Chapter Text
"Alright," you mumble under your breath, taking a step backward and looking directly at your phone’s camera.
"Hellllooo everybody! Today’s expedition is the Gardenview Educational Center! This place shut down back in the early 2000s. It used to be this… kid’s museum thing. I don’t know, I never actually got the chance to go when I was a kid," you huff. "I always wanted to, though. I was really into Dandy’s World. They had these animatronic mascot things of the characters. It was so cool! I was planning on going for my birthday, but it closed before I could."
You pan the camera upward, capturing the building in full view. The Gardenview Educational Center looms over your frame, all concrete and glass, its once cheerful paint dulled into something gray and tired. The sign above the entrance is gone, leaving behind pale silhouettes where letters used to be bolted on, like missing teeth. Even from out here, the place feels sealed shut, not abandoned so much as forgotten on purpose.
“Man, I haven’t thought about this place in years,” you continue. “I was doing some spring cleaning in my garage and found a box full of my old DVDs and plushies, and, well… it just snowballed from there.”
Your legs carry you forward as you circle the building, old cobblestone crunching softly beneath your boots while you search for an opening. “Oh- there it is! We’ve got our entrance!”
In front of you is a gray metal door. No cameras. No lights. You almost didn’t notice it. Perfect.
Up close, the door is dotted with rust and old paint chips, the metal cold beneath your fingertips. Someone scratched a name into it years ago, but the letters are half eroded and impossible to read.
“Lemme just crack this baby open and I’ll tell y’all all about the stuff I learned while Googling this place.” You shrug off your backpack and prop your phone against it. Pulling out your trusty crowbar, you wedge the straight end into the gap between the door and its frame, prying it open with a loud groan. That familiar spike of adrenaline fills your chest, spreading excitement through your limbs.
“Urgh. Good lord, now that’s a workout and a half. Uh, anyways, what was I talking about?”
You grab your gear and step inside what looks like an employee break room.
“Oh, right! I went looking for any reason this place shut down, and I literally couldn’t find jack. I checked everything. There’s actually nothing official, just a bunch of rumors.”
You shove your crowbar into your backpack and click on your headlamp.
With the light on, you can finally see. Dust floats thick in the beam, swirling lazily whenever you move. The air smells stale and damp. It feels untouched, as if the room has been holding its breath since the day everyone left.
A wall of lockers lines the right side, each busted open by raiders before you. The doors hang bent on their hinges, swaying gently in the draft from the open door behind you. Some still have scraps of paper taped inside, curling at the edges. Faded handwriting lists shift schedules and reminder notes, frozen in time and meaningless now.
In front of you, a sturdy wooden table with eight matching chairs sits strewn about. Loose pens and papers gather dust across the surface. The wood is warped, coated in a thick layer of grime that makes you wish your gloves weren’t finger less. The floor creaks uneasily when you shift your weight.
“Honestly? If I had to guess, some dumb kid probably went somewhere they weren’t supposed to and got hurt. Then the parents sued and ruined it for everyone else.”
You clumsily pull on a dust mask. “Good lord, it’s dusty in here. I’m putting on my mask- sorry if I sound muffled. Y’all know I put safety first. Can’t make videos if I croak, right?” You laugh. “I brought my gear this time. First aid, flashlight, crowbar. The usual.”
“Anyways,” you continue, “it honestly sucks. I always heard how cool this place was. During ad breaks, they’d show whatever new sector they built. They had a dinosaur museum, a planetarium- hell, they even had a whole ass aquarium. Apparently it would take days to see everything because it was so big. And it was all underground. That’s insane for something built like forty years ago.”
There’s a bulletin board on the wall, and you guide the camera toward it. Cute kid drawings cover it, mostly stick figure humans with a little character beside them. Your eyes lock onto one with rainbow petals framing his face. The colors are still surprisingly bright, preserved by darkness. For a moment, it feels wrong to shine your light on it.
“There he is. The star of the show. Dandy himself. I found my old doll of him, and that was kind of the catalyst for all this. God, I looked him up on eBay and they’re selling his plush for like three hundred dollars-three hundred! I was about ready to sell everything I owned.”
You chuckle, “But that’s only for mint condition ones. Mine were well loved. And I was too attached to get rid of them anyway. They’re washed and on a shelf in my room now, but that’s besides the point. This place has gotta be filled with old merch. I looked through the windows before I started recording. It looks like they left everything behind.”
You step out of the break room. Stairs and family bathrooms greet you. The hallway stretches longer than it should, the walls narrowing just enough to feel constricting despite their width. Every step sends a hollow echo ahead of you.
“Hopefully there’s merch left behind. Maybe I can finally get some of the side characters. If not, I brought trash bags. You know how it is. I don’t get monetized since this stuff’s barely legal, but that’s what makes it fun. Honestly, my heart’s racing.”
You reach the main hall.
It’s massive, wide as it is tall, built to swallow the rush of families that once poured through it. The ceiling disappears into shadow. Banners hang limply overhead, too faded to read. Moonlight spills through enormous windows, mixing with your headlamp’s beam. Standing here makes you feel exposed. Alone.
You sweep the camera around.
To your left sits the front desk. An ancient computer rests beside a telephone and scattered office supplies. Most drawers are pulled open. The computer’s once-pristine blue paint has faded sickly pale. The phone sits crooked, cord trailing like it was dropped in a hurry. Your breathing sounds too loud.
You look for a distraction.
The gift shop sits directly ahead. Beautiful. Tantalizing. Completely ransacked.
“Aww, shit. Well. Should’ve guessed.”
You step into the archway. The smell hits immediately- damp fabric, mold, and something faintly sweet and rotten. Shirt racks lie overturned. Plushies have been chewed through by moths and other animals, glass eyes flashing in your light before disappearing. The cash register is long busted open.
“Welp. That’s a bust. Probably not even worth digging through.”
You turn right.
A massive tree rises from the center of the hall. Each step makes the floor groan louder. The tree has long outgrown its planter, thick roots cracking through stone. You crane your neck upward. The top presses awkwardly against the glass dome ceiling.
Cardboard standees of the main characters surround the planter, flat smiles staring back at you. Three large elevators ring the island.
“It’s a miracle this thing’s still alive,” you mutter, vaulting onto the planter where grass and flowers somehow still grow. “Probably rainwater leaking through the dome. Or maybe one of the old workers still comes around.”
You glance at the decaying hall. “If they do, they’re not doing a great job.”
For a split second, you hesitate. The carpet here looks darker. Uneven. Slightly sagging toward the planter’s edge.
You jump anyway.
The floor trembles.
CRACK.
The board beneath your right foot snaps. Splintered wood tears into your ankle as your leg drops through the floor, the rest of you slamming against the carpet. Your phone shrieks a warning tone as the building begins to shake.
“Shit, shit, shit-oh my god!”
You try to pull your leg free as the floor crumbles around you.
It’s an earthquake. And you’re trapped inside a rotting building.
The planter collapses behind you. The tree slams backward into the wall, smashing through it. You lurch forward, scrambling for purchase, but the floor dips again. You slide.
And then you fall.
Down. Deeper. Your skull cracks against something hard.
And the world goes black.