[June 7th, 2022]
Called in sick today. Instead of going to work, I’m in the hotel parking lot, waiting inside of Jimmy’s car. It’s more of a van, actually. I’m all the way in the back seat, but not in the trunk. He might look back there.
I can’t tell you how bored I am. I’ll finish this entry when something finally happens.
[June 7th 2022, continued]
I was asleep when I heard the front door slam. Holy fuck. If I was snoring, I would’ve been absolutely fucked, but instead he was just driving somewhere. He was using Google maps on his phone, and had the phone propped up on one of those stands that could charge it. I might just steal it from him, since he won’t need it anymore.
Was he going to Gabi’s house? I had no idea. I felt a pit in my stomach when the thought crossed my mind. I realized I couldn’t hop over into the middle seat without him noticing me. He was gonna get all the way to her house, and I wouldn’t be able to do jack shit.
Thankfully, he pulled into a gas station and I had time to move up, right behind the driver seat. It was then that I had an idea to make this easier. It was a long shot, but if it worked, there would be no chance of him escaping.
While he was inside the gas station, I took his phone off the stand, and input a different address into Google maps. The old house right in front of the bunker. A couple minutes after I put the phone back, he came back to the car and sat down. He didn’t notice that his route changed.
He drove all the way to the clearing between the abandoned houses.
“What the fuck…”
It sounded like he began to realize that wherever he was going, this was not the place. That’s the last thing I remember from that moment.
I woke up with my torso hanging over the passenger seat. I felt a sharp pain in my jaw. I tensed up, and slowly looked around. Jimmy was out cold, with the horse tranquilizer dart sticking out of his neck. I guess he knocked me the fuck out right after I got him.
My god was he heavy. I regret not driving closer to the hatch before pushing him out of the car. Then I wouldn’t have had to drag him so far.
After the long, excruciating process of getting him all the way into the bunker, I quickly got him to the middle pillar in one hard pull, put his hands behind it, and ziptied them together before collapsing onto my back.
I took away all his belongings, walked back over to the ladder underneath the hatch, and took a good look around. Inside the middle of the bunker was a single bar, or pillar, directly in the center. Stuck to that bar was a sleeping human being. No, he didn’t qualify as a human after what he put Gabi through.
I couldn’t help but hate the guy. He was a long time friend of hers. I could’ve been that friend. I could’ve been that lucky person who knew her from a young age, when I was constantly bullied in highschool and just needed one person like Gabi.
Why you? Why did YOU get to have that in your life? Fuck you.
I needed to think of something cruel I could do to him, but what? I could worry about that later. Right now, I needed to get his car out of there. Cameras were definitely gonna see the same latex suit driving around in his vehicle that was jumping on top of Gabi’s roof. They might even see him try to attack the post man if they look at the right cameras. No, that guy would definitely come forward when the news came out. It might be time to ditch this costume and start using something else.
I drove to the nature trail that was within walking distance of Jimmy’s hotel. Of course, I didn’t park at the entrance. I kept going for a couple miles, and then parked the car on the side of the road, next to the woods.
I cut through the woods, and made my way to the stream. I took off the full-body latex suit and put it in my backpack. From now on, I would only use the suit while going into the bunker. Using it to go into Gabi’s house would have to wait for a while, unless it was important. People would be looking for it now. This latex suit already committed too many crimes.
I followed the stream back to the nature trail, went back to the entrance where my own car was parked, and innocently drove home after a nice hike.
There was a park near the bunkers neighborhood where people went to run often. I could park over there at night, run to a place where I could discretely change into my latex suit, then make my way over towards the burnt down neighborhood, and then the bunker to…. Do what exactly? Bring the next person down there. I could just leave them all to die, unless I need specific information from them. Maybe I’ll eventually find a way to dispose of the bodies, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get there.
I got home just in time for Gabi’s stream. It was titled “Someone tried to break into my house!”
I couldn’t wait to see her talk about it. I got to hear what happened from her and Jimmy’s perspective. She described how they heard the noise on the roof, how they heard screaming, then glass breaking. She talked about how the man’s disguise was found in the house next to hers they broke into, and even said no DNA evidence was found on it.
I smiled when she talked about the “nice man” who called the cops on him, and told her that he saw him on the roof, in a full-body latex suit. The chat was really creeped out by that part.
But she described me as their “new friend” which made me start giggling and kicking my legs.
After telling her story, she said something I wasn’t expecting.
“And I know it could be completely unrelated, but I’m pretty sure that fucker stole my diary. Like, it’s been missing since before this happened, but now that it has I’m wondering if it has something to do with this.”
She didn’t know where her diary was. Which meant she didn’t know about the attic. Holy shit. I gotta get that diary. If I bring it to her, I can say I found it outside somewhere, or spotted it on the roof of the unoccupied house. This could be a perfect excuse to talk to her.
I just need to keep it safe in my room until then. Maybe if I needed information I could read it, but it doesn’t seem like anything dangerous is happening right now.
I put that thought in my back pocket, and continued watching the stream. An ant bit my ankle. I sighed.
After picking up the diary, I kept the stream on in the background while I spent almost an hour picking up trash, and spraying raid all over the floor. I swept the kitchen, cleaned the counters, and shoved all the open bags and containers of food into the cabinets. Now the apartment was empty again, save for two of those foldable chairs you bring to soccer games. I bought the second once recently for Gabi, in case she came over again.
There was a knock on the door. I jumped to my feet. Gabi came when I was about to off myself, to tell me in her own way that she wanted me to continue the mission. It only made sense that when I cleaned the area and prepared for her to come over, that she would feel something and come to my door right away!
I opened the door, trying to suppress my smile. It wasn’t Gabi. I couldn’t have possibly guessed who it would be today. Of all people, it was Reese. The new guy from work.
“Uh- come on in…”
I said the response I rehearsed in my brain. It was for Gabi, but I guess it could be for Reese too.
He silently came in, and I pulled up a chair for him. I awkwardly sat down in the other one. He sat down too, and just stared at me blankly. I had no idea how he felt about me at this point. He had been at work just as often as I have, just on different days. I was sure he knew how the other coworkers thought about me, and had some judgements of his own.
On the other hand though, he didn’t ever join in on the insults while everyone else was doing it. Not in front of me at least. I wasn’t sure what to expect. Maybe he was sent here by the manager to see if I was actually sick?
“Can I get you something to drink? I got whiskey and uh… water.”
His eyes moved to the right. What was he thinking about?
“Whiskey sounds nice.”
He said. I went to the kitchen, poured him a tall glass of whiskey, in a regular glass, and then handed it to him.
Fuck me, am I insane? Why didn’t I just get the shot-glasses out? I just handed him a tall glass of whiskey without ice as if it were a glass of milk.
Still, he drank the whole thing in a few gulps. His facial expression didn’t change.
“I’m… impressed.”
I said. He nodded.
“I always enjoy a good challenge. I gotta stay sharp, if I wanna be able to protect Gabi like you do.”
“Yea- y- huh?”
“Cause you gotta always be prepared, right? Always having a plan?”
He continued to gaze at me with that ever-present neutral expression of his. He definitely got me to slip up just then. I wasn’t prepared, and I had no convoluted lies ready to use, so I just decided to play dumb.
“Who’s Gabi?”
He pointed to my phone. It was still resting against the wall, playing her stream in the background. Oh. I reached for the horse tranquilizer in my back pocket.
“Is that horse tranquilizer or acid?”
He asked nonchalantly. I couldn’t stop my face from contorting into a fearful expression. All feeling in the lower half of my body diminished. I felt like an unstable floating head, and I had a strange dizziness in the bottom of my vision. Reese being an undercover cop didn’t sound unreasonable right then.
He smiled, knowing I was right where he wanted me.
“Who are you?”
I forced the words out. I refused to go down with no dignity or fight left in me.
“I’m Noah. Your favorite discord moderator.”
After a pause, I sighed, falling out of my chair. I stared up at him while laying on the floor. I was so exhausted from all the paranoia and stress.
“Yeah… yeah that makes sense. You probably found me weeks ago, when I made that first thread about being in Gabi’s closet.”
“You know me too well. How come you haven’t answered my messages?”
I thought about the video. Did I misinterpret me and Gabi’s first interaction, or did I double misinterpret it as a result of gaslighting? Wait… that doesn’t make any sense. I decided not to think about it yet.
“I was kinda busy. I was getting ready to uh… kidnap a whole entire person.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“You got GatorGuy?”
“I think so. It was Jimmy. Whether or not he is GatorGuy, he’s pretty fucked up and needed to be taken out.”
“Ah, so Jimmy then. Yeah he’s not GatorGuy, believe it or not. But he is a problem.”
I sat upright.
“You knew he was a problem?”
“Not until recently. You see, there’s a reason Gator wanted to get Jimmy closer to Gabi. Well, a reason besides getting in your head of course. He knew Jimmy in real life. His people were getting ready to dox him. They had all kinds of dirt on ‘em. Pedophilia, beastiality, racism, the whole enchilada.”
“Not surprised.”
I huffed.
“Yeah, they were ready to expose the shit out of him, and make fun of you for worshipping somebody who associated with people like him. But Blake-slash-Gator, he said he had a better idea. They wouldn’t release any of this information yet. Instead, Gator would meet him in real life. He would be this random nice guy named Blake who had no clue what twitch was. He just happened to live in Jimmy’s area.
Poor little Jimmy, he had no idea he was being stalked, his routine documented, interests and hobbies exploited for emotional manipulation, everything Blake could use to seem like the perfect friend. It even worked a little too well… heh, it kinda… awakened something in Jimmy, if you catch my drift.”
“Fucking degenerate.”
“I know right! So anyways, he got real close to Jimmy, and got Jimmy real close to Gabi.”
“…and then he followed him all the way to Gabi’s house…”
“Mhm.”
I stood up so fast.
“The real danger hasn’t even started yet….”
“And you know he’s watching both of us. Now that Gabi mentioned your apartment in relation to her house, he now has more than enough information to know where you live.”
“Yeah, but… there’s nowhere he could put bugs right? I keep this place completely empty so it’s easy to check.”
“You would think…”
He said, picking up an ant and pulling the head off. The inside of the ant had wiring, and strange mechanical pieces. These weren’t ants…. they were bugs.
Ok, I was kidding about that last part. Noah just nodded.
“Yeah, you made yourself hard to watch, I’ll give you that. But you and I both know just how meticulous and cunning this motherfucker is. If we don’t have a plan yet, we already lost.”
I thought back to when Jimmy was first invited out here. If Blake was about to get the information then, it’s possible he could’ve already been here since the 4th. If that’s the case, there’s no way he didn’t see me staring down through my window like a dipshit. God, why couldn’t I be more careful?
Blake could be hiding in my walls. He could be in my own attic. He could be watching be from Gabi’s attic, then hiding under the mattress when I go in there. God, he’s so fucking weird. Can’t he just stop this? What would be so hard about it? Like seriously just chill.
“Ok, if I were Blake, where would I want to be right now? If I can’t bug the apartment, where would I be watching us from?”
“Easy, Gabi’s house. I reckon he’s watched you evade the security system and copied you. Or he found the way in himself, and he knows your every move cause he knows who’s every move you’re paying attention to. All he needs to do to learn your routine, is to stay put. If he wants to know if you’re at home, he just needs to check for your car in the parking lot, or look into your window from wherever he can see it.”
“I see. Once he knows my routine, he can kidnap Gabi or whatever his plan is.”
“But the hours of a short staffed fast food chain will always be chaotic. There’s no predicting your movements there. If I were him, I would have no choice but to change tactics. I think that might be the only reason he hasn’t made a move yet.”
I sighed.
“So, in other words… The only reason I didn’t fail to protect Gabi was dumb luck.”
I sat down, contemplating for a moment. Noah paced over to the window and looked out with a pensive expression.
“…Nah, you made it hard for him too. If it weren’t for the security system, the window overlooking her rooftop, your eyes on everything, and your discipline, he could’ve had so many openings. He’s had to change his plans so many times, I’m sure. You definitely limited his options. Even during those moments where you felt entirely useless, when you thought you were no help at all, you kept doing what you were doing, having no idea that it was making a difference all along.”
He picked up something off the floor.
“And now…. you have this.”
He handed me Gabi’s diary. I forgot I’d brought it here.
“She trusts you now, in person. You can say you found this. You can ask her if she’s noticed anything strange. Have small amount of her food gone missing? Are there peepholes in the walls? Hell, you could just suggest checking the attic and she’ll assume someone’s in the house. Once the cops come to do a proper sweep, we can both make sure nobody comes in or out of the property until they find Blake. He’s in that house somewhere, I’m sure of it. And you’ll be right by her side while they take him away in handcuffs. That’s how you’ll be the hero. That’s how you’ll earn the right to reveal that you’ve been there all along, and she’ll finally accept your feelings.”
I’ll admit it. I was completely in tears by the end of his speech. It was all so simple. The answer was right there all along. Even if this plan didn’t work completely, Gabi would see me as her new ally, who pointed out all these flaws in her security.
Her sense of safety was already gone, so it’s not like I would be ruining it anymore. Soon, I would give her the diary, and earn her trust.
No, I already had it. She was just waiting. For me.
“I have to go.”
Said Noah.
“I’m in the room right below you. I doubt Blake realizes who I am unless he saw me come here. I’ll be watching over Gabi while you’re gone, and always be on standby if you need assistance. Just keep me in the loop, alright? Alright.”
We said our goodbyes, and he was about to walk out the door.
“Hold on a second.”
I couldn’t believe I forgot.
“Um… I don’t mean to uh…. just to be safe. Can you prove to me real quick that you’re Noah?”
He pulled out his phone, and showed me his discord account. He then recited the Gabi Creed, something our core group of admins used on special occasions, and only through voice chat. This was definitely Noah.
“It’s surreal, actually getting to see you in real life.”
He laughed.
“I get what you mean. Make sure you get plenty of sleep. You’re gonna need it soon.”
I couldn’t sleep though. My mind was racing with possibilities. Could I have seen Blake already without realizing it? Was there anyone I noticed who was around Gabi, or at least around her house often? Was Blake even a man? Was Blake someone I knew? Oh God, has he ever followed me to the bunker?
To be honest, as weird as it sounds, I didn’t even trust Noah. Well, I did, but not fully. Maybe it’s cause of how omnipresent Blake felt at the moment.
I re-watched the video Noah sent me. Gabi read my donation, and did a fake laugh. Gabi saw Jimmy’s highlighted chat message, laughed with her stomach, then made eye contact with the screen. Ouch. It stung, but fear had a strange way of pulling you out of denial. I was fully expecting Blake to make a move from the one angle I didn’t expect. I could just see him peeking out of every corner, behind every door. My fear would not let up.
Ok, so let’s say Noah lied to me on purpose. Could there be a reason, other than him being Blake? Well, what else does it explain? If I were Blake, I would want to infiltrate my workplace too. The unassuming new guy who’s definitely not out to get you.
That’s one way to get access to my schedule. As well as my address. At the same time though, it was true that Blake hadn’t made a move.
And Blake couldn’t have been here before the 4th, cause he needed Jimmy to know where Gabi lived so that he could know. And…. Noah had already applied for the job by then. Holy fuck, Noah, you genius. You were one step ahead of Blake, who was one step ahead of me.
Well, I guess this was more of a rock-paper-scissors thing, since I found Gabi before anyone else.
I don’t know what motivation Noah would have to go against me. He’s in love with Gabi too, and has joined me out of pure dedication.
I decided to watch some of Jimmy’s recent VODS. In a couple of them, he did happen to mention a new friend of his he met at a bar. A guy named Steve.
Steve. Why the hell not. And of course “Steve” was described as a super nice, chill guy, who didn’t really know about streaming, but Jimmy wanted to get him into it.
I tried to find more information on “Steve”, but to no avail. Blake really knows how to cover his tracks.
So Noah’s story is pretty much verified. Who else could Blake be? Anyone else at work? I doubt it. Maybe a customer? That rude guy from before?
Blake does seem to have a lot of time on his hands. Maybe he’s a rich guy who doesn’t need to hold a job down to complete his mission. Maybe he could appear as anything.
An ant bit me again. There were still a few around every now and then. I completely forgot about fixing the hole in the wall. Fucking hell. A few days ago, it seemed like everything went perfectly in a way that would piss me off. That’s Blake’s specialty, pissing me off. Maybe it wasn’t a series of coincidences. Instead of the world being out to get me, maybe this was a complex plan made by Blake to break me down mentally, just enough for me to lose my focus and create an opening.
If he wanted to simply kill Gabi, he could’ve done so already. He has something more elaborate in mind, something he wants to do in order to break me. That was always the goal. He was always fixated on me specifically, right? He hated me so much he wanted me to suffer.
The best way to do that would involve kidnapping Gabi and bringing her to a second location. He couldn’t do that if I was too focused.
Who had the most control over my life during the worst days, when it felt like the whole world was out to get me? The customer was definitely suspicious. But if my theory about Blake being a rich guy is true, he could control multiple people at once from behind the scenes. Maybe Blake wasn’t someone I’ve seen yet.
Fuck, I can’t just sit around speculating. I need some sort of clarity. Straight answers. Where can I find them?
I caught myself staring at the diary. Well, I just gotta give it to her, right? Less thinking, and more action. I gotta continue the story. Finish what I started. I’ll give her the diary, give her the clues she needs to figure out Blake is in her house, and we go from there.
I just feel like I’m not ready. It’s weird. What I want is right in front of me, and yet, I’m just stuck. I didn’t really think I’d get this far. I’m actually gonna be with Gabi tomorrow. I can’t believe it. Hell, it could even be today. Just as soon as I start. I just have to start….
I opened up the diary. I wasn’t gonna read it, I was just absent-mindedly flipping the cover back and forth, when I noticed something written on the inside. It was a heart, with the letters C + J written on the inside. The J was not for Jimmy, cause his username on twitch didn’t start with a J. Mine did. And Gabi’s twitch username started with a C.
Why was this significant? You see, Gabi had always been sending me subtle messages, ever since this all began. She had been able to communicate so much with just a simple glance or a smile, or allowing me to see the subtext in her words.
When she liked the tweet I sent after turning off her stream. That was a thank you. When she came to my apartment to thank me, and was quietly waiting for something, she wanted to know that I was still going to watch over and protect her.
And now, with no subtlety at all, right inside the cover of her diary, was written permission. She WANTS me to read it. This is why she reminded me of the diary during her stream where she talked about the attempted break-in. It was her way of saying “You have my diary. Go ahead and read it already!”
She definitely had something she wanted me to see. Yes, that’s it. That’s why I had the intuitive feeling that I wasn’t ready to give the diary back yet. This was the unfinished task. This was the message I was receiving through our connection, which was making me so confused!
I’m so happy right now. I can’t believe it. I can’t stop crying. I didn’t know it was possible to feel so much joy. I can’t wait to start reading this. I can’t wait to see what she thinks of me, and what she wants me to finally hear straight from the horses mouth, with no room for misinterpretation.
This was all part of the divine plan. This was all decided from the beginning. It is time to become enlightened by Gabi’s perfection!