Tales of Regression

Chapter 8
Form: Year

Chapter Description: Two teenagers mess around with a dark web site that asks for you to enter a year into a form. Hitting submit and waiting will have varying effects on the user besides just making you younger or older.

Story Written By AceFuzzLord. Contains Furry Anthro Characters. Read At Your Own Risk

Inside the Stern household is one rabbit who is smarter than the average Stern family member. Or so I like to think I am. I'm Gavin Stern, sixteen year old highschool junior and self-proclaimed badass when it comes to technology. My parents and grandparents usually come to me whenever they have a computer related question. Recently I discovered this really cool place online known as the dark web. I got interested and decided a few months back to download a browser called Tor and wanted to browse the dark web, but my mom found out and ruined it. If she finds out I still search on the dark web for fun, I can kiss my life away. She seems to think it's all illegal activity going on on the dark web.

"So... you found a creepy site asking you to put in a year in the form?" asks my worrywart mink friend, Hunter. He sets his left paw on the back of my computer chair as I boot up Tor. I mischievously grin as I nod.

"It says that if you input a year, it can make you older or younger. I haven't tried it yet, but I figured if I was going to try this site, that I would need my best friend over in case it does work and I accidentally make myself too young or old to reverse the changes." He leans in close to whisper to me as I click on the bookmark for the site.

"What if your mom finds out about this? She's gonna kill you if she does."

"Relax, Hunter. The only way she'll find out is if I royally mess up or you spill the beans. I promise if this goes too far that I'll stop, okay?" The site finishes loading as I finish my sentence. It's just a simple looking site with a red text box with black letters in an edgy font with a black background that has a cool looking red cross in the middle. There is also the year input thing and the submit button.

"Are you sure this is even safe? What if it's a scam site set up by someone looking to steal your info and passwords?"

"I don't know if it's safe or not and I cannot guarantee that I won't need to change my passwords, but you gotta admit the idea sounds cool. What if I become old and find out that I got my dream job or that I am still as good looking as I am now?"

"What if it works and suddenly you become a baby again or too old to fix this and I cannot help you?"

"Well, my interest is piqued already and I've already got it open, so I am not stopping. Besides, I doubt I'll get into that kind of situation with you around. So stop worrying so much about this and give me a random year to try this out on."

"Sigh, I know I'm going to regret this, but try 2014 and see what happens." I click on the form and type in the year he gave and hit submit. My mouse cursor changes to the spinning loading wheel as the page tries to process this. After a few more seconds I begin to feel a strange sensation all over my body, as though I was actually forced to eat the grease triangle they try to serve and call pizza at school. "Nothing happened, now let's call it quits and..." Suddenly the screen shuts off and turns back on for a second, causing me to blink. As I open my eyes I see that I have to look up more to see all of my screen.

"Huh? Hey! It worked!" I can hear it in my voice as I speak. I sound just like a kid again. I quickly give myself a look over and find even my clothes have changed to match my age. Excitedly I look to my left to find my friend looking as young as I am.

"Uh, why did it make me younger too?!"

"I don't know! But this is so cool!" I look around my room to find it is totally decked out like how I'd expect it to be. It looks like a room a nine year old would totally sleep in, even down to the cool sheets on my bed.

"Well, why don't we fix this and just pretend this never happened. I don't wanna have to go through middle school again in a few years. I was already pretty awkward and I don't wanna have to do that again. Plus, going through primary school once was enough for me." He fidgets nervously with his paws as I look over my room and how it changed.

"Come on, why not just go through a day like this? It's Friday, so it's not the worst thing in the world. It's not like I can't change us back later and then we forget about this whole thing and keep it a secret." Suddenly I start to hear my door open, so I minimize the browser as my mom comes in with a basket of laundry.

"You showing Hunter that new game you got? The one about farming and helping others?" I nod real quick as she comes and sets the basket on my bed. "That's nice. Please be sure to put away your clothes before dinner. Otherwise, have fun and don't go online without letting me know." She looks closer to a giant now that I am shorter than just a few minutes ago. Especially with her long ears. I'm so used to my ears being just about as long as hers that I forgot just how long they truly are. I know that sounds weird, but it's just something I noticed. As she leaves and closes the door I turn my attention back to my computer.

"Whoa, it's like she didn't even realize anything was even up. It's like she really thinks I'm this young. Hey, give me another year. I wanna try being older and see what happens."

"No. Just change us back before you mess up something by accident. I don't wanna be stuck as an old man or a little kid."

"Sigh, fine. I'll change us back." I lie to him as I open the browser.

"2007 is the right year, so put it in and let's just forget about this." He doesn't notice right away as I type in 1987 in the form. Right before I hit enter he notices. "Hey! I said 2007!" I click submit before he has a chance to stop me. "Why did you choose that year?"

"It's the year my dad was born. I just wanna see if I get to see what the future holds for me. Aren't you curious about your future as well?"

"Of course I'm curious, but I don't want to suddenly be in thirties and miss out on life."

"I swear I'll change us back before Monday. Then you can go back to being safe, boring Hunter." He scoffs at that comment and crosses his arms as the screen suddenly restarts itself and I blink again. As I open my eyes I feel less energetic than before starting this experiment. I turn to my friend to find he has some wrinkles over his face and is wearing a white tank top and black cargo shorts. There is also a small bump I notice kinda pushing against his tank top.

"Oh boy, getting old is fun. You should look in a mirror to see just how fun it really is." His sarcasm isn't funny, but I take his advice and pull out my phone from my sweatpants pocket and open the camera. My wrist popped when I grabbed it and it felt really good.

"Oh boy, I don't look too hot. I have bags under my eyes and some wrinkles. At least my wrist feels wonderful. Who knew popping your wrist joint could feel so good... Wait, if my wrist popped, does that mean I work in a job where I'm using a mouse a lot?"

"Do you know how ridiculous that sounds? Knowing you, the answer is obviously yes." I take a moment to think that over as I put my phone down on my desk and look around at my room. It looks totally bland and kinda barren compared to how I thought it would look. Suddenly my door starts to open and I quickly minimize the browser again. This time my dad comes in, scratching his head.

"Hey, have you seen my allergy pills? I seem to have misplaced them somewhere."

"No. I haven't seen them since I saw you take one yesterday." I lie, not knowing whether or not that statement is true because I don't fully know how the website has changed things in my life.

"If you happen to find it, would you mind letting me know? Oh, and be sure not to get into any more trouble illegally torrenting files online. Or at least don't get our internet service cut. This isn't like the early days when we were young and dumb twins in middle and high school." He leaves a quick as he came, closing the door behind him.

"Holy shit! This website has the power to change more than just age! Anyways, did you notice that lump on your side?"

"Huh?" I point to it and he lifts up his tank top. Right around where I pointed is a small lump. Neither of us know what exactly that lump is, but it makes Hunter worry. "Oh no. I think I know what this could be! My family on my dads' side has a history of skin cancer! I... I think I have skin cancer! Change us back! I don't wanna die of cancer!" He freaks out and goes into a panic attack over the lump.

"Will do. Uh, what's the right year?" My brain is firing on all cylinders as I for some reason cannot recall that the right year is supposed to be, what age we are supposed to be.

"Try 2019!"

"But what would make us 4 years old. I don't think we were little kids."

"Who cares! Just put in anything!" As I bring back up the browser I type in 2019 like he suggests. The site feels like it is taking an eternity to load, longer than any of the other times. I sigh a breath of relief when the screen reboots. After blinking I am so much shorter. I turn to find a 4 year old Hunter being relieved that the bump is gone. I don't even want to know what that bump actually was in case it actually was cancer.

"Thank goodness I don't have to worry about that bump right now. But you really should turn us back before it's too late. Besides, the website took a while to load the last time, longer than before. I don't know if you noticed that, but I don't want to jinx this. I think it was maybe 2013 that is the right year. I don't know, all of this is messing with my head."

"I know what you mean. But I think that might be a little off. We were in highschool, right? I don't think we'd be old enough to go."

"Maybe we are just really smart?"

"Uh, I definitely think this site is messing with your head. We already went through most of puberty, I think. I remember my voice dropping and liking icky girls and..." Suddenly I start to hear my door start to open. Instead of minimizing the browser I accidentally end up closing it instead.

"I see someone is excited to play his new game." mom sings as she comes in. "Let mommy sit in the chair and I will make the game run." I get off the chair with my feet lightly thudding on the floor and take a seat on the edge of my bed, along with Hunter. I watch as she goes through explorer and finds the game and boots it up. We're greeted to a bright, colorful, cheerful edutainment game with very childish characters on the title screen. "You can show your friend Hunter just how much fun this game is."

"Fun!" I try my best to be as convincing as possible that I have the mindset of a 4 year old as to not arouse suspicions in my mom. I take a seat at the computer desk as she gets up. Hunter comes over and we are both able to fit on the chair.

Welcome to Adler's Puzzle Palace! If you are new to this game, click on the blue rectangle on the bottom and type in your name. If you are coming back, please select your name from the list.

I notice my mom watching over us as we pretend to be really interested in the game. The site must have done quite a number to us as some of these simple puzzles made for kindergartners seems to be stumping us. Things like simple addition and subtraction, connect the dots, problem solving, and a few others.

"Mommy has to go potty real quick. I'll be right back." As she leaves I pause the game and attempt to exit it.

"We have to be quick or we can kiss being big kids away for a while. My mind is starting to feel like Swiss cheese and I don't think we'll even be able to fix this if we forget how to." I agree with Hunter as I close the game. I luckily find Tor easily by just going to the C folder. After opening it I get a bit confused.

"What do I do? I don't remember."

"Just click the button at the bottom right of the screen. Quick!" I click it and wait for it to connect. "Okay, now click that one right there." He points towards a string of letters up near the left side of the browser. The page loads after what feels like an eternity and we are greeted with the same page as before we closed the browser. "I think you click on that and type in a year. Make us big kids again and then I say we never speak of this again."

"Yeah. What year? Do you know what year it is?"

"Oh no! I don't. Wait, look at the corner of the screen." I do and find it says "2023" on it. "Try, I don't know, 2013. I think that will make us big kids again. I think we would be old enough for really big kid school." I nod as I type it and click the button below. Luckily mom doesn't return before the screen goes blank and restarts. As I blink I feel a little cramped as Hunter sits beside me. We managed to make it out of this one, but I still don't remember how old we were before we started this. I should have written it down somewhere before doing this. Why didn't Hunter tell me to do this before we started?

"Okay, I think we are closer to where we started." Hunter sighs as he gets up off the seat. "I hope we are. I mean, do you remember what happened in school today? Maybe that could help us."

"Yeah, let's think about that." As I try to remember what happened my brain just can't remember right now, at least nothing that would help us. I remember standing around outside at lunch and chatting with Hunter, going to the library for class, and going to the computer lab to work on an English paper. "Hey, do you remember working on a paper for English today? Maybe that could help!"

"How? If this site has the ability to change memories, why would it not change our papers as well?"

"I don't know, but I think it's worth a shot to check them. I think I have a copy of a paper stored on my PC that could help."

"Fine, you look for that page and I'll try and remember anything else that might help." He walks over to my bed as I open explorer and find the documents folder. Inside I find a ton of different sub-folders and documents but I cannot remember which one I need. In a hurry I end up opening a ton of different documents.

"Okay, so far none of these are it. They all look like papers written by a primary school kid."

"Maybe that's because we are primary school kids right now. Maybe the website changed all your documents to match your age?" I get a little annoyed at Hunter for that comment.

"I sure don't hear you coming up with any better ideas!" As I go through the various folders I don't find the document I'm looking for if there are even any inside the folder. "At this point, we might as well get used to this because I can't find the document."

"I knew we shouldn't have done this, but at least you're not gonna have to go through this alone. I'm sorry about earlier. I am just kinda stressed about not being able to turn back."

"No, I should be the one saying sorry. I shouldn't have snapped like I did." As I'm about to turn my chair around I get a notification on the bottom right of my screen. "Huh? What's this?"

"What?" Hunter gets up and walks over, putting one paw on the back of the chair.

"I just got an email. It's probably nothing, but I might as well check it. I normally don't get notifications for mail, so this just caught me off guard. Also, who would email a 5th grader?" Those words make me cringe since I'm sure I wasn't a 5th grader before doing this.

"I don't know, but you might as well check it since we got nothing." As I click on the notification my mail client opens.

To: Gavin

From: May

Subject: You coming to my birthday party?

My mom is making me email everyone I want to invite. She says it's good practice for when I get a job in the future, but email is so not cool. Let me know if you're coming to my 17 party next weekend.

"Huh? Why did I get a message from some girl named May and what does she mean by her "17 party?" Do you have any idea, Hunter?"

"That's it! At least I think so. She must mean she is turning 17 and is having a birthday party." I feel confused because I'm not following.

"So? Why is a teen asking whether a 5th grader wants to come to her birthday party? Why would I want to go anyways, it's probably just gonna be boring teen stuff like girls talking about makeup and other girly things. She probably sent it to the wrong email address, anyways. I better just delete that bookmark and forget about trying to fix the situation because it's hopless."

"Sigh, you are so lucky I am here. I don't know how, but that email must have somehow been unaffected by the website."

"So what? How does that help us in any way?"

"It means that we must have been around her age before we started. So, maybe we can fix it by making us a few years older. Why don't we try sixteen? That's old enough, right?"

"Maybe, but what if this was just an email sent to the wrong person?"

"Oh my goodness. Just try it and if that isn't it, we can just give up and go back to being 10 because clearly we don't know what else to do. Does that sound fine by you?" I nod as I bring my attention back to the screen and bring the website back into view.

"If this doesn't work, it's definitely your fault."

"Fine. I'll take responsibility for the disaster you accidentally caused if it makes you feel better." After typing 2007 and hitting submit I feel anxious as the webpage slowly does its' thing. Eventually the screen goes blank and reboots. As I blink I begin to feel a level of clarity that I haven't felt since we've been using this website. My mind feels so much clearer now. It's like a fog has lifted off my brain.

"Heh, I shouldn't have doubted you, Hunter. You were right, as usual." I look to my left to see Hunter back to how he was before we went down this rabbit hole. "I'm sorry for doubting you and putting us both through all this."

"I'm just glad we made it out alright, but we shouldn't mess around with this site anymore because it is clearly not safe. You should delete the bookmark before you close the tab.” I take just a quick second to think about it before remembering I also have the link to this website saved in a random text file just in case I deleted the bookmark.

“Definitely. I don’t want someone like my mom or dad to accidentally find it and make themselves older or accidentally turn themselves into babies. Especially if I wouldn’t even realize something is wrong.” After deleting the bookmark, the only one I have not saved in a folder, I close the browser and get ready to shut off my computer. I know someone who I would definitely want to use this website on and his name is Axel. He’s the school bully...