Memories of the Past - An Interactive Novel

2.6

Your nose wrinkles at the idea of going toward the sour-scented bin, so you duck toward the building. It, surprisingly, isn't too large, despite its exterior appearance. It has brownish-gray shades in smooth, sleek strokes along its outside walls. It looks pretty, really, to any casual passerby, no matter what type of preference they have.

The inside of the building is not as pretty as the exterior, which disappoints you. It is dingy, dark, littered with cobwebs that whisked lightly back and forth. You spot a few black-and-gray creatures weaving new, shimmery webs, and you cringe, hurrying along. The building's floor is made of old, creaky wood, and as you move, it groans every time.

Clamping the bone harder between your jaws, you manage to spot some sort of spiral upward. It is situated at the back left corner of the building. To your left is a gaping hole, tall and stretching up. You peer through and see an entire part of the building, now undiscovered. Turning back toward the upward spiral, you see that it holds a long, thin pole in the middle, and in a pattern, there are small, wooden steps.

You decide that staying down would allow the humans to reach you easier, so carefully, you edge toward the steps. Looking directly up, you observe that there seems to be an entire floor of the newly dubbed unexplored area. You step up onto the first wooden platform and it creaks beneath your weight. Legs wobbling, you hop up each step.

Each step you go up, the creaking becomes louder and louder, and you become increasingly worried that someone is going to discover your location. What if the humans were following you?

Quickly, you manage your way up the rest of the steps, stumbling a bit on the last one. Tumbling down onto the next floor, you look up to observe what the new area looks like.

Eerily similar to the first, you notice. Though, no extra areas seemed to be present. In its simplest form, it was just a large platform. The roof is slanted, though, and you presume that for humans, they'd need to duck so that they didn't slam their heads against the roof. Instead of being mostly empty, though, it had plenty of boxes stacked up.

Each box was brown and appeared to be collapsing in on itself. You pull yourself to your paws and tentatively you trot over to one. Peeking over the top, you see tons and tons of small frames, each holding different images within their fragile, glassy fixtures.

Squinting, you go around to a few other boxes and find them similarly filled. However, some have small trinkets, objects, and various other trinkets, faded in coloration. Now disinterested, you settle between two somewhat flimsy boxes, feeling somewhat protected by their presence. Exhaustion sweeps over you within moments of laying down and your throat seems to dry instantly.

Perhaps exploring wasn't such a good idea.

-15 energy, -10 thirst, -5 health

Now, with a bone laid at your paws, you dug into it, managing to scavenge off the remainder of the meat. Your belly rumbles as you finish it up. Pushing the chicken bone away, you lick your lips, feeling satisfied hunger-wise. However, you feel as though you could pass out at any moment, and your throat is as dry as a desert.

+15 hunger

You hear a rustling nearby and your head jerks up at the noise. Ears swiveling, you look around. You can't see anything and you shift quickly back into your shelter. Terror sends a tremor through you, similarly to the tremors that the ground is now suffering from.

Looking up, your eyes widen at a shape that looms at the top of the spiral-y platforms. You tense up as you glance from box to box, and quickly you manage to wedge yourself tighter between the two nearby boxes. Both of the flimsy objects shift a bit, yet they don't move too much. You appear to be mostly hidden by the shadows they cast.

You, before you can make any further decisions, pass out due to your lack of energy.

______STATS______

Aspen

Hunger: 80/100

Energy: 2/100

Thirst: 21/100

Health: 48/100

_________________