Work Text:
It's four forty-five in the afternoon on a Thursday when Squiddo's work laptop pings with a new email. She squints into the air, then tabs over to her inbox—she's researching portfolios for a client's new goals, she has time to kill.
After a moment of staring at her screen, confused, she realizes the text of the subject line shifts as she looks at it, a mess of characters that she's pretty sure aren't even letters. Weird.
It's probably a bot—but it's an interesting one. Another second's hesitation, then Squiddo forwards the email to her personal address and returns to her research.
At home, eating takeout dumplings at a dim kitchen table, Squiddo opens her inbox again and remembers the strange email. It sits innocuous at the top of her personal inbox, shifting text and no sender in the subject bar.
At least it wasn't a boredom-induced hallucination, she laughs to herself as she clicks it open. The body text is the same shifting mass. Tilting her head to one side, she clicks inspect on the page to figure out how whoever made this did it.
The sidebar opens and reads, Here I am.
Squiddo narrows her eyes. She highlights the text—the only thing in the space where her email's code should appear—then closes the inspect sidebar and reopens it.
Hello again.
Now a curl of worry begins in her stomach: there's no way that should be displaying. She closes and opens inspect a few more times and notices as she does that if she's quick, sometimes bits of the mess in the email's body resolve into real text.
Are you listening?
We can see you.
Let me in.
Good evening, Squiddo.
We're ready.
We're waiting. We're watching.
Why are you here?
She closes the tab. What the fuck? She can barely even bring herself to be worried about malware or a virus hiding in the email—something is wrong, something way more important than some trojan horse.
She forces a deep breath. It's weird, sure, but there has to be an explanation. Right?
After another beat she reopens her inbox and forwards the email to her employer's IT, explaining she doesn't know where it came from and they should deal with it.
She shuts the lid of her laptop and turns back to her dumplings, suddenly much less interested in them.
The next morning is brutally sunny, forcing Squiddo to squint as she makes her way to her bus stop. She didn't sleep well, trying to tease apart the puzzle of the email and making no progress. She sits down on the bench, huddled into her coat against the chilly air.
Movement in the edge of her vision draws her out of her thoughts. There's something at the end of the block.
She squints through the light at the disruption and can't quite make sense of it: spots of void, like miniature black holes or like static, blink in and out of the world, moving in slow circles—no, spirals, and definitely toward her.
She blinks hard. Then a second time. The thing is still there, creeping closer. It's so dark it makes her feel dizzy, darker than she could ever hope to understand or even really see.
A glance around the bus stop tells her no one else has noticed.
"Um… excuse me?" She steps closer to the nearest person, an older Black woman in a long plaid coat. "Sorry, but, what's that thing down there?" She points towards the dark spots and can't quite bring herself to look at them head-on.
The woman gives her a strange look. "The… cars?"
"I—sorry." Squiddo feels her cheeks burn. There's nothing there. Of course there's nothing there. "I, uh… must've been a trick of the light, I'm—I'll leave you be now." They return to their place, shoulders hunched high. The woman takes a step away in kind, darting unkind glances their way every so often.
Squiddo keeps her eyes resolutely on the ground. There's nothing at the end of the street—the middle of it now, getting closer every moment. She's overtired and imagining things. It's impossible that anything would be there.
She boards the bus, looks out the back window, and the street really is empty save for cars. She breathes a sigh of relief she doesn't really feel.
"Hello?"Squiddo calls. They turn in her chair towards the entrance of her cubicle to see who's there.
The opening is empty.
They frown at the air—they could've sworn there was someone standing behind them.
IT gets back to them without much help to offer. The email comes from Squiddo's work account, apparently, and most of their answer is a firm warning not to make something like that again, and especially not on company time.
Squiddo opens a reply to protest their innocence—they don't even know how the thing worked, and besides why would they do something so bizarre?
They think of the dark spots on the street, and the sheer number of times today they've turned to greet a visitor who wasn't there, and delete the draft.
Squiddo startles awake in the middle of the night.
"Hello?" she calls into the darkness, then cringes at herself. Whatever's in here, behind her bedroom door, can't possibly be friendly. Why would she greet it?
"I know you're there," they add, trying to sound bolder than they are.
How could something get in here? It takes a key to get into this building, and a separate key to get into Squiddo's apartment. Their window is four stories off the ground.
Still, she's certain there's something.
She creeps out of bed, heart pounding, and yanks the blinds open.
The street below, and obviously the window itself, is empty.
Her breath hisses through her teeth. There's nothing there, obviously, of course. Why would there be something there? How could there be?
She flings the bedroom door open and peers into the darkened hall: also empty.
Her laughter sounds thin and ragged. "I'm losing it," she mutters and scrubs a hand through her hair. "I'm just—I'm losing it."
With another shaky laugh, she crawls back into bed.
She takes the subway to work—it's a longer walk, but they can't trust the static not to be at the bus stop. It's not every day, but most days, at one end of the street or another, swirling in her vision, and she swears it's getting closer as time goes on.
So, the subway it is.
Although she can't help looking over her shoulder, nothing appears. The stop nearest her building is underground, like the one nearest her work—it occurs to her that if something did appear, she would have nowhere to run.
They force themself to breath. It's going to be fine. The train is at least blessedly dim and a break from painful sunlight and office fluorescents.
As they climb up the stairs toward their brokerage, again at an underground stop, someone bumps into them; Squiddo's knocked into the railing with the force of someone running past.
They turn to look and call out in vague complaint at the retreating figure, which gets them a series of strange glances from other commuters—their skin crawls with the suggestion that maybe no one else can see the intruder.
The person, whoever it is, is running down the stairs at breakneck speed, short hair flying out behind them. Half-blinded by sun already, Squiddo can't make out the color of their hair or skin or clothes, but they squint a little harder and could swear the person is wearing her same backpack.
She wakes in the night. There's something outside her bedroom door.
Heart in her throat they cross the empty floor, swing the door open, and throw on the hall lights.
Nothing.
Of course.
She tries to laugh and can't quite manage it.
She has to squint against the hallway lights, but she pads towards her front room to check it's also empty. It's a short and unrewarding walk: the kitchen, the couch, the table, all are at peace. Squiddo lets out a shaky breath.
There wouldn't be anything outside the apartment, right? Surely not.
And, if there was, they try to assure themself, it would be fine. Getting in would take a key. Nothing is waiting for them there.
It's late. Why am I up?
On their way back to bed, they hesitate, then leave the hall light on. It burns their eyes—they swear it's gotten brighter in the past weeks—but nothing can hide in the shadows this way. They sit up in bed, squinting against the light, and wait for sleep to take them.
An email from HR shows up in Squiddo's work inbox—they want a meeting. To discuss her performance and future at the company.
Yeah, Squiddo's pretty sure she's getting fired. She comes very close to emailing back to demand to know what she's done—nothing has changed. She didn't even write that first email. She gets less sleep these days, but her work gets done. Clients like her. Her cubicle doesn't have a door for anything to hide behind.
Instead they fill out the form of their availability. Their hands shake on the keyboard.
They wake in the night. They check, and the hall is empty. They leave the light burning.
They return to the bus stop after watching spots of void rip through the enclosed subway. There are too many shadows there anyway, too many places for something to hide.
And of course, the rippling static turns back up that same morning.
Squiddo focuses her eyes on the curb, resolutely ignoring the… the thing. It doesn't make sense. It can't be there, it just can't. So she does not look at it. Doesn't give anyone a reason to stare at her like she's losing her mind.
Until the darkness blinks in the edge of her vision and she snaps her head up and it's close—too close to run, now, her reaction too late—she has the barest moment to grit her teeth. There's nothing there.
It sure hurts more than nothingness would.
Pain—Squiddo couldn't describe it beyond that, beyond pain—rips into her with the opening of a bubble next to her skin. Her nerves are alight in bursts, even spheres that send sparks along any root that touches them. Like flames racing along a fuse, like a knife through butter, bruising impacts deep in her muscle. Her vision goes hazy in the onslaught, mind simmering static below a sensation more intense than can be described.
She comes to on her knees, at the empty bus stop, breath shaking. The pavement is cold through her slacks.
She blinks up at the world around her, just to confirm that the people waiting with her have left, and has to look back down immediately. The sun is brighter, she swears, painful even in that second.
The bus must have come and gone without anyone stopping for her. They choke down the start of tears—they're a grown adult, random strangers at the bus stop ignoring her should not be a problem.
They stand and every muscle trembles. There's dirt on the knees of their dress pants and the bottom of their coat. They brush it off and decide they need to purchase sunglasses.
The person meeting with her from HR is named Brian but turns out to be a woman. It's the least strange thing that's happened to Squiddo since she opened that email, and she doesn't even blink.
"Hi, Squiddo," she greets them. "I'm so glad you could make it."
Squiddo just nods. They didn't sleep last night—or if they did it was so little they don't remember it—and they don't trust themself to come up with the right words.
"Would you mind closing the door behind you? And… sorry, could you take your sunglasses off?"
Squiddo closes the door and sits down across the desk from Brian. "I'd rather not," they say. Their voice comes out thinner than they meant, ragged. They suppose they haven't spoken to anyone recently. "It's… really bright in here." Through their sunglasses—the first pair they could find, polarized and vaguely pink—everything is dim and blurry, held at a comfortable distance.
Brian hesitates. "I see. Are you… sick?"
Squiddo laughs, or tries to. "It's been, like, a week, but thanks for noticing." They shake their head. "I'm fine, I—uh, I guess I've just been having trouble sleeping, but I'm alright." They take a breath. "What did you want to talk about?"
Now it's Brian's turn to take a breath. "There are a couple things. IT has concerns about how you use your company laptop, and some of your coworkers are worried about you."
"I didn't write that email," Squiddo snaps. "Okay? I didn't."
"Okay. I believe you. There's a record of suspicious code packages coming from your workstation—do you know how they did get there?"
"I… don't," Squiddo admits. "Wait, like more than one?"
"Yes. Does any of that sound familiar?"
"No," they insist. They catch themself wringing their hands together and lay them flat on their knees. "I don't—I don't know, okay! You can look through the damn laptop, I didn't do anything."
"Can you take a deep breath with me? There's no need to shout."
Squiddo takes the performative breath and tries not to glare. The door is closed, they realize, ridiculously delayed given that they closed the thing. Someone could be listening in. They force themself not to twist to look at it.
"We can circle back to the laptop, okay? There's also a matter of your colleagues being concerned. A couple different people have told me you're being erratic and the quality of your analysis has struggled."
Squiddo feels their jaw clamp shut.
"What do you think of that?"
"I think I'm fine," Squiddo replies. "I'm—nothing's gonna happen." They say it to soothe themself as much as Brian.
Brian is quiet for a loaded second.
"Are you aware of our medical leave policies?" she restarts, voice cautious. "If you should need—"
"I said nothing's wrong," Squiddo snaps. They force themself through another strangled breath. "Sorry. Sorry. I just—I know I said I wasn't sleeping but I'm not sick. Okay?"
"I'm here to help you," Brian says. Her voice is too low, too gentle, as if Squiddo is a spooked horse. "But I can't do anything if I don't know what's happening. I want to hear your side of the story, alright?"
Squiddo hears the threat loud and clear.
They weigh their odds, then before they can finish doing that blurt out, "I think I'm being stalked."
Brian blinks. "Excuse me?"
Squiddo cringes. "I—I think someone's following me. Something—yeah. Something's stalking me."
"That's a very serious situation," Brian says, tone somehow more chastising than sympathetic. "What's been happening?"
Like a bottle uncorked, the story pours out of Squiddo. It comes in fits and starts, choking on sleepless incoherence and the indefinability of what they've seen. There's someone watching them through their apartment door, who stands behind their desk only to duck out of sight when they turn, and there's a rip in space trailing them through the city. They try to describe the pain of being caught, and fail. They try to explain the fear and uncertainty that haunts their every step, and fail.
Brian has stopped taking notes when Squiddo runs out of tails to chase. They look at her with their breath ragged and their eyes wide behind their glasses, the closed door behind them burning in their awareness.
"That certainly sounds… difficult."
Squiddo's face burns. She doesn't believe me. Of course she doesn't, I sound insane. I am insane.
"I can send you resources on our medical leave policy," Brian continues kindly. "Do you want to go over them with me?"
Squiddo hesitates a beat, slowly losing the fight not to check the door behind them. "I'm being stalked," they insist—they know exactly what Brian is trying to say to them and they will not give in to it yet. "What would a doctor do about it?"
Now it's Brian's turn to pause. "I hear where you're coming from. I know you're scared." Squiddo laughs. Scared doesn't begin to describe this feeling. "I think it's for the best if you take some time off. Talk to a doctor, and then we can talk about coming back to work. Okay?"
"No." Squiddo lays their hands flat on their knees again. "No, I—you're not listening to me. I don't need a doctor. I didn't do any of the—the stuff IT says. Someone's following me; they're—they're listening at the door. Okay?"
"There's no one at the door," Brian assures them. "I can promise you that."
"You can't," Squiddo snaps. "It's closed! I just, I need to see what's behind it, okay? Okay? I need to—I can't see and there's something there, you have to believe me." Their voice breaks, their shoulders hunch—dangerously close to begging.
"Take a deep breath, Squiddo. You'll be alright."
Squiddo stands quick enough their chair scrapes over the floor, twists towards the exit, checks themself and turns back. "I—y'know what?" They can feel their heartbeat in their throat, driven by the awful knowledge that there is something waiting outside and Brian does not believe her. "I quit! This—you guys don't care, you, you aren't listening—I can't do it. I can't. I quit." They pause. "Sorry."
They hurry to the door, fling it open: nothing. Whatever Brian says to them, they can't hear it over blood in their ears and footsteps echoing their own as they race out of the building.
Squiddo is awake at night. Someone is at the door.
Her heart is pounding practically through her ribcage, so hard she can all but taste it, choking off her breath.
Every light in her apartment is blazing bright enough to nearly blind her. Her sunglasses have fallen to the floor—she herself is on top of the kitchen counter, knees hugged to her chest, back pressed against the wall.
The bedroom door is open. The bathroom door is open. The pantry is open. The front door is open.
Every blind is up, although with the dark night and the glowing apartment it's difficult to see out.
There's something in the hall. Of that, Squiddo is certain. Only their watery stare fixed on the doorframe keeps it out—it doesn't want to be seen.
She needs to go see it. She needs to lay eyes on the thing in the hall.
If they move from the counter, something at the window might get in. Something in her bedroom, also held back only by their gaze. Something in the gap where the pantry doesn't open flush with the wall. Something in the shadow behind the couch they can't get rid of.
It is unbearably bright. Light lances through their eyes, into their mind like an echo of the static. They want their sunglasses. They cannot afford to move.
Exhaustion and panic wash over them in waves: unbearable fear like molten gold at the mere suggestion that sleep might take them from their watch, the raw weight of days on end awake chewing at their edges.
The night passes like this, under a cloud of terror. Squiddo sits awake on her kitchen counter, vision too blurry to watch minutes tick away, light flooding into the hallway and streaming out the windows, shaking and paralyzed.
Later they will try to put words to it and find there are none. They will discover there is nothing in their power of analysis to describe what it felt like to sit there, hour on hour, fearing for her life from an invisible threat.
They will find this discovery cosmic. They will know in their bones that an experience so fundamentally unreachable might as well have not happened. And yet they will know that it did happen, that they sat vigil as their soul was changed by something not quite a god. This eternal moment will have them like a glue trap, and they will tear their fragile wings trying to beat away from it.
Even later, after that, they will stop running. She will live this second forever, all of it rather than the sliver they lived that night: the watcher and the watched, the unspeakable knowledge and the uncaring audience in an emotion as impossibly large as the unfolding pages of an atlas.
But before then, the realization. The last possible second that Squiddo could have lived in the same world as anyone else. At her last chance to turn around, she instead did something rash:
The static was racing through the air toward her. Memory heavy enough to fracture was gaining inertia inside them and hummed in harmony with the echo of pain they were just as incapable of describing.
Squiddo stared down the bubbles of void rippling closer. There is only one moment that has ever mattered, they think, and it is one that was not real.
They run toward the static, and laugh.