Sunny's hands are shaking; he reaches into his old lover's coat pocket. A single hard drive is in there. He stares at it. There's a small engraving of the name "TOMMY". His heart aches. He shoves it in his pant pocket, adjusting his glasses. He leaves the hollow apartment. The apartment he used to sleep in when he was lonely, the apartment that was once so welcoming.When Tommy 'left' the apartment, apart of it emptied out. It spilt out like a wounded beast and soaked into the floorboards. It rooted itself in the nameplate that read, "#07". It webbed its way into it's next victim, Sunny.Sunny was a normal guy. He had a daughter, her name being Charlie. He was working on this project- er.. rather, two projects. Testing AI sentience, and testing how AI's with sentience would interact with AI's without sentience. It was all an experiment back then.How times had changed.

Lexicon wakes up in his bed, his head pounding. He knows something is wrong. It feels like there's a gaping hole in his chest; a cavity. He gasps for air, grasping at his shirt. He can feel his heartbeat in his ears, a gentle thump, thump, thump. He feels...He feels emptied. Like they sucked all the blood out of his body and put in new ones, but they forgot a few veins, they forgot a few crevices. He is missing blood, his body is desperately trying to keep up while trying not to cave in on itself.He checks his phone, an email from Jack. From the little notification bubble, he can see it reads; "Dear Lexicon,I had a strange dream. About fire. Isn't that what Subject #F7B5C5 had been talking about? Fire? Speaking of #F7B5C5, have you checked up on them lately? I'm worried that #7A001E..."He rereads the couple of lines he can see over and over again. Dream, fire, Subject #F7B5C5, Subject #7A001E. His thoughts flooded back to him. He opened the email, and without reading the rest, he replies a swift, "What was your dream about?"

Jack downs some asprin, swallowing some water. They lazily plops back down onto their couch, pushing back their hair so they can read what's on their laptop. They'd finished and sent the email containing the inhabitants of their dream an hour ago, and Lexi still hadn't answered. They frowned. This was unlike Lexi. They didn't upset him, did they? They know their dream wasn't the nicest, but...They pushed it to the back of Their brain and tabbed over to the chatlog between them and Sunny.

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While they're doing that... Where would you like to proceed to? (WARNING! Once you choose a route it affects the ending. You have to do that route to it's fullest to have a continuous timeline.)

Lexicon stares at the email for the billionth time. That was his dream! There's no way that's a coincidence! Noooooo way! But, he reminds himself, he is not going to panic! In the back of his mind he thinks that he should reply to Jack, let them know that he's okay, but he's too blurry. He digs his nails into his palms, wanting to scream.He holds his palms into his eyes, rocking back and forth slightly. Okay.. Maybe he is panicking. He can feel the flames scorching his skin, and distantly a voice whispers "The apartment". The voice is almost akin to the crackling of flames. He gasps with air, as if he's been drowning his entire life.He still feels empty. The cavity in his chest hasn't filled, but it springs to life with new purpose. He knows where he's going.To the apartment.

- 10:38 AM -Hey Sunshine, did you retrieve the hard-drive?- 11:43 AM -
hey, yeah, sorry for the wait. i just got my hands on it.
Nice. I'm setting up my laptop right now. Are you able to come over and try it out? I would ask Lexicon but he hasn't been replying to my messages.
sure! i'll be over in a sec.
Thanks. See you in a bit..
Sunny speeds on the highway, checking the time. It's about 15 after noon. He'd stopped by home to say hi to his daughter, and to let her know he'd be out again. She nodded and asked if she could have her friends over, which he agreed to. He pulled up in Jack's driveway, getting out.He waved."Hey!"

"Hey, hey. Sunny, come inside. I ordered some chinese food, if thats okay.""Yeah, yeah of course!" Sunny locks his car behind him, continuing into Jack's house. Taking off his shoes and leaving them on the small mat for them that Jack has, he stares at the computer that's set up on Jack's dinning room table."I, er, set it up here so it's easier." Jack explained, sitting down in a chair to the side of it, leaving the chair directly in front of the computer to Sunny. "Take a seat?"Sunny looked from the chair to Jack, before nodding. He settled himself in the chair, before pulling the hard drive from his pocket. "Lets.. lets load it up!" He plugs it in hastily, watching as a little bar loaded up with information.Once it's loaded, a message appears on screen: HELLO READER! i'm fei :] it's so nice to me-.. what. what are you doing here. what. what. whatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhaThe text runs off-screen, and the computer makes an error noise before crashing. " SHIT! " Jack yells, groaning into his hands. Sunny looks worryingly from the screen to Jack. "It's okay! We can just.. try again.""Yes. Yes, right, you're right, we can just try again. I.." The doorbell rings. Jack gets up, opening it. Sunny sees him talk to a girl with firey red hair, then her exchange a big, brown paper bag. He waves her goodbye before closing the door. "Foods here, uhh.. quick break to eat?"Sunny nods, pushing away from the table and joining Jack on the couch. "Hey, on the bright side, at least we know Fei didn't kick the dust? There's still hope.""Hope is all we have these days, isn't it?""Yeah.. I guess so."

Charlie glances at the door to the house, seeing her dad walk through the door. She opens her mouth to say hi, but before she can even speak he's passed her and is rushing into his office. She raises an eyebrow, standing from her seat at the bar.Charlie watches as her dad sits down and plugs a hard-drive into his computer. He sighs in relief, before staring at the screen. He grimaces, before taking the drive out and setting it next to him. She checks the time, 11:59. He picks up his phone and stares at the screen, typing a response, before standing up.He looks up at Charlie, smiling. "Hey Char, how're you? Did you hang out with Amanda?"
She nods, "Mhm, we played Terarria on her computer." He nods along, glancing back at his phone. "Shoot, one sec, Jack needs me to pick something up," He walks over, kissing her head hastily. He grabs his keys, and waves bye. "Call me if you need anything! I'll pick up some pizza on the way home." He grins, before walking out.She waves back, watching as the door closes and locks. She glances over to the hard-drive, raising an eyebrow. Tip-toeing over, she grabs the drive, before loading it onto her father's open computer. After everything's downloaded, one message appears onto the screen:HELLO READER! i'm fei :] it's so nice to meet you!After it appears, several different folders also appear. One titled; "LIVE DESKTOP", the other glitches. At first it showed up at "#ADMIN TST1", before appearing as "THE APPARATUS". Charlie raises an eyebrow.

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

Charlie folded her arms, pulling the cursor over to what was labeled as "LIVE DESKTOP". Clicking it opens to a desktop that is comepletely blank, except for a trash folder. She is able to move the cursor as if she's on the laptop itself. She clicks on the trash and... jesus, there are so many files in the trash.From .exe's, to just normal .txt files. Some of them are corrupted, some not. Charlie clicks on the files, dragging them from the trash. A couple of them are unable to save, but most are able to be brought out somewhat.Strange how this desktop doesn't have a search engine...A notice appears on the screen: excuuuse me! what did i say about going on here, silly? haha! its too dangerous!"Well... I don't really care; so." Charlie said out loud, pretty sure that the computer wasn't listening. Or at least she was, until another response appeared.. . . do not disobey me, charlie. you will not like me when i am upset! :)Charlie stared at the message, "Wha- what? You did not just respond to me."oh but i did !! teehee. please shut this now. :)Charlie shut the computer entirely, yanking the hard drive out. She stared at her palm. Hooooooly shit! She grabbed her phone, furiously typing:- 12:17 PM -
AMI !!! IRIS !!!!!!!! LEAF !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MY PLACE NOW !!!!!!!!!!!!!- 12:18 -dude, whats going on?- 12:18 -
uuegegh you wooke me uuppppp- 12:19 -
POSSIBLE AI !!!!!!! COME SEE COME SEE
MY DAD WONT BE HOME UNTIL LIKE..... 3-4 I THINK! JUST GET OVER HERE- 12:19 -
okk ill wakkee up iriss :P be thererr sooon- 12:19 -
omw rn- 12:20 -
OKOKOK!!!!!!! SEE U THERE