404DEADLINK

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<<set $room to "frontlawn">> <<if visited() gt 1>> /% REVISIT — write this later: you came back out front, and something's shifted. %/ [ your revisit prose, when you want it ] <<else>> You are standing in the driveway of a white, mid-century kit-built ranch home, like one an American might see on the cover of a Sears catalog in 1958. The garage is on the left, and a long covered porch, resplendent with potted plants and wrought-iron patio furniture, is on your right. A Japanese maple, large juniper bushes, and a magnolia tree provide privacy for the porch. There is a mid-2000's gold Lincoln Town Car in the driveway. Ford calls the paint color "pueblo gold metallic." The tinted windows and chrome trim make it particularly noticeable. The lawn is simple; the grass is neither well kept nor overgrown. Like the other houses in the cul-de-sac, it is awash in the sound of cicadas, the blinking amber light of fireflies, and the iconic sunsets of summer in this part of the country. The garage door is open and a number of items are laid out on tables. People from the neighborhood are picking up and inspecting various items. It must be a garage sale. You consider your options. <</if>> [[go inside->living room]] [[spend some time on the porch->the porch]] [[check out the garage sale->garage]]

<<set $room to "livingroom">> <<if visited() is 1>> Every liminal space has a threshold. Most hyperspaces demand nothing. This place may demand everything. All that time you're spending on your phone — it's making you dumber and you know it. We wish we could say this place will heal you. We're not so sure of that. We can provide some brief lessons, though, and explain what you've stumbled into. While it is most accurate, in a sterile sense, to think of this place as a place, it is worth considering that a virtual thing based on a literal thing is, by design, a hackable thing — a textual backrooms. This is, in fact, the origin of so-called backrooms, before they became the washed-out version of horror they are today. Anyway, you have decided that this place is not an imminent threat to your phone addiction. The uncanny situation you have here is that, at any moment, the designer may adjust the substance of this container — by text, by sound, by any other sensory method at our disposal. We build out as we see fit. <</if>>The place you're in now, it is the living room. The front door is behind you, to the north. The north wall has two large windows, one on either side of the front door. There is another window on the west wall, and a large built-in bookcase on the south wall. The dining room is connected to the living area and hosts a large blond oak table. It looks heavy. There is a tall red oak armoire across from the dining table, and attached to the wall is a lamp from the '50s that is likely an original fixture. Beneath the lamp is a large Chinese vessel. On either side of the armoire are passages to the main upstairs hallway. Now, you have some choices to make. You will always have choices — until you don't. [[look down the hall->upstairs hallway]] [[bookcase->upstairs bookcase]] [[front door->Front Lawn]] [[downstairs to the basement->laundry room]]

<<set $room to "hallway">> <<if visited() is 1>> You're standing in the hallway. To the east, at the end of the hall, there is a bathroom — original pink tiling is visible from where you stand. The doors to the East and West bedrooms are closed. You notice two closets in the hallway. While you are curious by nature, you're mostly uninterested in the contents of the closets. You tell yourself that they most likely contain household cleaning items, towels, etc. There are strange sounds coming from the South bedroom. Will you go in? <<else>> The hallway again. The bedrooms are as you left them. The sound of running water is coming from the bathroom. <</if>> [[go to the bathroom->upstairs bathroom]] [[South bedroom->south bedroom]] [[West bedroom->404deadlink]] [[East bedroom->404deadlink]] [[East closet->east closet]] [[West closet->west closet]] [[go back to the living room->living room]] <<linkreplace "Check the map">><<mapview>><</linkreplace>>

<<set $room to "deadlink">> 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 404 This room does not exist in this timeline. The door opens onto nothing. You can't make it make sense. The four-dimentional cognitive dissonance causes a psychedelic fugue state so strong you become violently nausious. You need to get the fuck out of here before you lose all of your health. [[back to the hallway->upstairs hallway]]

The door was stuck. It made a loud crunching sound when you pushed it open. You entered the South bedroom. It looks as though someone is using it as an office. No bed, a small rug, a desk with an exotic looking computer, and some boxes and packing supplies, tape, and markers. you notice the red HON filing cabinet in a corner of the room. Your attention is grabbed by the smell of bacon coming from the kitchen, which is far more interesting than anything in this room. After all, you're just a mammal. You like to eat and sleep and make love. The things in this room, when you consider what truly makes you feel alive, are... unnatural. The worst part of it must be the macabre humanoid puppet head on the floor across from the red fi|ling cabinet. [[open the filing cabinet->HON]] [[inspect the computer->PC]] [[check browser history->browser history]] [[inspect the puppet head->puppet]] [[inspect this room->officesplat]] [[leave this room->upstairs hallway]] [[go back to the hallway->upstairs hallway]]

[[access the attic->attic]].

You pick it up, but it turns your stomach, so you drop it hastily.