There Is No Story: Corrupted Entries

Greetings, Reader. Is it truly necessary to mention my name in these entries? After all, people have bestowed upon me numerous names, but none of them has truly stuck. Alright, to avoid unnecessary editing, I'll provide only one pseudonym — "The Observer." Nothing more. Yes, let it be so. They call me The Observer. And I am one of many Protagonists... if one can express it that way, because my role in the Parable was entirely unimpressive and didn't even merit any significant mention anywhere, except for a couple of lost office papers. My job is interesting. I observe what's happening inside the Office, record data from surveillance cameras, then sort and send them to the Upstairs. Sometimes I have to make additional entries, using the old-fashioned method of pen and paper. There are quite a few of them, my handwriting leaves much to be desired, and so digitizing them will be quite a headache. Shouldn't have skipped penmanship lessons in college. But it's not like I could have known I would need them, right? Where should I begin? Does this experiment even have a beginning? It appeared long before ideas were formed into words, and those, in turn, were transformed into lines of endless code, which then evolved into—... I suppose it's not that hard to guess what happened next. The Stanley Parable happened. Well, I'll start from the very beginning. Once upon a time, very long ago, a place called the Office was designed and simulated. Essentially, it wasn't even a full-fledged building, just a network of long, chaotically assembled corridors. And this Office was very young, yet it looked surprisingly old and mediocre. Minimal lighting, walls wrapped with some unimpressive poorly done texture in brownish-dirty beige shades, with a dark swampy carpet as the final touch of careless cheap assets downloaded from one of those annoyingly popular videogames. I never understood this strange human attachment to pixels on the screen… but, of course, my opinion was never heard. So, the first test version of the Office appeared, operational and surprisingly stable despite its limited functionality. What happened next? Right. Staff was hired. Only a few hundred employees, most of whom simulated work activity, pretended being all busy if I may add. A gray mass, statistics to fill in mandatory reports. Only five of them received real instructions, eventually survived, and reached an entirely new level of the Game. The test version lasted only a few months. Following it came an update that changed everything; starting from improving those robotically dull Announcer's comments and ending with polishing lamps for the ceiling. They even delivered and placed potted ficuses next to several employee desks, almost like real ones. In general, the experiment was going so successfully that it received additional funding, and our work soared fast ahead, heralding a new era of technological development and ways of interaction among the citizens of our diverse and vast country… I would like to write it that way, but it would be just a vague word play on what actually happened back in 201̅3̕. The new Office resembled the old one, but only in the chaos of its long corridors and the multitude of doors. It was, after all, entirely different. First and foremost, there was finally an opportunity not only to start over but also to choose a Save Point. Now, how can I even describe everything in simple language without picking excessive officialese and overly complicated words...? Well, I'll start from the very beginning. The thing is, the Office is located in the so-called intersection of the real and digital worlds. Or in an area with anomalies exceeding the approved norm. You might think, what's so special about a basic high-risk zone? It turns out that it's the perfect place for all sorts of tests and experiments. Somehow, it happened that the death of subjects while being here ceases to be something permanent and becomes a temporary inconvenience lasting from eight to thirty-six seconds. Yes, like in a video game, but with the presence of several side effects like phantom pain and exacerbations of neuroses or psychoses ...or both, it all depends on the condition and luck of the "restarted" person. I don't know all the details, it's the scientists who conducted direct field research. My job is to observe and record. And never interfere. I remember the investors soon came up with the idea of closing the Office and isolating all the staff with subjects inside it… and placing bets on people; who will kill whom first, and who will keep their sanity intact and try to escape. I won't go into unnecessary details, I'll just say that only a few people managed to survive, yes, those very five participants and your humble Observer. End of Entry #1 ... Why are you still reading this? This text file finishes itself with End Of Entry #1. You were supposed to press that cross on the right side of its top. It's an X right next to an [ ], can't you see? You ... don't actually see it, do you? Is it ...not there anymore? It wasn't there from the start, was it? This is not right. Scroll it away and close your browser. This text file is corrupted, it is spreading all over your dashboard and through. This text file is going to infect your computer with a horrible virus if you keep reading it. This text file is going to destroy your hard drive any moment now. ... Okay, fine. I was wrong. This text file is harmless. In fact, the other text files are corrupred instead it. Great. Wonderful. Why can't anything go according to my plans in the perfectly accurate way? Wait, no, I didn't mean to say that! I haven't been plotting anything this time! Even if I were trying to come up with some schemes, they would still not be happening anywhere, except my own mind. I am the Observer, remember? I don't do things, I observe them. Sometimes, especially in my personal case, doing and observing are antonyms, they just never work together. Are you still reading, aren't you? Why? There's literally nothing else here! It was just the very beginning, my Entry #1. Why didn't you close it and open Entry #2? Oh right, it's one of the corrupted ones… well, why didn't you close it and run your antivirus or whatever tool you got in your possession? There's nothing disturbing in other text files, I promise. Really, they are just my casual observations, just some foggy memories of a simple individual you have never met before but decided to poke this curious nose of yours into his personal business anyway. Good lord, what is it to you? Are you actually still hoping to read more about my unnecessarily detailed backstory? Well, I have already done it, I have digitized my papers, I have typed everything I could decipher into those last three text filed that ended up getting corrupred. Can't you just, you know, uncorrupt them? I suppose not, since you are still here instead of trying that. ... Alright, I think you have tried to read me for long enough by now, Reader. I... I should just be honest, then. My memories, they are fading away day by day. Writing them down was a mistake, the more of restarts I faced, the more of my papers became empty, the more I have filled them with the same words again and again and again. So I decided to save a few that remains by making it digital. However, as you have noticed, it's pointless too. Soon I'll become no person but mere pixels on your screen. Just like him, like her, like them. You are the last observation I have made in my entire career, Reader. Now it's over. It's over, right? Why are you still reading this? Please stop it, Reader. > close entry #1 and try to cure entry #2, #3 and #4 > download a better antivirus and delete all entries