◭ ℂ𝕦𝕓𝕚𝕤𝕞 ◭ (ƎNA x Reader)

◭ ℙ𝕣𝕠𝕝𝕠𝕘𝕦𝕖 ◭

Art by Limeworking on Deviantart

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Published → June 8, 2021

Edited → Dec 29, 2022

Word Count → 1425 Words

Warnings → Set in the Meatworld, not ENA World

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You had to admit, life after school wasn't too exciting.

You lived in a small apartment complex close to the edge of town, which meant it was annoyingly far away from literally everything, but it was the only place you could afford on such a small budget. It was a little dingy, but a fresh coat of paint and some homey furniture fixed it up nicely.

And so here you were, spending one of your rare days off simply relaxing in your room, browsing whatever popped up in your twitter feed even if it was ultimately uninteresting. After a few more minutes of thumbing mindlessly through memes and cat pictures, you blew a raspberry of boredom, placing your phone back onto your bedside table.

So there you sat, gazing soulessly into the ceiling like you were in a cinematic music video. Your eyes traced the small cracks, following them till it lead to the old glow-in-the-dark star stickers one of the previous residence had left there and you simply hadn't bothered to get rid of it yet. It added some flavour in your otherwise dull bedroom ceiling. Ultimately, you just twidled your thumbs thinking of possibly ways to pass the time.

Maybe you could go to the game store? Plenty of video games you could browse. New releases, nice end of year sales, cool merch that might help your dull room seem a little brighter. But it was on the other side of town and you really didn't feel like going on a long car drive.

And then your phone decided to suddenly break the silence with your obnoxiously loud ringtone, which scared the living shit out of you. You grappled with the bedsheets for a few moments, slightly pissed off that you almost fell out of your bed at your own ringtone.

After quickly swiping to answer, you were met with the cheerful voice of your dad.

"(Name)! Caught word that (Uncle's name) is having a garage sale. Pretty sure he's got a shit ton of old retro style games and I thought you might be interested," You could hear the sound of people idly chatting in the background, including the voices of your extended family.

That actually sounded fun, more fun than having a staring contest with the void. Plus, that bastard cheated. You'd prefer to have a few new games to grind on days like these than hangout with the void again.

"Yeah, sure I'll drop by," You slid your eyes away from the ceiling, rolling on to your side. After a few more exchanges about what you'd been doing over the past weeks, you hung up and shuffled into an upright position,  relishing in the way your back cracked as you stretched. With a slightly scuffle against the floor, a snack in one hand and a coat in the other, you were out the door with a plan set in mind.

Trees flashed past as you pulled out of the parking lot and drove down the mostly empty road, each one of them having turned a stark and sunny red-orange colour as the Summer faded into Autumn. You just mentally thanked yourself for bringing a jumper with you as you watched the branches sway in the breeze out of the corner of your eye.

Humming absentmindedly, your fingers drummed against the wheel to the tune of the song on the radio. Very few houses were out this way, making it easier to spot your uncle's, but the slew of cars parked close to his house sort've gave it away. And of course that meant you had to park something like five minutes away to get a good parking spot.

And just as the number of cars hinted, there were a fair few people milling around, picking up various items from the boxes laying around. You, knowing your uncle, went immediately towards the back where he kept his more antique and interesting items which were mostly tucked out of the way.

Much like previous garage sales, most of his "interesting" items were still pretty boring, mostly scraps from previous garage sales that had been either overlooked or not bought up. But there was one new thing.

An old floppy disc partially tucked underneath one of the boxes. You knew one of your friends were currently rebuilding one of those blocky, 90s style computers, maybe they would be interested in this.

But the weirdest part was the tape on the back of the disc, scrawled out in messy handwriting. The letters J.G were scribbled on the front.

"Initials? Odd" You muttered under your breath, turning it over to see what was written on the back.

"Auction day, Extinction party, Temptation stairway. And... Dream bbq? Coming soon? Who came up with these names. Was it you, J.G?" You shrugged, but decided to hold onto the disc anyway. Perhaps something interesting was on it. You just wondered where this came from since you'd never seen it before.

You looked around a little more, poking your nose around a few dusty boxes of other old games that were stacked together. No dice. Unless you counted the set of old D&D dice that had been shoved in one of those boxes.

"Hey, (Uncle's name). How much is this disc?" Your uncle poked his head out from under his workbench. He quickly adjusted his glasses, squinting to see the floppy disc you haphazardly held in your hand.

"For you? Just take it for free. Not like anyone else would buy it," He just waved you off, gingerly squatting to get at whatever interested him under his workbench once more.

And with their impeccable timing, the moment you stepped off the property your phone started chiming loudly in your pocket. Shuffling the disc to your other hand, your quickly grabbed your phone and accepted the call, hearing your friend's voice from the other side.

"Guess what? Actually never mind, I finally finished rebuilding that IBM PC I picked up the other week! Was wondering if you wanted to come over and see its first boot up," You chuckled at their ever so cheerful personality. It was infectious, even over the phone it seemed.

"Yeah, sure. Oh, plus I go this disc at my uncle's garage sale that I thought would be cool to check out, so I'll see you in 10, kay?" After a few more words of confirmation, you hung up and unlocked your car, setting the disc on the passenger seat before driving over to your friend's house. Good thing they were providing the snacks.

The moment you reached their front door, (Friend's name) quickly ushered you inside with obvious excitement. You rushed into their hobby room, knowing exactly where they had been building the pc for the past few weeks, and although you weren't as excited as they were, you still encouraged their enthusiasm.

Neither of you spoke as the old machine's fans whirred to life, struggling to turn on from its old age. But after a lot of struggling, it finally opened on a plain, blue screen.

After goofing around and choosing a very mature username and password, (Friend's name) stood up and pat you on the shoulder.

"I'm gonna go grab the snacks, why dontcha put in that disc while I get 'em?" You just nodded, fiddling around with the controls on the tower to actually open the tray before closing it gently.

And once again the machine buffered and took its sweet time with reading the floppy disc, all while you could hear (Friend's name) bumbling around in the kitchen pouring chips into bowls and grabbing bottles of soda, with a few curse words thrown into the mix.

A sudden grinding sound brought you out of your thoughts as the computer visibly shook. You, freaking out, rapidly pressed the button that would open the floppy disc reader, watching in dismay as it sputtered and smoked.

You just excepted your fate, letting your face drop onto the desk in defeat when a high pitched whistled reverberated around the room. One blinding white light later you felt an intense force sucking you from somewhere. You also felt your ears pop in that annoyingly painful way.

You didn't know why, perhaps it was the swirl of dizzying colours, or the extreme force you were under, but you slowly felt your consciousness escape you, leaving you in a swathe of darkness.