The Clutch (An Armageddon creepypasta)

[deathkamon]

The Clutch

He was looking around and about on the Internet, watching viral videos on YouTube, updating his Facebook, the usual routine a sixteen-year-old from Vancouver, Canada, would do. One day, while searching, he saw someone on Facebook say something about a game called Armageddon. There was a link to the official website, and as soon as he clicked on it, he was brought there. This game was old, and the website mentioned it being up ever since 1990, more than two decades back. It was entirely in text, no visuals included. No noise included, either. This game was a MUD, short for Multi-User Dungeon. The setting was in a desert world called Zalanthas. It seemed boring to him, but he gave it a shot, and he made a character on the client provided by the site. He started playing it off and on for a while and it soon ended up to be really fun and addictive. Eventually, he was playing it actively for around two years, usually on any and every day he had time. Then something strange happened.

His previous dwarf he made died to a bahamet, one of the large tortoise-like creatures in the game. He made a new character after that and it got accepted. But when he got on, his character had ended up in a place called Limbo. He was able to walk in four different directions: North, South, East and West. There was no room description, only the message reading: "If you are in this area, wish for staff to come to your character immediately." He knew for a fact that staff still ran this old, forgotten MUD. This is some mistake, he read in his head. He decided to exit off and get back on, but he then ended up in a pub, and his character couldn't go in any direction whatsoever. There was only a quit option. There was some more lively description of people walking about, talking to each other and the like. Again, still, there was a message in the description of the room telling the dubious player to send staff a notification about the situation. Eventually he did so, and after a while, one of the administrators replied to him, saying that they were unable to get his character out of the area. So he was just left there. Due to a recent game update, his character couldn't look at himself unless he had a mirror.

Around fifteen minutes later, he went back onto the game, and his poor character was still in the room. Today he was heading over to his friend's house, so he left the game up as it was, hoping a staff member would send an update on the situation once he returned. He hung out there for a few hours, but then he was really hungry and thirsty, despite the fact he just had a large steak dinner at his friend's and an A&W float returning home. When he got back to his computer, he noticed that he left the game up for the whole time, and his character was starving and getting thirsty according to the game. No message from staff. He would expect that after he typed the quit command, he would be sent out of the area, because the room itself had the option for players to quit out. Instead, it just sent a "What?" prompt, given when one enters a non-existing command. He pressed the "X" on the top right corner of the page, but it wouldn't close. He decided to just put the computer on sleep for the night.

The next morning, he was unbearably hungry and dehydrated. He had drank and ate so much that morning, he thought that he would vomit his food out. He packed half of everything from his fridge into his lunch that day, almost meant to be taken literally. Just being at school, he couldn't focus. He was light-headed and exhausted, and was told to sit out for Fitness. By the time he got home from being sent early, he was in agony. He almost couldn't even walk. Then he heard something from the computer which was still on sleep mode. It came from the pair of headphones. He turned off the computer's sleep mode and looked on the same tab holding the Armageddon web client. Obviously, his character was now losing both his consciousness and his health, no different than the boy in front of the screen. He scrolled up the log page, and then he saw something saying "The woman has arrived".

No general direction was shown as to where she appeared from, so he thought she was a staff member. So he asked out of character in the game,

"Are you a staff member?"

Then he heard another thing coming from the headphones. He placed them on curiously, then heard,
   
"Hello there, Justin".

Justin checked his Skype and TeamSpeak. Nobody was online. So he turned on the microphone and asked,

"Who is this?"

"Let us both talk to one another for a while. Or a brief moment, your personal preference. You seem very hungry and thirsty."

It sounded like as if someone fairly young was speaking, with a light, eastern European accent. It soon became obvious that this person is the woman in the Armageddon game. He was nervous and confused, but mostly confused. She gave his character a fruit. He made him eat it, knowing his character was hungry and thirsty, but then he felt full and saturated in real life. He motioned himself to slowly turn and walk away, but he felt inclined to keep asking more.

"How do you know who I am?"

"I know others who began here like you. I find that you are more unique than the others.
Therefore I would like you to do something for me, Justin McAdams. Show me how you feel when you have more than just yourself to live for."

After she said that, his character was teleported into the Hall of Kings, the starter area for each character first made in Armageddon. He got himself some starter gear and then he started playing. He decided to immediately find somewhere to quit. However, he couldn't quit when he entered the Gaj dormitory. The same thing happened where he couldn't close the tab. The fuck is this?, he thought, Why's this still happening to me? He closed down the computer and just when he was going to place down my headphones, he heard,

"Come back again."

At that point, he simply did a manual shutdown on the computer. He had enough of this. He fell back in his bed in exhaustion.

Today was Saturday, so he had all day to play. He found he was getting hungry and thirsty, and after scarfing on food and drink alike, he had no choice but to open up the computer and sign into his client (which was somehow already up) to feed and water his character. He placed his character into the T'zai Byn. Eat and drink, all I've gotta do, he thought. He went into sparring with a fellow Runner, but then he felt bizarre sharp pains around his body while this happened. Justin was panting heavily and even sweating in real life while attacking in Armageddon. Soon, his character had to go on a mandatory contract, and so far he wasn't inclined to do anything yet. Justin made his character mount a war beetle, and he was sent off into the sands, where a storm was taking place. Justin had a stretchy feeling in his legs in real life. Earlier that day he fell off his bike, so it could've been some imagination from his mind-boggling head. He and his fellow mercenaries were escorting a wagon to an outpost. While they were going along, he felt a burning sensation along the skin, as well as a tingly feeling as if sand was being blown at the face. They then ran into a pack of raptors.

All three started for him.

While his character was fighting, he was screaming in pain. He tried to stoop over to the medical cabinet in the washroom. He looked down at himself half way there, and he saw himself... Bleeding under his shirt. He immediately rushed—or crawled at this point—to the medical kit in the cabinet. He opened his shirt to see inch-deep gashes along his chest. He couldn't remember anything after that image, only that he blacked out on the floor.

Four hours later, Justin woke up. His parents were still out partying, and the neighbors were asleep at this hour, but he stopped bleeding. At this point, he used rudimentary stitches on his gashes, and the stapler did the trick. That's what happens when you get certified for Advanced First Aid. When he came back to the game, the Sergeant had bandaged his character. He was escorted by someone back to the gates, and Justin had the same problem where he couldn't quit or close the tab. At that point he did not want to get in, and he swore it to himself. The worst part was the fact that he had to lie about himself being attacked by a local black bear once his parents came home. They rushed him to the hospital to get some better stitches, and he surprisingly underwent only two days of treatment before he was let back home. The first thing he did was force water down his character's throat the moment the computer was given.

Throughout the next month, he was resting in the game and constantly eating and drinking. For safety measures, he made his character leave the Byn. His parents were becoming really concerned, and he didn't want to tell them about what was happening because they'd think he was crazy. He already started seeing the psychologist, school counselor and even the Church pastor at one point. Then one day, while he was walking around with his character, he noticed a Templar. He didn't manage to make his character bow in time, so the Templar subdued him, and he felt the clutch. He was in terror, and was trying to shut down the computer but nothing would happen. His character was brought to an execution block, and he felt pressure around his wrists when his character's were tied up from behind. There was a half-giant who raised his executioner's axe, but just before it landed down on the neck of Justin's character, his character was brought somewhere different.

There was no room title, no directions to go in, nothing. All text was cleared off of the client. When he typed down "look", the only thing he saw was "The woman is standing here". There was that woman again, but when he looked at her, there was no equipment description, nor any sort of other physical description, only "SHE GRINS". No matter what command he did, the only message that would show was "SHE GRINS". Even if he typed a command that wouldn't be taken as one, even if he simply spammed random keys and pressed enter, the single thing that would show on the screen would be the same each time:

"SHE GRINS".

Then he decided to simply type down "look", and the description no longer said that message. Instead, what had appeared was "The room is full of mirrors". When he typed in the command box "look mirror", Justin saw... He read... His own full description.

"Someone begins to silently approach you."

[deathkamon]

Btw, the woman you see there in the Creepypasta is supposed to be Ginka.

[RogueGunslinger]

I enjoyed that. Could use some formatting now that it's in Forum mode for an easier read, but I got through it easy enough.

Definitely had an eerie quality to it.

[Bast]

Many years ago I once teleported into an office with secretary and a coffee machine...my whiran was very confused. 

[Jihelu]

Many years ago I once teleported into an office with secretary and a coffee machine...my whiran was very confused. 

I'm..curious to that.


Anywho.
I really like this. I feel like it 'tries too hard' at some points, but it's very well made.
I'm also going to steal the limbo idea for my more supernatural characters.
I mean.
Use completely original backstory.

[Bast]

Many years ago I once teleported into an office with secretary and a coffee machine...my whiran was very confused. 

I'm..curious to that.

Xygax got me out he said it was some left over room that came with the mud or something...like an example room I guess

[deathkamon]

Yeah, that's actually somewhat true with the Limbo room, concerning it's a spare room. If staff don't mind me saying this, Limbo is actually a place where a PC would be placed in before they were teleoprted into some place like "___'s Pub". So that was actually based on one of my PCs who ended up there in Limbo and then the Pub. Both places are OOC places btw.

[deathkamon]

I also did a few edits here and there.

[deathkamon]

Gunna try and get it some shares on FB.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

That's freaking hilarious, man.

[deathkamon]

Submitted it to 4chan, I'm thinking about a few other options too but we'll see.

[deathkamon]

Major re-write and edit has been done.

[Jihelu]

I've always liked this.
Have any other work/spooky shit?

[deathkamon]

I've always liked this.
Have any other work/spooky shit?

Not really. A while back I've been working on some book about Arm in the perception of someone from the last Age, but it's since been abandoned. As for this, I'm planning on having it published to Creepypasta, which is a website entirely dedicated to horror stories shared from the Internet. Hey, maybe it could get some new players here if it's accepted?

I wanted to wait until the fifteenth to submit so I could get it in for this. I want that glassware set. I don't know what's in it, but I want it. Now.

[Jihelu]

Maybe. I doubt they would stay less they really liked rp

[deathkamon]

Maybe. I doubt they would stay less they really liked rp

Hey, you may never know. If they take the time to read a good story, why not take the time to get into a good story, eh?

[gotdamnmiracle]

The title had me imagining that it was about some vile mantis clutch. I honestly thought it would be from the point of view of the PC's and it would be a story about some rogue magicker or psycho tending and nurturing small clutch of black baleful eggs or something. Didn't expect the above.

[deathkamon]

Pasta has been submitted into the contest. I'll make sure to keep everyone updated on the contest info. Let us take a moment and pray to Tek/Muk Utep/Ginka/Staff Administration that we win this in the name of publicity and bragging rights. (Don't worry, I credited Armageddon as a whole in my submission, so we all get to share the glory once we win)