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“Hey! Everyone!” Emu yelled out, getting everyone’s attention. Lately, the troupe members of Wonderlands x Showtime have been brainstorming new ways to get people to come to Phoenix Wonderland outside of their ambassador duties. So far they’ve been successful, but need a bit of more oomph to truly sky rocket ticket sales.
“I’ve got a Wonderhoy idea! Why don’t we make a youtube channel!” Emu said excitedly. Youtubers were what all the younger generations were into nowadays, they raved for youtubers surrounding content like Skibidi Toilet and whatever the latest indie horror game was. “Excellent suggestion Emu, shall we make one highlighting behind the scenes content?” Rui growled like an alpha.
“That’d be a great idea!” Tsukasa exclaimed. “But are people really interested in that?” Nene inquired, it wouldn’t be worth putting all that effort into editing if it wouldn’t get a lot of views. “Don’t worry! There’s nothing to fear about that, I’m sure it’ll turn out okay! After all, We have a future world star on the set!”“Nene brings up a good point.” Rui started. “Why don’t we take something trending and incorporate ourselves into it?”
“Woah! You're so smart Rui!” Emu excitedly chirped. “Let’s see what’s on the trending pages!” Emu whips out her phone, navigating to the youtube app and scrolling down the trending section. The others huddled together as they looked at her phone as well, looking for something that would certainly draw audiences towards them but also somewhat related to them.
Emu stopped scrolling for a moment, pausing on a video with a thumbnail of a man looking somberly at the camera in a dimly litted room. “Ooh! Maybe something like this? It seems simple!” she suggested as the others struggled to look at the small screen of the phone.
Emu lifted the phone up so that the others could have a better look at the video’s thumbnail. After getting a good look at the thumbnail Nene narrowed her eyes, feeling a bit apprehensive by the idea. “Emu… I’m not sure it’s the best idea…” Nene commented with a slight frown on her face. “Eh? Why not?” Emu responded.
“I-It’s just not uh…Something we can insert ourselves into.” Nene responded awkwardly. Emu huffed as she continued scrolling the page before landing on a video with dark lighting and various text around the thumbnail.
“Eh? ‘Yandere idol demands you sing’? What does ‘ASMR’ mean?” Tsukasa said, tilting his head.
“Autonomous sensory meridian response. It is a tingling reaction in your body to certain sounds and such.” Rui responded, looking closer at the thumbnail. “Hey, doesn’t this guy look a little familiar?” Tsukasa said, adding another question onto the pile.Nene looked closer at the thumbnail, as much as she could with what limited screen space there was. “Now that you mention it… he does. That sort of looks like…” she trailed off, stopping herself. The group looked at the thumbnail once more before looking at one another, a singular person popping into their head. Yep, that definitely looked like him.
“Eh? Are we going to do ASMR?” Emu questioned, hovering her finger over the video. “Ahaha…Definitely not. Let us keep looking shall we?” Rui chimed in, urging her to keep scrolling.
Then, another video popped up. This time, it had a bright and eye-catching thumbnail. “Maybe this one!” Emu exclaimed, showing off her phone once more, lifting it up as the others leaned to look at it. Now this video, it seemed a bit more promising compared to the prior videos that appeared on the trending tab. Tsukasa started reading the title of the video out loud: “Do not watch Lankybox at 3am? Hmm… maybe this one could work,” he said.
“Waaaa!? What happens if you watch Lankybox at 3am?” Emu gasped, clicking on the video immediately. Emu started watching the video, as well as the others. She seemed oddly engrossed with the video, meanwhile the others watched on in a mixture of confusion and concern. It was only when they were five minutes in, they realized that the video was one hour and thirty minutes long. This was… this was definitely going to take a while to get through.
↠✩⍟⟪ ⏳𝖑𝖆𝖙𝖊𝖗…⌛️ ⟫⍟✩↞
“Oh…That was…” Tsukasa started. “That was so cool!!” Emu cut him off not on purpose. “Can we please do that? I wanna see what will happen if we watch our recorded plays at 3AM!”
“Emu…These videos aren’t..” Tsukasa started speaking yet again, before quickly being cut off again, this time by Nene. “Aren’t…Easy! Aren’t easy to do, as you have to stay up until 3AM.” Nene shot Tsukasa a glare saying ‘Don’t spoil her fun!’
“I can stay up! I really really really wanna do this!” Emu pouted, crossing her arms. The three of them gave each other a look before returning their gazes to Emu. “Alright, we don’t have much upcoming so i don’t see why not.” Rui growled like an alpha. Emu’s eyes brightened, practically shimmering in excitement. “Let’s start then! Oh, wait- but it isn’t 3AM!”“I mean, if we plan on recording the video… shouldn’t we figure out where we should stay up for the night? It wouldn’t be too comfortable filming outside in the middle of the night,” Nene pointed out. “Then let’s record at Rui’s! It’ll be like a sleepover!” Emu chimed in, full of energy. She turned to Rui, waiting in anticipation for an answer.
“I agree, how about we all meet up at my place around 2AM or so?” Rui growled like an alpha. “Alright! We shall end off for the day then and meet up at Rui’s house at 2AM!” Tsukasa exclaimed, standing up from the spot they were watching videos at. ↠✩⍟⟪ ⏳𝖑𝖆𝖙𝖊𝖗…⌛️ ⟫⍟✩↞ It was now 2AM. All members of Wonderlands x Showtime arrived at Rui’s house. Aside from Rui, of course, he already was there since he lived there. “Wauugh! I’m so tired!” Emu whined, flopping down onto Rui’s couch. “Now now, it’s 2AM and we must be quiet so as to not disrupt anyone.” Rui growled like an alpha.
“So, Should we just kill time for an hour until 3AM strikes?” Nene inquired, taking a seat on the couch next to Emu. Emu closed her eyes in thought. “Hmm… oh! Maybe we could tell spooky stories!” the pink-haired girl said out loud excitedly.
“Spooky stories, you say? Well, there’s one I have in mind,” Rui started growling, this time like a sigma. “Have any of you heard of… Belladonna ?” The air instantly got eerie around them, Tsukasa and Emu glancing nervously at each other. Rui smirked. “Well then… once upon a time, there was a detective…”
↠✩⍟⟪ ⏳𝖑𝖆𝖙𝖊𝖗…⌛️ ⟫⍟✩↞
“What!? That was so sad…Did Belladonna really die?” Emu yelled softly. “That was…Such a beautiful tale..” Tsukasa said, wiping the tears forming in his eyes.
“Heh… Loads of retellings may omit this, but it is said that they had children before Belladonna passed.” Rui growled like an alpha. Nene narrowed her eyes at Rui. “That was more odd than scary, I mean, a car?” She questioned the strange story Rui claimed as ‘Non-Fiction’ mid-way through the story. “Oh? But such a moving story surely must be reality,” Rui growled LIKE AN ALPHA !!
Nene wasn’t all too convinced. “That’s… oh,” she cut herself off as she noticed the time. “It’s almost 3AM.”
“Well now, I’ll go ahead and set the camera up.” Rui growled like an alpha, flashing them a mischievous smile. “Hahaha! Rely on your glorious leader to have the recording of one of our performances at the ready!” Tsukasa said, striking a good enough pose for someone who is sitting down. “We should probably get the video ready,” Nene said. “Got it!” Emu announced, pulling out her phone and opening up the youtube app. She went to her profile and quickly pressed on her saved videos playlist. “H-Hey! I just said I had the video already at the ready!” Tsukasa whisper-yelled, crossing his arms.“Hehe…I’ve got the camera ready!” Rui started growling like an alpha, walking back into the room. “I also have scripts for our intro, outro, and various points in the video. Most of the recording will be our raw reactions to what happens when we watch our performances at 3AM.” Rui finished growling like an alpha, handing out the scripts to everyone“Ah… should we record the intro now? Or should we watch the video first?” Nene asked as she took a quick glance at the script that Rui just handed out to them. “We watch the recording during the Youtube video, so we will do the intro first.” Rui growled like an alpha. “I’ll start recording in 3….2….1….”
"GUYS, TODAY WE ARE GOING TO WATCH OUR OWN PERFORMANCES AT 3AM TO SEE WHAT HAPPENS. MAKE SURE TO LIKE, SUBSCRIBE, HIT THE BELL, AND COMMENT DOWN BELOW WHAT YOU THINK WILL HAPPEN. LET'S GET INTO THE VIDEO NOW!!" Tsukasa yelled into the camera at a low enough voice as to not wake up the neighborhood, but still loud enough for the impact.
“And… cut! Wonderful! This’ll make for a great intro,” Rui growled as he stopped the recording. “Let’s start watching the video now! Nene, could you handle the camera from here?” he growled, turning to Nene. She nodded, taking the camera from him and facing it towards herself as if taking a selfie, she put her script out of view as she pressed record once again.
“GUYS! WE ARE ABOUT TO WATCH THE VIDEO. I DON’T KNOW WHAT’S GONNA HAPPEN, MAKE SURE TO COMMENT DOWN BELOW WHAT YOU THINK WILL HAPPEN ONCE WE PRESS PLAY.” She yelled into the camera before turning it towards Emu’s phone.
Emu’s hand shook as she pressed play, the video detailed one of their Wonder Stage plays they’ve hosted many times in the past. At around 30 seconds into the video, as per the script, Nene turned the camera back towards Tsukasa for him to say his next line. “WE ARE CURRENTLY WATCHING THE VIDEO BUT NOTHING IS HAPPENING YET, GUYS I'M SO NERVOUS ABOUT THIS. MAKE SURE TO LIKE THE VIDEO, ONE LIKE EQUALS ONE PRAYER FOR US.” Then, as the group watched the video, there was a strange loud noise that came from outside the house. It sounded almost like something fell down. “What was that?!” Emu exclaimed, turning her attention over to the source of the loud noise. “It… it sounded like it came from outside,” Nene responded. That definitely wasn’t part of the script. “Should we…?” she trailed off, unsure on what to do next.
“H-Hahaha! Your fearless leader shall take the lead!” Tsukasa said, his voice shaking out of fear. “I mean… we can just not check out the noise-” Nene was about to say, but got cut off by another, louder noise than before. “H-HAHA! It’s okay! We will go check it out!” Tsukasa stuttered out, his whole body shaking at this point.
Tsukasa opened the front door slowly, peeking around the corner in the direction of the noise. He signaled for the others to follow before closing the door with a small click. As they were tiptoeing around the side of the house in pursuit of the noise, Nene stopped in her tracks. “Wait. Rui, you have your house keys right?” She whispered, turning her camera towards where Rui was supposed to be, only to realize he was gone.“Huh?” Nene blinked, absolutely stunned. She swore that he was there, how could he have just disappeared without making a sound? The others seemed to have just noticed his sudden disappearance as well “Rui?! Where’d he go?” Emu exclaimed, looking around in hopes of finding him. ‘W-Well.. All we can do is keep walking.” Tsukasa said quietly, his face now pale white.
After a couple more paces, the 3 arrived where the sounds were, but the only thing present in that area was a large bush. “Eh? Was it really nothing after all?” Emu questioned, sounding partially disappointed. “Y-You see…? Your f-fearless leader saves the day yet again.” Just as they were about to leave, Nene noticed the bush moving in an odd manner.“...I think there’s something in there,” Nene said, pointing to the bush. As if on cue, a shadowy figure appeared from the bushes, rising slowly like a zombie. “I’m hungry. And you look tasty.” The being said, pointing at the 3 of them. “WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUGH!!!” Emu and Tsukasa yelled in sync, clinging to each other for dear life. The creature slowly stepped out into the moonlight, revealing it’s form as a lanky version of Robo-Nene, with bloody eyes similar to concepts like Sonic.Exe
“No… It can’t be… No… Noooo!! Robo-Nene?!” Nene cried out in shock and disbelief as she saw the strange lanky distortion of Robo-Nene. Her hands shook in fear, struggling to hold up the camera as it recorded the ominous sight. Tsukasa and Emu made a mad dash for the front door, pounding on it to be let in. “RUIIII!! THIS ISN’T FUNNY ANYMORE!!” Tsukasa yelled out, trying to get the attention of someone, anyone in the house.
Various lights in the neighborhood started turning on, everyone waking up from the sheer amount of noise. One of the neighbors came out, absolutely fuming. “You darn kids! What’s with all this noise!” a middle-aged man complained, pointing at the panicked duo knocking on the door. “Eh?! This isn’t… we were just-” Emu tried to explain to the old man.“Well? You kids nowadays are darn too loud! Go to bed, you darn kids!” the man yelled, leaving in a huff. Once the man left, Emu and Tsukasa sighed in relief. They couldn’t head back inside because the door was locked, and it wasn’t like they could keep yelling at Rui to open it. They’d probably get a noise complaint from the neighbors. So, the two returned back to where they were previously at. “Nene! Is everything al- Nene?” Tsukasa stopped in his tracks. She wasn’t there. The only thing that was left behind was the camera, still recording.
“Emu! Let’s look at the recording to see what happened.” Tsukasa picked up the camera, pausing the recording. He skimmed through the footage they just filmed to find the scene that just went down. The contents of the film are just as they remembered, until after they ran to the front. They watched Robo-Nene- No. Whatever that thing was, taking Nene to the forest. After they were out of shot, the screen turned to static with an image of that creature appearing on their camera, with the phrase:
“Come find me.”
Both of them were shaking at this point, staring towards the forest where they saw Nene being taken in the footage, they now assume Rui is also present there. “Wehhh! This isn’t as fun as the guys in the video made it seem!” Emu whined out, regretting everything so far. “We have no other choice than to go further, I just hope nothing bad is going to happen to them due to our stupidity.” Tsukasa said, taking the lead into the forest where his friends were being kept.
The two of them kept moving forward, full of uneasiness. Tsukasa looked back at Emu, who was sobbing at this point. “T-This is my fault..I suggested the youtube channel…” She shot her head back up at Tsukasa. “Are they gonna be okay!?” She yelled out, not caring about noise at this point.
“I….They’ll be okay, I promise.” Tsukasa flashed her a reassuring smile, he put his hand on her shoulder as if to say ‘Don’t worry, leave it all to me!’ Emu wiped her tears and smiled back at Tsukasa, determined to find her friends and forget the idea of a 3AM challenge channel. Tsukasa and Emu kept making their way over to the forest. They didn’t know how far the… creature went. But Tsukasa hoped that Rui and Nene couldn’t have gotten that far, right?
After about 5 minutes of walking, Tsukasa stopped in his tracks, opting to pull out the camera recording once again. “Eh? Tsukasa? What are you doing?” Emu inquired, looking over his shoulder at the camera. “I want to see if we went the correct way, it feels like we’ve been walking for ages.” Tsukasa responded, flipping through the footage once again. Once he got back to the strange “Come find me” quote, a strange shadowy figure dashed by their feet.
“W-What was that!?” Emu gasped out upon seeing the creature. As soon as it dashed by once again, it slammed into Tsukasa, toppling him over and knocking the camera out of his hands. “O-Owww..” Tsukasa winced as he got his bearings. He stood up, brushing himself up and grabbing the camera, but when he scanned the surrounding area, he noticed Emu was nowhere to be found.
“No…Not her too-” Tsukasa started, but quickly got cut off by a scream towards the house. He made a mad dash for the house, a fiery determination in his eyes to find his friends again.
As he neared the exit of the woods, he noticed a bunch of flashing red and blue lights, a loud wailing siren piercing his ears. He didn’t bother with whatever that was, all he cared about was finding his friends. “WHERE ARE YOUUUUU!” He shouted out above the trees, hoping one of them would hear.
Tsukasa made his way out of the forest, Rui’s house now in eyesight, but also, two police cars talking to an elderly man in front of said house. “There's one of them darn kids!” The old man pointed at Tsukasa. “I ain’t sure where the others scurried off too. But this was the one yelling at the top of ‘is lungs!” One of the policemen made his way towards Tsukasa, cuffs in hand.
“You’ll be coming back to the station with us, we’ve gotten multiple noise complaints around the neighborhood about you kids.” The policeman spat as he cuffed Tsukasa, leading him back to one of the cars. “No! No! NO!!” Tsukasa wailed out, kicking his legs as he was dragged to the cop car.
“I need to save my friends! They were taken by a robot monster!” He pleaded to the officer as he was placed in the backseat of the car. “Heh…Save your story for the boys down at the station, They’ll certainly take your ‘Robot monster’ seriously.” The cop scoffed. As he was driven away, he watched Rui’s house leave his sight more and more. Knowing he’ll never save his friends at this rate. “NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!” Tsukasa yelled out at the top of his lungs, not knowing what would happen to his friends.“No… Nooo!!” Tsukasa cried out as he woke up in a cold sweat. He caught his breath, looking around, realizing that the others were staring at him. “Ah, you’re finally awake, Tsukasa,” Rui growled like a SIGMA . “We thought we were going to have to do the video without you. You looked more dead than asleep.” He ended off with an ominous giggle.
Tsukasa looked around in shock, it was all just a dream? Just a dream…His friends are okay… Tears started welling up in Tsukasa’s eyes as he pulled them all in for a group hug. “You guys are okay! It was just a dream!” He sobbed, thankful to have the warm embrace of his friends again. “Eh? Of course we are okay! We are getting ready to do the video, it’s 3AM in 5 minutes!!” Emu excitedly chirped.
“Does anyone have the performance recording ready?” Nene asked, a little muffled due to being stuck in this group hug. “Ahahaha….” Tsukasa laughed nervously, letting go of everyone. “I do…But if anyone hears a noise, promise me we won’t go check.”
“Oh? And here I thought our fearless troupe leader would be the first to check on any strange noises!” Rui growled like an alpha. Tsukasa shook his head ‘no’, looking suspiciously at the front door. “After Robo-Nene.exe….I think i’m done.” They all looked between each other with concerned expressions.
“Robo-Nene.exe…? Erm, Tsukasa… You do remember that we were going to record a ‘ Watching our own performances at 3AM ’ video, right?” Nene reminded him. “I think the lack of sleep is getting to our dear old troupe leader here.” Rui growled like an alpha. “Oooh! Oooh! What if we have a sleepover instead!” Emu chimed in, practically bouncing in excitement.
“That’s a good idea, I’m sure my parents wouldn’t mind.” Rui growled like an alpha, turning to the others for their opinion. “Sounds good to me, just as long as you have spare blankets.” Nene nodded, pleased with the idea of having a sleepover instead of recording a whole video so late in the night.
“Then it’s settled! We shall have a sleepover tonight and brainstorm more ways to expand our reach tomorrow!” Tsukasa exclaimed, striking a cool, yet sloppy pose. Mostly due to him still being shaken up from his nightmare.
↠✩⍟⟪ ⏳𝖑𝖆𝖙𝖊𝖗…⌛️ ⟫⍟✩↞
It was now around 4am, everyone was asleep, save for Rui, who was up pondering what Tsukasa said. “Robo-Nene.Exe huh…” His face twisted into a villainous grin. “What a perfect plan, i’ll have to experiment with this…Just maybe not at 3AM.” He giggled to himself, thinking of all the new ideas Tsukasa’s little dream gave him.
“Maybe Lankylands x Boxtime isn’t such a bad idea after all.”