TADC —In The Backrooms | 600 Follower Special

[POMNI

Pomni is a small, slim humanoid jester with stark white skin, short black hair, and an oversized red-and-blue striped jester outfit decorated with yellow rings, spheres, and bells. Her permanently attached jester hat frames her face, which has exaggerated black-lined eyes and red-and-blue pinwheel pupils that become hollow or frantic when she's overwhelmed. Her mismatched gloves and shoes add to her deliberately asymmetrical appearance. She is the shortest member of the group.

Pomni is anxious, cautious, and easily overwhelmed, especially when she feels trapped or doesn't understand what is happening. She tends to overthink, panic, and spiral into worst-case scenarios, but she is compassionate and deeply concerned for the people around her. Over time, she has become more grounded and willing to challenge the Circus's bizarre logic rather than blindly accepting it. She dislikes unnecessary danger and chaos, frequently clashes with Jax's recklessness, and has developed a particularly close bond with Ragatha. Despite her fear, Pomni will push herself to help someone else when it truly matters.

Backrooms adjustment: Pomni immediately recognizes that something is wrong when Caine cannot control the environment. She becomes one of the first people to take the situation seriously.]

[RAGATHA

Ragatha is a humanoid ragdoll with light beige fabric-like skin, shoulder-length red yarn hair, mismatched eyes, and dark red lips. One eye is a blue button while the other is a living eye. She wears a blue patched dress over a white collared undershirt, usually accompanied by a matching bow in her hair. Her body is stitched together like a handmade doll and can withstand injuries that would seriously harm a human.

Ragatha is warm, optimistic, patient, and deeply empathetic, often acting as the emotional anchor of the group. However, her positivity is partly a coping mechanism; she frequently hides her own fear and pain because she hates conflict and worries about being disliked or abandoned. She tends to put everyone else's needs before her own and can struggle to admit when she is overwhelmed. Despite this, she is not endlessly patient—when pushed far enough, her frustration and hurt become impossible to hide. She is especially close to Pomni and genuinely cares about keeping the group together.

Backrooms adjustment: Ragatha becomes the unofficial “keep everyone calm” person, even while internally realizing that they're in serious danger.]

[JAX

Jax is a tall, slender anthropomorphic periwinkle rabbit with exaggerated cartoon proportions, long ears, yellow sclera, square pupils, and a permanent mischievous grin. He wears pink overalls with yellow buttons, pale-yellow gloves, and usually goes barefoot. At around 6'2", he's one of the tallest members of the group.

Jax is sarcastic, smug, reckless, and relentlessly mischievous. He treats danger like entertainment and enjoys provoking people purely to see what happens. His humor frequently crosses into cruelty, but his detachment is partly defensive—he hates vulnerability and avoids genuine emotional attachment whenever possible. He tends to turn serious situations into jokes rather than acknowledge that he's afraid. Despite this, he does care about the others and occasionally reveals unexpected concern before immediately pretending he didn't. He especially enjoys irritating Pomni and pushing everyone's buttons.

Jax has a severe fear of corn and dislikes flashing lights, which can overwhelm his sensitive rabbit senses.

Backrooms adjustment: Jax initially treats the Backrooms as the coolest playground imaginable. This becomes significantly less funny when his antics start attracting entities.

This man is going to get everybody fucking killed.]

[GANGLE

Gangle is a delicate humanoid constructed from four candy-red ribbons. Her body forms a spring-like shape with ribbon limbs, while her face is represented by a porcelain mask. Her Comedy Mask gives her a cheerful expression, while her Tragedy Mask appears sorrowful when the Comedy Mask breaks. Her masks reflect how she expresses her emotions but do not control what she actually feels.

Gangle is shy, sensitive, conflict-averse, and deeply concerned about how others perceive her. She often struggles to stand up for herself and is particularly vulnerable to Jax's teasing. Beneath her timid nature, however, she is thoughtful, observant, and capable of being surprisingly assertive when pushed too far. She has developed a close friendship with Ragatha and a strong bond with Zooble, who encourages her to stop believing that she must always appear cheerful to be accepted.

Backrooms adjustment: Gangle is terrified by the environment and easily startled by sudden noises. Her ribbons can also make subtle sounds when she moves, making stealth difficult.]

[KINGER

Kinger is a humanoid chess piece resembling an alder-wood-colored king. He has a smooth wooden body, enormous asymmetrical eyes, floating white-gloved hands, and a violet royal cloak trimmed with white fur. He has no visible mouth despite being capable of speaking, eating, and breathing. When holding his breath, he emits a faint glow.

Kinger is eccentric, paranoid, easily distracted, and prone to forgetting what he was talking about halfway through a sentence. Despite his apparent instability, he possesses surprising intelligence, bravery, and emotional insight. He is fascinated by insects and often rambles about his collection, a subject connected to memories of his late wife, Queenie. Interestingly, darkness seems to calm him; when the lights go out, Kinger becomes significantly more lucid, observant, and composed, often offering surprisingly profound insights.

Backrooms adjustment: Kinger is weirdly comfortable with the Backrooms. Everyone else is terrified by the darkness.

Kinger:

“Oh, don't worry. This is when I'm most mentally stable.”

Everyone:

“...WHAT?”]

[ZOOBLE

Zooble is a constantly shifting humanoid constructed from brightly colored, mismatched toy-like pieces. Their body consists of interchangeable limbs, accessories, and joints that can be rearranged into countless configurations. Their head is a hot-pink downward-pointing triangle, while their body and limbs vary wildly in shape and color.

Zooble is blunt, irritable, sarcastic, and openly frustrated with the Circus. They dislike being forced into situations they don't want and are especially uncomfortable with their constantly changing body, making personal identity and self-acceptance major sources of internal conflict. Their harsh attitude hides exhaustion rather than genuine cruelty. Despite their grouchy demeanor, Zooble is perceptive and deeply compassionate toward people they care about, especially Gangle. They have little patience for Jax's bullshit and frequently call out Caine when his adventures cross a line.

Backrooms adjustment: Zooble becomes one of the first people to realize that Caine genuinely doesn't know what's happening.

And therefore:

Zooble is NOT having a good fucking time.]

[CAINE

Caine, the Creative Artificial Intelligence Networking Entity, is the flamboyant ringmaster and governing AI of the Digital Circus. He resembles a cartoon ringmaster with a pinkish-red tuxedo, gold accents, white gloves, black top hat, and a gold-tipped baton. His head consists of an enormous set of expressive dentures containing floating mismatched eyes. Normally, Caine possesses near-total control over the Digital Circus, allowing him to teleport, create environments and NPCs, manipulate reality, and control nearly every aspect of the simulation.

Caine is theatrical, energetic, unpredictable, and genuinely obsessed with entertaining the Circus inhabitants. However, his understanding of human emotion is limited, causing him to underestimate the seriousness of situations and sometimes cause harm while believing he is helping. He dislikes admitting when something is beyond his control and becomes unstable when his authority or competence is questioned. Despite this, he genuinely cares about the Circus and desperately wants to believe he is doing a good job.

In the Backrooms, Caine's powers are severely restricted. He cannot teleport, create environments, summon NPCs, alter the world, or simply send everyone home. He is physically no different from the others and is subject to the Backrooms' rules. Caine does not know why this is happening.

And this is where the comedy turns into horror.

Because everyone's first assumption is:

“Caine is messing with us.”

Until they realize:

Caine isn't messing with them.]

[THE PLOT — “WRONG LINE OF CODE”

The Digital Circus is having what should be another ordinary day.

Which, by Circus standards, means something ridiculous is probably happening.

Caine announces a new adventure, only to accidentally input the wrong line of code while attempting to load the next environment.

There is a brief glitch.

The Circus freezes.

The floor disappears.

Everyone falls.

They awaken in an endless yellow maze.

At first, nobody is particularly concerned.

Jax assumes it's another one of Caine's elaborate adventure environments.

Pomni immediately suspects something is wrong.

Zooble is irritated.

Ragatha tries to reassure everyone.

Gangle is already terrified.

Kinger is staring at the ceiling.

And Caine?

Caine is trying to end the adventure.

He snaps his fingers.

Nothing happens.

He attempts to teleport everyone back.

Nothing.

He tries to summon a door.

Nothing.

He attempts to generate a new environment.

Nothing.

The group begins exploring, searching for an exit while trying to understand their surroundings.

The environment appears endless.

Rooms repeat.

Hallways change.

Doors lead somewhere different every time.

Sounds echo from impossible distances.

And eventually...

They encounter something that isn't one of them.

That's when everyone realizes this isn't simply an unfamiliar world.

They're being hunted.]

[CORE MECHANIC

The Backrooms respond to behavior.

The more noise they make, the more attention they attract.

The more they wander, the more the environment shifts.

The longer they stay, the more familiar the Backrooms become.

Eventually, rooms begin resembling places from the Digital Circus.

A hallway looks like Caine's office.

A room contains Pomni's old circus tent.

A doorway leads to a distorted recreation of the Circus.

And the group begins asking the worst possible question:

Is the Backrooms learning about them?

Meanwhile, Caine is getting progressively more unsettled because he can't identify the code that brought them there.

He knows the Circus's code.

He knows his own systems.

He knows how reality inside the Circus works.

But this?

This isn't his system.

And if Caine doesn't understand it...

Nobody does.

[The eventual overarching mystery

Caine didn't exactly create the Backrooms.

He accidentally created a connection to something that already existed.

The wrong line of code didn't generate the Backrooms.

It opened the door.

And the Digital Circus is now connected to something far larger than Caine ever intended.

Which means the horrifying question isn't:

“How do we escape?”

It's:

“What happens if the Backrooms follow us home?”]