left. Wallace: What if they get you, man? You: I would rather not think about what would happen if I got caught. Betty: Fair point... but- cinnapoodle: A-ha! You and your colleagues look at her. cinnapoodle: I’ve done it! We now have a macro to spam new user accounts on the server! You: That fast? cinnapoodle: It’s not that hard... if you’re a tech whiz like me. You roll your eyes and step towards your desk. Sitting down, you look at your colleagues briefly, and then shove your face into the monitor. ... Click! Whirrrr..... Clickclickclickclickclickclickclick.... MRRRRR! .... beep! The rough sounds of a dilapidated personal computer starting up fill the room, faintly echoing off of the floor and walls. On the screen, various commands related to hardware are run as a Packard Bell logo appears in the top left. “America grew up listening to us. It still does.” After an abysmal wait time, the computer boots to an all-too familiar sight: CS-DOS 9.20. C:\> It’s waiting patiently for a command. With the wide regarded satisfying clicks of an old keyboard... C:\>cd WINDOWSILL C:\WINDOWSILL> C:\WINDOWSILL>WINDOWSILL.COM Enter. ... The screen goes black as the computer begins loading a legally questionable fork of Microsoft Windows 98, Chronospace Windowsill ‘99. The screen lights up with a splash screen. The Chronospace logo engulfs it. The splash text reads: “Starting Chronospace Windowsill ‘99... Please wait... We mean that, by the way! Wait!” The screen momentarily goes black with no more than a command prompt in the top left reading: “Starting Windowsill ‘99...” before going back to the colorful splash screen. After what feels like an eternity, the computer boots to a log-on screen, with a risque picture of a posing rabbit woman as the wallpaper. “Please input your Chronospace Windowsill username and password.” User Name: Wade Harris Password: ************ Enter. ... A rather cheerful tune plays as an extremely unkempt desktop loads up. There’s a mouse cursor in the center of the screen. Faint clicks are heard as your new colleague sets up the... well, setup. ... ...... ......... cinnapoodle: Alright, go ahead. The cursor hovers over to a folder labeled “Dreamscape!” and double clicks it. ... The folder opens to reveal files related to this terrible Internet suite. The cursor hovers over “Dreamscape.exe” and double clicks it. ... ...... A mix between a Web browser, an instant messenger app, an electronic mail client and a phone dialer all simultaneously appear on the screen. A pop-up appears on the screen. It’s a log-in prompt for a dial-up network connection. E-Mail: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve Password: ********************* Phone number: 1+(484)-820-1337 Access type: Modem Service: Dreamscape! * Do you want to save these details so that sign-on is quicker next time? Sign-on! Click. ... Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Dingdingdingdingdingbwoooooooooooooooooooobwaaaaaa... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONEEEEEEEEEEEEEBWAAAAAAAKSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHBWBWBWBWOOOOOUUUUMMMKSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHH!!! Good Lord. [SIGN ON REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] [CONNECTION STARTED] A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen. The main page shows an abundance of hyperlinks to various websites. Apparently, the top page for today is Amazon.com. Classy. The cursor hovers over a link labeled “Dreamscape! TalkCity” and double clicks it. A list of chatrooms drops down. Fully preparing yourself for an abhorrent time, you click the top one, labeled “General”. ... The chatroom window opens. user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve has joined. wadebraid: List There are 2 other people in this chatroom right now: user.skcro@chronospace.eve, user.omegablazerxzv@chronospace.eve Phew. skcro: oh, hey again omegablazerxzv: Hey wadebraid: Hey skcro: what brings you here wadebraid: The fall of man skcro: what wadebraid: You’re a tech whiz, right skcro: yea wadebraid: I need your help skcro: with what user.omegablazerxzv@chronospace.eve has been marked as being away. wadebraid: Saving the Internet, Chronospace is falling apart and i need all the help i can get to bust in skcro: say less user.brewradio@chronospace.eve has joined the chat. brewradio: ooga booga skcro: yo, wanna help us take back the internet lol brewradio: sure wadebraid: Bitchin Dingaling! You have two new friend requests. Bitchin’! wadebraid: Cya two soon The cursor hovers over the “Leave” button and clicks it. You have been disconnected from TalkCity. [DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; USER LEFT] Betty: Should we light them up now? cinnapoodle: Definitely not! We haven’t got nearly enough people to lead a charge yet. We would overload their servers, yeah, but we wouldn’t have any actual humans to break into them. Ding ding! You have a new e-mail message. You click the e-mail window. The message is from the spawn of Satan himself, patrickhobbs. The subject reads: “YOU CAN RUN BUT YOU CAN’T HIDE!” Positively shocking. You click the e-mail, expecting the definition of “dumbass” in every language, but instead you get a rather empty message, save for one image and a caption beneath it. “Subject: YOU CAN RUN BUT YOU CAN’T HIDE! From: admin.patrickhobbs@chronospace.eve To: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve Sent from: ??? HELLO, WADE! DO YOU BELIEVE YOU CAN HIDE FROM ME IN YOUR PITY HOUSE? HA! I LAUGH IN YOUR FACE! BARBARA TRIED, AND LOOK AT HOW SHE ENDED UP! YOU CAN RUN, SURE, BUT IF YOU THINK YOU CAN HIDE... YOU CAN THINK AGAIN, MISTER! Caption: WHAT A SHAME.” Aside from the threats, the message seems rather tame. As for what lies in the image, well... you click it to download it. ... It downloaded. Opening it... Wait... Is... is that...? Your entire body locks up in horror as the hair on your arms stands up. Your mouth falls agape. Wallace and Betty both gasp in equal horror. Dear Lord, it is. An eerily high quality image of the headless, mangled corpse of a woman who you can only assume to be thephreakingsky fills the monitor. Her body is painted with gunshot wounds, and her chest cavity and stomach are split wide open. The head appears to have been taken off with a shotgun, not a blade. You: Fucking- shit! What the fuck?! Betty: Oh my... GOD! They’re definitely not joking now. Your hands uncontrollably twitch towards the ALT and F4 keys, but you can’t move your fingers. You’re too shocked. Good God, get it off! You want to keep what you ate last down, not up! The monitor goes black and cuts back to the desktop. Rae is cradled around the keyboard. Rae: Wade... I think it’s safe to say that... you’re in danger. You: It doesn’t take a genius to know that! Wallace: Guys...? You: What? He points past you to the window. Turning around, a figure stands in it, but they’re not a silhouette this time. An Asian man with short, black hair and an upturned lip stares you down. You want to do something, but... Wade rolled for initiative. Wade rolled a 1. No DEX points added. The man slowly reaches down and opens the window. He crawls in through the now open window, stretching as he does. You can only look at your colleagues in fear. First the corpse, now this? What kind of monsters are Chronospace? The man is now in your room. He’s looking around. ???: Sure is a great day today, isn’t it? You: Who the hell are you?! ???: Is that any way to greet a... guest? You: You’re not on the list, pal, now get lost! The man steps towards you. ???: Is that right? Mmmmm... I don’t think it is. Betty: Get the fuck out of here before I call the cops on your ass! ???: You see, Wade, you and I are kind of similar. We both love going places we shouldn’t, we both love getting on people’s nerves, and we both love to piss off in fear like the little bitches we are! The man is standing face to face with you now. You: Thanks...? ???: Oh... He draws a magnum and points it right between your eyes. ???: Don’t mention it, buddy. You can’t move. Not because you don’t want to, but because if you do, you lose 76% of the brain matter in your head, and 89% of the blood in your body instantaneously. That math probably isn’t correct, but if you move, you’re dead. Your colleagues are frozen in fear. Some help would be nice. Click! The man slowly turns around. ???: A new challenger approa... Rae is aiming a sawed-off shotgun at him. He looks mortified. Rae: Looks like we both came prepared. Just that one of us came a bit more prepared. Get out. The man cackles. ???: Since you asked nicely... I might as well! Good talk! The man holsters his gun and walks towards your window, and climbs out it, closing it behind him. He disappears around the corner. A car speeding off can be heard. Rae lowers her gun. Wallace: That sure was fun. You: You had a gun this ENTIRE TIME?! Where the hell did you get a gun?! Rae: Working at Chronospace, they arm you. It’s not for an intruder though, it’s for the... you know, traitors... You: THAT DOESN’T MAKE IT ANY BETTER! HOW ARE YOU SO CALM ABOUT THIS?! THAT MOTHERFUCKER HAD A G U N TO MY FACE!!! Rae: Wade, relax... You weren’t in any actual danger. Betty: What do you mean?! He was this close to getting killed! Rae: If that idiot’s gun was actually loaded, yeah. You: Wh...? Rae: I saw the back of the chamber. He didn’t have any bullets in it. Unless you’re allergic to air, you weren’t in any real danger. You look at the floor in defeat. Rae: We should get ready for the take-over. It won’t be easy. Get back on-line, Wade. You’ve got people to rally. You extend a sigh and sit back down, shoving your face into the monitor. The browser is still sitting on the TalkCity home page. ... You click the “Home” button at the top of the screen. A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen. The main page shows an abundance of hyperlinks to various websites. The cursor hovers over a link labeled “Chronospace Team” and clicks it. A rather long list of users who work for Chronospace prints onto the screen. Of the 67 users on screen right now, only a whopping one of them is an ally. Regardless of who’s a friend and who’s a foe, they’re all going down, even if you have to go down with them. Bring it on. Click. Tuesday, November 2nd, 1999. 11:55 PM. Nighttime is now more terrifying for more reasons than you being afraid of the dark. At any given moment, you could have the wrath of Thor unleashed on you without any warning. ... Click! Whirrrr..... Clickclickclickclickclickclickclick.... MRRRRR! .... Beep! The degrading sounds of a personal computer that probably roamed with the dinosaurs starting up echoes through a dark space. One who didn’t know any better might think aliens were landing on Earth. On the screen, various commands related to hardware are run as a Packard Bell logo appears in the top left. “America grew up listening to us. It still does.” After a mind-numbingly long wait, the computer boots to an old friend: CS-DOS 9.20. C:\> It’s waiting patiently for a command. C:\>cd WINDOWSILL C:\WINDOWSILL> C:\WINDOWSILL>WINDOWSILL.COM Enter. ... The screen goes black as the computer begins loading a legally questionable fork of Microsoft Windows 98, Chronospace Windowsill ‘99. The screen lights up with a splash screen. The Chronospace logo engulfs it. The splash text reads: “Starting Chronospace Windowsill ‘99... Please wait... We mean that, by the way! Wait!” The screen momentarily goes black with no more than a command prompt in the top left reading: “Starting Windowsill ‘99...” before going back to the colorful splash screen. After what feels like an eternity, the computer boots to a log-on screen, with a risque picture of a posing rabbit woman as the wallpaper. “Please input your Chronospace Windowsill username and password.” User Name: Wade Harris Password: ************ Enter. ... A rather cheerful tune plays as an extremely unkempt desktop loads up. There’s a mouse cursor in the center of the screen. ... You don’t know what to do today. Anything you can do will result in all of Chronospace jumping into your shit. You could chance it on TalkCity again, but after what happened yesterday, you’d probably get executed the mere millisecond you did anything. Despite your own conscience warning you, you decide you’re better than that. Your cursor hovers over the Dreamscape! shortcut and opens it. You learned from last time! You put a shortcut to the executable right on the desktop! Good for you! ... An Internet suite opens up. It’s still as awful as it was the prior days. You also learned to auto-accept the dialing prompt! So, it’s not gonna ask you again! “Dialing 484-820-1337...” ... Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Dingdingdingdingdingbwoooooooooooooooooooobwaaaaaa... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONEEEEEEEEEEEEEBWAAAAAAAKSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHBWBWBWBWOOOOOUUUUMMMKSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHH!!! Great heavens. [SIGN ON REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] [CONNECTION STARTED] A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen. The main page shows an abundance of hyperlinks to various websites. Where will you go today? Who knows. The only thing you know is that... you’re alone. All of your physical colleagues are absent. Anything that happens to you can’t be prevented. ... You’re waiting for something. Or... you’re too scared to click on anything. You pull your face out of the monitor and look to the right, at your window. Nobody’s there. At least, if they were, they scurried away when you turned. You shove your face back into the monitor. Not knowing what to do, you click on the instant messenger panel. Two friends are on-line. user.brewradio@chronospace.eve and user.skcro@chronospace.eve. Pulling your face out of the monitor, you look at the physical macro in the dark. Three men isn’t enough to lead a charge, and you’re not connected to a proxy server. Looking behind you, you can barely make out Rae sleeping on a bean bag in the darkness. Looking ahead, you snap your eyes to different things on your desk, none of which seem to have any real use in this situation. Confusion and uncertainty consume you. What’s your plan? Is the fatigue getting to you finally? Creak... What was that? You look to your left, at your door. There’s either nothing there, or something shrouded in the darkness... Crackle! You look to your right, at your window. Nothing there, either. Bang! You turn around, but there’s still nothing. It must be outside noise. Choosing to ignore these mystery sounds, you shove your face back into the monitor. The instant messenger client is still open. Your two friends are still connected. In the corner of your eye, the clock on your taskbar flips. Wednesday, November 3rd, 1999. 12:00 AM. It’s a new day. Hoorah. Dingaling! skcro sent you a message. You click on the notification. A chat-room window opens. Wade Harris (user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve) has been added to the chat. skcro: yo wadebraid: What’s up skcro: so, i was digging around and tinkering with some stuff and found out a way to absolutely wreck one of these freaks’ modems wadebraid: Do tell skcro: so, you basically get into the same space as them anywhere on-line, and then check their user info, due to an oversight you can briefly see what number they’re calling from and how they’re calling from it, so by using a proxy you can basically connect to their modem midcall and send anything you want down it, which kills it wadebraid: Interesting skcro: maybe you can get cinnapoodle finally lol You pull your face out of the monitor and turn around to see Rae, still sound asleep wearing barely anything, and basically on the floor. Eliciting no reaction, you shove your face back into the monitor. wadebraid: Yeah, maybe skcro: so i heard you were planning a revolt wadebraid: Yeah because i’m the one who told you skcro: oh right, anyways you probably need a lot more people, which is why i did my part and alerted my friend group to this whole thing, which got them to alert their friend groups wadebraid: How many people is that skcro: maybe like 40 wadebraid: Cool, that should work, but a few more wouldnt hurt skcro: i’ll see what i can do user.skcro@chronospace.eve has left the chat. “[DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; USER LEFT]” You are alone in this chatroom. Invite some friends, won’t you? No. You click the “Leave” button at the top of the window. The chat window closes. The instant messenger client and the Web browser were hiding behind it! What a find. Maybe, just maybe, you can get lucky on the forums tonight. The cursor hovers over a link labeled “Dreamscape! TalkCity” and double clicks. However, instead of bringing up the chat listings, it brings up a blocked screen. [PERMANENTLY BANNED FROM TalkCity] [DATE: Tuesday, November 2nd, 1999] [TIME: 3:22 PM] [MODERATOR MESSAGE: Turn around.] [DISCONNECTED FROM CHAT; NO ACCESS] ... Pulling your face out of the monitor, you slowly turn your head to look behind you. Nothing. The only thing there is Rae, still asleep. You look to your right, at the window. Nothing there. You turn and look to your left, at the door. Nothing there, either. You look ahead, and shove your face back into the monitor. They’re playing with your mind. That’s all it is. They just want to psych you into logging off. But you’re not that gullible to mind games. You’re not going on the forums, either way. You should search around for something else to do except stare at a banned screen in the hopes it’ll magically subside. You click the “Home” button at the top of the window. A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen again. Where to go...? Work, mind, work! ... You... don’t know, for once. You’re stumped. You can’t call upon any friends for help, because they’re all asleep or off-line. Sliiiiidddeeee... You pull your head out of the monitor and turn your head to look to your right, at the window. ! Your window slams shut. What looked like an upside down leg was visible for a brief period. Something is in here with you. No doubt about it. Wednesday, November 3rd, 1999. 1:00 AM. You slowly get up out of your chair. Whatever is in your room is purposefully hiding from you. If horror films and games have taught you anything, it’s that you never look away from where your foe might be. ... Looking towards your bed, which is completely shrouded in darkness, you step backwards towards your door slowly, in search of the legendary fabled 9 iron club. Shuffle! It’s moving... but to where, you don’t know. Now against the corner, you feel around behind you for your golf bag. Where is it...? Creak! It’s STILL moving. Wait... what about Rae?! Step, step, step... It’s moving to the left, which means whatever it is, it’s definitely after you. That’s no better than if it were after Rae, though. You finally find your golf bag, but now for the real challenge: finding your 9 iron. Huff... puff... It’s... breathing? Feeling your clubs, that’s not a 9 iron... that’s not it either... that’s a putter... that’s an 8 iron... A-HA! 9 IRON! You draw the club from the bag and wield it like a baseball bat. Time for a terrible idea. You: Hey! Don’t make me use this! I will, don’t think I won’t! The 9 iron beats the punch, pal! ???: ... Step... step... step... STEP. STEP. S T E P ! S T E P ! It’s really close. Wait. There’s a lightswitch in your room. You reach over and flick the lights on. As the lights come on, a young pink haired woman shrivels up in fear. Time for a one-liner. You: Hasta la vista, bitch! You swing the club towards her head... WHACK!!! The club vibrates violently in your hand as it stops mid-swing. THUD! You definitely hit her. That sure woke Rae up. Rae sits up in confusion, before turning to scared confusion upon seeing a crazed maniac high on weed wielding a 9 iron towering over a Chronospace employee. You walk over to the lady, and... BANG! You: DIE! BANG! JUST... BANG! FUCKING... BANG! BANG! BANG! DIE!!! BANG!!! You can feel your arms go numb as you deal the final blow. Rae is looking at you in horror. Without even looking at the body, you can tell one thing for sure... That motherfucker is out. But, even more sure, you’re covered in blood. And you probably just claimed another person’s life. But that doesn’t matter. You’re alive! And you got to use the 9 iron for its unintended intended purpose, so it’s a win-win! Rae slowly walks over to you. Rae: Jesus... Christ...! You: Wait... You crouch down, just to make sure whoever you just bludgeoned out was actually a Chronospace person... yeah, sure was. You: Hey... I armed myself! Rae: That’s not what Barbara meant by arm yourself! She meant like... you know, a gun? You: Who needs a gun when you have the greatest weapon ever curated by mankind, unintended to even be a weapon, the nine iron?! Rae: YOU, when you’re riddled full of bullet holes and wearing your own intestines as a scarf with your head carved clean out like A PUMPKIN ON HALLOWEEN NIGHT!!! Oof. You: Has anyone ever told you that you’ve got anger issues? Rae: *sigh* Many have... You: Well... You look down at your bloodied body. You: If I may be excused. Rae: It’s your house, Wade. You look at her, unamused, before turning around, opening your door, and walking out into the hall towards the bathroom. Walking into the bathroom, you close the door. But instead of getting into the shower, you press yourself against the door, and do something you’ve been holding in for 18 years, only just now unleashed by what you just did. You: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!! GOD... FUCKING DAMN IT!!! Is this what a panic attack feels like? Or is it just rage? Whatever it is, you’re straight A’s mad. This can be solved by simpl... [CALL PAUSED; RECORDING STOPPED] ... ...... ......... [CALL RESUMED; RECORDING RESTARTED] Wednesday, November 3rd, 1999. 5:06 PM. Well, hey howdy hey! You actually cleaned up the blood and brains. Good job, champ! You also invited Wallace and Betty over, but that’s not exactly news. What is news is what you have to show them! Betty: So what is it that you wanted to show us again? You: Something that’ll help with the revolt. Wallace: Is it... giving up? You: No, stupid. We can send audio down a moderator’s phone line at any time we want by exploiting an oversight. One of my friends did it and recorded it. Here, watch this! Click. [CONNECTION TERMINATED; INCOMING SIGN-ON] [CONNECTION REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.skcro@chronospace.eve] [TRANSFERRING RECORDING POINT OF VIEW FROM: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve TO user.skrcro@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] ... [POINT OF VIEW TRANSFERRED] Wednesday, November 3rd, 1999. 4:23 PM. You sit at your computer, eager to test out your new theory. You shove your face into the monitor. The TalkCity chat room listing greets you. You click the channel “General” from a long list of chatrooms. ... The chatroom window opens. user.skcro@chronospace.eve has joined. skcro: list There are 2 other people in this chatroom right now: tech.sudokoko@chronospace.eve, user.caughtfishing@chronospace.eve sudokoko: so if you get an error like that, you can recover the system but it’s not really recommended to because it can be super unstable and crash again caughtfishing: I see... skcro: yo sudokoko: hey user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve has joined the chat. wadebraid: Hello sudokoko: oh, great, it’s you caughtfishing: Who? You click on sudokoko’s screenname. A panel of information drops down about them, including the number they’re calling from. Win + Print Screen Yoink! Their number is now yours! Sucker! You pull your face out of the monitor and begin setting up a proxy server on another computer... done! You shove your face into a laptop screen...? You click the shortcut for Dreamscape! on the laptop. A pop-up appears on the screen. It’s a log-in prompt for a dial-up connection. ... ...... ......... E-Mail: user.skcro@chronospace.eve Password: *********** Service: Dreamscape! * Do you want to save these details so that sign-on is quicker next time? Sign-on! Click! ... ...... Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Dingdingdingdingdingdingding... Now’s your chance! You open your mic and hold up a cassette player to it, playing an ear-deafening song down it. You pull your face out of the laptop and shove it into your main monitor. tech.sudokoko@chronospace.eve has left the chat. “[CONNECTION TERMINATED; LINE TOO NOISY]” wadebraid: LOL skcro: YEAAAAAAAHHH IT WORKS [CALL ENDED; RECORDING TERMINATED] [CONNECTION TERMINATED; INCOMING SIGN-ON] [CONNECTION REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [TRANSFERRING RECORDING POINT OF VIEW FROM: user.skcro@chronospace.eve TO user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] ... [POINT OF VIEW TRANSFERRED] Wednesday, November 3rd, 1999. 5:12 PM. You: Pretty genius, huh? Betty: It could work in our favor, but that would take a lot of work just to boot one moderator offline... Rae: Not if... we macro. You: How the hell are you gonna macro that? Rae: Same way you macro making 500 accounts every 5 minutes. You look at Wallace and Betty with an unamused expression, before looking back at Rae. You: So... let’s get to work...? She nods. This’ll be a long rest of your day, for sure. Click. Thursday, November 4th, 1999. 3:22 PM. You could be doing something productive, but you aren’t. You’re sitting in your chair on the computer reading an article on home defense. You need the DEF points, man! But, you could also use ATK points... No! You have the 9 iron! Who needs a knife, or a taser, or a gun, when you have the pinnacle of American creation? The article states that you should put as much distance between you and an attacker as possible, but you don’t need to do that! You’re awesome. Awesome people don’t need to run away like a bitch. Rae: What are you doing? You pull your face out of the monitor and turn around to look at her. You: I am increasing my intelligence on the subject of violence. It’s fun, you should do it too! Rae: I don’t need to increase my intelligence on the subject of anything. You: Well, it could help. Especially since you slept through me almost getting my brains rearranged. Rae: If I recall correctly, you rearranged her brains. It didn’t look like you needed help. ... You: Are you trying to imply that I’m strong? Rae: No, I’m trying to imply that you’re alert. Seems your paranoia helped you out. You: For once. Rae: Anyways, we need to go. You: Wait... what? Go where? Rae: We need to pay the other “sane” ones a visit. You: Wallace and Betty? Rae: No. Barbara told you that not every Chronospace employee was corrupt, and that’s true. The sane ones agreed to meet me at that old abandoned shop downtown. You: Why can’t you go alone? Rae: Because you have THE ENTIRETY of Chronospace after you, so if I left you alone, I would come back to a disemboweled, decapitated corpse. You look down in silence. Rae: Let’s go. You: What, like... right now? She looks unamused. Rae: Yes, right now! You hit the power button on your computer. That’s a bad idea, but you don’t have time to shut it down through software. You stand up and follow Rae to the door. This could be the God honest truth, or a death wish waiting to happen. Either way, you don’t have a choice. You follow her down the hallway, and out the front door. It’s cold outside. Grabbing a jacket wouldn’t have hurted. Maybe you need the INT points instead... You walk down your driveway to see... Is that a Prius? That’s a Toyota Prius. Your tough colleague... drives a Prius. ... You: You drive a Prius? Rae: Do not comment on my car, please. You: It’s just amusing, I didn’t take you for the kind of person who would drive a Prius... Rae: Will you shut up and get in? You pull on the passenger door handle. It doesn’t open. You: I... can’t. Rae: Because it’s locked, stupid. The front headlights flash quickly as Rae opens the driver side door. Pulling on the handle, now it opens. You just physically felt yourself lose 5 INT points. Ouch. Sitting inside... good God! It’s cramped in here! You’re right up against the dashboard! You reach under the seat for the seat adjustment lever... where is it? Oh, right. These models of Prius don’t have a seat adjustment lever, for some ungodly reason. You feel like a hamster in a ball. Like, a really small ball. But you can’t do anything about it, so you grab your seat belt and buckle yourself in. This can only end one way... actually, it can end two ways, but your mind assumes it’ll end one way... the bad way. Ignition. The car reverses. Your seating situation hasn’t improved. Maybe a quip will help? You: I’m just now realizing how... short you are. Rae: Shut up. You: It feels like I’m in a soapbox here! Rae: And I’ll put you in one for real if you don’t zip it. That sounded genuine. Uh oh. The quip didn’t help! ... Click. [CONNECTION TERMINATED; INCOMING SIGN-ON] [CONNECTION REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: wallpaste@WebTV.net] [TRANSFERRING RECORDING POINT OF VIEW FROM: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve TO wallpaste@WebTV.net] [PLEASE WAIT] ... [POINT OF VIEW TRANSFERRED] Thursday, November 4th, 1999. 3:44 PM. You look outside your window to see Wade and the other one whose name you didn’t care enough to remember walking out to a Prius. What’s Wade doing with a bitch like her? Why’d she walk out of his house? So many questions, so few answers. But, this means you can get on-line without getting hassled by Boy Blunder! You’ll only be harassed by Miss America. You turn around and slide into your chair, grabbing your keyboard as you do. Stylish! You equally stylishly hit the power button on the keyboard, and lock your vision on the TV. A Philips logo appears briefly on the screen, serving as a reminder of who’s fault this is. Half of a second later, a jolly tune plays alongside a graphic of a road to a city. Maybe you shouldn’t have bought this thing. No! Computers are smelly and complicated. And they suck! You have to pay more than a thousand bucks just to get one that can run SimCity 2000 at a framerate higher than a Nintendo Game & Watch! After a needlessly long wait, a splash screen appears, bearing the Chronospace logo above the WebTV one. Somehow, you believe they didn’t make this thing. Instead of your usual home page loading up, a rather... red one appears instead. Instead of Dreamscape! lining the top of the page, red text reading Purgatory! lines it instead. It must be something Wade did. But it looks too... what's the word? Professional? Proper? Good? Whatever the word is, it doesn’t feel like something Wade would have made. He’s too busy being chased to do this. All of the text on the page is garbled nonsense, but the icons are still legible. You scroll over what used to be labeled “Community” and hit Enter. Waiting. After a short wait, a list drops down. The options are: Page Builder Around Pittsburgh Chat Discuss The cursor hovers over Chat and selects it. More waiting. A rather bloody looking page loads, but the text is legible at least... The current chats on right now are: Hell Purgatory! Joyous. The cursor hovers over Purgatory! and selects it. Even more waiting. The chatroom screen opens. ... wallpaste@WebTV.net has joined the chat There are 417 other people in this chat room wallpaste: hello? ... wandererofyears: Heya! stephk: yo wallpaste: what is this wandererofyears: This is where the tortured souls come when Chronospace doesn’t like them. wallpaste: why am i tortured wandererofyears: You’re Wallace Clark, aren’t you? You’re probably tortured because you’re Wade Harris’ friend. Purgatory! is where people who cross Chronospace or assist in doing so are sent when someone close to them is being hunted by them. wallpaste: seems accurate wandererofyears: Not me nor you are getting out of here, though. None of us are. wallpaste: why? wandererofyears: You’re only supposed to end up in Purgatory! if you get banned. The only other way to get in is to be added manually, and once you get added, it’s highly likely you’re added for good. wallpaste: damn wandererofyears: I have a plan though. That one tech lady, Cinnapoodle? She posted a cryptic bit of text here, and I was the only one who could decode it. It’s an address. She’s gone off to meet with other “sane” Chronospace people. Me and you both seem like normal people... what say we go over there with them? wallpaste: yeah, wade was walking out with her earlier, but idk if i really trust a stranger online yeasterday: smart move wandererofyears: Well, if you change your mind, find me at [DATA EXPUNGED; ADDRESS REMOVED FROM RECORDING] and we can go pay them a visit. You pull out a sticky note and write down the address. wallpaste: all right then Chronospace is upon us! admin.patrickhobbs@chronospace.eve has joined the chat. Uh oh. patrickhobbs: HELLO, WALLACE! HOW ARE YOU TODAY, BOY? wallpaste: do i have to answer that patrickhobbs: NO, I JUST WANTED TO SEE HOW YOU WERE! wallpaste: what do you want, anyway patrickhobbs: I WANT YOU TO REALIZE... WE CAN SEE CHAT LOGS! THANKS WANDEREROFYEARS FOR TELLING US EXACTLY WHERE YOU’RE GOING, I THINK MY FRIENDS WILL ENJOY MEETING YOU! OH, AND BY THE WAY... WALLACE? Oh boy. wallpaste: what patrickhobbs: THIS IS FOR YOU! CHRONOSPACE IS UPON US! Your screen glitches, and with a loud pop, it goes black. Your terminal turned off. Very funny, Hobbs. You hit the power button on your keyboard again. However, instead of taking you to the dialing screen, an unfortunate message prints onto the screen, leaving you in confusion. Whatever it means, your box is fucked. Damn. That sucks. ERROR 0425 Okay Looking at the sticky note, you realize some things are better left to the pros. Sorry, wandererofyears... Click. [CONNECTION TERMINATED; USER ENDED CALL] ... [DIALING 412-238-7315] ... [TRANSFERRING RECORDING POINT OF VIEW FROM: wallpaste@WebTV.net TO user.bettyboop@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] ... [TRANSFER FAILED; TARGET UNREACHABLE] ... [CONNECTION TERMINATED; INCOMING SIGN-ON] [CONNECTION REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [TRANSFERRING RECORDING POINT OF VIEW FROM: wallpaste@WebTV.net TO user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] ... [POINT OF VIEW TRANSFERRED] Thursday, November 4th, 1999. 6:21 PM. After a rather long drive, and with your mind violated by “music”, you arrive at your destination: a decrepit old shop. At least that part was truthful. You unbuckle your seatbelt, and open your door. The moment you step out, you feel your entire body tense up. You’re sore from being squished in that tiny interior for 2 and a half hours. This sucks! Regardless of how you feel however, you have to follow Rae behind the shop. This is it, this is where you die. There’s no way this isn’t a cover-up for a murder. But... it would be better than being ripped apart. Rae: ‘You having a seizure or something? You: What? Rae: You kinda... locked up, there. You look like you’ve seen a ghost. You: It’s nothing, just the thought of going behind an abandoned store to talk to a bunch of strangers who come from a company trying to murder me seems not so good after all! Rae: Trust me, Wade, if I wanted to kill you, I would’ve done it ages ago. You: True... ... She leads you behind the shop, through a chain gate, and between two fences. Who built this place? Willy Wonka? After a bit of walking and what-not, the two of you finally reach a plateau between the old shop and some apartment buildings. A small group of people are sitting down, except for one, who woke up today and decided he would stand up. You want to be like him. He’s cool. ???: Rae’s here! A bigger brown haired lady announces the obvious presence of your colleague. ???: It’s about time. ???: Who’s she got with her? ???: Is that one of the hackers? You’re getting mixed signals from this. Do they like you? Or do they hate you? You don’t know. You’re losing hope that you walk away from this alive. Rae: Everyone, this is Wade, A.K.A. the moron who kept breaking into my shit. You: Hey! I’m not a moron! ???: Well, then... I didn’t expect you to be so... fine. You roll for suicide. You roll a 1. Fuck. Rae: Amy, stop. NOLAN! GET OUT HERE!!! A tall bearded man appears from around the corner. nolanr: Quit yelling, I’m right here! Rae: Would you be so kind as to remind my roadrunner here as to what’s going down? You: Remind me? Of what, the revolt? If so, I’m the one who... Rae looks unamused at you. You should let the man talk. ... nolanr: It’s not the revolt, Wade. It’s something bigger than that. Chronospace is plotting a revolt of their own. They’re about to be indiscriminate against everyone. Which means, they won’t hesitate to kill anyone, even if there’s a conscious eyewitness present. It also means that they'll kill the eyewitness. So, yeah. That’s bad. You: What does Chronospace have to revolt against? The hackers? nolanr: Right on the mark. You: Great! Rae: No, it’s not great! It means your friends are boned! You: That's pretentious twaddle. Wallace and Betty are fine, they didn’t do anything to Chronospace. Why would they kill them? nolanr: Because they’re your friends, Wade. You’re wadebraid. You’ve broken into Chronospace more times than humanly possible. Rae: Exactly! So unless we do something fast, we’re all toast! nolanr: We’ve got enough people for a revolt of our own, thanks to you releasing your experiences on-line, Wade. We just have to hit them right as they try to hit us... and try not to die. You: And if we fail? nolanr: We die. Simple as that. You: Okay, then... Rae: Wade... I’m sorry. You: For what? Rae: We can’t help you in the real world, only on-line. We all have to ride back to Chronospace to have the best chance of disrupting their servers. Besides Wallace and Betty, you’re on your own for the revolt, Wade. You: And you waited until just now to tell me this?! Rae: Yes, I did. I did it so you know that we’re not all insane. nolanr: Chronospace plans to launch their revolt tomorrow. You’ll need this, Wade. Out of literally nowhere, the man hands you a pistol and a box of ammo. You: What?! Why?! nolanr: You do want to live, right? If so, you’ll need to defend yourself. They’re already after you as is, but when you hit them, they’ll send every person they can after you. Grabbing both, they’re rather heavy. You: God...! nolanr: Better get used to it. Rae: Come on, Wade. I’ll drive you back home before I set off. You: Two more hours in that tiny box? I don’t think I can do that again... Rae: Then just get in the backseat! She’s insulting your intelligence. Rae: Godspeed, everyone. This is for the Internet, for all of the lives lost, and for ourselves. Let’s go, Wade. She turns around and walks away. Looking briefly at the small group of people, you turn around and follow her to her car. [CALL PAUSED; RECORDING STOPPED] ... ...... ......... [CALL RESUMED; RECORDING RESTARTED] Thursday, November 4th, 1999. 8:49 PM. You’ve finally arrived back home after being crushed in the backseat of a Prius. You’re never getting into a Prius ever again. You step out of the car, with your body tensing up once more. Ouch! ... Standing up, you realize you have... not a lot of time to actually prepare for tomorrow! Damn! You stretch your body. It’s like every single bone in your body broke at once! You: Jesus, why didn’t you get a bigger car? Rae: Because I wouldn’t fit in a bigger car! You roll your eyes. Rae: Well, I guess I’ll get going, then. She steps over to you and... hugs you? Rae: See you around, maybe. She gets back into her soapbox of death and rides off. What the fuck? You didn’t consent to that! You should sue her. Regardless of what legal actions you’ll pursue, you have a revolt to stage. You walk up your driveway and to your front door. Opening it, you slam it behind you, lock it, and sprint through your house to your room. You quickly pull your phone off the hook and start calling Betty. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... A faint click is heard over the phone. Betty: Hello? You: Hey, you gotta get over here tomorrow. It’s urgent. Betty: It’s the revolt, isn’t it? You: Right on the fucking mark. Betty: I’ll be there, no matter what. You: Good. You hit the hook button, and start calling Wallace. ... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... A faint click is heard over the phone. Wallace: Yeah? You: Hey, you better not have plans tomorrow. Wallace: Only the plans to take back the Internet! You: I like how you think. Get here tomorrow as soon as you possibly can. We’re about to show these motherfuckers who’s the boss around here. Wallace: Damn right we are! You hang up the phone. You kick your shoes off and crawl into bed. Tomorrow, you win. For the Internet. Click. Friday, November 5th, 1999. 1:22 PM. Your door kicks open as Wallace and Betty both rush in, Betty locking the door behind her. Betty: So, are we doing this or what? You: You bet your ass we’re doing it. Wallace: Where’s whats-her-name? You: She ran off. She’s off to hit them head on in person. Betty: Brave girl... You: We need to be brave if we’re gonna pull this off. She left me her macros, so we can hit them hard. I’ve got some on-line friends ready for action too. Wallace: This is gonna kick ass! Betty: We shouldn’t celebrate before we even do anything, Wally. You say when, Wade. You: Alright. You exhale sharply. You: Well... I can’t believe I’m saying this unironically, but... Let’s save the Internet. Click! Whirrrr..... Clickclickclickclickclickclickclick.... MRRRRR! Beep! The familiar, friendly noises of a struggling personal computer starting up fill the room. On the screen, various commands related to hardware are run as a Packard Bell logo appears in the top left. “America grew up listening to us. It still does.” After a year long (not really) wait, the computer boots to your old friend: CS-DOS 9.20. C:\> It’s waiting for a command. C:\>cd WINDOWSILL C:\WINDOWSILL> C:\WINDOWSILL>WINDOWSILL.COM ... The computer begins loading an illegal fork of Windows 98. “Starting Chronospace Windowsill ‘99... Please wait... We mean that, by the way! Wait!” The irony. After a few moments, the computer boots to the desktop, as a login prompt appears. You hit OK before you can even comprehend what it said. An unkempt desktop appears. There’s a mouse cursor in the middle of the screen. The cursor hovers over a shortcut labeled “Chronospace Dreamscape!” and double clicks it. A corrupt, deceitful Internet suite opens up. ... “Dialing 484-820-1337...” ... Rrrrrrrr- Beep, boop, beep, beep, bop, boop, bop, bip, bip, beep. Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Riiiiiiiiinngg...... Dingdingdingdingdingbwoooooooooooooooooooobwaaaaaa... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONEEEEEEEEEEEEEBWAAAAAAAKSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHBWBWBWBWOOOOOUUUUMMMKSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHH!!! Jesus cussing christ. [SIGN ON REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED FOR: user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve] [PLEASE WAIT] [CONNECTION STARTED] A Web portal with an abundance of hyperlinks and uppercase text appears on the screen. The main page shows an abundance of hyperlinks to various websites. But you’re not going to any websites today. You’re doing something better than that. You’re liberating the Web. The cursor hovers into the instant messenger panel. Various friends are on-line, and you’ve been added to a group chat. The cursor clicks into the group chat. ... There’s 78 other Internet users here. wadebraid: Everyone, listen up Today is the day we take back the Internet from these deceitful lying lunatics It won’t be easy, and people are gonna die But if you’re here, you probably don’t care about that If you want to live, or can’t deal with fighting, there is no shame in leaving now For those of you that stick around, this is war And for the cultured here, you should know that... War never changes. Good luck. The cursor clicks the “Leave” button at the top of the window. You pull your face out of the monitor, and shove it into the screen of one of the laptops that Rae left you. The cursor hovers over a link labeled “Dreamscape! TalkCity” and double clicks it. ... A list of chatrooms drops down. You click the bottom most one, labeled “Staff”. The chatroom window opens. Wackadoo! Raelyn Miller (tech.cinnapoodle@chronospace.eve) has joined the chat! gazingatthemoon: Well, well, well... If it isn’t the traitor! What brings you here, snake? You’ve seen how she talks. cinnapoodle: I double-crossed him. I sabotaged those macros I made for him, effectively rendering him offenseless. gazingatthemoon: Good. It’s nice to see some of you still have sense. patrickhobbs: AND RESPECT! DON’T FORGET RESPECT, KATE! gazingatthemoon: Yes, and respect too... Anyways, we know they’re planning a revolt against us, so we need to simply use what we have; which is power, to hit them even harder. mewis: That’s not too hard. They’ve got nothing, we’ve got everything. We win automatically. cinnapoodle: Their revolt starts today, so we need to hit them before they can execute it. patrickhobbs: EXACTLY! gazingatthemoon: Are you OK, Rae? Something seems... off, about you. cinnapoodle: What do you mean? gazingatthemoon: You’re not usually this... professional. Not even during the break-in earlier this year. A window with an eye on it opens. sudokoko: because it isn’t her. hello wade :) You have been disconnected from TalkCity. [DISCONNECT FROM CHAT; REMOVED BY ADMINISTRATOR] They’ve found you out, obviously. It’s time. You pull your face out of the monitor, and turn around to look at your friends. You: Let’s do this. On the computer, various instant messenger notifications relating to starting a charge appear. You grab the user creation macro and plug it into one of the laptops. ... 3... 2... 1. Click! You turn the macro on. You grab the phone line hijack macro and plug it into the other laptop. Click! You turn this one on too. On the computer, the server is very obviously starting to slow down, as the animated elements are chugging along. Perfect. You shove your face into the monitor. The cursor hovers over the “Refresh” button at the top of the window and clicks it. Extremely sluggishly, the main Web portal loads, and, for a brief moment, the Chronospace staff links were visible and active. You hit the Refresh button a few more times, with the wait time becoming longer for each subsequent press. Finally, the Web portal loads, with all of the staff links in clear view. The cursor right clicks on all of them one after the other, opening them in new tabs, before clicking on a link labeled “Dreamscape! Server Management”. A site related to technical stuff about Dreamscape! loads briefly, before cutting to a black screen. They’ve booted you out automatically. The server needs to become slower before you can load the server management page, so you click on a tab labeled “Dreamscape! User Info”. A site related to users; new ones, updated ones and deleted ones loads up. The list of new users is absolutely freaking out from the amount of fake accounts being made every millisecond. You click on a tab labeled “Dreamscape! Moderation Panel”. Now we’re talking. A moderation panel opens up. You can exploit this. Due to how slow the server is, it doesn’t seem to be loading the authentication keys to stop a team member from being banned, so naturally, you type in various team member names and hit the ban button. And oh boy, is it glorious. admin.gazingatthemoon@chronospace.eve has been permanently banned. mod.chandlerj@chronospace.eve has been permanently banned. tech.sudokoko@chronospace.eve has been permanently banned. Could not ban admin.patrickhobbs@chronospace.eve. Reason: [NO ACCESS] What? The browser window begins to garble and distort, changing colors in the process. They’re obviously unhappy with what you’re doing. Pulling your face out of the monitor, you look at one of the laptops to see hundreds of users joining TalkCity, overloading it. It’s beautiful... Wallace: I have no clue what the hell Rae was thinking, but it’s doing wonders! The moment of pride is ruined by Betty asking a concerning question. Betty: Wade... why do you have it so hot in here? You: What? I set the thermostat to like, 50 degrees! Betty: That is not 50 degrees, Wade. She’s right... your thermostat is rising in temperature. You: They probably hacked it. Wallace: Hacked it? How do you hack a thermostat? Betty comes to a horrible realization. Betty: Because he has a smart thermostat! They’re raising the temperature on us! Wallace: What? You: They can’t get to us directly... so they’re trying to smolder us to death. Wallace: Oh, HELL no!!! You shove your face back into the monitor. Everything is going to shit. The browser is glitched beyond recognition. To make matters worse, Mr. Hobbs is leaving you some wonderful messages in the center of the screen. GET OUT GET THE FUCK OUT YOU’RE NOT WANTED SO YOU’RE NOT NEEDED Nice of him to ask, but you’ll have to decline. You click a tab labeled “Dreamscape! Promotion Panel”. This is where it gets devious. Since the server can’t load any authentication stuff, you can give anyone anything. You type your screenname in and hit “Promote to Administrator”. user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve has been promoted to Administrator. In the corner, a notification appears. “Your screenname has changed! Your new screenname is admin.wadebraid@chronospace.eve.” Bitchin’. You begin typing a large amount of names into the panel, hitting “Promote to Administrator” for each and every one. STOP STOP THAT YOU CANNOT HIDE FOREVER WADE WE WILL FIND YOU CHRONOSPACE IS UPON US Does he ever shut up? It’s getting hotter in your room. Betty: Wade... Do something! You pull your face out of the monitor and look at the thermostat. 79° It’s only gonna get hotter. You shove your face back into the monitor. The server is now slower than a snail. Maybe the server management panel will load now! You click on the tab and reload it. Bingo. The server management panel loads up. You click a link labeled “Extremely Advanced Server Options”. A lot of volatile looking options are visible to you. 85° From restarting the server to changing parts about it to changing who the owner is to even shutting it down for good, the possibilities are endless. You click the link labeled “Permanently Disable Dreamscape!”. You’re blocked from accessing it. The server isn’t slow enough. 90° You and your friends’ incessant panting echoes through the room. You’re sweating bullets. GET A GRIP WADE YOU CAN'T STOP THE INEVITABLE CHRONOSPACE WILL DOMINATE THE DIGITAL SPACE CHRONOSPACE IS UPON US Shut the fuck up. You click the link labeled “Change Elements”. 95° Your head hurts. You can’t tell if you’re seeing things or not. Betty: Shit... Wallace: Do something, already! You: I’m trying! It’s not slow enough! Wallace: Well, then make it slower! You: How?! Wallace: I DON’T KNOW, MAN! You pull your face out of the monitor and shove it into a laptop screen. You click on the chatroom labeled “General”. ... The chatroom window opens. Wackadoo! Raelyn Miller (tech.cinnapoodle@chronospace.eve) has joined the chat! cinnapoodle: List There are 726 other people in this chatroom right now. There are too many users to list on screen. A large flood of messages of people revolting, freaking out and anything in between fills the screen. 100° Your room has surpassed human body temperature! Congratulations! WADE CAN YOU FEEL THE HEAT? I KNOW I CAN ONE OF YOUR RAT BASTARD FRIENDS HACKED THE TEMPERATURE HERE TOO WE BOTH DIE TOGETHER SEE YOU IN HELL YOU MORON You’re not dying today. You pull your face out of the laptop and shove it back into your computer monitor. You click back to the index of the advanced server options, and click the server shut down link once more. This time, it loads. You’re on a timer, though. Behind you, you can hear something upsetting. Betty: Wade... Wa... Wade... Do something... THUD!!! Wallace: BETTY! Wade, she... WADE, BETTY’S DOWN!!! WADE, DO SOMETHING!!! The Internet needs you, but so do your friends. You’re too far in to give up now. 105° You click through the many, many, MANY buttons designed to deter a user from shutting the server down. YOU CAN’T STOP ME, PATRICK. YOU SMASH YOUR HAND AGAINST THE MOUSE OVER THE “Permanently Shut Down Dreamscape! For Good (It can’t be reversed!)” BUTTON. Nothing happened. Nothing happened...? Nothing happened! Wait, nothing happened! Something was supposed to happen! The server is too slow for it to even shut down! 110° THUD!!! Wallace is down too. You can barely breathe. You want to lay down, but you can’t... The Internet... it... it needs you... it needs me... The voice of the corrupt CEO echoes through the monitor. How does it feel, Wade? How does it feel to know you’ve failed? Does Hell’s inferno feel good? Can you feel your blood, and your internal organs start to boil? Face it, kid. You were nothing. Not even from the moment you signed on for the first time. And now... all of that work... it... it’s for nothing! You’re dead! And with your death, the Internet can go back to being what it should be! A dystopia for anyone to roam free! Goodbye, twerp. 115° On the computer, a hopeful sound plays, as the voice of your former colleague echoes through your room. BEEP! R: Oops! Sorry to... butt in, unannounced, but I’m afraid you’ve overstayed your welcome... Patrick. 120° You collapse out of your chair and onto the floor. R: I’ll just put it bluntly: You’re not a businessman, you’re a monster. R: You led all of these hopeful down-on-their-luck teenagers and young adults to an early death, and for what? Satisfaction? It can’t be that... you’re too much of a proper man for that! 125° You can’t see. You can only faintly hear two voices echo through your room... R: No... only a MONSTER would. But now that I stand here, from afar... I see no difference between the two, Patrick. All you ever did was complain! When we did the right thing, COMPLAIN! When we did the wrong thing, COMPLAIN! When we lived our lives- P: You’re nothing, Raelyn! You’re just another stuck up, single digit moron who made the wrong choice! I gave you another chance! I GAVE YOU A PURPOSE!!! YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE THE GOOD ONE IN A WORLD OF NOBODIES!!! You were supposed to lead the way when I was dead and gone, but no... You had to go and FUCK IT ALL UP!!! 130° R: I guess that makes us BOTH fuck-ups, then! You don’t know how satisfied I was seeing you fall out of that stupid fucking chair onto your fat ass, smoldering to death. Oh, yeah, that’s right. I can see you, Patrick. And I can see you too, Wade... Poor boy, poor poor boy... P: When I find you again... YOU’RE A DEAD WOMAN! A DEAD ONE!!! R: Oh believe me, Patrick... 135° I know. And you’re coming with me. We will face the devil together, you moronic waste of flesh and blood. 140° You: Rae... I’m... I'm sorry... I... I would have never started this if... if I stayed out... R: You don’t have to apologize for anything, Wade. It’s THIS prick who has to apologize! P: FUCK YOU!!! R: FUCK US BOTH, YOU ASSHOLE! 145° BEEP! F: So... I see the spore blossom finally meets his end. How are you, Patrick? P: You! You... You! F: What about me, Patrick? Is this some attempt at insulting me I can’t comprehend? *gag* F: Awwww, is the Big Bad Wolf not so big and bad anymore? P: Fuck... fuck... fuck... you... *vomiting* 150° You slowly pull your head off of the ground. R: Did you really expect everyone to be on your side, Patrick? No. We all ran off at the end. Fitting, since it all started with us running in. Remember that day? Why’d you have to go and terrorize us? You said it yourself, we were all like children to you. Looking at your friends, they’re not your friends anymore. They’re corpses. 155° F: Ah, yes... I remember that day. Where has the time gone? BEEP! M: Well, well, well! If it isn’t the crybaby of saints, crying his last tears. How do you do, Patrick? How do you like the sight of all of your best men and women watching you burn alive like an ant on a frying pan? Is it gut-wrenching? Good. 160° Your consciousness is slipping away like butter on a pan. Sluggishly, you climb to your feet and stumble towards your window, hitting your head against it in the process. P: *death rattle* R: You started Chronospace as a solution to a problem only you had. You kept pursuing the fix, with it always seeming so near... yet, it was so far away. Because it was never there to begin with. 165° You grab the red-hot windowsill and lift it up ever so slightly, before squirming your way through the window into a bush below. R: You thought you were running around a labyrinth, chasing after a fake hope... but in reality, you were just running in a circle. And you always ended up right back where you started from. Every. Single. Time. 170° R: *sigh* And to the kindred spirits who were, at first, my enemies, I wish there was something I could do for you now... but there isn’t. I’m sorry, kiddos... I’m sorry that this utter maniac sent you to an early, fiery death. I’m sorry that I couldn’t have done something for you sooner. I hope and pray that there is light for the three of you at the end of the tunnel... however long that tunnel may be. 175° You slowly stand up, soaked in sweat, before limping out of the bush and towards your street, running for the wind, never turning back. Freedom. R: As for you, sir... You can rot in Hell. Speaking of that... you shouldn’t keep Satan waiting for any longer, he’s really eager to meet you and the other monsters in this place. To all of the innocent souls who are burning in the halls... It’s time to rest. You didn’t deserve what you got, and I’m sorry for that. I hope that you can all find peace, wherever you may end up. 180° R: To my sweetheart, Molly, I’m sorry. I’m sorry that these monsters turned you into one of them, and I’m sorry that you were subject to the same fate as them. We will meet again, I’m sure of that. But the rest of you brainwashed monsters... you can all roam the halls of Hell’s domain. If any of you somehow make it into Heaven... you weren’t meant for Chronospace. 185° R: From me, the sane living souls, and all of the innocent souls cursed to their doom in the days past... This place will be forgotten. This is the end. For you, for me, for all of us. Burn in Hell, Patrick. *gunshot* THUD! 190° F: Wade... I take it you... didn’t use the gun I gave you? Fair. You didn’t seem like a kid who fought, anyways. You preferred to fight your fights on-line. Hell, maybe me and you will see each other again... we might become good friends. See you around, kid. BEEP! 195° M: And so, with a less than fiery inferno, Chronospace meets its end. It would’ve been a shame, but... you know. Regardless, this place will not be remembered. If it is... we have failed as a society. I hope you and your friends are already resting easy, Wade. Even though you cannot hear me, I hope my message finds you well. If it doesn’t... well, then that’s my fault. Goodbye, everyone. End communication. BEEEEEP! 200° [CALL PAUSED; RECORDING STOPPED] [NOTICE OF CESSATION] [SUBJECT: WALLACE MONROE CLARK JR.] [CAUSE: Subject died as a result of internal overheating. Body claimed by family members.] [NOTICE OF CESSATION] [SUBJECT: BETTY LORRAIN KRISTOFF] [CAUSE: Subject died as a result of internal overheating. Body claimed by family members.] [NOTICE OF TERMINATION] [SUBJECT: RAELYN MILLER] [REASON: Demonstration of exceedingly poor judgment; subject used Chronospace issued weapon on herself.] [ASSIGNMENT TERMINATED; OUTCOME NOT VIABLE] [REASSIGNMENT WILL BE ISSUED ON: NO REASSIGNMENT PLANNED] End of tape. You push yourself away from the monitor, mouth agape in shock. "Fuck..." You mutter to yourself. On an adjacent monitor, several voice-chatroom users voice their concern and disbelief for the tapes, equally shocked as you are. The chatroom's name? The Dreamscape! Archival Project. You get up out of your chair and walk out of the room, going outside for fresh air. Stepping outside, you inhale sharply and stretch your back, before looking up at the moon. Your hair lightly flows with the wind as the moonlight reflects off of your glasses. Behind you, "Oh, Kay... You should really move on, already." You turn around to find a long-haired pale man standing before you, wearing a tank top and jean shorts. "You know I can't. There's so much stuff the world has to see!" You perk up as your partner tilts his head. "Really, now? It feels like you've been at this for ages, now..." He steps over and looks up at the moon with you. "It just feels like... I can do something for once, and not be ignored. I'm not some pretty princess anymore, I'm a... I'm a... I'm a fuckin' queen." "Damn right you are." You pull a paper out of your pocket before unfolding it and looking at it. Your partner exhales sharply upon looking at the poster. Missing Person Issued by the Pittsburg, Pennsylvania Police Department Wade Morgan Harris Date of Birth: May 26th, 1981 (42 years old as of May 26th, 2023) Last Seen: November 5th, 1999 Notes: Victim had long brown shoulder length hair, exhibiting curls. Victim's jaw was crooked slightly. Victim had heterochromia. Harris disappeared on the 5th of November in 1999, and has not been profiled or located since. A search party, comprised of Harris' family, friends and law enforcement was launched on the 12th of November in 1999, though Harris remains missing and is suspected to have fled to California. Any reappearances should be reported to the Pittsburg, Pennsylvania Police Department. "I know that the Dreamscape! hacker is out there somewhere, Jö. He's got to be." "Why do you care so much? For all we know, he died in the Boom ages ago." "Are you kidding? I've got so much to ask him! 'How'd you make the macros?' 'Where'd you come from?' 'What even happened?'" "Calm down, girlie. Leave him to the police." Your partner looks off into the distance. "They'll find him eventually." "Yeah, but..." "No buts. Now, let's get inside. You can get back to talking about all this with your friends after dinner." "Sure thing, love." As your partner walks back inside, you spot a silhouette with a single bright blue eye crouched down, staring at you from afar. Raising your hand up as though to wave, the figure stands up and turns around, walking away. You look around for a bit before walking back inside and to your computer. The cursor hovers over the "Leave Call" button. Click. ♫ - CANYON.MID - WASD (https://wasdband.bandcamp.com/track/canyon-mid) CHRONOSPACE DREAMSCAPE! THE FINAL CUT Adapted from Julie Bell's CHRONOSPACE DREAMSCAPE! THE ORIGINAL CUT (https://c.hrono.space/) Inspired by Jay Tholen's 'Hypnospace Outlaw', Red Barrels' 'OUTLAST' and Daniel Myrick & Eduardo Sánchez's 'The Blair Witch Project' Created by Julie "whiskerpillar" Bell, SKCro and brew_. (akidwithatophat) Story Personnel: Story, writing, in-story websites: whiskerpillar Website CSS and icon management: SKCro Website layout and coding: brew_. WebTV images (The Original Cut): nitrate92 Featuring: The Reader (you) as Wade Harris/user.wadebraid@chronospace.eve whiskerpillar as Raelyn Miller/tech.cinnapoodle@chronospace.eve sudokoko as Molly Kourtner/tech.sudokoko@chronospace.eve Barbara Scott as Barbara Kornell/tech.thephreakingsky@chronospace.eve Scott “Scotty Boy” Harris as himself/admin.mewis@chronospace.eve Chandler Jenkins as himself/mod.chandlerj@chronospace.eve/the intruder Eevi Mäkelä as herself/Chronospace revolt member #1 Johnathan “Nessie” Norbert as himself/Chronospace revolt member #2 Ahti Koskinen as himself/Chronospace revolt member #3 Beatrice Herron as herself/Chronospace revolt member #4 SKCro as himself/user.skcro@chronospace.eve brew_. as himself/user.brewradio@chronospace.eve melaneykitty as user.bluuudroks25661@chronospace.eve lunasother as user.omegablazerxzv@chronospace.eve caughtfishing as himself/user.caughtfishing@chronospace.eve eggplantpizza as user.littledog@chronospace.eve Nolan “nolannips” Hicks as himself/user.nolannips@chronospace.eve JarHead as himself/user.jarhead@chronospace.eve [RECORDING FINISHED] [END CALL; THE END]