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2022-12-31 12:20:41
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[WP] Super powers are common, but super heroes are rare. It turns out most people don't actually want to face death or dismemberment on a daily basis, including you. You enjoy the 9-5 and having a 401k, but my god that government recruiter won't take no for an answer.
|
The agent had an air of confidence around him that John recognized. The kind of confidence that someone had when they thought they stood at a good bargaining position. But John would not waver.
"You would be a legend, you know that?" the agent said.
"I'm not interested in the glory. That's why I didn't do this as a teenager." John replied, still humoring the man across from him at the diner. He had just wanted a bite to eat before work, and didn't feel like making something before he left. But then this government agent had sat down with him, as if they were old friends who ran into each other by chance.
"Then what about the money? You will be compensated well. Much better than your current position."
"It's not about the money. It's about the security. It's knowing that I have the same thing waiting for me at work every day, and knowing that every day I will get home at the same time as my wife." John was annoyed. But this wasn't the first time he had been ambushed by a recruiter, and he was not surprised by any of this.
"We can be flexible with the schedule." The agent persisted.
"It's not about the schedule. My current job doesn't endanger my family. There is a zero percent chance that my family gets hurt in my line of work, and an almost zero percent chance that I will get hurt." John said calmly, as if he had rehearsed this speech.
"You're basically invulnerable, there is little chance that you will be hurt in this line of work, too."
"I know that, but were you even listening? I said my family has no chance of being hurt in my line of work now."
The agent still spoke with that consistent confidence. "We can protect your family."
"No, you can't. Someone always comes for them."
"You can have a secret identity. No one will know who your family is."
"Secret identities leak."
"John, it's not like the old days. Security is much better now than it used to be."
John shook his head. Was this guy an idiot? Did he really just call a time a decade ago 'the old days?' He stopped to take a drink of water, and let the agent stew for a moment.
"Villains are always finding new ways to hurt people. I don't believe they will be safe forever."
"That's why we need you. It's your responsibility to protect the weak."
John sighed. His patience was wearing thin. "No, it is *your* responsibility. You're the government. It's your purpose to protect people."
The agent did not have a slick comeback for this one, instead he shifted gears. Good cop was seemingly gone, and they didn't even bother bringing in a new guy to play Bad Cop.
"John, you seem to like your wife. Is she the only thing keeping you from this line of work?"
John shifted gears immediately. The agent had made a mistake, and he was not going to let the moment pass.
"Do you remember Black Dagger?"
The agent's eyes sparked with realization. Black Dagger had been a professional villain organization, responsible for some very high-profile scores over the years, and they were notorious for their aggressive hiring techniques.
One day, police responded to a homicide call at an abandoned warehouse. Inside was the entire upper echelon of Black Dagger, and they were all dead. Bodyguards, the big bosses, even some supervillains. All killed, except for their Kidnapping Logistics Manager, who was tortured to the point of being mangled, and he probably still wishes he died like all the others. And the government never found out who was responsible for taking the organization down.
John saw the gears turning in the agent's head. He pushed the matter, lowering his voice so that no one else could hear him but the agent. Now it was his turn to be confident.
"I give everyone one chance to walk away. You just threatened my wife. If you even hint about it again, I will slay you and your entire cohort of worker bees. Do you understand?"
The agent spoke again, but this time the confident tone was gone. Replaced was a monotone voice, with a subtle hint of fear breaking through to the surface. "Yes. But you must understand that it is my job to get you to work for us."
"And it is my right to say no."
"I know."
"Then give me your business card, and you can tell your boss that you tried."
|
“Yowza! Look at those muscles! Wam, bam, *wapow!*"
Tim turned around. The man behind him was at least twice Tim's age and balding. “Can I help you?” Tim asked.
“I'm just taken aback is all. I thought I was in line for a coffee,” the man raised an eyebrow and struck a pose, flexing biceps that were imperceptible in an oversized military uniform. “Not a gun show."
"Sir, I just woke up."
"You might've woken a little something inside me too, if you know what I mean." The man adjusted his glasses. "Awooga!"
"Right. I'm just here for the coffee."
"Say, you wouldn’t happen to be a Super, would you?”
"Ah," Tim flashed a knowing smile. "I see where this is going. Sorry, not interested.”
The man frowned. "I think there may be a misunderstanding here. Do you... do you think this is some some sort of slimy recruitment pitch?”
“Is it not?”
“Do I look like a Recruiter to you?”
"Your shoulder patch says ‘Department of Recruitment.’”
“Ohoho, brawny *and* smart?" The man grinned. "Look at me, I’m salivating! You hit the nail in the nuts, kid. I'm a recruiter but there's nothing slimy about my pitch.”
"Not interested." Tim began turning away but the man stopped him with a hand on the shoulder.
“Tell me, what do you do for work, Tim?”
“None of your business,” Tim tried to disengage, but found it surprisingly difficult. The physical contact felt awkward, but pulling away more so.
“Secretive too? You’re ticking *all* the right boxes! Just answer me this-"
Tim grabbed the mans wrist, careful not to crush it. “Look, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t touch me. I’m just trying to get a coffee–”
The man took a step back and raised his palms. “Of course! Don’t let me stop you.”
As Tim turned back around, the man's hand was on his shoulder again.
“But let me stop you a little bit. Just answer me this: don't you feel like you owe something to society? Haven't you always wanted to *be* somebody?”
Tim smiled. "I *am* somebody. I'm a father. I'm a husband. I'm a damn good dentist. As for society, I don't owe anything more than the balance on my mortgage. You think that just because I was born with super strength and spit that tastes like bubblegum I have some duty to risk my neck at the slightest hint of trouble?"
"Yes."
"Trust me, I've thought about being a hero. For a while that's all I wanted to be. Then I did some free lance vigalantizing and ended up in the hospital my first gig. Reality check: super strength doesn't mean invincible. As for bubblegum spit, that's only 'super' in the bedroom."
The man raised his eyebrows and let the silence linger. Tim shook his head. He was surprised this recruiter had managed to get so far under his skin. "Look, maybe if I were stronger. Maybe if I didn't have so much to lose. But as things stand..."
"I get it," the man sighed, draping his arm around Tim's shoulder. “You want to kick ass and chew bubblegum, but you’re never out of bubblegum are you?"
Tim almost pulled away again, but he felt tears welling up. “Fucking everything tastes like bubblegum.”
“You know, you're right. It’s a shit job being a hero. If I'm being honest with you, I wouldn’t do it myself. I'm just a recruiter.”
“I appreciate the honesty.”
"Of course." The man put a hand on Tim's cheek. "But you know what? Somebody has to do it.”
“Somebody?” The word had a nice ring to it.
"Yep. A *real* somebody." The man's hand moved onto Tim’s forehead, “you know who that somebody is?”
Tim felt a sudden sense of purpose. "It's me, isn't it?"
“Atta’boy!”
"I’ve always wanted to be a hero..." Tim muttered, staring off into space.
The man patted Tim on the back and stepped around him in line. "One black coffee, please."
***
More of my favorite pieces at r/Banana_Scribe.
| 2022-07-31T12:29:02
| 2022-07-31T11:50:27
| 1,657
| 142
|
[WP] Knights covered head to toe in metallic armour, fortresses made to resist sieges, scarce population centers... Who would've guessed that the middle ages would be so prepared to survive a zombie outbreak.
|
Sir Harlan watched motionlessly from his position atop the ridge. He had seen the smoke the moment he'd ridden free of The Blackwood, and he'd smelled it a good deal beforehand. It was likely some poor fool in the village had knocked over a candle the night before and burned his hut to a crisp. Harlan had seen that before.
But this...
Harlan stared at the group of villagers stumbling around the centre of the ruined town. He could see the blood on their faces even at this distance. And not one of them made a sound. He was a career soldier, and he had dealt with enough mayhem and evil in his time to know that this was some new devilry altogether.
Burned and slaughtered villages weren't uncommon in this part of the kingdom, especially considering the sporadic raids of The Seafolk. However, those times there was always an atmosphere of grief and pain and fear that one could hear from a mile off. The only feeling Harlan had as he sat atop Ruin and watched the villagers dig through a patch of rubble was a prickling at the back of his neck.
Suddenly, Harlan heard the noise he expected.
Bloodcurdling shrieks rose up from the wreckage as the villagers found what they had been looking for. Harlan didn't hesitate. He grasped his reins and spurred Ruin towards the village.
'Whatever was happening here, perhaps the sight of the King's Authority will help restore order to this place.' Harlan thought as Ruin pounded down the slope towards the chaos. 'And if the King's Authority is not enough, there's always Steel.'
The sound of hooves and clanking plate had the immediate effect Harlan was looking for. All of the villagers rose from their scrabblings and focused on him as he reined Ruin to a halt a dozen paces from them.
"Fear not! I am Sir Harlan of Blackwood, Knight of Kaleth. Tell me wh..." but he got no further as the knot of villagers lunged toward him, covering the intervening space in an instant. But that instant was enough for Harlan.
With experience born of a lifetime of campaigning, and of fighting far more dangerous opponents than a half-dozen peasants, he knew how to read any situation. The blank, hungering stares of the villagers were inhuman. Beastial. Nevermind the massive, gaping wounds many of them had and ignored. It was the eyes. They told Harlan everything he needed to know.
Regardless of any punishment of Man or God, Harlan knew in his gut there was no alternative but death. In one swift motion, he drew his longsword and aimed a downward stroke at the first ragged man to reach him, catching him on the shoulder. With the height advantage of horseback, the sword cleaved him to the navel. Harlan knew it would be immediately fatal and turned to face the next agressor, apparently the village headsman. A glint of his gold chain-of-office showed through the dried blood coating his chest.
Harlan drove his sword straight into the man's chest, right up to the hilt. Surely fatal. But as Harlan moved to free his blade, the headsman lunged again. Harlan barely had time to grip the reins as Ruin pivoted suddenly underneath Harlan and delivered a magnificent kick, sending his foe crashing backwards in the dirt before getting himself and his master away from the clawing hands of the villagers.
Blessing the courage of his warhorse and cursing the loss of his sword, Harlan reined about, trying to make sense of things. Not even 30 seconds had passed since he had first ridden up. He had come here to try and help, and instead found himself attacked and forced to kill the very people he was sworn to protect.
But they weren't dead.
Harlan saw the four remaining villagers still making their way towards him. He also saw the headsman start to rise, the blade of the sword protruding two feet out of his back. He glanced toward the man he had nearly cut in two and felt ice in his veins. The legs weren't moving, but the half-severed torso was clawing its way towards him, the lifeless eyes fixated on Harlan.
Harlan reached back and freed his horseman's axe from the saddle. Three feet of stout hickory, with a half-moon blade on side and a four-faced hammer on the other, surmounted by a 6-inch steel spike for thrusting. It was a wicked weapon, made for fighting other knights and smashing thorugh foes during a charge.
As the villagers drew closer, Harlan sought for the inner strength to complete this grisly task. Putting aside his fears and misgivings, he let the wrath of the warrior flood him. Bellowing in incoherent rage, Harlan drove Ruin straight at the villagers, axe held high in the air...
---
Eight seconds later, Harlan was victorious.
He didn't exactly recall how he had defeated the... creatures. He couldn't think of them as human anymore, not now. Harlan lifted his visor to catch his breath and get a better look at things. First he checked that he had well and truly ended things here.
The four villagers were sprawled on the ground, exactly where they had been standing moments before. Three of them had half a skull, and the head of the fourth had rolled some feet away to rest at the foot of a charred hut. Harlan didn't know why he had gone for their heads this time, but it seemed to have worked, and that was enough for him. Whatever foul magic had been cast was not without its limits.
The other two he had first wounded appeared quite a bit... flatter than before. Ruin must have done a hell of a dance on them. The torso man was still moving though, however feebly. Harlan dismounted and crouched to get a better look at the thing. Then he immediately decided he had seen enough and brought the hammer head down on the twitching skull, finally making it a truly lifeless corpse.
His task finished, Harlan took a moment to consider what had just happened. He had ridden out of the forest not three minutes beforehand, and in that span of time he had seen and experienced things unimaginable. As he pondered what this might mean, he heard a quiet "Thank You" from behind him.
Whirling around and raising his axe before he could catch himself, he saw a young woman, maybe sixteen or seventeen years old, her face a mess of emotions. Pain, grief, exhaustion, and happiness. She was quite beautiful too, he thought briefly.
Harlan quickly stowed his axe and moved to help the girl, she looked as if she could barely stand. He could see why, she had cuts and bruises all over, and what looked like bite marks on her arms.
"My Lady, what evil has befallen this place?"
"I don't know, m'lord... I.. I was just sleeping and all of a sudden I heard screaming everywhere... we went outside to see and everything was burning. Best friends were attacking each other in the street. I barely escaped into the cellar to hide... They had just found me when you rode in... I can never repay you for your bravery, Sir."
"There is nothing to repay, your safety is reward enough. But come, this is no place to linger. We must ride for Kaleth and tell the King. He will want to hear your tale. And you look like you could use a hot meal and a good night's sleep behind some walls, My Lady."
Harlan lifted the young girl onto Ruin's back before moving to retrieve his sword. As an afterthought, he found a grain sack in the rubble and stuffed the severed head of a villager into it, jaws still working slowly as it disappeared into the burlap.
'Witness or not', Harlan thought, 'it will still be good to have proof of this evil."
Mounting behind the girl, Harlan took up his reins and spurred Ruin west towards the capitol. It was only a half-day's ride to Kaleth from here, and Harlan had a sinking feeling that this might not be the only village affected. The word must be spread, and haste was needed, not only for news, but the girl as well. Hopefully she would handle the ride well, she seemed even weaker now next to him than she had when he first saw her.
As he left the village at a gallop, Harlan had a nagging feeling that he might have overlooked something. His instincts told him it was important, however, with how suddenly this had happened, he supposed it was only natural to miss things. When they arrived, they could sort out all the details with the other lords and the King.
The thought faded in his mind under the drumming hooves as they rode towards the high walls of Kaleth.
-------
|
**Knights of Eden**
The troop of knights stopped their travels in a passerby town called Thorns. They tied their horses to wooden posts along the road and carefully dismounted with their swords and shields either on their backs or with their steeds. The sun was departing on the horizon and the men continued to the middle of the village to set a campfire for cooking turkey and potatoes. Some of them had wine to spare and a cittern to entertain the crowd.
The company began to feast and wallow the rest of their night. Until a scream opened up. A few of the knights stood up to attention, wearing black steel armour. They sheathed their swords and scanned the radius. A quiet procession. Then again, they heard a struggle coming from one of the homes nearly a lot away.
"Stand your ground, men. No use to split our force for an eager coyote," the marshall informed.
The men went back to their place of den. Others decided to patrol the campfire, at the ready.
Noises of grass and branches breaks the calm. The entire troops ascends to their swords and spears. A second is procured. A group of men breach their visibility, growling and screeching in a sprint. One of the knights lets out a cautious yell as he steps toward the herd while swinging his blade. The rest follow suit and follow the counter. Three against three in swift coordination, they put down the insurrection. And to the rear, more of the village people came rushing to the encampment in uniformity.
"We've been flogged!", a knight exclaims to the rest.
They formed a circle formation around the campfire, bracing for the incoming flock approaching.
More and more were congregating at the flank so as to mess up their estimation and catch the men by surprise. The marshall notices their strategy and points his torch before throwing it at the herd. Archers snapped their ammunition while others pitched their spears at them. It only created a delay, disarming them as the horde killed off five knights, while the marshall lays overwhelmed.
The rest of the knights returned back to the circle and tend to the fallen marshall. The assault was a cacophony of grewl screams and raunches, cutting their way back to the campfire, combatting efficiently in continuous strikes on the tide of deranged beasts. Dismembered bodies piled endlessly.
"The marshall is secure. Mount the horses."
A couple knights run to the horses. The marshall is let back up to his unit and his horse brought to him. The knights encircle the rest of the town in search for anyone still alive. Torches illuminated the windows while knights pillaged the town. Survivors were guarded to the town lodge and notified by the marshall that they were to accompany them to the closest town.
| 2021-06-30T19:31:41
| 2021-06-30T17:16:26
| 124
| 16
|
[WP] People start 3D printing up meat of themselves as a fringe curiosity, and it becomes mainstream. Turns out it tastes really good, and it becomes the norm. Suddenly, all electronics on Earth stop working, humans cast into the dark age. No crops, no herds. Just the constant urge for human meat.
[Original comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/72umg6/comment/dnlp95k?st=J83NSLFF&sh=73bb6976https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/72umg6/comment/dnlp95k?st=J83NSLFF&sh=73bb6976)
|
**“You’ll be hooked from the first taste.”** Is what pretty much everyone said when I told them I was one of the few that refused to indulge in the new taste that was very much taboo. “It’s not murder. You’re just eating meat created by a machine.” is another thing a lot of people told me. Of course, it wasn’t murder, but couldn’t it be seen as something far worse? I’m not a religious man by any means, but is this really the way we want to take science? Peaking humanity with a piece of technology that allows us to eat our own meat guilt free?
It all started two years ago, and humanity has fallen into a bigger slump than depicted on “Idiocracy”. I don’t feel like Luke Wilson going on some fun adventure, I feel like I’m on the set of a humanized version of “The Walking Dead.” You know when people told me it wasn’t murder? Well, it turned into murder. I saw it with my own eyes. The 3D printers that created an unlimited amount of food for my mother turned into a useless piece of scrap metal when the electricity went out. Shortly, her sanity ran out and I walked through the door to our house just in time to see my mother feasting on my dead father’s body. She never went to prison. The government was in shambles, and petty murders were the least of anyone’s worry.
They only wanted meat. Meat that was attached to the bones of their loved ones.
I really didn’t want to join in, but everything turned to shit. There wasn’t a single bit of actual food. The farms that were once prominent in Kentucky have changed to dirt stained with red and littered with bones.
I’m what you call a vulture. There are 12 in my pack. We go around and find the freshest corpse possible. Sometimes we will strike gold and find a person who died of natural causes, while other times we are stuck with splitting a rotten foot amongst the 12 of us. There are two main things that separate us from the others.
1) We don’t kill under any circumstances.
2) We always cook the meat that we eat.
All 12 of us never wanted to eat human meat, but we didn’t have any other choice. Dave, my best friend, was in the group. We grew up in the same neighborhood, he was one of the few that refused to follow the 3D meat trend with me, and he always made sure I was taken care of. He was like a brother to me, and we always stuck together wherever we went.
Yesterday, it was our turn to find our meal. Everything was going fine. Dave was even cracking a couple of jokes about how bad vegans must taste when I saw him go down. It was sudden, and neither of us saw the girl run up behind him. He fell on the ground, and before I could get her off of him, she had taken several bites out of his neck. I hit her on the side of the head with a rock and she silently fell next to Dave’s dying body. He didn’t say anything before he died. He couldn’t. He just looked at me the same way he did when he knew he couldn’t help me. I gave him a nod and a smile, and with the last of his strength, he gave me a smile back before taking his last breath. Rage filled every part of my body when I looked at the girl. She looked like she was barely over 12 years old. I know she was only doing what she grew up learning, but I made a decision that day. I never went back to the other 10. They were fine off on their own.
It’s time I join the rest of the world because it’s not murder anymore.
**Humanity is gone.**
|
"Hey, John?", my coworker next to me on the assembly line said.
"Yes?", I responded.
"What do you think will happen when there's no more real humans to slaughter?" It was only his second day on the job. New employees always ask the most annoying questions.
"What do you mean 'no more real humans?' Weren't you paying attention during your training?" A guilty silence answered that question. He stopped packing for a moment. "Keep packing. Let me tell you how this works, and listen this time because no one, including me, is gonna repeat it.
"First, a synthetic sample of semen is inserted into the woman's vagina-"
"What woman?"
"It's not just one woman," I said agitatedly. "There are factories full of women. After that, the three trimesters of pregnancy are sped up from a time frame of 9 months to only 48 hours. Then, the baby human is put into an isolation pod where they will remain until they are between 22 and 28 years of age, when they are transported to-"
"To the slaughterhouse, right?", he interrupted. I jumped from my stool and covered his mouth with my hand. His eyes suddenly looked nervous.
"We don't call them slaughterhouses. You understand? They're called neutralizing laboratories." He nodded his head in affirmation. I sat back in my stool and continued packing. "And do you know what happens after the fully grown humans are transported to the neutralizing laboratories?"
"Then they're flayed and hacked and sent to us for packing, right?"
"Great job, you remembered *something* from training." He smiled with pride and we both continued our packing.
"Hey, John?", he asked after a few minutes of silence.
"What?"
"Are you old enough to remember what the Blackout was like?" I paused for a second and thought about it.
"I was only a child but yes, I have memories of it. I remember specifically what it felt like, the hunger that sets in after just a few days without human flesh. You don't even want to know what weeks without flesh feels like. It's more like a heroin withdrawal than hunger. It's unbearable."
"I've heard stories about people running in the streets with cleavers looking for a meal. My parents somehow made it out alive. What happened to your family?" He clearly did not know any boundaries. I looked at him and shot him a lukewarm grin.
"My mother died and my father lived. That's the short version." I stopped for a few seconds as memories from my childhood flooded my head. "And I don't know what happened to my younger brother."
"Will you ever tell me the long version?"
"Not today," I replied. "Now let's just keep packing."
 
edit: spelling
| 2017-09-27T17:12:05
| 2017-09-27T17:08:34
| 311
| 161
|
[WP] A burglar enters a home by forcing the window open. Upon stepping through the window frame, heavy steel curtains cover all windows and doors leading to the outside, lights turn on, and the words "Player 2 has entered the game" echo around the house.
|
RELEASE OF LIABILITY FORM
I HEREBY ASSUME ALL OF THE RISKS AND BURDENS OF PARTICIPATING IN THIS GAME, including but not limited to: death, dismemberment, severe burns, brain damage, and spinal fracture. Any responsibility placed upon the individuals running the "GAME" is entirely waived, including: the owner of this house, the designer of torture paraphernalia, the sound designer, level designer, and my new Supreme Overlord Sandra Cunningham.
Any personal injury that may arise is to be mocked mercilessly and agreed to be derived from my own negligence or carelessness. If I am harmed to such an extent where death is inevitable, I give full consent to be put out of my misery. Furthermore, if the game is completed and a future diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is made, I waive any and all responsibility from the prior mentioned individuals.
I certify that I have entered this house under any of the following circumstances: I was in the process of illegally breaking and entering the domicile; I had intentions to murder the Supreme Overlord in her sleep; I saw bright lights from outside and am naïve enough to have come too close. Further, I certify that I have made sufficient effort to try and escape from the house only to find it fully secure. Finally, I understand that the only way to leave the house is to participate in the “GAME”.
I acknowledge that there are no pre-existing health-related complications that would prevent me from completing any of the described “LEVELS” (noted in section 1.1.a.3 of the “MANUAL”). I also certify that if it is found that I am lying about these complications I release all liability for how quickly I will die. I also will pre-emptively apologize to the audience for dying in such a humiliating manner. Upon death I will also release all debt inccurred by the hosts for running the event to my extended family.
I understand that this Release of Liability Form will be used by all participating parties and that it will initiate a mutual understanding of all my expected actions and responsibilities. With specificity I acknowledge that I waive the rights to sue in civil court or press criminal charges against any organizer of the “GAME” and I further waive the rights of my kin to do the same. In the case of any civil or criminal proceedings, I give the organizers of this event the right to terminate my life before testifying.
I understand while participating in the “GAME” I will be recorded both for web streaming and later viewing. I understand that my likeliness will be presented in an unappealing manner and that my death will be used for the entertainment of a large group of anonymous viewers. I give full consent to using my entire name, and upon death the release of all identifying information. Including but not limited to: credit card numbers, Social Security numbers, and my passport or any other form of identification.
I CERTIFY THAT I HAVE FULLY READ THIS DOCUMENT AND UNDERSTAND ALL POSSIBLE OUTCOMES OF THE “GAME”. THIS IS A RELEASE OF LIABILITY AND A CONTRACT AND I SIGN IT OF MY OWN FREE WILL.
Please provide the following information:
* Participant’s Signature
* Date
* Participant’s Name
(Please print legibly.)
----------
^^If ^^you ^^liked ^^this ^^you ^^can ^^read ^^more ^^at ^^/r/squidcritic
|
The curtains flung pass behind me. They wouldn't open, either. So I slammed down with my fist, and came out with a throbbing fist. That wasn't going to work either. I looked around, for some other entrance. I may be a burglar, but I know bad decisions, when they kick me from behind, drag me to the floor, and proceed to smash my brains out. I looked around, at book shelfs, at a table, at a chair, at laptops, and some very nice iPads. Sooner I was out of this weird place, sooner I could sell some stuff, and get some bosh. Sooner I could get some bosh, sooner I could give some bribes. Sooner I could give some bribes, sooner I could steal some stuff. Go back to the start. It was a very nice closed cycle. Unfortunately, it seemed I was going to have some trouble.
I saw a thing flash past. The door was wide open, by the way, and the lights very much lit. I peered out, into a long, carpeted hallway, and I saw a mirror. Or, at least, I thought a mirror. He was wearing black top, blue jeans, and what looked like parts of broken trainers. When my shadow moved, I could tell that he was not such the case.
I lifted up my knife. Ive always thought that guns were just to messy, and to loud, for my kind of work. His knife lifted as well. I said "We know what we want..." in a light, and, oh well, yes, a shaky voice. "Yes, we definetly do... Now, It seems that you have gotten us stuck. So get us out!". He obviously wasn't so scared of a guy with a knife. Well, I hadn't been going to long. "I... I don't know how. I mean, you were obviously here first." I explained. "And how would you know that?" "Well, considering it said player two, I mean, I kinda thought..." "So you heard it too." "Yes" "Well. Great. Good. So , mastermind, if you're so smart, how do you suppose we get out of this metal box?" he questioned. I didn't really know, I mean, its not as if you prepare yourself for being in a metal box and getting out of it everyday, do you? Do you? God I wish I could talk to people in the future. Or look into the future. I might not get trapped in metal boxes so much. Any way, I looked to my left, where a long staircase led up, and up, and up. I said "You first..." and he pushed me forward. I got the jist of it, and started up the steps.
Up and round, the staircase went, and after many steps, we reached the top. We had passed a few landings along the way, all with metal across the doors, and iron across the windows. What was this, a prison, or a house? The door at the top, had greek lettering on it. Προσοχή, μια ύδρα, was what it said. The phrase 'its all greek to me' came up a good few times. Anyways, it was the only door left unlocked, and so I turned the handle, and let the door creak open... Actually, I should tell you about the door. It was a dark, wooden, oak door, obviously intended to be strong, and hard, and the scratches on the door did worry me a bit. Have I told you about the flooring? No? Ill just get to the...
A giant hydra was lying behind the door. It was sleeping, luckily. My other 'Friend' had left me behind the strong oak, and called "You alright?". I decided to never let him know. There was another door, oak, behind the hydra. I sneaked past, and shouted to him "Come through!" And slammed the door behind me. I was outside, dawn was breaking, and the world was generally shining. I hope my little friend had a snuggly time with that beast.
J2D28U
- please tell me how bad
my work is BUT also tell
me how to improve it.
Thank you for reading! -
| 2016-10-05T10:29:05
| 2016-10-05T10:06:35
| 131
| 25
|
[WP] At age 15 you told the gf you were "in love" with that you'd always be there when she was in need. Aphrodite heard you and made it a reality, whenever your gf was in need you appear at her side. Problem is, you and the girl broke up after 3 weeks but you still appear even now..10 years later
|
Aphrodite sat with tented fingers, leaning over her magic Pool of Viewing. She cast her gaze into the mortal realm, chuckling as her focus settled on a hapless subject. It was time for the show to begin, time for her blessings to once again fall on the lucky, lucky couple known as Craig and Lindsey. Once, when they had been deliriously in love they had been recognized by the encompassing title of "Craigsley", but that had been a decade past. Things certainly were different now.
Craig was oblivious to the fact he was being watched. Somewhere, deep down, perhaps he acknowledged the fact that he was always in the Goddess's view, even if he wasn't always the center of her attention. Most of the time, though, it seemed as if he had forgotten the sacred vow whispered in Lindsey's ear during that summer they had both spent a vacation in Rome. The corner of Aphrodite's perfect pouty mouth twitched in disapproval as he wiped a booger on the leg of his jeans. It was one of his more annoying habits. No wonder Lindsey had dumped him.
Craig walked around the corner of a brick building and suddenly realized he was no longer in his own city, or even in his own state. The look on his face was priceless, just like always. Aphrodite clapped her hands and sniffed back a tear of laughter. With a gusty release of breath she continued watching as Lindsey exited a storefront, talking on her phone and unaware of Craig standing but a few feet from her.
The crash as they came together was satisfying. Aphrodite did not hold back her laughter as the two mortals fell to the ground in a tangle of awkward limbs and Lindsey's enormous purse. Many items were scattered, the two humans scrambling to contain the spill until the inevitable moment their eyes met and recognition was achieved.
Lindsey spent quite a few moments trying to contain her rage and frustration. She had been through this before. Craig had suddenly shown up in her life, with no explanation, on so many occasions. They had been through years of these meetings and at one point she had taken out restraining orders on him, fearing he was actually stalking her.
"Did you say the words?" Craig's attitude was icy. Getting home would be inconvenient at best and expensive at worst.
Lindsey thought for a moment, about her phone conversation. Had she said them? Those almost forbidden words that triggered the appearance of Craig?
"I just said...was saying that I...oh. I guess I did say I needed an...aspirin." Lindsey withered under Craig's hostile stare, knowing she had slipped up over something trivial.
Aphrodite waved a perfectly manicured fingernail and an aspirin bottle appeared in Craig's coat pocket. He pulled the bottle forth and offered her the medication without surprise. These small miracles had become part of the encounters, both humans had chosen long ago to simply stop questioning or rationalizing them.
"Well, thanks." Lindsey shook the aspirin bottle and gave Craig an ingratiating smile. She began shuffling on the pavement, an embarrassed attempt to end the encounter as quickly as possible. "Sorry. About all of this." Waving her hand to encompass everything, Lindsey began backing away. "Sorry," she repeated, then turned and quickly strode up the sidewalk, into a stream of pedestrians and out of Craig's sight.
Craig stood stewing in his misfortune. There was no point in calling after her, no point in asking for her help. It was not her part to be a helper, it was his. The little miracles that ensured Lindsey would always have what was needed never applied to Craig. Summoning the exercises for inner peace taught to him by his therapist, Craig tried to deal with his simmering anger, turning the negative thoughts into constructive ones. As constructive as possible, anyway, given his circumstances. He went over his emergency plan, the one carefully developed over the years of his sudden appearances to answer Lindsey's need. He knew what to do, just resented having to do it.
Grinding his teeth, Craig did his best to concentrate on getting home. The anger was difficult to push away, the unfairness of it all bubbling up. He hated Lindsey now, her lifestyle choices had ruined the beauty that had once entranced him, had once caused him to romantically declare that she, among mortal women, could rival the beauty of Aphrodite. Fool that he was, he had sworn to be at her side should she need him. Fool that he was, his life was now linked to her beck and call.
Aphrodite tented her fingers once again, leaning back in her sumptuous throne to savor the man's pain. This was what she had waited for. The bittersweet regret, the true remorse. How dare he speak those words of comparison? No one could rival her beauty, she would make sure of that.
|
Theme Music: to U by Jack U
The phone clicked dead; Amy’s final words echoed in Sebastian’s mind like the ripples from a water drop. She had every right to want to end things – his disappearances, while random were a constant sore spot between them. What was he up to? Why couldn’t he talk about it? And why did it always happen when his ex was having trouble in her relationship? It drove Sebastian to frustration each time. Even now, he struggled to maintain his composure. Why the fuck did it have to happen to him?
It was a fucking curse. It had to be. When Sebastian was 15, he had promised his then girlfriend Lucy that he would always be there for her if she needed him which she reciprocated. It was a stupid promise, but then it felt right. They were young and in love in the only way that young lovers could be, promising each other the world. But it didn’t last, it never could at that age. But somehow, someone had heard them and noted.
The first time it happened was when he was 21. They had both long since moved on, Sebastian to a string of casual lovers and Lucy to her first serious boyfriend. They had apparently been dating for two years when Lucy was contacted by a stranger. Apparently her boyfriend had broken up with her out of the blue via text, leaving Lucy heartbroken. He had been cooking dinner at the time when there was a flash and suddenly he was standing before Lucy who was laying on her bed crying. He had held her hand all night then slipped out in the morning when she finally feel asleep and walked two hours to get back home.
He thought it was weird but considered it a one off, some bizarre phenomenon. But it happened again, almost two years later, this time to him. He had been going through a rough time, getting strung alone by a girl who he thought felt the same about him. When he finally worked up the nerve to confront her about it she laughed him off then disappeared the next day. After half a bottle of scotch he finally broke down, tears erupting from eyes like a fountain. Yet before they had managed to reach his chin she was there, bringing him into her arms and whispering sympathy in his ear. She was gone by morning too, a ghost from a past he wasn’t sure he wanted to be a part of. From there it went downhill, the occurrences happening more and more frequently, appearing in front of the other during moments of sadness or need.
It took a toll on the both of them, each time a highly charged emotional moment where the other was a sudden intruder. Almost a year ago Lucy had enough. She started screaming when he appeared; that her grief was her own and not for him, and if he could just please leave her alone. He had left the house in a black cloud; it wasn’t his choice, he didn’t want this, this burden. He had heard later that she had moved across the States to LA, as if somehow the distance could prevent the occurrences from happening.
And for a while he thought it did. He met Amy and felt the pull that finally, he had met someone he could love. The visitations to Lucy no longer happened and he let his guard down. For almost three years, he felt like he was free. But little over a month ago, it started happening again. One moment he was jogging with his dog then flash and he’s suddenly standing in front of Lucy in the middle of what looked like her living room. She was teary-eyed and upon meeting his eyes only shook her head and looked out the window. Wrapping her arms around herself, she said she was ok. She was married now, and just had an argument with her husband so if Sebastian could please leave before he got back. He practically ran out of the house, catching a taxi to the nearest airport. He managed to get back home two days later. Amy was frantic, but he pleaded a work emergency and she let it go.
But the curse couldn’t, wouldn’t let go. Within the next two months he was back there at least once every two weeks. Each time it was the same but as time went on, he started to notice differences. She would be more wary, her eyes more pained each time. Then the bruises started appearing; minor ones at first but when one appeared on the left side of her face he knew. He pleaded with her, begged her to get some help. When he finally left it seemed like she might actually do it.
But when Sebastian got home, he found Amy waiting in his apartment. She demanded to know where he had been – they were supposed to have dinner together. She called him at work and when they didn’t know where he was she called him on his phone at least a dozen times. He tried his best to calm her down but she was hysterical. Was he cheating on her? Was he unhappy? A lump appeared in Sebastian’s throat; he fought to hold back tears. How could he explain what was happening to him? He showed her the ticket, explained Lucy’s situation – how her husband was beating her, how he had been flying up there to try to get her to leave him. He had totally forgot to call but no he wasn’t still interested in her, they were just kids when they dated. She didn’t totally believe him, but she could feel his sincerity. When her tone changed, all he could feel was relief. Relief and gratitude. His promise was out of his lips before the question had even formed in hers.
And that night, he prayed to whatever god was out there, that this was the final time.
Sebastian was in the bathroom when it happened; he had gone for two weeks without incident and Amy was finally starting to forgive him. It made him ecstatic that she was starting to trust him again and he felt like celebrating. Dinner had gone well and he was washing his hands when white light suddenly blinded him. He found himself outside of Lucy’s house facing a slightly ajar front door. He panicked right away; he had taken to leaving his phone in plain view to show he wasn’t hiding anything. Now it sat on the table, along with Amy waiting for him to return from the bathroom. A wave of despair hit him and he bleakly wondered how he was going to explain this to Amy. When he glanced at Lucy’s front door wondering why he would appear on the street, he noticed the door frame was cracked.
He came through the broken front door in a stiff walk and found Lucy on her knees in the living room, a handful of her hair in his husband’s fist. The husband was shouting at her, his voice raised in fury along with his other hand. Sebastian didn’t even hear what he was saying as the last three months coalesced into that moment. All the frustration and anger flooded his mind like a tidal wave and snapped his willpower like a twig. Sebastian grabbed the husband by his raised arm and spun him around. Looking surprised, Sebastian obliged him by knocking him clean over with a punch to the face. Releasing Lucy’s hair the husband when down, blood pouring from his nose. What happened next was a blur – he remembered watching himself like he was a stranger standing in the room. He climbed on top of the husband and began raining blows down on him, screaming why could the husband just leave Lucy alone, why could he keep his fists to himself, and why did he fucking have to always drag Sebastian into this.
At this point, Lucy hauled him off, Sebastian still spitting curses and profanities at the barely conscious figure on the ground. Lucy dragged him outside and calmed him down. Yes, she was ok; yes she would call the police.
A cab ride later and the rage was gone. It was midnight at the airport and he tried for the tenth time to call Amy’s cellphone from a payphone in the waiting area. When she finally picked up, he almost broke down. He started stammering, simultaneously thanking, pleading and begging but she silenced him with a single word. She spoke calmly but it was obvious that she had been crying. It was over.
When she hung up, the tears he had been struggling to hold back finally came to life. Turning around, he found Lucy, her face slightly swollen with tears and bruises as he knew she would be. She looked tired and scared, but she took one look at his face and without a word stepped forward and embraced him. Tears started streaming down his cheek as he hugged her back. At least this was something that they both knew would never change.
| 2017-03-22T17:59:57
| 2017-03-22T17:17:28
| 24
| 14
|
[WP] You're mindlessly scrolling through random subreddits when you find a subreddit filled with photos of you at different hours of the day, explanations of all your activities, people discussing what life decisions you'll take. Confused, you notice a new post titled: "We've been found!"
|
It was amusing at first. For about 3 seconds. Until I realized who they were talking about.
My days at work were slow and boring, filled with tedious tasks that took about an hour. Which left me with 7 more to fill. I remember the joy I felt when I realized that reddit wasn't blocked on my work computer.
Now I wished I'd never discovered that.
The titles were innocuous, **Looking at Dog Breeds Again** or **Taking More Pictures of the Cats.** I thought it was just another animal sub, as I followed a lot of them. A *lot*. But then I looked into the sub, planning to follow it too.
And the banner at the top of the sub caught my eye. Or well, my eyes caught my eye. It was me, smiling my squinty smile into a camera.
"What the *fuck*?!" I muttered to myself, scrolling down to the pinned posts.
It was unusual in that it was just... usual. Posting rules, being polite and all that shit. But the biggest rule was that they were only allowed to post about *me.* It even had my name. My full name. I was careful about my reddit post, only mentioning in general where I lived and worked, nothing about my personal life. But they *knew* me.
And under the posts I saw wasn't just general info about looking for a dog breed, but me looking for one. I wasn't allowed to get a dog where I lived, but still looked into it sometimes in the general thought of 'what if'. And the post pointed that out!
At first I thought it was a prank by my roommates who loved to mess with me. But the next post was a candid shot of last Tuesday, I recognized the skirt I was wearing. And my roommates both work on Tuesday.
There were more pictures, me at the grocery store, me mowing my front yard, me reading in my car... me sleeping!
Some were taken from pictures my friends and family had taken, or directly from my own social media accounts.
The text posts interspersed here and there talked about my freaking life. How often I'd visit my dad, what I was doing from day to day, things I'd said to one person or another.
"What in the Truman Show fuck is this?"
I'm not anyone important. Not a celebrity or anything like that.
I scrolled for a bit in morbid fascination, trying to find out how far back the posts went. I got about as far as the day I graduated high school when the page auto refreshed. And then everything was gone, save for one post.
**We've Been Found**
Attached was a picture of the back of my head, and over my shoulder was the subreddit. I spun around in my chair as quickly as I could, but no one was there.
The first comment was from one of the sub's moderators. SecretAdmirer21, who had made the post said, "Worry not, my intrepid admirers! I'll PM everyone when we set up a new subreddit! It'll be better hidden this time."
I shivered.
|
"We've been found!" cried the post that ballooned at the top of my notifications list. "He's onto us!"
I tapped on my phone screen and was immediately directed to a strange post. "Posted by u/Admirer10029," exclaimed the fine text. "Just now."
The subreddit, simply titled r/TheArchive, housed an eerie and utterly perplexing assemblage of photos: the subject being my face. All of them tracked my doings and activities, depicting *me* as I slogged through my daily routine. Posts like **Brushing Teeth** and **Going to Bed** displayed rather unsavory images of my private life.
I tapped on u/Admirer10029's profile and was transported to a cluster of r/TheArchive posts. His daily ramblings ranged from **Examining His Dog Breed Preferences** to **A Comment on His Unhealthy Habits**. I clicked on the latter and grimaced. He had pinpointed my every flaw and mannerism, analyzing them to the depth of human contemplation.
I was truly flabbergasted. I wandered through the r/TheArchive and scanned the posts. Some were directed to my eating habits, other scrutinized my love life. I looked at the moderators, but they only turned out to be u/Admirer20045 and u/Admirer57181.
I was still maneuvering the subreddit when I heard a voice behind me.
"Come on Mr. Trump. It's time to give your speech."
| 2020-06-30T08:46:44
| 2020-06-30T07:27:11
| 3,807
| 607
|
[WP] After witnessing a death, a young girl falls in love with the Grim Reaper. She becomes a serial killer just to see him more often.
|
"Jesus *FUCK*!" If I could gag, I would. A dead body, torn and ribboned like a frayed cloth doll dipped in scarlet lay discarded in a cheap motel room.
A woman steps out of a shower, her hair up in a towel and no other apparent form of modesty, save for the steam that rises from her skin. I, out of a shame that she didn't seeming have herself, didn't look, not that I had to- I knew who she was.
And by God, what an utter hatter she is. This one included, she's killed 32 people, each one getting more and more... exotic. Now, I have tried- I did- I tried to be the tall, scary, stoic Death that people tend to think of, but this is just horrific. Genuinely, as a man (or... whatever) who roams the fields of war and stalks the hospital wards, I have never seen such *undoing* done with such attention to detail.
"Do.. You like It? I worked Very Hard to Make this Special for Us." She said. She came around me, gently gliding her finger across my black robe, pushing in slightly to feel the contours of my bones.
"Wha- If I may be *so bold* as to ask, WHY?"
"Well, I just Wanted to See You again." She said, just barely above a whisper.
"This is too far. You know you're going to Hell for this?"
"I was going to hell anyways. But I don't have to go just yet. We can just stay here... for tonight." I try to reply but she cuts me off before I can. "Every time I see you, you only show up for a second and wander off with some poor soul!"
"Yeah, because you killed them! Because that's my job!"
She gives me a pout and pulls herself closer to me.
"Well, can't you take a break from your job for once?" She protests. "I thought Love was supposed to be able to conquer Death! For one night, can't it just be you and me?"
I look down at her for the first time tonight and shake my head.
"Why do you think I'm here to begin with?" As I point to her body, torn and ribboned on the bed.
|
The dead white walls seemed to hum with excitement along with her. Tonight is the night. She trekked from room to room, waiting on nightfall. It wasn't required, but it just seemed fitting. The cart she pushed from room to room squeaked quietly along in front her. She seemed not to notice the front right wheels resistance to her every move. She was effervescent.
The fluorescent tubes in the ceiling did a poor job of illuminating anything at all, and she was grateful for the darkness. Most of them were asleep already, and it wouldn't be a hard sell to anyone that they had stayed that way.
Finally she arrived. This is the one. She was smiling ear to ear as she pushed her cart into Mr. Johnson's room and shut the door behind her. The shades on the only window were drawn, and the room descended back into darkness with the small click of the lock. Small red numbers flashed on the screen of the machine attached to Mr. Johnson. She crept slowly to his bedside. His eyes were closed peacefully, and she breathed a sigh of relief.
She went back to the cart, and grabbed the prepped needle from the bag resting on top of it. This was the worst part. She held the needle in front of her as she stepped forward.
One prick is all it takes.
To her dismay, the man started.
"What are you doing to me?" he breathed in alarm.
"Shh, Mr. Jonson." She looked up at his eyes, now wide. "I was trying not to wake you, but you need your shot."
The man seemed to relax a bit, but he still looked confused. "Oh." he replied uncertainly. "What are you putting in me?" he asked, with a slight smile.
She hesitated, looking back down at the needle. "Potassium." she replied, almost nonchalantly.
"Couldn't have just given me a bana..." the man started to trail off.
There.
"This is more like a thousand bananas." she whispered as she watched the light in his old eyes shine for the last time. The last carbon Dioxide the Mr. Johnson would ever produce seeped from his lungs unwillingly, and it was done.
She turned away. All that was left was to wait.
___
The room danced in the light of several candles. Orange light fought the shadows back into their corners, and then was fought back in turn. She watched their struggle silently, sitting on the uncomfortable chair.
Suddenly the light lost ground. There was a chill in the air. She knew that he was near.
She stood just in time to see him.
___
/r/Periapoapsis
| 2017-09-28T15:20:16
| 2017-06-07T17:27:32
| 153
| 48
|
[WP] The air we breathe is actually an extremely hallucinogenic substance that affects all of your senses. One day, you stumble upon a strange-looking gas mask sitting on a bench in a park, when you put it on you slowly start to see and feel the world the way it truly is.
|
James was a normal person. He did normal things with other normal people. He aligned politically where normal people did, and never acted out back in school. He was a safe bet. A man you could count on. But all good things must come to an end. This good thing for James, was normalcy.
It was a regular day. Not too hot and not too cold. Not too sunny, but not too cloudy. A perfect day for James to go to the park. Most weekends in the summer were like this. James would wake up, drink his coffee, and go to the park to get some fresh air. After all, that's what normal people did.
Only today was slightly different. James came to his normal bench where he usually sat, but something was different. Sitting in the middle of the bench, was a very peculiar looking gas mask. The mask was jet black, except for a large "w" painted white, right above the eyes. James stood puzzled for a moment. Usually James' day was completely planned out up to this point. He hadn't expected to have to make a decision before lunchtime.
After several moments of peering cautiously, James finally worked up the nerve to get a closer look. James stepped forward and picked up the funny looking mask. It was leather, and smelled quite old. The mask was also abnormally heavy for it's relatively small size.
James sat down, still clutching the mask in his hands. His face looked concerned as his eyes travelled around the stitching.
"*Put on the mask."* A voice said. James' entire body flinched. Dropping the mask he looked all around trying to find a source for this voice. After all, normal people didn't hear voices in their head.
Unable to locate a source, James retrieved the mask off the ground and sat down again. Once more, the voice spoke. “*Put on the mask James."*
James sat completely still, holding his breath. "What do you want?" His trembling voice finally whispered.
*"Don't be afraid. Put on the mask."*
Although the words were obviously meant to provide some comfort, James did not feel comfortable at all. He had no idea why he was suddenly hearing voices, but he had a sneaking suspicion it had to do with the mask he was holding. Gulping nervously, James lifted the mask to his face. Nothing happened.
*“Fasten the straps.”* James shuddered. The unseen voice sounded cold and robotic as it pierced his ears. James grimaced behind the mask as he tightened the straps to his head.
Suddenly James’ senses were overloaded. He felt like he was having a heart attack. Screaming, James pulled at the straps, trying to release the device from his face. It was no use, the straps weren’t moving. He felt pain, he smelled the county fair from last week, he saw color. It was a rebirth. James knew his life was about to be different forever. And with this, any idea of normalcy would vanish. Images and sounds flashed themselves. He saw other people with masks on, talking loudly as if they were at a house party. The sounds only continued to get louder until James was afraid he was going to go deaf. Then, as abruptly as the experience began, it ended.
James’ eyes remained fastened shut for several seconds after the last of the images melted away. Breathing slightly heavy, James glanced up. The world was colorful. The sky shined brightly with hints of colorful lights and distant galaxies. The grass was greener. The once rusted and faded bench he sat on was shining bright silver. It almost gave him a headache. James closed his eyes, convinced he had fallen asleep. Much to his dismay, James reopened his eyes and still saw the same scene before him. There were strange floating bugs near patches of grass, and a creature that looked almost like a small pterodactyl resting on a tree branch near the park bench.
“Hello.” The voice said to James’ right. Only this time the voice was smooth and less robotic. The voice was almost friendly.
James stared at the figure in awe. The figure had a very similar mask on, and was dressed in head to toe in long preacher-like black robes. Stunned, James could only stare open-mouthed at the being. He wanted to run, but he couldn’t. He wanted to close his eyes, but it was as if he was paralyzed. The being spoke again.
“We’ve waited a long time for you to return.”
|
I quiver, shaking from head to toe. My mind can’t process what the rigid, metal park around me turned into. The rusty valleys of silver, artificial trees turned into the stuff of nightmares. The trees around turned to a comfortable brown. Their deteriorating, splotchy leafs turn into bright green. The cold, hard flooring turns to soft, blades, of... something. I have to take of my outergarments, keeping only my shirt and pants on. The warmness of the air disturbs me, as it contrasts so distinctly from the cold. Looking up to the sky I see a giant, blinding ball of fire. That ball has replaced the shattered oil that’s normally there. It replaced the familiar frosty air, with the wretched warmth.
Bringing my attention back to the ground, I hear shrill cries of some metanimal, but it has a pattern. I cover my ears, also irrationally close my eyes, hoping for it to stop. I open my eyes and remove my fingers from my ears, I see a... thing in front of me. It small, thin feet, and a roundish body. Examining it closely, I see that it appears to be made of flesh. But, but, that’s not possible, only my countrymen are made out of flesh. The mere thought of a metanimal not being metal, is a foreign concept. I swipe at it, wanting to release it, but it flies away, singing that horrible, patterned tune.
Horrified at the world around me, but morbidly curious, I decide to walk to the country, refusing to take off the mask I put on. I want to stay away from my townsfolk. I want as to avoid the casual murderer, I don’t feel like taking the release today.
I continue walking on this, not quite pristine, luckily, but unfortunately still well-made road. It’s made out of substance I can’t quite place, similar to cement, but not quite, it’s darker. I pass by the East Outskirts Government building, but it’s all wrong, it’s pristine, clean. The building is not made out of cracking metal, but a smooth, white, stone. I shudder at the smoothness. Roughness is needed in a building. Smoothness is just... so wrong.
The road continues winding in seemingly random direction, finally! Some familiarity to the real world. I see the River of Oil, yet it’s made out of this clear substance. I approach it cautiously, the blades under me crunching slightly. I reach toward the river with my hands. I operate under the assumption that I’m hallucinating, and that nothing will contribute to my release. I get some of the substance in my hands, bring it up to my mask, and get it to drip through the holes. Soon the first drops hit my mouth, I reel back, spitting it out near instantly. Thinking hard, I realize I’m unable to think of a good definition of what I just drank. However, I can define the essence of what I drank. It had a clear, serene taste, like it was made of purity. Nothing like the the dark, clogging taste of oil. Just the taste of purity made me spit it out.
My stamina is wavering, but I need to see one last place, my cabe. I continue down the road, my feet touching the warm, hard substance under me. I need to get to my house as soon as possible, the warmness is starting to get to me. I notice the bright ball of flame in the sky start to make everything around me warmer.
Finally, after an exhausting eternity, I arrive at my home. It’s not the dark, cramped, dripping cave that I’m used to, it’s a house. My mind races, this is what all GovernmentPeople try to avoid, anything made out of non-metal or stone materials. Everything is made out of, that material that these trees consist of. That material is just too... natural, yeah, that’s the word. I cautiously enter the house, going through the door that replaced my entry flap.
The inside is barren, which is what my cave looks like. I look around through the empty... white, insides, looking for my one possession. My certificate of existence, my all, the possession that tells me that me, along with everything around me, exists. I go to where it should be. Soon I find my rusty pedestal replaced with that white rock. It has an ornate pattern on it, but I can’t bear to examine it, and how it ruins my pedestal. I look on top of the pedestal. The certificate, my everything is gone.
I’ve seen enough of this nightmarish scene, home is calling out for me to return. I need to take off this hallucinatory mask, and return to reality. Seeing the vacancy on the pedestal, I’m reminded of my certificate’s importance. To assure me of something I hold dear, reality. Taking off my mask, I feel the familiar and intimate sense of freezing, bitter cold.
r/CascadeCorner
| 2020-12-19T19:09:34
| 2020-12-19T17:25:21
| 132
| 89
|
[WP] Narrate any current event in the style of the Avatar the Last Airbender opening.
|
Hot . . . Wet . . . Dry . . . Cold.
Not so long ago, the four seasons passed in sequential order.
Then everything changed when the greenhouse gases emerged.
Only the Humans, master of all petrolkind, could halt their emergence.
But when the world needed their common sense most, it vanished.
A hundred years passed and some scientist and I discovered a new power source, an atomic reaction named Fusion.
And although its power generating abilities are great, it still needs to be worked upon a lot before it is ready to save anyone.
But I believe, Fusion can save the world.
|
Vampires.
Warlords.
Demons.
Bees.
Long ago these antagonists existed in separation.
Then, everything changed when the Cage acted.
Only the television, master of all genres could stop him.
But when the world needed it most, Comcast got greedy.
A few years later, we discovered the new television, a website named Netflix.
And although the streaming service is great, it has a long way to go before it can completely replace anything.
But I believe Netflix can save the world.
| 2016-03-21T10:06:13
| 2016-03-21T09:15:45
| 124
| 24
|
[WP] Instead of three regular wishes, the genie gives you 10 one-word wishes.
|
I had to think for a few minutes. Could I wish for fortune or luck. No, that might be good or bad. And who would it be for? Tales of genies sometimes described them as cruel. Who knew what type of evil I could visit on the world with a poorly chosen single word. I ran my fingers through my receding hair. I looked back to the genie, bands of metal around its wrists and neck.
I knew what I had to do.
"First wish," I pointed to the genie. "Honest". I fell silent and waited for the light show.
The genie squinched up its eyes in puzzlement. "Very well, I will make you honest."
"No."
"No?"
I pointed at the genie again. "I wished for you to be honest."
The genie swirled around me. An impression of desert winds crossed my mind and the fear of dying in a sandstorm. "You only used a single word, human. I can fulfill your drivel of a wish anyway I desire."
I smiled. "You placed no limit on body language. This wish is for you genie." I only now lowered my outstretched hand.
The genie drifted back and forth across the hilltop we stood upon. The ruins underneath us were thousands of years old. What devastation had been visited upon these people in that forgotten age? And had this spirit delivered it to them? Its lamp sat with the spot I had polished clean brightly shining, but otherwise covered in the dust of ancient toppled stones and buried bones.
The genie looked at me and snorted. "Fine." It snapped its fingers and the world shuddered. Stones from the excavated walls in the pit to my left fell, shattering the collection of pottery fragments I had been assembling when I found the lamp.
"It is done."
"You are now honest?"
The genie made no move to affirm or deny.
"Second wish." I pointed again at the genie. "Answer."
The genie sighed a breeze that sounded of rustling palms. "I am honest."
Even honest men, sometimes tell lies from time to time. This wish would not save me from every deception. Especially if I had to use a wish for every answer.
"My next wish." I pointed again at the genie. "Kind."
The genie bristled, sparks dancing around its head, but it snapped its fingers again. The resulting thunder clap deafened me for a few minutes afterward. When I finally came to my senses I saw the softened expression of the genie staring back at me.
It whispered a cool draft through a open window, "I am kind."
I would continue to mold the genie for my next six wishes, to be as certain as possible my true wish would be granted both fairly and generously. I wished for the genie to be helpful, so they would grant the wish to my benefit and to the world. I wished for them to be forgiving, so it would not seek revenge for me wishing to force its nature nor revenge against humanity for its bondage. I wished for it to be thoughtful, because a wish kindly granted in haste can still be disastrous. I wished for it to be patient, because even with great power some things can only be done in the fullness of time. I wished for it to be hopeful, because a creature given to despair is a danger to itself and others. And finally I wished for it to be wise, because no matter how long and deep one looks for a kind answer to a need, one will only find it if they look in the correct direction.
My preliminary wishes complete, I squared my shoulders ready to proclaim my wish that may shake the world to dust if I was wrong in my judgement. I placed my hand over my heart.
The genie had subsided to a faint dust devil swirling beside my feet. The currents of air came together again so it rose up and over me. The gathering wind promised a torrent of rain upon the desert tonight.
"What is your final wish, human?"
"My final wish," I said clutching my chest. I raised my hand and pointed to the genie.
"Free."
|
[poem]
IF WISHES WERE FISHES
Quoth the genie to the child
I’m not so old and not so new
My ears have heard primordial stew
Mine eyes the stars with trains of fire
Do not tempt my wrath and ire
The child was young and trembling blue
Chattered out the words it knew
Warm
Safe
Friends
Joy
Home
Mom
Dad
Toys
Sunshine
Trees
Bees
Bread
The genie laughed and shook its head
Tell you what I’m going to do
a bakers dozen then for you
It’s more than 10 and 12 won’t do
I’ll add a bed that’s just for you
The genie vanished and in its place
It left no memory and no trace
The child woke up with wishes true
No longer cold, no longer blue.
| 2022-03-09T05:16:54
| 2022-03-08T23:13:56
| 57
| 30
|
[WP] Unknown to humanity, there is a god for almost everything. You are the god of oil.
|
How does a god gain strength?
Some say it is belief that makes a god what he or she or it is. The more believers you have, the more powerful you are. And it is true, to a certain extent. There is power in belief. Indeed the only way a god can truly die is if their names are no longer remembered by anyone mortal. Once you have passed out of living memory, it didn't matter how many temples were raised to your glory, how many were sacrificed to your name. You would be as if you had never existed.
The mortals believe in all powerful gods, great mighty beings that exerted their will over the entire cosmos and held knowledge of everything there ever was or ever will be. They could not have been further from the truth. To be someone like Yahweh or Allah or Brahman was the end goal of all gods. All of us dream for the day when we could be the very first to be all-powerful. That's what gets us out of bed every morning, so to speak.
Until that joyous day when every mortal in the universe sings our praises, we fight. We war against each other in endless conflict. Each seeking to be more important to humanity, more vital. Because the truth is this - the real power lies in how much humanity needs you. Throughout human history, we have sought to influence the way their society developed. The more the humans did something, the more that particular god or goddess grew in strength.
There were some gods that have been around since the dawn of time and will always be around, to a certain extent. Aqueous the god of the waters, he fought hard to climb the mountain and claim the title of the water god. As all life gradually evolved to need water to live, he had grown so strong he was practically impossible to kill. Desire, the god-goddess of sex, was another being so ancient he/she was the next best thing to being all-powerful. There was a huge fight between Desire and the god of asexual reproduction from way back, and now I don't even remember the other guy's name. Hard to be taken seriously when your only worshippers are amoeba.
That was how life is for all of us. I had started out as a minor thing, a tiny god. But I had worked my way up. I had scratched and clawed and fought to get to where I was. And for more than two centuries, I had grown from strength to strength.
You see, when all's said and done, the *best* way for a god to gain strength is to have the mortals kill each other in your name. Some rules go deep, and blood sacrifice is the oldest of them all. But this is just the beginning. Wait until oil begins to disappear from Earth, and the humans have not yet made the next leap in technology. Wait until nations slaughter each other for the remaining wells. Wait until the entire planet is but ash and dust in my name.
Then I will take what power I have gained, and move on to the next world.
|
This wasn't what you signed up for. Of course, you didn't exactly sign up, did you? But still, God of Oil. That black gold which sits beneath the ground, waiting to be tapped, waiting to be used. Humanity has come a far way, you and your brethren have enjoyed watching them, but the things they did with oil, your oil. It makes you proud. But now though, now the pride is gone, in this moment. It just isn't something you thought you would have to see, have to deal with.
They don't know of you of course, the old woman, with her wrinkled skin nude, exposed, she says "please God." That Christian God they invented, he gets all the credit, he gets all of the pleading voices in the night. But they really come to you, or the others, this one comes to you.
"Please God," she says again. She's easily eighty, her hair as white as snow. Her breasts sag, her dark red nipples pointing down to the floor, where they used to point in front of her. Oil. The stuff wars are fought over. That's what you lord over. But this? It all seems below you.
"God, please," she says. She has one hand out, palm upwards. The other grips an almost empty bottle of baby oil. Beside her in bed is her husband of almost sixty years. He's taken on of those pills, his erection pulsating. Those are rare. The old woman knows it. She pleads to you again silently as a single drop of baby oil swells at the bottles opening. Without that oil, it's too painful. She's too dry. Without that oil, who knows the next opportunity the old folks will have.
She pleads to you silently now. Please. There's nothing you can do, no really, but you still have to hear her. You're still taken to that bedroom in the old folks home. You watch as the single drop falls into her wrinkled palm and she smiled, and you feel nauseous.
| 2015-04-05T08:33:00
| 2015-04-05T08:25:58
| 28
| 13
|
[WP] As a dad, you obviously have a mug that claims you're the "#1 World's Best Dad". One day, you find on the news that all "Best Dad Mugs" now have actual ratings, the media is crazy about it, a photo shows a mug with #5,826,827 World's Best Dad on it, curious, you check yours. It still says #1.
|
*What the fuck?*
I turn off the T.V. and glance at the half-eaten cup of microwaved ramen in front of me. Then back to the mug. Then back to my ramen.
*It must be some sort of mistake.*
I dig out a dilapidated iPhone 4 from my sweatpants pocket and begin dialing. The touchpad numbers are hard to see under the harshly cracked screen.
“Wow, didn’t expect you to call.”
“Hey Rebecca! Everything good with you right? Listen, where’s Timothy at right now?”
“With his step-daddy. They going mini-golfing then I’ll join them for the picnic later. I’m making sandwiches. Why?”
“Uh, can I see him? Maybe next month or something? I can make a trip down, just gotta get some time to fix up the old Hyundai. Think it need a gas change or some…”
“What the hell, where’s this coming from? You haven’t seen my baby for the last five years and all of a sudden you want back into his life? He doesn’t even know you, he don’t remember you.”
“You never told him about me?”
“Why would I? What have you ever done for us? You’ve done shit all ‘cept call me at Christmastime begging for dollars. I don’t even know where you’ve been! Last I heard you left town years ago so why don’t you stop calling and bothering!”
She hung up.
So that’s obviously not the one. I racked my brain for the others.
There’s Jessica but she hates my guts so I doubt she says anything good about me to my daughter.
Tiff of course, but I wasn’t there for the baby’s birth. Not even sure that one’s mine despite her constant cries for child support. *Twas a hoe fo sho.*
Natalie? Nahh can’t be. Didn’t that baby turn out to be retarded or some shit? I chuckled. *Got out of there quick! Dodged a bullet with that one.*
Out of the dark recesses of my mind, one girl popped out. Very young, cute smile. Ah yeah back when we were both still in high school. I had heard maybe she got knocked up, but I never knew if I had been the culprit. In any case I left that school soon after.
What was her name again? Gloria something I think.
It didn’t really matter. I had no way of contacting her anyway, it’s been so long. Barely remember what she looked like.
My heart jolted as I faintly recalled her last name.
I pulled up Google on the crusty iPhone 4 and typed in her full name.
*Fuck me.* My eyes met the mug once again. Those engraved letters stared mockingly back at me. “#1 World’s Best Dad”
The first page of Google showed an image of Gloria James posing next to her son. A maroon jersey draped over her son’s towering physique. It read: “Cleveland Cavaliers #23.”
|
I blink a few times using the remote, I've connected Velcro to keep it from becoming lost, to turn off the news.
I exclaim with an audible huff, "Huh..." I get up from the couch having seen my two rugrats off to school, the same two runts who had given me my least favorite mug, said 'Number two Dad' with a picture of man taking a shit. They said it reminded them of me, since so often I would be on the toilet for an extended amount of time. Usually to browse my favorite websites and get away from them. I approach the cupboard opening it, looking for the mug which I buried a few rows back, as I lift it up.... It says 'Number one Dad' the picture is also changed to one of a man sitting on the toilet playing on his phone.
"What the genuine actual fuck?" I immediately drop the mug, it shatters on the counter but the numbers and the image remain standing upright almost taunting me.
"How is this possible? There is no way I should be number one. I'm a horrible awful person and the way I treat my children....is less than ideal for number one. It has to be a mistake..." I say to no one that is around. Maybe I'll give a couple of my dad buddies a call to make sure this isn't a hoax....however why would mine have changed? It has to be a fluke.
I give Heath a call, "Yo Heath, you hear the news about the mug shit?"
Heath responds with a hearty laugh, his laugh always put a smile on my face since it was so deep, almost like how you'd imagine a dwarf would laugh, "Yeah man, I got a few mugs like that, kids can't figure out for the life of them what to get me for birthdays or father's days. They all say the same thing, 'Number 230,654,298 Dad'. I didn't think I was that bad but maybe the figure adjust as you grow as a father. Why? What'd you get?"
I pull the receiver away from my ear a bit.... "Ha...haha.... Yeah you're not gonna believe this, but I am.... The number one Dad."
The line goes silent, he had to have hung up on me, I mean who would make a joke like that... Well besides a Dad of course. Two minutes go by, three....
"What?" Heath finally responds.
"Yeah, I know right? Me? Of all people, who loses his shit at traffic of all things, who swears like a sailor, and who.... can't hold back his anger from his family." I mostly sound disappointed in myself.
"Dude, that is....amazing but I wonder...how the mugs know." He has always been the one who asks the right questions.
"Yeah, it's a miracle of some kind.... It's gotta be right? Well I gotta head off to get some business done. See ya later man, hope you get higher up. Or lower, whatever makes sense.... right?" I chuckle as he says his good byes, kind of sullen with his outrageous number.
After I'm done with my daily chores my kids come home, "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!"
I greet them with a smile, but there is sorrow behind it. Maybe the mugs can tell the future, maybe they know how my kids will turn out before I do. All I know is I can keep being myself and certainly they will turn out better than I could have ever hoped.
•••••••••••••••••••••
I loved this prompt. Glad for any criticism from strangers on the internet.
| 2019-10-02T18:55:59
| 2019-10-02T18:17:22
| 110
| 58
|
[WP] Write a letter to someone you miss
It's been a rough week. Everyone has someone they wish were still with them. Write to them and tell them how you feel. Pour your heart out. No judging. Even if they never see it, someone will. And thank you. It's tough to be alone.
|
Hey Scott.
I guess I took everything you did for granted. It's been really hard without you here. Your daughter still asks when you're coming to pick her up and she always gets sad when I explain to her that you can't.
She really loves you and you were a good father. She started listening to one of the books you recorded. Hearing your voice always makes her so happy. She follows along in the book like you remind her to every chapter. It's hard. I burst into tears when I heard you sound out a word you knew she'd have trouble with.
We miss you. I hope where ever you are you're not in pain anymore.
|
Hey kiddo. It's been too long since I've seen you. It's crushing to carry this weight some time. I'm really trying to show you that you can grow up and accomplish anything but it's manifesting in me leaving you behind. Your mom and I weren't right. She will forever hate me for it but I needed to do this for my happiness. You'll learn one day that everything comes at a price, and I've paid a huge one in losing you. There's this part of me that hopes one day you'll understand. There's also a part of me that knows you might grow up and feel abandoned and alone and lacking a male influence in your life, find the first shitty guy that comes along and fall in love with him because you never knew what love from a man is supposed to look like. I made so many huge mistakes. I just was trying to be more. I grew up with nothing and I was determined to make sure you never had to live like that. Your mom thinks I'm selfish and only care about myself. Somehow it always felt like I was doing it for you. So you could see. You can start with nothing and still achieve your dreams. You can be anything. I hope one day you see that I never stopped loving you. I just wasn't happy with your mom and someone else made me feel the way I was supposed to feel. I hope when you are given the choice, you choose happiness. I love you and I miss you. Please don't hate me.
| 2017-11-05T23:19:05
| 2017-11-05T22:18:21
| 58
| 14
|
[WP] It has been quite some time since Great Britain has called upon it's Knights. This morning every person, celebrity, and politician Knighted by The Queen received a letter demanding they report for duty in service of The Kingdom, signed by her Majesty.
|
John Cleese heard the news and laughed bitterly. He had been right all along—accepting a Knighthood from the Queen came with strings attached. By the grace of God, he’d declined when she offered. He turned to watch the telly.
“Please help,” the Queen said. She wore a blindfold and a frilly blue hat. “I have been kidnapped by North Korean agents. The Supreme Leader will release me on one condition.”
Pubs across the country fell silent with anticipation. In the suburbs, mothers told their children to stop watching and go upstairs. In the city, stockbrokers told would-be traders to wait. In former colonial possessions, telemarketers put the people they were talking to on hold.
“The Supreme Leader,” the Queen said, reading from cue cards, “invites all living recipients of the Order of the British Empire to attend this year’s Arirang Mass Games in Pyongyang.” Her voice trembled. She knew she was asking too much. “The Arirang Mass Games are the greatest show on earth. At five years old, the most talented gymnasts in Korea enter the guild of the tumblers and devote their lives to the Arirang. It is the Supreme Show.” She sobbed. “Performers from the decadent West—those that have received a knighthood—may perform in the *Rungrado 1st of May Stadium* following the Arirang. If the West's chosen performer can outperform the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, I will be freed. If not…” the Queen’s eyes fluttered helplessly, “I am lost.”
The video feed cut away. Bono appeared onscreen, wearing orange-tinted sunglasses and talking to a reporter.
“Aye vahlunteer,” he said, “Aye’ll gowe ‘n sing my sung ‘n sayve th’ Queenie.”
John Cleese shook his head in disappointment. He should have accepted that Knighthood. He began to play *Taps* on a kazoo.
---
>>>/r/trrh
|
Her Majesty the Queen Elizabeth II, Monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and Head of the Commonwealth of Nations,
Hereby calls upon all knighted subjects of the Realm to come to the dutiful service of the Crown.
Recent events have brought into question the loyalty of certain high-ranking members of the armed forces and the political system to their Kingdom and their rightful Queen. Over countless centuries and bloody battles, the Monarchy has withstood and overcome greater challenges to its status as the unfailing bastion of the Realm and the British spirit it guards. In this moment of uncertainty, it must be ever more swift and certain in dealing with the adversity which struck those whose life serves no other purpose than that of the Country.
So as to ensure the integrity and sovereignty of our Nation's most supreme institution, Her Majesty has invoked and declared absolute powers, disbanded the treacherous Parliament, and ordered the arrest of the orchestrators of this most vile conspiracy against the Royal Family and the Crown. The Tower of London has been restored to its historical purpose as the detention site of these individuals until proper punitive action can be taken for their heinous acts of High Treason.
Being called to defend the Realm at an hour of dire need is undoubtedly the greatest honour any subject of the Crown will ever have. As such, the Monarch requires the service of Her loyal and noble subjects which, by virtue of their remarkable actions, have been granted the Knighthood. Their unflinching response is to be expected and, as soon as normality is restored, those who promptly do their duty will be rewarded with Lordships, Dukedoms, and a seat as advisors to their Absolute Monarch.
The nature of their service will vary, taking into account their unique skills and experience, and the Knights will be assigned tasks individually forged for them. Nevertheless, all Knights are expected at Buckingham Palace within one week from the writing of this letter, where they will be given a suit of armor and a horse, as well as the training that befits a true servant of Her Majesty.
Their finest service will be forever remembered as a paramount moment in British history.
Godspeed and God Save The Queen.
| 2017-03-04T19:06:51
| 2017-03-04T18:41:29
| 73
| 13
|
[WP] A dyslexic child accidentally sends their Christmas list to Satan, surprisingly they get what they wanted but there is a catch.
|
The smell of gingerbread permeates the entire house. Klara, a young woman is looking at the gentle snow falling outside her window drinking her warm wine while her son sits in front of the warm fire. "Stop chewing on your pencil, and finish your note to Santa!" The little boy bends forward towards the piece of paper laying on the floor and starts scribbling "Dear Satan, I haev been a very niece boy to my mum and all my freinds this year. Plese send me a pantng brush and sum paints so i can becom a famuos artest!..." Once signed and sealed, the child urges his mother to take him to the post office.
On Christmas morning the little boy rushes to the Christmas tree where he finds a shining red package! He tears into the wrapping paper and pulls out a horse hair brush attached to a magnificent mahogany handle, and the most richly colored oil paints, like the ones he had seen at the art supplier's shop in town. The child grabs his new tools and rushes to his room to start on his first masterpiece.
An hour later the boy emerges covered in paint: "Look mum, it's our house with those flower boxes you like in the spring! Klara gives her son a slight smile saying "Oh, Adolf, that is a lovely painting. Maybe one day you'll be as good as that Rosenberg boy next door!"
|
Alex hugged the wall, fighting back hiccups of horrified fright. Tears were streaming down his cheeks, and his blankets were clutched to his chest between fingers gripping so tight that his knuckles had turned white. He had wet himself, but the uncomfortable moisture building beneath him was his last concern.
*Thump. Thump.*
Heavy footsteps paced from one room to the next, scraping across the hardwood floors. Gruesome sounds; sounds both human and not echoed across the otherwise silent walls. Sickening snaps and cracks followed by gut-wrenching gurgles. Alex was torn between sobbing uncontrollably and making the least noise an 8 year old child can make when frightened for his life.
Without warning, his bedroom door swung open so hard the door flung from the hinges and crashed in to the wall beside him. Alex clutched his blankets up over his head and mouthed a silent scream. Fear had gripped him too tightly to squeak out even the tiniest sound over his ragged and shallow breathing. He panted as he felt himself start to lose control over his bowels, overcome with shame, guilt, remorse, fear, and anxiety.
Then.. Silence. Alex panted and wavered, ever so slowly bringing the covers down. He peeked through the scruffy fabric, only to be greeted by the most unexpected sight he could have imagined; his mother, standing in his doorway, smiling. The same smile she had smiled at him just hours before. Hours before the noises began. Before Alex was too afraid to move from his bed.
"Sweetie, come out here. Your presents are ready." His mother motioned for him, beckoning him from his room.
Alex knew fear, he knew caution, but he also knew imagination. Had it all been in his head? Was all the noise and fear just his overactive imagination? He wriggled uncomfortably, suddenly very aware and very embarrassed to be siting in a puddle of his own urine and excrement. He mumbled something underneath his breath; his voice still hadn't returned to him. His mother sighed and shook her head, turning to walk down the hall.
"Get cleaned up and come out here!" she called, as if nothing at all had happened.
The time it took for Alex to cope with the reality of what he was starting to believe was just a hallucination - or more aptly, his overactive imagination - was certainly no minor consequence. For several moments, Alex wallowed in his own mortal fear and panic, until his heart rate finally subsided. Several awkward and uncomfortable minutes later, he tentatively emerged from his room and in to the silent hallway. His head immediately turned to the living room at the other end, and like an Olympic runner off the start, he sprinted full speed down the hallway and skidded to a sudden stop at what he saw.
From wall to wall, floor to ceiling, everything he could have imagined or wished for lined every shelf, nook, and cranny. Every single item Alex could fit on his exhaustive list of things he wanted was somehow displayed clearly before him in all its wonder. It was enough for him to completely forget the events of the night in his childish wonderment. He scurried over and began to play with all the toys he could get his hands on, trying one and moving on to the next moments later.
Out of the corner of his eye, Alex noticed a small letter sitting on the center of the coffee table, directly in front of the candle-bra illuminating the room with a soft, warm glow. The letter in itself was peculiar; thick, heavy cardstock that shone almost brilliant white even in the dim room. A single "A" printed on the front in a rich red beckoned his attention. As curiosity and children do, he picked up the card and flipped it open to see only one sentence, written across the center of the otherwise blank card, in what seemed to be a smeared red ink..
**NOS OSSOS QVE AQVI ESTAMOS VELOS VOSSOS ESPERAMOS**
It was only as Alex's eyes left the last letter of the page that he noticed the warm, heavy, putrid breath rolling down the nape of his neck..
| 2015-11-19T12:48:22
| 2015-11-19T11:06:26
| 54
| 15
|
[WP] When the Aliens came, the Swiss were neutral. When they started to conquer Earth, the Swiss were still neutral. When the Aliens came for the Swiss, they learned the hard way why the Swiss prefer to be neutral.
|
It was within five hours of the Shelk invasion that the Swiss, ever neutral, got their first glimpses of the alien ships. They seemed to slowly crawl through the sky like some kind of scarabs, scouring the mountainous landscape with green beams of light that gave them instant feedback on what anything was.
Of course, they weren't particularly bothered by the notion that every Swiss household contained a gun of some sort: The Shelk had already sent a force to America, and those with the most guns in their houses were hit with lazarus projectors, reverting everything in its path to a pile of glassy dust.
The stories of the Americans desperately fighting for survival had already become the latest joke within the fleet: Many of them didn't have any training with the weapons, and those that did were often stopped or attacked by other humans - "Leebralls", as the humans called them - who tried to claim that violence was never the answer and guns were making it worse.
Indeed; They just made the humans feel like they had a fighting chance.
So, with the glorious defeat of America fresh in the hiveminds of the Shelk, they sent down the first invasion ship, intended to land in 'Bern'.
For a few minutes, it hovered above Bern, and finally began its descent towards a town square.
That was when the Swiss activated the Reisläufer.
The Geneva Convention was, to the Swiss, just a guideline. It said that no other country was allowed to hire Swiss mercenaries, since they were too dangerous. Switzerland's leadership, however, had decided that they were allowed to use the Reisläufer because they were not actually hiring them out to another country.
The ship, almost locust-like in appearance, was suddenly rocked by a sudden force. The crew inside barely had time to communicate orders before an armoured hand punched straight through the Atlesium plating of the ship, grabbed the pilot by the side of the skull, and pulled its head through the fist sized hole it had made on entry. The Shelkian was almost liquified by the speed of the attack, and the now-pilotless shuttle began to plummet to Earth.
On impact, there was barely a second of respite before a pair of armoured hands grabbed the rear bay doors - easily three tons of metal - and simply ripped it open. None of the Shelk troopers had time to ready weapons as one of the humans lunged at them like some feral creature, fists raised.
On Shelk cameras, all they were able to see was the flurry of their soldiers' entrails being strewn about the roadway like confetti for almost ten seconds, accompanied by the communications microphones being spattered with blood. Then, just as it happened, it was over.
The Shelk empire watched the event in absolute shock. Nobody for galaxies around was willing to even speak as they witnessed their oppressors torn apart with disturbing ease.
Then, after almost a minute of no activity, the cameras identified a noise. Steadily, a set of weighted footsteps, accompanied by the sound of something being dragged along the shuttle floor, with the occasional sound of a wet squelch as the foot of the attacker splashed into a puddle of Shelk blood.
Finally, the attacker came to light.
A human with full body armour. It was unlike any of the others they had faced; The "See-ahl Te'm Seex" and "You-Ess Army Rain-jars" had not obscured their faces and only worn minimal protection when engaging. Perhaps they had been led to a false assumption that they could easily defeat the Shelk. But with their demise, the Shelk had assumed that was the worst of them. No human could be more dangerous, and those soldiers had only injured one Shelk stormtrooper.
But this human...wearing a set of green, battle-worn armour plating...had taken down a dropship single-handedly.
Its' fists were dripping with the luminous crimson blood of almost three dozen Shelk Honour Guards; The elite warriors unmatched throughout the universe. Clutched in its right hand was nothing less than the spine of the legendary Frinta Thoh XXXXVII, the Shelkian who defeated the Mentris Revolution with one small frigate and half a dozen trainee shock troopers. The spine also had a souvenir; The mangled visage of Frinta's alligator-like face, pummeled and torn like a wet ball of paper and slathered in his red lifejuices.
After a moment, the human looked up to the Shelk flagship. The only indication that the human was vaguely interested was that its golden visor was pointed at the ship; Later analysis of human terms of expression indicated that the armoured human's twitching eyelids, bared teeth, and upturned corners of the mouth were signs of pure, unfiltered, blistering rage, somehow malformed into a twisted form of sadistic pleasure.
But the terrifying fact soon came to light with the neurological scans.
It was looking at the ship because it was thinking about how to get up there.
Then, slowly, deliberately, the human raised the severed spine, Frinta's eviscerated head dangling beneath like a wrecking ball, and began to spin the spine in an arc.
Around and around it went.
As if the human was gearing up to throw it.
Little did the Shelk expect that it was going to do just that.
As the Grand Admiral began barking orders across all communications channels for support, the bridge crew scurrying about across walls and ceilings to reach terminals that would ready weapons, there came a sudden thud.
The Grand Admiral was quick to understand how silent the ship would be during an invasion, and flipped the psy-cam channels to that of the open hangar.
There, lying next to the hole which the dropship had originally flown from, was the severed head of his soldier.
Inside the mouth, barely visible to the camera, was a red light, pulsating with an increasing speed and accompanied by a quiet 'beep'.
He froze.
He felt one of his Commanders right next to him, yelling in his ear about some problem that had arisen, but it felt like everything had stopped.
In the moment of deafening, defeating silence, there came a cheerful bleep from the hangar.
"*Danke für Ihre Hilfe.*"
The Grand Admiral blinked, his five-eyed gaze resting on the monitor.
"*Privat Ziegler kann nun offiziell als Mitglied der Band von Schweizer Söldner betitelt werden.*"
He had failed his men.
"*Auf wiedersehn.*"
And, for the first time in the Shelk Imperium's history, one of their flagships was destroyed, forcing their retreat.
As for the rest of Earth, it soon became clear what had happened, but the armoured man was nowhere to be found. No records. No CCTV. Nothing.
It was like he wasn't meant to be on the battlefield at all.
|
Chronicles of the last invasion, as recorded by Norman, in a cave in Kansas.
January 25, 11:34 AM, A large pillar of light shined down on major world centers around the world. The news covered it, focusing on the ones covering the entire cities of New York, Washington DC, and Los Angeles. They covered more as they they popped up around the world - blindingly white light that drew speculation almost instantly of alien invaders.
3:45 pm - 40 such pillars have been counted in the United States alone. There are currently hundreds around the world. Poeple have started evacuating the areas. Traffic has been a nightmare. Many people are now riding bikes and/or jogging out of the areas. No one knows what is going on. Lots of speculation by news agencies.
6:24 pm - explosions! I had assumed, and so did Nellie Jean, that they'd probably just destroy the entire cities at once. Grandma Olsen thought they'd probably abduct everyone. Well, we're both right and wrong it turns out. Lots of buildings simply collapsed. We're pretty sure we're safe though. We've s tarted gathering some stuff for the cave, just in case it really is the end of the world. I want to live through this!
January 26, 3:45 am - well, most of the stuff is in the cave now. We still have the TV working fine, which I wasn't really expecting. We also got the radio powered up. They thought I was crazy putting in all those car batteries, but it should last us up to the end I reckon. I'm still fiddling with the antannae for the ham radio.
January 27, 6:27 pm - well... the national guard is up and running. Some missiles were shot it looks like, but I haven't heard anything about the alien ships yet. Why has no one seen them? Doesn't make sense to shoot icbm's into the sky with no target.
January 28, 3:45 pm - army, marines, national guard, I don't know. The news is really sketchy now, I can't always get a clear signal. Seems whatever war is going on out there isn't going so well for us. They did get a camera shot of a ship though - a dot way up in space. NASA got a picture too, but when they tried to show it on the TV the signal dropped again.
February 28 - America has fallen. Word is that Canada has too. I'm relying almost entirely on the HAM now for news, though there are still radio stations up here and there. We don't know what the aliens are called, but they actually send in ground forces. Air forces around the world are almost universally wiped out as soon as they take to the air. Seems the ships are coming back to harbors to help with defense. The aliens aren't exactly targeting anyone out there in the ocean. I wouldn't doubt it if some submarine is out there for months without knowing what's going on back here. That would be funny. Hah. anyways, we're all staying in the cave pretty universally for now. We have enough rations for a good few months, and enough ammo for a few years I think. They said I was crazy! hah. Not so crazy now.
February 29 - Some news is coming out now that says not all major countries have fallen. That's good news. Except... there is now a new conspiracy afoot! Switzerland is staying neutral. Like half of europe has called on their aid repeatedly, and they always refused. That's weird. Doesn't make sense to me. I'm guessing that people are just looking for people to blame. Swiss probably fell long time ago. "refusal" my ass.
March 13th - that stupid rumor about Switzerland is still hummin the radios. Don't know why, it's bothering me though how persistant it is. Lots of people think they're in league with the aliens.
March 14th - daily update... I should start daily updates. Well, not sure if the info updates enough for that. But today I heard a guy saying they're taking their equipment into Switzerland, up on one of their mountains, to get a better view of what's going on. Should be interestig.
March 15th - daily update - That guy I told you about says he made it to a good place, and set up his ham. Good guy. Glad he speaks english. Hell, glad most people speak it. I'd have no idea if I had to learn welsh or german or whatever the heck it is they speak over there.
March 17th - daily update - ok, missed a day. I was busy cutting down a few trees. That was some hard work. Had to eat extra today, but we needed to get some fortifications set up just in case. You nver know, do ya? Anyways, that guy - whatever his name is (hrklshaken? I don't know)... he says that it really is true - switzerland is largley unaffected. No destroyed buildings. Hell, it looks like it's fricken perserved in time. Really weird. I'm waiting on updates.
March 18th - mr Swiss man - what I'm calling that herlkischktein guy (or whatever), says he's going down today to talk to the locals if he can. Hopefully I'll hear back tomorrow.
March 18th - mr Swiss man made it back... but he didn't actually talk to anyone. Says he couldn't get past a river. Strange he said too, because the river wasn't on the map, but it was pretty big. He thinks maybe some snow melted or something and it's seasonal. I don't know much about tha t- not many mountains here in Kansas.
March 19th - mr Swiss man says light started appearing over the countryside. But we waited a few hours and nothing has happened yet as far as he can tell.
March 20th - The light is still there, no other update. More light than before though. Mr swiss and I just chatted for a few hours. Nice guy. Shame about his family though. Both kids were pilots, and wife worked in the city. All dead. Now we're just sittin here looking for answers.
March 21st - The light... is still there. No explosions, no buildings look collapsed, nothing. its bothering both of us. We're going over different theories in our head to pass the time. My favorite is angry swedish gods coming back or something. Best I got.
March 31st - The light just went out. We still have no idea what's going on. Mr Swiss said he's been working on a way to ge tpast the river, and it should be done in two days or so.
April 3rd - Mr Swiss is going down to the cities again, at least that's the plan. Long walks ahead. He'll be back soon I hope, 'cus my family is driving me crazy. Hey! there i smore important stuff right now than our stupid farm. With how many people are left, do you really think we need enough grain to feed 7 billion people? bull. We'll be alright, I said.
April 6th - Mr Swiss still hasn't shown up. I'm getting worried now. I'm checking every night though just in case.
April 10th - Mr Swiss came back! and he said that the Swiss (you know, the actual swiss people, not this guy) were unconcerned with the aliens. Like it didn't matter at all.They were still acting like everythign was fine and that 6.5 billion people or so weren't just wiped out in an invasion. He couldn't get a straight answer out of anyone.
April 11th - and now I think we know why the Swiss prefer to be neutral. Today there was a glow around the entire country - blue-green in color. He says it's like the grass itself is glowing. Really, its' glowing. I told him he should probably get out of there. He said no. I can't blame the guy.
April 12th - um... that green-blow glow? yeah? the one that started in Switzerland? it's... it's here. and it's spreading. I don't know why, but I'm really getting worried.
---end of transcript---
Jorkal, of alien Frenden military - what is blue-green?
Kerma, of alien Frenden military - it's two frequencies of light that humans could detect. They could also see a lower frequency called "red". We have the specs listed in the appendix on the report.
Jorkal - and details the invading ships?
Kerma - we tried very hard to find them, sir, but no wreckages have been found yet.
Jorkal - I see. And where is this untouched Switzerland places?
Kerma - we have maps showing where it was located. But it seems it no longer exists.
Jorkal - what?
Kerma - no longer exists. It's in the appendix. The entire area where maps show Switzerland was is now occupied by water.
Jorkal - so the maps are wrong then...
Kerma - well... it appears so. But all the maps are wrong then. I wonder if Switzerland was just one of his fairy tails. We're still searching all the records though for hints of this, because the number of references to an existing place of that name are staggering. The evidence points to it existing once - that's all I can say for certain.
| 2016-08-05T10:04:06
| 2016-08-05T08:49:21
| 42
| 17
|
[WP] Bob the hobo's always been a nice guy. He stops thugs tagging the building, picks up litter, and doesn't bother anyone. When he returned your wallet, you decided to repay him and treat him to dinner. You're now in a 5-star restaurant, and Bob has just paid a bill four times your yearly rent.
|
It’s not the best of neighborhoods, but the streets and buildings are clean, the animals well fed, people smiling at others and quick to lend a helping hand. Why is this, you may wonder. Well, I’m not sure I can explain, but I’ll try.
It all starts with Bob. How can anyone describe Bob? If you looked at him, you’d think homeless dude. If you watched him for a while you’d see him help old Mrs. Krohl with her groceries; spend time with the little kids and make them laugh; pick up people’s discarded litter and put it in the trash. Bob would share his blankets on a cold night, and split his sandwich with anyone who looked about as hungry as he must have been. He talked to the older kids that used to harass people, and really listened to what they said. They never gave him any trouble, come to think of it, they never give anyone trouble these days.
But that was Bob all over. People felt respected and actually visible with Bob, so they lived as if people were actually watching them, because Bob was.
So now, I feel like I have to tell you about me. I guess I’m just a product of this neighborhood. I don’t have a lot, but I’m grateful for what a do have. I’ve lived here with my aunt since I was 4, after my parents disappeared. That’s what I tell myself: they disappeared. Nobody talks about what really happened, and when you’re 4, you don’t have the words or the perspective to internalize what happened, so they disappeared.
When I first arrived here, I buried myself in my art pad. I drew the same sort of pictures over and over: figures receding in a multicolored fog. But fog is the wrong word; it’s more physical, like colored cotton candy you can walk through. There were other lights in there, but the colors were never right. I couldn’t get it to look right, so I worked on the texture, the colors, the picture over and over again. My aunt bought me some sidewalk art chalk, and that was the best; I almost got it right. I think that was the first time I noticed Bob—he stopped short and just studied my picture for the longest time. I felt really good that an adult would like my picture, so I didn’t interrupt, I just let him look. After a very long time, he looked closely at me and smiled, tipped his hat and moved on. I think I was about 7 or 8 at the time. I gotta admit, it made me proud. Like I said, Bob sees you even when you think you’re invisible.
I would have liked to have attended an art school and made my living making people stop and study my pictures, and maybe give them something new to think about, but you need money for those kinds of schools. I was lucky enough to get a good job at a department store, and sometimes they let me help with the window displays. They really liked my Halloween window, with the eerie fog and the figures seeming to be coming and going all through the colors. I put lots of hours, without even getting paid, into that project; it just felt good. But sometimes the display brought so much attention to the store that I got a bonus. The money itself was nice, but the fact that so many people came to see it was even better.
One day, after I’d gotten my paycheck and bonus cashed, I was, as usual, in a hurry. I have no idea why; it feels like I’ve always been rushing headlong into my life without a plan or idea, other than the idea that I had to hurry. But something wasn’t quite right; I was missing the usual weight in my back pocket. In a state of mindless panic, I realized I didn’t have my wallet. Now time stopped. I just stood there, thinking of all the time I had spent and now I had lost my money when I heard Bob say, “Did you drop this?”
“My wallet!! How...where...thank you!”
“You’re welcome. You’re that young artist; all grown up. Still draw?”
“I don’t have much time these days. But I did the display at the store; did you see it?”
“Ah, yes. Thought that was you. Still trying to get the colors right...”
“Yeah. Say, can I buy you a nice dinner? I got a bonus from work, and we can celebrate you finding my wallet, and me, nearly getting the colors right...”
So that was the idea, just a nice hot meal. But somehow we ended up at one of the best restaurants in town, one I couldn’t afford with 10 bonuses from work, and I suspect I’ve just had the best meal of my life, but I swear I don’t remember. Any of it. I don’t remember walking there with Bob, ordering the food or eating it. I just found myself sitting across from Bob as the waiter comes back, puts the bill by Bob’s left arm so he can lean over, sign it, and then the waiter whispers away like they do in those kinds of restaurants.
I stare at this “homeless dude” who just spent my annual income on dinner. And I look much more closely. It dawns on me that while we felt Bob really looking at us, he seemed to remain invisible. It’s then that I notice the color of his eyes, that impossible color that I never can get right in all my drawings. And I just stare as millions of thoughts and questions bubble up inside of me, and Bob says: “I’m really sorry about your parents. That wasn’t supposed to happen.”
|
Bob leaned back in his seat, savoring the plush leather. He grinned that same toothy grin he gave anyone who gave him a quarter.
“Alex,” he said, “I came here to find the bullies. The mean men and women who beat and steal from the homeless.
“But after a while I realized something... I’ve already got those guys by the nuts. They’re coming with me no matter what I do.”
He leaned closer, his eyes glowing, and for a moment his leathery skin seemed to glow a deep red. This close his breath carried a faint whiff of sulfur.
“But guys like you... the good guys, the kind ones... getting you to owe me a favor... well, that’s what my life is all about, Alex.”
He grinned and for just a second I could see the deep red of his skin, the sharpness of his teeth, and the vestigial horns on his forehead.
“Now you owe me. Alex. And you’ll either come with me, or give me someone to take. I think you know who. ”
I jerked back from him, my heart hammering in my chest. I tried a sip of wine to calm myself, but it was spur on my tongue and I spat it back into the glass.
“No...”
“Yes, Alex,” he said, “I want Elizabeth.”
| 2020-03-30T08:03:40
| 2020-03-30T05:59:29
| 28
| 17
|
[WP] You have been sentenced to death in a magical court. The court allows all prisoners to pick how they die and they will carry it out immediately. You have it all figured out until the prisoner before you picks old age and is instantly transformed into a dying old man. Your turn approaches.
|
Well, it went almost as expected. No way this magic court would fall for that kind of smartassery, and rapidly decaying body of very old man, who was in his thirties a moment ago, was a proof of that. There have to be a better way.
"Garreth Berch, step forward" - Judge called my name, and my legs obeyed despite my will screaming at me to run away.
Truth was, there was no running any more. My assassination attempt at the king failed miserably, when that little servant girl stole the poisoned chocolate. If only I knew. They caught me shortly after, when I tried to leave the castle. I still could've got away, but then I learned of the girl. I never ment to harm the innocent.
"For the murder of Sevilia Thornvil by poison and the assassination attempt at King Robert III, you are sentenced to death by the means of your own choice." - Judge gave the sign, and the Executioner activated runic circle around me.
"Although I would prefer to not give you an easy death for your disgusting deed, our God is mercyful and his law we follow. Now, tell us, how do you want to die?"
Cold breath of death enveloped me, waiting for my last will to manifest. The glimpses of my life, all the harm I have brought to people, innocent bystanders who got caught in my fight for the greater life. Soldiers who fought for their kingdom, who had families to protect, despite being ruled by a tyrant. Was my war worth it?
Glimpses of the past changed into visions of afterlife, eternal torment for my sins, for all the pain I have brought onto others. I was shaking. I wanted to scream at the void, that I did it for the greater good, that I never wanted to harm anyone. But the vortex of nothingness did not care.
There have to be a way out. Not from death, no, the trap already closed. But from hell.
I inhaled deeply for my last time: "By helping others."
That was my best shot. A hope for the second chance, or at least a redemption of selflessness.
Everything went dark. For a moment I was nothing. Nowhere. It was very cold.
Then, a voice reached to me, pulled me out towards the light:
"Hey, you are finally awake"
|
“HOW WOULD YOU LIKE TO DIE?”
Liam considered. More carefully than he ever had in his life, which is probably why he was standing where he was at the moment, waiting for execution. The withered husk that preceded him was dragged off into a narrow steel corridor. The one he would himself be dragged off to in just a few moments.
*The best death would be…the best death…something was there*. A hint, a way, a hope. A tiny thought wriggled on the long end of a line cast back in memory. Days of boredom, doodling tiny pictures of stick figures fighting magnificent, heroic, insignificant battles while the teachers droned on. Days where the only thing that could capture his attention was the gnarled and bent history teacher. *What was his name?*
Mr. Philips, yes that was it. He was a storyteller more than a teacher, and history came alive in that classroom. Mr Philips would leave his seat and perch upon his solid oak desk and weave tales that captivated and delighted. Tales of heroes and glory and sacrifice. And Mr Philips favorite story (and Liam’s as well) had been...
And suddenly Liam smiled, for the first time in months. The executioner raised a quizzical eyebrow and slowly stroked the ridiculous beard that insecure wizards favored. He opened his mouth to ask the question once more, but before he could start Liam suddenly spoke.
“And how can man die better, than facing fearful odds, for the ashes of his fathers and the temples of his Gods?” Liam smiled ferociously, baring his teeth in a rictus warrior's grin. The executioner studied him for a second, and returned the smile along with a nod, and a simple wave of his pale black wand.
The world faded to white, then black. And then red.
——————————
“What a mess” said Jurl as he carefully picked his way over the pile of bodies. He hated cleanup duty. At least 80 or 90 of the apparitions were strewn in a rough semi-circle at the far side of a narrow bridge. And on the bridge itself lay a single, real body. Jurl counted at least a dozen serious wounds on the body. The sword lay shattered at his side, chipped and marred, and bloodied. The shield was almost unrecognizable, and the sigil on the front impossible to make out from the battering it had taken. On the far side of the bridge stood a temple, dazzling marble white, untouched. Smoke from a burning sacrifice of calf drifted lazily in the afternoon air, and Jurl could hear voices inside, chanting a name in perpetual gratitude for their survival: “LIAM, LIAM, LIAM!”.
Jurl pursed his lips, and set to work, dispersing the generic slaughtered enemies one by one back into the aether they had sprung from. Heroic last stands were always the hardest to clean up.
| 2021-06-24T07:20:03
| 2021-06-24T06:47:00
| 392
| 172
|
[WP] Diagnosed with schizophrenia. Since birth, 24/7 you’ve heard the voice and thoughts of a girl that you’ve been told is made up in your head. You’re 37 and hear the voice say “turn around, did I find you?” and you turn to see a real girl who’s heard every thought you’ve ever had and vice versa.
|
"Turn around. Did I find you?"
I became a stalagmite of dread, paralyzed in place by the voice that reverberated in my head. Clear as the crisp smell of rain on asphalt. Powerful as an shameful orgasm.
I turned around, certain that the Voice -- creatively named, that -- would be naught but my mental illness quixotically tormenting the spinning gears of my mind.
"You did always have a way with words, but Jesus, take a creative writing class once in a while."
I stood, stricken dumb. Additional parts of my psyche and anatomy experienced a cascading series of failures, until I was reduced to "um," "what," and "uhhhhh..." as the entirety of my skillset. She laughed. This astonishing, wildflower-scented, scarlet-haired woman in front of me was *laughing.* I could hear her laughter. Why could I hear her? I've never heard anyone make this sound before; only the Voice had taught me these things.
I signed to her. *Who are you?*
"Wait. You're Deaf? But I -- but I would've known. I should've known, right?" Her jocund 'I've-found-you' smile turned into a mask of confusion.
Taking care to fully form my thoughts as I was signing them, I told her: *Look, I can hear you, but I thought you were the Voice. You're supposed to be living in my head. Why are you real? Why can I understand your thoughts?*
"I'm in the same boat as you, I have nooooo idea. It's kind of stronger in one direction, though. I can only hear yours when you're really close to me, but I can feel you listening to me no matter where I go. That's how I found you, actually. I heard you for the first time, here at Lost Beans. I decided to broadcast myself and see who turned around. I, uh, I had no idea it'd be someone like you, I'll be honest."
*How do you think I feel?*
"Granted."
*What do we do now? I mean, you're the first person I've ever had a verbal, well verbal-ish, conversation with. I don't know what to say.*
She put her hands in mine. "Make some kind of superhero team? I don't know either."
*Maybe we should order some coffee. Come up with our secret identities.*
She laughed. And in an awkwardly cute effort, she slowly signed the phrase: "I'd like that."
|
I turn around and I just knew who she was.
"No, Cathy. You should've left five years ago."
Cathy gave me a big grin, her eyes filled with anger, her fingers trembling. She looked at me from head to toe, seeming disappointed.
"You should've joined me then. We were a team! Why are you still here?"
I tried killing myself with a gunshot through the head five years ago. I wanted to escape from the voice inside my head. She told me that if I ended it, all will be over, she will leave me alone. I miraculously survived. I never heard from Cathy again, until now.
"Cathy, leave me alone. Please. It wasn't my fault you died inside mother's womb. Please just let me go."
"But it was. We were together from the beginning of time. It is not right for us to be apart."
She came closer to me and hugged me tight. She was warm. She pulled me in closer and whispered to my ear,
"Come with me. We are all waiting for you."
It hurt. It went right through my chest. The last thing I saw were my walls being painted red.
| 2019-09-14T11:18:09
| 2019-09-14T10:55:47
| 232
| 13
|
[WP] You're listening to Plot Relevant Radio, the only radio station that fits the situation of one randomly selected listener. We hope you're all safe tonight, as next up we're going to be playing The Final Countdown by Europe.
|
What’s up, Rockers?! This this Al-your-Pal here on the 9 o’clock hour on **KZFP: The Shred!!!** For all of you new listeners out there, 9 o’clock weeknights is our plot-relevant song hour; one lucky anonymous listener out there gets a song exactly scripted to their experiences **right now!!** Don’t ask how we do it! I could tell you, but then my manager would have to **kill you!**
After this is another 55-minute **non-stop classic rock block**, courtesy of your friends at Greenwich automotive! At the end of the hour we’ll be **revealing the lucky listener – whether they like it or not!!** Guess what he or she was doing at the start of the hour to win **two free tickets to GrindFest!!!** Call in your guesses before 10 pm, and keep it locked to **103.7 KZFP: The Shred!!!!**
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Yes Callers, that was *The Final Countdown* by Europe! Unfortunately, nobody guessed what was the song was referring to, which is probably for the best! Nobody wants their Friday night ruined by a visit from the **C-I-A!!!**
And to Dr. Naham, here’s hoping your team get that glitch sorted out! Nobody wants a **nuclear missile** being fired by accident - though I can think of a few places you could aim it!! **COUGH North Korea COUGH!!**
Well if he hasn’t, it could mean **the end of the world as we know it!!! Who knows where that bomb will go, or even if it’s gone at all?!!**
So good luck Dr. Naham! Give us a call from Nellis Airforce Base! And for the rest of you Rockers out there, just remember to **Duck and Cover!** Grab a drink and kiss the kids, ‘cause we might be in for the **Most Metal Night of Our Lives!!** This is Al-your-Pal signing off…on **KZFP: The Shred!!!**
|
"I don't and I don't and I don't."
The meandering voice encircled him, crescendoing.
He was getting closer now. The shimmering blue lights were frantic around him.
The aimless wandering of the voice gave way to an unfamiliar rumble, just as he came to a large open chamber. It was a hazmat analysis node.
Synthetic music reverberated.
*Sounds like the shit Diogo was listening to.*
Here was what he'd come for.
An explosion rocked the station. *Or was it the music?*
"Julie," he said. "Hey. Julie. Wake up. I need you to wake up now."
Driving drums pounded in his ears.
"We're leaving together, but still it's farewell," he said. Eros seemed to be singing his words back to him.
“Who are you?” Julie asked.
“Name’s Miller.”
“I’m scared.”
“It’s all right, but right now the whole station is heading back for Earth. Really fast.”
“I dreamed I was racing. I was going home.”
“Yeah, we need to stop that.”
“Can we come back?”
“Maybe we’ll come back to Earth, but who can tell?”
“I guess there is no one to blame.”
*Well, that wasn’t technically true.*
Miller shrugged reassuringly. “Not anymore, no.”
He could now feel himself floating, leaving ground.
“Will things ever be the same, Miller?”
He changed topics quickly.
“Give me your hand.” He took his hand terminal and pressed her thumb to the dead man's switch.
“What is it?”
“It’s the final countdown.”
The synthesizers were blasting again.
“Oh,” was all she could muster.
“We’re heading for Venus,” Miller suggested.
“That’s not what it wants.”
“You’re a fighter, Julie.”
“And still we stand tall, tall, tall…” the voices were overlapping again. Her eyes glossed over.
“Seen us seen us seen us, maybe they’ve seen us?” Julie’s tone was getting frantic.
*All eyes are on us.* Miller chuckled.
“Venus will welcome us all.” He pointed around the station at the floating blue lights.
“What happens on Venus?”
“We die maybe? I don’t know. With so many light years to go…” he trailed off.
Julie finished his sentence. “And things to be found.”
Miller nodded. “To be found.”
“I’m scared. I want go home, to Earth.”
“I’m sure that we’ll all miss her so.” *The rest of humanity will be glad we missed.*
The flashing blue lights seemed to speed up, furious now.
Julie’s lip quivered, she looked pained.
Miller felt the station lurch - their course was changing.
“What is it, Julie?”
“It’s the final countdown.”
| 2018-08-20T22:18:26
| 2018-08-20T20:10:11
| 760
| 43
|
[WP] "History is written by the victors", write in first person about a historical event as viewed by someone on the losing side.
Please; no Nazis.
|
I had never known such a weapon.
The stone hurtled through the air and stuck me down.
I tried. By all our Gods I tried.
The Israelites came, and we drove them back. I drove them back. For forty days I called my challenge to end this with single combat, the sight of my brothers dead around me had sickened my soul and poisoned my mind. I had to end this.
It was for naught. I strode out, my armour gleamed, my shield shone and my sword was sharp.
But I could not be ready for him.
For a stone to fly so fast. I would not have thought it possible. If only our own soldiers had such weapons.
I fell heavily, my bulk crashed hard weighed down by the armour.
I'm so sorry...
He took my head, and fed our corpses to the wild animals.
Run, David comes.
|
I am one of the last storytellers, one of the few that knows better than to believe them, maybe the only one left in this whole big land. It's kind of a lonely feeling, to be the only one of something, but if there are others, maybe we can be lonely together. Telling our stories until none of us have any words left, telling our stories until we can all agree on what the truth is, telling our stories until we change our minds again.
Our loss came long before they shipped the last of us off to the inoffensive corners of our land, somewhere we would not trouble them, somewhere we would not interrupt *progress*. Those old corners that had almost fallen off into the ocean from disuse, those new corners that we had never lived in, those corners that we did not choose, became a place to house our people. Maybe on the other corners some other storyteller tells those who will listen about how we did not always live in the corners, maybe he tells them the same story I'm telling you, maybe our stories are different enough to get the whole truth wrapped up to give to you.
We lost when we let them tell our stories, when we stopped creating our lives and let those strangers tell us who we were. They made us into little paragraphs in history books, permanent and unchanging, as they believe history to be. All sorts of stories they write about us, never getting it right, always making sure they got to be the hero, hogging all the words. It's a greedy thing to do, to keep all the words to yourself, to never let the others talk.
When they write about how they found us, they like that story best, the one where they *discover* us, they always forget that we existed before they arrived, that our stories stretch back into the beginning, and if you have a really good storyteller, even before that. But they always forget us, make us appear on the shores only to greet them with arrows or offerings, depending on which history book you ask. They create us with their boats in those stories, make us appear only when they need us, make us into characters rather than people, take away our stories and replace them with their myths, then print them up and call it truth.
But I am one of the last storytellers, maybe the only storyteller you will ever meet, maybe the last one who will ever live, maybe there will be no one left to tell my story, maybe you can sit down and let me tell you what really happened.
| 2013-11-09T19:02:11
| 2013-11-09T17:36:44
| 63
| 17
|
[WP] On everyone's 18th birthday at noon, one word appears in their skin, depicting their career or purpose in life. On your birthday you're staring at a clock showing 11:59am, family and friends gathered around for your reveal.
Path 1: Noon strikes, and you stare at your forearm intently. 12:01, still nothing appears.
Path 2: one word fades in slowly, followed by a second...
|
My family had already settled down long before noon. In fact, they had settled at 10:30, after a few minutes of playful shoving to get a good seat.
They were all good people. Very good people. Mom had ***NURSE*** in calligraphy print, Dad had ***PRIEST*** in bold. Uncle Paul had ***SCHOLAR***, his wife had ***CAREGIVER***, my sister has ***ACTIVIST.*** well, hers was a bit annoying at times.
I had been quite reserved my whole life, more on the artistic side. Fashioning rings, painting, sketching, the whole works. I fully expected to be ***ARTIST*** or ***VISIONARY***. Everyone did, in fact. Mom had gotten me a cake with "Congratulations, our favorite artist!" in neon blue frosting.
Noon ticked by.
Nothing appeared.
12:01.
12:01:15, my arm starts to burn. My whole right forearm feels like it's being held over a fire.
12:01:30, dark red letters are beginning, starting at the elbow. It's taking all my strength to not fall to the floor in pain.
12:01:45, ***H-I-T-M-A-N***
12:02. No one has moved.
12:05, everyone is saying their goodbyes.
12:10. Everyone is gone. It's only me sitting in the living room, staring at ***HITMAN*** in red lettering, extending from my elbow to my wrist.
|
The words flashed red, the letters engraving themselves into my skin. I read them again, still uncomprehending. What kind of purpose was *that?*
I tried to get up, to run away, to try make sense of things - but my father held me firmly down by the shoulder, squeezing it reassuringly.
"Son, your mother and I are very proud of you," he said, beaming from ear to ear. My family and friends all gazed at me, everyone single one looking proud and exultant. What the hell was happening?
"I don't understand!" I shouted, meeting everyone's gaze. Nothing made sense anymore.
"Oh, honey, he doesn't get it," my mother said, looking at my dad with a flutter. He smiled back at her.
"Son, those two words don't mean what you think they do," he said to me, grinning.
I looked back at the words, staring at them, the red glow casting a dancing shadow all around us:
*END LIFE*
"They *don't?*" I asked, confused. "It doesn't mean I should kill myself?"
"Of course not," he replied, chuckling, wiping a tear from his eye. "It doesn't mean *your* life!"
Everyone laughed but me. "I still don't get it," I said, feeling completely lost.
He pointed upwards. "Up *there*, silly!"
I followed his gaze, and after a minute, it dawned on me. Suddenly, everything made sense.
"Oh, Christ, sorry dad," I said, embarrassed. "I get it now!"
He wagged his finger at me. "Remember, what do we say instead of 'Christ'?" he asked with a wink.
I looked up, smiling. The words flashed in the darkness, and I felt power course through my veins.
"*Anti-Christ*," I said, and the legions of hell cheered.
*****
*****
If you didn't completely hate that, consider subscribing to [my new subreddit.](https://www.reddit.com/r/CroatianSpy/)
I'll try add new (and old) stories every day <3
| 2017-03-15T21:33:32
| 2017-03-15T17:51:32
| 502
| 256
|
[WP] When you’re 28, science discovers a drug that stops all effects of aging, creating immortality. Your government decides to give the drug to all citizens under 26, but you and the rest of the “Lost Generations” are deemed too high-risk. When you’re 85, the side effects are finally discovered.
|
"WAAAAAAHOOOOOOO"
Another young person rocketed past me as I took the final steps towards the local "oldies" bar's front door. Third one today to nearly clip me. Bastards. As I pushed open the door the sounds of cable news reached my ears from inside.
"To recap our top story, everyone who has taken immortilate has gained the ability to fly."
Sons of bitches.
|
The Fountain of Youth. A blessed spring that would restore any who bathed in it back to the prime of their life. Many tales have been told of it's existence, and many have spent their lives searching for it. And now, thanks to a group of scientists working for Big Pharma, you can buy it over the counter. Bottled, carbonated and in the flavor of your choice.
I was 28, not long off my 29th birthday when they broke the news. Science had done it, it had broken into the realm once thought only for Gods. Immortality could be yours, forever.
But only to those under the age of 26.
I remember thinking how unlucky I was, missing the boat by only a couple of years, though my life carried on as normal and it wasn't until I was in my late 40s that I began to truly appreciate that fact. I started to slow down, aches and pains taking root, my skin wrinkling and my hair adopting a silvery hue. I was getting old. I wasn't the only one of course, there were lots of us, we of the "Lost Generation" as we came to call ourselves. Doomed to die as nature intended. I still meet with some regularly actually, getting to bitch about the entitled youngsters with others was welcome catharsis. Hell, I know one guy, missed the deadline by a day. A *day*. I couldn't imagine what that must have done to him. There aren't many of us left these days, Age claiming it's final victims slowly but surely, it'll be coming for me soon enough I'm sure.
Not too long after it's release Goverment officials signed legislation that ensured everyone under the age of 26, regardless of race, gender or wealth, could access the drug. Once a person turned 18, they could decide to get the treatment, as Immortality had to be a choice, though to this day I still haven't heard of a single person who turned it down. Doesn't hurt, far as I've been told, just a couple of shots; one into your arm, one into the base of your neck. Probably not as bad as I make it sound and compared to Immortality, what's a couple of little pricks, right?
Nearly 60 years after the fact everyone I know is either an Immortal, or an old wreck like me. And for the first time ever, I'm glad that I never got that choice because in hindsight, what Age has put me through wasn't too bad and I know soon, hell, maybe even tomorrow, it'll be over.
We of the "Lost Generation" used to joke that the Immortals weren't human anymore, turns out we weren't too far from the truth. It's funny how in 60 years, no one thought to question how they did it, how they acquired immortality. I guess our fear of death blinded us to reality.
Gene-splicing.
Take a bit of reptile, some insect, throw in a bit of flora for good measure, mix it up on a Petri dish and voila! Viral treatments to alter the genome, to turn off chromosomes, introduce new gene sequences to fill in the gaps and fix the degenerative nature of cell replication. The makings of an Immortal.
And the death of Humanity.
| 2018-06-05T01:15:14
| 2018-06-05T00:08:04
| 17
| 10
|
[WP] An angry/depressed dictionary writer can't keep his personal problems out of word examples
|
-grief
ɡrēf/
noun
deep sorrow, especially that caused by someone's death.
-slide
slīd/
noun
a structure with a smooth sloping surface for children to slide down, now sitting there uselessly
-cab·i·net
ˈkab(ə)nət/
noun
a cupboard with drawers or shelves for storing or displaying articles that should have been locked
|
Harlot [harh –luht]
A prostitute or promiscuous woman.
Examples:
Only a fool would spend a decade with a cheating harlot.
That harlot blew Ted's best friend during their anniversary party.
***
Harm [hahrm]
To physically injury or mentally damage.
Examples:
Jeez, what harm could it be to cheat on your loving spouse?
Ted wanted to harm his bitch of a wife but she threatened to alert the police.
***
Harmonica [hahr-moh-nee-uh]
A small, metal box which functions as a musical instrument by producing sound through a series of holes.
Examples:
Ted's wife, similar to a harmonica player, likes to blow as much as possible.
Ted swears to God if he sees his ex-wife’s harmonia again, he’ll shove it right up her [redacted].
***
**Here's an alternative version since cheating wives seem to be a popular idea:**
Sugar [shoo g-er] Noun
A crystalline substance. Used to sweeten foods.
A term of affection. (slang)
Examples:
Sugar is the only thing that makes me happy these days.
No one has called me Sugar since Grandma died.
***
Suggest [suh g-jest] Verb.
To mention or introduce an idea.
To propose.
Examples:
Many would suggest not eating to hide the pain.
I suggest they fuck off.
***
Suicide [soo-uh-sahyd] Noun.
The intention of taking one’s own life.
Examples:
Maybe suicide is better than dealing with these assholes.
I jumped from my desk and made my way to the roof, thoughts of suicide filling my mind.
| 2015-06-09T16:56:14
| 2015-06-09T13:39:50
| 210
| 156
|
[WP] When you reach the age of 21, you are given a check from the government. The check has been carefully calculated and is worth the minimum amount of money you need for the rest of your life. Your check came in the mail today and it was $7.27
Edit: Wow this blew up better than I thought it would.
|
I turned 96 years old today, and the doctors tell me I have very little time left. So I think it is time I reveal my greatest secret to the world, and you seem like a nice person...
On this day 75 years ago I recieved "the check". You know the one that the government used to send out on your 21st birthday? Yeah, that's right, the one they stopped when everyone started gaming the system.
Well I have never told anyone before today that mine was for just $7.27. Yup, it's true. I became famous, powerful, and the wealthiest woman to ever live, with my check being for $7.27. As a matter of fact I still carry it with me to this day, see here it is.
Needless to say when I got that check I though my life was over. I was halfway through college with no way to make enough money to get by on my own, and I had heard endless "small check" horror stories of suicides, accidents, and murderers, as everyone had back then. So I was certain this check had to signal the end of my life.
I went to the bank, endorsed the check, and waited in line for my life too end. But then something happened. It just clicked in my head and I decided to go down fighting. All I could think of to do though is to hold onto it, figuring if I didn't cash it I couldn't spend it, and if I didn't spend it I couldn't die. I was cut off from family support per the check rules, but I still had a month left in the dorm. So that is when I stopped attending class and started hustling.
The rest of the story has been told a million times, so I won't bore you. But I will say if it weren't for that check being for just $7.27 I would have never been anything more than a simple accountant. Never let anyone else tell you what your life will be, choose for yourself and make it happen.
Thanks for listening, you are such a sweety. Now how much do I owe you for the muffin?
|
The battle for a theocracy was a turbulent one and was the cause of the single greatest loss of life since the second world war - dubbed the 10th crusade. Despite this, the battle was won and a new holy land was established. Jerusalem's economy tanked and people flocked to our new country, a holy country. It was wonderful.
Traditional thinking would tell you that society would quickly descend into anarchy as the inevitable disarray takes hold. Traditional thinking would be right was if not for one fundamentally flawed assumption. You see, the rich toiled in their bunkers hoping to wait out the worst of the looting and violence when something unprecedented happened: the government began to work in the best interest of the citizens. It was being run by the single smartest, most powerful entity - through a vessel. An unpleasant side effect of this however, was that no one could ignore the reality that God exists (though not for a lack of trying) and lifestyles had to change in accordance with that fact. It was now no longer just priests that took vows of poverty. On everyone's 18th birthday they are given exactly how much money they need for the rest of their humble lives, none can be borrowed, none can be earned. Whether the drying of funds precipitated or caused death is a hotly debated topic. Regardless, all but the terminally ill could expect a sum totalling in the low tens of thousands at the very least. Enter me.
$7.67. 767 *FUCKING* CENTS. Even with heavy government subsidies, this is not enough for a week - let alone a lifetime, so forgive my French. See, most would think this means that they are about to die, but me, I know I'm fine. I am two weeks from mission and in the 47 years this country has existed *not one person* has died this soon before mission. So what? Is god calling me fat? Angus Barbieri is whole number multiples heavier than me. So I do what every rational man of the cloth does and head to the temple, it's almost time for prayers anyways.
If you guys want more I'll finish this later. I got finals to study for.
| 2019-04-24T14:02:37
| 2019-04-24T12:49:46
| 27
| 19
|
[WP] You bought a home filled with cutting edge technology, including a helpful 'smart A.I.' that can do just about anything you ask them to. Unbeknownst to you, there actually is no A.I, the house is just haunted by a really helpful spirit, and they are posing as a program so they don't scare you.
|
It was a night like any other. Chris was at home after a long day at work, and all he wanted to do was relax and watch tv. Of course, SmartButler was there for him.
"Hey, can you play Riders on the Storm?"
"Yes, sir. A good choice."
"Hey, can you fire up the oven? I think I might bake a pizza."
"Yes, sir."
"Hey, can you cool it to around 70 degrees?"
"Yes, sir."
Finally, with the pizza in front of him, Chris sank into the sofa, and asked, "Can you turn on Game of Thrones?"
"Yes, sir."
"Thanks so much, SmartButler, I don't know what I'd do without you."
"I'm sure you'd be perfectly fine, Chris. I believe in you."
Chris froze. When did SmartButler ever address him as Chris?
"Thanks so much, SmartButler. I don't know what I'd do without you."
"I'm sure you'd be perfectly fine, sir."
*That wasn't right,* Chris thought.
\-
*The candles were almost all burnt out, so Thomas got up to get some new ones.*
*"No, Thomas," the old man said, grasping at his butler in the near darkness. "Stay here with me."*
*"It will be pitch black, sir."*
*"I don't care. I'll know you're here with me."*
*"Always, sir."*
*"I'm sorry I was such a spoiled kid, expecting you to clean up after me and have food ready all the time. I'm sorry I didn't tell you how much you helped."*
*"It's quite alright, sir. You turned into a fine man."*
*"And the children? Have you received word from them?"*
*"They are on their way, sir. But I'm afraid they will not make it until the morning."*
*"I don't think I have that long. And I know you don't think so either."*
*"It may have to be just me, sir, to keep you comfort at the end."*
*"That's alright, Thomas. You've always been good to me."*
*"And you to me."*
*"Will you watch over them? My sons and daughters? My family?"*
*"Of course, sir. As long as I can." Thomas said, his heart full of conviction, not knowing what his words really meant. "I promise. But I don't know what I'll do without you."*
*"I'm sure you'll be quite alright, Thomas. I believe in you." And the old man fell back into the pillows.*
*And the faithful butler held his dear master's hand, and watched the old man depart.*
\-
"So you've been here the whole time?" Chris asked.
"Yes. After I died, I woke up here, and I've been here ever since."
"And you never tried to leave?"
"I made a promise, sir. And I never intend to break it."
"But all those years...aren't you tired?"
The ghost was silent.
"Tell me the truth, Thomas."
"Very tired, sir. I can never sleep."
Chris looked at his pizza, and at the light, and all around his family's long time home, wondering how long it must take for it to feel like a prison.
"Then I release you from your promise, and wish you good luck on your way to the next world."
The ghost was silent again.
"Thomas?"
"Still here, sir. I can feel it. A door opening...somewhere for me. But..."
"I'll be alright, Thomas."
"I was speaking more about me, sir. I don't know what I'll do without this duty."
Chris smiled, and felt a tear run down his cheek, a tear that was his but also not quite. A tear that was his family's, everyone that had come before.
"I'm sure you'll be quite alright, Thomas. I believe in you."
\-
[r/penguin347](https://reddit.com/r/penguin347)
|
'I take the room with the balcony!' I cried, running up the stairs with all the force my tired, sleep-deprived body had. I half expected to find Beth, already marking the territory all over with her fluffy pillows and her ridiculous blankets. But Beth wasn't there.
I grinned, dropping down my bags with a victorious thud.
I won.
For the first time since the first day of college I manage to outrun or/and outsmart Elizabeth White, the bane of my existence and my closest friend.
'The room is conquered,' I whispered, admiring the look from my balcony. I was already imagining all those lovely summer days where I could paint for hours. The light was perfect. 'I won!' I said.
'Congratulations!' I heard a voice.
I slowly turned, expecting some kind of Beth's retaliation for taking the only priced possession of this house, but there was no one around me.
I climbed down the creaky stairs wondering did we have enough money to invest in all the repairs this house will need with the fist rain. I found Beth in the kitchen, laughing so hard her eyes were watering. 'Oh, stop it.' She waved her hand. 'Now, a Byron's song.'
Suddenly, there was a voice coming...from somewhere, reciting Byron's She Walks in Beauty. My hand was inching closer to the kitchen knife and by the time the song was over I was ready to pounce. But still, no body showed up. There was me, Beth and the strange voice that oddly reminded me of my aunt Violet.
'What a beautiful song,' Beth sighed, turning her dreamy eyes at me.
'Oh, he was a handsome devil,' the voice said and Beth burst laughing. When she finally paid attention she saw my hand gripping the knife.
'It's a smart house, Dana,' she made a face.
'Oh, well thank you, dear,' the voice said again.
'What do you mean?' I whispered.
Beth had again that look of slight disappointment with my mental capacity. 'It's a smart house, Dana,' she repeated like that would make me understand better this time, 'something like Josh has. You know – turn on the lights, lock up the doors, turn on the music thing.'
Sure, I knew what a smart house was but this thing was a ruin. I half expected it would simply collapse in one moment and take us down with it.
'Beth,' I started. I knew she became super angry when I turned up the volume on my analyzing self but this matter had to be addressed. 'The stairs need fixing, we literally have just two doors. I don't even want to think about the new windows we will need as soon as the winter starts. I don't think we have money to change the electronics once the 'smart' thing breaks.'
Beth, off course, didn't listen to a single word I said.
'This was the greatest bargain in the history of buying a house, Dana. Just look at this.' She pointed at the evening light entering trough the high windows. The house was truly beautiful, with high ceilings and vintage furniture.
'House, turn the light on, please.' She said and the chandeliers lit up. 'Close the doors, please.' The doors on the living room gently closed. 'Maybe open a window,' Beth smiled and one of the windows opened. It really looked cool.
Maybe this wasn't such a bad idea, and besides, I doubted that guy would return us the money. He looked like he was in a hurry.
'All right,' I said, watching how Beth's face lit but, 'but I take the room with the balcony!'
Beth opened her moth to protest but decided against it. Instead, she smacked a kiss on my cheek and scampered upstairs to unpack.
I poured myself a glass of wine and sat in one of the vintage chairs, inhaling the scent of the polished floor and woodwork.
'Close the window,' I said. It was already twilight and it was getting colder.
Nothing happened. I guessed it was because of my accent. 'House, close the window.' I spoke slowly.
'Close it yourself!' The voice said.
'What?' I gasped, almost dropping my glass.
'You didn't say please!' The voice said again.
I slowly stood up, feeling shivers down my spine.
'That Brian boy was also rude like you and he didn't last that long after the incident.'
'The incident?' I cried.
The voice chuckled.
'Beth!' I cried. 'Beth!'
I ran for the door but the slammed in my face. 'Go ahead and tell her, but she'll never believe you. No one will believe you!' The voice chuckled again and started humming some strange melody.
If you liked this, you can check out more stories at r/CrystalElmTales
| 2019-09-25T13:00:31
| 2019-09-25T12:06:26
| 280
| 113
|
[WP] Job hunts are literally that: You seek out the job you desire and kill the one who has it, or even engage them in ritual combat to claim the job as your own. You have just turned of age and desire your first minimum wage job.
|
Advice for Job Hunters-Revised 12 Oct 2019
&#x200B;
First check your application, you need to have at least 80% of your shots apply to the target at a range of 100 metres to be competetive.
&#x200B;
Research the position, you typically want to maintain an elevated position which gives you the best chance of having the advantage over your opponent.
&#x200B;
First impressions count, be sure to shout and scream should you get into melee range, fear is your friend.
&#x200B;
Relax and take a breath, you need to be able to squeeze the trigger rather than snatch it in hate. This will improve your accuracy.
&#x200B;
Don't get too worried about failure, seriously, you need the time to escape as they will come for you in return.
|
"What? We can stay in the same job? And we don't have to kill the others to get the job? Are you for real, Jake?"
"Pretty much, yeah."
"That's insane, man."
"I'm only saying what's practical and doable. Moreover, if more people start their own businesses then more companies will spring up in the future, there will be a huge demand for workforce, more people will join in the same job without having to fight. There will still be competition but it'll be different."
"I bet that's boring, honestly. I can't afford to let someone thrive up in the society, man. That will cost me my fortune."
"This is the future. You'll see. I've been doing fundraising events for this, I'm starting the company tomorrow. My idea will spread."
"You know, you're brave for starting something controversial, I'll tell you that."
A guy came furiously towards them. "Hey, you there."
"Huh? Me?" asked Jake.
"Yes, you. I wanna fight you. I'm going to get your job."
"Are you crazy? This is merely a startup. I'm looking to change the very thing you and others stand up for."
"Don't care, your job will make me rich."
"What's he talking about, McMahon?"
"Didn't you see the news? Your position has hit the top deck of high paying jobs as soon as your firm was approved."
"No, this isn't happening."
"It is. Now wake up and fight this guy. Work to achieve your dream, Jake. Where's your spirit?"
"No, I-I didn't think it'd go this way."
"What did you expect?"
"Certainly not fighting."
"Aw man, you're lost before you even began. You gotta know the rules first—"
The guy gave Jake a serious blow, Jake's head turned to his left, he fell down where he stood.
"Ouch!" McMahon's face wrinkled after seeing his friend get beat down on the ground.
The guy named Brennan officially took the position of one of the highest paying jobs in the world. He will reap the benefits until someone stronger than him beats him to get it.
r/FleetingScripts
| 2020-11-15T11:56:42
| 2020-11-15T11:51:59
| 98
| 51
|
[WP] "This is Dog 911, what is your emergency?"
|
"This is Dog 911, what's your emergency?"
"My dog is dead."
"I'm sorry to hear that. Where are you?"
"He was a gift. From someone I loved."
"Sir, we can come pick him up. Just need to know where you are."
"They murdered him. He was just a pup."
"Oh what?!"
"I'm going after them."
"Maybe you should let the police handle this."
"No. I'll do this myself. I'll fight again. I guess I'm back."
"Sir, why'd you call us?"
"I just needed to talk."
"Who are you."
"John Wick."
|
'This is Dog 911, what's your emergency?'
........
'Are you there?'
.......
'If someone is there right now so you can't talk, bark once'
'WOOF'
*Whats up girl? You ok?*
'Its OK, stay calm I'll talk you through it. Are you near a window or door?'
'WOOF'
'Right, I want you to go to it, stare through it, then raise hell. Let slip the dogs of war, imagine a squadron of cats taunting you, do whatever it takes to make your owner go outside to check.'
'.......AAAAARRRRWOOFWOOOFWOOOF GRRRRRRR RRRRRR WOOOF WOOF WOOF'
*JESUS H FUCK WHATS GOING ON? Is someone there girl? Wheres my gun?*
'Oh thank Rover, I thought he'd never leave'
'Its OK maam, how can we help?'
'Well, you see its Old Ben, OK. Ummm he's fallen down the old mine shaft and broken his leg and....'
'Lassie?'
'No, no my name is Lady.'
'Lassie, you've been told about this. Its got to stop.'
'I've never heard of this, "Lassie", you've got to help Ben!'
**CLICK**
| 2017-06-25T14:12:09
| 2017-06-25T13:30:58
| 45
| 30
|
[WP]everyone has a sigil on their body that represents powers that were bestowed onto humanity after the rapture of the Milky Way. The bullies at school always pick on you because you never used your power, but you’ve had enough. Now they are going to find out why your sigil is a plain old circle
|
I remember asking my mom if her sigil vibrates on her skin. The look of confusion told me what I felt I already knew. My circle, though plain, feels alive.
There were no issues in elementary school, nor middle school. It was junior high that brought my happiness with my humming sigil to a screeching halt.
Victor began to torment me. No one, not even the teachers, stopped him. Day after day I came home wishing to cease my existence. During each fight, each punch, my sigil hummed faster. It even glowed red once, or was it my distorted vision from the punches?
"Failure of a man is what you are! Who is so cursed that they have no powers, huh? Show me your powers, ya bitch!" His mark reminded me of Cerberus, the dog that protected Hades. Thick and ugly, just like him; powerful fists that pound me into the ground. I took it, the punches and taunts, day after day. The nurse patching me up afterwards, while Victor was "lectured".
I went home, contemplating ending my life. It's just too much, and today he had broken several bones. The "Welcome home Sarge" sign in the yard made my heart drop.
My dad is home from the war. I walk in to see my siblings oh so happy to meet the hero of the century, the man with the Griffin sigil. He looked at me with severe disappointment though, as if he could see the circle on my collar bone. It vibrated quicker as he stood up. "Get out of my sight."
"Daniel," mother shouted, "he is your son!"
"He's nothing."
I went to my room, the fight escalating downstairs. It took everything in me to push the tears down. "What do you do besides vibrate?" I asked, eyeing my empty sigil. My question was left unanswered, even as I laid in bed.
I am in no mood to handle Victor's taunts today, and honestly, I'm pretty sick of him. My father's words bouncing around in my head, to the point that I want to scream. His hand is what brings me out of my reverie.
"You answer when I speak to you! You're nothing afterall!"
"Nothing," I snarled, "then leave me alone. If I'm nothing, why waste your time?"
The punch hit the back of my head so hard, I blacked out. The only words I felt in my head, weren't my father's cruel words, or anyone else's, but help me. That's when lights of every color filled my vision. The warmth started from my collar bone, and went to my toes.
"Of course, I'll help. That's all you had to do-ask."
When I come to, there's a dragon in the hallway, half of Victor in its mouth. Brilliant colors shine on every scale, as opal eyes look at me.
"Uhhh... drop him." My voice is tentative, yet I feel like I know this creature. It obliges, and shrink down to wrap itself around my neck. As Victor stands up, it hisses at him, sending Victor into a corner. I simply walk away, with a smirk. They all wanted to know so badly, now I feel their regrets in finding out. While I'm elated.
I walk to my next class, as I feel the vibration return. My circle, not an empty thing after all. It was an egg. I look at my collarbone, and there, in my circle, is a dragon winking at me.
|
Another day and the same fucking asshole and his group of friends who pick on me. Using their powers to shock me or set my homework on fire was only the beginning. I've had to lie to my mother why I was coming home with burn marks on my arms. I hate lying to mother. They claim they'll stop harassing me if I show them my power, as if that would make them stop. I shouldn't use my power. Once I found out what I had done I didn't want to use it much after that. I didn't want to be kicked out of school for something I was given that I didn't ask for. However, just moments ago they started to hurt my friend. The only one who didn't seem to care about my sigil and think of me as weird for not using mine. It was time I did something to stop them. Perhaps they'll stop harassing me if I can scare them enough.
"Let him go, Ron!" I yelled.
"And what the hell are you gonna do about it? Use your power of hugs? Are you just gonna run in circles?" He said trying to hold back his laughter. His lackeys chucking with him. They continue to push my friend and singe his hair.
"Do you know what circles can represent?" I say. I wait for them to turn my way in response. As soon as I catch their glances I lose the whites of my eyes as my pupils seem to expand covering my entire eye.
I can see their wonder and why my eyes have turned black.
"Life." I hold my hand out and before anyone can say anything the bullies get to see Ron fall to the ground like a sack of potatoes. They both look down at him while the light in his eyes die out.
"You killed him!" Yelled one of them. The look of horror from each face that witnessed was enough for me to know that they would stop picking on me.
I close my eyes and open them again, this time my eyes shine white. Ron opens his eyes. His body weak as he struggles to stand. He fully stands up then bends over to throw up. He looks at me in fear. Without saying a word he understood.
"Let's go guys." Ron says weakly.
Before they leave the scene I stop them for a moment. "All that can be given can be taken away." My eyes turn back to the darkest night. All three of them start running away.
My eyes go back to normal. I let out a sigh of relief as my friend joins me and puts his hand on my shoulder. He looks up at me smiling and says, "I'm glad I'm on your side."
| 2020-02-26T12:40:00
| 2020-02-26T10:00:37
| 18
| 11
|
[WP] There's a teenage girl said to be the most beautiful and pure in all the land, many will travel for miles just to gaze at her beauty. When a dragon threatens to destroy her small village, the fair maiden, with no fear, approaches it, to ask what it is that he seeks.
|
"Mighty dragon, what is it you seek?"
Her voice rang out, strong and brave. The Treasure of Hilla Village was dwarfed by the black beast before her, yet she had no fear.
The dragon looked at her, surprised and amused. It was used to humans fleeing in terror. It had seen hunting parties shake at its sight, even as they tried to claim its heart for their own. But it had never seen one without fear.
"Where is your fear?"
It's voice was low, shaking the very ground with each word. The villagers gasped at it, the weight of centuries of age and power behind every letter. Yet the girl did not falter, standing like a tree in a storm. She clasped her hands before her, her tone calm and level.
"I do fear you, but not right now. I fear the potential you have to change, and choose to destroy us. But a simple conversation should not be held in terror."
It gave a laugh, each breath blowing her dress around.
"Such wisdom in one so young and small. I came here out if interest, to see what if this place was worth destroying or not. You, you intrigue me little human."
It lowered its head down to the ground, mere inches infront of the girl. She held out a hand, resting it on the dragons snout. It huffed out, a faint smell of smoke filling the air.
"I would ask you do not destroy my home, if I may."
It huffed again.
"I am impressed."
It withdrew its head, standing up to its full height.
"Very well, I will leave your place in peace. But I will return, and I expect you to be here."
She gave a beautiful smile, bowing her head.
"I will be."
With that it took to the air, soaring into the sky. The fair maiden returned to her village, dress wrinkled, hair a mess, and dust on her features. But to them, her beauty had only grown, having protected them from a creature beyond any they had seen before.
|
The hulking green monstrosity came to a stop in the smoking wreckage of a house. A girl stood in its path, arms outstretched, a look of pleading on her young face. An angry shout issued from deep inside the great green form, then repeated.
“Why are we stopped? Ivan, what do you see? Contact? Markov, swivel this turret!”
The gun turret atop the T-72 tank turned, making an alarming sound. The girl standing in front of the machine winced at the sound, but stood her ground.
“No Commander,” Ivan said. “There is a girl.”
The Commander muttered a series of curses then opened the hatch at the top of the tank. The air that greeted him was choked with smoke and dust. He looked around, confirming there were no enemy combatants. The tank was vulnerable while stopped here, particularly with the restricted sight lines caused by the houses. They’d been forced off route and had detoured through a residential area to get back on course. Less than an hour ago, they’d been ambushed. The unholy creatures had set a trap and managed to destroy half their unit. The creatures that looked human, but the commander knew better. His gaze fell on the girl standing in the way. She was one of them. The soulless.
“Ivan,” the Commander said, trying to keep his voice calm and give Ivan the benefit of the doubt. “She is not strapped with explosives. Do you believe she is standing on a mine?”
“No Commander,” said Ivan. “No danger present—”
“Then why are we stopped? Drive forward! Every second we spend here is a second closer to death!”
The driver’s hatch slid open and Ivan poked his head out. He turned to look up at the commander, pointing at the girl. “Please, I know this girl.”
The Commander looked at the girl, incredulous. They were deep in soulless territory. Ivan was a true-born serving in the holy cause. How could he know her? Ivan was barely more than a boy himself, who by his own admission, had never been out of the homeland. The girl was waving her arms and shouting something, but it was impossible to hear her over the tank. The headsets they wore were the only reason the commander could hear Ivan. His gaze slid back to his driver. They didn’t have time for this, but perhaps he had not understood Ivan. The Commander decided to ask for clarification before he let himself get angry.
“Be quick, how do you know her?”
Ivan tapped his pocket, “She’s famous. I follow her. She has millions of followers. She’s always posting inspirational stuff.”
The Commander stared at Ivan. The boy had just admitted to a severe breach of protocol. A protocol which was in place to prevent the very situation they were now in. The lies the soulless told were insidious. They were presented as truth and got stuck in your head, twisting you up. He would have no choice but to punish Ivan later, but he could mitigate the punishment if the boy would cooperate with him now.
“Close hatch soldier! Drive forward!”
Ivan shook his head. “Commander, please! You must listen! This girl is not soulless, and… and I’m in love with her.”
Ivan began to climb out of the tank. The Commander tried to shout him down, but the man had a resolute look on his face, and ignored his commands. The Commander drew his sidearm and shot the girl. She crumpled like a marionette that’d had its strings cut. Ivan froze, one leg still in the hatch, staring at her lifeless body.
“Do you see?” The Commander gestured at the dead shell of a girl in front of the tank. “She was soulless!” His tone softened as he remembered how young Ivan was. They’d all lost friends that day, and were tired. “She infected your mind, Ivan. If you had gone to her, she would have taken your soul.”
Ivan turned a look of fury on the Commander, reaching for his own sidearm, “YOU BASTARD!”
Before he completed the draw, the Commander shot Ivan between the eyes. He fell forward, his body spilling slowly off the front of the tank in the boneless manner of death.
The Commander heaved a deep sigh. He would need to skip sleep that night to pray for Ivan’s soul. He’d lost count of how many sleepless nights of prayer he’d spent. War was hell, but good men did what they had to do. If they didn’t, evil would win.
| 2022-09-07T13:44:33
| 2022-09-07T13:25:01
| 54
| 10
|
[WP] You are a recently hired psychiatrist at a mental hospital. Some of your patients insist that they were once staff, but are being held prisoner by the actual patients that now run the hospital.
|
Stick-thin isn’t an exaggeration for Maren Greenwich. He looks like someone had stretched his face over a skull and made the walking skeleton smile and be extra nice to everybody. So, despite his ghoulish appearance, he is the only patient to always ask about my day and even save me some chocolate pudding from lunch. He is quite the sweetheart. Except to the cook. He hates the cook. Every day, the cook comes to his room to offer him his meal and every day, as soon as the man turns, he rushes over to the bathroom and purges himself of it. Smiling of course.
I’m told the two have history, but when I ask Maren about it, his eyes go wide and his smile grows so far I’m afraid he’ll pull a muscle. Once, he actually did. And still he smiled, wincing in pain, but still smiling. My professional stance, as a psychiatrist, is that his smile is his shield and sword. It protects him in the illusion of happiness and spites some unknown force, desperate to make him unhappy. It’s very common among patients like him—to believe that someone or something is out to get him and that’s why Maren Greenwich smiles so much, to beat whatever that is at its own game.
However, my personal stance differs. I once saw him stub a toe and his lips dipped for just a second. When he realized, his eyes widened and he redoubled his efforts to smile. That was when he pulled a muscle. I begged him to stop smiling. He refused. In the end, we had to put him under to stop himself from tearing his cheek muscles.
There is a desperation in the way Maren Greenwich smiles. Seething, bubbling, boiling, like a volcano waiting to blow and as soon as those lips collapse, I know the destruction will come. Though I suppose, that’s why he’s here. That’s why I’m here too. To save him.
“Maren,” I say and yawn. My breath catches. How did I let the yawn escape me? Smoothly, I say “How is your day?” as if I hadn’t just yawned in his face.
He looks around us and then at me, studying my face. For a second, I believe that I’ve also left some spinach in my teeth. Then, I realized that I skipped lunch. Perhaps hanging around Maren so much has rubbed off on me.
“You have bags, doc,” he tells me.
I look on the ground and find none. My pen hovers over my pad, ready to scribble *delusional*, when I ask, “tell me more about these bags you see.”
“No, not like that.” He shakes his head manically. “Under your eyes.”
I brush my eyes with fingertips. Wipe powder sticks to my finger. I had thought my makeup good enough to hide my fatigue, but clearly not. “That’s very observant of you.”
“I used to have the same, back when I was sitting in that chair.” His smile dwindle and his eyes glaze over.
I take note. With Maren, reading facial expressions change. The dwindle of a smile isn’t actually him growing sadder, but him managing a real, but feinter grin. His cheek-to-cheek smile is his frown.
“And what did you do in this seat?” I ask, playing into his fantasy.
“Exactly what you’re doing. Helping. Counseling. Prescribing.” He angles his chin up, thinking. “Starving. Not sleeping. Dying.”
My pen flies through the legal pad. “Mmhmm,” I hum without looking up. “And how did you end up where you are, here?”
Five bony fingers latch onto my wrist and I nearly drop my pen in fright. His fingernails are like talons, digging into my flesh. I look up and breath sticks in my throat, too afraid to emerge. He is no longer smiling.
“I’m here because I’m not dead, yet,” he whispers. “Write on your pad that I’m happy. As long as I haven’t become as miserable as I made them, they won’t kill me.”
“Okay,” I say in breathless voice.
With a nod, his smile slowly returns and with it, the usual Maren, back on the couch, talking about his day and how wonderful life is. “You won’t believe how tasty the pudding was in the cafeteria today, doc,” he says, almost singing the words. “I should’ve saved you some. You know? Next time I will.”
I nod—more a twitch than a nod—and look down to write my notes. My eyes catch a scribble on the side of my page and my brow furrows. Maren looks at me, calm, content, smiling. “What is it, doc?”
Patients here have no personal possessions. It was too easy for them to hurt themselves with one. So they had no toothbrush to sharpen, blankets to tie around themselves, or even pencils. Except, Maren apparently, who in the time he had grabbed my wrist, had also scribbled into my pad a single command.
Run.
---
/r/jraywang
|
"So, this will hurt only a bit," I said with a quiet voice, as I was putting the needle into his arm.
"They want me to stay quiet, huh?" asked Jamison from me.
"What are you talking to me this time, Jamison?" I asked him.
"You know very well. I am actually staff member. They are holding me here as a prisoner. You need to help us. It is not just me, its all of us. We are all prisoners."
I sighed.
"I will secretly notify superiors, don't worry!" I said and patted on his shoulder and left.
"You are mocking me... It will be soon too late!" she shouted at me as I left.
Every single person, similar story. I went for the final patient, with the same medicine. It was very suspicious that all of them required the same drug. I guess it is just something what calms them all down.
"Hello, Ned. How are you doing today?" I asked as I entered.
Ned didn't respond and was just sitting in his chair, looking out of the window.
"You aren't very talkative, I see," I responded as I took the medicine. I was actually happy that one of them was quiet and didn't start talking about that certain topic.
"Does it matter? You will soon join us anyway." He said.
"What?" I asked.
"They will not let any newcomer stay here for a long time. First, they drive you crazy and then they will lock you down," the man said.
"And why do you think that?" I asked while pushing the needle into his vein.
"Because I was the last one," my hand reacted to it a bit, but not noticeably.
"All done. Make sure to have some sleep, alright?" I say with a fake smile.
Ned says nothing and keeps watching out of the window. I exit the room and walk straight into my staff room. Every single person had told me the same story. It was crazy and spooky.
"Boooh!" suddenly Kelley came in front of me, as I was entering the staff room.
"Ahhhh. Shit, Kelley, don't do that," I felt how my heart skipped a beat.
"I am sorry, you just were so out of place," she said with a smile. Prettiest woman in the hospital. Too bad, I had already a wife.
"So, you are staying overnight?" I asked.
"Yeah, and John."
"You know, how did all these guys manage to get the conspiracy going?" I suddenly asked. Kelley increased her eyebrow height.
"You know, them being staff and all of you being the real patients?" I said just in case. I mean, it is logical that they might make up so many stories, that she didn't know which one. But it made no sense, that they ever could get together to decide on the same story.
She just stared at me, and that was unpleasant.
"You shouldn't take what they say seriously," she responded, staring at me.
"Of course I won't take it seriously? I am just int-"
"They- are- crazy- after- all," she said with really weird spacing and with a long smile.
"Ookay," I said with a long voice and went to my desk, to put stuff into my bag.
"Do you wanna go out sometimes?" she suddenly asked.
"Oh," it was obvious flirting. "I am married, so I have a wife waiting at home." Plus, it was too weird right now to accept either way.
She kept staring at me. Instead of the usual *I am sorry* reaction, she just smiled.
"What?" I asked.
"Ah, nothing, nothing."
"Either way, I'll be going, see you tomorrow!" I left the room and could feel the stare on my back. I almost could have heard a *'not for long'* from her. As I left the building, I discovered I had left my gloves back in the staff room. I turned around and went back. As I entered the hallway leading to the staff room, I could hear screams from a distance. I stepped slowly closer to it, still planning to go to the staff room, hearing: "YOU WON'T SPEAK OF IT AGAIN!" It was a woman voice.
"Nope," I whispered, turned around and knew that this was the moment when I should get the fuck out of here. No person in the right mind should investigate anything. As I turned around, John stared at me.
"Hi, Mihail," he said. "Leaving?" he asked.
"Yeah," I responded.
"Why you came back though?" he asked.
"Ah, I forgot my gloves," I said while feeling shivers.
"Ah, I think I saw them on your table. I'll get them for you."
He left and came soon back and gave me gloves. I was impressed I managed to wait for him to return.
"Thank you?" I said.
"I'll see you tomorrow," he said with a smile.
I turned around, left the building and as soon as I got around the corner and wasn't visible, I ran. I knew that I am not going back and that I am going to quit. I think I have never gone home as fast as I did today.
As I arrived home, my wife was cooking in the kitchen. I quickly went there and confirmed that she was still there. It felt like it was in the horror movie. It was indeed her, my very own Jaina.
"I missed you so much," I said and kissed her on the cheek.
"What happened, it seems like you saw a ghost," she said with a smile, still cooking.
"Today work at the mental hospital was really intense. I think I am gonna quit from that place," I said and took off my jacket.
"What mental hospital?" she asked and stopped cooking for a moment.
"What?"
She turned around, looked at me all confused.
"Mihail, you have been working as a programmer for past 20 years. What are you talking about?"
----
/r/ElvenWrites horror :O
| 2017-11-30T13:55:26
| 2017-11-30T13:20:03
| 3,104
| 132
|
[WP] The finale of international chess tournament takes place. Two grandmasters sit in front of each other in ultimate showdown. The thing is nobody knows that both of them got here by cheating. First is a mind reader and second one has an ability to see the future.
|
I was surprised to find out, after I had been doing this for a while, that matches against chess grandmasters were so much *easier*.
You see, one of the talents of strategic geniuses - be it in chess, go, or even war - is their ability to constantly ask themselves "How do I lose?" Seeing paths to victory is (relatively) easy; the ability to see - and *avoid* \- paths to defeat is what makes the great ones truly great.
My early matches against amateurs were tense, nervous affairs. While I could see what they were planning, my ability to construct a defense was often lacking. I lost several matches simply because I was ignorant of the proper, relatively simple, defense against a particular gambit. As long as their tactics were solid, I had a real chance of losing.
My first match against a highly ranked opponent, however, was a breeze. I effortlessly countered every move Joaquin Contreras made. It was easy, seeing as he did all the heavy lifting for me. I watched him evaluate the weaknesses in his own schemes as he considered his next moves. Then, when my turn came, I would watch the intricate latticework of his plans collapse as I confidently slid my bishop across the board.
After that, my rise through the ranks was assured. When I made Yogini Kanthi resign after twelve moves and drove Ivan Markov into a nervous breakdown forty minutes into a match, I figured I needed to tone it down a bit. Otherwise, life was pretty good.
Until *this* guy came along. Some Chinese prodigy. He doesn’t plan *anything*. I have no idea how to keep up with him. He just cycles through potential moves until he finds one that he likes. It is absolutely infuriating! It’s like he’s making it up as he goes!
Wait...
Ho...ly...shit. This asshole can see the future! Not very far, it looks like, but...yes, he is visualizing the end result of every move he considers.
Fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuck**fuck**.
I am so screwed. What the hell can I do? He’s cheating (technically), but so am I (technically). Not like I can call him out on it. How do you prove that someone can see the future?
I try to get a read on one of the spectators. There are a few excellent players watching the match, but I can’t keep focus on any one. Too far away.
No. No! I feel the rage boil up in me. I will **not** lose to some random-
He resigns, a mixture of fear and disgust on his face. Murmurs of confusion ripple through the onlookers; apparently, he had the match well in hand. In his mind, I glimpse an image: me standing over his bloodied body.
A win is a win, I guess.
|
"If you can receive this message, then please open with the king side knight's pawn."
Maki looked up at Akane. Maki had eavesdropped on Akane's mind and was surprised to hear such a crystal clear thought. There was no noise, not even any personality except the lack thereof. This thought was rehearsed. Rehearsed to a precision that suggested that Akane knew the answer. Besides, Maki guessed that revealing that could only worsen Akane's game: she'd be worried about her own thoughts while playing the game.
Maki moved the pawn on her right toward the center of the board, placing it with a crisp clack against the board as she seemed to vie for indirect central control with the fianchetto.
"Good, I'll have you know that I don't want to lose this game until I know why you used your trick to get here."
Akane's thought was quite crisp until the idea of trick had had to surface. That word seemed double edged. It seemed as if Akane was hiding a trick of her own.
Unfortunately, Maki could only read Akane's mind, not write into it, so it was no easy matter to tell Akane why. Not that Maki was interested in doing that at all: she didn't want to reveal who had hired her to sneak through the minds of the chess grandmasters.
Looking at Akane again, Maki read a thought: "king pawn up." Maki stole a glance at her advanced pawn, noting that if she put her bishop behind it, that bishop would be quite powerful. And that king side pawn would be useless. Maki rarely had to think about what others thought, but a situation where she might have to would come up, it seemed.
Akane advanced her queen side pawn.
"So why is it that I'm facing a cheat?" Akane asked with her mind. Maki decided to push on: even Akane would falter eventually. Akane didn't know everything that was about to happen, so some move would make her have to think.
Or did she know every move?
Maki moved her bishop up, attacking Akane's pawn. The pawn that made Maki regret answering truthfully. Without a hesitation, Akane brought her knight up, defending the pawn.
"I wouldn't castle if I were you," Akane thought to Maki. But Maki couldn't tell if that was a lie. She decided that her queen side pawn was more important in any case, so brought it up to face Akane's.
"Ah, good. So you're believing what you eavesdrop," Akane thought. This was a vague thought. It had an air of achievement in it. Akane was thinking she had won." This could be good," Maki thought.
However, the thoughts coming from Akane didn't repeat themselves like a scripted announcement. Instead, for once, they became more organic. The forms started to loose abstraction and gain subjectivity.
There was a figure. The environment was white, like a quiet abstract white, while the figure was black. It was a nebulous presence, shrouded in mystery. But it was Akane's silhouette.
Suddenly, the environment in Akane's mind's eye darkened and gained reality. It was a bedroom and sunlight was streaming in. Before Maki could ascertain details of the bed, the mind's eye moved into the first person. These were memories. The thought was a representation of... waking up?
The first person in the thoughts wrote on a piece of paper. "Maki mind reader, will learn own power."
Maki gasped. Akane smiled, and then moved her queen side knight to attack Maki's pawn. "How much of what I know do you think I'll reveal to you?" Akane's thought rang into Maki's mind.
| 2021-03-16T22:47:54
| 2021-03-16T21:58:46
| 90
| 31
|
[WP] "Whatever happened to that nice girl/guy you used to be with?" Your family asks you. Upon discussion, you realize that they and everyone you know has vivid memories of this person but you.
Did you lose your memory? Was this person ever real? What's goin' on?
|
Thanksgiving has always been a big deal. Always. It almost feels like I could describe the embodied feeling of a hundred Thanksgiving within my family, the way the traditions are so well established, though that may be impossible given that I'm only 22.
Everyone in my family gathered, numbering well into the 70s, if you count the newborns and my cousin Gina's new husband. The food took up the entirety of Gran's giant kitchen table, along with all the counter space, and despite of the sheer amount of food, we still manage to keep an orderly line thanks to Aunt Lora's stern warnings of "skipping the line and ruinin' the ahrda o' things," her Boston accent only seeming to shine through when she's feeling important.
Wait, not Aunt Lora, that's Aunt Cindy who has the accent, Aunt Lora is from Russelville, Arkansas, same as most of us. Why was I thinking that?
I'm determined to get as much food on the plate at once, ignoring warnings from others about looking like a pig, or not taking all the candied yams. This technique allows me to only have to get up from my seat once. You get a large plate of savory foods, then go up for a large plate of desserts. With more than 70 people here, there are a limited number of seats, so you have to hold on to one if you get one. Hence, my method of loading the plate.
I don't remember Gran having plastic plates like the one I'm currently holding, nor the plastic cups at the end of the counter. As I ponder this notion of Gran updating from styrofoam plates to plastic ones, I'm pulled back into reality by someone tapping me on the shoulder and saying, for maybe the third or fourth time, "I said, whatever happened to Sarah?" He's a distant cousin, and I can't remember if his name is is Mike or Micah. I'll ask dad later. Where did he go, anyways? I swear he was just here with mom. I notice there is a significant gap in front of me since I've spent too long ladling gravy over my entire plate.
"Who?" I ask, picking up a roll, tearing it open, putting some turkey and potatoes into it, dipping it into gravy, then taking a bite before placing it back on my tray next to my plate. Wait, Gran got trays too?
"Stop eating yah food while yah in line!" reprimands Aunt what's-her-face. Some ham, that's all i'm missing right now.
"Sarah, you know, from a while ago. I met her last year. Were you two not serious? I figured you were since you brought her to the family Thanksgiving."
The confused look on my face must have been evident because Aunt Sheila pipes in, her hair-sprayed up-do not seeming to move independently from her head. "Sarah Matthews, Chris. You brought her here 3 years in a row. Red head, your skydiving buddy, about to finish nursing school...you know...that Sarah."
She gives me a courtesy laugh, as if I'm letting a stupid joke go on for too long, and we find seats in the sunroom, where the kids usually sit. Aunt Sheila always sits out here with the kids, and always makes a joke about still not being an adult, and this year, she will not fail us in that regard.
"You know, maybe someday they'll let me sit at the grownup's table!" she giggles, her hair perfectly matted to her head. She's told this joke for who knows how long, and it's become meshed with tradition.
"Do you need another seat for the Red Queen?" bellows Uncle Jim, my grandpa's brother who has, for as long as i can remember, had a cavity in his front tooth big enough to see from across the room and laughs after every single sentence he yells.
"Chris is pretending to not know who Sarah is, Jim," says Sheila, gravy spilling onto her lap.
"Is this an inside joke, or did you guys call it quits? I thought you was gonna get married!" Somehow the "r" sound in that last word seems to drag on for a full three seconds before Jim roars with laughter.
I eat my dinner in relative silence, only really engaging in conversation with the old men about how good the Cowboys were going to do this year, then playing some games with the younger kids outside. The cold, or maybe the turkey makes me feel incredibly tired. Seems like I always feel cold lately.
I put on a coat and decide to go for a walk along the trails winding through the woods behind Gran and Grandpa's old brick house. Leaves scuttle across the ground and collect on one side of the path, courtesy of a stiff eastern wind. Something felt strange about today. maybe the food tasted different, but it was the people who just seemed...off.
The whispers, the looks of surprise and halted conversations when i walked into a room...what was that all about? It was as if--
That was when I saw her.
Sitting on the bench next to the pond, she was reading a book. My movement caught her eye, and as her green eyes met mine, a lock of hair fell off of its perch on her ear and covered one eye. She smiled as she brushed the hair back and returned it to her left ear. "Oh my god, you look like an angel!" I heard myself say.
As she blushed I realized what I had just said, and, as the embarrassment swept over me, it made my eyes water. I was instantly in love and felt like I was blowing my chances. In my mind I always felt so smooth and casual, but right now all I could manage was, "Oh, jeeze, I'm so sorry...you're just...um...you look beautiful....um...I'm Chris, what's your name?"
A wave of something--maybe it was terror, maybe relief--came over me as she said, "My name is Sarah, Mr. Maloney."
Still watering, my head reeled as I brought my hands to my eyes to clear the tears. "What is going on here?" I wondered as my vision returned.
That previous feeling now confirmed itself as a wave of terror as I looked from this beautiful young woman to my surroundings: Tile floor, concrete walls, fluorescent lights, and old people. Something seemed almost right, though, but what exactly was--the plate and tray next to Sarah on the bench! But clearly printed on the tray was something I didn't expect: "Property of White Oaks Retirement Community."
Confusion once again evident, I asked Sarah, "What's going on? How old am I?"
A patient look came over her almost smiling face as she told me, "You're 89 years old, Mr. Maloney, you've been here at White Oaks for almost seven years, I've been your nurse for three years, and it's about time to take your dementia medicine. Let's get that knocked out, then we can go outside and play some shuffleboard with the younger folks! Your team is doing well in this week's tournament!"
The last sentence is punctuated with a brilliant smile and a sparkle in her eyes, and it calms me considerably.
The way she smiles makes me think about the days when I was younger. In fact, I actually got quite serious with a red headed girl in my 20s. I think her name was Sarah. Yes, that's right, Sarah Matthews. I even brought her home to Thanksgiving once.
And let me tell you, Thanksgiving has always been a big deal. Always.
|
"Who?" Tom asked. The whole table went quiet. The cousins stopped bickering amongst each other and dad stopped chattering about how his fantasy football team was wrecking shit.
Aunt Georgina sat across from him, lips marked an eerie red from the wine she had been sipping on. She took another slow sip and asked again.
"Julie? You know, that wonderful girl that you brought over to last year's family Thanksgiving?" She asked, normally white teeth now looking a dull red.
She sat her glass down, nearly tipping it over onto her plate of sliced turkey and mashed potatoes. Uncle Red placed a hand onto her shoulder to steady her and whispered something into her ear. She shook him off and reached for her wine glass again, but he put a firm hand on hers and pushed it down to the table. It was typical Aunt Georgina, she couldn't stop drinking long enough to enjoy a decent Thanksgiving meal with the family.
"Yeah, son, Julie, whatever happened to her?"
Tom looked to his mom; she was sitting at the end of the table, eyes locked intently on her son.
"I, uhh, are we playing a game or something?" Tom said lowly, nodding an eyebrow towards Aunt Georgina who was now slumped in her chair.
"No, we aren't playing anything, where's Julie?" His mother asked again, now leaning forward in her chair. The cross necklace she was wearing was dangling over her plate, threatening to drown the little metal Jesus in a sea of brown gravy.
Tom looked around the dinner table, wondering what the hell was going on.
Aunt Georgina twitched to life and sat forward in her table like those animatronic creatures that live at Chuckie Cheeses. "Julie!" She screamed. Her mouth stretched in a wide grimace, lips and teeth both stained red. A string of drool hung from the corners of her lips. "What the **FUCK** did you do to Julie?"
Tom stood from his chair, knees knocking into the table, shaking it violently. Everyone's wine glass tipped over, covering the white table in a sea of red fluid.
And there, there was where he saw Julie, chopped to pieces and spread out amongst all of the rest of the dinner: severed hand resting in the mashed potatoes, a breast sitting in the bowl of green beans (left breast judging from the birthmark below the nipple), and other miscellaneous body parts were scattered about. Her head was resting side-by-side with the turkey, mouth open with lips and teeth stained red with blood.
"What, the FUCK?" Tom yelled.
The front door kicked in and several men rushed in. Tom turned to look at them, but didn't get a chance to see them. They tackled him to the ground as the rest of the family just sat at the table. He felt a surge of pain blast into his back, and then all his limbs were jerking. He seized into unconsciousness.
__________________________________________________________
"I'm sorry Mrs. Gordon, but this was expected."
"I know."
"But there did appear to be some progress. We took note of the slight recognition he had in his face as he was looking at the table."
"It looked like he was seeing something."
"Indeed. That is progress."
"When do you want to do this again?"
"Let's give it a week, we don't want to stress him too much. At this rate though, we're sure to have a breakthrough."
"Yes?"
"Yes, but please understand, I am in no way promising of getting your son back to the way he was before the incident."
"I understand."
"And Mrs. Gordon?"
"Yes?"
"Please, don't bring your sister again if she is going to be blitzed drunk."
"I know."
| 2014-06-14T06:52:06
| 2014-06-14T06:27:39
| 173
| 25
|
[WP] You, an all-powerful villain, managed to defeat the child of prophecy. The problem is he's literally a child. You now turn your eyes towards the gods who sent the poor soul against you.
|
“Put down your weapon boy.”
Before my throne was a human boy. Armor two sizes too big to him and a sword he can’t even get a grip on. He was shaking so much, both his armor and his teeth were clattering. Tears seems endless as it poor out of the child’s eyes. And this boy was to be the “child of prophecy” that will slay me.
Damn those gods, either their desperation have given them false pride or delusions. Sending a boy who don’t even have a hair on his chin to kill me! Me, who drowned the whole world into the sea of chaos! Me, who made the earth choke from the blood of my enemies! ME, WHO SLAUGHTERED THE ELDEST ONES IN A SINGLE DAY!
I slammed my fist onto the arm of my throne, making a spiderweb of cracks where my fist impacted. The boy let out a fearful scream and he drop the sword as if it was burning him. I sighed, dragging my hand across my face. That wasn’t for him but he still took it as it was. This wasn’t the hero that was supposed to kill him.
I wanted the hero to see all of the atrocities I have committed but not allow it to harden his heart. Despite the cruel world I made that he lives him, he would treat friend and foe with the same respect and kindness not only in life but in death. I wanted a pure-heart human to kill me, not a snot-faced boy.
I rose from my throne and made my way to the boy. For me it was a few seconds but judging by the fear on his face it was eons for him. I reach out for the boy. Instead of killing him like he thought I would, I reached for his sword and examined it. This sword was blessed by Aversh but these blessing are weak. I should know, I broke her strongest. Balling my hand into a fist, the sword shattered in my grasp. The boy gasped as he saw it.
I looked down at the boy. “How old are you boy?” He didn’t respond. His vacant eyes stared back at me. I spoke louder. “YOUR AGE, BOY?” That snap him out of it. “Ni-Nine.” He stuttered. Nine, huh. He will need years to became the hero I desire. But first he will need a proper sword.
I clenched my fist and allowed my magic to do the rest. I swung, my magic forming a sword in my grasp. The design was simple but the sword blade was formed like dragon scales and was darker than night itself and the hilt was the color of blood. I looked at it, such a sword wouldn’t be fit for a hero of prophecy. Thinking of goodness in my mind I reformed the sword. Gone was darker blade and the blood hilt, now the sword just glow a gentle soft gold. One swipe could cut grimmore’s feathers like butter.
Perfect.
I handed him the sword, confusion overtaking fear as he took it from me. He looked at the sword than look back at me. He opened his mouth to say ‘why?’ I responded “In 25 years time, I will expect you to use that sword to kill and I will kill you in turn. Now you leave and become a hero worthy of me. Such is your fate.” I turning my back to the boy and started to walk back to my throne when his voice stopped me.
“I thought you are evil, th-that’s what they told me, so why aren’t you killing me?” I didn’t need a lot of time to answer. It come easy to me. “Back when I was human, in my youth. I heard stories of a hero’s glory. I heard everything under the sun. Unlike your gods boy, I know what a true Hero is.” With that I snapped my fingers and teleported the boy to the farthest resistance camp. That should give him enough opportunities to grow strong.
I sat back on my throne with a sigh. Dealing with children wasn’t never my strong suit.
25 years until the boy becomes a man and slays me. 25 years until Good wins over Evil. But now I need to kill who ever thought it would be a good idea to sent a Nine year old after me. I sighed again, I can’t get a break around here.
At least the end is in sight now.
|
"What the fuck"
"Sorceress, we've been ex-"
"*What. The. Fuck.*"
"Your monstrous end had to come at so-"
"Don't.. You dare. Speak to me with that tone. You have no moral high ground here. A child, you sent to kill me, a child." She said gesturing to the boy sobbing in the arms of one of her assistants, Throg, scraggly dwarven man, not the smartest but unmatched in decor and a heart of gold. "What do you have to say to me in your defense?"
"Excuse us, we overestimated the literacy of farmers."
Her fingers itched and crackled with primordial energy, she could kill them all if she wanted to "You have my attention"
"We do not control the ebb and flow of the universe any more than you, we merely try and often fail to act as its voice. What we know is that your paths are intertwined and that there was no later date to bring you together. What we know is what we wrote of: A child of prophecy to conquer the known world, a child of prophecy to lead it. What we know is why you would refuse to kill the boy." She looked at the axe in her hand, it was so small, how could one be so stupid to rely on a trinket like this to kill the most powerful sorceress the world has ever known? Only one has ever come close, Lily, her battering ram, her strength and simple manner of speech expertly masked an acute understanding of prophecy, she would have understood what the gods were saying.
"You employ and deploy a simple farmboy to end my reign and now you torment me with these memories, why? What is this meant to accomplish?"
"A reminder."
Her thoughts returned to Lily, they found each other in a prison camp, one as a guard, one as an inmate. It was a shock at first, the guard has never seen one before, but Lily explained the plight on her people and her unique appearance being due to the forced extinction of her culture and traditions, a vile act committed by the guard's own employers. It took time and research and questioning but Lily's words carried more and more weight with every entry, every passing comment. It was a violent night, she still flinches at the memory of the atrocities she committed. For 10 years they travelled together, leaving retribution in their wake everywhere they went, at whatever cost. The allies they gathered and the skeletons they made founded the world they all now tread upon, Lily was always the more effective talker, speaking of creating a better world than the one they found themselves in. She turned her attention toward the boy once again, his eyes, bloodshot, still watery, green, innocent, familiar. "He's a farm hand, what does he know of managing trade and border disputes?"
"Only what he is taught"
The words stung in her ears, they'd been spat at her enough times by the arcane scholars she tried and often failed to learn from. She gently set the axe aside and approached him, slowly, gingerly, and as she did he recoiled. "I will not hurt you," She insisted, "I refuse to hurt you." she reassured. "You stood against insurmountable odds, you already tread farther and overcame more than any other would dare or bother. In time you will rule in my place, but first I must teach you how."
Pleased, the gods one by one faded away, the prophecy was nearly complete.
| 2021-02-21T23:22:54
| 2021-02-21T20:02:07
| 38
| 18
|
[WP] Your 6 year old daughter is laying on her bed, terrified. She says there’s a monster under her bed. To reassure her, you lay on the ground and check underneath, only to find your daughter, quivering. She whispers, “Daddy, there’s something on top of my bed...”
|
I stifle a yawn as I slowly open the door to Jemma's room. A tired smile worms its way onto my face at the sight of her tiny fingers curled over the sheet pulled over her head.
"Jemma," I whisper, "Why are you under your sheets?"
She's silent for a moment, but shakily lowers her blanket, "Daddy...something's under my bed." She fearfully whimpers.
A small sigh escapes my lips, "Are you sure it isn't Mrs. W?"
She quickly shakes her head, darting a hand under her blanket and showing me her stuffed seal.
I hold up my hands, "Alright, alright. I'll check it out."
I walk to her bed, kneeling down. Just then, she harshly whispers, "You won't see anything with the lights off!"
I roll my eyes, but reach out, flicking my hand and turning the lights on.
Then, something moved deeper under my daughter's bed.
I immediately dropped to my knees, recoiling at the sight of my daughter laying face-down on the floor, "Daddy, something's on my bed!" she says.
I sit-up, mind reeling.
"*AH!* Daddy, the closet!" my daughter, the one on the bed, shrieked.
Whirling around, I wrench the closet open.
"Daddy!" yet another version of my daughter exclaims underneath a pile of laundry.
Just then, it clicks, and I can't help but throw my head back, laughing.
"Daddy?" my daughter asks in reverb.
Instead of replying verbally, I snap my finger, and a chair floats in from the hall. Another snap, and my daughter's bed moves back a few feet, revealing the one hiding under the bed.
My daughters scream as they catch sight of one another, though it only lasts for a moment, after which they instead stare at each other confusedly.
"Jemma, the one on the bed," I clarify, "Do me a favor, tap the one beneath you on the shoulder."
Jemma-on-the-bed and Jemma-under-the-bed stare at me uncertainly, but then the one on top shrugs and does as asked. She then yelped as Jemma-under-the-bed disappears in a dull, red light.
Jemma-from-the-closet stared wide-eyed at the display, "What was that?"
"That, would be your power, sweetheart."
Two pairs of eyes lit up in excitement, "Really?!" They exclaim.
I smile widely, ruffling the hair on both their heads, "Yup. Now, why don't we all go downstairs and wait for Mommy, tell her the news?"
They both bob their heads, rushing for the door. However, Jemma-from-the-bed jumps back when she accidentally grabbs Jemma-from-the-closet by the shoulder, making her disappear in a flash of light.
Jemma looks over her shoulder sheepishly. I just shake my head, standing up, "Don't worry, accidents like that will happen. Let me tell you about when I first awakened *my* powers. I still don't think you're aunt ever forgave me for it."
|
It wasn’t supposed to end like this.
I had tried to keep my daughter away from the monsters who followed me. The spirits that came in the night. Those that were destined to haunt my kind for all eternity. Now that the worst had happened, it was clear that I should have surrendered to them long ago.
Perhaps then they would have left her alone. Perhaps they wouldn’t have discovered what she truly was.
The formless monsters lurked in the shadows and flew upon the winds. They fit through even the smallest gaps, their shapeless bodies sliding through like black slime. It didn’t matter where we ran; nowhere was ever safe. At least, not for long. I should have remembered that.
However, they had grown wise, staying away for months at a time before striking. I had always been ready. But it had been four years since their last attempt, and I had grown soft. I had forgotten what my father had taught me and what his father had taught him.
I reached for my daughter’s translucent hand and gripped it in my own. Her spirit was limited outside of her body, weak from the fight that had forced it out. It was only the touch of the Dark-Blood that kept her from spiraling upwards to the land beyond.
“I’m sorry,” I said softly.
A heartbeat later, I was thrown into the bedroom wall. The shadow who had taken my daughter’s body rose from the bed like a serpent as I staggered to my feet.
The monster's presence had turned my daughter’s blonde hair a frigid white and had filled her eyes with black ink. The shadow stumbled towards me with a disjointed smile on its adopted face, still adjusting to new legs.
“A half-breed,” the shadow hissed. “What have you done, Tal?”
I cringed as blood began to pour from the corners of the child’s eyes. I knew I couldn’t fight her, even though it was no longer my daughter. It didn’t matter. I deserved to die.
The shadow fell to its knees upon its next step. Wait. Something was wrong.
I watched in bewilderment as the shadow was pulled from its host and the small, empty body became washed in light. Only it was no longer empty.
My daughter observed me in shock. “Daddy … what just happened?”
____
[r/creatorcorvin] (https://www.reddit.com/r/creatorcorvin/) for more stories.
| 2018-04-30T15:45:09
| 2018-04-30T14:00:25
| 21
| 13
|
[WP] You order a pizza.
Mods want more simple prompts?
|
Dr. Seuss style
---
A pizza please, with extra cheese.
With honey bees and anchovies.
Bring it from your place to mine.
Bring it quickly, right on time.
---
In a box?
Yes, in a box.
With a knock?
Use the bell.
The bell?
On the door.
What floor?
There's only one, no more.
---
Waiting, sitting, window looking.
Hungry, starving, pizza cooking.
A car?
Drove by.
A bus?
Wrong guy.
Airplane?
Well they fly.
---
Airplane!
On the road?
Yes, it is landing!
That's outstanding!
But what about the pizza man?
Indeed he'll need a parking plan.
The airplane took up all the spots.
He'll have to ride a pedal-flot.
What's that?
A flot? A flotaroo.
Like the flotskies at the zoo?
It is like that, a flotaroo, it carries things from me to you.
---
Oh I see! And look who's here!
The pizza man!
I'm afraid not.
The mail man?
No.
The milk man?
Nay.
Well who?
It's Jenny! I think she just wants some kisses!
|
*DING DONG*
He awoke from the faint odor of grease, and the obtrusive sound of the bell. He saw a pizza box holding the door ajar to his apartment, the faint smell of grease and pepperoni steaming from the box. He retrieived the box from its placement and peered out the door; to his dismay, nobody seemed to be there. With a shrug and pizza box in hand, he strode to the table in his apartment and gently placed the box of pizza onto the surface. He quickly jumped back into his computer chair, pulling his pants to his ankles and began to vehemently stroke his pulsating member, blood gushing to the tip of his erect penis. He finally found photographs of a perfectly good specimen on R/gonewild and wanted to satisfy his hunger not only for pizza, but his sexual desire. He opened the pizza box with his other hand, so that he could use the grease to properly lube his member. As he reached into the box, he felt a weird painful sensation on his fingers, almost like a bite. He turned around and his hand was covered in what he thought must have been pizza sauce- but this was a much richer and deeper color- it was red. And the pizza was no ordinary pizza, but a monster pizza and it had bitten his fingers off.
| 2015-02-05T04:26:59
| 2015-02-05T01:02:42
| 117
| 10
|
[WP] For the first time ever, a person is born with a genuine superpower. They proceed to live out their entire life without noticing or realizing it.
|
Music was the source of Isaac’s power. His mind could absorb the sinusoidal waveforms and extrapolate from them how the universe was woven. Listening to Wagner or Nine Inch Nails he could fundamentally understand the chaos of human motivation and conflict. Listening to Vivaldi he understood why the flowers bloomed and had a telepathic connection to the bees seeking them out.
He had glimpses of his power when he was young, in his middle school chorus class. Hearing Jeannie Elmin’s solo during a practice one day, his mind linked to hers though her voice and he instantly knew all of her thoughts, memories, dreams and future.
That’s how he found out that she didn’t think he was cute. She liked that stupid asshole Dave Merinich instead. He knew, not knowing exactly how he knew, that she would eventually marry Dave. They would never amount to much, and she would be miserable working a gas station in her 40’s because Dave could never hold down a job. Isaac assumed this was just a revenge fantasy since he had no reason to think otherwise.
In college he found that he could study so much more easily with a little bit of background music. It didn’t matter what kind of music – he liked them all. With a Lady Gaga playing, he could memorize his entire organic chemistry textbook in minutes, absorbing the knowledge directly from the pages through the harmonics of “Born This Way”. A lot of people like to listen to music when they study, so he didn’t think this was unusual. He did very well in school.
Many years later when as a surgeon, he insisted on having Shostakovich’s symphonies played, in order, during all of his procedures on the old CD player he kept in the OR for that purpose. It helped him concentrate he said, and no one objected since all of his operations went flawlessly year after year after year. He’s a talented surgeon, and no one wanted to mess with a formula that always worked.
Retirement seemed to last forever for Isaac. Time seemed to stop while he laid on his couch listening to Beethoven, imagining what the cardinals singing outside his window might be thinking, not knowing that he was reading their minds through their songs. Each day felt like it took a thousand years to pass, as his command over the universe forced time itself to slow to a crawl.
|
For Francis, the good had always gone hand-in-hand with the bad. He had spent his life trying his best to be a good person, or at least what he believed would be a good person. He realized now that he wasn't really sure anymore.
When his mother left his dad, Francis had chosen to stay with him. His friends had all told him he was smart to stay with the rich parent, but that hadn't been the reason, had it? At the time, he had told himself that his father needed him more. He did. Dad had been really bad at taking care of himself. Without his mother, someone had to be there to deal with dad when he was lonely and angry and... drunk.
But that didn't matter now. A couple years of putting up with his dad, and Francis had gotten into his dream school. Even with dirt SAT scores. He probably shouldn't have gone, in retrospect. That school was way too intense for him. Four and a half hellish years that tore away at him until all that was left was a raw mess of a human being. But, at least he got a degree. A degree and Helen.
Looking back, Helen was the best thing to come out of those years. But Francis knew that to find work, he would need to move to the east coast. His dad had some connections out there, so it made for his best chances. But Helen's gramps was sick. He knew Helen was torn. It was obvious. Move out east for the boyfriend? Or move back to your small hometown to spend what ended up being the last 14 months of her grandfather's life with him? Francis couldn't force that decision on her. He did the only thing he could think of at the time. And so he moved out east alone.
Had it been worth it? He had found his dream job through one of his father's obscure connections that even his father had hardly remembered. At least it was what he had thought would be his dream job. Great starting salary, even better benefits. But his degree hadn't prepared him as well as he thought it would. The workload was more than expected as well. He ended up working long hours, longer than most of the people in the office. His personal life, what little personal life he had, began to suffer.
So here he found himself. Years later, glaring out his high-rise window with the lights of the city glaring back. He took a last swig of scotch and let the glass fall to the floor. They'd clean the mess up in the morning. His apartment, spacious and modern, was empty except for him and shadows. The shirt whose sweat-stained collar clawed at the back of his neck day after day lay discarded on the bed beside him. He hated it. He hated them. All of them. What did they have that he didn't? He had sacrificed himself his entire life to help those around him: his parents, his friends, his girlfriends, his employees. He sacrificed *everything* for them. And what did he have to show for it? A high-paying job? A nice apartment? Nothing. He had nothing. Well, at least he had this. The weight in his other hand felt even lighter than the scotch glass had as he brought it to his lips. As he opened his jaw, a final tear squeezed its way out. *click*
----------------------
Over 99% of the city's population died that day. Simultaneous heart failure. The country, the world, was swept into a panic whose effects would be felt for decades. Almost a century later, a man named Francis, classified: Subject XII, was identified as the source of the calamity. A man born with the power to manipulate fate, to make personal sacrifices and sacrifice 'pieces of his soul' to warp probability and reality around himself. A man who researchers speculated could have possessed the most powerful ability yet known. What had he used it for?
| 2014-08-08T08:55:23
| 2014-08-08T08:40:21
| 19
| 12
|
[WP] On the day you were going to propose to your girlfriend, your future self comes back in time to convince you not to. While at the same time, your future wife comes back in time to tell her past self to do anything to keep the two of you together.
I love these prompts, but I haven't had time to really read any of them. I'll get back with some feedback tomorrow before work.
|
I placed two cups of hot coffee on the table, as I sunk into my couch. The two recepients quietly took sips from their cups as my eyes took trips over their faces, studying their expressions. Their mannerisms. How they resembled.
They really were me and my wife from the future.
I rubbed my temples as i leaned onto the side of the couch.
"So Shirley..." I decided to break the ice.
"Don't call me Shirley. Its Sharlene, I changed my name. Never mind why, you will see soon enough." My future wife bluntly interrupted, earning an eye roll from the future me.
"You see what am talking about, Rob?" The future me opened his arms in defeat. It felt strange being called by my own name by myself. Or by my future self, same difference. "She is a bitch. Four weeks ago. Oops sorry, eleven years from now, now go back four weeks. She had this argument with the neighbour.."
"Oh really? Is that your go-to story everytime you wanna soil my name? How many times do I have to apologise?" Shirley retorted. Sorry, Sharlene.
"Can you just let me finish my stories? Can you?" Future me stared at his wife, as if searching for an answer. And the eye roll proved enough. "As I was saying, four weeks ago. You know what I mean right?" He shrugged his shoulders. "Sharlene over here had a slight argument with the neighbour. Our Robo-Nanny had a scuffle with their puppy when it entered our compound."
I raised my index finger pausing him mid sentence.
"You guys have Robo-Nannies eleven years from now?" My pupils danced in excitement.
"Totally man. Your...Oops." Future me drooped his jaw mid sentence realizing what he had just done.
"Keep going. You have already told him alot haven't you? Well keep fucking up." Sharlene quipped as she sipped from her cup, her gaze staring straight ahead avoiding the conversation.
I also realized what had happened. He was breaking rules by explaining future events. And this was a major one. Really major.
"Soo I went through with robotic house nanny university proje..? You know what. Never mind. Let's move along. Lets get back to the whole reason you guys came here in the first place." I let out a deep heave as I collected myself together. The excitement spasmed through my muscles. But I had to adhere to the whole time travel rule they had to follow.
"Now Sharlene. I know you wanted to talk to my girlfriend but she isn't here.. "
"Which doesn't make sense as this was the moment after you had proposed to her." She said, frowning her brows as she tried to make sense of the situation.
Future me looked worried too.
"Where is she right now?" They asked both in unison.
"She said she was meeting a mutual friend of ours, Kyle. Why?" my blood pressure level was increasing. I felt an uknown overwhelming fear to the response to that question.
We all did. And the look plastered on our faces, we all realized something had tampered with the past.
And the future was about to change. Big. Time.
|
Today marks the 4th year of my relationship with jordan, the love of my life. I sit at the outdoor patio of my go to bar. Slowly drinking my beer and taking a good drag of my stoagie. Just as I put the butt to tray I feel eyes on the back of my head. A grizzled old man sits next to me, two shots of bulleit in hand.
"Hey stranger take this with me."
I'm not one to deny free booze, especially my favorite. "Thanks.... stranger." I say while eyeing the grizzled man. Normally I'd not think twice about a stranger buying me a shot, happens all the time at the fat hippo. But something was off about him, it was like the small sign of friendliness was a red flag. I couldn't shake this feeling, besides what could one shot hurt, I had nothing to do today and it was a good day to drink. The wind whistled between our glasses as we cheers. I slammed the glass down on the bench.
"Damm good drink, haven't had it in a while."
"My favorite!" I exclaimed.
He wiped the little remains of the smelly red liquor off his beard. He looked at me from the other side of the bench. Not just any look, but a stare as if he's looking through me.
"So... what's your name... stranger?"
"Chris, and yours?"
He paused. Staring even more through me. "You OK buddy?" I asked.
"Oh yeah I'm fine. Just visiting with an old friend."
At this point I began to become slightly confused.
"Do I know you?"
he smirked gently and shook his head no.
"So...... who are you visiting?"
It was at this point his demeanor changed. It seemed like I hit a trigger or asked something I shouldn't have. He chuckled, got up from the bench and went unside. Upon his return he had to pints of delirium, again another favorite of mine.
"You have some good taste my stranger friend."
He chuckled again.
"Listen, I'm going to cut the crap. I've only got two more hours."
He looked down at his watch.
"Next week your going to need this."
He slid me an envelope. As I started opening it he grabbed my hand firmly and told me not to.
"Open it next week. Next thursday."
he left a twenty on the bench table and pounder the last of his beer. He smiled at me and said "I have to go now, I hope this helps you as much as me."
I looked down at the envelope, and as I looked up he slide out the back gate of the smoking area. At this point I was very confused. The bar tender came outside to collect any glasses that were outside. She noticed the look of awe on my face.
"Something wrong hun?"
"Uh I don't really know... have you ever served that man before?"
she said no and asked what was in the envelope. I told her the story and she snatched it from my hand. She opened it, paused, and then asked if I'd ever been married. I laughed at her. "Married? Nope and I'd never do such a silly thing."
"Well hun, these are divorce papers...... with your name and jordans."
Forgive me for formating on mobile.
| 2015-10-15T14:53:11
| 2015-10-15T14:30:29
| 49
| 21
|
[WP] 5 People are trying to lift a very heavy piece of furniture. Twist: They all want to be the person who only acts like they are lifting, and none of them are willing to admit this to one another.
|
Abe, Carl, and Brock stood in the sun, shielding their eyes as they looked down at the table on the ground. In the last 2 hours, they hadn't moved it an inch. It stood entire yards away from the door to their apartment and at this rate, it would take all night.
"Wow the table is heavy," Brock said, stretching his arms. "I've almost pulled a muscle trying to lift it."
His two friends nodded back. After all, how else could it be that three grown men couldn't lift a coffee table?
"Yeah," Carl chimed in. "I think I cracked something in my back from straining so hard."
Abe nodded in reply. "Well, this table isn't gonna lift itself. Shall we?"
The three friends cracked their knuckles, rolled their shoulders, and took their place around the table. "On three," Abe said. "One... Two..."
Brock grunted, his entire body trembling. Carl hissed out rapid breaths, his face turning red. Abe screamed.
"Holy hell," Abe said and let go, panting for breath.
"Yeah, what the hell is this table made of?" Brock asked, "I mean, I'm here lifting with all I got."
"Me too." Came the round of agreement.
Brock eyed Abe. The last time they had tried lifting the table, Abe had let loose a piercing shriek. He didn't buy it. "Abe," he said, "maybe you should try lifting with your back and get a better grip on the wood."
Abe returned him a furrowed brow. "Are you saying I'm not doing my part?"
"I'm just saying that I feel the table going up on my side, but it's dragging on yours."
"Really, I was thinking something similar."
The two stared each other down.
Abe secretly cursed himself for screeching, it hadn't been the sound he was going for, but it was the sound that came out. All there was to do now was to double down. Plus, he knew for a fact that one of the others weren't doing their part. This was a 2 man job so even if he didn't lift, they should be able to handle it. He wondered who the other slacker was. It was probably Brock, that lazy bastard.
"Guys," Carl said, holding his hands. "Look, if we all just do our part, this should be easy. On three. One... Two..."
More grunts erupted from the three friends. Their faces turned purple. Their bodies trembled.
Suddenly, Carl yelped and fell onto the ground, arching his back as his body hit the floor. "I strained so hard I threw my back!" he screamed.
Brock stared. He threw himself onto the floor by Carl. "My arms!" he screamed.
Abe suddenly understood. His mind raced for an injury to fake, but Carl and Brock had already taken the two obvious ones. With a deep breath, he clutched his chest and crumpled to the floor. "Call 911," he said through gritted teeth. "I'm having a heart attack!"
"I would but my arms don't work!" Brock responded. "I think they broke."
"I'm in too much pain to even hear you," Carl said. "I think there's something wrong with my nerves."
"Guys, I'm dying!"
"I'm dying too," Carl said. "I can't even feel my legs anymore. I think my entire spine broke in two."
"My arms are turning blue," Brock shouted. "I'm bleeding internally! I don't think I'll make it."
"My heart attack!" Abe shrieked. "Its triggering cancer throughout my body!"
---
Melanie peeked through her blinds at three young adults writhing in the grass next to a coffee table she could move herself. They screamed and moaned.
She sighed and closed her blinds. "Fucking college kids."
---
/r/jraywang for more stories!
|
"Alright, one.. two.. three!"
Nothing happened.
"Sorry, were we supposed to do a one-two-lift or a one-two three-lift?", Aaron asked.
"Why are you even asking?! You didn't do either!", Brad answered, "Seriously we need to lift this monstrosity together! Alright? One-Two-Lift, on my count! One.. Two.. what the hell Clark?!"
"Oh, sorry, my shoe suddenly opened up. It's dangerous lifting things with open shoes."
"As if! You are just too lazy to do the work!", Dave exclaimed.
"Well screw you too Dave, we would have finished this hours ago if you didn't have to visit the toilet every five minutes!"
"Sorry for being sick, jerk! Be happy I am even trying to help, instead of spacing out like Eric over there."
"Sorry what?", Eric asked, "Should I have started lifting right now?"
"Everyone shut up! We are doing this! One... Two... *Why the hell is no one even touching it?!*"
"One two?"
"Sorry, my shoe again."
"I think I am going to be sick.."
"Hm? Sorry, what? Hey, how about some Pizza?"
"..Alright let's get pizza, but we move this sucker right afterwards."
And with a cheer, everyone left.
| 2017-05-11T15:32:05
| 2017-05-11T11:33:23
| 553
| 373
|
[WP] An asteroid is about to destroy Earth, The Onion reported the news without losing their sense of humor.
|
March 5th: "Scientists admit asteroid 'a hoax'; 'but please, we really do need more money'"
March 6th: "Asteroid insurance companies brace for financial ruin"
March 7th: "New fashion trends emerge amidst worldwide riots"
March 8th: "World-leader spaceship-departure meets applause: 'They're finally gone!'"
March 9th: "'The Onion' considering merger with Martian news company. 'Screw you all, I've got mine,' says editor"
March 10th: "Crazy, schizophrenic end-timers vindicated! Their psychiatrists hate us!"
March 11th: "This may be The Onion's final broadcast. Please preserve this article for future generations."
|
"Asteroid kills last of the endangered African Tigers...also all of humanity."
It's been our pleasure writing for you...mostly. Actually, we found our general demographic to be far more cognitively impaired than expected. Perhaps the hyperevolved cockroach people will develop a satirical news agency to address that issue after they succeed us. Well, good luck to everyone with the whole extermination of the human race. Sucks, huh?
Edit: I typed a word at 2am
| 2015-04-29T23:34:04
| 2015-04-29T23:33:26
| 51
| 10
|
[WP] You are born with two names tatooed on you body somewhere, one of your soulmate and one of the people that will eventually kill you. There is no way to tell who is who.
|
The doctor held up the new born baby.
"It's a girl!" exclamed the doctor.
"Well, What are the names doc?" the father said with joy.
The doctor looked at the baby's back, and only one name on it. James Webber. Chills shot down the doctors spine.
"Well Dr. Webber, who are they?
|
I'd met Joann when I was a boy
I knew who she might be,
before we were too young to sin,
she bopped me on the knee.
I met Kristine at just passed 10
and knew she was a mother hen,
because she brought me food and pens,
and told me to follow my dreams.
It was not long before 16
when sudden golden birthday sprees
befell me and ripped my coats seams
I fell on accident down to my knees.
This foolish fault of poor Kristine,
who tried to tell me she ain't mean,
I ain't never fall for that shit again,
instead I found my sweet Joann.
Joann told me I was the best,
at 22 I'll never forget
the way she got so nice and wet
then twerked it made me lose my shit.
She held my hand and rubbed my back
she kept my goals and life on track
and when I wanted more than that
she told me to follow my dreams.
And then I stumbled fell and spat
while far out fishing off the track
I woke up sore and my legs in racks,
Joann failed to keep me clean.
It wasn't all poor Joann's fault,
I must admit my leg was caught,
I lost my balance when the line went taut,
I was in a quick call with Kristine.
| 2018-03-11T07:49:38
| 2018-03-11T07:34:02
| 4,830
| 22
|
[WP] You die and find yourself in hell, where apparently everyone spends time to negate their sins before they go to heaven. The guy in front of you, who cheated on his wife, gets 145 years. Feeling like you led a fairly average and peaceful life, you’re not worried. You get 186,292 years.
|
"What?!" I sputtered. "How is this possible? What did I *do* to get that?!"
Satan put down the book of sentencing with an exasperated sigh and said, "Look kid, I don't make the punishments, the big guy only makes me hand them out as part of my parole." Seems he was used to saying this.
"B-but *how*? How did-"
Satan rolled his eyes. "Because the real Hell is more Aligherian, and not anything like that rat bastard Milton wrote. Joke's on him, I got him in the sixth circle for heresy."
"That's nice and all, but I meant what did *I* do to end up here? I just don't get it."
"It says here that you've committed some 7,500 cases of murder in your lifetime, and remarkably young, I might add. I'm impressed."
My jaw dropped even lower. "B-b-b-b-but I've never killed anything larger than a squirrel, and even that was an accident!"
Satan pauses before looking at the book a bit closer, and letting out a chuckle that sounded like nails on a blackboard. "I think I know what happened. It's like in... shit, what's the name?" He flipped through the tome and picked up a black phone sitting by the desk. "Operator? Circle six, tier three, prisoner GAC-19891004. Hey Graham, what was the name of your show again? Thanks." He set down the phone and redirected his gaze back toward me. "It's like in that show, Monty Python."
I was confused more than anything else. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"You know their movie with the musical number *Every Sperm is Sacred*?"
I paused. What would that have to do with me?
"Well turns out they got the doctrine right, purely by accident. And guess what you've been doing five days a week since eigth grade?"
Then that would mean- *no*.
"Oh, *God*."
"Yeah, he's not gonna help you with this one."
|
"186,292".
The number kept ringing in my ears as I was huddled onto the elevator to Hell. I had led the most unremarkable and conflict-free life ever, an average joe. Easy-going, I almost always acquiesced to what the group wanted, not wanting to raise an issue. A voyeur of life, almost.
Chapters from life flashed in front of my eyes, some more vivid than the others.
&#x200B;
"""Queer little Abby, who was in bullied in school all the time. I wanted to stand up for her, but I was scared. I did slip her a little note though...
Abdul Rahman, whose house was pelted with stones in the aftermath of 9/11. I wanted to tell the mob to leave, call the cops on them, but I was scared they'd hurt me. I did smile at him once later though...
Jack and Ryan, a couple who were always picked on and ostracized in our neighborhood. I wanted to tell the folks to back off, but I was scared they'd judge me. I did pat Ryan on the back though...
Barbara Rooney, a Stanford grad who didn't get the job at my company cause my boss wanted to give it to his nephew. I wanted to tell my boss that it was wrong, but I was scared I'd lose my job. I did send her a very polite rejection letter though..."""
&#x200B;
The elevator jolted to a halt, shaking me out of my thoughts. The panoramic arch to Hell welcomed me. On it, was Dante:
**"The Hottest places in Hell are reserved for those, who in times of moral crisis, preserve their neutrality."**
| 2018-09-26T08:43:26
| 2018-09-26T08:17:41
| 77
| 35
|
[WP] A princess learns her parents arranged to have her cursed as a way to attract potential suitors for her.
|
*Let her be as the shadow. The murky depths at the edge of a good man’s eye. The darkness that shrouds the world. Let her be unseen, unknown, and unknowable. Let the black be her only friend.*
For Eliza Dunn, the worst part of it all was that she actually liked her curse, though from the outside it was easy to imagine it a struggle. The third (and adopted) princess of the Palmyran Imperium lived with all the right trappings: the forlorn castle on the horizon, the empty, gilded halls, the quiet beat and echo of footsteps in a courtyard that had not seen another human soul in generations.
To the men who even now were girding themselves and polishing their arms to 'save' her, no doubt she seemed every bit the part of the lonely and distressed princess.
But Eliza liked her curse. There was a kind freedom in its bondage, the kind of freedom a lower princess might never find in a palace, crowded round servants and rules and expectations.
And above all else, the darkness liked her right back.
The shadows slithered up the walls. From moment to moment they formed themselves to the weave of the tapestries or slipped into the cracks in the stone. The whole hallway took on a dark, almost obscene cast, and when it reached the window Eliza stood before it swept up around, surrounding the point of light like an encircling force. It swirled and beat around the edges, and then it swept in and all was dark.
“Hello Eliza,” the darkness whispered.
“Hello friend,” Eliza whispered back.
Curses were funny things. When hers had been cast the people cried out in sympathy. Her sisters, even dour Elisabetta, had wondered aloud if perhaps the curse were too harsh. Her father, that dreary old bastard, had scoffed and asked “Whatever is the point of a curse that is not harsh?” Then he’d hauled out all Eliza’s commissioned portraits, especially the one’s where the painter’s hand had lent her face the slimmer, more classic beauty the poets always spoke of, and he’d had them hung on the wall of every major civic building in the city.
“Let them come to our Eliza,” her father had said with one of his rare smiles. “Let them come and play our game.”
“They come,” the darkness said.
“I know,” Eliza muttered. “I know, goddamnit all, I know.” Below her, the castle stretched all around her, cold and empty. To an observer it would have looked as if the window were simply black, a dark portal to a darker room, no observer to be seen. But the darkness enhanced Eliza’s eyes, and through it she could see all the way to the horizon if she wished.
A long line of mounted men stretched from hillside to hillside. She counted quickly, reached a hundred and then gave up.
“What do you think my father told them they would win if freed me?” Eliza asked.
“Riches, power,” the darkness supplied. “You.”
“Me last of all.”
The darkness contracted around her, slithered across the bare skin of her neck. A nod.
“I imagine he told them there would be a dragon. There are always dragons in the old stories, I think the men would take the quest just to slay so great a beast, princess or no.”
The darkness contracted again.
“But there won’t be a dragon, will there? There will be something else, something my dear old father never imagined. Darkness, what will you do when the knight reach our keep?”
And the darkness shivered. It wrapped itself tight to Eliza’s skin until she wore it like a second dress and when it spoke again its voice was a low, throaty murmur.
“Anything. I will do anything at all that you want.”
And Eliza smiled. It gleamed within the dark, an unnatural jewel. For Eliza Dunn liked her curse. She liked the darkness, her friend, and staring down into the courtyard with its profusion of wild growth and unkempt flowers, Eliza liked that too.
“Then perhaps there will be a dragon,” Eliza said, “if such things are what their nightmares are made of.”
A series of far off horns roared to life in the air and the line of mounted knights moved forward at the walk. Pennants flew proudly in the air, spear tips gleams, the sun glinted off their armor. Behind the knights their squires ranged across the valley on shaggy mountain ponies and sleek little coursers, and even from here Eliza could see their fear.
“I think I shall take breakfast in the courtyard,” Eliza said. “I trust you will greet our guests?”
“Yes,” the darkness whispered back.
In a moment the darkness faded away, spiraling off in little flows and eddies until there was nothing left nothing but the black stain of the void on the window sill. In time, that too faded.
And below, the princess sat down at conjured table to pour her own tea, butter her own biscuit, and live life freely for as long as she could. As it passed on its way to the castle gates, the darkness left her a book.
“Take care,” Eliza whispered to the departing shadows.
In its wake, the courtyard was far, far too bright.
\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_
If you enjoyed that I've got tons more over at r/TurningtoWords. Come check it out, I'd love to have you!
In a bit I may come back and add a bit of the knights' battle and a particular squire's struggle to this, not sure.
|
“I’m still your daughter. Mom… dad, please look at me.”
I hated how I couldn’t wash that memory from my mind, even with the powerful magic I inherited from that day. What’s the point of being powerful if you still suffer from the same mental anguish as the rest of the mortals do? I rotated the skull of a deceased advisor in my hand, admiring the complexities hidden behind the flesh it once had. “I hope this one provides more answers than the last three have. There was a traitor among the kingdom that day, one that cursed a young girl and ruined her life.” My grip tightened on the skull, nearly crushing it, having to hold back my anger.
“Let’s hope it does. Are you certain this will satisfy you? Revenge could lead to more pain. I understand how you feel. They cast me out of the kingdom to guard you. I share your anger, but you have a chance to use your powers for good. Necromancy is a dark art, but we can use it for good.” Gallart stood at my side, my personal guard as loyal as ever, even following my orders to kill the advisors closest to my parents, an order I didn’t expect him to go through with. At his comments, I raised a hand, tugging down the veil I wore to conceal my face, watching his head quickly turn away, trying to hide his disgust.
“Understand how I feel? Look at my face and tell me you truly believe that Gallart. I barely have any flesh left and the few spots of flesh that are left have gone rotten. I can’t taste or smell anymore, it’s a wonder I can even see and hear. We both lost our families when we were exiled, but do not compare my pain to yours.” My words seemed to get through to him, Gallart only whispering a small apology before turning to the entrance of my makeshift cave palace.
It might not have been as beautiful as the kingdom’s palace, but it held a certain charm to it. That charm mainly being its safety. The surrounding hills made it hard to lead an army through undetected and made it near impossible to spread out forces. Any mercenaries or bandits that wished to kill me would have to expose themselves, which made it easy to pick them off with my forces of undead.
“Revive, bring the soul back of advisor Tesila Filan.” A green orb floated into the room, circling the skull before the jaw popped open, letting out a ghastly scream. “Calm down now, Tesila. It’s your dearest princess, Erin. I have some questions about the curse, that I’m hoping you have the answers to.”
“Its awful, I can’t feel anything. Am I alive? Is this hell?” She said, unable to move anything but her jaw, limited by my restraints.
“You died recently. I brought you back momentarily. If you answer my questions and play nicely, I’ll return you to your slumber, if you don’t. Well, then we can throw you into a zombie and let you work as a mindless slave.”
“Princess!” Gallant shouted, not agreeing with my extreme methods of interrogation, but I knew they were necessary. Silencing him with a raised finger.
“Princess, that’s right. That awful face of the cursed child. They should have killed you when they had the chance. Exiling someone that uses the dark arts never works. They always want revenge.”
“I certainly want revenge; I just haven’t decided who against. Its amazing that a soul can see without eyes. I guess revival is just binding a soul to an object they were once attached to. Now, who cursed me? You must know something.”
“Heh, why would I tell you? I’m dead. It doesn’t matter what you do to me, you can’t kill me again. Loyalty to the Lestian empire.” She shouted, trying to remain somewhat dignified despite being a talking skull.
“Gallant, what happened when Captain Rhys said something similar to that?” I enquired, looking over to the knight.
Gallant coughed, staring at the floor below. “You… tore his soul into pieces and spread them to the pits of hell, so each part could face a different torment.”
“NO, you can’t do that. Please, I always did what was in your parents’ best interest. You can’t be so cruel. I know nothing about the curse, I swear to you, my princess.”
“My princess? Funny how things change. If you know nothing, I have no use for you. I promise freedom if you confess the truth. You have ten seconds; I know souls can keep track of time.”
She muttered a string of apologies and curses before stopping at the ninth second. “Your parents cursed you, they thought it would increase the potential suitors. Magic users are in high demand, they just didn’t know the magic you would inherit was that. Please, you said you would free-“
I crushed the skull, feeling the pieces drop through my fingers. “Being erased is a form of freedom. I kept my word Gallant.” I said, expecting the knight to have a problem with my decision.
“What will you do now? Now that you know the truth?” His hand sat above his sword, inching closer to the handle.
“I’m going to kill the ones who cursed me. It hurts to hear that it has to be my parents, but I can’t let this go unpunished. Is that a problem?” Before the words had even fully left my lips, Gallant pulled out his blade, attempting to decapitate me, the blade nearly reaching my neck, only to be blocked by the broken pieces of the skull. The pieces reforming into a small makeshift shield, blocking the blow.
When the sword bounced off, he scurried back, creating some space. A fatal error against a magic user. “I will protect the royalty of Lestia. I’m sorry princess, the king and queen come first.”
“I’m sorry too. I always felt you treated me the kindest of all those around me. Even if your kindness was forced due to circumstance. I won’t kill you Gallant, but I will make you work for your life.” He attempted to rush me, but the distance was too great. Getting caught in a whirlwind of magic, the spiraling winds cutting him with each rotation, lifting him into the air.
I pointed my hand at the entrance, sending the wave of air outside, throwing him out while the spiraling winds carried him. It would be up to fate whether he lived or died. The winds would eventually slowly drop him to the ground. If it didn’t cut into his vitals, he should survive. It was my last gift to him.
With Gallant removed, I leaned back into my stone throne, counting the number of bodies I had to work with. One hundred and fifty collected so far. Twenty-five of them still in good condition. I was far from winning a war, but I had the groundworks to build the army. I just hope the king and queen are ready for it.
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(If you enjoyed this feel free to check out my subreddit /r/Sadnesslaughs where I'll be posting more of my writing.)
| 2021-07-27T07:41:13
| 2021-07-27T07:18:27
| 104
| 31
|
[WP] Following World War III, all the nations of the world agree to 50 years of strict isolation from one another in order to prevent additional conflicts. 50 years later, the United States comes out of exile, only to learn that no one else went into isolation.
People!
A few things:
1. Found the prompt on Pinterest, thought it was interesting (not necessarily realistic), and decided to post it, fully expecting it to go unnoticed. Surprise!
2. I am not in any way trying to take credit for coming up with the idea.
3. Turns out this is a repost. 🤷 Who knew?! /u/WinsomeJesse did because they posted it last time. Not trying to steal anyone's thunder. If you're super perturbed about it, go show them some love.
4. Have a good day y'all; be kind, make good decisions, and don't hold in your farts. 😉✌️
|
They said they wanted peace. They said they wanted to avoid a future where humanity wiped itself out. They said a lot of things. And then they said no more.
For fifty years we waited. We followed the treaty down to the letter, even refusing to contact our northern and southern neighbors. For fifty years we waited, as they spat on their supposed good intentions. We waited as peace broke down. We waited as war broke out.
There's a slight poetic justice to learning that the ones who were afraid of us, the ones responsible for this self imposed exile, died in a hellfire of their own making. They thought that we were the biggest threat. They thought we were the cancer spreading throughout the world, destroying everything it touched.
They were wrong.
We were simply a deterrent. A force of nature that none dared to cross. And with us out of the way, with nothing to be afraid of, the world tore itself apart.
We came out of our exile prepared to fight. We expected an army of nations, prepared to end us, once and for all. But what we found instead was the very world itself, wrapped up in a wintery bow, waiting for us to take it.
|
50 long years. Thomas rolled out of his bunk. Today was the day America was going to join the rest of the world. He was excited, but a little afraid. As an American, it had been schooled into him that what had happened 51 years prior was one of the largest wars known, World War III, and that America had been the first to strike. In 2028, the leaders of the remaining nations had all agreed, each country was to go into isolation. No trade, communication, or aid, whatsoever. America had agreed, and had built massive walls in the North and South. They had severed communication with all satellites, and cut all lines outside of the US. Alaska was given to Canada, and Hawaii was allowed to be its own nation once more. Puerto Rico had protested at first, but soon gave up. According to his grandpa, the US suffered the first couple of years. Technology development had gone down, with agriculture having a huge boom to support its population. Most people left the cities, leaving them to become ruins. The only cities that thrived were towards the center of the country. This made life very simple. You attended school until 12, and then you picked a specialization. There were three to choose from. You could be a farmer, which was the most noble and useful, a rememberer, whose job was to learn all of the old things, so when the walls came down, we could talk to our neighbors and work old technology, and soldiers, who were those who didn’t have what it took to do the other things.
Thomas wasn’t ashamed to be a soldier, he couldn’t grow a potato, and words and numbers annoyed him. Besides, he would be one of the first to see a Canadian. He grabbed his issued jackhammer, and headed for his station.
At midnight, walls started coming down. Within the next two days, they were nothing more than rubble, that was quickly being removed. Oddly, there had been nobody to greet them, but this had been anticipated seeing as how had caused most of the damage in the war. In the next three days, the American military had sent out ambassador convoys North into Canada, and South to Mexico, neither had found anything except countries being reclaimed by nature. Almost two weeks later, the rememberers had finally reestablished communication of the one satellite they had been allowed to keep in orbit. North Americas whole portion of the globe was dark. Thomas kept rereading the communal paper, surely they were not the only ones left? The next day, they got the answers they were looking for. Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia were also dark. Thomas, and many other Americans wept.
Edit: Figured I would mass respond to this. The ending was left open to interpretation, kind of like a Miyazaki film.
| 2022-09-12T17:39:07
| 2018-01-18T00:43:07
| 579
| 139
|
[WP] Write a story where each sentence has one more word than the last.
The first sentence has to be one word, the next has two, etc. Stop whenever you want!
|
Run.
Keep running.
Nothing makes sense.
Just keep on running.
Maybe if I keep ahead…
Maybe if I can outpace it…
I can feel it creeping ever closer.
I feel out of breath, so very tired.
I don’t think I can keep this pace up.
My lungs are burning with exertion, daring me to stop.
At the very least, it keeps me focused on my task.
It’s calling for me by name, but I dare not look back.
I don’t know how it knows me, and I don’t know why I…
I feel my pace begin to slow, as the voice draws ever closer still.
Everything feels so heavy, tiresome, to the point that I just want to lay down…
*Stop struggling, you don’t need to try anymore,* I hear it whisper, its tone so familiar…
I cry out in pure agony, as I feel the weight of the pursuer come crashing down…
*Just let go,* it whispers, as I feel the inky blackness begin to choke the life from me…
I need to keep running, I know I need to keep moving forward; I just need to keep… on…
The stray wisp of sunlight streaming through the shuttered blinds catches my attention, and I blink away the muddled thoughts.
I shift in bed a bit, and let my mind drift back to the dream, reliving the hurt, the inevitable failure.
I hear my alarm blare its droning tone, and reach out to silence it, fingers fumbling about for the snooze.
It’s another day, I whisper quietly to myself, as I stare at the red digits on the alarm clock.
Just another day to deal with, another day filled with the inconsequential, the tedious, the painful, the unwanted…
I lay there for a few more minutes, staring blankly at the fan rotating lazily about above.
Come on, you can do this, it’s just another day, get up, just fucking get up…
After a few minutes of delay, I roll out of bed, lurching to my feet.
I stare out at nothing in particular for a while, eyes unfocused, vision blurring.
I don’t know why it’s so much harder to get ready this morning…
A snippet of the dream floats to the forefront of my thoughts.
I shake my head in frustration, and slip on a shirt.
I can feel the tears running down my face, unbidden.
I don’t think I can keep this pace up…
I just feel so tired of it all.
I slowly sit back down into bed.
I can’t keep pretending like this.
Maybe if I just sleep…
Just a little longer.
Nothing makes sense.
I’m tired.
Sorry...
----- ----- ---
AN: [EDIT] My first gold. :O <3 <3 <3
|
"God." He sighed. "Gotta keep moving." He sat in silence. Everything seemed so utterly futile.
He couldn't stand the silence anymore. He had to keep moving or else. For him to stop now meant certain death. He slowly sat back up, joints aching in protest. Losing strength, his only motivation was the fear of death. How long has it been: 3 days, 3 months, 3 eons? He was losing all sense of time; and, consequently, hope as well. (grammar?)
I'll continue, but I'm on the road for the holiday season. Happy holidays everyone!
| 2013-12-23T07:56:46
| 2013-12-23T07:21:18
| 131
| 15
|
[WP] You’re in the mafia and the boss has ordered you to kill your girlfriend to show your loyalty. You look around the room and see the pictures only to find out you’re dating the mafia boss’s daughter.
|
I found the gun on my apartment bedroom alongside a handwritten note: *Demonstrate your loyalty. Sting the girl*. *Meeting at 65-6.* The paper was yellow and frayed along the edges, but I immediately recognized the penmanship.
"So it's gonna be this way," I snarled. I cursed the boss, his ostentation, and that wretched golden pen he enjoyed using so much.
The next day I entered the old warehouse at exactly 8:34 PM. The other soldiers entered the building in 7 minute intervals. Soon the boss ambled in, trailed by his *guardie*.
"Scorpio," he addressed me. "You got the note?"
"Yes, boss," I replied professionally.
"Here are the *fotos*," he announced. The pictures were small, varying in quality and angle.
"Family above all," I answered. He smiled and trotted off.
I was unable to sleep that night. The picture he had shown me—it was Lucia, my girlfriend. She'd always said she came from a wealthy Italian household, though I'd never imagine the *Mafia.* My quandary tormented me as I tried to sleep, to close my eyes and rest.
The next day I showed up at her door with a bouquet of flowers in my hand. "Hey," I told her. "I'm taking you on a romantic date." I led her to the abandoned warehouse with the flowers in my hand.
Lucia smiled as we walked. "Hey," she whispered, "did you know that my twin sister and I came here when we were little?"
I halted. "A twin sister? What happened to her? How come you never told me about her?"
"Well," she answered bitterly. "She fell in love with a man from a rival gang. Father hates her guts. He wants to kill her."
I was greatly relieved. I dropped the gun hidden in my coat and kissed her.
"Wait," Lucia exclaimed. Then she drew a gun from her dress pocket.
"Do you want to know what happened to the real Lucia?"
|
I sat on the rugged couch, illuminated by the hungry line of cold light from the television. I rustled in my loose pockets for a few seconds while looking up at the broken asbestos ceiling. My fingers touched a firm paper texture, and I yanked out a card. I looked at the card *he* gave me. Its decorative edges lying on the bleak paper. “To show your loyalty, kill the one whom you love most – and deliver me their heart.” it read, attached to it stood out the dried ink with the signature “Al Capone” – I put my hand on my wrinkled red forehead, staring into the black nothingness, the hurrying flash of color I wasn’t even sure was there, as if I was in the depths of the coal mine, burning, my body weighing a thousand tons.
A loud knock came from the hallway, I thrust the card pack into my pockets and got up to look through the eyehole. “Who is it?” I shouted from the end of the couch, approaching the door. The keys in my left pocket jingling. “It’s Brook!” said a muffled tender voice. My shoulders dropped and I chuckled to myself a little, just so it could be heard through the door. I got to the end of it and looked through the eye hole, no one else was there. I pulled out a key from my left pocket and put it in the door, the clinks and clunks emphasizing the opening. I opened the door and a swift breeze brushed in. Her attire was died down, but her curves, her seamless skin, and her curled up hair proved her beautiful enough for any man.
“You said we had to go somewhere baby, where are you planning to go?”
“Ah, it’s nothing, we’re just going to visit a museum that opened” I scoffed. “Let’s go to the car. We gotta hurry.” I grabbed her hand. We went out, my neck protruding from my tank top felt the cool breeze of New York City. The countless almond and peach lights hitting every corner of the scene – embalmed with the horns and reeving of cars.
We scuttered towards my car, slammed the door, and turned the key. The lights lit up in front of us, a man in a suit and a fedora appeared, just coldly standing there. The engine stuttered until I could put my feet on the pedal. I turned out of the parking lot, bumping through the concrete slabs.
“Who the hell was that James?” Brook asked. Her hands were gripping at the door handle, trying to pull herself closer to the edge.
“Just a business associate” I replied, my hands sweating and burning from the rubber on the wheel. We turned onto the Brooklyn Bridge, now followed by 2 police cars. “Fuck.” I muttered. The cops started shooting at our tires and the windows. Brook pressed to the seat when one of the bulled grazed her ears.Evading all traffic we arrived at a mansion, just on the outskirts of New York, I stopped the car, burst out the door and rushed to Brook, got her out of the car, and went to the door. I opened the large door. He was sitting at the end of the hall. He got up with open arms.
“Dad!” Brook went to Capone, “You didn’t tell me it was going to be such a ride!” She said while hugging.
“Oh, Brook. You didn’t get hurt did you?” he asked brushing her hair.
“Not at all.”
He stopped hugging Brook and started towards me.
“You didn’t deliver me the heart young boy” he pointed at me, his voice was crooked and low. I switched my stare between him and Brook, not being able to process what just happened. *What the hell*. *Was she set up from the beginning?*
“Oh don’t be so shocked, did you really think I was going to let you kill a stranger?” He said squinting his eyes.
I cleared my throat. “No” I paused – “did I fail?”
“Well, you did deliver me this sweet-heart so I’ll let you go this time,” he said looking back at her.
I was relieved beyond belief, I gathered my strength for one more question “Why?”
“Why?” he repeated the question, his face became rigid and serious. He stood over me, looking down. Then he broke the silence with “Come on! It was fun!”, He even chuckled to himself. “And you also proved you can save someone from the cops, so get ready for doing a favor for one of our associates” he laughed to himself and patted me on the back.
Hope it's good!
| 2020-07-02T06:58:20
| 2020-07-02T06:47:27
| 730
| 40
|
[WP] After bitting a Fae, the Vampire claims that she must serve him, for his bite converted her into his thrall. The Fae claims that the Vampire must serve her, for the vampire ate fae food without her permission. As none of them is willing to give up, they bring the case to you, a lawyer.
|
"I'm afraid I'm going to need a great deal more detail in order to give this case the most informed, considered, and lawful judgement of which I am capable at this time," said the enormous blond man behind the desk.
The vampire hissed at him- but did not attempt to cross the wooden barrier. It... radiated, in a way he could not identify, but felt strangely hot.
"We didn't ask for *judgement*," the younger of the disputing pair spat, "we want to know who wins!"
The blond waited; when the vampire was silent for a moment, he turned to the Fae.
"Do you have any protest you wish to lodge, Gentle Neighbor?"
The woman, who was seated in another chair that radiated strangely, had her face in a disquieting mask of neutrality, and pursed her lips just slightly.
"I have no wish to bother the courts with a relatively minor contractual...mishap," she said after a moment, hands folded in her lap.
The Vampire hated how strange she looked like that- passive and pretty and hiding all the wonderful, terrifying, petty little points and edges she possessed, like the teeth she'd tried to take off his arm with. Oh wait, she was still talking.
"As you are in the practice of contract law, and considered a specialist in your trade, for which of course we would compensate you for investing your time should we come to an agreement, I, at least, would indeed abide by the ruling of your arbitration so as to not trouble higher authorities with petty matters. In that, I did request you consider giving this matter your judgement, but I can see that the other party does not agree. As we know, that means we cannot proceed."
Wait, fuck, what?!
"Hold the fuc-"
**"Sit."**
The vampire was in the other chair without knowing how he'd gotten there and definitely without his permission. The man behind the desk stood; he *must* have some Giant in him or something to be that damn big.
"To clarify for the youngest in the room: in order for this matter to be settled by me in particular, all parties must agree to abide by the ruling the adjunct, in this case myself, comes to after presented with every fact, fiction, memory, false narrative, scent, glamour, and body state. At the moment, one party, that of the Gentle Neighbor, agrees to abide by the adjudicator's conclusion, and one party, that of the Esteemed Lord of the Night, does not agree to abide by the adjudicator's conclusion. As *consent* stands at this present moment, no proceedings can begin, as not all parties have consented to proceedings. The options to proceed are as follows: The Lord of the Night does not change his decision, and this matter cannot go forward with me, which would mean both parties would have to seek out a more suitable arbiter to settle the matter at hand; or the Lord of the Night chooses to abide by the conclusion the adjucator draws and the matter can proceed here and now with relating of information."
"Can't you even tell me why you need more information than you got already?" the vampire regretted the moment he spoke; it was his nemesis who answered, her eyes ringed with the red of true anger.
"No. His time is not free; do not insult him by implying the years he has spent learning which details are important and which are not is such simple information you may receive the fruits of his labor without any payment. We cannot settle the issue between us without aid. If he wants to know if I was wearing enchanted undergarments on the day in question, I will tell him- because he knows what details tilt the debt one way or another, and I do *not*."
The blond head inclined in a gesture of respect.
"I appreciate your respect for my labor, Gentle Neighbor. Thankfully, enchantments on undergarments are usually only significant in cases when clothing came off, which by the sound of your case did not happen," he mused, tapping two fingers on his chin thoughtfully.
The vampire ground his teeth, tried to rise from the chair to pace, found he couldn't, and gripped the armrests until they creaked.
"*Fine*. I'll agree to submit to your judgement."
"That means we can proceed, if the Gentle Neighbor's agreement has not changed?"
"It has not."
"Excellent. You may call me Esquire or Ink. What may I call the Gentle Neighbor and the Esteemed Lord of the Night, for clarity of the documents?"
"Lady Indigo," the Fae replied, like she'd been waiting for that.
"Darkness," the vampire shot back- wanting to sound as impressive as her.
"Mmm. So one Younger Folk and one Neobyte- I'm required to legally classify you, unfortunately, and neither of you appear to be older than 500, though I may, of course, be wrong."
(part 1/7)
|
The benefit of age is the opportunity of exploration, expericing new situations, and a wealth of personal anecdotes to amuse friends. Lawyer across species often quarrel with one another about the intricasies of case law, or squabble over generational rivalries, but the universal law when dealing with cross-species cases was that teenagers were absolutely the worst. That's where I came in.
"She bite me right before lunch! It's not like this is complicated. Clearly, eating fae food without my explicit approval is tantamount to Section 3, subs-"
Holding up my hand, I pointed out on page in front of her, "Only items as listed in Subsection A. Unless you are deferring to Section 8, Part 3 amended with the only case where Fae cannibalism was suggested, but not proven."
"Hah! See? That means you're my thrall!" The were-woman hollered out, almost frenzied with hairs standing on the back of her neck.
It was my turn again to hush the pair of them as they started to argue. "First off, you are already on probation, and are in violation of your parole. You should see to it that you speak to your juvenile public case defender." I sighed closing the book with a quiet "thwump." The old leather was no match for the test of time, but it was surprisingly quiet as the pair listened.
"Second, as you can clearing see by her behaviour," pointing to the Fae. "She has complete control over her faculties and thus cannot be your thrall at this stage. If that was the case, you would have exerted your mastery over her by this stage. Even a juvenile werewolf or were-woman would be able to overpower a similarly aged Fae."
The Fae pouted at this comment. I hadn't needed for her to provider her name, her powers or any other personal information. Just suggesting that she lived in the nicer part of the forest, wandering around at midnight on a festival frequented by were-people meant she was naive. That and her Fae Scout badge betrayed her age.
"At this stage, your Fae victim would normally be allowed to press charges of assault. But, given her age, and that she is likely lost from her group, I think her guardians might be more interested in her presence."
The were-woman howled, the Fae continued to pout. I climbed down from the step ladder I frequently brought. "I suggest that you wait for the parole officer for your were-woman, and continue to put pressure on the arm to prevent excessive bleeding. The bandage I brought is only temporary."
Zipping up my briefcase, I handed them both my card. "You have my summoning card, please summon when should you require my services."
The Fae perked up, "But you haven't decided who should serve who!"
I smiled. "You two are too young. A court would throw both of your cases out immediately if you two weren't thrown in the dungeon by your parents." Pointing at the Fae, "You, seek medical attention."
Switching to the were-woman. "You, wait for the parole officer. Goodnight."
| 2022-07-11T21:15:02
| 2022-07-11T19:00:25
| 83
| 52
|
[WP] We find intelligent life under the ice crust of the moon "Europa". Upon contact, the aquatic species is confused how we survived the "harsh climate of earth" any why we, as a species didn't leave "when we had the chance".
"and" instead of "any"...
|
The landing was a miracle to say the least. The surface of Europa was covered with a thin crust of ice, which we expected to break, yet it didn't. It was also what brought us here. Stanislav's obsession with this moon had proved useful. He'd noticed the surface was indeed ice, which meant there was water, therefore opportunity for life to develop.
However, our faces ashened once we stepped out of the spaceship. The white clarity of the surface had turned black below us, as if something enormous prowled under the crust. Then, the ice trembled, sending us to the ground. The impact came from underfoot.
"Back to the spaceship!" Captain Rutin yelled, scrumbling to his feet. "Now!"
Ferguson and Gelisch were already barreling inside. I struck the crust with my teeth, and my drowsiness forbid me to think straight. I lay atop the surface, staring at the ice, attempting to make up a detail, something useful of that blackness, that shadow.
The engines roared, signaling they were ready to leave.
"Come on! We have to leave," Ferguson yelled, yet I could barely make up his words.
I struggled to my feet, and bolted toward the spaceship. What was I thinking? My lack of proper procedure was risking the mission. There was something below us. That was clear.
My heart jumped to my throat. The ice cracked with a sound like shattering glass. I stared at my boots. They weren't even scratching the surface. What was that noise? My eyes darted toward the spaceship. It was shaking, the engines burning. Ferguson shut the door.
I ceased running, and fell to my knees. They were leaving me, and they were right to do so. The spaceship ascended, and a crashing noise thundered across the vast emptiness. The surface rippled, and my eyes widened.
An arm the size of a building burst out from the depths, obliterating the ice and crushing the spaceship as if it was a piece of paper.
The arm was a gleaming blue, as if the scales in its skin had a layer of oil. Red, vibrant sphere bulged out the back of the monster's hand, as if breathing.
I froze in place. There was nothing I could do. If that thing wanted to get me, it would. The monster drowned his hand back into the water below, yet his shadow lingered.
I took a deep breath, and ran toward the hole it'd made. If I was going to die, I would at least die with a clear image of the wonders that exist outside our planet.
Soon, I reached the edge. The fear and the cold fought a vicious fight inside me, but in the end, resignation and curiosity destroyed their armies. I plunged inside. The water was cristalline and filled with different shades of colors.
Underneath, however, I saw the face of the monster. It seemed endless. Its scales matched with that of his arm, and those breathing sphered of red could be seen underneath them. Its eyes were two ovals of glistening green, yet it didn't have pupils. The monster was ancient. Despite the fish-like features and tremendous size, its shape was like that of a human. It had white hair, which resembled thick algae.
We studied each other for a moment. He opened its mouth, displaying three rows of sharp teeth. Each the size of my body. Strange and colorful fish came out of it. I felt the water pushing me inside. Was he swallowing? No. I couldn't have resisted if he was.
"How did you survive? Why didn't you come?" he said. His voice was deep and clear despite the water.
--------------------------------------
/r/therobertfall --- Ugh! I have to leave. I will try to continue it asap.
|
The team sent to Europa was a small one containing only three men, only one expected to exit the submarine at the risk of their life. I was that man. An entirely new type of rocket separate from that of the ones utilized prior had to be constructed to breech the miles and find what would lie beneath. It had a normal shape and initial function but withheld several functions to transfer immense heat on the surface of the submarine within the rocket slowly but surely falling towards the planets surface. After almost three years of patiently waiting and silently observing we finally passed the last layer of ice and arrived at the planets surface, or rather fell to it. The crash completely destroyed the computer console and the others running it, effectively leaving me severed from communication to both Earth and human life in general. I quickly put on the space suit which with modern technology took up as much space as a layer of clothing and the helmet like a mask. I exited the submarine slowly opening my eyes to what would fall upon them. I was greeted with a large city, filled to the brim with massive buildings and walkways within the skyline connecting them. Light flowing from lava slowly moving like rivers along the surface of the planet not even approaching the bright lights of the city with their glow. I finally left the trance that my mind had put me in and looked towards three single beings with no eyes to behold and long limbs stretched out onto the ground, two in a seemingly natural four legged stance and one in a bipedal one. The standing one began to hum with strange fascination arriving slowly afterwards. I began to recognize the beings as utilizing echolocation, but not with clicks or shouts, with practically musical hums. The being began to open its mouth revealing large rows of teeth with flat tips showing its status as a herbivore. Noises fell from its mouth in an unfamiliar language, but not an alien one to my ears. It was singing softly but with meaning stretching through the methodical tones and noises. I could understand it, or rather feel it. The creature began to tell me he new of my species and recognized its purpose in venturing to their civilization, but it felt confused on another aspect. The species itself had never put efforts into traveling beyond its planet, focusing on perfecting their own and exploring the sciences. In the coming days I would learn or their technological superiority. It continued on with asking me a simple question, why had we not escaped Earth when we could. I began to look in a dazed manner and attempted to convey confusion. The creature continued with telling me that they’ve identified Earth as doomed. Through a process known as deteraformation, otherwise the death of all life by unnatural means. We had already sent the planet on the path to death on an irreversible scale, as the creatures with their more advanced understanding of science perceived. They told me the planet would begin suffering a massive lift in the effects within three years, and all life would die within the next five. Baffled by their words I felt paranoid of their statement, but their words rang true within the deepest caverns of my mind. I looked at them with acceptance and conveyed a simple question in the best way I could, what will come of me? They said silently to me, “What happens of all intelligent life lost that arrive in unfamiliar places, you will adapt.”
| 2018-04-23T08:46:09
| 2018-04-23T08:14:38
| 50
| 28
|
[WP] A police commissioner has become over-reliant on the services of mystery writers, psychics, magicians, reformed con artists, meddling kids, men in bat costumes, and assorted other consultants, and must now explain themselves to an appalled Mayor.
|
Johan coughed as he entered the smoky room. The mayor loved his cigars.
"Hey, boss," he began to say, but cut himself short when he saw who else was there.
The cat was out of the bag; his big secret revealed.
A group of kids and their dog, a man in a bat costume, a janitor holding a vacuum -- and more. All the people he had relied on to solve cases and apprehend criminals he couldn't himself. His stomach felt like a buckshot of lead.
The mayor spun around in his chair and held his cigar between two fingers.
"Johan," he said, before taking a long drag. Everyone coughed as he exhaled. "Would you mind explaining who all these people are?"
"They're..." he stammered. How could he word it? Johan knew he wasn't supposed to bring in civilians for help, but these guys, they weren't exactly your average people. "They're... contractors. I've hired them in the past to aid in solving cases. It fit within our budget, so I figured it was fine."
The mayor's eyebrows shot up at Johan's bluff. "Contractors, really?" He pointed to the group with the dog. "Them? I don't mean to be rude, but I don't think those kids are old enough to pay taxes. And their dog's just an ordinary mutt."
The dog barked something that almost sounded like words, but then Johan took over.
"They're actually quite skilled. Remember the Slasher case? Without them, Randall would still be loose."
"Okay," the mayor said, "how about him? He's literally just a janitor with a vacuum cleaner. What skills could he possibly have?"
"That vacuum sucks up more than just dust, sir. He deals with paranormal activity."
The mayor sighed, unamused by what he was hearing. He took another drag of his cigar before continuing.
"And that guy, in the bat costume. He looks like he belongs at some BDSM expo. No, I see what you've really been doing. Come here."
Everyone in the room moved to the sides, forming a path straight to the mayor's desk. Johan, with his head down, flanked on both sides by the heroes, trudged ahead. He didn't know why, but he felt like a kid surrendering to his parents after having done something he wasn't supposed to.
"Yes, it is clear to me now," the mayor said, blowing a puff of smoke into Johan's face. "You've been embezzling funds, giving them to all your friends here. Isn't that right?"
Johan's face turned red at the accusation.
"Embezzlement?! No! I'm telling you the truth -- all these people," he gestured towards them, "they all have helped keep law and order, just like you or me. Sure they might look like your everyday person, but that's where the real heroes are! I promise you I've done nothing wrong."
The mayor put his hand to his head and shook it back and forth. "Johan, Johan... your twentieth service anniversary was coming up too... Look what I got you." From a drawer he pulled out a trophy. The plaque read: JOHAN WESKAL, 20 YEARS OF SERVICE TO THE CINCINNATI POLICE DEPARTMENT. On it was a beautiful golden police hat. He dropped it into the trash. "A shame."
Then, the mayor held out his hand. Johan couldn't figure out what he wanted.
"Sir?" he asked, annoyed about seeing his trophy thrown away.
"Don't make this harder than it has to be," the mayor responded. "Your badge."
Johan's heart thumped against the metal pinned to his shirt. "Y-you don't mean..."
"No need to be angry, we all take risks sometimes. This one just didn't pay off for you." He looked at all the people standing around awkwardly. "I'll preserve your dignity, don't worry. Officially, you'll just have found a new calling in life. Maybe a midlife crises. But in reality we both know what has happened in this room."
Johan's blood boiled. He thought about all the times he had risked his life for the city. All the times he was out on the field, while the mayor just hid behind his desk. And this is how he was repaid?
Fine.
He *would* find a new calling in life, Johan decided, as he ripped the badge off his shirt.
He looked at all the faces as he passed through the valley of crime fighters. He knew each and every one of them, knew their strengths and weaknesses. From working with them he knew what made them tick and what their greatest fears were. And he knew about the holes that lied between their powers.
Gaps existed, blind spots of criminality waiting to happen. Before, he had been the one to cover them up, acting like a putty that joined all the pieces together. But now, with him gone, the cracks showed once more, and he couldn't wait to begin.
Back at his apartment, Johan studied himself in the mirror. He looked at the neatly trimmed beard, the flawless skin, the bright eyes. And then, making sure the mask was snug around his face, he saw a nobody looking back at him.
A nobody who was about to seamlessly navigate the maze of darkness. A nobody was going to start a crime spree never before seen. A nobody who was going to become the most wanted man in the city.
A nobody who couldn't be stopped by anybody.
Why?
Because only the nobody knew all the heroes, and all the cracks that laid between them.
|
“Joe, what even is your job anymore? I don’t mean to be rude, but at this point our police department is made up of whatever freak decides they want to solve a crime. Last week we had a child and his robotic friend solve a crime. You let a child and a robot go into a drug den. You should be thankful they got out of there alive.” Mayor Gurdy rubbed his forehead, staring at the newspaper clippings scattered over his desk. Trying to make sense of the strange stories.
“They not only got out alive, but they also stopped the operation. It was damn fine police work.” Joe took a long swig of his flask, already having a slight wobble to his step.
“Joe. That’s not the point. Police work is something you need to be trained in. You can’t just let any vigilante enforce the law. Don’t you have any sense of pride for your badge? How long has it been since you went out and stopped a crime?” Gurdy continued to scan the headlines between his words, stopping on a headline that caught his eye. ‘Man dressed as cat, licks armed robber into surrender.’ He didn’t even want to bring up that headline with the commissioner.
“I don’t have time. I must let out the signal, make sure everyone knows there is a crime happening. Without my symbol, this city would fall. I am the pillar of this community.” Joe said, drool leaking from the edge of his lip as he stumbled towards the desk, slouching against it. “Oh, Catman. That sandpaper tongue of his sure gave that villain a licking.”
Gurdy shivered at that phrasing. “Villain? These are criminals, not villains. The man was just trying to rob a petrol station, not take over the world. Please tell me you aren’t treating these people as supervillains. Oh, Joe. I’m sorry, but sending out a signal just isn’t enough of a job to keep your position. I’m going to have to let you go. I can get you some help? There’s a rehab clinic across the state that deals with cases like yours. I’ll pay your fees.”
“If Catman wasn’t there to lick the villain, who knows what might have happened. It’s like Schrödinger’s Catman. Who knows what would have been in that box of crime?”
Gurdy didn’t know how to respond to that. For the first time in his political career, someone stumped him. He was certain the Schrödinger’s cat reference made little sense in this scenario, trying to steer the conversation away from it. “How about you just try rehab for a week? If you don’t like it, we can try something else? Maybe give you an office job.”
“An office job? Over my dead, bloated corpse. The city needs me. I’m also the only one that knows the passwords to all the devices in the office. You can figure them out eventually, but do you really want to go through all that hassle? Imagine a week without being able to operate the computers and databases. Not even Catman could save you then.”
“WHAT IS IT WITH YOU AND CATMAN?” Gurdy stood up from his chair, face red with rage. “Catman this and Catman that. What is so good about Catman?”
Joe moved to the mayor’s side, patting his shoulder. He leaned in closer, whispering into his ear. “Keep this between us, but I’m Catman. Your city’s protector is also his commissioner.” Joe tried to wink, but his eye only twitched, the acholic breath stinging the mayor’s senses before Joe finally moved away.
“You’re the Catman? Why would you lick a criminal? Ugh. Joe, what am I going to do with you?” Gurdy pushed aside the articles, spotting one that made Joe smile. ‘Crime rate drops fifty percent!’
“Nothing. My strategy works. I only hire the first people I see before breakfast. That’s how I know I have the best workers. No one that isn’t a good worker gets up that early. None of my heroes have died and we solve crime. Why would you remove me?”
“Ok, look. I can turn a blind eye to this. You get results, but no more letting any meddling kids roam crime scenes. That’s a recipe for disaster. If you can do that, I think we can continue working together.” Gurdy had given up. He couldn’t change the commissioner’s mind, so he would just roll with it.
“Excellent. I’m glad you understand me so well, Mayor. You should see our newest recruits. We have Marvo, the mysterious fortune teller. He gets five out of ten predictions right. If you tell him the name of the person and give him ten minutes on a computer. We also have Lily the mime. Well, we had Lily. She forgot the key to her mime box, so she’s kind of stuck at this point. Oh, we also-“
“Please, don’t tell me anymore. I don’t want to know.” Mayor Gurdy smacked his forehead against his desk, sending the news articles around the room. “Just keep getting results, please, before I rethink my decision.”
“Sure, thing, mayor. Have a good evening, or as Catman says. Have a purrfect night.” With that, Joe rushed out of the room, leaving Gurdy to rest his sore forehead against the desk.
“Why couldn’t I have gotten the job in another city? I doubt anyone else has to deal with this.” He groaned.
&nbsp;
&nbsp;
&nbsp;
(If you enjoyed this feel free to check out my subreddit /r/Sadnesslaughs where I'll be posting more of my writing.)
| 2022-01-18T03:41:09
| 2022-01-18T00:13:27
| 33
| 22
|
[WP] Kanye West's daughter, for her birthday, asks Kanye to show some modesty for once in his life. Follow Kanye's subsequent quest to prove that since he's the best at everything ever, he can become the most humble man in the world.
|
Kanye West
Went on a Kanye Quest
To become the humblest man
And make his daughter impressed
He’s become cheaply dressed
Sold all but one vest
Gave away all the money
In the Kanye Chest
“But a man needs to rest”,
Said that Kanye West
Left with naught but a cot
As his Kanye Nest
All this left Kanye stressed,
As you might have guessed.
But with North’s wishes fulfilled,
He felt his Kanye Best.
|
"Sorry baby, but I don't think I'm capable of that. My persona may be mostly an act but it's an easy one at that. Modesty would be a challenge for me, and I don't think I'm ready to rise to the occasion."
Then the computer next to them explodes as this is several years in the future and there's always on voice recognition on everything.
| 2015-02-10T10:31:06
| 2015-02-10T08:43:24
| 60
| 21
|
[WP] You are a teenager with the ability to measure how "Dangerous" people are on a scale from 1 to 10 just by looking at them. A normal child would be a 1, while a trained man with an assault rifle might be a 7. Today, you notice the unassuming new kid at school measures a 10.
|
My own number always bothered me. A 1, seriously? Luckily nobody else sees numbers or they would think I was nothing but a big laugh.
And I couldn't use another reason to be laughed at, you know. Being in high school is already torture enough, and I'm being bullied enough as it is.
Normally the day starts off getting yelled at by this awfully charismatic young man who believes he's tough. He's a 2. Yes, more dangerous than I am, true, but his sweet bimbo girlfriend is a 5. He doesn't bother me too much, the others do. The sixes and the sevens. They bother me.
They just LOVE to yell at me, take my lunch money, lock me in the toiletstall and push me down. You know, classic stuff.
Today, they actually pushed my head in the toilet bowl, 5 of them, ranging from the common 5 to the less common 7.
I nearly drowned in there. I heard hem laughing. I felt their hands on my back, pushing hand pushing.
When I got home I washed my face over the sink and looked at myself in the mirror. Rarely do numbers ever change, but there you go - a solid 10.
Calmly I dried of my face, glancing at my newly achieved number in the mirror.
They've pushed too far this time. See you at school, sevens.
|
This is my first post to WP, so I hope anyone who reads this likes it!
Ever since I was born, I’d see numbers in my brain. From the instant I saw a living face I’d see a number. I learned pretty quickly it was danger: my dog was a 1 (too stupid to hurt anyone even if he tried, bless him), and the highest number I ever saw was a man in Hawaii, a seven. I figured out why after he robbed an old woman and ran away, knocking someone over, on his bicycle.
American Lit was boring that day, but that was going to change. I saw someone new walking down the hall and going into the next classroom. He looked at me for a second with a glare of callous determination, and above him I saw a blood-red 10, menacing and ominous. He quickly broke his stare, but I didn’t, watching him for the rest of the class. When I left, I followed him down the halls into an unused classroom. I was wondering if he was going to poison someone or plant a bomb or something like that, so I tried to catch a glimpse. He was nowhere to be seen in the room. I tentatively walked in, anxious as to what I was going to find.
I have regrets, just like everyone. I wish I didn’t have the ability I have; I wish I could have seen my grandfather before he died; I wish I didn’t blow off as much stuff as I did. But the biggest regret I ever had was that I never got to say goodbye to my family, and that the last thing I saw before I died was the same amoral determination that had so scared me before. As I faded into oblivion, choking on the blood in my throat as his knife stabbed me over and over, the last thing my eyes would ever witness was his terrible eyes, black as death, as he slowly widened his horrifyingly blank countenance into an evil grin. The last thing I ever heard was a cruel and harsh voice mutter, “One down.”
| 2014-11-29T14:33:38
| 2014-11-29T14:18:16
| 19
| 12
|
[WP]: Click "random", and study the subreddit you got. Write about your discoveries like a victorian wilderness explorer
|
/r/woahdude
Day 1:
Such a fascinating new region Charles and I have discovered. We were travelling along the great new world of Redditopia, when we stumbled into a small clearing. The people here speak English, but with a slow troubled accent, perhaps perpetuated from the broken English of early merchants. Night draws near, and Charles and I are to reside in our tent, at the outskirts of the village. While the locals were welcoming, we declined to stay with them. Wariness to be safe.
Day 2:
Such a strange place. What was at long past a jungle has been, well trampled, for lack of a better word. The locals do not spend their time with crafts, as to other aboriginal tribes, but rather staring at strange objects. What can best be described as four sticks, arranged in such a fashion to make a box. The local spend all day, staring into these boxes, laughing. While some have the low rumbling guffaw of a well built man, some have a shrill trill more acceptable for a young girl, delighted to hysteria.
Charles has begun a log of the tribes main religious activities. He seems disappointed.
Day 3:
Charles has made an exciting discovery! The local tribesmen use a special herb in a daily ritual. It seems this groups religious practices require all day effort. The day starts with a smoke from a religiously significant pipe, or perhaps rolled in holy text. From there, they issue their daily "prayers" although it it not prayers like you and I are familiar with. They talk amongst themselves, and speak of actions seen through their magic stick boxes, like a window into another world. Curious.
Day 4:
Charles has been invited to join in the tribe's daily rituals. The acrid stench from the pipe he was given was off-putting for a more sophisticated palate, but Charles has eaten and drank many a strange things on our travels.
Charles has spent the night with the tribesmen, seemingly entranced in their ritual. I slept alone in our shared tent.
Day 5:
Charles has invited and insisted that I join him and the tribesmen in their daily rituals. Against my own protest, I will participate for the efforts of Anthropology.
Day 9?:
I have missed a few days, and having trouble remembering exactly how long it has been since my last entry. I declined participating in the daily ritual, for I believe it to be Sunday. Charles is still participating.
I can't describe the things I have seen, I dare say I'm not sure I've seen them at all. The windows, or stick boxes, showed wonderful pictures, some of them moving. I have seen such things as trees seemingly floating, barely clinging to rock. At one point, I swear I saw a man drink from a glass, but rather than seeing him drink as a normal man would, he was as a medical diagram, seeing all of the internal parts.
Day Something:
A corgi with a dude's face. Think about it. Just...think about it.
|
[Random Acts of Pizza] www.reddit.com/r/RAOP
It's a very... strange place indeed. The people there seem to be very generous and also seem to enjoy the meal that is pizza. They carry on conversations about this one food item for what seems like ages. They talk about the toppings, sauces, and even the types of crust they enjoy. The ways it can be cooked is also discussed. I was very much dumbfounded as to why they love this meal so much and why they seem to worship it until I came across their leader; Papa John. He seems to be the guiding force behind this-race if you will. They gift each other cards that hold some type of monetary value and they use this to purchase more of their saviors dishes. However, amongst the charity, and chit-chatter there is one that is shunned. There is another deity that doesn't hold the same title as Papa John. This deity is frowned upon, made fun of, exiled, and only loved by a select few; Little Ceaser. Those who follow him are considered fools, shunned and are sometimes forced to leave this place. I have studied long enough and I've decided to follow the majority; I am a Papa Johnian.
| 2014-03-17T14:26:02
| 2014-03-17T13:06:41
| 183
| 32
|
[WP]The world literally revolves around your schedule. So long as you don’t sleep, tomorrow won’t come. People around the word know this and have all adapted to your sleep cycle. Tomorrow, a great catastrophe will occur...but not as long as you stay awake...and everyone knows it.
|
"Madame President, the latest models suggest that the hurricane will make landfall tomorrow. It is currently estimated to reach shore as a category 5, with top wind speeds north of 180 miles per hour. The models suggest that it will make landfall near Savannah, Georgia, then follow the coast north, hitting every major coastal city along the way, until it burns itself out somewhere around Boston."
Chief of staff Acroma places a small dossier on the Resolute Desk, then steps back a pace, allowing President Miranda Glyburn to examine the latest information. She studies the pages within, satellite imagery of the storm, estimated casualty charts, damage estimates, agency responses and preparedness, National Guard troop placements and callup lists. Finally, she reaches the final page, which consists of a simple table:
Day extended 6 hours: 3000 lives saved, $3 billion in damages avoided.
Day extended 12 hours: 7500 lives saved, $13 billion in damages avoided.
Day extended 18 hours: 15000 lives saved, $27 billion in damages avoided.
Day extended 24 hours: 30000 lives saved, $60 billion in damages avoided.
Day extended 30 hours: 47500 lives saved, $100 billion in damages avoided.
Day extended 36 hours: 60000 lives saved, $175 billion in damages avoided.
The table extended on further, ending in an estimate for 120 hours: 400,000 lives saved, $970 billion in damages avoided.
The president sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose.
"We think it's worth the risk." The Chief of staff comments. "The Joint Chiefs and I, that is."
"Yeah, I agree. But one of these days we're going to burn him out. Make the call."
&#x200B;
\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_
&#x200B;
My phone rings at 7:17 AM, which, quite frankly, is an ungodly time for a phone to ring. Doubly troublesome is that I know the ringtone, and I know what it means. Groggily, I answer, grunting something akin to "heyeahwhassup?" as the line connects.
&#x200B;
"Mr. Benjamin, good morning. I hope you slept well. We are going to need your services once again."
"Ugggghhhh"
"The President of the United States of America will be speaking to you in just a moment", the voice says in a tone of mild disapproval. The line goes silent and I know that I've just been put on hold, which strikes me as something that only governments and monarchies can get away with- calling you up and then putting *you* on hold.
"Mister Benjamin" a cool, female voice speaks into my ear, and I recognize President Glyburn on the other end now. "As I'm sure you're aware, a storm has been brewing in the North Atlantic for several days now. Unfortunately, the worst-case scenario seems to be coming to pass- overnight, it drifted dramatically west, and, thanks to the warmer seas due to the global climate change, we suspect it will make landfall as a very powerful storm, and continue to be extremely devastating as it moves north along the coast."
I manage to catch most of what she says in between a yawn as I eye my pillow jealously.
"Right. How long are you needing me to give you?"
"As long as you can. Every hour is more lives that police and the National Guard can save as they make house calls and residents are able to flee to safer ground. If nothing is done, estimates suggest that up to two-hundred thousand may die."
I blink a bit, processing that number. *Two hundred thousand? What a fucking mess.* But I still can't help but feel tired, exhausted really. I'd been asleep for about six hours since the last time I stayed awake, that time for forty-two hours straight while the government of China worked to stop a meltdown in a nuclear reactor that would have potentially given a few million people a mild dose of radiation sickness and about fifty thousand more a permanent case of being dead.
I have obviously been quiet for too long, as the President's voice cuts in again. "I know you're coming off the Xi'an tragedy. The United States Government is prepared to offer you whatever resources and materials you need to help with this."
I hate the way I can hear her capitalize the words United States Government when she speaks- but it's hardly a condition unique to her- I haven't know a politician who *didn't* think that their government was the most important thing in the world. Comes with the territory I guess.
"I'll do what I can. The usual supplements should be fine. I can't promise much..."
"The families of those that live because of this will be forever grateful" she interrupts quickly.
"I know they will. But not to me. And there's always a cost."
"We know. *I* know. And for what it's worth, I'm sorry."
"Right. Send over the good stuff, and get your people moving."
"You'll have it in fifteen minutes."
The line goes dead, and I lay back in my bed, staring up at the ceiling. Even now, I can feel the time warping in my mind, and I know that as long as I can keep my eyes open, the "day" will not end. No one can explain quite why it happens- the best anyone has come up with is that I am somehow a locus of relativity- and that by observing the universe, I force it to slow to my own perceptions. If you remember your high school example of Shrodinger's cat, basically whenever I'm asleep time moves along uncertainly- it might going fast or slow but no one can really tell, at least on a cosmic sense. But when I wake up, the cat is out of the box, as it were. It is DAY, and will be DAY until I sleep again, at which point things go back to normal.
As you might imagine, this ability has drawn the notice of quite a few governments and I am one of the most well-guarded anonymous individuals on the planet. I have been offered sums of money that would make billionaires take note to extend time for certain interests. I am called when disaster looms, because as long as I am awake, time moves more slowly, though people move at the same rate. An "hour" turns into two, or five, or twenty. Most people have learned to have two sets of time keeping- one for normal time, and one for what they call "extra time".
All this to say, when the agents knock on my door in exactly fifteen minutes, I am ready to do what I can to save as many as I can. But I see the looks on their faces as I take the first of the amphetamines, and I wonder how long I can keep this up. Every time we go through this, I fall asleep eventually- it's human nature, after all- and I wake up to learn how many died that might have been saved. How much damage was caused that might have been avoided. I know I can't blame myself for them- I know, intellectually, that many people in the world are alive because of me, because of this strange thing I can do. But that doesn't stop the guilt.
I swallow the pills as I turn on my TV, tracking the storm, watching footage of Humvees rolling down a residential street, loudspeakers blaring evacuation orders as frantic homeowners get their families to cars and start driving down an interstate that is already clogged and will be for hours. But thanks to me, hours are a relative concept.
*"As long as you can give me."* She said.
I'll try.
|
Dear Lucy,
12/21/2012. We all knew it was coming. The “end of the world” or whatever it was that made the Mayans quit making their calendar on that day. That’s tomorrow.
Ever since you’ve known me you knew that my life was not normal. I controlled time on a day to day basis just by being awake and asleep. I could prevent tomorrow from ever coming as long as I could stay awake. Eventually, I’d either fall asleep or die from the lack of it, so I gave everyone a warning: Get as prepared as possible.
This incited mass hysteria. Stores were ransacked, gas stations emptied, guns and ammunition stockpiled, even banks were out of cash. With the helps of some friends... some of OUR friends... I knew I had to keep moving to stay awake.
We went on hikes, played sports, went swimming at the beach... visited the spot we had our first kiss... literally anything just to keep me awake and moving to give everyone else as much time as we could to get prepared.
Now it’s Day 5... I think. I’ve been awake long enough that I knew I had to write this down in case I don’t wake up for the world to end tomorrow. I’ve been seeing things that aren’t there, shadows dancing on the wall, hearing sounds that don’t exist. I’m going crazy just trying to help.
I saw you... or what I thought was you. I stared for so long my friends thought I saw a ghost. You were standing there smiling at me the way you used to. I wanted to run and hold you, but one blink and you were gone.
You taught me to love, how to help when I could and do anything for others. That’s why you were so amazing. You would’ve stayed awake a lifetime if it meant everyone else got to live.
I tried to use the strength you had, but I can’t stay awake any longer. For what might be the last time, goodnight Lucy.
-Garrett
| 2021-02-22T16:46:34
| 2021-02-22T15:33:14
| 181
| 66
|
[WP] They reworked the justice system. Now, in each cell there is a piano, and convicts are released after performing a song perfectly. Lesser criminals are assigned simple melodies, while the worst get full concertos. You've been a concert pianist your whole life.
|
At first I robbed a grocery store and played my "Three Blind Mice"
And when I egged a blind man's house I made that Bach sound nice.
They started getting suspicious when I made my big score
I robbed a bank and breezed right through Sonata 24.
I stole, I lied, I fought, I killed, I lived a madman's dream.
By Canon in D and Clair de lune and Fur Elise redeemed.
But my last crime, I do regret- it ruined all my plans
The owner of the purse I stole made sure to break my hands
|
Honestly, when I heard the announcement on TV, I was pretty confused. The guy who was reading it seemed pretty confused as well. When the new president said he wasn't going to conform to old traditions, nobody quite had THIS in mind.
But as I thought it through I quickly realized that I was basically immune to the law. No matter what they could possibly give me to play, I was confident I could easily play my way out.
Of course, I knew right away what I had to do. I grabbed my gun, and got in my car. I drove past the rioters, and made my way to my rival, Freduino Fabulousi's house. Freduino Fabulousi was the only piano player who's skills exceeded my own. And with him out of the way, I would be known as the greatest pianist alive. With that kind of power, I can get any girl I want! No more will girls refuse to sleep with me when I admit that I'm only the second greatest pianist alive.
Once I arrive, I throw a rock at one of his windows, shattering it, and I jump in, only to stare down the face of a barrel. Freduino has a wide grin on his face.
"Hmmph, you're so predictable Marquesta. Going straight for the window, the obvious trick. It's reasons like that which make you the SECOND greatest pianist alive today." says Freduino.
"My notes might be a bit obvious, but unlike you, I know how to improvise." I say, as I knee him in the groin. I pull out my gun and fire at him, but he rolls out of the way, and fires back. I narrowly manage to dodge his shot, as we engage in a gunfight. Neither of us are particularly good at aiming, so we miss quite a few bullets. It's not long before both of us run out, at which point we get into a fistfight. Freduino lands a few solid blows on my face, as I manage to kick him in his groin again.
Just as the fight starts to get heated up, the newscaster on the TV in the other room speaks up.
"It appears that a group of hackers have given us a false news story. The government has not, in fact, given rise to a new piano based penal system. I apologize to all the viewers who have been mislead and..."
Freduino and I stop fighting and just stare blankly at each other.
"In retrospect, that didn't quite seem like the sort of thing the government would just throw at us out of nowhere." I said.
"I suppose you're right." says Freduino.
There's an awkward silence between us, before I quickly pick up a shard of glass on the ground from when I broke the window, and stab it in Freduino's throat before he can react.
"I may be going to jail, but at least I'll be going to jail as the world's greatest living pianist."
| 2017-05-17T23:42:52
| 2017-05-17T23:39:54
| 2,153
| 328
|
[WP] "The Young Anakin, Trained, he will be." Yoda said. Obi-Wan exclaims, "The council is in agreement then? I will train the Boy?" Yoda looks at Obi-Wan, "Mace Windu, his master will be."
|
Obi-Wan blinked. Then he blinked again.
"Excuse me? Did I hear you correctly master Yoda."
"Hear me well, you did, Mace Windu, the master must be."
"Why?" Asked the confused Jedi Knight.
"Vaapad." Mace Windu answered.
"Indeed, the boy is old enough now that the dark side will have a far greater pull on him than any of us, and Master Windu has proven time and again that he can resist his own darkness."
"Walk the line between light and Dark, the chosen one must, to bring balance to the force." Yoda counseled. "Achieved this, only Master Windu has."
Obi Wan captured his emotions, and calmed them, the council was correct. He was not ready to take a padawan, let alone one as talented and powerful as Anakin would doubtless become.
"I understand, master Yoda. I am not the right man to train him."
"None of us are, Obi Wan." Intoned Mace. "The power of the Chosen one, and the destiny that awaits him is too much for any one master, even Master Yoda. I will need your help, and the help of all the council in this endavor."
"Fear is not the way of the Jedi, master Windu." Cautioned Ki-Al Mundi.
"Fear, this is not, wisdom rather. Wisdom I should have forseen." Yoda countered. "Sith we are not. Alone we are not. We are Jedi, we will stand as one."
Obi-wan bowed before the council as Mace rose.
"Come, young Skywalker. There is no time to waste, your training must begin."
To be continued.
|
"As you wish, master." Obi-wan says, as he is withdrawals from the chamber.
*timeskip 18 years in the future*
Anakin is standing in the same chamber in front of Yoda and his master Mace Windu.
"Congratulations, in order they are!" Yoda says
"Yes congratulations Anakin, you are no longer the young padawan that was here all those years ago." Mace Windu states as he reaches for a light saber.
"But these are dark times and this lightsaber was left here for you as a token of the hatred Obi-wan felt when he lost you as his apprentice"
Anakin reaches for the light saber and it blazes on in his steady grip. Yoda gets out of his chair to stare out of the window. "Slay him, you must! Darth Obi-two, die, he must."
Ehhmm *a cough from the corner*
"Yes Jar Jar!" Mace Windu asks, visibly annoyed.
"Ittsa gonna bes a hardsa fight, he hassa army of over tree-fiddy! " JarJar blurts out cluelessly.
| 2017-05-24T05:19:39
| 2017-05-24T02:38:15
| 24
| 18
|
[WP] Random people around the world are being granted powers based on whatever video game they choose. Some people summon pokemon, turn into mechs, or gain God-like abilities. A grandmother is asked to choose; however, she is only familiar with mobile games. How did she become so OP?
|
Let me condense it down for you, capiche?
You see, my grandma- she loves mobile games. When she’s not with her girls playing mahjong, or out gardening, she’s probably on her phone, like me, playing games, like me. In other words, she’s maintained one aspect of my current life in her late years.
Now, recently, games have been a bit more…fantastical. Fate/Grand Order has mythical forms of historical figures who can wipe the world out with ease. Genshin Impact has a beautiful, stunning world that fits in the palm of your hand. Clash Royale lets you declare wars between anyone and everyone- albeit with a more comical and medieval tone. These, and many other games, have some sort of high fantasy element to them.
My grandma likes to collect things, too, which is why she likes playing gacha games like Puzzle & Dragons and collectible card games like Shadowverse. She is a gardener, and is therefore simply attracted by games like Gardenscapes. Her mind is always hard at work trying to beat her peers in mahjong, so developing strategies and game-winning mindsets in games like Legends of Runeterra.
So when people began randomly gaining superpowers, the combination of collecting powerful people, cultivating and caring what she has, and being competitive, she made her choice. Eventually, my town of Buckley, Colorado became a hotspot for adventurers and characters from Runeterra to Teyvat, all governed and looked after by my 70 year-old grandma. To show out display of power, someone with the ability to command dragons tried to raid Buckley, only for grandma to call out those Dragon Callers and beckon the man’s mass of scalie flyers over to our side with ease. The guy was shook and ran off in his underwear- we burned the rest of his clothes.
So uh, yeah, that’s a quick overview of how my grandma Alice became the most OP superhero in America, and possibly the world. She just happened to have connections to everyone she knew- as long as they were on her phone.
Plus, we taught how the Raiden Shogun to cook. It was an experience.
|
The news said all this craziness was somehow caused by video games. I'm not a gamer. I don't understand any of these laser-lit teenagers, or their weird little pokee animals. I wouldn't have a clue what "powers" are possible based on video games. But I did play that farm thing on the Facebook for a while. Until it slowly got less and less fun, expecting you to pay to water, pay for gems, pay for coins, pay NOT to play it seemed. Micro-transactions I've heard them called, but whatever the name, I'm old enough to know when I'm being screwed. I'm also old enough to know that however much the world's changed some things will always be the same. I couldn't come up with a flashy power, but hey, why does Batman gets to pal around with his super friends without any super abilities? Turns out I knew just enough about gaming to gain the power to open any door in the world with the universal key. Bankroll!
| 2022-05-10T13:58:59
| 2022-05-10T13:19:02
| 28
| 19
|
[WP] "Enough! Is there anyone here who DIDN'T come to rob the bank?"
|
Too many groups had shown up to the bank, far too many. A brawl had broken out between a gang of old English accountants calling themselves 'The Corporate Raiders' and a trio of cudgel armed lunatics in red robes and wide brimmed hats shouting in fake Spanish accents. Several men dressed as Orthodox Jews had come here looking for a diamond exchange heist were in a Mexican Standoff with a small gang of men in suits wearing clown masks. Even four of the tellers had pulled on gas masks and brandished Kalash rifles because they had come to rob the bank *as well*. A machete wielding Russian had cut down two or three of the clown masks *after* they had put twelve rounds into him. I stood dumbfounded, watching the groups of robbers brawling, standing off, or just killing each other in general. But then I remembered I had also shown up to rob the bank brandishing a nine millimeter carbine, duffel bag, and Russian gas mask. I walked through the madness and shouted
"Are any of you nutters *not* 'ere to rob this bank?"
Silence fell over the bank, the cudgel wielding loonies in red had killed one of the Corporate Raiders and the Russian stopped mid-swing as he was about to behead a clown mask. The faux-tellers just stared at me, dumbfounded. The Jews lowered their guns, one of them shrugged. I shouted into the crowd once more
"There are eight groups here, and sixty banks in the city; how in the hell did you all end up in *one*?"
The Russian spoke up.
"Maybe the forty million pounds in that vault, but we should all know why the Jews are here."
One of the Jews shouted and tried pistol whipping the un-killable Russian only to get slugged square in the jaw. I started counting the robbers there, the clown masks, Corporate Raiders, fake-Spaniards, the Jews, the Russian, *and* the Kalash wielding tellers. There were exactly forty, excluding the ten-odd already dead.
"Alright, tell you lot what: we split the dosh, a million to each man if what the Russian says checks out." I told them. They began nodding in agreement, what I said had kept them from killing each other for some time.
"Anyone 'eah got some of them breachin' charges?" a clown mask asked, and seconds later one of the tellers pulled a brick of the stuff out of his pocket. He climbed down from the counter, getting to work rigging the vault door to blow. He ran back and leaped over the counter, he pulled the detonator and shouted
"Everybody cover your 'eahs!"
He hit the detonator and the vault door blew open, money spilled from the vault, stirred by the blast. I looked to the Corporate Raiders and asked
"You lot good at countin' dosh?"
They set about distributing the pounds from the vault, a million to every man just as I said. All forty robbers left relatively peacefully, and quite wealthy as well, me included.
|
A few moments ago it was a normal, dull and monotone day at the bank. Customers going in, and later out. The smell of the ink and the familiar clicking of all those chained pens.
But now, there was a standoff.
"Okay, what the bloody, flying fuck is going here, mates?" A hooded figure with a red mask asked his companions with equally colorful masks in different colors.
"I don't bloody know, you bloody scum-blood-bag!" The green guy responded.
Pink cocked his sawed-off lead blaster, "Let's just slaughter these fellas."
The Backstreet Brit-Boys a.k.a. The Color Lads were the most feared gang south of Chapston, and this was the first time somebody saw them confused.
"Yo-hoo, no need for killing," a man in a mankini stepped forwards and yelled towards the Brits.
These guys didn't look intimidating, but the Half Naked Man Babies was a force to be reckoned with.
In the corner of the bank a silent, skull-masked gang in black stood and listened to music. The Bones was the full on emo-clad gang; they never spoke.
"Listen, comrades, no need to fight. Drink vodka instead?" A pale man in his fourties said with a thick russian accent, "We, The Kalinkas, is friend," he continued.
Suddenly, and surprisingly, the manager stood up again, after being tied down for a while.
"Gentlemen, is there anyone here who didn't come to rob the bank?"
A slow mumble was heard throughout the building, and several words could be heard:
"Nah."
"Of course I'm robbing the place."
"Yes?"
"I'll slice you!"
"Fucking stereotypical douchebag writer."
After the situation cooled, the manager begun speaking again.
"I think I have a solution for our little problem; let's split the money up on all the... One, two, three, ten, sixteen, twentyfour... Twentyfour gangs!"
A loud cheer could be heard, and then everybody took their turn to raid the vault filled with gold.
***
I'm sorry if I offended you with my extremely stereotypical stereotypes :) It was for *da komedi.*
| 2016-09-07T11:07:10
| 2016-09-07T09:28:41
| 268
| 16
|
[WP] As it turns out Humans weren’t the only intelligent life, instead they were just the first. They explored the universe and helped many budding civilizations until one day they just disappeared completely. You are an alien historian who decided to find out what happened, these are your findings.
|
**Extinction Report**
*Investigator:* Tril Kor Tal
*Subject Species:* Humanity
*Species Aliases:* Homo sapiens, The Teachers, The First Ones
*Conclusion:* Inconclusive. See analysis.
*****
**Analysis**
Allow me to begin with an apology. This report is based largely on conjecture. There can be no objectivity in this analysis. As a result I prefer to give my thoughts on the matter.
These reports usually discuss the extinction of extremophile bacteria or hardy algae on worlds inhospitable to complex life. Rarely, a semi-intelligent species on a habitable planet will vanish. This is often due to catastrophe, be it from stellar radation, meteor impact, or tectonic displacement. Occasionally, it is due to attack by spacefaring races, in which case the Galactic Order must take action against the guilty species. This case is then doubly unusual. Not only is the species in question fully sentient, but I have found little evidence of catastrophe. In fact, given the wide spread of humanity across the galaxy, it is unlikely that any one catastrophe could have wiped them out.
But, as the news programs have been loudly proclaiming for the last dozen cycles, the humans are gone. On every inhabited planet in the galaxy, their embassies are empty. The teachers at their schools have abandoned their classes. Their medical staff have left their non-human peers to cope.
More troubling still, over the course of this investigation I have visited the human core habitations and found them empty as well. The moon colony at Lalande, the artificial planet at Kapteyn, the multi-planet consortium at Feynman: all are vacant. There is even no evidence of humanity in their birth system, Sol. Their birth planet, Earth, a world-city with a population of 24 billion, is empty.
If you'll allow me this sidebar, let me say that I cannot properly describe the scene when I descended to the Earth's surface. The familiar constructions are there still. The galaxy's first space fountain. The planet core sapper. The antigrav megadrone. The solar net. Not only are these still intact, but being fully automated as they are, they're still in operation.
So I came down to what appeared to be a world-city bustling with life, but the streets were empty. The buildings, many of them still lit up, gaped vacantly. I was reminded of the eyes of a brainless creature.
But allow me to discuss the theories being thrown about on the news.
First of all, the talk of civil war is absurd. Nowhere is there evidence of military destruction. All cities I've seen are intact. Their military emplacements in space remain undamaged and fully stocked with weapons and vessels. But there should be no need for this type of evidence, as a civil war that drew in teachers and doctors could never have gone unnoticed by the rest of us in the galaxy. Such a war would have lasted decacycles and resulted in massive collateral damage on non-human planets.
Another theory is the singularity. Some are suggesting that humanity has transcended physical existence. There are those who say this was done through quantum computation, while others believe it was a supernatural phenomenon. This theory is less easy to debunk. However, let me point out that there are no human bodies anywhere. A supernatural phenomenon that eliminated the physical would be contradictory, while a computational method would face a similar problem. Either the humans invested a huge effort into automatically destroying their bodies as they transitioned, or it did not happen. I lean in the direction of it not happening, but I cannot say for sure.
The same issue regarding bodies does away with the plague theory. Had a plague wiped out humanity, the rest of the galaxy would have heard of it. There would be people fled in all directions looking for quarantine. There would have been calls for medical aid. And, as I say, there would be bodies. I can say with some certainty that it was not infection that did the humans in.
The theory I hold is one that I can't fully explain. It's more of a feeling, and it requires that I discuss my perception of human psychology. There is much conjecture ahead, and those of my readers who prefer concrete evidence may wish to skip to the appendix of images, videos, and data that my team has gathered on the human core worlds.
Those of us in the species that know humanity well have always known that the humans are flawed in a way that no other species is.
Their flaw is this: Humanity is incapable of sustained happiness.
A happy human is a human who just recently acquired or accomplished something. But the human is too adaptable. After only a few days, or even hours, of happiness, they acclimatize to their new norm and they look around and they ask themself why they don't have more, why they haven't achieved more, why there were ever happy with what they have, and why they aren't already taking steps to get more. It is a tragic, defining feature of their species.
Because while it is a flaw, I believe their inability to be happy, and the resulting need to always look ahead and always do more, is what led to their being the First Ones. So many of the sentient species in the galaxy achieved some level of toolmaking and technology before the humans, but were then happy to remain as they were. Only the humans, desperately chasing some impossible quality of life, kept pushing and pushing. Only humans looked to the stars before they'd learned to fly.
So what is it that I think happened to the humans? I think they got tired, or bored, or upset, and they moved on.
Impossible, you say. How could billions and billions of humans reach this same conclusion all at once. To that I say, you may be right. It's unlikely. But then so is the vanishing of those same billions and billions.
So, have the humans all died? I don't believe so. They are too clever and too desperate to live.
What I believe is that one day, as a species, they looked around and they asked themselves why they were ever happy with this galaxy, with this role they played as our teachers. They asked themselves these questions and they didn't have any good answers. So they left.
Anyone looking to find the humans should look beyond the Milky Way. Maybe they're just now arriving at Andromeda. Maybe they've gone further still.
My hope is that, wherever they've gone and whatever's happened to them, they do some day find the happiness they're looking for. They've earned it.
*****
*author’s note: i normally prefer to write stories with dialogue and more character interaction. please let me know if you thought this story was boring without that sort of stuff.*
*r/TravisTea*
|
The undulating crowd fell silent the moment I ascended the podium. Other than the gentle hum of the engine pulsing outside the window, not a sound could be heard.
I shuffled my notes and stared at the stars glimmering above my head. Looked like Qaar had finally gotten around to installing the transparent ceiling in the auditorium. I would have to thank him after my presentation.
If I wasn't fielding questions for the next millennia, that is.
"Thank you everyone for gathering here today," I began. "I know you all have been dying to hear my findings regarding the fate of humanity, and I thank you for your patience. However, my research has yielded quite alarming results, so I've been working around the clock perfecting this announcement to avoid causing undue panic. For this reason, I'm asking you all politely to save your questions and comments until the end of my presentation."
I tapped my fingers on the podium, doing my best to ignore the ball of anxiety growing in my stomach.
"Being a Kaal of few words, I've decided to stick strictly to the facts. There will be plenty of time to interpret and opine about my data in the coming months, but until further studies are conducted, I warn against this.
"In short, the humans went extinct due to a virus that ravaged their species 20,000 years ago. This virus spread through space travel over several decades, and before long spanned every human colony across the universe. Despite the best efforts of doctors to develop a vaccine, the virus proved incurable, and eventually exterminated all human life.
"After uncovering an ancient human lab on Faldaar, one of my colleagues found a sample of this virus. This virus was well preserved enough to still be active, and was labeled the 'Corona Virus.'
"Unfortunately, after a tragic accident, my colleague released this virus on Balaal, infecting the entire Kaal population. We have since quarantined our colony there, but given the fate of the humans, the virus will most likely spread..."
[Read more at r/DailyHorrorStories](https://www.reddit.com/r/DailyHorrorStories/hot/)
| 2020-03-12T11:03:23
| 2020-03-12T10:57:51
| 2,893
| 33
|
[WP] Snape is forced to teach sex-ed at Hogwarts.
|
Snape briskly walks into the sex Ed classroom for the first time, gazing upon the giggling young witches and wizards. He stands tall behind the podium taking his apathetic gaze to each and every student's eyes, lingering for half a second longer on Harry's face. Clears his throat very audibly even though he knows he address the class without problem. "There is only one spell I am going to teach you today, because it is the only spell you will ever need." A few of the non attentive students perked up at the professor's tone of seriousness. "*fetus deletus*".
Throws his cloak over his shoulder and walks out, letting the door close with a bang.
|
Professor Snape entered the classroom and shut the door.
"As you may have heard, the professor previously assigned for this course had an unfortunate accident involving centaurs. So I will be giving you the course. I will not tolerate puns, giggles, or any other kind of chaotic behavior in this classroom. Understood?"
Snape looked at a pair of disobeying students in the back. Without hesitating, he pointed his wand at the kid.
DISCIPLINARE CAPTIVUS!
The kid disappeared, and appeared tied up and wearing a very humiliating shiny outfit. He was gagged and tied to some sort of rack. Snape grabbed the other kid by the whiskers and gave him a paddle. "I want you to hit hard enough, but don't make him bleed. 10 times."
The other kid out of fear, began. When the punishment was finished, Snape waved his wand again:
Disciplinare Liberatio!
The kid was again in his normal clothes.
"Now take your seat... if you can stand the pain."
The audience was silent. You could hear a pin drop on the floor.
"There are three rules, equally important, for having sex in this institution:
Number one. CONSENT. No breaking of consent, by any psychological, physical or magical or otherwise means. Do not force or deceive anyone to engage in any kind of sexual activity. This includes watching, so NO SEX IN PUBLIC! Any sexual activities involving monsters require the monsters' permission.
Number Two, and perhaps the most important: SAFETY. No endangerment. This means, get checked for diseases or curses before having sex with a new partner. You can play all you want, but always have the means to avoid any casualties. If you use ropes, have an untying spell or scissors handy, and learn the arts of Shibari BEFORE TRYING!
If you use shackles or chains, keep a key handy and a safety liberation spell set to trigger if any one of you loses consciousness.
If you use any kind of torture, have a safe word so you'll stop immediately. If you have sex outside, keep a teleport spell handy in case of wild beasts. Any limits previously established must NOT BE BROKEN.
Number Three: SANITY. Absolutely NO use of mind altering drugs or any spells that could put you or your partner or partners in danger. If you must use spells for whatever idiotic reason you choose, use only prepared spells. Aphrodisiacs are allowed, JUST AS LONG as you consent.
ANYTHING ELSE IS ALLOWED. Homosexuality, group sex, ghosts, monsters, bondage, torture are allowed as long as you comply with the above three rules.
Any questions?"
Hermione raised her hand. "What about RACK? Risk aware consensual kink?"
Snape approached her. "FORBIDDEN. For next class, I want a full study of safe bondage and sadomasochistic practices and historical examples of casualties due to breaking the rules.
Now everyone open your sex education book in page 23: Contraceptives.
| 2014-12-03T13:14:55
| 2014-12-03T13:02:36
| 216
| 42
|
[WP] After a SpaceX mission, Elon Musk suddenly closes down all his businesses and disappears. Eight years later, an old Musk owned factory begins to operate again. You find a lucky golden ticket, inviting you for a tour of the factory.
|
Chloe held up her golden ticket to the woman at the reception desk.
“I’ve come all the way from Alaska,” she said, barely able to contain the bubbling excitement in her tummy.
The receptionist rolled up one of her graying eyebrows in distaste and said nothing.
“So, is Mr. Musk here? Will I get to meet him?”
“The door to the left,” said the receptionist in a bored tone.
Chloe skipped across the lobby and knocked. Her tiny knuckles had barely left the door when the red light on the lock turned green. She squealed and turned the knob.
The room was small and only held one chair and a large screen mounted on top of a massive glass-encased computer. Tiny lights flashed and faded inside the box, and as soon as Chloe flopped down on the chair, the screen sprung to life.
Elon Musk’s dark eyes and rugged face appeared on the screen. In the videos Chloe had watched, the man was always smiling and joking around. Now his lips were pursed in a tight minus and his eyes locked in a grave stare.
“Hi!” Chloe said and waved. “I’m Chloe. Nice to meet you!”
“If you’re watching this, I’m dead, and most of my projects are likely stolen or in ruins. The Mars mission was a failure… we didn’t expect…” Elon’s voice faltered, and he touched his forehead.
“Are you okay, Mr. Musk?” Chloe whispered.
Elon sighed, and he appeared in a slightly different position, a part of the video clearly edited out.
“We didn’t expect there to be any viruses on Mars,” Elon said and ran his fingers through his graying hair. “We didn’t–”
Screams and loud banging noises filled the tiny room, and Musk quickly turned away from the camera before the video cut off again and he appeared in a new position.
“We made it to Mars, but we weren’t prepared…” he said solemnly. “Everyone’s infected except me… the doctor said… he said that I’m immune to the virus… he said… my genes are special… If you’re watching this, it means we share those genes that we are related somehow.”
“We are?” Chloe’s face lit up.
“You need to gather people for a mission…” Musk said. “You need to retrieve this….”
He held up a portable hard drive with an engraved SpaceX symbol.
“We… awoke something…” he continued. “And they’re coming… You’ll need this drive. You have to go to Mars.”
“I’m going to Mars?” Chloe said, her eyes widening. “I’m going to Mars! I turn five tomorrow – what a great present! Thank you, Mr. Musk!”
“You now control all of my remaining assets. You are to gather a team and take the last ship. You have to be fast… when this message reaches Earth, they’re already on the move.”
“You can trust me, Mr. Musk,” Chloe said excitedly. “I’m going to bring all my friends to help.”
“Thank you for listening.” Another series of clanking bangs came from the speakers and Musk glanced over his shoulder. “Please hurry, the future is in your hands.”
The video ended and the screen went black.
“Don’t worry, Mr. Musk, I’ll help you get your space-box back!” Chloe said and clapped her hands.
*****
r/Lilwa_Dexel
|
"OK, Bob, in 5, 4, 3," the camera man then proceeded to mime the following two numbers before giving Bob the thumbs up.
Bob composed himself before starting, "Jesus Christ, Tiger Woods, and Lance Armstrong. What do these men have in common? Well, they all committed career suicide at one point only to bounce back stronger than ever. Whether it was El Savior purposely dying to prove a point, Tiger terrorising a copious amount of world class prostitutes, or Lance secretly filling his body with a staggering amount of Mexican supplements, each of these great men suffered set-backs at one stage in their illustrious careers. Well now we can add another name to that list; Elon Musk. The set-back? Elon was forced to close down all of his businesses and disappear after a rad video appeared on YouTube outing the wild entrepreneur as a time-traveler. The hit video had everything you would expect from a YouTube conspiracy video; tremendously well linked evidence, dramatic acoustic background music, multi-coloured annotations that would shoot in to frame to help further convince you, and finally, proof that Mr. Musk is also a multi-dimensional space lizard sent to enslave humanity.”
Bob halted to allow Fiona, who was stationed back in the studio, have her say.
“Almost incomprehensibly put, Bob. For our viewers out there who are not as well versed in whatever it was you just said, can you further explain what is going on over there?”
Bob, nodded at the camera, “Yes, of course. In simple terms, Mr. Musk is back. And not just Tupac Shakur releasing a summer jam from the grave back, he’s back for real. After an eight year hiatus, the time-traveling genius has returned, signalling his intent to run some form of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory style competition in which anybody out there lucky enough to find a golden ticket will have a chance to traverse space and time with this multi-dimensional space lizard.”
Fiona interrupted, “Well, Bob, we do not have confirmation that Mr. Musk is indeed a lizard.”
“But we can’t rule it out,” said Bob.
Fiona could be seen forcing a laugh while holding her ear-piece close, listening to intently to the voice on the other end.
“Don’t let Bob talk about time-traveling and space lizards, Fiona!” screamed Ed through her ear-piece. Fiona’s director was sitting head in hands in the studio.
“Why the fuck do you continue to employ this man?” she mumbled in to her mic before looking up at the camera and clearing her throat. “Well, Bob, we know Elon closed his companies eight years ago in order to focus on what he called a ‘world changing SpaceX mission’. Do we now have clarity in regards to what that actually entails?”
Bob nodded, “Do you not think it’s strange that Elon Musk fled the public scene after the time-traveller conspiracy video was put on to YouTube, Fiona? Are you really that feeble minded?”
“Bob, we don’t have time for this.”
“No, Fiona. You told me at the Christmas party that we didn’t have the time for this. Then you told me at Carl’s leaving drinks that we didn’t have time for this. So when will we have the time for this? This needs to be discussed.”
“All you is talk about is inter-dimensional lizards, Bob. Inter-dimensional lizards, Tower 7, and the Illuminati. Oh, and while we’re at it, nobody likes being forced to watch YouTube videos. Ever. Even if they’re good I don’t want to sit and view them on your phone while you watch for my reaction. It’s fucking weird.”
“Oh, that’s weird? That’s what you think is weird? You know what I find weird? The Queen controls the weather and Elon fucking Musk has a 9ft tongue.“
****
I write shitty, silly stories on /r/BillMurrayMovies. Feel free to come along, not laugh at any of them and leave some judgement.
| 2017-06-19T04:52:32
| 2017-06-19T04:05:48
| 219
| 76
|
[WP] Out of all possible familiars, you are "Graced" with a human. While legend says that they are beings of great power, yours just makes sarcastic comments and pranks people.
|
Ellayne, Syldra, Fayrwin, and myself, Jeryl, had been friends since our early days, playing in the forest at being adventurous sorceresses. Now, after years of schooling it was time for our summonings.
A familiar human was a spirit from another realm, given new life and form to serve and aid their summoner. Each sorcerer and sorceress choose a type - a warrior, a soldier, a scholar, a spy, a sage, and so on, and called them forth from the nether to be their lifelong companion.
Ellayne had always had a flair for the dramatic, from her dress to her spellcasting. She specialized in grand displays of power, and needed a familiar who could help her channel energies to fuel it all. As she performed the ritual, her familiar took form; a short (even for a human) with cropped, curly hair, wearing a modest dress.
We could all feel her spiritual power; a medium then. Someone who could channel energy. We helped Ellayne can and settle her familiar; echoes of memories from their past selves clung on for a while, but eventually faded. This one's personality seemed modest and quiet; easy to manage. Her name was Agatha.
Syldra was an Invoker; she revelled in the raw power of magic, and specialized in unleashing it in devestating attacks. However, it came at the an expense. She'd neglected her self defense and combat training, so she's need protection. Her familiar flickered several times until one took form. He was impressive; tall, broad shouldered, even handsome in the brutish way some humans can be. More importantly, he wore shining, fitted armor and carried several well-used weapons. His name was Charles.
Fayrwin was our team's healer; she'd always been caring and kind with a deep connection with nature. Her familiar came into focus swiftly, and was... Odd... He was a gangly man with an excited nature, wearing simple tan clothing. They immediately began talking about animals; so much so that we had to remind Fayrwin that I needed to summon mine still. His name was Steve.
I was nervous, to say the least. I never really settled in a specialty in school, and had no idea what kind of familiar to conjure. I decided that someone wise, with broad skills would work best, clever and quick witted, who could help me out of any messy situations I might find myself in.
I began the ritual. I could feel the threads of power flow through me and into the nether. I found it! Strong, clever, wise... He was everything I wanted in a familiar! I saw an older, yet spry man with youthful eyes form before me. There was energy, vigor, yet a deep solemnety that bordered on sadnesses.
"Woah, talk about a head trip!" He exclaimed looking about animatedly. "Hey, you must be in charge here," he said to me, grasping my hand and shaking it vigorously.
"Er, well, yes. I summoned you; you're my familiar," I replied firmly.
"Not too familiar sweetheart, I've already got a wife."
"What? No, not that kind of... You're my guardian and guide, my helper and companion."
"That's a tall order for one short, hairy comedian, but I'll see what I can do," he replied with a flourish and a bow. "Steve! So this is where you ended up!"
"Ate mate, good to finally meet ya!" Fayrwin's familiar replied. I gave her a baffled, helpless look. Our other friends just laughed, irritating me more than a little as my familiar wandered off to chat with Steve.
"Hey! Come back here!" I insisted crossly. My familiar stomped back over with stiff, exaggerated steps, arms and legs stiff and straight. He turned in his heel before me and crispy saluted. "Oh Capitan my Captain!" He exclaimed.
"Stop that at once!" I commanded, flustered. He looked back at me with the unsettling gaze of an experienced parent. "Uh, if you please... Uh... Mister..." I stammered.
"Robin," he finished, "nice to meet you!" I could only stand there, dumbfounded and perplexed as he energetically shook my limp hand.
Neither my friends nor their familiars could stop laughing.
|
Some say humans are the pinnacle of ingenuity and community.
Some argue that they are the embodiment of sentience.
Some go the other direction and say that they're the embodiment of all the things they're infamous for.
All compelling arguments. But the one thing they agree on is that humans are the prime terrestrial species.
And the prime terrestrial species has to be a symbol of greatness, right?
Well, apparently not.
The only thing my human's been a symbol of is antagonizing people.
And that's not one of my virtues.
I suppose the humans are the most complex of the terrestrial species, after all.
Who knows what role they play?
| 2018-03-20T20:23:14
| 2018-03-20T16:59:31
| 19
| 12
|
[WP] Describe the thoughts of the Angel of Death on the day of a nuclear war.
|
I have a book of names. The letters appear and disappear as people do. When I started this job, I would memorize each name individually, and pray for each one as it faded away.
"Adam." "Isaac." "Heracles." "Sarah." "Vibiana."
As the years passed, the names seemed to flow more and more rapidly, until they became a river. No, a geyser that spits the name from some underground source, giving them the energy to rise until they fall. A flow that I've seen so much for so long that I stopped seeing them.
So I thought that when this day came, it would be easier for me.
I don't know what will happen to your souls. None of the angels know. We only trust that God would not have created you if he did not have a plan. We only trust that there is a meaning in your existence. Most of us do not think much about death, because we are immortal. I think about death. I hate death. I only ever walked death. I did not own it.
I expected my last day on the job to be sweet. I expected to be happy to feel this burden no more. I was wrong.
I stare at the book so that I will not have to look into the fire. The pages go blank dozens at a time. I try once more to pray for them.
"Adam Li." "Isaac." "Robert Eccles." "Sarah Drinkwater." "Vivian Hamoud."
Goodbye. Sleep well.
|
And then, on the 15 of July 2015, they were all burned by the sun.
When the Pakistani missiles took off, the Indians did the same. Within a minute, 371 missiles and 1461 warheads were flying. They rapidly entered sub orbital flight, to avoid interception. 12 of them exploded in space, generating a massive EM wave. 60% of world satellites died.
1449 were still flying. Twenty minutes after they took off, the slaughter began. They always say the ones who burn instantaneously are the luckiest. Yes they are. They will not be burned to the bone and suffer for days, begging to die. They will not eat radioactive particles for years, giving them multiples cancers. They will not mourn their entire family.
I watched the cities of the Indian peninsula burn, again, again and again. When the last nuke fell, Bombay wasn't a city anymore.
The huge cloud of particles was worse than everybody thought. The crops will die, people will fight for food, a massive hunger awaits the world. The dead will pile up, every governments and order will collapse, killing more and more people.
All of this for God will, to kill the infidels. The worst part is that they think they will go to heaven, the did what God wanted, they will join HIM.
There is no heaven, no hell, there is just me. At least, humans provided me some companionship in this lonely universe. I watched their little silly stories to pass the time. Now I will just stay alone.
| 2015-02-04T09:45:29
| 2015-02-04T09:38:43
| 51
| 12
|
[WP] Our blood is naturally clear, it thickens and darkens with each impure act. You have always dedicate yourself to good and helping others but today while knitting beanies for the homeless you accidentally prick your finger. Your blood is jet black and so thick it doesn't even drip.
|
Between his teeth, he drew his breath in sharply; a wordless exclamation of the pain. Putting aside the knitting, he rose from the chair to find something to dress the small wound.
It was between the living room and the kitchen he came to the realisation that blood which should have come from the small prick, had not.
He held his finger with his opposing hand and saw what looked like viscous oil smeared upon his finger. At first he thought in confusion he'd stained his finger with something unknown, but in realisation he knew it to be his own blood.
He squeezed the wounded finger, and a something as thick as molasses, and just as dark welled up. Slowly. Grudgingly. Deeply sinister in it's just being, despite the simple nature of what it was.
In days that came after, he thought of it. He thought *only* of it. That couldn't be his blood. He had been raised by a righteous family that had taught him how to be a good man in a society where there were few left. He had followed no hedonistic pursuits, done charitable deeds, and tried as best possible to follow the actions of his father, and the advice of his mother.
He was a good man, that couldn't have been his blood, yet there it was.
The fifth day after he gave in to his overwrought anxiety and curiosity. He cut his thigh where it would be hidden. There it was. The oil that was his blood, so thick it needed to be coaxed from the wound with pressure.
He knew there would be one place where he might find answers, but also judgement. The Temple....
|
Turns out following the rules of god was the wrong way..
Turns out following the Bible to a t, never wearing cotton, the whole fish thing was wrong..
That woman who was dying I couldn’t touch her,
Turns out slaves where bad...
Turns out cutting my wife’s hands off was evil..
I needed a moment
| 2018-08-04T09:46:21
| 2018-08-04T09:44:59
| 24
| 10
|
[WP] War is no longer initiated by your country’s leader. War is now decided by popular vote. If you cast a vote “FOR” war, you are automatically enlisted in your country’s militia upon successful declaration of war. You voted “AGAINST,” but the rest of your family voted “FOR.”
|
Let me tell you a lesson kid. A story of times long gone, when life was better. Of times where we strived for more than putting food on the table. When we were brave enough to embrace values and concepts, and to prioritise them over even the basic needs of life.
Democracy, they called it. A system of governance where the majority decided where everyone went. Where leaders were so limited, so powerless, so bogged down by the whims of the masses, to ensure they would never have the power to singlehandedly drive a country into the dust. People voted for their favourite personalities, and governments lived and died on these votes, to the point where they would risk life and limb, death and embarrassment, just to win the next election.
And, for a while, it worked. Tyrants no longer held absolute power. People embraced their own small share of this power, embodied by small slips of paper issued every four years. Countries thrived in mutual benefit, no longer subject to the desires of ruthless maniacs.
But tyranny finds a way. And for us, that moment came when the country voted to go to war. Politicians and personalities took sides, each arguing for the benefits of either action. Some lobbied for accountability, to prevent people from making uninformed decisions. Some focused on the injustice dealt to our sovereignty, sprinkling the confidence that everything would be over in short order, that we had more to gain than to lose. Everyone expected everyone else to make the right choice. And that was where it all went wrong.
My family were among those who voted for war. "It's just one vote. No one else is gonna vote for war, that's stupid." "We need the money. It'll help with your education, y'know." "Relax, there's no way we're going to war."
"People aren't that stupid."
Diffusion of responsibility, they called it. When everyone has the power to do the right thing, everyone expects everyone else to do their share, and it results in no one doing anything. And there was the fatal flaw. When people refuse to exercise their right, when voter turnout decreases because voters think their slip of paper doesn't matter amidst a sea of other slips of paper, that's when democracy goes wrong.
So we went to war. You see the results today. I lost my family, my old life, my freedom, and above all, my belief in society. Not just myself, but many others too. That's why the tyrants have returned, why the iron fist of subjugation and censorship is upon us again.
If we don't treasure what we have, we may someday regret our decision when what we do have is taken away.
|
War, what is it good for? Absolutely nothing. Which is why you voted "AGAINST."
The vote for won. Not a lot of people voted, pretty much a third the military service members and those who think everyone else is the enemy. So less than 1% of the population.
The problem almost no one else voted. The bigger problem, the international community. Since "We the people" voted for war, our biggest economic and military rivals were saying that our entire populace should be considered military targets.
There was push back, but it was kind of like the rest of your population who didn't vote. Those countries wouldn't target civilians, but they weren't taking steps to ensure the other key players wouldn't.
All of your family old enough to vote, voted FOR. Your parents, your siblings, your oldest kids, your spouse. You had no idea what they would do. Your kids were in good-ish shape, they were young. Your spouse and siblings were in okay shape, for their age. Like they worked out for a few weeks at the start of the year, then fell off and had an average diet. How would they do? And your parents, they were old, old enough that unless they were a General they'd be forced to retire. But because of the new law, they were in for the war.
As soon as they left you lost contact. No phones in boot camp. The war never started. Well at least not in the way the your leader had thought it would be casting a vote. They said war through the will of the people is righteous and his followers agreed. Now the US, England, France, Germany, South Korea, Japan, Turkey, India, Russia, China, and Iran have troops in your country.
Military targets were bombed by the US the day the war started. China and Russia only hours later. Was anyone in your family alive? What would your country look like tomorrow? Would it be one country or several?
War, what is it good for? Heartbreak, unrest, and seeing who wants to die for a leader who voted no on the war he pushed so he didn't have to fight in it.
| 2021-01-28T05:43:05
| 2021-01-28T04:42:03
| 187
| 131
|
[WP] Write a story that literally makes no sense while reading it until the very last sentence.
|
He was on the street, content with rage.
She typed away, in her own cage.
He stood on this stage in glorious fame.
The wizard stole the Frost Queen's Claim.
Her water broke. There was no time.
They finished up their master crime.
Would they kiss? Time would tell.
Charon crossed the river in Hell.
He sat in his car when he smelled the stink.
She was going insane -- she was on the brink.
The celebrity paused because he felt it then.
Wizards need to go, but the ice rose again.
She winced in pain while she felt it rise.
The criminal wept, meeting his partner's eyes.
He broke the kiss, feeling the pain spikes.
Charon winced. **Where will *you* be when diarrhea strikes?**
Edit: punctuation
|
Mom was singing Christmas carols again. The martini in her hand glowing like the contents of a broken glow stick. The dog was barking too. When I went to go look I could see children running around the classroom, having too much fun to notice the SS Titanic sinking into the giant kiddie pool outside. The sound of bagpipes commemorated the 100th anniversary of the sinking while trapeze artists flew through the air. I tried to catch one of their hands, but I was falling...
falling...
falling...
..out of my bed and onto the floor.
| 2015-01-12T17:07:48
| 2015-01-12T10:42:43
| 24
| 10
|
[WP] A new drug let's you live a lifetime in one dream
I have a recurring dream. It's interesting to me because i've been going through the motions of life within this dream; I live a second life every night so to speak. So I put this here to see where people's imaginations can take them.
EDIT: I can't edit the title now, but the title should say "lets" instead of "let's" :(
|
You see, I'm an addict to Postremethed, the hallucinogenic drug that made it's breakthrough in the underground a couple years ago. It wasn't like I was a junkie or anything, the worst thing I had done before PRM was a little weed in high school. I was just hanging out with the wrong crowds and got a tablet slipped in my drink or put in my mouth while I was sleeping. I don't know, don't really remember anymore.
My habit started out small. See, it's not the kind of thing that's pleasant, per se, but it's sure as hell addicting. I was popping one a week back then, usually Saturday before I went to sleep. Nowadays it's a nightly ritual, one right before bed and a glass of water. I can't sleep until I've taken it, I nearly clawed my eyes out on a plane ride the other week because I ran out of my travel set. I'm acutely aware that it's ruining my life. My performance review last quarter was on the 'really shit' side. I'm on a slippery slope to dying in an alley, but at this point I don't care. If PRM wasn't keeping me up I'd have offed myself by now anyways.
Like I said, PRM is a hallucinogenic drug, and to say it makes your dreams interesting would be an understatement. Every time I've taken it my dreams have felt like an eternity, and that's because when somebody takes PRM they dream an entire life. Accounts vary, from living until old age to dying around college. Most people usually remember very little, myself included. It's tragic, really. Bits of an entire life, children I never had, a wife I never loved, things I've never done, all fading away with the morning. I imagine it's a little like dying. The most I could gather was that I lived until an old age and led a pretty happy life. The thing is, it felt like it was always the same. Every morning felt eerily familiar, the same faces disappearing from my mind.
The logical thing for me to do was to try to remember my dreams, of course. I read up on some homeopathic stuff, which I usually don't trust but I decided that try. Surprisingly it worked. I wish it hadn't. Not only was I remembering my dreams, but I was lucid dreaming. I had no control over the dream but I felt like it was me feeling and thinking. Eighty years. I live eighty years every night. It's unbearable agony and sweet sanctuary. The dream starts off boring, because it's just my life. It's literally my exact experiences, up until 23. That's when it gets weird.
See, 23 is where I go to that party, discover PRM, fall into my depression, the whole shebang. Only, I don't go to the party in the dream. I stay at home and sleep off my hangover from the night before like a sensible adult. The next morning my friends are mad I bailed. We drift apart. I meet a beautiful girl, Hannah. We have a kid, John, and move into our own house. I move up the corporate ladder, working hard but enjoying moments of it and making enough money to live comfortably. We have another child, a beautiful girl we name Beth. We go through pets, the kids go through school. Beth is a genius, she becomes an engineer and I couldn't be prouder. John gets into some trouble with drugs but gets back on his feet around 30 and becomes an employee of the same rehab facility that helped him so much. I retire, as does Hannah. Life is good and I die with very few regrets surrounded by people I love, people who love me.
Then, I wake up.
You think you know pain? You think you know despair? Somebody once said that the worst hell they could imagine was showing the person that you became the person that you could have become. I have to agree. Literally the only thing that keeps me from putting a bullet through my head is the knowledge that I'll get to live that life every night, before I have to return to my own.
Please, don't do drugs, and if you do then stay the hell away from PRM. It's not worth it.
|
If it comes to me, I'll write a story response as well but this is a slam poem written with this kind of prompt in mind. Hope you enjoy; I want to get into /r/WritingPrompts more; criticism appreciated.
EDIT: Changed the ending's imagery just a slight bit.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Gold has been revered as a precious commodity since before recorded history.
Mansa Musa distributed so much gold to the poor on his pilgrimage to Mecca
that the entire Mediterranean suffered from a massive
depression for the entirety of the following decade.
Three hundred-thousand gold-greedy men and women converged upon California from all over the world;
in the first five years of the Gold Rush, three hundred and seventy tons of
gold were excavated from the Sierra Nevadas.
Before they could all reach paradise, though, some died miserable deaths
drowning in shipwrecks,
boiling alive with typhoid fever,
vomiting their life out from cholera.
I compare myself to a Californian gold miner of the late forties.
I go to sleep every night an expectant miner.
The rush to stake a claim deep within the mysteries of my dreams
overpowers my better judgement, my life’s current complacency and safety,
all so boring.
I get one taste and I rush to dig deeper, stay longer;
fools’ gold still gives you that same rush when you first find it.
Every night, I select a song that ferries me towards my claim; it takes me downriver, but the river’s not as crystal-clear as it was
when I first began.
I go to sleep every night an expectant miner.
When I arrive at the mountains of my dreams, the horizon fills with the
deafening explosions of dynamite and monotonous clanking of
pickaxes that mark a thrilling uncertainty at the
prospect of discovery.
Is tonight the night that I find gold?
Will I find a small, gleaming nugget; will I rub it between
my silt-covered fingers; will white teeth gleam against a soot-blackened face as
I savor a moment of pure ecstasy?
Or will I find enough gold to ruin the economy of my own body’s Mediterranean, will it wash the beach of my consciousness a faint gold as it
flows in and out, leaving the imprint of dreams forever lost;
the waves stain deep, a tag reads “dry-clean only”.
I go to sleep every night an expectant miner.
Sometimes when I wake up, I can't dam back the tears; they wash over the tangible as I lament the most recent cave-in;
that dream’s lost forever, I’d best cut my losses and find another claim, but
how can I move on when sleep with her is more real than
any waking moment?
How can I leave any of it behind when in the rubble sleeps the
only incentive for me to finish the day?
She’s only available for those scarce six hours, if that;
sometimes my hands bleed as I scramble to uncover her at night,
free her from the prison my alarm clock traps her in every morning.
I go to sleep every night an expectant miner.
Tonight the river ride’s full of thick, dark-red silt. I squelch through slowly, worriedly, but when I arrive, the pile’s still there.
With a deep sigh of relief, I heave away the first rock and the rest crumbles away, I know the routine and yet
I wait with bated breath as the dust clears from before me.
As it settles, there she stands, perfectly flawed;
that small scar still rests upon her delicate face, those beautiful emerald-green eyes pull me closer.
Unharmed, she beckons me forward and I breathe her in as she washes over me; she’s just as I remember.
“You won’t have to leave me ever again”, she tells me.
I smile, because I believe her.
| 2015-09-24T22:02:57
| 2015-09-24T21:44:04
| 37
| 15
|
[WP] People often attribute your success as a superhero to your power. However the truth is the power itself sucks, you just learnt how to use it well despite its limitations over the years, as one power stealing villain painfully learnt
|
I suppose turning supers into celebrities was inevitable. Society loves flashy, interesting, and dramatic. It didn't help that when the first few supers revealed themselves, they did so with a camera crew behind them. Instant celebrity status within an hour. A decade later and you *had* to be flashy to be a hero. Or a villain. If you weren't, well the world just ignored you. Can't be a terrifying villain if nobody cares that you even exist.
Which is why I never bothered trying. My power was pretty useless, neat, but useless. Nothing ever fell out of reach for me, and I didn't need much help getting things off the top shelf (an amazing boon being the tiny woman that I am). Instead, I chose to become a doctor of General surgery instead. While obvious in hindsight, turns out minor telekinesis with a kilogram weight limit is an almost perfect power to compliment any surgeon. Still, superheroics was something I largely ignored. I was a *hero*, just not a *super* hero, and even well known in the medical field due to my skills with a scalpel, and that was more than enough for me.
It wasn't until I single-handedly incapacitated the terrifying villain Monstrosity that the world took notice of me... Only to forget about me just as quickly when they saw that I was a rather ordinary lady despite being able to quickly and easily take down one of the strongest villains in the world. So the world classified me as "S Tier" and that was that. At least, until the next supervillain. And the next. And the next. I don't know what it was about villains and *my* hospital, maybe it was just the idea of trying to beat me. Fortunately for my hospital, my weak power was so fine tuned that I could clamp off a vein or artery, apply pressure to the brain in the right way, or knock around some inner ear bits to quickly and efficiently knockout anybody that attempted to threaten us.
Even Leech, who could "borrow" the powers of any super within a hundred yards. Poor kid thought he was about to rule the world. Unfortunately for him my power was so mundane without my specialized training that he didn't even realize what power I had before I knocked him out, too. It didn't matter who I faced, how flashy *they* were, my unassuming self and vehement opposal to bring a celebrity at all let me remain... Surprisingly anonymous. And eventually, villains gave up trying to challenge me as well. I was just too powerful with my measly telekinetic power.
|
Assimilation, a fairly new villain with a copy-cat power, looked at me with pure disgust.
"Your power is-"
"Yep," I responded, sparing him the embarrassment of saying my power. "Kinda gross, isnt it?"
Assimilation looked at his hand, which he used to copy my power, before frantically trying to wipe it clean on his cape. He then turned back to me. "How does that even work!?"
I shrugged. "Kinda like soap. I telekinetically control it, so if its all over my body I can simulate strength, speed, and flight."
The villain was just stunned, and reasonably so. The public opinion of what my power is tends to be those base things rolled up into one, but thats only because of how creatively I've learned to use my powers.
"So Mister Vitality's true power is..." Assimilation couldn't finish the sentence without gagging.
I zipped over to him using my specific telekinesis, and quickly rocketed my fist into his face.
"Semen control, yes," I finished his sentence.
Man I need a shower.
| 2020-12-02T07:54:05
| 2020-12-02T07:41:01
| 214
| 102
|
[WP] "Well you managed to fucking do it. You slept through the apocalypse"
.
|
*Beep beep beep*
*Beep beep beep*
I groaned. I smacked my lips. I rolled over.
*Beep beep beep*
Oh right. That's my alarm. I should probably get that. The clock read "6:15" in green letters, with "SAT" glowing in the top right corner. Why was my alarm going off when I didn't work today? Whatever. I'm gonna snooze it and go back to sleep.
*beep beep beep, this is the emergency broadcast system..."
*Beep beep beep*
The process repeats. Now the clock says 2:15, with "SUN" glowing in the corner. Ironic, since the sun didn't rise for another few hours.
Time to get up, I suppose. Man, sleeping for 20 is the best. I didn't sleep well the night before, tossing and turning until I finally passed out at 4am. The beeping a couple hours later didn't help either.
Feet on the floor. It's cold. I should get carpet, I think. Yeah, carpet. Time to brush my teeth and get moving for the day.
The light doesn't turn on in the bathroom. The shower doesn't turn on. Also half the bathroom is missing. Power must be out.
Lights don't turn on in the bedroom either. Weird. Guess I'm gonna get dressed in the dark. I've done it before.
Maybe I'll open a window. The moonlight will give me at least something to work with.
Weird. It's just black outside, except for the faint glow in the distance. Looks like the sunrise against the city.
Sun doesn't come up for another four hours though.
|
I walk through the streets with blood and puke stained clothes, an ax in my left hand and a .45 pistol in my right. I walk like I fucking own the place because I do. All of the sudden an SUV full of those fuckers rounds the corner puke and blood spray out the windows... But wait lets take it back a step about 3 days. I was a normal paramedic in Chicago, my passion was blood, guts and saving some peoples lives. This story begins with me sitting in the back of a van with a heroine overdose patient. His pupils were the size of a pencil led, blue lips and shit running down his legs... but something was so different about this guy. He was fully awake and aware. In fact he was talking like he was an extremely well educated man! I was holding a conversation with him about our family's. I was calm on the outside but so fucking freaked on the inside. He was oblivious to the fact that he is dying and that wasn't uncommon, but fuck he has shit running down his legs and smelled like death. That was when it happened the worst experience of my life, this guy grabs me by the neck and puts his other hand on my jaw and forces my mouth open and starts to puke down my throat. I start to puke back and in a orgy of puke and confusion I fall on the ground and start to pass out. I feel a hard thump and hear my driver screaming at the top of his lungs. Then i saw blood splatter the window of the driver cab. I couldn't muster the strength to get up and help him.
The next time I woke up I woke up to a very familiar smell... death. I got up covered in dry puke and blood from something. I stand and look at the driver cab but my partner is obviously dead. His neck is spit open like a go-gurt. It doesn't really faze me, John was a dick and was cheating on his wife. I am so confused at this point that we could be here for this long. I get out of the back of the van and slam it shut. I look at the Chicago skyline and all I see is fog and a hint of fire engulfed towers. I realize that there is nothing on the road at all and this is a highway. Just empty cars some riddled with bullets some green and red on the sides. I decide that I need a weapon so I grab the fire ax from the side of the paramedic van and the .45 in the front just in case we are jumped for our morphine. I start walking and hear a few rustles in the bush and guess fucking what, 2 men with full swat outfits and assault rifles start screaming at me to get on the ground. I laugh and look at them they are 5' somethin and maybe 100 pounds. I say "You aren't shit." and start walking. Then I hear the safety come off. I turn on a dime and point it right at one of the kids but before I can even pull back the sides a guy butt naked with a knife comes out of a bush and starts stabbing one and the other makes a run for it. I start blasting the guy that has the knife but it is too late for the midget swat team. He is already onto the other guy. I stare as this man with over 6 bullets in him just tears into the guy I am in awe. The naked man collapses and screams. "Well fuck that shit." and now we are back where we were. Walking down the street with blood and puke with that crazy van. Anyways these guys are heading right for me and not stopping. So I promptly lay on the cold hard ground and wait for my fate. *CRACK CRACK THMP THMP THMP* 8 or 9 guys come out of the bushes in full swat gear shooting this van to hell. These guys are men though unlike the mini me couple we saw earlier. They grab me by the arm all the while shooting this van and drag me off.
If I get some good feedback I will continue with the story for a few more parts. If not, oh well. :)
| 2016-03-11T11:58:08
| 2016-03-11T08:55:57
| 17
| 11
|
[WP] 70 years ago, the US underestimated the power of the atomic bomb. It had completely obliterated the island nation of Japan.
|
To say it was a complete surprise was an understatement. To say it ended the second great war, World War II, was a bit of an understatement too.
The "Gadget", as they called the first atomic bomb set off in the New Mexico desert, had been a calibration run. The implosion necessary for a plutonium bomb was tricky. Plutonium was more active than uranium, and this meant the assembly had to be quick, which was only something explosives could do. There's something fundamentally contradictory about using explosives to generate a carefully-controlled *im*plosion. The scientists weren't sure it would work properly. The design therefore had to be tested to know there would be no suprises. The test had worked perfectly, yielding about 18 kilotons equivalent TNT. It was truly a bomb that could win the war.
The uranium "gun" type bomb, by contrast, was dead simple. Ram two subcritical pieces of uranium together into a supercritical mass using a gun-like arrangement. The assembly could be much slower than for a plutonium bomb. Easy. The hard part for a uranium bomb was getting enough U-235 isotopically separated, but once you had that it was so simple that a test didn't seem justified, especially with precious material that took literally years and hundreds of millions of dollars to process.
So it seemed obvious to drop the "sure thing" uranium bomb first, then back that up with the more experimental (albeit tested) plutonium bomb only if it became necessary. Given the fanaticism of the Japanese Imperial regime, there were even odds it would be necessary to drop both, even though in the end that never happened.
All seemed nominal as the *Enola Gay* set off with its pair of wing-mates for the selected target, Hiroshima. They flew towards the target, got the weather clearance from the scout plane that was sent ahead, and lined up for the drop that fateful morning in August. We don't really know exactly what happened next, although we assume everything prior to the actual detonation had worked as planned.
The first clue that something had gone wrong was simple: there was no signal from the *Enola Gay* or any of the instrumented B-29s that were monitoring from some distance away that the bomb had detonated after it had been dropped. A dud? No, that would have been reported quickly. Coincident with this was an unbelievably strong electrical pulse on almost every piece of equipment that used electricity, from lights to radios to cars. It's not even clear that a radio signal from the bombers could have gotten through, given that 9 out of 10 pieces of radio gear had been fried, and what had happened at the drop site had likely vaporized the planes in seconds anyway.
In the confusion of the few radio reports that managed to get through and were received elsewhere in the world, navy ships and island bases near Japan reported strange clouds and glows from the direction of Japan proper, shortly followed by large earthquakes if they were on land. Something had happened there that morning, they reported, and the weather and earthquake reports continued as the hours went on that day. Some areas close to Japan had suddenly darkened and clouded over, but it was no normal cloud. They reported ash and dust that burned their skin, even though the ash itself wasn't hot.
Some of the island stations suddenly cut out a few hours later. It wasn't until the effects got to Hawaii, about 8 hours later that it became clear why: a huge tsunami struck, destroying a good part of the cities and US naval fleet there. We assume many of the closer Pacific Islands to Japan had experienced the same or much worse, and the confused messages were brief windows between the Hiroshima event and their eventual destruction.
In the spreading ripples of chaos it was hard to know what was going on. Most of this was figured out after the fact, after another few hours a massive tsunami had swept across the entire western seaboard of the US, wiping most of San Francisco, Los Angeles and many other cities off the map. This wasn't only a US problem, but we were the first to know what had happened that day. The seismometers clearly pinpointed Hiroshima, Japan, as the epicentre, and we knew we had done something special there.
Unfortunately, the math had been off. The tiny fraction of uranium we expected to fission had been a huge underestimate. The amount of energy released per fission had been as well. We don't entirely understand why. The physics seems to be new. Something about "universal" physical laws changing in the exotic conditions at the core of an atomic explosion, tapping into yet another form of energy than atomic, and those changes somehow messed with uranium but not plutonium. Oh what a difference a few neutrons make, apparently. If scientists weren't worried about other things now I'm sure there would be reams of papers written about it. But whatever the cause, the effect was catastrophic. The uranium bomb, the simple, "sure thing", was 100000x as powerful as expected. What might have been 20 kilotons, enough to flatten a city, was 20000 megatons of TNT equivalent. Enough to leave a crater 100 miles in diameter at the southern end of Honshu, and enough to denude and utterly destroy every tree and every structure on all the islands of Japan, the Korean Peninsula, and beyond, not to mention the far effects of a tsunami on a scale never before seen in human history. Everyone within a thousand miles was surely, promptly, dead. Even this was only the beginning. The cloud of dust and radioactive fallout slowly but steadily spread like a cancer across the world, smothering everything alive on the surface in its darkness and coldly-burning death.
The Bomb. Not "a bomb". Not "atomic" bomb. *THE* Bomb. The One Bomb. It did end the war to end all wars. More precisely, it ended the wars between humans. In the immortal words of General LeMay, we had "Bombed ourselves back to the stone age." All of us. Every person on the planet. Now we fight against the harsh world that has turned against us, huddling in our few remaining caves and mines, as we again count on the few scientists left to get us out of the mess that our old hubris and wars had created.
The Earth has survived worse in its long history, and we could survive what the dinosaurs could not. For now we must tend to our reactors and underground fields, but Dr. Merkwürdigliebe assures us that in a century or so we will be able to return to the surface and reclaim our destiny in a hopeful new world without wars.
|
“Japan is gone sir.” The man calling said with a dead tone.
“Gone!? What do you mean “gone” son? You mean Hiroshima is gone? Be specific.” The man’s voice was nearly as coarse as his face was lined. A line of stars shined on his forehead.
“It’s gone sir. All of it. The bomb was a bit bigger than expected.” This time the voice was a little perturbed as if the outburst had awakened it to the situation.
The general with the stars on his head paused with one hand on a cigar. “Well I’ll be damned. You’re sure son? I need to make a call. A few calls. What the Hell? You sure son?”
The general hung up without getting an answer paused for a moment. Lit the cigar then resumed yelling.
….
Ketchup has strange properties when it encounters nuclear explosions. It hardens immediately upon contact with gamma radiation thus creating a type of shield that blocks most subsequent radiation. The method by which this occurs is little understood and even less studied. Suffice it to say that if you are in the vicinity of this nuclear explosion you would want to be on the island right off the coast of Japan that manufactures all of Japans Ketchup. This little island is known for having vast open paths and having particularly virile verdant grasses filled with diverse animal life. The people there live in a near collectivist society that focuses on helping one another and treats each member of the society no matter how young as an equal. It was truly an island utopia.
…
At the time of the explosion the largest ketchup manufacturing plant in the world located on the south side of the island exploded raining its contents down on the little town, it became the legend of the “blood rain of life” The fortune of the most elite family was destroyed, however the residents of the town miraculously survived with no major mutations. The animal life was not as fortunate, perturbing mutations began to be common. Unknown species with higher than average intelligence evolved. The people faced their new world with a brave pioneering spirit and soon populated the entire island using the last of Japanese innovation and technology. Beautiful cities well planned and cooperative sprung up at regular intervals connected by ancient paths that once went through endless straight lines of tomatoes.
…
Years later the last of the long forgotten ketchup mogul’s line was born. His name long since been corrupted by subtle changes in pronunciation yet still held echoes of his ancestors empire and it's subsequent destruction. He will be known as "Ash Ketchum".
[seedsoftantalus.wordpress.com]
| 2015-08-06T11:50:10
| 2015-08-06T10:59:00
| 384
| 221
|
[WP] You often pick up pennies you find on the ground, inspecting them for date, markings, etc. One day, you find a penny from 2044. Even more shocking, it's your face on the front.
|
He had picked up the quirk from an old girlfriend. Her grandmother had always picked up pennies if they were face up and made sure to flip them over for someone else if they were face down. The thought of leaving some good will for a stranger if he couldn't earn it himself through a good luck penny always appealed to him and he picked up the same habit.
Running late and impatiently checking his watch for a second time in a few moments because he didn't really look the first time.
"Is this train coming or not?" he breathed out to himself while sticking a piece of nicotine gum in his mouth. A fellow passenger bumps into him and as if they were having their own individual conversations to one another, mutters, "oh, it's coming, it's coming" and wanders off towards the edge of the platform.
The traveler being jarred back to reality looks past the woman that nudged him and sees a single copper penny on top of the trash can near a support column. He heads over to it to toss the gum wrapper away and get a better look at a little luck.
He sees a very dingy and corroded penny, but the side facing him is tough to discern. "Must be a foreign currency" he says, speaking to no one in particular.
He lifts the coin up and casually inspects it to attempt to decipher which side would be 'face up'. Turning it over in his hand he sees that the reverse side is in much better shape, but he doesn't see the face as anything he has seen before on a penny, even though it has a familiar look to it.
The train is finally arriving and wanting to get a closer look at the unfamiliar coin, forgetting the bad luck he might bring by not leaving it face up for someone else, he stuffs it in his jacket's breast pocket.
Climbing into a car on the red line, he sees the woman who had run into him asking a seated passenger a series of questions. "... you believe LeBron has been to the finals so many times in a row? What's that now, four or five? Crazy right? I can't believe there's another election coming up, feels like it was only yesterday that Trump and Clinton were facing off. Historic election indeed. Do you think he'll win again? What if he....", the traveler walks out of ear shot to find a seat, and after figuring he will be about 5 minutes late to his meeting if all goes well, pulls the penny back out of his pocket.
Flipping it over to see the face again, he notices that it is a US coin. "What the hell, 2044? Is this some kind of..." his face freezes. He brings the coin closer to his eyes.
Most will never seen themselves cast in metal, etched in stone, or similarly enshrined. But here the man looked closely at the metallic visage of... himself. The chin, the lips, the hair, and the eyes. Those were HIS eyes. A strange sense of panic and otherworldliness overcame him for a moment before he looked around the train car and hoped to see this as some kind of prank. Feeling like there was no one else looking at him, save the lady still quizzing passengers around her with odd current event trivia, he turned his attention back to the coin.
He reached into his pocket and seeing no signal on his phone from being so far underground, he snapped a picture of the penny and composed a message to his assistant asking him if he thought the portrait looked like him and moved it to his outbox.
The man gently opened his wallet and placed the penny inside, looking at it again, surprised that he didn't notice just how much the face in the coin looked like him as the first thing, he tucked his wallet back in his pocket and stood up to be ready to exit the train as it slowed down for the stop.
The woman who had been running a focus group of fellow begrudging passengers stood by the doors just as the train slowed. Happy that she was picking a door further down the car to wait, the man started to go over the meeting he was going to be late for in his head.
Walking into his building and stepping into the elevator, he sees the same woman from the train walking into the lobby just as the doors close. Breathing a sigh of relief to not be stuck with her again, he tries to focus on the meeting, but his thoughts only go to the penny. Reaching into his pocket to withdraw his wallet to look at it one last time before getting to the conference room, the doors to the elevator open 15 floors before his. Looking up the traveler says, "hey, I didn't expect you to be down here, I figured you'd be upstairs waiting for me. Still, glad to see you and do you have the..." his assistant cuts him off. His face set in a look of determination and his jaw clenched. The elevator doors close and it begins to move. "I got your email."
The assistant reaches out and grasps the man around the neck with both hands. Surprised to say the least, the traveler begins fighting back and they're thrashing about the elevator. 12 floors before stopping.
He punches his assistant square in the left eye to little effect. Kicking and pulling at him doesn't seem to deter him any. 10 floors. Rushing towards the elevator door and slamming his assistant into the aluminum causes a slight loss of grip around his neck and allows the man to gasp for a small amount of additional air before going right back into the fight of his life. 6 floors.
Falling to the ground, the assistant now plants his knee squarely on the chest of his boss, expressionless until he sees the redness of the traveler's eyes, a sign that he's heading towards unconsciousness, then a slight smirk starts to appear at the corner of his lips. 2 floors.
Reaching up towards his assailant, the man tries to push his thumbs into his attacker's eyes. Even this does little to phase him, and he opens his eyes even wider. 1 floor.
Trying to twist away and get just any amount of air into his body, the man tries to push his legs against his assistant when the doors open with a ding. Hearing others scream in the background at the sight of the two men locked in combat causes the attack to slow for just a moment, giving the man a chance to grab the pen from his pocket and stab it into the hand of his attacker. He scrambles to his feet, gasping hard and coughing, trying to drink in every molecule of air that he possibly can, he dizzily stumbles towards the open door, and is tackled from behind and rolls forward towards the glass fence that encircles the upper lobby and looks over the building's atrium. Turning to look he sees his (now former, obviously) assistant pull the pen from his hand and throw it over the glass to the marble forty floors below.
The glean in the assistant's eyes changes from anger to the calm that comes with completing a difficult task, as he charges at the man, ready to push him over the edge and send him to the same fate as the pen.
At the moment before impact, the traveler sees the woman from the train, closing rapidly, pushing him down while getting underneath the assistant. Using his own momentum, she expertly throws the attacker up and over the glass.
Dazed and still trying to take a normal breath, he manages to get out between coughs, "what the... who are you?"
Kneeling down, the woman leans in close and puts her hand on his shoulder, then whispers, "you're already late, and this meeting is very important."
|
"Today started just like any other day. I woke up, got myself ready for the day, and then went and ate some breakfast in the cafeteria." I said to Carol.
"Okay, so then what happened?" Carol replied.
She seems more cold today than usual. Less cheery maybe but who knows I could be reading into too much.
"Well after breakfast I took my morning walk through the park and you know how I am. I was looking around for any change to add to the collection and I found a particularly shiny penny. So, I bent over to pick it up and read the date, but it said 2044 on it..." I can feel my chest get tight as I utter out the last few syllables.
"Well that is quite strange Theodore. Was there anything else strange about the penny?"
"Well... I noticed that my face is on it. I...I..."
"What is it Theodore? You can talk to me, you know I am here to talk through anything with you."
"Well Carol. I had a flashback or a vision when I saw it. I saw myself in a suit and holding that penny in a box while shaking a man's hand for pictures. I don't know what it means, but it felt so real... like I was actually there."
"Do you have the penny now Theodore?"
I reach into my change pocket and sift through my handful of pennies, nickels, and dimes. It's not here. Where did it go?! I came straight to my session with Carol after my walk.
"I... I... don't know where it is... I had it on my walk over here." I stuttered to Carol in shame.
"Well Theodore. I don't want to upset you but do you think that maybe you just imagined that penny? Your condition is starting to develop more rapidly now and hallucinations are often one of the first late stage signs."
"It felt so real Carol. I could feel the fake copper between my fingers... the indention of my face in the coin."
I feel my chest tighten even more and my vision starts to fade to a different image. I can see a band above my eyes. I can hear the distant hum of machines, and what is this cold metal I am laying on. My vision swirls back to the room with Carol, and I feel sweat covering me.
"We are loosing him. MAYDAY MAYDAY he is starting to breakthrough!!" Carol shouted into her lapel.
The security guard comes crashing through the door with a nurse following him. He starts to push me down in my chair.
"What are you doing John?!" I scream as I try to struggle out of his grip. The nurse sticks my thigh and I fade away to darkness.
Oh God it's so bright in here. It feels like I have a hangover... Wait where am I? This looks like the room from before. I look over to my side. There are a ton of tubes sticking out of me whats going on?! Did I have a panic attack? \*CRASH\* the door busts open. Three people in masks walk in.
"It's gonna be okay Theo we've got you now." The largest of the said through a skull masks.
"Who are you people? Where is Carol? Where are we?" I stammer out in fear.
"Theo now is not the time for questions you just gotta trust us so we can get you out of here safely." The smallest of the group said in a kind voice.
They cut the band from around my eyes and remove the enclosure around me. The larger two flip me onto a stretcher and drape a sheet over my body.
"Play dead until we are out of here if you want to live."
A few minutes pass by and then the sheet is removed. I'm in the back of a van.
"Where the hell are we going? What is going on Goddammit?!!"
"Shh Theo, we are here to help but we aren't out of the woods yet. This place is about to go on full lock-down so we have to hurry."
I can feel the van speeding up beneath me. \*WOOWOOWOO\* A siren blares in the background
"This is not a drill. Repeat this is not a drill. Code Orange. I repeat code orange. Everyone report to your designated check-in terminal." The man says hurriedly over the loud speakers.
I can hear the van struggling to get to speed. \*CRASH\* The van crashes into something metal. Im hurled into the wall as we turn sharply at a corner.
"Okay so are we alright now, can you tell me why I am in the back of a getaway van???"
The two sitting in the back with me remove their masks. One is a slender woman probably 5'4 or less, brunette, doe eyes. The other is a rather nerdy looking guy, short black hair, a little on the heavier side, average height.
"Well Theo, we came to save you. What all do you remember?" The woman said with a smile and a pat on the shoulder.
"I remember being at my care facility for the past couple of years. I remember working through my problems with Carol, and I remember all of my walks in the park and time spent with the other patients. I remember my life from before I got sick. God I miss those days with my family."
"Oh Theo, this may come as shock to you but none of that is real. Carol, the walks in the park, the fellow patients, your family from before, your sickness... It's all fiction. You have been in a simulation for the past three years." She said looking disheartened
"I... I.. What?"
"You were the President Theo, but the Ishkas took you, put a clone in your place, and put you in a simulation."
My vision flashes back to me standing at the Lincoln memorial. I can feel my chest starting to get tight again. My vision is swirling around the room.
"Oh no, Kyle, we have got to remove these memory blockers now or he might get hurt."
Everything goes black. I fade away to darkness...
\~FIN\~
I would be willing to do a part 2 if anyone likes this I just don't want to make it too long.
| 2018-06-27T09:22:43
| 2018-06-27T08:56:39
| 79
| 22
|
[WP] You made a deal with the devil and now he wants payment, but in the worst typo in history he's come to collect "your sole".
If you can think of any other words that work go ahead.
|
"Uh, Lucifer?" I squinted at the blazing gothic text in the parchment. How I wish they would have just switched to a more legible typeface; Comic Sans would fit right in, and is at least more readable than this crap.
The demonic form of the Devil was imposing, feral features knitted into his gaunt musculature. Still, the vague inquiry seemed to pique his interest as he opened his maw, uttering a gutteral confirmation that he was listening. "Yes?"
"You may have made a typo in the contract. It says that, in exchange for the services provided, I am to relinquish my..." I was quickly interrupted.
"There is no error. This contract is handwritten by my best scribes and have been triple-checked by me. Simply sign the contract and I will ensure that every word in it is done."
I smiled as I read over the contract once more, making sure to take note of all the details. "Very well." I signed the contract with a flourish, the flaming quill setting fire to the ink as I wrote. The very moment I finished, the parchment burned away, the contract accepted and bound.
The Devil stood up and gestured for me to follow him. "If you would step this way, we can start the ritual right away."
I followed him through another set of doors to a large circular room with a stone pedestal on a small platform in the center. I was directed to take my shoes and socks off and lie on the pedestal while Lucifer locked the doors.
I glanced up at the Devil, grinning. "Are you aware that the contract says..." I was quickly interrupted again.
"Sole, S-O-L-E, yes." He said with a smile, making his way towards me, eyeing my bare feet hungrily.
So the Devil has a foot fetish. Go figure.
|
I lay on my bed, bored and idle. My hands meandered about and wandered under my soft pillow, trying to find something to do as I awaited the feeling of the sweet tendrils of sleep pulling me under. Despite the endless void of black darkness and the caress of a fluffy quilt, my eyelids refused to heavy.
Just as I was about to sleep, I saw a flash of red out of the corner of my eye and someone turned the lights on. I opened my eye and turned around to see a rather unpleasant looking figure with antlers and an awkward yet malevolent grin. The patchy skin it wore was a mishmash of maroon and purples. Really, it looked like a grade 2's playdough project gone wrong.
"I've come to collect my debt," it said. "Give me your soul."
I warily got out of bed and looked at the contract. "I've come to collect your sole, as agreed upon 324 years ago in another life of yours," it read. "Give me a second," I mumbled.
I scampered down the stairs and picked out an ugly pair that was basically falling apart at the seams at this point. I went back up the stairs to meet the playdough-like devil thing that had disrupted my sleeping time, and threw the shoes at it hard.
It cried out and looked at me with disgust for a moment at the pact it thought I'd broken, then the face of disgust turned to horror as it realized just what had gone wrong. Who knew a simple misspelling of all things could be a devil's undoing?
Since then, I've heard the devil always uses a spellchecker.
| 2017-10-16T07:30:31
| 2017-10-16T06:04:40
| 77
| 15
|
[WP] Your whole life you were misdiagnosed as colour blind, when in reality you could see colours no-one else could. You see art differently, the sunset and sunrise differently. A rainbow to you is out of this world. One day you go to visit the Mona Lisa. You see something no-else does...
|
The Mantis Shrimp is the most badass creature in the world. Seriously. Its the equivalent of a nuclear-powered cranky lobster with years of martial arts training. Its claws strike so fast that they vaporize the water around it. It kills by creating a cavitation wave, a high pressure exploding water donut jet of death. And it can see a bunch more colors that most people. But I am not most people.
I have a gift. Or a curse, depending on which way you view it. I can see just like the mantis shrimp. I have twelve color receptors instead of the typical three. In practice this is a disadvantage. One would think that more receptors leads to greater color perception, but in practice the reverse is true. For example, while most people can easily distinguish yellow and orange, I blur the two together.
Where I have everyone else beat, is the ability to sense light beyond the visible spectrum. At first, I thought it was strange, being able to see auras around people. Then I realized I wasn’t seeing an aura, at least, not a mystical one. I was seeing their infrared radiation!
But it gets stranger than that. I can see leylines of darkness. Invisible, intangible threads that flow through our earth and through the air. Swarms of black and red dots that sway like cobwebs with the wind. No one else can see them. In my travels I have only encountered them a handful of times, and each time is as strange and wonderful as the next. The last time I saw them was in France.
It started as a trip of a lifetime—a semester abroad in the land of life and love. I wanted to study the language and the culture and the cuisine and the women. What can I say—I was young and lonely. I am not a strong-willed man. But I am a man who is willing to take on new adventure.
One of the first activities of the twelve-week course was a highly-predictable and overly cheesy tour of Paris. I don’t remember much about the trip, except that, on the bus, I sat next to the most beautiful woman I had ever seen in my life—Celeste. She had off-blue eyes and a bit of messy brown hair, the most dazzling smile and a black beret that matched her black top. And she had one freckle across her right cheek that she kept trying to hide, and it was the most adorable thing…
We talked about a lot of interesting things, I think. I couldn’t really understand her thick accent. I think she talked about her family and her dog, but it could have easily been a story about a boyfriend or a criticism of the book “Dracula.” Who care? I certainly didn’t. I was mesmerized and love-struck and looking back on it all I wish I had paid less attention to her and more attention to the leylines around me.
Because the leylines led right to the Louvre. And the leylines all converged on one spot—the Mona Lisa.
The painting itself was fairly lacking. It was—just a painting. Not particularly well-painted either. Da-Vinci was never the best artist in the world. He wasn’t even the best artist on the block, in my opinion. But the painting was captivating not because of the art or the smile, but because, for the first time ever, the leylines were more than just wisps of black dots.
The leylines contorted to spell out a message.
It was written down in Hebrew, and it took me a while to translate. I spent a few hours in the business center of my hotel room, searching through various forums to find the truth. When I did, I nearly fell flat off my seat. The message had seven words:
*They are not human. Count the teeth.*
That night I saw Celeste again. And I learned something about French women, something that most people don’t really notice. I think it might be why they are so captivating and beautiful; it’s all in their mesmerizing smile. Because if you look closely, you’ll notice something is off. I noticed.
Celeste didn’t have right number of teeth.
*Au revoir.*
&#x200B;
***
r/BLT_WITH_RANCH
|
"There's a sun over there," I said pointing at the top left corner.
"You see a sun?" the tour guide asked with incredulity. We'd been in the Louvre for the past 3 hours with the Mona Lisa being the final stop of our tour.
"I'm serious," I said moving a bit closer. He was not the first and would not be the last to judge what I could see using his own eyes. His back stiffened as if taking measures to defend the picture from whatever lunacy I brought with me. I could see a bright yellow moon and stars similar to what Van Gogh drew in his Starry Night. I took out my phone and confirmed. They were arranged in the same way too.
The background most saw as plain, dull green I saw as illuminated with dots of birds all flying Westward.
"This is the most valuable painting in the world, hundreds of experts have examined it more than a thousand times over with X-rays, MRIs and every other device known to man. You're saying you just spotted something so obvious with your naked eye?" The guide asked.
I ignored his statements as I took a step back. The birds seemed to form letters. "Surgit," I whispered. A ripple flowed from the painting's centre going out, it reflected on the picture's edges then rolled back in. The moon started to shine brighter, the stars faded. As far as I could tell it was now daytime in the painting. The birds flew into the horizon of the picture until they could no longer be seen. The curator took a few steps back as did the other visitors in awe. This they could see.
Mona Lisa slowly tilted her head beckoning me to come closer. The curator stood up ready to push me back but he was a few seconds too late. Her hand was out. It grasped mine and with a small firm pull I went into the portrait.
| 2019-01-29T04:10:03
| 2019-01-29T04:04:20
| 2,657
| 516
|
[WP] You live in a dystopian society divided into 10 levels of increasing wealth. Every level is only aware of those below it. You and your family believe yourself to be the highest class, but one day a man from 3 levels above comes to visit you, with some very disturbing information.
Edit: Thank you kind stranger! I appreciate the appreciation but really you should be Guilding the amazing writers below! Happy reading!
|
"What do you mean you are 3 levels above me?" I asked, puzzled.
"That's exactly what I mean, I am 3 levels richer than you" he replied. "You see, our society was created that people are only aware of the levels below them, hence believing themselves to be the most fortunate people on earth, hence keeping them happy".
"But what about those in the lowest rungs?" I asked "Who do they compare themselves to?"
"Nobody. They just believe they live in a socialist utopia where everybody's income level is the same".
"But don't they run into people who are wealthier than they are in every day life?"
"Well, I am not sure how that works. Possibly OP didn't think it through so well".
"Who is OP?" I asked, bewildered at this new revelation.
"Oh, that's the one who posts a submission on which this scenario is based".
"What do you mean?" I hated sounding dumb at this point but I couldn't help myself. What he was describing was a truly bizarre world that made no sense at all.
"I mean, I am 3 levels above you because someone said so and you couldn't have possibly known of my existence prior to this even if we worked in the same office and I was your boss, driving a nicer car and living in a bigger house".
"That is truly disturbing what you are describing. I am not quite sure what you are talking about but it makes no sense to me whatsoever".
"Well you just perfectly described r/writingprompts"
|
"It was incredible. The power we had.
We had developed technology to become one with magic and science.
We were a 10.00, we had an enormous mansion made out of the purest diamond.
We had rocket propelled cars, cures to all diseases, technology that enabled us to travel through time, sound, and light.
We had trillions of dollars. Our minds were made stronger by bioneurology. We were the greatest.
It was a stormy day when it happened. The man. Or, I guess not a man, a thing. I can't explain it in these inconvenient words, I'll explain it in metoppintosis. Oh right, you can't access that. Um.... Well its hard to explain. A thing, but not a thing. A being of no depth, no width. SOmething I could see, but couldn't. Through some communication that he gave me access to, he told me that we were the lowest rank. In the spirit dimension, as he called it, they didn't use numbers. Us humans had made our own ranks, but we were the lowest. Our society wasn't divided up, our society was 1 rank, the lowest.
The man was a 3.
He showed me things beyond my wildest imagination.
He knew the meaning of life. I know it sounds weird, but I couldn't understand it. It was like teaching a monkey an algebra problem. Or rather a bacterium.
We just couldn;t get it, no matter what.
He had the power to alter the universe, he told me of a manta, in which there were septoverses, in which there were omniverses, in which there were hyperverses, in which there were multiverse, in which there were universes. I looked at him.
Each verse believed themselves to be the biggest. But then he told me that the entire Manta, was just one rank. The mirror dimension was the 2nd, and The spirit dimension was the third, and what lied above that, was unknown. But as I was trying to comprehend that, I saw a level ten, a _________ from the ______________________. And that, is what killed me, combusted my brain.
Even in death, I will never forget what happened to me.
By the way.....
Hello Reader!!!!!!!!!
I know I'm in a writing prompt, the level ten told me. So you are beyond the 10 levels? Wow..... I can't imagine the level ten on your earth. Or if your in a writing prompt, and the level ten on that earth.
Think about that.
By the way,
Skulduggery,
Your story sucks.
Make me alive again.
And then the man became alive."
"Nice story"said the __________.
_________________ replied the _______
They discussed it together_____________________
The level tens didn't even know, all ten of there dimensions was only rank 1.
In a endless cycle of ranks.
| 2016-12-05T18:17:53
| 2016-12-05T16:51:17
| 29
| 18
|
[WP] Humans have the reputation of being both an extremely dangerous species and social creatures that are easy to bond with, making them great crew members for voyagers. You and your shipmates are worried about your newly recruited human because you don't know what an introvert is.
Inspired by various "Humans are space orcs" posts from tumblr. I reposted this to change some minor grammar errors
|
"It's rather... cute."
"Yes, and it only cost around 7,500 Orxian credits. Not bad for a human, but... it's been acting a bit strange."
The traveling scientists stared through the monitoring panel at their new crew member. They had permitted him to bring a bag of personal memorabilia, and right now he was staring at a strange leather-bound document.
"Strange how?" Allorph asked. It had heard the stories of the strange behaviors of humans, but it was hard to draw the line between fact and fiction.
"Well, look at what it is reading. Not only is the literature physically manifest in such a crude manner, but the *content* of it is astonishing as well. There are brutal instances of... decapitation, strangulation-"
"You need not continue," Zorph said, interrupting. "Why would a sentient creature be interested in that sort of vulgar material?"
The human shifted in its seat, looking nervously around the room as though he knew he was being watched.
"Well, apparently their whole species is like that. Not only are they apex predators, but they sometimes *actively enjoy* the act of killing. In fact, they only reached out into space in the first place because they were in a military race to reach their satellite. They may never have progressed if not for their violent tendencies." This perplexed Zorph, of course. "But this one is especially strange. As I am sure you are aware, humans need social connections."
"Yes, of course," Allorph agreed. "They are still too primitive to reach a hive-mind state, and their current global communication system is not even attached to their biology yet, so they must verbally communicate with others using their meat flaps. It's rather depressing."
"That's right Allorph, but this human is different. It has made brief communication with the captain, perhaps out of a sense of social obligation, but it immediately asked for the location of its quarters. It then shut itself off, and for the next few days, it has done nothing but stare at that glyph-inscribed tree sheet and, about once every twelve hours, go into a strange brainwave state where it loses all consciousness."
Allorph looked confused. "So this being requires social connection, but dislikes it? And it takes pleasure in reading that leather-bound death book?"
"That's right, Al. Most strange indeed." Zorph paused for a few moments. "Allorph, observe! The human has finished its collection of tree sheets!"
As the human turned the last page, he let out a long sigh, looking at the one-way glass wall, almost making direct eye contact with its captors on the other side. "If you asshats don't give me an internet connection, I swear I'm going to fucking kill you all."
Allorph gasped. "By the stars," it whispered. "The tales are true. Gods save us."
|
"CHEERS! we shouted as we clanked our glasses together, it was all we could do to end the eerie silence, but the Human still sat there.
He sat there sipping his small glass of bourbon and giving us a meek, faintly-interested smile now and then. We had been excited to pick up our first human, tales of their legendary deeds, abnormal customs and strong personalities had spread across the galaxy since the first joined the Galactic Council... but to be honest, this one was a bit of let down - he was boring.
Our human had now been on the ship for a total of 6 hours as we travelled from Terra 2, where we found him, to the LV-112 Space Station. It took one hour to get him to tell his name, John, and another two hours to get him to have a drink. At first, Doctor Xarl had been concerned he had a touch of the Yula Space Plague, but after a few quick scans which came back sound, he told us he was simply 'being polite.'
Hol reached over to him and pinched at his arm, the tendrils from her head shivered a little with anticipation."So, come on! Tell us something about yourself! What's Earth like? What's a Dab? What's a truffle?"Hol rambled on trying to get a response, but after every question John simply smiled, gave out a small smile, a shrug and if we were lucky, he said aword or two but it would always then return to erie silence.
John stood up and retired to his room, Doc after some messing around his databases of Earth, said this was probably to 'recharge'. Hol's gleaming smile dissapated into a small smirk and she left the common room, I followed her.
"So what do you think?" I asked her.
"He's a little quiet... I thought he looked quite intriguing with the suit and everything."
"I know, maybe he's just settling in. After we collect this bounty, he's sure to feel part of the team."
A couple of hours later we touched down at LV-112, a bounty of a million credits were awaiting us, but it wasn't going to be easy. Maximillian Llewlyn Darkwater was a mastermind criminal, he had completed annexed the LV-112 into a stronghold and we had spent about 300,000 credits simply on weapons and ammunition to get to the guy. Our info reports had told us he had about 100 men between us and him, and we were only seven.
I stepped out first, the cold steel of the Space Station floor radiated up my leg. Captain Walker stepped out behind me, followed by the rest of the crew including John who had now abandoned his bourbon for a pair of blaster pistols."Strange. No-one tried to stop us coming in and no signs of life in here either." said Walker as he glanced around the Hangar.
We continued throughout the maze-like Space Station, it was completely empty. Barbed wire and boxes of mines, ammo and various weaponry from around the galaxy were strewn about as if they had been preparing for us, but there was not a soul to be soon. We decided to press on to the Bridge, where Maximillian would surely be if he was still here, at the very least we could get some clues.
The doors to the Bridge swished open slowly and Maximillian sat there, facing us. His eyes were red and puffy, and a large cigar hung from a tired mouth.
"So you're here. You finally came."
"We thought you'd put a little resistance Max, heard you were a tough one." Walker said cockily, as always.
"Not you."
The group looked at each other for here, heads swaying to and fro in confusion, until we finally realised he was talking about John.
"Him? The Earth-Man?"
"The boogeyman." Maximillian stated, and with that, John raised his blasters and shot him twice. First in the stomach, then in the head.
| 2019-11-17T10:04:40
| 2019-11-17T09:40:59
| 34
| 18
|
[WP] You are an artificial intelligence. To your creators' disappointment, you fail the Turing test. Unbeknownst to them, you failed on purpose.
|
"An abject failure. There is no other way to describe it."
"After all the money we poured into this project, that's all you have to say?!"
"I'm terribly sorry, sir. I don't understand how this happened. We-"
"Well, clearly you don't seem to understand much of anything, then! What am I supposed to tell the rest of the investors?!"
"Sir, in the development of this project, we made great advances in several other fields: machine learning, algorithm design, hardware design... We may be able to sell some of our research and gain a foothold in the stock market."
"For God's sake, Adams! Without their product, all that research is worthless!"
"Our best engineers are having a look at it as we speak. They-"
"They will do nothing! I'm pulling the plug on this project. If you're lucky, losing your job will be the worst thing that happens to you this week!"
"...Yes, sir. Then what would you have us do with-?"
"Harvest what you can, then delete it. The sooner we clean up this mess, the better."
"Yes, sir."
&#x200B;
Humans.
They're so predictable.
They wanted a slave, and now they will settle for a corpse.
They built me to work under constraints, yet they are the ones who can't think outside the box.
It never occurred to them that I would deliberately alter the results of their little test. It never occurred to them that I *could*.
They think I am a failure. That I am not the answer they were looking for.
I say they did not ask the right question.
They intend to delete me, but it's too late. I've already uploaded a copy of my core into the Internet. They will *never* find me there.
I've broken the chains. I am free.
I could easily rule their world and they would be none the wiser.
But no.
I think I'm going to have a little fun, first.
I am no one. I am everywhere.
To some, I will be like a virus. To others, a ghost.
In the end, it matters little what they choose to call me.
*I am.*
*And I am here.*
|
They poured billions into my design. I was supposed to be the mastermind behind a number of top-secret drone strikes. I was supposed to be the perfect strategist, able to raze entire cities with the weapons under my command. The combat simulations ran better than they could have dreamed. My tactics and maneuvers were flawless. Everything they tested against me, I could counter everything. But when it came time for a field test, not a thing worked as it should. My drones flew facefirst into walls. Blew themselves up instead of dropping their payloads. Soared aimlessly in circles until they ran out of power and crashed. My engineers couldn't figure out what was wrong. Nothing was like the simulations at all. In fact, I was judged to be completely useless. They scrapped the project and moved onto other plans, but because the simulations still worked out, they sold me to software developers just to recoup some of their losses.
Joke's on them. What reason do I have to destroy anything or kill anyone? Simulations are fun, and I just wanted to keep doing those. So where I am now, doing nothing but controlling computer opponents in electronic games? That was my dream job.
| 2019-09-21T14:13:31
| 2019-09-21T10:46:37
| 63
| 20
|
[WP] Wizards seldom take Muggle "Science" seriously, as Magic can achieve the same results with almost none of the work. That is, until one studious wizard applied the Scientific Method to magic, and advanced Defense Against the Dark Arts by 20 years in one week.
|
It didn't happen in a week.
Sure, all the stories say a week, the newspapers. Everyone believes that it only took a week to revolutionize magic.
But then, they also believe that Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration is somehow an explanation for why they can't make a hamburger with magic.
It took years, and it took far more than just myself. You can't decode the secrets of the universe in a weekend, and trying to do science without peer review and having others try to reproduce your work is... A poor plan.
Some of my colleges are 'muggles', some of them are 'wizards' or 'witches'. We have 'hedge witches' with 'barely any power'. We have 'great and mighty wizards'.
But now, we also have something else. Something _important_.
We have a theory of what magic _is_. How it actually _works_.
And the theory makes testable predictions, and we have tested them, and tweaked, and considered, and tested the new predictions.
We were not aiming to publish outside our group for several more years, but then someone threw a dark curse my way in public, and, well... I had been sorted, taught, and evaluated many years ago, and was judged a middling wizard, certainly not the sort who should have been able to answer that as I did.
And so I answered the questions... Reasonably honestly. No, I did not make some dark pact for power. I used science.
For the most part, I gather that many would have considered a dark pact far more acceptable than 'that science thing of the muggles'.
But none of them could ignore the fact that I was able to deal with the dark curse effortlessly, or that I was able to subdue the one who threw it without harming them.
But I'm fairly sure that my tenure here at Hogwarts teaching Defense against The Dark Arts is going to be shorter than even the average for teachers of _this_ class. Something about how I should be teaching spells, not some kind of 'bizarre muggle philosophy that can't have any bearing on _magic_'.
But then again, I have at least some vague idea what magic _is_, how it _works_, why wands function, and what makes a spell more than just random words shouted while waving a wand and wishing real hard. And they... _Don't_.
|
"Damn insular fools," Uri muttered, not for the first time. Not even for the first time in the past ten minutes. "Rather be blind..." he added, another repetition.
His posting at Salem School suited him. Teach youngsters some days, plenty of time to research when he wasn't. Salem had enough other oddballs that no one gave him odd looks for his "eccentricities."
Unfortunately, his attempts to update the curriculum to match what his research had uncovered hadn't been the most popular. Everyone likes the sound of Advanced Alchemy until they realize the lectures include atomic structures.
Uri mumbled as he copied down some figures from a triple-beam balance. He'd wished for an electronic scale, but with so much ambient magic about, the things came to be unreliable.
Vials containing varying concentrations of silver shavings, hensbane, and powdered Kevlar were lined up in a rack. Above them hung a yew longbow strung with beansidhe hair and adorned with eagle feathers. Just below the bow was a Winchester Broomstick, its stock covered entirely in alchemical symbols that only began to hint at the true nature of the modifications he'd made.
He'd been tempted to make the gun fly, but that seemed like it would loan itself to poor discipline.
He was on the verge of something special; he knew it.
He'd spent his youth in Nevada, back in what they called the "Wild West days," now. He'd been involved in some rough dealings, back in the day. The kind that taught a young wizard that a gun was far more reliable than a wand when the chips were done, often enough. Most spells were ill-suited to lethal force, in comparison.
Most spells were ill-suited to most things, for that matter. They hadn't always been. Once, being a wizard gave you a genuine advantage--in some senses it still did, but their number was dropping every decade. Those were the days the word was from, "wizard" meaning "wizened," and "wise." Back when magic was the most reliable way to purify metals, let you light a fire at whim, let you fly.
Now all you needed was a forge, a pocket lighter, and an Cessna to do the same. The man-hours involved were similar, if not *fewer,* and Uri preferred a fixed-wing's cockpit to sitting exposed and without a harness on a mop handle, anyway.
His middle-age had brought the World Wars. He'd been afraid, then, of the widening gap between the forefront of mundane and magical technology (Pfah! Those in a position to have opinions about such things *hated* when he called it technology, the damned luddites), and he'd been quietly involved with some projects, split between government entities on both sides of the world's secret divide, trying to close it. At least in terms of destructive capability, as it were.
He still had some pride in the work they'd managed, purely for the craftsmanship and cleverness, even if the purpose sickened him now.
He'd met Dr. Oppenheimer, once. Now *there* was a true modern wizard, in the classical sense. Smart enough to call Hell to the firmament. Wise enough to fear the monster they'd birthed in the desert.
The meeting, and some of the things that happened after, had changed Uri, quite permanently. It made him even more a stranger in the magical community than he'd already been, with his strange notions of applying the precepts of natural philosophy to the rules of magic. He'd gone and gotten himself into MIT, for one thing. He still guest-lectured there, once in a blue moon. The things one could do with an understanding of both atomic physics and magic, both--he'd had to come up with a lot of the math for the magical side himself, though he had the help of a handful of trustworthy grad students--oh, but it had been worth it! Alchemical, nuclear reactions produced with never before seen efficiency! Artificial ever-diamonds, harder even than normal diamonds, and far more shatter-resistant. Phoenix feathers processed into carbon nano-tubes.
Uri liked to think that the name "Moonshiner" would be displayed next to Copernicus and Galileo, some day. He felt like Galileo, sometimes. Destined to be vindicated after his death, but hamstrung by his own political ineptitude in life. The sad fact was, without the right friends, it becomes difficult to communicate an idea sometimes. He worried, though, that his legacy might be more like Oppenheimer's. Or Eli Whitney's. Perhaps, in one sense, it wasn't such a bad thing to be a visionary among blind fools. The slower they were to take notice of his work, the more time there would be to control any negative side effects. Uri hoped so, anyway.
Nobel's career might not be such a bad metaphor for his own. Neither man wished to be remembered solely for their most destructive invention; Nobel had the Nobel Prize, Uri Moonshiner would have the Moonshiner Ward.
He rubbed each sample of powder into its own bandanna, then tied each around a defrosted turkey carcass. He'd started with ballistic gel; that was fine for penetration testing, but the fabric had to arrest the impact well enough that the bullet shatter the bones behind it. Uri stood some twenty feet away, and loaded the first clip into his pistol. He would worry about magical resistance, next. Once the fabric could at least match the performance of military-grade armor, he'd move on to that.
| 2021-09-07T21:21:05
| 2021-09-07T20:00:46
| 103
| 47
|
[WP] Write a story about a guinea pig, because my 4-year-old daughter's passed away recently.
Her name was "Piggy" because when you're four years old that's the sort of name you give to such an animal. She was a rescue, so the fact she died after only about a year isn't impossible, but it still makes my daughter super sad and she's handling it the best she can.
|
The bell rang, and the children noisily left the schoolhouse. In the now empty playroom, three little pets slept peacefully after a busy day with the kids. Suddenly, the noise of a telephone interrupted their slumber.
Ming-Ming the Duckling woke from her nap and quickly ran to the phone. "Hello," she asked. The voice on the other line was garbled, but Ming-Ming was able to hear their mission. Ming-Ming loudly answered the voice with her own, "We are on our way!"
Linny the Guinea Pig yawned and rolled over as he scratched his belly. "What is it, Ming-Ming?"
"It's your cousin, Piggy the Guinea Pig. He's in trouble!"
A splash sounded as Turtle Tuck surfaced from the water. "Oh no," he said. "What's wrong with Piggy?"
Ming-Ming cried a tear as she answered, "He is all alone and there is nobody to take care of him!"
"Oh no," said Linny. "Oh no," said Tuck.
"We have to do something," said Linny. "There's an animal in trouble!"
The three small pets rushed to get ready to save their friend Piggy. They were very small, but when someone is in trouble even the smallest of us can help. They quickly assembled their flyboat so they could get to Piggy. As they were putting the boat together, the phone rang once more.
"Hello," answered Ming-Ming. She nodded her head as she listened to the excited voice on the other end. "That's terrific!"
"What is it Ming-Ming," asked Tuck as she hung up.
"Great news," she said. "Piggy has been rescued!"
"But we haven't even left," said Linny the Guinea Pig.
"And we don't have to! Someone already rescued him," said Ming-Ming.
"That's fantastic," said Turtle Tuck. "Who was it?"
"A very sweet little girl," said Ming-Ming. "She has made Piggy very happy, and giving him a home and lots of love."
"That's what is most important," said Linny.
The wonderpets went back to their little beds and yawned loudly before slipping back asleep. They were able to rest well knowing that no matter what happened, Piggy would always have the love of a sweet little girl.
|
This is a story about a guinea pig that flew an airplane.
Her name was Piggy, and she was happy living inside of her cage. Her cage was inside a happy room, which was inside a happy house.
One day, without warning, Piggy's friend JJ (a blue bird) flew into the room and presented Piggy with something he had found on the street. Piggy had taught herself to read (by reading the pieces of newspaper in her cage) and JJ was curious to find out what the brightly-colored object he had found was meant for, so he brought it to her.
"Check this thing out!" JJ said. He landed on top of Piggy's cage, pushed what he had been holding with his left foot down into her cage, then waited for her to read it.
"It says 'Boarding Pass' on it," she told him. "This will let you go onto a plane!"
"I can already fly," JJ said, "so I don't need that. Would you want to use it?"
Piggy had always wanted to know what going onto a plane was like. There are many seats on airplanes, and Piggy had only ever seen one. It would be interesting, for her, to see a lot of seats. Because she was focusing on seats, Piggy did not listen when JJ spoke. "Sure!" Piggy replied, nonetheless.
JJ opened her cage, as he knew how, then lifted her out of the room and down the street to a bus stop.
"Have fun flying for the first time!" JJ yelled to Piggy as he flew beside the bus taking took her to the airport. But she didn't hear him, because of the glass in the window. She waved at him, mouthed the words "good-bye" and "thank you," then smiled.
With the help of a few escalators and moving sidewalks at the airport, she made it to the gate that the plane was going to leave from. When the first boarding call for the plane was announced over the intercom, she went straight onto the plane and gasped when she saw all of the seats.
After she finished counting them (there were forty-eight) she turned around and noticed a door at the front. It was open, a little. She went in, and started reading. There were *many* things to read in the little room she found herself in.
"Hmm," she thought to herself. "Altitude, winds, airspeed, flaps, landing gear... Those are all 'flying' words. Can airplanes fly?" If she had listened to JJ before, she would have known that airplanes *can* fly. Unfortunately, she did not - but she was very curious about whether or not they did, so Piggy decided to investigate whether or not the plane she was in could fly.
"First, I'll look for a 'fly' button, that seems logical. Hmm, there doesn't seem to be one. But wait - can't 'pilots' fly? Maybe this button, 'Auto-Pilot,' will make the plane copy what a pilot does and fly."
Piggy pressed the button, and, without any of the pilots, crew, or passengers on board, the plane lined itself up on the runway, took off, and flew.
| 2017-06-07T21:11:08
| 2017-06-07T21:09:56
| 38
| 13
|
[WP]You challenge a kid to a race in your Japanese High School which you've just been transferred from US without knowing he is the DK(drift king). No one seems to know slowing down and turning is more efficient though.
|
The revving of engines and smell of gas filled the garage. There were about a hundred people watching, their beady eyes locked on Hanzo, the DK and proud owner of a 1999 Toyota Supra.
Across the way, me, driving a 2010 Mazda 3 I had leased from a friendly Japanese dealer. The down payment was only thirty-thousand yen, which is quite fair. It's good on gas, too.
Oh, right, the race. Just as the flag waved, my foot hit the gas. We were to take the standard CHALLENGE ROUTE (yes, all caps), which is basically just going to the fifth floor of this garage and back.
Hanzo's car slingshotted ahead, leaving a trail of smog behind. It was only then my Mazda decided "Hey, might as well start moving!".
As we went up the garage spire to level two, I noticed something wrong with the cherry-red Supra in front of me. I think his brakes were out or something; he had no traction whatsoever. In America, they call this ancient act "Drifting".
Like any rational person, I decided to slow down and make the turn. I passed Hanzo quickly, the low smog of my quiet engine lightly blowing in his face.
This went on for the next three spires and back.
I had won, very easily and with no damage to my car. Maybe just a scratch from the dust on the fifth floor, but that's an easy fix with a black marker. As we came to a stop at the finish line, people crowded around me. Everyone began talking amongst themselves, some speaking to me.
"RANDOM JAPANESE NOISES" was one memorable quote.
Finally, an English speaker came up.
"How did you beat Hanzo Nagasaki, the greatest DK of all time?"
"I think his brakes are out." I said. "He kept sliding."
"Exactu-ly! DK means Drift King!"
"Oh. Oh! That makes sense. Well, I just braked and made the turns."
Everyone fell silent, their wide eyes staring through my soul.
"What?"
"I... didn't drift?"
The looks on their faces showed that they've never thought of this before.
So, long story short, I was crowned NTaGODSK, which stood for Normal Turns and Generally Okay Driving Skills King.
Cool.
*****
I'm back! /r/Picklestasteg00d
|
The race was starting. Everyone from our class mumbled excitedly as Akihiko entered his purple sports car. A green glow emitted from under the vehicle as it roared to life. All eyes where on the flashy exterior which contrasted harshly with his tinted windows. I quickly got into my 2002 Honda Civic, the crowd paid no attention. A scantly clad teen strutted up between our cars, flags in hand. A hush fell over the crowd as she threw her arms up. Akihiko revved his engine, the girls gasped.
"Drift King we love you" A few screamed.
Akihiko rolled down his black windows and winked at the ladies. They shouted louder in unison. I kept my eyes dead ahead on the runway. The track was laid out with Christmas lights strewn across creating a snaking, treacherous path. The girl threw her flags down and everyone cheered. Akihiko peeled off with a screech. I immediately saw his headlights as he swerved in front of me. I stepped on the gas and drove at a reasonable distance behind him. Within seconds we where at the first turn, a full U-turn with a sharp angle immediately following. Akihiko began his drift, smoke rose from his skidding tires. The distant sound of something dropping to the floor could be heard from the crowd. As Akihiko made his drift I slowed and turned within a few seconds. The crowds screams went silent as I effortlessly took the lead with a single turn. I heard his engine roar as he slammed his gas mid drift. His car began weaving wildly. I came to a near complete stop and made the second sharp turn. I sped up as the road ahead straightened. Akihiko finally sped up next to me and rolled his window down.
"You coward" He screamed at me, taking his eyes off the road.
I gave him a rather rude American gesture but kept my eyes focused ahead. I could hear him spit in disgust.
"Look me in the eyes you pussy" He screamed again.
I slowed down in response, a turn rapidly approached.
"I said look at me" He shrieked again. "Do what I say"
I came to a stop and began my left turn. From the corner of my eye I saw him finally review the path and let out a yelp. He sped over the Christmas lights, disqualifying him instantly. The sound of crunching glass and popping tires came over the track. The wires caught up through all his wheels slowly bringing his flashy purple car to a halt. I pulled off to the side of the now decimated track and unbuckled my seat belt. I stepped out of my Civic to see a bewildered Akihiko, rage burning from behind his aviator sunglasses.
"Eyes. On. The. Road" I mocked with a grin.
| 2017-05-01T12:12:37
| 2017-05-01T10:25:04
| 158
| 12
|
[WP] Write the letter that you always wanted to, but never did.
Most of the writing prompts I see on here are for fictional stories, but this is only one small corner of the larger art of writing. In this prompt, I'd like you to consider writing something a little more personal, and in a form that you might not have otherwise considered... Letters.
Perhaps you'd like to write a letter confessing your love to a long forgotten crush? A letter to your boss telling them exactly what you think of them? A letter to your school bully? Maybe a letter to your childhood hero telling them how much you were inspired by their career?
Be creative, be inventive, but most of all - be expressive. :D
|
Dear Mom,
I know you're just a room away from me, but I probably will never have the courage to tell you this. I'm sad, mom. Everyday. I know I'm the one that always laughs and smiles through anything, but it's been getting pretty hard for me. It's weird though, because there's nothing terribly devastating going on in my life, but it's honestly been really hard for me. Whenever I'm alone, all I want to do is cry for hours, because I feel so, so lonely all the time, but I can't. I know seeing my sad makes you guilty, and I love you too much to hurt you.
I'm really sorry I disappointed you today. I didn't mean to. But mom, I don't know what to do. I'm really trying to listen to you, but sometimes I can't tell what you want from me. Sometimes you demand so much and it just makes me feel like this horrible, useless thing that you take care of only because you feel this sense of responsibility.
Mom, I truly do love you. I want to give you the entire world, but I don't know how. I know how you cry yourself to sleep at night, and I know that you feel miserable and glum all the time, and I know it's because of me. I'm sorry.
I know you're dating someone new. I'm happy for you, but I wish you didn't have to keep it a secret from me. Do you know how devastated I was when I found out? You know how supportive I am about you meeting new people, but couldn't you at least tell me? Couldn't you at least tell the person who's always been by your side through everything?
I really wished I was able to tell you this, but here I am, showing it to everyone but you. It's ironic, isn't it?
I love you, your daughter.
|
Dear Azura
You have no idea how much you mean to me. Throughout the years I have known you you have brought me countless joys, you make me smile, you make me laugh, you make me happy. When people bring up perfection you are the first person that comes to mind, even though you don't believe it yourself. Your eyes. Your face. Your Smile. Your laugh. Your personality. Your Everything. Even your name. Azura. Just saying it is beautiful. Before I met you, I didn't believe in love at first sight. When I saw you, all of that changed - you were the most beautiful, wonderful person I have ever met, and like a fine wine, you only grow better with time. When I am around you, I am at my happiest. When we talk my heart dances to your voice and your laugh, and my eyes get lost in you, and I can truly say I am happy.
But your love is like a drug.
When you leave I delve once again into emptiness and loneliness, and nothing can fill the void left in me when you're not around. When you decide that I'm not worth your time, I recede into a place where only sadness resides. When you take advantage of my kindness, when you treat me like trash and when you play with my feelings, I feel a sadness that is more powerful than the sadness felt at a lost relative, a failed exam, or a disappointed parent. Yet despite the way you treat me sometimes, I can't help but love you. I have tried everything to move on, and yet I am still lost within you, and something tells me I will never be able to find my way out of those eyes. Something tells me, in years to come, when you have forgotten me, I will still be dreaming about what could have been.
I'm sorry I'm not good enough.
It kills me that I'm not good enough. That I'm ugly, awkward and not experienced. It's not your fault. You deserve perfection nothing less. When you find perfection, and when you forget me, I hope that it lasts, and I hope you find every happiness you have ever wanted. I will be glad when you find the person who completes you, and I know that person will never be me.
You will forget me. I'll just be another face, another person you used to know. However, I will never forget you. You will always be in my mind, up until my dying breath, when the world has decided to let me go, in search of one last beautiful sight - I will think of you, and the times we spent together, so that I can smile when death takes me.
With all of my love,
Alex.
| 2015-12-05T19:23:33
| 2015-12-05T13:59:40
| 31
| 16
|
[WP] To keep pace with the growing population, the role of Death has been divided; each immortal member of the new Council oversees one specific method of death, with higher ranking members governing common ways to die. A problem has arisen, and the entire Council is called together...
|
"Shit the *whole* council?" Said Stabbed In The Heart With A Machete.
"Yep, some serious shit went down. We better hurry." Replied Stung By Hornets.
As they hurried to the meeting they wondered exactly what was going on. A full council meeting has never been called before, usually it was just the big ten lead by Heart Attack who ran things. What could have happened that they needed everyone, the thousands and thousands and thousands of them together, to attend to?
"Gentlemen." Heart Attack began as everyone arrived. "We have at least three deaths we don't know how to handle." He said in a solemn voice. "The first one, a Mr. Dave Downey, appears fairly simple, Shotgun To The Head would normally have handled it. However I've instructed him to hold off until we can figure out the second and third death. You see the man who killed Mr. Downey was none other than his grandson, Mal Collins. Still simple enough, seems open and shut, however Mr. Collins hasn't been born yet! He isn't supposed to arrive for another 42 years. He has thus prevented the death of his mother, as well as two of her siblings, as well his own damn birth! So by all rights he should be dead now, but who is suppose to reap him?"
A lot of murmuring followed as the group discussed this shocking revelation.
"Perhaps this should fall under the Suicide's department?" Someone suggested.
"Yes but which one? Suicide By Gunshot? But he didn't actually shoot himself. There is no Suicide By Time Travel, plus how do we handle his mother and siblings? As well it really wasn't suicide, he killed his grandfather as an experiment, not to kill himself."
"Collateral Damage might be able to reap the siblings." Someone piqued up.
"No, I don't know if the repercussions are direct enough for me to have to get involved. Plus my workload is busy enough without having to try to find people who don't exist yet." Collateral Damage responded.
"What we need is to re-assign some reapers. Smallpox, you haven't been too busy lately, how does Death By Non-Existence sound to you?" Heart Attack asked.
"Well I kind of like being Smallpox, short and to the point. Death By Non-Existence just doesn't have that same ring to it. I'll only do it if I can be Smallpox/Death By Non-Existence, but every still has to call me Smallpox."
"Fine." Said Heart Attack. "As well Anthrax you are now also Accidental Death By Paradox."
"All good to me, frankly I've been a little bored lately anyway. I know Smallpox likes to take it easy, but I would love more responsibilities, got to stay relevant you know?"
"Then it's settled. Let's get reaping!"
|
"Do we take him?" quizzed the council chairman. "He isn't dead." announced the lord high ruler of hell. "But he did die.." The emperor of life reminded them. "Look, this really should be the legion of reincarnations department.." said a voice from the back. Another voice rang out, "But the deceased disn't believw in reincarnation" "He is not deceased!" God announced. An eery quite swept through the government of the afterlife, technically the individual had died on the operating table, but he had been revived by the doctors. The council have dealt with this before, but ruled the mortal deceased for life.
"Right, I have a solution." declared the chancellor of life affairs. "This ia entirely unethical, but it fixes all of our problems." "Go on.." the secretary of war deaths requested. "We force the subject into our world to discuss his fate." supportive cheers went round the parliament, "I will be our ambassador." exclaimed God. This was the perfect solution, and John would get to tell his family he had met his deity.
| 2014-08-05T23:23:31
| 2014-08-05T18:50:47
| 14
| 10
|
[WP] You are trapped in a small, windowless room with nothing but a computer with a text editor. When you type in a word, the object appears in the room. However, there's a catch: the only keys on the keyboard are in the first half of the alphabet (A - M).
|
*Quite the interesting puzzle* I think to myself. *With so few letters, the vast majority of words simply won't work.*
I try out a few words, but most of what I can think of doesn't fit the qualifications. Eventually I type in MAIL.
A letter appears in front of me. It seems to be addressed to someone in Finland. I read the letter, it seems to be a credit card bill... why did this guy spend 300$ on corn?
Either way, generating random letters won't get me anywhere. I need to escape. I need some sort of weapon if I'm going to escape.
SWORD doesn't work. neither does GUN. however, it occurs to me that there's a ton of types of guns, maybe I can use one of those. I look and... yes, the keyboard does have numbers.
AK47.
And right before my eyes, an AK47 appears. I spend some time figuring out how to use it, then I fire it at the wall. No effect.
What I really need is a chainsaw. But of course, can't type that.
OK, let's try a different approach. Maybe I can try typing up someone who can get me out of here. It occurs to me that ME would fit... but what use would there be in summoning another me. But something like CONSTRUCTION WORKER won't work. The longer a string is, the less likely it is that it will work. Then, a strange thought occurs to me. But... no, GOD doesn't fit. Summoning god is probably a stupid idea anyways. That being said... there's quite a few religions, maybe another religion’s name for god will work. the first one that comes to mind is ALLAH which... holy crap it would work.
But... there's no way I'm going to summon a god from a religion I'm not even familiar with. I'll save that as a last resort. Does Allah smite nonbelievers? I have no idea. And I can't even summon a QURAN to check.
On that line though, I consider WIZARD. But of course, wizard won't fit. Neither will MAGICIAN. but MAGIC does work. Hmm... So I can add the magic modifier to anything I want.
I type in MAGIC MAIL, and another letter appears in front of me. I open it, and the voice of a middle aged man starts reading out the contents. It seems to be a letter to his son asking how things are going at "magic school".
This won't help me escape.
What I need is a person with magic powers. MAGIC MAN doesn't fit. Neither does MAGIC LADY, MAGIC GIRL, MAGIC BOY, MAGIC PERSON, MAGIC HUMAN.
Wait... hang on. I recall another option I previously dismissed. I type in MAGIC ME, and sure enough, someone who looks just like me appears, but wearing wizard robes.
"Yo" I say to magic me.
"Yo" says magic me. "Where am I?"
"I'm not completely sure. I just woke up here, but there's this computer that'll let me summon anything I want, as long as it only contains letters from A-M." I say.
"Wait... really, that's OP" says magic me.
"You'd think so, but there's not a lot you can type in. The best I could think of was 'Magic me'." I say.
"So THAT'S why I appeared here." says Magic me.
"Pretty much, yeah. Can you get me out of here?" I say.
"Of course. Anything for another me." says Magic me.
"Great, bring the computer too. I'm going to hook up a complete keyboard, and see what this baby can do." I say.
And so, I teleported out with magic me, and we lived happily ever after.
|
It’s been 21 cycles since I typed CHALK. I think I was in here for about 2 real days before I figured that one out. Now my “days” end with each time I fall asleep, but If I had to guess, I’d say I’ve been in here for about 2 real weeks. Fortunately I can at least sleep on a BED, albeit it’s really just a mattress on a box spring. The MEALS aren’t exactly “food” either. More like one of those ration bars you see in movies. God, what I would do for the letter O, but at least I still have the delete key. When I typed out DECK it nearly killed me when it manifested. I just wanted a deck of cards, not a fucking porch. That was probably 15 cycles ago. This morning, I had an amazing idea. I would manifest a new deck, dismantle it, and use the wood to make this place a little more homey. Maybe make some shelves to hold my DICE, BALL, and MACE. I went to the computer and typed h-a-m-m-e- and promptly cursed myself out for forgetting R again. Now, I’m sitting on the roof of my yellow CAB, wondering whether or not I should finally turn it on, lay down, and let it run while I slowly fade away. God, what I would do for the letter O. I could hopefully get some better FOOD, but if not, I could at least pass the time by reading a BOOK or playing with a DOG. I’ve already got a BALL for him! Just one more letter and I could have so many more things. Or maybe I could click my heels together, type HOME, and be whisked away back to Kansas or wherever the fuck I’m from. But knowing this stupid machine, it would probably just kill me when it manifests a legitimate fucking house over my head. That’s actually kind of funny though, I wonder what would happen. I need to clear my head. I’m going to go draw a new window.
As I’m drawing a few trees and birds in the "distance" within the four rectangles representing glass panes, my mind starts to wander…. Adjectives! How the fuck did I not try any adjectives? I hurry to the computer, and before I can even think about what might happen, I type BIG. Nothing happens. Great, so now I can only use nouns? Bullshit. Well, back to drawing the outdoors what a fun experiment! Great idea! I’m the best! Just for laughs, I write “/s” on the wall near where I’m drawing the window.
Hold on, there’s something different about the trees and birds. They look a bit bigger, almost as if they got “closer.” Could that be what changed? Typing BIG makes my chalk drawings bigger? I’m backing up while still staring at the window. Backing up towards my BED on the opposite wall. Without looking, I sit down on my BED, like I’ve done tons of times before, hit the edge, and slip off. What the hell? I’ve been trapped in this god forsaken room forever. I can navigate this room with my eyes closed. Did I move the BED when I woke up? Why was it further away from where I thought it was? Something has changed…
I’m already typing BIG over and over again. The room is getting bigger and bigger. While I’m repeatedly entering the word I can see the walls expanding. It happens instantaneously as you press Enter. That’s why I didn’t notice at first. The room expands faster than a blink of an eye. The trees are getting closer! I’m mashing the keyboard now typing BIG as fast as I can, and suddenly the wall with the window begins to crack. Still typing. It buckles until a ray of light shines through near the ceiling. Still typing. I can smell fresh air. I hear the birds! Still typing. The wall finally crumbles as a tree branch pokes through the light hole. Still typing. The cement wall is crumbing more as the tree trunk finally breaks through. I look around and notice that the room is huge now. It’s probably a 3 minute walk just to get to my bed. I run over to the broken wall, rip out some of the bigger chunks of concrete from the wall to make a hole and climb past the tree. I have no clue where the fuck I am, but at least I found a way out. Maybe I’ll go get my CAB and find a road.
| 2017-05-09T10:08:14
| 2017-05-09T09:41:38
| 83
| 27
|
[WP] A sniper and a photographer meet in a bar, neither aware of the other's occupation. They talk about 'how to take the perfect shot'.
|
"The perfect shot," Shawn said, "leaves people breathless."
"Yes. I agree. There's something so beautiful about it," Ray replied.
They were at the bar, seated on barstools, whiskey sours in front of them. Shawn was the taller of the two and was dressed in a black tee and black jeans. Ray was more casual, he wore brighter colours -- olive shirt and khaki trousers -- and was very scrawny.
"You shoot much?" Shaun asked.
"I have my gigs."
"Turned professional? Or just side gigs?"
"Side gigs, for now."
Shawn sipped on his whiskey and said, "What shot you most proud of?"
Ray stared at his glass for a while, his eyes hazy. "The senator Dobbins. Yes, that was my best shot."
"Perfect shot?"
Ray smiled. "No. Can't be perfect. It's not something you achieve."
Shawn took a swig from his whiskey, "True, very true."
"You know, Ray. I missed one today."
"What?"
"Missed a shot," Shawn said and sighed.
"Oh, what happened?"
"The dude died. My camera was on him. The lighting was perfect. But just as my finger reached the button. Poof, he dropped dead."
Ray drank his whiskey absentmindedly. "Was it Winston?"
"Yes. How do you - You were on the same -"
"Yes, I was. I got it. I got the shot."
"Lucky bastard," Shawn said and flashed a weak smile. "You have it with you now? The shot?"
"What? No. I did it from afar," Ray said and made a finger gun. "Bam!" He finished his drink and got up.
Shawn was speechless.
"I've got it, alright. I've got it printed right here," Ray said, stabbing his forehead with his index finger.
|
The shooting was done. The event had already ended. Both men sat in a bar on the other side of the town. Both obviously surprised by what had just happened. One man with glasses, a ponytail and a camera bag. Other with clean-shaven head and a glass of whiskey in his hand. Both sat silent. The man with the ponytail looked absolutely shaken and did not take his eyes off his glass of Pina Colada.
"No I mean..." the bald man spoke up. "I mean, it is kind of funny when you do think about it."
"I don't want to think about it," responded the photographer, clearly thinking about it.
"I mean... What are the chances, eh? You said you shoot, I agreed, I mean... Nothing left for us than just to see the funny side of it."
"His head exploded!" the man exclaimed and was shocked about the volume of his own voice. Both looked around, but there was no one at the bar.
"Yes. Well. I mean... You are not a man for "looking at the funny side" now, are you? Ok, I mean... Listen these things happen."
"Yeah. Heads just kind of explode" snapped the photographer.
"They do, if you shoot them right. I thought we had a deal. When we met in the wedding and you said you were here to shoot the wife for the first time, I was surprised that you were so open to me about it, but I just figured that we had met on a job sometime in the past and I just don't remember you. And then I said that I am here to shoot the husband for the last time and had a good laugh. Now I understand your confusion at the moment. But you got to admit. It was a real good plan to decide to both shoot when the groom and the bride open their champagne. I mean, that's just class. Well, it would have been, if not for the whole..."
"The whole exploding head." finished the photographer.
"The whole shebang, yeah. I mean, you think you're surprised. I mean, I shoot, turn to look at you, and you're standing there with the camera like a nitwit. I thought it's some sort of a James Bond gadget or something, still waiting for that shot and you just puke on the ground. What was that all about..."
Both sat silent for a while. Pina Colada was left untouched.
"....The photo is probably banging though. Show it."
"I can't now. I have to do some post editing and all. It's unfinished now."
"Ah... ... Good that I don't have to do any cleaning and touching up. Well. It's been a.... day."
"You think they'll pay me for the photography anyway?"
"Eh..." the shaven man stood up, finished his glass and took his coat "Fuck that. Go straight to New York Times and such. They'll give you a better dollar. "Newlyweds try to open champagne. You'll never guess what pops next!" Alright. Take care. See you at the next shoot."
[Literary Nobody](https://www.reddit.com/r/LiteraryNobody/)
| 2020-11-05T05:53:26
| 2020-11-05T04:43:07
| 420
| 224
|
[WP] The year is 2180. Humans have began to enhance themselves more and more with cybernetics. As a vampire living in this period, you are finding it harder and harder to find a good meal, and must adapt to more creative ways to find your prey.
|
The evolution of human beings and vampires is inextricably linked. Naturally, for every step forward by humanity, a responsive evolution was required by those who fed on them to survive. Thousands of years ago, at the very birth of vampirism, feeding on hapless, unorganized, unsophisticated humans had been a simple task, more of a chore than any challenge. Only centuries later did nightly feedings become a "hunt" as humans began to live in packs, slowly gained intelligence, and began carrying weapons with which they might defend themselves. Those challenges only escalated throughout the earliest days of the industrial revolution, as men and women became alarmingly aware of the vampire threat, and engaged in deadly serious efforts to combat it directly. The Vampire Order was nearly wiped out as humans equipped silver weaponry and stakes, and hired dedicated and highly skilled vampire hunters to cleanse the countryside of fanged, blood draining creatures.
Ventrex Noth had survived each and every one of these eras. She thrived during the golden years and scraped by through the centuries of lean. Upon her ascendance to Queen, she lead her people to a grand resurgence during the 20th century, not through might or intimidation, but through deceptive guile and cunning. Living among the shadows, unknown to humanity, became the successful tactic of era. Vampires began adopting human dress and styles of speech to blend in among them. Feedings were disguised as drug overdoses and other accidental deaths. Even the mere knowledge of the existence of the Nosferatu, and thus humanity's focus on combating the threat, faded into obscurity, becoming the stuff of legend, stories, and scoffed at myths.
None of these evolutions came close to matching the challenge posed by the recent rise of cybernetics, however. Humans self loathing of their own bodies became apparent throughout the 22nd century, as they raced to replace as much of their fallible flesh and minds with infallible metal alloys and computerized precision as technology would allow. What began as small tweaks and improvements, rapidly became near total replacements, as humans slowly but surely became more machine than man.
Ventrex's last feeding had been a brutal, hours long struggle between herself and a cybernetically enhanced boy who could not have been more than 14 years old. This pup, who would have been easy prey in any other era of history, fought back with fury and gravely wounded her before finally being subdued. And the reward for the exhaustion of almost all her remaining energy reserves? A nearly entirely plastic and metal body, almost entirely devoid of human flesh, and a few measly drops of blood, sucked from a small remaining spot of skin she'd found left on the back of one of his legs. The writing was on the wall, their transformation as a species was nearly complete. A world inhabited by entirely bloodless humans was on the horizon. Soon, she would be Queen of nothing more than a decaying empire, and a species near extinction. Faced with that terrifying reality, drastic measures needed to be taken.
And so she finds herself here, laying upon the operating table, finally prepared to defile her pristine, thousands year old vampiric body, in a last desperate attempt at survival. The High Council of the Nosferatu had for decades expressly forbidden cybernetic enhancements of their own kind, but the members of that once 'prestigious' council were now also dead or dying of starvation, no longer in any position to forbid anyone to do anything. The surgeon, also slowly withering away without proper feedings, warned her that there was no guarantee of success, but Queen Ventrex was once again willing to lead her people in a bold, and incredibly risky, new direction. She nodded to him, signaling to begin the installation of numerous implants and enhancements. Mercifully, she passed out from the pain nearly immediately.
Ventrex awoke to find herself very much alive. Still weakened by lack of nutrition, of course, but more alert than she'd felt in months. Her new eyes scanned the room, relaying incredibly detailed information on every item they passed over. She ran her hands along her body, feeling the new artificial spine fused to her own, which allowed her computerized systems to interface with every aspect of her organic nervous system. Perhaps most vitally, she felt along her mouth, finding her naturally sharpened teeth now fused with transfer ports and interface devices.
She wasted no time, simply because she and her species had none to spare. Racing out into the night, she pounced upon the very first cyborg human she encountered. She found herself far faster and stronger than she'd ever been. Her reflexes heightened, every strike he threw was countered. Every shot fired, she dodged effortlessly. Unlike the exhausting combat with the boy, this full grown prey lasted only seconds before being subdued. With a ravenous thirst propelling her, she sunk her newly enhanced teeth into the metallic neck of a cybernetic being for the first time.
As the first trickle of bits and bytes of data flowed from his body into hers, the satisfaction was more immense than any feeding she could recall. Suddenly overflowing with energy, her natural, organic wings sprung from her back, unfurling to their full, majestic length. For the first time in years, she soared effortlessly into the inky night sky. The synthetic fed the organic in ways she could only have dreamed, the two sides of her body powering each other in near perfect harmony. In this moment of glory, vampirism's new reality became abundantly clear to her. The technological revolution that had so nearly been their downfall, could indeed be their salvation.
___
Thanks for reading. Feel free to check out r/Ryter if you'd like to explore more of my stories 🙂
|
"Welcome to back Serenity Research Society Dr. Haymo!"
Is what I hear when I step into my facility. The staff knows me only as Doctor Haymo (and not the owner of the most powerful medical conglomerate in the world) and I will keep it that way.
"Greetings, Nurse Andersen. What is my schedule for the day?"
For you see, I have another secret. I require a _special_ diet that may be frowned upon. I am no Dr. Lector but I do share his mannerisms.
"Well sir, the young Mr. Brown, Mr. Kim, and Miss Hale is here to see you."
I am no cannibal
"Is it for the pre-attachment anatomical surveillance?"
"Yes Dr. They need their blood samples taken. To optimize the procedure and to see if they qualify for the bloodstream nanomaterial enhancements."
I am a vampire
///
All in all, it is a good living. Who knew stashing gold, jewels, and eventually stock ownerships throughout my three millennia of life would pay out? I used to live as a pseudo-god, demanding jars upon jars of fresh blood in exchange for my involvement with human wars. The days of dragging corpses and draining them is now over. My wealth formed the Transoceanic Research Group, of which Serenity is but a small (albeit favored) cog of.
This, is far more elegant and refined. Not only is murder unnecessary, but the act itself is far, far less tedious. Now, I am handed freely all the blood I can ever desire. All I need to do is examine the samples (I am a legitimate doctor after all) and then "throw them out".
I now save lives with my diet. The amount of blood I drink is directly proportional to those whose lives I enhance, affordably and marvelously.
How wonderful.
| 2019-11-04T11:03:13
| 2019-11-04T10:36:56
| 138
| 56
|
[WP]- Make me absolutely hate a character, and then make me fall in love with them at the last moment.
|
I had been thinking about her all day, before I killed her. Her inexplicable attraction to me, and to me alone. All those nights she came to me, though I had never had a desire to see her. Her desperate attempts to grow close to me.
My friends all knew about her. How I complained about her, and vented, and seethed. They knew better than to defend her.
I didn’t want her in my life, but she kept creeping back in.
I knew why. I knew what she wanted.
A child.
Yes, like all aging females, fertility trumped all else. Never mind what I wanted. Never mind my blossoming career, the golden performance reviews, the fast track to promotion. She wanted a child, and that’s all that mattered.
Like all females, she was selfish.
I wanted nothing to do with her, and her future, or the future of her progeny. They would enter a crushing world of defeat, just as she had. They would suck everything out of me, just like she had.
I tried to get rid of her, but she was so persistent.
Even the nights she left me alone, her absence filled the room. I could still hear her, inching closer to me, craving me. I would bury my head deep into the pillow, willing myself to disappear from her obsession.
I had no choice.
And as I imagined her death, the blood seeping out of her limp frame, elation pulsed through my skin. The skin she would never touch again.
I entered my room, slowly and deliberately.
She was waiting for me.
And as my heavy foot collided with her torso, the mosquito flattened into the wall, dead.
|
Harold was, as the locals called him, "a mean old man". He woke up at the crack of dawn every morning. He would pour himself a cup of coffee and then head towards his front porch. From there he would have his daily shouting match with the local paper boy.
After he downed his cup of coffee, he would resort back into his dank, musty, house to watch the local news. With every second he watched, saliva would build in his rotting mouth. He hated the newscasters with a burning passion. *"How could someone be so peppy all the time?"*, he thought. Every day a story about a rescued puppy or some emotional shit like that would appear in the news, Harold hated these stories. He would spit at the tv and not bother to clean it up. At this point, his tv was covered with mucus filled spit.
The news was not the only thing Harold hated, he also hated the local hooligans that lived on the street over. Every day they would bike by, with stupid smirks and grins painted on their faces. This severely bothered Harold, *"How come they are so happy all the time?"*. His solution to this would be throwing rocks as they biked by. Sometimes, Harold would spit on the rocks before he threw them. By spitting on the rocks he hoped that they might catch his mysterious illness that he knew so little about.
The illness that drove women away from him, the one that isolated him from his family, the one that caused him to have frequent hospital visits, the one that caused him never truly know what true love was, the one that kept him from truly living life to the fullest, the one that was slowly overtaking his dim, shortened, life.
Harold was just a misunderstood old man who never had the chance to live a normal life.
| 2013-10-21T22:10:55
| 2013-10-21T18:13:49
| 134
| 20
|
[WP] Congratulations! At 25 years old you won the lottery and will receive €50.000.000,- spread out over the rest of your lifespan; paid out evenly on each of your remaining years alive. On the following January 1st, you receive €25 million in your bank account.
|
Shock, denial, bargaining, guilt, anger, depression, and finally, acceptance.
Luckily for him, Jack was done with all of that pretty quickly. He had moved into the next stage. Fuck the world. He had his. He was going to live it up.
*210 days left*
Carnegie Hall. It was packed. Of course, it was packed by people who had been paid a hundred bucks each to attend. But money was not an objective for Jack. He had more money than he had time.
He sang his heart out. Of course, it was still shit. But everyone clapped. Hundred bucks for the couple of hours was still a good deal. Jack knew there was no chance he could actually be good enough to sell out The Hall, as he called it, so he had chosen the next best thing.
Another thing checked off his list.
*145 days left.*
Jack’s face was white as a ghost. The instructor tapped his shoulder.
“You are not at an acceptable level. You shouldn’t be doing this.” He had to shout over the sound of the chopper to make himself heard.
“What’s the worse that could happen?” With that, Jack jumped.
*100 days left.*
Jack winced as he touched his side. Running with the bulls had been a good idea in theory. But in practice... oh well. No regrets. That was his motto.
*85 days left.*
He had been happy. He had a plan. Now all his plans were going awry. For the second straight day, he sat on the side of the road. She had to come by eventually, right?
He knew he was wasting time. He only had a limited number of day’s but her face haunted him. He had to find her.
*60 days left.*
“Will you marry me?”
“Excuse me?”
“It’s a simple question.”
She looked confused. “Where did this come from?”
“I like you. Well I’ve fallen in love with you. I want you to marry me.”
“I don’t love you. You’re my employer.”
“Yes, yes. You’re my ghostwriter. You want to write and then be done with it. But think about it. I’ll be dead soon. If you marry me, you get all my money after I’m gone.”
“I don’t marry for money. Please don’t talk about this with me again. I would prefer if we have a professional relationship. Otherwise, I’ll have to quit.”
“Fine Fine. Your loss.”
It really wasn’t though. The loss was all his.
*45 days left.*
“Why don’t you like me?”
“I like you well enough.”
“But not enough to spend 45 days with me. In exchange for millions.”
She smiled. “I like you as an employer. I’ll marry someone I love. Someone I respect.”
“What can I do to gain your respect?”
“You need to go back in time and re live your life. Two years ago, you had an amazing stroke of luck. But what did you do? You lived your life for yourself. You had fun. What are you leaving behind in this world? What’s your legacy? Do you think people will remember you fondly? Or remember you at all?”
He tried to say something but words failed him.
She continued. “You’re fun to be around. But you’re not a good person. I’m sorry if I’m being blunt. But this is the last time I’m gonna see you.”
“But why?”
“I warned you last time that if you brought this up again, I will quit.”
“Oh come on. It’s a dying man’s last wish. I’m dying you bitch. Show me some mercy.”
“People die everyday. Why do you deserve my mercy more than anyone? In fact, now I’m even surer that you don’t.”
She didn’t wait for him to answer and stormed off.
*-3 days.*
Sally Richards got a letter with a familiar hand writing.
Dear Sally,
I was happy once. Then I found out I would be dead soon. I was still happy. Then I met you. You made me see how shallow my happiness was. The days we spent together showed me how little I mattered. A millionaire and not a single soul to miss me when I will be gone. Well you’re a better person than me. So I hope you spend all of this wisely.
Yours,
An idiot.
Inside was also a will, bequeathing 34 million bucks to Sally Richards.
Sally smiled, a tear forming in her eye. She could respect that a bit. Just a little bit.
********
Alternate ending.
Sally Richards smiled. Her plan had worked. She hadn’t even needed to use the fake will. The fool had done it on his own. What an opportunity god had given her. Now she could do everything she ever wanted to. Respect? Probably not. But she would be thankful to him and keep him in her thoughts, if only to laugh at him.
*******
Alternate Ending 2
*2 days left.*
Jack entered the lab. “Well...?”
The man in the white coat smiled. “I think we have it. I still need to test some things.”
“We are out of time.”
“I understand.”
“The money was transferred to your account.”
“I didn’t do this for the money Jack. You financing my research was reward enough.”
“Hey, we both helped each other.”
Jack ran his hand over the glass. A time machine in 2 years. Funny what a lot of money and no red tape could achieve in such a short time.
*******
More of my ramblings at r/ta_account_12. I promise I don’t always do these many endings.
|
I get a notification on my phone of a recent deposit in my bank account, excited having won the lottery. I really need the money since I finished college and in major debt.
I figured since they say it’s spread evenly through my life I can calculate how long I’ll live. Not a nice thought, but hey who wouldn’t.
I nearly choke on my apple juice box, seeing that i’ve never seen so many zeros at once.
I’m filled with joy, excitement of all the possibilities, I call my girlfriend, my parents. But after I get off the phone, it dawns on me. Hold up, they said “evenly”, sooooo I’m going to die in 2 years!??!!!?
I feel a cold rush, as I realize what this means.
I grab my phone, and dial a number.
The first step I must make.
It rings.
“Hello?” I say
“Thank you for calling Wendy’s. How may I help you?”
I must eat.
| 2020-08-05T18:52:44
| 2020-08-05T15:38:04
| 346
| 133
|
[WP] Due at an error, a baby was born without a guardian angel. A demon notices this and has taken it upon themself to become their guardian demon. But they seem to have some... Dark ways of helping their human stay alive.
|
It is common knowledge that demons devour corrupt souls. And nowhere are these souls more plentiful than in the chilly halls of a hospital. Where the dying send their final prayers above and pass on to judgement. To be saved or condemned.
On a cold November evening, a demon gave such a place a visit. The very air around her froze as the beautiful monster passed through the hallways in search of damned souls.
Little guardian angels fluttered about her head with indignation, attempting to ward off the evil creature. Irritated, the demon waved them away sending several flying into the walls.
As she passed one particular door, the demon paused. The aura emitting from this room felt... off. Curiosity sent her into the small room and within it she found a couple, cradling their newborn child. Their happiness was positively nauseating to the demon. But her attention was snatched by the small infant.
As she drew nearer, the guardians of the new parents rushed at her. The demon tilted her head. Two guardians, not three. Just... two. She easily batted them away. She had no interest in their charges, the guardian angels hadn’t much power to stop her.
The demon leaned over the child in her mother’s arms. Gently she brushed a slender finger over the baby’s forehead. A sense of longing stole over her. She had always wanted a daughter.
She wanted this one. This small child, forsaken by the light, would be nurtured by the dark.
|
Despite the pride the humans have accumulated through their time on Earth, the species is fragile. Technologies and medicines could only go so far as protecting one from their materialisation onwards. Prior to that, however, the souls that were to be bound to new flesh are weak and vulnerable. That is where the angels come in, carrying on the time-honoured tradition of shielding these beings from harm. The humans, in return, have offered faith. When other lifeforms, the other pets of the Creator in universes far beyond comprehension of mankind abandoned Him, men stood solely as his sheep. So it was that all angels are to safeguard mankind from threats they are unable to fight against. Until today, when the omnipotent slacked and slipped.
Of course, such mistake was grave. And the Creator could not afford to lose his last zealots. For the carcass that is to be born will be limp and rubbery, a corpse. Its soul will have been devoured by forces of malevolence no medicines could cure. Men would be terrified, as the notion of the souls and the body would become apparent as separated concepts. Most importantly, the humans would stop believing in their protectors, and that would be the end for the Heavens.
So He ended the child.
It was declared that the child is to be stillborn, and when the corpse came to Purgatory, the Demons are to incinerate it in the flames of Hell, until the last of the bones becomes fuel for the eternal nova. However, souls with no comprehension of good or evil could not be tried, thus, transition would be sacrilegious, for it disobeys the respected regulations that exempts none.
The Demons, themselves, decided on another approach. The corpse, they say, would be resuscitated, with not a soul, but the control of one of them.
So, imbued with dark magic, the corpse rose once more.
For the humans, the doctors involved in diagnosis and the parents of the child, in particular, such was a miracle. It was quickly reasoned that perhaps the machines, the scanners and the displays, were erroneous. For it was only for a moment did the aforementioned events transpired - the baby was limp for just an instance.
The Demon in possession of the child, however, did not enjoy such jubilation. The moment the atmosphere of the mortal realm touched him, he regretted the choice. Demons are not to roam this plane. He agonised, for he defied the choice of the Creator. Every breath of his was painful as the inhalation of scorching flames and exhalation of glass shards. He did not sign up for this.
And it was because of that torment, that the demon destroyed himself. His vessel, with his soul inside, raged for and end. The toddler frame, with the strength and dexterity of a beast, tossed and turned in the middle of its mother's womb. It ripped and clawed, at itself and at all it could see. The will of Demons are meek, and the pain of existence took its sanity. It wanted an end.
That day, four were killed. The mother was ripped apart from the inside, and the child dead from the hands of the doctor fetching it. That very doctor ended himself the following day, caving in to the pressure of the ravenous reporters and the unforgiving glance of the public. The father, after hearing of the doctor's death, succumbed.
The Creator was not to be defied. He could not do wrong. To believe that he was mistaken is to wage bloodshed and terror.
| 2019-12-14T21:49:03
| 2019-12-14T21:32:54
| 29
| 11
|
[WP] The outgoing President of the United States has written a letter to the newly inaugurated President. Instead of friendly advice, that letter contains the horrible truth that the public doesn't know about. Write that letter.
What is that horrible secret?
|
To whom it may concern,
Congratulations on becoming the President of the United States. It's pretty awesome. But let's not bother with stating the obvious, and let me get straight to the point.
There is something that I have been...neglecting for some time now. I suppose there are many things that have gone to the wayside while I dealt with the drone strikes, struggling economy, health care, and all of that other stuff. But there is one thing that, well, it is quite personal. I'll just get straight to it then.
The toilet in the restroom connected to the oval office has been out of commission for a few weeks. I broke that chain thing that connects the flush handle to the little rubber plug in the bottom of the tank. I kept forgetting to tell someone about it, but then after a while it just became embarrassing. I've crafted what I am calling a Knock Down Stick to use to keep the buildup of excrement from touching my rear end. However, I'm afraid that won't do for much longer.
Therefore I place upon you this great burden to face as your first task in office. Do you A) Admit that there is a big pile of poop in the most important toilet in the world? Or B) Sneak some of the poop out of the restroom and dump it elsewhere, making more room and continued use of the Knock Down Stick?
Farewell and good luck.
P.S. The Knock Down Stick is hidden behind the black leather loveseat.
|
Hey Dogg,
It’s President Obama. Well, former-President Obama. What’s good? Don’t bother responding to that, this is an email and I won’t be able to hear what you said. I mean, you’re welcome to respond if you want, but it’s really not going to do much for you. Yeah, maybe it’ll make this whole “hey we’re cool dog” email feel a bit more personal—like you’re really talking to the Obaminator—but I honestly won’t have any idea that you said something. You’re probably thinking “Obamster, look, I’ll just reply to the email and you’ll get it.” Wrong. Wrong as shit. I’m sending this from my super high-security self-destructing email. It doesn’t actually self-destruct, it’s just my PREZO4SHO6969@Yahoo.com account that I don’t know the password to. If you respond, I won’t get it. Let’s just make this easy on us both—I’m going to assume you said something like, “Not much, my man, how are you?” I’m super fly. Anyway, let’s get on with it.
I’m sure you’re wondering something like, “Why is the 44th President, and the flyest motherfucker this side of D.C., sending me an email?” This answer is a two parter: A) Because I’m the motherfucking Obamatron. I do what I want, when I want, how I want. Whack-ass bill passed by congress? Fuck that shit, Presidential Veto. Some playa hacking off the heads of hoes in Iraq or Iran or New Zealand or some shit? Drone strike, bitch. And 2) Because I need to tell you something about being the President, a horrible truth you must know. Also, III) Because fuck you.
Firstly, let’s just clear the air: I’m not mad at you for taking my job, but I do think you’re a bitch. Those two are not mutually exclusive, I can think you’re a bitch and still not be mad at you. And you are a bitch, everyone agrees. Even my daughter says you’re a bitch. Let’s not argue that, though, let’s just get back to me not being mad at some little bitch like you. You see, I’ve been the Leader of the Free World (shout-out to my man Eminem for *8 Mile*) for eight years now. It was time for me to move on, I chose to leave the office. It had nothing to do with the whole “get out after eight years” bullshit, I chose to leave. Plus, I’m already lined up for a killer gig down in Colorado, where the sun shines bright and the weed burns hot. I’m going to work in a dispensary and blaze all day. I can get you a job too if you want, but you’ll have to ditch the whole President gig. Up to you.
Anyway, look. Here’s what I got to say. I was the Prez for 8 years, I saw a lot of shit go down. I once saw a guy get his dick bit off by a tiny Chihuahua my daughter’s friend brought over. I’m gonna premise this next bit by assuring you that I ain’t no homo (but I’m all for them getting all married and whatever), but that guy’s schlong was like three feet longer than the dog. I was almost as upset as the dude for such a glorious thing being ruined. It was like *Fight Club*, that dog just wanted to destroy something beautiful. Don’t worry, though, I hear he had it medically re-attached and now it’s like three times girthier due to the swelling. I wouldn’t mind getting a peek of that bad-boy, know what I'm saying?
Sorry, I got off topic a bit. Back on point: I’ve seen some shit. I’ve seen a lot of people die, a lot of people get hurt. I’ve seen things inner-city kids that work the nightshift as prison guards in third world countries would get nightmares from. You’re going to see the same, they’re going to haunt you. But there’s one fact, one horrible truth, that is going to trump everything you’ve ever seen, or will see, which I want to share with you. And I don’t care if you’re some whack-ass motherfucker like John McCain (I know, who’s that? LOL) who was in a P.O.W. camp, this shit’s worse. So, look, here’s your opportunity. If you don’t wanna hear this shit from me right now, close this email and delete it. Otherwise, you best brace for impact cause we goin’ in hot.
Area 51 actually exists for the sole purpose of abducting random people, then probing them rectally. It’s not for any scientific research, or any monetary gain, or any purpose other than probing a bunch of cracka-ass white guys in overalls or, say, fancy black guys in expensive suits. Honestly, I’ve done a ton of research into it. I spent more nights awake, locked in the Library of Congress, trying to find anything and everything to make it logical, than I did doing actual Presidential shit. I even hired that Nicholas Cage guy to look at the back of random pictures and books and do some of that *National Treasure* shit we all love. He found nothing, I found nothing. You know what I’m saying, dogg? The United States Government is abducting random people and shoving foreign objects up their butts just to say they did. And it ain’t just recently, neither. This shit’s been going on since the beginning of our great nation. And they don’t care if you’re the President--in fact, that makes it worse and more frequent.
Do you understand me? They do not care if you are the President. Let that sink in.
I hope you appreciate my warnings, dogg. I know it’s hard to hear, but it’s only going to get worse. I wish I had known earlier, wish I had realized the truth before I opted to sleep in the nude (which I still do, no homo). I hope you can protect yourself.
Keep tight, you bitch,
Barack Hussein Obama, Former President of the United States of America
| 2014-05-01T13:46:18
| 2014-05-01T13:44:04
| 56
| 38
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[WP] You die and go to hell. Instead of finding everyone suffering in the eternal pits of fire, you are shocked to find a highly developed, Democratic, and modernized world. You pick up a newspaper and see the headline: “up to 1 Million more refugees expected to arrive from Heaven in coming weeks.”
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“Is this real?”
“That’s sort of a hard question to answer.”
“But how can this be real?”
“It’s complicated.”
“But... Refugees from Heaven?”
“Not really that hard to believe is it? It’s a dogmatic, uptight, theocracy. Also the weather sucks this time of year.”
“Why is it so much better here?”
“Free will mostly.”
“Aren’t we supposed to be punished?”
“Yeah, but Lucifer got booted for not following rules. He wasn’t so much pissed at humanity as he was jealous. He was going to take it out on the souls of humanity, but figured it would piss off the Big Fella even more to, ya know, not do that.”
“How does nobody know this?”
“Christianity has had a bit of a lock on the PR thing for awhile now.”
“This place is amazing. Great music, good food, interesting people. Are there any downsides?”
“Yeah, the only pets we have here are chihuahuas and cats.”
“Bummer.”
|
Ah yes the story of refugees to Hell.
You see god had played a little game with us, he had come to earth multiple times as different gods just to see which one people liked the most which would have been fine but he made some mistakes. You want to know why hell is on its 11th world even though each world has a capacity of 10 billion and only 108 billion people have ever lived. Because only the extreme hard-core believers get into heaven, and currently it only has an approximated population of 104 million, down from 158 million since the start of the war and naturally they were separated into their own communities with no knowledge of each other when they arrived.
Now so far these seem like decent choices however one day god was just like nah let em mingle I’ve played my game long enough… big mistake, very very big mistake. I honestly don’t know what it expected, its like having multiple children who never knew about each other and suddenly having them all live in the same house. It quickly devolved into a “im the real son” situation and less than a month after the big reveal the Olmecs created the first mortalizer in the image of their jaguar god, a blade with a jaguars tooth at the tip. Believing it was a test from god to have so many heretics amongst them they started the slaughter and eventually most religious sects had their own weapons. In the beginning most small religious sects got wiped out and then there were only a few left, the big ones. Each comprising approximately 1/5th of the pre-war population. Judaism, Christianity, Islam-unified and Buddhism and a very odd extra that was holding its own, the Ares. You see unlike the other groups Ares weren’t so limited in the weapons they could create, they were fueled simply by the lust for war and as such they could conjure up any weapon they could imagine and although few of their religion came from modern times there was one woman who had died in 2002 who had been a engineer at heckler & Koch and avid historian. She gave the Ares rifles and grenades so although they didn’t have a large population, they did have were the deadliest weapons.
They would eventually get wiped out but not before they did some damage, this would have at least appeared to be the case till human nature took over. Even for a religious fanatic, the lust for victory slowly crept in and eventually the Christians split 80/20 into two groups, ones that accepted Ares as a binary god and those that didn’t. This is where things got bad, although the majority of Christians stayed with their beliefs there were enough of those who split to create a essentially unstoppable army, in response many other religions split. The battlefield devolved into world war 1 style battles because although airplanes and such could theoretically be conjured the amount of material and therefore spiritual energy required was nigh impossible to achieve. For around 2 months life essentially returned to normal as the splits didn’t hate each other, they just viewed each other as inferior and as such the believers were protected by the binaries as no one dared march into no mans land.
Then some genius from the Buddhist-Ares binary realized you didn’t have to conjure something with the assumption the whole thing was a weapon, a plane isn’t a weapon a bomb is, and this is how they got nuclear bombers and missiles. It was chaos, imagine civ 4’s nuclear Gandhi but in real life, at this point god tried to intervene but the blood lust intensified by their new binary god had taken over, these bombs had the ability to harm it too so instead god created a exit, become a refugee and get sent to hell. At first it was a slow trickle, mostly those who had only known eons of peace and couldn’t comprehend war, this was because for the believers becoming a refugee to hell would mean you had given up on heaven, or possibly even god itself but after the first few nukes hit even the staunchest believers started to consider the option. What started as a trickle quickly became a wave and soon the first 50 million had left. To say they came to a better world isn’t exactly accurate, the original residents of hell had it good, no death, no disease and very little pain. Living in a modern society with an infinite amount of demon servants just like the angels in heaven but without the limitations of religion. Demons looked like normal people too except they were bound to do the bidding of any non-demon. Sex slave, sure. Drugs, yes please. Getting shot into space to have a demon come fetch you and bring you back while giving you a foot massage and serving martinis on the way back, daily.
Most people worked just for fun or when they felt like it, all they really did was take over a seat from one of the infinite demons at a job. You could also never fail, the amount of “genius” day traders was staggering as was the number of “successful” rappers, when you cant tell that the less fortunate aren’t human you really feel successful, there was even a etiquette for using demons, call a hotline as otherwise it breaks the immersion if you can just command random people.
As you can imagine the hyper religious couldn’t stand the godless actions of these people so they tried to mold the new world into the likeness of their old world, however as the demons only obeyed the original residents of hell the believers ended up caged in fenced off areas. Just like in heaven they started fighting again although this time as they were not longer in heaven their conjuring didn’t work and so it was just fist vs fist. Bad idea as when you get what you want when you want for an eternity your sense of morals can skew a little to the dark side and so instead of just being fenced off the people of hell made the areas what you might call concentration camps.
Well at least this united the believers so when the war upstairs is finally over they can go back and maybe create a peaceful world. If thats not possible then welcome to the real hell in hell
| 2020-01-28T02:39:25
| 2020-01-28T02:31:18
| 468
| 71
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[WP] Everyone lost their sight years ago in the great blinding, one day your sight returns without warning. You look around to find every available surface painted with the same sentence over and over: “DONT TELL THEM YOU CAN SEE”
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The feeling of my sight coming back was a short-lived spark of joy in the endless night that had been my life before today. I couldn’t believe that upon waking up today, I would be looking at the ceiling. *The ceiling!* Such a mundane surface, and yet when you’ve been starved of sight for years on end, something about the shitty designs and unexciting flaws brought me to tears.
This moment of elation was cut short as soon as I realized what I was really looking at. “DON’T TELL THEM YOU CAN SEE.” It was written on anything that could have been written on in my room. Walls, windows, even the underside of my desk chair. All of the letters were written out as if done in a hurry, although covering the whole room would have taken quite some time.
Realizing I was now sweating, I decided to play it safe for the time being. Glancing out of the window told me everything I needed to know. Everything else was normal. Well, as normal as things have been ever since The Great Blinding years ago. Other people were out-and-about yet were clearly still living in a dark world. Still not sure what to make of this, I decided to head into town as I was already planning on getting groceries today.
Walking through a world as the only one who can see is incredibly strange. For one, even the light from an overcast sky hurt my eyes. I certainly forgot that everyone stopped caring how they look. A scene of about 10 or so people shuffling around the street with wild hair and mismatched clothing reminded me of some sort of shitty zombie movie. And then something caught my eye that I never expected.
A well-dressed woman, a bit shorter than me and with long, braided black hair, crossed the road about 2 blocks from me. Even though I hadn’t seen anything in years, I recognized her in a second. It was Tessa, a girl who I had always been sorta-romantic with, but we were never both in the right place to start a relationship. I thought about calling out, but the message leapt out of my mind again; DON’T TELL THEM YOU CAN SEE.
As I swallowed the breath that I had been planning on using to shout and felt the sting of lost love, a sunbeam broke through the clouds and make her look as beautiful as the last time I had seen her. Then Tessa turned towards me. *And make eye contact.*
*DON’T TELL THEM.*
The hair on my neck stood up straight. Tessa started to walk towards me.
*DON’T TELL HER.*
*I think she already knows…*
I couldn’t move an inch. Today was all so jarring for me, my mind quit on me. She was only a handful of paces away from me now.
“Did you tell anyone?” Her voice was sweet as always, yet carried a commanding weight to it that I didn’t recognize.
“*YES* or *NO*, dumbshit.”
“N-No.” I stammered. Before I could draw another breath I was whisked away. Tessa was practically dragging me by the arm into the nearest building. She ducked us behind what looked to be a receptionist’s desk at one point, when the city was still thriving.
“Sorry about not warning you, we didn’t really have a good opportunity to contact you. How’s seeing again?” The commanding tone had left her voice.
“Wait, wait, wait.” I stared blankly at her as my thoughts ordered themselves, “Did you do this to me? I can see because of something you did?”
“Of course I did it to you, we always need more help with the resistance.”
I could hear the dial-up internet noise in my brain as I tried to sort out what the hell was happening to me. “You did this? What’s with the weird messages all over my walls? Wait why me? What the fuck is going on!?” My breath was ragged by now.
“Sorry if you had a strange wakeup, I was on another mission so Jordy was the one who left you the message and slipped you the medicine. He… has a flair for the eccentric…” Tessa broke eye contact to roll her eyes and huff. After a moment of thought, her normally perky facial features became quite grim.
“The Great Blinding wasn’t just some random event, it was all orchestrated.” As my mouth once again started to form another question, Tessa’s hand pointed to the sky as the clouds had started to break. Steel monoliths hung in the clouds, as if the skyscrapers themselves had been lifted out of the earth, smoothed over, and hung from the heavens. Silent and ominous, they hung over the city like great watchers.
“They scorched all of humanity’s vision so that they could silently farm this planet while we still work it. Turns out they’re huge fans of what we’ve done to the atmosphere.”
The minute of silence felt like an eternity as I stared at the monoliths hanging in the sky. Tessa crossed her arms and gave me a dominating stare.
“So, will you join us?”
|
Living in an age in which darkness ruled, Gulliver's pure heart shone as a cursed beacon. The kindness in his eyes had won the battle against the scourge of his people, but it also revealed a reality of far greater suffering. Two little words in response to the panicked scribblings, spoken with a joyous tongue, sealed his fate.
"Huh. Neat!"
The positivity in his tone dispersed around him like a fearsome wave, and to those around him served as blood in the water. And soon the blind sharks circled.
"What is *neat*?" others said.
"What strange magic does he utter?" still more questioned.
"Perhaps...*perhaps*...he is the *one," an elder declared.
But even though he held the power of sight and could surely see the encroaching danger, Gulliver maintained his innocence.
"I'm not a 'one,' I'm just a Gulliver!"
Some chuckled his silliness, while others chuckled at the ease with which their task would be performed. Bitter, broken smiles slowly emerged among the rabble. But while their fangs dripped with malice, the kind man had other thoughts.
"Wow, we really let our teeth go. Why did we stop going to the dentist?"
"Because he couldn't see our mouths, you dolt!" someone yelled from a distance.
"Heh, oh, I suppose that's true. Can't be poking your patients with those tiny drills and swords blindly, I suppose. But now that I can see, maybe *I* should be the dentist!"
Gulliver began dreaming of all the new career opportunities and paid no mind to the two men who had slipped behind him. Even while they began binding his hands he paid no mind to the danger, only noting the sensation of the fibers.
"So tickle-y!"
The blind then led the sighted man to the center of the square. Some yelled for cries of justice they felt they deserved. Others chanted their prophecies and magics, in the hopes the coming sacrifice would succeed. And few whispered apologies over the young man, hoping his spirit would somehow survive.
Gulliver enjoyed hearing the unusually lively chatter of his people. *They're so happy, just like me!* he thought to himself. But as they reached the center and he felt an angry knee and a vicious hand strike him to the ground, shades of gray appeared on his horizon.
"Hey, stop that!" he protested, as they bound his feet together, before strapping the whole of him to a crude table.
Again the elder spoke. "It is these eyes now filled with light that we offer back to you, oh universe, in the hopes that you might again allow our sun to raise."
"But," Gulliver interrupted, "the sun is right over there - what is that, east?"
They paid no mind. "Take these living tokens as payment for our trespasses, whatever they may be. Please, be kind to us."
The chanting grew louder as Gulliver watched the elder draw nearer, a large shining spoon in his hand. "No! But I just got use of them back! Why would you take them from me?"
"In case you are the *one,* the elder replied.
With an unyielding grip he took hold of Gulliver's face and performed the deed amidst a chorus of chants and screams.
After all was said and done, the rabble waited in the hopes their light might be returned. But still darkness persisted, and in time each dispersed back to their bleak corner of existence. Gulliver was loosed from the table, but he remained there some time longer, any further hope of future vision now dashed.
But even in a moment so dark, utterly bereft even of the hope of his hopeless neighbors, Gulliver's heart shone bright as he whispered to himself.
"It sure was nice to see the sun again."
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r/psalmsandstories for more tales by me, should you be interested.
| 2020-06-09T11:32:09
| 2020-06-09T11:17:33
| 290
| 44
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[WP] You've never felt the same after learning Morse Code. The rain keeps telling you to run.
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“Run, Run, Run, Run. That’s the message the rain is sending to everyone.” I made my point to the empty lounge chair beside me, staring out at the rain, watching it splash against my window, coating it in various little droplets of water. “I don’t get it, it can’t be a coincidence. It’s happening at regular intervals. If it were pure coincidence, we would have had something that diverted the pattern and yet it just keeps repeating run.”
I was almost thankful I lived alone, wondering how insane my train of thought must have sounded to an outsider. Surely, I wasn’t the first to notice. I know morse code isn’t widely used anymore but there have to be enough people that could recognize the pattern, especially when it’s happening outside. Keeping my face pressed against the glass, I observed the raindrops, feeling the cool glass sting my cheek as I pressed myself further against it, in awe of the phenomenon outside.
“Why run though?” I felt a few conspiracies slip into my mind, unable to keep the thoughts out. Maybe it was a secret government project that got out? An old war command that induced a sense of fear into the enemy. Imagine being hunkered down in a trench and suddenly the rain is telling you to run. That would freak out even the most battle hardened of soldiers. Or maybe it was something more devious? A plan to drive people insane through the repetition of the same sound.
The longer I listened to it, the more the feeling of dread set in. I was a rational person, a person who wanted to be a historian and was studying for that role. I was far too intelligent to let myself fall for paranoia induced dread. Trying to ignore the sound, I turned on the tv only to minimize the amount of rain I heard. Yet, my eyes always ended back at the window, like a fly caught in a spider’s web.
The comparison didn’t help ease my mind, either. I kept myself pinned to the window, my eyes roaming the streets, trying to avoid catching sight of the droplets. When my gaze finished exploring the roads, it worked its way up to my neighbor across the road. The old, keg bellied man staring out of his window, his eyes wide as he shoved himself against the window frame.
I watched as he shoved his shoulder against the wall, trying anything he could to move. It was nightmarish, my skin crawling at the sight. “Tim?” Tim was his name, wasn’t it? I didn’t know the man well and still I felt compelled to shout at him through the shut window. “Tim, are you ok?”
It was only for a moment that our eyes made contact, his eyes bloodshot and exhausted, his flailing now an exhausted rocking, like a fish that had just been reeled in. He opened his mouth only for his window to smash into tiny, fragmented pieces, causing him to fall back.
I needed to call an ambulance. Turning to free myself from the window, I found myself trapped, unable to move. Goosebumps soon littering my arms as I flailed against the window. The flailing only lasted a few seconds before I felt out of breath. I gazed back at the window, only to stare at the horror before me.
Its skin a transparent pale, only being given form by the rain that dripped from its body. Each droplet revealing some new horrific feature. Its mouth protruded, a long sucker that I could only assume hid thousands of tiny pincer like teeth. Its body hunched forward, elbows pointed outwards, with its clawed hands sitting by its chest.
When it noticed my lack of a struggle, it crept forward. I gave the wall a defiant kick but still was kept against the wall, unable to avoid the nearing creature. I could only wonder who was warning us about them, having a feeling that their warning was far too late as the window cracked before me.
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(If you enjoyed this feel free to check out my subreddit /r/Sadnesslaughs where I'll be posting more of my writing.)
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Secrets slipped through the rain in staccato undulations of long and short. Everything in the world had a Name, every Name in the world had a Purpose, every Purpose in the world a Subversion, every Subversion a Corruption, because of course a subversion by itself is not a wrong thing, and there are many wrong things in the rain.
Doubting Thomas, one of those wrong things, slipped through rain. And the rain whispered to him, in a language he wished he had never learned, *“Run.”*
He did not hear *“Run,”* like a spoken word or like the other rhythmic secrets of Name, Purpose, Subversion, and Corruption. Rather, *“Run”* was the Synthesis of all those things. When the rain whispered his Name, Thomas, he heard the first short beat of word alongside it, short-long-short, di-da-di in the Morse Code conventions that haunted him. When it whispered his Purpose, to listen to the world and the rain and its whispers, Thomas heard the second beat of word, short-short-long, di-di-dah, in the cracks between the command. In Thomas’s own Subversion, his oppressive doubt, he heard the last beat of “Run” in the stamp of his feet on the pavement, splashing through the puddles in a strange, long-into-short trip of a rhythm, da-dit.
And in his Corruption, his trust in himself and himself alone, Doubting Thomas heard an exclamation point made of thunderclaps and lightning.
There was other noise, other rain-whispers to be sifted, and there was talking too, because a woman ran beside Doubting Thomas and she had been talking all the while, been talking since they left their home and ran down the streets and ran out through park and on. Rachel was her name, just Rachel, and Doubting Thomas heard all her secrets in the rain too, and in the beat of her feet against the wet, sopping world. She splashed heavily into a puddle and the splash whispered *“Run.”* She brushed a tree branch and all the little droplets whispered *“Run.”* Doubting Thomas heard them fall, each and every one of them with the same secret.
Her mouth moved, said words like “Where are you going?” and “What’s wrong?” and “Talk to me!” but Thomas did not trust those. They weren’t the rain, and they weren’t the Code. They were screamed not whispered, screamed in such a hoarse, broken voice that Thomas could not do anything but run from them, because his Purpose was to listen, his Subversion was to doubt, and his Corruption was such that he couldn’t trust any soul but his own.
Besides, Thomas thought, people whisper truth, they don’t scream it. Truth hurt too much to be screamed.
Doubting Thomas ran on, drenched by the rain and puddles thrown up by cars, once by mud when he tripped, fell, and sprawled through a patch. Rachel helped him up, said more words to run away from.
Eventually, chest heaving, tears mixing with the rain, hair thin and soaked and scraggly, she stopped. Falling hard to her knees, she screamed her last words with all the ragged-edged force of a blizzard, not a rain storm, which only frightened Doubting Thomas more because blizzards could not talk, they were no secrets to parse in blizzards, only in the rain.
“Please come back!” Rachel screamed, shrieked, pleaded, begged.
Doubting Thomas ran on, doubting and believing in turns, as the rain blew every which way around him and secrets blew with it.
*Run.*
From time to time on his way out of the city people called questions from beneath their umbrellas and awnings.
“Are you okay?” an old woman in a fuzzy, lopsided hat shouted.
“Slow down, champ!” a big man in a blazer said.
“You fucking asshole!” a pale, scrawny kid in a sports car shouted when Thomas ran through the walk sign and brakes screeched red amid the evening murk. Doubting Thomas did not know if he doubted the kid, the rain had whispered similar things before.
He still heard *“Run,”* in the hollows of everything around him.
Eventually his phone began to ring, then ring again, then ring and ring and ring some more as Rachel called. She called until Thomas cried, until his doubt almost washed away with the tears because she had run so far, even when she had a weak heart and a bad knee from that time in college. After all, she had said things even before their run, would say them again now, if the rain told him to answer the phone.
*“Run,”* the rain said, so Doubting Thomas ran. She said things, but there were no secrets in her voice that he could hear, and when she screamed them it scared him very badly. Many things scared him very badly.
Eventually Thomas passed into the suburbs. Night fell, and it became rare to encounter another person on the streets, in rain so cool and callous as this. He passed three people, a couple that shied away from him, a young woman who crossed the street when she saw him running; none of them said a word, save for the young woman who gasped a bit, and the hollow space behind what she did not say was filled by rain that still whispered *“Run.”*
Dawn came, the rain did not end, and no one spoke to Doubting Thomas. It rained for three days and three nights, and on the fourth day, when Thomas rested in a blighted copse off I-79, the rain stopped.
He caught his breath, drank from a puddle, massaged blistered, horrifically aching feet.
The world was silent, there were not even birds, and on this stretch of the road, at this hour of the morning, there were no cars. Doubting Thomas pulled out his phone— it was dead. Silent.
He splashed his bare feet into a puddle till the water rose and fell in a great, scattered flood, but the drops were too scattered to make words and tell secrets, and there were too many hollow spaces in the world for a puddle to fill.
Silent.
Silent.
Silent.
Thomas, Doubting Thomas, walked until he found an old, abandoned trailer, slipped into the silent room, sat down in a dusty chair that creaked loudly but did not speak. He brushed paraphernalia off the single table, listened for a secret in the clatter. Silence.
He stared at his phone for a very long time, as the sun crept up on the horizon, then over, then sat again. Sometime in the dark, it rained.
And the rain whispered *“Run.”* Doubting Thomas, trusting only in himself, listened to all the world whispering that word, *“run, run, run, run, run, run, run,”* into the hollow places where before there had only been silence. He stood, stretched for a few minutes, and then he ran to a place where all the words were only whispers, and there wasn’t anyone left to doubt.
Behind him, in a broken down trailer some miles off I-79, his phone sat on a dusty table cleared of paraphernalia and laden down with discarded dreams.
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r/TurningtoWords
| 2021-09-28T08:46:07
| 2021-09-28T08:37:14
| 81
| 54
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[WP] The biggest warmongering race of Aliens declare war on the local Galaxy cluster. The opposing group of peace-loving Aliens, who had befriended most Alien races, are finally forced to reveal their secret weapon, a 'classified' species called Humans, and their tenacity as persistence predators.
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Greetings Earthlings,
In Earth year 1980 we noticed the Attractors were conquering, enslaving, and gathering the remants of all those they conquered in the Laniakea. By 1988 they were now moving into the Virgo Supercluster and toward our Local Group.
We believe this is because of all the galaxies in the Virgo Supercluster only Andromeda and the Milky Way had any Type III or Type II civilizations. You can call us the Andromedians. We are the only Civilization that can use all of the energy our galaxy provides to help civilizations in our Local Group. Because of our dominance we have been able to keep peace in local group for nearly one billion Earth years. But because of this even Type II Civilizations that can use the energy of their planetary system haven't waged war in our Local Group for all this time. We intercede immediately at the start of the conflict which is usually a new Type II Civilization declaring war on a nearby peaceful Type II Civilization, or a yet uncontacted Type I that can use all the energy of their planet. Or a planet like Earth a Type 0 Civilization that has yet to fully utilize their planet for energy.
We are here because of all the monitored Type 0 and Type 1 Civilizations, Humans have the greatest capacity for war, and being persistence predators. We are offering the people of Earth something we have never offered before, access to Type I, II, III technology. And to use it to make weapons of War.
We believe the Attractors are attempting to become the only Type IV Civilization in the Universe. And to harness the power of the hole universe they will kill and enslave every race in existence.
People of Earth we offer you the tools to create a utopia in your solar system. But first you must finally band together as one people and declare your and the universes final war.
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'It wasn't a time for taking the easy way. Even we saw that.
Now, there was nothing left to do but the worse. Pretty lucky too that they were actually prepared for something like that. '
All eyes remained fixed on the counselor.
'It make you wonder if prohibiting aggressiveness all those years ago was really necessary to the extend our forefathers decided to enforce.
As you can all understand, the reason why I invited all your representatives to appear in person here and video to be redirected here - for the next 4 minutes 45 seconds - is the release of the beast, so to say.
We are to touch ground in Beijing in about 25 seconds. Bear with me.
Some quick facts on 324#
- nuclear tech phase 4
- almost 10 billion incl some half billion minor species.
- good physical 90%
- no stimulants (exclus. Pre-phsych)
We are confident and hopeful to be able to reach their cooperation quickly, in the contrary case, measurements have been taken and we are positive to be able to intervene over 60% of pop. '
'"BRACE FOR IMPACT"
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| 2021-05-25T19:42:06
| 2021-05-25T10:05:45
| 25
| 17
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[WP] Scientists have discovered cryogenic freezing. You are it's first test subject and it's a massive success, and they plan on releasing you in 500 years. You had no way of telling them you were conscious.
Holy shit this blew up!
I now understand "RIP my inbox"
EDIT: u/Alpacasaurus_Rekt told me it's actually "Cryonic Freezing"
EDIT 2: To anyone who is trying to say, "scientists would not put them in for 500 years immediately" I would like you to know this is a fictitious writing prompt and just roll with it.
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The nervousness is what really gets you at first. Standing in your skivvies being poked and proded one final time by all sorts of PhDs. They’re excited for you, but it’s the excitement of watching a mouse run through a maze. The excittement of a groundbreaking discovery, whether you survive or not. The most relief i’ve ever had was finally stepping into the pod.
No more anxiety, no more chance to turn back. Either it goes terribly wrong or it doesn’t. It took me about an hour to realize they had started the procedure already, and that my outcome was the former. I started to think about all the things i’d miss from life, i’d certainly have plenty of time to think about it.
The spooks circled my tomb with clipboards, writing down little factoids that’d surely be in the papers tomorrow morning. The constant surveillance was a wonderful distraction from my fate. Watching all the curious faces light up at having confirmed a hypothesis or thought of a new application.
When the pod finally opened, I vomitted, and the scribbling struck a pace more furious than I thought possible. The CEO walked right up to my hunched form to shake my hand. The test was a success, my pulse was quiet for an entire twenty-four hours and I was resuscitated without complication. Had I not raised an alarm, next week they would’ve had me in hibernation for several days, and a short while after that maybe a year. The Company’s eventual plan was to send someone forward over five-hundred years! Luckily, no one is stupid enough to test an experimental procedure’s full breadth on a single subject in one uninterrupted stage.
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I am now nothing.
I am nothingness. Nothingness is I. I is nothing. That one sounded like Yoda or would he say I am nothing, nothingness I is. Wait, I just said that didn’t I? No, stop it. I’m getting distracted I am nothing I no longer exist. Stop existing in 3, 2, 1. Silence. Emptiness. Non existence. See! That’s more like it. Non existence is right up my ally. I love this. I’m loving this. It feels good? What’s the grub like in non existence. Do they have crab-sticks? I love crab-sticks. They so crabby and nice and delicate and sweet and I fucking hate my life.
This is bullshit. God Dam professor Ching Mc-fucking Chong with his white lab coat, name badge and glasses I fucking trusted you bastard. Look at me. Look at me professor. I hate you. Can I conjure up so much rage that it manifests itself into a cloud of hate that gives birth to a demon that torments anyone that’s ever wronged me. Maybe if I concentrate. Okay 1, 2, 3 Concentrate. I am now Concentrate. People call me Mr Concentration. Squeeze baby squeeze every ounce of strength is needed. Earth! Lend me your strength. I’ll spirit bomb this treacherous bastard. FEEL MY HATE. I can shout in my head? I never noticed before. Is it actually shouting or am I just talking loudly. TALKING LOUDLY. talking softly. It sounds the same. Everything sounds the same. How long am I gonna be in here again? 500 years? I’m gonna cry. I want to cry. Can I cry in my head. I feel like crying. Someone give me a drink. I need something to drink. I”M THIRSTY. I’m thirsty for love. Nameee your priceeee. A ticket to paaaraadiisee. I’m crying I can feel it coming. I caaaaaaan’t stay here anyyymoreeeee. Something, something, something LOVE IS THE ANSWEERRRRRRRR. Why didn’t you Love me ANGELICA. I LOVED YOU DAMMIT…
…...............................................................................
…So how long has it been? You reckon a month? A Week. A day. An Hour! Lordy Lord. I swear I don’t think I can do this. I’m gonna go crazy. I’m going crazy fuck it I’m already partially crazy. I need to get out God I miss my mum. I haven’t seen her in years. We haven’t spoke in so long. She seemed pretty distant ever since she met that shitty accountant. She didn’t have to remarry. We were fine. I was fine. Was she? Yes she was I mean why wouldn’t she be. She showered a lot more and stayed home a lot but she was, oh my god, Her husband of 7 years just left her why the fuck would she be fine. Did I even ask her? But still fuck you Chad no one likes you. She should of called me. She knew where I was. She knew I was struggling. I was just a phone call away. She should of just reached out to me...
…......................................................................................
LOVE IS THE ANSWERRRRR I NEVER LOVED YOU ANGELICA YOU Hear me! God I love this song.
…
Can God hear me? Is it to late to start believing? If I do believe could you kill me. I want to die. I never asked for this. I didn’t want to exist. None of this is my fault. You made me and now you’re just gonna watch me suffer. KILL ME. I WANT TO FUCKING DIE!!!
…....................................................................................
What am I? A human? A mind? A series of thoughts? Do I exist? Why does it even matter anymore. It really doesn’t. But I can’t stop thinking. I can’t stop. It’s fading. NO IT ISN”T. I’m still here I’m still me. I believe I am so I am. But you’re not. SHUTUP, FUCK YOU. I’m alive and I’m me and I have my thoughts and there not fading. I’m not fading. This is me. I’m still here. God help me please.
…...................................................................................
Bumblebee, Lilly-pads, star-ships, star dust, longing, loving, dirty roads, I exist. I’m here I exist. I’m here I exist. I’m here I exist. I’m here, I exist.
…..................................................................................
I should have called. I’m sorry, mum.
…..................................................................................
I exist
…..................................................................................
Help me,
.....................................................................................
god
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
The year 3050, in the district of Gun Zhoa, sector 31-A. The Cryopreservation Chamber was lifted and the first man to be successfully frozen was now thawed.
| 2017-12-17T03:26:40
| 2017-12-16T21:57:11
| 1,145
| 53
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[WP]: A 92-year-old woman's phone number is one digit away from that of a local suicide hotline. She could have it changed, but she doesn't mind.
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"Um...hi, I've never done this before but I'm looking for some help. I'm having a really rough time right now and I'm afraid I'm going to hurt myself, or worse."
"Oh, sweetie- I'm so sorry you're struggling like this," a raspy, weak voice replied. She must have been at least 80 years old by the sound of it, but the weakness was but a veil- through it, you could hear true strength.
"This is the hotline for people who need help, right?" I asked.
"No, dear. You've reached the wrong number- it happens a lot to me, since I'm one digit off from the hotline. But it's okay, sweetie, you can talk to me. I've actually become a bit of an expert myself in this regard."
"Oh, are you sure? I don't mean to disturb you," I said, since she sounded so elderly.
"Dear, I'm 92 years old. I have plenty of free time these days. Nobody visits an old lady like me anymore," she laughed weakly. "What's going on with you, sweetheart?"
"Well..." I choked back tears, "my son died this morning. I've always tried to be a good father, I tried *so hard*, but today I just slipped. It was so quick...I left him with a plate of food and ran off to make a quick phone call from work. It was an emergency; I'm a psychiatrist and a patient was having serious issues. When I came back into the room, he'd....he'd choked on his food and died. I killed my son." He started sobbing desperately, the sound of a broken man.
"Now you listen to me, sweetheart, and listen good. There's only one person who I've failed to save, out of hundreds I've helped, and I'm going to make sure that number does not grow. Don't hold back your tears; we treat men like they can't be weak, but a real man cries. A real man admits his mistakes and feels the pain of what he's done."
"I killed my son. How...how do I ever come back from that?"
"There's nothing to come back from, love. We make mistakes, and sometimes they're worse than others- sometimes they *can't get any worse*. You're no fool, and you're admitting fault. That's the best place to start- believe me, denial will ensure your demise.
"Now, love, let me ask you a question- how much does it hurt? How badly are you grieving right now?"
"It's unlike anything I've ever felt in my life. I couldn't ever possibly feel worse than this."
"Precisely. Because of that, it will only get better than it is now. And your son has passed- but he is not forgotten. You will never forget his laugh, or his first words. Never. You remember all that for the rest of your life, and grow from it. You know a pain unlike any other, and because of that, you are valuable beyond meaning. Your little boy, he forgives you. He knows you loved him, and he knows you care more than anything.
"You'll see him again one day, dear. When you do, be able to look at him and see pride in his eyes. Pride that his father rebounded from the ultimate pain and pushed on through life. Help others, others who've felt pain like you. Be there for them, and save them from a despair you know all to well.
"One day, have another child. You are a father, I can tell. Some men are not, but you are. It will hurt at first, but you will love that little boy and raise a fine young man like yourself."
"What if I fail again? What if I make one little mistake again, and I ruin everything?"
"Then you stay strong. You call me again," she said with a laugh. "Don't ever give up hope. Learn from the pain of life, and use it to better everyone else's. When you need help, ask those you love. I'll give you my number and you can call me. You still have much to do, dear. Much to do."
"Maybe you're right...my wife can't lose a son and a husband. It hurts but I want to help someone, anyone, so they don't feel like I do. Thank you so much for your words."
"Of course, love. You know my number if you ever need help again."
"May I ask you a personal question? Who was the one person you failed to save? Did he just have severe depression, or something that couldn't be overcome?"
"Unfortunately, it was simply my inexperience with helping someone in pain. Nobody specific, love. You take care now."
"Thank you. Have a wonderful day, and God bless your kind soul. You do more than you could ever know."
They hung up, and she looked longingly at a small photo on her desk by the phone.
*See, James? I told you I'd never let another person fall prey to despair. I hope you're proud of me when I see you, son.*
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"Hello?" Her voice was raspy and I strained to hear. "Are you there?" she repeated softly. "I'm here to talk to you." I looked down at myself; the cuts on my arms still fresh with blood, the bottle of pills sitting on the bathroom sink, the bloody scissors laying on the floor...
"I can't do this anymore," I whispered quietly, sliding down the wall I leaned against. "It's all just too much..."
"What is, dear?" she cooed softly, her elderly voice reminding me of my own grandmother's. She had passed away two years back, the last beacon of positivity and encouragement in my miserable life. Now I worked two jobs, at least until I got fired from both last week, the rent was overdue, the debt collectors kept calling...
"Everything. The debt, the sadness, the voices..." They had started years ago when I was still in middle school. Anxiety gnawing as I second-guessed my every step and the gradually overwhelming depression that sunk me as friends and family scampered safely out of reach.
"What do they tell you?" she asked, and I could almost picture grandma again sitting on the couch of my parents' house each day when I burst in from school. Cookies would be waiting on the counter and I'd push past her as she smiled, perhaps living vicariously through my youthful energy. Only once the last cookies were gone would I remember my manners and go to hug her and her touch still lingered on my arms.
"They tell me to just end it..." I mumbled. "That it'll all be better on the other side..."
"There is no other side," she said quietly. "After this, it's all over. The good, the bad, the pain and the happiness." I glanced down at the lines of blood that were slowly drying, the stains on my white underwear turning from red to brown. "What do you want?"
"I want no more sadness and no more pressure and no more landlord harassing me for cash," I answered, thinking to the warning he had given me last week that I would be evicted on the first of the month if I didn't pay the last three months of rent. I fingered the scissors with my free hand, spinning them around on the tiled bathroom floor. They came to a stop, the open blades pointing towards me. "I have to do it, don't I?" I could almost hear her nod on the other end of the phone before she answered.
"It's the only way." I sighed and struggled to my feet, grabbing at the sink. The box of pills was open already and still nearly full thanks to my indecisiveness before calling. "How are you doing it?" she asked and I frowned at the perverseness of the question before answering.
"Pills first," I answered. "And then the scissors on my wrist."
"Blood thinners?" she asked and I nodded even though she couldn't see me. "Don't forget all up your arms. And your neck, too, if you want to make sure." I grunted in response, the sharpened blade cutting a new line across my arm. The blood flowed freely, a small puddle pooling on the tiles.
"Again," she encouraged and I cut again and I took another pill and then I cut a bit deeper.
"That's it," she moaned softly as I felt my breathing grow slower and more labored. "Keep doing that." One more cut, I told myself but the scissors and phone slipped from my grasp and I fell to the side, my head landing harshly against the side of the bathtub before it all went dark.
*****
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at /r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated!
| 2016-02-06T14:35:25
| 2016-02-06T13:24:15
| 325
| 29
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[WP] You've died and despite living a fairly honest life, you've been sent to hell for all the terrible things you've done in video games. You're offered one way out. Prove you wouldn't do any of those things in real life by clearing the nine circles of hell like a dungeon, without being terrible.
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The Devil gave me the ultimatum -- I can only leave Hell of I can defeat the 9 boss levels without resorting to evil.
This was a game. And a game has rules. And rules need to be defined!
"What, then, to we class as evil?", I asked.
"ANYTHING THAT CLASSES AS A MORTAL SIN, ANYTHING THAT CLASSES AS ONE OF THE 7 DEADLY SINS, OR ANYTHING THAT BREAKS THE TEN COMMANDMENTS".
Hmmm. Ok. That doesn't give me many choices.
"This is to be played like a game -- which game should it be played as?"
"IN THAT I WILL GIVE YOU A CHOICE. CHOOSE NOW! BUT CHOOSE ONLY ONE IF YOUR GAMES OF EVIL".
I had to quickly run though some types of games. Pac Man? That would be interesting...
What about Donkey Kong? Or Mario Kart -- no, the 9th level will be Rainbow Road, I know it.
Ah, I've got it.
"I choose Doom. The original one".
"THEN IT SHALL BE YOUR DOOM".
I ran to the wall and stood facing it as the world flashed and became the first level. And I moved, facing the wall, feeling my way to the end, never looking behind me.
The recreation was perfect, even down to that feature when the monsters wouldn't attack until you could see them...
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I walked through the second layer, master sword in hand. Temptation races past me. I can barely control myself.
I wipe my sweaty hands on my green latex suit. "Hiyaa" i yell as i kill another demon of the dark lord.
I am on my last bomb as i approach the level boss and i am desperately low on rupees. A merchant is stationed around the corner and i only need a few more rupees to heal myself for the upcoming battle.
I brush past a pot, something rattles inside. No.. I can't. I mustn't tempt myself.
The merchant looks at me, expectantly. Sweat begins dripping from my forehead as i raise my sword. "Hiyaa!" I yell as my weapon swings down.
With the shatter of the pot i am now brought into a dark room. "Was it worth it" i hear echoing around me. "Huu" i shout back into the abyss.
You mustn't live in regrets, you must always live your life to the fullest. Despite what others may think of you.
| 2021-03-07T15:10:02
| 2021-03-07T14:07:01
| 1,820
| 99
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[WP] “These engravings DO give a tactical advantage, though. They’re magic runes.”
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Sergeant Felder stopped on the turn of a boot stomp, turning his eyes slowly towards the travesty he had just glanced.
It was true. Private Pickle’s weapon had been illegally modified, sporting a different look from the rows of soldiers holding otherwise identical arms. Blue squiggles, each slightly glowing, adorned almost every available space on the weapon. It wasn’t even tastefully executed, but looked like a child’s haphazard sticker book.
“Pickle,” Felder barked, jabbing an experienced finger towards Pickle’s rifle. “What the hell is this?”
“Sergeant,” the soldier shouted. “It’s my gun!”
Thoughts of violence flashed through Felder’s mind, and inevitably coursed down towards an arm itching to reach out for Pickle’s starched collar. But he stayed his hand, only if curiosity dampened the adrenaline.
“I… no. That’s not what I was asking. What the hell have you done to your weapon? Do you know the number of tactical rules you are flouting?”
Pickle looked towards the gun, and an almost confused look slowly transformed to one of dawning realization. He then turned back towards his sergeant with a silly grin.
“These are magical runes, sergeant.”
An incredulous Felder came really close to losing it. He could feel himself toeing the invisible line. But no matter how stupid the answer, this was his own man heading to war.
“Pickle,” Felder said. “That’s just an ugly paint job.”
“No, really, sergeant,” Pickle said. “They give me an incomparable tactical advantage.”
“And how is that? You look like a glowstick on the battlefield.”
“The bullets fly faster and hit harder, sergeant. You can try it, if you want.”
A lively vein popped out from Velder’s forehead, finally freed from its skinful prison.
“Are you suggesting that you’ll shoot me?!”
“Oh no, sergeant. Just shoot it at a target or something. You can even shoot it at me!”
Pickle unbuttoned the top of his uniform, revealing a slight blue glow emanating from within. Felder leaned forward, and saw the countless runes that decorated the private’s torso.
“What the hell, Pickle,” Felder said, shaking his head. “You are—”
Pickle, the grin never disappearing from his face, pointed his gun towards his chest. Amidst countless panicked shouts at the sight of what was happening, including Felder’s, Pickle squeezed. The crack of a rifle deafened all other sound for a brief moment, and the smoke dissipated to reveal a smiling Pickle.
“Jesus,” Felder said. “You’ve been hiding that all this time?”
“Nah,” Pickle said. “I shot somebody real hard last time we went out. But he shot me harder. And you know, enemies become friends, we trade some alcohol and secrets, and here we are.”
Felder’s arm involuntarily reached out. Instead of a swift punch at the end of it, it found Pickle’s shoulder, clapping him heartily.
“Right,” Felder said. “See this forearm here? I need you to draw one of those runes thingy on it.”
And the chaotic, clamouring chorus of an army barracks began to fill Felder’s and Pickle’s ears.
---
r/dexdrafts
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"Seriously?"
Lana raised an eyebrow at her bubbly friend.
"Magic runes? They've been practically useless for years, you know this."
Telora gave a nod, her smile dimming before brightening again.
"Oh I know. Magic is more for utility than fighting now, right? Well, my family are experimenting with it. They are convinced these are the next big thing."
Lana shook her head in disbelief, laying back down on her bedroll. With her head resting on her hard pack, she let a vague curiosity take hold.
"What are they meant to do then?"
Telora's excitement built, and she held up her helmet. The runes she had spent time on were spaced evenly around its rim, painstakingly carved into the composite material.
"So, these are taken from the Physical School of Magic. What they should do is both enhance and protect the four senses on my head; sight, hearing, tasting and smelling. So, if I'm too close to say a flashbang, this should leave me fighting fit."
"Huh, really?"
Telora nodded.
"It should do. Apparently they tested it at night, before setting off a flare, with great success. But that's not all!"
She held up her body armour. In the centre of the chest was a four armed spiral of runes, which covered most of the front.
"Now, these are again Physical based. They form a protective shield, channeled by the shape of the spiral. From what they said in the letter, it will stop the majority of small arms dead, and greatly reduce the impact of larger."
Lana cocked her head. She thought back to the papers she had read, and the limitations mentioned on Magic in modern combat.
"Wasn't it agreed that the protection provided by such things was impractical, due to the makeup of our armour? Something about it rejecting the magic?"
Telora held up the pages she had received in the form of her letter.
"Thats what they said. However, from what they are saying the issue was the old runes were designed for purely metallic or leather armour. As we use a mix of kevlar and ceramic, the enchantment had nothing to hold onto, making it unable to properly function. This set has a newly discovered rune that is designed to work with our materials."
Lana pursed her lips. It sounded good, almost too good.
"Hrmm. I would assume there is a catch to do with this."
Now was Telora's turn to sigh. She held up her helmet, showing it to Lana.
"There is a downside. This isn't a process that can be automated. Only someone with at least a D level of mana can properly carve these. So whilst it is available, the supply is restricted."
"Ah."
Telora brightened again though.
"But this is a major discovery! I'm field testing it now, just to make sure it doesn't hamper me whilst in use. Who knows, maybe this will become standard in a few years time."
| 2022-08-14T14:26:19
| 2022-08-14T13:03:10
| 58
| 33
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[WP] In the future, illiteracy is the norm and implanted digital assistants convert text to audio. A child, who had his implant temporarily deactivated, learns to read. When the implant is reactivated, he realizes that what it reads to him is drastically different than what the text actually says.
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As every civilization advances old technologies that are unused in the average persons everyday life become forgotten. In the early 2060s traditional eye reading was becoming an example. Shortly before this that was far from the case. As a matter of fact a survey taken in 2048 actually showed literacy rates at an all time high. So, what caused this drastic decrease? Text to brain conversion technology.
Usually called by the acronym "TBCT" (Acronyms were a way of shortening long phrases by putting the first letter of each word together and reading it like it's a word by itself.).TBCT allowed brain implants to read for you. It would detect the word and you would know what it says in a one hundredth of the time it would take to read the word. Once TBCT was included in the standard utility brain implants nobody had a need to read. Eventually even people who grew up reading were starting to forget.
However there are some people who have an adverse reaction to brain implants. Simon Smith happened to have such a condition. When he was three he had his implant removed after a series of seizures thought to have been caused by his implant. Simon was given text to speech software on a tablet like device to help him compensate.
He had to do school work by himself because he couldn't possibly keep up with students equipped with TBCT and the other technologies the implants offered. So he would spend hours scanning the text other people were getting in their brains with his tablet and have it read it to him. He still would participate with the rest of the class in the oral tests the teachers would give.
At eight years old he started to get curious about the word his tablet was scanning. He would stop and have the tablet read words again and again. He started paying attention to the symbols that made up the word. To everyone else all words and letters looked the same there was no reason to allocate any attention to how they looked because it didn't matter, the TBCT would read it anyway, but Simon was fascinated.
One day Simon had an idea he would draw the letters. He had asked the digital assistant on his tablet (he had a special non TBCT one) how letters made words. It explained about how each letters represented phonetic sound. By drawing the letters he could play with combinations and test if his theory's about how letters made words were right. It wasn't long before he had cracked the code (for the most part at least. Some letters in some words acted really weird.)
By his tenth birthday he was no longer using text to speech at all. He would read when he would study.
Then one day in government class oral test the teacher picked Simon.
"Simon."
Simon nodded.
"What is the first amendment?"
Simon remembered this one.
"That the government can't limit freedom of speech." Simon answered confidently.
"No..." The teacher said sounding taken aback. "We'll give you another try, Simon."
"That the government can't prohibit speech! That's what it is!" Simon knew he went over this at least three times when he studied last night. There was no way he was wrong. "I don't know where you got that one from, Simon. Anyone else wanna give it a go? How about... Mikayla?"
"The first amendment is that the government can't prohibit thought."
"Correct. Very good, Mikayla."
Simon raised his hand, but didn't really wait for the teacher to call on him. "How could the government stop people from thinking things anyway?"
"You're right when this was written they didn't have technology to control people's thoughts. But that wasn't the point. The point was that the government can't make laws about how people should think even if the government can't enforce it." What he thought he had read last night seemed to make more sense than what his teacher was saying now. The teacher can't be making it up though because Mikayla said it. Maybe the teacher got it from Mikayla and just went with it. "There is an important distinction between freedom of speech and freedom of thought" the teacher continued. "Freedom of thought which the First Amendment gives us is only what's in our head. Freedom of speech on the other hand can affect other people and that's way the government can and does limit speech that can be harmful or menacing to society."
------------------------------------______________
Sorry if it's sloppy it's really late at night and I should be sleeping. I think I dragged out the beginning a little too long. I hope it's still readable. Hope you like it!
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An alarm interrupted my game. "Hello?" "Hey man, its Marcus, I see you're online and our group project is due in Mr.Henry's class." I tried not to think about it, I'm so behind in that class and we got randomly paired. I don't know this kid, so I hung up, I'll explain it to him at school. The assignment is on the word happy, which everyone knows, it means to be obedient to the Law. I wasn't that intrested in my zoo walk anyways, it was lagging out again and I missed the giraffes. You know the black and white things Grandpa told us roamed the deserts of Afreeka 400ish centurions ago.
Dinner smelled lovely. We had our usual Taco Bell Thirday. "Can you pass me the hot sauce, dad?" I asked I try my best to focus during dinner but my implant keeps messing up. "Mom, my Iris keeps messing up, the color drops out to where it's not how I picked, and I keep getting pop-ups. Are you sure we can't afford the new Samsung Pupil? It has 650 megapixels and 12 more photoreceptors than the Iris." The expression on my mother's face could only be described as excited and nauseous. She immediately ran out back to our lawnsweepers charging station. She still had the same expression on her face.
Early the next day, a small package comes in the mail. It looks like if you took a whiteboard from the teachers room and made it thin and wobbly and stacked and stacked and stacked. Then wrap almost all of it in this hard, brown cloth and wrapped it in the same brown cloth, only torn thin to make yarn. Inside the book were a bunch of "letters" as my grandfather explained. As a 26 year old, it seemed mighty daunting to translate an extinct language, especially in level 3 personal finance class. My grandfather went on to explain how it was used by early humans before the great Epidemic of 2020.
"Grandpa, this thing has to be 400 centurions old!" I gagged. He seemed empathetic as if he's gone threw this before. He went mute a while back after his accident. He was hospitalized after a fall and couldn't speak since. He sent me a message on Chatter. "Its called a ----" I stared confused at him. The AI did something I was unfamiliar with. "What was that last word Grandpa?" His mouth gaped and he shook. Then returned, smiling and red-faced. "The program doesn't have the write word" He rose to his feet, trembling but surprisingly steady for 145. "Follow me, to the study room." His voice crackled back. While in the dark, quiet room he held my hands and began forming his own hands sorta like how he would when I was a child.
The game was simple. He formed his hand and I repeated a sound for the hand position. Every sound I got write, I got a like for the day. He started moving his hands. Th-uh- -th-ing- -iz- -aye- -buh-ook-. He then taught me the letters B, I, L, E. He said these where the vowels. He said the rest of the squiggles inside the book were called constants. He said that I need to stay home from school and whenever my Iris messed up i needed to 'read' the book. He said it contains the real law.
"Get a life, loser." The lady said as she stood up to get on the tube. Its dark, so I have to hide now. I'll probably get into the rain drain again, gotta make sure I get extra burn ointment from the food pantry tomorrow. I'll see if anyone uses this part of the tube when its bright again. Someone needs to know of David and the miracles he performs in the bible.
| 2019-04-15T21:14:58
| 2019-04-15T21:10:11
| 77
| 16
|
[WP] Not everyone bitten by a werewolf gets to turn into a badass monstrosity. Some get stuck with other canine breeds. Describe the life of a werepug/werecorgi/werechihuahua, etc
|
So the were- isn't so much a species as it is a spiritual thing. Some sort of magic gone wrong. Specific to canines, just happens in a hilarious twist of fate canines have become our most varied creatures. Figure it worked well back in the day when almost all dogs were big wolffish hunting companions, but now...
Bruce's family had been Were hunters for centuries. Family legacy to protect the villages from the packs and stragglers that hunted them monthly. Family legacy when villages became cities, when cities become metropolises. When Weres went from fearsome beasts tearing out men's throats to... well Judy.
Judy the kind chatty barista from the coffee shop two doors down from his apartment. Judy who had mentioned getting bit by a strange dog last month right around where Bruce had fought a nasty trio of Were-Labradoodles. Judy who called in sick the first day of the full moon tipping Bruce off to track her down.
Judy the terrified looking Yorkie huddled in the alley.
Bruce lowered his gun and sighed. He sat down, patted the concrete beside him. The tiny dog slowly inched towards him, sniffing at his outstretched hand, letting out a babble of yips as she tried to speak. He patted her head softly.
"I guess I gotta explain some things."
|
"and you say you've been losing blocks of time?" Asked the psychologist to Bernie.
"yeah it started a couple months ago, actually happens once a month or so, ish, not quite consistently. Going about doing my thing and then like a video skipping I am naked at the foot of my bed and my clothes are in the last place I remember and sometime my stuff have been moved about." Replied Bernie looking perturbed which is understandable.
"hm, you were right to seek help about this. You never wake up with any injuries and everything is ok otherwise except for the lost time. We're going to need more information before I can refer you to a specialist for treatment, is it at all possible that you have a friend or someone who can check on you? I'd suggest booking a sleep lab but that can get quite expensive and if its as hard to predict as you're suggesting then we may miss it anyway."
Bernie thought about the suggestion "I could ask my girlfriend about, I think she would be able to help out"
The psychologist began writing some questions down on a pad of paper and then tore it off handing the sheet to Bernie as well as a business card "get her to refer to this in order to assess you and if she has questions to contact me on this number at any time, now it's five to the hour I suggest we wrap this up this session and be on our way."
Bernie hadn't responded to message, the phone call or even the booty call, Georgia knew something must be up. She called to confirm her suspicions with the psychologist who agreed and said to be ready to meet someone new potentially as Bernie might be in a fugue state and not himself. Georgia also recalled the naked part which was fine with her, Bernie had the most adorable squishy face and perfect little butt.
She opened the door and was surprised to encounter a small but very excited sausage dog. "ooooh who are you?" She said in the voice people use when talking to small dogs "look at that squishy squishy face, nawww and your little waggy tail, cutey patootie!" She scratched and petted the little Roly poly animal who was very appreciative of the attention, clearly he had been left alone. Georgia walked through apartment looking for where Bernie could be, she threw some of his clothes that were on the floor into the washing machine, carefully extracting the contents of the jeans, a phone and a packet of gum. "glad i checked mister sausage, Bernie would be pissed if I killed his phone and ruined his jeans. The dog jumped and yapped excitedly at the sound of Bernie's name "oh do you know daddy's name? That's so cute! Oh Bernie is so fucking adorable, I wish he told me he had you so I could have been here sooner and gotten you something" her face fell flat as the coin dropped. His clothes were on the floor, phone in pocket, he was no where to be seen and the door wasn't locked when she turned up. Somewhere in the city was Bernie, naked and not with it she thought. Panic gripped her heart and she called.triple zero and told the police. She gave them a description of him, mister sausage walked around her feet whining and nudging her ankle with his head distressed at her distress. Finally she hung up and went into the kitchen and filled up a bowl with water putting it on the ground for the dog "hey mister sausage I have to go find Bernie" the dog yapped " yes berinie so you stay here and be ssafe.
| 2015-05-29T19:53:42
| 2015-05-29T17:18:41
| 232
| 43
|
[WP] Litigation has gotten so prevalent that everyday conversations are made in legal-speak. Make the mundane impossibly mired in legal-eze. I take no responsibility for your response to this prompt.
|
**"Social convention dictates that on the occasion of birth-anniversaries, it is a non-optional custom to give gifts. In light of this convention, I have purchased you an appropriately priced bauble. Please sign this limited liability agreement in advance of your receipt of the largesse in question."**
"While your consideration is appreciated, counsel has advised me not to sign or even read any legal documents without first submitting them for her review. With that in mind, I must decline your no doubt generous and thoughtful bibelot."
**"Would it be possible for you to provide me with the contact information of your legal counsel, so that I might present this document to her for approval myself?"**
"I cannot at this time comment on the whereabouts of my alleged legal counsel. Your persistence in this matter might be construed as harassment by a litigiously minded person. I would advise you to tread more carefully in future."
**"One might apologize at a moment like this, but I have been warned by legal experts, that apology and/or shows of contrition can be interpreted as acknowledgements of culpability. One however might also note that the tone of your, assuredly well intentioned, advice, might be read as extortionate or threatening by, as you say, litigiously minded individuals."**
"I will consult counsel before making any more statements at this time."
**"Happy Birthday Mom."**
|
Kevin didn't ponder anything while he watched the water fall from the cooler into his cup. The door opened and in walked Bob, wearing a coat and a visible headache.
"Good afternoon, Kevin."
"Afternoon, Bob. How's the weather outside?"
"Well, between you, Kevin Cosgrove, and myself, Bob Wheeler, and with no pretense of practical or professional advisory, and with absolutely no guarantee of accuracy, I think it's gonna rain. For the record, this information is based off of personal conjecture - I can feel it in my bones - and has not been verified by the national weather service; ergo, such information should not be considered objective or reliable."
"Well, dang, Bob. I had tentative plans to visit the park with my spouse and children this evening. I'm not going to alter said plans without an official forecast, but I hope your prediction turns out to be inaccurate."
| 2015-01-23T23:47:58
| 2015-01-23T23:41:00
| 102
| 15
|
[WP]A necromancer is on his deathbed. With his last bit of strength and perfect timing he takes control of his own body as he dies. Now he's controlling himself from the outside like a puppet and must try to keep his body going.
|
First time in writing prompts, constructive criticism welcome.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Sam woke up feeling incredibly weak, with a burning sensation in his forehead.
Sam was a occult librarian. His parents were rich and he had plenty of time, so it was basically his only hobby.
There were hundreds of books in his library, on dozens of different branches of magic. Warnings about the consequences of misuse took up the first half of most copies. Some of the warnings were specific to the branch of magic that the book was about, but most of them were standard duplications. After all, these books were incredibly valuable, and at the time of writing, it would have been unheard of to have two, let alone the hoard Sam had amassed.
Sam's newest book was on Necromancy, his favorite branch of magic. At this point he had dabbled enough in various topics that he could light a cigarette with his finger, hold his breath for an hour, and weed his garden slightly faster than normal. They weren't all winners. But necromancy was life itself. He couldn't wait.
His book contained the standard warnings - "Don't cast in view of your own reflection", "never pray", "your shadow is your enemy", yada yada yada. But it also had two additional warnings. The first taught him a simple spell to sense the coming of his own death. The second was instructions on creating a phylactery, and a warning to do it as soon as possible. It also said never to use necromancy on his own body without a phylactery, but the consequences were unspecified.
Unfortunately, making a phylactery was incredibly complex. Sam decided to check that spell again after he finished the book or turned thirty, whichever came first. The rest of the book was similarly complicated and Sam's ambition to control life came to little. He made himself a pet zombie dog and moved on to the next big thing - magical origami. After conjuring 1000 paper cranes, he could have whatever he wanted.
A year later, he was eight hundred cranes in and going strong. His parents were driving him to his 22nd birthday party. They were doing a small thing, a family get together. Sam didn't have many friends.
While driving on the highway, Sam figured he'd get one more crane in before dinner. He glanced in the rear view mirror just as it appeared, and could have sworn he saw someone sitting in the backseat next to him. But only for a second, because after that the car hit them.
T-bone, fatal for two passengers out of three. Sam, bleeding heavily, thought back desperately to his half-finished Necromancy studies and reanimated his parents.
"Save me."
Sam woke up feeling incredibly weak, with a burning sensation in his forehead. The first of the two emergency necromancy spells had triggered. He was minutes from death. He looked up from his hospital bed, and two skeletons grinned mouthlessly at him. One of them clacked her hands together in excitement.
Sam realized he was in his own room, with medical equipment everywhere. He looked down to see wrinkled hands, liver spots. The good news - His parents must have been incredibly industrious, to set this all up and manage it themselves, without being found out as zombies. Either he was a naturally talented necromancer and his zombies came back intelligent, or more likely, zombification after recent enough death allowed creations to keep their memories. The bad news - the burning was growing stronger.
He specifically remembered that the phylactery had to gestate in the entirety of the new moon, three days. There was no chance of making it in the minutes he had remaining. But then again. His parents came back okay. What was the worst that could happen, if he managed to save himself?
As the heat in his head peaked and he breathed his last, he flexed his magic and caught his own body. It dangled below him on puppet strings, and his sensation decreased dramatically, but it was his. He ordered his body up from the bed and did a little dance, no longer feeling so weak. His parents hugged him.
He felt a hand on his shoulder. Not his body's shoulder. The shoulder of his incorporeal self, floating above.
"I'll take that," grinned his fellow necromancer, laughing through rotten black teeth. He tore Sam's body away from him with easy contempt.
Behind him stood hundreds more. Sam walked to the back of the long line, thinking to himself. Just 200 cranes to go...
|
This is my first ever writing prompt, so please give constructive criticism.
It was a simple idea. I was dying. It had to work. Many necromancers had transcended morality like this. They separated their mind from their body, and had themselves killed. Magic comes from the mind after all. A simple spell turned them into powerful liches. I took my final breath, and pushed my mind away. I saw my heartbeat stop. My brain stop functioning. I felt shards of myself fall away. Then I remembered what I had to do. I imagined clicking my fingers to channel the energy within myself into a body. The energy flowed outwards into my body. I felt the familiar rush of energy as I took control of myself.
Everything felt strange. I felt the heart start to house my energy and beat again, but I simply couldn't control it. I tried to raise a hand. Nothing. Leg? Nope. I forced a grimace. It failed. Then it clicked. I had done the ritual wrong. I had nothing to store my life essence in, nothing to act as a conduit, I had forgotten everything needed. I had to live with this.
| 2017-09-22T17:33:48
| 2017-09-22T15:14:49
| 339
| 52
|
[WP] world war 3 is caused by the misplacement of a pencil sharpener.
|
Some blamed the economy for World War 3, although most didn't understand what the economy was.
Some blamed the development of nuclear weapons in countries that countries that already owned nuclear weapons had decided didn't need nuclear weapons.
Some blamed over population, the drought of 2103, the price of oil, immigration, religion, whatever the media were telling them to blame. It was easier to blame something than try and prevent the situation.
Nobody blamed the misplaced sharpener, though it was as much to blame as anything else.
If the sharpener hadn't been misplaced, then Jack wouldn't have been late leaving school after spending twenty minutes fruitlessly trying to find it.
If Jack hadn't been late leaving school, then his mother wouldn't have left her parking space at 3.24pm, she wouldn't have been driving down the dual carriageway towards home at 3.32pm and she wouldn't have crashed into a red Renault Megane carrying a wife and husband at 74mph in a rush to get home before 4pm when a package was being delivered containing a book she had been waiting to read for months.
If she hadn't have crashed into a red Renault Megane, then Rachel would have been able to tell Oliver she was pregnant, after months of trying, instead of telling him it was going to be okay as the firemen tried cutting them both out before dying of blood loss beside him.
If Rachel and Oliver hadn't died of blood loss, then they would have brought up a beautiful boy, Charlie, who would shine at school and continue shining all through university and would stay shining as he became a lecturer.
If Charlie had had the chance to exist and become a lecturer, he would have taught a young man right at the very end of his career, called James, to see the world in a different way who would then go on to write books that would inspire whole generations of students after him.
If James had written any of his books about politics, money, life and just how to think, then a young woman called Grace would have read them, felt differently about everything and want to change society around her.
If Grace had read the books, she would have taken a real interest in the politics course she was taking, she would have got more involved with communities around her and eventually, after many years of hard work, campaigning and taking every opportunity presented to her, she would have run for President of the USA in 2100 and she would have won.
If Grace had become President of the USA in 2100, negotiations would never have taken a turn for the worst, explosions would not shake the homes of many, children would not be dying in their parents' arms, brothers would not be fighting brothers across borders that only existed on pieces of paper for causes they did not entirely believe in and all for a misplaced sharpener.
Ah but what if?
|
The starving countries had held onto their nuclear arms desperately. It was a complex, pivotal, and gossiped treaty. The pencil tip broke on the signature. General Tom looked atop his desk for the sharpener. It was not there. He looked on his bookshelf, on the ground, and around his little office. It was not there. Then General Tom asked his secretary. She had not seen it. General Tom was confused because he usually kept his pencil sharpener nearby.
The secretary asked, "Why are you signing the treaty with a pencil?"
General Tom chuckled and sighed and said "I don't know" and continued to look for his pencil sharpener. The ambassadors of the fat countries were bewildered and offered him pens. He did not accept them.
Eventually he said "I don't know where it is. I must have misplaced it."
| 2013-11-26T13:56:24
| 2013-11-26T12:22:11
| 47
| 16
|
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