"Modified Cartridge"

(Reinterpretation of the Creepypasta "Sonic 3: Hacked Cartridge" written by Seeth)

Sometimes, curiosity takes you to places you never thought you would be in your life. I have a very close friend who was about to graduate from his university, with a job already proposed far from the country. We were both very close, we shared all kinds of tastes, but lately we had not been able to communicate due to personal things for each of us. A few weeks before he took off for new terrain, he had sent me a message. He wanted us to get together to try out some games from our high school days. I had no problem, it would be a short trip with beautiful moments. I remembered putting my old Sega console in a box next to a shelf where I usually keep various things I no longer use. I wanted to go take it out to start setting up the small table where we would play.

Unfortunately, I had a small mistake, causing the console to fall from the top of the shelf, and along with it, the cartridges. I was lucky to grab the console, but the few cartridges I had hit the ground. It must have been the effect of not having used them for a long time, but the plastics, along with the plates, broke. I was hoping it wasn't something that serious, but unfortunately for me, it was. I tried each of the cartridges, none of them worked correctly, or they had graphic errors that were impossible to overcome, or they didn't even open at all.

While I was thinking about what to do, my friend sent me another message, he said that preferably, he wanted to play Sonic 3. Since he had many fond memories of that game. Since I would be arriving in a few hours, I thought I would go out for a while in search of somewhere that sells cartridges. Very close to the entrance to the big city where I live, there were several stalls selling items that were no longer in use. I tried my luck there, fortunately, they sold a big bag with cartridges of all kinds, not just the Genesis. I could recognize that it contained several kinds since the bag was semi transparent. I asked about the price, to my surprise, that those who were selling didn't even know what they were selling, they just called the bag something full of decorative items. Decor? Yes, some of the cartridges even had the label on them, but I wasn't going to question things like that. They gave it to me cheap, 25 dollars.

When I got home, I started testing the corresponding cartridges. Well, each one worked, some with their labels somewhat worn, but you could tell which game it was. But, there was something I noticed. In some cases, the cartridges made noises when shaken, it's as if a small part inside had broken. It was strange, but as long as they worked, I wasn't going to open them. One of those cartridges that emitted sound was the Sonic 3, I left it connected to the console, and to kill time, I went to eat something until my friend arrived. A few hours passed, and it finally arrived.

We got comfortable in some chairs, and we started playing, as he had only one control, I passed it to him, and we would take turns each level. While the game showed the SEGA logo, my friend told me about the memories this game brings back. I responded that I was happy anyway. When selecting single player mode, the first thing that showed up was that the match selection was weird. There were 3 identical save files, just Sonic, on Angel Island, with nothing else.

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The other files played the error sound when trying to choose them. The Eggman who is at the end to delete games had disappeared, and it was not allowed to start a game without saving either. At first, I assumed that perhaps it is an effect of the cartridge being somewhat damaged, due to those sounds it made when shaking it, I mentioned this to my friend. He had no problem choosing the first game, he had told me that as long as it allowed him to have some fun, he didn't care. As expected, Sonic was on the huge island, trampolines, or spikes. It was just flat terrain with occasional climbs that required jumping.

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It went like this for a while, until he came to a pit that seemed to have no bottom.

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He made Sonic jump, and once on the other side, some kind of cutscene began. Sonic moved forward slowly, and stopped right behind a tree.

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In front of him, there were three silhouettes, two familiar, but another that I couldn't recognize at first. One was of Knuckles, who after doing the animation has him laughing.

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He turned around, did his pose when he is ready to fight, and did a Spin Dash towards Sonic, pushing him into the pit. After a fade to black, the poster for Act 2 appeared. The structure was not that different, too flat, but with textures of being below the ground.

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After a while of running, a giant ring appeared at the end of the level. There was nowhere else to go, if I kept going, there was a wall that wouldn't allow me to continue.

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Once inside, the special phase wouldn't be very strange, except that the red spheres formed a narrow path, and there was only one blue sphere to grab. I can even assure that the text of “Get the blue spheres.” It was changed, instead it read “Catch the blue sphere.”

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It seems that more than getting the spheres, t was just following the formed path to the end without crashing. Luckily, we managed to win it, the results screen gave us the perfect bonus since there was no ring. But what caught our attention was the message above.

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“Don't push me away, please.” “Your eyes, bright as an emerald.” At the end of the victory melody, there was a small distorted and very poor quality sound, I can't describe it very well, but it sounds like someone's voice coughing was put in. My friend commented “Hey, I don't remember any of this, did you unlock something new?” “It's not even fun.” I answered no, this was something outside of what the original game would be. That we were playing an edited cartridge. I wonder if we better remove it, and play something else with the cartridges I had. I nodded, I would watch that game myself later. A little before the night arrived, my friend left, before leaving he told me to tell him later what happened with that already strange Sonic 3, laughing I answered yes.

As soon as he left, I wanted to satisfy my curiosity hunger, I put the cartridge back in to continue the game. The file showed that Sonic was at Launch Base.

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At this point, knowing it was a modification, I wasn't surprised. What did happen was the level start sign, a few seconds after showing the name, the graphics distorted, but thanks to the fact that I paid attention, I could see that in the background there were some incorrectly placed letters, but that, in my opinion, vision, they formed a sentence. “Stay with me”

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Once again, the level was too simple, there weren't even any enemies, just rings and item boxes.

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Reaching the end, I saw how this time there were only two silhouettes, Tails, and the one whose shape I could finally recognize, Sally Acorn. Sonic's companion in an old animated series and some comics. I could recognize her since I used to read Sonic comics online.

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He couldn't reach them since in front of him was a wall made up of giant rings. There was no choice but to enter, once inside, another special phase of a single blue sphere.

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Upon completion, the message changed. “They are no longer here."

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Another sound effect at the end, but this time I can describe it as, someone wearing out, or sighing. My feelings went from curiosity to a little discomfort. They moved me to Hydrocity. The music was gone. Or at least most of it, since only small sounds were heard randomly. The entire ground was flat.

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After running around aimlessly for a while, Sonic stood still.

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He moved forward slowly, and that silhouette of Sally was now completely visible. She stared at Sonic for a while, turned around, and began to move forward quickly.

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I regained control of Sonic, I didn't know what to do, did I have to follow her? It was the only thing that could be done. After advancing for a while, I couldn't reach it, until a wall appeared. But made of speed boxes.

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If I looked up, I couldn't jump over the wall, I had to break like 3 to get over, by doing so, I managed to reach Sally easily. When I reached it, it was as if I had entered to a giant ring, since it took me to a special third stage. But there were no red spheres, it seems that I just had to find the blue sphere. It took a while since I got lost, without having a fixed guide through the red ones, it was difficult.

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I got the emerald, but this time, there was no text at the top, but texts began to arrive quickly below. “It's special” “You're part of me” “You won't get detached” “You find yourself on the floor and walls”

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There were more texts, but they passed so quickly that I could barely make out the ones I mentioned. After a while with the black screen. I returned to Angel Island, but something very noticeable was visible, the ground was changed, I could distinguish how little Sally heads formed the entire level. I began to feel both uncomfortable and with a strange sensation, fear? I guess so. I advanced a little, noticing that the level was the same as the first time, just the floor textures changed.

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I reached the end. Instead of showing the scene we had seen, Sonic just continued running, when he left the camera, the game over text appeared, as if I had lost all my lives. Below him, a final message appeared: “Anderson, here you will lie.”

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Anderson? What? I was very confused. It was already late at night. Between the confusion and sleep, I couldn't do anything else, it was better to go to sleep, and come back the next day. Once I got up, I turned the console back on. The starting selection now had the first window blocked, only the next two remained. Ultimately, I wanted to know more about this rare modification. I played one more game. I didn't get to the end, but I took photos with my phone. I started posting the photos along with my descriptions of what I remembered on forums dedicated to editing games. I was asking if anyone knows where it came from, or even knows the name of the modification.

A few hours passed, until that, I had gone to university. When I returned, most of the responses were that they didn't recognize it anywhere, others asking for more photos, some asking if I was willing to sell the cartridge, but no one giving a concrete answer. To kill some time, I took out all the cartridges that shared the fact that, when shaken, they made noise. There were 5 in total. I wanted to open them to see what was broken. But I saw that my computer had received many response notifications on a forum where I had posted the photos.

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It was someone who asked me for more photos and more description, and what he claimed to know about the author. At that time I had no problem describing more and sending him more photos. It took me a long time to respond. Told me.

"Oh. Yes, it's a cartridge I made for entertainment, it had been stolen a few days ago, how nice to see someone else sharing the taste for modifications. Could you pass it to me personally? I just haven’t finished it yet.”

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Out of mere curiosity, I asked him the meaning of everything he had done, his levels were very simple, but, above all, I asked him about Anderson. It took me another long moment to answer, when I was about to get up from the chair to go and pour myself water. I received another response. “I can't talk to you about that, it's something personal, please, I need you to return it to me, do you know that it is in very bad taste to keep someone else's property? Do me a favor and send me your address.” The message with a more aggressive tone made me too uncomfortable.

I replied that there is no reason to get angry, and that, furthermore, if I sent him my address, it does not ensure that we will be very close to each other. This time I received a response immediately.

“I have no problem traveling to wherever you are as long as you give me back what belongs to me, come on, don't make it more difficult and just tell me your address."

I stopped responding to him. Before I even knew if I had to trust or not. I was going to clear up my doubt in a search, I just put Anderson. Unrelated results. Until it occurred to me to maybe put the name next to Sally. How could I have forgotten. Most of the results were from newspaper pages announcing the search for Sally Anderson, missing for 7 months near here.

A chill reached my entire spine. I remember seeing the news on television at the time. What did I have to do with the cartridge? That guy sure is dangerous. I went back to the forum messages tab, the last thing I saw was that I got about 8 messages from the same guy. I only read part of it before blocking it. "It's mine." I was in enormous suspense, I called the police to tell them my case. When they arrived, they only told me that they will be monitoring the area, and that if something were to happen, or if I felt I was being watched, just to call them and that they would come as soon as possible.

For the next few days I was afraid. I couldn't sleep well. I could be being watched without knowing it. One of these days, the sun was setting. Something that almost completely knocked me over in terror. It was an email that arrived on my phone.

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It was that guy, I recognized him from the message.

“I didn't think you were so close, you saved me work. I know everything about you, you probably thought that these days I was doing nothing. I just hope that you haven't mistreated my things, especially opening them, that would make me very angry, anyway, we'll see each other very soon.”

Open them? I remembered that some cartridges made noise when shaken. Wasn't it something that was broken? I grabbed the screwdriver to open the Sonic 3 cartridge. When I saw what was inside, it made me drop it, falling to the ground. It was, a nail, and a tooth. With signs of having been forcibly removed.

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My arms were shaking. I immediately called the police to get them here. But on a night like this, I doubt they'll get there quickly. I didn't dare to open the other cartridges, I formed a barricade at the entrance to my house, I grabbed the best I had to defend myself. I'm just in a corner of my room, I have nowhere to go, I can only sit and wait. The days that I haven't been able to rest well affect me in a bad way, I feel like just sleeping, hoping for the best. Maybe just dream, dream of being another blue sphere to catch.


"Epilogue"

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It was… confusing. I felt a hole in my chest, like something was missing. In this area you can have the necessary protections, but in most cases you would feel unprotected. I figured why, my belongings had been stolen. They came to my house while I was gone. I don't care much, but they had
taken important things, necessary for me. I guess in the underworld any profit is valid. I felt obliged to recover what I cherish so much. Why wouldn't I do it? Where did I have to start? In a city that is ventilated on cold nights, with no protection, one must act quickly to avoid scandal. Then, remembering the nature of the objects, it was first to investigate repair shops or garden sales. I spent hours, even days, asking each person who worked in those professions.

Nothing, there was absolutely nothing. Next up were yard sales or places where they sell salvaged things, or that's what they call them to cover up. There were no signs of what he was looking for either. Many hours into the night, awake, I didn't want the only memory I have of her to be lost forever. I tried the following: buy everything that looked similar and try it in my home. Many bags filling my living room without any purpose. I spent a whole night trying each one. Again without results. None of these plastics were able to transmit the signal, that signal, the dim light that makes me feel warm along with many good moments. Although I felt slight satisfaction when trying them, it was not what I was looking for. But the third option had arisen. In the middle of the dark night, it could be selling online. Those sites expand search capabilities on a very large scale.

I checked it a short time ago, but there was a risk of getting lost even more. You don't know what you can find there, although peaks of luck come when you least expect them. In my case, it was not like that. I couldn't find anything. Buying everything I saw wouldn't have helped much either. He had been like this for many days, coming and going from one place to another. With every hour that passed, that flame within me faded. I felt like my memories would be gone, but I didn't have to get ahead of the worst. That light, a light of hope for me, turned on again when I saw a post asking about something that caught my attention. I'd be lying to you if I said I found it. The coincidence was a very extensive search.

Every detail he said made my heart beat more and more. Wild instincts coming out of hiding. I think I acted too aggressively. I have to apologize. My exaltation made him not answer me for a long time. I know it may have been scary, but it wasn't necessary to block me either. There was a lot of hype on both sides. You know, because I don't know who you think you are, but you'd be surprised how easy it is to locate someone who thinks they know how to hide well. It was a fun activity, but there comes a time when you get tired of continuing to play cat and mouse. Another cold night, but this time I had the opportunity to once again feel the warm flame of my precious memories intact. Even though the cartridge is dismantled, it made me a little angry.

Luckily, the amulet that makes it more special was just lying on the floor of this room. What amulet? I thought you already knew. It Is something special. Belonging to everyone who is a part of me. It won't be a problem for me to put it back inside. You know, talking to you has made me feel something special. You reflect a flame similar to hers. You must be someone unique. I wouldn't want to leave everything just like that. I would love for you to be part of my collection.

Edit Report
Pub: 13 Mar 2024 06:04 UTC
Edit: 16 Mar 2024 00:28 UTC
Views: 54