#entity!gojo

Stupid, stupid, stupid—

After you spoke, the tapping didn't stop again. The noise was constant, and you were fairly sure it was getting faster and louder by the moment.

You didn't want to run back the way you had come, but you definitely weren't about to stick around where you were when there was clearly another mysterious entity nearby. Trying your luck with the pretty one had been foolish enough; you had no doubt that you had already wasted all the good fortune you were due to be awarded for the rest of your life.

The void above the red water slide made you think of a great, inky eye, which was possibly the furthest thing from comforting.

But what other choice did you really have? Your heroic entity was gone, and you were running short on options. The hole above the slide was at least small enough that a larger monster would struggle to fit inside.

Pushing yourself to your feet, you took a deep breath, attempting to manually center yourself.  You needed to keep your wits about you; mistakes like the one you had just made would get you killed.

The knocking was getting louder. The sound was bordering on insistent, as if whatever was on the other side was realizing that you weren't planning to open the door for it.

You shuffled up to the tiled edge of the pool, peering down into the water. It wasn't very deep; the water probably wouldn't come up past your knees once you got in. The memory of falling in was still fresh, the stark terror you had felt as you were uncontrollably swept toward the great hole in the river room even more so.

The water was predictably hot, which was interesting because none of the spouts you had sampled produced warm water. There wasn't time to think about the thermodynamic inconsistencies in your environment. If you were lucky, you might live long enough to speculate later.

Wading through the warm water, you tried to avoid sloshing around too much just in case the noise further agitated the knocker. You could feel the water seeping into your clothes, bringing with it a pronounced sense of dread.

Standing before the slide, you didn't have the opportunity to question your choices before the incessant knocking escalated to banging.

Gripping the sides of the shiny, red slide, you hauled yourself up out of the water. Your boots had still been somewhat wet before getting back in the water, but you had forgotten just how heavy they became when they were completely soaked. You scrambled upward, lodging the soles of your shoes against the edges of the slide to anchor yourself as you climbed.

Whatever laid beyond the void at the end of the slide didn't become any more visible as you neared it, which wasn't encouraging.

The sound of something slamming into the door behind you was plenty encouraging though.

The sudden, violent increase in intensity surprised you enough that you lost your footing briefly, your boot squeaking against the smooth plastic as you scrambled to keep yourself from falling backward. You caught the edges of the slide, gripping them hard enough to make your hands hurt.

You had nearly reached the top when you heard metal groaning. Whatever was on the other side of the door had increased its efforts too, and it sounded like it wouldn’t be long before it was able to breach the door.

Diving forward into the hole, you barely made it over the threshold before you heard the door give. The tunnel was too narrow for you to properly turn around. Not that you found yourself wanting to do so, but the tight space limited your field of vision too much for your comfort. You strained your neck, eyes scanning the room for the threat.

It was like an explosion. The vault door flew off its hinges, sailing into the opposite wall. You heard tile crack as it hit, followed by a thunderous splash as the door tumbled into the shallow pool.

The sound came just before you saw it.

Ragged breathing.

It stepped through the open doorway. For a moment, it looked like a human child. Young, maybe six or seven, androgynous, wearing an oversized, ratty pair of overalls.

The way it moved was off though, and there was something in its dark eyes that frightened the animal in you.

“Help—” It called. “Help, help—”

The sound of its little voice raised all of the hair on your body.

You could see more detail as the entity wandered past the slide, revealing a sight that made you want to get away as quickly as possible.

The entire backside of the entity was hollow. It looked as if the majority of its body had long since rotted away, leaving behind an empty shell. It almost made you think of a cicada husk, though you didn't want to speculate on what might have left such a thing behind.

“I want my mama—” The entity whined. “Please help me—”

It was trying to lure you in, just the same way that it had done by knocking. The hollow child didn’t appear to be all that smart, but it did seem to know what was most likely to work. If you had ended up here with no knowledge of your surroundings, you might have clung to the possibility that there was another person around, even if that person was a lost child.

Its disguise wasn’t nearly as convincing as your entity’s though, and no sane person would believe that a human child could break an inoperable vault door apart.

The hollow child dragged itself along, head swiveling as it took in its environment. It didn’t even look your way, apparently not recognizing where you were hiding as a potential route for escape. The small entity moved toward the tunnel, its empty eyes trained on the most obvious exit. It kept calling, its increasingly desperate vocalizations echoing through the space as it entered the tunnel.

It was only when the disturbing thing was out of your view for a few beats that you realized you had been holding your breath. Releasing a shaky exhale, you tried to keep quiet just in case it was still lurking nearby.

Only when its calls finally faded did you dare turn to face the darkness before you. 

You couldn't see anything, which was minutely less terrifying than what you had just witnessed. Using your hands, you felt all along the walls around you.

The space was tube-shaped, almost like a pipe. The walls were all smooth stone with no seams or imperfections. There was no water flowing, which suggested that the water and foliage somehow manifested at the connection between this area and the slide. 

Wormholes were just speculation, even in your highly theoretical field, but every moment you spent in this place made their existence seem more and more feasible.

You put a cautious hand forward, feeling for any changes in the material beneath you. It all seemed stable, so you started moving.

Not even a minute had passed before you heard that uneven breathing echoing behind you.

Whipping your head around, you could see small silhouette at the top of the slide.

It felt as if someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over you, the sort of shock that shorted your brain and kick-started your heart.

You didn't stop to think about it, you just launched yourself forward, crawling at maximum speed away from the thing behind you. You didn't have to look to know; that unnatural creature was giving chase.

“Help me—help me, please—”

Every word the empty child spoke motivated you to move faster. It sounded like it was getting closer, which only made you push yourself harder.

There wasn't any warning. One moment, there was nothing but darkness before you and solid ground beneath you, and the next you were falling through blinding brightness.

Down, down, down, your stomach dropped as you plummeted toward a mottled rainbow floor.

Below you was an enormous ball pit, a sea of color that stretched almost endlessly in every direction. You hit with a resounding smack, sinking into the deep pit of plastic balls. They flew everywhere in your panic, producing a cacophony of hollow sounds as you attempted to pull yourself toward the surface.

When you broke through to open air, the very first thing you did was look upward.

Far above you was a plain ceiling with a single missing tile. In that dark space through which you had just fallen, the terrifying child entity stared down at you. You couldn’t make out its expression, but you got the impression that it wasn’t willing to follow you down into the ball pit. You watched each other for a long moment, and when you dared to blink, you found that the entity had disappeared in the brief moment that your eyes were closed.

Its newfound absence was much less reassuring than it had been the first time.

You watched the space above you for a long time after that, trying to keep yourself from shifting in a way that would cause you to sink further into the pit. Only when you were fairly sure that you were alone again did you finally begin taking in your surroundings.

The area was almost entirely ball pit. The balls varied somewhat in size, though none appeared to be much larger than your head or smaller than your fist. You had no idea how deep the pit was, and you certainly weren’t curious to find out. While initially you had not been able to spot an exit, now that you were stationary, you were able to see a wall covered in colorful, abstract wallpaper some distance away.

While you weren’t sure you would be able to reliably swim through solids, allowing yourself to die in a ball pit definitely wasn’t an option for you.

It took you some time to figure out how to move without immediately sinking. Orienting yourself to be more horizontal helped, though it wasn’t easy to stay at the perfect angle, because the best leverage came from your feet pushing against pockets of more densely packed balls.

You were still moving forward though—until something brushed up against your leg.

The sudden sensation caused you to freeze. You looked around you for some evidence that you weren’t alone, scanning the endless, rainbow sea of orbs. The actual movement was so subtle you almost missed it, a flash of something solid, matte, and smooth. Were it not for the shifting of the balls, you might have dismissed it entirely. The plastic ocean arched and dipped, moving as if there was something traveling beneath the surface.

Something huge.

The idea was enough for you to immediately prioritize speed. You worked harder, making the most of every opportunity to get even a millimeter closer to your goal.

You were making decent progress until whatever was with you in the pit touched you again.

The reaction you had was one part mindless panic, one part intentional attempt at defense. You shrieked, kicking out hard. You flailed both legs like it might ward off whatever had just touched you, but you only succeeded in sinking deeper into a particularly loose patch of plastic balls. You weren’t too far down, maybe one or two layers deep into the pit, but it seemed like all of the more sure footing had dissolved around you. Sinking a little deeper, you found your fear addling your mind as you tried and failed to resurface.

Predictably, your frenzy seemed to only encourage whatever was after you. You could track its movement based on the displacement of balls around you. It seemed to be circling you, pressing in tighter each round.

You barely caught a glimpse of it the next time it bumped into you.

It came at you from behind, pushing against your thigh before swiftly retreating. The creature had tough, navy skin, its texture almost exactly like that of a vinyl mat one might encounter in a gym. What you saw must have been its tail, a great fin that cut through the plastic sea with ease.

There wasn’t time to consider its nature before you felt something firmly clamp down on one of your ankles. You were yanked downward, descending rapidly through the balls.

Screaming, you kicked to free yourself, just slipping out of the vinyl creature’s jaws.

You could see it more clearly now. It seemed to be made of vinyl mats, its chunky body stitched together with thick, high durability thread. Pushing against it, you used the side of its body as launchpad to jump upward, soaring toward open air. You didn't break the surface, but the success gave you motivation and a plan.

Waiting for the next strike, you kept your eyes moving, looking for the signs that the vinyl monster was nearing.

It went for your calf this time. You quickly slipped your legs upward, tucking them tight against your torso before angling your feet to jump off the solid body of the creature again. Over and over, you waited patiently for the strange monster to strike, using it as leverage to slowly bring you to the surface.

It was only when you finally made it to the light that you realized you weren't sure if you would be able to use the same method to get out of the pit entirely. You were already so tired, your mouth dry, your muscles fatigued, and your head swimming with the effort of overcoming it all. The adrenaline was making you push through your limits, but the wall you were sure to soon hit was already looming over you.

There wasn't time to consider your circumstances further, because your potential escape had evidently driven the thing going after you to work harder. It had you by the joint this time, its huge maw trapping your knee as it pulled you back down. You managed to free yourself again, but only after the creature's hold inexplicably loosened.

It started circling you again, slowly closing in while you tried to even out your breathing.

Maybe this was its strategy. The monster might have just been toying with you from the start, exhausting you for fun before it did whatever predators made of plastic and foam did to things like you.

This wasn't over until it was over though.

You steadied your mind, taking a deep breath while you tried to spot your adversary. You actually felt it coming, recognizing the sound and vibration in the hollow plastic around you.

This time, you jumped diagonally, making real progress toward the wall. It was difficult to stay oriented, especially as the vinyl beast adapted to your change in approach. It was coming faster now, perhaps sensing that you had the potential to actually elude it if given the opportunity.

That worked to your benefit though. You were getting a hang of the rhythm now, instinctively moving with the push and pull of the plastic surrounding you. The ball pit truly was an ocean in a strange way. It was almost like you were moving through a liquid on a molecular level rather than experiencing it macroscopically.

You were gaining significant distance thanks to the monster's urgency. If you could just keep it up for a little longer—

Something strange caught your eye.

Striding over the surface of the pit was the pretty entity that had saved you earlier. He moved across the balls as if they were a solid surface, showing no signs of sinking as he went. As he neared, you could see that there was a disturbing look on his face, a mix of fury, elation, and excitement swirling in his expression.

The arrival of your entity distracted you just long enough for the vinyl monster to have its chance. It caught you by the arm this time, its huge, padded teeth closing around your limb much more tightly than before. You cried out as you were jerked under again, fighting against the hold on you.

There was barely sufficient time for you to understand as it happened. Your limb was suddenly freed, and then you were catapulted clear out of the pit. You sailed through the air, landing just shy of the wall you had been headed toward. 

As you tried to make sense of your new location, you realized that the pit was shallow by the wall. You could actually stand, feet unsteady on the tough, plastic netting beneath them. The rainbow sea topped out around your waist, and there was a small ledge nearby where you could see the green, mesh netting was anchored. You started fleeing, hurrying through the balls toward the solid edge by the wall. Only when you were finally free of the pit did you turn your attention back to it.

At first, you couldn't see either entity, you could only see approximately where they were. The pit was shifting violently where they fought, balls moving around them in big waves as the commotion escalated.

Your entity appeared first, erupting from the pit with such force that it sent sprays of color in every direction. He crouched down on the shifting surface beneath him, scanning the environment.

The vinyl monster breached next, looking much less whole than you had initially known it to be. Large chunks of its body were missing, dense yellow foam bursting from tears in its skin.

Your entity was on the beast immediately, his hands grabbing at its open wounds. He threw the monster up into the air, and for the first time you were able to get a true sense of its form. It was something like an enormous shark, though it seemed to be entirely made up of man-made material. It thrashed in the air before your entity caught it on the way down. The second time your entity threw the vinyl creature, it was toward the wall you were standing by.

The vinyl shark hit the wall with a loud thud, bouncing off of the ledge and into the pit, seemingly stunned by the impact.

Your entity materialized near it, ripping into its foamy flesh. At first, the beast writhed about, but its fight quickly waned as more pieces of it were lost. It was only when the vinyl shark could do little more than twitch and squeak that your entity decided it was finished with its work.

He turned to you, moving with an urgency that spoke of relief.

Maybe you were projecting though, because relief had become your dominating emotion. Your entity had come to your rescue again, appearing out of nowhere for the second time just to save you.

You wondered if the people you worked for knew about things like him, about beings that bent and broke reality at will, creatures who rewrote the laws of physics as you understood them whenever it served them.

As your beautiful entity drew nearer, an irrational, selfish, jealous part of you hoped they didn't know, and that they would never, ever find out.

The giant, rubbery entity that had attacked Satoru's creature deflated pathetically before him, releasing a withering squeal as it died. He made his way to the very edge of the pit, keeping his eyes trained on his trembling charge.

After witnessing such an intense display, Satoru expected his creature to shrink away from him again.

It didn't though. Instead, his creature leapt toward him, embracing him in its arms. It pulled him in tightly, sniffling softly against his chest. The rawness of it stirred something in him, a soft, warm feeling that he couldn't quite identify.

It made Satoru feel good, better than he could remember ever feeling. There was some kind of relief mixed in, like holding his creature provided necessary physical evidence that everything was as it should be. Though unfamiliar, the feeling felt correct, like it was some higher indulgence he had been missing out on.

Of all the feelings he had, violence came most naturally to Satoru. 

He was strong, stronger than any other being that he had ever encountered. It didn't take much for anything he did to become classifiable as harm. It had come to be something that he considered part of his nature, if not part of the true substance of his being.

Satoru could tell that his creature was different from him. 

Soft. Gentle. Sweet.

Weak.

Satoru looked down at the little thing in his arms, and suddenly realized that at some point he had started holding his creature back. He looked into those watery eyes and felt something more intense than mere pity.

It was unfair, wasn't it? 

Something like you ending up in a place like this would only end in one, predictable way. Satoru had seen it more times than he could count. There was plenty of evidence around marking the end of so many creatures like his. Left as you were, you would surely meet the fate you had so narrowly avoided up until now.

Another cruel casualty of the universe's indifference.

The thought of you falling victim to the same circumstances as nearly every other being who had the misfortune of slipping into his world upset Satoru more than he ever expected. This was becoming more than mere curiosity. This was something that Satoru didn't have a word for, a strange attachment that brought about emotions stronger than anything Satoru had felt in a very long time.

Looking down at you, Satoru found that he could only approximate the feeling with one, simple word.

Mine.

It was only after you calmed down that you realized the entity was carrying something with him.

He was wearing a backpack, the sort of standard-issue pack that your employer provided to exploration teams.

All things considered, that should have been concerning, but the only thought you had on recognizing the backpack was joy. In addition to basic survival supplies, those packs contained a water bladder, one that had the capacity to hold five liters of liquid. You reached for the pack eagerly, not bothering with polite words.

However, it seemed that the entity understood you well enough that perhaps you should have.

“Need water.” The entity hummed, handing the pack over with a big grin.

The pack’s bladder was completely full, and it appeared that none of the other rations or supplies had even been touched. There was a small, dark stain on one side of the backpack, which you elected to ignore. You drank from the attached nozzle eagerly, finding yourself unbothered by how stale the water tasted.

Only once you had your fill did you turn your attention back to your entity.

“Thank you.” You rasped.

The entity’s smile grew, his beautiful, blue eyes crinkling in the corners.

“Pretty, strong~” He said, exuding an obvious pride. “Helping~”

“Yes, thank you for helping me again.” You nodded toward the pack. “I'm sorry that I was mean to you before. I was scared.”

“Scared?” The entity asked, furrowing his brow.

You laughed softly despite yourself.

“Not anymore.”

The eyes reflect truths that can't be trusted, the heart beats with veracious sorrows long covered.

Schwarzchild Drainhole by 缺省 (default)

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taglist: @mariaaaaaa045

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The task of reaching your new goal was more arduous than you had expected. Some of the rivers were quite wide, and you had already been forced to turn around and try a different path on two separate occasions.

Your next jump would be particularly challenging. There wasn't much room on the walkway between the two rivers, and there was even less space available on the slippery surface where you needed to land. Some of the canals were visibly more shallow, but others were deep enough that you couldn't see the bottom, and the foreboding hole that each of them ultimately led to made you even more wary of falling in. In the face of your mounting fatigue, you were finding yourself wondering if the entire endeavor was pointless.

It was that same, primitive part of you that urgently pushed you forward anyway.

The result was disastrous; you landed wrong, causing one of your knees to slam into the wet tile. You hissed in pain, rolling to sit on your ass so you could assess the damage. Your jumpsuit was still intact, but the outer material around your knee was now frayed. You pulled the leg of your jumpsuit up momentarily to inspect your injury. It wasn't bad enough to require immediate attention, but the significant scrape was already oozing blood. You could feel said blood dripping down your leg as you stood, a deep ache blossoming through the joint as you tested your weight on it.

There wasn't much to be done for it. If anything, your injury motivated you to keep moving, providing just enough adrenaline to sharpen your mind. All you needed to do was focus on the next jump, and then the jump after that, and so on until you made it to the green tunnel. It wasn't far now, maybe five or six rivers away, and all of those distances appeared to be much more manageable than the one you had just cleared.

You were so locked in that you very nearly overlooked it.

It was just a feeling at first, a pressing reminder from your brain that you weren't safe. The sensation did little to prepare you for what came next. You had already made it halfway by then. Breathing heavily, you were steadying yourself for your next leap when something deep within you told you to look to your side. 

A shadow emerged from one of the tunnels nearby, a dark, ominous presence that made you wonder if you had ever actually been afraid before then. It was almost too alien for your brain to comprehend, the sort of creature only approximated in horror media, a being plucked straight out of an eldritch nightmare.

The best descriptor your mind could find for the monster was ‘soupy’. Though it appeared to be made of flesh, it wasn’t quite a proper solid. The thing's viscous body dripped, its form more loose than should have been possible. Big, wet pieces of it sloughed off onto the floor and into the water, the lost bits swimming aimlessly around the main body. Occasionally, one of the pieces rejoined the goopy source, rearranging its form in unnatural ways as it moved.

The wicked smell hit you next, a putrid scent that reminded you of a mix of formaldehyde and the summer that your elderly, agoraphobic neighbor had died while your family was on vacation.

You couldn’t stop yourself from gagging, which seemed to catch the monster’s attention, its melted face turning toward you.

You froze under its gaze, spellbound by the echoing dread in its empty eyes. The two of you held eye contact for a moment, like you were both so caught by the unexpected appearance of the other that it rendered the two of you unable to decide how to respond.

The monster recovered before you did. It made a terrifying noise, a vocalization that was reminiscent of scraping metal, the sound of different, screeched frequencies all layered on top of one another. The creature’s cry wormed its way into your brain, causing your thoughts to stutter. The stimulation was painful to process, a sound so overwhelming that it bordered on debilitating.

The sight of it moving toward you shook you from your state of abeyance. 

The monster’s approach was steady, though not incredibly fast. You only needed to cross a few more rivers, and then you would easily be able to outrun the thing. You made your next jump without any problems, the added incentive of a hostile entity making the feat much less daunting by comparison.

You were almost feeling confident after your next jump, the tangible triumph just within your reach.

The platform you landed on was excessively slippery. You slid on contact, your momentum propelling you straight into the water beyond. It was shockingly cold, the icy water soaking into the ribbed cuffs of your jumpsuit immediately. Your outfit wasn’t made for submersion, so the water-resistant inner layer slowly began to trap liquid as it seeped in, weighing you down as you tried to orient yourself. In your surprise, it was difficult to tell up from down, and in your panic, it was impossible to remember a way to rationalize direction.

Swiping blindly, you ended up making contact with a wall, but it was too slick for you to ground yourself properly. You could feel the current of the river pulling you, a flow even stronger and swifter than you had theorized. While you weren't exceptionally close to the void into which the canal drained, that was beginning to change at a rapid pace.

You were still floundering when something hauled you out of the water.

Hissing, clawing, and spitting, you essentially embodied the definition of an angry, wet kitten. You weren’t sure what sort of fight you could hope to put up against the nasty goo monster, but that didn’t mean you were ready to give up yet.

You were too addled by your sudden cold plunge to process much of what was going on.

The creature felt more solid than you expected. It was behind you, holding you under your arms as it dragged you backwards. Kicking and flailing wasn't accomplishing much. If anything, your struggle only made the monster grip you more tightly. 

It was another moment before you realized the true nature of your situation.

The slimy meat creature was in front of you, not behind. It was still advancing, though it seemed significantly less enthused than before. Its horrible vocalization had become quieter as well, the cacophonous sound now less imposing as it echoed off the tiled walls.

There wasn’t time for you to fully comprehend your circumstances before they changed again. You were deposited between two, adjacent partition walls, tucked into a space about half as wide as you were tall. The walls provided some protection from the monster’s screeching, and being concealed in the smaller space made you feel safer despite the knowledge that you definitely weren't.

Your brain caught up shortly after that.

Your rescuer was a person. You only caught the back of him as he strolled off, a tall man dressed in a fitted, black shirt and big, white pants. 

What followed was sickening. The wet, squelching sounds of flesh tearing were accompanied by the distorted shrieks of the monstrous creature, and something that almost sounded like unhinged laughter. Too scared to look, you scooched further into your hiding spot, hands over your ears in an attempt to drown out the noises.

You trained your eyes on the white wall in front of you, actively attempting to dissociate so that you wouldn't have to think about where you were and what was happening. Just then, an unidentifiable piece of offal slammed into the wall before you. The impact was so forceful that it actually caused the wall to crack, the loose, melty flesh disintegrating as it slid to the floor.

Despite the macabre nature of it, you couldn't bring yourself to look away. You watched the disgusting chunk of monster slowly dissolve into slime, the essence of it spreading across the wet floor.

It was over soon after that.

Your hands fell away from your ears. The only thing you could hear now was that constant roar of water falling. The relevant silence was deafening, a unique sort of tension that could only be born from the sudden cessation of such brutal violence. It was the kind of feeling that made time stop, the sort that seemed to stretch out the empty space between your heartbeats.

There wasn't any question as to what would happen next. The person who had helped you wouldn't simply make a quiet exit after such a display. You wanted to feel gratitude, but the only emotion you could muster was something akin to nauseating anticipation.

Perhaps he felt something similar, because he was taking his time reappearing. The seconds turned to minutes, and those minutes grew infinitely lengthier as you waited. When he finally came into view it was almost relieving, though the sight of him caused something in your brain to short circuit.

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Your savior was beautiful.

It wasn't just that he had come to your rescue either, the man before you was objectively one of the most attractive people you could have conceived.

Everything about him was flawless.

The clothes he was wearing had been partially shredded in his fight with the monster, revealing a heavily muscled body. His pale skin, though noticeably scarred, was radiantly youthful and healthy. His white hair, though a tousled mess, still fell nicely around his face. And said face, though spattered with what appeared to be blood and viscera, was perfectly symmetrical.

Everything about him was also horrifying. 

The man before you was too flawless.

There was something uncanny about all of it. Everything from his strong, sculpted form, to his six, gorgeous, azure eyes. Something was just off. He was unnatural in a way you couldn't quite pinpoint, an imperfect detail that slipped away while you were distracted by the glamour of everything else.

Looking straight at him made you feel confused. Some ancient thing deep inside you knew that this person should have been setting off the same alarm bells that the monster he had just defeated did, but all you felt was the unsettling absence of fear.

The man smiled down at you, his perfect, white teeth remarkably free of the blood that trailed down the corners of his mouth.

“All clear.” He said confidently.

His voice sounded wrong. There was something in the timbre of it that was almost artificial in nature. It was as if he was just pretending to be able to mimic human speech, like he was forcing whatever structures existed inside his throat to conform to his desired reality.

You blinked up at him, caught up in the warring sensations that directly observing him evoked.

You might have been stuck like that forever if he hadn't reached for you.

The man's sudden movement broke the spell you were under. You whimpered, scrambling backward until you hit one of the partition walls you had been cowering behind.

Your savior flinched too, retracting his hand before putting on a pout that could only be rivaled by sad shelter puppies.

“Scared?” He cooed.

You nodded in response, too afraid to lie and too stupid to play dead.

He made a sound that you hoped meant he found your condition endearing. He reached for you again, though this time you didn't have anywhere to go. You pressed your back flush against the wall anyway, your eyes darting from side to side in search of a feasible option for escape.

Your rescuer's frown deepened. He crouched down low, making himself smaller as he tried to touch you for a third time. You didn't realize how badly you were shaking until his big hand wrapped itself around your forearm, a solid anchor that felt more real than anything else about him.

The look on his face was sympathetic if not pitying, an expression that might have soothed you if a real human was making it.

You hadn’t noticed that you were crying either, at least not until the beautiful entity swept your tears away with his thumb. He brought said thumb to his lips, licking it with visible curiosity. Whatever he gleaned from the unsettling action was unclear, but you found yourself believing that he had succeeded in gathering information of some kind.

Though the creature was proving himself more benevolent than malicious, that didn't stop the violent sobs that bubbled up in your throat. If anything, his perceived harmlessness gave you the permission to freak out that you had been denying yourself since arriving in this strange world.

To his credit, he did give you a moment to implode before tiring of your display.

The pretty thing pretending to be a man sighed dramatically, pushing a finger to your lips.

“Shhh—” He shushed you softly. “Shhh—quiet.”

Whether it was fear or the sheer aberrancy of his actions that did it, you couldn't be sure. Regardless, you began to sober up shortly after that. 

The entity seemed pleased with himself, smiling again as your breathing evened out.

“All clear.” He repeated. “Move out.”

Schwarzchild Drainhole by 缺省 (default)

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Satoru didn't know what to do.

He thought that he had finally gotten himself under control, but it had only taken a single moment of weakness to squander all of the care and planning he had put into securing his creature's trust. That fragile trust, spun glass in his hands, was pulverized into sand before he even had the opportunity to consider the consequences of what he was doing.

He had ruined it, had ruined everything in a moment of eagerness. A moment of selfishness.

The taste of your wariness hung in the air, thin and bitter, the acrid smell of your distress thickening each time you threw yourself at him. He could tell that you felt you needed to secure his interest, and he didn't know how to explain that it was already impossible for you to lose it. The bridge of communication that had been painstakingly built between you was suddenly too unsteady to cross.

Satoru didn't know how to fix it, but he was trying. He gave you space and time when you made it clear you wanted it, and he tried to anticipate every need before you had it. You weren't asking for what you wanted properly anymore, which led to Satoru overcompensating when you actually did, with the single, very frustrating exception of physical intimacy. You shrunk away from his touch even as you claimed to invite it, instinctive fear that Satoru had earned with his violation of your mind. You didn't remember what happened, Satoru had guaranteed that in his zealous over-correction, but he couldn't do anything about your natural proclivity for reading the residual energy left behind.

There was something about you that was different from so many other creatures that he encountered, a fundamental distinction in the nature of your energy that made you both alluring and troublesome. You could see glimpses of the real Satoru, could sense that he wasn't what he appeared to be. Up until he messed everything up, you had been able to shake off his uncanniness with relative ease.

Satoru felt stuck.

His relationship with you being unstable was an incredibly unpleasant feeling, and yet it was by far one of the most enthralling things that he could recall ever happening to him. While he would have preferred a scenario where you weren't suffering the effects of his ineptitude, this was still the most Satoru had felt about anything in a very long time. He thought that obtaining and keeping you would be the peak of possibility for his emotional capacity, but the potential of losing you in this way was an entirely new level of overwhelming intensity.

It worried him. His obsession was already more severe than he had ever expected it to become, and he hadn't coped with it well thus far.

Possessing you had changed something in him. It had given him the purpose that he lacked. It helped him look forward to the boring parts of his routine. It caused him think positively about the eternity that stretched out endlessly before him.

It had also made him volatile and territorial and greedy.

That was the main issue, the thing that had caused this instability in the first place. Satoru was hungry for you, starved of something that he never knew he needed. Too quick to indulge his urges, too eager to satiate his own needs, too ignorant to the problems forming as a result of his actions—it was a full-blown miracle that he hadn't accidentally killed you somewhere along the way.

Satoru wasn't used to making mistakes, so finding himself caught in an enormous web of them had caused it to be difficult to decide how he should move forward.

Maybe what you needed was not something that he could directly provide. You had presumably been independent before he came across you. Confident in a way that your meager survival skills should not have begotten, but independent nonetheless. Satoru had thought extensively about the ways he could provide you enrichment, but perhaps it would be most pertinent to give you the opportunity to remember what it was like to need him.

Satoru didn't want you to face any real danger. It was the reason he hadn't considered letting you roam outside the safety of the field in the first place. However, there might be some benefit to letting your leash out a little bit. Once you understood the significance of what Satoru offered you, you would surely come back to him on your own.

You just needed to be offered the appropriate experience.

It was surprising that it had taken so long for you to recognize your symptoms as burgeoning mental illness.

Obsessive thoughts, fear, sadness, irritability…the only reason you hesitated to call it zoochosis was because you didn't view yourself as a captive animal. Your entity might have considered you one, but he didn't have the words to describe what was happening to you. Satoru had certainly noticed your abnormal behavior, but you struggled to believe he might be able to fully comprehend the complex reasons behind your altered state.

In light of your realization, your fixation with the jungle made more sense. You were ruminating on that place because you were seeking some method of self-medication. The jungle could provide almost everything you had been craving. Space. Some variation. A sense of self-sufficiency. A little burst of novelty was all you needed, and a solo adventure to the jungle could be the ultimate fix.

Obviously, Satoru would be upset if he found out, but that only made the idea more enticing. The risk was alluring. You just had to time it right. If you waited for your entity to leave, you could probably get there and back without him noticing at all.

And if Satoru did notice? Well…the thought of his reaction to you wandering was almost as exciting as the trip itself.

꧁‧˖₊⋆˚·𓁿·˚⋆₊˖‧꧂

It was both motivation and opportunity when a new cache of supplies appeared.

While you had been primed to believe that the backpacks were simply scavenged from people who had died of causes other than Satoru, the sight of yet another team's worth of packs raised all the hair on your body. It was unfair of you to suspect Satoru of committing misdeeds, but at the same time, you were struggling to believe that all of the protein bars you consumed were ethically acquired.

The impulse to overprepare for your adventure had been driven by your scientist's precaution more than anything else. There was no real motivation behind it; even for all your newfound unease around Satoru, you weren't planning some grand escape. It was stimulation that you were seeking, not full-blown change. The backpack was insurance in the event that something went wrong, and would certainly provide a little drama if you were caught.

You kept repeating that reasoning to yourself as you rearranged the items in the pack over and over again. It was hard to predict how Satoru would take it if he came back to find both you and a backpack missing, but the idea of him being upset over it did make you a little giddy. A visit to the jungle might not even be necessary—you were starting to think that a show of possessiveness from your entity would fix you right up.

Of course, you knew that was ridiculous. This was objectively about more than validation and reassurance that your entity wanted you…but it was still nice to think about.

Regardless of your true motivations, you still found yourself back at the pond, staring up at that rock wall.

One would think that being seriously injured the first time around would have deterred you from trying again so eagerly. Unfortunately, Satoru's seemingly limitless ability to bend the laws of reality had arguably given you your very own god complex. The thought of potentially failing your task did float through your mind, but it was quickly vanquished by your overconfidence. It made you feel as if everything was on your side. Even the lily pad seemed to be on board, making its way over to where you were standing with astounding quickness. The snail was visible, stuck to a rock on the far edge of the pond, which only made you more assured that there would be no surprises to hinder you this time around.

The climb was easier the second time. The footholds felt wider, the rock less damp under your fingers. Without your jumpsuit, you had a little more freedom of movement, even though Satoru's pants were way too long for you. You had tied the clothes up as best you were able, but you could already feel the soft, billowy fabric coming undone as you made your way up the rock wall.

It was only once you were clinging to the edge of the crack that you realized your plan for this was half-baked at best. The pack wouldn't fit through the narrow space while it was on your back, and it would certainly get soaked if you managed to take it off and pass it through. The cave that laid between you and the jungle was almost completely underwater, but not very deep, leaving you with just enough room to crawl through with your head above the water. The current was strong enough that it would be easy to get swept away if you weren't careful, and there was no guarantee you would be able to keep hold of the slippery rock.

Under any other circumstances, the tight space and dangerous conditions would have been more than enough to prevent you from risking it. However, the goal being within your sight was enough to make you abandon all caution and persist. That, and getting back down on purpose wasn't looking any easier than pressing forward.

You shimmied the pack off of one shoulder, using its momentum to swing it off of the other shoulder and through the crack. Gripping the ledge for dear life, you hauled yourself up and through the gap, holding your breath as you briefly went below the surface. Luckily, it was easy enough to get your bearings, though you did nearly lose track of your pack in the dark. Once you had a solid grip on it, you set your eyes back toward the jungle and started to crawl.

꧁‧˖₊⋆˚·𓁿·˚⋆₊˖‧꧂

The jungle was almost like the a real-world botanical garden. You had to continuously remind yourself that this wasn't just a regular, indoor garden and that you were absolutely still in the backrooms.

It was somewhat humid, but the plentiful water, warmth, and light was likely what had allowed so many plants to flourish. There was a creek with a rocky bottom that fed the waterfall, the water source winding all throughout the space. While the jungle lacked walls in the same way the field did, it was still quite maze-like. Every so often, you would come across a tiny bridge made of stone, offering safe passage over the water.

The running water made a pleasant, peaceful sound, a gentle rush barely audible over the sound of instrumental spa music and recorded bird calls emanating from an unknown source.

It was beautiful. Breathtaking. Everything that you needed and more.

It was also incredibly overwhelming.

You weren't used to there being so much. So much to see, so much to hear, so much to smell—even the feeling of all the new textures were overstimulating to you. As distressing as it was, it was also wonderful. Maybe if you spent long enough here, you would get used to it, and then you could actually take in more than a few details at a time.

After wringing out your clothes, you began trekking further through the undergrowth, looking up at the warm, artificial light coming through the glassy ceiling. It was bright, just enough for the plants to get what they needed without being oppressive.

It was still hard for you to decide whether plants in the backrooms had the same needs as plants in the real world. It hadn't rained once in the field, yet the grass seemed to thrive. At the same time, it never grew taller or suffered from being crushed. You had wondered if you might be able to map the field out by creating desire paths, but no matter how often you walked the same route, there was never any change in the ground beneath your feet.

Ironically, just as that thought entered your mind, the path you were walking suddenly disappeared, plunging you down into darkness.

꧁‧˖₊⋆˚·𓁿·˚⋆₊˖‧꧂

Your cry of surprise followed by the wet sound of you hitting the ground echoed all around you, your blunder replayed over and over ad infinitum. How you didn't break something when you landed was a mystery. Your ass hurt, but overall you weren't injured…at least not physically.

"Motherfucker—that smarts." You hissed.

You recognized your surrounds as a parking garage, although it wasn't anything like one you had seen in real life. Everything around you was made of smooth, gray concrete. Huge, cylindrical columns were all around you, set in straight, evenly spaced rows that reached into the distance. While they appeared to be structural, you knew better than to assume they provided any actual support for the roof above. All they really did was obscure your view. Nearby you could see large, white arrows painted on the ground, although they didn't appear to actually indicate anything.

Looking up, there was no visible sign of any hole through which you could have fallen. Not that it would have mattered. The ceiling was too high up to reach, and there wasn't anything around that was suitable for you to climb on anyway.

Compared to where you had just been, this place was disturbingly empty. It felt more vacant than the field, the result of the lower ceiling and near complete lack of variation in color. You couldn't hear anything except for your heartbeat in your ears. While the inherently disorienting nature of the backrooms had become less impactful after all your time in the endless field, the dramatic change in scenery combined with the anxiety of being alone without any way for Satoru to find you was making you feel panicky.

Regret settled in almost immediately. You shouldn't have done this, shouldn't have dared to wander unfamiliar territory without your entity. While you had made some serious mistakes in the backrooms, this was possibly your worst idea ever.

You stood up, holding back tears as you adjusted your wet pack. Crying wouldn't help you, after all. All you could do now was try to help yourself.

Yuji wasn't particularly concerned with fixing everything that humanity had broken. It was too great a task, and even thinking of tackling it took him down a dark line of thought. Allowing himself to think of humanity as the true curses caused him to stray from his path, so he focused on the one thing he thought he could fix.

Yuji was old enough himself that he had started to feel like a bit of a myth. Sometimes he would hear or read about himself and feel that the person in the story wasn't him, but instead some legendary hero.

That was the way everyone spoke of Gojo Satoru. Not as the man that had been his mentor, but instead some fantastic creature who performed acts on par with that of a god.

It was true that Gojo Satoru was closer to god than man, but he had ultimately still been a man. Yuji couldn't let himself forget that fact, because if he did, he might end up thinking the same way that the people who had gotten the strongest sorcerer sealed away did. He couldn't risk viewing Gojo as something more than human, because then he might be able to justify giving up on finding him.

Besides, if anyone understood Gojo's situation, it should have been Yuji.

Locating the front gate had been the (relatively) easy part, but handling what had happened to it in a world without cursed energy was another problem entirely. The gate was inert when Yuji found it, completely unresponsive to every attempt to open it.

It was perhaps fortunate that the people handling the gate had viewed it the way that they did, because it had resulted in the only saving grace of the entire endeavor.

A bunker full of dangerous nuclear waste was an upsetting place to find Gojo Satoru laid to rest, but the resulting phenomenon meant that the gate could be manipulated in ways that might not have been afforded to them otherwise. The Prison Realm was inexplicable to the scientists that Yuji approached, which meant that they were willing to just about anything to explain it.

Once it was discovered that the gate was capable of absorbing and neutralizing unfathomable levels of ionizing radiation, Yuji practically had his pick of investors. There were a number of governments who had been unable to independently fund the project, but they had still contributed to the cause in hopes of reaping the benefits later. However, it was ultimately a private group that secured the future of the venture.

Yuji sometimes wondered if he was making the right choices, but it was hard to view this particular project as harmful overall. It was apparent that there were some sacrifices being made in the pursuit of understanding what had happened with the Prison Realm, but the eventual outcome would surely benefit every living creature on the planet.

A few test subjects might lose their lives along the way, but that was arguably the best possible outcome in the grand scheme of things.

In pursuit of the whole, everything falls apart.

carry the zero by built to spill

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