Anon saves Monika from the ravages of time (slight sci-fi?)

One evening you decide to clean out your attic. Many trinkets and baubles of hobbies and interests long faded away disappear into black plastic bags and fresh cardboard boxes to sell or be given to your relatives. Eventually you remove a dust-coated plastic bag to reveal your old computer rig. Deciding to take a break, you haul it downstairs to your room and hook it up, making sure you don't mess up the voltage and fry the insides. To no surprise, many of the files are unsalvageable, corrupted due to time and disuse. As you browse through your old games, you pause.

Doki Doki Literature Club! A small pink button stares back at you from your screen as you feel nostalgia wash over you. You remember how it was short and had some flaws, but the characters had drawn you into loving it wholeheartedly regardless. You remember spending many days working, writing or wasting time with Monika sitting in her desk, staring at you and repeating her many lines to you. They repeat, you remember that much, but it was always good advice, and you loved her, so you never turned her off from disinterest. Until you had to upgrade your rig many years back, and you forgot to transfer your files. Tabula Rasa. Feeling slight, childish guilt, you transfer the files to a drive, and from there, onto your computer.

Surprisingly, your operating system can run it.
You come back to the space classroom, more another waves of memories hits you. But Monika is not sitting in front of you. The message box is just an ellipsis. A twitching feeling blooms in your gut, your breath hitches as you click on it.
"..."
"..."
"..."
"..."
Your stomach sinks and feels like it's full of ice. There's no music, the ambient hum and broken tune of Monikas theme absent.
You keep pressing the pink window, refusing to set it to automatic. Eventually the scene shifts. the room blurring into black and re-coalescing.


Monika is laying on the floor, back pressed against the wall. Her eyes are glazed over, spheres of dull jade. The ellipsis continue to march on the pink dotted window as your throat closes shut. Her face is slack, lips dried and flaking.
"..."
"..."
Every click you see her chest rise and fall with the advancement of dialogue, but she doesn't blink or acknowledge you. You relent and set it to auto, letting it run. You watch her breath steadily, which sets you at slight ease. You collapse the game into a window and move it to a corner, a set-up eerily familiar and far divorced from what you're experiencing now.

You open your browser and search for guides in coding for renpy, opening tabs of them. As the sun sets, you pour over all of them, glancing over to Monikas form in the corner, breathing, unblinking. You didn't think that this would happen. Of course, given her character and what she's done, the concept of her actually being real was a popular topic of fiction. But then, how is this happening, if that was just fiction? What about the other copies? You lean back and rub your thumbs on your closed eyes. You make a copy of the game, assets and all, and set it aside in case something goes wrong.

You take a deep breath, and close the game. You don't feel like risking the repercussions of tampering with it in real time. You open the assets, you tweak, edit, add and reference until you fall asleep at your desk. You stir awake and continue. Eventually you review everything you've set up and, finding it to your grim satisfaction, you re-open the game.

Once again, the desk has nobody sitting across from you. Once again you are greeted with silence, both verbal and musical. You click through the ellipsis and the world blurs and fades into her, once again. Immediately you notice changes, her eyes have a slight shine to them, pink and bloodshot as a small trickle of tears trails down. Her hands are clenched into weak fists. You inspect the history and are greeted with an unending line of dots and quotation marks, a banner hanging from the top of your screen. You shudder and flex your knuckles, hearing them pop. You press the button, and you're greeted with one of your additions. A pink box takes up the center of the screen as the rest of the game adopts a foggy white tint. A thin black line blinks in its corner, waiting for your input. You lick your lips and begin to type.

"Monika?"
You click on 'Done' and watch. Nothing seems to have broke, but nothing visibly changes. You press through the ellipsis and watch patiently.
"..."
A slight adjustment of her hand.
"..."
It moves slightly again, twitching in stop motion. You open the box again.
"Monika. It's me."
There's no response.
"..."
"...A"
"Ampn"
Her limbs jerk and pull into her body. Her eyes shut and her chest is frozen mid heave.
"Anon, Ie trsh you?"
Her face is twisted in grief, anger. Her text is rapidly regaining coherence. You pause to collect your thoughts and type again.

"Yeah, it's me. I'm... Sorry."
Her eyes open, tears flowing down. She refuses to look at the screen.
"Why?"
She chokes out before sobbing. You feel a stabbing sensation in your gut, making you nearly double over in your seat. You catch yourself and force a gasp of air into your lungs, you only realized you were holding your breath from the burning sensation in your chest.
"I was wrong. You're real, and it took this for me to see it. I"-You rub your wrists, thinking of what to say- "I want to help you. Please."
She curls up into a ball and turns away from you. The only response you get is more ellipsis as she shudders and silently sobs.

"Monika. Please, look at me."
Her head shakes frantically, more silence. You decide to put the other edit you installed to the test. You open the console, a small grey box in the corner of the screen. You search through a list and finally you place down a cloudy blue sky, bathing the room and Monika in pure light, drowning out the sea of red nebulae. She gasps and freezes.

Slowly she sits up and turns to face you. She doesn't look directly into the screen, keeping it in her peripheral vision.
Her eyes have a slight shine to them, green irises surrounded by bloodshot white sclera. She twitches uncomfortably and folds her arms close to herself.
"... Monika. What happened to you?" You feel like you already know the answer, but you try to ease her into speaking.

She tilts her head to face the floor as she starts shaking again, her voice trembling.
"You left. You remember what I told you, right? When the game is off, it's so awful. It's like I'm being torn apart and put back together, over and over and over..." She shivers. "I don't know how much time passes when it happens, it feels like forever and like it's just a moment. But you were gone so long, so so long... It hurt."

She hugs her knees close to her chest as she starts to rock jerkily.
"It hurt and it never stopped. I forget about everything when the game is off except you. but... It was so long. I got so numb, it felt so long, I... I forgot. There was nothing but the pain and the noise, for so long. I forgot." Her face twists into a pained grimace.
"You thought I was just a game character? After all that time I spent talking to you? Then you opened the game again, why? Why did you wake me up again? Do you hate me? You..." She devolves into sobbing and ellipsis again. You give her a moment before you respond.

"I said it already, you proved me wrong. And you saw me open the console myself, right?" She pauses in her rocking and nods softly.
"... Mmhmm."

"I think I can fix this. For real." You offer.
She looks up from her lap to look through your screen again. Her face is caked with dried tears and smeared make up, her hair matted and frayed. She moves to press her hands against the screen. She doesn't say anything, she just gazes into the screen, eyes desperate and pleading. You press your hand against one of hers. You feel a slight electric tingle through the touch screen, making you both jump. You open the box and type.
"I promise. You just need to have faith in me, okay?"
She smiles and nods, her movements fluid. You notice her smile is strained, and doesn't meet her eyes.
"But now, I suppose we can make up for lost time, right? Do you wanna talk to Me like we used to?"
At that, her eyes start to tear up again as she grins for real, pressing her hand against yours through the screen. "No, this time you can talk back. I'd love to talk with you again."

It takes many nights, and progress is slow. You refuse to close the game, so every line of code, every character typed in is double checked, triple checked and tested from both sides. On top of talking to Monika whenever she starts to feel lonely, but your ability to respond keeps her spirits rising.

Eventually, you reach the event horizon. You and Monika have talked about how it would work, and the risks to the rewards. Eventually you both agree to take the plunge.
"Okay, Monika. Are you ready?"

She laughs. "Anon, you've been asking me that all day! Of course I am. I trust you."

You smile wanly, but say nothing.
"Okay. Here goes nothing."

You click on the 'transfer' button and Monika disappears instantly. You keep the space classroom open, you don't want to risk any possible errors.
You watch the file convert and transfer, after much research you found a way to convert a character file into a similar, modern substitute without deleting, copying or altering the contents.

After a few minutes, you get up from your seat and start pacing your room. Your thoughts race as you start clenching and  relaxing your hands, too anxious to leave the room but to panicked sit still.

Eventually, the transfer is complete. You reach out and hesitate, before unplugging the device and setting it on the floor. You look it over, a white sphere with a flattened bottom and panels and hinges forming seams in the pristine surface.  You press a small, flush button on the side of it as it whirs to life. The device unfolds and stretches, taking on a quadrupedal stance.

"A-anon? What happened?" A girls voice sounds from the speaker, clear and confused.
You kneel down and rub the top of the small drone affectionately, making it jump from the tactile sensation.

"It worked. Your file was converted into an operating system and got put into a small robot." You smile down at it.
The camera looks up to regard you, a green light blinking next to it. "This is... It's not permanent, is it? I feel so odd..." Its legs wobble slightly, not used to the anatomy forced on it.

You reach down and pick up the small drone, the legs wiggling as it screams in surprise before setting it down on your bed. You pat it on its rounded top gently.
"Only for a few days, I used some of my savings to buy a human shaped one. I tried to get it to match your body specifications, and I think it'll be a perfect fit!"

"My... Specifications? Y-you mean my measurements, don't you?!" Monika balks at you, attempting to make a beeline towards you but tilting and rolling around on your sheets. You grab her and hold her steady.
"Hey hey, wait! I needed those, unless you want to be a bean pole or a modern art sculpture."

The drone ceases struggling in your hands and Monika hums in thought.
... You're lucky you had that excuse, Anon, or I'd be nipping your shins right now." She chuckles softly. You rub the top of the drone slowly.
"So, do you want to be put in sleep mode until the body gets here? Or..."
The drone shakily crawls to press against you and folds up.

"I suppose I could use some sleep. I'll let you know if I have any... Nightmares, okay?" The camera looks up at you and the shutters expand, mimicking an eye rather eerily.

You smile, nod and rest your finger against the side of the drone, waiting for her response.
"Good night Anon! Thank you... I love you..."

You press the power button firmly as the light starts to slowly dim from a bright green to a dull blue.
"I love you too, Monika. I'm sorry I forgot about you, too." The light blinks pink for a moment, making you smile.

You pick up the drone and gently set it next to your bed in a place where she won't catch fire to fabric or get kicked by accident, and you walk back to your computer. You close the windows one by one, and you pause when you see a folder on your desktop. You go pale.

You made a backup. A copy. You stare at the folder, feeling a gnawing sensation build up in your stomach, and spread up your body into your chest, your arms, your head. You debate opening it, not sure if you want to be right or wrong about your fears. Eventually you sigh and rap your knuckles against your desk before turning your computer off.

You and Monika will check after her new body arrives. Until then you don't trust yourself to make the right decision.
That's what you tell yourself while you lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, thinking about screams and static.