Chapter Text
A cold breeze travels through the air. Water droplets add onto the puddles that they have already formed. Overcast. It's just bright enough to see where one is going. Many have already gathered indoors, with a few stragglers out and about.
One of these stragglers, an older monster woman, is currently and unknowingly being followed by a lone shadow.
This particular shadow was not motivated by very much. Drifting around, loosely looking for a place to stay.
The walk does not last very long before they arrive to a house. This town is not particularly big.
The house itself is what most people likely imagine when they hear the word 'home'. A homely home. Home.
The lady enters the house and puts away her umbrella, then trudges off to the upstairs. The shadow slips into the shadows of the living room. They take in the surroundings.
The living room itself is painted in many shades of sepia, and looks to have all the usual things one does. A few chairs, a couch, and something else that sticks out amongst everything else.
A large and dark purple-y blue television with a red cloth under it.
The lady returns, muttering something to herself as she does.
"Goodness, what a day."
She sits on the couch and flicks the television on with the remote.
Displaying on the screen is a game show, contestants compete against each other using their wit and skills to win the prize of the episode.
The shadow watches along and is thoroughly entertained by it. One of the contesters is in the lead, only to comically mess up and lose their spot to one of the others.
If the shadow's face had been visible in this form, there would be a smile.
This is so fun.
They slowly slink around towards entertainment center through the regular shadows in the room.
As soon as that happens, the shadow feels a familiar tug. The sudden sense of a darker darkness.
Oh, there's a Dark World in there!
Describing the Dark World inside itself as 'busy' would be a great understatement. There are so many things going on at once.
Holy moly.
Spying from within the world's own shades, the shadow watches as countless other Darkners work on countless things.
Fellow shadow-like Darkners practice their saxophones, dice carry props around or slack around, and an absurd amount of remotes act as bodyguards and enforcers.
How many remotes does this family need?!
They get around to a stage area, and that's when the shadow finds themself a bit mesmerized of sorts.
From the grain of the wooden floor to the endless red curtains, to the gigantic Darkner in the middle.
A huge, well dressed man with an even larger television head. His suit is red and his tie is untucked.
He's delivering some boisterous speech, but the shadow cannot focus on most of the words.
This man is terrifyingly tall. Too tall.
Though, he does not seem to pose much of a threat, even with his size. He appears to be a very charismatic sort of guy.
And he's wearing shoes that look like bananas...
So, the shadow stares from their little corner, overcome with a paralyzing mix of awe and fear.
After saying something along the lines of, "And we'll be right back after these messages!", the TV man snaps his fingers and walks offstage. Commercial time.
The shadow has to take their own breather, recovering from how entranced they were.
They continue to spy around. Some of those dice are gambling, the musical shadows continue grooving, the remotes bust the gamblers, there's a cute blue lady...
Through their observing and eavesdropping, they come to learn more about that giant TV man.
His name is Mr. 'Ant' Tenna and he is the leader of this Dark World. The place they are currently in is his studio, and all of these Darkners are his employees.
A lot of them don't seem to be very fond of him, for reasons that escape the shadow. Even though his height is intimidating, he looks to be a fun guy!
...Why is his first name in quotes? They do not find this out, unfortunately.
After spectating a while longer, the shadow becomes lost in thought.
The place that held the previous Dark World they lived in was going to shut down soon. They left before it could even have the chance to get ugly, not wanting to know what an abandoned Dark World would be like.
Which means that I'm not doing anything right now, and this place is really nice...
It was then that the shadow decided.
They were going to see if they can get a job here.
...Definitely not an acting role or anything else to do with being on camera. They're more for working behind the scenes.
At the entrance, they prepped themself for a few minutes. The before part of doing these things always knew how to make them nervous.
And the middle part. And the end part.
You're gonna walk in there and it's going to be fine. The worst they can say is no. You're going to be fine.
This darker, purple carpet area did help to calm their nerves. They take note of that.
The shadow takes a deep breath and walks into the studio proper.