Into Darkness

Mold

"OHH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSHH!"
"SUITCASE, CALM DOWN!"
"STOP YELLING!"
"This is basically the same as what I always see, really."
"SHUT UP, BASEBALL!"
Test Tube fumbled around in the darkness and found one of the patterned armchairs they'd been navigating. Using it as an anchor point, she squinted and tried to work out where everyone was.
Lightbulb was directly in front of her, she knew that. Suitcase was to the left and forward, and so was Baseball. Knife and Microphone were more to the right. Alright, she thought. That's everyone worked out. Now I need-
Lightbulb stumbled in from the right and bumped into Test Tube, nearly making her lose balance by loss of concentration alone. "GAH! Okay fine I don't know where anyone is I don't know we are darnit this is completely worthless and I don't- I just-"
Lightbulb whistled and put her hand on Test Tube again. "Hey, breathe, breathe. No need to break it down so early in the challenge. If this is one."
Test Tube visibly- well, not visibly at the moment- flinched, but relaxed at her friend's touch. Before them, Suitcase was still having a fit and the other three were all experiencing varying levels of panic, apathy, and annoyance.

Rolling her eyes playfully, Lightbulb cleared her throat and clapped her hands, forcing the group of four to look in their general direction.
"Bromeos, you're all takin' this way too harsh-like, you get me?"
There was a short silence, followed by a grumbled "no" from Knife.
"Check-it!", continued Lightbulb, raising her eyebrows.
Suddenly, a blinding flash of light forced everyone except Lightbulb to cry out and cover their faces instinctively. "GAH!" Knife grunted, scowling at Lightbulb once his eyes began to adjust. "What did... oh." He blinked a couple times. "You're glowing."
As the rest of the group blinked repeatedly and got used to the bright light before them, Lightbulb proudly placed her hands on her hips and grinned, her glass body now a beacon of white light. "There, see? Nothin' your pal Lightbulb can't solve! And you were all so worried, too!" She glanced around, a bit disappointed that the area she illuminated didn't exceed any more than a few yards.
Test Tube glanced at her, silently processing the same line of thought. "I suppose our best option, given the circumstances, is to continue on like normal. We'll just have to be a bit more cautious about tripping over things..."
Suitcase frowned at that and did her best not to think about how... imposing the darkness was. Sure, tripping over a coffee table could hurt, but now that the contestants could no longer see what surrounded them, Suitcase found herself a touch more anxious. The shroud of deep black loomed above like the strong wings of a vulture, and the silhouettes of tacky furniture took the forms of ghouls and nightcrawlers. She let a shiver wash over her body and shook her head. She'd be fine, her friends... well, her competitors were here. They wouldn't let her get hurt, probably.
"Are we sure we know which way we came from?" Mic inquired. Test Tube frowned and glanced around again. "Well, I remember this armchair being in this spot, so I can deduce that we came from behind where you're standing. That being said, it's not like we know what we're looking for..." Test Tube leaned on the aforementioned seat and looked down, deep in thought. "We couldn't see any walls before the lights went out, so we were already moving blind to some extent."
"We would've at least gotten a warning when we came up on one," Lightbulb countered. "Now we can only see a world as big as about ten feet, and I hate feet."
Test Tube blinked and absentmindedly waved her off. "Eh, yeah, whatever you're trying to say, I suppose we should just continue."
Before she had even closed her mouth, Knife had taken the lead, Baseball following close behind. Looking at Lightbulb and shrugging, a silent indication that she didn't mind going in first, Test Tube strode after them, followed by Lightbulb herself, Suitcase, and finally Microphone.

The apprehensive adventures trekked onward across the thick expanse of darkness, surrounded on all sides by pristine, new, ugly looking furniture. More than once, Test Tube felt a brief desire to stop and inspect one of the armchairs. She silently chastised herself for being so easily distracted- after all, it's not like any of these items were actually for sale.
As they progressed, the group slowly began to feel more and more uneasy. As quickly pointed out by Lightbulb, an unpleasant odor had begun filling the air, as though the surrounding nothingness had managed to grow mold.
Likewise, the furniture they passed gradually became less untouched, and more... lived-in. Large areas of fabric were worn down or ripped off entirely, and a few armchairs had larger chunks missing, exposing the rusty springs and discolored foam hidden underneath the surface.
"F-Friends," Suitcase began, "I have an awful feeling that, perhaps, we might be heading the right way. Maybe we should... turn around?"
"Hey, something's finally changing, so I'm not gonna complain." Microphone shrugged.
A grunt from the head of the group sounded Knife's agreement. "We also don't know if it'd change with any other direction we went. I know it doesn't smell great-" "It's not that," Suitcase interrupted. She glanced around at the destroyed furniture, more and more resembling a pile of viciously-destroyed rubble than anything it had represented previously. "I just think that maybe... maybe something did all this, and maybe we shouldn't be walking directly towards it."
"Hey, someone had to've put the chairs out in the first place, so I say the chances of finding help are just as high!" Lightbulb countered, and the group continued walking. Suitcase, deciding not to argue further, huffed quietly and glanced around, trying not to let the overwhelming feeling of impending dread weigh her to her knees.
"JEEPERS, look!" Suitcase was startled, as were the other contestants. Test Tube had scrambled a few steps ahead of the flock and was excitedly inspecting what appeared to be an abandoned, decrepit shack- the sort of shed you'd find available for purchase in a place selling furniture alongside it. As her companions caught up, Test Tube was already discarding the illegible scraps of paper lying among the rest of the garbage. There was quite a mess strewn about- various shards of smashed porcelain made watching your step a necessity, a few smaller tables and chairs lay broken and rotting, and as Test Tube pushed open the door, the smell of mold and filth became overpoweringly potent.
Microphone and Suitcase retched, and Knife scrunched his face up in discomfort. Ignoring their reactions, Test Tube and Lightbulb cheerfully scooted through the doorway, nearly pulling the weak slab of wood off of its hinges in the process. "Wowie, this is quite the treasure trove we've unearthed! Take a good look around, friends, the answers to our questions may lie dormant in this very building!"
Despite Test Tube's enthusiasm, only Suitcase bothered to squeeze into the crumbling shed with her and Lightbulb, if only to avoid the frightening nothingness outside.
"That's a lot of big words, anyways I found this book so yeah" Lightbulb dusted off a thick leather-bound tome and held it out to her scientist buddy, who was already grabbing at it. "Might find somethin' cool in here, or at least something vaguely lukewarm?"
Test Tube poured over the yellowed pages with intense curiosity as Lightbulb and Suitcase watched, but her face quickly fell into a defeated frown. "Oh, for- okay, I'm not saying this book is worthless per se, but so far I can't find a single passage containing anything but inane poetry!" Grumbling in dissatisfaction, she held out the book for the other two to see, having thrown it open to a page somewhere in the middle of the book.

Hello
You are my very new friend
You are cold and wet and sad,
But my sweet lips disinfect
You are not perfect
But no one is to me
I will be your perfect buddy
I will be your body

As Lightbulb and Suitcase read down the page, the text devolved into a repeating chorus.

I will be your buddy
I will be your body
I will be your buddy
I will be your body

"It goes on like that for three more pages", Test Tube interrupted, causing the pair to glance up at her. "It's as subjectively vapid and pretentious as any other poetry I've read, but aside from annoy me, it's done nothing for us." "I wouldn't say so", Lightbulb replied, taking the book from Test Tube and flipping through some more pages with a bit less care than had been administered previously. "You said it yourself, you didn't go through the whole- ahah!" Lightbulb lit up, figuratively, and turned the book back around to present a sticky, orange scrap of paper glued tightly to the surface of one of the pages.

i'm next i think
if anyone should read
this , god help you
hello

As Test Tube furrowed her brow in deep thought, Lightbulb scoffed at the ominous words. "Maybe I was the one who spoke too soon- thanks for nothing, orange dude! Couldn't even bother to say things in the right order. You say 'hey' FIRST! What a whackjob." Before Test Tube could reply, she was interrupted by Suitcase stumbling and falling backwards against a disused writing desk. "I-I, oh my gosh, ohh my gosh, does that really not mean anything to either of you?" As the brightly-colored pair stared at Suitcase blankly, she continued. "A-a scary old shed in the middle of this dirty, nasty, smelly, horrible wasteland, broken up like s-someone was attacked by a wild animal, with a book containing a vague warning alongside what are probably his last words- does that not mean, to you, perhaps, that being here isn't a good idea?! Th-that maybe we're in way over our heads and we should be making a break to where we started? Where there was light, and safety, and-" "Chairs that weren't ripped up!" Lightbulb helpfully added." "AND CHAIRS THAT WEREN'T RIPPED UP!" Suitcase all but but screeched. She could feel everything pushing down on her, crushing her, and worse, she felt like she was being toyed with- not just by her fears and whatever was lurking outside, but her own companions. "You're both way, way too calm about this! We're going to die! We're going to die here!" As she descended into panicked sobs, Lightbulb and Test Tube glanced at each other awkwardly, neither being quite sure how to diffuse the situation.
A couple yards away, Knife poked his head through the doorway and looked at them incredulously. "What's she crying about? What did you knuckleheads do?" "Can you make her quiet down?" Microphone was clutching her head with one hand and furiously cranking down the gain knob on her back with the other. "It's giving me a headache..."
"D-don't just dismiss me like that!" Suitcase cried out at Microphone. "I'm appalled at you! We could be dealing with imminent doom, and all you care about is making me shut up!"
Microphone flinched back, failing to come up with any words to fire back. Beside her, Knife leaned on the rickety building and tutted. "Man, you are just getting on everyone's bad side today, aren't you? Though I suppose Baseball doesn't count, seeing as his only side is currently-" "Where is Baseball?" Suitcase interrupted. She was suddenly quieter, and staring intently at Knife.
"Baseball? He's..." Knife turned and scanned the area outside of the shack.
"Oh. Well, then."
"Is he not there?" Test Tube walked over to look for herself, prompting Suitcase to descend back into shivers and panicked murmuring.
True to Knife's lack of a concrete response, Baseball was nowhere to be seen.
Nothing greeted their searching gazes save for the rolling fog, the heaps of trashed furniture, and the deafening blackness coating the landscape.