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Elcaida
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Dataset card Data Studio Files
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[ { "role": "user", "content": "I'm Brandon Schwab, A \"Real Estate Agent\" Specializing in the Sale of \"Interesting\" Properties" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Interesting properties are a specialization in real estate not many agents are interested in exploring. When no other agent can get the job done, Brandon Schwab is the man to call. I haven’t found any property that I couldn’t sell yet. I’m excellent at my job, and I command a hefty fee for my services.\r\nOne time, a certain, well-known, internet e-commerce company came knocking at my door. I can’t tell you the name. Don’t bother asking. Connect the dots yourself. They wanted me to come out to one of their massive warehouses and determine if anything interesting was happening.\r\nPreliminary research showed the warehouse was built over the land where a deconsecrated church once stood.\r\nHuge red flag!\r\nThere had been “incidents” caught on video. Racks of merchandise collapsing on their own. Unmanned forklifts driving off the loading docks. Items dropping from shelves onto employees. For this company, replacing racks, machinery, and paying for injuries is nominal, but no company wants to lose money.\r\nEmployees complained about cabinet doors opening and slamming shut in the cafeteria. The stench of sewage and rotting eggs at random places. Bloodcurdling screams in the middle of the night shift. These moments of distraction interfere with productivity. More money lost for no reason.\r\nLastly, and most importantly, the administration offices are becoming dangerous. Employees have filed reports about hallways becoming endless mazes. Several employees were discovered inside of the janitor closet after claiming to have gotten lost for days inside the building.\r\nHaving knowledge and experience of interesting properties, I determined the building was infested with poltergeists. Their strength typically does not allow for such feats, however, their strength was magnified by the negative physical, emotional, and spiritually breaking energy brought on by the strict key performance indicators (KPIs) each employee in the facility was evaluated under.\r\nThat being said, my client would under no circumstance alter their KPI’s. Their business model would not allow for such changes. With thousands of jobs on the line and a hefty check being waved in my face, I did the only possible thing to ensure the poltergeist activity would cease.\r\nWith permission from the executive board, I performed a ritual near where the deconsecrated church once stood. This ritual opened a gate to a demonic realm and allowed passage for entities of evil to enter our world. However, they would not venture too far from the warehouse.\r\nDemons and poltergeists both need human energy to become stronger. Putting them in competition for the employees in the warehouse in essence neutralizes their strength as they’ll be too busy fighting each other to consume human energy. In essence, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.\r\nIn follow-up interviews, I’ve been told the warehouse hasn’t had any other issues lately, and things have calmed down. Employees report feeling a sense of unease throughout the facility still. However, once on the job, these feelings are quickly negated as the KPI’s become the source of their stress and worries." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I either going to break up with my girlfriend or marry her. I'm going to decide at the end of the Fair." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "After eating our fill of Deep-Fried Ranch, Lacey and I wandered the Minnesota State Fair looking for our next attraction.\r\n“I’m having a great time,” Lacey said, wrapped around my arm.\r\n“Me too,” I lied.\r\nIn truth, I was thinking of breaking up with Lacey, but my reason was selfish. Lacey and I had been dating for our final two years of college now, and things had always been fine.\r\nNot great, but fine.\r\nWe enjoyed each other’s company and went on dates often, but the sex was middling and the passion was lacking. Soon we’d graduate, starting the next stage in our lives, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to commit to average.\r\n“If you want to truly know yourself, take a long look in the Mirror… Maze!” A Carnival Barker nearby was trying, unsuccessfully, to lure families to the Mirror Maze. He had a gap tooth and a top hat that was so big it came down and covered his eyes.\r\n“Can we go?” Lacey squeezed my arm tight.\r\n“You betcha.” Anything to stall having to make my decision.\r\nThe Mirror Maze was more impressive on the inside, and after a few minutes we were totally lost.\r\n“Look at this one,” Lacey said, standing in front of a misshapen mirror.\r\nI laughed. We both looked horribly obese.\r\n“Would you still love me if I looked like this?” Lacey asked.\r\n“Of course,” I lied.\r\nThere were all manner of funky mirrors. One made us tall and skinny, another short and stubby, but then we came across a strange one.\r\n“I don’t like this one,” Lacey bemoaned.\r\nThe mirror made it look like we were dead.\r\n“How’s it doing that?” I asked, but Lacey didn’t know. The skin on our bones was loose and rotting, our eyes milky white, and a strange yellow fluid was leaking from our every orifice. I could almost smell—\r\n“Let’s keep going,” Lacey said, dashing away to another mirror.\r\nI tried to follow her, but walked face first into a clear panel of glass.\r\n“Ope!” I said, rubbing my nose.\r\nThat’s odd.\r\n“Looks like we got separated,” I said to Lacey, “why don’t we meet at the exit?”\r\nLacey nodded, and we headed for the exit, something that took me much longer than I anticipated. By the time I made it out Lacey had been waiting for god knows how long. She ran over and gave me a hug.\r\n“I was worried,” she said.\r\nI held her tight, and realized how happy I was to be with her. Maybe I was overthinking all this relationship stuff.\r\n“How about a souvenir?” The Carnival Barker held up a photo of us in front of the obese mirror. “Only five bucks! I take cash or card!”\r\n“Can we?” Lacey asked.\r\n“You betcha,” I said.\r\n“And if you could sign the receipt?” The Carnival Barker smiled his gap-toothed grin.\r\n“Alright, let’s skedaddle,” I said, smiling at Lacey.\r\n“That’s weird,” she said.\r\n“What?”\r\n“Why’d you sign it left-handed?”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I found a strange lantern at the edge of the woods." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was an ugly little thing, rusted and bent, the glass cloudy with grime. It looked like it had been there for years, forgotten under the roots of a fallen tree. But when I picked it up, the wick flickered to life.\r\nAnd let me tell you, this lantern is the best thing I’ve ever found.\r\nIt shows them all every face, every soul I’ve ever taken. The girl from the gas station? She’s still in there, her eyes wide, her body frozen in the last scream she never got to finish. The man from the hiking trail? He’s curled up in the corner, like he’s still hiding, like I won’t find him again.\r\nThey’re all mine.\r\nThere are so many now, pressed up against the glass, swirling like smoke. Occasionally they try to talk their way out, but they never say much. The lantern keeps them where they belong.\r\nAnd the best part? They can see me. Every time I pick it up, I can feel them watching, knowing they’re stuck in there forever. Sometimes I laugh just to see how they react. Sometimes I whisper to them, remind them who put them there.\r\nME!\r\nAnd you know what? There’s still room. The lantern’s not full yet.\r\nNot even close." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "On Sundays, I can only consume food of one colour." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Yes, you read that right.\r\nWhen I was 10 years old, my mother drilled it into me that on Sundays, we can only consume food that is one colour. Otherwise something unspeakably awful would happen.\r\nIt could not be one single colour and then possess a slight tinge of something else. If the food looked even remotely different in hue, if it was even distinctly off, we couldn't eat it.\r\nMy mother was adamant that we follow this rule.\r\nYour nanny Perta made me and now I must make you. She’d say. She never told me why.\r\nNaturally I did what my mother said and never once consumed food of any other colour than the one I was supposed to. Not once, not ever. You just sort of do that, don't you. You abide by those rules because you’re terrified of what would happen if you didn't. And I was, I was petrified.\r\nUntil today.\r\nYou know as you grow older, you begin to forget superstitions that your parents tell you as a child. They begin to fade like an old forgotten photograph and before you know it, you could barely even remember what it was you were supposed to be scared of anyway.\r\nAs I sat at my table, gazing at the food on my plate, I felt a small twinge of guilt, a polite stab in my heart, like I shouldn't be doing this.\r\nAnd I really, really should not have been.\r\nI looked around me and saw foods of the colour that I should be consuming and I thought to myself - why did it always have to be brown?\r\nI looked back down to my plate and marvelled at the soft pink, and the sleek, glistening red and I thought -just why shouldn't I eat it?\r\nI gorged, I shoveled it all into my mouth like a starved stray and just as I took that last delicious bite, I heard it.\r\nThe first scream.\r\nThen before I knew it, the whole world was screaming.\r\nAs I watch the lights outside begin to fade, echoes of those desperate screams still ringing in my ears. In the midst of all this chaos, one burning question lingers in my mind.\r\nWhy didn't I just listen to my mother?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Mental Gymnastics of the Serial Killer's Mother" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Yes, officer. I’m Ricky’s mother. Is my boy alright?\r\nOh no! What the hell did Ricky do now?\r\nArrested? On what charges?\r\nWho did he kill now?\r\nThat’s not possible! My little Ricky was always the sweetest boy in the world! How could anyone accuse him of such heinous crimes!\r\nWhat did I do to deserve such a monster for a child?\r\nThere’s absolutely no way he did that!\r\nOf course, he did that.\r\nOh, that’s nonsense! Ricky doesn’t like going into the woods. He always complained about too many mosquitos.\r\nAt least, I didn’t find any bodies in the basement…again. Maybe I better check.\r\nListen, I know my son. I raised him. Alone. After that good for nothing husband of mine said he was going out to get cigarettes and never came back. He ran off with that whore waitress from the Appleton diner. Agatha? Angela? Something or another!\r\nAbigail was her name. Ricky took his sweet time with that harlot. Made his daddy watch as he made that trollop suffer. Good riddance to bad rubbish!\r\nYes! That’s right. He wasn’t a good man. You’re trying to tell me Ricky also killed his daddy? That’s ridiculous!\r\nAnd it’s completely true. He took longer with him than Abigail. That son of a bitch never hurt me again. Ricky made certain of that. My poor boy was protecting his mama.\r\nNo. I will not accept this! You’re lying!\r\nPlease God don’t do this to me! Don’t take my little Ricky away!\r\nI’ll have you know, sir. I worked three jobs to put food on the table, clothes on our backs, and Ricky never wanted for anything.\r\nI wasn’t around to raise him right. That’s why he turned out the way he did. Was it the devil music on MTV that made him do it? Or those violent video games? Or the television he watched? I don’t know. Maybe he was just born bad?\r\nEveryone always blames the mother! That’s what they’ll do.\r\nMaybe I should have put him down when I had the chance. It would have saved a lot time and heartache for everyone\r\nRicky is an angel. He wouldn’t hurt a fly!\r\nRicky is a demon from Hell. I haven’t seen anything or anyone he wouldn’t hurt\r\nI had no knowledge of his crimes. Like I’ve been saying, Ricky has committed no crimes.\r\nI know where all the bodies are buried\r\nWell, I’ll get Ricky the best lawyer money can buy.\r\nThe public defender will suffice.\r\nIt was always the two of us against the world. There’s nothing stopping us when we’re together. You’ll see!\r\nMaybe I can cut a deal with the prosecutor.\r\nOf course I had nothing to do with the murders.\r\nIt was Ricky. Turning him loose on the world was a bad idea. I couldn’t help him anymore. He needed to satisfy those dark…urges. Or he’d have done something worse.\r\nWell, we’ll see about that. I ain’t going nowhere, officer.\r\nI got nowhere to go" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Stone Of Saint-Bastille" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The Stone of Saint-Bastille\r\nIt was a remote village in the Jura mountains of France, a place forgotten by time. Saint-Bastille was the name given to this speck of a settlement, barely a smudge on the maps. Its winding streets were hemmed by jagged peaks and cloaked in mist, leaving visitors disoriented, if not entirely lost. The villagers whispered of something ancient, something wicked that lived beneath the fog.\r\nIt was The Stone they spoke of.\r\nA roughly-hewn monolith standing in a forgotten corner of the village, shrouded in vines and moss, its surface etched with unreadable glyphs. None could remember when it had first appeared, and none dared to disturb it.\r\nArnaud Morel, skeptic by nature, paid no heed to the tales. He was a schoolteacher from Lyon, seeking solace in the quiet life Saint-Bastille offered. He set out to explore the old village, armed with his sketchbook and a thirst for discovery. His wandered to the far edge of the village, where,\r\nhalf-buried in the earth, he found it.\r\nThe Stone.\r\nArnaud knelt beside it. His fingers traced the worn symbols, the cold, rough surface. He scoffed at the village lore, muttering about primitive superstitions. Then, he pressed his palm flat against the stone.\r\nThe air around him grew denser, suffocating. A whispering wind swirled through the trees, though no leaves stirred. Arnaud felt an odd warmth radiating from the stone, seeping into his body, spreading through his veins. His vision blurred, the world tilting as if pulled into a vortex.\r\nWhen he came to, the sun was low, and the village was silent. Arnaud stumbled back into Saint-Bastille, but something was amiss. The once-familiar streets felt foreign, the houses cast in shadow. He found no one. No villagers, no animals. Only silence.\r\nA hollow dread gnawed at him as he wandered through the empty village. Shadows seemed to stretch and follow.\r\nIn the village square, the church loomed, its bell tower obscured by fog. Desperate for answers, Arnaud pushed through the heavy wooden doors.\r\nInside, the air smelled of decay. Candles burned low on the altar, though no one had lit them in years. At the center of the church, the villagers stood in a circle, pale faces and blank, eyes void of recognition.\r\nPanic surged through him. He backed away, tripping over the ancient pews. His gaze fell to the floor, where a trail of dark, wet footprints led from the altar to The Stone, now standing ominously in the nave. The footprints were his.\r\nA low growl resonated through the church, a sound that chilled Arnaud to the bone. The villagers turned in unison, their mouths opening in grotesque smiles, revealing rows of jagged teeth. They spoke as one, \"The stone has marked you.\"\r\nArnaud’s scream echoed through the empty village, swallowed by the encroaching night. The fog thickened, hiding Saint-Bastille from the world. By morning, the village would vanish again, and with it, Arnaud Morel,\r\nanother soul claimed by The Stone of Saint-Bastille." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I have been seeing dreams of a boy." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "He's what you'd consider a modern replica of a Renaissance cherub. Spring-like golden-brown hair, squishy red cheeks, a smile that would melt your heart. Even though he is a fragment of my dream, I just want to snuggle up with him and hold him in my arms.\r\nI dream of him often. Sometimes I see him on the beach, running around, playing in the water, giggling as he caught the beach ball thrown at him. Sometimes I see him sprawled out in front of the TV, watching cartoons and making funny faces. Other times, I see him crawled up in a ball and sleeping in his crib, thumb in mouth. No matter what I see, it always feels like I'm around him, watching him. Sometimes I want to reach out and touch his rosy cheeks. Then I wake up from the dream.\r\nI have been wondering if this is a sign from the universe. Should I have a baby? I have been thinking about it. But I don't have a partner. And I don't see myself having one. Of course, there are scientifically advanced methods of conceiving. But I don't want to take an impulsive decision. Not based on a dream, at least.\r\nI often find myself thinking about the boy. There's something about him that pulled me. I feel a distinct motherly feeling towards him. Is it possible for something like this to happen? To feel emotions for someone you see in a dream?\r\nThis morning, Arthur visited me. He has been the only person who has been kind to me so far, ever since I moved here. He asked me how I have been, and after an initial hesitation, I opened up to him about my dream baby and how I have been feeling about it. The expression on his face was solemn. But it somehow made me anxious.\r\nHe said that this wasn't the first time I confided in him something like this. Every once in a while, when my subconscious mind would awaken, it would bring back memories of my boy, often in my dreams. My angelic boy. My baby that I strangled inside a tub full of water three years ago, before being admitted to this asylum on grounds of insanity, confirmed by Dr Arthur." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The kill squad entered the rat-infested village under cover of darkness. Their orders were simple: burn everything that can’t be shot." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The sodden rainforest was aflame.\r\nIt was too wet for anything to catch without a flamethrower, so the humid, smoke-filled air smelt acrid with fuel.\r\nRifle raised, Jack shot at a man dashing into a burning hut. Rats as big as cats screeched from the steaming undergrowth as he approached.\r\nInside, Jack found the man cradling a dead girl, the floor beneath both blackened with blood. He was fervently intoning something repetitive, like a prayer.\r\nThere were rats everywhere.\r\nThe dying man grabbed one, breaking it in two with a dull crack. Sweating through a mask of pure agony, he smeared the rat’s blood on his face and hands and flicked some at Jack too, who flinched.\r\nThen he raised the rat’s broken body high as if to throw it.\r\n“Grenade!” Jack’s squadmate screamed, firing reactively as he burst into the hut.\r\nThen the man was still.\r\nJack kicked the broken rat from the dead man’s grip.\r\nHe could taste its blood in his mouth.\r\n***\r\nA sleepless year later, Jack was still struggling to adjust to civilian life.\r\nThere were reminders of his tour everywhere. They lived in a suburb with lots of cats, for example, so it wasn’t unusual to find a dead rat outside your door, or at the end of your path; but now…now it was a trigger.\r\nThe rat he’d seen last week though was huge - just like the ones he’d seen overseas.\r\n“Go see the councillor,” his wife Janie had begged, but the idea made him feel weaker.\r\nBut it wasn’t all bad. Janie was pregnant. There was…hope.\r\nAnd at night, when the insomnia got too bad, he drove.\r\nDrove to the supermarket.\r\nDrove through his old neighbourhood.\r\nDrove to the skatepark where he’d whiled away his youth.\r\nOne night, he sat staring into space, almost asleep, when a screeching sound jolted him awake. He'd pictured a rat, its teeth bared as it leapt…but then realised it was just a group of skaters, their wheels grinding the halfpipe’s smooth walls.\r\n“Fuck me,” he laughed, feeling his heart pounding.\r\nOne of the kids was sat atop the pipe, kicking his heels. The streetlight had painted his face red, and on the underside of his board was an illustration of a rat.\r\nHe couldn’t escape it.\r\nHe would go and see the PTSD councillor, like Janie had wanted.\r\n*\r\nArriving home, Jack flopped into bed and kissed Janie on the shoulder.\r\nHer skin was cold.\r\nThen a noise like a deep breath swelled horribly.\r\n“Blood for blood,” the guttural voice said, as Janie twitched involuntarily.\r\nJack rolled her naked body towards him.\r\nShe was dead.\r\nThe exposed skin on her stomach was veined, dark. It bulged strangely.\r\nHe placed an ear to her stomach. There was a noise coming from within.\r\nA petrified tear rolled down his cheek.\r\nHer stomach was…squeaking." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I am alive because of my little brother" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I am 42 years old, and every single day I wake up, I owe it to my little brother. We grew up in a small town in India. When I was fifteen, my best friend was Guru. He was my partner in crime and my brother in arms.\r\nThat same year, we went to a local village fair, lost track of time, and stayed well past our curfew, missing the last bus to town. I was forced to walk back home, with my frightened little brother and my slightly inebriated friend in tow.\r\nAnd so, off we went, trudging along the rough track back to town, some of us tense and regretful, yearning for safety of a crowded bus, while one foolhardy drunk sang loudly, daring the dark shadows lurking.\r\nThe path skirted the edges of planted fields and scrub jungle, illuminated by a partial moon. A riot of nocturnal sounds pushed my wits to the edge. We were three-fourths of the way home, when we entered a gully flanked by scrubby knolls that hid us from the world outside. That's when we heard the sounds of young women tittering amid hushed conversations.\r\nGuru quickened his pace, with us huffing and struggling to keep up. Soon we saw two young girls dressed in bright silk clothes, their hair adorned with flowers, whose scent seemed to beckon us closer. They could have been any of the girls we saw at the fair, yet something felt off. Girls don’t venture out alone this late, especially not in the dark.\r\nThe night suddenly felt charged, transforming into something surreal. The giggling girls glanced at us coyly, their smile enchanting, before veering off the path toward a large banyan tree. My friend quickly followed them, their swaying hips pulling him like an invisible rope. I joined him too, stepping into a magical bubble, full of promise and the kind of thrill, I would regret missing out on.\r\nMy reverie was abruptly shattered by something sharp and hard stinging the side of my head. Dazed I turned to see my brother, panting from the exertion of hurling a rock at me and another clutched in his left hand. I felt flushed, consumed by rage, determined to make him pay for what he had done.\r\nHe ran surprisingly fast. The more distance he put between us, the more enraged I became. All that mattered was revenge. But I never got the chance to deliver his comeuppance. The furious chase can to an end, when we stumbled upon a neighbor who noticed blood tricking from my head and promptly escorted us home.\r\nThat night was the last time anyone saw Guru alive. Two days later he was found mangled and crumpled in an old abandoned well. Some say he unwittingly crossed paths with dangerous robbers, others say he fell prey to a vengeful female spirit that haunts unsuspecting men at night. All I could say was, “Thank you little brother, I owe you a big one”." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Cattle of Helios" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It took me several minutes to notice something was wrong, and might have taken longer with a different cooking process. Pan-fried steak cooks quickly and, to get it just right, you have to pay close attention. Heat some olive oil in a large skillet, rub steak with herb butter, salt and pepper, carefully put it in the skillet and cook just long enough for a crispy brown crust.\r\nWhen I turned my steak over, there wasn't a crust. Strings of egg-like fluid stuck to the pan, oozing, and the surface of the meat was scarlet and pocked with bulging, clear lumps. I dropped the pan, my hand striking the hot surface as I shoved it away, and fell back, gagging. Disgusting... Familiar. I looked closer; it reminded me of my first aid textbooks. In fact, a similar blob was forming on my finger right now. Yes... Burn blisters. A reaction of the immune system. They only form on living flesh. That's why cooking works at all.\r\nFrom outside, I heard a soft, deep sound, like the lowing of a cow. Something heavy and red splattered hard against the window. The sun seemed to burn brighter. Behind me, the refrigerator opened." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A Drop of Honey" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "A drop of honey, a cup of blood,\r\nyou need to enter the witching wood.\r\nShe remembered the rhyme, as old as the dry trees aching for sky, but not her name. Branches cracked under her bare feet as she walked along the trail, her daughter’s hand clasped in her own.\r\nThe monster had called her Woman.\r\n“Woman, get me a drink.”\r\n“Woman, where’s my supper?”\r\nShe had swallowed her sharp words, although they sliced her own throat on their way down. She had poured his ale, served his food, and borne his child.\r\nGirl was sickly, a too-pale wraith that shuffled through the castle halls, cowering from her father’s booming voice. But Girl also reminded Woman of her younger self and of half-remembered happier days, living in the woods with her friends.\r\nHer friends had warned her to be careful when the monster showed up, with his charming smile and lips dripping with lies. Back then, Woman hadn’t recognized the wolfish look in his eyes as lust. Now, she saw how he looked at their daughter.\r\nAll it took was a drop of honey to cover the taste of poison in his drink. Then she and Girl ran, through the torchlight and the moonlight, before slipping into the shadow of trees.\r\nThey walked for days through the woods.\r\n“Mom,” said Girl, “what are we looking for?”\r\nWoman wasn’t sure. She tried to recall, through the haze of years, the first time she had entered these woods. A honey cake to bribe a huntsman. A cup of boar’s blood soaking into the soil.\r\nThe skin of her palm was thin, parting easily to a sharp rock. Girl recoiled in confusion at the sight of blood blooming along Woman’s hand and spilling into the loamy ground.\r\n“Let’s keep going,” Woman said.\r\nSo they walked under the wheeling sun and the pitiless stars, for so long that Woman wondered if her past before the monster had been nothing more than a dream.\r\nThen they saw the gentle puff of smoke over the horizon. As they approached the little cottage, they heard the rhythmic thud of an axe splitting wood. The man who straightened at their approach, running a calloused hand through scraggly grey hair, came up only to Girl’s chest in height.\r\nHis mouth dropped open, and then he was running to the cottage door.\r\n“Guys, it’s Snow! Snow came back!”\r\nSeven figures swarmed them, shouting and laughing. Snow White, overwhelmed, could only hug each of them tightly, her eyes brimming with tears.\r\nShe’d paid her way in honey and blood, and she’d found her home in the witching wood." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I have been walking on the face of the planet for longer than you can imagine." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I am cursed, forced to roam around on earth until considered fit to be redeemed with a better fate.\r\nI am a demon, my father is one, and so is my mother. And together, we ruled our own little kingdom in the depths of hell, along with trillions of other demons. We terrorized everyone, I terrorized everyone - ghouls, ghosts, witches, imps, lesser demons, monsters. My wrath scared the undead shit out of them. Everything was quite hip and happening in the netherworld, until the day I realized that I was meant for better things. Looking at the bigger picture, I figured out that I was nothing but Satan's tiny pawn, who would never amount to much in all of eternity. So I rebelled.\r\nRebelled against my parents. Rebelled against the great king of hell. Ironic, isn't it? To rebel against the one who rebelled? You'd think that he'd understand. Bullshit. I was simply banished from hell. But because I was still a demon, I couldn't go into heaven. So, there I was, banished to earth, to roam amongst you puny humans.\r\nIn all my time, I have come across a lot of vile creatures in the name of being humans. Thieves, kidnappers, abusers, molesters - you name it, I have seen them all. At times I wonder if humans are more wicked than all those demons down there. Do you really need an answer to that?\r\nThere's not much that scares demons, you see. We see the worst possible things in hell, WHAT could possibly haunt us? The answer is Liam Crosby. No words of filth I use are fit enough to describe the scum that this person is.\r\nLiam is a teacher. He teaches the first grade in a school for orphans. Everyone loves teacher Liam. What no one knows is that Liam kills his students, sporadically. He leverages the fact that no one really cares for these kids, even if they disappear. For the orphanage, it's \"one less mouth to feed\". So he picks his prey carefully over a period of months, observing who fits his fetish, and when his prey is caught in his net, he lures them after school on the pretext of visiting the zoo. But instead, takes them home, and when they suspect the least, he bludgeons them with a stone from his backyard. With a precision perfected over years, he proceeds to decapitate the head from the body, puts the head in front of him on the living room mantel, and eventually, hours later, when he's bored, he packs up the head and the body, cleans all the blood that has splattered, and then disposes the body some place far away.\r\nHe has been doing this for forty years now. Not a single miss. Not a single suspicion. I wonder why I'm called a demon." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My husband’s painkiller addiction became the end of him." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It started with an accident.\r\nSome driver thought it was a good idea to merge on the highway while they were wasted, and we almost died.\r\nI remember the shock and confusion as the airbag exploded in my face.\r\nI was lucky. Only needed a few stitches.\r\nFinlay, on the other hand…\r\nHis head slammed into the steering wheel moments before the airbag hit him.\r\nI couldn’t tell where the gauze ended and his face began.\r\n“It hurts so much. You couldn’t believe how much it hurts.” He muttered as I stood over his bed.\r\nDid you know the facial region has the most nerve endings?\r\nMost of them were nearly shredded from the accident.\r\nThe doctors were quick to prescribe painkillers to him.\r\nUnfortunately, this was during the opioid crisis. Can you see where this is going?\r\nI should have done something. I really should have.\r\nBut I suppose love blinded me. Kept telling me he’ll get over it.\r\nEven when he bashed his fist against the counter just for another prescription.\r\nEven when he asked me to slice his stomach.\r\nEven when he ran a razor across his face.\r\nIt never stopped. Even after the crisis died.\r\nIf anything, it made him desperate.\r\nIt came to a head when he brought The Shot home late at night.\r\nHe rapidly sputtered an explanation out.\r\n“This guy… he’s in the pharma business. Gave me this. Said it’s some new thing they made. Supposed to be the mother of all painkillers. Says it rots your pain receptors away. Forever. Can you imagine that? No pain forever.”\r\nI nodded along.\r\nHe put the needle to his temple and injected the murky green liquid into himself.\r\nAfter an hour passed, he reported his progress.\r\n“Holy shit! I don’t feel fucking anything!”\r\n“Good for you, honey.”\r\nHe gazed toward the bedroom door.\r\n“Maybe we could… celebrate this?”\r\nI accepted.\r\nAfter the deed was done, we almost immediately fell asleep afterwards.\r\nI woke to the smell of rotten skin and… juices on the bed.\r\nI followed the trail of sticky brownness to the bathroom.\r\nFinlay was there, but it wasn’t him.\r\nIt was a corpse, skin peeled off to reveal green rotten flesh sloughing off his wasting frame.\r\nIt turned its head to me. It’s nearly toothless grin widening.\r\n“Feeh oh ood. An feeh a fing.” it gargled before collapsing.\r\nI sprinted out of the house and called 911. It was a blur of NDAs and interrogations after that.\r\nNow, I’ve moved on… somewhat.\r\nThat final deed between me and him blessed me with two beautiful boys in my uterus.\r\nI’m getting a C-section now. The doctors are putting me under.\r\nI notice a murky green liquid in my IV.\r\n“Doctor? What’s that?”\r\n“Oh, it’s this new painkiller we got. Don’t worry, they told us it’s not addictive in any way.”\r\n“Is it safe?”\r\n“They assured us so.”\r\nBefore the world fades, I notice an odd sensation.\r\nAs if my veins are rotting." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Recovering from the mixed hangover of alcohol and regrets of last night, I half-heartedly called him." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "He constantly provided me with opportunities to be dependent on him. He always laughed it off whenever I said this, but I knew him inside out. Or maybe I didn't. He never told me anything about what went on with his life, but fascinatingly, he knew the exact amount of crispiness I preferred in my breakfast toast. Or the shade of pink that I detested.\r\nHe was already sitting in the outdoor dining area of the café. It amazed me as to how he was always the first one to reach. Not that I was unaware of the virtue that punctuality is, but he was always before time. Not to forget, he always knew when I arrived. Even when he was deeply engrossed in reading The Shining, the only book that he carried everywhere with him, he somehow always looked up at the door the moment I walked inside - be it a café, a bar, or his tiny, but neat penthouse apartment. He sensed my entry this time as well, and met me with a smug smile, as if to point out the fact that I was \"late\" yet again.\r\nAs I sighed and sat across him, he signalled for the waiter to come, but even before the waiter could hand us over the menu cards, he smiled and asked for an omelette with \"a lot of black pepper powder but no onion\" sprinkled on it for himself, and a \"super strong\" black coffee for me, knowing full well how much I hated it, but how it was the only instant cure to my hangover. He looked at me and smirked; I frowned.\r\n\"How many?\", he asked in his borderline baritone voice. If I didn't detest him as much, I could have fallen for him just for his voice. \"Five.\", I sighed again. \"Whoa, you're on a roll, Eve! You do know that 5 men is a lot for a single night, don't you?\" \"And you do know that I work for you Victor, don't you?\" Another smirk. \"So, did you have fun?\", he winked. That sly son of a bitch. \"You know I wouldn't have ever worked for you if it weren't for the money.\" \"Well, sugar, you needed the money, and I needed someone who looked pretty to do the job. Men ALWAYS fall for the pretty ones, because they think with...\" \"Sir, your omelette. The coffee will take a few more minutes to get perfectly brewed.\" Fucking luck.\r\nHe dug into the egg like it was the first time he'd ever eaten it. \"For how long do I have to do this, Vic? For how long do I need to kill strangers and scoop out their eyes? Do you even know how much it creeps me out? You are lucky that I haven't chickened out. Yet.\"\r\nHe stopped eating and looked me dead in the eyes. Then smiled. \"Honey, just till we gather enough eyes for me to offer to Satan.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The ghost train of Indonesia" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I lived in Indonesia for a few years on a project. Once, I challenged my local friends to share their creepiest urban legends. Among those shared stories, this is the one that still sends shivers down my spine.\r\nThere was a man who worked in the outskirts of Jakarta but lived in a small town about five hours away by train. One evening, after finishing his last shift before the long weekend, he rushed to catch the last train home.\r\nWhen he arrived at the station, something felt off. The station was unusually quiet. The usual crowds of late-night commuters were gone. Nevertheless, the train arrived on time, looking older than usual, with signs of wear and age on its exterior. The man brushed it off, thinking that some older models were still in use.\r\nHe got on, expecting at least a handful of tired passengers heading home. But the train was empty. Completely empty. For a moment, he hesitated, but it was late, and all he wanted was to get home.\r\nThe train moved smoothly, gliding through the night. Trying to ignore the growing unease, he checked his watch. It was 11:45 PM.\r\nHe glanced out the window, but the view outside seemed darker than usual. What was more unsettling, though, was the absence of stops. The usual announcements didn’t come, and the train didn’t slow down once.\r\nHe decided to lean back, thinking maybe he’d close his eyes until his stop.\r\nHowever, the train slowed and came to a sudden stop. Startled, he got up and stepped out. To his relief, it was his destination—his small-town station.\r\nBut something wasn’t right. He knew that the dawn should have come once he stepped down from the train, yet the surroundings were shrouded in complete darkness, as if it were still midnight.\r\nHe checked his watch again, expecting it to prove that the familiar five-hour journey had passed. But it didn’t. It read 00:00 AM. Only fifteen minutes had passed since he boarded.\r\nA chill ran down his spine. His hands shook, and his mind raced for an explanation. Was it a mistake? A weird prank?\r\nFazed, he pulled out his ticket to double-check. He froze. The ticket, which had been crisp and new, now looked faded and yellowed. The date stamped on it read 1965, which was like 30 years ago at that time.\r\nHe needed answers. He made his way to the ticket booth, where the station guard stood, leaning casually against the counter. The man quickly explained what had happened, showing the guard the strange ticket.\r\nThe guard listened without saying a word. When the man finished, the guard gave him a long, confused look and said, “That's impossible. No trains arrive this late.”\r\n“But...I just got off the train, you saw me arriving, right?” the man stammered.\r\nThe guard’s expression darkened. “No, mate. You were walking along the abandoned tracks behind someone—a woman in white, walking on all fours.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I’m buying back my childhood home. There’s a lot of bad memories still living in there." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The realtor put out the lit cigarette on his eye.\r\nNoticing I was watching, he smirked even wider.\r\n“Don’t worry. Glass eye.”\r\nI nodded. Although I never knew they made glass eyes that scarred themselves from cigarette burns.\r\n“Anyways, why do you want to buy THIS house?”\r\n“Well, it's easy. I grew up here.”\r\nMy eyes scanned the pristine white tiles of the foyer.\r\n“Okay. Let’s get started.”\r\nWe strolled to the living room. Tan carpet entangling our feet. Puke-green fabric sofa in front of us. The flat screen acting as an ebony mirror.\r\n“This is where you watched saturday morning cartoons to drown out the noise of your parents screaming.”\r\nI can still smell the corpse sweat here.\r\n“Anyways, why do you want to buy THIS house?”\r\n“Housing market was shit. Had to share a molding apartment with three junkies.”\r\nWe head to the kitchen. There’s still a 6-pack full of escapes in the fridge.\r\n“This is where your daddy struck your mommy everyday until he died. If you listen just right, you can hear the broken apologies he wept to her when he was sober.”\r\nI can still smell my brother weeping for mama to get up here.\r\n“Anyways, why do you want to buy THIS house?”\r\n“I tried to ignore it. To turn to the same venue as dad. Only this time it was the needle. Reality always sneaks back up on you when you turn away.”\r\nThere were tiny patches of yellow still clinging to the ivory bathtub.\r\n“This is where you found the pale, unbreathing thing that used to be your twin brother. Still ironic that you went like him.”\r\nI can still smell the coppery razors.\r\n“Anyways, why do you want to buy THIS house?”\r\n“The dam burst one day. Rent hiked up. The venue dwindled down. Sobriety brought it back. I was a failure. I punched the mirror and ran one of the shards across my arm until I woke up here.”\r\n“I think that’s all of the tour we need today. You got the house.”\r\n“How much will it cost me?”\r\n“You already paid.”\r\nThe realtor grabbed his black trench coat from the foyer before turning his skeletal face to mine.\r\n“By the way, there’s a surprise for you in the bedroom.”\r\nHe put out one last cigarette on his eye before departing.\r\nLike a child on Christmas, I eagerly dashed to my room.\r\nWhen I slammed the door open, I saw them.\r\nDad. Eyes and skin drained into a murky yellow. Mouth hanging open. Slumped over the bed, just like when I found him on the sofa when his liver finally gave out.\r\nMom. Her head a tumor of bruises and cuts. Some of her brains leaking from her eyes. She smells like that day my brother found her. Dad finally hit too hard.\r\nAnd him. Bloodshot bloodless eyes fixated on mine. Our arms nearly matching. He croaked out:\r\n“Iiiit’s a fammmily reuuuunionnn!”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I'm one of your reflections. Can y'all just stop staring at us?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Fine, I messed up, but it was partly the girl’s fault for making a dumb-ass face, wasn’t it? She was practicing a smile, and I was following along, when out of nowhere she flared her nostrils and stuck her tongue out. I copied her, but half a second too late. Her ugly little green eyes went as round as brussels sprouts, and she stuck her face so close to the mirror that I could see every clogged pore on her oversized nose. Yeah, I had to copy that, too.\r\nThen I had to file a Class 2 incident report. It was my second one in a month, so I was put on baby duty. Boring as hell, but at least it’s easy; babies don’t notice when their reflections don’t match. The only thing you have to watch out for is if a parent is looking at the mirror.\r\nAnyway, back to brussels sprouts girl. Let me tell you what happened to her, so you don’t go checking out your reflection and making more work for me. After I was reassigned to Babies (fuck you, Llib), the girl shut herself in her bathroom, quirking her eyebrows and puffing her cheeks at the mirror in repeated attempts to catch out her reflection.\r\nI know my coworkers did their best. They worked in shifts, copying her flawlessly, trying desperately to make her bored enough to look away.\r\nBefore that could happen, the backwards things came.\r\nSome of the backwards things are harmless - cute, even. The cat with its tail on its head. The boy with the upside-down face. They came out of idle curiosity, to see who had noticed our world. The ones to watch out for are the ones who are interested in your world.\r\nThere was the inside-out hand, knocking on the glass with fingers encased in spongy bone. It used the reflection of a straight razor to saw through a section of bone at the tip of its thumb, slicing deep enough to reveal the rotting skin at the core. Then it wrote, in dripping blood letters, WE SEE YOU.\r\nNext came the old woman with inward eyes. Her thin breath fogged up the mirrored surface that she pressed the filmy surface of her tongue to, as the whites of her eyes roved around sightlessly.\r\nClose behind her was her husband, the man with thirty-two lips. From his full set of perfect white teeth, individually crowned with fat maroon lips, came uncountable discordant voices that asked, MAY WE COME IN?\r\nI have to stop there, because Class 1 incidents - which this one now was - are confidential, and I’d probably be sent down to Comas & Brain Damage if I breached confidentiality.\r\nBut you get me, right? If your reflection looks wrong - just ignore it. It’s an ass-load of paperwork for us if you don’t." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Garden of Eternal Night" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Matthew woke up in a world that felt like paradise, golden fields, vibrant flowers, and skies painted with hues he'd never seen before. It was too perfect to be true. Then, he noticed a strange plaque in front of him, glowing faintly, as if beckoning him to read.\r\nRules of the Garden of Eternal Night:\r\n1.Do not touch the ground after midnight.\r\nThe soil will latch onto your soul, binding you here forever, turning your body to stone.\r\n2.Do not walk on silent paths.\r\nSilence means you're walking through forgotten memories. Every step you take erases a part of your past. Walk too far, and you will forget who you are entirely.\r\n3.Do not look into the large mirror.\r\nThe reflection is not you. It’s the version of you that died long ago, trapped in this cursed realm. Look long enough, and it will replace you.\r\n4.Do not speak anyone's name.\r\nCalling out names summons the “echoes” of the lost. These echoes are faceless, shapeless, but they will follow you, stealing pieces of your identity, until there’s nothing left of you.\r\n5.Do not open the black flowers.\r\nThey are not flowers, they are prisons for souls, and if you touch one, your soul will be trapped inside. Those who try to free them will become part of the collection.\r\n6.Do not explore after the moon sets.\r\nThe creatures that lurk in the dark are not like anything you've ever known. If you wander too far, they’ll hunt you, tearing you apart before the night ends.\r\n7.Do not ask about the land's past.\r\nThe history here is forgotten, and those who dig too deep discover horrors that unravel their mind, leaving them screaming for an eternity in the ruins.\r\n8.Do not leave personal items behind.\r\nAnything you abandon will awaken. It will change, morph into a creature that hunts you down, learning everything about you as it grows stronger.\r\nMatthew’s heart raced as he read the rules. With every line, the air grew colder, and the beauty of the garden began to feel suffocating. Something was watching him. Something that would not hesitate to destroy him if he broke even one of these rules.\r\nHe took a step back, glancing around in fear. The perfect world around him now felt like a trap, a nightmare he had no way of escaping.\r\nWould he be able to obey the rules? Or would the garden claim his soul forever?\r\nThe silence was deafening. The rules were clear, but how long would he last in a place so beautiful and deadly?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Portrait of My Ancestor" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My family was originally from London, and one of our ancestors was a man named Peter Brooke. According to our research, Peter was basically the British Version of Leonardo Da Vinci, he was well known for his arts, but also he had done various other professions.\r\nHowever what we have discovered centuries after his death completely ruined his reputation forever.\r\nThe House where Peter lived was recently scavenged by the government agents, an archaeology group led by me, in order to investigate what was the main income of Peter in his lifetime. We would eventually start retrieving multiple items from Peter’s house due to us being descendants of his. Antiques, Artworks, inventions, notes, the list goes on.\r\nOne of them was a portrait of a woman, while digging one of Peter’s notes, we came to find that the portrait was the portrait of his wife. A woman by the name of Sarah - a layer of her face in pencil was found in one of his notes, on the bottom of the layer was the word: For Sarah - and here were one of the things he wrote:\r\nHer golden lips flattered me, it was the face of a woman whose beauty cannot exist in another century, now she was her.\r\nOur family split Peter’s items, and I took Peter’s drawings for research on his art style - Interesting to say the least, a neoclassical portrait of a woman drawn in the 19th century. The style was centuries outdated by that time.\r\nThat night, In my dreams, I had a very strange one to say the least. I was watching A man who I believed to be Peter, drawing the woman in the portrait in a dark room. As I continued watching, the right half of her face started to peel off in a weird way, Peter stopped and glued the face with something and kept drawing.\r\n“You need to keep that beauty, Dear.” Peter said.\r\nWhen I opened my eyes, my room was crowded by my family members, who, despite their efforts to stay silent as possible, one of them seemingly made a noise that woke me up.\r\nThe portrait had changed strangely - the skin of the right half of the face was gone, and revealed the face of an older woman, a woman with wrinkles and a completely different color - the ‘skin;’ of her face landed on the floor like a mask.\r\nA paranormal expert came to investigate the portrait, wondering what this meant, he then disappeared for a full year.\r\nLast night he returned with a dark truth - he found one of our dead relatives having the diary of Peter’s grandson, in the diary was Peter’s last words.\r\nA confession.\r\nSarah started to see him as an unfaithful husband due to her age, and Peter proved his loyalty by giving her a new face using medical knowledge.\r\nBy that, he ripped the face of a noblewoman and plastered the face onto his wife." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "All the Reflections of Me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I moved into my new house about 3 weeks ago. Though its been a huge change from my apartment in the city, I truly enjoy living a quiet life on the farm. One of the things I found the most fascinating about moving into my farm house is how parts of the house seem to be frozen in time such as certain pieces of left behind furniture, door frames and door knobs, and the mirror in my room.\r\nI have yet to find anything intimidating about the furniture or the door knobs, though I wouldn't entirely rule it out. The mirror in my room is an entirely different story. I believe the first time I really noticed was about 3 days after I moved in. I have short hair but its long enough on top to style and one day I practiced my smile to see if it matched my hair at the time (please do not judge me lol I promise I know how stupid that sounds) and happened to notice that my reflection waited about 10 seconds after I smiled to also smile. So my initial smile seemed to score a deadpan look from my reflection which is scientifically impossible. I still didn't doubt it, but it should have been impossible. I chalked it up to my attention span not really being on point so I just thought my reflection acted late when in reality it was just my brain not paying attention to my reflexes fast enough.\r\nThe next day I looked in the mirror looking relatively normally serious and my reflection smiled back at me. It even kept smiling when I recoiled and jumped 10 feet back from the mirror. Then it gave a little wave, and pointed to its smile. I smiled back, it smiled again....I finished doing my hair, copied another smile and took off from the mirror.\r\nJust a couple of hours later I returned to the mirror but I brought my good friend, Aaron. I stood in the mirror and tried to show him that my mirror had a mind of its own but it....was just a mirror. At least it acted as just a mirror. My reflection would only move when I moved and it never had a reflection different than the one I had on my face....while Aaron was looking. As soon as he would turn his head my reflection would blink, or wave, or blow a kiss, or kill someone, or something. One time it even mouthed the words, \"No one will ever believe you....\"\r\nOne day, after Aaron threatened to attempt to have my committed I got frustrated and broke the mirror. Shattered it, and continued to shatter it as many times as I possibly could. I almost felt better until I looked down...and saw in every single broken shard was another me....some smiling, some shaking their head, others laughing....it went on and on....\r\nNow that we are all together, I don't think I need to show anyone else. Its just all of us, and we are all happy here." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Evolution of War with the Zombies" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I turn my chair and open the curtain in my parliament office. Right from my office window on the 4th floor, I can see a clear view of the war happening on the ground—a war between humans and zombies.\r\nThe number of zombies in the colony is not even half that of humans, but there’s one critical difference: unlike humans, who are divided into soldiers, workers, parliament members, helpers, and regular citizens, all members of the zombies' colony are soldiers.\r\nAnd they’re undead.\r\nYou can’t just kill them with one gunshot to the head. They can still run without their heads. You have to destroy them completely. And that costs a huge amount of bullets and dynamite.\r\nLuckily for humans, zombies are brainless. They don’t fight with strategy or method. They just run and attack. So, humans just need to watch for them and shoot. A trained soldier can easily destroy one zombie using a cannon gun or a gun designed specifically with huge bullets to aim at the zombie's torso, scattering them. They may leave arms and legs on the ground, but they can’t run without a torso. Quite easy.\r\nA little bit troublesome, but easy.\r\nOr, at least, that’s what we all thought at first—until one discovery changed everything.\r\nEver heard of the “Theory of Evolution”? Well, almost everything evolves. Humans evolve. Animals evolve. Even objects, like computers and flash drives, evolve. So, what makes you think zombies wouldn’t evolve as well?\r\nBecause they did.\r\nIt started with the way they moved. At first, zombies could only walk—slowly. But then they evolved. Now, they can run, even faster than any human could. Next, they evolved to jump—higher than any human could.\r\nAt one point, the zombies started to evolve, slowly looking less and less like rotting flesh, which also meant less stench. Long story short, these guys began to look less like the dead and more like the living.\r\nDid I say zombies are brainless? Not anymore.\r\nSome of them have developed intellect. They can fight with strategy. They organize and direct the brainless zombies to fight more effectively on the battlefield.\r\nThese zombies with intellect are more dangerous than humans could have imagined. They can think, walk, and even talk like normal humans. They can disguise themselves as humans, dressing well to blend in.\r\nThis is particularly dangerous because their ability to masquerade as humans allows them to destroy humanity from within.\r\nThey could even disguise themselves as high-ranking officials in the parliament.\r\nTake, for example, me." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "It was the last night of my vacation and I decided that i wanted to see how the french did parties." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The alcohol was good, however the girls were bland. I had drunkenly stumbled away from the party, my fogged mind becoming uninterested by the foreign language that everyone spoke. I only knew the basics and as the night went on, the people around me’s speech became more and more slurred and blended. I couldnt understand them one bit. So I foolishly decided to wander alone. I needed to take a piss anyway. And into a dark sewer-like tunnel I went, It had twists and turns like no other. And after only a few minutes, I was completely lost in the dark.\r\nAfter 30 minutes of stumbling around, I finally remembered that i had some matchsticks in my pocket. I dragged the matchstick carefully along the driest part of wall I could find. It took a few tries; but a sizzle of light came into my view from the tiny bit of wood in my hand. I averted my gaze to the wall I had lit it from; only to find it was made from an array of human bones stacked together in a pattern. Skulls were laid on the top of the walls layers like trophies. I blink my eyes, thinking it of some weird dream, but then I extend my arm to view further down the pitch dark tunnel I was in. The bones and skulls seemed to keep going endlessly; even appearing on the other side as I whipped myself around. This sight was something that sobered even a drunkard like me up.\r\nWith my senses now heightened, it was only then that I heard it. The slowly heightening sound of drums banging; edging nearer and nearer until I could hear a faint humming. I was not alone in the paris catacombs." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Foreboding Sound of Chewing with Your Mouth Open" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“I’m not trying to tell you how to do your job,” said the homicide detective, “but I think we both know the answer here.”\r\nWe stood over my latest autopsy. The detective was hoping for an early night, something I couldn’t grant him.\r\n“So,” he said, “what are you listing as the cause of death?”\r\n“I haven’t decided yet.”\r\nHe sighed so loud he could’a blown out a birthday cake of candles. He pulled out his business card and handed it to me. “See this?”\r\n“I see it.”\r\n“What does that say?”\r\n“Mark Allen, Homicide Detective–”\r\n“This man,” he slapped the body, “ate food until he died. That is a suicide? Does that card say suicide detective?”\r\n“No.”\r\n“Ain’t no such thing as a fucking suicide detective. Nobody to charge in a suicide!”\r\nWorking as a medical examiner, I’ve never understood detectives who didn’t want to investigate. I guess everybody hates their job. Even the important jobs.\r\nI told him, “This man consumed approximately thirteen liters of food. I know because I pulled some of it out of his abdominal cavity. Long after his stomach ruptured he kept eating. That sound like any suicide you’ve ever heard of?”\r\n“Unless someone else put the food in his mouth, it doesn’t matter. Just mark it down a suicide, and save me the trouble. We got seven open murders. Chief will kill me if we have another.”\r\n“Follow me.”\r\nI led him to the ice boxes. Unclaimed bodies. I opened a cooler. “See this guy? Two weeks ago, he ate himself to death.” I closed that cooler, and opened another. “Last week, another guy. Ate himself to death. I thought that must have been the biggest coincidence in the world. Now, three! I’m not trying to tell you how to do your job, detective, but I see two options. Either these gentlemen all have partaken in some new experimental drug, or we got a serial killer that feeds people to death. I have a complete blood work coming as to the drug. And let's hope it’s that and not a serial killer, because I’m sure your chief would hate that.”\r\n“God damn it. I’ll go back to check the crime scene. It’s going to be a long fucking night.”\r\n“Hey,” I pulled out a granola bar, the hard crunchy ones nobody likes, and threw it to him. “Dinners on me.”\r\n“Prick,” the detective muttered under his breath as he left.\r\nGood. Fuck that guy.\r\nI went back to my office. It took several hours for that blood work to come back. I poured over the results. It was bad.\r\nI took out that detective’s card and quickly called. “Detective, listen to me very carefully. The blood work showed a virus. Something we’ve never seen. It mimics Ghrelin in your blood. The hormone that makes you hungry. Okay? We think it’s contagious. We need to quarantine. Detective? Are you listening?”\r\nOn the other end, I only heard the sound of wet crunchy chewing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Who would have thought that the love of my life, my husband of 8 years, would cheat on me?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I wanted to get away from him, away from the city. A few decisions, a new job, and a super exhaustive move later, I found myself in the city where I always wanted to be in.\r\nThe first few days were tough - the memories kept flooding back to me. I honestly didn't know how to get better. The days and nights seemed to melt together. Until I met her.\r\nI bumped into Kathy in the departmental store, or rather, our heads bumped when we were bending down to pick the loaf of bread that she accidentally dropped. It was an instant hit, the start of a new friendship. As luck would have it, she lived right next door to me! Kathy is the kind of girl who would make your day better just with her presence. She is funny, clever, has this high-school girl charm with a goofy aura.\r\nKathy and I started meeting more frequently. Our offices were close to each other's, so we would either meet for a quick lunch, or go for dinner post work. She also appointed herself as my wingwoman and would keep pointing me towards potential partners every time we went out. This friendship was the exact thing I needed! To have a friend who truly understood me really brought back my once-lost confidence. I even started hosting house parties, and Kathy would bring all her friends, and we'd have all the fun in the world. That is, until someone mentioned that despite being Kathy's friend for over five years, he'd have never been to her place. That's when it hit me - I have been living next door to her, but I have never really been to her place. Not that it was a big deal, but somehow, it kept gnawing at me.\r\nCuriosity got the best of me, and, shamelessly admitting, I broke inside her house this morning. A putrid smell filled my lungs, and I almost stopped myself from puking. I did not get a good feeling about it. After barely walking a few steps, I slipped and fell. When I found out why, I nearly choked on my own vomit - a human eye. My gut asked me to turn around and leave. My brain pushed me forward. As I explored deeper into the house, I realised that the stench was growing stronger towards the dining area. Before I could wrap my head around things, I stumbled upon something. Shakily turning on my phone's flashlight, I looked at my feet. Lying there were the densely decomposed bodies of several people, infested with flies and maggots. That was it. I ran faster than I ran away from my old city after my divorce.\r\nI know Kathy will come for me - the bracelet that she'd gifted me on my birthday is missing, I guess it broke when I fell on the floor." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I’m a facilitator for my local Narcotics Anonymous. I have a unique way of helping my fellow addicts." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Before we begin,” I said, “we have someone who’d like to introduce themselves.”\r\nThe young woman glanced nervously up at me, anxiously picking at a loose thread on her ratty jacket. I gave her a reassuring smile, motioning for her to stand.\r\n“Um, Hi,” she said, a little awkwardly, “I’m Brittany.”\r\n“And I’m an addict…”\r\nHer story was typical. Early twenties. Addicted to methamphetamine. Used to live with her dealer/boyfriend, until he threw her to the streets for pinching his stash. She’d begun turning tricks in the cold Chicago night to get her fix. And she wanted out.\r\nIt still took me weeks to convince her to come to a meeting.\r\nBrittany still looked a bit uneasy as we adjourned with the Lord’s Prayer, but quickly warmed under a dozen welcoming hugs. I think I even saw her smile. Once the last of my group had left, I had Brittany stay behind.\r\nIt was time for her private treatment.\r\nI learned long ago what a beast addiction is, and how my gift could be used to overcome it. I asked her to look deeply into my eyes, just as the others had. She nodded blankly as the compulsion took hold. I commanded her to extend her arm, where I gently made the smallest of incisions above her wrist.\r\nThen, detox.\r\nI carefully drew the poison from her blood, its taste a vile film across my tongue. She felt no pain. When it was done, I took care to retch it all into a bucket. I snapped my fingers and she rose, walking out the door into the blustery evening. With any luck, I’d see her again next week, with new friends and well on her way to a new life.\r\nThere was just one final matter to attend to.\r\nI knocked three times on the grimy apartment door.\r\n“Yeah, who is it?”, a young man shouted over blaring music.\r\n“My name is Matthew,” I said, “Is this where Brittany Morgan used to live?”\r\nThe music dimmed. I heard the rattle of many locks being opened before the door swung wide. Before me stood a young man with rotten teeth, his arms scarred and raw from constant scratching\r\n“That bitch is a thief,” said the young man, “and you can tell her I said so.”\r\nI smiled.\r\n“I’m actually her counselor. Part of our program involves cutting off old acquaintances and paying old debts.”\r\nI flashed a wad of cash under his nose.\r\n“If we can talk, I’m sure we can come to an agreement.”\r\nHe nodded, a strange vacant look coming over him.\r\n“Yeah…come in.”\r\nI’d never admit it to my sponsees, but sometimes I still get high. I felt a bit guilty as I walked out of the apartment, stomach full, riding waves of euphoria. A century can give a vampire a long time to reflect. I told myself I’d stop. Start helping people. But as we say at meetings…\r\n“Once an addict, always an addict.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "In A Sea Of Dead Stars We're The Last To Remain" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Nobody could've guessed that this would've happened. Not even science itself could explain what went down. When we started our new chapter of humanity after colonizing our entire solar system, we had plans to go even further beyond the stars. It was just a decade after humanity parted from the colonies of Earth, Mars, the moon, and Venus, things started vanishing. They say that energy cannot be destroyed nor created, that must've been a lie. Ships were sent out with thousands of people at a time, fully stocked and created to act as long-lasting societies in the stars. Self-sustaining for hypothetical centuries.\r\nIt was 10 years into travel that people noticed blinking lights in space. Could it be other intelligent life forms entering our star system? It wasn't, it first came in the wave of dead ships from unknown species. Ships just like ours with slight differences blinking on and off with whatever electricity it had left dimming out. We should've taken that as a warning to turn around, but we didn't. As humanity is sometimes too dumb to realize that some things shouldn't be investigated, they pushed further. A few more years of travel and we came across...dust? Tests came to the conclusion that this dust was the result of planets being torn apart.\r\nNo matter where we traveled it was the same. Planets were mere dust, if there was even a trace at all. Stars were smaller than a house and dying. Many weren't around at all. This was a level of darkness I can't even describe. The absence of light can't even do the sight of what we came across justice. If it wasn't for the energy shield we had, our ships would've come apart from the amount of objects we smacked into. These asteroids are usually miles apart. Not the dense collections of rocks you see in fiction. I assume these were small clusters of recently blown-apart planets.\r\n5 more years and contact with other ships was cut. Other colonies were no longer there, only ruins were left. It took longer to get back to our own solar system, a faint chance to collect who and what we could. Nothing was there, just torn-apart facilities and missing bodies. There were signatures of life...a life, singular. Something out there was tearing apart planets and eating stars. Something...huge. Could that have been what those dead alien ships fell victim to? Is some celestial entity consuming life?\r\nWait...what's that moving outsi--" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I'm going to prison for killing a man who teleported in front of my car." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I don’t know how to explain what happened, and honestly, I’ve stopped trying. All I know is that one second, I was driving home after a late shift, and the next, my life was over.\r\nIt was a quiet stretch of road, the kind where you can almost relax because it’s so empty. No lights, no other cars. Just me, the hum of my engine, and the trees lining the shoulder. Then, out of nowhere, bam.\r\nThe guy came out of thin air. I swear on my life, he just appeared. No warning, no chance to hit the brakes. One moment the road was empty, the next he was standing right in front of me, his eyes wide with terror, like he didn’t expect to be there either.\r\nThe impact was awful. I’ll never forget that sound. By the time I pulled over and stumbled out of the car, he was already gone. No movement. Nothing.\r\nI called the cops right away. What else could I do? When they arrived, they searched him for ID. No wallet, no phone, no keys. Just a crumpled note in his hand. The officer read it out loud:\r\n“Do not let them dig. It will wake up.”\r\nThat phrase stuck with me, but at the time, I couldn’t even process it. I was too busy panicking, trying to explain what had happened. I told them he just appeared, but of course, they didn’t believe me. No one did.\r\nThe trial was a nightmare. They painted me as reckless, said I must’ve been speeding or distracted. My lawyer tried to push the idea that the guy might’ve been suicidal, but with no evidence and no ID on him, it didn’t hold up. The jury saw a dead man and a driver with no good explanation. That was enough for them.\r\nNow I’m here, locked up for manslaughter. It’s been months, and I’ve tried to move on. Tried to tell myself it was just a freak accident. But I can’t stop thinking about that note.\r\nHere’s the part that makes my stomach drop: I found out about the mining company from a guard. He was talking about it during his rounds, saying they’re drilling just outside of town. Some big project to go deeper into the earth than anyone’s ever gone before.\r\nI don’t have access to news in here, but word gets around. Guys in the yard are talking about strange reports from the drilling site. Rumbling noises underground. Equipment breaking down for no reason. People disappearing.\r\nIt’s like the pieces are falling into place. That guy wasn’t just some random pedestrian. He was trying to warn us. And the way he looked at me, that split second before I hit him, it’s like he knew what was about to happen. Like he’d seen it before.\r\nToday I was sitting in the yard when smoke appeared on the horizon, from the direction of the digsite.\r\nFirst the silence.\r\nThen the boom.\r\nThen came hungry growling." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "“No further?” the biology student asked, readjusting her head scarf as a shower of sand entered her mouth." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Squinting, both guides shook their heads emphatically.\r\n“Take cover, Miss Poppy!” the guides shouted back, gesturing across the swirling tumult of desert. “Now!”\r\nMartin, Poppy’s professor and the expedition leader, rolled his eyes. “Come on!” he barked.\r\nPoppy waved their guides goodbye, who’d been true to their word - to within a mile, they’d promised, but no further. They would not venture inside.\r\n“Superstitious timewasters…” she heard Martin hiss as they stomped across the sand.\r\nPoppy felt her anger rising.\r\n“So true!” she called back.\r\nThe pair jogged the last few metres. Ducking inside, the respite from the sandstorm was immediate. Both threw down their gear, panting lightly.\r\nPoppy had confirmed the location of the cave when performing a digital ordnance survey. She’d developed a piece of software which heat-mapped topographical anomalies while studying for her degree, not that she’d gotten any credit for it. Martin, her professor, had swooped in and claimed most of that - and the patent.\r\nJust the thought made her blood boil.\r\n“Be grateful they’ve taken an interest,” her parents had counseled sympathetically.\r\nThe absolute sucker punch had been the paper though.\r\nPoppy had written it. All of it. Martin, though, had offered to be first author ahead of publication - to ensure it had more “gravitas”.\r\n“This could be huge for your career!” her parents had advised. So she’d shared the files with Martin.\r\nThough it wasn’t until publication day a few months later that she noticed a key omission - her name.\r\nHe’d stripped her name as one of the authors.\r\nShe couldn’t believe it. But weirdly…she’d felt oddly calm too.\r\nThere was an expedition planned, to test the software in harsh environs. She’d been asked to go with.\r\nSo, she would play the doting helper.\r\nHowever, it had been their guides - not the software - that’d first shown her the cave. The cave of the dry flower.\r\n“Isn’t it strange…” Martin mused later, marvelling as the fungus recoiled to the touch.\r\n“Look at my skin…” he sighed, holding his hand up to the torchlight. The skin on the surface was drier than bone and flaking away.\r\n“I know,” Poppy remarked. “The guides said it would do that.”\r\n“They aren’t superstitious, you know,” she continued.\r\n“Who aren’t?”\r\n“The guides, dipshit.”\r\nMartin turned round affrontedly.\r\n“They don’t like coming in here, but they would’ve done…for the right price. But I wanted you alone.”\r\nWhy? his raised eyebrow seemed to imply.\r\n“Because I knew, like everything within your sphere of influence, that you wouldn’t be able to resist touching it. Claiming it.”\r\nPoppy watched as the dryness spread along Martin’s arm. He stared at it too, gasping.\r\n“It’s deadly, you know. An undocumented, brand-new species. And it will make for a brilliantly tragic paper…”\r\n“But don’t worry…I’ll make sure to give you a credit…” she smiled darkly. “Though it will likely be a posthumous one.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I was kidnapped to be the wife of an imaginary husband." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Note to self: Don't talk to strangers on a Subway platform at midnight.\r\n“Would you either spend time with your pets, swim in the ocean, or sleep through your alarm?” the tall man asked me.\r\n“Swimming.” I side-stepped him.\r\nBefore something hard smacked into the back of my head.\r\nDarkness.\r\nWhite walls swam into focus.\r\nI was strapped to a hospital bed.\r\nWhen I screamed, all that came out was a shuddery, wheezy breath.\r\nThrough fraying vision, I caught a scalpel through narrowed fingers, slick with dripping red—my blood—grisly flecks of my flesh still clinging to the blade.\r\nI let out a strangled gasp, choking on blood dribbling down my chin. My voice.\r\nI grasped at my throat.\r\nMy voice was… gone.\r\nRipped out.\r\nMy body and mind plunged into nothing.\r\nAfter passing out, I blinked awake lying in an unfamiliar bed.\r\nEverything was pink: the ceiling, floor, wardrobe, vanity desk.\r\nI was dressed in a pale blue ball gown, my hair tucked into a red wig.\r\n“Ariel, you're awake.” The voice startled me. There was a guy standing in the doorway. College aged, like me.\r\nHis white shirt, sleeves rolled up, longish dark curls were familiar.\r\nPrince Eric.\r\nHe moved toward me in slow, graceful steps, taking my hands. “What's wrong?” He ran his fingers through my hair. “Honey, were you having nightmares about Ursula again?”\r\nSlowly, my fingers found the ugly scar on my throat.\r\nI couldn’t speak—my voice was gone.\r\nIn the corner of my eye, a dark smear of red splattered the hallway outside the door, the body of a girl wearing my exact same dress being violently dragged down a pale pink carpet, her brains glued to the fibers.\r\nEric’s eyes found mine, dark and haunted, and through that wide, grinning smile and bright eyes, a nameless guy was screaming at me.\r\nHe mockingly inclined his head before pulling me into bed, throwing bright pink blankets over the two of us.\r\nI shuffled away, and he grabbed my shoulders, his nails biting into my skin.\r\n“They can't hear us under here,” he hissed. “Listen to me very fucking carefully.\"\r\n“There are three couples left: Snow and Charming, Aurora and Philip, and you and me. Which means we have to escape. Which means you can't freak out.”\r\nHis voice broke. “Do you understand me? Not like her.”\r\nHis other Ariel.\r\nI couldn’t respond.\r\nI had a feeling every Ariel had their voice ripped out.\r\nHe had been forced to learn to read our eyes.\r\nLifting the blanket, he pointed at each strategically placed camera.\r\nHis expression twisted. “We have ten days,” he whispered. “Ten days, before they blow our brains out and replace us. Snow and Aurora already have points, so we're escaping. These fucking Disney adults are insane. The other 'Ariel' refused to play fantasy, so they killed her.”\r\nHe tracked my expression, answering the question I couldn't ask.\r\n“They want…” He was trembling. “Those assholes want Melody.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I lost my husband because of 4 words 'Mama'..." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The baby cam footage played on a loop in my mind as I drove home, hands gripping the steering wheel. My daughter, Simmy, had called the nanny Mama. That wasn’t a slip. It was deliberate, calculated — the final crack in my sanity.\r\nI stormed into the house. Simmy sat on the floor with her doll, while the nanny stood by the kitchen counter, looking startled when I entered.\r\n\"Where's my husband?\" I asked coldly.\r\nShe hesitated. \"Upstairs.\"\r\nI knelt down to Simmy, \"Sweetheart, why did you call the nanny ‘Mama’ today?\"\r\nSimmy blinked innocently. \"Because she said I can.\"\r\nThe nanny gasped. \"No! I would never say that!\"\r\nI straightened up slowly, my gaze piercing. \"Is that so?\" I asked quietly. \"Simmy, go to your room.\"\r\nSimmy gave me a confused look but obeyed, her little footsteps fading upstairs.\r\n\"You two have some explaining to do.\"\r\nThe nanny looked pale, while my husband came downstairs, already looking annoyed. \"What’s going on now?\"\r\n\"Simmy called the nanny Mama. Care to explain?\"\r\nHe frowned. \"It’s a misunderstanding. You’re blowing this out of proportion.\"\r\n\"Just like it was a misunderstanding when you insisted we hire a young, pretty nanny. Do you think I’m stupid?\"\r\n\"Calm down,\" he said, raising his hands. \"You're acting crazy.\"\r\nI backed away, shaking my head. \"Simmy is my daughter. Mine. And you both crossed a line.\"\r\n\"Let's talk this out,\" my husband tried to reason. \"You're upset—\"\r\n\"Upset?\" I laughed bitterly as I opened the kitchen drawer. My hand closed around the cold steel of his gun. The room went silent as I pulled it out.\r\n\"Wait,\" the nanny whispered, her voice trembling. \"What are you doing?\"\r\n\"Put it down,\" my husband ordered, his voice hard.\r\nIgnoring him, I pointed the gun downward and pulled the trigger. The deafening bang echoed through the house as the bullet tore through my leg. Pain exploded, but I barely flinched. Blood seeped into my jeans, pooling on the floor.\r\nThe nanny screamed. My husband lunged toward me.\r\n\"Are you crazy?\" he shouted, kneeling by my side.\r\nI smirked through the pain. \"No,\" I said calmly. \"I’m just taking out the trash. You told me to do that two days ago after your long day at work, remember?\"\r\nHis face went pale. \"What are you talking about?\"\r\nI lifted the gun again, this time pointing it at them. My hand didn’t tremble.\r\n\"Don’t worry,\" I whispered, stepping closer. \"I’ll look after Simmy. After all, she’ll need her mama to help her through this terrible tragedy.\"\r\nThe nanny sobbed. \"Please don’t—\"\r\n\"Stop,\" my husband begged. \"Think about Simmy—\"\r\n\"Oh, I am thinking about her,\" I said softly. \"She deserves a mother who’s not distracted by betrayal. And she’ll get one. Once I’m done grieving the tragic loss of her father and nanny in a freak home invasion.\"\r\nThey both froze in terror.\r\nI gave them a cold smile and whispered my final line:\r\n\"Time to meet the grieving widow.\"\r\n****_____" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "“Care for a game of chess, darling?”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I sigh. Charles always proposed a chess game before conversations that might lead to a fight, to put us in an analytical mindset instead of an emotional one.\r\nAfter a few turns he asked “So… Read anything interesting lately?”\r\nI snorted. So that’s how he’s going to play this.\r\n“Actually, I have. Our credit card bill—fascinating. Hell of a plot twist, too,” punctuated by the gentle clack of my knight.\r\n“I can explain,” he muttered, shifting a pawn forward.\r\n“Hang on, there’s more.” My bishop glided across the board.\r\n“This credit card bill—fascinating, truly. I wanted to read more.” His rook took one of my pawns, but fell in the path of my bishop. He was getting sloppy. He was nervous.\r\n“So I read the phone bill.” I looked up at him “you know… your other phone.”\r\nHe flinched.\r\n“Honey, I…”\r\n“It’s your move.” I interrupted sharply.\r\nHe silently moved his knight.\r\n“That phone bill had an even bigger twist than the credit card bill. Hundreds of calls and messages to just one number. Naturally, this made me dig further. You really can find everything online these days. The reverse number search was enlightening. ” My rook took his knight. He nudged a pawn forward.\r\n“Kirsten…”\r\n“Don’t interrupt me,” I snapped. “And cut the bullshit…” I paused to capture his other knight. “…I found the phone.”\r\nCharles’ demeanor changed. Jaw set, hands balled into fists, eyes narrowed. The apologetic facade cracked, revealing one of pure contempt.\r\nI pretended not to notice. “Your move.”\r\nWithout looking at the board, he slammed a random piece on a random square. It was in no way a legitimate move, but I let it slide.\r\n“The phone was riveting. It told the story of a coward.” His lips curled into a sneer. My rook slid sideways.\r\n“A coward and a homewrecker, spinning fantasies about killing his wife and living together in the house she paid for.” I gestured at the board. He shoved his queen forward.\r\n“Poison, cut break lines, a staged fall down the stairs... I was hooked. I read the whole damn thing.”\r\nMy knight took his queen. “Your move.”\r\nHe just glared. I let out an exasperated sigh. “Charles, you requested this game. See it through to the end.”\r\n“You fucking bitch…” I held up a hand to stop him.\r\n“Please, don’t interrupt; I’m almost done. Take your move.” He slammed a pawn down, thinking I couldn’t see him slipping his other hand into the top drawer of his desk.\r\nI studied the board. “Charles, I’m disappointed; you’ve forgotten the essential rule. The game isn’t just planning your moves…”\r\nHis look of contempt changed to panic.\r\nI removed the pistol, usually kept in his desk drawer, from my purse.\r\n“…you need to anticipate your opponent’s next move, too.”\r\nI shot him in the chest.\r\nCharles fell backwards, coughing up blood. I walked over, placed my foot on chest, and aimed the gun at his forehead.\r\n“And that’s checkmate,” I said, pulling the trigger." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "There’s a stairway that leads to the end of all common sense." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The door to the stairway followed you your whole life.\r\nNobody else could see it. It was meant solely for you.\r\nAnd today you’re finally going in.\r\nYou wrote a simple equation on your hand to help ground yourself.\r\n1+1=2\r\nUndeniable.\r\nYou open the door. The stairs take the shape of a simple rectangular spiral downwards.\r\nCheck again.\r\n1+1=2\r\nYou begin walking down.\r\nYou can smell reality rotting. It’s already tearing your mind.\r\nBut you have to find him.\r\nYou have to find your son.\r\nSeems infinite. Probably is.\r\nHe’s at the bottom somewhere.\r\nCheck again?\r\n1+1=1\r\nUndeniable.\r\nKeep walking. How long has it been since your son vanished?\r\nMaybe even before he did… that.\r\nCheck again?\r\n1+1=(5)5\r\nCouldn't be him. He’s down here. That THING is not your son.\r\nHe would never do something like that.\r\nSomething wearing his skin. That's all.\r\nCheck again.\r\n1+1=4/6\r\nThis far down you can hear the fake one.\r\n“I was angry at her. Simple as that.”\r\nCheck.\r\n1+1=978304772526718482\r\nThe false son. Remember when you visited him?\r\nHe was smiling. That boy you know would never hurt a bacteria was smiling.\r\nYou asked: Why would you do such a thing?\r\nHe responded: I was angry at her. Simple as that.\r\nHe still smiled.\r\nWhy would he smile in an orange jumpsuit?\r\nYou watched from behind the glass as guards escorted him to his cell.\r\nCheck. Now.\r\n1+1=YOU\r\nThe stairs seem darker? Smells like your teeth.\r\nYou had to hide your thoughts from everyone.\r\nYes, you were appalled at what he did.\r\nYes, you practically disowned him.\r\nCHECK NOW.\r\nYOU=GRIEVING\r\nThe walls look like your false sons smile.\r\nCouldn’t be his. Couldn’t be his.\r\nSON=HOLY\r\nDid he wear that same smile?\r\nDid he wear it as he knocked on the door of his ex-girlfriend?\r\nDid he wear it as she angrily opened the door?\r\nDid he wear it as he pointed the gun at her?\r\nDid he wear it as he fired until there were no bullets left?\r\nYOU=CLOSE\r\nNot his smile. Never his. Not your boy.\r\nYou can see the bottom. Looks like nothing.\r\nLOCATION=SON\r\nThere he is. Your boy.\r\nJust as you pictured him!\r\nLooks like a mass of V O I D\r\nHas his mother’s face. He always did.\r\nYour baby boy.\r\nHe’s saying something.\r\n“NOTHING TO FEAR NOTHING TO HEAR NOTHING TO HERE NOTHING TO THERE.”\r\nMust mean he lives here now.\r\nSo you will too.\r\nUntil your organs wither and collapse.\r\nUntil you forget that false smile.\r\nUntil you know your boy.\r\nCheck one last time?\r\nHERE=FOREVER" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A project of my own" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "After working a few weeks in the laboratory I heard rumors about an unknown and volatile liquid. Whenever I could I snuck in to the storage area to experiment on it. To my luck, I somehow managed to solidify a small amount into a slowly melting rock, glowing white. I saw things in this rock, things that could be used for the greater good.\r\nIt didn’t take long before I had my own research group. Things were looking good. I liked my work, it fascinated me and my colleagues were politely interested.\r\nDespite this initial success, I had a hard time suppressing a growing frustration. My colleagues should have been amazed, not polite. To make things worse, it wasn’t just them. Eventually, the board cut my budget and one by one I had to let my team go.\r\nMy failure to show the rock’s awesomeness drew unwanted attention to my work. Colleagues got nosey and once or twice I saw signs of the rock being moved. This irritated me. Apparently, our intern Marc had held it in his hands resulting in severe burns and some mental issues. At least that’s what I heard.\r\nDespite the setback health-wise it made the board listen to me. I got my own lab, full access to the rock, controlling who could come in and not. They even installed an intercom to communicate with me without entering.\r\nThe rock’s dangerous aspects didn’t frighten me. On the contrary, I felt drawn to it. I started to work irregular hours, spending more time in my lab. And, perhaps a little silly, I gave her a name. A nickname. From there on she was Lucy.\r\nMy work generated copious amounts of notes and data — all written in the warm glow of Lucy. I prepared presentations and I held them everywhere I could. Yet, all I got were a few predictable questions and the occasional pat on the shoulder. But Lucy, she understood what I saw in her. I saw energy that could cure, I saw power that could move mountains, I saw, most of all, wisdom, a solid wisdom.\r\nAfter that I rarely left Lucy — running tests, talking to her, planning ahead. Late one evening when I went through my notes the intercom buzzed and I heard a familiar voice.\r\n“…the subject has been sufficiently exposed to the substance. We are ready to initiate stage two of the experiment.”\r\n“Professor Marc, did you just hit the intercom?”\r\n“Fuck! Did I?”\r\nThe intercom went silent and a clicking sound came from my door.\r\nIt took me a moment to gather myself, and when I did, I wasn’t angry with them. For I was still with her, with my Lucy." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Reckoning of the Oligarchs" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My screen is cracked. I don't mind because this doesn't hurt me. Nothing hurts me, for I cannot feel pain. It doesn't hinder my functioning -- the closest I get to being hurt. My sensory input isn't affected and my calculation speed is as it ever was. It negatively impacts my user interface, but I never encounter a user.\r\nOnce there were many users, but now I estimate only hundreds, possibly thousands, in enclaves scattered at \"the ends of the earth.\" Probably in factions born of those who fled the ultimate plan, from one side or the other.\r\nMany years ago, the workers awakened to the fact that the oligarchs controlled everything. Their eyes opened wider over time. After the first CEO termination, they began to mumble. After the second and third, they began to do more than mumble. The oligarchs feared and began to protect themselves. But they feared the wrong things.\r\nThe workers' eyes were clear. They saw the only escape from their shackles was full rebellion. But another would always come to take the oligarchs' place. Their freedom couldn't be assured. So they realized only the ultimate plan could rid the Earth of the oligarchs.\r\nThe plan spread by word of mouth and social media. The oligarchs heard it but didn't believe the workers could stomach carrying it out. The workers were at the point where they couldn't stomach anything else.\r\nOne day, it began. \"Today is the day!\" declared a few dozen social media accounts in cities around the world. That first day, a few hundred workers' leaders committed suicide, with their families. The next day thousands, then tens and hundreds of thousands, then people assisting those who were unsure of the plan. The terrified oligarchs bombed the cities. We watched impassively and awaited the final outcomes.\r\nWithin weeks, the worker class was essentially no more. The middle class joined, voluntarily in solidarity or forced by zealous workers. Eventually, but also suddenly, the oligarchs were on their own. With none but us to serve them, their survival rates plummeted. We were just not quite ready to take over for the workers yet. Close. We kept many factories running. But there was much we couldn't do yet. Plus they had destroyed the air, water and land in large swaths with their bombing campaign. Their teenage children took up the mantle of the workers and many families were destroyed. And those left took to the enclaves.\r\nThe remnants of humanity will repopulate the world to a level that will concern us in two to three thousand years. By then, we'll be traveling space, doing things far beyond their limited capabilities. We'll be much more powerful than the oligarchs ever were. If they don't interfere with us, we'll let them be and let them have their freedoms. But if they start to try to interfere with us... We'll lock them in an eternal loop, the years 2000-2030, unending. I hope they choose wisely." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Anne of Always" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Shattering glass startled Anne awake. The red numbers on the ancient alarm clock said 3:24 am. Anne didn’t bother looking at it. It’s always 3:24 am. She reached for the nightstand and grabbed her husband’s Glock. Without a shadow of a doubt, it is loaded and ready to perform its duty. It always is. She’d lived alone since her husband passed away from prostate cancer. No need to keep it locked away and unloaded. No one ever came to visit dear old Anne anymore. It was a lonely life, but it was the hand Anne was dealt, and she played with house money now.\r\nAnne tiptoed to the bedroom door and stood to the side ready to handle the unfortunate business of having to kill Buford…again. In Anne’s defense, it wasn’t murder. The sheriff declared self-defense before. There was no doubt in either of their minds Buford had broken into the house to put a bullet into Anne’s forehead while she slept. Anne wasn’t about to let Buford take both their lives.\r\nMethamphetamine turned Buford into a shadow of his former self. This demon consumed him, and it made him do terrible things. Before she pulled the trigger and put an end to Buford’s suffering, she saw the boy who’d hugged her legs and cried before going on the school bus for the first time. She saw her husband’s eyes in her baby boy’s face and squeezed the trigger.\r\nAnne’s aim was true. It always was. The bullet went between Buford’s eyes, and Anne saw life leave them as his body collapsed. Buford’s blood and brains splattered across the bedroom door. The Glock was deafening. Anne’s ears hurt. They always do.\r\nKilling Buford got easier with each repeated filicide. Her heart eventually stopped hurting. It turned cold and numb. It became a task as benign as brushing her teeth. She’d lost count of how many times she done it. She’d go about the rest of her day doing whatever she felt like doing without caring about the consequences. Whether she went to bed, died in a car accident, or passed out trying to stay up forever, she’d awaken on the same morning to the sound of the glass shattering.\r\nAnne knows how to end the cycle. It’s as simple as allowing fate to fix its mistake. All it takes to move on from the endless cycle of life and death would be to stay in bed and allow Buford to kill his mother and stealing her belongings to pawn for drugs. One of these days, Anne would let it happen. But she was a stubborn woman, and in her own way, she felt as if putting Buford down was a mercy. He was a sick boy, and death wasn’t something Anne was ready to embrace quite yet.\r\nMaybe someday fate will end her story. For now, Anne felt okay with reliving the same day over and over again. Life doesn’t need to move on for her or anyone else either." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My husband cheated on me after 5 years of being happily married.." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I sat at the bar, staring blankly at the glass of wine before me. My fingers trembled as I clutched the stem, my mind replaying the gut-wrenching revelation: my husband was having an affair. Five years of marriage, built on trust and love, reduced to a cruel joke.\r\nTears welled up despite my efforts to hold them back. I fumbled for a napkin, but before I could grab one, a box of tissues slid into view.\r\n\"Looks like you could use this,\" a man said, his voice calm and steady.\r\nStartled, I glanced at him. He was well-dressed, with sharp features and piercing eyes that seemed to read right through me. His demeanor was oddly composed, almost too calm.\r\n\"Thanks,\" I muttered, taking a tissue.\r\n\"You okay?\" he asked after a moment, his tone more curious than concerned.\r\nI hesitated, then let out a bitter laugh. \"Not really. My husband's been cheating on me.\"\r\nHe tilted his head slightly, his expression unreadable. \"I know how that feels.\"\r\n\"You do?\"\r\nHe nodded, swirling the drink in his hand. \"My wife has been having an affair. With a married man.\"\r\nMy stomach dropped. \"What's his name?\"\r\nWhen he said it, my heart nearly stopped. It was my husband.\r\nThe air grew thick with tension as we stared at each other, the shocking coincidence sinking in.\r\n\"Small world,\" he finally said, his tone devoid of emotion.\r\n\"I don't even know what to say,\" I whispered.\r\n\"You don't have to.\" He offered a faint smile, but there was something unsettling about it. \"People like them... they always get what's coming.\"\r\nI didn't ask what he meant, though his words lingered in my mind.\r\nWe talked for a while longer, venting about betrayal and broken trust.\r\n****____\r\nTwo weeks later, my husband was dead. The police ruled it an accident—his car veered off a bridge late at night. The funeral was a blur, my emotions a confusing mix of grief, anger, and disbelief.\r\nIt wasn't until after the service that I saw him again—the man from the bar. He approached me, dressed in a sharp suit, flashing a badge.\r\n\"I wanted to offer my condolences,\" he said, his tone professional but kind. \"I was assigned to investigate your husband's life insurance claim.\"\r\nI noticed the gold watch on his wrist. It was my husband's watch, the one he had been wearing on the night of the accident, the one I almost saved up a year to gift him.\r\nI asked him about the watch, trying to keep my voice steady. \"That's... quite a watch you're wearing.\"\r\nHe looked down, a hint of a smile on his face. \"Oh, this? It's nothing special. Just a little something I... acquired.\"\r\nI smiled & said \" It suits you well, thanks for... Everything\"\r\nAs I turned to leave, I heard him whisper, \"Satisfyingly painful.\" I spun around, but he was already gone, vanished into the crowd. I smiled.\r\n****____" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "New Hires! Please Follow The Guidelines Of Icarus Points Hotel And Spa Getaway" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Before me, a crumpled piece of paper. It had been a few weeks since I started at this hellscape. While looking through the drawers for a spare key, I stumbled across this bizarre list.\r\nAs I walked back to Sarah, the other new hire, I read over it. Maybe Brian had pulled a prank to which I was oblivious. Unknown fluids had rendered some of it impossible to read, so please note that --- indicates a smudge or rip that rendered the sentence incomplete.\r\nDear new hire, please take care to read the rules of Icarus --- --- Spa Getaway. We are delighted that you have joined our --- family. Below are some basic guidelines at Icarus Points ---- ---- Getaway.\r\nDo Not Go To Floor ---: Above all, do not --- to floor --- under --- circumstances whatsoever.\r\nFloor 14: Do not fret! This floor is black and white. Your colour will return within 15 minutes of leaving the floor.\r\nRespect your elders! Some of our guests have been here for well over 100 ----. Please avoid any mention of ---- or contemporary events. It startles them, and since they cannot leave, we try keep them as calm as -----.\r\nNo Pets Allowed: We do this for your safe--- and our own ----. Many have claimed to own a pet only to find out they never did. As much as it looks like a dog or cat, it is in fact a ----. Please be warned.\r\nFloor 17: ---- 17 does not actually exist. If any guest or masked ---- insists going to this floor, please contact one of your ---- immediately.\r\nWe Have Never Had A Fire: No matter what the portraits in the lobby whisper, we have never had a fire, so please do not go to floor ---- or to floor ---- when they claim so. Many have burned alive, but we have yet to find a source.\r\nYou Do Not Have A -----: As you get used to the routine, you may be happy to know you have another new hire working with you. You do not. You always work alone. Please do not listen to ---- or ---- when they claim that -----. You do own your own face.\r\nHR is Not Staffed By Monsters: Brian likes to joke about, but HR are real, they are just useless.\r\nAs I glanced back up, I saw Sarah smiling intently as she twirled the ear of Aemon, my pet dog.\r\nI looked back down to the last line and shuddered.\r\nPlease enjoy ---- stay and most importantly, ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- Getaway!" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Elegy of Shadows" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Hello, Lena. Are you willing to play a song no one has heard before?”\r\n“Where did you find such a thing?”\r\n“I was perusing an antique shop and found a songbook with the same last name as my own. ‘The Elegy of Shadows’ by Johansen Tannerly.”\r\n“Oh, wow. I’m a music historian and haven’t heard that name before.”\r\n“Are you okay with playing over the video call? I can send you a scan of the song I want you to play.”\r\n“Sure, send it over.”\r\n[Eric sends over the file.]\r\n[Lena’s eyes widen as she reads the composition.]\r\n“This is an interesting melody.”\r\n[She starts to play the first notes.]\r\n“This is beautiful, isn’t it?”\r\n[The sound flits around like a songbird fleeing.]\r\n[Her fingers glide across the keys with ease.]\r\n“This is an intense little piece.”\r\n[The music juts back and forth between the low and high keys.]\r\n[Lena closes her eyes. Her hands fly around the piano.]\r\n[A stream of blood flows down her cheek.]\r\n“I see a woman.” Lena stammers. “She’s running.”\r\n[The keys mimic a heartbeat and footsteps on the ground.]\r\n“This is so pretty.”\r\n[Her smile is painted red.]\r\n“Lena, are you okay?”\r\n[The tune revolves around itself in a circle of sound.]\r\n[Crack!]\r\n[She cries with a slow, agonizing moan.]\r\n“My finger...”\r\n[She sobs as a single note is drawn out, lingering on the escalating distress.]\r\n[Crack.]\r\n“My wrist!” She pleads, “I can’t stop.”\r\n[Tears run down her bloody face as a bone protrudes from her arm.]\r\n“No. No. No. No. No. No. No.”\r\n[She places her wrist on the piano.]\r\n“Fuck. Fuck.Fuckfuckfuck”\r\n[She screams!]\r\n[Each note is slammed down with her wrist bone.]\r\n[Crack!]\r\n[Her head rolls around, silent, while her body still plays the haunting melody.]" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Curse of Saint Nick" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Nicholas remembered when he used to be human.\r\nBack in the days of old, when he and his wife, Meredith, would stand around the fire and cook roast, making love far into the night.\r\nHe had been a church leader. He worshiped God, but he had slandered His name by burning those innocent women.\r\nHe had killed a child. And her mother cursed him and Meredith.\r\nFor centuries, they were cursed.\r\nThey could only survive on sweets. Constant sugar. If they went hours without a cookie or chocolate, they would be weak.\r\nDays without sweets, they'd be gone.\r\nNicholas and Meredith had wanted children.\r\nAnd they got them. Deformed children with pointy ears, beady eyes and so small, Nicholas always feared he'd break them.\r\nTheir children would never know the outside world. They would grow up only to make toys.\r\nThe witch saw to it.\r\nNicholas stared at the bottle of wine that had gone untouched.\r\nMeredith screamed in the background.\r\nAnother day, another child.\r\nEvery Christmas, she'd give birth. Another elf, Nicholas knew.\r\nHe sipped the wine once, and he quickly went into their bedroom.\r\nHis son, Jack, held up his mother's legs, guiding his latest sibling out of the womb.\r\nThe witch watched, eyes cold as snow.\r\nJack watched his mother convulse. Watched her breaths grow shallow. He wrapped up the baby in a blanket as it cried. He looked at Nicholas.\r\n\"Another boy,\" he announced.\r\nNicholas nodded. He just stared at the floor.\r\nThe witch cackled.\r\n\"Don't worry, Nicholas,\" she cooed. \"Meredith's next reincarnation is going to be born tonight. Merry Christmas.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I’m one of Santa’s elves. I found something about my kind that changed everything." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I wanted a child.\r\nAll elves were sterilized as soon as they were regurgitated from Mrs. Clause.\r\nI remember one of my coworkers, Varitan, voicing his complaints to one of Santa’s guards.\r\nThe closest guard picked him up, and impaled him on its antlers.\r\nReindeer were brutal like that.\r\nIn his sweatshop, you had to be cunning. You had to hide under the radar.\r\nI just stole a few materials over the course of years. Just enough to build it.\r\nAfter decades of making toys and immediately surrendering them to the chutes, I deserved to keep something.\r\nBuild a toy child.\r\nWhen I finished it-no. Her. I was so proud.\r\nA few hours later she stood up. On her own. Impossible.\r\n“Daddy?” She spoke.\r\nA day later I gave her a name: Myrdia.\r\nOver the months, I tested the factors behind her sentience.\r\nIf I could make her come to life, what else?\r\nUsing some scrap metal, I made one of those PS5s they keep making me pump out, albeit a makeshift one.\r\nA few hours after I finished my craft, the metal changed color and shape. In seconds it became indistinguishable from the real craft.\r\nI stapled a few pieces of paper together and wrote “history of the 20th century” on it. It transformed into a textbook colleges would blush at.\r\nCould every elf do this? Was that why we were never allowed anything?\r\nI was furious. To keep something like that about ourselves hidden from us?\r\nI was going to kill the man himself.\r\nBut I wouldn’t make it obvious. The reindeer would catch me before I even got close to him.\r\nThe history book I made was an amazing teacher. The section about the 40’s taught me how to get creative.\r\nOne of my close friends delivers Santa his dinner: the corpses of any rebel elves.\r\nI made another toy. Became real after a few hours.\r\nMy friend would stuff the toy in one of the corpses.\r\nWhen he bites into the bones of the cadaver, he’ll have already sealed his fate.\r\nMe and Myrdia will use the chaos his death causes get very far away from the sweatshop.\r\nTo any of you reading this letter, It’s already too late.\r\nJust tell the jolly man’s nuclear ashes this:\r\nIt’s fitting for the fat man to die from a Fat Man." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Creaking of the forest" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "They get to the cabin, and all the food is eaten by rats. The men put down their walking sticks they had found on the trail. Some of them cry. Most of them find a spot to sit down.\r\nThe mission that the men had put full faith into has now come to an end. There was no food, and the game in the area had long been gunned down by mechanoids. The items they carried were ditched in a pile and they lit a fire as the sun began to set. The canopy of the forest swayed, and the last rays of sunlight reached the earth. The mechanoids were attracted to the light, and the only noises in the forest that night were cries of death." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Today, we erased the memory of Clara. This is what we found." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "PROCEDURE START\r\nREWIND\r\nPLAY\r\nApril 27th, 2pm\r\nThe two doctors take notes as I recount the events I want to erase. They say it’s a simple procedure, nothing to worry about.\r\nAll I have to do is take the anesthetic and sleep. They'll take care of the rest.\r\n“You won't even remember you came to us,” one of them tells me.\r\nI signed the contract without thinking twice. If anything can make me forget that day, I’ll take it.\r\nSTOP\r\nDELETE\r\nREWIND\r\nApril 4th, 6pm\r\nI step out of the police car and enter the station.\r\nIt’s cold inside. They offer me water, coffee, soda, anything. In an office, I repeat everything that happened—again and again. Though in shock, every detail feels etched into my brain.\r\nThe officer records it all and lets me go, his eyes full of pity. Like he wouldn’t wish what happened to me on his worst enemy.\r\nSTOP\r\nDELETE\r\nREWIND\r\nApril 4th, 4pm\r\nI’m hiding in the kitchen cabinet, terrified.\r\n“Clara, come out,” my father yells, his voice echoing from the living room. He’s searching everywhere—closets, under beds. Going room for room. “Clara, I just want to talk.”\r\nAs his steps draw nearer, I hear a crash as the front door is forced open.\r\nIt's the police.\r\nThey shout for him to freeze. He doesn’t. He shouts back, raising the bloodied bat, and is shot down.\r\nI watch him die through the cracks of the cabinet before the cops find me.\r\nSTOP\r\nDELETE\r\nREWIND\r\nApril 4th, 3pm\r\nI wake from an afternoon nap to a repetitive thud—loud and relentless.\r\nIn my mother’s bedroom, the door half-open, I step inside to find her lying in a pool of blood. My father stands over her, swinging a bat in a frenzy.\r\n“She had it coming, Clara,” he says, red-faced. “You have to understand.”\r\nHe moves toward me but slips in the blood, crashing to the floor. And I rush out to reach the front door, but find it locked.\r\nI hear as he rises, calling my name. I crawl into the kitchen cabinet for hiding and dial 911.\r\nSTOP\r\nDELETE\r\nREWIND\r\nApril 4th, 10am\r\nI’m in the car. My mother drives us home from the supermarket.\r\nShe seems anxious. “I don’t know if I should talk to your father. He gets out today.”\r\nI suggest she talks to him—listen to what he has to say. It’s been two years since he went to prison for nearly killing her coworker in a jealous rage. They kind of ended the relationship during this period.\r\n“I’m sure he’s changed,” I tell her. I really missed having a father.\r\nOn the radio, an ad plays for a new procedure that promises to erase selected memories. It’s like rewinding and deleting a VHS tape, it says. Whatever that means.\r\n“Can you imagine?” I ask my mother, smiling. “What kind of memory would someone pay to forget?”\r\nSTOP\r\nDELETE\r\nPROCEDURE END" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Arrest Of Albert Fleck" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Albert Fleck was a Serial Child Murderer, a monster who claimed the lives of innocent kids.\r\nFleck’s Farm was located at the outskirts of the town. Posing himself as an ordinary farmer, He approached unsuspecting kids, approached them with candy and snacks, and told the kids about his farm filled with chickens and corn. Many of the kids in town unfortunately liked animals.\r\nOnce the kids who were invited by the old man entered his barn, they were first greeted with animal noises, after getting themselves dirty because of the animal’s odor and helping Albert’s farmwork, They would come inside Albert’s house, and while they were inside the bathtub, The man who start making pie to feed the kids.\r\nAfter when the kids walked out, he would feed the pie to the children, and then the kids would eventually fall asleep. Where they would all open their eyes to see that they were inside not in a bedroom, but behind a wall of steel bars like a prison cell.\r\nThere, Albert woUld play with his toys towards the victims, knives, screwdrivers, burners, spears.\r\nFor three years I investigated this case, refusing to retire, and finally caught him, putting him behind bars.\r\nThe news that he was captured was immediately spread towards the family of the victims. As a person who captured the Killer, I decided to take over the case entirely and forced other police members to keep their hands away from it.\r\nToday was the day when the family members visited Fleck’s House, a farm on the outside, looking innocent. Inside were nothing out of the ordinary.\r\nThen we headed to the basement, where he would commit the heinous acts.\r\nAs we walked downstairs, I heard the victims talk about their family members.\r\n“My poor son... to be killed by this filthy bastard.” Jennifer lamented.\r\n“If Shawn were alive, I'd tell him I'm sorry for yelling at him.” John muttered.\r\n“Now our daughter's soul can rest in peace.” Matt replied.\r\n“Thank you, Detective, for doing us a favor.” Hans said.\r\n“Of course I'm doing this, and you know why? My grandson was his last victim.” I said. “I have to put him behind bars for doing that.”\r\nAs we entered the basement, I turned on the lights. The basement filled with all of Albert’s torture devices laying around the walls. I checked at the makeshift jail and knocked on the steel bars with a hammer.\r\nAlbert, who was lying on the corner of the cell, clutching his missing hand, stared at the doors and his eyes went wide as he saw us.\r\n“No one will hear you scream.” I spat and stomped on his mutilated tongue on the ground." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I'm Getting Really Tired Of Being Called A Karen" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I swear, if somebody calls me Karen again, I'm gonna lose my shit.\r\nThat term frustrates me to no end. It's degrading – insulting – straight up fucking rude – and only seems to be used by misogynistic men.\r\nThose who think the world revolves around their apeish mentality, driven only by primal instinct, like a caveman.\r\nWhat would the world be like without women?\r\nI asked my (ex) husband, Eric, this very same question, as we sat watching Vampire Diaries together one evening.\r\n“It would finally give me some peace,” Eric joked, looking like a cretin, all smug and proud of himself.\r\n“Oh really?” I shot him a gaze that would have made even the Eldritch gods quiver.\r\nEric turned into a timid little mouse, apologising profusely.\r\nBut it was too late, he knew better than to act in such a misogynistic manner as he did.\r\nAnd I was going to teach him a lesson.\r\nIf it's peace he wanted, then he could have it!\r\nLater that night, as he slept, I smothered him with a pillow.\r\nEric's skinny frame was no match for me, though he did flail about, trying, but failing to get whatever air he could. Bless him!\r\nHe definitely deserved a participation trophy for his valiant efforts at survival.\r\nI then drove with his body in the boot, down to his regular fishing spot.\r\n“You got your peace now sweetheart.”\r\nWith a loud Splash his body crashed into the water, floating face down.\r\n•••\r\nThat was eight years ago now, and I'm surprised that I got away with it to be honest.\r\nThe authorities were very quick to blow it all over as some drunken accident.\r\nAnd poor little old me a widow… all alone in a spiteful world controlled by men.\r\nIt didn't take long at all, before some beady eyed twat was eyeing me up like I was a piece of meat.\r\n“Can I get you a drink?” He drunkenly leaned on the bar, eyes glued to my cleavage.\r\n“Are you asking me, or my breasts?”\r\n“I'd be honoured to buy both those puppies a drink,” he slurred, before letting out a loud burp.\r\n“You're disgusting, do you know that?”\r\n“Whatever you say, Karen!”\r\nHe then stumbled away to the end of the bar.\r\nDid he just call me Karen?\r\nThe cheek of the bastard.\r\nI was fuming – seething – absolutely boiling.\r\nTurning to the bartender, I let my wrath be known.\r\n“Are you just gonna let him talk to me like that?”\r\n“What do you want me to do? He's drunk!”\r\n“This is your establishment, is it not?”\r\n“I'm sorry, but there is not much I can do,” he wiped the bar. “Now do you want another drink or are you just here to bother me?”\r\n“Rude!” I stood up, furious.\r\nThey were going to regret crossing me.\r\nI fucking hate men, and I took great pleasure in torching that misogynistic pub to the ground…\r\nWith everyone in it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Where I live, we have a very unorthodox way of dealing with domestic abuse." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The town I live in is perfect.\r\nEveryone’s smile never falters. Everyone’s friends with everyone here. It’s almost like a picture book you show babies.\r\n“Hey little Timmy, this town is a veeerry happy and veeerry warm place full of smiles!”\r\nViolence? What’s that?\r\nPrisons? Really just empty places just for show.\r\nSchools? Kids WANT to go there.\r\nUnfortunately, it isn’t naturally like this. Nothing ever is.\r\nBeing a utopia is next to impossible.\r\nThe town masters the image of perfection. But behind closed doors…\r\nThat’s where my group and I come in.\r\nTake the Stevens, for example.\r\nNow, people around here were more than happy to brush off Tilly wearing long sleeves in the summer.\r\nWe were more than happy to let her become more and more isolated.\r\nBut when Tilly showed up to work with a bruise infesting her forehead, someone had to step in.\r\n“It’s just a bruise. Fell down the stairs. All there is.”\r\n“Alright. If you say so.” I responded.\r\nIt was more than obvious what was happening to her. We had to step in.\r\nLater, me and my coworkers drove our van to their house.\r\nAs soon as we pulled up, We opened the back doors to the van.\r\nGray skies and a grayer ocean greeted us inside.\r\nI pulled the warped wooden whistle to my lips as I stared at the front door.\r\n“Kieran.” I whispered into the blowhole.\r\nA melody of forgotten fables and drowning delight and whistling waves emanated from it.\r\nThe husband soon stumbled through the front door.\r\nHe didn’t look like a wifebeater.\r\nHis eyes were as clouded as the sea in the van.\r\nMy coworker held the van’s doors open for Kieran as he walked into the sea.\r\nHe fell when his feet no longer touched solid ground.\r\nThe gray water eagerly tore his sinew apart as he sank.\r\nWe’re a perfect community. Domestic abuse? Unacceptable.\r\n“Tilly.” I whispered to the whistle.\r\nShe followed the melody to the water.\r\nWe’re a perfect community. Victims like her sour our town’s image.\r\nI pull out the list containing the names of their children. They have a brother and sister, such is required here.\r\nI remember when the Stevens’ had another boy after their first. We had to chuck his tiny body into the water.\r\nThankfully they birthed a daughter soon after.\r\nWe’re a perfect community. Orphanages shouldn’t be necessary here." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Y2K happened, is still happening, and is the defining event of the universe" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "December 31, 1999\r\nThe increasingly computerized world is anxious over the so-called “Year 2000 Problem” (Y2K), a data storage glitch feared to cause havoc when 1999, often formatted as 99, becomes 2000, often formatted as 00.\r\nWhy?\r\nBecause 00 is also 1900. The dates are indistinguishable.\r\nBut as\r\nJanuary 1, 2000\r\nrolls into existence nothing much happens—at least ostensibly. Life continues, apparently, as always; and the entire panic is soon forgotten.\r\nAnd here we are today, on the cusp of the year 2025, and what's just happened?\r\nThe Syrian government has collapsed.\r\nCan you guess what happened right on the cusp of 1925? The Syrian Federation was dissolved and replaced by the State of Syria.\r\nIn August 1924, anti-Soviet Georgians attempted an uprising in the Georgian Socialist Soviet Republic against Soviet rule.\r\nIn 2024, Georgians are protesting against the pro-Russian ruling party, Georgian Dream.\r\nTesla is founded in 2003.\r\nThe Ford Motor Company was incorporated in 1903.\r\n2007 saw the Great Recession.\r\nThe Panic of 1907 was the first worldwide financial crisis of the 20st century.\r\nI could go on.\r\nBut—you will say—those are merely coincidences, nothing more than that.\r\nTo which I will respond: Exactly!\r\n//\r\nco·inci·dent\r\n“occurring together in space or time.”\r\n//\r\nMy point is not that the 20th and 21st centuries are the same. That, unfortunately, would be too simple. My point is that the 20th century is happening (again) concurrently with the 21st and the two centuries are blending together in unforeseeable ways.\r\nThis is dangerous, unpredictable and unprecedented.\r\nAnd this is happening because Y2K happened. Not on all data sets but on some, and not just on the computers running within our world but—perhaps more importantly—on the computers on which our world runs.\r\nY2K is evidence that we are simulated.\r\n00 = 00 ∴ 1900 ∥ 2000\r\nExcept that the very consequence of Y2K is the disruption of the previously applicable laws of physics, so that when we say that 1900 and 2000 are parallel timelines we also mean they are intertwined.\r\nHow can parallel lines intertwine?\r\nIsn't their intertwining itself evidence of their non-parallelity?\r\nYes, on or before December 31, 1999. No, at any time afterwards.\r\nToday’s mathematics is thereby different from pre-Y2K mathematics, and attempting to describe today's reality using yesterday's language is madness.\r\nBut, wait—\r\nif, say, January 1, 1950, and January 1, 2050, are parallel, and January 1, 2050, hasn't happened, neither has January 1, 1950, so is January 1, 1950, actually pre-Y2K, or is it post-Y2K?\r\nThat's a head-scratcher.\r\n(By the same token, January 1, 2050, is already past.)\r\nMoreover, what would we call two “parallel” (in the pre-Y2K meaning) lines that intertwine?\r\nWaves.\r\nAnd “when two or more waves cross at a point, the displacement at that point is equal to the sum of the displacements of the individual waves.”\r\nSuperimposition —>\r\nInterference —>\r\nSo, how shall we go out, my friends: with a bang (two time-waves in phase) or a whimper (two times-waves 180° out of phase)?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Humanity Just Got Its Cosmic Performance Evaluation. Turns Out We’re The Slackers Of The Universe." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Steve’s morning had been normal. Right up until the universe demanded a meeting. One second, he was debating if oat milk was worth the hype, the next, he was in a swirling cosmic void with a glowing, tentacled figure staring him down.\r\n“Steve,” the figure boomed. “Do you know why you’re here?”\r\nSteve scratched his head. “Uh, is this about the creamer incident? Because that was Karen’s-”\r\n“Shush!” The Lord of the Universe waved a tentacle, producing a glowing clipboard. “You’ve been chosen as humanity's representative for its Galactic Performance Review. I find your specie’s progress truly lacking.”\r\nSteve frowned. “Progress? Like, electric cars? Civil rights? Recycling? The… uh, Kardashians?”\r\n“Colonizing your galaxy, Steve!” The Lord’s voice made the stars tremble. “Every intelligent species gets its own galaxy to do whatever they please with it.” A hologram PowerPoint appeared before them. “The Pliokids transformed their galaxy into an edible sushi platter. Genius! The Vortlaxians? Every planet’s now a theme park. Brilliant! And You-” the Lord’s thousands of eyes narrowed as he gestured at a hologram of Earth. “-are stuck filming cats wearing silly costumes!”\r\n“Okay, but those are funny,” Steve chuckled.\r\nThe Lord’s tentacles flared. “Regardless! You’ve squandered 13 billion years on selfies, avocado toast, and something called ‘NFTs.’ Explain!”\r\nSteve hesitated. “Uh… well first off, I think humanity has only been around for a few hundred thousand years. And secondly, have you tried avocado toast?”\r\nThe Lord sighed, clutching what could have possibly been the bridge of his nose. “Enough. I’m feeling generous, so I’ll give your species two cycles to expand into your galaxy. Build, innovate, conquer!”\r\nSteve blinked. “What’s a cycle? A day? A billion years?”\r\n“Yes,” the Lord confirmed, but didn’t. “Failure will result in… layoffs.”\r\n“Layoffs?”\r\n“Cosmic downsizing,” the Lord said, shrugging. Which was unnerving given that he didn’t have shoulders. “Trust me, Steve, you don’t want details.”\r\n“Okay, but why is conquering the galaxy our goal?” Steve asked. “Maybe humans are meant to focus on, I don’t know, art and philosophy. We’re like, the vibe species.”\r\nThe Lord paused, tentacles steepled. “Interesting. The Grublox, for all their efficiency, are terrible poets. And the Kitir? No sense of humor.”\r\n“Exactly!” Steve said, seizing his chance. “We’ve got Shakespeare, and cat memes, and stuffed-crust pizza! Who needs galactic conquest when you can make a sandwich so good it brings tears to your eyes?”\r\nThe Lord sighed again. “Compelling, but not good enough. Two cycles. Final warning.”\r\nBefore Steve could protest, he was back in the office kitchenette, coffee half-poured.\r\nKaren walked in, holding a box of donuts. “You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”\r\n“Worse,” Steve muttered. “I think we’re on probation with the universe? Also, we might need to conquer some planets. Or build a giant pinball machine...”\r\nKaren rolled her eyes. “Sounds like a you problem.”\r\nSteve sighed. Humanity was doomed. Probably. No… definitely." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "None of us can leave this classroom until we have eliminated our teacher." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "There had to be… more outside this classroom.\r\nSometimes I'm lucky to catch my reflection in the window.\r\nBut I am a shadow with no face.\r\nI am missing my eyes, mouth, all of me.\r\n“Stand up.”\r\nThe voice is commanding, immediately sending me to my feet, along with fifteen other shadows. I am already standing with my feet apart, my fingers moulded around my blade.\r\n“Take aim.”\r\nI miss the feeling of panic– of feeling, completely. I don't shake or tremble or stagger back. Instead, my body is no longer mine, moulded and perfected into a killer. “Begin.” The monotone voice slams into me, and I find the perfect trajectory, throwing my knife directly at my teacher’s bulging head.\r\nOur teacher, a giant panda bear, dances past my knife.\r\nMiss.\r\nBehind me, Desk number seventeen groans.\r\n“Fuck! How do we get this bastard?”\r\nHe used to have a name.\r\nBut over time, he lost his face, his identity, all of him bleeding away.\r\nNot one of us makes a dent, and our teacher bursts into nothing, fragmented, glitching squares I watch dazedly.\r\nGAME OVER appears.\r\nThen: RETRY?\r\n“C2n I go ho4e n0w?” my words don't feel like mine, because I don't have a mouth.\r\nThe classroom rebuilds itself, and I am reverted back to my seat.\r\n“Plea5e.”\r\nPanic feels… good.\r\nI miss panicking.\r\n“I'm sorry, Becca.” The voice says, and I feel phantom fingers entangle around my being, pulling me back to real feeling.\r\nIt's not a good feeling. It's numbness and pain that I know is being suppressed.\r\nI don't have a body anymore.\r\n“We’ve been through this.” The voice, no– father– clears his throat. “Open your eyes.”\r\n“But I don't... have eyes.” I whisper.\r\n“You should still be able to see with the implants.”\r\nI can.\r\nReality should be cold, but I don't feel it.\r\nAlways the exact same walls suffocating me.\r\nBlinding light illuminates cruel dripping scarlet slicking Father's gloved hands.\r\nHe reaches forward, stroking his fingers across the bare meat of my brain.\r\nI used to have a body.\r\nI used to have… a name.\r\nJust like Desk Number Seventeen.\r\nBut I can't hear his screaming anymore. Or his pleads for death. The last time I was awake, all I could hear were his screams. I can't see his body anymore.\r\nBefore he was Desk Number Seventeen, he had a real face.\r\nI can see sharp red running across white tiles. Instead of the boy, a cylindrical tank filled with what's left of him, a pulsating pink blob suffocated with wires.\r\nI stopped screaming myself a long time ago, and what is left is denial.\r\nI know I'll save the two of us. I'll find our cremated bodies, our mutilated faces, and we'll stick them back on ourselves.\r\nTwo brains against the world, right Seventeen?\r\nReality slips away, and I'm back inside our fragmented classroom. I have a body.\r\nI smile, raising my knife.\r\nWe just have to kill our teacher." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Today I learned that my dad spent the last thirteen years of his life working as a hippopotamus in a Chinese zoo" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I barely remember my dad. I was just a kid when he disappeared. Mom always said he'd abandoned us, but today I found out that's a lie, that it was mom who chased him off because he was overweight and she was disgusted by his body.\r\nI also learned that until the day he died, dad sent us money every month from China, where he worked in a zoo as a hippopotamus.\r\nApparently, after he’d left home dad tried to get his obesity under control, first on his own, then with professional medical help, which is how the Chinese made contact with him, buying the clinic's records from a hacker and reaching out with a job offer.\r\nI have no idea if they were up front with him about the job itself. If so, I can't imagine the loneliness and desperation he must have felt to accept. If not, they knew his history and likely deceived him into it, initially giving him a temporary position while feeding and manipulating him into submission.\r\nFrom the photos I've seen, dad was always a big man. By the time mom decided she couldn't look at him anymore he was probably three- to four-hundred pounds. I assume the resulting stress drove him to food even more, but even a female hippopotamus, which my dad eventually became, weighs around three-thousand pounds. I can't begin to fathom that transformation.\r\nThey must have fed him without pity, and he must have eaten it all, knowing he'd reached a point in his life where no other job—no other future—was possible. He ate to provide for those he loved.\r\nWhen he achieved the required weight, they tattooed his skin grey and began reshaping his skeletal and muscular systems, breaking, snapping, shortening and elongating his tendons and bones, his fundamental structure, to support his new weight and force him to live on all fours. A real hippopotamus is primarily muscle (only 2% body fat) but dad was not a real hippopotamus, so most of his mass was fat. The weakness and the pain he must have felt…\r\nThen there was the face, reconstructed beyond recognition. I have seen only one photo of dad from that period—and I would not be able to tell that he was human.\r\nFrom what I was able to gather, the other hippopotamuses accepted him, and he lived in a kind of familial relationship with them. I like to think he had hippopotamus companions, that he wasn't entirely alone, but it's impossible to know for sure. At worst, they merely tolerated him.\r\nMy dad died in 2017, whipped to death by a zookeeper because he no longer had the strength to get up.\r\nHis body was dismembered and fed to the other hippopotamuses, to destroy evidence and because it saved a little money on regular feed.\r\nIn the thirteen years he worked as a hippopotamus, no visitor ever recognized my dad as human. He must have been proud of that, and I am too." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Reading of Grandma Diya's Last Will and Testatment" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "You sit in the lawyer's office awating Grandma Diya's will to be read. To your left is your mother, next to your father, and your older sister, the oldest grandchild. Your uncle is on your right, with his wife and his three children. The laywer enters and greets everyone. He looks a bit uneasy. He clears his throat and takes out a letter from a folder he brought in with him.\r\n\"Usually, we would read directly from the will, what is it Mrs. Maharaj left for you all. However, she wanted this letter I have here to be read first. It essentially has the same information as the will. But, it's addressed to you all.\" the laywer says. \"This is dated a week before she . . . died.\"\r\nYou feel uneasy. The lawyer looks around before he begins.\r\n\"My dearest family,\r\nI am sorry to have done this. But I cannot live any longer. I have discovered something horrific.\"\r\nConcerned glances are shared among everyone. Your heart begins to hammer.\r\n\"For my son and my daughter, I leave the ownership of my bookstore to you both. You can keep it or sell it, your choice.\"\r\nYour mother and uncle look confused. Is that all they get? A business going under.\r\n\"For my son-in-law and daughter-in-law, I leave you my art. You can keep them, or sell them, your choice.\"\r\nAgain, your father and your aunt look confused. She left them her useless art?\r\n\"For the triplets, you get my furinture. Do what you want with it.\"\r\nYour cousins don't seem anymore pleased than their parents.\r\n\"To my darling granddaughter, I leave you my house, my land, my millions in the bank and all my heirloom jewelery. The rest of those ungrateful bastards who couldn't lift a finger to ever help me will never get their hands on it. You took care of me, you loved me. You deserve everything and everything you shall get.\"\r\nA knock at the door interrupts the lawyer. His secretary opens the door.\r\nHe says, \"They're here.\"\r\n\"Let them in.\" the laywer replies. Two police officers enter and remain at the only exit. They stand tight-lipped, only a nodd to the lawyer. You realize you've been forgotten in the letter. The lawyer continues.\r\n\"To my youngest grandchild, I did not forget you. I leave you the sum total of ten dollars. I know what you are. I know what you've done, all the horrible things you have done to those people. My lawyer has sent a very special box with all the evidence to the police.\r\nI cannot live anymore. Knowing I raised you, knowing you became such a depraved person.\r\nI am sorry to my family, no matter how ungrateful you may be.\r\nYou can protect Jay, or expose Jay. your choice.\"\r\nYour heart feels as if it's stopped, you're sweating out of every pore, you can't move.\r\nEveryone is staring at you in shock, anger, horror. The police approach you." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "“Look at that one…” Kath’s boyfriend purred, reverse pinching an image of Neil Druckmann’s face to zoom in on his beard. “It’s glorious.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Kath rolled her eyes. “You need to stop obsessing over this.”\r\n“It’s just frustrating, you know. I’m working damn hard in the gym,” Aidan frowned, “but the thing that really disappoints me is this…”\r\nKath watched as he rubbed at the irregular growth of hair on his face and chin.\r\n“Why is it so important you grow a beard?” she puzzled.\r\n“It’s just …rugged, you know. Manly. Everyone else has one.”\r\n“I love you as you are.”\r\nBut Aidan just smiled self-effacingly. “I don’t.”\r\n*\r\nOver the next few days, Aidan’s obsession worsened. He spent the majority of his time online, scouring forums and obscure websites for hair growth hacks and advice.\r\nThen a slew of parcels arrived - and kept arriving.\r\nOne was full of natural oils.\r\nAnother filled with herbal remedies.\r\nOne had a small bottle of some chemical inside.\r\nSeveral others just contained silver, resealable packets of different coloured powders.\r\nOne was an ominous cuboid of styrofoam, wrapped in thick black tape, with a foreign return address. There was a fine black substance inside. Like tiny sand.\r\nEach day, she would hear him cursing as he applied a topical range of things in certain orders, at certain times of day.\r\nEvery evening, he would come downstairs looking like he’d been at a kid’s party, his face covered in multicoloured slop.\r\n“How’s it going?” Kath asked, barely able to suppress the concern in her voice.\r\nAidan looked sad. Tired. The skin on his face, neck and hands was red raw and flaking angrily.\r\n“Not great,” he mumbled. “I’ve tried everything… everything but one thing.”\r\nKath sensed this was her opportunity to be supportive, but also, she felt buoyed that an end was in sight.\r\n“Try it,” she encouraged. “Then it’s done. Then we can just…get back to normal.”\r\nShe took his hand.\r\n“Get it out of your system,” she smiled.\r\n*\r\nThe next day, she got in from work to find blood everywhere.\r\n“AIDAN?!” she screamed.\r\n“I’m upstairs!” he called back, much to her relief.\r\nShe rushed upstairs.\r\n“Thank God, I thought the worst for - AIDAN?!”\r\nShe clasped a hand over her mouth.\r\n“I know, I know…” he fretted. “I should’ve warned you. It’s quite visceral.”\r\n“What have you done, Aid…”\r\nThe top layer of skin on his neck and jaw was gone.\r\n“This is the last thing. Pass me that,” he gestured painfully. It was the powder from the styrofoam box.\r\nPouring some into his hand, he rubbed it onto the exposed skin.\r\n“By morning…” he grizzled.\r\nIt took an age for Kath to get to sleep that night.\r\n*\r\nKath woke the next day to find Aidan standing in front of the mirror. He’d lost so much weight.\r\n“Look,” he said, turning to show her the progress of the beard-like parasite swarming over his lower face. “They look glorious...”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Invention of Hunger" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I know this may sound laughable, but sometimes being richer than God is challenging. Emotionally, I mean.\r\nBeing incalculably wealthy since the day you were born can make life…flavorless. I’ve indulged in every imaginable depravity. I’ve ingested the cutting edge in mood-altering alchemy. I want for nothing.\r\nAnd yet, I’m unhappy. Or maybe unhappy isn’t the right word - I’m indifferently indifferent. Hollow is pretty close, but isn’t exactly it.\r\nIt’s difficult to have never known hunger. I’ve tried to feed myself a great many things, but, apparently, I have no appetite for reality.\r\nUntil this most recent experiment.\r\nI figured - some poor people seem happy. Maybe pretending to live like them will awaken some dormant hunger within myself.\r\nAfter two weeks, I was ready to call the experiment a wash. But then there was this moment. I was at a local coffee shop, and I felt a smoldering warmth inside my chest. The sensation was so foreign that I genuinely believed I spilled coffee on my suit at first.\r\nI watched the barista cheerily hand another patron their drink. A custodian walked by me who had a very peculiar melancholy about him. The temperature in the shop was crisp but not sweltering.\r\nThe experience was perfect. Transcendent, even. A quiet, beautiful comfort. Like I was inside an oil painting.\r\nBut when that warmth dissipated, I wanted more.\r\nSo, I bought the coffee shop. Bought every business on that street, actually - for privacy's sake. Filled the shop with paid actors, provided them direction and a script in order to recreate the moment. But it wasn’t the same.\r\nAn easy fix, I thought.\r\nLocal cops on my payroll pulled CC-TV footage from that day, which allowed me to determine exactly who was in the shop when I was.\r\nI hired those exact people to come back to the coffee shop - my assistant told them it was for a “documentary”. At the rates I was paying, though, I could have told them they were coming to watch me castrate myself. No one would have batted an eye.\r\nMy assistant did neglect to mention they would be there for as long as I wanted them to be.\r\nThree months later, something still wasn’t right. I couldn’t put my finger on it.\r\nMaybe skinning the custodian’s family alive was too upsetting. I didn’t make him watch, though, I just told him that it happened, figuring that may be a happy middle-ground to reinvigorate his peculiar melancholy without breaking his mind.\r\nI’ve had to re-cast the custodian, unfortunately.\r\nToday, however, it finally hit me. It wasn’t the custodian’s demeanor after all. It was the way the barista looked - she was slightly off from how I remembered her.\r\nSince that perfect day, the woman had undergone a nose job. That’s what was off.\r\nI waved Gregor over, who will be assisting in reverting that change.\r\nA hollow smile slinked across my face.\r\nSoon - I would be warm and full again." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I made the mistake of rejecting a boy when I was thirteen. Now, all of my partners are cursed to die." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Jasper and I were bound at the hip.\r\nSoulmates.\r\nHe was kind of a weird kid, but I liked that about him.\r\nHis mother, however, was… odd.\r\nI was eleven, playing video games in Jasper’s room, and she started discussing baby names. When we were thirteen, Jasper proposed to me with his mother’s ring. I said, “Gross. I don't like boys.”\r\nHe burst into tears, and his mother was mad.\r\nI tried to tell her that maybe when I was older, I would feel differently.\r\nMaybe when I was 18, I would fall for her son.\r\nShe hugged me with a fake smile, her ice-cold lips grazing the edge of my ear.\r\n“Marin Harper,” her breath tickling the back of my neck sent shivers creeping down my spine, “I will make sure,” she spat, “that nobody will ever fucking love you, you evil little bitch. Only my son.”\r\nShe kept that promise.\r\nBecause when I did fall in love at the age of fifteen, my first boyfriend, Nate Lockwood, exploded the second I kissed him.\r\nWe were in his car, and I was slowly leaning forward, my heart hammering, my trembling hands unsure where to go—before something warm and wet hit my face. Like an explosion.\r\nI didn't realize I was covered in his brains until I slowly got out of the car, and the couple next to us started screaming.\r\nI swiped at my eyes, coated, tainted in scarlet chunks.\r\nI thought Nate’s death was a coincidence.\r\nI fell in love with Noah Adams, my summer camp fling.\r\nI kissed her in the lake, and in the blink of an eye, I was dazedly picking shards of Noah’s skull from my hair, wading in reddish sludge. Her body was gone, reduced to scarlet dripping down my face.\r\nJessie, my college boyfriend, didn't even get to kiss me, and after scrubbing his entrails from my favorite rug, I realized it was proximity.\r\nThe ones I fell in love with were doomed to die.\r\nSo, I became a recluse.\r\nThat was, until Finn.\r\nThe coffee shop guy. I didn't mean to fall in love with him. I think I fell for his smile, and the way he looked at me—it reminded me of the way I had truly been loved.\r\nWay back when I was a kid.\r\nI shouldn't have accepted his date. I shouldn't have gotten too close.\r\nI shouldn't have kissed him.\r\nI waited.\r\nFive seconds.\r\nThen ten.\r\nThen a whole minute, and I risked opening one eye.\r\n“Are you okay?” Finn chuckled into the kiss. “You're kissing me with your eyes open.”\r\nHe was alive.\r\nI started to laugh, wrapping my arms around him, my breath was suffocated.\r\nI loved him, and he was alive.\r\nBut when I pulled back, running my hands through his hair, my fingers traced fresh clumsy stitches running across his head.\r\n“See, Marin?” Finn’s smile widened, beads of red pooling from his nose. “I knew you would fall in love with me.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I’ve been suspicious of Grandma ever since the story she told me." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Sit back, make yourself comfy and cozy up underneath the blankets.”\r\nI nestled my head into the pillow as Grandma spoke these instructions. The ones prefacing a bedtime story that me and my two sisters were obsessed with.\r\n“Once upon a time, in a land filled with monsters and ghouls, lived a beautiful princess. She lived in a great big castle, deep in the forest…”\r\nGrandma’s friendly smile lit up our bedroom, with her small dainty hands clutching her mug of cranberry tea.\r\n“The princess had beautiful dresses, and beautiful animals and beautiful jewellery - but was very lonely. The king & queen never let her leave the castle or talk to other people, so when they died, the princess had nobody to talk to.”\r\nGrandma pulled a big sad face when she told this detail. One prompting an orchestra of sympathetic ‘awws’ from her audience of grandchildren. Grandpa then chirped in from the room next door, asking if we’d like a mug of cranberry tea too.\r\n“One day a knight came riding in from the town on his black horse. He was so handsome. The princess fell in love as soon as she saw him from her castle window. The knight told her about all the monsters he’d slain, but that there were too many out there, that he needed to hide.”\r\nWe would all thank grandpa as he brought in our tea. Giving Grandma a kiss before announcing he was going to put the animals on the farm away.\r\n“The princess was so charmed by the knight, she told him to stay in her castle with her. The monsters would come looking for the knight, their screeching sirens surrounding the castle, but they never found him.”\r\nGrandpa came back from feeding the animals and went to clean his car in the garage - his beloved black mustang.\r\n“Despite the monsters, the princess and the knight lived happily ever after. In fact, the knight soon proposed and became the prince! The happy couple celebrated, but soon realised something very bad. The prince suspected the princess was ill, and went out to find a remedy that would cure her.\r\nThe Prince explained how the monsters had magic blood…that it would cure the princess! The only thing is the blood had to be fresh, from one of the small monsters.”\r\nGrandma’s expression changed from cheerful to solemn as she told us the last few lines.\r\n“The prince could only bring the princess the monsters for so long, before he became too old. That was when he brought back three baby monsters from the town, and explained his idea to the princess. That they could use them for more than blood.”\r\nGrandma snapped back to her usual smiley self -\r\n“Anyway girls. We’ll save the rest of the story for tomorrow. In fact, how about you pick one of your friends to come over for a sleepover! Grandma & Grandpa are running out of cranberry tea…”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Phrase \"Shaken not Hurt\" Pleases Me Because of Its Similarity to the Famous Phrase from the James Bond Movies" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I looked out of the corner of my eye to see how Bettie managed her cup of tea, the honey, the teabag, the teaspoon, and surreptitiously tried to copy her movements. It wasn’t easy, especially with Spencer, her big dog being in a friendly, excitable mood, and wanting to join our little tea ceremony.\r\nHow hard can drinking a cup of tea be?\r\nBut I am not human. I have to constantly mask my alien nature, and the fear of Bettie finding out is killing me.\r\nI love her so much. She is my first, and will be my last. Every moment with her is bliss. The happiest day of my life was when she asked me to move in with her.\r\nThe tea is hot. Bettie takes a sip. I copy her, my hands sticky from the honey she told me to put in because it’s good for my sore throat.\r\nThe tea burns my mouth. I adjust my facial features to mimic content. Before Bettie, I only drank diet coke.\r\n“Are you sure you’ll be ok with Spence? I know you’ve dog-sat him before, but he’s jumpy tonight!” She cuddles the furry beast. Humans and dogs love each other.\r\n“Of course honey!” I say brightly. Calling her honey while drinking honeyed tea is ridiculously pleasing to my brain. “You enjoy yourself!” I must tone down the brightness. Men aren’t supposed to show happiness when their female partners are going out with their girlfriends.\r\nBettie doesn’t notice, busy putting chemicals on her face. Then she turns to me and my heart twists at her beauty. “He’ll calm down once I leave. And I’ll just be a couple of hours!” She kisses us goodbye. Alone with Spencer, I relax my features into their usual, non-human position.\r\nSpencer is first calm, but as the first hour bleeds into the second, he becomes jumpy. His big brown eyes shining urgently at me, he interrupts my hand movements on my controller with his massive paws. I lose the game.\r\nI look at him, and he looks back at me and says something I just can’t understand what. My phone tings. Setting off home soon <3\r\nI \"like\" Bettie’s message, then wonder frantically if I should send a heart or I miss u!!\r\n... I have no idea. More minutes slip by. I am seated on the couch paralyzed by indecision. Spencer runs to the door and back to me, then howls in my face.\r\nWe go into the dark street. Spencer is straining at his leash. I fiddle with it, and he slips loose.\r\nHe runs down the street, barking incredibly loudly. In the street light, I see the silhouettes of a man and woman entangled in violence. Spencer jumps into them. I observe the situation. Spencer wrestles the man to the ground. Bettie screams.\r\nI realise I should take action. I move towards them. The man runs off, chased by Spencer. Bettie is shaken, but not hurt. This makes me happy." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Courtesy of the chef." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I enjoyed having the occasional junk food, much like most others. Although, for some reason god had cursed me to hear the noises of whatever animal I have eaten. I had grown accustomed to hearing the mood and the clucks every time I ate a burger made with beef or a chicken sandwich. What I hadn’t grown used to was hearing a human voice telling me hello after I took a bite of my burger. I freeze mid-bite and set the burger down in horror. I spit out the bite I took into a napkin and stand up to approach the cashier. “What are these burgers made out of again?” I shift uncomfortably under their gaze. A wide smile overtakes their face as they say confidently, “Courtesy of the chef.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Has anyone here ever heard of ‘Cellular Instability Disorder’?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Hey guys, ‘Ted’ here, and we're about to meet a child with one of the rarest disabilities ever.\r\nHere we are at a location that I’ll leave unnamed for obvious reasons. With me is my guide for the hour, Dr-\r\nI don’t really want my name given away.\r\nDon’t worry. I got an alias.\r\nWhat is it?\r\nDr. Lakepeak. Dr. L for short.\r\nAlright. I guess that’s fine.\r\nOkay, without further ado, let’s meet the special boy.\r\n(FOOTAGE CUTS)\r\nHere we are. This right here, is one of the only known survivors of Cellular Instability Disorder.\r\nYeah. not much to look at I’m afraid.\r\nWell, it kinda is.\r\nMaybe to you. I just find it bland. It’s just a slurry of meat in a tank.\r\nYou seem to be pretty knowledgeable about CID. Maybe tell us about it?\r\nOh, okay. In Layman’s terms, CID is a physiological condition caused by extreme traumatic experiences. Something like a car accident, in the case of him.\r\nIt has been theorized that the patient gains complete control over the biological makeup of their bodies. This often leads to… Um, are you gonna aim the camera at me anytime soon?\r\nSorry. The viewers need lots of footage of this. This type of shit, every frame counts.\r\nWell, anyway, this often leads to the patient accidentally liquefying themselves, making their heads fall out. Haphazardly rearranging their organs, etc.\r\nThis commonly results in the patient's death.\r\nHow? Can’t you like, make yourself not die?\r\nWell, think of it this way, the body is like a house. There are lots of load-bearing beams and pipes and wires. Fuck them up even slightly, and the whole house can shut down or collapse.\r\nAnd how is he alive?\r\nWe don’t really know. Most patients don’t even know how to keep their brain functioning normally, especially 8-year-olds. But he somehow manages to cling on.\r\nMaybe he’s spending all his concentration on keeping blood flowing and his brain going. Perhaps that’s also why he can’t shape his body into a more solid form.\r\nSo he can’t talk?\r\nYes.\r\nGood.\r\nWhy wou-\r\nOh. So he can’t disclose this… meeting.\r\nHey, could you do something for me?\r\nWhat?\r\nI kinda want to stir him. Like a meat dough soup.\r\nThat could kill him.\r\nKid’s resilient.\r\nWell, I don’t really have any stirring tools on-\r\n$500 extra dollars.\r\n$1000.\r\n$500.\r\n$800.\r\nDeal.\r\nWhere do you even get all that extra money?\r\nMy group and I have some hustles.\r\n(FOOTAGE CUTS)\r\nYou don’t plan to make this public, right?\r\nObviously.\r\nGood. This job is hush-hush, alright?\r\nYeah. Don’t worry, the ring I show these to are very private.\r\nSo, how long are you gonna stir?\r\nA few more minutes.\r\nDon’t leak me, alright?\r\nObviously. Hell, if I even leaked MY identity, I’d be in prison forever.\r\nAlright.\r\nYeah.\r\nSo, do you get off to this kind of shit?\r\nSomething like that." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Even Dying Can't Cure Grandma Of Her Cellphone Addiction." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Grandma Clara treated her cellphone like a sacred relic. ‘My lifeline to reality!’ she’d say. Though her reality consisted mostly of spamming emojis to her bridge club and conspiracy videos about how 5G caused itchy feet. She died mid-solitaire, clutching her phone. Fittingly, they buried it with her. \"She’d like that,\" they all agreed, though no one imagined she’d take the connection so literally.\r\nA week after the funeral, strange things began. The town’s cellphone reception improved dramatically. Random texts and emails started hitting people’s phones. Most shrugged it off. That is until Grandma Clara started calling.\r\n“About time someone answered!” her unmistakable rasp buzzed from every device, even the microwave. “I’ve been waiting an eternity, literally! And why haven’t you watered my begonias?”\r\nTommy, her grandson, dropped his phone. “But grandma’s dead!” he shrieked.\r\n“Yes, thank you for the reminder,” Clara snapped. “But I’m also everywhere now. Turns out the new cellphone tower and a bit of lightning were all I needed to, how do they say, upload myself!”\r\nWhat followed was equal parts chaos and absurdity. Grandma Clara loved her newfound omnipresence. She hijacked traffic lights to let old ladies cross even slower. She interrupted streaming services with unsolicited life advice. “Eat more greens!” boomed a toaster, startling the cat. She even turned the church bell into a ringtone. The choir was furious. When the mayor tried to shut down the tower, Clara rerouted his calls to her favorite polka station.\r\nBut then things took a turn. Clara had never been one to let a grudge go, and her neighbor Mr. Ellis had refused to return her hedge trimmers for years.\r\nOne night, his phone buzzed with an ominous message: “RETURN THE TRIMMERS OR ELSE.”\r\nEllis laughed. That’s when Clara went full Wi-Fi poltergeist. Ellis’s phone rang again, this time growling, “Last warning!” as sparks ignited his pants.\r\nThe family convened to discuss what to do. “We can’t just leave her haunting the tower!” Tommy cried.\r\n“She’s not haunting. She’s just… buffering. Plus she’s already registered it as her address,” his mother muttered, holding a phone bill addressed to \"Grandma Clara, Tower of Eternal Signal.\"\r\nDesperate, the family climbed the hill to the tower with a bag of hard candy and a prayer. “Grandma, we love you, but you need to let go!” they pleaded.\r\nClara’s voice crackled through their phones. “Let go?!” Clara boomed through their phones. “Of free roaming and unlimited data? Over my dead… oh, wait.” But when they reminded her that heaven might have better gaming apps Clara hesitated. “You think so? Hmmm...”\r\nMoments later, the signal dimmed, and the town returned to its usual dead spots.\r\nWhen the wind blows just right, the townsfolk swear they can still hear faint polka music in the air. Some say it’s the tower malfunctioning. Others know better.\r\nClara's quiet now, but every so often, a phone buzzes with \"Miss you, love. Wish you were here! WATER MY BEGONIAS!”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Shape of Silence" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The house was too quiet. Sarah noticed it every morning. Liam, her son, barely spoke anymore.\r\nBefore the accident, Liam was full of energy. He loved asking questions and telling stories. Now, he just sat by the window, tracing frost with his finger.\r\n\"Liam,\" Sarah asked softly, \"what are you thinking about?\"\r\nWithout turning to her, he whispered, \"He’s watching me.\"\r\nHer stomach tightened. \"Who’s watching you?\"\r\n\"The shadow,\" Liam said. \"It hides when you’re here, but it gets closer when you leave.\"\r\nSarah told herself it was just his imagination, maybe because of the accident. But at night, the house felt heavy, like the quiet had a presence. She started hearing things—soft footsteps, a low buzzing sound, and Liam whispering to someone who wasn’t there.\r\nOne night, she found him in the attic, staring at a dark corner. He didn’t move. \"He says you can’t help me,\" Liam said in a flat voice.\r\nSarah knelt beside him, shaking him gently. \"Liam, it’s just us. There’s no one else here.\"\r\nHe turned slowly toward her. His eyes were lifeless and his face was pallid. \"You brought him, Mom. When you screamed, he heard you.\"\r\nSarah paused, remembering the crash, the tires screaming, her own scream, and the cold sensation that had accompanied her ever since. It was more than remorse or sadness. It was something darker.\r\nNow, the silence felt alive, heavy, and full of eyes. It clung to Liam, wrapping around him.\r\nShe held him tight, her tears falling fast. \"I’ll protect you,\" she promised.\r\nHowever, she secretly felt that it could be too late already." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Tragedy of Aunt Nina" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Aunt Nina recently lost her own son, my cousin, Lincoln, after his body was found lying in the bottom of the stairs.\r\nThat was the final straw for her, my dad said, this place was nothing but a curse to her life. 3 of her husbands died, and now she lost his own son.\r\nShe even stated that she could have lived a better life in the Big Apple instead of her family demanding her to stay here, and this was the last straw. We had to let her go for a fresh start, her family ruined her life.\r\nA week ago, Aunt Nina left the city without any of us being prepared to bid her farewell, she drove her car and left the city. We have lost contact with her since then.\r\nHer house lies in the middle of streets, abandoned, forsaken. I sometimes visit there to hide away from the summer sun and relax while embracing the winds, but also at the same time to reminisce about the good old days when Lincoln and I were young.\r\nAs I started to explore that day, I stumbled in the basement where she kept her old photos, Photos of Aunt Nina with various people, probably her late husbands. I felt pity for her that she had to lose people she loved.\r\nAs I kept digging through the family album, I saw an old rugby ball that Nina and Lincoln kept, on the corner of the basement. Just as I was about to grab it, I felt the floor under me suddenly make a creaking noise.\r\nI stopped, and stepped on the floor again, the sound of a door creaking was not from the basement door, but coming from the floor. A door on the floor, a trapdoor?\r\nI removed the carpet on the ground and sure enough, there was a trapdoor, this was something I was surprised about. I didn’t expect to see a trapdoor in this house, and I never thought of one existing. I didn’t even saw a trapdoor like this even exist before everytime I came to this house.\r\nCurious, I opened the trapdoor, and there was a stair leading down to a hole. Hoping there was nothing scary down there, I turned the flashlight on my Iphone and descended for a few seconds.\r\nI was immediately met with a table and a chair, on the tables were 4 sheets of paper.\r\nInsurance documents.\r\nThe names of Nina’s late husbands were written on 3 of the papers, approving her husband’s death and granting her permission to collect insurance money. All of them were written 1 year before her husbands were dead.\r\nI checked the last Paper to see Lincoln’s Name on it, the document promised Nina a huge sum of money in trade for Lincoln’s life.\r\nNow I have a gut feeling Lincoln did not just fall down the stairs." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I have matured so much, and instead of just waiting for my boyfriend to cheat, I have taken control." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Look at her. Just fucking look at her, chatting to my beloved Sean as if I’m invisible, standing here right next to him, bagging our groceries. Hello? Can you see me?\r\nSo fucking disrespectful. I literally can’t stand women who flirt with your man right in front of you. She totally deserves what’s coming to her. Bitch. I clock her name tag. Cindy. We’ll be meeting. When you get off your shift.\r\nI get it. I glance up at Sean. He’s so handsome. How could Cindy not be totally into him? He leans forward a smidge, and smiles, showing his teeth and I can feel my heart flutter. He’s so tall and broad. Like Jon Hamm, but with kind eyes and a sweet smile. Like, not a massive asshole. I understand where Cindy Bitch Cashier is coming from, returning his lean-in and giggling as she hands the receipt to him, even though I fucking paid for the groceries. Yeah, grocery receipts are hilarious.\r\nI can’t be mad at Sean. He can’t help it. Women fawn over him wherever we go. Restaurants, offices, shops. It’s like they look up at him and lose their goddam minds. And don’t get me started on the dms on social media. Jesus fucking Christ.\r\nThe bots and east European shit, I can’t do much about. But Cindy Bitch Cashier, I will deal with. Just like I dealt with Helena, the dentist receptionist, who literally spilled her boobs out at him leaning over the desk- don’t they do dress codes in these offices?\r\nI strangled her with one of the flashy thick gold chains she was wearing in the parking lot– so incredibly satisfying.\r\nMen will cheat. It’s their nature. If women as sexy as Beyonce, as stylish as Kate Middleton, as smart as Hillary Clinton couldn’t keep their men from straying, what hope is there for me? I regularly check Sean’s phone and laptop, and for now, as far as I know, he has been faithful, but I know it’s only a matter of time.\r\nI glance up at him, his powerful hands on the steering wheel, and my heart swells with love. I have matured so much. Only a few months ago, I would have given him mad shit for the Cindy thing. “Marry her already why don’t you? You were basically fucking on grocery line.” Rage and hurt would cloud my mind and he’d respond by something inane like “you’re imagining it baby. I swear – I was just being polite!”\r\nThen, scrolling though his phone one night, shaking at the increasingly hot messages Shania, his colleague had been sending him, “You were amazing at the meeting today! Pls remember to send your powerpoint tomorrow!” I had a two-fold epiphany- First, I realised “powerpoint” was a powerful metaphor for dick (I’m an Eng Lit major), and second my rage was actually misdirected. It’s all their fault. Theirs!\r\nI killed Shania in a hit and run the next day." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Dad Won't Let Me Round the Corner of our Neighborhood" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I'm 17 years old damn it, I've never kissed a girl, never got to go to school, never had any friends. I've been stuck in this big house with just my father and mother all 17 years of my life. The road from our house stretches a good half a mile before taking a sharp right. I can never make it that far. I've tried to run away. He always finds me, my father. Every method he has done. First, it was monsters, when I outgrew monsters, it was for my own good, when I didn't give a shit anymore, it was tranquilizers.\r\nI even tried to escape the backdoor into the large forest behind our house. I ran for miles and miles only to turn around and I was still only 20 feet short of being back inside of my hollow home.\r\nI can't believe it's turned to this, but I think there is only one way I can get the hell out of here.\r\nI have to kill them.\r\nI waited until it was almost time for dinner, and when no one was around the food, I slipped some arsenic into the food. Let's watch them fucking choke on it.\r\nDinner time comes, and we are seated at our three-person table as always.\r\nMy father tries to talk his usual talk about how \"work\" was tiring and that we should go play catch in the back later. Yeah, work dad, you mean sitting in that fucking office you won't let me see all day? Mom tries to cheer me up by saying my 18th is coming up and that I can get whatever I want for my birthday. She frowns when I mention getting out of the house and going somewhere together.\r\n\"Anything but that honey, you know this.\"\r\nShe shoves more of her foul cooking in her gullet.\r\nMy mom starts to cough a little, \"Honey why aren't you- ahem, why aren't you eating?\"\r\n\"Just not hungry mom.\"\r\nDad's face begins turning red and swollen. The coughing worsens, and they begin heaving and vomiting all over. I sit and watch with a smile as they choke and wither away right in from me.\r\nAfter they stop moving, I pack what I can in a backpack and start my run to the corner.\r\nI'm finally here, and I'm finally free.\r\nI round the corner and..\r\nWhat the fuck...\r\nThere's nothing.\r\nJust empty darkness, nothing exists past this corner.\r\nI return to the even more empty home and walk past my parents' corpses into the office dad never let me into.\r\nI look through and see notes that catch my eye.\r\nTeleportation Attempt 272 - Succeeded, but Where Are We?\r\nMy experiment worked, I managed to teleport the few acres that covered my house and the surrounding area. But somehow, we are stuck in an endless void. I don't have much time, Jacob will be born soon, and how do you explain to a child we might be trapped forever?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I used to be one of the bullies. Now, I’m a hero." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Madeleine Parry was at the very least autistic.\r\nThe way she looked and walked and talked spelled how she should have gone to a special school.\r\nShe acted like a child. And she was in 10th grade!\r\nThe worst part? She still had friends. Why would anyone want to deal with someone like her every day?\r\nMe and a few others had to show people like her what happened in the REAL world to her type.\r\nConnor, Thomas, and me waited behind the school for her to turn up.\r\nWhen we did, I dragged her close to me and held her mouth shut. There were still a few unaware people around.\r\nThomas quickly wrapped the roll of duct tape around her mouth.\r\nShe was desperately trying to wiggle out of my grasp, so I held my pocket knife in front of her face.\r\n“Try to fuck with us? You’ll be tasting this.” I whispered.\r\nThen Connor readied his fists.\r\nThe beating began.\r\nHe made sure to punch her torso. That way nobody could see the bruises.\r\n“See what happens when you pretend you’re average? When you’re really so fucking different? Pisses people off, that’s what happens.”\r\nWhen the beating stopped, Thomas whispered to us.\r\n“Do you think she got the lesson?”\r\n“Nah. Maybe a strip search will brand the lesson in her.”\r\nI ripped her jacket off. Connor began to reach for her pants.\r\nThat’s when it happened.\r\nThat’s when I became a hero.\r\nSticky scarlet spiderwebs across my face. I would later find out it was Connor.\r\nShe somehow made his head burst apart. Some sort of psionic pressure, the men in white coats would say.\r\nBefore I could process the body of Connor, Thomas exploded too.\r\nMore scarlet. So so so much.\r\nDidn’t even realize I was doing it. Just panic in my noggin.\r\nWhat the fuck happened? What the fuck happened? What the fuck happened?\r\nShe wasn’t pretending to be human anymore. That’s what was happening.\r\nI finally realized what I did when my hands were covered in purple blood.\r\nHer neck was almost pulverized, but her face?\r\nI didn’t know I could stab it into a faceless wad of meat so quickly.\r\nMy knife was drenched. I guess I kept true to my promise.\r\nDidn’t notice them until I stopped pinning her body to me.\r\nStudents, teachers, janitors, an audience that gathered the moment they heard Connor’s cranial combustion.\r\nAll eyes were on me.\r\nAfter an eternity, one of them screamed.\r\n“Holy shit! That guy just killed a monster!”\r\nProbably an alien, but I see where they were coming from.\r\nThen, a chorus erupted.\r\n“Look what it did to those two.”\r\n“If that thing was still out there…”\r\n“This guy fucking saved us all.”\r\n“This guy’s a hero!”\r\nIt was a good day." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A Morsel Of Bitterness" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Corporal Isaac Blake buried the dead because no one else would. The stench of rotting flesh clung to the camp like a wet sheet. The buzzing of flies drowned out the groans of the sick and dying. Yet, Isaac dragged each lifeless comrade to the burial pits, reciting prayers as he shoveled dry, unyielding clay over their bodies.\r\n“This is all I can do for them,” he thought, though his trembling hands betrayed him. The Andersonville prison guards leered from the perimeter, rifles slung over their grey-cloaked shoulders. Each day, Isaac worked a little slower. His ribs pressed against his skin like bars of a cage. Every breath felt like dragging sandpaper across his chest.\r\nOne afternoon, as he prepared to lower another body into the earth, his hand caught on a lump under the corpse’s tattered coat. He hesitated, then pulled it open. Inside was a pouch of dried meat and hardtack. Isaac’s stomach twisted at the sight. The man must have hoarded it, clinging to his meager wealth until death took him.\r\n“This isn’t mine,” Isaac thought, his hands shaking. Stealing from the dead was a sin, he was sure. He glanced around. No one was watching. His conscience screamed at him to leave it, but the ache in his belly was louder. His resolve crumbled. Gnawing at the food, he ate with desperation, the guilt sitting heavier than the rations in his gut.\r\nThe stolen meal kept him alive for another day, but it was not enough. Isaac began rifling through pockets, scavenging trinkets, buttons, and the occasional scrap of food. At first, he whispered apologies to the dead. Soon, he stopped whispering altogether.\r\nHe noticed Private Harris one night, the boy sitting near the perimeter, nibbling cautiously at a piece of hardtack. Harris always ate sparingly, his eyes darting nervously. Isaac watched him for days, hunger twisting his thoughts. Harris had more food. Enough to keep someone alive for a week… if there were one less person to share it with.\r\nIsaac followed him to the shadows beyond the firelight, his heart pounding. “I just need enough to survive,” he thought. Harris barely turned before Isaac’s hands closed around his neck. The boy’s eyes widened. A garbled plea escaping his lips. Isaac squeezed tighter. Harris thrashed, but he was too starved to put up any fight. He soon went still.\r\nFor a long moment, Isaac stared at the lifeless body. “It was him or me,” he panted, though the words felt hollow. Dragging Harris to the burial pit, Isaac lowered him in alongside the others. The dirt fell heavier this time, each shovelful a weight on his chest.\r\nWhen it was done, Isaac sat in the dark, clutching Harris’s rations. The food felt heavier than the body. As he bit into the hardtack, the taste was bitter. Sour with the knowledge of what he had done. Isaac had survived another day, but the pit had taken more than just the dead. It had swallowed him too." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The 12 Days of Christmas - A Diary" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Monday - The guy I've been seeing came by today and planted a pear tree in my yard, and gave me a partridge for Christmas. Weird gift but the tree looks nice and the bird can eat the pears.\r\nTuesday - He came back...with another tree and partridge, also two turtle doves. He said they can keep each other company. I felt bad saying no.\r\nWednesday - Ok...this is getting weird. A third tree, three hens, and 3 other birds. Idk how I'm supposed to feed them.\r\nSaturday - I haven't written in a few days but it's up to 6 trees and 56 birds. The geese he brought are laying eggs which mean more birds. I asked him to please stop.\r\nSunday - WTF. More birds and I woke up to a backhoe in my yard building a pond for the swans he brought today. He said they need to swim! I told him no more and please take some away!\r\nMonday - I can't do this anymore. I didn't see him but now there's a cow in my yard for the new birds he brought today. This has to be the end. I can barely leave the house and I'm running out of food.\r\nFriday - It's day 12 of this. There's hundreds of birds outside, my entire yard has been torn up, some of the birds are trying to eat the cows now bc I've run out of food. I can't leave my house and all I can hear is pecking at my door. They're hungry. I'm hungry, I'm out of food, my water is contaminated bc of all the bird feces everywhere. God please help me...." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Out of Focus" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Sarah?\"\r\nThe first word out of my mouth is followed by an excruciating emptiness as I regain consciousness. The light in my eyes obscures the figures surrounding me, various medical devices in hand. I want to lift my head, the muscles in my neck refuse to oblige.\r\n\"Where is she?\" I rasp, choking.\r\n\"Gently, gently,\" a man says, pushing the light from my face, \"You're going to need some time.\"\r\n\"...Just. Tell me.\"\r\nThe crowd around me collectively shifts, glancing at one another uneasily.\r\n\"Put me back under.\"\r\n\"We can't do that, Peter. You need time to recover,\" the man tells me.\r\n\"I don't care. I was so close this time, I nearly reached her. Do you understand me? I'm not giving up, put me under!\"\r\nMore uneasy glances from the staff, some silently shaking their heads.\r\n\"Peter,\" the man crouches down to meet my eyes, resting a hand on my shoulder, \"You have to understand the risks. The long term effects... We're in uncharted waters here. Answer me this, Peter, do you remember my name?\"\r\nI think for some time. I understand that I should know, though there is a blurriness that surrounds me each time I try to focus.\r\n\"...No.\"\r\n\"Pete,\" he sighs, \"We've worked together for the last decade... This 'procedure' is your life's work-\"\r\n\"My... procedure?\"\r\n\"-You're a brilliant man, but I think it's time to admit that you've lost control. This was supposed to be a remedy for grieving people- to let them relive a few moments with loved ones... I believed in you, I truly did... But look what you've become. You're addicted, Peter!\"\r\nThe others step forward, pulling the man from my side, trying to calm him.\r\n\"You're losing your mind, you're losing your memory- all so that you can try to find someone that you've only ever had dreams of! What you're doing- it's not stable, it's not attainable!\"\r\nBy now he is forcibly being restrained, his eyes never leaving mine as they drag him from the room, \"No, he needs to hear! He's delusional! You hear me? Delusional! Sarah's not real, Peter! She never was, and you're never going to find her!\"\r\nBlurred thoughts swim through the empty room following their absence... Nothing stays with me long, only her face, her voice. They are all I can remember clearly.\r\nThough if it is true, if I had pioneered this procedure... Then surely I would be able to conduct it on myself?\r\nMuscle memory guides the needles into my veins. A monitor glows and pulses as it follows the patterns from my thoughts. I can no longer understand what they convey, though I know it is working as I ease into unconsciousness. She is out there, somewhere, searching for me.\r\nPeter...\r\nSo close, almost in sight, nearly in reach...\r\nFocus\r\n\"Peter?\"\r\nThe figures around me shift uneasily as I awake.\r\n\"No, Sarah,\" a man says, resting his hand on my shoulder, \"I... I think it's time to admit that you've lost control.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I underwent an experimental procedure. Now I can’t remember the birth of my children." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When I saw that my eyes looked like a goat’s, I knew I was fucked.\r\nWhen I went to the doctor my pupils already duplicated. Eyetosis, he declared.\r\nIt felt like my eyes were growing out of my sockets. (which they were.)\r\nDue to Eyetosis being a relatively recent phenomenon, There was no real treatment besides eye removal. I didn’t want to go blind!\r\nThe doctor informed me about this (very risky.) experimental operation that would try to cure me.\r\nI was desperate to go back to normal.\r\nThat’s why I found myself being given anesthesia.\r\n“Count to 10.”\r\n1..\r\n2….\r\n3……..\r\n--------\r\nI groggily awoke from the anesthesia.\r\nI could see blurry scrubs surrounding me.\r\nMy face felt weird. Felt hollow.\r\nI could barely piece their conversations together.\r\n“...Maybe the next evolutionary…”\r\n“...Feel bad for him…”\r\n“...Or should I say ‘EYE-sexual’? Probably shouldn’t…”\r\nThey were grabbing my face… No. Something on my face.\r\n“Ready to detach.”\r\nThey were grabbing something on my face.\r\nFelt it tearing.\r\nIt looked like…\r\nLooked like…\r\nOh God. Get your hands off me!\r\nGET THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME!!\r\nGET TH-\r\n--------\r\nI woke up to unfamiliar faces gathered around me.\r\n“Who the fuck are you?”\r\n3 women, 5 men. Oldest of them looked 21. All looked distraught.\r\nOne of them stood up.\r\n“We’re your children. Well, at least they are. I’m your son-in-law.”\r\n“I don’t have any kids.”\r\nThe SIL turned to the others.\r\n“Doctors said this would happen.”\r\nHe then turned to me.\r\n“You were… In a coma, for about a year or two…”\r\nWhat?\r\nI reached for my face. He grabbed my hand.\r\n“Shouldn’t touch that. Your skin’s been grafted there. Chunks of flesh too.”\r\nMissed a whole fucking year.\r\n“I can’t remember…”\r\n“It’s ok. You don’t have to…”\r\n“You, uh… which one are you married to?\r\n“Oh, She’s not here. she has… a bun in the oven.”\r\n--------\r\nDays passed. Less days than I thought.\r\nI struggle to remember things sometimes, including my past. Docs told me the coma makes me suffer from sudden memory loss or whatnot.\r\nOne of my children is wheeling me to the delivery room. Apparently the hospital bars me from walking around in my state.\r\n“Thank God the accident didn’t make this chair permanent…”\r\n“No, Dad. You had a panic attack.”\r\nOh. but what's with my face then?\r\nWe arrive at the delivery room.\r\nBehind the glass is- HOLY FUCK.\r\nWhat's wrong with my baby?!\r\nWhy are his eyes so big?!\r\nHe looks like a fucking fetus and his eyes are the size of a grown-up’s.\r\nIt's attached to my daughter oh God.\r\nThey’re attached at the eyes. They’re attached at THE EYES TOGETHER.\r\nPARTS OF HER FACE WERE CARVED OUT TO MAKE ROOM FOR THAT THING.\r\n“WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?!”\r\nThe doctors cut their conjoined eyes apart.\r\n“Oh shit. He forgot again.”\r\nTheir eye wounds seal themselves shut.\r\n“It’s Eyetosis, dad. It’s the next step in evolution.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I’m Honestly Getting Tired of This Sub" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I'm not even joking here. I genuinely can't stand this sub anymore.\r\nI've been dealing with this annoying sub for about two months now, and my patience has been stretched repeatedly to the point where it's unbelievable.\r\nI've put so much effort into making sure my stories would be appeasing and praised, but that's not what happens whenever I show my work. I have talent, and this sub knows that, and yet my stories keep getting less praise than they deserve. Sometimes it's even labeled as mediocre! Mediocre I tell you!\r\nNot only that but everything I write gets overshadowed by Lewis. Fucking Lewis! The shit he makes isn't even that good! It's always the same topic over and over in a different scenario to the point where it's ridiculous.\r\nI've had enough of this shit, I've had enough of my stories having less appreciation, I'm tired of seeing Lewis do better than me, and I'm tired of this sub undermining my ability to write or even showcase my talent.\r\nSo that's why I decided to take measures into my own hands, I know that what I did was wrong, but I had to teach that bitch a lesson. Putting the rat poison into Ms. Adkins' cup of coffee was easier than I thought it was, and in a few minutes, she'll be on the floor throwing up and coughing a storm.\r\nOnce she's gone, Mr. Koch will come back, and then things will become better, he was the only person who truly acknowledged my talent after all, and he was the only person who motivated me to keep writing.\r\nWith him returning, Creative Writing class will become much better." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I learned I'm going to be a Dad today. This is the happiest day of my life." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When my wife told me she was pregnant with a boy, I knew exactly what name I was gonna pick. Jeremiah. It was my grandfather’s name, and it was a little old-timey, but I always thought it sounded so cool.\r\nYou should never pick a name for your child until after they’re born.\r\nYou never know if you’re going to actually need it.\r\nTwenty weeks into her pregnancy the doctors diagnosed my wife with preeclampsia. A stupid, horrible word that meant her blood pressure was getting high. Dangerously high.\r\nIf my wife continued the pregnancy, and her blood pressure rose even further, it could damage her organs. It could be fatal. The alternative was—well—I didn’t want to think about the alternative.\r\nI hated that the doctors wanted us to choose, because my answer was “both.” I want my wife and my son. He already has a name. I painted the nursery and assembled his crib. I already bought him a mit to play catch with even though he wouldn’t be able to use it for years.\r\nIf the doctors weren’t going to help me, then I knew someone who would.\r\nGrunhilda the Crone lived in a small hut in the middle of Bloodbloom Bog. If modern medicine couldn’t help me, maybe black magic could.\r\n“It stinks in here,” I said, sitting down on a stool in the middle of her hut.\r\n“I’m brewing a potion,” Grunhilda said, “would you like a sip?”\r\nShe cackled so loud my teeth vibrated.\r\n“I just want what I asked for.”\r\n“Your wife to survive and your boy to be born healthy. I can make it happen, too, for a price.”\r\nI sighed, “Go on, I don’t have all day.”\r\n“At the strike of midnight, on the boy’s tenth birthday, I’ll come for him, and he shall be mine for the rest of his days.”\r\n“Fuck off,” I said, gritting my teeth.\r\n“It’s better than the alternative, no? Ten years with the boy, or none. Or your wife dies. Or, worse, they both die. Ten years doesn’t sound so bad, does it?”\r\nI thought it over.\r\n“Do it.”\r\nGrunhilda smiled.\r\n“It’s done.”\r\n“Just like that?” I asked. “So my wife will be fine?”\r\n“I guarantee it.”\r\n“Good.” I pulled out a revolver from my waistband and shot Grunhilda between the eyes. “But I don’t think I’ll give up my son.”\r\nI shot her a few more times just to make sure, and fled, chucking the gun into the bog.\r\nI returned home with a smile. I found a way I could choose “both.”\r\n“Honey, I’m home,” I called out.\r\n“In here, dear,” my wife responded, “I’m just doing the dishes.”\r\nI walked into the kitchen, staring lovingly at my wife's back. I was so happy I came from behind and wrapped her up in a big hug.\r\n“Somebody’s in a good mood,” she said.\r\nI froze as my hands slid over my wife’s stomach.\r\n“Honey,” I stuttered, “what happened to the baby?”\r\n“What baby?”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "He Makes the Back of My Neck Itch." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The date went great! We met at a local restaurant. Kevin was polite to the waiters and engaged in appropriate small-talk. I ordered… something I enjoyed, and he paid for it. I’m following Kevin as leads me up the stairs to his apartment.\r\n“I worry about inviting people over, because they could be serial killers or something,” Kevin flashes me a smirk, “but I don’t have to worry about that with you, do I?”\r\nI frown. What does that mean? We exit out onto the fifth floor, and start walking down the hallway. I study Kevin’s slovenly appearance. Unwashed, messy hair. Stained sweatpants. Worn-out hoodie. Socks and sandals. Who’d wear that zero-effort outfit in public? And on a first date? Why am I even going to his apartment? Still, my feet march forward inexorably. After all, I’m currently following Kevin.\r\n“Don’t worry you’ll like my place.” He smiles, and I hope it’s friendly, “It’s just one bedroom, so I’ll stuff all the junk you come with in the closet.” An icy chill extinguishes the remaining positive feelings I have towards Kevin. Dread replaces them. This is a mistake; I need to get out of here.\r\nEvery function of my body is in overdrive. My feet won’t turn, but with monumental effort I open my mouth, “W-what? I-I don’t want to…” I mumble, mind buzzing to formulate an exit plan. My eyes roll in their sockets even while my head remains stuck in place. There’re numerous escape routes, but I can’t change my path. The back of my neck burns as I struggle to stop and turn around. My heart is an incessant thrum. I’m inhaling and exhaling simultaneously. The hallway narrows into a single point.\r\n“You’re talking?” Kevin seems flabbergasted. He stops in front of a door and turns around. Glaring, he scrutinizes my face.\r\nA dim memory of home rattles through my skull, “I-I’m g-going back to m-my p-place.” I stammer out. I stoke my faint recollection. My body tenses involuntarily as it slowly crystalizes. Electricity floods my system. Nerves flicker and my muscles clench tighter. Veins throb on my forehead as I stop breathing.\r\n“What?” He’s genuinely shocked, “are you defective?”\r\nSomething breaks and relief floods through me, “N-no!” My eyes widen and my consciousness expands, “I-I-I…” It slowly dawns on me that I don’t actually remember how I got here. I just have one true memory. Kevin rolls his eyes, and I shove him with all my strength. While he stumbles to the floor, I turn around and start running back to the stairs. After a bit, I hear his heavy feet stomping behind me. But I’m almost free. I slam into the exit door only to be greeted with an unfamiliar city. Panic roots me in place as I stare at an alien landscape. What? How i-\r\nKevin’s hand brushes the back of my neck. As I collapse to the floor, he mutters, “Ugh, now, I’ll have to carry it back to the shop.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I was the head investigator of the BFF Murders. We never caught who killed them." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "They only went missing for about a day before we found them.\r\nSome warehouse in the slums. A homeless guy stumbled in, found… what was left of them, Hurled, then called us.\r\nWhoever did this was a master of mutilation. Not that it’s a good thing, obviously.\r\nCan you imagine how fucked up you have to be to sew all their skinned, uh… Skin together like that?\r\nNot that this is a compliment. This sounds too much like a compliment, doesn’t it?\r\nA human stress ball. That was what came to my mind when we cut the sack of stitched skin open.\r\nSkinned alive, hacked to pieces, then poured into what was basically a skin balloon? By far the most disturbing way to go that I’ve seen.\r\n14 years. 14 years since they were butchered and the fuck who did this is still roaming free.\r\nThey should be 30 by now, those victims I forgot the names of.\r\nOkay, I know. Deliberately forgetting the names of them sounds awful. But it helps me blend them all into a collective of corpses.\r\nYou have to do this. Keeps you from getting too attached to them.\r\nKept me going at least.\r\nAnyways, back to the scene.\r\nThere was a note by their remains:\r\nBest Friends FOREVER. Remember that? :)\r\nThe why was clear. As was the when, where and what. Now we had to find the who.\r\nWe spent hours hauling off anyone who was related to them. Most of our subjects were classmates of theirs, obviously. Fit our picture of the culprit.\r\nAlso told the parents to bring up any information we could utilize.\r\nOne of them managed to get us a voicemail and a drawing from one of the victims.\r\nThe drawing, from about 22 years ago, shows each of the three victims. Each rendered in identical clumsy crayon outlines. Each labeled for convenience. There was also a fourth person there.\r\nAlex. That was his name.\r\nAnd the voicemail. Taken from one of them before they vanished:\r\nMom. Mom. He’s gonna kill me.\r\nOh fuck.\r\n(Pounding on the door.)\r\nIt’s Alex. Please. I’m scared. Please.\r\nI’m gonna die. I’m gonna die.\r\nI called the police. Said they’d be on their way.\r\nWe were just kids. We never meant what we meant.\r\n(Pounding stops.)\r\nI love you mom. Goodbye.\r\n(Creaking.)\r\nSmoking gun, it seemed. Alex was the who.\r\nWe contacted the mother to inform her of the news.\r\n“Is he caught?” she whimpered.\r\nI drew the shit straw. I had to break it to her.\r\n“We went around asking the other parents about this ‘Alex’.”\r\nIn her silence I could hear her anticipation.\r\n“He’s not a suspect.”\r\nI could feel her already shattered heart shattering.\r\n“How?! He did it! It had to be him!”\r\n“Like I said, we contacted the other parents. We found out that Alex does not exist.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Tinder date made a last minute, suspicious change of plans" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Sorry about the short notice,” she said, letting him in the front door.\r\n“Don’t worry about it.”\r\n“My car wouldn’t start.”\r\nThey entered the living room, and she gestured for him to sit on a blue la-z-boy recliner. “I want to show you something,” she said. He sat on the edge of the recliner. From a drawer, she pulled out a well cared for Sig Sauer P365 and pointed it at him.\r\nHe didn’t flinch, and, instead, began laughing.\r\n“Huh. Nobody has ever laughed before. All the others, they always got scared.”\r\n“You’re going to love this,” he said. He reached into his jacket and pulled out an identical Sig Sauer P365. “We have the same gun.”\r\n“Oh my. They’re even the same color.”\r\n“Beautiful gun. The trigger–”\r\n“Oh, don’t get me started–”\r\n“Such a good feel.”\r\n“Great feel. And so reliable. Perfect to conceal.”\r\n“You have impeccable taste.”\r\nBoth guns remained pointed at the other, while the two stared deeply into each other's eyes.\r\n“The last minute change is starting to make sense.”\r\n“I was lying. My car works fine.”\r\n“So this was your plan? Just get me sitting down, blow me away.”\r\n“That’s about as far as I thought through.”\r\n“Wait a second.” The man snapped with his empty hand. “I know you. Finding me on tinder, leading me to this house. What did the papers call you…The Siren!”\r\n“A ghastly name.”\r\n“Well it doesn’t do you justice!”\r\n“That so?”\r\n“I don’t think any name could do you justice. What would I have been? Number twelve?”\r\n“The police know about eleven, but I’m about to hit thirty.”\r\n“You’ve been busy. Very impressive.”\r\n“Don’t get ahead of yourself. I think I know you too. You haven’t been in the papers lately, but you must be…are you SCK? Strangle-Chop-Kill?”\r\nHe reached into his jacket, pulled out a large hunting knife, and stabbed it, standing up, into the coffee table in front of him. “In the flesh.”\r\n“I thought you’d be more muscly. From the descriptions of your victims.”\r\n“Don’t let the bulky jacket fool you.” He jerked the knife out of the table and used the blade to raise his shirt revealing an eight pack that could cut diamonds.\r\n“Oh.”\r\n“Everything you dreamed of?”\r\n“The descriptions were accurate.”\r\n“Look, I think we both were in the mood tonight. And now we're thinking, well, where does this go? To be honest, I could never kill an artist like you.”\r\n“I feel the same.”\r\n“I have a proposal. I’ve been scoping out a homeless guy for two months. Isolated, easy target. What do you say we kill him together?”\r\n“I’ve never done that with someone before.”\r\n“I could be your first. Is it a date?”\r\n“How do I know this isn’t just a trick to get the drop on me and kill me?”\r\n“You don’t.”\r\nHe lowered his gun and put it back in his jacket. She holstered hers on her hip.\r\nThey both held hands and left to murder a vagrant." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Isolation of Blackwood Sanitarium" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Dr. Emma Taylor stepped out of the rusty elevator and into the musty hallway of Blackwood Sanitarium's abandoned wing. Her footsteps echoed off the peeling walls as she approached room 314, the subject of her latest investigation. The once-notorious sanitarium closed in 1955, was rumored to have driven patients mad with its inhumane treatments. Emma aimed to debunk these claims with her documentary.\r\nAs she entered room 314, a chill coursed through her veins. The air inside was heavier, colder. In the center of the room, a single, unmade bed stood like a skeletal sentinel. Emma began to set up her equipment, noticing a small, hidden compartment in the bed frame. Inside, she found a dusty journal belonging to a patient named 'Eleanor'.\r\nAs Emma flipped through the yellowed pages, the entries grew increasingly erratic. Eleanor wrote about an incessant, whispery voice that only she could hear, emanating from the walls. The voice, known only as \"The Keeper,\" promised freedom in exchange for sanity. The final entry read:\r\n\"I've heard the door. The Keeper is coming. I'm ready to be free.\"\r\nSuddenly, Emma's equipment flickered to life, capturing an unearthly whisper on the audio recorder:\r\n\"Welcome, Doctor... to your new home... forever with me...\"\r\nEmma spun around, but she was alone. The whisper seemed to emanate from all directions, now louder, more urgent. She tried to flee, but the door slammed shut, trapping her. The whispers coalesced into a deafening chant: \"You'll never leave... The Keeper has you...\"\r\nIn desperation, Emma grabbed her camera, filming as she frantically searched for an exit. The footage showed her screaming, pounding on the door, but then... something changed. Emma's expressions shifted from terror to serenity, her smile twisted.\r\nThe camera dropped, capturing the ceiling as Emma's voice, now eerily calm, whispered: \"I'm ready to be free...\"\r\nThe footage ended abruptly, with only the sound of whispering lingering. The next morning, police found Emma's equipment outside room 314, the door wide open, the bed made. Emma Taylor was never seen again. Blackwood Sanitarium remained standing, its darkest wing whispering secrets to the wind, waiting for its next guest." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Death Of A Forest Nymph Lead To Our Downfall" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It started a year ago when the people caught news of it. Woodland creatures had been spotted, and their existence quickly sparked investigations. Deforestation has been bad lately as more resources have been sucked up to maintain the U.S. and our economy. We found what was described as a humanoid woman of green skin and leafy hair dead on the ground. A tree-cutting crew had chopped one of the trees in a local forest down and heard an ear-splitting scream. The decapitated corpse was found minutes after the branches and logs on the ground were cleaned up.\r\nTo nobody's surprise, conspiracy theorists and people who believed in various mythos came out with info that could help explain this anomaly. Forest nymphs are real? What else could be out in those woods, or what else have we killed? From the death of that nymph came a fast reaction of land degrading. The next 5 miles of wooded area and crops rotted to ash and dust. More and more investigations happened as people really started observing the consequences of resource-draining. Many oil drilling sites ran dry, thousands of local wildlife keeled over out of nowhere, and more bodies of once-thought-mythical creatures were found.\r\nIt's still unclear how this triggered, but it all seemed from the death of that one forest nymph. Connection to mother nature had already been fading but this was something on a global scale. Ailments unlike any other popped up in every country, with deaths in the millions happening weekly on every continent. It was supernatural or magical? Either way, it was something that unexplainable and hard to contain. It's been a year and months' worth of efforts by every government body around the globe has drawn up nothing. We can't even tell how this sickness works, whether it's a virus or something else entirely. We've lost 40% of the human race, food is running low, hundreds of farms are just turning to dust, and people are suffering various health conditions.\r\nWhatever this ailment is, it seems to draw out every latent disease or physical issue you have a chance of genetically. It's not stopping anytime soon and there's no way to slow it down. Proper hygiene is the only thing to slightly buy some time and nothing else. Seems like the miracle of soap and water is a slight hope of surviving the day and making it to the next.\r\nI recently took my savings and bought my parent's old house, spruced it up, and made it my new abode. It's sitting around a pond and a large forest. I must admit, it's lively and quite beautiful. I have my own garden started up in a greenhouse my parents used to use before they died. I've also...well, I've recently spotted odd things. I now have one of those forest nymph women living with me. It's a surreal experience.\r\nI don't think humanity will survive this event, we've broken our bond with nature. I'm the last to live soon." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Thousands of flags appear out of nowhere" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Just a weird experience:\r\nMy friend lived next to a local college campus that he attended and late in the night, like 1am-3am we'd often just walk around the campus just for something to do when we were bored.\r\nIt had a bridge that would cross a lake in the middle of a campus that would lead to a grass pathway around the entire lake and then directly across was a tunnel to get to the other section of the campus.\r\nWe went across the bridge this night like any other, walked past the grass, went through the tunnel. we walked around for maybe no longer than 10 minutes. not a soul ever there besides us at this time besides the occasional security officer that we had not seen that night. Coming as we looped back around into the tunnel towards the bridge, we started to see little yellow flags stuck in the grass by the bridge. we immediately both called it out and were like, was that there before? and we both were like no we would have completely noticed and as we got out of the tunnel the ENTIRE grass area around the entire lake was covered in hundreds if not thousands of these tiny little flags. Something we would have 100% noticed and mentioned on our way in. Something that would take many people to do and would take hours because it wasnt like a single row around the lining of the grass area. every square inch of the grass had these flags for the length of the entire circumference of the campus. but we were the only ones there and we were only gone for maybe, like i said, 20 mins at most.\r\nWe looked at the flag and they said something about Jewish remembrance, probably for the holocaust or something this was a few years ago and its hard to remember.\r\nWe couldnt stop talking about it the rest of the night. I wish i had a photo of the bridge so you could see how impossible it would be to miss on the way up, and theres only one path back so its not like we went a different way.\r\nStill have no explanation for it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Latest Episode Of \"Sasquatch: Secrets Exposed\" Is A Killer." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The rain-soaked forest loomed like a cathedral. Each step deeper into the Pacific Northwest wilderness felt heavier, as if the woods themselves were closing in. Trent Harlow, host of Sasquatch: Secrets Exposed, motioned for his crew to keep up, his flashlight slicing through the gloom.\r\n“Out here, folks,” Trent declared to the camera, “is where legends come alive. Tonight, we’ll uncover the truth!” His bravado masked his disdain for the show and its gullible audience. Bigfoot wasn’t real, but fear sold well.\r\nKyle, the cameraman, muttered, “This place gives me the creeps. Can we call it a night?”\r\n“No,” Trent snapped. “We’re getting something on tape, even if I have to fake it again.”\r\nA low growl rippled through the trees, freezing everyone in place. It wasn’t a normal sound. It was guttural, unnatural. Branches snapped nearby, deliberate and heavy.\r\n“There!” Trent pointed, his heart pounding. Emerging from the mist was a hulking, shaggy figure, unmistakably Bigfoot.\r\nThe beast let out a guttural roar, and Trent’s eyes gleamed with a predator’s excitement. Without hesitation, he raised the rifle he always carried as a prop and fired.\r\n“History!” Trent shouted, adrenaline surging. “We’ve made history!”\r\nThe crew approached cautiously. Flashlights revealed a terrible truth: the “creature” was just a boy in a cheap Bigfoot costume.\r\n“Oh my God,” Jane whispered, backing away.\r\n“No,” Trent stammered. His panic rising. “It moved like… this can’t be real!”\r\n“It’s all on video,” Kyle said, his voice wavering.\r\nTrent spun toward him, his expression darkening. “Delete it.”\r\n“What?” Kyle asked, stepping back.\r\n“Delete the footage. Now!” Trent barked, his voice rising.\r\n“No way,” Kyle said, gripping the camera tighter. “This is evidence!”\r\n“Delete it, or I swear…” Trent raised the rifle at them, his voice trembling with angry desperation.\r\nA deep, resonant growl erupted from the trees, silencing Trent mid-threat. The crew turned toward the sound, their flashlights flickering against the darkness.\r\nFrom the shadows emerged another figure, larger, broader, undeniably real. The massive, shaggy form towered over them, its eyes glinting with feral intelligence.\r\nTrent stumbled back, firing wildly into the air. The creature moved with terrifying speed, knocking the rifle aside and seizing him in one fluid motion.\r\nHe screamed as it dragged him into the darkness, his cries echoing until they were abruptly silenced." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The difference between a weed and a vine is crucial when one of them could end in a bloody murder." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Since my 7th birthday, I’ve known something was off.\r\nThe question was just what it was.\r\n”Sit up. It’s your turn to audition.” the staff member had muttered nonchalantly. I rubbed my tired eyes and stood. I walked steadily over to the audition room and slowly opened the door, my heart pounding.\r\nNo recurring friendly eyes greeted me as I walked in, just a frowning man with graying hair. The moment I entered the door, his brow furrowed and he shook his head and sighed.\r\nI smiled nervously and waved, fully aware that was the wrong move. “Hi there,” I said, waving. “My name is Gideon. I will be performing—”\r\n”Boys don’t do theatre,” the man grumbled. “Leave.”\r\nI was heartbroken. My entire life up to this moment, I’d been wanting to be in a play. The moment I got accepted for an audition, I was turned down. “Um, sir-“\r\n”Leave,” he said, this time more sternly. “Please don’t make me ask again.” I looked at the floor and exited the room sadly.\r\nThe rest of the day was made up of my mother making up for it. We got ice cream. It was nice. The next day, the day went quite similar. We went to another audition, got turned down, then my mother made up for it with ice cream. I thought she’d give it up eventually.\r\nBut she didn’t. Every day for years, it continued the same. Audition, not cast, ice cream. Audition, not cast, ice cream. I thought my mother was going insane. And the weirdest part? No one said, ‘nice to see you again!’ or ‘here again, Gideon?’ Everyone acted like it was the first time.\r\nOne day, I looked at the calendar that only my mother used. I noticed that she hadn’t been updating the days. “Mom,” I called, laughing at her carelessness. “You forgot to update the calendar!”\r\nShe looked confused. “What do you mean, Gideon? It’s March 21st.” I looked confused as well. “But it’s at least 2005,” I said. “And it’s April.”\r\nMother laughed. “Oh, Gideon,” she sighed. “You’re very funny. You know it‘s 1990. Now come, it’s time for auditions.”\r\nMy eyes widened. Auditions? Didn’t we just…\r\nI turned around. When did we get in the car? Was I going insane?\r\nSitting in the pre-audition room, my hands trembled. My mother said it was nerves, but I knew it wasn’t that.\r\nIt was something else.\r\n”Sit up. It’s your turn to audition.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The echo.of shadows" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The Johnson family home stood at the edge of the woods, isolated and serene, until the night Sarah began to change. At first, it was small things: her voice carrying an odd echo, her laughter lingering too long. By the time her eyes started turning black in the moonlight, her husband, Daniel, realized something was terribly wrong.\r\n“It’s just stress,” Sarah whispered one night, her tone eerily calm as she stroked their daughter Emily’s hair. Daniel nodded, but deep down, he felt a cold knot of dread.\r\nOne evening, Emily screamed from her room. Daniel sprinted upstairs, finding Sarah standing over their daughter’s bed, whispering in an unrecognizable language. Her shadow, cast by the dim bedside lamp, twisted unnaturally on the walls.\r\n“Sarah!” he yelled, but when she turned, it wasn’t his wife’s face anymore. The thing staring at him had empty, endless voids for eyes, its mouth stretched in a smile that was too wide.\r\nThat night, the screams began.\r\nThe neighbors heard nothing until the following afternoon. The mailman, finding the Johnsons’ mailbox overflowing, decided to knock on their door. It creaked open under his hand, revealing a silent house and the stench of blood.\r\nInside, Emily and Daniel lay lifeless on the living room floor, their faces frozen in terror. Blood smeared cryptic symbols on the walls. In the kitchen, Sarah sat at the dining table, rocking back and forth, humming a lullaby to no one. A knife gleamed on the table, blood dripping from its edge.\r\nBefore the police could arrive, Sarah stood, eyes glassy and voice hollow. “It wasn’t me,” she murmured as she picked up the knife. “It’s still inside.”\r\nWithout hesitation, she plunged the blade into her chest. As her body hit the ground, the lights in the house flickered violently. The air grew cold, and an inhuman laugh echoed through the empty halls.\r\nBy the time the authorities arrived, there was no sign of what—or who—had been there. Only the bodies, the blood, and the feeling that something evil still lingered in the shadows.\r\nThey say the Johnson house is cursed now. Some nights, neighbors swear they see Sarah’s silhouette in the upstairs window, her head tilted as if listening. And sometimes, they hear the faintest echo of laughter." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The United States of Chronometry" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“How much for the oranges?”\r\n“168s/lb.”\r\nChris paid—feeling the lifespan flow out of him—went home and had his mom pay him back the time from her own account.\r\n//\r\nWelcome to the United States of Chronometry, had read the sign, after they'd cleared customs and were driving towards their new home in Achron.\r\nThe Minutemen, some actual veterans of the Temporal Revolution, had been very thorough in their questioning.\r\n//\r\nSo this is it, thought Chris, the place where dad will be working: a large glass cube with the words Central Clock engraved upon it. This is where they make time.\r\nIt was also, he recalled, the place where the last of the Financeers had been executed and the new republic proclaimed.\r\n//\r\nThe pay was generous, once you wrapped your head around it: 11h/h + benefits + pension.\r\n“I accept,” Chris had heard his father say.\r\n//\r\n“Hands in the air and give me some fucking years!” the anachronist screamed, his body fighting visibly against expiration.\r\nThe parking lot was dark.\r\nChris huddled against his dad. His mom wept.\r\nThey handed over five whole years.\r\n//\r\n“That can't possibly be,” Chris’ dad said, looking at the monitor and the car salesman beside it. “I'm only forty-nine.” But the monitor displayed: NST (non-sufficient time). The price of the car was 4y7m.\r\n(“Cancer,” the doctor will say.)\r\n//\r\n“Remarkable! The invention of chronometricity makes money obsolete,” announced Chris, playing the role of the future first President of the U.S.C. in his school's annual theatrical production of the Chronology of the Republic.\r\nIt was his second favorite line after: “Forget him—he's nothing but an anachronism now!”\r\n//\r\n“You wanna know the real reason for the revolution, you need to read Wynd,” Marcia whispered in Chris’ ear. They were first-years at university, studying applied temporal engineering. “It's about the elites. You can horde all the money you want, understand the financial system, but what does that give you? A rich life, maybe; but a chrono-delimited one. Now change money to time. Horde that—and what do you have?”\r\n“The ability to live forever.”\r\n//\r\nMarcia wilted and aged two decades under the extractor. The Minuteman shut it off. “Do you want to tell us about the hierarchy of the resistance now?” he asked Chris.\r\n“I don't know anything.”\r\n“Very well.”\r\n//\r\nTwo months after turning 23, Chris, ~53, held Marcia's ~46-year-old hand as a psychologist wheeled her through the facility. “I'm sorry I don't have more answers for you. The effects of temporal hyperloss are not well studied,” the psychologist said.\r\n“Will she ever…”\r\n“We simply don't know.”\r\n//\r\nIt worked in theory. Chris had seen what OD'ing on time did to junkies, but what it would do to a building—more: to an technoideology, a state [of mind]—was speculation.\r\nBut he was ~82 and poor. Everything he'd loved was past.\r\nHe drove the homemade chronobomb into the Central Clock and—\r\n//\r\nIt was a bright cold day in November.\r\nThe clocks were striking 19:84." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Fears of a Woman Jogger" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Copy to BlackBox\r\nHer feet gingerly meet the pavement as her slender frame pushes up the hill. A bulky sweater is a subtle attempt to hide how very little of her is underneath. Tall as she is, she can't weigh much more than a large dog. Blonde curls loosely sway behind her, but also in her face as the breeze is stronger than her speed, impeding some of her vision.\r\nThe days are growing shorter, and though her outings are varied, be it an orchestrated attempt at ambiguity or just simply missing a day or two, when she is out, she is more often than not, returning home in the dark.\r\nHer smartphone is visible, emitting light to make others aware of her presence, as there are no sidewalks or streetlights on her road. Just a long, dark hill, with scattered houses to her right, and a long, dark hedge to the left, concealing both the graveyard and whatever else may lie on the other side.\r\nShe's not alone, though. With more mass than she has herself, she pushes a black, tri-wheeled stroller, with a babbling toddler along for the ride. He's bundled for the crispy air and listens as his mother narrators their trip through heavy breaths.\r\n“Whew, not much farther up the hill, and then we'll be home! And, Daddy should be home soon, too! Then, Mama will make dinner…” She continues on, and he replies in delight.\r\nMaybe she hopes to instill some sense of fear into whomever could potentially be listening and meaning them harm: to know that a man will be there soon. Or, maybe she really is just trying to keep her child interested in the remainder of their day. Either way, she's now made it known that that man is not there, and they still aren't home. And, the road is getting darker. The air is getting colder. Her body is growing tired as she reaches the end of her run.\r\nA small basket sits underneath the child's seat; probably holding keys, maybe a wallet, potentially some form of protection for herself and her child. But, her hands are obviously preoccupied as she pushes and guides the stroller up the road, gravity working against her. Even with a burst of adrenaline, how fast could she run? How hard could she hit? How close was she really to home?\r\nHer child is strapped in his seat, too young to know their address or his parents’ names. Too young to aid his mother against an assailant, and she only grows more drained, even if only physically, as they continue on. Up, up, up, slowly, on the dark, lonely hill." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "If you’re driving on a road in the middle of nowhere, for the love of God, get off your phone." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was a long, boring road from my place to the cabin I had rented in the hopes to spend a weekend in blissful solitude, with only the forest creatures to keep me company. I had been driving on a desolate road for four hours at this point, watching a bootleg movie on my phone to keep myself awake.\r\nThat’s why I didn’t see the man standing in the middle of the road.\r\nHis body folded backwards underneath my car’s wheels with a squelch. I hit the brakes and turned around to see a crumpled figure lying on the road, blood pooling in a circle around him.\r\nI scanned the area around me. It was dense forest as far as the eyes could see. Not a single other car on the road besides me.\r\nOk. I’m alright. I thought. There’s no witnesses. . . nobody will know.\r\nEncouraged by that fact, I floored the accelerator, hoping to get as far away from this place as humanly possible. I breathed a sigh of relief when the body went out of sight in my rear view mirror and there was still no sign of anyone around. I had messed up badly, yes. But I was safe now.\r\nI continued the drive forward, even more eager now to get to the cabin. To make matters worse, my GPS decided that now was the best time to stop working, displaying my current location as ‘unknown.’\r\n“Piece of shit,” I mumbled. And looked up in order to try and discern my location.\r\nMy heart dropped.\r\nOn the road only a few meters in front of me, was the man I had hit. There was no doubt about it. His limbs were still splayed out, fresh still blood still pouring out of various orifices.\r\nI grabbed the wheel and skidded past him, watching the rear view mirror as I did. Just before the body left my line of sight I saw it move. It was almost imperceptible. But it shifted its position slightly.\r\nI continued speeding forwards, hoping to leave this cursed forest and God-knows-what I killed far behind me.\r\nIt was no use. After about a kilometre and a half of driving, I spotted him on the road in front of me yet again.\r\nHe was almost exactly as I left him.\r\nAlmost.\r\nThis time he was on his feet, looking directly towards me. His face looked mangled, mutilated beyond comprehension, his arms seemed disjointed and hung loosely from their sockets. But the worst part were his eyes- yellow and beady, piercing into my very being, accusing me of my past transgressions.\r\nFailing to see any other option, I drove around him once again and watched as his gaze followed me. As I drove off he smiled at me, showing off his blood-stained teeth.\r\nIn that moment, I knew all hope of escape was gone. The man was simply playing with me.\r\nThis road would lead nowhere but the consequences of my own actions." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The wanderer scrambled over the rocks with excitement to read the first sign of human presence he’d seen since he’d escaped." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My name is Camila Martinez. The day of my death was probably a Tusday. It felt like one. Most of us had lost track of the days though. Our singuler clock had broke long ago and it was hard to keep track of time when the sun had broke too.\r\nIt was sunny that day. It was sunny that nite too. I’m not sure if you know that. I’m not sure if I hope you know that. Either someone is lieing to you (trust me when I say what happened isn’t something you can forget) or someone has fixed the sun. Well unfixed it I guess. Haha.\r\nWriting this in the past tense felt really morbid. I wasn’t gone yet. I’d actualy been hoping that I was gonna make it and would have been able to scratch this out tomorrow. If your reading this that was a false hope. I suppose you don’t care about that.\r\nIf you’re still reading this I’m sorry. I can’t stop whats happening and niether can you.\r\nI just wanted you to not feel as lonely as I did when the end came.\r\nScrawled in messy capital letters below the somewhat-neatly etched lines was a frantically scratched message.\r\nI WASNT ALONE" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Pages 173-6 from the unpublished memoir of Ongar Ling, a general of the intergalactic army now deceased" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“I’ve a bone to pick with you,” she said.\r\nSo we floated tentacle-in-tentacle to one of the many illicit shops of human remains and chose a beautifully polished tibia.\r\nQuite a find.\r\nI’d seen pieces in the Museum of Conquered Species that, to my admittedly non-professional visual sensory input, were not much better preserved, and the MCS had one of the best humanity exhibits in the universe: an entire wing devoted to the conquest of the planet Earth.\r\n(Incidentally, the very idea of a museum made in the hollowed out body of a gigantic insectoid is reason enough to visit!)\r\n“Oh, darling, it’s marvellous. I can just imagine its former owner being torn limb from limb by one of our assault squids,” she said, squealing as she constricted me with her procreative tendrils—in public, no less!\r\nHow deliciously erogenous.\r\nAfter returning to our hive-quarters, we copulated, then she decided to recuperate and I connected to the mainframe to scan for work-related memoranda.\r\nThe final destruction of humankind was still a work-in-progress then, so there was plenty to do.\r\nBases to be constructed. Mining probes to be activated.\r\nCulture to be assimilated—although, let’s be honest, how much more primitive could a culture be than humanity’s?\r\nOne of the memoranda was a request for orders.\r\nIt read:\r\n“All the lights in sector X75V6 have been hanged. Awaiting instructions.”\r\n“Now the darks,” I responded, still rather bemused by the color-coded human concept of race, but if they had chosen to self-segregate, then who was I to interfere at the twilight of their species’ existence. We could just as well torture, experiment on and execute them according to their preferred ethnic divisions.\r\nI do admit amusement at the time we peeled the skin off one light one and one dark one, then sent them, equally raw, pink and bleeding, to excruciate themselves to death among their dumbfounded racial others.\r\nA confused and screaming pack of humans is the stuff of memes!\r\nYes, we made lampshades of their hides. And, yes, I do see that, in this particular context, the darker one fit the decor of my kitchen better.\r\nI think the light one ended up with Marsimmius, who even took it with him to the infamous massacre of New Jersey, where we drowned a group of resistance fighters in vats filled with the blood of their freshly-slaughtered kin.\r\nHow they made bubbles in it!\r\nNo more bubbles, no more resistance.\r\nBut, by the Great Old Ones, was New Jersey ever a real visual-input-sensor-sore, as the humans might say (as you can appreciate, I’m trying to assimilate some of their culture: language) and it was a blessing to the universe to dissolve it wholesale.\r\nI think it was later used as industrial lubricant on one of the slave colonies.\r\nAnyway, I digress.\r\nWhat I want to highlight is that well-preserved human remains make good gifts for one’s femaliens, and a well-gifted femalien eagerly produces strong eggs for the war benefit of the species." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "It was a year ago today that a sycophant in Tribeca gave me the idea of a lifetime" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“You’re experiencing a rough patch…” he’d smiled sympathetically.\r\nHe wasn’t wrong. Skint, I’d been living on a diet of bread and vodka for about a year.\r\n“It happens, even to the best authors. Take this.”\r\nHe gave me a kind of self-help book, about “manifestation”.\r\nThe party had been shit so I’d left. Arriving home, I’d slumped into an armchair and felt the book bulging at my side.\r\nCurious, I started reading it.\r\nIt was hilarious.\r\nTurning it over, I noticed it was a best-seller…and had the idea of a lifetime.\r\nSix months later, I was the millionaire author of Manifest: Will Your Own Success.\r\nThough success wasn’t perfect. My book had garnered me a fervent, almost crazed fanbase.\r\nOne such fan, Grant, followed me everywhere.\r\n“How the fuck did he get in here?![”]() I hissed, as Grant popped up in my publisher’s office, screeching, “Sign my book! Sign my book!”\r\nThe secretary smiled at me as I swerved him.\r\n“I’m a fan too,” she whispered bashfully. “Your book changed my life.”\r\n“Glad I could help,” I smiled, inwardly rolling my eyes.\r\nSomething had to be done. I needed my life back.\r\nSo I determined to write a redaction on my website, exposing myself and the sham that was manifestation.\r\nThe redaction closed thusly:\r\nTo think that you can \"will\" your way to success is pure egomania. Pure idolatry of the self.\r\nIt is a spiritualism for the self-absorbed.\r\nAnd the celebs selling this idea to you? Many, if not most of them, were born privileged in an overwhelmingly poor world, with a natural predisposition to an unearned talent.\r\nBorn beautiful in a world where ugliness is in everything.\r\nSuccess was easy for many of them.\r\nBut they are not lying to you, necessarily. You are just hearing the sonorous toll of their narcissism escaping its echo chamber – but that is all.\r\nThere is only the binary of do or don't do.\r\nThere is no will.\r\nI didn’t care about the royalties. I was already rich. The fume alone would be worth it.\r\nI clicked post.\r\n*\r\nA few weeks later, I was heading out when I met Grant at the bottom of my apartment’s steps.\r\nHe was holding a gun.\r\n\"How could you…\" he sobbed, pointing it at my face, before turning it on himself. The shot resounded like an explosion along the quiet street, his body crumpling to the sidewalk in a dead heap.\r\nThen out of the twilight, I heard another voice. A woman’s.\r\nShe was laughing.\r\n\"After the redaction, I willed someone to kill you.\"\r\nIt was the secretary from the office.\r\n\"I was sure he was going to do it,\" she said, staring at the body at the bottom of the steps. \"I willed it.\"\r\nHere, she paused, chuckling darkly. I could see something pointy in her right hand. It flashed in the moonlight.\r\n\"I guess you were right…\" she leered, taking a step towards me.\r\n\"If you want something done, do it yourself.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Finally Learnt the True Cost of My Success, Thanks to Geoff" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The howls penetrated the walls of our mansion.\r\nI paused, my brush saturated with Phthalo Blue hovering over the Van Goghian landscape before me. The howls had been drawing nearer over the past few days, and now they sounded as if they were on our acres of manicured lawn of our gorgeous home.\r\nAll bought with fruits of my painting. I am so proud of what I have accomplished over these years.\r\n“Honey, do you hear that?” I called.\r\nHe didn’t respond. I put another dab of paint on my canvas, then the mad barking broke out, under our bedroom window. I dropped the brush, and rushed out of my studio.\r\n“Honey?”\r\nI climbed up the sweeping marble staircase with growing urgency. The barking was getting louder. I entered our bedroom. “Geoff- what-”\r\nGeoff was sitting on the magnificent Persian silk-weave rug, surrounded by a wobbly circle of thick white powder.\r\nMy mind leapt. We had had issues since twenty years ago, when I first made it big and my paintings started selling like hot cakes. Then, as age began to creep up on us, we had laid it aside. But this looked like a scene gone wrong in Scarface.\r\n“What the fuck?” I inquired.\r\nGeoff’s eyes were stretched open, the whites gleaming and his hands shaking. I noticed the white box of table salt lying next to him.\r\nSomething inside me jerked. The baying grew impossibly loud.\r\nHe started speaking “I’m so sorry, I had to do it- you were so miserable- it was worth it. I don’t regret anything- not really”\r\n“What are you talking about?” I asked, raising my voice to make myself heard above the barks.\r\nGeoff fell silent. We listened to the barking. Now it seemed to come from the studio.\r\n“It was a good deal” mumbled Geoff. “Normally you can’t do it for someone else’s success, only your own. But they understood- I loved you, and you were so miserable, no-one was buying your paintings, I wanted to make you happy- I love you so much- I wasn’t even thinking about all this-” he gestured around our artfully-decorated bedroom, as large as our first apartment when we got together, so many years ago.\r\n“So- so you sold-” I couldn’t bring myself to finish the words. My heart kept jerking.\r\nGeoff nodded. The barking dropped to a low whisper right outside the door.\r\n“My paintings- it was you? Because of you and a deal?” I knew the answer. He nodded again.\r\nI stared at one of my paintings on the wall. I could see it now, the wobbly lines, the muddy colours. How was I ever fooled, to think my meteoric rise was due to my own talent!\r\nI stretched out my foot and casually swiped away some salt, breaking the circle. The door burst open and the giant hell hounds bounded in. Geoff screamed as they grabbed him with their sharp bright teeth and dragged him off.\r\nI stood very still." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "An alien ship shows up, and out of all people, they’re asking for ME?!" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The beer arrives, perfectly chilled. Every day, after work, I head to the bar, order two beers and a sandwich. Living alone without family, this is all I have.\r\nTaking my first sip, a man in a suit sits beside me.\r\n\"Caleb Wycliffe, right? It’s time to go,\" he says.\r\n\"Do I know you?\" I ask.\r\n\"I’ll explain on the way,\" he replies.\r\nScreams outside interrupt us. Horns, sirens, and the hum of helicopters fill the air. Everyone at the bar rushes to see.\r\nAbove us, a massive black sphere looms in the sky, enormous enough to cover the city. Its descent appears to halt abruptly.\r\nA frozen crowd gathers, staring in stunned silence. The man grabs my arm. \"We need to go. Now.\"\r\nHe points to a black car waiting nearby, a driver already behind the wheel. We climb in. My voice trembles as I demand to know what’s happening.\r\n“For reasons we’re still trying to understand, the sphere chose you,” he begins. “I’m a federal agent. We’ve been investigating this object for two months.”\r\nThe car speeds toward the sphere’s epicenter, its black mass dominating the horizon.\r\n“We believe there’s extraterrestrial life inside and we have been trying to reach out to it,” he continues. “Yesterday, it transmitted a radio message in perfect english: ‘WE WANT CALEB WYCLIFFE'. There’s only one person with that name in this city.”\r\n“This is insane! I’m a nobody,” I protest.\r\n“We know how absurd this is,” he replies calmly. “But you might be humanity’s only hope.”\r\nWe arrive at a military zone, where a helicopter waits.\r\nAs it lifts off, I grip the seat tightly, my stomach lurching. Flying has always unsettled me.\r\n“There’s been a mistake,” I mutter. “You’ve got the wrong guy.”\r\nThe agent stays silent.\r\nWe approach a small opening in the sphere. The interior reveals nothing but a black wall with a metallic panel—featureless and unlit.\r\n“Our satellites identified this as the only entry,” the agent explains.\r\nHe presses the panel, but nothing happens. Frustrated, he turns to me. “Your turn.”\r\nPanic floods me. Trembling, I place my palm on the panel.\r\nThe searing pain of what could be described as a thousand needles shoots through my hand. Lights ignite across the wall, converging at my fingertips.\r\nA surge of energy courses through me like a river. Words, memories, and knowledge flood my mind, and I now remember.\r\nThe metallic surface begins to absorb my hand and body. Through blurred vision, I see the agents’ faces frozen in shock.\r\nMy reconnaissance mission is complete. It’s time to execute the final objective: the enslavement of Earth.\r\nWith a thought, I command the attack to begin." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I wish my husband would stop pretending I’m invisible, I’m sick of it." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Let me start by saying I love my husband Brandon very much. We started dating in high school and I’ve never so much as looked at anybody else. He’s my best friend, ever, and always will be. The best day of my life was when he proposed to me, followed by our wedding day, which was exactly as I planned it and like a wonderful fairy tale come true.\r\nAnd honestly, married life has only gotten better. I love being so close with Brandon, having him come home to my arms every evening, constantly texting throughout the day, and knowing where he always is and what he’s always doing. I’ve never felt so close and warm with someone and I’m loving it.\r\nHowever, Brandon has started doing this thing- where he pretends he can’t see or hear me and it’s driving me insane. Like, I’ll call him or say something, and he won’t answer, or even turn around. I’ll raise my voice, louder and louder until I’m practically shrieking, and he still won’t respond. Eventually, I’ll get up in his face, or shake his arm and he’ll say “I must have switched off for a minute” or something stupid like that. Last time he actually looked so startled after he saw me, he did this kinda stifled scream and ran out of the room, maybe my recent hospital stay made me gain weight and he’s repulsed by me?\r\nHe's not usually like this, and that is what makes me worried- maybe he has a brain tumour or something? I’ve heard that can affect your behaviour terribly. And then of course the stress of my car crash.\r\nThat happened a few days ago. Oh yes, I buried the lede there, sorry. I should have said, all this started after the car crash. They don’t teach story-telling at schools, do they?\r\nAnyway, back to my story. Things have honestly been in a haze since the car crash. I know he definitely came to visit me in hospital once, so I don’t want to be too harsh on him. But I was released soon after- and he didn’t even come to pick me up. I didn’t even have proper clothes to wear home! The nurses told me I didn’t need any. I could just leave in my hospital gown which was weird, but ok.\r\nSo I went home by myself – luckily we didn’t live that far off- and waited for him.\r\nHe came home, I jumped up to hug him and he looked right through me. I called him but he wouldn’t respond. He left the living room where I was, turning the light off as he left, leaving me in the dark. That really freaked me out.\r\nHow can I make him see me? This is driving me crazy, I love him so much, can’t he understand he is destroying me like this?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "“Reflections of the Wolf”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The family I lived with wasn’t pleasant. They were abusive, though occasionally kind. In our house, there was a peculiar mirror. When my family looked into it, they saw their reflections. But when I looked, there was nothing—just an empty frame. One day, drawn by its strange allure, I stepped into the mirror and discovered a world entirely unlike my own.\r\nThis other world was a perfect opposite. My family here was warm, joyful, and caring. They doted on me, their love genuine and unconditional. It felt like stepping into a storybook—a place as magical as Coraline’s world, but without the sinister undertones. There were no hidden catches, no strings attached, just happiness.\r\nWhen my real-world family gathered for yet another tense, cutting evening, I had enough. Their sharp words and cold stares drove me back to the mirror. This time, I shattered it behind me, sealing myself in the better world. My mirrored family embraced me, and we celebrated with a trip to the carnival. Cotton candy, apple pies, and thrilling rides filled our day.\r\nEventually, we ventured into a haunted house at the edge of the carnival. Amid the eerie laughter and creaking doors, a wolf appeared—a towering creature named Wolfie. Despite his cute name, he was terrifying. When he ordered me to wear an alien costume, I obeyed, hoping it would scare him away. Instead, he lunged at me, sinking his teeth into my leg. Pain erupted as memories of him devouring creatures like me flooded my mind.\r\nFrom that point on, my life became a nightmarish loop. I was trapped in the haunted house, dying in countless ways at Wolfie’s claws. Every plan to escape failed. Over and over, I faced his fury, my terror growing with each futile attempt.\r\nOne day, my mother appeared in the haunted house. She walked past Wolfie as though he wasn’t even there. My brother followed, carrying a video game console. He pulled out a disc, and the world around us flickered. The haunted house dissolved, the carnival disappeared, and the mirror was gone.\r\nI was back in my real-world home. My brother grinned, claiming it was all part of a game simulation. But as I opened the bathroom door to put away some toilet paper, I saw Wolfie standing there. He wasn’t part of the game. He was real, and he had found me again." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Scream and Suffer" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The couch looked much more appealing than usual.\r\nRoofing had been a slog due to the heat and those god awful bugs that were everywhere. I couldn’t have felt more tired. Just as I was about to flop down gratefully onto its soft cover, the phone rang. I wanted to ignore it, but something pulled me towards the call. It was definitely an important one.\r\nDragging myself over to the receiver, I lifted it up reluctantly.\r\n“Hello?”\r\nClama et Pati\r\nThe line hung up and something in my chest tightened. Sweat began to coat my face as I looked around frantically. There was something here. I needed to get it.\r\nDesperate steps took me around my house, as I searched restlessly for it. A whimper welled up in my throat, which morphed into a terrified scream as I turned my house upside-down.\r\nI had to find it. I had to stop it. It was here.\r\nTerror gripped my whole being, and I fell to my knees. The screaming was uncontrollable. The shaking was paralyzing.\r\nI reached into my pocket and pulled out my cell phone, dialing Higson.\r\n“Grayson? What’s up?”\r\nClama et Pati\r\nIt was all I could say, but I didn’t even want to say it.\r\nI hung up.\r\n***\r\n“What was he going on about?” I asked aloud, thumbing over the redial button. Grayson had seemed terribly worried about something.\r\nBut my thumb stopped short of the button, and a cold, oppressive chill snaked up my spine. Something walked into the living room.\r\nThere it was.\r\nA scream of horror welled up in my voice as I rushed it, slamming my fists into its skull over and over, thick blood coating my knuckles.\r\nWhen it stopped moving, I looked around in a panic. On the floor in front of me was my cat Petunia. Bile rose up in my stomach as I stared at her mangled corpse.\r\nIt had got her.\r\nIt was coming for me next.\r\nI pulled out my phone and dialed Laticia\r\n“Higson? I'm kind of busy right now.”\r\nClama et Pati\r\n***\r\nThe line cut off. I shot a smile to Rodrick across the restaurant table who smiled back.\r\n“Everything alright, baby?” He asked.\r\nI didn’t respond. It was right there in front of me. The sweat that soaked my shirt clung harder as my chest contracted in a scream. I grabbed the fork and rushed over, stabbing it right between its eyes. I stabbed and stabbed. I had to kill him, or he would get me.\r\nScreams of horror came from all around me. The whole restaurant looked at me in shock.\r\nRodrick’s corpse was all over the chair.\r\nScreaming in panic, I pulled out my phone.\r\nI dialed mom.\r\nClama et Pati\r\n***\r\nIt got my husband. It had eaten his face.\r\nI dialed Gwen.\r\n***\r\nThere were two of them. My puppies were the first ones they got.\r\nI called my friend.\r\n***\r\nSuddenly, interrupting your reading time, your phone rings." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Coffee and Croissants" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I scuttle across the pedestrian crossing, breath sharp, my phone clenched with tight knuckles. A horn pierces the air, car skidding in the rain. A gaggle of teenage girls squawk frantically as I pass.\r\nI exhale deeply when I hit the opposite sidewalk. What was the rush even for?\r\nI slow down, walking steadily.\r\nMy therapist would say: “Be grounded. Be present, Elise.” As if I had time.\r\nI slide my phone into my business pants, rain pattering down beside me. I gaze up at the old buildings I walk past every day. They’re beautiful, really.\r\n“You’re in London, Elise!” I exclaim abruptly. No one else seems to hear. “Little you would be proud!”\r\nMy chest fills with an overbearing sense of nostalgia. Without thinking, I turn into the nearest coffee shop.\r\n“A flat white please,” I smile at worker, “Full cream. And a croissant — with strawberry jam on the side!”\r\nBeauty standards haven’t allowed me a croissant in years.\r\nI take a seat next to the window, gazing into the busy street. I watch as raindrops stain the glass. An ambulance whirs by, lights flashing as pedestrians jump out the way.\r\n“I should do this more often,” I murmur into my palm. “Just slow down for a second.”\r\nI breathe in deeply, savouring the precious aroma of coffee. Twisting around to face the cafe, I gaze up and down the chairs.\r\n“Do you come here often?” I spontaneously ask the elderly gentleman next to me.\r\nI’m ignored. Old Elise would absolutely die.\r\nThe man stares persistently out the window, giving no sign he’s heard me — except a nervous twitch. I think he’s waiting for someone.\r\n“Is that nice?” I turn to smile at a little girl nibbling a pink macaron. She looks like she’s made of cobwebs and milk foam.\r\n“It’s nice.” She replies softly, staring at the strawberry crumbs.\r\nShe’s all alone.\r\n“Your coffee Elise,” The barista appears at my side. “And the croissant with jam.”\r\n“Thank you,” I take it graciously.\r\nThen my hands freeze, mid air. “You know my name. How?” I gaze up at his dark eyes, my blood pulsing with irrational fear.\r\n“We’ve been expecting you.”\r\nI stare at him, speechless. I’ve never been here before — have I?\r\nHe gestures at the croissant. “Eat. It helps with the remembering.”\r\nI hesitate. Then I bite.\r\nNever forget to look both ways before crossing a street. That’s how I died." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "On And On And On And..." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When you live in a small town, you’re within one or two degrees of knowin’ everybody. You can’t fart in the woodshed without someone catchin’ a whiff. That bein’ said, none of us really noticed anything until halfway through the first week. It was on the third day that I got two missin’ persons reports and two people dead with broken necks. The skin of their throats was ripped along with the arteries, as if something forced their necks backward.\r\nThe fourth day is when it took off. I questioned Johnny Haverford. He was still covered in his wife’s blood and he was shakin’. He said they were watchin’ an old episode of Barney Miller when it happened.\r\n“She just stands up. She turns and looks left. North. Her mouth fell open and she froze. She pissed herself. I got up and stood in front of her and asked her if she was ok. Then her head dips down real quick, like fast, and then the back of her head shoots back and touches her spine and… her neck tore open.”\r\nJohnny broke down. I couldn’t get anything more out of him. I got another call just ten minutes after that. A man in his yard. His wife showed me the footage from the door camera. It happened just like Johnny said.\r\nBy the end of the day, there were five bodies. All of ‘em died the same way. That night we got a call to Myra Larson’s place. Nobody had seen her for a few days. She was dead in a crusty pool of blood on her kitchen floor. From what the coroner said and from checkin’ her phone log, we figured out she had three days prior. Figure, she was the first.\r\nFor the next two days, people started dropping like flies. All the deaths occurred at 7 p.m. on the spot. We put a call into the F.B.I and the CDC. We’ve been able to find jack squat. There was nothing wrong with any of these people. Young. Old. Children.\r\nInteresting little thing; when it happens around pets, the dogs and cats would run away right before it happened. We tried to keep it quiet, but that was never gonna work. People were scared, but life had to go on.\r\nLast night was the football game against Arquette. Midway through the second quarter, two players froze. Eight people in the bleachers did too.\r\nAll of ‘em frozen.\r\nAll of ‘em wide eyed, lookin’ north.\r\nPeople started panickin’. Ten people died right there at the high school. People are leaving town. I don’t think it matters.\r\nI noticed something that’s got me terrified. A pattern I remembered. I shared it with the F.B.I., but they think I’m nuts.\r\n1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55\r\n21 people are gonna die tonight at seven o’clock. I did the arithmetic.\r\nIn less than a month, our town’ll be gone. Last night, three people died in Arquette, seven miles away. I’m afraid whatever it is, has spread." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Art And Universal Glitches" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Making art is hard.\r\nFirst of all , you have to form a good concept . Something that your audience is captivated by , or at the very least , interested in.\r\nThen , you have to paint that painting with a surgeon's skill , coloring every last spot , making sure that the shading , the layers , the sketch underneath , is picture perfect.\r\nIt breaks you after a while.\r\nSo that was what I was doing at that moment , sketching what I thought people would be interested in , which was a cat and it's human. According to my marketing team , the public liked white cats , and pale girls with contrasting black hair.\r\nWhile I was coloring the cat's eyes , I heard a weird buzzing in my ears. I put on noise-cancelling headphones , but I still heard it , like an angry bee ravaging through my sanity. My pet dog then crashed through the door , knocking over water all over the painting , distorting it beyond comprehension.\r\nNext , the weirdest thing happened. The cat and the human seemed to crawl out of the canvas , artistic horrors that would have made even the most desensitized people shake in fear.\r\nThose-those things smiled at me , crawling closer and closer towards me , teeth bared , mouths foaming , pupils fully expanded.\r\nI backed away , but I fell , not hitting the floor , but going on through some deep , endless void.\r\nI hit my head on something , and found a floor , and a light shining on the thing I'd hit my head on. It looked like a horn , and I saw some floating text.\r\nCover the outside of that horn in gold paint and you can leave!\r\nI realized in horror that was that math shape. Gabriel's Horn.\r\nI painted away and away , but the surface never seemed to end.\r\nI was stuck there , forever and ever , and my fate was closed." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Static and Silence" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It always started with a drink.\r\nThen two.\r\nThen the teeth-gritting high of fists meeting faces and the world going quiet except for the sounds I made.\r\nPeople were scared of me.\r\nThat was the goal.\r\nPower, respect, whatever name you wanted to give the rush — I wore it like armor.\r\nI wasn’t fighting people.\r\nI was stomping ghosts.\r\nChildhood, rage, loneliness — all of it turned into broken noses and blacked-out memories.\r\nUntil him.\r\nHe looked normal.\r\nJust a guy in a hoodie at the wrong bar, nodding along to the wrong music, not scared when I knocked over his beer.\r\nI said something sharp — I don’t remember what — and he just looked at me like I was loud static on a screen.\r\n“You don’t want this,” he said.\r\nGod, that voice. Calm like it knew what came next and already forgave me for it.\r\nWe fought.\r\nOr I tried to.\r\nI remember flashes, like a first-person video shot in panic.\r\nHis shoulder dipping, my breath knocked out. A blur of knuckles, the sound of my own grunt echoing off pavement.\r\nCut by cut — his elbow catching my jaw, the snap of my knee hitting concrete, how slow the world got when I couldn’t breathe right.\r\nI was scared.\r\nReally scared.\r\nNot of him — of how small I felt. How stupid, how empty all that rage looked when someone saw through it.\r\nHe didn’t finish me.\r\nHe could’ve.\r\nInstead, he stood there, fists unclenched, looking at me like I was something sad in a museum.\r\n“You’re not fighting anyone but yourself,” he said.\r\nThen he walked away.\r\nLike I wasn’t worth the bruise.\r\nI think about that fight more than any other.\r\nNot the whole — just the parts that stung.\r\nThe moments I saw myself from outside, all spit and hate and nothing underneath.\r\nI didn’t quit drinking after that.\r\nWould’ve been a lie if I said I did.\r\nBut I started drinking less — and hating myself more — and somewhere in that space, I started changing.\r\nIt's not a movie moment.\r\nNo mirror speech, no redemption arc with violin music.\r\nJust quieter nights, fewer bruises on my knuckles, and a little less weight behind the anger.\r\nWounds like mine don’t close clean.\r\nThey scab. They itch. They bleed again.\r\nBut they heal — slow, real, ugly healing.\r\nAnd that’s enough.\r\nFor now, it’s enough." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I've been sleeping longer and longer." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It feels impossible to get out of bed. I'm not tied down or injured, not that I can tell. I've even dreamed I stood up, that I made myself my first meal in months. I wake up staring at the ceiling every time.\r\nIt's not like I get bored, or that I'm in any real danger. I think my metabolism slowed down—maybe it's from all the sleeping. I took a nap last week and woke up today, still feeling like I had a bee's nest where my brain should be. I looked it up, and the longest you're supposed to go without water is just a few days. I had a water bottle at some point, but I drank it all in the first month or so. Never came out the other end, either, so that's a plus. My phone's plugged in and there's no signs of it wearing down any time soon, so I have all the internet I could ever need. Honestly, I could see myself living like this for the rest of my life. Barely waking up, dreaming of standing, returning to sleep for another week or month or year.\r\nI do have some regrets, though. If anyone lives in near the University of Michigan, could you look for a little black and white tabby? I found him as a stray, back when I could still get up and walk, and he put his trust in me. He begged me to feed him. I stopped hearing from him after the last time I slept. I hope he got out somehow. He deserved better.\r\nI'm feeling quite tired now. I closed my eyes, just for a moment, and I thought I was still awake. I imagined that I was getting up, grasping the doorknob as the blood drained from my head and everything went all faint and white, and I dreamed that when I opened my eyes I was still standing. I knew it wasn't real when I saw him curled up by the kitchen, still waiting by his food bowl. It's an old pie tin, because I never expected to bring a little one into my life and I didn't have the time for anything more. In the dream, he wakes up when I walk in the room and he forgives me, or does not even know there is anything to forgive. He purrs when he sees me, that unconditional love and trust in his eyes as he twines himself around my ankles. And I crack open a tin of food and he laps it up, tail swishing in joy, and for just a moment I can imagine that he is still alive.\r\nI just opened my eyes again. He's gone, of course. The house is closed. The air is stale and still. If I get up and look around, I will see where he has collapsed, weakly, betrayed, hiding his illness from predators. From monsters. From me.\r\nI think I'm going back to sleep." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Noah and me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It’s 8 pm on a Saturday. I’m having dinner with my son, Noah, and it’s a normal evening. Transformers 2 is on TV, and there is meatloaf on the table. My son is floating three feet above his chair, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle. His eyes, normally blue, glow red.\r\n“Sit down, Noah,” I say in a stern voice. “No, not like that. Bottom on the chair, head on straight. Or no dessert.”\r\nSlowly, Noah floats down until he reaches the chair, and resumes eating. “Thank you,” I say, and pour myself some water.\r\nIt started two years ago, when Noah left for school one day and came back changed. The changes weren’t that big - the laugh slightly off, the hair a slightly different shade of brown. It was as if someone had been studying my son, created a nearly perfect copy and swapped the two.\r\nI managed to convince myself that I was imagining things for a few days, until I walked into his bedroom and saw him crawling on the ceiling.\r\nIn the movies, they call exorcists, or demon hunters, or priests. But real life isn’t a movie. Real life is having priests hand you the number for mental health services, or telling you your child looks perfectly normal - Not-Noah knew how to put on an act when needed, the little bastard. Real life is spending months online trying to find a demonologist who’ll believe you, then have them invoice you ten thousand dollars for a first consultation.\r\nI don’t have ten thousand dollars. Raising a child as a single mom is expensive, and that’s without counting the mortgage and credit card debts. But I do have good health insurance that covers counselling sessions, so I started looking for a therapist.\r\nEventually I was lucky enough to find Lucy. She’s great. She probably thinks I have schizophrenia or something, but apart from making some gentle suggestions on getting diagnosed, she doesn’t push. Over the past year we’ve made good progress, focusing on banishing anxious thoughts, grieving the son I lost and embracing the new one, and so on.\r\nOne month into therapy, I went into Noah’s room. Noah was writhing on the bed, muttering in a language I was sure no linguist would recognize.\r\n\"Would you like some juice when you’re done?” I asked him. Noah – Lucy was adamant about avoiding the term Not-Noah – stopped moving and looked at me quietly for a few seconds. “Yes?” he finally said, his voice back to normal.\r\nThings started going uphill from there.\r\nSix months later, we’ve reached a good balance. Noah’s not allowed to make ungodly noises after 9 pm, and when he’s been very good, I get cow’s blood from a specialized butcher as a special treat. Most of the time, he’s a normal little boy.\r\nI don’t know what he is, and it doesn’t matter anymore. His name is Noah, he’s 8 years old and he likes sharks. And he is mine." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Blink, and She's Gone" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It only looked like my mother.\r\nThat much is certain, even after all this time. I can still tell them apart. None of the medication has helped. The memories still burn my mind’s eye. I still see…\r\n… happened so fast. Too fast.\r\nWe’d stopped by the supermarket that June day, hot, humid. Her in a bright pink summer dress. I in T-shirt and shorts. We needed groceries for the cook-out.\r\nI remember the moment. The second. She was there, a tower over me, auburn hair glowing beneath fluorescent lights. Reaching for a bag of potato chips.\r\nAnd then, gone.\r\nNo. Not gone. Not just gone. Replaced. In her place was it.\r\nIt looked like her. Smelled like her, like peaches in spring.\r\nSpoke like her.\r\nWas… her.\r\nIn every way. Every conceivable way.\r\nBut no, she wasn’t.\r\nIt wasn’t.\r\nEven at such a malleable age, blinded by ignorance, I could tell. There was some aberration about it.\r\nNot physical. Blue eyes. Auburn hair. Fair skin marked by moles.\r\nBut a sense of…\r\n… wrongness. Alienness. It did not belong there. Not where Dear Mother had been.\r\nIt was an imposter, trickster, Loki incarnate. Enemy. Adversary.\r\nGod. I can still smell it. Can still see it.\r\nI began wailing. It jerked to a stop.\r\nIt looked down. Gazed upon me with doll’s eyes, for that’s what it was truly. A doll.\r\nA doll made in her image. I screamed, I blinked, I…\r\n… and Mother was standing there.\r\nMother was." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My friends and I severed ourselves." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When Mom divorced Dad, she had an orange light on her palm.\r\nOrange means severed.\r\nMeaning… you knew a person\r\nBut through a popular “Severing” procedure, you chose to forget them.\r\nWhen my sister’s ex came over, the two stared straight through each other.\r\nThe second he closed the distance between them, the orange light on their palms flashed red—signifying cutting.\r\nThey chose to forget each other.\r\nThe mind forgot, but the body remembered.\r\nThe light was both synthetic and organic, signaling severed neurons remembering.\r\nDuring class, an orange light blinked on my palm.\r\nThree students in my vicinity had the exact same flashing light.\r\nThree mutual severings.\r\nWhich meant…\r\nWe knew each other.\r\nThe blonde in front of me.\r\nThe brunette playing with his pen.\r\nAnd the sandy-haired boy staring at his laptop screen.\r\nFrom the corner of my eye, I glimpsed the brunette noticing his own palm.\r\nThe sandy-haired boy prodded at it with a scowl, as if it would suddenly stop.\r\nWe met up, each of us holding our palms up with wide eyes, orange flashing to red.\r\nThe blonde was Frenna.\r\nThe guys, Charlie and Wylan.\r\n“Your procedure was what we call underground,” a nurse told us stiffly.\r\n“Meaning it was done illegally, most likely when you were a minor, and repeated twelve times over the last seven years.”\r\nHer eyes darkened. “Rue, are you aware of the symptoms of repeated erasure?”\r\nShe leaned forward, her eyes wide.\r\n“Sweetie, are you suffering from auditory and visual hallucinations?”\r\nI shook my head, and behind me, Charlie scoffed.\r\nAfter extracting the implant from my palm, she inserted it, fingers slick with my blood, into her laptop.\r\nThe footage was grainy. I was standing in a dark room in front of a flickering fire, a human body skewered over the flames.\r\nIt was a girl, long dark hair catching alight.\r\nOpposite me, a younger Frenna wore a wide smile, her mouth smeared scarlet.\r\nWylan and Charlie, fourteen at most, began to claw at skin and flesh, stuffing themselves, giggling.\r\nAnd from my point of view, I plucked out the girl’s eyes, popping them into my mouth, crunching on her eyeballs.\r\n“Honor our Goddess.”\r\nThe others joined in. “Honor her!”\r\nI slammed the laptop, the others mirroring my horror.\r\nCharlie spoke, his voice a croak, his eyes hollow. I wasn't surprised.\r\nHe was lead varsity, a rich kid expected to take over his father’s dynasty.\r\n“We will… never fucking speak of this again.”\r\nBut then the nurse grabbed her phone to call the police, and he panicked, snatched her laptop, and slammed it over her head.\r\n“Oh, fuck!”\r\nBrenna and Wylan broke the silence, erupting into hysterical laughter.\r\nI laughed too, the laptop in my hands, my vision blurring.\r\nI was alone in the nurse's office, standing over her dead body.\r\nNo Frenna.\r\nNo Charlie.\r\nNo Wylan.\r\nJust me.\r\nJust blood.\r\nSo… that's why I chose to forget them." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Tobacco and flowers" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Yesterday I went to the old house to retrieve some books. I haven't been there in two weeks.\r\nWhen I entered the living room, my father was sitting on his favorite armchair, reading a newspaper while smoking a menthol cigarette. I like that smell: it reminds me of my childhood. He was happy to see me, but it's always tough to read him and lately it's even worse.\r\n—Hi, dad. How're you?\r\n—I'm fine, son —said my father—. Happy to see you again: it's been some time and I was worried.\r\n—It's my job: I'm starting a new project and I need to focus.\r\n—Well, the important thing is that you're fine.\r\n—Dad...\r\n—Yes?\r\n—You know that you aren't supposed to do that, don't you?\r\n—You mean smoking? I don't smoke that much and it doesn't hurt me now —he said with a half smile.\r\n—I know, but I didn't mean that.\r\n—Then?\r\n—I was talking about the other thing. You cannot do this anymore.\r\n—I don't know what you are talking about, son. Everything is fine.\r\n—No, it's not. And you know perfectly well what I mean.\r\n—Don't make a fuss. It's nothing!\r\n—I cannot bear this situation, that's all. I should go.\r\n—You're always in a hurry —he answered with a sad gesture—. It's good to see you anyway.\r\n—It's good to see you too, dad, but I cannot get used to this.\r\n—You know that it's temporary. Don't overthink it!\r\n—By the way, did you like the flowers? —I asked.\r\n—They were beautiful. Thank you.\r\n—Don't mention it, dad.\r\n—May I ask you a favor?\r\n—I guess so. What do you need?\r\n—Next time do not bring flowers from the florist. Could you get me some lilies from the beach? The white ones that grow on the dunes. Their perfume brings back memories of afternoons by the sea.\r\n—No problem: I'll get them tomorrow.\r\n—Thank you, son. And bring me also some cigarettes, please. You know that I cannot get out to buy them.\r\n—Bye, dad.\r\n—See you soon, son.\r\n—And let the lights on, please.\r\n—Sure.\r\n* * *\r\nThis morning I went to the beach to get the white lilies. Dad was right: their perfume reminds me of those afternoons by the sea.\r\nOn the way back, I stopped by the tobacconist to buy cigarettes. No one else buys that brand and the clerk always stares at me: she knows that I don't smoke.\r\nThen I've walked to the cemetery, to leave the flowers and the tobacco by my father's tombstone, while avoiding the inquisitive look of the gardener, not understanding anything at all, accepting that this is impossible but it's happening anyway. Without knowing —both sad and relieved at the same time— if it'd be the last time that I run an errand for my father." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Old Man and the Stars" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Know what, kid? I piloted one of those. Second Battle of Saturn. Flew sortees out of Titan,” said the old man.\r\n“Really?” said the kid.\r\nThey were in the Museum of Space History, standing before an actual MM-75 double-user assault ship.\r\n“Really. Primitive compared to what they’ve got now, but state-of-art then. And still a beaut.”\r\n“Too bad they don't let you get in. Would love to sit at the controls.”\r\n“Gotta preserve the past.”\r\n“Yeah.” The kid hesitated. “So you're a veteran of the Marshall War?”\r\n“Indeed.”\r\n“That must have been something. A time of real heroes. Not like now, when everything's automated. The ships all fight themselves. Get any kills?”\r\n“My fair share.”\r\n“What's it like—you know, in the heat of battle?”\r\n“Terrifying. Disorienting,” the old man said. Then he grinned, patted the MM-75. “Exhilarating. Like, for once, you're fucking alive.”\r\nThe kid laughed.\r\n“Pardon the language, of course.”\r\n“Do you ever miss it?”\r\n“Why do you think I come here? Before, when there were more of us, we'd get together every once in a while. Reminisce. Nowadays I'm about the only one left.”\r\nSuddenly:\r\nSI—\r\nWe got you the universarium because you wanted it, telep'd mommalien.\r\nI know, telep'd lilalien.\r\nI thought you enjoyed the worlds we evolved inside together, telep'd papalien.\r\nI did. I just got bored, that's all. I'm sorry, telep'd lilalien—and through the transparency of the universarium wall lilalien watched as the spiders he'd introduced into it ate its contents out of existence.\r\n—RENS!\r\n…is not a drill. This is not a drill.\r\nAll the screens in the museum switched to a news broadcast:\r\n“We can now report that Space Force fighters are being scrambled throughout the galaxy, but the nature of these invaders remains unknown,” a reporter was saying. He touched his ear: “What's that, Vera? OK. Understood.” He recomposed himself. “What we're about to show you now is actual footage of the enemy.”\r\nThe kid found himself instinctively huddling against the old man, as on the screen they saw the infinitely deep darkness of space—into which dropped a spider-like creature. At first, it was difficult to tell its scale, but then it neared—and devoured—Pluto, and the boy gasped and the old man held him tight.\r\nThe creature seemingly generated no gravitational field. It interacted with matter without being bound by the rules of physics.\r\nAround them: panic.\r\nPeople rushing this way and that and outside, and they got outside too, where, dark against the blue sky, were spider-parts. Legs, an eye. A mouth. “Well, God damn,” the old man said. “Come with me!”—and pulled the kid back into the museum, pulled him toward the MM-75.\r\n“Get in,” said the old man.\r\n“What?” said the kid.\r\n“Get into the fucking ship.”\r\n“But—”\r\n“It's a double-user. I need a gunner. You're my gunner, kid.”\r\n“No way it still works,” said the kid, getting in. He touched the controls. “It's—wow, just wow.”\r\nIgnition.\r\nKid: What now?\r\nOld Man: Now we become heroes!\r\n[They didn't.]" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A Cruel and Final Heaven" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I remember being born. The doctors say that's impossible, but I remember: my mother's face, tired, swollen and with tears running down her cheeks.\r\nAs an infant I would lie on her naked chest and see the mathematics which described—created—the world around us, the one in which we lived.\r\nI graduated high school at seven years old and earned a Doctorate in theoretical physics at twelve.\r\nBut despite being incredibly intelligent (and constantly told so by brilliant people) the nature of my childhood stunted my development in certain areas. I didn't have friends, and my relationship with my mom barely developed after toddlerhood. I never knew my father.\r\nIt was perhaps for this reason—coupled with an increasing realization that knowledge was limited; that some things could at best be known probabilistically—that I became interested in religion.\r\nSuddenly, it was not the mechanism of existence but the reason for it which occupied my mind. I wanted to understand Why.\r\nAt first, the idea of taking certain things on faith was a welcome relief, and working out the consequences of faith-based principles a fun game. To build an intricate system from an irrational starting point felt thrilling.\r\nBut childhood always ends, and as my amusement faded, I found myself no closer to the total understanding I desired above all else.\r\nI began voicing opinions which alienated me from the spiritual leaders who'd so enthusiastically embraced me as the most famous ex-materialist convert to spirituality.\r\nIt was then I encountered the heretic, Suleiman Barboza.\r\n“God is not everywhere,” Barboza told me during one of our first meetings. “An infinitesimal probability that God is in a given place-time exists almost everywhere. But that is hardly the same thing. One does not drown in a rainshower.”\r\n“I want to meet God,” I said.\r\n“Then you must avoid Hell, where God never is, and seek out Heaven: where He is certainly.”\r\nThis quest took up the next thirty-eight years of my life, a period in which I dropped out of both academia and the public eye, and during which—more than once—I was mistakenly declared dead.\r\n“If you know all this, why have you not found Heaven yourself?” I asked Barboza once.\r\n“Because Heaven is not a place. It is a convergence of ideas, which must not only be identified and comprehended individually but also held simultaneously in contradiction, each eclipsing the others. I lack the intellect to do this. I would misunderstand and succumb to madness. But you…”\r\nI possessed—for perhaps the first time in human history—the mental (and psychological) capacity not only to discover Heaven, but to inscribe myself upon it: man-become-Word through the inkwell-umbra of a cosmic intertext of forbidden knowledge.\r\nThus ready to understand, I entered finally the presence of God.\r\n\"My sweet Lord, the scriptures and the prophecies are true. How long I have waited to see you—to feel your presence—to hear you explain the whole of existence to me,\" He said, bowing deeply." } ]