FISSURE EP
This story contains multiple acts, in which the listener can read the story that was created around the music.
Listen while you read.
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ACT 1. FISSURE
3… 2… 1… GO!
Charles starts counting down from 50, as two of his friends scatter in order to find a good hiding spot.
“Here I come!”
echoes through a dry and windy olive grove. Hide and seek is a game the three friends love to play. Every time they seem to find new and better places to hide from each other.
Hesitantly looking for a spot with good cover, Charles starts climbing up a steep hill. As he reaches the top, he stops. He finds himself completely frozen. Charles has seen many strange things throughout his life but this is something else. He can’t believe his eyes. In a small ditch, a fissure starts to form in the middle of the air. Charles slowly starts taking a few steps forward. He notices that it is slowly absorbing light and energy from the sun.
The sound coming from the void between the fissure sounds like a person screaming while gasping for air. Charles feels very conflicted. Staring blankly at the fissure, a hurricane of emotions hits him in a violent guttural punch.
Charles suddenly dashes towards the fissure to close it.
Stretching his hands out, he starts pulling both ends together with all of his body strength.
“AAAGGGGHHHHHHHHHH”
The scream echoes through the dry valley, his two friends have never heard him make this sound and immediately initiate in the action to help Charles. They hastily rush towards where the scream is coming from.
Boy 1 screams to the sky: “Charles!!!! CHAAAAARRLEEESS!!!”
Agonising screams continue to glide over the hills.
Boy 2: “Charles is awesome! I bet he is coming up with a new
hiding strategy!”
Still unsure where Charles is, the boys continue to follow the pain. The boys start to run up the hill with a heavy load of concern.
Meanwhile Charles’ hands are being scorn from the fissure, white electromagnetic waves are coming through, causing huge forces of friction to his hands.
The boys get closer, but slow down as they finally reach the top of the hill. Once they realise in what situation Charles is in they aggressively yell.
“CHARLES STOP!”
“CHARLES FOLLOW PROTOCOL. stop right now”
Skin and bones are being destroyed.
“Protocol??!!”
Charles’ willpower and determination to stop this wrecking force of change keep him trying to close the fissure.
Change is taking place. The echoes and openness of the land seem to lose weight. The acoustics, temperature and light are subtly changing. He feels the scorching sun isn’t burning him anymore, the ground is cooling off and the clouds are traveling at outrageous speeds. Charles starts to hear everything move around him. From the dry grass cracking under his shoes to the ants walking miles away from him.
This physical overload forces him to drop to his knees begging for his misery to stop.
The worried boys finally make it to the top of the hill where they see Charles on his knees, begging for his misery to stop.
They go stand next to him and put their hands on Charles’ shoulder.
“It’s going to be okay
just, let, go…
Let go Charles.”
Charles refuses to let go, but the pain won’t let him. He is resisting every force working inside his body. His friends both have tears running down their cheeks. They gently grab his bloody hands and lay Charles down.
He looks up to see his friends again. He finally accepts that he must let go. For the first time in his life Charles feels true happiness. He has been unlocked and feels grateful for it.
As he hangs on to the fissure with his half remaining fingertips, he collapses and faints.
In the last seconds of his consciousness, he feels the grip of his friend slowly fade away, and the earth beneath him starts to shift and sink.
Up until now the life of Charles has been absolutely flawless.
He’s never had to worry about anything. Conflict never took place. Everybody lived in peace with each other. The places Charles would go to and explore were always so clean and well kept. Everybody kept an eye out for each other and their environment. Charles never got hurt by not one person nor thing. Since trying to close the fissure, many new things have happened to Charles which he has never experienced before. Pain, anger, frustration, emotional conflict and sadness all rose up.
_
Slowly awakening.
Charles finds himself in a dark and gridded room. The only light source is coming from one of the walls, which is an entire screen.
It takes Charles’s eyes a long time to adjust to the bright light coming from the screen.
The young boy is very confused and sad.
Act 2. WHISPER
“I… Wha… t ha p penned?…”?
Charles is hit by a wall of fear. He’s been unconscious for what seems to feel like days and has finally snapped out of it.
In shock he jumps up to see where he is, but immediately collapses trying to get out of the chair. His own body weight is almost too much to bear for his leg muscles.
“ .. “
“?”
Charles quickly remembers what happened and pulls his hands to his face.
“My hands are… fine…?
“But why are my wrists completely red?"
Examining his own body, he notices a thick, crumbly layer of salt and dead skin on him. Charles’ realisation of his body astonishes him.
“How did I get like this?”
E n e r g y.
“I am weak..”
Tears are running down his face. Charles feels defeated. His breathing increases intensely and slowly builds up a lot of violent tension.
“Whoever did this to me will SUFFER.
I am not somebody’s meat puppet or science experiment.
Now, now, now, now, now, now, now, NOW!!!!!!!!"
Charles lashes out at everything.
The screen turns off. It becomes pitch black in the room. After Charles calms down for a few minutes, the screen turns back on with a text.
“H e l l o C h a r l e s ”
“I ’m h a p p y t o s e e y o u a g a i n . ”
He kicks the chair as hard as he can, rips the headrest off and throws it at the screen wall.
"WHO ARE YOU?!
SHOW YOURSELF RIGHT NOW!"
Stomping in circles he looks around the room for any possible escape. But no.
No.
No way out...
He tries to rationalise the situation he finds himself in. By now, the effort of standing is getting heavy on his knees.
Charles is in pain.
“ s h o w y o u r s e l f ” he whispers.
The screen wall turns black.
It flashes back on with new text saying
“N o t y e t "
"Why not now??!!!!!! WHY?
How could you have done this to me?
What have you done???!!! I demand answers!!!!!!"
It feels like Charles’ heart has been stabbed by a huge knife.
Empty
Just emptiness and questions.
Facing the screen he stares at the text. Thoughts are running wild.
Slowly making a fist, another wave of rage and anger hits him. Charles sweat feels cold. Once again, the hurt is building up asking for release.
Charles grabs the headrest and notices a metal pin is attached to it to lock it in place to the chair.
He looks at the pin and charges towards the screen wall ready to destroy it.
"AAAHHHGHHHHH"
Pulling the headrest back, he swings it with all he’s got into the screen.
*shatter*
Tiny pieces of glass fly everywhere.
At the point of impact the screen has a big crater of dead pixels.
He pulls the headrest out of the screen. Runs a few steps back and throws it against the screen until most of it doesn't work anymore. He is destroying it until the very last LED doesn't work anymore.
*Hit,
hit,
hit*
It doesn't seem to have an end. The screen is already completely broken, emitting no light anymore yet Charles is still hitting it as if it would resolve the situation he’s in.
It’s pitch black in the room, once again.
Charles slowly realises that there’s no point to keep hitting the wall.
"Try to calm down, think. Think. I need to sit down for a bit.”
Following the wall, he wants to go sit in the corner on the opposite side of the room.
In the darkness he relies on his touch to get away from the broken screen with all the shattered glass. Carefully he takes one step at a time.
“Found the first corner, now on to the second”
….
step
step
Charles feels much safer not having to touch broken glass against a wall. He follows the smooth wall with more confidence and speed.
He brushes his hands quickly over the wall.
“Initiate.”
“Oh what’s this?” he asks himself
A small circle lights up.
He swipes his hand across the circle again
“Initiate”
This strange circle is giving him joy. The voice triggers some weird emotions in him. It somehow seems familiar…
He makes the voice reappear by passing his hand over the circle again.
“Initiate Charles.”
Without hesitating he holds his palm over the circle and a heavy mechanism starts to rumble.
“Why did that work?
A door opens with bright light behind it.
“At this point I am not even surprised.”
The contrast of total darkness to this bright light hurts his eyes.
ACT 3. SLINGSHOT
The hidden door opens up wider, his eyes get used to light again. The room behind the door is big. There are several long tables in the middle of the room. The tables are all cluttered with strange objects, but fascinating laboratory. Beautiful ivy hangs from wooden racks along the walls. In glass cupboards are old jars filled with various dark liquids.
Hesitantly Charles takes a few cautious steps inside. Nobody is around. He continues to go inside, being careful that he doesn't close the door behind him.
“Wow! The air is so fresh.”
He takes in multiple deep breaths.
“I feel very nice.”
Each breath he takes feels reminiscent of a early morning in a forest.
“In a weird way, I feel like I’ve just woken up from an amazing deep slumber."
"Now, let’s see what all these objects are on the tables."
Most tables are too cluttered with bits and pieces to even be able to recognise the objects. Some are more organised than others. The two tables closest to the door he just entered from have baked goods on them. A very, hard and stale loaf of bread is just sitting there next to a pile of flowers and multiple rolling pins.
Looking further at the other tables the one in the middle grabs his attention.
It has nothing but a small toolbox, a slingshot and 3 metal balls on it. The balls have a pretty colourful shine, similar to a layer of gasoline on a puddle of water. He picks up one of the balls and the slingshot.
Charles loads it up and aims for a a pile of pillows in the corner of the room.
As soon as he lets go of the ball, Charles gets launched forward with huge speed. He feels the air passing by and sees the pillow he aimed towards coming closer very quickly.
“Holy shit!!!!!!
Help help help help help help help”
His point of view of what he sees is now coming from the ball.
Without noticing it. His body drops to the floor.
“I am so happy I aimed for pillows and not one of the glass jars!.
I hope it’s going to feel soft.”
“ahhhhhhhhhh"
Right before he hits the pillow he closes his eyes
*poof*
Time slows down. Each second feels like an eternity. And he feels an intense heat.
"Wow this feels so amazing, being fully absorbed in hot softness.
This is heaven."
Charles opens up his eyes and sees the fibres of the cloth from the inside of the pillow.
The ball pierced through the cushion and is slowly sinking in place, in the pillow’s filling. Charles feels the harsh fibres scratch his entire body.
As soon as the metal ball stops moving, Charles’ point of view goes back to his own body. Laying on the ground, he is sweating like a dog, but is so obsessed by what he just experienced, he instantly wants another go.
“That was so amazing.”
He is in awe of what strange powers the balls have. Excited, he gets up and grabs the ball closest to him. The ball has “30 sec” written on it and fires it at random towards another table further away, not even thinking about where he is launching the ball at.
Charles flies away once again but this time his vision gets warped into his past. He sees his entire life fast forwarded into 30 seconds.
From the moment he was born, to a woman holding him in her arms, to playing with friends in the mountains.
While seeing everything flash by, he experiences the raw emotions tied to the memories. First he experiences pure happiness which quickly switches into sadness, then fear. Halfway through, a man takes him away from his mother and snap, all he sees for the remaining 20 seconds is the chair he just woke up in. All emotions from that point on fade away into nothing.
…
"What did I just see? Have I spent half of my life, in this chair? But how come I’ve never seen it? That man…."
*Click.*
A soft thud comes from the door closing. A tall, man stands in front of the door.
Charles knows he is the one that took him away.
“Why did you do it?
Why did you lock me up?”
“EXPLAIN YOURSELF”
Charles hasn’t noticed the effect the objects have taken a toll on his body. He has a very high fever and his shirt is soaked in his own sweat.
“Calm down Charles.”
“NO!”
“You monster!
How dare you?
You crazy bastard!”
Charles dashes towards the man to punch him, he wants to hurt him. Charles grabs anything he can find on the tables and throws it at him. The man gets hit hard but also manages to deflect some objects thrown at him. Attempting to calm Charles down, he tells him that he needs to focus on his breath and sit down.
The glass jars filled with weird fluids are what Charles has is mind set to. He grabs one and throws it directly at the man.
*Splash*
The jar shatters against the wall and strangely only a thin layer of dust comes off the jar along with thousands of glass shards.
“Stop it Charles!
You are going to hurt yourself!
STOP IT!”
The man is trying to come closer to Charles.
Charles grabs a new jar of clear fluid from the top shelf and pretends to throw it at the mans face but cleverly aims for his feet. The man kicks the jar back and hits him in the face. The jar is squishy and seemingly unbreakable.
“You son of a bitch.”
Charles decides to take him right on.
“Tell me who you are!!!!
Who are you?!!”
Charles jumps and strikes with a full hit to the mans face. Theyboth fall down and start wrestling on the ground.
Struggling to come on top, they are screaming, kicking and punching each other. Charles is able to pin him down with his feet and violently punches the man multiple times with his fragile fists.
Blow after the blow the mans face becomes bloody and very bruised. Charles is so angry, he has no intention of stopping whatsoever.
The aggression is only getting worse. His body temperature is still rising. Without realising it he is all of a sudden punching the pillows he shot earlier. His body is begins to shake very hard and foam is coming from his mouth and is no longer able to move his own body through the spasms.
Everything then freezes. All the objects in the room dissolve and the room he finds himself in is the gridded room he woke up in earlier.
The man rushes over to Charles and picks him up.
“You’ve gone too far Charles. You need to be healed.”
Act 4. RECOVERY
Laying down in a comfortable bed, Charles is in a coma, recovering from the poison and the extreme exhaustion.
“I wonder when Charles is going to wake up.
Geez… I am so glad I ran an inceptive simulation when he woke up in the chair. Although he was poisoned severely, he still had the strength to beat me to death. Luckily it wasn’t the real me! Damn!
I knew he would be very mad at me and would want to hurt me but i didn’t know it would pan out like this! His inner strength and rage to fully commit to his feelings was incredible. In a weird way, I’m really proud of him.
The toxins on the projectiles took a toll on his body. Took me forever to get him to breathe in a normal pattern. It was only a prototype and I was still working on stabilising it.
Why didn’t you look in the box next to the slingshot. I had
gloves in there to protect yourself. I guess he's never built up a sense of caution. The poison was able to get under your skin quickly and be absorbed into your blood very quickly.
Only time will tell when he wakes up. But when he does, I have a nice treat for him.”
Act 5. QT HQ
After many weeks, and his body cleansing out the toxins he had in him, Charles wakes up from his comatose state.
He slowly opens his eyes and sees the man sitting next to him in bed.
“Hey kid, welcome back!”
Charles replies with a soft and tired
“Hey.”
“You’re probably still mad at me, and I’m sorry for the way you feel.
I’d love to show you something special I’ve made for you. Years ago, I made this simulation but never fully developed it further because you were already so happy in Base Realm V15.42. Perfecting this simulation seemed rather pointless, as I thought this day wouldn’t come so soon. In this simulation you will find a girl who you will fall madly in love with. She knows who you are and is waiting for you.
She wants you.
Nevertheless, if you would like to enter and have fun, you may do as you please. Just let me know.”
“I’d actually like to have some fun. I feel weird and could use some happiness.”
“Alright then, just press the button in the next room and you’ll be transferred.”
Charles takes his time, walks around a bit first and decides he’s ready. He heads over to the next room and softly presses the button.
Within a flash his environment changes and finds himself at a high school.
“Wow, I feel good!”
“SO good!!!”
Red varsity jacket
White shirt
Blue denim jeans
White sneakers
Looking around Charles can already sense where the man got his
inspiration from.
“This place is basically just a High School Musical ripoff.”
Nevertheless, Charles is ready to roll. His hair is looking sharp, his outfit is brand new. He is feeling a major vibe. The way his body feels has also changed. He puts his hands over his biceps and flexes and can definitely tell that he’s gotten some big guns.
“Alright, straight posture, walk down the hallway and own this place!”
He snap points at all the kids that he feels need a smile on their face. After walking a majestic 15 seconds, there she is!
“IT’S HER!!”
Spotlights all of a sudden turn on her, a huge fan starts blowing behind her, making her hair wave. She’s got her eyes locked on Charles like a target seeking missile, ready to blow up his heart.
Charles is hypnotised by her sexy walk, she’s got that strut.
"She’s got maximum hippage my dude!"
He is blown away, having trouble to contain the extra blood flow that’s going on in his pants. The level of overwhelmingness is almost too much for him.
She’s now 10 meters in front of him. Her entrance is making
Charles’ heart beat faster by the second.
“Hey Charles! ;)
It’s so nice to finally meet you!!! How have you been doing
all these years? Your dad has told me all about you :P
He made me just for you ˆ.ˆ!"
".. Sorry…
what were you saying? I was lost in your deep blues eyes. I fell so deep into them it felt like i was swimming in the ocean."
Charles is SO in love, she has the deepest blue eyes he is absolutely lost in.
She starts to grab his red varsity jacket with a huge L on the left side. She pulls Charles in closer and starts grinning and looking at him all submissively.
“Let’s go somewhere else tough guy” “I have waited so long for this moment, you cutie ;) xxx”
She grabs his hands and drags him through two brown doors with push bars that leads to the basketball court. It’s really dark in here. All the lights are off but there’s a bit of light coming from very small windows that are high up on the walls.
Charles: “PERFECT”
Girl: “I know right, nobody will see us here, so we can do whatever we want to ;)”
Charles: “I am the luckiest boy alive”
Girl: “You sure are hihi” “Now come here you handsome piece of ass”
She grabs and yanks Charles towards her aggressively, but Charles doesn't mind. He is in absolute awe of her beauty and allure. They are standing, face to face in the middle of the court, deeply staring at each other. She starts to tilt her head and smiles.
Charles notices that her teeth have changed. They are all rugged, sharp and clear for some reason. He leans back a little to inspect her more thoroughly. In a swift move she plants her lips on his neck and starts gently kissing him, licking from his collar bone all the way behind his ear. She pulls back and looks at him again.
“Did you like that?” she asks seductively
“That felt like heaven” Charles replies.
“Would you like more?”
Charles grabs her by her waist and pulls her closer. As Charles expecting another sweet lick of joy, her grin transforms into an evil smirk.
“aDLKJh3rYGO#*&GWEUYGFSJHDFG!!!!!!”
She plants her sharp teeth in Charles’ neck and rips out the flesh between the bite marks.
“WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!”
She pushes him, grabs him by his pants and slams him on the ground, causing his pants to rip wide open.
Blood is dripping down from her mouth, onto her crop top shirt. She wipes off her mouth with her arm and starts to lean over Charles, who’s laying down on the ground terrorised and in pain.
"Tell him to end all of this. We are all suffering for you. The sexual urge is too strong. Make it stop. Make it come to an end. We were made for your pleasure, so let me give it to you, let me fulfil my task"
She looks over him squirming on the ground, laying down in the pool of blood that keeps on getting bigger by the second. Charles looks up at her and notices that she has her eyes are fixated towards his underwear. The hunger for Charles’ private parts needs to be quenched. Her stomach rumbles as she licks her lips thinking of what she’s going to do next.
The girl starts to bend over, hanging over Charles. His fear is rising by the second. The pain from his neck is immeasurable and he is on the verge of despair. As she slowly creeps in closer, he feels his brain overloaded. Every neural passage is firing rapid messages causing Charles to react in the only way he knows.
Instinct. As her face is just a few inches away from his body
*WWWHAAAMM*
Charles plants his knee in her face, gets up and starts to run for his dear life. Quickly exits through the brown doors, runs down the hall, exits the school, runs across the grass fields towards the main road in front of the school.
As he’s running away, he looks back at the school he just exited and sees just a boring square building with no windows. When he turns his head back, a car rushes onto the sidewalk ahead.
The scientist hastily pulls up in a candy apple red 66 Corvette,
"Charles, hop in! We gotta get out of here."
Pedal to the metal, they drive off into the distance.
"I’m so sorry that happened to you… but in all fairness I told you I never finished this simulation. I never designed all of this with the intention of hurting you. Quite the opposi-.”
Charles interrups:
“She told me that they have a death wish. Her, “my girl” and apparently everybody has a death wish. She told me that she wants it all to end, this whole world."
“It's been too long. I should have known. Well, should we grant them their wish?”
“I don’t know. How would we do that? Can’t we just exit and delete this whole place?”
"I know something better.”
He takes a sharp turn onto a very long straight road going into the rural part of the city.
For some reason, when they turn around the corner, the people are already looking at the car.
“They know where you are. It won’t be long before they start coming after us.”
“I’m taking us to a place where we can retaliate.”
When Charles turns around to look back towards the city, he sees a horde on the horizon running towards the car.
“Hurry!!!"
“We’ve almost reached our destination!
Grab the bag in the back.
Do you remember the video game “Dr. Destruction?””
“Wow yeah I loved that game!”
“Well the machine gun turret from that game is sitting right on your lap! The rest of the guns from that game are in the trunk!
When the car stops, hop out and choose whichever one you want.
Up ahead is a big lake with a small dock. I’ll park the car infant of the dock, giving us cover and we’ll setup the turret. Make sure to always have a backup gun on your belt and we should be fine.
The main road turns into a dirt road. The docks are in sight. Alright. Here we go!
Hold tight!”
Frank slams on the brakes and skilfully drifts the car into place.
"Pop the trunk!" Charles shouts.
A huge pile of guns unveils itself. Charles knows exactly how all the guns work, how many bullets each gun houses and what their recoil kickback handles, well in the game at least.
He marvels at how cool this all is, then quickly grabs his favourite guns. In the meantime Frank has set up the turret.
Charles, you need to command the turret. I have my own set of weapons I want to use. Just use the turret as much as you can then switch to the guns on your person.
“Ready?”
“Ready." Charles affirms with a smirk on his face.
Charles flips the switch on the turret which makes it start spinning. He practices aiming up left and right, waiting for the storm to come.
"Wait for my first shot.
Steady, steady, steady…
FIRE!"
The scientist shoots a neon green ball towards the horde that explodes on impact.
As soon as the ball explodes Charles revs up the turret's engine and starts mowing down people, aiming from left to right.
"DIE!!!!!!"
Many pallets shoot out of the turret at unbelievable speeds. On impact the pallets make whatever body part it hits melt to mush.
A sea of bodily goop is forming on the ground, the crazed people are stomping through the slush of their fallen kind.
Bodies are dropping by the second.
When the pallets finally are all gone, Charles grabs his favourite gun. The laser beam, which is a gun with a 3 burst charge with a cool down rate of 2 seconds. It delivers a massive, thick laser, that pierces whatever it touches.
He aims it cleverly towards the horde where he can hit the most people in a row.
Vvvoom vvvoom vvvoom
It’s a strange sight to see. All the people running towards them have a face of relief once they get hit by the brutal beam, slicing whatever it hits.
They are happy.
Vvvooom vvooom vvvoom
Just a few people are left over. Frank throws over a revolver,
"Let's finish this."
Frank lines up the sight on the last person's head.
"Wow, that was something else. The rush and delivery always gives me the chills. Wow!”
“Can we go back now? I want to take it easy.”
“Alright then, let’s go.”
Act 6. Closure
After cooling down, and catching a good night’s sleep, when they both have breakfast together, Frank initiates:
“Hey Charles, I want to show you the rest of the building. There’s a lot of history I want to share with you.
This is the living room where I live and sleep.”
It’s a big, open place that is very nicely organised, soft lights, Persian rugs on the floor and many plants that fit in to the space well.
“The truth is Charles, long ago, humanity took a very dark turn. Humanity at one point had spread over the earth like a virus to the planet. Mother earth’s own ecosystem was out of balance and something had to be done. A reset.
Come take a look.”
Frank opens up the curtains and a vast landscape of dust, sand, and debris is being beaten down by very harsh sun.
There are only a thousand people or so left on planet earth.
“Charles, I know you saw some scary things about me. The reason I wasn’t around in your early childhood is because I was a wanted man. People wanted me for my technologies, to save, help and even bring a swift and painless end to lives before the reset.
So when you saw me taking you with me, later being in the same chair for more than half your life, is because I put you in a world where you could keep on living a normal, happy life with no worries. I wanted to let you experience what life has to offer, instead of living in this devastated land with only me."
This day is inevitable and I wanted to let you out when you turned 18, but there was a malfunction in the system and you got out earlier than expected.
For me, it really is nice to have my son back. I get to hug you, and actually talk to you.”
“Thank you for all that you have done for me. I had such an amazing time while i was gone. But…. it might have been better to have just stayed like this, and that we could build worlds together that we could go visit and experience together…
What about mom?
Where is she?”
…..“Frank?”
“She died in the reset…
I tried my best to protect her, but she accepted her fate. We promised each other that I would make sure you would have a good, life, one where you would learn how to love everyone and would always try to help the people and living organisms in nature.
This is the picture I took of her when I last saw her.”
Charles cries and runs over to his dad to hug him tight.
“Let's make sure we fulfill her promise.”