Doll Chisaki

I...don't like how she's looking at me.

The mannequin's eyes follow me around as I look at her. It's not really a mannequin per se - she has an articulated mouth, and more humanlike, almost functional hands. Her clothing is tattered, torn, and dirty, but it's a similar seifuku to the one Chisaki wears, albeit white instead of blue.

And of course, red-brunette twintails. Can't ignore those.

Finally, the mannequin opens her mouth.

"Ah. Ah." She points at me, and I almost jump out of my shoes.

"Uh...hey!" I say to her. We are silent for a moment. "I'm uh, Hinata! Nice to...meet you...?"

"Hi-na-ta." The mannequin girl - Doll Chisaki, as chat apparently seems to be calling her now, holds up a small doll of her own. It looks like a miniature but blank version of herself. She points at me, and then at it. "Hi-na-ta."

"Uh...right. Hinata. I'm Hinata." I give her a grin. "I...am Hinata."

This is going nowhere.

Doll Chisaki shakes her head and points to the doll.

"Hi-na-ta."

I'd like to start telling her that I'll let the doll be Hi-na-ta and that I am Hinata, but I know it'll be futile, so I drop the subject. As she does, she holds out her hand, almost like the regular Chisaki loves doing.

"Hand?"

"Uh, sure." I grip my hand in hers. It's cold and glossy.

"Adventure!"

"Uh, yeah. Adventure."

The maze is actually rather quite beautiful. It's filled with gothic architecture, and not in the horror sense, but with actual beautiful decoration. I mean, I guess it was the same with the movie theater, so I shouldn't be too comfortable, but still.

"Hey uh...Chisaki?" The doll responds to me calling out to her. "Where are we going?"

"Workshop!" Doll Chisaki says with a happy smile, or what I think is a smile. She puts her hands behind her back and leans in, just like Chisaki normally does.

Damn.

We wander through the halls, almost aimlessly. The moment I take my eyes off of her to admire a rather beautiful box, I turn to see that Doll Chisaki is gone.

"Chisaki? Chisaki!" I shout, as much worried for her safety as mine. "Chisaki!"

"Hi-na-ta!" A voice echoes out, and I follow it through a small corridor, until I reach a large, wide open space.

There's a whole field of mannequins lined up, row by row. They stand parallel, all while slumped down in an identical position.

"Chisaki?"

Doll Chisaki sits in the center of the formation, just in front of a giant box. I run over to her. As I approach the box, I realize that it's an entire room. A giant glass pane separates the exterior from the interior, but there is a door to the side. Inside are several of those grey-glassy NPCs holding combs, brushes, and other accessories. There are carts filled with lotions, makeup, and bottles of other stuff I'm not quite familiar with. On the wall are several posters - concept art and advertisement posters of Our Little Forever, mostly.

"Workshop!" Chisaki points to the room, and heads for the door. I look at the NPCs. They are slouched over and wrapped up in strings. A massive CRT sits in the center, taking up the other side of the wall. Doll Chisaki looks at me, then at the locked door, when I notice that there is a coin slot next to said door.

Remembering my possessions, I insert the coin I have.

The door opens up, and Chisaki enters. When I try to as well, I am blocked off my some kind of invisible wall, so I give up.

Inside, warm incandescent bulb lighting activates as the strings on the NPCs go taut. The NPCs - seemingly some kind of string puppets, unlike the autonomous NPCs from the other areas, welcome Doll Chisaki in like a princess, and motion her to a seat. Doll Chisaki sits onto a chair, as prim and proper as her janky movements allow, and sit there, seemingly happy as the NPCs brush her hair and apply lotions and such to her. There's also a seamstress, who is actively cleaning up and fixing the clothing on her body.

"Hi-na-ta!" Doll Chisaki waves to me from the chair, and I wave back. The NPCs continue to work on Doll Chisaki with painstaking effort. Doll Chisaki sits there, happily, playing with the little mannequin she has decided is also me, as the NPCs fix her up. And then, it is done.

The lights begin to dim as the workshop NPCs begin to shut down. The strings manipulating their arms go limp, and as they do, so do they.

Then, the lights shut off completely. Doll Chisaki looks at me sadly.

"Oh..." I try to enter the box, but as I do, Doll Chisaki shakes her head. She gets up and presses a button, and the large dormant CRT TV now opens up with a familiar scene. There are three NPCs in it - a green adult, a blue adult, and a purple child. The adults are talking to one another.

"I mean him as a person. He's not trustworthy." The green adult says.

I...I think I remember this.

"Well, I trust him. Besides, I need money for the new game. We're on the verge of bankruptcy, and we need a small cash infusion to get this game out. Hey, after that, I'll buy you anything, okay?" The blue adult counters back.

I know this.

"...alright. If you trust him, maybe I do as well..."

"Y-yeah..."

The two NPCs saunter over and look at the boy.

"Hi-na-ta!" Doll Chisaki cries out, then points at the boy. The onscreen figures do not react.

"Hinata, you really like that one, don't you?"

"Ahaha, who is that?" NPC mom asks.

"That's the first heroine I designed for the game. Her name is Chisaki." NPC dad kneels down in front of little NPC boy Hinata in that stance I always remember him making, then makes a declaration. "I henceforth retroactively dedicate the creation of Chisaki to you. So take good care of her name, okay?"

This is a scene from long ago. The scene I only remembered yesterday.

"Hi-na-ta!" Doll Chisaki jumps up in joy. "Hi-na-ta! Hi-na-ta! Hi-na-ta!" The runs over to my echo to give him a hug, but she's blocked off by the giant window. "Hi...Hi-na-ta..."

The screen shuts off.

Doll Chisaki looks to me. Despite the lack of a face, I can tell she's looking at me excitedly. The window disappears as Doll Chisaki steps out of the room.

"Hinata here!"

I feel like vomiting. This shouldn't be in the game. This is invading my mind. I angrily turn to her, when I notice the fact that every single mannequin is now looking at me. It's just like in the classroom again, but now they're mannequins.

"Hi-na-ta!" The mannequins reply in unison as Doll Chisaki now tries to get closer to me.

"Shit! Stay back!" I take out my revolver, and fire it into one of the approaching mannequins. The mannequin falls over silently, but Doll Chisaki screams.

"No! Violent!" She screams and suddenly, has teleported away. The other mannequins freeze. I fall over, sweating.

Oh god.

After catching my breath, I take a peek at chat.

"HINATA YOU USELESS OAF"
"What were we expecting from this coward anyways?"
"You guys are too harsh on him this shit creepy"
"Stfu and suffer more, that's the only way you'll be fun"
"I shid my pants"

"Yeah, I'm a useless oaf! Please, someone help me!" I desperately wave my arms around, trying to form a defensive circle around me with my revolver, but after a moment of silence, I sit down.

I'm screwed, aren't I?

"Hi-na-ta!" A voice echoes from further down.

My only hope!

I run back into the maze, and realize just how dark it is in some of the places. I take out the submachine gun to use as a flashlight, but it flickers and dies.

Welp.

I take out the revolver and somehow stumble my way through the maze, and manage to reach another light area. The ceiling here is even higher.

No, it's outright nonexistent.

I look up, and see an inverted mirror version of the maze I was just in. I can literally see myself peering upwards.

I'm not going to question that. For the sake of my own sanity.

Finally, I manage to come across Doll Chisaki, who is holding a scrap of paper, presumably something she took from the salon.

"Oh thank god Chisaki, you're here." I shake my head. "Now come on, we have to find our way out of here..."

"Help Chisaki find friend?" Doll Chisaki inquires, completely ignoring me.

"Oh! No, I wouldn't be a good friend for you-hey!" Chisaki yanks me towards the concept art of the girls. "Oh." I shake my head. "I...don't know how." I stare at the picture, and there she is, Chisaki, surrounded by the four other girls. There's one taller girl with a short brunette bob, one with light blue hair in the background, a short one with blonde half-twintails, and another one with long purple hair.

Those are the other girls my dad designed. Apparently, never implemented.

"Play...play with friends." Doll Chisaki looks at me. "Hinata also friend?"

"Y-yeah, I guess I'm a friend!"

"Chisaki help friends." She points to the girls. "Hinata...help Chisaki?"

I am physically unable to refuse something like this.

"Of course." I give her a salute. "I'll uh, help you out with anything!"

"Follow, follow!" Hearing my response, Doll Chisaki excitedly grabs my hand, and drags me forward.

***

"We're BANKRUPT, Taro!" The stringed grey NPC yells at stringed blue NPC.

I again, am the only one in the audience. There are several inactive NPCs slumped over on chairs, but I don't think they count.

"Makoto, please!" The echo of my dad says, pulling Doll Chisaki over. "I have a new game, this will turn-"

"No, it won't! You've fallen off, Taro. No one will buy your shit. It's over. We're over. The company is over."

Doll Chisaki looks up at my dad sadly, then at 'Makoto', presumably a man who worked with my father. I shake my head.

"Fine, then have it your way! I'll get a loan. I'll get back up on my own two feet. Just you wait, Makoto!" The scene ends, with the two men going limp again as the scene ends, and the room goes dark. Doll Chisaki slumps over, looking sad.

"Game abandoned?"

"N-no, no!" I say as I look at her. Doll Chisaki gives me what I think is a smile.

'Chisaki...make people happy." She puts her fingers towards the corners of her mouth, and (unsuccessfully) attempts to curl them upwards. "Chisaki and friends, happy!"

"Yeah, yeah." I look over back at chat, but they're as unhelpful as usual.

"Friend!"

"Huh?"

There's a long purple haired mannequin lock in a cage that Doll Chisaki now points to. She has her arms close to her chest. Presumably a dandere character, I reckon. She has a beret on her head, like an artist of some kind. The bars of the cage are made of stone.

"Hi-na-ta!" Doll Chisaki says, pointing at her friend. "Friend!" With the glass now gone, I take a step towards it. The purple haired mannequin girl sits there, lonely.

It's kind of sad.

"Friend!" Doll Chisaki says, as she points to the girl. "Friend...not free..."

I remember something.

My chisel.

I take out the chisel and begin to pound them against the wall. One-two, one-two. Once one bar breaks, I move to another one. Soon, the hole is big enough for the mannequin girl to pass through.

She's not going to leap out and bite me or something, is she? I reach in, and the moment I put my hands on her, I can feel myself absorbing it. Like it's entering me somehow.

I look down at my HUD, and notice the purple haired mannequin sitting in my inventory.

That's one down.

"Alright Chisaki!" I cheerfully look over at her. "So, where are your other friends?"