Title: Alter Ego
Author: neutralizing
Series: Yume Nikki
Rating/Genre: T, horror/suspense
Word Count: 800 on the dot FUCK YEAH
Summary: When she opens her mouth she tries to scream—but all that comes out of Poniko is a sickly sounding gurgle that echoes in her head. (Poniko, and experiences in her own Dream World.)

Author's Note: Practice with writing horror and using less than 1000 words? Yeah, I'll take it.

You can probably make better sense of this than I can, because it's 6 in the morning as I type this.

Very loosely inspired by the manga, but seeing as I don't happen to particularly care for it, this is set in the games.

The door beckons her.

There is nothing about this door that's especially outstanding—in comparison to the glowing neon door, and the one plastered with eyeballs, it's boring, a muted, modest indigo with violet accents. But something in her chest stirs and she feels her arm reaching out to the doorknob without her meaning to.

The doorknob is cold, and it bites into her palm.

A vast expanse of white greets her when she opens; she watches her breath curl, frozen, around her, lingering like some sickly miasma. She walks without meaning, not sure where she's going and equally uncertain of when she'll stop.

The igloo is the first change of scenery she comes across, not counting the sparse trees that are gathering diamond dust on their needles. She crawls inside and there's nothing—except a pool of shimmering pink, that is.

The feeling in her chest stirs again, and she submerges herself.

The Pink Sea is humid and breezy, a stark contrast from the dry cold of the Snow World. She takes a winding path through the shoal until she spots the balloon; reflexively her fingers curl around it and suddenly she's knee deep in lukewarm water. Yards ahead, a lone green balloon sways in the distance.

When she touches the green balloon, she's back on the shoal but there's a conic house ahead of her now. It's no more than two or three yards away, she guesses, but somehow it manages to loom and make her feel miniscule. It radiates malice.

She enters the house anyway.

The house is dark; in the dimness she can make out what she assumes to be furniture but there's something in the center of the room she can't discern. Despite the fact fear is pulsing through, her body is working against her. Her legs move without the desire to, her arms moving against her will. She isn't controlling her own body anymore, but just merely a guest observing. She steps inside and flips on the lights.

The hairs on her neck stand on end, and a shudder ripples from the small of her back, down to her toes.

She's not sure what is in the middle, except that it's not human: it's a black mass her size, with a white face endless stare, its mouth upturned in a grotesque mockery of a smile. She whirls around in a moment of clarity and wrenches the doorknob and finds out, with cold horror, it somehow locked itself.

It moves with surprising speed and envelops her body in thick, black ooze; it slides up her arms, covers her chest and coats her neck. It forces itself past her lips and spreads inside her ears.

When she opens her mouth she tries to scream—but all that comes out of Poniko is a sickly sounding gurgle that echoes in her head.

Poniko doesn't know how much time passes between her transformation and when the girl arrives, but she's nevertheless stunned when one day a mute girl with chestnut braids and a weary face nonchalantly walks inside. She can't fathom how she got in; the door has been locked every time she's tried to escape.

All she does is mess with the lightswitch. It drives Poniko mad; she wants to ask her why, why she isn't running away to escape, but she can't—her voice died the moment she took her own steps inside.

The lights dim, then brighten. Dim, brighten. Dim, brighten.

Poniko feels a familiar lurch in her stomach—it's getting angry.

She wills this stranger, this stupid awful girl, to understand the warm, soft colors beguile a terrible fate, and there's still time to go, and turn around—

The house darkens, and Poniko feels like she's turning inside-out.

If the girl is at all terrified of her transformation, she doesn't show it. She remains still a very long time, before digging into her pockets. Even in the shadows, she can see the blade of the knife glimmering like a silver smile. The girl walks towards her, knife brandished, and shoves it deep into her belly—

Poniko jolts awake with such force, she nearly falls out of her bed. The air is punctured with her heavy breathing and her pillow is drenched in sweat. For several minutes, she is too stunned to move from her position, but her mind is racing wildly with frantic thoughts, and eventually they stop at a single, terrifying question.

She forces herself to fall deep asleep, and she wastes no time tearing through the Snow World, the Pink Sea, the shoals—

She wrenches the door open to the conic house, nearly taking it off its hinges. In the middle sits a young girl with chestnut braids and a weary face.

With shaking fingers, Poniko switches the lights off.