2025-07-25: Alone in the Dark
- Cutscene: Alone in the Dark
- Cast: Makoto Niijima
- Where: Niijima Apartment, Shinjuku, Tokyo
- OOC Date: 25 July 2025
- IC Date: 15 June 2012
- Summary: On the night of awakening her persona, Johanna, Makoto Niijima can't sleep. Her first encounter with the dark hour leads to Makoto learning something upsetting about her sister. CW: Panic attack, Nyctophobia, Phasmophobia.
June 15, 2012
11:57 PM
Despite how exhausted she is, Makoto Niijima can't sleep.
Even though the adrenaline and euphoria of awakening Johanna has long passed, she's still restless.
She was barely able to make something to eat when she got home, and she'd have to be up in the morning to make lunch from scratch, and she'd be in the rare position of putting the finishing touches on her homework before school. She should, by rights, be totally dead to the world right now.
But laying under her sheet, with her black and white polka dot blanket atop, eyes closed, hasn't done anything.
The dim light of the hallway filters under her door, as do the lights of Shinjuku's streets from the edges of her curtains. The light of her CD player as it plays one of her many study CDs, and the blue light from the charger of her laptop at her desk.
Just enough to avoid pitch black. Just enough that she's never totally in the dark.
A large well loved Buchimaru-kun plush lays sprawled out next to her. A childish toy that's been with her more than a decade now. But he's been a comfort all these years
But with sleep not coming, Makoto lets out a groan of frustration. She opens her eyes...
...just as the clock strikes midnight, reality shifts, and the world is enveloped in darkness. There is a sudden, unnatural silence, but most of all, the green moon of the Dark Hour is not enough to light a room like this.
Her first response is terror, her body freezing, her heart racing. The warning Ren gave her was not enough to prepare her for experiencing it.
She fumbles around on the shelf that serves as the head of her bed for the torch she keeps there, knocking her alarm clock over as she tries to grab it. That sound alone causes her to flinch, and try to cover her head.
She can't even pretend it's not dangerous. Aren't there Shadows at this time of night? And she's still in her pajamas.
After too long in silence, she reaches up again, placing her hand on the little torch. She rotates it in her hand, and pushes the on switch.
Nothing.
She presses it again. And again and again and again. And nothing changes.
Her chest feels tight. She can hear her heartbeat in her ears.
Normally so cool and collected in the Metaverse, here in the Dark Hour, she's a panicked mess.
She glances across to her desk. Her phone should be there. She just has to get there.
She grabs Buchi next to her, wrapping her arms tightly around him.
Buchimaru-kun will keep you safe if I'm not here, Makoto.
She manages to crawl off the bed, clinging to the plush for dear life. She creeps forward on all fours, reaching her desk. She grasps around atop it. Her phone should be right near the edge-
That's it. She pulls it down, barely avoiding tangling her arm in the cable, her other arm wrapped tightly around Buchi.
She presses the power button, and there's a dim red light coming from it. She turns the phone toward her, to try and swipe down and turn on the torch.
But only the Metaverse Nav app is there, staring at her. Casting almost no light at all. Nothing to stave off the darkness.
What little light there is green, horrid, and ghostly.
"I'm sorry," The words escape her lips quietly, and then repeat faster and faster. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry! Onee-chan, where are you, help me! Sis! Sae!!"
"Match found."
That voice startles her, and she throws her phone in the air, and it lands screen up. Standing there. The red light staring at her.
"S-" She stops herself. Her arms still wrapped around Buchimaru-kun, she takes a deep breath. Then another. And another.
Eventually, she can't hear her heart in her ears anymore. And then she speaks, unsure if the fear in her voice is from the dark or what she's about to say.
"Sae Niijima."
"Match found."
Her breath catches in her throat. Surely not. Surely it's a mistake.
"Sae Niijima." She repeats.
"Match found."
Twice is coincidence, three times...
Makoto crawls forward, making toward the phone, picking it up. From there, she crawls toward her window, and uses her cabinet to pull herself upright with one hand.
The green light is sickly, awful, and unpleasant.
But it's not pitch black.
Makoto walks shakily back to her bed, and sits upon, drawing her knees up and holding Buchi to her chest as tight as she can, as if to use him to shield her against an unnatural darkness
If there's one good thing about the dark hour, there's no one else here to hear her sob into the back of Buchi's plush form.
When the power finally returns, she can stand again. She can close her blinds most of the way. She can plug in her phone and turn off the torch and pull the covers over her and, finally, fall asleep-
As long as the torch of her phone stays lit to keep the darkness and ghosts at bay.