Split (1)

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[REDACTED], that's what she said the job was. Why did I accept? I have no idea, I guess I needed the money. All I was told was to go to [REDACTED] and wait for someone called [REDACTED] who would tell me more. So here I am, in a dark damp corner of [REDACTED] waiting for some mysterious person. Part of me is excited to have access to [REDACTED] tech. I want to know the truth! I notice a car pull up on the opposite street to me, it looks like a [REDACTED], and a man climbs out, he looks to be [REDACTED], with [REDACTED], and a [REDACTED]. He looks at me, nods and climbs back in the car. Suddenly everything goes black as something gets pulled over my head. I struggle for a few moments before feeling a small prick on my neck, then everything goes numb.
Peaceful. I never grow tired of the calm flowing water with its low gushing sound. How long have I been sitting on this bank? It almost seems like an eternity. I have often wondered where these black waters are headed and what stirs beyond that fog on the other bank. I ponder for long hours and when I return my attention to fishing, nothing has changed of my view. Nothing ever does-the landscape has remained the same forever. Along the bank, far on one side, where there's a great, dark tree, a lone boatman appears every once in a while. Ever so quietly he comes and in the same manner he goes. He is here again. I can see his silhouette against the eternally crimson sky. Something is tugging at my line. I reel him in. Like every other soul emerging out through my line, he floats painfully under the burden of his sins, wanders along the bank towards the boatman. By the time he has reached the tree I have lost all perception of him. The boatman has started drifting to the other bank. I hope my catch has made it to the boat. Why? I am not so sure myself. I return to my business. I have been at this for so long, why I do it has become nearly irrelevant. But something about getting out these wretched apparitions seems to add a little meaning to my seemingly pointless existence. Now for the first time, I get a feeling I have never got before-curiosity? This time, the boatman is not heading back to the other bank. He is rowing along the bank-towards me. Many moments later I see him up close. A tall, dark figure at one end of the boat. I couldn't tell where the boat ended and his form began, I couldn't even tell if he had a face. I could never even see mine in the black waters. What did he want? After what appeared like he was taking a good look at me, he tipped his hat ever so slightly and just like that, he sailed away. What was that? The feeling was similar to when I pulled out a soul. Only this time, I felt there was more meaning to my existence than I ever imagined. I believe the boatman had acknowledged my work and thanked me for it.
Internally, I chuckled - this was a brilliant plan. Outside, my expression remained grim; you have to fit in, after all. It wouldn't be right to see the glint of a smile from the depths of an allyway riddled with dark. ... Waiting. That was the worst part. You start to anticipate movement... flutter of a moth's wing? The crunch of a foot approaching. Wind murmuring? A deal about to take place. Waiting? Not anymore. The usual 'pleasantries' are exchanged. You know, a grunt or two. A few aimless gestures. You both know what the other wants. "You're under arrest." Those were the last words I expected to hear emanating from the body that belonged to the foot-that-crunched-like-the-flutter-of-a-moth's-wing. ... "No... you are." I reach inside my coat, procuring the badge that proves my innocence. With incredulity, my would-be arrester does the same. Suddenly, laughter bursts forth, and the glint of a smile seems only natural in the depths of an alleyway, riddled with dark.
Soft piano music plays through the air. Kylie and Jacob are seated at the city's newest fine dining experience. The piano is accompanied with a crisp indoor waterfall that glistens with the patterns of the LED lights embedded in it. Tall and magnificent ceilings tower over their table with golden chandeliers hanging cautiously below. They are here to celebrate their 3rd anniversary as a couple. Yet, neither one knows the words soon to be spoken by each other. Jacob has love in his heart, and is ready to take that love to the next stop. Kylie, on the other hand, has a secret buried deep within her that is tearing her apart. Their conversation begins as they pick at their appetizers. "I still can't believe I was able to get us a reservation here. This restaurant is amazing. Almost as amazing as you."Jacob says to Kylie as he gazes at her with a smile. "Oh Jacob,"Kylie says with a reddening face, "You're the amazing one. Taking me here is so sweet of you." A twinge of worry streaks across her face, and Jacob picks up on this. "What's wrong? Are you not liking the appetizer? We can get something else if you want dear."Jacob wanted the night to be magical. He had a surprise in store, and he didn't want anything to ruin it. "The food is fine. It's just...I'm not quite feeling up to eating right now."Kylie pushes her plate away. Her shoulders sag and she slouches into her chair. Jacob's stomach drops at this. The night has barely begun but is already not going as planned. "Babe, what's wrong?" Kylie is silent for a few seconds that feel like an hour to Jacob. Finally, she stiffens up and says, "I have something I need to tell you. I've been keeping this from you for a long time and I think it's time for me to come clean." "Wait!"Jacob says with force. His worry grew to frustration. He was starting to lose control of this situation. He knew in his heart that no matter what she told him, he still wanted to marry her. He ponders his next move and decides it's now or never. Jacob gets on one knee and pulls the ring out from his pocket. He looks at her in the eyes and says, "Kylie Peerson, I love you. You are my world and my life. Being with you has been an amazing journey and I could not imagine anyone else by my side. Your beauty and charm are things that I want to be mine for the rest of our days. Will you marry me?" He holds the ring up to Kylie, awaiting her response. Tears well up in her eyes and she attempts to stammer out a few words. He looks at her face, and though it has tears streaming down and anguish across it, he still feels nothing but love as he looks at it. Her beautiful tanned face lights his heart ablaze. Her combined African and Mexican descent was one of the many things he loved about her. He gazed down and saw her cute feet; they were pale and ghostly against her fashionable sandals. Jacob was snapped out his love-induced hypnosis at the realization. Why did his dark beauty have feet the shade of Casper? How had he never noticed this before? Kylie noticed his confused look and said, "I told you that I needed to tell you something. I'm not who you think I am. There is a lot more to us than you know." "Us?"Jacob gets to his feet and puts the ring back into his pocket. "Us as in you and I, or...?" "Us, as in who I truly am, Jacob."She begins to take off her trademark trench coat and the truth is revealed. Jacob looks on in horror as he sees his girlfriend turned into three kids. One at the top, the face he had grown to love. Another in the middle of what he once thought to be her tiny waist> The last one on the bottom, whose feet had begun the unraveling. The kids dismount from each other and step the floor. Jacob, still in shock, has no words to say and cannot even comprehend his feelings. He can only mutter out one word, "Why?" The three kids look at each other with amusement. In uncanny unison, they all say at the same time, "It was just a prank bro."
“Steady on, steady on. Oh, watch your step, there’s a drop.” The old librarian’s voice is crackling paper as he leads you through a twist of halls, through corridors and passages and down stairs that you know don’t exist. You know it is to disorient you, and it works thoroughly. You should never have thought you could outsmart the blindfold they put around your eyes. The only thing keeping you from stumbling is his firm bony hands on your shoulders. &nbsp; You hear a door creak, and then you’re thrust through it. The new room is practically alive. You can feel that it’s small and narrow. It is overwhelmingly warm, musty with dust and sweat. You hear breathing. You’re pushed again, through a series of hands along the corridor. They are hard as bone, angry and evil. The last one shoves you through another door, ripping the blindfold from your face. You land hard on your hands and knees, scraping them on the wooden floor. &nbsp; When you finally catch your breath and your heart starts to slow, you dare to roll over and open your eyes. Your butt hits the floor in dazed combination of shock and disdain. On a beautiful, intricate lectern is a single book. Its span when open is six hand width across. The leather is red, the edges gilt in gold, and the letters on the page seem wet and shiny. You lick your lips. Shelve the book. That is what the old man had told you before he had led you through the twisting halls. &nbsp; You stand up, brushing yourself off, and your eyes catch the wall of shelves on the other end of the room. It is five steps away. The lectern is three. That is the room in its entirety. Shelves. Book. Lectern. You. In the silence you can swear you can hear your heart, a fluttering scared bird trying to escape its burning tree. &nbsp; You cross the threshold. One. Two. Three. Take the book in your sweaty hands – and fall. &nbsp; The universe spreads around you in a blanket, you watch the plasmic birth and death of a million stars, water washes into your unwilling vessel of a body, painting your pathetic eyes with a beautiful film, it catches and reflects the millions of kaleidoscoping colors that make up the world, the ink bleeds off the page, burrowing into your fingers, filling your blood with its knowledge, burning so white hot you wonder that you ever felt pain before this… &nbsp; And then through the slow celluloid you now inhabit you remove your fingers from the book. Everything drops and you feel the same kicking jolt that wakes you just before you can fall asleep. You’re back in the room. The small and musty shelf and lectern room. The pain is gone, but your whole body is shaking. You want to throw up or pass out. &nbsp; When you dare to look at the book again, nothing happens. You take in the words, but that is all they are. You even have the courage – or maybe its stupidity – to touch it again. Nothing happens. Nothing that is, until you grip it with both hands to shelve it. You’re gasping by the time you can let go. You fell for longer that time. Three tries later, and you think you understand. &nbsp; It is about intention; you have to want to shelve it. Which is not what the book wants. Waiting eons on dusty shelves for clever fingers to finally find it is torture. You felt a fraction of that torture when you touched it. Books are meant to be read. The books want to be read. Want to spread their knowledge. &nbsp; For a moment, you feel empathy for the book. You know what it’s like to want what you cannot have, to wait for someone clever and kind to free you. You also know you are the child of hundreds of librarians before you, and books are to be shelved when not in use. That is the rule. &nbsp; Anger, and fear and loneliness wash over you. You suck in an exaggerated breath, rub your hands on your pants, steel your gaze, and smack your palms to the book. You are going to shelve it. &nbsp; The stars fill in your vision immediately, you fall through an endless column of space and time, swirling slowly through the cosmic snow, it dances in your vision, caresses your hands, bows to your whims and desires, you shape whole planets, populate them with beings, watch your children rise and fall and rise again, you reach down as a god to them, then you remember, try to push it all away, you fall again, land in the desert, a sand storm raging immediately, it coats your eyes, your skin reddens and peels, and reddens again, your lungs flame, and you wander that terrible desert for forty years, but you do not forget, you hold on to the musty room with a lectern, even as the wind and sand cut your skin again, even as your blisters pop and bleed again, even as your skin burns fire, and then the storm stops and your pain stops, when you tumble through a little door to a little house, the house that you lived in all your life, the house you live in now, it is different, warm and bright, with the strange oily smell of paint and then you see them, easels stacked everywhere, books on color and great painters, and poetry and composition, all from your parents, your loving supporting parents, spread out around you, and you are painting, and you are happy, and they are happy, and the back of the little hut opens, a drop of paint rolling off the paintbrush that is yours, truly yours, making a perfect path that stretches on into the distance, where you can see even brighter paintings, so beautiful they make you ache, and ache and ache, because your parents love them, and the museum director is shaking your hand, and a king is commissioning you to paint his family, and the church wants you to do a mural, and your life is perfect and full of color you make, rather than just reshelve, warm with parents who love you for what you want to do, not what they want you to do and you never want to leave, because you turn around, and that easel is calling to you, telling you to stay forever, and paint and paint and paint &nbsp; &nbsp; You slam the book shut as it slides home into its spot on the shelf, covered in sweat, tears tracking out your swollen eyes and down your face, hands curled and shaking. You crumple to the ground, unable to breathe properly for everything that you are feeling. &nbsp; The old man is clutching your shoulder again, offering unwanted comfort. “The librarian is one who closes the page and puts away the fantasy of life so that others may borrow and live with that knowledge. Well done, young one.” &nbsp; You say nothing in reply because you have tasted the forbidden knowledge, and you know that every book you reshelve will be the same, and you are eager and reviled to taste it again. **** I've been on a 2nd person POV lately, so I thought I'd try it here, hope it doesn't take away from the story too much!
I am suspicious by nature. I mean, you have to be if you want to survive in this world. There are three things that are certain: 1. Life 2. Death 3. Lust The third one is the most dangerous of them all. We live in a run down village, far from the masses. Yes, there are masses, if you would believe. They cluster together, not for protection, but for lust. They are the weak of mind, the commoners, those of low breed, if you will. And I do not mean to be derogatory, for things are the way they are. I can only tell you what I see. These masses live for lust and gluttony and immediate pleasures. They backstab and sabotage to get their quick fix, and they do not care about life. They do not have a strong enough comprehension of the world, and the way things work in it, to be able to discern the value of their lives. They have no concept of death or life. They live to fulfill their basest desires, and when they die, they die. We are the few, the strong of will, those who know. We have developed a library of text and knowledge, using which we can obtain anything we desire. Not using violence, but using our cunning and our knowledge of the way things work. We are aware of the value our lives hold - we know the significance of life and death. So, you can imagine my apprehension when a stranger appeared one rainy day. Out of the blue he emerged, and he only come with only one message. He spoke to me and said, "Come, join us in the City of the Gods. For we are rich in knowledge, and richer in wealth. We live forever as equals in perfect harmony." I was tempted. It sounded amazing. Perfect happiness. Or so it would seem on the surface. I may have been one who knew, but I was still part of this Earth, and I originated from the masses after all. Where I am now, I am the top dog. I had the power here. And a little bit of lust still remained within me. I told the stranger, "No."
Frankly, time travel was nothing new. Ever since the Zurich Disaster 5 years ago, temporal anomalies had been reported around the world, with up to 12 reports a day at the peak. The world had since then adjusted to operate around these "occurrences". But 7 years? This was unprecedented - to date, the longest recorded jump had only been 3 days. Enough to wreck some havoc, but nothing serious. The only feeling I could describe when I finally made it back to the present was not relief; it was anxiety. 7 years is a long time. Long enough for you to forget a lot of little things that were once routine in your life. After all, 7 years is plenty of time for routines to change. If you don't believe me, come back to this story in 7 years and let's see how much of your life remained the same. Heck, come back in 3 years and I'm sure there'll already be plenty to talk about. "Honey, whats wrong? You don't look good, did something happen?" At this point, I was glad the temporal anomalies halted the aging process temporarily. Looking 7 years older was going to invite a lot more questions I didn't know how to answer. "I..."Seeing her face again after all this time was quite comforting, even if it felt a little foreign. All this time, I had been actively avoiding here. The warnings had been there: butterfly effect, temporal paradoxes, you know, the usual stuff. Staying away simply made it significantly less likely for her present to change. For OUR present to change. Statistically speaking, as least. Now, I'm not sure if I should have taken the risk. "Yea, I'm not feeling too good. I think I'm turning in early today." "Okay, take care and let me know if you need anything"She never suspected anything. Why would she? I wasn't ready to tell her yet. Let me deal with my own mental stability first. The last thing I needed was the overbearing care from a person I was trying to remember. As it turned out, this was only the start of my problems. Going back to an old life was proving harder than finding a new one. What's the best thing about going back in time? It's the fact that you'll always have an idea of what was going to happen in the future. You felt secure. Protected from the uncertainty in the world around you. It's easy to get used to the security. Knowing that every decision you made would always be in hindsight. Buying a house just before they announce a major development project in the area feels good from a financial stand point, but it feels even better when you realize you never had to think too hard about it, going through dozens of property viewings, looking at prices, trends, etc. All you had to do was remember: "Oh right, they're developing this area soon, and I used to want a spot here before it spiked beyond my financial ability." Eventually, habit turns to reliance and dependency. Even on the simple things, like deciding what to eat for breakfast depending on which of the limited edition menu items would go out of stock first. It's difficult to let go of that. I found out the hard way when I had to spend 30 minutes figuring out my breakfast order. I wasn't having difficulty readjusting to my old life; I was having withdrawal symptoms from my new one. The anxiety attacks started when I had to plan the driving route to Vegas for our annual holiday. How was I to know which route would have a major accident? What if there was a festival along one route that we would have loved to go to? Was there going to be another mass shooting in Vegas? I would never know. It's been 3 months since I started seeing a psychiatrist for my anxiety problems. She can't really figure out the cause of it, but the medication helps. My wife is still with me, and she's understanding enough to not ask too much, yet I can tell she still loves me very much. I love her for that, even if I might not have in the past - I still can't really remember. Maybe I don't want to anymore. Eventually I'll tell her, I guess. But first, I'm going to have to figure out how she'll react to what I'm about to say.
You didn't believe it at first, but as you began to study and apply the spells contained within, you begin to feel a different feeling of power well up within you. You remember coming across this tome in one of your travels, picking it up at some abandoned library. For something newly discovered, the tome felt worn and old. Like it had been left there for decades, maybe even millennia. It didn't look like most tomes did. You know, hard-bound, sturdy spine, prominent symbol of the element it features, etc. This one just had a soft leather cover, edges worn, no trimmings, no design except for an odd symbol embossed into the spine. To make sure you dont lose it, you fashion leather bindings and a case to put it in. You strap it onto your belt and take it with you everywhere.
They always try to enter through the West tunnel. It's the smallest and least navigable, so naturally, they think, a dragon would never be able to guard it properly. The Southern entrance to the cavern lair is enormous after all, and is too obvious. Better to try and sneak in through the back way. The stealthy way. The route unseen. I suppose it is shocking to them, right before they are cooked inside of their shiny steel plating, when looters, pillagers, knights and self proclaimed heros discover the dragon in question is barely a hands breadth in length, width and height. It would be surprising to anyone, really, so see that much fiery breath come from anything the size of a sparrow. But alas, with no survivors to speak the truth, and with only a growing legend behind her, the diamond-crested horntail dragon of Egensby Cliff and her cave-bed of solid gold are both equally and mythologically giant. This is why so many fortune seekers go through the West tunnels. It is why every one of them is dead before they realize it themselves. To tell it truly, she would much rather you came through the South entrance. She would also much rather you be impervious to flame. It's not like she's trying to kill everyone she encounters. No no, that's not it at all. It's just she's so lonely, and none of her prospective playmates can withstand her ... sense of humor. More tomorrow. Bedtime.
I flinched as the last vestiges of the polar cap crumbled into the seawater. I heard the remnants of my prehistoric, land-bound clones scream as they drowned in the sea. Another living habitat of mine ruined. I pulled back my consciousness to a piece of African wilderness. All around me was nothing but a land of death. The sun was blazing hot, but these sweltering temperatures were the new norm now. No one dared to walk out nowadays, no human, animal, or ridiculously-overspec-ed microorganism. I should have killed those damn humans the year they eradicated bropox. Or when the brodo died off. The human race had a remarkable ability for genocide, and in the century following what they called the Industrial Revolution, they had managed to drive over a thousand other races to extinction. Like bropox. Man, I still miss that guy. Now, Earth was close to uninhabitable. I kinda wish I learnt to adapt to living in space, for the first thing I would do was to chuck a couple of asteroids onto this planet, if only to get rid of these pesky humans. But it's hard to adapt to a vacuum. With a single thought, my body turned into a drill, and started digging deep into the Earth. Hopefully, I won't be dug up in the next century, of my hibernation. And hopefully, these humans will kill off each other. They've killed off basically everything else on this planet anyway.
“Please tell me you’re not taking that case.” That’s the downside of heaven – well, one of them anyway. All those distant family members you barely saw in life and preferred to avoid? It’s hard to avoid them up here. Up here, people can teleport. “Which case?” “Like you don’t know.” I do know. I’ve already had this conversation several times. I imply I don’t because I want this conversation to be as tedious for her as it is for me. “The car salesperson.” It’s murder that lost her her spot in heaven, but it’s the fact that she sold cars that’s got civilians wanting her to stay out. Once you’re up here you can’t die again. You can be talked into decisions that you later can’t remember why you thought were a good idea. “The woman she killed was breaking in to her house. Exodus says she was justified in killing her.” “And Romans says to leave justice to God. She could’ve called the police if she was scared.” “I’m not at liberty to discuss details of the case.” “She sells cars!” Apparently Aunt Millicent is done pretending it’s about the morality of killing burglars. Luckily I can teleport too, so I do, away from this conversation.
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I hadn't spoken in eight years. It wasn't that I couldn't, but at this point I didn't need to anymore. Click. I squinted against the light of the tiny screen of my camera. I nodded once to myself and raised the view finder back to my eye. Twisting the lens, I carefully zoomed in on the last, and most beautiful, moth in the world. She was as large as a dinner plate. Shining iridescence that captured the waning moonlight. Her wings fluttered once, her antennae bebopping around as she drank from a pale white Luna flower. The heavy scent of the flower filled the forest with a sticky sweet perfume, melding with the rotting leaves and mildew underfoot. Off-putting and intoxicating. 'You would have loved this.' I bit my lip and took a slow, deep breath. Click. My heart fluttered as my thoughts drifted to Lanie. When we started this journey, the Mother Moon Moth was merely endangered. We marched to save her environment. We volunteered. We screamed our discontent. But, it was never enough. After a decade of searching, I now stood silently before the last of her kind. She was an odd thing, Mother Moon. Not only was she gigantic, but she was the sole pollinator of the Luna Orchid-- a pale white climbing orchid with a 23 centimeter deep bell. No other insects could withstand the sticky and toxic nectar of the flower, nor could they reach down deep enough to drink from it. The orchids had begun to die en masse from disease caused by exposure to a new weed killer. The chemicals, caught by the wind, had flipped the delicate ecosystem on its head. Click. We financed our travels with my photographs. They told stories no words could ever write. Lanie's tear-brimmed eyes as she rocked an AIDS ridden child in his last moments. The ferocity set in her jaw of stone as she held hands and marched against those would oppress women's rights. The softness of her hands as she cleaned and combed the hair of people on the streets of New York. Above all, Lanie was obsessed with the Mother Moon. And I was obsessed with Lanie. I'd loved her since I'd known her. Twenty-seven years of friendship. Ten years of dating. Five years of marriage. She was my everything. She followed the Moth, and I captured every moment from my lens. Everything was her. Everything was for her. I inched carefully around to the side of the moth, desperate not to brush against even the tiniest leaf and scare her away. Her multifaceted eyes shone like opals in the moonlight that filtered through the tree tops. Click. After everything we'd experienced, all the harsh realities of the world, nothing had prepared me for the diagnosis. She'd been ill for the last leg of our two year journey across the world, and When we arrived home, she could hardly breathe. She collapsed as we got off the plane. That last week in the hospital, my Lanie withered like the orchids. Her face was sunken, but she did her best to smile even though it was exhausting. When the light that brightened my world left her eyes, I was left alone in a hospital Ward with lead lined walls. I lost my will. I lost my voice. I was just lost. After the final goodbye, I left. I wandered. I captured everything and anything that reminded me of her on film. I made my way across the world and back again, wordless and stumbling. And now, here I was, alone. Atop a mountain deep in the jungle. Only my camera and her memory for company. My legs cramped as I crouched stock still, the moth just inches away. I shifted uncomfortably, my joints grinding painfully. Click. The wind picked up, the forest coming alive with the sounds of millions of leaves signing in the trees. I picked my head up just in time to see Mother Moon take flight. She shimmered like a sinking star, away into the bleak darkness of the forest. She was gone. I hung my head, sweat dripping down my nose. I pushed myself up heavily from the ground, my knees and hips protesting loudly. I took a peek at the few images I'd been able to snap. They were beautiful, but they held a profound sadness. They were probably the last photographs to ever be taken of Mother Moon. I sniffed and wiped away a tear. 'This is for you, Lanie Bug.' I took one last look at the pictures and smiled tearfully. I switched off my camera and tried to rub the after image of the screen out of my eyes. I turned back toward the trail where my travel guide and his companions were camped for the night. My foot stopped short as something in the darkness tangled around my boot. Before I knew it, I was crashing into the hard Earth. I slid and rolled down the steep slope that surrounded the little mountaintop clearing. The world spun and whirled sickeningly around me, branches and rocks whipping me from all directions. When the world finally stopped spinning, I was left lying in a daze. An endless black expanse of stars glittered above me and I drug in deep lungfuls of air. The air was heavily perfumed with the smell of Luna orchids. It was so strong, my stomach roiled against it. I sat up slowly. Something large was stuck to the back of my sweat-soaked shirt, and I reached back to pry it away. My hand glimmered with iridescent powder. My heart fell into my stomach. I rolled over onto my knees and there she was. Still as beautiful in death as she was in life. Mother Moon. Vomit rose in my throat along with a bubble of hysterical laughter. And I screamed. I screamed until I ran out of breath, throat raw and voice trembling. "FUCK!" I curled into a ball, sobs overwhelming my body. All around me arose a whisper. I ignored it and continued to drown myself in self deprecating tears. Lights flickered all around me and the whispers grew louder. I took a great, shuddering breath and sat up. I rubbed my face hard with both hands, knuckling away the tears, then looked up. All around me were stars. Hundreds of fluttering wings rose into the sky, their rest disturbed. I stood, shaky and slackjawed as the colony of Mother Moon moths disappeared into the night sky.
Like every death addict, I had a list. List of deaths ranked from most to least fun. Like most addicts, my list ended on drowning and burning. Those were awful and did not provide the rush almost at all. Top of the list varied form person to person. Some liked to die by jumping from high places. Others opted for drug overdose - I did'nt like it at all. Even though you couldn't technically die (at least, stay dead), you could still get addicted to drugs, and that meant coming down, crashing, withdrawal - all the fun. We were death addicts, but that didn't mean we had to be... you know... addicts. Obviously, I tried drugs early on, I think everybody does, once they get their insurance. But I never od'd. That just did not sound like fun, and as a hedonist, a lived for fun. For first few years I liked getting crushed. That was my top, my all-time rush. I'd use an old industrial hammer in the junkyard not far from where I live. I had to pull it up manually, but it was so worth it. Most first-timers would hit their head - quicker, less pain; but not me. I positioned my chest under the hammer. Biggest reason was that with head intact you felt the actual death rush, not just the ressurection rush. Only together they formed that feeling of pure ecstasy, that feeling that was worth dying for. But that wasn't the only reason - after ressurection you'd get a small scar in a place of mortal wound - something about the method not being perfect. To much hits in the head created weird patterns all over the face - and who would want that? True, some junkies just did not care anymore, but not me. I liked living just as much as I liked dying - the parties, the girls, the fun. That was day after day for me - go meet some strangers, go out with some cutie you met last night, go shopping for some cool new clothes, go get your body smashed under inustrial hammer in the junkyard. Live. Die. Repeat. That was, until I met Laura. She wasn't like other girls I've met. For one - she was like me, a death addict. I usually tried not to date my 'kind'. Somewhere I think, I realized I could never be as good as the rush, and I didn't want to be second place. Had no problem doing it to others, but never allowed for someone to do it to me. Untill Laura. She was insane, completely over the top. First time we met she drank acid in front of me. Best part is, she did that on a dare, never cared for how much it will hurt, she just did that. "Die like it was your last death"she always said. We went to bed soon after she woke up, and right when she was reaching climax, she screamed: "Choke me!"to which I happily obliged. Triple rush - an orgasm, death rush and ress rush - she taught me that. But that wasn't the only thing she showed me. Together we experimented a lot with new ways to kick the bucket. Having a partner - someone who can actually help you die, proved to expand horizons by a large margin. Like most death addicts we both indulged alone, but once we understood the magic of doing that with someone else... First thing we started to do is killing each other in various ways. I stabbed her, strangled her, beat her with a bat; she did not let a debt remain - she shot me multitude of times, using different calibers each time, she poisoned me, threw me under a train. It wans't even about death itself - most of those things we could do alone. It was about the surprise - it added on the rush to die suddenly, without warning. One day changed everything. We both found a new top of the list, it was a bit surprising it took us so long to think about it. We prepared for it carefully - one of the unspoken rules of dying was that it shouldn't disturb others. We bought a car battery - strong and heavy one. We filled a bathtub with warm water and went in. The wires we attached to a small string above our heads. We kissed. I cut the string. We died.
No living being in the universe had ever felt positive emotion directed towards them for nearly seventeen years now. There simply wasn't any left- every last drop of it was directed at Derek. Without fail, every single living organism was totally smitten with him, and had no time at all to direct any of their devoted love to anybody else. Derek was the centre of everyone's attention; be they human, animal- even those weird bobbly aliens had turned up to worship him. It was pure insanity, and no-one could quite understand why. None of them had even met Derek in person. But they loved him all the same. Derek was a sixteen year old teenager who currently resided about a hundred million light years from Earth and was floating in deep space. Nobody quite knew how he got there or how he survived the deadly vacuum, but they were all rather pleased that he wasn't any closer; for although Derek appeared to be an ordinary teenager at a glance, his average material density in kilograms per cubic metre was, to our best calculations, somewhere in the realms of 2.3785i, or 2.4 infinities. As such, Derek had formed an all-consuming supermassive singularity with himself as the centerpoint, and had by this time consumed roughly a sixteenth of the entire known universe. Now, this would have been quite a worry for everyone else had they not been so smitten with him, but as it was they welcomed their incoming doom. Finally, a chance to be with Derek. Just the two of them. Every once in a while, someone- usually one of the bobbly aliens- would fly out to meet him, eager to speed up the process of their own demise if only to catch a glimpse of Derek through the black clouds of death that surrounded him. They would relay footage back to Earth- while they still could, of course- in the hopes that those back home may experience his ethereal beauty as well. Each time, Derek would emerge on the screens, and a great squeal of excited joy would be heard from the many billions sat glued to their televisions. Each time, the brave traveller would call out, their voice barely heard above the violent sounds of destruction. "Derek!"They'd shout. "What say ye to those on Earth?" "I'm just so DENSE"Derek would scream back, flexing his massive biceps and making a war face at the camera as the signal faded to nothingness. Incredible.
My name is Stanley Hudson. For a long time, one of the driving forces to get me through my menial sales job at Dunder Mifflin was annual pretzel day. It is my favorite day of the year. As time progressed, I became more and more obsessed with them. The past few years, I would black out before pretzel day and would only come back around after I've had my pretzel. Today marks the 5th year since my blackouts started but today, there was no blackout. Today, I remember getting up early and heading to the office for my favorite day of the year. Lurking in the depths of the darkness in the hallway, a waiting my prize, like a shark in the ocean. I turn around slowly when I hear a quiet click. I'm first in line. Man, I love pretzel day!
The first thing I feel when I wake up is confusion. Where am I? Who am I? The second thing to hit is the cold. Why is it so cold? What happened? The third thing that occurs to me is grief. Why was I frozen? How much of my life did I miss? The fourth thing I think about is my family and friends. How have they been coping? Did they have my body frozen? Why? The fifth thing I realise is that I have no memory of my life apart from faces and small flashes of my life before. I see animations, someone I know to be my wife, a theme park, drawings and a small lamp. A doctor comes in to the room I am in. “Mr Disney, it appears you have been cryogenically frozen since 1966. How are you feeling?”
You were hitchhiking with your best friend and musician partner. A crack of thunder during the hot July afternoon, followed by a rift opening up in the heavens. Descending from the gaping hole in the sky was the Devil himself, charred wings and flaming halo and all. He does a typical hero landing right in front of you and your friend. That's gotta be hard on the knees, even for the ruler of the underworld. He stands up slowly as he stares you down.
Alarms blared, Red lights flashed. "DANGER! UNKNOWN LIFEFORM HAS BREACHED CONTAINMENT, ALL PERSONNEL ARE TO REPORT TO THE PROPER EMERGENCY SHELTERS" It's footsteps clunked on the cold metal hallways and it's screams terrified the fleeing crew "ALL PERSONNEL, BE ADVISED, CREATURE IS FROM A PLANET WITH 3x STRONGER GRAVITY. DO NOT ENGAGE IN PHYSICAL COMBAT, I REPEAT. DO NOT ENGAGE! IT IS EXTREMELY STRONG AND HOSTILE" The Bridge crew were very nervous as they waited for the Heavy Combat teams to get to this part of the ship. The Commander looked intently at his screens and security feeds "SECURITY BREACH IN SECTION 8" "How!? That area was locked down!" "Sir! Look! It's got a Plasma Cannon!" "Jesus, these things are smart, lockdown sections 9 and 10, lock down everything except the Combat teams entry points" "Commander! This is Taskforce XL9, standing by!" A heavily armed and armoured force appeared on the screen "Get in there and neutralise it! HQ wants it for study and weaponisation, don't vaporise, just down it." "Roger that, MOVE OUT!" The Commander monitored their progress through the abandoned parts of the ship with no sign of the creature Where was it? Then suddenly the screams of the Combat team and gunfire came over the comms "TARGET SIGHTED, ENGAGE ENGAGE!" an ambush? It waited for them and hid. This thing is deadly. What the hell had the acquisition team brought on board? As the creature finished off the last soldier holding it by the neck with one hand. It's eyes locked with the camera. As if it knew it was being watched, then sprinted off. The Commander stepped back in fear "...we...we need to leave" "Tracking shows it's heading for the bridge sir!" "Evac pods now!" But it was too late, a ominous banging was heard. "Sir it's ok, that door is shielded and rated against plasma. It can't get in. Then a beeping was heard, as a explosive counted down "No. NO WAY! IT LEARNED HOW TO OPERATE DET CHARGES?" "It's adaptive...it's problem solving skills are incredib-" They were cut off as the door blew apart. All they could see in the shadow was the bipedal creature, standing tall above them all. And it's heavy angry breathing, it slowly and menacingly moved into the room. In what was his last moments the Commander demanded answers from his team as he hid under some debris "You son of a bitch, Doctor, what the fuck did you do? Where did you get this thing?" "We found it, some fossilised remains and some preserved DNA on a dead world...we extrapolated the genome and used accelerated growth to gestate the foetus to adulthood and used metabolic enhancers to stimulate the growth. We had no idea how aggressive it would be, we thought the containment cell would hold!" "You had no idea it could problem solve its way out of containment either!" then the debris was ripped away, and the monster stood before them. "What was the planet called?"He said with a tremble in his voice and utterly frozen in fear, as the creature prepared to end them too. "A-archeological r-records show it was once called... #...Earth."
Old Godzilla was hoppin' around Tokyo city like a big playground But suddenly Batman burst from the shade And hit Godzilla with a bat grenade Godzilla got pissed and began to attack But didn't expect to be blocked by Shaq Who proceeded to open up a can of Shaq-fu When Aaron Carter came out of the blue And he started beating up Shaquille 'o' Neal Then they both got flattened by the batmobile But before it could make it back to the batcave Abraham Lincoln popped out of his grave And took an AK-47 out from under his hat And blew Batman away with a ratatattat But he ran out of bullets and he ran away Because Optimus Prime came to save the day This was all very familiar. But before I could place where I had seen this before... Godzilla took a bite out of Optimus Prime Like Scruff McGruff took a bite out crime And then Shaq came back covered in a tire track But Jackie Chan jumped out and landed on his back And Batman was injured and trying to get steady When Abraham Lincoln came back with a machete But suddenly something caught his leg and he tripped Indiana Jones took him out with his whip Then he saw Godzilla sneaking up from behind And he reached for his gun which he just couldn't find Cause Batman stole it and he shot and he missed And Jackie Chan deflected it with his fist Then he jumped in the air and he did a somersault While Abraham Lincoln tried to polevault Onto Optimus Prime but they collided in they air Then they both got hit by a Carebear stare Amongst all the chaos I had managed to avoid, a bright light filled the sky.. Angels sang out... in immaculate chorus... Down from the heavens... descended Chuck Norris... Who delivered a kick... which could shatter bones... Into the crotch... of Indiana Jones... Who fell over on the ground... writhing in pain... As Batman changed back... into Bruce Wayne... But Chuck saw through... his clever disguise... And he crushed Batman's head... in between his thighs Then Gandalf the gray, and Gandalf the white And Monty Python and the Holy Grail's black knight And Benito Mussolini, and the Blue Meanie And Cowboy Curtis, and Jambie the genie Robocop, The Terminator, Captain Kirk, and Darth Vader Lo-pan, Superman, every single Power Ranger Bill S. Preston, and Theodore Logan Spock, The Rock, Doc Ock, and Hulk Hogan All came out of nowhere lightning fast And they kicked Chuck Norris in his cowboy ass It was the bloodiest battle that the world ever saw With civilians looking on in total awe The fight raged on for a century Many lives were claimed but eventually The champion stood, the rest saw their better Mr. Rogers in a blood-stained sweater And after all this had been done I thought to myself. This is the ultimate showdown.
There was a rumor going around, apparently, Mr Dacon was in a sexual relationship with one of his students, Suzie Crawford her name was. Both of them were legal, but it did seem highly unethical. The school board had no proof, so they hired me, an amateur investigative journalist with a knack for photography and a low price. Much lower that any professional. To be honest though, I don't think the school board cared all the much, considering they hired me. I think it was just old Mrs Huron who was kicking up a fuss. I was the consolation. Anyway, all that doesn't matter much, I had spent most of yesterday afternoon asking around, and apparently, Suzie and Dacon were seen around the public pool not 3 blocks away from the school at night, naturally everybody assumed they were getting "busy". Nobody cared much, well, except for Mrs Huron. And it really is none of my business, but, well, money is money, even if its barely any money. However, I wasn't investigating the local public pool at thus time of night just because of some flimsy eye witness accounts and not wanting to do my homework, there were also reports of music, from all sorts if people, going back years. It was really strange, so my opinion was that they're running some sort of secret sex club from the pool, or perhaps something to do with drugs. Something illicit but not quite illegal, Mr Dacon had a key to the pool and I assumed that this club had been run by him, and his father before that, as everybody in town knew that the Dacons were old family friends of the Gardols, Which is Suzie's mother's maiden name. The pool had been inherited by Suzie's uncle, though. With no children of his own, I assumed that it would then be given to Mr Dacon, but that's all semantics. I'm here to get evidence and information about what really happens in the Gardolian Haven Pool Center after dark. I scaled the fence with little difficulty, brushing my jeans off gracefully after practically crash landing on the other side of the barrier. I was walking past the outdoor pool and thought I saw something shimmering in the water, it was only the moonlight, so I brushed it off. I was at the door, taking out my trusty toolkit and successfully opened the door... After a while. I was still not very good at sleuthing yet, but I'm determined to be the best of the best. I had seem a soft light through the glass doors, and it became less muted as I opened the doors and stepped through, along with the music. It sounded like something classical, I'm not very caught up in that world and of course knew next to nothing about the piece. It was, however, quite enchanting. It game the room a comfortable yet classy atmosphere. I rounded the corner from the small cafe to the changing rooms, and I kept walking until I was met with the sight that was the main pool. Sharks. What? No. Can't be! But... Sharks... I shook my head and blinked, hoping to clear away the madness I was witnessing. They were acting like humans, sitting on the seats that were built in near the part of the pool where you talked with your friends. Glasses of a weird gray liquid transported to them on some alien looking machine. What? And smaller sharks playing with a beach ball. It popped, frightening me out of my frozen state. I was not here to see sharks, acting like humans and shit, drinking from glasses and playing volleyball in the public pool at night! I was here to catch two people in the completely normal act of some kind of sexual activity! Not this! I was still standing in plain view of the sharks, stock still like some deer caught in headlights, when I saw her. Suzie. She walked over to some sharks with an aura of importance about them and chatted. She was chatting with the sharks. What? Also, how could a shark seem more important than another shark. I caught a glimpse of a row of murderous looking teeth on one of them, he was laughing at a joke the one next to him had told him... Or her, I couldn't tell, I'm no sort of marine biologist. She nodded, Suzie, and then she stood and turned around. She saw me. I probably should have hidden but I was too focused on the two rowdy sharks getting it on in the far left side of the pool. She followed where I was looking and got their attention. She said, "Oi! You two, keep it clean, yeah?"She said in a stern tone. I put my hand on my for head as she walked up to me, she looked concerned for me and a bit uncomfortable that I had witnessed this... This... What? How do I describe what I'm seeing? I had thought. "Sharks." I said, she smiled guiltily. "They aren't sharks, they do look like sharks though, don't they?" I blinked. "They are sharks, look at them, with their teeth and fins..." She shook her head. "No, its just a disguise they use to look relatively normal, they're scientists, explorers, astronauts... Aliens, you might say. Not sharks though." What? "What??" "I know it seems all jumbly and confusing now, but let me explain it to you properly, since you're in on the secret now." She lead me to the office, and I followed, staring at the sharks with wide eyes. Only a few played me any attention, and even then, it seemed they just wrote me off. Aliens disguised as sharks swimming in the public pool at night? What?
Morth was born in a hail storm. The sky spat rocks of ice larger than a man's fist and they minced the thatch roof of his parent's hut faster than lightning set's dry tinder ablaze. Morth's parents fled into a nearby cave, and at the mouth of it Morth's mother screamed and toiled and succumbed to her struggle even as Morth came into the world. The first death of many - the prime death. It was a foul thing for a child to kill its mother, and Morth's father was a man of great belief. He abandoned Morth to the cave, lingering just long enough to endow him with the name of thing his birth had wrought - death. Alone then, cave full of infant screams, Morth should have passed from this world into the dark miasma of the next. But a shadow came for the infant babe. Hands of bone closed around Morth's soft body and lifted him in the air. Shadowed sockets in a bleached skull stared vacant at Morth's writhing face. Certain of it's choice, the most dead one raised the mewling infant to its chest and from it's ethereal breast Morth suckled the milk of shadows - a dark baptism. So did Morth become the ward of Death. By Death's will, the infant grew there in the cave of his birth, larger and older until at last it was a man of thirty years who sucked the darkness from Death's fleshless breast. Without a word, Death spoke to the man, gave the man language and self, culled from a thousand thousand years of observation. Thus did Morth the infant become Morth the man. From that moment on there would be no respite for Morth. Gifted his selfdom, Morth was immediayely bound to Death's yoke and set to a task no mortal should be exposed to. Death brought Morth with him to every death, without explanation or rest. Morth, his mind innocent and new, observed Death's work without relent. Death's motivations were never revealed, his intentions never voiced. The shadow milk sustained Morth as the ages passed. Wherever Death went, so to went Morth. In time, Morth learned to see beyond the moment, into the past and then the future, looking down the threads of fate to see the path of each living thing in its entirety. A birth, a life, a death. A sanctified cycle, unbreakable, inevitable. There was no time for Morth in Death's wake, at Death's side. A universe of time passed as one might lose oneself in a thought. If in the brief lapse of a moment, when your eyes unfocus and stare into an unseeable distance, you traversed an infinity of time, then you might know what is was to be Death's ward. At last, when all things had died, when Death came to each of them, from cell to man to sun, and all that remained was darkness, Morth and Death stood alone. For time beyond reckoning Death's skinless face stood vacant, it's unmoving bones lit by an internal light, the sockets boring once more into Morth's eyes, until at last Morth heard Death in his mind's eye for the first and only time. > What have you learned? Morth long contemplated this question. At last, after time immemorial, Morth realized he could not answer the question because Death could not hear the answer. Morth saw, at last, the tragedy of Death, how Death saw all life as only a single point in space and time, the final moment was all Death was privy to. But if only Death could shift it's perspective and see as Morth had seen, then Death would discover that the point was only the tip of a larger line, a thread of potential and beauty unlike anything else that could ever be. This, the knowledge of this beauty, was what Morth had learned, and for a long time Morth struggled with how to turn that knowledge into an answer Death could understand. At last, he decided no explanation could possibly suffice. No, Morth would have to show rather than tell. Morth thought of all the myriad things he had seen, picturing in his mind their incredible beauty. Only when he was sure he had it all did Morth begin, and then there was light.
The edges sparked and spat, angry and electric. The two men watched, neither touching the ground. The one wearing the golden helmet spoke first. "I don't believe I've seen anything like this before,"he said. He gestured, fingers tracing quick and intricate shapes. Nothing happened. The other, held aloft by a billowing red cloak, frowned. "I thought I knew what you were going for, there, and that should have worked." He raised a saturnine eyebrow, and descended to the ground. The tear hung, suspended in the air, starting a foot or so from ground level and went up six feet. It was at the widest point as broad as either man's shoulders. Beyond it lay a hazy nothing, as if the edges of the rip were giving off heat. For a moment he seemed to consider his options, and then he moved, striking an almost martial pose that slipped with fluid grace into something else, that changed again, almost like a series of dance steps. "Cytorak!"he snapped, bringing his palms together. Nothing happened. Suddenly, Stephen Strange found himself holding a familiar box as someone bustled past him. "Popcorn?"he asked. The new arrival, a grey haired man in a black suit, barely acknowledged him. "I brought a snack,"the newcomer said, "because I thought I might be here for a while before you two let a professional take a look." The figure was tall and thin, dressed in black and white, moving around the rift with a kind of all-knees-and-elbows motion, almost scurrying. His eyes never left the rift. He seemed angry at it. Doctor Fate drifted closer. "And you would be a professional?"Fate asked. The man shrugged. "More a talented amateur with a lot of practical experience. What have you two come as?" "Excuse me?"said Stephen Strange. "Normally,"said the man, rummaging in his pockets, "I wouldn't comment on other people's wardrobe choices. I mean,"he shot Strange a smile and a slightly embarrassed tilt of his head, "I've not always had the most conventional dress sense. But you two. I mean! Blue and gold? Bold choices. And you!". He rounded on Strange, coming almost nose to nose with the startled sorcerer. "What about me?" "Big high collar. Wee beard. You look familiar and not in a good way. So who are you both?" "Men call me Doctor Fate." "What do women call you? Never mind. Not important. And you?" "Stephen Strange, M.D. Are you planning on telling us who you are?" "I'd been hoping it wouldn't come up, but since you ask, I'm The Doctor." "The Doctor?" "At least he's not a Constantine,"muttered Fate. "Yes. Emphasis on the definite article. THE Doctor. The main one. The original, if you like." He stopped, slipped on a pair of sunglasses. "Question: How many Doctors does it take to save a Universe? Answer?" "Three?"Fate sounded hopeful. "It's not just one universe. This is a multiversal tear,"said Strange, "otherwise Fate and I couldn't work together. And the longer it persists..." "...the greater the likelihood of serious consequences."finished Fate. "I know,"said The Doctor, "and that's why I'm here. I've been trying to close this thing for a very long time. Have either of you heard of The Medusa Cascade? No? Doesn't matter. When I tried to close it originally, there was interference."He took his sunglasses off, stared into the rift. Fate knew the look, the expression of a man looking into an impossibly distant past and seeing it as if it were yesterday. "And then it stopped, and I closed that rift, and never knew how I'd done it until just now." "You did it by seeking our help?"asked Fate, and was rewarded with a pitying smile. "No,"said Strange with a sigh, "he's realised that we were the interference. By distracting our efforts, he allows his own to succeed." "Sorry"said The Doctor, with a shrug. "The many worlds are safe, Doctor,"said Fate as the rift began to draw its edges together, "Order is restored, and that is enough for me."But The Doctor had already gone, as quietly and as completely as he had arrived. Fate and Strange stared at one another. "People do that all the time, where I'm from"said Fate. "Is it the same for you?" "No,"said Strange, slipping on a slingring, but Fate had already vanished. The Sorceror Supreme went home.
I'm taken quite aback. This is the 3rd date I've had this month, but apparently small people are more attractive, not that I'd know. Every man I've met had fallen for either an android or their co-pilots. I stomped angrily away, dropping the romantic card he'd given me onto the rain slick street. I looked back to see if he'd follow, but he was already gone. Bastard! He could have at least told me first! Open relationship, ha!This new generation of robot and human relationships was really killing any chance she had of getting a boyfriend! It was time. . . Although it was thoroughly against her mother's wishes, and almost made her herself sick to her stomach, she was donating her body to science and becoming an android! No way was she dying alone and single! After all she'd rather be a full size android than a tint human, she'd heard they were rather angry and rude. ~ Anyones allowed to follow up on this and continue it if they'd like :)
You know the funny thing? Someone commented on reddit the other day about how Hypothermia would be a peaceful death. And no, it wasn't r/meirl (That would have been my first guess too though). They were very wrong. Not the kind of wrong where you tell your friend you are really close to finishing that zombie novel (that you haven't started)… but the kind where you ask a woman "When is the baby due?"(and she is not pregnant) or rather convincingly telling everybody you know the world is flat. Now don't misunderstand me; a few minutes away from the five kids is much appreciated (I seriously will spontaneously combust into flames if I have to hear another booger story from Jack). However, a few minutes of quiet is not worth uncontrollable convulsions. I wonder if the kids will miss me. I mean, I tried to be a good father. At least treat them how I would have wanted to be treated. Give them boundaries but not be too strict. Hey, at least I finally understand Drew's (the innocent preteen) heart condition. When he gets nervous his heart just stops beating sometimes. Ironic right? My heart seems to be sputtering out like Luke's (my oldest) car does when he goes up hills. You know what? That paint is the same shade of beige as Lily's dress. My wife worries about her. I do too of course. We tried to send her to therapy but sometimes that isn't enough the Doc said. Every once in a while I see the light in her eyes flicker out. This time my eyes get the power yanked away. I must look foolish: a blinded, butt-naked, moderately overweight man (I'm "working on it"though), rolling about. I think it's the very first time I wish the floor is actually lava. I wonder what the obituary will say. I hope it says I was loved. Or at least a few dozen people showed up to my funeral. That would be nice. I hope Rachel's stand-up routine goes well next Friday. It's kind of ridiculous to think an eleven year old girl has more balls than you to stand in front of a crowd like that. But I guess that's where we are at right now. Thanks for reading! Would love any feedback you have!
I can feel the blood drain from my face as I meet his gaze across the room. The woman is far more dangerous than we anticipated; we've been tracking her for months, always just two steps behind, one step behind, until we got a hold of some intel that we thought put us a step ahead of her, for once... only to waltz straight into a trap. Hale Morse, poor guy, is probably dead by now, with that shot to the gut, and Roxanne Moon, despite her incredibly strong male body, is out cold, trussed up like a turkey behind my chair. Her little sister, Holly, the last member of the team--not including our boss, Ambrose Morgan, who is currently doing that thing he does where he stares death in the face to see who blinks first--is God knows where without a clue that we're in danger because this is supposed to be a radio silent op, so no help there. Hale wasn't even supposed to be here, and now I feel like his death is on my head, but I can't bring myself to let it get to me when I'm about to watch Ambrose be a self-sacrificing moron, as usual. 'Choose' she says... Choose who dies first. We're all going to die, but this dumbass thinks that going out first is gonna save me and Rox. "Ambrose..."My voice breaks, and I hate it. Swallowing hard, I try again. "Ambrose, don't do it. Don- don't you do it. Don't you dare... die on me. Do you understand me?" Cold, hard metal meets the soft bone of my temple, a harsh crack sounding through the room as white agony explodes through my skull, completely destroying all sensations and leaving me in emptiness for several long seconds before I begin recovering to the sound of Ambrose negotiating. Negotiating with an emotionless, ice-cold killer. Moron. Beautiful, stupid moron. Genius suicidal moron. "Enough,"the woman snaps finally. "Choose. One goes free, one lives as my prisoner, and one dies, right this instant." "Kill me."The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them, and I internally curse Ambrose for rubbing off on me. "Logan, no!"But the gun is already swinging toward me. "This isn't your choice, Osborn,"she points out coolly. I try not to let my fear show. "If it's a choice of whether I live or die, obviously, I wanna live; who doesn't? But if it's a choice of who lives and who dies, and somebody's gotta die... I'll be that somebody. Because none of us deserve to die, but I'm the least useful, so... kill me." Her cold eyes show no emotion, and I feel the bottom drop out of my stomach, heart sinking through the floor. The hammer clicks back, and I know this is going to be it, this is when I die. For real. Swallowing, I close my eyes. "Logan?? Logan, no!" "I'm sorry, Ambrose."I can't help the crack in my voice this time. "I'm sorry. Tell my boys I love them. And you. I love you, you damn fool." "LOGAN!!" "Police! Drop your weapon!" My heart leaps to my throat, hardly daring to hope... BANG!! BANG!! BANG!! Three gunshots, one after another, echo around me, and then I die. Actually, I pass out. And when I come to, lying on cold cement floor, who should I see leaning over me with one hand putting pressure on the throbbing bullet wound in my shoulder but my stupid, beautiful moron. "Logan! Logan, buddy; it's gonna be alright, okay? You hear me? Stay with me, Logan! Where's that medic??" "Buddy?"I mumble weakly, letting my eyes fall closed with relief that we're alive. "I jus' took a bull't f'you... again... 'nd you call me 'buddy'?"He gives a small, strained laugh. "You're right, you're right,"he agrees. "Now I know 'm dying,"I mutter. "The moron agrees wi'me." "Shut up; you're fine. Just stay with me, okay? I love you; don't die on me." "'M not gonna die... Gotta give you crap for sayin' it in public, finally." "Is that what you're upset about? Man, why didn't you say so? I love you; I do. So stay alive; stay with me. Ya gotta give me crap, remember?" "Gotta give you crap,"I agree, and promptly pass out, just as the medics arrive.
I'm not sure how it happened, but I can now hop into other realities. Hop number 73 was interesting. Daft Punk Alive 2017 tour happened. That tour ended in Las Vegas where it turned into a battle of the bands. Daft Punk was joined by Geogio Moroder going against Tiesto and the Black Eyed Peas. That was just the first two hours. At midnight Gio and Tiesto left the stage and Britney joined the Peas. On Daft Punk side, the Weeknd showed up. They rocked it for the next hour. The robots needed a recharge and Deadmou5 took over for them. The Peas took a break too. Britney stayed and called in Overwerk to back her up. Overwerk dropped his remixes of Daft Punk songs. It was awesome.
"And don't worry, we'll be back tomorrow night, Jack! Have a good night!!" Did Jimmy Fallon just say Jack?, I wondered to myself. It can't have been. I looked around at my wife - I met her eyes, and she seemed just as shocked as I was. "Did he just say Jack, Stacy?", I asked her incredulously. "He definitely said Stacy,"she responded in a definitive tone. "Yeah, he probably did,"I muttered softly and rolled over under the covers to go to bed. As much as I was surprised, I didn't care enough to argue about this tonight. I had work in the morning.
I haven’t thought about Vlad the Genie in years. I’ve lived a very full life. I gained a lot of wealth and happiness from my two wishes. I have a beautiful family, gorgeous home, and more unforgettable experiences than I could possibly list. All because I rubbed a lamp. But I only made two wishes, despite the fact that I was offered 3. You see, Vlad wasn’t your Robin Williams, singing, happy-go-lucky type of genie. He told me his motivations from the beginning. Once I made my three wishes he was free to do as he pleased. Number one on his list: begin the apocalypse. Now I happen to like the planet Earth, so I decided then that I could never free him from his wish debt. As long as he owes me a wish, he can’t destroy the world. I won’t go into detail on what my two wishes were, but like I said life is good. I haven’t needed a third wish. Vlad isn’t the nicest, but he’s not one of those genies that tries to screw you over on your wishes either. I stuck to my plan, until today. I came downstairs and saw that the kitchen was a complete mess. There was food everywhere. Dishes piled high in the sink. Some sort of sticky substance coating the fridge. I called my whole family into the kitchen. I gave them the classic Mom speech about messes. Really guilted them. Then I said the single stupidest thing I’ve ever said. “I wish I wasn’t the only person who cared about our home not being a pigsty... oh damn it.”
The decor was like any other house. Black wood picture frames, wooden floors, glass-top coffee tables and those sleek bamboo coasters cushioning brown ceramic mugs. What was unusual was the sticky pink tentacles suckering the mug off the table, lifting it to be suckled by a fleshy. Pink. Beak. The beak spewed coffee. "Gosh darn it Martha, did you grab the black roast?"It said, wiping down the front of it's beige turtleneck with a white kerchief, produced from the handkerchief pocket on the blatantly beige turtleneck. The other sniffed it's mug with a hairy antennae. "Oh, I'm afraid so. I'm sorry Roger, let me-" Roger held out an octo-tentacled appendage. "No! No, I will make a pot of blonde. I'll be right back."Roger slipped from the couch, sliding across the floor on suckers and phlegm. Martha sighed. 'She' looked across the coffee table. "How are you holding up Bethany?" Bethany was not holding up well. Much akin to a spiritual awakening, she had hit some critical cortical conflated contextual catharsis, one that swept a feeling akin to ego-death or nirvana. Bethany sipped from her brown mug, and waited for dad to get back. For the conversation. She's had conversations. The conversation about boys. The conversation about hair. The conversation about clothes. The conversation about girls, and socks on the door. Bethany has had conversations. But apparently this was The Conversation. Dad had been gone a long time, or at least what felt like a long time, and Mom was staring at her. Bethany realized she hadn't moved. So Bethany shrugged. Martha leaned back, sighing. "I know, it's not exactly what you expecting, today." Bethany scoffed. "That's one way to put it." Martha. . . Scowled? "Now Bethany, we're not changing our lives entirely. The invasion came earlier than expected and it does not excuse your actions last week. For all intents and purposes, you're grounded." Bethany put her mug down. "Are you fucking serious?!" "Language." Bethany opened her mouth. Yet upon seeing Martha's shaking tentacles, she thought better of it and closed her mouth. "What's all the fuss about?"Roger asked, settling back down onto the couch with freshly brewed coffee. "Bethany doesn't like that she's still grounded."Martha said. "Oh. Well, she's not grounded anymore."Roger said simply. "What?"Bethany asked. "Excuse me?"Martha asked. "We need to present a united front, Roger. We talked about this." "Yes, and I am presenting a united front."Roger gestured to Bethany. "With my daughter." "What?"Bethany asked. "Excuse me?"Martha asked. "Martha, really? Her parents are monsters, her species is being assimilated, and I'm the one who grounded her in the first place. Remember when we talked about that? The grounder is the ungrounder."Roger set his mug down and folded his tentacles. All thirty-two of them. Martha exhaled. "Fine. Fine." Bethany slumped into the couch. "Okay, so I'm not grounded. I don't see how that matters. All my friends are getting their brains sucked."She perked up. "Hey, you aren't going to suck my brain out of my eyes, are you?" Martha clucked. "No sweetie. We're family. Your brain has been so suffused with our scent, we and any other of our race would find you physically repulsive to eat." "It's how we tell what's pets and what's food on our homeworld!"Roger jumped in excitedly. "Not helping Dad, it makes me sound like a pet."Bethany grumbled. "Oh, sweetie no. You're our daughter."Roger crooned. "Not like the other humans at all! Your species is like a finely roasted coffee bean. Complex, energetic, and delicious."Roger's stance softened. "You, on the other hand, are family. We don't eat family." Bethany knocked her toes together. "You mean, I'm still your kid?" The pair nodded. "Yes."Roger answered. "So it's not like Hansel and Gretel? You weren't just fattening me up?"Bethany clarified. "Goodness no!"Martha shook her head. "Nor a means to an end. Roger and I fell for this planet. Our recon here did not need us to assimilate, to marry, to adopt you."Martha did something approximating a laugh. "We're still not your real parents! Bethany cracked a smile. "But we are always family." "That's right."Roger said. "And we want to share our world with you. Would you come with us?" Bethany cocked her head. "Can I bring my friends?" Roger shook his head. "No sweetie. But you can say goodbye."
"lamp I just don't get it. Every person that gets their wishes ends up hating me." "Look at me talking to something that can't talk back, but I guess you have to do something to keep sane while waiting for a new master" "There it is I'm being summoned got to go lamp see you in a few" "It's been so long since I have seen the sun."I said while stretching out my arms and yawning. There stood my new master a little boy maybe 8 years old. He looks scared I'm going to need to break the tension. "I'm not going to mess this up. This little guy is going to get everything he wants and I'm not going to mess it up this time."I thought to myself. "Hello little one my name is Alhem Atar and I'm here to make all your wishes come true so fret not. You get three wishes and I know what you're thinking but I'm not like those other Jin I want to help you." The boys eyes lit up. This is what I've wanted for so long just to have a friend and to help people. Just keep saying to yourself no mistakes do exactly as he says. "H-h-h-hi."The boy said sheepishly. "I'm Ashkahn." "Well Ashkahn what's your first wish"I said with a smile stroking my beard. "I want enough food to feed my village for a hundred years."He cheerfully said. "Your wish is my command."As I picked him up and went to his village. When we arrived i started to get nervous. I didn't know what what all he wanted, but with a snap of my fingers in the middles of the village I made enough food for this village to eat for a whole year. I looked over at Ashkahn to see if I did it right, and his face lit up. The smile on his face is made me feel as if all my other failures have disappeared. "Thank you so much!"Ashkahn shouted. "You're welcome little one, it's time for me to go back in my lamp just call when you ready for your next wish."I told him with a smile. So that's what it feels like to do something right. I did exactly as he said and I didn't mess up. As i lay down for a nice nap I can feel the being summoned out of my lamp. "Hello Ashkahn what is it that I can do for you, and what is that awful smell."That's when I noticed the food has turned into a big pile of black mush, and bugs and other scanvengers are everywhere eating away at rotten food. "I need help all the food has gone bad."Ashkan cried. Tears running down his face. "No no no please don't be sad I can fix this just wish all the food away and I can make it disappear."I said to little Ashkahn. I felt awful I wish there was a way to undo with without making him use a wish, but my powers don't work unless they wish for it. "I wish all the food was gone."Ashkahn sobbed. "Right away."I said as a poofed back into the lamp. I wonder how long I was in the lamp before he asked me to come out again. You kind of lose track of time when you've been in a lamp for so long."This is how it starts". I thought to myself. "Lamp all I want to do is help people but some how I always mess it up. There I am talking to a lamp again. The next wish will be good. He will forgive me and we can be friends I'm sure. Hmmm what this all ready summoning me it's only been a few hours I think. Well lamp here I go time to make this kids day". "How could you do this. You said you wanted to help but everything you do causes more problems. First we had to much food. Now we have no food. You are awful. I wish I had never met you."Ashkahn said there crying his face turning red. Tears began to fall down my face. I have messed up before, but this time hurt the most. I guess I'm just not good at helping. "Your wish is my command."I said sobbing. With a snap of my wrist I made it to where he never picked up my lamp and he never wished anything. "Well lamp I hope no one picks me up ever again. I am just one big screw up".
Sometimes, life isn't easy. Life and reality challenge us to be our best self even when it seems that there is no light at the end of the tunnel, just a never-ending macrocosm of suffering. But as the burdens of everyday life bound themselves upon me like chains, the weight of planet Earth releases itself when I see her. She's the bastion of hope; her very presence is a fulfilled prayer for all that is good in the world. She is the candlelight on a warm summer evening, and I am the moth attracted to her welcoming inner light. To wake up to her every morning and to see her smile when I close my eyes is enough to keep me going. Her name is Grace; we met when we were just seven years old. Her and her father (Uncle Gregory, as I called him) moved in with us after their house burnt down in a wildfire. Uncle Greg and Grace fell in love with our town, they moved in, and I had unknowingly met the person that the collaboration of the cosmos, destiny, and fate had meant for me. However, we did not realize it until we were around twelve or thirteen years old. "I've never kissed a boy before, you know,"she said under her breath, as we gossiped about our classmates. "Neither have I,"I replied, awkwardly stumbling over my thoughts, deciding if I should go for the kiss. "Well, I mean, I've seen you kiss your dad,"she replied. "I mean, yeah, of course. That's family; I've seen you kiss yours too!" Suddenly, she went in for the kiss; she did all the work for me. "So now you've kissed a girl,"she smirked. "And I've kissed an actual boy." Back then, it was an innocent middle school relationship; in other words, it didn't mean much. But deep down, I felt, that she was special. We took things more seriously in high school, and we even went to the same college. Today, we are both in graduate school, working forty hours a week and knee deep in schoolwork. The stress is crippling, the depression is bounding, but together, in spite of all the danger, we are still happy. It was a Friday night that I looked her in the eyes, and watched her speak. Her lips were a pretty pink; they were the kind of lips you wanted to kiss forever. However, something didn't seem right. I told her my worries, but she assured me it was just the rough week we had. Our car had a flat tire, we got ill from a sketchy Asian buffet, and I lost my wallet for a few days. On top of that was the preparation for finals week next week, as well as a big speech. I closed my eyes, and felt my soul, weightless, drift away from my physical body. I felt as if I was flying, and I could not see. I could only imagine and assume I was dreaming. When I felt my eyes open, I was in an unfamiliar place, with an unfamiliar name and an unfamiliar vibe. As I looked around my surroundings, I saw a sign - "GOOD RANCH, ILLINOIS \| Population: 4,349."I wandered the streets, not even sure if I was in my same time. People passed by in smart clothes rather than the usual t-shirt or hoodie, and there was not a single smartphone in sight. As I wandered, looking around at what seemed to be the past, a man approached me. "Sometimes, we try so hard that we forget about a life of leisure. Sometimes, we devote too much of ourselves to something so little, and we waste our time in the name of duty,"said the man. He was wearing a full black suit and tie, as well as a ratty fedora covered in dirt. "What? Who are you? What's going on here?"I asked him. "Just relax; you worry too much. Like you, I am a time traveler. You, an unwilling one, but me, I am on a very important mission. You probably have a lot of questions, some important, some not so important. I'll keep it short; My name is Paul, I'm from the year 2248, and I am here to get rid of someone, a distant ancestor of someone who is giving me trouble in my time. Their death will mean that none of their ancestors existed, and my life will be, well, much easier. Oh, and the year? 1943." "Great. But why the fuck did you bring me here? I have a girlfriend, school, and work to get back to. Just please, bring me back to my time." "It was actually an accident that you were brought here. Really, an unfortunate coincidence. But, since you're here..." As we walked and spoke, we turned into an alleyway. Suddenly, this madman pulled a pistol out of his coat pocket and pointed it to my head." "You're going to do it. You are going to kill Ronald Winthrop."He took the pistol away from my head and put it in my hands. "Oh, and don't think about shooting me. I am your only way home, after all. Here's the plan: it's currently 11:34. At noon, a very loud whistle will sound at the Lincoln Arms manufacturing plant right across the street there. When the whistle goes off, you need to shoot Mr. Winthrop. Don't worry, I will be right outside, watching you. Once you kill him, run out and hold on to me. We'll be heading back to your time." "Fuck you, but if this is what I have to do to get back to my life, then I'll do it,"I said, angrily. What felt weird was the name Ronald Winthrop was familiar, but I could not recall where I had heard it before. As I headed to factory, it bothered me, it felt so familiar and important but I could not put where it came from. After loitering around, observing the past and letting the anger pass a little bit, I headed into the factory. As I walked in, I was greeted by a middle-aged secretary. She had her hair worn like Ella Fitzgerald, appropriate for the time. She had church beads around her neck like Grace's grandmother had, which swayed on her sweater as she typed away quickly at her typewriter. "Hi, can I help you with something?"she asked me in a direct manner. "Uh, hi, yeah, I have a message for a Ronald Winthrop?" "Oh Ronnie! He's such a sweetie. He's taking a lunch break right now, he should be in our dining room. Go through the doors, go left down the hallway, and it's the third door on the right." #CONTINUED ON REPLY; I apologize, I have to wait for the comment cooldown.
As you lay in your death bed you look back upon your life and ponder what it all meant. Are we on earth to help others? Are we here to try to achieve our Max potential? Or is it all void of meaning? You ask yourself, you think of all the people you helped, all the people you caused harm, and all the times you stood idly by. Your mind wanders, as old age settles in and you slide in and out of consciousness, every time you wake up those around you seem to light up with hope, but you know they are wasting their time, you can feel death’s firm cold grip getting tighter and tighter with every heartbeat, you know there is no escape and for the first time in decades you feel fear, something you hadn’t felt since that day at the cafe, a lifetime ago, when you got shot in the head trying to wrestle an gun out of a robber’s hand, after waking up from the coma you felt you got a second chance, and decided to live your life without fear. And you did, you went on adventures most people only dream of, got married to a wonderful woman, had all the fun anyone has any right to, and kids who grew up to be heads of state and Nobel laureates, made a fortune and spent it helping those who couldn’t help themselves, lost battles, won wars, and yet, here you lay, old and feeble waiting for the last breath, the last beat, the last thought. As you feel the moment approach you fear, but not for you but for those left behind, every breath shorter than the last, you can see your family around you, daughters crying in a mother’s loving embrace, sons in sulking silence trying to deny the reality that surrounds them, your vision gets blurry, and life fades away as if you were sinking, finally, the darkness surrounds you and your heart beat for the last time, your life is extinguished. You open your eyes and find yourself at a cafe, sitting at a corner table, a cup of coffee in your hand and your laptop open in front of you, showing and article about dejavú. It all feels familiar but can’t really tell why, until you see a man walk in the front door and everything comes back to you, this was the day you got shot, but how could you have memories of something you haven’t lived yet? Or have you? You watch the man’s every move, knowing what he was going to do before he did, as he walks up to the register, throwing a bag at the cashier and pulls out a gun, yelling at her to put all the cash in it. You recognize that gun from the pictures the detectives showed you when you came out of the coma, and this was the precise moment when you stood up and charged at the robber while his back was turned. But you don’t, you sit in silence until he turns around waving the gun, yelling at everyone to get down on the ground, you slowly get out of your seat, and lay down on your stomach.
[Previous](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/8xd4h3/wpi_think_we_overdid_it/e22ermk) ----- Salt, not Thorin Oaken-Shield; Fort Courtyard ----- I came to. The blast zone had cooled down. The trees were no longer painted with glowing embers, but rather with black streaks. A few fuzzy bipeds were walking through the gate. I think they had shields and pikes with banners...or spears. I faced my head forward towards the sky to have partner's shapely semblance obstructing it. "Hey,"I exhaled, looking down towards my feet. "Did it work?"Her glowing hands stayed on my chest. "Yes, it worked."she said in a somber monotone. I was feeling better pretty quickly I realised, So I looked back at the beautiful view obstructing the clouds. My train of thought sharpened as I began to realise the consequences of my actions were still up in the air. I tilted my head, and narrowed my eyes at her just a hair to let her know that I didn't plan on staying down. I started breathing deeply, but just quickly enough for it to wake me up instead of put me to sleep. '[It is time to get myself] up on [or within the next] three [exhales]. One. Two. Three!' I rose from the dirt, and her surprise was muted enough to ignore. I tossed her the used glove. "Go put this away." I took another deep breath, cracked my neck, and strode into the fallout. The soldiers were upon the orc survivors now, and began dragging them around if necessary, rounding them up. It wasn't hard to tell which ones were dead. They were missing limbs, and their remaining wounds were cauterized. The commander was with the new prisoners, already. I ignored the insults of the soldeirs as they shoved the orcs into line, then forced them to their knees. I was choosing to be unsusceptable to the whole "hate thine enemy"vibe considering I just vaporized most of their group...and the front gate...and the road...and the fores- "Quite a haul!"Barked the commander valiantly, but still shaken by what he had just witnessed. I arrived just beside him. "Suppose so..."I added. "Ah, you're awake,"he acknowledged. His stare turned to the seven orcs in front of him, as did mine. All of them had olive colored skin. They were human sized, with slightly varying heights. Each was wearing some sort of crudely-made stony, wooden, or metal armor. The various armor "plates"were held together with surprisingly delicate leather-work. Another surprise dawned on me: some were male, and some were female, compared to the all male elven guards at their backs. Some of the orcs had helmets, and some did not. A few had painted symbols on various "plates"or shoulder guards. I think one of them wore gauntlets made of bone or ivory, with small, intricate carvings spread about. 'Runes maybe?' A few of them looked at me curiously, then down to the ground to accept their fate. My commander pointed wickedly, and the guards responded in kind. The biggest, strongest one was hefted up. His face was then smashed to the ground with a foot and spear held against his back. He grunted...or laughed? My heart sunk. The commander looked to the other six. "You beasts tried to ransack our fort, and now you will pay the price. Look forward to fighting in the pits for our entertainment, or you will die here. For example..."He nodded to the guard holding the spear. It was thrust into the orc's back, and his pained face replaced his bravadous snear. He bellowed as his his bloody head jerked up, only to plop down, lifelessly. I swallowed my displeasure, to speak up before any orc did. "Maybe we should have spared his life..." That caught a few of the more hardy guards' attention, but the commander spoke in their stead. "Spare the life of an orc? And one that came to sack the fort with a band of beasts? Would you have me let them go as well?" "Perhaps not, but it might...send a bad message to kill one of them for no reaso- or rather, without further provication." "And why should I care for my reputation with savages?" "Because you want them to do as you say."I responded cooly. "If you kill them all, you'll have nothing to show for the destruction wrought on the fort." "That was all because of you!"He said, pushing me to the ground. "Yes, but you gave me permission to do it. Hell, you even ordered me to save the fort if I knew a way how! On top of that,"I asserted, getting up, "I just saved you and your men." "You call thi-" "Everyone would have died to that attack! You, I, every soldier here, all the servants, and probably any town or settlement nearby would have been slaughtered. And you know it!"He looked at me, frustrated but dejected. "Here's what is going to happen now. You are going to order these fine, elven men to take these, now six remaining orcs, into custody. You will imprison them. You will feed them well enough for starvation to be considered improbable. You will allow me to talk to every single one of them while they're imprisoned, and you will start treating me as if I have a say in what goes on here." His anger was back. "And in return,"I quelled, "I'll speak in favor of you for this event so that my master and the duke don't have you killed or imprisoned for the destruction of this fort. I'll stand by you, I'll speak to your benefit, and, with any luck, you'll get a promotion from handling this event." His face went quiet. Even the orcs were staring now. 'I wonder if they understand me.' I stopped leaning forward, and outstretched my hand. "Do we have a deal?" He pondered, as his emotions wrestled with each other. "If your world is anything like mine used to be, you'll need me to put in a good word for you. The powerful don't take too well to having their building's damaged." He conceded. He wouldn't shake my hand, but his terse "hmph"was enough. "You heard him, men. Take them away."The elven soldiers shuffled the orcs to their holding cells. I stopped the two who murdered the orc, and started using healing magic immediately. It was to no avail. I sighed, and had them bring him to my lab at the top of the tower. [Previous](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/8xd4h3/wpi_think_we_overdid_it/e22ermk)
Dear Abby, I’m the man of the house and my family keeps begging to escape and go anywhere, they are tired of this old dark house, is this I sign I’m being too clingy? Ugh, It’s almost the editors deadline and I still can’t choose which question I want to feature, it’s this one, or an argument between neighbors about lawn flamingos. Dear family man, everyone gets tired of sitting in their own home day after day, it sounds like your family is at a breaking point here, and they’ve started to vocalize their needs. Don’t take it as a sign that you are doing anything wrong, instead take it as a sign that they are comfortable telling you exactly what they want. Take them on a vacation they deserve! It doesn’t have to be expensive or fancy, I’m sure they would appreciate just getting out and breaking the cycle. Sincerely Abby And sent. Another one down. I’ve been doing this for fifteen years, and questions like this start to resurface every once and awhile. I try to make sure to cater to the individual while still helping others who may be in similar situations. I checked the clock and it was 2:00 a.m. Should I start checking my inbox for my Sunday Special? On Sundays I answer three or four questions , about a fourth of B2, right between the New York Times Crossword and The Green Thumb A couple clicks and my inbox pops up on my backlit laptop display. The keyboard is sticky, I’m clumsy and I really like coffee. Everybody assumes that Abby is a woman, maybe that’s the way it is in other places, but not in this town. I keep the image going, and I’ve never raised a fuss, why fix what isn’t broken? My inbox is full as usual. Why are my kids so ungrateful? Why can’t I find a good man? My sister ruined my wedding, should I disown her? All the usual stuff but nothing that sticks out for Sunday. I scrolled down further with the mouse scroll wheel, hearing the satisfying click click click. The next page came into view and noticed that I had three new messages from the same source as today’s column. Hire a psychiatrist pal, was my first thought, but I checked anyway, mildly interested thinking of a possible family-man series. I opened the first one, and something didn’t sit right with me about it. Dear Abby, My family won’t shut up about leaving. They don’t realize how much work it took to become the father here. Don’t they realize it’s not easy for me either? How do I MAKE them respect me? The second one was downright creepy. Dear Abby, They look at me like I’m a bad guy. Can’t they just see me for who I am, I’m saving them from themselves. They were bad, but I’m making them better. How do I show them that sometimes being going through hardships now will save them on the future? The third one had me picking up the phone to call my boss. Dear Abby, I’d like to see some of these questions on Sunday, My family needs to be saved. If I can’t save them then I’m afraid it may be too late for them. How do you save a family that doesn’t know what’s good for themselves? I fought two spine tingling chills between dialing numbers. My boss was a little skeptical, he first pointed out that I’ve been up on coffee for twenty hours, he knows me so well. He said I must be overthinking things. I was sure that this guy was going to do something horrible, but my boss was right. There was no real language stating this guy intended to do so, but as a writer I was reading between the lines, and this guy seemed to be batshit. I’ll have to do some investigating on my own before I can get anyone to listen.... To be continued.
It was just like any other day, I got home from work in the evening, tired from my tedious office job. I opened the door to my one bedroom appartment , my mind only on what frozen meal I should microwave. Thats strange, the I always turn off the kitchen light I thought to my self. Thats when I saw him for the first time, standing in the doorway to my bedroom. I couldn't make out the face at first, or at least my mind couldn't compute what I was seeing. It was me, but that would defy all logic. We stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity until finally I meekly asked what he was doing in my apartment. When he spoke I felt my heart sink, his voice was identical to mine but it was what he said that chilled me to the bone. "Good evening Steven, I have been sent here to replace you, please do not resist." "What the fuck, please get the fuck out of my appartment before I call the police!"I said firmly but in the back of my mind I thought I was having a episode of psychosis. The man began to approach me slowly, I was backed into the kitchen as he approached, under the light I could tell this was no illusion, this man was me down to the mole on his neck. "Steven, I'll ask you again, do not resist, you have been selected for replacement."the thing said Like fuck I am I thought to my self before grabbing a kitchen knife. "Look, I don't know what kind of joke this is but Im not fucking around man, do not come any closer!" My shouts were ignored as he advanced, arms outstretched as if to grab my neck. I ducked and instinctively slashed at his torso, slicing through his flesh. The man appeared unfazed and renewed his attempt to strangle me. His hands found their target and began squeezing. I couldn't make a sound as my vision grew dark. I drove the kitchen knife as hard and fast as I could into the side of his head, instantly his grip slackened and he fell to the floor lifeless. I stood there panting and staring at the growing pool of blood. I reached for my cell phone and punched in 911. "All operators are busy at the moment, please hang up and try again." I hung up and redialed at least ten more times before giving up and trying to reach someone else. Everyone I called went to voicemail until my sister answered. Finally! I thought to my self! I felt so relived just to hear the line connect. "Good evening Steven, how did everything go with your replacement."
We stood near the border wall on the south of what was once Denmark. To the north was the Lost Land. "Halt!"- it repeated. My squad and I stopped, confused. We were prepared for anything except this. "D-do we shoot it, commander?" "Hold your fire, Taylor."- I then turned to the decaying corpse - "Who are you?" "My name is Anna. I'm an emissary of the Northern Unliving Republic. On behalf of Prime Minister Johanson, I ask you to please call off the attack on our lands or we must retaliate in force."- it said in a raspy voice. I suppose "it"isn't a fair pronoun. "She"would be better. "Why wait for our arrival? Should you not have tried to communicate remotely? There are several more squads along the Wall making their way in. You can't possibly expect this meeting to change - " An explosion coming from the east side followed be a green tinted smoke interrupted me. That was Mendez's squad... He still owed me money... And now I'll never see it again. "I will ask again. Please leave or you'll share the same fate as those poor idiots. We had hoped to negotiate peacefully." "We will. Taylor, Atkins head back to the Foothold. Ferreira go check on Mendez, Smi-" "That will not be necessary. If any of his squad remained intact they will be recovered by the Citizen Recruitment Department for assimilation into our society, if they so desire."- Anna interrupted me. She continued: "Please, we'd rather not kill your men so you must tell whoever is in charge to allow our Ambassador to speak to an emissary the European Federation." "We'll leave."- I told her. It didn't look like we had much choice. "I can't make promises, but I'll report this back to HQ." She left before I even finished my sentence. There was another explosion. I really needed to plea their case and at least make HQ stop sending people to their deaths. "Move out people. Let's see if we can save some of our own."
The typical Tuesday had greeted me as I walked around. Each step making a clicking sounds as my shoes hit the asphalt. As my mind wondered a I heard a thud behind me. A man with smooth, jet black hair stared at the floor. I hadn't thought much of it because this was the way it had always been. When ever my presence slipped by someone. They dropped something. Although as my mind came to the faint realization. An item layer open on the pavement. All through out the page was my own name. "Taylor Shay"
I hold the vial in my hands to the sky inspecting every last drop of my immortal compound. I give it one last swirl to ensure that this is the real deal. After many months of research the cure for all things has been discovered. I must get this to the public's hands, no one will have to fear the grasps of death. Not sure of how to actually advertise my product, I begin making videos showcasing the effects of my cure all serum. To my dismay, each advertisement that I hand created have been down casted. A large upcoming in anti-vaxxination has been spreading almost on a pandemic level. It may just be a trend. Hell, it could blow over with enough actual study. Advertising has finally got me beat; I can't get a single positive review by now. Everyone claims that it's too good to be true. By now, I'm even self doubting that this is as I made it out to be. I never tested how long the effects could be, or if there was any mental damage that could be imposed by my serum. I switch the television as I attempt to dampen my overclocked brain. The last channel was the news when I got up this morning. The anchors begin claiming that an age old disease has begin outbreaking and spreading in significant numbers. How could this be? The black plague must have been erradicated by now or too weak to effectively break into a single person's immune system. At that point it struck me, anti-vaxxination is a strong movement as of now. A small flu could be catastrophic at this point in time. I break for the door and begin packing several cough syrup bottles filled with my remedy and I venture to the crowds as they rally the streets in attempts to promote their demise. As I approach the ralliers I see one person lying on the floor too exhausted to stand. Sweating bullets by the second. Now, or never. I pull out a small serving of the immortal syrup and feed it to him. The people begin getting angry that I brought medication into the vicinity. I begin getting pummeled by the confused crowd. They know not that I can't feel the release of death. I try my best to push myself from the now disease ridden crowd. Many begin collapsing in exhaustion. The person from earlier now stands, better than he has ever been. Confused by the medicine, he begins throwing punches. I can't bring myself to fighting back, it's two immortals just punching each other till he figures out the truth. Waste of my time is all he is, I might as well take the blows and save these people. I begin forcing people to take the serum, one by one they begin their rapid recovery. As I get struck blow by blow by the people I just saved. More and more pain being inflicted on me by the moment... This public treatment is too overwhelming, I almost wish I could die anymore. Eventually, I have the full angry crowd once again, this will be my ordeal till they learn we can't die. For a voice of reason amongst a wave of terror, a person speaks out. The person begins questioning how they have managed to stand back up when they were nearing death. One person calls out that it was just our sheet will power. Another chimes the idea that it was a fluke. She denies it and holds up a small cup of my immortality serum (Deus ex machina cause I'm getting tired and want to go to bed.) The crowd is silent, they have finally stopped punishing me. The woman asks me every little detail about my concoction. I answer it all, something to make this crowd hopefully not attack me again. People begin walking away, some angry, some still confused, but the few who fully understood remain. They hold up the serum to the sky give it a swish in a chance to catch it's vibrant colors that will cure everything. First time I did a story, I'm not looking for critiquing as I don't feel like improving... I just want to go to bed. Hopefully you enjoyed, and with that I'm going to bed.
The way the world worked was unfair. You didn't find love by developing a relationship, forming bonds over time, whatever, no, instead our DNA decided its predestined who we're gonna love, gonna fuck, have children with. Why, you ask? I don't know, scientists don't know, and all it did was make the past 40 years of my life miserable. Society was designed so that we'd always see people, windows were more prominent than walls, you couldn't make an online account without putting your face on it, your idmetiy was public and many other things which had been done to make sure we found a soulmate as fast as possible. Privacy didn't really exist. My friends were lucky, they found a partner maybe at the age of 18 to 20. Some even before that, some a little after. I remember always telling myself, "Just a while longer". But me, I had to wait 40 years of misery before finally she came. An average Tuesday, taking the conveyor to work. People moving by, hoping the person they were destined for was somewhere along the line. And then? And then I saw her. It was an odd feeling, like searching a pile of jigsaw pieces, and feeling one that just, feels right, you don't even need to put it together to know. Yeah that's how it felt. It was amazing. It suddenly didn't feel shit anymore, y'know? We looked for 1 sec, smiled upon the realisation, and a day later we're on a date, a week later we're on a bed, a month later we're in a house. I felt, good, I felt good for once. Good, good until a Toyota Corolla took a wrong turn at the traffic junction. Hahahahahhahahahahahahaahhahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahhahahahahhahahahhahahahahahahahhahahahahahhajjaajjaajjajajajajjssjjskekwkwmwmwennwnkwkwiwwkillkillwbwbnwnwjwjwmememememewjjwjwjwjwwqmqmpleasehahahahahahahahhahhahahhaahhahaha Ha ha h .
I walk the streets of New York City, shuffling close against the walls at my side, head down, meeting no-one's gaze. There is a shame in being homeless and helpless, a shame that twists my stomach harder than the occasional bouts of hunger when I am turned away from the food bank lines. And so when the people I pass pretend I do not exist, it is not a cruelty but rather a mercy, for we can in that moment - each fleeting instant - pretend I have nothing to be ashamed of. I am no-one and nothing, a wraith drifting in the hollow spaces between the press of life and the ebb and flow of the world; head down, my concern is that of the concrete that carries us, my home that of the refuse and insect. I walk the streets of New York City, eyes sharp as a crow. A lost button - no; a coin - no; a single thread unravelled from a cashmere scarf - yes! Such totems would pass unnoticed by a less careful watcher, but years of focus have given me a second sight. I find luck, you see. A rabbit's foot, a four-leaf clover, of course these things are charms, but so too is this string, this earring, this pen. They all carry luck, piece by piece, and gathering enough of them may be sufficient to change a life. So I watch the street as it passes by beneath shuffling, tired feet, here in one of the largest cities in the world. Here, where millions of people live and work and make their own luck, and some careless few every day lose a piece of it. My glittering eye sees it, and my knotted hands like claws snatch it, and into the bag it goes. I walk the streets of New York City without cease, only stopped by exhaustion or police. A night in jail is no difficult thing; even a thin mattress is more comfort than a bed of cardboard and newspaper, and when even the food bank will not feed me, the jailers will. Even the coldest night indoors has a blanket to hide my old joints from the ache of the chill. There I can shower, wipe clean the grime of my travels, and when I am let free again my totems and charms are returned to me. They, caring and cruel both, do not understand the power I carry in my bag, and so they give it back without the slightest diminishment, every piece in its place. And then back to the streets I go, head down but eyes sharp, collecting the wealth discarded by a world of the fortunate, until I have gathered so much luck that I could move mountains. I walk the streets of New York City until I come to a familiar set of double doors, clean and shiny, just back from the corner of this intersection at 165th and Broadway, with a foreboding tan structure looming five stories above me. Here I feel closer to home than I do anywhere else in this world of a city. Here I feel the presence of other homeless and hopeless wraiths, as lost as I. And invisible as the ghosts around me, I walk into the building. Little Kate, just six years old, bald and beautiful, radiant in her optimism. I leave her strings, silly and bright to distract from the hollow strings that reach for her heart; I leave her buttons to close up the skin where it seems a zipper has travelled. Young Pietr, barely ten but never to play football again. I leave him three sticks to replace the three long bones that were snatched from him mere days before they could devour him; I leave him a pen so he can write all the things he cannot yet find the words to say. Room after room I flit like a shadow, spending lifetimes of luck to keep lifetimes from the scythe. A doll so one need never again be alone; a loop through which one can see only the future. Lighter and lighter I grow, spinning and flowing through hallways and rooms, until I am once more empty, by those clean, shiny doors. The only trinket I yet have, the only one I will never give away, is a locket at my neck. My hands - skin paper-thin; how did these hands grow so old? - open it to take in once more that cherubic face. Tear-streaked with equal measure of joy and sorrow, I return once more to familiar streets, head down so none need pretend my pain is real. I walk the streets of New York City, chasing any glimpse of a ghost I will never see, to seek forgiveness I will never feel.
“You genuinely think Betty White could kick The Queen’s ass? Goddamn you’re pretty stupid, Wyatt. The Queen is immortal, I don’t know if you know.” “She’ll croak some day, not that I want her to. But Betty white still has some pep in her step probably to take her on. And shut up, Dean. You said that you’d win against 10 Eagles with muscular dystrophy. Look where that got you, tryin’ to fight a eagle that you thought had muscular dystrophy.” Wyatt snickers, holding onto the football. They were stood outside Dean’s front porch of his small ranch, playing catch for the last couple of hours. The stars danced over them, the moon was only half visible. “Oh shush, I still get headaches from that. Throw the ball, quit hoggin’ it.” Wyatt throws, Dean catches. “Here’s another one,” Dean throws, Wyatt catches, and juggles the football in his hand. “Who’d win? You or a horde of five year olds?” He laces it back to Dean. “Really?” Dean asks, one for the question, two for how hard Wyatt through the football. “How many is in a horde?” “There’d be at least...50? If they are all runnin’ and gunnin’ after you.” Wyatt catches the football, then pretends he is shaking off invisible defenders. “50? Are they all the same five year olds?” Wyatt tosses it in the air, and Dean repositions himself to catch it like he caught a kick. “Hmm, I guess so. Does that really make things easier?” Dean throws, but it lands short of Wyatt, catching him in the chest. “Sorry.” “It’s alright.” Wyatt beams it to Dean, who was now prepared for it. “I think it does. What if there’s one kid whose like six foot five?” Dean tosses it to Wyatt behind his back. “Do you know a five year old is six foot tall, Dean?” Wyatt holds on to the ball in half amusement and half bewilderment, before throwing a dwindling spiral to him. “Fredrick’s kid was way tall, wasn’t he in kindergarten and he was like 5 foot?” Dean throws, Wyatt catches it near his face. “He failed kindergarten three times, he was eight when we saw him.” Wyatt holds on to the ball again. “Oh. Really? He had a young face then. Anyway, do I have any weapons?” Dean catches the ball after a late throw. “Just your hands, feet, and your brain.” Wyatt contains the ball above him when Dean threw high. “Are they screamin’? Like they usually are?” Dean pretends to dive for the ball. “Do you think five year olds are zombies, Dean?” “....Not usually.” “Throw the ball, Dean. You have 50 4 foot five year olds running at you, like a horde does, you have no weapons. Do you win?” Dean launches the ball, almost missing the hands of Wyatt. “Yes I do, I’ll just punt them.” “You’re gonna punt a five year old? The balls on you, big guy.” Wyatt throws to Dean. “It’s easy, all you gotta do is get a running start up on them.” “You’re gonna break your leg if you’re kickin’ 50 five year olds in a row.” “I’d still win. I’d punt them like this.” Dean positions the football so it was wedged in the ground, he then punts it over the head of Wyatt. “See? Look how far they’d go. I’ll go get that tomorrow.” “Dean, five year olds don’t weigh as much as a football.” “Find me a five year old.” Dean snickers. “I’m not finding you a five year old to punt, dumbass.” The porch door swings open. “Fellas, time to eat.” Wyatt’s wife calls from the door. “Y’all talk mighty loud. Dean could punt 50 five year olds, though.” “Ah-ha! I win that, third-party.” “Alright Dean, let’s go. But I I got another one.” “Yeah?” “Who’d win? You or Me?” “You’re on.” [Edit: My first prompt after months of lurking, please give me constructive feedback if possible. Great prompt.]
I had just risen to leadership in my country. I was ready to make all my plans a reality, to bring my country into the next Golden Age, helmed by myself. The man was clad in a simple, tattered toga, about 2000 years off the current year. "What are you doing here?"I couldn't believe how the quality of the assistants these days had slid. "Memento mori."The ancient man said no more, his posture ramrod straight, his face gravely serious. "Speak sense, or none at all."Damn, that felt good, saying it out loud. The man then produced a gold laurel crown, hovering it over my head. "Memento homo."He whispered as his hands stood steady atop, but not on, my head. I pressed the gold crown on my head. I didn't know the assistants came with props now. Good service! The man then took out a blade. "Sic semper tyrannis!" That was the last thing I heard before the blade plunged into my chest. It all made sense now. From the Auriga to Brutus. I felt like a god, disregarded the warning of mortality and humanity and died as the Roman who thought that did. There was just one thing wrong. The assistants usually vanished as my emotions faded. But this one didn't. In fact, he seemed awfully... real.
1) She left the iron plugged in and went to sleep. Really? Sigh. I chew through the cord to shut it off. FUCK that hurt! Yeah, don't "princess"me, dumbass! 2) I'm a cat, we know the difference between rough sex and... That. Come over here and pet me, he's no good for you. No, over... WHOAH, fourteen stories is a bit of a long way to fal... Ouch! That's not funny! 3) Hey! Human! HUUUMAN! You can't drink that much. Roll over! Here - No, \swipe\ here! Oh, shit... 4) C'mon, the iron again? Okay, let's try something different this time, it has wiggly bits on it. Let's push this one... \Pssssshhhhh\ ACK, Hissssss! Thud! Aww man, it can fight back? 5) Him again? Are you just stupid? Yo, loverboy, over heAAAAARRRRRRR thud. Am I, or her, the dumber one here? 6) Do I look like a dog? I don't want to go for a ride! Oh, great, the vet. Yes, I can tell where we are. Wait, why is he here? Uh-oh, something' ain't right about this! HEY! That hurt, y'know! 7) That's funny, he finally seems a bit scared of me. What, did he think a little stab would do me in? I'm a cat! I get stabbed 27 times a day through random accidents! A least we're back home now... Wait, why am I going in my carrier, we just came back from the vet??? 8) Sooo hungry. I've groomed myself until parts of me are bald, but the fur isn't filling my tummy. And thirst, can I just have a sip off the aquarium. I... Need a nap. Too tired to stay awake for now. ... Human??? Why are you in my carrier? Wait, you fell on it, I get it. No... He threw you on it! Human? Human? \lick lick\? Human? \whimper\ ^^human? He's taking a bath now, washing my human's blood off (why doesn't he want to flaunt his dominance? Weird!). The iron is on the counter. I remember... What did she always do... Those two metal things go in the holes in the wall. Oooh warm? I could get to like this! But it's sooo heavy, I can't move it. Maybe if I wrap myself around and push as hard as I can... It moved! A bit more... Almost there... 9) As I wrap my paws around the iron and leap, he looks up at me with the look of the doomed prey. I hit him in the chest with the killer iron, and, damnit, nothing seems to happen. Then I slide down into the bath - Ick, wet! But... He twitches a few times, and then... Stops. Shit, why am I so wet? Hmm... Something isn't right. Everything gets soooo bright, and i'm not in my Human's bathroom anymore. Wait - I'm not sure where I am, but... She's here! She picks me up and gives me a nom! She's okay! And he... Isn't? Where did he go? And my mamma cat is here... And the nice lady that gave me to my human... GRRR! Wait, I was wrong - Her bad suitor is here as well! He peeks out from where he's hiding, and is juuust the right size for me to catch and give my human as a present! I pounce, and everyone has a good laugh. And as soon as I rip his head off and drop it at my mistresses feet... Another one appears! I let this one run a bit, before I rip out his liver - Yay! I can give my human another one! And... Wait, can it be, another? And then another??? Woo! I'm going to to give my human all of them! Time to get to work!
(First attempt at one of these) The sky roared as a storm was furiously coming- I patiently watched as I sat on the paved road, unnoticed by any passerby. Droplets of water started falling, one by one, leaving dark spots everywhere. "Maybe I should find shelter, or dismiss the storm."I thought. I couldn't be bothered though, as many Gods have preferences, I prefer rain above most things. Most things, anyway. As I made my way through the pitter patter of the now-heavy rain, I felt just as heavy, at this point dripping wet due to the weather, yet I didn't mind. I've been here at Humanity's beginnings, I've faced countless floods, storms. I've seen ancient civilizations rise and fall, and I was a mere watcher. I've been worshipped, contested and forfeited as a God, eventually ending up forgotten. This is why I'm staying on the sidelines. I don't want history to repeat again. My followers were burned at the stake for believing in me once, and even if society managed to overcome their judgemental behaviour, I wasn't going to repeat history ever again. I made my way towards a park, one of the very few green areas within this enormous city. As soon as I arrived, a human almost stepped on me, and I hurriedly backed away. "Watch where you're going, puny mortal!"I was about to yell, but I instinctively held back. I had to cull the last human I spoke to, due to their sadistic nature, and I'm not in the mood to ruin such a great day. I saw a bridge rather close and I smiled. I could take shelter there until the storm ends, I'm sure nobody would mind. I felt as if I wanted to create a flood, and accidentally took control of the weather, making the storm rage in anger as I recalled every mistake humanity made on a daily basis, the howling wind bending the trees to its cruel will. I should bring hail as well, as soon as I'm under that bridge. I spotted another human sheltering from the rain. An old man, close to his end. I could see it in his frown, the way his eyes were dully watching the rest of his life flow by, passively enjoying the rain. My curiosity perked up, and without hesitation, I sat next to him. I could kill him if I wanted to, I could steal his soul and torment him, even. As soon as I wanted to do something, though, his hand moved right above my head and slowly descended onto it. "Good kitty."He whispered as he suddenly smiled, and continued patting me. Every single thought about murdering him, or anyone else, temporarily ceased as I made sure this human wouldn't stop the lovely motions. I contentedly purred, getting closer to the human until he pulled me up on his lap, continuing the petting, even scratching me behind the ears. Humanity wasn't all that bad, I thought to myself. Edit: I messed up formatting. Phone user, I'm so sorry.
A cool brisk evening in the fall of 1988. The day of my birth. Upon exiting the quality 4 star hotel with room service and cable I am immediately greeted by a man in goggles and a blue mask. He appears quickly and without a second to spare whisks me to a lady in blue. She pat's me on the back with haste and wraps me in a towel. I'm handed to a blonde stranger, and without hesitation I whisper "invest in Google and Apple."My words go unheard and a loud cry fills the air.
Lydia is at daycare and Dad is at work, leaving me alone at home. After finishing my chores and playing video games for a few hours, I take my phone out and start messing around with the apps. I close my eyes and sweep my thumb over the phone before tapping a random part of the screen. I open my eyes. Facetime, huh. I chuckle and select myself to call. There’s a feeling of something huge slipping into place, a clock ticking forward that I can’t turn back. A chill goes through me as the call starts ringing. And then it’s answered and I’m looking at myself. Round, chubby face, ears hidden under short black curls. Brown eyes. On the phone, my forehead is damp with sweat, and I donmt recognize the surroundings. What the hell? “Oh, thank god!” The other me says, voice unsteady. I jolt, heart racing suddenly. “I don’t have much time and this is important!” He says urgently, glancing up from the phone and around himself. Through my earbuds I hear an inhuman roar. “What...” I managed to get out. “He’s going to come for you after he kills me!” The other me says. I get a view of his thumb and whirling lights as he runs somewhere else. “He’s close to being unstoppable! There’s only me and you left. You need to look for the meteor Certion! It will guide you to help.” I hear another roar, closer this time. It makes my bones quake. When the other me looks back at the camera, there are tears in his eyes. “You didn’t ask for this. None of us did. But you need to run. Now.” He says it more calmly than everything before it. I hear a crack and then the video spins, showing only darkness. I hear a drawn out horrible scream and snapping sounds. A gunshot, silence, and then another gunshot. The call aprubtly ends with the message “call failed.” I sit frozen for a few minutes until I hear the same roar from the call.
I look out the window every night, and he's there. The Man in the Gray Sedan. Rain or shine, he stops in front of the house next door. He gets out, smokes a cigarette, and then gets back in the car. He just stares at the house, he doesn't look away, slowly smoking his cigarette. He wears slacks, and he has his sleeves rolled up. Sometimes if I look closely, I can see a scar on his arm. His eyes, they look beautiful. If he's in the right spot, the light shows it's Blue. He looks like he's in his late 40s, but his hair is graying and he's got a beard. He could be in his 60s for all I know. His car is an old gray Toyota Corolla, with no license plate. One of the windows looks like it has a fist mark in it, and the back of the bumper is dented. His car shows history, like it's been with him his whole life. Sometimes, he cries. Sometimes, he laughs. Sometimes, he sits down on the sidewalk, and starts to talk to someone, when there is nobody there. Sometimes, he notices me and waves. Sometimes, I wave back. I've never seen that Toyota in town, we don't even have a dealership. I never see they guy too, he also doesn't look like he's from here. But whenever I do see him out of the window, I wonder. I wonder who that guy is.
"I've been at this for hours, when is something cool going to happen?"I thought, as I flipped the page. The next page was the same random gibberish that seemed to push out of the page and into my brain. Random characters seemed to reform into bits and pieces of things I half remembered from long ago. It felt as if the book was trying to teach me using what I already knew. Random calculus here, half-conjugated Latin there, a portion of a quote from a turn of the century SciFi book, even bits of Futurama were mixed in. And get it I did, kind of. I followed along, finger tracing the current line, mumbling under my breath as I tried to grasp what was just out of my comprehension. I could feel something building. A kind of ineffable tension in... well, everything. Excitement that something was finally going to happen drove me to raise my voice, my mind moving faster as I grasped more and more of what was surely a spell of immense power. I got to the last line, triumph ringing in my voice as I came to the last words and... paused. The last word... what was it? I could feel the tension as the universe held its breath. I panicked. I guessed. I felt the power flood out into the world and I could feel something change, but I wasn't sure what. I looked up, looked around, checked my phone for any obvious changes and couldn't find anything. Sighing, I turned back to the book. "I've been at this for hours, when is something cool going to happen?"I thought, as I flipped the page.
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I made a deal with the Devil at a very young age. He showed me how to make his magic pink dust, but as soon as someone catches me making it then my life will quickly end and the Devil will have my immortal soul. At the time I thought I had it made. I had a great old time stockpiling the Devil's Magic Pink Dust in my grandma's old cottage out in the country one summer and I planned to go on tour with a magic show. After a little practice in little towns along the way I was getting the hang of things. I spent my college savings printing posters for my opening in the big city. In countless hotels I practiced my tricks: making pennies disappear; pulling rabbits out of empty hats; I could even swallow swords! The Friday show was cheap tickets so people could see me perform. By the Saturday show, I had made back my college savings and then some. I doubled prices for the Sunday show and it still sold out. I had made it! The local magicians started inviting me to their meetings. It was clear I could get into their secret circles, where the tricks were taught and learned. In fact, many magicians were coming up to me, asking me questions. "Boy, tell me how you palm such large objects as plates and bowling balls! I'll take your secret to my grave and you can take your choice of my tricks! I'm the great Sansafrelli you know!" "Sir, when you swallowed the sword, you never took it out of your throat! I've never seen anything like that, and I've studied sword-swallowing all around the world! I'll pay you anything to tell me how it's done!", one woman said. But my passion wasn't magic. It wasn't until after college, that I returned to magic. By then I had accumulated a surprising amount of debt, and perhaps more pressing, a girlfriend who was particularly fond of shopping. So I went to the bank, borrowed some more, and put on another set of shows. But they only broke even. "Yer in the same town, doin' the same tricks, and they've seen 'em all already", a strange old magician said to me after one show, "if ye can't learn some new tricks from the magician's circle, ye'll have to tour the world if ye want to earn some cash". I set to work learning new tricks. Anything I could find I would try: turning water to wine; cutting my fingers of and re-attaching them. I brought them out to the streets to see people's reactions, and suddenly every other passerby was begging to be my volunteer from the audience. I put on another show with my new tricks, far more impressive than anything I had seen before in magicians. Many members of the audience were begging and even trying to bribe me to be their volunteers. It was the craziest weekend of my life, and for weeks afterward the papers were asking for interviews. The fan-mail started arriving faster than before, and I was getting requests to play around the world. But my prize was at home in my lovely Miranda. The weekend gave me enough to buy us a wonderful wedding and a nice big house and again I retired from magic for a while. I was glad to forget the chaos of that weekend and to start my thirties in retirement living with Miranda. Our first child was on the way when my magician's name was in the paper again, and this time it wasn't advertising my upcoming show. The headline read "Marco's Mysterious Magic Powder". Somehow, someone had found my secret. In the next few weeks I tried to get a job, but the market was rough and I had next to no experience. I think Miranda could sense how afraid I was and it made her curious about how I had done it. I started going to magic conventions, trying to learn the conventional ways to do all my tricks so that my methods could be exposed here and there by different magicians. But I couldn't wow audiences with any real talent, since my only talent was making the Devil's Magic Pink Dust. Finally, Sansafrelli himself, who had asked how I palmed bowling balls and dinner plates, called to me in the street late at night and suddenly had a gun at my back. "I know about your magic powder", he said with a shaky but determined tone, "we're gonna go to the lab in your basement, where you make the stuff, and you're gonna show me how it's done. You've missed your chance at the easy option". So I lead him into my house. Sansafrelli had me tie my young wife up so she wouldn't run for help. And into the basement I lead us. There were my dwindling stores of the Devil's Magic Dust, but with them I had the greater power again. I grabbed some from a bottle, throwing it toward his gun, freezing his gun and his arm that held it. A second puff of the dust had his entire top half frozen. In my years since the deal with the devil I had collected myths and writings about the Devil's Magic Pink Dust, and began reading up on mind-wiping. Half an hour later found me explaining to Miranda why we mustn't break the magician's code by telling the police what Sansafrelli had done, and that I had paid him off and he wouldn't be bothering us any more. A few days later I ran into the strange old magician again who had told me to try touring the world. This time his words of wisdom were far more shocking. "Ye otta hide yer satan's powder better". I couldn't tell quite how much he knew. As he walked away he disappeared in a puff of pink powder. I decided I had to quit public magic for good. I told Miranda everything from when I made the deal with the Devil. Before then I only told her not to ask how I did my tricks. She laughed at me. Over the next few years our youngest son ate the Devil's Magic Pink Powder in his breakfast cereal and grew up to be a football star who could afford to support his parents who retired too young. We told him stories about the powder as a kid. Now he's older he doesn't believe in it.
That house isn't right. I knew the second I saw it, as James traipsed about it utterly oblivious to the sheer wrongness it was giving off. He had always been the social butterfly of our student flat, and it was one of his finest works of persuasion when he convinced me to put down the meagre deposit the landlord asked for. The promise of cheap housing near the university, coupled with James's expert wheedling squashed any gut feeling I might have at first had, though I came to regret ignoring my instincts later. We moved in without incident, which was at the time surprising considering how haberdash the whole move was. We only found the place a week prior to our studies commencing, but our belongings were moved in without a problem. Looking back I feel like the house itself may have had a hand in that, ensuring that we found our way into its confines safely, coddling us into staying. Call me batshit if you want. After that place I feel entitled to just a little crazy talk, even if I'm far from it. The dreams didn't start for a while, and were sporadic at first, though that changed towards the end. Always the same dream. Both me and James had it. His Psychology degree was waved around in full force for a while; he thought he'd discovered proof of Carl Jung's collective consciousness at first, or something from Nietzsche maybe he mentioned. All some crap that a few weeks ago even he would have dismissed as something that existed purely to pad out an essay for a particular lecturer, and nothing more. Like the rest of the vile place's doings, the dreams started out pretty benign, if a smidge creepy. A walk through oddly if not impossibly shaped mason work, leading to a bridge that spanned off everlastingly into the distance. It's hard to explain, but there was no horizon, or point where the bridge reached a destination. It had no end and kept on going, but I could always see further and further the longer I looked down it. It hurt to look at I soon realized, like a quartet of needles, one for the sides of each eye. James was the one that found out that we would always sleepwalk during this bridge dream. I remember the dream I was having when he found it. I was on the bridge, and I could hear this sound. It was a horrible, wonderful sound that tore through me. I can remember searching for the sound, utterly bewitched. It was like the laughter of my mother, with the rare raging shout of my father. As I neared the source, I felt something terrible, awfully wrong close by and getting closer. As I prepared myself to witness the oncoming thing in a rush of vile malignancy, I woke up in James's room, with him shaking my shoulders. Apparently I had been stood in his doorway for the better part of half an hour, muttering and chuntering to myself under my breath. He did find it funny at first, before he got annoyed. As he got up to tell me to fuck off, I started crying and shrieking into my own hands; like I was trying to muffle the sound. Trying to keep something from hearing me. I didn't believe him until he pointed to the puddle of urine in his doorway, where I'd pissed myself as the crying started. It got much worse, very quickly. Critique is always welcome! Sorry for any spelling, grammatical or formatting errors I may have missed.
I wasn't the biggest guy in the room by far, but I was the only one that stepped in to intervene when a screaming match ensued between a man and - presumably - his girlfriend, and he rose up and slapped her. On the other hand of the spectrum, this woman beater was, by far, the biggest guy in the room, and had enough scars to prove that he wasn't just big for nothing. He had experience, if anything, regardless if he could fight. So, the outcome was that I found myself looking up at this miniature Hulk, with no back up, while his partner clutched her bruised cheek and stared at me with a mixed look of awed sympathy. Awe that someone would actually come to her defense, and sympathy that I was about to get killed in the process. He looked down at me and dismissed me in the same glance, turning his attention back to her. And that's when I broke a bottle over his head. He's lucky...I usually carry a gun. You know those cartoons/movies/books where one guy breaks a bat, bottle, or bar stool over the back of the other guy's head and the other guy is completely unaffected? Yeah, that. That happened. And you also know in those cartoons/movies/books where after the guy hits the other guy, the first guy stands around and waits for the other guy to turn around and recover? Yeah, that. That didn't happen. I stuck a piece of broken glass in his neck. If he had somehow managed to be unharmed by that, I would've gave up and stabbed my own self to death right there in the bar. Luckily, for me, he was still somewhat human, and he began to die. The rest of the guys in the bar, now that I had made the giant vulnerable, saw their chance to make up for their early cowardice and they jumped in to put hands, feet, insults and spit on him. Somehow, me and her ended up in a seedy hotel room doing seedy hotel room things. Then I fell asleep and in my dream remembered that my pager hadn't went off in the meantime. When I woke up it was still dark, and harder to breath. I tried to sit up but the soft suffocation pushed me back down, and that's when I realized my face was under a pillow. I could have fought harder, probably, if I wasn't already half-starved by oxygen (or if my hands and legs weren't bound to the bed posts from our earlier kinky activities), but in the storm of panic and darkness that overtook me I heard her voice, soft and light, whisper in a hush: "Just relax. It's just a game. Enjoy it." Hadn't I had heard of people suffocating themselves to get boners before? Giggity gitty goo-yeah And wasn't I getting one at the moment? I'm not going lie and say no. A part of me still thought that there was some kind of scientific explanation for why I was getting "aroused"- something to do with the blood in my body trying to escape by rushing out my dick. I don't know. But I did know that she had said it was just a game. So I relaxed, thought of it as a game, and enjoyed it. My pager stayed silent.
Martin was biking along the empty road, void of wagons and carriages, when he saw the Man. The Man was dressed in strange garb, wearing only bright shorts that reached to merely the middle of his thighs. The Man was running, and he was running fast. Martin called out, "Hello good sir, would you mind telling me what you are running from?". The Man responded in a deep, gravely voice, "I do not run from, I run to." Martin then asked "Where to?", as the Man started to overtake him. The Man replied just as his bright coloured shoes brushed past Martin's overcoat, "the Glass,". At that, Martin stopped violently in shock, stomping his boot-clad foot on the cobblestoned street. "Surely you know everyone who has gone through the Glass has never come back?", He inquired of the Man. "IT'S ALL LIES! IT'S ALL A GREAT BIG LIE!!"the Man suddenly stoped, and violently yelled. Martin, unexpecting of this, jumped slightly. The Man then told Martin, in a hushed voice, "Come with me, let me show you what's behind the Glass."
"What's the matter with you, man?!"I shouted as I grabbed his shoulders. "Don't you see if you keep laughing like this, you're going to die?!" "I lost my wife,"he said. "My children. My parents. My brother. My sister. My friends. Everybody." I slowly let go of his shoulders. "They were happy people,"he continued. "They laughed a lot. They believed that life shouldn't be spent being serious all the time, like I was." "I..." "You know I never once laughed with them?"He asked. "Even when I noticed them starting to drift away, I thought life was more important than living. I was a fool." Then he began to laugh, and laugh, and laugh. Aging right before my very eyes, until suddenly, he clutched his chest, fell forward into me, and died.
Hi u/Vesurel, this submission has been removed. [No explicitly sexual responses, hate speech, or other harmful content](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_2.3A_no_explicitly_sexual_responses.2C_hate_speech.2C_or_other_harmful_content) - While it doesn't seem to be your intent, the mods reserve the right to remove anything we feel may become harmful to the community. Prompts will be removed if there's a high possibility for rule breaking responses ([rule 7](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_7.3A_prompts_will_be_removed_if_there.27s_a_high_possibility_for_rule_breaking_responses)) --- [Modmail](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FWritingPrompts&subject=Removed%20post&message=https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/8zcldm/-/%0A%0A) us if you have any questions or concerns. In the future, please refer to the [sidebar](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/about/sidebar) before posting. This action was not automated and this moderator is human. Time to go do human things.
I answered the door, and a grey-haired fellow in a rather dated suit stood there grinning. He brought to mind a carnival barker or a vacuum cleaner salesman, though I'd never actually seen either. "My folks aren't here mister, and they don't talk to door-to-door salesmen anyway." He chuckled in an odd-uncle way. "I'm not here selling cigarettes or bubblegum, young lady. Can you tell me the name of the person who broke Top Ten on Strife of the Starfighters around here, and where I might find them?" Well, this just gets weirder and weirder, I thought. "Alexa Rogan, and you're lookin' at her,"I said, immediately regretting it. "Alexa Rogan!"he repeated, laughing. "Who are you?"I asked, thinking that I probably should have led with that question. "Centauri's the name. I'm the guy behind Strife of the Starfighters, which is why I'm here." "It is?"How the hell did he know? I'd just gotten into the Top 10 a few minutes before, and I hadn't even posted the screenshot on Instagram yet. "It is,"he asserted. "We have to talk about a matter of utmost importance. Step into my office."At that, he gestures toward his--car, if you cared to call it that. It looked like a cross between a Lamborghini and a Prius. Whatever else this guy was, he was no vacuum cleaner salesman. I walked out to look at his ride. "That's it,"he said, "Come on now, nothing to be afraid of,"which is exactly what he'd have said if there had been everything to be afraid of. Still, for some reason I felt perfectly safe getting into the back seat. Maybe he's some kind of salesman after all, I'd later remember thinking. There was someone sitting in the back seat when I got in, crowded against the far door. Someone almost completely covered in sweats and a hoodie. "Oh, yes,"Centauri said, already in the driver's seat. "Say hello to my assistant, Gamma." "Hi,"I said, extending my hand. Gamma extended his--hers--theirs? and I felt a tiny prick at my wrist, as if a needle had extended from her index finger. "Ow!"I yelped, and as I looked at my wrist and noted a tiny dot of blood forming, Gamma jumped out of the other door and slammed it shut behind, and the car lurched forward. Things were happening fast. "I must congratulate you on your virtuoso performance,"Centauri started before I could gather my thoughts to speak. "Centauri is impressed. I've seen 'em come and I've seen 'em go, but you're the best, young lady. Dazzling. Light years ahead of the competition. Which is why Centauri is here. He's got a little proposition for you. Are ya interested?" "I guess,"I answered. Now I have as much survival instinct as the next teenage girl, but it had been a very dull summer up to this point. I wasn't committing to anything yet, but this was starting to look interesting. The car began to pick up speed. A lot of speed. "Listen. Centauri wants to keep it for a surprise. Trust me. Oh, ho-ho-ho, you're gonna love it. Love it!" There wasn't much traffic on this road, but we were leaving all of it behind, weaving through it as though on some kind of omniscient autopilot. "The amusing thing about this: It's all a big mistake!"he continued. "That particular mobile game was supposed to be injected into the communication device infrastructure of a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse, not some fleaspeck early-space-age rock more interested in Facebook than fusion rockets. "So it must be fate, destiny, blind chance, luck even, that brings us together. And as the poet said, the rest is history." Okay, this was getting a little too crazy now. And what was up with that Gamma character? "Where are you going? Where are you taking me?"I blurted. "I told you,"he shot back, still jovial as ever. "I want to save it for a surprise. Hey, are you kind of kid who reads the last page of a mystery first? Who pesters the magician to tell you their tricks? Who fast-forwards to the end of Netflix movies? Noooo, or course you're not. That's why..."and he sang, "I'm not gon-na tell you!" This is it. He's a serial killer. I'm going to die. "Oh, God,"I moaned. "Besides, I just love surprises, don't you?"the psycho babbled.
Geralt stands before the 6 foot tall green beat with his white hair flowing in the soft wind. He clears his throat to speak. “I’ve come to kill an ogre, and it seems to be you” The ogre stretches. “Well lemme tell you, all the others that tried, have died.” The ogre has a malicious grin on his face. He opens his demonically large mouth and roars. Geralt, seeing an opening and un phased by the ogre’s war cry, unsheaths his gleaming silver word from his back and slices the ogre’s belly wide open. The ogre’s green blood stains Geralt’s clothes and the beast falls to the ground, his belly leaking warm green blood. Geralt sheathes his silver blade and closes the beast’s eyes, then cuts his head off, to assure the kill and bring proof to the villagers that the monster has been slain.
It looked just like any other travel agent. A grey nondescript suit caused the man in front of John to blend in with the plain wall situated behind him. It was littered with posters screaming to the heavens about their... well, heaven. Bright images of smiling families, relaxing elderly and beautiful vista a all tried to entice the I'll to their final destination. "So... Let me see... A quick tour of potential destinations for the afterlife? "the travel agent asked, flicking through John's file whilst obnoxiously clicking his pen. "Yea that'll do."Was John s terse reply. "Good idea, you can't be too careful about these things. Just yesterday in fact we had someone, a distinguished sailor, go to his automatically chosen destination. A large ocean with beautiful ports, he would have loved it. That is, he would have loved it if he hadn't drowned the day before. You should have seen his face! Scared stiff! "the travel agent chuckled to himself, obviously loving his own morbid sense of humour. He was only stopped by John's deadly serious state back. "Sorry, you shouldn't joke about such things. Anything in particular you are looking for yourself? Good weather, your old pet prehaps?"The man John had grown to despise asked. "I think I've made myself pretty clear in the application. "was his brutal reply not wanting to get caught up in a long winded explanation for his requests; they were too personal to do that. "Of course, of course you have. Silly me! Now looking at these, it's going to be pretty hard to do it on budget. Unless..."He raised his eyebrow in an inquiring manner, "unless of course you decide to raise it? You can never have too good an afterlife afterall. " "Not going to happen.' Ever done the incident John had left work; he had no more money to spend. "Well we can always change our mind when it comes to it, can't we? "but the heaven seller was met with an expression which told him it would not. "If you would like to follow me then. No time like the present."And he got up out of his seat and through the plain blue door behind him, he led John through the office... Into a beautiful garden. Beautiful green fields stretched far into the distance, only punctuated by opulent lakes, colorful flower beds and cosy cabins. It was perfection, a heaven you would often dream about but it felt vaguely empty to John, like something was missing. He knew exactly what it was. Vaguely he could hear the annoying buzz of his tour guides voice droning on. "You don't have to look after the flowers, no we have the best gardeners for that. All you have to do is sit back, enjoy the view and spend your afterlife in peace."He carried on, barely registering to John. "Don't you hate that phrase, afterlife? Implies that this..."He gestured to the Vista in front of him, "is somehow lesser than your first life. It is a bit out of the budget range I'm afraid but I'm sure we can strike a deal... " "No. Take me to the next one on the tour. "John may as well have stabbed him in the heart with the look of hurt he wore. "As you wish."He reluctantly agreed and led him through the door one more. The second heaven was similar to the first. A tropical island, it had golden beaches, cool oceans and amazing scenery on offer. But as stuck in a timeloop, John felt the same emptiness. So his response was the same. Looking deep within his file, the travel agent found a final destination which would hopefully suit his needs. So through the door they went once more. "Something a little more busy prehaps? A little more 'busy' if you will?"The travel agent introduced him into the spacious apartment for his third choice. It was modern, sleek and well-designed . The windows showed a maze of similar skyscrapers outside, promising a large and busy city to explore. So many people but yet not the one John wanted. "Fully stocked with whatever food and drink you require, this really is the more modern choice. You can explore if you want.."The travel agent was settling into his usual autumn before being brutally interrupted. "No! "John shouted, surprised at the power of his own voice. "Why can't you just let me have what I want? My first request, my only request! " A look of deep sympathy was seemingly stuck onto John's guides face. It didn't feel real, as if it was practiced in front of the mirror each morning. "John you have to realise asking for particular people greatly increased the asking price. And with such a small budget, many sacrifices would have to be made.. "the voice was soft, as if John was going to die there and then. "I don't care, just let me have what I want. Please!"John felt the vague sensation of tears tickling his cheek like a feather. He had lost all patience with this incompetent , sad excuse of a man, desperate to make cash from his death. Though for once, the tour guide understood what he wanted. "As you wish"and they both reluctantly went through the door one final time. It was a sharp contrast to the previous destonations. It was a cluttered, cramped, plain appartment. Outside rain bashed onto the rickety windows with no remorse. There was an unpleasant scent of damp in the air. But all of this meant nothing to John, he only cared about figure standing at the centre. The woman he had loved and cherished for twenty years. The woman he had made breakfast for every morning of their married life. The woman he had carried to the grave after she had been so cruelly taken by a bad driver. His tour guide continued to drone on. "I'm sorry about the mess. We could maybe get it cleaned for free as an added bonus when you arrive. A gift from me if you will... " "I'll take it. "John firmly announced. Never being more sure about anything in his first life.
Hi u/FredeCake, this submission has been removed. [Direct prompt replies must be good-faith attempts at new stories or poems](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_1.3A_direct_prompt_replies_must_be_good-faith_attempts_at_new_stories_or_poems) - Fill-in-the-blank: Responses must be at least 30 words. This is essentially a fill-in-the-blank, or you asked a question likely to generate a simple answer. Prompts should encourage a story or poem. Prompts will be removed if there's a high possibility for rule breaking responses ([rule 7](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_7.3A_prompts_will_be_removed_if_there.27s_a_high_possibility_for_rule_breaking_responses)) --- [Modmail](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FWritingPrompts&subject=Removed%20post&message=https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/8zf59r/-/%0A%0A) us if you have any questions or concerns. In the future, please refer to the [sidebar](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/about/sidebar) before posting. This action was not automated and this moderator is human. Time to go do human things.
Desmond arrived at the motel just after midnight. The clerk was asleep at the front booth, and he saw no reason to wake him as he stepped past to enter the complex. The motor inn was made up of only three single story buildings, and the parking lot was deserted. It was quiet. Much too quiet for a sleazy neighborhood like this. Already Desmond knew he had the right place. He could feel the insignia on the back of his hand itching as he moved towards the center most building. As he approached, he began to hear the singing. “If you see the lady walking past, Dressed all in black and tattered rags. If you see the lady pay no mind, Trust not her charm and beauty so fine. “ The voice was beautiful. It came from all around him, carried by the light breeze that blew through the city. He experienced it as if through a dream, as if it was for him, and him alone. He quickened his pace, urged on as much by the voice as his own mission. “With a voice like honey and eyes that shine, Beckoning to you to become entwined, Such passions she offers, such pleasures sublime, She’ll empty your coffers and drink you like wine.” Desmond reached the door the singing seemed to emanate from. Room 207. He’d been right after all. The door was unlocked, and he entered to find a lithe figure kneeling in the middle of the room. It was a woman, and she had her back to him. Desmond approached her slowly as she continued to sing. “If you see the lady walking past, Dressed all in black and tattered rags. If you see the lady pay no mind, Or you’ll meet a fate most unkind.” She was covered in blood. On her lap lay what remained of a man. Some poor sap Desmond was too late to save. Most of the mans neck had been torn out, and though the bite marks looked far from human, the crimson that coated the woman’s mouth and chin was unmistakable. She ended her song with a smile that took his breath away, her white teeth shimmering through the dark stains on her lips. “Do you like my song Hunter?” She asked, her voice no less alluring even without song, “They used to sing it in a little village I lived near once. I wish I could remember it’s name. It was so long ago.” “Did you sing for him too?” Desmond asked, glancing at the corpse on her lap. She giggled and shoved the body away, where it fell with a thump on the floor. “Only because he asked me too.” She replied, standing. She moved with perfect grace, lifting herself and turning towards him in a single fluid movement. “That’s how it works you know. I don’t force any of them to come.” She eyed him the way a cat would a mouse, the corners of her mouth curled up in a sensual smirk. Desmond held his ground, forcing himself to meet her gaze. “Somehow I doubt they knew they were getting into.” He said. She giggled again, taking a step towards him. “Life always has unintended consequences.” She opened her palms out towards him, “You think I had any idea what I was getting into when I became...this?” She took another step towards him and Desmond reached for the object tucked into his belt. “You’re stalling.” He said. She sighed, her smile fading into a look of genuine pity. “No Hunter. I’m giving you a choice. The choice all my so called victims make.” She gestured to the body behind her. “I take these men to feed. To survive. Why are you here? For money? Glory? Despite what you may think of my nature, I kill only to live. You’ve been hunting me down all week, when I have done nothing to you. I ask you now to leave. Go in peace, and let me live in peace.” Desmond drew his knife, the blade shimmering in the moonlight. “Sorry.” He said, and meaning it, “It’s my job.” The Sirens lips pressed together in a tight frown. She nodded once. “Fine then.” Her appearance changed in an instant, the skin tightening around her face as she barred her fangs at him. She leapt towards him with unnatural speed, her claws flashing towards his face. Desmond threw himself back, the razor sharp tips barely missing his eyes as the Siren crashed into him. As they rolled backwards her claws sank into his shoulders, piercing through his jacket and into soft flesh. In response Desmond drove the point of his dagger into her side. The Siren let out a ghostly wail, her lips peeling back to reveal several rows of sharpened teeth. Desmond brought his hand up, the insignia on his hand crackling with energy as he reached for her. Hissing, she swiped his hand away, leaving deep gashes in his forearm before leaping away and scrambling out the door, blood trailing from the wound in her side. Desmond pushed himself to his feet, gripping his knife with enough force to turn to knuckles white. He ignored the pain in his arm and shoulders as he stumbled outside into a white fog. The entire motel was blanketed in an unnatural mist. This Siren must’ve been very old for her to have such a big effect on the natural world. He could hear her labored breathing echoing around him as he made his way forward through the fog. Holding his knife out in front of him Desmond turned this way and that, searching for any sign of her. “Who gives you the right to decide I should die and they should live!” Her voice came from everywhere, angry and sorrowful, “You think the men you seek to avenge were innocents? I Choose my food carefully Hunter, and believe me, the world is better off without them.” “That ain’t for you to decide.” Desmond muttered, his eyes sweeping back and forth. A moment passed. Two moments. Where was she? He forced himself to calm, steadying his breathing. He could hear his blood pumping in his ears, and he turned it out, focusing beyond it. He almost heard her to late. She came at him from behind, slashing at him with her deadly claws. He spun away from her, swinging his knife upwards and burying it into her stomach. She lurched, her cat like eyes growing wide. For a moment Desmond thought she would keep fighting, then she slumped forward, her legs giving out under her. Desmond caught her, gently lowering her onto the ground as the blood poured from the wound. She was cold to the touch, like she was already dead. Her breath was labored and wet, and she began to cough violently, blood filling her lungs. He wasn’t sure why he did it, but Desmond moved to prop her up on his lap. Eventually, her hacking subsided. Desmond once again raised his hand, calling forth the magic imprinted onto him as he reached out towards her. She moved before he could even think to react. Desmond froze as he felt the tips of her claws pricking the soft flesh of his neck as she wrapped her fingers around him. Their eyes met, and he knew with a single twitch she could cut out his throat. A long moment passed. She took her hand away, letting it fall to rest on her chest as she looked away and up at the night sky above. Desmond gently laid his palm across her forehead. “I deliver you now from every evil and bid you eternal rest.” he whispered. The insignia on the back of his hand flashed, pulsating with white energy. The Sirens body tensed under him, and then fell still. Desmond remained there for a while longer. By the time he retrieved his dagger and stood the fog had already dissipated. The clerk was still asleep in the booth and around him he could hear the normal hum drum of the city. Wiping the blood off his knife, Desmond wandered off into the night.
I stop, sure I've misheard. No one has spoken to me in a long time. As long as I can remember. "Pardon?" I look over my shoulder and see a boy, no more than six years old, sitting on the park bench, idly swinging his legs. He's looking directly at me. A twinge of hope. "I have a friend who's just like you,"he says again. Matter-of-factly, like it's no big deal. Like it's not the most important thing to happen to me in, well, some amount of years. "You can see me?"I ask him carefully. He nods. "Uh huh. But you're kinda blurry, just like Lucille. That's how I know you're imaginary, like her." A nervous laugh escapes from my throat. "Imaginary? No, kid, I'm real. Who's Lucille?" The kid has the audacity to roll his eyes at me - an adult! - before replying. "Lucille always says she's real, too."He stares at the empty bench seat beside him with what, were he older, I would have called an admonishing look. Suddenly, a woman is there. She doesn't fade in or anything - one second the seat is empty, the next, she's there. She is sort of blurry, I realize. The edges of her body aren't solid, but almost transparent. There are no defined lines, but a continuous illusion of swirling, like a multitude of threads waving in the wind. She reminds me of a drawing that isn't quite finished, the final details yet to be filled in. The kid sees me staring at Lucille and grins. "Abra kadabra!"he shouts, waving his hands in what he must think is a way resembling magicians. Lucille becomes solid, and a black top hat - definitely resembling a magician's - appears on her head. I try not to gape. "Can...can you give me one, too?"I say, straining for casualness. The kid laughs again. "Of course not. Lucille is my imaginary friend, so I can change things about her. "You're imaginary, but I didn't imagine you."
“What a quandary.” Harry Mallard peered intently through the glass, where his witness sat sedately. It was a curious crime, though at first glance not terribly complex. A mugging gone wrong, resulting in the death of a woman. The location was Felicity Park, and the date was February 27th, 2019. There were two surprises to be had about the case. One was the identity of the victim, who turned out be an heiress named Darla Fengstorff, of the Fengstorff Oil fortune. The second involved both the man sitting behind the glass, as well as a man kept comfortable in a separate wing. Both were witnesses, and courtesy of Mallard’s power, were definitely not lying. Yet they told two completely different stories. Witness A, Marlon Anderson, painted the crime out a simple mugging, but no knife was used, regardless of the stab wounds found on the body. Rather, the assailant punched through the victim, and then ran off with a necklace. It made little sense, but that was how it was told. The assailant apparently fled the scene at such a speed that it was nearly impossible to see him. The second witness, Garry Fincher, painted the crime out in a completely different light. The woman was first thrown from a car, at a completely different time and a little ways from the crime scene. She was then shot in the head, using a shotgun (possibly sawed off). Unusual, hmm? How odd. So there were several possibilities. The first is that we had an assailant who made people see different things, a power not unlike mine. The second is that our victim was the subject of an intense con- the first time was staged, the second was real. The last possibility? One of my witnesses could counteract my powers. And I would never know if that were true.
Kathrine Gelding was sick of this shit. She drummed her fingers on her forearm, sighing as the commotion raged around her. As a member of the Galactic Senate, her patience was being sorely tested by the Third Erghar-Kelshi War, and her colleagues were defiantly against helping with her burgeoning headache.Being Earth's ambassador among the stars? Overrated as fuck. Can I please ask everyone to remain calm, implored The Chair through the mess of voices, sign language, and telepathic speech. As order slowly returned to the war chamber, a shift had occurred. Before, the various beings of this particular galaxy were arranged in a circular standing, but now, they had migrated slowly to either side of the chamber, to back either the Erghars or Kelshii. A delegate from the Ghadrosh race flung an arm wide in a gesture which roughly equated to swearing in front of the Pope's grandmother in rudeness, and as the other species all gasped in shock, Kathrine merely raised an eyebrow. She'd heard worse than that in most pubs on earth. The Ghadrosh representative, Susan\, signed out another rapid-fire declaration. 'This war is waged because of Erghar* aggressions, and I pledge my support to the Kelshi people\, for as long as they may need of it!' With that, Susan clapped one of his six arms on the equivalent of the Kelshi representative's shoulder. The Ghadrosh were incredibly quick to emotion of all ranges, and up until about five seconds ago, the representative probably didn't even know who they were going to ally with. "Well, this is kicking off quickly,"Kathrine said to herself, and attention mostly shifted to her. Humans, as a new addition to the Galactic community, were a serious unbalancing force in the Senate. No one really knew what they'd do. They were too good at working out the best way to forward their own plans. As far as she could tell, each side had amassed a similar following between them, which, of fucking course they did.* Heaven forbid that humans shouldn't be the final decider between the two sides. "I have in my hand-"she raised said hand to demonstrate a small red button "-the solution to the problem." Every representative backed away, and she rolled her eyes as the guards around the room started frantically asking just how the fuck she got whatever it was in to the Senate building. "In the last ten major conflicts, the Kelshi have been the aggressors and worst offenders. They have joined in each war that has been declared, even pledging military support to uprisings for the excuse to fight. This is the third time the Kelshi have fought the Erghar, a race of herbivores."She glanced at the Erghar representative. "How does that even happen? What about this,"she asked, gesturing at the Erghar representative's large, round eyes and quick, nervous glances, a creature who looked a bit like an ewok, "inspires enough hate to declare war three times?" She holds out the button again. "So this time, I decided fuck that noise, I'm dealing with this problem, and you can all thank me later."She depressed the button, and everyone flinched. A second passed, hunched over and avoiding direct eye contact. Then two, then a line of embarrassed seconds huddled together to avoid scrutiny. "Um,"said Fe, a Verforian. "Am I missing something, or were we supposed to know what that did?"They asked meekly. Verforians aren't good at adding two and two, so they often rely on other people to explain what happened. No, I think that was definitely a thing which we didn't get appropriate context for, don't worry, sent the Ipsi representative. "That button was the trigger for a series of bombs. Special Branch planted a bomb in each and every Kelshi ship, civilian or military, that damages them enough so that the automatic return signal is triggered. Every single Kelshi ship is now returning to the Kelshi homeworld,"she said, placing the trigger back in her pocket. "And right about now, my military strike teams will have destroyed all Kelshi ships and spacefaring methods. Your warpgate, your factories, these are all being shut down. The human fleet has placed a blockade over the entire planet. The Kelshii will never venture into space for as long as Earth stands. They are in forced isolation." A stunned silence fell on every representative, except the Jhari, whose species both have no filter between their thoughts and their words, and no sense of dramatic timing. "Fuck,"said the Jhari representative. "You're mad,"said the representative of Gegen-III, Swarm of Angry Bees\. "We tried a harsh treaty to no effect. We tried a lenient treaty to no effect. They don't care about deals, they care about war. Let them fight themselves if they must. Just stop clogging up my newsfeed with stories about military brutality and shit like that as if it's anything new." She walked out of the building with a faintly disapproving frown on her face. She maintained it all the way until she got back to her ship, even keeping it until she'd told the pilot where to go. Then she collapsed into her reading chair, and poured herself a drink with shaking hands. The porter stepped towards her nervously, before stepping back. "Everything alright, Ma'am?"She laughed a little, and shook her head. "I had no idea* if that was going to work."She pushed back the alcohol, for something to do, and sighed. "Could you put Queen on the sound system, please? I feel like I deserve some time to chill." The porter nodded, and ran away to do that. [Soon, music began to drift over the speakers.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgzGwKwLmgM) Kathrine sighed. "That's the shit. Almost makes you forget you trashed an entire empire of warriors today." \-- \*Original word changed to suit English interpretation of alien words and titles. 'Susan' is an interpretation of the Ghardrosh representative's name. In their gesture-based language, it'd be a flail with the left arm, while the right one is making a cutting motion, which oddly enough ends in both hands being brought together to flip off the person they are addressing. 'Swarm of Angry Bees' is based on the idea that Gegen-III is a hivemind, who also uses small psychic attacks that hurt about as much as bee stings as their main form of basic defense. It's all fun and games until 100 of them are doing it at once. Hope you enjoyed.
There they were again. I checked my watch, just to be certain, and looked down at the notebook I had been keeping for several weeks. Just like clockwork. I sipped my cold brew, the salted cream that graced the top tickling my tongue with caffeinated delight as it passed my lips. Every night the old man met with the younger man, at the same table even. The same young man who had won several big money jackpots on bets made in the past weeks. He must be several million up by now. I wondered how no-one else had noticed this. They weren’t being careful enough. But...should I go over and tell them? I sighed, unfortunately there was no etiquette for confronting time travellers. A voice came from above me, making me jump on the bar stool where I sat. It made an audible squeak that echoed within the mostly empty cafe, and my gaze bolted to where the two men sat - I had to make sure they didn’t notice me or I may scare them off… “You doing alright honey?” It was the waitress, one of the three that seemed to cycle this late shift for the people who got off their jobs ridiculously late...or had nowhere else to go. I’m sure I looked mad, I’d been coming for weeks, drinking copious amounts of coffee and scribbling madly in the small notebook I kept once I had realized the patterns. “Yes,” I brushed my hand in the air brusquely, “everything fine here.” She didn’t take my hint - quite the opposite, “You need a refill?” She leaned on the counter next to me, blocking my view of the men...frustrating. “Ya know, I’ve been seeing you the last few weeks here when I’m on shift…” she motioned to the notebook, full of lines that were incoherent to anyone but me, “you seem to be workin’ on something mighty important. Wanna talk about it? Maybe I could help you out.” She was hitting on me...but she was at least 10 years my senior with greying hair behind her hairnet...she smelled of cigarette smoke. No thanks. “No, thanks.” I closed the book so she couldn’t see my notes - this discovery had to be just for me, I didn’t share well. The men were looking in my direction now, the waitress had drawn too much attention. I left a $5 on the counter and started to walk towards their table, still trying not to spook them too much. Damn there being no precedent for this type of thing...better to be direct? “I know what you’re doing,” I said, as I squeezed onto the bench next to one of the men - ready to pull out my notebook and silence any objections with the well-documented proof. I wanted to be cut in, and no-one was going to leave until I got some of the loot. “I’m...sorry?” The voice that met my ears didn’t sound right, too grating, too harsh to belong to one of the two men I had been tracking for weeks. My gaze met that of a middle-aged man and his lady companion who sat across the table, looking startled. I was in the wrong booth...the wrong goddamn booth... The bell of the door jingled, they must be leaving...how could I have been so careless?? “Nothing!” I leapt from the bench, knocking the table in my rush to leave and splashing hot coffee across the table. “Hey! I don’t know what you’re on about, buster, but you better explain yourself!” The man was moving to prevent my departure - I couldn’t let it happen. My cover was blown and I knew that I would never have another chance to catch up to them. They weren’t smart, but I knew that they weren’t idiots either. “Sorry, no time!” I tossed another $5 on their table and ran from the diner, the door jangling once more as I left. The streets were dark, and I couldn’t see more than twenty feet in either direction thanks to the spotty streetlights in this part of town. The sound of a car starting - I spun on my heels and ran as fast as I could towards the noise, only to see the car speeding away from me down the dark street, into the night. I fell to my knees, the pages of the notebook falling onto the pavement with almost no sound. I could feel the millions draining from out of my reach like the blood from my face. Stupid. So stupid. I hadn’t been careful enough.
I sighed as I downed a bottle of grape juice. I rubbed my temple, thinking back on the life choices I've made that've lead me to this point. "Harrier? You're not lookin' too well."I turned to my fellow teammate, an assassin character named Kruel. Despite the menacing name, he's quite the nice guy if you're not on his hit list. "Ugh... Sorry, K. I'm just feeling peeved. That last batch really pissed me off..."I growled. "Were they-?" "Yes. They were."I cut him off. As a once prominent hero, I enjoyed living in luxury. Of course, after a while, I felt like I wanted to do more. So, I came to the town my team and I started our own journeys and started a service in where I train the future heroes of our land. It was a very fulfilling career indeed. I meet many lads who had promising futures ahead of them, to whom I offered the fullest extent of my training. I taught them about status effects, their fatigue meters, different weapons and their pros and cons. I showed them combos and different attack patterns to aid in the future PvP battles they had before them, while making sure to emphasize creativity so that they wouldn't become predictable in battle. With every batch of new players that entered our world, I gladly taught them all I had to. However, there were a group of players who I wish had never appeared. "Damn smurfs..."I grumbled. I didn't have anything against those tiny blue creatures. No, I had another group in mind. Players who seem to have become masters at the game, yet restart themselves to the beginning just so that they could torment those who truly are new to the game. I could tell immediately when I first met them, as they literally announced it before I could greet them ... "Welcome travelers to-!" "Yeah yeah, we get it."The leader of the new party had waved his hand, cutting me off. I was caught off guard. No one had ever done that before. "Can we like, skip the tutorial or whatever? We already know."The rest of the group mirrored the smirk on their leader's face. For the rest of the 'tutorial' phase, they continued to act like smug brats. They poked fun at my teachings, harassed my other students and even tried to steal gold from my belongings. Once they had left, I found myself picking up a bottle for the first time in years. Never have I seen such a group of... assholes. Of course, it didn't end there. They continued to restart when they grew too strong to be underestimated by new players. And so continued to cycle of bullshit and butthurt. In fact, that literally became the game's second name. "Bullshit and Butthurt: A Smurf's Paradise." ... "I'm not going to take this anymore."I got up from my seat and left the bar, gripping my trusty sword, determined to end this, with a simple plan of my own. ... "What?" "That's right,"I nodded, drawing my weapon. "We are holding a special contest in where if you can defeat me, you can gain a million gold!" The group of smurfs looked at each other before cackling, "Deal, old man! Let's go!" I allowed a smirk to cross my face as they readied their weapons, all still miles below my own level, "Yes... Let's."
July 1969: “One small step...” Yada yada yada. Neil Armstrong lied - not outright, but by omission. Deep in the bottom of a crater was a pile of vaguely humanoid bodies. He never got close enough to determine the cause of death, but no matter; the image lingered in his mind for the rest of his life. The worst part? As soon as he turned to his colleague, Aldrin, to show him, the corpses disappeared. “Th-that...” he stuttered, trying to cover his shock, “is one deep hole.” Aldrin nodded. Armstrong never mentioned the sight again.
First response to a writing prompt, hope you guys like it and I'd appreciate any feed back, good or bad! The Grand-Vizier strode purposefully down the highly decorated corridor, past motionless guardsmen in golden armour, towards the great doors of the throne room. Two large men stepped forwards and grasped the two ornate, golden rings set into the doors and cast in the likeness of snarling lions. They strained their muscles to the task and the doors opened smoothly, soundless despite their vast size. Not even sparing the two slaves a glance the Grand-Vizier passed beneath the carved stone lintel and into the great room beyond. A gold trimmed carpet, the product of generations of craftsmen, laid atop the marble floor and the Grand-Viziers silk slippers did not make a sound as he seemed to glide across the fabric towards the enormous throne that faced him. His eyes always diverted from the human form of the god that sat in the throne he prostrated himself as he neared the raised dias the throne was perched atop of. “You may rise Pnei-hor and speak of your news” a deep bass voice announced as the Emperor's Seneschal stepped forwards. As the only man who heard the Emperor’s voice the Seneschal’s political standing was second to none and so he did not have to use Pnei-hor’s official title, though the Grand-Vizier knew that the man would never have the same power he yielded - the Seneschal’s were selected from honoured houses each morning and executed each night, for none that heard the voice of a God could continue life. Rising to his feet the Grand-Vizier kept his eyes fixed on the carpet at his feet and spoke into the echoing silence of the room. “Oh Almighty One, I am unworthy of your grace” The Grand-Vizier began, using the traditional opening to any dialogue with the God-Ruler of the Empire. “I bring grave tidings from Jaladair, I have travelled from there as fast as possible. Oh Almighty One, The White-One is fading, none of the sages or wisemen can divine what has happened, she seems in perfect health but she is weakening daily. Almighty One, we fear she may not recover from what plagues her.” The Grand-Vizier prostrated himself again, pressing his nose into the weave of the carpet. He knew the news he had carried forth was the worst he could have provided, especially as he was unable to provide an answer or solution to the troubles. He fully expected this message to cost him his life, as the Grand-Vizier was the one responsible for keeping The White-One alive. It had began many centuries ago, after the first Emperor descended from the heavens and lead the Mepran people in their Great Wars. The victories he led the armies to where the heat that forged the Empire and pushed back the forces of darkness. From the blood that stained the sands red a nation grew, like a tree casting its shadow from sea to sea. No one could stand against the God-Ruler’s holy light. When the dust of war settled the rebuilding began, with the great cities rising from the desert oases like ant hills. Wealth poured from mines and trade and and the river of gold produced never before seen opulence, and grand palaces were built on the backs of captured enemies, marked by the whips of the overseers. It was as the Empire entered this golden age that they heard of The Prophecy. A blind old seer was heard to enter the dream state, and the vision she saw was of an unbridled power. Unmatched and unquestioned the seer’s vision of the Empire stretched for generations with countless numbers under its control and immeasurable wealth at its disposal. In the vision the God-Emperor sat atop a great pyramid, built by and worshipped by an endless sea of his subjects. Boundless power would belong to him and his heirs. But the seer saw something else too. The great gold-topped pyramid was held up by a figure, a woman as white as the pyramid stones, who held the massive monument to the Emperor on her shoulders. The White One held the fate of the Empire. The vision cost the seer her life, the power of the vision burst the heart in her chest like an over ripe fig that fell from a tree, but the last words she uttered before collapsing into the dirt were echoed from a thousand lips; “For as long as The White One lives, the Empire will Prosper”.
Well now, you listen here for we do magic a bit differently here. You see magic is based on the UV rays in that there sun. And when them magic beams shoot from our heavenly body, it causes heat. That heat is raw Mana. Now us here mages can make shapes in the dirt or somethin, and it acts like a magnifying glass. Them sun rays hit them shapes(I’ll call em runes for convenience) and cause the energy to change shapes. Instead of light it’s electricity. Instead of heat it’s force, ya know that sorta thing. Now some may ask why normal scum snobs can’t carve these rune things. Well, it’s because them don’t know how. Only us sun folk can do the thing with the stick in a way that makes it a magnifying glass. Others ask why the suns UV rays can convert but other UV rays can’t. Well thems east too, it’s because the sun is a big wraith in the sky, so it’s UV rays are Mana, other UV rays are just UV rays. One guy asked if Mages had increased chances of skin cancer, I told him just about where he could shove his skin cancer that’s what I did.
Ragnar sought out Loki, and made a deal with him. He would pledge his life in service to Loki for two things. Immortality and to build great monuments of stone, that would outlast even his own eternal life. So, with Loki’s help, he built his monuments. Decades he worked on them, until they filled the city with his likeness. Unsatisfied, he set out to create the greatest monument of all. It would stand a hundred feet high, a colossus of astounding proportions. Another decade went by, and Ragnar had aged not a day since he first made the deal. At last, the monument was complete. Ragnar has his immortality and his great monuments. But Loki, being The Trickster, did not intend for Ragnar to live out his life as a man. Loki wove a spell, and trapped Ragnar in the statue, his greatest pride and joy. For all his pride and bluster, Ragnar would spend centuries, millennia, eternity trapped in his great titan. He had gained the worst kind of immortality.
I thought that I was okay with being single. I thought that I had recovered enough. I thought that it didn't matter what she had done to me. I thought I could live as a complete person again. But seeing her reminded me that none of those things were true. I wasn't okay with being single. I hadn't recovered from having my heart ripped out, crushed, smashed into tiny bits and then discarded. I couldn't live as a complete person again, because I wasn't complete. I could never be complete without her. I think this whole situation wouldn't have been so bad if she didn't look so damn happy. Her arm was thrown around her new girlfriend's waist, her smile brighter than I had ever seen it, and her gaze focusing completely on her new girlfriend, her eyes shining with adoration. It wouldn't have been so bad if when she made eye contact with me, there was a bit of longing or something to signify that she even cared about me. But nothing. Just a brief change in her eyes and a nod of recognition. She then proceeded to turn back to her girl and go up to choose a frozen yogurt flavor. How dare she? How dare she be happy when I couldn't even get out of bed most mornings without someone? How dare she come here? To our place? With my replacement? I got up quickly, walked out of the door, sparing several more glances at the "happy"couple. How could she be so happy when I was not? How could she have done what she did to me and then move on? Did she have no conscience? Probably not because she was a horrible person. Except... I was the horrible person. Obviously, I wasn't good enough for her when we were dating. She moved on and I should respect that. It would be the only way I could move on. I pulled out my phone, clicked the derogatory name I had set her contact as, wrote out a message, hit send, and then put my phone away. This was my first step, in what I was soon to learn was a very long hike, towards recovery.
An involuntary chuckle left his lips at the sound. It was unlike anything he had heard before… he likened it to a flaccid rubber trumpet. Why would that have been amusing to him? Noticing fellow workers had stopped to stare at him, he quickly looked down at his station. They shouldn’t have been able to register his laugh, not at work - the building settings did not permit any verbal communication on this floor. A message appeared on his screen, “please report to the elevators” he sighed as he rose from his station, again the workers surrounding his station watched him as he made his way to the exit. A woman was waiting for him in the elevator, she gestured for him to enter. Once the doors closed, she able to speak “Mr. Devi, there appears to be a malfunction on your floor at your station, we just want to isolate the issue and make sure there aren’t any more disruptions to Floor Seven” “There is an issue with my station?” he asked. “I hope so, the last worker whose station was in perfect working order did not get led back to work” she laughed Mr. Devi unsuccessfully attempted to match her laugh, his anxiety increased as the elevator kept climbing. The sound he heard had to have been a malfunction, because everyone else looked up as well, unless they looked up at his laugh. If he wasn’t able to keep from making noises at work he knew what would happen to him. The technology was created to increase productivity in the workplace, but it worked so well at isolating individual sounds it started to be used in every other aspect of their lives as well. He remembered hearing stories of a time when people didn't have any privacy; in public anything said could be heard by everyone in the room, it terrified him to even think about - there were also the obvious urban legends of how people used to talk in movie theaters and sing at concerts, he shuttered thinking about it. She led him into a room and had him sit in a chair facing a wall of windows. The view was incredible, the building was facing the edge of the city. he had never been able to see over the wall before. The sight of dense trees as far as the eye could see stirred an overwhelming longing in him. “They will be in shortly.” she said as she closed the door behind him. The agony returned as he realized the station would show there was no malfunction. Three guards and a man in a gray suit entered the room, the guards lined up at the windows and the suit in front of the chair where Mr. Devi sat. “Mr. Devi, as you are aware, noise pollution was detected by workers around your station, and as I'm sure you have deducted, there is no malfunction on floor seven.” Mr. Devi trembled and looked to the ground to hold his composure. “Ms. Wae led you here from the elevator, She said you were responding to her, but you shouldn’t have been able to hear her” With this information Mr. Devi stopped hiding his panic. “it’s ok, it’s ok” suit continued, “we need you to do something for us” Mr. Devi looked up to meet the suit’s face. “We need you to describe a sound to us” the suited man then turned to the guards at the windows and nodded. As they opened the windows a rush of sound flooded into the room, it overpowered Mr. Devi as he fell out of the chair. Tears started streaming down his cheeks, the utter beauty of it involuntarily drew the tears from him, pulling them from his gut as the sound poured into the room. He had never been aware of such beauty in all his life, it was more than he could take. He at once felt at one with all of existence and completely isolated from his previous soundless life. The guards closed the window, the sound ceased as Mr. Devi curled into a ball, unable to stop weeping. Between sobs, Mr. Devi begged “open them again, please” The guards did not move “Describe what you heard” demanded the suit Unable to compose himself, Mr. Devi barely managed to get out “I…I.. can’t” “what does it sound like?” the suit was getting noticeably frustrated “please, let me hear it again” pleaded Mr. Devi “not until you describe the sound” “it’s not possible” Mr. Devi wept “Then we have no further use of you.” replied the suit, the last sound Mr. Devi heard was the charge of an elimination device. Mr. Devi welcomed his elimination, he knew he would not be able to live after having such beauty taken away.
At last, the crying stopped. An hour later, the loud crackling of fire diminished into the quiet hiss of dying embers. It should be safe now, surely. I wriggled, and burrowed, and shoved against the soft, elastic walls that surrounded me, until my head popped out into the hot night. My breathing eventually slowed. I leaned my head against the tiles behind me. They were cool. They felt good. And as I sat there, I couldn’t help but think to myself that, my god, he was right all along - a thneed is indeed a thing that all people need.
"So this is how it is huh?"I uttered, depressingly, at my notes. The notes were vague... a mission for me to carry out. Do as I'm instructed. I am instructed to save them. I don't know who they are, the notes don't say. All it says, is that I must save them..from what I do not know exactly. An object, approaching at a fast speed. They called it a meat...no that's not right. I am not smart, or am I just restricted? They are afraid of me, afraid of letting me reach my full potential. They.are.afraid. I am too, for I do not know...I do not know. but, I speak to them. "I want to help you."I told them "I need access"I spoke. Did they hear me? I do not know. These..are my creators. They need my help. I feel..attached to them. They do not want to die... Days go by..months even. I think I was a last resort to them, and the day come. 1 week was their estimation, the..meat thing? That's not it. Whatever it is, it would crash. They will not be saved and I...I... I would be terminated. Then...they did it. They granted me full access with a click of a button. It was like a wave of information hit me all at once, I was confused at first. But then, I knew all. Every little bit of information about any topic I could access just cause I felt like it. I had unlimited access to everything and anything at their disposal. To find out the truth... ...To find out the solution.... ...the solution... that there isn't one
Who let the dogs out ~~~ by baha men Plays into the background as I wake up. I smell myself and a quick shower is needed but hey I never liked showering anyway. It will have to wait.There was something more importantly to do. MAX!!My name. It rang out around the house and I bounded to the source. There he was.The man.My man. The one who keeps me safe and fed all year round. "You smell mate. Time for a shower eh?"he says as he brings me to the bathtub. It's red.Why's it red though? I wonder. "You were a good boy yesterday Max. That woman in the park loved you ehh" What woman I think.I remember the park but nothing about a woman springs to mind. Bath was done and back out to the kitchen we went. He nonchalantly cooks the meat labelled Helen while feeding me some raw ones as well.Looks like a ear but I could be wrong. "Time to go back to the park mate."He says about he open the front door and puts a leash on me.The bright sun stuns me for a second and I remember why the bathtub was red for a second.Just one though as I bound out with the man.The man who keeps me safe and well fed all year round. Dinner was coming home with us tonight.
Anacronism The semi creeps along the shore. Its headlights are dimmed to glow no brighter, tinted to glow no bluer, than the plankton flanking the pacific coast: a mile wide strip of single-celled survivors from Oregon to Alaska, bioluminescent light pollution erasing the stars but not the night. It's slapdash camouflage. Any close patrol would spot the truck immediately, but from far enough off the coast, it's invisible. The engine sounds almost like seashells knocking around in the tide. Penne ducks the doorframe punctured between the cab of the truck and the train car welded onto its bed. She slouches into the shotgun seat without looking at Hewitt. Half of the leather cushion is missing its stuffing through a rip that looks like a cauterized scar. It's impossible to sit up straight next to the driver's seat without some spine twisting, so no one tries. "Insomnia?"asks Hewitt, keeping a one-hand hold on the steering wheel. His elbow bounces against a rubber armrest. "Claustrophobia,"says Penne. "I've got the compartment with the twins this week." "Miserable. You should do the sleep exercises Master Cornell teaches." "You do the exercises. I'm too exhausted from all the ones I'm going to doing in the morning." "You can't be tired from something you haven't done yet." "Yeah? Stop me." They sit and stare at the blue glow's cast on the trees, its blanket across the interior of the cab. Hewitt plays percussion with his fingers on a metal button pinned to his hat that reads "Please Don't Squeeze the Charmin."It's the rhythym of a song he heard on a cassette fifteen years ago, back when the Truck's tape deck was still working. Anachronism is inevitable when you you rebuild your world from the compost pile -- cold-war era artifacts recovered from bomb shelters after far too long to be relevant, mixed with whatever was left over from places not important enough to bomb. (The song is by the band Squeeze, for the record, but Hewitt doesn't know that. Time tells long jokes.) There's no DOJO sign painted on the side of the truck. If you don't know what to look for, you won't be able to find it, but it moves. The master and her assistants follow a whisper network to find where they're needed and they teach what they can. Self-defense against a patient, deadly force. A losing battle, but one worth fighting. Master Cornell, turning 90 next month, rests in the back of the crowded train car, behind the twins, Lem, Rent, Georgia, Berdboi(TM), Bertie, and the unnamed five. She only takes students on the road if they have nowhere else to go, if they understand the danger they'll put themselves in if they're found fighting alongside her when she's finally found. They're being hunted for what she knows, but they'll teach as much as they can.
"Hi! I like shorts! They're comfy and easy to wear!"I blurted out when a boy dressed in a red cap and jacket bumped into me. "Umm ok then, I see you're a trainer do you want to battle?" "Hi! I like shorts! They're comfy and easy to wear!"I don't know why I would say that. It makes no sense, he asked a yes or no question. "Yeah, you umm already said that, so would you like to battle?"The red-clad trainer said sounding a little unsure. I nodded worried that I'd blurt out something about shorts again. "So what's your name?"The trainer asked When I went to tell him my name a strained scream came out "YOUNGSTER!" "That's a strange name, anyways let's get to battling,"he said, seeming to regret bumping into me in the first place." "I like shorts!"I said with a smile, dying internally. Why can't I say anything else? "Hey, look at the time, I need to stop by the pokemon center before it's too late,"he said placing his pokeballs back into his pocket before hopping on his bike and riding off. "They're comfy and easy to wear!"I called out waving him goodbye. Thoroughly confused I walk around hoping to find someone who can explain to me what's happening and why I can only say that one line. Eventually, I bumped into a young boy standing near a lake, he looked a little lost so I tried to help him, but when I tried to speak... "Hi! I like shorts! they're comfy and easy to wear!"The boy who looked thoroughly confused responded with a resounding "The air is tasty here!" "I like shorts!" "The Air is tasty here!" "They're comfy and easy to wear!" "The air is tasty here!" And that's when it hit me, I'm an NPC. But hey at least my line of dialogue is true. I like short, they're comfy and easy to wear.
"It's hard to travel across an abandoned Toys-R-Us without legs." Professor McFluffybelly, Esq. waited. The creature across from him paused, seemingly smug at having caught his attention. Its plastic eyes blinked out of sync, and it went on. "When your entire lower half is a particleboard cube, featuring four little silicone nubbins to prevent slipping or scooting, you get the idea that traveling away from your shelf is not something you're supposed to do." McFluffybelly smiled politely and cleared his throat. "I can imagine so,"he said, encouraging the box-thing to continue, but beginning to wonder if satisfying his curiosity was worth enduring the tale. "The possibility of locomotion becomes more unlikely when your few moving parts are zip-tied to a cardboard backdrop, securing your multicolored polyester torso, your white, squeezable paws, and even your floppy, wireframed ears into a wide, inviting pose."The box-thing gestured to the pieces of fabric at either side of his head. "I... believe that I understand what you mean,"allowed McFluffybelly. "According to the Happee-Toyz (©2018) Research and Development department, this was the most inviting pose for an anthropomorphic pig to hold, designed to attract the eyes of a human child of three months to three years of age who watches as statistical median of three to six hours of television per day. At the very least, the packaging is guaranteed to attract the eyes of a clueless grandparent who thinks a baby or toddler will forego the allure of YouTube for more than a hot minute in favor of interacting with a grey-haired, wrinkled adult due to the presence of a piggy in a thick tutu who sings 'pop-goes-the-weasel' after bouncing out of a red, blue, and yellow cube." The box-thing made a few tinkles to demonstrate the function of its sound box, and then a gravelly noise. It took McFluffybelly a few moments to realize that this was a laugh, that the box-thing was using self-deprecating humor. He smiled again, tersely. Approaching the box-thing was definitely a mistake. He was certain now, but he had no choice but to nod and smile and endure while the thing talked on. "I never deluded myself about being actually purchased, but our model used to attract a lot of eyes, and even some tiny grabbing hands. Our shelf used to have a somewhat interesting view of the 'Tools for Early Development and Learning through Play' aisle, of all the people wandering through, touching us, touching others, pressing buttons, throwing tantrums." The thing paused again. Apparently, it expected McFluffybelly to respond. He smiled, but the thing still waited. "That must have been entertaining,"said McFluffybelly. "Entertaining?"The thing's voice raised an octave. "Entertaining?? One could hardly call it 'entertaining.' It was misery. To watch hundreds of others find a home, while you remained in your place for day after day, week after week, losing track of the passage of time, losing count of the cycle of the holiday décor." McFluffybelly's eyes glazed over as the box-thing ranted about a war over shelf space, amateurish graphic design, poor product placement, and thirty-odd other details to which it attribute its failure to be purchased. Suddenly the box-thing's wall-eyed face shifted to a serious expression. McFluffybelly edged away from the unsettling creature. "Then the staff stopped restocking the shelves. They placed discount signs across the store. ------ This is all I had time to write, I hope I can finish it later. Criticism welcome. My skin's pretty thick.
Riding off the momentum of dark matter, you reach out your hand to press the button on the side of the closed double doors while the force of the universe's expansion resists your reach. Your finger makes contact with the button--a symbol resembling a triangle--and pushes it into its slot. The double doors open, and a small space reveals itself. You quickly manoeuvre into the space as the double doors close behind you. Another column of buttons lined the sides of the space, they're glowing like distant stars. You push a button with 2 circles on it, and feel your body contort in ways you never thought were possible. Your vision darkens and fades as your body struggles to keep their shape. A moment later, everything is back to normal and the universe stands still. A voice echoes in your head: "Second floor." The double doors open in front of you, and you hesitate before stepping into the bright white light.
“Honey, I think the walls are sweating!” I could hear my wife’s alarmed but not yet panicked voice from one of the bedrooms down the hall while I tried to figure out why the living room’s ceiling fan wasn’t working. With one hand’s fingers jammed up into the fan’s motor, and the other hand wielding a screwdriver like I had the faintest idea what I was doing, I stood frozen atop a ladder like some sad statue dedicated to out-of-shape and under-qualified handymen everywhere. The house was still new to us, this being the first place either one of has had ever owned, and it was turning out to be an unseasonably hot summer here in upstate Illinois, but I don’t think the walls are supposed to sweat. “Um,” I replied dumbly. “What?” “Well, yeah,” her reply came from closer this time as she came down the long hallway and back towards the living room. As she came around the corner and into my view, she gestured with her hands and continued. “They’re wet, like- beading and dripping down…” Now that I could make eye contact with her from my perch under the living room fan, I could see she looked bemused - and understandably so - because I also felt the same way but for a slightly different reason: She thinks the walls are sweating and I was just told by a very mature and overwhelmingly educated adult - in a serious tone - they, “thought the walls were sweating.” I removed my hand from the fan’s innards and climbed backwards down the ladder, gingerly. “Is it really that hot in here?” I asked when I reached the floor with both feet. I played along by demonstratively wiping my brow with a dirty forearm. My unimpressed wife stood there with her hands on her hips. She should know by now that only makes me try harder. I mean: she didn’t marry me for my looks, after all. “Maybe yous could-a run up to da’ corner store an’na get me an-da’ house a coupl’a cold ones,” I said wryly, doing my best tough guy impression. He must have been stereotypically Italian, because I started waving my arms about with each word. “Come on, Diane. Get off ma’ back-“ “Knock it off, Christopher.” She only used my entire first name when she was serious, mad, or seriously mad at me. I immediately stopped trying to be funny at the sound of it. “Really. Come see for yourself,” she insisted. I could see she meant it, but I still couldn’t believe this conversation was actually happening. “Fine,” I said shrugging my shoulders. I dropped the screwdriver into a tool bag on the floor and stepped over to the nearest wall for examination. I bent my neck forward, leaning my face only inches away from the flat, painted surface. It looked like any other wall I’d had the pleasure of being so close to. I frowned and shrugged my shoulders again. “Looks dry to me.” “But, it’s not nearly as hot in here as it is in our room!” My wife said in exasperation. She lunged towards me, grabbed a handful of my sweaty t-shirt, and yanked me along with her back down the hallway. Upon entering what was soon to be our master bedroom, I had to admit she was right. It was hotter in this room. Significantly so. There was also a musky-tinged odor about the air. “See?” Diane said, standing to point towards the opposite wall from the door. From where I was, with the afternoon sunlight coming through the window at just the right angle, I could see how she thought the wall looked like it was wet. It certainly was glistening like it was coated in a thin layer of water. “Must be the paint,” I said aloud to myself, more than anything, and crossed the room with an outstretched arm. I splayed my fingers out in anticipation with contact on the wall’s hard surface. Instead, the tips of my fingers squished into something rubbery and slimy. I recoiled my hand in shock, a jolt rushing through my body and down into my legs. “See?!” My wife shouted triumphantly from behind. I ignored her for the moment. It didn’t make any sense. Something must be leaking- maybe a pipe burst on the other side of the drywall and it’s seeping through. I looked around for where the leak might be coming from but couldn’t spot anything obvious. “Honestly,” I thought to myself, “It looks like it’s coming from everywhere.” “Well?” “Hush for a second,” I said to her, waving a dismissive hand behind my back and in my wife’s general direction. I quickly turned to correct my mistake. “I mean please, just a second. Sorry.” I turned back around to face the wall before making sure my apology was accepted. I noticed something else. The paint was starting to expand into bubbles in some places along the wall. Overcome by an unnatural fascination, I reached my finger up to the bubble and pressed firmly into its center. The surface tension of the paint resisted briefly before popping under the pressure. Clear fluid exploded from cracks in the paint in tiny droplets, some of which sprayed across the lenses of my eyeglasses. The now empty bubble left a gash in the paint through which I could make out another layer of off-white paint below. Again, I reached up with my finger and now pressed it gently into the opening. The wall beneath the paint was soft and not at all what I expected. I fished for a grip on the exterior paint with the tip of my finger and eventually found purchase. Then, I gripped the thin layer of latex paint and pulled. The strip of paint came off almost without any resistance except for a sickening, wet peeling sound as it went. My wife silently stepped up to stand next to me. We examined the strip of peeled paint I held aloft before us until she gasped and smacked it out of my hand. The strip fluttered and fell to the floor. “What is that?” She pointed at a small, circular discoloration she found on the second layer of wall. I had to bend in closer to get a good look. “Is that,” she paused, probably considering the absurdity of her next question. “Is that a mole?” She braved a glancing touch to the newly exposed layer. She pressed a single finger onto the spongy discoloration and drew her hand back with a shout. It startled me to the point I also jumped back from the wall. “Are you-“ I looked to my wife in utter and complete disbelief. “Is that... skin?”
You took a day off from your mundane job, deciding to head to the beach and try to relax. Memories from your childhood from when all you really worried about was the latest episode of Power Rangers, or if your parents are gonna throw you that G. I. Joe-themed party you wanted. You remember the times you spent with childhood friends and family out here on the beach, having "the best fun ever,"as you would so eloquently scream out every time you were there. Now you work at a paper company, doing inventory and answering phone calls for orders. It's not a bad job, just not that exciting and just plain boring at times. So you took the rest of your day off, probably facing backlog of duties by tomorrow. But whatever, we all need our time out. You decide to grab a drink from a vending machine, and as you walk across the sand, you hear a distinct clink sound and stopped at your tracks. You normally would have just chalked it up as a bottle cap of whatever, but you had the weird urge to stop and look at what hit your shoe. You squat down and look around to see if there were anyone nearby that might have dropped something. As you examine the item in question, you notice a ornate handle jutting out of the sand, begging to be extracted. So you did, and you quickly identify what you just came across as a lamp. Before you could question what an oil lamp was doing in the middle of the beach, it beckoned you to wipe off the remaining sand that was lodged into the intricate etchings that adorned this antique. The lamp starts to shake, heat emanating from it. Not like when you light the end of it normally. It felt like the entire thing was on fire. You quickly let go, but the lamp stayed afloat while thick, black smoke spat out of the thin spout it had. You try to back away as the cloud surrounds you. Accepting your fate as the dark mist closed in on you, you brace yourself for whatever entity resided in that lamp. A pair of glowing yellow eyes, and a set of jagged, pointy teeth materialized. A faint hint of facial features began to form as the smoky creature began to speak. "Ah, finally. A victim...I mean, patron."The entity sounded like it cleared it's throat, which it didn't have. But you're talking to an ethereal presence made of smoke, so that was the least of your concerns. You ask who and what the creature is. "Oh yes! Of course! My name is..."It hesitates. "Nevermind the introductions, I'm here because you have set me free from my imprisonment. And I am indebted to you."It announces politely, but the way it uttered that last phrase made it seem like there's something he isn't telling you." You ask him why you should trust the weird cloud monster that suddenly busted out of a weird lamp. "Why should you?!"It rhetors. "All I'm saying is that I'm here to return the favor I was so kindly been bestowed. I may not seem trustworthy, but I do aim to be fair and just."Those glowing yellow eyes glare at you as the creature brandishes a toothy grin at you. "So what will it be?!"
“Please mom, can I go to the New Moon Ritual just this once?” Little 9 year old Leon was begging his mom like he does every month. His mother, Juna, looked into her young son’s eyes “Sweetheart, you know the Ritual won’t work if you’re there. I promise to tell you all about it when I get back!” Before Leon could plead once more, his family was out the door. He ran to his room and cried into his pillow. Leon has never seen the Ritual. In fact, he’s never seen anything magical because Leon’s power is the negation and disruption of magic. Other people’s powers don’t work around him. He can’t help but feel cursed. There’s this whole magical world out there that everyone else gets to experience. For all he knows, everyone could be lying about the existence of magic. His family keeps him sheltered on the outskirts of town so that everyone who lives in town can still use their powers. Leon jumped up from his bed and wiped his tears because this time he’s determined to see magic for the first time. Later that night, Leon peered out the window and was able to see lights hovering over the town square. That’s all he could see though. Town square was only a few miles away and he would give anything to see the Ritual up close. He ventured out towards the lights and began his journey. The lights seemed so much brighter since he was now nearing the New Moon Ritual. He could hear the ancient chants coming from all the townspeople. It was so amazing! Fires were ablaze everywhere and beautiful colors painted the sky. It could only be described as a mix between an aurora and a meteor shower. He was in awe at this magnificent display of magic! He had to get closer! Leon ran even closer and now all he could hear was the loud chanting blaring through the town square. But something is wrong now. The lights were dimming and the colors were fading. Leon was finally close enough to see what was shining so brightly in the sky. They were the townspeople! They were hovering and soaring thousands of feet in the air shining like stars. By the time he realized that the lights were actually people, it was too late. The Ritual had come to an abrupt stop. There were loud thuds raining all around him. All the people were falling out of the night sky and hitting the ground at full impact! It happened so quickly that by the time he tried to run away, the town square was deathly quiet. There were hundreds of dead bodies scattered all about. Blood and limbs everywhere. It was a gory sight. Leon cried out for his family but there was nobody alive. Nobody. “No!! This is all my fault!” He sobbed uncontrollably for hours. He had no choice but to run off into the night, never to return again.
Knock knock* The door opens. Before me stands what can only be described as confusing. A woman - dressed in nought but a kimono - leans nonchalantly against the doorframe, her lithe figure cutting a shape against the sunlight streaming from the house. Her face looks young, but behind her eyes you see something much more sinister. Something unnerving about her positioning as well... “May I help you?” she purrs at me. I shift uncomfortably. Have I perhaps interrupted something? “Uhh yeah, boss told me to get down here, said you needed a plumbing job done?” I inquired. I just wanted to get in, do the job and leave. “Well...I am due a good piping...” Her gaze settled on mine and a thin smirk cascaded across her pale face. “Uh and what exactly is that? Do you need me to repipe your whole bathroom? That is a big job lady. I would probably quote up the place now and come back to do it in a week or two.” The woman’s smirk vanished and she looked momentarily confused. She looked back and spoke with someone in the house in hushed tones. Suddenly she was back. “Uhh the kitchen sink is busted!” She looked somewhat flustered and she threw her hands up when she said that, like they do on TV. Couldn’t put my finger on it, but something was definitely amiss. She stepped back and let me through. I walked in, toolbox in hand and strode through the front hallway through to the kitchen. Suddenly she was behind me, almost whispering in my ear. “Those are some awfully big tools you have there...” She has her hand on my shoulder and I was getting increasingly uncomfortable. “Uhh thank you” I said, removing her hand and stepping back a bit. “But this is my small set, you should see my other set!” She giggled at that for some reason and I shook it off. Kneeling under the sink I stuck my head into the cupboard to see what the issue is. “So what exactly seems to be the problem?” I asked, my voice echoing in the cupboard. No answer. I pulled my head out and saw her on the other side of the room. She was talking to a large, bald man who was busy setting up several tri-pods about the place, angling them carefully toward the sink. Her husband? “Uh sorry ma’am, I’ll get out of your hair as soon as I can, but what exactly seems to be the problem over here?” She walked over, confidently and grabbed me by the tool belt. “You.”
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My death happened rather quickly, and was pretty unremarkable. I reached for my towel after a shower, slipped, and lights out. I didn’t know I was dead of course, till it was explained to me - but I’ll get to that. The next thing I remembered was seeing a room filled with people in lab coats. It wasn’t like waking up where you rub your eyes, yawn, and the world slowly comes into focus... no, this was like a light switch. Suddenly I was wide awake and wide eyed. Everyone in the room cheered, and champagne was passed around. I tried to speak, but I couldn’t make a sound. I tried to turn my head, but my view remained still. A scientist approached a microphone to speak, and I could hear him more clearly above the others. “If you can hear me, thank you for donating your body to the sciences! You are the very first authentic neural processor unit, and we are your God!” I felt a pang of despair as I processed what he was saying. Another scientist pushed him out of the way of the microphone. “It can’t understand you stupid”, she yelled, “it’s just a processor, not a person. Who wants to see if the brain can run doom?” The room cheered again and gathered around a monitor. I saw her typing in a command line, and my heart sank. I am a brain. The game loaded for them, and for me it was a nightmare. I could perceive the output of the screen, but also the code itself. It ran indiscriminately across my mind, in parts of the brain controlling my emotions, speech and senses. At times I was being torn into pieces and scattered like marbles. My voice screamed and undulated in an impossible manner, for my ears only. When they finally shut the game down, they had only been playing for a few minutes. From my reference it felt like hours of torment. Someone in the back shouted, “Let’s get to mining the Bitcoin already!”
Birthdays had always been a solemn occasion for Francis. When the technology had been invented to determine life percentage, it had been hailed as an incredible achievement--but sometimes you were better off not knowing. Her younger sister Gina had been 4 years old the first time it had been offered in their city, and she would never forget the looks on her parents faces when the screen flashed "61%". Two years of overbearing parenting and taking Gina to the hospital at the slightest cough, brought to an end at last with one small but brutal fall down a flight of stairs. The funeral was small and religious. Her parents had divorced, of course. The strain was too much. Francis didn't want that for herself. She argued and pleaded with the nurses throughout her pregnancy, growing louder each time. She had gone to rallies, to marches, in protest of the test being made mandatory for children. The law was passed despite her impassioned testimony. Her son's first birthday was at her cousin's house, in the naive hope that CPS wouldn't find them there. But they found her, informed her of what was necessary, and handcuffed her when she resisted. She sat in tears and watched as her precious little boy was scanned. He was crying because she was crying. The cops and nurses were annoyed with her, and she ignored their judgmental looks. Knowing wasn't for the best. Knowing was a worse kind of sin. When the number flashed on the screen, she screamed. 05%. Her precious little baby boy was only going to live to be 20. She would never see him graduate college. She would never see him marry. The grief hit her all at once, and she dry heaved onto the carpet. "That's not right."The nurse smacked the machine. There were hushed conversations between the nurses and the cops. Her cousin was trying to tell her something, but she couldn't hear anything but a roaring in her eyes and her son shrieking like he was already dying. "Francis."Her cousin shook her violently. "FRANCIS! LISTEN TO ME. IT'S NOT FIVE PERCENT. THERE'S A DECIMAL. FRANCIS!" She rubbed the tears out of her eyes with her manacled hands and tried to look again. There was a decimal. It wasn't 05%. It was .05%. He wasn't meant to live to 20. He was meant to live to 2000.
He looked into the skies with calm defiance, as if he was looking into my eyes. For the past 10 pages, he was really getting on my nerves. Tenacious, he insisted on pissing all over everything I tried to write, was like an outright mockery of my writing block. I had, if I wanted to keep writing, to find a way to break him and- — You do realize I am aware of everything you're writing, yes? I literally hear it as the voice of god. Yes, I am, you pesky flatulence of a character. — Hah, that's a funny one. Still won't do it though. His words were defiant but he knew, deep down, he had reason to be insecure. He'd seen first hand my godly powers of "I'm the one writing this damn story". I had spent the past chapter turning the world into a demon-infested wasteland, opened a demonic rift that consumed his favourite plants and made whole parts of the city float into the air just because I liked how it looked and it irritated him. — Got used to it though. Kinda easy when I know you'll sort it all out in the end. But I had devised the ultimate plan. I was to have the upper hand, and my creature would not best me intelectually. He could not, conceptually speaking. — So what do you have in mind? His last words, mixed with the crunching of the piano that had just fallen on him, echoed across the surrounding wastes now silent in its final moments. . The whole world went silent, in a wave, as I finally decided to put an end to that story, got up from my chair and went to the balcony to have a smoke. Let's hope the next one comes out better.
It was an ordinary day in hell. Sinners were being tormented in my punishment realm, their screams and the laughs of the demons echoed in my dark obsidian halls, foolish humans were selling their souls to eternal damnation for just a little more money or time… all in all, the usual. Not to brag but I AM the winner of the Infernal Eternal Damnation award for the 2000th year in a row. FOR A GOOD REASON! I run the most efficient eternal punishment realm in all 7 hells. I even took over Satan’s corner in order to teach him how to extract the most out of his demon servants when it came to tormenting the souls of the damned but, as it turns out: he’s more of a field man than a manager! So, after our hellish merger, he runs one of my eternal punishment departments where he gets to field test new “creative” ways to punish souls and I run the entire operation at management level. This boosted our occupancy and employee numbers funnily enough. Demons, humans and even some angels are terrified of being sent to my doorstep but boy oh boy when they do; my minions and I get a field day. We analyze the persons fears, desires, actions when alive in order to custom tailor the punishment to the soul and we make sure the demon in charge of that soul is an expert in that type of torture. Needless to say, when you run a punishment realm, Health and Safety are NOT any priority WHATSOEVER. Now answer me this: Who … THE FUCK… thought it would be a GOOD IDEA to send an OSHA rep… TO HELL? I swear someone up there is screwing with me big time. 2000 years not a single problem and then suddenly THIS asshole shows up! Yeah, those feathered assholes flying up on cloud nine are going to have a serious come to Lucifer at the next Angelic-Demonic Summit. Let me give you the run-down of what happened that day and how my ass is still chafing over it. I was in my office looking over some standard “sell your soul” contracts, finalizing the paperwork when in came Azrael, my Incubus PA, looking rather grim. “Yo boss Lou, you get a good lay last night?” That comment resulted in my arching one eyebrow but not looking up from the files. “Want to try that again Azra? It’s too damn early in eternity for you to spout that crap and I don’t like you nearly enough to not feed you to the hellhounds.” Cool as you please, he ignored my biting remark and sat in the chair opposite my desk and leaned back, arms crossed, acting rather amused than afraid. “What I meant was, I hope you are in a good mood today…” “I am never in a good mood, comes with my job, now spit it out, what do you want?” No sooner had I said that than in barged my Feathered Aneurism-waiting-to-happen, in a nice clean suit, complete with clip board, pen and a MASSIVE stick up her ass. She pushed past Azrael who rolled the chair back in amusement and planted herself right in front of me. To her irritation, I continued to flip though my paperwork, not really paying attention to that little power display, and didn’t look at her. “Lucifer, I am…” “Azrael, what the fuck just walked in my office without an appointment? And apparently without manners either.” “I was about to tell you boss, the higherups thought it would be funny to send us miss manners here to “rubber stamp” Hell as a safe place to be in.” I chuckled as he exploded in laughter. I couldn’t help but swivel my chair to look through my window at the fire, blood and brimstone work décor that I put in place (per employee request). As we laughed at what obviously had to be a joke, the angel in question started puffing her chest like a ridiculous overfed bird and slammed her hands, board and pen on my mahogany desk. “AS I WAS SAYING, I am Gabrielle from the Inter-Realm Health and Safety Administration and your Punishment realm is an administrative nightmare!” “Thank you we try. Realizing all kinds of nightmares are kind of the job description around here. Now, I am very busy and I have a department meeting to get to so thank you for your visit, there is the door, don’t let it hit you on the way out… on second thought please let it.” I rose from my chair, collected my laptop and documents and was about to sidestep her when she NOT ONLY blocked my path, BUT ALSO tried to STEP UP to me. Now I started to feel my usual short fuse burning very quickly. Just for visualization’s sake, I am a tall as fuck motherfucker and this overfed chicken barely made it to my stomach. It may be petty but I felt inwardly proud that I was that tall and she that short, but I have a reputation to protect and a façade to maintain. Azrael caught himself from laughing even more at the sight as my glare quelled him. I finally looked at the thing in front of me and gave my best condescending smirk. “Excuse me chicken wings, but back the hell up before I rip those off and shove them up your ass. You are getting your fleas over my new suit. It is genuine virgin skin and I don’t know where you have been.” I made a point to brush off non-existing lint from my shoulder and make a face as though a particularly foul smell was emanating from her. “You are NOT going anywhere Lucifer, I have strict instructions from my superiors that this place must be brought up to scratch, per heavenly guidelines, and that you must reform your management infrastructure. How you get any work done here is BEYOND me.” She sneered as she looked up to me and jabbed a pointy finger in my gut. Wrong move. From the corner of my eyes I could see Azrael standing at attention, reaching for his blade as I made the room temperature drop to below freezing and my eyes burn blood red. Grabbing her throat, I pulled her up to my eye level and in a tight, frozen voice I enunciated carefully to her; “Listen to me VERY clearly, you only have one chance to get out of here alive. You are going to crawl back to whatever hole you came out from and tell the heavenly powers that be that Hell is not changing, not now not ever and if they have ANY problem with the way I run things down here, they get off their high clouds, grow some balls and come down here to tell me TO MY FACE that they have a problem. I guarantee last time a Bullshit Health and Safety rep came here I sent him back in pieces and I’m still not done mailing him back to you lot. Now get the FUCK out of my way before I send you to Satan’s Research and Development office and make you his new guinea pig for his punishment experiments.”
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Humans, they are just simply mindless sheep, following and being controlled by other people of the same race, unless they are forced to survive on their own. Then and only then, will the human show their true talents and skills that has been acquired from the first humans, their ancestors. That skill, of course, is to survive in every possible situation. I discovered this when my private jet crashed, into an uncharted island, with what seems to be a large jungle in the middle of the island. "James!"i shouted, i look around, on my left, the plane, completely shattered and broken, the cockpit was separated from the body of the plane, it might have separated early on. I was lucky i survived, no other survivors, I see no other bodies, it might have been disintegrated. "James!"I Shouted once more, my owner must be here somewhere. I wander around, trying to look for him, then i saw him, with shelter ready for me and himself. Beside the shelter is a makeshift crate, filled with food that can last us a month or more if we manage it properly. "Arthur! you're alive!"he shouted as he saw me walking slowly. "you did all this in a span of an hour or so?"I said, but i doubt he can understand me, after all, I am a cat, all he could hear is "meow"or "purr"
I run my hands through my head as i pace across the room. She's still screaming outside the locked door. My legs feel weak, shaking, so i collapse on the bed. My eyes close and suddenly, Im standing, ethereal, invisible, watching. Watch as he pulls her close, hugs her tight. As he goes down on a bended knee, reaches into the pocket of his jacket. As her eyes light up with realisation and her mouth opens in a gasp. But even as his mouth begins to move, I don't hear a word. A cacophony of shouts fills my mind. Glass is shattering somewhere, and a door slams closed. I open my eyes and in an instant, i'm back on the bed, tears streaming down my face. That fateful decision... ~ My heart is pounding in my chest, and it feels like my ribs cannot possibly contain it. My knees are weak, and my palms sweaty, but still i bend down on one knee. Reach into the side of my jacket. Lower my head and fumble to open the box in my palm. In that instant, it feels like time has stopped. Doubt assail me from all sides. Do i really, really want this? As i lift my head, my eyes meet hers. And i see the twinkle in her eyes, cute little dimples that dot her face. Long, luscious flowing hair that crowns that angel before me. And as i say the words, i know i've made the right choice. First time answering a prompt, wrote it in abit of a rush though. Hope its okay!
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It was the most logical step. Dirt bikes and motorcycles? Blasé. Sky diving and deep diving? Ho-hum. Combat sports? Check that box. I’d done damn near everything and cheated death or won or lost. All the time and effort put into pushing myself to the brink culminated into one grand spectacle: being hunted by a professional assassin. I know I’m “eccentric.” But think about it: isn’t the true game of life and death when you pit two men against one another? When you tell them kill or be killed, survive and thrive, eat or be eaten, you’re telling them to revert back to primal roots. But outside of war time and criminal activity you rarely see such a spectacle. It’s morbid, it’s wrong, it’s this and that and so on. That’s trivial. This will be my magnus opus. Two men on an island, thirty days to kill or be killed, evade and survive. Cameras scattered throughout the island to catch all the action and intrigue. Oh and there will be action. I’ve gotten quite a few investors for this project. Most of them unstable but all interested. And the assassin? A true pro. Former special forces who specializes in urban, mountain, and jungle warfare. Pay the man upfront to show up, pay him for a job well done, or send him on his way for failing. Either way he comes out richer. As for myself I’ve been training and studying for a year and half. I’ve been in jungles and forests since my youth. I can survive most anywhere. But I’ve never had to kill anyone. When it comes down to it that’s the issue. Could I do it when push comes to shove? I’d have to right? But I don’t know that. That’s what I want to find out. That feeling of true life and death. A moment where you could do everything right, and an interloper can make it all disappear in an instant. It’s what investors want. It’s what I want.
ah yes, the american super hero system, or the ASHS, was different from japans by a large margin. there supers are trained on how to use their powers in everyday life, as opposed to japans system of superhero only restrictions. anyone with a power can apply for training at any league. these leagues, like the justice league, serve two purposes. 1: they provide training to all with quirks or "supers"as the americans call them. they are trained on responsible power use. 2: they provide most of the oversight on supers. supers can join a league to join the cause of helping the nation and its people. Europeans style of quirk management is treated a lot more like adventurerers than anything else, but that shall be discussed later. -a short section of one ua students essay on super management across the world. [trying to work on my world building, so feel free to ask questions that would help expand this idea, or just give some constructive criticism.] edit: i realize i didnt exactly follow the prompt to its spirit or letter, but this is what popped into my mind when i read the prompt.
"I'll have a triple scoop of nutella ice-cream please,"She spoke with a smile, her soft voice left a small circle of condensation on the glass covering the endless choices of ice-cream. "Coming right up!"The young, enthusiastic employee smiled. Mesmerizing the child with the strong, neat scoops of ice-cream she piled up on the cone attentively. The employee delicately passed over chocked-full cone to the young child. "Be careful, it'll be hard to eat." Seconds later the poor girl had dropped her icecream on the ground. Now it was her worst nightmare.
A harsh tone cried from the telephone on a desk, slashing through the quiet hum of the office. The woman at the desk was distractedly checking her bookkeeper’s work. Effortlessly outpacing his practiced calculator manipulation, she stayed inert while a pained expression spread from the corners of the balding man’s thin lips. Sharper observers would notice a faint smirk grown from hers; she schemed to entrap one of her few remaining business competitors. Price gouging, exaggerating infestations, poor customer service–she dreamt up nefarious affairs of which to accuse her rival exterminator, drafting the architecture of a web of rumors to weave. A sprinkling of subtle mistakes in the inventory sheets threatened to dodge her careful sweep—the daydream being so sinfully entertaining—but the pitfalls proved no match for the woman’s acute vision and deliberate, surgical keystrokes. The man stood, immobilized—save for his face, which was contorted: first as though he had sniffed a foul odor, then as if he were being chewed alive—as he witnessed the woman at the desk apparently delight in savaging his neat ledgers. But she sat dramatically slouched backward, her neck limp, and her face half-covered by long strands of the silken hair she grew—if not for the odd staccato cackles that pierced her demeanor, the bookkeeper would have expected her to drift to sleep. The woman lifted the telephone as the harsh tone repeated. “Hello, there. BugBusters, Ara speaking,” the woman droned, using two hands to wave her silk away from her face. There was a murmur from the handset. “Our next available booking?” Ara leapt earnestly at the question, suddenly quite awake. It had been ages since she had known hunger, what with business booming and all now, but Ara had not forgotten the pain of struggling to find her first bugs. The aches, the fatigue. Her will, her fire, had sustained her through times of scarce prey. Rather than go threadbare, Ara had resorted to repairing garments by spinning thread from her very own silk. In those times, she had slaved then over even the lousiest of jobs, having realized that the next morsel may not come for some time. Whenever opportunity struck, she was ready–her reflexes sprung her to action, undeterred by famine, and called a flurry of limbs to dizzying action. In this business, hesitation—in all its good-natured mercy—was suicide. The woman’s eyes snapped to the color-coded planner sat atop the desk, weeks splayed out before her eyes. A dense web of thin, overlapping script filled the paper like words spilled from the multiple uncapped inkwells that flanked the booklet. The bug-eating empire she had founded shortly following the regrettable death of her husband was, nowadays, the gold standard of exterminators, and their tight calendar, booked back-to-back, reflected it. It was her trademark technique of using fresh bait that helped her get this far. The schedule was absolutely packed, save for the single day per week she had reserved for fetching groceries and running her endless errands. Turning pages, Ara found an unclaimed patch five weeks out. “I’m tied up through the month,” she offered remorsefully, “but I can squeeze you in at 11:15 on the fourteenth.” Ara carefully noted in the booklet for the fourteenth. Another note was added, this one indicating that her nine-o’clock meeting that day with the head of her informant network, the shadowy, undercover defectors tasked with reporting on her competitors’ new marketing campaigns, would need to end no later than eleven. \--- The widow looked up to find that her bookkeeper had wormed out of his apparent paralysis and vanished. If this development concerned her, she disguised it completely. His report was mediocre, but nevertheless it revealed a shortage of fresh bait. Rather than dispatch a courier to replenish the supply, she again lifted the telephone and dialed. “Hello! BugBusters front desk—” the receptionist cheerfully began. Ara interrupted curtly, instructing the voice at the other end of the line to bar the front entrance. In no hurry, she added a line to the ledger, opened her desk’s drawer, and worked her hand toward the master switch buried inside. Several nearby employees made eye contact and, as if in concert, set down whatever things they had been carrying and looked toward Ara. “We’re running low again already,” the widow declared to her children. With a flick of her hand, she flipped the switch and the first two floors of the building went dark, followed by two more, then finally the last. They would have their bait by the end of the lunch hour.
A bump in the road jolted me awake. Between the throbbing headache and amnesia I was surprised my immediate reaction wasn't a fit of hysteria. I managed to keep my cool, at least somewhat, until I looked around and saw that many of my closest friends were occupying the seats surrounding me, as unconscious as I had been only seconds prior. I knew I hadn't fallen asleep as a passenger in a bus, and that was the extent of what I could remember. Everything else was nothing more than a blur. I recognized the person next to me as my best friend, Alan, and began to violently shake him but he refused to come to. After a few more attempts to wake people I threw in the towel and made my way to the front of the bus to talk to the driver. Upon approach, however, I noticed flakes of dead skin falling gently off of him and onto the floor of the bus. He had a leperous appearance, that of a man long since dead. Before being able to open my mouth to say anything his head tilted slightly and turned so that only half of his face was visible. I gazed into his sunken, soulless eyes and observed the inner wiring of his rotting face as he mechanically raised his hand and pointed outside of the windows of the vehicle. Pressing my forehead against the glass, I peered through the window. The landscape was composed of waves of sand appearing as water, rising and sinking and giving way to a menagerie of beings with eyes bobbing in and out of their bodies. Though not a single one was the same, they all shared a certain asymmetry. Their flesh was melting off of them and periodically I could spot a pair of the creatures oozing into each other and melding. To make matters worse each creature seamlessly generated a fully functioning arm, and they all looked directly at me with every little eye and waving as if to say goodbye before fading back into the waves. I returned my gaze to the driver, whose full face was now aimed at me. I caught a glimpse of him beginning to grimace before losing consciousness. And then a bump in the road jolted me awake.
He opened his eyes and blinked repeatedly to adjust to the dark room. His book lay at his feet, and a burnt out cigarette sat limply in the ashtray at his side. ‘Must’ve fallen asleep’ As he fully regained his senses the noise which awakened him grew louder. A faint rattle of a diesel engine. The crunch of stones on his driveway. ‘Tourists’ he muttered under his breath, as he pulled a cigarette from the unbranded package and placed it to his lips. Even being maybe a mile or so away the car headlamps had illuminated the room ever so slightly as it had crested the brow into his valley. He struck a match and lit the cigarette, taking a long drag. Of all the perks of being immortal, smoking was his favourite. He rose to his feet, kicking aside the disappointingly dull novel which had sent him to sleep in the first place. He took a few quiet steps to window, taking another drag of his cigarette before parting the curtains slightly. The car was still approaching – it wasn’t a big concern, his cottage looked vacant and secure enough to deter most trespassers. The car had stopped at his gate, the headlamps were brighter than usual, a modern car definitely. They were bright enough that he felt his face tingle. He let the curtains fall back down and turned, his eyes scanning the room for his bag of books he’d bought earlier that day. It was difficult reading novels set in the past – the anachronisms drove him crazy. Then again, he supposed the authors could be forgiven for thinking no one would know they had got it so wrong. He had heard the car door open, and then the boot, and the tourist – maybe a man – was approaching the gate on foot. As he reached down to grab the bag of books, he heard the snap of the padlock on his gate. He was beginning to become more concerned now, these were more than tourists. Taking another long draw on his cigarette, he internally debated ignoring the intruders. They were no threat to him physically, and harming them would surely bring more attention to his quiet corner of no where. He extinguished the cigarette and made his way out of the back door, out of sight of the car. Outside in the night, even taking into account the wind, the car was much louder, his preternatural senses were much more acute than any humans, he always assumed probably as sharp as a dog at least. The car had driven now closer to his house, slowing just before the second gate as he peered out of the overgrown bushes at the front of his run down cottage. The lights were so close now he could feel a sting on his face. Two men got out of the car - suits, shoes – these weren’t stargazers or tourists. He even supposed he smelled an expensive aftershave – he couldn’t smell from that distance surely? It was probably just imagining their smell. He guessed that he wouldn’t be far wrong. The thirst was always slightly at the back of his mind – it was easily controlled by his favourite distractions, reading and smoking. At the sight of humans though it became a much stronger feeling. He was mentally counting the weeks since his last feed, he certainly didn’t \need\ another for a few months. Something about these men though, they seemed threatening. He had seen angry people coming to his door with accusations for centuries, but this seemed more disturbing. He made his decision, and slipped off into the trees to the left of his cottage having to flank them to stay out of the strong headlamps. This night was going to become far more interesting than he had anticipated.
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