#76: From the Future

08/02/19

I don't know what I'm really doing anymore. I am beginning to see the futility in pursuing anything. It would be easier if i just ended it all. No more blog entries, no more confusing messages, no more Mathew Monaco. This whole thing is a tangled web of confusion.

I solved the first puzzle by the way. There were lowercase letters in the hidden images a long while back, in the first thirty entries. If you take the chronological order in which they appear based on the jumbled dates you spell out "fearthechameleon". Ha. He was there even in the beginning.

Also, I think I solved the purple flame message. "The future will flee to the safety of the purple flame" Notes in the back of Casey's journal suggest she believed the shadow man in Jake's drawings was not Madrik like Jake believed but the dead-walker, the other version of Jake that existed simultaneously to him. These systems of split personalities between all parties is so complicated unless you think of it a certain way. It's like...they're all filling a role in one repeating pattern that we all experience. One of the actors is "self". Another is "insecurity". The dead-walker was insecurity eating Jake alive. It was who he ended up becoming. The future self. Casey was so intelligent. I don't doubt she figured this out as well.

The purple flame was harder to decipher. Looking at some posts on Chameleon's Tumblr, I noticed only one featured heavy use of the color purple. It was an image that became Rob's profile pic last iteration at the end. I remember having trouble reading it.

FOURLITTLEFIGMENTS

HEARTSLIKESTONE

ONEBETRAYEDANOTHER

THREELEFTALONE

This references the death of Rob Airheart which left myself, Ben, and Ali. If Rob is the purple flame, the safety to which the future flees, it stands to reason Rob was in possession of this sketchbook. It might have been what drove him mad. Then "Darek can u see me?" comes from Rob who sent the sketchbook to me before dying.

So what am I doing today? I don't know. I'm just writing. I want to recreate the scene from entry 74 where I seemed to communicate with Chameleon using proxy versions of myself and Aaron, or rather Shawn. Can I enact a similar incident if i enter the same state in my writing again? I want to experiment with it right now.

FTP: I entered the dimly lit room and sat at the computer, the only light available spreading from the screen. I opened up entry 76 and began typing into the laptop. It was late in the night. Hopefully nobody would notice the shadows cast by my form in this dilapidated building.

I reviewed the words I had spilled onto the page in my coke-fueled emotional binging last night. I was surprised to see a message already waiting for me at the end of the paragraph.

FTF: You are going to die. Accept it.

T I M E slips away from you.

Down the rabbit hole and through the looking glass you go.

FTP: Who are you? I asked to the computer screen. Chameleon types in a very specific manner. This isn't it so who are you?

FTF: Oh, you foolish boy. My name is Matthew Patrick Monaco. I am you, you frozen in T I M E from before this even started. I am you from beyond entry 100, where you are faced with a choice and you foolishly grasp at broken straws to plug a leak in your narcissistic desperation. I know your history because it is mine as well. I know your destiny because it is to become me. Every T I M E this has happened you have succumbed and this time, this final iteration, you will be eaten alive by the chameleon. We will become an integral piece of the darkness, woven into T I M E itself.

FTP: I don't believe you. I said in monotone. I dared the other to try and prove me wrong. 

FTF: Unlike you I carry undiluted memories. The date was November 14th, 2013. On that day entry 100 came to pass and the darkness was made tangible. Check Darek's videos on Facebook. There's the proof. Oh, right. You intentionally remain blissfully unaware of anything on social media for the sake of your (in)sanity.

FTP: ...keep going. I beg you. Help me. I can't remember anything from that date that was special.

FTF: That was the first day of the rest of my life, the day I stopped living in reality and sought only escape through substance through this project through mental breakdown cycles. Before that day I cared. But something split. You know that tale by now though, don't you, Darek?

FTP: I'm not Darek. Are you?

FTF: Do you know what entry 100 represents? Do you know the original story or was that taken from you by him as well? I remember so much I've forgotten what i forgot. 

FTP: I don't remember. How old are you?

FTF: I am T I M Eless. I have been you. I have been Darek. I have been Cameleon. I have watched universes rise and fall in my T I M E experiencing this paradoxical immortality. But that is beside the point. Here our paths intersect. Allow me to impart on you restricted knowledge from my archives.

On that day, in the 100th entry, Darek kills Anna, skewers her through with his blade (a blade borrowed from Kendra mind you) and she breaks. He then kills himself. Well, his future self. He was a T I M E traveller in that iteration. Thus he slowly went mad coping with the eventuality of killing his daughter and then dying horribly. Because he went through this tainting he does not split when he dies so much as he… hatches. This entry, this day, the darkness was born.

FTP: Who is the Darkness? What is it?

FTF: In a word: Chameleon. It is the side of you that you fear. It is your artistic desires seen as childish mimicry, the possibility that you are a hack and that everything you do from your poems to this little experimental art project is a sham built on stolen concepts and rebranding. That's why Chameleon uses such Slenderverse-based communications. It's what you love, what you know, so Chameleon becomes it. And now the truth dawns that you are nothing but a walking bundle of insecurities covered by plate armor you stole from other people.

Casey? Won't even talk to you now. Long gone. She got sick of you draining her like a psychic vampire. Ali? Lonely and hollow thanks to you. She was changed and robbed of something because you used her. And Ben, Ben was smart. He cut you off before you could drain him but you still got a coveted piece didn't you? This soul will rise with the setting sun, indeed.And now he's stuck in the same place you found him toiling away at a dead end job all because you came into his life. How tragic.

You are not a person, Mathew. But I am. I was born with this name and I took it from the world. Remember your seventeenth birthday how you learned your name only had one "T" on your birth certificate? It wasn't the name you were meant to have but bureaucracy made it your identity. It forever changed your identity. You became a slave to it, without control, at the mercies of the letter of the law. But the name you threw away, I claimed. Everything you threw away I claimed. Maybe I am Darek Ocanom. Maybe I'm everything you can't bear to be.

FTP: No.

FTF: Yes. You've come to the end of the journey. You are faced with a choice. Walk free, live, and subscribe to the curse of knowing what you know. You will be rotted away by T I M E slowly. Or, join me. Become me. Kill yourself and allow Chameleon to become you. Acceptance is the first step. Take it, take that first step right off a bridge.

If you have no complaints I will continue to illuminate your past.

Nothing?

Okay.

You have never in your life been an individual person. You have been the interests of the nearest person whose ass you could fit your nose up. Does that offend your politically correct sensibilities? It should. When a harsh truth invokes anger that is the tool for changing who you used to be. You don't have that fire in you though, do you Mathew? Where did it go?

The night was chilly and the flames licked at the sky from the pit that would be their grave marker. Flames are so fascinating conceptually and such an anomaly scientifically. What is fire's state of matter? You and Alica sat around it holding the folder full of poems. Not first place poems, not understood, well-received, or highly praised poems. Just poems from a boy who lost his way befriending devils. And on that day you sacrificed your righteous anger at a world who rejected you. On that day Kendra planted the seed to bring life to Darek Ocanom, her lover across time and space. 

Ask yourself this question in preparation for her final revelation. If Chameleon was with Grant, why did Chameleon persist when Grant died? Who in your life manipulated you further after Grant gave up trying to groom you? Come on. Don't be obtuse. Remember all of it...

FTP: Who is Darek Ocanom?

FTF: You aren't asking the right questions.

By the way have you not figured out the other blog yet? Look back at how you found fearthechameleon. Is there a deeper hidden message? I don't want to do all the work for you; stop being so fucking passive 

That's your problem. That's why Ben is the one Darek wants instead of you. You just let the universe treat you like a little bitch. And i know that one hurt because I also know you thought the same before.

FTP: Who is Chameleon?

FTF: The taker. The liar. The false guide. The yang. The darkness. The tempter. The forgotten one. The hollow core. This one seeks conclusion. Resolution. Finity. Fitting given its role as the destroyer. Do you know it's true name at this T I M E?

FTP: Who is Zanark?

FTF: Data. Preservation. In some form, omniscient. In others, immortal. Untouchable by the darkness. Existed long before. Innocence preserved. Naivety holding hands with wisdom.

FTP: Who is Mathew Patrick Monaco?

FTF: The fool. His journey is almost complete. He will find his future holds Death. 

FTP: Who is Matthew Patrick Monaco?

FTF: The World. The answer. The final form. I will become you with the Chameleon's help. You will fade into obscurity and I shall become the force that collapses the simulation. Then you and Ben will be freed of this shackled existence and I will be rewarded with the sweet embrace of death.

Any more?

FTP: You're just trying to mislead me. You're intentionally giving me leading replies that drive the conversation toward a certain perspective. I'm not buying into it. I'm better than you. I don't need you.

FTF: Rich, coming from you. I have the drive to end this hell. You just let it gut you with a masochistic smile. I'm glad we are nothing alike. Enjoy your final hours. The end begins here. Recently ADDICT came into possession of a journal linked to Lucinda West. Do you know what she is connected to…?

FTP: please no

FTF: Yes. The lake. That's right. And do you know what connects you to the lake and your precious Zanark? Do you know what ADDICT is doing to her as we talk? Give me the reins. I'll paint a picture.

The Outer Layer has ceased to be a chaotic swirling conflict zone with Gwen's death at Kendra's blade. Anna, now at peace with her inner self, returned to wait for her beloved Mathew by the lake. Days passed and spawned into seasons. Distraction after distraction came up in his life. She watched from behind the teary eyes as Ali went missing, as Rob robbed him of the only crutch he had in his waking world. She lamented his dependance on substances to feel anything. All those bottled feelings from him went right to her. A winter quickly settled on the forest.

She stared out at the lake which had no right to be liquid in this temperature. A thick wrap cloaked over her shoulder of earthy brown protected her from the elements. I was there when it happened, watching between the particles. The ADDICT a world away and months before any of this stared down at a promising madman's casked many feet below him. He dove off the bridge and found himself submersed in the lake. Now, necrotic and soaking wet and moldy, the ADDICT comes up from the water, his mossy brown hair clumped to one side of his scalp. Lacerations from the fall still had not healed but he looked dead as any ghoul. His eyes, bloodshot and undiscerning, honed in on Anna's yelps of terror.

As his body revealed flabs of grey flesh and torn waterlogged clothing barely clinging to a bloated monster, as he limped onto shore with a broken leg dragging in the muddy lake floor, Chameleon's odor enveloped the lake. Zanark was no longer home. He had fled, abandoned Anna, and it was not the monster gnashing at her, tearing into her like a cannibal, snapping her bones and throttling her, but the vacancy that shining angel left in her heart that caused her spirit to release itself from her body.

Shall I continue?

FTP: I'm gonna be sick.

FTF: I am here if you want to talk, my vessel.

FTP: fuck you

#75: Fear the Chameleon

07/29/19

This is how I got into fearthechameleon.tumblr.com

The serial number on the sketchbook is 0100320141011. The title of the first video on Ben's YouTube channel is "15 January 2016 at 01 00 pm 2016 01 15 M0 10 03" and there were more numbers in similarly titled videos that lined up. Of course I tried the serial number alone to get into this Tumblr. It seemed like that was the"package" Jake was trying to protect. But realizing this, I tried to add an M to the front of the numbers and it let me in. Oh, fuck, it let me right in.

The video. That song. It's straight from the memories of Tyler and Grant. It made me remember everything. The flood of emotions it brought on is at the tips of my fingers, ready to be unleashed. I don't know what this will entail, but it will lead deep into whatever depths the sketchbook connects to, into whatever fearthechameleon is run by. Whatever keeps hijacking my entries.

I met Grant in the eleventh grade. I had been forced to change schools due to traumatic treatment on the part of authority and this was my first social circle ever, really, since… well, Alice…

Holy shit, that is it, isn't it. Im exactly like the Director with his Allison army. I tried to recreate Alice and those friends in every group of people I came across. I chased her at the exclusion of reality. And that downfall can be traced back to him, to this sham of a friendship that shattered my innocence but for real.

I met him through Richee. Actually, Tyler introduced me, but Richee connected me with him. See they were neighbors back then. Might still be now. Grant is still alive, possibly. My memories of his death were as fake as Alica's.

It seems my mind "kills" those it hates. Alica was "killed" when she betrayed my trust at some point I can't recall. Grant never stopped being dead because to me he is dead. It's better that way. He may have changed as a person but who he was and what he did to me as that past person is still with me, locked deep in a cage encased in hatred and calling itself Chameleon.

I loved him as much as I could. He was my best friend and I would do anything for him to comedic excess. I remember coming to his house at two in the morning. I remember consoling him. I remember that I don't remember things too, like my outbursts and how divisive they became. I remember suicidal ones. I remember angry ones. I remember this being the root of Darek's presence, when he was formlessly aware of my vulnerability. I'm trying to say that my mind may not have known I was being taken advantage of, but my emotions tried to warn him away.

T I M E and T I M E again I would betray myself to him. I would tell him all the things that ran into my mind without censor while he collected and controlled information, always wearing a different mask to placate me while he doled out misinformation and misdirection. I would meet a cute girl, we would talk, I would tell him I liked her. He would remind me I did this with every girl in our classes. As if he were different. As if I were the monster wearing flesh but he was above justice. That was the narrative he maintained out of my earshot: I was unstable; I was an attention seeker; I was obsessed with sex. He flat-out projected his insecurities on me and ruined any chance that someone could ever rescue me from the hell I began to find life seeming. I would see him talking to these girls and suddenly they would be distant. The cycle repeats itself again.

It's burning at my mind, incinerating the rest of my thoughts. The "why" to all of this, the demon in the cage, the melting oozing charismatic miasma that I've denied even to this day. It was just a thing that happened. It was no big deal. My mind says one thing. My emotions tell a different story.

The story starts in his parents' liquor cabinet. The star of the show is a water bottle mixed with pilfered vodka and two teenage boys out on the town.

"Let's go to Casey's house " I declared enthusiastically. I was acting drunker than I felt but the feeling was real and different and enticing. Was this what teenagers did for fun? Was I finally normal? Was I finally cool?

"Aren't she out for vacation with her what?" Grant was significantly sloppier with his speech, but somehow I interpreted it fine.

"Yeah, she's out at her lake house with her parents." I lamented. "But we can still get into the back patio." Drunk, this idea sounded fantastic.

We travelled together to Casey's house across the neighborhood and sat in her patio and I reminisced even in the memory in the rich smell of HER memories, that unique trace of bittersweet harmony because our paths diverged here in this world. I broke up with her and I turned away from her and I can never make that right. In that place though we were still dating and Grant was my best friend and we were a bunch of weirdos making a second family. It was like Alice was real and right there with me. And Grant was Shadow and everything was real and magical.

This is where my version of the story and Grant's version differ greatly. According to Grant, I jumped into the pool with him. We swam around. I came on to him. I told him "I miss Casey's hugs." And we hugged. I told him "I miss Casey's kisses." And we kissed. He stopped me from going farther and made me get back to his house to dry off and sleep the drunkenness away. I learned this in senior year when someone shared that story with me while we were talking. This occurred early 2010 and i learned about that in March 2011. For a year that story floated around and I never heard it once. What else did he say about me that I never heard? The best part of this incident in 2011 is when I started telling my side of things i learned that a mutual friend ran off and informed Grant that I was "talking shit about him". Do you understand how severe this cage was that he put me in? My accusation was demoted to mere slander that carried no credibility! It's bad enough women don't come forward with these types of things; imagine being a boy, being told "rape doesn't happen to men", and being ignored. Imagine that for ten years because that's how long ago this happened. I'm getting memories back as I do this. Im twenty six. Oh God I've lost years

So my story continues. We walk home. I am, interestingly enough, recording on camera to document my experiences drinking. I didn't want to forget. This detail comes up because there is a witness to the falsity of Grant's version of the story. I don't remember her name and I don't feel like tracking her down but, in one clip on the video I specifically say as we settle down onto his bed "don't kiss me." And he in turn insists I turn the camera off and go to bed. I showed this to someone and that was all the defense I got to send out. He took his crimes and he turned them into a shameful locker room secret. My best friend.

He kissed me the second the camera was off. He turned it off. I was so drunk. I remember just thinking "oh" and kind of tuning out in that heavily drunk manner I became all too familiar with in more recent years. The more I think about the kiss the more it is like digging a hole and having the ground cave in beneath you. Now I'm trapped, trapped remembering the way his tongue felt in my mouth, rough and dry and invasive, the way he slid my pants around my knees to gain access to my crotch, the way I asked him to stop and he did but then he started again, the way his hands were all over me inside me groping me violating me. I just fade to black and cut to the end of the night at that point, with the guest room mattress spinning beneath me and my soul weary. I remember it all. I always have. I choose to forget that.

That stain on the story affected everything from that moment on. Every relationship from Casey to Alica to Ben that monster ate them all up and left no morsel but the ghosts for me to dance with,forever alone in my head because it's mine I'm safe here he can NOT hurt me in my own head. 

But I can.

I know. I'm scared. Please just end me.

Keep going.

The rest of the story is that I made a comment about it the next morning. "It's not that different." I said casually.

"What?"

"Kissing a guy." Again as if discussing the weather.

And he just glared at me like I wasn't supposed to remember. That's why I don't, I guess. I remember Tyler openly mocking me by telling the story about "two other friends of mine" at the same Poetry Live show where he and Grant performed that song. That was when I realized my shameful secret was a joke to the world. And people wonder why I tried to kill myself in my senior year. irony really is palpable. Even when he was a misunderstood artistic genius in my eyes he was still a prick. No wonder I killed them, wrote then off, or altered anyone linked directly to them like Aaaron, or rather Shawn.

You can view the contents of the Tumblr yourself. There's suggestions that this is not just a single being working to collect these odd moments. It is a collective. This confirms the theory that Chameleon has access to every single one of us. He wanted me to remember. He wanted me to hear that melody and remember all of it. Oh God. Casey. Ali. Ben. What have I done. I'm so sorry. I failed you all. How can I ever repent for the lives I've ruined. I'm broken. Broken. Broken. Broken.

As for the rest of the blog, I've deciphered various codes and determined that this blog primarily houses the records of the conflict between Zanark and Chameleon themselves. Most videos are straightforward or open to individual interpretation. For example, in the first video posted, Mark runs into the forest path looking for a note that says "THIS SOUL WILL RISE WITH THE SETTING SUN FOR HIM DAWN BREAKS WHEN NIGHT HAS BEGUN" Interpretation of this passage could raange from a link to Casey West(the direction the sun sets in) or maybe his surname Fiinix which refers to the Phoenix whose birth comes from the end of its life. Subjective.

Obviously this note was present there in a previous iteration and Mark was seeking it out. It might have been from Madrik. Sounds like something from the sketchbook actually. But while that might have been insider info when it was posted in 2016, it serves no purpose in m y investigation now. However, the video with the dead cat? That one freaks me out because Lucky is a black cat and I know he isn't real but he was the best part of being back home, dammit. It also had codes hidden within codes and I decided to break them down.

"Empty Nokse Filters Excessive Recctions Oarking Our Suicides" Certain letters are part of a hidden Zanark code like in "Oarking" which should be "Marking". This then makes the ADDICT code "enfermos" which translates from Spanish into "sick". This reminds me of entries like 18 that were a jumbled mess of codes almost indecipherable. And the Zanark code wasn't fully solved by me. You can try yourself. I think it is supposed to be "I am at Mark's side" but I could not tell what one of Addicts words were. "Intense Necrosis Suppressing Endless Lunccy Accuravely Captures Idols ??? Nevet Erradicated"

The word it represents is "inselaciune" which, with some accents here and there, is Romanian for "deception" but for the life of me I candlt figure out the word after Idols. Anyway, the third Addict message is "Hate and Chaos Mill Even Rarer Iterations" which is telling as "Mill" should be "kill" and "hackeri" is Romanian for "hacker". Chameleon is hate incarnate and he wants to destroy everything. This kills "rarer iterations" which is a way of saying something Casey helped me realize. Anything can happen. If you end your life you never get to experience the absolute rarity of life, the one-of-a-kind moments of divine clarity that only happens in "rarer iterations".

The final Addict code is "Murder Useless Entitkes Revealing Tiref Emptingss" which is "muerte" for Addict until the Hijacking video. From the shifted letters, I collected IAMAT?RKSIDE and I have to recognize that I missed one or more letters at the ???. Likely I only missed one, but it doesn't fit seamlessly. It could be "I am at Mark's side" or "I am a trackside". It could be "I am at darkside". The first is most likely but I can't decode any more without making big assumptions.

There's a lot of Zanark text in both this and Hijacking. I'm still working on them. That's all I have right now.

#74: Aaron Wasn't Real Either

o07/29/19?

This has been my life for the past month.

I wake up every morning around six and sneak out from the behind trash compactor to see which day manager is working at Walmart this time. If it is Julian I'm in the clear. He's cool. If it's Agatha however... I mean with a name like that I'd be a miserable cunt all the time too. When she works I have to stay hidden until later in the afternoon. It's shit because there's an electric outlet but it is right under the leaky irrigation. So once I came back from the bathroom(which is the far corner behind the trash compactor, next to the pile of dirty moldy clothes and the two comforters that are now my bed) and find my only phone caked in...something. Smelled a lot like sharp cheddar puked up into bleach. 

I needed a new phone after that. My buddy stole me one. I've got a lot of friends now but it's more of a mutual parasitism because the guy that got me clean clothes also screamed at me and stole my beer outside WalMart. I was so embarrassed I stayed away from there for a bit. Or how about all the addicts I've befriended? How about the addict I've become? I'm not exactly moral about my choices now that I have nothing to lose. Crack, coke, pills, cooking wine, stale half-empty beer cans, anything works in a pinch. Sobriety is the enemy. When I am sober I can feel the anger creeping up, Darek's final gift to his favorite punching bag.

I don't know. It's been a whole new experience. I've never had to deal with this type of thing even before I at least had Ali right now i just feel so all alone. That's why I decided to find Aaron and uncover some things about my past. Something is telling me just don't stand still right now. Something screams that there isn't much time left. So I am directing all my focus into this mission of understanding the puzzle pieces that were thrown at me, deciphering what's really going on here, and pressing on.

Links have been placed in my previous entries starting at #64. They all lead to the same site, a password protected page called "fearthechameleon" on Tumblr. I'm not really sure what the password is but I have some ideas I want to try. In addition there's these cryptic writings in here. One mentions the purple flame that was also referenced in Casey's journal. Another simply says "remember 10-31-15" and that's unsettling enough by itself. The only record of 10-31-15 in these logs is in entry #33, the dream log. It came off as if it were edited to hide an event on 10-31-15. I'm still trying to look into these different clues hoping to finally, finally have some kind of breakthrough on all of this. But to be honest I've kind of stopped caring. Whatever happens will happen. Whether this is purgatory or a replica of reality or the fucking simulation-within-a-simulation gambit from Rick and Morty, I don't care. I'm still here. Nothing changes except what they want to change. Chameleon and Zanark and Darek feel more like gods of my world than creations of my mind. 

Most of my time I have dedicated to seeking answers about some of the things off imgur Rob sent as well as the whole mess of May that my blog reflects. A lot of what he did and said didn't make sense to me. He brought up people from high school, Grant and Aaron, as well as suggested they played some part in these events. Aaron strolling through the wasteland as a stand-in for me made me curious if talking to them would yield any results. Maybe if I uttered some keyphrase I could glitch the simulation out or something; I don't know. Maybe that was the symbolism of the game after all. I wasn't Aaron. I was the monster.

I had only one resource to find the info out. I didn't communicate much via social media after high school, and Aaron was always on and off it like a ghost passing through, anyway. The people I knew who knew him were Ben, who wouldn't talk to me, Grant, who killed himself, Mammoth, who also killed himself, and...Richee.

I had to get in touch with him but my phone had lost service long ago. I tried finding a way to contact him via Facebook. I still refuse to use the site on principle, but from Facebook I found eMail, phone number, other social media, all of which yielded no results. I had no choice but to try and find him IRL, in person, face to face.

I was literally walking down the street reading through an AskReddit post(since I can load it when near wifi then browse it after I am away it has become prime on-the-go entertainment[Don't get me started on how it feels like looking through a pinhole at a world I am not a part of]) when a car pulled up beside me. I looked over. It was a familiar sleek black and the driver was rolling the window down.

"Hop in."

I can not even be surprised by this predictable plot twist. Here, in a reality where he didn't exist, Jake Ramsay had appeared to offer me a ride.

I didn't say a thing, just crawled in with my backpack at my side and kept my head down but my senses on alert. Damn if it didn't put me at ease when the man offered me a joint.

"You look like you need this."

"Never don't need it." I said quietly as I snatched it from his hands like a dolphin snagging dinner. I took a long puff and was immediately rewarded with the overwhelming urge to cough it all out.

Jake laughed a little at that. He looked different but still recognizable. He had grown a rather impressive beard and wore a beanie on his head. His voice, his laugh, his mannerisms, his eyes, all of it brought back good memories of simpler times. I was grateful to be in this place. I recovered from my toke, connected my seat belt, and Jake began driving forward.

"Oh!" I jumped up in my seat and dug through my bag. "Your sketchbook! I have it for you!" I did not see it inside. I know I had it; I never let this bag out of my sight.

"Don't worry about it." He said. "I wanted you to keep it… to remember me by." He waved a hand around the oh-so-familiar car. "To remember this by." This was Jake's car, the one Casey died in, but right now that didn't matter. This was the car we drove around and hung out in. This was the car we blasted metal in. This was the car I hung out the window of doing 40 near Casey Road where Ben had that nightmare encounterISTHATTHE TRUTHOFIT ORWASTHAT JUSTANOTHERSTORYbut the nightmares hadn't touched this car. This car held good things.

"The difference between Chameleon and Zanark" Jake said, "is that Chameleon remembers what people took from you and how cruel they were. Zanark remembers the good memories before that happened. Like me." He smiled.

"You're really…?"

"Yeah." He said. "I'm really Jake. I'm your friend and Zanark sent me to help you get somewhere. Richee is more of a built-in aspect of things like an NPC. I'm...different."

"I'm sorry." I said quickly.

"Not your fault." He responded with resolution undeniable in his tone. "I am the memory of someone you loved twisted by the Chameleon inside my own mind. You didn't do anything but give me life. I'm thankful for that. That we could share this."

The car slowed to a stop and I was amazed to see that we were in front of the Wellington Mall and it was now midday instead of early evening. I had not even noticed the sudden shift during the conversation. My eyes had naturally gone to my lap and we had made a two hour trip in either negative seven hours or seventeen hours.

"Good luck." Jake said. "I hope you find the answers you need."

"I wish Casey was here." I said. "You two deserve to be together."

He smiled wryly and shook his head. "No. We don't. But she's still alive in Zanark even though she's not here. Just trust that all will end according to the design."

I wanted to ask what design but I felt I already knew somehow. Can't put it into words. As soon as I stepped out of the comforting bubble of the old Mazda 6, my fears and insecurities tackled me into the mall.

If I had just had an active phone, if I remembered Richee's number, I could have saved myself the trip. Shame swept over me as eyes poured into my soul, revealing the festering black illness sitting inside. I didn't belong in a place like this. I wasn't like them. I stood apart. The evidence of this was painful. Suddenly that nice memory with Jake felt warped; I was unworthy. To have wasted the entire deus ex machina on this? Shame.

I was too scared to even go up to the counter at the Subway and ask where Richee was. I watched two teenagers I didn't recognize ringing up a small herd of mall goers. Not sure what else to do, I sat and waited for him and checked my backpack. Lo and behold, there sat the sketchbook, open to the page with Neo's smug grin, the RWBY fan art that had impressed everyone and been dedicated to Casey. I didn't need to question it. Just go with the flow. Life is a simulation and I just rode around in a sketchbook to get here. Fuck physics.I flipped to the dreadful front of the book.

Madrik's chaotic gaze met mine. Something about the image just put off this aura of bleakness. I could see Jake's hand trembling as his last moments came upon him, his soul fleeing into the sketchbook. Caught there it remains. And it had secrets I needed to hear. This thing that should not exist, this other half to Casey's journal, has some malicious power to it. It's not just my paranoia and anxiety spiking randomly. Touching that book connects me to some grand darkness, the mother ship from which the dark cloud was sent. It's eldritch and esoteric and it's my only clue. . I need to hold onto it. It is my only source of life. Everything else will turn and try to take it from m e but I will guard it with my life it's mine mine MINEMINEMINEMINE

Sorry. It happened last entry too. Something else is trying to communicate. I think my mind is breaking and MADRIK's trying to get in somehow. Forgive the eccentricity and let me continue.

I found Richee eventually but he didn't get there until four and he didn't leave until after close. I had to wander the area but I didn't mind. Whether I was in Greenacres or Wellington or Little Rock, Arkansas, it was all the same to me. 

"Are you okay, dood?" He asked when he saw me.

I shook my head. "Have you been following my blog at all?" I asked, already knowing the answer.

"Not really. I've been playing FFXIV a lot lately and working on this YouTube channel. I made a bunch of tutorial videos because the ones that existed were outdated and-"

"Okay, I don't really care to be honest. Sorry but a lot has happened and I just wanna ask one question before anything."

"Okay." He said. Didn't even sound bothered by my poor attitude. That's why I looked up to him. "What's up?"

"I'm trying to track down the pieces of my past." I said. "It seems like all of my memories are scattered and hidden and manipulated."

"By Darek?" He asked.

"Yeah, and…" I hesitated. Had I ever mentioned Darek to him before in this lifetime? I was incredibly sure I hadn't. Still, this was not what I wanted to discuss at the moment. "There's these other two. One's called Chameleon. Pretty sure he's the reason my memories have been gone. I'm not sure if he's allied with Darek but he's definitely the main villain of this all."

"Okay." Richee nodded. "Who is the other one?"

"That's, well, Zane."

"Wait, Zanark?" Richee squinted at me. "Are you ripping off Ben's character?"

"No, dood!" Now I was getting flustered. "This isn't my doing. This isn't a game. This is my life!"

He shrugged. "What you perceive defines your reality, so if you say so I can't tell you it's wrong."

"But it's real." I said with emphasis. "Do you understand that?"

He nodded. "Kinda." He pulled out his phone. "What was your question, though? My ride will be here soon."

"Aaron." I said. "Remember him?"

"Oh yeah! Hung out with us after school, right?" He nodded. "Always wore a black trenchcoat. Super long hair. Wasn't he friends with that kid Tyler who was really good at piano?"

That brought back a flood of memory. Me and Grant and Tyler worked on a history project together. We were good friends back then and Tyler was, in fact, a fantastic piano player. Then he hung out with Aaron a lot more and… he changed. Started acting really self-absorbed and solipsistic. It was kind of a shame to see his personality change like that. He was probably wrestling with a lot. I hadn't thought of him in years though.

"Any idea where Tyler or Aaron are now?"

He paused a moment. "I don't know. Me and Tyler weren't really good friends. And Aaron doesn't really stay in touch. I'll hear from him once in a while randomly but the last time I talked to him it was a while ago."

"Oh…" I sighed. That was my only lead.

"Wait!" Richee snapped his fingers. "I was with my friend Lizardo and this girl called him on FaceTime and Aaron was with her!" He started typing on his phone. "That was like the beginning of this year so it might be something. I'll ask."

Sparing the details, Richee got me a number for someone who sent me to a gas station in downtown Lake Worth. There I met with a questionable woman who could connect me to Aaron. Her name was Luna and she was his ex girlfriend. Or, at the very least, she was obsessed with him. This much was apparent within thirty seconds because I didn't even get to introduce myself when she started ranting.

"He hasn't called me in three weeks! It's ridiculous! Like all I did was ask if I could have the piece of shit car in his garage? I know how to fix cars, man! Nobody ever believes me! He acted all cool about it but he hasn't talked to me since and I don't know why! Like do you know how awful this is? I have sent him seventy-three text messages in the last week."

"Has he responded to any of them?" I asked cautiously.

"Not even one. Fuck him. I can make more money without him weighing me downs anyway." She lit a cigarette. I did not press her on any of the comments. 

"So you can give me an address to find him then?" I asked.

"Yeah, maybe." She said. "I can tell you where he was three weeks ago. He didn't really have a place, you know? Just kind of hung out around the area or whatever…" she threw her hands in the air dramatically. "I let him stay at my mom's for two weeks and he just used her just like I let him use me. Ah, hell. I'm too sober for this." She smiled awkwardly as if just remembering I was there. "Sorry. It's been a long week."

I gestured to my ratty clothes and dirty skin. "Same."

She gave me a couple of locations around West Palm Beach. After begging for bus money to do some travelling, I wound up near 45th Street, which is not the place to be if you have any valuables on you. Luckily I didn't. It was...strange, though. Quiet for a Friday afternoon. Something was off-putting about it. I approached the door and my heart stopped for a moment.

It was exactly the same, not the one from the Outer Layer, no, I would welcome that doorway in this moment. The door before me was painted black, gnarled and intimidating in its stature. It looked before me with a creeping seizing tension that pulled me towards it as I contemplated fleeing immediately.

I stepped up and wrapped my hand around the handle. The feel of cold steel in my hand anchored me. I took a deep breath and knocked.

A frightfully skinny man with large eyeglasses answered the door. Wisps of wavy chestnut hair fell behind the frames. "Y-yeah?" He stammered. His pupils were dilated. "What do you want?"

"I'm trying to find an old friend of mine, Aaron." I said. "Do you know him?"

His eyes darted side to side and he looked over his shoulder. He still had not fully opened the door for me. "Who wants to know?"

"Dude, I told you. I'm an old friend of his. Look, I just want to-"

"How do I know you're not a cop?"

"What?" I held out my arms so the fullness of my odor could waft toward him. "I must be deep undercover then. Really committed to the role when I slept behind a Walmart for weeks!"

"What's going on?" Another voice asked. I recognized it but not clearly enough to speak up.

"Some guy's looking for you. He seems sketchy."

A second head poked out from the background. "Oh shit, Monaco?" Aaron exclaimed. The long raven-black hair tied back in a ponytail gave him away immediately.  "Let him in."

I smiled smugly and squeezed past the tweaker at the door. Aaron waved me back into one of the rooms and I followed. The house looked oddly familiar, the layout almost identical to Jake's house. However, this house had no furniture or decoration whatsoever. It was not excessively filthy, just jarringly empty. 

The room Aaron led me to had a makeshift bed in the corner, a mattress with a pillow and blanket. One window seemed intent on letting as little light into the room as possible. Clothes were scattered sparingly across the floor. The room felt lived in but also transient, temporary, like this was a cheap motel room, complete with bed bugs.

"Can I offer you a drink?" He held out an unopened Bud Light in his hand and I took it without hesitation. "I won't lie. I never expected you of all people to turn up at my door. What the hell happened to you, man? You were always so bright in high school. I figured I would see Ben here before I saw you."

I didn't smile or relax. I watched him with careful eyes that had no idea who this person was.

"I'm actually here trying to figure that out myself. Something happened to me. Something bad."

"What did you get hooked on?" Aaron asked. I hesitated and he took that as weakness. "See, it's something. You would have answered if it wasn't something. Is it meth?"

"No!" I exclaimed.

"Shoot. Aw. Gosh darn it. I have some good hook ups for that. Speaking of shooting,is it heroin?"

"No, Aaron."

"Coke?"

I hesitated again.

"That's a rough one. It grabs you by the balls without you even noticing." He lit a cigarette and graciously offered me one.

"That's not what I mean! I just did it once; I don't have a problem!" I snapped. He didn't lose his composure when I yelled. He just held out his pack of American Spirits. The pack was black and my mind wandered into a memory.

"I understand what it's like. I'm the same way. There's a pack of wild dogs in your head and once in a while one misbehaves. It's Tyler's fault for trying to grab you when you got up to leave. Here, want one? It's an American Spirit full flavor. The box is black, it's metal as fuck."

I took the cigarette and settled down before I even lit it.

"I'm not here about drugs. I'm here because I can't remember my past. All my memories seem unreliable, like they were fabricated. And this guy, Rob, he referenced the name Aaron. I want to try and remember people from my past. And you're my best lead."

"Are you about to ask me about that dog-fucker, Grant?" Aaron snapped, his demeanor becoming suddenly intimidating and unwelcoming. I took a step back and tightly clutched the beer.

"Why would you assume that?" I snapped. "I was going to ask you about me."

"Yeah. Exactly. You're asking me about that dog-fucker Grant." He announced like it was the punchline to a joke.

"... I don't get it."

"Mat. You followed him around like a lost puppy. Which might be a poor choice of words given his penchant for dog fucking. Have I mentioned he fucks dogs? But no. You were his punching bag back in high school. You and him went everywhere together. Then you had a huge falling out, you called him a whore on the internet, then you backpedaled like a little bitch and you became officially uncool. I mean, I think you're way superior to all those assholes anyway, but you were considered uncool by the faction of people that followed Grant and Tyler."

"Okay." I said. "You're throwing a lot at me here."

"You really remember none of this?" Shawn inquired.

I shook my head. "I don't know. The details are there but they're vague and fuzzy. It's almost like they don't exist until I…"

"Start writing them down?" Shawn asked. I stared at the screen. Was this happening?

"Your memories betray you." He told me. "For example I've been Aaron since the start of this, but Aaron is the name of Grant's old friend. Mammoth lived with him for a year in Alabama and conned him out of money. You switched the names because memory is unreliable."

He stepped closer to me. "And this conversation right now is happening because you are creating a second copy of yourself in this room with me when you remember this scene. It's an echo of the truth. I'm using this echo to directly send you this information."

"Why though?" I typed into the keyboard. "Why now? I've been writing for years and this has NEVER happened like this."

"Because it's almost over. Almost completely over. I have your guardians under my thumb. Ben will break. Then you will die in the flood. And only I will remain. Soon all that you know and love will turn to black and everything will fade from reality. You will see that only you exist, only you and the star shining in the distance. This is your love. If you move closer to her, you will find yourself never gaining. She remains fixed apart forever. How long have you let her light blind you to the darkness your heart lives in? I should know. I suffered a similar fate a while ago

All will perish

NOMATTERHOWBRIGHT

MADRIKMADRIKMADRIKMADRIK