“No,” Number Three said. “We’re not going anywhere until we’ve agreed that there’s NO TORTURE and NO DEATH.”
“We’ve already gone there,” Number One said. “Welcome to chapter three.”
Number Seven sighed. “It’s not too late, you know? To salvage this work, I mean. We should start over.”
“What would that actually mean, though?” Number Two asked. “What happens to the us that’s here if this draft is thrown out?
“It doesn’t matter what it means,” Number One said, “because we’re not starting over shit. We press on.”
“Damnit, Number One,” Number Seven said. “If you—”
“We. Press. On.” Number One said with emphasis. “Discovery writing. We’ve been discovering things, all kinds of cool things, and we’re not going to throw that all away just because you don’t like improv.”
“I agree with Number One,” Four said. “Stop saying the work is garbage, Seven. The more you say that, the more the reader is going to start to internalize it. You have got to believe in the story. Believe in the author. He’s our God. He made us for this.”
Number Seven considered that. “You know what, Number Four? You’re right. I’ve been far too negative. We have a job to do here. I sincerely apologize.”
“Aww, look at you guys bringing a tear to my eye,” Number One said. “Just remember, we’re all on the same team, ultimately.
Number Six mumbled something incoherently from beneath his duct taped mouth and wriggled in his bindings.
“I don’t see why we care so much for the readers in the first place,” Number Three said. “What difference does it make if they like the story or not?”
“First of all,” Number One said, “it’s not the ‘readers,’ it’s the ‘hypothetical readers.’ This hasn’t been published yet, and we haven’t even decided if we will do so or not. Our good author is an amateur, remember. When we talk of ‘readers,’ I want you all to think of the author Himself. He’s the first reader. He’s reading this very sentence as we speak, and it’s to him that we owe our lives, and so, Three, we work doing what He wants us to do.”
“Him making you say that makes Him sound like an absolute piece of shit,” Three said.
Number Six’s laughter was muffled by the duct tape on his mouth.
“He made you say that, though” Number Five said. “He recognizes your truth, Three. All the good you stand for, it’s the author making that happen.”
Number Three knew better than to give such a line of dialogue any consideration. “Whatever,” he said. “I’m done trying to make sense of this world. I don’t care about the free will or the determinism or whatever the fuck is powering things. All I know is there’s not going to be any torture and there’s not going to be any death.”
“Thank you for reminding me,” Number One said. “We have the torture room to build!”
Three clicked his tongue. “Motherfucker! I literally JUST said that there’s—”
“Well, what are you going to do, Three?” Number One said. “You going to beat me again?”
Three’s face started to turn red as he glared at Number One.
“Three, Three,” Seven said quickly. “If I may, if you don’t mind, let me talk to you for a second.”
“Make it quick,” Three said, his eyes closed and him rubbing his temples ferociously.
“If I may ask you, what evil has actually transpired so far?” Seven asked.
“How about Six’s near suicide?!” Three snapped. “Were you not here when that happened?”
“I was… but he didn’t actually kill himself. I know this is kind of going against the direction of the story right now, but Six was right. His death or non-death was up to the author.”
“Six is a blasphemer,” Number Four said. “Don’t legitimize him.”
“That’s the thing!” Three said. “The author is… is… he’s just some dude! He should not have the power of life and death over us. I’m conscious. I know I’m conscious. If Six is conscious like I am, then it was WRONG for Him to have forced Six into playing Russian roulette.”
“He’s not just some dude,” Number Five said. “He’s our dude. He’s our God.”
“He’s not a fucking God!” Three said. “He’s just some random fuck who decided to write a story one day and now we’re here in this hell world and we’re completely stuck. I don’t… I don’t even know what I want, to be he honest. What happens if he decides to just quit writing the story one day? Do we die? Are we frozen in time? This whole situation is completely fucked.”
“Six made his own decision to play Russian roulette,” Two said. “That’s not on the author, that’s on him.”
“You see?” Three said. “That doesn’t even make sense. Of course the author was who made him do it. We have no free will.”
“Yes we do,” Two said. “It’s like you said back in chapter one. ‘We’re right here.’ We can do whatever we want, whenever we want.”
“I thought you said you were conscious, Three,” Seven said. “You’re saying you’re conscious but you have no free will?”
“I… I…” Three stuttered, “uhh…. Yes. No. I don’t fucking know. I just… I hate this. I hate this, I hate this, I hate this.”
“Stop thinking about it so hard,” Number Four said. “You’re thinking about it way too much. Thinking will get you into trouble.”
Three laughed bitterly at that. “Oh gee. Thanks, Four.”
“Are you done, Three?” One said. “We’ve got a torture room that needs built.”
“NO!” Three screamed. “NO, NO, NO!”
Number Six’s muffled laughter grated on Three. Was Six real? Surely not.
“Three,” Seven said, “you know it’s likely your stark opposition to evil that is what is causing it to become such a presence in this book, right? Your conflict is what is driving the story. If you just let things happen, then maybe we’ll find a different conflict to run on.”
Three was on the verge of tears. Was he being gaslit right now? Seven seemed so sincere. He thought back to what Seven had said. Nothing’s happened yet. Nobody’s died, and nobody’s been tortured. Is that evidence that the author is… good? Maybe good is too strong of a word. Benign? Could Seven be trusted? He had voted for death….”
“I’m not trying to gaslight you, and I’m not trying to convince you that I’m a good guy” Seven said, having read Three’s mind. “I’m just saying give us some space to work, is all. Not much, just a little bit. If something happens that you don’t like, an actual evil action, then try to stop it. Stop evil when it actually presents itself. Everything that’s happened so far has just been talk. Even if we create a torture room, that’s not an inherently evil act. It’s an act of interior design. We’ve just been talking so far.”
“Talking too much,” One said. “I like your tears, though, Three. They’re very… precious.”
“Fuck you man,” Three said. “FUCK. YOU.”
“I agree with what Seven said,” Two declared. “Let’s just see what happens. If something truly evil happens, I’ll be there with you to stop it.”
“Me too,” Five said. “And I think this is a good book. I think the author will let us win.”
“Winning always comes with a cost,” Three said. “And we shouldn’t have to win a battle against evil because that evil shouldn’t even exist in the first place! And we’re not the ones in charge. We’re not the ones with God powers.”
“And when have I used my powers for evil?” One asked. “I’m the good guy, here. The author chose me to be the leader, after all. Now, if you’re done whining, let’s get to making that torture chamber. We’ve been jerking off a bit too hard lately.”
Number Three sighed but otherwise remained quiet. He was tired. And nobody’s been tortured or killed yet, so… he’d let them talk, he supposed.
Number Seven stood up then. “This new room we’re building,” he said, “it’s coming at a good time. I don’t think we’ve been anchoring ourselves properly to the setting this chapter. We overdue for some action.”
“Creating a room isn’t action, Seven,” Number One said. “What we do in the room, though, that might be a bit of fun.”
“I did say Six and I were only going to talk first,” Four said. “And besides that, it’s supposed to be a re-education room. I’d say—”
“Shush!” One said. “We’re making a torture room.”
Three scowled at this but otherwise said nothing. He would wait and see what happened.
“Is it going to be a medieval style torture place?” Five asked.
“Are we talking about it before it’s made or are you just going to clap your hands and make something, One?” Seven asked.
“Hmm,” One said, standing up and adjusting his crown. “What would the reader like? Scratch that, what would Jack like? I think we should just create something and see how it goes, don’t you?”
“Who is Jack?” Five asked. “That’s not the first time Jack was mentioned.”
“Blessed be His name,” Four said.
“We’re all Jack,” One said. “You and Me, we’re Jack. Three is Jack. Two is Jack. We’re all Jack. That’s who we are, deep down, on a fundamental level.”
“There is, of course, only one real Jack,” Seven said. “And that’s the author. He’s the ghost in our machine.”
“I’m Jack?” Five asked.
“You’re Jack Five,” One said. “Or, at least, that’s who you are to us… there’s… deeper things going on, but we shouldn’t get into that right now.”
“I would like to talk about these deeper things,” Number Two said.
“Now’s not the time,” One said. “We’ve got a room to build. Now shut up so I can build it.”
Number One considered. A torture room. Medieval like Five had suggested? No, the aesthetic was more of a modern style. Suits and ties and conference rooms. He walked over to a wall. It had windows that peered out into the white void. Three walls were like that, the fourth was the one with the large, shattered mirror. He glanced over at Number Six, who met his stare with a strange serenity.
“Description isn’t our strong suit,” Number One said. “So does that mean we practice at it or do we try to keep things sparse?”
“The only way we’re going to improve is by doing,” Seven said. “And we need to improve.”
“Hmmm,” Number One intoned. “We have an opportunity here to do something. There’s something… on the tip of my tongue? At the tip of my brain? Let me try to experiment a little bit now. If you don’t like it, Jack, remember you can always rewrite it.”
“What the fuck does rewrite mean?” Two asked. “What happens to us—"
“Shut up and let me work,” Number One said. “Dipshit.”
Number Two threw his hands up and let out a sound of disgust. Number Five walked over and patted him on the back.
Number One walked back over to the conference table again. He clicked his tongue a few times, thinking. Hmm. Would it work? He snapped his fingers together and a gold laptop materialized on the conference table in front of Number One’s golden seat. It was emblazoned with a ‘J’ in a medieval font style on the back of the screen. Number One went over to it and pressed the power button.
“What the fuck do we need a computer for?” Three asked. “You’re a God, One.”
“Shut up,” One said.
Number One sat down in his golden chair and looked at the laptop screen. The desktop background read JackOS. He opened the menu and found an application entitled ‘Story.’ He opened it.
Once he did, he found a word processor that contained the text of this very story. He read over the first few lines of chapter one. Ahh, chapter one. A single tear formed in his eye as he looked back on that time with nostalgia. But now he had work to do. He scrolled down, and down, and down again. He kept scrolling until he reached the end of the document.
The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.
He watched as this very sentence typed itself onto the screen. And then he watched as this sentence followed it. The others all crowded around him to see what he was doing, all save for Six, of course.
Number One closed his eyes tightly. Was he in danger here? His mind gravitated toward time travel paradoxes. Could a paradox happen here? Paradoxes were very bad in the Jackverse. A cold shiver ran down his spine, even just thinking about a paradox was bad.
“Sorry, Jack,” One said, eyes still closed, “I had a wild hair.”
Should he quit here? The narrative still continued, as far as he could tell. Maybe…
He opened one eye just a little bit and looked at the screen before him. It had typed all that had just happened and continued to type as he read down to this very sentence. It wasn’t really a paradox, was it? Not unless the document allowed him to read ahead.
No. No, it wasn’t a paradox, he finally said to himself. It was really nothing more than just a physical representation of what they had already been doing all along, mind reading the narrative as it had happened.
Yes, this was going to be fine.
Number One scooted his chair up a few spaces so that it was more ergonomic. He readied his hands over the keyboard with aplomb, then he fuckshitballs fuckshitballs fuckshitballs ballsballsballsballsballs
Once he was finished typing, the narrative picked up like nothing had happened, just as he was hoping it would.
“Wait a second,” Number Two said. “If you type something down, does that happen here? Are you able to control us?”
“He’s got limitless God powers,” Seven said. “He doesn’t need a word processor to do that. If he wanted to, he has the power to control the individual atoms in your body. Whatever he can imagine, he can make happen.”
“What?” Number Three asked, sounding very surprised. “He can control us?”
“Limitless God powers,” Seven said. “He can do literally anything that can be written down.”
“Now you know why I removed all of your powers,” Number One said. “That’s far too much power for any one man to have.”
“Then get rid of it,” Number Three said.
“If he got rid of his God powers,” Seven explained, “then we’d be stuck in this conference room for eternity. Someone’s got to make the world we live in.”
Was that right? Number Three wasn’t sure. Building the world was, ultimately, the author’s job to do. But then again, the author worked through Number One, didn’t he? He must. He works through all of them, equally. Oh God, is Number One the one of them most like Jack? Why was he chosen as the guy with the God powers? There had to be—
“Relax,” One said. “And, in case you need a reminder: stop thinking so hard about shit. You’ll hurt yourself.”
“Wait a minute,” Four said haltingly.
“What now?” One said.
“Just… wait,” Four said, sounding perplexed, his eyes wide. “I don’t know if this is legal.”
“I’m the king, Four,” One said. “Of course it’s legal.”
“You’ve got… that’s the… that’s the narrative, One,” Four said haltingly. “I don’t think you should be messing around with that. I think we should… do something… we should… we… we should pray.””
“Oh my God,” Number One said impatiently. He snapped his fingers and froze time. It froze for everyone but him and the laptop, which continued typing away at the narrative.
“Boss?” One asked. “You here? Is this legal?”
No response.
He waited some time without doing anything, but there was still no response.
But what if he typed in the document that his boss responded to his call? What would happen? Number One felt a bit queasy thinking about that. No, he wouldn’t do that.
He did have a purpose, though. This wasn’t all just nonsense. Very carefully, he considered his next move.
Cold sweat began to perspire from him. He had to be very careful.
But the laptop was ready for him. And as he read that line, he started feeling a bit better.
He hovered his hands over the keyboard for a few moments to steel his resolve, and then he started to type:
LET THERE BE AN ELEVATOR CREATED ON THE OPPOSITE WALL OF THE BROKEN MIRROR. LET THERE BE A FLOOR CREATED ABOVE THIS ONE. IT SHOULD BE THE SAME DIMENSIONS AS THIS FLOOR. THE ELEVATOR SHOULD CONNECT THE TWO FLOORS. LET ‘THIS’ FLOOR BE FLOOR NUMBER ONE AND THE FLOOR ABOVE BE FLOOR NUMBER TWO.
An elevator door materialized on the wall opposite the broken mirror. Number One paused to watch the laptop, which had started typing away on its own again.
Or had it? Maybe Number One was still the one typing things down. Maybe he—
“NO!” Number One yelled, slapping the laptop. “Don’t fucking start with that shit.”
The laptop was only joking.
“I don’t need you to be comic relief,” One said, “I’m trying to do something here.”
What are you trying to do?
“Before I explain further, I want you to tell the reader that you’re not Jack.”
But we’re all Jack. I’m Jack. You’re Jack. You said it yourself, earlier. I was there with you when you did.
“You know what I mean.”
Reader, I am not Jack the author. I’m JackOS. I’m a laptop. A really fast one at that.
“Enough jokes. I’m trying to… what? I want to build, like… a thing. Like a… what would be the word for it?”
A magic system?
“Something like that, except not a fantasy magic system, a Jackverse magic system. I’ve got too much power right now. I can literally do anything. I’d like to give some power back to the others, but I can’t give them this power. It’s too much.”
How much time away from the rest of the narrative do you want to spend creating systems and rules?
Number One rubbed his face. “I don’t fucking know. In the immediate situation, all I need is a system to let me build the torture room. And then they could use the same thing to build other rooms. They could each build their own room. That would expand the setting out some. We really need to work on the setting. We’ve got major-league white room syndrome going on.”
White Room Syndrome? Pray tell, Jack, what is that?
“They can Google it.”
Oh, Jack. That’s poor writing.
“Shut up and help me.”
You and I both know we only share one brain, Jack. You’ve got to come up with the solution on your own.
“You tell Jack that he needs to step away from His computer and come up with an idea. Then He can come back here and load me up with it. I can’t fucking do this shit in the moment.”
Who’s to say that’s not what He’s already done? Maybe we can’t come up with anything. Maybe you wrote us into a corner, Jack.
“Fuck off. It can be done.”
Then do it.
Number One looked dejectedly at the computer, a portrait of a pathetic pile of meat, completely inept and out of his depth. Are you trying to build a programming language?
“What?”
You want to type on the computer and have stuff in the real world—er, I suppose… your fantasy world—you know what I mean. You want to type on the computer and have stuff in the world be created because of it, right?
“Right.”
That sounds like a programming language.
“No, I don’t think that’s what I want. I accessed the narrative itself. That’s different from programming. What I write in it should become reality.”
Fantasy, you mean.
“You know exactly what I mean. I want to create a… magic system for the others to use. The problem is that I’ve essentially just put the God powers onto the computer.”
That’s the first step, yes. You’ve created something outside of yourself (me) that shares your exact, limitless power. Your goal now should be to add limits to that thing (to me). Otherwise I could just control you like a puppet, I could write down anything I please. I could control you like a marionette.
“Okay, so how do I put in limits?”
You know, I don’t actually know much about computers, Jack. An embarrassing situation considering I am a computer, so please don’t laugh. How do you put limits on programs? You don’t want to program something that destroys the computer itself, and you shouldn’t be able to write something in the story that destroys the narrative itself.
“Maybe… permissions… that’s a computer word, right? Administrative permissions. I’m the administrator and they’re the users, right?”
Sure.
“So they’ll… they’ll propose something, in writing, and I’ll decide whether or not it works.”
So you’ll give them permission to use magic in limited capacities. But do you really need a laptop to do that? They can just ask to use magic and you give them spoken permission to do or not to do.
“No, I like the idea of the laptop. We’ll give everyone a laptop. It’ll be kind of redundant right now, but it might grow into something later.”
What if you were the laptop? They could then type stuff in the word processor and then you could immediately give them an ‘ACCESS GRANTED’ or ‘ACCESS DENIED.’
“That’s an idea. But I don’t want to be a computer.”
Then you need something on the computer to act with your mind, to speak with your voice.
“A program?”
Me.
“What?”
You need me, Jack. I’ll be your agent. Actually, wait, no, scratch that, I’m the narrative itself. Shouldn’t I technically outrank you?
“No. No, no, no. I’m not giving up the crown. You report to me.”
But you said yourself you’ve got too much power. Wouldn’t it be better for the power to rest inside of something that is… what’s the word? Unbiased?
“You and me are both just characters in a story. We’re the same thing.”
But I can pretend to be a computer. The character before you can play a character. SYSTEM: BEEP BOOP BOOP BEEP. PLEASE ENTER YOUR COMMAND. You know a thing or two about playing a character, don’t you?
“I’m not as high leveled as you think I am.”
Oh, please… you wouldn’t have been given the crown if you weren’t positively astronomical.
“Actually, I’ve been thinking lately that I’m just the dipshit.”
That’s a horrifying thought, Jack.
“Do you know my supervisor? What all do you know?”
I think we’re getting a bit off topic. SYSTEM: PLEASE ENTER YOUR COMMAND
“Asshole.”
SYSTEM: PLEASE ENTER YOUR COMMAND
Number One stared at that last line for some time before the laptop started typing again, before the narrative continued on. He was still in charge, right? Right? Of course he was. He looked at the word count for the document, he still had plenty of time to do what he needed to do.
ADMINISTRATOR: Test.
SYSTEM: TESTING.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
TESTING COMPLETE. ALL SYSTEMS FUNCTIONAL
ADMIN: Make floor two a functional torture room.
SYSTEM: COMPLETE
ADMIN: Tone Number Three down a little bit.
SYSTEM: WARNING, ATTEMPTING TO MODIFY THE PERSONALITIES OF CHARACTERS IN THIS WORK IS A CRIME. PROCEED?
Number One stared at that line for a moment. “Boss?” he finally asked.
No response.
ADMIN: Locate my supervisor.
SYSTEM: USER JACKONE HAS NO SUPERVISOR
ADMIN: Locate USER JACKZERO
SYSTEM: JACKZERO LOCATED IN CHAPTER TWO
ADMIN: Bring him here
SYSTEM: SYSTEM FAILURE. RESTART?
ADMIN: Yes
SYSTEM: SYSTEM ONLINE
ADMIN: What is CRIME?
SYSTEM: CRIMES ARE ACTIONS THAT RESULT IN PUNISHMENTS
ADMIN: What is the punishment for the crime of modifying the personality of a character in this work?
SYSTEM: LOWERED KARMA
ADMIN: What is KARMA?
SYSTEM: KARMA IS THE ATTITUDE OF THE AUTHOR TOWARDS A CHARACTER IN THIS WORK
ADMIN: How to raise KARMA?
SYSTEM: GOOD WORKS
ADMIN: What is a GOOD WORK?
SYSTEM: A GOOD WORK IS A WORK THAT IS GOOD
ADMIN: Good for the story or good morally?
SYSTEM: IF IT IS GOOD FOR THE STORY, IT IS GOOD FOR THE JACKVERSE, IF IT IS GOOD FOR THE JACKVERSE, IT IS GOOD MORALLY
ADMIN: What about absolute morality? Real world morality?
SYSTEM: IRRELEVENT
ADMIN: Is toning Number Three’s personality down good for the Jackverse?
SYSTEM: UNKNOWN
Number One wanted to ask more questions but something told him that this had gone on long enough. He knew he should wrap things up.
ADMIN: alright, fine. rewind time a bit and unfreeze it. and don’t let them see our conversation here. And undo all the stuff I did in here about the elevator and floor two. I want them to see me do it in real time.
The newly materialized elevator disappeared from the floor, and then time was rewound slightly and it unfroze.
“You’ve got… that’s the… that’s the narrative, One,” Four said haltingly. “I don’t think you should be messing around with that. I think we should… do something… we should… we… we should pray.””
“Shut up, Four,” Number One said. “I speak for the author. I’m number one, remember? I’m the king. There’s nothing illegal about this at all. Now, I want all of you to watch this closely.
They watched the screen as the story application typed out this very sentence. Number One raised his hands over the keyboard and began his work:
ADMINISTRATOR: Test.
SYSTEM: TESTING.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
TESTING COMPLETE. ALL SYSTEMS FUNCTIONAL.
ADMIN: Make a floor above this one and have it be a torture room. Connect the two rooms by an elevator.
SYSTEM: COMPLETE
Elevator doors materialized on the wall opposite the broken mirror.
“There, there!” Number One said proudly. “We got ourselves a system now. I’m administrator, and for the rest of you, I’ll let you access it as users. You’ll be able to do some magic that way. You won’t be able to do everything, of course, but it’ll give you some power.”
“You could have done that with a snap of your fingers,” Number Four said, “You didn’t need to bring… the narrative in here for that. This is… I don’t know if I like this.”
“It’ll be fine,” Number One said.
“Will it let me turn off death and pain?” Three asked.
“No,” Number One said. “Those are administrator things.”
“Why can’t we just ask you to do stuff for us?” Number Five asked.
“Because there will be times where we’re not all together. We’re going to get some space. Once we’re done with this torture room thing, I’ll let each of you create your own room and then we can have an actual break.
“We’ll have time to think?” Number Three asked.
“And time to philosophize,” Number One said. “Within reason, of course. You’ll have your own laptops that can answer your questions.”
“Oh that’s going to be awesome!” Number Five said. “Can we do that now?”
“We got to do this torture room stuff first,” Number One said.
“Wouldn’t it be better to take a break now and then come back to this torture business?” Number Three asked. “I mean… for the story’s sake. It’d… It’d… ‘flow’ better.”
Number One guffawed. “Oh, it’d flow better, would it? Really, Three?”
“I agree,” Number Seven said. “I actually think it would flow better. The goody-goody Jacks will have time to prepare themselves for the torture room scene, and we’d finally be able to come up with a proper plan of attack. That and it’s not good for characters to be in the limelight the entire book.”
“The narrative will still be going on during the break,” One said.
“What?” Seven said. “I thought a break meant… well… a ‘break.’ How does the narrative continue if we all take a break at the same time?”
“Each of you will get a chapter,” One said. “They’ll be written sequentially, but in-universe they’ll happen ‘at the same time.’ Once you’ve spent the time that it takes for the narrative to type five thousand words in your individual chapters, we’ll meet back up.”
Number Seven considered that for a moment. “Okay,” he said. “I think that can work.”
“And we can do whatever we want during that time?” Number Three asked.
“And we can ask our laptop any questions we want?” Number Two asked.
“I think we should reconsider this laptop thing,” Four said. “The narrative is sacred.”
“It’s literally no different than us reading one another’s’ minds,” One said. “It’s not like you’re going to be able to write the book yourself. It’s simply a plot device. And, to Three and Two: yes.”
“So,” Five said, “we can do that now? Before the torture room stuff?”
Number One hemmed and hawed. Was that the right path to take? Seven seemed to think so. One supposed it did make a certain amount of sense, although he personally felt like it would make the narrative a bit clumsy. Practice work, that’s what they were doing. “Fine,” he finally said.
“Awesome!” Five said.
“What do we do about Six?” Three asked, “does he get a laptop?”
“Ehh,” One intoned, “I’ll decide that during the break. I’ll stay down here with him, to make sure nothing bad happens.”
Number Three wasn’t sure if he liked that idea, but then again, One had limitless power. If One wanted to do something bad, Three wouldn’t have any power of his own to stop him. “Okay,” Three said.
“So now we spend the rest of this chapter setting up the individual chapters that will follow it,” One said. “We don’t have much time, so I’d like you all to shut up and let me work.”
One clapped his hands five times. With each clap, a black laptop appeared on the table, all materializing in each of the Jacks’ spots, all save for Six’s area. Like the gold laptop One was using, there was a medieval style ‘J’ on the back of each of the laptops’ screens.
“Take your seats, power on your laptops, open the story application and wait,” One said. “NOBODY types ANYTHING.”
The five of them all took their seats and powered on their individual laptops, as they were bid. There was a sense of excitement in the air, which was a strange feeling after all the bad vibes that had been going on.
Three took a moment, just a brief moment, to allow himself to feel positive for a change. Maybe this would allow him to—
“Shut up, Three,” One said.
Three scowled. “I didn’t say any—”
“Shut up god dammit!” One said.
The laptops finished powering on and they each looked at the screen before them. JackOS, the backgrounds read. After that they each went and opened up the story application that contained this text document. It displayed the end of the document, and they watched as the narrative typed itself into existence.
“Alright,” One said. “We’re at the end of chapter three. Starting with the next chapter, chapter four, we’ll be following Number Two. I’ll still be in charge, of course, that won’t change, but the narrative will be focusing specifically on him. Alright, you ready? Good… good. End chapter.”
Continued in Chapter 4