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Note to readers; I finished the chapter a while ago, however my editor has been busy lately which is why it's been quite some time. X3 It's a very interesting chapter though! I recommend you 100% to read it all! Have fun. :3
Sinuyan – The Yans’ story
Chapter 2 - Rotating Conflicts
The grass in the forest is drenched from the midnight storm. Some of the trees in the forest were snapped in half, some others just bent. Despite how terrible the forest looks, the atmosphere is quite peaceful. The calm after the storm has set upon the house and the surrounding area, with birds taking flight once again and other critters emerging from their homes, if they weren’t destroyed. The animal were quickly rebuilding, birds collecting twigs for their nest, rabbits burrowing into the ground. The dirt road is now just a long line of mud, now not even motorbikes able to drive on it. Luckily there was barely any damage done to the house, and inside, the house was surprisingly warm even though nobody has turned on any source of heat yet.
“Wake up, Tortie! It’s time to get up!” Dani knocks at Tortoise’s door over and over, not just waking her up but some Yans down the hallway as well. Dani presses her ear against her side of the door to listen in, hearing only a faint mumble as Tortie attempts to crawl out of bed. Torrie, already awake before Dani’s over-excited knocking, starts to get herself ready. She puts on dark blue jeans as well her favourite shirt, a plain white tee with a “<3” on the front. In the room next to hers, Seth and Jeb happily snuggle up close to each other, ignoring the commotion, and obviously not wanting to get out of bed, enjoying each other’s company way too much.
Tortie responded to Dani after having enough of her pestering, saying she’ll be up soon. Dani accepted it and started down the hall and down the stairs. The door to Brian’s room opens up, and coincidentally, so does Torrie’s, which is right in front of his door. They stand in front of each other in the dark red coloured hallway, Brian dressed in a casual white shirt with cargo shorts, his feet covered in two mismatched socks, grey and black. Torrie takes one big sweeping look, until her eyes rests on his messy black hair, looking as though it had just survived a squirrel attack. “Uh, your hair...” she chuckles.
Brian pays no attention to his wild hair. “Yeah, don’t worry about that, it will sort itself out later, maybe. Do we have any leftover pizza?”
“Yeah, a bit, but let’s save it for later. Go get toast or something. Everyone has bread in their house. I mean, the normal ones do. And I think Sinu is normal… right?”
“To the best of my knowledge, he is!” Brian laughs. “Doesn’t sound too bad, I guess. I’ll make it cinnamon toast. Think he’s normal enough to have cinnamon?” Brian and Torrie closes their doors behind them and start to make their way to the kitchen, talking about Sinuyan’s strangeness level, or lack thereof, if it is the case.
Just about everyone is awake due to Dani and her over-excited self. She notices Jeb and Seth aren’t downstairs yet, so she jogs upstairs, knocking on Jeb and Seth’s door repeatedly. “Hey guuuuys, time to get up! Today is the day we get to play with the funky gadget thingamajig!” After knocking for at least a good long while, she stops and sighs. “You two, get up! I’ll eat your breakfast if you don’t!”
After being totally ignored, Dani gives up and heads to the kitchen to grab Jeb and Seth’s share of cinnamon toast, complimentary of Brian and Tortie, and follows Brian into the main area of the house, bringing her food with her. Sinuyan and Aakash already are comforting themselves with the television, an early morning program on. They both have tea and toast, Sinuyan in the reclining chair and Aakash lying down on the three-seat couch with his feet up, looking so relaxed that he may be about to drop his cup of tea. The morning feels very relaxed, almost every Yan out in the living room or kitchen; socialising, laughing, anticipating about the teleporter and what games they’ll be able to play. Seth and Jeb however still laze about in their room.
After Sinuyan’s breakfast is hungrily devoured he stands up, Dani wondering where he’s off to, almost immediately coming to the conclusion that he’s setting up the teleporter. She exclaims excitedly, “Are you setting up the teleporter? Are we going to start playing it? Are we?!?!”
Sinuyan laughs and shrugs off her impatience. “Not yet, I’m just going to go check on the lazy couple.”
Dani sits down on the floor and sighs. “Awww…”
Sinuyan stretches as he walks into the hallway and to the door which at this rate should be labeled: “Permanently undisturbed and still ignoring.” Without hesitating, he bravely opens the door and looks towards the double bed to find an expected sight: Jeb straddling Seth, making out with him. Fortunately and luckily for Sinu, they’re both fully clothed. Sinu rolls his eyes and closes the door as he awkwardly goes back down the stairs and calls for Dani. “Uh, Dani! Can you get these two out of the room? I don’t want to be the one to break them up.”
Dani immediately knows what he’s talking about. She gives a faint chuckle and says, “Don’t worry, I’ll pull them apart like… like… a thing that pulls things apart. Uh, you know what I mean.”
Sinuyan nods with a cute laugh, and sits down in his chair again. Dani, seemingly fearless, bursts in just like Sinu and yells out, “You two! Stop making sweet love! Time for breakfast, or whatever’s left that I didn’t eat. Jeb, you, get off your boyfriend. Seth, stop being good-looking in your girlfriend’s eyes for at least an hour!” She laughs and stands by the door as Jeb finally straightens herself up, a little lost with air as she pants a little.
“Ooh, that was fun.” She smiles and pokes out her tongue at Dani, who sticks out her tongue in retaliation.
Seth looks quite stunned as if the makeout session was unexpected for him, and tries to squirm out from Jeb’s weight, to which he easily succeeds because of his girlfriend’s extraordinary light weight. They both get properly dressed, and finally approach the other Yans out in the main area. The Yans take a quick look at them, Seth in his red jacket and long red track-pants, and Jeb in a more appropriate attire compared to last night, wearing a long-sleeved black shirt and long black pants. For a color described as "the absence of all color", it was her favourite.
Jeb and Seth make their way into the kitchen, holding each other’s hands, not able to let go for even a second. As Seth rummages through the fridge, Jeb occupies herself by looking at the bench in front of her. Crumbs everywhere, a cutting board and a small knife. She tilts her head and lifts up the knife. Seth closes the fridge and places the five slices of pizza onto the bench, on top of the cutting board. Jeb gets a cloth from the kitchen cupboard and uses it to make a sort of temporary sheath for the knife, placing it in her trousers’ pocket. Seth slices up the pizza evenly and gets plates for both him and her partner. The bread was all out, so this was all they had left, no thanks to a certain someone.
Seth eats the pizza as soon as possible, not minding it being cold. Jeb however heats it up. Not surprising, seeing as how she absolutely loves hot weather and everything warm. She doesn’t mind sitting in a stinking hot room all day, and if she gets burnt, she easily takes care of it. Doesn’t ignore it though. Soon everyone is content with their stomachs full and their bodies and brain just about ready for anything! After Aakash is done watching one of his favourite television programs, he gets up from the couch that he basically just owned for an hour and starts walking down to the basement. Dani, without saying a word, hoping he won’t notice or won’t send her away, tags along, very much excited for what’s to come.
In the basement, the electric-powered panels are lit, glowing brightly from all the wacky buttons and lights that indicate separate operations. Aakash, the inventor of the machine, starts to work away at it, flicking levers and knobs ‘till the teleporter springs to life. It starts up how it should. The beams that kinda look like lasers make up the holographic door has no red lights flickering and no emergency shut downs preparing. The startup runs smoothly, Dani standing a small distance away has her lips slightly parted, her mind in such amazement that she forgets she has a mouth.
Aakash notices Dani’s reaction. “Ha, like what you see, Dani? You seem to be the one most excited to try it out, considering-” Aakash’s voice fades as Dani’s eagerness drowns him out.
“This is awesome! I really can’t wait to try it out! This is like, next-gen future stuff! But, then again… I just remembered we’re trying out horror games and horror games only, why am I so excited...?” Dani immediately starts to re-think her emotions, her friendly and contagious smile turning into a more worried look that makes her appear as though she was contemplating ideas deep inside her head.
“You’ll be fine! There’s absolutely no reason to worry, everything is perfectly safe. If you die in-game, you’ll be scared for a split-second, then you die in-game, then you come back here! How about that? Sound great? Of course, dying is never great, but...” Aakash jokes, Dani lightening up a little to laugh. The two of them easily hear the commotion upstairs, Jeb, Brian and Fire especially. Dani and Aakash can just make out what’s being said. Jeb is teasing the other two. “What have you two been doing, hmmm? Where did you two go off to last night? Nobody heard or saw you guys go to bed last night...” Jeb winks at Fire and Brian, who frantically protest against any intimacy between them.
Fire shakes her head and laughs. “What?! Jeb, we weren’t even in the same part of the house! Also, you can’t talk! You had like… a make out session this morning!”
“Yes, but it was acceptable. We’re already a couple, you two are just oblivious~” Jeb teases, giving Fire a small innocent smile, and Fire and Brian start arguing with her again.
Dani muttered to Aakash, “I dost think they protesth too much…” Aakash nodded his head in agreement with a smirk, and told her to go get the others.
“Ask Torrie if she can bring that teddy bear from the back closet down, she knows which one. Somebody might end up needing it!” Dani immediately ran up the stairs to bring the news.
From the top of the stairs, Dani yells, “Guys! Guys! The teleporter is ready! Oh, and Torrie, Aakash mentioned something about a bear…?”
Torrie poked her head around from the next room, with a knowing look on her face. “Yeah, I can bring it, I’ll be down in a sec.”
As the rest of the Yans gathered toward the stairs, Dani exclaimed, “Let’s goooo!” and immediately leaps down the stairs, bounding down each step as if though she were a mountain goat, expertly climbing down a steep mountain, although more angular and less cold.
The Yans walk to where their attention was being called to, down the stairs and into the basement. The room seems to be a bit more bright than yesterday for some reason, but the Yans however seem to not notice. The teleporter makes a long whirring and buzzing sound as the map is finally finished converting itself into a 3D realm. Aakash presents the scene. “Yans and Yans, I am just about ready to send you through the portal! As long as you don’t end up killing each other before or after, this should be an extremely fun experience! And scary of course. To start, we’ll be venturing into…” He pauses for dramatic effect, all the Yans on the edge of their seats (if they had seats).
“SCP Containment Breach!” He exclaims. There’s silence for about ten seconds until finally, from the back of the group, Jeb exclaims, “fuck yeah!” Which of course triggers off the rest of the Yans as they discuss to each other what they’re going to do, their strategy plans, survival tactics, etc. Brian and Dani start getting really nervous, unsure of how well think they’re prepared. Torrie, just now coming down the stairs, brings the teddy bear to Aakash, and he whispers something into her ear, and she nods in understanding, and joins the group. It takes a good minute for Sinuyan and Aakash to get them settled down, not even the loud roaring of the teleporter disrupting their discussions.
Sinuyan announces, “We’ll all go through the portal, except for Aakash. He’ll stay here and maintain the teleporter and monitor how you all are doing.”
Aakash adds a final send-off. “I wish you Yans the best of luck!” Immediately Aakash nods to Sinuyan who walks through the teleporter, straight into it without a care in the world, his body not appearing on the other side of the panel, but in the game realm. Jeb holds Seth’s hand and guides him through the portal, while Dani jumps through, and so does Fire. Brian, Tortie and Torrie slowly slide their way through.
It only takes a few seconds for everyone to arrive. All they can see however, is pitch black. A loud, almost dog-whistle pitched buzzing is heard, followed by a voice, Aakash’s voice. “Alright, all of you SHOULD be in pitch black darkness right now. That’s normal, I assure you have not gone blind. That’s because I just need to set this up veeery quickly. Give me a few seconds.” Typing is heard and the speaker turns off. Suddenly, nobody can hear the familiar sounds of each other anymore, and Jeb and Seth who were previously holding hands are now separated, every Yan in their own space, cut off from everyone else.
Seth remains perfectly still, shaking a little, holding onto his girlfriend’s hand, not able to move any step in the shadowy void. He blinks. The void is gone, light fills his eyes and he focuses onto his surroundings, with nobody else, and no hand to hold. White tiles make up most of the walls and flooring, and with sinks and stalls nearby, Seth immediately knows that he’s in the bathroom. He doesn’t see any men’s bathroom characteristics, so unfortunately, he’s in the female’s bathroom. It doesn’t seem to phase him though, he looks around, seeing his own reflection in the mirror. Dark brown curly hair, brown eyes, bag on his back, completely normal and fine despite having been transferred into a game. He starts feeling something. Something in the bottom of his heart, and it aches more than he has ever felt it ache before. Seth realises something. He’s very, very alone, and there’s no guarantee he’ll find anyone alive to help him through the game.
“Please approach SCP-173 for testing.” The administrator squeaks through the low quality speakers. Dani screams, being forced out of her cell by two guards, one holding each arm. Sinuyan and Tortie’s attention are both drawn onto her. “Oh my gosh! Ohhh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no! Why did I like this idea!? Take me back to the cell, I’ll stay there while you guys play the game!!” The guards throw her into the group, already standing around the outside of the gate. Tortie and Sinuyan catch her, and Sinuyan stares menacingly at the guards. Tortie simply hugs her while trying to calm her down. “Don’t worry Dani, you’ll be fine! We’re all together, we’re not going to die. Trust me!” Dani silences herself and looks at Tortie, her eyes showing fear and worry.
Dani forces a smile and nods. “Okay,” she wipes away some tears forming in her eyes. “Thanks, I know I can trust you guys!”
Tortie and Sinuyan nod back. “Where did everyone else go?” Tortie asks. “I hope they didn’t get, like, de-pixelated or something, if that’s even possible-”
Tortie was interrupted by the administrator on the balcony above. “Enter SCP-173’s containment cell now, or we will shoot!” The three hurriedly walk into the chamber holding the deadly SCP.
“We’ll find them later, I guess, let’s just focus on us right now.” Sinuyan says. “So… I’ve always had trouble with the beginning part in the game…”
“Ohhh shiiiiit...” Torrie sighs, Brian looking around repeatedly as Fire remains quiet in a corner, thinking to herself. The room is brightly lit and somewhat calm, probably because of the white colour to it. Tables and chairs dot the room, the Cafeteria lonely apart from the three Yans and a vending machine in the corner of the room.
Brian realizes what being in this room means. “Alright… At least we’re somewhere safe. SCP 173 can’t come in here right? There’s no air vents!” Brian says as he starts searches the room for air vents.
“Well… I guess. But we should get a move on as soon as possible. We don’t know where the others are, and we don’t know how much time we have before the MTF arrives. I don’t think the breach has started yet. So… this way.” Torrie points to a door, the S.C.P. logo marking the grey metal door. She then notices Fire hasn’t made a move to follow them. ”Come on, Fire, let’s go.” Fire then jumps and catches quickly up to Brian and Torrie. In the first empty hallway, it’s easy to hear each other’s footsteps, probably a good thing. Probably a bad thing.
Suddenly, the same loud, high-pitched buzzing is heard again, greeting the voice of Aakash as he panics. “Guys! This was a big mistake! Something has gone extremely wrong! I didn’t see it until now, but you’ve got to listen to me, you have to win the game! If all of you die… I can’t send you back here. If all of you die, you die permanently. Get to the exit as soon as you can, I prefer you pick Gate-” He’s suddenly cut off. Every yan hears it, they all realise it. This is now something serious. It’s no more fun and games from here on out, it’s now a challenge for survival.
“To the end, either one of us or all.” Jeb mutters. She’s been wandering the hallways of the foundation for awhile, watching out for any of her friends. A loud cry is heard, coming from the bathroom. Jeb immediately recognizes it, her boyfriend. She slams her hand against the button to open the door, leading herself away from the intersection and into the hallway that leads into the two bathrooms. A gun shot is heard. “No!” Jeb exclaims and falls onto the ground, startled. Her body was frozen from shock, not from being hit but from the fear. “Miiiiince!!” Seth wails out his girlfriend’s nickname, hoping to be reunited with at least someone to keep him from the dread of being alone. She hears his voice, and summons her energy to get up and go investigate the gunshot and Seth’s scream.
Sinu, Dani and Tortie tries their utter hardest to keep track of SCP-173. Their eyes are peeled, and they take turns when blinking. The lights shut off, the Yans left in complete darkness, wading in their own suspense. The lights shudder back on, and SCP-173 is right in front of Sinuyan, staring him right in his eyes, as if saying, “I dare you to blink.”
The lights flicker off again, and when they turn on a second later, 173 is gone, but now torments the guard on the balcony area viewing the testing area. He shoots several rounds of his sub-machine gun at the concrete monster, but to no avail, for when the lights blink on and off again, the guard is dead, and 173 is nowhere to be seen. Darkness again.
Suddenly, the SCP announcer is heard over the speakers.“The site is experiencing multiple Keter and Euclid level containment breaches. Full site lock-down initiated.” Everybody knew it was time to get to business.
“You hear that, guys! We’re now in real danger, and the SCP’s just escaped. Be on your toes.” Torrie seems to have taken up charge in this group. Brian bravely enter the computer areas, with Fire close behind. Paper, documents and notes shower the several desks that dot the room. In the corner is a small area blocked off by a medium sized wall that doesn’t reach the ceiling. They both begin to scavenge, knowing the drill they ignore the small blackouts that cause all the computers in the area to shut down, leaving the room in a more darker state, unable to see a few metres in front. Torrie manages to scout out a few supplies on one of the many assignment and paperwork littered desks, a cup sitting next to the keyboard, stained coffee smothered over the smooth surface that holds up the bulky old monitor of the computer.
She picks up a level 2 card and a navigational system. She attempts to turn it on. Nothing, not even a small LED light indicating that it’s low on batteries. She swears under her breath, knowing that she’ll have to find batteries just to make her way around this place. Brian looks over to her, several pieces of paper in his hand. “You don’t need that, we’ll make it out fine. Do you know what gate Aakash wanted us to go through?”
“He was cut off. It’s either Gate A or Gate B. Gate A is easier to go to, I guess we should find the others and head there… or, we can go there ourselves.”
“Well, if at least one of us makes it, we’re okay! Right? Besides, I’m pretty sure the Gate B ending is death anyway.”
Fire is still for some reason remaining quiet throughout the search and discussion, though she does seem to be searching for useful items, albeit very slowly.
“Sounds good I guess.” Torrie replies and goes back to fiddling with the navigational system in her hand, flicking and fiddling with the thin card in her hand that could mean the difference between life and death. They continue on to the next room.
Sinuyan leads the two shaking girls into the next room, Dani looking behind the group, making sure nothing sneaks up on them. Tortie asks, “I wonder where all the scientists and guards went? They’ve disappeared really fast, faster than all of us I’d say. We aren’t exactly the fittest group around.”
Dani laughs, knowing it’s true, not even thinking of contradicting the facts. Sinuyan smiles and wonders too where the rest of the staff has gone.
The small sub-group finds themselves in a tiny sort of hallway, on the left of them is an even smaller hallway beside this one, filled with cabinets and cupboards that Dani immediately goes to investigate, knowing that SCP-173 isn’t able to reach it. On the right is a small wall, most of it just windows outlooking the room below, a door leading to the stairs that venture into the dark space. Sinuyan spots it. It didn’t phase him before, but now that he knows it can kill him, his eyes just water at the thought of having to be face to face with it, SCP-173; a concrete, cold, fast, brutal being. Blinking is so simple and unnoteworthy, yet it’s the last thing that anyone would want to do when faced with it.
“I don’t like this. We don’t have to go down there do we? Look, we’ve got a gas mask right here!” Dani calls out from the small crowded hallway, climbing over boxes and junk on the floor so she can reach the doorway to show her new equipment off, Level 2 card, gas mask and a document showing information on SCP-173.
“Great! But we’ll need gas masks for all of us if we want to make it.” Sinuyan looks back to the cold room below, shivering at the thought of having to go down there. The trio grows quiet. This game wasn’t really meant for multiplayer. fuck, it was hard enough for one player as it was! How were they supposed to get through all of this alive? These thoughts and more crossed everybody’s mind.
Dani, after careful contemplation, suddenly squeaks, “Hey! I’ve got an idea! When we do need to use gas masks, how about we just send all of us through, and the person with the gas mask keeping an eye out, and the rest are blindfolded so they don’t get like… hurt from the gas or whatever it is.”
“That sounds amazingly stupid.” Tortie comments.
“Why? Do you think you could come up with a better idea that doesn’t involve searching that room for another mask or two?” Dani retorts.
Tortie officially turned on her sass machine. “Well first of all, what if the person with the gas mask fails to protect us. If they die, we’ll all be blindfolded, and we’d be dead before we can even swear. We’d be dead before we can hear our own friend’s neck being snapped in half. And I doubt just a blindfold will protect our eyes from the gas, anyway, dummy.”
“Well you don’t have to call names, you little eggplant!”
“You orange!”
“Large-nose!”
“Pointy Ears!”
“YOU UNPEELED BANANA-!”
“THAT’S ENOUGH!” Sinuyan finally brought an end to the fued. Both Dani and Tortie jump when they hear him yell, he’s usually very calm and collected. They stop squabbling immediately, though. “Guys, guys, stop FIGHTING! Ugh, we don’t even know what the next room is. We may not even need a gas mask un
til awhile later, when we can find more. Come on, we better check the door before we make any other decision.” Dani and Tortie nod slightly, ashamed they annoyed him so much with their petty name-calling.
The three approach the next door, and press the button, not knowing what lied beyond. In the next room, there’s a single button and monitor, with a swiveling camera that shows a not-so-empty room full of gas and a very dangerous SCP-173. They all turn around and close the door before walking over to the door hiding the stairs and another terrifying room.
Tortie shivers, and says, “So, uh… who wants to go first?”
“Shhhh…” Jeb comforts, Seth having been crying for so long that he can’t stop, his heart rate beating extremely fast. “Sweetie, shhh, It’s okay! I’m here now.” Jeb smiles at her boyfriend as she hugs him, rubbing his back. Fortunately, the gunshot wasn’t directed at Seth, but at another man, who in fact was driven so mad as to commit suicide, right in the men’s bathroom next door. Seth whimpers and clings to her as he mutters between sobs. “I don’t want to be alone again…”
Even though Seth is known to be quite the talkative and fun guy, people have a hard time believing him to be scared of the most simplest things. Jeb however, having been with him for at least four years now, knows all sides of him; anger, fear, regret, sadness. All of which she might see soon, all in the short span of a few hours. “Are you okay?” Jeb strokes his cheek, Seth finally managing to calm himself down. He nods his head, not able to let go of his girlfriend. Not able to move. “W-What was the gunfire? Did you get… hurt?” Seth asks, even in fear still managing to care for her.
“I’m fine. Don’t worry. I think it was in the other bathroom, as long as we don’t go in there, we should be fine!” Seth smiles and rests his head on her lap, taking in the relief. The bathrooms seem safe for now, they figured, so why feel the need to go somewhere else in a hurry?
“Jesus, how many rooms are there?” Fire exclaims, it being the first thing that’s come out of her mouth through the whole game-play experience so far, surprising both Brian and Torrie. After walking through several corridors, luckily without any creepy or dangerous interruptions, they find themselves at yet another intersection. One way leading back, two others leading to what they’ve already explored which was just dead ends. With only one option left, the troop ventured into yet another hallway, the three Yans sick of wandering around and getting no where.
Fire screams, “Torrie! Watch out!”
They all hear it. The buzzing from the Tesla gate.
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And that cliffhanger 
Can't wait til the next chapter, great work again Jeb and Dani!