TALES OF TERROR

Chatroom 98

Umm... hi. I am currently in a bed, inside St. Anne's Hospital in North London. Dr. Martin kindly allowed me to use his laptop, so I can explain how I got here, and what happened to me.

My name is David Argento, I am 16 years old, and... apparently I am suffering from a mental illness of some kind.

There was only so much I could take in from the doctor's words in the opposite patient room, since I have a bloody massive headache.

I've been given a fair amount of Ibuprofen, but this headache seems permanent. But I don't care... I absolutely must get this written down at all costs. Anyways, you might be wondering how I got here. Here is my story:

About four nights ago, I went upstairs to the loft and took my old schoolbooks to the burning pile. I just finished my G.C.S.Es, and like all my friends, hated every single subject I did. Math, History, English - especially English. You name it, I really hated it. So I found the books exactly where I left them a few months back (or dumped, more like) in a corner that was so old, there was enough dust to make a candy floss (cotton-candy).

I scorned the moment I looked at them again, except I knew this would be the last time I'd have to look at them. So I collected them all underneath one arm. Disgusting. I considered changing clothes shortly afterwards.

But then, something caught my eye. I'm not really sure how I noticed it, but I remember being so intrigued by it that I dropped the books on the loft floor and picked it up. It was a red CD-ROM case, about the size of the average book. There were no words of any kind, even when I turned it over on the other side, sod all. I was kind of excited, it looked like a computer game that the previous house owners had left behind. Since I absolutely loved computers at the time, I was interested in giving it a go on my Dell.

But when I opened the case, the disc inside lacked any kind of artistic illustrations, instead just a bland, white colour with some text written on it in black marker pen. The words were: "CHATROOM 98". I wasn't exactly pleased when I learned it wasn't a game, but since someone had actually went through the effort of making a CHATROOM disc, rather than the vast chatrooms available on the internet, I concluded it would be somehow different. That, I got right.

Having kicked the worthless books down the attic ladder, I inserted the disc inside my old laptop. After a brief moment, a red box with no text in it appeared. I wasn't sure what to make of it at first, but it seemed to linger there for half a minute. Then, the screen went black for a brief moment, and flashed. The words "Welcome to CHATROOM 98" appeared at the top centre of the screen. Chatroom 98? What was the significance of that number? Then, what appeared to be a white text box opened up in the centre. I didn't know what to type, so I randomly put: "Hello."

I didn't expect any kind of response but then I got one. A person by the name of DARWYN CLARKE replied "Good Afternoon."

There was no possible way that this person was real, it seemed like I was the only possessor of this CHATROOM disc. Then I realized it was one of those Chatbots; a software designed to stimulate an intelligent conversation with whoever talks to it. ICT was the only thing that I was good at.

I still thought it was strange, though. I'd only lived in my current house for 6 years, but I had never encountered that red box in my entire life. I suppose the houses' previous owners must have owned it. But it's not like they owned a computer - unless you count the smashed to pieces one that we threw away to the dump when we first arrived. Anyway, I tried to start a conversation, to see to what extent the A.I. had been programmed.

"Lovely weather we're having," I wrote. No sooner than three seconds, Mr. Clarke replied, "No, it seems rather miserable today." I was taken aback. The weather was, more or less, exactly how he put it. I didn't know either, until I looked out the window, and saw that it was about to rain.