CRITIC

It's here. I can feel it. I haven't seen it yet, but I can feel it. I have to constantly fight the urge to live looking over my shoulder now. Why is it here? Why now? What have I done?

Things have not exactly gotten better. Chelsea's been high strung for the past couple of weeks, and I fear that the Choir's gotten its claws in her now. There are no plans now. No brilliant ideas on what to do next. If Chelsea's beginning to hallucinate, then there won't be anybody to help me stay in reality.

And then there's CRITIC. Not sure what it's doing here. Not entirely caring about that at this point. I worry that I'm actually starting to go properly insane, that these hallucinations might not all be because of the Choir now...

No more plans, no more ideas. I just need to hold out for as long as I can, until something happens to relieve a little of this stress.

Test 3

Ich kann das nicht mehr machen. Jetzt ist es schlimm. Wirklich schlimm. Ich denke, der Chor hat damit begonnen, Chelsea zu beeinflussen. Ich kann nicht wirklich sagen.

Das ist nicht so sehr ein Test, wie es eine Erkenntnis ist. Etwas, das ich von Anfang an hätte wissen müssen. Diese Dinge sind nicht statisch. Sie sind wankelmütig Wesen. Eines Tages werden sie nahezu abwesend von deinem Leben, und am nächsten werden sie man nicht allein lassen. Diese Tests, der Versuch, ein Muster zu finden. Diese Tests, der Versuch, zu finden, eine Grenze für Ihre Macht. Alles nutzlos. Wenn sie wollte, konnte der Chor über meine Hände zu nehmen, wie ich, tippen, wie sie, verweigern, lass mich zu schreiben. Auch diese Gesten die ich verwendet haben, um zu Chelsea reden kann auch wahrscheinlich geändert werden, wenn sie dies wünschen.

Sie sind mit mir spielte. Ich habe diese Idee in meinem Kopf, dass ich ihre Qualen verwenden wurde, und dass ich kann machen, was sie zu mir umzugehen. Aber sie sind nicht einmal versucht. Sie sind nur Unordnung mit mir, um zu sehen was passiert. Nur mit den Ärzten gefällt. Alles ist nur eine Erweiterung ihres Spiels. Sobald Sie in gelutscht, es gibt kein Entkommen, du bist dazu verurteilt, den Rest Ihres Lebens als ihr Spielzeug zu leben.

Ich kann nicht mehr schreiben. Es ist nur eine Frage der Zeit, bis ich nicht mehr lesen kann. Alles, was ich höre, ist verdorben. Selbst die Dinge, die normale klingen. VOR ALLEM die Dinge, die normale klingen. Wie lange, bevor sie meine Vision, meinen Tastsinn, mein Geruchssinn, zu verschleiern? Alles ist in gewisser Weise ein Kanal für Informationen, und der Chor kann zugreifen, und diese Information zu verändern. Sie werden mich nicht erwartet, Selbstmord zu begehen oder zu töten Chelsea. Sie erwarten mir ihr zu ertragen. Sie erwarten von mir zu nehmen, was sie können, bis ich völlig in ihrer Halluzination eingetaucht bin.

Da ist keine Hoffnung und keine Zuversicht. Ihre Sprache führt uns.

Second Test

Okay, this isn't as much a single test as it is a series of mini-tests. I'm going to try to ascertain how far the Choir will let me communicate, and how much room I have to maneuver with them

Test 1: Recorded self reading the pages on the Choir on various informational blogs.

Result: Inconclusive. The end product was a monotone chant of "Perhaps their language leads you," one of the mantras the Choir likes to repeat when it's not trying to drive me to murder. Not sure if this is because what I said was altered or if what I heard was altered. Notes on how to improve future tests rendered unreadable.

Test 2: Attempted to transcribe notes for future tests

Result: Failure. The notes immediately degenerated into unreadable gibberish.

Test 3: Attempted to write my own name, along with a few normal questions and statements.

Result: Success.

Test 4: Brought Chelsea in and showed her the card with my name on it. Gave her a sheet of paper and gestured at her to do the same.

Result: Success. The Choir apparently does not interfere with inane acts.

Test 5: Showed Chelsea a card that read “Nod your head if you can read this.”

Result: Success. 

Test 6: Showed Chelsea two cards that read "They are the Choir" and "Please repeat out loud the other card"

Result: Failure. She said "The Choir leads us." I really need to find a way to isolate vocal manipulations from auditory manipulations.

Test 7: I cut up several cards to form a sentence that read "The Choir changes what we say and what we hear." Observed response from Chelsea.

Result: Inconclusive. Not sure what I was thinking there, since whimpering could be a legitimate successful or failed response.

Test 8: I put my fingers to my lips.

Result: Successful. Chelsea calmed down significantly.

Test 9: I showed Chelsea a post on my blog, specifically one early on with possible Choir activity. 

Result: After a minute or so of reading, Chelsea showed surprise and mild shock. I must assume she discovered the long span of the Choir's activity.

Test 0: Failure. Failure. Failure. Their language leads us. Their hand conducts us. We sing only to their tune. There is no hope and no confidence.

First Test

Okay, so I finished my first test. Not really keen on spitting out details, but I can say with complete certainty that my blood is still red. That's a check for normalcy, and I guess it means I'm not a Camper or a Greyskin.

Currently preparing the other tests. This is actually a bit harder than I thought it would be...

Hello again

So I've been trying to keep to a normal sleep schedule. It's not at all perfect, but I'm not flying off the handle anymore, at least. It doesn't help that my affliction has decided that it no longer wants me to sleep. It was fine when I was trying to research 24/7, but apparently now sleep is no longer going to be easy...

So, yeah, long story short, this IS me, and not some alternate personality bullshit. The me that's been posting all this time was also me, kind of, but that's a REALLY long story, and not one I want up here yet. All you get to know is that the researching, prying, slightly insomniac person is really me, while the angry guy really isn't. For the sake of simplicity, let's just assume I've magically worked through my anger issues. It's not quite what happened, but fuck me if I'm putting all that shit up here when I'm trying to keep positive.

So yeah, Advisor. I know who he is, he used to be a good friend of mine back in college. Not the community college I thought I went to, but the university where that creek was. He and I were in similar fields, I was biology, I think. I just sort of took classes and had a major that fit them. Advisor was a biochemistry major, and we had some of the same classes throughout our undergrad studies. Anyway, I was having problems, Advisor pointed me in the direction of an experiment that he promised would help me. Truth be told, it did help the issue I wanted it to help, but it also wiped a lot more out of my memory than I wanted it to, and it had me under DECRESCENDO's followers' watch for what must have been a year and a half or so. And now I'm here, the amnesiac is worn off, or degraded, or something, and I'm having a pretty shitty time trying to consolidate everything.

I think Chelsea thinks I've gone off the deep end. Not really sure what to think about that. On the one hand, she was the girlfriend of a me that wasn't really me... Yeah, no, I'm not going to bother with this now. She can think what she wants for now, I need to figure out how to get rid of the Choir.

So that brings me to my real update. I think I'm going to start testing on myself. Research has hit a dead end, and Advisor's documents won't really help me here, so I'll take the initiative and mess around until I find something that works.
Or something that kills me. Can't really be too picky here.

YOU MOTHERFUCKER

YOU FUCKING SOLD ME OUT! YOU BASTARD!

What did you get out of it, huh? What did you get for SELLING YOUR BEST FUCKING FRIEND TO THOSE DEVILS?

Did they give you that “dream job” you were looking for? The one that you wanted so badly you’d commit a sin this grave just for a chance at it? Obviously not, since you talk a lot about your “former colleagues.”

What happened, suddenly all that left a bad fucking taste in your mouth? So you just QUIT? You knew then, like I know now, there is no quitting. Not when these fuckers are involved. You ran away? To where? You sold your soul and my mind for a shot at something and when you found that it wasn’t what you had expected, you just left?

Did they let you leave quietly, or did they chase you? I’ll bet it was neither. You were never one to leave behind loose ends, you’d have all of your research end perfectly, nothing left unsupported. When you broke up with a friend, you broke off completely. So, if you suddenly didn’t want to be associated with a group like that, what would you do? Would you just kill your bosses, or would you kill anyone who had ever laid eyes on you in that organization?

I wonder why you wanted to come here and see me. Am I a loose end too? I know your name, and even if you’ve destroyed all records of you, someone’s bound to find something useful to do with your name. Or perhaps I’m still a subject. You took the research they were doing, whatever it was, and I’ll bet I’m a plethora of information to add on to those notes.

No, I don’t think I care anymore why you wanted to see me. The important thing is that you didn’t. I’m still alive, and you’re nowhere near me at the moment. Still hung up on that job they gave you in March? Still bummed out that you could only “drop by the town and do a few chores”? Now there’s another question, why haven’t I seen those doctors around recently? They just seemed to vanish off of the face of the earth. I doubt you had anything to do with that, huh?

Come to think of it, what DO you do now? Hell, what DID you do? What was that “dream job” you were so hyped up about all those years ago? Something so good you would trick your best friend into that horrible experience just for your foot in the door?

You better have a good explanation for yourself, Advisor, or I’ll compromise you so badly you won’t know where to start burning.

A Request

That’s it. I’m done with reading. There’s only so much you can read over and over hoping it sticks. And those goddamn microsleeps slowly stealing bits and pieces away from me. I have no idea what’s wrong with me. My research indicates that the Choir is not to blame for all of my symptoms, but that’s only because there haven’t been any cases like me ever. Everybody else gets found by the Choir, goes paranoid, and dies, or becomes a Greyskin. So I don’t know what’s the deal with all my weird symptoms.

My memory problems are getting worse, too. Or maybe I’m just now noticing them. In any case, what I was apparently able to remember five months ago is now fuzzy at best, and missing at worst. In addition, I’m starting to recall things that I know cannot have happened. Not clear pictures or scenes, but rather little instances of something. Places and people I’ve had no prior interactions with are just randomly popping into my head. It always feels like something is just at the tip of my tongue, but I just cant grasp it.

Another passing observation I’ve gotten while trying to work out my memory issues is that the quality of my posts have changed. My early posts were fraught with rage, as I guess I was fighting some form of anger management issues. Although why I had issues is something I can, surprisingly, no longer remember. I said at one point that I assaulted my brother at a family reunion, and while that’s one of the few things I clearly remember, it does nothing to explain why I had those issues or why I attacked my brother out of the blue. But in any case, the anger seems to have lifted somehow recently. I don’t feel as constantly enraged by the world as I did. I really just feel kind of detached. The only thing keeping me going are these studies, something I’m sure I would have found boring two or three months ago. I don’t know, I just feel a compulsion to learn. As if knowing everything will help me get out of this bind.

And The Advisor claims to know something I don’t, something that I won’t be able to find just by searching the internet. So since all my other leads have gone dry, I must ask you once again, Advisor, to impart whatever knowledge you have. You seem to be interested in keeping me alive, and this is my only hope now…