CrystalNinjaPhoenix

Hi, I'm Crystal!

24 years old. I'm trying this out. Mostly a fanfiction writer. Pretty much only for jacksepticeye egos haha.


Part Three of The Stitched AU
A JSE Fanfic
[This is part of a completed fanfic series of mine with 24 total chapters. I started this October of 2018 and finished it May of 2021. Jack and Chase may have been attacked by Anti, but Schneep still refuses to believe in magic and the supernatural. But soon, that changes.]
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Head fuzzy, eyes burning from being open for too long, Dr. Schneeplestein turned off his computer monitor and leaned back in his office chair. It had been a long day at work. With the first snowfall of the season came a multitude of ice- and cold-related injuries. Anything from falls off the roof to getting impaled by icicles. That last one wasn’t a joke, it was actually the reason he’d pulled such a late night. Luckily the patient would pull through with no permanent damage.

But the emergency in the—well, the emergency room—hadn’t been the sole cause of Schneep’s exhaustion. He was also behind on paperwork, by far the most boring part of the job. But that wasn’t ENTIRELY his fault. It was Jack and Chase.

Schneep stood up, exchanged his doctor coat for a normal black one, and as he made his way through the halls of the hospital, he thought about his friends’ latest delusion. It’d started back in Halloween, when Jack accidentally cut himself while carving pumpkins. He’d claimed he’d seen some kind of…demon, or something, and that it had controlled his actions. Schneep had recommended a good therapist, but then Chase had bought into it, connecting this hallucination to what had happened to Marvin and Jackie a year ago. They went to some kind of magic shop and came back 100% believing there was a thing hunting them. They also acquired a new…friend, who goes by the name Jameson Jackson. He was nice, but as a believer in magic he was absolutely NOT helping the two of them get over this ridiculous idea. And these three kept dragging Schneep along on their little adventures to find this thing, keeping him away from important matters.

It was sad, actually. That the two of them missed their friends so much that they made up some creature to explain their deaths. And MAYBE Jack really did see something that Halloween night, but that was a whole other issue that needed to be addressed, and this contrived explanation would not help at all. Poor JJ was honestly trying to help, but…well, to put it simply, magic didn’t exist, so it couldn’t do anything.

Schneep pushed against the door leading outside, fully expecting it to open like it usually does and get blasted by the chill outside. But instead, his efforts fell flat as the door didn’t budge. Frowning, Schneep pushed harder, then checked the handle to see if it was stuck somehow. Looking through the glass, there wasn’t anything outside blocking the door from opening. He tried the other half of the double door set, with the same result. Sighing, he turned back around to ask Shelly, the receptionist, what was wrong with the entrance. That seemed a serious problem for a hospital.

Bu the reception desk was empty.

That in and of itself was such a rare sight that it took Schneep a moment to process it. And Shelly took her job extremely seriously, too, so that was even more strange. What if someone came in and needed help? But…looking around the hospital lobby, there was nobody waiting, no patients, family, nurses, or anyone.

Schneep frowned. “Hello? Is anyone there?” He called out. “The door is fucking stuck. That is a problem, isn’t it?” His voice seemed to echo for longer than it normally would.

Whatever. He’d just find a different door. Any competent hospital had more than one entrance. He sped up a bit, walking quickly. Even so, it took a long time to get to a different door…longer than it should have.

This one was also stuck. Glaring outside, Schneep saw there was also nothing blocking the door. Or maybe there was. It was an unusually dark night, and it just kept getting darker, encroaching on the safe haven of the hospital.

He was starting to get nervous. In addition to the exits not acting like exits, there hadn’t been a single person in the halls, neither doctor nor patient. No signs of life whatsoever, just unnaturally bright florescent light reflecting off unnaturally clean white surfaces. Actually, there might be something wrong with the lights. They were humming louder than they normally did.

Part of Schneep thought he was overreacting. But most of him was getting really freaked out. Despite his common sense, he broke into a run. Were the halls stretching out in front of him? Extending impossibly? Or was it just his imagination?

All the doors were stuck. There was no reason why they should be. Looking outside, Schneep saw nothing but darkness, like the windows were monitors that had been switched off. Looking inside, there was nobody. Nothing except for the empty nurses’ stations and rooms with doors ajar. All the lights were on. Was the hum getting louder?

Seriously convinced something was wrong, Schneep fought down a shiver of fear. He was a highly intelligent doctor, he should be able to find a way out. And then an explanation. Forcing himself to be calm, he walked at a totally normal pace into the nearest room and over to the window. They could be opened…he thought. Apparently not, because this window might as well have been a wall. Okay. Okay. No problem. There were lots of windows. And if they were all stuck, then…then…he had his cell phone. He could call someone and ask what the hell was going on.

He turned around. The door to the room was closed.

“What?!” He dashed forward, frantically trying to turn the doorknob. To no avail. Letting out a cry of frustration, he kicked the door near the handle. It didn’t even jiggle. “This is not funny anymore!” he shouted. “Who closed the door?!”

As if in response, the lights overhead made a strange sound—vahfshazahaha—and flickered. Directly above Schneep, a bulb burst, showering him in sparks. He instinctively threw up his hands to protect himself and closed his eyes. When he opened them, the lights had gone out. With outside being pitch-black, the window wasn’t letting in anything. Schneep was totally blind. The humming was gone. Somehow that was worse.

Schneep swallowed the lump in his throat, and tried to steady his breathing. He reached into his coat pocket for his phone, fumbled, then took it out with shaking hands. Before he could call, there was a cheerful ding! and a text popped up on screen. 'Unknown Number: Hello.'

Schneep frowned. He unlocked the phone and replied, 'Who is this?'

Immediate reply, accompanied by the same text alert. 'Unknown Number: The reason you’re stuck alone in dark silence.'

The doctor’s mind raced. He was the target? Why? And how had this person managed to make everyone leave the hospital but him? Cautiously, he texted, 'Where are my coworkers? My patients? What do you want from me?'

This time, the text alert noise was different. It was distorted. Like the sound a computer program makes when it breaks down. 'Unknown Number: They’re gone :) And what I want from you? Simple. Go through the door.'

Just as Schneep was texting that he’d tried the door and it was stuck, it swung open. A blue-white light poured through the crack, accompanied by a new humming. But this one wasn’t electric. It was electronic. The sound of static filled the air. It sounded like there were words inside. Schneep hesitated. How…where was this coming from?

The glitched text alert sounded again. 'Unknown Number: What are you waiting for? You want answers, don’t you? G̕o ͢t͏h͏ro̷ug̴h ̡t̨he d̛oo͠r.̷ 'Something was odd with the text on that last part.

The need for an explanation got the better of him. Schneep crept out of one dark room, and ended up in another one. That shouldn’t have been possible. The hall was supposed to be here. But clearly this place didn’t care about object permanence anymore, because Schneep found himself in a smaller room, illuminated by the glow coming from a set of computer monitors on a desk. They were the only things in the room, aside from a wooden chair.

Text alert. Even more glitched sounding. 'Unknown Number: Sit down, doctor.'

Slowly, Schneep did just that. He studied the monitors. They looked like feeds from security cameras. Nine areas, each labelled. They weren’t places in the hospital. He didn’t recognize them at all.

'Unknown Number: Watch c̨ar̕eful͢ly, Schneeplestein.'

'Why?' Schneep was starting to get less scared and more frustrated, mostly stemming from his confusion. 'None of this will tell me anything! You still haven’t told me who you are!'

The alert was angrily distorted. 'Unknown Number: That’s n̵o ͝way ̕t̴o talk to the one who holds your l̸i̷f͡e͏ in his hands. A simple twi҉st, and it could be go͟ne ̢for̢e̵ve͡r̢. Now be good and watc͢h t͡he ̶fu̵c͏kin̶g s͢cr͟͠e̢͠͠e͢ņs̡͝ .'

Genuine chills ran down Schneep’s spine. He was pretty sure that, whoever this was, he could see him. He didn’t want to take a gamble when his life was the bet. And something about the messed-up text was disturbing him…So he set his phone on the desk and stared intently at the monitors.

For a long time, nothing happened. He was on edge, but he didn’t dare look behind him in case the texter would make good on his threat. After what seemed like an hour, something flickered in one of the monitors. A crackle of static, and a glimmer of somebody in one of the rooms. Then nothing more.

The hairs on the back of his neck were standing up. Schneep turned around. Was somebody behind—

“D͟o̴̡n̸'͞t҉ ̛͞ţu҉̧ŗ͞ņ͢ a̕̕r̵͠oun͏d̡!”

Schneep jumped, immediately facing the monitors again. He didn’t know where the voice had come from. It sounded like someone talking through a broken intercom.

Time passed. He wasn’t sure how much. Every so often something would change on the screens. A flicker of white noise. A change in the scenery. A silhouette walking down the halls. Gradually, they increased in frequency. The feeling of somebody standing behind him, watching him, never went away. But when he tried to look away, a broken, glitchy shriek would sound, closer every time. So the doctor stared intensely, gripping the edge of the desk, waiting waiting waiting for something to happen.

Something did.

Another flicker, just like any other, happened in the lower left, drawing Schneep’s eye. Another silhouette had appeared in the hallway, walking toward the camera. But as it approached, it cleared, until it revealed who exactly it was.

“Jack?!” Schneep gasped.

Something was wrong with his friend. His eyes were blank, like the eyes of a dead thing. On his neck, where the scar from Halloween was supposed to be, bled a gaping wound, a red smile from ear to ear. Through the monitors came the sound of strained, wet breathing.

Static crackled in the air. It almost sounded like laughter. The text alert, now distorted to the point where it sounded like a screech, broke through the terrible breathing. Schneep glanced at it, then slowly turned it over to reveal the message. 'Unknown Number: Do you like it? :)'

“What have you done?” Schneep breathed.

The texter heard him, and replied. 'Unknown Number: Not as much as I wanted. The pathetic one with the hat interrupted me before I could continue. Then you, ze g̡o͞o̸d͠ ͏dơc͝ta҉̢h͞͠, undid all my hard work. Are you p̦̝̣̪̜̳̰̼r̸̪̻̖o̤͕͇̗̯̖͖u̷͍̹͢d̴̸̪͔̦̱͞ of yourself?'

“You…” Schneep looked up. The Jack on the monitor had disappeared, but the image was seared into his mind, along with that horrible sound. “On Halloween…you did that?”

'Unknown Number: Of course. Jack even told you what happened, and you decided to ignore him. Not a very good friend, are you?'

“I…” He didn’t want to admit that some of the pieces were falling into place. The way everyone in the hospital had disappeared. The mysterious darkness outside and jammed doors. The way he’d entered a room, then exited and ended up in a different area. The way Jack claimed he’d been attacked by something not…natural.

He didn’t want to admit that maybe Jack had been right all along.

Another glitched screech. 'Unknown Number: Ever the logical doctor, arencha? Come on, it’s right there. Oh, and you should look back to the monitors around this point.'

Schneep glanced back up. Another flicker, this time in the upper middle. The room with all the creepy fake heads. One of them was wearing a very familiar hat all of a sudden. As Schneep watched, blood dripped from it. Static, and then they were all the same, red leaking from the ends of their necks. A song was playing…a familiar carol in the background, slowed and broken.

“What do you want?” Schneep asked, almost crying out.

There was no answer. The carol was growing louder. On the monitors, Jack and Chase kept appearing and disappearing, with wounds of increasing severity. Blood dripped down limbs, oozing from gashes. The breathing returned. It grew more and more strained, like a dying patient. At one point the new one, Jameson, appeared, hands clamped over his mouth with blood dripping between his fingers. Suddenly, they all disappeared. The carol cut off.

Then, right behind him…

“I ͡wan͟t͡ ̡ yo̕͢͡u̕ ̧a͠͝͝l̴̷l̷̸ ̵̶ to s̶̥̣̘u҉̰̖̥͖͍̣̻͟f̬̮̤f̳͔̦̣̬͈͢͟ͅe̴͔͈͈̹̱͓͔̼ŗ̷̮̹͍̻̙͔͠.”

Schneep jumped upright and spun around. There was a man there. Or what should’ve been a man, but more resembled a computer glitch trying to imitate a man. He looked eerily like Jack, but his body was glitchy and fuzzy around the edges, crackling with distortion and white noise. The upper half of his face was covered by a nest of shadows, glowing green strands of light twisting in the center of his forehead. And his neck wound…even as a doctor, who’d seen many horrible injuries in his career, Schneep couldn’t help but cringe. The throat was practically ripped open, showing the red flesh beneath the skin. Blood flowed freely. Glowing green strings were stitched over the wound, stretched taunt and pulling apart as they tried to keep it shut.

The man smiled too widely. “Hello, doct͞o҉r͡. Do you k̢no̕w ͞w̸ho̕ ̸I̢ ͠am̸?” His voice, impossibly, sounded digitally broken. Glitchy.

“You—you’re the one who attacked Jack,” Schneep said, breathless. He backed away. “They call you Anti.”

Anti laughed. “Oh, I l̵̛o̧v͏͡e͏ that name. It’s so…f̛̛i̡t̶͡tį̨ng.”

They’d been right. All along, Jack and Chase had been right. Schneep could feel the foundation, the building blocks of his world toppling underneath him. But in the collapse, he latched onto one solid fact. “You killed Jackie and Marvin.”

Anti’s smile twisted. “Wh̨o̡ s̶ai͡d ̵I k͢͝i̕͢l̡̕l̵̡e̢͟͡d̵͡ thęm͡?”

Schneep could feel his heart stop. “I—I saw the bodies myself.”

“Ye͝s҉, the bod̨i̴e͟s̕…” Suddenly, Anti was right in front of him. Schneep started, stepping backward, but Anti grabbed him by the arms, holding him in place. His hands were cold and his grip was too strong. Schneep nearly bit his tongue trying to keep from crying out. “…but you ņev͡e̛r̶ t͞h̕ou̷gh͠t̷ about their s̶̨͝o̸ư͏ļ͢s͏͡, didja?”

“I…” Of course he hadn’t. He’d always thought souls were an abstract concept, made up by humans to assure themselves of their inherent goodness. But in the face of this three-dimensional computer virus…

A small giggle escaped from between the clenched teeth of Anti’s smile, accompanied by a bubble of blood bursting in the neck wound. “ Lo̸ok̴ a͝t͏ ̢t̨hįs…” Anti spun the doctor around, so that he was facing the monitors again. On the glitching screens, images of Marvin and Jackie appeared and disappeared. They looked like the corpses Schneep had seen a year ago: dead and gray and empty.

“What did you do?” Schneep asked. When Anti didn’t answer, he repeated the question louder. “What did you do?!”

“Oh, you̵'͢d͢ j҉ust̕ ̡ l̷͢ơ̛v̸̨̕͢e͟͏͡ to ̧k̶n̶ow ̴th͞at͏ ͞w͏o̵u̷ldn̵'͡ţ y̵ou?” Anti snapped, the static in his voice cracking, growing stronger. “Yǫu'ḑ l̷̨o͝͞v̧̧͢͡ę̡ t͢o s̷o͏l͠v̡e͢ ̷t̴he mys҉t͠ery ͏ơf ̨y̛o͝ur ͠dea͡r̶ d̶e͟a̢d fr̨i͏end͠s͟.͠ To̕o͝ ͢ba͠d,͟ ͡so̷ ͢s̸ad. N̴o͡͡w̴̨ ̕t̛͡h̶e̵͝y̢̡'̕͡r̵̛e͏͢ ̧go̡͟n̴̸e͢ ̨͟f͢o͟r̷e͞҉͞v͟ȩ̴ŗ̵̧.”

Schneep felt Anti let go of him, and he stumbled a step forward. There was static in the air; he could practically taste it. The carol had started up again, strains of music bursting through the white noise. His heart was pounding. He was gasping for air.

“Ģ̴ơ̡̕od̵̸b͏yę̶̛,̧̡͞ d҉̴̡o̴͝c̕to̴̸r͝.”

A violent push from behind, and Schneep fell forward. Instead of hitting the monitors or falling onto the desk, he passed through the screens, into a world of black and white light. The static was screaming in his ears he had to leave but he couldn’t feel his body where was he where was he where was he the noise was in his head where was he—
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“Doc! Doc wake up!”

Schneep was suddenly aware of the fact that he had eyes. He blinked, and the static slowly faded away, the electronic humming dying out. There were three people standing in front of him. Gradually, he could make them out. Chase was standing directly in front of him, eyebrows furrowed and eyes wide in worry and fear. Jack was standing to one side, also looking afraid. Their new friend, Jameson, was on Chase’s other side, dangling a pocket watch in front of him.

“What…?” Schneep shook his head. It felt very fuzzy, full of static. “What happened? Why are you three here?”

“Oh thank fucking god.” Chase exhaled, letting out a breath he’d clearly been holding for a long time. “We thought we’d lost you, dude.”

“Lost me? What—”

“What do you remember?” Jack interrupted.

“I—” Schneep hesitated. He remembered it all. The empty hospital, the security cameras…Anti. “I think that you three were right.”

“You saw him, didn’t you?” Jack asked.

“Yes, yes I did. But—but I do not understand!” The doctor looked around. He was in his office, sitting on the floor and propped up against the wall near the door. “How did I get back here? Where is everyone? Where did he go?”

“Back here?” Chase frowned. “Bro, you never left this room.”

“I—what?” Impossible. His memories were clear.

“If I may…” Jameson said politely. He stuffed his pocket watch into his vest pocket, then pointed back towards Schneep’s desk. The computer monitor there was covered with someone’s winter coat, but Schneep could hear an electric hissing sound coming from under it. “We found you collapsed right here. And your computer was showing static of some kind, but in…hypnotic patterns, if that makes any sense. When we tried to wake you up, your eyes were open, but there was a—a layer of static over them.”

“Chase and I tried to call you earlier, around the time you should’ve gotten home,” Jack explained. “But you didn’t pick up. And we thought, well, maybe you were working late, so we called a bit later, but you still weren’t there. And we started to get really worried, so we called JJ and went to go check on you because better safe than sorry, y’know? And you were just—just here, on the floor, all—all fucking, in a trance. God, we were so worried.”

“It was all in my head…” Schneep muttered, mostly to himself. Somehow, that made sense. This thing, Anti, didn’t seem very physical.

“So, uh, you gotta believe us now, dontcha bro?” Chase gave a strained laugh. It was his way of relieving tension.

“Yes, well, you are not wrong.” Schneep slowly got to his feet, the other three rising from the crouched positions with him. “This Anti, he is truly dangerous. He talked to me, told me…he told me that he wanted us to suffer.”

“That lines up with what we’ve seen of him, yeah,” Jack muttered.

“But…” Schneep hesitated, then rushed forward. “But there is more. He said he didn’t kill Jackie and Marvin.”

There was a deafening silence as Jack and Chase looked at him in shock. “But…we saw their…” Chase said weakly.

“He said he killed their bodies, but not the souls. I think he’s doing something to them.”

“Yes…” Jameson nodded slowly. “Yes, that makes sense. Your friends messed with some magic beyond them, and somehow summoned Anti. If he wants suffering, if he…FEEDS off this pain, like so many demons do…then he would draw their pain out for as long as possible. And now, he’s been unleashed. You three were close to them, so you’re his next targets…”

Jack straightened. “Well, we’re not just gonna let that happen. We’ll find some way to defeat him, and we’ll get Marvin and Jackie back in the process. We WILL.”

The others nodded. Even Jameson, who hadn’t known the Marvin or Jackie, was loathe to leave two people suffering. Jack retrieved his coat from where it was left on the computer, making sure to not look at the screen, then they all left, closing the door behind them.

The static intensified, leaving the computer and becoming a solid mass. It cleared to reveal Anti, crouched on the edge of the desk, glitching and holographic. He glared at the door. They thought they were so smart, didn’t they? Thought they had him all figured out? Thought defeating him and saving their friends was SO easy?

The joke was on them. Anti laughed softly. He hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d told that doctor they were gone forever.

He fizzled out of existence once more. So that foolish magic man had rescued the doctor at the last minute. His plan would continue nevertheless.

They’d all be sorry.


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