Dayshift
Life in beta.
Danny didn’t even remember who gave him the game. That felt important later.
It came in a blank white box—no logo, no rating, no warning label. Just a USB drive and a folded card that said:
STILL IN BETA. PLAY HONESTLY.
It was a joke gift, obviously. White elephant rules. Danny worked at a tech company where irony was a competitive sport. Someone probably thought it would be funny to gift him a “choose your own adventure” game to mock his well-documented love of RPGs.
At home, he plugged it in.
The game called itself DAYSHIFT. Mid-range graphics. A little uncanny in the way faces didn’t blink often enough. The protagonist looked vaguely like Danny if you squinted and felt generous. Same messy hair. Same tired posture. Same apartment layout, right down to the chip in the kitchen counter.
That was… fine. Procedural generation, he assumed. Or lazy asset reuse. Beta, after all.
The choices were limited. Disappointingly so.
Go to work.
Call in sick.
Ignore the message.
Danny frowned. “That’s it?”
He picked Go to work. The game faded to black and displayed a line of text:
GOOD. SOME DAYS NEED TO HAPPEN.
The next morning, Danny went to work.
Nothing remarkable happened until 3:17 p.m., when his manager announced a “restructuring” and laid off the guy two desks down. The guy who’d joked, just yesterday, about buying a house.
That night, the game updated itself.
No patch notes. No prompt. Just… more options.
Speak up.
Stay quiet.
Take notes.
Danny picked Stay quiet. It felt safest.
The next day, HR called him in—not to fire him, but to thank him for being “adaptable.” He got a raise. A small one. Enough to sting.
Danny laughed, nervously, and told himself it was coincidence. Confirmation bias with a graphics card.
The game grew darker.
The protagonist stopped being called You and started being called Danny.
The choices got more specific.
Take the late train.
Cross against the light.
Look down at your phone.
Danny hovered his mouse. His stomach felt hollow, like he’d missed a step on the stairs.
He chose Take the late train.
The next day, a news alert buzzed his phone while he waited on the platform:
Pedestrian struck by vehicle at intersection near—
He didn’t finish reading it.
He stopped playing for three days.
On the fourth night, the game launched itself.
No menu. No exit button.
Just a single choice, pulsing softly on the screen:
Continue.
Danny whispered, “Nope,” and reached for the power button.
The screen flickered.
YOU DON’T HAVE TO LIKE IT, the text said.
YOU JUST HAVE TO PICK.
He unplugged the computer. The screen stayed on.
Breathing fast now, he clicked Continue.
The game skipped ahead. The graphics sharpened. The apartment on-screen was no longer like his apartment.
It was his apartment. His unwashed mug on the desk. His jacket slung over the chair.
The protagonist—Danny—sat at the computer, staring back at him.
The choice appeared.
Stop playing.
See what happens.
Danny laughed again, that brittle sound people make when their mind is trying to flee without their body.
He selected Stop playing.
The next day, nothing happened.
No eerie coincidence. No headline. No mirrored moment.
Relief washed over him so hard he had to sit down.
That night, the game was gone. The USB drive, too. The folder erased itself cleanly, like it had never existed.
Danny slept better than he had in weeks.
The following evening, his phone buzzed with a calendar notification he didn’t remember setting:
CHOICE PENDING.
The screen dimmed. Text appeared, stark and familiar.
Tell someone.
Pretend it was a dream.
There was no third option.
Danny stared at the reflection of his own face in the dark glass. The choice didn’t feel new. It felt overdue.
Somewhere—quietly, patiently—something waited to see what he’d decide this time.
And whatever he chose tomorrow would still happen.
Because the game, it turned out, had never needed the screen at all.
This was delightfully creepy.
Oooo...creepy!