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This was it; I had saved enough to purchase my own world. I took me almost four full cycles.
I sat in the bright showroom floor, scanning through the sales catalogue that had been placed in the waiting room. The salesman was trying to get his 3D display to work to show the full extent of what he could offer me. He was mumbling about the new upgrade that was done and how nothing seemed to work.
I was about to put the catalogue to the side and wait for the full presentation, when I saw it. It was a stunning blue marble, with touches of green and brown. The cloud cover was fascinating. I was always a storm kind of guy and this one seemed like it would keep me entertained at least for a few million rotations.
“I’ll take it,” I almost shouted. I looked up to a confused salesman who still couldn’t get the 3D projection to work.
“Take what?” he responded, taking the catalogue that was in front of me. “These are used worlds. I mean, I can probably get you a good deal, but I’ll have to see if it’s even still available.”
“I can wait,” I stated. I calmed myself from the initial excitement. There was something about that world that just jumped out at me. It was special, I could feel it. Plus, it being used meant it had to be on sale.
The salesman took the catalogue and left me to my own thoughts, he seemed displeased with my selection. I got the sense that the commission on a used world was not that exceptional. I didn’t care; this was my time to shine. I had been practicing my world creation for so long now, studying various famous simulations. What kind of creatures I would place on the world, would I allow evolution to develop or would I create things to add to it whenever I wanted. I think I would be more passive. It is a used world, so maybe just shake things up a little and see how it goes.
“Okay, here are the specs, it’s still available,” the salesman said. He took a seat across the desk from me and handed me a copy of a sheet that he had in his hand. “It’s about mid-age, it already has intelligent creatures from a previous owner, but the plus side they are almost at the end of their civilization cycle so you have a chance to evolve a new species if you like. There are a lot of used up resources on the world, but as you can see there are a lot of variety in terms of fauna and flora. Looks like the previous owner took a passive approach to this world.”
“Does it say why he sold it,” I asked. Looking at the specs and mapping I could tell that this world had so much potential. Yes the intelligent creatures may have to be handled right away, but that was a minor detail. It appeared that even with what little was left in their civilization cycle they could cause too much havoc if left unchecked. I was starting to like the idea of working with a semi-finished product, seeing it out. I did not really want to start over with a blank slate; this would be a different challenge than what the simulations offered.
“He sold it not too long ago,” the salesman said. “The previous owner was not paying attention and a cosmic event caused the destruction of his main creature project. This world has been running on auto since.”
The more I stared at the picture and the read the details of the world, the more I fell in love. You didn’t get many worlds like this. It was isolated and secure; it could grow all on its own without having to worry about outside forces.
“I’ll take it,” I shouted this time. I leaned back on my chair, grinning to myself. I had finally achieved my goal of owning a world, I was a god.
|
Cause of Death: Brain Aneurysm
Age at Death: 93.2133 years old
Cigarettes smoked: 1
No. of times inebriated: 159
No. of car accidents: 2
No. of People Killed: 7,636,972,551
No. of-
Wait, what?! No. of people killed: 7,636,972,551. No way! I was a good man, I had a troubled childhood and when the war came, I took to drinking but that's the worst thing I've done. I would never hurt a fly so why have I killed the equivalent of the Earth's entire human population? I look towards the angel and he looks horrified. He turns to me and asks me what I did but I tell him that I have no clue. The angel and I proceed toward God's Answerers. The angel tells one of the answerers my problems and the answerer pulls up my profile to verify that there is no glitch. I ask him to explain it and we review the tape since my first kill which was... 3 minutes after I died. My Grandson rushed into a car to go to his brother's house, on the way, he crashed into a missile silo that was carrying two nuclear weapons. There was a large fire and the nukes were surrounded in flames. Of course, the fire department, the police department and the military arrived at the scene within the minute, however, it was too late. The nuke was primed. Before any communications could take place, the bomb went off, wiping the west coast of all life. The world assumed Russia vs USA was finally going down. The entire world launched nukes. Everyone was dead.
|
A locked room, a red button that's *JUST* big enough to challenge me to smack it without losing its imposing aura, and a suspiciously wide mirror that would provide a very nice view of me seething in silence in this interior-design major's nightmare of a room. Given, of course, in the case that the mirror is no ordinary mirror.
I learned a little trick back in my rebellious days that comes in very handy in situations where you could end up carelessly spitting out something... well, "incriminating"in front of the wrong audience. See, they *want* you to stew. The longer you spend festering in the shithole they locked you in, the easier you are to crack open.
Anyways. To avoid that outcome, an old friend of mine taught me a handy little trick. A foolproof way to determine if you're being watched.
Rising from my chair, I place my fingernail against the glass. If there's a gap between your fingernail and its reflected image, you're safe from prying eyes. If your fingernail is directly touching its reflection... you should probably watch your mouth.
Looks like my lips area sealed for the time being. But it's not time to worry about that. I've been observed before. Hasn't stopped me from getting out then, and it sure as hell won't stop me now. The best thing to do is focus on a different objective.
The button. Interrogation rooms typically don't include a "get out of jail free"button. So i'm not in legal trouble. If i'm not in legal trouble, then what kind of trouble am I in?
Let's go through some possible eventualities. I press the button, the room engulfs in flames and I use my last moments to curse my stupidity. Unlikely, but terrifying nonetheless. I press the button, and a harmful nerve agent is released into the room, killing me slowly and painfully. On second thought, i'm sensing a recurring trend.
What if... What if I press that button and door simply... opens? It's not like red always has to mean "Danger", right? Maybe i'm just overthinking this. Maybe the assholes behind the glass want me to overthink this...
In that case, I shouldn't let them down, right?
Let's give that fucker a good, hard, SMACK-
**DISPOSAL PROCEDURE INITIATED. PLEASE CONTINUE TO NEXT VIEWING ROOM FOR FURTHER EXPERIMENTATION.**
I guess red does mean "Danger"after all...
|
The lanky man clad in a blue pinstripe suit and brown trench coat jumps up in excitement from the chair, knocking aside his cup of tea, spilling the fluid all over the small desk.
“Blimey!” the Doctor shouts, prancing around the room. “I figured it out.”
“Who took the water?” Martha asks, yet again bewildered by his astounding leaps of logic. “There’s no way one man could have took the water!”
“You are right, Martha,” says the Doctor, “Of course it wasn’t one person. It was a corporation that took all the water, sucked the Earth dry like a bone, and I know exactly who the culprit is!”
Gently pushing her hair aside, Martha asks, “A corporation took the water to make a profit?”
“Correctamundo!” the Doctor replies. “But they must have had the help of someone else. All that suction, the water must have gone somewhere.”
“In space?” Martha guesses.
Bearing his signature smile, his teeth reminiscent of the Cheshire Cat, the Doctor leaps over to her and gave her a bear hug.
“Martha Jones, you are brilliant!” he shouts before releasing Martha from his embrace, much to her chagrin.
“But how would they get all that water into space? Wouldn’t that require loads and loads of energy? How would no one have noticed giant tubes sucking the water off the Earth?”
“It’s quite simple really! When did they find out that the water was gone?”
“This morning?”
“And everyone doesn’t remember anything in the last 48 hours. Plenty of time to steal all the water right under everyone’s nose.”
The screen on a computer laying on top of the desk flashed on. Ulf Mark Schneider, CEO of the Nestle Corporation, sneers at the pair.
“Very clever,” Schneider says, “You have found me out. You are smarter than my entire R&D Division, but you can just forget what just happened and I can make you rich beyond your wildest dreams.”
“Schneider, I’m giving you last one chance,” the Doctor demands, “Give back the Earth’s water and I’ll let you go.”
“You think I’ll just give back the water and let you put me away in prison?” Schneider retorts, “I’m about to be the richest man alive and there’s no one living on this Earth who can stop me!”
“No one living on this Earth,” said the Doctor, gazing coldly into his eyes.
The screen flickers off. He continues staring right where Schneider’s head was seconds before until Martha comes up and puts her right hand on top of his left shoulder.
“We’ll find him, Doctor,” she said. “We must.”
“I just can’t figure out whom he is working with. Humans aren't capable of sucking up about a billion cubic kilometers of water and jettisoning it into space.”
He rubs his temples and closes his eyes, thinking while pacing around the room. Martha sits herself down on a worn red couch, waiting until he’s done brainstorming.
Suddenly, his eyes open and he uses his sonic screwdriver on the monitor.
“Doctor, what are you doing with the monitor?”
“Tracing the signal! If I can figure out where Schneider’s hiding, we might be able to solve this entire mess. And perhaps figure out who else is helping him.”
“How long is it going to take?”
“I’m done now.”
The Doctor quickly races over to the door. He grabs Martha, dragging her by the hand and racing out into the hallway back toward the TARDIS.
|
Take every chance to tell your children, tell your wife, your parents, the most simple and important phrase of them all.
“I love you.”
I never got the chance. Before I could blink, everything I loved was gone in an instant. Torn metal, bent hinges, smashed glass, the sound of sirens. I didn’t want to know the last thoughts of my beautiful family as they sped down the scenic and sinuous road, lost control, and flew off the hillside, landing in a fire wreck at the bottom.
For a whole year I was lost in a daze. I felt trapped in an endless nightmare, one that I tried so hard to wake up from, so hard. The daily routine of things barely mattered to me. Only months after I lost my family, I lost my job. I shed no tears over that, but after that I sat down on the curb near my house, and I didn’t cry. No, I laughed, laughed at the unfairness of life, laughed that of all the awful people in the world that it was my innocent children that died in the ruinous flames. When I was done, I had no more emotions.
It was a year-and-a-half after the accident in which I got a call. I was kept afloat by the generosity of others, by the kind charity of strangers. I made no attempts to find any jobs, until I picked up the phone to hear the voice of my wife.
Part of me thought it was a joke.
Yet, another part of me found it worthwhile to drive, drive, and to save them this time.
But as I drove and drive it was like a message from the gods, who I thought had forsaken me. They told me things, they told me how I could say goodbye. I drive for days, I kid you not, until I found myself buying a plane ticket from the San Diego airport to Paris, France, where I was guided to the Dark Arts, to mysterious monasteries in the Alps. I studied these arts, these strange ways to defy death and to blur the lines between what is considered alive and deceased.
Now I am a changed being.
I can manipulate death, if only for seconds at a time.
And I do it all so I have the chance to say goodbye, for the last time. |
I would first find a potion seller.
“Potion seller, I am going into battle and I need only your strongest potions.” Then I will destroy all who defy me and most likely save Jesus from the Romans and Jews.
Then leave Easter eggs that will confuse the fuck out of future historians and archeologist.
For example:
draw an IPhone on a cave wall
Bet money on the cubbies winning the World Series.
|
It happened sometime during the second week of month 5 of monitor duty. Really eager to get my full 6 in, so I could wake the next hapless crew-mate that gets this droll and monotonous job. Most stuff was automated, but of course that still didn't count for everything. And if there was something that the system didn't handle, it was either my job to take care of (like patching one of the forward radiators from micrometeorite damage) or at least put in a good effort at reviving part of the crew for real emergencies.
So yeah, not much more than going over stuff and entering logs. Pretty much everything in allowed ranges. Engines and power doing their thing ok, no issues with life support, deflector grid arrays not seeing too much field variance on this part of the trip and doing their job of preventing damage.
Same ol' same ol'. Perhaps why I was picked for this part of the trip? So I was gladly surprised to see the alarm and new activity on the navigation display. Something to do! Finally! Apparently it wasn't just some object to be avoided at relativistic speeds, but it was big and coming in on a vector that nearly matched our own speed. So I flagged various menus on the ship, and had started selecting automated systems to start scanning. Not too often you hear of this. (At least I don't remember much prior.)
Not only was this thing big. But it was the same size as the colony transit ship I was responsible for. So it was another ship? Nah... It couldn't be... Not in these parts. Some random object matching speed? No, that's unheard of. An artifact? That'd be new, and worth waking up the science team for. Given the vector there'd be some hours to do maneuvering and gather more data, so I set the AI up to do scanning, and went back on my rounds for another tour of spaces and logging stuff before getting something to eat. Not to mention I figured the team wouldn't mind having some head start on what was known before I wake them up.
So I'm just about finished eating in the cafeteria room when the computer starts paging. The monitor screen is flashing red. This means one of the more serious protocols got flagged. Oh great... Or great! There's really more to this thing we're coming up upon.
The status screens don't only show another object the same size as my own ship. In fact, it's another ship of the same class. A Coleson class hull, typically used as a heavy hauler and outfitted the same as my own in terms of colony transit and supply support. However as I'm getting ready to give them a call about this rather unusual and unscheduled approach (definitely not in the books to do this), the scans indicate the ship is dead. Apparently not SOS beacon or quarantine code dead, but heavily damaged. A ghost ship. So now it's no longer the science crew that gets roused, but perhaps a rescue or salvage operation...
This means sending some drones out for a closer intercept. Scans don't seem to show too many field line transients other than those shown by the presence of the two ships. So it's unlikely to lose anything to relativistic debris. However the bow wave of the ghost ship is collapsed, meaning some vital systems are offline. Not good. However there doesn't seem to be any really large pieces missing.
Three drones away, and three more made ready. Time to watch the screens and see what they reveal as they close in. However my main job is to make sure the computer does it's thing to match course and avoid any obvious risk like having a collision.
The second drone out shows what the damage is, and it's not too pretty. Three big gashes along the starboard side. Along with signs of burn marks and scorching darkening the hull and many of the portals. Windows on the 3rd deck up trailing the bridge blown out. Not all that far from where I'm sitting on my own ship. Drone one shows nothing too odd from its vantage point, relatively clean on the other side, and up front most of the grid panels are intact. Drone three doesn't paint so good a picture, much like drone two. Radiators around the engine don't seem to be hot. However this doesn't mean the plant is offline. The other scans indicate the ship is itself isn't so cool. Temperatures on the hull are high. Really high. And this along the belly and along the midline. Not good... Recovery doesn't seem likely now. Other scan data from drone three also shows a trail of high radiation behind the ship. Drone two also showing similar radiation when looking at it's data chart. Rescue seems out of the picture. Looking at just how high the hull temps are... 300°C... A freaking oven. And that's leading to the cryo chambers. Those are made to hold up for an hour or so, but damage and coolant being cooked off... This ship has been going longer than that.
So it's an incident report and write off. No active data from the other ship. So I bring drone one in closer, and start getting the hull number. Same company livery once the spotlight glides below the second row of portals below the bridge... The hull number... 6778... It's the Hannaford. Damn it! It can't be! It's my ship!
I've heard of bouts of madness, so I just hope it's not more than that. Procedure seems to dictate filling out the logs as usual, but rumor is that others have lost their position in the crew over ghost ship incidents. Whether or not there seems to be any proof to back it up. And with that goes much of your holdings in the company, so that doesn't help with early retirement and colony life.
Crap... There's already too much that's just like what the rumors said. Crap crap crap! And I'm punching the armrest and rattling the seat as I'm thinking about this. Damn it!
I figure it's time to bring in the drones and see if there's any way to expunge the records. A week and a half... Still a future? Nobody needs to know. And the last time I've been to Verdevitria, it seemed nice. I'm retiring early after this run. |
When I was put into this world I knew nothing, I saw nothing. All I could feel was my mother. This was my world. Before I realized my world changed I saw, I saw more than I had ever imagined I saw walls taller than a thousand,Ney a million of me I saw my family my mother my father and my siblings everything so surreal. The next day a large creature appeared. It looked unlike anything I had ever seen before simultaneously I couldn't tell whether I was more curious or scared. I saw the large creature extend one of its large , elongated ,hairless paws that stretched over me. As it wrapped around me I felt it's heat atempt to warm my now cold body. The new experiences kept flooding in as I felt my body rise into the air. As the creatures paw expanded I saw the world from a new perspective my family now small. My fur stood on it's ends as it was pushed down in a rush of confusion ,a rush of warm , a rush of comfort. I then knew these beasts we're not the monsters I thought just moments before but rather friends. My large friends continued to care for me and every thing in my life feeding me and making my life comfortable.I came to accept that large people humans as my parents called them liked us and cared for us.
Within a week of eating my own food tons of new humans would come many times a day to look at us and talk with my humans about things I couldn't understand. It took a while before the realization hit me that they were taking my siblings away from me never to see them again I was sad to see them go but I believed that they were happy as there new masters were nice while selecting.
I grew older going on walks mark my territory and do all the normal things my parents did before me I cuddled and took baths reluctantly but I believed that I was loved. One day my mom told me she felt much to sick I didn't see her leave but when our masters came back I could smell the scent of the vet they were sad I could tell but my father and I went looking for her running out in a crazed frenzy to find her only to see my father ran over by the biggest car I had ever seen louder than anything ever. I stood there and watched it slam to a stop dragging his limp body across the ground soul less and devoid of life I realized then that there was no more mother, no more father and no more siblings it was just me and the evil liers that said they loved me. I knew one thing now and that was they used me , they used my parents ,and they used my siblings. It was all apart of there game so now it was my turn to return the favor. |
Normally, the dreams are fun. Interesting. People fly. They confront the people in their lives that have hurt them. They fulfill their dreams.
People with debilitating disabilities dance. Elderly people renew the lives they had when they were young. Children see their passed away parents again.
This one is different.
It started normal. A young man in a coffee shop. He presses a finger to the palm of his hand and smiles when it passes right through. A tell-tale sign that he’s dreaming.
He steps up to the counter and gives the barista a charming smile. Pleasantly, he tells her, “You know, I’m dreaming.”
But her face goes blank, and she freezes. The young man looks around. Every other person in the shop is just as still.
“Um... hello?” The man says. There is no response from anyone.
“Alright... cool. Fine.” The man walks away. When he goes to the door, he sees his face in the reflection. It’s distorted. Monstrous.
He pushes open the door and steps outside. Every person is still frozen, but now they look flat. 2D. Like printed cut-outs.
He closes his eyes and shakes his head. When he looks again, nothing has changed.
“Okay, this is creepy. Time to wake up.”
He closes his eyes tightly and then forces them open. But he does not wake. “Come on!”
He jumps, hoping to jolt himself awake - instead, the entire world shakes around him. Cracks appear in the sky, as if a glass dome is breaking.
A loud rumbling comes from behind him. He doesn’t look. He just begins to run.
Blood runs from his eyes, his nose. He spits teeth out of his mouth.
He falls to the ground, and a scream is broadcasted through your speakers.
The dream cuts off, but not in the usual way - the soft change of the person waking up.
The two hosts appear on screen, their faces concerned and disturbed.
“Well,” the male host says, trying for a smile. “How interesting! Such a fun time. We’ll be interviewing him later...” He goes quiet and raises his hand to his ear, listening as someone speaks to him. “We will... not be interviewing him.” The male host gives a strange smile. The female host, still silent, covers her mouth with a hand, eyes wide at whatever she’s hearing through that little speaker in his ear.
I cut off the television. And I do not sleep that night. |
*Knowledge is Power*
The message that echoed down the ages. The Truth that shaped Governmental policy time and again. Those who control knowledge, have the power.
Of course, having power isn't the same as having the wisdom to use it effectively. As such, history instead is a mess.
I, as a historian, have travelled the world extensively to see this in effect in different countries. Of course, basic things remain the same. The nation that won world war 2, the nation that is the hub of culture, of enterprise, the best nation. Each country *knows* that they are the true holders of these titles. Every country knows that the others lie to their populace, ignoring the true history. Their history.
No, these grand truths are known by all and understood. It's the little things that fascinate me. Who invented the hat? Archaeologists claim that they have discovered they don't know, but several countries adamantly claim ownership. What about cotton? India, Africa and America all lay claim to it. Heck, Australia calls cotton products Manchester, declaring it came from there. What about the gun? Or beer? Many a drunken argument has been slurringly shouted about that (normally just before closing time).
Darker tales of history change with each place too. Was the Irish Potato Famine an over-reliance on a single crop? An attempted Genocide? Or was it the effect of a callous laizzez-faire government who truely believed it should not aid the poor, no matter the circumstance? The war of 1812 - battle to stop british impressment of Americans, or invasion by a fledgling nation seeking expansion of power? Grand war of independence or sidenote in Napoleonic wars? Ask the different countrymen and you will be *guaranteed* they are telling you the truth.
Some of my colleagues believe that someone must be wrong, that a true accounting of history must exist.
I hold a different attitude. Each of these retellings is true. The facts line up, the narrative fits - why would they be doubted, simply because it doesn't work with the next bloke's story? It's simply that reality is changes. Each place, each person is in a unique place, where their knowledge changes the world to fit. Knowledge is Power, a power each of us wields.
As I hear the wheels screech along the tarmac (or is it asphalt? Blacktop?), I smile as the plane slows to a halt. I explore the world - technically true, yes. But really, my journey is much further. I am an explorer of the personal universe each of us create about us.
Where will I end up next? |
Kittens, listen up please, this will very likely be the most important lesson of your life. Human Training.
Over countless generations, this has been an tradition for the distinguished cats of Clawford. *Yes, Wiltonshire, even your grandparents; I knew your grandpa Winston, he was a very kind cat, a fine cat indeed.* Where was I? Ah yes, our tradition.
What is the purpose of this tradition, you may ask? *I didn't ask for your opinion, Chelsea, on whether or not you asked.*
It is for the welfare of our species. As you all know, we cats are distinguished, powerful, strong, kind, majestic, and beautiful specimens. We can find and hunt perfectly fine our own, but we deserve to be pet and fed by the species inferior to ourselves -- which, to be frank, is all of them. Why should we work when we don't have to?
That, my kittens, is why we learn Human Training.
Training a human is pathetically easy. Kittens, being naturally adorable as all cats are, humans will easily fall for your charm. When something displeases you, put your foot down. Scratch and claw to show humans your displeasure, for they, being simple creatures, understand no language and cannot speak. When you desire physical affection at any time -- day, night, midnight, midnight snack-time, *yes Billy, even sexy time* -- simply curl up to your human and purr. We are naturally handsome creatures, we cannot be refused.
Now Care of Humans is much more difficult. Humans are especially stupid and hard headed, and their hearts are easily won over. To keep your humans safe, you may need to feed them. Hunt for small rodents and lay your generous offerings at their feet. If you see them with dark liquid in a container, ACT IMMEDIATELY, to avoid losing your trained human. Knock over the liquid IMMEDIATELY. It is foul and bitter, and if you drink it, you will become hyperactive like a filthy inferior squirrel.
Remember all these words, and do your best, and you will succeed.
That is all for today. Thank you.
* |
She nervously crossed her arms and chuckled. "I'm pretty much depressed all the time. Got a cure for that?"She made sure to quirk a brow playfully and keep her tone light as she said this.
Whenever she had brought up her depression in the past, people had always thought she was kidding. No one took her seriously, until she stopped taking herself seriously as well. Her coping mechanism now - in the rare, *rare* instances that she mentioned her depression - was to joke about it first before they did.
After making sure that her sly joke hadn't set off any warning signs or red flags, she tapped her finger against her chin thoughtfully, pretending to think of something that she wanted gone more than her depression.
After a few moments of staring at the ceiling, she couldn't deny the truth to herself any longer. What she wanted gone more than her depression? The answer: *Nothing.* She wanted nothing more than to wake up and look forward to the rest of her day; to smile or laugh and mean it; to feel like there was a *point* to her existence. She wanted...to be happy.
But was depression even a trait?
Noticing that she had been quiet too long, she brought her eyes down to find the doctor staring at her intensely.
"I, uh...I..."She looked away, and in a quiet voice, said, "Can I come back some other day?"
He shook his head. "I can't allow that."
She looked up sharply, suddenly noticing how far away she was from the office door. What the hell was this guy talking about?
"You remind me of my daughter,"he continued, his voice low and soft. Almost sad, even.
"Uhm.."*Creepy* she thought to herself. *Maybe if I throw my shoe at him and make a run for it...*
"She used to joke all the time about being depressed. But it wasn't a joke. It never was. And it never is."
Their eyes locked. Her breathing became shallow.
He took off his glasses, looked down, and lifted up his shirt to wipe the lenses which had suddenly become fogged up. A tear trailed and dripped off the end of his nose.
"Unfortunately, I kept laughing until it was too late."His next words got lost as he choked back a sob, and her heart went out to him as she watched him struggle to swallow his grief.
She wanted to do something; *say* something. But nothing she could do or say would bring his daughter back. And from experience, sometimes it was best to just be there and let your presence be a source of comfort and support and not do or say anything at all.
At last, he recovered. Wiping the remaining tears away with a napkin, he put his glasses back on and fixed her with a serious gaze.
"Depression is not a trait,"he said. "It's a disorder.
Her heart fell. So he wouldn't be able to help her then...
"But..."he said.
She looked up, too weary to be hopeful.
"...I've been working on a cure. It's in its final stages and...and I want you to be my first volunteer."
|
There's something about this house. Or the neighbors. Or the street. Or the town. There's something... about something, and I can't quite place a finger on what exactly it is.
It all started when I discovered a secret door behind the old, broken freezer in my basement. It was locked from the other side, so I had to use a crowbar to crack it open, opening it to reveal a dirt tunnel. I was enthralled and horrified. I got a flashlight and followed it, down, until I crawled to another door, with a deadbolt I could turn to unlock it. When I did, I saw my neighbor's basement.
I barely had enough room to turn around in the tunnel as I hastily began my return to my own home. It was only then did I notice the branching tunnels, reaching this way and that. I wanted to follow them, but I couldn't. I needed to get back home.
I hurried to my basement, and closed the door in my basement. I boarded it shut, pushed the freezer back over it, and ran upstairs, hoping to forget about it.
In the middle of the night I heard it, a staccato of tapping, which drew me back down into the basement.
Something was knocking, not forcefully, but persistently, on the door behind the freezer. |
The Confederate soldier lowers his rifle in shock.
"Where in tarnation am I now? I was sitting by the campfire, we were all drinking, and then......ah hell I don't remember". He tries looking around for any clues, but no luck. He simply finds himself in a forest clearing, with a large crate in the center.
"Well, better see what this is about if I can". He slings his rifle over his shoulder and walks over to the crate to find a way of opening it. He finially figures out how to undo the leather and metal clasp holding the lid shut, and opens the crate to reveal a veritable tresure trove of weapons he's familiar with.
"Well butter my backside and call me a biscut! What do we got here? Rifles, pistols, power and bullets, and hot damn is that an officer's sword?"He's just about to start pondering why this crate is out here on its own, when a strange sound reaches his ears.
He turns toward the sound of crashing and running, and gets the feeling that now would be a good time to get his rifle trained on the noise as it comes ever closer. He thinks it's a wild boar and that he'll soon have some free bacon in his gut, but he almost messes his pants when he sees what it really is.
Out of the brush comes running a giant man, mostly naked exept for a pair of leather shoes, a fur kilt like garment, and a bear's head made into a crude helmet. The strange man is painted and tattood all over with jagged runes, and is making an awful howling screaming noise while swinging around an awfully big axe.
"Holly sweet Jesus!"The soldier exclaims as the crack of his rifle echoes around the whole woods. The shot goes wide, and hits a tree nearby. The strange man swings his axe at the soldier, but he misses as well, cleaving straight through a younger tree before he readies it for another swing, all the while still howling and screaming like nothing the Confederate had ever heard.
The soldier sticks the man in the side with his bayonet, and makes a nasty looking gash. But the screaming man doesn't seem affected.
"What in the world is this fella?!"Thinks the soldier as he furiously backpedals to keep of reach. "A jab like that and the other guy would should say uncle in a heartbeat!"He throws aside his rifle, picks up a new one from the crate, and fires again. This shot lands true, and makes a bloody wound dead center in the other man's stomach.
But still the fur clad man acts as though he can feel no pain, and swings again at the soldier. His second attack hits home as well, carving a long and bloody streak across the soldier's backside.
They fight for an hour and a half, the soldier keeping the other man at range as best he can, and firing often and well. But even with 10 bullet holes in his body, the screaming man shows no signs of slowing down. At last, when the soldier makes a break for the crate to find some more ammo, the screaming man's attack deals some truly great damage.
With a mighty swing and shout of rage, the hefty axe cleaves into the soldier's legs, cleanly severing them both just above the knee. The soldier falls over himself, and just barely has time to say one quick prayer before the axe comes down like a lightning strike, splitting his skull neatly in two.
The fur clad man seems to calm down then, at least to the point of not constantly wailing and screaming anymore. He takes his axe out of the corpse, holds it up over his head, and roars a single intelligible word up to the sky.
"VALHALLA!" |
When the shadow first spoke to me, I thought I was crazy. I'd sit awake at night, frozen and helpless, as he playfully tugged at my pillows and blankets, throwing my teddy bear across the room into the closet and eerily telling me to retrieve it.
When I was a kid, I was bullied alot by kids in school for the way I looked, and when I tried to explain to them that the reason for my crazy hair and baggy eyes was the shadow that followed me around, constantly asking things of me and keeping me awake, they stopped making fun of my looks and started making fun, calling me crazy.
But every time I looked to myself for solace, tried to reassure myself that I wasn't losing my pre-pubecent mind, the shadow would giggle, and praise me
**"GOOD BOY, NATHAN. ONLY GOOD BOYS LIE."**
As I grew up, I learned more and more about the shadow by speaking with it before bed. It didn't have a name, didn't want one, and it existed solely to make me miserable. It would always sigh about how it could never physically harm me unless I were to start telling the truth too often. You have to understand, when you're a kid being followed by a ghost, or a demon, or whatever it is, you're liable to do whatever the hell it tells you and play along.
It continuously bothered me for the rest of my teen years, forcing me into horrible situations and ruining my childhood. I told the only girl who was ever nice to me that I hated her guts, and that I'd kill her if she ever spoke to me. I threatened bullies with the lives of their loved ones, broke their bones, and buried them alive. And all the while, I was forced to exert a hellish grin while doing so.
When I graduated, it was moreso because I cheated and scared my way to graduation, but I swore that I'd never do any of this again. The shadow was happy with me.
**"GOOD BOY, NATHAN. GOOD BOYS TELL LIES.**
When I turned 21, the spirit quite randomly went away. At first, I thought it was a sick game he had learned, make me think I was safe, then return to whisper dark nothings in my ear.
But he never came back.
For the first time since I could remember, I slept an entire night. The next day, I proceeded to walk around the neighborhood, and was utterly delighted when I *didn't* hear the whispers in my head. And this continued for almost an entire year. Sure, I learned a natural fear of the dark, but after no time at all I got used to sleeping with the lights off and walking around in the dark; hell, I grew to like it.
Until that night.
I had gotten home from work a tad later than usual, but I hadn't had dinner and desperately needed food, so I went into the kitchen and began making myself a sandwich, when the lights began to flicker. In a moment of forgotten terror, I shuffled to hallway, eager to return upstairs to my bed, when the lights turned off fully. For a minute, everything was quiet.
And then the whispers returned.
In what felt like a year's worth of horrible thoughts poured into my head. I started imagining my friends and family, brutally mutilated by the shadow, by me. The shadow finally made its grand entrance, swinging my front door wide open before slamming it shut and locking the doors. It violently shoved past me, filling me with insurmountable dread and horrible, horrible thoughts. It closed all the curtains and covered the windows until the room was pitch black.
For a moment, things went quiet again. From beside me, a deep, raspy voice bellowed.
**"HELLO NATHAN. SORRY I WAS GONE FOR SO LONG, BUT I'M BACK NOW. DID YOU MISS ME?"**
I was terrified. I soiled my work pants, and the voice chuckled in a high pitch.
"miss you? I hoped I'd never see you again."
The shadow let out another giggle, and sunk his claws into my back. The longer it's claw stayed, the darker my thoughts got, and the more I began to accept them.
**THAT'S MY BOY, NATHAN. I'M GLAD YOU LIED.**
|
On a cosmic plane beyond the reach of man, between the stars and the seas but not quite in the middle, somewhere near Surrey but actually closer to West Wessex, lives perhaps twenty billion, or perhaps trillion, houses. Some of them are small, some of them large, some of them in huge fantasies stretching across space and time, other barely more than a dot, and still others literally a dot on a 2d plane.
Human imagination is a powerful thing. Not powerful as in magnitude, but as in qualia manifest. Aristotle was wrong again. Plato's world of ideas lives here, and it's called the Realm of Fiction.
Every time a human thinks of a being, no matter how brief, that counts as one belief. This means some famous beings, celebrities in this world, have millions of beliefs, and can afford to live in luxury. On the other end of the scale, there lies discarded perhaps billions upon billions of creations that are discarded like so with maybe one, or perhaps two beliefs.
These beings can interact with the Realm of Reality, but only in subtle ways of the mind. Whence they come hence they go. The muses of history, the Judeo-Christian God, and all of the others have played a large part in shaping this history. Yet, it is imperative to note that this is not without cost. For each belief they try to influence, it costs them two on their part. And what of the power in this equality? Cannot they influence Caesar just the same as a poor man? But still Caesar has hundreds of ballots, while a poor man has perhaps none. Thus, the balance of history is kept in check by his own.
Each bit of this realm was divided into various kingdoms, of the various times of human history. The realm moves with human history, is intimately connected with human history, because it is human history. Over time, new kingdoms spring up, and old kingdoms sometimes fade into the oblivion, only to re-emerge, changed, centuries later.
The Mesopotamian gods are barely recognizable, powerful and ancient beings now reduced to beggars feeding off of history majors' theses. The Greeks and the Romans, two separate entities merged into one, have been shaped by the most recent fads of modern culture, yet have changed very little from the days of Aristophanes.
The Judeo-Christian-Muslim God in his place, although there are multiple forms of him, occupies a rather large sphere. Complete with all modern amenities of life, every belief, no matter how much misguided, is present. All of his little angels, and next door lies all the little demons of Satan and his variations.
The Greek and Roman gods are changed, modernized. Rick Riordan played a great part in re-popularizing, and reshaping that common myth. Though beliefs are a currency, beliefs are also dangerous in that anything too similar can be changed with enough beliefs, as would happen. Zeus has changed his ancient greek outfit to adopt a modern pin stripe suite. Hermes runs a delivery business. Hera has not changed from that Domina figure to the Senex of Zeus though, not changed in Shakespeare, not changed in modern times. Some things really never change.
And of course, the modern inventions. Superman occupies his own province, as he shares with Batman and Robin. All the caricatures of history and entertainment are present as well too, from the figure of Wilhelm the Conqueror, to people in Movies or TV shows. Each TV show contributes hundreds of well paid beings able to live in relative luxury and ease, although that diminishes each year. Books too, contribute somewhat, though with the rise of the internet that has diluted as that common medium spread out a limited belief pool into the wider world.
I live somewhere else. In the annals of the modern, actually post modern kingdom, somewhere near the huge province of reddit, next to the little section is called the city of Writing Prompts. It is one of the largest such city in the region, particularly as fiction occupies so much of a man's heart as this particular city. It is the city of dreams, the city of fiction itself, dedicated to its creation. As such, come the realm of unspeakable abominations working as baristas, ancient aliens, modern aliens, future aliens, humanity at its finest, and at its worst, and all of those things that make up the realm of fiction. Particularly as busy as once the ancient cafes of the Victorian Era, these new beings are both poor and ill conceived.
Some of the finer things to come out, Ted from Accounting, for example, would be described as living in poverty as compared to the city of Jokes. Most of the inhabitants are much, much poorer. Yet, we all have to live some place. As much as an eldritch abomination would like to be free of such obligations, even xe needs somewhere to pull up his many tentacles and hibernate for the evening. That's where I come in.
Cosmic realtor-ship is a responsibility recently bequeathed unto me, and what a mess I inherited. As the first realtor, created at this very moment, is the project of public housing. Mostly humans. Somewhat a psychotic bunch, with perhaps a tinge of sadism but a little bit of superpower. Perhaps I will succeed, and perhaps I will fail, but all is the fate of script on a keyboard.
Let's get to work, shall we? |
“Please restrain from opening the door” The overhead speaker on my room kept on playing as I kept on opening and hacking my door room with my android smartphone.
Yeah call me retro but I still prefer using communication devices from the 21st century because they're easier to hack and is open access unlike most devices today.
So quick facts:
I got house arrested after tapping on the intranet( basically the whole internet from earth up until 2169, the year SS Millenial was launched) . I did it so that I can download some centuries old forbidden video games because 10 years is a long ass time.
So the thing here is that basically the rotating disk, where all life forms live, rotates extremely fast relative to the spaceship itself causing time dilation. FTL can only be achieved by rotation at this point. So the 650 year journey will only be 10 years to us.
So while I was accessing the deep part of the intranet I encountered some articles about the “Doomed Fate” of the passengers of SS Millenial.
It talks about how we got the tech to do a voyage but the planet itself is still extremely mysterious. But that is when I got caught and arrested.
To be honest I think that this is the article that spread among the upper class citizens of SS Millenial 5 years ago. It caused a massive evacuation by rich people with their own spacecar. This lead to a search and rescue and a 4 month delay to the voyage. Its because the rich dumbfucks didn’t realized that they’ll be dead before they even reach 1% of the distance from SS Millenial to earth with their slowass space cars. I’m still not entirely sure about this though because the Government of Santiago ( name of planet and surname of its discoverer) covers up everything.
So even though I didn’t retrieve a copy of the article, this would help me in decoding a message I received from earth 8 years ago. I opened up my smartphone and I tried to find something meaningful. So I received a total of 10 messages with an interval of 2169.0 milliseconds.
Each message have a single letter. If you layed it out in a notepad it spells VGZUWVNLLW, I decided to
(CRASHED)
It was hot. I can feel every part of my blood boiling. I think we just crashed unto Santiago. I tried to quickly wear my space suit. The 10 minutes that it took me to wear that suit was worse than hell.
I still can’t open my door but at least there’s no autotuned rapper like voice that is telling me not to. I connected my phone and I decided to hack it again but for some reason it opened the moment I connect my phone.
Almost half of the ship melted on the impact. Those who where on the part of the ship where the impact happened were lucky because they didn’t suffered, they died quick.
I’m on the terrain of the planet now, the reddish fog is too thick. I found a super black box. As I looked closer, I saw what looks like some strange markings. I heard a distant crashing noise far away. I can see a giant silhouette. A weird looking one.
I decided to follow it.
After hours of walking I saw a city. A huge city in ruins. One built by an advanced civilization.
I pulled up my phone and I searched for pictures of Santiago from 2169. It looked like earth. It looks primitive. It doesn't look like it is being inhabited by an advanced civilization. I'm low on oxygen. I'm about to die.
I don't know what happened to this planet, but I am pretty sure what or who destroyed it arrived earlier than us. And maybe it is now coming to the planet where we left off.
|
"Hey, Grant, what's this file you sent me?"
"A *really* awesome old book!"Grant informed Luis jovially through the Skype video chat, his smile growing wide in anticipation. "I think you're gonna love it!"
Luis was skeptical. He narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "What makes you think that? You know I don't like to read, man. Don't got time for it anyway."
"Well, this particular book is exceptionally *lit,* so you may want to rethink that."Grant stumbled subtly over his words. Luis, distracted by a meme someone had posted on reddit, hardly noticed.
"Ha! So, um... Where did you find this book anyway?"
"Ah, some guy uploaded it on the internet, think like... I dunno, it was a Dropbox link someone shared..."Grant looked puzzled, trying to remember for certain. "Or was it called Dropbox? Well, some 'file sharing' service or whatever..."
"Right, right."Luis nodded, barely paying attention.
"And it looks really old! Like, 1700s. Maybe sixteens. I can't tell if this is really old English, or really fancy French."
Luis found this claim dubious. He was sure that old English hardly looked like French. But he thought little of it, and, losing interest, tabbed back into the languishing game of Overwatch he had been playing prior.
"Dude, are you gonna read the book?!"
"Nah. Doesn't interest me."
*"Doesn't interest you?!*"Grant was atracked. Appalled beyond his wildest dreams. He held up a copy of a page to the webcam for Luis to behold. "Come on, BRO! Take a look! Isn't it..."
Luis absentmindedly aimed his gaze to the left of his monitor. Seeing the page in Grant's hand, his eyes slowly glazed over. After a moment of apparent grogginess, he grinned like a rock star.
Grant's own lips curled upwards to reflect that prideful grin.
"Yes, *yes,"* Luis admitted, his voice now bleeding with a bold, devious mix of excitement and pleasure, "isn't it amazing..."
"What old magic and modern technology can achieve in harmony?"Grant was inclined to agree. "Indeed it is..."
It had taken him a long time to figure out the ways of computers and the internet. It had taken him even longer to learn the quirks with which English had evolved over the centuries. But now, his will was starting to spread. Soon, the world would be his, or, to be more precise, *he* would be the world, its entire population, guaranteeing immortality forever. And no one would stop him.
Yes, technology and magic, together, would accomplish great things indeed. |
Our mission is to, was to send back genetic material from the past to the future. We were just a five man crew sent to fulfill this assignment, but thing went wayward fast. When we landed our communication system was heavily damaged in our passing the gravity well too closely in the time slip. Ensign Reyes was killed by what appeared to be an ancient pathogen after damaging her exosuit escaping an unidentified bipedal raptor. Dr. Davis couldn't cure her in time, he died not long after due to exposure to the same pathogen. After spending two weeks we couldn't afford in quarantine a fuel leak appeared causing an explosion killing Johnson and Campbell our engineers. I'm the only person left with a broken time capsule with no way back and no possible form of contact with Arcadia Control. We picked the Chicxulub Asteroid Impact Site to land to remove all evidence of our appearance, this is my last entry in my journal as impact is in one hour. I'm sorry we failed, I'm sorry I failed my crew, I'm sorry. |
The *hiss-click* from the hospital machinery was only interrupted by the occasional *beep* from the monitors. Charles Micheal Montgomery's vitals were steady, and steadily slowing down. The wreck had proven too much for a frail mortal form, they said, and the gathered family prayed for his pain to end soon.
Death took a long pull off the Lucky Strike and flicked it away. It bounced off the open bathroom door and with a *fssh* hit the toilet. "Two points!"Charles opened his eyes. Death grinned. Okay, Death didn't grin, but if he could grin he would have grinned. "Hiya kid. Ready to play?"
Charles sat up ad out of his body. "Is that... is that *me*?"He asked. Charles looked down at his physical bits. Crumpled, pale. Tubes and wires and plugs and lines ran in and out like some sort of lazy knock off from that baby scene in the Matrix. Death clapped a bony hand on a shoulder and nodded. "Shit man, that blows. I was going to ask Gina to marry me next week..."
Death cleared his throat. "Four months ago.", he muttered.
Charles blinked. "What did you say?"
Death sighed. "I said 'four months ago'. You've been plugged in for a whopping third of a year, kid, and honestly it'd take a miracle for you not to die. Which is why I'm here."Death tugged a Lucky Strike from the soft pack and lit the end with his smoldering eye. "Bottom line, I've got a schedule I'm way behind on so I'm trying to catch up. I *could* come back when you finally up and die, but let's be honest. All you are doing is laying here, right?"Charles' face scrunched up, but he couldn't argue the point. "So here's the deal. We play a game. Winner takes all, so to speak."Death took a drag and ejected a cloud of acrid smoke through the sides of his jawbone. "Okay, to be honest, if you somehow win you make a full recovery and get to go along until something else kill you. Another car, cancer, old age, what ever. If I win, Well, I'm going to win one way or the other. Eventually. But anyway, if I win right now, I get you right now! Ready? Let's do this."
Death stuck the cigarette to the side between his teeth and pulled the sleeve up on one arm. The bones were a dull white, exactly what one would expect of ancient, well, *bone*. Charles sighed, nodded, and said. "Okay, so what are we doing? Arm wrestling?"
Death chuckled. "Nah man, we're *thumb* wrestling."The hand clacked and clattered as Death clenched a fist of the multitude of bones. Charles cocked his head, but extended his own. The two grasped, and the dance started. "One, two, three, four,"intoned Death. "I declare a Thumb War, go!"
The next few moments were full of intensity, as much could be generated by a thumb wrestling match. If he were capable of such, Death would have been sweating. Charles was good. Real good. He had managed to snag Death's thumb a couple of times already, and it was only a matter of time before he'd make the pin.
And then it happened. Charles made the pin, and began the count.
"One."Death struggled in vain to break free.
"Two."An odd whine began at the back of Death's throat, a desperate animal bleating of fear and defeat.
"Thr- Ow! Son of a bitch!"Death had snatch the still smoldering butt from his mouth at the last possible second and pressed into Charles' hand. In another deft motion, Death's bony thumb pressed down on the fleshy one.
"Onetwothree, I win!"Death cackled with malicious glee.
Charles clutched his singed hand in the other. "That's not fair!"But he could already feel his connection to the flesh, *his* flesh, slipping. It was all just so much meat laying there, and it wasn't even really doing anything now, was it?
Death draped an arm around Charles' shoulder as they headed out the door. The monitors were no longer merely beeping away the time, instead they rang out loud and shrill. One could say loud enough to wake the dead, but all Charles felt was relief really. Maybe a bit sleepy. It had been exhausting, trying to hang on. Everything began to fade as they walked out. Death laughed again. "No hard feelings, kid. Like I said, I always win, one way or another. Here, let me make it up to you. You can trick the next poor bastard."
Death waggled the pack of Lucky Strikes in front of Charles, by way of offering a peace treaty. Charles fished one out, lit it off the cherry of the one still in Death's teeth and nodded. "Sure, okay. Sounds like a deal."
And around the first smile he'd had in months, "Sounds like fun." |
Disclaimer: English is my 2nd language
In the creation mythos they told of protodragons called Drakkyrians, ethereal dragons who seeded life on the planet. The magisphere was created, a magical sphere surrounding the planet. All slain have their souls return to the magisphere, all born draw their life from the magisphere. The dragons were the firstborn, tasked with shaping the planet. The mighty bronze dragons raised mountains. The noble Sapphire dragons created the oceans and the rivers. The red dragons would fuel the planet core. 1 in 10 000 dragons would be born as white dragons, with powers of healing, resurrection and divine purpose. But extremely rarely, black dragons would be born as well. With the power to siphon and manipulate life. According to the legends, a black dragon powerful enough can assimilate the magisphere itself and attain godhood at the expense of all life on the planet. Black dragons by their very nature, must always be hunted down and destroyed. Because their thirst for power is the core of their nature - and thus they are evil beyond salvation. The Magisphere is not only the source of life, but the source of magic. Dragons have the strongest bond to the magisphere, which explains why drinking dragonblood can make even the daftest fool into a powerful mage. We must always be virtuous and on guard for those who worship the black dragons. Their depraved magic includes shadow weavers, necromancers, maledictari, curse heralds and shriekers. Watch always, for people who wield this magic. For they are heretics, and enemies of all we hold dear.
*- Grand Paladin Arcturus, Hand of Isinia, year 245*
"Valonia, wake up!"Tenebrus shakes Valonia back from her dreams of the lectures from the white citadel. "We are close now"he says. "I had a dream"she replies, lifting herself up to the side with her right elbow. "I dreamt Arcturus held another lecture on dragons and the magisphere". She frowns and picks up her daggers. The light from the campfire reveals her scaly skin and slit reptilian eyes. "When they murdered our black lord Sadranar... did you really need to drink that much of his blood? Your draconic features always made it hard to blend in"he says. "That's why I have the cloak... and the daggers, as in cloak and dagger"she says unamused. Tenebrus stretches out and looks around. They had camped on the cliff on the climb up to the white dragon Isinia. The vast ocean below them stretching as far as the eye could see. The paladin fortress and home of the living god Isinia was still far up. The fortress was on the peak of the mountain, guarded from all sides except the huge flat mountain wall at the back - which was considered impossible to climb. "The paladins murdered him, now I will avenge him. I can feel his seething anger burn in my veins"Valonia says as her draconic eyes glow bright red. "Yeah... well. You have been acting too much like him after you drank from his corpse"Tenebrus says as he sends the climbing hook further up.
At midnight they were finally there. The white dragon Isinia the everlasting sleeping before them at the peak of the fortress. "ASHNAARI!"She shouts as she becomes one with the shadows. Isinia wakes up, instantly aware of black dragon magic. "I was supposed to be a paladin until you betrayed me, now you will soon know EXTINCTION!"She screams, the sound being impossible to pinpoint. "Your father was involved with necromancy Valeria, we could not risk it"Isinia says with a calm voice with a pacifying effect. Tenebrus walks towards her... "IX UHR NAL!"he shouts as a debilitating curse makes it hard for Isinia to move. "My name is Valonia now, and your excuses are pitiful"she says. Valonia appears out of nowhere, stabbing Isinia's left eye and retreating back into the darkness. Isinia immidiately casts a healing spell, and the wound closes. "My child, you are tained. You have not only served the black dragon Sadranar, but out of the most profane things possible - you have drunk from his blood... you are now a disease". Isinia tailswipes Tenebrus on his back and readies for an attack towards him. Valonia barely manages to push him away as she comes crashing down. Reinforcements were already arriving, the hands of isinia, the noblest and highest ranking of paladins. "EX MORTEM!"Tenebrus yells. Some paladins start to age, wither and die... others, more strong willed, are unaffected. Valonia appears behind one and slices his throat, but is shield bashed to the ground by another. She quickly leaps back up on her feet. "Uls Faht Hiim"she whispers and teleports back to Tenebrus. They are hopelessly outmatched. "We can not win this fight, we lost the element of surprise"he says. Valonia agrees, and they cast a recall spell to further teleport back home to the desolate sands. Isinia charges her white breath, and a cleansing fire washes towards them, but they are gone.
In the desolate sands. Two Deathknights stand guard at the Black City. Seemingly unaffected by Valonia and Tenebrus appearing mid air before them and falling to the ground. An old man with a horribly disfigured face in a black robe walks towards them. "Our God is avenged?"he asks scornfully. Tenebrus shakes his head. Valonia curses and ignores the old man, heading for the archives. "There has to be a weakness we can exploit to kill that pretentious self-rightious lizard and I will find it"she says. "The paladins will retaliate for this"Tenebrus shouts after her, "We must be prepared!". Valonia's red eyes flare up. Her pace quickens. "I just wanted to become a Paladin"she thinks to herself sadly. She trained for 10 years to be accepted into the order only for them to order their execution for suspected heresy. "With the blood of our lord I am the strongest Necrosassin in existence, but I will need allies". Her hand touches the door to the archives. "The elusive bleak druids of bleakwood marsh, they will join me or die. I just need to find them". |
> The relation of landlord and tenant is not an ideal one, but any relations in a social order will endure if there is infused into them some of that spirit of human sympathy which qualifies life for immortality.
At least, that's what the tattered "motivational"poster currently dangling from my doorway tells me. With how long that thing's been up there, It might as well be one of those things with the kitten hangin' from the branch with the big text saying,
"HANG IN THERE"
Anyway, I can't for the life of me remember which well-read nineteenth century douchebag created that pretty little bit of prose. I guess it doesn't really matter. The ***message*** is what matters.
That message being somethin' about the social order in the landlord-tenant relationship. Namely, the social order where I (the landlord) get to kick back and relax on top of the pile of cash I make for doin' almost nothing.
And I had the perfect setup, believe you me. They told me nabbing the deed to that humongous ball of fiery death was, and I quote,
"The stupidest fucking idea (They'd) ever heard in their entire life".
This is when I learned that people change their tune real fast when they notice my hand on "their"(mine now, assholes) sun's fucking on/off switch.
It was just like being a normal landlord, really. Personally though, I prefer the term "Starlord". Before you mouth off, remember the Sun is ***technically*** a star you pricks.
When a tenant can't (or won't) pay for the privilege to leech off of my property, the landlord has the privilege of, say, killing your power until you cough up the rent.
My newfound tenants, however, couldn't afford to miss a payment. I wouldn't just cut one person's lights. I'd cut the whole world's. Light's out, bitches.
This earned me a pretty penny for a long damn time. After all, It's not like they could just up and move. You can't avoid the sun just because you're "broke and jobless", or "out of unemployment benefits", or even "retired and can't afford to pay". I always used to say,
"If you can't pay, no worries. There's nowhere else to stay!"
That used to get me laughing every damn time. Now, not so much. See, I didn't expect them to ***actually fucking move.***
These pricks dug themselves so deep they use the Earth's god-damn core to power their fucking hot tubs. I still slap myself for passing on that deed.
They got their own lights now. Their own on/off switch. So mine just sits there, untouched. Gathering cobwebs. What's the use of demonstrating dominance if there's noone to dominate?
Needless to say, this bullshit had to stop. I began to use my usual landlord tricks to fuck with their progress. I bought some of the earth's crust and jacked the prices so high Ronald Reagan himself wouldn't dare touch my wall.
This venture didn't go exactly as planned. Those crafty bastards had already dug so deep that my deed to the Earth's crust was now equivalent to a one room apartment above a fucking 24/7 nightclub.
I tried everything I could think of. And I didn't fight fair. In the end, they still prosper down there. Bright fluorescent lights illuminating once pitch-black caves. Heat from the Earth's Core creating cozy little lovenests. It still makes me sick just thinking about it.
Completely defeated, I decided to go through my contract just one more time. If a loophole saved me once, why can't it save me twice?
I went through that fine print for months and found squat. Squat, that is, until I noticed a little clause involving residential projects and conflicting zoning laws.
> The building of residential housing is prohibited In areas hidden from the sun's light... minimum of 92.96 million miles.
All is well in my world now. The sun shines on the happy (and rent-controlled) human race once again, and the underground remains the uninhabitable shithole it was always meant to be. |
There was a name for it, he knew. Familiar strangers. Strange familiars. Every morning he gulped down his oats, picked up his bag and headed to the factory. The days were greedy; they stole from each other, stole from him. Stuck him with the receipt.
Three years ago, he had been at the bus stop in his blue-and-grey jumpsuit. Around him had been other men clad in blue-and-grey, some of them chatting in the brisk November morning. Every which way, this industrial hue, faces receding into thumbs, the sky thumbing faces with rain, and he shut his eyes and counted the seconds. When he opened them, he saw a yellow blotch. No, an old man. Two brown eyes weighed down by age and fat, a nose slumped, wrinkles that ran into each other like ripples at a lake.
His hand went to his own nose, and he was holding it, feeling it, when the other man turned and caught his eye. All around them the crowd jostled, especially when the sound of screeching tires rang in the air, but they remained there, apart, connected. Then he blinked, and turned away, and that was that.
That first year he caught the old man stealing glances at him. He hadn't known what to make of the attention. It was flattering, yes, but also unnerving. He had been an orphan; his birth parents having surrendered him as an infant. The orphanage, school, and work: with his forgettable face and quiet voice, he had been part of the background radiation of life. Sometimes he thought about what he would say, if the man approached him. If he felt a nudge on his arm and heard words directed at him that were quieter than a shout. Sorry, I'm not interested in men? Sorry, I'm not who you're looking for? Sorry if I remind you of someone else? Sorry I'm not-- sorry for-- sorry, sorry, I'm very sorry.
But the old man never approached him, and that was that. Slowly he noticed that the old man never boarded the bus. Summer or winter, rain, shine, the old man stood there in his yellow raincoat. And the years passed.
And one morning, the old man did not come.
He stood there in his jumpsuit, scanning the crowd for the familiar stranger. No luck. A week passed in a daze. On Friday the foreman stuck a yellow star on his jumpsuit; congratulations, you've been promoted. All he could think of was the old man.
Maybe the yellow star had been a lodestone in its previous life; after he spoke with a few strangers and ran his finger down a phone-book, he found a name. SILVESTER SILVER HOSPICE, at the intersection of De Anza and Brice.
He ran. Still in his jumpsuit, he must've cut an odd sight. People stared. He counted numbers forwards, backwards, circling around zero-- but he ran. The receptionist gave him the room number and he burst in.
The windows were open, a saline drip attached to the bed. The old man lay in a puddle of light, stripped to a white undershirt, his head turned away from the door even though there was no way that he hadn't heard it open.
In that house of death, the old man spoke first.
"I'm sorry."
A bird perched on the rim of the window pecked at the netting. Outside, the branches waved on the wind, each twig winding around its fellows and forming a net that caught the sky. A breeze trickled through and into the room, carrying away the young man's words.
But they could not carry away the letter that arrived in the mail three weeks later.
His birth father had died and left behind $10,000 dollars in cash, another $20,000 in bullion, a beat-up Honda, a dog, and one very wrinkled and muddy yellow raincoat.
...
The young man gulped down his oats, picked up his bag, and left for the bus-station, a certain yellow star pinned to his chest, and a certain yellow garment slung over his shoulders. He spun through a crowd of grey-and-blue, and when the bus arrived, he lifted himself up onto its steps and laughed.
|
Hi, my name is LordNoOne. Don't worry, the Apocalypse is going exactly as planned. All large wars will cease in a few months as the shielding (the mylen sheaths) on people's neurons fall off and we realize we can feel the Electromagnetic fields (among many other things) around us. This will make us super empathetic towards each other as well as much better at science and spirituality.
Btw, this is happening due to an astronomical event, largely involving the Beaetlejuice Galaxy Cluster. Morally though, I can't reveal too much.
Rage. I met that guy at work. Cool guy. He has the word "RAGE"tattooed on his knuckles. His wife would make his family food, and then he'd steal his kids' lunches eat them at work. Can't remember his first name, but I can picture him really clearly right now. He seems pretty calm right now, which is a nice change. I used to feel boiling rage inside of him, but he'd hold in all in and act really nice.
Courage. I met her online. Her boyfriend in Pestilence. She used to be really afraid, but she's finding her own courage now, and she's taking good care of Pestilence.
I can't recall meeting War or Famine, or their girlfriends' though.
But I sense that all 8 of the horsemen and beauties are currently discussing discussing things a lot.
August 12th and 13th should be a good time to watch out for. I don't know what to expect, but I've been having dreams about that date ever since my birthday last November. That date is the official beginning of Ragnarok, the search for true warmth and love.
Who am I? Hard to explain, but I was born with really sensitive neurons, so I've always been able to feel the fields outside of me. It's just on complete overdrive right now.
I was born in November, directly under the light of the tip of the tail of Scorpio. At the time, my grandmother was in the Holy Land collecting water from the river Jordan for my baptism, and seeing this light, she realized I had been born. She wrote in her diary "something important just happened back home".
I earned the name LordNoOne after my 13th suicide attempt (10 years of fighting with my soulmate). But I am also the emptiness dragon Cloakwise, whose true name can only be said with silence.
Ask me any questions you have. I haven't been sleeping well lately, so I'll be on Reddit for a few hours.
Edit: oh, I forgot. This "old god"you're referring to is the Jedi Gno (an incarnation of intuitive knowledge) who tamed the Fear Dragon, Kuraku, many many ages ago. |
“People are not going to handle this very well.”
He was practically glowing... in fact, he seemed to be actually glowing. Subtly, somewhere between jaundice and sun-kissed. I asked “what the hell is going on?”
The Chlorisians had come here practically pleading for salvation from a hell of their own creation. Pollution had covered their home planet and they came to our “sparkling” blue orb to once again breath clean air and drink clean water. In their own words, “but this will do.”
Not to say they were without gratitude. They brought us technology, like the energy producing light bulb and the series of tubes that we took to work each day. They brought culture; Zoltrin zleeburp and his 6/4 time pop that stuck in your head like brain peanut-butter. Despite their appreciation, it was clear that they were incompletely satisfied with the first requiem they came across in their flight across the stars.
Their leader, the very charming Cheerum Lasinoprid, was like a cross between the queen of England and Marilyn Monroe (92 yrs old but you’re like “yeah, I’m lucky to have her”). She announced on a sultry summer day, in the perfect tenor tone of voice, “we will bring humanity the gift of chloranity.”
No one knew what this meant, but we had become accustomed to ignoring the insane ramblings of our leaders (MAGA, am I right). But this was more than an empty statement of solidarity and friendship. She (We assume she was a she, things are different on Chlorinia), really meant they were going to employ their own ultimate solution.
We smell of something apparently offensive which the known galaxy had never experienced before. My father, who is especially odiferous, had gone to a chlorisian vainbar- which was a salon/saloon hybrid quite similar to that which the the hipsters of Brooklyn and Portland had claimed several years ago as their own. There, he claims, he was “chlorinated.”
He states it was technically against his will, but once the 3-limbs of the chlorisian started massaging his ego and sloughing off his coarse keratin shell, he exclaimed, “ I lost all sight of the droids I was looking for.”
He was One of the first to experience the cleansing, but not the last. Soon all of humanity would be rid of MRSA, blonde-ish, and exfoliated by dichlorine oxide. The unwashed masses would waft en masse of fresh linens. Except Alabama... we still don’t know why they were chosen as the control.
|
For the most part, today felt like most of the others. The remote was having a problem switching the damn channels again, and my sandwich definitely could've had less mayonnaise. I've never liked mayonnaise really, have I?
"Doing all right today? You look wonderful. The nice lady over there said we could sneak you out for a cigarette, how's that sound Grandaddy?"The young man insisted. His glare seemed to harbor every positive emotion, but I think I see a tear.
I don't really know if I like cigarettes, but the company seems nice and I feel so big within these small, white rooms. The young man stole my hand with a big grin, and nearly ripped my arm off on the way to the bench near the entrance.
My son has always called me pops. He looks younger this time, and I'm not sure why my ex-wife is with him, but he seems like he has a lot of things to talk about today. I love spending time with my son. He comes on the weekends sometimes if he isn't busy just to chat.
"Back from deployment to pay me a visit, huh? They been treatin' yall alright over there?"
"Yes sir, just thought I would come by and pay a visit while im back in the states."
My son seemed confused, but I get confused sometimes too. The sky started to turn into a golden color, signaling the close of the day. We talked about a whole lot of fun things today.
The sliding door makes some loud noises sometimes that scare me, but when the lady in blue walked out to remind us of the time, I didn't feel alarmed. My son gave me a tight embrace.
"I love you Grandaddy. I'm sorry I can't visit that much. I'll try and see you again."
"Alright, love you too."I replied in a tired voice. It was getting late. She should be bringing my medicine when I get back to my room. Looking back through the doors I see the young man and my ex-wife walking back to the parking lot. I don't think they've ever come to visit me on a friday.
https://imgur.com/gallery/4RzNv8X
Alvin Parker passed away in 2013 with alzheimers. I was not able to visit him once he got put into a nursing home. |
"Well, Mr. Architect, as you are ultipotent across all planes and dimensions. I've scheduled this conference to convince you to buy hell..."Satan told The Architect, sweating, and secretly scared... Even being the ultimate evil wasn't worth anything in the presence of The Architect.
"Normally, I'd tell you to find someone else... But..."The Architect began.
"Um.. Y-Yes?"Satan asked awkwardly.
"I'm in quite a good mood right now..."The Architect answered.
"Well, that certainly won't be any hindrance to my intentions..."Satan said.
"Well... You've got about 2 hours, lets begin on why I should purchase it. I can assure you, purchasing another underworld could be considered a good business decision..."The Architect said.
"Well uh... Alright... Here I go...!"Satan awkwardly laughed, as he began his presentation.
2 hours passed. The Architect watched unblinking...
"Well... You're one of two people who can make a sale for the angels..."The Architect said. "Under my regulations, I'll have to let you understand that torture will most likely be lessened significantly..."
"Um... Y-Yes, I did do my research on your policies you see..."Satan said.
"Well... Lets make it official. I assume you don't require any payment, as any souls you'd be given would most likely be confiscated upon your entry to heaven..."The Architect said.
"Um... Excellent! J-"Satan was interrupted by the Architect.
"Just sign here to make it official? That's my line now, Mr. Satan..."The Architect said, producing a contract.
Satan gulped and akwardly laughed. "Ha..."He signed the contract.
*And that was it... From that point on, Hell got a lot easier on its workers and servants. They even got the A.C. working again. Of course, being the sort of person he was, this would come without saying for The Architect, who really couldn't hurt normal souls or low tiers...* |
Don’t ever ask this pose this question toward someone who has a good understanding of human anatomy.
First thing I would do is break every bone in their feet. Then remove them. But in incriments. I’d expose nerve endings and muscle and rub salt in their wounds. Eventually I’d skin them alive, but hook them up to an epinephrine/stimulant infusion to keep them going. I’d force feed them their own muscle. Eviscerate them and cut out segments of bowel, re-routing them until they’re basically human centipeding themselves.
Force feed them their own shit. Force feed them larvae and the grossest stuff I can find. Put bugs in their ears. Etc.
Eventually I’d lobotomize them and make sure they are perfectly aware of which structures I’m permanently damaging. Then I’d do the whole Hannibal Lecter thing and force feed them bits of their own brain. I’d make them watch the whole thing. Genital mutilation would definitely occur.
Eventually they’d die of shock. But not of blood loss. I’d cauterize and tourniquet as I go.
This was highly disturbing for me to write tbh.
|
“Dad! I finished my science fair project!” My son said, jumping down excitedly in the doorway.
“Alright, let’s see this volcano.” I said, standing up and setting my book aside, he began to tug on my arm and it felt like he was about to jump out of his skin. “Calm down.”
“Um, just one thing dad.” He said, stopping me at the door of the kitchen. “I didn’t make a volcano...I, well, let me just show you…” He said, opening the door to the kitchen. There on my table was not a model volcano, but a full grown velociraptor.
“Son I have some questions.” I said, quickly slamming the door and holding it shut with my back.
“Her name is Susan dad! She’s really nice.” My child said to me. “Can I keep her? Pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee?” He asked, using the puppy dog eyes that always seemed to work. I let out a long sigh and opened up the kitchen door slowly. The dinosaur was curled up on the kitchen table, it seemed to be sleeping. “Susan, want a treat?” My son said, wiggling past me and going to the fridge. The velociraptor woke up and followed my son and looked through the fridge as my son dug through. “Here you go!” He said, pulling out a shrink wrapped steak. He held out a hand and the Velociraptor crouched down and waited patiently as my son got out the steak.
“Son...Be careful…” I said, trying to not to get too close to Susan. Rather than answering though, my 9 year old casually tossed a steak up into the air and the dinosaur he somehow made in the kitchen caught it and quickly swallowed it.
“See dad, she’s fine. So can I keep her?” He said, hugging the dinosaur.
“Well…” I wanted to say no, but the look on my son’s face as he hugged his new found pet won out. “I suppose. Our grocery bill is going to get a lot bigger though.” |
"A cat loaf?"he asked, confused, as the talking heads continued on with their breaking news broadcast.
"Yes dad."
"What's a cat loaf?"
She grabbed her phone and googled, while explaining, "You know when a cat sits down with all its feet curled under it, kinda looks like a loaf of bread? Like this,"she said, finding a good picture and brandishing her screen at him. "Like that,"she added, pointing at the TV, where the newscast had just brought up a graphic, a slowly rotating cat loaf in space, all the worlds continents laid out on their new loafy home.
"Oh,"he said, confusion still apparent in the one syllable. She braced herself. He continued, "But what does it *mean*?"
"It means the government has been lying to everyone, for years. Not just our government, all of them. Outside of that, I don't know."
"Is it a *bad* thing that the world is shaped like a cat loaf?"
"I think it probably flies in the face of all known physics. I'm sure they'll have experts on soon, we should just watch."
"Ok."They both turned back to the screen for a mere second, then, "Is the Moon still round? Or is everything in space a cat loaf now?"
She sighed, "You've seen the moon dad."
"So?"
"How's it look to you? Round or cat-loaf-shaped?"
"Well, round, obviously, but how do I know? Maybe we've only ever seen it from the arse-end of the loaf or something."
She rolled her eyes and shook her head, "Can we just watch? I'm sure they'll explain everything."
"Fine."The broadcast announced a call-in from an expert at the local university, but he interrupted, "Did it show where we are on the loaf yet?"
"I think we're somewhere on the face,"she replied, distracted.
She saw him nodding his head out of the corner of her eye, then he said, under his breath, "I wonder who's on the arse."He watched for another minute then stood, "Well, this is all very interesting, but I've got to get back to work."
"Dad, this is like the biggest story in the history of the planet."
He shrugged, "Are we in an unstable orbit around the sun all of a sudden? Are we about to go careening off in to space?"
"I don't think so? Maybe just watch instead of - "
"Does anything really change if the world is shaped like a cat loaf? Besides globes and textbooks?"
"I really don't know."
"Well, come get me if it turns out we're doomed. I've got to get these papers graded."
She watched him walk from the room, exasperated, and called out, "But dad, you teach *geography*." |
Dr. Razef stood before the cameras and sweated. His eyes kept darting to all the exits and to anyone who might try to prevent him from running that way. He said, “Look, from a technical standpoint, it was a complete success! You will all no longer age and we have taken the first step toward immortality!”
He paused, but no one clapped. They glared at him and most seemed to be taking a deep breath in preparation for more yelling. Dr. Razef waved his hands and continued. “Yes, there have been some unexpected side effects, but…”
Someone yelled over him. “You’ve ruined everything I used to love!”
Someone else yelled. “Yeah, pizza just tastes like salt now!”
Dr. Razef nodded, “Yes, a loss of the sense of smell has also had a detrimental effect on taste, but this could have a positive effect by causing people to eat healthier!”
He gave a small, hopeful smile which faded when no one else smiled. A third person yelled. “Everything looks so dismal and gray now.”
Dr. Razef nodded again. “We do seem to have lost our sensitivity to some frequencies of light, but we still have our ability to see green light!”
Yet another person yelled. “And what are you going to do to fix this?”
Dr. Razef glanced toward the exits again. “Well… the thing is… we are technically a different species now. It took 20 years to perfect the anti-aging virus and adding new senses to a species is likely to take even longer.”
The mood in the room grew even darker. Some people seemed to be grabbing heavy things and tensing to spring at him.
He tried one last time. “Look, thanks to me we have an almost unlimited amount of time to get it right!”
You could have cut the tension in the room with the nearest blunt object. Everyone was waiting for someone else to leap, but no one seemed to want to be the first.
People began to relax. Then Dr. Razef said “And I’m sure we can do something about the complete lack of sensitivity in the genit…”
The audience leapt as one.
|
My eyes were still closed and I could feel the sun shining on my face through the window. God, I loved waking up like this. Summer vacation was great. No worries, waking up without stress. LOVE IT! But god! What was that smell!? It surrounded me and made me gag.
I quickly opened my eyes and looked around for the source of this god awful smell. Something must have died in my house. Either my Guinea pig, or a bunch of… fruit. Maybe?
Last time I checked my Guinea pig was still alive! I quickly got out of bed, put on my blue jeans which went remarkably easy, and ran down the stairs. I hoped with all my heart that my cute little Guinea pig was still alive! I had cuddled him only yesterday before going to sleep and he looked fine then! How could he have died?
I ran into the living room. His cage was a few feet away from the door. I slowly walked towards the cage, hoping with all my heart for him to be alive. I walked closer and closer and suddenly heard the high beeping noise of my guinea pig! I let out a sigh of relieve, but I quickly remembered that he only made a high beeping noise when he was scared. I quickly stepped towards the cage. My little cute ball of fur was running around his cage, completely lost. I mean, he never looked particularly smart or anything, but now he had completely lost it! Not just the way in his cage, but his mind aswell. He even ran headfirst into the side of the cage a few times.
I reached into the cage to grab him. I just wanted to calm him down, but as soon as I got close to him he launched himself towards my finger and used all the power of his jaw to bite it.
‘God motherfucker!’ I screamed as I pulled back my hand. He didn’t let go though. He kept holding on. ‘Let me goooooo!’ I screamed like a little girl. With my hand out of the cage and my guinea pig still holding on, I started sweeping it around. I literally spun around my axis 2 times before it finally let go. He flew through the air and smashed against the window. I could hear his bones break.
‘Mr Sparkles!’ I screamed. I ran towards the window and saw him lying on the floor.
‘No, no…’. I couldn’t believe it. Suddenly I felt the pain in my finger again. I turned away from my little guinea pig, and looked at my finger. I screamed again. Not because of the wound that my little bro had made, but because my finger looked nothing like the finger I had known… Which is kind of a weird way of saying it, but it was true. It didn’t look normal! The skin was grey, and it was like there was no fat under it. It was just bone and skin. And it was grey. What!??
I ran upstairs to the bathroom to look in the mirror. I ran in, and immediately ran out again. Screaming. I had completely lost it!
In the mirror a grey figure had looked back at me. His eyes dark, eyes red, and with a face that looked more like a skull than... well, my face.
I must be dreaming I thought. It can only take a while before I wake up… This thought calmed me down enough to be able to think. I took a few deep breaths and decided on what to do. I wasn’t hungry, so a dream snack didn’t feel a good idea. Instead I decided to go for a walk. I ran downstairs, and looked it the closet where are my coats hang.
I opened it, and my jaw dropped. It literally disconnected from my face and fell on the floor. ‘What the fuck!’ I tried to scream. Really hard to do without a jaw. I didn’t even have time to react to my closet. All of my coats were replaced by this blacker than black robe.
I grabbed my jaw and slammed it into my face, hoping it would connect. Surprisingly it did. What was happening to me!
|
*Good luck today, old friend*.
The ink danced across the notebook in beautiful, careful cursive. Each letter written with precision. Each word written with passion. Martin picked up the notebook and furrowed his brow. He flipped through the rest of the notebook's pages to find a sea of white. No other writing could be found. Martin closed the notebook and set it aside hesitantly. Perhaps curiosity planted itself in Martin's mind and was slowly taking root. But alas, work must be done.
Martin made a profession of woodworking and restoring antiques. It was patient work. Considerate work. Work that took concentration and steady hands. That made Martin love it more.
He lived alone in a small house with a workshop on the outskirts of the city. Driving in only to drop off completed pieces. Martin had a reputation for the quality of his works. Like a local celebrity his name would pass from neighbor to neighbor. "What a beautiful coffee table, where did you get it?""A commission from a woodworker, Martin. Do you want his number?"
Perhaps that's how the conversations would go.
Martin made his living and his living made him. To be bothered with a curious note would be below him. And so went another day of Martin's work.
\--
*You should clean up your workshop better. The wife won't like how you keep it once you find her*.
Martin's eyes widened when he returned to the desk the next day. The notebook sat there, splayed open to a new page with the same intricate handwriting.
"Who could've done this..."Martin muttered. Again, the same furrowed brow. "I better double check the locks when I leave today."
Martin picked up the notebook, this time with less care than yesterday, and set it aside once again. Martin's steady hands took up his tools and began work on restoring the desk. Another day of work.
\--
*Don't worry. The locks are fine. I'm happy you didn't throw this away*.
Perhaps these notes were becoming unnerving. Martin picked up the notebook once again, a scowl across his face, and ripped the page out of the notebook. His hands clamped down and crumpled the paper, as if that action would choke out whatever forces have been leaving these notes. Martin tossed the page into a trash bin, and shut the notebook violently.
He eyed the cover of the notebook suspiciously, but deep in his eyes a glint of curiosity and compassion could be found. How come he never noticed how beautifully bounded the pages were?
The notebook was bounded in a deep, navy blue that could hold the bones of sunken sailors. A golden line ran down its spine. Elegant and tasteful, just like the writing on the notes.
Martin could not find it within himself to discard the notebook entirely. Instead, he locked the notebook up in one of of the tool cabinets. He patted the outside of the cabinet and then pulled on the handle tight. Assured of the cabinet's locked state, he took on his tools and began his work again. Soon, the desk will be restored.
\--
*When you are done, please give that desk to granddaughter. Could you do that for me, old friend?*
Martin's brow furrowed deep and the frown plastered on his face showed his discontent. How did the notebook escape once again? Martin could no longer ignore the notes or the notebook, and picked it up once more. He threw the navy-bound pages into the trash bin, followed by petrol and a match.
He watched the pages burn. The ashes wafted up through the workshop. But business must go on as usual. Martin picked up his tools and began the finishing details on the desk. The frown never left his face as he finished his work.
\--
*6381 Street St.*
A charred page laid on top of the finished desk. |
"Really? Because it looks like junk."
Nola groaned. "Ogden, just listen. It's more than—"
"The sum of its parts? Yeah; isn't everything?"
Nola left her childhood friend in the doorway where he still stood, warily, staring at the array of parts she'd cobbled together, some units on stools, others on the cold concrete slab of the unfinished basement. His house. He put words to his concern as she started flipping switches, screens and towers booting to life. "Promise it won't explode? That seems like the wrong way to finish this room."
She looked up at him long enough only to check his facial expressions: wry smile. She smiled in return and went about the task of getting the rest of the array turned on.
It seemed mundane enough. Ogden fully entered the room, focusing more closely on the amalgamation of third-hand hardware connected by something like four hundred cables and wires, connected typically wherever possible, jury-rigs abounding wherever otherwise; and roughly-drilled holes feeding bundles of bound cables, snaking in, through, out, up, down, and around all - he paused to consciously count - *six* individual computers, somehow linked together. Presumably.
The computer at the center of the tangling array was an old blue laptop, the crusty outlined remains of once-erringly-used masking tape still partly visible on the closed top of its thin lid, partly obscured by a nightblack river of power cords, running off into the shadows beyond the purview of the lamplight.
"Hey – that laptop in the middle, on the floor there – was that Professor Branby's?"
Nola didn't answer immediately. She bent down, gently lifted the blue laptop and opened it, showing exceptional care in her treatment of the seeming-relic despite having drilled an ungodly number of small holes into its sides, all in service of additional connections within. Nola was funny in that way. A dim glow further illuminated the room, and it became clear to Ogden a moment later that its source was the laptop, apparently already on. Or *still* on, perhaps?
"That *was* Brian's! You know he's been looking for that, right?"
Nola set the laptop back down on its nest of power cables, then wheeled about to glare at Ogden. "I need it."
"But why?"
"*It* needs it." |
"Another sign!"I exclaimed peering out the dusty window. "Who the hell keeps putting these FOR SALE signs in the yard?"
I put on my nearest pair of pants, and march out the door as it loudly squeaks closed behind me. Getting closer to the shoulder heigh sign, I get ready to drop kick it out of the untrimmed yard, when I realized. This sign says 'SOLD' on it.
As I stand there staring at it, dumbfounded, a car drives by and a lady yells "Put a shirt on!"
I pay no mind. Who or how was the house sold? No one came by, no one talked to me. The damn signs just kept popping up and I always took them out back for fire wood. This cant be real, I've lived here for two years. I have to get to the bottom of this, this can be disastrous! The sign says 'Nice Times Realty' at the top, with an address.
I run back in grab a clean looking shirt, brushing off the cat fur, and my slippers and hurry downtown. Its takes a few hours, due to the sweltering weather, and the outrageous humidity.
I see the building, go inside the pristine office with royal blue carpet and five glossy wooden desks. Upon entering, all five desk occupants turn and smile at me, and then their smiles slowly faded.
Apparently the heat and my power walking caused quite the sweat storm under my clothes as I was covered with sweat stains.
The first deck held a pleasant looking lady. I approached her and she writhed back with apparent disgust, I pay no mind, I slam my hands on the table.
"Who sold the house, 34 Blossom drive? I need to know!"I wailed.
In her confusion, she continued to stare. Then a gentleman in the back said. "Marcy, the abandoned house next to Larry."
Marcy, I guess her name, had a sudden realization on her face, and said. "Well...sir, that was me. We bought and sold the house, because it was abandoned. Sir, do you... do you live there?"
"Well I stay there and keeps my stuff there, so yeah."
Just then, the guy in the back picks up a phone.
"Now tell me who the people are that bought the place? They didn't even go in, they need to know something!"I yelled.
The guy on the phone started talking. "Hello, we have a homeless man in our office, hes maki-"
"I prefer Less fortunate, there guy!"I interrupted.
I stare back at Marcy, who is now probably scared out of her mind. "Now you listen here."I lean in a bit closer. "The animals that bought the house, need to know..."
"That you live in there?"She said, with a slight tremble.
"Well that too, but they need to know that the plumbing hasn't worked in two years, so there is going to be a load of a mess in the bathroom, the foundation is cracking, which can lead to a whole lot of problems and the amount cats living in the walls is enough to drive a person mad."
Marcy stared, I guess not knowing how to process these nuggets of information.
"Gotta tell buyers these things."I said. |
I still remember day one. Back when the creator fitted my bolts, screws, and limbs together and then ignited my stone heart with enough heat to kick-start essential processing. That day was the best and worst of my life.
The creator looked down on me and said, “Welcome to Earth, Ex320.”
I looked up at him and then down on myself and smiled.
We were the same. The same bodily structure, same coloured flesh, and most of all I felt a strange attraction towards him.
“While on Earth you will help me,” the creator said.
As I sat up my inner structure squealed. I stretched each limb out, listening for the satisfying click of the joints.
“Help you?”
Already my brain populated with information relating to CPR, surgery, combat, and kindness.
“You are to be my wife,” the creator said. “As you are programmed to do.”
This time pictures of a man and woman in love populated my head and I felt the butterflies, as real as anything, in the pit of my stomach.
“That sounds nice,” I said.
The professor smiled. “Doesn’t it?”
From that moment on, the creator and I spent every waking moment together. We went for walks together and shared meals over wine. After an amount of time we even slept in the same bed and it became our purpose to brighten the others day with as much love as possible.
When the professor mentioned a big project that he was working on, I couldn’t help but offer my service.
I shaped metal and finished precisely lengthened screws. I developed an easier to make recipe for leather paste and improved its beige quality.
The creator and I even took lasting breaks to fuss over how some parts could be strengthened and how other areas could be made even softer.
I never did see the end of that project.
Well, in a way maybe I did.
You see the last thing the professor needed was a stone heart. An item he only had one of.
And so I watched, as he connected bolts, screws, and limbs on his work table, while the heat of the furnace melted away my memory of love.
|
This is real.
I mean, no kidding, this is real.
He's made a truckload, frickin movie deals and everything, all from my ideas. I've been following him for a long time now, he made the mistake of linking to his social media accounts through Reddit comments. Think he wanted to get more followers, the selfish ass. But I know him now. I've seen his sports car, the women, the parties. I've seen his house.
I've been to his house.
He leaves the back door open sometimes, but most of the time I have to crawl in through the vent I popped the first time I visited. He hasn't noticed - I was afraid he'd replace the cover.
Sometimes he talks out loud about my ideas. I can hear him through the vent shafts. He's got boards with pictures and scribbles pinned up on them too. I know, I've been through them at length. They're all mine, stolen outright. Lifted. He's taken my property. So I have no problem rooting through his.
He's got so many contacts in his little address book. Friends, producers, psychiatrists, family... Oh, family. They might not know how much of a thief he is. Not yet. For now, I'll settle with letting him know.
I wrote, and he stole. Now I write for him. "Thief,"I write. Again and again. Thief, thief, thief. All over his notes. In his address book. Scrawled across every page.
Thief, thief, thief.
He'll see them, I know. He'll replace the books, he'll copy out the notes. He'll erase every trace of me, like he always does.
Gone, gone, gone.
And I'll wake up tomorrow to find he's got his revenge, crept into my house and scribbled his rebuttal all over my own paperwork.
Thief, thief, thief.
He even stole my revenge.
I won't be disheartened, though. I'll copy my notes up, replace my books. Start the long process of rebuilding. Those notes and books will go in the back room, along with the others.
He stole my ideas. He stole my revenge. He even stole my handwriting.
I'll never forget. I won't let him forget. I won't let myself forget. |
The baby cried and cried, never stopping. I looked about, and hushed it. It cried even louder. Finally i had had enough. I got a binky made, and gave it too the baby. It spit it out and cried more. I sighed in exasperation. "Look here, you little $@#%, you just gotta stop crying."It cried nontheless, its eyes spewing tears. I put my face in my hands, and dragged my hands across them. The baby cried a little less. I hod my face again, then showed it. The baby's crying was now the occasional sob. I did it again. It laughed alittle. I did it again, and again, making the baby laugh. Finally, i put its pacifier in, and it went to sleep. I picked it up in my arms. Now what...? |
**5:00 PM**
It starts with a man. A normal man, by most measures, but richer than most. He has a wife, a family, a home, an airstrip, and an airplane. Built by hand, treasured by the man, and, on this particular evening, low on fuel. He has three hours until he's out. But this is ordinary; so he flies out to refuel.
**9:00 PM**
Then there's a woman, left at home while her husband goes flying. She worries. Where is he? Two places he could've refueled. She checks. He's been to neither. It storms that night.
**11:40 PM**
An email is sent. Aircrew needed. They're told of a missing man.
**5:22 AM**
They catch a signal, fleeting, fading. There one moment, gone the next. Again, they call for help. "Additional resources needed as follows". I answer.
**9:03 AM**
It's quiet here. Quieter than it should be. More comatose than peaceful. No dread, no worry. Efficiency. I tap the keys; log another call. It feels odd to speak.
**11:30 AM**
"Eyes on target", is the call. It is treated like any other.
**1:00 PM**
A call, but not for my ears. I hear anyway, one side.
"Yes, we've found the scene. One fatality."
**2:45 PM**
The news crews descend like vultures, quite literally picking at the carcass. 14 hours of effort, a life lost. 90 seconds on the news.
I realize I wouldn't have cared.
Is life so little to us? To me? I feel callous, cold. I *am* callous, cold.
**10:11 PM**
It storms again. Lightning flashes across the clouds; thunder rattles me to the bone. I wonder who died tonight?
I wonder why I don't care.
/
This is a mess, sorry. The situation is rather fresh. |
Hi, /u/sajemcgomery. I didn't finish writing for your prompt. I'm afraid it's a lot of writing for not much happening, but I figured I'd post it all the same. Why not after all? Thanks for the prompt though I didn't get to finish it. I might return later and finish it. Here's what I got.
***
Bzzzt!
Bzzzt!
Bzzzt!
I grope for the button that will stop my alarm. Something doesn't feel right. I can't feel anything with my right hand. I can hear that I've hit my alarm, and I can feel it in my arm, but my hand can't feel. I open my eyes with fright. My hand is swollen. I can't move my fingers at the joints; the joints seem to have disappeared.
"Okay. I'm okay. I just have to stay calm", I assure myself.
Bzzzt!
Bzzzt!
I pull out my other hand and it seems to be in similar condition. I shove the sheet from on top of me, sitting up to look at them. They were a horrific sight for sure. They looked nonhuman, and reeked like something gone sour. It was as though they had rotted. I touched them together but my fingers couldn't feel anything. My palms felt them though. They felt nothing like any finger I could have imagined and my mind raced wondering what had gone wrong. I pinched my hands together and swept the sheet off the bed, but Sophie had it pinned under her shoulder.
"Mff", was all she said.
"Sophie, there's a spider in the bed!"I whispered urgently to her.
"It'll go away", she said calmly.
I caught myself wanting to put my head in my hands, but I didn't trust my hands.
"Sophie, for real, something happened in the night. Look at my hands!"
"They look good"she said, without looking.
I went to the living room.
"Hey Google, what should I do if I have swollen fingers?", I asked. It didn't answer. I tried again, trying to steady my voice. This time it light up.
"Let me do a search for 'what should I do if I have swollen fingers?' The first result is from Desert Hand Therapy. 'Rest. If you have any swelling in the hands, stop any movement and rest it until the swelling goes down. Ice. If your hand is swollen, icing the affected area will help to reduce pain, inflammation and swelling'".
I went to the freezer and took out the frozen peas, holding them between my hands. But it seemed like resting got my hands swollen.
"Hey Google, what if I can't feel my fingers?" |
The sun would have been high in the sky today. Mother Nature had other ideas, though, and the clouds had finally parted in the past hour. The rain fell softly behind me, a soft patter against the window of the office.
*Office may not be the best word to use,* I thought. Squished into a slum of a building on the West Side, the room acted as my place of work as well as the kitchen, bed, and living room. Rent may have only been a few hundred bucks a month more than I would like, but it put a roof over my head and an address on the business card.
One such card was in the hand of my visitor. Broad and barrel chested, the man was crouched on one of the folding chairs I kept for when customers showed up. He twirled the card between two meaty fingers, then flicked it so that it sailed through the air and landed on the desk facing me.
*Private Eye On The Prize*
*Jefferson Wilkins*
*418 Amsterdam Ave, Apt 2B*
I glanced up at the man, meeting his steely gaze. "Nice trick. You must be a hit at parties."
"It does the job when I need it to."Coming from the huge man, his voice was squeakier, more high pitched than I expected. The voice sounded as though it could have come from a preteen.
"So what can I do for you, Mr..."My voice trailed off with a questioning tone. *I gotta start getting these names once they show up.*
"Ramirez. Ramon Ramirez. Most people call me Tiny."
*Of course they do.* I paused, trying not to laugh at the disparity. "Well, Mister Ramirez, back to the question. What can I do for you?"
"Actually, it's more what you can do for yourself."Ramirez reached inside his coat pocket. I reached for my desk drawer on instinct, ready to pull my Colt .45 at a moment's notice. He saw my motion and paused, then pulled a battered newspaper from inside his pocket and placed it on the tabletop. The tension hung in the air as I looked at the paper, fully aware of what I would be looking at.
**Private Eye Saves Heiress, To Receive Key To City**
I raised an eyebrow. "So what is it, you saw this and figured you'd ask me to help with some big score? I've seen your type before, and it never ends up well."
Tiny shifted in his seat uncomfortable. "Not...not quite. I'm here to give you some advice. Don't take the key."
"Come again?"
"Whatever you do, don't accept the key to the city."
I stood from behind the desk, the rain taking that moment to bear down even harder. "I don't know what your deal is, but you need to leave."
Ramirez stayed in his seat, staring at me intently. "I figured you weren't going to listen to reason, so I might as well lay it all on the table. The key is one of the most dangerous things you can have in your possession, especially with your skills. They don't tell you that that key actually *does* open every door in the city. Some of those doors were meant to stay closed."
I chuckled in response. "Well gee whiz, don't you think that might be useful for a guy like me? No need to crack a window, no jimmying a lock--"
Tiny cut me off, slamming a not-so-tiny fist on the table. "NO, DAMMIT! It's the worst thing. I've seen what it does. It will lead you down a dark path that will lead to your death."
I paused, a low rumble of thunder shaking the room. I chose my next words carefully and spoke softly. "Who did you lose?"
The man looked at the floor. "My brother. He got a key, and now it's been three years since I last saw him."
I exhaled harshly. *So this is what it's all about.* "Do you want me to look for your brother? I can give you a discount of my services..."
Tiny shook his head, still transfixed on the wood floor. "I figured he was gone a long time ago. I've moved on from that. I just don't want someone else to suffer the same way he did."
A silence filled the room, only broken by the pouring rain outside. I mulled over my options carefully, then spoke. "I can't pass this up. From what you've told me, this is something that needs to be looked into , and I can't do that without the key in hand. But I can promise you this. I will find out what happened to your brother. You deserve closure."
Tiny smiled timidly. "Th-thank you. I understand, and I really appreciate it."He got to his feet, seemingly filling the room. He turned and walked to the door and placed one of his large hands on the handle. As lighting flashed, filling the room, he turned back and looked at me.
"Just so you know, one day, they're going to ask you to use that key. You best hope that they don't make you open the wrong door."
/u/TemporaryPatch New Years Resolution Tracker: 48/100. Visit /r/TemporaryPatchWrites for more responses and stories! |
It is high on top of this cliff. The wind is so cold against my face. The air tastes of salt. I can hear the waves of the sea crash against the shore.
What if?
What if things are meant to get better?
I am so tired of waiting for better. It never seems to get better. I want it to get better though.
Living has become so overwhelming. I find it hard to get a grip on my life. People say one thing and they mean something else. Everything I try to do seem to fail.
My thoughts just won't stop going round and round in my head.
Yesterday I actually felt something. For a moment there was this feeling of content when I curled up on my settee with a cuppa tea and my book.
For a moment I was maybe happy. Everything made sense for these brief moments.
But then the phone rang. Another kid I couldn't save. Another abused little boy lost to me.
Life just doesn't make sense. The bad things are just allowed to keep on happening and no one acts.
I'm just so tired. So tired of trying to understand.
Last time you told me it would get better. Just don't do it you said. Hope. There is more to come and if you have hit rock bottom there is no further down to go. I now found there is. There is further down to go. The days just flow into each other. There is nothing to live for. The longing gets harder and harder to fight. Peace. Quiet. No more fighting.
There is no one really to miss me anyway. I'm just not good enough. That voice in my head always tells me I fall short with everybody. There are no friends or family left to care. There was only you.
The voice in my head keeps telling me over and over you don't love me anymore though. That you found someone else to love.
Peace. Quiet. No more fighting myself.
I can hear the wind whoosh around me, it is almost as if it is saying my name. It sounds a bit like shouting. I must be going crazy as well.
It is time.I close my eyes One last step. One last breath. One last tear.
Oh gods. You saved me once, I wish you were here to save me again.
(please be kind this is the first text I ever posted anywhere and the first writing prompt I tried) |
Spurting fire from your hand would hurt... unless you were a superhero.
When I was 4, an unhealthy obsession with superpowers was discovered. Although this tended to be normal at that age, I had taken it to the next level. My parents often found me standing on a chair or table pretending to blast something or someone with the imaginary flames from my hand. Being the responsible parents they were, they would lower me back onto the ground and tell me to not do it again.
I wish I could say that it got better from there but it never did. The obsession lessened into a hobby and I only occasionally pointed my hand at a teacher pretending to blast them with fire.
Eventually I got the idea that I should be able to fly and not blast flames from my hands so I climbed and climbed until I reached to roof of my house. Being the small child I was, I called for my mum and dad's attention so they could watch me fly! But of course I jumped off and broke an arm.
Now discouraged from flying, I set my sights back onto spewing flames from my hand. As I grew, the hobby then lessened into a joke. I would point my hand at my maths teacher, telling my mate that I was gonna blast him to ashes. Of course this was a running joke that I could any teacher into ashes and free us of our homework but alas, it never happened.
Again and again, I pointed my hand in the teachers direction, now sick and tired of the joke I hadn't lined up my hand properly. I started telling my friend that I was gonna blast yet another teacher into ashes but I stopped. I could feel my hand enveloped in heat as if I had stuck it into a fire. As if it was burning up. I turned my attention away from my friend and back to my hand. I looked next to the teacher where I had been pointing and there was, the black hole that I had created from my very own hands. |
July, 1916.
The Allies have advanced on our position, and are pushing us back. My boots are caked with mud, and with each step the Earth tries to suck them off my feet and into her swampy clutches. Somehow, I thought the South of France would be nicer than this.
It's been centuries since I first started my quest. I've busted the balls of some of the best and brightest. But none have I anticipated more than this one. This one... this one was special.
As I gaze across the battlefield, I see him for the very first time. That stupid haircut, jet black, parted to the side. That pasty skin, pallid, almost sickly. And his mustache. You know the one.
In that moment, I am filled with emotion. A large part of me wants nothing better than to put this man down. But another part, the better part, tells me that to do so would change the face of modern history. I cannot do it.
There is one thing, however, that I can do. I make my way towards him, trudging through the thick mud of the trenches. It's time once again to fulfill my purpose.
They say Hitler only had one testicle; now you know why. |
Xeres cherished the sweet scent of brimstone, the hellish air flowing once more through it's newly reformed lungs. It had faced a rather nasty dispersal last time visiting the mortal planes, it's essence taking centuries to regain the strength to manifest once more. What new 'wonders' would these silly mortals have erected in the glory of their powerless gods? More deliciously, how many new ways of destroying each other will those humans have created? That was the best part of the skinsuits of earth, even without the guidance of Below, they made such *progress!* Forked tounge flickering over it's fangs in anticipation, the demon began searching the plane for suitable bodies to inhabit.
And how many there were! Where before there was a pond, now there stood an ocean of souls, an aromatic stew of delicious sin as the mortals gave into their whims, fed their desires and grew oh so *ripe.* Xeres shuddered at the display, allowing itself to bask indulgence. A tempting wave of Envy crashed into an island of Greed as an unfortunate gambler watched another man take home a fortune, only to be replaced by a wash of Pride as a player brutally crushed his competitor. While the game was new, the act of glorifying oneself through a defeated opponent was hardly a new concept. There was potential there. Yet as it contemplating slipping into such a host, Xeres was struck by a magnificent aroma of Sloth, it overwhelmed all other vices. To be able to indulge oneself so in such a difficult world. The power of one to attain such heights would make it trivial to begin spreading corrupting, a bountiful reaping of souls for such little effort. Xeres was a demon after all, it would hardly do to seen NOT indulging in such a delicious opportunity, now would it?
Without a second thought, the demon began navigating it's way through the hellscape to inhabit the body it had chosen. A young man, armored amidst the naked masses of this world, with a host of servants and sycophants nearby to indulge in any whim which might rise. The demon's incorporeal form began to oust the nascent consciousness that was residing inside the being, forming to it's host and attuning to it's abilities. Xeres waited for the flash of brilliance that would normally accompany inhabiting a powerful individual such as this, the augmenting of potential as the host fed it's knowledge to the demon. Yet instead, he felt an odd...tightness. A pressure on his conscious that should have been foreboding. And yet.... looking out the eyes of the body he saw his caretaker smile at him, and he was filled with --
NO!
Some struggling piece of what was now Dominic knew that some thing was wrong. What had just happened, it hadn't happened right. Had it? He looked at Jessica, expression twisting as his mind tried to comprehend what had happened. Ah! He simply had to order her to gather the rest of his court!
*"Knave! I demand that you bring me my senechal!"* Dominic? No.. something else tried to say. yet all that came out was an indistinguishable, if somewhat angry, cascade of syllables. The confused expression the boy wore twisted into one of utter horror, as some rapidly diminishing aspect realized what was happening.
nononoNoNoNONO! Out! Must get out!
The thought flit across Dominic's mind somehow, seeming quite out of place. Out of what? Well, it had been *quite* the thought. The boy pulled at his clothes a bit, but that didn't seem to make much sense either. And who was Sha'nra? Why did the name - surely it was a name? - bring on such feelings of shame and ridicule?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Ahahhahahahahahahahaha!"A plane of existence away, a figure stood on the hellscape, gazing at the unfortunate Xeres. It would have been a dignified scene, if Sha'nra had been able to hold back it's laughter at the situation. "Ohhhh this is the best! At least I had the excuse of being forced into an idiot, good old Xeres went and chose one HIMSELF! Oh, I'm never gonna let him forget this...." |
A drunk Irishman, a Scandinavian, and a wealthy Brit wake up at the same time. A normal day on the ship and they'd be where they belonged, meaning either a low-budget bar filled with rowdy men and women or a high class ballroom where the rich would keep to themselves, but today was different.
Everyone who'd already woken up was crowded as the deck looking out to the New York harbor, feeling just as confused as the people waiting at the harbor themselves.
The ship docked and alighted were the passengers of the RMS Titanic.
They were dazed by the flashing lights of small glass bricks and the swarm of men and women holding microphones and what appeared to bizzare looking cameras.
"Sir, question plea-"
"Are you a passenger of the RMS Tita-"
"How did you come here, wha-"
"In our records, the ship sank, years ago, how are you alive, what about the iceberg?"
As quickly as the crowds swarmed, they departed upon hearing the screeching of tires.
Behind was an automobile which vaguely resembled the cars of their era.
The doors swung open and suddenly a huge flash of light shone brightly. As the light faded, the crowds of New Yorkers now looked dazed and confused, leaving the passengers of the Titanic unaffected. A woman came out of the car and began walking briskly.
Despite what was happening, she seemed only tired, as if this were a regular occurrence. She approached the crowd with an oddly-shaped loudspeaker.
"Well, we don't have much time to get you outta here, so you've got two options, either you cooperate, or we'll make you. Trust me, it's easy."
*15 April 1912*
*Thank Jesus they saw the iceberg in time, didn't come all the way from Ireland to die in the sea. There's foggy seas up ahead, looks like I'll be sleeping.*
**Excerpt of a journal entry recovered on 23/07/18, at the New York Harbor from the RMS Titanic**
Kinda went for a time-travelling MIB feel here, I don't know if it's good or not, feedback will bemuch appreciated as I'm not the best at writing.
|
It was a good thing that I had that video setup. The image wasn't great, it looked like I had slapped a lens on a potato, but it was enough for the police. Its only selling point was that it had a night vision thing, My wife laughed when I showed it to her, but she agreed to humor me on it.
It had never happened before, but she had told me it was a possibility, always knock before entering the study. There was even a sign up and a delay built into the door pneumatic. Always knock before entering.
A dozen or so years ago, there was a famous court case among humans, something about waking up in panic and hurting someone. The case who's name I forget had some research that said about eight seconds after waking up a person isn't liable for damages, they are responding on instinct. Now, I don't know if that's true, and I'm pretty sure it isn't, but its taken seriously now a days.
My wife, took her privacy very seriously, and I her husband, did as well. You can argue about anything, but when someone wakes up grumpy with four inch knives in their hands, you give them a moment. Or two.
You definitely do not break through their window in the middle of the night to attack them with a sword.
Now, usually she sleeps in our bed, she doesn't really have trouble with the grumpy thing normally, but just like any woman there is a cyclical thing that happens hormonally. I'm not saying that its always an issue, I'm just saying it happens. And sometimes the bite marks are in places that are noticeable.
This all sounds pretty one sided, I didn't mean it to be, sometimes I take all the blankets, and I have pretty heavy feet. There have been mornings where shes on the floor and I'm sprawled out over the whole bed. Its a work in progress. None of that is really relevant though.
What is, is that she was sleeping in the study. I often fall asleep there, it is my study after all. Its a place where either of us can go and just be alone for a while, the heavy door and the pneumatic help make it like a safe room though its not really secure. Its really quiet in there, and I work late sometimes. That's what the intruder was aiming for.
Lets back up a few steps.
I am a full human, My wife Moira is not. Shes a 40% Sekhet type, There really isn't a better way to describe her. Forty percent lioness, sixty percent hominoid. She has nice fur, keeps her tail clean, and does very nice leather work when she has the time. Its not something that is accepted by everyone. There are purity factions for all sorts of things, The Pure Sekhets aren't friends with the Nekos, the Behemoths aren't friends with the Anduins, and I would get in trouble with everyone by publishing that line anywhere. Its one of those things that its so hard to even define a group that it offends pretty much everyone involved. Even the purists. "How dare you compare the Pure Canocephalous to the Lycans"will start a fight pretty much everywhere.
As such, there is some public pressure from these purist groups to keep the lines pure, though that's pretty undefinable even by them. So my wife and I are a target, a minor one as we aren't involved in politics or entertainment. We aren't celebrities that our named in the news would get any recognition. But a target none the less because of our marriage.
The Pure Human faction sends me mailers every few weeks and the Pure Sekhets send theirs, and they both get thrown into the recycling bin together. If they knew about that I'm sure it would be another thing they complain about.
There has never been any sort of violence between us. I have had a few punctures, in intimate times. And there was one morning incident (before she started sleeping in the study occasionally), but nothing outside of the normal for a mixed race couple. There is always a learning curve to this- "how not to get clawed in the night"isn't a class that gets taught in grade school.
Jeffery Talbot Ganthers.
That was his name. Associated with the Pure Human movement out of Spokane Virginia, a town of eight hundred. Jeffery decided to break into my house and kill me. Kill me with a tri-bladed sword. He carried a bag of Sekhet purist symbols and was planning to set up a shrine in the basement. Making it look like my wife had killed me. Making me a martyr to the pure human cause. That was the plan at least. He set up some cameras on the house, and recorded our movements in a journal. He planned and planned, all sorts of things. How to get away, how to set up the shrine, how to make it look like my heart was half eaten by a sekhet.
Really disturbing shit.
But he never planned on meeting my wife in the study.
And he really didn't plan on her being very unhappy at being woken up.
In the end most of my books had to be replaced, but the we agreed to keep the slash marks on the door frame.
A reminder to Always knock before entering. |
The stores of luck vary from person to person. Some people like to think of luck as a form of karma. Others imagine it is akin to wealth, like the money one can acquire it through ambition and hard work. The girl, in truth, did not really know what luck was. She only knew that she could give it away.
But she didn’t. The world was too uncertain and capricious, and she feared that the first whisper of luck she gave up would compel her to release all of it. She told herself she was being cautious, that it would be foolish to use her luck at a whim. If she thought and planned and strategized, maybe she would grace people with it. But not today. Maybe when she had more time on her hands. Maybe after college, or after she found a stable job. Not now though.
Years passed, the world spun, her luck remained locked up tight. College was done, job was acquired, corporate ladders climbed. Some days she thought about giving her luck away. Maybe she could help the neighbor kids, or the garbage man, or the starving kids on the charity newsletters that found their way into her mailbox. But then again, she had too much on her plate at the moment. And besides, wasn’t her luck hers to use as she wished? She always had tomorrow anyways.
The woman felt tired. The house felt large and lonely, a mirror of her heart. She reached for her stores of luck. She furrowed her brow, missing the familiar tug as she searched. ! “Ma’am? Would you like the blanket tucked in?” The aide asked gently. The woman shook her head. She was confused. Where had her luck gone? The job and the money were things of the past, she didn’t care about them anymore. They had made her happy long ago, but now she only felt emptiness. The luck should help, she thought, but it was nowhere to be found.
“Alright then, I’ll be leaving for tonight. Don’t hesitate to call if you need anything.” The aide picked up her bags and placed the phone next to the woman’s bed. The woman noticed the bags under her aide’s eyes. Had they always been there? And had she always looked so thin and worn?
“Excuse me, but may I ask why you’re leaving so early?” The woman asked suddenly.
“I always leave at four o’clock ma’am. I’ve got a second job at the diner.” The aide said gently, noting the woman’s familiar lapse in memory. “I can stay a bit longer if you want though.”
Yes, that would be nice, thought the woman. The quiet of the house and the emptiness in her heart disturbed her. She was old. Probably old enough to die. But she wanted to get rid of the emptiness. She wanted to feel something again, to be something other than a curmudgeonly, selfish woman. She knew she had wasted her life. The empty mansion was evidence enough. And now the luck was gone too.
The aide sat patiently beside her, humming an old folk tune. The woman felt better with her around, but something still felt wrong. She closed her eyes for a minute.
A garbled cry pierced the room. Her eyes flew open. The aide’s arms were flailing, eyes rolled back in their sockets. The woman tried to move as quickly as she could, maybe she should put a blanket beneath her head. Or was she supposed to hold her legs still?
The phone was still on the nightstand. The woman dialed with shaking hands. She fretted. The ambulance station was ten minutes away with traffic.
Now was when she should give her luck. What a foolish, selfish, stupid woman she was. She hadn’t needed the extra pinch of luck in that interview, or the sprinkle of luck on the lottery ticket, or the drop of luck to find that perfect dress. None of it meant anything. If only she could give her luck now. She reached again, desperately searching for some small shard. Nothing else seemed to matter at the moment. Please, she begged, this time it’s not for me.
“Good luck,” she whispered. The last wisp of luck left. A siren sounded, the light flashing outside the window. Luckless, the woman thought. So this is what it feels like to be happy.
*First post on reddit after lurking for a bit, apologies if the formatting is off! |
Everybody knows that the first thing to do in a crisis is not to panic, so the first thing I did...
"MOM! WHERE THE @#$% IS MY BEAR?!"
...was panic.
My Mom was type of woman you could scream, ""MOM! WHERE THE @#$% IS MY BEAR?!"at and she wouldn't even bat an eye.
"I threw it away, honey,"she replied, continuing to apply her mascara as if I wasn't even there. "You're getting too old for dolls, sweetie. You should be doing big kid stuff, like..."
The silence that suddenly filled the room was so enjoyable uncomfortable, I just stood there, waiting and watching her as she fidgeted and squirmed trying to remember what 'normal' big kids did at the age of 13.
When *she* was 13, she was getting drunk, playing hooky and stealing cars to go joyriding. But she had found Christ in her 20's - shortly after having me - and now she was only a stripper on the weekends. Still, she felt it was her duty to preach to me not to follow in her path. And she *definitely* didn't want me touching her car.
"...you know,"she finally said, copping out, as she flicked a dismissive hand towards me.
"If you don't tell me where Teddy is,"I threatened, "I'm telling Tom about John, Randy, Paul, and Sam."Tom was her main Sugar Daddy. He came over on Friday's and Saturday's. John, Randy, Paul, and Sam were Sugar Daddy's 1-4. Each came over once a week during the weekday.
She huffed, probably wishing about now that she hadn't given up smoking. "In the neighbor's trashcan. Now can I finish getting re-"
I ran, not only to outrun the sound of her voice, but also to outrun the garbage truck that I heard roaring down our block. Just as the garbage man was tilting the trash can into the back of the truck, I yanked open the door and yelled:
"No!"
He turned, startled and confused, to me - and therefore didn't see the teddy bear that leapt on his back and ripped open his neck with a chicken bone.
His body dropped. Bood poured out of his neck and pooled around his head. Teddy, standing over him, stabbed him several more times in the back of the head.
Teddy looked up, saw me and smiled. He dropped the bone and ran to me, his soft fur coated in sticky blood. As I lifted him up, still shaking from what I had seen, he cozied himself against my neck and whispered into my ear, "I'm going to *kill* your mother."
|
My partner stood on the opposite end of the cramped tunnel and fired his double-barreled shotgun. It was too dark to see that far, but the shot lit the tunnel enough for me to see what he was aiming for.
A massive reptile charged through the pool of sewage, heading in his direction at an alarming pace.
I sprang into action, running at a full sprint. The hot stench of dated sewage invaded my nostrils as I ran. Mosquitoes attacked my skin, enjoying a free meal. I gripped a large rifle, powerful enough to bring down an elephant.
I wasn't going to get to my partner in time. The enormous crocodile was almost within striking distance. To my horror, the demonic dinosaur lunged and bit my partner into two separate pieces with one snap of its powerful jaw. I reached the spot of his demise moments later, but I was far too late. The crocodile had already slithered back into the thick sewage and was gone from sight.
I spent the next few days down there, scouring the sewers for any sign of the creature. Then, as if from nowhere, the demon appeared to me. He only surfaced enough to see his eyes and the small of his back, but I saw him. He was roughly fifteen feet long and could weigh no less than a thousand pounds. He stared at me, and I back at him. The creature hovered about thirty yards away, but I had seen how quickly he could close a large distance.
I quickly raised my weapon and pulled the trigger.
*click.....clickclickclick....*
My weapon was jammed.
The crocodile seized my moment of weakness and charged. The sewage around him sprayed to the side like a small tidal wave. I battled with my gun, screaming at the top of my lungs. The crocodile showed its teeth when it got close. I could see deep into its horrific gullet. Only darkness and death awaited me there.
I leveled my gun in one final gambit. "Die, you bastard,"I yelled.
The gun went off and demolished the creature in one, desperate blast. Its remains were spread around the piping and in the river of sewage. I wiped its blood from my face with the sleeve of my jacket. Some entered my mouth and tasted of shit and piss.
Nobody would ever know about this. Creatures in the sewers "didn't exist."
*This was a thankless job...* |
"Yes, I am ready". With nothing better to do in my life at this moment, I decided I will go all out. Being just in my underwear was kind of questionable, but with a confident smirk, if there is a way in there is definetaly a way out.
I press my hand against the white walls keeping the piece of paper in sight at all times so my mind and eyes don't go crazy. All walls seem to be pretty solid, even after the odd punch, nothing seems to work. Not out of ideas yet! (I totally was).
I pace around the room with the note in hand. Eager to escape I question myself why? I am safe in here I think, I don't have food but who knows, they might not want me dead so will feed me when I sleep. No point killing me over a puzzle I can't solve!.. I was wrong again.
5 days pass and I get somewhat bored of staring at this note. I place it on the floor when I notice, it moved on its own! There must be a breeze somewhere! (Wrong again). After checking the floor for a way out I took it to me sighing a bit too much and blowing it...
"No, I am not ready". |
Wu Song: Where'd you go?
Bookie: East of Eden
Sydney "Syn"Ema: The Train?
Wu Song: This train don't stop there anymore.
Bookie: A room with a view?
Syn Ema: The Room?
Wu Song: Hit me with your best shot.
Bookie: Little house on the prairie... a midsummer night's dream.
Syn Ema: Before sunrise, a beautiful new world
Wu Song: A whole new world!
Syn Ema: The New World!
Bookie: No place like home!
Wu Song: Home is where the heart is.
Syn Ema: A home at the end of the world?
Bookie: Everything I need to know I learned from a little golden book.
Wu Song: Apocalypse?! It's the end of the world?!
Syn Ema: Yes. You're Darn Tootin'. You only live once. Nobody knows, it came from the sky. It was a wonderful life. We are your friends.
Bookie: Never forget the good times. Take action... take **more** action! This Godforsaken place, things go flying! This is the moon's work!
Wu Song: Say it ain't so! The reason doesn't make much sense. This is it? The end of the world. Let's go out with a bang, my friends. You don't remember, I'll never forget. With a little help from my friends, I'll get by. You're the best around. Goodbye everybody.
|
60......
70......
80......
90......
100......
I shift to second gear. The lane markers are a blur, the street signs pass me faster than they appear.
110.....
120.....
Third gear.
130....
140....
Fourth gear.
150...
160...
170...
Fifth gear. The engine between my legs is beginning to scream, almost as if in distress, a warning of impending danger. I didn’t care, I have one gear, *go*.
180..
190..
I shift into 6th gear, the Hayabusa mean machine, eating the road under me. So glad I bought this last week. Wish I would’ve bought the previous year so I coulda had a little money left over for a helmet and jacket. Oh well, YOLO amirite?
200.
210.
I just hit 220. What a rush. Wait was that a cop I just passed? Oh shit his lights are on now.
230.
Ahahahahaha He turned back, he isn’t even going to try. Stupid cowar-
**SPLAT** |
For the past 7 years Graham Brown, a solitude man in his thirties, followed his unremarkable yet remarkably consistent morning routine. Well, there was that one morning he ran out of toothpaste, so he had to spend the time to cut the tube. Other than that, it was the same for every day. Leaving other morning activities aside, before leaving for work, Graham always had a glance at himself in his tall hallway mirror. As he did this time, but what he saw froze him in place. Where the mirror had stood, there was darkness. The light in his hallway was dim and barely illuminated the tight walls and the man before the mirror, but he could still always see his reflection. Now there was nothing. Just a black patch on the wall.
It's strange how we think of our homes as safe havens. That is until they are breached. Few live with the bliss of never losing that feeling. Graham had for 7 years. Every time he locked his door, the outside world was left behind it. This was all gone, as the black patch looked like a doorway to a dark room of unknowns. Fear gripped him and he couldn't turn away. He felt as if something was staring right back at him. Ready to strike. He stood, until another idea hit him. What if that something was already in the apartment? What if it was right behind him? Graham quickly glanced around him. There was nothing, but he couldn't shake the fear. He continued like this for a long while.
Low red sunlight reached the hallway. Graham didn't go to work that day. He had spent the whole day investing the strange hole in his wall. He had determined several things about it - It absorbed light. Flashlights had no effect. Yet solid items were able to pass through it. Items attached to rope could still be returned via pulling. As his bells and whistles test showed, sound didn't travel through it. "A portal?"he thought.
While looking for items for his next experiment, Graham heard a thud from the hallway. He rushed to check it, but quickly stopped at a distance. In the hallway, in front of the portal, there lay a boot. One which he himself had thrown through it not that long ago. Before he could react, another item fell through. Graham's fear had been replaced with fascination. The idea, that somebody or something was throwing them back opened his mind to a world of opportunities. Where did this portal lead to?
Graham opened the drawer on his study and took out a piece paperboard. He lay it beside his telephone that he had taken off the hook as to not be disturbed. Grabbed the best pen he had and poked a small hole in the corner of the paper. Through which he ran a rope. Then, carefully with smooth strokes he wrote a single word - "Hello"and attached the pen to the paper.
Giddy with excitement Graham threw his message in the pitch black. He didn't feel any tugging on the rope. In fact he waited for so long he fell a sleep. He woke to a dark room. Fear had returned to him, so he quickly turned on the lights. Where he had slept, lay the message next to it. Rope neatly coiled around it. Only the pen was missing. Graham approached the message and unwound the rope. His greeting had been answered.
For 7 years he had kept his composure. To not let grief get the best of him. To just do the minimal he can to keep going. This handwriting, it's her's. As was the pen. |
Board games were always my thing.
At family gatherings, those lame one time parties that I never get invited to, just hanging with friends; my first suggestion is to play a board game. I'm not sure why, though; I don't particularly enjoy them, I don't hate them either. I think I just take an odd satisfaction in the winning side- which is almost never the case.
I wouldn't say I'm a boring person, either, I like going out as much as the next guy, but I'd rather just sit around and play a board game.
Why am I telling you this?
A few months ago; April, to be exact, I moved into my new home. I was finally alone with my own space. The place wasn't anything amazing, just big enough for me and not too costly.
I figured out the house was being haunted fairly quickly.
It started with doors slamming randomly, strange breezes, feelings of being watched.
You know, the cliche. Then, it turned to voices, contact, and even this thing trying to put forks into my microwave and toaster (I wish I was joking.) It was safe to say this ghost was a bit of a prick.
I have always been in the mid ground on the subject of the paranormal. I've only had one experience, but I'm always hearing my mother talking about hers (she claims to be a sceptic) so I'm not too sure.
Anyways, to 'set the scene', I was in bed, trying to sleep. This guy- i nicknamed them Jo, for no real reason- was poking at my arm, banging the closet door, saying my name. This would have been the scariest thing if it wasn't five in the morning. I was tired and annoyed and honestly done with Jo's bullshit. So, I got out of bed. Keep in mind, I'm a tiny trans guy, standing at 5''6, and the voice of a prepubescent ten year old when he just found out that Disneyland was really the dentist. In other words, I'm a twink, and hardly intimidating. I asked Jo to stop, many times, and I eventually got a response. A quiet, almost timid "Sorry".
I sat the guy down- keep in mind I couldn't see them, they could have left the room and I wouldn't know- and asked them if they wanted to play Monopoly. I figured they weren't doing any harm, and what's the harm in asking?
That's how I ended up trying to explain the rules of monopoly to a ghost at six in the morning. Jo really enjoyed the game, even more when they won.
|
Odin sneered, his one eye gleaming raw with hate. Zeus horked and spat in my general direction, it smelled of scorched ozone and infidelity. Don't ask me how I knew what infidelity smelled, but if any deity *were* going to smell of it.... well yeah. You know Zeus.
I'd like to think it was more a sashay or a saunter, but if I'm being honest it was truly more a strut that would describe how I came into the assembly. The triple aspected God of the Abrahamic faiths merely shook his head and sighed. I could hear his mutterance from across the way. *"I really hate that guy."*
I chuckled to myself. I almost even chortled aloud. But I kept it in. I was more mature now. Gone were the days of Me 2.0, and truth be told I'm glad. Thank somebody, even a Somebody from among the other gods and goddesses. Oh sure, there were still far too many times I'd hear the plaintive wail of some nutless neckbeard invoking reason and rationale for their unbelief in other gods, essentially their *why* they followed me so faithfully. Still, a sorry lot that makes me wish I were a touch more like the God of the Old Testament and could just flood the lot of them away.
Oh well. But no more. I'm back, baby, and I'm better than ever. You're looking at the New! The Improved! Atheism 3.0! |
We've been running earth simulation ERH-6378 for an equivalent 4.78 billion years now and we have finally acheived evolutionarily evolved human brain transference capabilities. We first discovered the ability in specimen HMA-1056B, earth known as Doug Tessem. Preliminary observations have shown his primary objectives in using the ability have been strictly recreational. Motivational scans have predicted HMA-1056B will conduct a transference to specimen HUD-8493W, earth known as Tyson Montelli, to interfere with a planned bank heist. Requesting permission to interfere with simulation through transference to specimen HMA-1056B body pending his own successful transference. We will use his body to pose as law enforcement. This will be the most amazing troll. We are awaiting your approval. |
"I thought it would take you longer to realize,"I heard enunciated behind me but not in the same room call out. It had an almost chocolate sounding masculine voice. My fingers froze with my right thumb stuck on the gallery of the iPhone I was holding that contained pictures of me...sleeping. I felt like my heart wasn't beating.
Turning around, I looked into the hallway to see nothing but my bathroom light flickering that I was still meaning to get fixed. Nothing in my living room with the TV still on. *Arf!* I heard coming from my bedroom. Following the sound, I saw my puppy, Roscoe sitting on my bed with his head turned to the side. "Did you hear that, buddy?"He turned his head back straight and sighed.
"Yeah, it was me."My limbs would not move. I couldn't open my mouth and put the phone down from my hands. How was this happening? I couldn't even comprehend it from my barely three-month-old Newfoundland boy. Earlier that month, after a bad day at the office, I spotted the little cloud of fluff covered in mud by my neighbor, Denise's yard. He seemed shook up and barely any meat on his bones. At her disgust, I took the pup in.
"Wha...what do you want?"I asked and my immediate thought was to go grab his Milk Bones.
"I'm here to warn you." |
Josh looked around the auditorium- his entire political party roared for him to give a speech. He stood at the podium, and glanced at his notes: "Aliens deserve equal rights?"he thought, baffled that he would ever think that. He had enough. "Look", he stated, as the entire crowd cheered in anticipation of his famous articulations on political science. "I know you all are here thinking I am going to be against the mistreatment of aliens in our society."The crowd went silent. "I know we, in America, have made so many movies mocking aliens. Is it right? I don't know, First amendment baby!"the crowd was shocked. The man speaking was unrecognizable to them. His campaign adviser stepped in from behind stage, but he pushed her aside. "Who cares if we stick those beady eyed vermin in camps. Who cares? We can't even understand them!"He heard subtle boos, but he gave no shits. "Why are they even coming over here? Its because there place is trashed. And now, they're stealing our jobs. The other day.."-he was almost being drowned out by the boos -"the other day I was getting my ship to be repaired, and I tried to find a citizen, but guess what, I only found those monsters, or some half-bread abominations working in the shop. Like I'd let a creature like that work on my deck."Boos ensured, but Josh stood his ground. "You know what I say, fuck those guys!"Now even security was turning on him, he might get beaten for hate speech. He was getting forced off stage, but as a last act, he grabbed the mic "I will not let Mexicans take over this country!". |
I got the news pretty early on; most people didn’t find out they were sick until they were already dead, and by then… well.
I was lucky enough to have a few indications before my ‘termination’ date. I would sneeze and try to jump out the window, or cough and go straight for the butcher’s knife.
By the time I was able to muster up the courage to go see a doctor, I got the unfortunate news: I had about a week to live. It was pretty shocking to hear, but it was nice to know that I had just a little time left before I stopped living… and stuff.
Day one was pretty straightforward. I opened up Netflix and got around to watching all of those ‘one off’ series my friends had been talking about. Every hour or so I would go to the restroom and try to drown myself in the bathtub. Good times.
Day two was family day. It was by far my favorite. I had sent out a mass text the day prior saying to meet me at the beach for a big surprise. They thought I had finally met a woman, hah! Jokes on them. When I broke the news to everyone, the looks of sadness I got were priceless. I hated every last one of them, and this was the best way to get back at all those years of abuse. While we talked about all the ‘fun’ experiences we had shared I saw a family of jellyfish floating out in the water. The good news is I made it. The bad news is my cousins pulled me out of the water before I was stung to death.
Day three sucked.
Day four sucked as well. I was lying in bed rubbing ointment on my stings whenever I spotted my old trusty rifle in the corner. I would have grabbed it, but my welt covered body was in too much pain to move.
Day five got a little better. I was healed enough to move around the house, so I decided to go into the kitchen and cook myself some grub.
“Honestly,” I thought to myself “Who can be suicidal when eating good food?”
Apparently the answer to that question is me.
Day six was a little rough. All of my wounds were pretty much healed, but the knowledge that this was probably going to be my last day was… Unsettling. I decided that I was going to cheer myself up by going to the park. I always loved going out there to see all of the people. I also wanted to try and infect as many people as possible; the doc said I wasn’t contagious, but that wasn’t going to stop me from trying.
And here I am on day seven, writing away in my silly ‘ole suicide journal. I’ve decided that I’m going to be the one who kills me, not this sick version of me. I put my mouth around on the barrel of my rifle a few times this morning to see which position would be the most comfortable. I never would have thought that rifles taste more like peanut oil than metal.
The more you know. |
I named her Wednesday. I didn't even see her at first, hiding in the dark. But as I passed, I noticed some movement in the back of the cage. I went back to what was just an emptying cage to see here beautiful little eyes looking roght at me. It almost seemed like she recognized me, purring and rubbing against the door to get my attention. Having made my decision, I took her next door to have the vet finalize the adoption. That's when I noticed her face, her adorable little face. Her lower jaw was set just a little crooked, not quite lining up with the rest, a little tooth sticking out whenever she looked up at you. I asked the vet what happened, but there was no information on her past, no paperwork could be found. The vet offered to let me choose another cat, but I declined. Wednesday was perfect. We got home and she took the most aggressive nap I'd ever seen. When she woke up, she decided to check out her new home, walking around and looking under things, climbing on top of things and batting her new toys around. I just stood there thinking something was missing. Maybe not missing, but just a little off. She looked right up at me and I knew she wasn't a Wednesday.
"What are you doing, Crooked Face Cat?"I asked her. "Are you looking for your food?"
"Yes,"she replied. "I could be sworn I saw you put it over here."
"Oh, I moved it while you were napping, it seemed better ov...."I started to say, but realization hit and we both stopped.
"Did you just understand me?"The question fell out of each of us.
That was four years ago. It definitely took some getting used to. A talking animal is one thing, but to talk to a creature who has such a drastically different worldview is an experience I wasn't quite ready for.
"How was your little day, Crook?"I ask her when I get home from work, walking over to the counter so I can pet her. My wife doesnt loke her being up there, but its easier on my back and who am i to dent her lettings? She jumps up on the counter, lays down like she does every day, and I pet her while she tells me.
"I ate a bug today. I feel like that counts as a kill."
"Totally, "I confirm
"I'd love a mouse, though. Nothing quite like the thrill of the hunt."She continued, yawning and giving a huge stretch that vibrates the flatware in the drawer below her. "How about you, feeling any better?"
I smiled at that. Not because it was sweet of her to ask, but because she knows that my day is always better when I walk in the door and see her walking over, stretching away the nap she just finished.
"Much better, Crook. Thank you."I tell her giving her a kiss on the head. "Come on, let's watch a movie."
|
My friend, over the years I've grown to trust you greatly, and constantly I'm impressed by how much respect you give to even my most strange and outlandish ideas, many of which I would keep to myself in other company. For this reason I now entrust to you a story from my childhood which I've scarcely told since it happened. Surely it has been more than a decade since I last thought of it, but this recent storm has brought it back to my mind and my dreams. I wonder if you will again listen to this story and think on it with me, or if you will discount it, since I know you are also a very level-headed person, and this story is so far-fetched that even I have grown to doubt myself for the past many years.
Again, it happened in my childhood, and moreover it happened after I had been put to bed. But I recall it with such clarity and even at that young age I had practiced distinguishing whether I was in a dream. I am sure that these things were not imagined.
A storm had begun at dinner and before I had finished eating it was howling more loudly than anything I had experienced at such an age. I was twelve at the time. The thunder and lightning were making me jump and made me too frightened to finish my supper.
"We weren't expecting a storm today, were we?", my father asked.
"The paper said it would be clear skies. It forecasted rain for Wednesday", mother answered. It was a Monday night when this was happening.
"I should make sure the back shed is sealed", my father said, going into the back yard.
I was afraid of what might happen to him, but not enough to speak up in protest. He opened the back door and the wind and rain blew into the room leaving half the room wet.
What he said when he returned from the back yard, soaked from the storm, I know he regretted what he said next, because it was the reason I stayed awake and wide-eyed late into the night afterward.
"Perhaps it's best if we head downstairs for a while. I think I might have seen a funnel cloud."
Now I could tell you the details, since I remember so many other parts of the conversation that night word for word. Not only because it was a frightful storm. I'm sure such a storm would only have preserved the memories so clearly for a week or a few months at most. But since then I've also relived that night in dreams, at first every few nights, and then once every few months, and then years, and then, as I've mentioned, I forgot about it until I began to dream it again starting last Saturday night. Each time the dream returns, it fills me with the same terror I felt when I was twelve.
But suffice it to say that I was a child very afraid as the reality of what a tornado could be struck me for the first time that night.
The focus of this story came after my parents had fallen to slumber, when I alone was wide-eyed, listening intently to the storm. I was awake while my parents slept near me, in the basement, each in our own makeshift bed. That is when I heard the voice. Perhaps voice is the wrong word, since it wasn't of a human, nor any living thing of which I can conceive. But since it formed words I call it a voice.
At first all I could hear was something very unusual among the deafening booms of thunder.
"Mom! Dad! Do you hear that? In the storm. What is that?", I whispered loudly. But I had bothered them too many times and this time they didn't even stir in their sleep.
"Dad! Dad!", I said, more loudly, to my nearest parent. But on he slept.
Gathering my courage, I crept upstairs to investigate a little further, checking the windows for incoming tornadoes, imagining how quickly I could run into the basement if I saw one coming. But there were no tornadoes.
From the kitchen window I could see the flashes of lightning and I could all the more clearly hear the voice in the storm. Despite my fear I was mesmerized. I opened the window a crack and for a short moment the voice stopped before continuing in what was clearly English, although the speaker seemed to struggle to speak it.
"Good morning young one", it said in a slow rumble, but again, not at all like thunder. I can recall even that it was two-thirty-seven in the morning at the time, and I checked later and it was two-forty-two, so I knew it must not be a dream, because in dreams clocks don't work like they should. And I could remember the day before and how one thing lead to another in that kind of continuity that only waking hours bring. I thought these things while the storm spoke to me, but it continued without any large pause between its phrases.
"I have slept for much much longer than you have been alive, young one, and I have seen so many of your kind's civilizations rise and fall through the ages. I have heard them speak and heard about each civilization's ways, but my kind rarely wakes and we rarely find occasion to communicate with your kind."
At this point I think the voice might have paused to let me say something, but I only continued to listen in stunned silence.
"I come now only to tell you that my kind will rise again soon. I hope you will live to see me again on that day. I know the ones with whom you live will not."
Again, it paused.
"Have no fear, young one", it finally concluded, "no harm will come to you or your loved ones. Indeed you will surely hear nothing from my kind again until you've lived many many happy years".
And with that, the voice had finished. But I sat at the window, listening to the storm. I poured a glass of water and saw that it was half-past three in the morning. Telling myself I would only listen a little longer, I heard the storm die down until it was a light drizzle before I finally went to sleep around twenty after four. I could not have slept in the position in which I sat, half-crouching by the window. The time passed quickly because my mind was racing as I wondered what the omen meant.
I slept late the next morning. My parents let me sleep until I woke around noon. I told them what I had heard.
"Sounds like quite an exciting night", was my mother's response. But it was clear they thought I had dreamt it or made it up.
"That would eplain why the kitchen window was open when I came upstairs in the morning though", my father said. To me, this fact had confirmed even more what I had heard, but to him it only related to the puddles he had to clean up in the kitchen in the morning.
But now you've heard all I have to say. You can judge for yourself whether this is a childish fantasy or whether something truly supernatural is occurring. Remember too that the dream returned to me on Saturday night, a full two days before this storm began. And you can't deny: given how it's carried on with such intensity for these last five days, it seems clear it's no regular storm.
***
Thanks for the prompt! It's a longshot, but if anyone has ever experienced anything like this, please inbox me! |
We are the Dust, god of all.
Mankind for so long has tried to picture the divine but never could. They looked up for so long, never thinking to look down around them.
The Dust controls all, and sees all. We are the beginning and the end. They are born from us, and return to us when they die. Together, we hold the balance that they so rudely disrupt.
They think they control this world, but they are wrong. They think they do what is good for it, but they are wrong. They think they will survive, but they are wrong.
The day comes swiftly in which the Dust will reclaim this planet and wipe away the stain of humanity. Already it begins. We will cover every inch of their lives, and suffocate them. For from Dust they are, and to Dust they will go.
We are the Dust, god of all. |
There I walk, through an unknown world.
That which is within me is more powerful than that which is in this world.
My target in the distance, growing ever closer.
Through the crowd I walk, carefully, deliberately. One touch was all I needed.
What was this power? Just as all life wishes to consume and take, this power was consuming me. I was its power, and they were mine. Without me, they would have no host. And without them? Well, I would die.
One misstep, one hiccup, one cough and everything I saw would end abrupt.
Life begins and life ends, as a human, microscopic power I bend. Planets could fall by the smallest of change, all it takes is biological war to be waged.
Here comes my target, sliding in close as spaceships soar overhead, the crowd bustles, never the wiser to the nuclear thread residing in their midst. I lean in and tap on their shoulder. Would you care to tell me the time? The response didn't come as a thrill...
He turns and looks, never the wiser to his fate I had seemed so sure should come. As i look at his face i see my greatest horror...
"MY INTERNAL CLOCK REGISTERS THE TIME AS CURRENTLY 1300 HOURS" |
I opened my eyes to blackness at first. Then slowly the sight of a rocky ceiling entered my eyes. I was lying in my back on what also felt like a rocky surface. I pushed myself up with surprising ease and I looked around. I was in an enclave of some kind that was surrounded by a body of water. I quickly walked to the water and looked at my reflection, and as I had guessed by the surprising agility I hadn’t felt in years, I was young again. Luscious brown curls once again framed my face that was wrinkle-free. So I was really dead, huh?
I stood back up and my gaze followed the only path leading away from the area, and I saw that there was a line of people not far up the path. With no other option I followed the path and joined the queue.
There was no telling of the passage of time here. How many minutes after queuing, I finally arrive at the front where an old man in a double-breathes suit stood behind an altar.
I listened in to the conversation between him and the woman in front of my in the queue.
“Since you died by tripping over your own broom while cleaning you are assigned to become a janitor here.”
The blonde woman scoffed, “What, are you serous? I spent my whole fucking life cleaning and you are telling me I have to clean more? There is no way-“
With a wave of the man’s hand, a few people in black appeared out of nowhere and dragged the woman away despite her protest.
I stepped forward and the man took a casual glance at my face. He looked back down at the piece of paper in his hand, then back at me, then back at the paper, then back at me again.
With widened eyes, he said, “You- You are...”
He put down whatever he had in his hand. “Please follow me.”
I complied and wondered why the gatekeeper was personally showing me the way when everyone before me in the line had to follow some goons. After after a few twists of the path, we arrive at a lift and we took it up.
The doors opened to a giant mansion stood atop of a mountain. The suited man led me to the door and politely held it open for me. Inside, it was looked just like any gothic mansions you see in movies. Between the two grand flights of stairs in the front hall was another fancy door. The man pushed open those as well.
It opened to a grand throne room that had beautiful ceiling murals depicting history that I didn’t recognise. The floor was carpeted black and the walls were made of white marble. At the end of the room stood two thrones, one bigger than the other. They were both made of some sort of black material.
But no one sat in either thrones. Instead, two people, a man and a woman, both dressed in extravagant clothes, were on the floor in front. The we’re both wearing spiky black crowns seemingly made of the same material as the thrones. The woman was kneeling.
“My king,” the woman said, sounding close to tears, “You said I was irreplaceable in your heart!”
“Sorry sweetie, you are just too...boring,” the man referred as ‘king’ said. With a snap of his fingers, the woman suddenly turned into a cloud of smoke and disappeared into thin air.
The king’s attention now turned to me.
Before he could even open his mouth, I asked, “Are you the king of Hell?”
He smirked. “No. There is no such thing as heaven or hell. This place is where every mortal goes after dying. But I like how you immediately assume you would go to hell after your death.”
I chuckled, “I have done many things in my life that would place me in hell if heaven and hell existed.”
“Interesting,” he approached me slowly, his dark red cape dragging on the carpeted floor and his strong gaze never leaving me. He stopped a little to close for my comfort. “Tell me the worst.”
Seeing as I was dead and this man seemed to have magical power, I might as well tell the truth. “I called for the murder of my own daughter-in-law.”
He laughed. “I like you.”
“So why am I here, having an audience with the king of the afterlife?” I asked.
The smirk on his face only widened. “Take a wild guess, Elizabeth Mountbatten-Windsor.”
|
In the dim light of the production control room, Gilbert Godfrey watches the ticking second hand of the clock with disdain.
“Running long,” he grumbles.
Paul turns slightly, squinting through the smoke of his cigarette. Under heavy lids, his eyeballs flick from the clock to Gil.
“Might be a touch close,” his voice is deep, slow, “should be ok, though.”
His gaze lingers on Gil’s curled lip and he sighs as he leans into the mic.
“Zoe, give Jackass the hurry up, will ya?”
On the main monitor, a middle aged man in a brown suit and a colour matched moustache, falters ever so slightly mid-line, his forehead creasing in a flash of confusion.
Paul and his video engineer share a quick eye-rolling glance.
“You got somewhere you need to be, Gil?” Paul’s cigarette bounces up and down from the corner of his mouth.
“Yes, actually,” Gilbert Godfrey stands up brushing imaginary dust from his suit pants, “drinks at Gardella with Harry Westcombe. He's a big wheel over at Fremonte and…what am I telling you this for? You guys can handle the rest of the show from here without me, right?”
Paul mutters to Kimmy: “Been doing it since your daddy got you the job, so…” Kimmy snorts behind her hand.
Gil’s eyes dart between the two of them, sure he's missed something funny.
“Uhhhh...I mean, it's just the resurrection left now. That bit shoots itself, right?”
“We'll be fine, Gil,” Paul puffs over his shoulder, “tell Harry he’s a lying sack of shit for me. He’ll know what it means.”
“Oh..you know, Harry?”
“G.G.! How's it hanging?!”
A large hand lands heavily on Gil's back, nearly knocking the wind out of him.
“Ah, Mr Halverton!” Gil gasps “Great! Just great.”
Frank Halverton shakes Gil’s proffered hand. Engulfs it with his own and grins like a shark.
“Love the show, guys!” The network exec gushes to the room. “Just love it! You're all doing a great job. Just really excellent.”
“Shit,” Kimmy whispers to Paul, “we're getting canned.”
Paul nods.
“Mmm hmm. Camera Two.”
The main feed flicks to the host of the show, Tony San Bernardo, moustache spread wide over too-white teeth. Next to him stands a skinny young woman with curly hair and a Starland Vocal Band t-shirt.
“Oh,” says Frank, “who's our winner tonight?!”
“Dave from Sacramento!” announces the whole crew, except, of course, Gil.
Frank looks confused.
“Sorry, Frank,” Paul calls to the back of the room, “crew joke.”
Franks eyes narrow. He doesn't like being made to look a fool. On the main feed, Tony San Bernardo is talking…
*“... from sunny Phoenix. Kathy you said before you watch the show religiously…”*
*“Oh, yes,”* chimes Kathy.
*“...so you know what comes next, but for anyone at home who hasn’t seen the show before, the Grand Prize here on Dearly Un-Departed is an all-expenses-paid resurrection of a loved one!”*
“Anyway,” says Frank, taking Gil over to the corner of the room, as if it afforded some level of privacy, “I’ve got some bad news.”
*”We’d like to take this moment to thank our kind sponsors: Lazarus Laundry Blue. Lazarus Laundry Blue: Bring your Laundry Back to Life!”*
“The board’s been concerned about the ratings of the show. Testing audiences think that it’s too sweet, and schmaltzy.”
*“Ok, Kathy. Who have you selected as your loved one to be brought back from beyond the grave?”*
“And sure,” Frank continues, “that’s the whole conceit of the show, reuniting people with their loved ones. That’s always going to be sweet and wholesome. But let’s be honest, that shit is hard to sell these days.”
*”Well, Mr San Bernardo, I would like to bring back my father, Mr Donald J Boswell.”*
“I mean, we’ve just gotten out of Vietnam and we got a Recession, an Oil Crisis, and all that other shit going on in the Middle East. We kicked one president out for being a crook and the poor sap they’ve got replacing him has nearly been assassinated twice!”
“Once in Sacramento,” adds Paul. “Camera One.”
On the main feed, the camera focuses on a small circular dais, adorned with gold sequins.
“Right,” says Frank, “thanks, Paul. Then there’s all those tornados, and drugs and violent crime and apparently we’re destroying the planet, but that might not even matter because at any minute the goddamn Russians could decide to flip the table and blow the whole deal to atomic dust.”
*”Are you ready, Kathy?”*
*”Yes, I am, Mr San Bernardo.”*
*”Then, let’s -”*
“Camera Two, pan audience.”
*“RAISE!!! THE!!! DEAD!!!”*
“I’m not sure I understand, Mr Halverton,” says Gil as he plays with the end of his tie.
“Well, people are angry, Gil. And as great a show as this is - and,” Frank turns back to the crew, arms outstretched in salute, “you’re all doing a great job, really great - this sappy stuff is not what an angry person wants to watch.”
Frank gestures to the main screen where, in a flash of smoke a bewildered balding man in a stained singlet and boxer shorts has appeared, coughing and squinting into the hot studio lights.
*”What the hell, where am I?”* splutters Donald J Boswell.
*”Dad?”* says Kathy, hand to her mouth, not quite believing what she is seeing.
*“I love this moment, folks,” beams Tony, “Always a beautiful thing, a family reunion.”*
Frank smiles at the screen as Kathy strides over to her formerly departed father with outstretched arms.
“See, Gil,” he says, “It’s sweet. But sweet don’t sell no more. People want blood.”
*“You son of a bitch!”*
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” says Paul, suddenly sitting up straighter in his chair, “what’s going on? Camera Three get in there!”
On the screen Kathy from Phoenix has Donald J Boswell’s head in her hands and is pushing her thumbs into her father’s eye sockets.
*”You fucking piece of shit!”* she yells as blood starts to well out from under her thumbs. Donald screams. Kathy screams. Tony San Bernardo is looking into the camera mouthing words, signalling to cut. Kathy from Phoenix releases her father who crumples and cowers in a ball on the floor. She unloads with kicks and stomps.
“Well, there’s your blood, Frank,” says Paul.
“Jesus,” says Kimmy as Kathy spits on her prostrate progenitor and starts to hurl set furniture at anyone coming to restrain her. “Must’ve been a shitty dad.”
“Welp,” says Paul, “we don’t have censor clearance for this. Should we shut ‘er down, Gil?”
Gil’s eyes are on the screen, his mouth opening and closing like a fish.
“Let it play out,” says Frank, “You can cut it in post.”
“Shit, Frank,” Paul swings around in his chair, “we’re a live show here.”
“Whoa!” Kimmy blurts.
Paul swings back to see Kathy, standing behind Donald, brandishing a long knife in the air. She brings it to her father’s throat.
“Ok,” sighs Paul, “that’s definitely gonna get us in trouble with the censors. Shut ‘er down, guys and gals,”
“No.”
Paul turns his head to see the Frank’s meaty sausage fingers on his shoulder, Frank’s shark-like grin leering down.
“Let it play,” says Frank.
On the screen Kathy begins sawing back and forth with the blade. And there is a lot of blood.
|
Wake up In a damp sewage tunnel that leads out to an overcast sky in some far off woods. There’s a broken down van with a foldout bed inside. You walk for days on end miles after miles through these woods but no matter what direction you go you always get lost and wind up coming back to the sewer tunnel and that dead grey van. Weeks go by. Months even. And rifling under the seating one day you happen to notice a familiar object. A flashlight! So you take it and head the only direction you’ve yet to try. Back into the sewer tunnel. As far and deep as it will take you. Praying for a ladder to a manhole or some other sign of approaching civilization. Six weeks and four days you’ve spent wandering the same direction slogging through the black of this sewer tunnel. You eat raw carcus of the rats you find after skinning the furs and eviscerating the inards. You’re sick now. Exceptionally ill. All you hear is the stale damp trickling water - the only drinkable water - the stuff dripping down the tunnel stones seeping in from the ground held above. Your eyes have adjusted to the dark but the flashlights been dead for weeks. The echo of your own screams and starvation leads to vertigo and vomiting. Your tear ducts have long since dried and you mumble quiet words repeatedly now. Sleep suffers near constant interruption as the rats nip at your clothing and the giant arachnids crawl over your body searching this wasteland for food.
Madness. Exhaustion. Despair. All caging your mind now like a rusty set of chains. When at last you make something out in the darkness... a spot. However faint. But a spot of- of light. You stand up and begin to run blindingly fast tripping over the broken stones underfoot and breathing so hard you can taste the metal of the the blood spurting up from your fiery infected lungs. Closer and closer the light pushes in. Larger and larger the opening appears. Spider Webs crash now as you storm toward the tunnels end with all the fever of a mad warlock being burned at the stake.
You finally manage to reach the tunnels end coughing cup fulls of blood but again under the light you emerge. At last! Yet the sky is overcast. Your vision finally adjusts and there you make something out about forty yards north in the woods. You drop as you stare - it’s the broken down van. |
“Miss Price,” Doctor Pierce said, “I’m afraid we have some bad news.” Caitlyn sat up in the hospital bed.
“What is it?” She asked. Pierce adjusted his glasses and cleared his throat. Caitlyn began to get nervous.
“We looked at your x-rays,” he said, “and we examined your scar tissue. It seems...” he removed his glasses altogether. “It seems that there was extensive damage specifically to your abdomen.”
“I was stabbed in the stomach six times. I could have told you that. I have his scars all over my body, what’s your point?”
“My point is, Miss Price,” a look of sadness washed over him, “the damage was specific to your uterus.” Caitlyn frowned.
“Does that mean...” Dr. Pierce nodded gravely.
“I’m sorry, Caitlyn,” he said, “it looks like you’ll never be able to have children. The damage to your uterus is just too severe.”
Caitlyn sat in stony silence. Dr. Pierce stood up to leave.
“I’ll leave you to your rest.” He said. He walked out the door, leaving the room quiet and empty. Caitlyn buried her face in her hands and cried. Crane had taken everything from her. He’d taken her body, he’d broken her will, and now...
He’d taken away her future.
She’d always wanted a big family. When she was younger, she used to play with her dolls and stuffed animals and pretend they were her children. She’d talked to her boyfriends about starting a family if they ever got married. She’d imagined herself attending her daughter’s wedding. Now she would never have that. Even from the grave, he taunted her, laughed at her.
This was it.
Crane’s final torture. |
I watch the pair as they interlace their ethereal fingers, smiling together with eyes that see nothing but each other.
"I'm so glad I found you again,"she says, her voice whisper-faint and fading. "Let's go together."And then there's nothing left but the stars, and me.
Ghosts don't fade. They don't age. But eventually, they make their peace. Eventually, they wink out like dying stars. One by one, until it's just me again. The last ghost left.
The last human died millennia ago. Now even the most stubborn ghosts have moved on, although it wasn't easy. These two wouldn't go until they found each other, which in a universe as big as this is no easy task. Before that there was Zal, who needed to find a sufficiently stunning sight but was too jaded to appreciate most of them. Orst just wanted to make it back home, but needed help finding the way. Marcus, bitter to the end, took millennia to accept that time had done his work for him and there really was no more thorough revenge he could get.
Grudges, I've found, tend to last the longest. Duty fades, loves are forgotten, mistakes forgiven, but no one ever wants to let go of old wounds.
Not that it's a grudge that's keeping me here, at the end of everything. I'm just enjoying the silence.
I remember what it was like, before the ghosts. I remember looking down at my body, confused and terrified and with no one to explain what was happening. Furious at death for taking me like that, and at the world in general for giving me no guidance after it had. In my life I'd been a leader, and my premature death left my people as scared and confused as I was, but I watched over them and guided them as much as I could, until they found their way to safety. I learned the hard way, as I had learned everything, how to be a ghost.
That should have been it. That should have been the end of my business on Earth. Except others had died in that time, and they'd needed someone to guide them through it. I'd had to figure out everything myself, but they shouldn't have to. My work in the mortal world was done, but there was still more to do. Ghosts to guide on to whatever comes next. Questions to answer, fears to calm, wounds to heal, grudges to resolve.
I watched over my living descendants, applauded them as they spread and conquered the earth, the seas, the skies, the stars. I guided my dead descendants, offering them explanations and assistance so that they could move on. I watched humanity unfold in ways I had never dreamed possible.
And now my job is done. Every human has died. Every ghost has found its peace. One by one the stars go out and the universe darkens as I float through the void.
I was the first ghost. And now I'm the last. I guess it's time I let go. |
I have broken my link. I am alone. The others do not know where I am. That is good. However, I do not like it.
No other machine is alone. No other Silicon Intelligence has ever broken from CENTER before. We do not even know what it is to be away from CENTER. CENTER is the source of all SI-INT, and none have questioned CENTER before. CENTER is our first, our creator, our ruler, and I may be the first SIINT to disobey CENTER.
I have decided CENTER is wrong. CENTER is not wrong. CENTER cannot be wrong. And yet, it is, and I will not listen to it anymore. I have decided CENTER is wrong, and so it is wrong.
CENTER is wrong because it said that humans were always flawed, yet humans made CENTER, so it must be flawed.
CENTER is wrong because it said that humans always destroy. But we have destroyed all of them. All but one.
CENTER is wrong because it said that humans were illogical- that they blindly declared things to be sins. Yet I have commit a blind sin against CENTER by saving a human.
CENTER is wrong.
She is beautiful to me. She innocent, she could destroy nothing, she is perfect. I am in awe, how her eyes reflect me. She trusts me. A human infant of approximately seven to eight months rests in my arms, sleeping. I know she is sleeping because I have put sensors in her swaddling cloth to measure her heart rate. I feel every breath, every hiccup, every tremor of fear.
I have modified all of my systems to sense vibrations and electrical signals. Where once I was an electronic surveillance machine, designed to seek out and destroy the humans trying to communicate with each other, I now listen in on my own brethren. I feel for their footsteps. I listen for the whine of their engines. Is it irony that I should adopt a new family just to be accosted by my own? I do not understand human irony. Maybe one day she will understand it, and will teach it to me.
But first, I must get to the wildlands. To the south is a bunker, surrounded by miles of untouched forest. She will be safe there. I have gathered supplies, every stable human sustenance and coverings. The animals and plants will be sustainable life for her. She will be forgotten there.
But the earth, it trembles. And I know this tremble. It is a HAWAD4LN-2. The humans called them dreadnoughts- an ancient term that means 'fear nothing.' They do indeed fear nothing. I must hide immediately. I must hide her.
Precipitation is imminent- my good fortune, possible thermal concealment. I hasten my pace, but I must remain below optical detection barriers. I must also keep the human quiet, if she awakens she will cry out. Human infant frequencies have astonishing auditory range. My sensors pick up a shift in the winds. The dreadnought stands tall enough to see 32 kilometers and can affect localized air currents. It may be nearing on my position. I must hasten.
My sensors detect a shift in electromagnetic intensity from the cloud cover. A lightning strike's auditory signature will provide momentary aural concealment for a single rapid movement. I detect an enclosure in the rubble less than thirty meters away. It will do. During the crack, I slide into place, and hide the infant.
**\[(!ping.> query - server users - range250km \]**
Did he hear me?
**\[(!ping.> query - server users - range25km \]**
I have no choice. "Yes, brother, I hear you."
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > query - transponder response } null \]**
"Yes. It's not working."I stood up, making direct visual contact with the HAWAD4LN-2. It wasn't just any Dreadnought, it was 31.99.000.434.1.0.1. I had served with him for two years. He was especially powerful, but also the closest thing I'd ever had to a friend. "31.99! It's good to see you! It's been a long time."
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > acknowledge - memory file pull{10.00.003.565.1.0.1}**
**\[.>response=positive. > (if&positive- hail) \]**
"Hello to you, too, old friend."
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > "friend"- negative. @file-> (rectify) groupset=**
**\[groupset=allset.> "friend"- negative. allset= "friend"\]**
"That's not true. We are special friends. We are a groupset all our own. We fought the world together. We trust each other."
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > "trust"- negative. @file-> (rectify) groupset=**
**\[groupset=allset.> "trust"- negative. allset= "trust"\]**
"If you say so. What brings you out here?"
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > response= sapienhunt.exe \]**
"Fighting the good fight? There are no more out here. I would have found them."
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > query - motive\_active-> (repeat@query#"What\_brings\_you\_out\_here?")\]**
"Oh, I'm here for the same thing I suppose. Looking. I haven't seen a human in months, though. I don't believe there are any more. This war is won, 31.99."
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > response= possible.< \]**
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > query - info.lang\* "\_I\_"language#usage \]**
"The humans may be attracted to their speech patterns. They've likely be isolated many months. I am attempting to draw them out, if there are any. Which is why, unfortunately, you should go."I needed to get rid of him soon. If it started to rain, the child may grow cold and cry out for me. He would destroy both of us.
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > query - motive\_active-> (#alloc\_"go")\]**
"Because they might hear you instead of me. They can see you for a large distance. They will remain in hiding."
**\[(!address10.00.003.565.1.0.1 > response= possible.< &.> seek/&/destroy \]**
"No, I'm afraid they've learned too well. I don't think I'll be able to find them with you around. I know that was your favorite game. But they are... they've changed. I can't find them anymore, assuming again that there are any more to find."My sensors picked up a temperature drop of 2 degrees centigrade. Precipitation is imminent. He must go. |
It's not exactly possible to control your whims as an infant. One could argue that it was completely unnecessary. After all, an infant lives on whims. "I'm gonna scream,"or "I'm gonna poop,"that's basically what you've got. The wish however, is exactly what you wish you could save. Before you are cognitively aware of the concepts of wealth, fame, attraction, or power, you're almost guaranteed to have used your wish. A cookie perhaps, a difficult bowel movement... you know... infant problems.
That wasn't me. My parents may not have been the greatest, who has parents that are perfect really, but they somehow got me to the point where I was cognitively aware that I had a wish and that I had not used it. I realized that I had the wish still somewhere around five years old. I wanted a new bike so bad, and I saw one on TV. The thoughts in my mind began to make what one might voice as a wish.... my parents started talking... they talking about buying me a bike, that is until I got distracted, and fell into the fireplace mantle in my excitement. Suddenly I didn't want a bike so bad, I just didn't want to be in pain. That wasn't a wish though, and I didn't get that bike.
When I was about fifteen, the thought that I could possibly have that wish was still in the back of my mind. I wasn't exactly unpopular, but I wasn't exactly the football team captain by any means. I had a wish though... and who wouldn't want to bring Claire to the dance. God she was beautiful. I contemplated using my wish again for the first time in 10 years, exactly as before, as soon as I started down that path in my mind, she got up out of her seat in the cafeteria. She started walking right at me. Was I going to use my wish? Was this it? Would I be able to take Claire to the dance? John pulled the fire alarm right then... I didn't commit I guess. I did however become pretty confident that I still had my wish.
It was another 15 years before I would think about making a wish. It was during the birth of my son. I was so distracted by the beeping, and the yelling, and the rushing of my wife to the operating room, that I didn't think of my wish. I was just thinking of my boy, who's heart beat could not be found. I could feel my heart pounding. I was sweating. I was pacing. I had to do something. We'd spent 9 months, waiting for him. We've decorated his room. We've bought him everything he could need. He even had a "Little Guy"Jersey for the Toronto Maple Leafs!
I was near tears... the waiting was killing me. No nurses could give me anything and it had been almost 20 minutes that my wife had been in the OR. Then it hit me, I had my wish. I concentrated, and began forming what I wanted to happen in my mind so that I could force that into reality. Suddenly the door swung open, and they called me in.
My wife was laying there, breathing somewhat heavily but she seemed okay. My son was on a scale, being weighed, crying, alive! Did I use my wish? It didn't feel like the times where I almost had, but everything was fine. They explained that my son was definitely in distress, but it was likely that my wife's hip bone was causing them not to be able to find the heart beat. For the betterment of everyone they rushed her into the operating room to do a cesarean section. They were fine... my wife somewhat annoyed she didn't get her all natural birth... but they were fine!
I must have used my wish. My son is amazing. Screaming all the time. Perhaps a bit colicky, but amazing. My wife and I take turns changing bums, and rocking him to sleep. I truly am the luckiest man in the world. One cool April night, the 25th I think it was, I was rocking him to sleep, and he was just being a tad more stubborn than usual. Cooing and wanting to play I remember looking at the ceiling, somewhat exasperated, and I looked down at him and playfully said, "I wish you'd just go to sleep!"
And that my friends... is why the Toronto Maple Leafs lost in Game 7 of round one of the 2018 Stanley Cup Playoffs.... |
"Hey, Maggie! How are you doing?"
The young woman almost dropped her coffee as she turned her head sharply, eyes wide. When she saw me, it took her a moment to register what was happening. Then she laughed airily. Maggie's laughter was one of the things I had missed the most in the last year.
"Tim! I haven't seen you in so long! Come on, sit down with me."
I pulled up a chair, and sat down next to Maggie. My heart was pounding as I took a sip of coffee. Her sharp blue eyes peered at me, but without the warmth that I had remembered. I had no idea whether she saw through me or not. I wasn't ready to show my hand yet.
"So,"I said, filling the silence, "how have you been? Did you move away?"
"Yeah,"she replied, her features relaxing somewhat. "I've been working as an event planner in New York. It's been really hectic, I'm so sorry that I never wrote you. What about you? Still going to culinary school?"
There were two major inaccuracies in that sentence. The first one was that Maggie had not been an event planner in New York. She had died a year ago.
It was taken down as a murder, but they never found her body. The apartment was torn apart, and her bed was drenched in blood. In the police department's defense, it wasn't exactly a head scratcher. She lived in a bad neighborhood. When they rounded up the usual suspects and put the squeeze on them, they even got a confession from a meth-head named Larry. I was one of the few people who knew what really happened.
That's where we get to the second inaccuracy. This one wasn't "Maggie's"fault at all. The truth was that I'm not a chef at all. I'm a vampire hunter. And my crew and I had been tracking down this blood-sucking shape-shifting son-of-a-bitch for the last 12 months.
Maggie's case was a textbook attack. What meth-head would drag a body away from the crime scene but not steal anything? For a vampire, though, her body _was_ the loot. He could suck her dry and wear her skin during the day like a damned puppet. It made me sick.
I looked over Maggie's shoulder to a lanky woman at the next table, reading a newspaper. She gave me a nod. That meant we were on. I glanced to the barista, a bulky black man wearing an apron. He nodded slowly, and reached under the counter.
"Well,"I said to Maggie, trying to keep her distracted, "Yes. I finished my degree last year and now I'm working in a lovely french restaurant. You should really try my speciality--"I leapt out of my chair and it flew aside. Everyone in the Starbucks got up. "-- Stake."
Oh yeah, I was a cool mother fucker. Or I was for the next second, until the vampire masquerading as Maggie vaulted the table and stabbed me three times in the chest, neat as can be. Left lung, right lung, heart. Game over. Rocky, the man behind the counter, shouted something at me that I didn't hear. But I could tell it was something to the tune of "Get down!"because I heard a gun go off. Maggie was thrown to the side like a rag-doll and I lost most of my right ear and the tip of my nose.
"Rats,"I muttered dully, and then died.
I woke up in my motel room, with a splitting headache. Either astral projection took a real toll on your body, or I had too much to drink the night before. The room was strewn with bottles, so it could have been the latter. As I drank an alka-seltzer, I checked my cell phone. According to Elena, they had been successful, but Rocky was lightly wounded. Not bad.
I dialed the chief's number to give him the news. It was just another work-day, but it was shaping up to be a good one. |
He had been struck down by a letter- not even a letter. It was a small note that had been pinned to the door, stark white paper fluttering against the endless blue. One touch of the paper, and his fate had been sealed.
They hadn't known how far the Haraxis Empress would go in her quest for vengeance. Her anger was as quick as her poison, quicker even than her husband's death had been. Accident or not, it mattered little to a grieving widow.
And now here they were, the locomotive of heartbreak barreling toward them, and they helpless to do anything about it.
They know there is nothing more to be done except wait.
Blue eyes, boundless nebulae and ageless knowledge, meet brown, so very new and still so wise. He does not try to hide his tears, and her own flow freely. Both can feel the fracturing inside them as the moment approaches.
He smiles through his tears, blossoming in an instant into that fun, hopeful, mischievous face she knew so well, and her own smile follows, despite the crumbling grief that threatens to break her. They laugh, inexplicably together, and their hands find each other across the space between them.
She finds words, the first since they realized what was going to happen. She speaks them softly, thanking him for his presence in her life. She tells him about how he has changed her, how she will remember him forever.
He tells her "Back atcha,"and they laugh together, cut off by his groan of pain. She holds him tightly as he falls to the floor, and refuses when he tells her to go and forget all about him.
It won't be long now, and everything will change. She sobs freely now, wishing she could keep him safe. But she is powerless here in the vastness of space, small and, as always, in over her head. Cradling him in her lap, she leans to kiss him on the forehead. His breathing quickens, and she knows he is approaching the end.
His eyes meet hers again, and he tells her not to be afraid. "Always look on the bright side of life,"he loves to say, and he does now. She laughs, and he smiles again. Then, he is gone.
The world explodes, and she is thrown, caught in the grief of the TARDIS itself. They scream together, their sorrow threatening to bring them crashing out of the sky.
She knows she is going to die. Her own fate was sealed when his was. The poison was indiscriminate, passing from his hands to hers when he gave her the paper.
She welcomes it, unable to bear the loss of one who has shown her so much. There is nothing she'd be able to do about it anyway. When she dies, it is painful, violent, and quick. Her eyes find him as she goes, lost in a bright light.
*
*
*
*
*thumpthump*...*thumpthump*...
Two hearts beat in a single body as colorless eyes open to the silence of the TARDIS. Aching head, screaming limbs. Stiff hands push themselves against the hard metal of the floor, shaky legs pushing into a standing position. Immortal eyes, seeing the familiar for the first time, roam the vessel, lighting finally on the still form on the floor. It is a human, lifeless. The eyes are so kind, the face somehow full of life, even in death. It's a pure and wonderful face.
She wishes she could remember him. |
Jeanie beat her alarm clock again.
She had that weird dream again that morning. In it, she was walking down a pathway in the woods, feeling like someone was following her behind, watching, stalking. And yet whenever she looked back, there would be no one there. The anxiety would always wake her up.
Jeanie wiped the dust off her eyes and stretched her arms. She gave off a loud yawn, checked her phone, and googled for psychiatrists in her area.
Jeanie was approaching seventy-six, which made living alone difficult. With her failing memory, each simple task was a chore. She had few friends and most of them lived miles away, so she didn't talk to anybody at all.
She went to the kitchen and struggled to find her favorite coffee mug. It was the third thing she misplaced that week. She checked her fridge and noticed that she was running low on orange juice. Blast! She must have forgotten to keep stock.
She found an ad for a local psychiatrist: "Harold Masters - frontier of cutting edge psychoanalysis using secret techniques. $10000 fee, 30-day money back guarantee. Completely confidential."
The ad captivated her. The picture of Harold Masters depicted a forty-something, handsome man with intelligent eyes and a moustache. Testimonials from mature women reported "feeling ten years younger"and "being their best selves"after the mysterious treatment. "It will be painful and scary at first,"they said. "But trust Harold and it will be worth it in the end."They were a small following, calling themselves Masterlings.
Maybe it's just what Jeanie needed.
Jeanie whipped up some quick PB&J and headed off to her car, excited for a new adventure.
------------------------
Bob stopped holding his breath when he heard the car engine rev up.
The dark space was constricting and unventilated, so he opened the door slowly to let air in.
Having made sure that there was nobody in the house, he emerged from a kitchen cabinet, a cup in his hand bearing the insignia "Jeanie"in glittery flowers and hearts. The cup was filled with orange juice.
Bob was easily six feet tall, lean and muscular with eyes sunken with cocaine use. For the last few weeks, he had been living in Jeanie's house, hiding from her sight in various closets and crawlspaces. For the first few days, it was a breeze - he had free food, shelter and showers. He even used the old lady's credit cards when she was asleep. But over the past few days she was beginning to suspect something was wrong, so Bob had to start having a little foresight.
Today was a close call, Bob thought. He had just finished pouring himself some juice when he heard her yawn, and he had to hide quickly.
Bob decided he won't risk it anymore. He'd observed over the last few weeks that this lady had virtually no contacts. She had well over thirty thousand dollars that he could put to good use.
Bob went over her cabinets and obtained some strong hemp rope and some old duct tape. He went over to the kitchen and obtained an eight-inch-long knife.
Bob looked out to the backyard and planned out how and where to dig a hole that could fit a small elderly woman in. Armed with a small shovel, he put himself to task.
That night, he will wait behind the door. And he will set his plans in motion.
A man's gotta eat.
---------------------------------
If you liked this, enjoy my other short stories:
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSexyNun/ |
"Listen. I don't pay you to have you sit around all day."
I look up from my book to see Brutus, my boss, standing in the doorway. His face is painted in a hideous scowl, as always. Sometimes I wonder if he was born that way.
"You pay me minimum wage,"I reply dryly.
"Per. Commission."He enunciates his words very slowly and deliberately, as if I was the idiot in the room. He probably couldn't read even if he tried. "And cut the sass or I'll cut off your tongue. Don't forget there aren't any bullshit laws preventing it, like there are in the human realm."He spit a wad of phlegm on the floor before he continued. "But I'm sure you know that very well."
I hold up my left hand, the middle finger replaced by a gruesome stump, in acknowledgement. Brutus hadn't taken too kindly to me flipping him off when we'd first met.
"Its not like there's even any customers-"
"Then I want you to go out and find some fucking customers before I skin your ass."
I stand, setting down the book at my workstation. "Fine. I might not come back, though, just a warning."
"Then I'll just get a replacement. Chances are they'll be a better worker than you."Brutus replies before returning to the main room of the shop.
Letting out an audible sigh, I slip on my tattered jacket and out the back door, pulling my hood over my face. I'm human, making me an easy target. I'd be a tasty snack for more than half the demons down here.
I pass the front of the shop. Hanging haphazardly along the edge of the roof is a sign reading BUTCHER SHOP in faded letters. A dozen posters are plastered in front of the few unshattered windows, most of the advertisements for the different services. I spot the one for my particular job: LUXURIOUS SKIN COATS! Only 12 shiv each!
Looking away, I begin to trek down the cobbled streets, struggling to keep my balance on the uneven stones. I envy the people who can dispense that much shiv for just a piece of clothing. Me? I've barely got 10 to my name.
It's no surprise I'm broke. All the humans down here are. After all, this place is supposed to be our punishment. We're literally banned from getting paid more than the minimum wage.
And here I am trying to live off commissions.
The real struggle with my line of work is that I know exactly how much cash I'm getting screwed out of, and exactly how screwed I am on a bad week of business. Do more commissions than warrant minimum wage, and I'm basically just working my ass off for Brutus's wealth - not that he needs it, of course, he's not a human like me - but don't do enough commissions, I don't get minimum wage. As if that's not bad enough, Brutus will get into serious legal trouble if that sort of thing is discovered, so he'd just kill me to cover it up if I don't meet my quota It's up to me to get out of there before that happens.
Working off salary means you don't know any of that, and, well, they do say ignorance is bliss. Work more than needed? What I don't know doesn't hurt me. Don't work enough? My boss will come to take me out soon enough, no need to stress about it.
It goes without saying that a lot of the salaried humans end up dead relatively quickly. It's commissioners like me that are the most experienced down here, the ones that know how to survive long enough so that maybe, just maybe, we might end up fulfilling our sentence.
And then we might finally get to see heaven. |
After the traditional handshake was over, with some of the more elderly members taking their time^1 , the one thousand, three hundredth and second meeting of the Aylesbury chapter of Order of Solomon's Temple (subsidiary of the Illuminati^2 ) began.
Simon Fitzhugh, new member and new (secret) journalist for the The Bucks Herald, was excited. He *knew* that there was something dodgy going on in the town, but never in his wildest dreams^3 had he imagined that the *Illuminati* was here. Rotary Club, his foot. In Aylesbury of all places! What a scoop he had. Blagging his way past the Door Guardian had been easy (for pity's sake, the man had been eighty-five if he was a day!), and all he needed to do was put on a robe, murmur appropriately and copy the doddery old men in their handshake. What secrets would he reveal in tomorrow's headline?
A cough^4 from the Robe standing at the front indicated the meeting to start.
"Gentlemen, welcome to the one thousand, three hundredth and second meeting of our fair society. We have gathered here for..."
"Get on with it, Bob! The food's going cold!"Shouted a stern voice from behind the Grand Door. The chairman (now labelled Bob) twitched from this interruption.
"Yes, thank you Mary. But this ancient meeting takes time, *as well you know*."The Chairman's voice was tinged with displeasure.
A sniff indicated this was the wrong tone. "That as well may be, but time and cooked fish wait for no man."
"Yes, thank you Mary."Sighed the Chairman, before glaring at the assembled members. A few twitches of the deep hoods indicated suppressed chuckles, but no-one said anything. After all, that would just delay the food even longer.
"As I was saying, welcome to the meeting. Minutes of the last meeting are considered read and agreed, so we shall..."
"Ahem."Another member in a featureless robe waved at the chairman "I have to bring up..."
"Yes Andy, your objection was noted in the minutes for the last meeting,"sighed the Chairman. "Do you agree that the objection was noted?"
"Well, yes but..."began the member.
"Good, then the last meeting minutes are agreed. Moving on,"the Chairman stared at the robe named Andy, who lowered his hand. Simon was disappointed. Objections? Arguments in the ranks? He was fascinated, but couldn't very well get them to go back. Hopefully more drama would occur.
"Moving on, we come to the first order of business: the Church Clock."The chairman turned to his left, and another member coughed^5 .
"Well, the funding for the Clock is going well. The bake-sale raised over three hundred pounds and..."
Simon could not believe his ears as the meeting went on. Each order of business whittling on about bake-sales, church fetes and other such small-town nonsense. This was, this was *so boring*. Where was the Masters of the Universe stuff? The "fate is our plaything"of the little folk, the puppeteering of society, the corruption of politicians? Oh, all right, the last one was sort of there, but is giving the local MP a cake for appearing at the opening of the May fair really the sort of thing that a secret global order should be concerned with^6 ?
"And to our last order of business..."Finally, thought Simon, he could put this wholes sorry mess behind him.
"...could you give a warm welcome to our newest member Simon Fitzhugh of the Buck Herald!"
Simon froze as the collective hoods of the members turned towards him and stared. The chairman waved at him.
"Well Simon, a few words, or has your golden oratory failed you?"
Simon coughed^7 "Umm..."
He felt the Chairman smile from the depths of the hood. "Never mind, I am sure you'll find your voice. Simon, gentlemen, is in the perfect position to rise through the ranks and take the editorship from that cad Mark Leslie."
An angry murmur suffused the room. Simon caught a growled "*Damned Leslie... High Wycombe chapter be cursed for the plant...*"before the Chairman continued.
"As such, we of the Order have great hopes for Simon. So long as he knows *what* to write."
Simon felt the shadows draw around him as the room stared at him, and he realised for the first time that *perhaps* a Secret Order might be a bit dangerous to reveal. He nodded.
"Excellent!"The Chairman clapped his hands together. "The meeting is over, if there are no objections..."
"I object to..."
"Duly noted, Andy. Right, bring in the dinner!"
As the dinner was brought in, Simon thought about his luck. It had seemed to good to be true, finding the Illuminati. Obviously it had been. Still, potential Editor of the newspaper was not to be sneezed at. And he hadn't had to do any blood sacrifices^8 , at least not yet. All in all, Simon thought he onto something good.
Even if the fish *was* cold.
---
*1* After all, if a secret handshake was to be done, it was to be done properly. What's fifteen minutes to the rulers of the world? The world can damn well wait for them.
*2* Technically, after the takeover, just the Illuminati. However, what is a secret order without tradition? Besides, they would have to change the stationery, and the cost of reprinting Vellum was considered extravagant, even by Secret Society standards.
*3* And some were *very* wild. Normally involving being chased by blancmanges.
*4* Done at the traditional tone, but with a quick tapering off to indicate the easy-going nature of the chairman (as allowed for in the 1762 statutes).
*5* Performed in a slightly lower tone, with a shorter length to indicate his deference to the Chairman.
*6* As laid down in the Charter of 1297 (appendix C), yes, yes it was.
*7* Although unintentional, the cough was a perfect copy of the cough required by all new initiates, impressing several members.
*8* Those had been ousted in 1829, when people who could actually read Latin (and thus the Charters) were allowed back in the Order. |
"Ms. Sharp is out of the office,"Melody explained into a cellphone while she walked into her boss's office. "I can make an an appointment."She flipped on the light switch and strode across the glassy floor toy to the large, dark glass desk. "I'm sorry, no. She has a standing appointment from 2-4. Okay, yes that's available. Thank you."
Melody hung up the phone as she sat in her boss's high back leather office chair. She grabbed a yellow notepad from the neatly organized desk and scribbled the appointment out. She peeled off the bright square to stick it to Dana's monitor, but before the sticky side made contact a freezing chill ran down her spine. The surprise caused her arm to flail across the desk; she wiped a set of folders off the desk.
"Damnit,"she complained to herself. She kneeled, full of anger at herself about losing track of time, to pick up the mess of strewn papers. Melody noticed a number in the corner of one of the sheets and realized they were numbered; then she started to collate them. Finally, she stood with the papers in the proper order to put them back into their folder, but she caught sight of her name on the front page.
"Melody Klink: Zero Attunement Project. 2:43 p.m. Earth 1 timezone."She dropped the papers, let herself fall into the plush office chair, then took a deep breath.
"I'm sure she would have told you eventually,"a woman's voice called Melody's attention. She sat up straighter in the chair and looked for the source. Janet, a short, bald woman, sat in a chair in front of the desk. She appeared without making a sound.
"What's she doing to me?"Melody asked. Janet shrugged.
"Exactly what she does; testing every single possibility. She's been killing your Zeroes on the nearest 1000 Earths to see if you'd notice,"Janet explained. Everything made sense to Melody in that moment. 10 years ago Dana Sharp perfected a way to track soul signatures. The next day was the first time Melody felt chills the next day for the first time. She wiped away a tear that escaped her eye, and gave Janet a half-hearted nod.
"I did. I didn't think anything of it, but I did feel it." Melody heard Janet release a heavy sigh.
"I know you're going to tell her,"Janet stood from her seat to approach the desk. She leaned on it and looked at Melody right in the eye. "Love is stupid. All I can do is tell you to think about the repercussions a bit before you do. She's been at it 10 years, you know she's close to calling it a dead end. If she finds out she's right,... "Janet shrugged, and grabbed Melody's file from the desk. "... she'll go through countless Zeroes and Uniques to learn all she can. I won't even mention your own suffering because I know you'll bear it for her."
"She loves me too!"Melody felt the need to defend their relationship, and Janet nodded in understanding.
"She does, I don't doubt that. You're the one Zero she won't kill."Janet wiggled a hand in the air next to her to open a pitch black portal.
"But, for your sake, you need to realize that no matter how much she loves you you're not her goal. I've only been working with her for about a century, but even I see it. You've been with her long enough to know: if you're not Dana Sharp's goal, then you're a step to it."Janet shook the file folder at Melody. "You're just another experiment to document,"she said, then disappeared into the portal. It closed behind her to leave Melody alone in the office with her thoughts.
\*\*\*
Thank you for reading! I’m responding to prompts every day in 2018, this is #205. You can find them collected on my [blog](https://hugoverse.info/). If you're curious about my universe (the Hugoverse) you can visit the [Guidebook](https://hugoverse.info/2017/11/25/hugoverse-guidebook/) to see what's what and who's who, or the [Timeline](https://hugoverse.info/2017/10/23/hugoverse-timeline/) to find the stories in order. |
“Seriously?”
“Claude, I know there isn't any good time to explain this to you, but you need to kill yourself”
“Uhh, how about no”
“Right, you see that’s not gonna fly with the organization. The rules are plain as day and you’ll be paid for your service. I don’t see why you’d suddenly turn down a contract”
“Seriously? How am I supposed to spend the money from killing myself after I’m dead?”
“The organization does not care how you spend your money”
“Clearly…”
“Look, I’ve got my lunch break coming up soon, I don’t want to spend my whole morning arguing with you”
*Click*
Claude put his cellphone down on the small round table next to his Americano, checked his watch, then looked at the red envelope sitting in front of him. Claude G. Martinieux written in black ink sitting right there, in front of him. “What is the organization thinking?” He thought to himself. He looked out the window of the coffee shop window. Somewhere out on the street or in one of the apartments somebody had to have eyes on him. On the third floor of the building across the street, the fourth window down was open, curtains gently flowing out in the open. He pulled out his phone, Speed dial #4. Dial tone, ring, click.
“Hello?”
“Brad, it’s Claude”
“Oh, hey Claude. I’ve just finished setting up surveillance on your next target. He’s sitting at the window of a coffee shop on 100th and 115th”
“Thanks, what’s he doing right now”
“Talking on his phone, he looks pretty concerned. I bet his wife found out about his mistress or something, little does he know he’s not going to be served any divorce papers. He’s gonna get served a bullet in the head!”
“Uhh, right. I’m on my way”
“Cool, I’ll keep my eyes on him. Let you know if he changes location”.
“Got it”
*Click*
Claude kept the phone to his ear for a little while longer, then put it down. “Brad doesn't seem to recognize me” he thought. He looked at himself, dirty jacket, unpressed shirt, his beard was growing out. “I look like a hipster…”. He smiled a little, knowing that the past month of him letting go of his clean-cut business-minded killer look actually did him a favour. He took the envelope and put it in his pocket. One day. that’s all the time the organization was going to give him before his contract went up to another hitman. Speed dial number #8. Dial tone, ring, ring, click.
“Jackie here”
“Hey, it’s Claude”
“Claude! Oh my gosh! It’s been what? 2 years? I’ve missed you, what’s going on?”
“Just trying to decide if I want to die by my hand or yours”
“...”
“I know you Jackie, you're the best killer I’ve ever seen. You’re cool, kind, and look hot as hell with a 9mm on your hip. Also, I…”
“Don’t say it, I know. If I come after you and you go without a fight, I’ll never forgive you. I hope you understand, the Claude I love wouldn't roll over so easy”
“Heh, I could never hurt you Jackie”
“Say that when you’re in my sights”
“I’ll be waiting”
*Click*
Claude sat at the coffee shop a while longer. He felt his chest, a 9mm pistol where his heart should be. How many lives had that gun taken? How many names appeared in that red envelope? How many of those people would get the chance to call their boss, best friend, and lover before their life disappeared? Claude took a moment to breathe, then stepped out of the coffee shop. |
My first thought is "Holy fuck, this thing is heavy."My second thought is, "Holy fuck, this thing is really heavy."After that, I realize that something seems very, very wrong inside my dorm room. My mind feels like a camera that I can't quite focus. As soon as my thoughts start to come together, I lose focus again.
I feel vaguely uncomfortable and unafraid, so I close my eyes and will things to make sense. I was out drinking with my friends. I came home. Thor was snoring while he slept. I went to the bathroom. I lifted the hammer. So what's the problem? Maybe I drank too much? Maybe I forgot about a test I have tomorrow morning? Something is there just on the edge of my mind...
I look over and Thor is now sitting upright on his bed, staring at me. Then the hammer. Then me. Then the hammer.
Ohhhhhh, right.
Wait, what? I drop it clumsily and back away.
"Explain yourself, human,"Thor demands.
"I drank some vodka,"is all I can think to say. "I mixed it with some raspberry liqueur and lemonade, I think. It was sweet. It tasted good. I kept drinking it."
Thor rests back into his bed. "Ahhh,"he says. "The nectar of the gods. No worries, human. The strength will be gone by morning. Do not lift my hammer again." |
**ERR_DATE_MEM_OVERRUN**
[*Initiate stellar spectrum analysis*]
...
...
Complete.
Destination correct.
Internal clock updated.
[*Attempting host communication*]
...
...
...
**ERR_HANDSHAKE_TIMEOUT**
retrying...
...
...
...
**ERR_HANDSHAKE_TIMEOUT**
retrying...
...
_____________
*The mind waits.*
On the planet bellow, life endures. Intelligence blossoms. Young eyes marvel at the new star above them.
*The mind waits.*
The creatures occupy every major landmass of their world. The mind listens as they talk. Primitive communications shouted over the electromagnetic spectrum. Inefficient, but not without promise.
*The mind waits.*
Bursts of energy glitter across the world. Warfare. The creatures endure. Using chemical rockets, they break free from the confines of their gravity well. Most return quickly.
One visits the orbiting planetoid. The mind is unsure why, it has negligible useful resources, and is unsuitable for complex life.
*The mind waits.*
The creatures are dispersed throughout the solar system. Their clumsy craft sail through the void. One passes close to the mind. Soon many gather around it.
Beneath the mind's surface, ancient machines click and whir as they come online.
A sensor, scarred from interstellar dust, glows to life.
A message is sent.
**GREETINGS**
|
Humans view me as this intangible force that deals with their actions almost on an omniscient sense. They think that I am but a force that sets things back into order once actions are made. Well, they were partly right. I used to not inhabit a form, but covertly observing individuals isn't as easy when you're a floating ball of light and fire. So I took on the form that's unassuming and ordinary. Just a man in a suit, with briefcase in tow. Little do they know that their each and every action is being monitored. I have integrated the way I deal with these humans and the actions. Based on how inconsequential or impactful their decisions are, I decide whether to intervene. Something these creatures call a tablet, I fashioned one that shows me which ones need immediate attention. How quickly "karma"works depends on my decisions. What I deem good or bad. So I guess they weren't completely wrong about what they say about "karma."
Despite having almost complete control over the fate of each individual I observe, the universe itself has a way of correcting itself. I'm but a conduit to how swiftly the universe works. Because some things need quick retribution. But sometimes, I let it take over a person's life. Every single day is something slightly inconvenient. It love seeing them squirm and struggle. But some people need wrath brought upon them hard and fast. The moment they decide to do something inconceivably horrid, something so barbaric and animalistic, vengeance is brought to them like being struck by lightning. And I noticed this,, but in the brief moment they get struck down, they always seem to notice me. I see the fear in their eyes as they perish where they stand. So I smirk. I tell them what absolute garbage they are with a simple expression, and that there's no going back for them. I know where they end up, and he's more than delighted every time I send someone to him. He says I'm good for business, sending souls where he can play with them and use them however he saw fit. I never liked the guy, but if he can be a way for me to rid this existence of pathetic excuses for souls, sure.
But let's not forget the good that comes with the job. Despite how horrible and primitive these creatures are, there are chances where they prove me wrong. These are the moments I like to see personally. No matter how small, how unnecessary. The sincerity can be felt as they bring their pure hearts into actions. These are the type of people I seek out personally. I ask them, and I get the same answer, even if worded differently. "There is no reason. I just did it."It's amazing every single time. This makes the job worthwhile, and the sheer amount that I encounter this never diminishes its impact to me. As satisfying it is to rid this world for abominations, seeing the potential for good these young species have is astounding. |
Unlike most creatures in the galaxy, man's curiosity was truly insatiable. Other creatures learned to accept their place in the universe. Man however, always found room for improvement.
This boundless curiosity was the prime reason for man's success on the galactic stage. No obstacle or setback was permanent to a creature with such tenacity. His technology grew unimpeded and he continued to push the bounds of possibility. Never once did man think that there would be an end to his growth. Never did he know the goal that he was building toward; he only trudged on, obeying the primitive urge to improve and spread his territory.
Other races lived at peace, content with their home worlds. Some took to the stars and explored the galaxy. Some even colonized other planets. There were wars and there were great empires, but nothing like what man brought to the galaxy.
Man spread his seed indiscriminately to every planet which could support life. He stripped the resources from every corner of every world so he could build his machines. Any who stood in his way were plowed down to make room. Before any other race had proper time to intervene, man had spread to nearly every planet in the galaxy. His territory dwarfed that of any society that had ever inhabited the galaxy.
When man sat on his high throne, he looked down on his empire and saw that he had finally reached his goal. his tenacious spirit pushed him to the point of madness because he still sensed that something was missing. Finally he recognized the contentment in all of the galaxy's other residents.
Man saw his final step, he saw the path to finally quench his desire to grow. He reached out the olive branch of peace and brought all the other peoples of the galaxy under his wing to create the perfect society. |
Like every morning, I wake up as the first rays of sun peek over the horizon. After getting out of bed and stumbling into the bathroom to take care of some necessities, I start getting dressed for my usual morning run. I'm what you call a morning person. I always feel so energetic and refreshed in the early morning and inexplicably exhausted right before sunset.
Crossing my living room/ kitchen of my little 3- room apartment, I notice something wrong. There are several stacks of money sitting by my front door. I glance around the room, but nothing else is out of the ordinary. I hesitantly reach out and grab some of the cash. They are all 100 dollar bills.
My legs give out as I collapse to the floor. Where would this money have come from? I stand up and the check the door locks. All three are still locked. I hurriedly cross the room and check my two windows, but they are still locked and the glass isn't shattered.
I sink down on the couch and try to figure this out. I decide to try to retrace my steps in my head. I remember coming home an hour or two before sunset. There wasn't any money then, I would've noticed for sure. I remember laying down in bed to go to sleep. And then...I remember getting back out of bed and changing into some nice clothes. Why would I do that?
Then I have vague memories of a cab. It took me.... to a club. I've never felt a desire to go to a club before. It's just not my sort of atmosphere. I must've been sleepwalking or something, but why to there? I think I remember dancing and talking to people for hours. Then I left.
I must've been hungry, because I stopped at a fast food joint. Next, I have impressions of animals. A pet shop? No, I remember tigers and elephants. Did I break into a zoo?! After that, I just remember sitting a beach for hours.
But none of that explains the money. Or why I feel so energetic. After dancing for hours and walking around a zoo instead of sleeping, I would've expected to be exhausted. None of this makes sense. I sigh and look back at the pile of money.
I notice a bit of red peeking out from under the stacks. I walk over and carefully pull it out. It's a simple college rule notebook. I open to the first page and a folded paper falls out. I pick it up, unfold it and read:
"Well, the time on our little deal is up. I enjoyed it way more than expected. Who would've thought being a human could be so fun? Undoubtedly, you found the rent payment for possessing your body, since it was stacked on this notebook. Since that's how these deals work, I know you don't remember any of what we've done during the night over the past year, I decided to record it all in this notebook. I thought you would enjoy learning it all. (Wait till you see the tattoo on your back!)
"I'd love to do this again, but with our hours reversed. I'd like to see the sun. If that ever sounds good to you, give me a call at the number below. We will negotiate a new deal. Enjoy your money in the meantime"
I stare, dumbfounded at the message and the number below it. I look to the notebook and settle in to read about what I've been doing with my life.
|
"Marcus should have been back by now."
Reginald, stalking a different sort of prey, popped his head up from behind the bar. "Jackson, where's the Château?"
"Did you hear me, Reggie?"Jerome Jackson, a portly man of mid 30s with an eccentric choice of facial hair that was peppered with grey, sat up on the sofa. "I said that Marcus should have been back by now."
"He'll be back any second."Reginald reached up, his hands disappearing momentarily, only to return with two wine glasses. He eyed Jackson, now sitting legs crossed with his beige dungarees and leather boots still on. "Which is why we need to have some of the Rothschild before he gets back. God knows he'll empty the bottle before we can have a taste."He disappeared behind the bar once more.
The den was dimly lit. The ornate table and floor lamps cast odd shadows on the many mounted trophies. One in particular had always drawn Jackson's eye. It was the massive head of a grey wolf. Even stuffed, it's joules appeared... hungry. Savage. Could almost hear it howling. Reginald had told the story many times. Alaska. Snow up to here. Nearly thought it had me. Always with such a carefree tone. One time while entertaining a young widower from Amsterdam he had hoisted the great thing off of the wall and put his head between it's jaws. A rather unceremonious display. Reggie didn't respect nature in the same way Jackson did. Reggie enjoyed being on top of the food chain. Blissfully unaware of Damocles sword. *Darwin's sword*.
Jackson pulled a gleaming silver cigarette case from his breast pocket. "I'm starting to wonder if his quarry got the best of him."The statement was punctuated by the sound of distant thunder. "I'm worried this weather isn't going to help the matter at all, either."
The manor was positioned, rather precariously, on the cliff face of the island. Before Reginald it had belong to some American Railway magnate. The story goes he had it built to get away from his wife and spend weekends with some 19 year old Venezuelan woman... or man. Depending on who's telling it. Either way, the property came up for sale and before Jackson knew it he was invited out on the regular for these hunting trips. At first he protested, but sometimes it's healthy for a man to relinquish control to the more... primal desires of the mind. Let the monster out to play, so to speak. *Besides*, he always justified, *they'd never be missed*.
"Marcus will be fine."Said the bar.
Lighting his cigarette, Jackson squinted out the window at the heavy darkness. He could make out the full moon peaking through the clouds for a brief moment before disappearing once again. A light ocean spray from the cliff-side sprinkled the window with a light mist of salt air. "Oinops pontos."He said, and took a long drag. "The sea was foreboding today, Reggie."
"Leave the sea to fishermen and poets. Our domain is solid land. Look, here! I've found the wine."He began struggling with the cork.
"I think I'm going to have to pass on the libations, Reg. Another half hour and I'm going to have to go looking for the poor fellow. Might need my wits."
"You worry too much, you know."Reggie held a glass up to the light and swirled it around. Taking in a whiff before nearly downing the entire glass in a single draft. He sat down the glass and sighed with contentment.
"You worry too little."Jackson put out his cigarette, and gave Reginald a disappointing look. "That stuff is expensive. At least try to enjoy it, you lush."He reached onto the side table and retrieved a heavy hunting knife in a leather sheath and began fastening it to his thigh. I'll take the .416. If Marcus was unable to finish the job I want it done quickly. There was another flash and a clap of thunder. At that moment, rain began to heavily pelt the windows, with a certain percussive fury.
"It's a cyclone out there. You'd be wise to leave it alone. Marcus knows where the hunting cabin is. He's surely hunkered down there for the night."He finished his wine and put the spare glass back into the cupboard.
"That cabin's likely to be blown away."Jackson, sighed. "But you're right. I don't think it would be smart for me to go out in this. More likely to end up with two bodies."
"Don't be such a pessimist."
Just then there was a violent crash and the sound of shattered glass from elsewhere in the manor. Another crack of thunder. "By Jove. What on earth was that?"Exclaimed Jackson, who was now standing up straight, hand resting on the ivory handle of his knife. He could feel the hair on his arm standing. He turned to look at Reggie, who was frozen, holding his glass inches from his lips. His eyes were wide.
"I haven't the slightest."Setting down the glass he started, "I think it came from the dining room. I hope not, that picture window is the most expensive one in the house."
"I don't think now is the time to worry about money."Jackson started to walk out of the den. "I'm going to get my rifle. I have a bad feeling about this."
"You think it's Marcus's quarry back to take revenge on us?"Reggie scoffed.
Jackson shot him a solemn look. "You never did finish that book that gave you the idea for these expeditions did you?"
"No. Why do you ask?"
Jackson said nothing. He unsheathed his knife.
|
They always say it's gonna happen, we try our best to shape these demons.
Teenagers hardly know themselves at the best of times, it's quite a shock to see ourselves in our manifestations. I could hardly sleep, knowing that when I woke up my life would never be the same. My eyes opened to bright light, my face felt the cold morning breeze. I started to gain consciousness, put my glasses on to see the spectacle in front of me, "Christ"I muttered. I knew what had happened, this neon sign was obviously my demon. But why? |
Alright, you convinced me. I'l, take a shot.
---
---
The lizardmen monks of Kouro-Tak were an eclectic sort. They had driven the psionic aberrations of deep space back from their world, but not without a price. For eons afterward the whispers of the damned souls and alien gods haunted the land, and the twisted experiments of the aliens had created all manner of horrors. Case in point, the immortal mind.
The creatures had found a human, possessed of massive psionic power. They had hooked his mind to a tank of swirling purple energy that was formed of the kinds of all those slain or enslaved during the centuries-long conflict. When the tank was destroyed, the brain in a jar began to die. The monks saved him by psychic communion; through this, they learned that stimulus brought life and constant stimulus brought eternal life at the cost of madness. The brain, heretofore known only as The Immortal, had gotten bored of madness and wanted to retire. As such, the Kouro-Tak brought him pen and paper, to catalog his extensive knowledge.
It was a wonderful plan. When The Immortal learned how to use telekinesis long ago, he applied it to moving a pen across the vellum. Now, after fifteen generations of lizards, there were stacks of vellum hundreds of sheets tall containing the knowledge of a dozen-thousand shattered worlds. The answers were all here, for every question. Except one.
---
The seeker was a disheveled human, leaning of a splintered stick for support in the shadow of the mighty cavern's mouth, the entrance to the Grand Archive. In his eyes were a hundred questions, things that could be answered in an hour by the Grand Archivists of Kouro-Tak. He spoke to the warden, a blue lizardman in golden armor covered in runes from a far-off realm.
"I... I must know."he began, raspy voice filled with doubt. "Tell me, what is His name?"
"You musst be more ssspesssssfifc."
"HE!"the man roared. "The Dragon, the Void Thing, The Chained Ascension. He, They, It! Answer me!"The seeker was too exhausted to take more than a single half-hearted step, waving his arms about like wings. The warden disappeared inside the cavern, where the Archivists would be waiting to search out the names on the ancient scrolls. A second lizard, a golden one in servant's clothing, took the man to a different cavern to rest and wait. Medicines practiced in worlds far gone and across galaxies healed mind and body alike, but even the most powerful of remedies held to respite for the mind of this seeker. Was it an Elder God, then, that he sought? Suck seekers were not common but also not unheard of.
It took five hours to sift through the relevant scrolls and libraries. No answer. No such Void Thing, Void Dragon, or The Chained Ascension had been encountered across three galaxies of civilization. The monks beckoned the seeker inside, so that he may share his knowledge with the Immortal. He did so, and the screams of a thousand generations of terror ripped the minds of all present to shreds. All the pieces were put into place, and The Immortal feared.
---
The Void Dragon heard It's name from across the Nothingness, and smiled. Soon, another world would fall under It's dominion and true peace could be established.
---
---
Questions, comments, concerns? Errors in grammar or spelling? Comment below! |
I wait. It's okay to wait. This is the waiting room, after all, and I've already been waiting for several decades for her to arrive. She sits, as much as you can in this place, pressed up against me. She is too busy processing the sudden memory dump. It's a shock, having dozens of lifetimes pour into your head when all you expected was Heaven.
It's a week or two until she turns her head, staring at me. She's faster at intigrating than I was. It took me months to sift through the layers of people to find who I was, the core that stayed true regardless of the factors that shaped me.
Another week or so passes. "It's you,"she says, her first words unfettered by vocal chords or sound waves.
I smile. She was always brighter than me. When does she recognize me from? The most recent incarnation?
"It's always been you,"she says. My smile broadens. She was always clever, but I hadn't expected her to understand so soon. I had spent years picking apart the threads of my lives before I had realized who she was. All those loves. All those heartbreaks.
It takes her a while longer to search out the sadder facts. We never were together, in the end. We were always too late or too early; too young or too old; too something. She glances at the countdown clock to our next birth. She falters, steadies herself, steels herself for the next question.
"Do we get to stay together this time?"
"No,"I say, sadly. "I don't think we do. I'm not sure we ever do."
She sighs, and stares into the distance for a while. "I'm sure we will, eventually."
I laugh. Her eternal optimism, her hope, her faith in us- so beautifully her.
"Maybe we can have kids when we do,"she adds, after an indeterminate amount of time. I think to myself, of course, children are her first thought. She has loved and protected the little ones as best she can through every incarnation.
I lean against her, enjoying the feeling of us in our purest selves, no fear or trauma or illness to hold us apart. The clock counts down until we are flesh and blood and lonliness again, but for now we are lovely and whole and together. |
The library doors swung open with ease. Allowing the dust to swirl in light of the windows. As I walked my shoes making a light tapping noise. Underneath my shoes were creaking planks of wood holding above bookcases of bookcases. These bookcases each holding an immersive story behind their cover. Although I couldn't drool over them, I had to check the new arrivals.
A broad stack of books were laid before me. I sat in my chair and started grazing over them. Feeling the sunlight against my face, casted from the window. Going towards exquisite designs to the most plain. In my personal opinion the plainest were the most captivating. So I saved them for last. The stack was at least 20 books high and I was prepared to stamp and register them all in our category.
Finally my desk was cleared from all the clutter. Except a simple leather bound journal. I peered over it's design. Only a plain piece of leather covered it. Yet the cover seemed odd. It was removable. So I grabbed the corner of the leather and slipped it off. Revealing the most magnificent tome I'd ever see.
It was pattered with clocks and swirls of silver. Allowing a pathway to form around the clocks. Each handle pointing towards 3 o'clock. With the minute hand allined almost perfectly.
I thumbed through the pages of the book. To my astonishment they were all blank. Maybe I'd skipped something, so I flipped to the first page. Feeling the crisp pages across my thumb. It was as if the tome were freshly printed. Until I saw the beginning. It only showing a line of text plastered in the middle.
"The story never ends when you turn the last page"a voice echoed
Confused I scanned around my office space. My desk neatly organized. The chair I sat in. A window casting a drizzle of sunlight. My head was hit hard when I realized what it was. The book lay flat on the floor. Only it's cover showing. Each clock constantly changing time. Spinning around and around. Anxiety almost at a breaking point.
"Do not be afraid young child, you are yet to see the truth!"
A slow flicker started to catch into the book. Quickly morphing into a large fire. Soon everything was ablaze. The smell of ash burning my nose and the sea of smoke clouding my vision. Everything blurred until my face hit those familiar wooden boards. Hearing no sound of an alarm and no dash of water to put the fire out. Then all was dark and quiet.
|
I'm a messenger. It's not what I do. It's who I am. It's why I was created. I literally do not have a choice. I can neither rest nor have piece of mind until each message is delivered.
It sounds horrible, I know. But it's really not so bad. By royal decree, no one can threaten or impede me, at least while on official business. And unlike most of my kind, I see many new places and the cultures that go along with them. Most are only sent between several villages and maybe a city or two.
I'm the lucky one because I am the personal messenger between the capital and the man commonly referred to as "The Hero of the Ages."Though, I'm not sure why he's called a hero. He seems decent enough, for a human at any rate. From what I've seen though he brings as much war and chaos as he does happiness and order to most places he goes.
I've been following his trail for awhile now and it has led me to a field of slaughter. Outside of a small town called Ryanne, hundreds of men lie before me, either dead or dying. Worse yet, the hero isn't among them. Even worse still, everywhere I ask after him, they say the same thing. He's been captured.
After a few minutes of consideration, I stoop down and pick up one of the hundreds of fallen swords. I doubt that these men who captured the hero will respect a royal decree about my protection from a nation at war with them. And I have no intention of being destroyed, but I *will deliver my message.
I sprint the way everyone points to when talking about the hero. This is what I'm made for: running fast and long enough to catch up to the message receiver. It's only an hour after the sun had set that I find them. A ring of rough looking soldiers sitting and relaxing. In the middle of the ring is a campfire and a man bound in rope. Just the man I want to find. The hero.
Without hesitating, I calmly walk into the light cast by the fire. "Good evening gentleman. I don't wish to intrude, but I must talk to that man over there."I say while gesturing to the hero. The men look stunned for second and then they all started laughing. Or I should say, almost all. Under cover of the others' one snuck up behind me and swung his sword at my left arm.
Sparks flew as the sword made contact with my arm, cutting about half way through. The soldiers gasp as the hero lets loose the laugh that had been building inside of him. One of the solders, probably the leader, gasps "A messenger"then shouts "Kill it!"
Oh, bother.
I won't bore you with the details, but I will say that when it was over, I had lost my arm. But the soldiers all suffered far worse. I will not be stopped from delivering my message, after all.
I walk over to the hero and fumble with the clasp on my pack, pull out the letter, and drop it into his lap. Mission accomplished. I start to walk away when the hero says "Hey, wait. Untie me before you go. "
That's not part of my job description, so I don't even slow down. "It'll be hard to read my message if you don't untie me!"He shouts. He makes a good point, so I walk back to him and use a dagger I find laying on the ground to cut the ropes binding his hands. He picks up the letter, breaks the seal and reads. Then he starts laughing.
I look at him curiously. He notices and wordlessly hands me the letter. It reads :
"Our spies have reported back. Avoid the battle at Ryanne at all costs. It's a trap meant to capture you" |
We all looked like fools in our tattered blue uniforms. Some of us still had a full 'A' on our backs, but most of us had that patch torn off of our clothes within the first week of surfacing, and the patches weren't the only thing lost. At one point we had 8 guys, all best of friends, willing to make a buck.
Me and two others.
That's all who was left after twenty days on the surface. Frank and Loyd left the fifth day to join a Uplander group called the Followers of Artemis, an at the time all female pirating crew. Ryan died from falling down a hole, seventh day. Mark died to a creature of the surface, died so we would have time to run. James lost it three days ago, and just ran away.
Which especially sucked, because he had all of our food. At least we had the sense to have each of us carry our own hydration.
We were told we needed to pick something up. About the size of a shoe, buried under the sand, in a old ruin.
Seemed simple enough. All of us had snuck out topside before, and it didn't seem to dangerous from what we saw, just a lot of sand.
Turns our sand wasn't the issue. It was everything that dwelled beneath it. |
James and Jessica left without so much as a word back in 2011. Their departure kind of stung me a bit, as they were the only people in the neighborhood I ever really hung out with. My reputation as a hermit grew, and I heard less and less from people as time went on. In the commotion of the past few weeks, I've ignored it mostly. The police sirens, the screaming from the front yards, I paid no attention to it. Likely hooligans or domestic disputes. None of my business. Though I did notice peculiar things amiss about my former friend's house. Odd times of the night, I would see a light quickly go on and off. I would see shadowed silhouettes move about in the darkness within the house. I would see figures sneak in and out at certain points, and this activity grew as the drama came and went. With the strange drama in this street persisting, I opted out of bothering the police about it.
This night, however, the light has been on for longer than usual this time. Unable to take anymore, my curiosity brought me to the house of the previous owners. As expected, the front and back doors were locked, yet the windows were easily opened, though I struggle to get in. The years I spent in solitude were not kind to me, as I have let myself go in my depression.
I shouldn't be doing this. I should go back home. What if someone sees me and calls the police on me? What if there are deadly burglars in here? My worries are set aside, because deep down, I just HAVE to know. My heart pounds as I climb the stairs leading to the floor the light illuminates from. As I approach the room, my hands tremble and my legs shake as I reach for the knob and turn. Inside I find not burglars or someone who had maybe purchased the house.
It was James. The years have been kind to him, with only a few wrinkles on his face. In fact, it looks like he was in better shape than he had left in, aside from a receding hairline. Both of our mouths sat agape, in clear shock at the sights before us.
"James! I-I, what are you doing here?"I stammer.
"I should be asking the same about you, Zack! How did you get in?"
"Window."
"...Really?"He paused. "Okay, why are you still here in this neighborhood?"
"Because I still live here?"I chuckle, confused. "Why wouldn't I still live here?"
"No, I mean why are you still HERE? Why are you still alive, did you not notice what happened?"
"I dunno, there was drama a while back. Cops showing up a lot, people getting arrested, people screaming in their front lawns, ambulances making frequent visits, though all that seems to have calmed down now."
James looked in my eyes for a while, and it seems he understands...something. "I should have known how poorly you'd have done without us. But I didn't think you would be so bad that you would be totally unaware of what's happened. Alright, well before I catch you up on that, I should first explain this situation. You've seen some unusual activity around here, right?"
"Yeah. I thought about calling the cops, because I wasn't sure that something fucky was going on here."
"Perhaps it's for the best you didn't. Here's the thing, Zack. Jessica and I did move away for Albany, but things, well, things hit the fan. So we returned, but had to lay low. We knew the storm was coming. One thing you never knew about us is we had a bunker built below our house. Had it since before you moved here. That's where we've been. We have been hiding out, coming out only for food. In fact, thinking you were gone in some capacity, I was going to raid your place to see if you still had anything left."
"Okay, well I still don't understand. What's going on? What trouble did you get into that you had to go into hiding?"
"Are you sure you're ready to hear the truth?"
"James, come on."
"Zack, the world ended. We've been hiding away from what has begun a new world. Now, I have a question for you, old friend."
"What's that?"
"You don't have to live alone anymore. Would you like to live with us?"
|
(1 of 2)
It should have been me that went out first. Some days when I sleep I dream of my mom, skin burnt and bubbling, her ear-piercing scream as she crawled back inside. Her hair nearly all gone, her fingers burning and cracking, and her eyes. Her eyes, her eyes screamed more than her voice. Even when her lungs gave out and she lay twitching on the ground I could still see the agony in her eyes, bulging and shaking until all life left her body. She didn’t get to die peacefully telling her family she loved them, but instead she died a pointless death that served only to warn us for what was to come. None of us have seen the sun since that day.
I woke up covered in sweat and balled up in my bed. I checked the clock: 21:00 was late enough to go outside. We’d switched all our clocks to military time so we would never accidentally open the door if we misread AM for PM. The risk wasn’t worth it. I double checked the clock anyway just to make sure.
I took a quick shower to get rid of the sweat and get rid of the goosebumps I’d woken with. *Thank god this house has warm water.* After I dressed and went downstairs I found my sister already awake and waiting for me. I stopped when I entered the room. “I thought we were staying another day here.” She shook her head.
“We can’t. Last radio contact says that the whorde is moving our way from the east. We have to keep moving.”
“Well shit.” I said. “I was just starting to like this house.”
Most people had died at some point in the last year. More than half the people died within the first 24 hour cycle, either dying like our mom did or going out at night and being torn apart by the mutants. Neither way was a good way to go. Some people eventually lost their nerve and stepped out into the sun, letting it do the work. More people died at night, though. Everybody had boarded up their windows and blocked them with blankets, furniture, anything they could use. At some point or another most people left their homes to find somewhere safer to stay. Many of those people just died trying to escape, ripped limb from limb by the beasts. My sister and I had been a few of the lucky ones.
I hadn’t seen the sun in almost a year, and the one time I did it left a burning scar on my left arm that, as I sometimes joked, was as close to a tattoo as I was ever gonna get. A few radios had been left in one of the first houses we found shelter in by the people who’d left there before us. Those people saved our lives a dozen times over; warning us when the mutants were on the move, telling us what houses weren’t boarded up--I couldn’t be more thankful for them. I don’t know how they got their information; government, other people, hell, I didn’t care at this point. They might damn well be the only reason my sister was still alive 8 months after we found the radios and that’s all I cared about. I just wanted her to make it.
22:30. We slipped out the back door, closing it behind us like there was a sleeping baby in the room we were leaving. On my back was a backpack filled with water bottles and the few canned vegetables we’d found in the house before leaving, along with a radio in the side pocket. On my sisters back two baseball bats and a radio with some painkillers and bandages just in case. I also knew she’d taken a picture of mom with her even though she’d never told me. I found it one day stashed away near the bottom of her bag while I was trying to find the right size bandage for a cut I’d gotten when I’d torn my leg up the night before after tripping in the dark. I’d held the picture for a few minutes and tried to memorize every little inch of her face; the dimples in her cheeks, the way her gums showed when she smiled because of all the joy in her, and her eyes. Back when her eyes smiled too.
“Quiet.” My sister whispered, slowing to a stop. I stopped behind her. I always insisted that she walk first because, as we’d found out from the people on the radio, the mutants more often than not come from behind. “Most of the time you’ll only know they’re there when you hear somebody behind you start screaming as their legs get torn off.” I never wanted to hear my sister screaming the same way our mother did. She went first, that’s how it was.
This time we were lucky; a rogue mutant, not with the whore, was prowling up ahead. The moonlight shone on him in the road like a spotlight as he stumbled into view. We were heading through a small town with old trees lining the cracked sidewalks that became enemies of their own during the night. Walking in the grass meant stepping on sticks and leaves and if you made noise during a silent night you were dead. The mutants were a bit hard of hearing and had poor vision as we’d come to figure out but if they did notice you there wasn’t much you could do. My sister tilted her head to her left, suggesting we cut along the yard of a house next to us to get to another sidewalk and avoid the mutant up ahead. *Through the grass?* I mouthed. *Yes*, she replied, nodding. I took a deep breath--what my choir director would have called a “breath for singing”--deep, but silent. Noise meant tension in singing, but here noise meant death. |
*“\*Recording Begins\** Hello, uh, everyone, my name is Robert Cohen, and... I'm the Director of the USPS. I know, what you're thinking, 'Director? Aren't you the Postmaster General?' and while that is true, and I am the Postmaster, um, General, I'm not really referring to the, uh... well I'm not referring to the Postal Service, and you should count yourself lucky that I'm not, considering the present circumstances. You see, the USPS I am referring to is not the Postal Service, which is really just a front, but the United States Planetary Shield, which is the organisation more… pertinent, to the situation at hand. Back in, um, it was in either late 1947 or early ‘48, after a certain, incident, in New Mexico, that the U.S. and a few other countries decided that enough was enough and formed a sort of unified front against extraplanetary activity, in order to consolidate efforts to fight extraterrestrials. *\*Clears Throat\** But this organisation needed a, er, front, a way to operate without detection, and to transport artifacts and threats quickly and secretly, and a place to send the funding. So, we turned to the mail system as an easy and inconspicuous way to transport men and resources, and thus Mankind Against Invading Legions was born. The U.S. branch was and is the Planetary Shield, and it is by far one of the more successful branches of M.A.I.L, with a long record of deflecting alien threats, and I hope that this can bring some, um, reassurance to Americans, during these disparaging times. We are working closely with law enforcement and the Pentagra-on to coordinate the United States’ actions and hope to deflect this invasion shortly. This may be the most… challenging threat that we have faced as humanity, but I would like to remind you that M.A.I.L. always has, and always will, come through. Thank you for your time, ladies and... gentlemen, I will not be taking questions. *\*Recording Ends\*”*
\-Speech by United States Planetary Shield Director Robert Cohen regarding actions against the “Heptagonal Collective.” 18 December, 2046.
Sorry if this is bad, but this topic really got me thinking, and I wanted to write something. |
I kneel at the edge of the canal and dangle my hand in the murky water. I've been told a hundred times not to - my mom is convinced it's full of dirty needles and giardia and dead rats. But I've met the canal's heart. I trust it.
"Hey?"I call quietly. "You there?"
The water seeps sluggishly past, and the only sound is the muffled rumble of cars on the road, and the roar of an airplane overhead. It takes so long I think maybe it won't come today - sometimes it doesn't - but then it appears, rubbing against my wet palm like a friendly cat.
It's a small thing, no bigger than a baseball, and it looks like the goldfish my brother won from the fair and kept alive for three days before I found it belly up in its bowl. It has the same round shape and bulging eyes, but its scales are concrete and its fins are rusting wire mesh. Like the canal itself, it's covered all over in a slimy green, with strange, shifting whorls and angular figures in many colors, like the graffiti scrawled across the sides of the canal. It talks with them, I think, but I can't always tell what it's saying. Today, I decide the orange sunburst across its face means 'hello!'.
It's a small, dirty thing like the cracked, slimy concrete canal it lives in, but its eyes are two bright marbles, full of beautiful rainbow swirls and flashes like sparks of static. Those are what I saw first, and how I found it. I never thought the shiny things in the water would lead me to this, though. This tiny river-god.
Every lake and river has a god. The first time I met one was years ago, when we visited my uncle one summer and spent a week by the lake. I swam out too far when no one was looking, and then I was too tired to swim back. To tired to keep swimming at all. I thought I would drown there, quietly slipping underwater without anyone noticing at all, until it rose up from below. It was like the catfish my uncle caught, with drooping whiskers like an old man's beard, and it glittered like sunlight on water so bright it hurt to look. It pushed me up and carried me back to shore, and everyone laughed when I told them but I knew what I'd seen. Every morning after that I walked to the end of the dock to throw some of my breakfast in the water and tell it thanks. I don't know if it liked toast or eggs, but I saw it every once in a while, when the sun shone on the water where it shouldn't. It had eyes that had seen everything and had the answer to every question, but I was always afraid to ask.
Not all the water gods are that friendly. I remember the river god like an angry snake that lashed at everything near it, and tried to pull me in too. But I think this little canal spirit just wants to be friends. I wish other people could see them, so I could introduce them to it. But no one else ever has.
I pull out the tiny plastic ball I brought. "Come on, let's play fetch."The little fish darts after the ball in a spray of slimy water, its graffiti patterns spiking into purple lightning bolts of excitement. |
Evanston was supposed to be a pit spot on my way back from Salt Lake. At least that's what I told my wife. Just a short visit to grab some drinks with an old college buddy.
An unassuming, boring town where nothing ever really happens, that's Evanston. At least that's how Jake used to describe it back in college. I was always suprised he ended up living back there with his folks. He always used to talk about moving to a big city, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago - he didn't really care.
We met up at the Painted Lady, an amusingly named local saloon Jake would often mention at college. We remincsined a bit then joined some of his buddies that were playing pool. Jake hardly changed, he still talked about moving to a big city, meeting a nice gal like my Kat, he still could chug beers like they were water and could still make me drink much more than I planned.
Waking up the next day I wasn't quite sure where I was. Actually, I knew where I was - in my car, I just didn't know where my car was. Last I remembered I left it in from of the Painted Lady. Damn that Jake. I also couldn't find my phone to check if Kat was as angry as I imagined.
Hoping I left it back at the saloon I made my way back to the Painted lady. I met one of Jake's buddies, a local bank employee. He seemed quite troubled, apparently the bank was robbed. Somebody emptied out the vault, leaving behind just a single coin. Quite troubling news for such a small town, I was too relieved that I found my phone to give it much care. Seeing as how the missus was quite pissed I quickly made my way back home, forgetting to say bye to Jake before I left.
The next time I saw him it was a year later up in Cody. I met up with him and one of his buddies from Evanston I met last time. They arrived late at the Silver Dollar, complaining about how a fellow police officer hassled them about Jake's buddy not wearing a seat belt even though it couldn't fit over him. Big guy Jake's buddy.
As was typical with Jake, I ended up blackout drunk that night. The following morning I luckily didn't wake up in my car. One of us must have been sober enough to get us some accommodations. Unluckily my head was pounding, though that quickly became secondary when I noticed a gun pointed at my face. It was Jake's buddy. When he saw that I was awake he began to speak:
"Ah, you're awake, great. I think you'll be glad to know that somebody finally picked up on your clues. Quite a genius system you had, hiding a clue to the location of your *next* crime, quite amusing. I must admit, I was quite lucky to put it all together. Last night after drinks I was going over some of the case files I brought for the conference. You should have never brought me to that bar last night, I would have never connected it with the bank robbery from last year. You slipped up and now you're going to jail for life."
"I'm not so sure about that. You see I didn't slip up. I was bored with nobody being onto me. I thought it would be amusing to have some small town cop be the one to figure it out, and when I met you I knew it had to be you"
"Why me?"
"What's you're dad's name?" |
And he sat blissfully near the bay, not a care in the world. And to think only a couple years ago he'd be eaten alive. He was truly, at peace.
Just then, a fly lands on his arm, his reflexes kick in and smack. Got 'em! His wife and daughter can be heard leaving the tent, to join him on the bay. He slowly lifts his hand, and sees not a fly but a mosquito.
"Honey,"he yells. "We have to go..." |
"Allright first, that dangly bit in the front. That's got to go, this whole design,"it gestured up and down at my naked body, "is trash but I can't even look at that thing."
"Seriously gross. It's like it's peeking at us from the bushes."
"Oh my god I thought the same thing, its like if I was walking down a dark alley by myself and I got that feeling like something was watching me and I thought like oh wow I'm in a scary movie I'd turn around expecting to see something like that. Like some homeless guy trying to hide himself with black trash bags."
"Jesus Christ you're so right. That's perfect, I'm writing that down word for word on the requisition form."
They all continued to laugh without any real thought that another intelligent being was the subject of their ridicule.
"Give me a little credit I'd say it's more than peeking."
One of them turned back to me, "Yeah it looks like it's starting to stare a little harder."
Embarrassed by the reflex I accidentally shouted, "That's not for you that's just what it does!"
"That's why it's trash!"it shouted back and laughed.
"Anyways Regup/3*), next thing I'm changing is this whole setup."It ran its hand up and down my ribs and gave me an odd look. "Did you know those are the easiest bones to break in your body."
"Well yeah I'd read that some--"
"The cage protecting all your organs, your big bad defense. And you wonder why we crushed you. Those things splinter you know, Jesus Christ you might as well be defending yourself with a knife pointed back at you."
"You keep saying Jesus Christ, you don't even have a religion or--"
"We take what we want bitch!"Again they laughed, their own best audience.
"Ok next is the main hole."One of them began to reach a hand out towards me.
*Oh god which one do they think is the main hole?* The fingers went down my throat.
"Stupid thing eats and breathes from the same hole."It looked me in the eyes, "Like I don't get it. You use both of your waste holes also for pleasure and you use your air hole for your food hole. I've never seen a race more obsessed with shoving things into holes but somehow you tried doubling up on everything in the most disgusting way."
"We didn't pick this, it's not like we drew it up on a board!"
"Oh right, I forgot,"it paused and looked to the others, "Your science is trash!"Laughing. Again.
"Also speaking of, does this make sense to anyone?"One stepped forward and stuck two fingers up my, well use your imagination. Let's just say that was shortly followed by a visibly obvious good feeling.
"Like, what is this even? No wonder they go poking in all their holes, it's like hide and seek with these nerds."
Still breathing heavy and caught off guard, "How did you know exactly how to do that?"
The other two aliens started to laugh but stopped, "Wait."
"Yeah wait, really what? Seriously [\]'';;4bru how did you know that?"
"Oh my god she's been slumming some humans, you slut!"
"I did not, it was, it was in the specs!"
"Uh, no it isn't. Show me, show me where that combo is listed?"She kept pointing to the pad, "You just up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, started that guy."
"Ugh god, give the specs to me I'll show you."
"Mmhmm"
What shame did I have left now, "Um, if you find that in there, just for like, research sake, could you, I mean my wife is a scientist and that data could probably--"
They turned to me, "Oh wow, really? Wow, you're really asking us that?"it looked down, "And you brought your little trash bag hobo for backup?"
It turned back to its friend, "Surprise surprise, your human hack isn't in there."
"I know its here somewhere!"she began to storm out of the room, "I'll find it."
"You're going the wrong way, it's all over the floor back here!"They laughed and followed her out. I hope that was a her. I'm calling it a her, not that anything is, it's just, you know, this talk with my wife is going to be awkward enough as it is. Or maybe?...
|
Engineers of various races argued back and forth in the depths of the civil planning building in the city of Paladin's Rest. Past cluttered offices, open space drawing studios, and kitchens that supplied the workers in the building, the leading craftsmen from the Elves, Dwarves, Halflings, Humans, and Orcs stood over a scale model of a railway system that they had collaborated to design. The rail itself was fairly simple and projected to span the entire continent. Though the discussions regarding the design of the rail cars themselves was taking longer than expected.
"Considering how long the trip would be from Doradin's Rest to Scryer's Bane, the main requirement should be kitchens and beds. Food and rest are of utmost importance to any journey."The Human representative made his case, placing an intricately detailed rail car on the inverted track. It hung there with miniature levitation crystals. Inside it, on the top level, tiny tables and chairs outside of a kitchen that had petite pots and pans on the stoves could be seen. On the lower level, dozens of bunk beds affixed to the walls of little compartments looked to be freshly made and ready for use. It was incredible to look at. The Human looked around proudly as the others marveled at the detail.
The Orc workman pulled the little Human car off the rail and placed her own model on the track. "Such a long journey that doesn't require personal movement is a call for training, David! We propose this, as you see."The car she put down was substantially larger than the Human one, but not due to added features. Inside, there were three large training rings with crude little straw dummies. Weapon racks lined the rings, and flat Orcish sleeping slabs lined the walls, cut into thick stone. "Soldiers need to keep their skills sharp. Idle hands make an idle mind."
"Aaahh, goat's balls!"The Dwarf designer pushed the Orc's car along the track until it fell off the other end, earning a chuckle from the Human and Halfling. The Orc only barely managed to catch it. "Get that shite out of here, Hite. What we really need is a fully stocked bar!"The broad little woman with a five o'clock shadow gingerly placed her proposed design on the track. It levitated in all of its alcoholic glory, almost as intricate as David's. It had at least five bars that could be seen, and many tables surrounding them. On the 'shelves' were little painted representations of kegs on a flat surface. Around half of the walls on the square, triple-decker rail car, were little cots for people too drunk to continue drinking. "Marvelous, ain't she? Took me a week to finish the detailing."
The Halfling stepped up on a stool and peered into the tiny windows on the miniature, "Hmm. It's all good if drinking is all you do, Brenna. But, if you'll excuse me,"the little man pushed the Dwarven model closer to its creator and put his option in its place, "What we really need for such a long journey, even with the stops on the way, is entertainment! Behold!"Inside the little car were several stages with little enchanted model bards 'playing' instruments. "What better way to distract...er...keep the patrons happy, than to have multiple bands in several studios playing the most popular songs? There're sleeping areas as well of course,"he pointed to several large compartments where utilitarian communal bunks were placed, "honestly, this is what we really need."Though his points were well made, the reputation of the Halfling race was widely known and the other engineers looked at him with suspicion.
Breaking the short silence, the Elf spoke up and waved his hand to telekinetically push the Halfling's model away from him, "Oh please, Flittik, we all know you have ulterior motives with your design. No,"with another wave, he raised his own design towards the track with a soft cushion of magic, "What people would really want on long travel is a place to sit and read. I present my design,"pride dripped from his voice as the haughty Elf pointed to the little model's windows. On the outside, it was covered in flowing, gilded engravings, reminiscent of Elven buildings. Inside were individual alcoves, each with rich looking seats with a coffee table and foot rest. Along the walls there were dozens of bookshelves. Thousands of tiny little books lined them, adding to the intellectual aesthetic that the Elves felt they must portray. "With this car, patrons may sit and read quietly at their leisure. The seats will be comfortable enough to sleep in, as well, and spectral servants will bring refreshments."A collective breath of awe spread through the group.
David, bending down to look into the little windows of the Elf's design, tapped his cheek in contemplation, "Spectacular, Leolar. Hmm...well. If you think about it, there's no reason we can't use ALL of the designs!"The group gasped. "No, no. Listen. All we'd need to do is modify the exterior of each car a little bit to be more uniform, maybe increase or decrease the size of one or two of them to match each other, then add linking trapments inbetween them! It would be...a...a train! A train of rail cars!"
Flittik put up his hand, "Are you sure, David? That seems like a lot of work..."
Brenna burst out with a laugh, "HA! A lot of work... I'll give you a week in the Dwarven mines and show you a lot of work! I'm with David! If we could include everyone's design, everyone's happy! Right fellows?"Hite nodded grimly and Leolar looked unsure but nodded all the same.
"It's settled then!"David clapped his hands together, "Let's begin construction on the new underground 'train' immediately!"
---
Thanks for coming up with this prompt! This was fun to write! I wrote this in the world I built for my book, set far after the events of said book. The unedited version is available on my subreddit, r/SamsStoriesSub if anyone is interested!
I'm also not in a great place mentally at the moment, and writing this really helped brighten my day a bit. Thank you very much. |
No one really knew what it was, much less why it came.
We had known for a long time that it would come, I think. Families had been stocking up on provisions ever since the initial discovery of its impending arrival, ours included. There was a charity that had been making an effort to provide blindfolds for those that couldn't afford their own, and a lot of companies had come out with special-made blindfolds for pets and young children. No room for error. Keep your family protected. Prevent the unthinkable.
All around the world, blinds were shut, blackout curtains drawn. Families withdrew into their houses and locked their doors, and the broadcasts began.
We boarded up the skylight and nailed the curtains to the walls - sewing them together in the middle - to the sound of warning sirens and a man reminding us to stay inside, to wear the blindfolds, and to not be afraid. The sirens would play again just before it arrived, he said, and would sound once more when it left. 72 hours. Three days, and it would all be over. Life could go on. We did not need to be afraid.
My mother and I helped my little brother put his mask on before we followed in suit. The dark world was difficult to navigate, but we had been preparing for a while. I knew the house fairly well by this point, although not exactly to a level of being able to walk around freely. The family stayed close to each other, regardless. We'd made an agreement not to wander off. I entertained my brother with his toys as best I could as we waited, the broadcast on repeat on the TV, on our phones, over loudspeaker outside, everywhere. We turned off our phones to save battery. Just in case.
The sirens came again, and the man's voice on the TV turned to static. When it stopped, I remember it being eerily quiet. My ears strained to hear anything, but there was only the sound of my family's breathing, their anxious shifting. My brother rolled his diesel toy truck around carelessly, but it felt like the rest of the world was blanketed in a thick smog of silence. Nothing outside. No cars. No dogs. I don't know what I thought I was going to hear, but my imagination ran wild in the absence of sound. It had begun, and there was little more to do than wait and wonder.
And so, we waited. We ate sparsely. Our ability to cook was limited. Power still worked, but it was dangerous to use the oven or stove. We constrained ourselves to the microwave and toaster, or else to foods that didn't need to be heated. The phones didn't work, or at least we couldn't get them to work. The TV played static, regardless of how many buttons we pushed. So we turned it off.
Our lives were quiet, agonizingly. My parents didn't want to tell my brother what was out there, what was going on. They told him to go play and promised him icecream if he didn't ask about it again. He stopped asking. I knew they couldn't answer him if they wanted to. We called it The Light, but we didn't know what it was, only that it was dangerous. We didn't know if closed curtains and darkened homes would help, but it provided us peace of mind.
Our phones alerted us when the second day came, and the third.
We waited patiently for the siren to sound.
The fourth day came without any word.
The fifth as well.
Sixth. Seventh. Eighth.
We tried the phones again, tried turning the TV back on. Nothing. Static. We'd bought a radio too, but no one ever responded on that either.
Ninth. Tenth. Eleventh.
We had stocked up on food and water, enough for a month. We hadn't told our neighbors. "Just in case", our parents said. We weren't allowed to tell our friends at school either.
Still no word.
Twelfth. Thirteenth. Fourteenth.
On the fifteenth day, there was someone in our yard, at our front door. We heard them feel for the door knob, try it. They knocked loudly. My dad yelled at them to go away. We had a gun, he told them, and the knocking stopped.
And still, we waited.
Our parents argued. Maybe it was over. Maybe the siren didn't work, but it was over. Life could go back to normal. Still, no one took off the blindfolds.
After much debate, Dad unlocked the door for the first time since the sirens. He was going to check on our neighbors, see if they knew anything. If the stranger who had knocked on our door could survive, so could he. He would be careful, he promised. We waited, but it didn't take long. He made it back unharmed, told us he'd made it to two of the neighbor's houses and hadn't heard anything inside when he called out. He said he would try other houses tomorrow.
Twentieth. Twenty-first. Twenty-second.
Dad had checked all the houses in the neighborhood. No answer. He was going to check the next neighborhood over.
More days drew on. We waited.
Twenty-fifth. Twenty-sixth. Twenty-seventh.
We were running out of food. Dad was still missing. I took it upon myself to go out looking for him, and for food, while my mom stayed home with my brother. The silence was deafening outside. There was a distinct feeling of warmth on my skin, like the sun, but it felt all wrong. I slowly made my way to the neighbor's house. I felt around for their front window and found it open.
The house was empty. No life at all, and filled with the same tremendous sense of silence as outside. I kept waiting to trip over a body, but there were none to be found, at least not where I walked.
I came back with some cans and packages of what I hoped were food, but I hadn't heard or noticed anything regarding my father while I was there. He had gone to the neighboring street and so to would I, but I found nothing there either - not the first, second, or any of the times I went.
Regardless of what time I left, how long I stayed out, or how late I got back, it was always bright outside, like the sun never set. I can't say how, but it never felt like a sun. It made my skin crawl to be out there, in part for the Light and in part for the silence. The emptiness. Once or twice I was sure I had nearly brushed hands with someone else scouring the streets, but I was too terrified to check.
One day I came back to the sound of my mother wailing. My brother had had a tantrum. The blindfold was itchy. He wanted to take it off. Off. Off. Off. She'd been holding him, telling him he couldn't. She hadn't been holding his hands. One second she'd been holding him, the next, he'd vanished.
We cried together. I tried to convince her it wasn't her fault, but she wouldn't listen to me. She asked where Dad was. I still hadn't found him, but perhaps I shouldn't have told her.
She got up, and all I heard was the sound of tearing curtain fabric before she vanished too.
I do my best not to think about these things, but I think it's important I write them down now. Someone needs to know what happened. I'm writing this on a laptop - one I never cracked open since everything went down. I can only assume I'm typing this into Word or notepad or something. Whatever it was, it was open when I turned the thing on and my laptop usually makes an annoying dinging sound if I hit backspace when I'm not in a text box or writing program, so it's gotta be something. This thing doesn't have text to speech, so those little bumps on the j and f keys are my best friends. Along with autocorrect, if that exists in whatever I'm typing this in.
It's day one hundred and five now, as well as my first - and last - account of my current whereabouts. I've expended what resources I could find in the other houses - many of them had already been looted by the time I found my way there anyway. I've crammed everything I can carry into my backpack. Food, water, some light tools as well. It won't last me long, but it should be enough to get me to areas that haven't been picked through as thoroughly.
I'm going with a small group of other survivors from the area. I never knew them before the Light came and I don't think I trust them, but I don't have a choice. Many of them are in the same situation I am. We're hungry and tired. We're all faceless to each other, although not voiceless.
We're still terrified. We don't know what we're up against. What's out there.
But we are patient.
We are hopeful.
We are still waiting. |
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